should appear that these were absolutely necessary to the recommending them to your Favour and Esteem and this also would return to your advantage since by this Influence upon the World it would come to pass that you could not want a proportionable number of fit and worthy Objects of your Affections and Choice To your great advantage it would be to stir up in the Men an Ambition to be well accomplisht too to make them asham'd of Ignorance and Vice by your Example and you your selves would be the more happy in Brothers Husbands and Children And the Women of our Age have perhaps greater advantage than ever their Ancestours had for the Improvement of their Minds at least so far as the Reading of Good Books can contribute towards this When you have a great many of the best Books in the World either wrote in your own Language or Translated into it Translation is a mighty Favour to you It brings the Wisdom of the Ancients to you unveil'd and inables you to study and learn it without the previous discouraging fatigue of Learning Languages We have lately seen some of the choicest Histories and best Pieces of useful Philosophy that Greece or Rome could boast of Translated into English And still this Work of Translating goes on and will especially do so if it has the Encouragement and Favour of your Sex And I would hope to see our own Language as Learned as any other in the World And why may we not see the costly useless Trifles that fill the Closets of our Ladies thrown out and Excellent and Vseful Books set up there in their stead You have almost nothing else to do but to study all the time that you live single and are at liberty from Affairs of the World To be sure there is nothing you can do so much to your advantage as to entertain and employ your selves much with Good Books I need not Recommend to you Plutarch or Hierocles or Livy or Seneca or the Excellent Antoninus lately Translated with the Learned and Vseful Reflections of Madam Dacier a Philosopher of your own Sex at this time Famous for her Wit and Learning Nor shall I mention any more since they may be met with at every Booksellers And it is chiefly my present Business to Recommend the following Book Here then you have the Characters of the Vertues and Vices very faithfully and truly drawn Whereby you may learn to distinguish the one from the other and may avoid that common and mischievous Error of mistakeing Vertue for Vice and Vice for Vertue Vice is an Vgly Name and that which almost all abhor should be imputed to them and Vertue is generally in the Notion commended and esteemed and therefore almost all pretend to Vertue in general But when we come to the reproof of particular Vices and to charge them upon those that are Guilty and so when we come to insist upon particular Vertues and to urge the Practice of them Then the World boggles and hesitates or it may be is angry and opposes Then the beloved Vice will not be believed to be a Vice and it shall be accounted ill nature or moroseness or a particular spite that calls it so And the Vertue that we want and do not care to put in practice will not be allow'd to be a Vertue but shall be disputed against The one will be defended under a soft and specious name and the other rejected under a bad one Thus do many Persons often deceive themselves to their disparagement and shame and misery While they cannot discern aright in this matter they perhaps shun the most Honourable Vertues and embrace the most shameful Vices They will refuse what is good and betake themselves to what is hurtful They will be asham'd of Vertue and boast of their Vices Further as Persons are apt for themselves to find out this way to evade the Arguments for Vertue and the Reproofs of Vice so they will endeavour to influence others after the same manner They that are Vicious naturally desire to have others like themselves that their better practice may not condemn or disparage them that others may fall into the same inconveniencies which they have brought themselves to by their wickedness and so may not be able to deride or despise them or that they may accomplish upon those who are yet afraid of Vice some base and shameful design To these Purposes they endeavour much the confounding of all things and especially of the natural and common signs of Passions and Vices in the Soul These they would fain have not regarded nor believed to be the Marks and Symptoms of any such things Highly necessary it is then to be possest with a clear and distinct knowledge of these things And here you have Vertue represented in her true Beauty and Lustre and the ugly Mask the frightful Vizor which spiteful Sinners put upon her is taken off You may see her in all her Charms as far as they can be represented in a Description or Picture of her which I confess cannot have the advantages of the Life in a sublime Example but yet may be sufficient to beget in us some Love and Admiration of the Beauty And here you have also Vice represented in its true Colours and all her Deformity shown as far as was consistent with Modesty and Discretion and the Paint and Disguise which the Vicious Wit of the World puts upon her is also removed Here are Motives to Vertue and just Disswasives from Vice proposed The Means of practising and improving in the one and of abstaining from and mortifying the other You have the Subjects treated on such as are of common Vse and Concern such as relate to every one The Vertues such as all may reach and the Vices such as all are exposed to You have all the Discourse plain and easie Free from the crabbed terms of the Schools You have a Philosopher not dictating after the rudeness of an Academy but complementing and insinuating his wholsome Counsels in the stile and manner of a Courtier And if thà t will recommend the Book further I must tell you That the most of it was written by a very Eminent Person in a Neighbour Nation who had the Honour to be a Counsellour and Preacher in Ordinary to the King that then Reigned there Here you have an Excellent Anatomy as it were of the Soul a view of the Insides of Mankind so that you may see the secret Motions Workings and Effects of all sorts of Passions and Humours Here you may learn the World then without mingleing with it which is the safest way and the pleasantest of doing this For thus you will not be in danger of being corrupted or vexed with the wickedness and folly of it while you are learning it which things in Converse you will be constantly exposed to This Book like a Mariners Chart shows the Rocks and Shelves of Vice whereon unwary and untaught Souls are wont to make Shipwrack of
Religion and Learning and then they are railed at for Ignorance Folly and Vice To this Cause must all their Emptiness and Impertinence be imputed hence 't is they are no more useful to the World To this also we must impute all their Vices the ill Influence they have among Men and all the Mischief they do Thus we may see how Important it is to the World and how much for the Interest of the Other Sex that the Women be bred to useful Knowlege and Vertue And thus I have follow'd the Common Custom in giving the Preference to the Men and speaking first of their Interest in this Matter I shall now apply my self directly to the Women themselves and endeavour to make it appear to them how Important and Vseful it is to themselves to be Learned and Vertuous Something is said of Learning in the following Book and therefore I shall say the less here and the Particular Vertues are recommended and therefore I shall only insist upon some General Commendations of it Let me intreat you then to consider the Pleasure and the Advantage of Knowledge This is like Light Chearing and Delightful to the Mind and Ignorance like Darkness is Vncomfortable and Sad. Knowledge enlarges the Soul Ignorance contracts it The former is the Brightness and Beauty of the Soul and adds Lustre to it as Polishing does to a Jewel the latter sullies and dims and makes it ugly Knowledge elevates the Mind Ignorance depresses it Knowledge tends to refine it from the Dregs of Sensuality Ignorance leaves it polluted Knowledge improves its Powers encreases its Liberty and Freedom and releases its Activity from the Shackles that Ignorance lays upon it Ignorance is weak and poor Knowledge is rich and Strong Enough cannot be said in Praise of this inestimable Thing But especially are Moral and Divine Knowledge most to be valued these do especially improve and adorn and will make you acceptable to God and the World and easie and happy in your selves The Rules of Pious and Vertuous Living are the certain Rules of Happiness The making of us Vertuous and Good is the greatest Blessing and the highest Benefit that can possibly be conferr'd upon us Those are most deplorably Ignorant of the Natures both of Vertue and Vice that imagine there can be a greater Good than the One or a greater Evil than the Other that we can be Happy and Vicious or miserable and excellently Vertuous Vertue and Wisdom tame the Appetites and guide them Safely and Honourably They Compose and Calm the Passions and quiet the Mind Vertue sets the Soul in Order which is Beautiful and Pleasant it teaches every Faculty and Power in us its right Place and Office makes it know its Bounds and do its Duty Vice Disorders and Confounds all Vertue is the Health Vice the Sickness of the Soul and as the Health of the Body improves and maintains its Beauty and Strength so does Vertue for the Soul and Vice on the contrary Weakens Deforms and gives it Pain à nd Trouble Vertue is Serene and Calm Vice is Stormy and Tempestuous The Vertuous Woman may live without Fear or Distrust in Tranquility and Repose She has no cause to blush in Company nor to tremble when she is alone She can enjoy the Present Time with Quietness and Peace has neither Shame nor Remorse for what is past and none but fair and joyful Hopes for what is to come The most lasting and most tasteful Pleasure attends it Pleasure that no Man can take from her such Delight as does not Torment with Impatience nor make her Sick with Disgust that does not depend as those of the World do on innumerable Circumstances whereof if any one be wanting they are Odious or Insipid Vertue and Wisdom are the only Things that can fit you for all Conditions to adorn them and be happy in them They direct to the most Honourable and comfortable Vse both of a Good and Bad Fortune both of a Married and a Single State These believe me are the most powerful and the most lasting Charms These will gain you true Admirers and sincere Servants while outward Beauty and Ornament procure only fiegned Ones And will hold the Hearts they win faster than the fading Advantages of an outside Inclination may make a Man Court and Seek you it may be enough to be a Woman for this especially if to that there be added Beauty and the Invincible Charms of a good Fortune but these cannot beget a true and lasting love Without Wisdom and Vertue and Knowledge The Servant is no sooner better acquainted but it may be Folly and Vice distaste him and his Addresses are at an End If Interest engage him still then he proceeds to make up the proposed Bargain and there is a Marriage without Love which is an Hell upon Earth Beauty without these Things though it be Charming at the first Sight yet it can secure none but the lightest and most foolish Part of Mankind and in them it kindles no more than a brutish Desire which turns into Distaste very commonly as soon as it is gratified Their mighty Admiration falls into Contempt and one may see the fine and pretty thing sitting alone for all him while the Passionate Lover is hugging a Bottle perhaps and kissing the Glass instead of her and any thing is able to draw or detain him from her Company Knowledge and Vertue would make you worthy of that Love-which Nature inclines us to present you and would make your Society always pleasant and always desirable and that to the best and wisest of Men. It is no small advantage to you that as Wisdom and Vertue are the most charming things and will give you the greatest power you can have over the other Sex so they will direct you to judge rightly of Men and to place your Favours and Affections there where they are best deserv'd where they will be best requited where it will be most for your Honour and Happiness to place them As these will inable you to know and discern which are the best and wisest of them so they will dispose you to value such Men most and to prefer them When guided by these you will not be caught with fine Cloaths or a spruce Mien you will not fall in love with a Man for his boasting of and commending himself nor for his addressing blasphemous Complements to you you will not judge of his worth by the former trick nor of his love by the latter You will not think to be happy and be at the mercy of a fool or expect that he will use you well who has not one Vertue to direct or dispose him to do so Nor will you think that an abundance of Wealth is sufficient alone to make you happy And let me add That your Constant preference of the best and wisest Men would be one of the most powerful means to reform the Age. It would soon make Vertue and Wisdom more generally sought after among Men when it
they may do all that they know And if it be said that tho they are not better yet they are more happy than the others because their mind is without inquietude as it is without design In truth it were the greatest injury that could be done them to speak of them in this manner For this were to found their Felicity in their Defect and to own that they are no otherwise happy but because they are Stupid or Ignorant If a Marble Stone feels nothing of pain we do not say for that reason it is very well We do not account it in health but unsensible It is after this manner that the thoughtless are not unhappy for 't is the wanting of a sense of it that hinders them from being so And this is no very honourable advantage to them that they are free from care and trouble as Stones are free from Sickness or Beasts from Remorse of Conscience If the Stupid are found sometimes at the same point with the Philosophers in the tranquility of their Mind 't is yet with a great deal of difference between them in that the latter surmount what the others are ignorant of The Serpents under the Earth are not less safe from a Tempest than any persons that are above the Clouds The meaner Spirits like them by creeping find their safety in their weakness But it is much more glorious to be above the Storm than beneath it and to have it under our Feet than over our Heads Since the true Felicity cannot be acquir'd without Vertue and Morality the Happiness of the Simple is of another Nature than that of the Wise And in my Opinion they are no otherwise happy in this World than those in a feigned Limbus in the other where they stay between good and bad without being touched by either of them The Melancholy do not live in this indifference they owe not their felicity to the Ignorance but to the Goodness of their Minds and it would be too shameful a happiness to them and such as they would complain of if it were necessary to them to be insensible of Good that they might be so of Evil. To know how much the Melancholy Humour excels all other it ought to be consider'd that they who are forward and light are no less uncapable to defend themselves from Misfortunes than to tast the true Pleasures Their Heat precipitates them into extreams They do nothing but in Frolick as if they were made up only of Sulphur and Gun-powder they need but a mear Spark to set on Fire both their Actions and their Thoughts And of this there is no other remedy but to wait for the end of their Impetuosity which often tires its own self and of it self the Fire goes out The Spirits that are without Conduct in their Enterprises are also without Courage in their Afflictions They are a bad sort of Souldiers that use well neither the Sword nor the Buckler and the same lightness which