PHILOSOPHICAL WRITINGS OF LORD BACON. 407 



rous,and all of them replete with misapplied learning, and ve- 

 hement abuse. The course of his reasoning is not a little cu- 

 rious. " I have so small a regard," says he, " for deep and 

 " subtle inquiries into natural philosophy, that could physic 

 '* be unconcerned, could religion remain unshaken, could edu- 

 " cation be carried on happily, I should not intermeddle ; but if 

 " we look de facto upon those experimental philosophers, and 

 " judge how little they are fitted for trusts and managements 

 " of business, by their so famed mechanical education, we must 

 " rise as high in our resentments as the concerns of the pre- 

 " sent age and of posterity can animate us." The grounds 

 which he more particularly assigns for entertaining these " high 

 " resentments" against the experimentalists, are, first, their 

 neglect and contempt of the Aristotelian logic ; " that art," 

 says he, " by which the prudent are discriminated from fools ; 

 " which informs us of the validity of consequences, and the 

 " probability of arguments, and which forms statesmen, di- 

 " vines, physicians, and lawyers." In the next place, he con- 

 tends, that the innovating spirit of their philosophy would lead 

 to dangerous revolutions. " In such times," says he, " as I 

 " thought it our interest to subvert the monarchy of England, 

 " and the repute of the clergy, I was passionately addicted to 

 " this new philosophy; for I did not question but the authio- 

 " rity of all antiquity in spiritual affairs would vanish, when it 

 " appeared how much churchmen were mistaken in the com- 

 " mon occurrences and histories of nature. How rational this 

 " opinion of mine was, and how it is verified in these days, let 

 * the Hierarchy and Universities judge *." 



With 



* Stubbe's Legends no Histories ; or, a specimen of some animadversions upon the 

 History of the Royal Society. Pref. 4to. Lond. 1670. 



