call'd The Apothegms of King James, King Charles, the Marquess of Worcester, the Lord Bacon, and Sir Thomas Moor; his Lordship is dealt with very rudely. For besides the addition of insipid tales, there are some put in which are beastly and immoral:1 such as were fitter to be joyned to Aretine, or Aloysia, than to have polluted the chaste labours of the Baron of Verulam." And Stephens, in the preface to the Memoirs, published in 1734, when speaking of Blackburn's edition of Bacon, says, "Would any one, that had consulted the reputation of the Lord Bacon, or indeed his own, have published several Apophthegmes under his Lordship's Name, which he himself, as well as Dr. Tenison, allowed to be scandalous and spurious? Those which his Lordship compiled as an amusement, during his indisposition in the year 1625, were printed in the same year, amounting to the number of two hundred and eighty: And were not reprinted by Doctor Rawley in the first edition of the Resuscitatio in 1657: but, upon the republishing that work, with a dedication to King Charles the Second, the Bookseller contrived to insert them with some alteration and additions; which, instead of increasing, diminished the value of the whole."" This volume contains a copy of the first edition of 1625,3 with an appendix containing the Apophthegmes, published by Archbishop Tenison in his Baconia. I have, to use Bacon's own words, fanned the collection published under his name, and rejected the spurious additions. They are inserted in a note.* The use which Lord Bacon made of these "Mucrones Verborum," may be seen by comparing Apophthegme 251, with the same anecdote as incorporated in the Advancement of Learning. § 10. THE ORNAMENTA RATIONALIA, &c. Are inserted from the Baconiana.-The short notes, of which there is a MS. in the British Museum, are taken from the Remains published in 1645.-The Essay on Death, of which there is a Manuscript in the British Museum, is inserted from the Remains. I know not by what authority this fragment is ascribed to Lord Bacon. It appears not to be in his style; and, excepting the following passages, I do not find any similarity in this Essay with his general sentiments upon death; PAGE 133 OF THIS VOLUME. "There is nothing more awakens our resolve and readiness to die, than the quieted conscience, strengthened with opinion that we shall be well spoken of upon earth by those that are just and of the family of virtue; the opposite whereof is a fury to man, and makes even life unsweet. 66 Therefore, what is more heavy than evil fame deserved? Or, likewise, who can see worse days, than he that yet living doth follow at the funerals of his own reputation." PAGE 12 OF THIS VOLUME. "A mind fixed and bent upon somewhat that is good, doth avert the dolours of death; but, above all, believe it, the sweetest canticle is, Nunc dimittis,' when a man hath obtained worthy ends and expectations." 1 Ex. gr. Apotheg. 183, 184. But note that this edition was published in 1661, during Rawley's life, who died in 1667. Amongst the Apophthegmes inserted in the note, the following, which, from its internal evidence, I can scarcely think spurious, would have admirably illustrated Bacon's favourite opinion, that all men should be engaged in active life; that, in this theatre of man's life, it is reserved only for God and angels to be lookers on. "When his Lordship was newly advanced to the Great Seal, Gondomar came to visit him: My Lord said, That he was to thank God and the King for that honour; but yet, so he might be rid of the burthen, he could very willingly forbear the honour. And that he formerly had a desire, and the same continued with him still, to lead a private life. Gondomar answered, that he would tell him a tale, 'Of an old rat that would needs leave the world: and acquainted the young rats that he would retire into his hole, and spend his days solitary; and would enjoy no more comfort and commended them upon his high displeasure, not to offer to come in unto him. They forbore two or three days; at last, one that was more hardy than the rest, incited some of his fellows to go in with him, and he would venture to see how his father did; for he might be dead. They went in, and found the old rat sitting in the midst of a rich Parmesan cheese.' So he applied the fable after his witty manner.' See end of Apophthegmes. • Lansdowne Collection, No. 205, fo. 217. • Harleian, vol. ii. p. 196. ESSAY S. 1. OF TRUTH. light upon the face of the matter, or chaos; then he breathed light into the face of man; and still he breatheth and inspireth light into the face of WHAT is truth? said jesting Pilate; and would his chosen. The poet that beautified the sect, not stay for an answer. Certainly there be that that was otherwise inferior to the rest, saith yet delight in giddiness; and count it a bondage to fix a belief; affecting free-will in thinking, as the shore, and to see ships tossed upon the sea: a excellently well: "It is a pleasure to stand upon