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Then follows a poetical account of the empanelling of the jury, the arraignment of the malefactors, and the proceedings generally, "soure Ben," all the while, having the culprits in custody in "the Trophonian Denne." 1

§ 3. MATTHEW'S POSTSCRIPT.

Another very remarkable piece of evidence is Mr. Tobie Matthew's postscript. It is appended to a letter to Bacon, which is itself without date, but is addressed to the Viscount St. Alban, and must therefore necessarily have been subsequent to the 27th day of January, 1621, when his Lordship was invested with that title. The letter is found in the collection of Birch, and is placed by him among those "wanting both dates and circumstances to determine the date." It appears to be in answer to a letter from Lord Bacon dated "the 9th of April" (year not given), accompanying some "great and noble token" of his "Lordship's favour," which was, in all probability, a newly printed book; for Bacon, as we know from the Letters, was in the habit of sending to Mr. Matthew a copy of his books as they were published; and much of their correspondence had relation more or less to the books and writings on which Bacon was at the time engaged. We know that the works published by Lord Bacon, after 1620, were the History of Henry VII., in March, 1622; the De Augmentis, in October, 1623, the Apothegms, in December, 1624, and the Essays and Psalms, in 1625; and there is reason to believe that the Folio of 1623, which was entered at Stationers' Hall in November of that year, was issued from the press in the spring of that year, - there being a copy now in existence bearing the date of 1622 on the title-page, showing that a part of the edition was actually struck off before the end of 1622. In like manner, the first edition of the Apothegms bears date 1625, though in fact pub1 Bridges' Brit. Bibliographer, I. 513.

2 Works (Mont.) XII. 468; (Philad.) III. 160.

lished in December, 1624.1 We know, also, from the Letters, that Mr. Matthew resided in London in the years 1621-2, and down to the 18th day of April, 1623, the date of a letter of Bacon, which he was to carry with him into Spain to the Duke of Buckingham, in whose service he was to be there employed; and he returned to England with the Duke and the Prince in October, 1623, and received from the King at Royston the honor of knighthood on the 10th day of that month.2 He remained a few years in London, and then went to Ireland. In a letter to the Duke, dated at Gorhambury, March 20th, 1621–2, Bacon says: "I am bold to present your Lordship with a book of my History of King Henry VII., and now that, in summer that was twelve months, I dedicated a book to his Majesty, 'and this last summer, this book to the Prince, your Lordship's turn is next; and this summer that cometh, if I live to it, shall be yours." The Novum Organum had been dedicated to the King in 1620, and if we count the summers, we shall see that the summer of 1621 was devoted to the History of Henry VII., and that of 1622 to the De Augmentis, which was to be dedicated to Buckingham, but was not published until October, 1623, just after the Duke's return from Spain. On the 20th of March, 1622, copies of the History of Henry VII. were presented to the King and Buckingham, and on the 20th of April following, one to the Queen of Bohemia, as we see by the Letters.3 And it is not improbable, that on the 9th of April of the same year, a copy may have been sent to Mr. Matthew also, and that this may have been the "noble token" referred to. Neither is there anything at all in the way of the supposition that this date may actually have been the 9th of April, 1623; and there was no publication of any work of Bacon, during that spring, which he would

1 Spedding's Pref. Works (Boston), XIII. 314.

2 Nichols' Prog. James I., III. 930 n.

8 Works (Mont.) XII. 430; XIII. 36, 39.

be sending to Mr. Matthew, unless it were precisely this Folio of 1623: nor does anything appear on record to indicate a later date than this for this very notable postscript. And considering that it was this same Mr. Tobie Matthew, who personated the "Squire" in the masque at Essex's house; that he was "one of the most eccentric characters of that age,” an intimate literary friend of Bacon, and a correspondent of long standing, to whom he was in the habit of sending his books as they came out, making him, too, sometimes, his critical "inquisitor"1 beforehand; that, at this very time, the closest relations of friendship and correspondence subsisted between them, "being," says Bacon, not long after, in a letter to Cottington, as true a friend as any you or I have; " 2 and that he was himself a scholar, and a son of the Archbishop of York, with whom also Bacon corresponded, and was particularly familiar with Bacon's writings, mind, and character; we shall be prepared not to be so greatly surprised at the intimation given in this postscript, that he knew a secret, respecting which he could not forbear to compliment his Lordship on this occasion; and the more especially, if we may suppose that it was the new Folio that he had before him. The letter runs thus:

