Such is the nature of human delight; such the nature of human foresight! As he must have known, what he has so beautifully taught, that a man of genius can seldom be permanently influenced by worldly distinction: as he well knew that his own happiness and utility consisted not in action but in contemplation, (a) as he had published his opinion that "men in great place are thrice servants; servants of the sovereign or state, servants of fame, and servants of business; so as they have no freedom, neither in their persons, nor in their actions, nor in their times,” (b) it is probable that he was urged to this and to every other step on the road to aggrandizement, either by the importunities of his family, or by his favourite opinion, that "knowledge is never so dignified and exalted as when contemplation and action are nearly and strongly conjoined together: a conjunction like unto that of the two highest planets, Saturn the planet of rest and contemplation, and Jupiter the planet of civil society and action.” It has been said by some of the ancient magicians, that they could see clearly all which was to befal others, but that of their own future life they could discern nothing. It might be a curious speculation for any admirer of the works of this great man, to collect the oracles he would have delivered to warn any other philosopher of the probable danger and certain infelicity of accepting such an office in such times. (a) See note F F F at the end. (b) "Thou art become (O worst imprisonment) Imprisoned, now indeed In real darkness of the body, dwells Shut up from outward light."-Samson Agonistes. Essay on Great Place, vol. i. p. 33. To the hope of wealth he would have said, "it diverts and interrupts the prosecution and advancement of knowledge, like unto the golden ball thrown before Atalanta, which, while she goeth aside and stoopeth to take it up, the race is hindered. "Declinat cursus aurumq. volubile tollit." (a) To the importunities of friends he would have answered by his favourite maxim, "You do not duly estimate the value of pleasures; for if you observe well, you shall find the logical part of some men's minds good, but the mathematical part nothing worth: that is, they can judge well of the mode of attaining the end, but ill of the value of the end itself." (b) He would have warned ambition that "the seeled dove mounts and mounts because he is unable to look about him." (c) To the supposition "that worldly power is the means to do good," he would have said, "A man who spends his life in an impartial search after truth, is a better friend to mankind than any statesman or hero, whose merits are commonly confined within the circle of an age or a nation, and are not unlike seasonable and favouring showers, which, though they be profitable and desirable, yet serve for that season only wherein they fall, and for a latitude of ground which they water; but the benefices of the philosopher, like the influences of the sun and the heavenly bodies, are for time permanent, for place universal: those again are commonly mixed with strife and perturbation; (a) Advancement of Learning, vol. ii. p. 52. but these have the true character of divine presence, and come in aura leni without noise or agitation." (d) (d) "Zeno and Chrysippus did greater things in their studies, than if they had led armies, borne offices, or given laws; which in truth they did, not to one city alone, but to all mankind. Their quiet contributed more to the common benefit than the sweat and labour of other people. That retreat is not worth the while, which does not afford a man greater and nobler works than business. There is no slavish attendance upon great officers; no canvassing for places; no making of parties; no disappointments in my pretension to this charge, to that regiment, or to such or such a title; no buoy of any man's favour or fortune, but a calm enjoyment of the general bounties of providence, in company with a good conscience. A wise man is never so busy, as in the solitary contemplation of God and the works of nature. He withdraws himself to attend the service of future ages." Seneca. "There were reckoned above human honours, honours heroical and divine; in the distribution whereof antiquity observed this order. Founders of states, lawgivers, extirpers of tyrants, fathers of their country, and other eminent persons in civil merit, were honoured with the title of Worthies only, or Demi-Gods; such as were Theseus, Minos, Romulus, and the like: on the other side, such as were inventors and authors of new arts, and such as endowed man's life with new commodities and accessions, were ever consecrated among the greater and entire gods, which happened to Ceres, Bacchus, Mercury, Apollo, and others, which indeed was done justly, and upon sound judgment. The introduction of noble inventions seems to hold by far the most excellent place among all human actions. And this was the judgment of antiquity, which attributed divine honours to inventors, but conferred only heroical honours upon those who deserved well in civil affairs, such as the founders of empires, legislators, and deliverers of their country. And whoever rightly considers it will find this a judicious custom in former ages, since the benefits of inventors may extend to all mankind, but civil benefits only to particular countries or seats of men; and these civil benefits seldom descend to more than a few ages, whereas inventions are perpetuated through the course of time. Besides, a state is seldom amended, in its civil affairs, without