Chapter 9. Francis Bacon
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Cosmic Consciousness, by Richard Maurice Bucke, [1901], at sacred-texts.com
CHAPTER 9.
Francis Bacon.
Born 1561.; died 1626.
Nothing approaching to an exhaustive study of this case can be attempted here. The mere flanges of the subject have filled a moderate-sized
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library, while the core of the matter has hardly been touched upon.
I.
Without more ado or any beating about the bush it may as well be frankly stated at once that the view of the present editor is:
a. That Francis Bacon wrote the "Shakespeare" plays and poems.
b. That he entered into Cosmic Consciousness at about the age of thirty, or perhaps a year earlier, as his intellectual and moral development was very precocious.
c. That he began writing the "Sonnets" immediately after his illumination. The "Sonnets," as considered here, are the first one hundred and twenty-six, which distinctly constitute a poem in and by themselves and deal with the subject here considered.
d. That the earlier of these one hundred and twenty-six "Sonnets" are addressed to the Cosmic Sense, and the later to it and its offspring, the plays.
e. That in the "Sonnets" the following individualities may be recognized: (a) the Cosmic Sense; (b) the Bacon of the Cosmic Sense, and of the plays and "Sonnets";. (c) the special offspring of the Cosmic Sense—the plays; (d) the ostensible Bacon of the court, politics, prose writings, business, etc., and possibly others.
II.
It is not absolutely denied that the first one hundred and twenty-six "Sonnets" can be read as if addressed to a young male friend (although in the case of several this might be, it seems to the writer, successfully disputed), but it is clear that so read they lack meaning and dignity—that, in fact, looked at from this point of view, they are entirely unworthy of the man (whoever he was) who wrote "Lear" and "Macbeth." And it may be claimed that an almost (or quite) constant characteristic of the writings of the class of men dealt with in this volume is exactly this double
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meaning corresponding with the duplex personality of the writer. Of this double, often triple, meaning the works of Dante and Whitman supply perhaps the best examples.
T. S. Baynes [86: 764] says that these speculations "cannot be regarded as successful"; but let us, for the sake of argument, suppose that there really was such a young man, such a dark woman [Mary Fitton, 167: 30 et seq. or another], that would prove absolutely nothing. These people might have had a real existence and might have been spoken to and spoken of as the superficial meaning of the "Sonnets," just as the ocean is spoken to and of in the superficial meaning of "With Husky Haughty Lips" [193: 392]. Or take for another example the "Prayer of Columbus" [193: 323]. Columbus might have made just such a prayer, and there is no reason why Whitman should not have put such a prayer into his mouth; but nothing is more certain than that the words in question are addressed to the All Powerful by Whitman himself. But why select instances? There is perhaps not a line in the "Leaves" which has one meaning only. Then who to-day does not understand that in the "Divine Comedy" Dante used the theological terms current in his day to veil and express far deeper and loftier thoughts than had theretofore ever been annexed to them? Attach the current signification to the terms used and his verses had one meaning, but ascribe to these terms his intention and they have another vastly wider and deeper. So his last and best translator, who undoubtedly knew him profoundly, says that "a far deeper-lying and more-prevailing source of imperfect comprehension of the poem than any verbal difficulty exists in the double or triple meaning that runs through it" [70:16]. Or is "Seraphita" a sort of fairy tale having for central figure an idealized hysterico-maniacal Norwegian girl'?
III.
That a man having Cosmic Consciousness is, in fact, at least a dual person is abundantly shown and illustrated in the present volume. and "Shakespeare," the author of the plays and "Sonnets,"
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is really another (while the same) self of the Bacon who wrote the prose works, spoke in Parliament, lived before the world as jurist, courtier and citizen. Just as "Seraphita" (Seraphitus), while being Balzac, is totally distinct from the ostensible Balzac who was seen in Parisian drawing rooms. Just as the Whitman of the "Leaves" is wholly distinct (yet the same) from the Whitman who rode on omnibusses and ferries, "lived the same life with the rest," and died in Camden, March 26, 1892. Just as "Gabriel," while being Mohammed, is at the same time another and distinct personality.
This identity (at the same time) and disparateness is the true solution (it is believed) of the Bacon-Shakespeare controversy.
IV.
