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00 Introduction - The New Atlantis - Sir Francis Bacon · Classic Science Fiction Books

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  Speaker 1: Section zero introductory note. Bacon's literary executor, doctor Rowley, published
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  Speaker 1: The New Atlantist in sixteen twenty seven, the year after
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  Speaker 1: the author's death. It seems to have been written about
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  Speaker 1: sixteen twenty three, during that period of literary activity which
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  Speaker 1: followed Bacon's political fall. None of Bacon's writings gives in
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  Speaker 1: short space so vivid a picture of his tastes and
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  Speaker 1: aspirations as this fragment of the plan of an ideal commonwealth.
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  Speaker 1: The generosity and enlightenment, the dignity and splendor, the piety
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  Speaker 1: and public spirit of the inhabitants of Bensalem represent the
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  Speaker 1: ideal qualities which Bacon the statesman desired, rather than hope
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  Speaker 1: to see characteristic of his own country. And in Solomon's
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  Speaker 1: house we have baconed the scientist, indulging without restriction his
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  Speaker 1: prophetic vision of the future of human knowledge. No reader
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  Speaker 1: acquainted in any degree with the processes and results of
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  Speaker 1: modern scientific inquiry can fail to be struck by the
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  Speaker 1: numerous approximations made by Bacon's imagination to the actual achievements
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  Speaker 1: of modern times. The plan and organization of his great
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  Speaker 1: College lay down the main lines of the modern research, university,
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  Speaker 1: and both in pure and applied science. He anticipates a
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  Speaker 1: strikingly large number of recent inventions and discoveries. In still
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  Speaker 1: another way, is the New Atlantis typical of Bacon's attitude.
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  Speaker 1: In spite of the enthusiastic and broad minded schemes he
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  Speaker 1: laid down for the pursuit of truth, Bacon always had
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  Speaker 1: an eye to utility. The advancement of science, which he sought,
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  Speaker 1: was conceived by him as a means to a practical end,
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  Speaker 1: the increase of man's control over nature and the comfort
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  Speaker 1: and convenience of humanity. For pure metaphysics or any form
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  Speaker 1: of abstract thinking that yielded no fruit, he had little interest,
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  Speaker 1: and this leaning to the useful is shown in the
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  Speaker 1: practical applications of the discoveries made by the scholars of
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  Speaker 1: Solomon's House. Nor does the interest of the work stop here.
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  Speaker 1: It contains much, both in its political and in its
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  Speaker 1: scientific ideals, that we have as yet by no means achieved,
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  Speaker 1: but which contain valuable elements of suggestion and stimulus for
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  Speaker 1: the future. End of Section zero