EVERYMAN'S LIBRARY EDITED BY ERNEST RHYS ESSAYS ESSAYS OF FRANCIS BACON WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY OLIPHANT SMEATON THE PUBLISHERS OF LIB ( K^t c I\T WILL BE PLEASED TO SEND FREELY TO ALL APPLICANTS A LIST OF THE PUBLISHED AND PROJECTED VOLUMES TO BE COMPRISED UNDER THE FOLLOWING TWELVE HEADINGS: TRAVEL ^ SCIENCE ^ FICTION THEOLOGY & PHILOSOPHY HISTORY ? CLASSICAL CHILDREN'S BOOKS ESSAYS ^ ORATORY POETRY & DRAMA BIOGRAPHY ROMANCE IN TWO STYLES OF BINDING, CLOTH, FLAT BACK., COLOURED TOP, AND LEATHER, ROUND CORNERS, GILT TOP LONDON : J. M. DENT & CO. \rnif 1 2&-ESSAYES orCOUNSEIS CIVILL &@) MORALLY FRANCIS BACON Cord LONDON:PUBLJ5HED byJ-MDENT--CO AND IN NEW YORK BY E-P DUTTON & CO Fir it Edition, January 1906. Reprinted April 1906. THE TABLE ESSAY PAGE INTRODUCTION ..... is i. Or TRUTH ... .3 ji. OF DEATH . . .... 6 in. Or UNITY IN RELIGION .... 8 iv. Or REVENGE . . . , .13 v. OF ADVERSITY . . . . .15 vi. OF SIMULATION AND DISSIMULATION . . .17 vn. OF PARENTS AND CHILDREN . . . .20 vin. OF MARRIAGE AND SINGLE LIFE . . 22 ix. OF ENVY ..... r 24 x. OF LOVE . . .... 29 xi. Or GREAT PLACE . . . . .31 xn. OF BOLDNESS . . . . 35 xni. OF GOODNESS, AND GOODNESS OF NATURE . , 37 xiv. OF NOBILITY . . . . .40 xv. OF SEDITIONS ANI> TROUBLES . . .42 xvi. OF ATHEISM ...... 49 xvn. OF SUPERSTITION , . . . 5 2 xvni. OF TRAVEL ...... 54 xix. OF EMPIRE . .... 57 xx. OF COUNSEL . ... , 62 xxi. OF DELAY ...... 67 xxii. OF CUNNING ... . . , 68 xxiii. OF WISDOM FOR A MAN'S SKLF . . .72 xxiv. Or INNOVATIONS . .... 74 xxv. OF DISPATCH 76 xxvi. OF SEEMING WISE ... .78 xxvn. Or FRIENDSHIP . . . . .80 xxvin OF ExptNsr ... , 87 The Table ESSAY PAGE xxix. Or THE TKUI GREATNESS or KINGDOMS AND ESTATE: 89 xxx. Or REGIMENT or HEALTH . . .98 xxxi. Or SUSPICION . ... 100 xxxii. Or DISCOURSE ..... 102 xxxui. Or PLANTATIONS .... 104 xxxiv. Or RICHES ...... 107 xxxv. Or PROPHECIES . . . . .no xxxvi. Or AMBITION . . . . .115 xxxvn. Or MASQUES AND TRIUMPHS .... 115 xxxviii. Or NATURE IN MEN . . .117 xxxix. Or CUSTOM AND EDUCATION . . .119 XL. Or FORTUNE ..... izi XLI. Or USURY ...... 123 XLII. Or YOUTH AND Ace .... 127 XLIII. Or BEAUTY . . . . . ,129 XLIV. Or DsroRMiTV . ... 131 XLV. Or BUILDING . . . . . 133 XLVI. Or GARDENS. . . . . ,137 XLVII. Or NEGOCIATING ..... 144 XLVIII. Or FOLLOWERS AND FRIEND; .... 146 XLIX. Or SUITORS ...... 148 L. Or STUDIES . . . . . .150 LL. Or FACTION . . . . . .152 LII. Or CEREMONIES ..... 154 LIU. Or PRAISE . . . . . ,156 LIV. Or VAIN-GLORY ..... 158 LV. Or HONOUR AND REPUTATION . . . 160 LVI. Or JUDICATURE ..... 162 LVII. Or ANGER ...... 166 ITIII. Or VICISSITUDE or THINGS .... 168 Or FAME, A FRAGMENT . . . 174 INDEX or QUOTATIONS AND FOREIGN PHRASE; . 177 GLOMARV . .... 183 vni FRANCIS BACON Baron Verulam and Viscount St Albans, but not Lord Bacon, as he is sometimes erroneously styled was born at York House, Strand, the London mansion of his father, January 22, 1561. He was the younger son, by his second wife, of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal from 1558 till his death in 1579 a man of profound legal learning, unswerving devotion to principle, and states- manlike sagacity. Both Camden and George Buchanan designate him, in common with Sir W. Cecil (Lord Burghley) as "twin pillars of the State." The second wife of the Lord Keeper and the mother of Francis was Anne, daughter of Sir Anthony Cooke, who had been the tutor of Edward VI. To his instruc- tions were largely due the culture and piety of the youthful sovereign. His daughters, Katherine, Mildred, and Anne, also trained by their parent, were celebrated as prodigies of learning even in an age when the glamour of Renaissance studies still tempted women to forsake the distaff for Demosthenes and their virginals for Virgil. The eldest was classed among the Ic.iding Latinists of her day; Mildred, the second, who married Lord Burghley, and, accordingly, was Bacon's aunt, was described by Ascham as the best female Greek scholar in England Lady Jane Grey excepted ; while Anne became celebrated in Court circles for her linguistic accomplishments and her skill in theology. Not only did she correspond in Greek with Bishop Jewell and translate his Apologia from the Latin, but her rendering of the sermons of Bernard Ochino from the Italian has been praised by competent judges. These facts regard- ing Sir Nicholas and Lady Bacon are mentioned to show b ix Introduction that, if heredity hold for aught, he was descended on both sides from parents of more than average ability. Almost from birth Francis was a delicate child, and suffered from prolonged ill-health, a circumstance to which some biographers have attributed the gravity of manner, even in youth characteristic of him. Probably it were due rather to his intense absorption, even in early childhood, in studies commonly assigned to youths considerably his seniors. Were ill-health the cause, the premature readiness of wit he displayed even before he went to college would scarcely have preserved its perennial spontaneity in the face of prolonged sickness. The boyhood of great men is generally an interesting epoch of their life to study. The boy often shows himself, by many premonitory turns and traits, the father of the man ; while the faint foreshadowing of many of those qualities, later in life making for greatness, can often be traced in unlooked-for places. The case was even so as regards Bacon. Though his earlier boyhood is almost a blank to us, save that he spent it between the family residence in London, situated near the present Strand and the Thames, and the country seat at Gorhambury in Hertfordshire, ! yet we obtain interesting light upon the facts of his career, when he emerges from the domestic seclusion of home to proceed in his thirteenth year with his brother Anthony, two years his senior, to Trinity College, Cambridge. Young though he was, he appears to have been quite fitted to hold his own with his fellow-students. His tutor was Dean Whitgift, yet to attain to the Primacy, and to win, if not note, at least notoriety as the champion of Anglicanism against Cartwright and the Puritans. At Cambridge Bacon remained three years. That he profited by the academic curriculum, as far as was possible under the inept and inefficient system then in vogue, may be taken for granted. As Macaulay says, " Bacon departed, carrying with him a profound con- tempt for the course of study pursued there, a fixed 1 Spcdding's Life of Bacon. Cf. Nichol and Montagu. x Introduction conviction that the system of academic education in England was radically vicious, a just scorn for the trifles on which the followers of Aristotle had wasted their powers, and no great reverence for Aristotle himself." ' About this time he was introduced to Court life. The high station occupied by his father and the influential family connections of the lad rendered this easy. Besides, the facts are matter of history that Elizabeth on more than one occasion visited her Lord Keeper in his stately home at Gorhambury, and amidst the immemorial oaks and elms of the beautiful Hertfordshire demesne the scene may have occurred in which the flattery- loving Queen, in response to a graceful compliment on the part of the youth, styled him, with reference to his grave demeanour, " her young Lord Keeper." That he was early familiar with the etiquette and customs of Court is manifest from the first draft of the " Essays," " On Ceremonies and Respects," 2 and " On Honour and Reputation." 3 His advice regarding conduct in high station towards superiors, inferiors, and equals is characterised not only by sound reason but by a wise expediency, which looks upon the rendering of respect to superiors not as an act of servility but of practical duty demanded from us by our relative stations in the social hierarchy. If we do not render respect to superiors, can we expect inferiors to tender respect to us ? As both Anthony and Francis looked forward to a diplomatic career, to be prepared for it they were ad- mitted "ancients" at Gray's Inn in June 1576, where they shortly afterwards erected the lodging which the latter continued at frequent intervals throughout his life to occupy. Three months later Francis crossed over to Paris in the suite of Sir Amyas Paulet, the English ambassador, to begin his practical training in diplomacy. The supreme talents of the youth must certainly have impressed the Parisian circles to which he had access. Of this proof is forthcoming in the miniature of him which a painter, no less distinguished 1 Essay on Bacon. * p. 154. 3 p. 160. XI Introduction gravity in his speaking. His language (where he could spare or pass by a jest) was nobly censorious. No man ever spoke more neatly, more pressly, 1 more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness in what he uttered." 2 Two pieces of preferment, if such they can be called, came to him at this time he was admitted a Queen's Counsel Extraordinary, while the Cecils, wearied by his continual importunity, were at last shamed into procuring for him the reversion of the Registrarship of the Star Chamber on the death of the occupant. As this event did not take place for many years, Bacon, like Walter Scott with his Clerkship, experienced all the humiliation of waiting to nil dead men's shoes. Surprise has been expressed that, con- sidering the reputation of the late Sir Nicholas Bacon, his son, even in spite of the apathy of the Cecils, should not have received some marks of favour from the Queen. The young politician, however, in his zeal for the defence of popular privileges, had attacked, in the House, the attempt to force on the Commons a confer- ence with the Lords, on a question of Supply ; while lie also had opposed the demand for large subsidies. Such offences were unpardonable without apologies the humblest, which do not appear to have been offered. Burghley and his son Sir Robert Cecil made the most of this "insubordination." They fanned the spark of irritation in the Queen's mind into the flame of indignation. Any solicitations on Bacon's part for pro- motion, therefore, were met with chilling silence or polite refusal. Personally, however, Burghley's constant refusal to assist Bacon proceeded as much from the great statesman's detestation of nepotism as from con- tempt for his nephew's vanity and instability. To the resolute old Treasurer, Francis Bacon's versatility savoured too much of political volatility an offence inexcusable in his eyes. Bacon now resolved to be the suitor for his kinsmen's good offices no longer. He, therefore, transferred his allegiance to the party of the Earl of Essex, that brilliant 1 Readily. * Discoveries Jonson's Works, vol. iii. p. 401. xiv Introduction but impetuous young nobleman, who, after climbing so high into the favour of the Queen, fell so disastrously through conduct that had not even the merit of oppor- tunism to palliate it. But at this time he was the rising star in English politics, and the rival of the great Burghley himself. For Bacon, the young Earl con- ceived an affection both warm and sincere. With the advancement of his friend's fortunes Essex specially charged himself, making request so persistently to the Queen, first for the Attorney-Generalship, next for the Solicitor-Generalship, and finally for the post of " Master of the Rolls," that her Majesty begged him to speak on some other topic ! When all these offices were put past Bacon, greatly to his chagrin, his patron consoled him with the gift of an estate at Twickenham, valued at ^2000. They appear to have lived on terms of the closest intimacy, Bacon sharing in the social pleasures of Essex House, to aid which he wrote the Masque "The Conference of Pleasure" a line of work for which Bacon evinced special aptitude, as witness his "Palace of Learning" and contributions to the "Gesta Grayorum," written at the request of the Benchers of Gray's Inn. How profoundly he had studied even the art of amusing people is evident from his Essay on "Masques and Triumphs," 1 published in the 1625 edition of the work. The question of the degree of Bacon's culpability in undertaking a part at least of the prosecution of Essex, when, upon the failure of the latter in 1599 to suppress Tyrone's rebellion in Ireland, and after his absurd attempt to raise an insurrection, he was impeached on a charge of high treason, is too vexed a problem to be discussed here with the limited space at our command. Let it suffice to say that while on the one hand Bacon had certainly been placed in possession of the facts of Essex's treasonable negotiations with the King of Scots, on the other he exhibited unnecessary rancour against his former benefactor, twice interposing to keep the Court in view of the main facts of the case, from which 1 p. 115. Cf. Nichol and Spedding. XV Introduction Coke's confusion had allowed the examination to wander. 1 Professor Gardiner's opinion is perhaps the fairest summary of both sides of the matter. "That the course Bacon took indicates poverty of moral feeling cannot be denied. Yet our sentiment on the precedence of personal over political ties is based on our increased sense of political security, and is hardly applicable to a state of things in which anarchy, with its attendant miseries, would inevitably have followed on the violent overthrow of the Queen's right to select her Ministers." Essex was convicted, condemned, and executed. So threatening, however, was the attitude of the people, to whom the dashing, debonair Earl had presented himself in the light of a national hero by his capture and sack of Cadiz, that Elizabeth quailed before it, and insisted on an official "declaration" of Essex's treason being prepared. The drawing up of this was entrusted to Bacon. In it he persistently takes the blacker view of his late friend's conduct, refusing to admit any pallia- tion of the crimes with which he was accused. Whether pricked in conscience over his conduct, or stung into irritation by the taunts of the friends of Essex, he issued immediately thereafter a justification of his action, which savours not a little of Jesuitical casuistry. Qui s' excuse s 'accuse ! There is reason to believe that the passage in the Essay on " Friendship," written in 1607, and beginning, "There be some whose lives are, as if they perpetually played upon a stage, disguised to all others, open only to themselves. But perpetual dis- simulation is painful, and he that is all fortune and no nature is an exquisite Hirelinge, &c.," a but which was omitted in the 1625 edition, had direct reference to the career of Essex. In 1597 the first edition of his " Essays "was published. The volume, which was of small octavo size, and dedi- cated to his brother Anthony, contained the following 1 Essex's recriminations upon Bacon at his trial but charges never denied by the latter. Cf. Michel's Bacon and Macaulay's Essav. 1 (it. Arber's Harmony of the Essays of Bacon, wherein the several editions are printed in parallel columns, xvi Introduction ten papers: (i) Of Studies. (2) Of Discourse. (3) Of Ceremonies and Respect. (4) Of Followers and Friends. (5) Of Sutors (suitors). (6) Of Expense. (7) Of Regiment of Health. (8) Of Honour and Re- putation. (9) Of Faction. (10) Of Negociating. The pregnancy of the thought and the pithiness of the style rendered the book well-nigh an epoch-making one. Its popularity was great, almost from the day of issue. But of this more anon. Elizabeth was now rapidly nearing the end of her memorable reign a reign which for her closed amid the gloom of that IVeltschmerz, or weariness with the world, resulting from the discovery that those she had believed devoted to her were, even then, secretly doing reverence to the rising star of the King of Scots. Her isolation and heart-loneliness were as pathetic as they were pitiable. All her older Ministers had predeceased her. Burghley, the greatest of all, had died in 1598, and was succeeded by his son. A new race of politicians had arisen, with new methods of diplomacy savouring more of the dawning than of the dying century. Among the worshippers of the new luminary was Bacon. Once while emphatically asserting himself in the State paper he addressed to Cecil on the " Pacifica- tion of Ireland," a loyal well-wisher for the long life and prosperity of Elizabeth, he was already coquetting with the "King across the Border." For scarcely had the "British Solomon" had time to seat himself on the throne of England, than, with all a supple-backed courtier's adaptability to circumstances, Bacon sought to win the monarch's goodwill by flattery, which from him, intellectual giant as he was, must have been as false as it was fulsome. He received the honour of knighthood, however, in 1603, followed by a pension of ;6o a year, in consideration of James's respect for his late brother Anthony's (who had died in 1601) staunch championship of the Scottish succession. He was also appointed a ' King's Counsel," with an annual gratuity of 40. The means whereby he flattered the King's Caledonian sympathies, in largest measure, however, xvii Introduction were by advocating, both in Parliament and with his pen, a scheme for the Union of the Kingdoms as well as the Crowns of England and Scotland. His " Articles touching the Union" is a skilful collection of all historical and scientific analogies bearing on the con- clusion he sought to prove, viz., that "there is a consent between the rules of nature and the true rules of policy; the one being nothing else but an order in the govern- ment of the world, the other an order in the govern- ment of an estate." The germs of his essay on "The True Greatness of Kingdoms and Estates," ' in the form it assumed in the edition of 1612, are undoubtedly to be found in his "Articles touching the Union." The fact may also be of interest that, when in October 1604 James adopted the title of " King of Great Britany "- abbreviated into " Great Britain " he assumed the name suggested by Bacon. The arguments of the latter, moreover, were so cogent that the Joint Committee, which met to discuss the terms of Union, came to an almost unanimous agreement. The majority of the Commons were also won over, and had not the King obstinately stood out for vesting the right of conferring letters of naturalisation in the Crown, the Union might have been consummated 100 years prior to the date of its actual accomplishment. In 1605 Bacon issued the first of his great philo- sophical treatises, the Advancement of Learning after- wards translated and expanded into the Latin dissertation, De Augments Scientiarum a noble review of the state of learning in his age, its defects, the emptiness of many of the studies chosen, and the means to be adopted to secure improvement. His essays "On Seeming Wise," 2 "On Custom and Educa- tion," 3 and " On Studies," * are all concerned with topics indicated rather than treated of in the Advance- ment of Learning, but which are nevertheless to be found there. 'p. 89. The form in which we now possess this Essay differs materially from that in the edition of 1612. ''p. 78. 'p. 119. '' He that hath wife and child hath given hostages to fortune ; " 6 " The joys of parents are secret, and so are their griefs and fears; they cannot utter the one, they will not utter the other ; " 7 "A man's nature runs either to herbs or weeds, therefore let him seasonably water the one and destroy the other." 8 Finally Bacon's Essays are the work of a man, who in precept, at least, had a deep reverence for moral principle. None other than one entertaining such sentiments could have said as he has done : " A man that hath no virtue in himself ever envieth virtue in others." 9 " Power to do good is the true and lawful end of aspiring, for good thoughts (though God accept them) yet towards men are little better than good dreams, except they be put in act ; " 10 and "The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall ; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall; but in charity (goodness) there is no excess, neither can angel or man come in danger by it." n The writer of these Essays was also a man who theoretically cherished a profound love and respect for justice: "The principal duty of a judge is to suppress force and fraud ; " I2 " Let no man weakly conceive that just laws and true policy have any antipathy, for they are like the spirits and 1 p. 150. * p. 150. ' p. 103. * p. 129. 5 p. 127. 6 p. 22. "> p. 20. * p. 118. *p. 24. I0 p. 31. " p. 37. " p. 162. xrxiv Introduction sinews that one moves with the other ; " I " Suspicions among thoughts are like bats among birds ; they ever fly by twilight. They dispose kings to tyranny, husbands to jealousy, wise men to irresolution and melancholy." 2 Bacon, moreover, always maintains the Sanctity of Truth alike in scientific investigation and the inter- course of life : " Truth which only doth judge itself, teacheth that the enquiry of truth, which is the love- making or wooing of it, the knowledge of truth which is the presence of it, and the belief of truth which is the enjoying of it, is the sovereign good of human nature" 3 or in moral conduct : " It is heaven upon earth to have a man's mind move in charity, rest in providence, and turn upon the poles of truth." 4 Francis Bacon, if he had sinned greatly, had suffered greatly, and it is pleasant to think that in the end the benediction of heavenly peace had descended on him. No man could write about Religion as he has done without having the root of the matter in his own heart : " It is peace which containeth infinite blessings ; it establisheth faith, it kindleth charity, the outward peace of the Church distilleth into peace of conscience:" 5 "The parts and signs of goodness are many ... if a man easily pardons and remits offences, it shows that his mind is planted above injuries. But, above all, if he have St Paul's perfection that he would wish to be anathema from Christ for the salvation of his brethren, it shows much of a Divine nature, and a kind of con- formity with Christ himself." 6 And so we leave Francis Bacon ! Had he left us no other literary legacy than those wonderful Essays, he would have established a claim upon the gratitude, not alone of his fellow-countrymen, but of his fellow-men a claim the years will ever strengthen and time will aye confirm ! 1 p. 165. 2 p. 100. 3 p. 4. 