ROGER BACON. 147 



Brazenose College, and perhaps he studied at neither, but 

 spent his time at the public schools. 



He went early over to Paris, where he made still greater 

 progi'ess in all parts of learning, and was looked upon as the 

 glory of that university and an honour to his country. At Paris 

 he did not confine his studies to any particular branch of 

 literature, but endeavoured to comprehend the sciences in 

 general fully and perfectly by a right method and constant 

 application. 



When he had attained the degree of Doctor, he returned 

 again to his o^vn country, and, as some say, took the habit of 

 the Franciscans in 1240, when he was about twenty-six years of 

 age ; but others assert that he became a monk before he left 

 France. After his return to Oxford, he was considered by the 

 greatest men of that university as one of the ablest and most 

 indefatigable inquirers after knowledge that the world had ever 

 produced; and therefore they not only showed him all due 

 respect, but likewise, conceiving the greatest hopes from his 

 improvements in the method of study, they generously contri- 

 buted to his expenses, so that he was enabled to lay out, within 

 the compass of twenty years, no less than;^2ooo in collecting 

 curious authors, making trials of various kinds, and in the con- 

 struction of different instruments for the improvement of useful 

 knowledge. 



But if this assiduous application to his studies, and the 

 stupendous progress he made in them, raised his credit with 

 the better part of mankind, it excited the envy of some, and 

 afforded plausible pretences for the malicious designs of others. 

 It is very easy to conceive that the experiments he made in all 

 parts of natural philosophy and the mathematics must have 

 made a great loise in an ignorant age, when scarcely two or 



