Shakespeare v Bacon - tale of the tape - popularity

A Battle of the Experts
In this Bacon Bits I am sinking into the quagmire of depravity, baseness and .....reality. Yes we are engaging in a popularity contest. I must deal with it.
As you know popularity contests have little or nothing to do with the actual condition of things except to say mom liked you best for reasons that escape all reason. To say I like this or that while concealing my criteria not only from you but also myself is so common we call it politics. The reason we call politics politics and turn up our collective noses at it is because we are the total politicians all day every day but we don't like to think we operate 90% of the time on whim and favoritism so we project our anger about the silly or non logical decisions we make onto our favorite sport - bash the politicians.
My intent is not to moralize but to merely point out the strain we place on the ligiimitisy of our moral self image when we pretend that the politicians should not be politicians when we are the politicians in our own lives and we put people in office or our bed chamber based on mom-liked-you-best criteria.
As you know Sir Francis Bacon is my choice to run for the office of Jesus if it ever becomes available but anyway he wrote a nice essay about Simmulation and Dissimulation which is basically about the kinds of bullshiting we do which Dr ...apparently didn't know about when he he wrote On Bullshit. I understand Dr Frankfort's goal was merely a scholorly essay but someone liked the title and put it on the New York Times best seller list which is also a popularity contest. But-for my-favorite-man's essay On Bullshit is almost a thorough survey of the subject.
ncidentially, there is a little spiritual group based in northern California who believe Bacon to be one of St Germaine's reincarnations. We shall add their vote to the survey is the it's close.
I digress badly but, hey, popularity contests are bullshit contests. Trying to write a novel for the past four or five years called "Bullshit: The Novel" qualifies me as a bullshitter, doesn't it?
All that being said my favorite topic of late has been the life and works of Sir Francis Bacon which includes the Plays, Sonnets, Spencer, Don Quixote to name a few. Bacon was the main writer during his lifetime and one to polish the finished products including the King James Version his Good Pens (credited authors) and some French and at least one Spanish author. He doubtless helped his mother, QEI, write some of her poems and letters.
There are many very intelligent and competent men and women who still believe in Santa Clause on the Avon. My mission is not to blast the truth because the truth hurts if you cling to hard. Hurt feelings causes resistence. Since the Stratfordians and poor Oxfordians do not trust their own judgement I have gathered quotes about both personalities to compare and contrast as if a popularity poll.
The question is ; who liked who best or who was the more beloved as we look at the actual quotes - Shakespeare or Bacon. Ridiculous question you may say because Bacon was a philosopher and legal beaver who wrote dry philosophy and his few poems aren't near as good as his cross town rival William Shakespeare the superstar of literature.Hold on to your hats. If you don't want to read the whole thing I am working on a summery.
Who are we polling?
The first poll turns out to be one person because only one person wrote of both Shakespeare and Bacon : Big hearted Ben Johnson.
THE BEN JOHNSON POLL
Quotes Supporting William Shakespeare

Ben Jonson (1573 - 1637) A quibble is to Shakespear what luminous vapours are to the traveller: he follows it at all adventures; it is sure to lead him out of his way and sure to engulf him in the mire.
Ben Jonson My Shakespear, rise! I will not lodge thee by Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lie A little further, to make thee a room.
Ben Jonson Sweet Swan of Avon!
Ben Jonson He was not of an age, but for all time!
Quotes Supporting Sir Francis Bacon

Ben Jonson He who have filled up all numbers and performed that in our tongue which may be compared or preferred either to insolent Greece or haughty Rome...In short, within his view, and about his times , were all the wits born that could honor a language or help study. Now things daily fall; wits grow downward and eloquence grows backward, so that he may be named and stand as the mark and acme of our language. --

Ben Jonson In his adversity, I ever prayed that God would give him strength for Greatness he could not want. Neither could I condole in word or syllable for him, as knowing no accident could do harm to virtue, but rather to help to make it manifest.----

Ben Jonson, (1621)Hail, happy genius of this ancient pile! How comes it all things so about thee smile? The fire, the wine, the men! and in the midst, Thou stand’st as if some mystery thou did’st!

