Novum Organum

XL. The formation of notions and axioms on the foundation of true induction is the only fitting remedy by which we can ward off and expel these idols. It is, however, of great service to point them out; for the doctrine of idols bears the same relation to the interpretation of nature as that of the confutation of sophisms does to common logic.[10 - We cannot see how these idols have less to do with sophistical paralogisms than with natural philosophy. The process of scientific induction involves only the first elements of reasoning, and presents such a clear and tangible surface, as to allow no lurking-place for prejudice; while questions of politics and morals, to which the deductive method, or common logic, as Bacon calls it, is peculiarly applicable, are ever liable to be swayed or perverted by the prejudices he enumerates. After mathematics, physical science is the least amenable to the illusions of feeling; each portion having been already tested by experiment and observation, is fitted into its place in the system, with all the rigor of the geometrical method; affection or prejudice cannot, as in matters of taste, history or religion, select fragmentary pieces, and form a system of their own. The whole must be admitted, or the structure of authoritative reason razed to the ground. It is needless to say that the idols enumerated present only another interpretation of the substance of logical fallacies. —Ed.]

XLI. The idols of the tribe are inherent in human nature and the very tribe or race of man; for man’s sense is falsely asserted to be the standard of things; on the contrary, all the perceptions both of the senses and the mind bear reference to man and not to the universe, and the human mind resembles those uneven mirrors which impart their own properties to different objects, from which rays are emitted and distort and disfigure them.[11 - The propensity to this illusion may be viewed in the spirit of system, or hasty generalization, which is still one of the chief obstacles in the path of modern science. —Ed.]

XLII. The idols of the den are those of each individual; for everybody (in addition to the errors common to the race of man) has his own individual den or cavern, which intercepts and corrupts the light of nature, either from his own peculiar and singular disposition, or from his education and intercourse with others, or from his reading, and the authority acquired by those whom he reverences and admires, or from the different impressions produced on the mind, as it happens to be preoccupied and predisposed, or equable and tranquil, and the like; so that the spirit of man (according to its several dispositions), is variable, confused, and as it were actuated by chance; and Heraclitus said well that men search for knowledge in lesser worlds, and not in the greater or common world.

XLIII. There are also idols formed by the reciprocal intercourse and society of man with man, which we call idols of the market, from the commerce and association of men with each other; for men converse by means of language, but words are formed at the will of the generality, and there arises from a bad and unapt formation of words a wonderful obstruction to the mind. Nor can the definitions and explanations with which learned men are wont to guard and protect themselves in some instances afford a complete remedy – words still manifestly force the understanding, throw everything into confusion, and lead mankind into vain and innumerable controversies and fallacies.

XLIV. Lastly, there are idols which have crept into men’s minds from the various dogmas of peculiar systems of philosophy, and also from the perverted rules of demonstration, and these we denominate idols of the theatre: for we regard all the systems of philosophy hitherto received or imagined, as so many plays brought out and performed, creating fictitious and theatrical worlds. Nor do we speak only of the present systems, or of the philosophy and sects of the ancients, since numerous other plays of a similar nature can be still composed and made to agree with each other, the causes of the most opposite errors being generally the same. Nor, again, do we allude merely to general systems, but also to many elements and axioms of sciences which have become inveterate by tradition, implicit credence, and neglect. We must, however, discuss each species of idols more fully and distinctly in order to guard the human understanding against them.

XLV. The human understanding, from its peculiar nature, easily supposes a greater degree of order and equality in things than it really finds; and although many things in nature be sui generis and most irregular, will yet invent parallels and conjugates and relatives, where no such thing is. Hence the fiction, that all celestial bodies move in perfect circles, thus rejecting entirely spiral and serpentine lines (except as explanatory terms).[12 - Though Kepler had, when Bacon wrote this, already demonstrated his three great laws concerning the elliptical path of the planets, neither Bacon nor Descartes seems to have known or assented to his discoveries. Our author deemed the startling astronomical announcements of his time to be mere theoretic solutions of the phenomena of the heavens, not so perfect as those advanced by antiquity, but still deserving a praise for the ingenuity displayed in their contrivance. Bacon believed a hundred such systems might exist, and though true in their explanation of phenomena, yet might all more or less differ, according to the preconceived notions which their framers brought to the survey of the heavens. He even thought he might put in his claim to the notice of posterity for his astronomical ingenuity, and, as Ptolemy had labored by means of epicycles and eccentrics, and Kepler with ellipses, to explain the laws of planetary motion, Bacon thought the mystery would unfold itself quite as philosophically through spiral labyrinths and serpentine lines. What the details of his system were, we are left to conjecture, and that from a very meagre but naïve account of one of his inventions which he has left in his Miscellany MSS. —Ed.] Hence also the element of fire is introduced with its peculiar orbit,[13 - Hinc elementum ignis cum orbe suo introductum est. Bacon saw in fire the mere result of a certain combination of action, and was consequently led to deny its elementary character. The ancient physicists attributed an orbit to each of the four elements, into which they resolved the universe, and supposed their spheres to involve each other. The orbit of the earth was in the centre, that of fire at the circumference. For Bacon’s inquisition into the nature of heat, and its complete failure, see the commencement of the second book (#pgepubid00006) of the Novum Organum. —Ed.] to keep square with those other three which are objects of our senses. The relative rarity of the elements (as they are called) is arbitrarily made to vary in tenfold progression, with many other dreams of the like nature.[14 - Robert Fludd is the theorist alluded to, who had supposed the gravity of the earth to be ten times heavier than water, that of water ten times heavier than air, and that of air ten times heavier than fire. —Ed.] Nor is this folly confined to theories, but it is to be met with even in simple notions.

XLVI. The human understanding, when any proposition has been once laid down (either from general admission and belief, or from the pleasure it affords), forces everything else to add fresh support and confirmation; and although most cogent and abundant instances may exist to the contrary, yet either does not observe or despises them, or gets rid of and rejects them by some distinction, with violent and injurious prejudice, rather than sacrifice the authority of its first conclusions. It was well answered by him[15 - Diagoras. The same allusion occurs in the second part of the Advancement of Learning, where Bacon treats of the idols of the mind.] who was shown in a temple the votive tablets suspended by such as had escaped the peril of shipwreck, and was pressed as to whether he would then recognize the power of the gods, by an inquiry, But where are the portraits of those who have perished in spite of their vows? All superstition is much the same, whether it be that of astrology, dreams, omens, retributive judgment, or the like, in all of which the deluded believers observe events which are fulfilled, but neglect and pass over their failure, though it be much more common. But this evil insinuates itself still more craftily in philosophy and the sciences, in which a settled maxim vitiates and governs every other circumstance, though the latter be much more worthy of confidence. Besides, even in the absence of that eagerness and want of thought (which we have mentioned), it is the peculiar and perpetual error of the human understanding to be more moved and excited by affirmatives than negatives, whereas it ought duly and regularly to be impartial; nay, in establishing any true axiom the negative instance is the most powerful.

