Bacon is Shake-Speare

A third from Adrian Quiney written (about 1598-1599) to his son Rycharde Quiney in which he says "yff yow bargen with Wm Sha or receve money therfor, brynge youre money homme."

There exists no contemporary letter from anyone to anyone, referring to the Stratford actor as being a poet or as being in any way connected with literature. But from the Court Records we learn that;

In 1600 Shakespeare brought action against John Clayton in London for £7 and got judgment in his favour. He also sued Philip Rogers of Stratford for two shillings loaned.

In 1604 he sued Philip Rogers for several bushels of malt sold to him at various times between March 27th and the end of May of that year, amounting in all to the value of £1. 15s. 10d. The poet a dealer in malt?

In 1608 he prosecuted John Addenbroke to recover a debt of £6 and sued his surety Horneby.

Halliwell-Phillipps tells us that "The precepts as appears from

memoranda in the originals, were issued by the poet's solicitor Thomas

Greene who was then residing under some unknown conditions3 at

New Place."

Referring to these sordid stories, Richard Grant White, that strong believer in the Stratford man, says in his "Life and genius of William Shakespeare," p. 156 "The pursuit of an impoverished man for the sake of imprisoning him and depriving him both of the power of paying his debts and supporting himself and his family, is an incident in Shakespeare's life which it requires the utmost allowance and consideration for the practice of the time and country to enable us to contemplate with equanimity – satisfaction is impossible."

"The biographer of Shakespeare must record these facts because the literary antiquaries have unearthed and brought them forward as new particulars of the life of Shakespeare. We hunger and receive these husks; we open our mouths for food and we break our teeth against these stones."

Yes! The world has broken its teeth too long upon these stones to continue to mistake them for bread. And as the accomplished scholar and poetess the late Miss Anna Swanwick once declared to the writer, she knew nothing of the Bacon and Shakespeare controversy, but Mr. Sidney Lee's "Life of Shakespeare" had convinced her that his man never wrote the plays. And that is just what everybody else is saying at Eton, at Oxford, at Cambridge, in the Navy, in the Army, and pretty generally among unprejudiced people everywhere, who are satisfied, as is Mark Twain, that the most learned of works could not have been written by the most _un_learned of men.

Yes! It does matter that the "Greatest Birth of Time" should no longer be considered to have been the work of the unlettered rustic of Stratford; and the hour has at last come when it should be universally known that this mighty work was written by the man who had taken all knowledge for his province, the man who said "I have, though in a despised weed [that is under a Pseudonym] procured the good of all men"; the man who left his "name and memory to men's charitable speeches, and to foreign nations, and the next ages."

CHAPTER VII

Bacon acknowledged to be a Poet.

In discussing the question of the Authorship of the plays many people appear to be unaware that Bacon was considered by his contemporaries to be a great poet. It seems therefore advisable to quote a few witnesses who speak of his pre-eminence in poetry.

In 1645 there was published "The Great Assises holden in Parnassus by

Apollo and his assessours" a facsimile of the title of which is given on page 57. This work is anonymous but is usually ascribed to George

Withers and in it Bacon as Lord Verulan is placed first and designated

"Chancellor of Parnassus" that is "Greatest of Poets."

After the title, the book commences with two pages of which facsimiles are given on pages 58, 59.

[Illustration: Plate XVI. Facsimile Title Page]

[Illustration: Plate XVII. Facsimile of Page III of "The Great Assises"]

[Illustration: Plate XVIII Facsimile of Page IV of "The Great Assises"]

Apollo appears at the top, next comes Lord Verulan as Chancellor of Parnassus, Sir Philip Sidney and other world renowned names follow and then below the line side by side is a list of the jurors and a list of the malefactors.

A little examination will teach us that the jurors are really the same persons as the malefactors and that we ought to read right across the page as if the dividing line did not exist.

Acting on this principle we perceive that George Wither [Withers] is correctly described as Mercurius Britanicus. Mr. Sidney Lee tells us that Withers regarded "Britain's Remembrancer" 1628 and "Prosopopaeia Britannica" 1648 as his greatest works.

