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Political Philosophy of Sir Francis Bacon

Francis Bacon, Baron Verulam, Viscount St. Albans, making him Sir Francis Bacon, considered nothing more important or more worth understanding than the problem of political philosophy, or the nature of what would be the best state or commonwealth. Bacon believed that nothing would be more precious in this world than what would result from the meeting of the mind of man with the nature of things. This would take place when the mind of man could subdue nature so as to force out of nature the most perfectly human thing, the commonwealth described by Bacon in his New Atlantis (White 366).

Bacon was an important man in his time, not a philosopher who remained far from the fray but a man who constantly expressed himself in study, speech, and writing on the law and who served as a member of the learned council of Queen Elizabeth and of King James. Bacon gave lectures on the law, and as solicitor general and as attorney general, he was the official representation of the crown and made recommendations on behalf of the monarch and gave his opinion on the legality of action. As chancellor, Bacon rendered decisions, and before arriving at a decision he would determine the direction in which the law would go on the basis of that decision if the decision itself were used later as a precedent. He was always eager to simplify and codify the law, to analyze leading cases, to unite law and logic, and to understand why the law was as it was (Green 165).

Bacon was primarily a political philosopher with a desire to reshape the nature of the state into a form that would be as close to perfection as possible. His economic, legal, and social writings were shaped to this same end. His belief in the possibility of a perfect state is related to his view of the nature of humankind. Since his idea of the state is also a matter of understanding and drawing upon nature, Bacon also considers the nature of knowledge and how knowledge shapes human beha...

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Political Philosophy of Sir Francis Bacon. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 19:36, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1701668.html