followed Coriolanus as it did Cato either he had returned into Rome victorious and established a better form of Government or being conquered had left a more lasting Government behinde him Cato dies because hee could not make the Citie free Coriolanus because hee would not bring it under subjection If any man wonders that I should compare Coriolanus to Cato let him in the first place and much more admire that Plutarch should compare him to Alcibiades the one was altogether effeminate the other manly The Greek soft and tender with Socrates education savoured of a Schoole The Roman harsh and hardened brought up in the camp was composed of nothing but warre The first was ambitious the last proud One severely flattered the people the other free opposed them Alcibiades framed himselfe to all mens fashions Coriolanus intended to frame every one to his humors One was beautifull eloquent and subtle with his beauty allured with his eloquence perswaded and with his subtilty deceived The other sterne in aspect rough in speech single in heart allured not perswaded not nor did not deceive Alcibiades loses himselfe like a vaine man Coriolanus like a solid In their banishments and in their deaths wherein they seemed to bee most like one another they were contrary They were both exiled it is true but one because he would alter the forme of the Common-wealth the other because hee would not have it altered They were both kill'd I confesse it but Alcibiades for hatred of his vices Coriolanus for envy of his vertues A Table of the chiefe heads discoursed upon in the Life of ALCIBIADES MAns desire is to live in the memorie of posterity chusing rather to survive infamous then to be quire forgotten p. 1. Mens virâ—ous actions ought not to bee recorded in Histories p. 4 Whether vice and vertue proceedes from the Patents inclinations or from the influence of stars or the temperature of the climat in which a child is borne p. 6 Whether by a childs actions one may judge of what his disposition will be when hee comes to be a man 15 Defects many times illustrate the perfections which are in a man 24 Feare the strongest and most prevailing passion 28 Alcibiades embraces learning to soment his Ambition 31 Alcibiades takes away halfe Nicetus his plate 33 The cause why Nicetus takes it patiently 33 Alcibiades contemnes the gifts of the Athenian Nobles and accepts a country fellowes p. 36 The reason thereof 37 Of what nature the reciprocall love was betweene Socrates and Alcibiades 38 An outward beauty argues not inward vertue 40 A young man cannot naturally be wise and in an old man wisedome decayes 45 Whether one may passe immediately from speculation to practise 46 Divines seldome good Polititians 48 Discourse unnecessary in speculative Sciences 49 Experience Mistresse of Policie 51 Great difference betweene being extravagant by election and being such naturally 56 Seldome any griefe but hath some pleasure in it Or any joy without some grief 59 Alcibiades no sooner admitted to the government of the Common-wealth but presently hee salls at odds with Phaeaces and Nicias 61 Emulation and Necessity Gaine and Glory were produced by Nature to keepe men from idlenesse 61 Why mans Emulation never ceases 62 The name of Liberty is commonly misunderstood 65 Whether manifest opposition or supplanting insinuation will soonest ruine a man 66 Open opposition dangerous at first onely 68 Growing powers easily kept from rising but grown hardly brought downe 69 Alcibiades and Nicias being put upon the Ostracisme it falls upon Hyperbosus a most vitious man 71 Inconveniencies of overmuch providence 74 Both the Nobles and the vulgar hate a great man but for different reasons 77 Why the Common-wealth of Athens grew not to such a height as the Roman 77 Ostracisme ill executed 79 The power and efficacie of union 80 Inconveniencies of banishing one great man and leaving another at home 82 Aristotle mistaken in the description of an excellent man 83 Wayes to suppress greatnes 85. yet all vaine 88 Powerfull Subjects must bee punished with death or not at all 88 Ostracisine an absolutely pernitious law 89 Whether he that knowes his own worth hee that knowes it not or a worthless man be most dangerous in a Common-wealth 90 Ingratefulness oftentimes springs from the delaying of gratitude 97 Vices have sometimes appearance of vertues 98 Too much circumspectness sometimes is hurtfull 105 A third may moderate two contraries if he participates of both otherwise not 107 Whether man be most pious in prosperity or in adversity 109 Some are naturally treacherous some become so upon occasion given them 114 Great difference between revenging a wrong and vindicating ones reputation 114 A mans presence continues love and his absence causes it to be forgotten 117 Envy and pusillanimity inseparable 121 Vices suddenly changed into vertues give great cause of suspition 123 A Paradox concerning Luxury and Incontinencie 126 Faults and errors are many times better connived at than reprehended 132 Some natures will gain the love of all sorts of men 133 An advice contrary to likelihood is seldome accepted of 135 Aloibiades takes Selibria by a stratagem 138 A sudden resolution works wonderful effects 139 Nature seldome bestowes valour and sagacity upon one person 142 Policie is an Art by it selfe which no man hath yet rightly learned 144 Cato unapt for Sciences and in what manner 145 An emulous equall carps at his corrivals skill an inferior emulator at his person 146 A fault committed out of malice and wilfulness is not so shamefull as one committed through inability or ignorance 148 Reputation is not lost by degrees but either remaines entire or is quite lost 149 Aloibiades cunning and subtile rather than wise 150 The difference betweene subtiltie and Wisdome 150 Some things laudable in a private man which are disalowed in a pulick person 152 A Generals subtilty different from a Polititians 154 Aloibiades