boord onely without worke of any other tooles or instruments at all unto whom he answered Because our citizens should be moderate in all things that they bring into their houses and have no furniture therein that might set other mens teeth on water or which other men do so much affect From this custome by report it came that king Leotychides the first of that name being at supper in a friends house of his when he saw the roofe over his head richly seeled with embowed arch-worke demanded of his host whether the trees in that countrey grew square or no When he was asked why he forbad to make warre often against the same enemies For feare quoth he that being forced estsoones to stand upon their owne guard and put themselves in defence they should in the end become well experienced in the warres in which regard Agesilaus afterwards was greatly blamed for being the cause by his continuall expeditions and invasions into Boeotia that the Thebans were equall in armes unto the Lacedaemonians Another asked also of him why he enjoined maidens marriageable to exercise their bodies in running wrestling pitching the barre flinging coits and lancing of darts For this purpose quoth he that the first rooting of their children which they are to breed taking fast and sure holde in able bodies wel set and strongly knit might spring and thrive the better within them and they also themselves being more firme and vigorous beare children afterward the better be prepared and exercised as it were to endure the paines and travels of child-birth easily and stoutly over and besides if need required be able to fight in defence of themselves their children and countrey Some there were who found fault with the custome that he brought in that the maidens of the city at certeine festivall daies should dance naked in solemne shewes and pomps that were set demanding the cause thereof to whom hee rendred this reason That they performing the same exercises which men do might be no lesse enabled than they either in strength and health of body or in vertue and generosity of minde and by that meanes checke and despise the opinion that the vulgar sort had of them And from hence it came that Gorgo the wife of Leonidas as we finde written when a certeine dame and ladie of a forren countrey said unto her There be no other women but you Laconian wives that have men at command answered in this wise For why we onely are the women that beare men Moreover he debarted and kept those men who remained unmarried from the sight of those shewes where the yoong virgins aforesaid danced naked and that which more is set upon them the note of infamie in depriving them expresly of that honour and service which yonger solke are bound to yeeld unto their elders in which doing he had a great foresight and providence to move his citizens to marriage and for to beget children by occasion whereof there was never any man yet who misliked and complained of that which was said unto Dercillidas by way of reproch though otherwise he was a right good and valiant captaine for when he came upon a time into a place one of the yonger sort there was who would not deigne to rise up unto him nor give him any reverence and this reason he gave Because quoth he as yet you have not begotten a childe to rise up and doe his duety likewise to me Another asked of him wherefore he had ordeined that daughters should be married without a dowrie or portion given with them Because quoth he for default of marriage-money none of them might stay long ere they were wedded nor be hearkened after for their goods but that every man regarding onely the maners and conditioins of a yoong damosell might make choise of her whom he meaneth to espouse for her vertue onely which is the reason also that he banished out of Sparta all maner of painting trimming and artificiall embelishments to procure a superficiall beauty and complexion Having also prefixed and set downe a certeine time within the which aswell maidens as yoong men might marrie one would needs know of him why he limited forth such a definite terme unto whom he answered Because their children might be strong and lustie as being begotten and conceived of such persons as be already come to their full growth Some woondered why hee would not allow that the new married bridegrome should lie with his espouse but expresly gave order that the most part of the day hee should converse with his companions yea and all the nights long but whensoever hee went to keepe company with his new wedded wife it should be secretly and with great heed and care that hee be not surprized or found with her This quoth he is done to this end that they may be alwaies more strong and in better plight of body also that by not enjoying their delights and pleasures to the full their love might be ever fresh and their infants betweene them more hardie and stout furthermore hee remooved out of the citie all precious and sweete persumes saying That they were no better than the verie marring and corruption of the good naturall oile the art also of dying and tincture which he said was nothing else but the slatterie of the senses to be briefe he made the citie Sparta inaccessible as I may say for all jewelers and fine workmen who professe to set out and adorne the body giving out that such by their lewd artificiall devices do deprave and marre the good arts and mysteries in deed In those daies the honestie and pudicitie of dames was such and so far off were they from that tractable facilitie and easie accesse unto their love which was afterwards that adulterie among them was held for an unpossible and uncredible thing And to this pupose may well be remembred the narration of one Geradatas an ancient Spartane of whom a stranger asked the question What punishment adulterers were to suffer in the citie of Sparta for that he saw Lycurgus had set downe no expresse law in that behalfe Why quoth he there is no adulterie among us but when the other replied againe Yea but what and if there were even the same answere made Geradatas and none other For how quoth he can there be an adulterer in Sparta wherein all riches all superfluous delights and dainties all outward trickings and embelishings of the bodie are despised and dishonoured and where shame of doing ill honestie reverence and obeisance to superiors carrie away all the credit and authoritie One put himselfe forward and was in hand with him to set up and establish the popular State of government in Sparta unto whom hee answered Begin it thy selfe first within thine owne house And unto another who demaunded of him why he ordained the sacrifices in Lacedaemon so simple and of smal cost To the end quoth he that we should never cease and give over to worship and honour the gods
Pindarus also writeth as touching Agamedes Trophonius That after they had built the temple of Apollo in Delphos they demanded of that god their hire and reward who promised to pay them fully at the seven-nights end meane while he bade them be merie and make good cheere who did as he enjoined them so upon the seventh night following they tooke their sleepe but the next morning they were found dead in bed Moreover it is reported that when Pindarus himselfe gave order unto the commissioners that were sent from the State of Boeotia unto the oracle of Apollo for to demand what was best for man this answere was returned from the prophetisse That he who enjoined them that errand was not ignorant thereof in case the historie of Agamedes and Trophonius whereof he was author were true but if he were disposed to make further triall he should himselfe see shortly an evident proofe thereof Pindarus when he heard this answer began to thinke of death and to prepare himselfe to die and in trueth within a little while after changed his life The like narration is related of one Euthynous an Italian who was sonne to Elysius of Terinae for vertue wealth and reputation a principall man in that citie namely that he died suddenlie without any apparent cause that could be given thereof his father Elysius incontinently thereupon began to grow into some doubt as any other man besides would have done whether it might not be that he died of poison for that he was the onely childe he had and heire apparant to all his riches and not knowing otherwise how to sound the trueth hee sent out to a certeine oracle which used to give answere by the conjuration and calling forth of spirits or ghosts of men departed where after he had performed sacrifices and other ceremoniall devotions according as the law required he laied him downe to sleepe in the place where he dreamed and saw this vision There appeared unto him as he thought his owne father whom when he saw he discoursed unto him what had fortuned his sonne requesting and beseeching him to be assistant with him to finde out the trueth and the cause indeed of his so sudden death his father then should answere thus And even therefore am I come hither here therefore receive at this mans hands that certificate which I have brought unto thee for thereby shalt thou know all the cause of thy griefe and sorrow now the partie whom his father shewed and presented unto him was a yoong man that followed after him who for all the world in stature and yeeres resembled his sonne Euthynous who being demanded by him what he was made this answere I am the ghost or angell of your sonne and with that offered unto him a little scrowle or letter which when Elysius had unfolded he found written within it these three verses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which may be done into English thus Elysius thou foolish man aske living Sages read Euthynous by fatall course of 〈◊〉 is dead For longer life would neither him nor parents stand in stead And thus much may suffice you both as touching the ancient histories written of this matter and also of the second point of the foresaid question But to come unto the third branch of Socrates his conjecture admit it were true that death is the utter abolition and destruction aswell of soule as body yet even so it cannot be reckoned simply ill for by that reckoning there should follow a privation of all sense and a generall deliverance from paine anxietie and angush and like as there commeth no good thereby even so no harme at all can ensue upon it forasmuch as good and evill have no being but in that thing onely which hath essence and subsislence and the same reason there is of the one as of the other so as in that which is not but utterly becommeth void anulled and taken quite out of the world there can not be imagined either the one or the other Now this is certeine that by this reason the dead returne to the same estate and condition wherein they were before their nativitie like as therefore when we were unborne we had no sense at all of good or evill no more shall we have after our departure out of this life and as those things which preceded our time nothing concerned us so whatsoever hapneth after our death shall touch us as little No paine feele they that out of world be gone To die and not be borne I holde all one For the same state and condition is after death which was before birth And do you thinke that there is any difference betweene Never to have bene and To cease from being surely they differ no more than either an house or a garment in respect of us and our use thereof after the one is ruined or fallen downe and the other all rent and torne from that benefit which we had by them before they were begun to be built or made and if you say there is no difference in them in these regards as little there is be you sure between our estate after death and our condition before our nativitie a very pretie and elegant speech therefore it was of Arcesilaus the philosopher when he said This death quoth he which every man tearmeth evill hath one peculiar propertie by it selfe of all other things that be accounted ill in that when it is present it never harmeth any man onely whiles it is absent and in expectance it hurteth folke And in very truth many men through their folly and weakenesse and upon certaine slanderous calumniations and false surmises conceived against death suffer themselves to die because sorsooth they would not die Very well therefore and aptly wrot the poet Epicharmus in these words That which was knit and joined fast Is loosed and dissolv'd at last Each thing returnes into the same Earth into earth from whence it came The spirit up to heaven anon Wherefore what harme heerein just none And as for that which Cresphontes in one place of Euripides speaking of Hercules said If under globe of earth with those he dwell Who being none have left laid once in grave A man of him might say and that right well That puissance and strength he none can have By altering it a little in the end you may thus inferre If under globe of earth with those he dwell Who being none have left laid once in grave A man of him might say and that right well That sense at all of paine he can none have A generous and noble saying also was that of the Lacedaemonians Now are we in our gallant prime Before as others had their time And after us shall others floure But we shall never see that houre As also this Now dead are they who never thought That life or death were simply ought But all their care was for to dy And live as they should
that in sea all plunged she had beene Yea and himselfe said unto her women and waiting maidens Retire a side and stand you farre from me Faire damosels untill such time you see That I have washt from off my shoulders twaine The filth of sea that now my skinne doth staine And when he had thus said he went downe into the river And there anon he scowr'd cleane away The salt sea-fome upon his head that lay In which place the poet hath marvelous well observed and expressed that which ordinarilie hapneth in such a case for that when they who come foorth of the sea stand drying them in the sunne his heat doth presently dissipate the most subtile and lightest substance of the humiditie and then that which is most foule and filthy remaining behinde sticketh to is baked and felted to the skinne in manner of a falt crust untill it be washed off with fresh and potable water THE TENTH QUESTION What is the cause that at Athens they never judged nor pronounced the daunce of the tribe Aeantis to be the last AT the solemne feast which Serapion made for the victory of the daunce which the tribe or linage Aeantis obteined by his leading and conduct to which feast we were bidden as being of that tribe for that the people had endued us with the priviledge and right of bourgeosie in the same much talke there was occasioned by the great emulation and strife which had beene for the honour of that present daunce and indeed followed it was with much zeale and heat of affection by reason that king Philopappus himselfe in person was a most honourable and magnificent president thereof having defraied the charges belonging to the daunces of every tribe who being present also with us invited guests to this stately supper as hee was a prince no lesse courteous and full of humanitie than studious and desirous and desirous of knowledge had both the proposing and also the hearing of many antiquities Now there was propounded and put to discourse such a matter as this by Marcus the Grammarian namely that Neanthes the Cyzicene wrote in his fabulous narrations of this citie that the tribe Aeantis had by especiall honour this speciall priviledge above the rest that their daunce was never adjudged to the last place That writer quoth the king is not sufficient to authorize an history but supposing that this were true let us make it the subject-matter of our discourse at this present and search the cause thereof But admit quoth our friend Milo that this were a false tale What then quoth king Philopappus there were no great matter in it if the like befall unto us for love of learning as sometime did to the wise philosopher Democritus who feeding one day as it should seeme upon a coucumber when he perceived the juice and liquor thereof to be verie sweet and to taste of honie demanded of his maid-servant who attended upon him where she bought it who named a certeine garden whereupon he rose from the boord and would needs have her to bring him thither and to shew him the very place where it grew but the wench woondering at her master and asking him the reason what he meant to be gone in such haste Why quoth he I must needs finde out the cause of this extraordinary sweetnesse and finde it I shall when I have well viewed and considered the place hereat the maiden smiling Sit you still good sir quoth she and let this thing trouble your head no farther for the trueth is this I chanced before I was aware to put this coucumber into a vessell that had honie in it Then Democritus seeming to be offended and displeased with her Thou angrest me to the heart with thy prittle-prattle I will I tell thee go forward in this my intended purpose and search into the cause hereof as if this sweetnesse were naturall and came of the coucumber it selfe and even so we will not pretend this readinesse and facilitie of Neanthes in delivering some matters incredible as an evasion or excuse to avoid this present disputation for if none other good wil come of our discourse yet I am sure it will serve well to whet and exercise our wits the while Then all the companie at once with one accord fell to praise the said tribe Aeantis relating and collecting what commendable acts soever and glorious feats of armes had beene performed by that tribe And here they failed not to rehearse the famous battell of Marathon which is a State belonging to the tribe Aeantis They forgat not to alledge likewise how Harmodius and Aristogtton were Aeantides borne in Aphidne a towne of that tribe Also Glaucias the oratour affirmed that the right wing or point of that battell of Marathon was assigned to them of that tribe proving the same by the Elegies or verses which the poet Aeschylus had composed in the praise of their good service having himselfe in person fought valiantly in the said conflict Moreover he shewed that Callimachus the high marshall of the field being one of that linage both bare himselfe right bravely that day and was one of the principall authors after captaine Miltiades of that fought field gave his voice with him and perswaded to strike this battell Unto this allegation of Glaucias I my selfe added moreover and said That the decree or commission by vertue whereof Miltiades led foorth the Athenian armie with banner displaied into the field was concluded at what time as the tribe Aeantis was president of the counsell at Athens as also that the same tribe in the battell of Platea carried away the praise and prise for their brave service above the rest and heereupon it is that this tribe of Aeantis solemnizeth every yeere a stately sacrifice for that victorie as being commanded and appointed so to doe by the oracle of Apollo upon the mount Cithaeron and the same performed by nymphes or maidens Sphagitides for the celebration of which solemnity the city furnisheth them with beasts and other things needfull for the same sacrifice But yet you see quoth I that all the rest of the tribes may as well alledge for themselves many valiant act by them atchieved and namely Leontis from which my selfe am descended which in glorious renowme giveth place to none whatsoever Consider therefore my masters whether it bee not very like and more probable that this was attributed unto it for to appease and comfort that woorthy person who gave the name unto this tribe I meane Ajax the sonne of Telamon who had not the patience to endure the overthrow in judgement and losse of Achilles armour but was so farre inflamed with envie emulation and wrath that he spared nothing nor cared for the ruine of all to the end therefore that he might not fall into another fit of furie and be implacable thought good it was to ease him of the thing which might of all things offend and vexe him most in that disfavour and disgrace
is tossed within a round compasse for neither the setled constitution of a disease is without some cause bringing into the world irregularly and against all law of nature a generation and power from that which hath no being at all nor an easie matter is it for a man to finde out a new cause unlesse withall he do set downe a new aire strange water and such meats as our forefathers never tasted of imagining that they are run hither to us now and never before out of I wot not what other worlds or imaginarie inter-worlds and spaces betweene for sicke wee fall by meanes of the same things whereof we live and no peculiar and proper seeds there be of diseases but the naughtinesse and corruption of such things whereby wee live in regard of us and our owne faults and errours besides about them are they which trouble and offend nature these troubles have perpetually the same differences though the same many times take new names for these names are according to the ordinance and custome of men but the maladies themselves are the affections of nature and so those diseases of themselves finite being varied diversified by these names infinite have deceived and beguiled us and as there is not lightly and upon a sudden committed in the Grammaticall parts of speech or in the Syntaxis and construction thereof any new barbarisme solaecisme or incongruitie even so the temperatures of mens bodies have their falles errours and transgressions which be certeine and determinate considering that in some sort even those things which are against nature be comprised and included in nature and this is it that the wittie inventers and devisers of fables would signifie in saying That when the giants made warre against the gods there were ingendred certeine strange and monstrous creatures every way at what time as the moone was turned cleane contrary and arose not as she was wont and verily their meaning was that nature produced new maladies like unto monsters but withall imagine and devise a cause of such change and alteration that is neither probable nor yet incredible but pronouncing and affirming that the augmentation more or lesse of some diseases causeth that newnesse and diversitie in them which is not well done of them my good friend Philo for this intention and augmentation may well adde thereto frequencie and greatnesse but surely it transporteth not the subject thing out of the first and primitive kinde and thus I suppose the leprosie or Elepantiasis to be nothing els but the vehemencie of these scurvie and scabbie infections as also the Hydrophobie or vaine feare of water no other but an augmentation of the passions of stomacke or melancholie and verily a woonder it were that we should not know how Homer was not ignorant hereof for this is certeine that he called a dogge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of this raging accident whereto he is subject and hereupon men also when they are in a rage be said likewise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When Diogenianus had thus discoursed Philo himselfe both seemed somewhat to answere and refute his reasons and also requested me to speake in the behalfe of the ancient physicians who were thus challenged and condemned for their ignorance or negligence in these principall matters in case it were true that these maladies were not of a later breed and more moderne than their age First therefore it seemed unto me that Diogenianus put not this well downe for a good supposall that tensions and relaxations according to more or lesse make no differences nor remove the subject matters out of their kinde for by this meanes we should likewise say that vineger differed not from wine that is souring nor bitternesse from styplicitie or sourenesse nor 〈◊〉 from wheat ne yet garden mints from the wilde mint but evident it is that these do degenerate yea and become altered in their very qualities partly by relaxations as the things doe languish and lose their heart and in part by tension as they be reenforced and take vigor for otherwise we must be forced to say that the flame differeth not from a white or cleere winde nor a light from a flame nor frost from dew nor haile from raine but that all these be but the inforcements onely and tensions of the same things and so constantly we shall be driven to affirme that blindnesse and dimme sight differ not and inordinate passion of vomiting called Cholera is nothing different from a keckish stomacke and a desire to cast but onely according to augmentation and diminution more or lesse and all this is nothing to the purpose for if they admit and say that this very tension and augmentation in vehemencie came but now of late as if this noveltie were occasioned by the quantitie and not the qualitie yet the absurditie of the paradox remaineth neverthelesse moreover seeing that Sophocles speaking of those things which because they had not bene in times past men would not beleeve to be at this present said very well in this wise All kind of things both good and bad Once at the first their being had This also seemeth very probable and to stand with great reason that maladies ran not forth all at once as if the barriers had bene set open for the race and they let out together but some came alwaies successively behinde at the taile of others and each one tooke the first begining at a certaine time And a man may well conjecture and guesse quoth I that such as arose of want and indigence as also those that came of heat and colde were the first that assailed our bodies but repletions gluttonies and delicate pleasures came afterwards together with sloth and idlenesse which by reason of abundance of victuals caused great store of superfluities and excrements from whence proceeded sundry sorts of maladies the complication whereof and intermixture one with another bringeth evermore some new thing or other for every naturall thing is orderly and limited because that nature is nothing els but order it selfe or at leastwise the worke of order whereas disoreder like to the same that Pindarus speaketh of is infinit and can not be comprised within any certeine number so that whatsoever is unnaturall the same immediatly is unlimited and infinit for the trueth we can not deliver but one way marie to lie a man may finde an infinit number of meanes by occasion of innumerable occurrents also accords musicall and harmonies stand upon their certeine proportions but the errours that men commit in playing upon the harpe or other instrument in song and in dauncing who is able to comprehend although Phrynichus the tragedian poet said of himselfe thus In daunce I finde as many sorts And formes of gestures and disports As waves in sea and billowes strong Arise by tempest all night long And Chrysippus writeth that the divers complications often prositions which they call Axioms and no more surmount the number of ten hundred thousand but Hipparchus reprooved this