4 P- 4- 5 P- 9- 6 P- 39- Introduction The following list gives the chief editions of Bacon's works : Essays, 1597; 2nd Edition, 1598; 3rd Edition, 1606; 5th Edition, newly written, 1625. Advancement of Learning, 1605, 1629, 1633. De Sapientia Veterum, 1609, 1617, 1633, 1634. The Wisdome of the Ancients, done into English by Sir A. G. Knight, 1619, 1658. (The) New Atlantis, 1660. Novum Organum, 1620, 1645. Life of Henry VII., 1622, 1629. De Augmentis Scientiarum, 1623, 1635, 1645, expanded from the Advancement of Learning, translated in Latin under the supervision of Bacon. Apophthegmes, New and Old, 1624 [B.M. 1625]. Sylva Sylvarum, published after the author's death by W. Rawley, 1627, 1635. COLLECTED WORKS Opera omnia quae extant. Philosophica, Moralia, Politica, Historica, 1665. Opera Omnia. Life of Francis Bacon, by Dr Rawley. Edited by J. Blackbourne, 1730. Bacon's works, with Life, Mallet's, 1740 and 1753. Montagu's, 17 vols., 1825-1826. Works, originally collected and revised by R. Stephens and J. Locker, published after their deaths by T. Birch, 5 vols., 1765. Works, collected and edited by J. Spedding, R. L. Ellis and D. D. Heath, 14 vols., 1857-1874. XXXVI TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE MY VERY GOOD LO. THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM HIS GRACE, LO. HIGH ADMIRAL!, OF ENGLAND EXCELLENT Lo. SALOMON sales; A good Name is as a precious oyntment ; And I assure my selfe, such wil your Graces Name bee, with Posteritie. For your Fortune, and Merit both, have beene Eminent. And you have planted Things, that are like to last. I doe now publish my Essayes ; which of all my other workes, have beene most Currant : For that, as it seemes, they come home, to Mens Businesse, and Bosomes. I have enlarged them, both in Number, and Weight; So that they are indeed a New Worke. I thought it therefore agreeable, to my Affection, and Obligation to your Grace, to pre- fix your Name before them, both in English, and in Latine. For I doe conceive, that the Latine Volume of them, (being in the Universall Language) may last, as long as Bookes last. My Instauration, I dedicated to the King: My Historic of HENRY the Seventh, (which I have now also translated into Latine) and my Portions of Natural! History, to the Prince: And these I dedicate to your Grace ; Being of the best Fruits, that by the good Encrease, which God gives to my Pen and Labours, I could yeeld. God leade your Grace by the Hand. Your Graces most Obliged and Jaithjull Servant, FR. ST. ALBAN. ESSAYS OR COUNSELS CIVIL AND MORAL ESSAY I. OF TRUTH WE AT is truth ? said jesting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer. Certainly there be that delight in giddiness, and count it a bondage to fix a belief; affecting free-will in thinking, as well as in acting. And though the sects of philosophers of that kind be gone, yet there remain certain discoursing wits which are of the same veins, though there be not so much blood in them as was in those of the ancients. But it is not only the difficulty and labour which men take in finding out of truth, nor again that when it is found it imposeth upon men's thoughts, that doth bring lies in favour ; but a natural though corrupt love of the lie itself. One of the later school of the Grecians examineth the matter, and is at a stand to think what should be in it, that men should love lies ; where neither they make for pleasure, as with poets ; nor for advantage, as with the merchant ; but for the lie's sake. But I cannot tell : this same truth is a naked and open day-light, that doth not shew the masques and mummeries and triumphs of the world, half so stately and daintily as candle-lights. Truth may perhaps come to the price of a pearl, that sheweth best by day ; but it will not rise to the price of a diamond or carbuncle, that sheweth best in varied lights. A mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure. Doth any man doubt, that if there were taken out of men's minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men poor shrunken things, full of 3 Bacon's Essays melancholy and indisposition, and unpleasing to them- selves ? One of the fathers, in great severity, called poesy vinum dcemonum, because it filleth the imagina- tion, and yet it is but with the shadow of a lie. But it is not the lie that passeth through the mind, but the lie that sinketh in and settleth in it, that doth the hurt, such as we spake of before. But howsoever these things are thus in men's depraved judgments and affections, yet truth, which only doth judge itself, teacheth that the inquiry of truth, which is the love-making or wooing of it, the knowledge of truth, which is the presence of it, and the belief of truth, which is the enjoying of it, is the sovereign good of human nature. The first creature of God, in the works of the days, was the light of the sense ; the last was the light of reason ; and his sabbath work, ever since, is the illumination of his Spirit. First he breathed light upon the face of the matter or chaos ; then he breathed light into the face of man ; and still he breatheth and inspireth light into the face of his chosen. The poet that beautified the sect that was otherwise I inferior to the rest, saith yet excellently well: It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore, and to see ships tost upon the sea : a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle, and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below : but no pleasure is comparable to the standing upon the vantage ground of truth (a hill not to be commanded, and where the air is always clear and serene), and to see the errors, and wanderings, and mists, and tempests, in the vale be- tow : so always that this prospect be with pity, and not with swelling or pride. Certainly, it is heaven upon earth, to have a man's mind move in charity, rest in providence, and turn upon the poles of truth. To pass from theological and philosophical truth, to the truth of civil business : it will be acknowledged, even by those that practise it not, that clear and round dealing is the honour of man's nature ; and that mixture of falsehood is like allay in coin of gold and silver; which may make the metal work the better, but it embaseth it. For these winding and crooked courses are the goings of the serpent; which goeth basely upon 4 Of Truth the belly, and not upon the feet. There is no vice that doth so cover a man with shame as to be found false and perfidious. And therefore Mountaigny saith prettily, when he inquired the reason, why the word of the lie should be such a disgrace and such an odious charge ? saith he, If it be well weighed, to say that a man lieth, is as much to say as that he is brave towards God and a coward towards men. For a lie faces God, and shrinks from man. Surely the wickedness of falsehood and breach of faith cannot possibly be so highly expressed, as in that it shall be the last peal to call the judgements of God upon the generations of men : it being foretold, that when Christ cometh, he shall not find faith upon the earth. ESSAY II. OF DEATH MEN fear death, as children fear to go in the dark ; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other. Certainly, the contemplation of death, as the wages of sin, and passage to another world, is holy and religious ; but the fear of it, as a tribute due unto nature, is weak. Yet in religious meditations there is sometimes mixture of vanity and of superstition. You shall read in some of the friars' books of mortifica- tion, that a man should think with himself what the pain is if he have but his finger's end pressed or tortured, and thereby imagine what the pains of death are, when the whole body is corrupted and dissolved : when many times death passeth with less pain than the torture of a limb ; for the most vital parts are not the quickest of sense. And by him, that spake only as a philosopher and natural man, it was well said, Pompa mortis magis ferret quam mors ipsa. Groans and convulsions, and a discoloured face, and friends weeping, and blacks, and obsequies, and the like, shew death terrible. It is worthy the observing, that there is no passion in the mind of man so weak, but it mates and masters the fear of death ; and therefore death is no such terrible enemy, when a man hath so many attendants about him that can win the combat of him. Revenge triumphs over 1 death ; love slights it ; honour aspireth to it ; grief flieth ; to it; fear pre-occupateth it; nay, we read, after Otho ' the emperor had slain himself, pity (which is the tenderest of affections) provoked many to die, out of mere compassion to their sovereign, and as the truest ; sort of followers. Nay, Seneca adds niceness and satiety : Cogita quam diu eadem feceris ; mori vellt, non tantum /orfis, out tniser, sed etiam fastidiosus potest. A 6 Of Death man would die, though he were neither valiant nor miserable, only upon a weariness to do the same thing so oft over and over. It is no less worthy to observe, how little alteration, in good spirits, the approaches of death make ; for they appear to be the same men till the last instant. Augustus Ca?sar died in a compliment : Livia, conjugii nostri memor, vive et vale. Tiberius in dissimulation, as Tacitus saith of him : Jam Tiberium vires et corpus, non dissimulatio, deserebant. Vespasian in a jest, sitting upon the stool : Ut puto Deus fio. Galba with a sentence, Feri, si ex re sit populi Romani, holding forth his neck. Septimius Severus in dispatch : Adeste si quid mihi restat agendum. And the like. Certainly the Stoics bestowed too much cost upon death, and by their great preparations made it appear more fearful. Better saith he, Qui finem vital extremum inter muner a ponat Naturae. It is as natural to die as to be born ; and to a little infant, perhaps, the one is as pain- ful as the other. He that dies in an earnest pursuit is like one that is wounded in hot blood; who, for the time, scarce feels the hurt ; and therefore a mind fixed and bent upon somewhat that is good doth avert the dolours of death. But above all, believe it, the sweetest canticle is Nunc dimittis ; when a man hath obtained/ worthy ends and expectations. Death hath this also,/ that it openeth the gate to good fame, and extinguished \ envy. Extinctus amabitur idem. ESSAY III. OF UNITY IN RELIGION RELIGION being the chief band of human society, it is a happy thing when itself is well contained within the true band of unity. The quarrels and divisions about religions were evils unknown to the heathen. The reason was, because the religion of the heathen con- sisted rather in rites and ceremonies, than in any constant belief. For you may imagine what kind of faith theirs was, when the chief doctors and fathers of their church were the poets. But the true God hath this attribute, that he is a jealous God; and therefore his worship and religion will endure no mixture nor partner. We shall therefore speak a few words con- cerning the unity of the church ; what are the fruits thereof; what the bounds ; and what the means. The fruits of unity (next unto the well pleasing of God, which is all in all) are two ; the one towards those that are without the church, the other towards those that are within. For the former; it is certain that heresies and schisms are of all others the greatest scandals ; yea, more than corruption of manners. For as in the natural body a wound or solution of continuity is worse than a corrupt humour, so in the spiritual. So that nothing doth so much keep men out of the church, and drive men out of the church, as breach of unity. And therefore, whensoever it cometh to that pass, that one saith Ecce in deserto, another saith Ecce in penetralibus ; that is, when some men seek Christ in the conventicles of heretics, and others in an outward face of a church, that voice had need continually to sound in men's ears, flolite exire, Go not out. The doctor of the Gentiles (the propriety of whose vocation drew him to have a special care of those without) saith, If an 8 Of Unity in Religion heathen come in, and hear you speak with several tongues, will he not say that you are mad? And certainly it is little better, when atheists and profane persons do hear of so many discordant and contrary opinions in religion; it doth avert them from the church, and maketh them to sit down in the chair of the scorners. It is but a light thing to be vouched in so serious a matter, but yet it expresseth well the deformity. There is a master of scoffing, that in his catalogue of books of a feigned library sets down this title of a book, The morris dance of heretics. For indeed every sect of them hath a diverse posture or cringe by themselves, which cannot but move derision in worldlings and depraved politics, who are apt to contemn holy things. As for the fruit towards those that are within, it is peace, which containeth infinite blessings : it estab- lisheth faith ; it kindleth charity ; the outward peace of the church distilleth into peace of conscience ; and it turneth the labours of writing and reading of controversies into treaties of mortification and devotion. Concerning the bounds of unity ; the true placing of them importeth exceedingly. There appear to be two extremes. For to certain zelants all speech of pacifica- tion is odious. Is it peace, Jehu .-" What hast thou to do with peace ? turn thee behind me. Peace is not the matter, but following and party. Contrariwise, certain Laodiceans and lukewarm persons think they may accommodate points of religion by middle ways, and taking part of both, and witty reconcilements; as if they would make an arbitrement between God and man. Both these extremes are to be avoided ; which will be done, if the league of Christians penned by our Saviour Himself were in the two cross clauses thereof soundly and plainly expounded : He that is not with us is against us ; and again, He that is not against us is with us : that is, if the points fundamental and of substance in religion were truly discerned and distinguished from points not merely of faith, but of opinion, order, or good intention. This is a thing may seem to many a matter trivial and 9 Bacon's Essays done already ; but if it were done less partially, it would be embraced more generally. Of this I may give only this advice, according to my small model. Men ought to take heed of rending God's church by two kinds of controversies. The one is, when the matter of the point controverted is too small and light, not worth the heat and strife about it, kindled only by contradiction. For, as it is noted by one of the fathers, Christ's coat indeed had no seam, but the church's vesture was of divers colours ; whereupon he saith, In veste varietas sit, scissura non sit: they be two things, unity and uniformity. The other is, when the matter of the point controverted is great, but it is driven to an over-great subtilty and obscurity; so that it becometh a thing rather ingenious than substantial. A man that is of judgement and understanding shall sometimes hear ignorant men differ, and know well within himself that those which so differ mean one thing, and yet they themselves would never agree. And if it come so to pass in that distance of judgement which is between man and man, shall we not think that God above, that knows the heart, doth not discern that frail men in some of their contradictions intend the same thing, and accepteth of both? The nature of such controversies is excellently expressed by St, Paul in the warning and precept that he giveth concerning the same, Dcvita profanas vocunt novitatcs, ct oppositions falsi nominis scientix. Men create oppositions which are not ; and put them into new terms so fixed, as whereas the meaning ought to govern the term, the term in effect governeth the meaning. There be also two false peaces or unities : the one, when the peace is grounded but upon an implicit ignorance ; for all colours will agree in the dark : the other, when it is pieced up upon a direct admission of contraries in fundamental points. For truth and falsehood, in such things, are like the iron and clay in the toes of Nebuchadnezzar's image ; they may cleave, but they will not incorporate. Concerning the means of procuring unity ; men must beware, that in the procuring or muniting of religious 10 Of Unity in Religion unity, they do not dissolve and deface the laws of charity and of human society. There be two swords amongst Christians, the spiritual and temporal ; and both have their due office and place in the maintenance of religion. But we may not take up the third sword, which is Mahomet's sword, or like unto it ; that is, to propagate religion by wars, or by sanguinary persecutions to force consciences ; except it be in cases of overt scandal, blasphemy, or intermixture of practice against the state ; much less to nourish seditions ; to authorize conspiracies and rebellions ; to put the sword into the people's hands ; and the like ; tending to the subversion of all government, which is the ordinance of God. For this is but to dash the first table against the second ; and so to consider men as Christians, as we forget that they are men. Lucretius the poet, when he beheld the act of Agamemnon, that could endure the sacrificing of his own daughter, exclaimed : Tantum relligio fotuit suaderc malorum. What would he have said, if he had known of the massacre in France, or the powder treason of England ? He would have been seven times more Epicure and atheist than he was. For as the temporal sword is to be drawn with great circumspection in cases of religion ; so it is a thing monstrous to put it into the hands of the common people. Let that be left unto the Anabaptists, and other furies. It was great blasphemy when the devil said, I will ascend and be like the Highest; but it is greater blasphemy to personate God, and bring him in saying, / will descend and be like the prince of dark- ness : and what is it better, to make the cause of religion to descend to the cruel and execrable actions of murthering princes, butchery of people, and sub- version of states and governments? Surely this is to bring down the Holy Ghost, in stead of the likeness of a dove, in the shape of a vulture or raven ; and to set out of the bark of a Christian church a flag ol a bark of pirates and assassins. Therefore it is most necessary that the church by doctrine and decree, princes by their it Bacon's Essays sword, and all learnings, both Christian and moral, as by their Mercury rod, do damn and send to hell for ever those facts and opinions tending to the support of the same ; as hath been already in good part done. Surely in counsels concerning religion, that counsel of the apostle would be prefixed, Ira hominis non implet justitiam Dei. And it was a notable observation of a wise father, and no less ingenuously confessed : That those which held and persuaded pressure of consciences, were commonly interessed therein themselves for their own ends. ESSAY IV. OF REVENGE REVENGE is a kind of wild justice; which the more man's nature runs to, the more ought law to weed it out. For as for the first wrong, it doth but offend the law ; but the revenge of that wrong putteth the law out of office. Certainly, in taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy ; but in passing it over, he is superior ; for it is a prince's part to pardon. And Salomon, I am sure, saith, // is the glory of a man to pass by an offence. That which is past is gone, and irrevocable; and wise men have enough to do with things present and to come : therefore they do but trifle with themselves, that labour in past matters. There is no man doth a wrong for the wrong's sake ; but thereby to purchase himself profit, or pleasure, or honour, or the like. Therefore why should I be angry with a man for loving himself better than me? And if any man should do wrong merely out of ill nature, why, yet it is but like the thorn or briar, which prick and scratch, because they can do no other. The most tolerable sort of revenge is for those wrongs TV Inch there is no law to remedy ; but then let a man take heed the revenge be such as there is no law to punish ; else a man's enemy is still beforehand, and it is two for one. Some, when they take revenge, are desirous the party should know whence it cometh : this is the more generous. For the delight seemeth to be not so much in doing the hurt as in making the party repent : but base and crafty cowards are like the arrow that flieth in the dark. Cosmus, duke of Florence, had a desperate saying against perfidious or neglecting friends, as if those wrongs were unpardon- able : You shall read (saith he) that we are commanded to forgive our enemies ; but you never read that we are commanded to forgive our friends. But yet the spirit of Job was in a better tune : Shall we (saith he) take good 13 Bacon's Essays at God's hands t and not be content to take evil alsol And so of friends in a proportion. This is certain, that a man that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green, which otherwise would heal and do well. Public revenges are for the most part fortunate ; as that for the death of Caesar; for the death of Pertinax; for the death of Henry the Third of France ; and many more. But in private revenges it is not so. Nay rather, vindi- cative persons live the life of witches ; who as they are mischievous, so end they infortunate. ESSAY V. OF ADVERSITY IT was an high speech of Seneca (after the manner of the Stoics) : That the good things which belong to prosper- ity are to be wished; but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired. Bona rerum secundarum optabilia, adversarum mirabilia. Certainly, if miracles be the command over nature, they appear most in adversity. It is yet a higher speech of his than the other (much too high for a heathen) : // is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man, and the security of a god. Vere magnum, habere fragilitatem hominis, securi- tatem dei. This would have done better in poesy, where transcendences are more allowed. And the poets indeed have been busy with it ; for it is in effect the thing which is figured in that strange fiction of the ancient poets, which seemeth not to be without mystery ; nay, and to have some approach to the state of a Christian : that Hercules, when he went to unbind Prometheus (by whom human nature is represented), sailed the length of the great ocean in an earthen pot or pitcher: lively describing Christian resolution, that saileth in the frail bark of the flesh thorough the waves of the world. But to speak in a mean. The virtue of prosperity is temperance ; the virtue of adversity is fortitude ; which in morals is the more heroical virtue. Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament ; adver- sity is the blessing of the New ; which carrieth the greater benediction, and the clearer revelation of God's favour. Yet even in the Old Testament, if you listen to David's harp, you shall hear as many hearse-like airs as carols; and the pencil of the Holy Ghost hath laboured more in describing the afflictions of Job than the felicities of Salomon. Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes ; and adversity is not without comforts and hopes. We see in needleworks and Bacon's Essays embroideries, it is more pleasing to have a lively work upon a sad and solemn ground, than to have a dark and melancholy work upon a lightsome ground : judge therefore of the pleasure of the heart by the pleasure of the eye. Certainly virtue is like precious odours, most fragrant when they are incensed or crushed : for pro- sperity doth best discover vice ; but adversity doth best discover virtue. 16 ESSAY VI.^-OF SIMULATION AND DISSIMULATION DISSIMULATION is but a faint kind of policy or wisdom ; for it asketh a strong wit and a strong heart to know when to tell truth, and to do it. Therefore it is the weaker sort of politics that are the great dissemblers. Tacitus saith, Livia sorted well with the arts of her husband and dissimulation of her son ; attributing arts or policy to Augustus, and dissimulation to Tiberius. And again, when Mucianus encourageth Vespasian to take arms against Vitellius, he saith, We rise not against the piercing judgement of Augustus, nor the extreme caution or closeness of Tiberius. These properties, of arts or policy, and dissimulation or closeness, are indeed habits and faculties several and to be distinguished. For if a man have that penetration of judgement as he can discern what things are to be laid open, and what to be secreted, and what to be shewed at half lights, and to whom, and when (which indeed are arts of state and arts of life, as Tacitus well calleth them), to him a habit of dissimu- lation is a hinderance and a poorness. But if a man cannot obtain to that judgement, then it is left to him, generally, to be close, and a dissembler. For where a man cannot choose or vary in particulars, there it is good to take the safest and wariest way in general; like the going softly by one that cannot well see. Certainly the ablest men that ever were have had all an openness and frankness of dealing, and a name of certainty and veracity; but then they were like horses well managed ; for they could tell passing well when to stop or turn ; and at such times when they thought the case indeed required dissimulation, if then they used it, it came to pass that the former opinion spread abroad of their good faith and clearness of dealing made them almost invisible. There be three degrees of this hiding and veiling of B 17 Bacon's Essays a man's self. The first, closeness, reservation, and secrecy ; when a man leaveth himself without observation, or without hold to be taken, what he is. The second, dissimulation, in the negative ; when a man lets fall signs and arguments, that he is not that he is. And the third, simulation, in the affirmative ; when a man industriously and expressly feigns and pretends to be that he is not. For the first of these, secrecy : it is indeed the virtue of a confessor; and assuredly the secret man heareth many confessions ; for who will open himself to a blab or a babbler ? But if a man be thought secret, it inviteth discovery; as the more close air sucketh in the more open : and as in confession the revealing is not for worldly use, but for the ease of a man's heart, so secret men come to the knowledge of many things in that kind ; while men rather discharge their minds than im- part their minds. In few words, mysteries are due to secrecy. Besides (to say truth) nakedness is uncomely, as well in mind as body ; and it addeth no small rever- ence to men's manners and actions, if they be not alto- gether open. As for talkers and futile persons, they are commonly vain and credulous withal. For he that talketh what he knoweth, will also talk what he knoweth not. Therefore set it down, that an habit of secrecy is both politic and moral. And in this part, it is good that a man's face give his tongue leave to speak. For the discovery of a man's self by the tracts of his countenance is a great weakness and betraying; by how much it is many times more marked and believed than a man's words. For the second, which is dissimulation : it followeth many times upon secrecy by a necessity ; so that he that will be secret must be a dissembler in some degree. For men are too cunning to suffer a man to keep an indiffer- ent carriage between both, and to be secret, without swaying the balance on either side. They will so beset a man with questions, and draw him on, and pick it out of him, that, without an absurd silence, he must shew an inclination one way ; or if he do not, they will gather as much by his silence as by his speech. As for equivoca- 18 Of Simulation and Dissimulation tions, or oraculous speeches, they cannot hold out long. So that no man can be secret, except he give himself a little scope of dissimulation ; which is, as it were, but the skirts or train of secrecy. But for the third degree, which is simulation and false profession : that I hold more culpable, and less politic; except it be in great and rare matters. And therefore a general custom of simulation (which is this last degree) is a vice, rising either of a natural falseness or fearfulness, or of a mind that hath some main faults, which because a man must needs disguise, it maketh him practise simulation in other things, lest his hand should be out of use. The great advantages of simulation and dissimulation are three. First, to lay asleep opposition, and to sur- prise. For where a man's intentions are published, it is an alarum to call up all that are against them. The second is, to reserve to a man's self a fair retreat. For if a man engage himself by a manifest declaration, he must go through, or take a fall. The third is, the better to discover the mind of another. For to him that opens himself men will hardly shew themselves adverse; but will (fair) let him go on, and turn their freedom of speech to freedom of thought. And there- fore it is a good shrewd proverb of the Spaniard, Tell a lie and find a troth; as if there were no way of discovery but by simulation. There be also three disadvantages, to set it even. The first, that simulation and dissimula- tion commonly carry with them a shew of fearfulness, which in any business doth spoil the feathers of round flying up to the mark. The second, that it puzzleth and perplexeth the conceits of many that perhaps would otherwise co-operate with him, and makes a man walk almost alone to his own ends. The third and greatest is, that it depriveth a man of one of the most principal instruments for action, which is trust and belief. The best composition and temperature is to have open- ness in fame and opinion ; secrecy in habit ; dissimula- tion in seasonable use ; and a power to feign, if there be no remedy. 