MAY it please your most
excellent Majesty,
In the midst of my
misery, which is rather assuaged by remembrance than by hope, my chiefest
worldly comfort is to think, That . . . I was evermore so happy as to
have my poor services graciously accepted by your Majesty . . . . For as
I have often said to your Majesty, I was towards you but as a bucket, and a
cistern; to draw forth and conserve; whereas yourself was the fountain. Unto
this comfort of nineteen years' prosperity, there succeeded a comfort even in my
greatest adversity, somewhat of the same nature; which is, That in those
offences wherewith I was charged, there was not any one that had special
relation to you Majesty. . . . I have an assured belief that there is in
your Majesty's own princely thoughts a great deal of serenity and clearness
towards me your Majesty's now prostrate and cast down servant. . .
.
And indeed, if it may please your Majesty, this theme of my misery
is so plentiful, as it need not be coupled with any thing else. I have been
somebody by your Majesty's singular and undeserved favour: even the prime
officer of your kingdom. Your Majesty's arm hath been over mine in council,
when you presided at the table; so near I was: I have borne your Majesty's
image in metal; much more in heart; I was never in nineteen years' service
chidden by your Majesty. . . . But why should I speak of these things
which are now vanished? but only the better to express my downfall.
For
not it is thus with me: I am a year and a half old in misery: though I must
ever acknowledge your Majesty's grace and mercy, for I do not think it possible,
that any one that you once loved should be totally miserable. Mine own means,
through mine own improvidence, are poor and weak, little better than my father
left me. . . .
. . . I have (most
gracious Sovereign) faith enough for a miracle, and much more for a grace, that
your Majesty will not suffer your poor creature to be utterly defaced, nor blot
the name quite out of your book, upon which your sacred hand hath been so oft
for new ornaments and additions.
Unto this degree of compassion, I
hope God above (of whose mercies towards me, both in my prosperity and my
adversity, I have had great testimonies and pledges, though mine own manifold
and wretched unthankfulness might have averted them) will dispose your princely
heart, already prepared to all piety. . . . I most humbly beseech your
Majesty to give me leave to conclude with those words which Necessity speaketh:
Help me (dear sovereign lord and master) and pity me so far, as I that have
borne a bag be not now in my age forced in effect to bear a wallet; nor I that
desire to live to study, may not study to live. . . . God of heaven ever
bless, preserve, and prosper your Majesty.
Your Majesty's poor ancient
servant and beadsman,
Fr.
St. Alban
Background of This
Letter
When in his fiftieth year, at the height of his fame and glory,
Francis Bacon was convicted of bribery, fined £40,000, deprived of the great
seal, relieved of public office, and sentenced to the Tower of London to be
released at the King's pleasure. Although there is some doubt as to this
letter ever having been sent, it was certainly calculated (like many of Bacon's
writings) to persuade. In any event, whether the letter came to him or not, the
King took pity on his "poor ancient servant and beadsman," permitting him to be
released after only four days in the Tower. James even mitigated his fine.
Bacon's most important philosophical writing was done in those last five years,
after his disgrace and retirement from public life. He "took all knowledge as
his province" and made enduring contributions to science, metaphysics, and
literature, writing—"for greater permanence," as he said—in Latin. His chief
titles to fame are the brief and pungent essays—published in his thirty-sixth
year—and the vast Novum Organum, which proved of fundamental value in the
history of philosophy, after the repudiation of
scholasticism.