XLVII. The human understanding is most excited by that which strikes and enters the mind at once and suddenly, and by which the imagination is immediately filled and inflated. It then begins almost imperceptibly to conceive and suppose that everything is similar to the few objects which have taken possession of the mind, while it is very slow and unfit for the transition to the remote and heterogeneous instances by which axioms are tried as by fire, unless the office be imposed upon it by severe regulations and a powerful authority.

XLVIII. The human understanding is active and cannot halt or rest, but even, though without effect, still presses forward. Thus we cannot conceive of any end or external boundary of the world, and it seems necessarily to occur to us that there must be something beyond. Nor can we imagine how eternity has flowed on down to the present day, since the usually received distinction of an infinity, a parte ante and a parte post,[16 - A scholastic term, to signify the two eternities of past and future duration, that stretch out on both sides of the narrow isthmus (time) occupied by man. It must be remembered that Bacon lived before the doctrine of limits gave rise to the higher calculus, and therefore could have no conception of different denominations of infinities: on the other hand he would have thought the man insane who should have talked to him about lines infinitely great, inclosing angles infinitely little; that a right line, which is a right line so long as it is finite, by changing infinitely little its direction, becomes an infinite curve, and that a curve may become infinitely less than another curve; that there are infinite squares and infinite cubes, and infinites of infinites, all greater than one another, and the last but one of which is nothing in comparison with the last. Yet half a century sufficed from Bacon’s time, to make this nomenclature, which would have appeared to him the excess of frenzy, not only reasonable but necessary, to grasp the higher demonstrations of physical science. —Ed.] cannot hold good; for it would thence follow that one infinity is greater than another, and also that infinity is wasting away and tending to an end. There is the same difficulty in considering the infinite divisibility of lines, arising from the weakness of our minds, which weakness interferes to still greater disadvantage with the discovery of causes; for although the greatest generalities in nature must be positive, just as they are found, and in fact not causable, yet the human understanding, incapable of resting, seeks for something more intelligible. Thus, however, while aiming at further progress, it falls back to what is actually less advanced, namely, final causes; for they are clearly more allied to man’s own nature, than the system of the universe, and from this source they have wonderfully corrupted philosophy. But he would be an unskilful and shallow philosopher who should seek for causes in the greatest generalities, and not be anxious to discover them in subordinate objects.

XLIX. The human understanding resembles not a dry light, but admits a tincture of the will[17 - Spinoza, in his letter to Oldenberg (Op. Posth. p. 398), considers this aphorism based on a wrong conception of the origin of error, and, believing it to be fundamental, was led to reject Bacon’s method altogether. Spinoza refused to acknowledge in man any such thing as a will, and resolved all his volitions into particular acts, which he considered to be as fatally determined by a chain of physical causes as any effects in nature. —Ed.] and passions, which generate their own system accordingly; for man always believes more readily that which he prefers. He, therefore, rejects difficulties for want of patience in investigation; sobriety, because it limits his hope; the depths of nature, from superstition; the light of experiment, from arrogance and pride, lest his mind should appear to be occupied with common and varying objects; paradoxes, from a fear of the opinion of the vulgar; in short, his feelings imbue and corrupt his understanding in innumerable and sometimes imperceptible ways.

L. But by far the greatest impediment and aberration of the human understanding proceeds from the dulness, incompetence, and errors of the senses; since whatever strikes the senses preponderates over everything, however superior, which does not immediately strike them. Hence contemplation mostly ceases with sight, and a very scanty, or perhaps no regard is paid to invisible objects. The entire operation, therefore, of spirits inclosed in tangible bodies[18 - Operatio spirituum in corporibus tangibilibus. Bacon distinguished with the schools the gross and tangible parts of bodies, from such as were volatile and intangible. These, in conformity with the scholastic language, he terms spirits, and frequently returns to their operations in the 2d book. —Ed.] is concealed, and escapes us. All that more delicate change of formation in the parts of coarser substances (vulgarly called alteration, but in fact a change of position in the smallest particles) is equally unknown; and yet, unless the two matters we have mentioned be explored and brought to light, no great effect can be produced in nature. Again, the very nature of common air, and all bodies of less density (of which there are many) is almost unknown; for the senses are weak and erring, nor can instruments be of great use in extending their sphere or acuteness – all the better interpretations of nature are worked out by instances, and fit and apt experiments, where the senses only judge of the experiment, the experiment of nature and the thing itself.

LI. The human understanding is, by its own nature, prone to abstraction, and supposes that which is fluctuating to be fixed. But it is better to dissect than abstract nature: such was the method employed by the school of Democritus,[19 - Democritus, of Abdera, a disciple of Leucippus, born B.C. 470, died 360; all his works are destroyed. He is said to be the author of the doctrine of atoms: he denied the immortality of the soul, and first taught that the milky way was occasioned by a confused light from a multitude of stars. He may be considered as the parent of experimental philosophy, in the prosecution of which he was so ardent as to declare that he would prefer the discovery of one of the causes of natural phenomena, to the possession of the diadem of Persia. Democritus imposed on the blind credulity of his contemporaries, and, like Roger Bacon, astonished them by his inventions. —Ed.] which made greater progress in penetrating nature than the rest. It is best to consider matter, its conformation, and the changes of that conformation, its own action,[20 - The Latin is actus purus, another scholastic expression to denote the action of the substance, which composes the essence of the body apart from its accidental qualities. For an exposition of the various kinds of motions he contemplates, the reader may refer to the 48th aphorism of the 2d book (#Book_II_Aph_48). —Ed.] and the law of this action or motion; for forms are a mere fiction of the human mind, unless you will call the laws of action by that name.[21 - The scholastics after Aristotle distinguished in a subject three modes of beings: viz., the power or faculty, the act, and the habitude, or in other words that which is able to exist, what exists actually, and what continues to exist. Bacon means that is necessary to fix our attention not on that which can or ought to be, but on that which actually is; not on the right, but on the fact. —Ed.]

