26. Chap. 3. Of three Commerces 50. Chap. 4. Of Diversion 71. Chap. 5. Vpon some Verses of Virgil. 88. Chap. 6. Of Coaches 190. Chap. 7. Of the inconvenience of Greatness 222. Chap. 8. Of the Art of Conferring 230. Chap. 9. Of Vanity 269. Chap. 10. Of managing the Will 371. Chap. 11. Of Cripples 410. Chap. 12. Of Physiognomy 428. Chap. 13. Of Experience 477. ESSAYS OF Michael Seigneur de Montaigne The Third BOOK CHAP. I. Of Profit and Honesty NO Man is free from speaking foolish things but the worst on 't is when a Man studies to play the Fool. Ne iste magno conatu magnas nugas dixerit Lest it with him do come to pass To take great Pains to be an Ass. This does not concern me mine slip from me with as little care as they are of little value and 't is the better for them I would presently part with them for what they are worth and neither buy nor sell them but as they weigh I speak in Paper as I do to the first I meet and that this is true observe what follows To whom ought not Treachery to be hateful when Tyberius refus'd it in a thing of so great Importance to him He had word sent him from Germany that if he thought fit they would rid him of Ariminius the most potent Enemy the Romans had by Poyson He return'd answer That the People of Rome were wont to revenge themselves of their Enemies by open ways and with their Swords in their hands and not clandestinely and by Fraud Wherein he quitted the utile for the honest You will tell me that he was a Deceiver and did not speak as he thought I believe so too and 't is no great Miracle in Men of his Profession But the acknowledgement of Virtue is not less valid in the Mouth of him that hates it for as much as truth forces it from him and if he will not inwardly receive it he at least puts it on and with it makes himself outwardly fine Our outward and inward Structure is full of imperfection but there is nothing useless in Nature not so much as Inutility it self nothing has insinuated it self into this Vniverse that has not therein some fit and proper place Our Being is cemented with sickly Qualities Ambition Jealousie Envy Revenge Superstition and Despair have so natural a Possession in us that the Image is discern'd in Beasts Nay and Cruelty so unnatural a Vice for even in the midst of Compassion we feel within I know not what tart-sweet titillation of ill-natur'd Pleasure in seeing others suffer and the Children feel it Suave meri magno turbantibus aequora ventis Et Terra magnum alterius spectare laborem 'T is sweet from Land to see a Storm at Sea And others sinking whilst our selves are free of the Seeds of which Qualities whoever should divest man would destroy the Fundamental Conditions of human Life Likewise in all Governments there are necessary Offices not only abject but vicious also Vices have there a help to make up the seam in our piecing as Poysons are useful for the Conservation of Health If they become excusable because they are of use to us and that the common Necessity covers their true Qualities we are to resign this part to the strongest and boldest Citizens who sacrifice their Honour and Conscience as others of old sacrific'd their Lives for the good of their Country We who are weaker take upon us the parts of Actions both that are more easie and less hazardous the publick Weal requires that a Man should betray and lye and massacre let us leave this Commission to Men that are more obedient and more supple In earnest I have often been troubled to see Judges by Fraud and false hopes of Favour or Pardon allure a Criminal to confess his Fact and therein to make use of Cozenage and Impudence It would become Justice and Plato himself who countenances this manner of proceeding to furnish me with other means more suitable to my own liking This is a malicious kind of Justice and I look upon it as no less violated by it self than by others I said not long since to some company in Discourse that I should hardly be drawn to betray my Prince for a particular Man who should be very much asham'd to betray any particular Man for my Prince and do not only hate deceiving my self but that any one should deceive through me I will neither afford matter nor occasion to any such thing In the little I have had to mediate betwixt our Princes in the Divisions and Subdivisions by which we are at this time torn to pieces I have been very careful that they should neither be deceiv'd in me nor deceive others by me People of that kind of trading are very reserv'd and pretend to be the most moderate imaginable and nearest to the Opinions of those with whom they have to do I expose my self in my true Opinion and after a method the most my own a young and tender Negotiator and one who had rather fail in the Affair than be wanting to my Self And yet it has been hitherto with so good luck for Fortune has doubtless the best share in it that little has past from hand to hand with less suspition or more favour and privacy I have a free and open way that easily insinuates it self and obtains belief with those with whom I am to deal at the first meeting Sincerity and pure Truth in what Age sover pass for current and besides the liberty and freedom of a Man who treats without any Interest of his own is never hateful or suspected and he may very well make use of the Answer of Hipperides to the Athenians who complain'd of his blunt way of speaking My Masters do not consider whether or no I am free but whether I am so without a Bribe or without any advantage to my own Affairs My liberty of Speaking has also easily clear'd me from all suspition of dissembling by its vehemency leaving nothing unsaid how home and bitter soever so that I could have said no worse behind their backs and in that it carried along with it a manifest shew of simplicity and negligence I pretend to no other fruit by acting than to Act and add to it no long pursuit nor proposals every action plays its own Game win if it can As to the rest I am not sway'd by any Passion either of love or hatred towards the great ones nor have my Will captivated either by particular injury or obligation I look upon our King with an affection simply loyal and respective neither prompted on nor restrain'd by any private Interest and I love my self for it Neither does the general and just Cause attract me otherwise than with moderation and without Animosity I am not subject to these penetrating and entirely affected Engagements Anger and Hatred are beyond the duty of Justice and are Passions only useful to those
your Wife and eat Melons 't is odds you relapse into some new Distemper The Stone has this priviledge that it carries it self clean off Whereas others always leave behind them some impression and alteration that renders the Body subject to some new disease and lend a hand to one another These are excusable that content themselves with possessing us without extending it farther and introducing their consequences But courteous and kind are those whose passage brings us any profitable issue Since I have been troubled with the Stone I find my self freed from all other accidents much more methinks than I was before and have never had any Feaver since I argue that the extreme and frequent vomitings that I am subject to purge me and on the other side my nausities and the strange Fasts I am forc'd to keep digest my present humours and Nature in those Stones voids whatever there is in me of superfluous and hurtful Let them never tell me that it is a medicine too dear bought For what avails so many stinking Apozemes Causticks Incisions Sweats Setons Diets and so many other methods of Cure which oft by reason we are not able to undergo their violence and importunity bring us to our Graves So that when I am ill I look upon it as Physick when well for an absolute deliverance And here is another particular benefit of my disease which is that it almost plays its game by it self and lets me play mine or else I only want Courage to do it for in its greatest fury I have endured it ten Hours together on Horse-back do but endure only you need no other regiment Play Run do this and the t'other thing too if you can your debauch will do you more good than harm Say as much to one that has the Pox the Gout or Bursten Belly The other diseases have more universal obligations wrack our actions after another kind of manner disturb our whole order and to their consideration engage the whole state of life This only pinches the Skin it leaves the Understanding and the Will wholly at our own dispose as also the Tongue Hands and Feet It rather awakes than stupifies you The Soul is struck with the ardour of a Feaver over-whelm'd with an Epilepsie and displac'd by a sharp Megrim and finally aastonish'd by all the Diseases that hurt the whole Mass and the most noble parts This never meddles with the Soul If any thing goes amiss with her 't is her own fault she betrays dismounts and abandons her self There are none but Fools who suffer themselves to be perswaded that this hard and massy body which is bak'd in our Reins is to be dissolv'd by drinks wherefore when it is once stirr'd their is nothing to be done but to give it passage and also it will take it of it self I moreover observe this particular convenience in it that it is a disease wherein we have little to guess at We are dispenc'd from the trouble into which other diseases throw us by the incertainty of their Causes Conditions and Progress A trouble that is infinitely painful We have no need of Consultations and Doctoral Interpretations the sense well enough informs us both what it is and where it is By such like Arguments weak and strong as Cicero did the disease of his Old Age I try to rock asleep and amass my imagination and to dress its Wounds If I find them worse to morrow I will provide new remedies and applications That this is true I am come to that pass of late that the least motion forces pure blood out of my Reins And what of that I stirr nevertheless as before and ride after my Hounds with a Juvenile ardour And find that I have very good satisfaction for an accident of that importance when it costs me no more but a little heaviness and uneasiness in that part 'T is some great Stone that wasts and consumes the substance of our Kidneys and of my Life which I by little and little evacuate not without some natural pleasure as an excrement henceforward superfluous and troublesome Now if I feel any thing to rowl and stir do not expect that I should trouble my self to consult my Pulse or my Urine thereby to put my self upon some tormenting prevention I shall soon enough feel the pain without making it more and longer by the disease of fear Who fears to suffer does already suffer what he fears To which may be added that the Doubts and Ignorance of those who take upon them to expound the designs of Nature and her internal Progressions and the many false Prognosticks of their Art ought to give us to understand that her ways are inscrutable and utterly unknown There is great uncertainty variety and obscurity in what she either promises or threats Old Age excepted which is an undoubted sign of the approach of Death in all other accidents I see few signs of the future wherein we may ground our Divination I only judge of my self by my real sense and not by discourse To what end since I am resolv'd to bring nothing to it but expectation and patience Will you know how much I get by this Observe those that do otherwise and who rely upon so many diverse perswasions and counsels how oft and how much they labour under imagination without any bodily pain at all I have many times pleas'd my self being well and in safety and deliver'd from these dangerous accidents to communicate them to the Physicians as but then beginning to discover themselves in me where I under-went the terrible sentences of their dreadful conclusions being very well at ease and was so much the more obliged to the favour of Almighty God and better satisfied of the vanity of this Art There is nothing that ought so much to be recommended to Youth as Activity and Vigilance Our Life is nothing but motion I move with great difficulty and am slow in every thing whether in Rising going to Bed or Eating Seven of the Clock in the Morning is early for me and where I govern I never Dine before Eleven nor Sup till after Six I have formerly attributed the cause of the Feavers and other Diseases I have faln into to the heaviness that long sleeping had brought upon me and have ever repented my sleeping again in the morning Plato is more angry at the excess of sleeping than that of drinking I love to lye hard and alone even without my Wife as Kings and Princes do but well cover'd with Cloathes They never warm my Bed but since my being grown Old they give me for need warm Cloths to lay to my Feet and Stomach They find fault with the great Scipio that he was a great Sleeper not in my opinion for any other reason if not that men were displeas'd that he alone should have nothing in him to be found fault withal If I have any thing curious in my way of Living 't is rather in my Lying than any thing else
in Company with him the said Lord Almoner and another Bishop he was presently aware of this Gentleman who had been denoted to him and presently caus'd him to be call'd to his Presence to whom being come before him seeing him pale and trembling with the Conscience of his Guilt he thus said Monsieur such a one You already guess what I have to say to you your Countenance discovers it and therefore 't is in vain to disguise your Practice for I am so well inform'd of your Business that it will but make worse for you to go about to conceal or to deny it you know very well such and such Passages which were the most secret Circumstances of his Conspiracy and therefore be sure as you tender your own Life to confess to me the whole Truth of your Design The poor Man seeing himself thus trap'd and convinc'd for the whole Business had been discover'd to the Queen by one of the Complices was in such a Taking he knew not what to do but joyning his Hands to beg and sue for Mercy he meant to throw himself at this Prince's Feet who taking him up proceeded to say Come on Sir and tell me have I at any time heretofore done you any Injury or have I through my particular Hatred or private Malice offended any Kinsman or Friend of yours It is not above three Weeks that I have known you What Inducement then could move you to attempt my Death To which the Gentleman with a trembling Voice reply'd That it was no particular Grudge he had to his Person but the general Interest and Concern of his Party and that he had been put upon it by some who had perswaded him it would be a meritorious Act by any means to extirpate so great and so powerful an Enemy of their Religion Well said the Prince I will now let you see how much more charitable the Religion is that I maintain than that which you profess Yours has perswaded you to kill me without hearing me speak and without ever having given you any cause of Offence and mine commands me to forgive you convict as you are by your own Confession of a Design to murther me without Reason Get you gone that I see you no more and if you are wise choose henceforward honester Men for your Counsellors in your Designs The Emperour Augustus being in Gaule had certain information of a Conspiracy L. Cinna was contriving against him who thereupon resolv'd to make him an Example and to that end sent to summon his Friends to meet the next morning in Counsel but the night between he past over with great unquietness of Mind considering that he was to put to death a young man of an illustrious Family and Nephew to the great Pompey which made him break out into several ejaculations of Passion What then said he Shall it be said that I shall live in perpetual Anxiety and continual Alarm and suffer my Assassinates in the mean time to walk abroad at Liberty Shall he go unpunished after having conspir'd against my Life a Life that I have hitherto defended in so many Civil Wars and so many Battels both by Land and Sea And after having setled the Universal Peace of the whole World shall this man be pardoned who has conspired not only to Murther but to Sacrifice me For the Conspiracy was to kill him at Sacrifice After which remaining for some time silent he re-begun louder and straining his Voice more than before to exclaim against himself and say Why liv'st thou If it be for the good of many that thou should'st Dye must there be no end of thy Revenges and Cruelties Is thy Life of so great value that so many Mischiefs must be done to preserve it His Wife Livia seeing him in this perplexity Will you take a Woman's Counsel said she Do as the Physicians do who when the ordinary Recipe's will do no good make Tryal of the contrary By severity you have hitherto prevail'd nothing Lepidus has follow'd Savidienus Murena Lepidus Caepio Murena and Egnatius Caepio Begin now and try how Sweetness and Clemency will succeed Cinna is convict forgive him he will never henceforth have the Heart to hurt thee and it will be an Act of Glory Augustus was glad that he had met with an Advocate of his own Humour wherefore having thank'd his Wife and in the Morning countermanded his Friends he had before summon'd to Council he commanded Cinna all alone to be brought to him who being accordingly come and a Chair by his Appointment set him having commanded every one out of the Room he spake to him after this manner In the first place Cinna I demand of thee patient Audience do not interrupt me in what I am about to say and I will afterwards give thee Time and Leisure to answer Thou know'st Cinna that having taken thee Prisoner in the Enemies Camp and that an Enemy not only made but born so I gave thee thy Life restor'd thee all thy Goods and finally put thee in so good a posture by my Bounty of living well and at thy ease that the Victorious envy'd the Conquer'd The Sacerdotal Office which thou mad'st Suit to me for I conferr'd upon thee after having deny'd it to others whose Fathers have ever borne Arms in my Service and after so many Obligations thou hast undertaken to kill me At which Cinna crying out that he was very far from entertaining any so wicked a Thought Thou dost not keep thy Promise Cinna continued Augustus that thou would'st not interrupt me Yes thou hast undertaken to murther me in such a Place such a Day in such and such Company and in such a Manner At which Words seeing Cinna astonish'd and silent not upon the Account of his Promise so to be but interdict with the Conscience of his Crime Why proceeded Augustus to what end would'st thou do it Is it to be Emperour Believe me the Republick is in a very ill Condition if I am the only Man betwixt thee and the Empire Thou art not able so much as to defend thy own House and but t'other day wast baffled in a Suit by the oppos'd Interest of a mean manumitted Slave What hast thou neither Means nor Power in any other thing but only to attempt against Caesar I quit claim to the Empire if there is no other but I to obstruct thy Hopes Can'st thou believe that Paulus that Fabius that the Cassians and Servilians and so many Noble Romans not only so in Title but who by their Virtue honour their Nobility would suffer or endure thee After this and a great deal more that he said to him for he was two long Hours in speaking Well Cinna go thy way said he I again give thee that Life in the Quality of a Traytor and a Parricide which I once before gave thee in the Quality of an Enemy Let Friendship from this time forward begin betwixt us and let us try to make it appear whether I have given or
to be understood The Imitation of Words by its own Facility immediately disperses it self thorough a whole People but the imitation of inventing and fitly applying those Words is of a slower Progress The Generality of Readers for having found a like Robe very mistakingly imagine they have the same Body and Inside too whereas Force and Sinews are never to be borrowed the Gloss and outward Ornament that is Words and Elocution may Most of those I converse with speak the same Language I here write but whether they think the same Thoughts I cannot say The Athenians says Plato are observ'd to study length and elegancy of Speaking the Lacedaemonians to affect Brevity and those of Creet to aim more at the Fecundity of Conception than the Fertility of Speech and these are the best Zenon us'd to say that he had two sorts of Disciples one that he call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 curious to learn things and these were his Favourites the other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that cared for nothing but Words not that fine Speaking is not a very good and commendable Quality but not so excellent and so necessary as some would make it and I am scandaliz'd that our whole Life should be spent in nothing else I would first understand my own Language and that of my Neighbours with whom most of my Business and Conversation lies No doubt but Greek and Latine are very great Ornaments and of very great use but we buy them too dear I will here discover one way which also has been experimented in my own Person by which they are to be had better cheap and such may make use of it as will My Father having made the most precise Enquiry that any man could possibly make amongst Men of the greatest Learning and Judgment of an exact method of Education was by them caution'd of the Inconvenience then in use and made to believe that the tedious time we applied to the learning of the Tongues of them who had them for nothing was the sole cause we could not arrive to that Grandeur of Soul and Perfection of Knowledge with the ancient Greeks and Romans I do not however believe that to be the only Cause but the Expedient my Father found out for this was that in my Infancy and before I began to speak he committed me to the care of a German who since died a famous Physician in France totally ignorant of our Language but very fluent and a great Critick in Latine This Man whom he had fetch'd out of his own Country and whom he entertained with a very great Salary for this only end had me continually in his Arms to whom there were also joyn'd two others of the same Nation but of inferiour Learning to attend me and sometimes to relieve him who all of them entertain'd me with no other Language but Latine As to the rest of his Family it was an inviolable Rule that neither Himself nor my Mother Man nor Maid should speak any thing in my Company but such Latine Words as every one had learnt only to gabble with me It is not to be imagin'd how great an advantage this prov'd to the whole Family my Father and my Mother by this means learning Latin enough to understand it perfectly well and to speak it to such a Degree as was sufficient for any necessary Use as also those of the Servants did who were most frequent with me To be short we did Latin it at such a Rate that it overflowed to all the Neighbouring Villages where there yet remain that have establish't themselves by Custom several Latin Appellations of Artizans and their Tools As for what concerns my self I was above six years of Age before I understood either French or Perigordin any more than Arabick and without Art Book Grammar or Precept Whipping or the expence of a Tear had by that time learn'd to speak as pure Latin as my Master himself If for Example they were to give me a Theam after the Colledge fashion they gave it to others in French but to me they were of necessity to give it in the worst Latin to turn it into that which was pure and good and Nicholas Grouchi who writ a Book de Comitiis Romanorum William Guirentes who has writ a Comment upon Aristotle George Bucanan that great Scotch Poet and Marcus Antonius Muretus whom both France and Italy have acknowledg'd for the best Orator of his time my domestick Tutors have all of them often told me that I had in my Infancy that Language so very fluent and ready that they were afraid to enter into Discourse with me and particularly Bucanan whom I since saw attending the late Mareschal de Brissac then told me that he was about to write a Treatise of Education the Example of which he intended to take from mine for he was then Tutor to that Count de Brissac who afterwards prov'd so valiant and so brave a Gentleman As to Greek of which I have but a very little Smattering my Father also design'd to have it taught me by a Trick but a new one and by way of sport tossing our Declensions to and fro after the manner of those who by certain Games at Tables and Chess learn Geometry and Arithmetick for he amongst other Rules had been advis'd to make me relish Science and Duty by an unforc'd Will and of my own voluntary motion and to educate my Soul in all Liberty and Delight without any Severity or Constraint Which also he was an Observer of to such a degree even of Superstition if I may say so that some being of Opinion it did trouble and disturb the Brains of Children suddenly to wake them in the Morning and to snatch them violently and over-hastily from Sleep wherein they are much more profoundly envolv'd than we he only caus'd me to be wak'd by the Sound of some musical Instrument and was never unprovided of a Musician for that purpose by which Example you may judge of the rest this alone being sufficient to recommend both the Prudence and the Affection of so good a Father who therefore is not to be blam'd if he did not reap Fruits answerable to so exquisite a Culture of which two things were the cause First a steril and improper Soil for tho I was of a strong and healthful Constitution and of a Disposition tollerably sweet and tractable yet I was withall so heavy idle and indispos'd that they could not rouze me from this Stupidity to any Exercise of Recreation nor get me out to play What I saw I saw clearly enough and under this lazy Complexion nourish'd a bold Imagination and Opinions above my Age. I had a slothful Wit that would go no faster than it was led a slow Understanding a languishing Invention and after all incredible defect of Memory so that it is no wonder if from all these nothing considerable can be extracted Secondly like those who impatient of a long and steady cure submit to all
