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neral deficience, that it is not known how much of them is verity, and how much vanity.

The knowledge which respecteth the faculties of the mind of man, is of two kinds; the one respecting his understanding and reason, and the other his will, appetite, and affection; whereof the former produceth position or decree, the latter action or execution. It is true that the imagination is an agent or nuncius in both provinces, both the judicial and the ministerial. For sense sendeth over to imagination before reason have judged, and reason sendeth over to imagination before the decree can be acted: for imagination ever precedeth voluntary motion, saving that this Janus of imagination hath differing faces; for the face towards reason hath the print of truth, but the face towards action hath the print of good, which nevertheless are faces,

Quales decet esse sororum. Neither is the imagination simply and only a messenger, but is invested with, or at leastwise usurpeth no small authority in itself, besides the duty of the message. For it was well said by Aristotle, "That "the mind hath over the body that commandment, "which the lord hath over a bondman; but that "reason hath over the imagination that command"ment which a magistrate hath over a free citizen," who may come also to rule in his turn. For we see that in matters of faith and religion, we raise our imagination above our reason, which is the cause why religion sought ever access to the mind by similitudes, types, parables, visions, dreams. And again, in all persuasions, that are wrought by eloquence, and other impressions of like nature, which do paint and disguise the true appearance of things, the chief recommendation unto reason is from the imagination. Nevertheless, because I find not any science that doth properly or fitly pertain to the imagination, I see no cause to alter the former division. For as for poesy, it is rather a pleasure, or play of imagination, than a work or duty thereof. And if it be a work, we speak

not now of such parts of learning as the imagination produceth, but of such sciences as handle and consider of the imagination; no more than we shall speak now of such knowledges as reason produceth, for that extendeth to all philosophy, but of such knowledges as do handle and inquire of the faculty of reason; so as poesy had its true place. As for the power of the imagination in nature, and the manner of fortifying the same, we have mentioned it in the doctrine De anima, whereunto most fitly it belongeth: and lastly, for imaginative or insinuative reason, which is the subject of rhetoric, we think it best to refer it to the arts of reason. So therefore we content ourselves with the former division, that Human Philosophy, which respecteth the faculties of the mind of man, hath two parts, Rational and Moral.

The part of Human Philosophy which is Rational, is of all knowledges, to the most wits, the least delightful, and seemeth but a net of subtilty and spinosity for as it was truly said, that knowledge is pabulum animi; so in the nature of mens appetite to this food, most men are of the taste and stomach of the Israelites in the desert, that would fain have returned ad ollas carnium, and were weary of manna; which though it were celestial, yet seemed less nutritive and comfortable. So generally men taste well knowledges that are drenched in flesh and blood, civil history, morality, policy, about the which mens affections, praises, fortunes, do turn and are conversant; but this same lumen siccum doth parch and offend most mens watery and soft natures. But to speak truly of things as they are in worth, rational knowledges are the keys of all other arts; for as Aristotle saith aptly and elegantly, "That the hand is "the instrument of instruments, and the mind is the "form of forms;" so these be truly said to be the art of arts; neither do they only direct, but likewise confirm and strengthen: even as the habit of shooting doth not only enable to shoot a nearer shoot, but also to draw a stronger bow.

The arts intellectual are four in number, divided

according to the ends whereunto they are referred ; for man's labour is to invent that which is sought or propounded; or to judge that which is invented; or to retain that which is judged; or to deliver over that which is retained. So as the arts must be four; art of inquiry or invention; art of examination or judgment; art of custody or memory; and art of elocution or tradition.

Invention is of two kinds, much differing; the one of arts and sciences, and the other of speech and arguments. The former of these I do report deficient ; which seemeth to me to be such a deficience, as if in the making of an inventory, touching the state of a defunct, it should be set down, That there is no ready money. For as money will fetch all other commodities, so this knowledge is that which should purchase all the rest. And like as the West-Indies had never been discovered, if the use of the mariner's needle had not been first discovered, though the one be vast regions, and the other a small motion; so it cannot be found strange, if sciences be no farther discovered, if the art itself of invention and discovery hath been passed over.