flies to Farnabazus 54 Why he gained the love of all men Ibid In Arts some things are judged by the Senses and some by the understanding 187 Aloibiades had many vertues and many vices 160 He met with a Common wealth which admired his vertues and followed his vices Ibid. His vices overthrew him in his forraign imployments 161 Aloibiades his deaâ—h 162 Man wrastling with Fortune at last is overcome 162 Nothing firm in the world 165 Why some men continue fortunate some not 166 Alcibiades often though not continually forrunate 158 Some caÌ„not suffer the best nor endure the worst 84 Too much care is the daughter of suspition and enemy of truth 81 Compassion is the daughter of Feare 44 Envy takes pleasure in defects 24 Perfect excellency is hated by most men 72 The forbidden thing seems best 64 No man can give that which he is not owner of 9 The desire of worldly glory is wise mens madness and fooles wisdome but beguiles all 93 Modesty moderates envy extinguisheth it not 121 Prudence hath measure for its actions but
unremembred As it were in dispight of fate fantastically besotted with his body though extreamly afflicted and desirous to survive in others memories though with shame And the worst remembrance is more acceptable unto him then none at all Annihilation is an enemy to man not so much in respect of being nothing as of not being what he is VVe shall not peradventure find a subject so unfortunate that would be contented to be changed into another individium no not to exchange his fortune because the changing would be the annihilating of him Yet it seemes harsh that a man should have a recourse to wickednesse to make him remaine in the world to that which is not and to nothing because he would not be so and yet some do it and attaine to it whether it be because some writers willingly set downe any thing that is great or notorious sometimes to raise their stile with the relation sometimes to attract mens attentions with the rumour and with the great motion awake please and raise up the understanding they awake it but violently they raise it but to something which naturally and directly it abhorres they please it but often times corrupt it or whether it proceed from that all men take delight in such kind of relations the most wicked are comforted through the similitude the lesse bad extenuate their badnesse by comparing it the contrariety encreases the good mans merit Great actions though bad do in the matter communicate with good ones and with advantage because they do not find it limited as these last doe and so they deceive and those who think they can give instruction to others by laying them open and blaming them are oftentimes deceived They might doe some good in teaching of morall vertues if vertue as it hath a particular forme to distinguish it from vice had also a particular matter to worke upon Vertues matter is open and manifest vices is for the most part hidden and concealed and he is sometimes deceived in it that operates and he also that almost continually sees the operating One should not peradventure lose his labour in the teaching of morall vertues if there were no meanes to teach their contraries and that one might learne onely by example of imitation and not of shunning and avoyding There being onely one rectitude makes it a secure judge of obliquity It s having latitude makes it a deceitfull judger of rectitude Nature is inclined to evill and evill actions include a certaine acritude in themselves and if they be great and have a prosperous successe cause more to follow then to beware of them and make more emulators then enemies They merit but little of posterity that will relate evill actions causing that to be heard which themselves would unwillingly have seen Many evill things would be thought to have bin impossible to be done did not Historians set them down as done and how much better were it to avoyd falling into them to live deceived then warned Simplicity is a great vertue and ignorance is wisedome True it is that if the knowledge of the will which is done be taken away it makes a man sometimes runne into it but if the manner of doing it be â—â—ncealed it alwayes keepes one innocent There are times wherein bookes would bee cancelled and some men who ought not to be mentioned and seeing it is not in our power to forget them let us at least not mention them The ancient Romans did so but to what purpose was it if writers made mention in their Annals even of those men whom the Senate had cancelled out of its bookes undoing that which the Common-Wealth had done by relating that it had done it Is it not to be admired that those seven brave men which affected fame and renoune by erecting wonders in the world could not attaine to it and he that impiously burned but one of them for that purpose did get it in despight of all Greece which then strove with its uttermost might to have him blotted out of all mens memories A pestilent body leaves a contagious corps behind and though men leave being wicked yet they leave not producing of more and a delict when it is done and past serves yet for an example An infected body often communicates its infirmity but never its health though it be never so exquisitely cured I know not whether it be because that nature in providence drives away the evill from it selfe and thriftily reserves that which is good Or by reason that evill proceeds from any cause and that which is good from a sound and entire one onely The perfect mixt will have what is wholsome unwholsomnesse pâ—oceeds from a corrupt mixt in the first humility bounded by the naturall heat is fixed in the latter it flies unbounded This comes forth with its malignity and being a fumid vapour it takes hold and cleaves too the other retaines what is good and if it doth chance to come forth being a dry exhâ—lation it doth not fasten nor take hold This which befalls the body is also practised in the mind A good fame and