THE TRAGEDY OF SIR FRANCIS BACON

This book is an attempt to establish the following
propositions:

I. That Bacon's romantic fable, « The New
Atlantis," is not an Utopian dream, but a thinly disguised
account of an actual Secret Society, with which
he was closely associated.

2. That the objeet of this Fraternity of learned men,
known superficially to history as the Rosicrucians, or the
Brethren of the Rose and Cross, was "the advancement
of learning," "the bettering of men's bread and
wine," and the "universal reformation of the whole
wide world."

3. That the principal method by which the achievement
of this end was attempted, was the preparation
and publication of instruttive and elevating literature.

4. That books published under the auspices of the
Fraternity were secretly hall-marked, and are to be
identified by peculiar and distinitive emblems, which
may be found concealed in the form of paper-marks,
printers' ornaments, and wood-cuts...