LII. Such are the idols of the tribe, which arise either from the uniformity of the constitution of man’s spirit, or its prejudices, or its limited faculties or restless agitation, or from the interference of the passions, or the incompetence of the senses, or the mode of their impressions.

LIII. The idols of the den derive their origin from the peculiar nature of each individual’s mind and body, and also from education, habit, and accident; and although they be various and manifold, yet we will treat of some that require the greatest caution, and exert the greatest power in polluting the understanding.

LIV. Some men become attached to particular sciences and contemplations, either from supposing themselves the authors and inventors of them, or from having bestowed the greatest pains upon such subjects, and thus become most habituated to them.[22 - The inference to be drawn from this is to suspect that kind of evidence which is most consonant to our inclinations, and not to admit any notion as real except we can base it firmly upon that kind of demonstration which is peculiar to the subject, not to our impression. Sometimes the mode of proof may be consonant to our inclinations, and to the subject at the same time, as in the case of Pythagoras, when he applied his beloved numbers to the solution of astronomical phenomena; or in that of Descartes, when he reasoned geometrically concerning the nature of the soul. Such examples cannot be censured with justice, inasmuch as the methods pursued were adapted to the end of the inquiry. The remark in the text can only apply to those philosophers who attempt to build up a moral or theological system by the instruments of induction alone, or who rush, with the geometrical axiom, and the à priori syllogism, to the investigation of nature. The means in such cases are totally inadequate to the object in view. —Ed.] If men of this description apply themselves to philosophy and contemplations of a universal nature, they wrest and corrupt them by their preconceived fancies, of which Aristotle affords us a single instance, who made his natural philosophy completely subservient to his logic, and thus rendered it little more than useless and disputatious. The chemists, again, have formed a fanciful philosophy with the most confined views, from a few experiments of the furnace. Gilbert,[23 - Gilbert lived toward the close of the sixteenth century, and was court physician to both Elizabeth and James. In his work alluded to in the text he continually asserts the advantages of the experimental over the à priori method in physical inquiry, and succeeded when his censor failed in giving a practical example of the utility of his precepts. His “De Magnete” contains all the fundamental parts of the science, and these so perfectly treated, that we have nothing to add to them at the present day.Gilbert adopted the Copernican system, and even spoke of the contrary theory as utterly absurd, grounding his argument on the vast velocities which such a supposition requires us to ascribe to the heavenly bodies. —Ed.] too, having employed himself most assiduously in the consideration of the magnet, immediately established a system of philosophy to coincide with his favorite pursuit.

LV. The greatest and, perhaps, radical distinction between different men’s dispositions for philosophy and the sciences is this, that some are more vigorous and active in observing the differences of things, others in observing their resemblances; for a steady and acute disposition can fix its thoughts, and dwell upon and adhere to a point, through all the refinements of differences, but those that are sublime and discursive recognize and compare even the most delicate and general resemblances; each of them readily falls into excess, by catching either at nice distinctions or shadows of resemblance.

LVI. Some dispositions evince an unbounded admiration of antiquity, others eagerly embrace novelty, and but few can preserve the just medium, so as neither to tear up what the ancients have correctly laid down, nor to despise the just innovations of the moderns. But this is very prejudicial to the sciences and philosophy, and instead of a correct judgment we have but the factions of the ancients and moderns. Truth is not to be sought in the good fortune of any particular conjuncture of time, which is uncertain, but in the light of nature and experience, which is eternal. Such factions, therefore, are to be abjured, and the understanding must not allow them to hurry it on to assent.

LVII. The contemplation of nature and of bodies in their individual form distracts and weakens the understanding; but the contemplation of nature and of bodies in their general composition and formation stupefies and relaxes it. We have a good instance of this in the school of Leucippus and Democritus compared with others, for they applied themselves so much to particulars as almost to neglect the general structure of things, while the others were so astounded while gazing on the structure that they did not penetrate the simplicity of nature. These two species of contemplation must, therefore, be interchanged, and each employed in its turn, in order to render the understanding at once penetrating and capacious, and to avoid the inconveniences we have mentioned, and the idols that result from them.

LVIII. Let such, therefore, be our precautions in contemplation, that we may ward off and expel the idols of the den, which mostly owe their birth either to some predominant pursuit, or, secondly, to an excess in synthesis and analysis, or, thirdly, to a party zeal in favor of certain ages, or, fourthly, to the extent or narrowness of the subject. In general, he who contemplates nature should suspect whatever particularly takes and fixes his understanding, and should use so much the more caution to preserve it equable and unprejudiced.

LIX. The idols of the market are the most troublesome of all, those namely which have entwined themselves round the understanding from the associations of words and names. For men imagine that their reason governs words, while, in fact, words react upon the understanding; and this has rendered philosophy and the sciences sophistical and inactive. Words are generally formed in a popular sense, and define things by those broad lines which are most obvious to the vulgar mind; but when a more acute understanding or more diligent observation is anxious to vary those lines, and to adapt them more accurately to nature, words oppose it. Hence the great and solemn disputes of learned men often terminate in controversies about words and names, in regard to which it would be better (imitating the caution of mathematicians) to proceed more advisedly in the first instance, and to bring such disputes to a regular issue by definitions. Such definitions, however, cannot remedy the evil in natural and material objects, because they consist themselves of words, and these words produce others;[24 - The Latin text adds “without end”; but Bacon is scarcely right in supposing that the descent from complex ideas and propositions to those of simple nature, involve the analyst in a series of continuous and interminable definitions. For in the gradual and analytical scale, there is a bar beyond which we cannot go, as there is a summit bounded by the limited variations of our conceptions. Logical definitions, to fulfil their conditions, or indeed to be of any avail, must be given in simpler terms than the object which is sought to be defined; now this, in the case of primordial notions and objects of sense, is impossible; therefore we are obliged to rest satisfied with the mere names of our perceptions. —Ed.] so that we must necessarily have recourse to particular instances, and their regular series and arrangement, as we shall mention when we come to the mode and scheme of determining notions and axioms.

