CHAPTER IX.
Did Francis Bacon write Shakespeare's Works?
Nobody knows.
We cannot say we _know_ a thing when that thing has not been proved.
_Know_ is too strong a word to use when the evidence is not final and absolutely conclusive.

We can infer, if we want to, like those slaves.

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No, I will not write that word, it is not kind, it is not courteous.
The upholders of the Stratford-Shakespeare superstition call _us_ the hardest names they can think of, and they keep doing it all the time; very well, if they like to descend to that level, let them do it, but I will not so undignify myself as to follow them.