some who openly maintaine that Osiris is the Sunne and that the Greeks call him Sirtus but the article which the Aegyptians put before to wit O is the cause that so much is not evidently perceived as also that Isis is nothing else but the Moone and of her images those that have hornes upon them signifie no other thing but the Moone croissant but such as are covered and clad in blacke betoken those daies wherein she is hidden or darkened namely when she runneth after the Sunne which is the reason that in love matters they invocate the Moone And Eudoxus himselfe saith that Isis is the president over amatorious folke And verily in all these ceremonies there is some probabilitie and likelihood of trueth But to say that Typhon is the Sunne is so absurd that we ought not so much as give eare to those who affirme so But returne we now to our former matter For Isis is the feminine part of nature apt to receive all generation upon which occasion called she is by Plato the nurse and Pandeches that is to say capable of all yea and the common sort name her Myrionymus which is as much to say as having an infinite number of names for that she receiveth all formes and shapes according as it pleaseth that first reason to convert and turne her Moreover there is imprinted in her naturally a love of the first and principall essence which is nothing else but the soveraigne good and it she desireth seeketh and pursueth after Contrariwise she flieth and repelleth from her any part and portion that proceedeth from ill And howsoever she be the subject matter and meet place apt to receive as well the one as the other yet of it selfe enclined she is alwaies rather to the better and applieth herselfe to engender the same yea and to disseminate and sowe the defluxions and similitudes thereof wherein she taketh pleasure and rejoiceth when she hath conceived and is great therewith ready to be delivered For this is a representation and description of the substance engendred in matter and nothing else but an imitation of that which is And therefore you may see it is not besides the purpose that they imagine and devise the soule of Osiris to be eternall and immortall but as for the body that Typhon many times doth teare mangle and abolish it that it cannot be seene and that Isis goeth up and downe wandring heere and there gathering together the dismembred pieces thereof for that which is good and spirituall by consequence is not any waies subject to change and alteration but that which is sensible and materiall doth yeeld from it selfe certeine images admitting withall and receiving sundry porportions formes and similitudes like as the prints and stamps of seales set upon waxe doe not continue and remaine alwaies but are subject to change alteration disorder and trouble and this same was chased from the superor region and sent downe hither where it fighteth against Horus whom Isis engendred sensible as being the very image of the spirituall and intellectuall world And heereupon it is that Typhon is said to accuse him of bastardie as being nothing pure and sincere like unto his father to wit reason and understanding which of it selfe is simple and not medled with any passion but in the matter adulterate and degenerat by the reason that it is corporall Howbeit in the end the victorie is on Mercuries side for hee is the discourse of reason which testifieth unto us and sheweth that nature hath produced this world materiall metamorphozed to the spirituall forme for the nativity of Apollo engendred betweene Isis Osiris whiles the gods were yet in the belly of Rhea symbolizeth thus much that before the world was evidently brought to light and fully accomplished the matter of reason being found naturally of it selfe rude and unperfect brought foorth the first generation for which cause they say that god being as yet lame was borne and begotten in darkenesse whom they call the elder Horus For the world yet it was not but an image onely and designe of the world and a bare fantasie of that which should be But this Horus heere is determinate definit and perfect who killeth not Typhon right out but taketh from him his force and puissance that he can doe little or nothing And heereupon it is that by report in the citie Coptus the image of Horus holdeth in one hand the generall member of Typhon and they fable besides that Mercurie having berest him of his 〈◊〉 made thereof strings for his harpe and so used them Heereby they teach that reason framing the whole world set it in tune and brought it to accord framing it of those parts which before were at jarre and discord howbeit remooved not nor abolished altogether the pernicious and hurtfull nature but accomplished the vertue thereof And therefore it is that it being feeble and weake wrought also as it were and intermingled or interlaced with those parts and members which be subject to passions and mutations causeth earthquakes and tremblings excessive heates and extreame drinesse with extraordinarie windes in the aire besides thunder lightnings and firie tempests It impoisoneth moreover the waters and windes infecting them with pestilence reaching up and bearing the head aloft as farre as to the Moone obscuring and darkning many times even that which is by nature cleane and shining And thus the Aegyptians do both thinke and say that Typhon sometime strooke the eie of Horus and another while plucked it out of his head and devoured it and then afterwards delivered it againe unto the Sunne By the striking aforesaid they meane aenigmatically the wane or decrease of the Moone monethly by the totall privation of the eie they understand her ecclipse and defect of light which the Sunne doth remedy by relumination of her streight waies as soone as she is gotten past the shade of the earth But the principall and more divine nature is composed and consisteth of three things to wit of an intellectuall nature of matter and a compound of them both which we call the world Now that intellectuall part Plato nameth Idea the patterne also of the father as for matter he termeth it a mother nurse a foundation also and a plot or place for generation and that which is produced of both he is woont to call the issue and thing procreated And a man may very well conjecture that the Aegyptians compared the nature of the whole world especially to this as the fairest triangle of all other And Plato in his books of policy or common wealth seemeth also to have used the same when he composeth and describeth his nuptiall figure which triangle is of this sort that the side which maketh the right angle is of three the basis of foure and the third line called Hypotinusa of five aequivolent in power to the other two that comprehend it so that the line which directly falleth plumbe upon the base must answer proportionably to the male
likewise under it all other profane authors out of which a minde that is not corrupt may gather profit so they be handled wisely and used with discretion To which effect Plutarch delivereth in this treatise good precepts And after he hath shewed generally that in Poesie there is delight and danger withall he refuteth briefly those who flatly condemne it Then as he proceedeth to advertise that this ground and foundation is to be laide namely that poëts are liers he describeth what their fictions be how they ought to be considered and what the scope and marke is whereat Poë sie doth aime and shoot After wards he adviseth to weigh ponder well the intention of Poëts unto which they addresse accommodate their verses to beware of their repugnanits and contradictions and to the ende that we be not so soone damnified by any dangerous points which they deliver one after another to oppose against them the opinions and counsels of other persons of better marke Which done he addeth moreover and saith That the sentences intermingled here and there in Poëts do reply sufficiently against the evill doctrine that they may seeme to teach elsewhere also in taking heed to the diverse significations of words to be rid and freed from great encumbrances and difficulties discoursing moreover how a man may make use of their descriptions of vices and vertues also of the words and deeds of those personages whom they bring in searching unto the reasons and causes of such speeches and discourses thereout to draw in the end a deeper sense and higher meaning reaching even to Morall philosophie and the gentle framing of the minde unto the love of vertue And for that there be some hard and difficult places which like unto forked waies may leave the mindes of the Readers doubtfull and in suspense he sheweth that it is an easie matter to apply the same well and that withall a man may reforme those sentences ill placed and accommodate them to many things And in conclusion framing this discourse to his principall intention hetreateth how the praises and dispraises which Poëts attribute unto persons are to be considered and that we ought to confirme all that which we finde good in such authors by testimonies taken out of Philosophie the onely scope whereunto yoong men must tend in reading of Poëts READING AND HEARING of Poemes and Poets THat which the Poet Philoxenus said of flesh that the sweetest is that which is least flesh of fish likewise that the most favorie is that which is least fish let us O Marcus Sedatus leave to be decided and judged by those who as Cato said had their palats more quicke and sensible than their hearts But that yoong men take more pleasure in those Philosophicall discourses which favour least of Philosophie and seeme rather spoken in mirth than in earnest and are more willing to give care thereto and suffer themselves more easily to be led and directed thereby is a thing to us notorious and evident For we see that in reading not onely Aesops fables and the fictions of Poets but also the booke of Heraclides entituled Abaris and that of Ariston named Lycas wherein the opinions of Philosophers as touching the soule are mingled with tales and feigned narrations devised for pleasure they be ravished as one would say with great contentment and delight And therefore such youthes ought not onely to keepe their bodies sober and temperate in the pleasures of meate and drinke but also much more to accustome their minds to a moderate delight in those things which they heare and read using the same temperately as a pleasant and delectable sauce to give a better and more favorie taste to that which is healthfull holsome and profitable therein For neither those gates that be shut in a city do guard the same and secure it for being forced and won if there be but one standing open to receive and let in the enimies nor the temperance and continencie in the pleasures of other senses preserve a yoong man for being corrupted and perverted if for want of forecast and heed taking he give himselfe to the pleasure onely of the care But for that the hearing approcheth neerer to the proper seat of reason and understanding which is the braine so much the more hurt it doth unto him that receiveth delectation thereby if it be neglected and not better heed taken thereto Now forasmuch haply as it is neither possible nor profitable to restraine from the reading and hearing of Poemes such yoong men as are of the age either of my soone Soclarus or of your Cleander let us I praie you have a carefull eie unto them as standing more in need of a guide now to direct them in their readings then they did in times past to stay and dade them when they learned to go This is the reason that me thought in dutie I was bound to send unto you in writing that which not long since I discoursed of by mouth as touching the writings of Poets to the end that you may reade it your selfe and if you find that the reasons therein delivered be of no lesse vertue efficacie than the stones called Amethysts which some take before and hang about their necks to keepe them from drunkennesse as they sit at bankets drinking wine merily you may impart and communicate the same to your sonne Cleander to preoccupate and prevent his nature which being not dull and heavie in any thing but every way quicke lively and pregnant is more apt and easie to be led by such allurements In Polypes head there is to be had One thing that good is and another as bad for that the flesh thereof is pleasant and favorie enough in taste to him that feedeth thereupon but as they say it causeth troublesome dreames in the sleepe and imprinteth in the fantasie strange and monstrous visions Semblablie there is in Poesie much delectation and pleasure enough to entertaine and feed the understanding and spirit of a yoong man yet neverthelesse hee shall meet with that there which will trouble and cary away his minde into errours if his hearing be not well guided and conducted by sage direction For verie well and fitly it may be said not onely of the land of Aegypt but also of Poetrie Mixed drugs plentie as well good as bad Med'cines and poisons are there to be had which it bringeth foorth and yeeldeth to as many as converse therein Likewise Therein sweet loue and wantonnesse with dalliance you shall finde And sugred words which do beguile the best and wisest minde For that which is so deceitfull and dangerous therein toucheth not at all those that be witlesse sots fooles and grosse of conceit Like as Simonides answered upon a time to one who demanded of him Why he did not beguile and circumvent the Thessalians aswell as all other Greeks Because quoth he they are too sottish for me to deale withall and so rude that I can not skill of deceiving them
feareth Neptune and standeth in dread least he shake cleaue and open the earth and so discover hell he will rebuke also himselfe when he is offended and angrie with for Apollo the principal man of all the Greekes of whom Thetu complaineth thus in the Poet Aesohylus as touching Achilles her sonne Himselfe did sing and say al good of me himselfe also at wedding present was Yet for all this himselfe and none but be hath slaine and done to death my sonne alas He will like wise represse the treares of Achilles now departed and of Agamemnon being in hell who in their desire to revive and for the love of this life stretch foorth their impotent and seeble hands And if it chaunce at any time that he be troubled with passions and surprised with their enchantments and sorcerie he will not sticke nor feare to say thus unto himselfe Make hast and speed without delay Recover soone the light of day Beare well in minde what thou seest heere And all report to thy bed feere Homer spake this in mirth and pleasantly fitting indeed the discourse wherein he describeth hell as being in regard of the fiction a tale fit for the eares of women and none els These be the fables that Poets do feigne voluntarily But more in number there are which they neither devisenor counterfeit but as they are perswaded and do beleeve themselves so they would beare us in hand and infect us with the same untruthes as namely when Homer writeth thus of Iupiter Two lots then of long sleeping death he did in balance put One for Achilles hardy knight and one for Hector stout But when he pis'd it just mids behold str Hectors death Weigh'd downward unto bell beneath Then Phoebus slopt his breath To this fiction Aeschylus the Poët hath aptly fitted one entire Tragedie which he intituled Psychostasia that is to say the weighing of Soules or ghosts in balance Wherein he deviseth to stand at these skales of Iupiter Thetu of the one side and Aurora of the other praying each of them for their sonnes as they fight But there is not a man who seeth not cleerely that this it but a made tale and meere fable devised by Homer either to content and delight the Reader or to bring him into some great admiration and astonishment Likewise in this place T' is Iupiter that mooveth warre He is the cause that men do jarre As also this of another Poët When God above some house will overthrow He makes debate twixt mort all men below These and such like speeches are delivered by Poëts according to the very conceit and beliese which they have whereby the errour and ignorance which themselves are in as touching the nature of the gods they derive and communicate unto us Semblably the strange wonders and marvels of Hell The descriptions by them made which they depaint unto us by fearefull and terrible termes representing unto us the fantasticall apprehensions and imaginations of burning and flaming rivers of hideous places and horrible torments there are not many men but wot well ynough that therein be tales and lies good store no otherwise than in meates and viands you shall finde mixed otherwhiles hurtfull poyson or medicinable drugs For neither Homer nor Pindarus nor Sophocles have written thus of Hell beleeving certainely that there were any such things there From whence the dormant rivers dead of blacke and shady night Cast up huge mists and clouds full darke that overwhelme the light Likewise The Ocean coast they sailed still along Fast by the clifs of Leucas rocke among As also Here boyling waves of gulfe so deepe do swell Where lies the way and downfall into hell And as many of them as bewailed and lamented for death as a most piteous and woful thing or feared want of sepulture as a miserable and wretched case uttered their plaints and griefes in these and such like words Forsake me not unburied so Nor unbewailed when you go Semblably And then the soule from body flew and as to hell she went She did her death her losseof strength and youthfull yeeres lament Likewise Doe not me kill before my time for why to see this light Is sweet sorce me not under earth where nothing is but night These are the voices I say of passionate persons captivate before to error and false opinions And therefore they touch us more neerely and trouble us so much the rather when they finde us likewise possessed of such passions and feeblenes of spirit from whence they proceed In which regard we ought to be prepared betimes and provided alwaies before hand to encounter and withstand such illusions having this sentence readily evermore resounding in our cares as it were from a trunke or pipe That Poetrie is fabulous and maketh smal reckoning of Truth As for the truth indeed of these things it is exceeding hard to be conceived comprehended even by those who travell in no other businesse but to search out the knowledge and understanding of the thing as they themselves do confesse And for this purpose these verses of Empedocles would be alwaies readie at hand who saith that the depth of such things as these No eie of man is able to perceive No care to heare nor spirit to conceive Like as these also of Xenophanes Never was man nor ever will be Able to sound the veritie Of those things which of God I write Or of the world I do endite And I assure you The very words of Socrates in Plato imply no lesse who protesteth and bindeth it with an oath that he cannot attaine to the knowledge of these matters And this will be a good motive to induce yoong men to give lesse credit unto Poëts as touching their certaine knowledge in these points wherein they perceive the Philosophers themselves so doubtfull and perplexed yea and therewith so much troubled Also the better shall we stay the mind of a yoong man cause him to be more warie if at his first entrance into the reading of Poëts we describe Poetrie unto him giving him to understand that it is an art of Imitation a science correspondent every way to the seat of painting and not onely must he be acquainted with the hearing of that vulgar speech so common in every mans mouth that Poësie is a speaking picture and picture a dumbe Poësie but also we ought to teach him that when we behold a Lizard or an Ape wel painted or the face of Thersites lively drawen we take pleasure therein praise the same wonderfully not for any beautie in the one or in the other but because they are so naturally counterfeited For that which is soule of it selfe ilfavored in the owne nature cannot be made faire seemly but the skil of resembling a thing wel be the same faire or be it foule is alwaies commended wheras contrariwise he that takes in hand to purtray an ilfavoured bodie and makes thereof a faire beautifull image shall exhibite a
incontinencie is to be reprooved but if by his speech and talke she perceived that he was a man of wit and wise behaviour and thereupon wished in her heart to be his wedded wife and to dwell with him rather than with one of her owne countrie who could skill of nothing else but to daunce or be a mariner I cannot blame her but thinke her praise woorthy In like case if when Penelope deviseth and talketh courteously with her woers who sued unto her for marriage and thereupon they court her againe and bestow upon her gay clothes rich jewels and other goodly ornaments fit for a Lady Vlisses her husband rejoice That she was well content to take Their gifts and did to them love make As though she would be kinde againe And yet her shewes were all but vaine If I say he joyed in that his wife received their courtesies and tokens and so made againe of them surely he surpasseth Poliager the notorious bawd playing his part in the Comedies of whom there goeth this by-word Bawde Poliager happie man hee That keepes at home in house a shee A heavenly goate whose influence Brings in riches with affluence But if he did it to have them by that meanes under his hand whiles they upon hope of obtayning their suit little thought of him how he watched them a shrewd turne then his joy and confident assurance was grounded well upon good reason Semblably in the counting that he made of those goods which the Phaeacians had landed when they set him on shore and having so done spred saile and departed backe againe if being thus left solitarie alone and finding him selfe forlorne he doubted of his estate and what should become of him and yet his mind was so set upon his goods that he feared Least part thereof they tooke away Whiles that on shore asleepe he lay His avarice were lamentable nay it were abominable I assure you But if as some do thinke and say being not sure whether he were in the Isle Ithaca or no he supposed that the safety of his gods and money was a certaine proofe and demonstration of the Phaeacians loyaltie and sidelitie for never would they have transported him into a strange land but for lucre nor when they left him and departed would have forborne his goods he used herein no foolish argument and his providence in so doing is commendable Some there be who finde fault with this verie landing of him upon the shore in case the Phaeacians did it whiles he was asleepe in deed and they say that it appeereth by a certaine Chronicle or Historie among the Tuskanes which they keepe by them that Vlisses was given by nature to be verie drowsie which was the cause that to many he was not affable and men oftentimes might hardly speake with him Now if this was no sleepe in very truth but that being both ashamed to send away the Phaeacians who had conducted him over sea without feasting them giving them presents and rewards for their kindnesse and also in feare least if they were seene there still upon the coast whiles he entertained them so kindly himselfe might be discovered by his enimies he used this pretense of feigned sleepe to cover and hide the perplexitie wherein he was or to shift off this difficultie wherein he stood in this case they allow and commend him for it In giving therefore to yoong men such advertisements as these we shall never suffer them to runne on still to the corruption of their manners but rather imprint in them presently a fervent zeale and hartie desire to chuse better things namely if we proceed directly to praise this and to dispraise that And this would be done especially in Tragedies those I meane where in fine words and affected speeches be oftentimes framed to cloke dishonest and villanous deeds For that which Sophocles saith in one place is not alwaies true If that it be a naughtie deed Of it good words cannot proceed For even himselfe is woont many times to palliat wicked conditions yea and naughtie acts with pleasant speeches and familiar apparant reasons which carie a probabilitie of sufficient excuse And even so plaieth Euripides his companion who shewed himselfe upon the same stage for see you not how he bringeth in Phoedra to begin with her husband Theseus First laying all the blame on him as if forsooth the wrongs and abuses that he offered unto her were the cause that she was enamoured upon Hippolytus The like audacious and bold speech he putteth in Helenas mouth against queene Hecuba in that Tragedie which is entituled Troades objecting unto her and saying That she was rather to be punished for bearing such a sonne as Alexander Paris who committed the adulterie with her A yoong man then ought not to accustome him selfe to thinke any such inventions as these to be pretie gallant and wittie ne yet laugh at such subtile and fine devices but to abhorre and detest as much or rather more wanton and filthie words than loose and dishonest deeds Moreover it would be expedient in all speeches to search the cause whereupon they do proceed after the example of Cato when he was a litle boy For do he would whatsoever his Master or Tutour bad but ever and anon hee would be inquisitive and questioning with him the reason of his commandements And yet we are not to beleeve and obey Poets as we ought either Schoole-masters or Law-givers unlesse the matter by them proposed have reason for the ground and grounded then it shal be thought upon reason if it be good and honest for if it be wicked it ought to seeme foolish and vaine But many of these men there be who are verie sharpe and curious in searching and demanding what Hesiodus should meane in this verse Whiles men are drinking doe not set The flagon over the wine goblet as also what sense may be made of these verses in Homer Another chariot who mounted is when from his owne he is alight Must not his speare and iavelin mis But trust thereto and therewith fight but other sentences iwis of greater importance and danger they admit soone and giue credit thereto without further enquiry examination as for example at these verses they sticke not The privitie to fathers vice Or mothers fault reprochable Will him debase who otherwise Is hardie stout and commendable no more than they doe at this Vpon a man if fortune frowne His heart therewith must be cast downe And yet such sayings as these come nere unto us and touch the quicke troubling our maner and behaviour in this life imprinting in us perverse judgements base and unmanly opinious unlesse we acquaint our selves to contradict ech of them in every point after this maner And wherefore ought he to beare an abject minde who is crossed with adverse fortune why rather should not he make head againe and wrestle with her bearing himselfe so much the more aloft and never endure to be troden downe and
