thought shall be my grave_, followed up as they are by the thinly veiled
pathos of his appeal in the Epilogue, perplex and distress the reader.
_Prospero triumphans_, without one word of warning or explanation, has
changed into _Misero supplicans_. Why this sudden revulsion? To my
untutored mind it intimates a working-over of the play after Bacon’s
fall, for the purpose of adapting it, not too obviously, to the altered
circumstances of the original author, that _unfortunate_ Chancellor who,
according to Ben Jonson, _hath filled up all numbers, and performed that
in our tongue which may be compared or preferred, either to insolent
Greece or haughty Rome_. The date of this (last) working-over would
probably synchronise with the first public or semi-public appearances of
the _First Folio_ (of _Shakespeare_), of Bacon’s _De Augmentis
Scientiarum_, and of Ben Jonson’s _Time Vindicated_, these four
events--with perhaps a Court performance of the adapted _Tempest_ thrown
in--being, I venture to think, intimately connected with what may be
called an Apotheosis of Bacon.
“A remarkable story indeed”--an objector may say--“but do you seriously
believe that Bacon can be proved to have been the Author, and
_Shakespeare_ the pen-name? Besides, does it really matter--except to
Stratford and Verulam--whether _Shakespeare_ hailed from this place or
that? We have the poems and we have the plays, and that is enough. As
for your reading of _The Tempest_, it may be ingenious, but it is not
convincing. Patience, with a modicum of ingenuity, has probably never
despaired of cajoling almost any given meaning out of any fable--fables,
like dreams and Delphian utterances, being almost as plastic as wax.
Moreover, the inner meaning you claim to have disclosed, involves the
absurdity of supposing that a fable was invented for the express purpose
of wrapping up the said meaning, so effectually as to ensure its being
missed by all the world, a few esoteric contemporaries only excepted.
The idea, to be quite candid, belongs rather to Bedlam than to Bacon.”
Strict proof, I reply, is hardly to be expected either now or hereafter.
A high degree of probability, resting on evidence of various kinds and
different degrees of cogency, is all that the writer has ever contended
for. The history of literature abounds in instances of pseudonymity. Of
these one of the most apposite that occurs to me is that of
Aristophanes, who made use of the name Callistratus, a contemporary
actor, to mask his (own) authorship of the _Birds_, _Lysistrata_, etc.
There are differences, of course, between the two cases, one being that
in that of Aristophanes there were no very obvious reasons for
concealment, whereas in the case of Bacon there were several. Whether it
really matters who the great poet was depends on the word “really.” It
certainly does not matter in the sense in which the high price of coal,
the low price of Consols, England’s relations with other Powers, etc.,
matter. It does matter for _The Tempest_, the symbolism of which
probably extends beyond Miranda and Prospero, as far as Neapolis, and
possibly further. It cannot fail to affect the interpretation of other
plays of _Shakespeare_. It solves, or helps to solve, interesting
problems in the life and acknowledged works of Bacon. It matters in
short for all genuine admirers of English literature. As to
plasticity--where the fable to be juggled is vague, undocumented,
variously and incoherently documented, or frugal of features, the
operation will be child’s play. With such a fable as _The Tempest_ the
trick can only be brought off by singling out one or two features and
shutting the eye to all the rest. One objection only remains to be dealt
with. The reference to Bedlam with which it concludes might have been
omitted, but no discussion of this question seems quite in order without
some innuendo that the unorthodox person is mad or a crank. The
objection itself (though the phrasing might be challenged as favouring
the objector) is pertinent enough, and may be answered as follows: Bacon
was an inveterate treasure-seeker. The unsunned treasures he sought were
not material things like gold and silver, but gems of thought hidden
away in the dreamlands of poetry. The genesis of this habit was no doubt
closely related to his theory that poesy enables the artist in words to
_retire_ and _obscure_ ... _secrets and mysteries_ by _involving_ them
in _fables_ invented for the purpose, a practice by no means uncommon,
he firmly believed, among the poets of antiquity when they wished to
reserve information for _selected auditors_.
