All who were great and good loved and honored him……His Lordship was a good poet, but concealed, as appears by his letters.–Aubrey a contemporary writer

I affirm with good assurance that Nature gives the world that individual species but once in five hundred years. –Archbishop Tenison, writing of Lord Verulam
At twelve his industry was above the capacity and his mind beyond the reach of his contemporaries. -David Lloyd from The Statesman and Favourites of England (1665)

There is a very good psychological reason why orthodox scholarship is so concerned to repudiate any suggestion of Lord Bacon’s connection with Shake-speare. This is to protect the Bard (whom all admire, whoever he was) from the stigma of Lord Bacon’s supposed corruption, which they in their ignorance take for granted.-Martin Pares

You are my own son, but you, though truly royal, of fresh and masterly spirit shall rule nor England nor your mother, nor reign o’er subjects yet to be. —1577, Queen Elizabeth I in an angry tone to a 16 year old Francis right after she reveals to Francis the secret of his parentage

The fact of Francis Bacon’s Parentage–the legitimate son of Queen Elizabeth and therefore the legal heir to the Throne—is indubitable, supported as it is , not only by a mass of circumstantial evidence but by such direct testimony as Leicester’s letter to King Philip of Spain, which Mme Deventer von Kunow discovered among the Spanish State Archives, begging King Philip to use his influence with Queen Elizabeth to secure his public acknowledgment as Prince Consort……..No one can possibly follow Mme D. von Kunow’s revelations and remain unconvinced.–Williard Parker in the Foreword to Francis Bacon, Last of the Tudors

“It is not my meaning to treat him as a ward; Such a word is far from my Motherly feeling for him. I mean to do him good.”– Anne Bacon in a letter to Anthony Bacon about Francis revealing her special relationship to Francis as a guardian rather than his actual mother

Francis Bacon is the Queen’s Bastard.– Edward Coke, a life long foe of Bacon’s is recorded to have blurted this statement out in public

I have been induced to think, that if there were a Beam of Knowledge derived from God upon any man in these modern times, it was upon him (Bacon): for though he was a great reader of books, yet he had not his knowledge from books, but from some grounds and notions within himself. –Dr. William Rawley 1670, Bacon’s Chaplain, Secretary & Confidant

Francis Bacon, the Glory of his Age and Nation, the Adorner and Ornament of Learning,, was born in YORK HOUSE or YORK- PLACE in the STRAND.- Dr. William Rawley, from the first passage of the first page of Resuscitatio, or Bringing into Public Light Several Pieces Hitherto Sleeping” 1670

Dr. Rawley’s opening statement that Francis Bacon “was born in York House or York Place (he uses italics in the 1670 version to draw attention to the phrase) is intended to provoke the reader to ascertain WHERE he was born and who were his parents: For YORK HOUSE was the residence of Sir Nicholas Bacon, but YORK PLACE was the Queen’s Palace, afterwards known as Whitehall. The first sentence, then raises the question acutely: Was Francis a Bacon or a Tudor? Was he born at York House or York Place? If anyone knew the truth, Dr. Rawley did. He writes openly as near the truth as he dare. He knew better than anyone else that York House was not York Place and was never known as York Place. York Place was the name of Queen Elizabeth’s Palace in the old days.- Alfred Dodd: The Marriage of Elizabeth Tudor

He was born to the Purple and brought up with the expectation of a great career. He employed several years of his youth in traveling France, Italy and Spain. He saw himself destined one day to hold in his hand, THE HELM OF THE KINGDOM.-Pierre Ambiose, in 1631, from the first biography of Francis Bacon, published in France

I remember, being then a young man, hearing it said openly by people, that this was done by the contrivance of Leicester, with a design to impose, hereafter, some base son of his own upon the Nation as the Queen’s Offspring.–William Camden, historian, friend of Francis Bacon’s and referring to the Act of Succession

Not only did Francis Bacon believe that he was the Queen’s son, but others knew it also–as a State Secret.– Alfred Dodd

“My conceit of his person was never increased toward him by his place, or honors: but I have and do reverence him, for the greatness that was only proper to himself, in that he seemed to me ever, by his work, one of the greatest men, and most worthy of admiration, that had been in many ages.” –Ben Johnson