of an honest man which both for the present and also all the rest of our life may leave in our soule the cicatrice or skar of repentance sorrow and heavinesse In conclusion to the end that we should not commit those deeds in haste which afterwards we may repent at leasure he sheweth that we ought to have before our eies the hurts and inconveniences caused before by evil bashfulnesse that the consideration thereof might keepe us from falling into fresh and new faultes OF UNSEEMELY AND naughtie bashfulnesse AMong those plants which the earth bringeth foorth some there are which not onely by their owne nature bee wilde and savage and withall bearing no fruit at all but that which woorse is in their growth doe hurt unto good seeds and fruitfull plants and yet skilful gardiners and husbandmen judge them to be arguments and signes not of bad ground but rather of a kinde and fat soile semblaby the passions and affections of the minde simply and in themselves are not good howbeit they spring as buds and flowers from a towardly nature and such as gently can yeeld it selfe to be wrought framed and brought into order by reason In this kinde I may raunge that which the Greekes call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is as much to say as a foolish and rusticall shamefastnes no evill signe in it selfe howbeit the cause and occasion of evill and naughtinesse For they that be given to bash and shame over-much and when they should not commit many times the same faults that they doe who are shamelesse and impudent heere onely is the difference that they when they trespasse and do amisse are displeased with themselves and grieve for the matter where as these take delight pleasure therin for he that is gracelesse and past shame hath no sense or feeling of griefe when he hath committed any foule or dishonest act contrariwise whosoever be apt to bash be ashamed quickly are soone moved troubled anon even at those things which seeme onely dishonest although they be not indeed Now lest the equivocation of the word might breed any doubt I meane by Dysopia immoderate bashfulnesse whereby one blusheth for shame exceedingly and for every thing whereupon such an one is called in Greeke Dysopetus for that his visage and countenance together with his mind changeth falleth and is cast downe for like as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greeke is defined to be a sacred heavinesse which causeth a downe-looke even so that shame and dismaiednesse which maketh us that we dare not looke a man in the face as we should and when we ought the call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And hereupon it was that the great Oratour Demosthenes said of an impudent fellow that he had in his eies not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. harlots playing pretily upon the ambiguity of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth both the round apple in the eies and also a maiden or virgine but contrariwise the over-bashfull person whom wee speake of sheweth in his countenance a minde too soft delicate and effeminate and yet he flattereth himselfe therein and calleth that fault wherein the impudent person surpasseth him Shamefastnesse Now Cato was woont to say That he loved to see yoong folke rather to blush than to looke pale as having good reason to acquaint and teach youth to dread shame and reproch more than blame and reproofe yea and suspition or obloquie rather than perill or danger Howbeit we must abridge cut off the excesse and over-much which is in such timidity and feare of reproch for that often-times it commeth to passe in some who dreading no lesse to heare ill and be accused than to be chastised or punished for false hearts are frighted from doing their duty and in no wise can abide to have an hard word spoken of them But as we are not to neglect these that are so tender nor ought to feed them in their feeblenesse of heart so againe we must not praise their disposition who are stiffe and inflexible such as the Poët describeth when he saith Who fearelesse is and basheth not all men fast to beholde In whom appeares the dogged force of Anaxarchus bolde but we ought to compound a good mixture and temperate medley of both extremities which may take away this excessive obstinacie which is impudence and that immoderate modestie which is meere childishnesse and imbecilitie True it is that the cure of these two maladies is difficult neither can this excesse both in the one and the other be cut off without danger For like as the skilfull husbandman when he would rid the ground of some wilde bushes and fruitlesse plants he laieth at them mainely with his grubbing hooke or mattocke untill he have fetched them up by the roote or else sets fire unto them and so burneth them but when he comes to proine or cut a vine an appletree or an olive he carrieth his hand lightly for feare of wounding any of the sound wood in fetching off the superfluous and ranke branches and so kill the heart thereof even so the Philosopher entending to plucke out of the mind of a yoong man either envie an unkind and savage plant which hardly or unneth at all may be made gentle and brought to any good use or the unseasonable and excessive greedines of gathering good or dissolute and disordinate lust he never feareth at all in the cutting thereof to draw blood to presse and pierce hard to the bottom yea and to make a large wound and deepe skarre But when he setteth to the keene edge of remonstrance and speech to the tender and delicate part of the soule for to cut away that which is excessive or overmuch to wit wherein is feated this unmeasurable and sheepish bashfulnesse he hath a great care and regard lest ere he be aware he cut away therewith that ingenuous and honest shamefastnesse that is so good and commendable For we see that even nourses themselves when they thinke to wipe away the filth of their little infants and to make them cleane if they rub any thing hard otherwhiles fetch off the skin withall make the flesh raw and put them to paine And therefore we must take heed that in seeking by all meanes to do out this excessive bashfulnesse utterly in yoong people we make them not brasen faced such as care not what is said unto them and blush thereat no more than a blackdog and in one word standing stiffe in any thing that they do but rather we ought to doe as they who demolish and pull downe the dwelling houses that be neere unto the temples of the gods who for feare of touching any thing that is holy or sacred suffer those ends of the edifices and buildings to stand still which are next and joined close thereto yea and those they underprop and stay up that they should not fall downe of themselves even so I say beware and feare we must
and kinde looke can not choose but in his heart blame the father that begat him and the mother that bare him We read that Pisistratus married his second wife when his sonnes whom he had by the former were now men growen saying That since he saw them proove so good and towardly he gladly would be the father of many more that might grow up like them even so good and loyall children will not onely affect and love one another for their parents sakes but also love their parents so much the more in regard of their mutuall kindnesse as making this account thinking also and saying thus to themselves That they are obliged and bounden unto them in many respects but principally for their brethren as being the most precious heritage the sweetest and most pleasant possession that they inherit by them And therefore Homer did verie well when he brought in Telemachus among other calamities of his reckoning this for one that he had no brother at all and saying thus For Jupiter my fathers race in me alone Now ended hath and given me brother none As for Hesiodus he did not well to wish give advice to have an only begotten sonne to be the full heire and universall inheritour of a patrimonie even that Hesiodus who was the disciple of those Muses whom men have named 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for that by reason of their mutual affection and sister-like love they keepe alwaies together Certes the amitie of brethren is so respective to parents that it is both a certaine demonstration that they love father and mother also such an example lesson unto their children to love together as there is none other like unto it but contrariwise they take an ill president to hate their owne brethren from the first originall of their father for he that liveth continually waxeth old in suits of law in quarrels and dissensions with his owne brethren and afterward shall seeme to preach unto his children for to live friendly lovingly together doth as much as he who according to the common proverbe The sores of others will seeme to heale and cure And is himselfe of ulcers full impure and so by his owne deeds doth weaken the efficacie of his words If then Eteocles the Thebane when he had once said unto his brother Polynices in Euripides To starres about sunne-rising would I mount And under earth descend as farre againe By these attempts if I might make account This sovereigne roialtie of gods to gaine should come afterwards againe unto his sonnes and admonish them For to mainteine and honour equall state Which knits friends ay in perfect unitie And keeps those link't who are confederate Preserving cities in league and amitie For nothing more procures securitie In all the world than doth equalitie who would not mocke him and despise his admonition And what kinde of man would Atreus have bene reputed if after he had set such a supper as he did before his brother he should in this maner have spoken sentences and given instruction to his owne children When great mishap and crosse calamitie Upon a man is fallen suddenly The onely meed is found by amitie Of those whom blood hath joined perfectly Banish therefore we must and rid away cleane all hatred from among brethren as a thing which is a bad nurce to parents in their olde age and a woorse fostresse to children in their youth besides it giveth occasion of slander calumniation and obloquie among their fellow-citizens and neighbours for thus do men conceive and deeme of it That brethren having bene nourished and brought up together so familiarly from their very cradle it can not be that they should fall out and grow to such termes of enmity and hostility unlesse they were privie one to another of some wicked plots and most mischievous practises For great causes they must bee that are able to undoe great friendship and amitie by meanes whereof hardly or unneth afterwards they can bee reconciled and surely knit againe For like as sundry pieces which have beene once artificially joined together by the meanes of glue or soder if the joint bee loose or open may bee rejoined or sodered againe but if an entire body that naturally is united and growen in one chaunce to bee broken or cut and slit asunder it will be an hard piece of worke to finde any glew or soder so strong as to reunite the same and make it whole and sound even so those mutuall amities which either for profit or upon some neede were first knit betweene men happen to cleave and part in twaine it is an easie matter to reduce them close together but brethren if they bee once alienated and estranged so as that the naturall bond of love can not hold them together hardly will they peece againe or agree ever after and say they be made friends and brought to attonement certeinly such reconciliation maketh in the former rent or breach an ill favoured and filthy skar as being alwaies full of jealousie distrust and suspicion True it is that all jars and enmities betweene man and man entring into the heart together with those passions which be most troublesome and dangerous of all others to wit a peevish humor of contention choler envie and remembrance of injuries done and past do breed griefe paine and vexation but surely that which is fallen betweene brother and brother who of necessitie are to communicate together in all sacrifices and religious ceremonies belonging to their fathers house who are to be interred another day in one and the same sepulchre and live in the meane time otherwhiles under one roofe and dwel in the same house and enjoy possessions lands and tenements confining one upon another doth continually present unto the eie that which tormenteth the heart it putteth them in minde daily and howerly of their follie and madnesse for by meanes thereof that face and countenance which shoulde bee most sweete best knowne and of all other likest is become most strange hideous and unpleasant to the eie that voice which was woont to be even from the cradle friendly and familiar is now become most fearefull terrible to the eare and whereas they see many other brethren cohabit together in one house sit at one table to take their repast occupie the same lands and use the same servants without dividing them what a griefe is it that they thus fallen out should part their friends their hoasts and guests and in one word make all things that be common among other brethren private and whatsoever should be familiar acceptable to become contrarie odious Over and besides here is another inconvenience and mischiefe which there is no man so simple but he must needs conceive and understand That ordinary friends and table companions may be gotten and stollen as it were from others alliance and acquaintance there may be had new if the former be lost even as armour weapons and
dead whereas if he could have held his tongue a little while longer and mastered himselfe when the king afterwards had better fortune and recovered his greatnesse and puissance he should in my conceit have gotten more thanks at his hands and beene better rewarded for keeping silence than for all the courtesie and hospitalitie that he shewed And yet this fellow had in some sort a colourable excuse for this intemperate tongue of his to wit his owne hopes and the good will that he bare unto the king but the most part of these pratlers vndo themselves without any cause or pretense at all of reason like as it befell unto Denys the tyrants barbar for when upon a time there were some talking in his shop as touching his tyrannicall government and estate how assured it was and as hard to be ruined or overthrowen as it is to breake the Diamond the said barbar laughing thereat I marvell quoth he that you should say so of Denys who is so often under my hands and at whose throat in a maner every day I holde my rasor these words were soone carried to the tyrant Denys who faire crucified this barbar and hanged him for his foolish words And to say a trueth all the sort of these barbars be commonly busie fellowes with their tongue and no marvell for lightly the greatest praters and idlest persons in a countrey frequent the barbars shop and sit in his chaire where they keepe such chat that it can not be but by hearing them prate so customably his tongue also must walke with them And therefore king Archelaus answered very pleasantly unto a barbar of his that was a man of no few words who when he had cast his linnen cloth about his shoulders said unto him Sir may it please your Highnesse to tell me how I shall cut or shave you Mary quoth he holding thy tongue and saying not a word A barbar it was who first reported in the city of Athens the newes of that great discomsiture and overthrow which the Athenians received in Sicily for keeping his shop as he did in that end of the suburbs called Pyraeum he had no sooner heard the said unlucky newes of a certaine slave who fled from thence out of the field when it was lost but leaving shop and all at sixe and seven ran directly into the city and never rested to bring the said tidings and whiles they were fresh and fire-new For feare some els might all the honour win And he teo late or second should come in Now upon the broching of these unwelcome tidings a man may well thinke and not without good cause that there was a great stirre within the city insomuch as the people assembled together into the Market place or Common hall and search was made for the authour of this rumour hereupon the said barbar was haled and brought before the bodie of the people and examined who knew not so much as the name of the partie of whom hee heard this newes But well assured I am quoth he that one said so mary who it was or what his name might be I can not tell Thus it was taken for an headlesse tale and the whole Theatre or Assembly was so moved to anger that they cried out with one voice Away with the villaine have the varlet to the racke set the knave upon the wheele he it is onely that hath made all on his owne singers ends this hath he and none but he devised for who els hath heard it or who besides him hath beleeved it Well the wheele was brought and upon it was the barbar stretched meane while and even as the poore wretch was hoised thereupon beholde there arrived and came to the citie those who brought certaine newes in deed of the said defeature even they who made a shift to escape out of that infortunate field then brake up the assembly and every man departed and retired home to his owne house for to bewaile his owne private losse and calamity leaving the silly barbar lying along bound to the wheele and racked out to the length and there remained he untill it was very late in the evening at what time he was let loose and no sooner was he at liberty but he must needs enquire newes of the executioner namely what they heard abroad of the Generall himselfe Nicias and in what sort he was slaine So inexpugnable and incorrigible a vice is this gotten by custome of much talke that a man can not leave it though he were going to the gallowes nor keepe in those tidings which no man is willing to heare for certes like as they who have drunke bitter potions or unsavory medicines can not away with the very cups where in they were even so they that bring evill and heavie tidings are ordinarily hated and detested of those unto whom they report the same And therefore Sophocles the Poet hath verie finely distinguished upon this point in these verses MESSENGER Is it your heart or els your eare That this offends which you do heare CREON. And why do'st thou search my disease To know what griefe doth me displease MESSENGER His deeds I see offend your heart But my words cause your eares to smart Well then those who tell us any wofull newes be as odious as they who worke our wo and yet for all that there is no restreint and brideling of an untemperate tongue that is given to walke and overreach It fortuned one day at Lacedaemon that the temple of Iuno called there Chalciaecos was robbed and within it was found a certeine emptie flagon or stone bottle for wine great running there was and concourse of the people thither and men could not tell what to make of that flagon at last one of them that stood by My masters quoth he if you will give me leave I shall tell you what my conceit is of that flagon for my minde gives me saith he that these church-robbers who projected to execute so perilous an enterprise had first drunke the juice of hemlocke before they entred into the action and afterwards brought wine with them in this bottle to the end that if they were not surprised nor taken in the maner they might save their lives by drinking each of them a good draught of meere wine the nature and vertue whereof as you know well enough is to quench as it were and dissolve the vigour and strength of that poison and so goe their waies safe enough but if it chance that they were taken in the deed doing then they might by meanes of that hemlocke which they had drunke die an easie death and without any great paine and torment before that they were put to torture by the magistrate He had no sooner delivered this speech but the whole companie who heard his words thought verily that such a contrived devise and so deepe a reach as this never came from one that suspected such a matter but rather knew that it was so indeed whereupon they
an houre fled vice and cast it from him fully whereof in a long time before he was not able to be rid of one little portion But you know full well already that those who holde such extravagant opinions as these make themselves worke enough and raise great doubts and questions about this point namely How a man should not perceive and feele himselfe when he is become wise and be either ignorant or doubtfull that this growth and increase commeth in long processe of time by little and a little partly by addition of some thing and partly by subtraction of other untill one arrive gently unto vertue before he can perceive that he is going toward it Now if there were so quicke and sudden a mutation as that he who was to day morning most vicious should become in the evening as vertuous and if there ever were knowen to happen unto any man such a change that going to bed a very foole and so sleeping should awake and rise a wise man and taking his leave of yesterdaies follies errours and deceits say unto them My vaine lying dreames so vaine a-day aday Nought worth you were I now both see and say Is it possible that such a one I say should be ignorant of this sudden change and not perceive so great a difference in himselfe not feele how wisedome all at once hath thus lightened and illuminated his soule for mine owne part I would rather thinke that one upon earnest prayer transformed by the power of the gods from a woman to a man as the tale goes of Caeneus should be ignorant of this Metamorphosis than he who of a coward a foole and a dissolute or loose person become hardie wise sober and temperate or being transported from a sensuall and beastly life unto a divine and heavenly life should not marke the very instant wherin such a change did befall But well it was said in olde time That the stone is to be applied and framed unto the rule and not the rule or squire unto the stone And they the Stoiks I meane who are not willing to accommodat their opinions unto the things indeed but wrest and force against the course of nature things unto their owne conceits and suppositions have filled all philosophie with great difficulties and doubtfull ambiguities of which this is the greatest In that they will seeme to comprise all men excepting him onely whom they imagine perfect under one and the same vice in general which strange supposition of theirs hath caused that this progresse and proceeding to vertue called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seemeth to be a darke and obscure riddle unto them or a meere fiction little wanting of extreame follie and those who by the meanes of this amendment be delivered from all passions and vices that be are held thereby to be in no better state nor lesse wretched and miserable than those who are not free from any one of the most enormious vices in the world and yet they refute and condemne their owne selves for in the disputations which they holde in their schooles they set the injustice of Aristides in equall ballance to that of Phalaris they make the cowardise and feare of Brasides all one with that of Dolon yea and compare the follie or errour of Melitus and Plato together as in no respect different howbeit in the whole course of their life and mangement of their affaires they decline and avoid those as implacable and intractable but these they use and trust in their most important businesse as persons of great worth and regard but we who know and see that in every kinde of sinne or vice but principally in the inordinate and confused state of the soule there be degrees according to more or lesse and that heerein differ our proceedings and amendments according as reason by little and little doth illuminate purge and cleanse the soule in abating and diminishing evermore the visiositie thereof which is the shadow that darkneth it are likewise fully perswaded that it is not without reason to be assured that men may have an evident sense and perceivance of this mutation but as if they were raised out of some deepe and darke pit that the same amendment may be reckoned by degrees in what order it goeth forward In which computation we may goe first and formost directly after this maner and consider whether like as they who under saile set their course in the maine and vast ocean by observing together with the length and space of time the force of the winde that driveth them doe cast and measure how farre they have gone forward in their voiage namely by a probale conjecture how much in such a time and with such a gale of winde it is like that they may passe so also in philosophie a man may give a gesse and conjecture of his proceeding and going forward namely what he may gaine by continuall marching on still without stay or intermission otherwhiles in the mids of the way and then beginning a fresh againe forward but alwaies keeping one pace gaining and getting ground still by the guidance of reason For this rule If little still to little thou do ad A heape at length and mickle will be had was not given respectively to the encrease of summes of money alone and in that point truely spoken but it may likewise extend and reach to other things and namely to the augmentation of vertue to wit when with reason and doctrine continuall use and custome is joyned which maketh mastrie and is effectuall to bring any worke to end and perfection whereas these intermissions at times without order and equalitie and these coole affections of those that studie philosophie make not onely many staies and lets in proceeding forward as it were in a journey but that which is worse cause going backward by reason that vice which evermore lies in wait to set upon a man that idlely standeth still never so little haleth him a contrary way True it is that the Mathematicians do call the planets Stationarie and say they stand still while they cease to moove forward but in our progresse and proceeding in philosophie that is to say in the correction of our life and maners there can be admitted no intervall no pause or cessarion for that our wit naturally being in perpetuall motion in maner of a ballance alwaies casteth with the least thing that is one way or other willing of it selfe either to encline with the better or else is forcibly caried by the contrary to the worse If then according to the oracle delivered unto the inhabitants of Curba which willed them if they minded afterwards to live in peace they should make war both night and day without intermission thou finde in thy selfe and thine owne conscience that thou hast fought continually with vice as well by night as by day or at leastwise that thou hast not often left thy ward and abandoned thy station in the garrison nor continually admitted the