So far the discussion has been grave to the point of dullness. Would
that I had been able to enliven it, if only because _The Tempest_ is a
comedy--heads the file of the comedies in the _First Folio_. Possibly
the following quotation from the work of an eminent critic may help to
remedy the fault: _Miranda_ ... _and her fellow Perdita are
idealizations of the sweet country maidens whom Shakspere_ (sic) _would
see about him in his renewed family life at Stratford_.[75]
THE COMMON KNOWLEDGE OF SHAKESPEARE AND BACON
Many years ago, when, not having bestowed a thought upon the subject, I
was, naturally, of the orthodox Stratfordian faith, and knew nothing of
the Baconian “heresy” except the time-honoured joke that “Shakespeare”
was not written by Shakespeare, but by another gentleman of the same
name (which I thought “devilish funny”) I happened to be reading Bacon’s
_Essay on Gardens_. This passage at once arrested my attention: “In
April follow, the double violet; the wall-flower; the stock-gilliflower;
the cowslip; _flower-de-luces, and lillies of all natures_.” Why,
thought I, those last words are almost identical with some used by
Perdita at the conclusion of her lovely catalogue of flowers! I turned
to the _Winter’s Tale_ (IV. 4) and there read:
lillies of all kinds,
The flower-de-luce being one.
For at least half a minute I thought, in my innocence, that I had made a
discovery! But reflection of course, told me that so startling a
parallelism must have been observed by hundreds before me. “Lillies of
all kinds,” says Shakespeare; “lillies of all natures,” says Bacon; and
each specifies “the flower-de-luce” as one of them! Surely, I said to
myself, this is no mere coincidence! Surely one of these writers must
have, consciously or unconsciously, taken the words from the other! On
closer inspection, too, I found a remarkable resemblance between the two
lists of flowers, Bacon’s and Shakespeare’s; that they are in fact
substantially the same. Did then Shakspere borrow from Bacon? Very
possibly, I thought; but on investigation I found that the _Essay on
Gardens_ was first printed in 1625, nine years after player Shakspere’s
death. Well, then, did Bacon borrow from Shakspere in this instance?
Few, I think, would be inclined to adopt that hypothesis. The author of
the _Essay_ had made a life-long study of gardens, and, as Mr. James
Spedding writes (though I did not discover this till years afterwards),
“it is not probable that Bacon would have anything to learn of William
Shakespeare [i.e., Shakspere of Stratford] concerning the science of
gardening.” “Moreover,” says the same writer, “the scene in _Winter’s
Tale_ where Perdita presents the guests with flowers ... has some
expressions which, if the _Essay_ had been printed somewhat earlier,
would have made me suspect that Shakespeare had been reading it!”[76]
Yes, indeed, and these “expressions,” almost identical in both, have
made some persons “suspect” that the same pen wrote both the _Essay_ and
the _Scene_.
There are, as all those who have studied the two authors are aware, many
other striking coincidences to be found in the writings of Shakespeare
and Bacon. In this chapter I propose to consider some of them only,
namely those which, nearly twenty years ago, formed the subject of a
controversy between the late Judge Webb, and the late Professor Dowden.
In the year 1902 the late Judge Webb, then Regius Professor of Laws, and
Public Orator in the University of Dublin, published a book which he
called _The Mystery of William Shakespeare_.
The eighth chapter of that work treats “Of Shakespeare as a Man of
Science,” and here the learned Judge put forward a number of
parallelisms taken from Shakespeare’s plays and Bacon’s works (mainly
from the _Natural History_, which was published eleven years after the
death of Shakspere of Stratford), in order to show that “the scientific
opinions of Shakespeare so completely coincide with those of Bacon that
we must regard the two philosophers as one in their philosophy, however
reluctant we may be to recognize them as actually one.”
To this the late Professor Dowden replied, in _The National Review_ of
July, 1902, and brought forward an immense amount of learning to show
that these coincidences really prove nothing, because “all which Dr.
Webb regards as proper to Shakespeare and Bacon was, in fact, _the
common knowledge or common error of the time_.” Whereunto the Judge, in
a brief rejoinder (_National Review_, August, 1902), intimated that all
he was concerned with was “the common knowledge and common error of
Shakespeare and Bacon,” his case being that in matters of science these
two, as a fact, show an extremely close agreement. The question for the
reader, therefore, is whether or not that agreement is so remarkable
that something more than “the common knowledge or common error _of the
time_” is required to explain it.
