than their own, and commend it when they return.
IC7 Francis Bacon (1561–1626) from New Atlantis
For a brief note on Bacon’s career, see IC6. His long essay New Atlantis appeared as an addition to his last published work, with the comment appended: ‘A Worke unfinished’. It is a remarkable combination of elements: a Renaissance‐style literary synthesis of the teaching of both the Christian Bible and pagan antiquity; a response to the contemporary age of European exploration; and a blueprint for a research institute (which had an influence on the founding of the Royal Society). The present short extract is restricted to this last, in which Bacon’s traveller to a lost island in the Pacific is given a description of ‘Salomon’s House’: the transdisciplinary research institute dedicated to bringing the light of knowledge to the study of ‘the works and creatures of God’. The extracts are taken from Francis Bacon: The Major Works, edited with an introduction and notes by Brian Vickers, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996/2002, pp. 480–2 and 484–8.
‘God bless thee, my son; I will give thee the greatest jewel I have. For I will impart unto thee, for the love of God and men, a relation of the true state of Salomon’s House….
‘The End of our Foundation is the knowledge of Causes, and secret motions of things; and the enlarging of the bounds of Human Empire, to the effecting of all things possible.
‘The Preparations and Instruments are these. We have large and deep caves of several depths: the deepest are sunk six hundred fathom; and some of them are digged and made under great hills and mountains: so that if you reckon together the depth of the hill and the depth of the cave, they are (some of them) above three miles deep… And we use them for all coagulations, indurations, refrigerations, and conservations of bodies. We use them likewise for the imitation of natural mines; and the producing also of new artificial metals, by compositions and materials which we use, and lay there for many years….
‘We have burials in several earths, where we put divers cements, as the Chineses do their porcelain. But we have them in greater variety, and some of them more fine. We have also great variety of composts, and soils for the making of the earth fruitful.
‘We have high towers; the highest about half a mile in height; and some of them likewise set upon high mountains; so that the vantage of the hill with the tower is in the highest of them three miles at least. And these places we call the Upper Region: accounting the air between the high places and the low, as a Middle Region. We use these towers, according to their several heights and situations, for insolation, refrigeration, conservation; and for the view of divers meteors; as winds, rain, snow, hail. […]
‘We have also a number of artificial wells and fountains, made in imitation of the natural sources and baths; as tincted upon vitriol, sulphur, steel, brass, lead, nitre, and other minerals. And again we have little wells for infusions of many things, where the waters take the virtue quicker and better than in vessels or basins. And amongst them we have a water which we call Water of Paradise, being, by that we do to it, made very sovereign for health, and prolongation of life….
‘We have also certain chambers, which we call Chambers of Health, where we qualify the air as we think good and proper for the cure of divers diseases, and preservation of health.
‘We have also fair and large baths, of several mixtures, for the cure of diseases, and the restoring of man’s body from arefaction: and others for the confirming of it in strength of sinews, vital parts, and the very juice and substance of the body.
‘We have also large and various orchards and gardens, wherein we do not so much respect beauty, as variety of ground and soil, proper for divers trees and herbs: and some very spacious, where trees and berries are set whereof we make divers kinds of drinks, besides the vineyards. In these we practise likewise all conclusions of grafting and inoculating, as well of wild‐trees as fruit‐trees, which produceth many effects. And we make (by art) in the same orchards and gardens, trees and flowers to come earlier or later than their seasons; and to come up and bear more speedily than by their natural course they do. We make them also by art greater much than their nature; and their fruit greater and sweeter and of differing taste, smell, colour, and figure, from their nature. […]
‘We have also divers mechanical arts, which you have not; and stuffs made by them; as papers, linen, silks, tissues; dainty works of feathers of wonderful lustre; excellent dyes, and many others; and shops likewise….
‘We have also furnaces of great diversities, and that keep great diversity of heats; fierce and quick; strong and constant; soft and mild; blown, quiet; dry, moist; and the like. But above all, we have heats in imitation of the sun’s and heavenly bodies’ heats, that pass divers inequalities and (as it were) orbs, progresses, and returns, whereby we produce admirable effects….
‘We have also perspective‐houses, where we make demonstrations of all lights and radiations; and of all colours; and out of things uncoloured and transparent, we can represent unto you all several colours; not in rain‐bows, as it is in gems and prisms, but of themselves single. We represent also all multiplications of light, which we carry to great distance, and make so sharp as to discern small points and lines; also all colorations of light: all delusions and deceits of the sight, in figures, magnitudes, motions, colours: all demonstrations of shadows. We find also divers means, yet unknown to you, of producing of light originally from divers bodies. We procure means of seeing objects afar off; as in the heaven and remote places; and represent things near as afar off, and things afar off as near; making feigned distances. We have also helps for the sight, far above spectacles and glasses in use. We have also glasses and means to see small and minute bodies perfectly and distinctly; as the shapes and colours of small flies and worms, grains and flaws in gems, which cannot otherwise be seen; observations in urine and blood, not otherwise to be seen. We make artificial rain‐bows, halos, and circles about light. We represent also all manner of reflexions, refractions, and multiplications of visual beams of objects.
‘We have also precious stones of all kinds, many of them of great beauty, and to you unknown; crystals likewise; and glasses of divers kinds; and amongst them some of metals vitrificated, and other materials besides those of which you make glass….
‘We have also sound‐houses, where we practise and demonstrate all sounds, and their generation. We have harmonies which you have not, of quarter‐sounds, and lesser slides of sounds. Divers instruments of music likewise to you unknown, some sweeter than any you have; together with bells and rings that are dainty and sweet. We represent small sounds as great and deep; likewise great sounds extenuate and sharp; we make divers tremblings and warblings of sounds, which in their original are entire. We represent and imitate all articulate sounds and letters, and the voices and notes of beasts and birds. We have certain helps which set to the ear do further the hearing greatly. We have also divers strange and artificial echos, reflecting the voice many times, and as it were tossing it: and some that give back the voice louder than it came; some shriller, and some deeper; yea, some rendering the voice differing in the letters or articulate sound from that they receive. We have also means to convey sounds in trunks and pipes, in strange lines and distances….
‘We have also engine‐houses, where are prepared engines and instruments for all sorts of motions. There we imitate and practise to make swifter motions than any you have… We imitate also flights of birds; we have some degrees of flying in the air; we have ships and boats for going under water, and brooking of seas; also swimming‐girdles and supporters. We have divers curious clocks, and other like motions of return, and some perpetual motions. […]
‘These are (my son) the riches of Salomon’s House. […]
‘For our ordinances and rites:
