for this particular Number of Five Senses Whether enough of them and to prove that These are suflicient by comparing and distinguishing them and the Uses they serve All Bodies say they without us which are Objects of our Senses are either very near and close to Our Body or they are at some distance from it If they be close to us and still remain without us then they fall under our Touch If they approach and come into us then they are the Objects of our Taste If they are more remote and stand before us so that their Distances are measur'd by a Right Line then the Sight discerns them If the Line be Oblique and the Motion Reflex then the Hearing does it Now methinks the Distinction were better thus Of the Five Senses accommodated for the Service of the whole Man as he is compounded of Body and Soul some are appropriated to the Use of the Body only and These are the Touch and the Taste the One for all that enters within the Other for that which continues still without it Some again are first and chiefly design'd for the Benefit of the Soul and those are Sight and Hearing the Former to assist Invention the Latter for Improvement and Instruction and all manner of Communication And One more in the midst of these Extremes sitted to those Spirits and Avenues that belong to Soul and Body both which is Smelling Again They answer to the Four Elements and their respective Qualities The Touch to the Earth Hearing to the Air Taste to Water and Moisture Smelling to Fire and Sight to a Compound of Water and Fire because of the Brightness of the Eye It is likewise pretended that there are as many Senses as there are General Divisions of sensible Objects and these are Colours Sounds Scents Relishes and a Fifth sort which wants a Name to express it adapted to the Touch and comprehending all the Tactile Qualities as Hot Cold Hard Soft Rough Smooth Sharp and the rest of them But This is evidently a Mistake for the Number of the Senses is by no means adjusted according to the Number of the Objects they are capable of Nor are these Objects the Cause of their being just so many and no more Were this a good Account it wou'd follow that we must have been endu'd with a great many more than we now have whereas now one and the same Sense entertains Objects of different Kinds and one and the same Object creates a Perception and impresses it self upon several Senses at once The most probable Account of this Matter seems rather to be That the Senses were intended for Means and Instruments of conveying Knowledge to us and that Nature which as she is not niggardly so neither is she profuse hath given us as many Senses as are suflicient for this purpose and that when she had supply'd us with enough for our Use she did not think sit to give us any more Of These the Sense of Seeing does surpass all the rest in the Quickness of its Operation A Comparision of them For it reaches the very Heavens in an Instant and acts in the Air which is full of Light and Images without any Trouble or Motion whereas all the rest of the Senses receive their Impression by the Motion of those Bodies which make it And all Motion requires Time to be perform'd in so that all the other Senses must needs proceed more slowly than This which need but open its Organ and is sure to find Light and Colours stand always ready to be discern'd by it All the Senses are likewise capable of Pleasure and Pain but This is observable of the two grossest of them That the Touch is capable of abundance of Pain and but very little Pleasure and the Taste just contrary feels a great deal of Pleasure and little or no Pain The Weakness and Uncertainty of our Senses is the Great Cause of our Ignorance and Errour The Weakness and Uncertainty of them and all sort of Misapprehension For since Knowledge is attain'd by the Mediation of the Senses only if these make a false Report what can we do but receive and stick to it But after All who can tell what Reports they make or how can any Man accuse them of Falshood since we learn all from Them and consequently even That which gives us this Jealousie and is the Ground of the Accusation Some indeed affirm That the Senses are faithful in all their Messages and represent the very Truth That when we imagine they deceive us the Fault is not in Them but in something else and that we ought rather to lay it at any other Door for no other thing is so free from so incapable of imposing upon us Some again run into the contrary Extreme cry out upon the Senses as downright infamous Lyars and tell you that nothing at all of Certainty can be had from them * See Advertisement But the Truth lies between these Extremes Now Whether the Senses themselves are deceiv'd or not thus much at least is evident The mutual Deceits of the Mind and the Senses that they put a Cheat nay sometimes a Constraint upon Reason and that by an unhappy Vicissitude Reason pays them back in their own Coin and returns the Cheat upon Them And is not Man think you like to be wonderful Wise and Knowing when the outward and the inward Instruments of Instruction are Eternally tricking one another and his whole Composition is full of Falshood and Weakness in the most necessary and essential Parts of it Now that the Senses deceive and commit a Violence upon the Understanding we see plain enough in those Instances where Some of them immediately put us in a Rage Others sweeten and appease the Soul and Others again tickle and please it exceedingly And why shou'd Men turn their Heads away when they are let Blood or lanced or suffer Incisions and Burnings but from their Consciousness of the Power the Senses have to disturb their Reason and that the same thing is better born when the Eyes do not observe the Operation The Looking down a Pit or vast Precipice disorders and confounds a Man though he knows at the same time that he stands safe himself and cannot reasonably apprehend any danger of salling into it And to instance in no more 't is evident that Sense of Pain and Pleasure both does every Day vanquish and utterly confound the best and bravest Resolutions of Virtue and Temperance and Patience Again It is no less evident that the Senses on the other hand are cheated by the Understanding This is demonstrated by those Agitations of Anger and Love and Hatred and other Passions which impose upon us and make us see and hear things quite otherwise than they really are Nay sometimes our Senses are not only deceived but perfectly stupify'd and bound up from all power of Action by violent Disorders of the Soul as if the Soul retir'd inwards and were entirely taken
they should not bear to have it so much as recommended or mentioned but prefer Slavery and Dependance before living upon their own Stock getting above Fortune and making themselves easy and Masters at all times and places and upon all Accidents alike May we not most justly cry out with Tiberius more justly indeed than He did O Wretches born to be Slaves How absurd is it that we who are such Patrons and Sticklers for Liberty in the Case of our Bodies Estates and all other Properties should not bear to have our Mind free which after all is the only Free-born thing that belongs to any of us We seek and employ conveniences fetch'd from all parts of the World count no expence too great for the Health the Service the Ornament of the Body but grudge every thing for the improvement and enriching of the Mind In short We are so partial as to take all possible pains that the Body may be at large while the Soul is fettered and coop'd up in Prison The other Branch of this Liberty in which the Will is concerned is of yet greater value in which the Wills is concerned is of yet greater value Liberty of the Will and ought to be more endeavour'd after by a Wise Man as indeed it is more serviceable to him than the former Now here I think it necessary to admonish my Reader that the Matter under our present Consideration is not that Faculty and Privilege of Human Nature which Philosophers and Divines commonly stile Free-Will nor shall we treat of it in the same Method with Them But my meaning is That a Wise Man ought to preserve his own Ease and Quiet to keep his Will and Affections free and disengaged and to lay them out upon very few objects and those such as may justify his Choice For indeed the things that deserve our Choice and challenge our Affections if nicely examined will be found but very few But this is not all For even Those that deserve them best will not justify our Vehemence and Eagerness and immoderate Fondness of them And here I find my self under some necessity of encountring two very popular and plausible Opinions The One is That which teaches us to be always forward to serve other people to lay aside all thoughts of one's self for the sake of our Neighbours and especially when the Publick Good is concerned pretends that no private Interest ought to come in Competition with it And the Other prompts us to espouse such Matters with all possible Zeal and to the very utmost of our power He that declines the Former is accused of wanting Good nature and a publick Spirit and He that is remiss in the Latter is suspected of Coldness and Indifference want of Generosity and the Zeal that is required of a Good Man and in short reputed incapable of making a Friend Now whatever there may really be at the bottom of these Opinions yet it is plain the World have overloaded the Foundation and built such Notions upon it as exceed all Reason and Measure and nothing can be more Romantick and Extravagant than what we sind delivered upon these Occasions For our Governors who feel the Advantage of them oftentimes infuse Principles into us not according to the true merits of the Cause but in proportion as they perceive they may prove serviceable and beneficial And it frequently falls out that those Opinions which are in themselves most reasonable and true are not most convenient to be generally entertained And besides this Observing how natural the Love of our Selves and our own private Advantage is and what Partialities and unreasonable Excesses it is apt to carry us into they thought it necessary to divert and draw us off as far from This as possibly and so took the Common Course of bending the Crooked Stick the Contrary way that it might at last stand strait by being forced toward the other Extreme 1 These Opinions when misunderstood and misapplied which is commonly the Fate of most Opinions when they fall into the hands of a Multitude occasion great Injustice and Disorder many Difficulties and grievous Mischiefs As we may plainly observe in those persons that snap at every bait of this kind let themselves out to hire as it were and devote all their Time and Pains to the service of other people These men do not only suffer themselves to be managed and taken absolute Possession of by their Friends but they thrust themselves forward of their own accord and will have an Oar in every Boat It is indifferent to Them whether the Matter concerns them or not whether it be of greater consequence or of none at all still they Interess themselves in all alike for indeed they often do it merely to keep themselves in Motion and Employment It stirs their Spirits put their Soul into a pleasing sort of Agitation and thus * In Negotio sunt negotij causà they are busy purely because they love to be so They cannot bear the having nothing to do nor can they confine their Thoughts to their own Affairs but either do not see or carelesly overlook them and so seek Employment abroad and meddle and turn undertakers in things that are foreign and distant as if they had nothing at all to do at home no concerns that are essential and necessary to be followed no personal no domestick Cares that lye upon their hands such as ought to be first dispatched and which if duly attended to would leave no room for Sloth nor leisure so great as should prove a Temptation to us to turn Managers for other people that we may keep our selves in Action Many of these persons are good husbands of their purse and careful not to part with a Penny of Money but upon valuable considerations but they are unreasonably prodigal of their Soul their Life squander away their Time and their Pains their Affections and their Will most profusely and unaccountably dedicate Themselves and all their Powers to any occasions that calls for their Assistance And yet when all is done These are the valuable Treasures of which we ought to be exceeding choice and sparing and in such Instances it is chiefly that Frugality and good Management are commendable But alas the Persons we speak of are so far from this that they glory in their Extravagance act all with such Violence and Passion that they are lost to Reason and common Sense and never think they do enough till they have engaged as deep as is possible and given up their Persons and their Wits both to the Cause they espouse Great Men make their Advantage of such Tempers as these Men that will be eager and angry and expose nay lose their lives upon pretences of Friendship and Punctilio's of Honour and Respect are special Tools for Their purpose And they are not wanting to countenance and caress them throw out large Promises and use a thousand little Stratagems to draw them in and six them to their
the Defect It must be compos'd of a delicate fluid Substance of fine and subtle Parts and these well joyn'd together and all united without any Separation or void Spaces throughout the whole It hath Four small Cavities or Ventricles Three of which lie forward in the middle and are plac'd in a Collateral Line to one another The Fourth lies behind these toward the hinder part of the Head and is single by it self This is the Shop in which the Vital Spirits are first form'd and united in order to the being afterwards converted into Animal Spirits and then convey'd into the Three Cavities that lie forward And these Animal Spirits are the Instruments made use of by the Soul for discharging her several Functions and exercising all her Faculties Those Faculties are likewise Three the Understanding the Memory and the Imagination And these are not exercis'd distinctly and apart nor hath each of them a different Ventricle of the Brain appropriated to it which is all an old and vulgar Errour concerning them but their Operations are alltogether and in common All the Three Faculties exert themselves in all and every of the Three Cavities somewhat like our Bodily Senses which are double and have Two Organs in each of which the same Sense performs all its Operations entire From hence it comes to pass that a Man who is hurt or disabled in Two of these Three Ventricles as one in a Palsie for Instance does yet continue to have the use of all his Three Faculties That is He understands and remembers and forms Idea's still by virtue of that One Cavity which the Disease hath not yet seized upon It is true he does this more weakly and every Operation of every kind is more imperfect than it was formerly because the Strength and Vigour of One is not equal to the united Force of Three But yet it evidently follows from hence that each Faculty hath not its Workhouse in a distinct Apartment and entire to it self alone for then assoon as any of these Ventricles begins to be disabled that Faculty to which it belongs must immediately cease and cou'd never more be exerted in any Degree at all Some Persons have been of Opinion How far the Reasonable Soul is Organical that the Reasonable Soul is not Organical that is that it can act separately and independently and hath no need of any Corporeal Instrument to assist it in the Discharge of its Functions And this Notion they have been more fond of because they imagine it of consequence for proving the Immortality of the Soul Now without engaging in a vast and dark Labyrinth of Dispute about a Matter which we are incapable of knowing perfectly this Question may be brought to a short Issue For if we will but credit our own Eyes and our own Experience every Day gives us Demonstrations which overthrow this Opinion and establish the Contrary It is certain that all Men have not equal Capacities nor do they apprehend things or argue upon them alike but the Disparity is very great and visible between one Man and another It is no less evident that the same Person changes and differs from himself that his Reason is more clear and perfect and strong at one Time and at one Age in one Disposition of Body and in one Circumstance of Fortune and Life than it is in another One Man can do nothing except he have Ease and Leisure another requires Dangers and Difficulties to rouze him and never thinks to purpose till he be prest hard and driven to Extremities A Third finds himself much more capable in Health than in Sickness And a Fourth feels his Mind most vigorous and active then when his Diseases and Weakness have reduc'd his Body lowest The same Man at one Season excels in Judgment and flags in his Fancy so that One Faculty decays in proportion as Another improves Now the most probable Account that can be given for all these Differences and Alterations seems to be a difference in the State and Disposition of the Organs which are to the Soul as Tools to the Artificer Which way but this shall we answer for the strange Effects we see produc'd by Drunkenness by the Bite of a Mad Dog by a high Fever by a Blow upon the Head by the Vapours that rise from the Stomach and annoy the Brain and by several other Accidents which affect any of the Parts thereabouts What Confusions do they make how perfectly stupid and childish and frantick do Men grow upon them lose their Memory quite and feel their Heads turn'd upside down their former Idea's eraced their Judgment destroy'd All the Wisdom of Greece is not able to maintain it self against them and if the Shock be very violent indeed then it does not only disturb and enfeeble but quite drive away the Soul and constrain her to remove out of the Body Now it is plain that these Accidents are purely Corporeal and consequently they cannot affect what is not so they can never fly so high as the exalted and Spiritual Faculties of the Reasonable Soul all that they can do is to vitiate the Organs to put Them out of their Course and intercept the usual Communications and when This is once effected the Soul can no longer act regularly She may command but They cannot obey and if these Organs are sore bruised and distorted very grievously then She and They can no longer subsist together The Lodging is no longer sit to entertain her and she must be gone Now I do by no means see how this Opinion can be guilty of any Prejudice to that of the Immortality of the Soul For first We are not here enquiring what the Soul is but how she operates and what Laws of Action she is bound up to while in Conjunction with a Mortal Body And Secondly The making Use of Corporeal Instruments does by no Means prove the User to be Corporeal or Mortal God without all Question is Immortal and yet God himself does not think it below him to use such and to proportion the Effects and Operations of his Providence to them He produces Men of different Understandings and Parts according to the Constitution of their Parents and the Concurrence of other Natural Causes nay even according to the different Climate and Country and Air they are born in For Greece and Italy have ever been observ'd to produce Men of quicker and clearer Wit than Muscovy and Tartary And as God does in this Case so does the Mind in others It reasons better or worse remembers more or less Faithfully hath a more fruitful or more barren Imagination according as the Organs which are the Corporeal Instruments appointed to serve it upon these Occasions are better or worse disposed to do their Duty Now the Brain is properly the Instrument of the Reasonable Soul and therefore upon the due Temperament of This a great deal must needs indeed the Whole in a manner will depend That therefore shall be the next
entertains Arguments for the widest and most distant Contrarieties Nothing so extravagant nothing so absurd but hath found its Assertors and Abettors And this not only in the fanciful Conceits of private Persons but in the more general Sense and Agreement of large Societies and Communities Thus History tells us that what is detested as Impious Unjust and Unnatural in one Country hath been receiv'd with Veneration and practised as highly Decent and a Duty nay even esteem'd an Act of Religion in another And there are not many Laws or Customs or Opinions which we can say have universally obtain'd or have been every where rejected The Marriages of near Relations Some condemn as Incestuous but Others have not only allow'd but recommended nay in some Cases even enjoyn'd them The Murdering of Infants and of Parents when old and decrepid and the having Wives in common are now and in our parts of the World lookt upon as barbarous and execrable but the Worshippers of Moloch we know thought their Children the most acceptable Sacrifice and if Herodotus and some other Historians say true the Scythians thought the other not only innocent but a Mark of Tenderness and Respect and never pretended to any Propriety in a Marriage-Bed When Dionysius offer'd Plato a rich Embroider'd Robe he refus'd it with this Reason for his denyal That it was not fit for a Man to be so effeminately clothed And yet Aristippus another Philosopher accepted it and he had his Reason for That too which was That no External Habit cou'd corrupt the Mind and that the Soul might still be Masculine and Chaste though the Body were attir'd in Clothes never so Soft and Effeminate The Dialogue between this last Philosopher and Diogenes each vindicating his own manner of Living and reflecting upon the others that differ'd from him is thus represented by Horace * Si pranderet olus patienter Regibus uti Nollet Aristippus Si sciret Regibus uti Fastidiret olus qui me notat Diog. If Aristippus patiently cou'd dine On Herbs he wou'd the Courts of Kings decline Arist If He that censures me knew how to use The Courts of Kings He wou'd his Herbs refuse Creech Epist XVII When Solon was mourning and full of lamentation for the Death of his Son a Friend advised him to moderate his Passion since Tears upon that occasion are unprofitable and to no purpose That very Consideration says Solon excuses my Excess of Grief for what can justifie a Man's Concern what can provoke Tears so much as the Thought that all our Sorrow is Fruitless and Vain Socrates his Wife pretended this Aggravation of her Grief that the Judges had condemn'd him unjustly Nay sure reply'd he if a Man must suffer it is infinitely more eligible to die innocent than to deserve Condemnation One Philosopher tells you That a Man is truly possest of nothing which he is not prepared to lose †In aequo enim est Dolor amissae rei Timor amittendae For the Fear that a thing may be lost is a Passion every whit as tormenting as the Concern for it when actually lost Another who passes for as Wise a Man as He comes and tells you quite contrary That the Uncertainty of what we have and the Apprehension of its being taken away from us heightens and gives a Relish to our Enjoyments by disposing us to hold the Blessings faster and closer to our Hearts and rendring us more affectionate and tender of them A Cynick begged of Antigonus that he wou'd bestow a Drachm of Silver upon him No says the King So small a thing is not a Present fit for a Prince to give Then Sir be pleased to give me a Talent Nor that neither says Antigonus For a Talent is a Summ as much too great for a Philosopher to receive A certain Person was extolling a King of Sparta for his exceeding great Goodness and Clemency and the Instance he gave of it was That he was kind even to the Wicked and Unworthy And this argu'd a great Degree of Goodness in him So far from that says another that according to this Account he is no Good Man for no Prince can be so who is not severe to the Wicked Thus you may observe how many different Faces Reason puts on and what a Two-edg'd Sword it is which with dextrous Management will cut both ways * Ogni Medaglia ha il suo riverso Every Medal hath its Reverse says the Proverb There is nothing said but hath somewhat to be said against it says the soundest Philosophy and a Man might demonstrate the Truth of it upon any Subject in the World Now this great Variety and Flexibility may be imputed to several Causes It may come from that perpetual Flux of Humours and variable Constitution of the Body which is so great so constant that a Man is never exactly the same in this respect at any two times of his whole Life It may be charg'd upon that infinite Variety of Objects that offer themselves to his Contemplation It may proceed from the Temper of the Air the Difference of Weather of Climates and Seasons for as was observ'd before †Tales sunt hominum mentes quali pater ipse Jupiter auctiferà lustravit lampade terras In each Man's Breast that Weathercock the Mind Moves with the Rack and shifts with every Wind. And a Thousand other external Causes may contribute to it But if we come nearer home and look within much may be laid upon the several sorts of Motion which the Mind is put into both by its own natural and constant Agitation and by the different Impressions which the Passions make upon it Much also may be argu'd from the different manner of the Object 's being represented to it according to the different Prospects taken of them For in this respect it happens to the Eye of the Mind as it does to that of the Body that no two Persons see the same thing exactly and in all respects alike Their Situation their Organs and infinite other little unobserv'd Accidents there are that make some though perhaps not so great a Diversity as to be discern'd in the Act of Vision Besides every thing we know hath different Glosses and Faces and is capable of being consider'd under different respects which was Epictetus's meaning when he said That every thing hath two he might very truly have said a great many Handles But after all nothing adds more to this Ambiguity and variety of Opinions than that Spirit of Contradiction and Dispute and a vain Affectation of Wit generally predominant in the World which lets nothing pass quietly in Conversation and accounts it a Reflexion upon one's Parts not to have somewhat to say by way of Repartee and Objection though never so contrary to Truth and sometimes even to the Person 's own Judgment too And hence it is frequent for such People to take contrary Sides for their Business is not so much to advance an
