states or greatness few cases might be new to him. But it is evident that Elizabeth was right, when he grew to manhood, in regarding him as incapable of turning his speculations to profitable actions. Her successor also found out, and told him, that he was not made for small matters.' Yet small matters make up ninety-nine parts out of a hundred of public life as well as private. What the world may have lost by so misplacing Bacon, the world will never know. We only know it got little in

he did to be made Chancellor, and in what he did when made so the loss to himself was total-the loss of happiness and of honor!

born for contemplation, the comparison is constantly recurring. To nobody oftener than to Bacon; and nobody was more conscious that he had chosen wrong. It was an evil day for him when, on his being taken as a marvellous child to Queen Elizabeth, she called him, in compliment to his father, (one of those compliments by which she paid all services, and yet won all men to her service,) her young Lord Keeper. We never think of these illomened words but as of a spell uttered over him by a perverse fairy, who, in uttering return. While, alas for himself!—in all them, had read backwards the natural history of his life-had poured in at his dreamy ear the fumes of a poor ambitionand beckoned him on, by the delusive seals floating in the perspective, into the way he Our knowledge of Bacon-of all that is certainly should not have gone. He was most fatal to his character, up to the time painfully aware that it would have been of his Chancellorship,—is derived from his well for himself, and for mankind, if he own Letters. But for them, the gossip of had never exchanged the Court of Trinity his contemporaries would have been unheard for that of Greenwich. He was dedicated of or disbelieved. On asking the name of by nature a High Priest of knowledge, hu- the cruel adversary who discovered and man and divine; and he turned himself betrayed them, what is our astonishment at into a Crown Lawyer! She designed him for finding, that, as through life he had been a the rival of Aristotle, not Coke-not to be friend to nobody but himself, so on this directing the torture of wretched suspected occasion it was he himself who had been traitors, but to interrogate herself on the his greatest enemy! Among his very kindly rack of wise Experiments. The latest letters is one to his successor, by noble task even of historian or legislator this time Ex-Keeper Williams, (he had for England was below his calling. He been just turned out by Buckingham,) adwas to be the reviser and reformer of her dressed to him for the purpose of depositown great laws, made dark and of small ef- ing them with him for posterity; since fect through men's traditions. And for many of them, as touching on late affairs of what was it that he broke his vows, and state, might not be fit to be published yet. laid aside, or grievously interrupted his Here we see him in a succession of begvast contemplative ends,' during the drud-ging letters, (such letters as can seldom geries of Term and Parliament? He left push their way to any other secretary but it for a life truly much more alien and de- that of a mendicity society,) begging for basing than the most humbling legends concerning his immortal contemporary-that contemporary, whom perhaps he never saw, except it might be (as the legends go) holding gentlemen's horses at the playhouse door, or acting the Ghost in his own Hamlet. Yet how really kin to him was Shakspeare? Much more so than Robert Cecil, the cousin-german, whom he sought in vain to wheedle, by affecting that he had ever thought there was some sympathy of nature between them, though accidents had not suffered it to appear! How much farther even than generous and surly Ben, would Shakspeare have seen into the only greatness Bacon could never want-that of the philosophy and the poetry of their common genius! He was, as he said, a man of books; and in all that concerned

place or for promotion, as men starving beg for bread. We put our hand over the page at last, as much from being sick of its monotony, as from a sense of shame. The importunity is the more degrading, since he could not possibly suppose that he had been passed by unintentionally. It is here that we see him false to the generous Essex, the only friend he ever had; and base to Buckingham, the matchless friend,' who knew him and despised him; as pedantic and as cowardly as the sovereign whom he corrupted by his adulation; and even as arrogant and insolent to Coke, in cold blood and bitter spirit, as was ever Coke himself to Raleigh and the other unhappy men whom that most savage of Attorneys insulted, hacked, and mangled, before he turned them over to the halter or the axe.

The debasement of the marriage institu- more constant in consulting his spirit, not tion by the sale of infant wards, was one his genius, in every thing that concerned of the most corrupting consequences of himself. the feudal system. But the evil habits it The evil habits which led to Bacon's fall, introduced, can be no excuse for the mar- and his conduct on his impeachment, are riage brocage correspondence of a grown- in keeping with his former life; only that, up man;-not even of Francis North, to our own mind, they are far from being much less of Francis Bacon. He seems as dishonorable-bribery and all-as the to have got on as ill with his wife almost greater part of it. He said, and we have as Coke; and has immortalized their no doubt truly, that he had never been requarrels in his Will. Coke was too stout-puted avaricious. The jackdaw taste for hearted, we should think, to have transfer- hoarding was not among his weaknesses. red his hatred of Lady Hatton into this But he was expensive beyond his means; solemn instrument. But the government, and it is the empty bag which finds it hard upon his death, carried off his Will with to stand upright. Where the fund was to his other papers; and it was no more come from for defraying these expenses, heard of. was not thought of at all, or not in time. The pressure came a pressure to be met only by stern, inviolable principles; by that kind of instinct in practical virtue which Bacon never had. The vague way in which he generalized over his affairs, is singularly illustrated by the provisions of his will. He is founding Lectureships in the Universities; when, if he had looked back upon his most recent Letters, he would have learned that his honest debts were ill provided for. His difficulties, and finally his disgrace, were probably very much contributed to by his careless government of his dependents. It was quite

