INTERPRETATION OF NATURE.
to religion ; though this is no other than seeking to flatter God with a lie. Others tremble for the precedent, lest the shifting and changes of philo sophy end with attacking religion. Others, lastly, seern in fear that, in the inquisition of nature, something may be found to shake religion. Both which opinions savour of a sort of incredulity and worldly policy, but the last cannot even be brought ir.to doubt or question without impiety ! From which it was sufficiently clear, that in opinions of this kind there is much weakness, and not a little envy and bitterness. For natural philoso phy is, next to the divine word, the most certain remedy of superstition, and the most wholesome food of faith ; and is, therefore, rightly considered the truest and loveliest handmaid of religion ; the one displaying the will of God, the other his power. So that he was not wrong who said : " Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God," joining in an intimate union, in formation of his will, and meditation on his power. But, though this is most certain, it still remains among the most effectual hindrances to natural philosophy, that all which is pronounced by blind zeal and superstition is considered out of the reach of dispute. He thought also, that, in the orders and cus toms of schools, colleges, and such conventual bodies, all is found to be adverse to the further progress of the sciences. For much the greater part are professors, and in the receipt of emoluments. And the lectures arid exercises are so arranged that nothing out of the common routine can easily arise in any one s mind. But if a man chance to use the liberty of inquiry and judgment, he will soon find himself left in a great solitude. And if ever he can bear this, he will yet find that, in achieving his fortune, this industry and magnani mity will be much hindrance to him. For in places of this kind men s studies are almost con fined to the writings of certain authors ; from which, if any one disagrees, or propounds matter of argument, he is immediately set down as a turbulent person and an innovator. Though, if one judge fairly, there is a great difference between the government of civil affairs and the arts ; for the danger is not alike of new light, and of new motion. It is true that in civil affairs change, though for the better, is suspected from fear of disorder; since governments rest on authority, consent, credit, opinion, not on demonstration and truth in abstract. But in the arts and sciences, as in mines, all sides should resound with new w*orks and further progress. And it is so in right reason. But in real life, he saw that the government and administration of the knowledge, which is in use, presses cruelly, and checks the increase and growth of science. He thought also, that, even in the opinion and common feeling of men, much appears on all VOL. I. 54 sides that denies a fair opening to the increase of knowledge. For most men, unjust to the present times, hang upon antiquity, and believe that if we, who now live, had had the office of first attempting what was sought for and discovered by the ancients, we should not have come up to their works by a great space. And in like man ner they believe that if a man even now, relying upon his own powers, attempt to begin anew an inquisition, the end will be, that he will either come to the very conclusion that was approved of by antiquity ; or else to some one, which, having been long ago decided upon and rejected by antiquity, deservedly fell into oblivion. Others, altogether slighting the powers of human nature at both periods, ancient and modern, fall into a fanciful and superstitious belief that the elements of the sciences emanated from spiritual beings, and that new inventions in the same manner may receive assistance from their author ity and concurrence. Others, of more sober and chastened imagination, but greater diffidence, openly despair of any increase of knowledge, from reflecting on the obscurity of nature, the shortness of life, the uncertainty of the senses, the weakness of the judgment, and the difficulties and unbounded variety of experiments. So that such swelling hopes, as promise more than we now have, are the offspring of a weak and unri- pened mind, and will no doubt have their begin ning in exultation, their middle course in diffi culty, and their end in confusion ; and there is as little hope of the reward as of the accomplish ment ; for knowledges evidently breed and expand in great and excellent wits, but the esti mation and price of them is in the multitude, or in the inclinations of princes and great persons meanly learned. So that the projection of sciences and the judgment upon them are not in the same ; whence it comes that those inventions only suc ceed which are accommodated to popular reason and common sense; as happened in the case of Democritus theory of atoms, which being a little too remote, was treated with ridicule. Hence, sublime views of nature, which almost like religion, must enter the senses of men with difficulty, may be now and then conceived, but (unless proved and recommended by evident and exceeding utility, which hitherto has not been the case) are generally in a short time blown and extinguished by the winds of common opi nions; so that time, like a river, is wont to briny down to us what is light and blown up, while il sinks and drowns that which is solid and grave. So he saw well that the hindrances of an improved state of the sciences were not only external and adventitious, but innate also, and drawn from our very senses. Moreover, he thought that the vagueness and irregular form of words mocks the understanding