virtuous Behaviour and generous Actions of other Men Hence we study and invent Causes and Intentions for them and of our own Malice assign vain and wicked Motives and Occasions for what they do This is a most abominable Vice and an evident Proof of great Malignity in our Nature and of a diseased Mind There is no great Matter of Wit or Judgment shewn in such Proceedings but they betray a World of Baseness and Ill-Nature For whence can all this Misconstruction spring but either from that Envy which our Neighbours Honour and Reputation provokes in us or from a measuring of others by our selves and so taking that for granted in Them which we are Conscious of in our selves or from a Weakness and Distemper in the Mind which like some Sicknesses in the Body alters and vitiates the Palate confounds and blinds the Sight that we neither see nor taste Things as they are and that Virtue in its native Purity and Lustre is too Strong for us to bear or conceive From the same Cause it is that we are so officiously Spightful in publishing other Mens Vices and Failings that we aggravate these beyond what they deserve but take good Care to extenuate their Virtues as much hence from single Actions and particular Circumstances we draw general Inferences and fix standing Characters upon Men Hence comes our Partiality in judging and our Regards not to the Thing but the Person If he be a Friend or of Our Opinion or in Our Interest then all he does is justified or applauded and every Thing becomes him and his very Vices are Virtues But if he be an Enemy if he have disoblig'd us Personally or be engag'd in a Contrary Faction he is stark naught and nothing is as it should be Thus we are content to wrong and disgrace our Judgment provided we may but gratify our Passions But alas we are not come to the End nor to the worst Part of it yet For most of the Impieties and Heresies the Errours in point of Belief and Controversies of all Sorts in Religion if we examine them strictly and trace them up to their first Head will appear to be so many noisome Streams of this bitter Fountain a polluted and wicked Will inordinate Passion and senfual Pleasure which by Degrees bribes and debauches the Understanding and wins it over to its own Side The People sat down to eat and to drink and rose up to play As the Scripture observes of the Israelites Idolatry and St. Augustine very well to this purpose * Quod vult non quod est credit qui cupit errare Lib. 2. de Civ Dei That when a Man feels an Errour agreeable to him he does not believe what is True but what he would gladly have to be True Thus by Degrees it hath come to pass that the Wickednesses which at first were committed with many Doubts and Misgivings and great Reluctancies have not only out-worn all Scruple in time but been asserted and maintained for Divine Truth and Express Revelation What was at first in the Sensual Appetite only hath made its Way higher and got the upper Hand of the Understanding What was meerly Passion and Pleasure hath been advanced into a Principle of Religion and an Article of Faith So dangerous a thing is it for any part of the Soul to be diseased So Strong the Infection and so quickly does it spread from one Faculty to another And thus you have had an Account what those Three Causes of Our Mental Defects and the Errors in our Judgment are which were said to be external and foreign to the Mind it self For it appears that the Understanding may be wanting or impaired by Means of Sickness or Bodily Indisposition more especially any Disease or Hurt in the Head or any inconvenient Shape of the Skull From the prejudicate Opinions of the World and taking up groundless Whimsies for measur'd and certain Truths And Lastly from any Disorder in the other Faculties of the Rational Soul which are plac'd below and ought by Nature to be under the Governance of the Mind Those whose Failings proceed from the first of these Causes deserve our Pity not our Censure or Blame and of them some are curable and others incurable The Second are not wholly Innocent but yet Faulty in such a Degree that we may pardon and excuse them But the Third sort are altogether Guilty They deserve both Censure and Punishment for suffering the Order of their Creation to be so inverted that those which were born Subjects and ought to submit should usurp the Throne and presume to give Laws to their Natural Sovereign But besides these outward and accidental Failings there are others It s Natural Defects Natural and Internal such as take their first rise from and are born and cherished in the Mind it self The greatest of All and indeed the Source and Root of all the Rest is Pride and Presumption The First and the Original Sin of Mankind the Bane of every Soul and the Cause of all manner of Evil 'T is This that puffs Men up with Sufficiency and Self-Satisfaction This will not suffer us to yield to any body or think others Wiser or Better than our selves This makes us despise the good Counsel of our Friends and place an entire Confidence in our own Opinions This calls the Judgments of other People into Question arraigns and condemns them nay sometimes such as we understand nothing of nor are capable of examining or comprehending the Reasons of them 'T is most truly observ'd that Judgment and Wisdom is not only the Best but the Happiest Portion God Almighty hath distributed among Men. For tho' this Distribution be made with a very uneven Hand yet no body thinks himself stinted or Ill dealt with but he that hath never so little is contented in this Respect however and thinks he hath a Child's Share at least Now This Distemper is owing to no Cause so much as the want of being more intimately acquainted with our selves for by this means we are Strangers to our Wants and Weaknesses and not at all sensible of our greatest Misfortunes So that the Root of all our Diseases is Ignorance not That which is opposed to Skill in Arts and Sciences and conversing with the Writings of Learned Men but Ignorance of our own Affairs and Condition the Removal and Cure whereof was proposed in the Beginning as the Design of this whole First Book CHAP. XV. Of the Memory MEmory is very often mistaken by the Vulgar for Understanding and Good Sense but in truth they are very different Things For both Reason and Experience tell us as hath been observed formerly that it is very possible and usual for a Man who is Excellent in one of these respects to be wretchedly weak and wanting in the other This indeed is a Faculty very Serviceable and Useful to Mankind but it comes far short of the Understanding and is much the Tenderest and most Feeble of all those Parts
it the Title of a Virtuous or Vicious a Spiritual or a Carnal Mind according as it pursues commendable and exalted Objects or is sunk into Sensuality and Vice Thus the true and only way by which the Will can ennoble it self is by loving and choosing worthy and noble Things and the abandoning it self to little and low base and unworthy ones is the debasing and disparagement of it So that our former Comparison is in this regard justify'd again for thus the Will is as a Wife who gets or loses Quality according to the Person she marries and in strictness can claim no Honour nor Place but that which belongs to her Husband Daily Experience assures us that there are Three Things which whet and stimulate the Will The Difficulty of Obtaining The Rarity or Excellence of the Thing we seek and The Absence or Fear of Losing it And the Three Considerations opposite to These which are It s being Easie and in our own Power The Abundance or Commonness of it and The Constant Presence and Secure Enjoyment do as much blunt and pall our Will The Three former raise our Esteem of any thing the Three latter render it cheap and beget Neglect and Contempt We are also sharpned and made more eager by Opposition and Refusal and entertain some sort of Indignation which makes us more resolute against any thing that pretends to stand in our way and disappoint our Desires And thus in the other Extreme we disdain and overlook the Blessings we have in hand though never so valuable and lose what we are already possest of for things distant and in Reversion and in proportion what we lawfully do or may enjoy for such as we cannot or ought not * Quod licet ingratum est quod non licet acrius urit Ovid. Eleg. Amor. Lib. II. What comes with Ease we nauseously receive Restraint inflames and Hardships Pleasure give Thus the Case stands with us in our Pleasures of all sorts †Omnium rerum Voluptas ipso quo debet fugari periculo 〈◊〉 The Danger which in reason should absolutely destroy Delight is the very thing which heightens it and the strongest incentive to our Appetites in the pursuit of it So that both Extremes have at last the same Effect and either of them serves to make us miserable Want and Plenty Security and Fear Desire and Enjoyment all give us the same Disquiet and put us to perpetual Pain And this unhappy Disposition is the true account why Men so seldom make a right estimate of Things from whence grew that Proverb of the Prophet in his own Country to intimate how very different Intrinsick Worth and Common Opinion are and that the highest Endowments and most Divine Excellencies when Custom and Acquaintance hath rendred them familiar to us can no longer preserve the Value and Veneration most justly due to them What Course is to be taken for the managing and regulating our Will See B. II. Ch. 2. B. III. Ch. 6 will be shewn hereaster The Passions and Affections ADVERTISEMENT THE Passions of the Mind are a very large and copious Subject furnish great variety of Matter for Reflection and are one of the most considerable Topicks in all this Treatise of Wisdom And upon this occasion we are to observe that the first Step to be made in this Branch of it is to learn the true Nature of the Passions and how to distinguish them from each other which shall be taught you here in the First Book And then for the Remedies of Cure by which they are to be curb'd controul'd and brought within due Bounds such of them as are general will be laid down in the Second And those that are proper for each Passion in particular will be directed and specify'd accordingly in the Third Book This Method being most agreeable to that Scheme of the whole Work drawn out in the Preface Now in order to attaining to a clear and distinct Knowledge of them at present I design to employ one Chapter in treating of the Passions in general and then to speak of each Passion singly in the Chapters that follow But before I enter upon That I think my self oblig'd in Justice to declare that of all the Authors I have seen none hath represented this Matter more copiously and to the Life than the Sicur de Vaux in his Moral Tracts to whom I have been much beholding and have borrow'd a great deal from thence of what I shall say upon this Subject of the Passions CHAP. XVIII Of the Passions in general PAssion is a violent Motion of the Soul in that which is distinguished by the Name of Its Sensitive part An Account of Passion what and whence it is And the Cause and Tendency of this Motion is either to pursue somewhat which the Soul apprehends to be Good or to decline and run away from something which it apprehends to be Evil. But it is very necessary and of great consequence upon this Occasion to be rightly inform'd how these Motions begin and what it is that cherishes and kindles these Fires in us Of This several Accounts may be given and different Comparisons made use of to illustrate it by according to the different Respects in which we consider them And first of all with regard to the suddenness and vehemence of their Emotions it is to be observ'd That the Soul which however seemingly multiply'd by Distinctions is really but One and the Same in the Body hath several Powers belonging to it and These differ greatly in their Qualities and Operations according as the several Vessels in which the Soul keeps her Residence and the Instruments she makes use of in discharging her Functions and the Objects propounded to her Contemplation are differently dispos'd Now when the Parts where the Soul takes up her Lodging are not crowded or over-burdened but filled in such Proportions as sute well with their ordinary Custom and Capacity and such as are convenient for a due discharge of their respective Duties then all the Operations of the Soul are gentle and mild sedate and regular But on the other side when any of these Parts are either put into a swifter and more violent Motion or are heated above their ordinary and proper Temper then they immediately feel a considerable Change to the great Prejudice and Disorder of the Soul The like we see in the Beams of the Sun which when scatter'd loosely with all that Freedom they naturally take in diffusing themselves impart a moderate and gentle a cherishing and kindly Warmth but when contracted within the Concave of a Burning-Glass they burn up and quite consume the very things to which they gave Life and Nourishment before It must be farther observ'd too that These Parts are not always distributed alike And from hence arises another Distinction not only with regard to the Kind and Quality but to the Degree of their Emotion and so they differ in the same sort as their Violence is greater
for the Service and Gratification of his filthy Desire That Desire if allow'd and let alone will turn to Rage and Madness and yet a great part of this is unavoidable For Nature hath given us the Inclination and That is the Reason why it is common to All and very strong in the greatest part of Mankind The Care incumbent upon Us must be to keep a strait Hand and a constant Watch over this Passion To check and divert its first Irregularities and cool those Fires which we cannot absolutely quench For if indulg'd it levels Men with Brutes stupisies all our Wisdom baffles our Resolution confounds our Prudence and Conduct breaks in upon our Contemplation hardens the Conscience blinds the Eyes of the Mind and disturbs all the Operations of our most noble Faculties This convinc'd Alexander that he was Mortal and is such another Argument of our Frailty as Sleep is for both of them agree in suspending suppressing and binding up the Powers of the Reasonable Soul Philesophy takes upon it to treat of all manner of Subjects The Chams Câ—â—li whence and uses great Freedom of Expression in doing so that so the true Causes of Things may he discover'd a right Judgment made of them and proper Rules and Directions given for the governing our selves with regard to them The same thing Divinity does likewise which is a Science insmitely more sublime and resin'd of nicer Honour and greater Modesly and Reserve And this Liberty may sometimes be very Convenient nay very Innocent and Chaste for the Sun shines upon Dunghils without contracting any of the Pollution or ill Scents by his Rays that fall there But this is a Case that requires great Tenderness and Caution and usually Silence is the most becoming and the most profitable For one had better altogether conceal and suppress those things which when intended for Cood are yet liable and likely to be made an ill use of by most of Those into whose hands they sall And highly probable it is that many Persons have learnt to be more exquisite in their Vices of this kind by those very Precepts and particular Instructions design'd to teach them how to prevent or conquer those Exorbitances 'T is true indeed Nature by strong Impulses persuades to these Gratifications but yet it is as true that she teaches us to blush and be out of Countenance at the very Mention of what she is so importunate for Some indeed pretend that we ought to be ashahed of nothing that is Natural and that this Aâ—â—elation of Modesty serves only to sharpen Men's Appetites the more That we may as well be ashamed for the Infirmities of our Bodies the spontaneous Motions of our Lungs and Heart and Veins and Arteries our Eating and Drinking and Weariness and Pain and Sickness and Dying all which like This before us have their Motions and Intervals without our Consent or Knowledge return by certain necessary Causes and act upon us by unseen Springs and All like This too betray the great Weakness and Indigent State of Humane Nature Our Brain discharges it self by Defluxions our Eyes by Tears our Body by proper Evacuations our Faces grow red or pale our Bodies fat and lean our Hair black or white or grey and we are not concerned in or for these things which yet are no more Natural than This yet They or any Discourse of Them is by no means ignominious or unbecoming and in the present Case it is To all which Objections it were sufficient to oppose the general Sense and Practice of all civiliz'd Persons and Countries who in proportion to their being polish'd and resin'd above others have ever exprest a greater Reserve in educating their Children in their own Behaviour and Conversation and in looking upon all such as Impudent and Profligate who indulge loose and wanton Discourse and even They who are but too much Friends and Slaves to this Passion choose rather to provoke it by distant Myâ—â—â—rious Expressions and nauseate the Roug◠〈◊〉 Rudeness of blunt uncomely Language 〈…〉 you will ask whence this Shame proceeds 〈…〉 how that Custom became so general The Câ—â—tification of these Appetites I grant you is 〈◊〉 shameful in it self in the least It is truly and properly Natural and no Shame is due to it sim ply consider'd for Beasts 't is plain have no Sense of any But why do I speak of Beasts The Sacred Oracles of God themselves have told us expresly that This is no Appendage of our Nature that while Man preserved his primitive Purity and was in that Condition which was Originally and truly Humane he had no Sense of Shame Gon. ii 25. nor ever blush'd at his own Nakedness Every Work of God is Sacred and Good and nothing but the Abuse can cast a Blemish upon it So that in truth Shame is only the Essect of Weakness and that Weakness the Essect of Sin Shame came into the World afterwards and by Accident it was no part of the Creation hath no Eeing in Nature but is the Creature of our own Wickedness and what we have brought upon our own selves by making the Workmanship of God Instruments of Vice and Pollution The true Reason then which makes this Passion so violently condemn'd and run down Hew it is Vibra is not from any real Vice or Shame in it when consider'd abstractedly and in its own Nature but from the general Corruption and Inordinacy Men are betray'd into by it For how very few are there that have any regard to Moderation or Discretion or Decency What infinite indirect Methods do they use for the gratifying of these Appetites What Quarrels and Disturbances what Wars and publick Consusions what Desolation and Ruine have been owing to this accursed Cause this common but most fatal Incendiary of Mankind Insomuch that the Wickedness of the Means that introduce these Pleasures and the long black Train of Consequences they draw after them are worse a Thousand times than the Thing it self The Expence and Damages are infinitely more than the Purchase is worth And all these ill Essects are peculiar to Mankind for other Creatures know nothing of all this Clutter But Men have used great Industry to Trapan themselves On one side they make Laws to keep them off urge Religion and Modesty and Decency to restrain their Desires and yet on the other hand they sharpen and inflame them set all their Wits at work to contrive to confound to get over every thing for the compassing their Desires Witness Comedy and Poetry particularly whose pretended Beauties even when most Chaste were chiefly seen in amorous Subjects but now they have perfectly prostituted themselves to Lewdness and seem to design nothing so much as the laughing Virtue and Reserve out of Doors as if These were the things we ought most to be asham'd of But of all others the most mischievous Corruption of Nature seems to be the setting an extravagant value upon stollen and unlawful Pleasures representing Injuries of this
The Causes from whence it arises are various Weakness of Judgment Its Causes which is most remarkable in Women and Children I. Aged and Sick People whom Experience shews to be of all others most fretful and peevish and easie to be provoked * Invalidum omne naturâ querulum est Every thing that is infirm is naturally disposed to be querulous and froward It is a Mistake as great as it is common to imagine that Fierceness and Rage is an Argument of Courage For all violent Motions are like the Essorts of Old Men and Children who run when they would walk and go faster because they have not Strength enough to go how There is not in the World any thing so feeble as an irregular and unsteady Motion and therefore Anger which is such in the Mind is rather a Mark of Infirmity and Cowardise It is a Distemper in the Soul which makes it tender and sore not able to endure Offences as Hurts and Wounds in the Body render the Smart of every little Blow intolerable Were it in a State of perfect Health and Soundness every Trifle cou'd not create so great a Disorder †Nusquam sine querel◠aegra tanguntur But when all is full of Aches and Diseases the gentlest Touch is treublesome and it is always complaining because always ailing A Miser will fume and storm for the loss of a Penny for the missing of some Advantage which he might have gain'd A jealous Husband will fall into a Rage for the most innocent Smile of his Wise or the least Glance of her Eye II. Luxury and Niceness or any particular Fancy that renders a Man Singular and Humorsom and Uneasie is apt upon the least Accident which crosses that Humour to put him into Passion and ‖ Nulla res magis Iracundiam alit quam Luxuria No one thing says a great Philosopher cherishes Anger more than this vain Temper III. So again does the being fond of any little trifling things not worth our Affection and Concern A Glass a Dog a Bird This is a Folly that gives us a great deal of Trouble and often exposes us to most unreasonable Passions the least of which is more than they can possibly deserve Another Cause is Curiosity IV. and a busie inquisitive Temper * Qui nimis inquirit seipsum inquietar He that asks too many Questions is sollicitous to disquiet himself This is so far from avoiding and conniving at that it is seeking Occasions hunting about and following the Scent and with great Eagerness and Pleasure running abroad after Provocations without having the Patience to stay till They come home to Us. Sometimes indeed says Seneca Anger comes to Us but not near so often as We go to It. V. Another is Credulity and Easiness the suffering our selves to be possest with the first Account and the first Chance-comer and not reserving an Ear free for the other side of the Cause nor suspending our Belief till more perfect Information But the Principal VI. and indeed the very formal Cause of Anger is an Opinion that we have been undervalu'd and ill us'd That some Word some Look for any thing will serve carried an Air of Contempt and was less respectful than it ought to have been This is always the Argument angry Men lay hold of in their own Justification And no wonder then that Proud Men are most Cholerick and fuller of Resentment than any others since no other Disposition makes Men think so much their Due and consequently inclines them to be so jealous of Affronts and Omissions in point of Respect For which Reason the Scripture tells us Prov. xiii 10. xxi 24. that Only by Pride cometh Contention in one Place and Stiles it most Emphatically Proud Wrath in another The Signs and Symptoms of this Passion are many and manifest Signs of it more and more visible than those of any other and so Strange and Strong that they make a mighty Difference in the Person alter the whole Temper and Frame both of Body and Mind transform and turn him into quite another Man Insomuch that * Ut sit difficile utrum magis detestabile vitium aut deforme it is not easy to say whether this Vice be more detestable or more deformed and disfiguring Some of these Changes and Symptoms are outward and apparent Redness and Distortions of the Face Fieryness of the Eyes a wild and enraged Look Deasness and Insensibility in the Ears Foaming at the Mouth Palpitation of the Heart Quickness and Unevenness of the Pulse Swelling and Bursting Fullness of the Veins Stammering in the Tongue Gnashing and Setting of the Teeth Loudness and Hoarsness in the Voice The Speech thick and indistinct and in short The whole Body is set on Fire and in a perfect Fever Some have been transported to such a Degree upon these Occasions that their very Veins have broke their Urine stopt and they have dropt down Dead being stifled and strangled with excess of Passion And what Condition can we suppose their Mind must be in in the mean while when the Disorders of the Body are so Violent and Dismal Anger at the first Brush quite banishes Reason and confounds the Judgment clears all before it and takes possession for it self alone and when it hath got it then it sills all with Fire and Smoke with Darkness and Confusion with Noise and Clamour It is like a Robber or an Enemy that first drives the Master out of Doors and then sets Fire to his House and that with such Fury and Madness as to destroy and burn it self alive in het Flames It is like a Ship that hath neither Rudder nor Pilot neither Sails nor Oars nor Ballast but floats about at Random and commits it self to the Mercy of Winds and Waves and that when the Sea rides Highest and the Storms are Loudest and most Raging And what can be expected in such a Case but Strandings and Shipwracks when there are so many Rocks on every Side to break her to Pieces so many Quick-Sands to swallow her up when she thus lets her self drive upon them This leads us to consider its Effects which are indeed very great and for the most Part Its Effects exceedingly Wretched and Deplorable I. For First Anger urges and exposes us to Injustice it takes Fire afresh and is rendred more Violent and Fierce by any Opposition though never so Reasonable and Fair and that too not only by Dispute from others but even from a Man 's own Senses and Reflection and the being Conscious to himself that he is Angry either without any just Cause or to a greater Degree than the Provocation deserved When a Man hath thus fusser'd his Reason to be shaken and disturbed let one with all the Calmness imaginable offer the clearest Vindication the justest Excuse any thing to remove or mitigate this Passion all is to no Purpose or to worse than none for Truth and Innocence