LX. The idols imposed upon the understanding by words are of two kinds. They are either the names of things which have no existence (for as some objects are from inattention left without a name, so names are formed by fanciful imaginations which are without an object), or they are the names of actual objects, but confused, badly defined, and hastily and irregularly abstracted from things. Fortune, the primum mobile, the planetary orbits,[25 - The ancients supposed the planets to describe an exact circle round the south. As observations increased and facts were disclosed, which were irreconcilable with this supposition, the earth was removed from the centre to some other point in the circle, and the planets were supposed to revolve in a smaller circle (epicycle) round an imaginary point, which in its turn described a circle of which the earth was the centre. In proportion as observation elicited fresh facts, contradictory to these representations, other epicycles and eccentrics were added, involving additional confusion. Though Kepler had swept away all these complicated theories in the preceding century, by the demonstration of his three laws, which established the elliptical course of the planets, Bacon regarded him and Copernicus in the same light as Ptolemy and Xenophanes. —Ed.] the element of fire, and the like fictions, which owe their birth to futile and false theories, are instances of the first kind. And this species of idols is removed with greater facility, because it can be exterminated by the constant refutation or the desuetude of the theories themselves. The others, which are created by vicious and unskilful abstraction, are intricate and deeply rooted. Take some word, for instance, as moist, and let us examine how far the different significations of this word are consistent. It will be found that the word moist is nothing but a confused sign of different actions admitted of no settled and defined uniformity. For it means that which easily diffuses itself over another body; that which is indeterminable and cannot be brought to a consistency; that which yields easily in every direction; that which is easily divided and dispersed; that which is easily united and collected; that which easily flows and is put in motion; that which easily adheres to, and wets another body; that which is easily reduced to a liquid state though previously solid. When, therefore, you come to predicate or impose this name, in one sense flame is moist, in another air is not moist, in another fine powder is moist, in another glass is moist; so that it is quite clear that this notion is hastily abstracted from water only, and common ordinary liquors, without any due verification of it.

There are, however, different degrees of distortion and mistake in words. One of the least faulty classes is that of the names of substances, particularly of the less abstract and more defined species (those then of chalk and mud are good, of earth bad); words signifying actions are more faulty, as to generate, to corrupt, to change; but the most faulty are those denoting qualities (except the immediate objects of sense), as heavy, light, rare, dense. Yet in all of these there must be some notions a little better than others, in proportion as a greater or less number of things come before the senses.

LXI. The idols of the theatre are not innate, nor do they introduce themselves secretly into the understanding, but they are manifestly instilled and cherished by the fictions of theories and depraved rules of demonstration. To attempt, however, or undertake their confutation would not be consistent with our declarations. For since we neither agree in our principles nor our demonstrations, all argument is out of the question. And it is fortunate that the ancients are left in possession of their honors. We detract nothing from them, seeing our whole doctrine relates only to the path to be pursued. The lame (as they say) in the path outstrip the swift who wander from it, and it is clear that the very skill and swiftness of him who runs not in the right direction must increase his aberration.

Our method of discovering the sciences is such as to leave little to the acuteness and strength of wit, and indeed rather to level wit and intellect. For as in the drawing of a straight line, or accurate circle by the hand, much depends on its steadiness and practice, but if a ruler or compass be employed there is little occasion for either; so it is with our method. Although, however, we enter into no individual confutations, yet a little must be said, first, of the sects and general divisions of these species of theories; secondly, something further to show that there are external signs of their weakness; and, lastly, we must consider the causes of so great a misfortune, and so long and general a unanimity in error, that we may thus render the access to truth less difficult, and that the human understanding may the more readily be purified, and brought to dismiss its idols.

LXII. The idols of the theatre, or of theories, are numerous, and may, and perhaps will, be still more so. For unless men’s minds had been now occupied for many ages in religious and theological considerations, and civil governments (especially monarchies), had been averse to novelties of that nature even in theory (so that men must apply to them with some risk and injury to their own fortunes, and not only without reward, but subject to contumely and envy), there is no doubt that many other sects of philosophers and theorists would have been introduced, like those which formerly flourished in such diversified abundance among the Greeks. For as many imaginary theories of the heavens can be deduced from the phenomena of the sky, so it is even more easy to found many dogmas upon the phenomena of philosophy – and the plot of this our theatre resembles those of the poetical, where the plots which are invented for the stage are more consistent, elegant, and pleasurable than those taken from real history.

In general, men take for the groundwork of their philosophy either too much from a few topics, or too little from many; in either case their philosophy is founded on too narrow a basis of experiment and natural history, and decides on too scanty grounds. For the theoretic philosopher seizes various common circumstances by experiment, without reducing them to certainty or examining and frequently considering them, and relies for the rest upon meditation and the activity of his wit.

There are other philosophers who have diligently and accurately attended to a few experiments, and have thence presumed to deduce and invent systems of philosophy, forming everything to conformity with them.

A third set, from their faith and religious veneration, introduce theology and traditions; the absurdity of some among them having proceeded so far as to seek and derive the sciences from spirits and genii. There are, therefore, three sources of error and three species of false philosophy; the sophistic, empiric, and superstitious.

LXIII. Aristotle affords the most eminent instance of the first; for he corrupted natural philosophy by logic – thus he formed the world of categories, assigned to the human soul, the noblest of substances, a genus determined by words of secondary operation, treated of density and rarity (by which bodies occupy a greater or lesser space), by the frigid distinctions of action and power, asserted that there was a peculiar and proper motion in all bodies, and that if they shared in any other motion, it was owing to an external moving cause, and imposed innumerable arbitrary distinctions upon the nature of things; being everywhere more anxious as to definitions in teaching and the accuracy of the wording of his propositions, than the internal truth of things. And this is best shown by a comparison of his philosophy with the others of greatest repute among the Greeks. For the similar parts of Anaxagoras, the atoms of Leucippus and Democritus, the heaven and earth of Parmenides, the discord and concord of Empedocles,[26 - Empedocles, of Agrigentum, flourished 444 B.C. He was the disciple of Telanges the Pythagorean, and warmly adopted the doctrine of transmigration. He resolved the universe into the four ordinary elements, the principles of whose composition were life and happiness, or concord and amity, but whose decomposition brought forth death and evil, or discord and hatred. Heraclitus held matter to be indifferent to any peculiar form, but as it became rarer or more dense, it took the appearance of fire, air, earth and water. Fire, however, he believed to be the elementary principle out of which the others were evolved. This was also the belief of Lucretius. See book i. 783, etc.] the resolution of bodies into the common nature of fire, and their condensation according to Heraclitus, exhibit some sprinkling of natural philosophy, the nature of things, and experiment; while Aristotle’s physics are mere logical terms, and he remodelled the same subject in his metaphysics under a more imposing title, and more as a realist than a nominalist. Nor is much stress to be laid on his frequent recourse to experiment in his books on animals, his problems, and other treatises; for he had already decided, without having properly consulted experience as the basis of his decisions and axioms, and after having so decided, he drags experiment along as a captive constrained to accommodate herself to his decisions: so that he is even more to be blamed than his modern followers (of the scholastic school) who have deserted her altogether.

