spoken of though it be not sufficient to haue a childe either well brought vp or well instructed For a new care must be taken and new diligence be vsed to cherish the growth of the good seeds bestowed manured in the mind of the child which made Aristotle say that education onely was not enough to make a man vertuous For though the child be so well bred as hath bin prescribed yet vnlesse some care be had to bridle it so vnpleasing a thing it is for youth to liue within the compasse of modestie and temperance it is easily turned to that part to which pleasure and delight doth draw it Neuertheles that first culture bestowed vpon childhood doth so much auaile as the yong man that is disposed to hearken to good admonitions shall haue the lesse to do to liue vertuously and to tame that sensitiue part which he hath onely to striue withall and to make obedient to the rule of reason Captaine Carleil then said I pray you before you go any further let me aske this one question why vntil now your author hauing spoken of this moral science hath all this while made no mention of the speculatiue sciences wherein me thinketh a yong man hath special need to be instructed for they also I suppose are necessary to happinesse of life That doubt the author answereth thus said I Vertues are generally deuided into Speculatiue and Practike or we may say into Intellectiue and Actiue The speculatiue habites are fiue in number viz Vnderstanding called by the Latines Intellectus Science Wisedome Art and Prudence And because hitherto he hath spoken onely how men in ciuill life may attaine to be good or decline from being euill and that the speculatiue sciences declare but how wise how learned or how prudent they be and not how good or vertuous they be and that these two first ages are not of capacitie sufficient to embrace them therefore he reserueth the treating thereof vntill a fitter time which the course of our speech will leade vs vnto Yea but Aristotle saith quoth the Lord Primate that yong men may be Arithmeticians and Mathematicians and finally therin wise but yet he affirmeth that they can not be prudent That place of Aristotle said I is to be vnderstood not of this first degree of youth whereof the author hath spoken hitherto but of the perfection and ripenesse that in time it may attaine as after shall be declared when time doth serue That time said Captaine Carleil we will attend But because we see both vertues and sciences are to be learned and that I haue heard question and doubt made of the manner of learning them I pray let vs heare whether your author say ought thereof and specially whether our learning be but a rememorating of things which we knew formerly or else a learning a new This is indeed said I no light question which mine author handleth also euen in this place and there are on either side great and learned authors as Plato and Aristotle first whereof the one was accounted the God of Philosophers and the other the master of all learned men and ech hath his followers who with forcible arguments seeke to defend and maintaine the part of their master and captaine But before we enter into that matter you must vnderstand that Plato and Aristotle haue held a seuerall way each of them in their teaching For Plato from things eternall descended to mortall things and thence returned as it were by the same way from the earth to heauen againe rather affirming then proouing what he taught But Aristotle from earthly things as most manifest to our senses raised himselfe climing to heauenly things vsing the meane of that knowledge which the senses giue frō which his opiniō was that al humane knowledge doth come And where sensible reasons failed him there failed his proofes also Which thing as it hapned to him in diuine matters so did it likewise in the knowledge of the soule intellectiue as some of his interpreters say which being created by God to his owne likenesse be hath written so obscurely thereof that his resolute opinion in that matter cannot be picked out of his writings but that reasons may be gathered out of them in fauour of the one part and of the other as though the treatie of a matter so important and necessary to our knowledge were as schoole-men say a matter contingent about which arguments probable may be gathered on both sides yet had he before him his diuine master who as far as mans wit could stretch without grace had taught him cleerly that which was true that mans soule is by nature immortall and partaker of diuinitie howsoeuer some of the Peripatetikes seeme out of Aristotle to affirme that Plato was contrary to himself as making the soule somewhiles immortall and otherwhiles not which in truth is not in Plato to be found if he be rightly vnderstood But to the purpose The opinion of Aristotle was that our soule did not only not record any thing but that it shold be so wholy voyd of knowledge or science as it might be resembled to a pure white paper and therefore affirmed he that our knowledge was altogether newly gotten and that our soule had to that end need of sense and that sense failing her all science or knowledge should faile withall Because the senses are as ministers to the mind to receiue the images or formes particular of things which being apprehended by the common sense called sensus communis bring foorth afterwards the vniuersals Which common sense is