[604] A belief in astrology, or at least the influence of the stars was almost universal in the time of Bacon. [605] Germany. [606] Charlemagne. [607] When led thither by Alexander the Great. [608] Striking. [609] Application of the “aries,” or battering-ram. [610] This fragment was found among Lord Bacon’s papers, and published by Dr. Rawley in his Resuscitatio. [611] Tac. Hist. ii. 80. [612] Cæs. de Bell. Civ. i. 6. [613] Tac. Ann. i. 5. [614] _Vide_ Herod. viii. 108, 109. [615] Varro distributes the ages of the world into three periods; viz: the unknown, the fabulous, and the historical. Of the former, we have no accounts but in Scripture; for the second, we must consult the ancient poets, such as Hesiod, Homer, or those who wrote still earlier, and then again come back to Ovid, who, in his Metamorphoses, seems, in imitation perhaps of some ancient Greek poet, to have intended a complete collection, or a kind of continued and connected history of the fabulous age, especially with regard to changes, revolutions, or transformations. [616] Most of these fables are contained in Ovid’s Metamorphoses and Fasti, and are fully explained in Bohn’s Classical Library translation. [617] Homer’s Hymn to Pan. [618] Cicero, Epistle to Atticus, 5. [619] Ovid, Metamorphoses, b. ii. [620] This refers to the confused mixture of things, as sung by Virgil:— “Namque canebat uti magnum per inane coacta Semina terrarumque animæque marisque fuissent; Et liquidi simul ignis; ut his exordia primis Omnia, et ipse tener mundi concreverit orbis.”— _Ecl._ vi. 81. [621] This is always supposed to be the case in vision, the mathematical demonstrations in optics proceeding invariably upon the assumption of this phenomenon. [622] “Torva leæna lupum sequitur, lupus ipse capellam: Florentem cytisum sequitur lasciva capella.” _Virgil_, _Ecl._ ii. 63. [623] Ovid, Rem. Amoris, v. 343. Mart. Epist. [624] Psalm xix. 1. [625] Syrinx, signifying a reed, or the ancient pen. [626] Ovid, Metam. b. iv. [627] Thus it is the excellence of a general, early to discover what turn the battle is likely to take; and looking prudently behind, as well as before, to pursue a victory so as not to be unprovided for a retreat. [628] It may be remembered that the Athenian peasant voted for the banishment of Aristides, because he was called the Just. Shakspeare forcibly expresses the same thought:— “Let me have men about me that are fat; Sleek-headed men, and such as sleep o’ nights: Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look; He thinks too much: such men are dangerous.” If Bacon had completed his intended work upon “Sympathy and Antipathy,” the constant hatred evinced by ignorance of intellectual superiority, originating sometimes in the painful feeling of inferiority, sometimes in the fear of worldly injury would not have escaped his notice.