a trim man indeed as thou art doest waile weepe and lament that thou drinkest not thy selfe drunke as those doe yonder nor lie in soft and delicate beds richly set out with gay and costly furniture Now when such temptations and distractions as these be returne not often but the rule and discourse of reason presently riseth up against them maketh head turneth upon them suddenly againe as it were in the chace and pursued in the route by enemies and so quickly discomfiteth and dispatcheth the anxietie and dispaire of the minde then a man may be assured that he hath profited indeed in the schoole of Philosophie and is well setled and confirmed therein But forasmuch as the occasions which doe thus shake men that are given to Philosophie yea and otherwhiles plucke them a contrarie way doe not onely proceed from themselves by reason of their owne infirmitie and so gather strength but the sad and serious counsels also of friends together with the reproofes and contradictorie assaults made upon them by adversaries betweene good earnest and game doe mollifie their tender hearts and make them to bow bend and yeeld which otherwhiles have beene able in the end to drive some altogether from Philosophie who were well entred therein It may be thought no small signe of good proceeding if one can endure the same meekly without being mooved with such temptations or any waies troubled and pinched when hee shall heare the names and surnames of such and such companions and equals otherwise of his who are come to great credit and wealth in Princes courts or be advanced by mariages matching with wives who brought them good dowries portions or who are wont to go into the common Hall of a citie attended upon and accompanied with a traine and troup of the multitude either to attaine unto some place of government or to plead some notable cause of great consequence for he that is not disquieted astonied or overcome with such assaults certaine it is and we may be bold to conclude that he is arrested as it were and held sure as he ought to be by Philosophie For it is not possible for any to cease affecting and loving those things which the multitude doth so highly honor and adore unlesse they be such as admire nothing else in the world but vertue For to brave it out to contest and make head against men is a thing incident unto some by occasion of choler unto others by reason of folly but to contemne and despise that which others esteeme with admiration no man is able to performe without a great measure of true and resolute magnanimitie In which respect such persons comparing their state with others magnifie themselves as Solon did in these words Many a wicked man is rich And good men there be many poore But we will not exchange with sich Nor give our goodnes for their store For vertue ay is 〈◊〉 Whereas riches be 〈◊〉 And Diogenes compared his peregrination and flitting from the city of Corinth to Athens and againe his removing from Thebes to Corinth unto the progresses and changes of abode that the great king of Persia was wont to make who in the Spring season held his Court at Susis in Winter kept house at Babylon and during Summer passed the time and sojourned in Media 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hearing upon a time the said king of Persia to be named The great king And why quoth he is he greater than my selfe unlesse it be that he is more just and righteous And 〈◊〉 writing unto Antipater as touching Alexander the great said That it became not him onely to vaunt much and glorifie himselfe for that his dominions were so great but also any man els hath no lesse cause who is instructed in the true knowledge of the gods And Zeno seeing Theoplird stus in great admiration because he had many scholars Indeed quoth he his auditory or quite is greater than mine but mine accordeth better and makes sweeter harmonie than his When as therefore thou hast so grounded and established in thine heart that affection unto vertue which is able to encounter and stand against all externall things when thou hast voided out of thy soule all envies jealousies and what affections soever are woont either to tickle or to fret or otherwise to depresse and cast downe the minds of many that have begunne to professe philosophie this may serve for a great argument and token that thou art well advanced forward and hast profited much neither is it a small signe thereof if thou perceive thy language to be changed from that it was wont to be for all those who are newly entred into the schoole of philosophie to speake generally affect a kinde of speech or stile which aimeth at glory and vaine ostentation some you shall heare crowing aloud like cocks and mounting up aloft by reason of their levity and haughty humour unto the sublimitie and splendor of physicall things or secrets in nature others take pleasure after the maner of wanton whelps as Plato saith in tugging and tearing evermore whatsoever they can catch or light upon they love to be doing with litigious questions they goe directly to darke problemes and sophisticall subtilties and most of them being once plunged in the quillits quidities of Logicke make that as it were a means or preparative to flesh themselves for Sophistrie mary there be who goe all about collecting and gathering together sententious sawes and histories of ancient times and as Anacharsis was wont to say That he knew no other use that the Greeks had of their coined pieces of mony but to tell and number them or els to cast account and reckon therewith even so do they nothing els but count and measure their notable sentences and sayings without drawing any profit or commodity out of them and the same befalleth unto them which one of Platoes familiars applied unto his scholars by way of allusion to a speech of Atiphanes this Antiphanes was wont to say in merriment That there was a city in the world whereas the words so soone as ever they were out of the mouth and pronounced became frozen in the aire by reason of the coldnesse of the place and so when the heat of Summer came to thaw and melt the same the inhabitants might heare the talke which had bene uttered and delivered in Winter even so quoth he it is with many of those who come to heare Plato when they be yoong for whatsoever he speaketh and readeth unto them it is very long ere they understand the same and hardly when they are become olde men and even after the same sort it fareth with them abovesaid who stand thus affected universally unto Philosophie untill their judgement being well setled and growen to sound resolution begin to apprehend those things which may deepely imprint in the minde a morall affection and passion of love yea and to search and trace those speeches whereof the tracts as Aesope was woont to say leade rather in
wives and children For the goddesse Diana in Ephesus yeelded sanctuarie franchise and savegard unto all debters against their creditours who fled for succour into her temple But the sanctuarie indeed of parsimonie frugalitie and moderate expense into which no usurers can make entrie for to hale and pull out of it any debter prisoner standeth alwaies open for those that are wise and affoordeth unto them a large space of joious and honorable repose For like as that Prophetesse which gave oracles in the temple of Pythius Apollo about the time of the Medians warre made answere unto the Athenian Embassadors That God gave vnto them for their safetie a wall of wood whereupon they leaving their lands and possessions abandoning their citie and forsaking their houses and all the goods therein had recourse unto their ships for to save their libertie even so God giveth unto us woodden tables earthen vessels and garments of course cloth if we would live in freedome Set not thy minde upon steeds of great price And chariots brave in silver harnesse dight With claspes with hookes and studs by fine device Ywrought in race to shew a goodly sight for how swift soever they be these usurers will soone overtake them and run beyong But rather get upon the next asse thou meetest with or the first pack-horse that commeth in thy way to flie from the usurer a cruell enemie and meere tyrant who demaundeth not at thy hands fire and water as sometimes did that barbarous King of Media but that which woorse is toucheth thy libertie woundeth thine honor and credit by proscriptions writs and open proclamations If thou pay him not to his conteut he is ready to trouble thee if thou have wherewith to satisfie him he wil not receive thy payment unlosse he list if thou prize and sell thy goods he will have them under their worth art thou not disposed to make a sale of them hee will force thee to it doest thou sue him for his extreame dealing he will seeme to offer parley of agreement if thou sweare unto him that thou wilt make paiment he will impose upon thee hard conditions and have thee at command if thou goe to his house for to speake and conferre with him hee will locke the gates against thee and if thou stay at home and keepe house thou shalt have him rapping at thy doore he will not away but take up his lodging there with thee For in what stead served the law of Solon in Athens wherein it was ordained that among the Athenians mens bodies should not be obliged for any civill debt considering that they be in bondage and slaverie to all banquers and usurers who force men to keepe in their heads and that which more is not to them alone for that were not such a great matter but even to their verie slaves being proud insolent barbarous and outrageous such as Plato describeth the divels and fiery executioners in hel to be who torment the soules of wicked and godlesse persons For surely these cursed usurers make thy hall and judiciall place of justice no better than a very hell and place of torment to their poore debters where after the manner of greedie geirs and hungrie griffons they flay mangle and eate them to the verie bones And of their beaks and talons keene The markes within their flesh be seene And some of them they stand continually over not suffring them to touch and taste their owne proper goods when they have done their vintage and gathered in their corne other fruits of the earth making them fast pine away like unto Tantalus And like as king Darius sent against the citie of Athens his lieutenants generall Datis and Artaphernes with chaines cordes and halters in their hands therewith to binde the prisoners which they should take semblablie these usurers bring into Greece with them their boxes and caskets full of schedules bils hand-writings and contracts obligatorie which be as good as so many irons and fetters to hang upon their poore debters and thus they go up and downe leaping from citie to citie where they sow not as they passe along good and profitable seede as Triptolemus did in old time but plant their rootes of debts which bring foorth infinite troubles and intolerable usuries whereof there is no end which eating as they goe and spreading their spaunes round about in the end cause whole cities to stoupe and stinke yea and be ready to suffocate and strangle them It is reported of hares that at one time they suckle young leverets and be ready to kinnule others that be in their bellies and withall to conceive a fresh but the debts of these barbarous wicked and cruell usurers do bring foorth before they conceive For in putting out their money they redemand it presently in laying it downe they take it up they deliver that againe for interest which they received and tooke in consideration of lone and use It is said of the Messenians citie Gate after gate a man shall here find And yet one gate ther 's alwaies behind But it may better be said of usurers Usurte here upon usurie doth grow And end thereof you never shall know and here withall in some sort they laugh at natural philosophers who holde this Axiome That of nothing can be engendred nothing for with them usurie is bred of that which neither is not ever was of that I say which never had subsistence nor being Howbeit these men thinke it a shame reproch to be a publicane and take to farme for a rent the publike revenewes notwithstanding the lawes do permit and allow that calling whereas themselves against all the lawes of the world exact a rent and custome for that which they put foorth to usurie or rather to speake a truth in lending their money they defraude their debtors as bankrupts do their creditors For the poore debter who receiveth lesse than he hath set downe in his obligation is most falsely coufened deceived and cut short of that which he ought to have And verily the Persians repute lying to be a sinne but in a second degree for in the first place they reckon to owe money and be indebted in as much as leasing followeth commonly those that be in debt But yet usurers ly more than they neither are there any that practise more falshood and deceit in their day debt bookes wherein they write that to such a one they have delivered so much whereas indeed it is farre lesse and so the motive of their lying is faire avarice neither indigence nor poverty but even a miserable covetousnes and desire ever to have more and more the end whereof turneth neither to pleasure nor profit unto themselves but to the losse and ruine of those whom they wring and wrong for neither till they those grounds which they take away from their debters nor dwell in the houses out of which they turne them nor their meat upon those tables which they have from them ne
to stay and be quiet or dolour to be silent no nor perswade him that is surprised with sudden feare to rest still or one who is stung with remorse and repentance to forbeare crying out to hold his hands frō tearing his haire smiting his thighs of such force and violence is vice finne above either the heat of fire or the edge of the sword Moreover cities states when they publish their purpose to put forth to making any ships or huge statues called Colossi give eare willingly to the workmen disputing one against the other as touching the workmanship heare their reasons see their models platformes which they bring and afterwards make choise of him to goe in hand with that piece of worke who with lesse cost and charges will do the deed as well or rather better and more speedily Now put the case that we publish by proclamation to make a man infortunate or cause a life to be wretched and miserable and that there present unto us for to enterprise this fortune on the one side and vice on the other the one to wit fortune is full of her tooles and instruments of all forts and provided of furniture costly and chargeable for to make a life unhappie and miserable as for example brigandise and robberies bloody warres inhumane cruelty of tyrants and tempests at sea she draweth after her flashes of lightning out of the aire she mixeth and dresseth a poisoned cup of deadly hemlocke she bringeth sharpe edged swords to do the businesse she stirreth slanders and raiseth false furmises and calumniations she kindleth burning agues and hote feavers she commeth with fetters manacles and other yrons jingling finally she buildeth cages and prisons for this purpose and yet the most part of all this geere proceedeth rather from vioc than fortune but suppose that all came from fortune and that vice standing by all naked and having need of no other thing in the world without it selfe to assaile a man should demand of fortune how she could make a man infortunate and heartlesse in these tearmes What fortune doest thou menace povertie Metrocles will be ready to laugh thee to scorne who in Winter time used to sleepe among sheepe and in Summer season tooke his repose in cloisters and church porches and so challenged for his felicity the king of Persia who was wont to Winter in Babylon and passe the Summer in Media threatenest thou servitude and bondage bringest thou chaines and yrons or the wofull condition to be solde in open market as a slave Diogenes will despise thee for all that who being exposed and offered to sale by the rovers and theeves that tooke him cried and proclamed himselfe aloud Who will buy a master who doest thou temper or brew a cup of poison why didst not thou before offer such a cup to Socrates for to drinke but hee full meekely with all mildnesse and patience without trembling for feare and changing either countenance or colour for the matter drunke it off roundly and after he was dead those that survived judged him happy as one who in the other world made account to live an heavenly and blessed life presentest thou fire to burne withall loe how Decius a Romane captaine hath prevented thee who when there was a fire made in the mids betweene two armies for to consume him voluntarily and with a formall praier offered himselfe as an holocaust or burnt offering unto Saturne according to his vow made for the safetie of the Romane empire The honest and chaste dames of the Indians such as entirely love their husbands strive and be ready to fight one with another about the funerall fire and as for her who obteineth the victorie and is burned therein together with the dead corps of her husband all there doe deeme right happie and testifie so much in their hymnes and songs As for the Sages and wise Philosophers of those parts there is not one of them all reputed a holy man or blessed if he do not whiles he is alive in perfect health and found sense and understanding separate his owne soule from the body by the meanes of fire and after he hath cleansed and consumed all that was mortall depart out of the flesh all cleane pure but forsooth from abundance of wealth and riches from an house sumptuously built and furnished from a costly and daintie table full of fine delicate viands thou wilt bring me to a poore thred-bare cloake to a bag and wallet and to begging of my daily bread from doore to doore well even these things were the cause of Diogenes felicitie these woon unto Crates freedome and glory but thou wilt crucifie mee or cause mee to be hanged upon a jibbet or sticke my body thorow with a sharpe stake and what cared Theodorus whether his corps rotted above ground or under the earth these were the happie sepultures of Tartarians and of the Hircanians to be eaten and devoured of dogs as for the Bactrians by the lawes of the countrey those were thought to have had the most blessed end whom the fowles of the aire did eat after they were dead Who then are they whom these and such accidents do make unhappy even such as are false-hearted base-minded senselesse and void of understanding untaught and not exercised in affaires of the world and in one word such as reteine still the opinions which were imprinted in them from their infancie Thus you see how fortune alone is not a sufficient worke-mistresse of unhappinesse and infelicity in case she have not sinne and vice to aide and helpe her for like as a thred is able to divide and saw as it were thorow a bone which hath lien soaking long before in ashes and vineger and as workemen can bend bow and bring into what fashion they will yvorie after it hath bene infused and mollified in ale or beere and otherwise not even so fortune comming upon that which is already of it selfe crazie and corrupt or hath bene susteined by vice is of power to pierce wound and hollow the same Moreover like as the poison Pharicum otherwise called Napethus or Aconitum being hurtful to no other person nor doing harme to those who handle and beare it about them but if it touch never so little one that is wounded presently killeth him by meanes of the sore or wound which receiveth the influxion and venim thereof even so he whose soule is like to be destroied and overthrowen by fortune ought to have within himselfe and in his owne flesh some ulcer some impostume or maladie for to make those accidents which befall outwardly wretched pitifull and lamentable What is vice then of that nature that it had neede of fortunes helping hand to worke wretchednesse infelicitie from what coast I pray you doth not fortune raise tempests upon the sea and trouble the water with surging billowes environeth not she and besetteth the foote of desart mountaines with the ambushes and forelayings of theeves and robbers