LXIV. The empiric school produces dogmas of a more deformed and monstrous nature than the sophistic or theoretic school; not being founded in the light of common notions (which, however poor and superstitious, is yet in a manner universal, and of a general tendency), but in the confined obscurity of a few experiments. Hence this species of philosophy appears probable, and almost certain to those who are daily practiced in such experiments, and have thus corrupted their imagination, but incredible and futile to others. We have a strong instance of this in the alchemists and their dogmas; it would be difficult to find another in this age, unless perhaps in the philosophy of Gilbert.[27 - It is thus the Vulcanists and Neptunians have framed their opposite theories in geology. Phrenology is a modern instance of hasty generalization. —Ed.] We could not, however, neglect to caution others against this school, because we already foresee and augur, that if men be hereafter induced by our exhortations to apply seriously to experiments (bidding farewell to the sophistic doctrines), there will then be imminent danger from empirics, owing to the premature and forward haste of the understanding, and its jumping or flying to generalities and the principles of things. We ought, therefore, already to meet the evil.

LXV. The corruption of philosophy by the mixing of it up with superstition and theology, is of a much wider extent, and is most injurious to it both as a whole and in parts. For the human understanding is no less exposed to the impressions of fancy, than to those of vulgar notions. The disputatious and sophistic school entraps the understanding, while the fanciful, bombastic, and, as it were, poetical school, rather flatters it.

There is a clear example of this among the Greeks, especially in Pythagoras, where, however, the superstition is coarse and overcharged, but it is more dangerous and refined in Plato and his school. This evil is found also in some branches of other systems of philosophy, where it introduces abstracted forms, final and first causes, omitting frequently the intermediate and the like. Against it we must use the greatest caution; for the apotheosis of error is the greatest evil of all, and when folly is worshipped, it is, as it were, a plague spot upon the understanding. Yet some of the moderns have indulged this folly with such consummate inconsiderateness, that they have endeavored to build a system of natural philosophy on the first chapter of Genesis, the book of Job, and other parts of Scripture; seeking thus the dead among the living.[28 - In Scripture everything which concerns the passing interests of the body is called dead; the only living knowledge having regard to the eternal interest of the soul. —Ed.] And this folly is the more to be prevented and restrained, because not only fantastical philosophy, but heretical religion spring from the absurd mixture of matters divine and human. It is therefore most wise soberly to render unto faith the things that are faith’s.

LXVI. Having spoken of the vicious authority of the systems founded either on vulgar notions, or on a few experiments, or on superstition, we must now consider the faulty subjects for contemplation, especially in natural philosophy. The human understanding is perverted by observing the power of mechanical arts, in which bodies are very materially changed by composition or separation, and is induced to suppose that something similar takes place in the universal nature of things. Hence the fiction of elements, and their co-operation in forming natural bodies.[29 - In mechanics and the general sciences, causes compound their effects, or in other words, it is generally possible to deduce à priori the consequence of introducing complex agencies into any experiment, by allowing for the effect of each of the simple causes which enter into their composition. In chemistry and physiology a contrary law holds; the causes which they embody generally uniting to form distinct substances, and to introduce unforeseen laws and combinations. The deductive method here is consequently inapplicable, and we are forced back upon experiment.Bacon in the text is hardly consistent with himself, as he admits in the second book the doctrine, to which modern discovery points, of the reciprocal transmutation of the elements. What seemed poetic fiction in the theories of Pythagoras and Seneca, assumes the appearance of scientific fact in the hands of Baron Caynard. —Ed.] Again, when man reflects upon the entire liberty of nature, he meets with particular species of things, as animals, plants, minerals, and is thence easily led to imagine that there exist in nature certain primary forms which she strives to produce, and that all variation from them arises from some impediment or error which she is exposed to in completing her work, or from the collision or metamorphosis of different species. The first hypothesis has produced the doctrine of elementary properties, the second that of occult properties and specific powers; and both lead to trifling courses of reflection, in which the mind acquiesces, and is thus diverted from more important subjects. But physicians exercise a much more useful labor in the consideration of the secondary qualities of things, and the operations of attraction, repulsion, attenuation, inspissation, dilatation, astringency, separation, maturation, and the like; and would do still more if they would not corrupt these proper observations by the two systems I have alluded to, of elementary qualities and specific powers, by which they either reduce the secondary to first qualities, and their subtile and immeasurable composition, or at any rate neglect to advance by greater and more diligent observation to the third and fourth qualities, thus terminating their contemplation prematurely. Nor are these powers (or the like) to be investigated only among the medicines for the human body, but also in all changes of other natural bodies.

A greater evil arises from the contemplation and investigation rather of the stationary principles of things from which, than of the active by which things themselves are created. For the former only serve for discussion, the latter for practice. Nor is any value to be set on those common differences of motion which are observed in the received system of natural philosophy, as generation, corruption, augmentation, diminution, alteration, and translation. For this is their meaning: if a body, unchanged in other respects, is moved from its place, this is translation; if the place and species be given, but the quantity changed, it is alteration; but if, from such a change, the mass and quantity of the body do not continue the same, this is the motion of augmentation and diminution; if the change be continued so as to vary the species and substance, and transfuse them to others, this is generation and corruption. All this is merely popular, and by no means penetrates into nature; and these are but the measures and bounds of motion, and not different species of it; they merely suggest how far, and not how or whence. For they exhibit neither the affections of bodies nor the process of their parts, but merely establish a division of that motion, which coarsely exhibits to the senses matter in its varied form. Even when they wish to point out something relative to the causes of motion, and to establish a division of them, they most absurdly introduce natural and violent motion, which is also a popular notion, since every violent motion is also in fact natural, that is to say, the external efficient puts nature in action in a different manner to that which she had previously employed.

But if, neglecting these, any one were, for instance, to observe that there is in bodies a tendency of adhesion, so as not to suffer the unity of nature to be completely separated or broken, and a vacuum[30 - Galileo had recently adopted the notion that nature abhorred a vacuum for an axiomatic principle, and it was not till Torricelli, his disciple, had given practical proof of the utility of Bacon’s method, by the discovery of the barometer (1643) that this error, as also that expressed below, and believed by Bacon, concerning the homœopathic tendencies of bodies, was destroyed. —Ed.] to be formed, or that they have a tendency to return to their natural dimensions or tension, so that, if compressed or extended within or beyond it, they immediately strive to recover themselves, and resume their former volume and extent; or that they have a tendency to congregate into masses with similar bodies – the dense, for instance, toward the circumference of the earth, the thin and rare toward that of the heavens. These and the like are true physical genera of motions, but the others are clearly logical and scholastic, as appears plainly from a comparison of the two.

