true and assuredremedies and in stead of leaving the heart afflicted amid humane thoughts and considerations raiseth and lifteth it up unto the justice wisedome and bountie of the true God and heavenly father it causeth it to see the estate of eternall life it assureth it of the soules immortalitie of the resurrection of the bodie points of learning wherein the Pagans were altogether ignorant and of the permanent and everlasting joies above in the kingdome of heaven Now albeit as this trueth of God revealed unto us in his sacred word hath instructed and resolved us sufficiently it will not be amisse and impertinent to learne of our authour and such others those things which themselves did not well and thorowly understand neither in life nor yet in death for that the foundation failed them and they missed the ground-worke indeed and in cleaving and leaning to I wot not what fortune and fatall destinie they caused man to rest and stay himselfe upon a vaine shadow of vertue and willed him in one word to seeke for consolation where there was nothing but desolation for happinesse in misery and for life in death As touching the argument and contents of this treatise adorned it is with notable reasons similitudes examples and testimonies the substance whereof is this That Apollonius unto whom it is addressed ought not to be over-pensive and heavie for the death of his sonne deceased in the flower of his age To move and perswade him thereto Plutarch after he had excused himselfe in that he wrote no sooner unto him and shewed that space of time comming betweene doth better prepare mens hearts which sorow and be in anguish to receive comfort he condemneth aswell blockish and senselesse folke as also those that be weaklings and over-tender in adversitie Which done he entreth into a generall review of the remedies which be appropriate to cure the miseries and afflictions of man namely that hee ought to holde a meane and to continue alwaies like himselfe to cast his eie and have regard upon the divers accidents of our life and in enjoying the blessings thereof to thinke upon future crosses and calamities to be armed with reason for to beare all changes to remember and carefully to thinke upon the estate of this mortall and transitorie life to consider the evils and miseries of the same to endure patiently that which can not be avoided and prevented with all the cares and lamentations that be and to compare our owne adversities with other mens Then he proceedeth unto the particular consolations of those who are heavie and sorowfull for the death of their children kinsfolke or friends to wit That there is no harme nor evill at all in death but rather that it is a good thing that the houre of it being uncertaine it is a comfort unto those whom it summoneth who no doubt would be cast downe and overthrowen with the apprehension of miseries to come in case they had any foresight thereof After this he proveth at large by three inductions and arguments of Socrates that there is not any evill in death which he confirmeth by divers examples and then returning into his consolations he mainteineth and holdeth That whosoever die yoong are most happie that the consideration of Gods providence ought to reteine and stay us that we are not to mourne and lament for the dead neither in regard of them nor of our selves that since over-long heavinesse and sorow maketh a man miserable it were very good for him to be rid and dispatched of that paine quickly Having finished this point he resolveth and assoileth certeine difficulties which are presented in these maters and then taking in hand his purpose againe he ruleth and reformeth the affections of the living toward them that are departed he reclaimeth them from persisting and continuing obstinately in bewailing their absence willing them rather to bewaile the case of those who are living and by many reasons doth prove and conclude that they who die betimes have one marvellous advantage over those that remaine alive in the world Then he teacheth a man to mainteine and cary himselfe as he ought in all affaires refuteth those who can abide no paine and trouble and knitting up all the premisses in few words he adjoineth certaine necessarie and profitable counsels in such accidents and before that he concludeth the whole treatise he describeth the felicity of those whom death cutteth off in the prime of their yeeres having a speciall regard herein to Apollonius the 〈◊〉 unto whom he writeth and assuring him by the recitall of the good parts and vertues which were in his sonne lately departed that he was without all question in that place of repose and rest which the Poets do imagine Upon which occasion he treateth of the immortalitie of the soule according to the doctrine of Plato and his followers which is the very end and closing up of all that had bene delivered before A CONSOLATORIE ORAtion sent unto Apollonius upon the death of his sonne IT is not newly come upon me now at this present and not before to pitie your case and lament in your behalfe ô Apollonius having heard long since as I did the heavy newes concerning the untimely death of your sonne a yoong gentleman singularly well beloved of us all as who in that youth and tender yeeres of his shewed rare examples of wise carriage staied and modest behaviour together with precise observance of those devout dueties and just offices which either perteined to the religious service of the gods or were respective to his parents and friends for even from that time have I condoled with you and had a fellow-feeling of your sorrow but for me to have come then and visited you immediatly upon his decease departure out of this world to present you with an exhortation to beare patiently and as becommeth a man that unfortunate accident had bene an unseemly part of mine and unconvenient considering how in that verie instant your minde and bodie both overcharged with the insupportable burden of so strange and unexpected a calamitie were brought low and much infeebled and my selfe besides must needs have moaned you felt part of your griefe and sorrowed with you for companie for even the best and most skilfull Physicians when they meet with violent rhewmes and catarrhes which suddenly surprise any part of the body doe not proceed at the first to a rough cure by purgative medicines but permit this rage and hot impression of inflamed humours to grow of it selfe to maturitie by application onely of supple oiles mild liniments and gentle fomentations But now that since your said misfortune some time which useth to ripen all things is passed betweene and given good opportunitie considering also that the present disposition and state of your person seemeth to require the helpe and comfort of your friends I thought it meet and requisit to impart unto you certeine reasons and discourses consolatorie if happily by that meanes I may ease
him and in this maner began to perswade Above all things my good childe quoth he studie and endevour to imitate the humanitie and sociable nature of your noble father unlesse haply you have me in jealousie and suspition as if I went about to compasse your death The youth was abashed to heare him say so and went with him well supper was no sooner ended but they made an end of the yoong gentleman also and strangled him outright so that it is no ridiculous and foolish advertisement as some let not to say but a wise and sage advise of Hesiodus when he saith Thy friend and lover to supper do invite Thy foe leave out for he will thee requite Be not in any wise bashfull and ashamed to refuse his offer whom thou knowest to hate thee but never leave out and reject him once who seemeth to put his trust and confidence in thee for if thou do invite thou shalt be invited againe and if thou be bidden to a supper and go thou canst not choose but bid againe if thou abandon once thy distrust and diffidence which is the guard of thy safty and so marre that good tincture and temperature by a foolish shame that thou hast when thou darest not refuse Seeing then that this infirmitie and maladie of the minde is the cause of many inconveniences assay we must to chase it away with all the might we have by exercise beginning at the first like as men do in other exercises with things that are not very difficult nor such as a man may boldly have the face to denie as for example if at a dinner one chance to drinke unto thee when thou hast drunke sufficiently already be not abashed to refuse for to pledge him neither force thy selfe but take the cup at his hand and set it downe againe on the boord againe there is another perchance that amids his cups chalengeth thee to hazzard or to play at dice be not ashamed to say him nay neither feare thou although thou receive a flout and scoffe at his hands for deniall but rather do as xenophanes did when one Lasus the sonne of Hermiones called him coward because he would not play at dice with him I confesse quoth he I am a very dastard in those things that be lewd and naught and I dare do nothing at all moreover say thou fall into the hands of a pratling talkative busie bodie who catcheth hold on thee hangeth upon thee and will not let thee go be not sheepish and bashfull but interrupt and cut his tale short shake him off I say but go thou forward and make an end of thy businesse whereabout thou wentest for such refusals such repulses shifts and evasions in small matters for which men cannot greatly complaine of us exercising us not to blush and be ashamed when there is no cause do inure and frame us well before-hand unto other occasions of greater importance And heere in this place it were not amisse to call unto remembrance a speech of Demosthenes for when the Athenians being sollicited and mooved to send aid unto Harpalus were so forward in the action that they had put themselves in armes against king Alexander all on a sodaine they discovered upon their owne coasts Philoxenus the lieutenant generall of the kings forces and chiefe admirall of his Armada at sea now when the people were so astonied upon this unexpected occurrent that they had not a word to say for very feare What wil these men do quoth Demosthenes when they shall see the sunne who are so afraid that they dare not looke against a little lampe even so I say to thee that art given much to blush and be abashed What wilt thou be able to do in weightie affaires namely when thou shalt be encountred by a king or if the bodie of some people or state be earnest with thee to obtaine ought at thy hand that is unreasonable when thou hast not the heart to refuse for to pledge a familiar friend if he chance to drinke unto thee offer thee a cup of wine or if thou canst not find meanes to escape and wind thy selfe out of the company of a babling busie bodie that hath fastened and taken hold of thee but suffer such a vaine