788 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



BACON'S IDOLS: A COMMENTARY. 



BY WILLIAM HENEY HUDSON, 



PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE IN THE LELAND STANFORD JUNIOR UNIVERSITY. 



IN the first book of the Novum Organon the great leader of the 

 new philosophy undertook to set forth the dangers and difficul- 

 ties which stand always in the way of clear and fruitful thought. 

 Conscious that he was breaking entirely with the schools of the past, 

 and ambitious of laying the firm foundations on which all future 

 inquirers would have to build, it was natural that Bacon should 

 pause on the threshold of his vast enterprise to take stock of the 

 mental weaknesses which had rendered futile the labors of earlier 

 thinkers, and which, if not carefully guarded against, would jeop- 

 ardize the efforts of times to come. That the understanding may 

 direct itself effectively to the search for truth it is necessary, he 

 insisted, that it should have a full apprehension of the lapses to 

 which it is ever liable, the obstacles with which it will constantly 

 have to contend. A vague sense of peril is not enough. As a first 

 condition of healthy intellectual activity we must learn to know 

 our frailties for what they really are, estimate their consequences, 

 and probe the secrets of their power. 



Bacon's statement of the sources of error and vain philosophiz- 

 ing is regarded by him as merely the pars destruens or negative por- 

 tion of his work as it were, " the clearing of the threshing floor." 

 But his aphorisms are packed close with solid and substantial 

 thought, and well deserve the attention of all who would seriously 

 devote themselves to the intellectual life. " True philosophy," as 

 lie conceived it, " is that which is the faithful echo of the voice of 

 the world, which is written in some sort under the direction of 

 things, which adds nothing of itself, which is only the rebound, the 

 reflection of reality." To reach for ourselves, as nearly as we may, 

 a philosophy which shall meet the terms of this exigent definition 

 is, or should be, one chief purpose of our study and our thought. 

 We may very well ask, then, what help so great and suggestive a 

 thinker may give us on our way. 



With his characteristic fondness for fanciful phraseology, Bacon 

 describes the causes which distort our mental vision as Idola idols 

 or phantoms of the mind.* Of such he distinguishes four classes, 

 which he calls, respectively: Idols of the Tribe (Idola Tribus); 

 Idols of the Cave (Idola Specus) ; Idols of the Market Place (Idola 



* Idola (Greek cfScSXa), though commonly rendered idols, would here undoubtedly be 

 more correctly translated phantoms or specters. With this explanation, however, I shall 

 usually employ the more familiar word. 



