up one

of the old man's fagot, in the band. For the harmony of a science, supporting each part the other, is and ought to be the true and brief confutation and fuppreffion of all the smaller fort of objections. But, on the other fide, if you take out every Axiom, as the sticks of the fagot, one by one, you may quarrel with them, and bend them, and break them at your pleasure so that, as was said of Seneca, Verborum minutiis rerum frangit pondera; so a man may truly say of the Schoolmen, Quæftionum minutiis, Scientiarum frangunt foliditatem. For were it not better for a man in a fair room to fet great light, or branching candlestick of lights, than to go about with a small watch candle into every corner? And fuch is their method, that rests not fo much upon evidence of truth proved by arguments, authorities, fimilitudes, examples, as upon particular confutations and solutions of every scruple, cavillation, and objection; breeding for the most part one question, as fast as it folveth another; even as in the former resemblance, when you carry the light into one corner, you darken the rest; so that the Fable and fiction of Scylla feemeth to be a lively Image of this kind of Philosophy or knowledge; who was transformed into a comely Virgin for the upper parts; but then Candida fuccinctam latrantibus inguina monftris: fo the Generalities of the Schoolmen are for a while good and proportionable; but then, when you descend into their diftinctions and decifions, instead of a fruitful womb, for the use and benefit of man's life, they

end in monstrous altercations and barking queftions. So as it is not poffible but this quality of knowledge must fall under popular contempt, the people being apt to contemn truth upon occafion of Controverfies and altercations, and to think they are all out of their way which never meet: and when they see such digladiation about fubtilties, and matters of no use or moment, they eafily fall upon that judgment of Dionyfius of Syracufe, Verba ifta funt fenum otioforum.

Notwithstanding, certain it is that if those Schoolmen, to their great thirst of Truth and unwearied travail of wit, had joined variety and universality of Reading and Contemplation, they had proved excellent Lights, to the great advancement of all learning and knowledge; but as they are, they are great undertakers indeed, and fierce with dark keeping: but as in the inquiry of the divine Truth, their pride inclined to leave the Oracle of GOD'S word, and to vanish in the mixture of their own inventions; fo in the inquifition of Nature, they ever left the Oracle of God's works, and adored the deceiving and deformed Images, which the unequal mirror of their own minds, or a few received Authors or principles, did represent unto them. And thus much for the second disease of Learning.

For the third vice or disease of Learning, which concerneth deceit or untruth, it is of all the rest the fouleft; as that which doth destroy the effential form of Knowledge, which is nothing but a representation of truth: for the truth of being and

the truth of knowing are one, differing no more than the direct beam and the beam reflected. This vice therefore brancheth itself into two forts; delight in deceiving, and aptness to be deceived; imposture and credulity; which, although they appear to be of a diverse nature, the one feeming to proceed of cunning, and the other of fimplicity, yet certainly they do for the most part concur: for, as the Verse noteth,

Percontatorem fugito, nam Garrulus idem eft,

an inquifitive man is a prattler; fo, upon the like reason, a credulous man is a deceiver: as we see it in fame, that he that will easily believe rumours, will as easily augment rumours, and add fomewhat to them of his own; which Tacitus wifely noteth, when he faith, Fingunt fimul creduntque: fo great an affinity hath fiction and belief.

This facility of credit, and accepting or admitting things weakly authorized or warranted, is of two kinds, according to the subject: for it is either a belief of History, or, as the Lawyers speak, matter of fact; or else of matter of art and opinion. As to the former, we see the experience and inconvenience of this error in ecclefiaftical Hiftory; which hath too easily received and registered reports, and narrations of Miracles wrought by Martyrs, Hermits, or Monks of the defert, and other Holy men, and their Relics, Shrines, Chapels, and Images: which though they had a paffage for a time, by the ignorance of the people, the supersti

tious fimplicity of some, and the politic toleration of others holding them but as divine poefies; yet after a period of time, when the mist began to clear up, they grew to be esteemed but as old wives' fables, impoftures of the Clergy, illufions of fpirits, and badges of Antichrift, to the great scandal and detriment of Religion.

So in natural History, we see there hath not been that choice and judgment used as ought to have been; as may appear in the Writings of Plinius, Cardanus, Albertus, and divers of the Arabians, being fraught with much Fabulous matter, a great part not only untried, but notoriously untrue, to the great derogation of the credit of natural Philofophy with the grave and fober kind of wits: wherein the wisdom and integrity of Aristotle is worthy to be observed; that, having made fo diligent and exquifite a History of living Creatures, hath mingled it sparingly with any vain or feigned matter: and yet, on the other fide, hath caft all prodigious Narrations, which he thought worthy the Recording, into one Book: excellently discerning that matter of manifest truth (such, whereupon obfervation and rule were to be built,) was not to be mingled or weakened with matter of doubtful credit; and yet again, that rarities and reports that seem incredible are not to be fuppreffed or denied to the memory of men.

And as for the facility of credit which is yielded to Arts and opinions, it is likewife of two kinds; either when too much belief is attributed to the

Arts themselves, or to certain Authors in any Art. The Sciences themselves, which have had better intelligence and confederacy with the imagination of man than with his reason, are three in number; Aftrology, Natural Magic, and Alchemy; of which Sciences, nevertheless, the ends or pretences are noble. For Aftrology pretendeth to discover that correfpondence or concatenation, which is between the superior Globe and the inferior: Natural Magic pretendeth to call and reduce natural Philosophy from variety of speculations to the magnitude of works and Alchemy pretendeth to make feparation of all the unlike parts of bodies, which in mixtures of nature are incorporate. But the derivations and profecutions to these ends, both in the theories and in the practices, are full of Error and vanity; which the great Profeffors themfelves have fought to veil over and conceal by enigmatical writings, and referring themselves to auricular traditions and such other devices, to fave the credit of Impostures: and yet furely to Alchemy this right is due, that it may be compared to the Husbandman whereof Esop makes the Fable; that, when he died, told his Sons, that he had left unto them gold buried under ground in his Vineyard; and they digged over all the ground, and gold they found none; but by reason of their stirring and digging the mound about the roots of their Vines, they had a great Vintage the year following: fo affuredly the search and stir to make gold hath brought to light a great number of good and fruitful inven