Another considerable evil is, that men in their systems and contemplations bestow their labor upon the investigation and discussion of the principles of things and the extreme limits of nature, although all utility and means of action consist in the intermediate objects. Hence men cease not to abstract nature till they arrive at potential and shapeless matter,[31 - Donec ad materiam potentialem et informem ventum fuerit. Nearly all the ancient philosophers admitted the existence of a certain primitive and shapeless matter as the substratum of things which the creative power had reduced to fixed proportions, and resolved into specific substances. The expression potential matter refers to that substance forming the basis of the Peripatetic system, which virtually contained all the forms that it was in the power of the efficient cause to draw out of it. —Ed.] and still persist in their dissection, till they arrive at atoms; and yet were all this true, it would be of little use to advance man’s estate.

LXVII. The understanding must also be cautioned against the intemperance of systems, so far as regards its giving or withholding its assent; for such intemperance appears to fix and perpetuate idols, so as to leave no means of removing them.

These excesses are of two kinds. The first is seen in those who decide hastily, and render the sciences positive and dictatorial. The other in those who have introduced scepticism, and vague unbounded inquiry. The former subdues, the latter enervates the understanding. The Aristotelian philosophy, after destroying other systems (as the Ottomans[32 - An allusion to the humanity of the Sultans, who, in their earlier histories are represented as signalizing their accession to the throne by the destruction of their family, to remove the danger of rivalry and the terrors of civil war. —Ed.] do their brethren) by its disputatious confutations, decided upon everything, and Aristotle himself then raises up questions at will, in order to settle them; so that everything should be certain and decided, a method now in use among his successors.

The school of Plato introduced scepticism, first, as it were in joke and irony, from their dislike to Protagoras, Hippias,[33 - The text is “in odium veterum sophistarum, Protagoræ, Hippiæ, et reliquorum.” Those were called sophists, who, ostentationis aut questus causa philosophabantur. (Acad. Prior. ii. 72.) They had corrupted and degraded philosophy before Socrates. Protagoras of Abdera (Ἄβδηρα), the most celebrated, taught that man is the measure of all things, by which he meant not only that all which can be known is known only as it related to our faculties, but also that apart from our faculties nothing can be known. The sceptics equally held that knowledge was probable only as it related to our faculties, but they stopped there, and did not, like the sophist, dogmatize about the unknown. The works of Protagoras were condemned for their impiety, and publicly burned by the ædiles of Athens, who appear to have discharged the office of common hangmen to the literary blasphemers of their day. —Ed.] and others, who were ashamed of appearing not to doubt upon any subject. But the new academy dogmatized in their scepticism, and held it as their tenet. Although this method be more honest than arbitrary decision (for its followers allege that they by no means confound all inquiry, like Pyrrho and his disciples, but hold doctrines which they can follow as probable, though they cannot maintain them to be true), yet when the human mind has once despaired of discovering truth, everything begins to languish. Hence men turn aside into pleasant controversies and discussions, and into a sort of wandering over subjects rather than sustain any rigorous investigation. But as we observed at first, we are not to deny the authority of the human senses and understanding, although weak, but rather to furnish them with assistance.

LXVIII. We have now treated of each kind of idols, and their qualities, all of which must be abjured and renounced with firm and solemn resolution, and the understanding must be completely freed and cleared of them, so that the access to the kingdom of man, which is founded on the sciences, may resemble that to the kingdom of heaven, where no admission is conceded except to children.

LXIX. Vicious demonstrations are the muniments and support of idols, and those which we possess in logic, merely subject and enslave the world to human thoughts, and thoughts to words. But demonstrations are in some manner themselves systems of philosophy and science; for such as they are, and accordingly as they are regularly or improperly established, such will be the resulting systems of philosophy and contemplation. But those which we employ in the whole process leading from the senses and things to axioms and conclusions, are fallacious and incompetent. This process is fourfold, and the errors are in equal number. In the first place the impressions of the senses are erroneous, for they fail and deceive us. We must supply defects by substitutions, and fallacies by their correction. Secondly, notions are improperly abstracted from the senses, and indeterminate and confused when they ought to be the reverse. Thirdly, the induction that is employed is improper, for it determines the principles of sciences by simple enumeration,[34 - Bacon is hardly correct in implying that the enumerationem per simplicem was the only light in which the ancients looked upon induction, as they appear to have regarded it as only one, and that the least important, of its species. Aristotle expressly considers induction in a perfect or dialectic sense, and in an imperfect or rhetorical sense. Thus if a genus (G), contains four species (A, B, C, D), the syllogism would lead us to infer, that what is true of G, is true of any one of the four. But perfect induction would reason, that what we can prove of A, B, C, D, separately, we may properly state as true of G, the whole genus. This is evidently a formal argument as demonstrative as the syllogism. In necessary matters, however, legitimate induction may claim a wider province, and infer of the whole genus what is only apparent in a part of the species. Such are those inductive inferences which concern the laws of nature, the immutability of forms, by which Bacon strove to erect his new system of philosophy. The Stagyrite, however, looked upon enumerationem per simplicem, without any regard to the nature of the matter, or to the completeness of the species, with as much reprehensive caution as Bacon, and guarded his readers against it as the source of innumerable errors. —Ed.] without adopting exclusions and resolutions, or just separations of nature. Lastly, the usual method of discovery and proof, by first establishing the most general propositions, then applying and proving the intermediate axioms according to them, is the parent of error and the calamity of every science. But we will treat more fully of that which we now slightly touch upon, when we come to lay down the true way of interpreting nature, after having gone through the above expiatory process and purification of the mind.

LXX. But experience is by far the best demonstration, provided it adhere to the experiment actually made, for if that experiment be transferred to other subjects apparently similar, unless with proper and methodical caution it becomes fallacious. The present method of experiment is blind and stupid; hence men wandering and roaming without any determined course, and consulting mere chance, are hurried about to various points, and advance but little – at one time they are happy, at another their attention is distracted, and they always find that they want something further. Men generally make their experiments carelessly, and as it were in sport, making some little variation in a known experiment, and then if they fail they become disgusted and give up the attempt; nay, if they set to work more seriously, steadily, and assiduously, yet they waste all their time on probing some solitary matter, as Gilbert on the magnet, and the alchemists on gold. But such conduct shows their method to be no less unskilful than mean; for nobody can successfully investigate the nature of any object by considering that object alone; the inquiry must be more generally extended.

