Francis Bacon

Francis Bacon was the founder of the modern scientific method.   The


focus on the new scientific method is on orderly experimentation.   For Bacon,


experiments that produce results are important.   Bacon pointed out the need


for clear and accurate thinking, showing that any mastery of the world in


which man lives was dependent upon careful understanding.   This understanding


is based solely yyon the facts of this world and not as the ancients held it


in ancient philosophy.   This new modern science provides the foundation for


modern political science.   Bacon's political science completely separated


religion and philosophy.   For Bacon, nothing exists in the universe except


individual bodies.   Although he did not offer a complete theory of the nature


of the universe, he pointed the way that science, as a new civil religion,


might take in developing such a theory.


        Bacon divided theology into the natural and the revealed.   Natural


theology is the knowledge of God which we can get from the study of nature and


the creatures of God.   Convincing proof is given of the existance of God but


nothing more.   Anything else must come from revealed theology.   SCience and


philosophy have felt the need to justify themselves to laymen.   The belieft


that nature is something to be vexed and tortured to the compliance of man


will not satisfy man nor laymen.   Natural science finds its proper method when


the 'scientist' puts Nature to the question, tortures her by experiment and


wrings from her answers to his questions.   The House of Solomon is directly


related to these thoughts.   "It is dedicated to the study of Works and the


Creatures of God" (Bacon, 436).   Wonder at religious questions was natural,


but, permitted free reign, would destroy science by absorbing the minds and


concerns of men.   The singular advantage of...