Ben Jonson,No man ever spake more neatly, more pressly, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. His hearers could not cough or look aside from him without loss. He commanded where he spoke ... No man had their affections more in his power.

Ben Jonson,In short, within his view, and about his times, were all the wits born that could honour a language, or help study. So that he may be named and stand as the mark and acme of our language…

Ben Jonson, But I have and do reverence him for the greatness that was only proper to himself, in that he seemed to me ever, by his work, one of the greatest men and most worthy of admiration that had been in many ages. ... I ever prayed that God would give him strength: for greatness he could not want. Neither could I condole in a word or syllable for him, as knowing no accident could do harm to virtue, but rather help to make it manifest. Discoveries (1641), p 102.

Ben Johnson My conceit of his person was never increased toward him by his place, or honors: but I have and do reverence him, for the greatness that was only proper to himself, in that he seemed to me ever, by his work, one of the greatest men, and most worthy of admiration, that had been in many ages."

Ben Jonson 1620 The fire, the wine, the men! and in the midst, Thou stands't as if some Mysterie thou didst! --- addressing Bacon during a tribute on his 60th birthday

Bacon wins the Ben Johnson Poll


CONTEMPORARY POLL

Quotes Supporting Sir Francis Bacon

Queen Elizabeth I, My little Lord Keeper--- addressing Bacon when he was a child

1577, Queen Elizabeth I in an angry tone to a 16 year old Francis right after she reveals to Francis the secret of his parentageYou are my own son, but you, though truly royal, of fresh and masterly spirit shall rule nor England nor your mother, nor reign o'er subjects yet to be. ---

Tobie Mathew, friend of F. Bacon" It will go near to pose any other nation of Europe, to muster out in any age, four men, who in so many respects should excel four such as we are able to show them: Cardinal Wolsey, Sir Thomas More, Sir Philip Sidney, and Sir Francis Bacon. The fourth was a creature of incomparable abilities of mind, of a sharp and catching apprehension, large and faithful memory, plentiful and sprouting, deep and solid judgment, for as such as might concern the understanding part. A man so rare in knowledge, of so many several kinds endued with the facility and felicity of expressing it all in so eloquent, significant, so abundant, and yet so choice and ravishing, a way of words, of metaphors and allusions as, perhaps, the world hath not seen, since it was a world. I know this may seem a great hyperbole, and strange kind of excess of speech, but the best means of putting me to shame will be, for you to place any other man of yours by this of mine." -

Tobie Matthew, ......And I can truly say (having had the honor to know him for many years as well when he was in his lesser fortunes as now that he stands at the top and in the full flower of his greatness) that I never yet saw any trace in him of a vindictive mind, whatever injury were done him, nor ever heard him utter a word to any man's disadvantage which seemed to proceed from personal feeling against the man, but only (and that too very seldom) from judgment made of him in cold blood. It is not his greatness that I admire, but his virtue: it is not the favours I have received from him (infinite though they be) that have thus enthralled and enchained my heart, but his whole life and character; which are such, that, if he were of an inferior condition I could not honour him the less , and if were my enemy I should not the less love and endeavour to serve him.---

Tobie Matthew (Bacon)...was a creature of incomparable abilities of mind, of a sharp and catching apprehension, large and faithful memory, plentiful and sprouting invention, deep and solid judgement, for as such as might concern the understanding part. A man so rare in knowledge, of so many several kinds endued with the facility and felicity of expressing it in all so elegant, significant, so abundant, and yet so choice and ravishing a way of words, of metaphors and allusions as, perhaps, the world hath not seen, since it was a world. Preface to his Collection of Letters (published 1660).

