of the actions and customes of men These things being granted I think that truth of it selfe begets no hatred and therfore we need not seek the cause why it doth but on the contrary I say with Aristotle that wee love truth and that in such a measure that we like no falshood but that which hath an appearance of truth which wee call likely or probable which makes the romants to be disliked as soon as wee discover any impossibilities in them And they that would amuse little children with monstrous tales must yet so fit them to their little wit as that they may beleeve them and so think them true which is easily done because of their want of experience But forasmuch as the greater part of men is imperfect so farre as they love to be praysed so farre do they hate those that tell them the truth of their defects which ordinarily carry blame with them And because the same reason that makes every one love his own praise makes a man also take pleasure in blaming of others that he himselfe may seem more perfect Hence it comes that dispraise being very well liked by all save only him whom it concerns who is very sensible of it it was upon this ground that Terence said that Truth begets hatred especially when it is opposed to flattery and to complying with the humours of every man which makes truth appeare so much the more austere as a Countrey-man comming next after a Courtier seems so much the arranter clowne and all other contraries set neer together make one another the more discernable The second said that this proverb Truth begets hatred is not grounded upon truth for every man not only professes it but also gives testimony that he is pleased with it It is also the object of our understanding which never rests till it hath found it seeking it with no lesse earnestnesse than that wherewith the will seeks after goodnesse So that setting truth on the one side known to be such and on the other side untruth likewise known to be such it is as impossible for the understanding not to love the truth as for the will not to incline to a known good This love of truth is so remarkable in all persons that not only the Iudges according to their duties and places do use all possible diligence to finde out the truth of a fact but also all those which are not at all interessed in the businesse are notwithstanding so much taken with it that though their eares be extreamly tired with listening to the one party yet they have not the power to refuse audience to the other side that undertakes to discover falshood in his adversaries tale and if the understanding do not conceive the truth it never remaines any more satisfied than a hungry stomack would bee with painted meat Wherefore it belongs only to diseased mindes to hate truth as only to sore eyes to turne from the light Wherfore as men do not determine of colours tastes and other objects of the sense by the judgement of indisposed organs nor say sugar is bitter because the tongue in a fever being filled with choler judges so even so ought we not to say after the perverse judgement of the vicious that truth begets hatred and by consequence we are not to seek the cause of a thing which is not so The third said that whatsoever agrees to our nature and is found in us all cannot be called a disease but rather the contrary Now not only the understanding and the inner senses but also all the outer senses of man taken in generall and in particular are pleased with falshood and love to bee deceived Whence it comes to passe that of all the sects of Philosophers there was never any sect more esteemed than those which distrusted the abilities of our minde and held themselves in a continuall suspence or uncertainty nor was there ever any more ridiculous than those that were most confident of their opinions And because the acknowledging that we cannot know truth is a kinde of truth of which our understanding is uncapable therefore did Democritus lodge truth in a pit and others sayd she was flown to heaven both expressions signifying that shee is out of mens reach Besides our understanding loves its liberty no lesse than our will loves it and as the will should no longer bee free if it were necessarily carried to some object whence proceeded so many differing opinions concerning the chiefest good even so our understanding foreseeing that if at once it should know the truth it must cease to be free to turne from it it therefore preferres likelihoods and probabilities from whence ariseth that pleasure which wee take in disputes and problematicall altercations For which cause also the sect of Pyrrhon is by most men esteemed above all others And the greatest part of the Sciences and Arts have no foundation but upon the errours of our faculties Logick upon the weaknesse of our understanding in discerning of truth for the better disguising of which and so our greater pleasure Rhetorick or the Orators Art was invented the end of which is not at all to speak the truth but to perswade you to what it pleaseth Poesy is the art of lying artificially in feigning that which neither is nor was nor