The like and in a maner the same both did and suffered another named Theocritus the Sophister save that the punishment which he abid was much more grievous For when King Alexander the Great had by his letters missive given commandement that the Greekes should provide Robes of purple against his returne because upon his comming home he minded to celebrate a solemne sacrifice unto the Gods in token of thanksgiving for that he had atchieved a victorie over the Barbarians by reason of which commaundement the States and cities of Greece were enjoyned to contribute money by the poll Then this Theocritus I have ever to this day quoth he doubted what Homer meant by this word Purple death but now I know full well that this is the Purple death which he speaketh of By which words he incurred the high displeasure of King Alexander and made him his heavie friend ever after The same Theocritus another time procured to himselfe the deadly harted of Antigonus King of the Macedonians by reproching him in way of mockerie with his deformity and defect for that he had but one eie For the King having advaunced Eutropion his Master Cooke to aplace of high calling and commaund thought him a meete man to be sent unto Theocritus as well to give account unto him as also to take account of him reciprocally Eutropion gave him to understand so much from the King and about this businesse repaired often unto him In the end I know well quoth Theocritus thou wilt never have done untill thou have made a dish of meate of me and serve me up raw to the table before this Cyclops to be eaten twitting the King with his one eie and Eutropion with his cookerie But Eutropion came upon him againe presently and said Thou shalt be then without a head first For I will make thee pay for thy prating and foolish toong and with that he went immediately to the King and reported what he had said who made no more adoe but sent his writ and caused his head to be smitten off Over and besides all these precepts before rehearsed children ought to be inured from their very infancie in one thing which is most holy and beseeming religious education and that is to speake the truth For surely lying is a base and servile vice detestable and hatefull among all men and not pardonable so much as to meane slaves such as haue little or no good in them Now as touching all that which I have delivered and advised hitherto which concerneth the honest behaviour modestie and temperance of yoong children I have delivered the same franckly resolutely and making no doubt thereof Mary for one point which now I am to touch and handle I am not so well resolved but much distracted in my mind hanging to and fro as it were in aequall balance and know not which way to incline whether to the one side or to another Insomuch as I am in great perplexitie and feare neither wote I whether I were better to go forward and utter it or to turne backe and hold my peace And yet I will take heart and boldly declare what it is The question to be debated is this Whether we ought to permit those that love young boies to converse with them and haunt their companie or contrariwise keepe them away and debar them that they neither come neere nor have any speech with them For when I behold consider the austere nature severitie of some fathers who for feare that their sonnes should be abused wil in no wise abide that those who love them should in any sort keepe cōpanie or talke with them but thinke it intolerable I am affraid either to bring up such an order or to approove mainteine the same But when on the other side I propound before mine eies the examples of Socrates Plato Xenophon Aeschines Cebes and all the suit and sort of those woorthy men in times past who allowed the maner of loving yoong boies and by that meanes brought such youthes to learne good sciences to skill of government State matters and to frame their maners to the rule and square of vertue I am turned quite and altogither of another minde yea and inclined wholly to imitate and follow those great personages who have the testimonie of the Poet Euripides on their side saying in one place after this maner All loves do not the flesh grossly respect One love there is which doth the soule affect With justice bewtified and aequitie With innocence likewise and chastitie Neither ought we to overpasse one faying of Plato which he delivereth betweene mirth and good earnest in this wise Good reason it is quoth he that they who have done woorthy service and atchieved great prowesse and victory in a battaile be priviledged to kill whom it pleaseth them among their captives And for those who desire nothing but the bewty and fresh floure of the bodie mine opinion is they should be put backe kept away but such in one word as love of the bewrie of the minde are to be chosen admitted unto them Also I hold that such kind love is to be avoided and forbidden which they practise in Thebes and Elis as also that which in Candy they call Ravishment but that which is used in Athens and Lacedaemon we ought to receive and allow even in young and faire boies Howbeit concerning this matter every man may for me opine what he thinketh good and do as he seeth cause and can finde in his heart Moreover having sufficiently treated of the good nourture and modest behaviour of children I purpose to proceed unto the age of yoong men but first I will speake my mind 〈◊〉 once for all as touching one point For many a time I have complained of those who have brought up divers ill customes this above the rest namely to provide for their children whiles they be very yoong and little masters teachers and governors but after they are growen once to some yeeres they give them head and suffer them to be caried away with the violent heat of youth whereas contrariwise it were meet and needfull to have a more carefull eie unto them and to hold a streighter hand over them at that time than during their infancie and childhood For who knoweth not that the faults of yoong children are but small light and easie to be amended as for example some shrewdnesse and little disobedience to their tutors and governors or haply some negligence and default in not giving eare to their teachers and not doing as their Maisters appoint them But contrariwise the offences that yonkers commit are many times outragious and heinous as gourmandise and surfeting robbing of their fathers dice plaie in masks and mummeries excesse in feasting banqueting quaffing and carousing 〈◊〉 love of yoong maidens adulteries committed upon maried wives thereby the overthrow of houses and confusion of families In regard of which enormities it behooved parents to represse and bridle
children be growen to that age wherin they are to be committed unto the charge of Tutors Schoolemasters and governors then parents ought to have an especial care of their state namely under whom they set them to be trained up least for want of good providence and foresight they betray them into the hands of some vile slaves base barbarians vaine and light-headed persons For most absurd and ridiculous is the practise of many men in this point who if they have any servants more vertuous or better disposed than others some of them they appoint to husbandry and tillage of their ground others they make Masters of their ships They employ them I say either in merchandise to be their factours or as stewards of their house to receive and pay all or else to be banquers and so they trust them with the exchaunging and turning of their monies But if they meete with one slave among the rest that useth to be cupshotten given to gluttony belly cheere or otherwise is untoward for any good service him they set over their children to bring them up Whereas indeed a governour over youth should be wel given of a right good nature himselfe such an one as Phoenix was who had the breeding and education of Achilles The principal point therfore and most important of all that hitherto hath bene alledged is this That choise men be sought out for to be teachers masters of our children who live in good name and without challenge whose cariage and behaviour is blameles who for their knowledge experience of the world are the best that may be found For surely the source roote of all goodnes and honesty is the good education and training up of our children in their tender age And like as good husbandmen and gardeners are woont to pitch props stakes close unto their yong plants to stay them up and keepe them streight even so discreete and wise teachers plant good precepts and holesome instructions round about their yoong schollers to the end that thereby their manners may bud foorth commendably and be framed to the rule of vertue But contrariwise you shall have some fathers now adaies that deserve no better than to be spit at in their very faces who either upon ignorance or for want of experience before any triall made of those masters who are to have the conduct and charge of their children commit them hand over head to the tuition of lewd persons and such as beare shew and make profession of that which they are not Neither were this absurditie altogether so grosse and ridiculous if so be they faulted herein of meere simplicitie default of foreknowledge But here is the heights of their folly and errour that themselves knowing otherwhiles the insufficiencie yea and the naughtines of some such Masters better than they doe who advertise them thereof yet for all that they commit their children unto them partly being overcome by the slatterie of claw-backes and partly willing to gratifie some friends upon their kinde and earnest entreatie Wherein they do much like for all the world to him who lying verie sicke in bodie for to content and satisfie a friend leaveth an expert and learned physition who was able to cure him and entertaineth another blind leech who for want of skill and experience quickly killeth him or else unto one who being at sea forgoeth an excellent pilot whom he knoweth to be very skilfull and for the love of a friend maketh choise of another that is most insufficient O Iupiter and all the gods in Heaven Is it possible that a man bearing the name of a father should make more account of a friends request than of the good education of his owne children Which considered had not that ancient Philosopher Crates 〈◊〉 you just occasion to say oftentimes that if possibly he might he would willingly mount to the highest place of the citie and there crie out aloud in this manner What meane you my Masters and whether runne you headlong carking and caring all that ever you can to gather goods and rake riches together as you do whiles in the mean time you make little or no reckoning at all of your children unto whom you are to leave all your wealth To which exclamation of his I may adde thus much moreover and say That such fathers are like unto him that hath great regard of his shoe but taketh no heed unto his foor And verily a man shall see many of these fathers who upon a covetous minde and a cold affection toward their owne children are growen to this passe that for to spare their purse and ease themselves of charge chuse men of no woorth to teach them which is as much as to seeke a good market where they may buy ignorance cheapest Certes Aristippus said verie well to this purpose when upon a time he pretily mocked such a father who had neither wit nor understanding and jibed pleasantly with him in this maner For when he demaunded of him how much he would take for the training up and teaching of his sonne He answered An hundred crownes A hundred crownes quoth the father by Hercules I sweare you aske too much out of the way For with a hundred crownes I could buy a good slave True quoth Aristippus againe Lay out this hundred crownes so you may have twaine your sonne for one and him whom you buy for the other And is not this a follie of all foliies that nourses should use their yoong infants to take meate and feed themselves with the right hand yea and rebuke them if haply they put foorth their left and not to forecast and give order that they may learne civility and heare sage holesom instructions But what befalleth afterward to these good fathers when they have first noursed their children badly then taught them as lewdly Mary I will tell you When these children of theirs are growne to mans estate and will not abide to heare of living orderly and as it becommeth honest men but contrariwise fall headlong into outragious courses and give themselves wholy to sensuality and servile pleasures Then such fathers all repent for their negligence past in taking no better order for their education but all too late considering no good ensueth thereupon but contrariwise the lewd prancks which they commit daily augment their griefe of heart and cause them to languish in sorrow For some of them they see to keepe companie with flatterers parasites and smell feasts the lewdest basest and most cursed wretches of all other who serve for nothing but to corrupt spoile and marre youth Others to captivate and spend themselves upon harlots queanes and common strumpets proud and sumptuous in expence the entertainment of whom is infinitly costly Many of them consume all in delicate fare and feeding a daintie and fine tooth Many of them fall to dice and with mumming and masking hazard all they have And divers of them againe entangle themselves
some wicked and ungodly speech without any answere adjoyned thereto for to refell the same presently what then is to be done Surely we must confute it by opposing contrarie sentences of the same author in other places niether are we to be angrie or offended with the Poët in this case but rather thinke they be words either merily spoken or only to represent the nature of some person with him only to be displeased Moreover against these fictions in Homer when he reporteth how the gods fall together by the eares and throw one another downe or that they be wounded in some battell by the hands of mortall men also that they beat variance and debate you may if you will by and by oppose that which he himselfe speaketh in another place and so beat him with his owne rod saying thus unto him You know sir if you list ywis To tell us better tales than this And verily you both utter better wordes and thinke of better matters otherwise in these places The Gods in heaven do live at ease They know no trouble nor disease Also Whereas the Gods in blisse and joy Do ever live without annoy Likewise The Gods themselves are void of care Sadnesse and sorrow mens lots they are For these are the true and safe conceptions which we ought to have as touching the Gods And for all other fabulous fictions and attributes given unto them they have beene devised only to give contentment to the readers or to moove their affections In like case whereas Euripides saith Gods over men having power andmasterie Abuse and decceive them with wiles and sophistrie It were not amisse to alledge and inferre that which he writeth better and more truely in another place If Gods do harme or what doth not beseeme No Gods in truth we are them for to deeme Also when Pindarus speaketh verie bitterly and eagerly in one place tending altogether to revenge All meanes and plots we may addresse To worke and compasse our foes distresse We may come upon him againe and answer thus But you good Sir elsewhere affirme That The joy we gaine by fraud and trecherte Turnes in the end to woe and miserie Moreover when we heare Sophocles in this song Lucre alwaies full pleasant is and sweete Although it come by false meanes and unmeere Reply we ought and say thus We have heard you sing in another tune Deceitfull lies and false language Bring forth no fruit that will beare age Furthermore to encounter these speeches which are delivered as touching riches Powr-full is riches to win forts steepe and high As well as places most plaine and accessible Whereas those pleasures which redy be and nigh To hold and enjoy for poore is impossible And why a toong that smooth and filed is Will cause aman foule and unpersonable Of no regard whose parts be all amis Faire for to seeme full wise and commendable The Reader may alleage many opposite sentences of Sophocles and these among the rest I see no cause but men in povertie May be advaunc'd to place of dignitie Also A man is not the woorse for his povertie In case he have both wisedome and bone stie Likewise What joy what grace can some of wordly pelse If first by shifts a man to it attaine And then with restlesse cares torment himselfe And take bad courses the same to maintaine And Menander verily in one place hath highly praised and extolled sensuall lust and concupiscence whereby he set them forward who are of an hot nature and of themselves prone to voluptuousnes namely in these and such like amatorious words What creatures soever do live and see The sunlight joy that common treasure Are all have beene and ever shall be Subject and thral to fleshly pleasure Howbeit in another the same Poët hath turned us about and forcibly drawen us unto honestie repressing and bridling the insolent furie of a loose and luxurious life saying in this wise A filthie life though pleasant for the while With shame at last doth all delights defile These sayings are in some fort contrarie to the former but far better and more profitable every way And therefore the setting together and consideration of such contradictorie sentences will bring foorth one of these two effects for either it will draw yoong men to the better way or at leastwise derogate the credit of the woorst But if peradventure it come to passe that the Poëts themselves do not solve and salve those strange and absurd sayings which they seeme to set abroad it were not amisse to oppose against them the contrarie sentences of other famous authors and when wee have weighed and compared them in balance to make proofe thereby which are the better As for example if haply Alexis the Poët hath prevailed with some by these verses of his If men be wise above all they will chuse By all meanes their pleasures to compasse and use Whereof there be three most powrfull and rise Which wholy possesse and accomplish our life To eat to drinke to follow venerie As for therest I hold accessarie We must call to minde and remember that the sage Socrates was of another opinion and spake the contrarie for he was woont to say that the wicked lived for to eate and drinke but the vertuous did both eat and drinke to live Semblably to meete with this verse of the Poët who ever it was that wrote thus To make thy part good with aperson lewd Fight with like lewdnes and be thou as shrewd Bidding us in some sort to accommodate and frame our selves like to the lewd and wicked we may be readie with that notable Apophthegme of Diogenes who being asked how a man might be revenged best of his enemie answered thus If quoth he thou shew thy selfe a good and honest man The wisedome also of the said Diogenes we must set against the Poët Sophocles who troubled the minds and consciences of many thousands with distrust and dispaire by writing these verses as touching the religion and confraternity in the Mysteries of Ceres How happie men and thrice happy are they Whose fortune it is the secrets to see Of Mysteries so sacred and streight way Downe into hell for to descend with glee For they alone in blisse shall live for ay The rest in bale must suffer paine alway How now quoth Diogenes when he heard such verses read Saist thou so indeed And shall Pataecian the notorious theese be in better state after this life when he is once departed only because he was entred and professed in the orders of this confraternitie than good Epiminondas As for Timotheus when upon a time in the audience of a full Theatre he chaunted a Poeme which he had compiled in the honor of Diana wherein he stiled her with the Attributes and Epithets of Menas Thyas Phoebas and Lyssas which signifie Furious Enraged Possessed and starke Mad Cinnesias presently cried presently aloud unto him I would thou haddest a daughter of thine owne with such qualities The