a power or facultie of the sensitiue soule that distinguisheth betweene those things that the outward senses offer vnto it and is therefore called common because it receiueth commonly the formes or images with the exteriour senses present vnto it and hath power to distinguish the one from the other But as those senses know not the nature of things so is the same vnknowne also vnto the common sense to whom they offer things sensible Wherefore this commonsense being as we haue said a facultie of the sensitiue soule offereth them to the facultie imaginatiue which hath the same proportiō to the vertue intellectiue as things sensible haue to the sense aforesaid For it moueth the vnderstanding after it hath receiued the formes or images of things frō the outward senses layeth them vp materiall in the memory where they be kept This done Aristotle and his followers say that then the part of the soule capable of reason beginneth to vse her powers and they are as they affirme two the one intellectus possibilis and the other intellectus agens these latin words I must vse at this time because they be easie enough to be vnderstood and in English would seeme more harsh whereof the first is as the matter to the second and the second as forme to the first Into that possible facultie of the vnderstanding do the kinds or species of things passe which the fantasie hath
A DISCOVRSE OF CIVILL LIFE Containing the Ethike part of Morall Philosophie Fit for the instructing of a Gentleman in the course of a vertuous life By LOD BR Virtute summa Caetera Fortunâ ANCHORA SPEI LONDON Printed for EDVVARD BLOVNT 1606. TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE HIS SINGVLAR GOOD LORD ROBERT Earle of Salisbury Vicount Cranborne Lord Cecill Baron of Essenden Principall Secretarie to his Maiestie Knight of the most noble order of the Garter c. THis booke treating of the Morall vertues being now to come vnder the censure of the world doth summon me of it self to craue protection from your Lordships honorable fauour as the personage who knowing best their worth may best protect him from the iniury of any that should attempt to carpe the same And my priuate obligations for your manifold fauours among which the great benefite of my libertie and redeeming from a miserable captiuitie euer fresh in my remembrance doth make me hope not onely of your Honors willingnesse to patronize both my selfe and my labour but also that you wil be pleased therein to accept of the humble and deuoted affection wherwith most reuerently I present it vnto your Lordshippe Vouchsafe therefore my most honored good Lord to yeeld me the comfort of so gracious an addition to your former fauors and benefits and to giue to all the yong Gentlemen of England encouragement to embrace willingly that good which they may receiue by reading a booke of so good a subiect the title whereof bearing in front your noble name shall giue them cause to think it worthy to be passed with the approbation of your graue iudgement VVhich being the most desired frute of my endeuour I will acknowledge as none of the least of your great graces and euer rest Your Lordships most bounden and humbly deuoted LOD BRYSKETT TO THE GENTLE and discreet Reader RIght well saith the Wise man that there is nothing new vnder the Sunne and further that there is no end of writing books For howsoeuer in a generalitie the subiect of any knowledge be declared yet the particulars that may be gathered out of the same be so many as new matter may be produced out of the same to write thereof againe so great is the capacitie of mans vnderstanding able to attaine further knowledge then any reading can affoord him And therefore Horace also affirmeth that it is hard to treate of any subiect that hath not bene formerly handled by some other Yet do we see dayly men seeke partly by new additions and partly with ornaments of stile to out-go those that haue gone before them which haply some atchieue but many moe rest farre behind This hath bred the infinitenesse of bookes which hath introduced the distinction of good from bad vsed in best Common-weales to prohibite such as corrupt manners and to giue approbation to the good For that the simpler sort by the former drinke their bane in steed of medicine and in lieu of truth the proper obiect of mans vnderstanding they introduce falshood decked in truths ornaments to delude the vnheedful Reader Whereas on the other side the benefite which we receiue by the reading of good books being exceeding great they deserue commendation that offer their endeuours to the benefiting of others with books of better matter Which hath made me resolue to present vnto thy view this discourse of Morall Philosophie tending to the wel ordering and composing of thy mind that through the knowledge and exercise of the vertues therein expressed thou mayst frame thy selfe the better to attaine to that further perfection which the profession of a Christian requireth and that euerlasting felicitie which assisted with Gods grace neuer refused to them that humbly and sincerely call for the same thou mayst assuredly purchase As my meaning herein is thy good chiefly so let thy fauourable censure thankfully acknowledge my labor and goodwil which may moue me to impart after vnto thee another treating of the Politike part of Morall Philosophie which I haue likewise prepared