PREFACE. Vll 



&quot; received the greatest light from Geraldus, Pontanus, 

 &quot; Ficinus, Vives, Comes, Scaliger, Sabinus, Pierius, 

 tf and the crown of the latter, the Viscount of St. 

 &quot; Albans. 



&quot; It is true, the design of this book was instruc- 

 &quot; tion in natural and civil matters, either couched 

 &quot; by the ancients under those fictions, or rather 

 &quot; made to seem to be so by his lordship s wit, in the 

 &quot; opening and applying of them. But because the 

 &quot; first ground of it is poetical story, therefore let it 

 &quot; have this place, till a fitter be found for it.&quot; 



The author of Bacon s Life, in the Biographia Bri- 

 tannica, says, &quot; that he might relieve himself a little 

 &quot; from the severity of these studies, and as it were 

 &quot; amuse himself with erecting a magnificent pavi- 

 &quot; lion, while his great palace of philosophy was 

 &quot; building, he composed and sent abroad in 1610, 

 &quot; his celebrated treatise Of the Wisdom of the An- 

 &quot; cients, in which he shewed that none had studied 

 &quot; them more closely, was better acquainted with 

 &quot; their beauties, or had pierced deeper into their 

 &quot; meaning. There have been very few books pub- 

 &quot; lished, either in this or in any other nation, which 

 &quot; either deserved or met with more general applause 

 &quot; than this, and scarce any that are like to retain it 

 &quot; longer, for in this performance, Sir Francis Bacon 

 &quot; gave a singular proof of his capacity to please all 

 &quot; parties in literature, as in his political conduct he 

 &quot; stood fair with all the parties in the nation. The 

 &quot; admirers of antiquity were charmed with this dis- 

 &quot; course, which seems expressly calculated to justify 



