that he is the personage in this state which I love most." Things had not come to that yet, but they were fast coming; and Bacon, like a philosopher, was preparing for the change. As for friendship, what was it? "That which is, is between superior and inferior, whose fortunes may comprehend the one the other." But how could the fortunes of Essex, now lying at point of death in the Lord Keeper's house, be said to comprehend the fortunes of Bacon? Obviously they could not: and therefore the friendship between the two, having no longer any logical basis, must cease to exist.

This again was in accordance with the rules of the art of the Architecture of Fortune; for "another precept of this knowledge is that ancient precept of Bias, construed not to any point of perfidiousness, but only to caution and moderation. 'Et ama tanquam inimicus futurus et odi tanquam amaturus!' For it utterly betrayeth all utility for men to embark themselves too far into unfortunate friendships, troublesome spleens, and childish and humorous envies or emulations."1

Remembering Bacon's recent allusions to the "hopes" of those who had begun "to fall on reckoning" how many years the Queen had reigned, we can have little difficulty in determining the date of the following New Year's letter:—

"TO THE QUEEN.

"It may please your excellent Majesty,

I presume, according to the ceremony and good manner of the time and my accustomed duty, in all humbleness to present your Majesty with a simple gift; almost as far from answering my mind as from sorting with your greatness; and therewith wish that we may continue to reckon on, and ever, your Majesty's happy years of reign; and they that reckon upon any other hopes, I would they mought reckon short, and to their cost. And so craving pardon most humbly, I commend your Majesty to the preservation of the Divine goodness."

With this imprecation upon the plotters of the Essexian faction, Bacon concludes his first stage of intercession for his friend.

1 Advancement of Learning, xxiii. 42.

CHAPTER XIII.

BACON'S PART IN THE PROCEEDINGS AGAINST ESSEX.

DISSATISFIED with the result of the statement in the Star Chamber made on the 29th of November, the Queen determined to institute some kind of proceedings against Essex. The account of the Queen's motive given in Bacon's Apology is very different from that contained in a letter written by him. The Apology represents the resolution as originating with the Queen; the letter represents the Queen as yielding to compulsion, and attributes the resolution to her advisers. The discrepancy requires consideration. The account in the Apology is as follows:

...

...

"I besought her Majesty to be advised again and again how she brought the cause into any public question. . . . Immediately after, the Queen had thought of a course to have somewhat published in the Star Chamber .. which, when her Majesty propounded unto me, I was utterly against it. Towards the end of Easter term her Majesty told me that she was determined now, for the satisfaction of the world, to proceed against my Lord 'ad castigationem, et non ad destructionem.' . . . Whereunto I said, utterly to divert her, &c. But yet I think it did good at that time and holp to divert that course of proceeding. Nevertheless, afterwards it pleased her to make a more solemn matter of the proceeding." 1

...

Compare this, than which nothing can be more explicit, with a letter, written it is true in Anthony Bacon's name, but actually written by Francis Bacon, and containing a statement supposed to be made by Francis to Anthony.

"I do assure your Lordship that my brother, Francis Bacon, who is too wise (I think) to be abused, and too honest to abuse, though he be more

1 1 Apology, p. 12.

reserved in all particulars than is needful, yet in generality he hath ever constantly and with asseveration affirmed to me that both those days, that of the Star Chamber and that at my Lord Keeper's, were won from the Queen, merely upon necessity and point of honour, against her own inclination." 1

Which of these two accounts are we to believe? The first impulse is to prefer the account in the letter, as being written nearer to the time, and therefore more likely to be accurate. But on the other hand, the account in the letter stands alone, and is incompatible with all that can be gathered from contem= porary writers about the Queen's attitude. Moreover, the peculiar nature of the letter has to be taken into consideration. to be written in the following way:

It came

In the summer of 1600, after Bacon's temporary reconciliation with Essex, for the purpose of conciliating Essex to the Queen, Francis Bacon, who was supposed to know better than other people what would please the Queen, agreed to draw up for Essex a letter to Anthony Bacon, which Essex might copy out in his handwriting and send: and then Francis would shew it to the Queen as a proof of Essex's contrition and loyalty. To make the thing more natural and deceptive, Francis Bacon also drew up, in Anthony's name, a letter to Essex, which letter was to elicit in answer the letter above-mentioned. The two letters might naturally be supposed to be shewn by Anthony Bacon to his brother Francis; and Francis might then shew them to the Queen.