Even when men build any science and theory upon experiment, yet they almost always turn with premature and hasty zeal to practice, not merely on account of the advantage and benefit to be derived from it, but in order to seize upon some security in a new undertaking of their not employing the remainder of their labor unprofitably, and by making themselves conspicuous, to acquire a greater name for their pursuit. Hence, like Atalanta, they leave the course to pick up the golden apple, interrupting their speed, and giving up the victory. But in the true course of experiment, and in extending it to new effects, we should imitate the Divine foresight and order; for God on the first day only created light, and assigned a whole day to that work without creating any material substance thereon. In like manner we must first, by every kind of experiment, elicit the discovery of causes and true axioms, and seek for experiments which may afford light rather than profit. Axioms, when rightly investigated and established, prepare us not for a limited but abundant practice, and bring in their train whole troops of effects. But we will treat hereafter of the ways of experience, which are not less beset and interrupted than those of judgment; having spoken at present of common experience only as a bad species of demonstration, the order of our subject now requires some mention of those external signs of the weakness in practice of the received systems of philosophy and contemplation[35 - See Ax. lxi. (#Book_I_Aph_61) toward the end. This subject extends to Ax. lxxviii (#Book_I_Aph_78).] which we referred to above, and of the causes of a circumstance at first sight so wonderful and incredible. For the knowledge of these external signs prepares the way for assent, and the explanation of the causes removes the wonder; and these two circumstances are of material use in extirpating more easily and gently the idols from the understanding.

LXXI. The sciences we possess have been principally derived from the Greeks; for the addition of the Roman, Arabic, or more modern writers, are but few and of small importance, and such as they are, are founded on the basis of Greek invention. But the wisdom of the Greeks was professional and disputatious, and thus most adverse to the investigation of truth. The name, therefore, of sophists, which the contemptuous spirit of those who deemed themselves philosophers, rejected and transferred to the rhetoricians – Gorgias,[36 - Gorgias of Leontium went to Athens in 424 B.C. He and Polus were disciples of Empedocles, whom we have already noticed (Aphorism 63 (#Book_I_Aph_63)), where he sustained the three famous propositions, that nothing exists, that nothing can be known, and that it is out of the power of man to transmit or communicate intelligence. He is reckoned one of the earliest writers on the art of rhetoric, and for that reason, Plato called his elegant dialogue on that subject after his name.] Protagoras, Hippias, Polus – might well suit the whole tribe, such as Plato, Aristotle, Zeno, Epicurus, Theophrastus, and their successors – Chrysippus, Carneades, and the rest. There was only this difference between them – the former were mercenary vagabonds, travelling about to different states, making a show of their wisdom, and requiring pay; the latter more dignified and noble, in possession of fixed habitations, opening schools, and teaching philosophy gratuitously. Both, however (though differing in other respects), were professorial, and reduced every subject to controversy, establishing and defending certain sects and dogmas of philosophy, so that their doctrines were nearly (what Dionysius not unaptly objected to Plato) the talk of idle old men to ignorant youths. But the more ancient Greeks, as Empedocles, Anaxagoras, Leucippus, Democritus, Parmenides, Heraclitus, Xenophanes, Philolaus, and the rest[37 - Chrysippus, a stoic philosopher of Soli in Cilicia, Campestris, born in 280, died in the 143d Olympiad, 208 B.C. He was equally distinguished for natural abilities and industry, seldom suffering a day to elapse without writing 500 lines. He wrote several hundred volumes, of which three hundred were on logical subjects; but in all, borrowed largely from others. He was very fond of the sorites in argument, which is hence called by Persius the heap of Chrysippus. He was called the Column of the Portico, a name given to the Stoical School from Zeno, its founder, who had given his lessons under the portico.Carneades, born about 215, died in 130. He attached himself to Chrysippus, and sustained with éclat the scepticism of the academy. The Athenians sent him with Critolaus and Diogenes as ambassador to Rome, where he attracted the attention of his new auditory by the subtilty of his reasoning, and the fluency and vehemence of his language. Before Galba and Cato the Censor, he harangued with great variety of thought and copiousness of diction in praise of justice. The next day, to establish his doctrine of the uncertainty of human knowledge, he undertook to refute all his arguments. He maintained with the New Academy, that the senses, the imagination, and the understanding frequently deceive us, and therefore cannot be infallible judges of truth, but that from the impressions produced on the mind by means of the senses, we infer appearances of truth or probabilities. Nevertheless, with respect to the conduct of life, Carneades held that probable opinions are a sufficient guide.Xenophanes, a Greek philosopher, of Colophon, born in 556, the founder of the Eleatic school, which owes its fame principally to Parmenides. Wild in his opinions about astronomy, he supposed that the stars were extinguished every morning, and rekindled at night; that eclipses were occasioned by the temporary extinction of the sun, and that there were several suns for the convenience of the different climates of the earth. Yet this man held the chair of philosophy at Athens for seventy years.Philolaus, a Pythagorean philosopher of Crotona, B.C. 374. He first supported the diurnal motion of the earth round its axis, and its annual motion round the sun. Cicero (Acad. iv. 39) has ascribed this opinion to the Syracusan philosopher Nicetas, and likewise to Plato. From this passage, it is most probable that Copernicus got the idea of the system he afterward established. Bacon, in the Advancement of Human Learning, charges Gilbert with restoring the doctrines of Philolaus, because he ventured to support the Copernican theory. —Ed.] (for I omit Pythagoras as being superstitious), did not (that we are aware) open schools, but betook themselves to the investigation of truth with greater silence and with more severity and simplicity, that is, with less affectation and ostentation. Hence in our opinion they acted more advisedly, however their works may have been eclipsed in course of time by those lighter productions which better correspond with and please the apprehensions and passions of the vulgar; for time, like a river,[38 - Bacon is equally conspicuous for the use and abuse of analogical illustrations. The levity, as Stuart Mill very properly observes, by which substances float on a stream, and the levity which is synonymous with worthlessness, have nothing beside the name in common; and to show how little value there is in the figure, we need only change the word into buoyancy, to turn the semblance of Bacon’s argument against himself. —Ed.] bears down to us that which is light and inflated, and sinks that which is heavy and solid. Nor were even these more ancient philosophers free from the national defect, but inclined too much to the ambition and vanity of forming a sect, and captivating public opinion, and we must despair of any inquiry after truth when it condescends to such trifles. Nor must we omit the opinion, or rather prophecy, of an Egyptian priest with regard to the Greeks, that they would forever remain children, without any antiquity of knowledge or knowledge of antiquity; for they certainly have this in common with children, that they are prone to talking, and incapable of generation, their wisdom being loquacious and unproductive of effects. Hence the external signs derived from the origin and birthplace of our present philosophy are not favorable.