to follow this if I shall find the fauourable acceptation hereof such as may encourage me thereunto The booke written first for my priuate exercise and meant to be imparted to that honorable personage qui nobis haec otia fecit hath long layne by me as not meaning he being gone to communicate the same to others But partly through the perswasion of friends and partly by a regard not to burie that which might profit many I haue bin drawne to consent to the publishing thereof Gather out of it what good thou canst and whatsoeuer thou mayst find therein vnperfect or defectiue impute charitably to my insufficiencie and weaknesse and let not small faults blemish my trauell and desire to benefite thee But say to thy selfe with that worthy bright light of our age Sir Philip Sidney Let vs loue men for the good is in them and not hate them for their euill Farewell A DISCOVRSE CONTAINING THE ETHICKE PART OF MORALL PHILOSOPHIE FIT TO INstruct a Gentleman in the course of a vertuous life Written to the right Honorable ARTHVR late Lord Grey of Wilton By LOD BRYSKETT WHen it pleased you my good Lord vpon the decease of maister Iohn Chaloner her Maiesties Secretarie of this State which you then gouerned as Lord Deputie of this Realme to make choice of me to supply that place and to recommend me by your honorable letters to that effect I receiued a very sufficient testimonie of your good opinion and fauourable inclination towards me And albeit your intention and desire in that behalfe tooke not effect whether through my vnworthinesse or by the labour and practise of others yet because your testimonie was to me instar multorum Iudicum and because that repulse serued you as an occasion to do me after a greater fauor I haue euermore sithens caried a continual desire to shew my selfe thankfull to your Lordship For when at my humble sute you vouchsafed to graunt me libertie without offence to resigne the office which I had then held seuen yeares as Clerke of this Councell and to withdraw my selfe from that thanklesse toyle to the quietnes of my intermitted studies I must needes confesse I held my selfe more bound vnto you therefore then for all other the benefits which you had bestowed vpon me and all the declarations of honorable affection whereof you had giuen me many testimonies before And therefore being now freed by your Lordships meane from that trouble and disquiet of mind and enioying from your speciall fauour the sweetnesse and contentment of my Muses I haue thought it the fittest meanes I could deuise to shew my thankfulnes to offer to you the first fruites that they haue yeelded me as due vnto you from whom onely I acknowledge so great a good That they will be acceptable vnto you I make no doubt were it but in regard of the true and sincere affection of the giuer who in admiring and reuerencing your vertues giueth place to no
souldiers besides that their peaceable maner of coming freed me from doubt of cesse thanked be God the state of the realme was such as there was no occasion of burthening the subiect with them such had bin the wisedome valour and foresight of our late Lord Deputie not onely in subduing the rebellious subiects but also in ouercoming the forreine enemie whereby the garrison being reduced to a small number and they prouided for by her Maiestie of victual at reasonable rates the poore husbandman might now eate the labors of his owne hands in peace and quietnes without being disquieted or harried by the vnruly souldier We haue said sir Robert Dillon great cause indeed to thanke God of the present state of our country and that the course holden now by our present Lord Deputie doth promise vs a continuance if not a bettering of this our peace and quietnesse My Lord Grey hath plowed and harrowed the rough ground to his hand but you know that he that soweth the seede whereby we hope for haruest according to the goodnesse of that which is cast into the earth and the seasonablenesse of times deserueth no lesse praise then he that manureth the land God of his goodnesse graunt that when he also hath finished his worke he may be pleased to send vs such another Bayly to ouersee and preserue their labours that this poore countrey may by a wel-ordered and setled forme of gouernement and by due and equall administration of iustice beginne to flourish as other Common-weales do To which all saying Amen we directed our course to walke vp the hill where we had bene the day before and sitting downe vpon the little mount awhile to rest the companie that had come from Dublin we arose againe and walked in the greene way talking still of the great hope was conceiued of the quiet of the countrey since the forreine enemie had so bin vanquished and the domesticall conspiracies discouered met withall and the rebels cleane rooted out till one of the seruants came to call vs home to dinner Where finding the table furnished we sate downe and hauing seasoned our fare with pleasant and familiar discourses as soone as the boord was taken vp they sollicited me to fetch my papers that I might proceede to the finishing of my last discourse of the three by me proposed But they being ready at hand in the dining chamber I reached them and layd them before me and began as followeth Hitherto hath bin discoursed of those two ages which may for the causes before specified be wel said to be void of election