On reading Bacon's Letters, we feel that, for the first time, we are learning from them his true nature. It is now, too, we first can understand how it was, that the Cecils would never take to heart the interests of a relation of whom they would be naturally so proud. What alone, for instance, after all that had passed betwixt them, could Lord Salisbury have thought of the looseness and absurdity of his 'protesting before God, that if he knew in what course of life to do him best service, he would take it, and make his thoughts, which now flew to many pieces, to be reduced to that centre.' Literary vanity in character that he should let them have (like other vanities) must be paid for. But things their own way, and leave them to the vanity of following the example of Ci- themselves. When his grateful servant, cero and Pliny, was dearly purchased by Meautys, put up that most interesting of all the scandal of the revelations which are monuments, Franciscus Bacon sic sedelaid open in these Letters. It cannot have been insensibility to shame it looks more like an unconsciousness of any thing deserving blame. All people are proverbially unfair judges in their own cause. With most, however, this is an unfairness of degree. Yet instances arise, from time to time, in which extreme selfishness appears to have absolutely destroyed, wherever the parties themselves are interested, the optic nerve on which our moral perceptions depend for light. Such people may be the best advisers in the world for other persons; yet, nevertheless, they may exemplify to perfection the prudent maxim of the courts, that he who is his own counsellor has a fool for his client. Montesquieu's striking character of Cicero-Un beau génie, mais une âme souvent communc-applies still more strikingly to Bacon. For we are afraid, if Bacon's genius was of a higher order than Cicero's, his spirit was proportionally lower; and that he was much

bat,' it was not only from reverence ;-we doubt not but that the recollection of many kindnesses brought tears, at the time, into his eyes.

But other men, whose lives will bear as little examining as Bacon's, have been soft and indulgent masters. Persons, not strict themselves, cannot easily be strict with others; and the false indulgence which corrupts and ruins, is neither a virtue nor a kindness. There is, indeed, a strange anecdote told of Bacon; and (stranger still) we have seen it cited as a favorable instance of his charity. According to the story, when he was informed that his servants were robbing him, taking money from his closet, all he said was, Ay, poor men, that is their portion.' A pretty school this, truly, for the servants of a Judge, presiding in a court of arbitrary equity, with no precedents and few rules! What chance, in that case, of protection for a suitor against harpy hands? We know from Norburie, that annuities and

pensions were made out of the favors of good History of England, and a better Dithe Court, such as fixing days of hearing, gest of your laws.' Strange levity at such &c. The credit of the story may proba- a moment, on such a subject!—a levity as bly be reducible to the inference which by-impossible for Sir Thomas More, as More's standers would draw, of the uselessness of own jesting on the scaffold was unintelligiremonstrance with a master so careless or ble to Lord Herbert ;-more inconsistent corrupt, that the liberties which he allowed and perplexing than even the boisterous his servants to be taking with other people, pleasantries of Cromwell to the placid taste were only those which they were taking and judgment of David Hume. Bacon with himself. calls upon the King with his accustomed The narrative of Bacon's behaviour on eloquence, and with all the freedom of his impeachment lies in small compass. At truth and virtue, to go on with the good the first news of the accusation he is full work. How little did he foresee that, of confidence-desiring no privilege of within twenty years, the civil reformation, greatness.' He is as innocent as any born of which he considered himself to be, as upon St. Innocent's Day.' Before the it were, the first martyr, would have deweek is over, however, he flies unto the stroyed his favorite Star-Chamber as well! King's Majesty with the wings of a dove, Your Majesty's Star-Chamber, next to which once within these seven days he your court of Parliament, is your highest thought would have carried him a higher chair. You never came upon that mount flight.' Though still, on entering into but your garments did shine before you himself, he cannot find the materials of such went off. It is the supreme court of judia tempest as is come upon him.' A month cature ordinary; it is an open council. passes. He has by this time understood Nothing, I could think, would be more reathe particulars of the charge, not formally sonable than that your Majesty would be from the House, but enough to inform his pleased to come thither in person, and conscience and his memory. Upon which make there an open declaration that you he suddenly falls back upon the justifica- purpose to pursue the reformation which tion of Job' confesses his sin without the Parliament hath begun.' What innofig-leaves and moveth their Lordships to cent person could advise more coolly? To condemn and censure him; only begging the day of his death, Bacon seems to have of them charitably to wind about the been unable to see his own offence as he particulars of the charge, here and there, must have seen it in any other person. as God shall put it into their minds-and How differently had he seen it, from the so submits himself wholly to their piety heights of his lofty speculation upon huand grace.' The utmost of his desire is, man life, and the Colors of good and evil,' now, that his penitent submission might be when, in his noble Essay upon Judicature,' his sentence, and the loss of the Seals his he had proclaimed to Judges, that,' above punishment. At the same time, like a good all things, integrity was their proper virtue ; citizen, he professes to find gladness in the that the place of justice was a hallowed reflection, that the greatness of a magis-place; that not only the bench, but the trate hereafter will be no sanctuary for footpace and purprise thereof ought to be guiltiness; which, in few words, is the preserved from scandal; for justice cannot beginning of a golden world.' It is melan-yield her fruit with sweetness among the choly to see him in this extremity, when brambles of catching clerks.' 'prostrating himself before the mercy-seat' of James, take credit with his master for not moving him to interpose his absolute power of pardon between the sentence of the House; and reserve for the royal ear the pitiful palliation of a courtier-that he 'was still a virgin for matters which concerned his crown or person.' He is even playful with his disgrace: Because he that hath taken bribes is apt to give bribes, I will go further, and present your Majesty with a bribe. For, if your Majesty give me peace and leisure, and God give me life, I will present your Majesty with a