abhorr'd by our manners which also for having according to their practice a so necessary disparity of Age and difference of Offices betwixt the Lovers hold no more proportion with the perfect Union and Harmony that we here require than the other Quis est enim iste amor amicitiae cur neque deformem adolescentem quisquam amat neque formosam senem For what is that Love of Friendship why does no one Love a deform'd Youth or a comely Old Man Neither will that very Picture that the Academy presents of it as I conceive contradict me when I say that the first fury inspir'd by the Son of Venus into the heart of the Lover upon the sight of the Flower and prime of a springing and blossoming Youth to whom they allow all the Insolencies and Passionate Attempts that an immoderate Ardour can produce was simply founded upon an external Beauty the false image of Corporal Generation for upon the Soul it could not ground this Love the sight of which as yet lay conceal'd was but now springing and not of maturity to Blossom Which fury if it seiz'd upon a mean Courage the means by which he preferr'd his suit were rich Presents favour in advancement to Dignities and such Trumpery which they by no means approve If on a more generous Soul the pursuit was suitably generous by Philosophical Instructions Precepts to revere Religion to obey the Laws to die for the good of his Country by examples of Valour Prudence and Justice the Lover studying to render himself acceptable by the Grace and Beauty of his Soul that of his Body being long since faded and decay'd hoping by this mutual Society to establish a more firm and lasting Contract When this Courtship came to effect in due season for that which they do not require in the Lover namely Leisure and Discretion in his pursuit they strictly require in the person Loved forasmuch as he is to judg of an internal Beauty of difficult Knowledg and obscure Discovery then there sprung in the Person Loved the desire of a spiritual Conception by the mediation of a spiritual Beauty This was the Principal the Corporeal Accidental and Second Causes are all the wrong side of the Lover For this reason they prefer the Person Beloved maintaining that the Gods in like manner prefer him too and very much blame the Poet Aeschilus for having in the Loves of Achilles and Patroclus given the Lovers part to Achilles who was in the first flower and pubescency of his Youth and the handsomest of all the Greeks After this general Familiarity and mutual Community of Thoughts is once setled supposing the soveraign and most worthy Part to preside and govern and to perform its proper Offices they say that from thence great Utility deriv'd both to private and publick Concerns That the force and power of Countries receiv'd their beginning from thence and that it was the chiefest security of Liberty and Justice Of which the Salutiferous Loves of Harmonius and Aristogiton is a good instance and therefore it is that they call'd it Sacred and Divine and do conceive that nothing but the Violence of Tyrants and the Baseness of the common People is mimical to it finally all that can be said in favour of the Academy is that it was a Love which ended in Friendship which also well enough agrees with the Stoical definition of Love Amorem conatum esse amicitiae faciendae ex pulchritudinis specie That Love is a desire of contracting Friendship by the Beauty of the Object I return to my own more just and true description Omnino amicitiae corroboratis jam confirmatis ingeniis aetatibus judicandae sunt Those are only to be reputed Friendships that are fortified and confirmed by Judgment and length of time For the rest which we commonly call Friends and Friendships are nothing but Acquaintance and Familiarities either occasionally contracted or upon some design by means of which there happens some little intercourse betwixt our Souls but in the Friendship I speak of they mix and work themselves into one piece with so universal a mixture that there is no more sign of the Seame by which they were first conjoin'd If a Man should importune me to give a reason why I Lov'd him I find it could no otherwise be exprest than by making answer because it was he because it was I. There is beyond I am able to say I know not what inexplicable and fatal power that brought on this Union We sought one another long before we met and by the Characters we heard of one another which wrought more upon our Affections than in reason meer reports should do I think by some secret appointment of Heaven we embra'd in our Names and at our first meeting which was accidentally at a great City entertainment we found our selves so mutually taken with one another so acquainted and so endear'd betwixt our selves that from thenceforward nothing was so near to us as one another He writ an excellent Latin Satyr which I since Printed wherein he excuses the precipitation of our intelligence so suddenly came to perfection saying that being to have so short continuance as being begun so late for we were both full grown Men and he some Years the older there was no time to lose nor was ti'd to conform it self to the example of those slow and regular Friendships that require so many precautions of a long praeliminary Conversation This has no other Idea than that of its self this is no one particular consideration nor two nor three nor four nor a thousand 't is I know not what quintessence of all this mixture which seizing my whole Will carried it to plunge and lose it self in his and that having seiz'd his whole Will brought it back with equal concurrence and appetite to plunge and lose it self in mine I may truly say lose reserving nothing to our selves that was either his or mine When Laelius in the presence of the Roman Consuls who after they had sentenc'd Tiberius Gracchus prosecuted all those who had had any familiarity with him also came to ask Cajus Blosius who was his chiefest Friend and Confident how much he would have done for him And that he made Answer All things How All things said Laelius And what if he had commanded you to Fire our Temples He would never have commanded me that repli'd Blosius But what if he had said Laelius Why if he had I would have Obey'd him said the other If he was so perfect a Friend to Gracchus as the Histories report him to have been there was yet no necessity of offending the Consuls by such a bold confession though he might still have retain'd the assurance he had of Gracchus his disposition However those who accuse this Answer as Seditious do not well understand the Mystery nor presuppose as it was true that he had Gracchus his Will in his sleeve both by the power of a Friend and the perfect knowledg
themselves to be deluded with desire of Novelty and to have left the Serenity of their own Heaven to come so far to gaze at ours came to Roane at the time that the late King Charles the Ninth was there where the King himself talk'd to them a good while and they were made to see our Fashions our Pomp and the form of a great City after which some one ask'd their opinion and would know of them what of all the things they had seen they found most to be admired To which they made Answer Three things of which I have forgot the Third and am troubled at it but Two I yet remember They said that in the first place they thought it very strange that so many tall Men wearing Beards strong and well Arm'd who were about the King 't is like they meant the Swiss of the Guard should submit to Obey a Child and that they did not choose out one amongst themselves to Command Secondly they have a way of speaking in their Language to call Men the half of one another that they had Observ'd that there were amongst us Men full and cramm'd with all manner of Conveniences whilst in the mean time their halves were Begging at their Doors Lean and half starv'd with Hunger and Poverty and thought it strange that these Necessitous halves were able to suffer so great an Inequality and Injustice and that they did not take the others by the Throats or set Fire to their Houses I talk'd to one of them a great while together but I had so ill an Interpreter and that was so perplex'd by his own Ignorance to apprehend my meaning that I could get nothing out of him of any moment Asking him what advantage he reapt from the Superiority he had amongst his own People for he was a Captain and our Marriners call'd him King he told me to March in the Head of them to War and demanding of him further how many Men he had to follow him He shew'd me a space of Ground to signifie as many as could March in such a compass which might be Four or Five Thousand Men and putting the question to him whether or no his Authority expir'd with the War He told me this remain'd that when he went to Visit the Village of his dependance they plain'd him Paths through the thick of their Woods through which he might pass at his ease All this does not sound very ill and the last was not much amiss for they wear no Breeches CHAP. XXXI That a Man is soberly to judg of Divine Ordinances THings unknown are the principal and true subject of Imposture forasmuch as in the first place their very Strangeness lends them Credit and moreover by not being subjected to our ordinary Discourse they deprive us of the means to question and dispute them For which reason says Plato it is much more easie to satisfie the hearers when speaking of the Nature of the Gods than of the Nature of Men because the Ignorance of the Auditory affords a fair and large Career and all manner of Liberty in the handling of profane and abstruce things and then it comes to pass that nothing is so firmly believed as what we least know nor any People so confident as those who entertain us with Fabulous Stories such as your Alchymists Judicial Astrologers Fortune-tellers and Physicians Id genus omne to which I could willingly if I durst join a sort of People that take upon them to Interpret and Controul the Designs of God himself making no question of finding out the cause of every Accident and to pry into the secrets of the Divine Will there to discover the Incomprehensible Motives of his Works And although the variety and the continual discordance of Events throw them from Corner to Corner and toss them from East to West yet do they still persist in their vain Inquisition and with the same Pencil to Paint Black and White In a Nation of the Indies there is this commendable Custom that when any thing befalls them amiss in any Rencounter or Battel they Publickly ask Pardon of the Sun who is their God as having committed an unjust Action always imputing their Good or Evil Fortune to the Divine Justice and to that submitting their own Judgment and Reason 'T is enough for a Christian to believe that all things come from God to receive them with acknowledgment of his divine and instructable Wisdom and also thankfully to accept and receive them with what Face soever they may present themselves But I do not approve of what I see in use that is to seek to continue and support our Religion by the Prosperity of our Enterprizes Our Belief has other Foundation enough without going about to Authorize it by Events For the People accustomed to such Arguments as these and so proper to their own Taste it is to be fear'd lest when they fail of Success they should also stagger in their Faith As in the War wherein we are now Engag'd upon the account of Religion those who had the better in the Business of Rochelabeille making great Brags of that success as an infallible approbation of their Cause when they came afterwards to excuse their Misfortunes of Jarnac and Moncontour 't was by saying they were Fatherly Scourges and Corrections if they have not a People wholely at their Mercy they make it manifestly enough to appear what it is to take two sorts of Grist out of the same Sack and with the same Mouth to blow Hot and Cold. It were better to possess the Vulgar with the solid and real Foundations of Truth 'T was a brave Naval-Battel that was gain'd a few Months since against the Turks under the Command of Don John of Austria but it has also pleas'd God at other times to let us see as great Victories at our own Expence In fine 't is a hard matter to reduce Divine things to our Ballance without waste and losing a great deal of the weight And who would take upon him to give a reason that Arius and his Pope Leo the principal Heads of the Arian Heresie should Die at several times of so like and strange Deaths for being withdrawn from the Disputation by the Griping in the Guts they both of them suddenly gave up the Ghost upon the Stool and would aggravate this Divine Vengeance by the Circumstance of the place might as well add the Death of Heliogabalus who was also Slain in a House of Office But what Ireneus was involv'd in the same Fortune God being pleas'd to shew us that the Good have something else to hope for and the Wicked something else to fear than the Fortunes or Misfortunes of this World He manages and applies them according to his own secret Will and Pleasure and deprives us of the means foolishly to make our own profit And those People both abuse themselves and us who will pretend to dive into these Mysteries by the strength of Humane Reason They never give one
do not so Maliciously play the Censurers as they do it Ignorantly and Rudely in all their Detractions The same pains and licence that others take to Blemish and Bespatter these illustrious Names I would willingly undergo to lend them a shoulder to raise them higher These rare Images and that are cull'd out by the consent of the wisest Men of all Ages for the Worlds Example I should endeavour to Honour anew as far as my Invention would permit in all the Circumstances of favourable Interpretation And we are to believe that the force of our Invention is infinitely short of their Merit 'T is the Duty of good Men to Pourtray Vertues as Beautiful as they can and there would be no Indecency in the Case should our Passion a little Transport us in favour of so Sacred a Form What these People do to the contrary they either do out of Malice or by the Vice of confining their Belief to their own Capacity or which I am more inclin'd to think for not having their sight strong clear and elevated enough to conceive the splendour of Vertue in her Native Purity As Plutarch complains that in his time some Attributed the cause of the Younger Cato's Death to his Fear of Caesar at which he seems very Angry and with good reason and by that a Man may guess how much more he would have been offended with those who have Attributed it to Ambitious Senceless People He would rather have perform'd a handsome just and generous Action and to have had Ignominy for his Reward than for Glory That Man was in truth a Pattern that Nature chose out to shew to what height Humane Vertue and Constancy could arrive but I am not capable of handling so Noble an Argument and shall therefore only set Five Latine Poets together by the Ears who has done best in the praise of Cato and inclusively for their own too Now a Man well Read in Poetry will think the two first in comparison of the others a little Flat and Languishing the Third more Vigorous but overthrown by the Extravagancy of his own force He will then think that there will be yet room for one or two Gradations of Invention to come to the Fourth but coming to mount the pitch of that he will lift up his Hands for admiration the last the first by some space but a space that he will swear is not to be fill'd up by any Humane Wit he will be astonish'd he will not know where he is These are Wonders We have more Poets than Judges and Interpreters of Poetry It is easier to Write an indifferent Poem than to Understand a good one There is indeed a certain low and moderate sort of Poetry that a Man may well enough judg by certain Rules of Art but the true supream and divine Poesie is equally above all Rules and Reason And whoever discerns the Beauty of it with the most assured and most steady sight sees no more than the quick reflection of a Flash of Lightning This is a sort of Poesie that does not exercise but ravishes and overwhelms our Judgment The Fury that possesses him who is able to penetrate into it wounds yet a Third Man by hearing him repeat it Like a Loadstone that not only attracts the Needle but also infuses into it the Vertue to attract others And it is more evidently Eminent upon our Theatres that the Sacred Inspiration of the Muses having first stirr'd up the Poet to Anger Sorrow Hatred and out of himself to whatever they will does moreover by the Poet possess the Actor and by the Actor consecutively all the Spectators So much do our Passions hang and depend upon one another Poetry has ever had that power over me from a Child to Transpierce and Transport me But this quick resentment that is Natural to me has been variously handled by variety of Forms not so much higher and lower for they were ever the highest of every kind as differing in Colour First a Gay and Spritely Fluency afterwards a Lofty and Penetrating Subtilty and lastly a Mature and Constant Force Their Names will better express them Ovid Lucan Virgil. But our Poets are beginning their Career Sit Cato dum vivit sane vel Caesare Major Let Cato's Fame Whilst he shall Live Eclipse great Caesar's Name Says one Et invictum devicta Morte Catonem And Cato fell Death being overcome invincible Says the Second And the Third speaking of the Civil Wars betwixt Caesar and Pompey Victrix causa Diis placuit sed Victa Catoni Heaven approves The Conquering Cause the Conquer'd Cato loves And the Fourth upon the Praises of Caesar Et Cuncta terrarum subjacta Praetor atrocem animum Catonis And Conquer'd all where e're his Eagle flew But Cato's Mind that nothing could subdue And the Master of the Quire after having set forth all the great Names of the greatest Romans ends thus His dantem jura Catonem Great Cato giving Laws to all the rest CHAP. XXXVII That we Laugh and Cry for the same thing WHen we Read in History that Antigonus was very much displeas'd with his Son for presenting him the Head of King Pyrrhus his Enemy but newly Slain Fighting against him and that seeing it he wept That Rene Duke of Lorraine also Lamented the Death of Charles Duke of Burgundy whom he had himself Defeated and appear'd in Mourning at his Funeral And that in the Battel of Auroy which Count Montfort obtain'd over Charles de Blois his Concurrent for the Dutchy of Brittany the Conquerour meeting the Dead Body of his Enemy was very much Afflicted at his Death we must not presently Cry out Et cosi auen che l' animo ciascuna Sua Passion sotto el contrario manto Ricopre con la vista hor'chiara hor bruna That every one whether of Joy or Woe The Passion of their Mind can palliate so As when most Griev'd to shew a Count'nance clear And Melancholick when best pleas'd t' appear When Pompey's Head was presented to Caesar the Histories tell us that he turn'd away his Face as from a sad and unpleasing Object There had been so long an Intelligence and Society betwixt them in the management of the Publick Affairs so great a Community of Fortunes so many mutual Offices and so near an Alliance that this Countenance of his ought not to suffer under any Misinterpretation or to be suspected for either False or Counterfeit as this other seems to believe Tutumque putavit Jam bonus esse socer lacrymas non sonte cadentes Effudit gemitusque expressit pectore laeto Non aliter manifesta putans abscondere mentis Gaudia quam Lacrymes And now he saw 'T was safe to be a Pious Father in Law He shed forc'd Tears and from a Joyful Breast Fetch'd Sighs and Groans conceiving Tears would best Conceal his Inward Joy For though it be true that the greatest part of our Actions are no other than Vizor and Disguise
