 Bacon continues and states: “The sign is in the predicament of relation.” This may sound innocent, but in Bacon’s account it has the effect of transforming the traditional relation between a sign and its meaning, either a thing or a concept. The theologians were aware of a twofold relation: that of sign to thing signified and sign to the perceiver of the sign. For the majority of theologians, the first relation is an essential and permanent relation; the latter is accidental and non-permanent. Bacon reverses this. He remarks,