were brought on or what Part they were to act * Quidam vivere incipiunt cum desinendum Quidam ante desiverunt quà m inciperent Inter caetera mala hoc quoque habet stultitia semper incipit vivere Some says the Philosopher begin to live when they should make an End others cease to live before ever they begun Among the many Mischiefs that Folly brings upon us This is not the least That it is always beginning to live We think of Business and intend to set about it but make no Progress at all nor bring any thing to perfection The World is a Theatre and our present Life in it the Beginning and the End of a Play Description of it our Birth draws the Curtain and our Death shuts it up again T is a Comedy of Errours a constant Succession of Accidents and Adventures a Contexture and Chain of several Miseries linked closely and interwoven within one another nothing but Evil on every side That which passes off and that which approaches and comes into its place and these drive out and push forward each other as the Waves of the Sea do in their Ebbings and Flowings Trouble and Disquiet are always at hand but for Happiness we are cheated with the empty Shadow of it Blindness and Insensibility take up the Beginning of our Lives Labour and Anxious Care the Middle Weakness and Pain the Latter End But Ignorance and Errour reach from the Beginning to the End These are inseparable and keep us Company quite through The Life of Man hath its Inconveniences and Miseries of several sorts Some of them are in Common extending to all Persons and all Times Others are Peculiar and Successive and distinguish'd by the different Parts and Age and particular Seasons and Accidents of Life As Childhood Youth Maturity Man's Estate and Old Age for Each of these hath its distinct Calamities some Embasements and Incumbrances which may be properly call'd its own When Youth and Old Age come to be weigh'd one against the other Youth and Age compar'd it hath been usual to give the Advantage to the Latter And most Authors speak of Age with Honour and Respect as having attain'd to greater degrees of Wisdom more maturity of Judgment more Moderation and Temper All which good Qualities are marvellously cry'd up with a Design to put Youth out of Countenance and to charge upon it the contrary Characters of Vice and Folly Licentiousness and Extravagance But with the leave of those who have thus decided the Controversie I must take Liberty to declare that this Verdict is in my Opinion very unjust For in good truth the Defects and the Vices of Age are More in Number Worse in Quality and less to be resisted or recover'd than those that are peculiar to Youth Years deform our Minds as much as our Bodies bring Wrinkles there as well as in our Faces and turn our Tempers sour and mouldy with long keeping The Soul keeps pace with the Body Both are spent and Both decay till at last we grow so weak so perfectly helpless as in respect of both to verifie that Proverb of Old Men being twice Children Age is a necessary but a strong Disease it loads us insensibly with grievous Imperfections and then contrives to cover the Shame of them with creditable Names What is in effect no other than Moroseness of Humour a peevish dislike of the present Enjoyments and Disability to do as the Man did heretofore passes for Wisdom and Gravity Experience and an Insight into the Vanity of the World But Wisdom is somewhat much more noble than all this comes to and far above making use of such mean Instruments There is a vast difference between growing older and growing wiser between forsaking all Vice and the changing one for another and as it often happens in this Case changing for the Worse Old Age condemns the Pleasures and Gayeties of Youth but how much of this must be allowed to it s not being now able to relish them any longer It is like Esop's Dog hates and despises what it cannot enjoy But This is not to disdain and give over Pleasure it is rather to be disdain'd and given over by it Pleasure is always Airy and Entertaining and these are Persons no longer for its Turn But why should they cast a Reflection upon That which is due to themselves Why shou'd Impotence corrupt their Judgment For this if impartially consulted would tell Young Men that there is Vice in their Pleasures and Old Men that there is Pleasure in Vice And if this were rightly understood and frankly confest Youth would be a great deal the better and Old Age not one whit the worse The Vices more peculiar to Youth are Rashness and Heat Forwardness and an unguarded Conversation Debauchery and all manner of Sensual Excess And these are in some Degree natural to that State the Effects of Warmth and Vigour and the Boylings of a Florid Blood All which as they need and ought to be corrected so they have something to say in their own Excuse But what Apology shall we make for the Ill Qualities that attend Old Age The lightest and least of which are vain Arrogance and Pride a troublesome and peremptory way of Conversing and an engrossing all the Talk to themselves froward and unsociable Humours Superstition and Whimsie Love of Riches when past the use of them sordid Avarice and Fear of Death which generally is not as some have favourably interpreted the Case the effect of a cold Blood and low Spirits and of Courage damp'd by these Natural Causes but it proceeds from long Custom and Acquaintance and a foolish Fondness for the World by which the Old Gentleman hath corrupted his Judgment and hath a greater Tenderness for it than young Men who enjoy more and know less of it Besides these there are Envy and Ill-Nature and Injustice but the most exquisite and ridiculous Folly of all is that Affectation of a severe and grave and wise Character and hoping to gain Respect and Deference by an Austere Look and Scornful Behaviour which indeed does but provoke Laughter and become it self a Jest while it pretends to extort Observance and Fear For the Young Fellows combine together against this formal Austerity which they see put on only for a Disguise and with a design to amuse and affright them into Reverence where real Merit which would engage it is wanting In short The Vices of Old Age are so numerous on the One Hand and the Infirmities of it on the Other and Both together conspire to render it so despicable that the best and most saving Game it can play is to secure Mens Affections and to win them by Methods of Kindness and Affability and Good-Nature For Churlishness and an Imperious Humour and whatever aims at Fear and Dominion are not by any means Weapons fit for These Persons to manage The Affecting so very much Awe does by no means become them and if the thing
Affectation of a Coquette or some other Imposture which he sees and confesses to be an Imposture and all the while runs mad and owns no other Charm but what he perfectly sees through the Fallacy of But to shew you what Footing Vanity hath got and how close it sticks to Humane Nature Visits and Matters of Civility we will now pass from private Deportment and Dispositions to publick Conversation by which This will plainly appear to be no particular and personal Defect but the Vice of the whole Species in common And here what Vanity what loss of Time may we observe in the Impertinencies of Visits Howd'you's Forms of Address mutual Entertainments In the Offices of Civility set Speeches and Ceremonious Behaviour in Prossers of Service in Promises and Praises How many fulsome Strains of Complement what Infinite Hypocrisy Falshood and Deceit How open and barefac'd so that the Person that utters it and he to whom it is directed and every one that stands by sees and knows and is satisfied it is False Thus Conversation is now become little else than a Tryal of Skill for Dissimulation and looks like a common Confederacy where Men have combin'd together to lye and bubble and abuse and make a Jest of one another Nay good Manners require that at the same time a Man tells you an impudent Lye you should return him your Thanks for what you know he intends not a word of and He again who is satisfied you believe not a Syllable of what he says receives those Acknowledgments of yours with a set Face and an Air of Confidence and thus you stand cringing and fawning and dodging for the last Word each striving to begin and fearing to leave off and shrugging when both are heartily weary and would fain be well quit of one another What Inconveniences are we content to endure for these Formalities We expose our Selves to the Air to Heat to Cold disturb the Peace of our Lives and are in perpetual Pain for these courtly Follies We neglect our Business of Weight and Consequence and attend upon Wind and Smoke We are vain at the Expence of our Ease nay of our Health of our very Life And what can prove Mankind more enslav'd to Vanity than This That Levity and Accident tramples Substance under Foot and Air carries away solid Body whither it will especially when a Man that behaves himself otherwise must be look'd upon as a Sot and a Fool one that knows nothing of the World nor what becomes him to do in it Thus to play this Farce dextrously is the greatest Mark of Wit and the most affected Harlequin in it is the finest Gentleman but not to be Vain is contemptible Stupidity and he that declines playing the Fool betrays his own want of Sense and good Breeding Nay when there is no need of all this Form and Complaisance Vanity hangs about us still Witness the freer Discourses of the most familiar Acquaintance and intimate Friends How many trifling Impertinences Falshoods Banters I omit the wicked and mischievous Part because that falls not under this Head How many arrogant and vain Boastings go to the making up this sort of Conversation too Men are so industrious to take to seek to make occasions of Talking of themselves or of somewhat that belongs to them They do it with so sensible and yet so nauseous a Pleasure if they think they have said or done a good thing or that somewhat they are possest of is better than ordinary They are so uneasie till they have publish'd and enlarg'd upon it as if all their Wit and Worth were lost unless other People were made sensible of it too They catch at the very first Convenience cry it up to the greatest Degree imaginable nay they perfectly bring it in by Head and Shoulders and interrupt all other Discourse to start This And when any body else is Talking we presently thrust our selves in and take an Advantage of shewing our Parts so eager are we that People shou'd understand what we are and have a regard for us and not for Us only but for every thing that we have a regard for As a yet greater Demonstration how absolute a Sovereignty Vanity hath obtain'd over Humane Nature Publick Commotions we need but recollect the most considerable Revolutions that ever happen'd in the World and the Occasions of them For thus it will soon appear that the most general and most formidable Convulsions of Cities and Kingdoms and whole Empires the Seditions and Revolts and Fates of Armies the bloodiest Battels the barbarousest Murders the sharpest Disputes and most implacable Quarrels have proceeded from very trifling ridiculous and insignificant Causes Witness the long War between Troy and Greece the Piques of Sylla and Marius and all the Confusions that follow'd from thence in the Civil Wars of Caesar and Pompey and Augustus and Anthony The Poets have represented this well enough by pretending an Apple to have been the Boutefeu the Original of all that Blood and Devastation in Asia and Greece And indeed the first Springs upon which these vast Events move are commonly Things of no consideration but That which begins very small swells to a vast Bulk afterwards and the blowing it up thus is an irrefragable Proof of the Vanity and Folly of Mankind Nay many times an occasional thing goes further with us than the principal Cause and some paltry little Circumstances make more sensible Impressions and gall us more than the main Matter to which they retain as Caesar's Robe put Rome into greater Passion and Concern than his Death it self and the Two and twenty Stabs in his Body had done before The Last and indeed the most exquisite Vanity is our seeking with so much Industry and Passion Notions of Happiness and Content and pleasing our selves so highly nay placing our very Happiness in Advantages which have neither real Worth nor Necessity to recommend Them But as they are trifling and frivolous in themselves so they are such as we may be very happy and live very comfortably and conveniently without Whereas on the other hand those that are necessary and essential to our true Happiness find little or no part of the Regard due to them and every Body is indifferent whether he hath Them or not Thus the Condition of Man is all Air and Speculation His whole Happiness imaginary Opinion and Dream is all he pursues and in this he stands Alone and cannot match himself in the whole Word God hath all Good in Essence and Reality and Evil in Notion and Understanding only Man on the contrary hath only fantastical Good but his Evils are weighty and substantial Beasts are not satisfy'd with Opinion nor do They feed upon Fancy but require somewhat that is present and sensible and real to content them Vanity is reserv'd to Man for his Portion the Inheritance and peculiar Right of his Nature He runs he bustles he fights he dies he flies he persues he grasps
Instance is applicable to all Here mention'd which are owing to the Love of our Selves and comparing our own Case with that of other People T is pleasant when the Seas are rough to stand And view another's Danger safe at Land Not ' cause he 's troubl'd but 't is sweet to see Those Cares and Fears from which our Selves are free Mr. Creech And sure there is a great difference between Malignity and Self-Love between Tenderness for our own Safety and a Malicious Joy in Calamities and Dangers In a Word To give you a true Representation of the greatness of our Misery 〈◊〉 of Spiritual Miscries I only add That the World abounds with Three sorts of Men which out-do all the rest both in Number and Reputation and those are The Superstitious The Formal and The Pedantick These tho' they are concern'd in different Matters move by different Springs and act upon different Stages for the Three principal Topicks are Religion Common Conversation and Learning and each of These is the Field appropriated to each of these Persons Religion to the Superstitious Common Conversation and the Dealings of Humane Life to the Formal and Learning to the Pedants But These I say tho' engag'd in Matters so distant are yet all cast in the same Mould and agree in their general Qualities and Characters That they are all weak and mean Souls extremely defective either in Natural or Acquir'd Abilities incapable or ignorant Men of dangerous Opinions sick Judgments nay sick of a Disease that scarce ever admits of a Recovery For all the Pains and Trouble you give your self to instruct these Men better is but so much Time and Labour lost upon them They are so much in the Wrong and so highly conceited that none who differ from them can be in the Right that no good is ever to be done If you will take Their Judgments none are comparable to themselves for Virtue or for Wisdom Obstinacy and Self-sufficiency which every where hath too great an Ascendent reigns Absolute here and is in its proper Kingdom Whoever hath once drunk in the Infection of these Evils there are little or no Hopes left of ever making him a sound Man again For what is there more exquisitely foolish what more stiff and inflexible than these Fellows They are secur'd by a double Barrier from the Conquests of Reason and Persuasion First by their Weakness and Natural Incapacity which disables them from seeing the Strength of Arguments and Reproofs and then by a false Confidence in their own Excellencies above the rest of the World which makes them despise all Others as their Inferiours unable to advise and unfit to reform Those who are already so much wiser and better than They. As for the Superstitious The Superstitious See Book II. Chap. 5. they are highly Injurious to God and dangerous Enemies to True Religion They disguise themselves with a Mask of Piety and Zeal and Reverence and Love for God and this Jest they carry so far as to teaze and torment themselves with Austerities and Sufferings that were never requir'd at their Hands And what is to be done with such infatuated Wretches as These who imagine that those voluntary Afflictions are highly meritorious that the Almighty is indebated to them and much oblig'd by Works which he never commanded and that all the rest ought to be released in consideration of These Tell them they take things by the wrong Handle that they stretch and pervert and misunderstand the Scriptures and lay Burdens upon themselves more and heavier than God ever laid Their Answer is that They intend well and that Intention they doubt not will Save them that what they do is from a Principle of Piety and Devotion and cannot want Merit and Acceptance upon that Account Besides there is something of Interest in all this which you can never prevail with them to part with for what Gain is to be proposed in Prospect what Satisfaction to be receiv'd in Present which can make them amends for the mighty Expectations and Raptures of that fond Notion that by this means God becomes Their Debtor and they merit at His Hands The Formalists are a sort of People entirely devoted of Form Formalists and Shew and Outside and These think themselves at liberty to indulge their Passions and gratifie any though never so unlawful Desires without Check and Controul provided they do not offend against the Letter of the Law nor omit any of those external Observances which are required in their Behaviour and lookt upon as the Rules of Living Here you shall see an old griping Jew that hath brought God knows how many Families to Beggery and Ruine but he hath done no hurt in all this For he never asked for more than his Own at least what he thought so and if upon these Demands Arrests and Suits and Prisons have ensu'd yet he only suffer'd the Law to take its Course and who can blame this honest Man for coming by his Right in the way of Justice But O Good God! how many good things are neglected and how many wicked and barbarous things done under the pretence of Forms and the Protection of the Laws Nothing can be truer than that Extremity of Right is Extremity of Wrong He that makes This the Rule of all his Proceedings and allows himself to take the Advantage of the Law upon every occasion is so far from an honest Man that he is one of the most dangerous Knaves Such Reason was there for that Saying us'd to this purpose God deliver us from the Formalists By Pedants I mean a sort of prating Fellows who first tumble over Books with great Pains and Study and afterwards let fly in all Companies and vend all they have pick'd up in their Reading with as much Impertinence and Ostentation and all this too to turn a Penny and promote their Interest or their Credit by it There are not in the World a Pack of more little Mercenary Wretches more unfit for Business and yet at the same time more forward and presuming and conceited of Themselves Hence perhaps it is that in all Countries and all Languages Pedant and Scholar are Terms of Ridicule and Reproach To do a thing aukwardly is to do it like a Scholar To behave one's self like a Clown and be ignorant of the World is to be a mere Scholar Such Scholars I mean as These I am now treating of for these Reflections do not concern Learned Men in general but such superficial Pretenders to it as are only walking and living Nomenclatures that have a Memory stuff'd full of Other Men's Knowledge but none at all of their Own Their Judgment their Will and their Consciences are not one whit improved by it They are never the wiser nor more prudent never the more dextrous in Business nor the more honest and virtuous for all the Schemes and Institutions they have run thro' They can repeat These but they have not digested them are Masiers
The Power of the Husband In some Places where the Paternal Authority hath been so This hath likewise Extended to Capital Punishment and made the Husband Judge and Disposer of Life and Death Dionys Halic l. 2. Thus it was with the Romans particularly For the Laws of Romulus gave a Man Power to kill his Wife in Four Cases viz. Adultery Putting False Children upon him False Keys and Drinking of Wine Thus Polybius tells us that the Greeks and Caesar says that the old Gauls gave Husbands a Power of Life and Death In Other Parts and in these already mention'd since those Times their Power hath been brought into a narrower Compass But almost every where it is taken for granted that the Authority of the Husband and the Subjection of the Wife implies thus much A Right to direct and controul the Actions to confirm or disannul the Resolutions and Vows of the Wife to Correct her when she does amiss by Reproofs and Confinement for Blows are below a Man of Honour to give and not sit for a Woman to receive and the Wife is obliged to conform to the Condition to follow the Quality the Countrey the Family the Dwelling and the Degree of her Husband to bear him Company wheresoever he goes in Journeys and Voyages in Banishment and in Prison in Flight and Necessity and if he be reduc'd to that hard Fortune to wander about and to Beg with him Some celebrated Examples of this kind in Story are Sulpitia who attended her Husband Lontulus when he was proscribed and an Exile in Sicily Erithrea who went along with her Husband Fhalaris into Banishment Ipsicrate The Wife of Mithridates King of Pentus who kept her Husband Company when he turn'd Vagabond Tacit. after his Defeat by Pompey Some add that they are bound to follow them into the Wars and Foreign Countries when they are sent abroad upon Expeditions or go under any Publick Character The Wise cannot sue or be sued in Matters of Right and Property all Actions lie against the Husband and are to be commenced in His Name and if any thing of this Kind be any where done it must be with the Leave and Authority of her Husband or by particular Appointment of the Judge if the Husband shall decline or refuse it neither can she without express Permission from the Magistrate Appeal from or be a Party in any Cause against her Husband Marriage is not every where alike nor under the same Limitations Different 〈◊〉 aâ—â—â—â— it the Laws and Rules concerning it are very different In Some Countries there is a greater Latitude and more Liberties Indulged in Others less The Christian Religion which is by much the strictest of any hath made it very close and strait It leaves Nothing at large and in our own Choice but the first Entrance into this Engagement When once That is over a Man's Will is made over too and conveyed away for the Covenant is subject to no Dissolution and we must abide by it whether we are contented with our Terms or not Other Nations and Religions have contrived to make it more Easie and Free and Fruitful Of Polygamy and Divorce by allowing and practising Polygamy and Divorce a Liberty of taking Wives and dismissing them again and they speak hardly of Christianity for abridging Men in these Two particulars as if it did great Prejudice to Affection and Multiplication by these Restraints which are the Two great Ends of Marriage For Friendship they pretend is an Enemy to all manner of Compulsion and Necessity and cannot consist with it but is much more improved and better maintain'd by leaving Men free and at large to dispose of Themselves And Multiplication is promoted by the Female Sex as Nature shews us abundantly in that one Instance of Wolves who are so extremely Fruitful in the Production of their Whelps even to the Number of Twelve or Thirteen at a Time and in this exceed other Animals of Service and common Use very much so many of which are kill'd every Day and so few Wolves And yet there are notwithstanding fewer of the Breed Breeders because fewer She-Wolves than of any other Species For as I said the true Reason is because in all those Numerous Litters there is commonly but one Bitch-Wolf which for the most Part signifies little and bears very rarely the Generation being hindred by the vast Numbers and promiscuous Mixtures of the Males and so the much greater part of them die without ever propagating their Kind at all for want of a sufficient Proportion of Females to do it by successfully It is also manifest what Advantages of this Nature Polygamy produces by the vast Increase of those Countries where it is allowed The Jews Mahometans and other Barbarous Nations as all their Histories inform us very usually bringing Armies into the Field of Three or Four Hundred Thousand fighting Men. Now the Christian Religion on the contrary allows but One to One and obliges the Parties to continue thus together though Either nay sometimes Both of them be Barren which yet perhaps if allowed to change might leave a numerous Posterity behind them But supposing the very best of the Case all their Increase must depend upon the Production of One single Woman And lastly they reflect upon Christianity as the occasion of insinite Excesses Debaucheries and Adulteries by this too severe Constraint But the true and sufficient Answer to all these Objections is That the Christian Religion does not consider Marriage upon such Respects as are purely Humane and tend to the Gratification of Natural Appetites or promote the Temporal Good of Men It takes quite another Prospect of the Thing and hath Reasons peculiar to it self sublime and noble and insinitely greater as hath been hinted already Besides common Experience demonstrates that in much the greatest part of Marry'd Persons what they complain of as Confinement and Constraint does by no means cool and destroy but promote and heighten the Affection and render it more dear and strong by keeping it more entire and unbroken Especially in Men of honest Principles and good Dispositions which easily accommodate their Humours and make it their Care and Study to comply with the Tempers of the Person to whom they are thus inseparably united And as for the Debaucheries and Flyings out alledg'd against us the only Cause of Them is the Dissoluteness of Men's Manners which a greater Liberty though never so great will never be able to correct or put a Stop to And accordingly we find that Adulteries were every whit as rife in the midst of Polygamy and Divorce Witness the whole Nation of the Jews in general and the Example of David in particular who became guilty of this Crime notwithstanding the Multitude he had of Wives and Concubines of his own On the contrary These Vices were not known for a long while together in other Countries where neither Polygamy nor Divorce were ever permitted as in Sparta for Instance and at
