Well, sit you out: go home, Berowne: adue."
To which Berowne replies:—
No, my good lord; I have sworn to stay with you."
Achitob was a visitor at the Academie in France. There are other points of resemblance, but sufficient has been said to warrant consideration of the suggestion that the French "Academie" contains the serious studies of the four young men whose experiences form the subject of the play.
The parallels between passages in the Shakespeare plays and the French "Academie" are numerous, but they form no part of the present contention.
One of these may, however, be mentioned. In the third Tome the following passage occurs[11]:—
Psal. xix.: "It is not without cause that the Prophet said (The heavens declare the glory of God, and the earth sheweth the workes of his handes) For thereby he evidently teacheth, as with the finger even to our eies, the great and admirable providence of God their Creator; even as if the heavens should speake to anyone. In another place it is written (Eccles. xliii.): (This high ornament, this cleere firmament, the beauty of the heaven so glorious to behold, tis a thing full of Majesty)."
On turning to the revised version of the Bible it will be found that the first verse is thus translated: "The pride of the height, the cleare firmament the beauty of heaven with his glorious shew." The rendering of the text in "The French Academy" is strongly suggestive of Hamlet's famous soliloquy. "This most excellent canopy, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fritted with golden fire, why it appears to me no other than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours." The author has forsaken the common-place rendering of the Apocrypha, and has adopted the same declamatory style which Shakespeare uses. It is strongly reminiscent of Hamlet's famous speech, Act II., scene ii.
Only one of the Shakespeare commentators makes any reference to the work. The Rev. Joseph Hunter, writing in 1844, points out that the dramatist in "As You Like It," describing the seven ages of man, follows the division made in the chapter on "The Ages of Man" in the "Academie."[12]
The suggestion now made is that the French "Academie" was written by Bacon, who is represented in the dialogues as Achitob—the first part when he was about 18 years of age, that he continued it until, in 1618, the complete work was published. In the dedication the author describes himself as a youth of immature experience, but the contents bear evidence of a wide knowledge of classical authors and their works, a close acquaintance with the ancient philosophies, and a store of general information which it would be impossible for any ordinary youth of such an age to possess. But was not the boy who at 15 years of age left Cambridge disagreeing with the teaching there of Aristotle's philosophy, and whose mental qualities and acquirements provoked as "the natural ejaculation of the artist's emotion" the significant words, "Si tabula daretur digna animum mallem," altogether abnormal?