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SKETCH OF THE LIFE AND CHARACTER OF LORD BACON.

THE most prominent among the writers of English Prose Literature in the early part of the Seventeenth Century, is Francis Bacon, son of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper of the great seal in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Francis, the youngest son of Sir Nicholas, was born at York House, in the Strand, London, January 22d, 1561. When a boy, his health was delicate and his mind was grave and studious. Having access to the court, in consequence of his father's high position, it is said that his premature sobriety of deportment, united to precocity of wit, greatly amused the Queen, and led her often to call him her 'young Lord Keeper.' At twelve years of age, he produced some ingenious speculations on the arts of legerdemain, thus foreshadowing his future eminence in physical science.

In earlier years, inquisitiveness of mind displayed itself in breaking open the drums and trumpets that were bought for him, in order to discover whence came the sound which they gave forth; and he is said to have quitted the sports of the field to discover the cause of an echo in a neighboring vault. His mother, the daughter of a Tutor of Edward VI, was a woman of high culture, being familiar with the Latin and Greek languages, which ladies were then accustomed to learn, having but little of modern literature to study. She is said to have been also able to speak and to translate the French and the Italian, with ease and correctness. To her, therefore, we may suppose that Bacon was largely indebted for the literary and scientific turn given to his mind while yet in childhood, as well as for the pre-eminent abilities which he possessed.

In his thirteenth year, he became a student at Trinity College, Cambridge, then the noblest institution in England

But he was not satisfied with the course of studies there pursued, the natural sciences being quite neglected, and the time occupied too much with the scholastic subtleties of the middle ages, which he characterized as so much spider thread spun out of the brain of the scholastics, admirable for its fineness, but without any use or purpose in nature. He did not remain long enough at the University to receive his degree-having been there but three years-long enough, however, to acquire a great contempt for the pedantic trifles that occupied so unprofitably a large part of the time of English students in that and other English schools.

Before reaching the age of seventeen, he was sent by his father into France, being entrusted to the care of the Queen's ambassador, Sir Amias Paulet, who occasionally assigned him some offices of trust for the Queen. Three years were spent at Poictiers, and devoted to literary and scientific pursuits—the result of which was the writing of a portion of the Essays, and of Notes on the State of Europe-the latter being probably his first literary performance. At this time there raged in France a fearful controversy between the Huguenots and the Roman Catholics.

While thus engaged at Poictiers, he received the news (Feb. 20, 1579) of his father's death, and immediately hastened home. Finding his eldest brother in possession of his father's estate, and but a slender bequest left to himself, altogether inadequate to support him in a fitting style, he applied for political employment. But after repeated failures in his applications to his uncle, Lord Burleigh, the Prime Minister, he resolved to attain to high place by the path of the study and practice of the law. He entered Gray's Inn as a student, and devoted himself unremittingly to the duties of his chosen profession for ten or twelve years, at the end of which he had fully mastered the Common Law, and become familiar with every branch of Jurisprudence. Notwithstanding the most persistent appeals which he made to the Lord Treasurer, his uncle, for official position, he was obliged for years to put up only with evasive promises or direct denial. His uncle, though a man

of judgment and foresight, was yet a man of very slender liberality, or regard for intellectual merit. For it is said that he considered one hundred pounds too large a gratuity for Spenser's "Fairy Queen," which he denominated " a foolish old song.'

After a while (having entered upon the practice of law), Bacon received the honorary appointment of Queen's Counsel extraordinary, and, later still, the lucrative position of Registrar of the Star Chamber. During this period, however, he did not neglect his scientific studies, but then drew up a sketch of his great work, The Instauration of the Sciences.

In 1593 he represented in Parliament the County of Middlesex, and distinguished himself as a skillful debater. In the language of Ben Jonson, "No man ever spoke more neatly, more pressly, more weightily. The fear of every man that heard him was lest he should make an end." Here he made a strong speech on the popular side in opposition to the court, which brought down upon him the displeasure of the Queen, to appease which, he addressed her an apology of the most servile and submissive character.