makes them very rash in their onset does also render them weary and impatient when they come to suffer or defend themselves On the contrary the Melancholy have always the Spirit equal They are free from Insolence in a Good Fortune and from Despair under an Evil One. They endure what they cannot overcome they surmount the Maladies of the Soul by Strong Reasoning and those of the Body by Invincible Patience And if heretofore a Man could find himself bold enough to assault the person of a Duke of Milan in the middle of his Guards in the face of his Court and even in a Church only for the having practised several times upon the Picture of this Prince What boldness ought those Wise Men to have who are of this Temper what can they find of new in any Events that may be able to put them in a Wonder Instead of being surprized they discover things to come at a distance by their foresight that they may in good time accustom themselves to them They render things as easie to them by Meditation as they become to the Vulgar by long experience It ought not to be strange if the Melancholick are very constant and one can never see them troubled even when they are constrain'd to give way to Force since they always reserve a secret place within themselves where the Storms of Fortune know not how to arrive It is thither that the Soul withdraws her self to maintain an eternal Serenity there she gains an Absolute Empire over her Opinions And there she entertains her self alone even in the midst of Company without suffering any interruption of her repose and silence by the Throng or Tumults of the World It is in this solitude and abstractedness of the Superior Part in us that the Spirit fortifies it self that Morality is learnt and that some possess before-hand even without a multitude of years and a long experience the Prudence of Old Men and the Wisdom of Philosophers Lastly It is in this place that we shall have always the means of having pleasant Thoughts if we preserve in our selves the Images of those things that are agreeable For if the present Objects displease us we may by entring into our selves render our Minds easie and content while our Senses are under a persecution We may entertain our selves with the thoughts of a beauty at the same time when an ugly Face is before our Eyes But who can ever enough commend this Noble Contemplation of the Melancholick Since 't is by this that the Soul seems to quit when it will the troublesom commerce of the Senses And we may consider with an Attention the less distracted what we are when our Imagination represents us to our selves which it does more clearly and with less danger than the foolish Narcissus is said to have seen himself in the Fountain I do not wonder at all that the Poets feign'd he destroy'd himself because he fought himself out of himself It is in truth impossible we should find our selves but in our selves by all that is besides we meet with nothing but our appearance and shadow Insomuch that without the Use of this Noble Meditation to which the Melancholy Temper is disposed a man seems to have his Reason imperfect and even unuseful For as the Bees must retire themselves to the making of Hony after they have been collecting Matter for it among the Flowers So 't is necessary that after we have viewed a diversity of Objects we should retire within our selves to derive the fruit of our Observation and to make the Consequences it will afford Without this whatever Study or Experience we have it will be nothing but a confusion and medly of things we may gather good things but shall be very ill Managers of them our Actions will appear without Conduct our Thoughts witâ—out Order and our Discourse without Judgment The greatest part of the grosser Spirits have a sentiment quite contrary to this and cannot bring themselves to imagine that there is any other
make Reflections upon their Unsteadiness they would confess that when the Poets invented their Chimera they had a design to draw their Picture since to speak the truth there is as prodigious a variety in their Sentiments as in the feigned Body of this Monster In truth it is just matter of wonder that the same Mind should be capable in so little time of so different Thoughts even to contrariety sometimes If many of these Women had a Painter hired to take every day a Draught of them according to their different Resolutions I assure my self that there would appear every night under their Hands a meer Landskip of a Wilderness We may see some of them that will on this day appear mighty Chast and on the next they are Lewd now they show themselves Covetous and anon Liberal It would be well for them that they could forget this shameful variety and that they were without Memory as well as without Steadiness For the little Memory they have however little it is will make them ashamed of their Judgment I could wish to them that which Epictetus requires in a Wise Man that is That they knew the Art of Regulating their Opinions and of Subjecting them to Reason They would herein have conquer'd many of their Enemies and appeased those Winds which ordinarily cause all the Tempests of their Life But when is it that these Women are more subject to this Ridiculous inequality than when they are elevated with a High Fortune since from that time every one worships their Opinions even the most Extravagant of them and their Imperfections are praised and their very Vices term'd Vertues since also they have then all things so much at their Wish and are sometimes so weary even of Delight that their own Disgust which arises from their being cloy'd causes their Inconstancy Having tired themselves with true Pastimes their sickle Minds busie them with Imaginary ones It is for this Reason that Prosperity and Levity are very often lodged together Let none deceive themselves in this Matter nor think that to render any Steady in their Minds I have a Mind to make them Obstinate It is not always blameable to change there are Seasons wherein this is not contrary to Prudence It is as great a fault altogether to adhere to an Opinion when it is an ill one as to change from that which is good Obstinacy and Inconstancy both are equally contrary to Election because the one is Immoveable when it ought to change and the other changeable when it ought to be fixed That we may be Steady or Constant there is nothing more required than that we persevere in Truth and Equity Besides I know very well that the Minds of the wisest Persons may be moved at the first in some Re-encounters Aulus Gellius says That the Stoicks themselves do not deny but their Wise Man is capable of some change because say they the Emotion is not in our Power but the Consent to it is And to speak in the Terms of their Sect the Visions do not depend upon us but only the Approbations I blame then the Unsteadiness which proceeds from our selves and not at all that which is join'd to the weakness of our Sence and is not in our own Power I HAVE a Mind to discover yet other Causes of the Unevenness of the Mind I suppose then that even knowing Persons may have sometimes their Mind uneven and as it were irresolute because the greatness of their Light does as it were dazle them and make their Election waver and while they look upon the same Object under various Appearances they cannot easily determine themselves but do find some probability as it seems to them even on all sides Nevertheless it must be own'd that this Uncertainty is yet more common to the Ignorant for that while they know not the true Nature of Good or Evil there is more of Hazard than Assurance in their Choice and by so much the more as their Spirit is weak they are unconstant SEE AGAIN a Cause of this of another Kind There are some who have truly some Wit and Knowledge but they have nevertheless also I know not what natural Easiness of Temper that renders them susceptible of all sorts of Opinions Their Spirit has some Light but it has nothing of Force it knows how to propose but has need of Assistance towards the making a good Conclusion There are but too many of this Sort who see the Truth but are not able to follow it Who set sail towards the right Port but every the least Tempest casts them upon another Coast and who suffer themselves to be carried away with a Perswasion as Ships are by the Winds and Stream of the Tides As they are Credulous they are Unsteady AND IN TRUTH may we not see some that have a certain Distrust of their own Sentiments though they are not bad and that cannot go without a Guide though they are not blind Paschalius says that Women ordinarily believe very lightly when they are in great prosperity and that it is from hence that they appear so uneven He brings the Example of Procris in Ovid to show that they very easily believe what they fear or what they desire since she her self was so credulous to the Reports of Slanderers and yielded so readily to the Offers of Cephalus her Husband when he was disguised that she became as lightly Jealous as she was Amorous And in truth those that are in a great Fortune let themselves easily be catch'd with Flattery or moved to Revenge And as there is no injury so small for which they will not insist upon a Satisfaction so there is no praise or Commendation of them so excessive as that they will not receive it It is their constant Misfortune to give Credit to Flatterers and Slanderers LASTLY to find out the more ordinary and dangerous Source of Unevenness we may observe that we shall find none more capable of this than those Women who have no Design or those that have bad ones There are some careless Wretches that do not propose to themselves any end at all who live in I know not what sort of Indifference like those Archers that let fly their Arrows into the Air without aiming at any Mark or as Mariners that should let themselves wander upon the Ocean without steering towards any Port. It cannot be but such must be very unconstant But those that have any ill Design must needs be yet more so because the frequent Remorses that gripe them cause their minds almost every moment to change their Opinion as they do their Faces to change Colour So that to have a steddy constant mind there is nothing more requisite than to keep it Innocent And to this purpose I have a most admirable Rule which I took from a Person very knowing and religious To preserve said he an Equality of Mind in all our Designs and in all our Sentiments without giving our Consciences any Reason ever to reproach us we ought to take care in all our Pretensions that Justice do seek Prudence find Strength revenge and Temperance do possess There ought to be Justice in the Affection Prudence in the Understanding Courage in the Effects and Temperance in the Use The Practice of this excellent Advice would confirm the most unconstant Thoughts and happily determine those that are most true For that none may flatter themselves it must be said that the true Evenness of Mind is inseparably join'd to Purity of Conscience LET US FINISH this Discourse too with that which is of Importance Whatever it is that happens to us that is strange or deadly what need is there that it should mightily trouble us Certainly there would be many more that would endure well and constantly the Evils that befall them if they could represent to themselves that 't is God who tries us and that Patience is a Vertue so lovely that in the Exercise of this Men are apt to think well of ones Actions though they are none of the best There are many more would defend themselves from Sadness if they would but consider that this Passion is no less unprofitable than dangerous If I say they would consider that in the greatest Extremities either there is a Remedy or there is none If there be one why should we not employ all possible means without admitting so great a Trouble of Mind till we see how they shall succeed If there be no Remedy we must resolve to suffer as we must to die since as the one is inevitable according to the Laws of Nature so we see the other to be so according to the Laws of Necessity After all How superfluous is Sorrow and Grief It cannot find again that which is lost nor call to life what is dead it cannot hinder but that Evils will come nor can it cause the good things that are gone away to return And nevertheless as if this fatal Passion could not do us harm enough alone we help it to persecute us There are some that do not put forth the least Endeavour towards the helping of themselves who seek Solitude for fear they should be diverted from their Grief and who fly from Comforters as if they were Murtherers What a Blindness is it to do ones self so much Mischief without any appearances of Advantage If we examine this Case well we shall find that we are not so unhappy in any thing else for the most part as we are in our Grief and Trouble of Mind Or that we are not so truly sad because we are unhappy as we are unhappy in that we are sorrowful and sad FINIS ADVERTISEMENT The ARTS of EMPIRE and Mysteries of State Dis-cabineted in Political and Polemical Aphorisms grounded on Authority and Experience and Illustrated with the Choicest Eâ—â—mples and Historical Observations By the Ever Renowned Knight Sir Walter Raleigh Published by John Milton Esq Printed for Joseph Wats at the Angel in S. Paul's Church-Yard
of the Books we read Our humour is alter'd while we think not of it we laugh with them that laugh we are debauch'd with the Libertine and we rave with the Melancholick To that degree are we influenced as to find our selves altogether changed with our reading of some Books we entertain other Passions and Steer another course of life The reason of this is not difficult to be found out for as teeming Mothers cannot look intently upon some Pictures without giveing their Infants some marks of what they observe why should we not easily believe that the Lascivious stories in Romances may have the same effect upon our Imagination and so leave some Spots upon the mind I grant indeed that we know what we read to be meer fiction yet it fails not for all that to give real motions while we read it the inclination that we have to evil is so strong that it improves by examples of evil tho we know them to be false ones As the Jvy mounts and supports its self by the hollow and dry Tree as well as by the sound and green one so our natural corruption and irregular Appetites carry us so strongly to what is forbidden that even a false and feigned History is sufficient to encourage and animate us to the most wicked undertakings As the Birds were invited to peck at the Painted Grapes of Xeuxis so our Passions take fire at the Amours that are described in Romances The reading of so many wanton things in those Books heats a Person by little and little and insensibly destroys that reluctancy and horrour that should always possess us against all that is evil We grow so familiar with the Image of Vice that we fear not when we meet with the thing it self And after a Man has lost the modesty of his mind he must be in a great deal of danger to lose also that which his modesty alone could have preserved As the Water infallibly runs west when the Banks that restrain'd it are broken down so our affections escape with all manner of liberty after that this honest fear which should govern them is remov'd This licentiousness indeed is not always form'd in a moment nor do we become vicious all at once by this reading The contagion of these Books gains upon the heart almost by insensible degrees it works in the mind as Seed does in the Earth first it spurts then it shoots out and grows every day stronger and stronger that it may bring forth at last the pernicious Fruit of wickedness But this is not yet all the evil that attends the reading of Romances But after it has render'd us bold enough and given courage to do ill in the next place it renders us ingenious and cunning we derive from thence subtilty with confidence and do not only learn the evil we should be