prating fellow as this to walke and leade thee at his pleasure up and downe having not so much power as to say thus unto him I will see you againe hereafter at some other time now I have no leasure to talke with you Over and besides the exercise and use of breaking your selves of this bashfulnesse in praising others for small and light matters will not be unprofitable unto you as for example Say that when you are at a feast of your friends the harper or minstrell do either play or sing out of tune or haply an actour of a Comedie dearely hired for a good piece of money by his ill grace in acting marre the play and disgrace the authour himselfe Menander and yet neverthelesse the vulgar sort doe applaud clap their hands and highly commend and admire him for his deed in mine advice it would be no great paine or difficulty for thee to give him the hearing with patience and silence without praising him after a servile and flattering maner otherwise than you thinke it meet and reason for if in such things as these you be not master of your selfe how will you be able to hold when some deare friend of yours shall reade unto you either some foolish rime or bad poësie that himselfe hath composed if he shal shew unto you some oration of his owne foolish and ridiculous penning you will fall a praising of him will you you will keepe a clapping of your hands with other flattering jacks I would not els And if you doe so how can you reprove him when he shall commit some grosse fault in greater matters how shall you be able to admonish him if he chance to forget himselfe in the administration of some magistracie or in his carriage in wedlocke or in politike government And verily for mine owne part I do not greatly allow and like of that answere of Pericles who being requested by a friend to beare false witnesse in his behalfe and to binde the same with an oath whereby he should be forsworne I am your friend quoth he as far as the altar as if he should have said Saving my conscience and duety to the gods for surely he was come too neere already unto him But he who hath accustomed himselfe long before neither to praise against his owne minde one who hath made an oration nor to applaud unto him who hath sung nor to laugh heartily at him who came out with some stale or poore jest which had no grace hee will I trow never suffer his friend and familiar to proceed so farre as to demand such a request of him or once be so bolde as to move him who before had refused in smaller trifles to satisfie his desire in
their wilde and untamed affections with great care and vigilance For this floure of age having no forecast of thrift but set altogither upon spending and given to delights and pleasures winseth and flingeth out like a skittish and frampold horse in such sort that it had need of a sharpe bit and short curb And therefore they that endeuor not by all good meanes forcibly to hold in and restraine this age but give yoong men libertie and suffer them to do after their own mind plunge them ere they be aware into a licentious course of life and all maner of wickednesse Wherefore good and wise fathers ought in this age especially to be vigilant and watchfull over their sonnes they ought I say to keepe them downe and inute them to wisedome and vertue by teaching by threatning by intreatie and praiers by advise and remonstrances by perswasion and counsell by faire promises by setting before their eies the examples of some who being abandoned to their pleasures and all sensualitie have fallen headlong into great calamities and wofull miseries and contrariwise of others who by mastering their lusts and conquering their delights have wonne honor and glorious renowne For surely these be the two Elements and foundations of vertue Hope of reward and Feare of punishment For as hope inciteth and setteth them forward to enterprise the best and most commendable acts so feare plucketh them backe that they dare not enter upon lewd and wicked pranks In summe Fathers ought with great care to divert their children from frequenting ill companie for otherwise they shall be sure to catch infection and carie away the contagion of their leandnes This is that Pythagoras expresly forbiddeth in his Aenigmaticall precepts under covert and dark words which because they are of no small efficacie to the attaining of vertue I will briefly set downe by the way and open their meaning Taste not quoth he of the black tailed fishes Melanuri which is as much to say as Keepe not company with infamons persons such as for their naughtie life are noted as it were with a blacke coale Passe not over a balance That is we ought to make the greatest account of equitie and justice and in no case to transgresse the same Sit not upon the measure Choenix That is to say we are to flie sloth and idlenes that we may forecast to make provision of things necessarie to this life Give not every man thy right hand which is all one with this Make no contracts and bargaines indifferently with all persons Weare not a ring streight upon thy finger i. Live in freedome and at libertie neither intangle and clog thy life with troubles as with gives Dig not nor rake into the fire with a sword whereby he giveth us a caveat not to provoke farther a man that is angrie for that is not meete and expedient but rather to give place unto those that are in heat of choller Ear not thy heart that is to say offend not thine owne soule nor hurt and consume it with pensive cares Abstaine from beanes i. Intermeddle not in the affaires of State and government for that in olde time men were woont to passe their voices by beanes so proceeded to the election of Magistrates Put not viands in a chamber-pot whereby he signifieth that we should not commit good and civill words to a wicked minde because speech is the nutriment of the understanding which becommeth polluted by the leudnesse of men Returne not backe from the limits and confines when thou commest unto them that is to say If wee perceive death approching and that wee are come to the uttermost bounds of our life we ought to beare our death patiently and not be discouraged thereat But now is it time to retume againe to my matter which I proposed before in the beginning namely as I have alreadie said we are to withdraw our children from the societie and companie of leud persons and flatterers especiallie for that which many a time and often I have said to divers and sundrie fathers I will now repeat once againe namely That there is not a more mischievous and pestilent kinde of men or who doe greater hurt to youth and sooner overthrow them then these flatterers who are the undoing both of fathers and sonnes causing the olde age of the one and the youth of the other wretched and miserable presenting with their leud and wicked counsels an inevitable bait to wit Pleasure wherewith they are sure to be caught Fathers exhort their sonnes that be wealthie to sobrietie and these incite them to drunkenesse Fathers give them counsell to live chaste and continent these provoke them to lust and loosenesse of life Fathers bid them to save spare and be thriftie these will them to spend scatter and be wasters Fathers advise their children to labour and travell these flatterers give them counsell to play or sit still and doe nothing What all our life say they is no more but a moment and minute of time to speake of we must live therefore and enjoy our owne whiles wee have it we must not live beside our selves and languish What need you regard and care for the menaces of a father an olde doting foole carying death in his face and having one foot in the grave we shall see him one of these dayes turne up his heeles and then will we soone have him forth and cary him aloft bravely to his grave You shall have one of these come and bring unto a youth some common harlot out of the stinking stewes having bome him in hand before that she is some brave dame and citizens wife for to furnish whom he must robbe his father there is no remedie Thus fathers goodmen in one houre are bereaved and spoiled of that which they had saved many a yeere for the maintenance of their olde age To be short a wretched and cursed generation they be hypocrites pretending friendship but they can not skill of plaine dealing and franke speech Rich men they claw sooth up and flatter the poore they contemne and despise It seemeth they have learned the Art of singing to the Harpe for to seduce yoong men for when their yoong masters who mainteine and feed them begin to laugh then they set up by and by a loud laughter then they yawne shew all their teeth counterfeit cranks fained and supposed men bastard members of mankinde and this life who compose themselves and live to the will and pleasure of rich men and notwithstanding their fortune is to be free borne and of franke condition yet they chuse voluntarily to be slaves who thinke they have great injurie done unto them if they may not live in all fulnesse and superfluitie to be kept delicately and doe nothing that good is And therefore all futhers that have any care of their childrens good education and wel doing ought of necessitie to chase and drive away from them these gracelesse imps and shamelesse beasts they shall doe
feareth Neptune and standeth in dread least he shake cleaue and open the earth and so discover hell he will rebuke also himselfe when he is offended and angrie with for Apollo the principal man of all the Greekes of whom Thetu complaineth thus in the Poet Aesohylus as touching Achilles her sonne Himselfe did sing and say al good of me himselfe also at wedding present was Yet for all this himselfe and none but be hath slaine and done to death my sonne alas He will like wise represse the treares of Achilles now departed and of Agamemnon being in hell who in their desire to revive and for the love of this life stretch foorth their impotent and seeble hands And if it chaunce at any time that he be troubled with passions and surprised with their enchantments and sorcerie he will not sticke nor feare to say thus unto himselfe Make hast and speed without delay Recover soone the light of day Beare well in minde what thou seest heere And all report to thy bed feere Homer spake this in mirth and pleasantly fitting indeed the discourse wherein he describeth hell as being in regard of the fiction a tale fit for the eares of women and none els These be the fables that Poets do feigne voluntarily But more in number there are which they neither devisenor counterfeit but as they are perswaded and do beleeve themselves so they would beare us in hand and infect us with the same untruthes as namely when Homer writeth thus of Iupiter Two lots then of long sleeping death he did in balance put One for Achilles hardy knight and one for Hector stout But when he pis'd it just mids behold str Hectors death Weigh'd downward unto