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Copy by Henry Thurstan Holland, dated.

48 letters to W. H. Thompson dated 1831-1866, and 1 letter addressed to [John] Allen dated 24 Aug. 1840. Names mentioned in the accompanying calendar of the letters include Henry Alford; John Allen; Robert Leslie Ellis; Edward FitzGerald; Arthur Hallam; Walter Savage Landor; Samuel Laurence; Richard Monckton Milnes, Lord Houghton; Stephen Spring Rice; Sir Henry Taylor; Robert John Tennant; Alfred, Lord Tennyson; Charles Tennyson [later Turner]; and William Wordsworth. Spedding also refers to his work on Francis Bacon.
With a further 35 letters to William Aldis Wright and William George Clark, dated 1862-1881. Letters to William George Clark date from 1862 to 1864 and relate to collations of Shakespeare's plays. Letters from 1881 to William Aldis Wright relate to Frederick James Furnivall, with copies of Spedding's letters to Furnivall, and one letter from Furnivall to Spedding dated 26 Feb. 1881. Accompanied by a mechanical copy of the Northumberland Manuscript.

JSB was aware that WW had a chapter on Francis Bacon in his Inductive Philosophy. WW's account has generated much of the current interest in Francis Bacon's philosophy. JSB is not at present employed on the Opus Majus, but the 'Opus Tertium' and 'Opus Minus'. The MS of these are very rare. Bacon frequently refers to the Opus Majus which is found in the Trinity MS, and JSB would like to see it. He has discovered a 'fine MS of this work at [Badby]'.

Letters concerning Bacon, dated 21 June 1861 and 6 May 1862.

Thanks Welby for sending him her two pamphlets [Ambiguities and Apparent Paradox], which he discusses. Declares that it is a difficult matter 'to persuade a plain man to go through the process necessary to attain precision of thought: it requires great literary skill in presenting the process.' Claims that he tried to do something of this sort in his Principles of Political Economy, but fears that he bored the readers. States that he would like to see Herbert Spencer's answer to Apparent Paradox. States that if she wants to call Locke as a witness 'it would be easy to find suitable quotations in Chap. IX of Book III of the Essay on Human Understanding, and that with regard to Bacon, there is Aphorism XV in the Novum Organum. Believes that modern instances are more impressive however.

Two letters.

East Hendred, Wantage, Berkshire. - Thanks Bob for his 'delightful Christmas gift' [his poem "A Dream"]. Was 'busy on hack-work' when it arrived, so only read it yesterday with 'much interest and admiration'. Asks if the 'two lines about Verulam' mean that Bob is an 'advocate of the Baconian heresy' [about the authorship of Shakespeare's works]: if so, he is the first poet Wilfrid has met 'who could believe for a moment that the author of the essays could have written the plays'; has also 'never met an actor who could conceive that they were the work of an author without intimate stage-experience'. This is however a 'minor issue', which 'detracts little from the beauty and wisdom of the poem'. He and his wife send best wishes to the Trevelyans for Christmas and the new year.

Asks Whewell's opinion of his interpretation of new research into Bacon's submission and confession and speculates that the final book on Bacon will not be written in their time.

26 Lower Belgrave Place - Concerning the cast from the St Albans figure of Lord Bacon.

Three letters. Concerns E. Marriott's Bacon or Shakespeare? : an historical enquiry.

Typewritten copy of letter dated 11 August 1891. Says that her two pamphlets she sent him have greatly interested him; believes that her Great Cloud of Witnesses will be most improving to the reader, 'if it does not reduce him to a too depressing state of scepticism.' Observes that it is difficult 'to persuade a plain man to go through the process necessary to attain precision of thought': attempted to do something similar in The Principles of Political Economy, but fears that he 'bored the readers horribly'. Would much like to see Herbert Spencer's answer to her Apparent Paradox; refers to the belief in ancestral ghosts. If she wants 'to call Locke as a "witness", it would be easy to find suitable quotations in Chap. ix of Book III of the Essays on the Human Understanding, which deals with the "Imperfection of Words".' Also refers to 'Aphorism xv in [Bacon's] Novum Organum'. However, he believes modern instances to be more impressive, 'as it might be supposed that the progress of science had removed the evils pointed out by Bacon and Locke.'