owne part whether I did well or ill I know not but surely when I began my cure of choler in my selfe I did as in olde time the Lacedaemonians were woont to do by their Ilotes men of base and servile condition For as they taught their children what a soule vice drunkennesse was by their example when they were drunke so I learned by observing others what anger was and what beastly effects it wrought First and formost therefore like as that maladie according to Hippocrates is of all others woorst and most dangerous wherein the visage of the sicke person is most disfigured and made unlikest it selfe so I seeing those that were possessed of choler and as it were beside themselves thereby how their face was changed their colour their countenance their gate and their voice quite altered I imagined thereupon unto my selfe a cerreine forme and image of this maladie as being mightily displeased in my minde if haply at any time I shoule be seene of my friends my wife and the little girles my daughters so terrible and so farre mooved and transported beside my selfe not onely fearefull and hideous to beholde and farre otherwise than I was woont but also unpleasant to be heard my voice being rough rude and churlish like as it was my hap to see some of my familiar friends in that case who by reason of anger could not reteine and keepe their ordinary fashions and behavior their force of visage nor their grace in speech ne yet that affability and pleasantnesse in company and talke as they were woont This was the reason that Caius Gracchus the Oratour a man by nature blunt rude in behaviour and withall over-earnest and violent in his maner of pleading had a little flute or pipe made for the nonce such as Musicians are woont to guide and rule the voice gently by little and little up and downe betweene base to treble according to everie note as they would themselves teaching their scholars thereby to have a tunable voice Now when Gracchus pleaded at the barre at any time he had one of his servants standing with such a pipe behinde him who observing when his master was a little out of tune would sound a more mild and pleasant note unto him whereby he reclaimed and called him backe from that loude exclaiming and so taking downe that rough and swelling accent of his voice Like as the Neat-heards pipes so shrill made of the marrishreeds so light The joints whereof with waxe they fill resound a tune for their delight Which while the heard in field they keepe Brings them at length to pleasant sleepe dulced and allaied the cholericke passion of the orator Certes my selfe if I had a pretie page to attend upon me who were diligent necessarie and handsome about me would not be offended but verie well content that when he saw me angrie he should by and by present a mirror or looking glasse unto me such a one as they use to bring and shew unto some that newly are come out of the baine although no good or profit at all they have thereby But certainely for man to see himselfe at such a time how disquieted he is how farre out of the way and beside the course of nature it were no small meanes to checke this passion and to set him in hatred therewith for ever after They who are delighted in tales and fables doe report by way of merrie speech and pastime that once when Minerva was a piping there came a Satyre and admonished her that it was not for her to play upon a flute but she for the time tooke no heed to that advertisement of his notwithstanding he spake thus unto her This forme of face becomes you not lay up your pipes take armes in hand But first this would not befor got your cheekes to lay that puft now stand But afterwards when she had seene her face in a certaine river what a paire of cheekes she had gotten with her piping she was displeased with her selfe and flung away her pipes And yet this art and skill of playing well upon the pipe yeeldeth some comfort and maketh amends for the deformitie of disfigured visage with the melodious tune and harmonie that it affoordeth yea and afterwards Marsyas the Minstrell as it is thought devised first with a certaine hood and muzzle fastened round about the mouth as well to restraine and keepe downe the violence of the blast enclosed thus by force as also to correct and hide the deformitie and undecent inequalitie of the visage With glittring gold both cheekes as farre as temples he did binde The tender mouth with thongs likewise fast knit the necke behinde But anger contrariwise as it doth puffe up and stretch out the visage after an unseemely maner so much more it sendeth out undecent and unpleasant voice And stirs the strings at secret note of heart Which touched should not be but by a part The sea verily when being troubled and disquieted with blustring winds it casteth up mosse reits and such like weeds they say it is cleansed andpurged thereby but the dissolute bitter scurrile and foolish speeches which anger sendeth out of the minde when it is turned upside downe first pollute and defile the speakers themselves and fill them full of infamy for that they be thought to have their hearts full of such ordure and filthinesse at all times but the same lurketh there untill that choler discovereth it And therefore they pay most deerely for their speech the lightest matter of all others as Plato saith in that they suffer this heavie and grievous punishment to be held and reputed for malicious enemies cursed speakers and ill conditioned persons Which I seeing and observing well enough it falleth out that I reason with my selfe alwaies call to mind what a good thing it is in a feaver but much better in a fit of choler to have a tongue faire even and smooth For in them that be sicke of an ague if the tongue be not such as naturally it ought to be an ill signe it is but not a cause of any harme or indisposition within Howbeit if their tongues who are angry be once rough foule and running dissolutely at random to absurd speeches it casteth foorth outragious and contumelious language the verie mother and work-mistresse of irreconciliable enmitie and bewraieth an hidden and secret maliciousnes As for wine if a man drinke it of it selfe undelaied with water it putteth foorth no such wantonnesse no disordinate and lewd speeches like to those that proceed of ire For drunken talke serveth to make mirth and to procure laughter rather than any thing else but words of choler are tempered with bitter gall and rankor Moreover he that sitteth silent at the table when others drinke merrily is odious unto the companie and a trouble whereas in choler there is nothing more decent and beseeming gravitie than to be quiet and say nothing according as Sappho doth admonish When furious choler once is up
every thing appeereth greater than it is through anger And therefore at these and such like faults we should winke for the time and make as though we sawthem not and yet thinke upon them neverthelesse and beare them in minde But afterwards when the storme is well overblowen we are with out passion do not suspect our selves then we may do well to consider thereof and then if upon mature deliberation when our mind is staied and our senses setled the thing appeere to be naught we are to hate and abhor it and in no wise either to for-let and put of or altogether to omit and forbeare correction like as they refuse meats who have no stomacke nor appetite to eat For certeinly it is not a thing so much to be blamed for to punish one in anger as not to punish when anger is past and alaied and so to be retchlesse and desolute doing as idle mariners who so long as the sea is calme and the weather faire loiter within the harbor or haven but afterwards when a tempest is up spread sailes and put themselves into danger For even so we condemning and neglecting the remissenesse and calmnesse of reason in case of punishment make haste to execute the same during the heat of choler which no doubt is a blustring and turbulent winde As for meat he calleth for it in deed and taketh it naturally who is a hungrie but surely he executeth punishment best who neither hungreth nor thirsteth after it neither hath he need to use choler as a sauce or deintie dish for to get him a stomacke and appetite to correct but even when he is farthest off from desire of revenge then of necessitie he is to make use of reason and wisdome to direct him for we ought not to do as Aristotle writeth in his time the maner was in Tuskane To whip servants with sound of flutes and hautboies namely to make a sport and pastime of punishing men and to solace our selves with their punishment for pleasures sake and then afterwards when we have done repent us of it for as the one is brutish and beastlike so the other is as womanish and unmanly but without griefe and pleasure both at what time as reason and judgement is in force we ought to let justice take punishment and leave none occasion at all for choler to get advantage But peradvenure some one will say that this is not properly the way to remedie or cure anger but rather a putting by or precaution that we should not commit any of those faults which ordinarily follow that passion Unto whom I answere thus That the swelling of the Spleene is not the cause but a symptome or accident of a fever howbeit if the said humour be fallen and the paine mitigated the feaver also will be much eased according as Hieronymus saith Also when I consider by what meanes choler is engendred I see that one falleth into it upon this cause another upon that but in all of them it seemeth this generall opinion there is that they thinke themselves to be despised and naught set by And therefore we ought to meet with such as seeme to defend and mainteine themselves as being angry for just cause and to cure them after this maner namely by diverting and remooving from them as far as ever we can all suspicion of contempt and contumacie in those that have offended them and mooved their anger in laying the fault upon inconsiderate follie necessitie sicknesse infirmitie and miserie as Sophocles did in these verses For those my Lords whose state is in destresse Have not their spirits and wits as heretofore As fortune frownes they waxen ever lesse Nay gone are quite though fresh they were before And Agamemnon albeit he laid the taking away of Briseis from Achilles upon Ate that is to say some fatall infortunitie yet He willing was and prest him to content And unto him rich gifts for to present For to beseech and intreat are signes of a man that despiseth not and when the partie who hath given offence becometh humble and lowly he remooveth all the opinion that might be conceived of contempt But he that is in a fit of choler must not attend and waite until he see that but rather helpe himselfe with the answer of Diogenes These fellowes here said one unto him do deride thee Diogenes but I quoth he againe do not finde that I am derided even so ought a man who is angry not to be perswaded that he is contemned of another but rather that himselfe hath just cause to contemne him and to thinke that the fault committed did proced of infirmitie error heady-rashnesse sloth and idlenesse a base and illiberall minde age or youth And as for our servants and friends we must by all meanes quit them hereof or pardon them at leastwise For surely they cannot be thought to contemne us in regard that they thinke us unable to be revenged or men of no execution if we went about it but it is either by reason of our remissenes and mildnesse or else of our love and affection that we seeme to be smally regarded by them whiles our servants presume of our tractable nature easie to be pacified and our friends of our exceeding love that cannot be soone shaken off But now we are provoked to anger not onely against our wives or servitors and friends as being contemned by them but also many times in our choler we fall upon In-keepers Mariners and Muliters when they be drunke supposing that they despise us And that which more is we are offended with dogs when they bay or barke at us and with asses if they chance to fling out and kicke us Like unto him who lifted up his hand to strike and beat him that did drive an asse and when the man cried that he was an Athenian But thou I am sure art no Athenian quoth he to the asse and laid upon the poore beast as hard as he could and gave him many a blow with his cudgell But that which chiefly causeth us to be angrie and breedeth a continuall disposition thereto in our minds causing us so often to breake out into fits of choler which by little and little was ingendred and gathered there before is the love of our owne selves and a kinde of froward surlinesse hardly to be pleased together with a certaine daintinesse and delicacie which all concurring in one breed and bring foorth a swarme as it were of bees or rather a waspes neast in us And therefore there cannot be a better meanes for to carrie our selves mildly and kindly towards our wives our servants familiars and friends than a contented minde and a singlenesse or simplicitie of heart when a man resteth satisfied with whatsoever is present at hand and requireth neither things superfluous nor exquisite But he that never is content With rost or sod but cooke is shent How ever he be serv d I meane With more with lesse or in a meane He is not