ignorant of but also the most delicate and charming ways of committing it And to speak with reason how can it be imagin'd possible to read some Paragraphs in those Books without a great deal of danger When we often see there this Woman quitting her Country and her Parents to run after a stranger whom she fell in love with in a moment Or read how the other found ways to receive Letters from her Gallants or to give them their guilty assignations These are nothing but Lessons of Artifice and skill to teach persons how they may sin with subtilty And for my part I am not able to apprehend with what appearance of reason any can justify so dangerous a Reading On the contrary the Lacedemonians forbad the hearing of Comedies because they present sometimes Murders sometimes Thefts or Adulteries and because in a well regulated Common-wealth nothing ought to be suffer'd that is contrary to the Law not even in fictions or plays Why then are these Romances permitted where we read almost nothing but actions that are dishonest examples that are lascivious and passions that are extravagant Shall we dare to read those things in Books which the Heathens forbid to be represented on Theaters Shall it be said that Christians have less love for Vertue than Infidels And if they were afraid lest the People should be debaucht by such sights have not we reason to fear that weak minds may be corrupted by so filthy reading Nevertheless some may accuse me of too much severity who will be vext to see me ravishing from them their beloved Idols in taking away their Romances who will be griev'd no less for their losing of these bad Books than the Women of whom the Holy Scripture speaks that were weeping for the loss of Jammuz A falsehood shall often have more of the Vogue than truth and they will more willingly read those Books that corrupt the manners than those that regulate them and there are many Ladies that learn to tell without Book the Stories of Amedis while they neglect those of the Holy Writt Lastly they take much less pleasure in the best Sermon than in a sorry Comedy and go oftner to hear a Buffoon than a Preacher Straton complain'd very justly that he had fewer Scholars than Menedemus because there are many more to be found who seek the School of Pleasure than there are that follow that of Vertue and we love rather those who flatter us and make us laugh than those that make us sad and menace us tho for our advantage AND THAT I may conceal nothing that is to the purpose It is extreamly unhappy to mankind that it is enough to raise a curiosity for the Reading of any Book to know that it is forbidden as we observe by daily experience I think the same Evil Spirit who deceiv'd the first of Women possessing her to her destruction with the pleasures of the Tree of knowledge does still inspire others after the same manner promising their eyes shall be opened and they shall see admirable things in what is forbidden them and making them believe 't is out of envy alone that such reading is forbidden them This errour corrupts a great number of those who are persuaded by their Flatterers that as weak persons are always in danger even in the midst of things that are good So the most able Spirits are never in danger no not among a multitude of things that are bad and therefore all reading is to be forbidden to the one sort and all is to be permitted to the other But for my part I must needs think the contrary and declare that whatever measure of Wit any can have they are not withstanding always oblig'd to flee from danger And I doubt there are very few that have the strong constitution of Mithridates to nourish themselves with Poison and live upon that which is mortal to all others I approve no more of the Poets than Romances when there is any thing of ill in them In what ever Period or Page I find any thing of Vice it is my intention to make War with that And let the World think of this
deserve to be heard because they require a civility that they will not pay As they are uncapable to speak what is fine themselves so they are to understand it when spoken by others And it must be beliv'd they would not speak so many ill things if they would give themselves more leisure to hear those that are good And however there are too many to be sound who affect and are proud of this impertinent Tattle who think it a sign and proof of much Wit to speak much and a disgrace to listen with silence to the discourses of others Yet I fear not to say to them a truth which may be very useful tho it be not very pleasant Those of this Humour are incapable of any trust they can keep nothing secret of their designs or business That which is only in the thoughts of the Wise is in the Mouth of the Imprudent And no otherwise than as they say of the Dead Sea that nothing there will go to the bottom and whatever is cast upon it instead of sinking down floats at the top of the Water It is just after the same manner with some tatling humours they can keep nothing to themselves instead of concealing wisely what is important they make all appear both in their looks and discourses See here the unhappiness of those that talk much in an entertainment Let them consider as much as they can their discourse it is next to impossible but that in saying a great many things some of them will be such as ought not to be said As it is difficult in removing the hand often not to lay it sometimes upon the part that is ill so 't is as difficult in speaking much to avoid touching sometimes upon our most secret and important designs And if unthinkingly we many times lay our hand upon a place that is in pain we as unthinkingly let our Tongue run into the predominant Passion of the Mind I know well enough there are those who promise themselves they will never discover their Secrets tho they do give themselves leave to talk much in Company Imagining 'tis enough for the avoiding this to put themselves upon general matters and to propose the speaking of things indifferent But there is no manner of safety in this sort of Conduct for tho they think themselves speaking only of Common things they that have any measure of Wit above a very low degree will easily remark some traces or shadows of their thought The secret meaning appears through this Veil And as we see the Needle touched with a Loadstone tho far distant from the Pole yet turning that way and pointing towards when it does not touch it so our Speech has always I know not what of our Thought and will shew it in the most distant Harangue and among the matters that are the most Universal Let us set our selves as much as we will to dissemble and feign after we have flutter'd a while about the secret of our Hearts like a Flie about the Candle yet at last we shall there burn our Wings We lose our selves like them there where we trifle and play I am extreamly in love with this Comparison because those Women that are so much addicted to talk do mightily resemble those little Creatures who are made up altogether of Wings who have no solidity of Body who have nothing but Colour to derive to their young ones and discover their weakness even by their lightness But if the Arguments I make use of do seem to be weak I will give them a most excellent Example which perhaps will have more effect than all the Precepts of Morality For let them cast their Eyes but a little on her that ought to be the Rule as she is the Ornament of their Sex they will perceive that the Holy Scripture does not mention her speaking more than four or five times in her whole life It may be this will seem to them very difficult and I believe it were a miracle in some if they could only hold their peace with discretion so many times as the Blessed Virgin is said to have spoke and if they did abuse their speech but as seldom as she made use of hers They are alas too far from arriving at this perfection Instead of an imitation of it in not speaking but out of Charity or Modesty as she did they hardly ever speak but to say something ill of others or to boast something good of themselves Their Discourse is all made up of Condemnations or Praises that are both unjust It is nothing else but Vanity or Evil speaking There is no doubt then to be made but that many must be at great pains with themselves to restrain as they ought the Liberty of their Tongue From whence it is very hard for them to succeed well in entertaining and the indiscretion of their discourse does very often expose them to the railery or hatred of the Publick It is also the unhappiness of those who have not prudence enough to examin their own speeches that they are yet less able to consider well what they hear said by others Their liberty is blind and utters upon all manner of occasions and in all companies Yet I do not design to say in this matter that there are not certain rencounters wherein they may speak with more freedom than in many others BUT IT OUGHT to be very well observed to whom we discover our sentiments when there is danger in having them publisht And it would be to us an occasion for a most bitter repentance to find that in the mouths of all the World which ought never to have fled from our own It seems to me therefore that the remedy for this mischief that you may not be continually subject to the alarms of other peoples obloquy nor yet forced to live always under a violent constraint is this to chuse well those whose company you intend mostly to frequent and not to make acquaintance indifferently with all sorts of persons And to speak my thoughts concerning the Election that ought to be made of the Wits or Humours capable of your Conversation I find there are two sorts of persons whom you ought absolutely to fly they are the Vicious and the Ignorant Because the Conscience is not safe with the former nor the Mind contented with the Latter The entertainment of those who want Religion or Knowledge ought to be entirely suspected and we have reason to judge that it must have some grand design to excuse two so great defects as Impiety and Ignorance This Evil Choice offends the Vertues either Moral or Christian For is it not true that in communicating as freely with the meanest Spirits as with the most excellent we oblige neither the one nor the other because the latter are offended at this and the former will deride and abuse it This is imprudently to afford matter either to Hatred or Railery you will in this way obtain the approbation of no body while
greatest Tyrants of our Repose since the one carries us away to the time to come and the other makes us return to that which is past Taking away from us the liberty of making the present time happy while we desire those things that are not yet come or unprofitably regret those that are past The abler Spirits do easily resist and defie this Tyranny As when a Ship is tost in a mighty Tempest tho the Mast be broken and the Sails torn in pieces yet the Needle is always pointed towards the Polar Star so ought we always to demonstrate a steddiness of Mind in the most tragick misfortunes and to shew a temper equal amidst the greatest inequality of Affairs And as the Winds can easily drive the Ship besides the Port she designs for but not the Needle from pointing to the Pole After the same manner when some Obstacles retard our pretensions they ought not for all that to drive us from our Reason or make shipwrack of our Constancy NOW I HAVE SAID what there is of good that may be found in the Gay and Chearful Humour it is time to examine what evil may be met with in it And since we have remarked the defects which many attribute to Melancholy let us betake our selves a while to mention its good effects and just praises This is that which renders the Mind subtle for the Sciences indefatigable for affairs serious in Conversation constant in Designs modest in good Fortune patient under Bad and judicious and reasonable in all Things It is of this just and equal Temperament that Vertue serves her self to appear with all her Ornaments This Nature has been wont to chuse when she would form Conquerors or Philosophers And this is that which Grace it self has always employ'd to give to the World the most extraordinary persons It seems as if the Persons of this Humour were born Wise that Nature had given them more than Study and Endeavour can procure to others And that without falling under the inconveniences of Old Age they possess in good time almost all its maturity 'T is true they reproach it with this that their Meditation is of more worth than their Discourse But they ought to know that as the Judgment of such persons is solid so they commonly disdain that superfluous ornament and shew which the slighter Wits make so much use of to procure credit among the Vulgar In this their Modesty they resemble the Eagle in the Apocalypse that had Light within and had Eyes under his Wings Whereas the great Talkers have them only upon the Feathers as the Peacocks on those of their Train being no otherwise reasonable but in Colour and Appearance I do not at all deny but the Gay and Chearful Humours have something of pleasantness but they are also subject to very great defects For as much as the Railery and Jesting which they often engage in tho it be agreeable to some yet it usually does offend more than it pleases And one shall often see this sort of Wits among themselves begin in Jest and play like Puppies and soon end in Earnest and quarrel But especially when Religion or any ones Reputation is their Subject 't is the easiest thing in the World for them to fall into Impiety and Slander And since we cannot rally the Great without Imprudence nor the Miserable without Cruelty and then in doing this we should always contradict either the Rules of Policy or the Laws of Nature The graver Spirits have a great deal of reason to abstain from that which makes them who profess it pass for Buffoons or for Enemies and which often gives themselves in the end an occasion to weep after that they have provided for others something to laugh at For my part I think it no disparagement to Melancholy to own that it has no inclination to so ridiculous a quality which supposes always a lightness of Spirit and very often a great liberty of Conscience It was this giddy-headed Temper which was that of the foolish Virgins and of the same are they who have more Wit than Judgment Who nevertheless seem for the present to have some Light but it is an ignis fatuus or such as like a Spark shines but a moment e're it goes out They let themselves be impos'd upon for want of being able to foresee far enough into Affairs of Importance whereas the Wise are never drowsie when they should prepare themselves for good or dangerous occasions for fear they should afterwards be oblig'd to Repentance and Shame And to speak of things as they are Since the Spirit and the Sense have a quarrel which will last as long as life and the Soul is not strong but in the weakness of the Body as in the ruin of an Enemy There is some ground to say that when the Humour is so brisk and so free that it is become the more strong and on the contrary when it is Humbled and Melancholy 't is become a Slave to Reason like a Maid-servant that shews discontent in her looks when she is hardly treated by her Mistress The Joy which arises from the Conscience has marks that are altogether particular 't is the purest that is and resembles the unspotted brightness of the Stars which always cast forth an Equal Lustre But that which comes from the Body or the Temper is like the Comets which have there nourishment from below by the exhalations of the Earth which presage none but dire Events and which seem to dance in the Air while they run after the Vapours that feed them but go out as soon as they are destitute of that Matter The Passion of the Melancholy has nothing parallel to these Tragick Meteors either in their formation or in what maintains them Their Amity has no Aim besides the Goods of the Mind And as the Fire of their Affection is most pure so it loses nothing of its ardour it endures always in an equal state like that which some Philosophers fancied to be under the Orb of the Moon I readily acknowledge as to what regards Friendship that the Gay Humors are therein more forward and free but then the Melancholy are more discreet in it and fitter to be trusted These adhere constantly to their designs while the other change every moment their Passions and lend themselves out to every Object that presents A very little matter serves either to overcome or persuade them Inconstancy is almost inseparable from this Humour and if they are not capable of corruption through malice at least they are liable to it by weakness But if their Plainness merits some Favour I cannot for all that count it reasonable that we ought to esteem so very much a Natural Goodness which is rather an effect of the Temper than the Choice When a Person cannot be Bad there is no such great glory in being Good And if the Simple do not much mischief they are not to be thought the less culpable for that since notwithstanding
