صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

2

says: "It his very true also, about that time, Her Majesty taking a liking to my pen, commanded me to pen that book, which was published for the better satisfaction of the world; what I did, but SO as never secretary had more particular and express directions and instructions in very point how to guide my hand in it".")

His conduct in the prosecution of Essex pleased nobody, not even those whose interests he was serving. The friends of Essex were exasperated, the Queen could not appreciate his obedience to her haughty temper, and ever after entertained for him feelings approaching to contempt, while popular odium pursued him for many years. His ingratitude will for ever remain an indelible stigma on his memory, an unmistakable proof of that flaccid spirit and unscrupulous conscience which we find repeated in several episodes of his subsequent life. It will be seen that the same ignoble readiness which he now evinced in forgetting the obligations of a friend was, on another occasion, manifest in betraying the duties of a judge.

Essex was executed on the 25th Feb. 1601, and Elizabeth, who seems to have profoundly regretted the fate of her favourite, was not long to survive him she died in the year 1603, and was succeeded on the throne by James VI. of Scotland.

Bacon's first care on the approach of the new sovereign was to efface the unfavourable impressions which his conduct towards Essex must have produced on the mind of one so deeply concerned in the intrigues and wild projects of the haughty courtier. Elizabeth had scarcely turned cold, when Bacon assailed the attendants and hangers-on of the new sovereign with epistles and supplications, to forestall, as it were, the good graces of his Scotch Majesty. 10) Even during the life time of Elizabeth, he had, by the intervention of his brother Anthony, corresponded with James. In his „,,Discourse in the Praise of his Sovereign" he lavishes the most adulatory expressions in praise of Elizabeth, asserting her eminent political talents to be only equalled by the irresistible charms of her person, and applying to her the impassioned lines in which Virgil sings the beauty of his goddesses; he shortly after informs James that he was a still greater sovereign, that the lily of the mountain is superior to the lily of the valley, and that the greatest happiness his late sovereign mistress could enjoy on earth was to have such a model of learning and wisdom as her successor. 11) He went as

9) Works, Apology to the Earl of Devonshire. Vol. I. p. 440.
10) Compare Lett. Temp. Jac. No. 62, 63, 64, 66, 67,
68.
11) Works, Lett. No. 65.

far as Boxbourne to meet his new liege lord, where, by his courteous addresses and loyal assurances, he succeeded in propitiating the King, who was willing to forget the unfavourable opinion he had formed of the unfaithful friend of Essex. James treated him with kindness, and at his coronation (7th May 1603) bestowed on him the dignity of knighthood.

He was now permitted to recieve the hand of Miss Alice Barnham, daughter to a rich alderman of London City. By the death of his brother, he became proprietor of the beautiful seat of Gorhambury and sole inheritor of the paternal estate. Happy in a fair wife, in the enjoyment of wealth and honour, he could, however, neither efface nor forget the dire services rendered by him under the preceding reign. To reestablish himself in public esteem, he published the aforesaid Apology, but without much effect he was never again to be a truly popular man. He wrote to Lord Southampton, the generous patron of Shakespeare, a congratulatory epistle on his releasement from prison, whither the interest and support he accorded to Essex, had conducted him. This letter is another illustration of that want of manly resolution, and of that readiness to sacrifice his dearest convictions to the smiles of court favour, which pervaded his whole public career. Here, as at every other phase of his political life, we find a statement of that gloria in obsequio, of which he boasted towards his sovereign, and by which all his thoughts and actions would seem to have been regulated. In the following lines he very artlessly gives a pretty fair picture of his character: "Yet it is as true as a thing that God knoweth, that this great change hath wrought in me no other change towards your Lordship than this, that I may safely be that to you now, which I was truly before".12)

But the odium which neither apologies nor letters of defence could efface from the memory of his contemporaries was in a great measure counterbalanced by his really high talents and abilities. His brilliant successes in politics and literature secured him from the contempt which would otherwise have been irrevocably attached to his name. By his activity in the new parliament which met in March 1604, particularly by his exertions in favour of the abolition of some abusive practices in connexion with the granting of monopolies for the purveying of the king's household, he acquired a certain popularity, without, however, in the least engaging his interests at Court. He also made himself conspicuous by his projects of a

12) Works, Lett. No. 71.

[ocr errors]

reform of the penal code, and by his efforts in behalf of a favourite scheme of the King, viz the legislative union of England and Scotland. In short, by his dexterous management of affairs in and out of parliament, he speedily rose in the King's esteem, and was erelong to enjoy substantial proofs of his lord's good graces. In 1604 he was appointed King's Counsel with an annual fee and pension.

Bacon had already created himself a name in the literary world. His moral and political essays, his legal dissertations, his religious tracts obtained considerable success. Many of his productions were translated into foreign languages, and all were praised and admired in literary circles. As yet, however, it would seem that he had not much, if at all, occupied himself with philosophical subjects; at least we have no more conclusive proofs than Bacon's own allusions to the matter in his petitions to lords and ministers; for it was not till 1605 that he published his ,,Proficience and Advancement of Learning".