publike exercises The Lacedaemonians likewise would never have put up the insolent behaviour and mockerie of Stratocles who having perswaded the Athenians to sacrifice unto the gods in token of thankesgiving for a victorie as if they had beene conquerours and afterwards upon the certaine newes of a defeature and overthrow received when he saw the people highly offended and displeased with him demaunded of them what injurie he had done them if by his meanes they had beene merrie and feasted three daies together As for the flatterers that belong to Princes courts they play by their-lords and masters as those fowlers do who catch their birds by a pipe counterfeiting their voices for even so they to winde and insinuate themselves into the favour of kings and princes doe resemble them for all the world and by this devise entrap and deceive them But for a good governour of a State it is not meet and convenient that he should imitate the nature and the manners of the people under his government but to know them and to make use of those meanes to every particular person by which he knoweth that he may best win and gaine them to him for the ignorance and want of skill in this behalfe namely how to handle men according to their humours bringeth with it all disorders and is the cause of irregular enormities as well in popular governments as among minnions and favorites of princes Now after that a ruler hath gotten authoritie and credit once among the people then ought he to strive and labour for to reforme their nature and conditions if they be faultie then is he by little and little to lead them gently as it were by hand unto that which is better for a most painefull and difficult thing it is to change and alter a multitude all at once and to bring this about the better he ought first to begin with himselfe and to amend the misdemeanours and disorders in his owne life and manners knowing that he is to live from thence foorth as it were in open Theater where he may be seene and viewed on everie side Now if haply it be an hard matter for a man to free his owne mind from all sorts of vices at once yet at least wise he is to cut-off and put away those that bee most apparent and notorious to the eies of the world For you have heard I am sure how Themistocles when hee minded to enter upon the mannaging of State-matters weaned himselfe from such companie wherein hee did nothing but drinke daunce revell and make good cheere and when he fell to sitting up late and watching at his booke to fasting and studying hard hee was woont to say to his familiars that the Tropheae of Miltiades would not suffer him to sleepe and take his rest Pericles in like case altered his fashions in the whole course and maner of his life in his person in his sober and grave going in his affable and courteous speech shewing alwaies a staied and setled countenance holding his hand ever-more under his robe and never putting it foorth and not going abroad to any place in the citie but onely to the tribunall and pulpit for publike orations or els to the counsell house For it is not an easie matter to weld and manage a multitude of people neither are they to be caught of every one and taken with their safetie in the catching but a gracious and gainfull piece of worke it were if a man may bring it thus much about that like unto suspicious craftie wilde beasts they be not affrighted nor set a madding at that which they heare and see but gently suffer themselves to be handled and be apt to receive instruction and therefore this would not in any wise be neglected neither are such to have a small regard to their owne life and maners but they ought to studie and labor as much as possibly they can that the same be without all touch and reproch for that they who take in hand the government of publike affaires are not to give account nor to answere for that onely which they either say or doe in publike but they are searched narrowly into and manie a curious eie there is upon them at their boord much listening after that which passeth in their beds great sifting and scanning of their marriages and their behaviour in wedlocke and in one word all that ever they doe privately whether it be in jest or in good earnest For what need we write of Alcibiades who being a man of action and execution as famous and renowmed a captaine as any one in his time and having borne himselfe alwaies invincible and inferiour to none in the managing of the publike State yet notwithstanding ended his daies wretchedly by meanes of his dissolute loosenes and outragious demeanour in his private life and conversation at home insomuch as he bereft his owne countrey of the benefit they might have had by his other good parts and commendable qualities even by his intemperance and sumptuous superfluitie in expence Those of Athens found fault with Cimon because he had a care to have good wine and the Romaines finding no other thing in Scipio to reproove blamed him for that hee loved his bed too well the ill-willers of Pompey the Great having observed in him that otherwhiles he scratched his head with one finger reprochedhim for it For like as a little freckle mole or pendant-wert in the face of man or woman is more offensive than blacke and blew marks than scars or maimes in all the rest of the bodie even so small and light faults otherwise of themselves shew great in the lives of Princes and those who have the government of the weale-publike in their hands and that in regard of an opinion imprinted in the minds of men touching the estate of governours and magistrates esteeming it a great thing and that it ought to be pure and cleere from all faults and imperfections And therefore deserved Julius Drusus a noble Senatour and great ruler in Rome to be highly praised in that when one of his workemen promised him if he so would to devise and contrive his house so that whereas his neighbours overlooked him and saw into many parts thereof they should have no place therein exposed to their view and discoverie and that this translating and alteration thereof should cost him but five talents Nay quoth he thou shalt have ten talents and make mine house so that it may bee seene into on everie side to the end that all the citie may both see and know how I live for in trueth he was a grave wise honest and comely personage But peradventure it is not so necessarie that a house lie so open as to be looked into on all sides for the people have eies to pierce and enter into the verie bottom of governours manners of their counsels actions and lives which a man would thinke to be most covert secret no lesse quick-sighted are
you are so yoong a man And why not quoth he for Alexander whom you make a god among you by your decrees is yoonger than my selfe Furthermore over and besides a ready tongue and well exercised he ought to bring with him a strong voice a good breast and a long breath to this combat of State government which I assure you is not lightly to be accounted of but wherein the champion is to be provided for all feats of masteries or fight for feare lest if it chance that his voice faile or be wearie and faint he be overcome and supplanted by some one Catchpoll Crier and of that ranke Wide-mouth'd Jugler or mount-banke And yet Cato the yoonger when he suspected that either the Senate or the people were forestalled by graces laboring for voices and such like prevention so as he had no hope to perswade and compasse such matters as he went about would rise up and holde them all a day long with an oration which he did to drive away the time that at least-wise upon such a day there should be nothing done or passe against his mind But as touching the speech of a governor how powerfull and effectuall it is and how it ought to be prepared we have this already sufficiently treated especially for such an one as is able of himselfe to devise all the rest which consequently followeth hereupon Moreover two avennes as it were or waies there be to come unto the credit of government the one short and compendious yeelding an honourable course to win glory and reputation but it is not without some danger the other longer and more base and obscure howbeit alwaies safe and sure For some there be who making saile and setting their course as a man would say from some high rocke situate in the maine sea have ventured at the first upon some great and worthy enterprise which required valour and hardinesse and so at the very beginning entred into the middes of State-affaires supposing that the Poet Pindarus said true in these his verses A worthy worke who will begin Must when he enters first therein Set out a gay fore front to view Which may farre off the lustre shew For certeinly the multitude and common sort being satisfied and full already of those governours whom they have bene used to a long time receive more willingly all beginners and new-commers much-like as the spectatours and beholders of plaies or games have better affection a great deale to see a new champion entring fresh into the lists And verily all those honours dignities and powerfull authorities which have a sudden beginning and glorious encrease doe ordinarily astonish and daunt all envie for neither doth the fire as Ariston saith make a smoke which is quickly kindled and made to burne out of a light flame nor glorie breed envie when it is gotten at once and speedily but such as grow up by little and little at leisure those be they that are caught therewith some one way and some another And this is the cause that before they come to flower as it were and grow to any credit of government fade and become dead and withered about the publike place of audience But whereas it falleth out according to the Epigram of the courrier or runner Ladas No sooner came the sound of whip to eare But he was at the end of his carreare And then withall in one and selfe-same trice He crowned was with laurell for his price that some one hath at first performed an ambassage honourably rode in triumph gloriously or conducted an armie valiantly neither envious persons nor spightfull ill-willers have like power against such as against others Thus came Aratus into credit the very first day for that he had defaited and overthrowen the tyrant Nicocles Thus Alcibiades woon the spurres when he practised and wrought the alliance betweene the Mantimeans and the Athenians against the Lacedaemonians And when Pompey the great would have entred the citie of Rome in triumph before he had shewed himselfe unto the Senate and was withstood by Sylla who meant to impeach him he stucke not to say unto him More men there be sir who worship the Sun rising than the Sun setting which when Sylla heard he gave place and yeelded unto him without one word replying to the contrary And when as the people of Rome chose and declared Cornelius Scipio Consull all on a sudden and that against the ordinary course of law when as himselfe stood onely to be Aedile it was not upon some vulgar beginning and ordinary entrance into affaires of State but for the great admiration they had of his rare and singular prowesse in that being but a very youth he had mainteined single fight and combat hand to hand with his enemy in Spaine and vanquished him yea and within a while after in the necke of it had atchieved many worthy exploits against the Carthaginians being but a militarie Tribune or Colonel of a thousand foot for which brave acts and services of his Cato the elder as he returned out of the campe cried out with a loud voice of him Right wise and sage indeed alone is he The rest to him but flitting shadowes be But now sir seeing that the cities States of Greece are brought to such tearmes that they have no more armies to conduct nor tyrants to be put downe nor yet alliances to be treated and made what noble and brave enterprise would you have a yoong gentleman performe at his beginning and entrance into government Mary there are left for him publike causes to plead ambassages to negotiate unto the Emperour or some sovereigne potentate which occasions do ordinarily require a man of action hardy and ardent at the first enterprise wise and warie in the finall execution Besides there be many good and honest customes of ancient time either for-let or growen out of kinde by negligence which may be set on foot renewed and reformed againe many abuses also by ill custome are crept into cities where they have taken deepe root and beene setled to the great dishonour and damage of the common-wealth which may be redressed by his meanes It falleth out many times that a great controversie judged and decided aright the triall likewise and proofe of faithfull trust and diligence in a poore mans cause mainteined and defended frankly and boldly against the oppression of some great and mightie adversarie also a plaine and stout speech delivered in the behalfe of right and justice against some grand Signiour who is unjust and injurious have affoorded honorable entries unto the management of State affaires And many there be who have put foorth themselves made their parts knowen and come up by enterteining quarrels and enmities with those personages whose authoritie was odious envied and terrible to the people for we alwaies see that presently the puissance and power of him that is put downe and overthrowen doth accrue unto him who had the upper hand with greater reputation which I speake not
importing a generall striking out of all debts and a cancelling of bonds he imparted this desseigne and purpose of his to some of his friens who did him a shrewd turne and most unjustly wrought him much mischiefe for upon this inkling given unto them they made haste to take up and borrow all the money they could as farre as their credite would extend not long after when this edict or proclamation aforesaid concerning the annulling of all debts was come foorth and brought to light these frends of his were found to have purchased goodly houses and faire lands with the monies which they had levied Thus Solon was charged with the imputation of doing this wrong together with them when as himselfe indeede was wronged and abnused by them Agesilaus also shewed himselfe in the occasions and sutes of his frends most weake and feeble minded more iwis than in any thing else resembling the horse Pegasus in Euripides Who shrunke full low and yeelded what he could His backe to mount more than the rider would and helping his familiar frends in all their distresses more affectionatly and willingly than was meet and reason for whensoever they were called into question in justice for any transgressions he would seeme to be privie and partie with them in the same Thus hee saved one Phaebidas who was accused to have surprised secretly the castle of Thebes called Ladmia without commission and warrant alledging in his defence that such enterprises ought to be executed by his owne proper motive without attending any other commandement Moreover he wrought so with his countenance and favour that one Ephodrias who was attaint for an unlawfull and heinous act and namely for entring by force and armes with a power into the countrey of Attica what time as the Athenians were allied and confederate in amitie with the Lacedaemonians escaped judgement and was found unguiltie which he did being wrought thereto and mollified as it were by the amourous praiers of his sonne Likewise there is a missive of his found and goeth abroad to be seene which he wrote unto a certaine great lord or potentate in these tearmes If Nicias have not trespassed deliver him for justice sake if he have transgressed deliver him for my sake but howsoever it be deliver him and let him go But Phocion contrariwise would not so much as assist in judgement Charillus his own sonne in law who had married his daughter when he was called into question and indited for corruption taking money of Harpalis but left him and departed saying In all causes just and reasonable I have made you my allie and wil imbrace your affinitie in other cases you shall pardon me Timoleon also the Corinthian after that he dealt what possibly he could with his brother by remonstrance by praiers and intreaty to reclaime and disswade him from being a tyrant seeing that he could doe no good on him turned the edge of his sword against him and joined with those that murdered him in the end for a magistrate ought to friend a man and stand with him not onely with this gage as farre as to the altar that is to say untill it come to the point of being forsworne for him according as Pericles one day answered to a friend of his but also thus farre forth onely as not to doe for his sake any thing contrary to the lawes against right or prejudicial to the common-weale which rule being neglected and not precisely observed is the cause that bringeth great losse and ruine to a state as may appeare by the example of Phoebidas and Sphodrias who being not punished according to their deserts were not the least causes that brought upon Sparta the unfortunate warre and battell at Leuctrae True it is that the office of a good ruler and administratour of the weale-publicke doth not require precisely and force us to use everity and to punish every slight and small trespasse of our friends but it permitteth us after we have looked to the main-chance and secured the State then as it were of a surplussage to succour our friends to assist and helpe them in their affaires and take part with them Moreover there be certeine favours which may be done without envie and offence as namely to stand with a friend rather than another for the getting of a good office to bring into his hand some honourable commission or an easie and kinde ambaslage as namely to be sent unto a prince or potentate in the behalfe of a city or State onely to salute him and doe him honour or to give intelligence unto another city of important matters in regard of amity league and mutual societie or in case there fall out some businesse of trouble difficulty and great importance when a magistrate hath taken upon himselfe first the principall charge thereof he may chuse unto him for his adjunct or assistant in the commission some especiall frend as Diomedes did in Homer To chuse mine owne companion since that you will me let ulysses that renowmed knight how can I then forget Ulysses likewise as kindly rendreth unto him the like praise againe These coursers brave concerning which of me you do demand O aged fire arrived heere of late from Thracian land Are hither come and there were bred their lord them lost in fight Whom valiant Diomedes slew by force of armes outright And twelve friends more and doughtie knights as ever horse did ride Were with him slaine for companie and lay dead by his side This modest kinde of yeelding and submission to gratifie and pleasure friends is no lesse honourable to the praisers than to the parties praised whereas contrariwise arrogancie and selfe-love as Plato saith dwelleth with solitudes which is as much to say as it is forsaken and abandoned of all the world Furthermore in these honest favors and kinde courtesies which we may bestow upon some frends we ought to associate other frends besides that they may be in some sort interessed therein also and to admonish those who receive such pleasures at our hands for to praise and thanke them yea and to take themselves beholden unto them as having bene the cause of their preferment and those who counselled and perswaded thereto but if peradventure they moove us in any undecent dishonest and unreasonable sutes we must flatly denie them howbeit not after a rude bitter churlish sort but mildly and gently by way of remonstrance and to comfort them withall shewing unto them that such requests were not beseeming their good reputation and the opinion of their vertue And this could Epaminondas do of all men in the world best and shift them off after the cleanliest maner for when hee refused at the instant sute of Pelopidas to deliver out of prison a certeine Tavernor and within a while after let the same partie goe at libertie at the request of his lemon or harlot whom he loved he said unto him Pelopidas such graces and favours as these we are to grant unto
am advertised quoth he that thou against the lawes of military discipline usest many times to lie out of the campe and I understand likewise ful well that setting that fault aside thou art a souldier good enough well in regard of thy good services I am content to pardon all that is past but from hencefoorth thou shalt abide and tarie with me for I have a good pawne and suretie within that thou shalt not start and with that he caused the woman to come forth and appeare and so he gave her into his hands to be his wedded wife Anniball held all the citie of Tarentum with a strong garrison saving onely the castle but Marcellus by a wile and subtile stratageme trained him as farre as he could from thence and then returning with all expedition was master of the whole towne and sacked it in the execution of which service his scribe or chancellour asked him what should be done with the sacred images of the gods among the rest of the pillage Mary let us leave quoth he unto the Tarentines their gods being thus angred as they are with them When M. Livius who had the keeping of the castle vanted and boasted that by his meanes the citie was woonne all the rest who heard him laughed and mocked him but Fabius answered Thou saiest trueth indeed for if thou hadst not lost it once I had never recovered it againe After he was stepped farre in yeeres his sonne was chosen consull and as he was giving audience in open place and dispatching certaine publike affaires in the presence of many Fabius his father being mounted on horsebacke came toward him but the sonne sent one of his lictors or hushers before to command him to alight from his horse whereat all the rest there present were abashed and thought it a great shame and unseemly sight but the olde man dismounting quickely from his horse came toward his sonne as fast as his yeeres would give him leaue imbraced him and said Thou hast well done my sonne to know whom thou doest governe and to shew that thou art not ignorant what the greatnesse is of that charge which thou hast undertaken SCIPIO the elder whensoever he was at any leasure and repose either from military affaires or politike government emploied all that time in his private study at his booke whereupon he was woont to say That when he was alone he had most companie and when hee was at leasure he had greatest businesse After hee had woonne by assault the city of New Carthage in Spaine some of his souldiers brought a most beautifull damosell taken prisoner and her they offered unto him I would receive her willingly quoth he if I were a private person but being as I am a captaine generall I will none of her Lying at siege before a certeine citie situated in a low place and over which might be seene the temple of Venus he gave order unto them that by vertue of writs were to make appearance in court that they should come and plead before him within the said temple where they should have audience the third day after which hee made good for before that day hee had forced the citie When one demaunded of him being in Sicilie ready to embarke and passe over to Africke upon what confidence hee presumed so much to crosse the seas with his armada against Carthage See you not heere quoth he 300. men how they disport and exercise them selves armed all in militarie feats of armes along an high tower situate upon the sea side I tell you there is not one of all this number but if I bidde him will runne up to the top of this tower and cast himselfe downe from thence with the head forward Being passed over sea and soone after master of the field when hee had burnt the campes of his enimies the Carthaginians sent immediately unto him an embassage to treat of peace in which treatie it was concluded that they should quit all their vessels at sea abandon their elephants and besides pay a good grosse summe of money But so soone as Annibal was retired out of Italy into Africke they repented themselves of these capitulations and conditions for the trust which they had in the forces and person of Anniball whereof Scipio being advertised said unto them That although they would performe the articles of the foresaid agreement yet the accord should not stand for good unlesse over and above they paid 5000. talents because they had sent for Anniball to come over Now after that the Carthaginians had beene vanquished by him in open battell they sent new embassadors for to treat of peace againe but hee commaunded them presently to depart for that he would never give them audience unlesse they brought backe unto him lord Terentius a knight of Rome and a man of woorth and honor who by the fortune of warre was taken prisoner and fallen into the hands of the Carthaginians now when they had brought Terentius he caused him to sit close by his side in the counsell and then gave he audience to the foresaide embassadors and graunted them peace Afterwards when he entred Rome in triumph for this victorie the said Terentius followed hard after his triumphant chariot wearing a cap of libertie on his head like an affranchised slave and avowing that he held his freedome by him and when Scipio was dead unto all those who accompanied his corps when it was caried foorth to sepulture Terentius allowed to drinke a certeine kinde of mede made of wine and honie and for all other complements belonging to an honorable funerall he tooke order with great diligence but this was performed afterwards Moreover when king Antiochus saw that the Romanes were passed over into Asia with a puissant armie to make warre upon him he sent his embassadors to Scipio for to enter into a treatie of peace unto whom he answered This you should have done before and not at this present now that your king and master hath already received the bit of the bridle in his mouth and the saddle with the rider upon his backe The Senat had graunted out a commission unto him that he should take foorth certeine money out of the publick chest and chamber of the citie but when the treasurers would not suffer him that day to open the treasury for to be furnished from thence he said He would be so bold as open it himselfe Which quoth he I may well doe considering that by my meanes it was kept fast shut and locked first for the great quantitie of gold and silver which I have caused to be brought into it Petilius and Quintus two Tribunes of the commons accused him before the people and laid many grievous matters to his charge but he in stead of pleading his owne cause and justifying himselfe said thus My masters of Rome upon such a day as this I defaited in battell the Carthaginians and Annibal and therefore will I goe my selfe directly from hence with a chaplet