In accordance with his blindness to his real position, there are found among these later Letters, much sorrow for himself on thinking over from what height fallen;" much vain fawing also upon Buckingham, who had not forgiven his interference about his brother's marriage, and was now only scheming to extort from him, in his calamity, the surrender of York House. God above,' he supplicates to him, 'is my witness, that I have ever loved and honored your lordship, as much, I think, as any son of Adam can love or honor any thing that is a subject; so yet I protest, that at this

On this, a pardon of his entire sentence
was made out; and he was summoned to
Parliament, on the accession of King
Charles, the succeeding year.

time, low as I am, I had rather sojourn the rest of my life in a college of Cambridge, than recover a good fortune by any other means than yourself.' His frequent tentatives upon the coxcomb heart of James Our reverence for the genius of Bacon is were long as fruitless. I have been ever so great; we have that sense of what we your man, and counted myself but an usu- owe him for the delight and profit mankind fructory of myself, the property yours.' have reaped from his immortal writings; Mean time the King and Favorite were we feel so deeply what it is we lose in hope only thinking of getting him down to Gor- and glory, and how all that is most magnihambury out of sight;-plainly telling him, ficent in the prospects of human nature is that any longer liberty for him to abide in clouded over by that melancholy antithesis London was a great and general distaste, as which holds forth Bacon as at once 'the he could not but easily conceive, to the wisest and the meanest of mankind,' that whole state.' It was only after the return nothing can be thought of in the way of of the Prince and Buckingham from monument or reward which ought not to Spain, that Bacon at last succeeded with be gratefully bestowed, not only by fellowthe King to pass his pardon. I have been countrymen, but by fellow-men, for a nosomebody by your Majesty's singular and bler restoration of attainted blood than undeserved favor, even the prime-officer of ever fell to the office of any herald, upon your kingdom; your Majesty's arm hath the man who should indeed remove the been often laid over mine in council, blot of ignominy' from that still most rewhen you presided at the table, so near I splendent name. But, unfortunately, the was. I have borne your Majesty's image facts, and the one rational construction of in metal, much more in heart. I was never, them, admit of neither gloss nor question. in nineteen years' service, chidden by By attempting to disturb the verdict of his your Majesty, but, contrariwise, often over- contemporaries, we could not hope to make joyed when your Majesty would sometimes say, I was a good husband for you, though none for myself; sometimes, that I had a way to deal in business, suavibus modis, which was the way which was most according to your own heart; and other most gracious speeches of affection and trust, which I feed on to this day.' These most humiliating entreaties prevailed at last. Yet to the last we see no contrition-no feeling of moral degradation. His imagination is satisfied by making out a difference of shades,-' a difference not between black and white, but between black and grey,'-between his own offence and that of Sir John Bennet; and he writes under the strange impression, that the ignominy of his condition was not in the offence which he had committed, but in the punishment awarded to it. I prostrate myself at your Majesty's feet, I, your ancient servant, now sixty-four years old in age, and three years five months old in misery. I desire not from your Majesty means, nor place, nor employment; but only, af ter so long a time of expiation, a complete and total remission of the sentence of the Upper House, to the end that blot of ignominy may be removed from me, and from my memory with posterity; that I die not a condemned man, but may be to your Majesty, as I am to God, nova creatura.'

the least impression upon any one acquainted with the subject; whilst we should disqualify our judgment, prove ourselves disloyal to the truth of History, and rub out the line between right and wrong which it is the very province of History and of virtue to preserve. We know there is a silly notion, that Bacon made his submission to oblige and cover James. Nothing is less true. His disgrace, as well as that of Middlesex 300n afterwards, were serious embarrassments to the government, and were personally grave annoyances to the King.

