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and frame of words to deliver it in. The reason whereof not being perceived, but by greater intention of brain than our nice minds, for the most part, can well away with, fain would we bring the world if we might to think it but a needless curiosity to rip up anything further than extemporal readiness of wit doth serve to reach unto. Which course, if here we did list to follow, we might tell you that in the first branch of this sentence God doth condemn pride, and in the second, teach what happiness of state shall grow to the righteous by the constancy of faith, notwithstanding the troubles which they now suffer; and after certain notes for wholesome instruction hereupon collected, pass over without detaining your minds in any further removed speculation.

But as I take it, there is a difference between the talk that beseemeth nurses amongst children, and that which men of capacity and judgment do, or should receive-instruction by.

ORDER, CONSTANCY, AND MAJESTY OF LAW.

HE that goeth about to persuade a multitude that they are not so well governed as they ought to be, shall never want attentive and favourable hearers; because they know the manifold defects whereunto every kind of regiment is subject, but the secret lets and difficulties, which in public proceedings are innumerable and inevitable, they have not ordinarily the judgment to consider. And because such as openly reprove supposed disorder of state are taken as principal friends to the common benefit of all, and for men that carry singular freedom of mind, under this fair and plausible colour, whatsoever they utter passeth for good and current. That which wanteth in the weight of their speech, is supplied by the aptness of men's minds to accept and believe it.

Whereas on the other side, if we maintain things that are established, we have not only to strive with a number of heavy prejudices deeply rooted in the hearts of men, who think that herein we serve the time and speak in

favour of the present state, because thereby we either hold or seek preferment; but also to bear such exceptions as minds so averted beforehand usually take against that which they are loth should be poured into them.

Albeit, therefore, much of that we are to speak of in this present cause may seem to a number perhaps tedious, perhaps obscure and intricate; for many talk of the truth, which never sounded the depth from whence it springeth, and therefore when they are led thereunto, they are soon weary, as men drawn from the beaten paths wherewith they have been inured; yet this may not so far prevail as to cut off that which the matter itself requireth, howsoever the nice humour of some be therewith pleased or no. They unto whom we shall seem to be tedious are in no wise injured by us, because it is in their own hands to spare that labour which they are not willing to endure. And if any complain of obscurity, they must consider that in these matters it cometh no otherwise to pass than in sundry the works both of art and of nature, where that which hath greatest force in the very things we see, is notwithstanding itself oftentimes not seen.

The stateliness of houses, the goodliness of trees, when we behold them, delighteth the eye; but that foundation which beareth up the one, that root which ministereth to the other nourishment and life, is in the bosom of the earth concealed; and if there be at any time occasion to search for it, such labour is more necessary than pleasant both to them which undertake it and for the lookers-on. In like manner the use and benefit of good laws all that live under them may enjoy with delight and comfort, albeit the grounds and first original causes from whence they have sprung are unknown, as to the greatest part of men they are. That law which God himself hath made to himself, and by which He worketh all things whereof He is the cause and author; that law, in the admirable frame whereof shineth in most perfect beauty the countenance of that wisdom, which said, the "Lord possessed me in the beginning of His way;" that law which hath been the pattern to work, and the card

to guide the world by; that law which hath been of God and is with God, the author and observer whereof is the one only God to be blessed for ever; that law whereby He worketh, is eternal, and therefore can have no show or colour of mutability. Since the time that God did first proclaim the edicts of His law upon the world, heaven and earth have hearkened to His voice, and their labour hath been to do His will. He made a law for the rain; He gave His decree unto the sea, that the waters should not pass His commandment.

Now, if nature should intermit her course and leave altogether, though for a while, the observation of her own laws; if those principal and mother elements, whereof all things are made in this lower world, should lose the qualities which now they have; if the frame of that heavenly arch erected over our heads should loosen and dissolve; if celestial spheres should forget their wonted motions; if the prince of the lights of heaven, which now as a giant doth run his unwearied course, should begin to stand and rest himself; if the moon should wander from her beaten way, the times and seasons blend themselves in disordered mixture, the winds breathe out their last gasp, the clouds yield no more rain, the fruits of the earth pine away as children at the withered breasts of their mother, no longer able to yield them relief; what would become of man himself, whom these things do all now serve. See we not plainly that obedience of creatures unto the law of nature is the stay of the whole world?

Of law there can be no less acknowledged than that her seat is the bosom of God; her voice the harmony of the world. All things in heaven and earth do her homage; the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her power. Both angels and men, and creatures of what condition soever, though each in different sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent admiring her as the mother of their peace and joy.

FRANCIS BACON.

FRANCIS BACON, created Viscount St. Alban's when appointed Lord Chancellor in the reign of James I., was born A.D. 1561, died 1626, more pithily than truly designated by Alexander Pope, "the wisest, greatest, meanest of mankind." In addition to numerous political and legal tracts, he is the author of the Instauration of the Sciences, in four books, originating and exemplifying the inductive method of scientific investigation, and of a volume of Essays, from which the extracts are taken.

TRUTH.

WHAT is truth? said jesting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer. Certainly there be that delight in giddiness, and count it as a bondage to fix a belief, affecting free will in thinking as well as in acting. And although

the sects of the philosophers of that kind be gone, yet there remain certain discoursing wits which are of the same veins, though there be not so much blood in them as was in those of the ancients.

But it is not only the difficulty and labour which men take in the finding out of truth, nor again that, when it is found, it imposeth upon men's thoughts, that doth bring lies in favour, but a natural though corrupt love of the lie itself. One of the later school of the Grecians examineth the matter, and is at a stand to think what should be in it that men should love lies; where neither they make for pleasure, as with poets, nor for advantage, as with the merchant, but for the lie's sake. But I cannot tell; this same truth is a naked and open daylight that doth not show the masks and mummeries and triumphs of the world, half so stately and daintily as candle light.

Truth may perhaps come to the price of a pearl that showeth best by day, but it will not rise to the price of a diamond or carbuncle, that showeth best in varied lights. A mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure. Doth any man doubt, that if there were taken out of men's minds

vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of men poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition, and unpleasing to themselves.

One of the Fathers called poesy vinum dæmonium, because it filleth the imagination, and yet it is but the shadow of a lie. But it is not the lie that passeth through the mind, but the lie that sinketh in and setteth in it, that doth the hurt, such as we spoke of before. But howsoever those things are thus in men's depraved judgments and affections, yet truth, which only doth judge itself, teacheth that the inquiry of truth, which is the lovemaking or wooing of it, the knowledge of truth, which is the presence of it, and the belief of truth, which is the enjoying of it, is the sovereign good of human nature.

The first creation of God in the work of the days, was the light of the sense; the last was the light of reason; and His Sabbath work, ever since, is the illumination of His spirits. First, He breathed light upon the face of matter or chaos; then He breathed light into the face of man, and still He breatheth and inspireth light into the face of His chosen.

The poet that beautified the sect that was otherwise inferior to the rest, sayeth yet excellently well, "It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore, and see ships tost upon the sea; a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle, and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below; but no pleasure is comparable to the standing upon the vantage ground of truth, a hill not to be commanded, and where the air is always clear and serene; and to see the errors, and wanderings, and mists, and tempests in the vale below," so always that this prospect be with pity and not with swelling or pride. Certainly it is heaven upon earth, to have a mind move in charity, rest in providence, and turn upon the poles of truth.

To pass from philosophical truth to the truth of civil business, it will be acknowledged, even by those that practise it not, that clear and round dealing is the honour of man's nature; and that mixture of falsehood is like

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