CHAPTER VIII.

The Author revealed in the Sonnets.

Bacon also reveals much of himself in the play "As you like it," which of course means "Wisdom from the mouth of a fool." In that play, besides giving us much valuable information concerning his "mask" William Shakespeare, he also tells us why it was necessary for him to write under a pseudonym.

Speaking in the character of Jaques, who is the alter ego of Touchstone, he says,

Act ii, Scene 7.

"O that I were a foole, I am ambitious for a motley coat.

_Duke_. Thou shalt haue one.

_Jag_. It is my onely suite, Prouided that you weed your better judgements Of all opinion that growes ranke in them, That I am wise. I must haue liberty Wiithall, as large a Charter as the winde, To blow on whom I please, for so fooles haue: And they that are most gauled with my folly, They most must laugh....

Inuest me in my motley: Giue me leaue To speake my minde, and I will through and through Cleanse the foule bodie of th' infected world If they will patiently receiue my medicine."

He also gives us most valuable information in Sonnet 81.

Or I shall liue your Epitaph to make, Or you suruiue when I in earth am rotten, From hence your memory death cannot take, Although in me each part will be forgotten, Your name from hence immortall life shall haue, Though I (once gone) to all the world must dye, The Earth can yeeld me but a common graue, When you intombed in men's eyes shall lye, Your monument shall be my gentle verse, Which eyes not yet created shall ore read, And toungs to be, your being shall rehea.r.s.e, When all the breathers of this world are dead, You still shall liue (such vertue hath my Pen) Where breath most breaths euen in the mouths of men.

Stratfordians tell us that the above is written in reference to a poet whom Shakespeare "evidently" regarded as a rival. But it is difficult to imagine how sensible men can satisfy their reason with such an explanation. Is it possible to conceive that a poet should write _against a rival_

"Your name from hence immortall life shall haue Though I (once gone) to all the world must dye"

or should say _against_ a _rival_,

"The Earth can yeeld me but a common graue While you intombed in men's eyes shall lye."

or should have declared "_against_ a _rival_,"

"Your monument shall be my gentle verse"

No! This sonnet is evidently written in reference to the writer's mask or pseudonym which would continue to have immortal life (even though he himself might be forgotten) as he says

"Although in me each part will be forgotten."

It is sometimes said that Shakespeare (meaning the Stratford actor) did not know the value of his immortal works. Is that true of the writer of this sonnet who says

"my gentle verse Which eyes not yet created shall ore read"

No! The writer knew his verses were immortal and would immortalize the pseudonym attached to them

"When all the breathers of this world are dead."

Perhaps the reader will better understand Sonnet 81 if I insert the words necessary to fully explain it.

Or shall I [Bacon] live your Epitaph to make, Or you [Shakespeare] survive when I in Earth am rotten, From hence your memory death cannot take, Although in me each part will be forgotten.

Your name [Shakespeare] from hence immortal life shall have, Though I [Bacon] once gone to all the world must die, The earth can yield me but a common grave, When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie, Your monument shall be my [not your] gentle verse, Which eyes not yet created shall ore read, And tongues to be your being [which as an author was not] shall rehea.r.s.e, When all the breathers of this world are dead, You [Shakespeare] still shall live, such vertue hath my pen [not your own pen, for you never wrote a line]

Where breathe most breaths even in the mouths of men.

This Sonnet was probably written considerably earlier than 1609, but at that date Bacon's name had not been attached to any work of great literary importance.

After the writer had learned the true meaning of Sonnet 81, his eyes were opened to the inward meaning of other Sonnets, and he perceived that Sonnet No. 76 repeated the same tale.

"Why write I still all one, euer the same, And keep inuention in a noted weed, That euery word doth almost sel my name, Shewing their birth and where they did proceed?"

(Sel may mean spell or tell or possibly betray.)

Especially note that "Invention" is the same word that is used by Bacon in his letter to Sir Tobie Matthew of 1609 (same date as the Sonnets), and also especially remark the phrase "in a noted weed," which means in a "pseudonym," and compare it with the words of Bacon's prayer, "I have (though in a 'despised weed') procured the good of all men."

[Resuscitatio, 1671.] Was not the pseudonym of the Actor Shakespeare a very "despised weed" in those days?

Let us look also at Sonnet No. 78.

"So oft have I enuoked thee for my Muse, And found such faire a.s.sistance in my verse, As every _alien_ pen hath got my use, And under thee their poesy disperse."

