BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION. 



would best advance his ends. Thus, when, as one of her 

 majesty s counsel, he had to plead again t Essex in 1600, after 

 his complete failure in Ireland, he treated him &quot; not tenderly,&quot; as 

 he admits, hoping thereby to retain the queen s goodwill, and 

 afterwards use it in favour of Essex. Six weeks later Essex was 

 liberated, but forbidden to come to Court. Bacon wrote to Essex, 

 that though he loved few persons better than himself, yet he loved 

 the queen s service and her favour, and the good of his country 

 more. lie appeared for the Crown at Essex s trial for treason in 

 1 60 1, and largely helped to secure his conviction. Prof. Gardiner 

 palliates his appearing thus against his former friend and bene 

 factor by referring to the insecurity of the State and the necessity 

 of preventing ambitious men from gaining undue authority, and 

 then producing revolt and anarchy. But if Bacon s so-called 

 &quot; love &quot; for Essex had had any real existence we cannot believe 

 that he would have aided in bringing a death sentence on him. 

 Even if all were the fault of Essex, others might have been 

 allowed to point the arrow, wing it for flight, and take the deathly 

 aim. In the last years of Elizabeth s reign Bacon busied himself 

 in the advocacy of religious toleration in Ireland, and the establish 

 ment of courts of justice there without English technicalities. 

 He also proposed the introduction, as a sort of garrison, of English 

 settlers. 



The accession of James led to Bacon s being knighted, and to 

 his sending to the king plans for the union of England and 

 Scotland, and for the pacification of the Church of England. 

 Bacon was appointed one of the English Commissioners to 

 discuss terms of union with the Scotch Commissioners. lie 

 laboured hard to secure freedom of commerce between the two 

 countries, and the naturalisation of Scotchmen in England, and 

 the converse. In 1605 he published his &quot; Advancement of 

 Learning.&quot; In i6of;, in spite of his warm advocacy, the House 

 of Commons rejected his statesmanlike proposals about the 

 union : he was more than a century in advance of his time. Dis 

 appointed in his hopes of gaining more influence at Court, Bacon 

 employed his leisure in his philosophical works, and in 1610 he 

 had finished the &quot; Wisdom of the Ancients,&quot; also having made 