Examines Elizabeth Wells Gallup's biliteral cipher theory, which she claimed was proof of Bacon's authorship of the works of Shakespeare.

(Cambridge.)—Discusses the meaning of the phrase ‘cat in the pan’.

(Undated. Postmarked at Cambridge on 7 Dec. 1899.)

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Transcript

My reasons for supposing that, in ‘cat in the pan’ {1}, the cat means a pussy, are: (1) that the word cate does not seem ever to have been spelt without a final e; & (2) that cate does not appear in the singular number earlier than the time of Shakespeare; in all older quotations it is cates in the plural.

Yrs
W W Skeat

[Direction:] W. Aldis Wright Esq. | Trinity College [At the foot:] Local.

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Postmarked at Cambridge on 7 December 1899.

{1} The phrase occurs in Bacon’s essay ‘Of Cunning’.

7 Camden St, N.W. - Thanks him 'for the Bacon which you found in the Barrow - It all amounts to wondrous little'. If Whewell is right that Bacon was well known with Cambridge men how could he be so little quoted? When he has time he intends to work out the thesis 'That Newton was more indebted to the schoolmen than to Bacon, and probably better associated with them'. He has received Mansel's Bampton lectures: 'I tell him by this post that it is the best argument I have seen against subscription at matriculation'. Discusses Earnshaw's integration of the equation of sound, his own method from 1848 and that of Jacques Charles.

London, Vere Street, 'near Oxford Chappel'. Sent to Sir Edward Littleton at Fedgeley [Teddesley?] Coppice, Staffordshire. - Apologises for not finishing any more busts. Has had to finish the statue of the Duke of Somerset and some other things to keep his men at work. Has finished four busts for Littleton: Milton; Sir Isaac Newton; Locke; and Bacon; now promises to begin that of Sir Walter Raleigh. Describes work and reason for delays.

Has called on Mr Wilson to see the portrait of Littleton's wife, as Littleton desired, and likes it very much. Ends with wishes for good health of both Littletons.

(This essay was probably written while Clifford was an undergraduate at Trinity.)

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Transcript

De statu scientiarum, quod non sit fœlix aut majorem in modum auctus; quodque alia omnino quam prioribus cognita fuerit via aperienda sit intellectui humano, et alia comparanda auxilia, ut meus suo jure in rerum naturam uti possit.

Bacon has an inconvenient habit of using old technical terms in entirely new senses, and of giving particular senses to general words which appear to have not the least connection with their ordinary meanings. For instance:—Form, Induction, Idol. We have other instances in the passage quoted above. “Scientiæ” does not mean a collection of facts or laws, but is more subjective, in accordance with the etymology. “Fœlix”, if affirmative, would mean that the sciences were easy, without inconvenient hitches and things hard to be understood. And “majorem in modum auctus” does not mean merely “increased” or “greatly advancing”, but denotes such an increase as changes the whole aspect of the science, or of some branch of it. In other words, it is a development of form and not of magnitude. The first clause, then, means that the sciences are perplexed with much the same general difficulties as they have been all along; that there has been no great clearing, which opened a wide surface to the feet of all walkers; and that this state of things is very unsatisfactory. In this sense we say that the clause is applicable to the present time. Admitting that the sciences generally are increased, that particular discoveries have been made, and the mechanical arts vastly improved—and indeed it could hardly be otherwise; admitting also, that the {1} state of certain particular branches of science has been auctus majorem in modum; we say that it still remains true, quod status scientiarum non sit majorem in modum auctus. There are still difficulties, and cramped methods; things do not flow on easily, except in some particular examples. Bacon’s idea of utilis inventio is not one that can be applied to mechanical arts (for there have been plenty of them), but one one that is ad generandum valida, capable of producing its like. For instance, the Chemical spectrum has already been the parent of many important discoveries, and there is no limit to the facts and laws which any one may discover by its means. Bacon’s method must be something general which corresponds to this special instance, and Induction, according to the common idea of the same, may have nothing whatever to do with it.

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Docketed by Clifford in ink ‘De Stato … | W K Clifford’, and by a later hand in pencil ‘Cambridge | early.’

{1} ‘the sciences … that the’: these three lines are marked in the margin with a vertical line and the comment ‘very good observn’. The comment probably relates specifically to the phrase ‘that particular discoveries … improved’.