ever shall be as picture and especially perspective endeavours only to deceive us Even the most pleasing Arts as Cookery the better they abuse our taste and our other senses by their disguises the more are they esteemed Look into civill conversation it is nothing but disguisement and not to speak of the maxime of King Lewis the eleventh to which he restrained all the Latin of his Successor the greatest part of the civilities of our Courtiers and Citizens too reaches no further And therefore wee need not wonder much if the clownes that run contrary to the ordinary course of all other men render themselves odious to every one The fourth said that the understanding is pleased with doubts as the wooers of Penelope loved to court her mayds that is to say because they could not enjoy the mistresse Nor is there any that being hungry and having put his hand to the platter would like well to look on it through a paire of spectacles of many faces through which there would appeare so many dishes and in severall places that hee could not tell which was the right Wherefore it is certaine that we love truth so well that no untruth can be welcome to us unlesse it be covered with the ornaments of truth and all those arts of disguising shew what esteeme we have of untruth seeing it must be like truth that wee may like it 'T is true that none but God being able to discerne this sort of truth which consists in the agreeing of our thoughts with our words and deceit being very frequent in this matter civility and curtesie teacheth us rather to use words of complement than rude and ill pollisht language the
rusticalnesse of which is ordinarily excused by clownes with the name of truth though truth be no more incompatible with good grace than pills are with leafe-gold by which the one is taken in better part and the other with lesse paine to the sick The fifth said that truth being the expression of the species of something and we taking pleasure to see a coppy well representing its originall it cannot beget hatred Things of themselves do not displease us at least there are more that please than that displease and of these a good part is sweetned by the manner of speaking of them as we see in jesting no man hindring us to speak truth laughing so that the denomination being not to be taken from the lesser and the lesse sound part truth cannot be said to beget hatred Also truth not being able to produce any thing but its like in an univocall generation it must be an equivocall one when it begets hatred the ignorant vulgar in this as they do often in other cases taking that for a cause which is none Otherwise the difficulty that we meet withall in seeking of truth increases the love of it and begets not hate of it Which love is no lesse universall than the hate of untruth as may appeare by that story of two Roman Citizens one of which was banished by a generall consent after it was known that he was so given to lying that he had never been heard speak truth the other received great and publick honours because he had never been heard speak any untruth no not in jest And we have nowadayes store of examples of the bad entertainment which all lyars finde which our ancient Gaules well knowing did account it the utmost degree of offence to give one the lie FINIS Of the Cock and whether his crowing doe affright the Lion THe first man said thus The Germans going to the warrs had reason to take a Cock with them to serve them for a spurre and an example of watchfulnesse whence came a custome to this day used by the Mule-drivers some of which tie a Cock upon their foremost carriage and others that will not trouble themselves with him provide only a plume of his feathers Upon the same ground Phidias made a statue of Minerva bearing a Cock upon her helmet unlesse you will rather think his reason to be because this Goddesse is as well president of warre as of study both which have need of much vigilancy Though this bird for other causes may be well enough said to pertaine to her as for his being so warlike and couragious as that he will not part with his desire of vanquishing though it cost him his life And this desire he prosecutes with such fury that Caelius Aurelian reports that a man fell mad having only been pecked by a Cock in the heat of his fighting For the passion of choler being a short madnesse is able exceedingly to raise the degree of heat in a temper already so extremely cholerick that in time the body of a Cock becomes nitrous and in this consideration it is prescribed to sick persons to make them laxative and it is the better if hee were first well beaten and plucked alive and then boiled And this courage of the Cock moved Artaxerxes King of Persia when a souldier of Caria had slaine Prince Cyrus to grant him leave to beare a little Cock of gold upon his Javelin as a singular badge of his great valour In imitation whereof all the souldiers of the same Province fell to weare the like upon the crests of their helmets and were thence called Alectryons that is in Latine Galli a name afterward given to our Nation and it