renoune resembles rest the bad and great is like motion one is like a cleare and calme streame which though it be deep glides smoothly in its channell the other like a fierce torrent which swell'd and troubled runs violently precipitous with much noise Cur corrupt nature inclines to evill violently forceth it selfe to any good And seeing rest leaves no such impression as motion a cleere smooth streame drawes not with such violence as a troubled rough one and nature defends it selfe from its contrary and followeth its like we need not wonder if good examples seldome cure but evill ones doe for the most partinfect The renoune which remained of Alcibiades the membrance of his Counrry Parents Nurse Tutors when there was not any memory left to posterity of any of his companions no not so much as of their names causeth Plutarch to esteem him to be a man of eminent vertue Of such men I know not whether it bee because all things which belong to a great one are esteemed great or peradventure infamous the Country Parentage and Tutors are much enquired after and sometimes also what influence of the heavens he was borne under Or because wee should conceive that greatnesse is not attained is not the purchase of man himselfe but the gift of the influences of heaven of the nature of such a temperature of the assistance of Tutors and as accidentall not to bee valued in him As if he did not in himselfe include the seed of greatnesse and that to become conspicuous he must be aided by the nature of the soile the influence of the stars the temperature of his Parents and the education of his Tutors as if he were a plant no way excelling another were it not planted in a better earth nourishing by a more industrious hand and hath a more benigne influence of the heavens Man is prone to deprive himselfe of his
Youth should grieve at the defects of old age and old men laugh at the ignorance of youth But they are not sorry that a young man wants wisdome but onely that he doth not know it and esteem it because they exceeding in this noble vertue the daughter and onely comfort of old Age they are grieved to see that Talent despised for which onely they can bee respected and reverenced Young men laugh at old men because the deformity which they see present being greater than the griefe moves their imagination stronglier than the future on which oftentimes they doe not think and which they know not whether it will happen or no or hope it will be better What a barbarous thing is a young man Let him that will bee safe from him shun him he walks in unknown wayes and I had almost said like a thing mixt of Man and Beast the degree of the mixture is unknown what he will be is impenetrable sometimes they are like Beasts because they doe not make use of reason sometimes worse because they abuse it The overmuch heat hinders wisdome in youth too much coldnesse extinguishes it in old age sometimes it never comes but man passes from immaturity to rottennesse and when it does come it is alwayes late and lasts but a little It is almost the onely one amongst sublunary things which doth not receive the proportion of Periods a Beginning a Being an Increase and Declining Quintilian wonders why all men being made by Nature to be good few are such I to not wonder at it doe rather consider whence it proceeds that the superior part for the most part is not so and whereas it is made to command it obeyes Peradventure the advantage of yeares is a great cause of it in which our sense doth with ease tyranny over us without meeting with any opposition or let from the soule and because they are the first yeares it takes strong root and being many it frames a habit Then comes Reason in and findes the Tyrant already in possession fortified and rooted It must fight against that which he is and that which he hath done it must subdue the forces of sense overcome the resistance of habit and destroy that Nature to frame a new one But why doe we not at the first as soon as we are born attain to reason Peradventure because we would then presently operate without a guide and wanting experience we should precipitate Learned and wisemen induced by a case which happened in our dayes and being singular and almost monstrous makes no president have believed that a Subject may securely passe over from speculation to practice without any further experience I will here set down my opinion therein with all due respect and reverence to famous Writers of great merit If truth onely wâ—re the object of our understanding and not that also which is like unto it there would be no error And if all things could be demonstrated there would be no opinions the deficiency of the one and super-abundancy of the other ruine the world The understanding despairing of demonstrating the truth gives it selfe over to vanity and goes in quest of opinion and not being able to acquiesce in it he raises himselfe higher and seekes to stirre up admiration through novelty seeing he cannot teach and direct with truth He esteems himselfe to be a brave man in Sciences that makes not the clearest but the hardest argument which though it doth not convince yet it overcomes the understanding as if the ones wisdome consisted in the others ignorance and truth which should be the easiest for the understanding to finde as the center of ponderous things is sought out by difficult obscure things How many things are there daily seen which because we know not how they are nor how they are done doe astonish and breed admiration in us for nothing else but onely because we take the lofâ—iest and most difficult way to understand what they are and how performed And afterward if the Artificer doe divulge it we finde it to be an easie and plaine way we acknowledge the error we cease our admiration and remaine ashamed The like would happen in questions concerning Sciences if truth were discored to us and that God did not hide it from man shewing him this