Letters will render their names as known and famous as their own publick actions themselves could do And besides this difference these are not Idle and empty Letters that contain nothing but a fine Gingle of well chosen Words and fine Coucht phrases but rather repleat and abounding with Grave and Learn'd Discourses by which a Man may render himself not more Eloquent but more Wise and that instruct us not to speak but to do well A way with that Eloquence that so enchants us with its Harmony that we should more Study it than things Unless you will allow that of Cicero to be of so Supream a perfection as to form a compleat Body of it self And of him I shall further add one Story we read of him to this purpose wherein his nature will much more manifestly be laid open to us He was to make an Oration in publick and found himself a little straightned in time to fit his Words to his Mouth as he had a mind to do when Eros one of his Slaves brought him word that the audience was deferr'd till the next Day at which he was so ravisht with Joy that he enfranchis'd him for the good news Upon this subject of Letters I will add this more to what has been already said that it is a kind of Writing wherein my Friends think I can do something and I am willing to confess I should rather have chose to publish my Whimsies that way than any other had I had to whom to Write but I wanted such a settled Correspondency as I once had to attract me to it to raise my Fancy and to maintain the rest against me For to Traffick with the Wind as some others have done and to Forge vain Names to direct my Letters to in a serious subject I could never do it but in a Dream being a sworn Enemy to all manner of falsification I should have been more diligent and more confidently secure had I had a Judicious and Indulgent Friend to whom to address than thus to expose my self to various judgements of a whole People and I am deceiv'd if I had not succeeded better I have naturally a Comick and familiar Stile but it is a peculiar one and not proper for Publick business but like the Language I speak too Compact Irregular Abrubt and Singular and as to Letters of Ceremony that have no other substance than a fine contexture of courteous and obliging Words I am wholly to seek I have neither faculty nor relish for those tedious offers of Service and Affection I am not good natur'd to that degree and should not forgive my self should I offer more than I intend which is very remote from the present practice for there never was so abject and servile prostitution of tenders of Life Soul Devotion Adoration Vassal Slave and I cannot tell what as now all which expressions are so commonly and so indifferently Posted to and fro by every one and to every one that when they would profess a greater and more respective inclination upon more just occasions they have not wherewithal to express it I hate all air of Flattery to Death which is the cause that I naturally fall into a Shy Rough and crude way of speaking that to such as do not know me may seem a little to relish of disdain I Honour those most to whom I shew the least Honour and Respect and where my Soul moves with the greatest Cheerfulness I easily forget the Ceremonies of Look and Gesture I offer my self Faintly and Bluntly to them whose I effectually am and tender my self the least to him to whom I am the most devoted Methinks they should read it in my Heart and that my expression would but injure the Love I have conceived within To Welcome take Leave give Thanks Accost offer my Service and such verbal Formalities as the Laws of our modern civility enjoyn I know no Man so stupidly unprovided of Language as my self And have never been employ'd in Writing Letters of Favour and Recommendation that he in whose behalf it was did not think my mediation Cold and Imperfect The Italians are great Printers of Letters I do believe I have at least an hundred several Volumes of them of all which those of Hannibal Caro seem to me to be the best If all the Paper I have Scribled to the Ladies all the time when my Hand was really prompted by my Passion were now in being there might Peradventure be found a Page worthy to be communicated to our young enamorato's that are Besotted with that Fury I always Write my Letters Post and so precipitously that though I Write an intollerable ill Hand I rather choose to do it my self than to imploy another for I can find none able to follow me and never transcribe any but have accustomed the great ones that know me to endure my Blots and Dashes and upon Paper without Fold or Margent Those that cost me the most Pains are the worst of mine when I once begin to draw it in by Head and Shoulders 't is a sign that I am not there I fall too without premeditation or design the first word begets the second and so to the end of the Chapter The Letters of this Age consist more in fine Foldings and Prefaces than matter whereas I had rather Write two Letters than Close and Fold up one and always assign that employment to some other as also when the business of my Letter is dispatcht I would with all my heart transferr it to another Hand to add those long Harangues Offers and Prayers that we place at the Bottom and should be glad that some new custom would discharge us of that unnecessary trouble as also of superscribing them with a long Ribble-row of Qualities and Titles which for fear of mistakes I have several times given over Writing and especially to Men of the long Robe There are so many innovations of Offices that 't is hard to place so many Titles of Honour in their proper and due order which also being so dearly bought they are neither to be mistaken nor omitted without offence I find the same fault likewise with charging the fronts and Title Pages of the Books we commit to the Press with such a clutter of Titles CHAP. XL. That the Relish of Goods and Evils does in a great measure depend upon the opinion we have of them MEn says an ancient Greek Sentence are tormented with the Opinions they have of things and not by the things themselves It were a great Victory obtain'd for the relief of our miserable Humane Condition could this proposition be establish'd for certain and true throughout For if evils have no admission into us but by the judgement we our selves make of them it should seem that it is then in our own power to despise them or to turn them to good If things surrender themselves to our mercy why do we not convert and accommodate them to our advantage If what we call Evil and Torment
paces hurried them on full speed hoping in so short a Carreer both to look to their order to husband their breath and at the same time to give an advantage of violence and impression both to their persons and their missile Arms Others have regulated this question in charging thus if your Enemy come running upon you stand firm to receive him if he stand to receive you run full drive upon him In the expedition of the Emperour Charles the Fifth into Provence King Francis was put to choose either to go meet him in Italy or to expect him in his own Dominions wherein though he very well considered of how great advantage it was to preserve his own territories entire and clear from the troubles and inconveniences of the War to the end that being unexhausted of her stores it might continually supply Men and Money at need that the necessity of War requires at every turn to spoil and lay waste the Country before them which cannot very well be done upon ones own to which may be added that the Country people do not so easily digest such a havock by those of their own party as from an Enemy so that seditions and commotions might by such means be kindled amongst us that the Licence of Pillage and Plunder which are not to be tollerated at home is a great ease and refreshment against the fatigues and sufferings of War and that who has no other prospect of gain than his bare pay will hardly be kept from running home being but two steps from his Wife and his own House That he who lays the Cloath is ever at the charge of the Feast That there is more alacrity in assaulting than defending and that the shock of a Battels loss in our own Bowels is so violent as to endanger the disjointing of the whole Body there being no passion so contagious as that of fear that is so easily believ'd or that so suddenly diffuses its Poison and that the Cities that should hear the Rattle of this Tempest that should take in their Captains and Souldiers yet trembling and out of breath would be in danger in this heat and hurry to precipitate themselves upon some untoward resolution Notwithstanding all this so it was that he chose to recall the Forces he had beyond the Mountains and to suffer the Enemy to come to him For he might on the other side imagine that being at home and amongst his Friends he could not fail of plenty of all manner of conveniences the Rivers and Passes he had at his Devotion would bring him in both Provisions and Money in all security and without the trouble of Convoy that he should find his subjects by so much the more affectionate to him by how much their danger was more near and pressing that having so many Cities and stops to secure him it would be in his power to give the Law of Battel at his own opportunity and best advantage and if it pleas'd him to delay the time that under covert and at his own ease he might see his Enemy founder and defeat himself with the difficulties he was certain to encounter being engag'd in an Enemies Country where before behind and on every side War would be made upon him no means to refresh himself or to enlarge his Quarters should diseases infest them or to lodge his wounded Men in safety No Money no Victuals but all at the point of the Launce no leisure to repose and take breath no knowledge of the ways or Country to secure him from Ambushes and Surprizes And in case of losing a Battel no possible means of saving the remains Neither is their want of Example in both these cases Scipio thought it much better to go attacque his Enemies territories in Affrick than to stay at home to defend his own and to Fight him in Italy and it succeeded well with him But on the contrary Hannibal in the same War ruin'd himself by abandoning the conquest of a strange Country to go defend his own The Athenians having left the Enemy in their own Dominions to go over into Sicily were not favoured by Fortune in their design but Agathocles King of Syracuse found her favourable to him when he went over into Affrick and left the War at home By which Examples and divers others we are wont to conclude and with some reason that events especially in War do for the most part depend upon Fortune who will not be govern'd by nor submit unto humane prudence according to the Poet. Et male consultis pretium est prudentia fallax Nec fortuna probat causas sequiturque merentes Sed vaga per cunctos nullo discrimine fertur Silicet est aliud quod nos cogatque regatque Majus in proprias ducat mortalia leges Prudence deceitful and uncertain is Ill Counsels sometimes hit where good ones miss Nor yet does Fortune the best Cause approve But wildly does without distinction Rove So that some greater and more constant Cause Rules and Subjects us to more powerful Laws But if things hit right it should seem that our Counsels and Deliberations depend as much upon Fortune as any thing else we do and that she engages our very Reason and Arguments in her uncertainty and confusion We Argue rashly and adventurously says Timaeus in Plato by reason that as well as our selves our Discourses have great participation with the Temerity of Chance CHAP. XLVIII Of Horses drest to the Menage call'd Destriers I Am now become a Grammarian I who never Learn'd any Language but by Rote and who do not yet know Adjective Conjunction or Ablative I think I have Read that the Romans had a sort of Horses by them call'd Funales or Dextrarios which were either Led-Horses or Horses laid in at several Stages to be taken fresh upon occasion and thence it is that we call our Horses of Service Destriers And our Romances commonly use the Phrase of destrer for accompagner to accompany They also call'd such as were drest in such sort that running full speed side by side without Bridle or Saddle the Roman Gentlemen Arm'd at all peices would shift and throw themseves from the one to the other desultorios equos The Numidian Men at Arms had always a Led-Horse in one Hand besides that they Rode upon to change in the heat of Battel Quibus desultorum in modum binos trahentibus equos inter acerrimum saepe pugnam in recentem equum ex fesso armatis transultare mos erat Tanta velocitas ipsis tamque docile equorum genus Whose use it was leading along two Horses after the manner of the Desultorum Arm'd as they were in the heat of Fight to vault from a tir'd Horse to a fresh one so Active were the Men and the Horses to Decile There are many Horses train'd up to help their Riders so as to run upon any one that appears with a drawn Sword to fall both with Mouth and Heels upon any that front or oppose
they must of necessity rebound and blunt themselves meeting with a Body upon which they can fix no Impression the ordinary and middle condition of Men are lodg'd betwixt these two Extremities consisting of such who perceive Evils feel them and are not able to support them Infancy and Decrepitude meet in the imbecillity of the Brain Avarice and Profusion in the same thirst and desire of getting A Man may say with some colour of truth that there is an Abecedarian ignorance that precedes knowledge and a Doctoral Ignorance that comes after it an Ignorance that knowledge does create and beget at the same time that she dispatches and destroys the first Of mean understandings little inquisitive and little instructed are made good Christians who by reverence and obedience implicitely believe and are constant in their belief In the moderate understandings and the middle sort of capacities the error of Opinions is begot and they have some colour of reason on their side to impute our walking on in the old beaten path to simplicity and brutishness I mean in us who have not inform'd our selves by Study The higher and nobler Souls more solid and clear sighted make up another sort of true believers who by a long and Religious investigation of truth have obtain'd a clearer and more penetrating light into the Scriptures and have discover'd the Mysterious and Divine secret of our Ecclesiastical Polity And yet we see some who by this middle step are arriv'd to that supream degree with marvelous Fruit and Confirmation as to the utmost limit of Christian intelligence and enjoying their victory with great Spiritual consolation humble acknowledgment of the Divine favour examplary reformation of manners and Singular modesty I do not intend with these to rank some others who to clear themselves from all suspicion of their former Errours and to satisfie us that they are sound and firm to us render themselves extream indiscreet and unjust in the carrying on our Cause and by that means blemish it with infinite Reproaches of Violence and Oppression The simple Peasants are good People and so are the Philosophers Men of strong and clear Reason and whose Souls are enrich'd with an ample instruction of profitable Sciences The Mongrets who have disdain'd the first form of the Ignorance of Letters and have not been able to attain to the other sitting betwixt two Stools as I and a great many more of us do are dangerous foolish and importunate these are they that trouble the World And therefore it is that I for my own part retreat as much as I can towards my first and natural Station from whence I so vainly attempted to advance The vulgar and purely natural Poesie has in it certain Proprieties and Graces by which she may come into some comparison with the greatest Beauty of a Poesie perfected by Art As is evident in our Gascon Villanels and Songs that are brought us from Nations that have no knowledg of any manner of Science nor so much as the use of Writing The indifferent and middle sort of Poesie betwixt these two is dispis'd of no Value Honour or Esteem But seeing that the Ice being once broken and a Path laid open to the Fancy I have found as it commonly falls out that what we make choice of for a rare and difficult Subject proves to be nothing so and that after the invention is once warm it finds out an infinite number of parallel Examples I shall only add this one That were these Essays of mine considerable enough to deserve a Censure it might then I think fall out that they would not much take with common and vulgar Capacities nor be very acceptable to the singular and excellent sort of Men for the first would not understand them enough and the last too much and so they might hover in the middle Region CHAP. LV. Of Smells IT has been reported of others as well as of Alexander the Great that their Sweat exhal'd an Odoriferous Smell occasion'd by some rare and extraordinary constitution of which Plutarch and others have been inquisitive into the cause But the ordinary constitution of Humane Bodies is quite otherwise and their best and chiefest Excellency is to be exempt from Smells Nay the sweetness even of the purest Breaths has nothing in it of greater perfection than to be without any offensive Smell like those of healthful Children which made Plautus say Mulier tum bene olet ubi nihil olet That Woman we a sweet one call Whose Body breathes no Scent at all And such as make use of these exatick Perfumes are with good reason to be suspected of some Natural Imperfection which they endeavour by these Odours to conceal according to that of Mr. Johnson which without offence to Monsieur de Montaigne I will here presume to insert it being at least as well said as any of those he quotes out of the Ancient Poets Still to be Neat still to be Drest As you were going to a Feast Still to be Powder'd still Perfum'd Lady it is to be presum'd Though Arts hid causes are not found All is not sweet all is not sound As may be judg'd by these following Rides nos Coracime nil olentes Malo quam bene olere nil olere Because thou Coracinus still dost go With Musk and Ambergris perfumed so We under thy Contempt forsooth must fall I 'd rather than smell sweet not smell at all And elsewhere Posthume non bene olet qui bene semper olet He does not Naturally Smell well Who always of Perfumes does Smell I am nevertheless a strange lover of good Smells and as much abominate the ill ones which also I reach at a greater distance I think than other Men Namque sagacius unus odoror Polypus an gravis hirsutis cubet hircus in alis Quam canis acer ubi lateat sus For I can Smell a Putrid Polypus Or the Ranck Arm-pits of a Red-hair'd Fuss As soon as best Nos'd Hound the stinking Stie Where the Wild Boar does in the Forrest Lie Of Smells the simple and natural seem to be most pleasing Let the Ladies look to that for 't is chiefly their concern In the wildest parts of Barbary the Scythian Women after Bathing were wont to Powder and Crust their Faces and whole Bodies with a certain Odoriferous Drug growing in their own Territories which being cleans'd off when they came to have familiarity with Men they were found Perfum'd and Sleek 'T is not to be believ'd how strangely all sorts of Odours cleave to me and how apt my Skin is to imbibe them He that complains of Nature that she has not furnish'd Mankind with a Vehicle to convey Smells to the Nose had no reason for they will do it themselves especially to me My very Mustachio's perform that Office for if I stroak them but with my Gloves or Handkerchief the Smell will not out a whole Day They will Reproach me where I have been the close luscious
life which we pretend to purchase at the price of dying are of no manner of advantage to us That man evades war to very little purpose that can have no fruition of peace and as impertinently does he avoid labour and toile who cannot enjoy repose Amongst those of the first of these two opinions there has been great debate what occasions are sufficient to justifie the meditation of self-murther which they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a handsome Exit For though they say that men are often to dye for trivial causes seeing those that deteine us in life are of no very great weight yet there is to be some measure There are fantastick and sencelesse humors that have prompted not only particular men but whole Nations to destroy themselves of which I have elsewhere given some examples and we further read of the Milesian virgins that by a furious compact they hang'd themselves one after another till the Magistrate took order in it enacting that the bodies of such as should be found so hang'd should be drawn by the same halter starke naked through the City When Threicion persuaded Cleomenes to dispatch himself by reason of the ill posture of his affairs and having evaded a death of the most honor in the battail he had lost to accept of this the second in honor to it and not to give the Conquerors leisure to make him undergo either an ignominious death or an infamous life Cleomenes with a courage truly Stoick and Lacedaemonian rejected his Counsel as unmanly and poor that said he is a remedy that can never be wanting and which a man is never to make use of whilst there is an inch of hope remaining telling him that it was sometimes constancy and valour to live that he would that even his death should be of use to his Country and would make of it an act of honor and vertue Threicion notwithstanding thought himself in the right and did his own business and Cleomenes after did the same but not till he had first tried the utmost malevolence of fortune All the inconvenences in the world are not considerable enough that a man should die to evade them and besides there being so many so suddain and unexpected changes in humane things it is hard rightly to judg when we are at the end of our hope Sperat in saeva victus gladiator arena Sit licet infesto pollice turba minax The fencer conquer'd in the lists hopes on Though the Spectators point that he is gon All things says the old Adage are to be hop'd for by a man whilst he lives ay but replies Seneca why should this rather be always running in a mans head that Fortune can do all things for the living man than this that Fortune has no power over him that knows how to dye Josephus when engag'd in so near and apparent danger a whole People being violently bent against him that there was no visible means of escape neverthelesse being as himself says in this extreamity counsell'd by Simon one of his faithful Guards to dispatch himself it was well for him that he yet maintain'd himself in some hope for fortune diverted the accident beyond all humane expectation so that he saw himself deliver'd without any manner of inconvenience Whereas Brutus and Cassius on the contrary threw away the remains of the Roman liberty of which they were the sole Protectors by the precipitation and temerity wherewith they kill'd themselves before the due time and a just occasion Monsieur d' Anguien at the Battel of Cerisolles twice attempted to run himself through despairing of the fortune of the day which went indeed very untowardly on that side of the Feild where he was engag'd and by that precipitation was very near depriving himself of the joy and honor of so brave a Victory I have seen a hundred Hares escape out of the very teeth of the Grey-hounds Aliquis carnifici suo superstes fuit Some have surviv'd their Executioners Multa dies variúsque labor mutabilis aevi Rettulit in melius multos alterna revisens Lusit in solido rursus fortuna locavit Much time and labour often does translate Life's mutability t' a better state Now fortune turning shews a reverse face And then again in solid joy does place Pliny says there are three sorts of diseases to escape any of which a man has good title to destroy himself the worst of which is the stone in the bladder when the urine is supprest Seneca says those only which for a long time discompose the functions of the Soul And some there have been who to avoid a worse have chosen one to their own liking Democritus General of the Aetolians being brought prisoner to Rome found means to make his escape by night but close pursu'd by his keepers rather than suffer himself to be retaken he fell upon his own sword and died Antinous and Theodotus their City of Epirus being reduct by the Romans to the last extremity gave the People counsel generally to kill themselves but the advice of giving themselves up to the armes of the Enemy prevayling they went to seek the death they desir'd rushing furiously upon the Enemy with an intention to strike home but not to defend a blow The Isle Gosa forc't some years ago by the Turks a Sicilian who had two beautiful daughters marriagable kill'd them both with his own hand and their mother running in to save them to boot Which having done sallying out of the House with a cros-bow and a harquebuze with those two shoots he kill'd two of the first Turks nearest to his door and drawing his sword charg'd furiously in amongst the rest where he was suddainly enclos'd and cut to peices By that means delivering his family and himself from slavery and dishonor The Jewish women after having circumciz'd their Children threw themselves down a Precipice to avoid the cruelty of Antigonus I have been told of a prisoner of condition in one of our prisons that his friends being inform'd he would certainly be condemn'd to avoid the ignominy of such a death suborn'd a Preist to tell him that the only means of his deliverance was to recommend himself to such a Saint under such and such vowes and fast eight days togeather without taking any manner of nourishment what ever what weakeness or faintness so ever he might find in himself during the time he follow'd their advice and by that means destroid himself before he was aware not dreaming of death or any danger in the Experiment Scribonia advising her Nephew Libo to kill himself rather than to attend the stroke of Justice told him that it was properly to do others Peoples business to preserve his life to put it after into the hands of those who within three or four days would come fetch him to execution and that it was to serve his Enemies to keep hi◠blood to gratifie their malice We read in the Bible that Nicanor