bell beneath Then Phoebus slopt his breath To this fiction Aeschylus the Poët hath aptly fitted one entire Tragedie which he intituled Psychostasia that is to say the weighing of Soules or ghosts in balance Wherein he deviseth to stand at these skales of Iupiter Thetu of the one side and Aurora of the other praying each of them for their sonnes as they fight But there is not a man who seeth not cleerely that this it but a made tale and meere fable devised by Homer either to content and delight the Reader or to bring him into some great admiration and astonishment Likewise in this place T' is Iupiter that mooveth warre He is the cause that men do jarre As also this of another Poët When God above some house will overthrow He makes debate twixt mort all men below These and such like speeches are delivered by Poëts according to the very conceit and beliese which they have whereby the errour and ignorance which themselves are in as touching the nature of the gods they derive and communicate unto us Semblably the strange wonders and marvels of Hell The descriptions by them made which they depaint unto us by fearefull and terrible termes representing unto us the fantasticall apprehensions and imaginations of burning and flaming rivers of hideous places and horrible torments there are not many men but wot well ynough that therein be tales and lies good store no otherwise than in meates and viands you shall finde mixed otherwhiles hurtfull poyson or medicinable drugs For neither Homer nor Pindarus nor Sophocles have written thus of Hell beleeving certainely that there were any such things there From whence the dormant rivers dead of blacke and shady night Cast up huge mists and clouds full darke that overwhelme the light Likewise The Ocean coast they sailed still along Fast by the clifs of Leucas rocke among As also Here boyling waves of gulfe so deepe do swell Where lies the way and downfall into hell And as many of them as bewailed and lamented for death as a most piteous and woful thing or feared want of sepulture as a miserable and wretched case uttered their plaints and griefes in these and such like words Forsake me not unburied so Nor unbewailed when you go Semblably And then the soule from body flew and as to hell she went She did her death her losseof strength and youthfull yeeres lament Likewise Doe not me kill before my time for why to see this light Is sweet sorce me not under earth where nothing is but night These are the voices I say of passionate persons captivate before to error and false opinions And therefore they touch us more neerely and trouble us so much the rather when they finde us likewise possessed of such passions and feeblenes of spirit from whence they proceed In which regard we ought to be prepared betimes and provided alwaies before hand to encounter and withstand such illusions having this sentence readily evermore resounding in our cares as it were from a trunke or pipe That Poetrie is fabulous and maketh smal reckoning of Truth As for the truth indeed of these things it is exceeding hard to be conceived comprehended even by those who travell in no other businesse but to search out the knowledge and understanding of the thing as they themselves do confesse And for this purpose these verses of Empedocles would be alwaies readie at hand who saith that the depth of such things as these No eie of man is able to perceive No care to heare nor spirit to conceive Like as these also of Xenophanes Never was man nor ever will be Able to sound the veritie Of those things which of God I write Or of the world I do endite And I assure you The very words of Socrates in Plato imply no lesse who protesteth and bindeth it with an oath that he cannot attaine to the knowledge of these matters And this will be a good motive to induce yoong men to give lesse credit unto Poëts as touching their certaine knowledge in these points wherein they perceive the Philosophers themselves so doubtfull and perplexed yea and therewith so much troubled Also the better shall we stay the mind of a yoong man cause him to be more warie if at his first entrance into the reading of Poëts we describe Poetrie unto him giving him to understand that it is an art of Imitation a science correspondent every way to the seat of painting and not onely must he be acquainted with the hearing of that vulgar speech so common in every mans mouth that Poësie is a speaking picture and picture a dumbe Poësie but also we ought to teach him that when we behold a Lizard or an Ape wel painted or the face of Thersites lively drawen we take pleasure therein praise the same wonderfully not for any beautie in the one or in the other but because they are so naturally counterfeited For that which is soule of it selfe ilfavored in the owne nature cannot be made faire seemly but the skil of resembling a thing wel be the same faire or be it foule is alwaies commended wheras contrariwise he that takes in hand to purtray an ilfavoured bodie and makes thereof a faire beautifull image shall exhibite a
apprehend and eftsoones call them againe to minde but suffer every thing to passe away and runne as it were through a sieve doe not in word but in deed and effect make themselves voide and emptie every day more than other depending onely upon the morrow as if those things which were done the yeere past of late and yesterday nothing appertained unto them nor ever were at all This is therefore one thing that hindreth troubleth that equanimity repose of spirit which we seeke for yet there is another that doth it more and that is this Like as flies creeping upon the smooth places of glasses or mirrors cannot hold their feet but must needs fal down but cōtrariwise they take hold where they meet with any roughnes stick fast to rugged flawes that they can find even so these men gliding glansing over al delectable pleasant occurrences take hold of any adverse heavy calamities those they cleave unto remember very wel or rather as by report there is about the city Olynthus a certain place into which if any flies called Beetles enter in once they can not get forth againe but after they have kept a turning about and fetching compasses round to no purpose a long time they die in the end wherupon it tooke the name of Cantharolethron semblably men after they fal to the reckoning up commemoration of their harmes calamities past are not willing to retire backe not to breath themselves and give over multiplying thereupon still And yet contrariwise they ought to do after the maner of Painters who when they paint a table to lay upon the ground or by a course of dead and duskish colours such as be fresh gay and gallant for to palliat in some sort to hide the unpleasantnes of the other they ought I say to smother and keepe downe the heavinesse of the heart occasioned by some crosse mishaps with those that have fallen out of their minde for to obliterate and wipe them out of their minde quite and to be freed cleane from them it is not possible and surely the harmonie of this world is reciprocall and variable compounded as it were of contraries like as we do see in an harpe or bow neither is any earthly thing under the cope of heaven pure simple and sincere without mixture But as Musicke doth consist of base and treble sounds and Grammar of letters which be partly vocall partly mute to wit vowels and consants and he is not to be counted a Grammarian and Musician who is offended and displeased with either of those contrarie elements of the arte but he that affecteth the one as well as the other and knoweth how to use and mixe both together with skil for to serve his purpose even so considering that in the occurrences of mans life there be so many contrarieties and one weigheth against another in maner of counterpoise for according to Eurypides It cannot stand with our affaires that good from bad should parted bee A medley then of mixed paires doth well and serves in each degree It is not meet that we should let our hearts fall and be discouraged with the one sort whensoever it hapneth but we ought according to the rules of harmonie in Musicke to stop the point alwaies of the woorst with strokes of better and by overcasting misfortunes as it were with a vaile and curtaine of good haps or by setting one to the other to make a good composition and a pleasant accord in our life fitting and sorting our owne turnes For it is not as Menander said Each man so soone as he is borne one spirit good or angell hath Which him assists both even and morne and guides his steps in every path but rather according to Empedocles No sooner are we come into the world but each one of us hath two angels called Daemones two Destinies I say are allotted unto us for to take the charge and government of our life unto which he attributeth divers and sundry names Here Chthonie was a downward looke that hath Heliope eke who turneth to the sunne And Deris shee that loves in blood to hath Harmonie smiles ever and anon Calisto faire and Aeschre foule among Thoosa swift Dinaea stout and strong Nemertes who is lovely white and pure But Asaphie with fruit black and obscure Insomuch as our Nativitie receiving the seeds of each of all these passions blended and confused together and by reason thereof the course of our life not being uniforme but full of disordered and unequall dispositions a man of good and sound judgement ought to wish and desire at Gods hand the better to expect and looke for the woorse and to make an use of them both namely by abridging and cutting off thatwhich is excessive and too much For not he onely as Epicurus was woont to say shall come with most delight and pleasure to see the morrow-sunne who made least account thereof on the eeven but riches also glorie authoritie and rule doth most rejoice their hearts who least feared the contrarie for the vehement and ardent desire that a man hath to any of these things doth imprint likewise an exceeding feare of forgoing and loosing the same and thereby maketh the delight of enjoying them to be feeble and nothing firme and constant even as the blase and flame of the fire which is blowen and driven to and fro with the wind But the man who is so much assisted with reason that he is able without feare and trembling to say unto Fortune 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Wel come to me if good thou bringest ought Andif thou faile I will take little thought Or thus Well maist thou take from me some joy of mind But little griefe thou shalt me leave behind hath this benefit by his confidence and resolution that as he taketh most joy of his good fortunes when they are present so he never feareth the losse of them as if it were a calamitie insupportable And herein we may aswell imitate as admire the disposition and affection of Anaxagoras who when he heard the newes of his sons death I know full well quoth he when I begot him that die he must and after his example whensoever any infortunitie hapneth to be readie with these such like speeches I know that riches were not permanent but transitorie and for a day I never thought other but that they who conferred these dignities upon me both might and could deprive me of them I wist that I had a good wife and vertnous dame but withall a woman and no more I was not ignorant that my friend was a man that is to say a living creature by nature mutable as Plato used to say And verily such preparations and dispositions of our affections as these if peradventure there shall befall unto us any thing against our intent and minde but not contrarie to our expectation as they will never admit such passionate words as these I never thought it would
