Excerpt from The Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral, of Francis Bacon: Edited With an Introduction and Notes Almost from birth Francis was a delicate child, and suffered from prolonged ill-health, a circumstance to which some biographers have attributed the gravity of manner, even in youth characteristic of him. Probably it were due rather to his intense absorption, even in early childhood, in studies commonly assigned to youths considerably his seniors. Were ill-health the cause, the premature readiness of wit he displayed even before he went to college would scarcely have preserved its perennial spontaneity in the face of prolonged sickness. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.