the persecutor of the Law of God having sent his Souldiers to seize upon the good old man Razis sirnam'd in honor of his vertue the Father of the Jews the good man seeing no other remedy his Gates burnt down and the Enemies ready to seize him choosing rather to dye generously than to fall into the hands of his wicked adversaries and suffer himself to be cruelly butcher'd by them contrary to the honor of his ranck and quality he stabb'd himself with his own sword but the blow for hast not having been given home he ran and threw himself from the top of a wall headlong among them who separating themselves and making room he pitcht directly upon his head Notwithstanding which feeling yet in himself some remains of life he renu'd his courage and starting up upon his feet all bloody and wounded as he was and making his way through the Crowd through one of his wounds drew out his bowells which tearing and pulling to pieces with both his hands he threw amongst his pursuers all the while attesting and invoking the Divine vengeance upon them for their cruelty and injustice Of violences offer'd to the conscience that against the chastity of woman is in my opinion most to be evaded for as much as there is a certain pleasure naturally mixt with it and for that reason the dissent cannot therein be sufficiently perfect and entire so that the violence seems to bee mix't with a little consent of the forc't party The Ecclesiastical History has several examples of devout persons who have embrac't death to secure them from the outrages prepar'd by Tyrants against their Religion and honor Pelagia and Sophronia both Canoniz'd the first of these precipitated herself with her mother and sisters into the river to avoid being forc't by some Souldiers and the last also kill'd herself to evade being ravish't by the Emperor Maxentius It may peradventure be an honor to us in future Ages that a learned Author of this present time and a Parisian takes a great deal of pains to persuade the Ladies of our age rather to take any other course than to enter into the horrid meditation of such a despaire I am sorry he had never heard that he might have inserted it amongst his others stories the saying of a woman which was told me at Tholouze who had past thorough the handling of some Souldiers God be prais'd said she that once at least in my life I have had my fill without sin I must confess these cruelties are very unworthy the French sweetness and good nature and also God be thanked the air is very well purg'd of it since this good advice 't is enough that they say no in doing it according to the Rule of the good Marot History is every where full of such as after a thousand ways have for death exchanged a painful and irksome Life Lucius Arruntius kill'd himself to fly he said both the future and the past Granius Silvanus and Statius Proximus after having been pardoned by Nero kill'â— themselves either disdaining to live by the favour of so Wicked a man or that they might not be troubled at some other time to obtain 〈◊〉 second Pardon considering the proclivity and faculties of his Nature to suspect and credit accusations against worthy men Spargapize's the 〈◊〉 of Queen Tomyris being a Prisoner of War 〈◊〉 Cyrus made use of the first favour Cyrus shew'â— him in commanding him to be unbound to kill himself having pretended to no other beâ—nefit of liberty but only to be reveng'd of himselâ— for the disgrace of being taken Bogez Governor in Eion for King Xerxes being beseigeâ—â— by the Athenian Arms under the conduct 〈◊〉 Cimon refused the conditions offered that 〈◊〉 might safe return into Asia with all his wealthâ— impatient to survive the loss of a place his Masteâ— had given him to keep wherefore having defended the City to the last extremity nothinâ— being left to eat he first threw all the Gold and what ever else the Enemy could make bootâ— of into the River Strymon and after causing 〈◊〉 great pile to be set on fire and the throats 〈◊〉 all the Women Children Concubines and Serâ—vants to be cut he threw their Bodies into thâ— fire and at last leapt into it himself Ninacheâ—tuen an Indian Lord so soon as he heard thâ— first whisper of the Portugal Vice-Roy's determiâ—nation to dispossess him without any apparent cause of the Command in Malaca to transâ—fer it to the King of Campar he took this resoâ—lution with himself He caus'd a scaffold more long than broad to be erected supported by Columns royally adorn'd with tapestry and strewd with flowers and abundance of perfumes All which being thus prepar'd in a Robe of cloth of Gold set full of Jewels of great value he came out into the street and mounted the Steps to the Scaffold at one corner of which he had a pile lighted of Aromatick wood Every body ran to the novelty to see to what end these unusual preparations were made When Ninachetuen with a manly but discontented countenance began to remonstrate how much he had oblig'd the Portuguese Nation and with how unspotted fidelity he had carried himself in his Charge that having so often with his sword in his hand manifested in the behalf of others that honor was much more dear to him than life he was not to abandon the concern of it for himself that Fortune denying him all means of opposing the affront was design'd to be put upon him his courage at least enjoyn'd him to free himself from the sence of it and not to serve for a fable to the People nor for a tryumph to Men less deserving than himself which having said he leapt into the Fire Sextilia the wife of Scaurus and Praxea the wife of Labeo to encourage their husbands to evade the dangers that prest upon them wherein they had no other share than meer conjugal affection voluntarily expos'd their own lives to serve them in this extream necessity for company and example What they did for their husbands Cocceius Nerva did for his Country with less utility though with equal affection This great Lawyer flourishing in health riches reputation and favour with the Emperor had no other cause to kill himself but the sole compassion of the miserable Estate of the Roman Republick Nothing can be added to the nicety of the death of the wife of Fulvius a familiar favourite of Augustus Augustus having discover'd that he had vented an important secret he had intrusted him withal one morning that he came to make his Court receiv'd him very coldly and lookt frowningly upon him He returns home full of despaire where he sorrowfully told his wife that being fall'n into this misfortune he was resolv'd to kill himself To which she roundly replied 't is but reason you should seeing that having so often experimented the incontinency of my tongue you could not learn nor take warning but let me kill my self first and without
and share whilst he keeps his Keys in his Bosom much more carefully than his Eyes Whilst he hugs himself with the Frugality of the pitiful pittance of a wretched and niggardly Table every thing goes to wrack and ruin in every Corner of his House in play drink all sorts of profusion making sports in their Junkets with his vain Anger and fruitless Parsimony Every one is a Centinel against him and if by accident any wretched Fellow that serves him is of another humour and will not joyn with the rest he is presently rendred suspected to him a Bait that old Age very easily bites at of its self How oft has this Gentleman boasted to me in how great awe he kept his Family and how exact an Obedience and Reverence they paid him How clearly did this man see into his own Affairs Ille solus nescit omnia I do not know any one that can muster more Parts both natural and acquir'd proper to maintain such a dominion than he yet he is faln from it like a Child For this reason it is that I have pickt out Him amongst several others that I know of the same humour for the greatest Example It were matter sufficient for a Question in the Schools Whether he is better thus or otherwise In his Presence all submit to and bow before him and give so much way to his vanity that no body ever resists him he has his belly full of Cringe and all postures of Fear Submission and Respect Does he turn away a Servant he packs up his bundle and is gone but 't is no further than just out of his sight the Pace of old Age is so slow and the Sence is so weak and troubled that he will live and do his old Office in the same House a year together without being perceiv'd And after a fit interval of time Letters are pretended to come a great way off from I know not where very humble suppliant and full of promises of amendment by vertue of which he is again receiv'd into favour Does Monsieur make any Bargain or send away any Dispatch that does not please 't is supprest and Causes now afterward forg'd to excuse the want of Execution in the one or Answer in the other No strange Letters being first brought to him he never sees any but those that shall seem fit for his knowledge If by accident they fall first into his own hand being us'd to trust some body to read them to him he reads extempore what he thinks fit and very often makes such a one ask him pardon who abuses and rails at him in his Letter Finally he sees nothing but by an Image prepar'd and design'd before-hand and the most satisfactory they can invent not to rouze and awake his ill Humour and Choler I have seen enow differing Forms of Oeconomy long constant and of like effect Women especially the perverse and elder sort are evermore addicted to cross their Husbands They lay hold with both hands on all occasions to contradict and oppose them and the first excuse serves for a plenary Justification I have seen who has grosly purloynd from her Husband that as she told her Confessor she might distribute the more liberal Alms Let who will trust to that Religious Dispensation No management of Affairs seems to them of sufficient Dignity if proceeding from the Husband's assent they must usurp either by Insolence or Cunning and always injuriously or else it has not the Grace of Authority they desire When as in the case I am speaking of 't is against a poor Old man and for the Children than they make use of this Title to serve their Passion with Glory and as in a common Servitude easily monopolize against his Government and Dominion If they be Males grown up and flourishing they presently corrupt either by force or favour both Steward Receivers and all the Rout. Such as have neither Wife nor Son do not so easily fall into this misfortune but withal more cruelly and undeservingly Cato the elder in his time said So many Servants so many Enemies Consider then whether according to the vast difference betwixt the purity of the Age he liv'd in and the corruption of this of ours he does not seem to advertise us that Wife Son and Servant so many Enemies to us 'T is well for old Age that it is always accompanied with Stupidity Ignorance and a facility of being deceiv'd for should we see how we are us'd and would not acquiesce what would become of us especially in such an Age as this where the very Judges who are to determine are usually partial to the young in any Cause that comes before them In case that the discovery of this Cheat escape me I cannot at least fail to discern that I am very fit to be cheated and can a man ever enough speak the value of a Friend in comparison with these civil tyes The very Image of it which I see so pure and uncorrupted in Beasts how religiously do I respect it If others deceive me yet do I not at least deceive my self in thinking I am able to defend me from them or in cudgeling my Brains to make my self so I protect my self from such Treasons in my own Bosom not by an unquiet and tumultuary Curiosity but rather by Mirth and Resolution When I hear talk of any ones Condition I never trouble my self to think of him I presently turn my Eyes upon my self to see in what condition I am what ever concerns another relates to me The Accident that has befaln him gives me Caution rouzes me to turn my Defence that way We every day and every hour say things of another that we might more properly say of our selves could we but revert our Observation to our own Concerns as well as extend it to others And several Authors have in this manner prejudic'd their own Cause by running headlong upon those they attack and darting those Shafts against their Enemies that are more properly and with greater advantage to be return'd upon them The last Mareschal de Monlue having lost his Son who was slain at the Isle of Madera in truth a very brave Gentleman and of great expectation did to me amongst his other Regrets very much insist upon what a Sorrow and Heart-breaking it was that he had never made himself familiar and acquainted with him and by that humour of Fatherly Gravity and Sowrness to have lost the opportunity of having an insight into and of well knowing his Son as also of letting him know the extream affection he had for him and the worthy opinion he had of his Vertue That poor Boy said he never saw in me other than a stern and disdainful Countenance and is gone in a belief that I neither knew how to love nor esteem him according to his desert For whom did I reserve the discovery of that singular Affection I had for him in my Soul Was it not he himself who ought to have
had all the pleasure of it and all the Obligation I forc'd and rack'd my self to put on and maintain this vain Disguise and have by that means depriv'd my self of the pleasure of his Conversation and I doubt in some measure his Affection which could not but be very cold towards me having never other from me than Austerity nor felt other than a tyrannical manner of proceeding I find this Complaint to be rational and rightly apprehended for as I my self know by too cortain Experience there is no so sweet Consolation in the loss of Friends as the conscience of having had no reserve of secret for them and to have had with them a perfect and entire Communication Oh my Friend am I the better for being sensible of this or am I the worse I am doubtless much the better I am consolated and honoured in the sorrow for his death Is it not a pious and a pleasing Office of my Life to be always upon my Friends Obsequies Can there be any joy equal to this Privation I open my self to my Family as much as I can and very willingly let them know in what estate they are in my opinion and good will as I do every body else I make haste to bring out and expose my self to them for I will not have them mistaken in me in any thing Amongst other particular Customs of our ancient Gauls this as Caesar reports was one That the Sons never presented themselves before their Fathers nor durst never appear in their company in publick till they began to bear Arms as if they would intimate by that that it was also time for their Fathers to receive them into their familiarity and acquaintance I have observ'd yet another sort of Indiscretion in Fathers of my time That not contented with having depriv'd their Children during their own long lives of the share they naturally ought to have had in their Fortunes they afterwards leave to their Wives the same Authority over their Estates and Liberty to dispose of them according to their own fancy And have known a certain Lord one of the principal Officers of the Crown who having in his prospect by right of succession above Fifty thousand Crowns yearly Revenue died necessitous and overwhelm'd with debt at above fifty years of age his Mother in his extreamest decrepitude and necessity being yet in possession of all his Goods by the Will of his Father who had for his part liv'd till near Fourscore years Old This appears by no means reasonable to me And therefore I think it of very little advantage to a man whose Affairs are well enough to seek a Wife that will charge his Estate with too great a Joynture There being no sort of foreign Debt or Encumbrance that brings greater and more frequent ruin to Estates and Families than that My Predecessors have ever been aware of that danger and provided against it and so have I But these who dissuade us from rich Wives for fear they should be less tractable and kind are out in their Advice to make a man lose a real Convenience for so frivolous a Conjecture It costs an unreasonable Woman no more to pass over one Reason than another They love but where they have the most wrong Injustice allures them as the Honour of their vertuous Actions does the good and the more Riches they bring with them they are by so much the more gentle and sweet Natur'd as women who are fair are more inclin'd and proud to be chast 'T is reasonable to leave the administration of Affairs to the Mothers during the minority of the Children but the Father has brought them up very ill if he cannot hope that when they come to Maturity they will have more Wisdom and Dexterity in the management of Affairs than his Wife considering the ordinary Weakness of the Sex It were notwithstanding to say the truth more against Nature to make the Mothers depend upon the Discretion of their Children They ought to be plentifully provided for to maintain themselves according to their Quality and Age by reason that Necessity is much more indecent and insupportable to them than to men and therefore the Son is rather to be cut short than the Mother In general the most judicious Distribution of our Goods when we come to dye is in my Opinion to let them be distributed according to the Custom of the Country The Laws have considered it better than we know how to do and 't is better to let them fail in their Election than rashly to run the hazard of miscarrying in ours Neither are they properly ours since by a Civil Prescription and without us they are all judg'd to certain Successors And although we have some liberty beyond that yet I think we ought not without great and manifest cause to take away that from one which his Fortune has allotted him and to which the publick Equity gives him Title and that it is against reason to abuse this liberty in making it to serve our own frivilous and private Fancies My Destiny has been kind to me in not preventing me with Occasions to tempt and divert my Affection from the common and legitimate Institution I see well enough with whom 't is time lost to employ a long Diligence of Good Offices A word ill taken obliterates ten years merit and he is happy who is in place to oyle their Good Will at this last Passage The last Action carries it Not the best and most frequent Offices but the most recent and present do the Work These are people that play with their Wills as with Apples and Rods to gratifie or chastise every Action of these that pretend to an Interest in their Care 'T is a thing of too great weight and consequence to be so tumbled and tost and alter'd every moment And wherein the Wise men of the World determin once for all having therein above all things a regard to reason and the publick observance We also lay these Masculine Substitutions too much to heart proposing a ridiculous Eternity to our Names And are moreover too superstitious in the vain Conjectures of the future which we derive from the little Observations we make of the Words and Actions of Children Peradventure they might have done me an injustice in dispossessing me of my Right for having been the most dull and heavy the most slow and unwilling at my Book not of all my Brothers only but of all the Boys in the whole Province Whether about learning my Lesson or any other bodily Exercise 'T is a folly to make an extraordinary Election upon the Credit of these Divinations wherein we are so often deceived If the Rule of Primogeniture were to be violated and the Destinies corrected in the Choice they have made of our Heirs one might more plausibly do it upon the account of some enormous personal Deformity a constant and incorrigible Vice and in the opinion of us French who are great admirers of Beauty
in all sorts of Literature who was as I take it the Son of that great Labienus the chiefest of Caesar's Captains in the Wars of Gaule and who afterwards siding with Pompey the Great so valiantly maintained his Cause till he was by Caesar defeated in Spain This Labienus of whom I am now speaking had several Enemies who were emulous of his Vertue and 't is likely the Courtiers and Minions of the Emperour of his time who were very angry at and displeas'd with his Freedom and Paternal Humours which he yet retain'd against Tyranny with which it is to be suppos'd he had tincted his Books and Writings His Adversaries before the Magistracy of Rome prosecuted several Pieces he had publish't and prevail'd so far against him as to have them condemn'd to the Fire It was in him that this new Example of Punishment was begun which was afterwards continued against several others at Rome to punish even Writing and Studies with Death There would not be means and matter enough of Cruelty did we not mix with them things that Nature has exempted from all Sense and Suffering as Reputation and the Products of Wit and communicate Corporal Punishments to the Learning and Monuments of the Muses Now Labienus could not suffer this loss nor survive these his so dear Issue and therefore caus'd himself to be convey'd and shut up alive in the Monument of his Ancestors where he made shift to kill and bury himself at once 'T is hard to shew a more violent Paternal Affection than this Cassius Severus a Man of great Eloquence and his very intimate Friend seeing his Books burnt cry'd out That by the same Sentence they should as well condemn him to the Fire too being that he carried in his Memory all that they contain'd The like Accident befel Geruntius Cordus who being accus'd for having in his Books commended Brutus and Cassius that dirty servile and degenerated Senate and worthy a worse Master than Tiberius condemned his Writings to the Flame He was willing to bear them Company and kil'd himself with Fasting The good Lucan being condemn'd by that Beast Nero at the last gasp of his Life when the greater part of his Blood was already gone by the Veins of his Arms which he had caus'd his Physitian to open to make him dye and that the cold had seiz'd of all his Extremities and began to approach his Vital Parts the last thing he had in his Memory was some of the Verses of his Battle of Pharsalia which he repeated and and dyed with them in his Mouth What was this but taking a Tender and Paternal Leave of his Children in imitation of the Valedictions and Embraces wherewith we part with ours when we come to dye and an effect of that Natural Inclination that suggests to our remembrance in this Extremity those things which were dearest to us during the time of our Life Can we believe that Epicurus who as he says himself dying of intolerable Pains of the Chollick had all his Consolation in the Beauty of the Doctrine he left behind him could have received the same satisfaction from many Children though never so well educated had he had them as he did from the issue of so many rich and admirable Writings Or that had it been in his choice to have left behind him a deform'd and untoward Child or a foolish and ridiculous Book he or any other Man of his Understanding would not rather have chose to have run the first Misfortune than the other It had been for example peradventure an Impiety in St. Austin if on the one hand it had been propos'd to him to bury his Writings from which Religion has receiv'd so great Advantage or on the other to bury his Children had he had them had he not rather chose to bury his Children had he had them had he not rather chose to bury his Children And I know not whether I had not much rather have begot a very Beautiful one thorough my Society with the Muses than by lying with my Wife To this such as it is what I give it I give absolutely and irrevocably as Men do to their bodily Children That little I have done for it is no more at my own dispose It may know many things that are gone from me and from me keep that which I have not retain'd And that as a Stranger I might borrow thence should I stand in need If I am wiser than my Book it is richer than I. There are few Men addicted to Poetry who would not be much Prouder to be Father to the Aeneid than to the hansomest and best fashion'd Youth of Rome and that would not much better bear the loss of the one than the other For according to Aristotle the Poet of all sorts of Artificers is the fondest of his Work 'T is hard to believe that Epaminondas who boasted that in lieu of all Posterity he left two Daughters behind him which would one day do their Father Honour meaning the two Victories he obtain'd over the Lacedemonians would willingly have consented to exchange those for the most Beautiful Creature of all Greece Or that Alexander or Caesar ever wish't to be depriv'd of the Grandeur of their Glorious Exploits in War for the conveniency of Children and Heirs how perfect and accomplish't soever Nay I make a great Question whether Phidias or any other excellent Statuary would be so solicitous of the Preservation and Continuance of his Natural Children as he would be of a rare Statue which with long labour and study he had perfected according to Art And to those furious and irregular Passions that have sometimes flam'd in Fathers towards their own Daughters and in Mothers towards their own Sons the like is also found in this other sort of Parentry Witness what is related of Pygmalion who having made the Statue of a Woman of singular Beauty fell so passionately in love with this Work of his that the Gods in favour of his Passion must inspire it with Life Tentatum mollescit ebur positóque rigore Subsidit digitis The tempted Ivory Pliant grows and now Under his wanton Touch does yield and bow CHAP. IX Of the Arms of the Parthians 'T Is an ill custom and a little unmanly the Gentlemen of our time have got not to put on their Arms but just upon the point of the most extream necessity and to lay them by again so soon as ever there is any shew of the Danger being a little over from whence many Disorders arise For every one bustling and running to his Arms just when he should go to Charge has his Cuirass to buckle on when his Companions are already put to rout Our Ancestors were wont to give their Head-piece Lance and Gantlets to carry but never put off the other Pieces so long as there was any work to be done Our Troops are now comber'd and render'd unsightly with the clutter of Baggage and Servants that cannot be from their Masters
