Note 4 — Chapter VII

To readers who have no sense of humor and irony, the essay 'Of Love' unquestionably gives countenance to the theory that Francis Bacon was cold and passionless in all that concerned woman. Of the many strange constructions put upon this essay, not the least amusing and perverse is that which would make it a piece of adroit flattery to Elizabeth, who never permitted love "to check with business," though she is represented to have used it as a diversion in idle moments. If Sir Thomas More's 'Utopia' had been published a quarter of a century after 1518 (the date of its appearance), a similar construction would have been put on the passage, which urges that lovers should not be bound by an indissoluble tie of wedlock, until mutual inspection has satisfied each of the contracting parties that the other does not labor under any grave personal defect. If it were possible to regard the passage containing this proposal as an interpolation in the original romance, it might then be regarded as an attempt to palliate Henry VIII.'s conduct to Anne of Cleves.