Thomas Cary [Carew] is correctly described as Mercurias Aulicus – Court

Messenger. He went to the French Court with Lord Herbert and was made

Gentleman of the Privy Chamber by Charles I who presented him with an estate at Sunninghill.

Thomas May is correctly described as Mercurius Civicus. He applied for the post of Chronologer to the City of London and James I wrote to the Lord Mayor (unsuccessfully) in his favour.

Josuah Sylvester is correctly described as The Writer of Diurnals. He translated Du Bartas "Divine Weekes," describing day by day, that is "Diurnally," the creation of the world.

Georges Sandes [Sandys] is The Intelligencer. He travelled all over the world and his book of travels was one of the popular works of the period.

Michael Drayton is The Writer of Occurrences. Besides the "Poly-Olbion," he wrote "England's Heroicall Epistles" and "The Barron's Wars."

Francis Beaumont is The Writer of Passages. This exactly describes him as he is known as writing in conjunction with Fletcher. "Beamount and Fletcher make one poet, they single dare not adventure on a play."

William Shakespeere is "The writer of weekely accounts." This exactly describes him, for the only literature for which he was responsible was the accounts sent out by his clerk or attorney.

Turning over the pages of the little book on page 9 the cryer calls out "Then Sylvester, Sands, Drayton, Beaumont, Fletcher, Massinger, Shakespeare (sic) and Heywood, Poets good and true." This statement seems to be contradicted so far as Shakespeare is concerned by the defendant who says on page 31 "Shakespear's (sic) a mimicke" (that is a mere actor not a poet).

     "Beamount and Fletcher make one poet, they      Single, dare not adventure on a play."

Each of these statements seems to be true. And on Page 33

Apollo4 says

     "We should to thy exception give consent      But since we are assur'd, 'tis thy intent,      By this refusall, onely to deferre      That censure, which our justice must conferre      Upon thy merits; we must needs decline      From approbation of these pleas of thine."

That is, Apollo admits that Shakespeare is not a poet but a "mimic," the word to which I called your attention in the "Return from Parnassus" in relation to "this mimick apes." In this little book Shakespeare's name occurs three times, and on each occasion is spelled differently.

This clear statement that the actor Shakespeare was not a poet but only a tradesman who sent out his "weekly accounts" is, I think, here for the first time pointed out. It seems very difficult to conceive of a much higher testimony to Bacon's pre-eminence in poetry than the fact that he is placed as "Chancellor of Parnassus" under Apollo. But a still higher position is accorded to him when it is suggested that Apollo feared that he himself should lose his crown which would be placed on Bacon's head.

Walter Begbie in "Is it Shakespeare?" 1903, p. 274, tells us: – That Thomas Randolf, in Latin verses published in 1640 but probably written some 14 years earlier says that Phoebus was accessory to Bacon's death because he was afraid lest Bacon should some day come to be crowned King of poetry or the Muses. Farther on the same writer declares that as Bacon "was himself a singer" he did not need to be celebrated in song by others, and that George Herbert calls Bacon the colleague of Sol [Phoebus Apollo].

George Herbert was himself a dramatic poet and Bacon dedicated his "Translation of the Psalms" to him "who has overlooked so many of my works."

Mr. Begbie also tells us that Thomas Campion addresses Bacon thus "Whether the thorny volume of the Law or the Schools or the Sweet Muse allure thee."

It may be worth while here to quote the similar testimony which is borne by John Davies of Hereford who in his "Scourge of Folly" published about 1610, writes

     "To the royall, ingenious, and all-learned         Knight, —

Sr Francis Bacon.

     Thy bounty and the Beauty of thy Witt     Comprisd in Lists of Law and learned Arts,     Each making thee for great Imployment fitt     Which now thou hast, (though short of thy         deserts)     Compells my pen to let fall shining Inke     And to bedew the Baies that deck thy Front; —     And to thy health in Helicon to drinke     As to her Bellamour the Muse is wont:     For thou dost her embozom; and dost vse     Her company for sport twixt grave affaires;     So vtterst Law the liuelyer through thy Muse.     And for that all thy Notes are sweetest Aires; My Muse thus notes thy worth in eu'ry Line, With yncke which thus she sugers; so, to shine."