force and perturbation, whilst inventions spread their advantage, without doing injury, or causing disturbance." Advancement of Learning, vol. ii. p. 62. In his New Atlantis he says, "We have two very long and fair galleries: in one of these we place patterns and samples of all manner of the more rare and excellent inventions; in the other we place the statues of all principal inventors. There we have the statue of your Columbus, that The flattering illusion of good to result from the union of contemplation and action would have been dissipated by the admonition, that the life and faculties of man are so discovered the West Indies; also the inventor of ships; your monk, that was the inventor of ordnance and of gunpowder; the inventor of music; the inventor of letters; the inventor of printing; the inventor of observations of astronomy; the inventor of works in metal; the inventor of glass; the inventor of silk of the worm; the inventor of wine; the inventor of corn and bread; the inventor of sugars; and all these by more certain tradition than you have. Then have we divers inventors of our own, of excellent works, which since you have not seen, it were too long to make descriptions of them; and besides, in the right understanding of those descriptions you might easily err. For, upon every invention of value, we erect a statue to the inventor, and give him a liberal and honourable reward. These statues are some of brass; some of marble and touchstone; some of cedar and other special woods gilt and adorned; some of iron; some of silver; some of gold." "For my part, I should think of a man who spent his time in such a painful impartial search after truth a better friend to mankind than the greatest statesman or hero, the advantage of whose labours is confined to a little part of the world and a short space of time, whereas a ray of truth may enlighten the whole world, and extend to future ages." Minute Philosopher. "But to speak my mind freely on the subject of consequences, I am not so scrupulous perhaps, in my regard to them, as many of my profession are apt to be my nature is frank and open, and warmly disposed, not only to seek, but to speak what I take to be true, which disposition has been greatly confirmed by the situation into which Providence has thrown me. For I was never trained to pace in the trammels of the church, nor tempted by the sweets of its preferment to sacrifice the philosophic freedom of a studious to the servile restraints of an ambitious life: and from this very circumstance, as often as I reflect upon it, I feel that comfort in my own breast which no external honours can bestow. I persuade myself that the life and faculties of man, at the best but short and limited, cannot be employed more rationally or laudably than in the search of knowledge; and especially of that sort which relates to our duty and conduces to our happiness. In these inquiries, therefore, wherever I perceive any glimmering of truth before me, I readily pursue, and endeavour to trace it to its source; without any reserve or caution of pushing the discovery too far, or opening too great a glare of it to the public. I look upon the discovery of any thing which is true as a valuable acquisition to society; which can short and limited that this union has always failed, and must be injurious both to the politician and to the philosopher. (a) To the politician, as, from variety of speculation, he would neither be prompt in action nor consistent in general conduct; (b) and as, from meditating upon the universal frame of nature, he would have little disposition to confine his views to the circle where his usefulness might be most beneficial. To the philosopher, as powers intended to enlarge the province of knowledge, and enlighten distant ages, would be wasted upon subjects of mere temporary interest, debates in courts of justice, and not possibly hurt or obstruct the good effect of any other truth whatsoever; for they all partake of one common essence, and necessarily coincide with each other and like the drops of rain, which fall separately into the river, mix themselves at once with the stream, and strengthen the general current." Middleton. : (a) "Sed quid ego hæc," says Cicero, "quæ cupio deponere, et toto animo, atq: omni curâ piλooope. Sic, inquam, in animo est: vellem ab initio." "Indeed, my lord, I greatly deceive myself, if in this hard season, I would give a peck of refuse wheat for all that is called fame and honour in the world." Such is the lamentation of Burke. "If this," says Lord Bacon, "be to be a Chancellor, I think if the great seal lay upon Hounslow Heath, nobody would take it up." "In the traditions of astrology, the natures and dispositions of men are not without some colour of truth, distinguished from the predominancies of planets; as that some are by nature made and proportioned for contemplation, others for matters civil, others for war, others for advancement, others for pleasure, others for arts, others for changeable course of life, but none the union of the opposite qualities of extreme contemplation and extreme action." De Aug. (b)" Men of genius are rarely either prompt in action, or consistent in general conduct. Their early habits have been those of contemplative indolence, and the day dreams with which they have been accustomed to amuse their solitude adapt them for splendid speculation and temperate and practicable counsels."-Coleridge. See similar observations in Aiken's Miscellaneous Pieces in Prose, in the Essay against inconsistency in our expectations. |