those that are visible Sebonde applyed himself to this laudable and noble Study and demonstrates to us that there is not any part or member of the World that disclaims or derogates from its Maker It were to do a Wrong to the Divine Bounty did not the Universe consent to our Belief The Heavens the Earth the Elements our Bodies and our Souls all these concur to this if we can but find out the way to use them For this World is a Sacred Temple into which Man is introduced there to contemplate Statues not the Works of a Mortal Hand but such as the Divine Purpose has made the Objects of Sence the Sun the Stars the Waters and the Earth to represent those that are intelligible to us The invisible things of God says St. Paul appear by the Creation of the World his Eternal Wisdom and Divinity being considered by his Works Atque adeo faciem caeli mon invidet orbi Ipse Deus vultusque suus corpusque recludit Sempér volvendo Séque ipsum inculcat offert Vt benè cognosci possit doceátque videndo Qualis eat doceatque suas attendere leges And God himself envies not Men the Grace Of seeing and admiring Heaven's Face But rowling it about does still anew Object its Face and Body to our view And in t ' our Minds himself inculcates so That we may well the mighty Moover know Instructing us by seeing him the cause Of all to rev'rence and obey his Laws Now our Prayers and Humane Discourses are but as Steril and undigested Matter The Grace of God is the Form 'T is that which gives fashion and value to it As the vertuous Actions of Socrates and Cato remain vain and fruitless for not having had the Love and Obedience of the true Creator of all things for their End and Object and for not having known God So is it with our Imaginations and Discourses they have a kind of Body but it is an inform Mass without Fashion and without Light if Faith and Grace be not added to it Faith coming to tinct and illustrate Sebonde's Arguments renders them firm and solid and to that degree that that they are capable of serving for Directions and of being the first Guides to an Elementary Christian to put him into the way of this Knowledge They in some measure form him to and render him capable of the Grace of God by which means he afterward compleats and perfects himself in the true Belief I know a Man of Authority bred up to Letters who has confest to me to have been reduced from the Errors of Miscreancy by Sebonde's Arguments And should they be stripped of this Ornament and of the Assistance and Approbation of the Holy Faith and be looked upon as mere Humane Fancies only to contend with those who are precipitated into the dreadful and horrible Darkness of Irreligion they will even there find them as solid and firm as any others of the same Quality than can be opposed against them so that we shall be ready to say to our Opponents Si melius quid habes accerse vel imperium fer If you have Arguments more fit Produce them or to these submit Let them admit the force of our Reasons or let them shew us others and upon some other Subject better woven and a finer Thread I am unawares half engaged in the second Objection to which I propos'd to make answer in the behalf of Sebonde Some say that his Arguguments are weak and unable to make good what he intends and undertake with great ease to confute them These are to be a little more roughly handled for they are more dangerous and malicious than the first Men willingly wrest the sayings of others to favour their own prejudicate Opinions to an Atheist all Writings tend to Atheism he corrupts the most Innocent Matter with his own Venom these have their Judgments so prepossest that they cannot relish Sebonde's Reasons As to the rest they think we make them very fair play in putting them into the Liberty of our Religion with Weapons merely Human which in her Majesty full of Authority and Command they durst not attack The means that I shall use and that I think most proper to subdue this Frenzy is to crush and spurn under foot Pride and Human Fierceness to make them sensible of the Inanity Vanity and Vileness of Man To wrest the wretched Arms of their Reason out of their Hands to make them bow down and bite the Ground under the Authority and Reverence of the Divine Majesty 'T is to that alone that Knowledge and Wisdom appertain that alone that can make a true Estimate of it self and from which we purloin whatever we value our selves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God not permits that any one would be More wise than he Let us subdue this Presumption The first Foundation of this Tyranny of the Evil Spirit Deus superbis resistit Humilibus autem dat gratiam God resists the Proud but gives Grace to the Humble Understanding is in all the Gods says Plato and not at all or very little in Men. Now it is in the mean time a great Consolation to a Christian Man to see our Frail and Mortals Parts so fitly suited to our Holy and Divine Faith that when we employ them to the Subjects of their own Mortal and Frail Nature they are not even there more equally or more firmly adjusted Let us see then if Man hath in his power other more forcible and convincing Reasons than those of Sebonde That is to say if it be in him to arrive at any certainty by Arguments and Reasons For St. Augustin disputing against the people has good cause to reproach them with Injustice in that they maintain the part of our Belief to be false that our Reason cannot establish And to shew that a great many things may be and may have been of which our Nature could not sound the Reason and Causes he proposes to them certain known and undoubted Experiments wherein Men confess they see nothing and this he does as all other things with a curious and ingenious Inquisition We must do more than this and make them know that to convince the weakness of their Reason there is no necessity of culling out rare Examples And that it is so defective and so blind that there is no so clear Facility clear enough for it that to it the easie and the hard is all alone that all Subjects equally and Nature in general disclaims its Authority and rejects its Mediation What does Truth mean when she preaches to us to fly wordly Philosophy when she so often inculcates to us That our Wisdom is but Folly in the sight of God That the vainest of all Vanities is Man That the Man who presumes upon his Wisdom does not yet know what Wisdom is and that Man who is nothing if he think himself to be any thing does seduce and deceive himself These Sentences
spoken of Criminals when they find the Judges in a good Humour gentle and mild Gaudeat de bona fortuna Let him rejoyce in his good Forune is much in use For it is most certain that Mens Judgments are sometimes more prone to Condemnation more sharp and severe and at others more facile easie and inclin'd to excuse He that carries with him from his House the pain of the Gout Jealousie or Theft by his Man having his whole Soul possest with Grief and Anger it is not to be doubted but that his Judgment will lean this way That venerable Senate of the Areopagites was want to hear and determine by night for fear lest the sight of the Parties might corrupt their Justice The very Air it self and the Serenity of Heaven will cause some mutation in us according to these Greek Verses in Cicero Tales sunt hominum mentes quali pater ipse Juppiter auctifera lustravit lampade terras The Minds of Men do in the Weather share Dark or serene as the day 's foul or fair 'T is not only Feavers Debauches and great Accident◠that overthrow our Judgments the least things in the World will do it We are not to doubt though we are not sensible of it but that if a continued Feaver can overwhelm the Soul a Tertian will in some proportionate measure alter it If an Apoplexy can stupifie and totally extinguish the sight of our Understanding we are not to doubt but that a great Cold will dazzle it And consequently there is hardly one single hour in a Man's whole Life wherein our Judgment is in its due place and right condition our Bodies being subject to so many continual mutations and stuffed with so many several sorts of Springs and Devices that I believe Physicians how hard it is but that there must be always some one or other out of order As to what remains this Malady does not very easily discover it self unless it be extream and past remedy Forasmuch as reason goes always lame halting and that as well with Falshood as with Truth and therefore 't is hard to discover her Deviations and Mistakes I always call that appearance of meditation which every one forges in himself reason This reason of the condition of which there may be a hundred contrary ones about one and the same Subject is an Instrument of Lead and of Wax ductile plyable and accommodable to all sorts of Bias's and to all Measures so that nothing remains but the Art and Skill how to turn and mould it How uprightly soever a Judge may resolve to demean himself if he be not well look'd to himself which few are careful to do his Inclination to Friendship to Relation to Beauty or Revenge and not only things of that weight but even the fortuitous instinct that makes us favour one thing more than another and that without the Reasons leave puts the Choice upon us in two equal Subjects or some Shadow of like Vanity may insensibly insinuate into his Judgment the recommendation or disfavour of a Cause and make the Ballance dip I that watch my self as narrowly as I can and that have my Eyes continually bent upon my self like one that has no great business elsewhere to do quis sub Areto Rex gelidae mettatur orae Quid Tyridatem terreat unicè Securus secure whatever King Does rule the stubborn North or whatso'ere The mighty Tiridates puts in fear Dare hardly tell the Vanity and Weakness I find in my self My Foot is so unstable and stands so tickle I find myself so apt to totter and reele and my Sight so disordered that fasting I am quite another Man than when full if Health and a fair Day smile upon me I am a very honest good natur'd Man if a Corn trouble my Toe I am sullen out of Humor and not to be seen The same Pace of a Horse seems to me one while hard and another easy and the same way one while shorter and another more long And the same Form one while more and another less taking I am one while for doing every thing and another for doing nothing at all and what pleases me now would be a trouble to me at another time I have a thousand senceless and casual Actions within myself Either I am possest by Melancholy or sway'd by Choler now by its own private Authority Sadness predominates in me and by and by I am as merry as a Cricket When I take a Book in hand I have then discovered admirable Graces in such and such Passages and such as have strook my Soul let me light upon them at another time I may turn and toss tumble and rattle the Leaves to much purpose 't is then to me an inform and undiscover'd Mass. Even in my own Writings I do not always find the Aire of my first Fancy I know not what I would have said but am often put to it to correct and pump for a new Sence because I have lost the first that was better I do nothing but go and come my Judgment does not always advance it floates and romes velut minuta magno Deprensa navis in mari vesaniente vento Like a small Bark upon the swelling Main When Winds does ruffle up the liquid Plain Very often as I am apt to do having for Sports sake undertaken to maintain an Opinion contrary to my own my Mind bending and applying it self that way does so rarely engage me in the Quarrel that I no more discern the Reason of my former Belief and forsake it I am as it were mislead by the Side to which I encline be it what it will and carried away by my own Weight Every one would almost say the same of himself if he considered himself as I do Preachers very well know that the Emotions which steals upon them in speaking does animate them towards Belief and that in Passion we are more stiff in the Defence of our Proposition take our selves a deeper Impression of it and imbrace it with greater Vehemence and Approbation than we do in our colder and more temperate Sense You only give your Councel a simple Breviate of your Cause he returns you a dubious and uncertain Answer by which you find him indifferent which side he takes Have you fed him well that he may relish it the better does he begin to be really concern'd and do you find him truly interested and zealous in your Quarrel His Reason and Learning will by degrees grow hot in your Cause behold an apparent and undobted Truth presents itself to his Understanding he discovers a new Light in your Business and does in good earnest Believe and persuade himself that it is so Nay I do not know whether the Ardour that springs from Spite and Obstinacy against the Power and Violence of the Magistrate and Danger or the Interest of Reputation may it not have made some Men even to the Stake maintain the Opinion for which at Liberty and amongst Friends
the knowledge of a certain Herb proper for their Cure There is no Sense that has not a mighty Dominion and that does not by it's power introduce an infinite number of Knowledges If we were defective in the intelligence of sounds of Musick and of the Voice it would cause an inimaginable confusion in all the rest of our Science For besides what appertains to the proper effect of every Sense how many Arguments Consequences and Conclusions do we draw to other things by comparing one Sense with another Let an Understanding Man imagine humane Nature originally produc'd without the Sense of Seeing and consider what Ignorance and Trouble such a Defect would bring upon him what a Darkness and Blindness in the Soul he will then see by that of how great Importance to the knowledge of Truth the privation of such another Sense or of two or three should we be so depriv'd would be We have form'd a Truth by the Consultation and Concurrence of our five Senses but peradventure we should have the consent and contribution of eight or ten to make a certain discovery of our own Being The Sects that controvert the Knowledge of man do it principally by the incertainty and weakness of our Senses For since all Knowledge is by their means and mediation convey'd unto us if they fail in their report if they corrupt or alter what they bring us from without if the Light which by them creeps into the Soul be obscur'd in the passage we have nothing else to hold by From this extream difficulty all these fancies proceed that every subject has all we there find in it self That it has nothing in it of what we think we there find and that of the Epicureans that the Sun is no bigger than 't is judg'd by our sight to be Quicquid id est nihilo fertur majore figura Quà m nostris oculis quam cernimus esse videtur But be it what it will in our esteems It is no bigger than to us it seems That the apparences which represent a Body great to him that is near and less to him that is more remote are both true Nec tamen hic oculis falli concedimus hilum Proinde animi vitium hoc oculis adsingere noli Yet that the Eye 's deluded we deny Charge not the Soul's fault therefore on the eye and resolutely that there is no deceit in the Senses that we are to lye at their Mercy and seek elsewhere Reasons to salve and excuse the Difference and Contradictions we there find even to the inventing of Lyes and other slams if it come to that rather than accuse the Senses Timagoras vow'd that by pressing or turning his Eye he could never perceive the light of the Candle to double and that the seeming so proceeded from the Vice of Opinion and not from the Instrument The most absurd of all the Epicureans Absurdities is in denying the force and effect of the Senses Proinde quod in quoque est his visum tempore verum est Et si non potuit ratio dissolvere causam Cur ea quae fuerint juxtim quadrata procul sint Visa rotunda tamen praestat rationis egentem Reddere mendose causas utriusque figurae Quam manibus manifesta suis emittere quoquam Et violare fidem primam convellere tota Fundamenta quibus nixatur vita salusque Non modo enim ratio ruat omnis vita quoque ipsa Concidat extemplo nisi credere sensibus ausis Praecipitesque locos vitare caetera quae sint In genere hoc fugienda Whatever and whenever seen is true And if our Reason can't the Knot undoe Why things seem to be square when very near And at a greater distance round appear 'T is better yet for him that 's at a pause To give of either Figure a false cause Than to permit things manifest to go Out of his Hands to give the lye unto His first belief and the Foundations rend On which all Life and Safety do depend For not alone Reason but Life and all Together will with sudden Ruin fall Unless we dare our Senses trust to miss The danger of a dreadful precipice And other such like Dangers that with Care And Wariness to be evaded are This so desperate and unphilosophical Advice expresses only this that humane Knowledge cannot support it self but by Reason that is unreasonable foolish and mad but that it is yet better that man to set a greater value upon himself make use of any other Remedy how fantastick soever than to confess his necessary Ignorance a truth so disadvantageous to him He cannot avoid owning that the Senses are the sovereign Lords of his Knowledge but they are uncertain and falsifiable in all Circumstances 'T is there that he is to fight it out to the last and if his just Forces fail him as they do to supply that Defect with Obstinacy Temerity and Impudence In case that what the Epicureans say be true viz. That we have no Knowledge if the Senses apparences be false and if that also be true which the Stoicks say That the apparences of the Senses are so false that they can furnish us with no manner of Knowledge We shall conclude to the Disadvantage of these two great Dogmatical Sects that there is no Science at all As to what concerns the Error and uncertainty of the Operation of the Senses every one may furnish himself with as many examples as he pleases so ordinary are the Faults and Tricks they put upon us In the Eccho of a Valley the sound of the Trumpet seems to meet us which comes from a place behind Extantesque procul medio de gurgite montes Idem apparent longè diversi licet Et fugere ad puppim colles campique videntur Quos agimus propter Navim And Rocks i' th Seas that proudly raise their Head Tho far disjoyn'd tho Royal Navies spread Their Sails between yet if from distance shown They seem an Island all combin'd in one Thus Ships though driven by a prosperous Gale Seem fixt to Saylors those seem under Sail That ride at Anchor safe and all admire As they row by to see the Rocks retire Vbi in medio nobis equus acer obhaesit Flumine equi corpus transversum ferre videtur Vis in adversum Flumen contrudere raptim Thus when in rapid Streams my Horse hath stood And I look'd downward on the rowling Flood Though he stood still I thought he did divide The headlong Streams strive against the Tide And all things seem'd to move on every side Like a Musket Bullet under the Fore-finger the middle Finger being lap'd over it which feels so like two that a Man will have much ado to persuade himself there is but one the end of the two Fingers feeling each of them one at the same time For that the Senses are very often Masters of our Reason and constrain it to receive Impressions which it
where after having joyfully feasted their Friends and Acquaintance they laid them down with so great Resolution that Fire being apply'd to it they were never seen to stir either Hand or Foot and after this manner one of them Calanus by Name expir'd in the presence of the whole Army of Alexander the Great and he was neither reputed holy nor happy amongst them that did not thus destroy himself dismissing his Soul purg'd and purified by the Fire after having consum'd all that was earthy and mortal This constant premeditation of the whole Life is that which makes the wonder Amongst our other Controversies that of Fatum is also crept in and to tye things to come and even our own Wills to a certain and inevitable Necessity we are yet upon this Argument of time past Since God foresees that all things shall so fall out as doubtless he does it must then necessarily follow that they must so fall out to which our Masters reply that the seeing any thing come to pass as we do and as God himself also does for all things being present with him he rather sees than foresees is not to compell an Event that is we see because things do fall out but things do not fall out because we see Events cause Knowledge but Knowledge does not cause Events That which we see happen does happen but it might have hapned otherwise and God in the Catalogue of the Causes of Events which he has in his Prescience has also those which we call accidental and unvoluntary which depend upon the Liberty he has given our free Will and knows that we do amiss because we would do so I have seen a great many Commanders encourage their Souldiers with this fatal Necessity for if our time be limited to a certain hour neither the Enemies shot nor our own Boldness nor our Flight and Cowardize can either shorten or prolong our Lives This is easily said but see who will be so perswaded and if it be so that a strong and lively Faith draws along with it Actions of the same certainly this Faith we so much brag of is very light in this Age of ours unless the Contempt it has of Works makes it disdain their Company So it is that to this very purpose the Sire de Joinville as credible a Witness as any other whatever tells us of the Bedoins a Nation amongst the Saracens with whom the King St. Lewis had to do in the Holy-land that they in their Religion did so firmly believe the number of every mans days to be from all eternity prefix'd and set down by an inevitable Decree that they went naked to the Wars excepting a Turkish Sword and their Bodies only cover'd with a white Linnen Cloth and for the greatest Curse they could invent when they were angry this was always in their Mouths Accursed be thou as he that arms himself for fear of Death This is a Testimony of Faith very much beyond ours And of this sort is that also that two Religious men of Florence gave in our Fathers days Being engag'd in some Controversie of Learning they agreed to go both of them into the Fire in the sight of all the People each for the verification of his Argument and all things were already prepar'd and the things just upon the point of Execution when it was interrupted by an unexpected accident A young Turkish Lord having perform'd a notable Exploit in his own Person in the sight of both Armies that of Amurath and that of Hunniades ready to joyn Battel being ask'd by Amurath who in so tender and unexperienc'd years for it was his first sally into Arms had inspir'd him with so brave a Courage reply'd that his chief Tutor for Valour was a Hare For being said he one day a hunting I found a Hare sitting and though I had a brace of excellent Grey-hounds with me yet methought it would be best for sureness to make use of my Bow for she sat very fair I then fell to letting fly my Arrows and shot forty that I had in my Quiver not only without hurting but without starting her from her form At last I slipt my Dogs after her but to no more purpose than I had shot by which I understood that she had been secur'd by her Destiny and that neither Darts nor Swords can wound without the permission of Fate which we can neither hasten nor defer This Story which I am going to tell may serve by the way to let us see how flexible our Reason is to all sorts of Images A Person of great Years Name Dignity and Learning boasted to me to have been induc'd to a certain very important mutation in his Faith by a strange whimsical Incitation and otherwise so very ill concluding that I thought it much stronger being taken the contrary way He call'd it a Miracle I look upon it quite otherwise The Turkish Historians say that the perswasion those of their Nation have imprinted in them of the fatal and unalterable Prescription of their Days does manifestly conduce to the giving them great assurance in Dangers and I know a great Prince who makes very fortunate use of it whether it be that he does really believe it or that he makes it his excuse for so wonderfully hazarding himself provided Fortune be not too soon weary of her Favour to him There has not happened in our memory a more admirable effect of Resolution than in those two who conspir'd the Death of the Prince of Orange 'T is to be wonder'd at how the second that executed it could ever be persuaded into an attempt wherein his Companion who had done his utmost had had so ill Success and after the same Method and with the same Arms to go attaque a Lord arm'd with a late Instruction of distrust powerful in followers and bodily Strength in his own Hall amidst his Guards and in a City wholly at his Devotion He doubtless employ'd a very resolute Arm and a Courage enflam'd with furious Passions A Poignard is surer for striking home but by reason that more motion and force of hand is required than with a Pistol the Blow is more subject to be put by or hindred That this man did not run to a certain Death I make no great doubt for the hopes any one could flatter him withall could not find place in any sober Understanding and the Conduct of his Exploit does sufficiently manifest that he had no want of that no more than of Courage The motives of so powerful a Perswasion may be divers for our fancy does what it will both with it self and us The Execution that was done near Orleans was nothing like this there was in that more of Chance than Vigour the wound was not mortal if Fortune had not made it so and to attempt to shoot on Horse-back and at a great distance and at one whose body was in motion by the moving of his Horse was the attempt of a man
