LIBER TERTIUS. 567 



Usus autem hujus partis Metaphysics^ quarn Desideratis 

 annumero, duas ob causas vel maxime excellit. Prima est, 

 quod scientiarum omnium officium sit et propria virtus, ut 

 experientiae ambages et itinera longa (quantum veritatis ratio 

 permittit) abbrevient ; ac proinde remedium veteri querimoniae 

 afferant, de Vita brevi et Arte longa. 1 Illud vero optime 

 prsestatur, Axiomata scientiarum in magis generalia, et quae 

 omni materiaa rerum individuarum competant, colligendo et 

 uniendo. Sunt enim Scientiae instar pyramidum, quibus Hi- 

 storia et Experientia tanquam basis unica substernuntur ; ac 

 proinde basis Naturalis Philosophies est Historia Naturalis. 

 Tabulatum primum a basi est Physical vertici proximum 

 Metaphysica ; ad conum quod attinet et punctum verticale 

 (opus quod operatur Deus a principio usque ad Jinem 2 ; sum- 

 mariam nempe naturae legem), haesitamus merito, an humana 

 possit ad illud inquisitio pertingere. Caeterum haec tria verae 

 sunt Scientiarum contabulationes, suntque apud homines 

 propria scientia inflates et theomachos tanquam tres moles 

 giganteae : 



Ter sunt conati imponere Pelio Ossam, 



Scilicet atque Ossae frondosum involvere Olympum : 3 



apud eos vero qui seipsos exinanientes omnia ad Dei gloriam 

 referunt, tanquam trina ilia acclamatio, Sancte, Sancte, Sancte. 

 Sanctus enim Deus in multitudine operum suorum, sanctus in 

 ordine eorum, sanctus in unione. Quare speculatio ilia Par- 

 menidis et Platonis, (quamvis in illis nuda fuerit speculatio,) 

 excelluit tamen; Omnia per scalam quandam ad unitatem 

 ascendere. 4 Atque ilia demum scientia caeteris est praestantior, 



1 " Vita brevis, ars vero longa, occasio autem praeceps, experimentum periculosum, 

 judicium difficile." Hippocrates, Aph. i. 1. I quote from Leonicenus's version. 



2 Eccles. iii. 11. 3 Virg. Georg. i. 281. 



4 No such doctrine as this is to be found in the remains which have come down to 

 us of the writings of Parmenides, and it is in effect inconsistent with what we know of 

 his opinions. His fundamental dictum appears to have been that that which is, is 

 one ; incapable of change or motion. That visible things are in any sense parts or 

 elements or attributes of the one immutable substance is, as far as we can judge, a 

 later doctrine. To the question, what then are the phenomena of the visible universe, 

 Tarmenides gives no answer ; unless we account as an answer what he says of their 

 delusive and non-existent character. Even Plato was far from teaching the doctrine of 

 an ascent to unity in the sense in which Bacon probably employed the terms. He 

 no doubt adopted in his own sense the dictum of the Eleatje, ev T& irdfra; but with 

 him as with them mere phenomena have no true existence. In later writers however 

 Bacon may easily have found expressions derived from the authority of Plato and Par- 

 menides, and more consonant with his own views of the nature of the universe. But 

 so far as they themselves were concerned, it may I think be safely stated that 

 though the latter affirmed the ev6rris of that which exists, no doctrice of eveaffis entered 

 into his teaching ; and that that which presents itself in the system of the former was 



004 



