shouldered, brown man, thin and nervous-looking. large head and small features.

He had a

It would be presumptuous to attempt anything like an exact valuation of Bacon's intellectual power. We state only what lies upon the surface when we say that the character and products of his intellect are very often as much over-estimated upon one side as they are under-estimated upon another. He is frequently praised as if he had originated and established the inductive method, as if he had laid down the canons appealed to in modern science as the ultimate conditions of sound induction. This is going too far. Bacon was an orator, not a worker; a Tyrtæus, not a Miltiades. He rendered a great service by urging recourse to observation and experiment rather than to speculation; but neither by precept nor by example did he show how to observe and experiment well, or so as to arrive at substantial conclusions. Not by precept; for if modern inductive method were no better than Bacon's inductive method, Macaulay's caricature of the process would not be so very unlike the reality. Nor by example; for the majority of his own generalisations are loose to a degree. To call Bacon the founder of scientific method is to mistake the character of his mind, and to do him an injustice by resting his fame upon a false foundation. Unwearied activity, inexhaustible constructiveness-that, and not scientific patience or accuracy, was his characteristic. what Peter Heylin calls "a chymical brain"; every group of facts that entered his mind he restlessly threw into new combinations. We over-estimate the man upon one side when we give him credit for scientific rigour; his contemporary Gilbert, who wrote upon the magnet, probably had more scientific caution and accuracy than he. And we under-estimate him upon another side when we speak as if the Inductive Philosophy had been the only outcome of his ever-active brain. His projects of reform in Law were almost as vast as his projects of reform in Philosophy. In Politics he drew up opinions on every question of importance during the forty years of his public life, and was often employed by the Queen and Lord Burleigh to write papers of State. done in addition to his practical work as a lawyer. multiplex labours do not seem to have used up his mental vigour ; his schemes always outran human powers of performance. His ambition was not to make one great finished effort aud then rest; his intellectual appetite seemed almost insatiable,1

He had

All this was

And yet his

1 It is a curious problem to make out why an intellect so acute and active revolted from the subtleties of the schoolmen, and did not rather turn to them as its most congenial element. Part of the explanation is doubtless to be found in the high development of his senses, in the strong arrest of his mind upon the outer world. A meditative man will walk for miles through the country, and be unable to describe minutely any one object that he has seen.

Bacon's eye

In a inan with such prodigious activity of intellect, and such a bent towards analysing and classifying dry facts, we do not look for much warmth of feeling. He is not likely to spend much of his time either in imagining objects of tender affection or in doting upon actual objects. The world has not yet seen the intellect of a Bacon combined with the sentimentality of a Sterne, or the philanthropy of a Howard. The works of Bacon afford very little food for ordinary human feelings. All the pleasure we gain from them is founded upon their intellectual excellences. Even the similitudes are intellectual rather than emotional, ingenious rather than touching or poetical. To adapt an image of Ben Jonson's-the wine of Bacon's writings is a dry wine. As we read, we experience the pleasure of surmounting obstacles; we are electrified by unexpected analogies, and the sudden revelations of new aspects in familiar things; and we sympathise more or less with the boundless exhilaration of a mind that pierces with ease and swiftness through barriers that reduce other minds to torpor and stagnancy.

Our author says of himself that he was not born "under Jupiter that loveth business"; "the contemplative planet carried him away solely." He had not the physical constitution needed to bear the worry and fatigue of the actual direction of affairs-not to say that he was so engrossed with his intellectual projects that practical drudgery was intolerably irksome. As Lord Chancellor, he cleared off a large accumulation of unheard cases with great despatch; but he proved unequal to the minuter duties of the office, and allowed subordinates to do as they pleased.1

Opinions. The following is a bare outline of Bacon's great philosophical project: "The 'Instauratio' is to be divided into probably drank in everything as he went along; or, if not everything, at least enough to keep him thinking about external things.

1 So much has been made of certain specific charges of moral delinquency on the part of Bacon, that we cannot pass them over without some notice. Attentive readers will have anticipated our explanation. Take the case of Essex, Essex warmly patronised Bacon, pleaded with the Queen for his preferment, and made him a present of an estate. Yet when Essex was charged with treasonable practices, Bacon, as one of the Queen's Counsel, took part in the impeachment. We cannot enter here into minute casuistry; but it is easy to see that the impulsive Essex forced his patronage and his favours upon Bacon, and that Bacon, while he feared to discourage such a man's friendship, was acutely aware of its inconveniences. A man of high honour would have firmly declined Essex's services; a generous man, who had accepted such services, would have felt bound to stand by Essex to the last; and yet it would have been imprudent to have acted otherwise than as Bacon acted. His conduct in the Chancellorship is a plainer case. The faults that have been proved against him were faults of omission, not of commission. He was engrossed with his Novum Organum' and other projects, and closed his eyes to the doings of subordinates. He may even have received bribe-money from them without being at pains to inquire into the particulars. We can quite believe his declaration that he never gave judgment with a bribe in his eye." He broke faith, not with justice, but with the giver of the bribe.

six portions, of which the first is to contain a general survey of the present state of knowledge. In the second, men are to be taught how to use their understanding aright in the investigation of nature. In the third, all the phenomena of the universe are to be stored up as in a treasure-house, as the materials on which the new method is to be employed. In the fourth, examples are to be given of its operation and of the results to which it leads. The fifth is to contain what Bacon had accomplished in natural philosophy without the aid of his own method, but merely by what may be called common reason. In the sixth part "will be set forth the new philosophy-the result of the application of the new method to all the phenomena of the universe."

