I have a purpose therefore (though I break the order of time) to draw it down to the sense, by some patterns of a Natural Story or Inquisition." But besides these natural stories, which were probably to be something like the "New Atlantis," and some other works particularly named, there was still another class, for which the world might "scramble" and "set up a new English inquisition," and upon which he continues in these words: : "As for my Essays and some other particulars of that nature, I count them but as the recreations of my other studies, and in that sort purpose to continue them; though I am not ignorant that those kind of writings would with less pains and embracement (perhaps) yield more lustre and reputation to my name than those other which I have in hand. But I account the use that a man should seek of the publishing of his own writings before his death, to be but an untimely anticipation of that which is proper to follow a man, and not to go along with him." 1 Again, speaking of his philosophy in general, he says: "For myself, nothing which is external to the establishment of its principles is of any interest to me. For neither am I a hungerer after fame, nor have I, after the manner of heresiarchs, any ambition to originate a sect; and, as for deriving any private emolument from such labours, I should hold the thought as base as it is ridiculous. Enough for me the consciousness of desert, and that coming accomplishment of real effects which fortune itself shall not be able to intercept." 2 He cares little now for any mere lustre of reputation. It is very possible, of course, that all these expressions had reference only to some other prose compositions of a popular character. They do not necessarily amount to any positive allusion to these plays; but when considered with reference to the entire mass of evidence, which will be pro1 Works (Boston), XIII. 188. 2 Proœmium, Craik's Bacon, 614. duced to prove the fact that he was the author of them, it must strike the mind of any reader with the force of a very pregnant suggestion, that he intended (in his own mind, at least,) to include them in the same category with the Essays as among those other unnamed particulars. The work of revising the Essays was continued, and the new and enlarged edition appeared, in 1625. If the Folio of 1623 were printed under his supervision, his part of the work must have been still in progress, if not entirely completed, at the date of this epistle to Bishop Andrews. His poetical works were in the possession of the world as "Mr. William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies," and as "Shakespeare's Sonnets and Poems;" and so he would let them remain. They had had their trial already and stood out all appeals, and the wit that was in them could no more be hid than it could be lost. These "feigned histories or speaking pictures," which had for one object, perhaps, "to draw down to the sense" of the theatre and the popular mind things which "flew too high over men's heads" in general, in other forms of delivery, would effectually do their own proper work; and they might be left to take care of themselves. "And there we hope," says the Preface, "to your divers capacities, you will find enough, both to draw, and hold you." For him, not to be understood would be all the same as not to be known: "Read him, therefore, and again and again: And, if then, you do not like him, surely you are in some manifest danger not to understand him." It is certainly conceivable, that a mind like his should care but little for any lustre that might be added to his name, or his memory, by these writings; or, at least, that he should be willing to wait until it should shine forth with an illumination sufficiently brilliant and clear to reveal by its own light the soul and genius of himself. In the mean time, he would take care to keep "the memory of so worthy a Friend and Fellow alive," as this "our Shakespeare" had come to be. The following son net, perhaps, may represent the true state of his mind and feeling, near the close of his life: : "Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, Fool'd by these rebel powers that thee array, So shalt thou feed on death, that feeds on men, Sonnet cxlvi. § 6. BACON A poet. Of course, if this theory be established, there will be no further question that Francis Bacon was a poet; but the business here will be to consider of the extraneous evidences of the fact, and also of those further proofs out of the writings themselves, more immediately connected with this part of the inquiry, which go to establish that We have already seen in his personal history that he was, in the earlier part of his career, much in the habit of writing sonnets. Some of them were addressed to the Queen, some were written for Essex to be addressed to her in his name, and one, at least, was commended by great persons; for, as he writes in the Apology concerning Essex, "a little before that time, being about the middle of Michaelmas term [1599], her majesty had a purpose to dine at my lodge at Twickenham Park, at which time I had, though I profess not to be a poet, prepared a sonnet, directly tending and alluding to draw on her majesty's reconcilement to my lord; which, I remember, also, I showed to a great person and one of my lord's nearest friends [Southampton ?], who commended it." In the letter of advice addressed by the Earl of Essex to Sir Fulke Greville on his studies, first printed by Mr. Spedding as written by Bacon, and palpably one of the numerous papers drafted by him for his patron's use, the Earl is made to say: "For poets, I can commend none, being resolved to be ever a stranger to them."2 However this may have been intended to be seriously spoken in character by the Earl to the Knight (who was himself a poet), when considered with reference to the actual facts now known concerning them both, it may be taken as a pretty good joke. Nor need there be any wonder that his sonnets were commended by the great, when we know, by acknowledged specimens of his skill in the art, that he was capable of writing very excellent poetry. Upon a review of his poetical works, Mr. Spedding ventures to express the opinion, that" Bacon was not without the fine phrensy of the poet," and that, if it had taken the ordinary direction, "it would have carried him to a place among the great poets." 3 His metrical versions of the Psalms of David, which were dedicated to his friend, the learned and pious poet, George Herbert, as "the best judge of Divinity and Poesy met," were the amusement of his idle hours, during a time of impaired health, in the spring of 1625, and within a year of his death. Certainly, nothing great, or very brilliant, should be looked for in these mere translations into verse. In idea and sentiment, he was absolutely limited to the original psalm: nor could he have much latitude in the expression; besides that large allowance must be made for the necessary difference between the young and "strong imagination" of "The lunatic, the lover, and the poet," of the "Midsummer-Night's Dream" of the man of thirty 1 Apology, Works (Phila.), II. 336. 3 Works (Boston), XIV. 113. three, and the more compounded age and the lassitude of the sick old man of sixty-five. Nevertheless, in elegance, ease of rhythmic flow, and pathetic sweetness, in many passages, they are not unworthy of the master himself, and in the expression and use of words, there are many similitudes with Shakespeare, and some striking parallel passages may be found in them: as, for instance, this one from the translaion of the XCth Psalm, "As a tale told, which sometimes men attend, And sometimes not, our life steals to an end :" which may be compared with the following lines from the "King John": "Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale, Vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man." — Act III. Sc. 4. And again, in the same Psalm, we have these lines: "O Lord, thou art our home, to whom we fly, Before the hills did intercept the eye, Or that the frame was up of earthly stage, One God thou wert, and art, and still shall be; Both death and life obey thy holy lore, And visit in their turns, as they are sent; A thousand years with thee, they are no more Than yesterday, which, ere it is, is spent: Or as a watch by night, that course doth keep, And goes, and comes, unwares to them that sleep." 1 And in the CIVth Psalm, we have this line :- "The greater navies look like walking woods." Now, compare this with the following lines from the "Macbeth":— "Mess. I look'd toward Birnam, and anon, methought, The wood began to move..... Mac. To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. -Out, out, brief candle! 1 Works (Boston), XIV. 125. |