and well worthy of admiration that I find so severe as not to desire to imitate my self to the degree it was in him The sâ—le Scipio Aemilianus would any attribute to him as brave and magnificent an end and as profound and universal a knowledge might be put into the other Scale of the Balance Oh! what an injury has Time done me to deprive me of the sight of two of the most noble Lives which by the common consent of all the World one the greatest of the Greeks and the other of the Romans were in all Plutarch What a Matter what a Workman For a man that was no Saint but as we say a gallant man of civil and ordinary Manners and of a moderate Ambition the richest Life that I know and full of the richest and most to be desir'd Parts all things consider'd is in my opinion that of Alcibiades But as to what concerns Epaminondas I will here for the example of an excessive goodness add some of his Opinions He declar'd that the greatest satisfaction he ever had in his whole Life was the contentment he gave his Father and Mother in his Victory of Leuctra wherein his deference is great preferring their pleasure before his own so just and so full of so glorious an Action He did not think it lawful even to restore the Liberty of his Country to kill a man without knowing a cause which made him so cold in the enterprize of his Companion Pelopidas for the relief of Thebes He was also of Opinion that men in Battel ought to avoid the encounter of a Friend that was on the contrary side and to spare him And his Humanity even towards his Enemies themselves having render'd him suspected to the Beotians for that after he had miraculously forc'd the Lacedemonians to open him the Pass which they had undertaken to defend at the entry into Morca near unto Corinth he contented himself with having charg'd thorough them without pursuing them to the utmost he had his Commission of General taken from him Very honourably upon such an account and for the shame it was to them upon necessity afterwards to restore him to his command and then to see how much upon him depended their Safety and Honour Victory like a shadow attending him wherever he went and indeed the Prosperity of his Country as being from him deriv'd died with him CHAP. XXXVII Of the Resemblance of Children to their Fathers THis fagotting up of divers pieces is so odly compos'd that I never set Pen to Paper but when I have too much idle time and never any where but at home so that it is compil'd at several Interruptions and Intervals as Occasions keep me sometimes many Months abroad As to the rest I never correct my first by any second Conceptions I peradventure may alter a Word or so but 't is only to vary the Phrase and not to destroy my former meaning I have a mind to represent the progress of my Humour that every one may see every piece as it came from the Forge I could wish I had begun sooner and had taken more notice of the course of my Mutations A Servant of mine that I employ'd to transcribe for me thought he had got a prize by stealing several pieces from me wherewith he was best pleas'd but it is my comfort that he will be no greater a gainer than I shall be a loser by the Theft I am grown older by seven or eight years since I begun neither has it been without some new Acquisition I have in that time by the Liberty of years been acquainted with the Stone a long Conversation which time hardly wears off without some such Inconvenience I could have been glad that of other Infirmities Age has to present long liv'd men it had chosen some one that would have been more welcome to me for it could not possibly have laid upon me a Disease for which even from my Infancy I have had so great a Horror and it is in truth of all the accidents of old Age that of which I have ever been most afraid I have often thought with my self that I went on too far and that in so long a Voyage I should at last run my self into some misadvantage I perceiv'd and have oft enough declar'd that it was time to knock off and that Death was to be cut off in the sound and living part according to the Chirurgions Rule in Amputations And that Nature made him pay very strict Usury who did not in due time pay the Principal And yet I was so far from being ready that in eighteen Months time or thereabout that I have been in this uneasie Condition I have so inur'd my self to it as to be content to live on in it and have found wherein to comfort my self and to hope so much are men enslav'd to their miserable Being that there is no Condition so wretched they will not accept provided they may live according to that of Moecenas Debilem facito manu Debilem pede coxa Lubricos quate dentes Vita dum superest bene est Maim both my Hands and Feet break Legs and Thighs Knock out my Teeth and bore out both my Eyes Let me but live all 's well enough he cries And Tamberlain with his foolish humanity palliated the fantastick cruelty he exercis'd upon Lepers when he put all he could hear of to death to deliver them as he pretended from the painful Life they liv'd For there was not one of them who would not rather have undergone a triple Leprosie than to be depriv'd of their Being And Antisthenes the Stoick being very sick and crying out who will deliver me from these Evils Diogenes who was come to visit him This said he presenting him a Knife presently if thou wilt I do not mean from my Life he reply'd but from my Disease The sufferings that only attaque the Mind I am not so sensible of as most other Men and that partly out of Judgment for the World looks upon several things as dreadful or to be avoided at the expence of Life that are almost indifferent to me partly thorough a stupid and insensible Complexion I have in Accidents which do not point-blanck hit me and that insensibility I look upon as one of the best parts of my natural Condition but essential and corporeal pains I am very sensible of And yet having long since foreseen them though with a sight weak and delicate and softned with the long and happy Health and Quiet that God has been pleas'd to give me the greatest part of my time I had in my Imagination fancied them so insupportable that in truth I was more afraid than I have since found I had cause by which I am still more fortified in this belief that most of the Faculties of the Soul as we employ them more trouble the repose of Life than they are any way useful to it I am in conflict with the worst the most sudden
have suffer'd themselves to be perswaded into this miserable Subjection that does not equally surrender himself to all sorts of Impostures Who does not give up himself to the mercy of whoever has the impudence to promise him a Cure The Babylonians carried their sick into the publick Place the Physician was the People where every one that pass'd by being in humanity and civility oblig'd to enquire of their Condition gave some advice according to his own Experience We do little better there being not so silly a Woman whose Charms and Drenches we do not make use of and according to my Humour if I were to take Physick I would sooner choose to take theirs than any other because at least if they do no good they will do no harm What Homer and Plato said of the Aegyptians that they were all Physicians may be said of all People there is no one that does not boast of some rare Receipt and who will not venture it upon his Neighbour if he will permit him I was the other day in Company where some one of my fraternity told us of a new sort of Pills made up of a hundred and odd Ingredients it made us very merry and was a singular Consolation for what Rock could withstand so great a battery And yet I hear by those who have made tryal of it that the least atom of Gravel will not stir for 't I cannot take my hand from the Paper before I have added a word or two more concerning the assurance they give us of the infallibility of their Drugs and the Experiments they have made The greatest part and I think above two thirds of the medicinal Virtues consist in the Quintessence or occult propriety of Simples of which we can have no other instruction than Use and Custom For Quintessence is no other than a Quality of which we cannot by our Reason find out the cause In such Proofs those they pretend to have acquir'd by the inspiration of some Daemon I am content to receive for I meddle not with Miracles as also the Proofs which are drawn from things that upon some other account oft fall into use amongst us as if in Wool wherewith we are wont to clothe our selves there have accidentally some occult desiccative Propriety been found out of curing kib'd Heels or as if in the Radish we eat for Food there have been found out some aperitive Operation Galen reports that a Man hapned to be cur'd of a Leprosie by drinking Wine out of a Vessel into which a Viper had crept by chance In which Example we find the means and a very likely guide and conduct to this Experience as we also do in those Physicians pretend to have been directed to by the Example of some Beasts But in most of their other Experiments wherein they declare to have been conducted by Fortune and to have had no other guide than Chance I find the Progress of this Information incredible Suppose man looking round about him upon the infinite number of things Plants Animals and Metals I do not know where he would begin his tryal and though his first fancy should fix him upon an Elk's horn wherein there must be a very gentle and easie belief he will yet find himself perplex'd in his second Operation There are so many Maladies and so many Circumstances laid before him that before he can arrive at the certainty of the point to which the perfection of his Experience should arrive humane sence will be at the end of its lesson and before he can amongst this infinity of things find out what this Horn is amongst so many Diseases what the Epilepsie the many Complexions in a melancholick Person the many Seasons in Winter the many Nations in the French the many Ages in Age the many Coelestial Mutations in the Conjunction of Venus and Saturn and the many Parts in mans Body nay in a Finger and being in all this directed neither by Argument Conjectures Example nor Divine Inspirations but meerly by the sole motion of Fortune it should be by a perfectly artificial regular and methodical Fortune And after the Cure is perform'd how can he assure himself that it was not because the Disease was arriv'd at its period or an effect of Chance or the Operation of something else that he had eaten drunk or touch'd that day or by Virtue of his Grand-mothers Prayers And moreover had this Experiment been perfect how many times was it reiterated and this long beadrole of Fortunes and Encounters strung anew from Chance to conclude a certain Rule And when the Rule is concluded by whom I pray you Of so many millions there are but three Men who take upon them to record their Experiments And must Chance needs just meet one of these What if another and a hundred others have made contrary Experiments We might peradventure have some light in this were all the Judgments and Arguments of men known to us But that three witnesses three Doctors should Lord it over all Mankind is against all reason It were fit that humane Nature should have deputed and cull'd them out and that they were declar'd our Comptrollers by express Letters of Attorney To Madam de Duras Madam The last time you honour'd me with a Visit you found me at work upon this Chapter and being it may happen that these trifles may one day fall into your Ladiships hands I will also that they testifie in how great honour the Author will take any Favour you shall please to shew them You will there find the same air and behaviour you have observ'd in his Conversation and though I could have borrow'd some better or more favourable garb than my own I would not have done it for I require nothing more of these Writings but to present me to your Memory such as I naturally am The same Conditions and Faculties your Ladiship has been pleas'd to frequent and receive with much more Honour and Courtesie than they deserve I will put together but without alteration in one solid Body that may peradventure continue some years or some days after I am gone where you may find them again when your Ladiship shall please to refresh your Memory without putting you to any greater trouble neither are they worth it I desire you should continue the favour of your Friendship to me by the same Qualities by which it was acquir'd and am not ambitious that any one should love and esteem me more dead than living The Humour of Tyberius is ridiculous but yet common who was more sollicitous to extend his Renown to Posterity than to render himself acceptable to men of his own time If I was one of those to whom the World could owe commendation I would acquit the one half to have the other in hand that their praises might come quick and crowding about me more thick than long more full than durable and let them cease on God's Name with my knowledge and when the sweet sound can
I know no mean Ceremonies and superficial Repentance It must sting me all over before I can call it so and that it prick my Bowels as deep and universally as God sees into me As to Employment many good Opportunities have escap'd me for want of good Conduct and yet my Deliberations were sound enough according to the occurrences presented to me 'T is their way to choose always the easiest and the safest course I find that in my former Counsels I have proceeded with Discretion according to my own rule and according to the state of the subject propos'd and should do the same a thousand years hence in like Occasions I do not consider what it is now but what it was then when I deliberated on it The force of all Counsel consists in the Time Occasions and things eternally shift and change I have in my Life committed some great and important Errors not for want of good Understanding but for want of good Luck There are secret and not to be foreseen parts in matters we have in handling especially in the Nature of men mute Conditions that make no show unknown sometimes even to the Professors themselves that spring and start up by accidental Occasions If my Prudence could not penetrate into nor foresee them I blame it not 't is commission'd no further than its own limits If the event be too hard for me and take the side I have refus'd there is no Remedy I do not blame my self I accuse my Fortune and not my own handy Work this cannot be called Repentance Phocion having given the Athenians an Advice that was not follow'd and the Affair nevertheless succeeding contrary to his Opinion some one said to him Well Phocion art thou content that Matters go so well I am very well pleas'd reply'd he that this has hapned so well but I do not repent that I counsell'd the other When any of my Friends address themselves to me for Advice I give it candidly and clearly without sticking as almost all other men do at the hazard of the thing that it may fall out contrary to my Opinion by which means I may be reproach'd for my Counsel I am very indifferent as to that For the Fault will be theirs in having consulted me and I could not refuse them my best Advice I for my own part can rarely blame any one but my self for my oversights and Misfortunes For indeed I seldom consult the Advice of another if not by Honour of Ceremony or excepting where I stand in need of Information as to matter of Fact But in things wherein I stand in need of nothing but Judgment other mens Reasons may serve to fortifie my own but have little power to dissuade me I hear them with Civility and Patience all but to my knowledge I never made use of any but my own With me they are but Flies and Atoms that confound and distract my Will I lay no great stress upon my Opinions but I lay as little upon those of others and Fortune rewards me accordingly If I receive but little Advice I also give but little I seldom consult others and am seldom believ'd and know no concern either publick or private that has been mended or better'd by my Advice Even they whom Fortune had in some sort ty'd to my Direction have more willingly suffer'd themselves to be govern'd by any other Counsels than mine and as a man who is as jealous of my repose as of my Authority I am better pleas'd that it should be so In leaving me there they humour what I profess which is to settle and wholly contain my self within my self I take a pleasure in being uninteressed from other mens Affairs and disengag'd from being their warranty and responsible for what they do In all Affairs that are past be it how it will I have very little regret for this Imagination puts me out of my pain that they ought so to fall out they are in the great revolution of the World and in the Chain of Stoical Causes your Fancy cannot by wish and Imagination remove one tittle but that the great current of things will reverse both the past and the future As to the rest I abominate that accidental Repentance which old Age brings along with it and he who said of old that he was oblig'd to his Age for having wean'd him from Pleasure was of of another Opinion than I am I can never think my self beholding to Impotency for any good it can ever do me Nec tam aversa unquam videbitur ab opere suo Providentia ut debilitas inter optima inventa sit Nor can Providence ever be seen so averse to her own Work that debility should be rank'd amongst the best things Our Appetites are rare in old age a profound Saciety seizes us after the Act I see nothing of Conscience in this heaviness and weakness imprint in us a drowsie and rheumatick Virtue We must not suffer our selves to be so wholly carried away by natural alterations as to suffer our Judgments to be impos'd upon by them Youth and Pleasure have not formerly so far prevail'd upon me that I did not well enough discern the face of Vice in Pleasure neither does the nausity that years have brought me so far prevail with me now that I cannot discern Pleasure in Vice Now that I am no more in my flourishing Age I judge as well of these things as if I was I who narrowly and strictly examine it find my Reason the very same it was in my most licentious age if not perhaps a little weaker and more decay'd by being grown old and I find that the Pleasure it refuses me upon the account of my bodily Health it would no more refuse it now in Consideration of the health of my Soul than at any time heretofore I do not repute it more valiant for being out of Combat My temptations are so broken and mortified that they are not worth its Oppositions holding but out my hands I repell them Should one present the old Concupiscence before it I fear it would have less power to resist it than heretofore I do not discern that in it self it judges any thing otherwise now than it formerly did nor that it has acquir'd any new light Wherefore if there be convalescence 't is an inchanted one Miserable kind of Remedy to owe a mans Health to his Disease 'T is not for our misfortune to perform this Office but for the good fortune of our Judgment I am not to be made to do any thing by Persecutions and Afflictions but curse them That is for People that are not to be rous'd but by a Whip my Reason is much more active in Prosperity and much more distracted and put to 't to digest Pains than Pleasures I see best in a clear Sky Health does premonish me as more chearfully so to better purpose than Sickness I did all that in me lay to reform and regulate my self from Pleasures at all times when