way were shut up Howbeit most true it is that those who for the most part occupie their understanding have least use of their senses which is the reason that in olde time they both builded the temples of the Muses that is to say houses ordained for students which they named Musaea as farre as they could from cities and great townes and also called the night Euphrone as one would say friend to sage advice and counsell as supposing that quiet rest repose and stilnes from all disturbance make verie much for contemplation and invention of those things that we studie and seeke for Moreover no harder matter is it nor of greater difficultie than the rest when in the open market place or common hall men are at high words reproching reviling one another not to approch and come neere unto them Also if there be any great concurse and running of people together upon some occasion not to stirre at all but sit still or if thou art not able to containe and rule thy selfe to rise up and goe thy waies For surely gaine thou shalt no good at all by intermedling with such busie and troublesome persons but contrariwise much fruit maist thou reape by turning away such curiositie in repressing the same and constraining it by use and custome to obey reason Having made this good entrance beginning to proceed now unto farther and stronger exercise it were verie good whensoever there is any play exhibited upon the Stage in a frequent Theater where there is assembled a great audicnce to heare and see some woorthie matter for to passe by it and to put backe thy friends who sollicite thee to goe thither with them for to see either one daunce excellent well or to act a Comedie nor so much as to turne backe when thou hearest some great shout and outcrie either from out of the race or the grand-cirque where the horse-running is held for the prize For like as Socrates gave counsell to forbeare those meates which provoke men to eate when they are not hungrie and those drinkes which incite folke to drinke when they have no thirst even so we ought to avoide and beware how we either see or heare any thing whatsoever which may either draw or hold us thereto when there is no need at all thereof The noble Prince Cyrus would not so much as see faire Ladie Panthea and when Araspes one of his courtiours and minions made report unto him that she was a woman of incomparable beautie and therefore woorthie to be looked on Nay rather quoth he for that cause I ought to forbeare the sight of her for if by your perswasion I should yeeld to goe and see her it may peradventure fall out so that she her selfe might tempt and induce me againe to repaire unto her even then haply when I shall not have such leasure yea and sit by her and keepe her company neglecting in the meane time the weghtie affaires of the State In like manner Alexander the Great would not come within the sight of King Dartus his wife notwithstanding that she was reported unto him for to be a most gallant and beautifull Ladie Her mother an auncient Dame and elderly matrone he did not sticke to visite but the yoong gentlewoman her daughter fresh faire and yoong he could not be brought so much as once to see As for us we can cast a wanton eie secretly into the coatches and horse-litters of wives and women as they ride we can looke out of our windowes and hang with our bodies halfe foorth to take the full view of them as they passe by and all this while we thinke that we commit no fault suffering our curious eie and wandring minde to slide and run to everie thing Moreover it is meet and expedient for the exercise of justice otherwhiles to omit that which well and justly might be done to the end that by that meanes a man may acquaint himselfe to keepe farre off from doing or taking any thing unjustly Like as it maketh much for temperance and chastitie to abstaine otherwhiles from the use of a mans owne wife that thereby he might be never mooved to lust after the wife of his neighbour taking this course likewise against curiosity strive and endevour sometimes to make semblance as though thou didst neither heare nor see those things that properly concerne thy selfe And if a man come and bring thee a tale of matters concerning thine owne housholde let it passe and put it over yea and those words which seeme to have beene spoken as touching thine owne person cast them behinde and give no eare thereto For default of this discretion it was the inquisitive curiosity of King Oedipus which intangled and enwrapped him in exceeding great calamities and miseries for when he would needs know who himselfe was as if he had beene not a Corinthian but a stranger and would needs goe therefore to the Oracle for to be resolved he met with Laius his owne father by the way whom he slew and so espoused his owne mother by whose meanes he came to be King of Thebes and even then when he seemed to be a most happy man he could not so stay but proceeded further to enquire concerning himselfe notwithstanding his wife did what she possibly could disswade him from it but the more earnest she was with him that way the more instant was he with an old man who was privie to all using all meanes to enforce him for to bewray that secret at length when the thing it selfe was so pregnant that it brought him into farther suspicion and withall when the said old man cried out in this maner Alas how am I at the point perforce To utter that which will cause remorse the king surprised still with his humor of curiositie notwithstanding he was vexed at the verie heart answered And I likewise for my part am as neere To beare as much but yet I must it heare So bitter-sweet is that itching-smart humor of curiositie like unto an ulcer or sore which the more it is rubbed and scratched the more it bleedeth and bloodieth it selfe Howbeit he that is delivered from this disease and besides of nature milde and gentle so long as he is ignorant and knoweth not any evill accident may thus say O blessed Saint when evils are past and gone How sage and wise art thou oblivion And therefore we must by little and little accustome our selves to this that when there be anie letters brought unto us we do not open them presently and in great haste as many do who if their hands be not quicke enough to doe the feat set their teeth to and gnaw in sunder the threds that sewed them up fast Also if there be a messenger comming toward us from a place with any tidings that we run not to meere him nor so much as once rise and stir for the matter and if a friend come unto thee saying I have some newes to tell you of yea mary
of one who had a cause to plead unto at the barre penned an oration for his purpose and gave it him The partie after he had read and read it over againe came unto Lysias heavie and ill-appaied saying The first time that I perused your oration me thought it was excellently well written and I wondred at it but when I tooke it a second and third time in hand it seemed very simply endited caried no forcible and effectuall stile with it Why quoth Lysias and smiled withall know you not that you are to pronounce it but once before the judges and yet see marke withall the perswasive eloquence and sweet grace that is in the writing of Lysias for I may be bold to say and affirme of him that The Muses with their broided violet haire Grac'd him with favour much and beauty faire And among those singular commendations that are given out of any Poët most true it is that Homer is he alone of all that ever were who overcame all satietie of the reader seeming evermore new and fresh flourishing alwaies in the prime of lovely grace and appeering yoong still and amiable to win favour howbeit in speaking and prosessing thus much of himselfe It greeves me much for to rechearse againe Atale that once delivered hath beene plaine He sheweth sufficiently that he avoideth what he can and feareth that tedious satietie which followeth hard at heeles laieth wait as it were unto all long traines of speech in which regard he leadeth the reader hearer of his Poemes from one discourse narration to another and evermore with novelties doth so refresh and recreate him that he thinketh he hath never enough whereas our long-tongued chatterers do after a sort wound and weary the eares of their hearers by their tautologies and vaine repetitions of the same thing as they that soile and flourry writing tables when they be faire scoured and clensed and therefore let us set this first and formost before their eies that like as they who force men to drinke wine out of measure and undelaied with water are the cause that the good blessing which was given us to rejoice our hearts and make us pleasant and merry driveth some into sadnesse and others into drunkennesse and violence even so they that beyond all reason and to no purpose use their speech which is a thing otherwise counted the most delightsome and amiable meanes of conference and societie that men have together cause it to bee inhumane and unsociable displeasing those whom they thought to please making them to be mocked at their hands of whom they looked to be well esteemed and to have their evill will and displeasure whose love and amitie they made reckoning of And even as hee by good right may be esteemed uncourteous and altogether uncivill who with the girdle and ussue of Venus wherein are allsorts of kind and amiable allurements should repell and drive from him as many as desire his companie so hee that with his speech maketh others heavie and himselfe hatefull may well be held and reputed for a gracelesse man and of no bringing up in the world As for other passions and maladies of the minde some are dangerous others odious and some againe ridiculous and exposed to mockerie but garrulity is subject unto all these inconveniences at once For such folke as are noted for their lavish tongue are a meere laughing stocke and in every common and ordinary report of theirs they minister occasion of laughter hated they be for their relation of ill newes and in danger they are because they cannot conceale and keepe close their owne secrets heereupon Anacharsis being invited one day feasted by Solon was reputed wise for that being asleepe he was found and seene holding his right hand to his mouth and his left upon his privities and natural parts for good reason he had to thinke that the tongue required and needed the stronger bridle and bit to restreine it and in very truth it were a hard matter to reckon so many persons undone and overthrowne by their intemperate and loose life as there have beene cities and mightie States ruinated and subverted utterly by the revealing and opening of some secrets It fortuned that whiles Sylla did inleaguer before the citie of Athens and had not leasure to stay there long and continue the siege by reason of other affaires and troubles pressed him sore for of one side king Mithridates invaded and harmed Asia and on the other side the faction of Marius gathered strength and having gotten head prevailed much within Rome certeine old fellowes being met in a barbars shop within the city of Athens who were blabs of their tongues clattered it out in their talk together that a certeine quarter of the citie named Heptacalchon was not sufficiently guarded and therefore the towne in danger to be surprised by that part which talke of theirs was over-heard by certeine espies who advertised Sylla so much whereupon immediately hee brought all his forces to that side and about midnight gave an hot assault made entrie and went within a very little of forcing the citie and being master of it all for he filled the whole streete called Ceramicum with slaughter and dead carcasses insomuch as the chanels ran downe with bloud Now was hee cruelly bent against the Athenians more for their hard language which they gave him than for any offence or injurie otherwise that they did unto him for they had flouted and mocked Sylla together with his wife Metella and for that purpose they would get upon the walles and say Sylla is a Sycamoore or Mulberie bestrewed all over with dusty-meale besides many other such foolish jibes and taunts and so for the lightest thing in the world as Plato saith to wit words which are but winde they brought upon their heads a most heavie and grievous penaltie The garrulitie and over-much talke of one man was the only hinderance that the citie of Rome was not set free and delivered from the tyrannie of Nero. For there was but one night betweene the time that Nero should have beene murthered on the morrow and all things were readie and prepared for the purpose but he who had undertaken the execution of that feat as he went toward the Theatre espied one of those persons who were condemned to die bound and pinnioned at the prison doore and readie to be led and brought before Nero who hearing him to make piteous moane and lamenting his miserable fortune steps to him and rounding him softly in the eare Pray to God poore man quoth he that this one day may passe over thy head and that thou die not to day for to morrow thou shalt con me thankes The poore prisoner taking hold presently of this aenigmaticall and darke speech and thinking as I suppose that one bird in hand is better than two in bush and according to the common saying that A foole is he who leaving that which readie is and sure Doth follow
shall be thought an adversarie because you are not ready to offend either part but indifferent to both in aiding as well the one as the other and envie shall you incur none as bearing part in their miserie in case you seeme to have a fellow-feeling and compassion equally with them all but the best way were to provide and forecast that they never breake out to tearmes of open sedition and this you are to thinke for to be the principall point and the height of all pollicie and civill government for evident it is and you may easily see that of those greatest blessings which cities can desire to wit peace libertie and freedome plentie and fertilitie multitude of people and unitie and concord as touching peace cities have no great need in these daies of wise governors for to procure or mainteine the same for that all wars both against the Greekes and also the Barbarians are chased away and gone out of sight as for libertie the people hath as much as it pleaseth their sovereignes and princes to give them and peradventure if they had more it would be woorse for them for the fertility of the earth and the abundance of all fruits the kind disposition and temperature of all seasons of the yeere That mothers in due time their babes into the world may beare Resembling in all points their sires to wit their fathers deare and that children so borne may live and be live-like every good and wise men wil crave at Gods hands in the behalfe of his owne fellow citizens Now there remaineth for a States-man and politike governour of all those works proposed one onely and that is nothing inferiour to the rest of the blessings above-named to wit the unitie and concord of citizens that alwaies dwell together and the banishing out of a citie of all quarrels all jarres and malice as the maner is in composing the differences and debates of friends namely by dealing first with those parties which seeme to be most offended and to have taken the greatest wrong in seeming to be injuried as well as they and to have no lesse cause of displeasure and discontent than they afterwards by little and little to seeke for to pacifie and appease them by declaring and giving them to understand that they who can be content to strike saile a little do ordinarily go beyond those who thinke to gaine all by force surmount them I say not onely in mildenesse and good nature but also in courage and magnanimitie who in yeelding and giving place a little in small matters are masters in the end and conquerors in the best and greatest which done his part is to make remonstrance both particularly to every one and generally to them all declaring unto them the feeble and weake estate of Greece and that it is very expedient for men of sound and good judgment to enjoy the fruit and benefit which they may have in this weakenesse and imbecilitie of theirs living in peace and concord one with another as they doe considering that fortune hath not left them in the midst any prize to winne or to strive for For what glorie what authoritie what power or preeminence will remaine unto them that haply should have the better hand in the end be masters over their adversaries but a proconfull with one commandement of his will be able to overthrow it and transport it unto the other side as often and whensoever it pleaseth him but say that it should continue stil yet is it not woorth all this labour and travell about it But like as scare-fires many times begin not at stately temples and publike edifices but they may come by some candle in a private and little house which was neglected or not well looked unto and so fell downe and tooke hold thereof or haply straw or rushes and such like stuffe might catch fire and suddenly flame and so thereupon might ensue much losse and a publike wasting of many faire buildings even so it is not alwaies by meanes of contention and variance about affaires of State that seditions in cities be kindled but many times braules and riots arising upon particular causes and so proceeding to a publike tumult and quarrell have beene the overthrow and utter subversion of a whole citie In regard whereof it perteineth unto a politike man as much as any one thing els to foresee and prevent or else to remedy the same to see I say that such dissentions do not arise at al or if they be on foot to keep them down from growing farther and taking head or at leastwise that they touch not the State but rest still among whom it began considering this with himselfe giving others to understand that private debates are in the end causes of publike and small of great when they be neglected at first and no convenient remedies used at the verie beginining Like as by report the greatest civill dissention that ever hapned in the citie of Delphos arose by the meanes of one Crates whose daughter Orgilaus the sonne of Phalis was at the point to wed now it hapned by meere chance that the cup out of which they were to make an essay or effusion of wine in the honour of the gods first and then afterwards to drinke one to another according to the nuptiall ceremonies of that place broke into peeces of it selfe which Orgilaus taking to be an evill presage forsooke his espoused bride and went away with his father without finishing the complements of marriage Some few daies after when they were sacrificing to the gods Crates conveied covertly or underhand a certaine vessell of gold one of those which were sacred and dedicated to the temple unto them and so made no more adoo but caused Orgilaus and his brother as manifell church-robbers to be pitched downe headlong from the top of the rocke at Delphos without any judgement or forme and processe of law yea and more than that killed some of their kinsfolke and friends notwithstanding they entreated hard and pleaded the liberties and immunitie of Minervaes temple surnamed Provident into which they were fled and there tooke sanctuarie And thus after divers such murders committed the Delphians in the end put Crates to death and those his complices who were the authors of this sedition and of the money and goods of these excommunicate persons for so they were called seazed upon by way of confiscation they built those chapples which stand beneath the citie At Syracusae also of two yoong men who were verie familiarly acquainted together the one being to travell abroad out of his countrey left in the custodie of the other a concubine that he had to keepe untill his returne home againe but he in the absence of his friend abused her bodie but when his companion upon his returne home knew thereof he wrought so that for to crie quittance with him he lay with his wife and made him cuckold this matter came to hearing at the counsell table of the
