My copy of Lord Bacon's _Essays_ is a 12mo.: London, 1668. And in the
epistle dedicatory, the author himself tells the Duke of Buckingham as
follows:
"I do now publish my _Essays_; which, of all my other works, have been
most current: for that, as it seems, they _come home to men's business
and bosomes_."
This will carry J. P. eleven years further back, at all events.