lawyer although he had no law in the world in him and was besides a man of very grosse capacity this man was served with a writ to appeare in the court for to beare witnesse of a trueth touching a certeine fact in question but he answered That he knew nothing at all True quoth Cicero for peradventure you meane of the law and thinke that you are asked the question of it Hortensius the orator who pleaded the cause of Verres had received of him for a fee or a gentle reward a jewel with the portraiture of Sphinx in silver it fell out so that Cicero chanced to give out a certeine darke and ambiguous speech As for mee quoth Hortensius I can not tell what to make of your words for I am not one that useth to solve riddles and aenigmaticall speeches Why man quoth Cicero and yet you have Sphinx in your house He met upon a time with Voconius and his three daughters the foulest that ever looked out of a paire of eies at which object he spake softly to his friends about him This man I weene his children hath begot In spight of Phoebus and when he would it not Faustus the sonne of Sylla was in the end so farre endebted that he exposed his goods to be sold in open sale and caused billes to be set up on posts in every quarrefour to notisie the same Yea mary quoth Cicero I like these billes and proscriptions better than those that his father published before him When Caesar and Pompeius were entred into open warre one against another I know full well quoth Cicero whom to flie but I wot not unto whom to flie He found great fault with Pompeius in that he left the citie of Rome and that he chose rather in this case to imitate the policy of Themistocles than of Pericles saying That the present state of the world resembled rather the time of Pericles than of Themistocles Hee drew at first to Pompeius side and being with him repented thereof When Pompey asked him where he had left Piso his son-in-law he answered readily Even with your good father-in-law meaning Caesar. There was one who departed out of Caesars campe unto Pompey and said That he had made such haste that hee left his horse behinde him Thou canst skill I perceive better to save thy horses life than thine owne Unto another who brought word that the friends of Caesar looked soure and unpleasant Thou saiest quoth he as much as if they thought not well of his proceedings After the battell of Pharsalia was lost and that Pompeius was already fled there was one Nonius who came unto him and willed him not to despaire but be of good cheere for that they had yet seven eagles left which were the standerds of the legions Seven eagles quoth he that were somewhat indeed if we had to warre against jaies jackdawes After that Caesar upon his victorie being lord of all had caused the statues of Pompey which were cast done to be set up againe with honor Cicero said of Caesar In setting up these statues of Pompey he hath pitched his owne more surely He so highly esteemed the gift of eloquence and grace of well speaking yea and he tooke so great paines with ardent affection for to performe the thing that having to plead a cause onely before the Centumvirs or hundred judges and the day set downe being neere at hand for the hearing and triall thereof when one of his servants Eros brought him word that the cause was put off to the next day he was so well contented and pleased therewith that incontinently he gave him his freedome for that newes CAIUS CAESAR at what time as he being yet a yoong man fled and avoided the furie of Sylla fell into the hands of certeine pirats or rovers who at the first demanded of him no great summe of money for his ransome whereat hee mocked and laughed at them as not knowing what maner of person they had gotten and so of himselfe promised to pay them twise as much as they asked and being by them guarded and attended upon very diligently all the while that he sent for to gather the said summe of money which he was to deliver them he willed them to keepe silence and make no noise that he might sleepe and take his repose during which time that he was in their custodie he exercised himselfe in writing aswell verse as prose and read the same to them when they were composed and if hee saw that they would not praise and commend those poemes and orations sufficiently to his contentment he would call them senselesse fots and barbarous yea and after a laughing maner threaten to hang them and to say a truth within a while after he did as much for them for when his ransome was come and he delivered once out of their hands he levied together a power of men and ships from out of the coasts of Asia set upon the said rovers spoiled them and crucified them Being returned to Rome and having enterprised a sute for the soveraign Sacerdotall dignitie against Catulus who was then a principall man at Rome whenas his mother accompanied him as farre as to the utmost gates of his house when he went into Mars field where the election was held he took his leave of her and said Mother you shall have this day your sonne to be chiefe Pontifice and high priest or else banished from the citie of Rome He put away his wife Pompeia upon an ill name that went of her as if she had beene naught with Clodius whereupon when Clodius afterwards was called into question judicially for the fact and Caesar likewise convented into the court peremptorily for to beare witnesse of the truth being examined upon his oath he sware that he never knew any ill at all by his wife and when he was urged and replied upon againe wherefore he had put her away he answered That the wife of Caesar ought not onely to be innocent and cleere of crime but also of all suspicion of crime In reading the noble acts of Alexander the great the teares trickled downe his cheeks and when his friends desired to know the reason why he wept At my age quoth he Alexander had vanquished subdued Darius and I have yet done nothing As he passed along through a little poore towne situate within the Alpes his familiar friends about him merrily asked one another whether there were any factions and contentions in that burrough about superioritie and namely who should be the chiefe whereupon he staid suddenly and after he had studied and mused a while within himselfe I had rather quoth he be the first here than the second in Rome As for hautie adventerous enterprises he was wont to say They should be executed not consulted upon and verily when he passed over the river Rubicon which divideth the province of Gaul from Italy for to leade his power against Pompeius Let the Die
altogether in his presence to runne upon him from everie side to teare him in pieces and make an end of him this plot was not projected so closely but it came to Mithridates eares who caused them al to be apprehended and sent to chop off al their heads one after another but immediately after he called to remembrance that there was one yoong gentleman among the rest for the flower of his yeeres for beautie also and feature of bodie the goodliest person that he had set eie on in his daies whom he tooke pitie of and repented that he had condemned him to die with his fellowes shewing evidently in his countenance that he was mightily greeved and disquieted in his minde as thinking verily that he was executed already with the first howbeit at a very venture he sent in all haste a countermaund that if he were yet alive he should be spared and let goe this yoong mans name was Bepolitanus and verily his fortune was most strange and woonderfull for had away hee was to the place of execution in that habit wherein he was attached and the same was a very faire and rich sute of apparell which because the butcherly executioner desired to reserve cleane and unsprent with bloud he was somewhat long about the stripping of him out of it whiles he was so doing he might perceive the kings men come running apace toward him and with a loud voice naming Bepolitanus See how covetousnesse which hath beene the death of many a thousand was the meanes beyond all expectation to save the life of this yoong gentleman as for Toredorix after he was cruelly mangled with many a chop and hacke his bodie was cast foorth unburied to the dogs neither durst any of his friends come neere for to enterre it one woman onely of Pergamus whom this Galatian in his life time had knowen in regard of her fresh youth and beautie was so hardie as to hazard the taking of his dead corps away and to burie it which when the warders and watchmen perceived they attached her and brought her to the king and it is reported that Mithridates at the very first sight of her had compassion for that she seemed to be a yoong thing a simple harmelesse wench every way but when he understood withal that love was the very cause thereof his heart melted so much the rather whereupon he gave her leave to take up the bodie and commit it to the earth allowing her for that purpose funerall clothes and furnishing her at his owne charges wish all other things meet for comly and decent buriall TIMOCLIA 〈◊〉 the Theban carried the like minde and purpose for the defence of his countrey and the common-wealth as sometimes Epaminondas Pelopidas and the bravest men in the world had done but his fortune was to fall in that common ruine of Greece when as the Greeks lost that unfortunate battell before Chaeronea and yet for his owne part he was a victour and followed them in chase whom he had disarraied and put to flight for he it was who when one of them that fled cried out unto him How farre wilt thou pursue and follow us answered Even as farre as into Macedonia but when he was dead a sister of his who survived him gave good testimony that in regard as well of his auncestors vertue as his owne naturall disposition he had beene a worthy personage and worthy to be reckoned and renowmed amongst the most valiant knights in his daies for some fruit received and reaped vertue which helped her to beare and endure patiently as much of the common miseries of her country as touched her for after that Alexander the Great had woon the citie of Thebes by assault the soldiers ran to and fro into al parts of the towne pilling and ransacking whatsoever they could come by it chanced that one seised upon the house of Timoclia a man who knew not what belonged to honour honestie or common curtesie and civilitie but was altogether violent furious and out of reason a captaine he was of a coronet of Thraciā light horsemen and caried the name of king Alexander his lord and master but nothing like he was unto him in conditions for having filled himselfe with wine after supper and good cheere without any respect unto the race and linage of this noble dame without regard of her estate and calling he was in hand with her to be his bedsellow all that night neither was this all for he would needs search and know of her where she had laid up and hourded any gold or silver one while threatning to kill her unlesse she would bring him to it another while bearing her in hand that he would make her his wife if she would yeeld unto him she taking vantage of this occasion which himselfe offred and presented unto her It might have pleased the gods quoth she that I had died before this night rather than remaine alive for though I had lost all besides yet my bodie had beene undefiled saved from all violence and villanie but since it is my fortune that heere after I must repute you for my lord my master and my husband and seeing it is gods will to give you this puissance and soveraigntie over me I will not deprive and disapoint you of that which is yours and as for my selfe I see well that my condition from hencefoorth must be such as you will I was woont indeed to have about me costly jewels and ornaments for my bodie I had silver in plate yea and some gold in good coine and other ready money but when I saw that the citie was lost I willed my women and maid-servants about me to get altogether and so I cast it away or rather indeed to say a truth I bestowed it and reserved it in safetie within a dry pit wherein no water is an odde blinde corner I may say to you that few or none doe know for that there is a great stone lieth over the mouth of it and a many of trees grow round about to shade and cover the same as for you this treasure will make you a man yea and a rich man for ever when you have it once in your possession and for my part it may serve for a good testimony and sufficient proofe to shew how noble and wealthy our house was before-time When the Macedonian heard these words his teeth so watred after this treasure that he could not stay untill the morrow and attend the day light but would needs out of hand be conducted by Timoclia and her maidens to the place but he commanded her in any wise to shut fast and locke the fore-yard gate after them that no man might see and know and so he went downe in his shirt into the foresaid pit but cursed and hideous Clotho was his mistresse and guide who would punish and be revenged of his notorious wickednesse by the hands of Timoclia who standing above for when she perceiued by his
two vertues of one woman by the one she first gave the citizens an affection minde and heart to begin and enterprise and by the other she ministred unto them meanes to execute and performe the same for which good service of Xenocrita those of the citie offred unto her many honors prerogatives and presents but she refused them all onely she requested this favour at their hands that she might enterre the corps of Aristodemus which they graunted and more than so they chose her for to be a religious priestresse unto Ceres supposing that this dignitie would be no lesse acceptable and pleasing unto the goddesse than beseeming and fitting the person of this lady THE WIFE OF PYTHES IT is reported moreover that the wife of rich Pythes in the daies of Xerxes when he warred upon Greece was a vertuous and wise dame for this Pythes having as it should seeme found certeine mines of gold and setting his minde thereon not in measure but excessively and unsatiably for the great sweetnesse and infinit gaines that arose thereby both himselfe in person bestowed his whole time therein and also he emploied all his subjects and citizens indifferently without respect of any person to digge and delve to carrie to purge and clense the said golde oare not suffering them to follow any other trade or exercise any occupation else in the world upon which unmeasurable and incessant toile many died and all were wery and grumbled thereat insomuch as at last their wives came with olive branches like humble suppliants to the gate of this lady his wife for to moove pittie and beseech her for redresse and succour in this case she having heard their supplication sent them away home to their houses with verie good gracious words willing them not to distrust and be discomforted meane while she sent secretly for gold siners goldsmithes and other worke-men in gold such as she reposed most confidence in shut them up close within a certeine place willing them to make loaves pies tarts cakes pastrie-works and junkets of all sorts sweet meats fruits all manner of meats and viands such as she knew her husband Pythes loved best all of cleane gold afterwards when all were made and he returned home to his house for as then he was abroad in a forren country so soone as he called for supper his wife set before him a table furnished with all kinds of counterfeit viands made of gold without any thing at all either good to be eaten or drunken but all gold and nothing but gold great pleasure at the first tooke Pythes for to see so rich a sight and so glorious a banquet wherein arte had so lively expressed nature but after he had fed his eies sufficiently with beholding these goodly golden works he called unto her in good earnest for somewhat to eate but she still whatsoever his minde stood to brought it him in gold so that in the end he waxed angrie and cried out that he was ready to famish Why sir quoth she are not your selfe the cause of all this for you have given us foison and store of this mettall but caused extreame want and scarcitie of meat and all things else for all other trades occupations arts and mysteries are decaied and their use cleane gone neither is there anie man that followeth husbandry and tilleth the ground but laying aside and casting behind us all thing that should be sowen and planted upon the earth for the food and sustentation of man we doe nothing else but digge and search for such things as will not serve to feed and nourish us spending and wearing out both our selves and our citizens These words mooved Pythes verie much howbeit for all this he gave not over quite the mines and mettall works but enjoining the fifth part of his subjects to travell therein by turnes one after another he gave the rest leave to husband their lands and plie their other crafts and misteries But when Xerxes came downe with that puissant armie for to make warre upon the Greeks this Pythes shewed his magnificence in the enterteinment of him with sumptuous furniture costlie gifts and presents which he gave unto the king and all his traine for which he craved this onely grace and favour at his hands againe that of many children which he had he would dispence with him for one of them that he might not goe to the warres to the end that the said sonne might remaine with him at home in his house for to tend and looke unto him carefullie in his old age whereat Xerxes was so wroth that he commaunded that one sonne whom he requested to be killed presently and his dead body to be cloven through in the mids and divided into two parts and so dislodged and caused his armie to march betweene them both the rest of his sonneshe led with him to the warres who died all in the field whereupon Pythes being discomforted and his heart cleane cast downe did that which those ordinarilie doe who want courage and wit for he feared death and hated life willing he was not to live and yet hee had not the power to make an end of his life what did he then There was within the citie a great banke or mount of earth under which there ranne a river which they called Pythopolites within this mount he caused his tombe to be made turned aside the course of the said river in such sort that as it passed the streame might glide upon this monument of his which being prepared and done accordingly hee went downe quicke and alive into the same sepulchre having resigned over unto his wives hands the citie and the whole seignorie thereof injoyning her thus much that she should not approch herselfe unto this tombe or monument but onely every daie once send unto him his supper in a little punt or boat downe the riveret and to continue this so long untill she saw that the said punt went beyond the monument having in it all his victuals whole and untouched for then she should not need to send him any more but take this for an assured signe that he was dead Thus lived Pythes the rest of his daies but his wife governed and managed the State prudently and wrought a great change and alteration in the toilsome life of her people A CONSOLATORIE ORATION SENT UNTO APOLONIUS UPON THE DEATH OF HIS SONNE The Summarie HOwsoever Plutarch in this treatise hath displaied his eloquence and all the skill and helps that he had by the meanes of Philosophie yet we see that the same is not sufficient to set the minde and spirit of man in true repose and that such consolations are as they say but palliative cures no better wherein also is discovered the want and default of light in the reason and wisdome of man yet notwithstanding take this withall that such discourses doe recommend and shew unto us so much the better the excellencie of celestiall wisedome which furnisheth us with
your anguish mitigate your pensivenesse and stay your needlesse mourning and bootlesse lamentation for why If minde be sicke what physicke then But reasons fit for ech disease A wise man knowes the season when To use those meanes the heart to ease And according as the wise Poet Euripides saith Ech griefe of minde ech maladie Doth crave a severall remedie If restlesse sorow the heart torment Kind words of friends worke much content Where folly swaies in every action Great need there is of sharpe correction For verily among so many passions and infirmities incident to the soule of man dolor and heavinesse be most irkesome and goe neerest into it By occasion of anguish many a one they say hath run mad and fallen into maladies incurable yea and for thought and hearts-griefe some have bene driven to make away themselves Now to sorow and be touched to the quicke for the losse of a sonne is a passion that ariseth from a naturall cause and it is not in our power to avoid which being so I cannot for my part holde with them who so highly praise and extoll I wot not what brutish hard and blockish indolence and stupiditie which if it were possible for a man to enterteine is not any way commodious and available Certes the same would bereave vs of that mutuall benevolence and sweet comfort which we finde in the reciprocall interchange of loving others and being loved againe which of all earthly blessings we had most need to preserve and mainteine Yet do I not allow that a man should suffer himselfe to be transported and caried away beyond all compasse measure making no end of sorow for even that also is likewise unnaturall and proceedeth from a corrupt and erronious opinion that we have and therefore as we ought to abandon this excesse as simply naught hurtfull and not beseeming vertuous and honest minded men so in no wise must we disallow that meane and moderation in our passions following in this point sage Crantor the Academick Philosopher I could wish quoth he that we might be never sicke howbeit if we chance to fall into some disease God send us yet some sense and feeling in case any part of our bodie be either cut plucked away or dismembred in the cure And I assure you that senselesse impassibilitie is never incident unto a man without some great mischiefe and inconvenience ensuing for lightly it falleth out that when the bodie is in this case without feeling the soule soone after will become as insensible reason would therefore that wise men in these and such like crosses cary themselves neither void of affections altogether nor yet out of measure passionate for as the one bewraieth a fell and hard heart resembling a cruell beast so the other discovereth a soft and effeminate nature beseeming a tender woman but best advised is he who knoweth to keepe a meane and being guided by the rule of reason hath the gift to beare wisely and indifferently aswell the flattering favours as the scowling srownes of fortune which are so ordinarily occurrent in this life having this forecast with himselfe That like as in a free State and popular government of a common wealth where the election of sovereigne magistrates passeth by lots the one whose hap is to be chosen must be a ruler and commander but the other who misseth ought patiently to take his fortune and beare the repulse even so in the disposition and course of all our wordly affaires we are to be content with our portion allotted unto us and without grudging and complaint gently to yeeld our selves obedient for surely they that can not so doe would never be able with wisedome and moderation to weld any great prosperitie for of many wise speeches and well said sawes this sentence may go for one How ever fortune smile and looke full faire Be thou not proud nor beare a loftie mind Ne yet cast downe and plung'd in deepe ae spaire If that she frowne or shew herselfe unkind But alwaies one and same let men thee find Constant and firme reteine thy nature still As gold in fire which alter never will For this is the propertie of a wise man and wel brought up both for any apparent shew of prosperitie to be no changling but to beare himselfe alwaies in one sort also in adversitie with a generous and noble mind to mainteine that which is decent beseeming his own person for the office of true wisdome considerate discretion is either to prevent avoid a mischiefe cōming or to correct and reduce it to the least narrowest compasse when it is once come or els to be prepared and ready to beare the same manfully and with all magnanimitie For prudence as touching that which we call good is seene and emploied foure maner of waies to wit in getting in keeping in augmenting or in well and right using the same these be the rules as well of prudence as of other vertues which we are to make use and benefit of in both fortunes as well the one as the other for according to the old proverb No man there is on earth alive In every thing who ay doth thrive And verily By course of nature unneth it wrought may be That ought should check fatall necessitie And as it falleth out in trees and other plants that some yeeres they beare their burden and yeeld great store of frute whereas in others they bring foorth none at all also living creatures one whiles be frutefull and breed many yoong otherwhiles againe they be as barren for it and in the sea it is now tempest and then calme semblably in this life there happen many circumstances and accidents which winde and turne us into the chaunces of contrarie fortunes in regard of which varietie a man may by good right and reason say thus O Agamemnon thy father Atreus hee Alwaies to prosper hath not begotten thee For in this life thou must have one day joy Another griefe and wealth mixt with annoy And why thou art by mort all nature fraile Thy will against this course cannot prevaile For so it is the pleasure of the gods To make this change and worke in man such ods As also that which to the same effect the poet Menander wrote in this wise Sir Trophimus if you the onely wight Of women borne were brought into this light With priviledge to have the world at will To taste no woe but prosper alwaies still Or if some god had made you such behest To live in joy in solace and in rest You had just cause to fare thus as you doe And chafe for that he from his word doth goe And hath done what he can not justifie But if so be as truth will testifie Under one law this publike vitall aire You draw with us your breath for to repaire I say to you gravely in tragick stile You ought to be more patient the while To take all this in better woorth I say Let
