300 NOVUM ORGANUM. 



settlements of men ; the latter, too, do not last beyond a few ages, 

 the former, as it were, for ever. Besides, a civil reformation is seldom 

 unaccompanied by violence and disturbance, but discoveries diffuse 

 blessings and confer benefits without injury or sorrow to any one. 



Again, discoveries are, as it were, new creations and imitations of 

 God s works : and the poet has well sung, 



&quot; Piimum frugiferos fetus mortnlibus aegris 

 Dicliderant quondam prcestanti nomine Athenre : 

 Et recreaveiunt vitam, Irgesque rogarunt. 



And it seems worthy of notice in Solomon, that whilst he was 

 flourishing in power, wealth, the magnificence of his works, his 

 attendants, his household, and his fleet in the lustre of his name 

 and the highest admiration of men he chose none of those things as 

 his glory, but declared that &quot; it is the glory of God to conceal a thing, 

 but the honour of kings to search out a matter.&quot; 



Again, let any one consider, if he pleases, how great a difference 

 there is between the life of men in the most civilized part of Europe 

 and in the wildest and most barbarous region of new India : he will 

 think the difference so great as to justify the saying, &quot; Man is a God 

 to man,&quot; not only in regard of age and advantages, but also from a 

 comparison of condition. And this superiority is the result, not of 

 soil, nor of climate, nor of bodies, but of Arts. 



Again, it is well to mark the force, virtue, and consequences of 

 discoveries ; and these occur nowhere more manifestly than in those 

 which were unknown to the ancients, and whose origin, though recent, 

 is obscure and inglorious; the Arts, namely, of Printing, of Gun 

 powder, and the Mariner s Compass. For these three have changed 

 the face and condition of things all over the world ; the first in letters, 

 the second in war, the third in navigation. And hence numberless 

 changes have followed ; so that no government, no sect, no star, 

 seems to have exercised greater power and influence over human 

 affairs than these mechanical discoveries. 



Besides, it will not be amiss to distinguish the three kinds, and, as 

 it were, degrees of human ambition. The first is that of those who 

 wish to increase their own influence in their country ; and this is a 

 common and degenerate kind. The second, that of those who strive 

 to enlarge the influence and power of their country among the human 

 race ; this kind is more dignified, but not less covetous. But when a 

 man endeavours to restore and increase the power and influence of 

 the human race itself over the universe, his is, without doubt, an 

 ambition (if such it may be called) at once sounder and grander than 

 the rest. Now, the empire of man over things is founded on the Arts 

 and Sciences alone, for Nature is only governed by obeying her. 



Besides, if the advantages of any one particular invention have so 

 affected men as to make them think that he who can oblige the whole 

 human race by any benefit is more than man, how much nobler will it 

 seem to make such a discovery as shall expedite the way to the 

 discovery of all other things ? And yet (to speak the whole truth), 



