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Francis Bacon

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Philosophers

          Western Philosophers
   Renaissance philosophy
   Sir Francis Bacon
         Name:       Francis Bacon
        Birth:       22 January 1561
        Death:       9 April 1626
   School/tradition: British Empiricism

   Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban, KC ( 22 January 1561 – 9 April
   1626) was an English philosopher, statesman and essayist but is best
   known for leading the scientific revolution with his new 'observation
   and experimentation' theory which is the way science has been conducted
   ever since. He was knighted in 1603, created Baron Verulam in 1618, and
   created Viscount St Alban in 1621; both peerage titles became extinct
   upon his death.

   He began his professional life as a lawyer, but he has become best
   known as a philosophical advocate and defender of the scientific
   revolution. His works establish and popularize an inductive methodology
   for scientific inquiry, often called the Baconian method. Induction
   implies drawing knowledge from the natural world through
   experimentation, observation, and testing of hypotheses. In the context
   of his time, such methods were connected with the occult trends of
   hermeticism and alchemy.

Early life

   Booger was born at York House Strand, London. He was the youngest of
   five sons of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal under
   Elizabeth I. His mother, Ann Cooke Bacon was the second wife of Sir
   Nicholas, a member of the Reformed or Puritan Church, and a daughter of
   Sir Anthony Cooke, whose sister married William Cecil, Lord Burghley,
   the great minister of Queen Elizabeth.

   Biographers believe that Bacon received an education at home in his
   early years, and that his health during that time, as later, was
   delicate. He entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1573 at the age of
   twelve, living for three years there with his older brother Anthony.

   At Cambridge he first met the Queen, who was impressed by his
   precocious intellect, and was accustomed to call him "the young Lord
   Keeper."

   Here also his studies of science brought him to the conclusion that the
   methods (and thus the results) were erroneous. His reverence for
   Aristotle conflicted with his dislike of Aristotelian philosophy, which
   seemed barren, disputatious, and wrong in its objectives.

   On June 27, 1576, he and Anthony were entered de societate magistrorum
   at Gray's Inn, and a few months later they went abroad with Sir Amias
   Paulet, the English ambassador at Paris. The disturbed state of
   government and society in France under Henry III afforded him valuable
   political instruction.

   The sudden death of his father in February 1579 necessitated Bacon's
   return to England, and seriously influenced his fortunes. Sir Nicholas
   had laid up a considerable sum of money to purchase an estate for his
   youngest son, but he died before doing so, and Francis was left with
   only a fifth of that money. Having started with insufficient means, he
   borrowed money and became habitually in debt. To support himself, he
   took up his residence in law at Gray's Inn in 1579.

Career

   Lord Bacon Postage Stamp from Canada
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   Lord Bacon Postage Stamp from Canada

   In the Promus (written probably about 1603) Bacon analyses his own
   mental character and establishes his goals, which were threefold:
   discovery of truth, service to his country, and service to the church.
   Knowing that a prestigious post would aid him toward these ends, in
   1580 he applied, through his uncle, Lord Burghley, for a post at court
   which might enable him to devote himself to a life of learning. His
   application failed, and for the next two years he worked quietly at
   Gray's Inn giving himself seriously to the study of law, until admitted
   as an outer barrister in 1582. In 1584 he took his seat in parliament
   for Melcombe in Dorset, and subsequently for Taunton (1586). He wrote
   on the condition of parties in the church, and he wrote down his
   thoughts on philosophical reform in the lost tract, Temporis Partus
   Maximus, but he failed to obtain a position of the kind he thought
   necessary for success.

   In the Parliament of 1586 he took a prominent part in urging the
   execution of Mary Queen of Scots. About this time he seems again to
   have approached his powerful uncle, the result of which may possibly be
   traced in his rapid progress at the bar, and in his receiving, in 1589,
   the reversion to the Clerkship of the Star Chamber, a valuable
   appointment, the enjoyment of which, however, he did not enter into
   until 1608.