well as in acting. And though the sects of philosophers of that kind be gone, yet there remain pleasure to stand in the window of a castle, and to see a battle, and the adventures thereof becertain discoursive wits, which are of the same low: but no pleasure is comparable to the standveins, though there be not so much blood in them as was in those of the ancients. But it is not only to be commanded, and where the air is always ing upon the vantage ground of truth, (a hill not the difficulty and labour which men take in find-clear and serene,) and to see the errors, and waning out of truth, nor again, that when it is found, derings, and mists, and tempests in the vale be it imposeth upon men's thoughts, that doth bring low:" so always that this prospect be with pity, lies in favour, but a natural though corrupt love of the lie itself. One of the later schools of the Grecians examineth the matter, and is at a stand to think what should be in it, that men should love lies; where neither they make for pleasure, as with poets; nor for advantage, as with the merchant, but for the lie's sake. But I cannot tell: this same truth is a naked and open daylight, that doth not show the masks, and mummeries, and triumphs of the world, half so stately and daintily as candlelights. Truth may perhaps come to the price of a pearl, that showeth best by day, but it will not rise to the price of a diamond or carbuncle, that showeth best in varied lights. A mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure. Doth any man doubt, that if there were taken out of men's minds, vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men, poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition, and unpleasing to themselves? One of the fathers, in great severity, called poesy "vinum dæmonum," because it filleth the imagination, and yet it is but with the shadow of a lie. But it is not the lie that passeth through the mind, but the lie that sinketh in, and settleth in it, that doth the hurt, such as we spake of before. But howsoever these things are thus in men's depraved judgments and affections, yet truth, which only doth judge itself, teacheth, that the inquiry of truth, which is the love-making, or wooing of it, the knowledge of truth, which is the presence of it, and the belief of truth, which is the enjoying of it, is the sovereign good of human nature. The first creature of God, in the works of the days, was the light of the sense: the last was the light of reason; and his Sabbath work ever since, is the illumination of his Spirit. First, he breathed and not with swelling or pride. Certainly, it is heaven upon earth, to have a man's mind move in charity, rest in providence, and turn upon the poles of truth. To pass from theological and philosophical truth, to the truth of civil business; it will be acthat clean and round dealing is the honour of man's knowledged even by those that practise it not, nature, and that mixture of falsehood is like alloy in coin of gold and silver, which may make the metal work the better, but it embaseth it. For these winding and crooked courses are the goings of the serpent; which goeth basely upon the belly, and not upon the feet. There is no vice that doth so cover a man with shame as to be found false and perfidious; and therefore Montaigne saith prettily, when he inquired the reason, why the word of the lie should be such a disgrace, and such an odious charge, saith he, "If it be well weighed, to say that a man lieth, is as much coward towards men. For a lie faces God, and II. OF DEATH.* MEN fear death, as children fear to go into the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other. Certainly, the contemplation of death, as the wages of sin, and passage to another world, is holy and religious; but the fear of it, as a tribute due unto na* See note A, at the end of the Essays. 11 ture, is weak. Yet in religious meditations, there III. OF UNITY IN RELIGION.* is sometimes mixture of vanity and of superstition. You shall read in some of the friars' books of RELIGION being the chief band of human society, mortification, that a man should think with him- it is a happy thing when itself is well contained self, what the pain is, if he have but his finger's within the true band of unity. The quarrels and end pressed or tortured; and thereby imagine divisions about religion were evils unknown to what the pains of death are, when the whole body the heathen. The reason was, because the reliis corrupted and dissolved; when many times gion of the heathen consisted rather in rites and death passeth with less pain than the torture of a ceremonies, than in any constant belief: for you limb for the most vital parts are not the quickest may imagine what kind of faith theirs was, when of sense. And by him that spake only as a phi- the chief doctors and fathers of their church were losopher, and natural man, it was well said, the poets. But the true God hath this attribute, "Pompa mortis magis terret, quam