why they ran away and suffered themselves to be beaten by those who had foiled them so often before but one of the Numantines answered Because the sheep be the verie same that they were in times past mary they have changed their shepheard After he had forced the citie of Numance by assault and entred now the second time with triumph into Rome he fell into some variance and debate with C. Gracchus in the behalfe of the Senate and certaine allies or confederates whereupon the common-people taking a spleene and displeasure against him made such clamours at him upon the Rostra when he was purposed to speake and give remonstrances unto them that thereupon he raised this speech There was never yet any outcries and alarmes of whole campes nor shouts of armed men ready to give battell that could astonish and daunt me no more shall the rude crie of a cofused multitude trouble me who know assuredly that Italy is not their mother but their stepdame And when Gracchus with his consorts and adherents cried out aloud Kill the tyrant there kill him Great reason quoth he have they to take away my life who warre against their owne countrie for they know that so long as Scipio is on foot Rome cannot fall nor Scipio stand when Rome is laid along CAECILIUS METELLUS devising and casting about how to make sure his approches and avenues for to assault a strong fort when a Centurion came unto him and saide With the losse but of ten men you may be master of the piece Wilt thou then quoth he be one of those tenne And when another who was a colonell and a yoong man demaunded of him what service he intended to do If I wist quoth he that my wastcoat or shirt were privie to my minde I would put it off presently and cast it into the fire He was a great enemie to Scipio so long as Scipio lived but when he was once dead he tooke it very heavily and commanded his owne sonnes to goe under the beare and carrie him upon their owne shoulders to buriall saying withall That he gave the gods heartie thankes that Scipio was borne at Rome and in no place else C. MARIUS being risen from a base degree by birth unto the government of State and all by the meanes of armes sued for the greater Aedileship called Curule but perceiving that he could not compasse it made sute the verie same day for the lesse and notwithstanding that he went besides both the one and the other yet he said That he doubted not one day to be the greatest man of all the Romanes Being troubled with the swelling of the veines called Varices in both his legges he suffered the chirurgian to cut those of the one legge without being bound or tied for the matter enduring the operation of his hand and never gave one grone or so much as bent his browes all the whiles but when the chirurgian would have gone to the other legge Nay staie there quoth he for the cure of such a maladie as this is not woorth the greevous paines that belongeth thereto He had a nephew or sisters sonne named Lusius who in the time that his uncle was second time Consull would have forced and abused a youth in the prime of his yeeres named Trebonius who began but then under his charge to beare armes this yoong springall made no more adoe but slew him outright and when many there were who charged and accused him for this murder he denied not the fact but confessed plainly that he had killed his captaine and withall declared the cause publikely Marius himselfe being advertised heereof caused to be brought unto him a coronet such as usually was given unto those who had performed in warre some woorthie exploit and with his owne hand set it upon the head of this youth Tribonius Being encamped very neere to the campe of the Tentones in a plot of ground where there was but little water when his soldiers complained that they were lost for water and ready to die for very thirst he shewed them a river not far off running along the enemies campe Yonder quoth he there is water enough for to be bought with the price of your blood Then leade us to it quickly answered his souldiers whiles our blood is liquid and will runne and never let us stay so long till it be cluttered and dried up quite with drought During the time of the Cimbrians warre he endued at once with the right of free Burgeousie of Rome a thousand men all Camerines in consideration of their good service in that warre a thing that was contrarie to lawe now when some blamed him for transgressing the lawes he answered and said That he could not heare what the lawes said for the great rustling and clattering that harneis and armor made In this time of the civill warre seeing himselfe enclosed round about with trenches and rampars and streight beleaguered he endured all and waited his best opportunitie and when Popedius Silo captaine generall of the enemies saide unto him Marius if thou be so great a warrior as the name goeth of thee come foorth of the campe and combat with me hand to hand Nay saith he and if thou art so brave a captaine as thou wouldest be taken force me to combatif thou canst CATULUS LUCTATIUS in the foresaid Cimbrian warre lay encamped along the river Athesis and when the Romans saw that the Barbarians were about to passe over the water and to set upon them retired and dislodged presently what reasons and perswasions soever their captaine could use to the contrary but when he saw he could doe no good nor cause them to stay himselfe ranne away with the formost to the end that it should not seeme that they fled cowardly before their enemies but dutifully followed their captaine SYLIA surnamed Foelix i. Happie among other prosperities counted these two for the greatest the one that he lived in love and amitie with Metellus Pius the other that he had not destroied the citie of Athens but saved it from being raced C. POPILIUS was sent unto king Antiochus with a letter from the Senate of Rome the tenor whereof was this That they commanded him to withdraw his forces out of Aegypt and not to usurpe the kingdome which apperteined to the children of Ptolomaeus being orphans The king seeing Popilius comming toward him through his campe faluted him a farre off very curteously but Popilius without any resalutations or greeting againe delivered him the letter which Antiochus read and after he had read it answered him that he would thinke upon the matter that the Senate willed him to doe and then give him his dispatch whereupon Popilius drew a circle round about the king with a vine rod that he had in his hand saying Resolve I advise you sie before you passe foorth of this compasse and give me my answer all that were present woondered and were astonished at the boldnesse and resolution
shoe upon a litle foot When one in reasoning debating a matter upon a time challenged him and said Sir you gave your consent once unto it and eftsoones iterating the same words charged him with his grant and promise True indeed quoth he if the cause were just I approved it in good earnest gave my promise but if not I did but barely say the word no more but as the other replied againe and said Yea but kings ought to accomplish performe whatsoever they seeme once to grant it be but with the nod of the head Nay said he againe they are no more bound thereto than those that come unto them are tied for to speake and demand all things just and reasonable yea and to observe the opportunity and that which fitteth and sorteth well with kings When he heard any men either to praise or dispraise others he said That it behoved to know the nature disposition and behaviour no lesse of those who so spake than of the parties of whom they did speake Being whiles he was very yoong at a certeine publicke and festivall solemnitie wherein yoong boies daunced as the maner was all naked the warden or overseer of the said shew and daunce appointed him a place for to beholde that sight which was not verie honourable wherewith notwithstanding he stood well contented albeit he was knowen to be heire apparant to the crowne and already declared king and withall said It is very well for I will shew that it is not the place which crediteth the person but the person that giveth credit and honour to the place A certeine Physician had ordeined for him in one sicknesse that he had a course of physicke to cure his maladie which was nothing easie and simple but very exquisit curious and withall painfull By Caslor and Pollux quoth he if my destinie be not to live I shal not recover though I take all the drogues and medicines in the world Standing one day at the altar of Minerva surnamed Chalceoecos where he sacrificed an oxe there chanced a louse to bite him and he was nothing dismaied and abashed to take the said louse but before them all who were present killed her and swore by the gods saying That it would do him good at the heart to serve them all so who should treacherously lay wait to assaile him yea though it were at the very altar Another time when he saw a little boy drawing a mouse which he had caught out of a window and that the said mouse turned upon the boy and bit him by the hand insomuch as shee made him leave his holde and so escaped hee shewed the sight unto those that were present about him and said Loe if so little a beast and sillie creature as this hath the heart to be revenged upon those that doe it injurie what thinke you is meet and reason that men should doe Being desirous to make warre upon the king of Persia for the deliverance and freedome of those Greeks who did inhabit Asia he went to consult with the oracle of Jupiter within the sorest Dodona as touching this desseigne of his and when the oracle had made answere according to his minde namely That if it pleased him he should enterprise that expedition he communicated the same to the controllers of State called Ephori who willed him also to goe forward and aske the counsell likewise of Apollo in the citie of Delphos and being there he entred into the chapell from whence the oracles were delivered and said thus O Apollo art thou also of the same minde that thy father is and when he answered Yea whereupon hee was chosen for the generall to conduct this warre and set forth in his voiage accordingly Tissaphernes lieutenant under the king of Persia in Asia being astonied at his arrivall made a composition and accord with him at the very first in which treatie he capitulated and promised to leave unto his behoofe all the townes and cities of the Greeks which are in Asia free and at libertie to be governed according to their owne lawes meane while hee dispatched messenges in post to the king his master who sent unto him a strong and puissant armie upon the confidence of which sorces he gave defiance and denounced warre unlesse he departed with all speed out of Asia Agesilaus being well enough pleased with this treacherous breach of the agreement made semblant as though he would go first into Caria and when Tissaphernes gathered his forces in those parts to make head against him all on a sudden he invaded Phrygia where he won many cities and raised rich booties from thence saying unto his friends That to breake faith and promise unjustly made unto a friend was impietie but to abuse and deceive an enemie was not onely just but also pleasant and profitable Finding himselfe weake in cavallery he returned to the citie of Ephesus where he intimated thus much unto the rich men who were willing to be exempt from going in person unto the warres that they should every one set sorth one horse and a man by which meanes within few daies he levied a great number both of horse and also of men able for service in stead of those that were rich and cowards wherein he said That he did imitate Agamemnon who dispensed with a rich man who was but a dastard and durst not go to the warre for one faire and goodly mare When he solde those prisoners for slaves whom he had taken in the warres the officers for this sale by his appointment made money of their clothes and other furniture apart but of their bodies all naked by themselves now many chapmen there were who willingly bought their apparell but few or none hads any minde to the persons themselves for that their bodies were soft and white as having bene delicately nourished and choisly kept within house and under covert and so seemed for no use at all and good for nothing Agesilaus standing by Beholde my masters quoth hee this is that for which you fight shewing their spoiles but these be they against whom you fight pointing to the men Having given Tissaphernes an overthrow in battel within the country of Lydia and slaine a great number of his men he overran and harried all the kings provinces and when he sent unto him presents of gold and silver praying him to come unto some agreement of peace Agesilaus made this answere As touching the treatie of peace it was in the citie of Lacedaemons power to doe what they would but otherwise for his owne part he tooke greater pleasure to enrich his soldiers than to be made rich himselfe as for the Greeks they reputed it an honour not to receive gifts from their enemies but to be masters of their spoiles Megabaetes the yoong sonne of Spithridates who was of visage most faire and beautifull came toward him as it were to embrace and kisse him for that he thought as he was right amiable to
be exceedingly beloved of him but Agesilaus turned his face away insomuch as the youth desisted and would no more offer himselfe unto him whereupon Agesilaus demanded the reason thereof and seemed to call for him unto whom his friends made answere That himselfe was the onely cause being afraid to kisse so fasire a boy but if he would not seeme to feare the youth would returne and repaire unto him in place right willingly upon this he stood musing to himselfe a good while and said never a word but then at length hee brake foorth into this speech Let him even alone neither is there any need now that you should say any thing or perswade him for mine owne part I count it a greater matter to be the conquerour and have the better hand of such than to win by force the strongest holde or the most puissant and populous citie of mine enemies for I take it better for a man to preserve and save his owne libertie to himselfe than to take it from others Moreover he was in all other things a most precise observer in every point of whatsoever the lawes commanded but in the affaires and businesse of his friends he said That straightly to keepe the rigour of justice was a very cloake and colourable pretence under which they covered themselves who were not willing to doe for their friends to which purpose there is a little letter of his found written unto Idrieus a prince of Caria for the enlarging and deliverance of a friend of his in these words If Nicias have not transgressed deliver him if he have deliver him for the love of me but howsoever yet deliver him and verily thus affected stood Agesilaus in the greatest part of his friends occasions howbeit there fell out some cases when he respected more the publike utility used his opportunity therefore according as he shewed good proofe upon a time at the dislodging of his campe in great haste hurry insomuch as he was forced to leave a boy whō he loved full well behind him for that he lay sicke for when the partie called instantly upon him by name besought him not to forsake him now at his departure Agesilaus turning backe said Oh how hard is it to be pitifull wise both at once Furthermore as touching his diet the cherishing of his bodie he would not be served with more nor better than those of his traine and company He never did eat untill he was satisfied nor tooke his drinke untill he was drunke and as for his sleepe it never had the command and mastrie over him but he tooke it onely as his occasions and affaires would permit for cold and heat he was so fitted and disposed that in all seasons of the yeere he used to weare but one and the same sort of garments his pavilion was alwaies pitched in the mids of his soldiers neither had he a bed to lye in better than any other of the meanest for he was woont to say That he who had the charge and conduct of others ought to surmount those private persons who were under his leading not in daintinesse and delicacie but in sufferance of paine and travell and in fortitude of heart and courage When one asked the question in his presence What it was wherin the lawes of Lycurgus had made the citie of Sparta better he answered That this benefit it found by them to make no recknoning at all of pleasures And to another who marvelled to see so great simplicitie and plainnesse as well in feeding as appearell both of him and also of other Lacedaemonians he said The fruit my good friend which we reape by this straight maner of life is libertie and freedome There was one who exhorted him to ease and remit a little this straight and austere manner of living For that quoth he it would not be used but in regard of the incertitude of fortune and because there may fall out such an occasion and time as might force a man so to do Yea but I said Agesilaus do willingly accustome my selfe