No sketch can here be attempted of his methods of induction. They possess little or no scientific value. He had no conception of valid proof. His own speculations are as rash as anything to be found in the schoolmen. Thus, among his 'Prerogative Instances' he lays down that precious stones, diamonds and rubies, are fine exudations of stone, just as the gum of trees is a fine straining through the wood and bark. He repeats this theory in the Sylva Sylvarum.' Of the thousand paragraphs in the 'Sylva' touching natural phenomena and their causes, there is hardly one that does not contain some speculation equally fanciful.

The opinions contained in his Essays 1-observations and precepts on man and society-are perhaps the most permanent evidence of his sagacity. In this field he was thoroughly at home; the study of mankind occupied the largest part of his time. The Essays treat of a great variety of subjects-Truth, Death, Dissimulation, Superstition, Plantations, Masks and Triumphs, Beauty, Deformity, Vicissitudes of Things. To give any general idea of the contents of so many closely-packed pages of solid observation, is impossible within our limits. It may be said that to men wishing to rise in the world by politic management of their fellowmen, Bacon's Essays are the best handbook hitherto published. His own worldly wisdom was clenched by the significant aphorism, 'By indignities men come to dignities."

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His opinions in religion have been disputed. We know that his mother considered him remiss in the matter of family prayers, and in this respect not a pattern to his elder brother. But there is nothing in his writings at variance with the orthodox faith. It has been doubted whether a work called 'The Christian Paradoxes' was written by him; but if it was, it is only what it professes to be a paradoxical expression of orthodoxy. He did not, as is sometimes stated, deny the argument from final causes.

He

1 The second part of the title-" Counsels Civil and Moral is much more descriptive of the book, but it has been dropped, and would be difficult to revive. The original ten essays contained almost nothing but maxims of prudence.

only maintained that looking for final causes is a distraction from the investigation of physical causes. He would seem to have held that theology can be founded only on the Bible, and that whatever is affirmed there must be believed implicitly.

ELEMENTS OF STYLE.

Vocabulary.-Bacon's range of subjects was wide, and his command of words within that range as great as any man could have acquired. He took pains to keep his vocabulary rich. From some private notes that have been preserved, we see that he had a habit of jotting down and refreshing his memory with varieties of expression on all subjects that were likely to occur for discussion.

"

He uses a great many more obsolete words than either Hooker or Sidney. To be sure, the language of the feelings and the language of theology have changed less than the language of science. But in his narrative and in his Essays, as well as in his scientific writings, Bacon shows a decided preference now and then for "inkhorn terms." In his History of King Henry VII.' we meet with such words as "habilitate for qualified, "the brocage of an usurper" for the baits or panderings of an usurper, "impatronise himself of" for make himself patron of, "difficile to" for slow to or unwilling to,—and suchlike. How archaic the scientific style is may be seen in the following passage from the 'Sylva Sylvarum '-perhaps an extreme case. It is headed, "Experiment Solitary touching Change of Aliments and Medicines:

"It helpeth both in medicine and aliment, to change and not to continue the same medicine and aliment still. The cause is, for that nature, by continual use of anything, groweth to a satiety and dullness, either of appetite or working. And we see that assuetude of things hurtful doth make them lose their force to hurt; as poison which with use some have brought themselves to brook. And therefore it is no marvel though things helpful, by custom, lose their force to help. I count intermission almost the same thing with change; for that that hath been intermitted is after a sort new."

The phrase "for that" in place of inasmuch as is used so often by Bacon as almost to be a mannerism. The frequent use corre

sponds to his habit of accounting for things.

Sentences. His general structure of sentence, as shown in his 'Advancement of Learning,' his History, and his occasional discourses, is less elaborate but more modern than in Hooker's average style. His sentences are shorter and more pointed; and being comparatively free from pedantic inversions, have a more modern flow. In the placing of qualifying clauses he is less awkward. The following period, from his "Discourse in praise of

Elizabeth," if somewhat intricate, is well built, and graduated to a climax :

"The benefits of Almighty God upon this land, since the time that in His singular providence He led as it were by the hand, and placed in the kingdom, His servant, our Queen Elizabeth, are such, as not in boasting or in confidence of ourselves, but in praise of His holy name, are worthy to be both considered and confessed, yea, and registered in perpetual memory."

The next, from the Advancement of Learning,' is an average specimen of his long sentence :

"And for matter of policy and government, that learning should rather hurt than enable thereunto, is a thing very improbable: we see it is accounted an error to commit a natural body to empiric physicians, which commonly have a few pleasing receipts whereupon they are confident and adventurous, but know neither the causes of diseases, nor the complexions of patients, nor peril of accidents, nor the true method of cures: we see it is a like error to rely upon advocates or lawyers, which are only men of practice and not grounded in their books, who are many times easily surprised when matter falleth out besides their experience, to the prejudice of the causes they handle: so by like reason it cannot be but a matter of doubtful consequence if states be managed by empiric statesmen, not well mingled with men grounded in learning.'

The Essays, particularly the earlier ones, are full of balance and point, suiting their character as emphatic aphoristic precepts. The Essay on Studies, the first of the original ten, is more than usually balanced :

"Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention. Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man. And therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit; and if he read little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know that he doth not. Histories make men wise; poets witty; the mathematics subtile; natural philosophy deep; moral grave; logic and rhetoric able to contend."

The following is from his sagacious Essay "Of Negotiat ing":

Letters are

"It is generally better to deal by speech than by letter. good, when a man would draw an answer by letter back again; or when it may serve for a man's justification afterwards to produce his own letter; or where it may be danger to be interrupted or heard by pieces. To deal in person is good, when a man's face breedeth regard, as commonly with inferiors; or in tender cases, where a man's eye upon the countenance of him with whom he speaketh may give him a direction how far to go; and generally, when a man will reserve to himself liberty either to disavow or to expound.

"