The original text and analysis of Bacon's essay on learning are as follows:
Original text:
History makes people wise; poetry makes people clever; mathematics makes people precise; natural history makes people wise People are profound; ethics make people solemn; logic and rhetoric make people eloquent. "Learning changes temperament." Moreover, there is no mental defect that cannot be remedied by considerable knowledge. The purpose of reading for learning is entertainment, decoration and increasing knowledge.
In entertainment, the main purpose of knowledge is to live in seclusion; in decoration, the purpose of knowledge is rhetoric; in talent development, the purpose of knowledge is to judge and handle affairs. Because experienced people are good at implementation, they may be able to judge a small number of things one by one; however, good general discussions and planning and arrangement of affairs come from knowledgeable people. of. Spending too much time on learning is laziness.
To use knowledge too much for decoration is false; to judge things entirely based on the rules of knowledge is the eccentricity of scholars. Knowledge tempers the nature, and itself is tempered by experience; people's talents are like wild flowers and plants, they need to be pruned by knowledge; and if knowledge itself is not limited by experience, its instructions will be too general. Deceitful people despise knowledge, foolish people envy knowledge, and wise people use knowledge.
Because knowledge itself still does not teach people how to use them; the way to use them is other than knowledge, and a kind of intelligence above knowledge can only be obtained through observation and experience. Don't read for the sake of refutation, nor for the sake of belief and blind obedience; nor for the sake of speech and discussion; the goal should be to be able to weigh the importance and examine the affairs.
Analysis:
This is an explanatory essay. It discusses the use of knowledge and the goals and methods of reading and studying. The author believes that reading for learning has three purposes: entertainment (relaxing in seclusion), decoration (familiarity with vocabulary), and increasing knowledge. The purpose of studying is to "be able to weigh the importance and examine the truth." In terms of methods of studying, the author advocates that different reading methods should be used for different books: selective reading, full reading, diligent reading, and careful reading in order to obtain High efficiency.
Moreover, reading should be combined with talking, writing, and note-taking, and combined with making up for one's own "mental deficiencies" to "change temperament through knowledge." These views, to a relative extent, reflect the author's materialist thoughts and attitude of attaching importance to practical science, and they still have cognitive significance and reference value.