19 ESSAY VII. OF PARENTS AND CHILDREN THE joys of parents are secret, and so are their griefs and fears : they cannot utter the one, nor they will not utter the other. Children sweeten labours, but they make misfortunes more bitter : they increase the cares of life, but they mitigate the remembrance of death. The perpetuity by generation is common to beasts ; but memory, merit, and noble works are proper to men : and surely a man shall see the noblest works and foundations have proceeded from childless men, which have sought to express the images of their minds, where those of their bodies have failed : so the care of posterity is most in them that have no posterity. They that are the first raisers of their houses are most indul- gent towards their children; beholding them as the continuance not only of their kind but of their work ; and so both children and creatures. The difference in affection of parents towards their several children is many times unequal, and sometimes unworthy, especially in the mother; as Salomon saith, A wise son rejoiceth the fatter, but an ungracious son shames the mother. A man shall see, where there is a house full of children, one or two of the eldest re- spected, and the youngest made wantons ; but in the midst some that are as it were forgotten, who many times nevertheless prove the best. The illiberality of parents in allowance towards their children is an harmful error; makes them base; acquaints them with shifts; makes them sort with mean company; and makes them surfeit more when they come to plenty : and therefore the proof is best, when men keep their authority towards their children, but not their purse. Men have a foolish manner (both parents and schoolmasters and servants) 20 Of Parents and Children in creating and breeding an emulation between brothers during childhood, which many times sorteth to discord when they are men, and disturbeth families. The Italians make little difference between children and nephews or near kinsfolks ; but so they be of the lump, they care not though they pass not through their own body. And, to say truth, in nature it is much a like matter ; insomuch that we see a nephew sometimes resembleth an uncle or a kinsman more than his own parent ; as the blood happens. Let parents choose betimes the vocations and courses they mean their children should take; for then they are most flexible; and let them not too much apply themselves to the disposition of their children, as thinking they will take best to that which they have most mind to. It is true, that if the affection or aptness of the children be extra- ordinary, then it is good not to cross it ; but generally the precept is good, Optimum etige, suave et facile illud faciet consuetude. Younger brothers are commonly fortunate, but seldom or never where the elder are disinherited. 21 ESSAY VII. OF MARRIAGE AND SINGLE LIFE /HE that hath wife and children hath given hostages to / fortune ; for they are impediments to great enterprises, . either of rirtue or mischief. Certainly, the best works, | and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men, which both in affection and means have married and endowed the public. Yet it were great reason that those that have children should have greatest care of future times ; unto which they know they must transmit their dearest pledges. Some there are, who though they lead a single life, yet their thoughts do end with themselves, and account future times impertinences. Nay, there are some other that account wife and children but as bills of charges. Nay more, there are some foolish rich covetous men that take a pride in having no children, because they may be thought so much the richer. For perhaps they have heard some talk, Such an one is a great rich man, and another except to it, Yea, but he hath a great charge of children ; as if it were an abatement to his riches. But the most ordinary cause of a single life is liberty ; especially in certain self-pleasing and humor- ous minds, which are so sensible of every restraint, as they will go near to think their girdles and garters to be ! bonds and shackles. Unmarried men are best friends, \ best masters, best servants ; but not always best I subjects ; for they are light to run away ; and almost all ) fugitives are of that condition. A single life doth well.j with churchmen ; for charity will hardly water the| ground where it must first fill a pool. It is indifferent for judges and magistrates ; for if they be facile and corrupt, you shall have a servant five times worse than a wife. For soldiers, I find the generals commonly in their 22 Of Marriage and Single Life hortatives put men in mind of their wives and children ; and I think the despising of marriage amongst the Turks maketh the vulgar soldier more base. Certainly wife and children are a kind of discipline of humanity ; and single men, though they be many times more charitable, because their means are less exhaust, yet, on the other side, they are more cruel and hard-hearted (good to make severe inquisitors), because their tenderness is not so oft called upon. Grave natures, led by custom, and therefore constant, are commonly loving husbands ; as was said of Ulysses, Vetulam suam pr&tulii immortalitati. Chaste women are often proud and froward, as pre- suming upon the merit of their chastity. It is one of the best bonds both of chastity and obedience in the wife, if she think her husband wise ; which she will never do if she find him jealous. Wives are young men's mistresses ; companions for middle age; and old men's nurses. So as a man may have a quarrel to marry when he will. But yet he was reputed one of the wise men, that made answer to the question, when a man should marry ? A young man not yet, an elder man not at all. It is often seen that bad husbands have very good wives ; whether it be that it raiseth the price of their husband's kindness when it comes ; or that the wives take a pride in their patience. But this never fails, if the bad husbands were of their own choosing, against their friends' consent ; for then they will be sure to make good their own folly. 23 ESSAY IX. OF ENVY THERE be none of the affections which have been noted to fascinate or bewitch, but love and envy. They both have vehement wishes; they frame themselves readily into imaginations and suggestions ; and they come easily into the eye, especially upon the presence of the objects; which are the points that conduce to fascination, if any such thing there be. We see, likewise, the scripture calleth envy an evil eye ; and the astrologers call the evil influences of the stars evil aspects ; so that still there seemeth to be acknowledged, in the act of envy, an ejaculation or irradiation of the eye. Nay, some have been so curious as to note, that the times when the stroke or percussion of an envious eye doth most hurt, are when the party envied is beheld in glory or triumph; for that sets an edge upon envy ; and besides, at such times the spirits of the person envied do come forth most into the outward parts, and so meet the blow. But leaving these curiosities (though not unworthy to be thought on in fit place), we will handle, what persons are apt to envy others ; what persons are most subject to be envied themselves ; and what is the difference between public and private envy. A man that hath no virtue in himself ever envieth virtue in others. For men's minds will either feed upon their own good, or upon others' evil; and who wanteth the one will prey upon the other; and whoso is out of hope to attain to another's virtue will seek to come at even hand by depressing another's fortune. A man that is busy and inquisitive is commonly envious. For to know much of other men's matters cannot be because all that ado may concern his own estate ; therefore it must needs be that he taketh a kind of play-pleasure in looking upon the fortunes of others. Neither can he that mindeth but his own business find 24 Of Envy much matter for envy. For envy is a gadding passion, and walketh the streets, and doth not keep home : Non est curiosus, quin idem sit malevolus. Men of noble birth are noted to be envious towards new men when they rise. For the distance is altered \ and it is like a deceit of the eye, that when others come on they think themselves go back. Deformed persons, and eunuchs, and old men, and bastards, are envious. For he that cannot possibly mend his own case, will do what he can to impair another's. Except these defects light upon a very brave and heroical nature, which thinketh to make his natural wants part of his honour ; in that it should be said, that an eunuch, or a lame man, did such great matters; affecting the honour of a miracle ; as it was in Narses the eunuch, and Agesilaus and Tamberlanes, that were lame men. The same is the case of men that rise after calamities and misfortunes. For they are as men fallen out with the times, and think other men's harms a redemption of their own sufferings. They that desire to excel in too many matters, out of levity and vain glory, are ever envious. For they cannot want work ; it being impossible but many in some one of those things should surpass them. Which was the character of Adrian the Emperor, that mortally envied poets and painters and artificers in works wherein he had a vein to excel. Lastly, near kinsfolks, and fellows in office, and those that have been bred together, are more apt to envy their equals when they are raised. For it doth upbraid unto them their own fortunes, and pointeth at them, and cometh oftener into their remembrance, and incurreth likewise more into the note of others ; and envy ever redoubleth from speech and fame. Cain's envy was the more vile and malignant towards his brother Abel, because when his sacrifice was better accepted there was nobody to look on. Thus much for those that are apt to envy. Concerning those that are more or less subject to envy. First, persons of eminent virtue, when they are 25 Bacon's Essays advanced, are less envied. For their fortune seemeth but due unto them ; and no man envieth the payment of a debt, but rewards and liberality rather. Again, envy is ever joined with the comparing of a man's self; and where there is no comparison, no envy; and there- fore kings are not envied but by kings. Nevertheless it is to be noted that unworthy persons are most envied at their first coming in, and afterwards overcome it better; whereas, contrariwise, persons of worth and merit are most envied when their fortune continueth long. For by that time, though their virtue be the same, yet it hath not the same lustre; for fresh men grow up that darken it. Persons of noble blood are less envied in their rising ; for it seemeth but right done to their birth. Besides, there seemeth not much added to their fortune ; and envy is as the sunbeams, that beat hotter upon a bank or steep rising ground, than upon a flat. And for the same reason those that are advanced by degrees are less envied than those that are advanced suddenly and per sal turn. Those that have joined with their honour great travails, cares, or perils, are less subject to envy. For men think that they earn their honours hardly, and pity them sometimes ; and pity ever healeth envy. Where- fore you shall observe that the more deep and sober sort of politic persons, in their greatness, are ever bemoaning themselves, what a life they lead ; chanting a quanta patimur. Not that they feel it so, but only to abate the edge of envy. But this is to be understood of business that is laid upon men, and not such as they call unto themselves. For nothing increaseth envy more than an unnecessary and ambitious engrossing of business. And nothing doth extinguish envy more than for a great person to preserve all other inferior officers in their full rights and pre-eminences of their places. For by that means there be so many screens between him and envy. Above all, those are most subject to envy, which carry the greatness of their fortunes in an insolent and 26 Of Envy proud manner; being never well but while they are shewing how great they are, either by outward pomp, or by triumphing over all opposition or competition ; whereas wise men will rather do sacrifice to envy, in suffering themselves sometimes of purpose to be crossed and overborne in things that do not much concern them. Notwithstanding, so much is true, that the carriage of greatness in a plain and open manner (so it be without arrogancy and vain-glory) doth draw less envy than if it be in a more crafty and cunning fashion. For in that course a man doth but disavow fortune ; and seemeth to be conscious of his own want in worth ; and doth but teach others to envy him. Lastly, to conclude this part; as we said in the beginning that the act of envy had somewhat in it of witchcraft, so there is no other cure of envy but the cure of witchcraft; and that is, to remove the lot (as they call it) and to lay it upon another. For which purpose the wiser sort of great persons bring in ever upon the stage somebody upon whom to derive the envy that would come upon themselves ; sometimes upon ministers and servants ; sometimes upon colleagues and associates ; and the like ; and for that turn there are never wanting some persons of violent and under- taking natures, who, so they may have power and busi- ness, will take it at any cost. Now to speak of public envy. There is yet some good in public envy, whereas in private there is none. For public envy is as an ostracism, that eclipseth men when they grow too great. And therefore it is a bridle also to great ones, to keep them within bounds. This envy, being in the Latin word invidia, goeth in the modern languages by the name of discontentment : : of which we shall speak in handling Sedition. It is a disease in a state like to infection. For as infection spreadeth upon that which is sound, and tainteth it ; so when envy is gotten once into a state, it traduceth even the best actions thereof, and turneth them into an ill odour. And therefore there is little won by intermingl- ing of plausible actions. For that doth argue but a 27 Bacon's Essays weakness and fear of envy, which hurteth so much the more; as it is likewise usual in infections ; which if you fear them, you call them upon you. This public envy seemeth to beat chiefly upon princi- pal officers or ministers, rather than upon kings and estates themselves. But this is a sure rule, that if the envy upon the ministers be great, when the cause of it in him is small ; or if the envy be general in a manner upon all the ministers of an estate; then the envy (though hidden) is truly upon the estate itself. And so much of public envy or discontentment, and the differ- ence thereof from private envy, which was handled in the first place. We will add this, in general, touching the affection of envy, that of all other affections it is the most importune and continual. For of other affections there is occasion given but now and then. And therefore it was well said, Invidia festos dies non agit. For it is ever working upon some or other. And it is also noted that love and envy do make a man pine, which other affections do not, because they are not so continual. It is also the vilest affection, and the most depraved ; for which cause it is the proper attribute of the devil, who is called The envious man, that soweth tares amongst the wheat by night : as it always cometh to pass, that envy worketh subtilly, and in the dark, and to the prejudice of good things, such as is the wheat. ESSAY X. OF LOVE THE stage is more beholding to love than the life of man. For as to the stage, love is ever matter of comedies, and now and then of tragedies : but in life it doth much mischief; sometimes like a siren, sometimes like a fury. You may observe, that amongst all the great and worthy persons (whereof the memory remaineth, either ancient or recent), there is not one that hath been transported to the mad degree of love; which shows that great spirits and great business do keep out this weak passion. You must except, nevertheless, Marcus Antonius, the half partner of the empire of Rome, and Appius Claudius, the decemvir and lawgiver : whereof the former was indeed a voluptuous man, and inordinate; but the latter was an austere and wise man : and therefore it seems (though rarely) that love can find entrance not only into an open heart, but also into a heart well fortified, if watch be not well kept. It is a poor saying of Epicurus, Softs magnum alter alteri theatrum sumus : as if man, made for the contemplation of heaven and all noble objects, should do nothing but kneel before a little idol, and make himself subject, though not of the mouth (as beasts are), yet of the eye, which was given them for higher purposes. It is a strange thing to note the excess of this passion, and how it braves the nature and value of things, by this, that the speaking in a perpetual hyper- bole is comely in nothing but in love. Neither is it merely in the phrase; for whereas it hath been well said that the arch-flatterer, with whom all the petty flatterers have intelligence, is a man's self, certainly the lover is more. For there was never proud man thought so< absurdly well of himself as the lover doth of the person! loved: and therefore it was well said, That it is impos- . sible to love and to be wise. Neither doth this weakness i appear to others only, and not to the party loved, but 29 Bacon's Essays to the loved most of all, except the love be reciproque. For it is a true rule, that love is ever rewarded either with the reciproque or with an inward aud secret contempt. By how much the more men ought to be- ware of this passion, which loseth not only other things, but itself. As for the other losses, the poet's relation doth well figure them : That he that preferred Helena, quitted the gifts of Juno and Pallas. For whosoever esteemeth too much of amorous affection, quitteth both riches and wisdom. This passion hath his floods in the very times of weakness ; which are great prosperity and great adversity (though this latter hath been less ob- served) : both which times kindle love, and make it more fervent, and therefore show it to be the child of folly. They do best, who, if they cannot but admit love, yet make it keep quarter, and sever it wholly from their serious affairs and actions of life ; for if it check once with business, it troubleth men's fortunes, and maketh men that they can no ways be true to their own ends. I know not how, but martial men are given to love: I think it is but as they are given to wine ; for perils commonly ask to be paid in pleasures. There is in man's nature a secret inclination and motion towards love of others, which, if it be not spent upon some one or a few, doth naturally spread itself towards many, and maketh men become humane and charitable ; as it is seen sometime in friars. Nuptial love maketh man- kind j friendly love perfecteth it ; but wanton love corrupteth and embaseth it. ESSAY XI. OF GREAT PLACE MEN in great places are thrice servants : servants of the sovereign or state ; servants of fame ; and servants of business. So as they have no freedom, neither in their persons, nor in their actions, nor in their times. It is. a strange desire, to seek power and to lose liberty ; or to seek power over others and to lose power over a man's self. The rising unto place is laborious, and by pains men come to greater pains ; and it is sometimes base, and by indignities men come to dignities. The standing is slippery ; and the regress is either a down- fall, or at least an eclipse, which is a melancholy thing. Cum non sis qui fueris, non esse cur velis vivere. Nay, retire men cannot when they would ; neither will they when it were reason ; but are impatient of privateness, even in age and sickness, which require the shadow : like old townsmen, that will be still sitting at their street door, though thereby they offer age to scorn. Certainly, great persons had need to borrow other men's opinions, to think themselves happy; for if they judge by their own feeling, they cannot find it : but if they think with themselves what other men think of them, and that other men would fain be as they are, then they are happy as it were by report, when perhaps they find the contrary within. For they are the first that find their own griefs, though they be the last that find their own faults. Certainly, men in great fortunes are strangers to themselves, and while they are in the puzzle of business they have no time to tend their health, either of body or mind. Tlli mors gravis incubat, qui notus nimis omnibus, ignotus moritur sibi. In place there is licence to do good and evil ; whereof the latter is a curse : for in evil the best condition is not to will, the second not to can. But power to do good is the true and lawful end of aspiring. For good thoughts Bacon's Essays (though God accept them) yet towards men are little better than good dreams, except they be put in act ; and that cannot be without power and place, as the vantage and commanding ground. Merit and good works is the end of man's motion ; and conscience of the same is the accomplishment of man's rest. For if a man can be partaker of God's theatre, he shall like- wise be partaker of God's rest. Et conversus Deus, ut aspiceret opera qua feccrunt manus su to have pinioned. ESSAY XXIV. OF INNOVATIONS As the births of living creatures at first are ill-shapen, so are all innovations, which are the births of time. Yet notwithstanding, as those that first bring honour into their family are commonly more worthy than most that succeed, so the first precedent (if it be good) is seldom attained by imitation. For ill, to man's nature as it stands perverted, hath a natural motion, strongest in continuance ; but good, as a forced motion, strongest at first. Surely every medicine is an innovation ; and he , that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils : ' for time is the greatest innovator ; and if time of course alter things to the worse, and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better, what shall be the end? It is true, that what is settled by custom, though it be not good, yet at least it is fit. And those things which have long gone together are as it were confederate within themselves : whereas new things piece not so well ; but though they help by their utility, yet they trouble by their inconformity. Besides, they are like strangers, more admired and less favoured. All this is true, if time stood still ; which contrariwise moveth so round, that a froward retention of custom is as turbulent a thing as an innovation; and they that reverence too much old times are but a scorn to the new. It were good therefore that men in their innovations would follow the example of time itself, which indeed in- novateth greatly, but quietly and by degrees scarce to be perceived: for otherwise, whatsoever is new is un- locked for ; and ever it mends some, and pairs other : and he that is holpen takes it for a fortune, and thanks the time; and he that is hurt, for a wrong, and im- puleth it to the author. It is good also not to try experiments in states, except the necessity be urgent, or the utility evident ; and well to beware that it be the 74 Of Innovations reformation that draweth on the change, and not the desire of change that pretendeth the reformation. And lastly, that the novelty, though it be not rejected, yet be held for a suspect ; and, as the Scripture saith, that we make a stand upon the ancient way, and then look about us, and discover what is the straight and right way, and so to walk in it. ESSAY XXV. OF DISPATCH AFFECTED dispatch is one of the most dangerous things to business that can be. It is like that which the physicians call pre-digestion, or hasty digestion, which is sure to fill the body full of crudities and secret seeds of diseases. Therefore measure not dispatch by the times of sitting, but by the advancement of the business. And as in races it is not the large stride or high lift that makes the speed ; so in business, the keeping close to the matter, and not taking of it too much at once, pro- cureth dispatch. It is the care of some only to come off speedily for the time, or to contrive some false periods of business, because they may seem men of dispatch. But it is one thing to abbreviate by contract- ing, another by cutting off: and business so handled at several sittings or meetings goeth commonly backward and forward in an unsteady manner. I knew a wise man that had it for a by-word, when he saw men hasten to a conclusion : Stay a little, that we may make an end the sooner, On the other side, true dispatch is a rich thing. For time is the measure of business, as money is of wares; and business is bought at a dear hand where there is small dispatch. The Spartans and Spaniards have been noted to be of small dispatch : Mi venga la muerte de Spagna ; Let my death come from Spain ; for then it will be sure to be long in coming. Give good hearing to those that give the first informa- tion in business ; and rather direct them in the beginning than interrupt them in the continuance of their speeches : for he that is put out of his own order will go forward and backward, and be more tedious while he waits upon his memory than he could have been if he had gone on in his own course. But sometimes it is seen that the moderator is more troublesome than the actor. 