great Fabrick of the World keeping him still in disputes not letting him understand it because he will mortifie him The Politick truth of the future being then ordinarily concealed how shall such an understanding find it which is accustomed to elevate it selfe above the matter to seek extravagant wayes to subtilize distinguish invent and imagine that if it doth not pâ—netrate into it it happens because it doth not raise elevate it self suffâ—ciently Then in our case it finds it self in a lowly gross matter not hard to be attained because the understanding doth not reach unto it but because for the most part it goes beyond it One going from Sciences where he is schollar that followes the opinions of those that went before him and he a master that invents and comming to the politick where Experience is Mistress and he a Master that followes it shall commit as many errors as the things are which he invents despairing of ever warranting or assertâ—ng any thing if he doth not turn from being a Master to be a Schollar forsaking speculation which is an enemy to Experience But above all others he shall seldome prove able in politick affaires that is accustomed to interpret the holy Scripture The difficulty proceeds not onely from the difference of tâ—mes God then making for the most part the secondary causes obedient to merit and now letting them oftentimes runne in favour of injustice but likewise from the difference which is between the Divine and Humane intellect the one infinite the other finite this an accident that a substance The holy Ghost doth not speak a word for one thing alone his sense may be interpreted for any thing that is pious for he meanes it all Hee gives scope of altering thoughts interpret and inlarge the old invent new teach with the doctrine and delight with the variety without prejudice of truth But man doth and saith one thing onely for it and and not alwayes for that which he should doe or say In what case then shall that man finde himselfe who comes from interpreting the Divine meaning which is so large and so good and goeth to interpret that of men which is alwayes short and for the most part evill seeing that in the one he cannot erre without he digresse and in the other men have often erred because they have not digressed I doe not say that discourse is not necâ—ssary for man I exclude it in speculative Sciences and admit it in what belongs to practice snow to be snow ought to be white and so ought a woman to be fair and yet notwithstanding if snow were as a woman it would not be white and if a woman were of the
himselfe from danger And when the Lord intending to punish him propounded three things unto him whether hee would endure seven yeares famine flye three moneths before his enemies or have three days pestilence in the land he chose the last quite against the vertue of fortitude but yet in favour of the publick good judging as St. Ambrose saith his absence would be more hurtfull to the people than the pestilence True it is that when he saw the Angel turn his sword upon the people he cried out that he should turn it against him that was guilty and spare the innocent But this was not fortitude digested by reason it was a violence incited by a tender and valorous nature Saint Ambrose saith That in his choyce hee followed wisdome in his griefe piety I will unfold this question by saying That the Proposition which God made to David was to keep him farre off that which David made to the Angel was to kill him He will not accept of going farre off and desires death because that by his absence the peoples light was put out and they would bee left without a guide in the dark whereas his death had been but a putting out of one light to give way to another The former seemes alwayes to be evill the latter is not alwayes so but many times is turned to a greater good It may also bee said that when David made his first choyce hee grounded it upon a hope hee had that hee he might appease God by Prayer which foundation when he found it prove vain he altered his desire Nothing makes a man better than prudency and nothing keeps him more secure than sagacity This sagacity would be dangerous if it were naturally rooted in the breast of a Generall born there and not acquired For those who are endowed therewith in this manner never goe about to try either force or fortune untill the case be quite desperate and for the most part the time past either to make use of force or adventure ones self upon chance A Generals sagacity is different from a Polititians The one is not good in the Citie wherefore Military men are little available in a Senate The other is pernicious in the field wherefore they send Gown-men Councellors to lose and ruine enterprises In one of these sagacities valour should prevaile in the other sagacity itself must have the upper hand The Polititian ought not betake himselfe to force till sagacity quite fails and the Military man will hardly make use of sagacity whilest he can work with violence Alcibiades hath recourse to Pharnabazus favourite to Artaxerxes King of Persia presently becomes bound to him in a most strict bond of amity He had I know not what of attractive in him which alluring mens mindes bewitched them A lively Spirit from which proceeds activity and abundance of meanes to work by If we seek the celâ—stial causes thereof it proceeds from the constitution of the Planets from the swiftnesse of the motions from Mercury set in his dignities If we seek the elementary causes we will say it proceeds from thesire which producing its nature in the Spirits participateeh his motion unto them from the center to the superficies Therefore in such kinde of people the spirits are perceived at the circumference by the motions of the head and hands and most of all by the splendor of the eyes out of which they send forth sparkles And by reason that no cause if we speak of celestiall ones concurres more in this