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Francis Bacon was the true author of Shakespeare's works, so "Bacon was the Bard"
Criminal psychiatrist Richard M. Bucke, in his 1901 book Cosmic Consciousness, uses his psychological expertise and powers of deduction to make a very strong case for Francis Bacon (1561-1626, jurist and courtier, Parliamentary speaker) as the author of all of William Shakespeare’s works. When you couple his observations with internal clues and some “common sense” facts, it seems almost a forgone conclusion.
Bucke’s treatise was about levels of consciousness, particularly about what he saw as the next stage of man’s inner development: a leap from a species dominated by self consciousness to one gradually awakening a new level of cosmic consciousness. Beginning with Gautama, the Buddha, and continuing to the late 19th century and his friend Walt Whitman, the book documents what he calls “indisputable evidence” of cases of personal breakthroughs into what he termed a new level of consciousness just being awakened as a new faculty in the mind of man. Like any new skill or learned behavior, the new ability first exhibits itself in isolated cases years apart, then gradually becomes more and more prevalent, eventually becoming another inherited trait of the entire species, just as self awareness is now.
Bucke obviously includes Francis Bacon in his list of illuminated individuals, along with Jesus, Paul, Mohammed, John Yepes (St. John of the Cross), William Blake, Honoré Balzac, Walt Whitman and numerous others. He establishes several criteria, noting how psychiatrists can distinguish between the insane and those truly experiencing a change in consciousness, a state that is neither psychotic nor damaging, and in fact always causes positive changes in the individual as can be seen by the type of people included. Ironically, Bacon died from cold after performing an experiment: trying to stuff a chicken with snow, to create the world's first frozen dinner!
Here’s a summary of Bucke’s arguments for Francis Bacon as Shakespeare
1. The plays introduce over five hundred new words, most derived from Latin. Bacon wrote in Latin, and shares 98.5% of Shakespeare’s vocabulary – too much to be coincidence, and the “two” writers did not know each other.
2. There are over 100 common expressions and phrases found in both writings.
3. Each read the same books, each had the same favorite books.
4. They wrote on the same subjects and always from the same point of view, and they never express irreconcilable opinions.
5. For over thirty years, they lived together in a town of only 160,000 and supposedly never met, nor even knew the existence of each other.
6. Bacon left behind an abundance of evidence of his literary life such as letters and manuscripts; Shakespeare left none, no manuscripts, not even a letter.
7. The localities of the plays were all locations known or visited by Bacon.
8. There is a parallel between the plays and incidents in Bacon’s life.
9. Examinations of Shakespeare’s “Richard III” and “Henry the VIII” and Bacon’s prose history of Henry the VIII make it clear that all three are from the same author.
10. The philosophy and science of Bacon are constantly worked into the poetry of Shakespeare.
11. There’s a ridiculous but brilliant Latin anagram in “Love’s Labour Lost”, the word: Honorificabilitudinitatibus. Scholars have found this phrase in Latin from these letters: “Hi ludi, tuiti sibi, Fr. Bacono nati” which translates as “These plays entrusted to themselves proceeded from Fr. Bacon”. The form of the “word” is Latin, the anagram is in Latin. The intention is clear.
On the outer leaf of a manuscript of Bacon’s is the word: Honorificabilitudino. This is another Latin anagram: “Initio hi ludi Fr. Bacono”, which reads “In the beginning these plays from Fr. Bacon”. This “less perfect” anagram preceded the better one later placed in “Love’s Labour Lost”. Two different authors, each came up with these anagrams?
12. Bucke claims to have found a hidden cipher in nearly every play that claims the authorship of Bacon; he intended to publish them later in a volume solely devoted to Bacon. Unfortunately, death preceded this volume.
Well, this pretty much blows away my theory that the plays were written by the entire acting troupe that performed them. When I read that there are no manuscripts of the plays from the time they were performed, and that two actors wrote them down years later from memory, I thought I had developed a good theory. In fact, there are no manuscripts at all from Shakespeare, and of the seven known autographs of his, no TWO versions spell the name the same way! Now, how many people do you know that would spell their name differently every time they sign it? To me, that one fact alone implies that there was no actual person named William Shackspear, er Shakespeer, er Shakespeare. Whatever… Shake a Spear!