76 Of Dispatch Iterations are commonly loss of time : but there is no such gain of time as to iterate often the state of the question ; for it chaseth away many a frivolous speech as it is coming forth. Long and curious speeches are as fit for dispatch, as a robe or mantle with a long train is for race. Prefaces, and passages, and excusations, and other speeches of reference to the person, are great wastes of time; and though they seem to proceed of modesty, they are bravery. Yet beware of being too material, when there is any impediment or obstruction in men's wills ; for preoccupation of mind ever requireth preface of speech ; like a fomentation to make the unguent enter. Above all things, order, and distribution, and singling out of parts, is the life of dispatch ; so as the distribu- tion be not too subtile : for he that doth not divide will never enter well into business ; and he that divideth too much will never come out of it clearly. To choose time is to save time ; and an unseasonable motion is but beating the air. There be three parts of business : the preparation, the debate or examination, and the perfec- tion. Whereof, if you look for dispatch, let the middle only be the work of many, and the first and last the work of few. The proceeding upon somewhat con- ceived in writing doth for the most part facilitate dispatch : for though it should be wholly rejected, yet that negative is more pregnant of direction than an indefinite ; as ashes are more generative than dust. 77 ESSAY XXVI. OF SEEMING WISE IT hath been an opinion that the French are wiser than they seem, and the Spaniards seem wiser than they are. But howsoever it be between nations, certainly it is so between man and man. For as the Apostle saith of godliness, Having a shew of godliness, but denying the power thereof ; so certainly there are in point of wisdom and sufficiency that do nothing or little very solemnly: magno conatu nugas. It is a ridiculous thing and fit for a satire to persons of judgement, to see what shifts these formalists have, and what prospectives to make superficies to seem body that hath depth and bulk. Some are so close and reserved as they will not shew their wares but by a dark light, and seem always to keep back somewhat ; and when they know within themselves they speak of that they do not well know, would nevertheless seem to others to know of that which they may not well speak. Some help themselves with countenance and gesture, and are wise by signs ; as Cicero saith of Piso, that when he answered him he fetched one of his brows up to his forehead, and bent the other down to his chin : Respondes, altero ad frontem sublato, altero ad mentum depresso supercilio, crudelitatem tibi non placere. Some think to bear it by speaking a great word and being peremptory ; and go on, and take by admittance that which they cannot make good. Some, whatsoever is beyond their reach, will seem to despise or make light of it as impertinent or curious ; and so would have their ignorance seem judgement. Some are never without a difference, and commonly by amusing men with a subtilty blanch the matter ; of whom A. Gellius saith, hominem delirum, qui verborum minutiis rerum frangit pondera. Of which kind also Plato, in his Protagoras, bringeth in Prodicus in scorn, and maketh him make a speech that consisteth of distinctions from the beginning 78 Of Seeming Wise to the end. Generally, such men in all deliberations find ease to be of the negative side, and affect a credit to object and foretell difficulties : for when propositions are denied, there is an end of them; but if they be allowed, it requireth a new work : which false point of wisdom is the bane of business. To conclude, there is no decaying merchant, or inward beggar, hath so many tricks to uphold the credit of their wealth, as these empty persons have to maintain the credit of their sufficiency. Seeming wise men may make shift to get opinion : but let no man choose them for employment; for certainly you were better take for business a man somewhat absurd than over-formal. ESSAY XXVIL OF FRIENDSHIP IT had been hard for him that spake it to have put more truth and untruth together in a few words, than in that speech, Whosoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god. For it is most true that a natural ' and secret hatred and aversation towards society, in any man, hath somewhat of the savage beast; but it is most untrue that it should have any character at all of the divine nature ; except it proceed, not out of a pleasure in solitude, but out of a love and desire to sequester a man's self for a higher conversation : such as is found to have been falsely and feignedly in some of the heathen; as Epimenides the Candian, Numa the Roman, Empedocles the Sicilian, and Apollonius of Tyana; and truly and really in divers of the ancient hermits and holy fathers of the church. But little do men perceive what solitude is, and how far it extendeth. For a crowd is not company, and faces are but a gallery of pictures, and talk but a tinkling cymbal, where there is no love. The Latin adage meeteth with it a little, Magna civitas, magna solitudo ; because in a great town friends are scattered; so that there is not that fellowship, for the most part, which is in less neighbour- hoods. But we may go further and affirm most truly, that it is a mere and miserable solitude to want true friends, without which the world is but a wilderness; and even in this sense also of solitude, whosoever in the frame of his nature and affections is unfit for friendship, he taketh it of the beast, and not from humanity. A principal fruit of friendship is the ease and dis- charge of the fulness and swellings of the heart, which passions of all kinds do cause and induce. We know diseases of stoppings and suffocations are the most dangerous in the body ; and it is not much otherwise in the mind : you may take sarza to open the liver, steel So Of Friendship to open the spleen, flowers of sulphur for the lungs, castoreum for the brain; but no receipt openeth the heart, but a true friend, to whom you may impart griefs, joys, fears, hopes, suspicions, counsels, and whatsoever lieth upon the heart to oppress it, in a kind of civil shrift or confession. It is a strange thing to observe how high a rate great kings and monarchs do set upon this fruit of friendship whereof we speak : so great, as they purchase it many times at the hazard of their own safety and greatness. For princes, in regard of the distance of their fortune from that of their subjects and servants, cannot gather this fruit, except (to make themselves capable thereof) they raise some persons to be as it were companions and almost equals to themselves, which many times sorteth to inconvenience. The modern languages give unto such persons the name of favourites ; or privadoes ; as if it were matter of grace, or conversation. But the Roman name attaineth the true use and cause thereof, naming them participes curarum ; for it is that which tieth the knot. And we see plainly that this hath been done, not by weak and passionate princes only, but by the wisest and most politic that ever reigned ; who have oftentimes joined to themselves some of their servants, whom both themselves have called friends, and allowed others likewise to call them in the same manner, using the word which is received between private men. L. Sylla, when he commanded Rome, raised Pompey (after surnamed the Great) to that height, that Pompey vaunted himself for Sylla's overmatch. For when he had carried the consulship for a friend of his, against the pursuit of Sylla, and that Sylla did a little resent thereat, and began to speak great, Pompey turned upon him again, and in effect bade him be quiet ', for that more men adored the sun rising than the sun setting. With Julius Caesar, Decimus Brutus had obtained that interest, as he set him down in his testament for heir in remainder after his nephew. And this was the man that had power with him to draw him forth to his death. For when Caesar would have discharged the senate, in regard of r 81 Bacon's Essays some ill presages, and specially a dream of Calpurnia, this man lifted him gently by the arm out of his chair, telling him he hoped he would not dismiss the senate till his wife had dreamt a better dream. And it seemeth his favour was so great, as Antonius, in a letter which is recited verbatim in one of Cicero's Philippics, calleth him venefica, " witch " ; as if he had enchanted Caesar. Augustus raised Agrippa (though of mean birth) to that height, as, when he consulted with Maecenas about the marriage of his daughter Julia, Maecenas took the liberty to tell him, that he must either marry his daughter to Agrippa, or take away his life ; there was no third way, he had made him so great. With Tiberius Caesar, Sejanus had ascended to that height, as they two were termed and reckoned as a pair of friends. Tiberius in a letter to him saith, Hac pro amicitid nostrct non occultavi ; and the whole senate dedicated an altar to Friendship, as to a goddess, in respect of the great dearness of friend- ship between them two. The like or more was between Septimius Severus and Plautianus. For he forced his eldest son to marry the daughter of Plautianus ; and would often maintain Plautianus in doing affronts to his son; and did write also in a letter to the senate by these words : / love the man so well, as I wish he may over-live me. Now if these princes had been as a Trajan, or a Marcus Aurelius, a man might have thought that this had proceeded of an abundant goodness of nature; but being men so wise, of such strength and severity of mind, and so extreme lovers of themselves, as all these were, it proveth most plainly that they found their own felicity (though as great as ever happened to mortal men) but as an half piece, except they mought have a friend to make it entire : and yet, which is more, they were princes that had wives, sons, nephews ; and yet all these could not supply the comfort of friendship. It is not to be forgotten, what G>mmineus observeth of his first master, Duke Charles the Hardy ; namely, that he would communicate his secrets with none ; and least of all, those secrets which troubled him most. Whereupon he goeth on and saith, that towards his latter 82 Of Friendship time that closeness did impair and a little perish his under- standing. Surely Commineus mought have made the same judgement also, if it had pleased him, of his second master, Lewis the Eleventh, whose closeness was indeed his tormentor. The parable of Pythagoras is dark, but true ; Cor ne edito, " Eat not the heart." Certainly, if a man would give it a hard phrase, those that want friends to open themselves unto are cannibals of their own hearts. But one thing is most admirable (wherewith I will conclude this first fruit of friendship), which is, that this communicating of a man's self to his friend works two contrary effects ; for it redoubleth joys, and cutteth griefs in halfs. For there is no man that imparteth his joys to his friend, but he joyeth the more ; and no man that imparteth his griefs to his friend, but he grieveth the less. So that it is in truth of operation upon a man's mind, of like virtue as the alchymists use to attribute to their stone for man's body ; that it worketh all contrary effects, but still to the good and benefit of nature. But yet, without praying in aid of alchymists, there is a manifest image of this in the ordinary course of nature. For in bodies, union strengtheneth and cherisheth any natural action ; and, on the other side, weakeneth and dulleth any violent impression : and even so is it of minds. The second fruit of friendship is healthful and sovereign for the understanding, as the first is for the affections. For friendship maketh indeed a fair day in the affections, from storm and tempests ; but it maketh daylight in the understanding, out of darkness and confusion of thoughts. Neither is this to be understood only of faithful counsel, which a man receiveth from his friend ; but before you come to that, certain it is that whosoever hath his mind fraught with many thoughts, his wits and understanding do clarify and break up, in the communicating and dis- coursing with another : he tosseth his thoughts more easily; he marshalleth them more orderly; he seeth how they look when they are turned into words ; finally, he waxeth wiser than himself; and that more by an hour's discourse than by a day's meditation. It was well 83 Bacon's Essays said by Themistocles to the king of Persia, that speech was like cloth of Arras, opened and put abroad; whereby the imagery doth appear in figure ; whereas in thoughts they lie but as in packs. Neither is this second fruit of friendship, in opening the understanding, restrained only to such friends as are able to give a man counsel : (they indeed are best) ; but even without that, a man learneth of himself, and bringeth his own thoughts to light, and whetteth his wits as against a stone, which itself cuts not. In a word, a man were better relate himself to a statua or picture, than to suffer his thoughts to pass in smother. Add now, to make this second fruit of friendship complete, that other point, which lieth more open, and falleth within vulgar observation ; which is faithful counsel from a friend. Heraclitus saith well in one of his enigmas, Dry light is ever tfic best. And certain it is that the light that a man receiveth by counsel from another is drier and purer than that which cometh from his own understanding and judgement ; which is ever infused and drenched in his affections and customs. So as there is as much difference between the counsel that a friend giveth, and that a man giveth himself, as there is between the counsel of a friend and of a flatterer. For there is no such flatterer as is a man's self; and there is no such remedy against flattery of a man's self as the liberty of a friend. Counsel is of two sorts ; the one concerning manners, the other concern- ing business. For the first ; the best preservative to keep the mind in health is the faithful admonition of a friend. The calling of a man's self to a strict account is a medicine, sometime, too piercing and corrosive. Reading good books of morality is a little flat and dead. Observing our faults in others is sometimes unproper for our case. But the best receipt (best, I say, to work, and best to take) is the admonition of a friend. It is a strange thing to behold what gross errors and extreme absurdities many (especially of the greater sort) do commit, for want of a friend to tell them of them, to the great damage both of their fame and fortune. For, as 84 Of Friendship S. James saith, they are as men, that look sometimes into a glass, and presently forget their own -shape and favour. As for business, a man may think, if he will, that two eyes see no more than one ; or that a gamester seeth always more than a looker-on ; or that a man in anger is as wise as he that hath said over the four and twenty letters ; or that a musket may be shot off as well upon the arm as upon a rest ; and such other fond and high imaginations, to think himself all in all. But when all is done, the help of good counsel is that which setteth business straight. And if any man think that he will take counsel, but it shall be by pieces ; asking counsel in one business of one man, and in another business of another man ; it is well (that is to say, better perhaps than if he asked none at all) ; but he runneth two dangers. One, that he shall not be faithfully counselled ; for it is a rare thing, except it be from a perfect and entire friend, to have counsel given, but such as shall be bowed and crooked to some ends which he hath that giveth it. The other, that he shall have counsel given, hurtful and unsafe (though with good mean- ing), and mixed partly of mischief and partly of remedy : even as if you would call a physician, that is thought good for the cure of the disease you complain of, but is unacquainted with your body; and therefore may put you in way for a present cure, but overthroweth your health in some other kind ; and so cure the disease and kill the patient. But a friend that is wholly acquainted with a man's estate will beware, by furthering any present business, how he dasheth upon other inconvenience. And therefore rest not upon scattered counsels; they will rather distract and mislead than settle and direct. After these two noble fruits of friendship (peace in the affections, and support of the judgement) followeth the last fruit, which is like the pomegranate, full of many kernels ; I mean aid and bearing a part in all actions and occasions. Here the best way to represent to life the manifold use of friendship is to cast and see how many things there are which a man cannot do 85 Bacon's Essays himself; and then it will appear that it was a sparing speech of the ancients, to say, that a friend is another himself : for that a friend is far more than himself. Men have their time, and die many times in desire of some things which they principally take to heart; the bestowing of a child, the finishing of a work, or the like. If a man have a true friend, he may rest almost secure that the care of those things will continue after him. So that a man hath as it were two lives in his desires. A man hath a body, and that body is confined to a place ; but where friendship is, all offices of life are as it were granted to him and his deputy. For he may exercise them by his friend. How many things are there which a man cannot, with any face or comeliness, say or do himself! A man can scarce allege his own merits with modesty, much less extol them ; a man cannot sometimes brook to supplicate or beg; and a number of the like. But all these things are graceful in a friend's mouth, which are blushing in a man's own. So again, a man's person hath many proper relations which he cannot put off. A man cannot speak to his son but as a father ; to his wife but as a husband ; to his enemy but upon terms : whereas a friend may speak as the case requires, and not as it sorteth with the person. But to enumerate these things were endless : I have given the rule, where a man cannot fitly play his own part : if he have not a friend, he may quit the stage. ESSAY XXVIII. OF EXPENSE RICHES are for spending, and spending for honour and good actions. Therefore extraordinary expense must be limited by the worth of the occasion ; for voluntary undoing may be as well for a man's country as for the kingdom of heaven. But ordinary expense ought to be limited by a man's estate; and governed with such regard, as it be within his compass ; and not subject to deceit and abuse of servants ; and ordered to the best shew, that the bills may be less than the estimation abroad. Certainly, if a man will keep but of even hand, his ordinary expenses ought to be but to the half of his receipts ; and if he think to wax rich, but to the third part. It is no baseness for the greatest to descend and look into their own estate. Some forbear it, not upon negligence alone, but doubting to bring themselves into melancholy, in respect they shall find it broken. But wounds cannot be cured without searching. He that cannot look into his own estate at all, had need both choose well those whom he employethj and change them often ; for new are more timorous and less subtile. He that can look into his estate but seldom, it behoveth him to turn all to certainties. A man had need, if he be plentiful in some kind of expense, to be as saving again in some other. As, if he be plentiful in diet, to be saving in apparel ; if he be plentiful in the hall, to be saving in the stable ; and the like. For he that is plentiful in expenses of all kinds will hardly be preserved from decay. In clearing of a man's estate, he may as well hurt himself in being too sudden, as in letting it run on too long. For hasty selling is commonly as dis- advantageable as interest. Besides, he thot clears at once will relapse ; for rinding himself out of straits, he will revert to his customs : but he that cleareth by degrees induceth a habit of frugality, and gaineth as 87 Bacon's Essays well upon his mind as upon his estate. Certainly, who hath a state to repair may not despise small things: and commonly it is less dishonourable to abridge petty charges, than to stoop to petty gettings. A man ought warily to begin charges which once begun will continue : but in matters that return not he may be more magni- ficent. ESSAY XXIX. OF THE TRUE GREATNESS OF KINGDOMS AND ESTATES THE speech of Themistocles the Athenian, which was haughty and arrogant in taking so much to himself, had been a grave and wise observation and censure, applied at large to others. Desired at a feast to touch a lute, he said, He could not fiddle, but yet he could make a small town a great city. These words (holpen a little with a metaphor) may express two differing abilities in those that deal in business of estate. For if a true survey be taken of counsellors and statesmen, there may be found (though rarely) those which can make a small state great, and yet cannot fiddle : as, on the other side, there will be found a great many that can fiddle very cunningly, but yet are so far from being able to make a small state great, as their gift lieth the other way ; to bring a great and flourishing estate to ruin and decay. And certainly, those degenerate arts and shifts, whereby many counsellors and governors gain both favour with their masters and estimation with the vulgar, deserve no better name than fiddling ; being things rather pleasing for the time, and graceful to themselves only, than tending to the weal and advancement of the state which they serve. There are also (no doubt) counsellors and governors, which may be held sufficient, (ncgotiis pares), able to manage affairs, and to keep them from precipices and manifest inconveniences ; which nevertheless are far from the ability to raise and amplify an estate in power, means, and fortune. But be the workmen what they may be, let us speak of the work ; that is, the true great- ness of kingdoms and estates, and the means thereof. An argument fit for great and mighty princes to have in their hand ; to the end that neither by over-measuring their forces they leese themselves in vain enterprises; nor, on the other side, by undervaluing them they descend to fearful and pusillanimous counsels. Bacon's Essays The greatness of an estate in bulk and territory doth fall under measure ; and the greatness of finances and revenue doth fall under computation. The population may appear by musters ; and the number and greatness of cities and towns, by cards and maps. But yet there is not anything amongst civil affairs more subject to error, than the right valuation and true judgement con- cerning the power and forces of an estate. The kingdom of heaven is compared, not to any great kernel or nut, but to a grain of mustard-seed ; which is one of the least grains, but hath in it a property and spirit hastily to get up and spread. So are there states great in territory, and yet not apt to enlarge or command ; and some that have but a small dimension of stem, and yet apt to be the foundations of great monarchies. Walled towns, stored arsenals and armouries, goodly races of horse, chariots of war, elephants, ordnance, artillery, and the like : all this is but a sheep in a lion's skin, except the breed and disposition of the people be stout and warlike. Nay, number (itself) in armies importeth not much, where the people is of weak courage; for (as Virgil saith) // never troubles a wolf how many the sheep be. The army of the Persians in the plains of Arbela was such a vast sea of people, as it did somewhat astonish the commanders in Alexander's army ; who came to him therefore, and wished him to set upon them by night ; but he answered, He would not pilfer the victory. And the defeat was easy. When Tigranes the Armenian, being encamped upon a hill with 400,000 men, discovered the army of the Romans, being not above 14,000, marching towards him, he made himself merry with it and said, Yonder men art too many for an ambassage and too few for a fight. But before the sun set, he found them enough to give him the chase with infinite slaughter. Many are the examples of the great odds between number and courage : so that a man may truly make a judgement, that the principal point of greatness in any state is to have a race of military men. Neither is money the sinews of war (as it is trivially said), where the sinews of men's arms, in 90 Of the true Greatness of Kingdoms base and effeminate people, are failing. For Solon said well to Croesus (when in ostentation he shewed him his gold), Sir, if any other come that hath better iron than you, he will be master of all this gold. Therefore let any prince or state think soberly of his forces, except his militia of natives be of good and valiant soldiers. And let princes, on the other side, that have subjects of martial disposition, know their own strength ; unless they be otherwise wanting unto themselves. As for mercenary forces (which is the help in this case), all examples shew, that, whatsoever estate or prince doth rest upon them, he may spread his feathers for a time, but he will mew them soon after. The blessing of Judah and Issachar will never meet ; that the same people or nation should be both the lion's whelp and the ass between burthens ; neither will it be, that a people overlaid with taxes should ever become valiant and martial. It is true that taxes levied by consent of the estate do abate men's courage less : as it hath been seen notably in the excises of the Low Countries ; and, in some degree, in the subsidies of England. For you must note that we speak now of the heart and not of the purse. So that although the same tribute and tax, laid by consent or by imposing, be all one to the purse, yet it works diversely upon the courage. So that you may conclude, that no people over- charged with tribute is fit for empire. Let states that aim at greatness take heed how their nobility and gentlemen do multiply too fast. For that maketh the common subject grow to be a peasant and base swain, driven out of heart, and in effect but the gentleman's labourer. Even as you may see in coppice woods ; if you leave your staddles too thick, you shall never have clean underwood, but shrubs and bushes. So in countries, if the gentlemen be too many, the commons will be base ; and you will bring it to that, that not the hundred poll will be fit for an helmet; especially as to the infantry, which is the nerve of an army ; and so there will be great population and little strength. This which I speak of hath been no where Bacon's Essays better seen than by comparing of England and France ; whereof England, though far less in territory and population, hath been (nevertheless) an over-match ; in regard the middle people of England make good soldiers, which the peasants of France do not. And herein the device of King Henry the Seventh (whereof I have spoken largely in the History of his Life) was profound and admirable ; in making farms and houses of husbandry of a standard ; that is, maintained with such a proportion of land unto them, as may breed a subject to live in convenient plenty and no servile condition ; and to keep the plough in the hands of the owners, and not mere hirelings. And thus indeed you shall attain to Virgil's character, which he gives to ancient Italy : Terra potens armis atque ubere glebes. Neither is that state (which, for any thing I know, is almost peculiar to England, and hardly to be found any where else, except it be perhaps in Poland) to be passed over ; I mean the state of free servants and attendants upon noblemen and gentlemen ; which are no ways inferior unto the yeomanry for arms. And therefore, out of all question, the splendour and magnifi- cence and great retinues and hospitality of noblemen and gentlemen, received into custom, doth much con- duce unto martial greatness. Whereas, contrariwise, the close and reserved living of noblemen and gentle- men causeth a penury of military forces. By all means it is to be procured, that the trunk of Nebuchadnezzar's tree of monarchy be great enough to bear the branches and the boughs ; that is, that the natural subjects of the crown or state bear a sufficient proportion to the stranger subjects that they govern. Therefore all states that are liberal of naturalization towards strangers are fit for empire. For to think that an handful of people can, with the greatest courage and policy in the world, embrace too large extent of dominion, it may hold for a time, but it will fail suddenly. The Spartans were a nice people in point of naturalization ; 92 Of the true Greatness of Kingdoms whereby, while they kept their compass, they stood firm ; but when they did spread, and their boughs were be- comen too great for their stem, they became a windfall upon the sudden. Never any state was in this point so open to receive strangers into their body as were the Romans. Therefore it sorted with them accordingly; for they grew to the greatest monarchy. Their manner was to grant naturalization (which they called jus civitatis}, and to grant it in the highest degree ; that is, not only ius commercn,jus connubii,jus h&reditatus, but also t'us suffragii and jus honorum. And this, not to singular persons alone, but likewise to whole families ; yea, to cities, and sometimes to nations. Add to this their custom of plantation of colonies, whereby the Roman plant was removed into the soil of other nations. And putting both constitutions together, you will say that it was not the Romans that spread upon the world, but it was the world that spread upon the Romans ; and that was the sure way of greatness. I have marvelled some- times at Spain, how they clasp and contain so large dominions with so few natural Spaniards : but sure the whole compass of Spain is a very great body of a tree ; far above Rome and Sparta at the first. And besides, though they have not had that usage to naturalize liberally, yet they have that which is next to it ; that is, to employ almost indifferently all nations in their militia of ordinary soldiers ; yea, and sometimes in their highest commands. Nay, it seemeth at this instant they are sensible of this want of natives ; as by the Pragmatical Sanction, now published, appeareth. It is certain, that sedentary and within-door arts and delicate manufacturers (that require rather the finger than the arm) have in their nature a contrariety to a military disposition. And generally all warlike people area little idle, and love danger better than travail; neither must they be too much broken of it, if they shall be preserved in vigour. Therefore it was great advantage, in the ancient states of Sparta, Athens, Rome, and others, that they had the use of slaves, which commonly did rid those manufactures. But 93 Bacon's Essays that is abolished, in greatest part, by the Christian law. That which cometh nearest to it is to leave those arts chiefly to strangers (which for that purpose are the more easily to be received), and to contain the principal bulk of the vulgar natives within those three kinds : tillers of the ground ; free servants ; and handicraftsmen of strong and manly arts, as smiths, masons, carpenters, etc. ; not reckoning professed soldiers. But above all, for empire and greatness, it importeth most, that a nation do profess arms as their principal honour, study, and occupation. For the things which we formerly have spoken of are but habilitations towards arms ; and what is habilitation without intention and act ? Romulus, after his death (as they report or feign), sent a present to the Romans, that above all they should intend arms, and then they should prove the greatest empire of the world. The fabric of the state of Sparta was wholly (though not wisely) framed and composed to that scope and end. The Persians and Macedonians had it for a flash. The Gauls, Germans, Goths, Saxons, Normans, and others, had it for a time. The Turks have it at this day, though in great declination. Of Christian Europe, they that have it are, in effect, only the Spaniards. But it is so plain, that every man profiteth in that he most intendeth, that it needeth not to be stood upon. It is enough to point at it; that no nation, which doth not directly profess arms, may look to have greatness fall into their mouths. And, on the other side, it is a most certain oracle of time, that those states that continue long in that profession (as the Romans and Turks principally have done) do wonders. And those that have professed arms but for an age have notwithstanding commonly attained that greatness in that age which maintained them long after, when their profession and exercise of arms hath grown to decay. Incident to this point is, for a state to have those laws or customs which may reach forth unto them just occasions (as may be pretended) of war. For there is that justice imprinted in the nature of men, that they enter not upon wars (whereof so many calamities do 94 Of the true Greatness of Kingdoms ensue) but upon some, at the least specious, grounds and quarrels. The Turk hath at hand, for cause of war, the propagation of his law or sect ; a quarrel that he may always command. The Romans, though they esteemed the extending the limits of their empire to be great honour to their generals when it was done, yet they never rested upon that alone to begin a war. First, therefore, let nations that pretend to greatness have this : that they be sensible of wrongs, either upon borderers, merchants, or politic ministers ; and that they sit not too long upon a provocation. Secondly, let them be prest and ready to give aids and succours to their confederates : as it ever was with the Romans ; insomuch as if the confederate had leagues defensive with divers other states, and, upon invasion offered, did implore their aids severally, yet the Romans would ever be the foremost, and leave it to none other to have the honour. As for the wars which were anciently made on the behalf of a kind of party, or tacit conformity of estate, I do not see how they may be well justified : as when the Romans made a war for the liberty of Graecia ; or when the Lacedaemonians and Athenians made wars to set up or pull down democracies and oligarchies ; or when wars were made by foreigners, under the pretence of justice or protection, to deliver the subjects of others from tyranny and oppression ; and the like. Let it suffice, that no estate expect to be great, that is not awake upon any just occasion of arming. No body can be healthful without exercise, neither natural body nor politic ; and certainly, to a kingdom or estate, a just and honourable war is the true exercise. A civil war, indeed, is like the heat of a fever ; but a foreign war is like the heat of exercise, and serveth to keep the body in health ; for in a slothful peace, both courages will effeminate and manners corrupt. But howsoever it be for happiness, without all question for greatness it maketh to be still for the most part in arms; and the strength of a veteran army (though it be a chargeable business), always on foot, is that which commonly giveth the law, or at least the reputation, 95 Bacon's Essays amongst all neighbour states ; as may well be seen in Spain, which hath had, in one part or other, a veteran army, almost continually, now by the space of six-score years. To be master of the sea is an abridgement of a monarchy. Cicero, writing to Atticus, of Pompey his preparation against Caesar, saith : Consilium Pompeii blanc Themistocleum est ; putat enim, qui mart potitur, eum rerum potiri. And, without doubt, Pompey had tired out Caesar, if upon vain confidence he had not left that way. We see the great effects of battles by sea. The battle of Actium decided the empire of the world. The battle of Lepanto arrested the greatness of the Turk. There be many examples where sea-fights have been final to the war ; but this is when princes or states have set up their rest upon the battles. But thus much is certain, that he that commands the sea is at great liberty, and may take as much and as little of the war as he will. Whereas those that be strongest by land are many times nevertheless in great straits. Surely, at this day, with us of Europe, the vantage of strength at sea (which is one of the principal dowries of this kingdom of Great Britain) is great : both because most of the kingdoms of Europe are not merely inland, but girt with the sea most part of their compass ; and because the wealth of both Indies seems in great part but an accessary to the command of the seas. The wars of latter ages seem to be made in the dark, in respect of the glory and honour which reflected upon men from the wars in ancient time. There be now, for martial encouragement, some degrees and orders of chivalry, which nevertheless are conferred promiscu- ously upon soldiers and no soldiers; and some remem- brance perhaps upon the scutcheon ; and some hospitals for maimed soldiers ; and such like things. But in ancient times, the trophies erected upon the place of the victory ; the funeral laudatives and monuments for those that died in the wars ; the crowns and garlands personal ; the style of Emperor, which the great kings of the world after borrowed ; the triumphs of the generals 96 Of the true Greatness of Kingdoms upon their return ; the great donatives and largesses upon the disbanding of the armies ; were things able to inflame all men's courages. But above all, that of the triumph, amongst the Romans, was not pageants or gaudery, but one of the wisest and noblest institutions that ever was. For it contained three things : honour to the general ; riches to the treasury out of the spoils ; and donatives to the army. But that honour perhaps were not fit for monarchies, except it be in the person of the monarch himself, or his sons ; as it came to pass in the times of the Roman emperors, who did im- propriate the actual triumphs to themselves and their sons, for such wars as they did achieve in person, and left only, for wars achieved by subjects, some triumphal garments and ensigns to the general. To conclude : no man can by care taking (as the Scripture saith) add a cubit to his stature, in this little model of a man's body : but in the great frame of kingdoms and commonwealths, it is in the power of princes or estates to add amplitude and greatness to their kingdoms. For by introducing such ordinances, constitutions, and customs, as we have now touched, they may sow greatness to their posterity and succession. But these things are commonly not observed, but left to take their chance. 97 ESSAY XXX. OF REGIMENT OF HEALTH THERE is a wisdom in this beyond the rules of physic : a man's own observation, what he finds good of, and what he finds hurt of, is the best physic to preserve health. But it is a safer conclusion to say, This agreeth not well with me, therefore I will not continue it, than this, I find no offence of this, therefore I may use it. For strength of nature in youth passeth over many excesses, which are owing a man till his age. Discern of the coming on of years, and think not to do the same things still ; for age will not be defied. Beware of sudden change in any great point of diet, and if necessity enforce it, fit the rest to it. For it is a secret, both in nature and state, that it is safer to change many things than one. Examine thy customs of diet, sleep, exercise, apparel, and the like ; and try, in any thing thou shall judge hurtful, to discontinue it by little and little; but so as, if thou dost find any inconvenience by the change, thou come back to it again : for it is hard to distinguish that which is generally held good and wholesome, from that which is good particularly, and fit for thine own body. To be free-minded and cheerfully disposed at hours of meat and of sleep and of exercise, is one of the best precepts of long lasting. As for the passions and studies of the mind ; avoid envy ; anxious fears ; anger fretting inwards; subtile and knotty inquisitions; joys and exhilarations in excess ; sadness not communicated. Entertain hopes; mirth rather than joy; variety of delights, rather than surfeit of them ; wonder and admiration, and therefore novelties; studies that fill the mind with splendid and illustrious objects, as histories, fables, and contemplations of nature. If you fly physic in health altogether, it will be too strange for your body when you shall need it. If 98 Of Regiment of Health you make it too familiar, it will work no extraordinary effect when sickness cometh. I commend rather some diet for certain seasons, than frequent use of physic, except it be grown into a custom. For those diets alter the body more, and trouble it less. Despise no new accident in your body, but ask opinion of it. In sickness, respect health principally ; and in health, action. For those that put their bodies to endure in health, may, in most sicknesses which are not very sharp, be cured only with diet and tendering. Celsus could never have spoken it as a physician, had he not been a wise man withal, when he giveth it for one of the great precepts of health and lasting, that a man do vary and interchange contraries, but with an inclination to the more benign extreme : use fasting and full eating, but rather full eating; watching and sleep, but rather sleep ; sitting and exercise, but rather exercise ; and the like. So shall nature be cherished, and yet taught masteries. Physicians are some of them so pleasing and conformable to the humour of the patient, as they press not the true cure of the disease ; and some other are so regular in proceeding according to art for the disease, as they respect not sufficiently the condition of the patient. Take one of a middle temper; or if it may not be found in one man, combine two of either sort ; and forget not to call as well the best acquainted with your body, as the best reputed of for his faculty. 99 ESSAY XXXI. OF SUSPICION SUSPICIONS amongst thoughts are like bats amongst birds, they ever fly by twilight Certainly they are to be repressed, or at the least well guarded : for they cloud the mind; they leese friends; and they check with business, whereby business cannot go on currently and constantly. They dispose kings to tyranny, husbands to jealousy, wise men to irresolution and melancholy. They are defects, not in the heart, but in the brain ; for they take place in the stoutest natures :/ as in the example of Henry the Seventh of England : there was not a more suspicious man, nor a more stout. And in such a composition they do small hurt. For commonly they are not admitted but with examination, whether they be likely or no ? But in fearful natures they gain ground too fast. There is nothing makes a man suspect much, more than to know little ; and therefore men should remedy suspicion by procuring to know more, and not to keep their suspicions in smother. What would men have? Do they think those they employ and deal with are saints? Do they not think they will have their own ends, and be truer to themselves than to them ? Therefore there is no better way to moderate suspicions, than to account upon such suspicions as true, and yet to bridle them as false. For so far a man ought to make use of suspicions, as to provide as, if that should be true that he suspects, yet it may do him no hurt. Suspicions, that the mind of itself gathers, are but buzzes; but suspicions, that are artificially nourished and put into men's heads by the tales and whisperings of others, have stings. Certainly, the best mean to clear the way in this same wood of suspicions, is frankly to communicate them with the party that he suspects : for thereby he shall be sure to know more of the truth 100 Of Suspicion of them than he did before; and withal shall make that party more circumspect not to give further cause of suspicion. But this would not be done to men of base natures ; for they, if they find themselves once sus- pected, will never be true. The Italian says, Sosfetto licentia fede ; as if suspicion did give a passport to faith : but it ought rather to kindle it to discharge itself. ESSAY XXXII. OF DISCOURSE SOME in their discourse desire rather commendation of wit, in being able to hold all arguments, than of judge- ment, in discerning what is true ; as if it were a praise to know what might be said, and not what should be thought. Some have certain common places and themes wherein they are good, and want variety ; which kind of poverty is for the most part tedious, and, when it is once perceived, ridiculous. The honourablest part of talk is to give the occasion ; and again to moderate and pass to somewhat else ; for then a man leads the dance. It is good, in discourse, and speech of conversation, to vary and intermingle speech of the present occasion with arguments ; tales with reasons ; asking of questions with telling of opinions ; and jest with earnest : for it is a dull thing to tire, and, as we say now, to jade any thing too far. As for jest, there be certain things which ought to be privileged from it ; namely, religion, matters of state, great persons, any man's present business of importance, and any case that deserveth pity. Yet there be some that think their wits have been asleep, except they dart out somewhat that is piquant and to the quick : that is a vein which would be bridled : Parce, piter, stimulis, et fortius utere loris. And generally, men ought to find the difference between saltness and bitterness. Certainly, he that hath a satirical vein, as he maketh others afraid of his wit, so he had need be afraid of others' memory. He that questioneth much, shall learn much, and content much ; but especially if he apply his questions to the skill of the persons whom he asketh : for he shall give them occasion to please themselves in speaking, and himself shall continually gather knowledge. But let his ques- 102 Of Discourse tions not be troublesome ; for that is fit for a poser. And let him be sure to leave other men their turns to speak. Nay, if there be any that would reign and take up all the time, let him find means to take them off and to bring others on ; as musicians use to do with those that dance too long galliards. If you dissemble some- times your knowledge of that you are thought to know, you shall be thought another time to know that you know not. Speech of a man's self ought to be seldom, and well chosen. I knew one was wont to say in scorn, He must needs be a wise man, he speaks so much of himself : and there is but one case wherein a man may commend himself with good grace, and that is in commending virtue in another, especially if it be such a virtue where- unto himself pretendeth. Speech of touch towards others should be sparingly used ; for discourse ought to be as a field, without coming home to any man. I knew two noblemen, of the west part of England, whereof the one was given to scoff, but kept ever royal cheer in his house : the other would ask of those that had been at the other's table, Tell truly, was there never a flout or dry blow given 1 to which the guest would answer, Such and such a thing passed: the lord would say, / thought he would mar a good dinner. Discretion of speech is more than eloquence; and to speak agreeably to him with whom we deal, is more than to speak in good words or in good order. A good con- tinued speech, without a good speech of interlocution, shews slowness ; and a good reply or second speech, without a good settled speech, sheweth shallowness and weakness. As we see in beasts, that those that are weakest in the course, are yet nimblest in the turn ; as it is betwixt the greyhound and the hare. To use too many circumstances, ere one come to the matter, is wearisome ; to use none at all, is blunt. 