fabrick than Mercury swift in his dignities therefore it proves most like him They draw him with wings at his feet at his head or his haire The Poets doe not make him loves Courcellor but his Messenger and sometimes his Minister to deceive His Minerall is Mercury which alwayes moves and is like silver but is not silver which deceives the eyes of those that look upon it with iâ—s splendor and ruines them that handle it with its poyson The Alchimists seeing it false because it is moveable seek to take away its motion and fix it Astrologians believe not it hath any happy influence in the understanding though it bee never so forunate They desire not to finde him in his own house and exaltation but rather in Saturns or at least favoured with his presence and beames to cut off his wings with the slowest Planets Sythe When they give him the company of any stars to make him have a happy influence it is of the lesser ones The over-much motion which it gives the spirits in beginning of an action doth not admit of a prosecution of it and the over-much light doth puzzle and resolve them If Philosophers desire a temperament for a great understanding they doe not commend that which is of fire nor that of earth not melancholy noâ— Bilis alone if any Bilis that which is black which is the Astrologers Mercury in the house of Saturn and the Quicksilver fixed by the Alchimists fire The Mercurials with their swiftnesse run over all things with their splendor they see them and because they run they cannot discourse and because their motion is from the center to the circumference they spread and dilate themselves abroad they doe not grow deeper nor take root And having many objects before their eyes they have always some new thing to propose whereby they seem fruitfull yet are but barren bringing forth abortive embrioes if they come to be children they are monstrous ones I beare with Princes sometimes they put themselves into such mens hands in compain comparison of which all others seeeme dull and obtuse Whilst a Melaâ—cholly man gives one reason they will give a thousand If one answer serves not they will give two or three they confound and delight with variety with their engines and inventions they gaine admiration with their words great spirit and effectuall operation as it were a fury they astonish Rethorick Poetrie Musick and other Arts doe consist of I know not what set on the outside the judgment whereof seemes to belong to the senses Energie Number Sweetnesse of voyce and variety of colouring Although they consist of somewhat else which is more internall to apprehend which is required great skill in those Arts and an eminent understanding to judge of it The ignorant man presently runnes to the sense and judges with the eye and eare commending according to his sight and hearing many times that which deserves no commendation and never blaming that which is blame-worthy Apparance deceives him because he fixes himselfe upon the accidents and commands them and not penetrating to the knowledge of the substance he discommends it not because he does not know it Seneca speaks of some Orators whose orations pronounced by themselves seemed excellent and at the very first gained applause but being read and examined were of no worth He confesses they forced his understanding and he commends them not because they deserved it but because they bound him to it The same
delight in being happy it requires a motion the pleasure is in the becomming so and he that oftenest and most times becomes such hath received most pleasure Such a happinesse doth that man attaine unto that humbles himselfe when he is come to the highest degree he enjoyes a perpetuall delight and yet doth not forsake his stand living in a continuall motion He alwayes humbles himselfe and is still raised up But even as Hippocrates was in mine opinion deceived judging it a good habit to be full of bloud so are they also who judge those men happy that are ful of bloud If any man had represented and set before the eyes of Caesar and Alexander the great and others who were then or are now like unto them the way and meanes whereby they had attained to their happinesse hearing nothing but outcries howlings and horrid lamentations seeing nothing but slaughters ruines of Cities desolation of Provinces Inhabited places made desolate fruitfull places barren themselves encompassed with fire dead carkasses and bloud it would surely strike a terror into them What happinesse is that then the cause of which affrights and terrifies even him that hath attained to it FINIS MARQUES VIRGILIO MALVEZZI HIS CORIOLANUS To the most Reverend Father Sforza Pallavicino Of the Society of Jesus Most Reverend Father I Dedicated my Alcibiades to King Philip the fourth I now dedicate Coriolanus to your most reverend Fatherhood What a happinesse do I enjoy to have the greatest Monarch of the world to be my Master And the greatest wit and most sublime understanding to my Nephew If these two lines which adorn my Writings were but graven upon my Tomb-stone they would fully satisfie my ambition namely HERE LIETH THE SERVANT TO KING PHILIP AND UNCLE TO FATHER PALAVICINE The goer by would therein read the happinesse of my birth and the worthinesse of my choyce And how can these my Writings be but secure protected by the greatest worldly power and defended by the greatest learning I beleeve my affinity will not derogate from mine attestation in witnessing that which your workes have manifested to the world I would I had almost said renounce my kindred rather than betray my judgement and leave being an Uncle rather than to not be a Trumpet of the eminency of your understanding and most rarely singular qualities I would beseech your most reverend Paternity to esteeme of that in mee which is none of mine namely your being my Nephew and I in the mean time will glory to have added the Title of Servant to the Character of Vncle So affectionately kissing your hands I rest Your most Reverend Fatherhoods most bounden Servant and most devoted Vncle Virgilio Malvezzi Bononia April 2. 