LXXII. Nor are those much better which can be deduced from the character of the time and age, than the former from that of the country and nation; for in that age the knowledge both of time and of the world was confined and meagre, which is one of the worst evils for those who rely entirely on experience – they had not a thousand years of history worthy of that name, but mere fables and ancient traditions; they were acquainted with but a small portion of the regions and countries of the world, for they indiscriminately called all nations situated far toward the north Scythians, all those to the west Celts; they knew nothing of Africa but the nearest part of Ethiopia, or of Asia beyond the Ganges, and had not even heard any sure and clear tradition of the regions of the New World. Besides, a vast number of climates and zones, in which innumerable nations live and breathe, were pronounced by them to be uninhabitable; nay, the travels of Democritus, Plato, and Pythagoras, which were not extensive, but rather mere excursions from home, were considered as something vast. But in our times many parts of the New World, and every extremity of the Old, are well known, and the mass of experiments has been infinitely increased; wherefore, if external signs were to be taken from the time of the nativity or procreation (as in astrology), nothing extraordinary could be predicted of these early systems of philosophy.

LXXIII. Of all signs there is none more certain or worthy than that of the fruits produced, for the fruits and effects are the sureties and vouchers, as it were, for the truth of philosophy. Now, from the systems of the Greeks, and their subordinate divisions in particular branches of the sciences during so long a period, scarcely one single experiment can be culled that has a tendency to elevate or assist mankind, and can be fairly set down to the speculations and doctrines of their philosophy. Celsus candidly and wisely confesses as much, when he observes that experiments were first discovered in medicine, and that men afterward built their philosophical systems upon them, and searched for and assigned causes, instead of the inverse method of discovering and deriving experiments from philosophy and the knowledge of causes; it is not, therefore, wonderful that the Egyptians (who bestowed divinity and sacred honors on the authors of new inventions) should have consecrated more images of brutes than of men, for the brutes by their natural instinct made many discoveries, while men derived but few from discussion and the conclusions of reason.

The industry of the alchemists has produced some effect, by chance, however, and casualty, or from varying their experiments (as mechanics also do), and not from any regular art or theory, the theory they have imagined rather tending to disturb than to assist experiment. Those, too, who have occupied themselves with natural magic (as they term it) have made but few discoveries, and those of small import, and bordering on imposture; for which reason, in the same manner as we are cautioned by religion to show our faith by our works, we may very properly apply the principle to philosophy, and judge of it by its works, accounting that to be futile which is unproductive, and still more so if, instead of grapes and olives, it yield but the thistle and thorns of dispute and contention.

LXXIV. Other signs may be selected from the increase and progress of particular systems of philosophy and the sciences; for those which are founded on nature grow and increase, while those which are founded on opinion change and increase not. If, therefore, the theories we have mentioned were not like plants, torn up by the roots, but grew in the womb of nature, and were nourished by her, that which for the last two thousand years has taken place would never have happened, namely, that the sciences still continue in their beaten track, and nearly stationary, without having received any important increase, nay, having, on the contrary, rather bloomed under the hands of their first author, and then faded away. But we see that the case is reversed in the mechanical arts, which are founded on nature and the light of experience, for they (as long as they are popular) seem full of life, and uninterruptedly thrive and grow, being at first rude, then convenient, lastly polished, and perpetually improved.

LXXV. There is yet another sign (if such it may be termed, being rather an evidence, and one of the strongest nature), namely, the actual confession of those very authorities whom men now follow; for even they who decide on things so daringly, yet at times, when they reflect, betake themselves to complaints about the subtilty of nature, the obscurity of things, and the weakness of man’s wit. If they would merely do this, they might perhaps deter those who are of a timid disposition from further inquiry, but would excite and stimulate those of a more active and confident turn to further advances. They are not, however, satisfied with confessing so much of themselves, but consider everything which has been either unknown or unattempted by themselves or their teachers, as beyond the limits of possibility, and thus, with most consummate pride and envy, convert the defects of their own discoveries into a calumny on nature and a source of despair to every one else. Hence arose the New Academy, which openly professed scepticism,[39 - We have before observed, that the New Academy did not profess skepticism, but the ἀκατάληψια, or incomprehensibility of the absolute essences of things. Even modern physicists are not wanting, to assert with this school that the utmost knowledge we can obtain is relative, and necessarily short of absolute certainty. It is not without an appearance of truth that these philosophers maintain that our ideas and perceptions do not express the nature of the things which they represent, but only the effects of the peculiar organs by which they are conveyed to the understanding, so that were these organs changed, we should have different conceptions of their nature. That constitution of air which is dark to man is luminous to bats and owls.] and consigned mankind to eternal darkness; hence the notion that forms, or the true differences of things (which are in fact the laws of simple action), are beyond man’s reach, and cannot possibly be discovered; hence those notions in the active and operative branches, that the heat of the sun and of fire are totally different, so as to prevent men from supposing that they can elicit or form, by means of fire, anything similar to the operations of nature; and again, that composition only is the work of man and mixture of nature, so as to prevent men from expecting the generation or transformation of natural bodies by art. Men will, therefore, easily allow themselves to be persuaded by this sign not to engage their fortunes and labor in speculations, which are not only desperate, but actually devoted to desperation.

LXXVI. Nor should we omit the sign afforded by the great dissension formerly prevalent among philosophers, and the variety of schools, which sufficiently show that the way was not well prepared that leads from the senses to the understanding, since the same groundwork of philosophy (namely, the nature of things), was torn and divided into such widely differing and multifarious errors. And although in these days the dissensions and differences of opinions with regard to first principles and entire systems are nearly extinct,[40 - Owing to the universal prevalence of Aristotelism.] yet there remain innumerable questions and controversies with regard to particular branches of philosophy. So that it is manifest that there is nothing sure or sound either in the systems themselves or in the methods of demonstration.[41 - It must be remembered, that when Bacon wrote, algebra was in its infancy, and the doctrine of units and infinitesimals undiscovered.]