Tobie Matthew I shall give you Measure for Measure.-- in a letter to Bacon

Toby Mathews (1617) But none who hath so astonished me and, as it were, ravished my senses, to see so many and so great parts which in other men were wont to be incompatible, united, and in that eminent degree in one sole person

Sir Tobie Matthew, 1623 The most prodigious wit that ever I knew of my nation, and of this side of the sea, is of your Lordship's name, though he be known by another.--

William Rawley Bacon contemned no man's observations, but would light his torch at every man's candle.--

Dr. William Rawley, Francis Bacon, the Glory of his Age and Nation, the Adorner and Ornament of Learning,, was born in YORK HOUSE or YORK- PLACE in the STRAND.- from the first passage of the first page of Resuscitatio, or Bringing into Public Light Several Pieces Hitherto Sleeping" 1670

Dr. William Rawley 1670, Bacon's Chaplain, Secretary & Confidant I have been induced to think, that if there were a Beam of Knowledge derived from God upon any man in these modern times, it was upon him (Bacon): for though he was a great reader of books, yet he had not his knowledge from books, but from some grounds and notions within himself. --

Dr. William Rawley He was deeply religious for he was conversant with God and able to render a reason for the hope which was in him.- Bacon's Chaplain and secretary

Rawley He carried himself with such sweetness comity and generosity that he was much revered and beloved by the readers and gentlemen of the house ... Children he had none ... yet he bade other issues to perpetrate his name, the issues in his brain ... Neither did the want of children detract from his good usage of his consort during the intermarriage whom he prosecuted with much conjugical love and respect A Short History of Sir Francis Bacon.

Dr. William Rawley, his chaplain He was free from malice, which, as he said he never bred or fed. He was no revenger of injuries; he was no defamer of any man; but would always say the best that could be said of any person, even an enemy. --

Pierre Amboise, 1631 Among so many virtues that made this great man commendable, prudence, as the first of all the moral virtues, and that most necessary of those of his profession, was that which shone in him the most brightly. Never was there man who so loved equity, or so enthusiastically worked for the public good as he. Vanity, avarice, and ambition, vices that too often attach themselves to great honors, were to him quite unknown, and if he did a good action it was not from a desire of fame, but simply because he could not do otherwise. His good qualities were entirely pure, without being clouded by the admixture of any imperfections, and the passions that form usually the defects in great men in him only served to bring out his virtues.--

Pierre Ambiose,He was born to the Purple and brought up with the expectation of a great career. He employed several years of his youth in traveling France, Italy and Spain. He saw himself destined one day to hold in his hand, THE HELM OF THE KINGDOM.- in 1631, from the first biography of Francis Bacon, published in France.

David Lloyd At twelve his industry was above the capacity and his mind beyond the reach of his contemporaries. - from The Statesman and Favourites of England (1665)

Thomas Powell, Dedication, Attourney's Academy (1630) ...to true nobility, and tryde learning, beholden To no Mountaine for Eminence, nor supportment for height ...

Hilliard his portrait painter (1576) If one but could paint his mind

John Davies( 1610) Thy bounty and the beauty of thy wit.

Thomas Champon (1619) And thy whole tongue is moist with celestial nectar!
How well combinest thou merry wit with silent gravity! How firmly thy love stands by those once admitted to it

Francis Beaumont You especially, Sir Francis Bacon, as you did then by your countenance and loving affections advance it, so let your good word grace, which is able to add value to the greatest and least of matters.--a contemporary of Bacon who dedicated a masque to the Gentlemen of Grays Inn and the Inner Temple, thanking them for their help

The Oxford English Dictionary credits Shakespeare with being the first to use about 3,200 words. This means that approximately one in every five words used by the author of the plays was a word he himself had coined. Parallel this with the known propensity of Francis Bacon for coining new words, witness the letter from Gosnold regarding the speech Bacon made arguing his first case in court. On the 5th and 9th of February 1594 Francis Bacon appeared in two cases. Harry Gosnold, a young lawyer of Gray’s Inn, who heard him, left a report by Bacon's arch rival: Edward Coke “That Francis Bacon retains his reputation gained, is not strange to any that knows him. The unusual words wherewith he had spangled his speech, were rather gracious for their propriety than strange for their novelty, and like to serve both for occasions to report and means to remember his argument. Certain sentences of his , somewhat obscure, and as it were presuming upon their capacities will, I fear, make some of them rather admire than commend him. In sum, all is as well as words can make it, and if it please Her Majesty to add deeds, the Bacon may be too hard for the Cook.”