contemplation but that of Fools and such as are distemper'd And in truth this Meditation in them would cause no less hurt than it does fear of it it would be as contrary to them as it is unpleasing It dazels the Spirits of those that are wicked the one sort it Blinds and others it severely Scourges It is not to be imagin'd that they who have nothing but Darkness in the Mind and Guilt in the Conscience can take any delight to enter into themselves or to search there for satisfaction or repose But to despise Contemplation because there are some that may lose themselves in it is not this as great an Error as if one should find fault with the Sun because the Owls cannot bear his brightness without considering that the Eagles can stedsastly behold it and that we should not tax this glorious Star for that our feeble Eyes are dazled by his Rayes and we find Darkness even in the Source of Light it self I have now said enough concerning these two Humours Having thus compar'd them together there is not a person who may not easily judge what ought to be her usage of both that she may succeed well in Conversation If the Chearful humour seems most agreeable the Melancholy seems most solid the one is the most beautiful the other the most rich They have both of them something of Good and something of Evil and indeed to speak my Opinion I judge that as the mixture of hot and cold is the support of our lives so all the force of agreeableness and a good Grace is derived from the tempering of these two Humours when it is so done that the one serves for a remedy to the other And if the Romans esteem'd those the best of their Tribunes who testified the most inclination to the Senate and those the wisest among the Senators which most favoured the interests of the People in like manner I think we may say that the most excellent among the Chearful Persons are they who approach nearest to the Melancholy and among the Melancholy they are the best who have most Gayety of Mind For being thus temper'd the first shall be the more Discreet and the latter less Austeer and Imposing Of Reputation BE IT SO THAT Reputation is a Mighty Treasure and that it serves no less to Vertue than Day-light does to a Picture to make it appear Nevertheless if it be well considered after what manner some lose or some possess it in these days we might rank it among the Goods of Fortune in which the Foolish have many times a larger share than the persons of greatest Merit If there were Wise and Just Judges to distribute this it were enough to be Vertuous for the obtaining a Reputation and Esteem among Men But it does frequently depend upon so very ill Arbitrators that if it were not for this that we are always oblig'd to avoid as much as we can the giving of Scandal it would really become those that are Wise to content themselves with the Testimony of a good Conscience alone without any further care for the Opinion of the Imprudent which a meer Chance may render either Good or Bad. This is a thing that depends too little upon our selves to be that which can render us happy And this were a Felicity but very ill secured which the Ignorance or the Malice of an Enemy can take from us A Renown or Great Fame is many times an Effect which seems to have nothing of a Cause and which rises like those groundless Alarms which put sometimes a whole Army into a Pannick Fear and Disorder while they can no ways find out what should be the subject or occasion of it I must also approve the opinion of those who compare it to the Winds because it rises and falls as lightly as they and above all because there is no one knows certainly the Original of them And since it is then so uncertain a thing why should any man labour with great unquietness of mind to know how he stands in the opinion of others and afflict himself for the Error of the Vulgar as if it were but now that the Ignorant had begun to mistake or lie I have taken occasion to wonder with Aristotle that the Ancients gave more recompences to strength and force of the Body than to the abilities of the Mind distributing their Lawrels to a bulky Wrestler and not to the Wise or Prudent It cannot be but that Ignorance and Poverty must have hinder'd them from putting a Price upon Vertue Ignorance might do this because Vertue being a thing that is hid in the Heart men are often abused in the judgments which they make of it And Poverty might cause it too because when they were forced to acknowledge its excellency they had nothing in the World sufficiently precious to make Rewards or Garlands worthy of it Now then if Human Judgments are so full of uncertainty what advantage or what wrong can Vertue receive from their Error In truth they cannot recompence it since they cannot know it they are not knowing enough for this nor rich enough O what Blindness and what Levity is in the World May we not see some persuading themselves there is great Vertue there where there is truly nothing but Vice and some on the contrary that give base and unworthy names to excellent things Like Astrologers that call some of the Stars the Bull or the Scorpion which have nevertheless nothing either of Fury or Venom but only Purity and Light I could heartily wish that they who meddle with judging of things without knowing well the nature of them might be Punisht as Midas was This Ignorant Judge prefer'd the rustick Sound of Pan's Pipe before the ravishing Harmony of Apollo's Lute giving his Vote to that which made the greatest noise And his fit condemnation was to wear Asses Ears having but an Asses Head and Wit before His Judgment was very like to that of a great many who esteem things only by their Colour and Mein and they are no less worthy of long Ears for a mark of their stupidity And indeed to make more account of the Appearance than the Truth of a thing Is not this to prefer Pan to Apollo a Pipe before a Lute and a Noise before a Harmony There is a great deal of Brutality in an Opinion so barbarous And nevertheless there are of such as these a great many in the World and these are they who give a bad repute to those that merit only a good one I shall therefore reserve my Resentment for those who can give just condemnations or praises and I shall not be at all of the mind to suffer my self to be uneasy at that which I ought to deride There are very few persons that judge with any soundness of that which they see The mind of the most does not penetrate far it stops as the Eyes do at the Colour and Surface Their Opinion is of very little Importance and I think
ought always to weep and who know not that it ought to guard it self as much against a dull Humour as against Cloudy Weather and that of all sorts of Wits those are the best that have some Gayety And it is necessary that persons be very heavy to believe that we cannot have a good Humour without an evil Conscience And besides if there were no Malice or a Man had no Enemies in the World there is almost nothing so assured or evidently true to which Men may not give several Faces If we consider our Actions well it will appear that they are all liable to a different interpretation Who can certainly judge where there is no Christianity of a Man that gives his Alms in publick Whether this be for a good Example or out of Vanity May it not be said of a person that is Patient that this is a sign he has little Sense as well as that he has this Vertue How know we whether a pleasant Humour be a Testimony of Licentiousness or of Freedom Those that are serious may they not pass for stupid or vain persons as well as for modest The Interpretation does all and tho the things are not indifferent yet we speak of them more according to our Sentiment than according to their Nature After all this Those that are Wise ought to seek their consolation in their own Mind and after they have done all they can to merit a good Reputation they ought then to disdain a bad one The disdain of Injuries is the death of Slander but the resentment revives it This is to acknowledge the force of its Arms when we confess it has been able to hurt us And they who are hurried into an excess of concern when they find themselves injur'd satisfie the designs of those that sought to offend them for this is to render our Enemy pleas'd when we give him Testimony that he hinders us from being so Tho our Reputation may be stolen from us or retrencht in some measure yet at last it will return again As our Hair grows again after 't is cut provided it have but a Root and our Innocence and Patience do remain In every case if they blame us unjustly we ought to feel more consolation in the Truth than trouble for the Imposture The Innocent should no more afflict themselves when they are said to be guilty than if it should be said they were sick when they are in a good state of Health It is from hence we may learn why the Vertuous are less revengeful when they are blamed than the Vicious For as those that are not beautiful would yet be often esteem'd so with their Disguises So the dishonest persons endeavour by their Artifices to gain the opinion of being very wise It is for this that such Women are so very troublesome and that one shall not dare to touch them in the least where they are hurt but presently they are extreamly disorder'd All the World knows that Lucrece when she kill'd her self for the Violence which she suffer'd from Tarquin said as she was dying she had two Testimonies of her Innocence that were unreproachable the one was her Blood in the sight of Men and her mind before the Gods But I am almost of the Opinion of a great Author who accuses her of not having been always so chast as she would fain be reputed And if she had not been at all Criminal she might without doubt have found more remedy for her trouble in her Conscience than in Death They say she resisted more out of humour or some secret considerations than out of Vertue and having passed away the time with other Galants of less quality than this Tyrant she fear'd that all her other faults would be discover'd by this and this fear they say made her resolve to leave the World by her own guilty Hand rather than to see her helf outlive the loss of her Reputation I declare that it is of more worth to be good in Effect than in Appearance and that an honest Woman ought to esteem Vertue beyond Reputation But I believe too that if one be very sensible of the Importance of her Fame she will with the more care avoid the danger of losing it Since they who have a true sense of Honour ought to esteem themselves unhappy when they are put to the trouble of justifying themselves and that when they are not guilty They ought always to have before their Eyes that which was said by Julius Caesar when he divorced his Wife Pompeia and that even after she had made her Innocency appear It is not enough said the Emperour that the Wife of Caesar be Innocent but she ought also to be free from Suspicion Of the Inclination to Vertue and of Devotion THEY WHO Imagine that the Piety of Women is nothing else but the tenderness of their Complexion and the weakness of their Spirit are not at all of our Opinion And they offer them no less affront in their endeavour to take away this Divine quality than if they had attempted to Rob their Faces of their Eyes It must be believ'd that they who desire a Woman without Devotion do also wish her to be without Modesty too And after they have taken from her all Sentiments of Piety they design and intend next to ravish something else This is an old Errour which begun with the World it self And the Libertins do nothing else in this with the Women of the present Age than what the Devil practised upon the first Woman whom he first depriv'd of the fear of God to the end he might afterwards persuade her to all manner of Liberty But it evidences a great want of Judgment for any to seek the Reputation of a good Wit in the contempt of Religion and that especially during a Reign and in a Court where Religion and Piety are so much reverenced by the greatest None can now observe the common Rules of Policy while they Violate the Rules of their Religion And 't is a very happy necessity which renders the looser Spirits of the Court without excuse when at this day they may see that if they will not render themselves ridiculous they must seek their Salvation together with their Fortune It is then necessary that the Ladies who would testifie that they have Inclinations to Vertue should gratifie more those that make profession of this than the Others for fear lest it be believed if they favour the Licentious or the stupid that there is some resemblance that has contriv'd a secret correspondence between them They that shew a hatred or coldness towards Persons of worth and Religion declare by the aversion they have to Good things that they are not born but for Evil. The weak Spirits have not Credit enough to be able to publish their Vertues nor enough Discretion to conceal their Defects And Nevertheless we may often see that they who are vain or designing do seek among the foolish their Admirers and
