PLEASURE OF KNOWLEDGE. THE pleasure and delight of knowledge and learning far surpasseth all other in nature; for shall the pleasures of the affections so exceed the pleasures of the senses, as much as the obtaining of desire or victory exceedeth a song or a dinner? and must not of consequence, the pleasures of the intellect or understanding exceed the pleasures of the affections? We see in all other pleasures there is a satiety, and after they be used, their verdure departeth; which sheweth well they be but deceits of pleasure, and not pleasure, and that it was the novelty which pleased and not the quality; and therefore we see that voluptuous men turn friars, and ambitious princes turn melancholy; but of knowledge there is no satiety, but satisfaction and appetite are perpetually interchangeable; and therefore appeareth to be good, in itself simply, without fallacy or accident. Neither is that pleasure of small efficacy and contentment to the mind of man, which the poet Lucretius describeth elegantly; Suave mari magno, turbantibus æquora ventis, &c. "It is a view of delight," saith he, "to stand Heaven and earth may pass away, but my words will not pass away. A perpetual feast of nectar'd sweets, or walk upon the shore side, and to see a ship tossed with tempest upon the sea, or to be in a fortified tower, and to see two battles join upon a plain. But it is a pleasure incomparable for the mind of man to be settled, landed, and fortified in the certainty of truth, and from thence to descry. and behold the errors, perturbations, labours, and wanderings up and down of other men." So always that this prospect be with pity, and not with swelling or pride. LOVER OF TRUTH. and encourage OUR trumpet doth not summon, men to tear and rend one another with contradictions; and, in a civil rage, to bear arms and wage war against themselves; but rather that, a peace concluded between them, they may, with joint forces, direct their strength against nature herself:* and take her high towers, and dismantle * Diderot, in his Tract" De l'Interprétation de la Na-. ture," says, "L'intérêt de la vérité demanderoit que ceux qui réfléchissent daignâssent enfin s'associer à ceux qui se remuent, afin que le spéculative fût dispensé de se donner du mouvement; que le manoeuvre eût en but dans les mouvemens infinis qu'il se donne ; que tous nos efforts se trouvâssent réunis et dirigés en même temps contre la résistance de la nature; et que, dans cette espèce de ligne philosophique, chacun fît le rôle qui lui convient." Lloyd, in his Life of Wilson, says, "An argument of a great capacity in a man of his great place, and greater employment; whose candour was yet equal with his parts, in her fortified holds, and thus enlarge the borders of man's dominion, so far as Almighty God of his goodness shall permit. ON GOVERNMENT. IN Orpheus's theatre, all beasts and birds assembled; and forgetting their several appetites, some of prey, some of game, some of quarrel, stood all sociably together, listening unto the airs and accords of the harp; the sound whereof no sooner ceased, or was drowned by some louder noise, but every beast returned to his own nature; wherein is aptly described the nature and condition of men, genuously passing by the particular infirmities of those who contributed anything to the advancement of a general learning; judging it fitter that men of abilities should jointly engage against ignorance and barbarism, than severally clash with one another. From a community of goods there must needs arise contention, whose enjoyment should be greater, and from that contention all kind of calamities must unavoidably ensue, which, by the instinct of nature every man is taught to shun. Having, therefore, thus arrived at two maxims of human nature, the one arising from the concupiscible part, which desires to appropriate to itself the use of those things in which all others have a joint interest; the other proceeding from the rational, which teaches every man to fly a contra-natural dissolution as the greatest mischief that can arrive to nature; which principles being laid down, I seem from them to have demonstrated by a most evident connexion in this little work of mine, first the absolute necessity of leagues and contracts, and thence the rudiments both of moral and civil prudence. HOBBS. who are full of savage and unreclaimed desires of profit, of lust, of revenge: which, as long as they give ear to precepts, to laws, to religion, sweetly touched with eloquence and persuasion of books, of sermons, of harangues, so long is society and peace maintained; but if these instruments be silent, or sedition and tumult make them not audible, all things dissolve into anarchy and confusion.* See ante, page 22. |