The Bacon Society. (INCORPORATED.) HE objects of the Society are expressed in the T 1. To encourage the study of the works of Francis Bacon as philosopher, lawyer, statesman and poet; also his character, genius, and life; his influence on his own and succeeding times, and the tendencies and results of his writings. 2. To encourage the general study of the evidence in favour of Francis Bacon's authorship of the plays commonly ascribed to Shakespeare, and to investigate his connection with other works of the Elizabethan period. The annual subscription of Members, who are entitled to vote at the Society's business meetings, is one guinea; that of Associates is half-a-guinea. The Society's Library and Rooms are at 11, Hart Street, London, W.C. (close to the British Museum), where the Secretary attends daily, and from 3 to 5. o'clock will be happy to supply further information, BACONIANA. VOL. VI. Third Series. JANUARY, 1908. THE BACON SOCIETY. No. 21. HE beginning of a new year or of a new volume seems to encourage a spell of introspection. It is more than twenty-two years since the first number of the "Journal of the Bacon Society" appeared and nearly sixteen years since it adopted the title of BACONIANA. The pages bear evidence of much valuable work on the part of the members in what, as a correspondent points out, Dr. Appleton Morgan has described as "the higher criticism of Shakespeare." There are contributions which approach the question of the authorship from many points of view; odd facts are brought to light; theories are propounded with different degrees of probability, but all of them assist in arriving at an intelligent solution of this vexed question. The results of careful and painstaking research abound. But interesting and valuable as are these contributions, a perusal of them affords no evidence of combined or systematic effort directed to the attainment of a particular object. It was in 1903, on the incorporation of the Society, that a scheme for its work was drawn up, and it must be admitted that but little has so far been done towards its accomplishment; yet a determined attempt to carry out that scheme would justify the existence of the B |