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"To the Lord Viscount St. Alban:

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"MOST HONORED LORD, I have received your great and noble token and favour of the 9th of April, and can but return the humblest of my thanks for your Lordship's vouchsafing so to visit this poorest and unworthiest of your servants. It doth me good at heart, that, although I be not where I was in place, yet I am in the fortune of your Lordship's favour, if I may call that fortune, which I observe to be so unchangeable. I pray hard that it may once come in my power to serve you for it; and who can tell but that, as fortis imaginatio generat casum, so strong desires may do as much? Sure I am that mine are ever waiting on your

1 Letter to Matthew.

2 Letter 1623, Works (Mont.), XII. 445.

Lordship; and wishing as much happiness as is due to your incomparable virtue, I humbly do your Lordship reverence. "Your Lordship's most obliged and humble servant, "TOBIE MATTHEW.

"P. S. The most prodigious wit that ever I knew of my nation, and of this side of the sea, is of your Lordship's name, though he be known by another.” (1)

Now, who else but this same Shakespeare could have been considered by Mr. Matthew to be a cover for the most prodigious wit of all England, at that day? or what else could have more naturally prompted this unique postscript than the new History of Henry VII., all sparkling with Shakespearean diamonds, or indeed this Folio, all blazing with the Baconian wit, power, and beauty? It could not have been Bacon as philosopher, statesman, or eminent prose-writer; for all his known works were published under his own name. Neither could the word wit have been used here in the more general sense of that day as meaning genius and ability in general; for in this sense, it could only have been applied to these same acknowledged works. It must therefore have been intended in the special sense of the word as now used. That Bacon was a great wit in every sense of the word, needs no demonstration here. We have direct and satisfactory evidence of it in his own writings everywhere; and it has been proverbial with all who have written concerning him, from Ben Jonson to Macaulay. Queen Elizabeth said he "had a great wit and much learning"; Ben Jonson, that he could not "spare or pass by a jest "; Sir Robert Naunton, a contemporary, says of Sir Nicholas Bacon, that he was an arch-peece of wit, and of wisdome," and "abundantly facetious; which tooke much with the queene"; and he adds that "he was father to that refined wit, which since hath acted a disastrous part on the publique stage, and of late sate in his 1 Works (Mont.), XII. 468; (III., Philad. 160).

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father's roome as lord chancellor ";1 and this testimony of Mr. Matthew that he was a "most prodigious wit" may be taken as settling the question. Clearly, somebody was shining in borrowed feathers, which not only belonged to Bacon, but made him the most prodigious wit of that side of the sea; and of this, Mr. Matthew was unquestionably a competent judge. It could have been no other than that upstart crow beautified with our feathers," that the incredulous Greene knew for "a Johannes factotum" and "the only Shake-scene in a country."

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Mr. Matthew was much in the habit of adding postscripts to his letters to Bacon. In one, he asks his lordship to send him " some of his philosophical labours"; and in a letter to Mr. Matthew, Bacon writes: "I have sent you some copies of my book of the 'Advancement,' which you desired, and a little work of my recreation, which you desired not." 2 "2 What this "little work" was, there is no intimation; and it might be altogether too great a stretch of the imagination to suppose it may have been a quarto play. Nevertheless, it may not be unreasonable to believe that these little recreations of his other studies may have helped to furnish the key, by which the secret had been unlocked. In fact, it would be well-nigh incredible, that a scholar, who was so familiar with Bacon and his writings as Ben Jonson, or Sir Tobie Matthew, must have been, should not have discovered the hand and soul of Francis Bacon in these plays of Shakespeare as certainly as a Bernouilli the genius of Newton in the anonymous solution of a mathematical problem, ex ungue Leonem :- especially, when he ventured to write in this manner in the Sonnets::

"Why is my verse so barren of new pride?

So far from variation or quick change?
Why with the time do I not glance aside

To new-found methods, and to compounds strange?
Why write I still all one, ever the same,

1 Fragmenta Regalia, 75, (London, 1824).

2 Letter, Works (Philad.), III. 71; (Mont.), XVI., Note A A A. (1605).

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