Francis Bacon 23 



contribute to the restriction of the true usefuhiess of the force 

 of nature. Man's moral and physical imperfections and limita- 

 tions, nevertheless, do not affect the character of knowledge it- 

 self. However oblique the sense or alien the mind of man, the 

 truth of being and the truth of knowing are one and the same. 

 Epistemology and ontology meet on the same ground, and we 

 have in Bacon a foreshadowing of the Cartesian dictum of the 

 necessary interrelation of thought and existence. Descartes says 

 " Cogito ergo sum " ; Bacon had said "A man is but what he 

 knoweth. The mind itself is but an accident of knowledge, for 

 knowledge is a double of that which is." (Works, Lond. 

 MDCCLX. V. 5. p. 69.) True knowledge therefore cannot be 

 gained from the works of the ancients or from any purely sub- 

 jective method of reasoning with the symbols of thought, but 

 is to be obtained from an examination of nature ; and even then 

 the chief attention of the scientist should be directed not to what 

 has already been done but rather forward to what may yet be 

 accomplished with the materials and forces which nature pro- 

 vides. Bacon manifests the prospective practical character of 

 the man of science rather than the retrospective conservatism of 

 the typical scholar of his day. His purpose in writing 'the 

 " Novum Organum " was to cover the whole field of science 

 known at that time and to discover its limitations, and then on 

 the basis of that investigation to proceed to fill up the lacunae 

 and to remedy the deficiencies. Such was the Great Renewal 

 which he planned for man's empire over the universe ; and the 

 progressive identification of science and nature, of experience 

 and reality, formed for him the end and purpose of knowledge. 



n. Tlie Means or Materials of Knozvledge 



Since man is endowed with capacities to receive impressions 

 from the world of nature and with the powers for the organisa- 

 tion of these impressions and for the modification of the mate- 

 rials of nature, and for the transformation of natural forces, one 

 of his chief occupations is to become familiar with the materials 

 and opportunities which are offered to him by his environment. 

 Knowledge of divine things is beyond the sphere of scientific 

 investigation, according to Bacon; but familiarity with his own 

 nature and with social phenomena should be among the first 



