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 of business.
For expert and execute,and perhaps judge of particulars,one by one; but the general counsels,and the plots and marshalling of affairs,come best form 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 a scholar.
They perfect nature,and are perfected by experience:for natural abilities are like natural plants,that need proyning (pruning) 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 morse.(Studeis go to make up a man’s character.-be-"unt-'stü-dE-"?-"in-'mO-"rAs)
Nay there is no stand 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.(Hair-splitters sim-mini sek-torr-es) If he be not apt to beat over matters,and to call up one thing to prove and illustrate another,let him study the lawyers' cases.So every defect of the mind may have a special receipt