Sir Thomas Bodley (founder of the Bodleian Library) Such is my censure of your cogitata that I must tell you (to be plain) you have much wronged yourselfe and the world to smother such a treasure so long in your coffer... all your treatise over doth abound with choice conceits of the present state of learning...... as many persuade with any student to look more narrowly to his business, not only by aspiring to the greatest perfection of that which is now-a-days divulged in the sciences, but by diving yet deeper as it were into the bowels and secrets of nature.... which course would to God (to whisper so much in your ears) you had followed at first when you fell to the study of such a thing as was not worthy of such a student. Nevertheless, being as it is that you were therein settled and your countrey soundly served, I can but wish with all my heart as I do very often that you may gain a full reward to the full deserts which I hope will come with heaps of happiness and honour.-- February 19th, 1607, in letter, to Francis Bacon.

John Chamberlain...a masque, of which Sir Francis Bacon was the chief contriver.-- , an eye witness to the performances at Grays Inn

Quotes Supporting William Shakespeare
contemporaries

Robert Green -A Groatsworth of Wit (September 3, 1592 ) His fellow actors and dramatists also had a word or two to say about him - so we have included quotes from his peers! This probably started with the infamous quote about William Shakespeare by Robert Greene who criticised the Bard in his deathbed autobiographical Groatsworth of Wit The quote is "for there is an up-start Crow, beautified with our feathers, that with his Tygers hart wrapt in a Players hyde, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blanke verse as the best of you: and being an absolute Johannes fac totum, is in his owne conceit the onely Shake-scene in a countrey." About three months after Green's death his editor, Henry Chettle, made a public apology to Shake-speare! Not all quotes, like the Robert Greene Groatsworth of Wit about the great Bard are complimentary.I think that Robert Green was the Don Rickles of the day so the Quote about an Upstart Crow is complimentary.

Bacon wins the Authors who knew one or the other.


THE ELEGY POLL (who cried for who)
Quotes Supporting Sir Francis Bacon

Samuel Collins (1626) Eleg ... a muse more rare than the nine Muses.

C.D. (1626)You have filled the world with your writings, and the ages with your fame

... extensive is art, how contracted is life, how everlasting fame; he who was in our sphere the brilliant Light-Bearer, and trod great paths of glory, passes, and fixed in his own orb shines refulgent

Anon (16Anon (1626) Elegy 26) Elegy The day-star of the Muses has set before his hour!

Thomas Randolf (1626) Elegy But he dispelled also the darkness which murky antiquity and blear-eyed old age of former times had brought about; and his super-human sagacity instituted new methods and tore away the labyrinthine windings, but gave us his own

John Williams (1626) Elegy Break pens, tear up writings, if the dire goddesses may justly act so. Alas! what a tongue is mute! what eloquence ceases! Whither have departed the nectar and ambrosia of your genius

R. C., T. C. (1626) Elegy The very nerve of genius, the marrow of persuasion, the golden stream of eloquence, the precious gem of concealed literature.

Anon (1626) Elegy Ah, the tenth muse and glory of the choir has perished. Ah, never before has Apollo himself been truly unhappy!

Anon (1626) Elegy Supreme both in eloquence and writing, under every head renowned

(1626) Elegy For if venerable Virtue and the wreaths of wisdom make an ancient, you were older than Nestor Gawen Nash

Anon (1626) Elegy Think you, foolish traveller, that the leader of the choir of the muses and of Phoebus is interred in cold marble? Away, you are deceived. The Verulamium star now glitters in ruddy Olympus

Thomas Vincent (1626) Elegy... but your fame adheres not to sculptured columns, nor is read on the tomb, ‘Stay, traveller, your steps’

Thomas Vincent (1626) Elegy If any progeny recalls their sire, not of the body is it, but born, so to speak, of the brain, as Minerva’s from Jove’s

Archbishop Tenison, I affirm with good assurance that Nature gives the world that individual species but once in five hundred years. -- writing of Lord Verulam


Quotes Supporting William Shakespeare
none, zero, nada, zip
Sir Francis wins by default