and without iudgement because of their want of experience For which cause haue they had others assigned to them for guides to leade them to that end which of themselues they were not able to attaine that is their felicitie in this life And now being to speake of that age which succeeds the heate of youth we must a litle touch the varietie of opinions concerning the same Tully saith that a citizen of Rome might be created Consul which was the highest ordinary dignitie in that citie when he was come to the age of 23. yeares Plinie in his Panegyrike saith that it was decreed lege Pompeia that no man might haue any magistracie before he were thirtie yeeres old And Vlpian lege S. Digest treating of honours writeth that vnder the age of 25. yeares no man was capable of any magistracie Among these three opinions the last of the ciuill lawyer holdeth the medium and is therefore the fittest to be followed for then is a young mans mind setled and he is become fit being bred and instructed as hath bin before declared to be at his owne guiding and direction and then doth the ciuill law allow him libertie to make contracts and bargaines for himselfe which before he could not do being in pupillage and vnder a tutor Howbeit our common law cutteth off foure yeeres of those and enableth a yong man at 21. yeeres of age to enter into his land and to be as we terme it out of his wardship Which time being I know not for what respect assigned by our lawes may well be held not so well considered of as that which the ciuill law appointeth if we marke how many of our yong men ouerthrow their estates by reason of their want of experience and of the disordinate appetites which master them all which in those other foure yeares from 21. to 25. do alter to better iudgement and discretion Whereby they are the better able to order their affaires Why said Captain Dawtry I haue knowne and know at this day some young men who at 18. yeeres of age are of sounder iudgement and more setled behauiour then many not of 25. yeeres old onely but of many moe yea then some that are grey-headed with age Of such said I there are to be seene oftentimes as you say some that beyond all expectation and as it were forcing the rules of nature shew themselues stayed in behauiour and discreete in their actions when they are very yong to the shame of many elder men Of which companie I may well of mine owne knowledge and by the consent I thinke of all men name one as a rare example and a wonder of nature and that is sir Philip Sidney who being but seuenteene yeeres of age when he began to trauell and coming to Paris where he was ere long sworne Gentleman of the chamber to the French King was so admired among the grauer sort of Courtiers that when they could at any time haue him in their companie and conuersation they would be very ioyfull and no lesse delighted with his ready witty answers thē astonished to heare him speake the French language so wel and aptly hauing bin so short a while in the countrey So was he likewise esteemed in all places else where he came in his trauell as well in Germanie as in Italie And the iudgement of her Maiestie employing him when he was not yet full 22. yeeres old in Embassage to congratulate with the Emperour that now is his comming to the Empire may serue for a sufficient proofe what excellencie of vnderstanding and what stayednesse was in him at those yeeres Whereby may well be said of him the same that Cicero said of Scipio Africanus to wit that vertue was come faster vpon him then yeeres Which Africanus was chosen Consull being absent in the warres by an vniuersal consent of all the tribes of Rome before he was of age capable to receiue that dignitie by the law But these are rare examples vpon which rules are not to be grounded for Aristotle so long ago said as we do now in our common prouerbe that one swallow makes not summer Among young men there are some discreete sober quicke of wit and ready of discourse who shew themselues ripe of iudgment before their yeeres might seeme to yeeld it them so are there among aged men on the other side some of shallow wit and little
no hope of his amendment should rather kill himselfe then by liuing inuite so many others to the like course of life not vnlike to the opinion alreadie recited that it is better one die for a people then that his life should be the occasion of the death of many For Plato aymed euermore at the purging of all cities frō such caterpillers which appeereth manifestly by the pain he would haue inflicted vpon parricides But that it was abhomination to him for a man to kill himselfe he plainely sheweth in his ninth booke of Lawes by the sentence he setteth downe against such men Neuerthelesse this indeed may be found in Plato that vice was so odious vnto him that he would rather haue a man to die then to vndertake any vile vicious action which might breed him perpetuall infamie And Aristotle in this point agreeth with his master though in many he delight to carpe him that a man ought to chuse rather to die then commit any abhominable or grieuous fact or do that which might be for euer reprochful vnto him And Plato his expresse sence of this matter is to be vnderstood in the same dialogue which you first spake of where Socrates is brought to say that the Lord and Ruler of this whole world hauing sent vs into this life we are not