Then it is that the Soul is in labor and suffers the throws of travel Then it is that painful Effects follow voluptuous Reasonings and that what appeared a Friend and favorable in thought revolts and becomes an Adversary in the operation It 's then no longer a Merchant at the Port who trades by the Map and proposeth to himself gain without danger and a voyage without a storm It 's a maker of Vows in the midst of a Tempest who now repents that he ever parted from home who casts his wares into the waves who seeks for a plank to save his own life The winds do not rise against words and deliberations throw not themselves against shelves The Cabinet is a place of peace and rest where we trace out and where we design things absent and objects which are far off Besides Picture may represent a thing and yet not be it There is always a difference And there needs but a beginning of Passion but the weak boilings of Anger but a light tincture of Shame but a slight grimace to spoil all the resemblance and to make another thing even a contrary thing of what we esteem'd the same or at least like it I shall leave you my Lord to think on the second part of this Comparison and conclude That Affairs have days byasses and postures which are neither to be seen nor observ'd but in the affairs themselves which embroil all the draughts and all the notions which out of it could possibly have been form'd of it There are certain motions and certain times which render our own knowledge unknown unto us Study cannot prevent them Discourse cannot sever them from action They hold and link themselves so fast unto it that there is no way left to sunder them and on the other side they pass so quick and so imperceptibly that it 's impossible to copy them The Romans meant this when they said That a man ought to deliberate with Occasion and in the presence of Affairs That a man ought to consult with his Enemy and resolve himself at sight of his Mine and looks That the Gladiator took Counsel in the Ampitheater That often Counsel was rather to be ravish'd then to be taken This is principally to be understood in War and Military actions But there is a War which is hardly crâ—dible even in peacâ—able and disarmed Actions We must fight every-where one way or other And Doubt Objection Contrary Reason do not always assault us in the Front nor openly they often lie in wait for us and in Ambushes Those Difficulties which were hid from our mind in an instant present themselves to the fight Time breeds its hinderances Men often cause theirs One onely Circumstance changeth all the nature of an Occasion After we have concluded That this or that will happen nor this nor that happens but a third Event which puts Foresight in disorder and Conjecture to confusion The defect is in the Matter not in the Undertaker The Act may be well understood and the Design well laid but the Instruments may be to blame the Marble and the Copper may be corrupted Besides a thousand accidents I know not what may come no man know from whence There may come misfortunes from Heaven above and from below the Earth A Thunder-clap may ruine the materials a subterranean Wind may make your work flie in the air And if you will believe an antient Poet The Gods will sometime recreate themselves they make it their pleasure and their pastime to sport with the Thoughts of Men Good and Ill Policie are equally subject to these latter inconveniences nor can we assure ourselves of any thing against Heaven Bâ—t without the Heavens intermedling the Policie we speak of forbears not to be unhappy In building them it sees the falls and ruines of its works or rather it sees only the Maps and the Projects because it rather designs then builds It figures Business and Undertakings as formerly Republicks and Princes have been fancied which had only a being in the Mind and could never be but by Miracle In effect what are these Affairs and these Enterprises but bold and magnifick Dreams which flatter the Imaginative part and unprofitably amuse Reason What are they but admirable Tales and impossible Histories After this manner the Speculatives compose Romances in their Counsels and form Propositions somewhat like those of that Artist who was so famous in the History of Alexander You know he found Colossuses which were little and Pyramides which were low He would have made a Statue which in one of its hands should have borne a City and pour a River out of the other These men also dote magnificently and their thoughts are no less vast nor less irregular There is no proportion of that Greatness which they conceive to the Meanness of what is feasible Matters are not capable of their forms and their Peeces cannot be acted because they cannot be fitted for the Theater there needs too many Engineâ— and too many Machines there are no Actors in all Europe to act such Parts The representation of them would be difficult to a King of Persia and yet for such they chose the Prince of Miranda Do not fancie my Lord that I intend to laugh The first journey I made into