mors ipsa." that he is a jealous God; and therefore his worGroans, and convulsions, and a discoloured face, ship and religion will endure no mixture nor partand friends weeping, and blacks, and obsequies, ner. We shall therefore speak a few words conand the like, show death terrible. It is worthy cerning the unity of the church; what are the fruits the observing, that there is no passion in the thereof; what the bounds; and what the means. mind of man so weak, but it mates and masters The fruits of unity (next unto the well pleasing the fear of death; and therefore death is no such of God, which is all in all) are two; the one toterrible enemy when a man hath so many attend-wards those that are without the church, the other ants about him that can win the combat of him. towards those that are within. For the former, Revenge triumphs over death; love slights it; it is certain, that heresies and schisms are of all honour aspireth to it; grief flieth to it; fear pre-oc-others the greatest scandals; yea, more than corcupateth it: nay, we read, after Otho the emperor had slain himself, pity (which is the tenderest of affections) provoked many to die out of mere compassion to their sovereign, and as the truest sort of followers. Nay, Seneca adds, niceness and satiety : 66 Cogita quamdiu eadem feceris; mori velle, non tantum fortis, aut miser, sed etiam fastidiosus potest." A man would die, though he were neither valiant nor miserable, only upon a weariness to do the same thing so oft and over and over. It is no less worthy to observe, how little alteration in good spirits the approach of death make: for they appear to be the same men till the last instant. Augustus Cæsar died in a compliment: “Livia, conjugii nostra memor, vive et vale." Tiberius in dissimulation, as Tacitus saith of him, “Jam Tiberium vires et corpus, non dissimulatio,| deserebant:" Vespasian in a jest, sitting upon the stool," Ut puto Deus fio:" Galba with a sentence, "Feri, si ex re sit populi Romani," holding forth his neck: Septimus Severus in despatch, "Adeste, si quid mihi restat agendum," and the like. Certainly the Stoics bestowed too much cost upon death, and by their great preparations made it appear more fearful. Better, saith he, "qui finem vitæ extremum inter munera ponat naturæ." It is as natural to die as to be born; and to a little infant, perhaps, the one is as painful as the other. He that dies in an earnest pursuit, is like one that is wounded in hot blood; who, for the time, scarce feels the hurt; and therefore a mind fixed and bent upon somewhat that is good, doth avert the dolours of death; but, above all, believe it, the sweetest canticle is, "Nunc dimittis" when a man hath obtained worthy ends and expectations. Death hath this also, that it openeth the good fame, and extinguisheth envy: "Extinctus amabitur idem." ruption of manners: for as in the natural body a wound or solution of continuity is worse than a corrupt humour, so in the spiritual: so that nothing doth so much keep men out of the church, and drive men out of the church, as breach of unity; and, therefore, whensoever it cometh to that pass that one saith, "ecce in deserto," another saith, "ecce in penetralibus;" that is, when some men seek Christ in the conventicles of heritics, and others in an outward face of a church, that voice had need continually to sound in men's ears, "nolite exire,"—"go not out." The doctor of the Gentiles (the propriety of whose vocation drew him to have a special care of those without) saith, "If a heathen come in, and hear you speak with several tongues, will he not say that you are mad?" and, certainly, it is little better: when atheists and profane persons do hear of so many discordant and contrary opinions in religion, it doth avert them from the church, and maketh them, "to sit down in the chair of the scorners." It is but a light thing to be vouched in so serious a matter, but yet it expresseth well the deformity. There is a master of scoffing that in his catalogue of books of a feigned library, sets down this title of a book, "The Morris-Dance of Heretics;" for, indeed, every sect of them hath a diverse posture, or cringe, by themselves, which cannot but move derision in worldlings and depraved politics, who are apt to contemn holy things. As for the fruit towards those that are within, it is peace, which containeth infinite blessings; it establisheth faith; it kindleth charity; the outward peace of the church distilleth into peace of conscience, and it turneth the labours of writing and reading of controversies into treatises of mortification and devotion. See Note A at the end of the Essays. Concerning the bounds of unity, the true placing [ points: for truth and falsehood, in such things, are like the iron and clay in the toes of Nebuchadnezzar's image; they may cleave, but they will not incorporate. 