As for Cleon's dream, I think it was a jest: it was, that he was devoured of a long dragon, and it was expounded of a maker of sausages that troubled him exceedingly. There are numbers of the like kind, especially if you include dreams and predictions of astrology. But I have set down these few only of certain credit for example. My judgment is, that they ought all to be despised, and ought to serve but for winter-talk by the fireside: though when I say despised, I mean it as for belief; for otherwise the spreading or publishing of them is in no sort to be despised, for they have done much mischief. And I see many severe laws made to suppress them. That that hath given them grace and some credit consisteth in three things-first, that men mark when they hit, and never mark when they miss, as they do generally also of dreams. The second is, that probable conjectures or obscure traditions many times turn themselves into prophecies, while the nature of man, which coveteth divination, thinks it no peril to foretel that which indeed they do but collect. The third and last (which is the great one) is, that almost all of them, being infinite in number, have been impostures, and by idle and crafty brains merely contrived and feigned after the event past.

style is now no more of England, but of Britain.

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The following few sentences are from the Thirty-sixth Essay, entitled "Of Ambition," which is in the collection of 1612:

Ambition is like choler, which is a humour that maketh men active, earnest, full of alacrity, and stirring, if it be not stopped; but if it be stopped, and cannot have its way, it be cometh a dust, and thereby malign and venomous. So ambitious men, if they find the way open for their rising, and still get forward, they are rather busy than dangerous; but if they be checked in their desires they become secretly discontent, and look upon men and matters with an evil eye, and are best pleased when things go backward, which is the worst property in a servant of a prince or state. It is counted by some a weakness in princes to have favourites, but it is of all others the best remedy against ambitious great ones; for when the way of pleasuring and displeasuring lieth by the favourite, it is impossible any other should be over-great.

We subjoin the whole of the Thirty-seventh, entitled "Of Masques and Triumphs," which was first published in 1625:

These things are but toys to come amongst such serious observations; but yet since princes will have such things, it is better they should be graced with elegancy than daubed with cost. Dancing to song is a thing of great state and pleasure. I understand it that the song be in quire, placed aloft, and accompanied with some broken music, and the ditty fitted to the device. Acting in song, especially in dialogues, hath an extreme good grace: I say acting, not dancing (for that is a mean and vulgar thing), and the voices of the dialogue would be strong and manly (a bass and a tenor, no treble), and the ditty high and tragical, not nice or dainty. Several quires placed one over against another, and taking the voice by catches, anthem-wise, give great pleasure. Turning dances into figure is a childish curiosity; and generally let it be noted, that those things which I here set down are such as do naturally take the sense, and not respect petty wonderments. It is true, the alterations of scenes, so it be quietly and without noise, are things of great beauty and pleasure; for they feed and relieve the eye before it be full of the same object. Let the scenes abound with light, especially coloured and varied; and let the maskers, or any other that are to come down from the scene, have some motions upon the scene itself before their coming down; for it draws the eye strangely, and makes it with great pleasure to desire to see that it cannot perfectly discern. Let the songs be loud and cheerful, and not chirpings or pulings. Let the music likewise be sharp and loud, and well placed. The colours that show best by candle-light are white, carnation, and a kind of sea-water green; and oes or spangs, as they are of no great cost, so they are of most glory. As for rich embroidery, it is lost and not discerned. Let the suits of the maskers be graceful, and such as become the person when the vizors are off, not after examples of known attires-Turks, soldiers, mariners, and the like. Let anti-masks not be long: they have been commonly of fools, satyrs, baboons, wild-men, antics, beasts, spirits, witches, Æthiops, pigmies, turquets, nymphs, rustics, cupids, statues (moving), and the like. As for angels, it is not comical enough to put them in anti-masks; and anything that is hideous, as devils, giants, is on the other side as unfit. But chiefly, let the music of them be recreative, and with some strange changes. Some sweet odours suddenly coming forth, without any drops falling, are in such a company, as there is steam and heat, things of great pleasure and refreshment. Double masks, one of men, another of ladies, addeth state and variety. But all is nothing, except the room be kept clean and neat.

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Queen Elizabeth's time of England, an Irish rebel condemned, put up a petition to the deputy that he might be hanged in a wyth, and not in a halter, because it had been so used with former rebels. There be monks in Russia, for penance, that will sit a whole night in a vessel of water, till they be engaged with hard ice. . . . . . But if the force of custom, simple and separate, be great, the force of custom copulate, and conFor there example joined, and collegiate, is far greater. teacheth, company comforteth, emulation quickeneth, glory raiseth: so as in such places the force of custom is in its exaltation. Certainly the great multiplication of virtues upon human nature, resteth upon societies well ordained and disciplined: for commonwealths and good governments do nourish But the virtue grown, but do not much mend the seeds. misery is, that the most effectual means are now applied to the ends least to be desired.