and Support of Humane Affairs the Cement that knits and keeps them Fast and Strong the Soul that gives them Life and Motion the Band of all Society which can never subsist without it the vital Spirit of this Body Politick that enables Men so many Thousands of Men to breath as One and compacts all Nature together Now notwithstanding the absolute Necessity and unspeakable Convenience This is of for sustaining the Universe yet is it really a very slippery and unsafe thing extremely difficult to manage and liable to infinite Changes and Dangers * Arduum subjectum fortunae cuncta regendi onus The Governing of Men and their Affairs is a very hard Undertaking a heavy Burden and exposed to great variety of Chances It often declines and languishes nay sometimes falls to the Ground by secret Misfortunes and unseen Causes And though its rising to a just Height is Gradual and Slow a Work of much Time and great Pains and Prudence yet the Ruins and Decays of it are frequently sudden and surprizing and the Constitutions which took up Ages to finish and build up are broken and thrown down in a Moment It is likewise exposed to the Hatred and Envy of all Degrees and Conditions The High and the Low watch it curiously and are Jealous of all its Proceedings and set Themselves at Work perpetually to endanger and undermine it This Uneasiness and Suspicion and general Enmity proceeds partly from the Corrupt Manners and Dispositions of the Persons in whom the Supreme Power is vested and partly from the Nature of the Power it self of which you may take this following Description Sovereignty is properly a Perpetual and Absolute Power What Sovereign Power is Subject to no Limitation either of Time or of Terms and Conditions It consists in a Right of constituting and giving Laws to all in General and to each Person under its Dominion in Particular and that without consulting or asking the Consent of such as are to be govern'd by them and likewise in being above all Restraints or having Laws imposed upon it self from any other Person whatsoever For to Impose and Command a Duty argues Superiority and That which is Sovereign can have no Superiour And as another expresses it It infers a Right Paramount of making Reservations and Exceptions from the usual Forms as the King in Courts of Equity corrects the Common Law For Sovereignty in its highest and strictest Importance implies the Contrary to Subjection or the being bound by Humane Laws either of others or its own Appointment so as not to repeal or alter them as there shall be Occasion For it is contrary to Nature for all Men to give Law to Themselves and to be absolutely commnded by Themselves in Things that depend upon their own Will * Nulla Obligatio consistere potest quae à voluntate promittentis statum capit No Obligation can continue firm none can lie there where the Person that engages hath nothing but his own Will to bind him And therefore Sovereign Power Properly so call'd cannot have its Hands ty'd up by any other whether Living or Dead neither its Own nor its Predecessor's Decrees nor the Received Laws of the Country can be Unalterable or Irreversible This Power hath been compared by some to Fire to the Sea to a Wild Beast which it is very hard to tame or make treatable it will not endure Contradiction it will not be molested or if it be it is a Dangerous Enemy a just and severe Avenger of them that have the Hardiness to provoke it †Potestas res est quae moneri doecrique non vult cistrigationem aegrè fert Power says one is a Thing that seldom bears to be admonish'd or instructed and is generally very impatient of Contradiction or Reproof The Marks and Characters which are proper to it Its Properties and by which it is distinguish'd from other Sorts of Power are the Giving Judgment and pronouncing Definitive Sentences whereby all contending Parties shall be concluded and from whence there lies no Appeal A full Authority to make Peace and War Creating and Depriving Magistrates and Officers granting Indulgences and dispensing with the Rigour of the Laws upon particular Hardships and extraordinary Emergencies levying of Taxes coining and adjusting the Value of Money ordering what shall be current in its Dominions and at what Prices Receiving of Homage and Acknowledgments from its Subjects and Embassies from Foreigners Requiring Oaths of Fidelity from the Persons under its Protection and administring them in Controversies and Tryals of Right and Wrong But all is reduc'd at last and comprehended under the Legislative Power the enacting such Laws as it shall think fit and by Them binding the Consciences of Those who live within its Dominions Some indeed have added Others which are so small and trivial in Comparison that they are scarce worth naming after the Former such as the Admiralty Rights of the Sea Title to Wracks upon the Coast Confiscation of Goods in Cases of Treason Power to change the Language the Ensigns of Government and Title of Majesty Greatness and Sovereignty is infinitely coveted by almost All. But wherefore is it Surely for no other Reason so much as that the Outside is Gay and Glorious Beautiful and Glittering but the Inside is hid from common Observation Every body sees the Plenty the Pomp and the Advantages of a Crown but few or none at a distance are acquainted with the Weight the Cares the Troubles and the Dangers of it It is True indeed To Command is a Noble and a Divine Post but it is as True that it is an Anxious a Cumbersome and a Difficult One. Upon the same Account it is that the Persons in that Dignity and Elevation are esteem'd and reverenc'd much above the Rate of Common Men. And very Just it is they should be so for this Opinion is of great Use to extort that Respect and Obedience from the People upon the due Payment whereof all the Peace and Quiet of Societies depend But if we take these great Persons apart from their Publick Character and consider them as Men we shall find them just of the same Size and cast in the same Mould with other common Men nay too often of worse Dispositions and not so liberally dealt with by Nature as many of their Inferiours We are apt to think that every Thing a Prince does must needs proceed upon great and weighty Reasons because all they do is in the Event of great and general Importance to Mankind but in truth the Matter is much otherwise and They think and resolve and act just like One of Us For Nature hath given Them the same Faculties and moves them by the same Springs The Provocation which would set Two private Neighbours to Scolding and Quarrelling makes a Publick War between Two States and what One of Us would whip his Child or his Page for incenses a Monarch to chastise a Province that hath offended him
a thousand other such Sayings by which they remarkably argued a distrust of their own Judgments The rest of them though upon some occasions they have proceeded somewhat dogmatically and delivered their Minds boldly and positively yet seem rather to have dissembled their Doubts than not to have had any and to put the best face they could upon the matter that the World might see how far their Wit would carry them in the Search of Truth a Thing * Quam Docti fingunt magis quà m nôrunt which Learned Men seem rather to have framed an Idea of to themselves than to have known her as she is For after all their boasts of attaining her their Courage fails them at last and the Things uttered by them they dare not venture to bestow any more honourable Titles upon than that of Probabilities and Appearances of Truth and while they represent them variously sometimes in one prospect and form and sometimes in another by Questions and Problems and Ambiguous Disputes as if their design was rather to enquire than to teach and that they sought Information themselves while they pretend to give it to others from all this I say and the whole current of their Style we may reasonably gather that they wrote and spoke not so much with a design to establish a Notion or render it unquestionable as for Diversion and to Exercise their Wits as one says We cannot be sure what their opinions were or that they really believed their own Writings for indeed * Noâ—â—â—â—m id sensiffe quod dicerent quà m exercere ingenia maâ—â—â—â—â—â—â—â—â—cultate voluisse videntur they seem not to have designed we should gather their Sense of things so much as that we should observe and admire their Parts and Skill by those Trials which the nicety and difficulty of their Subject put them upon And who can ever persuade himself that Plato intended his Republick and fanciful Ideas should ever pass for Current Doctrine or that Pythagoras in advancing his Numbers and Epicurus his Atoms spoke their own real Opinions and such as they thought were weighed and measured Truths They pleased and entertained their own Minds with these nice Speculations but †〈…〉 singuntur non ex Scientiae vi the Notions were owing more to the Fruitfulness of their own Inventions than to any strength of Proof or force of Knowledge And indeed they may seem sometimes to have gone out of the common road on purpose and with great Industry to have sought somewhat of Difficulty the better to amuse the world by thus concealing the Vanity of the Subjects they were upon and to furnish matter for the gratifying their Reader 's Curiosity How wretchedly is Aristotle the very Idol of these Dogmatists confounded and at a loss How inconsistent with himself and forced sometimes to confess the Impotence of Human Nature and how short the most inquistive come of the Truth Those that afterwards signalized themselves by a more positive and magisterial way of Writing and from thence got the Title of Dogmatists were Men of a Pedantick and presumptuous Temper They it is true condemn and detest this Rule of Wisdom and were fonder of a Hot-headed peremptory Fellow though contrary to their own Party and Judgment than of a peaceable sedate and modest Man who contents himself with Doubting and declines the pronouncing any thing definitively that is in plain English they esteem a rash Fool more than a Cautious Wise Man Like Women who take it ill not to be contradicted and had rather be answered rudely than not at all Because they think the Coldness and Indifference of Silence argues greater Contempt and Disdain than it is possible for the most injurious Language to express In which they betray great perverseness and injustice For what reason can be given why a Man should not be allowed to suspend his Judgment and still to deliberate upon things as Doubtful without venturing to affirm on either side when They at the same time take a privilege of determining as They see fit Is not there the same Equity at least the same Right for the one as for the other and what mighty Crime is it frankly to confess one's self Ignorant when he is really so and to say nothing when he cannot speak with good Assurance and full Satisfaction It is certain that all Philosophers are agreed so much to our disadvantage as to pronounce that we are Ignorant of a great deal more than we know nay that our Knowledge is not comparable not fit to be mentioned in competition with our Ignorance The Causes of which are infinite for we may be mistaken in the Objects of our Enquiry by reason of their being too near or too distant too great or too small of too long or too short duration and in perpetual Flux and Uncertainty These Causes of Error proceed from the Object but then there are infinite Others owing to our Selves and our Manner of Perception which in truth is not yet universally agreed upon nor perfectly well understood What we think our selves sure of we do not really know nor can we be secure of continuing in our present Opinion any time For how often do we see fresh Arguments extort it from us or if our Obstinacy will hold it fast in despight of all Reasons to the Contrary yet at least they raise a dust and disturb us in the Possession of it Now I would be glad to know which way a man shall ever be capable of improving his Judgment if he fasten himself down to some certain notions resolving to look and examine no farther nor enduring to hear any thing offered in prejudice of an Opinion which he fancieth himself abundantly satisfied in already The plain Truth is Men are asham'd of this Suspense I am treating of because they have a wrong Notion of it They look upon it as a Sign of Want of Judgment whereas in reality the Greatest and most judicious Philosophers that ever lived were the most frank in this Point The Idea of Positiveness and Presumption hath taken such fast hold of them and they think Dogmaticalness and Learning so inseparable that they are out of Countenance in any case to own their Ignorance lest This should be thought a Reflection upon their Parts and Attainments There is no persuading them that there is a sort of Ignorance and Doubt more Learned more Generous and consistent with better Assurance and more accurate Knowledge than all Their boasted Science and Certainty This gave that great renown to Socrates and entitled him to the Character of the Wisest Man of his Age This is the Fruit of Study and deep enquiry it is a modest candid innocent and hearty acknowledgement of the sublime mysterious Nature of Truth and the Defects and Poverty of our own Understanding so weak within so beset with Mists and Darkness without and from Both so uncertain and unsteady in its Resolutions The Lord knoweth the Thoughts of Man that they are but
Party But though Fools believe and are caught by them yet Wise Men know this is all Trick and Design that there is Deceit in the Bait and Death upon the Hook and that all their fair Carriage and large Promises are designed not at all to serve Us but to serve themselves of us Now First of all This Temper we have been describing puts all into confusion exposes the Mind to perpetual uneasiness and brings it into a State of absolute Slavery It argues Ignorance of that which every one ought to know and that is how much he owes to himself and what the Obligations are and the Offices arising from them which are first and strictly due at home All which these persons violate for while they are so mighty officious and liberal in the service of other people they injure and defraud themselves and spend that Stock of Ease and Comfort which is their own due and ought to be preserved Besides if we desire Business Providence hath cut us out enough of our own let us but look at home and discharge the Duty of our respective Stations diligently but especially let us but look within and we shall be far from finding any occasion to ask for work of our Neighbours The difficulty will then be to dispatch that which they ask of Us and instead of laying our selves out upon every bodies business besides we shall then find our hands Full and a necessity of keeping close to our own He that takes care to live as becomes his Virtue and his Honour so as may preserve his health and give him a contented and cheerful Enjoyment of the World hath enough to do and He that neglects or impairs any of these merely to do another service is ill advised and under colour of Good-nature to his Friend is guilty of great Injustice and Ill-nature to himself To oblige and assist others so far as may be consistent with the securing these things to our selves is sufficient but to go beyond that is to break our Duty in one particular while we supererogate in another He is an unreasonable Man that expects one should sacrifice his Virtue or his Happiness to him and He is a very foolish Man that will do it if it be expected And therefore I repeat again a Direction given just now That a Man ought to espouse and devote himself to but very few things and to take care that these be such as will justify the setting his heart upon them and They to be sure can be but very few Secondly This Eagerness of Intention and vehement concern is not only unfit and unjust in other respects but it is also an Inconvenience to it self For it puts Men beside their measures and proves the greatest hindrance and perplexity that can be to that very Undertaking which we are so impatient to accomplish and have set our hearts so much upon As when we strive to go exceeding fast our legs sink under us or step awry or interfere and stop one another * Ipsa se velocitas implicat unde Festinatio tarda est Qui nimium properat seriùs absolvit The very Swiftness of the Pace confounds it self so that even Hast breeds delay And he that begins too fast is slowest in finishing Thus it is likewise with the Mind of a Man when Intoxicated with this forward and furious vehemence of Intention he confounds and hampers himself betrays himself to Indiscretion and Injustice in his proceedings renders himself suspected and hardly thought of gives offence and ground of Resentment to others and puts his own Mind upon a perpetual Fret and Ferment as oft as any thing happens that either defeats or delays the Success he is labouring after †Male cuncta ministrat mdash mdash Impetus Heat and Violence never manage any thing well We may observe it daily what Advantages men lose and how great an Injury they do to themselves their Business the Cause and Party they espouse by this want of Temper even to the ruin of the fairest and most promising Expectations in matters of the greatest Importance And the thing is no less evident too in the most common and insignificant cases In a matter so frivolous as Play for instance where He that is eagerest and most intent upon Winning breaks the rules and proper methods overlooks the advantages of the Game and contributes to his own Loss Whereas an Adversary that plays calmly and sedately hath always his Eyes and his Wits about him his Passion never transports his Reason but he makes the best of every Chance and does not only enjoy the Diversion but bid fairest for the Success He makes his Feints and Doubles and lays hold on every favourable occasion if he fail of his design he bears it with Moderation and makes it up another time is always ready to observe and to improve every Change of Fortune and by jogging on leisurely and keeping the Reins in his own hand comes soonest and safest to his Journey 's End This leads us to a Third Remark of very great Consequence which is that this vehement and eager Zeal infects the Mind and corrupts the Judgment For while Men are addicted to one Person or Party and wholly set upon promoting Their Advantage they go furiously to work and strain every thing beyond its due pitch They extol their Favourites and Partners in the same Cause with undeserved Commendations and load their Adversaries with odious Characters and false Accusations turn Superstitious to the last degree and interpret every Event as ominous and a Prognostication of Good in favour of themselves and Friends and a plain declaration of Providence against those that are engaged in opposition to them Nay they carry this Folly so far as not to see or allow any Virtue or Good quality in their Adversaries represent them as Vicious and Villains and would have us believe that all who think and act and design otherwise than They themselves do must be either Knave◠or Fools and Madmen and those who are more just and moderate in their Sentiments that observe any real Virtues and give due Praises to those that disser from them are presently suspected to be of the same Party and Principle merely for their Charity in vindicating or excusing and not running into the same Excesse of Partiality and Prejudice the same unreasonable Censures and Condemnations with these hot-headed Zealots Whereas indeed nothing can be more extravagant than to imagine that a Man who is not one of Us cannot possibly be a Good Man and that he may not for the main or at least in some cases where the Point in difference is no way concerned be very honest and commendable though it be his unhappiness to be under a wrong persuasion and in some particulars embarqued in the Interest or Opinions of those who are very naughty Men. That Passion should commit a violence upon the Will is but too much but that it should debauch and blind the Judgment and
was a despicable thing because it was the Effect of Cowardice and Laziness so the Doing Well where it is without the expence of Trouble and Hazard is look'd upon by these persons as too vulgar and cheap a thing but the attempting and going through with it in despight of Hazards and Troublesome Oppositions and where these attack us in great number and labour hard to obstruct and deter us from our Duty This is the Commendation of a Good and a Virtuous Person indeed * Difficilia quae pulchra 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plato Whatever is excellent is Difficult was we know the usual Saying of the Noblest Philosopher But to deal plainly and speak the Truth of the matter the Difficulty of obtaining any thing does by no means alter the nature or add to the real and intrinsick value of the thing it self nor is it as I have taken occasion formerly to observe any just and warrantable Cause for raising it in our Esteem Nay it is beyond all Controversy certain on the other side that Natural Excellencies are much more desirable and better than those that are studied and acquired That it is much more Brave and Great and Divine to act by the motions and spontaneous Perfections of Nature than with the most exquisite Dexterity and nicest Improvements of Art in an easy free equal and uniform manner than with laborious Efforts uncertainly and with Doubt and Danger and Perplexity of Thought It is in the former of these two Senses that we term Almighty God Good His Excellencies are his Nature Essential to him and if They could cease he must cease to Be. And therefore to call not Him only but even the Blessed Angels and the Spirits of Just Men made perfect Virtuous is a Diminution and Disparagement to them Theirs is properly Goodness too but Virtue is a Title too low for the Happiness of unsinning Perfection a State of Indefectibility and above the reach of all Temptation 'T is true indeed in the Condition we now live where Dangers surround and threaten and Frailties betray us perpetually Virtue makes somewhat of noise and clutter and is forced to act with some Vehemence and this gives it the Preference before Smooth and Still Goodness For the generality of people always measure the Excellence of a Thing by the Shew and the Difficulty and admire that most which costs dearest but this is a false method of judging and we are not much to wonder if They are wrong here who indeed are generally so in all their Estimations of Men and Things For these great Swelling Performances that look so big and seem to be all zeal and fire are not subsantial nor to the purpose They are no part of true Honesty nor the Products of that fix'd Principle we are speaking of but rather intemperate Heats and Feverish Fits very different from that Wisdom we are now in quest of which is healthful and moderate gentle and calm equal and uniform Thus much may suffice to be said of Honesty or Sincerity in general For as to the several parts of it and the particular Duties resulting from thence they will come under our Consideration in the Third Book and particularly when we shall treat of the Virtue of Justice And here I find my self under an Obligation of discharging my Promise Of Grace in the necessary Addition of what follows in this Paragraph To silence if it be possible the unjust Malice and disadvantagious Character cast upon me by some who find fault with my as they think them Extravagant Commendations of Nature as if This were able to do every thing and no other Assistances were required To these persons it might suffice to reply that by Nature I understand as was observed before the God of Nature and the Dictates of Eternal Reason written and engraved in every Heart by His Almighty Hand I might also alledge that the Subject of this Book is only Natural and Human and that the Author is not obliged by his Design to concern himself with any Virtues properly Divine or the Advantages above the power of Nature to confer But waving all this I readily acknowledge that to render the Virtue and Integrity I have been describing compleat and give it all the Perfections it is capable of one thing more is necessary The Grace of God I mean which must animate and invigorate this Goodness and Probity shew it in all its lustre give the finishing stroke refine and exalt it from a mere Moral to a Christian Virtue This renders it accepted at the Throne of Heaven approved of God capable of an Eternal Recompence and so crowns it both with Perfection here and a Reward hereafter It is not easy to find Apposite Resemblances for Things which cannot present themselves to us by any sensible Ideas But if you will pardon the meanness of the Comparison I should almost venture to compare the Probity here insisted on to a Skilful Master who touches the Keys of an Organ with absolute Accuracy and Art but all to no purpose the Instrument is dumb till the Wind express the Excellence of his Hand by giving Sound to the Instrument and making that Melody which all his Mastery in playing was not able to do without it Thus Moral Virtue is but a sort of Speculative Perfection till the Grace of God inspire and enable us to put it in Practice and produce the Fruits of it Now This is a Blessing which does not consist in refined Thought nice Notions and long or learned Discourses it is not to be acquired by Rule or the methods of Human Industry and Art nor can we attain to it by our own Labour and Toil the utmost we can do is to prepare and endeavour to qualify our selves duly for the receiving it for after All Receive it we must It is a Gift that comes down from on high and the very Name of Grace is designed to represent to us the Good Will of the Donor and that the Gift is entirely free Our part is to ask to seek to implore it with all imaginable Humility and the most fervent Desires we are capable of To prostrate our selves before the Throne of Grace and with the utmost Contention of Heart and Voice to say Vouchsafe O my God in thy Infinite Goodness to look down with an Eye of Mercy and Pity upon thy poor Servant Accept and grant my Desires assist my weak Endeavours and crown those good Inclinations which are originally derived from Thee The Law by which I stand obliged the Light by which I am instructed in my Duty are of thy Ordering thou hast stamped our Nature with these Impressions of Good and Evil and shined in our hearts by thy Precepts O give Success to thy own Institution and finish the work thou hast begun that so the Glory and the Fruit may redound to the Planters use and thou may'st be first and last in all my Actions and Designs my Thoughts and my Desires Water me abundantly
Grace at the bottom but by the Figure and all the outward appearances they make they very much resemble the Persons mentioned before who are so immoderately zealous for Religion that they have little or no concern for any thing besides marvellously satisfied with Themselves and merciless Censurers of all the World besides And these are the Men that make all manner of Probity and Good Actions to be a consequent and attendant upon Religion wholly to depend upon and entirely to be devoted to it and so they acknowledge no such thing as Principles of Natural Justice or Probity of Mind and otherwise than they are derived from and moved by the Springs of Considerations purely Religious Now the Matter is far otherwise for Religion is not only after it in Time but more limited and particular in its Extent This is a distinct Virtue and not the Comprehension and Sum of all Virtues and as the Instances of Pharisees and Hypecrites here prove may subsist without Them or that general good Disposition of Mind which we call Probity And so again may They be independent of Religion as the Examples of Philosophers and good Moral Heathens who we cannot say had ever any Religion properly so called shew on the other hand This is also according to the common Schemes of Theology a Moral Virtue a Branch of Justice which we know is one of the Four Cardinal Virtues and teaches us to give to All their Due according to their Quality and respective Claims Now God being Supreme the Maker and Master of the Universe we are bound to pay him the most profound Honour the most humble Obedience the most punctual and diligent Service This now is properly Religion and consequently it is a division under the General Topick of Justice Again These Persons as they mistake the Nature so do they likewise invert the Order of things for they make Religion antecedent to Probity But how can this be since as the Apostle says Faith cometh by Hearing and Hearing by the Word of God how I say can That which is the Effect of Revelation and Instruction be the Cause of a Thing originally rooted in Nature born with us and inseparable from us For such is that Law and Light of God kindled in every Man's Breast and interwoven with the Constitution of the whole Species This therefore is plainly disturbing the true Order of these matters and turning them out of all method They would have a Man Virtuous and entirely Good merely for the Prospect of Heaven to allure or the Terrors of Hell to affright and awe him into his Duty But methinks those Expressions carry a very ill sound and speak a mean and vulgar Virtue ' If the Fear of the Divine Vengeance and Everlasting Damnation did not restrain me I would do thus or thus O pitiful cowardly Wretch what Sense what Notion hast thou of thy Duty what Inclinations dost thou cherish all this while what Motives dost thou act upon what Thanks dost thou deserve for all that is done upon such constraint and against thy own Will Thou art not wicked because thou darest not be so for fear of the Rod. Now I would have thee so perfect as not to want the Courage but the Inclination to do amiss I would have thee so resolutely good as not to commit the least Evil though thou wer 't sure never to be chidden never to be called to an account for it Thou playest the part of a Good Man that thou may'st be thanked and rewarded for thy pains I would have thee be really so without any prospect of hire or gain nay though none but thy self should ever be conscious of thy Virtue I would have thee so because the Laws and Dictates of Nature and Reason direct and Command thee to be so For Nature and Reason in this case are but another word for God and These Principles and That Light and the Original Distinctions of Good and Evil are his Will and his Laws issued in a different manner Because the Order and Good Government of the World whereof thou art a part require this at thy hands because thou canst not consent to be otherwise without acting against thy self in contradiction to thy Being to thy Interest to the End of thy Creation And when thou hast thus satisfied thy duty and acted upon these motives never be solicitous for the Event but persevere in Virtue in despight of any Sufferings or Dangers that may threaten thee When I urge This as the best Principle of doing well I do not wholly disallow all others nor utterly condemn that Probity required and cherished by the external motives of Recompence and Punishment as if These were unlawful to be proceeded upon Doubtless they have their Use and Efficacy are very proper for the reducing of Ill Men who must be treated in a more slavish and mercenary way and the Foundations thus laid at first come frequently to noble Improvements But still I call this a poorer and meaner Principle and would have my Wise Man aspire to something sublimer and more worthy his Character For This requires a brighter stronger and more generous Probity than the Common sort of Mankind may be allowed to take up with And even Divines have generally represented such a Piety as Servile Imperfect accommodated to the weaker and more ignorant and fitter for Babes and Beginners than for Strong and Masterly Christians This farther is very certain that the Probity wholly depending upon a Spirit of Zeal and Religion and having no regard to the Principles of Natural Light besides that it must needs be accidental and unequal in its Operations and want that Evenness and Constancy which was there largely shewn to be one of its Properties I add that This is a very dangerous Principle and does frequently pruduce horrid and scandalous effects for it makes all the Rules of Common Honesty subservient to Zeal for Religion and opens a Door for all those execrable Villanies which the dear-bought experience of all Ages hath too sensibly convinced us are capable of being committed under the fair Shew and Colour of Piety And These are really so dreadful and detestable that we have reason to question whether any other occasion or pretence in the World have done more mischief than those false but specious professions of Religion The Cause and Honour of God is indeed the Greatest the Noblest and most worthy our Zeal and if it were not all this in its own nature the abuse of it could never be so fatal as it is For Brave and Valuable things only are subjects for Hypocrisy and what is little and despicable as the right use of it does no great good so the perverting it to wrong purposes can do no mighty harm It is not therefore any Disparagement to Religion but the confess'd Excellency of it above any other Subject whatsoever that the Corruption and false Pretences of it are so pernicious Were it less good the abuse of it must have been
