The philosophical system contemplated by Francis Bacon--say the Baconians--was divided into two grand Divisions, the Didactic and the Historical. The first--its author (despairing of contemporary fame, or possibly distrustful of the permanence of the vernacular) locked up in the universal language of scholars, and left it by his testament to "the next ages." The other he chose to put into Dramatic form. The spirit, motive, theme, and purport of two great phenomena of English letters, synchronizing in date (the philosophical canon of Bacon and the dramatic canon of "Shakespeare,") are identical, and form together essentially one great body of philosophy and inductive science, and, therefore, must have had the one author. "It is a thing, indeed, if practiced professionally, of low repute; but if it be made a part of discipline, it {204}is of excellent use--I mean stage playing." he says himself. And again: "Dramatic poetry is as history made visible." This Historical or preliminary division of the Philosophy did not need a dead, but a living language--the language of his race. This he left in English: and when, at the end, a broken, weak, despised old man--knowing himself only too well to be the meanest and weakest of his kind; but yet conscious of having, in a large sense, worked for the good of his fellow-men--he made no excuse or palliation, but only bespoke for himself and his life "men's charitable speeches." But, if there was but one author for these two contemporary works, why not William Shakespeare as well as Francis Bacon? Why not ask the question, "Did William Shakespeare write Lord Bacon's works?" * as well as, "Did Lord Bacon write William Shakespeare's work?" While not within our scope to demonstrate the identical philosophy of the Novum Organum and the Shakespearean Drama--(a work to which Miss Bacon devoted her life--and whose demonstration has been followed by Judge Holmes)--it is property within that scope to examine, from the outside, the question whether, as matter of fact, William Shakespeare could have written either; or whether, from circumstantial evidence merely, Lord Bacon was thus, and in pursuance of a great purpose, actually the author of the Dramatic canon of "Shakespeare." * See this question asked and answered affirmatively in "North American Review." February, 1881. New York. D. Appleton & Co.