NOVUM ORGANUM. 28 r 



in other cases a manifest and a common nature ; but it will never be 

 come visible, if the experiments or contemplations of men are engaged 

 on those same things exclusively. Hut generally ami commonly in 

 Mechanics, old discoveries are esteemed new, when any one refines 

 upon or embellishes things which have been long ago discovered, or 

 unites and compounds them, or connects them more conveniently 

 with their application, or produces the result in greater or even less 

 mass and volume than usual, and the like. 



And so it is very little wonder if discoveries, noble and worthy of 

 mankind, have not been brought to light, how men have been con 

 tented and delighted with slight and peurile tasks of this kind, and 

 have thought, moreover, that in them they have aimed at or obtained 

 something great. 



Ixxxix. Nor is the fact to be passed by, that Natural Philosophy has 

 in all ages found a troublesome and difficult enemy : I mean supersti 

 tion, and a blind and immoderate zeal about Religion. For we m;iy 

 see among the (ireeks how they who first proposed the natural causes 

 of lightning and tempests to the then unprepared ears of men, were on 

 that account found guilty of impiety towards the Cods ; nor were 

 those much better treated by some of the ancient Fathers of the 

 Christian Religion, who, from the most certain demonstrations (which 

 at the present day no one in his senses contradicts) laid down that 

 the world is round, and, as a consequence, asserted the existence of 

 Antipodes. 



Moreover, as things are now, the discoursing on Nature is made 

 harder and more dangerous by the summaries and methods of the 

 scholastic Theologians, who, not contented with having reduced 

 Theology (as far as they were able) to order, and fashioning it into an 

 Art, have further contrived to mix up the disputatious and thorny 

 Philosophy of Aristotle with the body of Religion in an inordinate 

 degree. 



In the same direction (though in a different way) tend the specula 

 tions of those who have not feared to deduce the truth of the Christian 

 Religion from the principles of Philosophers, and to confirm it by their 

 authority, celebrating the union of Faith and sense, as if it were a 

 legitimate marriage, with much pomp and solemnity ; and soothing 

 the minds of men with a pleasing variety of things, but in the mean 

 time mixing up the divine with the human element in a most unfitting 

 manner. Now, in such mixtures of Theology with Philosophy, those 

 things only are comprehended which are now received in Philosophy, 

 while novelties, although they are changes for the better, are all but 

 removed and exterminated. 



Lastly, you may find that, owing to the want of skill of certain 

 Theologians, the approach to any Philosophy, however corrected, is 

 almost closed. Some, indeed, in their simplicity, are half afraid, lest 

 perchance too deep an inquiry into Nature should penetrate beyond 

 the permitted limits of sobriety; falsely transferring and wresting 

 what is spoken in Holy Scripture of Divine mysteries against those 

 who pry into the Divine secrets, to the hidden things of Nature, 



