NOVUM ORGANUM. 273 



the worst of all auguries is that which is drawn from agreement in 

 intellectual matters, with the exception of Divinity and Politics, in 

 which suffrages have lawful weight. For nothing pleases the many 

 which does not strike the imagination or bind up the intellect in the 

 tangles of common conceptions, as we have said above. And so 

 that saying of Phocion may very well be transferred from moral to 

 intellectual matter, &quot; That men ought straightway to examine them 

 selves as to what mistake or fault they have committed, if the multi 

 tude agree with and applaud them.&quot; This Sign, therefore, is one of the 

 most hostile. So we have here pointed out how weak are the Signs 

 of the truth and soundness of the systems of Philosophy and the 

 Sciences now in vogue, whether they be drawn from their origin, from 

 their fruits, from their progress, from the confessions of their authors, 

 or from consent. 



Ixxviii. But now we must come to the Causes of errors, and of so 

 long a persistence in them through so many ages. And these are so 

 very numerous and powerful, as to remove all grounds for surprise 

 that those observations which we bring forward should have hitherto 

 lain hid and escaped men s notice ; and it only remains for us to 

 wonder that these things could, even thus late in the day, have entered 

 into the mind of any mortal, or have afforded him matter for thought : 

 and this, as we think, is rather the result of some happy chance than 

 of any excellence of faculty in ourselves, so that it should be regarded 

 as the offspring rather of time than of ability. 



And first, the number of ages, if we consider the matter justly, 

 shrinks within very narrow bounds. For out of the twenty-five 

 centuries over which the memory and learning of mankind principally 

 range, scarcely six can be picked out and set apart as having been 

 fruitful in Sciences, or favourable to their progress. There are deserts 

 and waste grounds in time, no less than in space ; for not more than 

 three revolutions and periods of learning can properly be counted : 

 one among the Greeks ; the second among the Romans ; the last 

 among ourselves that is to say, the nations of Western Europe : and 

 to each of these we can scarcely with fairness assign more than two 

 centuries. The intervening ages of the world, as regards a rich or 

 flourishing growth of the Sciences, were unfortunate. For there is no 

 need to mention either the Arabs or the Schoolmen, who, in the 

 intervals, rather wore down the Sciences with their numerous treatises, 

 than increased their weight. So, the first cause of so trilling an 

 advance in the Sciences is rightly and duly referred to the narrow 

 limits of the time lhat has been favourable to them. 



Ixxix. In the second place, a Cause offers itself which is in every 

 way of great moment ; viz., that in those very ages in which human 

 wit and literature have flourished most, or even in a moderate degree, 

 Natural Philosophy has obtained a very small share of attention. And 

 yet this same Natural Philosophy ought to be n-garded as the great 

 mother of Sciences. For all the Art* and Sciences, if torn from this 

 root, are polished, it may be, and fashioned into use, but do not grow 

 at all. Now, it is manifest that after the Christian Religion had been 



18 



