naming the Trinity, etc. This is the
plan Newton followed, in the papers which have at last been published.[305]

So I, for one, thought little about the general tendency of orthodox
writers to claim Bacon by means of the Paradoxes. I knew that, in his
"Confession of Faith"[306] he is a Trinitarian of a heterodox stamp. His
second Person takes human nature before he took flesh, not for redemption,
but as a condition precedent of creation. "God is so holy, pure, and
jealous, that it is impossible for him to be pleased in any creature,
though the work of his own hands.... [Gen. i. 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, 31,
freely rendered]. But--purposing to become a Creator, and to communicate to
his creatures, he ordained in his eternal counsel that one person of the
Godhead should be united to one nature, and to one particular of his
creatures; that so, in the person of the Mediator, the true ladder might be
fixed, whereby God might {145} descend to his creatures and his creatures
might ascend to God...."

This is republished by the Religious Tract Society, and seems to suit their
theology, for they confess to having omitted some things of which they
disapprove.

In 1864, Mr. Grosart published his discovery that the Paradoxes are by
Herbert Palmer; that they were first published surreptitiously, and
immediately afterwards by himself, both in 1645; that the "Remains" of
Bacon did not appear until 1648; that from 1645 to 1708, thirteen editions
of the "Memorials" were published, all containing the Paradoxes. In spite
of this, the Paradoxes were introduced into Bacon's works in 1730, where
they have remained.

Herbert Palmer was of good descent, and educated as a Puritan. He was an
accomplished man, one of the few of his day who could speak French as well
as English. He went into the Church, and was beneficed by Laud,[307] in
spite of his puritanism; he sat in the Assembly of Divines, and was finally
President of Queens' College, Cambridge, in which post he died, August 13,
1647, in the 46th year of his age.

Mr. Grosart says, speaking of Bacon's "Remains," "All who have had occasion
to examine our early literature are aware that it was a common trick to
issue imperfect, false, and unauthorized writings under any recently
deceased name that might be expected to take. The Puritans, down to John
Bunyan, were perpetually expostulating and protesting against such
procedure." I have met with instances of all this; but I did not know that
t