BOOK I.] APHORISMS. 387 



same way as that which it would have adopted under the 

 guidance of logic, namely, the first; for the mind is fond of 

 starting off to generalities, that it may avoid labour, and after 

 dwelling a little on a subject is fatigued by experiment. But 

 those evils are augmented by logic, for the sake of the ostenta- 

 tion of dispute. 



XXI. The understanding, when left to itself in n man of a 

 steady, patient, and reflecting disposition (especially when unim- , 

 pcdcd by received doctrines), makes some attempt in the right . 

 way, but with little effect, since the understanding, undirected 

 and unassisted, is unequal to and unfit for the task of vanquish- 

 in^the obscurity of things. 



XXII. Each of these two ways begins from the senses and 

 particulars, and ends in the greatest generalities. But they are 

 immeasurably different ; for the one merely touches cursorily 

 the limits of experiment and particulars, whilst the other runs 

 duly and regularly through them, — the one from the very outset 

 lays down some abstract and useless generalities, the other gra- 

 dually rises to those principles which are really the most common 

 in nature* 



XXIII. There is no small difference between the idols of the 

 human mind and the ideas of the Divine mind, — that is to say, 

 between certain idle dogmas and the real stamp and impression 

 of cTeated objects, as they are found in nature. 



XXIV. Axioms determined upon in argument can never 

 assist in the discovery of new effects; for the subtilty of nature 



is vastly superior to that of argument. Biit axioms properly and j 

 regularly abstracted from particulars easily point out and define v 

 new particulars, and therefore impart activity to the sciences. 



XXV. The axioms now in use are derived from a scanty hand- 

 ful, as it were, of experience, and a few particulars of frequent 

 occurrence, whence they are of much the same dimensions or 

 extent as their origin. And if any neglected or unknown in» 

 stance occurs, the axiom is saved by some frivolous distinction, 

 wluin it would be more consistent with truth to amend it. 



XXVI. We are wont, for the sake of distinction, to call that 

 human reasoning which we apply to nature the anticipation of 

 nature (as being rash and premature), and that which is properly 

 deduced from things the interpretation of nature. 



XXVII. Anticipations are sufficiently powerful in producing 

 ^ The Latin is, ad ea quae revera surU naturce notiora. This expression, 



v^turcB notiora, naturce notior, is so frequently employed by Bacon, that 

 we may conclude it to point to some distinguishing leature in the Baco 

 riian physics. It properly refers to the most evident principles and 

 "laws of nature, and springs from that system which regards the material 

 universe as endowed with intellL'-ence, and acting according to rules 

 cither fashioned or clearly under.stot-d by itsell £d. 



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