." Even when, upon this royal hint, he erected his elegant
mansion of Gorhambury, he was still careful not to lose sight of that
idea of lettered privacy in which he loved to indulge; and the
accomplishments of his mind were reflected in the decorations of his
home. In the gardens, on which his chief care and cost were bestowed,
arose a banqueting-house consecrated to the seven Sciences, whose
figures adorned the walls, each subscribed with a Latin distich and
surrounded with portraits of her most celebrated votaries; a temple in
which we may imagine the youthful mind of that illustrious son of his,
who "took all learning to be" his "province," receiving with delight its
earliest inspiration! In his second wife,--one of the learned daughters
of sir Anthony Cook, a woman of a keen and penetrating intellect, and
much distinguished by her zeal for reformed religion in its austerer
forms,--sir Nicholas found a partner capable of sharing his views and
appreciating his character. By her he became the father of two sons;
that remarkable man Anthony Bacon, and Francis, the light of science,
the interpreter of nature; the admiration of his own age, and the wonder
of succeeding ones; the splendid dawn of whose unrivalled genius his
father was happy enough to behold; more happy still in not surviving to
witness the calamitous eclipse which overshadowed his reputation at its
highest noon.

The lord keeper was esteemed the second pillar of that state of which
Burleigh was the prime support. In all public measures of importance
they acted together; and similar speculative opinions, with coinciding
views of national policy, united these two eminent statesmen in a
brotherhood dearer than that of alliance; but in their motives of
action, and in the character of their minds, a diversity was observable
which it may be useful to point out.

Of Burleigh it has formerly been remarked, that with his own interest he
considered also, and perhaps equally, that of his queen and his country:
but the patriotism of Bacon seems to have risen higher; and his
conformity with the wishes and sentiments of his sovereign was less
obsequiously exact. In the affair of lady Catherine Grey's title, he did
not hesitate to risk the favor of the queen and his own continuance in
office, for the sake of what appeared to him the cause of religion and
his country. On the whole, however, moderation and prudence were the
governing principles of his mind and actions. T