That this part of knowledge is wanting, to my judgment, standeth plainly confessed: for first, logic doth not pretend to invent sciences, or the axioms of sciences, but passeth it over with a cuique in sua arte credendum. And Celsus acknowledgeth it gravely, speaking of the empirical and dogmatical sects of physicians, "That medicines and cures were first "found out, and then after the reasons and causes "were discoursed; and not the causes first found "out, and by light from them the medicines and cures discovered." And Plato, in his Theatetus, noteth well, "That particulars are infinite, and the higher generalities give no sufficient direction; "and that the pith of all sciences, which maketh the "artsman differ from the inexpert, is in the middle propositions, which in every particular knowledge are taken from tradition and experience." And therefore we see, that they which discourse of the in

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ventions and originals of things, refer them rather to chance than to art, and rather to beasts, birds, fishes, serpents, than to men.

Dictamnum genetrix Cretea carpit ab Ida, Puberibus caulem foliis, et flore comantem Purpureo: non illa feris incognita capris, Gramina cum tergo volucres hæsere sagittæ. So that it was no marvel, the manner of antiquity being to consecrate inventors, that the Ægyptians had so few human idols in their temples, but almost all brute:

Omnigenumque Deum monstra,et latrator Anubis, Contra Neptunum, et Venerem, contraque Miner

vam, etc.

And if you like better the tradition of the Grecians, and ascribe the first inventions to men, yet you will rather believe that Prometheus first struck the flints, and marvelled at the spark, than that when he first struck the flints he expected the spark; and therefore we see the West-Indian Prometheus had no intelligence with the European, because of the rareness with them of flint, that gave the first occasion: so as it should seem, that hitherto men are rather beholden to a wild goat for surgery, or to a nightingale for music, or to the ibis for some part of physic, or to the potlid that flew open for artillery, or generally to chance, or any thing else, than to logic, for the invention of arts and sciences. Neither is the form of invention which Virgil describeth much other.

Ut varias usus meditando extunderet artes

Paulatim.

For if you observe the words well, it is no other method than that which brute beasts are capable of and do put in ure: which is a perpetual intending or practising some one thing, urged and imposed by an absolute necessity of conservation of being; for so Cicero saith very truly, Usus uni rei deditus, et naturam et artem sæpe vincit. And therefore if it be said of men,

Labor omnia vincit
Improbus, et duris urgens in rebus egestas ;-

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it is likewise said of beasts, Quis psittaco docuit suum zaige; Who taught the raven in a drought to throw pebbles into an hollow tree, where she espied water, that the water might rise so as she might come to it? Who taught the bee to sail through such a vast sea of air, and to find the way from a field in flower, a great way off, to her hive? Who taught the ant to bite every grain of corn that she burieth in her hill, lest it should take root and grow? Add then the word ertundere, which importeth the extreme difficulty; and the word paulatim, which importeth the extreme slowness; and we are where we were, even amongst the Egyptians gods; there being little left to the faculty of reason, and nothing to the duty of art, for matter of invention.

Secondly, the induction which the logicians speak of, and which seemeth familiar with Plato, whereby the principles of sciences may be pretended to be invented, and so the middle propositions by derivation from the principles; their form of induction, I say, is utterly vicious and incompetent; wherein their error is the fouler, because it is the duty of art to perfect and exalt nature; but they contrariwise have wronged, abused, and traduced nature. For he that shall attentively observe how the mind doth gather this excellent dew of knowledge, like unto that which the poet speaketh of, Aërei mellis cœlestia dona, distilling and contriving it out of particulars natural and artificial, as the flowers of the field and garden, shall find, that the mind of herself by nature doth manage and act an induction much better than they describe it. For to conclude upon an enumeration of particulars without instance contradictory, is no conclusion, but a conjecture; for who can assure, in many subjects, upon those particulars which appear of a side, that there are not other on the contrary side which appear not. As if Samuel should have rested upon those sons of Jesse, which were brought before him, and failed of David which was in the field. And this form, to say truth, is so gross, as it had not been possible for wits so subtile, as have managed these

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