, was an eventful one to Bacon's fortunes. In it the vision
of his great design disclosed itself more and more to his imagination
and hopes, and with more and more irresistible fascination. In it he
made his first literary venture, the first edition of his _Essays_
(1597), ten in number, the first-fruits of his early and ever watchful
observation of men and affairs. These years, too, saw his first steps in
public life, the first efforts to bring him into importance, the first
great trials and tests of his character. They saw the beginning and they
saw the end of his relations with the only friend who, at that time,
recognised his genius and his purposes, certainly the only friend who
ever pushed his claims; they saw the growth of a friendship which was to
have so tragical a close, and they saw the beginnings and causes of a
bitter personal rivalry which was to last through life, and which was to
be a potent element hereafter in Bacon's ruin. The friend was the Earl
of Essex. The competitor was the ablest, and also the most truculent and
unscrupulous of English lawyers, Edward Coke.

While Bacon, in the shade, had been laying the foundations of his
philosophy of nature, and vainly suing for legal or political
employment, another man had been steadily rising in the Queen's favour
and carrying all before him at Court--Robert Devereux, Lord Essex; and
with Essex Bacon had formed an acquaintance which had ripened into an
intimate and affectionate friendship. We commonly think of Essex as a
vain and insolent favourite, who did ill the greatest work given him to
do--the reduction of Ireland; who did it ill from some unexplained
reason of spite and mischief; and who, when called to account for it,
broke out into senseless and idle rebellion. This was the end. But he
was not always thus. He began life with great gifts and noble ends; he
was a serious, modest, and large-minded student both of books and
things, and he turned his studies to full account. He had imagination
and love of enterprise, which gave him an insight into Bacon's ideas
such as none of Bacon's contemporaries had. He was a man of simple and
earnest religion; he sympathized most with the Puritans, because they
were serious and because they were hardly used. Those who most condemn
him acknowledge his nobleness and generosity of nature. Bacon in after
days, when all was over between them, spoke of him as a man always
_patientissimus veri_; "the more plainly and fran