much Confidence And to give a touch at the Principal Vices which are contrary to this Vertue Those Women that kill themselves are not courageous but desperate this is to give way instead of defending our selves It is to yield our selves to an Enemy without putting him to the trouble to conquer us There is no great need of Resolution to lay hold on Death for a rememdy to it self There is no great strength of Spirit to practise upon our selves the Office of an Hangman It is better to seek the end of a Disease in good Medicaments than in Poison otherwise this is not a resistance but a flight this is not to seek a remedy but to render our ruin the more Infallible As we count the Body weak when it sinks under a small Burden so we ought to believe the Mind cowardly when it faints under an Affliction It is indeed upon this ground that many accuse the Women But the Men have no Reason to Reproach them for a Vice which themselves are often guilty of As Lucretia kill'd her self for the Loss of her Honour Cato did the same thing for the Loss of Liberty And why should they blame a young Lady for that which many have so highly commended in a Philosopher And to say the truth though some have set themselves to invent Slanders for the disparagement of the Women it ought to be own'd that they are more firm to their designs than the Men. At least let us learn from the Holy Scripture that upon an occasion which required the greatest Affection and Courage towards the Service of God One might have seen three Mary's under the Cross where there was but one of Twelve Disciples Of Constancy and Fidelity THOSE THAT HAVE been possest with a belief that Levity is natural to Woman when they read this Discourse which undertakes to prove the contrary they will perhaps think that we pretend to find Stability in the Winds a good foundation upon the Waters or strength in Reeds But setting aside their Opinion since it is not our Design or Commission to rectify all those who are in an Errour we will make it appear that as to what concerns Inconstancy that Sex are more in danger to be injur'd by it than to be guilty of it And that their distrust is very just in an Age when the Friendships that are promised with a great deal of Ceremony are without Truth or but of a Moments Duration Constancy is not used but in good things and Obstinacy in those that are evil otherwise Wickedness would be Eternal and Repentance should be forbid for fear of a change When an alteration is just it is a matter of Choice when 't is not so it proceeds from Levity As it is not reasonable that they who are sick should remain always in that condition that they might not be inconstant so likewise I do not think there is any more fault in forsaking an ill Opinion than in getting rid of a Fever And I believe that to Repent may be as necessary to the Mind as Medicines are sometimes to the Body What danger is there in preferring a greater merit to a less or to own that the Sun has more of light than the Stars Otherwise the first things that we shall happen to see in the World would put a Shackle upon our Liberty even to the taking away from us the right of Chusing or to the making us love that which may be worthy of Hatred Those that highly esteem'd Nero while he manag'd himself wisely in the first five years of his Empire Were they oblig'd for this to love and Honour him also when he was become a Tyrant After he had cashier'd all his Vertue must they still owe him Friendship I did love this Man for his Merit this Face for its beauty this Flower for its Colour this Man is debaucht and become vicious this unhappy Face is grown ugly this fine Flower Alas is wither'd why would you have me to be still fond of an object where the lovely Qualities are no more to be found And can the Building stand when the Foundation is taken away If this be a due preserving of these Melancholy Laws of Constancy They who love a curious Picture would be oblig'd to admire the Cloth too after that the fine Draught were defaced There is no Religion in that Love which obliges to pay an Honour to such Relicks any more than as our Affection may be changed into Pity with the decay of the Object or unless it were to avoid Ingratitude rather than Inconstancy It is for this reason that they who love nothing but the Beauty of the Body have a great deal of difficulty to live long in Love It is only the Beauty of the Mind and the never fading Charms of Vertue that can lay hold of us for ever Faces as well as the Years have their Seasons How agreeable and lovely soever a Spring may be we must expect to see the Flowers wither'd away and to endure a Winter after the fine days NEVERTHELESS there is no ground to condemn so noble a Vertue and a quality so necessary to the World as Constancy without which all the Love in it were but Treachery and Deceit Let it then be taken how it will whether as Men are wont to do or according to reason I say the following Examples will shew that the Men are very injurious when they give the Names of Vices to the Vertues of the Women when they will needs call them obstinate or fickle tho they have reason to change or not to change Sinorix being deeply in Love with Camma the Wife of Synattus he employed all his Arts to win her consent to his Passion But when all his endeavours together with the Luster of his Quality were not of force sufficient to shake the Resolution of this Woman he imagin'd that if her Husband were but taken out of the World he should then easily possess what was now refused him He kill'd him and after that Cruelty he so importun'd the Parents of this Widow that by their influence she at last consented in appearance to the Marriage of Sinorix When they were come then to Celebrate the Marriage and that they must go to the Temple of Diana This Chast Lady brings out a Cup of Wine of which she drinks a good part to Sinorix and gives him the rest he received it joyfully and drank it all not imagining in the least that it was poisoned Camma seeing her design now accomplisht she threw her self upon her Knees before the Image of Diana to whom she gave her thanks and made her excuses after this manner Great Goddess thou knowst with how great a Constraint and with what Design I have consented to marry with this Murderer If Grief would kill as often as it is extream I should not have been now in this World where nevertheless I have not refused to stay a while that I might take vengeance on this perfidious Man whom thou
seest here who believes that I am able to love him after he has ravisht from me my Dear Synattus Think with thy self Barbarous Man and acknowledge how much right I have to Sacrifice thy life to that thou hast taken from my Husband I do not value at all my own for I defer'd to put an end to it only that I might give to Posterity one more remarkable Testimony of my Love and of thy Cruelty Camma was happy in this that Sinorix died before her tho he drank last of the fatal draught The Gods gave this satisfaction to her Fidelity and she ended her life calling still upon Synattus that he would come and accompany her in her departure from this World Can any of the Men give a more noble Example of Constancy than this And was it not a Philosophick Madness to maintain in publick that among a thousand Men one should hardly find one constant but amongst all Woman-kind not one After this it is easy to judge whether the Prince of Philosophers had reason to compare Woman to the first Matter because that has always a desire to the changing of its Forms and tho it has gained one that is altogether perfect yet it still retains a general inclination for all other He had a design to shew by the Parallel that the Women are as unsatisfied and unconstant towards the Men as Matter is towards the Forms But this is a Comparison too injurious and such as would agree better a great deal with the Philosopher himself than with any the most unconstant Woman that could be found For he forsook one Mistress for another to whom he made his devout Addresses that he might Testifie with the more solemnity that he himself was guilty of a Crime of which he had accused the Women In truth they have more reason to complain of the Men than they have to fear their Reproaches How are credulous Spirits at this day ill requited for their simplicity Whatever assurances many Men do give they ought rather to be reckoned Deceivers than Inconstant because at the same time that they promise Fidelity they are forming a Design to violate it There is no alteration in their Resolutions but there is in their Words THIS VICE does not haunt those Minds that are above the Common Rank One may be assured of them and their least designs remain firm in all sorts of occasions and under the greatest storms of Fortune Levity comes of Weakness and Constancy from a strength of Spirit After that Affection has bound together two Generous Souls the Separation of them must be impossible For since Love is in its Nature Immortal when it can cease to be it must be acknowledged that it is not true St. Augustine said that his Friend and he seemed to have between them but one Soul both for Life and Love That Death had not so much Separated two as divided one And that after the Loss of this Confident he had a fear of Death and a horrour at Life Because without him he was but half alive and nevertheless he saw himself oblig'd to preserve the rest that his Friend might not entirely die There are but few so constant as this great Person was The Friendships of these times are no longer so firm And if we consider well those between whom the affections they had for each other are ruin'd upon the slightest occasions we may believe that the Union is very often without strength when the Separation is so often made without regret AFTER WE have spoken of Inconstancy we shall encounter Perfidiousness which is ordinarily inseparably adjoyned to it And in truth I am not able to comprehend how it comes to pass that any are Perfidious when the whole World has so great an abhortence of this crime and it does so infallibly procure Enemies They that make use of it ought to fear it and they whom it has hurt will seek to be revenged on it But that which is worthy of astonishment is this Tha the very Aspect of such Persons testifies that while they set the whole World against them they are not in a very good agreement with themselves thus declaring without words the horrour which themselves are filled with at their own wickedness It is not necessary to be very well skill'd in the Rules of Physiognomy to observe upon their Faces the wickedness and the torment of their Minds It must needs be that these are the greatest Criminals in the World since they themselves form their own Process in their own Consciences and that even to the executing it too upon themselves sometimes with their own Hands The forlorn Wretches practise a new form of Justice upon themselves where they alone are Judges and Executioners Accusers and Guilty Altho naturally we love our selves yet such can shew themselves no Mercy and they shew by those their fatal Looks that none can absolve them while their own severe Consciences do condemn and torment them This is the most horrible and the least excusable of all Crimes because those that attempt this are at the cost of so much trouble to commit it and they must do so much harm to themselves to do it to others Faithfulness on the contrary is always chearful even among difficulties and Perfidiousness is always musing and melancholy even in the midst of Divertisements A Mind that is faithful does not resent its Afflictions but that which is treacherous has no tast of its Pleasures Their Sentiments are very differently taken up for the Vice makes the one sort weep even among Delights and the Vertue helps the other sort to laugh even among their Evils and their sufferings When a Soul is sullied with this Vice it is capable of all the wickedness that can be imagin'd and especially does Avarice follow it very near And when once a Woman is become Covetous she has a great deal of difficulty to be faithful there is nothing that she will not do and that she will not sell to be rich This is the most infallible mark of a clownish Spirit and of a Soul debauched The Ladies ought never to testifie that they have any inclination to to this lest they fall under the Fate of Procris who after she had resisted both threatnings and submissions yet she yielded assoon as she saw the Mony told down BUT THAT WE MAY see this Vice in all its Aspects The Credulous and the Ignorant are no less in danger of falling into this than any other They are persuaded to many things which their Easiness afterwards makes them suffer contrary to their Honour It seems to say the truth that these Women are neither Faithful nor Perfidious for they have not the Design that should make them Perfidious nor yet Strength enough to be faithful It is this simplicity as the Poet speaks which is worthy of excuse provided that one does not take pleasure in being deceiv'd The Politick are liable to do by Wickednesses that which the Simple do by
persuading himself that a Woman had Learning enough when she could put a difference between the Shirt and the Doublet of her Husband The Opinion of this Prince would be very ridiculous in those Countries where People go Naked or as well among those Nations who make the Shirt and the Doublet all of a piece The Esteem which he had of the Ignorant and Simple does oblige me to believe he might have made a Vow that he would love none but those that were like himself The Emperor Theodosius made not so great account of the Ignorant He married Athenais only because she was Learned and of a good Wit without any regard to this that she was Daughter to a Father of but mean Extraction who left her no other Dowry but the Beauty she was born with and the Philosophy of his School They that will distrust a Woman when she knows a little more than ordinary are certainly such weak people as deserve to fall under what they fear and who found their Suspicions upon the very Reasons themselves which ought to give them Assurance Moreover the Ladies that have some Knowledge and Learning do of all others afford the greatest pleasure in Conversation and they receive no less in solitude when they entertain themselves alone Their Thoughts have wherewithal to content them while the Ignorant are subject to Evil Thoughts because they know nothing commendable to employ their minds about As their Conversation is tedious so their Musing can be but extravagant They that say the Women have a great advantage in their Ignorance do they not give too much honour to the untaught simplicity of the Village which is commonly much in danger when it meets with Importunity and Occasion Or if this Sentiment be good why may we not say as well that the Blind are great gainers in the loss of their Eyes if it were enough to shut the Eyes for the avoiding of a Precipice In the Court as in the Ocean it is necessary to know the Shelves if we would avoid the making Shipwreck and if the Ladies do that which is evil after they know it to be so we ought to place the Cause of their Misfortune in their Design not in their Knowledge And nevertheless I will maintain as Reason does oblige me That a Lady ought to be Learned that she may make a figure in Conversation It may be that this Sentiment will at first sight offend that of the Ignorant and Stupid who persuade themselves that they should find their own dear resemblance every where that a Woman cannot study nor read without becoming Vicious or at least without being suspected But they that judge so rashly in this case do despise that which they ought to desire as if they were oblig'd to hate all the accomplishment which they have not themselves or as if they ought not to make account of any but very little Spirits Whereas they ought to represent to themselves that those Women who have not Judgment enough to know Vice they have not enough neither for the choice of Vertue or to know how according to the Occasions they should prefer Truth to an appearance Also they who understand ever so little of Morality cannot be for this Advice since we are daily taught by experience to acknowledge that the light of our Reason is as it were a natural Vertue which disposes to do good almost without any Study and that we really see a very good Wit without a good Conscience The assistance of Learning fortifies the good Inclinations and they that persuade themselves the reading of Books is only a School to teach them to commit Evil with Address might more decently believe that the Ladies may find there more to correct than to corrupt them Reading and Conversation are absolutely necessary to render the Wit and the Humour agreeable and as the one collects for us matter for Discourse the other by use teaches the method of unfolding it gracefully that we may join together Readiness and Abundance without this our Conversation is nothing else but an insupportable Tyranny and it is impossible without putting ones self upon a Rack to stay long with these Women who can entertain us with nothing but the number of their Sheep if they be of the Country or if they be of the Town then can talk of nothing but the Heads and Petticoats in fashion It ought not then to be imagin'd that in speaking of this accomplisht Woman whose Character we are framing we do intend to describe a Mother of a Family that knows well how to follow her Servants or takes care to comb her Children Tho we do not condemn these things yet we must declare that skill in Musick History and Philosophy and the like accomplishments are more agreeable to our design than meer good Houswifry And there can be none so much Strangers to Common-Sense as not to own that without these good Attainments tho the Women may have an excellent Wit yet they will be apt to have their minds fill'd with things very Evil and very Impertinent Their good Nature and their good Inclination remain without effect under the want of Reading and Conversation when the Tyranny of their Mothers or of their Husbands or else some other misfortune hinders them from attaining those excellent qualities which they are born capable of FOR TO SAY that the Sciences are too obscure for the Ladies and that they cannot comprehend the Arts even in their Principles because of the Terms that are too hard to be understood This in truth is a very strange Error It is an opinion altogether extravagant to think that the Sciences cannot as well be exprest in English as in Greek or Latin These Disputers that through Ignorance or Malice have obscur'd the Arts under Terms that are rude as under ragged Cloaths and who will not unravel the Confusion that we may still have recourse to them as to an Oracle They do them no less wrong in forcing them to appear in an Apparel so shameful than the Libertins do to Vertue when they describe it as terrible and inaccessible that they may deter others from venturing upon it But the Worthy Persons know how to take away this Mask It is an Imposture that gives no trouble but to the Spirits of the Vulgar I easily allow that as for Philosophy and Theology one may find in them some words that seem not to be purely English I grant that when other Arts have their peculiar Terms which are not usually softned and explained to be accommodated to them who do not make profession of those Arts it is not reasonable that two of the noblest Sciences in the World should make themselves more familiar than the others I own too that in strong reasoning there are sometimes words used which are a little mysterious because they express the truth somewhat better than those that are more Polite But after all where there is not this necessity what need have we to affect Obscurity