hereto that in no mutation and change of fortune I should not seeke for change of my life And in verie truth when he grew to be aged he did not for all his yeeres give over and leave his hardnes of life and therfore when one asked him Why considering the extreame cold winter and his old age besides he went without an upper coat or gabardine he made this answer Because yoong men might learne to do as much having for an example before their eies the eldest in their countrey and such also as were their governors We reade of him that when he passed with his armie over the Thasians countrey they sent unto him for his refection meale of all sorts geese and other fowles comfitures and pastrie works fine cakes marchpanes and sugar-meats with all manner of exquisite viands and drinks most delicate and costly but of all this provision he received none but the meale aforesaid commanding those that brought the same to carrie them all away with them as things whereof he stood in no need and which he knew not what to do with In the end after they had beene verie urgent and importuned him so much as possibly they could to take that curtesie at their hands he willed them to deale all of it among the Ilots which were in deed the slaves that followed the campe whereupon when they demaunded the cause thereof he said unto them That it was not meet for those who professed valour and prowesse to receive such dainties Neither can that quoth he which serveth in stead of a bait to allure draw men to a servile nature agree wel with those who are of a bold and free courage Over and besides these Thasians having received many favours and benefits at his hands in regard whereof they tooke themselves much bound and beholden unto him dedicated temples to his honour and decreed divine worship unto him no lesse than unto a verie god and hereupon sent an embassage to declare unto him this their resolution when he had read their letters and understood what honour they minded to do unto him he asked this one question of the embassadors whether their State and countrey was able to deifie men and when they answered Yea Then quoth he begin to make your selves gods first and when you have done so I will beleeve that you also can make me a god When the Greeke Colonies in Asia had at their parliaments ordained in all their chiefe and principall cities to erect his statues he wrote backe unto them in this manner I will not that you make for me any statue or image whatsoever neither painted nor cast in mould nor wrought in clay ne yet cut and engraven any way Seeing whiles he was in Asia the house of a friend or hoste of his covered over with an embowed roofe of plankes beames and sparres foure-square he asked him whether the trees in those parts grew so
knowledge A begger upon a time craved almes of a Laconian who answered him thus But if I should give thee any thing thou wouldest make an occupation of it and beg still so much the more for verily whosoever he was that first bestowed almes upon thee was the cause of this villanous life which thou leadest now and hath made thee so vagrant and idle as thou art Another Laconian seeing a collectour going about and gathering mens devotions for the gods said thus I will now make no more reckoning of the gods so long as they be poorer than my selfe A certeine Spartan having taken an adulterer in bed with his wife a foule and ilfavoured woman Wretched man that thou art quoth he what necessitie hath driven thee to this Another having heard an oratour making long periods and drawing out his sentence in length Now by Castor and Pollux what a valiant man his here how he rolleth and roundly turneth his tongue about and all to no purpose A traveller passing thorow Lacedaemon marked among other things what great honour and reverence yoong folke did to their elders I perceive quoth he there is no place to Sparta for an olde man to live in A Spartan was upon a time asked the question what maner of Poet Tyrtaeus was A good Poet beleeve me quoth he to whet and sharpen the courages of yoong men to warre Another having very badde and diseased eies would needs goe to warfare and when others said unto him Wilt thou go indeed in that case as thou art in what deed thinkest thou to do there Why quoth he if I do no other good els I wil be sure to dull the brightnesse of mine enemies sword Buris and Spertis two Lacedaemonians voluntarily departed out of their countrey and went to Xerxes king of Persia offering themselves to suffer that paine and punishment which the Lacedaemonians had deserved by the sentence of the oracle of the gods for killing those heralds which the king had sent unto them who being come before him were desirous that he should put them to death in what maner he would himselfe for to acquit the Lacedaemonians the king wondering at this resolution of theirs not onely pardoned the fault but earnestly requested them to stay with him promising them liberall enterteinment And how can we say they live here abandoning our native soile our lawes and those kinde of men for whose sake to die we have so willingly undertaken this long voiage and when a great captaine under the king named Jndarnes intreated them stil very instantly assuring them upon his word that they should be kindly used and in equall degree of credit and honour with those who were in highest favour with the king and most advanced by him they said unto him It seemeth unto us sir that you full little know what is liberty and freedome for he that wist what a jewell it were if he be in his right wits would not change the same for the whole realme of Persia. A certeine Laconian as he way-fared came unto a place where there dwelt an olde friend and host of his who the first day of purpose avoided him and was out of the way because he was not minded to lodge him but the morrow after when he had either hired or borowed faire bedding coverings and carpets received him very stately but this Laconian mounting up to his beds trampled and stamped the faire and rich coverlets under his feet saying withall I beshrew these fine beds and trim furniture for they were the cause that yesternight I had not so much as a mat to lie upon when I should sleepe and take my rest Another of them being arrived at the city of Athens and seeing there the Athenians going up and downe the city some crying salt-fish to sell others flesh and such like viands some like publicanes sitting at the receit of custome other professing the trade of keeping brothel-houses and exercising many such vile and base occupations esteeming nothing at all foule and dishonest after he was returned home into his owne countrey when his neighbours and fellow-citizens asked him what newes at Athens and how all things stood there Passing well quoth he and it is the best place that ever I came in which he spake by way of mockerie and derision every thing there is good and honest giving them to understand that all meanes of gaine and lucre were held lawful honest at Athens and nothing there was counted villanous and dishonest Another Laconian being asked a question answered No and when the party who mooved the question said Thou liest the Laconian replied againe and said See what a foole thou art to aske me that which thou knowest well enough thy selfe Certeine Laconians were sent upon a time ambassadours to Lygdamis the tyrant who put them off from day to day and hasted with them so as he gave them no audience at the last it was tolde them that hee was at all times weake and ill at ease and not in case to be conferred with the ambassadours there upon said unto him who brought this word unto them Tell him from us that we are not come to wrestle but to parle onely with him A certeine priest inducted a Laconian into the orders and ceremonies of some holy religion but before that he would fully receive and admit him he demanded of him what was the most grievous sinne that ever he committed and which lay heaviest upon his conscience The gods know that best quoth the Laconian but when the priest pressed hard upon him and was very importunate protesting that there was no remedie but he must needs utter and confesse it Unto whom quoth the Laconian must I tell it unto you or to the God whom you serve unto God quoth the other Why then turne you behinde me quoth hee or retire aside out of hearing Another Laconian chanced in the night to goe over a church-yard by a tombe or monument and imagined that he saw a spirit standing before him whereupon he advanced forward directly upon it with his javelin and as he ran full upon it and as he thought strake thorow it he said withall Whither fliest thou from me ghost that thou art now twise dead Another having vowed to fling himselfe headlong from the high Promontorie Leucas downe into the sea mounted up the top thereof but when hee saw what an huge downfall it was he gently came downe againe on his feet now when one twitted and reproched him therefore I wist not quoth he that this vow of mine had need of another greater than it Another Laconian there was who in a battell and hot medley being fully minded to kill his enemie who was under him and to that purpose had lifted up his sword backe to give him a deadly wound so soone as ever hee heard the trumpet sound the retreat presently stated his hand and would no more follow his stroake now when one asked him why he slew not his enemie
lawes and shame sweet and gracious Bacchus as if these two deities gave you not sufficient whereupon you might live what are you not abashed to mingle at your tables pleasant frutes with bloudie murder You call lions and libards savage beasts meane while your selves are stained with bloudshed giving no place to them in crueltie for where as they doe worie and kill other beasts it is for verie necessitie and need of sood but you doe it sor daintie fare for when wee have slaine either lions or wolves in defence of our selves we eat them not but let them lie But they be the innocent the harmelesse the gentle and tame creatures which have neither teeth to bite nor pricke to sting withall which we take and kill although nature seemeth to have created them onely for beautie and delight Much like as if a man seeing Nilus overflowing his banks and filling all the countrey about with running water which is generative and frutefull would not praise with admiration the propertie of that river causing to spring and grow so many faire and goodly fruits and the same so necessarie for mans life but if he chance to espie a crocodill swimming or an aspick creeping and gliding downe or some venemous flie hurtfull and noisome beasts all blameth the said river upon that occasion and saith that they be causes sufficient that of necessitie he must complaine of the thing Or verily when one seeing this land and champian countrey overspred with good and beautifull frutes charged also and replenished with eares of corne should perceive casting his eie over those pleasant corne sields here there an eare of darnel choke-ervil or some such unhappie weed among should thereupon forbeare to reape and carie in the said corne and forgoe the benefit of a plentifull harvest find fault therewith Semblably standeth the case when one seeth the plea of an oratour in anie cause or action who with a full and forcible streame of eloquence endevoureth to save his client out of the danger of death or otherwise to proove and verisie the charges and imputations of certaine crimes this oration I say or eloquent speech of his running not simplie and nakedly but carrying with it many and sundrie affections of all sorts which he imprinteth in the minds and hearts of the hearers or judges which being many also and those divers and different he is to turne to bend and change or othewise to dulce appease and staie if he I say should anon passe over and not consider the principall issue and maine point of the cause and busie himselfe in gathering out some by-speeches besides the purpose or haply some phrases improper and impertinent which the oration of some advocate with the flowing course thereof hath caried downe with it lighting thereupon and falling with the rest of his speech But we are nothing mooved either with the faire and beautifull colour or the sweet and tunable voice or the quicknesse and subtiltie of spirit or the reat and cleane life or the vivacitie of wit and understanding of these poore seelly creatures and for a little peece of flesh we take away their life we bereave them of the sunne and of light cutting short that race of life which nature had limited and prefixed for them and more than so those lamentable and trembling voice which they utter for feare we suppose to be inarticulate or unsignificant sounds and nothing lesse than pitifull praiers supplications pleas justifications of these poore innocent creatures who in their language everie one of them crie in this manner If thou be forced upon necessitie I beseech thee not to save my life but if disordinate lust moove thee thereto spare me in case thou hast a mind simply to eat on my flesh kill me but if it be for that thou wouldest feed more delicately hold thy hand and let me live O monstrous crueltie It is an horrible sight to see the table of rich men onely stand served and furnished with viands set out by cooks and victuallers that dresse the flesh of dead bodies but most horrible it is to see the same taken up for that the reliques and broken meats remaining be farre more than that which is eaten To what purpose then were those silly beasts slaine Now there be others who making spare of the viands served to the table will in no hand that they should be cut or sliced sparing them when as they be nothing els but bare flesh whereas they spared them not whiles they were living beasts But forasmuch as we have heard that the same men hold and say That nature hath directed them to the eating of flesh it is plaine and evident that this cannot accord with mans nature And first and formost this appeereth by the very fabrick and composition of his bodie for it resembleth none of those creatures whom nature hath made for to feed on flesh considering they have neither hooked bil no hauke-pointed tallans they have no sharpe and rough teeth nor stomack so strong or so hot breath and spirit as to be able to concoct and digest the heany masse of raw flesh And if there were naught else to be alledged nature her-selfe by the broadnesse and united equallity of our teeth by our small mouth our soft toong the imbecillitie of naturall heat and spirits serving for concoction sheweth sufficiently that she approoveth not of mans usage to eat flesh but dissavoreth and disclaimeth the same And if you obstinately maintaine and defend that nature hath made you for to eat such viands then that which you minde to eat first kill your selfe even your owne selfe I say without using any blade knife bat club axe or hatchet And even as beares lions and woolves slay a beast according as they meane to eat it even so kill thou a beefe by the bit of thy teeth slay me a swine with the helpe of thy mouth and iawes teare in peeces a lambe or an hare with thy nailes and when thou hast so done eat it up while it is alive like as beasts doe but if thou staiest untill they be dead ere thou eate them and art abashed to chase with thy teeth the life that presently is in the flesh which thou eatest why doest thou against nature eat that which had life and yet when it is deprived of life and fully dead there is no man hath the heart to eat the same as it is but they cause it to be boiled to be rosted they alter it with fire and many drogues and spices changing disguising and quenching as it were the horror of the murder with a thousand devices of seasoning to the end that the sense of tasting being beguiled and deceived by a number of sweet sauces and pleasant conditure might admit and receive that which it abhorreth and is contrary unto it Certes it was a pretie conceit which was reported by a Laconian who having bought in his Inne or hostelrie a little fish gave it as it