It is perhaps impossible for the merely self conscious man to form any conception of what this oncoming of Cosmic Consciousness must be to those who experience it. The man is lifted out of his old self and lives rather in heaven than upon the old earth—more correctly the old earth becomes heaven. One of the prime necessities of this period is solitude. Why? Probably because the person is so occupied with, so enraptured by, his new world (his new self), that he simply cannot bear to be called back to the old world (the old self). So Balzac would (at this period of his life) shut himself up—hide himself—for weeks and months at a stretch. So Paul conferred not with flesh and blood, "neither went up to Jerusalem" [22:1–17], but "away into Arabia," and seems to have lived very much to himself for some time. Solitude (although naturally he was so eminently sociable) became, under the same circumstances, a necessity to Whitman, and in the early part of his Cosmic Conscious life he would frequently spend days, weeks and even months at a stretch in the sparsely peopled or uninhabited districts of Long Island—especially along the seashore.
Immediately upon the illumination of Jesus (if we can depend upon the account given in Matthew and Mark) he was "led up of
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the spirit into the wilderness," and remained in solitude for a certain time. And it is probable that sufficient research would reveal action of this kind as universal in pronounced cases. Be this as it may, Spedding [174: 49] says that: "From April, 1590, until the latter part of 1591 [nearly two years] I find no other composition of Bacon's [than a letter of five pages!] nor any important piece of news concerning him." While (referring to the very same period in his life) Bacon says, writing to Burghley late in 1591 or early in 1592, when he was thirty-one years old, and, according to the hypothesis, one to two years after his illumination: "I do not fear that action shall impair it [his health], because I account my ordinary course of study and meditation to be more painful [more laborious] than most parts of action are" [174: 56].
Then again it seems that, especially during these two years, 1590 and 1591, Bacon frequently, to use his own words, "fled into the shade" at Twickenham and "enjoyed the blessings of contemplation in that sweet solitariness which collecteth the mind as shutting the eyes doth the sight" [129: 71]. So "there are times noted by Mr. Spedding when Bacon wrote with closed doors, and when the subject of his studies is doubtful; and there is one long vacation of which the same careful biographer remarks that he cannot tell what work the indefatigable student produced during those months, for that he knows of none whose date corresponds with the period" [129: 71–2]. And doubtless Mrs. Pott is in the right when she suggests that it was during such periods and probably during 1590–91 that many of the early plays were written [129: 71].
V.
Thus we have the frame into which to set the picture: Bacon's mind is exceedingly precocious and he enters Cosmic Consciousness, let us suppose, early in 1590, at or shortly after the age of twenty-nine; he had probably written several plays before that, a few of which may have been thought worthy of inclusion in the
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1623 folio. In the spring of 1590 (in his thirtieth year) he acquires the Cosmic Sense. For the next two years (1590–91) he is much secluded and produces a number of plays, while, as a sort of running commentary upon his mental experiences and his work, he wrote the earlier "Sonnets," the rest being written one or two at a time as occasion called them forth, between this period and the date of their publication-1609.
It would be proper in this place to give some account of Bacon's personality were it not that the subject is too large for the limits of this volume. The question which concerns us here is, of course: were his intellect and moral nature (especially the latter) such as belong to persons having Cosmic Consciousness 2 Upon the answers to the last half of this question a doubt (fostered chiefly by Pope and Macaulay) has arisen. The point cannot be argued here. All that can be said is that the present writer believes that Bacon was as great morally as he was intellectually; and he believes that whoever will take the pains to seriously consider the standard works on the subject written by able and impartial men (such as Dixon's "Personal History" [75], Spedding's "Life and Times" [174], Spedding's "Evenings with a Reviewer" [177], and especially the "Life," by Rawley, who knew Bacon well) will inevitably come to the same conclusion. Rawley says of him: "He was free from malice; 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" [141: 52]. And after many years’ study of the subject Spedding sums up as follows:
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And then, at the end of his book, after all the facts of Bacon's life that have come down to us had been reviewed and considered he goes on:
Compare with this estimate of Bacon's mental attitude under the depressing circumstances of his last years the undying and inexhaustible cheer of Walt Whitman, Jacob Behmen, and William Blake in like case.
VI.
Here (while speaking of the personal traits of this man) will be as good an opportunity as any to quote a few passages which seem to glance at some certain quality in Bacon's mind such as this master faculty of which there is question in this book. For instance, Rawley [141:47], as a result of personal observation, says of him: "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. For though he was a great reader of books, yet he had not his knowledge from books, but from some grounds and notions from within himself; which, notwithstanding,
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he vented with great caution and circumspection." In other words, Hawley thinks that Bacon was inspired, and says that he was exceedingly careful in publishing the truths or ideas derived from that source. And this is exactly what is claimed by the present editor as one reason for the concealed authorship of the plays and sonnets.