Criminal psychiatrist Richard M. Bucke, in his 1901 book Cosmic Consciousness, uses his psychological expertise and powers of deduction to make a very strong case for Francis Bacon (1561-1626, jurist and courtier, Parliamentary speaker) as the author of all of William Shakespeare’s works. When you couple his observations with internal clues and some “common sense” facts, it seems almost a forgone conclusion.Bucke’s treatise was about levels of consciousness, particularly about what he saw as the next stage of man’s inner development: a leap from a species dominated by self consciousness to one gradually awakening a new level of cosmic consciousness. Beginning with Gautama, the Buddha, and continuing to the late 19th century and his friend Walt Whitman, the book documents what he calls “indisputable evidence” of cases of personal breakthroughs into what he termed a new level of consciousness just being awakened as a new faculty in the mind of man. Like any new skill or learned behavior, the new ability first exhibits itself in isolated cases years apart, then gradually becomes more and more prevalent, eventually becoming another inherited trait of the entire species, just as self awareness is now.
Bucke obviously includes Francis Bacon in his list of illuminated individuals, along with Jesus, Paul, Mohammed, John Yepes (St. John of the Cross), William Blake, Honoré Balzac, Walt Whitman and numerous others. He establishes several criteria, noting how psychiatrists can distinguish between the insane and those truly experiencing a change in consciousness, a state that is neither psychotic nor damaging, and in fact always causes positive changes in the individual as can be seen by the type of people included. Ironically, Bacon died from cold after performing an experiment: trying to stuff a chicken with snow, to create the world's first frozen dinner!
Here’s a summary of Bucke’s arguments for Francis Bacon as Shakespeare
1. The plays introduce over five hundred new words, most derived from Latin. Bacon wrote in Latin, and shares 98.5% of Shakespeare’s vocabulary – too much to be coincidence, and the “two” writers did not know each other.
2. There are over 100 common expressions and phrases found in both writings.
3. Each read the same books, each had the same favorite books.
4. They wrote on the same subjects and always from the same point of view, and they never express irreconcilable opinions.
5. For over thirty years, they lived together in a town of only 160,000 and supposedly never met, nor even knew the existence of each other.
6. Bacon left behind an abundance of evidence of his literary life such as letters and manuscripts; Shakespeare left none, no manuscripts, not even a letter.
7. The localities of the plays were all locations known or visited by Bacon.
8. There is a parallel between the plays and incidents in Bacon’s life.
9. Examinations of Shakespeare’s “Richard III” and “Henry the VIII” and Bacon’s prose history of Henry the VIII make it clear that all three are from the same author.
10. The philosophy and science of Bacon are constantly worked into the poetry of Shakespeare.
11. There’s a ridiculous but brilliant Latin anagram in “Love’s Labour Lost”, the word: Honorificabilitudinitatibus. Scholars have found this phrase in Latin from these letters: “Hi ludi, tuiti sibi, Fr. Bacono nati” which translates as “These plays entrusted to themselves proceeded from Fr. Bacon”. The form of the “word” is Latin, the anagram is in Latin. The intention is clear.
On the outer leaf of a manuscript of Bacon’s is the word: Honorificabilitudino. This is another Latin anagram: “Initio hi ludi Fr. Bacono”, which reads “In the beginning these plays from Fr. Bacon”. This “less perfect” anagram preceded the better one later placed in “Love’s Labour Lost”. Two different authors, each came up with these anagrams?
12. Bucke claims to have found a hidden cipher in nearly every play that claims the authorship of Bacon; he intended to publish them later in a volume solely devoted to Bacon. Unfortunately, death preceded this volume.
Well, this pretty much blows away my theory that the plays were written by the entire acting troupe that performed them. When I read that there are no manuscripts of the plays from the time they were performed, and that two actors wrote them down years later from memory, I thought I had developed a good theory. In fact, there are no manuscripts at all from Shakespeare, and of the seven known autographs of his, no TWO versions spell the name the same way! Now, how many people do you know that would spell their name differently every time they sign it? To me, that one fact alone implies that there was no actual person named William Shackspear, er Shakespeer, er Shakespeare. Whatever… Shake a Spear!
