Francis Bacon Research Trust

Bacon’s Library

Engraved frontispiece illustration to the first English translation of Francis Bacon’s De Augmentis Scientiarum, entitled Of the Advancement and Proficience of Learning or the Partitions of Sciences. The book was published in 1640, being printed in Oxford by Leon. Lichfield, Printer to the University, for Rob. Young and Ed. Forrest. The engraving was made by William Marshall. The translation was done by the Rev. Doctor Gilbert Wats, and the book was dedicated to King Charles I and his son, who later became King Charles II.

In this illustration Francis Bacon is shown attired in his robes as Lord Keeper of the Great Seal and Lord Chancellor. He is wearing his distinctive black hat and is seated at his writing desk.

The actual portrait of Bacon is derived from an original, done from life, which was engraved by Simon Pass in the first half of 1618, after Bacon had been made Lord Chancellor (4 January 1618) and before he was created Baron Verulam (12 July 1618). This original portrait was printed in Holland’s Baziliologia (1618), the same plate being reused later for the frontispiece of Bacon’s Sylva Sylvarum (1626 and 1627), with suitable changes. In this Advancement of Learning illustration the portrait is redrawn, with specific changes and additions (the original was of Bacon’s face and upper torso only) to show the Lord Chancellor seated and writing at a desk.

The picture has a cabalistic structure, but with much deliberately veiled, as emphasised by the curtain which is partly drawn back to reveal the laurel wreath and plaque on the wall above Bacon’s head. The shelf and table have on them seven books, representing the seven parts of Bacon’s Great Instauration—a series which is patterned on the Seven Days of Creation. Books I and II lie stacked on the end of the table, Books III, IV, V and VI stand on the shelf, and Book VII, in which Bacon is still writing, lies open on his writing desk next to a clock.

In cabalistic terms, the curtain on the (heraldic) right-hand side of the picture veils wisdom, the light of nature that lies concealed until discovered. This light is the light of love, known also as Eros, Cupid, the Divine Mercury or the Word of God, which lies deep in the heart of all creation and creatures. The purpose of Bacon’s Great Instauration is to discover and come to know this light through the living experience of embodying it. How best to do this is the labour of love.

To know this light, the truth, we need to use our intelligence, which is represented by the left-hand side of the picture (i.e. on Bacon’s left). Intelligence balances wisdom, and it is the philosophical faculty of the intelligent mind and heart which, because it loves wisdom, is able to discover and know it. Bacon’s library represents this philosophy. Its seven books signify the order or pattern which is produced in the mind when illuminated by the light of wisdom, just as a prism produces a spectrum when light shines into it.

The heraldic shield is associated with chivalry and therefore with Mars, a symbol of the intellect and its faculty of judgment or perception. The shield displays Bacon’s coat-of-arms as Viscount St. Alban, thus implying a pure or clear-sighted perception (alban means ‘pure’ or ‘white’).

The crown of bays above Bacon’s head, surrounding the plaque with words engraved on it, signifies the ‘crown’ of the cabalistic picture. Bacon’s head, with its black hat, is suitably located in the position of knowledge. His heart, equally suitably, is located at the rosa-solis (‘rose of the sun’) centre, the place of beauty that forms the heart of the tree of life structure which invisibly underlies this cabalistic picture. Book VII, which Bacon is shown writing in, lies in the Mercurial section of the picture, the ‘glory’ of the tree of life, and indicates thereby a great secret.