Bacon | Page 7

to
find Bacon bringing against the Puritans the converse of the charge
which his age, and Pascal afterwards, brought against the Jesuits. The
essay, besides being a picture of the times as regards religion, is an
example of what was to be Bacon's characteristic strength and
weakness: his strength in lifting up a subject which had been degraded
by mean and wrangling disputations, into a higher and larger light, and
bringing to bear on it great principles and the results of the best human
wisdom and experience, expressed in weighty and pregnant maxims;
his weakness in forgetting, as, in spite of his philosophy, he so often
did, that the grandest major premises need well-proved and ascertained
minors, and that the enunciation of a principle is not the same thing as
the application of it. Doubtless there is truth in his closing words; but
each party would have made the comment that what he had to prove,

and had not proved, was that by following his counsel they would "love
the whole world better than a part."
"Let them not fear ... the fond calumny of neutrality; but let them know
that is true which is said by a wise man, that neuters in contentions are
either better or worse than either side. These things have I in all
sincerity and simplicity set down touching the controversies which now
trouble the Church of England; and that without all art and insinuation,
and therefore not like to be grateful to either part. Notwithstanding, I
trust what has been said shall find a correspondence in their minds
which are not embarked in partiality, and which love the whole letter
than a part"
Up to this time, though Bacon had showed himself capable of taking a
broad and calm view of questions which it was the fashion among good
men, and men who were in possession of the popular ear, to treat with
narrowness and heat, there was nothing to disclose his deeper
thoughts--nothing foreshadowed the purpose which was to fill his life.
He had, indeed, at the age of twenty-five, written a "youthful"
philosophical essay, to which he gave the pompous title "Temporis
Partus Maximus," "the Greatest Birth of Time." But he was thirty-one
when we first find an indication of the great idea and the great projects
which were to make his name famous. This indication is contained in
an earnest appeal to Lord Burghley for some help which should not be
illusory. Its words are distinct and far-reaching, and they are the first
words from him which tell us what was in his heart. The letter has the
interest to us of the first announcement of a promise which, to ordinary
minds, must have appeared visionary and extravagant, but which was
so splendidly fulfilled; the first distant sight of that sea of knowledge
which henceforth was opened to mankind, but on which no man, as he
thought, had yet entered. It contains the famous avowal--"I have taken
all knowledge to be my province"--made in the confidence born of long
and silent meditations and questionings, but made in a simple good
faith which is as far as possible from vain boastfulness.
"MY LORD,--With as much confidence as mine own honest and
faithful devotion unto your service and your honourable

correspondence unto me and my poor estate can breed in a man, do I
commend myself unto your Lordship. I wax now somewhat ancient:
one and thirty years is a great deal of sand in the hour glass. My health,
I thank God, I find confirmed; and I do not fear that action shall impair
it, because I account my ordinary course of study and meditation to be
more painful than most parts of action are. I ever bare a mind (in some
middle place that I could discharge) to serve her Majesty, not as a man
born under Sol, that loveth honour, nor under Jupiter, that loveth
business (for the contemplative planet carrieth me away wholly), but as
a man born under an excellent sovereign that deserveth the dedication
of all men's abilities. Besides, I do not find in myself so much self-love,
but that the greater parts of my thoughts are to deserve well (if I be able)
of my friends, and namely of your Lordship; who, being the Atlas of
this commonwealth, the honour of my house, and the second founder of
my poor estate, I am tied by all duties, both of a good patriot, and of an
unworthy kinsman, and of an obliged servant, to employ whatsoever I
am to do you service. Again, the meanness of my estate doth somewhat
move me; for though I cannot accuse myself that I am either prodigal or
slothful, yet my health is not to spend, nor my course to get. Lastly, I