158 BACON 



and, though men live indeed in the view of the heavens, yet 

 our minds are confined in the caverns of our bodies ; whence 

 of necessity we receive infinite images of errors and falsehoods, 

 if the mind does but seldom, and only for a short continuance, 

 leave its den, and not constantly dwell in the contemplation of 

 nature, as it were, in the open daylight. And with this emblem 

 of Plato's den agrees the saying of Heraclitus ; viz., that men 

 seek the sciences in their own narrow worlds, and not in the 

 wide one. 



But the idols of the market give the greatest disturbance, 

 and, from a tacit agreement among mankind, with regard to the 

 imposition of words and names, insinuate themselves into the 

 understanding: for words are generally given according to 

 vulgar conception, and divide things by such differences as the 

 common people are capable of : but when a more acute under- 

 standing, or a more careful observation, would distinguish 

 things better, words murmur against it. The remedy of this 

 lies in definitions ; but these themselves are in many respects 

 irremediable, as consisting of words : for words generate words, 

 however men may imagine they have a command over words, 

 and can easily say they will speak with the vulgar, and think 

 with the wise. Terms of art also, which prevail only among the 

 skilful, may seem to remedy the mischief, and definitions pre- 

 mised to arts in the prudent mathematical manner, to correct 

 the wrong acceptation of words ; yet all this is insufficient to 

 prevent the seducing incantation of names in numerous re- 

 spects, their doing violence to the understanding, and recoiling 

 upon it, from whence they proceeded. This evil, therefore, 

 requires a new and a deeper remedy ; but these things we touch 

 lightly at present, in the mean time noting this doctrine of 

 grand confutations, or the doctrine of the native and adven- 

 titious idols of the mind, for deficient. 



There is also wanting a considerable appendix to the art of 

 judgment. Aristotle, indeed, marks out the thing, but has 

 nowhere delivered the manner of effecting it. The design is to 

 show what demonstrations should be applied to what subjects, 

 so that this doctrine should contain the judging of judgments. 

 For Aristotle well observes, that we should not require demon- 

 strations from orators, nor persuasion from mathematicians ; * 

 so that, if we err in the kind of proof, judgment itself cannot be 

 perfect. And, as there are four kinds of demonstration, viz., 