I am one of the many who have never been able to bring the life of William Shakespeare and the plays of Shakespeare within planetary space of each other. Are there any two things in the world more incongruous? Had the plays come down to us anonymously, had the labor of discovering the author been imposed upon after generations, I think we could have found no one of that day but Francis Bacon to whom to assign the crown. In this case it would have been resting now on his head by almost common consent.- Dr. W. H. Furness, the eminent American scholar in a letter to Nathaniel Holmes, Oct. 29, 1866

Francis Bacon was the most important philosopher of his day. His vision of enchantment, The Essay of Gardens, has had enormous effect upon the imagination of subsequent garden owners. He was a Renaissance man. He was interested in scientific philosophical and literary studies. The thinking behind the foundations of the Royal Society went much deeper. Bacon had certainly been a considerable influence. -Charles Quest-Ritson , The English Garden, Viking/Penguin 2001

One of the most important visionaries of what the new science might entail was the English philosopher Sir Francis Bacon.(1561-1626) Francis Bacon spent his later years pursuing a literary career and developing a philosophy of science which was to prove an inspiration for many who would follow him. For Bacon the relationship between science and spirituality was clear– science would serve the Christian faith. Through science, man would be restored to the state of grace which he had enjoyed in the Garden of Eden before the Fall, to the “sovereignty and power.”…which he had hid in his first state of creation. According to Bacon, not only science would restore man to his rightfull dominion over the Earth, it would also create the perfect moral Christian society. Bacon outlined this vision in his treatise, The New Atlantis (1627) In this he describes an idealised land where all people live in harmony without crime or promiscuity., “free from all pollution and foulness.” Citizens of this “New Atlantis have access to all manner of technologies, including flying machines, submarines, and a huge range of medicines fro healing the sick, and prolonging life. These wonders are made possible through the work of a group of 36 “fathers” who form the core of a scientific institute cum monastic colony known as Solomon’s House. It was this fictional institution that inspired the founders of the Royal Society in 1660, an organization that continues to play an important role in the scientific community to this day.- Katy Redmond, from her prize winning essay Science and Spirituality : Complimentary or Contradictory, appeared in Resurgence Magazine, Oct, 2003,  

Scientists are still perceived by many laymen as powerful, frightening and isolated figures, speaking a language and thinking thoughts accessible only to their colleagues. The noble scientist: Sir Francis Bacon’s New Atlantis published in 1626 was the first literary work to portray the scientists in a positive light. In this work, Bacon attempted to revolutionise the image of of the scholar from one of mercenary pedant to that of an altruistic idealist, intent only on contributing to the common good. New Atlantis provided the motivation for the founding of the Royal Society of London in 1662.-John L. Casti, from Paradigms Regained, Abacus 2001

I am sort of haunted by the conviction that the divine William of Stratford is the biggest and most successful fraud ever practiced on a patient world. The more I turn him round and round the more he so affects me” –Henry James (Letters)

Bacon made our world.-Sir Karl Popper, philosopher

A Dictionary of the English language might be compiled from Bacon’s works alone.- — Samuel Jonson

The first time I heard Bacon mentioned as the possible author of the plays and poems, the idea lit up in my brain , and I felt certain that it could not have been the Mummer…… The moment it was suggested that Bacon had written them, I felt as many must have felt when they heard for the first time that the earth goes round the sun. Things began to get concentric again; hitherto they had all been eccentric. –George Moore in a Letter to R. L. Eagle

…….And I can truly say (having had the honor to know him for many years as well when he was in his lesser fortunes as now that he stands at the top and in the full flower of his greatness) that I never yet saw any trace in him of a vindictive mind, whatever injury were done him, nor ever heard him utter a word to any man’s disadvantage which seemed to proceed from personal feeling against the man, but only (and that too very seldom) from judgment made of him in cold blood. It is not his greatness that I admire, but his virtue: it is not the favours I have received from him (infinite though they be) that have thus enthralled and enchained my heart, but his whole life and character; which are such, that, if he were of an inferior condition I could not honour him the less , and if were my enemy I should not the less love and endeavour to serve him.—Tobie Matthew, friend of Bacon’s

Bacon contemned no man’s observations, but would light his torch at every man’s candle.–William Rawley

Among so many virtues that made this great man commendable, prudence, as the first of all the moral virtues, and that most necessary of those of his profession, was that which shone in him the most brightly. Never was there man who so loved equity, or so enthusiastically worked for the public good as he. Vanity, avarice, and ambition, vices that too often attach themselves to great honors, were to him quite unknown, and if he did a good action it was not from a desire of fame, but simply because he could not do otherwise. His good qualities were entirely pure, without being clouded by the admixture of any imperfections, and the passions that form usually the defects in great men in him only served to bring out his virtues.–Pierre Amboise, 1631