Italy I met with one of these gallant Spirits who proposed the Conquest of Greece and was but little more powerful then he whom I but now mentioned But Your Highness may observe if you please by the way That this brave Man's Father was a Neapolitan and his Mother of Florence and that they had taken care he should be bred at the Court of Rome It 's true they chose a means very proportionable to the end and they did raise a great Enemy against the Great Turk Must he not have been confident of a great many Miracles to have thought to have done any thing with such small Forces Yet must I in his favor confess the truth I never met with so fruitful nor so hot a Fancy as his There never was so quick a discourse which ran over more or which with more difficulty could return to its source But this fertility and this capacity did nothing but furnish matter to his Extravagancie and give but the more scope to his fond thoughts The farther his Reason went the farther it stragled from his end After a long Conference I had with him I knew that the great Design which he call'd The Interest of God and the Business of the Virgin Mary which he was going about to sollicite in the Court of Princes had no other foundation but the desire of an Intelligence with the Cossaâ—ues the hope of some Revolt in some place or other the word of a Greek Hermit and the Vision of a Melancholy person Yet was he as I at first told you a very good Wit There was a great deal of pleasure to hear him And out of Constantinople and Greece about which his extravagancie rowl'd he forbore not in other matters to be wise enough I have heard him deliver Oracles and speak things which methought were Revelations so far did I find them beyond the common reach of a humane spirit He
no legitimate Favorites far less legitimate Ministers And truly I pity the Empire and am asham'd of the Emperor when I see the Empire Emperor in such servile mercenary hands With horror I look on those base spectacles of unhappy Reigns those monstrous productions of evil times Blind times times full of darkness unhappy in Princes and barren of Men And in your opinion was there ever any solitary person so estranged from Court who was so little interessed in the things of this world who without disdain could look on things so disjointed and see the world overturned after such a manner Was there ever so calm a Contemplative who without emotion could see people of nought wrest into their hands the conduct of great States and seat themselves at the stern although they ought only to have been at the oar Yet hath this been seen and that often too The Consulare was profan'd more then once by infamous persons And he who under anothers reign must have been hid amongst the Baggage hath had the command of an Army But besides the Eusebiusses and the Eutropiusses the History of the Empire of the Orient wants not many such shameful examples It shews us miserable Eunuchs who had only learn'd how to comb women and how to spin lifted up all at once to be Heads of the Council and Captains General And other more recent Histories produce such as were Barbers Tailors Grooms of the Chamber the evening before the next morning chang'd into Chamberlains Ambassadors c. employed about the most important Negotiations and most illustrious Offices of their Country So that whatsoever our Man can say He who admires the Court and the Arts of Court audacious Ignorance hath often presided in the Conduct of humane things Although he swears that he hath seen rays about the face of Monsieur the Duke of this false light is but a deception of the sight and an illusion of his mind Fools have often held the places of Wise men and there was a time when those who ought to have dictated the Laws and pronounc'd Oracles could neither write nor read It was not that their common sense was the clearer for not besng imbroil'd in any stranger knowledges They neither had the goods of Nature nor any acquir'd goods They only had what commonly follows natural and acquired goods I would say a good opinion of themselves accompanied with the despising of others Although it is not the common course to know affairs by revelation and that they are to be learn'd by Experience unless we can outgo Experience by the strength of Reason They perswaded themselves that Authority supplied all that and that immediately after their promotion God was obliged to endow them with a spirit of well-governing and to render the Princes election valid by a sudden illumination of his Ministers Yet it is not so to be ordered It 's all what God hath been pleased to do for the Ministers of his only Son of whom we have said somewhat at the beginning of this Discourse It 's whereby he mocks proud Philosophy He hath confounded humane Prudence by taking those new and gross souls to be the Considents of his Secrets filling them very full as an antieut Christian says because he found them very empty He hath taken from their cabins and from their shops those whom he would make the Kings and Doctors of Nations Other