But nothing can much exceed in value the testimony of Ben Jonson who in his "Discoveries," 1641, says "But his learned, and able (though unfortunate) Successor [Bacon in margin] is he, who hath fill'd up all numbers, and perform'd that in our tongue, which may be compar'd or preferr'd either to insolent Greece, or haughty Rome."

"He who hath filled up all numbers" means unquestionably "He that hath written every kind of poetry."5

Alexander Pope the poet declares that he himself "lisped in numbers for the numbers came." Ben Jonson therefore bears testimony to the fact that Bacon was so great a poet that he had in poetry written that "which may be compar'd or preferr'd either to insolent Greece or haughty Rome."

But in 1623 Ben Jonson had said of the AUTHOR of the plays

"Or when thy sockes were on Leaue thee alone, for the comparison Of all, that insolent Greece or haughtie Rome Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come."

Surely the statements in the "Discoveries" were intended to tell us who was the AUTHOR of the plays.

After perusing these contemporary evidences, and they might be multiplied, it is difficult to understand how anyone can venture to dispute Bacon's position as pre-eminent in poetry. But it may be of interest to those who doubt whether Bacon (irrespective of any claim to the authorship of the plays) could be deemed to be a great poet, to quote here the words of Percy Bysshe Shelley, who in his "Defence of Poetry" says

"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."

The immortal plays are the "Greatest Birth of Time," and contain a short summary of the wisdom of the world from ancient times, and they exhibit an extent and depth of knowledge in every branch which has never been equalled at any period of the world's history. In classic lore, as the late Mr. Churton Collins recently pointed out, they evince the ripest scholarship. And this is confirmed by classical scholars all the world over.

None but the profoundest lawyers can realise the extent of the knowledge not only of the theory but of the practice of Law which is displayed. Lord Campbell says that Lord Eldon [supposed to have been the most learned of judges] need not have been ashamed of the law of Shakespeare. And as an instance of the way in which the members of the legal profession look up to the mighty author I may mention that some years ago, at a banquet of a Shakespeare Society at which Mr. Sidney Lee and the writer were present, the late Mr. Crump, Q.C., editor of the Law Times, who probably possessed as much knowledge of law as any man in this country, declared that to tell him that the plays were not written by the greatest lawyer the world has ever seen, or ever would see, was to tell him what he had sufficient knowledge of law to know to be nonsense. He said also that he was not ashamed to confess that he himself, though he had some reputation for knowledge of law, did not possess sufficient legal knowledge to realise one quarter of the law that was contained in the Shakespeare plays.

It requires a philologist to fully appreciate what the enormous vocabulary employed in the plays implies.

Max Muller in his "Science of Language," Vol. I, 1899, p. 379, says

"A well-educated person in England, who has been at a public school and at the University … seldom uses more than about 3,000 or 4,000 words. … The Hebrew Testament says all that it has to say with 5,642 words, Milton's poetry is built up with 8,000; and Shakespeare, who probably displayed a greater variety of expression than any writer in any language … produced all his plays with about 15,000 words."

Shakspeare the householder of Stratford could not have known so many as one thousand words.

But Bacon declared that we must make our English language capable of conveying the highest thoughts, and by the plays he has very largely created what we now call the English language. The plays and the sonnets also reveal their author's life.

In the play of "Hamlet" especially, Bacon seems to tell us a good deal concerning himself, for the auto-biographical character of that play is clearly apparent to those who have eyes to see. I will, however, refer only to a single instance in that play. In the Quarto of 1603, which is the first known edition of the play of "Hamlet," we are told, in the scene at the grave, that Yorick has been dead a dozen years; but in the 1604 Quarto, which was printed in the following year, Yorick is stated to have been dead twenty-three years. This corrected number, twenty-three, looks therefore like a real date of the death of a real person. The words in the Quarto of 1604 are as follows: —

Hamlet, Act v, Scene i.

