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NOTES.

NOTES.

FRANCIS BACON,

The first edition of the Essays, in 1597, contained ten essays, including Of Studies and Of Negotiating; the second edition, in 1612, contained thirty-eight, including Of Youth and Age and Of Nature in Men; the third edition, in 1625, contained fifty-eight. In these later editions Bacon revised and enlarged most of the essays already published. The text of 1625 is here followed. In 1638 Dr. Rawley, Bacon's chaplain, published a Latin translation of the Essays; whether Bacon himself was the translator is uncertain.

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OF TRUTH.

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1.-1. Pilate: at the trial of Jesus; John xviii. 38.-2. there be that: understand "those" after "be."-5. discoursing=discursive, passing rapidly from one thought to another' (A New English Dictionary).-9. imposeth-lays restraint.—17-18. masks and mummeries and triumphs: spectacular theatrical performances, very popular in Bacon's time, in which there was much tinsel and glitter.-18. daintily=prettily, delightfully.— 23. vain empty, false.

2.-3. "vinum dæmonum "-" wine of devils"; the father was St. Augustine (354-430).-7. howsoever although.-15. sabbath work, i. e., the work of God's one continuous sabbath ever since the great work of creation ended.--19. The Poet: Lucretius (96 ?55 B. C.); the quotation is from his De Rerum Natura ("On the Nature of Things "), II. 1 ff., in which he expounds the philosophy of Epicurus. the sect: the Epicureans.-25. not to be commanded, i. e., there is none higher (cf. commanding view "); commanded is a military term.-26. errors-wanderings.-28. provided.—prospect = looking forth, survey.-31. poles axes.-34. round-fair.

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3.-3. Montaigne: a French essayist (1533-1592).

OF INNOVATIONS.

3.-24. of course by its course, or "running."―31. admired wondered at-33. round=rapidly (cf. "round trot ").

4.-6. pairs-impairs.-13-14. Scripture saith: Jer. vi. 16:"Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein."

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OF NATURE IN MEN.

4.-18. doctrine-instruction.-19. importune-importunate. 5.-3-4. "Optimus," etc." He is the best liberator of the soul who bursts the chains galling his breast and ceases from grief at once (Ovid, Remedia Amoris, 293); animi should be fuit. -14. lay: so in the original.-25. "Multum," etc." My soul has long been a sojourner." -converse-live.-26. affect take to, like.-29. so as so that.

OF YOUTH AND AGE.

6.-10. Septimius Severus: a Roman Emperor (146-211 A. D.). -11-12 "Juventum," etc." He passed a youth full of errors, nay rather of fury" (Spartian, Severus, ii.); Bacon quoted apparently from memory, and very inaccurately; Spartian wrote, "Juventum plenam furorum, nonnunquam criminum, habuit ("He had a youth full of fury and sometimes of crimes "). -14. Cosmos: one of the famous de Medici family who ruled Florence in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.-Gaston: a French general (1489-1512), who won a great victory over the Spaniards at the age of twenty-three.-20. abuseth-deceives.— 28. care not are not cautious.-31. unready, i. e., not ready for use, ill-trained; the Latin version has male domitus.

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7.-1. compound employments of both, i. e., employ both together.-5. extern accidents external effects, i. e., results coming ("falling upon ") from without-as in this case, from the disposition of the populace toward age and youth.-8-10. "Your young men," etc.: Joel ii. 28.—18. Hermogenes: a famous Greek teacher of rhetoric, of the second century A. D., "who became a master at fifteen and an idiot at five-and-twenty" (Saintsbury, A History of Criticism, I. 90).-23. Tully: Marcus Tullius Cicero. Hortensius: a Roman orator (114-50 B. C.).—24. Idem," etc."He remained the same, but the same was not becoming (Cicero, Brutus, 95); Cicero's exact words are, Remanebat idem nec decebat idem."-25. magnanimous great-souled.-26-27. Scipio Africanus: a Roman General (234?-183? B. C.), who won great victories in Africa over Hannibal when little more than thirty years old. 27.-Livy: the Roman historian (59 B. C.-17 A. D.).-27-28. "Ultima," etc." His last deeds were inferior to his first"; Livy's exact words are, Memorabilior prima pars vitæ quam postrema fuit" ("The first part of his life was more memorable than the last part ").

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OF NEGOTIATING.

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8.-10-11. will help the matter in report for satisfaction sake, i. e., such agents will make a more favorable report than truth allows, in order to satisfy their employer.-11. affect take to, like.-19. prescription-former record.-24-25. the start, or first performance, is all, i. e., the negotiator who imposes the first and fundamental condition controls the whole situation.-29. All practice is to discover or to work, i. e., the object in all practical handling of men is either to discover their natures and purposes, or to make them do something.—33. fashions=ways, habits.

OF STUDIES.

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9.-7. expert men: experienced, practical men, in distinction from learned men.-12. humor-mood, habit of mind.-17. admire wonder at.-25. curiously carefully (Lat. cura, care "). -28. arguments-subjects.-29. else, i. e., in other cases.-flashy insipid.-30. conference intercourse and conversation.-33. present wit: a mind, or wits, always ready for use on the instant (cf. "presence of mind ").

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10.-2. witty: clever, quick-minded, and full of bright notions. 4. "Abeunt," etc." Studies pass over into manners (Ovid).5. wit-mind.-13. schoolmen: the theologians and philosophers of the Middle Ages, who excelled in analysis and subtle distinctions.-cymini sectores "splitters of cummin" (cummin were small seeds); cf. "hair-splitters.”—15. illustrate throw light upon, clear up.

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JOHN MILTON.

FREEDOM OF THE PRESS.

Areopagitica, selections from which are here printed, was published as a pamphlet, unlicensed, in November, 1644. It was occasioned by an order of Parliament, on June 14, 1643, that no Book, Pamphlet, paper, nor part of any such Book, Pamphlet, or paper, shall from henceforth be printed, bound, stitched or put to sale by any person or persons whatsoever, unless the same be first approved of and licensed under the hands of such person or persons as both, or either of the said Houses [of Parliament] shall appoint for the licensing of the same." The order merely renewed the substance of previous decrees by the "Star Chamber"; but Milton and other lovers of freedom had expected more liberal things from the reform Parliament, which was waging war against the king on behalf of popular liberty. In form Areopagitica is a speech addressed to Parliament. Its name is derived from the Abyos 'ApeoжаayıTIKós of Isocrates, the Greek orator (436-338 B. c.), who in this oration argued for the restoration of its former powers to the Court of Areopagus (so called from the place of session, Areopagus, or "Mars Hill") as a bulwark of Athenian liberty, then menaced by Philip of Macedon. The outline of Areopagitica, in Milton's own words, is as follows:-"First, the inventors of it [restriction of the press] to be those whom he will loath to own [i. e., Roman Catholics]; next, what is to be thought in general of reading, whatever sort the books be; and that this order avails nothing to the suppressing of scandalous, seditious, and libellous books, which were mainly intended to be suppressed; last, that it will be primely to the discouragement of all learning and the stop of truth."

11.-3. thereafter, i. e., after they have shown themselves to be bad books.-10. dragon's teeth: Jason, directed by Medea, sowed the teeth of the dragon of Colchis, and from them sprang up armed men (see Ovid's Metamorphoses, VII. 121 ff., and William Morris's Life and Death of Jason, VIII.).—15. in the eye,

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