   During this period Bacon became acquainted with Robert Devereux, 2nd
   Earl of Essex (1567-1601), Queen Elizabeth's favourite. By 1591 he was
   acting as the earl's confidential adviser. Bacon took his seat for
   Middlesex when in February 1593 Elizabeth called a Parliament to
   investigate a Roman Catholic plot against her. His opposition to a bill
   that would levy triple subsidies in half the usual time (he objected to
   the time span) offended many people; he was accused of seeking
   popularity, and was for a time excluded from the court. When the
   Attorney-Generalship fell vacant in 1594 and Bacon became a candidate
   for the office, Lord Essex's influence could not secure him the
   position; in fashion, Bacon failed to become solicitor in 1595. To
   console him for these disappointments Essex presented him with a
   property at Twickenham, which he subsequently sold for £1800, the
   equivalent of around £240,000 today.
   Memorial to Francis Bacon, in the chapel of Trinity College, Cambridge
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   Memorial to Francis Bacon, in the chapel of Trinity College, Cambridge

   In 1596 he was made a Queen's Counsel, but missed the appointment of
   Master of the Rolls. During the next few years, his financial situation
   remained bad. His friends could find no public office for him, a scheme
   for retrieving his position by a marriage with the wealthy widow Lady
   Elizabeth Hatton failed, and in 1598 he was arrested for debt. His
   standing in the queen's eyes, however, was beginning to improve. He
   gradually acquired the standing of one of the learned counsel, though
   he had no commission or warrant and received no salary. His
   relationship with the queen also improved when he severed ties with
   Essex, a fortunate move considering that the latter would be executed
   for treason in 1601; and Bacon was one of those appointed to
   investigate the charges against him, and examine witnesses, in
   connection with which he showed an ungrateful and indecent eagerness in
   pressing the case against his former friend and benefactor. This act
   Bacon endeavoured to justify in A Declaration of the Practices and
   Treasons, etc., of ... the Earl of Essex, etc. He received a gift of a
   fine of £1200 on one of Essex's accomplices.

   The accession of James I brought Bacon into greater favour; he was
   knighted in 1603, and endeavoured to set himself right with the new
   powers by writing his Apologie (defence) of his proceedings in the case
   of Essex, who had favoured the succession of James. In 1606 during the
   course of the uneventful first parliament session Bacon married Alice
   Barnham (1592 - 1650), the fourteen year old daughter of a
   well-connected London alderman and M.P. Little or nothing is known of
   their married life. In his last will he disinherited her.

   However, substantial evidence suggests that Bacon's emotional interests
   lay elsewhere. John Aubrey in his Brief Lives states that Bacon was "a
   pederast". Bacon's fellow parliamentary member Sir Simonds D'Ewes in
   his Autobiography and Correspondence writes of Bacon: "yet would he not
   relinquish the practice of his most horrible & secret sinne of sodomie,
   keeping still one Godrick, a verie effeminate faced youth, to bee his
   catamite and bedfellow". Bacon's mother Lady Ann Bacon expressed clear
   exasperation with what she believed was her son's behaviour. In a
   letter to her other son Anthony, she complains of another of Francis's
   companions "that bloody Percy" whom, she writes, he kept "yea as a
   coach companion and a bed companion" ("coach companion" in Bacon's day
   carried louche connotations, as the interior of a travelling coach was
   one of the few places affording privacy). Bacon exhibited a strong
   penchant for young Welsh serving-men. One such person, Francis Edney,
   received the enormous sum of two hundred pounds in Bacon's will.

   Meanwhile (in 1608), he had entered upon the Clerkship of the Star
   Chamber, and was in the enjoyment of a large income; but old debts and
   present extravagance kept him embarrassed, and he endeavoured to obtain
   further promotion and wealth by supporting the king in his arbitrary
   policy.