1648. READER I Doe not professe my selfe so considerate as that I could not erre in mine advertisements neither am I so Vnchristian that I would have any mans reputation to suffer being any way touched by my ignorant mistakes I have therefore thought it good to recall two passages in a booke I set forth whilst I lived in Spaine called The Scale Whereof the one tends somewhat to the disparagement of the Duke of Savoy where I related there was a report that hee complied with the King of France in yeilding of Susa upon composition The other was concerning the Governour of the Bush through whose avarice J said the Towne was lost As for the first though I did not report it of mine own head yet it is so farre from truth that I should imagine I did wrong the sincerity Duke Charles used therein if I did not affirme the report to be false raised by some malicious and interessed persons As for the second I have seen the Cardinall Infante his Letters which testified that the Governour was wanting in nothing that belonged to him for the securing and defending of that place Therefore Reader if thou findest any other places in any parts of my books where I have plainly and unjustly touched any mans reputation I intend here to recall it in generall and will be ready to doe it in particular whensoever mine errors shall be made knowen to me And wheresoever the sense is dubious I shall desire to have it favourably interpreted CORIOLANVS CORIOLANVS his eminent vertues which mingled with some defect made it rather greater than equall obliges Plutarch to attribute the cause of the one to the goodnesse of his nature and of the other to the defect of education From the one he inferres that good soile may overcome bad tillage from the other that let the soile be never so good yet if it continually have bad tillage it will bring forth some bad plant The soile is the Minde the tillage Learning which being of a temperate complexion corrects all excesses and cures all contrarieties It raiseth those that are too low humbles them that are too stout where it findes any hard thing it softens it where any soft it hardens it resembling the Sun which with the same beames melts the Ice and hardens the mire This doctrine is so delightfull that it hath been able to attract the eyes which it could not dazzle I have a long time looked upon it with astonishment knowing that by consenting to it I should betray mine understanding and doubting lest by opposing it I should seem to question a truth and by arguing against education which hath commonly been approved of and most of all by the wisest I should be reputed rash and temerary though by right I should be applauded for it But if a good Citizen ought to expose his life to save the publick why should he not also adventure his reputation for the common service This will be also so much the easier because I mean not to direct my shafts against the thing it selfe but against the manner commending with others Education but not that Education which is commonly practised I represent unto my selfe two trees of the same kinde but in severall places one wilde in the forrest yet in good soile the other growing in a Garden amiddest the tendernesses of tillage and husbandry I see the boughes of the latter more beautifull and springing up its fruit fairer and bigger but the boughes ready to break at every blast of wind the fruit rot in a short time and affording but a weak kind of nourishment I see in the former rougher boughes lesser fruit and not so beautifull but the boughes resisting the fury of the North windes and the fruit not easily corrupted and strong for nourishment The roughnesse of the tree of the forrest yeelds I know not what kind of statelinesse so that Majesty added to the horridnesse brings forth a kind of reverence with delight The tendernesse of the other moves delight with its beauty but in such a manner that it doth in some kinde make the beholder grow tender with looking on it The tree of the forrest is like a vigorous sinewy well-limbed man with strong muscles A garden tree resembles a young and tender maiden
satisfaction and love passe to the understanding How can you conceive vertue to be otherwise but faire and good if â—ou consider it as vertue and in what other shape can you consider it if it doth not appeare naked unto you Hate Rage and Envy cannot touch it they are mothes which stick onely on the garments wormes that inhabit putrifaction onely strip her of applauses wealth and all other vaine habiliments if thou wilt have her be secure and enamourthee This vertue which being once known violently stirres up love takes impression in mens hearts sometimes in the Great ones sometimes in the Peoples by very different wayes Some would have it remaine within the spheare of mediocrity some would raise it up to the concave of the Moone It is not alwayes envy which desires it low nor love that continually desires to have it exalted Sometimes it happens because a Great one would come into a strict league of friendship with it and the People would by its means enjoy an honorable servitude He that is possessed of such a noble gemme may communicate it to some by a relation of friend to friend to others of Master to Servant The one to be perfect requires equality the other to bee pleasing a kind of distance The greater the Master is the more honorable is the servant and the more cordiall the friend is the greater equality is between them But the connexion which the People hath with a person of eminent vertue is like a servant to his Lord and he is desirous to exalt him But the great ones is as one friends to another and he doth not desire to have him advanced Aristotle though he makes equality too necessary in friendship sometimes attributing it to superabundancy sometimes