Here again we should understand how to read this Sonnet as under:--

"So oft have I enuoked thee [Shakespeare] for my Muse, And found such faire a.s.sistance in my verse, As every _alien_ pen hath got my use, And under thee [Shakespeare] their poesy disperse."

"Shakespeare" is frequently charged with being careless of his works and indifferent to the piracy of his name; but we see by this Sonnet, No.

78, that the real author was not indifferent to the false use of his pseudonym, though it was, of course, impossible for him to take any effectual action if he desired to preserve his incognito, his mask, his pseudonym.

CHAPTER IX.

Mr. Sidney Lee and the Stratford Bust.

One word to the Stratfordians. The "Shakespeare of Stratford-on-Avon"

myth has been shattered and destroyed by the ma.s.s of inexact.i.tudes collected in the supposit.i.tious "Life of Shakespeare" by Mr. Sidney Lee, who has done his best to pulverise what remained of that myth by recently writing as follows:--

"Most of those who have pressed the question [of Bacon being the real Shake-speare] on my notice, are men of acknowledged intelligence and reputation in their own branch of life, both at home and abroad. I therefore desire as respectfully, but also as emphatically and as publicly, as I can, to put on record the fact, as one admitting to my mind of no rational ground for dispute, that there exists every manner of contemporary evidence to prove that Shakspere, the householder of Stratford-on-Avon, wrote with his own hand, and exclusively by the light of his only genius (merely to paraphrase the contemporary inscription on his tomb in Stratford-on-Avon Church) those dramatic works which form the supreme achievement in English Literature."

As a matter of fact, not a single sc.r.a.p of evidence, contemporary or otherwise, exists to show that Shakspere, the householder of Stratford-on-Avon, wrote the plays or anything else; indeed, the writer thinks that he has conclusively proved that this child of illiterate parents and father of an illiterate child was himself so illiterate that he was never able to write so much as his own name. But Mr. Sidney Lee seems prepared to accept _anything_ as "contemporary evidence," for on pages 276-7 (1898 edition) of his "Life of Shakespeare" he writes

"Before 1623 an elaborate monument, by a London sculptor of Dutch birth, Gerard Johnson, was erected to Shakespeare's memory in the chancel of the parish church. It includes a half-length bust, depicting the dramatist on the point of writing. The fingers of the right hand are disposed as if holding a pen, and under the left hand lies a quarto sheet of paper."

As a matter of fact, the _present_ Stratford monument was not put up till about one hundred and twenty years _after_ Shakspeare's death. The original monument, see Plate 3 on Page 8, was a very different monument, and the figure, as I have shewn in Plate 5, instead of holding a pen in its hand, rests its two hands on a wool-sack or cushion. Of course, the false bust in the existing monument was subst.i.tuted for the old bust for the purpose of fraudulently supporting the Stratford myth.

When Mr. Sidney Lee wrote that the present monument was erected before 1623 he did not do this consciously to deceive the public; still, it is difficult to pardon him for this and the other reckless statements with which his book is filled. But what are we to say of his words (respecting the _present_ monument) which we read on page 286? "It was first engraved--very imperfectly--in Rowe's edition of 1709." An exact full size photo facsimile reproduction of Rowe's engraving is shown in Plate 19, Page 77.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate. XIX. The Original Stratford Monument, from Rowe's Life of Shakespeare, 1709]

As a matter of fact, the real Stratford monument of 1623 was first engraved in Dugdale's "Warwickshire" of 1656, where it appears opposite to page 523. We can, however, pardon Mr. Sidney Lee for his ignorance of the existence of that engraving; but how shall we pardon him for citing Rowe as a witness to the early existence of the present bust? To anyone not wilfully blinded by pa.s.sion and prejudice, Rowe's engraving [see Plate 19, Page 77] clearly shews a figure absolutely different from the Bust in the present monument. Rowe's figure is in the same att.i.tude as the Bust of the original monument engraved by Dugdale, and does not hold a pen in its hand, but its two hands are supported on a wool-sack or cushion, in the same manner as in the Bust from Dugdale which I have shewn in Plate 5, on Page 14.

What are we to say respecting the frontispiece to the 1898 edition of what he is pleased to describe as the "Life of William Shakespeare,"

which Mr. Sidney Lee tells us is "from the 'Droeshout' painting now in the Shakespeare Memorial Gallery at Stratford-on-Avon"?