To rush to the conclusion, that, because Bacon was corrupt, all lawyers were rogues, was a vulgar generalization, natural enough to James; but it would not be less absurd to suppose that Bacon was sacrificed from any Court intrigue, or from any love for Bishop Williams, or from any abstract wish for a Churchman as Lord Keeper. Many witnesses might be called. We will call only one; but that one shall be Hale. He was the friend and executor of Selden. Selden was compiling his Trea tise on the Judicature of the Lords during the time that Bacon's impeachment was going forward. He glanced at the impeachment in its proper place, and passed on. Hale in a similar work, nearly fifty years afterwards, had occasion to explain the circumstances under which the House of

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Lords had first obtained jurisdiction over some and crabbed learning. The haughtiAppeals from the Court of Chancery. In ness of his temper, and the frequent scandoing this, he was compelled to refer to the dal of its public exhibition, surrounded him case of Bacon. And he refers to it in with a palpable atmosphere of unquestionlanguage which must dispose, we fear for able hatred; of which he himself must ever, of Bacon's last subterfuge, that he have been abundantly aware, and which had sold justice, not injustice. The Lord the odor of patriotism that he died in, Verulam, being Chancellor, made many de- scarcely could dispel. In the case of Bacrees upon most gross bribery and corrup-con, the public would be long unwilling to tion, for which he was deeply censured in believe any thing against him. In the the Parliament of 18 Jac. And this gave case of Coke, they were as long unwilling such a discredit and brand to the decrees to believe any thing in his favor. But thus obtained, that they were easily allow- time sets these things right. Posterity, ed; and made way in the Parliament of 3 looking from a distance, is more truly just. Car., for the like attempt against decrees The faults of Coke were brave and open made by other Chancellors."* Hale object-were redeemable, and were redeemed. ed strongly to this innovation, on reasons Those of Bacon lay deeper, were more both of policy and law; but nobody will secret, and held the whole man more suspect him, on that account, of misrepre- thoroughly in dominion. The generation, senting the Chancellor, through whose cor- of which he was the glory and the shame, ruption the appellate jurisdiction had hap-felt at last that it had been humbled by him pened to get in.

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more than it had been raised. He was left Perhaps no two men ever stood so long to die without one sign of mourning or of and so near together, who were in greater honor, save a few magnanimous words* contrast than Bacon and Coke-the one from old Ben Jonson. His last Will and the master of universal philosophy and Testament was administered to by credireason the other the oracle of the English tors-the men whom he had singled out common law. It is difficult to conceive from among his countrymen to be his extwo men more unlike in their intellectual ecutors, all declining. While, alas, and and moral natures-in what was good or worst of all! the gauntlet which he threw bad in them. What one had, the other down in that most melancholy of all bewanted-what one wanted, the other had. quests-leaving his name to men's chariBacon was misled by his easy nature and table speeches, to foreign countries, and ordinary moderation-by the consciousness future ages'-there it is, still lying on the of genius, as well as by the flattery, wheth-ground unnoticed!—no one daring to take er of silent wonder or tumultuous applause, it up, to vindicate him-no one wishing to which, amidst all his mortifications, must take it up, to dwell on his disgrace. have often followed him. He was not aware that he had offended any one; he The noblest passage in all Ben Jonson's concluded, therefore, that he had no ene- What would we not give, that we could see in it writings is his protest in defence of Bacon. mies. It never occurred to him that he proof of any thing but that every faculty belong had loved nobody at all; that he had never ing to its writer was overwhelmed, subdued, and obliged a human being by opening out his dazzled by a genius, which some have conjecheart to him, or by any testimony of true tured that most of his countrymen were slow in affection! And that, therefore, though he was never increased toward him by his place or apprehending? My conceit towards his person might have dependents, or, in our home-honors; but I have, and do reverence him, for liest Saxon-English, might have hangers-on, the greatness that was only proper to himself, in he could scarcely hope to make a friend: that he seemed to me ever by his work one of certainly could not keep one. He thought that had been in many ages. the greatest men, and most worthy of admiration, In his adversity, I himself a general favorite-was ostentatious ever prayed that God would give him strength, in discourse on the popularity he presumed for greatness he could not want. Neither could upon-and he was only roused out of the condole in a word or syllable for him, as knowpleasant dream by the sudden storm under ing no accident could do harm to virtue, but rather help to make it manifest.' which he reeled for a moment, and then fell. The situation of Coke was precisely opposite. His forbidding manners were made still more repulsive through his weari

* Ilale's Jurisdiction, c. xxxiii.