old books, and the truth of some of them was questioned. Then came the Reformation, when the good news was spread abroad that God loved the world, and had given His Son that men might not perish, but have everlasting life.

This better knowledge of God gave men courage in seeking to know His works, and love cast out the old fear of Nature and its processes. The world was now prepared to receive the teaching of a new philosopher, who was to show men how they must enter the kingdom of Nature humbly and patiently, learning by careful observation and experiment to understand its wonders, and to use its powers for the help and comfort of mankind.

He was the son

This philosopher was Francis Bacon. of Queen Elizabeth's Lord Keeper, and was born at York House, in the Strand, on the 22nd of January, 1561. As a boy he was grave and studious, so much so that Queen Elizabeth used to call him her "little Lord Keeper," and she often liked to puzzle him with questions. At twelve years old he went to Trinity College, Cambridge. A great part of the training at the universities consisted at that time of the teaching of logic according to Aristotle's method. Under this system the time of the students was taken up in defending, by a process of reasoning, certain propositions and definitions; but Bacon saw that while they were learning how to make these assertions appear true, they were taking no real means of ascertaining their truth. He felt that the system did not teach them how to distinguish the true from the false, nor could they in its practice gain any new knowledge. He left college, therefore, persuaded that some new plan of study was needed by which men might be trained to find out by real tests what was true, rather than to defend what might be false. This idea laid strong hold of Bacon, and became the starting-point of his philosophy.

On leaving college, Bacon went to France for two years. When he returned, in 1579, his father was dead, and it was

necessary for him to earn a living in some more profitable way than by maturing his idea of how to gain new knowledge. He entered Gray's Inn, and in 1582 was called to the Bar. He found time, however, to set forth the first sketch of his idea in a Latin tract. He obtained a seat in Parliament, and took part in the Mar-prelate controversy, of which we have already spoken; but Bacon's position in relation to these disputes was that of moderator, and not of partisan.

Meantime Bacon worked at his profession, and made attempts, through the interest of the Earl of Essex with the queen, to get appointed Attorney-General; but the post was given to Sir Edward Coke. He also tried to gain in marriage a rich young widow, Lady Hatton, but here again Sir Edward Coke was his successful rival.

We must keep in mind that throughout his life Bacon's great desire was to devote his time to the working out of his scheme of philosophy-that he looked upon the law, and everything else by which money could be made, as second to this great object. He had dreams of a day to come, when he might have gained money enough to retire to Cambridge, with two or three students like-minded with himself, and there study Nature, and teach others how to learn its secrets. This was the one hope and prayer of his life, and he looked to it so strongly as the highest good that he became at last blinded to the means by which he sought to bring it about. His mind dwelt constantly on the perfecting of his system of philosophy, and on how he should be able to give it to the world; and yet, having no private property, he had to make money by a profession which he looked down upon as an insignificant employment compared with the service he desired to render to the world by his philosophy. This low view of his work separated it from all his nobler aspirations and convictions, so that he did not bring his conscience to bear upon it; and

the question of what was right or wrong in relation to it seems scarcely to have entered his mind.

While living in a world in which false principles were at work, he seems to have thought that in the world he must use the means others did for self-advancement and gaining money. He lived a kind of double life as a philosopher and a lawyer. As a philosopher he was full of noble aspirations; as a lawyer he was dishonest. As a philosopher he longed to serve mankind, and to help in removing many of the ills of human life; as a lawyer he regarded his friends too much as aids to his own advancement, and felt no remorse in forsaking them when it suited his purpose.

It was not till after the death of Elizabeth that Bacon obtained any great advancement. In the reign of James I. he was knighted, was made Solicitor-General, then AttorneyGeneral, and finally Lord Chancellor, with the title first of Lord Verulam, and afterwards of Viscount St. Albans.

The separation in Bacon's life of principles of integrity from the every-day world in which he dwelt, and the common work of it, caused his fall. It was discovered that in his office as Lord Chancellor he was enriching himself by taking bribes from those persons who appealed to him for justice. He was charged with this crime before Parliament, and at once acknowledged it. Then he was sentenced to pay a fine of £40,000, to be imprisoned in the Tower, to be deprived of all his offices, and to be declared incapable of ever holding any appointment again. The only thing he attempted to say in his defence shows how he had acted on the false principle, that in the world one must do as the world does-"I was the justest judge that was in England these fifty years; but it was the justest censure in Parliament that was these two hundred years."

The king ordered Bacon's immediate release from the Tower; and he spent the rest of his life in study and writing. Five years afterwards, on the 9th of April, he died.

During the reign of Elizabeth, Bacon published a little book, which he called "Essays, or Counsels Civil and Moral." He uses the word essay in the sense of a testing or weighing of things, so as to prove their real value. These essays were originally ten in number, but were afterwards increased to fifty-eight. They are careful studies of the due value of a number of things belonging to the mind of man and his life in this world-such as "Truth," "Adversity," "Studies," "Friendship," "Travel," "Expence," "Discourse," "Great Place," "Plantations," "Buildings," "Gardens," &c., &c. In these essays of the things of human character and life, Bacon was using the same principle of testing or trying the nature of things, as he was endeavouring to introduce for the purpose of enlarging the knowledge of Nature, and making it serviceable to man. Bacon's plan for teaching his system of philosophy was to write a series of works, all to be comprehended under the name of "Instauratio Magna," or the Great Building-up. There were to be six books:(1) The Advancement of Learning; (2) The "Novum Organum," or the New Instrument for getting Knowledge; (3) "The Experimental History of Nature;" (4) The "Scala Intellectus," or the Arrangement of Experiment into Science ; (5) The Anticipations of what Experiment may Teach; (6) "Active Science, or the Application of Science to the Uses of Man." The chief features in Bacon's philosophy were his more correct view of the relation of Nature to man; and his method for enlarging man's knowledge of Nature. The old fear of Nature, as the enemy of man, had given way in some measure before a better knowledge of God; but Bacon now distinctly taught that Nature is a kingdom, given by God to man, rich in treasures for his help and comfort. To enter the kingdom of Nature and subdue it, three things were necessary-first, obedience to its laws; second, to come to Nature as a child to be taught; third, to use experiment in order to find out and test assertions,

before receiving them as truth. This last Bacon called his new organon, or instrument, in distinction from the old organon, or instrument used by Aristotle for proving truth. Aristotle's system accepted certain general statements as facts, and without testing the truth of these, proceeded to draw conclusions from them. If the original propositions were always true, then the knowledge implied in them might be extended to particulars; but it must be first proved that the general statements were universally and at all times correct. Thus we may assert, as a general proposition, "all metals are solid;" then of any particular metal, such as iron, we may reason, “all metals are solid; iron is a metal, therefore iron is solid." Thus we seem to arrive by reasoning at the knowledge that iron is solid, though we may never have seen a piece of iron. Aristotle's method is called deduction, because from a general statement we deduce a particular conclusion.

But Bacon would say: there may be metals in the earth which are not solid; or there may be conditions under which metals, solid at one time, are liquid at another. Experiment must then be used, and different kinds of metals must be procured, and subjected to the test of different conditions. By experimenting on them in this way, we should arrive at the knowledge that at certain degrees of heat, all metals become liquid; and we might also discover that one metal-quicksilver-is liquid, even at a very moderate degree of heat. The knowledge of the effects of heat would be thus enlarged; and out of all the particular instances where we had tried its effects on metals, we make at last the general statement—at certain degrees of heat all metals become liquid. This process is called induction, because, from a number of particular cases, we are led to form a general statement. We must not suppose, however, that Bacon's method does away with Aristotle's. The mistake made before Bacon's time was that general state