The justice of the interdict of God From the most holy water I returned Pure and disposed to mount unto the stars. That the Dream deals in creative principles, platonically applied cannot be doubted. Theseus. What say you Hermia? be advised fair maid One that composed your beauties, yea and one By him imprinted, and within his power To leave the figure or disfigure it. (Act i.) This is nothing but Plato's eternal image to illustrate the imprinting of the Divine ideas upon creation, as a seal stamps its image upon wax. That is, entire creation is fashioned according to mind, and bears the impress, even as the poet stamps ideas upon his creations. This theory was revived by the Rosicrucians, and particularly by Jacob Boehmen, the seer of Görlitz, one of whose works bears the title De Signatura Rerum, or The Signatures of Things. Lord Bacon writes: "For God defend, that we should publish the airy dreams of our own fancy, for the real ideas of the world. But rather may He be so graciously propitious unto us, that we may write the Apocalypse, and true visions of the impressions and signets of the Creator upon His creature!" (p. 38 Preface, Advancement of Learning, 1640.) "Neither are all these whereof we have spoken, and others of like nature, mere similitudes only, as men of narrow observation perchance may conceive, but of the very same footsteps, and seals of Nature, printed upon several subjects or matter." (p. 135, Lib. iii., Advancement of Learning.) This metaphor of printing and sealing (signets) upon matter may be seen to be repeated in the play quoted, as by Bacon. The Dead were classically called Demetrians, as subject to matter, over whom Demeter, the earth goddess, presided. Existence is a coin with two faces. On one side is matter or phenomena, on the other side rationalism. A child untaught sees in letter-press, only certain uniform figures, the adult sees only the meaning. In the same way, Bacon, like Robert Fludd, the great Rosicrucian, always regards nature as a volume of God's creatures, as a text, in which very few can read, but whose spirit is at the bot tom of everything. I take it, with this idea firmly fixed in his mind, he set to work to illustrate the "BOOK OF NATURE," by another "BOOK OF NATURE," with a spiritual meaning behind it - Shakespeare's so-called plays,― the 1623 folio - "Philosophical Play Systems," as he terms them. Bacon writes: "To close in a word, let no man, upon a weak conceit of sobriety or ill-applied moderation, think or maintain that a man can search too far, or be too well studied in the Book of God's Word, or in the Book of God's Works." (Lib. i. p. 9, Advancement of Learning.) "First, the volume of Scriptures, which reveal the will of God; then the volume of creatures, which express His power." (Lib. p. 47, Advancement of Learning.) It is the Hermetic, or concealed spiritual meaning, which is stamped upon nature and phenomena, upon the reverse side of the coin of nature, or its visible text. The name Hermia carries a suspicious root origin and affinity to the Greek verb to "interpret," and means anything concealed. She is in love with Lysander, but her father's creative purpose is she should be crossed in her desires, and not wed with her natural affinity, but rather with Demetrius, whom she loaths, as the very pole opposite to her. Here let me remark, philosophically existence has its root essence in the marriage of contradictions, or out of antagonism; that is, out of conflict, or opposition of mind and matter. This crossing springing out of a father's purpose, is the basis of the action of the play, as far as the two pair of lovers are concerned. Hermia. O Cross! too high to be enthrall'd to low. Lysander. Or else misgraffed in respect of years. Hermia. O spite! too old to be engaged to young. Lysander. Or else it stood upon the choice of friends. Hermia. O Hell! to choose love by another eye. (Act i.) Here let me remark that the whole of Shakespeare's style, (if it be Shakespeare's,) is antithetical, and he delights in the union of contraries, amounting to paradox, just as Bacon reveals in his Antitheta, "For who knows not if the doctrine of contraries be not the same, writes Bacon. In this play we are discussing this doctrine of paradox is very strongly visible in the text. Theseus exclaims (in scene 1, act v Merry and tragical! Tedious and brief. (Act v. 1.) It is impossible to imagine a world constructed out of one principle. Just as art consists of light and shadow, so the world reveals in winter and summer, heat and cold, night and day, gravity and centrifugal force, love and hate, an everlasting opposition which continually run into each other. The magianism of Zoraster, and of the Manichees, was adopted by the Rosicrucians, and Bacon, in his discussion upon the Persian magic, evidently was imbued with this philosophy, which Heraclitus and Empedocles strongly enforced and delivered, and which may be summed up in the words of the former, "War is father of all things," Bacon repeats this in the words, "Strife and friendship are the spurs of action and the keys of works." CHAPTER VII. BACON'S NEW WORLD OF SCIENCES. I think I am right in saying, the general public imagine this problem of the Bacon-Shakespeare authorship, revolves only upon a question of names, as to who really wrote the 1623 folio plays. Interesting as such a literary acrostic might be, I myself think very little of it, and don't see what is particularly gained by a change of names, seeing a rose is just as sweet by any other name. The object of this work is to suggest in a humble way (and very incompletely, it must be confessed, but to the best of my powers), that the folio plays are symbolical, and examples of Bacon's inductive system, to which they are wedded by means of every sort of syllogism, analogy and parallel, joined to a great system of cipher. This assumption must, in its initial statement, excite incredulity and laughter, and I am not unprepared for it. If I had heard, a few years ago, such a theory, I might have myself smiled at such an airy flight of imagination. But I have well weighed the evidence presented by the most extraordinary book in the world, Bacon's De Augmentis of 1623, and particularly its supposed translation by Wats of 1640, which I believe is the real original English version first written by Bacon, and from which the former was translated into Latin. (For which proofs see my work, Hermes Stella.) Bacon speaks of this work as a key for the better "opening up of the Instauration." Without the reader knowing this work, it is impossible to convey the slightest idea of its scope, character and mystery. One of its most striking features is its prætermitted parts, Deficients, or Sciences, which are fifty in number, and which are catalogued at the end of the work, as A New World of Sciences. It has generally been understood these Deficients are only sciences, Bacon proposed the world should augment and perfect. But this idea, (though possibly in some few particular cases correct), cannot be applied to many of them, and in no way whatever applies to some. Bacon evidently wrote guardedly and with reserve upon these Deficients. He took even pains to conceal some of their real titles, and it was long before I recognized the true character of some of them, though well acquainted with the work. They are really, just those dangerous subjects, allied to Bacon's secret intentions and reserved plans, which cover under a fictitious disguise the entire Instauration. A great many of these Deficients belong to Bacon's completed works, others leave us completely in the dark, but they are all introduced with a profound object and plan, only hinted at in the darkest possible language. As this statement may arouse scepticism, I will here introduce the catalogue titles of this New World of Sciences. * HISTORIA INDUCTIVA, Nat * ASTRONOMIA VIVA, Living Astronomy. Cap. 4. Sect. 3. § 1. * ASTROLOGIA SANA. Sound Astrologie. Cap. 4. Sect. 3. §. 2. * PROBLEMES Naturall, a continuation thereof. Cap. 4. Sect. 5. * PLACITES Of ancient Philoso urall History for the building up phers. Cap. 4. Sect. 5. §. 1. of Philosophy. Cap. 3. Sect. 1. * OCULUS POLY PEMI, Or the * FORMÆ RERUM: A part of History of Learning from age to Metaphysique of the Forms of age. C. 4. Sect. 1. things. Cap. 4. Sect. 6. |