quoth he be throwen for all as if he would say This cast for it there is but one chance to lose all When Pompey was fled from Rome to the sea side and Metellus the superintendent of the publike treasurie would have hindred him for taking foorth any money from thence keeping the treasure house fast shut he threatned to kill him whereat Metellus seeming to be amazed at his adacious words Tush tush quoth he good yoong man I would thou shouldest know that it is harder for me to speake the word than to doe the deed And for that his soldiors staid long ere they were transported over unto him from Brundusuim to Dyrrhachium he embarked himselfe alone into a small vessell without the knowledge of any man who he was purposing to passe the seas alone without his companie but it hapned so that he was like to have beene cast away in a gust and drowned with the waves of the sea whereupon he made himselfe knowne unto the pilot and spake unto him aloud Assure thy selfe and rest confident in fortune for wot well thou hast Caesar a ship boord howbeit for that time he was empeached that he could not crosse the seas as well in regard of the tempest which grew more violent as also of his souldiers who ran unto him from all sides and complained unto him for griefe of heart saying That he offred them great wrong to attend upon other forces as if he distrusted them Not long after this he fought a great battell wherein Pompeius hand the upper had for a time but for that he followed not the train of his good fortune he retired into his campe which when Caesar saw he said The victorie was once this day our enemies but their head and captaine knew not so much upon the plaines of 〈◊〉 the very day of the battell Pompey having arranged his army in array commanded his soldiers to stand their ground and not to advaunce forward but to expect their enimies and receive the charge wherin Caesar afterwards said He did amisse and grossely failed for that therby he let slack as it were the vigor vehemencie of his soldiors which is ministred unto thē by the violence of the first onset abated that heat also of courage which the said charge would have brought with it When he had defaited at his very first encounter Pharnaces king of Pontus he wrote thus unto his friends I came I saw I vanquished After that Scipio and those under his conduct were discomfited and put to flight in Africke when he heard that Cato had killed himselfe he said I envie thy death ô Cato for that thou hast envied me the honour of saving thy life Some there were who had Antonie and Dolabella in jealousie and suspicion and when they came unto him and said That he was to looke unto himselfe and stand upon his good guard he made them this answer That he had no distrust nor feare of them who ledde an idle life be well coloured and in so good liking as they But I feare quoth he these pale and leane fellowes pointing unto Brutus and Cassius One day as he sat at the table when speech was mooved and the question asked what kind of death was best Even that quoth he which is sudden and least looked for CAESAR him I meane who first was surnamed Augustus being as yet in his youth required and claimed of Antonie as much money as amounted to two thousand and five hundred Myriades which he had transported out of Julius Caesars house after he was murdred and gotten into his owne hands for that he entended to pay the Romans that which the said Caesar had bequeathed unto them by his last will and testament for he had left by legacie unto every citizen of Rome 75. drams of silver but Antonie deteined the said summe of money to himselfe and answered yoong Caesar that if he were wife he should desist from demanding any such monies of him which when the other heard he proclaimed open port sale of all the goods that came to him by his patrimonie in deed sold the same and with the money raised thereof he satisfied the foresaid legacies unto the Romanes in which doing he wan all the hearts of the citizens of Rome to himselfe brought their evill wil and hatred upon Antonie Afterwards Rymetalces king of Thracia left the part of Antonius and turned to his side but he overshot himselfe so much at the table being in his cups and namely in that he could talke of nothing else but of this great good service and casting in his teeth this worthy alliance and confederacie of his so as he became odious therefore insomuch as one time at supper Caesar taking the cup dranke to one of the other kings who sat at the boord saying with a loud voice Treason I love well but traitors I hate The Alexandrians after their citie was woonne looked for no better than to suffer all the extremities and calamities that might follow upon the forcing of a city by assault but this Caesar mounting up into the publike place to make a speech unto the citizens having neere by unto him a familiar friend of his to wit Arius an Alexandrian borne pronounced openly a generall pardon saying that he forgave the citie first in regard of the greatnesse and beautie thereof secondly in respect of king Alexander the great their first founder and thirdly for Arius his sake who was his loving friend Understanding that one of his Procuratours named Eros who did negotiate for him in Aegypt had bought a quaile of the game which in fight would beat all other quailes and was never conquered himselfe but continued still invincible which quaile notwithstanding the said slave had caused to be rosted and so eaten it he sent for him and examined him thereupon whether it was true or no and when he confessed Yea he commanded him presently to be crucified and nailed to the mast of his ship He placed Arius in Sicilie for his agent and procuratour in stead of one Theodorus and when one presented unto him a little booke or bill wherein were written these words Theodorus of Tharsis the bauld is a theefe how thinke you is he not when he had read this bill he did nothing else but subscribe underneath I thinke no lesse He received yeerely upon his birth day from Mecaenas one of his familiar friends who conversed daily with him a cup for a present Athenodorus the Philosopher being of great yeeres craved licence with his good favour to retire unto his owne house from the court by reason of his old age and leave he gave him but at his farewell Athenodorus said unto him Sir when you perceive your selfe to be mooved with choler neither say do nor ought before you have repeated to your selfe all the 24. letters in the Alphabet Caesar hearing this advertisement tooke him by the hand I have need still quoth he of your company and
Pindarus also writeth as touching Agamedes Trophonius That after they had built the temple of Apollo in Delphos they demanded of that god their hire and reward who promised to pay them fully at the seven-nights end meane while he bade them be merie and make good cheere who did as he enjoined them so upon the seventh night following they tooke their sleepe but the next morning they were found dead in bed Moreover it is reported that when Pindarus himselfe gave order unto the commissioners that were sent from the State of Boeotia unto the oracle of Apollo for to demand what was best for man this answere was returned from the prophetisse That he who enjoined them that errand was not ignorant thereof in case the historie of Agamedes and Trophonius whereof he was author were true but if he were disposed to make further triall he should himselfe see shortly an evident proofe thereof Pindarus when he heard this answer began to thinke of death and to prepare himselfe to die and in trueth within a little while after changed his life The like narration is related of one Euthynous an Italian who was sonne to Elysius of Terinae for vertue wealth and reputation a principall man in that citie namely that he died suddenlie without any apparent cause that could be given thereof his father Elysius incontinently thereupon began to grow into some doubt as any other man besides would have done whether it might not be that he died of poison for that he was the onely childe he had and heire apparant to all his riches and not knowing otherwise how to sound the trueth hee sent out to a certeine oracle which used to give answere by the conjuration and calling forth of spirits or ghosts of men departed where after he had performed sacrifices and other ceremoniall devotions according as the law required he laied him downe to sleepe in the place where he dreamed and saw this vision There appeared unto him as he thought his owne father whom when he saw he discoursed unto him what had fortuned his sonne requesting and beseeching him to be assistant with him to finde out the trueth and the cause indeed of his so sudden death his father then should answere thus And even therefore am I come hither here therefore receive at this mans hands that certificate which I have brought unto thee for thereby shalt thou know all the cause of thy griefe and sorrow now the partie whom his father shewed and presented unto him was a yoong man that followed after him who for all the world in stature and yeeres resembled his sonne Euthynous who being demanded by him what he was made this answere I am the ghost or angell of your sonne and with that offered unto him a little scrowle or letter which when Elysius had unfolded he found written within it these three verses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which may be done into English thus Elysius thou foolish man aske living Sages read Euthynous by fatall course of 〈◊〉 is dead For longer life would neither him nor parents stand in stead And thus much may suffice you both as touching the ancient histories written of this matter and also of the second point of the foresaid question But to come unto the third branch of Socrates his conjecture admit it were true that death is the utter abolition and destruction aswell of soule as body yet even so it cannot be reckoned simply ill for by that reckoning there should follow a privation of all sense and a generall deliverance from paine anxietie and angush and like as there