it into several Desires of which let one be regent if you will over the rest but lest it should tyrannize and domineer over you weaken and protract in dividing and diverting it Cum morosa vago singultiet inguine venae Conjicito humorem collectum in Corpora quaeque and look to 't in time lest it proves too troublesome to deal with when it has once seiz'd you Si non prima novis conturbes vulvera plagis Volgivagaque vagus venere ante recentia cures Unless you fancy every one you view Revel in Love and cure old Wounds by new I was once wounded with a vehement Displeasure and withal more just than vehement I might peradventure have lost my self in it if I had merely trusted to my own Strength Having need of a powerful Diversion to disengage me by amorous Art and Study wherein I was assisted by my Youth I found one out Love reliev'd and rescu'd me from the evil wherein Friendship had engag'd me 'T is in every thing else the same a violent Imagination hath seiz'd me I find it a nearer way to change than to subdue it I depute if not one contrary yet another at least in its place Variation does always relieve dissolve and dissipate if I am not able to contend with it I escape from it and in avoiding it slip out of the way and make my doubles shifting of Place Business and Company I secure my self in the crowd of other Thoughts and Fancies where it loses my trace and I escape After the same manner does Nature proceed by the benefit of Inconstancy for the time she has given us for the sovereign Physician of our Passions does chiefly work by that that supplying our Imaginations with other and new Affairs it un-nerves and dissolves the first apprehension how strong soever A wise man sees his Friend little less dying at the end of five and twenty years than the first year and according to Epicurus no less at all for he did not attribute any alleviation of Afflictions neither to the foresight of the man or the Antiquity of the Evils themselves But so many other thoughts traverse the first that it languishes and tires at last Alcibiades to divert the Inclination of common Rumours cut off the Ears and Tail of his beautiful Dog and turn'd him out into the publick place to the end that giving the People this occasion to prate they might let his other Actions alone I have also seen for this same end of diverting the Opinions and Conjectures of the People and to stop their Mouths some Women conceal their real Affections by those that were only counterfeit and put on to blind mens Eyes but some of them withall who in counterfeiting have suffer'd themselves to be caught indeed and who have quitted the true and original Affection for the feign'd and by them have found that they who find their Affections well plac'd are Fools to consent to this disguise The favourable and publick reception being only reserv'd for this pretended Servant a man may conclude him a Fellow of very little address and less Wit if he does not in the end put himself into your place and you into his this is properly to cut out and make up a Shooe for another to draw on A little thing will turn and divert us because a little thing holds us We do not much consider Subjects in gross and single in themselves but they are little and superficial Circumstances that wound us and the outward useless rinds that pill off those Subjects Folliculos ut nunc teretes aestate cicadae Linquunt Such as the terous husks or shells we find In Summer Grashoppers do leave behind Even Plutarch himself laments his Daughter for the little apish tricks of her Infancy The remembrance of a Farewel of the particular grace of an Action of a last recommendation afflicts us The sight of Caesar's Robe troubled all Rome which was more than his death had done Even the sound of Names ringing in our ears as my poor Master my faithful Friend Alas my dear Father or my sweet Daughter afflict us When these Repetitions torment me and that I examin it a little nearer I find 't is no other but a Grammatical complaint I am only wounded with the word and tone as the Exclamations of Preachers do very oft work more upon their Auditory than their Reasons and as the pitiful eyes of a Beast kill'd for Service without my weighing or penetrating in the interim into the true and real essence of my Subject His se stimulis dolor ipse lacessit With these incitements grief it self provokes These are the foundations of our mourning The obstinacy of my Stone to all remedies especially those in my Bladder has sometimes thrown me into so long suppressions of Urine for three or four days together and so near death that it had been folly to have hop'd to evade it and it was much rather to have been desir'd considering the miseries I endure in those cruel Fits Oh that the good Emperour who caus'd Criminals to be ty'd that they might dye for want of pissing was a great Master in the Hangman 's Science Finding my self in this condition I consider'd by how many light causes and objects Imagination nourish'd in me the regret of Life and of what Atoms the weight and difficulty of this dislodging was compos'd in my Soul and to how many idle and frivolous thoughts we give way in so great an Affair A Dog a Horse a Book a Glass and what not were consider'd in my loss To others their ambitious hopes their money their knowledge not less foolish Considerations in my opinion than mine I look upon Death carelesly when I look upon it universally as the end of Life I insult over it in gross but in retail it domineers over me The Tears of a Foot-man the disposing of my Cloaths the touch of a friendly hand which is a common Consolation discourages and entenerates me So do the Complaints in Tragedies infect our Souls with Grief and the Regrets of Dido and Ariadne impassionate even those who believe them not in Virgil and Catullus 'T is a simptom of an obstinate and obdurate Nature to be sensible of no emotion as 't is reported for a Miracle of Polemon who not so much as alter'd his Countenance at the biting of a mad-Dog who tore away the Calf of his Leg. And no Wisdom proceeds so far as to conceive so lively and entire a cause of Sorrow by Judgment that it does not suffer an increase by presence where the Eyes and Ears have their share parts that are not to be moved but by vain accidents Is it reason that even the Arts themselves should make an advantage of our natural brutality and weakness An Orator says Rhetorick in the farce of his pleading shall be mov'd with the sound of his own Voice and feign'd Emotions and suffer himself to be impos'd upon by the passion
Society of all Studies Exercises and Commands both Military and Civil in the Common-Wealth and the Philosopher Antisthenes took away all distinction betwixt their Virtue and ours It is much more easie to accuse one Sex than to excuse the other 'T is according to the Proverb Ill may Vice correct Sin CHAP. VI. Of Coaches IT is very easie to make it appear that great Authors when they write of Causes do not only make use of those they think to be the true Causes indeed but also of those they believe are not so provided their Works may be illustrated with the Beauty of Invention They speak true and usefully enough if it be ingeniously We cannot make our selves sure of the supream Cause and therefore clutter a great many together to see if it may not accidentally be amongst them namque unam dicere causam Non satis est verum plures unde una tamen sit And thus my Muse a store of Causes brings For here as in a thousand other things Though by one single Cause th' effect is done Yet since 't is hid a thousand must be shown That we may surely hit that single one Will you ask me whence the Customs of blessing those that Sneeze we break Wind three several ways that which sallies from below is too filthy that which breaks out from the Mouth carries with it some reproach of having eaten too much the third Eruption is Sneezing which because it proceeds from the Head and is without offence we give it this civil Reception Do not laugh at this distinction for they say 't is Aristotle's I think I have read in Plutarch which of all the Authors I ever convers'd with is he who has best mixt Art with Nature and Judgment with Knowledge giving a Reason for the rising of the Stomach in those that are at Sea that it is occasion'd by fear having found out some reason by which he proves that fear may produce such an Effect I who am very subject to vomit know very well that that Cause concerns not me and know it not by Argument but by necessary Experience without instancing what has been often told me that the same thing oft happens in Beasts especially Hogs when out of all apprehension of danger and what an Acquaintance of mine has told me of himself that being very subject to it the Disposition to vomit has three or four times gone off him being very much afraid in a violent Storm as it hapned to that ancient Pejus vexabar quam ut periculum mihi succurreret I was too much troubled for my danger to relieve me I was never afraid upon the Water nor indeed in any other peril and I have had enow before my eyes that have been just enough if death be one so as to be astonish'd and to lose my Judgment Fear springs sometimes as well from want of Judgment as from want of Courage All the dangers I have been in I have look'd upon without winking with an open sound and intire Sight and besides a man must have courage to fear It has formerly served me better than some others so to order my retreat that it was if not without fear nevertheless without affright and astonishment It was stirr'd indeed but not amazed nor stupified Great Souls go yet much farther and represent flights not only sound and temperate but moreover fierce Let us make a Relation of that which Alcibiades reports of Socrates his fellow in Arms I found him says he after the rout of our Army him and Lachez in the rear of those that fled and considered him at my leisure and in security for I was mounted upon a good Horse and he on foot and had so fought I took notice in the first place how much Judgment and Resolution he shew'd in comparison of Lachez and then the bravery of his march nothing different from his ordinary gate his sight firm and regular considering and judging what pass'd about him looking one while upon those and then upon others Friends and Enemies after such a manner as incourag'd the one and signified to the others that he would sell his life dear to any one should attempt to take it from him and so they came off for People are not willing to attack such kind of men but pursue those they see are in a Fright This is the Testimony of this great Captain which teaches us what we every day see that nothing so much throws us into dangers as an inconsiderate eagerness of getting our selves clear of them Quo timoris minus est eo minus ferme pericula est When there is least fear there is for the most part least danger Our People are too blame to say that such a one is afraid of Death when he expresses that he thinks of it and fore-sees it Fore-sight is equally convenient in what concerns us whether good or ill To consider and judge of the danger is in some sort the reverse to being astonish'd I do not find my self strong enough to sustain the force and impetuosity of this Passion of Fear nor of any other vehement Passion whatever If I was once conquered and beaten down I should never rise again very sound Whoever should once make my Soul lose her footing would never set it upright again she retasts and researches her self too profoundly and too much to the quick and therefore would never let the wound she had receiv'd heal and cicatrize It has been well for me that never any sickness has yet discompos'd it At every charge made upon me I make my utmost opposition and best defence by which means the first that should rout me would make me for ever rallying again I have no after game to play On which side soever the inundation breaks my banks I lye open and am drown'd without remedy Epicurus says that a wise Man can never become a Fool and I have an Opinion reverse to this Sentence which is that who has once been a very Fool will never after be very wise God grant me Cold according to my cloth and Passions proportionable to the means I have to withstand them Nature having laid me open on the one side has cover'd me on the other having disarm'd me of strength she has arm'd me with insensibility and an apprehension that is either regular or dull Now I cannot long endure and when I was young much less endur'd either Coach Litter or Boat and hate all other riding but on Horseback both in the City and Countrey But I can worse endure a Litter than a Coach and by the same reason better a rude Agitation upon the Water from whence fear is produc'd than the motions of a Calm At the little jerks of Oars stealing the Vessel from under us I find I know not how both my Head and my Stomach disorder'd neither can I endure to sit upon a tottering Stool When the Sail or the Current carries us equally or that we are tow'd
him the Reason why he did so I hear said he that Physicians especially order'd Repose and forbid Emotion in all Tumors Socrates does not say do not surrender to the Charms of Beauty stand your ground and do your utmost to oppose it Fly it says he shun the sight and encounter of it as of a powerful Poyson that darts and wounds at distance And his good Disciple either faining or reciting but in my Opinion rather reciting than faining the rare Perfections of that great Cyrus makes him distrustful of his own Strength to resist the Charms of the Divine Beauty of that illustrious Panthea his Captive in committing the visiting and keeping of her to another who could not have so much Liberty as himself And the Holy Ghost in like manner Ne nos inducas in tentationem We do not pray that our Reason may not be combated and overcome by Concupiscence but that it should not be so much as try'd that we should not be brought into a state wherein we were so much as to suffer the approaches sollicitations and temptations of Sin and we beg of Almighty-God to keep our Consciences quiet fully and perfectly deliver'd from all commerce of Evil. Such as say that they have reason for their revenging Passion or any other sort of troublesom Agitation of Mind do oft say true as things now are but not as they were They speak to us when the Causes of their Error are by themselves nourish'd and advanc'd But look backward recall these Causes to their Beginning and there you will put them to a nonâ—plus will they have their Fault less for being of longer continuance and that of an unjust beginning the sequel can be just Whoever shall desire the good of his Country as I do without fretting or pining himself will be troubled but will not swoon to see it threatning either its own ruine or a no less ruinous continuance Poor Vessel that the Waves the Winds and the Pilot toss and steer to so contrary Designs in tam diversa magister Ventus unda trahunt He who does not gape after the Favour of Princes as after a thing he cannot live without does not much concern himself at the coldness of their Reception and Countenance nor at the inconstancy of their Wills He who does not brood over his Children or his Honours with a slavish propension ceases not to live commodiously enough after their loss Who does good principally for his own satisfaction will not be much troubled to see men judge of his actions contrary to his merit A quarter of an ounce of Patience will provide sufficiently against such inconveniences I find â—ase in this Receipt redeeming my self in the beginning as good cheap as I can and find that by that means I have escap'd much trouble and many difficulties With very little ado I stop the first sally of my Emotions and leave the subject that begins to be troublesome before it transports me He who stops not the start will never be able to stop the career Who cannot keep them out will never get them out when they are once got in and who cannot crush them at the beginning will never do it after nor ever keep himself from falling if he cannot recover himself when he first begins to totter Etenim ipsa se impellunt ubi semel à ratione discessum est ipsáque sibi imbecillitas indulget in altumque provehitur imprudent nec reperit locum consistendi For they throw themselves head-long when once they lose their Reasons and Frailty does so far indulge it self that it is unawares carried out into the deep and can find no Port wherein to come to an Anchor I am betimes sensible of the little breezes that begin to sing and whistle in the shrowds the fore-runners of the storm ceu flamina prima Cum deprensa fremunt Sylvis caeca volutant Murmura venturos nautis prodentia ventos as when Winds rise And stop by Woods a sudden Murmur send Which doth a storm to Mariners portend How oft have I done my self a manifest Injustice to avoid the hazard of having yet a worse done me by the Judges after an Age of Vexations dirty and vile Practises more Enemies to my Nature than Fire or the Wrack Convenit à litibus quantum licet nescio an paulo plus etiam quà m licet abhorrentem esse Est enim non modo liberale paululum nonnumquam de suo jure decedere sed interdum etiam fructuosum A man should be an enemy to all Contention as much as he lawfully may and I know not whether not something more For 't is not only liberal but sometimes also advantageous too a little to recede from ones right Were we wise we ought to rejoyce and boast as I one day heard a young Gentleman of a good Family very innocently do that his Mother had lost her Tryal as if it had been a Cough a Fever or something very troublesome to keep Even the Favours that Fortune might have given me through Relation or Acquaintance with those who have Sovereign Authority in those Affairs I have very conscientiously wav'd and very carefully avoided imploying them to the prejudice of others and of advancing my pretentions above their true Right In fine I have so much prevail'd by my Indeavours in a happy hour I may speak it that I am to this day a Virgin from all Suits in Law though I have had very fair offers made me and with very just Title would I have hearkned to them and a Virgin from Quarrels too I have almost past over a long Life without any offence of moment either active or passive or without ever hearing a worse word than my own Name a rare Favour of Heaven Our greatest Agitations have ridiculous Motives and Causes What ruin did our last Dukâ— of Burgundy run into about a Cart load of Sheeps Pelâ—s And was not the graving of â— Seal the first and principal cause of the greatest Commotion that this Machine of the World diâ— ever undergo For Pompey and Caesar are but the off-sets and continuation of two others And I have in my time seen the wisest Headâ— in this Kingdom assembled with great Ceremony and at the publick expence about Treaties and Agreements of which the true decision did in the mean time absolutely depend upon the Ladies Cabinet-Counsel and the inclination of some foolish Women The Poets very well understood this when they put all Greâ—â— and Asia to Fire and Sword for an Apple Inquire why that man hazards his Life and Honour upon the Fortune of his Rapier and Dagger let him acquaint you with the occasion of the Quarrel he cannot do it without blushing 't is so idle and frivolous A little thing will ingage you in 't but being once imbark'd all cords draw greater provisions are then required more hard and more important How much easier is it not to enter in than it is to get
such a Person I do quite contrary and amongst so many borrow'd things am glad if I can steal one disguising and altering it for some new service at the hazard of having it said that 't is for want of understanding its natural use I give it some particular address of my own hand to the end it may not be so absolutely strange These set their thefts to shew and value themselves upon them And also they have more credit with the Laws than with me We Naturalists think that there is a great and incomparable preference in the honour of Invention to that of Quotation If I would have spoke by Learning I had spoke sooner I had writ in a time nearer to my Studies when I had more Wit and better Memory and would sooner have trusted to the vigour of that Age than this would I have profess'd Writing And what if this gracious Favour which Fortune has lately offer'd me upon the account of this work had befall'n me in such a time of my Life instead of this wherein 't is equally desirable to possess and ready to lose Two of my Acquaintance great men in this faculty have in my Opinion lost half in refusing to publish at forty years old that they might stay till threescore Maturity has its defects as well as verdure and worse and old age is as unfit for this kind of business as any other Who commits his Decrepitude to the Press plays the fool if he think to squeeze any thing out thence that does not relish of Dotage and Stupidity Our Wits grow costive and thick in growing old I deliver my Ignorance in pomp and state and my Learning meagerly and poorly this accidentally and accessorily that principally and expresly and write purposely of nothing but nothing nor of any Science but that of Inscience I have chosen a time when my Life which I am to give an account of lies wholly before me what remains holds more of Death And of my death only should I find it a prating death as others do I would moreover give an account at my departure Socrates was a perfect Exemplar in all great Qualities and I am vext that he had so deform'd a Body as is said and so unsuitable to the Beauty of his Soul himself being so amorous and such an admirer of Beauty Nature surely did him wrong There is nothing more likely than a conformity and relation of the Body to the Soul Ipsi animi magni refert quali in corpore locati sint multi enim è corpore exâ—stunt quae acuunt montem multa quae obtundant It is of great consequence in what Bodies Souls are plac'd for many things spring from the Body that sharpen the Mind and many that blunt and dull it This speaks of an unnatural ugliness and deformity of Limbs but we call that ill-favour'dness also an unseemliness at first sight which is principally lodg'd in the Face and distasts us by the Complexion a Spot a rude Countenance sometimes from some inexplicable cause in members nevertheless of good simmetry and perfect The Deformity that cloth'd a very beautiful Soul in Boetia was of this Predicament That superficial ugliness which nevertheless is always the most imperious is of least prejudice to the state of the Mind and of little certainty in the Opinion of men The other which by a more proper name is call'd a more substantial Deformity strikes deeper in Not every Shooe of smooth sliming Leather but every Shooe neatly made shews the interior shape of the Foot As Socrates said of his that it accus'd just so much in his Soul had he not corrected it by institution but in saying so I believe he did but scoff as his Custom was and never so excellent a Soul made it self I cannot oft enough repeat how great an esteem I have for Beauty that potent and advantageous Quality He call'd it a short Tyranny and Plato the Priviledge of Nature We have nothing that excells it in Reputation it has the first place in the commerce of men it presents it self to meet 〈◊〉 seduces and prepossesses our Judgments with great Authority and wonderful Impression Phrâ—ne had lost her Cause in the hands of an excellent Advocate if opening her Robe she had not corrupted her Judges by the lustre of her Beauty And I find that Cyrus Alexanâ—nder and Caesar the three Masters of the World never neglected Beauty in their greatest Affairs no more did the first Scipio The same word in Greek signifies both fair and good and the Holy-Ghost oft calls those good whom he means fair I should willingly maintain the priority in things call'd goods according to the Song which Plato calls an idle thing taken out of some of the ancient Poets of Health Beauty and Riches Aristotle says that the right of Command appertains to the beautiful and when there is a Person whose Beauty comes near the Images of the Gods that then Veneration is likewise due To him who askt him why People ofter and longer frequented the company of handsome Persons That Question said he is not to be askt by any but one that is blind The most and the greateâ—â— Philosophers paid for their schooling and acquired Wisdom by the Favour and Mediatioâ— Beauty Not only in the men that serve me but also in the Beasts I consider them within two fingers breadth of Goodness And yet I fancy that those Features and Moulds of a Face and those Lineaments by which men guess at our internal Complexions and our Fortunes to come is a thing that does not very directly and simply lye under the Chapter of Beauty and Deformity no more than every good odour and serenity of Air promises Health nor all fogg and stink Infection and a time of Pestilence Such as accuse Ladies of contradicting their Beauty by their Manners do not always hit right for in a Face which is none of the best there may lye some air of probity and trust as on the contrary I have seen betwixt two beautiful Eyes menaces of a dangerous and malignant Nature There are some Physiognomies that are favourable so that in a crowd of victorious Enemies you shall presently choose amongst men you never saw before one rather than another to whom to surrender and with whom to intrust your Life and yet not properly upon the Consideration of Beauty A mans look is but a feeble warranty and yet it is something considerable too And if I were to lash them I would most severely scourge the wicked ones who belye and betray the promises that Nature has planted in their Fore-heads I should with great Severity punish Malice in a mild and gentle Aspect It seems as if there were some happy and some unhappy Faces and I believe there is some Art in distinguishing affable from simple Faces severe from rude malicious from pensive scornful from melancholick and such other bordering Qualities There are Beauties which are not only fair but sour and