66 of them importeth exceedingly. There appear to Of this I may give only this advice, according to my small model. Men ought to take heed of rending God's church by two kinds of controversies; the one is, when the matter of the point controverted is too small and light, not worth the heat and strife about it, kindled only by contradiction; for, as it is noted by one of the fathers, Christ's coat indeed had no seam, but the church's vesture was of divers colours; whereupon he saith, "in veste varietas sit, scissura non sit," they be two things, unity and uniformity; the other is, when the matter of the point controverted is great, but it is driven to an over great subtilty and obscurity, so that it becometh a thing rather ingenious than substantial. A man that is of judgment and understanding shall sometimes hear ignorant men differ, and know well within himself, that those which so differ mean one thing, and yet they themselves would never agree: and if it come so to pass in that distance of judgment, which is between man and man, shall we not think that God above, that knows the heart, doth not discern that frail men, in some of their contradictions, intend the same thing and accepteth | of both? The nature of such controversies is excellently expressed by St. Paul, in the warning and precept that he giveth concerning the same, "devita profanas vocum novitates, et oppositiones falsi nominis scientia." Men create oppositions which are not, and put them into new terms so fixed, as whereas the meaning ought to govern the term, the term in effect governeth the meaning. There be also two false peaces, or unities: the one, when the peace is grounded but upon an implicit ignorance; for all colours will agree in the dark: the other, when it is pieced up upon a direct admission of contraries in fundamental Concerning the means of procuring unity, men must beware that, in the procuring or muniting of religious unity, they do not dissolve and deface the laws of charity and of human society. There be two swords amongst Christians, the spiritual and temporal; and both have their due office and place in the maintenance of religion: but we may not take up the third sword, which is Mahomet's sword, or like unto it: that is, to propagate religion by wars, or by sanguinary persecutions to force consciences; except it be in cases of overt scandal, blasphemy, or intermixture of practice against the state; much less to nourish seditions; to authorize conspiracies and rebellions; to put the sword into the people's hands, and the like, tending to the subversion of all government, which is the ordinance of God; for this is but to dash the first table against the second; and so to consider men as Christians, as we forget that they are men. Lucretius the poet, when he beheld the act of Agamemnon, that could endure the sacrificing of his own daughter, exclaimed: "Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum." What would he have said, if he had known of the massacre in France, or the powder treason of England? He would have been seven times more epicure and atheist than he was; for as the temporal sword is to be drawn with great circumspection in cases of religion, so it is a thing monstrous to put it into the hands of the common people; let that be left unto the anabaptists, and other furies. It was great blasphemy, when the devil said, "I will ascend and be like the Highest;" but it is greater blasphemy to personate God, and bring him in saying, "I will descend, and be like the prince of darkness:" and what is it bet ter, to make the cause of religion to descend to the cruel and execrable actions of murdering princes, butchery of people, and subversion of states and governments? Surely this is to bring down the Holy Ghost, instead of the likeness of a dove, in the shape of a vulture or raven; and to set out of the bark of a Christian church a flag of a bark of pirates and assassins; therefore it is most necessary that the church by doctrine and decree, princes by their sword, and all learnings, both Christian and moral, as by their Mercury rod to damn, and send to hell forever, those facts and opinions tending to the support of the same, as hath been already in good part done. Surely in councils concerning religion, that council of the apostle would be prefixed, "Ira hominis non implet justitiam Dei ;" and it was a notable observation of a wise father, and no less ingenuously confessed, that those which held and persuaded pressure of consciences, were commonly interested therein themselves for their own ends. B IV. OF REVENGE. Revenge is a kind of wild justice, which the more man's nature runs to, the more ought law to weed it out: for as for the first wrong, it doth but offend the law, but the revenge of that wrong putteth the law out of office. Certainly, in taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over, he is superior; for it is a prince's part to pardon: and Solomon, I am sure, saith, "It is the glory of a man to pass by an offence." That which is past is gone and irrecoverable, and wise men have enough to do with things