Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning, Divine and Human.
Advancement of Learning, The, by Francis Bacon (1605), the original title being ‘Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning, Divine and Human.’ This book, received with great favor by the court and by scholars, was afterwards enlarged and published in Latin with the title ‘De Augmentis Scientiarum,’ as the first part of a monumental labor, ‘The Instauration of the Sciences,’ of which the second part was the still famous ‘Novum Organum,’ on which Bacon’s fame as a philosopher rests. The ‘Advancement of Learning’ considers first the excellence of knowledge and the best way of spreading it, what has been already done to scatter it, and what left undone. The author then proceeds to divide all knowledge into three kingdoms or inclosures,—history, poetry, and philosophy; which appeal directly to the three manifestations of human understanding, memory, imagination, and reason. The smaller third of the book relates to revealed religion.
Book I
Dedication to King James the First
To the King. There were under the law, excellent King, both daily sacrifices and freewill offeri...
I. Of Cavils against Learning
(1) In the entrance to the former of these—to clear the way and, as it were, to make silence, to ...
II. Objections of Politicians
(1) And as for the disgraces which learning receiveth from politics, they be of this nature: that...
III. Pretended discredits to Learning by learned men
(1) Now therefore we come to that third sort of discredit or diminution of credit that groweth un...
IV. How the follies of Learned Men have dishonoured Learning
(1) Now I proceed to those errors and vanities which have intervened amongst the studies themselv...
V. Other Errors of Learned Men which mar the Progress and Credit of Learning
(1) The first of these is the extreme affecting of two extremities: the one antiquity, the other ...
VI. Divine Proofs of the Dignity of Learning
(1) First, therefore, let us seek the dignity of knowledge in the archetype or first platform, wh...
VII. Human Proofs
(1) As for human proofs, it is so large a field, as in a discourse of this nature and brevity it ...
VIII. Excellencies of Learning enumerated
(1) To proceed now from imperial and military virtue to moral and private virtue; first, it is an...
Book II
The Advancement of Learning commended to the care of Kings
To the King. (1) It might seem to have more convenience, though it come often otherwise to pass ...
I. Triple Distribution of Human Learning. Of Natural History
(1) The parts of human learning have reference to the three parts of man’s understanding, which i...
II. Of Civil History
(1) For civil history, it is of three kinds; not unfitly to be compared with the three kinds of p...
III. Ecclesiastical History
(1) History ecclesiastical receiveth the same divisions with history civil: but further in the pr...
IV. Poetry
(1) Poesy is a part of learning in measure of words, for the most part restrained, but in all oth...
V. Knowledge divided first into Divinity and Philosophy
(1) The knowledge of man is as the waters, some descending from above, and some springing from be...
VI. Of Divine Philosophy
(1) This science being therefore first placed as a common parent like unto Berecynthia, which had...
VII. Of Natural Philosophy, Physical and Metaphysical
(1) Leaving therefore divine philosophy or natural theology (not divinity or inspired theology, w...
VIII. Of Mathematics, Pure and Mixed
(1) Nevertheless, there remaineth yet another part of natural philosophy, which is commonly made ...
IX. Human Philosophy, or the Knowledge of Ourselves
(1) We come therefore now to that knowledge whereunto the ancient oracle directeth us, which is t...
X. Of Arts concerning the Body
(1) The knowledge that concerneth man’s body is divided as the good of man’s body is divided, unt...
XI. Human Philosophy as it concerns the Mind
(1) For human knowledge which concerns the mind, it hath two parts; the one that inquireth of the...
XII. Division of Knowledge into Intellectual and Moral
(1) The knowledge which respecteth the faculties of the mind of man is of two kinds—the one respe...
XIII. Of Invention
(1) Invention is of two kinds much differing—the one of arts and sciences, and the other of speec...
XIV. Of Judgment
(1) Now we pass unto the arts of judgment, which handle the natures of proofs and demonstrations,...
XV. Of the Preservation of Knowledge
(1) The custody or retaining of knowledge is either in writing or memory; whereof writing hath tw...
XVI. Transmission of Knowledge
(1) There remaineth the fourth kind of rational knowledge, which is transitive, concerning the ex...
XVII. Of the Methods of delivering Knowledge
(1) For the method of tradition, I see it hath moved a controversy in our time. But as in civil ...
XVIII. Of Rhetoric
(1) Now we descend to that part which concerneth the illustration of tradition, comprehended in t...
XIX. Appendices to the Methods of Delivery
(1) There remain two appendices touching the tradition of knowledge, the one critical, the other ...
XX. Of Ethics in general
(1) We proceed now to that knowledge which considereth of the appetite and will of man: whereof S...
XXI. Of Private and Public Good
(1) To resume private or particular good, it falleth into the division of good active and passive...
XXII. Of Moral Culture
(1) Now, therefore, that we have spoken of this fruit of life, it remaineth to speak of the husba...
XXIII. Distribution of Civil Knowledge
(1) Civil knowledge is conversant about a subject which of all others is most immersed in matter,...
XXIV. Conclusion of the Review of Philosophy in general
Thus have I concluded this portion of learning touching civil knowledge; and with civil knowledge...
XXV. Of Theology
(1) The prerogative of God extendeth as well to the reason as to the will of man: so that as we a...
Conclusion
Thus have I made as it were a small globe of the intellectual world, as truly and faithfully as I...