NOTE A A A. 



came to speak upon the day of the obsequies, O what a tunable music he made 

 between his rhetoric and his tears ! for both flowed together. How curious 

 were his apostrophes ! how moving were his passions ! how winning his pro 

 nunciation ! Many pauses he was compelled to make by the applause and 

 humming of the swarms about him in the close of his periods. When he had 

 done, and the assembly brake up, it was in every mouth, that Playfer s elo 

 quence was not dead with him while this orator was alive. Let me trouble this 

 narrative with a small interjection. I was myself in the throng among those 

 that heard this oration, newly admitted into Trinity College, that being the 

 second day wherein I wore my purple gown. This being the first exercise that 

 I heard in Cambridge in the Latin tongue, I thought it was a city paved all 

 with emeralds, and that such learning and such silver elocution was common to 

 them all.&quot; 



I find the following notice of this work by Lord Bacon. On the 12th of 

 October, 1620, in a letter to the King, presenting the Novum Organum to his 

 majesty, Lord Bacon says, &quot; I hear my former book of the Advancement of 

 Learning, is well tasted in the universities here, and the English colleges 

 abroad ; and this is the same argument sunk deeper.&quot; And it is mentioned in 

 the following letter : 



To Mr. Mathew. 



Sir, Two letters of mine are now already walking towards you ; but so that 

 we might meet, it were no matter though our letters should lose their way. I 

 make a shift in the mean time to be glad of your approaches, and would be 

 more glad to be an agent for your presence, who have been a patient for your 

 absence. If your body by indisposition make you acknowledge the healthful 

 air of your native country, much more do I assure myself that you continue to 

 have your mind no way estranged. And as my trust with the state is above 

 suspicion, so my knowledge, both of your loyalty and honest nature, will ever 

 make me show myself your faithful friend, without scruple : you have reason to 

 commend that gentleman to me by whom you sent your last, although his 

 having travelled so long amongst the sadder nations of the world make him 

 much the less easy upon small acquaintance to be understood. 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. My Instauration I reserve for 

 our conference ; it sleeps not. These works of the alphabet are in my opinion 

 of less use to you where you are now, than at Paris ; and therefore I conceived 

 that you had sent me a kind of tacit countermand of your former request. But 

 in regard that some friends of yours have still insisted here, I send them to you; 

 and for my part, I value your own reading more than your publishing them to 

 others. Thus, in extreme haste, I have scribbled to you I know not what, 

 which therefore is the less affected, and for that very reason will not be esteemed 

 the less by you. 



Different Editions. 



This edition of 1605 was the only edition published during the life of Lord 

 Bacon, who died in 1626. 



An edition in octavo was published in 1629. The following is a copy of the 

 title page : The Two Bookes of Funds Bacon. Of the Proficience and aduance- 

 ment of Learning, Divine and Human. To the King. London: printed for 

 William Washington, and are to be sold at his shop in S. Dunstanes Church 

 yard. 1629. 



In the year 1633, there was another edition of the same size. The following 

 is a copy of the title page : The Two Bookes of Sir Francis Bacon, of the Pro 

 ficience and Advancement of Learning Divine and Hvmane. To the King. 

 Oxford, printed by I. L. Printer to the Vniversity, for Thomas Huggins. 1633. 

 With permission of B. Fisher. 



I once thought that the edition of 1633 was either a fac-simile, or part of the 

 remaining copies of 1629, as it consists of the same pages (335), and very 

 nearly resembling each other. But, upon examining pages 334 and 335, it 



