F. J. SCHULTE & CO., PUBLISHERS.
298 DEARBORN STREET.
BY
W. F. C. WIGSTON,
AUTHOR OF
A New Study of
Shakespeare," "Bacon, Shakespeare and the Rosicrucians"
"Hermes Stella," "Francis Bacon, Poet, Prophet and
Philosopher."
copyright 1892
"And now we have with a small bark, such as we were able to set out, sailed about the universal circumference, as well of the old as the new, World of Sciences, with how prosperous winds and course, we leave to posterity to judge." (Book ix P.467 Advancement, I640.)
"My belief is
that Bacon was profoundly imbued with... knowledge and sought to
embalm it in art, for delivery to after ages by what he terms 'the
handing on of the Lamp for posterity'; that is, the transmission of
certain secret doctrines, which have been preserved in the works of
such great poets as Dante, Virgil and even Homer....
The great poets in all times and ages, have been the guardians and
transmitters of these mysteries, and the wanderings of Ulysses by
Homer, belongs to the same category, being a history of the soul,
combined with a history of the race, that is to say, in the
adventures of Ulysses we have presented to us parables and allegories
of every description, some relating to the temptations of the flesh
and the transformations or disguises of the spirit, as in the
incidents of Calypso and Circe, others again being historical and dim
echoes of the explorations of mankind in a vast prehistoric past.."
|
INTRODUCTION |
9 |
|
I. THE TEMPEST |
33 |
|
II. BACON'S ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING, 1640 |
49 |
|
III. FATHER PAUL AND FATHER FULGENTIO, FRANCISCAN FRIARS OF VENICE |
71 |
|
IV. PAN, DIONYSUS OR BACCHUS, AND PERSEUS (BACON'S THREE FABLES ILLUSTRATING PARABOLICAL POESY AND STAGE PLAYS IN THE "DE AUGMENTIS") |
82 |
|
V.-THE COMEDY O ERRORS |
108 |
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VI.-MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM AND BACON'S THIRTEENTH DEFICIENT OF A NEW WORLD OF SCIENCES, OR MAGIA NATURALIS |
129 |
|
VII-BACON'S NEW WORLD OF SCIENCES |
140 |
|
VIII TITLE PAGE ENGRAVING OF ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING |
155 |
|
IX.-BEN JONSON'S DISCOVERIES OR EXPLORATA |
161 |
|
X.-CIPHER - CONTINUED |
169 |
|
XI.-MEASURE FOR MEASURE |
184 |
|
XII.-THE ROSICRUCIANS |
192 |
|
XIII GORHAMBURY AND VERULAM |
212 |
pp. 216-7
The modern critic quite forgets, the art of playwright was considered a despised weed, in Bacon's age, as is testified by abundance of evidence.......Seldon declared " It would be impossible for a lord to write verses," and for a man in Bacon's position, whose legal career depended upon solid character and rational learning, to have figured as a play writer, would have exposed him to the mercy of his enemies and ruined him in Elizabeth's eyes, to say nothing that the writing of such treasonable plays as Henry IV would have taken him to the Tower, as it did, indeed, Hayward for the same thing. Everlastingly critics cry out " Why did not Bacon acknowledge his writings?" If he had it is certain he would never have died Viscount St. Albans, or been Lord Keeper! The critic thinks of the modern standing of the actor, he sees the stage ennobled to an art, the theatre a splendid structure of imagination, the drama of now on a level with all that is best in literature and acknowledged (as a profession) in society--but he does not see the Globe, or the Fortune, the Rose, or the Curtain, as they once stood, mere cockpits full of gods and apple-gnawing rabble, seated on rude benches, and the structures themselves (like the Globe) mere mountebank edifices as they are represented in engravings and woodcuts handed down to us! Poetry and play writing in the service of the court, as the composition of masques and barriers, might raise a man like Ben Jonson, who had been a bricklayer, or even a reputed Shakespeare, but it would degrade a nephew of Lord Burleigh, a son of Queen Elizabeth's Lord Keeper, an aspirant at court and on the bench,-- a man whose mother, Lady Anne Bacon, held every eccentricity in abhorrence, with the severity of a straight-laced rigid Puritan. Even Bacon's splendid talents and prose writings raised the voices of his enemies against him. Coke, his great rival and life long foe, declared the Advancement of Learning a work none but a fool would have written, and said Bacon's ship device deserved to be freighted with fools......