"Of Studies" by Francis Bacon | Bengali Lecture | Prose [for Hon. 1st Year]

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Of Studies
Francis Bacon
STUDIES serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability.
Their chief use for delight, is in privateness and retiring; for ornament, is in discourse; and for ability, is in the judgment, and disposition (arrangement) of business.
For expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of particulars (small Part), one by one; but the general counsels (suggestion), and the plots (bad suggestion) and marshalling of affairs, come best, from those that are learned.
To spend too much time in studies is sloth (laziness); to use them too much for ornament, is affectation (air, pretend); to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar.
They perfect nature, and are perfected by experience: for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need proyning, by study; and studies themselves, do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience.
Crafty men contemn studies, simple men admire them, and wise men use them; for they teach not their own use; but that is a wisdom without them, and above them, won by observation.
Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider.
Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.
Some books also may be read by deputy, and extracts made of them by others; but that would be only in the less important arguments, and the meaner sort of books, else distilled books are like common distilled waters, flashy things.
Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.
And therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit: and if he read little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know, that he doth not.
Histories make men wise; poets witty; the mathematics subtile; natural philosophy deep; moral grave; logic and rhetoric able to contend.
Abeunt studia in mores. Nay, there is no stond or impediment in the wit, but may be wrought out by fit studies; like as diseases of the body, may have appropriate exercises.
Bowling is good for the stone and reins; shooting for the lungs and breast; gentle walking for the stomach; riding for the head; and the like.
So if a man’s wit be wandering, let him study the mathematics; for in demonstrations, if his wit be called away never so little, he must begin again.
If his wit be not apt to distinguish or find differences, let him study the Schoolmen; for they are cymini sectores.
If he be not apt to beat over matters, and to call up one thing to prove and illustrate another, let him study 197 the lawyers’ cases. So every defect of the mind, may have a special receipt.


‘’ Bacon expresses that studies “serve for Delight, for Ornament, and for Ability.” For delight, Bacon means one’s personal, private education; for “Ornament,” he means in conversation between and among others, which Bacon labels as “Discourse”. Studies for “Ability” lead one to judgment in business and related pursuits. From Bacon’s perspective, men with skilled experience can carry out plans and understand particular circumstances, but men who study are better able to understand important political matters and know how to deal with problem according to their severity like “Marshalling of Affairs”.

Bacon encourages studies but at the same time, he warns that 1) too much studying leads to laziness; 2) if one uses one’s knowledge too often in conversation with others, then one is showing off; and 3) to be guided solely by one’s studies one becomes a scholar rather than a practical man. Bacon’s argument about the value of studies is that studies are wonderful only if influenced by experience because a person’s natural abilities are enhanced by studies, but studies without experience, lead to confusion.

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