to desire to leaue it without his consent and who so doth the contrary offends nature offendeth God And this is the mystery of that precept of Philolaus which forbiddeth a man to cleaue wood in the high way meaning that a man should not seuer or deuide the soule frō the body whiles he was in his way on this earthly pilgrimage but should be content that as God and nature had vnited and tied the soule to the bodie so by them it might be vnloosed againe therefore the Peripatetikes also thought that they which die a violent death cannot be thought to haue ended their dayes according to the course of time and nature And with this my Lord Primate rested satisfied I turned me to Captaine Carleil and sayd Now sir concerning your doubts proposed you may haue perceiued that whatsoeuer destinie be neither it nor the diuine prouidence of Almightie God imposeth any necessitie vpon vs that vertue and vice are in our power vertue growing in vs by the right vse of our free choice and vice by the abuse of the same when through corruption of the iudgement to do that is in apparance good it chuseth the euill and lastly what kind of ignorance is excusable and which not Concerning my demaunds sayd Captaine Carleil I am resolued But since I see our doings proceed from election I would gladly know of you what maner of thing it is for I cannot perceiue whether it be a desire or an anger or an opinion or what I should call it None of all these said I but rather a voluntary deliberation following a mature and aduised counsel which counsell by Plato was termed a diuine thing For election is not made in a moment but when a thing is proposed either to be accepted or refused there must first be a counsell taken respecting both the end of the action and the meanes by which the same is to be compassed so as there is required a time of consultation and therefore it is said that hast is enemie to counsell and that oftentimes repentance followes them that resolue without discussing or debating of matters Next vnto counsell cometh iudgement and after iudgement followeth election and from election issueth the action or the effects that are resolued vpon and accepted as the best And because fortune though she be a cause rather by accident then of her selfe hath no small part in most of our actions the wisest men haue said that counsel is the eye of the mind by helpe whereof men of prudence see how to defend themselues from the blind strokes of fortune and eschuing that which may hurt them take hold of that which is profitable Why then said my Lord Primate it shold seeme that our counsell were wholy in our power But Xenophon is of a contrary opinion for he sayeth that good counsell cometh from the Gods immortall and that their counsels prosper who haue them to be their friends and theirs not who haue them to be their enemies To haue God fauourable vnto vs said I in all our doings is not onely desirable but that it may please him to grant his grace so to be ought all men to craue by humble prayer at his hands But that God is the author of our counsels otherwise then as an vniuersall cause is to be doubted not that the singular gift of the mind and the power thereof to deliberate and consult commeth not from him for the not acknowledging thereof were not onely a grosse ignorance but also an expresse impietie an vnexcusable ingratitude Howbeit since it hath pleased him to bestow vpon vs so great and liberal a gift as the mind we may well beleeue that he will not take from vs the free vse therof For to say that God were the imediate cause of our counsell were as much as to take from vs the vse of reason without which we are not any more men as of late was sayd And therfore besides Aristotles authoritie grounded in that point vpon good reason we find in the Scripture that after God had made man and giuen him by breathing vpon him the spirit of life which is the soule of vnderstanding he left him in the hand of his owne counsell Whereby it appeereth that counsel commeth from our selues and that election is the office of prudence which is called the soule of the mind and the Platonikes call the knowledge of good and euill whereunto it seemed that Tullie agreed when he said that prudence was the science of things desirable or to be eschued which sentence S. Augustine reporteth And Fabius Maximus said that the Gods through prudence and our vertues did grant vs prosperous successes in our affaires as if he should haue said that though God as an vniuersall cause concurred to accomplish our deliberations yet we were to endeuour our selues and to sharpen our wits to consult on the best meanes to compasse our good purposes if we desire to haue his fauour and not to sit idle expecting what will fall out And to end the discourse hereof the auncient Philosophers of the best sort held that the Gods seeing vs employ our vertues and faculties of the mind which hath a resemblāce vnto them well and wisely become our friends and the rather grant vs their helpe and fauour According to which opinion Euripides sayed that the Gods did helpe them that were wise But because we shall haue occasion to speake more largely hereafter of Prudence we will now returne to that which we left long sithens to speake of by the interposing of the doubts moued and that is the knowledge of our selues as the thing that must guide vs to that best and most