THE AFTER DEATH POLL- 1626 to now
Quotes Supporting Sir Francis Bacon

James Spedding For myself at least, much as one must grieve over such a fall of such a man, and so forlorn a close of such a life, I have always felt that had he not fallen, or had he fallen upon a fortune less desolate in its outward conditions, I should never have known how good and how great a man he really was---hardly, perhaps, how great and invincible a thing intrinsic goodness is. Turning from the world without to the world which was within him, I know nothing more inspiring , more affecting, more sublime, than the undaunted energy, the hopefulness, trustfulness, clearness, patience, and composure, with witch his spirit sustained itself under that most depressing fortune. The heart of Job himself was not so sorely tried, nor did it pass the trial better. Through the many volumes which he produced during these five years, I find no idle repining, no vain complaint of others, no weak justification of himself; no trace of a disgusted, a despairing or a faltering mind.--- commenting on Bacon's political fall from the Chancellorship

James Spedding, I infer from this sample that Bacon had all the natural faculties which a poet wants; a fine ear for metre, a fine feeling for imaginative effect in words, and a vein of poetic passion....Truth is that Bacon was not without the fine phrensy of a poet. -- "Works "

-John L. Casti Scientists are still perceived by many laymen as powerful, frightening and isolated figures, speaking a language and thinking thoughts accessible only to their colleagues. The noble scientist: Sir Francis Bacon's New Atlantis published in 1626 was the first literary work to portray the scientists in a positive light. In this work, Bacon attempted to revolutionise the image of of the scholar from one of mercenary pedant to that of an altruistic idealist, intent only on contributing to the common good. New Atlantis provided the motivation for the founding of the Royal Society of London in 1662. , from Paradigms Regained, Abacus 2001

Charles Quest-Ritson Francis Bacon was the most important philosopher of his day. His vision of enchantment, The Essay of Gardens, has had enormous effect upon the imagination of subsequent garden owners. He was a Renaissance man. He was interested in scientific philosophical and literary studies. The thinking behind the foundations of the Royal Society went much deeper. Bacon had certainly been a considerable influence. - The English Garden, Viking/Penguin 2001

Preface to Waller’s Poems (164.5).... of many wise and worthy persons of our times; as Sir Philip Sydney, Sir Fra. Bacon, Cardinal Perron, the ablest of his countrymen, and the former Pope who, they say, instead of the triple crown wore sometimes the poet’s ivy as an ornament perhaps of lesser weight and trouble. But Madam, these Nightingales sung only in the Spring, it was the diversion of their youth.

Percy Byshe Shelly His (Bacon's) language has a sweet and majectic rythm, which satisfies ths sense, no less than the almost superhuman wisdome of his philophy satisfies the intellect.

Percy Shelley, the poet Lord Bacon was a poet. His language has a sweet and majestic rhythm, which satisfies the sense, no less than the almost superhuman wisdom of his philosophy satisfies the intellect. It is a strain which distends and then bursts the circumference of the reader's mind and pours itself forth together with it into the universal element with which it has perpetual sympathy. He is the greatest philosopher-poet since Plato. --

Sir Karl Popper, philosopher Bacon made our world.

Samuel Jonson A Dictionary of the English language might be compiled from Bacon's works alone.- --

Frederich Nietzsche The critics can go to hell. We don't know half enough about Lord Bacon.-

Charles Darwin I worked upon the true principles of Baconian induction.--

Albert Schweitzer Francis Bacon drafted the programme of the modern world view.--

David Mallet, conversation he could assume the most different characters, and speak the language proper to each, with a facility which was perfectly natural.- Bacon biographer

R.J.W. Gentry,1948 The star of the first magnitude had set, and with him the constellation of his co workers. The great "deficiency" in English letters and language had been made good; his countrymen and the whole world had received, at his hands, a divine gift. The English Renaissance had seen its rise, it's zenith, and its setting in the life and labour of this supreme Englishman, Francis Bacon.---

Hazlitt The wisdom displayed in Shakespeare is equal in profoundness to the great Lord Bacon's Novum Organum. --