after this manner He had condemn'd a man in a great fine towards another by a determinate Judgment The truth some time after being discover'd he found that he had pass'd an unjust Sentence on one side was the Reason of the Cause on the other side the Reason of the Judiciary Forms He in some sort satisfied both leaving the Sentence in the state it was and out of his own Purse recompencing the interest of the condemn'd party But he had to do in a repairable affair mine were irreparably hang'd How many Sentences have I seen more criminal than the Crimes themselves All which makes me remember the ancient Opinions That there is a necessity a man must do wrong by retail who will do right in gross and injustice in little things that will come to do Justice in great that humane justice is form'd after the model of Physick according to which all that is utile is also just and honest and of what is held by the Stoicks That Nature her self proceeds contrary to Justice in most of her works and of what is receiv'd by the Cyrennicks that there is nothing just of it self but that Customs and Laws make Justice And what the Theodorians hold that maintain Theft Sacriledge and all sorts of Vncleanness just in a wise man if he knows them to be profitable to him there is no Remedy I am in the same case that Alcibiades was that I will never if I can help it put my self into the hands of a man who shall determine of my Head where my Life and Honour shall more depend upon the care and diligence of my Attorney than my own innocence I would venture my self with such a Justice as would take notice of my good Deeds as well as my ill and where I had as much to hope as to fear Indemnity is not sufficient pay to a man who does better than not to do amiss but our Justice presents us but one hand and that the left hand too let him be who he will he shall be sure to go off with less In China of which Kingdom the Governments and Arts without commerce with or knowledge of ours surpasses our best Examples in several parts of Excellence and of which the History gives me to understand how much greater and more various the World is than either the Ancients or We have been able to penetrate The Officers deputed by the Prince to visit the state of his Provinces as they punish those who behave themselves ill in their Places so do they liberally reward those who have carried themselves above the common sort and beyond the necessity of their Duty they there present themselves not only to be approved but to get nor simply to be paid but to be presented No Judge thanks be to God has ever yet spoke to me in the quality of a Judge upon any account whatever whether my own or that of another whether Criminal or Civil nor no Prison has ever receiv'd me so much as upon the account of entring in to see it Imagination renders the very outside of a Goal formidable to me I am so inamour'd of Liberty that should I be interdicted the remotest corner of the Indies I should live a little more uneasie And whilst I can find either Earth or Air open in any part of the World I shall never lurk any where where I must hide my self Good God! how ill should I indure the condition wherein I see so many People nail'd to a corner of the Kingdom depriv'd of the priviledge of entring into the principal Cities and Courts and the liberty of the publick Roads for having quarrell'd with our Laws If those under which I live should but wag a finger at me by way of menace I would immediately go seek out others let them be where they would all my little Prudence in the Civil War wherein we are now ingag'd is imploy'd that they may not hinder my liberty of riding from place to place Now the Laws keep up their credit not for being just but because they are Laws It is the mystical foundation of their Authority and they have no other and 't is well it is so for they are oft made by Fools for the most part by men that out of hatred to equality go less in equity but always by men who are vain and irresolute Authors There is nothing so much nor so grosly nor so ordinarily faulty as the Laws Whoever obeys them because they are just does not justly obey them as he ought Our French Laws by their irregularity and deformity do in some sort lend a helping hand to disorder and corruption as is manifest in their Dispensation and Execution The Command is so perplext and inconstant that it in some sort excuses both Disobedience and the Vice of the interpretation the administration and the observation of it What fruit then soever we may extract from Experience yet that however will little advantage our Institution which we draw from foreign Examples if we make so little profit of that we have of our own which is more familiar to us and doubtless sufficient to instruct us in that whereof we have need I study my self more than any other Subject 'T is my Metaphysick 't is my Physick Qua Deus hanc mundi temperet arte domum Qua venit exoriens qua deficit unde coactis Cornibus in plenum menstrua luna redit Vnde salo superant venti quid flamine captet Eurus in nubes unde perennis aqua Sit ventura dies mundi quae subruat arces Quaerite quos agitat mundi labor By what means God the Universe does sway Or how the pale-fac'd Sister of the day When in increasing can her horns unite Till they contract into a full orb'd light Why Winds do of the Sea the better get Why Eurus blows and Clouds are always wet What day the Worlds great Fabrick must o'rethrow Let them inquire would the Worlds secrets know In this Vniversity I suffer my self to be ignorantly and negligently lead by the general Law of the World I shall know it well enough when I feel it my Learning cannot make it alter its course it will not change it self for me 't is folly to hope it and a greater folly to concern a man's self about it seeing it is necessarily alike publick and common The bounty and capacity of the Governour ought absolutely to discharge us of all care of the Government Philosophical Inquisitions and Contemplations serve for no other use but to increase our Curiosity Philosophers with great reason send us back to the Rules of Nature but they have nothing to do with so sublime a Knowledge they falsifie them and present us her face painted with too high and too adulterate a Complexion from whence spring so many different pictures of so uniform a Subject as she has given us feet to walk withall so has she given us Prudence to guide us in Life not such an ingenious
but generally I give way and accommodate my self as much as any one to necessity Sleeping has taken up a great part of my Life and I yet continue at the Age I now am to sleep eight or nine hours together I wean my self to my advantage from this propension to sloth and am evidently the better for so doing I find the change a little hard indeed but in three days 't is over and see but few that live with less Sleep when need requires and that more constantly exercise themselves nor to whom long Journeys are less troublesome My Body is capable of a firm but not of a violent or sudden Agitation I evade of late all violent exercises and such as make me sweat wherein my Limbs grow weary before they are hot I can stand a whole day together and am never weary of walking But from my Youth I never lov'd to Ride upon Pavements On foot I go up to the Breech in dirt and little Fellows as I am are subject in the Streets to be Elbow'd and Justled for want of Presence and Stature and I have ever lov'd to repose my self whether sitting or lying with my Heels as high or higher than my Seat There is no profession is more pleasant than the military a profession both noble in its execution for Valour is the strongest proudest and most generous of all Vertues and noble in its cause There is no Utility either more Universal or more Just than the protection of the Peace and grandeur of a mans Country The company of so many Noble Young and Active men delights you the ordinary sight of so many Tragick Spectacles the liberty of this Conversation without Art with a Masculine and unceremonious way of living pleases you the variety of a Thousand several Actions the encouraging Harmony of Martial Musick that ravishes and inflames both your Ears and Souls the Honour of this exercise nay even the sufferings and difficulties of War which Plato so little esteems that he makes Women and Children share in it in his Republick are delightful to you You put your selves voluntarily upon particular Exploits and hazards according as you judge of their lustre and importance and see when even life it self is excusably employed Pulchrumque mori succurrit in armis And we conceive it brave to die in Arms. To fear common dangers that concern so great a multitude of men not to dare to do what so many sorts of Souls and a whole people do is for a heart that is low and mean beyond all measure Company encourages so much as Children If others excell you in Knowledge in Gracefulness in Strength or Fortune you have third causes to blame for that but to give place to them in stability of mind you can blame no one for that but your self Death is more Abject more Languishing and Painful in Bed than in Battel and Fevers and Catharrs as Painful and Mortal as a Musquet-shott And whoever has fortified himself valiantly to bear the accidents of common life would not need to raise his courage to be a Souldier Vivere mi Lucilli militare est To live my Lucillus is to make War I do not remember that I ever had the Itch and yet scratching is one of natures sweetest gratifications and nearest at hand but the smart follows too near I use it most in my Ears which are often apt to Itch. I came into the World with all my Senses intire even to perfection My Stomach is commodiously good as also is my Head and my Breath and for the most part uphold themselves so in the height of Fevers I have past the age to which some Nations not without reason have prescrib'd so just a term of Life that they would not suffer men to exceed it and yet I have some intermissions though short and inconstant so clean and sound as are little inferiour to the Health and Indolency of my Youth I do not speak of Vigour and Spriteliness 't is not reason that it should follow me beyond its limits Non hoc amplius est liminis aut aquae Coelestis patiens latus My sides no longer can sustain The hardships of the Wind and Rain My Face and Eyes presently discover me All my alterations begin there and appear worse than they really are My Friends oft pity me before I feel the cause in my self My Looking-glass does not fright me for even in my Youth it has befaln me more than once to have a scurvy complexion and of ill Prognostick without any great consequence insomuch that the Physicians not finding any cause within answerable to that outward alteration attributed it to the mind and some secret passion that tormented me within but they were deceiv'd If my Body would govern it self as well according to my Rule as my Mind does we should move a little more at our ease My mind was then not only free from Trouble but moreover full of Joy and Satisfaction as it commonly is half by Complexion and half by its own Design Nec vitiant artus aegrae contagia mentis I never yet could find That e're my Body suffer'd by my mind I am of the opinion that this temperature of my Soul has oft rais'd my Body from its lapses It is oft deprest and if the other be not brisk and gay 't is at least quiet and at rest I had a Quartan Ague four or five months that had made me look miserably ill my mind was always if not calm yet pleasant if the pain be without me the weakness and langour do not much afflict me I see several corporal faintings that beget a horrour in me but to name which yet I should less fear than a thousand passions and agitations of mind that I see in use I resolve no more to run 't is enough that I crawl along and no more complain of the natural decadency that I feel in my self Quis tumidum guttur miratur in Alpibus than I regret that my duration shall not be as long and entire as that of an Oak I have no reason to complain of my imagination for I have had few thoughts in my Life which have so much as broke my sleep if not those of desire which have awak'd without afflicting me I dream but seldom and then of Chimera's and fantastick things commonly produc'd from pleasant thoughts and rather ridiculous than sad and believe it to be true that dreams are the true Interpreters of our inclinations but there is art requir'd to sort and understand them Res quae in vita usurpant homines cogitant curant vident Quaeque agunt vigilantes agitantque ea sicut in fomno accidunt minus nimirum est 'T is no wonder if what men practice think care for see and do when waking should also run in their Heads and disturb them when they are asleep Plato moreover says that 't is the office of Prudence to draw instructions of Divination of future things from
Customs Mart. lib. 3. Epig. 68. Mart. lib. 1. Epig. 74. The Embraces of the Cynicks impudent and in open Sight The purest way of Speaking capable of various Interpretations The Philosophers Stone approved Homer the general Leader of all sorts of People Lucret. l. 5. Ibid. l. 4. Doubt whether man have all his Senses Ibid. Ibid. Lucret. lib. 5. Id. lib. 4. Ibid. Ibid. Mr. Creech Ibid. Mr. Creech The Voice the flower of Beauty Ovid. de Remedio Amo. l. 1. Ovid. Met. lib. 3. Mr. Sandys Ovid. Met. lib. 10. Cicero de Divin lib. 1. Aeneid l. Lucret. l. 4. Mr. Creech Ibid. Mr. Creech The Life of a Man compared to a Dream Ibid. Ibid. Mr. Creech Jaundies Hyposphragma Ibid. Ibid. Mr. Creech Id. lib. 3. Mr. Creech Id. l. 4. Mr. Creech Idem lib. 5. Time a moving thing without permanency No very resolute assurance at the article of death Aeneid l. 3. Lucret. l. 1. Lucan l. 1· The Suns Mourning for the Death of Caesar. Virgil. Georg. l. 1. Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. 2· c. 8. Lucan l. 2. Id. l. 4. Cice. Thus. lib. 1. The constant and resolute Death of Socrates The death of Pomponius Atticus by Fasting Horat. in Arte Poet. Death bravely confronted by Cato Plin. l. 2. c. 7. Senec. Ep. 98. Ovid. Am. lib. 2. El. 19. Sen. de Ben. lib. 7. cap. 9. Mart. lib. 4. Epig. 38. Hor. Epod. 11. Lucret. l. 4. Hor. l. 1. sat 2. Mr. Alex. Brome Ovid. Amo. l. 2. El. 19. Terence Ovid. Amo. Propert. Virg. Eg. 3. Propert. l. 2 â—leg 12. Ovid. Amo. lib. 2. El. 19. Rutilius in Itinerario Senec. Epist. 68. St. Luke chap. 2. Plutarch Juven Sat. 7. Cicero very ambitious of Glory Hor. l. 4. Ode 9. Cicero de off l. 3. Salust Cicero de off l. 1. Corin. 2. chap. 1. ver 12. Orlando Canto 11. By Sir Tho Hawkins Cicero Honour what is it Elian. Varro Cic. de Fin. Ovid Epist. penult Perseus Sat. 1. Hor. lib. 1. Epist. 16. R. F. Perseus Sat. 1. Ibidem Juven sat 13. Aeneid l. 7. The Muses sacrific'd unto by the Lacedaemonians and why Aeneid l. 5. Seneca Cicero de Nat. Deor. Lucan lib. 1. Cicero de fin lib. 2. Ovid. Amo. l. 3. El. 4. Hor. lib. 2. Sat. 1. Sir Richard Fenshaw Tacitus Presumption divided into two parts Horace de Arte Poet. Ben Johnson Mart. l. 12. Epig. 64. Ovid de Ponto lib. 1. Eleg. 6. Montaigns Stile Hor. Ar. Poet. Lucret. l. 5. Mr. Creech Virgil. Aeneid l. 7. Psal. 4.8 The Authors Stature Mart. Lucret. l. 2. Mr. Creech Hor. lib. 2. Epist. 2. J. D. Id. lib. 2. Sat. 2. Alexander Brome Juven Sat. 3. Horace l. 2. Epist. 2. J. D. Hor. l. 1. Epist. 6. Alexander Brome Seneca Agamemnon Terence Prop. l. 1. Eleg. 2. Seneca Agara Horace l. 1. Epist. 1. Sir Richard Fenshaw Propeâ— Proverb Juven sat 13. Cicero Lying condemn'd Cicero de off l. 1. Memory very useful to the Judgment Memory quite lost Ter. Eunu. act 1. sc. 2. Cicero The Author's Memory His Apprehension His Sight Mart. l. 13. Epig. 2. The picture of Rene King of Sicily drawn by himself Terence Andr. Act. 1. Scen. 3. Act. 1. Cicero acad. lib. 4. Tibullus l. 4. Horace l. 2. Epist. 2. Juvenal Plaut Perseus sat 4. Cicero de offic lib. 1. Enemies honour'd by the Persians for their Virtue Praise of Stephen Boetius Horace l. 2. Sat. 3. Mr. Alexander Brome Lactant. Instit. l. 2. Hor. lib. 1. sat 4. Mr. Alexander Brome Perseus sat 5. D. August de Civit. l. 1. cap. 1. Mart. Catullus Marâ—t contre Sagoin Lying an Argument of the Contempt of God Plaut The Character of the Emperour Julian the Apostate His Chastity His Justice His Sobriety His Vigilancy His Military Experience The remakable Death of the Emperor Julian Liberty of Conscience Lucret. l. 4â— Seneca Ep. 74. Ovid. Trist. Catullus Ep. 14. Senec. Ep. 70. Tacit. Annal lib. 14. Livie Post-horses first set up by Cyrus Livius Pigeons taught to carry Letters Juvenal sat 6. Catullus Prudentius Ibid. Idem Manil. Statius Claud. Mart. Epig. 28. lib. 1. Mart. l. 12. Epig Hora. l. 1. Ep. 18. Juven Sat. 3. Claud. Ovid Trist. lib. 3. Eleg. 5. Duels common in the Kingdom of Narsingua Pollio's Libel against Plancus The Lye reveng'd with a box of the Ear. Eneid l. 11. Tasso Can. 12. Mr. Fairfax The Art of cuffing interdicted by Plato Cowards naturally cruel and bloody Claud. Juven sat 6. Hor. l. 2. Ode 18. Sir Thomas Hawkins Sen. Epist. Eneid l. 4. Gall. Eleg. What an old man's study ought to be Tib. lib. 4. Eleg. pen. Propertius l. 3. Eleg. 11. The Gymnosophists voluntarily burnt Causes of Events in the prescience of Almighty God Fortuitous and voluntary Causes Assasination of the Prince of Orange The Duke of Guise Cicero de Divin l. 2. Cicero de Divin l. 2. Juvenal Sat. 6. Juvenal Sat. 14. Ovid. de Art lib. 3. Censure of Cicero and Seneca Plutarch reproach'd for Anger by a Slave of his That Correction never ought to be given in Anger Aeneid l. 7. Seneca Epist. 57. Claudian Aeneid lib. 12. The Authors Anger in great and little Occasions Bodinus a good Author The Bowels of a Lacedemonian Boy torn out by a Fox-cub The Patience of the Lacedaemonian Children Thievery odious to the Spartans Thievery very much practic'd by the Egyptians Fortitude of a Spanish Peasant Death of Epicaris Or light-horse Women obstinate Agesilaus mulcted by the Ephori for insinuating himself into the Heart of the People Caesar very ambitious Caesar called Drunkard Venus accompanies Bacchus Caesar's Clemency towards his Enemies Ambition the only ruine of Caesars Actions Aeneid lib. 10. The Obedience of Caesar's Souldiers Lucan l. 5. Exhortations to Souldiers before a Battel of great importance Caesar's promptness in his Expeditions Lucan lib. 5. Virg. Aen. lib. 12. Lucan lib. 4. Horat. lib. 4. Ode 14. Sir Thomas Hawkins The great Resolution of Caesar in several occasions Monstrous Armies of no great Effect That great numbers of Men cause Confusion Souldiers Mercenary Fidelity of the Garrison of Salona Virg. Georg. lib. 2. The Story of the death of Arria the Wife of Cecinna Petus Mart. lib. 1. Epig. 14. Seneca's great Affection to his Wife Proper l. 2. Eleg. ult Hor. lib. 1. Epist. 2. Sir Rich. Fenshaw Ovid. Amo. lib. 3. Eleg. 8. Lucret. lib. 3. Manil. Astroâ— Aul. Gellius Lucan li. 1. Aeneid lib. 8. Aeneid lib. 12. Humanity of Epaminondas Seneca Epist. 101. The Stone the most painful of all Diseases Mart. l. 10. Epig. 47. Cicero Thusc l. 2. Ibid. Aeneid l. 6. The Author's Father afflicted with the Stone Physick unknown to many Nations Juvenal Sat. 3. Aeneid lib. 7. Cicero de Divin l. 2. A Moor bath'd and purg'd to clear his Complexion Auson Epig. Mart. Epig. Wine prescrib'd for the sick Spartans The sick Persons of Babylon expos'd in the market place * Meaning that was troubled vvith the Stone Ter. Heaut Act. 4. Sc. 1. Treachery rejected by Tyberius Lucan
of important prejudice The pleasant Dialogue betwixt Plato's Legislator and his Citizens will be an Ornament to this place What said they feeling themselves about to dye may we not dispose of our own to whom we please Good God what cruelty That it shall not be lawful for us according as we have been serv'd and attended in our Sickness in our Old Age and other Affairs to give more or less to those whom we have found most diligent about us at our own Fancy and Discretion To which the Legislator answers thus My Friends who are now without question very soon to dye it is hard for you in the Condition you are either to know your selves or what is yours according to the Delphick Inscription I who make the Laws am of opinion that you neither are your selves your own neither is that yours of which you are possest Both your Goods and you belong to your Families as well those past as those to come but yet both your Family and Goods do much more appertain to the publick Wherefore lest any Flatterer in your Age or in your Sickness or any Passion of your own should unseasonably prevail with you to make an unjust Will I shall take care to prevent that inconvenience But having respect both to the universal Interest of the City and that of your particular Family I shall establish Laws and make it by lively Reasons appear that a particular Convenience ought to give place to the common Benefit Go then chearfully where Humane Necessity calls you It belongs to me who have no more respect to one thing than another and who as much as in me lies am careful of the publick Concern to take care of what you leave behind you To return to my Subject It appears to me that such women are very rarely born to whom the Prerogative over men in others excepted is in any sort due unless it be for the Punishment of such as in some lustful Humour have voluntarily submitted themselves to them but that does nothing concern the Old ones of which we are now speaking This Consideration it is which has made us so willingly to forge and give force to a Law which was never yet seeâ— by any one and by which women are excluded the Succession to this Crown and there is hardly a Government in the World where it is not pleaded as 't is here by meer reason of the thing that gives it Authority though Fortune has given it more Credit in some places than in others 'T is dangerous to leave the disposal of our Succession to their Judgment according to the Choice they shall make of Children which is often fantastick and unjust for the irregular Appetite and depreav'd Tast they have during the time of their being with Child they have at all other times in the mind We commonly see them fond of the most weak ricketty and deform'd Children or of those if they have such as are hanging at their Breasts For not having sufficient force of reason to choose and embrace that which is most worthy they the more willingly suffer themselves to be carried away where the impressions of Nature are most alone Like Animals that know their Young no longer than they give them suck As to what remains it is easie by experience to be discern'd that this Natural Affection to which we give so great Authority has but a very weak and shallow Root For a very little profit we every day ravish their own Children out of the Mothers Arms and make them take ours in their room We make them abandon their own to some pitiful Nurse to which we disdain to commit ours or to some Shee Goat forbidding them not only to give them suck what danger soever they run thereby but moreover to take any manner of care of them that they may wholly be taken up with the care of and attendance upon ours And we see in most of them an adulterate Affection begot by Custom toward the faster Children more vehement than the Natural and a greater Solicitude for the Preservation of those they have taken charge of than their own And that which I was saying of Goats was upon this account that it is ordinary all about where I live to see the Country-women when they want Suck of their own to call Goats to their assistance And I have at this hour two Foot-men that never suck't womans Milk more than eight days after they were born These Goats are immediately taught to come to suckle the little Children will know their Voices when they cry and come running to them when if any other than that they are acquanted with be presented to them they refuse to let it suck and the Child to another Goat will do the same I saw one the other day from whom they had taken away the Goat that us'd to nourish it by reason the Father had only borrow'd it of a Neighbour that would not touch any other they could bring and doubtless dyed of hunger Beasts do as easily alter and corrupt their Natural Affection as we I believe that in what Herodotus relates of a certain place of Lybia there are very many mistake he says that the women are there in common but that the Child so soon as it can go finds him out in the Crowd for his Father to whom he is first led by his Natural Inclination Now to consider this simple reason for loving our Children for having begot them therefore calling them our Second selves It appears methinks that there is another kind of Production proceeding from us that should no less recommend them to our Love For that which we engender by the Soul the issue of our Understandings Courage and Abilities spring from nobler Parts than those of the Body and that are much more our own We are both Father and Mother in this Generation these cost us a great deal more and brings us more Honour if they have any thing of good in them For the Value of our other Children is much more theirs than ours the share we have in them is very little but of these all the Beauty all the Grace and Value is ours as also they more lively represent and resemble us than the rest Plato adds that these are immortal Children that immortalize and deify their Fathers as Lycurgus Solon and Minos Now Histories being full of Examples of the common Affection of Fathers to their Children it seems not altogether improper to introduce some few also of this other kind Heliodorus that good Bishop of Tricea rather chose to lose the Dignity Profit and Devotion of so Venerable a Prelacy than to lose his Daughter a Daughter that continues to this day very Graceful and Comely but notwithstanding peradventure a little too curiously and wantonly trick't and too amorous for an Ecclesiastical and Sacerdotal Daughter There has been one Labienus at Rome a Man of great Valour and Authority and amongst other good Qualities excellent