2i8 BACON 



the Divine or angelic nature. The corrupt and preposterous 

 imitation of this perfective good is the pest of human life, and 

 the storm that overturns and sweeps away all things, whilst 

 men, instead of a true and essential exaltation, fly with blind 

 ambition only to a local one ; for as men in sickness toss and 

 roll from place to place, as if by change of situation they could 

 get away from themselves, or fly from the disease, so in ambi- 

 tion, men hurried away with a false imagination of exalting 

 their own nature, obtain no more than change of place or emi- 

 nence of post. 



Conservative good is the receiving and enjoying things 

 agreeable to our nature ; and this good, though it be the most 

 simple and natural, yet of all others it seems the lowest and 

 most effeminate. It is also attended with a difference, about 

 which the judgment of mankind has been partly unsettled and 

 the inquiry partly neglected ; for the dignity and recommen- 

 dation of the good of fruition or pleasure, as it is commonly 

 called, consists either in the reality or strength thereof the one 

 being procured by uniformity, and the other by variety. The 

 one has a less mixture of evil, the other a stronger and more 

 lively impression of good: which of these is the best, is the 

 question ; but whetlfer human nature be not capable of both at 

 once, has not been examined. 



As for the question, it began to be debated between Socrates 

 and a Sophist. Socrates asserted that felicity lay in a constant 

 peace and tranquillity of mind, but the Sophist placed it in great 

 appetite and great fruition. From reasoning they fell to rail- 

 ing, when the Sophist said, the felicity of Socrates was the felic- 

 ity of a stock or a stone ; Socrates, on the other hand, said, the 

 felicity of the Sophist was the felicity of one who is always itch- 

 ing and always scratching. And both opinions have their sup- 

 porters ; g for the school even of Epicurus, which allowed that 

 virtue greatly conduced to felicity, is on the side of Socrates ; 

 and if this be the case, certainly virtue is more useful in appeas- 

 ing disorders than in obtaining desires. The Sophist's opinion 

 is somewhat favored by the assertion above mentioned, viz., 

 that perfective good is superior to conservative good, because 

 every obtaining of a desire seems gradually to perfect nature, 

 which, though not strictly true, yet a circular motion has some 

 appearance of a progressive one. 



As for the other point, whether human nature is not at the 