Carlyle There is an understanding manifested in the construction of Shakespeare's plays equal to that in Bacon's Novum Organum --

Will Durant, Surely the Essays must be numbered among the few books that deserve to be chewed and digested. Rarely shall you find so much meat, so admirably dressed and flavored, in so small a dish. Bacon abhors padding, and disdains to waste a word; he offers us infinite riches in a little phrase; each of these essays gives in a page or two the distilled subtlety of a master mind on a major issue of life. It is difficult to say whether the matter more excels; for here is language as supreme in prose as Shakespeare's is in verse. It is a style like sturdy Tacitus', compact yet polished; and indeed some of its conciseness is due to skillful adaptation of Latin idiom and phrase. But its wealth of metaphor is characteristically Elizabethan, and reflects the exuberance of the Renaissance; no man in English literature is so fertile in pregnant and pithy comparisons.-- The Story of Philosophy

Sir Walter Raleigh once spoke of him by way of comparison (whose judgment may well be trusted), "That the Earl of Salisbury was an excellent speaker, but no good penman; that the Earl of Northampton (the Lord Henry Howard) was an excellent penman, but no good speaker; but that Sir Francis Bacon was eminent in both."

The American Publishers, 1856 In many respects Bacon resembles his immortal contemporary, Shakespeare. Like Shakespeare, he enjoyed the most splendid reputation for genius and ability, in his lifetime; like him, he was comparatively undervalued and neglected for ages after his death, and like him, in the present refined and severely scrutinizing era, he has been tried in the hottest furnaces of criticism, and has come forth pure gold, whose weight, solidity, and brilliancy can never hereafter be for a moment doubted. It is said of Shakespeare, that his fertile genius exhausted the whole world of nature. As a poet, he undoubtedly has done this; and Lord Bacon, as a philosopher, has done the same.- Advertisement

Isaac D' Israeli This servant of posterity, as he prophetically called himself, sustained his mighty spirit with the confidence of his post -humous greatness . Ever were the times succeeding in his mind. He was, indeed, one of those men who, "build great mornings for the world." --

Abraham Cowley Bacon at last, a mighty man, arose Whom a wise king, and Nature, chose Lord Chancellor of both their Laws. Bacon, like Moses, led us forth at last, The barren Wilderness he past,
Did on the very Border stand, Of the blest Promise'd Land And from the Mountain top of his Exalted Wit,
Saw it himself, and shewed us it.--- , Fellow of the Royal Society, honoring Bacon as it's Founder

Richard Maurice Bucke It is claimed that Bacon was really two men(the self-conscious Bacon and the Cosmic Conscious Bacon); that the man seen by Bacon's contemporaries and in the prose works was the former, while the concealed man who produced the plays and "Sonnets" was the latter. The Cosmic-Conscious Bacon had the use of all the learning and of all the faculties of the self concsious Bacon, and along with these the vast spiritual insight and powers which go with possession of Cosmic Consciousness.--- from his book Cosmic Consciousness

Hiliard, If one could but paint his mind. -- The Elizabethan Court Painter

Henry Hallam He was the wisest , greatest of mankind....

Alexander Pope Lord Bacon was the greatest genius that England , or perhaps any other country ever produced.-----

The great glory of literature in this island, during the reign of James , was my Lord Bacon.---Hume

George Sandys The crown of all modern authors .---

Edmund Burke Genius the most profound, of literature the most extensive , of discovery the most penetrating , of observation of human life the most distinguished and refined. --

Addison He possessed all those extraordinary talents which were divided amongst the greatest authors of antiquity.--

Professor Fowler No other author can be compared with him, unless it be Shakespeare.--

Fowler His utterances are not infrequently marked with a grandeur and solemnity of tone, a majesty of diction, which renders it impossible to forget, and difficult even to criticize them....... There is no author, unless it be Shakespeare, who is so easily remembered, or so frequently quoted...... The terse and burning words issuing from the lips of an irresistible commander.----

Macaulay With great minuteness of observation, he had an amplitude of comprehension such as has never yet been vouchsafed to any human being...the largeness of his mind was all his own. We marvel at him as clowns on a fair-day marvel at a juggler.---

