THE NOVUM ORGANUM. 77 



writings; and our knowledge of his method is therefore incom- 

 plete. Even the penultimate division of the Novum Organum 

 which was published along with the first two books, and which 

 treats " de parascevis ad inquisitionem," has all the appearance 

 of being a fragment, or at least of being less developed than 

 Bacon had intended it to be. 



The first part of the Instauratio is represented, not inade- 

 quately, by the De Augmentis, published about three years 

 after the Distributio Operis and the Novum Organum. It is a 

 translation with large additions of the Advancement of Learning, 

 published in 1605 ; and if we regard the latter as a development 

 of the ninth chapter of Valerius Terminus, which is an early 

 fragment containing the germ of the whole of the Instauratio ! , 

 the De Augmentis will appear to belong naturally to the great 

 work of which it now forms the first and only complete portion. 

 In the preface prefixed to it by Rawley it is said that Bacon, 

 finding "the part relating to the Partitions of the Sciences already 

 executed, though less solidly than the dignity of the argument de- 

 manded, . . . thought the best thing he could do would be to go 

 over again what he had written, and to bring it to the state of a 

 satisfactory and completed work. And in this way he considers 

 that he fulfils the promise which he has given respecting the 

 first part of the Instauration." 2 



From this general view of the different parts of the Instau- 

 ratio, as described in the Distributio Operis, we proceed to con- 

 sider more particularly the Novum Organum. Although it was 

 left incomplete, it is nevertheless of all Bacon's works that 

 upon which he bestowed the most pains. In the first book 

 especially every word seems to have been carefully weighed ; 

 and it would be hard to omit or to change anything without 

 injuring the meaning which Bacon intended to convey. His 

 meaning is not always obvious, but it is always expressed with 

 singular precision and felicity. His chaplain, Rawley, says 

 that he had seen among his papers at least twelve yearly re- 



1 I should rather say, the germ of all that part of the Instauratio which treated of 

 the Interpretation of Nature. For I cannot find in the Valerius Terminus any traces 

 of the first part, of which the Advancement of Learning was the germ. See Note A. 

 at the end. /. S, 



2 My own reasons for thinking that the De Augmentis did not form part of the 

 original design, together with the circumstances which, as I suppose, determined 

 Bacon to enlarge that design so as to take it in, will be explained in the preface to the 

 De Aitymentis. J. S. . 