Poverty and Jealousy into their Families They often carry three or four Manners hanging at their Ears and with this specious pretext spare neither Pearls nor Diamonds But in truth it is not without reason that such are suspected by many Persons and it is not these Ornaments that entertain the Conjugal affection and there is ground to believe that the wantonness of their Dress is rather contriv'd for their Gallants than their Husbands Of Beauty THEY THAT ADORE or that despise Beauty do defer too much or too little to the Image of God It is one of the rare presents that Heaven has made to this lower World but we ought to attribute all the worth of it to the Power and Bounty of him that has gratified us therewith In the Opinion of Plato it is an Humane Splendour amiable in its own Nature that has power to ravish with pleasure the Mind and the Eye And certainly this ought to be a sign of the inclination that we have to good For as much as Heretofore the Priests that were deform'd were excluded from the Temple let us not have an ill opinion of Beauty which God himself did judge necessary to them that were to approach his Altars The Judgments that we make of the Beauty of the Mind by that of the Body are not often the worst grounded The Soul like a Queen makes the richest preparations where she intends to appear with the greatest luster and advantage And in truth if Vertue be necessary for the establishment of Sovereign Authority it seems that Beauty is at least as necessary to grace it If we find sometimes the fine Wits in ill contriv'd Bodies these are like Relicks ill enshrin'd to which a great many will not pay so much Reverence as they would if they were cover'd with Gold and Pearls This Lovely Quality is worthy of Empire in all places where there are Eyes and Reason It has Enemies no where but there where it meets with the blind and the stupid The only glorious Countenance of Scipio Africanus made him conquer several Barbarous Nations even without drawing his Sword and Heliogabalus himself from being Priest of the Sun became Emperor of the whole World as soon as his Mother had shew'd him to the Souldiers Thus do the whole World pay their Respects to those to whom Nature has given this advantage and however they sometimes blame Beauty yet at least they pity it too THE VULGAR believe that if there is not Evil cover'd with Beauty yet at least Misfortune attends it and there is danger in it if Sin be not found with it But to say the truth when this is an occasion of evil it is often an Innocent that makes the Criminals and they who complain of it do as unjustly as they who should accuse the Sun for dazling their Sight when they have been staring too steddily upon that Star That is but hardly kept says Theophrastus which a great many love and desire and there can be no great assurance or safety in the possession of that which the whole World aspires to Sometimes they will lay so long Siege to those Cities and attack them on so many sides that at length they will make themselves Masters The Authority of this Great person does no prejudice to Beauty since 't is impossible to say any thing more to its praise than to own that all desire this as an Object the most pleasing to them And if the Fair sometimes suffer themselves to be won upon this complaint must be directed to their Minds rather than their Faces A Place is not the less strong because they have yielded it up who ought to defend it the default is in the Captain rather than in the Citadel Be it as it will the Homely have no advantage in this reproach For since they are never sollicited there is no resistance there to give a judgment of their strength They are at more cost and pains to defend themselves from disdain than pursuits and Patience is the Vertue which they have rather most occasion for THERE ARE SOME will accuse the Fair of being scornful But if this be well consider'd it would be acknowledg'd that their Disdain comes often from the goodness of their Conscience rather than from their Vanity because they know not how to endure those Idolatrous Addresses and excessive Praises which enamour'd Fools or crafty Pretenders make use of to catch them with As wise Kings deride the Complements of depending Courtiers as knowing that 't is Interest more than Affection that inspires them The Ladies also ought to deride the Respects of such Gallants for as much as with all their cares and all their labours they seek nothing still but their own pleasure and the destruction of those that give ear to them All their labour and endeavour aims at and is confind to their own pleasure and the ruin of the imprudent There is not so much Presumption in the most Fair as there is of Cowardliness in those Men who put themselves into the Fetters the Services which they pay and the proud Names they give the conquering Mistress do discover as much their own weakness and extravagance as they do their Passions Is there any ground to call that Empire Tyrannical where the Vassals are so Voluntary and so much the Enemies of their own Liberty YET I DO NOT intend for all this to make an Apology for those that are really Vain but only for those that ingenuous and plain Those Women who persuade themselves that the great number of their Gallants adds something to their Beauty and who please themselves so much in the submissions and respects that they pay them these give a great advantage to their Enemies and shew that they may be conquer'd at an easy rate since that there is nothing necessary to this but a few Respects and flattering Commendations These are things of which the Men will be no less prodigal than the Women can possibly be desirous of them But the Women ought to believe that when plain Ingenuity makes a bargain with Craft and Artifice it can never make it to advantage It often comes to pass that if the Women are fair those that praise have a design to deceive them if they are not fair they intend to deride them For this reason they have all of them great occasion both for Wit and Vertue in order to defend them selves from danger and contempt THERE ARE that scruple altogether the praising of Beauty because it fades in a little time it endures but like the sudden flashes of Lightning and that very often it forebodes no less than the approach of Storms and Tempests It is a Flower say they which is gone almost as soon as it is blown which the Winds tear in pieces the Sun withers and the Rain beats down and which is of so delicate a constitution that even without the help of Enemies it perishes by its own Weakness But what do they herein say of this which may
not also be said of other things in the world which also are not able to last always If they complain of Beauty it is because this has not the duration of the Stars as it has the Value and the Brightness of them And nevertheless it must be acknowledged that the most Fair may find an excellent remedy against Vanity and Pride if sometimes at the age of sixteen or of twenty years they would present to themselves the defects and inconveniences of Old Age. Whatever fine Feathers nature or art now affords they would be as much asham'd as the Peacock is when he views his black Feet if they would foresee a little so great alterations and ruins I do not make profession here of Preaching the four last things that men must come to but it seems to me that none ought to afflict themselves for a thing that Time will take away from them insensibly yea which diminishes every moment in spight of all the Art that can be used to preserve it It is true that Cato had so great an esteem of Beauty that he said publickly that it was no less crime to injure it than to rifle a Temple But he spake of that which is Natural not of that which is Studied and affected Sulpitia among the Romans had so beautiful Eyes that those of her time could not look upon her without being ready to adore her The Neck and Breasts of Theodora the Athenian were so agreeable that Socrates himself became in love with her These are the Features or Charms that ought not either to be sought by Artifice or possest with Vanity Nature has favour'd some persons with these things with design to please the Eye and to elevate the Mind to the love of him who is the source of all human Perfections The forced and feigned Beauties luckily fail in the view of all the world just after the manner of those false and seeming Stars which after they have a while abused our Eyes do demonstrate by their fall that we took a Vapour for a Star How much Art and Pains do many fruitlesly employ to cover the defects of Nature as if it were not better worth their while to have recourse to Vertue than to Disguise or as if it would not be much more to their advantage to repair what is wanting in the Face by the qualities of the Mind Their design succeeds extreamly ill and must do so because their Vanity appears with their Homeliness and they are not the more excusable hereby but more ridiculous They would think it very strange if they were treated after the fashion as Phryne did with those that came into her Company As soon as this Courtisan appear'd she defaced the lustre of all the Ladies at the Assembly leaving them no other Colour than what Shame and Jealousie could afford She invented a Play to make them merry wherein every one commanded by turns in their rank She commanded Water to be brought and that every one should wash her Hands and her Face As soon as they had obeyed her Commands there was discover'd all their Paint and Disguise there was not a person could be known they had quite other Faces all full of Blemishes and Features that were frightful This Sport would not be at all less troublesom to many of our Age than it was advantageous to that extraordinary Beauty It was also by her that the Areopagites themselves lost the reputation of being incorruptible Judges for they did not believe her Innocent nevertheless after they had seen her they were not able to judge her guilty Hipperidus pleaded unsuccessfully against her tho he was a most eloquent man for as soon as she appear'd her Presence serv'd her for an Apology and she needed but to shew that she might defend her self It is not only now-adays that the Fair carry the Cause After that Justice has lifted up her Vail to see them let them plead as little as they will their Cause will succeed well for them Of Curiosity and Slander CURIOSITY is not very often at a good agreement with Silence those that are desirous to learn abundance of News are not usually resolv'd to conceal it and Slander does infallibly make waste of that which an Imprudent Curiosity has collected The Mind of these Curious Women resembles the Barrel full of holes which the Danaides were condemned to fill which still let out the Water as fast as it was put in That which enters by the Ear goes out immediately at the Mouth because the indiscretion which lets them hear no less inconsiderately than they speak does no more refuse the opening to Lies for their going out than for their coming in I do not blame at all that Divine Curiosity of the Philosophers and the great Wits which reveals to us the Secrets of Nature and has afforded us the means to govern the Passions of the Soul I condemn only that Curiosity which carries us after the knowledge of things unprofitable or vicious and leaves us strangers to the knowledge of our selves And to say the truth I have no less shame than compassion when I see several that amuse themselves with the little stories of the place they live in and who know nothing but what is impertinent and troublesome to good Companies They seek to adorn their Minds as the Chineses do to beautifie their Cabinets I mean with some antiquated outlandish Trifle or sorry Pedlary I would advise those of this humour who are for spending all their time about things unuseful to learn themselves the Anatomy of little Flies or the Art of numbring the Atoms of the Air And that they may treat their Bodies as ill as they do their Minds I would have them live upon such things as Cray-fish where they may find more employment than nourishment This inconsiderateness gives but an ill credit to their Wit and no better to their Conscience We shall judge hereupon that they do not employ their Time only to hear superfluous things but also to hear evil ones And above all the readiness they have to believe a fault in another is a most certain sign of that which they have to commit as much themselves THERE ARE THEN some that listen with delight to all manner of Slanders that cannot endure one should speak to the advantage of any and who think that while their Company are finding fault with all the World besides them they make an Apology for their faults in shewing them many like themselves As if the number of Criminals could authorise their Wickedness When they hear the Vertues of some rewarded with their deserved Praises they sit as sad and uneasie as the Ugly are wont to be when the Fair are complemented in their presence And if we should examin well their thoughts we should find here yet a much blacker source of evil They are glad to have Companions in the Infamy but they would not have any partake with them in the Pleasure they have more of Jealousie