commeth no good thereby even so no harme at all can ensue upon it forasmuch as good and evill have no being but in that thing onely which hath essence and subsislence and the same reason there is of the one as of the other so as in that which is not but utterly becommeth void anulled and taken quite out of the world there can not be imagined either the one or the other Now this is certeine that by this reason the dead returne to the same estate and condition wherein they were before their nativitie like as therefore when we were unborne we had no sense at all of good or evill no more shall we have after our departure out of this life and as those things which preceded our time nothing concerned us so whatsoever hapneth after our death shall touch us as little No paine feele they that out of world be gone To die and not be borne I holde all one For the same state and condition is after death which was before birth And do you thinke that there is any difference betweene Never to have bene and To cease from being surely they differ no more than either an house or a garment in respect of us and our use thereof after the one is ruined or fallen downe and the other all rent and torne from that benefit which we had by them before they were begun to be built or made and if you say there is no difference in them in these regards as little there is be you sure between our estate after death and our condition before our nativitie a very pretie and elegant speech therefore it was of Arcesilaus the philosopher when he said This death quoth he which every man tearmeth evill hath one peculiar propertie by it selfe of all other things that be accounted ill in that when it is present it never harmeth any man onely whiles it is absent and in expectance it hurteth folke And in very truth many men through their folly and weakenesse and upon certaine slanderous calumniations and false surmises conceived against death suffer themselves to die because sorsooth they would not die Very well therefore and aptly wrot the poet Epicharmus in these words That which was knit and joined fast Is loosed and dissolv'd at last Each thing returnes into the same Earth into earth from whence it came The spirit up to heaven anon Wherefore what harme heerein just none And as for that which Cresphontes in one place of Euripides speaking of Hercules said If under globe of earth with those he dwell Who being none have left laid once in grave A man of him might say and that right well That puissance and strength he none can have By altering it a little in the end you may thus inferre If under globe of earth with those he dwell Who being none have left laid once in grave A man of him might say and that right well That sense at all of paine he can none have A generous and noble saying also was that of the Lacedaemonians Now are we in our gallant prime Before as others had their time And after us shall others floure But we shall never see that houre As also this Now dead are they who never thought That life or death were simply ought But all their care was for to dy And live as they should
all just and honest actions when it hath chased and removed out of the way ire and wrath and therefore men are mollified appeased and become gentle by examples of men when they heare it reported how Plato when hee lifted up his staffe against his page stood so a good while and forbare to strike which hee did as he said for to represse his choler And Architas when he found some great negligence and disorder at his ferme-house in the countrey in his houshold servants perceiving himselfe moved and disquieted therewith insomuch as he was exceeding angrie and readie to flie upon them proceeded to no act but onely turning away and going from them said thus It is happie for you that I am thus angrie with you If then it be so that such memorable speeches of ancient men and woorthy acts reported by them are effectuall to represse the bitternesse and violence of choler much more probable it is that we seeing how God himselfe although he standeth not in feare of any person nor repenteth of any thing that he doth yet putteth off his chastisements and laieth them up a long time should be more wary and considerate in such things and esteeme that clemencie long sufferance and patience is a divine part of vertue that God doth shew and teach us which by punishment doth chastise and correct a few but by proceeding thereto slowly doth instruct admonish and profit many In the second place let us consider that judiciall and exemplarie processe of justice practised by men intendeth and aimeth onely at a counter change of paine and griefe resting in this point That he who hath done evill might suffer likewise proceeding no farther at all and therefore baying and barking as it were like dogges at mens faults and trespasses they follow upon them and pursue after all action by tract and footing but God as it should seeme by all likelihood when hee setteth in hand in justice to correct a sinfull diseased soule regardeth principally the vicious passions thereof if haply they may be bent wrought so as they will incline turne to repentance in which respect he staieth long before that he inflict any punishment upon delinquents who are not altogether past grace incorrigible for considering withall and knowing as he doth what portion of vertue soules have drawen from him in their creation at what time as they were produced first and came into the world as also how powerfull and forcible is the generositie thereof and nothing weake and feeble in it selfe but that it is cleane contrary to their proper nature to bring forth vices which are engendered either by ill education or els by the contagious haunt of leaud company and how afterward when they be well cured and medicined as it falleth out in some persons they soone returne unto their owne naturall habitude and become good againe by reason heereof God doth not make haste to punish all men alike but looke what he knoweth to be incurable that he quickly riddeth away out of this life and cutteth it off as a very hurtfull member to others but yet most harmefull to it selfe if it should evermore converse with wickednesse but to such persons in whom by all likelihood vice is bred and ingendred rather through ignorance of goodnesse than upon any purpose and will to chuse naughtinesse hee giveth time and respit for to change and amend how beit if they persist still and continue in their leaud waies hee paieth them home likewise in the end and never feareth that they shall escape his hands one time or other but suffer condigne punishment for their deserts That this is true consider what great alterations there happen in the life and behaviour of men and how many have beene reclaimed and turned from their leaudnesse which is the reason that in Greeke our behaviour and conversation is called partly 〈◊〉 that is to say A conversion and in part 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the one because mens maners be subject to change and mutation the other for that they be ingendered by use or custome and the impression thereof being once taken they remaine firme and sure which is the cause also as I suppose that our ancients in olde time attributed unto king Cecrops a double nature and forme calling him Double not for that as some said of a good element and gracious prince he became a rigourous fell and cruell tyrant like a dragon but contrariwise because having bene at the first perverse crooked and terrible he proved afterward a milde and gentle lord and if we make any doubt hereof in him yet we may be sure at leastwise that Gelon and Hiero in Sicilie yea and Pisistratus the sonne of Hipocrates all usurpers who atteined to their tyrannicall dominion by violent and indirect meanes used the same vertuously and howsoever they came unto their sovereigne rule by unlawfull and unjust meanes yet they grew in time to be good governours loving and profitable to the common weale and likewise beloved and deare unto their subjects for some of them having brought in and established most excellent lawes in the countrey and caused their citizens and subjects to be industruous and painfull in tilling the ground made them to be civill sober and discreet whereas before they were given to be ridiculous as noted for their laughter and lavish tongues to be true labourers also and painfull who had bene idle and playfull And as for Gelon after he had most valiantly warred against the Carthaginians and defaited them in a great battell when they craved peace would never grant it unto them unlesse this might be comprised among the articles and capitulations That they should no more sacrifice their children unto Saturne In the citie also of Megalopolis there was a tyrant named Lydiades who in the mids of his usurped dominion repented of his tyrannie and made a conscience thereof detesting that wrongfull oppression wherein he held his subjects in such sort ' as he restored his citizens to their ancient lawes and liberties yea and afterwards died manfully in the field fighting against his enemies in the defence of his countrey Now if any one had killed Miltiades at the first whiles he exercised tyrannie in Chersonesus or if another had called judicially into question Cimon enditing him for keeping his owne sister and so being condemned of incest had caused him to be put to death or disfranchised and banished Themistocles out of the citie for his loose wantonnesse and licentious insolencie shewed publickly in the Common place as Alcibiades afterwards was served and proscribed for the like excesse and riot committed in his youth Where had bene then that famous victorie At chieved on the plaines of Marathon Where had bene that renowmed chivalrie Performed neere the streame Eurymedon Or at the mount faire Artemision Where Athens youth as poet Pindare said Freedome first the glorious ground-worke laid For so it is great natures and high minds can bring foorth no meane matters nor the
