3 g BACON 



possible to have the true pictures or statues of Cyrus, Alexander, 

 Caesar or the great personages of much later date, for the orig- 

 inals cannot last, and the copies must lose life and truth ; but 

 the images of men's knowledge remain in books, exempt from 

 the injuries of time, and capable of perpetual renovation. Nor 

 are these properly called images ; because they generate still, 

 and sow their seed in the minds of others, so as to cause infinite 

 actions and opinions in succeeding ages. If, therefore, the in- 

 vention of a ship was thought so noble, which carries commodi- 

 ties from place to place and consociateth the remotest regions 

 in participation of their fruits, how much more are letters to be 

 valued, which, like ships, pass through the vast ocean of time, 

 and convey knowledge and inventions to the remotest ages? 

 Nay, some of the philosophers who were most immersed in the 

 senses, and denied the immortality of the soul, yet allowed that 

 whatever motions the spirit of man could perform without the 

 organs of the body might remain after death, which are only 

 those of the understanding, and not of the affections, so im- 

 mortal and incorruptible a thing did knowledge appear to them. 

 And thus having endeavored to do justice to the cause of 

 knowledge, divine and human, we shall leave Wisdom to be 

 justified of her children.* 