condemn'd is almost continually join'd with a Fear that they do not And from hence it comes to pass that when these two contrary Passions meet together in one mind they must needs cause great inequalities and remarkable alterations because if the Desire excites us the Fear again damps us when the one animates us to the speaking of a good Word the other interrupts us and obliges to Silence We may judge from hence how much wrong this Fear does to a good Grace as well as Vanity and Constraint It ordinarily comes to pass that those Women who are always in alarm and every moment fear they shall mistake do almost nothing else but mistake An Extream Apprehension disposes the Mind to Errour as well as the Body to Distemper And to make a right Judgment of this troublesome Passion it seems to me that if we enquire well into the Cause of it we shall find the Education contributing no less to it than Temper and Birth Those that are brought up in Slavery know not how to do any thing with Liberty they dare not look up with that honest assurance which should give a good Grace to their Actions their Thoughts are always mean and whatever good Inclinations they may have yet their Shame and Ignorance hinder them from succeeding in all their Enterprises Those Women that have seen nothing of the World are liable to be astonish'd at small Matters because the constant Distrust which they have of themselves makes them fear and admire every thing For the most part after their Reverences they have no other Complements but those that are used at the ends of Letters They would have found out an excellent Remedy for this if they would but perswade themselves that they ought not so easily to admire things and that if they would give themselves leisure to examine that which at first sight amazes them they would often find after the conversation of an hour's length that what was the Subject of their Admiration ought to cause their disdain But this Resolution is not acquired without Labour It is very Difficult even to the best Wits to have Address without Experience or Readiness without Practice Actions breed a Habit with some difficulty but when the Habit is form'd then that produces the Actions with Ornament and a good Grace Nevertheless when I condemn the rustick Shame I have no Intention herein to recommend Impudence since both of them have Issues and Effects that are unjust forasmuch as the one transports us beyond our Power and what becomes us and the other detains us below them both On the contrary the Modesty that I desire is placed between these two vicious Extreams that it may keep us at a Distance from too good or from too ill an Opinion of our selves The Debauched or Lewd Woman THERE ARE perhaps but few Palaces that resemble the Isle of Chio where it is said the Ladies preserved inviolate the Laws of Chastity and Honour during the space of seven hundred Years I know not whether this was an Effect of their Skill or of their Vertue but be it as it will this was a Chastity of a long Duration and which deserves Admiration and Praise as much as the Corruption of the present Age deserves Reproofs and Punishments It may be this Discourse will not be at all pleasing to those Women to whom I desire it should be useful but if the Vicious are not disposed to receive our Remedies for their Cure at least they must expect to undergo our Affronts for their shame I speak boldly to all for if they be debauch'd I desire not to be in any Favour with them and if they be honest I do not fear that I shall hereby incurr their Hatred The one sort will applaud my Censure and the other will do me honour in not approving my Discourse any more than I do their Life However I shall always lie under this Inconvenience That whatever Horrour I can help any to conceive at this Crime it must be more obscure than injurious in such a matter It is necessary to conceal through Modesty that which Hatred and Truth would require to be publish'd It is herein that this Crime has a great advantage in that while it is worthy of Reproof the Filthiness it self nevertheless serves it for a Defence and one is constrained to spare it more out of shame than pity IT IS VERY TRUE then that the Passion of the debauched does no way deserve the Name of Love it is some other Disease which cannot be cured but by a Miracle and one may well say to the reproach of those that are infected with it what the Poet said of Myrrha that it was not Cupid that enkindled such a Flame in her but rather one of the most inraged Furies This is a Fire from Hell which has for its Smoak a black and dismal Blindness for its gloomy Shine a horrid Scandal and for its Ashes Infamy and Shame And how can their filthy Desire be call'd Love when instead of Election there is nothing in it but a brutal Universality For in loving all to speak properly they do not love any since this is a Fire which mingles with all sorts of Matter even to the burning in the Water I mean it can entertain for its Objects such as are worthy of the greatest horrour and detestation AND NEVERTHELESS though they have the Conscience full of Crimes these are often they who would pass for Saints As the most deform'd have most need of Paint and Disguise so these Debauchees do sometimes seek the most industriously the Appearance of Vertue It is for this Reason they live with so much constraint and that there is nothing equal or natural in their Deportment that they appear this day insolent according to their humour and to morrow carry themselves modestly according to their Dissimulation and Hypocrisie They who say the Vicious resemble the Syrens perhaps do not know all the Mystery of this Comparison One of these Monsters was named Parthenope that is to say Virgin having a smiling Countenance to allure Mariners withal and make them split upon those Rocks that were covered by the Water The most Immodest will sometimes endeavour to appear the most Chast but with all their Disguise they are but infamous Gulphs where none but the Imprudent and the Desperate make Shipwrack They make a show of Candour and ingenuous Freedom to the end they may the better deceive those who are simple enough to believe they do those things only out of Humour or very innocently which they really do with Design to catch some Fool or other thereby They do nevertheless even herein acknowledge the worth of Vertue since they borrow the Appearance of that for the putting off their Vice But herein their Design succeeds ill whatever address they have their Artifice renders them suspected And as we know that is counterfeit Gold which bears too bright a Colour so we may discover their disguised Vertue by it's making
too great a show After all the true Chastity does not seek so much to set off it self as that which is feigned the Caution and Reservedness of an honest Woman is very different from that of her who is not so the one is plain and natural the other is constrain'd But to say the truth it is not in this that the Debauched seem to me most blameable as yet they give some Honour to Vertue when they take pains to counterfeit it It seems that their Artifice is an effect of their Remorse and that as the homely in using paint do own the Defects of their Faces so the vicious while they dissemble their Crime have still some horrour at it not being able to endure that it should appear quite naked But there are some Impudent Creatures who boast of their Filthiness and make their Sin publickly appear who love not the Conversation of any but those that are most licentious and who entertain themselves always with the most shameful Discourses WHATEVER some say to excuse this Liberty I must needs think that 't is neither Genteelness nor good humour that gives such an Easiness that Complaisance does not at all extend hitherto and that it is impossible any should live in such Loosness without Offence to Modesty Shamefac'dness is always severe when 't is entire and true it is corrupted when it becomes softned If the Widow of Sigismond had been the most chast of all Women yet had she not put a Slur upon her Vertue when she answer'd to them who counsell'd her not to marry again That if she were to take an Example from any of the Birds she should rather chuse to imitate the Sparrows than the Turtles Though she had been never so innocent this bold Discourse would have made her accounted guilty If there was no wickedness in it yet at least there was Impudence But that I may dissemble nothing in this matter it must be said that the true Modesty will not only restrain a Woman from speaking what is dishonest but even from hearing and giving her self leave to understand it After Helen had opened the Letter which was sent her by Paris she thought her self bound to refuse him nothing When they have granted some Favour they engage themselves afterwards to do more than they intended They who have indeed no Desire to be conquer'd ought to take away at first all Hopes from those that assault them for fear lest they should take a gentle Refusal for a disguis'd Permission THE DEBAUCHED are not only Impudent but also Slanderers perswading themselves by a false Politick that they have justified their Sin if they can make it be thought universal What Errour what Blindness is here If they slander the most Vertuous they also hate those that are like themselves So that the Conformity which produces Friendship in all other Professions breeds nothing but Hatred among these Is not this to be at Variance with all sorts of Persons when the Presence of the Vertuous seems to reproach them with their Crimes and the Company of those that are like them does something diminish their Divertisement Lastly they add Cruelty to Impudence and Slander And that we may not engage in an impossible Task in undertaking to reckon up all the ill that is in such Persons it may suffice to say that we must reckon up all that there is of Wickedness and Crime in the whole World to express all that which is among these abject Creatures The Salvation of these hardned Wretches is almost desperate their Repentance ought to be placed in the rank of Miracles and whatever purposes they make of Conversion they always relapse into the same Hell It ought not to be a Wonder if they have sometimes in this World as much of Prosperity as of Sin and if they are as happy as they are guilty it is because the Righteous God deferrs their Punishment to render it the more extream He is not willing that they should encroach at all in this Life upon the Punishments which he prepares for them in the other I acknowledge that in this Age as well as in that of Phryne there may be found too many fair Debauchees But if we could well consider a great many of these infamous Sinners and had compar'd the Lines of their Faces with those in their Consciences we should often enough find in them an equal Deformity They do not think what must needs be the ugly Horrour of their filthy old Age since many of them have given their Nurses some fear almost from the Cradle They do not consider that the wrinkles make a reckoning of the Years upon their Faces as the figures do of the Hours upon a Dial. If one had painted the Portraicture of these wretches to the life and any could perswade themselves that the Devils do resemble them I believe the more among Mankind would take care not to damn themselves and that this frightful Object would beget in Men a greater fear of Hell than the severest Preachers are able to do But that I may be as short as obscure in a matter so unpleasing I shall finish the Character of the Debauchee after the same manner as Appelles did one of his Pictures After this admirable Limner had considered with abundance of Pleasure the Features and Charms of Compaspe a Mistress of Alexander he was so in Love that he was not able to finish the Copy of so lovely an Original I do that out of Hatred which he did out of Love and I find so many horrible Lines in the Pourtraicture of these Infamous Wretches that the Pencil falls out of my Hand having too much Anger and too few Reproaches to finish this Peice with Colours that are black enough Of Jealousie WE ALWAYS lose with great regret what we possess with Love and keep with Care It is for this reason that Jealousie is not so unjust as many imagine since it only makes us fear least another should ravish from us that which we think should be ours alone Is there so great an Offence in watching for the safety of that which we love especially in a time when Fidelity is so rare that there are not so many who live in no fear of being deceived as there are that expect to be so If the Goods of Fortune and of the Body yield to those of the Mind then also is the loss of these the most sensible and when any rob us of those Affections in another which we were possess'd of and think we merit by our own they take from us the greatest Good And to say truth that we may Philosophize rightly we must say Love is like an Empire or Kingdom Ruled by two Persons only where the Dominion cannot be extended further without detroying it and where Obedience and Sovereignty are reciprocal It is a Niggard that can be willing to lose nothing not so much as a glance of the Eye or a little Hair of the Head In truth it is no
less foolish to believe that there is no longer any Love in the Mind of one that is jealous than it would be to think that a Man has no Life in him when he complains he is sick On the contrary as the grief and the sense of Sickness are not found in those that are Dead so Jealousie can never be met with where there is really a Hatred and Indifference And it may well be that this Passion may have an appearance of Reason for it since God himself heretofore permitted to the Husbands a tryal of the faithfulness of their Wives with the Water which was call'd the Water of Jealousie or Probation If the suspicion of this sort had been a thing extravagant and unjust God had forbidden it directly instead of appointing so solemn a remedy for the cure of it and had testified a Hatred rather than a Compassion for this Malady Also they deceive themselves grosly who think they have rendered Jealousie altogether Criminal when they have said That it makes us have too bad an Opinion of our own Merit or of the Fidelity of the Person whom we love If we examine well this Passion we shall not find that it comes often from a distrust of our selves and that we do not cease for that to believe our selves Amiable or others Amorous It is a fear that does not so much discover our weakness as it does declare that the Merit of what we love may make it sought after And what do any in this which is not done by all for a Treasure or any other valuable thing which it is not possible for us to love without having some fear of losing it As they that believe very firmly may receive something of doubt so the most assured in love are capable of some suspicion The strongest Trees are moved with the Winds though the Roots are fast when the Branches and the Leaves are shaken One would perhaps be very willing to throw off an ill Opinion but the likenesses and conjectures sollicit and shake us till we are forced to conclude rather on the side of fear than assurance During this irresolution the Mind suffers much and the appearances give a great deal of pain when we cannot certainly judge whether they be true or false There are good and bad Examples either to make fear or to cure it but ordinarily we fix our Thoughts more upon those Examples that persecute than on those that may comfort us Such an one as that of Penelope affords comfort when one represents to himself that she was twenty five Years faithful during the Absence of Vlysses so long But that of Messalina torments and awakens suspicion when one thinks of her Infamy and Filthiness Our Spirit wavers between both sides and it is an unhappiness that conjectures having alarm'd us we find or we invent by much examining something to change our doubt into a belief And if it be said that we ought to be at rest after the experience that we have made of a Person who has testified her Affection by many effects It seems to me that these Proofs cannot hinder but that we shall have a great deal of Trouble because the fear that sometimes is not in our power will put the worst Interpretation upon the least appearances even to the busying it self afterwards with false Objects when it has not true ones Whatever Fidelity we have proved when Love has no more to desire it begins to fear all This is the natural course of our Passions which always threaten a change when they are extream and which fall of themselves without a true cause to do so only because they are mutable and humane Hippocrates has given us a Maxim to be observed That our Bodies are in danger of a Disease when they have too much health and strength A