Note again these words of Bacon's, taken from his essay "Of Truth" [35:82]: "The first creature of God, in the works of the days, was the light of the sense; the last was the light of reason; and his Sabbath work ever since is the illumination of his spirit." In other words: In the evolution of the human mind simple consciousness was first produced; then self consciousness; and lastly, there is being produced to-day Cosmic Consciousness. Bacon proceeds: "First he breathed light upon the face of the matter of chaos [and produced life, simple consciousness]; then he breathed light into the face of man [and produced self consciousness]; and still he breatheth and inspireth light into the face of his chosen" [endowing them with Cosmic Consciousness]. Compare: "It has been said, great are the senses, greater than the senses is the mind [simple consciousness], greater than the mind is the understanding [self consciousness]. What is greater than the understanding is that [Cosmic Consciousness]. Thus knowing that which is higher than the understanding and restraining yourself by yourself [note the inevitable reduplication of the individual], destroy the unmanageable enemy in the shape of desire" [154: 57]. And again: "It is not by reasoning that the law is to be found, it is beyond the pale of reasoning" [164: 39].
It is worthy of notice that Bacon seems to have recognized an interval between the light of reason and the illumination of the spirit as great as the interval between the light of sense and that of reason. That is, he recognized as great an interval between Cosmic and Self Consciousness as exists between the latter and simple consciousness—just as is claimed by the present writer. But within the field of self consciousness where could he find such an interval as this between reason and anything above reason?
Again in his great prayer [175: 469] Bacon says:
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The Cosmic Sense produced the plays. If Bacon had openly lived his whole life for the Cosmic Sense what other perhaps greater works might he not have produced? And instead of his almost hidden, misunderstood life, we might have had another of those open, exalted lives, each one of which is a source of endless inspiration to the race which is slowly toiling up from what we see around us to that divine goal.
To close this part of the subject, glance at two other short extracts. The first from the "Plan of the Work," the second from the "Novum Organum." Bacon says:
And again:
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VII.
This, of course, is not the place for a discussion of the authorship of the plays, but since it is here taken as certain that they are to be credited to Bacon, it will be right to give a few of the principal reasons for the adoption of that view. The testimony of the writer himself on the point will be produced when certain of the "Sonnets" fall under consideration. Exclusive of these passages in the "Sonnets" the "reasons" in question may be summed up as follows:
a. The large number of new words in the plays, estimated at five hundred, mostly from the Latin, and the much larger number of old words used in a new sense, estimated at five thousand, make it clear that these were written not merely by a genius but by a learned man—a man who read Latin so continuously as that he came almost to think in that language. Then the similarity of Bacon's style to that of the plays, and above all the striking identity of the vocabulary in the prose works and plays, so marvelous that 98.5 per cent. of "Shakespeare's" words are also Bacon's [37: 133], the use of the same metaphors and similes, of the same antitheta, etc. [37:136], makes it nearly certain (especially when it is borne in mind that that vocabulary, those metaphors, similes and antitheta are largely new) that the same mind produced both sets of books—the "Shakespearean" and Baconian.
b. Not only are there great numbers of new words and old words with new meanings, metaphors, similes, etc., common to the "Shakespeare" plays and to the Baconian prose, but the large number of phrases and turns of expression which are also found in both cannot possibly be attributed to accident. See these given by the hundred by Donnelly [74], by Wigston [197], by Holmes [99] and others.
c. Bacon and "Shakespeare" read the same books, and not only so, but the favorite books of the one were the favorite books of the other.
d. They write on the same subjects. The philosophy of the
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[paragraph continues] "De Augmentis," the "Novum Organum" and other prose works is constantly being reproduced in the plays; while Bacon's essays and the plays treat throughout the same subjects (human life and human passions) and always from the same point of view [197: 25 et seq.]
e. On all sorts of subjects, large and small, their point of view is the same—they never express irreconcilable opinions.