and how fierce soever the Assaults may be yet He will suffer but little by them who feels all easy in his own Breast and hath the best Defensive Armour in the World to oppose against them a Good Courage because a Clear Conscience Adversity is of two kinds Either That which truly and in its own nature is such More particular Advice what we cannot continue Men and not be moved with such as Sickness and Pain and the Loss of those things which are very dear to us or else That which is not really such but falsly represented to be so and owes its being reputed such either to some general Opinion and Vulgar Error or else to the private Interpretation and Sense of particular Persons When This is the Case a Man hath both his Mind and Body at his own disposal just as before any such Afflictions happened And therefore in such Notional Calamities all that need or can be said is this That what you make such doleful Complaints of hath nothing painful or troublesome in it but all this is of your own creating who put on an unnecessary Melancholy resent things tenderly cry out when you are not hurt and fancy Misery where there is really none As for those which are Real and Natural the most Obvious Real Afflictions Remedies against them and Popular and Sound Advice is in this Case the most Natural and most Equitable and therefore without proposing nice and studied and uncommon Arguments I shall content my self with these few following Reflections First A Man will do well to remember that nothing of this kind which he endures is contrary to the Law of Nature and the Condition of Manking Since Man is born to Sorrow as the Sparks fly upward that is All such things as these are very ordinary and usual and from his Birth entailed and annexed as Incumbrances upon this State of Mortality into which he is admitted Therefore upon every Accident that uses to afflict us we ought constantly to consider Two things The Nature of what happens to us and our own Nature and when once we come to regard things as they really are and to behave our selves accordingly we shall then deliver our selves from any Vexation and Disquiet that can arise from them Vexation and Fretfulness are a Disease of the Soul a Distemper unnatural in it self and what ought by no means to be allowed by us For Nature hath been so bountiful and so very provident for our Ease that there is not any Accident possible to come upon us which She hath not already furnished us with a Faculty to bear and manage and convert to our Good and rendred capable of such Arguments and Considerations as may very reasonably prevail with us to be contented under it There is no one Condition of Life so destitute and deplorable but it hath some Interval of Refreshment some Solace some mitigating Circumstance to soften it There is no Confinement so close no Dungeon so dark but some Light will spring in some Comfort may be found to chear the Prisoner and drive the Sorrow from his heart Jonas we see found Leisure for Devotion even in he Whale's Belly and from thence poured out a Prayer which God graciously accepted and answer'd And sure This is a Privilege of considerable Value and a great kindness in Nature that she supplies us with Lenitives and contrives whys for the qualifying and asswaging of our Pains even in the instant of our labouring under them This ought no more to be forgotten for ou Consolation and Support than that other Reflection That our Condition necessarily exposes us to Suffering and we were born liable to all kinds of Misery For * Omnia ad quae gemimus ad quae expâ—vescimus Tributa viâ—ae sunt all those Grievances which we either groan under or tremble with apprehensions of their Approach are but so many Taxes or Rent-Charges upon Life Secondly It may be of great Advantage to consider that notwithstanding none of us are or can be absolutely exempt from the Power and Jurisdiction of Fortune yet we are far from being entirely under it and That by much the least part of us is subject to it The Principal and most valuable is still in our own hands no Attempts from without can subdue or wrest it from us nothing can lose it but our own Consent and Voluntary Surrender 'T is confess'd Fortune can reduce us to Poverty waste us with Sicknes harass us with Afflictions but it cannot debauch our Manners nor enfeeble our Spirits nor make us submit to base and unmanly immoral and dishonourable Actions And how happy is it that we are thus far out of her reach how incomparably better that she should tyrannize over our Riches or Successes or even Health it self than that she should deprive us of our Probity our Courage and our Virtue Let us support and please our selves with this Reserve for while we hold our Own nothing can render us truly miserable In the next place I must beg of Men that they will be Honest and act according to the Rules of Reason and Justice For the very truth is Men are frequently very injurious to Providence and complain without any Just cause For if at any time a cross Accident befall us shall we sit down under it full of Murmurings and discontented Thoughts No sure let us rather recollect how much oftener things have succeeded as we would wish and then compute and compare these and balance one with the other And I make no doubt to affirm If this Reckoning were fairly and impartially stated but the most Melancholy most Unfortunate Man alive might see greater reason to commend and be thankful for the Good the Successful Passages of his Life than to repine at any Losses and Disappointments he may have sustained in it 'T is a Reflection full of Eternal Equity Shall we receive Good at the hand of the Lord and shall we not receive Evil But it is enough to silence all our Grumblings and put all Complainers to the blush when improved with this Small but most True Addition Shall we receive Good more and oftner and shall we not be content to receive the Evil which is but little and seldom Nature hath taught us to shut or turn away our Eyes from all such Objects as are shocking or offensive to us to remove them from such Colours as hurt and strain the Sight and to six upon others more gay and agreeable There is the same Reason here and Prudence and Duty both oblige us to call off our Thoughts from melancholy subjects and to divert them with others more pleasant and entertaining But we seem to be of quite different Dispositions to feed upon the Worst and indulge our selves in Peevishness and Spight We are like Cupping-glasses that draw only the foul and corrupt Blood and let all the good alone like Misers that put off their best Wine and keep the worst for their own drinking like froward
nay sometimes against Reason It brings Notions in Philosophy in Religion in Politicks Opinions and Ceremonies Fashions and Modes of Living into credit though they be never so fantastical and extravagant never so uncouth and distant from what Reason and Judgment would teach and approve Nor is its Tyranny less formidable in the contrary Extreme for it as frequently does great wrong to things in themselves noble and worthy of universal Advantage by disparaging and lessening them and even bringing them into Neglect and universal Contempt So unreasonably does Custom and common Fame raise or lower the Market so precarious and uncertain is the greatest intrinsick Worth if it happen to be lodged in an Obsolete Opinion an Antiquated and Unfashionable Virtue For all these things have their Seasons of Improvement and Declension and the Sentiments of the World upon them will vary though the Reason and Nature of the thing be constantly the same * Nil adeo magnum nec tam mirabile quiequam Principio quod non desinant mirarier omnes Paulatim Lucret. L. 11. What we now with greatest ease receive Seem'd strange at first and we could scarce believe And what we wonder at as Years increase Familiar grows and all our Wondrings cease Creech Thus you plainly see the vast Influence and excessive Power of Custom Plato was once reproving a Youth for playing often at Cob-nut who replied in his own excuse Methinks Sir under favour you chide me for a very small matter No said Plato you are mightily mistaken for be assured Young Man that Custom is never a small matter A Sentence this which well deserves the Serious Attention of All who have the care of educating Youth Once more Custom is so very tyrannical in the Exercise of its Power and expects so unreserved a Compliance that it will not give us leave to struggle with it or retreat from it nay does not allow us so much as the Liberty to consider and reason with our selves whether what it imposes be fit for us to comply with or not It so perfectly charms our Senses and Judgment as to persuade us that every thing which is new and strange must needs be contrary to Reason and that there can be no Justice or Goodness in any thing which Custom hath not confirmed and made current by its Approbation We do not govern our selves by Reason but are carried away by 〈◊〉 whatever is most in use that we esteem most virtuous most becoming even Error it self when it is become Epidemical hath the Authority of Truth with us These Complaints of Seneca are but too true in every Age and Place and were only the Plain and Mean and Ignorant People concerned in them the Calamity were somewhat tolerable Because these Men are not really qualified to enter into the true Reasons and Differences of things they have not Sagacity enough to see nor Solidity enough to search an Argument to the bottom and Therefore 't is the best thing They can do since they are not able to distinguish and judge for themselves to pin their Opinions upon the Sleeves of Those that are able and let Them speak for them This is a safe and a peaceable way and the Publick sinds great Ease and Convenience from it But for Wife Men who are under a very different Character and have another part to Act to see Them led thus about by the Nose and enslaved to every Folly that puts on the Venerable Face of Custom is very much below their Judgment and Quality and may justly be allowed to move our Indignation that They should so far forget themselves and what they are qualisied for I do not mean by this that a Man who would approve himself Wife Advice with regard to Laws and Customs should be Singular and Precise and denounce War upon all Mankind and their Manners for my Desire and Advice is that he should be very observant of the Laws and Customs which are established and in present force in the Countrey where he dwells Yet that not with a Servile Superstitious Spirit but from a Manly and Generous Principle That he should speak of them with Deference and great Respect and conform his Actions and whole Behaviour to the Rules and Measures they prescribe And all this I would have him do not merely from a Conviction of their Agreement with the Principles of Justice and Equity and Reason but without regarding so much what they are in themselves and upon this Consideration only that they are Laws and Customs Then I desire he should be very cautious and considerate in his Judgment of Foreign Customs and Constitutions and not rashly condemn or take offence at them upon slight and superficial Pretences And Lastly I would have him with all possible Seriousness Freedom and Impartiality examine into both the Domestick and the Foreign and engage his Judgment and Opinion in the behalf of either no farther than Reason will bear him out These are the Four Instructions which I shall a little enlarge upon and they contain the Whole of what seems to me necessary under this Head In the First place All Wife Men agree that the observing the Laws They ought to be complied with and being governed by the Customs of the Countrey where we dwell is the Great and Fundamental Principle the Law of Laws because indeed it is This which gives Life and Vigor to all the rest All affected ways of living that are particular and out of the common Road give just Cause of Indignation and Jealousy betray a great deal of Folly or Conceitedness or Ambition confound the Order and disturb the Government of the World I add in the Second Place that This be done out of Reverence to Publick Authority Not merely for the Justice and Equity of them For strictly speaking these Laws and Custom support their Credit and ought to preserve an Authority not merely with regard to any inherent Equity or Reasonableness to be discovered in them but they are sacred upon this single Consideration That they are Laws and Customs though there be nothing else to recommend them to our Observance This is the Mystical Foundation upon which they stand and the great Secret of Government and properly speaking they have no other Motive but their Sanction to enforce them My meaning is not from hence That any Establishment though never so strong can derive a Right to our Obedience upon Laws and Usages manifestly Unreasonable and Unjust but that He who obeys a Law merely for the sake of its Subject-matter being just though he do the thing commanded by it yet he does it upon a wrong Principle For at this rate every Law must submit it self to the Judgment of every private Man and each Subject shall call it to account arraign and try it at the Bar of his own Breast bring all Obedience to be a Matter of Controversy and Doubt and by consequence all the Right of Administration and the whole Civil Polity must
will be sure to stand its ground Distress and Pain are so far from making it flinch that they feed and cherish and exalt it it lives it grows it triumphs by them There is certainly greater Firmness of Mind express'd in bearing and making an Advantage of one's Chain than in breaking it to pieces because it keeps us confined and ties us fast to some Uneasinesses And all considerate Men must allow that Regulus shew'd infinitely more Gallantry than Cato * Rebus in Adversis facile est contemnere Vitam Fortiter Ille facit qui Miser esse potest Martial Lib. xi Ep. 57. The Base when wretched dare to Dye but He Is Brave indeed who dares to Live in Misery †Si fractus illabatur orbis Impavidum ferient ruinae Horat. Od. 3. L. 3. If the Crack'd Orbs should split and fall Crush him they might but not Appall Sir R. Fanshaw Nay these Men ought to be accounted Infamous and treated as Deserters For no Man can answer quitting the Post he is order'd to without the express Leave and fresh Orders of the Superior Officer who placed hi there We are by no means put into the World upon our own account alone and therefore Personal Calamities must not put us upon an Act of so great Injustice as the squandring away That in which Others have a Right as well as We nor yet are we Masters of our selves but under the Disposal and Direction of a Lord who hath a Right Paramount Thus you see what Arguments are generally brought on either side but if we set the Considerations of Duty and Religion aside and take the Liberty to speak the Sense of mere Nature in the Case the Resolution she would come to seems to be This That Men ought not to enter upon this Last and Boldest Exploit without some very extraordinary and most pressing Reason to induce them that so it may be what They call making a Decent and Honourable Exit Every slight Occasion every little Pett or cross Accident will not justify Men's falling out with the World and therefore They are certainly in a great Error who pretend that a small Excuse will serve to quit Life since there are no very Weighty Arguments to persuade our keeping it This is highly ungrateful to God and Nature when so Rich a Present is so much slighted and undervalued It is an Argument of great Levity and betrays a great deal of Moroseness and Ill Humour when we quarrel and break Company upon every slender Provocation But indeed there is something to be said though that something is not enough for a very Urgent and Weighty Occasion such as renders Life a perpetual Torment and the Thoughts of continuing in it insupportable such for Instance as I mentioned formerly Long Acute Excessive Pain or the certain Prospect of a very Cruel and Ignominious Death And upon this account the several Persons that I am going to name how favourably soever Story hath represented their Behaviour do by no means seem to have a Plea sufficient to Justify no not so much as to Excuse a Voluntary Death Such are Pomponius Attiâ—us Marcellinus and Cleanthes who after they had begun the Process resolved to finish it merely because they would avoid the trouble of having the whole Course to begin and go through again For what Apology soever might be made for the delivering themselves from a Painful Distemper yet when that Pain and the Cause of it were removed they lay under no farther Temptation to be out of love with Life and a bare Possibility of the Disease returning was a Consideration much too remote The Wives of Paetus and Scaurus and Labeo and Fulvius the intimate Friend of Augustus of Seneca and a great many more were as fantastically fool-hardy when they killed Themselves either to bear their Husbands Company out of the World or to invite Them to go with them So likewise Cato and others who were discontented with the Event of their Undertakings and the Chance of War and chose rather to dye by their own hands than to fall into their Enemy's notwithstanding these Enemies were such as gave them no just ground to fear any barbarous or dishonourable Treatment from them neither The same Censure will fall upon Them who murder'd themselves rather than they would be beholding to one they hated for their Lives or lye at the Mercy of an Ill Man as Gravius Silvanus and Statius Proximus did after Nero had given them his Pardon Nor are They less to blame who run into the Shades of Death to hide themselves from Shame and cover the Reproach of some past Dishonour or Misfortune such as Lucretia after the Injury she had suffered from Tarquin and Spargopises Son to Tomyris the Seythian Queen and Boges Commander under Xerxes the former because he could not bear being Prisoner of War to Cyrus the other for the Loss of a Town taken by Cimon the Athenian General Nor They who could not endure to survive a Publick Calamity though nothing extraordinary had befallen Them in particular such as Nerva the Great Lawyer Vibius Virius at the Taking of Capua and Jubelliâ—s at the Death of the greatest part of their Senators inflicted by a Roman Officer And least of all can those Nice and Delicate People excuse themselves who chuse to dye because they are cloyed with Life and weary of repeating the Same Things over again Nay I must go farther yet For it is by no means sufficient that the Occasion be very Important and full of Difficulty unless it be Desperate and past all Remedy too for nothing less than Necessity ought to be pleaded here and This should be the last Reserve the Only Escape from Extremity of Misfortune Upon this Account Rashness and Despondency and anticipating one's Fate and Giving all for Lost is always exceeding blameable an Instance whereof we have in Brutus and Cassius who before there was any occasion for it put an End to their own Lives and with Them to all the languishing Remains of the Liberty of Rome which was committed to and depended entirely upon Their Protection For as Cleomenes truly said Men are under an Obligation to use Life frugally and to make it go as far as possibly they can nay not only to contrive that it may last as long as is possible but that it may be useful to the very last For a Man may discharge himself of this Trust at any time and when Things are at the very worst tht they can be This Remedy is what no Man can be at a loss for But we should wait for better Days and try whether the hand of our Fortune will not mend upon us * Aliquis Carnisici suo superstes fuit Many a Man as Seneca observes hath outliv'd his Executioner Josephus and a great many besides have followed this Advice to excellent good purpose and Matters when in all human probability desperate and lost have wheel'd about and taken a quite different Course
unbecoming their Character and if They do a thing it must needs be excellent and good And on the other hand Governours are so sensible of the Force of this Motive too that they think their Subjects indispensably obliged to those Rules which they are content to be governed by themselves and that their own doing what they would have done by others is singly a sufficient Inducement to bring it into Practice and common Vogue without the Formality of a Command to enforce it From all which it is abundantly manifest that Virtue is exceeding necessary and advantageous to a Prince both in point of Interest and in point of Honour and Reputation All Virtue is so in truth without Exception though not All equally neither for there are four Species of it Four Principal Virtues which seem to have greater and more commanding Influence than the rest and those are Piety Justice Valour and Clemency These are more properly Princely Qualities and shine brightest of all the Jewels that adorn a Crown of the Excellencies I mean that even a Prince's Mind can be possibly endued with This gave occasion to that most Illustrious of all Princes Augustus Caesar to say That Piety and Justice exalt Kings and translate them into Gods And Seneca observes that Clemency is a Virtue more suitable to the Character of a Prince than to persons of any other Quality whatsoever Now the Piety of a Prince consists and must exert it self in the Care and Application which he ought to use for the Preservation and Advancement of Religion of which every Sovereign ought to consider himself as the Guardian and Protector And thus indeed he should do for his own sake for this Zeal and pious Care will contribute very much to his own Honour and Safety For they that have any regard for God will not dare to attempt no not so much as to contrive or imagine any Mischief against that Prince who is God's Image upon Earth and who plainly approves himself to be such by his zealous and tender Concern for the Glory and the Institution of his great Original And in effect this tends no the Security of the People too and the Quiet of the Government in general For as Lactantius frequently urges Religion is the common Band that links Communities together Society could not be supported without it Take off this Restraint and the World would immediately be overrun with all manner of Wickedness Barbarity and Brutality So great an Interest hath every Government in Religion so strong so necessary a Curb is the Sense and Fear and Reverence of it to unruly Mankind Thus on the other hand even Cicero who does not appear to have been any mighty Devote makes it his Observation That the Romans owed the Rise and Growth and flourishing Condition of their Commonwealth to their Exemplary Respect for Religion more than to any other Cause whatsoever Upon this account every Sovereign is very highly concerned and strictly oblig'd to see that Religion be preserv'd entire and that no Breaches be made upon it That it be encourag'd and supported according to the establish'd Laws in all its Rights Ceremonies Usages and Local Constitutions Great Diligence should be used to prevent Quarrels Divisions and Innovations and severe Punishments inflicted upon all who go about to alter or disturb or infringe it For without all Controversie every Injury done to Religion and all rash and bold Alterations in it draw after them a very considerable damage to the Civil State weaken the Government Dion and have a general ill Influence upon Prince and People both as Moecenas very excellently argues in his Oration to Augustus Next after Piety Justice is of greatest Consequence and Necessity Justice and Fidelity without which Governments are but so many Sets of Banditi Robbers and Invaders of the Rights of their Brethren This therefore a Prince ought by all means to preserve and maintain in due Honour and Regard both in his own Person and Conversation and in the Observance of those under his Jurisdiction 1. It is necessary to be strictly observed by the Sovereign Himself For nothing but Detestation and the utmost Abhorrence is due to those Barbarous and Tyrannical Maxims which pretend to set a Prince above all Laws and to complement him with a Power of Dispensing at Pleasure with Reason and Equity and all manner of Obligation and Conscience which tell Kings that they are not bound by any Engagements and that their Will and Pleasure is the only Measure of their Duty That Laws were made for common Men and not for such as They That every thing is Good and Just which they find most practicable and convenient In short that their Equity is their Strength and whatever they can do that they may do * Principi Leges nemo scripsit Licet si libet In summâ fortunà id requius quod validius nihil injustum quod fructuosum Sanctitas â—ietas Fides privata bona sunt quà juvâ—t Reges eant No Man ever presumes to prescribe to Princes or include them within the Verge of any Laws but their own Inclinations In the highest Post Justice is always on the stronger side That which is most profitable can never be unlawful Holiness and Piety Faith and Truth and common Honesty are the Virtues of private Men Princes may take their own Course and are above these vulgar Dispensations So say Pliny and Tacitus But against this false Doctrine too apt to be liked by Persons in Power I entreat my wise Prince to oppose the really Excellent and Pious Sentences and Directions of Grave and Good Philosophers They tell you That the greater Power any Man is invested with the more regular and modest he should be in the Exercise of it That this is one of those Things which must always be used with a Reserve and the more one could do the less it will become him to do That the more absolute and unbounded any Man's Authority is the greater Check and more effectual Restraint he hath upon him That every Man's Ability should be measured by his Duty and what he may not that he cannot do †Minimum decet libere cui nimium licet Non â—as potentes posse sieri quod nefas He that can do what he will must take care to will but a very little And Great Men should never think they have a Liberty of doing what ought not to be done The Prince then ought to lead the way and be first and most eminent for Justice and Equity and particularly he must be sure to be very punctual to his Word and to keep his Faith and his Promise most inviolably because Fidelity and Truth is the Foundation of all manner of Justice whatsoever whether to all his Subjects in general or to each Person in particular How mean soever the Party or how slight soever the Occasion be still this Word must be Sacred When he hath thus provided for his own Behaviour
