FRANCIS BACON ON PEACE AND THE 1604 TREATY OF LONDON

The article argues that for Francis Bacon (1561-1626), across his political, philosophic and literary career, the criterion for one's own peace is the weakness or incapacity or impotence of one's opponents. The article proceeds in two parts. The first outlines Francis Bacon's view of peace, particularly in relation to the Hobbesian view of peace which arises, in part, in opposition to it. The second lays out Bacon's view of peace in relation to his positions on several of the foreign policy issues of his own time, particularly treaties and empire, and the polemical uses to which Bacon put his view of peace to critique and criticize the 1604 Treaty of London.