read them again. Attributed to Shakespeare of Stratford they are
meaningless, they are inebriate extravagancies–intemperate
admirations of the dark side of the moon, so to speak; attributed
to Bacon, they are admirations of the golden glories of the
moon’s front side, the moon at the full–and not intemperate, not
overwrought, but sane and right, and justified. “At ever turn
and point at which the author required a metaphor, simile, or
illustration, his mind ever turned FIRST to the law; he seems
almost to have THOUGHT in legal phrases; the commonest legal
phrases, the commonest of legal expressions, were ever at the end
of his pen.” That could happen to no one but a person whose
TRADE was the law; it could not happen to a dabbler in it.
Veteran mariners fill their conversation with sailor-phrases and
draw all their similes from the ship and the sea and the storm,
but no mere PASSENGER ever does it, be he of Stratford or
elsewhere; or could do it with anything resembling accuracy, if
he were hardy enough to try. Please read again what Lord
Campbell and the other great authorities have said about Bacon
when they thought they were saying it about Shakespeare of Stratford.
X
The Rest of the Equipment
The author of the Plays was equipped, beyond every other man
of his time, with wisdom, erudition, imagination, capaciousness
of mind, grace, and majesty of expression. Everyone one had said
it, no one doubts it. Also, he had humor, humor in rich
abundance, and always wanting to break out. We have no evidence
of any kind that Shakespeare of Stratford possessed any of these
gifts or any of these acquirements. The only lines he ever
wrote, so far as we know, are substantially barren of them–
barren of all of them.
Good friend for Iesus sake forbeare
To digg the dust encloased heare:
Blest be ye man yt spares thes stones
And curst be he yt moves my bones.
Ben Jonson says of Bacon, as orator:
His language, WHERE HE COULD SPARE AND PASS BY A JEST, was
nobly censorious. No man ever spoke more neatly, more pressly,
more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in
what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted of his
(its) own graces. . . . The fear of every man that heard him was
lest he should make an end.
From Macaulay:
He continued to distinguish himself in Parliament,
particularly by his exertions in favor of one excellent measure
on which the King’s heart was set–the union of England and
Scotland. It was not difficult for such an intellect to discover
many irresistible arguments in favor of such a scheme. He
conducted the great case of the POST NATI in the Exchequer
Chamber; and the decision of the judges–a decision the legality
of which may be questioned, but the beneficial effect of which
must be acknowledged–was in a great measure attributed to his
dexterous management.
Again:
While actively engaged in the House of Commons and in the courts
of law, he still found leisure for letters and philosophy.
The noble treatise on the ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING, which at a
later period was expanded into the DE AUGMENTIS, appeared in 1605.
The WISDOM OF THE ANCIENTS, a work which, if it had
proceeded from any other writer, would have been considered as a
masterpiece of wit and learning, was printed in 1609.
In the mean time the NOVUM ORGANUM was slowly proceeding.
Several distinguished men of learning had been permitted to see
portions of that extraordinary book, and they spoke with the
greatest admiration of his genius.
Even Sir Thomas Bodley, after perusing the COGITATA ET VISA,
one of the most precious of those scattered leaves out of which
the great oracular volume was afterward made up, acknowledged
that “in all proposals and plots in that book, Bacon showed
himself a master workman”; and that “it could not be gainsaid but
all the treatise over did abound with choice conceits of the
present state of learning, and with worthy contemplations of the
means to procure it.”
In 1612 a new edition of the ESSAYS appeared, with additions
surpassing the original collection both in bulk and quality.