arch, says Lord Bacon, whether there may not be a kind of
magnetic power which operates between the earth and heavy bodies,
between the moon and the ocean, between the planets, etc. In another
place he says, either heavy bodies must be carried toward the center
of the earth, or must be reciprocally attracted by it; and in the
latter case it is evident that the nearer bodies in their falling,
draw toward the earth, the stronger they will attract one another. We
must, says he, make an experiment to see whether the same clock will
go faster on the top of a mountain or at the bottom of a mine; whether
the strength of the weights decreases on the mountain and increases in
the mine. It is probable that the earth has a true attractive power.

This forerunner in philosophy was also an elegant writer, a historian,
and a wit.

His moral essays are greatly esteemed, but they were drawn up in the
view of instructing rather than of pleasing; and, as they are not a
satire upon mankind, like Rochefoucauld's "Maxims," nor written upon a
skeptical plan, like Montaigne's "Essays," they are not so much read
as those two ingenious authors.

II

ENGLAND'S REGARD FOR MEN OF LETTERS[41]

Neither the English nor any other people have foundations established
in favor of the polite arts like those in France. There are
universities in most countries, but it is in France only that we meet
with so beneficial an encouragement for astronomy and all parts of the
mathematics, for physic, for researches into antiquity, for painting,
sculpture, and architecture. Louis XIV has immortalized his name by
these several foundations, and this immortality did not cost him two
hundred thousand livres a year.

[Footnote 41: From the "Letters on England."]

I must confess that one of the things I very much wonder at is that as
the Parliament of Great Britain have promised a reward of L20,000 to
any person who may discover the longitude, they should never have once
thought to imitate Louis XIV in his munificence with regard to the
arts and sciences.

Merit, indeed, meets in England with rewards of another kind, which
redound more to the honor of the nation. The English have so great a
veneration for exalted talents, that a man of merit in their country
is always sure of making his fortune. Mr. Addison in France would have
been elected a member of one of the academies, and, by the credit of
some women, might have obtained a yearly pension of twelve