f. They were (if two) the two greatest men living in the world at that time. For thirty years they lived in what we to-day should consider a small city of one hundred and sixty thousand inhabitants [82: 820]. And it does not appear that they ever met, and there is no evidence that either of them ever knew of the existence of the other. The lesser man of the (supposed) two—Baconleft behind him abundant evidence of the literary activity of his life in the form of manuscripts, letters to and from friends, etc. The greater "Shakespeare"—left none; not a manuscript, not a letter.
g. The localities of the plays are all such as are known to have been known to Bacon either by residence, visiting or reading—largely the two former. With these localities the writer frequently evinces an intimate familiarity. The one especial locality which must have been minutely known to William Shakespeare—Stratford and its neighborhood—is not introduced.
h. There exists a distinct parallelism between the successive plays (their incidents, scenes, etc.) and the occurrences of Bacon's life (his position, circumstances, residences, etc.), while there seems none between them and "Shakespeare's" life, so far as this is known to us [130]. .
i. The relation existing between "Shakespeare's" "Richard III" and his "Henry the VIII" on the one hand and Bacon's prose history of Henry the VII on the other makes it about certain that the same man wrote the three works [197: 1–24].
j. It is sometimes said that Bacon was a scientist, a philosopher, a courtier, a lawyer, a man of affairs, but not a great wit or poet, such as might have written the plays. But, in the first place, and putting aside the plays, Bacon was both a wit and a
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poet. Macaulay does not exaggerate when he writes that, as shown in his prose works: "The poetical faculty was powerful in Bacon's mind, but not, like his wit, so powerful as occasionally to usurp the place of his reason and to tyrannize over the whole man." "No imagination," he adds, "was ever at once so strong and so thoroughly subjugated" [120: 487].
k. The "Promus" argument would alone seem, to an impartial mind, pretty conclusive of the Baconian authorship of the plays. If this collection [129] was not made to aid in the production of these, will some one kindly tell us with what end Bacon undertook and prosecuted the labor of its compilation? Those who have still doubts upon the subject would do well to read Bacon's openly acknowledged writings. Then, in the second place, it is claimed here 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 (of course) the use of all the learning and of all the faculties of the self conscious Bacon, and along with these the vast spiritual insight and powers which go with possession of Cosmic Consciousness.
l. About April 18th, 1621, after his fall, Bacon composed a prayer which Addison quoted as resembling the devotions of an angel rather than those of a man [175: 467]. No truer or higher poetry is found in the plays or "Sonnets" than is found in it. No man with a soul in his body can read it and doubt its absolute candor and honesty. In it he says: "I have (though in a despised weed) procured the good of all men." No one has ever explained what this "good of all men," which Bacon had procured and which went about in a despised dress, might be. Is there anything else it could be except the plays? "The good of all men" is such an immense phrase that the object referred to must necessarily be enormous. What other such object could there have been in Bacon's mind at the time? Well, his philosophical works—the "De Augmentis" and the "Novum Organum" and the rest? Yes, it would doubtless be true of them. But the object spoken of
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was in a despised dress. Were they? Quite the contrary. They were in a genuine, high-class, philosophic garb as to form and style—more, they were in the best Latin that could, for love or money, be procured for them.
m. Bornmann [28] and Ruggles [145], in two fascinating volumes and from somewhat different points of view, have ably pointed out (as indeed had been done several times before but not so systematically) how persistently the thought of Bacon and that of "Shakespeare" run in the same channel; how the science and philosophy of the first are constantly worked into the poetry of the second, becoming its very life blood and soul, and how the method laid down and followed by the one is never lost sight of by the other. Indeed, if nothing had ever been written on the subject except these two books (and they do not touch the main, stock arguments) they would go far along to a demonstration of the proposition that the man who wrote the "Tempest," "Lear" and "Merchant of Venice" wrote also the "De Augmentis" and the "Silva Silvarium."