most sant oblations that is for so saith Epaminondas the Thebane fighting valiantly and exposing your selves to the most honorable and bravest services that be in defence of countrey of your auncestors tombes and sepulchers and of your temples and religion mee thinks also I see their victories comming toward mee in solemne pompe and procession not drawing or leading after them for their prize and reward an ox or a goat neither be the said victories crowned with ivie or smelling strong of new wine in the lees as the Bacchanales doe but they have in their traine whole cities islands continents and firme lands as well mediterranean as maritime sea-coasts together with new colonies of ten thousand men a piece to be planted heere and there and withall crowned they be and adorned on every side with trophaes with triumphes pillage and booty of all sorts the ensignes badges and armes that these victorious captaines give the images also that they represent in shew be their stately beautiful temples as the Parthenon the Hecatompedos their city walles on the south side the arcenals to receive lodge their ships their beautifull porches and galleries the province of the demy isle Chersonesus the city Amphipolis as for the plaine of Marathon it goeth before the laureat garland and victorie of Miltiades Solanius accompanieth that of Themistocles trampling under his feet and going over the broken timber and shipwracke of a thousand vessels as for the victory of Cimon it bringeth with it an hundred Phaenician great gallies from the rivers Eurymedon that of Demosthenes and Cleon comes from Sphacteria with the targuet of captaine Brasidas wonne in the field and a number of his souldiers captive and bound in chaines the victory of Conon walled the city and that of Thrasibulus reduced the people with victorie and liberty from Phyle the sundry victories of Alcibiades set upright the State of the city which by the infortunate overthrow in Sicilie reeled and was ready to fall to the ground and by the battel 's fought by Neleus and Androclus in Lydia and Carta Greece saw all Jonta raised up againe and supported And if a man demaund of each one of the other victories what benefit hath accrued unto the city by them one will name the isle Lesbos and another Samos one will speake of the Euxine sea and another of sive hundred gallies and he shall have another talke of ten thousand talents over and above the honour and glory of trophaees These be the causes why this city doeth solemnize and celebrate to many festivall daies and heereupon it is that it offreth sacrifices as it doeth to the gods not iwis for the victory of Aeschylus or Sophocles nor for the prizes of poetry no nor when Carcinus lay with Aerope or Astidamus with Hector But upon the sixth of May even to this present day the city holdeth festivall the memory of that victory in the plaines of Marathon and the sixth day of * another * moneth maketh a solemne offring of wine unto the gods in remembrance of that victorie which Chabrias obteined neere unto the isle Naxos and upon the 12. day of the same moneth there is another sacrifice likewise performed in the name of a thankes-giving to the gods for their liberty recovered because upon the same day those citizens which were prisoners and in bondage within Phyle came downe and returned into the city upon the third day of March they wonne the famous field of Platea and the sixteenth day of the said March they consecrated to Diana for on that day this goddesse shone bright and it was full moone to the victorious Greeks before the isle of 〈◊〉 The noble victory which they archieved before the citie of Mantinea made the twelfth day of September more holy and with greater solemnity observed for upon that day when all other their allies and associates were discomfited and put to flight they onely by their valour wonne the field and erected a trophae over their enemies who were upon the point of victory See what hath raised this city to such grandence Lo what hath exalted it to so high a pitch of honor and this was the cause that Pindarus called the city of Athens the pillar that supported Greece not for that by the tragedies of Phrynichus or Thespis if set the fortune of the Greeks upright but in regard of this that as himselfe writeth in another place along the coast of Artemisium Where Athens youth as poet Pindar said Of freedome first the glorious ground worke laid And afterwards at Salamis at Mycale and Plataees having setled it firme and strong as upon a rocke of diamonds they delivered it from hand to hand unto others But haply some man will say True it is indeed all that ever poets doe are no better than sports and pastimes But what say you to oratours they seeme to have some prerogative gative and ought to be compared with martiall captaines whereupon it may seeme as Aeschynes scoffing merily and quipping at Demosthenes said That there is some reason why the barre or pulpit for publicke orations may commence action and processe against the tribunall seat of generals and their chaire of estate Is it then meet and reasonable that the oration of Hyperides intituled Plataicus should be preferred before the victory which Aristides wonne before the city Platea or the oration of Lysies against the thirty tyrants goe before the massacre and execution of them performed by Thrasybelus and Archias or that of Aeschines against Timarchus being accused for keeping harlots and a brothell house before the aide that Phocion brought into the city of Byzantium besieged by which succour he impeached the Macedonians and repressed their insolent vilanies and outrages committed in abusing the children of the Athenian consederates or shall we compare the oration of Demosthenes as touching the crowne with those publicke and honorable coronets which Themistocles received for setting Greece free considering that the most excellent place of all the said oration and fullest of eloquence is that wherein the said oratour conjureth the soules of those their auncestors and citeth them for witnesses who in the battell of Marathon exposed their lives with such resolution for the saftie of Greece or shall we put in balance to weigh against woorthy warriours these that in schooles teach yoong men rhetoricke namely such as Isocrates Antiphon and Isaeus But certeine it is that this city honored those valiant captaines with publicke funerals and with great devotion gathered up the reliques of their bodies yea and the same oratour canonized them for gods in heaven when he sware by them although he followed not their steps and Isocrates who extolled and highly praised those who manfully sought willing were to spend their hartbloud in the battell of Marathon saying that they made so little account of their lives as if their owne soules had bene else-where other mens in their bodies magnifying this their resolution and the small
reproch or touch notwithstanding shee was yoong and therewith beautifull This fresh widow whiles she treated of a mariage to be made betweene Bacchon a yoong gentleman a neighbours childe whose mother was a very familiar friend of hers a certeine yoong maiden a kinswoman of her owne by often talking with him and frequenting his company much fell herselfe in some fancie with the yoong man Thus both hearing and speaking much good and many kinde speeches of him and seeing besides a number of other gentlemen and persons of good woorth to be enamoured upon him by little and little she also fell to bee in hot love with the youth howbeit with a full intention and resolution to doe nothing that should be dishonest or unbeseeming her place parentage reputation but to be wedded unto Bacchon lawfully in the open sight of the world and so to live with him in the estate of wedlocke As the thing it selfe seemed at the first very strange so the mother of the yoong man of one side doubted and suspected the greatnesse of her state and the nobility magnificence of her house linage as not meet correspondent to his cōdition for to be a lover or to be matched there and on the other side some of his companions who used to ride forth a hunting with him considering that the yoong age of Bacchon was not answerable to the yeeres of Ismenodora buzzed many doubts in his head and frighted him from her what they could saying That she might be his mother and that one of her age was not for him and thus by their jesting and scoffing they hindered the mariage more than they who laboured in good earnest to breake it for hee began to enter into himselfe and considering that he was yet a beardlesse youth and scarcely undergrowen he was abashed and ashamed to mary a widow Howbeit in the end shaking off all others he referred himselfe to Anthemion and Pisias for to tell him their minds upon the point and to advise him for his best Now was Anthemion his cousen german one of good yeeres and elder than himselfe farre and Pisias of all those that made love unto him most austere and therefore he both withstood the mariage and also checked Anthemion as one who abandoned and betraied the yoong man unto Ismenodora Contrariwise Anthemion charged Pisias and said he did not well who being otherwise an honest man yet heerein imitated leawd lovers for that he went about to put his friend beside a good bargaine who now might be sped with so great a mariage out offo worshipfull an house and wealthy besides to the end that he might have the pleasure to see him a long time stripped naked in the wrestling place fresh still and smooth and not having touched a woman But because they should not by arguing thus one against another grow by little and little into heat of choler they chose for umpiers and judges of this their controversie my father and those who were of his company and thither they came assistant also there were unto them other of their friends Daphnaeus to the one and Protogenes to the other as if they had beene provided of set purpose to plead a cause As for Protogenes who sided with Pisias he inveighed verily with open mouth against dame Ismenodora whereupon Daphnaeus O Hercules quoth he what are we not to expect and what thing in the world may not happen in case it be so that Protogenes is ready heere to give defiance and make warre against love who all his life both in earnest and in game hath beene wholy in love and all for love which hath caused him to forget his booke and to forget his naturall countrey not as Laius did who was but five daies journey distant for that love of his was slow and heavy and kept still upon the land whereas your Cupid Protogenes With his light wings displaied and spred Hath over seafull swiftly fled from out of Cilicia to Athens to see faire boies and to converse and goe up and downe with them for to say a trueth the chiefe cause why Protogenes made a voiage out of his owne countrey and became a traveller was at the first this and no other Heere at the company tooke up a laughter and Protogenes Thinke you quoth he that I warre not against love and not rather stande in the defence of love against lascivious wantonnesse and violent intemperance which by most shamefull acts and filthy passions would perforce chalenge and breake into the fairest most honest and venerable names that be Why quoth Daphnaeus then do you terme mariage and the secret of mariage to wit the lawfull conjunction of man and wife most vile and dishonest actions than which there can be no knot nor linke in the world more sacred and holy This bond in trueth of wedlocke quoth Protogenes as it is necessary for generation is by good right praised by Polititians and law-givers who recommend the same highly unto the people and common multitude but to speake of true love indeed there is no jot or part therof in the societie and felowship of women neither doe I thinke that you and such as your selves whose affections stand to wives or maidens do love them no more than a flie loveth milke or a bee the hony combe as caters and cookes who keepe foules in mue and feed calves and other such beasts fatte in darke places and yet for all that they love them not But like as nature leadeth and conducteth our appetite moderately and as much as is sufficient to bread and other viands but the excesse thereof which maketh the naturall appetite to be a vicious passion is called gourmandise and pampering of the flesh even so there is naturally in men and women both a desire to enjoy the mutuall pleasure one of another whereas the impetuous lust which commeth with a kinde of force and violence so as it hardly can be held in is not fitly called love neither deserveth it that name For love if it seise upon a yoong kinde and gentle heart endeth by amity in vertue whereas of these affections and lusts afterwomen if they have successe and speed never so well there followeth in the end the fruit of some pleasure the fruition and enjoying of youth and a beautifull body and that is all And thus much testified Aristippus who when one went about to make him have a distaste and mislike of Lais the curtisan saying that she loved him not made this answer I suppose quoth he that neither good wine nor delicate fish loveth me but yet quoth he I take pleasure and delight in drinking the one and eating the other For surely the end of desire and appetite is pleasure and the fruition of it But love if it have once lost the hope and expectation of amity and kindnesse will not continue nor cherish and make much for beauty sake that which is irksome and odious be it neverso gallant and in
wise Convey unto me that Musicall wench of thine that sings so daintily and receive for her ten talents which I send by this bearer let me have her I say unlesse thou thy selfe be in love with her When Antipatrides another of his minions came in a maske on a time to his house accompanied with a prety girle that plaied upon the psaltery sung passing well Alexander taking great delight contentment in the said damosell demanded of Antipatrides whether he were not himselfe enamoured of her And when he answered Yes verily and that exceeding much A mischiefe on thee quoth he leud varlet as thou art and the divell take thee but the wench he absteined from and would not so much as touch her But marke moreover besides of what power even in martiall feats of armes Love is Love I say which is not as saith Euripides Of nature slow dull fickle inconstant Nor in soft cheeks of maidens resiant For a man that is possessed secretly in his heart with Love needeth not the assistance of Mars when he is to encounter with his enemies in the field but having a god of his owne within him and presuming of his presence Most prest he is and resolute to passe through fire and seas The blasts of most tempestuous windes he cares not to appease And all for his friends sake and according as he commandeth him And verily of those children aswell sonnes as daughters of lady 〈◊〉 who in a Tragoedie of Sophocles are represented to be shot with arrowes and so killed one there was who called for no other to helpe and 〈◊〉 her at the point of death but onely her paramor in this wise Oh that some god my Love would send My life to save and me defend Ye all know I am sure doe ye not how and wherefore Cleomachus the Thessalian died in combat Not I for my part quoth Pemptides but gladly would I heare and learne of you And it is a storie quoth my father worth the hearing and the knowledge There came to aide the Chalcidians at what time as there was hot warre in Thessalie against the Eretrians this Cleomachus now the Chalcidians seemed to be strong enough in their footmen but much adoe they had and thought it was a difficult piece of service to breake the cavallerie of their enemies and to repell them So they requested Cleomachus their allie and confederate a brave knight and of great courage to give the first charge and to enter upon the said men of armes With that he asked the youth whom he loved most entirely and who was there present whether he would beholde this enterprise and see the conflict and when the yong man answered Yea and withall kindly kissing and embracing him set the helmet upon his head Cleomachus much more hardy and fuller of spirit than before assembled about him a troupe of the most valourous hosemen of all the Thessalians advanced forward right gallantly and with great resolution set upon the enemies in such sort as at the very first encounter he brake the front disarraied the men of armes and in the end put them to flight Which discomfiture when their infanterie saw they also fled and so the Chalcidians woon the field and archieved a noble victorie Howbeit Cleomachus himselfe was there slaine and the Chalcidians shew his sepulchre and monument in their Market place upon which there standeth even at this day a mighty pillar erected And whereas the Chalcidians before-time held this paederastie or love of yoong boies an in famous thing they of all other Greeks ever after affected and honoured it most But Aristotle writeth that Cleomachus indeed lost his life after he had vanquished the Eretrians in battell but as for him who was thus kissed by his lover he saith that he was of Chalcis in Thrace sent for to aide those of Chalcis in 〈◊〉 and hereupon it commeth that the Chalcidians use to chant such a caroll as this Sweet boies faire impes extract from noble race Endued besides with youth and beauties grace Envie not men of armes and bolde courage Fruition of your prime and flowring age For here aswell of Love and kinde affection As of prowesse we all do make profession The lover was named Anton and the boy whom he loved Philistus as Dionysius the Poet writeth in his booke of Causes And in our city of Thebes ô Pemptides did not one Ardetas give unto a youth whom he loved a complet armour the day that he was enrolled souldier with the inscription of Ardetas his owne name And as for Pammenes an amorous man and one well experienced in love matters he changed and altered the ordinance in battell of our footmen heavily armed reprooving Homer as one that had no skill nor experience of love for ranging the Achaeans by their tribes and wards and not putting in array the lover close unto him whom he loveth for this indeed had beene the right ordinance which Homer describeth in these words The Morians set so close and shield to shield So iointly touch'd that one the other held And this is the onely battalion and armie invincible For men otherwhiles in danger abandon those of their tribe their kindred also and such as be allied unto them yea and beleeve me they forsake their owne fathers and children but never was there enemie seene that could passe through and make way of evasion betweene the lover and his darling considering that such many times shew their adventerous resolution in a bravery and how little reckoning they make of life unto them being in no distresse nor requiring so much at their hands Thus Thero the Thessalian laying and clapping his left hand to a wall drew forth his sword with the right and cut off his owne thumbe before one whom he loved and challenged his corrivall to doe as much if his heart would serve him Another chanced in fight to fall groveling upon his face and when his enemie lifted up his sword to give him a mortall wound he requested him to stay his hand a while untill he could turne his body that his friend whom he loved might not see him wounded in his backe part And therefore we may see that not onely the most martiall and warlicke nations are most given to Love to wit the Boeotians Lacedaemonians and Candiots but also divers renowmed princes and captaines of olde time as namely Meleager Achilles Aristomenes Cimon Epaminondas And as for the last named he had two yong men whom he deerely loved Asopicus and Zephiodorus who also died with him in the field at Mantinea and was likewise interred neere unto him And when Asopicus became hereupon more terrible unto his enemies and most resolute Euchnanus the Amphyssian who first made head against him resisted his furie and smote him had heroique honors done unto him by the Phocaeans To come now unto Hercules hard it were to reckon and number his loves they were so many But among others men honour and worship to
