CJS said (October 27, 2009):

Dana is right in correcting some of the myths about Francis Bacon, but it is not generally know that at the time that covert Rosicrucian circles could have been considered to be synonymous with Scottish Freemasonry, in existence since the demise of the Templers and their being constituted as Elder Brethren of the Rosy Cross by Robert the Bruce in 1317. By the time the English got around to “establishing” their watered down “Anderson Constitutions” version of “English Freemasonry”, by purging it of all their history of scientific study – eg. Copernicus and Galileo, which remained heresy for 625 years – until their secretive English society had nothing secret left to hide except their funny handshakes and misunderstood boy’s club rituals.

It may be relevant that Cromwell’s brother-in-law, John Wilkins, set up a clandestine group which became known as the “Invisible College” – the fore runner of the Royal Society – and included all the brains of the day; Boyle; Hooke and Wren etc. latter these same people were meeting at Sir Thomas Gresham’s collage (established in 1597) at Bishopsgate, and Sir Thomas’ daughter was married to Sir Francis Bacon’s brother Nathaniel Bacon.

Is this Tony’s Bacon?

PS Laurence Gardners’ “The Shaddow of Solomon - The lost secrets of the Freemasons revealed” should have been compulsory reading for you, along with his earlier books which if you haven’t yet read, may provide further enlightenment to your hobby.

Vis: “Bloodline of the Holy Grail”; “Genesis of the Grail Kings” and “The Magdalene Legacy”

Tracy said (October 27, 2009):

Henry,
Let me recommend to your readers another terrific source on this subject. It's Timothy Spearman's site www.shakesaspear.com Please note that it's spelled shakes-a-spear, as in ' shaking a spear at ignorance', the way the goddess Athena does.

Spearman's site is packed with detail and insight. He not only explains that Bacon was most likely Shakespear, but that several other men
along with Bacon formed a small, secret society to get the job done. it's a fascinating read, and just might fill in some of the details a few
of your readers seem to think Fritz left out.

Tony said (October 26, 2009):

Although Springmeier presents the best reason yet for some to believe that Shakespeare was actually Bacon, there is something very wrong with his composition on Bacon.

Bacon died in 1626. It was almost 100 years later when "The Mysterious Force" bought out the English stone mason's guild and established "freemasonry" in 1717.

In Bacon's day the mason's guild was just another Christian guild, a standard part of the social fabric of the Middle ages. It had no power over anything except the stone mason trade.

Also, Springmeier, like most all western hemisphere English speaking people, seems totally unaware that before the Protest against the Church (Protestantism), England was the safest, happiest place on earth for man to live - right down to the lowest commoner. It was Catholic England which secured the Magna Carta and from which came the true ditty about "ol' King Cole" (was a merrie old soul and a merrie old soul was he . . . . . . .), King Arthur and his court, etc. It was an age wherein no man, or his family, was in need of anything as the monasteries provided "work" (whether or not needed) for all and paid all with the necessities of life - even a generous daily ration of beer. It was the time when the Cathedrals were built which the protesters burned down in their fit of insane rage against the religion of their heritage.

Few know the truth of the wholesale and extremely gristly slaughter of English Catholics - the people who refused to abandon the religion of their lifetime and that of their parentage back to Roman times - by other Englishmen who did abandon their religion when Cromwell and his Dutch army invaded England at the behest of English traitors at the top. The slaughter went on for decades. Those church lands of the monasteries, etc., were stolen by the criminals at the top whose offspring still own them today as England's lords and ladies.

Meanwhile, commoners who stole a crust of bread for their starving children from the land thieves, who, thanks to their theft, eventually had the means to establish (with the partnership of banker Rothschild) the heartless "industrial revolution," were hanged or sent to the colonies or Australia as criminals. England has been a hell hole ever since the so-called "reformation."

Since Ben Franklin let the English rulers know of the colony's free scrip, it hasn't been a hell of a lot better here. Under the insane Puritans it was almost as bad as England immediately after Cromwell's conquest.

You'll have trouble finding any of this in the Encyclopedia Britannica but good sources are the Protestant William Cobbett (A History of the Protestant Reformation in England and Ireland), and, in our life time, Catholic Eamon Duffy of Cambridge University (The Stripping of the Altars, Traditional Religion in England 1400-1580).

It seems odd to me that people who claim to be fiercely independent, such as many Americans, never seem to figure out that the King James Bible, as it's name implies, is the product of a politician. It has been seriously modified from its source, the only existing bible of the time, the Latin Vulgate - claims to the use of "original" manuscripts notwithstanding as, by that time, the originals were nothing more than a few decayed scraps preserved by the Catholic Church.

Dana said (October 26, 2009):

As someone who has studied the Bacon family in depth, including Sir Francis, I can tell you that much of the information contained in this article is factually incorrect, and disinformation. Neither, Nathaniel Bacon, the Rebel, nor Nathaniel Bacon, Gov. of Virginia, were descendants of Sir Francis Bacon. They were descendants of James Bacon, the brother of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Keeper of the Great Seal. In addition, Sir Francis had only 1 child, a son named Anthony Bacon, who was baptised at Barham, Suffolk, England and who died in infancy.

In regards to the Bruton Vault, nothing has ever been found. There is some suspicion, though unsubstantiated, that the Rockefeller family may have excavated beneath the ground and absconded with the contents of the vault. But, no evidence of the contents has ever seen the light of day.

Also, while Sir Francis Bacon has been suspected by many to have authored the works of Shakespeare, recent evidence-- such as the discovery of the notebooks of Sir Henry Neville, the material of which was written during his imprisonment, contained rough drafts of a number of Shakespearian works in the handwriting of Sir Henry Neville. Other evidence has lent credibility to the theory that Shakespeare's works were likely written by a group of highly educated men who were, in private, dissenters of the monarch. If those men were to have openly opposed the queen, it would have cost them their heads and the financial & physical security of their families. There is no evidence to substantiate Sir Francis Bacon as the sole author of the works of William Shakespeare.