New Atlantis
3/5
()
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon (1561-1626) was an English philosopher, scientist, and statesman. Recognized for his intelligence from a young age, Bacon would develop the empirical basis for modern scientific inquiry—known today as the scientific method—by promoting skepticism and observational experimentation as essential for the discovery of truth and the growth of human knowledge. A central figure of the scientific revolution and the Renaissance, Bacon was recognized as Lord Verulam and Viscount St. Alban during his lifetime and was honored by both Queen Elizabeth I and King James VI for his contributions to society. Bacon was also an accomplished statesman, responsible for drafting early legal documents and charters for the British colonization of the Americas. His career was not without controversy, however, as accusations of bribery tarnished his reputation and barred him from government service toward the end of his life and career. Today, he is remembered as one of the founders of modern science whose theories and methods continue to form the basis of all scientific experimentation and inquiry.
Read more from Francis Bacon
The Advancement of Learning Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Essays of Francis Bacon: or Counsels Civil and Moral Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Francis Bacon: The Complete Works (Centaur Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe New Atlantis Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Novum Organum Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Essays by Francis Bacon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5New Atlantis: Illustrated Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Harvard Classics: All 71 Volumes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings30+ Classic Philosophy Book Collection: The Art of War, Poetics, The Republic, The Meditations, The Prince and others Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Essays of Francis Bacon Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEssays of Francis Bacon Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5The Utopia Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe New Organon Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTHE HOLLOW EARTH: Sci-Fi Boxed Set - 24 Tales of Lost Worlds & Alternative Universes: King Solomon's Mines, The Lost Continent, New Atlantis, The Lost World, Journey to the Center of the Earth, The Mysterious Island, The Moon Pool, She, Pellucidar, The Monster Men, Adjustment Team… Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSci-Fi Anthology: Lost Worlds & Alternative Universes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsComplete Essays Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5New Atlantis and The City of the Sun: Two Classic Utopias Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Essays Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Advancement of Learning (Annotated) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Essays: Colours of Good and Evil Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Francis Bacon Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNew Atlantis Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIdeal Commonwealths Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to New Atlantis
Related ebooks
The Complete Francis Bacon Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVoltaire's Philosophical Dictionary Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Golden Verses of Pythagoras Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Wisdom of Zoroaster Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Gargantua and Pantagruel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVivo:The Life of Gustav Meyrink Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson - Plato, or the philosopher Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Ghost-Seer; or the Apparitionist; and Sport of Destiny Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Magician Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Proserpine and Midas Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Shaving of Shagpat Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsJames Weldon Johnson: The Best Works Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsErewhon, or Over The Range Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Endymion Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTimaeus and Critias Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBiographia Literaria Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMaxims and Reflections Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Poems of Goethe Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry of Horace Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Aeneid of Virgil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Father Sergius Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Heroic Enthusiasts (Gli Eroici Furori) Part the Second An Ethical Poem Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCivil War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Peace Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5False Start in Paradise Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBacon's Essays, and Wisdom of the Ancients Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Apology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Reviews for New Atlantis
48 ratings3 reviews
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5In the south seas our narrator comes to an nation unknown to Europe but fully informed about the past and present of all the worlds lands. This is a Christian nation by miraculous delivery of the gospels 20yrs after the Crucifixion which generously allows Jews and a few others to live there. Mostly tell rather than show, the narrator 'repeats' reports about the chastity of the people and the institutionalized pursuit knowledge and practical invention. Women however are kept firmly in the background, standing at the edges of a mans feast or sequestered in a viewing room, listed as servants and attendants of scholars, but hardly elsewhere. "Every sperm is sacred" played in my head during the Feast of the Family report. I'm inclined to think Francis Bacon a hypocritical prig.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Published in 1627 a year after Bacon's death, this slight book tells a story of a lost continent (island) which lay in uncharted waters in the South Pacific. It was discovered by a sailing ship that had been blown off course. The crew had eaten all their provisions and were preparing themselves for death when they discovered land. The inhabitants of the land welcomed the crew only when it was established that they were Christians and when they finally got ashore they found a civilization that was in many respects more advanced than their own. Following a brief description of the town and the lodging house that had been set aside for "strangers" the major part of the book tells about meetings with various officials who tell the crews representative, of the glories of The New Atlantis. The book ends suddenly (we know it was unfinished) following a description of the knowledge that had been gained by the New Atlantian's and how they had acquired it. One suspects that the reason for the sudden ending was that the book had served it's purpose. Bacon has been called the father of empiricism and spent much of his life attempting to codify scientific and mechanical discoveries, which in his opinion would help to show a way forward. The final section of the book takes place in the House of Salomon and the ship's representative is told that: "The end of our foundation is the knowledge of courses and secret motions of things and the enlarging of the bounds of human empire to the effecting of all things possibleI get the feeling from this book that Bacon is describing his idea of Utopia, but he is also careful to ensure that what he describes will cause little offence to 17th century Tudor England. Christianity is a vital aspect of the society described, but it is a society that tolerates other religions. There is no attempt to shock us with progressive social views, as the New Atlantian's value chastity and honesty and a well ordered society, however there is no King or aristocracy in evidence which might not have been quite so welcome at the Tudor English court. My first impressions from the story were that Bacon was attempting to describe his idea of heaven. When the crew sight the island they are dying from starvation and it may all be an hallucination. The crews representative says that "We are but between death and life, for we are both beyond the old world and the new," subsequently there is not too much to reinforce this idea, but it does demonstrate what a puzzling little book this is. I would go along with the idea that Bacon's main purpose was to use it as a propaganda vehicle to arouse interest in his ideas for collecting together all scientific and mechanical knowledge.The book is an early example of an Utopia and also falls under the genre of proto-science fiction and so would be of interest for readers in these fields, It may also be of interest for its descriptions of future mechanical and scientific discoveries that were envisaged by a man that was possibly in advance of his times. An easy and quick read for those that might be interested; 3 stars
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5It was a bit hard to get into, though the footnotes helped whole lot in the understanding of the text. It was also a bit of a slow beginning. But once I got into the flow of Bacon's writing and once he got past the technical stuff that set the stage for the rest of the piece it was smooth sailing.The most humorous part (though I doubt it was supposed to be) was when he explained why the natives of great Atlantis (America, though it sounded like only the top half of North America, the USA and Canada) went from those who populated Tall Ships to those who go around naked and are savages with no art or culture. Which of course, is why it's funny, because not all the tribes were naked and the fact that the Native North Americans had just as much art, culture etc, as any European or New Atlantean.Anyway, maybe I'm totally reading it wrong (wouldn't be the first time), but he was basically explaining what the United States of America has always been trying to be (and had and has differing levels of success at) a place where if you come to our shores as strangers you can stay or you can stay for a bit and use our hospitality, but if you stay forever you become an American. You can be African-American, Chinese American, Irish-American, but if you choose to stay you become an American. (Plus, there's the whole prude thing, which totally sounds like us crazy US/Americans a bit too).