shew the singular providence of God in the preservation of States and confusion of such wicked members as disturbe the publicke peace But in this recitall there is inserted and that with good grace a digression as touching the familiar spirit of Socrates by occasion of a Pythagorean Philosopher newly come out of Italie to Thebes for to take up the bones of Lysis for by occasion that Galaxidorus the Epicurean derided the superstition of this stranger praising withall the wisdome and learning of Socrates who had cleered and delivered Philosophie from all fantasticall illusions of spirits and ghosts Theocritus bringeth in an example of a certeine prediction of this familiar spirit But withall when the other had demanded the question whether the same were an humane and naturall thing or no the disputation began to kindle and waxe hote untill such time as Epaminondas and this stranger named Theanor came in place and then they fell into 〈◊〉 of povertie and riches by occasion that Theanor offered silver unto the The bans in recompense of their kindnesse and good enterteinment shewed unto Lysis And as they would have proceeded forward in this argument there came one who ministred occasion for to returne unto the former narration as touching the enterprise and exploit of the said exiled persons in which there is intermingled againe a treatise concerning the familiar of Socrates with a large recitall of the fable of Timarchus After which Caphisias rehearseth the issue of the tragaedie of the tyrants shewing thorowout notable discourses of the divine wisdome and joining therewith a consideration of Socrates his wisedome guiding and directing to a particular plot for the good of all Greece But in this place the reader must remember and call to minde who this Socrates was to wit a man destitute of the true knowledge of God and therefore he is to holde for suspected and naught this familiar spirit of his if a man would receive and admit the opinion of some interloquutors who suppose it was a Daemon or spirit from without to the end that we should not rest upon revelation inspirations and guidances of angels unlesse it be of such the testimonies whereof are grounded upon the holy scripture but flie from the profane curiositie of certeine fantcsticall heads who by their books published abroad in print have dared to revive and raise up againe this false opinion which some in this age of ours have of samiliar spirits by whom they are for sooth as well advised and as surely taught and instructed as by the very spirit of God speaking unto us by his written word OF THE DAEMON OR familiar spirit of Socrates ARCHIDAMUS I Have heard as I remember ô Caphisias a prety speech of a certaine painter making a comparison of those who came to see the pictures and tables which he had painted for he was woont to say that the ignorant beholders and such as had no skill at all in the art of painting resembled them who saluted a whole multitude of people all at once but the better sort and such as were skilfull were like unto those who used to salve every one whom they met severally by name for that the former had no exquisit insight into the works but a superficiall and generall knowledge onely whereas the other contrariwise judging every piece and part thereof will not misse one jote but peruse consider and censure that which is well done or otherwise Semblably it falleth out in my judgement as touching trueactions indeed which are not painted The conceit and understanding of the more idle and carelesse persons resteth in this bare knowledge in case they conceive only the summary and issue of a thing but that of studious and diligent persons and lovers of faire and goodly things like unto a judicious and excellent spectator of vertue as of some great and singular art taketh more pleasure to heare the particularities in speciall for that the end of matters ordinarily hath many things common with fortune but the good wit is better seene in causes in the vertue of particular occurrences affaires which are presented as when valour sheweth it selfe not astonied but considerate and well advised in the greatest perils where the discourse of reason is mingled with passion which the sudden occasion of danger presented doth bring Supposing then that we also are of this kinde of spectators declare you to us now in order from the beginning how this matter did passe and proceed in the execution thereof as also what talke and discourse was held there for that by all likelihood you were present and for mine owne part so desirous I am to heare that I would not faile to go as farre as to Thebes for the knowledge thereof were it not that I am thought already of the Athenians to favorise the Boeotians more than I should CAPHISIAS Certes Archidamus since you are so earnest and forward to learne how these affaires were managed I ought in regard of the good will which you beare unto us before any businesse whatsoever as Pindarus saith to have come hither expresly for to relate the same unto you but since we are hither come in embassage already and at good leasure whiles we attend what answere and dispatch the people of Athens will give us in making it strange and goodly and refusing to satisfie so civill a request of a personage so kinde and well affectionate to his friends were as much as to revive the olde reproch imputed upon the Boeotians to wit that they hate good letters and learned discourses which reproch began to weare away with your Socrates and in so doing it seemeth that we treat of affaires with two priests and therefore see whether the Seigniors here present be disposed to heare the report of so many speeches and actions for the narration will not be short considering that you will me to adjoine thereto the words that passed also ARCHIDAMUS You know not the men ô Caphisias and yet well woorthy they are to be knowen for noble persons they had to their fathers and those who had beene well affected to our countrey As for him pointing to Lysithides he is quoth he the nephew of Thrasibulus but he here is Timotheus the sonne of Conon those there be the children of Archinus and the other our familiar friends So that you shall be sure to have a well willing auditorie and such as will take pleasure to heare this narration CAPHISIAS You say well But where were I best to begin my speech in regard of those matters that ye have already heard and knowen which I would not willingly repeat ARCHIDAMUS We know reasonably well in what state the citie of Thebes stood before the returne of the banished persons and namely how Archias and Leontidas had secred intelligence and complotted with Phoebidas the Lacedaemonian captaine whom they perswaded during the time of truce to surprise the castle of Cadmus and how having executed this disseigne they drave some citizens
of Darius he tooke to wife upon pollicy because the state of his kingdome and affaires required such a match for expedient it was thus to mix and unite two nations together As for other ladies and women of Persia he went as farre beyond them in chastity and continence as he did the Persian men in valour and fortitude for he never would so much as see one of them against her will and those whom he saw he lesse regarded than such as he never set eie upon and whereas otherwise to all persons he was courteous and popular to such onely as were faire and beautifull he shewed himselfe strange and used them in some sort proudly As touching the wife of Darius a lady of surpassing beauty he would not endure so much as one word that tended to the praise thereof yet when she was dead he performed her funerals with so sumptuous and princelike obsequies he mourned and bewailed her death so piteously that as his kindnesse in that behalfe made the world mistrust and suspect his chastity so his bountifull courtesie incurred the obloquy and imputation of injustice And verily Darius was at the first mooved to conceive jealousie and a sinister opinion of him that way considering he had the woman in his hands and was besides a gallant and yoong prince for he also was one of them who were perswaded that Alexander held the tenure of his mighty dominion and monarchy by the goodnesse and favour of Fortune but after he knew the trueth once upon diligent search and inquisition by all circumstances into the thing Well quoth he the Persians state I perceive is not utterly overthrowen neither will any man repute us plaine cowards and effeminate persons for being vanquished by such an enemie for mine owne part my first wish and principall prizer unto the gods is that they would vouchsafe me fortunate successe and at the last an happy victory of this warre to the end that I may surmount Alexander in beneficence for an earnest desire I have and an emulation to shew my selfe more milde and gracious toward him than he is to me ward but if all be gone with me and my house then ô Jupiter the protectour of the Persians and ye other tutelar gods and patrons of kings and kingdomes suffer not any other but him to be enthronised in the roiall seat of Cyrus Certes this was a very adoption of Alexander that passed in the presence and by the testimony of the gods See what victories are atchieved by vertue Ascribe now if you will unto Fortune the journey of Arbela the battell sought in Cilicia and all other such like exploits performed by force of armes let it be that the fortune it was of warre which shooke the city of Tyrus and made it quake before him and opened Aegypt unto him grant that by the helpe of Fortune Halicarnassus fell to the ground and Miletus was forced and won that Mazeus abandoned the river Euphrates and left it disfurnished of garisons and that all the plaines about Babylon were overspred with dead bodies yet it was not Fortune that made him temperant neither was he continent by the meanes of Fortune Fortune it was not that kept and preserved his soule as within a fortresse inexpugnable so as neither pleasures could it surprise and captivate nor lusts and fleshly desires wound or touch And these were the very meanes whereby he vanquished and put to flight the person of Darius himselfe All the rest were the discomfiture of his great barbe-horses the overthrow and losse of his armour skirmishes battels murders executions massacres and flights of his men But the great foile and defaiture indeed most confessed and against which least exception can be taken was that wherein Darius himselfe was overthrowen namely when as he yeelded unto the vertue of Alexander to his magnanimity fortitude and justice admiring that heart of his invincible of pleasure unconquered by travels and in gratuities and liberality immatchable For in shields and speares in pikes and targuets in shouts and alarmes in giving the charge and in buckling together with the clattering of armour right hardie and undaunted aswell as he were Tarrias the soone of Dinomenes Antigones of Pellen and Philotas the sonne of Parmenio but against tickling pleasures against the attractive allurements of women against flattering silver and golde they were no better nor had more rule of themselves than slaves and captives For Tarrias at what time as Alexander undertooke to pay all the debts of the Macedonians and to make satisfaction unto all those who had lent them any money falsly belied himselfe saying he was indebt and withall suborned and brought foorth a certeine usurer to the verie table where this discharge was made who tooke it upon him that he was a creditor of his And afterwards when Tarrias was detected and convict heereof he had made himselfe away for very shame and compunction of heart but that Alexander being advertised thereof pardoned his fault yea and permitted him also to keepe the silver still that he had disbursed for his counterfet debt calling to minde how at what time as his father Philip laid siege to the citie Perinthus the said Tarrias in askirmish was shot into the eie and would not suffer the same to be dressed nor the shaft to be plucked foorth before the enemies were put to flight Antigenes causing himselfe to be enrolled and his name registred among others who were sent backe againe from the campe into Macedonie by occasion of sicknesse or maime whereby they were not serviceable being found afterwards to aile nothing but to counterfet sicknesse who otherwise was a good souldior and caried the marks of many a scarre in his body to be seene offended Alexander heereby and when the king demanded the reason why he had so done he confessed by and by that he was in love with a yoong woman named Telesippa whom he purposed to follow and accompanie being minded to goe to the sea-coast for that he could not find in his heart to be far from her Then Alexander asked him to whom the wench appertained who was to be dealt with for to make her staie Antigenes answered she was her owne woman of free condition Why then quoth Alexander let us perswade her to tary stil by faire promises good gifts for in no wise force her we may So easie was he to pardon and beare with love in any other rather than in himselfe The first cause of the infortunate fall of Philotas the sonne of Parmenio was in some sort his owne intemperance for there was a yoong woman borne in the citie of Pella named Antigona who in the saccage of the citie of Damascus was taken prisoner among other captives and indeed had bene thither brought before by Autophradates who surprised her at sea as she failed frō the coast of Macedonie toward the Isle Samothrace faire she was welfavored to see to and so far had she entangled Philotas with
the base to the female and the Hypotinusa to the issue of them both And verily Osiris representeth the beginning and principle Isis that which receiveth and Horus the compound of both For the number of three is the first odde and perfect the quaternarie is the first square or quadrate number composed of the first even number which is two and five resembleth partly the father and in part the mother as consisting both of two and three And it should seeme also that the very name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the universall world was derived of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say five and so in Greeke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in old time signified as much as to number and that which more is five being multiplied in it selfe maketh a quadrat number to wit twentie five which is just as many letters as the Aegyptians have in their alphabet and so many yeeres Apis also lived And as for Horus they used to call him Kaimin which is as much to say as seene for that this word is sensible and visible Isis likewise is sometime called Mouth otherwhiles Athyri or Methyer And by the first of these names they signifie a Mother by the second the faire house of Horus like as Plato termeth it to be the place capable of generation the third is compounded of Full and the cause for Matter is full of the world as being maried and keeping companie with the first principle which is good pure and beautifully adorned It should seeme haply also that the Poet Hesiodus when he saith that all things at the first were Chaos Earth Tartarus and Love groundeth upon no other principles than those which are signified by these names meaning by the Earth Isis by Love Osiris and by Tartarus Typhon as we have made demonstration For by Chaos it seemes that he would understand some place receptacle of the world Moreover in some sort these matters require the fable of Plato which in his booke entituled Symposium Socrates inferred namely wherein he setteth downe the generation of Love saying that Penia that is to say povertie desirous to have children went and lay with Poros that is to say riches and slept with him by whom she conceived with childe and brought foorth Love who naturally is long and variable and begotten of a father who is good wife and al-sufficient and of a mother who is poore needy and for want desirous of another and evermore seeking and following after it For the foresaid Poros is no other but the first thing amiable desireable perfect and sufficient As for Penia it is matter which of it selfe is evermore bare and needy wanting that which is good whereby at length she is conceived with childe after whom she hath a longing desire and evermore ready to receive somewhat of him Now Horus engendred betweene them which is the world is not eternall nor impassible nor incorruptible but being evermore in generation he endevoreth by vicissitude of mutations and by periodicall passion to continue alwaies yoong as if he should never die and perish But of such fables