at the doore but flung over the verie roofe thereof But to what purpose served all this and what good would this have done that he shoud shew himselfe so gentle so affable and humane if he had a curst dog about him to keepe his doore and to affright chase and scarre all those away who had recourse unto him for succour And yet so it is that our ancients reputed not a dog to be altogether a clean creature for first and formost we do not find that he is consecrated or dedicated unto any of the celestial gods but being sent unto terrestrial infernall Proserpina into the quarresires and crosse high waies to make her a supper he seemeth to serve for an expiatorie sacrifice to divert and turne away some calamitie or to cleanse some filthie 〈◊〉 rather than otherwise to say nothing that in Lacedaemon they cut and slit dogs down along the mids and so sacrifice them to Mars the most bloody god of all others And the Romanes themselves upon the feast Lupercalia which they celebrate in the lustrall moneth of Purification called February offer up a dog for a sacrifice and therefore it is no absurditie to thinke that those who have taken upon them to serve the most soveraigne and purest god of all others were not without good cause forbidden to have a dog with them in the house nor to be acquainted and familiar with him 112 For what cause was not the same priest of Jupiter permitted either to touch an ivie tree or to passe thorow a way covered over head with a vine growing to a tree and spreading her branches from it IS not this like unto these precepts of Pythagoras Eat not your meat from a chaire Sit not upon a measure called Choenix Neither step thou over a broome or besoome For surely none of the Pythagoreans feared any of these things or made scruple to doe as these words in outward shew and in their litterall sense do pretend but under such speeches they did covertly and figuratively forbid somewhat else even so this precept Go not under a vine is to be referred unto wine and implieth this much that it is not lawfull for the said Priest to be drunke for such as over drinke themselves have the wine above their heads and under it they are depressed and weighed downe whereas men and priests especially ought to be evermore superiors and commanders of this pleasure and in no wise to be subject unto it And thus much of the vine As for the ivie is it not for that it is a plant that beareth no fruit nor any thing good for mans use and moreover is so weake as by reason of that feeblenesse it is not able to sustaine it selfe but had need of other trees to support and beare it up and besides with the coole shadow that it yeelds and the greene leaves alwaies to be seene it dazeleth and as it were be witcheth the 〈◊〉 of many that looke upon it for which causes men thought that they ought not to nourish or entertaine it about an house because it bringeth no profit nor suffer it to claspe about any thing considering it is so hurtfull unto plants that admit it to creepe upon them whiles it sticketh fast in the ground and therefore banished it is from the temples and sacrifices of the celestiall gods and their priests are debarred from using it neither shall a man ever see in the sacrifices or divine worship of Juno at Athens nor of Venus at Thebes any wilde ivie brought out of the woods Mary at the sacrifices and services of 〈◊〉 which are performed in the night and darknesse it is used Or may not this be a covert and figurative prohibition of such blind dances and fooleries in the night as these be which are practised by the priests of Bacchus for those women which are transported with these furious motions of Bacchus runne immediately upon the ivie and catching it in their hands plucke it in pieces or else chew it betweene their teeth in so much as they speake not altogether absurdly who say that this ivie hath in it a certaine spirit that stirreth and mooveth to madnesse turneth mens mindes to furie driveth them to extasies troubleth and tormenteth them and in one word maketh them drunke without wine and doth great pleasure unto them who are otherwise disposed and enclined of themselves to such fanaticall ravishments of their wit and understanding 113 What is the reason that these Priests and Flamins of Jupiter were not allowed either to take upon them or to sue for any government of State but in regard that they be not capable of such dignities for honour sake and in some sort to make some recompense for that defect they have an usher or verger before them carrying a knitch of rods yea and a curall chaire of estate to 〈◊〉 IS it for the same cause that as in some cities of Greece the sacerdotall dignitie was equivalent to the royall majestie of a king so they would not chuse for their priests meane persons and such as came next to hand Or rather because Priests having their functions determinate and certaine and the kings undeterminate and uncertaine it was not possible that when the occasions and times of both concurred together at one instant one and the same person should be sufficient for both for it could not otherwise be but many times when both charges pressed upon him and urged him at ones he should pretermit the one or the other and by that meanes one while offend and fault in religion toward God and another while do hurt unto citizens and subjects Or else considering that in governments among men they saw that there was otherwhiles no lesse necessitie than authority and that he who is to rule a people as Hippocrates said of a physician who seeth many evill things yea and handleth many also from the harmes of other men reapeth griefe and sorrow of his owne they thought it not in policy good that any one should sacrifice unto the gods or have the charge and superintendence of sacred things who had been either present or president at the judgements and condemnations to death of his owne citizens yea and otherwhiles of his owne kinsfolke and allies like as it befell sometime to Brutus DEMAVNDS AND QUESTIONS AS TOUching Greeke Affaires THAT IS TO SAY A Collection of the maners and of divers customes and fashions of certaine persons and nations of Greece which may serve their turne verie well who reading old Authors are desirous to know the particularities of Antiquitie 1 Who are they that in the citie Epidaurus be called Conipodes and Artyni THere were an hundred and fourescore men who had the managing and whole government of the Common weale out of which number they chose Senatours whom they named Artyni but the most part of the people abode and dwelt in the countrey and such were tearmed Conipodes which is as much to say as Dusty-feet for that when
which begin three tragoedies of Euripides 1 King Danaus who fiftie daughters had 2 Pelops the sonne of Tantalus when he to Pisa came 3 Cadmus whilom the citie Sidon left He lived 98 yeeres or as some say a full hundred could not endure for to see Greece fower times brought into servitude the yeere before he died or as some write fower yeeres before he wrote his Panathenaick oration as for his Panegyrik oration he was in penning it tenne yeeres and by the report of some fifteene which he is thought to have translated and borrowed out of Gorgias the Leontine and Lysias and the oration concerning the counterchange of goods he wrote when he was fourescore yeeres old twaine but his Philippike oration he set downe a little before his death when he was farre stepped in yeeres he adopted for his sonne Aphareus the yoongest of the three children of Plathane his wife the daughter of Hippias the oratour and professed Rhetorician He was of good wealth as well for that he called duely for money of his scholars as also because he received of Nicocles king of Cypres who was the sonne of Euagoras the summe of twenty talents of silver for one oration which hee dedicated unto him by occasion of this riches he became envied and was thrice chosen and enjoined to be the captaine of a galley and to defray the charges thereof for the two first times he feigning himselfe to be sicke was excused by the meanes of his sonne but at the third time he rose up and tooke the charge wherein he spent no small summe of money There was a father who talking with him about his sonne whom he kept at schoole said That he sent with him no other to be his guide and governour but a slave of his owne unto whom Isocrates answered Goe your waies then for one slave you shall have twaine Hee entred into contention for the prize at the solemne games which queene Artemisia exhibited at the funerals and tombe of her husband Mausolus but this enchomiasticall oration of his which he made in the praise of him is not extant another oration he penned in the praise of Helena as also a third in the commendation of the counsell Areopagus Some write that he died by absteining nine daies together from all meat others report but fower even at the time that the publike obsequies were solemnized for them who lost their lives in the battell at Chaeronea His adopted sonne Aphareus composed likewise certeine orations enterred hee was together with all his linage and those of his bloud neere unto a place called Cynosarges upon a banke or knap of a little hill on the left hand where were bestowed the sonne and father Theodorus their mother also and her sister Anaco aunt unto the oratour his adopted sonne likewise Aphareus together with his cousen germain Socrates sonne to the a foresaid aunt Anaco Isocrates mothers sister his brother Theodorus who bare the name of his father his nephewes or children of his adopted sonne Aphareus and his naturall Theodorus moreover his wife Plathane mother to his adopted sonne Aphareus upon all these bodies there were six tables or tombs erected of stone which are not to be seene as this day but there stood upon the tombe of Isocrates himselfe a mightie great ramme engraven to the height of thirtie cubits upon which there was a syren or mere-maid seven cubits high to signifie under a figure his milde nature and eloquent stile there was besides neere unto him a table conteining certaine poets and his owne schole-masters among whom was Gorgias looking upon an astrologicall sphaere and Isocrates himselfe standing close unto him furthermore there is erected a brasen image of his in Eleusin before the entrie of the gallery Stoa which Timotheus the sonne of Caron caused to be made bearing this epi gram or inscription Timotheus upon a loving minde And for to honour mutuall kindnesses This image of Isocrates his friende Erected hath unto the goddesses This statue was the handi-worke of Leochares There goe under his name threescore orations of which five and twentie are his indeed according to the judgement of Dionysius but as Cecilius saith eight and twentie all the rest are falsly attributed unto him So farre was he off from ostentation and so little regard had hee to put foorth himselfe and shew his sufficiencie that when upon a time there came three unto him of purpose to heare him declame and discourse he kept two of them with him and the third he sent away willing him to returne the next morrow For now quoth he I have a full theater in mine auditorie He was wont to say also unto his scholars and familiars That himselfe taught his art for ten pounds of silver but hee would give unto him that could put into him audacity and teach him good utterance ten thousand When one demanded of him it was possible that he should make other men sufficient orators seeing himselfe was nothing eloquent Why not quoth he seeing that whet-stones which can not cut at all make iron and steele sharpe enough and able to cut Some say that he composed certeine books as touching the art of rhetorick but others are of opinion that it was not by any