Poet has made an handsomer one concerning the alteration of those Minds that have too violent an Affection The Will says he deserves a Wheel of Inconstancy for its Passions as well as Fortune does for her Favours when we are raised to the top we cannot long stay there either out of our infelicity or our weakness Those that are arrived at the most eminent degree of Love are like them that stand upon a very high building or hill their Brain is confused and though no Person thrusts them they stagger and even fall of themselves through the meer fear of falling When the Sun is arrived at the heighth of Noon he begins to go downward for that not being able to get above that pitch he retires and withdraws himself into another Hemisphere without being driven by any Person to it Our Minds seem to have the same Motions a disgust follows the pleasure by an order no less natural than that which makes the Night succeed and take place of the Day We find our selves insensibly weary'd with pleasant things and though the Soul be Immortal in its Nature yet in its Actions which have the Body and Animal Spirits for their Instruments it fails not to testifie a Youth or Old Age with the Body Socrates said That the Gods had endeavour'd to mingle together Pleasure and Pain but when they found this could not be done at least they would needs fasten them by their Tails to the end that one might succeed the other so to hinder in us both Insolence and Despair This comes to pass sometimes when we contribute nothing towards it voluntarily and as we pass from Joy to Sadness so we often perceive that our Love changes it self either into coldness or indifference The Distempers of the Mind as well as those of the Body do very often form themselves without our consent we lose the Rest of the Soul as we do our Health all at once sometimes without having foreseen this change and without being able to find either the Cause or the Remedy of this Passion any more than we can that of a Quartan Ague BUT I HAVE too long spoken against my own sentiment as well as against truth it self in favour of a Passion that ruins our Love our Reputation and the Quiet of the Mind Reason begets Love and Love Jealousie but both the one and the other of these prove what some sorts of Worms are to the Subject in which they are bred that is the Destruction of it The one kills the Father the other the Mother Let this Passion be moderated as it can be it is always dangerous and for this it is necessary to to commit an Injustice in taking away the use of it for the sake of the abuse because the one is too much fastened to the other As there is not any Serpent so little but it has some Poison so there is no Jealousie so well regulated as not to engender a great deal of Mischief They that compare it to the Ivy have made a handsome Comparison for ordinarily that grows only upon old and ruinous Buildings in like manner this Passion chuses out of all the rest of Mankind
only out of Inclination do affront us they do not love us at all for any Merit in us since very often they love before they know us and become amorous before they can well know whether we are amiable or not This is an effect of their Temper rather than Choice and in my Opinion we have no great Obligation to them for the doing that which they cannot hinder HAVING thus shown what there is of Good on of Evil in these two sorts of Amities it will be very easie to observe what will be the best life of them It is not necessary to divide but only to regulate them It is true that these are to our Minds like the two fansied Poles to the Heavens on which they turn these are the Poles of our Thoughts and Actions And as the one Pole of the Heavens is under our Feet while the other is elevated above our Heads so it seems fit that we have less regard to Inclination than to Election and this latter ought to serve us for a Star to guide our Love and Friendship by They say the Great Alexander had two Favourites whom he obliged after a very different fashion He lov'd Ephestion tenderly as the Companion of his Pleasures and Craterus strongly for the government of his Estate and Affairs As Emperour he esteem'd the one as Alexander he lov'd the other It is necessary to join these two sorts of Love together to make a perfect one lest Love being without Inclination be constrain'd or being without Election it be too Imprudent If there be no Consideration Love is without Conduct If there be no Sympathy in it 't is without much Pleasure and Sweetness In truth it seems as if these two Loves are in one Soul after the same manner that those two Twins of whom the Holy Scripture speaks were in the Womb of their Mother These are two Brothers of which the one is foremost in the Order of Nature but nevertheless he must not have the advantage of this The one is the more violent and impetuous the other is the more gentle and prudent And it is the unhappiness of our Minds as it was of their dying Father to encline more to the side of that love which is the more natural and which proceeds from Sympathy But as the Mother of Jacob gave him means to supplant his Brother iâ— ought also to be that reason should direct as how to regulate Inclination to the 〈◊〉 that Election may be the Mistress of it After all if any should demand of me the Rules that are most necessary to be observed in our Amity as well for the satisfaction of the Conscience as of the Mind in my Opinion there is no better than this To believe that our Affection is unjust whenever it is contrary to that we owe to God As the Ark was between the Cherubims so 't is necessary that God be present between two Hearts that mutually love This ought to be the Knot of our Loves that we may render them strong and reasonable And to say as that Reverend Bishop who has writ so Divinely on the Love of God Love is the more commendable on Earth by so much as it is the more like that which is between the Wise and Pure Inhabitants of Heaven Of the Complaisant or Pleasing Humour IT IS TRUE that there is nothing of more importance than to know the Art to Please and to make ones self beloved in all Companies As we have all an Inclination towards Society we ought to enquire after the means to succeed well in it and to gain the Affection and Esteem of those we meet when we are in Conversation or in Business It is true that among all the Qualities necessary to this there is not one that seems more requisite than Complaisance or Courteousness since without that all the other are without Gracefulness and are as it were dead But it is also very certain that the Use of this is very difficult Most easily does this offend either in Excess or Defect If it be not attended with a great deal of Judgment and Discretion then the Ladies that are too Complaisant pass for Loose or Affected and if they are not enough so they shall be thought to be Disdainful or Uncivil There is not less danger in receiving this than in giving it Those Ladies that render too much Complaisance are liable to be troublesome those that receive too much are in danger to be seduced There are those that will mingle Flattery with Complaisance to bring them into Error as Wine is mingled with Poison to draw down the deadly Draught There is therefore danger lest many should take the Poison for Food and lest they drink the Flattery while they think themselves receiving only a simple Complaisance Commonly the one of these is so strictly join'd to the other that there is need of a great deal of Prudence to be able to separate them And that we may the better succeed in this it seems to me convenient to examine in the first place what there is of Good or of Evil iâ— the Complaisant Humour to the end we may learn with the better method and the greater facility wherein the Use of this is allow'd or forbidden to us AS THE Complaisance which I must condemn is nothing else but the Art to deceive pleasantly it must be acknowledg'd that the most pernicious of its Effects are that it makes an appearance pass for truth and a feigned Friendship for a true one Those Spirits that are most dissembled constrain themselves to appear Genuine and Sincere to the end they may gain the Credit of Confidents and Friends But it is herein that their Artifice is discovered and it comes to be known that they have not that Freedom and Ingenuity they pretend to in that they over-act their Pretences to iâ— Though Patrâ—â—lus made use of all the Armour of Achilles and some of his Weapons yet he would not venture to use his Javeline because this was of such a sort as that Achilles alone was well able to manage it In like manner though a dissembled Person does take all the appearances of one that is Vertuous yet she should not dare to meddle with the pretence to Freeness or â—â—genuousness of Temper This is a quality that cannot possibly sit well upon her she cannot counterfeit Plaâ—â—ness without betraying that she wâ—â—â—â— it As the Câ—â—â—leons take all sorts of Colours from the things they lie upon excepting only the white so â—â—â—se disguised Souls will take all sorts of â—â—â—pes will appear under all forms of Countenance but after all their Artifice it will be always observ'd That it is impossible to serve themselves well of a pretence to Freedom and Candour As upon painted Faces we may commonly see both the Paint and the ugliness too so we may see at the same time upon the looks that are too Complaisant the plain traces of Dissimulation and Knavery The Ladies have but too much experience
may declare That Weeping and Complaint do not always testifie Impatience but only they show that we are not utterly insensible Let us declare That if God himself was pleased to show that he was indeed Man too by sadness and tears we ought not to be ashamed to confess our selves such likewise by the same signs and appearances However it be a sign of weakness to do thus yet is this so universal in this World that there is no more blame due to a Man for being liable to Grief than for being subject to Die We are no more unsensible in this Life than we are Immortal After all what advantage is it to be sullen in our Griefs Were it not better to diminish our displeasure by weeping than to be hardened into a Pillar of Salt instead of letting this bitterness drop out by the Eyes or of breathing it off with a few Complaints A great Poet had reason to say That the Tears as well as Waters have a right to a passage and we ought to moderate only not forbid the use of them Grief is sometimes like a Stream it swells if it be resisted it slides away and is spent in the less time if we give it way Provided we can overcome this Enemy what matter is it whether we do this by flying or fighting him But certainly I fear I may be accused for want of Judgment for my insisting upon this matter in as much as it seems no way necessary to allow Women the liberty to complain of their Grievances and the most part of them seem to understand the trade of that but too well They mightily extol the Constancy and Strength of Mind that was in Isabella Queen of Spain because she did not so much as complain under Sickness and the extreamest Pains And nevertheless they find at times enough of their Sex who have a Vice quite contrary to her Vertue such who do not only complain with Reason but with Artifice too and who would seldom be long ill if Complaining were enough to cure them However that be we may learn from what has been said that to have an equal Mind it is not necessary that we always abstain both from laughing or weeping It were a Philosophy too Stoical that would not permit any but the same resentment to events that are favourable or deadly I judge that according to the occasions that present whether they be Good or Evil a Wise Man may be joyful or griev'd yea I believe that he may complain when he has cause without being guilty of Cowardliness in so doing and that he need not be too much a Philosopher as Possidonius who would needs appear well when he was really Sick Let us proceed further and having seen wherein the equality of Mind does not consist let us observe wherein it does and having overthrown the Opinion of the Vulgar let us examine that of the Wise in this Matter I grant then that as there are many sorts of Winds upon the Sea that can toss the Ships so there are also many sorts of Passions within us to trouble and shake our Minds But it must be own'd that among all these Movements there are but two principally which cause the most remarkable changes in us I mean when the presence of Good gives us too much joy or that of Evil too much Grief There are some Passions that make the Blood fly out too much to the extreams of the Body there are others that cause it to retire and throng too much about the Heart and then that dilates or contracts it self too much As it may be seen that fair Weather envites us to walk and a Storm drives us into the House In like manner the Occasions of joy make us go too much out of our selves those of sadness make us retire too much within our selves The Excess of the one and the other hinders the due equality of the Mind It remains then only at present that we show which of these two Passions gives us the greater trouble and disorder and to see whether there be more danger of being too joyful in a Good Fortune or of being too sad in a Bad one CERTAINLY there are more die of Grief than of Joy and there are more Shipwracks in Tempests than in Calms Prosperity destroys less than Adversity And it is not to be imagin'd that Good should do as much Evil as Evil it self Though all the Passions are able to cause some inequality in us yet there is none more capable to destroy us than Grief This appears sufficiently even in the Colour of the Face in those that are afflicted and in the disorder that it brings into the Thoughts of the Wisest Persons I do not wonder at all that those Women who are possest with Grief are also pale and dejected as if they had no Life remaining in them since to speak the truth Grief is no other than a long Death and Death is no more than a short sadness And indeed Grief keeps us too long under Punishment It would seem a very favourable blow that should put an end to our sufferings though together with our Lives We never see any that kill themselves because they are too joyful but there are many do that fatal Office for themselves because they think themselves too much afflicted and who take Death for a Remedy to their Grief How much mischief does this Passion do both to Body and Soul It dispirits the Blood it infects the whole Constitution it gives Diseases to the Body and Inequality to the Mind It weakens the Instruments first and then the Reason It has sometimes need of Physick as well as Philosophy to heal it I own that there are seasons sometimes wherein Afflictions quicken us and open our Eyes but if we examine them throughly we shall find that they dull the Spirit more frequently than they awaken and excite it And that we may not dissemble the truth how many women may we see who in their Adversities become like the Niobe of the Poets who lost all sense in her misery and was turn'd into a Marble Statue How many are there that grow stupid and Immovable as she was who testifie neither Wit nor Courage who abandon themselves to their Grief and are to such a degree disabled that they cannot make one Effort either towards the comforting or defending of themselves It ought not therefore to be thought strange if sadness does so much destroy the Wit since as this is ordinarily accompanied with dispair it makes no resistance it stands with the Arms across it gives up its self a prey to the Enemy One may judge from hence how much more dangerous this is than Joy for that Moderation depends more upon us than Patience It is much more difficult says Aristotle to support ones self under Grief than to abstain from pleasure Temperance has its dependance on our Liberty but Toleration depends upon the Malice of our Enemy If Joy perswades sadness constrains us