present and to come; therefore they do but trifle with themselves, that labour in past matters. There is no man doth a wrong for the wrong's sake, but thereby to purchase himself profit, or pleasure, or honour, or the like; therefore why should I be angry with a man for loving himself better than me? And if any man should do wrong, merely out of ill-nature, why, yet it is but like the thorn or brier, which prick and scratch, because they can do no other. The most tolerable sort of revenge is for those wrongs which there is no law to remedy; but then, let a man take heed the revenge be such there is no law to punish, else a man's enemy is still beforehand, and it is two for one. Some, when they take revenge, are desirous the party should know whence it cometh this is the more generous; for the delight seemeth to be not so much in doing the hurt as in making the party repent: but base and crafty cowards are like the arrow that flieth in the dark. Cosmus, Duke of Florence, had a desperate saying against perfidious or neglecting friends, as if those wrongs were unpardonable. "You shall read," saith he, "that we are commanded to forgive our enemies, but you never read that we are commanded to forgive our friends." But yet the spirit of Job was in a better tune: "Shall we," saith he, "take good at God's hands, and not be content to take evil also?" and so of friends in a proportion. This is certain, that a man that studieth revenge, keeps his own wounds green, which otherwise would heal and do well. Public revenges and for the most part fortunate; as that for the death of Cæsar; for the death of Pertinax; for the death of Henry the Third of France; and many more. But in private revenges it is not so; nay, rather vindictive persons live the life of witches; who, as they are mischievous, so end they unfortunate. V. OF ADVERSITY. Ir was a high speech of Seneca, (after the manner of the Stoics,) that the good things which belong to prosperity are to be wished, but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired: "Bona rerum secundarum optabilia, adversarum mirabilia." Certainly, if miracles be the command over nature, they appear most in adversity. It is yet a higher speech of his than the other, (much too high for a heathen,) “It is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man, and the security of a God:"-" Vere magnum This would have done better in poesy, where habere fragilitatem hominis, securitatem Dei." transcendencies are more allowed; and the poets, indeed, have been busy with it; for it is in effect the thing which is figured in that strange fiction of the ancient poets, which seemeth not to be without mystery; nay, and to have some approach he went to unbind Prometheus, (by whom human to the state of a Christian, "that Hercules, when nature is represented,) sailed the length of the describing Christian resolution, that saileth in the great ocean in an earthen pot or pitcher, lively frail bark of the flesh through the waves of the world." But to speak in a mean, the virtue of fortitude, which in morals is the more heroical virprosperity is temperance, the virtue of adversity is tue. Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testacarrieth the greater benediction, and the clearer ment, adversity is the blessing of the New, which revelation of God's favour. Yet even in the Old Testament, if you listen to David's harp, you shall hear as many hearse-like airs as carols; and the pencil of the Holy Ghost hath laboured more in describing the afflictions of Job than the felicities of Solomon. Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; and adversity is not without comforts and hopes. We see in needle-works and embroideries, it is more pleasing to have a lively work upon a sad and solemn ground, than to have a dark and melancholy work upon a lightsome ground: judge, therefore, of the pleasure of the heart by the pleasure of the eye. virtue is like precious odours, most fragrant when Certainly they are incensed, or crushed: for prosperity doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best disco ver virtue. VI. OF SIMULATION AND DISSIMU LATION.* wisdom; for it asketh a strong wit and a strong DISSIMULATION is but a faint kind of policy, or heart to know when to tell truth, and to do it; therefore it is the weaker sort of politicians that are the great dissemblers. Tacitus saith, "Livia sorted well with the arts of her husband, and dissimulation of her son; attributing arts or policy to Augustus, and dissimulation to Tiberius:" and again, when Mucianus encourageth Vespasian to take arms against Vitellius, he saith," We rise not against the pierc ing judgment of Augustus, nor the extreme caution or closeness of Tiberius:" these properties of arts or policy, and dissimulation or closeness, are indeed habits and faculties several, and to be distinguished; for if a man have that penetration of judgment as he can discern what things are to * See note C, at the end of the Essays. |