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The phrase Obscuris vera involvens means "Truth is enveloped by obscurity". It is from Virgil's Aeneid (VI, 100).
It is also found on an engraving on the title page of Francis Bacon's Wisdom of the Ancients (1641 French edition).
The phrase is inscribed on Athena's shield and explains the imagery there: the sun (truth) enveloped in clouds (obscurity), but shining through.
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban PC, also known as Lord Verulam, was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England under King James I. Bacon led the advancement of both natural philosophy and the scientific method and his works remained influential even in the late stages of the Scientific Revolution.
Troy or Ilion was an ancient city located in present-day Hisarlik, Turkey. It is best known as the setting for the Greek myth of the Trojan War. The archaeological site is open to the public as a tourist destination, and was added to the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1998.
Wisdom, sapience, or sagacity is the ability to contemplate and act productively using knowledge, experience, understanding, common sense, and insight. Wisdom is associated with attributes such as unbiased judgment, compassion, experiential self-knowledge, self-transcendence, and non-attachment, and virtues such as ethics and benevolence.
In Greek mythology, the Trojan Horse was a wooden horse said to have been used by the Greeks during the Trojan War to enter the city of Troy and win the war. The Trojan Horse is not mentioned in Homer's Iliad, with the poem ending before the war is concluded, and it is only briefly mentioned in the Odyssey. But in the Aeneid by Virgil, after a fruitless 10-year siege, the Greeks constructed a huge wooden horse at the behest of Odysseus, and hid a select force of men inside, including Odysseus himself. The Greeks pretended to sail away, and the Trojans pulled the horse into their city as a victory trophy. That night, the Greek force crept out of the horse and opened the gates for the rest of the Greek army, which had sailed back under the cover of darkness. The Greeks entered and destroyed the city, ending the war.
Francis Bacon was an Irish-born British figurative painter known for his raw, unsettling imagery. Focusing on the human form, his subjects included crucifixions, portraits of popes, self-portraits, and portraits of close friends, with abstracted figures sometimes isolated in geometrical structures. Rejecting various classifications of his work, Bacon said he strove to render "the brutality of fact." He built up a reputation as one of the giants of contemporary art with his unique style.
The conventional wisdom or received opinion is the body of ideas or explanations generally accepted by the public and/or by experts in a field. In religion, this is known as orthodoxy.
An aphorism is a concise, terse, laconic, or memorable expression of a general truth or principle. Aphorisms are often handed down by tradition from generation to generation.
Annuit cœptis is one of two mottos on the reverse side of the Great Seal of the United States. The literal translation is "[He] favors [our] undertakings", from Latin annuo, and coeptum. Because of its context as a caption above the Eye of Providence, the standard translations are "Providence favors our undertakings" and "Providence has favored our undertakings".
In Greek mythology, Enceladus was one of the Giants, the offspring of Gaia (Earth) and Uranus (Sky). Enceladus was the traditional opponent of Athena during the Gigantomachy, the war between the Giants and the gods, and was said to be buried under Mount Etna in Sicily.
The Novum Organum, fully Novum Organum, sive Indicia Vera de Interpretatione Naturae or Instaurationis Magnae, Pars II, is a philosophical work by Francis Bacon, written in Latin and published in 1620. The title is a reference to Aristotle's work Organon, which was his treatise on logic and syllogism. In Novum Organum, Bacon details a new system of logic he believes to be superior to the old ways of syllogism. This is now known as the Baconian method.
The olive branch is a symbol of peace. It is associated with the customs of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, and is connected with supplication to gods and persons in power. Likewise, it is found in most cultures of the Mediterranean Basin and has become a near-universal peace symbol in the modern world.
The phrase "scientia potentia est" is a Latin aphorism meaning "knowledge is power", commonly attributed to Sir Francis Bacon. The expression "ipsa scientia potestas est" occurs in Bacon's Meditationes Sacrae (1597). The exact phrase "scientia potentia est" was written for the first time in the 1668 version of Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes, who was a secretary to Bacon as a young man. The related phrase "sapientia est potentia" is often translated as "wisdom is power".
"Pallas Athena" is a song written by David Bowie in 1993 for the album Black Tie White Noise. A live version of the song was recorded and released in 1997 during Bowie's Earthling Tour.
The Baconian theory of Shakespearean authorship contends that Sir Francis Bacon, philosopher, essayist and scientist, wrote the plays, which are publicly attributed to William Shakespeare. Various explanations are offered for this alleged subterfuge, most commonly that Bacon's rise to high office might have been hindered if it became known that he wrote plays for the public stage. The plays are credited to Shakespeare, who, supporters of the theory claim, was merely a front to shield the identity of Bacon. All but a few academic Shakespeare scholars reject the arguments for Bacon authorship, as well as those for all other alternative authors.
In classical mythology, the Cap of Invisibility is a helmet or cap that can turn the wearer invisible, also known as the Cap of Hades or Helm of Hades. Wearers of the cap in Greek myths include Athena, the goddess of wisdom, the messenger god Hermes, and the hero Perseus. Those wearing the Cap become invisible to other supernatural entities, akin to a cloud of mist sometimes used to remain undetectable.
Timeō Danaōs et dōna ferentēs, paraphrased in English as "I fear the Greeks even when bearing gifts", is a Latin phrase from Aeneid, a Latin epic poem written by Virgil. The phrase is spoken by Trojan priest Laocoön referring to the Trojan Horse used by the Greeks during the Trojan War. The literal meaning of the phrase is "I fear the Danaans [Greeks], even those bearing gifts" or "even when they bear gifts". Most printed versions of the text have the variant ferentis instead of ferentes. In modern English, it is used as a proverb to warn against trusting an enemy or adversary, even when they appear to be making an enticing offer.
Essayes: Religious Meditations. Places of Perswasion and Disswasion. Seene and Allowed (1597) was the first published book by the philosopher, statesman and jurist Francis Bacon. The Essays are written in a wide range of styles, from the plain and unadorned to the epigrammatic. They cover topics drawn from both public and private life, and in each case the essays cover their topics systematically from a number of different angles, weighing one argument against another. While the original edition included 10 essays, a much-enlarged second edition appeared in 1612 with 38. Another, under the title Essayes or Counsels, Civill and Morall, was published in 1625 with 58 essays. Translations into French and Italian appeared during Bacon's lifetime. In Bacon's Essay, "Of Plantations" published in 1625, he relates planting colonies to war. He states that such plantations should be governed by those with a commission or authority to exercise martial law.
Anthony Bacon (1558–1601) was a member of the powerful English Bacon family and was a spy during the Elizabethan era. He was Francis Bacon's elder brother.
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban, KC was an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, lawyer, jurist, author, and pioneer of the scientific method. He served both as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England. Although his political career ended in disgrace, he remained extremely influential through his works, especially as philosophical advocate and practitioner of the scientific method during the scientific revolution.
This is a complete chronological bibliography of Francis Bacon. Many of Bacon's writings were only published after his death in 1626.