Here the matter has been left, but I think it may be of interest to
consider once more the points at issue between these two learned
disputants. Let me premise that I do not write as a “Baconian.” The
hypothesis that Bacon was the author of the plays of Shakespeare, or
some of them, or some parts of them, may be mere “madhouse chatter,” as
Sir Sidney Lee has styled it, or we may be content with more moderate
language, and merely say that the hypothesis is “not proven.” I leave
that _vexata quæstio_ on one side. But, whatever may be our opinion with
regard to it, it must, I think, be admitted that some of the
“parallelisms,” or “coincidences,” between Bacon and Shakespeare are
really very remarkable, and the controversy between Judge Webb and
Professor Dowden, which I here pass under review, has not, as it seems
to me, so conclusively explained their existence as to leave nothing
further for the consideration of an impartial critic.
Let me take an example. Bacon in his _Sylva Sylvarum_, or _Natural
History_[77] (Cent. I, p. 98), speaks of “the spirits or pneumaticals
that are in all tangible bodies,” and which, he says, “are scarce
known.” They are not, he tells us, as some suppose, virtues and
qualities of the tangible parts which “men see,” but “they are things
by themselves,” i.e., entities. And again (Cent. VII, 601), he says,
“all bodies have spirits, and pneumatical parts within them,” and he
goes on to point out the differences between the “spirits” in animate,
and those in inanimate things. Further on (Cent. VII, 693), Bacon
writes: “It hath been observed by the ancients that much use of Venus
doth dim the sight,” and the cause of this, he says, “is the expense of
spirits.” Now in Sonnet 129 Shakespeare writes:
The expense of spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action.
Here we certainly seem to have a remarkable agreement between
Shakespeare and Bacon. Both use the very same expression “the expense of
spirit” and (which constitutes the real strength of the parallel) both
use it in exactly the same application. What is Professor Dowden’s
explanation? He says that “the mediæval theory of ‘spirits’ will be
found in the _Encyclopædia of Bartholomew Anglicus on the Properties of
Things_,” which he says was “a book of wide influence.” He says further:
“The popular opinions of Shakespeare’s time respecting ‘spirits’ may be
read in _Bright’s Treatise of Melancholy_, 1586, and _Burton’s Anatomy_,
1621, and in many another volume.... Bright, in his _Melancholy_, seems
almost to anticipate the theory of Bacon, and possibly he was himself
influenced by Paracelsus.” As to the expression “expense of spirit,” he
says it may be found in this book of Bright’s (pp. 62, 237, and 244),
and in Donne’s _Progress of the Soul_. I do not understand the Professor
to suggest that the Stratford player had consulted these works (Burton,
of course, is out of the question) for he writes: “The language of
Shakespeare is popular, and connected probably neither with what Bright
nor what Bacon wrote, but if a theory be required, it can be found as
easily in a volume which Shakespeare might have read, as in a volume
published after his death.” Bacon, however, we may say with confidence,
knew these books, and had, in all probability, read them. The Professor,
for instance, refers to Paracelsus, and subsequently, on another point,
to Scaliger. Bacon, as we know, was familiar with both these writers,
and makes reference to them (see, for instance, _Natural History_, Cent.
IV, 354, and Cent. VII, 694), whereas it will, I suppose, hardly be
suggested that the player had sought inspiration in the works of these
scholars.
The first question, then, which suggests itself is this. Are we to
conclude, because there is a theory of “spirits” (which Bacon says “are
scarce known”) to be found in Bartholomew Anglicus, and Bright, and
Paracelsus, that it was a matter of “popular” knowledge, a subject with
which Shakspere of Stratford, as well as the philosopher of Gorhambury,
would have been likely to be familiar? This question seems to me a very
doubtful one, but if it is to be answered in the affirmative, then we
have to ask: Is this assumed popular knowledge, or popular error,
sufficient to account for the use by both Shakespeare and Bacon of
exactly the same expression in exactly the same collocation? And in
considering this question we must remember that the evidence is
cumulative, i.e., this coincidence is not a solitary instance, but only
one of many, and it is but fair, if we wish to come to a just decision,
that all of them should be considered together.
