APHORISMS--BOOK I ON THE INTERPRETATION OF NATURE AND THE EMPIRE OF MAN I. Man, as the minister and interpreter of nature, does and understands as much as his observations on the order of nature, either with regard to things or the mind, permit him, and neither knows nor is capable of more. II. The unassisted hand and the understanding left to itself possess but little power. Effects are produced by the means of instruments and helps, which the understanding requires no less than the hand; and as instruments either promote or regulate the motion of the hand, so those that are applied to the mind prompt or protect the understanding. III. Knowledge and human power are synonymous, since the ignorance of the cause frustrates the effect; for nature is only subdued by submission, and that which in contemplative philosophy corresponds with the cause in practical science becomes the rule. IV. Man while operating can only apply or withdraw natural bodies; nature internally performs the rest. V. Those who become practically versed in nature are, the mechanic, the mathematician, the physician, the alchemist, and the _magician_,[2] but all (as matters now stand) with faint efforts and meagre success. VI. It would be madness and inconsistency to suppose that things which have never yet been performed can be performed without employing some hitherto untried means. VII. The creations of the mind and hand appear very numerous, if we judge by books and manufactures; but all that variety consists of an excessive refinement, and of deductions from a few well known matters--_not of a number of axioms_.[3] VIII. Even the effects already discovered are due to chance and experiment rather than to the sciences; for our present sciences are nothing more than peculiar arrangements of matters already discovered, and not methods for discovery or plans for new operations. IX. The sole cause and root of almost every defect in the sciences is this, that while we falsely admire and extol the powers of the human mind, we do not search for its real helps. X. The subtilty of nature is far beyond that of sense or of the understanding: so that the specious meditations, speculations, and theories of mankind are but a kind of insanity, only there is no one to stand by and observe it. XI. As the present sciences are useless for the discovery of effects, so the present system of logic[4] is useless for the discovery of the sciences. XII. The present system of logic rather assists in confirming and rendering inveterate the errors founded on vulgar notions than in searching after truth, and is therefore more hurtful than useful. XIII. The syllogism is not applied to the principles of the sciences, and is of no avail in intermediate axioms,[5] as being very unequal to the subtilty of nature. It forces assent, therefore, and not things.