Page:The Works of Francis Bacon (1884) Volume 1.djvu/208

80 alteration and incursion are. The superficies and upper parts of the earth are full of varieties. The superficies and lower parts of the heavens, which we call the middle region of the air, is full of variety. There is much spirit in the one part, that cannot be brought into mass. There is much massy body in the other place, that cannot be refined to spirit. The common air is as the waste ground between the borders. Who would not smile at the astronomers, I mean not these few carmen which drive the earth about, but the ancient astronomers, which feign the moon to be the swiftest of the planets in motion, and the rest in order, the higher the slower; and so are compelled to imagine a double motion: whereas how evident is it, that that which they call a contrary motion, is but an abatement of motion. The fixed stars overgo Saturn, and so in them and the rest, all is but one motion, and the nearer the earth the slower. A motion also whereof air and water do participate, though much interrupted. But why do I in a conference of pleasure enter these great matters, in sort that pretending to know much, I should forget what is seasonable? Pardon me, it was because all things may be endowed and adorned with speeches, but knowledge itself is more beautiful than any apparel of words that can be put upon it. And let me not seem arrogant without respect to these great reputed authors. Let me so give every man his due, as I give time his due, which is to discover truth. Many of these men had greater wits, far above mine own, and so are many in the Universities of Europe at this day. But alas, they learn nothing there but to believe: first, to believe that others know that which they know not; and after, themselves know that which they know not. But indeed facility to believe, impatience to doubt, temerity to answer, glory to know, doubt to contradict, end to gain, sloth to search, seeking things in words, resting in part of nature; these and the like, have been the things which have forbidden the happy match between the mind of man and the nature of things; and in place thereof have married it to vain notions and blind experiments: and what the posterity and issue of so honourable a match may be, it is not hard to consider. Printing, a gross invention; artillery, a thing that lay not far out of the way; the needle, a thing partly known before: what a change have these three made in the world in these times; the one in state of learning, the other in state of the war, the third in the state of treasure, commodities, and navigation! And those, I say, were but stumbled upon and lighted upon by chance. Therefore, no doubt, the sovereignty of man lieth hid in knowledge; wherein many things are reserved, which kings with their treasure cannot buy, nor with their force command; their spials and intelligencers can give no news of them, their seamen and discoverers cannot sail where they grow: now we govern nature in opinions, but we are thrall unto her in necessity; but if we would be led by her in invention, we should command her in action.