The office of Attorney General becoming vacant, Bacon applied in vain to his uncle and cousin, the Cecils, to use their influence to procure his appointment to it. He then applied to Lord Burleigh's rival, Essex, who was a great favorite with the Queen, to secure it for him. Essex employed all his ardor and power to accommodate his friend, and yet having failed, he soothed Bacon's disappointment by generously presenting him with an estate at Twickenham, worth two thousand pounds, a large sum for those days. Such friendship and kind offices met, however, with a most ungrateful and shameful requital. As Chambers states, "When Essex was [afterwards] brought to trial for a conspiracy against the Queen, the friend whom he had so largely obliged and confided in, not only deserted him in the hour of need, but unnecessarily appeared as counsel against him, and by every act and ingenuity as a pleader, endeavored to magnify his crimes. He complied, moreover,

after the Earl's execution, with the Queen's request, that he would write a declaration of the practices and treasons attempted and committed by Robert, Earl of Essex, which was printed by authority. Into this conduct, which indicates a lamentable want of high moral principle, courage, and self-respect, Bacon was in some measure led by pecuniary difficulties into which his improvident and ostentatious habits, coupled with the relative inadequacy of his resources, had plunged him. By maintaining himself in the good graces of the court, he hoped to secure that professional advancement which would not only fill his empty coffers, but gratify those ambitious longings which had arisen in his mind. But temptations of this sort, though they may palliate, can never excuse such immoralities as those which Bacon on this and future occasions showed himself capable of."

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It has been thought that Shakespeare, in his play As You Like It,' alluded to this transaction in the song of Amiens; and that Lord Bacon, who was living at the time, and who doubtless read the play, must have been keenly stung by the severe censure which it conveyed :—

"Blow, blow, thou winter wind,

Thou art not so unkind

As man's ingratitude;

Thy tooth is not so keen,

Because thou art not seen,
Although thy breath be rude.

"Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,
Thou dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot;

Though thou the waters warp,
Thy sting is not so sharp

As friend remembered not."

Here may with advantage be introduced the exceedingly able explanation which Dr. Fischer of Heidelberg, Germany, (in the Philosophy and Times of Bacon) furnishes of the noble and the ignoble sides of Bacon's Character and History:

"What attached Bacon to Essex and Buckingham [to

whom reference will soon be made],—was not friendship, not sympathy, but motives of self-interest. They were men of the most powerful influence; the former was a favorite of Elizabeth, and the latter of James I. To rise in the offices of the state, Bacon desired and sought court favor; and this could not be obtained and preserved without such mediators. If he would become a man of consequence and accelerate his career, the favor of others was unfortunately a more effective expedient than his own intrinsic talent. If Bacon could not give up his practical aims, and vanish into a life of seclusion, repugnant to his nature, he must seek for assistance-totally distinct from his own talents-in the influence, protection, and patronage of others, and these he could not secure without courtly pliability-without becoming a serviceable tool in the hands of the powerful."

"Here Bacon entered upon that hazardous and slippery path, which, though it brought him to the highest posts of honor, led him also into a multitude of perplexities and embarrassments, and at last caused his precipitate fall from the summit of prosperity to the depth of destruction. It was a hard and steep road that Bacon had to travel, as he rose from the poor barrister, to the Keeper of the Seals and Lord Chancellor of England; from the unwearied suppliant, to Baron Verulam and Viscount St. Alban. Nor did he find any difficulty in accommodating himself to the windings of the path, and in sacrificing so much of his moral independence as circumstances required. Nature had not formed him of stubborn material. He was easy and pliant to the highest degree-made on purpose to guide himself by the course of circumstances, of which he took a very clear view. The temporibus servire corresponded to his natural temperament, and to the tone of his philosophy, of which the fundamental principle was to follow the times by a mode of thought really conformable to the times. Altogether, Bacon did not regard life with the conviction that it was a problem of eternal import, to be solved according to a moral rule, but rather as a game that could only be won by quickly devised and judicious tactics. His ambition was of a yield

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