PREFACE. 1 1 



complete the work, I some years since prepared that 

 part which relates to the charge against him, and 

 entrusted it to a friend, that, in the event of my 

 death, my researches might not be lost. 



The life is now submitted to public consideration. 

 I cannot conclude without returning my grateful 

 acknowledgments to the many friends to whom I 

 am much indebted : particularly to Archdeacon 

 Wrangham, with the feeling of more than forty 

 years uninterrupted friendship; to my intelligent 

 friend, B. Heywood Bright, for his important 

 co-operation and valuable communication from the 

 Tanner Manuscripts ; to my dear friend, William 

 Wood, for his encouragement during the progress of 

 the work, and for his admirable translation of the 

 Novum Organum. How impossible is it for me to 

 express my obligations to the sweet taste of her to 

 whom I am indebted for every blessing of my life ! 



I am well aware of the many faults with which 

 the work abounds, and particularly of the occasional 

 repetitions. I must trust to the lenient sentence of 

 my reader, after he has been informed that it was not 

 pursued in the undisturbed quiet of literary leisure, 

 but in the few hours which could be rescued from 

 arduous professional duties ; not carefully composed 

 by a student in his pensive citadel, but by a daily 

 &quot; delver in the laborious mine of the law,&quot; where 

 the vexed printer frequently waited till the impatient 

 client was dispatched ; and that, to publish it as it is, 

 I have been compelled to forego many advantages ; 

 to relinquish many of the enjoyments of social life, 

 and to sacrifice not only the society, but even the 



