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 judgement and disposition of
business. For expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of
particulars, one by one; but the general counsels, and the plots and
marshalling of affairs, come best from those that are learned. To
spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for
ornament is affectation; to make judgement wholly by their rules is
the humour of the 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 one
thing to prove and illustrate another, let him study the lawyers'
cases: so every defect of the mind may have a special receipt.
_Francis Bacon._