of existence we are involuntarily influencing others, and unconsciously being influenced by others.

A storm of political and religious agitation preceded the birth of Bacon, and its clouds, though broken, were not scattered until the last of the Stuarts made the final and fruitless attempt to solve with arms the problem which the Tudors had devised.

After Henry the Eighth had dragged the Pope from the spiritual throne of England, and created a very good new church, which he supplied with a very indifferent head, he was occupied in efforts to completely disestablish one hierarchy and firmly establish another, to silence one class of consciences by tests that were martyrdom, and reconcile another with bribes that were bishoprics. His death handed over country and church to a boy-successor, who soon followed his father to that bourn where all kings go crownless. But not until he had out-Henried Henry in his new departure, and, under the protectorship of Somerset and Warwick, substituted sectarian fanaticism for his father's Statecraft, and "reformed" his people almost into rebels and revolutionists.

Queen Mary signalized her succession to the throne by undoing all that her brother had done, and as vigorously and more viciously attempting to force upon the body of the people one faith, one baptism, one sacrament. But she was fortunately summoned to join her father and brother before she had accomplished her mission, and at the very stage when she had prepared England to receive Elizabeth as the heir to Henry the Eighth's throne and Henry the Eighth's policy.

The new church received new life under a ruler who, to the courage of a Boadicea, added the cunning of a

Machiavelli. Unlike her brother and sister, she was conservative; and her task was not only to soothe, or sacrifice, as a last alternative, the Catholics,—it was to cool the ardor of reformers, and to deal with troublesome spirits, who, while supporting secession from the Church of Rome, refused adhesion to that of England.

With unparalleled skill she nationalized every warring sect; so that they who, under Edward and Mary, were ready to burn each other at the stake, stood shoulder to shoulder upon the decks of Drake's fleet, or the plain of Tilbury, to defend Elizabeth and England from foreign foes. The danger past, they renewed their bickerings, and she resumed her rôle of moderator.

Throughout her reign she was confronted by fears of Spanish invasions, papal plots, Irish rebellions, church controversies. And the task of her life was to evoke inward patriotism, command outward conformity, and to establish England upon a foundation which nothing could have sapped but the folly of her successor. In this object she was seconded by councillors whom the times begot for the times. These she used and abused. For she possessed, as Macaulay says of Louis XIV., the "two talents invaluable to a prince,the talent of choosing her servants well, and the talent of appropriating to herself the chief part of the credit of their acts."

Of the literature which met the subject of this sketch upon the threshold of life, little now can be said than that it was very meagre. The spirit of the age favored the pen dedicated to theological controversy. Although the Queen might reward a Spenserian sonnet, her chief adviser scorned the "old song," and begrudged the reward to the sweet singer. Although Elizabeth might

indulge in a masque of Ben Jonson's, or command Burbage to produce before Her Majesty a play of Will Shakspeare, a philippic of Demosthenes, or the "Phædon" of Plato, was alone worthy of the scholarly consideration of the pupil of Roger Ascham, or a Latin argument in favor of her politico-spiritual supremacy, written by some courtly theologian, pliant relic of the last reign, whom Mary would have made a saint if his prudence had not postponed the canonization of stake and fagot.

Education was limited to the few, and that of the most cultured in degree. Greece and Rome reigned supreme; or if the ancients were neglected, not England but Italy, that "store-house of divine rites," as it was then called, supplied the place of Athenian orator and Latin poet.

The mass of English mothers were instructed in the practical duties of the household only.

The average husband found the average wife all that his fancy painted her, if she were

"Versed in the arts

Of pies, puddings and tarts."

When Sir Peter, in one of his delightful outbursts of bad temper, contrasts Lady Teazle's country existence with her town life, she replies:

"Yes, I recollect it very well. My daily occupations were to overlook the dairy, superintend the poultry, make abstracts from the family receipt book, and comb my Aunt Deborah's lap-dog. My evening's employments were to draw patterns for ruffles which I had no material to make up, play at Pope Joan with the curate, read a sermon to my Aunt Deborah, and perhaps be stuck up at an old spinet, to play my father to sleep, after a fox-chase."

Unintellectual as these occupations were, they were in advance of those of the average Elizabethan maid and mother.

But, among the exceptions was Lady Bacon, mother of Francis. She was a daughter of the learned tutor of Edward VI., Sir Anthony Cooke, of whom it was said, "Contemplation was his soul, privacy his life, and discourse his element; business was his purgatory, and publicity his torment." Which reveals a scholarly gentleman, revelling in retirement, reading, and such conversations as enlivened Cicero's retreat to his Tusculan villa.

Sir Anthony first gave his five daughters a good education, and then provided them with good husbands, thus performing the whole duty of man as a father. One daughter married William Cecil, who, as Lord Burghley, was Elizabeth's chief adviser through many years. Lady Anne married Sir Nicholas Bacon, who was the Queen's Lord Keeper.

Lady Bacon was one of the exceptionally learned women of the day. She was somewhat distinguished for her Italian and Latin translations, took a deep interest in theological discussions, was tinctured with Calvinism, and was both an imperious and an affectionate mother. Sir Nicholas comes to us through the channel of biography as a sound lawyer, tiresome orator, honest judge and faithful subject. Their second and favorite son was Francis Bacon, the subject of this sketch, who was born on the 22d day of January, A. D. 1561, at York House, his father's London residence. The great philosopher came into the world and went out of it as all mortals do,— his first cry a protest against living, his last moan a protest against

dying. But to think of him as an ordinary child is difficult; for, before reaching his teens, he indulged in investigations into the laws of sound and the mysteries of animal magnetism.* And when the Queen toyed with his curly locks and asked his age, he replied, with the easy sycophancy of a courtier, "Two years younger than your Majesty's most happy reign."

Brilliant minds are said to derive their gifts from the mother. What Lady Bacon may have contributed she cultivated. Her son's delicate constitution consigned him to her care and companionship. Aided by a private tutor, she superintended his education. His studies were probably confined to Greek, Latin, French and Italian literature. He and his contemporary, Shakspeare, were to furnish the two pillars upon which the literary fame of the Elizabethan period rests. The first twelve years of his life were spent thus at home; but in an atmosphere of politics, in the company of distinguished men; and as persons of state discussed. affairs of state, the precocious boy stood by, probably drinking in all that was said, nursing the seed of an ambition that was to color his after-life.

In his thirteenth year he entered Cambridge, where he remained about three years. The "New Learning"

*In the 10th century of the "Sylvia," he alludes to this, in connection with a juggler, whom he probably met in the servants' hall, practising on their credulity, who would tell them which of a pack of cards they thought. Bacon says he related the incident to "a man that was curious and vain enough in these things. This pretended learned told me it was a mistaking in me; for, said he, it was not the knowledge of the man's thought (for that is proper to God), but it was enforcing a thought upon him, and binding his imagination by stronger, that he could think no other card."