to want as if he discovered the truth out of its due distance and with a hindred and obstructed meanes seemes to contradict himselfe and pretend it to proceed from a great equality He either was or would be deceived he needed to have bin neither if he had affirmed that both these causes united did produce a most strict league of friendship Superabundancy and want if one of them alone be divided into two subjects brings forth either slavery or its image The poor is the rich mans slave and the Scholar the Masters and if he be not he is like some such thing Of two superabundancies and two wants there is framed an almost indissoluble bond of friendship The People that find in themselves nothing but defect goe towards vertue and desire to have it made great because they will serve it The great one who with the defect of vertue hath superabundancy of honour and wealth would find him out who hath superabundance of what he wants with defect of his superabundance and desires to have him low because he would make him his friend And if this latter comes also to be exalted to honours and wealth the other loses his superabundancy and remaines with deefct onely He hath nothing whereon to found the harmonious equality which produces friendship and because he abhorres the character of being a servant he hates that vertue exalted which he venerated when it was humble If there be a great pleasure in the world it consists in doing a benefit and if there be any greater it is in requiting it Therefore that must needs be exceeding great which is produced by the harmonious interweaving of abundance and defect where the benefit is at the same time done and requited Plutarch calls Coriolanus proud and impatient I agree to it He attributes the cause of it to want of study I dissent from it Because learning doth not onely not hinder these passions but according to St. Pauls saying produces Pride and according to Solomons Impatience I attribute it to his being born in the Roman Common-wealth which more desirous to increase then to preserve itselfe as it was made more of valour esteeme in its Cittizens thereof Patience Wherefore at the last keeping one still alive it fell for want of the other True it is that as it is not against the law of Patience that one upon occasion when there is need should violently oppose one that operates ill no more is it of the essence of valour to repaire all dammages and revenge all offences But the Romans cared not for these qualifications That Valour was more usefull to them which operated then that which suffered And because for that part of valour which lookes after revenge wrath was very usefull and very hurtfull to that which belongs to suffering it is not to be wondred that some of them had the vice of impatience coupled with the vertue of fortitude Seneca would not admit this doctrine of wrath he would have it rooted out as if our nature were so perfect that it wanted no instigation to make it operate well nor no curbe to keep it from working evill He that will see how man ought to make use of wrath which we also call choler let him consider what use nature makes of that choler which is called Bilis I meddle not with that part which is called Nutritive which subtilizes the bloud that it may the easilier nourish the parts which feeds the heart and the musculous flesh which tempers the cold of the Pituitous humour with Melancholy I will speake only of the Excrementall Bilis There is one naturall and another without nature or extra naturam One reserved in the Gall bagge that is to clense and absterge the pituitous humors together with the ordures because like a medicament it instigates and provokes the expulsive vertue to send forth that which is not to be retained and which being retained would kill The other breeds Dysenteries Diareas Deliriums Frenzies perfect Tertians and an infinite of such diseases And even just so it is with wrath One kind of wrath is a passion which like that unbridled Bilis running on furiously brings one to a precipice The other regulated by the understanding and set apart for some occasion serves to instigate the vertue of valour and as Natures excrementall Bilis is necessary to expell the excrements which nature would not move to doe if it were not instigated so likewise this wrath is necessary for man to drive that away from him which the understanding hath concocted and judged fit to be driven out But nature doth not make use of the Bilis onely to expell excrements onely but also of the serous matter to distribute the bloud of melancholy to excite the appetite to retaine the food and sustaine the body Of the sharp and serous humour to mixe with the seed to provoke to generation and preserve the kind Although that serous humour bee that which causeth Hydropsie though the Atra Bilis produces Quartanes Cancers Hypocondries Rage and Madness though that from the sharp subtile humour the greatest part of the Cutancall diseases have their beginning So the minde likewise makes use of Wrath for Fortitude of Ambition for Magnanimity and yet the one
