In the early part of the year 1597, Lord Bacon’s first publication
appeared. It is a small 12mo. volume, entitled “Essayes, Religious
Meditations, Places of Perswasion and Disswasion.” It is dedicated
“_To M. Anthony Bacon, his deare Brother_.
“Louing and beloued Brother, I doe nowe like some that have an
Orcharde ill Neighbored, that gather their Fruit before it is
ripe, to preuent stealing. These Fragments of my Conceites were
going to print, To labour the staie of them had bin troublesome,
and subiect to interpretation; to let them passe had beene to
aduenture the wrong they mought receiue by vntrue Coppies, or
by some Garnishment, which it mought please any that should set
them forth to bestow vpon them. Therefore I helde it best as
they passed long agoe from my Pen, without any further disgrace,
then the weaknesse of the Author. And as I did euer hold, there
mought be as great a vanitie in retiring and withdrawing mens
conceites (except they bee of some nature) from the World, as
in obtruding them: So in these particulars I haue played myself
the Inquisitor, and find nothing to my vnderstanding in them
contrarie or infectious to the state of Religion, or Manners, but
rather (as I suppose) medecinable. Only I disliked now to put
them out, because they will be like the late new Halfepence,
which, though the Siluer were good, yet the Peeces were small.
But since they would not stay with their Master, but would needes
trauaile abroade, I haue preferred them to you that are next my
selfe, Dedicating them, such as they are, to our Loue, in the
depth whereof (I assure you) I sometimes wish your Infirmities
translated vppon my selfe, that her Maiestie mought haue the
Seruice of so actiue and able a Mind, and I mought be with
excuse confined to these Contemplations and Studies for which I
am fittest, so commend I you to the Preseruation of the Diuine
Maiestie: From my Chamber at Graies Inne, this 30 of Januarie,
1597. Your entire Louing Brother, FRAN. BACON.”
The Essays, which are ten in number, abound with condensed thought and
practical wisdom, neatly, pressly, and weightily stated, and, like
all his early works, are simple, without imagery. They are written in
his favorite style of aphorisms, although each essay is apparently a
continued work, and without that love of antithesis and false glitter
to which truth and justness of thought are frequently sacrificed by the
writers of maxims.
A second edition, with a translation of the _Meditationes Sacræ_, was
published in the next year; and another edition enlarged in 1612, when
he was solicitor-general, containing thirty-eight essays; and one still
more enlarged in 1625, containing fifty-eight essays, the year before
his death.
The Essays in the subsequent editions are much augmented, according
to his own words: “I always alter when I add, so that nothing is
finished till all is finished,” and they are adorned by happy and
familiar illustration, as in the essay of Wisdom for a Man’s Self,
which concludes, in the edition of 1625, with the following extract,
not to be found in the previous edition: “Wisdom for a man’s self is,
in many branches thereof, a depraved thing. It is the wisdom of rats,
that will be sure to leave a house somewhat before it fall. It is the
wisdom of the fox, that thrusts out the badger, who digged and made
room for him. It is the wisdom of crocodiles, that shed tears when they
would devour. But that which is specially to be noted is, that those
which (as Cicero says of Pompey) are _Sui Amantes sine Rivali_ are many
times unfortunate. And whereas they have all their time sacrificed
to themselves, they become in the end themselves sacrifices to the
inconstancy of Fortune, whose wings they thought, by their self wisdom,
to have pinioned.”
So in the essay upon Adversity, on which he had deeply reflected before
the edition of 1625, when it first appeared, he says: “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; adversity is the blessing of the New, which carrieth
the great benediction, and the clearer revelation of God’s favor. 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 labored more in describing the afflictions of Job than
the felicities of Solomon. Prosperity is not without many fears and
distastes, and adversity is not without comforts and hopes. We see in
needle-works and 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
odors, most fragrant when they are incensed, or crushed; for prosperity
doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best discover virtue.”
The Essays were immediately translated into French and Italian, and
into Latin, by some of his friends, amongst whom were Hacket, Bishop of
Lichfield, and his constant, affectionate friend, Ben Jonson.
His own estimate of the value of this work is thus stated in his
letter to the Bishop of Winchester: “As for my Essays, and some other
particulars of that nature, I count them but as the recreations of my
other studies, and in that manner purpose to continue them; though I
am not ignorant that these kind of writings would, with less pains and
assiduity, perhaps yield more lustre and reputation to my name than the
others I have in hand.”
Although it was not likely that such lustre and reputation would dazzle
him, the admirer of Phocion, who, when applauded, turned to one of his
friends, and asked, “What have I said amiss?” although popular judgment
was not likely to mislead him who concludes his observations upon the
objections to learning and the advantages of knowledge by saying:
“Nevertheless, I do not pretend, and I know it will be impossible for
me, by any pleading of mine, to reverse the judgment either of Æsop’s
cock, that preferred the barleycorn before the gem; or of Midas, that
being chosen judge between Apollo, president of the Muses, and Pan,
god of the flocks, judged for plenty; or of Paris, that judged for
beauty and love against wisdom and power. For these things continue
as they have been; but so will that also continue whereupon learning
hath ever relied and which faileth not, _Justificata est sapientia
a filiis suis_:” yet he seems to have undervalued this little work,
which for two centuries has been favorably received by every lover
of knowledge and of beauty, and is now so well appreciated that a
celebrated professor of our own times truly says: “The small volume to
which he has given the title of ‘Essays,’ the best known and the most
popular of all his works, is one of those where the superiority of his
genius appears to the greatest advantage, the novelty and depth of his
reflections often receiving a strong relief from the triteness of the
subject. It may be read from beginning to end in a few hours; and yet
after the twentieth perusal one seldom fails to remark in it something
overlooked before. This, indeed, is a characteristic of all Bacon’s
writings, and is only to be accounted for by the inexhaustible aliment
they furnish to our own thoughts and the sympathetic activity they
impart to our torpid faculties.”
During his life six or more editions, which seem to have been pirated,
were published; and after his death, two spurious essays, “Of Death,”
and “Of a King,” the only authentic posthumous essay being the Fragment
of an Essay on Fame, which was published by his friend and chaplain,
Dr. Rawley.
This edition is a transcript of the edition of 1625, with the
posthumous essays. In the life of Bacon[1] there is a minute account of
the different editions of the Essays and of their contents.