So much stress has, notwithstanding this illustrious example of the master, been laid, ever since the publication of the Baconian or inductive philosophy, upon the bare accumulation of facts, and so much has been written against generalizing and hypothesizing, that it may be as well, before quitting the subject, to point out wherein the disciples of Bacon have neglected the precepts of their master; and to inquire whether this neglect, and the only _partial_ adoption of his teachings, have not contributed greatly to the advancement of mere Knowledge at the expense of true Wisdom, and thus been very important causes of the degeneracy of modern mind.
Bacon seems to have foreseen this effect of the exclusive adoption of the experimental part of his philosophy—the only part which men have yet had the courage to adopt—when he said, “Our way of _discovering the sciences_ almost _levels the capacities_ of men, and leaves little room for excellence, as it performs all things by sure rules and demonstrations, and therefore these discoveries of ours are, as we have often said, rather owing to felicity than to any great talent, and are rather the production of time than of genius.”[27] It was for this reason that he so earnestly, as we shall see hereafter, insisted against its use by young and common minds, or as a means of mental cultivation. And too truly has the prophetic caution been fulfilled! Nevertheless, as it will be loudly denied that modern mind is degenerate, it may be as well to ask how much we are in anything, except physical science (facts, or what Bacon calls “Experience”), in advance of our two hundred years’ dead ancestors. Array the names in our list of Cogitatives, chronologically and analytically, or do so by any list of great thinkers, and you will scarcely find a proportion of one since 1700, to three who lived between 1550 and that date.
Nevertheless, though there is this falling off in Wisdom, how vast has been the accession of Knowledge. Bacon, in his day, complained that the former, (Reason) had gone on without the latter (Experience); so that, while mind had attained the highest flights of which it seemed capable, the arcana of nature were yet unexplored, and little or nothing had been done to advance man’s physical welfare. He said that, hitherto, reason and experience were as new gifts of the gods:—the one laid on the back of a light bird, the other on a dull ass, and that as yet they had not been united. His object was to unite them; to this purpose he devoted his gifted mind and strained his utmost energies. Yet if he were living now he would be compelled to make the same complaint, with this variation however, that men have abandoned the burden of the bird, and have loaded themselves with that of the ass.