as these we must make use not as of reasons altogether really subsisting but so as we take out of ech of them that which is meet and convenient to our purpose When as therefore we say Matter we are not to rely upon the opinions of some Philosophers and to thinke it for to be a bodie without soule without qualitie continuing in it selfe idle and without all action whatsoever for we call oile the matter of a perfume or ointment and gold the matter of an image or statue which notwithstanding is not voide of all similitude and even so we say that the very soule and understanding of a man is the matter of vertue and of science which we give unto reason for to bring into order and adorne And some there were who affirmed the minde or understanding to be the proper place of formes and as it were the expresse mould of intelligible things like as there be Naturalists who hold that the seed of a woman hath not the power of a principle serving to the generation of man but standeth in stead of matter and nourishment onely according unto whom we also being grounded heerein are to thinke that this goddesse having the fruition of the first and chiefe god and conversing with him continually for the love of those good things vertues which are in him is nothing adverse unto him but loveth him as her true spouse and lawfull husband and like as we say that an honest wife who enjoieth ordinarily the company of her husband loveth him neverthelesse but hath still a minde unto him even so giveth not she over to be enamoured upon him although she be continually where he is and replenished with his principall and most sincere parts But when and where as Typhon in the end thrusteth himselfe betweene and setteth upon the extreme parts then and there she seemeth to be sadde and heavy and thereupon is said to mourne and lament yea and to seeke up certeine reliques and pieces of Osiris and ever as she can sinde any she receiveth and arraieth them with all diligence and as they are ready to perish and corrupt she carefully tendeth and keepeth them close like as againe she produceth and bringeth foorth other things to light of her selfe For the reasons the Idaeae and the influences of God which are in heaven and among the starres doe there continue and remaine but those which be disseminate among the sensible and passible bodies in the earth and in the sea diffused in the plants and living creatures the same dying and being buried doe many times revive and rise againe fresh by the meanes of generations And heereupon the fable saith thus much more that Typhon cohabiteth and lieth with Nephthys and that Osiris also by stealth and secretly keepeth company with her for the corruptive and destroying power doeth principally possesse the extreme parts of that matter which they name Nephthys and death and the generative preserving vertue conferreth into it little seed the same weake and feeble as being marred and destroied by Typhon unlesse it be so much as Isis gathereth up saveth which she also norisheth mainteineth But in one word to speake more generally he is stil better as Plato Aristotle are of opinion for the naturall puissance to engender to preserve moveth toward him as to a subsistance and being whereas that force of killing destroying moveth behind toward non subsistence which is the reason that they call the one Isis that is to say a motion animate and wise as if the word were derived of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth to move by a certeine science and reason for a barbarous word it is not But like as the generall name of all gods and goddesses to wit Theos is derived of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say of visible and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
also powre forth our praiers unto them for to have their answere from the Oracles and to what purpose I pray you if it be true that our owne soules bring with them a propheticall facultie and vertue of divination and the cause which doth excite and actuate the same be some temperature of the aire or rather of winde What meanes then the sacred institutions and creations of these religious prophetesses ordained for the pronouncing of answeres And what is the reason that they give no answere at all unlesse the host or sacrifice to be killed tremble all over even from the very feet and shake whiles the libaments effusions of halowed liquors be powred upon it For it is not enough to wag the head as other beasts doe which are slaine for sacrifice but this quaking panting and shivering must be throughout all the parts of the body and that with a trembling noise For if this be wanting they say the Oracle giveth no answere neither doe they so much as bring in the religious priestesse Pythia And yet it were probable that they should both doe and thinke thus who attribute the greatest part of this propheticall inspiration either to God or Daemon But according as you say there is no reason or likelihood therof for the exhalation that ariseth out of the ground whether the beast tremble or no will alwaies if it be present cause a ravishment and transportation of the spirit and evermore dispose the soule alike not onely of Pythia but also of any body else that first commeth or is presented And thereupon it followeth that a meere folly it is to employ one silly woman in the Oracle and to put her to it poore soule to be a votary and live a pure maiden all the daies of her life sequestred from the company of man And as for that Coretas whom the Delphians name to have beene the first that chancing to fall into this chinke or crevasse of the ground gave the hansell of the vertue and property of the place in mine opinion he differed nothing at all from other goteheards or shepheards nor excelled them one whit at least wise if this be a truth that is reported of him and not a meere fable and vaine fiction as I suppose it is no better And verily when I consider and discourse in my selfe how many good things this Oracle hath beene cause of unto the Greeks as well in their warres and martiall affaires as in the foundations of cities in the distresses of famine and pestilence me thinkes it were a very indignity and unworthy part to attribute the invention and originall thereof unto meere fortune and chance and not unto God and divine providence But upon this point I would gladly ô Lamprias quoth he have you to dispute and discourse a little how say you Philippus may it please you to have patience the while Most willingly quoth Philippus for my part and so much I may be bold also to promise in the behalfe of all the company for I see well that the question by you proposed hath moved them all And as for my selfe quoth I ô Philippus it hath not onely moved but also abashed and dismaied me for that in this so notable assembly and conference of so many worthy parsonages I may seeme above mine age in bearing my selfe and taking pride in the probability of my wordes to overthrow or to call into question any of those things which truely have beene delivered or religiously beleeved as touching God and divine matters But satisfie you I will and in the defence of my selfe produce for my witnesse and advocate both Plato For this Philosopher reprooved old Anaxagoras in that being to much addicted to naturall causes and entangled with them following also and pursuing alwaies that which necessarily is effected in the passions and affections of naturall bodies he overpassed the finall and efficient causes for which and by which thinges are done and those are indeed the better causes and principles of greater importance whereas himselfe either before or else most of all other Philosophers hath prosecuted them both attributing unto God the beginning of all things wrought by reason and not depriving in the meane while the matter of those causes which are necessary unto the worke done but acknowledging heerein that the adorning and dispose of all this world sensible dependeth not upon one simple cause alone as being pure and uncompound but was engendred and tooke essence when matter was coupled and conjoined with reason That this is so doe but consider first the workes wrought by the hand of Artisans as for example not to goe farther for the matter that same foot heere and basis so much renowmed of the standing cup among other ornaments and oblations of this temple which Herodotus called Hypocreteridion this hath for the materiall cause verily fire iron the mollefying by the meanes of fire and the tincture or dipping in water without which this peece of worke could not possibly have bene wrought But the more principall cause and mistresse indeed which mooved all this and did worke by all these was art and reason applied unto the worke And verily we see that over such peeces whether they be pictures or other representations of things the name of the artificer and workeman is written as for example This picture Polygnotus drew of Troy won long beforne Who father had Aglaophon and was in Thasos borne And verily he it was indeed as you see who painted the destruction of Troy but without colours ground confused and mingled one with another impossible had it beene for him to have exhibited such a picture so faire and beautifull to the eie as it is If then some one come now and will needs medle with the materiall cause searching into the alterations and mutations thereof particularizing of Sinopre mixed with Ochre or Cerusse with blacke doth he impaire or diminish the glory of the painter 〈◊〉 He also who discourseth how iron is hardned and by what meanes mollified and how being made soft and tender in the fire it yeeldeth and obaieth them who by beating and knocking drive it out in length and bredth and afterwards being dipped and plunged into fresh waters still by the actuall coldnesse of the said water for that the fire heats had softened and rarefied it before it is thrust close together and condensate by meanes whereof it getteth that stiffe compact and hard temper of steele which Homer calleth the very force of iron reserveth he for the workeman any thing lesse heereby in the principall cause and operation of his worke I suppose he doth not For some there be who make proofe and triall of Physicke drogues and yet I trow they condemne not thereby the skill of Physicke like as Plato also himselfe when he saith That we doe see because the light of our eie is mixed with the cleerenesse of the Sunne and heare by the percussion and beating of the aire doth not deny that we have the
governour of all moisture 1301.40 Bactrians desire to have their dead bodies devoured by birds of the aire 299.50 Baines and stouphes 612.1 in old time very temperate 783.30 the occasion of many diseases 783.30 Balance not to be passed over 15.10 Ballachrades 903.30 Bal what it signifieth in the Aegyptian language 1319.1 Banishment of Bulimus 738.20 Banishment how to be made tolerable 275.1.10 no marke of infamie 278.20 seemeth to be condemned by Euripides ib. 30 Banished persons we are all in this world 281.20 Banquet of the seven Sages 326.30 Barbarians and Greeks compared 39.40 Barbell the fish honoured 976.40 Barbers be commonly praters 200.40 a pratling Barber checked k. Archelaus 408.10 Barber to K. 〈◊〉 crucified for his 〈◊〉 tongue 200.30 Barbers shops dry bankets 721.20 a Barber handled in his kinde for his 〈◊〉 tongue 201.1 Barly likes well in sandy ground 1008.10.20 Barrennesse in women how occasioned 844.20 Evill Bashfulnesse cause of much 〈◊〉 danger 165.10.20.30 over-much Bashfulnesse how to be avoided 164.30 Bashfulnesse 163.10 of two sorts 72.1 Bashfulnesse to be avoided in diet 613.1 Bathing in cold water upon exercise 620.20 Bathing in hot water ib. 30. Bathing and 〈◊〉 before meat 612.20 Bathyllion 759.10 Battus the sonne of Arcesilaus 504.30 Battus a buffon or 〈◊〉 775.10 Battus surnamed Daemon 504.20 Battus 1199.20 Beanes absteined from 15.20 Beare a subtill beast 965.10 why they are saide to have a sweet hand 1010.50 why they gnaw not the 〈◊〉 1012.30 tender over their yoong 218.20 a Bearded comet 827.20 Beasts haue taught us Physicke al the parts thereof 967.60 Beasts capable of vertue 564.50 docible apt to learne arts 570.1 able to teach ib. 10. we ought to have pittie of them 575.30 brute Beasts teach parents naturall kindnesse 217.218 Beasts braines in old time rejected 783.10 they cure themselves by Physicke 1012.1 Beasts of land their properties 958.50 what beasts will be mad 955.20 beasts not sacrificed without their owne consent 779.20 skilful in Arithmetick 968.20 kind to their yong 218.10 beasts wilde what use men make of them 237.40 of land or water whether have more use of reason 951. 30. beasts have use of reason 954.955 how to be used without injurie 956.40 how they came first to be killed 779.10 whether they feed more simply than we 702.1 whether more healthfull than men 702.1 Beauty the blossome of vertue 1153.10 beauty of what worth 6.50 beauty of woman called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 728.50 beauty without vertue not 〈◊〉 47.1 Beboeon 1370.40 Bebon ib. Bed of maried folke 〈◊〉 many quarrels betweene them 322 20. bed-clothes to bee shuffled when we be newly risen 777.40 Bees of Candie how witty they be 959. 50. bees cannot abide smoke 1014.30 they sting unchaste persons ib. 40. the bee a wise creature 218.1 The Beetill flie what it signisieth 〈◊〉 1291.30 why honoured by the Aegyptians 1316.30 Beer a counterfeit wine 685.40 Begged flesh what is ment by it 891.50 Bellerophontes continent everie way 739.30 Bellerophontes commended for his continence 42.30.139.30 he slew Chimarchus 489.10 not rewarded by Iobates ib. Belestre 1137.1 The Bellies of dead men how they be served by the Aegyptians 576.40 of belly belly cheere pro contra 339.340 belly pleasures most esteemed by lipicurus and Metrodorus 595. 10. belly hath no cares 620.40 Bepolitanus strangely escaped execution 502.40 Berronice the good wife of 〈◊〉 1111.40 〈◊〉 detected for killing his father 545.30 Bias his answer to a pratling fellow 194.20 his answer to king Amasis 327.10 his apophthegme 456.1 his apophthegme touching the most dangerous beast 47.30 Binarie number 807.10 Binarie number or Two called contention 1317.30 Bion his answere to Theognis 28.20 his apophthegme 254. 50. his saying of Philosophie 9.1 〈◊〉 hath divers significations 29.20 Birds why they have no wezill flap 745.10 birds how they drinke 745.10 skilfull in divination 968.40 taught to imitate mans mans voice 966.30 Biton and Cleobis rewarded with death 518.10 See Cleobis Bitternesse what effects it worketh 656.10 a 〈◊〉 of his toong how he was served by K. Seleucus 200.20 Blacknesse commeth of water 997. 10 Blacke potage at Lacedaemon 475. 20 Bladder answereth to the winde-pipe like as the guts to the wezand 745.20 Blames properly imputed for vice 47.30 Blasing 〈◊〉 827.10 The Blessed state of good folke departed 530.50 Bletonesians sacrificed a man 878.10 Blushing face better than pale 38 50 Bocchoris a k. of AEgypt 164.40 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 898.40 Bodily health by two arts preserved 9.10 Body fitter to entertaine paine than pleasure 583.10 body feeble no hinderance to aged rulers 389.40 bodies what they be 813. bodies smallest 813.50 body cause of all vices and calamities 517.30 body may well have an action against the soule 625.1 much injuried by the soule ib. Boeotarchie 367.10 Boeotians good trencher men 669 10. noted for gluttony 575.1 Boeotians reproched for hating good letters 1203.50 Boldnesse in children and youth 8.40 Bona a goddesse at Rome 856.50 Books of Philosophers to be read by yoong men 9.50 Boreas what winde 829.30 Bottiaeans 898.30 their virgins song ib. Brasidas his saying of a silly mouse 251.20 Brasidas his apophthegmes 423. 30.456.1 his death and commendation ib. 10 A Brason spike keepeth dead bodies from putrefaction 697.50 Brasse swords or speares wounde with lesse hurt 698.1 Brasse why called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 698.1 why it is so resonant 770.10 Brasse of Corinth 1187.1 Bread a present remedie for fainting 739.1 Brennus king of the Gallogreeks 910.40 Brethren how they are to divide their patrimonie 180.40 one brother ought not to steale his fathers heart from another 179 30. they are to excuse one another to their parents 179.50 how they should cary themselves in regard of age 184.185 Briareus a giant the same that Ogygius 1180.20 Bride lifted over the threshold of her husbands dore 860.30 bridegrome commeth first to his bride without a light 872.10 20. bride why she eateth a quince before she enter into the bed-chamber 872.20 brides haire parted with a javelin 879. 50 Brimstone why called in Greeke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 705.30 Brison a famous runner 154.30 Brotherly amity a strange thing 174.20 Brutus surprised with the hunger 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 738.50 his gracious thankefulnesse to the 〈◊〉 739.1 Decim Brutus why he sacrificed to the dead in December 862. 10 Brutus beheadeth his owne sonnes 909.50 The Bryer bush 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 892. 50 Bubulci the name at Rome how it came 865.10 Bucephalus K. Alexanders horse 963.50 how he was woont to ride him 396.20 Buggery in brute beasts not known 568.30 Building costly forbidden by Lycurgus 577.30.880.1 Bulb roote 704.20 Buls and beares how they prepare to fight 959.1 Buls affraied of red clothes tied to figge-trees become tame 323. 741.30 Bulla what ornament or jewell 40. why worne by Romaines children 883.40 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a fainting