"[Grave digger called.] Clow[n] … heer's a scull now hath lyen you i' th' earth 23 yeeres … this same scull, sir, was, sir, Yorick's skull, the Kings jester …

Ham[let]. Alas poore Yoricke, I knew him Horatio, a fellow of infinite iest, of most excellent fancie, hee hath bore me on his backe a thousand times … Heere hung those lyppes that I haue kist, I know not howe oft, where be your gibes now? your gamboles, your songs, your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roare, not one now to mocke your owne grinning…"

The King's Jester who died about 1580-1, just twenty-three years before 1604 (as stated in the play), was John Heywood, the last of the King's Jesters. The words spoken by Hamlet exactly describe John Heywood, who was wont to set the table in a roar with his jibes, his gambols, his songs, and his flashes of merriment. He was a favourite at the English Court during three if not four reigns, and it is recorded that Queen Elizabeth as a Princess rewarded him. It is an absolutely gratuitous assumption that he was obliged permanently to leave England when she became Queen. Indeed it is believed that he was an intimate friend of the Bacon family, and must have carried little Francis Bacon any number of times upon his back, and the little fellow must have kissed him still more oftentimes. The story in the play of "Hamlet" seems, therefore, to fit in exactly with the facts of Bacon's life; but it is not possible that the most fertile imagination of the most confirmed Stratfordian can suppose that the Stratford actor ever saw John Heywood, who died long before Shakspere came to London.

CHAPTER VIII

The Author revealed in the Sonnets.

Bacon also reveals much of himself in the play "As you like it," which of course means "Wisdom from the mouth of a fool." In that play, besides giving us much valuable information concerning his "mask" William Shakespeare, he also tells us why it was necessary for him to write under a pseudonym.

Speaking in the character of Jaques, who is the alter ego of

Touchstone, he says,

Act ii, Scene 7             "O that I were a foole,             I am ambitious for a motley coat.Duke. Thou shalt haue one.     Jag. It is my onely suite,             Prouided that you weed your better judgements             Of all opinion that growes ranke in them,             That I am wise. I must haue liberty             Wiithall, as large a Charter as the winde,             To blow on whom I please, for so fooles haue:             And they that are most gauled with my folly,             They most must laugh…             Inuest me in my motley: Giue me leaue             To speake my minde, and I will through and through             Cleanse the foule bodie of th' infected world             If they will patiently receiue my medicine."

He also gives us most valuable information in Sonnet 81.

     Or I shall liue your Epitaph to make,     Or you suruiue when I in earth am rotten,     From hence your memory death cannot take,     Although in me each part will be forgotten,     Your name from hence immortall life shall haue,     Though I (once gone) to all the world must dye,     The Earth can yeeld me but a common graue,     When you intombed in men's eyes shall lye,     Your monument shall be my gentle verse,     Which eyes not yet created shall ore read,     And toungs to be, your being shall rehearse,     When all the breathers of this world are dead,     You still shall liue (such vertue hath my Pen)     Where breath most breaths euen in the mouths of men.

Stratfordians tell us that the above is written in reference to a poet whom Shakespeare "evidently" regarded as a rival. But it is difficult to imagine how sensible men can satisfy their reason with such an explanation. Is it possible to conceive that a poet should write against a rival

    "Your name from hence immortall life shall haue     Though I (once gone) to all the world must dye"

or should say against a rival,

    "The Earth can yeeld me but a common graue     While you intombed in men's eyes shall lye."

or should have declared "against a rival,"

"Your monument shall be my gentle verse"

No! This sonnet is evidently written in reference to the writer's mask or pseudonym which would continue to have immortal life (even though he himself might be forgotten) as he says

"Although in me each part will be forgotten."

It is sometimes said that Shakespeare (meaning the Stratford actor) did not know the value of his immortal works. Is that true of the writer of this sonnet who says

                       "my gentle verse     Which eyes not yet created shall ore read"

No! The writer knew his verses were immortal and would immortalize the pseudonym attached to them

"When all the breathers of this world are dead."

Perhaps the reader will better understand Sonnet 81 if I insert the words necessary to fully explain it.

     Or shall I [Bacon] live your Epitaph to make,     Or you [Shakespeare] survive when I in Earth am rotten,     From hence your memory death cannot take,     Although in me each part will be forgotten.     Your name [Shakespeare] from hence immortal life shall have,     Though I [Bacon] once gone to all the world must die,     The earth can yield me but a common grave,     When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie,     Your monument shall be my [not your] gentle verse,     Which eyes not yet created shall ore read,     And tongues to be your being [which as an author        was not] shall rehearse,     When all the breathers of this world are dead,     You [Shakespeare] still shall live, such vertue        hath my pen [not your own pen, for you never wrote a line]     Where breathe most breaths even in the mouths of men.