   However, Bacon's services were rewarded in June 1607 with the office of
   Solicitor. In 1610 the famous fourth parliament of James met. Despite
   Bacon's advice to him, James and the Commons found themselves
   frequently at odds over royal prerogatives and the king's embarrassing
   extravagance, and the House was dissolved in February 1611. Through
   this Bacon managed in frequent debate to uphold the prerogative, while
   retaining the confidence of the Commons. In 1613, Bacon was finally
   able to become attorney general, by dint of advising the king to
   shuffle judicial appointments; and in this capacity he would prosecute
   Somerset in 1616. The parliament of April 1614 objected to Bacon's
   presence in the seat for Cambridge — he was allowed to stay, but a law
   was passed that forbade the attorney-general to sit in parliament — and
   to the various royal plans which Bacon had supported. His obvious
   influence over the king inspired resentment or apprehension in many of
   his peers.

   Bacon continued to receive the King's favour, and in 1618 was appointed
   by James to the position of Lord Chancellor. In his great office Bacon
   showed a failure of character in striking contrast with the majesty of
   his intellect. He was corrupt alike politically and judicially, and now
   the hour of retribution arrived. His public career ended in disgrace in
   1621 when, after having fallen into debt, a Parliamentary Committee on
   the administration of the law charged him with corruption under
   twenty-three counts; and so clear was the evidence that he made no
   attempt at defence. To the lords, who sent a committee to inquire
   whether the confession was really his, he replied, "My lords, it is my
   act, my hand, and my heart; I beseech your lordships to be merciful to
   a broken reed." He was sentenced to a fine of £40,000, remitted by the
   king, to be committed to the Tower during the king's pleasure (his
   imprisonment in fact lasted only a few days). More seriously, Lord St
   Alban was declared incapable of holding future office or sitting in
   parliament. He narrowly escaped being deprived of his titles.
   Thenceforth the disgraced viscount devoted himself to study and
   writing.

   However substantial evidence by Nieves Mathews is demonstrated in her
   book, Francis Bacon: The History of a Character Assassination (1996,
   Yale University Press) that Bacon was completely innocent of the
   bribery charges and that writers from later times were themselves
   guilty of slandering Bacon's reputation. Bacon, commenting on his
   impeachment as Chancellor in which he claims to have been forced to
   plead guilty to bribery charges in order to save King James from a
   political scandal stated:

     I was the justest judge, that was in England these last fifty years.
     When the book of all hearts is opened, I trust I shall not be found
     to have the troubled fountain of a corrupt heart. I know I have
     clean hands and a clean heart. I am as innocent of bribes as any
     born on St. Innocents Day.

Death

   Monument to Bacon at his burial place, St Michael's church in St Albans
   Enlarge
   Monument to Bacon at his burial place, St Michael's church in St Albans

   In March, 1626, Lord St Alban came to London. Continuing his scientific
   research, he was inspired by the possibility of using snow to preserve
   meat. He purchased a chicken (fowl) to carry out this experiment. While
   stuffing the chicken with snow, he contracted a fatal case of
   pneumonia. He died at Highgate on 9 April 1626, leaving assets of about
   £7,000 and debts to the amount of £22,000. It is said that the chicken
   still haunts Pond Square in London.

Works and philosophy

   Bacon's works include his Essays, as well as the Colours of Good and
   Evil and the Meditationes Sacrae, all published in 1597. His famous
   aphorism, " knowledge is power", is found in the Meditations. He
   published The Proficience and Advancement of Learning in 1605. Bacon
   also wrote In felicem memoriam Elizabethae, a eulogy for the queen
   written in 1609; and various philosophical works which constitute the
   fragmentary and incomplete Instauratio magna, the most important part
   of which is the Novum Organum (published 1620). Bacon also wrote the
   Astrologia Sana and expressed his belief that stars had physical
   effects on the planet. He is also known for The New Atlantis.

   Bacon did not propose an actual philosophy, but rather a method of
   developing philosophy; he wrote that, whilst philosophy at the time
   used the deductive syllogism to interpret nature, the philosopher
   should instead proceed through inductive reasoning from fact to axiom
   to law. Before beginning this induction, the inquirer is to free his
   mind from certain false notions or tendencies which distort the truth.
   These are called "Idols" (idola), and are of four kinds: "Idols of the
   Tribe" ( idola tribus), which are common to the race; "Idols of the
   Den" ( idola specus), which are peculiar to the individual; "Idols of
   the Marketplace" ( idola fori), coming from the misuse of language; and
   "Idols of the Theatre" ( idola theatri), which result from an abuse of
   authority. The end of induction is the discovery of forms, the ways in
   which natural phenomena occur, the causes from which they proceed.
   Bacon's developments of the inductive philosophy would revolutionize
   the future thought of humanity.