It has always appeared to us a very curious feature in the literary career of Bacon, that he had delayed so long giving the world tangible evidence of his zeal in the cause of science. Why did he not, at an earlier period, seek to justify the hopes which, from the warmth of his professions, people were entitled to entertain? Was his time so wholly absorbed by legal and parliamentary occupations as to find no spare time to teach the world how to increase knowledge and divulge the secrets of Nature? Why did all the effusions of his productive pen up to the accession of James I. relate to things which had only a very remote connexion with the domain of philosophy? This remarkable contrast between the paucity of philosophical productions antecedent to the arrival of James, and the comparative exuberance by which the event was followed, is, no doubt, assignable to various causes; but we venture to suggest that this change is in a great measure to be ascribed to the change of feeling and atmosphere produced at court by the accession of such a prince as James I. It is well known that James, although one of the weakest, most ridiculous and most despotic kings that ever mounted the English throne, was a man of some learning, well up in theology and in the philosophical ideas of his country. He would, perhaps, have cut no contemptible figure in the halls of the Academy at least a better one than in the drawing-rooms of St. James. His philosophical turn of mind naturally induced him to become the patron and friend of men of letters. Not only that; he wrote, disputed, and harangued with the fire of a Duns Scotus or Thomas Aquinas. To be consulted on philosophical topics, to

[ocr errors]

be afforded opportunities of playing the professor and the divine, of showing off his erudition, was what particularly flattered his vanity and gratified his pedantic propensities. Bacon was precisely the man who knew how to turn these circumstances to his advantage, how to pamper the vanities and humour the philosophical whims of his Majesty. He (the King) was the Solomon of his age, a fountain of knowledge, compared to which Bacon was but as a bucket or cistern to draw forth and conserve." ,,Since the birth of Christ, no king is to be found comparable to his Majesty for the variety and extent of his learning". „Neque vero facile fuerit, regem aliquem reperire, qui fuerit Majestati tuae literarum divinarum et humanarum varietate et cultura comparandus at regem, et regem natum, veros eruditionis fontes hausisse, immo ipsummet fontem eruditionis esse, prope abest a miraculo." 13) He feels himself called upon to inflame the torch of learning, because ,,merito temporibus regis omnium sapientissimi et doctissimi regeneratio ista et instauratio scientiarum debetur". 14) Such are the compliments and flatteries paid to the King at the commencement of almost every chapter of his de Augmentis. We have no hesitation in affirming that the desire of humouring the philosophical vein of James was a powerful inducement for Bacon to commence that series of philosophical writings which, after having been changed and rechanged, revised and enlarged a dozen times, was finally published under the title of: Instauratio Magna. Had the throne of England not been occupied by a prince of such a peculiar bent of mind as James I, it is not impossible but that the world would not so soon have heard of the Novum Organum or the de Augmentis.

Undoubtedly Bacon's thoughts from his earliest years did, in those moments which he could snatch from business, revert to philosophy; undoubtedly he keenly felt the deplorable state of general knowledge, and his imagination suggested vast conceptions of improvement. It is certain that his mind was exalted by the hope of effecting such an improvement, of becoming the Reformer of Science. If he were not born to make great discoveries, at least he felt himself to be the apostle who could announce them. A revolution in the Realm of Science was the subject of his meditation. His mind was sometimes so fully engrossed by this ,,fine frenzy" that he believed himself free from every other ambition. „I have,“ he says in a letter to Robert Cecil, no other ambition than my pen;

13) Works, de Augmentis Lib. I.

[ocr errors]

14) Works, Instauratio Magna. Dedicatio.

and by my works, I hope to transmit my name with honour to future generations" 15) He made a thousand vows and promises to pledge his life in the accomplishment of his great projects, and was unquestionably sincere in repeatedly protesting he would exclusively serve the cause of truth and knowledge; but his reformatory ardour was, unhappily, in itself but a mere speculation; it was a thing that filled his mind, but did not control his actions. What he said, he thought, but did not fulfill. In his lofty speculations he was incessantly disturbed by lower and more dominant passions. The imperious demands of his political ambition were to be satisfied; and consequently the King, the parliament, the great seal, and the woolsack were uppermost in his mind. To out-distance his rivals, to trip over or play some malicious trick to his competitors in the wild hunt after earthly treasures, were occupations more congenial to Bacon's temper than a perseverant and ,,fruit-bringing" study of the Laws of Nature. That noble pride and imperturbable tranquillity of soul, the glowing ardour in the pursuit of knowledge, that selfcontentedness and self-denial, which characterize the genuine heroes of philosophy, were no integral parts of the baconian character; therefore, neither his rich knowledge, nor his zeal in the cause of science could preserve him from falling a victim to the allurements and abasements of political life. Therefore it is, that whatever Bacon undertook in philosophy bears the stamp of immaturity and incompleteness; many parts of his Great Instauration are but rough sketches or mere programme of reform.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

In 1607 he wrote his work entitled,,Cogitata et Visa de Interpretatione Naturae", containing his opinions on the state of Science, and his views as to the best means of remedying the evils under which it laboured, so as to make it subservient to the wants and material progress of mankind. He never published this opusculum it being an outline of the first book of his Novum Organum was only intended for a circle of learned and literary friends, whose encouragement and advice he consulted on matters pertaining to science. His Thoughts and Views do not seem to have made the most favourable impression on his learned contemporaries, who, though in many cases fully cognizant of the defects and barrenness of Scholastic Philosophy, were too cautious to accept at once the revolutionary projects and destructive principles vented in the Cogitata et Visa. Sir Thomas Bodley, in a long epistle to Bacon concerning this recent production, makes the following very characteristic

15) Works, Letters and Speeches published by Birch.

« السابقةمتابعة »