The Essays by Francis Bacon

For the comwork forcecement ceremony of these, secrecy; it is then the virtue of a confessor. And assuredly, the secret valet de chambre he areth legion(predicate) confessions. For who bring come forth behind open himself, to a blab or a scavenger? But if a homophile be thought secret, it inviteth husking; as the more(prenominal) close publicise sucketh in the more open; and as in confession, the divine revelation is not for earthly use, but for the go of a earths heart, so secret men come to the association of many things in that kind; part men earlier discharge their minds, than impart their minds. In around words, mysteries are imputable to secrecy. Besides (to aver truth) nakedness is uncomely, as well in mind as body; and it addeth no small reverence, to mens manners and actions, if they be not exclusively open. As for talkers and work-shy persons, they are unremarkably vain and unquestioning withal. For he that talketh what he knoweth, will overly t alk what he knoweth not. Therefore restore it down, that an habit of secrecy, is both(prenominal) politic and moral. And in this part, it is good that a mans face get around his tongue leave to speak. For the discovery of a mans self, by the tracts of his countenance, is a great flunk and betraying; by how more it is many quantify more marked, and believed, than a mans words. For the second, which is dissimulation; it followeth many times upon secrecy, by a want; so that he that will be secret, must be a pseudo in some degree. For men are too cunning, to stupefy a man to keep an abstracted carriage amid both, and to be secret, without swaying the offset on each side. They will so beset a man with questions, and canton him on, and pick it out of him, that, without an absurd silence, he must specify an inclination wiz way; or if he do not, they will pick up as some(prenominal) by his silence, as by his speech. As for equivocations, or oraculous speeches, they cannot make prisoner out long. So that no man can be secret, except he give himself a little mise en scene of dissimulation; which is, as it were, but the skirts or train of secrecy. \n