Of Goodness and Goodness of Nature
by
Francis Bacon
(Essay)
I take goodness in this sense, the affecting
of the weal of men, which is that the Grecians call Philanthropia; and the word
humanity (as it is used) is a little too light to express it. Goodness I call
the habit, and goodness of nature the inclination. This of all virtues and
dignities of the mind is the greatest, being the character of the Deity: and
without it man is a busy, mischievous, wretched thing, no better than a kind of
vermin. Goodness answers to the theological virtue charity, and admits no excess
but error. The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall: the desire
of knowledge in excess caused man to fall: but in charity there is no excess,
neither can angel or man come in danger by it. The inclination to goodness is
imprinted deeply in the nature of man; insomuch, that if it issue not towards
men, it will take unto other living creatures; as it is seen in the Turks, a
cruel people, who nevertheless are kind to beasts, and give alms to dogs and
birds; insomuch, as Busbechius reporteth, a Christian boy in Constantinople had
liked to have been stoned for gagging in a waggishness a long-billed fowl.
Errors indeed, in this virtue, of goodness or charity, may be committed. The
Italians have an ungracious proverb, "Tanto buon che val niente;"
"So good, that he is good for nothing:" and one of the doctors of
Italy, Nicholas Machiavel, had the confidence to put in writing almost in plain
terms, "That the Christian faith had given up good men in prey to those
that are tyrannical and unjust;" which he spake, because, indeed, there
was never law or sect or opinion did so much magnify goodness as the Christian
religion doth; therefore toavoid the scandal and the danger both, it is good to
take knowledge of the errors of an habit so excellent. Seek the good of other
men, but be not in bondage to their faces or fancies; for that is but facility
or softness, which taketh an honest mind prisoner. Neither give thou Æsop's
cock a gem, who would be better pleased and happier if he had a barley-corn.
The example of God teacheth the lesson truly; "He sendeth his rain, and
maketh the sun to shine upon the just and the unjust;" but he doth not
rain wealth, nor shine honour and virtues upon men equally; common benefits are
to be communicated with all, but peculiar benefits with choice. And beware how
in making the portraiture thou breakest the pattern: for divinity maketh the
love of ourselves the pattern; the love of our neighbours but the portraiture:
"Sell all thou hast and give it to the poor, and follow me;" but sell
not all thou hast except thou come and follow me; that is, except thou have a
vocation wherein thou mayest do as much good with little means as with great;
for otherwise, in feeding the streams, thou driest the fountain. Neither is
there only a habit of goodness directed by right reason; but there is in some
men, even in nature, a disposition towards it; as on the other side, there is a
natural malignity; for there be that in their nature do not affect the good of
others. The lighter sort of malignity turneth but to a crossness, or forwardness,
or aptness to oppose, or difficileness, or the like; but the deeper sort to
envy, and mere mischief. Such men in other men's calamities, are, as it were,
in season, and are ever on the loading part: not so good as the dogs that
licked Lazarus sores, but like flies that are still buzzing upon any thing that
is raw; misanthropi, that make it their practice to bring men to the bough, and
yet have never a tree for the purpose in their gardens, as Timon had; such
dispositions are the very errors of human nature, and yet they are the fittest
timber to make great politics of; like to knee timber, that is good for ships
that are ordained to be tossed, but not for building houses that shall stand
firm. The parts and signs of goodness are many. If a man be gracious and
courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world, and that his
heart is no island cut off from other lands, but a continent that joins to
them: if he be compassionate towards the afflictions of others, it shows that
his heart is like the noble tree that is wounded itself when it gives the balm:
if he easily pardons and remits offences, it shows that his mind is planted
above injuries, so that he cannot be shot: if he be thankful for small benefits,
it shows that he weighs men's minds, and not their trash: but, above all, if he
have St. Paul's perfection, that he would wish to be an anathema from Christ
for the salvation of his brethren, it shows much of a divine nature, and a kind
of conformity with Christ himself.
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