likewise in all other things diligent industrious talkative and namely inclined to making of verses and chanting songs as much or rather more than any other passion which can enter into the heart of man THE SIXTH QUESTION Whether king Alexander of Macedonie were a great drinker THere was some speech upon a time as touching king Alexander the Great to this effect That he dranke not so much as sat long at his meat and passed the time away in devising and talking with his friends but Philinus shewed by certeine scroles papers and day-books of the said kings house that they who held that opinion knew not well what they said for that this particular instance was ordinarily and usually found in those records That such a day the king slept all day long upon his liberall drinking of wine yea and other-whiles it appeareth that he slept the morrow after likewise which is the reason that hee was not so forward in venerous matters nor given much to women though otherwise he was hastie quicke and couragious great arguments of an inward heat of bodie and it is to be seene upon record That his flesh yeelded from it and breathed a passing sweet smell insomuch as his shirts and other clothes were full of an aromaticall sent and savour as if they had bene perfumed which seemeth also to be an argument and signe of heat For we see that those be the hottest driest countries which bring foorth cynamon and frankincense according as Theophrastus saith That a sweet odour proceedeth of perfect concoction and digestion of humours namely when by naturall heat all superfluous moisture is quite chased and expelled And by all likelihood this was the principall cause that Callisthenes grew into disgrace and lost the kings favour for that he was unwilling to sup with him in regard that he would impose upon him to drinke so much For it is reported that upon a time the great boule or goblet surnamed Alexanders boule having passed round about the table thorowout untill it came to Callisthenes he refused it and put it backe saying withall I will not drinke in Alexander for to have need of Aesculapius And thus much was said then concerning king Alexanders much wine-bibbing Moreover king Mithridates he who warred against the Romans among other games of prise which hee exhibited ordeined one for those who could drinke best and eat most and by mens saying himselfe performed them both so well that he won the prize in the one and the other for he could eat and drinke more than any man living in his time by occasion whereof he was commonly surnamed Dionysus that is to say Bacchus But as touching the reason of this surname wee say it is an opinion rashly received for when hee was a very infant lying in the cradle the lightning caught the swadling clothes and set them on fire but never touched or hurt his body save onely that there remained a little marke of the fire upon his forehead which notwithstanding the haire did cover that it was not greatly seene so long as he was a childe againe when he was a man growen it chaunced that the lightning pierced into the bed chamber where he lay asleepe and for his owne person it was not so much as singed therewith but it blasted a quiver of arrowes that hung at his bed-side went through it and burnt the arrowes within which as the soothsaiers and wise men out of their learning did intepret signified that one day he should be puissant in archers and light armed men But most men affirme that hee gat his surname of Bacchus or Dionysus in regard of the resemblance and likenesse of such accidents of lightning and blasting as many times befall After these words passed they entred into a speech as touching great drinkers among whom was reckoned also one Heraclides a famous wrestler or champion whom the men of Alexandria in our fathers daies pleasantly called little Hercules This good fellow when he could not meet with a companion able to set foot to his and drinke with him continually used to invite some to breake their fast with him in a morning others to beare him company at dinner some he would bidde to supper and intreat others last of all to sit with him at his collation or banquet after supper now when the first were gone came in the second immediatly then you should have the third succeed them in place and no sooner were they departed but in steps the fourth crew without any interruption and he himselfe sat it out still and making no intermission was able to hold out with all and beare those fower repasts and refections one after another Among those who were familiarly acquainted with Drusus sonne to the emperour Tibetius a physician there was who in drinking would chalenge and defie all the world but observed it was by some that spied and looked neere unto him That to prevent drunkennesse he used to take alwaies five or sixe bitter almonds before every cuppe that he drunke and when he was once debarred of them and not suffered so to doe he was not able to beare his drinke nor resist the least headinesse and strength thereof And verily some there be who say that these almonds have an abstersive propertie to bite to clense and scoure the flesh in such sort as that they will take away the spottes and freckles of the visage by reason of which qualitie when they be taken afore drinke with their bitternesse they fret the pores of the skinne and leave the impression of a certeine biting behinde them by meanes whereof there ensueth a certaine revulsion downward from the head of those vapours which flie up thither and so evaporate away through the said pores But for mine owne part I am of this opinion rather that their bitternesse hath a vertue to dry up and spend humors which is the reason that of all vapours the bitter is most unpleasant and disagreeable to the taste for that indeed as Plato saith consuming moisture as it doth by meanes of the drinesse which it hath it doth unnaturally binde and draw in the little veines of the toong which of themselves be soft and spungeous after the same manner men use to restraine such wounds or ulcers which be moist with medicines or salves composed of bitter drougues according as the poet Homer testisieth in these verses A bitter roote he bruis'd with hands and laid upon the sore To take the anguish cleane away that it might ake no more And so applied when it was all paines were soone allaid The running ulcer dried anon and flux of bloud was staid He said well and truly of that which is in taste bitter That it hath a vertue propertie to drie And it should seeme also that the powders which women strew upon their bodies for to represse diaphoneticall and extraordinarie sweets be by nature bitter and astringent so forcible is their bitternesse to binde and restreine which being so great reason
and uniformitie to the end that they may in the meane time be the bolder and better assured to fall unto their victuals make merry with that plentifull fare that you have ordeined for us Then Philo entreated Marcion so to doe Now after that we had supped we called upon Philinus to set in hand with the accusation of this multiplicitie of sundry and divers viands Why quoth he againe I am not the author of this position neither is it I that have said so but this good host of ours Philo heere who evermore telleth us First and formost that those beasts which feede upon a simple kinde of meat and the same alwaies one live more healthie than men whereas they that be kept up and crammed in coupes cages mewes bartons or otherwise franke-sed fatted are in greater danger to fall into diseases more subject to crudities for that their meat is set before them mingled compounded and in some sort delicately condited Secondly there was never yet any physician so bold and venterous in making new experiments who durst offer unto his patient sicke of an ague any meat or nourishment so compounded of divers sorts but ordeined there is for them alwaies the simplest that can be had least smelling of the kitchin and cooks craft as that which is most easie to be concocted in the stomacke for in truth our meats should suffer alteration and be wrought by the naturall faculties within us and like as the colours which are most simple doe strike the deepest die and give the best tincture and among oiles that which hath no sent at all taketh best the aromaticall drougues and odors of the perfumes and sooner turneth or chaungeth than any other even so the simplest nourishment is that which most easily is altered and concocted by the vertue digestive whereas if there be many and sundry qualities and those of a contrary operation they corrupt soonest for that they fight and runne one against the other and so hinder concoction much like as in a citie the confused multitude of many nations hudled together from all parts hardly will ever grow to any agreement consistence well united and accordant for that ech partie leaneth to their owne rites striveth to draw all to their owne commoditie and followeth their private affections against others hardly or never agreeing and framing well with strangers Moreover we may have a most evident and infallible argument of this by the familiar example of wine for nothing there is that so doth inebriate as varietie and change of wines and it seemeth that drunkennesse is nothing els but the indigestion of wine and therefore our great professed drinkers avoid all that ever they can mixt and brewed wines yea they that are the brewers and minglers thereof doe it as secretly as it is possible like to those that lie in ambush for surely every change brings with it inequallity and a kinde of extasie putting all out of frame which is the cause likewise that musicians are very wary how they stirre or strike many strings together yet there is no other harme at all to be suspected but the mixture and varietie This I dare be bold to affirme that a man will sooner beleeve consent to a thing where contrary reasons be alledged than make good concoction and digestion of divers and sundry faculties but because I would not bee thought to speake in jest leaving these prooves I will come to the reasons of Philo for wee have heard him oftentimes say That it is the quality of the meat that causeth difficultie of digestion and that the mixture of many things is pernicious and engendreth strange accidents and therefore we ought to take knowledge by experience what is friendly and agreeable to nature that we may use the same and rest contented therein and if peradventure there bee nothing of the owne nature hard to be concocted but that it is the quantitie alone that troubleth and hurteth our stomacke and there corrupteth so much the rather in mine advice we ought to forbeare divers sorts of viands wherewith Philoes cooke exercising his art cleane contrarie to his masters hath even now empoisoned and bewitched us by diversifying our appetite and by novelties and change not suffring it to bee wearie and to refuse any thing feeding it still with one thing after another and causing it by this varietie to passe the bonds of contentment in reason much like unto the foster-father of lady Hypsipyle Who being set in meddow gay Flower after flower did crop away And yet his minde so childish was And in desire so farre did passe That bootie none would him content Vntill the flowers most part off went In this case therefore it were good withall to remember the wise instruction of Socrates who giveth us counsell to take heed and beware of those viands which draw men on to eat when they are not hungry wherein his meaning was this and none other that we should avoid and feare the diversitie and pluralitie of meats for this is it that causeth us to exceed the bounds of suffisance farther than needfull is and reteineth our pleasure in things that content the eie and the eare in venereous matters in plaies games and all kindes of sport being continually refreshed and renewed still with a singularitie and superfluitie that hath many heads whereas in simple and uniforme pleasures the attractive delight never exceedeth the necessitie of nature To be short of this minde I am That a man would better endure a musician who commended a confusion of many strings discordant or a master of wrestlers who praised the annointing of bodies for exercise with sweet oiles and perfumed ointments than a physitian who recommended this multiplicitie and varietie of viands for surely such alterations and changes from one dish to another must needs force and drive us out of the right way to health After that Philinus had thus said I am of this minde quoth Marcion that not onely they who disjoine and sever profit from honestie incurre the malediction of Socrates but also those who distinguish pleasure and health a sunder as if pleasure forsooth were repugnant or an enimie unto it and not rather a friend and companion thereof for seldome and even against our wils quoth he doe we make any use of paine as being an instrument too boisterous and violent whereas no man would he never so faine can chase pleasures away and banish them but they will present themselves alwaies in our feeding in sleeping in washing bathing sweating and annointing our bodies they enterteine foster and cherish him that is over-travailed and wearie putting away quite by a certeine familiar propertie agreeable unto nature whatsoever is strange and offensive for what manner of paine what want what poison is there how strong soever it be that riddeth or dispatcheth a maladie so soone or so presently as the bath in due time or wine given to those that have need and when
words of mine that I meant to alledge old testimonies and to cite stale and triviall examples for proofe of the cause to wit the funerals of Oeolycus the Thessalian and of Amphidamas the Chalcidian at which Homer and Hesiodus made verses one against another for the victorie as stories make mention but casting by and rejecting all these evidences so much tossed and divnlged already by Grammarians and namely the funerall obsequies and honours done to Patroclus in Homer where they read not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say launcers of darts but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say makers of orations and eloquent oratours as if Achilles had proposed rewards and prizes for orations leaving I say these matters I affirmed That when Acastus celebrated the funerals for his father Pelias he exhibited a combat of poets for the best game wherein Sibylla went away with the victory Hereat many stood up and opposed themselves against me demanding a reall caution at my hands for to make good that which I had averred for that it seemed unto them a very strange narration and incredible but as good hap was I called to remembrance that I had read so much in the Chronicle of Lybia cōpiled by Acesander where the story is put downe And this booke quoth I is not in every mans hand to reade howbeit I thinke verily that the most of you have beene carefull to peruse those records which Polemon the Athenian a diligent writer and a learned antiquarie who hath not beene idle and sleepie in seeking out the antiquities and singularities of Greece hath set downe in writing as concerning the treasures of the city Delphos for there you shal find written that in the treasurie of the Sicyonians there was a golden booke given and dedicated by Aristomache the poetresse of Erythraea after she had obteined the victorie gotten the garland at the solemnitie of the Isthmicke games Neither have you any reason quoth I to esteeme Olympia and the games thereof with such admiration above the rest as if it were another fatall desteny immutable and which can not be changed nor admit alteration in the plaies there exhibited as for the Pythian solemnitie three or foure extraordinarie games it had respective unto good letters and the Muses adjoined and admitted to the rest the Gymnicke exercises and combats performed by men naked as they were at first ordeined so they continued for the most part still and hold on at this day but at the Olympian games all save onely running in the race were taken up afterwards and counted as accessories likewise there have bene many of them which at first were instituted since put downe and abolished namely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say an exercise and feat of activitie when the concurrent mounted on horsebacke in the mids of his course leapeth downe to the ground taketh his horse by the bridle and runneth on foot with him a full gallop as also another called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which was a course with a chariot drawen by two mules moreover there is taken away now the coronet ordeined for children that atchieved the victorie in Pentathlus that is to say five severall feats to be short much innovation change and altering there hath beene in this festivall solemnitie from the first institution but I feare me that you will call upon me againe for new pledges and cautions to proove and justifie my words if I should say that in olde time at Pisae there were combats of sword-fencers fighting at the sharpe to the uttrance man to man where they that were vanquished or yeelded themselves died for it and if my memorie failed mee that I could not bring out mine author and name him unto you I doubt you would laugh and make a game of mee as if I had overdrunke my selfe and taken one cup to many THE THIRD QUESTION What is the cause that the pitch-tree is held consecrated unto Neptune and Bacchus And that in the beginning the victours at the Isthmian games were crowned with a garland of pine-tree branches but afterwards with a chaplet of smallage or parsley and now of late with the foresaid pitch-tree THere was a question propounded upon a time Why the manner was to crowne those with pine or pitch-tree branches who gained the prize at the Isthmick games For so it was that during the said festivall solemnity Lucanius the high priest made a supper at Corinth at his owne house and feasted us where Praxiteles the geometrician a great discourser told us a poeticall tale and namely that the body of Melicerta was found cast up driven upon the body of a pine-tree by the sea at a full tide for that there was a place not farre from Megara named Cales Dromos that is to say the race of the faire lady whereas the Megarians doe report that dame Ino carrying her yoong babe within her armes ranne and cast her-selfe headlong into the sea But it is a common received opinion quoth he that the pine is apropriat for the making of coronets in the honour of Neptune whereupon when as Lucanius the high-priest added moreover and said That the said tree being consecrated unto Bacchus it was no marvell nor absurditie if it were dedicared also to the honour of Melicerta Occasion was taken to search into the cause wherefore the auncients in old time held the said tree sacred unto Bacchus and Neptune both For mine owne part I saw no incongruitie therein for that these two gods be the lords and rulers over one genetall principle or element to wit humidity or moisture considering also that they generally in manner all sacrifice unto Neptune under the surname 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as one would say protectour of plants and unto Bacchus likewise by the name or addition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say the president over trees and yet it may be said that the pine more particularly apperteineth not to Neptune not as Apollodorus is of opinion because it is a tree that loveth to grow by the sea-side or for that it delighteth in the windes as the sea doth for some there be of this minde but especially in this regard that it affoordeth good timber and other stuffe for building of ships for both it and also other trees which for their affinitie may goe for her sisters to wit pitch-trees larike-trees and cone-trees furnish us with their wood most proper to flote upon the sea and with their rosin also and pitch to calke and calfret without which composition be the joints never so good and close they are to no purpose in the sea as for Bacchus they consecrated the pitch-tree unto him for that pitch doth give a pleasant seasoning unto wine for looke where these trees doe naturally grow the vine there by report yeeldeth pleasant wine which Theophrastus imputeth to the heat of the soile for commonly the pitch tree groweth in places of marle or white clay which by nature
of their bodies as they sit for that ordinarily men sit to their meat directly at their full breadth groveling forward and put their right hands streight foorth upon the table but after they have well supped they turne themselves more to a side sit edge-wise taking up no place now according to the superficies of the body not sitting as a man would say by the squire but rather by the line and the plumb like as therefore the cockal bones occupie lesse roome when they fall upon one of their sides than if they be couched 〈◊〉 even so every one of us at the first sitteth bending forward and fronteth the table with his mouth and eies directly upon it but afterwards hee chaungeth that forme from front to flanke and turneth sidelong to the boord Many there were who ascribed the reason of this to the yeelding of the couch or bed whereon men sit at their meat for being pressed downe with sitting is stretched broader and wider like as our shooes with wearing and going in them grow more slacke and easie for us by little and little untill in the end they be so large that we may turne our feet in them Then the good old man spake merrily and said That one and the same feast had alwaies two presidents and governors different one from another at the beginning hunger which cannot skill of keeping any good order toward the end Bacchus and him all men know very well and confesse to have beene a very sufficient captaine and an excellent leader of an armie like as therefore Epaminondas when as other captaines by their ignorance and unskilfulnesse had brought the armie of the Thebanes into a place so narrow that all was thrust together and the ranks and files came one upon another and crushed themselves tooke upon him the place of a commaunder and not onely delivered it out of those streights but also reduced it into good order of battell even so god Bacchus surnamed Lyaeus and Choreus that is to say a deliverer and master of daunces finding us at the beginning of supper thrusting one another and having no elbow roome by reason of hunger that throumbleth us together like a sort of dogges bringeth us againe into a decent order whereby wee sit at ease and libertie enough like good fellowes THE SEVENTH QUESTION Of those who are said to bewitch with their eie THere grew some question upon a time at the table as touching those who are reported to be eie-biters or to bewitch with their eies and when others in maner all passed it over with laughing as a frivolous and ridiculous thing Metrius Florus who had invited us to his house tooke the matter in hand and said That the effects or events rather which daily we doe observe do make marvellous much to the brute and voice that goeth of the thing but 〈◊〉 want of yeelding a good reason thereof and setting downe the true cause the report many times of such matters wanteth credit But unjustly quoth he and wrongfully in mine opinion for an infinit number there be of other matters that have a reall essence and are notoriously knowen to be so although we are ignorant of their cause and in one word whosoever seeketh in each thing for a probable reason overthroweth miracles and woonders in all for where wee faile to give reason of a cause there begin we to doubt make question that is as much to say as to play the philosophers so as we may inferre consequently They that discredit things admirable do in some sort take away and abolish all philosophie but we ought quoth he in such things as these to search Why they are so by reason and learne That they are so by historie and relation for histories do report unto us many narrations of like examples Thus we know that there be men who by looking wistly and with fixed eies upon little infants doe hurt them most of all for that the habit and temperature of their bodies which is moist tender and weake soone receiveth alteration by them and changeth to the woorse whereas lesse subject they be to such accidents when their bodies are better knit more strong and 〈◊〉 And yet Philarchus writeth in his historie of a certeine nation and people inhabiting the realme of Pontus in times past called Thybiens who were by that meanes pestiferous and deadly not onely to yoong babes but also to men growen for looke how many either their eie their breath or their speech could reach unto they were sure to fall sicke and pine away and this harme was felt and perceived as it should seeme by merchants who resorted into those parts and brought from thence slaves to be solde But as for these the example peradventure is not so strange and wonderfull because the touching contagion and familiar conversing together may yeeld a manifest reason and cause of such accidents and like as the wings of other fowles if they be laied together with those of the eagle perish consume and come to nothing for that the plume and downe of the feathers fall off and putrifie even so there is no reason to the contrary but that the touching of a man should be partly good profitable and in part hurtful and prejudiciall mary that folke should take harme by being seene onely and looked on is an accident which as I said before we know to be but for that the cause thereof is so difficult hard to be hunted out the report of it is incredible Howbeit quoth I then you wind the cause already you have met in some sort I say with the tracts and footing thereof and are in the very way of finding it out being come already to those defluxions that passe from bodies for the sent the the voice the speech and breath be certeine defluxions and streames as it were flowing from the bodies of living creatures yea and certeine parcels thereof which move and affect the senses when as they suffer by the same lighting and falling upon them and much more probable it is that such defluxions proceed from the bodies of living creatures by the meanes of heat motion namely when they be enchafed and stirred as also that the vitall spirits then doe beat strongly and the pulses worke apace whereby the body being shaken casteth from it continually certeine defluxions as is before said and great likelihood there is also that the same should passe from the eies more than from any other conduit of the bodie for the sight being a sense very swift active and nimble doth send forth and disperse from it a wonderfull fierie puissance together with a spirit that carrieth and directeth it in such sort that a man by the meanes of this eie-sight both suffereth and doth many notable effects yea and receiveth by the objects which he seeth no small pleasures or displeasures for love one of the greatest and most vehement passions of the minde hath the source and originall beginning at