Ignorants must never pretend to be so enlightned Nor that in stead of the Spirit of Prophecie explicating of the Scriptures and the gift of Tongues they should expect from hence the knowledge of past things the penetration into things to come the light which disembroils the intrigues of the Court the science of making War and the dexterity of treating Peace Besides they commonly succeed very ill in a Prosession which they never learn'd and in the exercise whereof they have indiscreetly cast themselves without the help of any preparative discipline without any ground of experience without knowing so much as the first elements of Civil wisdom You must make use of Address and of Method to conduct a Boat and to guide a Chariot You must know the ways if you will go for a Guide I have seen Rules and Precepts how to discharge the office of a Porter and that of a Jaylor although they are two employments which are of no great difficulty You must therefore learn all the Trades and study all the Arts even the least and those which are most â—asie And shall he who is to direct humane kind need no instruction shall the World be governed by Chance and Adventure May wethus with three Dice play for the safety of Nations and Kingdoms This is indeed unworthily to be in stead of God it 's to act Phaeton in the World and unequally to dispence lightâ—and heat on the face of the earth It 's to endanger the burning of one part and the freezing of the other Ignorant Favorites every day run this hazard and are engaged in this continual danger I mean of losing themselves and of losing their Country even when they have refin'd their Ignorance by the Customs of Court and that two or three good successes which come from the pure liberality of God have made them have a good opinion of themselves and made them believe they did the good which they did but receive All their Actions are then out of frame they are the false Measures of a false Rule In stead of knowing where to stop at such a point of Occasion so much enquired after by the wise and so necessary for the perfecting of affairs they always either go before or after it either they pass beyond it or they attain it not To day out of anger they declare a War To morrow out of cowardliness they beg a Peace They flatter the natural Enemies of their Country and offend the antient Allies of the Crown In Spain they would give Liberty of Conscience In France they would introduce the Inquisition The Frontiers are naked and disarmed and they sortifie the Heart of the State They have a mind to raze the Citadel at Amiens and to build one at Orleans But the Elections which they make of others are very worthy of that which was made of them For an Ambassage to Rome they propose to the Prince an expert Captain of a Troop who hath signaliz'd himself in divers battels Upon their recommendation an old Prodigal is plac'd in the Exchequer who in his youth spent all he had but who speaks admirably well of Oeconomy They require the Charge of Chief Justice for a man who is indeed of the Long-robe but renown'd for his little knowledge in Learning Of the same form he was who liv'd at I'aris in our fathers days when the Ambassadors of Poland arriv'd there they having complemented this man in Latine he prav'd them to excuse him for not returning them an answer Because he never had had the curiosity to learn the Pâ—lonian language You smile my
which he color'd his Enterprise withall This was the truth of the business A Grecian Physitian the Queens Domestick having a mind to review the Port of Pyreum and to cat the figs of Athens put this fancy of War into his Mistresses head and got her to engage her Husband in the Design So that the King of Kings the powerful and redoubted Xerxes raised an Army of Three hundred thousand Combatants cut the Mountains dryed up Rivers overburthen'd the Sea for nothing but to bring back a Mountebank into his Country methinks this gallant person might well have gone the journey with less expence and with a less numerous company But there presents it self to my memory my Lord another thing which deserves to be known which you will find nothing ungrateful It happen'd in the Kingdom of Macedonia more then fourscore years before the birth of King Philip at the time of that famous Conspiracie which of one State made two and divided the Court the Towns and Families It was Melcagers Wife Governor of a Frontier-town and General of the Cavalry who oblig'd her Husband to revolt and that for a very worthy subject The King having heard of the spirit and gallantry of that woman he had a mind to see her one day privately It was nothing difficult for him to obtain a favor which she easily granted to lesser great Lords and to less civil persons then himself She accustom'd not herself to tire the constancie of her Lovers nor to cause any of them to die for despair The King being come to the place assign'd and by misfortune finding her to be no such thing as he had fancied her he at first sight witness'd his disgust and went away presently with