remerity is unlimited The free putting a mans life into that mans hands whom he hath wronged is the greatest satisfaction that can be given 108 Temerity is an act without reason 108 There can be no eminent understanding without some parcell of folly 99 A great understanding causeth constancy a weake one obstinacy 145 He that is best if once he begin to be bad becomeâ— the worst 73 It is a great misfortune for a man to have worth and want repute and a far greater to have repute and want woâ—th 149 Peauty and eloquence are unprofitable weapons against wrath or fury 117 Youth should grieve at the defects of old age and old men laugh at the ignorance of youth 44 The Table of the chiefe heads discoursed upon in the Life of CORIOLANVS Coriolanus his defects attributed to want of education p 175 Whether education to Learning Sciences be good for all sorts of men p 176 Why the Romans honoured their Citizens for some brave acts with Oaken Crownes 182 All vices ought to be punished and all vertues rewarded 183 Impuniâ—â—e of offences is sometimes a reward p. 183 The vulgaâ—s reward is money a Noble mans honour 185 How rewards came to be altered 186 The same things are not in esâ—eeme every where 187 Nature desires that most which is most necessary 187 Riches the root of evill 188 Punishments changed by Tyrants 190 In what consists reputation 191 Who are fittest to command 193 Coriolanus rejoyced to have his mother heare of his worthy actions 194 Why anothers joy increases ours 195 Sannieticus King of Egypt 198 Coriolanus deâ—iring to bee chosen Consul by the people puts off his Senatoriall Robes 201 Why he did so 202 To judge of vertue truely wee must see it naked 204 Coriolanus termed proud and impatient and the cause of it 207 The vertue of choller in man 208 How humors in the body and passions in the mind may produce good effects 210 Wherein consists Patience 211 Women subject to impatience as well as men and the cause thereof 213 Why women being wrathfull are not valiant 214 How the common wealth of Rome might have made good use of Coriolanus his imperfections 216 Some defects are tolerable in young men and some vertues improper for them 218 Patience vertually containes all other vertues 222 A mans talents ought to bee imployed in due time 224 It is an unhappinesse for a man of worth to be born under a Tyrant or in a corrupt common wealth 226 The Ostracisine hindered the increase of the Athenian common wealth 227 The fortune of a Kingdome or common wealth may be transferred to another in the person of one man 228 A mans fortune decayes as his vigor 229 Coriolanus flies to the Volsci and is entertained by them 231 Man will give any thing to attaine his ends 231 Sometimes a man seekes to oppresse him whom he hath raised p. 232. and undoe what he himselfe hath done 234 One contrarie cures another if the contrarie bee not mistaken 235 Compassion and envie are the two ordinarie passions of great ones 236 Of favorites 238 Some desire greatnesse for their owne benefit some for the good of the common wealth 242 From different ends proceeds a different working towards them 243 Some love the person some its vertues 244 Mans life a warfare 248 Fortunes wheele cannot be fired 248 A stranger admitted in another common wealth to high degrees is in great danger 255 Every man hath a desire to his owne countrey 255 No man can hate his owne country though hee hate a prevailing party in it 256 Divers causes may provoke a man to bring in strangers to oppresse his native country 259 A man may rashly doe his countrey such a wrong as he cannot afterwards remedy 265 Coriolanus more fit to be compared with Cato then with Albiciades 268 Envie followes Humane glory 249 It is a great fortune to dye when fortune is at the highest 251 How Sejanus gained Tiberius 240 The Translator to the READER HAving this void Page lefâ— I thought good to set down therein this briefe explanation of the word Ostracisme which thou shalt finde in severall places of it The Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is derived 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies shells For the Athenians intended to put it in use the Citizens at the least to the number of six thousand for otherwise it was no lawfull nor full Assembly at a day appointed brought every man a shell whereon was written the name of him whom he would have banished and threw it into a place prepared for that purpose And the Magistrates telling the said shells he whose name was found written upon most of them was proclaimed banished for ten yeares Vale. FINIS Courteous Reader These Bookes following are Printed for Humphrey Moseley and are to be sold at his shop at the Princes Armes in St Pauls Church-yard Various Histories with curious Discourses in Humane Learning c. 1. THe History of the Banished Virgin a Romance translated by I. H. Esq Fol. 2. The History of Polexander Englished by William Brown Gent. Printed for T. W. and are to be sold by Hum. Moseley in Folio 3. Mr James Howells History of Lewis the thirteenth King of France with the life of his Cardinall de Richelieu in Folio 4. Mr Howells Epistolae Hoelianae familiar Letters Domestic and Forren in six Sections Partly Historicall Politicall Philosophicall first Volume with Additions in 8o. 1650. 5. Mr Howells New vollume of Familiar Letters Partly Historicall Politicall Philosophicall the second Volume with many Additions 1650. 6. Mr Howells Third Volume of Additionall Letters of a fresher date never before published in 8o. 1650. 7. Mr Howels Dodona's Grove or the Vocall Forrest in 120. with Additions 1650. 8. Mr Howells Englands Teares for the present Warres in 12o. 1650. 9. Mr Howell Of the Pre-eminence and pedegree of Parliament in 12º 1650. 10. Mr Howells Instruction for Forren Travels in 12o. with divers Additions 1650. 11. Mr. Howels Vote or a Poem Royall presented to His Majesty in 4o. 12. Mr. Howels Angliae Suspiria Lachrimae in 12o. 13. Policy Vnveiled or Maximes of state done into English by the translator of Gusman the Spanish Rogue in 4o. 14. The History of the Inquisition composed by the R. F. Paul Servita the compiler of the History of the Councell of Trent in 4o. 15. Biathanatos a Paradox of Self-Homicide by Dr. Io Donne Deane of St Pauls London in 4o. 16. Marques Virgillio Malvezzi's Romulus and Tarquin Englished by Hen. Earle of Monmouth in 12o. 17. Marques Virgillio Malvezzis David persecuted Englished by Rob. Ashley Gent. in 12o. 18. Marques Virgillio Malvezzi Of the Success and chief events of the Monarchy of Spain in the year 1639. of the Revolt of the Catalonians Englished by Rob. Gentilis 12o. 19. Marques Virgillio Malvezzi's considerations on the lives of Alcibiades and Coriolanus Englished by Robert Gentilis in 12o. 1650. 20. Gracious Privileges granted by the