This Sonnet was probably written considerably earlier than 1609, but at that date Bacon's name had not been attached to any work of great literary importance.

After the writer had learned the true meaning of Sonnet 81, his eyes were opened to the inward meaning of other Sonnets, and he perceived that Sonnet No. 76 repeated the same tale.

     "Why write I still all one, euer the same,      And keep inuention in a noted weed,      That euery word doth almost sel my name,      Shewing their birth and where they did proceed?"

(Sel may mean spell or tell or possibly betray.)

Especially note that "Invention" is the same word that is used by Bacon in his letter to Sir Tobie Matthew of 1609 (same date as the Sonnets), and also especially remark the phrase "in a noted weed," which means in a "pseudonym," and compare it with the words of Bacon's prayer, "I have (though in a 'despised weed') procured the good of all men." [Resuscitatio, 1671.] Was not the pseudonym of the Actor Shakespeare a very "despised weed" in those days?

Let us look also at Sonnet No. 78.

     "So oft have I enuoked thee for my Muse,      And found such faire assistance in my verse,      As every alien pen hath got my use,      And under thee their poesy disperse."

Here again we should understand how to read this Sonnet as under: —

     "So oft have I enuoked thee [Shakespeare] for my Muse,      And found such faire assistance in my verse,      As every alien pen hath got my use,      And under thee [Shakespeare] their poesy disperse."

"Shakespeare" is frequently charged with being careless of his works and indifferent to the piracy of his name; but we see by this Sonnet, No. 78, that the real author was not indifferent to the false use of his pseudonym, though it was, of course, impossible for him to take any effectual action if he desired to preserve his incognito, his mask, his pseudonym.

CHAPTER IX

Mr. Sidney Lee and the Stratford Bust.

One word to the Stratfordians. The "Shakespeare of Stratford-on-Avon" myth has been shattered and destroyed by the mass of inexactitudes collected in the supposititious "Life of Shakespeare" by Mr. Sidney Lee, who has done his best to pulverise what remained of that myth by recently writing as follows: —

"Most of those who have pressed the question [of Bacon being the real Shake-speare] on my notice, are men of acknowledged intelligence and reputation in their own branch of life, both at home and abroad. I therefore desire as respectfully, but also as emphatically and as publicly, as I can, to put on record the fact, as one admitting to my mind of no rational ground for dispute, that there exists every manner of contemporary evidence to prove that Shakspere, the householder of Stratford-on-Avon, wrote with his own hand, and exclusively by the light of his only genius (merely to paraphrase the contemporary inscription on his tomb in Stratford-on-Avon Church) those dramatic works which form the supreme achievement in English Literature."

As a matter of fact, not a single scrap of evidence, contemporary or otherwise, exists to show that Shakspere, the householder of Stratford-on-Avon, wrote the plays or anything else; indeed, the writer thinks that he has conclusively proved that this child of illiterate parents and father of an illiterate child was himself so illiterate that he was never able to write so much as his own name. But Mr. Sidney Lee seems prepared to accept anything as "contemporary evidence," for on pages 276-7 (1898 edition) of his "Life of Shakespeare" he writes

"Before 1623 an elaborate monument, by a London sculptor of Dutch birth, Gerard Johnson, was erected to Shakespeare's memory in the chancel of the parish church. It includes a half-length bust, depicting the dramatist on the point of writing. The fingers of the right hand are disposed as if holding a pen, and under the left hand lies a quarto sheet of paper."

As a matter of fact, the present Stratford monument was not put up till about one hundred and twenty years after Shakspeare's death. The original monument, see Plate 3 on Page 8, was a very different monument, and the figure, as I have shewn in Plate 5, instead of holding a pen in its hand, rests its two hands on a wool-sack or cushion. Of course, the false bust in the existing monument was substituted for the old bust for the purpose of fraudulently supporting the Stratford myth.