EDITED BY JOHN MORLEY.
| JOHNSON | Leslie Stephen. | LOCKE | Thomas Fowler. |
| GIBBON | J.C. Morison. | WORDSWORTH | F. Myers. |
| SCOTT | R.H. Hutton. | DRYDEN | G. Saintsbury. |
| SHELLEY | J.A. Symonds. | LANDOR | Sidney Colvin. |
| HUME | T.H. Huxley. | DE QUINCEY | David Masson. |
| GOLDSMITH | William Black. | LAMB | Alfred Ainger. |
| DEFOE | William Minto. | BENTLEY | R.C. Jebb. |
| BURNS | J.C. Shairp. | DICKENS | A.W. Ward. |
| SPENSER | R.W. Church. | GRAY | E.W. Gosse. |
| THACKERAY | Anthony Trollope. | SWIFT | Leslie Stephen. |
| BURKE | John Morley. | STERNE | H.D. Traill. |
| MILTON | Mark Pattison. | MACAULAY | J. Cotter Morison. |
| HAWTHORNE | Henry James, Jr. | FIELDING | Austin Dobson. |
| SOUTHEY | E. Dowden. | SHERIDAN | Mrs. Oliphant |
| CHAUCER | A.W. Ward. | ADDISON | W.J. Courthope. |
| BUNYAN | J.A. Froude. | BACON | R.W. Church. |
| COWPER | Goldwin Smith. | COLERIDGE | H.D. Traill. |
| POPE | Leslie Stephen. | SIR PHILIP SIDNEY | J.A. Symonds. |
| BYRON | John Nichol. | KEATS | Sidney Colvin. |
12mo, Cloth, 75 cents per volume.
Other volumes in preparation.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
Any of the above works will be sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the United States or Canada, on receipt of the price.
PREFACE.
In preparing this sketch it is needless to say how deeply I am indebted to Mr. Spedding and Mr. Ellis, the last editors of Bacon's writings, the very able and painstaking commentators, the one on Bacon's life, the other on his philosophy. It is impossible to overstate the affectionate care and high intelligence and honesty with which Mr. Spedding has brought together and arranged the materials for an estimate of Bacon's character. In the result, in spite of the force and ingenuity of much of his pleading, I find myself most reluctantly obliged to differ from him; it seems to me to be a case where the French saying, cited by Bacon in one of his commonplace books, holds good—"Par trop se débattre, la vérité se perd."[1]