But how far is it true, as Professor Dowden alleges it to be, that
“Bright in his _Melancholy_ seems almost to anticipate the theory of
Bacon?” The book is a scarce one. There is no copy in the London
Library. However I have taken the trouble to examine it at the British
Museum. Professor Dowden refers to pages 62, 237, and 244. In the
edition which I examined, that of 1586, there is no reference to the
“expense of spirits” at p. 237. Neither is there at p. 62. On page 63,
however, I find the following. The author, one Timothy Bright, “Doctor
of Phisicke,” is speaking of strong affections of the mind, and he says:
“If it holde on long and release not, the nourishment will also faile,
the increase of the body diminish, and the flower of beautie fade, and
finally death take his fatall hold; which commeth to passe, not onely by
_expence of spirit_, but by leaving destitute the parts, whereby
declining to decay, they become at length unmeete for the entertainment
of so noble an inhabitant as the soule,” etc. On p. 244 we read: “Now as
all contention of the mind is to be intermitted, so especially that
whereto the melancholicke person most hath given himself before the
passion is chiefly to be eschued, for the recoverie of former estate and
restoring the depraved conceit and fearefull affection. For there, if
the affection of liking go withal, both hart and braine do over
prodigally _spend their spirite_ and with them the subtilest parts of
the naturall iuyce [juice] and humours of the bodie. If of mislike and
the thing be by forcible constraint layd on, the distracting of the
mind, from the promptness of affection, breedeth such an agonie in our
nature that thereon riseth also great _expence of spirit_, and of the
most rare and subtile humours of our bodies, which are as it were the
seate of our naturall heate,” etc.
Now in both these passages we find, indeed, the expression the “expense
of spirit,” but, except for that, it appears that they can hardly be
cited as parallel passages with those of either Bacon or Shakespeare. It
is not alleged that this expression is peculiar to these two
writers--assuming the duality. The parallelism consists in this, that
they both use the words in connection with what Bacon terms “the use of
Venus.” I cannot see that the passages in Bright’s treatise, when they
are carefully examined, make this parallelism at all less remarkable.
The Professor further tells us that the expression “expense of spirits”
may be found in Donne’s _Progress of the Soul_[78] Stanza VI. I do not
find it in that stanza, but in Stanza V the following occurs. The poet
prays that he may be free,
From the lets
Of steep ambition, sleepy poverty,
Spirit-quenching sickness, dull captivity,
Distracting business, and from beauty’s nets,
And all that calls from this, and t’ others whets,
O let me not launch out, but let me save
Th’ expence of brain, and spirit, that my grave
His right and due, a whole unwasted man, may have.
And in Stanza XXI are the words quoted by Professor Dowden, concerning
the sparrow:
Freely on his she friends
He blood, and spirit, pith and marrow spends.
This indeed proves, what nobody has ever denied, viz., that the
expression “to spend the spirit” is not confined among writers of the
Elizabethan age to Bacon and Shakespeare. To what extent it detracts
from the force of the coincidence on which Judge Webb has laid stress, I
must leave it to the reader to determine. The learned Judge laughs at
the idea that citations from Bright’s _Treatise of Melancholy_ and
Donne’s _Progress of the Soul_, are proof that the expression was one in
common use.
There is another example of agreement between Bacon and Shakespeare in
connection with this theory of “spirits.” Jessica says (_Merchant of
Venice_, V. 1):
I am never merry when I heare sweet music.
To which Lorenzo replies:
The reason is your spirits are attentive.
Bacon writes (_Natural Hist._ Cent. VIII, 745): “Some noises help sleep;
as the blowing of the wind, the trickling of water, humming of bees,
_soft singing_, reading, etc. The cause is for that _they move in the
spirits a gentle attention_.”
Upon this Professor Dowden tells us that Bright talks of music “alluring
the spirites,” while “Burton quotes from Lemnius, who declares that
music not only affects the ears, ‘but the very arteries, the vital and
animal spirits,’ and, again from Scaliger, who explains its power as
due to the fact that it plays upon ‘the spirits about the heart,’
whereupon Burton, like Shakespeare’s Lorenzo, proceeds to speak of the
influence of music upon beasts, and like Lorenzo, cites the tale of
Orpheus.” But Burton’s _Anatomy_ was not published till 1621, about five
years after Shakspere’s death, and we can hardly suppose that the player
delved into “Lemnius” or “Scaliger!” But we shall doubtless be told
that, whether Shakspere had read these books or not, the fact that
Bright speaks of music alluring the spirits shows that this was a common
expression, and that Lorenzo’s words are to be referred to “the common
knowledge or the common error of the time.” But Lorenzo says, “your
spirits are _attentive_,” and Bacon speaks of “a gentle _attention_” of
the spirits. I do not see this expression in Bright, or Lemnius, or
Scaliger, as quoted by Professor Dowden. Here, then, we have two
expressions, “the expense of spirits” in connection with Venus, and “the
attention of spirits” in connection with music, both in Shakespeare and
Bacon. It will be for every reader who is interested in the question,
taking these coincidences with many others of a similar character, to
decide whether “the common knowledge of the time” affords a sufficient
explanation. And let him remember two things--first, that it is, of
course, impossible to find an agreement between Shakespeare and Bacon on
a subject of which they two alone (if two they were) had exclusive
knowledge, and secondly that though one, or two, or three threads may
not suffice to bear a weight, a great many threads combined into a cord
may do so. At any rate, it may be said of these two:
Utrumque vestrum incredibili modo
Consentit astrum.