103 ESSAY XXXIII. OF PLANTATIONS PLANTATIONS are amongst ancient, primitive, and heroical works. When the world was young, it begat more children ; but now it is old, it begets fewer : for I may justly account new plantations to be the children of former kingdoms. I like a plantation in a pure soil ; that is, where people are not displanted to the end to plant in others. For else it is rather an extirpation than a plantation. Planting of countries is like planting of woods; for you must make account to leese almost twenty years' profit, and expect your recompense in the end. For the principal thing that hath been the destruction of most plantations, hath been the base and hasty drawing of profit in the first years. It is true, speedy profit is not to be neglected, as far as may stand with the good of the plantation, but no further. It is a shameful and unblessed thing to take the scum of people, and wicked condemned men, to be the people with whom you plant : and not only so, but it spoileth the plantation ; for they will ever live like rogues, and not fall to work, but be lazy, and do mischief, and spend victuals, and be quickly weary, and then certify over to their country to the discredit of the plantation. The people wherewith you plant ought to be gardeners, ploughmen, labourers, smiths, carpenters, joiners, fishermen, fowlers, with some few apothecaries, surgeons, cooks, and bakers. In a country of plantation, first look about, what kind of victual the country yields of itself to hand ; as chestnuts, walnuts, pine-apples, olives, dates, plums, cherries, wild honey, and the like; and make use of them. Then consider what victual or esculent things there are, which grow speedily, and with- in the year ; as parsnips, carrots, turnips, onions, radish, artichokes of Hierusalem, maize, and the like. For wheat, barley, and oats, they ask too much labour ; but 104 Of Plantations with peas and beans you may begin, both because they ask less labour, and because they serve for meat as well as for bread. And of rice likewise cometh a great in- crease, and it is a kind of meat. Above all, there ought to be brought store of biscuit, oat-meal, flour, meal, and the like, in the beginning, till bread may be had. For beasts or birds, take chiefly such as are least subject to diseases, and multiply fastest ; as swine, goats, cocks, hens, turkeys, geese, house-doves, and the like. The victual in plantations ought to be expended almost as in a besieged town ; that is, with certain allowance. And let the main part of the ground employed to gardens or corn be to a common stock ; and to be laid in, and stored up, and then delivered out in proportion ; be- sides some spots of ground that any particular person will manure for his own private. Consider likewise what commodities the soil where the plantation is doth naturally yield, that they may some way help to defray the charge of the plantation : so it be not, as was said, to the untimely prejudice of the main business ; as it hath fared with tobacco in Virginia. Wood commonly aboundeth but too much ; and therefore timber is fit to be one. If there be iron ore, and streams whereupon to set the mills, iron is a brave commodity where wood aboundeth. Making of bay-salt, if the climate be proper for it, would be put in experience. Growing silk likewise, if any be, is a likely commodity. Pitch and tar, where store of firs and pines are, will not fail. So drugs and sweet woods, where they are, cannot but yield great profit. Soap-ashes likewise, and other things that may be thought of. But moil not too much under ground ; for the hope of mines is very uncertain, and useth to make the planters lazy in other things. For government, let it be in the hands of one, assisted with some counsel ; and let them have commission to exercise martial laws, with some limitation. And above all, let men make Lhat profit of being in the wilderness, as they have God always, and his service, before their eyes. Let not the government of the plantation depend upon too many counsellors and undertakers in the country that 105 Bacon's Essays planteth, but upon a temperate number : and let those be rather noblemen and gentlemen, than merchants ; for they look ever to the present gain. Let there be freedoms from custom, till the plantation be of strength ; and not only freedom from custom, but freedom to carry their commodities where they may make their best of them, except there be some special cause of caution. Cram not in people, by sending too fast company after company ; but rather hearken how they waste, and send supplies proportionably ; but so as the number may live well in the plantation, and not by surcharge be in penury. It hath been a great endangering to the health of some plantations, that they have built along the sea and rivers, in marish and unwholesome grounds. Therefore, though you begin there, to avoid carriage and other like discommodities, yet build still rather upwards from the streams than along. It concerneth likewise the health of the plantation that they have good store of salt with them, that they may use it in their victuals when it shall be necessary. If you plant where savages are, do not only entertain them with trifles and gingles ; but use them justly and graciously, with sufficient guard nevertheless : and do not win their favour by helping them to invade their enemies, but for their defence it is not amiss. And send oft of them over to the country that plants, that they may see a better condition than their own, and commend it when they return. When the plantation grows to strength, then it is time to plant with women as well as with men ; that the plantation may spread into genera- tions, and not be ever pieced from without. It is the sinfullest thing in the world to forsake or destitute a plantation once in forwardness : for besides the dis- j honour, it is the guiltiness of blood of many commiser-j able persons. 1 06 ESSAY XXXIV. OF RICHES I CANNOT call riches better than the baggage of virtue. The Roman word is better, impedimenta. For as the baggage is to an army, so is riches to virtue. It cannot be spared nor left behind, but it hindreth the march ; yea, and the care of it sometimes loseth or disturbeth the victory. Of great riches there is no real use, except it be in the distribution ; the rest is but conceit. So saith Salomon : Where much is, there are many to consume it ; and what hath the owner but the sight of it with his eyes ? The personal fruition in any man cannot reach to feel great riches : there is a custody of them ; or a power of dole and donative of them ; or a fame of them ; but no solid use to the owner. Do you not see what feigned prices are set upon little stones and rarities? and what works of ostentation are undertaken, because there might seem to be some use of great riches ? But then you will say, they may be of use to buy men out of dangers or trouble. As Salomon saith : Riches are as a strong hold, in the imagination of the rich man. But this is excellently expressed, that it is in imagination, and not always in fact. For certainly great riches have sold more men than they have bought out. Seek not proud riches, but such as thou mayest get justly, use soberly, distribute cheerfully, and leave contentedly. Yet have no abstract nor friarly contempt of them. But distin- guish, as Cicero saith well of Rabirius Posthumus : In studio rei amplificanda apparebat non avaritice prcedam sed instrumentum bonitati qu&ri. Hearken also to Salomon, and beware of hasty gathering of riches : Qui festinat ad divitias non erit insons. The poets feign that when Plutus (which is Riches) is sent from Jupiter, he limps and goes slowly ; but when he is sent from Pluto, he runs and is swift of foot : meaning, that riches gotten by good means and just labour pace slowly ; but when they come by the death of others (as by the course of 107 Bacon's Essays inheritance, testaments, and the like), they come tumbling upon a man. But it mought be applied like- wise to Pluto, taking him for the devil. For when riches come from the devil (as by fraud and oppression and unjust means), they come upon speed. The ways to enrich are many, and most of them foul. Parsimony is one of the best, and yet is not innocent ; for it with- holdeth men from works of liberality and charity. The improvement of the ground is the most natural obtaining of riches; for it is our great mother's blessing, the earth's ; but it is slow. And yet, where men of great wealth do stoop to husbandry, it multiplieth riches exceedingly. I knew a nobleman in England, that had the greatest audits of any man in my time : a great grazier, a great sheep-master, a great timber man. a great collier, a great corn-master, a great lead-man, and so of iron, and a number of the like points of husbandry : so as the earth seemed a sea to him, in respect of the perpetual importation. It was truly observed by one, that himself came very hardly to a little riches, and very easily to great riches. For when a man's stock is come to that, that he can expect the prime of markets, and overcome those bargains which for their greatness are few men's money, and be partner in the industries of younger men, he cannot but increase mainly. The gains of ordinary trades and vocations are honest, and furthered by two things chiefly : by diligence, and by a good name for good and fair dealing. But the gains of bargains are of a more doubtful nature ; when men shall wait upon others' necessity, broke by servants and instruments to draw them on, put off others cunningly that would be better chapmen, and the like practices, which are crafty and naught. As for the chopping of bargains, when a man buys, not to hold, but to sell over again, that com- monly grindeth double, both upon the seller and upon the buyer. Sharings do greatly enrich, if the hands be well chosen that are trusted. Usury is the certainest means of gain, though one of the worst ; as that whereby a man doth eat his bread in sudore vultus a/i'eni, and besides, doth plough upon Sundays. But yet, certain 108 Of Riches though it be, it hath flaws ; for that the scriveners and brokers do value unsound men, to serve their own turn. The fortune in being the first in an invention, or in a privilege, doth cause sometimes a wonderful overgrowth in riches ; as it was with the first sugar man in the Canaries : therefore if a man can play the true logician, to have as well judgement as invention, he may do great matters ; especially if the times be fit. He that resteth upon gains certain, shall hardly grow to great riches : and he that puts all upon adventures, doth oftentimes break and come to poverty : it is good therefore to guard adventures with certainties that may uphold losses. Monopolies, and coemption of wares for re-sale, where they are not restrained, are great means to enrich ; especially if the party have intelligence what things are like to come into request, and so store himself before- hand. Riches gotten by service, though it be of the best rise, yet when they are gotten by flattery, feeding humours, and other servile conditions, they may be placed amongst the worst. As for fishing for testaments and executorships (as Tacitus saith of Seneca, testamenta et orbos tanquam indagine capi) it is yet worse ; by how much men submit themselves to meaner persons than in service. Believe not much them that seem to despise riches; for they despise them that despair of them; and none worse, when they come to them. Be not penny- wise ; riches have wings, and sometimes they fly away of themselves, sometimes they must be set flying to bring in more. Men leave their riches either to their kindred, or to the public; and moderate portions prosper best in both. A great state left to an heir, is as a lure to all the birds of prey round about to seize on him, if he be not the better stablished in years and judge- ment. Likewise glorious gifts and foundations are like sacrifices without salt ; and but the painted sepulchres of alms, which soon will putrefy and corrupt inwardly. Therefore measure not thine advancements by quantity, but frame them by measure : and defer not charities till death : for certainly, if a man weigh it rightly, he that doth so is rather liberal of another man's than of his own. 109 ESSAY XXXV. OF PROPHECIES I MEAN not to speak of divine prophecies; nor of heathen oracles ; nor of natural predictions ; but only of prophecies that have been of certain memory, and from hidden causes. Saith the Pythonissa to Saul: To-morrow thou and thy son shall be with me* Homer hath these verses : At domus JEnecz cunctis dominabitur art's, Et nati natorum, et qui nascentur ab illis : a prophecy, as it seems, of the Roman empire. Seneca the tragedian hath these verses : Venient annis Sacula sen's, quibus Oceanus Vincula rerum laxet, et ingens Pateat tellus, Tiphysque novos Detegat orbes, nee sit terris Ultima Thule: a prophecy of the discovery of America. The daughter of Polycrates dreamed that Jupiter bathed her father, and Apollo anointed him : and it came to pass that he was crucified in an open place, where the sun made his body run with sweat, and the rain washed it. Philip of Macedon dreamed he sealed up his wife's belly; whereby he did expound it, that his wife should be barren ; but Aristander the soothsayer told him his wife was with child, because men do not use to seal vessels that are empty. A phantasm that appeared to M. Brutus in his tent said to him : Philippis iterum me -videbis. Tiberius said to Galba : Tu quoquc, Galba, degitstabis imperium. In Vespasian's time, there went a prophecy in the East, that those that should come forth of Judea should reign over the world: which though it may be was meant of our Saviour, yet Tacitus 1 10 Of Prophecies expounds it of Vespasian. Domitian dreamed, the night before he was slain, that a golden head was grow- ing out of the nape of his neck : and indeed the suc- cession that followed him, for many years, made golden times. Henry the Sixth of England said of Henry the Seventh, when he was a lad, and gave him water : This is the lad that shall enjoy the crown for which we strive. When I was in France, I heard from one Dr Pena, that the Q. Mother, who was given to curious arts, caused the King her husband's nativity to be calculated, under a false name ; and the astrologer gave a judgement, that he should be killed in a duel ; at which the Queen laughed, thinking her husband to be above challenges and duels : but he was slain upon a course at tilt, the splinters of the staff of Montgomery going in at his beaver. The trivial prophecy which I heard, when I was a child, and Queen Elizabeth was in the flower of her years, was : When Hempe is sponne, England's done. Whereby it was generally conceived, that after the princes had reigned which had the principal letters of that word hempe (which were Henry, Edward, Mary, Philip, and Elizabeth), England should come to utter confusion : which, thanks be to God, is verified only in the change of the name; for that the King's style is now no more of England, but of Britain. There was also another prophecy, before the year of 88, which I do not well understand : There shall be scene upon a day, Betweene the Haugh and the May, The Blacke Fleet of Norway. When that that is come and gone, England build Houses of Lime and Stone, For after Warres shall you have None. It was generally conceived to be meant of the Spanish fleet, that came in 88 : for that the king of Spain's sur- iii Bacon's Essays name, as they say, is Norway. The prediction of Regiomontanus, Octogesimus octavus mirabilis annus, was thought likewise accomplished in the sending of that great fleet, being the greatest in strength, though not in number, of all that ever swam upon the sea. As for Cleon's dream, I think it was a jest. It was, that he was devoured of a long dragon ; and it was expounded of a maker of sausages, that troubled him exceedingly. There are numbers of the like kind ; especially if you include dreams, and predictions of astrology. But I have set down these few only of certain credit, for example. My judgement is, that they ought all to be despised; and ought to serve but for winter talk by the fire-side. Though when I say despised, I mean it as for belief; for otherwise, the spreading or publishing of them is in no sort to be despised. For they have done much mischief; and I see many severe laws made to suppress them. That that hath given them grace, and some credit, consisteth in three things. First, that men mark when they hit, and never mark when they miss ; as they do generally also of dreams. The second is, that probable conjectures, or obscure traditions, many times turn themselves into prophecies ; while the nature of man, which coveteth divination, thinks it no peril to foretell that which indeed they do but collect. As that of Seneca's verse. For so much was then sub- ject to demonstration, that the globe of the earth had great parts beyond the Atlantic ; which mought be prob- ably conceived not to be all sea : and adding thereto the tradition in Plato's Timceus, and his Atlanticus it mought encourage one to turn it to a prediction. The third and last (which is the great one) is, that almost all of them, being infinite in number, have been impostures, and by idle and crafty brains merely contrived and feigned after the event past. 112 ESSAY XXXVI. OF AMBITION AMBITION is like choler; which is an humour that maketh men active, earnest, full of alacrity, and stirring, if it be not stopped. But if it be stopped, and cannot have his way, it becometh adust, and thereby malign and venomous. So ambitious men, if they find the way open for their rising, and still get forward, they are rather busy than dangerous ; but if they be checked in their desires, they become secretly discontent, and look upon men and matters with an evil eye, and are best pleased when things go backward ; which is the worst property in a servant of a prince or state. There- fore it is good for princes, if they use ambitious men, to handle it so as they be still progressive and not retrograde : which because it cannot be without incon- venience, it is good not to use such natures at all. For if they rise not with their service, they will take order to make their service fall with them. But since we have said it were good not to use men of ambitious natures, except it be upon necessity, it is fit we speak in what cases they are of necessity. Good commanders in the wars must be taken, be they never so ambitious : for the use of their service dispenseth with the rest ; and to take a soldier without ambition is to pull off his spurs. There is also great use of ambitious men in being screens to princes in matters of danger and envy: for no man will take that part, except he be like a seeled dove, that mounts and mounts because he cannot see about him. There is use also of ambitious men in pulling down the greatness of any subject that overtops : as Tiberius used Macro in the pulling down of Sejanus. Since therefore they must be used in such cases, there resteth to speak how they are to be bridled, that they may be less dangerous. There is less danger of them if they be of mean birth, than if they be noble ; and if they be rather harsh of nature, than gracious and H 113 Bacon's Essays popular ; and if they be rather new raised, than grown cunning and fortified in their greatness. It is counted by some a weakness in princes to have favourites ; but it is of all others the best remedy against ambitious great-ones. For when the way of pleasuring and dis- pleasuring lieth by the favourite, it is impossible any other should be over-great. Another means to curb them, is to balance them by others as proud as they. But then there must be some middle counsellors, to keep things steady ; for without that ballast the ship will roll too much. At the least, a prince may animate and inure some meaner persons to be, as it were, scourges to ambitious men. As for the having of them obnoxious to ruin, if they be of fearful natures, it may do well; but if they be stout and daring, it may pre- cipitate their designs, and prove dangerous. As for the pulling of them down, if the affairs require it, and that it may not be done with safety suddenly, the only way is the interchange continually of favours and dis- graces ; whereby they may not know what to expect, and be, as it were, in a wood. Of ambitions, it is less harmful, the ambition to prevail in great things, than that other, to appear in every thing; for that breeds confusion, and mars business. But yet it is less danger to have an ambitious man stirring in business, than great in dependences. He that seeketh to be eminent amongst able men hath a great task ; but that is ever good for the public. But he that plots to be the only figure amongst cyphers is the decay of an whole age. Honour hath three things in it : the vantage ground to do good ; the approach to kings and principal persons ; and the raising of a man's own fortunes. He that hath the best of these intentions, when he aspireth, is an honest man ; and that prince that can discern of these intentions in another that aspireth, is a wise prince. Generally, let princes and states choose such ministers as are more sensible of duty than of rising ; and such as love business rather upon conscience than upon bravery : and let them discern a busy nature from a willing mind. 114 ESSAY XXXVII. OF MASQUES AND TRIUMPHS THESE things are but toys, to come amongst such serious observations. But yet, since princes will have such things, it is better they should be graced with elegancy, than daubed with cost. Dancing to song is a thing of great state and pleasure. I understand it, that the song be in quire, placed aloft, and accompanied with some broken music ; and the ditty fitted to the device. Acting in song, especially in dialogues, hath an extreme good grace : I say acting, not dancing (for that is a mean and vulgar thing) ; and the voices of the dialogue would be strong and manly (a bass and a tenor, no treble) ; and the ditty high and tragical, not nice or dainty. Several quires, placed one over against another, and taking the voice by catches, anthem-wise, give great pleasure. Turning dances into figure is a childish curiosity. And generally, let it be noted, that those things which I here set down are such as do naturally take the sense, and not respect petty wonderments. It is true, the alterations of scenes, so it be quietly and without noise, are things of great beauty and pleasure ; for they feed and relieve the eye, before it be full of the same object. Let the scenes abound with light, specially coloured and varied ; and let the masquers, or any other, that are to come down from the scene, have some motions upon the scene itself before their coming down ; for it draws the eye strangely, and makes it with great pleasure to desire to see that it cannot perfectly discern. Let the songs be loud and cheerful, and not chirpings or pulings. Let the music likewise be sharp and loud and well placed. The colours that shew best by candle-light are white, carnation, and a kind of sea- water-green ; and oes, or spangs, as they are of no great cost, so they are of most glory. As for rich embroidery, "5 Bacon's Essays it is lost and not discerned. Let the suits of the masquers be graceful, and such as become the person when the vizars are off: not after examples of known attires; Turks, soldiers, mariners, and the like. Let antimasques not be long; they have been commonly of fools, satyrs, baboons, wild-men, antics, beasts, sprites, witches, Ethiopes, pigmies, turquets, nymphs, rustics, Cupids, statuas moving, and the like. As for angels, it is not comical enough to put them in antimasques ; and any thing that is hideous, as devils, giants, is on the other side as unfit. But chiefly, let the music of them be recreative, and with some strange changes. Some sweet odours, suddenly coming forth, without any drops falling, are, in such a company as there is steam and heat, things of great pleasure and refreshment. Double masques, one of men, another of ladies, addeth state and variety. But all is nothing, except the room be kept clear and neat. For justs, and tourneys, and barriers ; the glories of them are chiefly in the chariots, wherein the challengers make their entry; especially if they be drawn with strange beasts, as lions, bears, camels, and the like; or in the devices of their entrance ; or in the bravery of their liveries ; or in the goodly furniture of their horses and armour. But enough of these toys. 116 ESSAY XXXVIII. OF NATURE IN MEN NATURE is often hidden, sometimes overcome, seldom extinguished. Force maketh nature more violent in the return ; doctrine and discourse maketh nature less im- portune ; but custom only doth alter and subdue nature. He that seeketh victory over his nature, let him not set himself too great nor too small tasks : for the first will make him dejected by often failings; and the second will make him a small proceeder, though by often pre- vailings. And at the first let him practise with helps, as swimmers do with bladders or rushes; but after a time let him practise with disadvantages, as dancers do with thick shoes. For it breeds great perfection, if the practice be harder than the use. Where nature is mighty, and therefore the victory hard, the degrees had need be : first, to stay and arrest nature in time ; like to him that would say over the four and twenty letters when he was angry: then, to go less in quantity; as if one should, in forbearing wine, come from drinking healths to a draught at a meal : and lastly, to discon- tinue altogether. But if a man have the fortitude and resolution to enfranchise himself at once, that is the best: Optimus tile animi vindex Icedentia pectus Vincula qui rupit, dedoluitque semel. Neither is the ancient rule amiss, to bend nature as a wand to a contrary extreme, whereby to set it right ; understanding it, where the contrary extreme is no vice. Let not a man force a habit upon himself with a perpetual continuance, but with some intermission. For both the pause reinforceth the new onset ; and if a man that is not perfect be ever in practice, he shall as well practise his errors as his abilities, and induce one habit of both; and there is no means to help this but 117 Bacon's Essays by seasonable intermissions. But let not a man trust his victory over his nature too far ; for nature will lay buried a great time, and yet revive upon the occasion or temptation. Like as it was with ^Esop's damosel, turned from a cat to a woman ; who sate very demurely at the board's end, till a mouse ran before her. There- fore let a man either avoid the occasion altogether; or put himself often to it, that he may be little moved with it. A man's nature is best perceived in privateness, for there is no affectation ; in passion, for that putteth a man out of his precepts ; and in a new case or experi- ment, for there custom leaveth him. They are happy men, whose natures sort with their vocations ; other- wise they may say, Multum incolafuit anima mea, when they converse in those things they do not affect. In studies, whatsoever a man commandeth upon himself, let him set hours for it ; but whatsoever is agreeable to his nature, let him take no care for any set times ; for his thoughts will fly to it of themselves, so as the spaces of other business or studies will suffice. A man's nature runs either to herbs or weeds; therefore let him seasonably water the one, and destroy the other. 