Francis Bacon

LXXXV. Nor is it only the admiration of antiquity, authority, and unanimity, that has forced man’s industry to rest satisfied with present discoveries, but, also, the admiration of the effects already placed within his power. For[63] whoever passes in review the variety of subjects, and the beautiful apparatus collected and introduced by the mechanical arts for the service of mankind, will certainly be rather inclined to admire our wealth than to perceive our poverty: not considering that the observations of man and operations of nature (which are the souls and first movers of that variety) are few, and not of deep research; the rest must be attributed merely to man’s patience, and the delicate and well-regulated motion of the hand or of instruments. To take an instance, the manufacture of clocks is delicate and accurate, and appears to imitate the heavenly bodies in its wheels, and the pulse of animals in its regular oscillation, yet it only depends upon one or two axioms of nature.

"Mediocrity, or the middle way, is in most cases a virtue, and highly commendable; but in philosophy and the sciences it is a thing of dangerous consequence. For the path of virtue lies straight forward between two extremes; but the way of truth and knowledge lies through a narrow path, between two vast and hazardous rocks, where a man cannot deviate without falling into one or the other of them. [...] Thus the mind of man, being impatient of a lingering and progressive inquiry, is apt to take a flight, and to rise up to generalities, as it were upon the wings of Icarus; and so, by a premature and unseasonable flight, falls headlong into errors and false conclusions." (407–408)