n. Finally, consider the anagram discovered by Dr. Platt, at that time of New Jersey, in "Love's Labor's Lost" [51: 376]: "Beginning at the commencement of the fifth act, we meet one after another the following: Satis quod sufficit (that which suffices is enough) . Novi hominen tanquam te (I know the man as well as I know you). Ne intelligis domine (do you understand me, sir)? Laus Deo, bene, intelligo (praise God, I understand well). Videsne quis venit? (do you see who comes)? Video et gaudeo (I see and rejoice). Quare (wherefore)? Then, a few lines further on, the word Honorificabilitudinitatibus is (as it were) flung into the text. Immediately afterwards one says: 'Are you not lettered?' The answer is: 'Yes, he teaches boys the hornbook.' 'What is a b spelt backward, with the horn on his head?' The answer to that, of course, is 'Ba, with a horn added.' Now, 'Ba' with a horn added is Bacornu, which is not, but suggests, and was probably meant to suggest, Bacon. But whence is derived the a b which is to be spelt backward? In the middle of the long word we find these letters in that order—a b. Begin,
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now, at the b and spell backward as you are told. You get bacifironoh. From these letters it is not hard to pick out Fr. Bacon. Now take the other half of the word spelt forward—ilitudinitatibus. It is not hard to pick out from it ludi (the plays), tuiti (protected or guarded), nati (produced). These words, with those we had before, give us: Ludi tuiti Fr. Bacono nati. The remaining letters are hiiibs, which are easily read as hi sibi. Now put the words together in grammatical order and you have: Hi ludi, tuiti sibi, Fr. Bacono nati (these plays entrusted to themselves proceeded from Fr. Bacon). It is a perfect anagram. Each letter is used once and once only. The form of the long word is Latin and it is read in Latin. The sense of the infolded words corresponds with the sense, so far as it has any [compare honorificare, honorifico; see Century Dictionary], of the infolding word. The infolded Latin is grammatical. The intention is fully declared and plain. There is no flaw.
"But where, now, does the long word come from, and can a connection be traced between it and the actual man, Francis Bacon? To answer this, turn back to the Northumberland House MS. mentioned above. That MS. belonged to Bacon, and could never have been seen by the actor, Shakespeare. On the outer leaf is written the word: Honorificabilitudino. This also is an anagram. It infolds the words: Initio hi ludi Fr. Bacono (in the beginning these plays from Fr. Bacon). It seems to have been a first thought. The Latin words do not form a complete sentence; they suggest a meaning, but do not actually contain one. The anagram in this form was not considered satisfactory, and was amended into the form found in 'Love's Labor's Lost.'
"Thus we have before us the making of the word by Bacon. The sense of the word and its history correspond. The case seems to be complete."
o. But arguments such as above, though cogent and indeed of themselves sufficient if frankly considered, are no longer necessary to establish, although they may be allowed to suggest, the Baconian authorship of the plays and poems, since the writer within the last two years has discovered that these are all or nearly
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all signed by Francis Bacon, by means of a cipher invented by himself and kept to himself for forty odd years. The evidence upon which this statement rests, if not already published by the time this volume is issued, will very soon thereafter be given to the world.
VIII.
But the present volume has nothing to do with the Bacon-Shakespeare question except incidentally, by the way, and perforce. Somebody wrote the plays and "Sonnets," and that person, whoever he might be, had, it is believed, Cosmic Consciousness. And just as there is found in nearly all these cases two classes of writing—that, namely, which flows from the Cosmic Sense and that which, springing up in the self conscious mind, treats directly of the Cosmic Sense as an (to it) objective reality—so these two classes of writing are found here: (1) The plays, treating of the world of men and flowing directly from the Cosmic Sense, and (2) the "Sonnets," treating (from the point of view of the self conscious man) in a subtle, hidden manner, as is usual and indeed inevitable, of the Cosmic Sense itself.
It remains (all that can be done here) to give as many of the "Sonnets" as there is space for, accompanied by the necessary explanatory remarks.
IX.
The first seventeen "Sonnets" urge the Cosmic Sense to produce. The theory is that they were written, as they stand, earliest, and that they were the first writings of their author after illumination. If it be thought singular that a man should so write, then compare this with an undoubted case of precisely the same thing as is here supposed. The 1855 edition of "Leaves of Grass" was written by Whitman immediately after illumination. On the third page of the "Leaves" (the preface was written afterwards) stand these words, addressed to the Cosmic Sense:
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"Loose the stop from your throat—not words, not music or rhyme I want; not custom or lecture, not even the best, only the lull I like, the hum of your valved voice." In the case of Whitman, as in the case of Buddha and Jesus, the special urge of the Cosmic Sense was towards an exalted life. In the case of Bacon, as in that of Balzac, it was especially towards literary expression. In accordance with this distinction, Whitman writes, in a long life, two small volumes; Bacon, in a shorter life, ten or twenty times as much. Whitman's invocation occupies three lines; Bacon's, two hundred lines.
SONNET I.