118 ESSAY XXXIX. OF CUSTOM AND EDUCATION MEN'S thoughts are much according to their inclination; their discourse and speeches according to their learning and infused opinions ; but their deeds are after as they have been accustomed. And therefore, as Machiavel well noteth (though in an evil-favoured instance), there is no trusting to the force of nature nor to the bravery of words, except it be corroborate by custom. His instance is, that for the achieving of a desperate con- spiracy, a man should not rest upon the fierceness of any man's nature, or his resolute undertakings; but take such an one as hath had his hands formerly in blood. But Machiavel knew not of a Friar Clement, nor a Ravillac, nor a Jaureguy, nor a Baltazar Gerard : yet his rule holdeth still, that nature, nor the engagement of words, are not so forcible as custom. Only super- stition is now so well advanced, that men of the first blood are as firm as butchers by occupation ; and votary resolution is made equipollent to custom, even in matter of blood. In other things, the predominancy of custom is every where visible ; insomuch as a man would wonder to hear men profess, protest, engage, give great words, and then do just as they have done before ; as if they were dead images and engines moved only by the wheels of custom. We see also the reign or tyranny of custom, what it is. The Indians (I mean the sect of their wise men) lay themselves quietly upon a stack of wood, and so sacrifice themselves by fire. Nay, the wives strive to be burned with the corpses of their husbands. The lads of Sparta, of ancient time, were wont to be scourged upon the altar of Diana, without so much as queching. I remember, in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's time of England, an Irish rebel condemned put up a petition to the deputy, 119 Bacon's Essays that he might be hanged in a with and not in an halter, because it had been so used with former rebels. There be monks in Russia, for penance, that will sit a whole night in a vessel of water, till they be engaged with hard ice. Many examples may be put of the force of custom, both upon mind and body. Therefore, since custom is the principal magistrate of man's life, let men by all means endeavour to obtain good customs. Cer- tainly, custom is most perfect when it beginneth in young years : this we call education ; which is, in effect, but an early custom. So we see, in languages the tongue is more pliant to all expressions and sounds, the joints are more supple to all feats of activity and motions, in youth than afterwards. For it is true that late learners cannot so well take the ply ; except it be in some minds that have not suffered themselves to fix, but have kept them- selves open and prepared to receive continual amend- ment ; which is exceeding rare. But if the force of custom simply and separate be great, the force of custom copulate and conjoined and collegiate is far greater. For there example teacheth, company comforteth, emulation quickeneth, glory raiseth ; so as in such places the force of custom is in his exaltation. Certainly, the great multiplication of virtues upon human nature resteth upon societies well ordained and disciplined. For common- wealths and good governments do nourish virtue grown, but do not much mend the seeds. But the misery is, that the most effectual means are now applied to the ends least to be desired. J20 ESSAY XL. OF FORTUNE IT cannot be denied but outward accidents conduce much to fortune : favour, opportunity, death of others, occasion fitting virtue. But chiefly the mould of a man's fortune is in his own hands. Faber quisque fortuna sues, saith the poet. And the most frequent of external causes is, that the folly of one man is the fortune of another. For no man prospers so suddenly as by others' errors. Serpens nisi serpentem comederit non fit draco. Overt and apparent virtues bring forth praise ; but there be secret and hidden virtues that bring forth fortune ; certain deliveries of a man's self, which have no name. The Spanish name, desemboltura, partly expresseth them : when there be not stonds nor restiveness in a man's nature, but that the wheels of his mind keep way with the wheels of his fortune. For so Livy (after he had de- scribed Cato Major in these words, In illo viro tantum robur carports et animi fuit, ut quocunque loco natus esset, fortunam sibi facturus videretur} falleth upon that, that he had versatile ingenium. Therefore if a man look sharply and attentively, he shall see Fortune : for though she be blind, yet she is not invisible. The way of fortune is like the milken way in the sky ; which is a meeting or knot of a number of small stars, not seen asunder, but giving light together. So are there a number of little and scarce discerned virtues, or rather faculties and customs, that make men fortunate. The Italians note some of them, such as a man would little think. When they speak of one that cannot do amiss, they will throw in into his other conditions, that he \\&\.\\ poco di matto. And certainly there be not two more fortunate properties, than to have a little of the fool, and not too much of the honest. Therefore extreme lovers of their country or masters were never fortunate, neither can they be. For when a man placeth his thoughts without himself, he 121 Bacon's Essays goeth not his own way. An hasty fortune maketh an enterpriser and remover (the French hath it better, entreprenant, or remuant\ but the exercised fortune maketh the able man. Fortune is to be honoured and respected, and it be but for her daughters, Confidence and Reputation. For those two felicity breedeth ; the first within a man's self, the latter in others towards him. All wise men, to decline the envy of their own virtues, use to ascribe them to Providence and Fortune ; for so they may the better assume them ; and besides, it is greatness in a man to be the care of the higher powers. So Caesar said to the pilot in the tempest, Casarem portas, et fortunam ejus. So Sylla chose the name of Felix and not of Magnus. And it hath been noted, that those that ascribe openly too much to their own wisdom and policy, end infortunate. It is written that Timotheus the Athenian, after he had, in the account he gave to the state of his government, often interlaced this speech, And in this Fortune had no part, never prospered in any thing he undertook afterwards. Certainly, there be whose fortunes are like Homer's verses, that have a slide and easiness more than the verses of other poets : as Plutarch saith of Timoleon's fortune, in respect of that of Agesilaus or Epaminondas. And that this should be, no doubt it is much in a man's self. 122 ESSAY XLL OF USURY MANY have made witty invectives against usury. They say that it is pity the devil should have God's part, which is the tithe. That the usurer is the greatest Sabbath-breaker, because his plough goeth every Sunday. That the usurer is the drone that Virgil speaketh of : Ignavum fucos pecus a prasepibus arcent. That the usurer breaketh the first law that was made for mankind after the fall, which was, in sudore vulus tui comedes panem tuum ; not, in sudore vult&s alieni. That usurers should have orange-tawny bonnets, because they do judaize. That it is against nature for money to be- get money ; and the like. I say this only, that usury is a concession propter duritiem cordis ; for since there must be borrowing and lending, and men are so hard of heart as they will not lend freely, usury must be permitted. Some others have made suspicious and cunning pro- positions of banks, discovery of men's estates, and other inventions. But few have spoken of usury usefully. It is good to set before us the incommodities and com- modities of usury, that the good may be either weighed out or culled out ; and warily to provide that, while we make forth to that which is better, we meet not with that which is worse. The discommodities of usury are : first, that it makes fewer merchants. For were it not for this lazy trade of usury, money would not lie still, but would, in great part, be employed upon merchandizing ; which is the vena porta of wealth in a state. The second, that it makes poor merchants. For as a farmer cannot husband his ground so well, if he sit at a great rent ; so the merchant cannot drive his trade so well, if he sit at great usury. The third is incident to the other two, and that is. the decay of customs of kings or states, 123 Bacon's Essays which ebb or flow with merchandizing. The fourth, that it bringeth the treasure of a realm or state into a few hands. For the usurer being at certainties, and others at uncertainties, at the end of the game most of the money will be in the box ; and ever a state flourisheth when wealth is more equally spread. The fifth, that it beats down the price of land : for the employment of money is chiefly either merchandizing or purchasing; and usury waylays both. The sixth, that it doth dull and damp all industries, improvements, and new inven- tions, wherein money would be stirring, if it were not for this slug. The last, that it is the canker and ruin of many men's estates ; which in process of time breeds a public poverty. On the other side, the commodities of usury are : first, that howsoever usury in some respect hindereth merchandizing, yet in some other it advanceth it ; for it is certain that the greatest part of trade is driven by young merchants upon borrowing at interest; so as, if the usurer either call in or keep back his money, there will ensue presently a great stand of trade. The second is, that were it not for this easy borrowing upon interest, men's necessities would draw upon them a most sudden undoing, in that they would be forced to sell their means (be it lands or goods) far under foot ; and so, whereas usury doth but gnaw upon them, bad markets would swallow them quite up. As for mortgaging or pawning, it will little mend the matter : for either men will not take pawns without use ; or if they do, they will look precisely for the forfeiture. I remember a cruel moneyed man in the country, that would say : The devil take this usury, it keeps us from forfeitures of mortgages and bonds. The third and last is, that it is a vanity to conceive that there would be ordinary borrow- ing without profit ; and it is impossible to conceive the number of inconveniences that will ensue, if borrowing be cramped. Therefore to speak of the abolishing of usury is idle. All states have ever had it, in one kind or rate or other. So as that opinion must be sent to Utopia. Of Usury To speak now of the reformation and reiglement of usury ; how the discommodities of it may be best avoided, and the commodities retained. It appears, by the balance of commodities and discommodities of usury, two things are to be reconciled. The one, that the tooth of usury be grinded, that it bite not too much ; the other, that there be left open a means to invite moneyed men to lend to the merchants, for the continuing and quickening of trade. This cannot be done, except you introduce two several sorts of usury, a less and a greater. For if you reduce usury to one low rate, it will ease the common borrower, but the merchant will be to seek for money. And it is to be noted, that the trade of merchandize, being the most lucrative, may bear usury at a good rate ; other contracts not so. To serve both intentions, the way would be briefly thus. That there be two rates of usury ; the one free and general for all; the other under licence only, to certain persons and in certain places of merchandizing. First, therefore, let usury in general be reduced to five in the hundred ; and let that rate be proclaimed to be free and current; and let the state shut itself out to take any penalty for the same. This will preserve borrowing from any general stop or dryness. This will ease infinite borrowers in the country. This will, in good part, raise the price of land, because land purchased at sixteen years' purchase will yield six in the hundred and some- what more, whereas this rate of interest yields but five. This, by like reason, will encourage and edge industrious and profitable improvements ; because many will rather venture in that kind than take five in the hundred, especially having been used to greater profit. Secondly, let there be certain persons licensed to lend to known merchants upon usury at a higher rate ; and let it be with the cautions following. Let the rate be, even with the merchant himself, somewhat more easy than that he used formerly to pay ; for by that means all borrowers shall have some ease by this reformation, be he merchant or whosoever. Let it be no bank or common stock, but every man be master of his own money : not that I 125 Bacon's Essays altogether mislike banks, but they will hardly be brooked, in regard of certain suspicions. Let the state be answered some small matter for the licence, and the rest left to the lender ; for if the abatement be but small, it will no whit discourage the lender. For he, for example, that took before ten or nine in the hundred, will sooner descend to eight in the hundred, than give over his trade of usury, and go from certain gains to gains of hazard. Let these licensed lenders be in number indefinite, but restrained to certain principal cities and towns of merchandizing; for then they will be hardly able to colour other men's moneys in the country : so as the licence of nine will not suck away the current rate of five ; for no man will lend his moneys far off, nor put them into unknown hands. If it be objected that this doth, in a sort, authorize usury, which before was in some places but permissive ; the answer is, that it is better to mitigate usury by declaration, than to suffer it to rage by connivance. 126 ESSAY XLII. OF YOUTH AND AGE A MAN that is young in years may be old in hours, if he have lost no time. But that happeneth rarely. Generally, youth is like the first cogitations, not so wise as the second. For there is a youth in thoughts as well as in ages. And yet the invention of young men is more lively than that of the old; and imaginations stream into their minds better, and, as it were, more divinely. Natures that have much heat, and great and violent desires and perturbations, are not ripe for action till they have passed the meridian of their years : as it was with Julius Caesar, andSeptimius Severus. Of the latter of whom it is said, Juventuiem egit erroribus, imo furoribus, plenum. And yet he was the ablest emperor, almost, of all the list. But reposed natures may do well in youth. As it is seen in Augustus Caesar, Cosmus, Duke of Florence, Gaston de Foix, and others. On the other side, heat and vivacity in age is an excellent com- position for business. Young men are fitter to invent than to judge ; fitter for execution than for counsel ; and fitter for new projects than for settled business. For the experience of age, in things that fall within the compass of it, directeth them ; but in new things, abuseth them. The errors of young men are the ruin of business ; but the errors of aged men amount but to this, that more might have been done, or sooner. Young men, in the conduct and manage of actions, embrace more than they can hold ; stir more than they can quiet ; fly to the end, without consideration of the means and degrees ; pursue some few principles which they have chanced upon absurdly ; care not to innovate, which draws unknown inconveniences ; use extreme remedies at first ; and, that which doubleth all errors, will not acknowledge or retract them ; like an unready horse, that will neither stop nor turn. Men of age 127 Bacon's Essays object too much, consult too long, adventure too little, repent too soon, and seldom drive business home to the full period, but content themselves with a mediocrity of success. Certainly, it is good to compound employ- ments of both ; for that will be good for the present, because the virtues of either age may correct the defects of both ; and good for succession, that young men may be learners, while men in age are actors ; and, lastly, good for extern accidents, because authority followeth old men, and favour and popularity youth. But for the moral part, perhaps youth will have the pre-eminence, as age hath for the politic. A certain rabbin, upon the text, Your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams, inferreth that young men are admitted nearer to God than old, because vision is a clearer revelation than a dream. And certainly, the more a man drinketh of the world, the more it intoxicateth ; and age doth profit rather in the powers of understanding, than in the virtues of the will and affections. There be some have an over-early ripeness in their years, which fadeth betimes. These are, first, such as have brittle wits, the edge whereof is soon turned ; such as was Hermogenes the rhetorician, whose books are exceeding subtile, who afterwards waxed stupid. A second sort is of those that have some natural dispositions which have better grace in youth than in age ; such as is a fluent and luxuriant speech, which becomes youth well, but not age : so Tully saith of Hortensius, Idem manebat, neque idem docebat. The third is of such as take too high a strain at the first, and are magnanimous more than tract of years can uphold. As was Scipio Africanus, of whom Livy saith in effect, Ultima primis cedebant. 128 ESSAY XLIIL OF BEAUTY VIRTUE is like a rich stone, best plain set : and surely virtue is best in a body that is comely, though not of delicate features ; and that hath rather dignity of presence, than beauty of aspect. Neither is it almost seen, that very beautiful persons are otherwise of great virtue ; as if nature were rather busy not to err, than in labour to produce excellency. And therefore they prove accomplished, but not of great spirit ; and study rather behaviour than virtue. But this holds not always ; for Augustus Caesar, Titus Vespasianus, Philip le Bel of France, Edward the Fourth of England, Alcibiades of Athens, Ismael the Sophy of Persia, were all high and great spirits, and yet the most beautiful men of their times. In beauty, that of favour is more than that of colour, and that of decent and gracious motion more than that of favour. That is the best part of beauty, which a picture cannot express; no, nor the first sight of the life. There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. A man cannot tell whether Apelles or Albert Durer were the more trifler ; whereof the one would make a personage by geometrical proportions, the other, by taking the best parts out of divers faces to make one excellent. Such personages, I think, would please nobody but the painter that made them. Not but I think a painter may make a better face than ever was ; but he must doit by a kind of felicity (as a musician that maketh an excellent air in music), and not by rule. A man shall see faces, that, if you examine them part by part, you shall find never a good, and yet all together do well. If it be true that the principal part of beauty is in decent motion, certainly it is no marvel though persons in years seem many times more amiable ; pukhrorum autumnus pulcher : for no youth can be comely but by pardon, and considering the youth I 129 Bacon's Essays as to make up the comeliness. Beauty is as summer fruits, which are easy to corrupt, and cannot last : and for the most part it makes a dissolute youth, and an age a little out of countenance : but yet certainly again, if it light well, it maketh virtues shine, and vices blush. 130 ESSAY XLIV. OF DEFORMITY DEFORMED persons are commonly even with nature : for as nature hath done ill by them, so do they by- nature ; being for the most part (as the Scripture saith) void of natural affection ; and so they have their revenge oi nature. Certainly, there is a consent between the body and the mind ; and where nature erreth in the one, she ventureth in the other. Ubi peccat in uno, periditatur in aliero. But because there is in man an election touch- ing the frame of his mind, and a necessity in the frame of his body, the stars of natural inclination are sometimes obscured by the sun of discipline and virtue. Therefore it is good to consider of deformity, not as a sign, which is more deceivable, but as a cause, which seldom faileth of the effect. Whosoever hath any thing fixed in his person that doth induce contempt, hath also a perpetual spur in himself to rescue and deliver himself from scorn. Therefore all deformed persons are extreme bold : first, as in their own defence, as being exposed to scorn ; but in process of time, by a general habit. Also, it stirreth in them industry, and especially of this kind, to watch and observe the weakness of others, that they may have somewhat to repay. Again, in their superiors, it quencheth jealousy towards them, as persons that they think they may at pleasure despise ; and it layeth their competitors and emulators asleep, as never believing they should be in possibility of advancement, till they see them in possession. So that upon the matter, in a great wit, deformity is an advantage to rising. Kings in ancient times (and at this present in some countries) were wont to put great trust in eunuchs ; because they that are envious towards all are more obnoxious and officious towards one. But yet their trust towards them hath rather been as to good spials and good whisperers, than good magistrates and officers. And much like is Bacon's Essays the reason of deformed persons. Still the ground is, they will, if they be of spirit, seek to free themselves from scorn ; which must be either by virtue or malice ; and therefore let it not be marvelled if sometimes they prove excellent persons ; as was Agesilaus, Zanger the son of Solyman, ^Esop, Gasca President of Peru ; and Socrates may go likewise amongst them, with others. 132 ESSAY XLV. OF BUILDING HOUSES are built to live in, and not to look on ; there- fore let use be preferred before uniformity, except where both may be had. Leave the goodly fabrics of houses, for beauty only, to the enchanted palaces of the poets ; who build them with small cost. He that builds a fair house upon an ill seat, committeth himself to prison. Neither do I reckon it an ill seat only where the air is unwholesome, but likewise where the air is unequal ; as you shall see many fine seats set upon a knap of ground, environed with higher hills round about it ; whereby the heat of the sun is pent in, and the wind gathereth as in troughs ; so as you shall have, and that suddenly, as great diversity of heat and cold as if you dwelt in several places. Neither is it ill air only that maketh an ill seat, but ill ways, ill markets, and, if you will consult with Momus, ill neighbours. I speak not of many more : want of water ; want of wood, shade, and shelter ; want of fruitfulness, and mixture of grounds of several natures ; want of prospect ; want of level grounds ; want of places, at some near distance, for sports of hunting, hawking, and races ; too near the sea, too remote ; having the commodity of navigable rivers, or the discommodity of their overflowing; too far off from great cities, which may hinder business ; or too near them, which lurcheth all provisions, and maketh every thing dear ; where a man hath a great living laid together, and where he is scanted : all which as it is impossible perhaps to find together, so it is good to know them and think of them, that a man may take as many as he can ; and if he have several dwellings, that he sort them so, that what he wanteth in the one he may find in the other. Lucullus answered Pompey well ; who, when he saw his stately galleries and rooms so large and lightsome, in one of his houses, said : Surely an excellent place for summer, but 133 Bacon's Essays how do you in winter ? Lucullus answered : Why, do you not think me as wise as some fowl are, that ever change their abode towards the winter ? To pass from the seat to the house itself; we will do as Cicero doth in the orator's art, who writes books De Oratore, and a book he entitles Orator ; whereof the former delivers the precepts of the art, and the latter the perfection. We will therefore describe a princely palace, making a brief model thereof. For it is strange to see, now in Europe, such huge buildings as the Vatican and Escurial and some others be, and yet scarce a very fair room in them. First, therefore, I say, you cannot have a perfect palace, except you have two several sides; a side for the banquet, as is spoken of in the book of Hester, and a side for the household ; the one for feasts and triumphs, and the other for dwelling. I understand both these sides to be not only returns, but parts of the front ; and to be uniform without, though severally par- titioned within ; and to be on both sides of a great and stately tower in the midst of the front, that, as it were, joineth them together on either hand. I would have on the side of the banquet, in front, one only goodly room above stairs, of some forty foot high ; and under it, a room for a dressing or preparing place at times of triumphs. On the other side, which is the household side, I wish it divided at the first into a hall and a chapel (with a partition between), both of good state and bigness ; and those not to go all the length, but to have at the further end a winter and a summer parlour, both fair. And under these rooms, a fair and large cellar, sunk under ground ; and likewise some privy kitchens, with butteries and pantries, anid the like. As for the tower, I would have it two stories, of eighteen foot high a-piece, above the two wings; and a goodly leads upon the top, railed with statuas interposed ; and the same tower to be divided into rooms, as shall be thought fit. The stairs likewise to the upper rooms, let them be upon a fair open newel, and finely railed in with images of wood cast into a brass colour; and a 134 Of Building very fair landing place at the top. But