Thus it is easier to prove that if Shakspere wrote the literature we have an instance of a stupendous miracle than it is to prove that,although Bacon possessed all the qualifications , he might still have refrained from writing it. In the one case we should have to exercise that form of faith described as “believing what you know to be untrue,” on the other there is no tax whatever upon one’s faculty of credence.– H. Crouch Batchelor from Francis Bacon Wrote Shakespeare

The Shakespearean critics may blow a Shakesperean pipe but it plays a Baconian tune.-G. C . Gundry

In conversation he could assume the most different characters, and speak the language proper to each, with a facility which was perfectly natural.- David Mallet, Bacon biographer

The star of the first magnitude had set, and with him the constellation of his co workers. The great “deficiency” in English letters and language had been made good; his countrymen and the whole world had received, at his hands, a divine gift. The English Renaissance had seen its rise, it’s zenith, and its setting in the life and labour of this supreme Englishman, Francis Bacon.—R.J.W. Gentry,1948

I have sent your Shakespeare extracts to Collier. It is a great comfort to my thinking that so little is known concerning the poet. [Shakespeare] It is a fine mystery; and I tremble every day lest something should come out. If he had a Boswell, society wouldn’t have respected his grave, but would have had his skull in the phrenological shop windows.- Charles Dickens, as stated in a letter dated June 13, 1847, to his friend William Sandys

The wisdom displayed in Shakespeare is equal in profoundness to the great Lord Bacon’s Novum Organum. — Hazlitt

There is an understanding manifested in the construction of Shakespeare’s plays equal to that in Bacon’s Novum Organum — Carlyle

Bacon is Shakespeare — Edwin Durning Lawrence

The philosophical writings of Bacon are suffused and saturated with Shakespeare’s thought. — Gerald Massey

I worked upon the true principles of Baconian induction.–Charles Darwin

Francis Bacon drafted the programme of the modern world view.–Albert Schweitzer

He moved the intellects that move the world. -Macaulay

I have never been able to bring his life (William Shakspere) and his plays within a planetary space of each other.–William H. Furness

Although many writers state that Francis Bacon advocated the torture of nature in order to force her to reveal her secrets, a close study of his works contradicts this claim. His treatment of the myth of Proteus depicts a heroic mutual struggle, not the torture of a slavish victim. By the “vexation” of nature Bacon meant an encounter between the scientist and nature in which both are tested and purified.-Peter Pesic, Wrestling with Proteus: Francis Bacon and the “Torture” of Nature

From the patristic period to the beginning of the seventeenth century curiosity was regarded as an intellectual vice. Curious individuals were considered to be proud and “puffed up,” and the objects of their investigations were deemed illicit, dispute engendering, unknowable, or useless. Seventeenth-century projects for the advancement of learning had to distance themselves from curiosity and its dubious fruits or, alternatively, enhance the moral status of the curious sensibility. Francis Bacon’s proposals for the instauration of knowledge were an integral part of a process by which curiosity underwent a remarkable transformation from vice to virtue over the course of the seventeenth century. The changing fortunes of this human propensity highlight the morally charged nature of early modern debates over the status of natural philosophy and the particular virtues required of its practitioners. The rehabilitation of curiosity was a crucial element in the objectification of scientific knowledge and led to a gradual shift of focus away from the moral qualities of investigators and the propriety of particular objects of knowledge to specific procedures and methods. -Peter Harrison, Curiosity, Forbidden Knowledge, and the Reformation of Natural Philosophy in Early Modern England

Surely the Essays must be numbered among the few books that deserve to be chewed and digested. Rarely shall you find so much meat, so admirably dressed and flavored, in so small a dish. Bacon abhors padding, and disdains to waste a word; he offers us infinite riches in a little phrase; each of these essays gives in a page or two the distilled subtlety of a master mind on a major issue of life. It is difficult to say whether the matter more excels; for here is language as supreme in prose as Shakespeare’s is in verse. It is a style like sturdy Tacitus’, compact yet polished; and indeed some of its conciseness is due to skillful adaptation of Latin idiom and phrase. But its wealth of metaphor is characteristically Elizabethan, and reflects the exuberance of the Renaissance; no man in English literature is so fertile in pregnant and pithy comparisons.–Will Durant, The Story of Philosophy

Sir Walter Raleigh once spoke of him by way of comparison (whose judgment may well be trusted), “That the Earl of Salisbury was an excellent speaker, but no good penman; that the Earl of Northampton (the Lord Henry Howard) was an excellent penman, but no good speaker; but that Sir Francis Bacon was eminent in both.”