of great Dignity and Importance for Life much less suffer them to be hereditary and descend in the same Family nay it is dangerous indeed to continue These for any long Term of Years lest Men by this Means should strengthen their Party and at last become a Match for their Master And whoever shall consult Histories both Ancient and Modern and there examine the Causes of Powerful Factions and the most surprising and fatal Revolutions of States and Empires will find the greatest part of them owing to the Exorbitant Riches and Power of some over-grown Subject or the Influence and Interest of some old and important Officer So that Seneca had good Reason to say * Nil tam utile quam brevem potestatem esse quae magna sit Nothing is so convenient and advantageous to the State as the frequent Change of high Offices no Trust no Power which is Great ought to be continued long in the same Hand These are fair Against Tyranny and honest Means agreable to Justice becoming the Character of a Prince and fit for him to use for the acquiring and supporting himself bothin the Good Affections of the World and in a Venerable Authority with them Upon these Terms he may be loved and seared both and so it is necessary he should be For though a convenient Mixture of these Two be desirable and excellent yet either of them singly and destitute of the other is neither Reasonable in its self nor any Security to the Government Upon which Account it is that we detest and abhor a Tyrannical Authority a Fear absolutely repugnant to and destructive of Affection and Love such as reners the Person an Object of all Men's Hatred at the same time †Oderint dum metuant Let them hate me so they fear me is a brutish and savage Declaration no one that is really a Man would be content with Power and Greatness at that Rate and this Authority if it be sit to allow it so honourable a Name is such as Barbarous and Arbitrary and Wicked Men procure to themselves not by the Exercise but by the Abuse of their Power The Qualities and Character of a good Prince and a Tyrant have no manner of Resemblance to one another The Distance is so vast the Disparity so notorious that it is scarce possible for a Man not to distinguish between them In short they all turn at last upon these Two Points One is The observing the Laws of God and Nature with a Religious Strictness or the trampling both under Foot with the greatest Insolence and Contempt The other making the publick Good and true Interest of one's Subjects the End and Measure of all one's Actions or the making every Thing truckle to his own Will and by every Action and Design serving and aiming at nothing else but private Profit and Pleasure Now the Prince who will answer his Character and be what so glorious a Station requires must constantly remember that as it is the peculiar Happiness and Prerogative of Power to do whatever he hath a Mind to So it is also the true Prerogative of the Will and the most certain Mark of real Greatness to have a Mind to such things only as are Just and Lawful and becoming * Caesari cum omnia licent propter hoc minus licet Ut foelicitatis est posse quantum velis Sic magnitudinis velle quantum possis vel potius quantum debeas Caesar says Pliny hath less in his Power than Common Men upon this very account that every thing is in his Power For as it is a Happiness to be able to do what you please so it is true Greatness to will only such things as you can do or rather indeed to desire and will no more than you ought to do for in strict speaking a Man can do no more than lawfully hemay do The greatest Misfortune that any Prince is capable of is the being possessed with an Opinion that his Will is his Rule and that all that is possible is lawful for him As soon as ever he hath given way to this vile Imagination his whole Temper and Manners presently grow corrupt and from a good Man he is transformed into a wicked Wretch and a Monster Now this Opinion commonly insinuates it self by Sycophants and Parasites Flattery infuses and blows it up for Persons of that Dignity never want enough and too many to preach up to them the Greatness of their Power because this is a pleasing Doctrine and tickles the Ear but the Obligations of Duty carry a harsh and grating Sound and there are few but very few Servants so hardy in their Fidelity as to entertain their Master upon this necessary Subject But of all sorts of Flattery That is the most dangerous when a Man flatters Himself In other Cases a Man may stop his Ears against the treacherous Insinuation he may enjoyn Silence forbid all Discourse of that kind avoid the Presence and Company of the nauseous Wretches that use and hope to ingratiate themselves by it But when the Person who gives and he who receives the Flattery are one and the same What shall he do or whether shall he run from such destructive Conversation And therefore a Prince above all other People is highly concern'd to deal honestly by himself to decline and despise the fulsom and base Soothings of other People who hope to make their court this way and especially to be a severe Inquisitor and Judge of his own Actions and not to cajole himself into Ruine After all that hath been said and too much cannot be said against Tyranny and Arbitrary Administration it is necessary to add that sometimes such critical Junctures of Affairs will happen such Intricacies and Perplexities in Publick Business with regard to Time Person Places Occasions or some accidental Circumstances that a Prince will be driven to a necessity of doing some things which at first view may look like Tyranny As for instance When the Matter depending before him is the suppressing of another Tyranny the Licentiousness I mean of a head-strong hair-brain'd People whose ungovernable Fury is the most absolute most destructive Tyranny in the World Or when he is to break some close Cabal or powerful Faction of the Nobility and Persons of Wealth and Figure in their Country Or when the publick Treasures are reduced and wasted the King driven to extreme Wants and knows not where to furnish himself with needful Supplies and so is compelled for the Relief of the State in its present Exigency to raise Moneys irregularly and borrow from the Rich by such Loans as they are not perfectly contented with Of these Extremities and the Methods and Remedies proper for them I have spoken formerly and the only design of renewing the mention of them here is to persuade People to give the best and most favourable Interpretation to Cases of necessity and not immediately clamour against them and represent them in their worst and most
a brighter Image of Virtue and Magnanimity than a Monarch pardoning the Affronts and Ill-Usage which he never deserv'd But it is also very often the most prudent and politick Course and most effectual Security to him for the Future For Men who have any the least remains of Ingenuity and Humanity will be melted by it into Repentance and better Principles Perfidiousness it self will be put out of Countenance and others who see such eminent Goodness will be ashamed of any base Design and effectually diverted from pursuing or projecting it And of this Augustus hath given us a famous Instance both as to the Prudential and the Successful Part in his Behaviour to Cinna when engaged in a Conspiracy against him SECT VI. Treasonable Practices BY Treachery and Treasonable Practices I understand a secret Attempt or Conspiracy not against the Prince's own Person or the Government in general as the former Head was but against some particular Post or Place of Strength or some distinct and less Body of Men. In this respect it differs from what went before but they both agree in their Nature and Character of being secret and unforeseen Evils extremely dangerous if they succeed and as hard to be avoided or prevented For the Traytor is commonly hid in a Crowd in the very midst of the Party he designs to betray or of the Fortification which he intends to make sale of and deliver up into the Enemies hand The Persons most disposed to this abominable perfidious Trade are the Covetous the sickle and fond of Change and the formal Dissemblers And this Quality too they have that they make a mighty Noise and Bustle with their Loyalty are large in their Commendations of it violently and unseasonably clamorous against all breach of Trust superstitiously nice in Matters of little or no Consequence and these Pretences and Extraordinary Affectations of Fidelity by which they labour to conceal their Villany are really the best and surest Marks to discover and distinguish them by For they are so natural to Men of such Principles that any Man who knows what it is to over-act a Part cannot but find them out Now the Directions proper for such Occasions are for the most part the same with those in the former Case Only in the Matter of Punishment indeed this difference is to be made That These Men ought to be made Examples immediately to be dealt with after a very rigorous manner and excluded from all Mercy For they are Men of wretched profligate incorrigible Tempers the Bane and Pest of Mankind no Reformation is to be expected from them and therefore since Pity is lost as to all hopes of doing Good upon the Offenders themselves it is necessary they should be cut off for the Sake and Safety of others SECT VII Disorders and Popular Insurrections OF these I reckon several Sorts according as the Causes which provoke and kindle these Combustions the Persons concern'd in them the Manner and the Continuance of the Disorders differ The Variety whereof will appear more evidently by treating in the following Sections of Factions and Combinations Seditions Tyranny Rebellion and Civil Wars But at present I shall insist upon the plainest and most generally receiv'd Notion of the Word for such Risings of the People as proceed from some present Heat and are only a Tumult soon up and soon down again The Prescriptions proper for this Distemper are To draw them if possible to a Parley to try if they can be prevail'd with to hear Reason and in case they will suffer themselves to be argu'd with Then to expostulate and remonstrate things fairly by the Interposition of some Person of established Reputation eminent Virtue powerful Eloquence and skill'd in Address One whose Gravity and Industry and Authority may be sufficient to gain upon them and soften the Fury even of an incens'd Rabble For at the Presence of a Person thus qualify'd they will presently be Thunder-struck and all he says will gain credit and make its own way through them * Veluti magno in populo cum saepe coorta est Seditio saevitque animis ignobile vulgus Jamque faces saxa volant furor arma ministrat Tum pietate gravem ac mentis si forte virum quem Conspexere silent arrectisque auribus astant Ille regit dictis animos pectora mulcet Virgil. As when in Tumults rise th' ignoble Crowd Swift are their Motions and their Tongues are loud And Stones and Brands in rattling Vollies fly And all the Rustick Arms that Fury can supply If then some Grave and Pious Man appear They hush their Noise and lend a listning Ear He sooths with sober Words their angry Mood And quenches their innate Desire of Blood Mr. Dryden It may not be amiss upon some Occasions for the Prince himself to appear among them but then he must take great Care in what manner this be done He must have a serene and free Countenance an Air of Gayety and Assurance a Soul at perfect Liberty and free from all Apprehension of Death or Danger and ready prepared to entertain the worst Treatment that can possibly happen to him For to shew himself with a Face full of Fear and Distrust to descend to Flatrery and mean Remonstrances is beneath a Prince's Character It makes him cheap and contemptible encourages the Insolence of the People and does but inflame instead of appeasing their Rage This therefore was done exactly as ought to be by Caesar who when his Legions were in a Mutiny and rose up in Arms against him is described in the midst of them thus †Stetit aggere fulti Cespitis intrepidus vultu meruitque timeri Nil metuens mdash Lucan On the Top Of a Turf Mount stands Caesar fearless up Deserving Dread by his undaunted Look The same Account in effect does Tacitus give of Augustus composing the Discontents of his Legions at Actium So that upon the whole Matter there are two ways of managing the Mobb and quieting them when they run into Tumults and riotous Insurrections The best and bravest is that of the Prince himself quieting them but This as I observ'd is a nice Undertaking and had much better be waved if he have not an absolute Mastery over his Passions and be not in all Points qualify'd for the managing it dexterously The other which is more usual and more seasible is to do it by another hand and here a greater Latitude may be allow'd than the Majesty of a Monarch can admit of Flattery and Cajolling and all the Arts of Mollifying are the proper Applications for Stiffness and open Force will do nothing and the more you oppose the Torrent the higher and louder it grows The many-headed Beast is in this regard like all other Wild ones which are never to be tam'd with Blows and Beating but may be brought to hand by soothing and gentle Usage And therefore an Agent should never spare for good Words and fair Promises since these are
they allow of no Intermission but if the Difficulties are occasion'd by the principal Persons in the Family they fret and gall and wrankle inward and scarce admit of any Rest or Remedy The Best Method of rendring this Care easie and effectual is To procure some faithful Servants in whose Honesty we can have entire Confidence and Security To buy in Provisions in their proper Seasons and wait for the best Markets To prevent all unnecessary Waste which is the Province proper to the Mistress of the House To make Necessity and Cleanliness and Order our first Care and when These are served if our Circumstances will extend farther then to provide for Plenty and Shew and Niceness a gentile Appearance and every Thing fashionable in it's Kind To regulate our Expences by cutting off our Superfluous Charge yet so as to have a Regard to Decency and Convenience and grudge Nothing which either Necessity or Duty call for from us One Shilling saved with these Limitations will do us more Credit than Ten idly squandered away But to the avoiding Profuseness we should also add the other commendable Quality of good Contrivance for it is a Mark of great Address when we can make our Peny go a great Way and appear Handsomely with little Charge But above all things a Man must be sure to keep within Compass and sute his way of Living to his present Circumstances For the most probable Prospects are still but Futurities and as such they must needs be uncertain so that there cannot be a more ridiculous Folly than to spend high in Confidence of Reversions and distant Expectations A Master's Eye must be every where and if either He or the Mistress be ignorant and unexperienced in Business they must take Care to conceal this Infirmity and pretend at least to understand all that belongs to them But especially they must never appear Negligent or Remiss but put on an Air of Diligence and Concern however For if once the Servants get a Notion of their being Careless how their Affairs are managed they will not fail to take their Advantage and in a short Time leave them little or nothing to take Care of CHAP. XIV The Duty of Parents and Children THE Duty of Parents and Children is Reciprocal and Natural on both sides Thus far they both agree But if the Obligation be somewhat stricter on the Child's Part that Difference is compensated by being more Ancient on the Parents side For Parents are the Authors and first Cause and of the Two of much greater Consequence to the Publick The Peopling the World with Good Men and Good Patriots is their Work the Educacation and Instruction of Youth is the only Method of effecting it so that here the first Seeds of Political Societies and Institutions are first laid And of the Two Inconveniencies That is much less which the State suffers from the Disobedience and Ingratitude of Children toward their Parents than from the Remisness and Neglect Parents are guilty of toward their Children Hence in the Lacedoemonian and some other very wise Governments there were Mulcts and other Penalties inflicted upon Parents when their Children prov'd Perverse and Ill-tempered And Plato declared he knew no one Instance that needed a Man's Care more or deserved it better than the endeavouring to make a good Son And Crates in great Wrath expostulated thus with his Country-men To what Purpose is all this Pains to heap up great Estates while it is no part of your Concern what manner of Heirs you leave them to This is like a Man's being Nice of his Shooe and Negligent of his Foot What should a Man do with Riches who hath not the Sense nor the Hert to make a good Use of them This is like an embroidered Saddle and sumptuous Furniture upon a Jaded Horse Parents indeed are doubly obliged to the Performance of this Duty In Kindness to themselves as they are their own Offspring and in Regard to the Publick because these young Suckers are the Hopes of the Tree the promising Shoots upon the thriving and kindly cultivating whereof the Strength and Succession of the Body Politick depends So that this is killing Two Birds with One Stone serving one 's own private Interest and promoting the Welfare and Honour of one's Country at the same time Now this Duty consists of Four Parts each of which succeed in order to the other and these are proportion'd to the Four Advantages which Children ought to receive from their Parents in their proper Seasons Life and Nourishment Instruction and partaking of the Advantages of Life with them The First respects the Time of a Child's Existence till his Birth inclusively The Second his Infancy The Third his Youth and the Last his riper Age. Concerning the First of These I shall only say that though it be very little attended to yet is it of mighty Consequence and of strict Obligation For no Man who hath any the least Insight into Nature can be ignorant how hereditary Constitutions and Complexions are And therefore we may be good or ill Parents even before our Children are born And I am sure among other Inducements to the care of Health and a regular Way of living This ought not to be the least that Those who derive their Being from us do depend upon this Care for a great part of their Happiness For by what hath been largely discoursed in the first Book it may plainly appear that the Capacity and Turn of Men's Minds and the Soundness and Vigour of their Bodies are in great Measure owing to a Parents good Constitution And certainly To Men of any Conscience it should be an Eternal Sting and Reproach to reflect what Rottenness and Diseases they entail upon their Posterity by abandoning themselves to Lewdness and Debauchery how dearly those Innocents pay for their Ancestor's Excesses and what a Barbarity it is to send poor Wretches into the World to languith out a Life of Misery and Pain and suffer for Sins which they never committed So Necessary so Important a Virtue is Temperance to Successions and Families as well as to Mens own Persons So Mischievous is Vice and so Subtilly does it propagate its dismal Effects even to those that are yet unborn The Second of these Heads I leave to Physicians and Nurses and having thus briefly dispatch'd the Two First because somewhat foreign to our present Design and necessary to be mention'd only for the rendring this Division compleat I shall proceed to the Third which concerns the Instructing of them and is a Subject more worthy our serious Consideration So soon as the Child begins to move his Soul and the Faculties of That as well as the Organs of his Body shew that he is a Rational and not only a Living Creature Great Application should be used to form him well at first And this Care may be allowed to take Place about Four or Five Years Old for by that time The Memory and Imagination and some little Strokes
Questions and putting Cases informing themselves and opening their own Way If we never allow them to come in for a Share of the Discourse all we say to them will be to little Purpose Our Scholar only gives us the Hearing and that sometimes but Coldly and Negligently neither but as to any Application or Improvement he troubles not himself nor is at all Zealous about it because This is a Matter which he is not called upon for nor concern'd to bear a Part in the Conversation Nor is it enough in this Case that we make them Deliver their Opinions except we moreover require them to alledge their Reasons and oblige them to argue in Defence of it For this is the Way to prevent their talking without Book and by Rote This will make them Heedful and Attentive Cautious what they say and considerate before they speak and for their better Encouragement to confer with us freely we must commend and make the best of what they say and where the Performance falls short we must accept the Endeavour very graciously This Method of Instruction by way of Questions was admirably put in Practice by Socrates who was indeed the greatest Master in it of all the Philosophers and we see all along in Plato by what a Chain and Mutual Connexion of Enquiries he led Men gently up to the Truth and by insensible Degrees gain'd his Point upon the Objectors But indeed a much Greater than Socrates hath set us a Pattern in it Even our Blessed Lord who with inimitable Prudence appealed to Men's own Sense and Judgment and as he sometimes taught his Disciples so did he at others confute his Adversaries out of their own Mouths Now these Questions and Conferences need not always be confin'd to such Subjects as the Attainments of Memory or Fancy or what we call acquired Knowledge are concern'd in but may indeed they ought much rather to be extended to such as are Tryals of the Judgment and sound Sense So that no sort of Subjects will be excluded for all even the least and most Inconsiderable are capable of being employed to very good Purpose The Negligence of a Servant the Folly of a Child the Moroseness and Ill-nature of a Clown the Sports or Plays of Boys the Talk at Table for the Excellency and Business of Judgment does by no Means consist in the Management or Determination of Weighty or Sublime Matters only but in passing a true and Right Decision and setting a just Value upon all Manner of Things be they Great or Small Trivial or Important It is not the Condition of the Subject but the Truth and Pertinency of what is resolved and said upon it that proves the Person to be Judicious It will be very convenient therefore to let him deliver his Opinion of Men and Actions but to be sure always to say somewhat in Justification of his Opinion and to let nothing pass without some Reflexion and the Inducements which move him to think thus rather than otherwise For This will have a wonderful Influence in the directing his Conscience and practical Judgment which is of all other Faculties most necessary to be cultivated and set Right because if This Happen to go amiss all our Actions which result from its Determination must consequently be Irregular Cyrus his Tutor in Xenophon took this Course and propounded the following Matter of Fact for an Exercise and Lesson to his Pupil A great Boy having a short Coat gave it to one of his Playfellows who was less than himself and took away his Coat in Exchange which was Larger and too Big for the right Owner Now the Thing required of Cyrus was to deliver his Judgment upon this Matter Cyrus his Opinion was that the Matter was very well ordered and much better than before for now both the Boys were fitted to their Turn whereas till that Exchange was made neither of them was so His Tutor rebuked him very sharply for so rash and unjust a Judgment for that he had only considered the Convenience of the Thing and not the Right and Merits of the Cause since Justice is of so much greater Consequence that the other ought not to be put into the Balance with it nor must a Man's Property be invaded upon the Pretence of giving somewhat that its sitter for his Circumstances in the stead of it This now is an excellent Way of informing them Again When they repeat or quote any Thing out of their Books as Cicero or Aristotle or the like This Task should be imposed not merely for the Sake of retaining it in their Memories but to fasten it in their Minds and give them a true Tast of it and enable them to judge of it themselves And in order to this he should take it under all its different Appearances turn and examine it every way and be taught to apply it to several Subjects It would be a Matter of very small Consequence for a Youth to tell a Story of Cato's killing himself for Fear of falling into the Hands of Caesar or how Brutus and Cassius engaged in the taking Caesar off This is the least Part of the Improvement such Historical Narrations are Capable of furnishing The Main Point is To call these Men before him to Arraign and Try and Sentence them for these Actions Whether they did Well or Ill whether they consulted the Publick Good and behaved themselves like true Patriots what Prudence and Justice and Courage there was in these Instances and wherein these Excellencies exerted or their Contrary Qualities betrayed themselves Lastly In all the Questions and Conferences he ought to take Care that his Charge proceed according to Truth that he be taught to express himself Properly and Pertinently to reason justly and to exercise his Practical Judgment of Things which is an Excellence and Accomplishment infinitely to be preferred before any the nicest Subtilties of the most refined speculative Knowledge And in such Exercises as these No Doubt should be left unsatisfied no Point suffered to pass off Imperfectly discuss'd no Connivence given to lame and superficial Accounts of Things the little Shiftings of an Argument or the calling of an other Cause but the Scholar must be prest home carried to the Bottom of all that is propounded kept close to the Matter in Hand that so he may be a perfect Master of what he undertakes and have solid and substantial Grounds for the Opinions he entertains Secondly He ought to train his Pupil up to a becoming Curiosity and a Desire to know every Thing his Condition is capable of That so he may always have his Mind intent and his Wits about him applying himself to weigh and consider Critically all that is said or done in his Company taking nothing at first View without Reflection and a Second Examination of it privately in his own Thoughts And not only so but with Modesty and Temper to inform himself and consult others in Matters both of Right and of Fact It is a common
