Bacon's Essays, and Wisdom of the Ancients

83 More generally known as “The Gunpowder Plot.”

84 Isa. xiv. 14.

85 Allusion is made to the “caduceus,” with which Mercury, the messenger of the Gods, summoned the souls of the departed to the infernal regions.

86 “The wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.”—James i. 20.

87 He alludes to Cosmo de Medici, or Cosmo I., chief of the Republic of Florence, the encourager of literature and the fine arts.

88 Job ii. 10.—“Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?”

89 By “public revenges,” he means punishment awarded by the state with the sanction of the laws.

90 He alludes to the retribution dealt by Augustus and Anthony to the murderers of Julius Cæsar. It is related by ancient historians, as a singular fact, that not one of them died a natural death.

91 Henry III. of France was assassinated in 1599, by Jacques Clement, a Jacobin monk, in the frenzy of fanaticism. Although Clement justly suffered punishment, the end of this bloodthirsty and bigoted tyrant may be justly deemed a retribution dealt by the hand of an offended Providence; so truly does the Poet say:—

“neque enim lex æquior ulla

Quam necis artifices arte perire suâ.”

92 Sen. Ad Lucil. 66.

93 Ibid. 53.

94 Stesichorus, Apollodorus, and others. Lord Bacon makes a similar reference to this myth in his treatise “On the Wisdom of the Ancients.” “It is added with great elegance, to console and strengthen the minds of men, that this mighty hero (Hercules) sailed in a cup or ‘urceus,’ in order that they may not too much fear and allege the narrowness of their nature and its frailty; as if it were not capable of such fortitude and constancy; of which very thing Seneca argued well, when he said, ‘It is a great thing to have at the same time the frailty of a man, and the security of a God.’”

95 Funereal airs. It must be remembered that many of the Psalms of David were written by him when persecuted by Saul, as also in the tribulation caused by the wicked conduct of his son Absalom. Some of them, too, though called “The Psalms of David,” were really composed by the Jews in their captivity at Babylon; as, for instance, the 137th Psalm, which so beautifully commences, “By the waters of Babylon there we sat down.” One of them is supposed to be the composition of Moses.

96 This fine passage, beginning at “Prosperity is the blessing,” which was not published till 1625, twenty-eight years after the first Essays, has been quoted by Macaulay, with considerable justice, as a proof that the writer’s fancy did not decay with the advance of old age, and that his style in his later years became richer and softer. The learned critic contrasts this passage with the terse style of the Essay of Studies (Essay 50), which was published in 1597.

97 Tac. Ann. v. 1.

98 Tac. Hist. ii. 76.

99 A word now unused, signifying the “traits,” or “features.”

100 A truth.—A. L. II. xxiii. 14.

101 Proverbs x. 1: “A wise son maketh a glad father, but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother.”

102 Petted—spoiled.

103 This word seems here to mean “a plan,” or “method,” as proved by its results.

104 Ends in.

105 There is considerable justice in this remark. Children should be taught to do what is right for its own sake, and because it is their duty to do so, and not that they may have the selfish gratification of obtaining the reward which their companions have failed to secure, and of being led to think themselves superior to their companions. When launched upon the world, emulation will be quite sufficiently forced upon them by stern necessity.

106 “Select that course of life which is the most advantageous; habit will soon render it pleasant and easily endured.”

107 His meaning is, that if clergymen have the expenses of a family to support, they will hardly find means for the exercise of benevolence toward their parishioners.

108 “He preferred his aged wife Penelope to immortality.” This was when Ulysses was entreated by the goddess Calypso to give up all thoughts of returning to Ithaca, and to remain with her in the enjoyment of immortality.—Plut. Gryll. 1.

109 “May have a pretext,” or “excuse.”

110 Thales, Vide Diog. Laert. i. 26.

111 So prevalent in ancient times was the notion of the injurious effects of the eye of envy, that, in common parlance, the Romans generally used the word “præfiscini,”—“without risk of enchantment,” or “fascination,” when they spoke in high terms of themselves. They supposed that they thereby averted the effects of enchantment produced by the evil eye of any envious person who might at that moment possibly be looking upon them. Lord Bacon probably here alludes to St. Mark vii. 21, 22: “Out of the heart of men proceedeth—deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye.” Solomon also speaks of the evil eye, Prov. xxiii. 6, and xxviii. 22.

112 To be even with him.

113 “There is no person a busybody, but what he is ill-natured too.” This passage is from the Stichus of Plautus.

114 Narses superseded Belisarius in the command of the armies of Italy, by the orders of the Emperor Justinian. He defeated Totila, the king of the Goths (who had taken Rome), in a decisive engagement, in which the latter was slain. He governed Italy with consummate ability for thirteen years, when he was ungratefully recalled by Justin the Second, the successor of Justinian.

115 Tamerlane, or Timour, was a native of Samarcand, of which territory he was elected emperor. He overran Persia, Georgia, Hindostan, and captured Bajazet, the valiant Sultan of the Turks, at the battle of Angora, 1402, whom he is said to have inclosed in a cage of iron. His conquests extended from the Irtish and Volga to the Persian Gulf, and from the Ganges to the Grecian Archipelago. While preparing for the invasion of China, he died, in the 70th year of his age, A. D. 1405. He was tall and corpulent in person, but was maimed in one hand, and lame on the right side.

116 Spartian Vit. Adrian, 15.

117 Comes under the observation.

118 “By a leap,” i. e. over the heads of others.

119 “How vast the evils we endure.”

120 He probably alludes to the custom of the Athenians, who frequently ostracized or banished by vote their public men, lest they should become too powerful.