In many respects Bacon resembles his immortal contemporary, Shakespeare. Like Shakespeare, he enjoyed the most splendid reputation for genius and ability, in his lifetime; like him, he was comparatively undervalued and neglected for ages after his death, and like him, in the present refined and severely scrutinizing era, he has been tried in the hottest furnaces of criticism, and has come forth pure gold, whose weight, solidity, and brilliancy can never hereafter be for a moment doubted. It is said of Shakespeare, that his fertile genius exhausted the whole world of nature. As a poet, he undoubtedly has done this; and Lord Bacon, as a philosopher, has done the same.- Advertisement of The American Publishers, 1856

Lord Bacon was a poet. His language has a sweet and majestic rhythm, which satisfies the sense, no less than the almost superhuman wisdom of his philosophy satisfies the intellect. It is a strain which distends and then bursts the circumference of the reader’s mind and pours itself forth together with it into the universal element with which it has perpetual sympathy. He is the greatest philosopher-poet since Plato. — Percy Shelley, the poet

I infer from this sample that Bacon had all the natural faculties which a poet wants; a fine ear for metre, a fine feeling for imaginative effect in words, and a vein of poetic passion….Truth is that Bacon was not without the fine phrensy of a poet. –James Spedding, “Works “

This servant of posterity, as he prophetically called himself, sustained his mighty spirit with the confidence of his post -humous greatness . Ever were the times succeeding in his mind. He was, indeed, one of those men who, “build great mornings for the world.” — Isaac D’ Israeli

If we wish to know the force of human genius we should read Shakespeare. If we wish to see the insignificance of human learning, we may study his commentators. — Hazlitt

In his adversity, I ever prayed that God would give him strength for Greatness he could not want. Neither could I condole in word or syllable for him, as knowing no accident could do harm to virtue, but rather to help to make it manifest.—-Ben Jonson

Bacon at last, a mighty man, arose
Whom a wise king, and Nature, chose
Lord Chancellor of both their Laws.

Bacon, like Moses, led us forth at last,
The barren Wilderness he past,
Did on the very Border stand,
Of the blest Promise’d Land
And from the Mountain top of his Exalted Wit,
Saw it himself, and shewed us it.

— Abraham Cowley, Fellow of the Royal Society, honoring Bacon as it’s Founder

Bacon’s conception of the House of Salomon also serves to link him with Freemasonry and Rosicrucianism, in both of which Solomon’s Temple plays an important part, and both of which were beginning to flourish in Bacon’s day. – Martha Ornstein, Role of Scientific Societies in the Seventeenth Century

The New Atlantis seems to be, and probably is, the key to the modern rituals of Freemasonry- James Hughan

He was free from malice, which, as he said he never bred or fed. He was no revenger of injuries; he was no defamer of any man; but would always say the best that could be said of any person, even an enemy. — Dr. William Rawley, his chaplain

For myself at least, much as one must grieve over such a fall of such a man, and so forlorn a close of such a life, I have always felt that had he not fallen, or had he fallen upon a fortune less desolate in its outward conditions, I should never have known how good and how great a man he really was—hardly, perhaps, how great and invincible a thing intrinsic goodness is. Turning from the world without to the world which was within him, I know nothing more inspiring , more affecting, more sublime, than the undaunted energy, the hopefulness, trustfulness, clearness, patience, and composure, with witch his spirit sustained itself under that most depressing fortune. The heart of Job himself was not so sorely tried, nor did it pass the trial better. Through the many volumes which he produced during these five years, I find no idle repining, no vain complaint of others, no weak justification of himself; no trace of a disgusted, a despairing or a faltering mind.—James Spedding commenting on Bacon’s political fall from the Chancellorship

The poetical faculty was powerful in Bacon’s mind, but not, like his wit, so powerful as occasionally to unsurp the place of his reason and to tyrannize over the whole man. No imagination was ever at once so strong and so thoroughly subjugated.—Macaulay