the other half in the Second Table of the Decalogue Because it in part regards the Duty we owe to God and in part That which we owe to our Neighbour This is likewise so self-evident and acknowledg'd a Duty so strictly and indispensably requir'd at our Hands that No other Duty no other Affection can supersede it even tho' our Affection to other Persons may and is allow'd to be more intimate and tender For put the Case that a Man hath a Father and a Son both involv'd in the same Distress and that he have it in his Power to relieve but one of them it hath been the Opinion of very wise Men that he is bound to assist his Father notwithstanding his Affection to the Son according to what hath been lately urg'd upon that Occasion be the greater and stronger The Reason of which Resolution seems to be That the Son's Debt to the Father is of longer standing and the Obligation bore Date and was in Force before that to his own Son and that therefore it is in this as in other Cases of like Nature where no antecedent Tie can be cancell'd by any Engagement or Debt contracted afterwards Now this Duty principally consists in Five Particulars All of which are comprehended under that significant Expression of Honouring our Father and Mother The First is Reverence by which we are to understand not only those External Respects of the Looks or Gestures or Behaviour but the Inward and Respectful Sense of the Mind and This indeed chiefly as the Source and Foundation of the other Now This consists in a high Esteem and prosound Veneration for them looking upon them as the Authors and Original of our Being and all the Comforts of it The Instruments and Immediate Causes which the Universal Father of all things was pleas'd to make choice of for the bringing us out of Nothing and making us what we are and therefore in that Quality bearing a very great Resemblance to God himself The Second is Obedience Which provided the Matter of the Command be lawful cannot be dispens'd with upon the Pretence of any Rigour or Hardship that it is encumber'd with And thus we find the Rechabites commended by God himself for complying with the Severities of Life Jer. xxxv imposed upon Them and their Posterity by Jonadab their Ancestor The Third is Succouring them in all their Exigencies and Distresses maintaining and cherishing them in their Wants and Weaknesses Old Age and Sickness Infirmities and Poverty must be so far from Provoking our Scorn and Contempt that they are but so many louder Calls and more engaging Ties to Love and Duty to Assistance and Respect aiding and advising them in their Business and exerting our utmost Power to do them Service Of This we have some wonderful Examples in the other Parts of Nature and Brutes themselves have set us a noble and almost inimitable Pattern particularly the Stork which St. Basil so elegantly extols upon this account For the young Storks are said to nourish and feed the old ones to cover them with their Feathers when the Shedding of their own exposes them to the Injuries of Cold and Weather to fly in couples and join Wings to carry them on their Backs Nature it seems inspiring them with this Artificial Contrivance of shewing this Piety and Affection This Example is so lively so very moving that the Duty of Parents to their Children hath been express'd in some Translations by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is acting the Part of a Stork And the Hebrews in cohsideration of this eminent Quality call this Bird Chasida which signifies Kind Charitable Good-Natur'd Some very remarkable Instances of this kind among Men we read in ancient History Tymon Son to the Great Miltiades when his Father was dead in Prison and so poor that he had not wherewith to bury him tho' some say it was for the Payment of his Debts for failure whereof his Corpse was arrested and kept above-ground sold himself and sacrific'd his Liberty for a Summ of Money to be expended in defraying the Charges of the Funeral This Man did not contribute to his Father's Necessities out of his own Abundance or his actual Possessions but parted with his Freedom a Juying dearer to him and esteem'd more valuable than either Fortune or Life it self for his Father's Sake He did not relieve him alive and in distress but when he was dead no longer his Father no longer a Man What a Brave what an Heroick Act was this What may we reasonably imagine so gallant a Son would have done what indeed would he not have done for a living and a necessitous Father One that had asked or that had needed his Assistance This is a generous and a glorious Instance of the Duty now under Consideration We are likewise told of Two Examples in the weaker Sex Women who suckled the One her Father and the Other her Mother when they were Prisoners under Sentence of Condemnation and to be famished to Death which is said to have been heretofore a Punishment very commonly inflicted in Capital Cases It looks a little Unnatural for a Mother to Subsist upon her Daughter's Milk This is turning the Stream back again up to the Fountain-Head but sure it deserves to be considered by the Ladies of Our Age how very Natural indeed how Fundamental and Primitive a Law of Nature it is for Mothers to suckle and give that Sustenance which Nature hath provided on purpose to their own Children The Fourth Duty is To be governed and directed by them in all Matters of Moment to attempt no considerable Thing without taking their Advice and asking their Consent and being confirmed in our Intentions and Designs by the Parents Approbation and good Liking This is a general Rule extending to all the important Affairs of Humane Life All that are fit to trouble and consult them about but it hath a special Regard to the Disposing of themselves in Marriage which is of all others the most Weighty and Serious and such as Parents have a particular right to be well informed of and perfectly satisfied in The Fifth is Covering their Vices and Imperfections submitting to their Humors and Passions their Severity and hard Usage and bearing all their most unreasonable Peevishness and angry Rebukes with Patience and Temper Of This we have a notable Instance in Manlius Pomponius The Tribune had accused the Father of this Manlius to the People of several grievous Crimes among the rest of horrible Barbarity to his Son and among other Indignities that he forc'd him to dig and drive the Plough This Son went to this Tribune's House found him in Bed and putting a Knife to his Throat made him swear that he would withdraw the Indictment and prosecute his Father 10 farther declaring that he had rather submit to the most Slavish Drudgery his Father could impose upon him and toil at it all the Days of his Life than see him prosecuted and exposed for any
and faithful Transcript from the Original an Interpreter and Executor of his Master's Will to see that this be duly declared and diligently observed By this Will I mean the Law for this is the Authentick Will of the Prince and the only Declaration of it which Subjects are bound to take notice of Of this the Magistrate is to exact a faithful Account and punctual Observance for which reason we often find him termed by Authors The Living and the Speaking Law Now though it be the Duty of a Magistrate and an excellent Qualification in him to temper Justice with Prudence and Severity with Gentleness and Forbearance yet it must be confessed much more for the common Advantage to have such Magistrates as incline to the excess of Sharpness and Rigour than those who are dispos'd to Mildness and Easiness and Compassion For even God himself who so highly recommends so strictly enjoyns all those humane and soft Dispositions upon other Occasions yet positively forbids a Judge to be moved with Pity The Strict and Harsh Magistrate is the better Restraint the stronger Curb He contains People in Bounds and preserves a due Awe and Obedience of the Laws The Mild and Merciful One exposes the Laws to Contempt makes Magistracy cheap and lessens the Prince who made both the Law and the Magistrate in the Eyes and Esteem of his People In one word There must go two Qualifications to the Capacitating a Man for the discharging this Office compleatly Integrity and Courage The first cannot subsist alone but stands in need of the second to support and back it The former will be sure to keep the Magistrate's Hands clean from Avarice and Partiality and Respect of Persons from Bribery and Gifts which are the Bane and utter Exterminators of Truth and from any other violation of Justice which Plato calls what indeed it ought to be a Pure Unblemished Virgin This will also be a Guard to him against his Passions the Aversions or the Affection he may bear to the Parties concerned and indeed all other Resentments which are but so many Enemies and Underminers of Right and Equity But then he will find great occasion for Courage too to stand his ground against the Menaces and Imperious Sollicitations of Great Men the Requests and Importunities of Friends who fansie they have a sort of Right to dispose of him and will not take a reasonable Resusal To harden him against the Prayers and Tears the loud Cries and bitter Complaints of the Miserable and Afflicted for all these are very moving and forcible inducements a great Violence upon Reason and Duty and yet so committed that there is a plausible appearance of both in the very Diversion they labour to give us from both And the truth is this firmness and inflexible Constancy of Mind is the most masterly Virtue and particular Excellence of a Magistrate that he neither be terrified and subdued by Greatness and Power nor melted by Miseries and deplorable Circumstances These are what very brave Men are often transported by and therefore it is the greater Praise to continue Proof against them For though being softned by the latter have an Air of Good-nature and is more likely to prevail upon the Better sort of Men yer either of the Extreams is sinful and both forreign to the merits of the Cause which is the only thing that lies upon the Judge The Motives to Pity then are very dangerous Temptations and what a Man in Authority ought as much to stop his Ears against as Promises or Threatnings for even that God himself who is Love and Mercy in Persection hath discountenanced this unseasonable Compassion And the same Legislator who said Thou shalt not receive a Gift to blind thine Eyes therewith neither shalt thou accept the Person of the Mighty found it no less necessary for the Good of Mankind and the equal Distribution of Justice no less agreeable to his own Goodness to add that other Command Thou shalt not favour a Poor Man in his Cause CHAP. XVIII The Duty of Great and of Mean Men. THE Duty of Persons of Honour and Quality consists principally in these two Points The lending a strong and powerful Assistance to the Publick employing their Wealth their Interest their Blood in the Maintenance and Preservation of Piety and Justice of the Prince and the Government and in general of the common safety and advantage For they are the Pillars and Supporters upon which these noble Structures stand and by which they must be sustained The other Branch consists in being a mighty Defence and Protection to the Poor and Needy the Injured and Oppressed by interposing their Power on the behalf of such standing between Them and Ruin and giving a Check and Diversion to the Violence of wicked and unreasonable Men. Persons of Honour in a State should be like the Spirits and good Blood in our Bodies which always run to the wounded and the ailing part It was this that rendered Moses so proper to be made the Captain of the Israelitish Nation and the Scripture takes express notice of his Zeal in revenging the Injuries of one of his Brethren who suffered Wrong Act. 7. and slaying the insolent Aegrptian as a Sign that God had Marked him out for a Deliverer of his People Thus Hercules was Deisted among the Heathens for being a Scourge to the Cruelty of Tyrants and a Refuge to those that were Oppress'd and opprobriously Treated by them And those other renouned Names in Antiquity who followed his Example have always been looked upon as Heroes and something more than Men. Particular Honours and distinguishing Rewards were heretofore awarded to all such as to Persons who deserved exceeding well of the Publick and for an Intimation That no Character is more glorious none more attractive of Universal Admiration and profound Respect than that of being a Succour to the Afflicted and Abused and helping those who were in no condition of helping themselves It is by no means true Greatness to appear formidable to any part of Mankind except one's Enemies only The affectation to have others stand in Awe and Dread and to Tremble before one is a mean and pitiful Temper and at the same time that it renders the Man a Terrour it renders him an Odium too a publick Nuisance and a common Enemy Love in this case is more desirable than even Adoration could be without it Such imperious Men betray a fierce and haughty a proud and assuming Disposition This is it which makes them so Contumelious and Disdainful scorning their Inseriours as if they were no better than the Dross and Dung of the World and not Men of the same Nature with their own Great Selves From hence by degrees they degenerate into Barbarity and Insolence abusing all beneath them without the least Pity or Remorse enslaving their Persons invading their Properties and Possessions as if Humanity and Justice were intended only for the Benefit of them who need it least and as if they
Excellencies of Vlysses puts this of Skill in retreating into his Characler The Lacedaemonians who pretended to the most obstinate Courage of any Nation in the World yet in that renowned action of Platea gave ground on purpose to break the Persian Troops and disorder them in the pursuit This was an advantage which they had no other way of compassing and the Success answered the wisdom of the Design for they won the Day by this Feint of losing it In a word the most warlike Countrys in the World have given it authority and never thought themselves dishonoured by the Practice Nay even the Stoicks after all their impracticable and romantick Stretches of humane nature are content to allow their wise Man so far as looking Pale and shivering at new and surprising Accidents provided this be only a bodily Affection and that it do not enter so deep or last so long as to give the Soul any part of the Disorder And thus much may suffice to possess us with a true Idea of Fortitude or Courage in general Of the particular Objects and Exercise of Fortitude NOW that we may cut our Work out and lay it in due order it is necessary in the first place that I put my Reader in remembrance that this Virtue undertakes to deal with all that whatever it be which is called Evil according to the most popular and extensive signification of the Word Now this Evil is of two sorts either External or Internal The former is that which assaults us from without and goes by great variety of Names such as Adversity Afflictions Injuries Misfortunes Casualties or unwelcome Accidents The other arises from within and hath its residence in the Soul but it is excited and agitated by the Evil from without Such particularly are those Passions which disturb and discontent us as Fear Grief Anger and the rest of that black disorderly Crew It will be proper for us to speak to each part of this Division fully and distinctly to explain their Operations to provide Men with proper Remedies and sufficient means for the subduing and softening and regulating these Grievances And such are the Arguments and Directions for the Virtue of Fortitude now under our Consideration Consequently then what you are to expect upon this Subject will consist of two parts the one respecting the Calamities and Disastrous Accidents of our Lives the other concerning the Passions which these Accidents provoke and stimulate in our Minds And here my Reader must recollect that the general Directions thought necessary for the bearing good or ill Fortune decently he hath been supplyed with already So that referring him back to the second Book Rock II. Chap. 7. for what regards Prosperity and Adversity in the gross he is only to expect now that we should descend to the particular sorts of Misfortunes and what is â—it to be prescribed for each of them respectively CHAP. XX. Of External Evils WE may consider these External Evils in three several respects First with regard to the causes or occasions of them which shall make the Subject of this Chapter next in their Effects and lastly with regard to what they are in themselves where I shall treat of the several Species of them distinctly And under each of these Heads I will make it my endeavour to lay down such Rules and Directions as may sustain us under and fortifie us against them The Causes or Occasions of these afflicting Accidents which are capable of happening to every one of us may be publick or general when they affect a great many at the same time when whole Kingdoms or Neighbourhoods at least are involved at once such as Pestilence Famine War Tyranny and Oppression And these for the most part are Rods of the divine Vengeance Scourges sent by him to chastise the exorbitant Wickedness of obstinate Men who resuse to be won over by gentler methods of Reformation At least we know not what immediate cause to ascribe them to or else they are private Calamities and such as we are able to trace up to their first Author and Original that is they are inflicted and brought upon us by some other Person And thus both the private and publick Misfortunes are of two forts Now the publick Calamities those I mean which proceed from a general Cause though they do really come home to each single Person yet are they in different respects more or less grievous important and dangerous than the private ones of which we are able to give a distinct and particular account They are more so because they assault us with united force fall on in Troops and with greater violence make a louder noise rage more horribly have a longer and blacker train of ill Consequences attending them are more perplexing and amazing and create greater Disorders and a more general Confusion But then they are less so too in regard of their being thus general and for the numbers which are involved in them together For when a Disaster is common every Man is apt to think his own share of it the less It is some kind of comfort to think that we are not singled out for Examples and for this reason the efficacy of such Corrections is usually the less for every Man takes Sanctuary in the commonness of the Calamity and imputes it to some universal disorder in Nature or to some unusual concurrence of natural Causes and so shelters himself in the Crowd by vain pretences which personal afflictions leave no room for And besides daily experience shews that the Evils brought upon us by other Men gall us more sensibly and go nearer to the Quick and have a greater influence upon our Minds than any of the former sort are wont to do Now all these both of the one and the other sort have several proper Remedies and Considerations to qualifie and render them very supportable to us as particularly these that follow When we have any publick Calamities to encounter it will become us very seriously to reflect whence they come and by whom they are sent That the Cause and Author of them is God an Omnipotent and All-wise Providence whose Pleasure we are subject to and have an absolute and entire dependence upon that he governs and disposes all things and holds those vain Men in derision who hope to burst his Bands asimder and to cast away his Cords from them that we and all the whole Creation are tied by Laws of an invincible necessity and that the strongest Combinations nay the universal joynt strength of the whole World is much too weak to reverse or resist his Will Most certain it is that Providence and Necessity or Destiny when we speak strictly and properly are but one and the same thing There is no essential disserence between them or the Laws upon which they proceed and all they vary in is only as to those different respects which we are used to consider and reason upon them in Now to murmur and repine and torment our selves
and Offences for indeed they are no small advantages which these put into our hands particularly they are capable of turning to very good account two ways with regard to each of the parties concerned in them For first with regard to the person who did the Injury this hath discovered the Man to us we have seen a little more of the World we know such a one two well to trust him another time and have fair warning to avoid him ever after But then Secondly they help us to know our selves too shew us our own infirmities our breaches and blind sides where the Foe may get within us and what we cannot hold out against and this gives us warning to work upon those breaches and put them in a defensible condition against the next attack upon us Let us learn to amend that fault too which occasion'd the abuse that no other Man may have the like provocation to reproach us hereafter This is the true way of defeating the malice of others and doing right to our selves for what nobler Revenge can a Man take upon his Enemies than to turn their injuries and affronts to his own Prout and to learn more Prudence and Conduct and to grow the wiser and better more cautious and inoffensive by being ill used The World at this rate is an excellent School and the more unreasonable Men are the more a Man of good fense and temper may improve himself under their even unjust Corrections CHAP. XXI Of External Evils with regard to their Fruits and Effects HAving thus consider'd the Causes let us now enquire into the effects of our evils and what fruits they produce where again we shall meet with very powerful Antidotes and substantial remedies against them Now these effects are many and great general and particular The general effects are such as concern the good the support the order and improvement of the Universe The World would be quire stified and choak'd up it would Stagnate and putrifie if it were not sometimes stirred and changed and put into a new form by such important and alterative accidents as Plagues and Famines and War and Mortality these are the things that prune and purge it and throw down that product which overburdens the soil and by so doing they preserve the rest and give them elbow-room for were there no such evacuations we should not be able to move and live by one another But then consider the grateful Varieties and Vicissitudes the regular Successions and alternate Changes by which the World is thus adorned and beautified every part of the world finds some convenience by these alterations For from Nations and Men coming to be transplanted by such means the barbarous and wild and savage part of Mankind are polished and civilized Arts and Sciences Learning and Policy are spread wider and communicated to every part of the habitable Earth so that we are to look upon the Universe as one large Plantation where some Trees are removed to a more convenient Soil others are grasted and inoculated others cut down to the root that they make more regular shoots by the loss of superfluous suckers others quite plucked up but all this done in such order by the skillful Cultivater that every thing tends to thâ— profit and beauty of the ground These enlargements of our Thoughts and considerations of Universal advantage ought to content every Wife and good Man and prevent irreverent reflections upon those wonderful works of God which Men are too apt to accuse for barbarous and disorderly or to look upon with amazement as strange and unaccountable It is enough that they are the ordinances of God and nature and ought to satisfie us that how odd soever they may appear with regard to that little spot of ground which is commanded by our own Eye yet they do great and signal service to the whole For would we extend our prospect we should quickly discern that what is lost in one place is gained in another or rather indeed to speak more properly that nothing is lost any where but all conduces to the just variety and convenience of the World in general * Vir sapiens nihil indignetur sibi accidere sciatque illa ipsa quibus laedi videtur ad conservationem universi pertinere ex his esse quae cursum munch officiumque consummant A Wise Man says one will take nothing amiss that happens to him for he will observe that those very things by which his particular Interests seem to suffer are expedient and greatly contribute to the preservation of the whole and that these are the methods by which the course of the World is continued and every part of it brought to its just and necessary perfection The particular and personal effects of these evils are different according to the various tempers and conditions of the Men to whom they happen To the good they are an exercise and trial to those that are fallen a relief and recovery a warning and call to them that go astray and to the obstinately wicked a dispensation of Punishment and Vengeance Of each of these uses I shall say but one word or two very briefly And first these external evils provide the good Men excellent opportunities of exerting and improving their Virtue which would otherwise want matter to work upon and lie idle and undiscerned A good Man under affliction is in the same circumstances with Fencers in their Schools or Mariners in a Storm or Soldiers in an Action or Philosophers in their Academy that is he is upon his proper duty attending the business of his profession and shewing his skill in it for these are the very methods that instruct and enter and sorm and finish him in Virtue that establish him in Constancy and Courage and enable him to conquer and triumph over Fortune and the World They bring him acquainted with himself make him know his own strength by frequent experiments tell him what he may depend upon and promise himself from it nor do they only give him a true representation of his past and present condition but they help to amend it too they encourage and confirm his resolutions of doing well harden and accustom him to suffering fix and determine his mind secure his past conquests and render him invincible for the time to come Whereas on the contrary a long calm of prosperity is exceeding apt to soften and enervate Men's minds and to corrupt them by ease and leisure carelessness and sloth inactivity and long disuse Demetrius for this reason used to say that of all Men living he thought none so truly miserable as those who had never met with disappointments and crosses and trying afflictions and compared their life to the dead sea where there is a perpetual Stagnation and noxious vapours breed and reign for want of winds and a vigorous commotion of the waters to break and disperse and drive them away To Delinquents and inconsiderate Offenders these afflictions are a check and