That thereby beauty's rose might never die,
But as the riper should by time decease,
His tender heir might bear his memory:
But thou contracted to thine own bright eyes,
Feed’st thy light's flame with self-substantial fuel,
Making a famine where abundance lies,
Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.
Thou that art now the world's fresh ornament,
And only* herald to the gaudy spring,
Within thy own bud buriest thy content,
And, tender churl, mak’st waste in niggarding.
Pity the world, or else this glutton be,
To eat the world's due, by the grave and thee.
The fairest of all things is what Plotinus calls "this sublime condition," and of which Dante said: "Oh splendor of living light eternal! Who hath become so pallid under the shadow of Parnassus, or hath so drunk at its cistern, that he would not seem to have his mind encumbered, trying to represent thee as thou didst appear there where in harmony the heaven overshadows thee when in the open air thou didst thyself disclose" [71: 201].
SONNET II.
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
Thy youth's proud livery, so gazed on now,
Will be a tattered weed, of small worth held:
Then being ask’d where all thy beauty lies,
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days,—
To say, within thine own deep sunken eyes,
Were an all-eating shame and thriftless praise.
How much more praise deserv’d thy beauty's use,
If thou could’st answer—"This fair child of mine p. 169
Shall sum my count, and make my old excuse,—"
Proving his beauty by succession thine!
This were to be new made when thou art old,
And see thy blood warm when thou feel’st it cold.
SONNET III.
Now is the time that face should form another;
Whose fresh repair if not thou renewest,
Thou dost beguile the world, unbless some mother.*
For where is she so fair† whose unear’d womb
Disdains the tillage of thy husbandry?
Or who is he so fond will be the tomb
Of his self-love, to stop posterity?
Thou art thy mother's glass,‡ and she in thee
Calls back the lovely April of her prime:
So thou through windows of thine age shalt see,
Despite of wrinkles, this thy golden time.
But if thou live, remembered not to be,
Die single, and thine image dies with thee.
† Where is she so fair? What art is there so fair, etc.
‡ Thou art thy mother's glass—that is, nature's mirror. "Hold the mirror up to nature" (Hamlet). In the Cosmic Sense all nature, including the human heart, is reflected. In this connection consider (besides the "Shakespeare" plays) the "Comédie Humaine" of Balzac; the "Divine Comedy" of Dante; the "Leaves of Grass" of Whitman.
SONNET XV.*
Holds in perfection but a little moment,
That this huge stage presenteth nought but shows,
Whereon the stars in secret influence comment;
When I perceive that men as plants increase,
Cheered and check’d even by the selfsame sky,
Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease,
And wear their brave state out of memory;
Then the conceit of this inconstant stay
Sets you most rich in youth before my sight,
Where wasteful Time debateth with Decay,
To change your day of youth to sullied night;
And, all in war with Time, for love of you,
As he takes from you, I engraft you new.
SONNET XVI.*
Make war upon this bloody tyrant, Time?
And fortify yourself in your decay
With means more blessed than my barren rhyme? p. 170
Now stand you on the top of happy hours;
And many maiden gardens, yet unset,
With virtuous wish would bear your living flowers,
Much liker than your painted counterfeit:
So should the lines of life that life repair,
Which this, Time's pencil, or my pupil pen,
Neither in inward worth, or outward fair,
Can make you live yourself in eyes of men.
To give away yourself keeps yourself still;
And you must live drawn by your own sweet skill.
SONNET XVII.*
If it were fill’d with your most high deserts?
Though yet, Heaven knows, it is but as a tomb
Which hides your life, and shows not half your parts.
If I could write the beauty of your eyes,
And in fresh numbers number all your graces,
The age to come would say, "this poet lies;
Such heavenly touches ne’er touch’d earthly faces."
So should my papers, yellow’d with their age,
Be scorn’d, like old men of less truth than tongue;
And your true rights be term’d a poet's rage,
And stretched metre of an antique song:
But were some child of yours alive that time,
You should live twice—in it, and in my rhyme.
SONNET XVIII.*
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often in his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometimes declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; p. 171
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
SONNET XXXIII.*
Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign eye,
Kissing with golden face the meadows green,
Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy;
Anon permit the basest clouds to ride
With ugly rack on his celestial face,
And from the forlorn world his visage hide,
Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace:
Even so my son one early morn did shine
With all triumphant splendor on my brow;
But, out alack! he was but one hour mine,
The region cloud hath mask’d him from me now.