He who have filled up all numbers and performed that in our tongue which may be compared or preferred either to insolent Greece or haughty Rome…In short, within his view, and about his times , were all the wits born that could honor a language or help study. Now things daily fall; wits grow downward and eloquence grows backward, so that he may be named and stand as the mark and acme of our language. — Ben Jonson

The 1611 King James Bible is ornamented with Bacon’s symbols and in my own special copy of the record edition, also dated 1611, these symbols are Rosicrucianly marked to call the attention of the initiated to them and to tell them that the 1611 Bible is without possibility of doubt, one of Bacon’s books…..When Bacon was born, English as a literary language did not exist, but once he died he had succeeded in making the English language the noblest vehicle of thought ever possessed by mankind. This he accomplished merely by his Bible and his Shakespeare.” –Edwin D. Lawrence author of Bacon is Shakespeare and The Shakespeare Myth from a lecture October 9, 1912

…The Bible which all of us read and admire from a literary point of view because of it’s peculiar and beautiful English was written in that form by Bacon who invented and perfected that style of English expression. The first editions of this Bible were printed under the same guidance and in the same manner as were the Shakespeare plays, and the ornaments for the various pages were drawn in pen and ink and on wood by artists engaged by Bacon who worked under his supervision.Everyone of the ornaments concealed some Rosicrucian emblem and occasionally a Masonic emblem or some initials that would reveal Bacon’s name or the name of the Rosicrucians. Such ornaments were put not only in the Christian Bible that Bacon had rewritten but in the Shakespeare plays, and in some of Bacon’s own books, and a few other books that were typically Rosicrucinan in spirit.– Dr. H Spencer Lewis Imperator of the Rosicrucian Order from 1915 to 1939, from the Rosicrucian Digest, April 1930

It is claimed that Bacon was really two men(the self-conscious Bacon and the Cosmic Conscious Bacon); that the man seen by Bacon’s contemporaries and in the prose works was the former, while the concealed man who produced the plays and “Sonnets” was the latter. The Cosmic-Conscious Bacon had the use of all the learning and of all the faculties of the self concsious Bacon, and along with these the vast spiritual insight and powers which go with possession of Cosmic Consciousness.—Richard Maurice Bucke from his book Cosmic Consciousness

Francis Bacon, by contrast, walks masked and cool through this age of violence. Traps snap on either side, associates perish, he remains. Even when he is caught between parliament and king, and a powerful enemy demands his imprisonment in the Tower-even then, he goes free.-Loren Eiseley : on referrring to men who died bloodily in that dangerous age

He was deeply religious for he was conversant with God and able to render a reason for the hope which was in him.- Dr. William Rawley, Bacon’s Chaplain and secretary

If one could but paint his mind. — Hiliard, The Elizabethan Court Painter

He was the wisest , greatest of mankind…..Henry Hallam

Lord Bacon was the greatest genius that England , or perhaps any other country ever produced.—–Alexander Pope

The great glory of literature in this island, during the reign of James , was my Lord Bacon.—Hume

The crown of all modern authors .—George Sandys

Genius the most profound, of literature the most extensive , of discovery the most penetrating , of observation of human life the most distinguished and refined. –Edmund Burke

He possessed all those extraordinary talents which were divided amongst the greatest authors of antiquity.–Addison

No other author can be compared with him, unless it be Shakespeare.–Professor Fowler

With great minuteness of observation, he had an amplitude of comprehension such as has never yet been vouchsafed to any human being…the largeness of his mind was all his own. We marvel at him as clowns on a fair-day marvel at a juggler.—Macaulay

In temper , in honesty, in labour, in humility, in reverence, he was the most perfect example that the world has yet seen….. the duty and service of helping his Brethren to know as they had never yet learned to know.—Dean Church

He struck all men with an awful reverence. — Francis Osborne

A memorable example to all of virtue, kindness, peaceableness, and patience. — Peter Boener, his apothecary

If our great poets are the Lords of Language Thou art indeed the King.–Alfred Dodd

And those who have true skill in the works of the Lord Verulam, like great masters in painting , can tell by the design , the strength, the way of colouring, whether he was the author of this or the other piece though his name be not on it.—–Archbishop Tenison 1679

The English Renaissance was conceived in France and born in England in 1579. It ran its course and in 1623 with the Shakespeare Folio it attained maturity…….It passed when Francis Bacon was no more.–W.T.Smedley (The Mystery of Francis Bacon)