grievance is not owing to what we complain of but to our own humour and imagination If we will go to the Reason of the thing all places are alike and a Man 's All is every where equally For two words indeed comprehend the whole of what a Wise Man values and those two are Nature and Virtue The same Nature is common to all Countries the same Sky the same Elements The same Sun shines the same Stars rise and set and their Motion their Extent the Proportion they appear in the same And sure if any part of Nature he to be valued that above us is much more worthy of Consideration and Esteem than this Sediment and gross and drossy part which we tread under our fect The farthest prospect of the Earth which we can take does not amount to more than Ten or Twelve I eagues So that a Soul which settles its Affections upon this part shuts it self up in a very narrow compass But the Face of this glorious Firmament adorned and beautified with such insinite Constellations which like so many grafts of Jewels glister over our heads expands it self and that it may be more effectually and distinctly viewed the Motion is perpetual and circular and every part turned towards us so that every point is visible to every place within the single Revolution of each Day and Night The Earth which taking the Seas and ambient Atmosphere into the account is computed not to be above the hundred and sixtieth part as big as the Sun is to Us incomparably less still for it is not visible to us in any part except that little spot that single Point upon which we stand But were it otherwise what does this Change of our standing signifie We think it a hard case to be born in one place and driven to another Have we any propriety in the place of our Birth Our Mothers might have been delivered in any other place as well as that where they were and nothing is more entirely Casual than the particular Spot where we first drew Breath for there was in Nature the same possibility of our being born any where Besides every Climate produces and carries Men sustains them with its Fruits and furnishes them with all the Necessaries of Life so that there is little fear of Perishing any where Every Country settles us among our Relations too for all Mankind are so nearly allied in Blood and nearer yet in Charity and Affection Friends too may be found any where we need only be at the pains to make them which will soon be done if we are careful to win their Hearts by our Virtue and Wisdom Every quarter of the Habitable World is a Wise-man's Country or rather indeed no part of it is his Country It were an injury and disparagement to suppose him a Stranger any where and a weakness and littleness of Spirit in him to esteem himself so A Man ought to use his Privilege and assert his natural Right which consists in living every where as if he were at home and dwelt in his own In * Omnes terras tanquam suas videre suas tanquam omnium looking upon all places as if he had a propriety in them and upon his own Estate or native Seil as if it were in common to all Mankind But farther what alteration what inconvenience can possibly come to us by this changing our Residence Do not we still carry the same Soul about with us And will not our Virtue keep us company where ever we go What can hinder a Man said Brutus from carrying his Excellencies all he is really and truly worth into Banishment or Captivity The Mind and its commendable Qualities are subject to no consinement circumscribed within no determinate space of ground but can live and act and exert themselves in all places indifferently A good Man is a Citizen of the whole World frank and free content and cheerful wherever his Lot casts him always at home in his own Quarters and always sixt and settled however this Case or Portmantean that incloses and conveys him may be hurried and jumbbied from one place to another †Animus facer aternus ubique est diis cognatus omni mundo aevo par The holy and immortal Sâ—ul is an Vbiquetary of near resemblance and affinity to God himself and like him diffused equally and ever present to all the stages of time and all the distances of place And wheresoever a Man feels himself well and easie and in full enjoyment that is his home call the Country by what name you will And it is evident that Ease and comfortable Enjoyment is not entailed upon particular Cities or Climates this is what no place can give he can only depend upon his own mind for it and that can give it him in any place equally How many very significant Men have found cause to choose and impose a voluntary Banishment upon themselves How many others when sent and driven away and afterwards invited back again have refused to return into their own Native Country and been so far from thinking their Exile an insupportable Misery and Punishment that they have taken great delight and satisfaction in it and reckoned no part of their time so well spent or so worthy the name of living as that in which they were debarred their own Country This was the case of some generous Romans Rutilius and Marcellus in particular And again how many do we read of whom good Fortune hath taken by the hand as it were and led them abroad put them in the way of Honour and Preferment in foreign Lands such as they could have no probable prospect of ever attaining at home CHAP. XXV Of Poverty and Want and Lesses THis is a very vulgar and like the rest of theirs a very silly and poor spirited Complaint for it supposes the whole or at least the most considerable part of a Man's Happiness to depend upon the advantages of Fortune and looks upon a low and mean Condition as a real and sore Evil. But now to shew what that is in truth we must observe that there are two sorts of Poverty One is That Extremity of it which we properly call Penury or want of Bread when those supplies are lacking which are necessary to the support of humane Nature And this is a Calamity which happens but very seldom For Providence hath been so bountiful and Nature so prudent that there are but a few of these absolutely necessary things The very Frame of our Bodies is a good defence in this case and so far from exposing us to a needy Condition that a little will serve the turn and that little is to be had almost every where Nay it is to be had in such quantities as will not only reach to the keeping Life and Soul together but are a sufficient Competency for moderate and frugal Persons If we do not affect to lay it on thick and squander away our Provisions if we would
things may be to us they are of none at all to the Persons we tell them to except it be to give them a taste of our Folly and from a dislike of our Conversation to avoid the same absurdity in their own We fancy because these Accidents are pleasing to us that they are so to them but alas the difference of Persons should be considered for to render the Story agreeable to tell there needs no other Recommendation than that our selves are at the bottom of it but then the very same reason renders it as nauseous to the Hearer not only because he finds no Concern of his own there but from that natural Aversion and Disdain we bear to Men who are always big and full of themselves and have the vanity to suppose that whatever relates to them is worthy to be the Concern of all they converse with But especially we should be careful not to transgress this Rule of profiting others by running into the contrary extreme of Injurious or Offensive Language For Speech is in the very original intention of it an Instrument and Harbinger a Reconciler and Uniter of Mankind and therefore to apply it to any purposes contrary to these is to abuse and pervert the nature and design of it This Consideration was never more necessary than now and if applied to the modern way of Conversation would soon convince us how vainly those Persons pretend to Wit and Sense and Honour whose whole Discourse consists of Slander Detraction Mockery or Reproach sacrificing the reputations of the absent to an ill-natured Jest or exposing and ridiculing their Defects by Mimickry and Buffoonery all which are infinitely unbecoming the Character such Men aspire after and a Diversion too base and barbarous for any Wise or Good Man to allow himself in Our Discourse should be Easie and Pleasant Courteous and Entertaining not Rough and Harsh Difficult and Troublesome For this reason it will require some prudence in the Choice or the declining of our Subject We should contrive as much as possibly we can to start nothing but what will keep our Company in good humour never to engage in Controversies where any that are present shall find themselves concerned for this either disobliges if they think fit to let the Argument fall or else it draws them into Disputes and occasions Warmth and Uneasiness and perhaps Coldness and angry Resentments afterwards But though there should be no personal Interest in the case yet nothing of Controversie in general should be industriously begun for common Discourse is not the proper season for that If the Question be Substantial and of great Concernment the respect of a private Conference is due to it but if it be some nice and subtle point it is not worth so much as our common Talk Such Questions have been aptly enough compared to Crabfish of which some are all Shell and when we have taken great pains to open and prepare them for our Palates nine parts of ten must be thrown away and a very poor pittance remains fit for Eating Their difficult and abstruse Speculations raise a Noise and a Dust but when we examine what account they turn to little comes of them but Heat and Calmour and Contradiction Our Expressions should be strong and clear our Arguments sinewy and full not loose and flat and languishing and therefore we should observe and avoid the formality of Pedants the stiff-set way of Pleaders and the impertinent Affectation of the Ladies This particular sort of Temperance extends likewise to one very necessary Virtue which I think may not unfitly be called the Continence of the Tongue That I mean of keeping Secrets which though already spoken to in the Chapter concerning Fidelity Chap. 8. I thought not improper to make another mention of here And the rather because I take Secrets here in a more large and comprehensive Sense so that the Virtue at present prescribed does not only oblige us not to disclose those things which were committed to our Trust under the Seal of Secresie but also to suppress whatever in Prudence and our own Discretion appears unfit to be divulged All that is dangerous or of ill consequence all that can any way reflect upon our own or be injurious to another's Reputation In a word so strict a Guard so steady a Conduct in all our Conversation that our Tongue may not out-run our Judgment and that neither our own Consciences or those we keep Company with upon the severest and most impartial Recollection have cause to accuse us of saying any thing which was not fit to be said This is of greater Importance and needs to be more diligently attended to than People seem generally well aware of and yet it is no more than every Man 's own Reflections upon the indecent Gayeties and unthinking Freedoms in Conversation and the many ill Effects and hard Censures these produce may soon convince him of And satisfie him not only of the Beauty and Comeliness but of the safety and great advantage there is in a modest and cautious reserve While the word is kept in it is entirely our own but if it once break loose from us it can never be retrieved we have lost all our Property and Jurisdiction and must stand to the courtesie of the World who will make what use they please of it and very seldom are just or good-natured enough to make the right use or to understand it as innocently as we intended it Now as the advantage of Speech in general is an Excellence peculiar to Mankind and sets us above Brutes so Eloquence exalts those that are Masters and Professors of it above the rate of common Men. For this is the Art or Science of speaking a more accurate and exquisite way of Communicating our Thoughts of enforcing and adorning Reason This is the Rudder of the Soul that steers and turns Men and sets us at the Helm of our Audience to carry them whither we please It falls in with the Heart and secretly moves our Passions like the Chords in Musick which in a skilful Composition conspire together to make a more perfect and delightful Harmony By Eloquence I mean all that is necessary to make an accomplished Orator For this does consist not only in perspicuity and purity of Expression the Elegance and Propriety of the Words the happy Choice and regular Disposition the fulness and roundness of the Period and the justness of a sweet and musical Cadence but it must also be assisted and strengthned by other Ornaments and Graces and Motions of the Person himself Every Word should be inspired with Life and Vigour first by a clear and sweet Voice a proper and distinct Pronunciation rising and falling gently and easily as is best accommodated to the matter and design Then by a grave and unaffected Action where the Countenance the Hands the whole Body the every part and gesture speak as well as the Mouth all follow them ovements of the Soul and
himself with the Event of this Engagement and be a thousand times more perplexed and mortified with any ill Success than those very Soldiers who spend their Blood and stake down their Lives in the Service In a word We must learn to understand our selves and our Condition and distinguish aright between our private and personal and our publick Capacities For every one of us is under a double Character and hath two parts to play The one external and visible but somewhat foreign and distant the other domestick and proper and essential to us Now though our Shirt be next to our Skin yet according to the Proverb we should always remember that how near soever our Shirt may be our Skin is still nearer to us A Judicious person will discharge his Duty to the Publick and fill an Office well and yet at the same time will discern the Folly and Wickedness and Cheat which a Publick Station exposes him to the practice of He will not decline the thing because it is agreeable to the Custom and Constitution of his Countrey it is necessary and useful to the Publick and perhaps advantagious to himself He will submit in many things to do as the World does because the Rest of Mankind live at the same rate and since he cannot mend the World it is to no purpose to disturb it by being singular But still he will look upon this as a matter somewhat foreign and consider this Character as adventitious and accidental not natural to him it is what he is obliged to put on and appear in but he was not born with it nor is it a part of him And therefore he will always exercise it with all due Limitations and Reservations and not so embark in Business as to be quite swallowed up in it but manage Matters so that he may still enjoy himself and be free and easy with a particular Friend or at least within his own Breast not so serve the World as to neglect and be out of a Condition to serve himself nor endeavour the Benefit of others at the Expence or Loss of a Good that is truly and properly his own CHAP. III. True and Substantial Integrity of Mind the first and fundamental part of Wisdom THE Directions laid down in the two foregoing Chapters being such Preparations as were thought necessary for disposing aright the person who aspires after Wisdom and qualifying him to make successful progress in it That is By removing the Obstructions and cleaning his Mind of Prejudices and setting it at large from the Slavery and Confinement of Popular Opinions and private Passions and also by advancing to that noble and happy Freedom of Thought and Will already described that from hence as from some advantagious rising ground he may take a full prospect and arrive at a clear and distinct Knowledge and attain to an absolute Mastery over all the Objects and Things that occur to him here below which is the peculiar Character and Privilege of an exalted and resined Soul It may now be seasonable to advance in the Method proposed at our Entrance into this Book by giving some fit Instructions and general Rules of Wisdom The Two First whereof are still in the nature of Prefaces to the Main Work necessary to be laid in the Quality of Foundations upon which to raise this Glorious Superstructure And the Former and Principal of these two designed for the Subject of This Chapter is Probity and Sincerity That true Honesty and Integrity of Heart and Life is the First the Chief the Fundamental Point of True Wisdom is an Assertion which it may perhaps be thought needless for me to give my self any great trouble in proving For in truth all Mankind agree in highly extolling and zealously pretending to it though it is but too manifest that what some do in this kind seriously and out of Conscientious regard to their Duty and the real Worth of this Virtue others put on only to set the best face upon the matter and are compelled to dissemble from Shame and Fear and the Ill-consequences of avowing the contrary Thus far then the whole World is agreed that Honesty is recommended and respected and at least complimented every Man professes to be passionately in love with it and subscribes himself its most Faithful most Affectionate and most Devoted Servant So that I may spare my self the pains of arguing in behalf of the Thing in general but I am afraid notwithstanding it will prove no such easy matter to make Men agree with the Notions of that which in my esteem is the True and Essential Honesty and to persuade the as universal Love but especially the universal practice of That which I think necessary upon this occasion For as to That which is in common vogue and usually reputed such though the World I know are generally satisfied and trouble themselves so little about understanding or attaining to any thing better that except a very few Wise Men they have no Ideas no Wishes beyond this yet I make no difficulty to affirm that it is all but a spurious and counterfeit Virtue Sham and Trick and the product of Art and Study Falshood and Disguise Now first of all We cannot but be sensible False Appcarances of it that Men are very often drawn on and pusht forward to good Actions by several sorts of Motives Sometimes such as are by no means commendable As Natural Defects and Infirmities Passion and Fancy nay sometimes by Vice and Things in their own Nature Sinful Thus Chastity and Sobriety and Temperance of all sorts may be and often are owing to a weak Body and tender Constitution which cannot support Excess Contempt of Death to Peevishness and Discontent Patience under Misfortunes Resolution and Presence of Thought in Dangers to Want of Apprehension and Judgment and a due sense how great or imminent the Danger is Valour and Liberality and Justice are often inspired and practised by Ambition and Vain-glory the Effects of good Conduct discreet Management of Fear and Shame and Avarice And what a World of renowned and noble Exploits have been owing to Presumption and Foolhardiness Rashness and Inconsideration Thus what we commonly call Actions and Instances of Virtue are in reality no better than Masks and counterfeit Appearances of it They have the Air and the Complexion but by no means the Substance of it So much resemblance there is that the Vulgar who are no Criticks in Faces may easily mistake the one for the other and so much of good there is in the Effects and Consequences of such Actions that other people may be allowed to call them Virtuous but it is impossible the person himself who does them should esteem them such or that any considering Man can either allow them this Character when nicely examined or think one jot the better of the Man that does them For Interest or Honour or Reputation or Custom and Compliance or some other Causes altogether foreign to Virtue will be found
at the bottom and however beautiful the Front may be the Foundation is rotten and stark naught Sometimes very great and surprizing things are the Result of nothing better than mere Stupidity and Brutishness which gave occasion for that Reflection That Wisdom and Insensibility met together in the same Point and both of them felt and hardened themselves alike under Accidents and Misfortunes From all which and a great deal more that might be said it appears how exceeding dangerous and uncertain a method those men take who look no further than the outward Face of things and from the actions as we see them form a peremptory Judgment of the Probity or the Disingenuity of the Person Whereas for a right understanding of this matter we ought to take a distinct view of the Inside examine the whole Movement and mark well what Springs they are that set it on going For it often happens that very ill men do very good and commendable and beneficial Actions And both Good and Bad men restrain themselves and avoid Evil but though both abstain alike yet they do it out of very different Principles as Horace hath observed pertinently enough to this purpose * Crutus enim metuit foveam Lupus Accipiterque Suspectos laqueos opertum Milvins hamum Odernnt peccare Boni Virtutiâ— amore Tu nihil admitres in Te formidine poemae Sit Spes failendi miseobis Sacra profanis Hor. Epist xvi L. 1. So Crafty Foxes dread the secret snare The Kite and Hawk although the Bait be fair Yet never Stoop where they Suspect a Gin. The Good for Virtue 's Sake abhor a Sin 'T is fear of Pumshment restrains Thy Will Give leave How eagerly wouldst Thou be ill Horace by Creech To make a just discovery of the Man and inform our selves what is Honesty and Sincerity indeed the Actions are too weak an Evidence and he that goes no farther can know nothing These are only the gross Substance a Copy of his Countenance and the Counterfeit Lustre of a False Stone The Jewels cannot be distinguished with so superficial a view it is not enough to hear the Sound we must judge the Harmony and know what Hand it is that moves the Strings For the Motive and Cause is the Life and Soul of all and gives both Being and Denomination to the whole Action This is the only Mark we have to judge by and every Man is chiefly concerned to take care that This be pure and good and in every regard what it ought to be All which depends upon the Uprightness of the Intention and Unblemish'd Honesty of the Heart and that is the very Quality we are now looking after That Integrity which passes in common Estimation for the True What notiens the world have of it and is generally recommended and extolled a nd which indeed is all that those who have the Character and Commendation of Just and Honest and Fair-dealing men pretend to is at the best but a mean and formal and pedantick Virtue Such as is a Slave to Laws and takes its Measures from thence is check'd and kept under by Hope and Fear is acquired learned produced and practiced upon the account of and in submission to the Religion we profess the Government we live under the Customs of our Country the Commands of our Superiors the Examples of Them we converse with bound up in Forms and limited by the Letter of the Law an effeminate poor-spirited Honesty perplexed with Doubts and Scruples and Terrors of Conscience For some People never think themselves innocent and as they should be when their Minds are quiet and easy and void of Fear Now such an Honesty as this must not only be mutable and manifold in several parts of the World and vary as the Religion and Laws and Examples and Forms and Modes of the Countries where men happen to converse shall vary For where the Springs of Action change the whole Movement must needs change proportionably But which is yet more to its disparagement it must needs be irregular and unequal inconsistent with it self floating and unsettled full of Ebbings and Flowings Intervals of Heat and Cold inconstant and precarious depending on the Events and Successes of Affairs the Offering of Occasions and Interposition of sudden Emergencies the Difference of Persons and Circumstances and a thousand other unforeseen Accidents which move this Man and his Virtue as a Boat is moved by Sails and Oars by sudden strokes and spurts and gusts and pusss of Wind. In a word These Men are good purely by Chance by fits and starts by external and very distant motives and not in reality and by virtue of a fix'd and governing Principle This Defect of theirs is what not only standers by but even themselves are insensible of they never observe nor discover their own imperfections but it were easy to shew them to themselves and make the thing plain to them by holding a stiff Rein observing them more nicely and distinctly and quickning their attention a little And indeed nothing would be a more effectual Conviction of their Deficiency than the mighty inequality of their Actions and Tempers and their own Disagreement with themselves For in one and the same case you shall find them coming to quite different resolutions and determinations and acting in direct contradiction to what they have done before Sometimes they are so heavy and dull that neither Whip nor Spur can get them forward and presently upon the full speed that no Bit can stop them Now this prodigious unevenness and difference of Behaviour is occasioned by the difference of those external Motives by which they are governed and managed And as These sometimes agitate and heat them violently swell and multiply or grow lukewarm and cold and flag and droop again so must Their Virtue and Zeal needs increase and abate accordingly and thus it distinguishes it self from Real and Substantial Virtue by that Property natural to all Accidents which is the being capable of Augmentation and Diminution and so of no better Extract than all those Qualities whose dishonour it is according to the Terms of the Schools Recipere magis minus Now That True and Substantial Integrity which I insist upon at present as a necessary qualification What it is in Truth in order to Wisdom is free and easy void of Affectation and Constraint masculine and generous pleasant and chearful equal and uniform constant and steady magnanimous and brave keeping on its own course and never looking to the right hand or to the left never standing still or slackning or quickning its pace upon the account of Wind or Weather Accidents and Occasions may change but This continues always the same It is not in the power of any thing to alter or shake it my meaning is that the Man's Judgment and Will are fixed and immutable and the Soul where this Integrity hath taken up its Residence is never to be corrupted or diverted to dishonest purposes For