Macaulay The poetical faculty was powerful in Bacon's mind, but not, like his wit, so powerful as occasionally to unsurp the place of his reason and to tyrannize over the whole man. No imagination was ever at once so strong and so thoroughly subjugated.---

Macaulay He moved the intellects that move the world. -

Dean Church In temper , in honesty, in labour, in humility, in reverence, he was the most perfect example that the world has yet seen..... the duty and service of helping his Brethren to know as they had never yet learned to know.---

Francis Osborne He struck all men with an awful reverence. --

Peter Boener, his apot A memorable example to all of virtue, kindness, peaceableness, and patience. --

Mark Twain That is about the best play that Lord Bacon ever wrote.---- , after attending a Romeo & Juliet performance

Alexander Smith He seems to have written his Essays with the pen of Shakespeare.--

Alfred Dodd If our great poets are the Lords of Language Thou art indeed the King.--

Archbishop Tenison 1679 And those who have true skill in the works of the Lord Verulam, like great masters in painting , can tell by the design , the strength, the way of colouring, whether he was the author of this or the other piece though his name be not on it.-----

Archbishop Tenison And those who have true skill in the works of the Lord Verulam, like great masters in painting, can tell by the design, the strength, the way of colouring, whether he was the author of this or the other piece, though his name be not to it. Baconiana or Certaine Genuine Remains of Sir Francis Bacon (1679)

editors Francis Bacon, like the Duke in the play Measure for Measure, becomes a "developed" man, one who through his training in the Masonic and Chivalric Orders, sought not only to purify his own nature but to become a "living symbol" to others, striving and working for the good of his country, his monarch, and his own countrymen.-- Baconian Jottings Then And Now

Brian Vickers It is impossible not to admire the structure of Bacon's works. Outlines are clear and easily grasped, the argument proceeds firmly through each section, and each topic is covered with thoroughness and precision. There is in all the finished work, and even in some of the fragments, a strong sense of unity- the organic unity of a tree and its branches- which Coleridge perceived, and attributed partly to the unity of the subject and partly to 'the perpetual growth and evolution of the thoughts, one generating and explaining, and justifying, the place of another.... Francis Bacon and Renaissance Prose

Joseph Addison' I was infinitely pleased to find among the Works of this extraordinary Man a Prayer of his own composing, which for the elevation of Thought and Greatness of Expression, it seems rather the Devotion of an Angel than a Man. - s verdict in The Tatler 1621

Exit Shakespeare. --Bertram Theobald

Enter Francis Bacon. --Bertram Theobald

Quotes Supporting William Shakespeare

G. K. Chesterton (1874 - 1936) The souls most fed with Shakespeare's flame Still sat unconquered in a ring, Remembering him like anything. "The Shakespeare Memorial"

John Milton What needs my Shakespeare for his honour’d bones, Or sweetest Shakespear, Fancy's child, Warble his native wood-notes wild. "L'Allegro"

John Milton The labour of an age in piled stones, Or that his hallow’d relics should be hid
Under a star-y-pointing pyramid? Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, What need’st thou such weak witness of thy name? "Epitaph on Shakespeare"

John Milton ,And so sepulchered in such pomp dost lie, That kings for such a tomb would wish to die."Epitaph"

Horace Walpole (1717 - 1797) One of the greatest geniuses that ever existed, Shakespear, undoubtedly wanted taste."Letter to Wren, 1764"

Robert Graves Quote (1895 - 1985)The remarkable thing about Shakespeare is that he is really very good - in spite of all the people who say he is very good.

John Keats Quote (1795 - 1821), I have of late had the same thought - for things which I do half at Random are afterwards confirmed by my judgment in a dozen features of Propriety. Is it too daring to fancy Shakespeare this Presider? "Letter to B.R. Haydon, May 1817" (this a fascinating quote because Francis was one heart beat from the Throne. If allowed he would have been the Philosopher King described by Plato)- ed.