Francis Bacon spent three whole years in France- the most valuable of his life–and his subsequent literary eminence may be traced to his long sojourn in a foreign country.– Alfred Dodd

The Advancement of Learning , a work none but a fool would have written.—–Coke, great rival and lifelong foe

There happened in my time one noble speaker , who was full of gravity in his speaking. His language , where he could spare or pass by a jest, was nobly censorious. No man ever spoke more neatly , more pressly, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted of his own graces. His hearers could not cough or look aside from him without loss. He commanded where he spoke and had his judges angry and pleased at his devotion. No man had their affections more in his power.The fear of every man that heard him was lest he should make an end.–Ben Jonson, regarding Bacon’s eloquence

He explores every region…with the waste and the uncultivated tracts and predicts departments of literature that did not then exist. He would put his Atlantean hands to heave the whole globe of the sciences from their rest, expose all the gulfs and continents of error, and with creative hand remodel and reform the whole.—-Ralph Waldo Emerson,1835

In the Novum Organum Bacon refers to three kinds of idols. He calls these Idols of the Market Place, Idols of the Cave, and Idols of the Theatre. These idols are false appearances which deceive the mind. Could his Lordship have been referring to certain images or appearances which he himself had set up in different departments of life? The Idols of the Market Place are current fallacies sustained by popular tradition. This sounds a bit as though it described the Shakespeare myth, for the Stratford actor certainly engaged in buying, selling, and bartering. The Idols of the Cave are deep, subconscious things, hidden in the recesses of the intellect. Could this cavern be the vaulted tomb of the secret Adept of the Rosy Cross? The Idols of the Theatre are symbols or appearances parading upon a stage or acting out a drama. Is this a reference to the initiatory ritual of Freemasonry in which the members of the Lodge personify certain ancient and honorable masters of their Lodge?
—Manly P. Hall,” Francis Bacon & His Secret Empire.“

My little Lord Keeper—Queen Elizabeth I, addressing Bacon when he was a child

Exit Shakespeare. –Bertram Theobald

Enter Francis Bacon. –Bertram Theobald

The most prodigious wit that ever I knew of my nation, and of this side of the sea, is of your Lordship’s name, though he be known by another.–Sir Tobie Matthew, 1623

The fire, the wine, the men! and in the midst, Thou stands’t as if some Mysterie thou didst! —Ben Jonson 1620 addressing Bacon during a tribute on his 60th birthday

The key to the cypher is therefore the inductive method by which all the riddles in nature may be resolved. Bacon wrote the key in his epitaph, “Let compounds be dissolved.” The cypher is the compound; the master key to a master mind. The true reading of the hidden message depends upon a patient weighing of evidence and a constant elimination of long treasured non-essentials. The end of the code is the knowledge of hidden causes. The code apparently leads to Bacon, but his life , his work and his writings are parables grounded in hidden causes. It is a larger riddle concealed in a smaller one. –Manly P. Hall 1946 Francis Bacon & His Secret Empire

Thus, seeking for clues to the discovery of the man whose genius inspired the Great Shakespearean Folio, we shall do well to remember that his Lordship’s epitaph may reasonably apply the systems of ciphers contained in his plays: “Let compounds be dissolved.”
—Manly P. Hall Sages & Seers

Let me commend to you that wonderfully symbolic poem, the last poem that Shake-speare wrote, in a volume published by the Roscrosse Society entitled “Love’s Martyr” which simply means the Poet’s Martyr. The leading writers of the age contributed to this book of poems. The poem contributed by Shake-speare was entitled The Phoenix and the Turtle. It typifies the self-immolation, death and resurrection of a Poet. It contains the prophetic suggestion that after the black crow of slander has gone among the generations of men for three hundred years the Poet will rise once more revealing his personality to his countrymen. The same suggestion is to be found in Francis Bacon’s will : “I leave my NAME to mine own countrymen after some time be past.” -Alfred Dodd

 I was infinitely pleased to find among the Works of this extraordinary Man a Prayer of his own composing, which for the elevation of Thought and Greatness of Expression, it seems rather the Devotion of an Angel than a Man. – Joseph Addison’s verdict in The Tatler 1621

