THE LIFE OF THE HONOURABLE AUTHOR.1 FRANCIS BACON, the glory of his age and nation, the adorner and ornament of learning, was born in York House, or York Place, in the Strand, on the two and twentieth day of January, in the year of our Lord 1560. His father was that famous counsellor to Queen Elizabeth, the second prop of the kingdom in his time, Sir Nicholas Bacon, knight, lord-keeper of the great seal of England; a lord of known prudence, sufficiency, moderation, and integrity. His mother was Anne, one of the daughters of Sir Anthony Cook; unto whom the erudition of King Edward the Sixth had been committed; a choice lady, and eminent for piety, virtue, and learning; being exquisitely skilled, for a woman, 1 This Life was first published in 1657, as an introduction to the volume entitled "Resuscitatio; or bringing into public light several pieces of the works, civil, historical, philosophical, and theological, hitherto sleeping, of the Right Honourable Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam, Viscount St. Alban; according to the best corrected copies." Of this volume a second edition, or rather a re-issue with fresh titlepage and dedication, and several sheets of new matter inserted, appeared in 1661; the "Life of the Honourable Author" being prefixed as before, and not altered otherwise than by the introduction of three new sentences; to make room for which two leaves were cancelled. A third edition was brought out in 1671 by the original publisher, containing a good deal of new matter; for which however Dr. Rawley, who died in 1667, is not answerable. in the Greek and Latin tongues. These being the parents, you may easily imagine what the issue was like to be; having had whatsoever nature or breeding could put into him. His first and childish years were not without some mark of eminency; at which time he was endued with that pregnancy and towardness of wit, as they were presages of that deep and universal apprehension which was manifest in him afterward; and caused him to be taken notice of by several persons of worth and place, and especially by the queen; who (as I have been informed) delighted much then to confer with him, and to prove him with questions; unto whom he delivered himself with that gravity and maturity above his years, that Her Majesty would often term him, The young Lord-keeper. Being asked by the queen how old he was, he answered with much discretion, being then but a boy, That he was two years younger than Her Majesty's happy reign; with which answer the queen was much taken.1 At the ordinary years of ripeness for the university, or rather something earlier, he was sent by his father to Trinity College, in Cambridge,2 to be educated and bred under the tuition of Doctor John White-gift, then master of the college; afterwards the renowned archbishop of Canterbury; a prelate of the first magnitude 1 This last sentence was added in the edition of 1661. The substance of it had appeared before in the Latin Life prefixed to the Opuscula Philosophica in 1658, which is only a free translation of this, with a few corrections. 2 He began to reside in April 1573; was absent from the latter end of August 1574 till the beginning of March, while the plague raged; and left the university finally at Christmas 1575, being then on the point of sixteen. See Whitgift's accounts, printed in the British Magazine, vol. xxxii. p. 365., and xxxiii. p. 444. for sanctity, learning, patience, and humility; under whom he was observed to have been more than an ordinary proficient in the several arts and sciences. Whilst he was commorant in the university, about sixteen years of age, (as his lordship hath been pleased to impart unto myself), he first fell into the dislike of the philosophy of Aristotle; not for the worthlessness of the author, to whom he would ever ascribe all high attributes, but for the unfruitfulness of the way; being a philosophy (as his lordship used to say) only strong for disputations and contentions, but barren of the production of works for the benefit of the life of man; in which mind he continued to his dying day. After he had passed the circle of the liberal arts, his father thought fit to frame and mould him for the arts of state; and for that end sent him over into France with Sir Amyas Paulet then employed ambassador lieger into France; by whom he was after awhile held fit to be entrusted with some message or advertisement to the queen; which having performed with great approbation, he returned back into France again, with intention to continue for some years there. In his absence in France his father the lord-keeper died,2 having collected (as I have heard of knowing persons) a considerable sum of money, which he had separated, with intention to have made a competent purchase of land for the livelihood of this his youngest son (who was only unprovided for; and though he was the youngest in years, yet he was not the lowest in his 1 Sir Amyas landed at Calais on the 25th of September 1576, and succeeded Dr. Dale as ambassador in France in the following February. See Burghley's Diary, Murdin, pp. 778, 779. 