Thomas More (1779 - 1852),And one wild Shakespear, following Nature's lights, Is worth whole planets, filled with Stagyrites. "The Sceptic"

Laurence Olivier(1907 - 1989) Shakespeare - The nearest thing in incarnation to the eye of God.

Dame Ellen Terry (Wonderful women! Have you ever thought how much we all, and women especially, owe to Shakespear for his vindication of women in these fearless, high-spirited, resolute and intelligent heroines?1848 - 1928)

William Wordsworth (1770 - 1850) Scorn not the Sonnet; Critic, you have frowned, Mindless of its just honours; with this key Shake-speare unlocked his heart. "Miscellaneous Sonnets"

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806 - 1861), There Shakespeare, on whose forehead climb The crowns o’ the world; oh, eyes sublime With tears and laughter for all time! "A Vision of Poets"

Robert Browning (1812 - 1899), With this same key Shake-speare unlocked his heart' once more!
Did Shakespeare? If so, the less Shake-speare he! "House"

Thomas Carlyle (1795 - 1881) And yet, very literally, it is a priceless thing. "Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History"

Thomas Carlyle (1795 - 1881)If called to define Shakespeare's faculty, I should say superiority of intellect, and think I had included all under that. "Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History"

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772 - 1834) Our myriad-minded Shakespear."Biography. Chap. xv"

John Dryden (1631 - 1700), He was the man who of all modern, and perhaps ancient poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul. "Essay of Dramatic Poesy"(this quote is interesting because Francis Bacon wrote The Art of English Posey ascribed to Putnam)

John Dryden He is the very Janus of poets; he wears almost everywhere two faces; and you have scarce begun to admire the one, ere you despise the other. "Essay on Dramatic Poetry of the Last Age"

John Dryden But Shakespeare’s magic could not copied be;
Within that circle none durst walk but he. "Essay of Dramatic Poesy"

John Dryden He was naturally learned; he needed not the spectacles of books to read nature. He looked inwards, and found her there. "Essay of Dramatic Poesy"

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882), I am the owner of the sphere Of the seven stars and the solar year,(Interestingly Emerson was pro Bacon)

Ralph Waldo Emerson Of Caesar's hand, and Plato's brain Of Lord Christ's heart, and Shakespeare's strain. "The Absorbing Soul"

Ralph Waldo Emerson Nor sequent centuries could hit Orbit and sum of Shakespeare’s wit.
"May-Day and Other Pieces" (Emerson did not believe a man named Shakespeare wrote the plays)-ed

Ralph Waldo Emerson When Shakespeare is charged with debts to his authors, Landor replies, “Yet he was more original than his originals. He breathed upon dead bodies and brought them into life.”
"Letters and Social Aims"

Ralph Waldo Emerson,1835 He explores every region...with the waste and the uncultivated tracts and predicts departments of literature that did not then exist. He would put his Atlantean hands to heave the whole globe of the sciences from their rest, expose all the gulfs and continents of error, and with creative hand remodel and reform the whole.----

D. H. Lawrence (1885 - 1930)If we wish to know the force of human genius we should read Shakespeare. If we wish to see the insignificance of human learning, we may study his commentators. -

D. H. Lawrence (1885 - 1930) When I read Shakespeare I am struck with wonder That such trivial people should muse and thunder In such lovely language.

Coke The Advancement of Learning , a work none but a fool would have written.----- , great rival and lifelong foe

Undecided

James Barrie "I know not, sir, whether Bacon wrote the works of Shakespeare, but if he did not it seems to me that he missed the opportunity of his life." (in a pole this quote would be an undecided?)-ed

Aubrey -- a contemporary writer "All who were great and good loved and honored him......His Lordship was a good poet, but concealed, as appears by his letters."-- (Aubry was not only but a biographer who created the Shakespeare myth in the beginning)-ed

Martin Pares There is a very good psychological reason why orthodox scholarship is so concerned to repudiate any suggestion of Lord Bacon's connection with Shake-speare. This is to protect the Bard (whom all admire, whoever he was) from the stigma of Lord Bacon's supposed corruption, which they in their ignorance take for granted.- (undecided)-ed










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