may be for the like reason The Cock is also the Hieroglyphick of victory because he crows when he hath beaten his adversary which gave occasion to the Lacedaemonians to sacrifice a Cock when they had over come their enimies He was also dedicated to Mars and the Poets feigne that he was a young souldier and placed for a sentinell by this God of warre when he went to lie with Venus but feared the returne of her husband but this watchman sleeping till after Sun-rising Mars and she were taken napping by Vulcan Mars being very angry transformed this sleeper into a Cock for his negligence whence say they it comes to passe that well remembring the cause of his transformation he now gives warning when the Sun draws neere to our horizon Which fable is as tolerable as that of the Alcoran which attributes the crowing of our Cocks to one that as hee saith stands upon the first Heaven and is of so immense a hugenesse that his head toucheth the second which Cock crows so loud that he awakens all the Cocks upon the earth that immediately they fall a provoking one another to do the like as if there were one and the same instant of Cock-crowing all over the face of the whole earth The Cock was also dedicated to the Sun to the Moon and to the Goddesses Latona Ceresâ— and Proserpina which was the cause that the novices or those that were initiated in their mysteries must not eat of a Cock He was also dedicated to Mercury because vigilancy and earely rising is necessary for merchants and therefore they painted him in the forme of a man sitting having a crest upon his head with Eagles feet and holding a Cock upon his fist But particularly he was consecrated to Esculapius which made Socrates at the point of death to will his friends to sacrifice a Cock to him because his hemlock had wrought well And Pyrrhus curing men of the Spleen caused them to offer a white Cock whereas Pythagoras forbade his followers to meddle with the life or nourishing of any of that calour The Inhabitants of Calecuth sacrifice a Cock to their deity whom they conceive in the shape of a he-goat and Acosta out of Lucian assures us that anciently they worshipped a Cock for a God Which Christianity not suffering hath put them upon Churches the spires of steeples and high buildings calling them weather-cocks because as fanns they shew the coast whence the winde comes unlesse you rather think they are set up in remembrance of St. Peters repentance at the second crowing of a Cock. The cause of his crowing is commonly attributed to his heat which makes him rejoyce at the approach of the Sun as being of his own temper of which approach he is sooner sensible than others because hee more easily than any other creature receives the impressions of the aire as appears by that harsh voyce which he sometimes useth in crowing when he hath been newly moistened by the vapours and therefore the Countrey-men count it an ordinary signe of raine And forasmuch as the whole species of birds is more hot dry and light than the species of foure-footed beasts therefore the Lion though he be a solar creature as well as the Cock yet is so in a lesser degree than he Whence it
stopped the designes of his enemy and made them unprofitable In private businesse one puffe of wind upon the Sea one warre hapning between two neighbouring estates one change of some customes by land have need of more Wit than of Judgement or Courage to save you harmlesse from shipwrack and losse In the Courts of Law their Replies are pieces of Wit Yea Wit is of so great esteem with every one that all the perfections of the Soule are comprised in this word The French when they would expresse all that may be said of man beside the comelinesse and graces of his body say onely he is homme d'esprit I therefore think that the Inventive Wit ought to be preferred before Judgement which is of no use but onely in such affaires as afford and require choice as Courage is only for dangers The second said In vaine have men Wit if they want Judgement to guide it as for the most part it comes to passe So that ordinarily they are accounted opposites Also fooles want not that sharpnesse of Wit which serves for Invention nay rather both it and Courage are sharpned and made more active by the heat of frenzie But it is Judgement that they want the losse of which makes them be called fooles Which is observeable in the same company which was but now mentioned Wherethe Engineire or sharp-witted man will talke of very fine things but he poures them out like a torrent and without discretion whereas the Judicious man shall give better content than either of them though he speake fewer things of the businesse in hand than they doe But the Couragious man is apt to give distaste it being usuall with such to run beyond the bounds of that respect which other tempers are ashamed not to use for Judgement proceeds from a coldnesse of temper opposite to that heat which causeth promptnesse of Wit and Courage In war the Inventions and Courage aforesaid are also ordinarily not only unprofitable but also hurtfull without Judgement Which