His utterances are not infrequently marked with a grandeur and solemnity of tone, a majesty of diction, which renders it impossible to forget, and difficult even to criticize them……. There is no author, unless it be Shakespeare, who is so easily remembered, or so frequently quoted…… The terse and burning words issuing from the lips of an irresistible commander.—-Fowler

You especially, Sir Francis Bacon, as you did then by your countenance and loving affections advance it, so let your good word grace, which is able to add value to the greatest and least of matters.–Francis Beaumont a contemporary of Bacon who dedicated a masque to the Gentlemen of Grays Inn and the Inner Temple, thanking them for their help

….a masque, of which Sir Francis Bacon was the chief contriver.–John Chamberlain, an eye witness to the performances at Grays Inn

I shall give you Measure for Measure.–Tobie Matthew in a letter to Bacon

Francis Bacon, like the Duke in the play Measure for Measure, becomes a “developed” man, one who through his training in the Masonic and Chivalric Orders, sought not only to purify his own nature but to become a “living symbol” to others, striving and working for the good of his country, his monarch, and his own countrymen.–editors of Baconian Jottings Then And Now

This work undertakes to demonstrate, not only that William Shakespeare did not, but that Francis Bacon did, write the plays and poems. It presents a critical view of the personal history of the two men, their education, learning, attainments, surroundings, and associates, the contemporaneousness of the writings in question in prose and verse, an account of the earlier plays and editions, the spurious plays, and “the true original copies.” It gives some evidence that Bacon was known to be the author by some of his contemporaries. It shows in what manner William Shakespeare came to have the reputation of being the writer. It exhibits a variety of facts and circumstances, which are strongly suggestive of Bacon as the real author. A comparison of the writings of contemporary authors in prose and verse, proves that no other writer of that age, but Bacon, can come into any competition for the authorship. It is recognized that the evidence drawn from historical facts and biographical circumstances. are not in themselves alone entirely conclusive of the matter however suggestive or significant as clearing the way for more decisive proofs, or as raising a high degree of probability; and it is conceded, that, in the absence of more direct evidence, the most decisive proof attainable is to be found in a critical and thorough comparison of the writings themselves, and that such a comparison will clearly establish the identity of the author as no other than Francis Bacon. — NATHANIEL HOLMES 1884, The Authorship of Shakespeare, Bibliography of the Bacon-Shakespeare Controversy, ed. Ivy- man, p. 28.

It is impossible not to admire the structure of Bacon’s works. Outlines are clear and easily grasped, the argument proceeds firmly through each section, and each topic is covered with thoroughness and precision. There is in all the finished work, and even in some of the fragments, a strong sense of unity- the organic unity of a tree and its branches- which Coleridge perceived, and attributed partly to the unity of the subject and partly to ‘the perpetual growth and evolution of the thoughts, one generating and explaining, and justifying, the place of another…. Brian Vickers Francis Bacon and Renaissance Prose

 He seems to have written his Essays with the pen of Shakespeare.–Alexander Smith

“It will go near to pose any other nation of Europe, to muster out in any age, four men, who in so many respects should excel four such as we are able to show them: Cardinal Wolsey, Sir Thomas More, Sir Philip Sidney, and Sir Francis Bacon. The fourth was a creature of incomparable abilities of mind, of a sharp and catching apprehension, large and faithful memory, plentiful and sprouting, deep and solid judgment, for as such as might concern the understanding part. A man so rare in knowledge, of so many several kinds endued with the facility and felicity of expressing it all in so eloquent, significant, so abundant, and yet so choice and ravishing, a way of words, of metaphors and allusions as, perhaps, the world hath not seen, since it was a world. I know this may seem a great hyperbole, and strange kind of excess of speech, but the best means of putting me to shame will be, for you to place any other man of yours by this of mine.” – Tobie Mathew, friend of F. Bacon

St. Albans is referred to in the Shakespeare plays twenty-three times, and Stratford not once!–Ignatius Donnelly

It was not difficult for Bacon to appear as two men. One served the need of the moment and the other the need of the ages.—Manly P. Hall

That is about the best play that Lord Bacon ever wrote.—-Mark Twain, after attending a Romeo & Juliet performance

The critics can go to hell. We don’t know half enough about Lord Bacon.-Frederich Nietzsche

It is my belief that Love’s Labour’s Lost took immediate inspiration from the Gray’s Inn revels of 1594-5. It is very curious indeed to remember that the speeches of the Counsellors in Gesta Grayorum have been attributed to Francis Bacon, and if that attribution is correct, and if I am correct in hearing echoes of those speeches in Love’s Labour’s Lost, then the “civil war of wits” in that play may be, in one of its aspects, a reflection of some friendly crossing of swords between the two greatest wits of the age, Shakespeare and Bacon.–Frances Yates, a Stratfordian ; in the book A Study of Love’s Labour’s Lost

Money is like muck, not good except it be spread. Francis Bacon was a profound economist.-George Soros from the first article in the The Atlantic Monthly February 1997; The Capitalist Threat; Volume 279, No. 2; pages 45-58.

