The Advancement of Learning Page #6

The Advancement of Learning, published by Francis Bacon in 1605, is a foundational text in the history of science and philosophy. In this work, Bacon advocates for empirical research and the systematic organization of knowledge, laying the groundwork for the scientific method. The book critiques existing scholarly practices and proposes a new approach to learning based on observation and experimentation. It marks a significant shift towards modern scientific inquiry.

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comparison and to the disadvantage of a civil life, for safety, liberty,
pleasure, and dignity, or at least freedom from indignity, as no man
handleth it but handleth it well; such a consonancy it hath to men’s
conceits in the expressing, and to men’s consents in the allowing.  This
only I will add, that learned men forgotten in states and not living in
the eyes of men, are like the images of Cassius and Brutus in the funeral
of Junia, of which, not being represented as many others were, Tacitus
saith, Eo ipso præfulgebant quod non visebantur.

(3) And for meanness of employment, that which is most traduced to
contempt is that the government of youth is commonly allotted to them;
which age, because it is the age of least authority, it is transferred to
the disesteeming of those employments wherein youth is conversant, and
which are conversant about youth.  But how unjust this traducement is (if
you will reduce things from popularity of opinion to measure of reason)
may appear in that we see men are more curious what they put into a new
vessel than into a vessel seasoned; and what mould they lay about a young
plant than about a plant corroborate; so as this weakest terms and times
of all things use to have the best applications and helps.  And will you
hearken to the Hebrew rabbins?  “Your young men shall see visions, and
your old men shall dream dreams:” say they, youth is the worthier age,
for that visions are nearer apparitions of God than dreams?  And let it
be noted that howsoever the condition of life of pedantes hath been
scorned upon theatres, as the ape of tyranny; and that the modern
looseness or negligence hath taken no due regard to the choice of
schoolmasters and tutors; yet the ancient wisdom of the best times did
always make a just complaint, that states were too busy with their laws
and too negligent in point of education: which excellent part of ancient
discipline hath been in some sort revived of late times by the colleges
of the Jesuits; of whom, although in regard of their superstition I may
say, Quo meliores, eo deteriores; yet in regard of this, and some
other points concerning human learning and moral matters, I may say, as
Agesilaus said to his enemy Pharnabazus, Talis quum sis, utunam noster
esses.  And that much touching the discredits drawn from the fortunes of
learned men.

(4) As touching the manners of learned men, it is a thing personal and
individual: and no doubt there be amongst them, as in other professions,
of all temperatures: but yet so as it is not without truth which is said,
that Abeunt studua in mores, studies have an influence and operation
upon the manners of those that are conversant in them.

(5) But upon an attentive and indifferent review, I for my part cannot
find any disgrace to learning can proceed from the manners of learned
men; not inherent to them as they are learned; except it be a fault
(which was the supposed fault of Demosthenes, Cicero, Cato II., Seneca,
and many more) that because the times they read of are commonly better
than the times they live in, and the duties taught better than the duties
practised, they contend sometimes too far to bring things to perfection,
and to reduce the corruption of manners to honesty of precepts or
examples of too great height.  And yet hereof they have caveats enough in
their own walks.  For Solon, when he was asked whether he had given his
citizens the best laws, answered wisely, “Yea, of such as they would
receive:” and Plato, finding that his own heart could not agree with the
corrupt manners of his country, refused to bear place or office, saying,
“That a man’s country was to be used as his parents were, that is, with
humble persuasions, and not with contestations.”  And Cæsar’s counsellor
put in the same caveat, Non ad vetera instituta revocans quæ jampridem
corruptis moribus ludibrio sunt; and Cicero noteth this error directly
in Cato II. when he writes to his friend Atticus, Cato optime sentit,
sed nocet interdum reipublicæ; loquitur enim tanquam in republicâ
Platonis, non tanquam in fæce Romuli.  And the same Cicero doth excuse
and expound the philosophers for going too far and being too exact in
their prescripts when he saith, Isti ipse præceptores virtutis et
magistri videntur fines officiorum paulo longius quam natura vellet
protulisse, ut cum ad ultimum animo contendissemus, ibi tamen, ubi
oportet, consisteremus: and yet himself might have said, Monitis sum
minor ipse meis; for it was his own fault, though not in so extreme a
degree.

(6) Another fault likewise much of this kind hath been incident to
learned men, which is, that they have esteemed the preservation, good,
and honour of their countries or masters before their own fortunes or
safeties.  For so saith Demosthenes unto the Athenians: “If it please you
to note it, my counsels unto you are not such whereby I should grow great
amongst you, and you become little amongst the Grecians; but they be of
that nature as they are sometimes not good for me to give, but are always
good for you to follow.”  And so Seneca, after he had consecrated that
Quinquennium Neronis to the eternal glory of learned governors, held on
his honest and loyal course of good and free counsel after his master
grew extremely corrupt in his government.  Neither can this point
otherwise be, for learning endueth men’s minds with a true sense of the
frailty of their persons, the casualty of their fortunes, and the dignity
of their soul and vocation, so that it is impossible for them to esteem
that any greatness of their own fortune can be a true or worthy end of
their being and ordainment, and therefore are desirous to give their
account to God, and so likewise to their masters under God (as kings and
the states that they serve) in those words, Ecce tibi lucrefeci, and
not Ecce mihi lucrefeci; whereas the corrupter sort of mere politiques,
that have not their thoughts established by learning in the love and
apprehension of duty, nor never look abroad into universality, do refer
all things to themselves, and thrust themselves into the centre of the
world, as if all lines should meet in them and their fortunes, never
caring in all tempests what becomes of the ship of state, so they may
save themselves in the cockboat of their own fortune; whereas men that
feel the weight of duty and know the limits of self-love use to make good
their places and duties, though with peril; and if they stand in
seditious and violent alterations, it is rather the reverence which many
times both adverse parts do give to honesty, than any versatile advantage
of their own carriage.  But for this point of tender sense and fast
obligation of duty which learning doth endue the mind withal, howsoever
fortune may tax it, and many in the depth of their corrupt principles may
despise it, yet it will receive an open allowance, and therefore needs

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