That topic is the relation between Bacon and Essex. Of the splendid Essay of Lord Macaulay’s, which is still ringing in the ears of most English readers, no part was written with more force, or was more damaging to the character of Bacon, than that which treated of his conduct to the Earl of Essex. Many who could have forgiven the peccant Chancellor for being too ready to accept whatever was offered to him in the shape of present or gratuity, could not pardon the cold-blooded and faithless friend. Now it is precisely on this subject that Mr Spedding presents us with materials for forming a very different judgment from that which the eloquent pages of Macaulay had betrayed us into. Up to the period when Essex disappears from the scene, these two volumes give us their clear guidance. Of that guidance we very gladly avail ourselves.
We would premise that it is not our purpose, or endeavour, to defend Bacon at all points—to robe our Chancellor in spotless ermine; neither do we think that the result of renewed investigation is a clear verdict of “Not Guilty” on all the charges that have been brought against him. There is much in Macaulay’s estimate both of the character and the philosophy of Bacon with which we cordially agree. It happens frequently with great historic names that there is an oscillation of public opinion; the too harsh verdict of one writer, or one age, is followed by a verdict as much too lenient. Such oscillation seems to have lately taken place with regard to Bacon, and the disposition is at present to find nothing blameworthy in him. This disposition we do not share. We think that no good is done, but rather harm, when enthusiasm for the brilliant achievements of any man, whether in a career of war, or statesmanship, or letters, induces us to shut our eyes to his moral defects. For in these cases we do not, and cannot, exactly shut our eyes: we do something worse; we try to see that vices are not vices. We lower our standard, that we may pass no unfavourable judgment. It is an ill lesson that teaches us to forgive the overbearing despotism of a great soldier or great minister, or the rascality of a great wit; to see no injustice in a Napoleon, and no villany in a Sheridan. We believe that the censure of Lord Macaulay is too severe, but it is censure and not praise which the character of Bacon provokes. We all know that the fervid eloquence, or rather the ardent temperament, of our more than English Livy, led him into manifest exaggerations; but in general, we should say that his drawing is true to nature, except that it had this too swelling outline. His exaggerations were like those of Michael Angelo, who drew muscles disproportionately large, but who never drew a muscle where none existed. A sterling good sense presided over the verdicts of Macaulay—over the yes or no; but the verdict once determined, the impassioned orator ran the risk of falsifying it by the ruthless, unmitigated energy with which it was delivered.
We should not say of Bacon either that he was the “greatest” or the “meanest” of mankind. But as certainly as he was great in his intellectual attributes, so certainly was he not great in his moral character. Here he lacked elevation. He could tolerate artifice, and dissimulation, and gross flattery. If the crime of Essex justified him, as we are inclined to think it did, in breaking entirely with that nobleman, and treating him as an enemy to the State, what are we to say of the strain of advice which he habitually gives to Essex while the two are yet in perfect amity? A mere personal ambition, to be obtained by the petty arts of the courtier, is all that he prompts his friend to aspire after. Win the Queen—honestly, if possible; but, at all events, win the Queen! This is the burden of his counsel. Bacon was great in his intellectual speculations; he was mean in the conduct of life. The antithesis still remains to us in a modified form. All his life is a continual suing for place; and what he obtained by flattery and subservience, he lost by some poor cupidity.
Bacon was a philosopher from his youth, but from his youth to his old age he was also a lover of social distinctions, and of a sumptuous mode of life. If he had the desire to take all human knowledge for his province, and to extend his name and his good influence into future ages, if he desired to be a reformer even of philosophy itself, he had also other desires of a much more commonplace description; not evil in themselves—good perhaps in themselves—but not subordinated to the high morality which might have been expected from one so wise. But if in his rise to power he showed too much servility—if, when in the seat of power, he showed too much cupidity,—surely no one ever fell from greatness, no one was ever struck down from the seat of power, for so slight a measure of criminality. No historic personage can be mentioned amongst us, on whom so severe a punishment, so deep a disgrace, was inflicted for a fault so little heinous.
The first great error which Bacon committed, the consequence of which pursued him all his life, was the running into debt. It was a life-long fault. It was his fault, not his misfortune. He received less, we know, from his father than he might reasonably have expected, less than his brothers had received, but no biographer has ventured to call him poor—so poor that he could not have held his ground as a student of the law without incurring debt. Whether it was mere carelessness and imprudence, or a wilful spending “according to his hopes, not his possessions,” we find him very early in debt; and as years advance we find the debts, of course, more and more onerous. No one knew better than Bacon that he who owes has to borrow, and that he who borrows will have, in some form, to beg, to sue—will be tempted to sordid actions—will lose his independence, his upright attitude amongst men. There is no greater slavery than debt. It bred in Bacon that “itching palm,” and that perpetual suing, which disgrace his career.
He begins to sue from his very first entry into life. He puts his trust in the Lord Treasurer. And what is remarkable, the very nature of the first suit he makes is unknown. It was some office, not of a legal character, as we should conjecture. Writing to Walsingham about it, he says that the delay in answering it “hinders me from taking a course of practice which, by the leave of God, if her Majesty like not of my suit, I must and will follow: not for any necessity of estate, but for my credit sake, which I know by living out of action will wear.” At this date, 25th August 1585, he does not plead absolute inability to live on his private fortune. Subsequently, when his debts have increased, he writes upon this subject in a very different strain. He is embarrassed by usurers; he is arrested; debt comes upon him, as he says, like an armed man.
Of the earliest years of Bacon few memorials remain. But Mr Spedding brings together two conspicuous facts. The first is, that Bacon, at the age of fifteen, conceives his project of a reformation in philosophy; and the second is, that immediately on leaving college he accompanies Sir Amias Paulet on his embassy to France. Thus philosophy and diplomacy, speculation and state-craft, study and the world, take at once joint possession of Francis Bacon.
Of the first of these facts, and the most important in his life, Mr Spedding speaks in a passage of much eloquence, glowing and chastened withal:—
“That the thought first occurred to him during his residence at Cambridge, therefore before he had completed his fifteenth year, we know upon the best authority—his own statement to Dr Rawley. I believe it ought to be regarded as the most important event of his life—the event which had a greater influence than any other upon his character and future course. From that moment there was awakened within his breast the appetite which cannot be satiated, and the passion which cannot commit excess. From that moment he had a vocation which employed and stimulated all the energies of his mind, gave a value to every vacant interval of time, an interest and significance to every random thought and casual accession of knowledge—an object to live for as wide as humanity, as immortal as the human race—an idea to live in vast and lofty enough to fill the soul for ever with religious and heroic aspirations. From that moment, though still subject to interruptions, disappointments, errors, and regrets, he could never be without either work or hope or consolation.”
But this young philosopher is son of Sir Nicholas Bacon, the late Lord Chancellor; the Queen has laid her hand upon his head while yet a boy, and called him her young Lord Keeper; he is nephew to the Prime Minister; he dreams of courts, of place, of power. He must unite his lofty speculations with the great affairs of State; he must survey human knowledge from the high places of society. He enters Gray’s Inn, is a student of the law, and his heart aches after office and promotion.