360 BACON 



brought to light, without a previous regular examination and 

 discovery of the causes of that which is common, and the causes 

 again of those causes) are necessarily compelled to admit the 

 most common objects into our history. Besides, we have ob- 

 served that nothing has been so injurious to philosophy as this 

 circumstance, namely, that familiar and frequent objects do not 

 arrest and detain men's contemplation, but are carelessly ad- 

 mitted, and their causes never inquired after ; so that informa- 

 tion on unknown subjects is not more often wanted than at- 

 tention to those which are known. 



120. With regard to the meanness, or even the filthiness of 

 particulars, for which (as Pliny observes), an apology is requi- 

 site, such subjects are no less worthy of admission into natural 

 history than the most magnificent and costly ; nor do they at 

 all pollute natural history, for the sun enters alike the palace 

 and the privy, and is not thereby polluted. We neither dedi- 

 cate nor raise a capitol or pyramid to the pride of man, but rear 

 a holy temple in his mind, on the model of the universe, which 

 model therefore we imitate. For that which is deserving of 

 existence is deserving of knowledge, the image of existence. 

 Now the mean and splendid alike exist. Nay, as the finest 

 odors are sometimes produced from putrid matter (such as 

 musk and civet), so does valuable light and information ema- 

 nate from mean and sordid instances. But we have already 

 said too much, for such fastidious feelings are childish and ef- 

 feminate. 



121. The next point requires a more accurate consideration, 

 namely, that many parts of our history will appear to the vulgar, 

 or even any rnind accustomed to the present state of things, 

 fantastically and uselessly refined.- Hence, we have in regard 

 to this matter said from the first, and must again repeat, that we 

 look for experiments that shall afford light rather than profit, 

 imitating the divine creation, which, as we have often ob- 

 served, only produced light on the first day, and assigned that 

 whole day to its creation, without adding any material work. 



If anyone, then, imagine such matters to be of no use, he 

 might equally suppose light to be of no use, because it is neither 

 solid nor material. For, in fact, the knowledge of simple nat- 

 ures, when sufficiently investigated and defined, resembles light, 

 which, though of no great use in itself, affords access to the 

 general mysteries of effects, and with a peculiar power com- 

 prehends and draws with it whole bands and troops of effects, 

 and the sources of the most valuable axioms. So also the 

 elements of letters have of themselves separately no meaning, 

 and are of no use, yet are they, as it were, the original matter in 

 the composition and preparation of speech. The seeds of sub- 

 stances, whose effect is powerful, are of no use except in their 