Yet him for this my love no whit disdaineth;
Suns of the world may stain, when heaven's sun staineth.
SONNET XXXVI.*
Although our undivided loves are one:
So shall those blots that do with me remain,
Without thy help, by me be borne alone.
In our two loves there is but one respect,
Though in our lives a separate spite,
Which though it alter not love's sole effect,
Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight. p. 172
I may not evermore acknowledge thee,
Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame;
Nor thou with public kindness honor me,
Unless thou take that honor from thy name:
But do not so; I love thee in such sort
As, thou being mine, mine is thy good report.
The writer of the sonnet says, or seems to say, that should he acknowledge his other self, the Cosmic Sense, and its offspring, the plays, any good that could do him (the self conscious person) would be taken from this higher self, and that he will not consent to.
SONNET XXXIX*
When thou art all the better part of me?
What can mine own praise to mine own self bring?
And what is 't but mine own, when I praise thee?
Even for this let us divided live,
And our dear love lose name of single one,
That by this separation I may give
That due to thee which thou deserv’t alone.
O absence, what a torment wouldst thou prove,
Were it not thy sour leisure gave sweet leave
To entertain the time with thoughts of love,—
Which time and thoughts so sweetly doth deceive,
And that thou teachest how to make one twain,
By praising him here, who doth hence remain!
p. 173
SONNET LII*
Can bring him to his sweet up-locked treasure,
The which he will not every hour survey,
For blunting the fine point of seldom pleasure.
Therefore are feasts so solemn and so rare,
Since, seldom coming, in the long year set,
Like stones of worth they thinly placed are,
Or captain jewels in the carkanet.
So is the time that keeps you, as my chest,
Or as the wardrobe which the robe doth hide,
To make some special instant special blest,
By new unfolding his imprison’d pride.
Blessed are you whose worthiness gives scope,
Being had to triumph being lack’d to hope.
SONNET LIII.*
That millions of strange shadows on you tend?
Since every one hath, every one, one shade,
And you, but one, can every shadow lend.
Describe Adonis, and the counterfeit
Is poorly imitated after you;
On Helen's cheek all art of beauty set,
And you in Grecian tires are painted new:
Speak of the spring, and foison of the year;
The one doth shadow of your beauty show,
The other as your bounty doth appear;
And you in every blessed shape we know.
In all external grace you have some part,
But you like none, none you, for constant heart.
p. 174
SONNET LV.*
Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone, besmear’d with sluttish time.
When wasteful war shall statues overturn,
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword nor war's quick fire shall burn
The living record of your memory.
’Gainst death and all oblivious enmity
Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room,
Even in the eyes of all posterity
That wear this world out to the ending doom.
So, till the judgment that yourself arise,
You live in this, and dwell in lovers’ eyes.
SONNET LIX.*
Hath been before, how are our brains beguil’d,
Which, laboring for invention, bears amiss
The second burden of a former child!
O that record could with a backward look,
Even of five hundred courses of the sun,
Show me your image in some antique book,
Since mind at first in character was done!
That I might see what the old world could say
To this composed wonder of your frame;
Whether we are mended, or whether better they,
Or whether revolution be the same.
O, sure I am, the wits of former days
To subjects worse have given admiring praise.
SONNET LXII.*
And all my soul, and all my every part;
And for this sin there is no remedy,
It is so grounded inward in my heart.
Methinks no face so gracious is as mine, p. 175
No shape so true, no truth of such account;
And for myself my own worth do define,
As I all other in all worth surmount.
But when my glass shows me myself indeed,
Beated and chopp’d with tann’d antiquity,
Mine own self-love quite contrary I read;
Self so self-loving were iniquity.
’Tis thee (myself) that for myself I praise,
Painting my age with beauty of thy days.
SONNET LXX.*
For slander’s mark was ever yet the fair;
The ornament of beauty is suspect,
A crow that flies in heaven’s sweetest air.
So thou be good, slander doth but approve
Thy worth the greater, being woo’d of time;
For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love,
And thou present’st a pure unstained prime.
Thou hast pass’d by the ambush of young days,
Either not assail’d, or victor being charg’d;
Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise,
To tie up envy, evermore enlarg’d:
If some suspect of ill mask’d not thy show,
Then thou alone kingdoms of hearts shouldst owe.
SONNET LXXVIII.*
And found such fair assistance in my verse,
As every alien pen hath got my use,
And under thee their poesy disperse.
