It is by the Essays that Bacon is best known to the multitude. The Novum Organum and the De Augmentis are much talked of, but little read. They have produced indeed a vast effect on the

opinion of mankind; but they have produced it through the operation of intermediate agents. They have moved the intellects which have moved the world. It is in the Essays alone that the mind of Bacon is brought into immediate contact with the minds of ordinary readers. There, he opens an exoteric school, and he talks to plain men, in language which everybody understands, about things in which everybody is interested. He has thus enabled those who must otherwise have taken his merits on trust to judge for themselves; and the great body of readers have, during several generations, acknowledged that the man who has treated with such consummate ability questions with which they are familiar may well be supposed to deserve all the praise bestowed on him by those who have sat in his inner school. - MA

CAULAY.

II.

Bacon's sentences bend beneath the weight of his thought like a branch beneath the weight of its fruit. He seems to have written his Essays with Shakespeare's pen. He writes like one on whom presses the weight of affairs, and he approaches a subject always on its serious side. He does not play with it fantastically. He lives among great ideas as with great nobles, with whom he dare not to be too familiar. In the tone of his mind there is ever something imperial. When he writes on buildings, he speaks of a palace, with spacious entrances, and courts, and banqueting-halls; when he writes on gardens, he speaks of alleys and mounts, waste places and fountains-of a garden "which is indeed prince-like." To read over his table of contents is like reading over a roll of peers' names. We have taken them as they stand: "Of Great Place," "Of Boldness," "Of Goodness, and Goodness of Nature," "Of Nobility," "Of Seditions and Troubles," "Of Atheism," "Of Superstition," "Of Travel," "Of Empire," "Of Counsel "-a book, plainly, to lie in the closets of statesmen and princes, and designed to nurture the noblest natures. - ALEXANDER SMITH.

III.

I am old-fashioned enough to admire Bacon, whose remarks are taken in and assented to by persons of ordinary capacity,

and seem nothing very profound. But when a man comes to reflect and observe, and his faculties enlarge, he then sees more in them than he did at first, and more still as he advances fartherhis admiration of Bacon's profundity increasing as he himself grows intellectually. Bacon's wisdom is like the seven-league boots, which would fit the giant or the dwarf, except only that the dwarf cannot take the same stride in them.- ARCHBISHOP WHATELY.

BACON'S ESSAYS.

[INTRODUCTION.-The first edition of the Essays was published in 1597, at the very time when Shakespeare was doing his greatest work. They were only ten in number, but Bacon subsequently added to these, making in all fifty-eight essays in the edition published in 1625, the year before his death. In the dedication of this edition, Bacon says: "I do now publish my Essays, which, of all my other works, have been most current-for, as it seems, they come home to men's business and bosoms."

It should be noted that the word essay has considerably changed its application since the days of Bacon. The word then bore its original sense of a slight suggestive sketch (French essayer, to try, or attempt), whereas it is now commonly employed to denote an elaborate and finished composition.]

1.-OF STUDIES.

1. Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief use for delight is in privateness* and retiring ;* for ornament, is in discourse; and for ability, is in the judgment and disposition of business. For expert* men can execute, and per

NOTES.-Line I. delight, pleasure, pas- | 2. privateness, privacy; retiring, retiretime; ornament, the adornment

ment.

of conversation; ability, execu- 4. expert men: that is, men of mere
tive skill.
experience.

LITERARY ANALYSIS.-The following words in this Essay are used by Bacon in a sense different from their modern meaning: explain this difference"humor" (10); "crafty" (15); "simple" (15); "admire" (15); "curiously" (23); "witty" (34).

What are the modern forms of the words "privateness" (2) and "retiring" (2)?

The following words are obsolete-define them: "proyning" (12); “stond" (37).

1. Studies serve, etc. What three adverbial phrases are adjuncts to "serve?" 2-7. Their chief use... learned. Supply the ellipses in this sentence.

haps judge of particulars, one by one; but the general counsels, and the plots and marshalling of affairs, come best from those that are learned.

2. To spend too much time in studies is sloth, to use them too much for ornament is affectation, to make judgment wholly by their rules is the humor* of a scholar. They perfect nature, 10 and are perfected by experience-for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need proyning* by study; and studies themselves do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience.

*

3. Crafty men contemn studies, simple* men admire* them, 15 and wise men use them; for they teach not their own use-but that is a wisdom without them, and above them, won by observa tion. Read not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted, nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider.

4. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested: that is, some books are to

LITERARY ANALYSIS.-Note the expression, "the general counsels, and the plots and marshalling of affairs"-an expression having that over-arching quality which we think of as specifically Shakespearian.

8-10. To spend... scholar. What kind of sentence grammatically? How many members (independent propositions)? What grammatical element (word, phrase, or clause) is the subject of each?

13. except. What conjunction should we now use?

15-36. Crafty men... contend. Macaulay, in his essay on Lord Bacon, quotes this passage, and adds: "It will hardly be disputed that this is a passage to be chewed and digested.' We do not believe that Thucydides himself has anywhere compressed so much thought into so small a space."

18-20. Read not... consider. What is the figure of speech in this sentence? (See Def. 18.) With what is "(read) to weigh and consider" contrasted?

21, 22. tasted... swallowed... chewed... digested. Are these expressions literal or metaphorical? Explain, from the latter part of the sentence, what is meant by "tasted;" by "swallowed;" by "chewed and digested."

20

*

be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously, and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention. Some books also may be read by deputy, and extracts made of 25 them by others; but that would be only in the less important arguments, and the meaner sort of books; else distilled books are, like common distilled waters, flashy things.

5. Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man. And therefore, if a man write little, he 30 had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit; and if he read little, he had need have much cunning to seem to know that he doth not.

6. Histories make men wise; poets, witty; the mathematics, subtle; natural philosophy, deep; moral, grave; logic and rhet- 35 oric, able to contend. Abeunt studia in mores [manners are influenced by studies]. Nay, there is no stond* or impediment* in the wit but may be wrought out by fit studies, like as diseases of the body may have appropriate exercises. Bowling is good for the reins; shooting, for the lungs and breast; gentle 40 walking, for the stomach; riding, for the head; and the like.

LITERARY ANALYSIS.-29-33. Reading maketh... not. What is the figure of speech here? (See Def. 18.) This is a fine example of antithesis in the form sometimes called parison, or isocolon, in which arrangement the parts of the sentence follow in a series of corresponding elements. Thus, in this sentence, the first three propositions (members) are alike, word corresponding with word, and then follow three more members (complex propositions) in which clause (dependent proposition) corresponds with clause, and principal proposition with principal proposition. Point out the corresponding and the contrasting parts.

34-36. Histories... contend. This sentence presents an example of the same figure as in the previous sentence. Point out the corresponding parts. 38. like as diseases, etc. What is the figure of speech in this sentence? (See Def. 19.) Should we now use "like?"