what banquetting dishes or pastry works he loveth best as also to seeke and enquire of the diversitie of wines and pleasant odors he delighted in were a very uncivil and absurd part but when a man hath many friends many kinsfolks familiars to request such an one to bring with him those especially whose companie he liketh best in whō he taketh greatest pleasure is no absurditie at all nor a thing that can be offensive for neither to saile in one ship nor to dwell in the same house ne yet to plead in the same cause with those whom we are not affected well unto is so displeasant odious as to sit at a supper with them against whō our heart doth rise and the contrary is as acceptable for surely the table is a very communion and societie of mirth and earnest of words and deeds and therefore if men would be merry there and make good cheere I see no need that all manner of persons indifferently should meet but those onely who have some inward friendship and private familiaritie one with another as for our meats and sauces that come up to the boord cooks I confesse doe make them of all maner of sapours different as they be mixing them together and tempering harsh sowre milde sweet sharpe subtill and biting one with another but a supper or feast is nothing acceptable and contenting unlesse it be composed of guests who are of the same humour and disposition and for that as the Peripateticke philosophers doe affirme that there is one Primum mobile above or principall moover in nature which mooveth onely and is not mooved and another thing beneath and in the lowest place which is mooved onely and mooveth not but betweene these two extremities there is a middle nature that mooveth one and is mooved by another even so say I there is the same proportion among three sorts of men the first of those who invite another the second of such as are invited onely and the thirde of them that doe invite others and are invited themselves and now because wee have spoken alreadie of the first and principall feast-maker who inviteth it were not a misse to say somewhat now of the other two folks He then who is bidden and yet hath leave to bidde others ought in great reason as I thinke to be carefull and take heed that he forbeare to bring with him a geat number or multitude lest hee should seeme to make spoile of his friends house as of an enemies territorie and as it were to forage there for all those that belong unto him or to doe as those who come to occupie and inhabit a new countrey that is to say by bringing with him so many of his owne friends disease or at leastwise exclude and put by his guests who invited him and so by that meanes the masters of the feasts might be served as they are who set foorth suppers unto Hecate or Proserpina and to those averruncan gods or apotropaei whom men call upon not to doe good but to avert evill for they themselves nor any of their house licke their lips with any jot of all that cheere onely they have their part of all the smoake and troubles belonging thereto for otherwise they that alledge unto us this common saying At Delphi when one hath done sacrifice Must buy his owne viands if he be wise speake it but merily and by way of jest but certeinly it befalleth even so in good truth and earnest unto those who interteine either strangers or friends so rude and uncivill who with a number of shadowes as if there were so many harpies or cormorants and greedy guls consumed and devoured all their provision secondly a friend that is himselfe solemnly invited must be carefull that he take not with him for to goe unto another mans house those that he first meeteth or that come next hand but such especially as he knoweth to be friends and familiar acquaintance with the feast-maker as if he strived a vie to prevent him in bidding of them if not so to have those with him of his owne friends whom the master of the feast himselfe could have wished and made choise of to have bidden as for example if he be a modest man and a civill to sort him with modest and civill persons if studious and learned to furnish his table with students good scholars if he have bene beforetime in authority to fit him now with personages of power authority and in one word to acquaint him with those whom he knoweth he would be willing to salute and enterteine with speech and communication for this is a wise kinde of courtesie and great civilitie to give unto such a personage occasion and meanes to salute embrace and make much of them whereas hee who commeth to a feast with such about him as have no conformitie at all unto the feast-maker but seeme meere aliens and strangers as namely with great drunkards to a sober mans house to a man that is a good husband wary and thrifty in his expenses with a sort of dissolute ruffians and swaggering companions or unto a yong gentleman that loveth to drinke heartily to laugh to jest and to be merie with grim sires and severe ancients such as in their talke are grave and by their long beards may be taken for sages and profound clearks such an one I say is a very absurd fellow thus to requite the hospitall courtesie of his friend with such impertinent incongruity for he that is invited must be as carefull to please the first inviter as the feast-maker his guest and then acceptable shall hee be and welcome indeed if not himselfe onely but those also who come with him or for the love of him be of good carriage and lovely behaviour As for the third person who remaineth to be spoken of to wit who is bidden and brought in by another if he take pepper in the nose and can not abide to be called a shadow certeinely hee is afraid of his owne shadow but in this case there would be very great circumspection had for it is no point of honestie and good maners to be soone intreated and ready to follow every one indifferently at his call considered it would be and that not slightly what he is who moveth thee to go with him to such a feast for if he be not a very familiar friend but one of these rich magnificoes and portly personages who would as it were upon a scaffold make a shew unto the world of a number of favourites and followers to guard and attend him at his heeles or such an one as would seeme to doe much for thee or to grace and honour thee greatly by taking thee in this order with him thou oughtest flatly to denie him and refuse such courtesie well say that he be a friend and familiar person yet must not thou by and by for all that bee ready and obey but then onely when there is some necessarie occasion
indeed the most auncient of all others called even Bacchus himselfe Eubulus as if they had no need at all of Mercurie and in regard also of him they attributed unto night the name of Euphrone THE TENTH QUESTION Whether they did well who sat in consultation at the table WHen Glaucias had spoken these words we all thought that these turbulent and litigious debates had beene well appeased and laid asleepe but to the end that they might so much the rather die and be buried in oblivion Nicostratus provided another question and said At the first quoth he I made no great matter of this custome nor regarded it much taking it to be a meere Persian fashion but now seeing it is discovered to be an order also among the Greeks requisite and necessarie it is to render some reason thereof for to defend it against an evident absurditie which at the first sight presenteth it selfe for that the discourse of reason in manner of the eie is hardly to be governed by us and untoward for to be brought to performe her worke in a great quantitie of moisture and the same as yet stirring and waving and besides all odious griefes which on every side appeere and come foorth to wine like as snakes lizards and such like serpents are brought to light and shew themselves to the sunne cause the minde to be wavering inconstant and irresolute as therefore a bed or pallet is better than a chaire for them that are disposed to drinke and make merry for that it conteineth the body at full and exempteth it from all maner of motion even so the best way is to keepe the soule quiet and in repose altogether and if that may not be to do by it as men doe by children that can rest and stand on no ground but be evermore stirring namely to give unto it not a sword or a javelin but a rattle or a ball like as Bacchus putteth into the hands of drunken folke the ferula stalke a most light weapon and instrument either to offend or defend withall to the end that as they be readiest to strike so they might be least able for to hurt for the faults that bee committed in drunkennesse ought to passe lightly in mirth and go away with a laughter and not to bee lamentable tragicall and bringing with them great calamities Moreover that which is the chiefe and principall thing in consultation of great affaires to wit that hee who for want of wit and knowledge in the world should follow the opinion of those who are of great conceit deepe judgement and long experience this meanes wine bereaveth us of insomuch as it seemeth heereupon to have taken the name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greeke because as Plato saith it causeth them drinke it freely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say to have a good conceit and weening of themselves as if they were very witty and wise for how ever they take themselves to be eloquent faire or rich as ordinarily they doe all of them yet they esteeme better of their owne wit and wisedome than of any thing else and this is the reason that wine is talkative and full of words it filleth us with lavish speech and the same unseasonable yea it maketh us to have a marvellous good opinion of our selves in ech respect as if we were woorthy to commaund and prescribe unto others more meet to be heard than to heare and fitter to leade and goe before than to follow come after But quoth Glantias then an easie matter it is for any man to collect and alledge much tending unto this point considering how evident and plaine the thing is it were good therefore to heare a discourse to the contrary if haply any person yoong or old will stand up in defence of wine Then our brother full cunningly and sliely like a crafty sophister Why quoth he thinke you that any man is able so presently and upon a sudden to devise and speake unto the question in hand all that may be said probably thereto And why quoth Nicostratus should not I so thinke considering so many learned men in place and those who love wine well enough at which word the other smiled and said Are you in deed sufficient even in your owne conceit to discourse upon this point before us and yet indisposed and altogether unable to consider upon State matters and affaires of government because you have taken your wine well and is not this all one as to thinke that he who hath drunke freely seeth well enough with his eies and howsoever he heareth not perfectly with his eares those whom hee speaketh and talketh with yet for all that he hath the perfect hearing of those who either sing or play upon the flute for as it is likely and standeth to great reason that good and profitable things should affect and draw the outward sences more unto them than those which are gaudie onely and fine even so no doubt such matters make the minde also more intentive and if a man for that he hath plied his drinking overmuch cannot haply comprehend well the difficult subtilties of some high points in philosophie I nothing marvell thereat but if the question be of matters and affaires of State great likelihood there is that if he be called away thereto he should gather his wits more close together and be more vigorous like as Philip king of Macedonia who having plaied the foole and made himselfe ridiculous at Chaeronea after the battell there both in word and deed upon his liberall drinking presently assoone as hee fell to treatie of peace and articles of agreement hee composed his countenance to gravitie knit his browes and cast behinde him all vaine fooleries wanton gestures and unseemly behaviour and so gave unto the Athenians a sober discreet and well advised answere And verily one thing it is to drinke well and another thing to be starke drunke such as be so farre gone and overseene with drinke that they know not what they do or say ought as we thinke to take their beds and sleepe as for those who have taken their wine in deed too much and be scarse sober howbeit otherwise men of wit and understanding we shall never need to feare that they will faile in judgement yea and forget their experience considering that wee daily see these dancers singers and minstrels performe their parts no worse at feasts for all their liberall drinking than in the publicke theaters for the skill and knowledge whereof they have gotten the habit is evermore so present and readie with them that it maketh their bodies active and nimble able to performe those parts and functions directly yea and to answere the motions of the minde accordingly with confidence Many there be also in whose heads and hearts wine so worketh that it putteth into them an assured boldnesse and resolution which helpeth them much to the performance of any great actions and the same is nothing insolent
of the proper and native qualitie that it hath whereas colde by restreining seemeth to conteine and keepe each thing in the owne kinde or nature and water especially Now for the trueth of this that the coldnesse of water hath vertue to preserve the snowe is a sufficient testimonie which keepeth flesh a long time sweet and without corruption but contrariwise heat causeth all things to goe out of their owne nature yea even honie it selfe for being once boiled marred it is but if it continue raw it not onely keepeth it selfe well enough but helpeth to preserve other things and for a further proofe of this matter the water of lakes and pooles is a principall thing to confirme the same for as potable it is and as good to drinke in Winter as any other waters but in Summer the same is starke naught and breedeth diseases and therefore since the night answereth to Winter and the day to Summer those water-men of Nilus abovesaid are of this opinion That water wil continue longer before it turen and corrupt if it be drawen in the night season To these allegations which of themselves seemed to carry probabilitie enough reason also includeth as an evident inartificiall proofe to strengthen and confirme the experience and beleefe of these water-men for they said that they drew water whiles the river was yet still and quiet for in the day time many men either saile upon it or otherwise fetch water from it many beasts also passe to and fro in it whereby it is troubled thicke and muddie and such water will soone putrifie for whatsoever is mixed more easily taketh corruprion than that which is pure and simple considering that mixture maketh a fight and fight causeth change and alteration Now who knoweth not that putrifaction is a kinde of mutation which is the cause that painters call the mixtures of their colours by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say corruptions and the poet Homer when he speaketh of dying saith they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say staine and infect the common use also of our speech carrieth it to call that which is unmixed and meere of it selfe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say incorrupt and sincere but principally if earth be mingled with water it changeth the qualitie and marreth the nature of it quite for ever for being potable and good to drinke and therefore it is that dormant and dead waters which stand in hollow holes are more subject to corruption than others as being full of earthie substance whereas running streames escape this mixture and repell the earth which is brought into them good cause therefore had Hesiodus to commend The water of some lively spring that alwaies runnes his course And which no muddie earth among doth trouble and make woorse For holsome we holde that which is uncorrupt and uncorrupt we take that to be which is all simple pure and unmixed and hereto may be adjoined for to confirme this opinion of theirs the sundrie kinds and differences of earth for those waters which run thorow hillie and stonie grounds because they carrie not with them much of the earth or soile are stronger and more firme than such as passe along marishes plaines and flats Now the river Nilus keeping his course within a levell and soft countrey and to speake more truely being as it were bloud tempered and mingled with flesh is sweet doubtlesse and full of juices that have a strong and nutritive vertue but ordinarily the same runneth mixed and troubled and so much the rather if it be stirred and disquieted for the moving and agitation thereof mixeth the terrestriall substance with the liquid humour but when it is quiet and at repose the same setleth downe to the bottome by reason of the weight Thus you see why they draw up their water in the night-season and withall by that meanes they prevent the sun-rising which alwaies doth catch up and corrupt that which is in all waters most subtile and light THE SIXTH QUESTION Of those who come late to supper where discoursed it is from whence be derived these names of refections in Greeke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 MY yonger sonnes upon a time had staid longer at the theater than they should to see the sights and heare the eare-sports which there were exhibited by occasion whereof they came too late to supper whereupon Therus sonnes called them in mirth sport 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as one would say supper-letting and night-supping-lads with other such like names but they to be meet quit with them againe gave them the tearme of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say runners to supper Heerewith one of the elder sort there present said That hee who came late to his supper ought rather to be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because he maketh more haste with an extraordinary pace for that he hath seemed to staie too long to which purpose he related a pretie tearme of Battus the buffon or pleasant jester to Caesar who was wont to call those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say desirous of suppers who at any time came tardie For quoth he although they have businesse to call and keepe them away yet for the love of good cheere and sweet morcels they refuse not to come late though it be whensoever they are invited Heere came I in with the testimonie of Polycharmus one of the great oratours who managed the State of Athens in an oration of his where making an apologie of his life unto the people in a frequent assembly he spake in this wise Loe my masters of Athens how I have lived but besides manie other things which I have already alledged take this moreover that whensoever I was bidden to any supper I never came last for this seemed to be very popular and plausible whereas contrariwise men are wont to hate them as odious persons and surly lords who come late and for whom the rest of the companie are forced to staie Then Soclarus willing to defend the yoong boies But Alcaeus quoth he called not Pittacus Zophodorpidas because he supped late in the night but for that it was ordinary with him to delight in none other guests and table companions but base vile and obscure persons for to eat early or betimes was in old time counted a reproch and it is said that this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say a breakefast was derived of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say intemperance Then Theon interrupting his speech Not so quoth he but we must give credit rather unto those who report the auncient manner of life in old time for they say that men in those daies being laborious painfull and temperate in their living withal tooke for their repast early in the morning a piece of bread dipped in wine and no other thing and therefore they called this breakfast
maner of Gods service and worship declare the same unto us after three sorts the first naturall the second fabulous and the third civill that is to say restified by the statutes and ordinances of every city and State the naturall is taught by philosophers the fabulous by poets the civill and legall by the customes of ech citie but all this doctrine and maner of teaching is divided into seven sorts the first consisteth in the celestiall bodies appearing aloft in heaven for men had an apprehension of God by starres that shew above seeing how they are the causes of great symphonie and accord and that they keepe a certeine constant order of day and night of Winter and Summer of rising and setting yea and among those living creatures and fruits which the earth beneath bringeth forth whereupon it hath bene thought that heaven was the father and earth the mother to these for that the powring downe of showers and raine seemed in stead of naturall seeds and the earth as a mother to conceive and bring the same forth Men also seeing and considering the starres alwaies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say holding on their course and that they were the cause that we did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say beholde and contemplate therefore they called the sunne and moone c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say gods of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say to run and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say to behold Now they range the gods into a second and third degree namely by dividing them into those that be prositable and such as are hurtfull calling the good and profitable Jupiter Juno Mercurie and Ceres but the noisome and hurtfull 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say maligne spirits 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say furies and Ares that is to say Mars whom they detested as badde and violent yea and devised meanes to appease and qualifie their wrath Moreover the fourth and fifth place and degree they attributed unto affaires passions and affections namely love Venus lust or desire and as for affaires they had hope justice good policie and equitie In the sixth place be those whom the poets have fained for 〈◊〉 being minded to set downe a father for the gods begotten and engendred devised and brought in such progenitors as these To wit 〈◊〉 Ceus and Crius Hyperion and Iapetus whereupon all this kind is named Fabulous But in the seventh place are those who were adorned with divine honors in regard of the great benefits and good deeds done unto the common life of mankind although they were begotten and borne after the maner of men and such were Hercules Castor Pollux and 〈◊〉 and these they said had an humane forme for that as the most noble and excellent nature of all is that of gods so of living creatures the most beautiful is man as adorned with sundry vertues above the rest and simply the best considering the constitution of his minde and soule they thought it therefore meet and reasonable that those who had done best and performed most noble acts resembled that which was the most beautifull and excellent of all other CHAP. VII What is God SOme of the philosophers and namely Diagor as of the isle of Melos Theodorus the Cyrenaean and Euemerus of Tegea held resolutely that there were no gods And verily as touching Euemerus the poet Callimachus of Cyrene writeth covertly in Iambique verses after this maner All in a troupe into that chapell go Without the walles the city not farre fro Whereas sometime that old vain-glorious asse When as he had the image cast in brasse Of Jupiter proceeded for to write Those wicked books which shame was to indite And what books were they even those wherein he discoursed that there were no gods at all And Euripides the tragaedian poet although he durst not discover set abroad in open 〈◊〉 the same for feare of that high court and councell of Areopagus yet he signified as much in this maner for he brought in Sisyphus as the principall author of this opinion and afterwards favourizeth even that sentence of his himselfe for thus he saith The time was when the life of man was rude And as wilde beasts with reason not endu'd Disordinate when wrong was done alway As might and force in ech one bare the sway But afterwards these enormities were laied away and put downe by the bringing in of lawes howbeit for that the law was able to represse injuries and wicked deeds which were notorious and evidently seene and yet many men notwithstanding offended and sinned secretly then some wise man there was who considered and thought with himselfe that needfull it was alwaies to blindfold the trueth with some devised and forged lies yea and to perswade men that A God there is who lives immortally Who heares who sees and knowes all woondrously For away quoth he with vaine dreames and poeticall fictions together with Callimachus who saith If God thou knowest wot well his power divine All things can well performe and bring to fine For God is not able to effect all things for say there be a God let him make snow blacke fire cold him that sitteth or lieth to stand upright or the contrary at one instant and even Plato himselfe that speaketh so bigge when he saith That God created and formed the world to his owne pattern and likenesse smelleth heerein very strongly of some old dotards foolerie to speake according to the poets of the old comedie For how could hee looke upon himselfe quoth he to frame the world according to his owne similitude of how hath he made it round in manner of a globe being himselfe lower than a