   Bacon's somewhat fragmentary ethical system, derived through use of his
   methods, is explicated in the seventh and eighth books of his De
   augmentis scientiarum (1623). He distinguishes between duty to the
   community, an ethical matter, and duty to God, a purely religious
   matter. Any moral action is the action of the human will, which is
   governed by reason and spurred on by the passions; habit is what aids
   men in directing their will toward the good. No universal rules can be
   made, as both situations and men's characters differ.

   Bacon distinctly separated religion and philosophy, though the two can
   coexist. Where philosophy is based on reason, faith is based on
   revelation, and therefore irrational — in De augmentis he writes that
   "[t]he more discordant, therefore, and incredible, the divine mystery
   is, the more honour is shown to God in believing it, and the nobler is
   the victory of faith." And yet he writes in "The Essays: Of Atheism"
   that "a little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to atheism; but depth in
   philosophy bringeth men’s minds about to religion", suggesting he
   continued to employ inductive reasoning in all areas of his life,
   including his own spiritual beliefs.

Works on East Asia

   Francis Bacon was a prominent studier of East Asia, and was one of the
   first European sinologists. In his work Novum Organum, he attributes
   three world changing inventions to China, when at the time, many
   thought they were invented in the West.

   "Printing, gunpowder and the compass: These three have changed the
   whole face and state of things throughout the world; the first in
   literature, the second in warfare, the third in navigation; whence have
   followed innumerable changes, in so much that no empire, no sect, no
   star seems to have exerted greater power and influence in human affairs
   than these mechanical discoveries." -Novum Organum

   "For our ordinances and rites we have two very long and fair galleries.
   In one of these we place patterns and samples of all manner of the more
   rare and excellent inventions; in the other we place the statues of all
   principal inventors. There we have the statue of your Columbus, that
   discovered the West Indies, also the inventor of ships, your monk that
   was the inventor of ordnance and of gunpowder, the inventor of music,
   the inventor of letters, the inventor of printing, the inventor of
   observations of astronomy, the inventor of works in metal, the inventor
   of glass, the inventor of silk of the worm, the inventor of wine, the
   inventor of corn and bread, the inventor of sugars; and all these by
   more certain tradition than you have. Then we have divers inventors of
   our own, of excellent works; which, since you have not seen) it were
   too long to make descriptions of them; and besides, in the right
   understanding of those descriptions you might easily err. For upon
   every invention of value we erect a statue to the inventor, and give
   him a liberal and honorable reward. These statues are some of brass,
   some of marble and touchstone, some of cedar and other special woods
   gilt and adorned; some of iron, some of silver, some of gold."

Posthumous reputation

   Bacon's ideas about the improvement of the human lot were influential
   in the 1630s and 1650s among a number of Parliamentarian scholars.
   During the Restoration Bacon was commonly invoked as a guiding spirit
   of the new-founded Royal Society. In the nineteenth century his
   emphasis on induction was revived and developed by William Whewell,
   among others.

   Bacon was ranked #90 on Michael H. Hart's list of the most influential
   figures in history.

Bacon and Shakespeare

   Since the 19th century, there have been claims that Bacon was the
   author of the works attributed to Shakespeare (see Shakespearean
   authorship).

   In his "Letter to a Reader," Christopher Morley said this about these
   claims:

   "The first doubts as to Shakespeare's authorship, if I read the books
   correctly, were raised by a United States consul in the rum-drinking
   port of Santa Cruz. Like the consuls in O. Henry's Cabbages and Kings
   his official duties left much vacation for the mind. His idea was taken
   up by an eccentric lady whose name oddly enough was Delia Bacon; she
   inveigled Hawthorne into writing a preface for her book and the fun
   began." The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Cambridge edition
   text (Philadelphia: Blakiston Company, 1936), p. xvii.

Timeline

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