Essays

Francis Bacon is a seventeenth-century philosopher and scientist generally considered an early founder of empiricism, which is a branch of philosophical thought in direct conflict with the theory...

Bacon's Essays, written in three groups between 1597 and 1625, are Bacon's attempts to guide men to appropriate actions in their personal, business, and public lives--they are, in essence, the...

Francis Bacon's essay "Of Youth and Age," like many of his other essays, explores two sides of the same coin, that is, the benefits and detriments of youth as opposed to those of "age," by which he...

Knowledge broadens the mind, as they say, and Francis Bacon is certainly of that opinion in his essay “On Travel.” Bacon sees travel primarily in utilitarian terms, as a means of expanding one's...

In 1572, Montaigne began writing a series of essays, or Essais, as a way to occupy his mind. This project proved revolutionary. Before Montaigne, writing was typically public and purposeful. In the...

When discussing the style and themes of Sir Francis Bacon’s Essays, it’s important to remember that the Essays were published in three editions in Bacon’s lifetime. Each new edition added more...

Bacon, in short, argues that superstition—by which, we should be clear, he means Catholicism—is a corrupting influence in society. He goes so far as to say that even atheism is better than...

An important way in which writing makes an exact man is that a conscientious writer must always be searching his mind, as well as his dictionary and his thesaurus, for the exact word to express his...

In his essay “Of Anger,” Sir Francis Bacon lists various causes or motives of anger, including the following: a “natural inclination and habit to be angry”: in other words, a tendency toward anger...

"Of Marriage and the Single Life" is a short essay by Francis Bacon. Bacon begins the essay by proposing that married men and fathers stifle their own creativity and usefulness to the world when...

In his essay “Of Travaille” [that is, concerning travel], Sir Francis Bacon uses a variety of persuasive techniques and some notable instances of figurative language in order to support his...

Francis Bacon's "Essays" are a series of writings that address a very broad range of topics, including Anger, War, Virtue, Envy, etc... as well as the one at hand, Praise. On first glance they look...

For the protean Francis Bacon, the question of how to operate a plantation effectively was more than an academic exercise; along with Captain John Smith and his cousin the Earl of Salisbury, he was...

This is going to be a matter of opinion. I think that it's highly subjective to be able to argue that Bacon's works are an example of worldly wisdom. They are based on his own experience and what...

Francis Bacon's Essays, written in groups between 1597 and 1625, are masterpieces of practical guidance in how to get along in the world of business, politics, government, and personal relations....

This is the essay of a wise man, who describes the three fruits of friendship as follows: For there is no man, that imparteth his joys to his friend, but he joyeth the more; and no man that...

Bacon's essay "Of Delays" might well be called "Of Proper Timing" because its subject is the importance of weighing carefully when to move ahead with a plan and when to wait. The essay opens with...

Francis Bacon's essay "On Studies," perhaps his most famous, lays out the reasons that Bacon thinks that studies are an essential part of daily life and describes the kinds of studies that he...

In the 1601 edition of Francis Bacon’s Essays, the essay “Of Anger” concludes with the following paragraph: For raising and appeasing anger in another; it is done chiefly by choosing of times,...

In both his Essays and his New Atlantis, Bacon promotes an ideal world founded on Christian ethics conjoined with an enlightened view of scientific inquiry and rationalism. The Essays examine a...

A helpful discussion of Sir Francis Bacon’s essay “Of Truth” might begin by simply paraphrasing the argument of the essay. Essentially, Bacon argues as follows: Although there are few...

In his essay “On Truth,” Francis Bacon argues that people have a natural tendency to tell lies. Furthermore, he maintains that we have a “natural, though corrupt love, of the lie itself.” Belief in...

For a number of reasons, this is a difficult question to answer. For one thing, it is unclear what the “opinion” is supposed to be about? Is it supposed to be about Bacon’s essay “Of Studies”? Or...

The style of Sir Francis Bacon’s Essays is indebted to a number of sources, both literary and otherwise. Like most Renaissance Christians, especially the well-educated, Bacon was very familiar with...

Francis Bacon was a Renaissance humanist, and all of his essays reflect this characteristic. Each one is a blend of wisdom from the classical world of Greek and Rome and Christian theology. Bacon...

In the 1601 edition of Francis Bacon’s Essays, the penultimate (that is, next-to-last) paragraph reads as follows: To contain anger from mischief, though it take hold of a man, there be two things,...

I think that much of this can be read as opinion. It is difficult to assess whether or not such a statement is true because it is a matter of opinion. Take some of the items presented in the...

A thesis statement is meant to be a road map of your paper. It is going to be an interpretation of what the subject is. It should be a well written single sentence in the first paragraph of your...

In this paragraph, Bacon basically describes what he thinks are the causes of anger. Consider the first point. First, to be too sensible of hurt; for no man is angry, that feels not himself hurt;...