2 In February 1578-9. father's affection); but the said purchase being unaccomplished at his father's death, there came no greater share to him than his single part and portion of the money dividable amongst five brethren; by which means he lived in some straits and necessities in his younger years. For as for that pleasant site and manor of Gorhambury, he came not to it till many years after, by the death of his dearest brother, Mr. Anthony Bacon, a gentleman equal to him in height of wit, though inferior to him in the endowments of learning and knowledge; unto whom he was most nearly conjoined in affection, they two being the sole male issue of a second venter. Being returned from travel, he applied himself to the study of the common law, which he took upon him to be his profession;2 in which he obtained to great excellency, though he made that (as himself said) but as an accessary, and not his principal study. He wrote several tractates upon that subject: wherein, though some great masters of the law did out-go him in bulk, and particularities of cases, yet in the science of the grounds and mysteries of the law he was exceeded by none. In this way he was after awhile sworn of the queen's council learned, extraordinary; a grace (if I err not) scarce known before.3 He seated himself, 1 Anthony Bacon died in the spring of 1601. See a letter from Mr. John Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carlton, in the State Paper Office, dated 27th May 1601. 2 He had been admitted de societate introrum of Gray's Inn on the 27th of June 1576; commenced his regular career as a student in 1579; became "utter barrister" on the 27th of June 1582; bencher in 1586; reader in 1588; and double reader in 1600. See Harl. MSS. 1912, and Book of Orders, p. 56. 8 In the Latin version of this memoir, for "after a while" Rawley substitutes nondum tyrocinium in lege egressus, by which he seems to assign a for the commodity of his studies and practice, amongst the Honourable Society of Gray's-Inn, of which house he was a member; where he erected that elegant pile or structure commonly known by the name of The Lord Bacon's Lodgings, which he inhabited by turns the most part of his life (some few years only excepted) unto his dying day. In which house he carried himself with such sweetness, comity, and generosity, that he was much revered and beloved by the readers and gentlemen of the house. Notwithstanding that he professed the law for his livelihood and subsistence, yet his heart and affection very early period as the date of this appointment. But I suspect he was mistaken, both as to the date and the nature of it. The title he got no doubt from a letter addressed by Bacon to King James, about the end of January 1620-1. "You found me of the Learned Council, Extraordinary, without patent or fee, a kind of individuum vagum. You established me and brought me into Ordinary." Coupling this probably with an early but undated letter to Burghley, in which Bacon thanks the queen for "appropriating him to her service," he imagined that the thanks were for the appointment in question. This however is incredible. A copy of this letter in the Landsdowne Collection gives the date,-18 October 1580; at which time Bacon had not been even a student of law for more than a year and a half, and could not therefore have been qualified for such a place; still less could such a distinction have been conferred upon him without being much talked of at the time and continually referred to afterwards. Moreover, we have another letter of Bacon's to King James, written in 1606, in which he speaks of his "nine years' service of the crown." This would give 1597 as the year in which he began to serve as one of the learned council; at which time it was no extraordinary favour, seeing that he had been recommended for solicitor-general three or four years before, both by Burghley and Egerton. It appears however to have been no regular or formal appointment. He was not sworn. He had no patent; not even a written warrant. His tenure was only ratione verbi regii Elizabetha (see Rymer, A. D. 1604, p. 121.). Elizabeth, who "looked that her word should be a warrant," chose to employ him in the business which belonged properly to her learned council, and he was employed accordingly. His first service of that nature, the first at least of which I find any record, was in 1594. In 1597 he had come to be employed regularly, and so continued till the end of the reign, and was familiarly spoken of as "Mr. Bacon of the learned council." -- |