method but exercise onely that he made his scholars good oratours this is certeine that he never demanded any mony of naturall citizens borne for their teaching His maner was to bid his scholars to be present at the great assemblies of the citie and to relate unto him what they heard there spoken and delivered He was wonderfull heavy and sorrowfull out of measure for the death of Socrates so as the morrow after he mourned put on blacke for him Againe unto one who asked him what was Rhetorick he answered It is the art of making great matters of small small things of great Being invited one day to Nicocreon the tyrant of Cypres as he sat at the table those that were present requested him to discourse of some theame but he answered thus For such matters wherein I have skill the time will not now serve and in those things that sit the time I am nothing skilfull Seeing upon a time Sophocles the tragicall poet following wantonly and hunting with his eie a yoong faire boy he said O Sophocles an honest man ought to conteine not his hands onely but his eies also When Ephorus of Cunes went from his schoole non proficiens and able to doe nothing by reason whereof his father Demophilus sent him againe with a second salary or minervall Isocrates smiled thereat and merily called him Diphoros that is to say bringing his money twice so hee tooke great paines with the man and would himselfe prompt him and give him matter and invention for his declamatorie exercise Inclined he was and naturally given unto the pleasures of wanton love in regard whereof he used to lie upon a thinne and hard short mattresse and to have the pillow and bolster under his
quoth he to the number of thirty at the least If there be so many quoth he how commeth it to passe that you onely crosse and gainsay yea and hinder that which hath beene concluded and agreed upon by us all and to this purpose have dispatched a light-horseman to ride in poste unto the banished persons who had put themselves in their journey hitherward charging them to returne backe and that in no wise they should goe forward this day considering that the most part of those things which went to this journey fortuneit selfe had procured prepared fit for their hands upon these words of Phyllidas we were all much troubled and perplexed but Charon aboue the rest fastning his eie upon Hipposthenidas and that with a sowre and sterne countenance Most wicked wretch that thou art quoth he what hast thou done unto us No harme said Hipposthenidas in case leaving this curst angrie voice of yours you can be content and have patience to heare and understand the reasons of a man as aged as your selfe and having as many gray haires as you have for if this be the point to shew unto our fellow citizens how hardy and couragious we are that we make no reckoning of our lives and care not for any perill of death seeing we have day enough Phyllidas let us never stay for the darke evening but presently and immediately from this place run upon the tyrants with our swords drawen let us kill and slay let us die upon them and make no spare of our selves for it is no hard matter to do and suffer all this mary to deliver the citie of Thebes out of the hands of so many armed men as hold it to disseize and expell the garrison of the Spartanes with the murder of two or three men is not so easie a thing for Phyllidas hath not provided so much wine for his feast and banquet as will be sufficient to make fifteene hundred souldiers of Archius guard drunken and say we had killed him yet Crippidas and Arcesus are ready at night both of them sober enough to keepe the corps du guard why make wee such haste then to draw our friends into an evident and certeine danger of present death especially seeing withall that our enemies be in some sort advertised of their comming and approch for if it were not so why was there commandement given by them to those of Thespiae for to be in their armes upon the third day which is this and readie to goe with the Lacedaemonian captaines whensoever they gave commandement And as for Amphitheus this very day as I understand after their judiciall proceeding against him they minded to put to death upon the comming of Archias And are not these pregnant presumptions that the plot and enterprise is to them discovered Were it not better then to deferre the execution of our designments a while longer untill such time as the gods be reconciled and appeased for our divinors and wisards having sacrificed a beese unto Ceres pronounce that the fire of the sacrifice denounceth some great sedition and danger to the common weale and that which you Charon particularly ought to take good heed of is this Yesterday and no longer since Hippathodorus the sonne of Erianthes a man otherwise of good sort and one who knoweth nothing at all of our enterprise had this speech with me Charon is your familiar friend Hippathodorus but with me not greatly acquainted advertise him therefore if you thinke so good that he beware and looke to himselfe in regard of some great danger strange accident that is toward him for the last night as I dreamed me thought I saw that his house was in travell as it were of childe that he and his friends being themselves in distresse praied unto the gods for her delivery standing round about her during her labour and painfull travell but she seemed to loow and rore yea and to cast out certeine inarticulate voices untill at the last there issued out of it a mightie fire wherewith a great part of the citie was immediately burnt and the castle Cadmea covered all over with smoke onely but no part of the sire ascended thereto Loe what the vision was which this honest man related unto me Charon which I assure you for the present set me in a great quaking and trembling but much more when I once heard say that this day the exiled persons were to returne and be lodged here within an house of the citie In great anguish therefore I am and in a wonderfull agonie for feare least we engage our selves within a world of calamities and miseries without being able to execute any exploit of importance upon our enemies unlesse it be to make a garboile and set all on a light fire for I suppose that the citie when all is done will be ours but Cadmea the castle as it is already will be for them Then Theocritus taking upon him to speake and staying Charon who was about to reply somewhat against this Hipposthenidas I interpret all this quoth he cleane contrary for there is not a signe that confirmeth me mor ein following of this enterprise although I have had alwaies good presages in t eh behalfe of the banished in all the sacrifices that I have offred than this vision which you have rehearsed if it be so as you say that a great and light fire shone over all the citie and the same arising out of a friends house and that the habitation of our enemeis and the place of their retreat was darkned and made blacke againe with the smoke which never brings with it any thing better than teares and troublesome confusion and whereas from amogn us there arose in articulate vocies in case a man should construe it in evill part and take exception thereat in regard of the voice the same will be when our enterprise which now is enfolded in obscure doubtfull and uncerteine suspicion shall at once both appeere and also prevaile as for the ill signes of the sacrifices they touch not the publike estate but those who now are most powerfull and in greatest authoritie As Theocritus thus was speaking yet still I said unto Hipposthenidas And whom I pray you have you sent unto the men for if he be not too farre onward on his way we will send after to overtake him I am not able to say of a trueth Caphisias whether it be possible to reach him quoth Hipposthenidas for he hath one of the best horses in all Thebes under him and a man he is whom yee all know very well for he is the master of Melons chariots and his chariot men one unto whom Melon himselfe from the very first discovered this plot and made privie unto it With that I considering and thinking with my selfe what man he should speake of It is not Chlidon quoth I ô Hipposthenidas he who no longer since than the last yeere wanne the prise in the horse running at the solemne feast of
and with his dagger gave him such a stabbe as he laied him along and killed him out of hand but see the malice of Fortune there runnes me forth out of a milihouse or backhouse thereby another villaine with a pestle and comming behinde him gave him such a souse upon the very necke bone that he was astonished therewith and there lay along in a swoone having lost his sight and other senses for a time But vertue it was that assisted him which gave both unto himselfe a good heart and also unto his friends strength resolution and diligence to succour him for Limnaeus Ptolemeus and Leonnatus with as many besides as either had clambred over the walles or broken thorow came in and put themselves betweene him and his enemies they with their valour were to him in stead of a wall and rampier they for meere affection and love unto their king exposed their bodies their forces and their lives before him unto all dangers whatsoever For it is not by fortune that there be men who voluntarily present themselves to present death but it is for the love of vertue like as bees having drunke as it were the amatorious potion of naturall love and affection are alwaies about their king and sticke close unto him Now say there had beene one there without the danger of shot to have seene this sight at his pleasure would not he have said that he had beheld a notable combat of fortune against vertue wherein the Barbarians by the helpe of fortune prevailed above their desert and the Greeks by meanes of vertue resisted above their power and if the former get the better hand it would be thought the worke of fortune and of some maligne and envious spirit but if these become superior vertue fortitude faith and friendship should cary away the honour of victory for nothing els accompanied Alexander in this place As for the rest of his forces and provisions his armies his horses and his fleets fortune set the wall of this vile towne betweene him and them Well the Macedonians in the end defaited these Barbarians beat the place downe over their heads and rased it quite and buried them in the ruins and fall thereof But what good did all this to Alexander in this case Caried he might well be and that speedily away out of their hands with the arrow sticking still in his bosome but the war was yet close within his ribbes the arrow was set fast as a spike or great naile to binde as it were the cuirace to his bodie for whosoever went about to plucke it out of the wound as from the root the head would not follow withall considering it was driven so sure into that solid brest bone which is over the heart neither