this to be, if you do not point any of the lower rooms for a dining place of servants. For otherwise you shall have the servants' dinner after your own : for the steam of it will come up as in a tunnel. And so much for the front. Only, I understand the height of the first stairs to be sixteen foot, which is the height of the lower room. Beyond this front is there to be a fair court, but three sides of it of a far lower building than the front. And in all the four corners of that court, fair stair-cases, cast into turrets on the outside, and not within the row of buildings themselves. But those towers are not to be of the height of the front, but rather proportionable to the lower building. Let the court not be paved, for that striketh up a great heat in summer, and much cold in winter. But only some side alleys, with a cross, and the quarters to graze, being kept shorn, but not too near shorn. The row of return, on the banquet side, let it be all stately galleries ; in which galleries let there be three, or five, fine cupolas in the length of it, placed at equal distance ; and fine coloured windows of several works. On the household side, chambers of presence and ordinary entertainments, with some bed-chambers; and let all three sides be a double house, without thorough lights on the sides, that you may have rooms from the sun, both for forenoon and afternoon. Cast it also that you may have rooms both for summer and winter ; shady for summer, and warm for winter. You shall have sometimes fair houses so full of glass, that one cannot tell where to become to be out of the sun or cold. For inbowed windows, I hold them of good use; (in cities, indeed, upright do better, in respect of the uniformity towards the street) ; for they be pretty re- tiring places for conference ; and besides, they keep both the wind and sun off: for that which would strike almost thorough the room, doth scarce pass the window. But let them be but few, four in the court, on the sides only. Beyond this court, let there be an inward court, of the same square and height ; which is to be environed with 135 Bacon's Essays the garden on all sides ; and in the inside, cloistered on all sides, upon decent and beautiful arches, as high as the first story. On the under story, towards the garden, let it be turned to a grotta, or place of shade or estiva- tion ; and only have opening and windows towards the garden; and be level upon the floor, no whit sunk under ground, to avoid all dampishness. And let there be a fountain, or some fair work of statuas, in the midst of this court ; and to be paved as the other court was. These buildings to be for privy lodgings on both sides ; and the end, for privy galleries. Whereof you must foresee that one of them be for an infirmary, if the prince or any special person should be sick, with chambers, bed-chamber, ante-camera, and recamera, joining to it. This upon the second story. Upon the ground story, a fair gallery, open, upon pillars ; and upon the third story likewise, an open gallery upon pillars, to take the prospect and freshness of the garden. At both corners of the further side, by way of return, let there be two delicate or rich cabinets, daintily paved, richly hanged, glazed with crystalline glass, and a rich cupola in the midst ; and all other elegancy that may be thought upon. In the upper gallery too, I wish that there may be, if the place will yield it, some fountains running in divers places from the wall, with some fine avoidances. And thus much for the model of the palace ; save that you must have, before you come to the front, three courts. A green court plain, with a wall about it : a second court of the same, but more garnished, with little turrets, or rather embellishments, upon the wall : and a third court, to make a square with the front, but not to be built, nor yet enclosed with a naked wall, but enclosed with tarrasses, leaded aloft, and fairly garnished, on the three sides ; and cloistered on the inside, with pillars, and not with arches below. As for offices, let them stand at distance, with some low galleries, to pass from them to the palace itself. 136 ESSAY XLVI. OF GARDENS GOD ALMIGHTY first planted a garden. And indeed it is the purest of human pleasures. It is the greatest refreshment to the spirits of man; without which, buildings and palaces are but gross handyworks : and a man shall ever see that when ages grow to civility and elegancy, men come to build stately sooner than to garden finely ; as if gardening were the greater perfection. I do hold it, in the royal ordering of gardens, there ought to be gardens for all the months in the year; in which, severally, things of beauty may be then in season. For December and January and the latter part of November, you must take such things as are green all winter : holly ; ivy ; bays ; juniper ; cypress-trees ; yew ; pine-apple-trees; fir-trees; rosemary; lavender; peri- winkle, the white, the purple, and the blue; germander; flags ; orange-trees, lemon-trees, and myrtles, if they be stoved; and sweet marjoram, warm set. There follow- eth, for the latter part of January and February, the mezereon-tree, which then blossoms ; crocus vernus, both the yellow and the gray ; primroses ; anemones ; the early tulippa ; hyacinthus orientalis ; chama'iris ; fritillaria. For March, there come violets, specially the single blue, which are the earliest ; the yellow daffadil ; the daisy ; the almond-tree in blossom ; the peach-tree in blossom ; the cornelian-tree in blossom ; sweet briar. In April follow, the double white violet ; the wall-flower; the stock-gillyflower ; the cowslip ; flower-delices, and lilies of all natures; rosemary flowers; the tulippa; the double piony ; the pale daffadil ; the French honeysuckle ; the cherry-tree in blossom ; the dammasin and plum- trees in blossom ; the white-thorn in leaf ; the lilac-tree. In May and June come pinks of all sorts, specially the blush pink ; roses of all kinds, except the musk, which comes later ; honeysuckles ; strawberries ; btigloss ; 137 Bacon's Essays columbine ; the French marygold ; flos Africanus ; cherry- tree in fruit; ribes; figs in fruit; rasps; vine flowers; lavender in flowers; the sweet satyrian, with the white flower; herba muscaria ; lilium convallium; the apple- tree in blossom. In July come gillyflowers of all varie- ties; musk-roses ; the lime-tree in blossom ; early pears and plums in fruit; ginnitings; quadlins. In August come plums of all sorts in fruit ; pears ; apricocks ; ber- berries ; filberds ; musk-melons ; monks-hoods, of all colours. In September come grapes; apples; poppies of all colours ; peaches ; melocotones ; nectarines ; cor- nelians ; wardens ; quinces. In October and the beginning of November come services ; medlars ; bul- lises ; roses cut or removed to come late ; hollyokes ; and such like. These particulars are for the climate of London ; but my meaning is perceived, that you may have ve r perpetuum, as the place affords. And because the breath of flowers is far sweeter in the air (where it comes and goes, like the warbling of music) than in the hand, therefore nothing is more fit for that delight, than to know what be the flowers and plants that do best perfume the air. Roses, damask and red, are fast flowers of their smells ; so that you may walk by a whole row of them, and find nothing of their sweetness; yea, though it be in a morning's dew. Bays likewise yield no smell as they grow. Rosemary little; nor sweet marjoram. That which above all others yialds the sweetest smell in the air, is the violet; specially the white double violet, which comes twice a year ; about the middle of April, and about Bartholo- mewtide. Next to that is the musk-rose. Then the strawberry-leaves dying, which [yield] a most excellent cordial smell. Then the flower of the vines ; it is a little dust, like the dust of a bent, which grows upon the cluster in the first coming forth. Then sweet-briar. Then wall-flowers, which are very delightful to be set under a parlour or lower chamber window. Then pinks and gillyflowers, specially the matted pink and clove gilly- flower. Then the flowers of the lime-tree. Then the honeysuckles, so they be somewhat afar off. Of bean 138 Of Gardens flowers I speak not, because they are field flowers. But those which perfume the air most delightfully, not passed by as the rest, but being trodden upon and crushed, are three : that is, burnet, wild thyme, and water-mints. Therefore you are to set whole alleys of them, to have the pleasure when you walk or tread. For gardens (speaking of those which are indeed prince-like, as we have done of buildings), the contents ought not well to be under thirty acres of ground, and to be divided into three parts : a green in the entrance ; a heath or desert in the going forth ; and the main garden in the midst ; besides alleys on both sides. And I like well that four acres of ground be assigned to the green ; six to the heath ; four and four to either side; and twelve to the main garden. The green hath two pleasures: the one, because nothing is more pleasant to the eye than green grass kept finely shorn ; the other, because it will give you a fair alley in the midst, by which you may go in front upon a stately hedge, which is to enclose the garden. But because the alley will be long, and, in great heat of the year or day, you ought not to buy the shade in the garden by going in the sun thorough the green, therefore you are, of either side the green, to plant a covert alley, upon carpenter's work, about twelve foot in height, by which you may go in shade into the garden. As for the making of knots or figures with divers-coloured earths, that they may lie under the windows of the house on that side which the garden stands, they be but toys : you may see as good sights many times in tarts. The garden is best to be square ; encompassed, on all the four sides, with a stately arched hedge. The arches to be upon pillars of carpenter's work, of some ten foot high and six foot broad ; and the spaces between of the same dimension with the breadth of the arch. Over the arches let there be an entire hedge, of some four foot high, framed also upon carpenter's work ; and upon the upper hedge, over every arch, a little turret, with a belly, enough to receive a cage of birds ; and over every space between the arches some other little figure, 139 Bacon's Essays with broad plates of round coloured glass, gilt, for the sun to play upon. But this hedge I intend to be raised upon a bank, not steep, but gently slope, of some six foot, set all with flowers. Also I understand that this square of the garden should not be the whole breadth of the ground, but to leave, on either side, ground enough for diversity of side alleys ; unto which the two covert alleys of the green may deliver you. But there must be no alleys with hedges at either end of this great enclosure : not at the hither end, for letting your prospect upon this fair hedge from the green ; nor at the further end, for letting your prospect from the hedge, through the arches, upon the heath. For the ordering of the ground within the great hedge, I leave it to variety of device ; advising, never- theless, that whatsoever form you cast it into, first, it be not too busy or full of work. Wherein I, for my part, do not like images cut out in juniper or other garden stuff : they be for children. Little low hedges, round, like welts, with some pretty pyramides, I like well ; and in some places, fair columns upon frames of carpenter's work. I would also have the alleys spacious and fair. You may have closer alleys upon the side grounds, but none in the main garden. I wish also, in the very middle, a fair mount, with three ascents, and alleys, enough for four to walk abreast ; which I would have to be perfect circles, without any bulwarks or emboss- ments ; and the whole mount to be thirty foot high ; and some fine banqueting-house, with some chimneys neatly cast, and without too much glass. For fountains, they are a great beauty and refresh- ment ; but pools mar all, and make the garden un- wholesome and full of flies and frogs. Fountains I intend to be of two natures : the one, that sprinkleth or spouteth water ; the other, a fair receipt of water, of some thirty or forty foot square, but without fish, or slime, or mud. For the first, the ornaments of images gilt, or of marble, which are in use, do well : but the main matter is, so to convey the water, as it never stay, either in the bowls or in the cistern ; that the water be 140 Of Gardens never by rest discoloured, green or red or the like, or gather any mossiness or putrefaction. Besides that, it is to be cleansed every day by the hand. Also some steps up to it, and some fine pavement about it, doth well. As for the other kind of fountain, which we may call a bathing pool, it may admit much curiosity and beauty, wherewith we will not trouble ourselves : as, that the bottom be finely paved, and with images ; the sides likewise; and withal embellished with coloured glass, and such things of lustre ; encompassed also with fine rails of low statuas. But the main point is the same which we mentioned in the former kind of fountain; which is, that the water be in perpetual motion, fed by a water higher than the pool, and delivered into it by fair spouts, and then discharged away under ground, by some equality of bores, that it stay little. And for fine devices, of arching water with- out spilling, and making it rise in several forms (of feathers, drinking glasses, canopies, and the like), they be pretty things to look on, but nothing to health and sweetness. For the heath, which was the third part of our plot, I wish it to be framed, as much as may be, to a natural wildness. Trees I would have none in it; but some thickets, made only of sweet-briar and honeysuckle, and some wild vine amongst ; and the ground set with violets, strawberries, and primroses. For these are sweet, and prosper in the shade. And these to be in the heath, here and there, not in any order. I like also little heaps, in the nature of mole-hills (such as are in wild heaths), to be set, some with wild thyme ; some with pinks; some with germander, that gives a good flower to the eye ; some with periwinkle ; some with violets ; some with strawberries ; some with cowslips ; some with daisies; some with red roses; some with lilium convallium ; some with sweet-williams red ; some with bear's-foot ; and the like low flowers, being withal sweet and sightly. Part of which heaps to be with standards of little bushes pricked upon their top, and part without. The standards to be roses; juniper; 141 Bacon's Essays holly ; berberries (but here and there, because of the smell of their blossom) ; red currans ; gooseberries ; rosemary ; bays ; sweet-briar ; and such like. But these standards to be kept with cutting, that they grow not out of course. For the side grounds, you are to fill them with variety of alleys, private, to give a full shade, some of them, wheresoever the sun be. You are to frame some of them likewise for shelter, that when the wind blows sharp, you may walk as in a gallery. And those alleys must be likewise hedged at both ends, to keep out the wind ; and these closer alleys must be ever finely gravelled, and no grass, because of going wet. In many of these alleys likewise, you are to set fruit-trees of all sorts ; as well upon the walls as in ranges. And this would be generally observed, that the borders, wherein you plant your fruit-trees, be fair and large, and low, and not steep ; and set with fine flowers, but thin and sparingly, lest they deceive the trees. At the end of both the side grounds, I would have a mount of some pretty height, leaving the wall of the enclosure breast high, to look abroad into the fields. For the main garden, I do not deny but there should be some fair alleys, ranged on both sides with fruit- trees ; and some pretty tufts of fruit-trees, and arbours with seats, set in some decent order ; but these to be by no means set too thick ; but to leave the main garden so as it be not close, but the air open and free. For as for shade, I would have you rest upon the alleys of the side grounds, there to walk, if you be disposed, in the heat of the year or day ; but to make account that the main garden is for the more temperate parts of the year; and in the heat of summer, for the morning and the evening, or over-cast days. For aviaries, I like them not, except they be of that largeness as they may be turfed, and have living plants and bushes set in them ; that the birds may have more scope and natural nestling, and that no foulness appear in the floor of the aviary. So I have made a platform of a princely garden, partly by precept, partly by draw- 142 Of Gardens ing, not a model, but some general lines of it ; and in this I have spared for no cost. But it is nothing for great princes, that, for the most part, taking advice with workmen, with no less cost set their things together; and sometimes add statuas, and such things, for state and magnificence, but nothing to the true pleasure of a garden. '43 ESSAY XLVIL OF NEGOCIATING IT is generally better to deal by speech than by letter ; and by the mediation of a third than by a man's self. Letters are 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 direc- tion how far to go ; and generally, where a man will reserve to himself liberty either to disavow or to expound. In choice of instruments, it is better to choose men of a plainer sort, that are like to do that that is committed to them, and to report back again faithfully the success, than those that are cunning to contrive out of other men's business somewhat to grace themselves, and will help the matter in report for satis- faction sake. Use also such persons as effect the business wherein they are employed; for that quickeneth much ; and such as are fit for the matter; as bold men for expostulation, fair-spoken men for persuasion, crafty men for inquiry and observation, froward and absurd men for business that doth not well bear out itself. Use also such as have been lucky and prevailed before in things wherein you have employed them ; for that breeds confidence, and they will strive to maintain their prescription. It is better to sound a person, with whom one deals, afar off, than to fall upon the point at first ; except you mean to surprise him by some short question. It is better dealing with men in appetite, than with those that are where they would be. If a man deal with another upon conditions, the start or first performance is all; which a man cannot reasonably demand, except 144 Of Negociating either the nature of the thing be such which must go before ; or else a man can persuade the other party that he shall still need him in some other thing ; or else that he be counted the honester man. All practice is to discover, or to work. Men discover themselves in trust ; in passion ; at unawares ; and of necessity, when they would have somewhat done and cannot find an apt pretext. If you would work any man, you must either know his nature and fashions, and so lead him ; or his ends, and so persuade him ; or his weakness and disadvantages, and so awe him ; or those that have interest in him, and so govern him. In dealing with cunning persons, we must ever consider their ends, to interpret their speeches ; and it is good to say little to them, and that which they least look for. In all negociations of difficulty, a man may not look to sow and reap at once; but must prepare business, and so ripen it by degrees. '45 ESSAY XLVIIL OF FOLLOWERS AND FRIENDS COSTLY followers are not to be liked ; lest while a man maketh his train longer, he make his wings shorter. I reckon to be costly, not them alone which charge the purse, but which are wearisome and importune in suits. Ordinary followers ought to challenge no higher conditions than countenance, recommendation, and protection from wrongs. Factious followers are worse to be liked, which follow not upon affection to him with whom they range themselves, but upon discontent- ment conceived against some other : whereupon commonly ensueth that ill intelligence that we many times see between great personages. Likewise glorious followers, who make themselves as trumpets of the commendation of those they follow, are full of incon- venience; for they taint business through want of secrecy ; and they export honour from a man, and make him a return in envy. There is a kind of followers likewise which are dangerous, being indeed espials ; which inquire the secrets of the house, and bear tales of them to others. Yet such men, many times, are in great favour; for they are officious, and commonly exchange tales. The following by certain estates of men, answerable to that which a great person himself professeth (as of soldiers to him that hath been employed in the wars, and the like), hath ever been a thing civil, and well taken even in monarchies ; so it be without too much pomp or popularity. But the most honour- able kind of following is to be followed as one that apprehendeth to advance virtue and desert in all sorts of persons. And yet, where there is no eminent odds in sufficiency, it is better to take with the more passable than with the more able. And besides, to speak truth, in base times active men are of more use than virtuous. 146 Of Followers and Friends It is true that, in government, it is good to use men of one rank equally : for to countenance some extra- ordinarily is to make them insolent, and the rest dis- content; because they may claim a due. But contrariwise, in favour, to use men with much difference and election is good ; for it maketh the persons preferred more thankful, and the rest more officious ; because all is of favour. It is good discretion not to make too much of any man at the first ; because one cannot hold out that proportion. To be governed (as we call it) by one is not safe ; for it shews softness, and gives a freedom to scandal and disreputation ; for those that would not censure or speak ill of a man immediately, will talk more boldly of those that are so great with them, and thereby wound their honour. Yet to be distracted with many is worse ; for it makes men to be of the last impres- sion, and full of change. To take advice of some few friends is ever honourable ; for lookers-on many times see more than gamesters ; and the vale best discovereth the hill. There is little friendship in the world, and least of all between equals, which was wont to be magnified. That that is, is between superior and inferior, whose fortunes may comprehend the one the other. 147 ESSAY XLIX. OF SUITORS MANY ill matters and projects are undertaken ; and private suits do putrefy the public good. Many good matters are undertaken with bad minds ; I mean not only corrupt minds, but crafty minds, that intend not performance. Some embrace suits, which never mean to deal effectually in them ; but if they see there may be life in the matter by some other mean, they will be content to win a thank, or take a second reward, or at least to make use, in the mean time, of the suitor's hopes. Some take hold of suits only for an occasion to cross some other : or to make an information, whereof they could not otherwise have apt pretext ; without care what become of the suit when that turn is served ; or, generally, to make other men's business a kind of entertainment to bring in their own. Nay, some under- take suits with a full purpose to let them fall, to the end to gratify the adverse party or competitor. Surely there is in some sort a right in every suit : either a right of equity, if it be a suit of controversy ; or a right of desert, if it be a suit of petition. If affection lead a man to favour the wrong side in justice, let him rather use his countenance to compound the matter than to carry it. If affection lead a man to favour the less worthy in desert, let him do it without depraving or disabling the better deserver. In suits which a man doth not well understand, it is good to refer them to some friend of trust and judgement, that may report whether he may deal in them with honour : but let him choose well his referendaries, for else he may be led by the nose. Suitors are so distasted with delays and abuses, that plain dealing, in denying to deal in suits at first, and reporting the success barely, and in challenging no more thanks than one hath deserved, is grown not only honourable but also gracious. In suits of favour, the 148 Of Suitors first coming ought to take little place : so far forth consideration may be had of his trust, that if intelligence of the matter could not otherwise have been had but by him, advantage be not taken of the note, but the party left to his other means, and in some sort recompensed for his discovery. To be ignorant of the value of a suit is simplicity ; as well as to be ignorant of the right there- of is want of conscience. Secrecy in suits is a great mean of obtaining ; for voicing them to be in forwardness may discourage some kind of suitors, but doth quicken and awake others. But timing of the suit is the principal. Timing, I say, not only in respect of the person that should grant it, but in respect of those which are like to cross it. Let a man, in the choice of his mean, rather choose the fittest mean than the greatest mean ; and rather them that deal in certain things than those that are general. The reparation of a denial is sometimes equal to the first grant, if a man shew himself neither dejected nor discontented. Iniquum petas, ut