the labors of
Aristotle are the foundation of all knowledge, no one can estimate the
injury done by means of these bad translations."[25]

Bacon had occasion for lamenting not only the character of the
translations in use, but also the fact that many of the most important
works of the ancients were not translated at all, and hence lay out of
the reach of all but the rare scholars, like himself and his friend
Grostete, who were able, through their acquaintance with the languages
in which they were written, to make use of them, provided manuscripts
could be found for reading. "We have few useful works on philosophy in
Latin. Aristotle composed a thousand volumes, as we read in his Life,
and of these we have but three of any notable size, namely,--on Logic,
Natural History, and Metaphysics; so that all the other scientific works
that he composed are wanting to the Latins, except some tractates and
small little books, and of these but very few. Of his Logic two of the
best books are deficient, which Hermann had in Arabic, but did not
venture to translate. One of them, indeed, he did translate, or caused
to be translated, but so ill that the translation is of no sort of value
and has never come into use. Aristotle wrote fifty excellent books about
Animals, as Pliny says in the eighth book of his Natural History, and I
have seen them in Greek, and of these the Latins have only nineteen
wretchedly imperfect little books. Of his Metaphysics the Latins read
only the ten books which they have, while there are many more; and of
these ten which they read, many chapters are wanting in the translation,
and almost infinite lines. Indeed, the Latins have nothing worthy; and
therefore it is necessary that they should know the languages, for the
sake of translating those things that are deficient and needful. For,
moreover, of the works on secret sciences, in which the secrets and
marvels of Nature are explored, they have little except fragments here
and there, which scarcely suffice to excite the very wisest to study and
experiment and to inquire by themselves after those things which are
lacking to the dignity of wisdom; while the crowd of students are not
moved to any worthy undertaking, and grow so languid and asinine over
these ill translations, that they lose utterly their time and study and
expense. They are held, indeed, by appearances alone; for they do not
care what they know, but what they seem to know to the silly
multitude."