This being the origin of the letter last quoted, it is clear that we must not expect to find the truth in it, but rather such a version of the truth as would be best for the work in hand. Now it would be best for the Earl's interests that he should not know that the Queen had resolutely determined to bring him to a public humiliation, but that he should attribute the disgrace to her councillors. That was false, no doubt; but it was best for the Earl to be under that false impression, as it would leave the way more open to a reconciliation between the Queen and himself. Now who should give the Earl this false impression? who but Francis Bacon? And by giving it, and by appearing to the Queen to give it, would not Bacon be commending himself to 1 See p. 187, where the letter is given at full length.

the Queen, and so serving his own interests as well as the Earl's? Would it not be the part of a truly loyal servant thus to simulate in the service of his mistress?

Bacon had frequently advised her to make her ministers bear the brunt of any severity that it might be needful to shew towards Essex, while she herself was to assume the position of a gracious sovereign. Now, as she perused this letter, Bacon would appear to the Queen carrying out, at the cost of his own veracity, the very policy he had urged upon her for her good. Could she fail to be touched at the spectacle of Francis Bacon (innocently imagined by his brother Anthony "too honest to abuse ") deceiving his brother and his friend, and all to serve her and to screen her by his falsehood from the consequences of a resolution of her own, against which resolution he himself had ineffectually remonstrated? In this way Francis Bacon made the interests of Essex "comprehend" his own interests; and where both their interests appeared to require a little simulation, Bacon was not the man to shrink from using that "alloy" of falsehood which, however it may embase the metal of action, makes the metal wear the better.

Whether Bacon really deceived his brother and the Earl, or only deceived the Queen into the belief that he had deceived them, we have no means of knowing: but if we may attach any weight to the evidence derivable from the letter written by Bacon in Essex's name, the Earl had been led to suppose that the Queen was against his being subjected to any public

censure.

"You say the Queen never meant to call me to public censure, which sheweth her goodness; but you see I passed it, which sheweth others' power. I believe most steadfastly her Majesty never intended to bring my cause to a sentence; and I believe as verily that, since the sentence, she meant to restore me to attend upon her person. But they that could use occasions (which it was not in me to let), and amplify occasions, and practise occasions, to represent to her Majesty a necessity to bring me to the one, can and will do the like to stop me from the other."

As we proceed, we shall see indications that Essex was not prepared for the trial to which he was subjected. An attempt appears to have been made to surprise him into confessions and

admissions of serious charges of which he had received no warning, and against which he indignantly protested.

The Queen had at first fixed February, 1600, for a proceeding in the Star Chamber; but her resolution was for the time diverted by a piteous letter from Essex, imploring her not to subject him to such a humiliation.1 Her mind was however still bent upon a proceeding of some kind, and it was at last definitely determined that Essex should be informally tried in the Lord Keeper's house (York House) on the 5th June, 1600, "before an assembly of counsellors, peers, and judges, and some audience of men of quality to be admitted." So Bacon writes in the Apology; but the report of the proceedings which he drew up for the Queen implies that the audience was rather larger and more miscellaneous, "an auditory of persons to the number, as I could guess, of two hundred, almost all men of quality, but of every kind of profession: nobility, court, law, country, city.'

"2

Bacon's report goes on to inform us that after "the auditory was quiet from the first throng to get in, and the doors shut, the Earl presented himself, and kneeled down at the board's end, and so continued till he was licensed to stand up." A preliminary declaration was then made that "her Majesty being imperial, and immediate under God, was not holden to render account of her actions to any:" but, on account of recent rumours and slanders, and especially on account of a letter written to the Queen by a lady nearest to my Lord in blood (Lady Rich), she "was pleased to call the world to an understanding of her princely course held towards the Earl of Essex."

On the Earl's return, continues the report, her Majesty merely committed him to his chamber, till he had been heard by the Council. His defence was, first, good intention; second, that he had yielded to the "over-ruling persuasion of the Irish Council." Although this was no excuse for disobeying her instructions, yet she referred him to the Lord Keeper's house, sub libera custodia,

1 He was probably still ill and quite unfit to defend himself. Chamberlain speaks of him as being still ill in March, 1600. This letter is not mentioned in Bacon's Apology. * II. 175.