Thine eyes, that taught the dumb on high to sing,
And heavy ignorance aloft to fly,
Have added feathers to the learned’s wing, p. 176
And given grace a double majesty.
Yet be most proud of that which I compile,
Whose influence is thine, and born of thee:
In others' works thou dost but mend the style,
And arts with thy sweet graces graced be;
But thou art all my art, and dost advance
As high as learning my rude ignorance.
Compare with the above statement the cases of Jesus, Paul, Mohammed, Balzac and Walt Whitman, who either had no practice or training, or (as in the case of Balzac) derived little or no benefit therefrom, but who in middle life, began immediately upon illumination, either to speak or to write undying words.
SONNET LXXXVI.*
Bound for the prize of all-too-precious you,
That did my ripe thoughts in my brain inherse,
Making their tomb the womb wherein they grew?
Was it his spirit, by spirits taught to write
Above a mortal pitch, that struck me dead?
No, neither he, nor his compeers by night
Giving him aid, my verse astonished.
He, nor that affable familiar ghost
Which nightly gulls him with intelligence,
As victors, of my silence cannot boast;
I was not sick of any fear from thence:
But when your countenance fill’d up his line
Then lack’d I matter; that enfeebled mine.
p. 177
SONNET XCV.*
Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose,
Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name!
O, in what sweets dost thou thy sins enclose!
That tongue that tells the story of thy days,
Making lascivious comments on thy sport,
Cannot dispraise but in a kind of praise;
Naming thy name blesses an ill report.
O, what a mansion have those vices got
Which for their habitation chose out thee,
Where beauty's veil doth cover every blot,
And all things turn to fair that eyes can see!
Take heed, dear heart, of this large privilege;
The hardest knife ill-us’d doth lose his edge.
SONNET XCVI.*
Some say, thy grace is youth and gentle sport;
Both grace and faults are lov’d of more and less;
Thou mak’st faults graces that to thee resort.
As on the finger of a throned queen p. 178
The basest jewel will be well esteem’d,
So are those errors that in thee are seen
To truths translated, and for true things deem’d.
How many lambs might the stern wolf betray,
If like a lamb he could his looks translate!
How many gazers might’st thou lead away,
If thou would’st use the strength of all thy state!
But do not so; I love thee in such sort,
As, thou being mine, mine is thy good report.
SONNET XCVII.*
From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year!
What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen!
What old December’s bareness everywhere!
And yet this time removed was summer’s time;
The teeming autumn, big with rich increase,
Bearing the wanton burden of the prime,
Like widow’d wombs after their lord’s decease:
Yet this abundant issue seem’d to me
But hope of orphans, and unfather’d fruit;
For summer and his pleasures wait on thee,
And, thou away, the very birds are mute;
Or if they sing, ’tis with so dull a cheer,
That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near.
SONNET CXXVI.*
Dost hold Time’s fickle glass, his sickle, hour;
Who hast by waning grown, and therein show’st
Thy lovers withering, as thy sweet self grow’st; p. 179
If Nature, sovereign mistress over wrack,
As thou goest onwards, still will pluck thee back,
She keeps thee to this purpose, that her skill
May time disgrace, and wretched minutes kill.
Yet fear her, O thou minion of her pleasure!
She may detain, but not still keep, her treasure:
Her audit, though delay’d, answer’d must be,
And her quietus is to render thee.
SUMMARY.
In this case the ordinary details of proof of illumination are largely wanting. If William Shakespeare wrote the plays and "Sonnets," we have absolutely no external evidence to build upon. If Francis Bacon wrote them, we have the vague evidence of his seclusion at about the time his illumination (if at all) must have taken place, and Hawley's and his own seeming allusion to the possession by him of some such unusual, very exalted, faculty. Over and above these circumstances, which to most will seem very slight, the argument that the man who wrote the plays and "Sonnets" had Cosmic Consciousness must rest upon these writings themselves and would consist of two clauses. (1) The creator of the plays was perhaps the greatest intellect the world has seen. His moral intuitions were as true as his intellect was great. He
p. 180
was from all points of view a transcendently great spiritual force. Being so, he ought (according to the thesis maintained in this volume) to have had Cosmic Consciousness. (2) The first one hundred and twenty-six sonnets seem to show beyond doubt that their author had the Cosmic Sense and that these sonnets were addressed to it. It does not seem to the present writer that they can be made sense of (intelligently read) from any other standpoint.
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