The real author of the widely and suddenly circulated printed pamphlets known as the Fama Fraternitatis that announced and brought about the Rosicrucian revival in a new cycle of birth in Germany in the 17th century, was none other than Sir Francis Bacon (Tudor), son of Queen Elizabeth I, who was Imperator, or Ruler, King, High Priest for the Order in England, and various parts of Europe. The revival would never have become so popular nor attracted so much attention if it had not been that for the first time in the history of the Rosicrucian Order, the art of printing was freely used. As is natural with all of the ancient Rosicrucian literature, this authorship was veiled with symbolic name, in the German printing, as Christian Rosenkreuz, translated into our English meaning “a Christian of the Rosy Cross.” The discovery of a “body” in the “tomb”, or the finding of the “body” of a person known as C. R-C., is allegorical, and is not to be taken in a literal sense. The initials C. R-C., did not mean an actual person’s name Christian Rosenkreuz, which was misinterpretated and taken of the German language translation of these words, but of the Latin words standing for Christus of the Rosy Cross.–Fraternal Regards, and Best Wishes for Peace Profound to Sorors and Fraters all over the world in this Holy Season, Neil R. Whary, Past Master, Philo Lodge #243, F.&A.M., South River, NJ, USA

The Oxford English Dictionary credits Shakespeare with being the first to use about 3,200 words. This means that approximately one in every five words used by the author of the plays was a word he himself had coined. Parallel this with the known propensity of Francis Bacon for coining new words, witness the letter from Gosnold regarding the speech Bacon made arguing his first case in court. On the 5th and 9th of February 1594 Francis Bacon appeared in two cases. Harry Gosnold, a young lawyer of Gray’s Inn, who heard him, left a report :

“That Francis Bacon retains his reputation gained, is not strange to any that knows him. The unusual words wherewith he had spangled his speech, were rather gracious for their propriety than strange for their novelty, and like to serve both for occasions to report and means to remember his argument. Certain sentences of his , somewhat obscure, and as it were presuming upon their capacities will, I fear, make some of them rather admire than commend him. In sum, all is as well as words can make it, and if it please Her Majesty to add deeds, the Bacon may be too hard for the Cook.” [Edward Coke].”

…….There has been a great deal of scholarship gone into both sides of this issue. One of the things that has convinced me the most is that those who believe in Shakespeare don’t seem to have the same kind of knowledge of facts and the depth of perception. They’re mostly denying Bacon because–well–most people don’t think so, therefore it isn’t true. Shakespeareans are very defensive , often very superficial in their treatment of what is put out by Baconians.—Arthur Young 1987 The Shakespeare/Bacon Controversy

Did you know that Bacon’s 1609 essay on “Cupid and the Atom” foreshadowed the quantum of modern physics by 3 centuries? Also, Bacon’s authorship makes a vital connection between the court of Queen Elizabeth and the founding of America,which to Francis Bacon, was known as the New Atlantis.–Tom Mellet

Such is my censure of your cogitata that I must tell you (to be plain) you have much wronged yourselfe and the world to smother such a treasure so long in your coffer… all your treatise over doth abound with choice conceits of the present state of learning…… as many persuade with any student to look more narrowly to his business, not only by aspiring to the greatest perfection of that which is now-a-days divulged in the sciences, but by diving yet deeper as it were into the bowels and secrets of nature…. which course would to God (to whisper so much in your ears) you had followed at first when you fell to the study of such a thing as was not worthy of such a student. Nevertheless, being as it is that you were therein settled and your countrey soundly served, I can but wish with all my heart as I do very often that you may gain a full reward to the full deserts which I hope will come with heaps of happiness and honour.– February 19th, 1607, Sir Thomas Bodley (founder of the Bodleian Library) in letter, to Francis Bacon.