STUDIES serve for delight, for ornament, and
for ability. Their chief use for delight, is in
privateness and retiring; for ornament, is in dis-
course; and for ability, is in the judgment, and
disposition of business. For expert men can exe-
cute, and perhaps judge of particulars, one by one;
but the general counsels, and the plots and mar-
shalling 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 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 ex-
perience. 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 with-
out 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 dis-
course; 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 impor-
tant arguments, and the meaner sort of books, else
distilled books are like common distilled waters,
flashy things. Reading maketh a full man; confer-
ence 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 wan-
dering, 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.
文学作品欣赏—Of Studies (论学习）