The Fortieth, entitled “Of Fortune," is another of those published in 1612. We will give uue greater part of it:

The way of fortune is like the milken way in the sky, which is a meeting or knot of a number of small stars: not seen asunder, but giving light together: so are there a number of little, and scarce discerned virtues, or rather faculties and customs that make men fortunate. The Italians note some of them, such as a man would little think: when they speak of one that cannot do amiss, they will throw in into his other conditions And certainly there be not two that he hath poco di matto. more fortunate properties, than to have a little of the fool, and not too much of the honest. Therefore extreme lovers of their country, or masters, were never fortunate, neither can they be. For when a man placeth his thoughts without himself, he goeth not his own way. Fortune is to be honoured and respected, and it be but for her daughters, confidence, and reputation: for those two felicity breedeth; the first within a man's

Johnson, in his Dictionary, instead of quech, gives queck, as Bacon's word here; quoting the passage in a singularly perverted shape in all respects:-"The lads of Sparta were accustomed to be whipped, without so much as quecking." His interpretation, however, may be just enough:-"To shrink; to show pain; perhaps to complain."

self, the latter in others towards him. All wise men to decline the envy of their own virtues, use to ascribe them to Providence and fortune; for so they may the better assume them: and besides, it is greatness in a man to be the care of the higher powers. So Cæsar said to the pilot in the tempest, Cæsarem portas, et fortunam ejus.* So Sylla chose the name of Felix, and not of Magnus. And it hath been noted, that those who ascribe openly too much to their own wisdom and policy end infortunate. It is written, that Timotheus the Athenian, after he had, in the account he gave to the state of his government, often interlaced his speech, and in this fortune had no part,' never prospered in anything he undertook afterwards. Certainly there be, whose fortunes are like Homer's verses, that have a slide and easiness more than the verses of other poets; as Plutarch saith of Timoleon's fortune, in respect of that of Agesilaus, or Epaminondas: and that this should be, no doubt it is much in a man's self.

The Forty-first, entitled “Of Usury," first appeared in the edition of 1625. By usury Bacon means simply taking interest for money; and, with all his penetration, he was not before his age in his views upon this and other questions of commerce and political economy, as may be seen both from the present essay, and more fully from his History of Henry the Seventh. He was too sagacious, however, to contend that the taking of interest for money could be altogether dispensed with or put down; and accordingly, after having here pointed out what he calls "the discommodities of usury," he proceeds :

On the other side, the commodities of usury are: first, that howsoever usury in some respect hindereth merchandizing, yet in some other it advanceth it: for it is certain, that the greatest part of trade is driven by young merchants, upon borrowing at interest: so as if the usurer either call in, or keep back his money, there will ensue presently a great stand of trade. The second is, that were it not for this easy borrowing upon interest, men's necessities would draw upon them a most sudden undoing, in that they would be forced to sell their means (be it lands or goods) far under foot; and so, whereas

* Thou bearest Cæsar, and his fortune too.

usury doth but gnaw upon them, bad markets would swallow them quite up. As for mortgaging or pawning, it will little mend the matter; for either men will not take pawns without use, or if they do, they will look precisely for the forfeiture. I remember a cruel monied man in the country that would say, The devil take this usury, it keeps us from forfeitures of mortgages and bonds.' The third and last is, that it is a vanity to conceive, that there would be ordinary borrowing without profit; and it is impossible to conceive the number of inconveniences that will ensue, if borrowing be cramped: therefore, to speak of the abolishing of usury is idle. All states have ever had it in one kind, or rate or other; so as that opinion must be sent to Utopia..

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The Forty-second Essay, "Of Youth and Age," which is one of those. published in 1612, must be given nearly in full

:

A man that is young in years, may be old in hours, if he have lost no time, but that happeneth rarely. Generally youth is like the first cogitations, not so wise as the second; for there is a youth in thoughts as well as in ages and yet the invention of young men is more lively than that of old, and imaginations stream into their minds better, and, as it were, more divinely. Natures that have much heat, and great and violent desires and perturbations, are not ripe for action till they have passed the meridian of their years; as it was with Julius Cæsar, and Septimius Severus, of the latter of whom it is said, 'Juventutem egit erroribus, imo furoribus plenam;'* and yet he was the ablest emperor almost of all the list. But reposed natures may do well in youth, as it is seen in Augustus Cæsar, Cosmus, Duke of Florence, Gaston de Fois, and others. On the other side, heat and vivacity in age is an excellent composition for business. Young men are fitter to invent than to judge, fitter for execution than for counsel, and fitter for new projects than for settled business. For the experience of age in things that fall within the compass of it, directeth them, but in new things abuseth them. The errors of young men are the ruin of business'; but the errors of aged men amount but to this, that more might have been done or sooner. Young men in the conduct and manage of actions embrace more than they can hold, stir more than they can quiet, fly to the end without consideration of

* He spent his youth not merely in errors, but in madness.