And a little after, My conceit of his Person was never increased toward him, by his place or honours. But I have and do reverence him for the greatness that was only proper to himself, in that he feem'd to me ever by his work, one of the greatest men, and most worthy of admiration, that had been in many ages. In his Adverfity I ever prayed, that God would give him ftrength, for greatnefs he could not want. Neither could I condole in a word or fyllable for him; as knowing no Accident could do harm to Vertue, but rather help to make it manifeft.

A. Cowley, in his Poem to the Royal Society, after fome reflections upon the State of Philofophy aforetime, goes on,

S%
Ome fem exalted Spirits this latter Age has shown,
That labour'd to affert the Liberty
From Guardians, who were now Usurpers grown)
Of this Old Minor ftill, Captiv'd Philosophy;
But 'twas Rebellion call'd to fight
For fuch a long oppreffed Right.
BACON at last, a mighty Man, arose,
Whom a wife King and Nature chofe
Lord Chancellor of both their Laws,
And boldly undertook the injur'd Pupils caufe.

III.
Authority, which did a Body boast,

Though "twas but Air condens'd, and stalk'd about,
Like fome old Giants more Gigantic Ghost;
To terrifie the Learned Rout

With the plain Magick of true Reasons Light,
He chac'd out of our fight,

Nor

リ

By the vain fhadows of the Dead:

(fled;

To Graves from whence it rofe,the conquer'd Phantome
He broke that Monstrous God which stood
In midst of th' Orchard, and the whole did claim,
Which with a ufelefs Sith of Wood,
And fomething else not worth a name,
(Both vast for fhew, yet neither fit
Or to Defend, or to Beget;
Ridiculous and fenceless Terrors!) made
Children and fuperftitious Men afraid.
The Orchard's open now, and free;
BACON has broke that Scare-crow Deity;
Come, enter, all that will,

P

Behold the rip'ned Fruit, come gather now your fill. Tet ftill, methinks, we fain would be Catching at the Forbidden Tree,

We would be like the Deitie,

When Truth and Falfhood, Good and Evil, we
Without the Sences aid within our felves would see;
For 'tis Ged only who can find
All Nature in his Mind.

IV.

From Words, which are but Pictures of the Thought,
(Though we our Thoughts from them perverfly drew)
To Things, the Minds right Object, be it brought,
Like foolish Birds to painted Grapes we flew ;
He fought and gather'd for our ufe the True ;
And when on heaps the chofen Bunches lay,
He preft them wifely the Mechanic way,
Till all their juyce did in one Veffel joyn,
Ferment into a Nourishment Divine,

The thirsty Souls refreshing Wine.

Who

Who to the life an exact Piece would make,
Must not from others Work a Copy take;
No, not from Rubens or Vandike;
Much lefs content himself to make it like
Th' Ideas and the Images which ly
In his own Fancy, or bis Memory.

No, he before his fight must place
The Natural and Living Face;
The real Object must command
Each Judgment of his Eye, and Motion of his Hand.

V.

1

From thefe long Errors of the way,
In which our wandring Predecessors went,
And like th' old Hebrews many years did ftray
In Defarts but of small extent,
BACON, like Mofes, led us forth at last,
The barren Wilderness he past,
Did on the very Border stand
Of the bleft promis'd Land,
And from the Mountains Top of his Exalted Wit,
Saw it himself, and fhew'd us it.
But Life did never to one Man allow
Time to Discover Worlds, and Conquer too
Nor can fo fhort a Line fufficient be
To fathom the vast depths of Natures Sea:
The work be did we ought t' admire,
And were unjust if we should more require
From his few years, divided 'twixt th' Excess
Of low Affliction, and high Happiness:
For who on things remote can fix his fight,
That's always in a Triumph, or a Fight?

A. Cowley.
ESSAYS.

ESSAYS.

I:

Of Truth.

HAT is Truth? faid jefting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer. Certainly there be, that delight in giddiness, and count it a Bondage to fix a Belief; affecting free-will in thinking, as well as in acting. And though the Sects of Philofophers of that kind be gone, yet there remain certain difcourfing Wits, which are of the fame Veins, though there be not fo much Blood in them, as was in those of the Antients. But it is not only the difficulty and labour, which men take in finding out of Truth; nor again, that when it is found, it impofeth upon mens thoughts, that doth bring Lies in favour; but a natural, though corrupt Love, of the Lie it felf. One of the later Schools of the Grecians examineth the matter, and is at a ftand, to think what fhould be in it, that Men fhould love Lies; where neither they make for pleafure, as with Poets, nor L S

B

for

A