t the court but
successfully opposed his advancement by Elizabeth. Bacon then took up the
study of law, and was admitted to the bar in 1582. That he had not lost his
philosophy in the mazes of the law is shown by his tract, written about
this time, "On the Greatest Birth of Time," which was a plea for his
inductive system of philosophy, reasoning from many facts to one law,
rather than from an assumed law to particular facts, which was the
deductive method that had been in use for centuries. In his famous plea for
progress Bacon demanded three things: the free investigation of nature, the
discovery of facts instead of theories, and the verification of results by
experiment rather than by argument. In our day these are the A, B, C of
science, but in Bacon's time they seemed revolutionary.

As a lawyer he became immediately successful; his knowledge and power of
pleading became widely known, and it was almost at the beginning of his
career that Jonson wrote, "The fear of every one that heard him speak was
that he should make an end." The publication of his _Essays_ added greatly
to his fame; but Bacon was not content. His head was buzzing with huge
schemes,--the pacification of unhappy Ireland, the simplification of
English law, the reform of the church, the study of nature, the
establishment of a new philosophy. Meanwhile, sad to say, he played the
game of politics for his personal advantage. He devoted himself to Essex,
the young and dangerous favorite of the queen, won his friendship, and then
used him skillfully to better his own position. When the earl was tried for
treason it was partly, at least, through Bacon's efforts that he was
convicted and beheaded; and though Bacon claims to have been actuated by a
high sense of justice, we are not convinced that he understood either
justice or friendship in appearing as queen's counsel against the man who
had befriended him. His coldbloodedness and lack of moral sensitiveness
appear even in his essays on "Love" and "Friendship." Indeed, we can
understand his life only upon the theory that his intellectuality left him
cold and dead to the higher sentiments of our humanity.

During Elizabeth's reign Bacon had sought repeatedly for high office, but
had been blocked by Burleigh and perhaps also by the queen's own shrewdness
in judging men. With the advent of James I (1603) Bacon devoted himself to
the new ruler and rose rapidly in favor. He was knighted, and soon
afterwards att