very little satisfaction This affront was so briskly resented by her who took it and who had no ill opinion of her own merit that from that very hour she vowed revenge And being unable to effect it better then by corrupting her Husbands fidelity and debauching him from the service of his Master she to that end imployed all the charms both of her mind and countenance She on so credulous a spirit made use of the most subtile inventions which an artificial soul is capable of And you need not doubt but in the heat of her revenge she would have had an infinite many Husbands to have engag'd an infinite number of Enemies against the King and to have demanded satisfaction with more swords of the offence which she believ'd she had received Thus did Meleager quit the service of his King and imbark himself in the Party of a Tyrant without knowing what motion â—â—rove him nor what passion he reveng'd He acted a person he understood not He was his Wives soldier and thought himself one of the chief Heads of the League So easie you see it is for a man to deceive self in the judgment which he makes of the actions of men since men themselves who act are themselves he first deceiv'd the true cause being not always known unto them They are often blind instruments and are without knowledge of the interests or passions of another The Speculatives of Macedonia forbore not to publish palusible and specious reasons for Meleagers revolt Some say that a reproach which the King cast on him in presence of the Thessalian Ambassadors did so deeply strike him to the heart and made so wide a wound that it could never be cur'd That the caresses and favors which he receiv'd since that were useless plaisters applied to his wounded heart and the remembrance of an injury took from him the sense of a thousand benefits Others alleage the refusal of an Office he had demanded for his Son which indeed was not given to another but was suppress'd to keep him from entring into his family There were some who excused this his change by the love he bore his Country and his zeal for the antient Religion which pretence the Tyrant took to make war with the King All Histories hereupon exercise their subtilities and were all salâ—ly ingenious and subtile They sought the source of this ill some on this side and some on that and none found it None of them spoke of Meleager's Wives diâ—dain which was the onely cause of her Husbands defection which indeed was never discovered till by the after-age and long after the Kings the Tyrants and Meleager's death THese two Inrodes which we have made into Greece and Macedon were in our way and I dare believe they were nothing displeasing to Your Highness But I believe further That You judge as well as I that it 's much more fit to divulge Visions in History then at the Council and that Subtility when it 's amiss is less dangerous when it relates things done then when we deliberate what is to be done And here that we may say nothing which can be worse It 's the cause why things are not done at all The People of Athens are too able to deceive the People of Thebes Those plant their nets so high and these flie so low that they must do something extraordinary to be taken I say moreover The Athenians sometimes employ their subtilities to make themselves believe so and thereby deceive themselves From their false Principles they must necessarily draw false Conclusions and can never negotiate happily nor ever bring their Adversaries about to them keeping themselves always in terms so far from them and coming so little near them that they are so far from joyning together that they cannot so much as know one another It 's hard to hear better Orators or to see Opinions better debated But you must look for no more They therein place all their care and all their industry They make it so much their study as if Discourse were the principal end of Deliberation and somewhat above Action it self They had rather make their Eloquence appear to the ruine of the State then to preserve it without speaking word They esteem it a greater advantage to bear away the bell in Council from the rest of their Companions then to beat their Enemies in the field So that they accompt as nothing the disgraces of War hoping always to have their revenge at the next Treaty And yet there they meet with some Mind of seel which is incapable of perswasion which will cut what it cannot untie and with a firm and constant Negative break all their snares and all their wiles without troubling it self to unravel them Witness that Governor of Figeac who being at a Conference which Queen Catherine held with the Deputies of the King of Navar and the Huguenot Party which was to make them quit before the time agreed on those Places of security which had been put into their hands She had brought from Paris a man almighty in words to whose Rhetorick nothing till then had been impossible He from the beginning makes himself admir'd by the Assembly In pursuit he raiseth sweeter passions in the hearts of the Deputies and after