Book preview
New Atlantis - Francis Bacon
The Project Gutenberg EBook of The New Atlantis, by Frances Bacon
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: The New Atlantis
Author: Frances Bacon
Posting Date: October 23, 2008 [EBook #2434]
Release Date: December 2000
Language: English
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW ATLANTIS ***
Produced by Michael Pullen and William Fishburne. HTML
version by Al Haines.
THE NEW ATLANTIS
BY
SIR FRANCIS BACON
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
Bacon's literary executor, Dr. Rowley, published The New Atlantis
in 1627, the year after the author's death. It seems to have been written about 1623, during that period of literary activity which followed Bacon's political fall. None of Bacon's writings gives in short apace so vivid a picture of his tastes and aspirations as this fragment of the plan of an ideal commonwealth. The generosity and enlightenment, the dignity and splendor, the piety and public spirit, of the inhabitants of Bensalem represent the ideal qualities which Bacon the statesman desired rather than hoped to see characteristic of his own country; and in Solomon's House we have Bacon the scientist indulging without restriction his prophetic vision of the future of human knowledge. No reader acquainted in any degree with the processes and results of modern scientific inquiry can fail to be struck by the numerous approximations made by Bacon's imagination to the actual achievements of modern times. The plan and organization of his great college lay down the main lines of the modern research university; and both in pure and applied science he anticipates a strikingly large number of recent inventions and discoveries. In still another way is The New Atlantis
typical of Bacon's attitude. In spite of the enthusiastic and broad-minded schemes he laid down for the pursuit of truth, Bacon always had an eye to utility. The advancement of science which he sought was conceived by him as a means to a practical end the increase of man's control over nature, and the comfort and convenience of humanity. For pure metaphysics, or any form of abstract thinking that yielded no fruit,
he had little interest; and this leaning to the useful is shown in the practical applications of the discoveries made by the scholars of Solomon's House. Nor does the interest of the work stop here. It contains much, both in its political and in its scientific ideals, that we have as yet by no means achieved, but which contain valuable elements of suggestion and stimulus for the future.
THE NEW ATLANTIS
We sailed from Peru, (where we had continued for the space of one whole year) for China and Japan, by the South Sea; taking with us victuals for twelve months; and had good winds from the east, though soft and weak, for five months space, and more. But the wind came about, and settled in the west for many days, so as we could make little or no way, and were sometime in purpose to turn back. But then again there arose strong and great winds from the south, with a point east, which carried us up (for all that we could do) towards the north; by which time our victuals failed us, though we had made good spare of them. So that finding ourselves, in the midst of the greatest wilderness of waters in the world, without victuals, we gave ourselves for lost men and prepared for death. Yet we did lift up our hearts and voices to God above, who showeth his wonders in the deep, beseeching him of his mercy, that as in the beginning he discovered the face of the deep, and brought forth dry land, so he would now discover land to us, that we might not perish.
And it came to pass that the next day about evening we saw within a kenning before us, towards the north, as it were thick clouds, which did put us in some hope of land; knowing how that part of the South Sea was utterly unknown; and might have islands, or continents, that hitherto were not come to light. Wherefore we bent our course thither, where we saw the appearance of land, all that night; and in the dawning of the next day, we might plainly discern that it was a land; flat to our sight, and full of boscage; which made it show the more dark. And after an hour and a half's sailing, we entered into a good haven, being the port of a fair city; not great indeed, but well built, and that gave a pleasant view from the sea: and we thinking every minute long, till we were on land, came close to the shore, and offered to land. But straightways we saw divers of the people, with bastons in their hands (as it were) forbidding us to land; yet without any cries of fierceness, but only as warning us off, by signs that they made. Whereupon being not a little discomforted, we were advising with ourselves, what we should do.
During which time, there made forth to us a small boat, with about eight persons in it; whereof one of them had in his hand a tipstaff of a yellow cane, tipped at both ends with blue, who came aboard our ship, without any show of distrust at all. And when he saw one of our number, present himself somewhat before the rest, he drew forth a little scroll