Anonymous And Pseudonymous Authorship

To understand Francis Bacon we must keep in view the dominant motive of his life. It is embodied in these words: “It is enough, son, that I have sown unto Posterity and the immortal God.” Truth has ever been distasteful to despotism, hence the men of his day who realized the mental barrenness which prevailed in the world, and desired to enrich it, were obliged to veil their efforts from the jealous eyes of those in power.

This was the reason why Rosicrucianism flourished. As its single purpose was to convey knowledge to mankind, it sanctioned some methods which to one who does not realize the dangers which encompassed it seem childish. This is one of the keys to the mystery which shrouded much of Bacon’s life. That he employed a large portion of it in writing anonymously, or under the names of real or fictitious persons, cannot be successfully denied.
It is well to keep in view the important facts to which we have alluded: that Spedding, Bacon’s indefatigable biographer, could not connect him with the authorship of any important published work for fifteen years after his return from the French Court; that the Advancement of Learning, published at the age of forty-four, was his first published work of importance, and Rawley’s statement that he wrote the majority of his philosophical works during the five closing years of his life.

It must have been in the earlier period of his career, then, that many of the anonymous plays, afterwards published under the pen name, Shake-Speare, or Shakespeare, were written.

He must have done more literary work during the best years of his life than write bright letters or a few masques for the entertainment of the Court, and as playwriting would have ruined his official prospects, to say nothing of sensitiveness to public clamour, he of set purpose concealed his authorship as others often have done. This was made easier by his adoption of the Rosicrucian doctrine of Silence.