Note 126 — ESSAYS.
Reading edition
“We are a sufficient theme for contemplation, the one for the other.”—Sen. Epist. Mor. 1. 7. (A. L. l. iii. 6.) Pope seems, notwithstanding this censure of Bacon, to have been of the same opinion with Epicurus:—
“Know then thyself, presume not God to scan, The proper study for mankind is man.” Essay on Man, Ep. ii. 1. 2.
Indeed, Lord Bacon seems to have misunderstood the saying of Epicurus, who did not mean to recommend man as the sole object of the bodily vision, but as the proper theme for mental contemplation.