against a great good of the master's: and yet that is the case of bad officers, treasurers, ambassadors, generals, and other false and corrupt servants; which set a bias upon their bowl, of their own petty ends and envies, to the overthrow of their master's great and important affairs: and, for the most part, the good such servants receive is after the model of their own fortune; but the hurt they sell for that good is after the model of their master's fortune and certainly it is the nature of extreme self-lovers, as they will set a house on fire, an * it were but to roast their eggs; and yet these men many times hold credit with their masters, because their study is but to please them, and profit themselves; and for either respect they will abandon the good of their affairs.

Wisdom for a man's self is, in many branches thereof, a depraved thing: it is the wisdom of rats, that will be sure to leave a house somewhat before it fall: it is the wisdom of the fox, that thrusts out the badger, who digged and made room for him: it is the wisdom of crocodiles, that shed tears when they would devour. But that which is specially to be noted is, that those which (as Cicero says of Pompey) are, “sui amantes, sine rivali,” † are many times unfortunate; and whereas they have all their time sacrificed to themselves, they become in the end themselves sacrifices to the inconstancy of fortune, whose wings they thought by their selfwisdom to have pinioned.

OF INNOVATIONS.

As the births of living creatures at first are ill-shapen, so are all innovations, which are the births of time; yet notwithstanding, as those that first bring honour into their

* An, i. e. if.

† Lovers of themselves, without a rival.

family are commonly more worthy than most that succeed, so the first precedent (if it be good) is seldom attained by imitation; for ill to man's nature as it stands perverted, hath a natural motion strongest in continuance; but good, as a forced motion, strongest at first. Surely every medicine* is an innovation, and he that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils; for time is the greatest innovator; and if time of course alter things to the worse, and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better, what shall be the end? It is true, that what is settled by custom, though it be not good, yet at least it is fit; and those things which have long gone together, are, as it were, confederate within themselves; whereas new things piece not so well; but, though they help by their utility, yet they trouble by their inconformity: besides, they are like strangers, more admired, and less favoured. All this is true, if time stood still; which, contrariwise, moveth so round, that a froward retention of custom is as turbulent a thing as an innovation; and they that reverence too much old times, are but a scorn to the new. It were good, therefore, that men in their innovations, would follow the example of time itself, which indeed innovateth greatly, but quietly, and by degrees scarce to be perceived; † for otherwise, whatsoever is new is unlooked for; and ever it mends some, and pairs ‡ other; and he that is holpen § takes it for a fortune, and thanks the time; and he that is hurt, for a wrong, and imputeth it to the author. It is good also not to try experiments in States, except the necessity be urgent, or the utility evident; and well to beware that it be the reformation that draweth on the change, and not the desire of change that pretendeth

*Medicine, i. c. remedy.

† Elsewhere Bacon lays down this rule for reformers: "Let a living spring flow into the stagnant waters."

Pairs, i. e. harms.

§ Holpen, i. e. old preterite of help.

the reformation; * and lastly, that the novelty, though it be not rejected, yet be held for a suspect; † and, as the Scripture saith, “That we make a stand upon the ancient way, and then look about us, and discover what is the straight and right way, and so to walk in it.”

OF SEEMING WISE.

It hath been an opinion, that the French are wiser than they seem, and the Spaniards seem wiser than they are; but, howsoever it be between nations, certainly it is so between man and man; for as the apostle saith of godliness, "Having a show of godliness, but denying the power thereof;" so certainly there are in points of wisdom and sufficiency, that do nothing or little very solemnly: "magno conatu nugas." It is a ridiculous thing, and fit for a satire

"New interests beget new maxims of government and new methods of conduct. These, in their turn, beget new manners, new habits, new customs."-Bolingbroke, "Study of History," Letter VI.

It is only when new interests become general that old laws, which interfere with their enjoyment, should be repealed, or new laws, which may better secure their enjoyment and development, should be enacted. A people can suffer no greater curse than a meddling legislature, which leads instead of following public opinion. Every good law is moulded in the hearts of the people by their wants and necessities before it is ready to be embodied into a statute. It is a response to their requirements when passed. The theorist who thinks he can make a people of average intelligence happier by the enactment of laws which they have not in some way acknowledged the need of, is a reformer who threatens more harm than war or pestilence.

† Suspect, i. e. suspicion.

Achieve nothing with great labor, i. e. the mountains labor and give birth to an insignificant mouse.

to persons of judgment, to see what shifts these formalists have, and what prospectives * to make superficies to seem body that hath depth and bulk. Some are so close and reserved, as they will not show their wares but by a dark light, and seem always to keep back somewhat; and when they know within themselves they speak of that they do not well know, would nevertheless seem to others to know of that which they may not well speak. † Some help themselves with countenance and gesture, and are wise by signs; as Cicero saith of Piso, that when he answered him he fetched one of his brows up to his forehead, and bent the other down to his chin; "Respondes, altero ad frontem sublato, altero ad mentum depresso supercilio, crudelitatem tibi non placere." Some think to bear it by speaking a great word, and being peremptory; and go on, and take by admittance that which they cannot make good. Some, whatsoever is beyond their reach, will seem to despise, or make light of it as impertinent or curious: § and so would have their ignorance seem judgment. Some are never without a difference, || and commonly by amusing men with a subtilty, blanch ¶ the matter; of whom A. Gellius saith, "Hominem delirum, qui verborum, minutiis rerum frangit

* Prospective, i. e. perspective glass, which presented an object in a false light.

† “Mystery, the wisdom of blockheads, may be allowed in a foreign minister."-Horace Walpole, Correspondence. 2d Series, IV.

A French philosopher says: "Gravity is a mysterious carriage of the body to cover the defects of the mind."-Rochefoucauld's Maxims.

"With one brow raised to your forehead, the other bent tow ard your chin, you reply that cruelty does not delight you." § Impertinent, i. e. irrelevant. Curious, i. e. over-nice. Difference, i. e. fine distinction.

T Blanch, i. e. elude.

pondera."* Of which kind also Plato, in his Protagoras, bringeth in Prodicus in scorn, and maketh him make a speech that consisteth of distinctions from the beginning to the end. Generally such men, in all deliberations, find ease to be of the negative side, and affect a credit to object and foretell difficulties; for when propositions are denied, there is an end of them; but if they be allowed, it requireth a new work; which false point of wisdom is the bane of business. To conclude, there is no decaying merchant, or inward beggar, hath so many tricks to uphold the credit of their wealth, as these empty persons have to maintain the credit of their sufficiency. Seeming wise men may make shift to get opinion; but let no man choose them for employment; for certainly, you were better take for business a man somewhat absurd than over-formal.

OF FRIENDSHIP.

It had been hard for him that spake it to have put more truth and untruth together in few words than in that speech, "Whosoever is delighted in solitude, is either a wild beast or a god:" for it is most true, that a natural and secret hatred and aversation towards ‡ society, in any man, hath somewhat of the savage beast; but it is most untrue, that it should have any character at all of the divine nature, except it proceed, not out of a pleasure in solitude, but out of a love and desire to sequester a man's self for a higher conversation: such as is found to have been falsely and

*A foolish man who fritters away matters of importance by silly words, i. e. a trifler.

"It is better to be doing nothing than be doing of nothing," says an old philosopher.

† Aristotle.

"He who loves not others lives unblest."— Home's "Douglas." Aversation, i. e. aversion.