Francis Bacon was not satisfied with received knowledge. He waded out to the middle of that ocean and it came all the way up to his ankles. Traditional muses did not suffice either. So he chose a tenth muse while he was still in his teens in France. A letter Bacon received in 1582, from Jean De la Jesse, personal secretary to the duc d'Anjou identifies his tenth muse. Jesse asserts that his own Muse has been inspired by "Bacon's Pallas", "bien que votre Pallas me rende mieux instruit".

Pallas Athena Herself. Goddess of Wisdom. The Spear-Shaker.When she shook her spear the light of knowledge flashed forth, and all the darkness of ignorance fled away. Those true filed lines were her offspring, as Ben Jonson broadly hinted in his somewhat awkward introductory verse to The First Folio:

"In each of which he seemes to shake a lance,As brandish't at the eyes of ignorance."

With such inspiration Bacon could do no less than to imitate God Himself. God had built the world (the great globe), and he, Bacon, would finish the job by planting a model of it within the human mind. He used the broad cycle of the Plays to shadow forth the Scheme of Things Entire.----Mather Walker, author of The Secret of the Shakespeare Plays