OF STUDIES

Ø  Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability.

Ø  Excess of everything is bad. Thus a Bacon has pointed out, studies gives us pleasure in our leisure hours.

Ø  Studies and Experience must go hand in hand.  Natural abilities are not enough unless they are substantiated, and their deficiencies removed, by learning.

Ø  Bacon uses a simile. he compares these qualities to plants which are left to nature, consequently liable to grow out of shape. Similarly natural abilities should be subjected to studies in order to keep them in good shape.

Ø  As nature is to be subjected to studies, studies too are to be subjected to experience.

Ø  “Crafty men contemn studies, simple men admire them, and wise men use them”.

Ø  Cunning men look down upon books as useless for them.

Ø  The vulgar, fools look upon studies in sheer amazement as belonging to a world above their own low understanding, only to be gaped and gazed at but not to be approached and acquired.

Ø  Wise men, however,  put studies to the best use.

Ø  ”Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested”.

Ø  Summaries and extracts of books are tasteless, insipid reading. They are like distilled water which is completely tasteless.

Ø  “Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man” .

Ø  Full man – a man with full developed understanding.

Ø  Conference – conversation and discussion.

Ø  A readyman – a man with a ready wit.

Ø  An exact man- a man correct even about details.

Ø  “Histories make men wise”

Ø  Bowling- playing at bowls, a game

Ø  Stone-  a disease caused by the deposit of stone particles in the bladder and the kidneys.

Ø  Shooting – archery;

Ø  Studies are to mind what exercise is to the body.

Ø  Most diseases of the body can be cured by specific diseases likewise defects of the mind can be cured with the help of appropriate studies.

Ø  Wandering mind can read Mathematics.

Ø  Subtle distinctions in noticing the things can read Scholastic philosophy.

Ø  The study of legal cases is useful for  man who lacks the ability of going logically from point to point and calling one thing to prove and exemplify another.