The Advancement of Learning

by Bacon, Francis; Kiernan, Michael

• ISBN13: 9780198123484
• ISBN10: 0198123485
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2000-04-20
• Publisher: Clarendon Press

Summary

This seminal philosophical treatise, originally penned in 1605 and considered the first major philosophical work written in English, also offers the first description of science as a tool to improve the human condition. This breakthrough work of the English Renaissance hailed new times and new possibilities for the human species. Bacon catalogs the current state of learning, the obstacles to its progress, and his own plans for its revitalization. Newly designed and reset as an inexpensive paperback, this edition makes available a work that has significantly defined the modern era.

Author Biography

Michael Kiernan is Associate Professor of English, Pennsylvania State University, and editor of Francis Bacon: Essayes or Counsels, Civill and Morall (OUP/Harvard, 1985) to be reissued as Volume XV of OFB, 2000.

Table of Contents

List of Plates	x
References, Abbreviations and Symbols	xi
Introduction
Bacon's Programme for the Reform of Knowledge	xvii
Tvvoo Bookes	xvii
Seeking `publique designation' and `voluntary endeuours'	xxxi
Bacon and the British Solomon	xxxviii
The Text and its Transmission	1vii	(1)
Resources for a Copy-Text	1vii	(1)
05 in the printing-house	1vii	(1)
The Reprint Editions 29 and 33	1xxx	(1)
This Edition: Principles and Conventions	lxxxiii
THE TEXT
The Aduancement of Learning	1	(194)
Emendations of Accidentals	195	(10)
THE COMMENTARY
Commentary on The Aduancement of Learning	205	(158)
Glossary	363	(41)
APPENDICES
I. Bibliographical Description and Technical Notes	387	(12)
II. Signature References in this Edition with corresponding Page Numbers in SEH	399	(5)
Select Bibliography	404	(5)
Index to the Commentary	409

Excerpts

Excerpt

To the King

1. There were under the law, excellent King, both daily sacrifices and freewill offerings; the one proceeding upon ordinary observance, the other upon a devout cheerfulness: in like manner there belongeth to kings from their servants both tribute of duty and presents of affection. In the former of these I hope I shall not live to be wanting, according to my most humble duty, and the good pleasure of your Majesty's employments: for the latter, I thought it more respective to make choice of some oblation, which might rather refer to the propriety and excellency of your individual person, than to the business of your crown and state.

2. Wherefore, representing your Majesty many times unto my mind, and beholding you not with the inquisitive eye of presumption, to discover that which the Scripture telleth me is inscrutable, but with the observant eye of duty and admiration; leaving aside the other parts of your virtue and fortune, I have been touched, yea, and possessed with an extreme wonder at those your virtues and faculties, which the Philosophers call intellectual; the largeness of your capacity, the faithfulness of your memory, the swiftness of your apprehension, the penetration of your judgement, and the facility and order of your elocution: and I have often thought, that of all the persons living that I have known, your Majesty were the best instance to make a man of Plato's opinion, that all knowledge is but remembrance, and that the mind of man by nature knoweth all things, and hath but her own native and original notions (which by the strangeness and darkness of this tabernacle of the body are sequestered) again revived and restored: such a light of nature I have observed in your Majesty, and such a readiness to take and blaze from the least occasion presented, or the least spark of another's knowledge delivered. And as the Scripture saith of the wisest king, "That his heart was as the sands of the sea"; which though it be one of the largest bodies, yet it consisteth of the smallest and dunest portions; so hath God given your Majesty a composition of understanding admirable, being able to compass and comprehend the greatest matters, and nevertheless to touch and apprehend the least; whereas it should seem an impossibility in nature, for the same instrument to make itself ïfor great and small works. And for your gift of speech, I call to mind what Cornelius Tacitus saith of Augustus Caesar: "Augusto proïfuens, et quae principem deceret, eloquentia fuit." For if we note it well, speech that is uttered with labour and diffculty, or speech that savoureth of the affectation of art and precepts, or speech that is framed after the imitation of some pattern of eloquence, though never so excellent; all this hath somewhat servile, and holding of the subject.