Judge Webb, of course, refers to the well-known fact that both
Shakespeare and Bacon held similar views on the relationship of Art to
nature, both holding that art was not something different from nature,
but a part of nature. All will remember the dialogue between Perdita and
Polixenes in the _Winter’s Tale_:
_Per._: ... The fairest flowers o’ the season
Are our carnations and streak’d gillyvors,
Which some call nature’s bastards; of that kind
Our rustic garden’s barren: and I care not
To get slips of them.
_Pol._: ... Wherefore, gentle maiden,
Do you neglect them?
_Per._: ... For I have heard it said
There is an art which in their piedness shares
With great creating nature.
_Pol._: ... Say there be;
Yet nature is made better by no mean,
But nature makes that mean: so, over that art
Which you say adds to nature, is an art
That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry
A gentler scion to the wildest stock
And make conceive a bark of baser kind
By bud of nobler race: this is an art
Which does mend nature, change it rather, but
The art itself is nature.
It certainly seems remarkable that the King of Bohemia should lecture
the country girl on the essential identity of nature and art. It is not
exactly what we should have expected. It is somewhat strange, too, to
find Bacon waxing eloquent on the same subject, and to the same effect.
Take the following from the _De Augmentis_ (Lib. II, Cap. ii.):
“Libenter autem historiam artium, ut historiæ naturalis speciem,
constituimus: quia inveteravit prorsus opinio, _ac si aliud quippiam
esset ars a natura, artificialia a naturalibus_.... Sed et illabitur
etiam animis hominum aliud subtilius malum; nempe, _ut ars censeatur
solummodo tanquam additamentum quoddam, naturæ_, cujus scilicet ea sit
vis, ut naturam, sane, vel inchoatam perficere, vel in deterius
vergentem emendare, vel impeditam liberare; minime vero penitus vertere,
transmutare, aut in imis concutere possit: quod ipsum rebus humanis
præproperam desperationem intulit.”
That is to say, “we very willingly treat the history of art as a form of
natural history; for an opinion has long been prevalent _that art is
something different from nature_--things artificial from things
natural.... There is likewise another and more subtle error which has
crept into the human mind, namely, that of considering art as merely an
assistant[79] to nature, having the power indeed to finish what nature
has begun, to correct her when lapsing into error, or to set her free
when in bondage, but by no means to change, transmute, or fundamentally
alter nature. And this has bred a premature despair in human
enterprises.” He goes on to point out that, on the contrary, there is no
essential difference between art and nature, things artificial being
simply things natural as affected by human agency, which is a part of
nature, so that in the words of Shakespeare, “the art itself is
nature.”[80]
Here it may be worth while to point out that these words are not to be
found in the English _Advancement of Learning_, first printed in 1605,
but are found in the enlarged Latin version made under Bacon’s
supervision, and published in 1623, the very year in which the _Winter’s
Tale_ also first saw the light in print, to wit in the _First Folio_.
The play may, no doubt, have been written some ten years before that,
but whether in its earlier form it contained all this not very
appropriate philosophy concerning art and nature, it is of course
impossible to say. It is said to have been written about 1611, and we
find Bacon writing about the same time very much to the same effect as
above quoted.[81]
Artificial selection is, therefore, after all only a form and part of
natural selection, the _differentia_ being that it is human agency which
brings it into play. And that Bacon had, by one of his luminous
intuitions, which are really quite as remarkable as his inductive
philosophy, a foreshadowing of the theory of evolution is undeniable,
for we have it plainly stated in his _Natural History_ (Cent. VI, 525):
“This work of the transmutation of plants one into another is _inter
magnalia naturæ_; for the _transmutation of species_ is, in vulgar
philosophy, pronounced impossible, and certainly it is a thing of
difficulty, and requireth deep search into nature; but seeing there
appear some manifest instances of it, the opinion of impossibility is to
be rejected, and the means thereof to be found out.”[82]