and that we must have been a long time
govern'd by our appetites, and by our Tutors, who were often contrary to
one another, and neither of which alwayes counsel'd us for the best;
It's almost impossible that our judgment could be so clear or so solid,
as it might have been, had we had the intire use of our reason from the
time of our birth, and been always guided by it alone.

Its true, we doe not see the houses of a whole Town pull'd down
purposely to re build them of another fashion; and to make the streets
the fairer; But we often see, that divers pull their own down to set
them up again, and that even sometimes they are forc'd thereunto, when
they are in danger to fall of themselves, and that their foundations are
not sure. By which example I perswaded my self, that there was no sense
for a particular person, to design the Reformation of a State, changing
all from the very foundations, and subverting all to redress it again:
Nor even also to reform the bodies of Sciences, or the Orders already
established in the Schools for teaching them. But as for all the
Opinions which I had till then receiv'd into my beleef, I could not doe
better then to undertake to expunge them once for all, that afterwards I
might place in their stead, either others which were better, or the same
again, as soon as I should have adjusted them to the rule of reason. And
I did confidently beleeve, that by that means I should succeed much
better in the conduct of my life, then if I built but on old
foundations, and only relyed on those principles, which I suffer'd my
self to be perswaded to in my youth, without ever examining the Truth of
them. For although I observ'd herein divers difficulties, yet were they
not without cure, nor comparable to those which occurr in the
reformation of the least things belonging to the publick: these great
bodies are too unweldy to be rais'd; being cast down, or to be held up
when they are shaken, neither can their falls be but the heavyest.

As for their imperfections, if they have any, as the only diversity
which is amongst them, is sufficient to assure us that many have.
Custome hath (without doubt) much sweetned them, and even it hath made
others wave, or insensibly correct a many, whereto we could not so well
by prudence have given a remedy. And in fine, They are alwayes more
supportable, then their change can be, Even, as the great Roads, which
winding by little and little betwixt mountains, become so pla