Page:The Harvard Classics Vol. 51; Lectures.djvu/303

Rh time when it was not possible to write a history of what was known, wrote one of what it was necessary to learn." Wherever experimental investigators are to-day discovering new laws of nature, and thus more and more subjecting the physical world to the welfare of man, the spirit of Bacon is fruitfully at work.

BACON NOT PREOCCUPIED WITH SCIENCE

Among writers on education, the very magnitude of Bacon's position in the history of science has tended to overshadow his influence in other respects. Yet he urged the development of science because in his day it was relatively the most neglected and chaotic department of human endeavor, and not because he thought it absolutely and forever the most important. Newman himself does not insist more strongly than Bacon on the truth that science, though great, is not the complete satisfier of human needs. In "The Advancement of Learning," the first part of the "Instauratio Magna," Bacon pleads for the discovery and application to life, not merely of pure scientific truth, but also of clear ideals of mental, moral, and spiritual well-being. Religion and the so-called liberal studies had his eloquent and loyal support. "The New Atlantis" presents us not only with the model of a public institution of scientific research, but also with ideals of social and personal character. His Utopia was not, as some mistakenly declare, a merely industrial civilization, but a Christian commonwealth which exalted the humane feelings, family life, and artistic beauty.

DISTINCTION BETWEEN HIS ESSAYS AND HIS OTHER WORKS

Both in the prefaces to the "Instauratio Magna" and in "The New Atlantis," Bacon is thinking of the world as he believed it should and would become. The assumption that he had a similar purpose in his famous "Essays" unfortunately misleads many modern critics, and tends to obscure the peculiar merits of his most popular work. Yet Bacon himself tells us that in his opinion we already had enough books which enthusiastically described moral ideals, and that what we really needed were accurate observations on the extent to which