durst any saw off that part of the steile that was without for feare of shaking cleaving cracking the said bone by that means so much the more and by that means cause exceeding and intolerable paines besides the effusion of much bloud out of the bottome of the wound himselfe seeing his people about him a long time uncerteine what to doe set in hand to hacke the shaft a two with his dagger close to the superficies of his cuirace aforesaid and so to cut it off cleane but his hand failed him and had not strength sufficient for to do the deed for it grew heavie and benummed with the inflammation of the wound whereupon he commanded his chirurgians to set to their hands boldly and to feare nought incouraging thus hurt as he was those that were sound and unwounded chiding and rebuking some that kept a weeping about him and bemoned him others he called traitours who durst not helpe him in this distresse he cried also to his minions and familiars Let no man be timorous and cowardly for me no not though my life lie on it I shall never be thought and beleeved not to feare dying if you be affraied of my death ***************** OF ISIS AND OSIRIS The Summarie THe wisdome and learning of the Aegyptians hath bene much recommended unto us by ancient writers and not without good cause considering that Aegypt hath bene the source and fountaine from whence have flowed into the world arts and liberall sciences as a man may gather by the testimony of the first Poets and philosophers that ever were But time which consumeth all things hath bereft us of the knowledge of such wisdome or if there remaine still with us any thing at all it is but in fragments and peeces scattered heere and there whereof many times we must divine or guesse and that is all But in recompence thereof Plutarch a man carefull to preserve all goodly and great things hath by the meanes of this discourse touching Isis and Osiris maintained and kept entier a good part of the Aegyptians doctrine which he is not content to set down literally there an end but hath adjoined thereto also an interpretation thereof according to the mystical sense of the Isiake priests discovering in few words an in finit number of secrets hidden under ridiculous monstrous fables in such sort as we may cal this treatise a cōmentary of the Aegyptians Theologie and Philosophy As for the contents thereof a man may reduce it into three principall parts In the first which may serve insted of a preface he yeeldeth a reason of his enterprise upon the consideration of the rasture vesture continence and ab stinence of Isis priests there is an entrie made to the rehearsall of the fable concerning Isis Osiris But before he toucheth it he sheweth the reason why the Aegyptians have thus darkly enfolded their divinity Which done he commeth to descipher in particular the said fable relating it according to the bare letter which is the second part of this booke In the third he expoundeth the fable it selfe and first discovereth the principles of the said Aegyptian Philosophy by a sort of temples sepulchers and sacrifices Afterwards having refuted certaine contrary opinions he speaketh of Daemons ranging Isis Osiris and Typhon in the number of them After this Theologicall exposition he considereth the fable according to naturall Philosophy meaning by Osiris the river Nilus and all other power of moisture whatsoever by Typhon Drinesse and by Isis that nature which preserveth and governeth the world Where he maketh a comparison betweene Bacchus of Greece and Osiris of Aegypt applying all unto naturall causes Then expoundeth he the fable more exactly and in particular maner conferring this interpretation thereof with that of the Stoicks wherupon he doth accommodate and fit all to the course of the Moone as she groweth and decreaseth to the rising also and inundation of Nilus making of all the former opinions a certaine mixture from whence he draweth the explication of the fable By occasion hereof he entreth into a disputation as touching the principles and beginnings of all things setting downe twaine and alledging for the proofe and confirmation of his speech the testimony of
ceaseth to be it commeth and goeth together in such sort as that which beginneth to breed never reacheth to the perfection of being for that in very deed this generation is never accomplished nor resteth as being come to a ful end and perfection of being but continually changeth and moveth from one to another even as of humane seed first there is gathered within the mothers wombe a fruit or masse without forme then an infant having some forme and shape afterwards being out of the mothers belly it is a sucking babe anon it proves to be alad or boy within a while a stripling or springall then a youth afterwards a man growen consequently an elderly ancient person last of ala croked old man so that the former ages precedent generations be alwais abolished by the subsequent those that follow But we like ridiculous fooles be affraid of one kinde of death when as we have already died so many deaths and doe nothing daily and hourely but die still For not onely as Heraclitus saith the death of fire is the life of aire and the end of aire the beginning of water but much more evidently we may observe the same in our selves The floure of our yeeres dieth and passeth away when old age commeth youth endeth in the floure of lusty and perfect age childhood determineth in youth infancy in childhood Yesterday dieth in this day and this day will be dead by to morow neither continueth any man alwaies one and the same but we are engendred many according as the matter glideth turneth and is driven about one image mould or patterne common to all figures For were it not so but that we continued still the same how is it that we take delight now in these things whereas we joied before in others how is it that we love and hate praise and dispraise contrary things how commeth it to passe that we use divers speeches fal into different discourses are in sundry affections retaine not the same visage one countenance one minde and one thought For there is no likelihood at all that without change a man should entertaine other passions and looke who is changed he continueth not the same and if he be not the same he is not at all but together with changing from the same he changeth also to be simply for that continually he is altered from one to another and by consequence our sense is deceived mistaking that which appeareth for that which is indeed and all for want of knowledge what it is to be But what is it in trueth to be Surely to be eternall that is to say which never had beginning in generation nor shall have end by corruption and in which time never worketh any mutation For a moveable and mutable thing is time appearing as it were in a shadow with the matter which runneth and floweth continually never remaining stable permanent and solid but may be compared unto a leaking vessell conteining in it after a sort generations and corruptions And to it properly belong these tearmes 〈◊〉 and after Hath bene shall be which presently at the very first sight do evidently shew that time hath no being For it were a great folly and manifest absurditie to say that a thing is which as yet commeth not into esse or hath already ceased to be And as for these words Present Instant Now c. by which it seemeth that principally we ground and mainteine the intelligence of Time reason discovereth the same and immediatly overthroweth it for incontinently it is thrust out dispatched into future and past so that it fareth with us in this case as with those who would see a thing very farre distant for of necessitie the visuall beames of his sight doe faile before they can reach thereto Now if the same befall to nature which is measured that unto time which measureth it there is nothing in it permanent nor subsistent but all things therein be either breeding or dying according as they have reference unto time And therefore it may not be allowed to say of that which is It hath beene or it shall be for these termes be certaine inclinations passages departures and chaunges of that which cannot endure nor continue in being Whereupon we are to conclude that God alone is and that not according to any measure of time but respective to eternity immutable and unmooveable not gaged within the compasse of time nor subsert either to inclination or declination any way before whom nothing ever was nor after whom ought shall be nothing future nothing past nothing elder nothing yoonger but being one really by this one Present or Now accomplisheth his eternitie and being alway Neither is there any thing that may truely be said to be but he alone nor of him may it be verified He hath beene or shall be for that he is without beginning and end In this maner therefore we ought in our worship and adoration to salute and invocate him saying EI that is to say Thou art unlesse a man will rather according as some of the ancients used to doe salve him by this title EI EN that is to say Thou art one for god is not many as every one of us who are a confused heape and masse composed or rather thrust together of infinit diversities and differences proceeding from all sorts of alterations but as that which is ought to be one so that which is one ought to be for alternative diversitie being the difference of that which is departeth from it and goeth to the engendring of that which is not And therefore very rightly agreeth unto this god the first of his names as also the second and the third for Apollo he is called as denying and disavowing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say plurality multitude likewise Iëias which is as much to say as One or alone thirdly Phoebus by which name they called in the olde time All that was cleane and pure without mixture and pollution And semblably even at this day the Thessalians if I be not deceived say that their priests upon certeine vacant dayes when they keepe forth of their temples and live apart pivatly to themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now that which is one is also pure and syncere for pollution commeth by occasion that one thing is mingled with another like as Homer speaking in one place of Yvorie having a tincture of red said it was polluted and the word that he useth is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Diers also when they would expresse that their colours be medleies or mixed use the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say to be corrupted and the very mixture they tearme 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say Corruption It behooveth therefore that the thing which is syncere and incorruptible should be also one and simple without all mixture whatsoever In which regard they who thinke that Apollo and the Sunne be both one god are worthy to