been climbing, or rather creeping, since his death, for above two centuries, and have only just now reached!

The same fruitful and powerful mind which discoursed so eloquently and profoundly on the advancement and proficiency of learning, which expounded most luminously many of the subtlest doctrines of our law of real property, which projected the wisest plan for ameliorating the unhappy condition of Ireland, and grasped at once all the complexities of juridical reform, appears equally pre-eminent in the delicate and difficult task of detecting the causes of the controversies and abuses in the church, and of pointing out the best mode of ensuring its pacification and reform. The sectarian spirit which distracted the English church during the respective reigns of Elizabeth and James, was of a character which could not be overlooked by any one who had the good of his country at heart. Nor ought the experience of the past to be neglected

in such days as these of sects and schisms. Let us not idly reckon history as an old almanac, but rather listen to it as the voice of an ancient prophet, speaking of the age in which we live.

'It is very true,' said Bacon,' that these ecclesiastical matters are things not appertaining to my profession; which I was not so inconsiderate but to object to myself; but finding that it is many times seen that a man that standeth off, and somewhat removed from a plot of ground, doth better survey it and discover it than those which are upon it, I thought it not impossible, but that I, as a looker on, might cast mine eyes upon some things which the actors themselves, especially some being interested, some led and addicted, some declared and engaged, did not or would not see.'*

* Bacon's Works, vol. 7, p. 62. The simplicity and sincerity of Bacon's affection for the church appear from that most solemn address which he was accustomed to utter in his devotions:

'I have loved thy assemblies; I have mourned for

In his first tract on the Church, written in the reign of Elizabeth,* Bacon, after clearing the ground by some preliminary observations, begins by remarking that it cannot be denied that the imperfections in the conversation and government of those which have chief place in the church, have ever been

the divisions of thy church; I have delighted in the brightness of thy sanctuary. This vine, which thy right hand hath planted in this nation, I have ever prayed unto thee, that it might have the first and the latter rain; and that it might stretch her branches to the seas and to the floods. The state and bread of the poor and oppressed have been precious in mine eyes: I have hated all cruelty and hardness of heart: I have, though in a despised weed, procured the good of all men. If any have been my enemies, I thought not of them; neither hath the sun almost set upon my displeasure; but I have been as a dove, free from superfluity of maliciousness. Thy creatures have been my books, but thy scriptures much more. I have sought thee in the courts, fields, and gardens, but I have found thee in thy temples.'-Ib. p. 3.

It is entitled, An Advertisement touching the Controversies of the Church of England.'-Bacon's Works, vol 7, p. 28.

principal causes and motives of schisms and divisions. 'For whilst,' he says, 'the bishops and governors of the church continue full of knowledge and good works; whilst they feed the flock indeed; whilst they deal with the secular states in all liberty and resolution, according to the majesty of their calling, and the precious care of souls imposed upon them, so long the church is "situated," as it were,

upon a hill; no man maketh question of it, or seeketh to depart from it; but when these virtues in the fathers and leaders of the church have lost their light, and that they wax worldly, lovers of themselves, and pleasers of men, then men begin to grope for the church as in the dark.'

The second occasion of controversies is the nature and humour of certain men: 'The church, says Bacon, never wanteth a kind of persons, which love the salutation of Rabbi, master; not in ceremony or compliment, but in an inward authority which they

seek over men's minds, in drawing them to depend upon their opinions, and to seek knowledge at their lips. These men are the true successors of Diotrephes, the lover of pre-eminence, and not lord bishops. Such spirits do light upon another sort of natures, which do adhere to these men; 66 quorum gloria in obsequio"; stiff followers, and such as zeal marvellously for those whom they have chosen for their masters. This latter sort, for the most part, are men of young years, and superficial understanding, carried away with partial respects of persons, or with the enticing appearance of godly names and pretences: few follow the things themselves, more the names of the things, and most the names of their masters.'

The third occasion of controversies, 'I observe,' says Bacon, 'to be, an extreme

• 'Pauci res ipsas sequuntur, plures nomina rerum, plurimi nomina magistrorum.'