The Advancement of Learning

Francis Bacon

Edited with an Introduction, Notes and Commentary by Michael Kiernan

• 'The OFB includes a great deal of new information concerning the history of the transmission of Bacon's texts, thanks to the progress made in Bacon scholarship ... I cannot imagine a scholar who would not give preference to the convenience and complexity of the new Bacon volumes.' - Acta Comeniana
• 'Besides the texts themselves, the volumes include substantial introductions by the editors, detailed commentary and a useful glossary that gives the modern equivalents of Bacon's terms. Moreover, scholars can consult the meticulous technical descriptions of the texts reproduced and collated.' - Acta Comeniana
• 'The product of thorough, painstaking, and judicious scholarship ... should serve to strengthen the vitality and visibility of the Bacon project, and fulfil the aim of all sound critical editions: to ensure that the work will not need to be redone for a very long time.' - Notes and Queries
• 'This commentary, like the introduction, is underpinned by wide-ranging and sure-footed scholarship.' - Notes and Queries
• 'A thoroughly impressive job ... Kiernan begins his introduction with a fluent and efficient analytic summary of the contents of Bacon's book ... assured and authoritative bibliographical section.' - Notes and Queries
• 'This new edition of The Advancement of Learning is indeed more correct, more faithful, more profitable, and more diligent than any of its predecessors, and it is most warmly welcome. ' - Review of English Studies
• 'Many of Kiernan's notes become mini-essays in themselves, striking exactly the right balance between textual, semantic, and cultural elucidation, as well as providing summary guides to current Bacon research.' - Review of English Studies
• 'Kiernan is especially good in tracking classical and contemporary allusions; in situating Bacon on the social and political map of his day; and in discussing Bacon's understanding of humanism, rhetoric, dialectic, and moral philosophy.' - Sixteenth Century Journal

• authoritative critical edition based upon collation and analysis of the original editions
• comprehensive Introduction examines Bacon's appraisal of the current state of learning and his efforts to involve his contemporaries in his programme to reform and advance learning
• extensive commentary explores Bacon's sources and early modern contexts for Bacon's most important philosophical work in English

Francis Bacon
Edited with an Introduction, Notes and Commentary by Michael Kiernan, Associate Professor of English, Pennsylvania State University