The Life & Work of Roger Bacon

206579 Fordham Sep 9/25/56

EDITOR’S PREFACE

This volume is a new edition of the Introduction which the late Dr. Bridges prefixed to his edition of the Opus Majus, published at the Clarendon Press in 1897. The Preface to that edition contains full details regarding the important differences between it and the earlier edition by Jebb (1733), but it may be useful to point out here two of the principal features of the Oxford edition. (1) It contained for the first time—what Jebb had so inexplicably omitted—the important seventh part of the Opus Majus, which deals with Moral Philosophy and serves as the crowning portion of the entire work. (2) To his annotated edition of the Latin text, Dr. Bridges prefixed a highly useful analysis in English.

Dr. Bridges had already contributed the biography of Bacon to the New Calendar of Great Men,Macmillan and Co., 1892. and in 1903 he delivered an admirable lecture on Roger Bacon before the University Extension students.