From Francis Bacon's essay *Of Studies* (1625). Select the word that fits the blank. "Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an ______ man. And therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit: and if he read little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know, that he doth not."

Bacon's triad pairs each activity with the *specific* faculty it sharpens — and the next sentence confirms each pairing by reversing it: "if a man write little, he had need have a great **memory**." If writing's lack must be supplied by *memory*, then writing must train precision and recall — the man it makes is "exact." - "Eloquent" would tempt a reader who associates writing with style, but Bacon's contrast is with memory (you must write carefully or remember carefully). - "Honest" and "patient" have no anchor in the next sentence's reversal. *Exact* here means *precise, careful, accurate* — its older sense, preserved today in phrases like "the exact sciences."