also in traffick is the thing that directs the Merchant in his choice of the severall designes which he proposeth to himselfe and of the meanes to attaine his ends without which deliberation nothing comes to a good end neither in warre nor merchandize The third said that the most couragious doe alwayes give lawes to the rest and so cause themselves to be esteemed above them For in the first place if the company aforesaid be of knowing men before whom you are to speak Your invention and disposition the effects of wit and judgement will stand you in no stead if you have not the Courage to pronounce your Oration as we see in the Oration which Cicero had penned for Milo Nay it is impossible to invent well if you want Spirit which gives life to all actions which have the approbation of all men whether at the Barre or else-where so that they call them Brave actions and full of Spirit And if Courage be of esteeme in all actions then in Warre it is esteemed above all and the Laws punishing cowardlinesse not the defects of Wit or Judgement do plainly shew that they esteem Courage more than either of the other The fourth said That those which speak in favour of Wit and Courage employing their judgement in the choyce of the reasons which they produce do sufficiently shew that judgement is above them as being the cause that they are esteemed For you know the Philosophers maxime the cause hath a greater portion of whatsoever it communicates to the effect than the effect it selfe hath Also the Judge is greater than the Advocates to whom we may compare the Wit because it proposes the means and the Judgement makes choice of them and as for Courage if it be without Judgement it deserves not the name Without Judgement the inventions of the Wit are nothing but Castles in the aire and empty phantasies like a ruined house without chambers or any other requisites Such Wits for want of Judgement dwell upon nothing but alwayes skip from bough to bough and from conceit to conceit which for that cause are not ordinarily so profitable to their inventors as to the judicious who better know how to make use of them In truth you shall find most of the inventions in those which have least practice their in experience making many things easie which practice shews to be impossible and therefore they never found entrance in the Phantasie of a Practicioner Also there is more courage found in beasts than in men and in men we often see that the most couragious are not the most judicious but according as the quick-silver fixes in them by age so they grow lesse and lesse inventive and lesse resolute to expose themselves to such perils as their foolish youth and want of experience caused them to undervalue And to say the truth the Judicious man hath all the Wit and Courage that he should have for he that invents or proposes things contrary to a sound Judgement goes for a foole but he that hath Judgement cannot want Courage for these two cannot stand together to be judicious and yet not to forsee that Courage is necessary in dangers for the avoyding and overcomming of them So that he that saith a man is Judicious presupposeth Wit and Courage in him but not on the contrary there being many couragious but neither judicious nor inventive and more that have Wit without Judgement The fifth said that all our actions being composed all the faculties contribute to them and they must needs be faulty if they be not seasoned with Wit Judgement and Courage but if wee compare them together the Wit is the most delectable the Judgement most profitable and the Courage is most esteemed FINIS VVhether Truth beget Hatred and why TRUTH is an affection or quality of speech agreeing with our thought or apprehension Whence it followes that to speak the truth it is sufficient to speak of things as wee think of them whether wee have conceived of them aright or no. For which reason they say in Latin mentiri est contra mentem ire Yet there are two sorts of Truths the one single which is the truth of the termes as also there is an untruth of the termes for there neither is nor ever was any such thing as a Chimaera the other is composed truth which is an indicative speech wherin wee affirme or deny something of some other thing which manner of speech is only capable of truth or falshood For truth properly taken is when not only our discourse agrees with the species which is in our understanding but also when this species agrees with the thing spoken of So that truth may bee called the measure or agreement of any thing with the understanding and of the understanding with the speech concerning that thing This truth may be againe divided according to the difference of its objects into naturall which treateth of the nature of every thing and civill which speaketh only
comes to passe that the Cock hath a pre-eminence over the Lion which he understands not till the crowing raise in his imagination some species which in him produce terror Unlesse you will say that the spirits of the Cock are communicated to the Lion by meanes of this voyce for that is a thing more materiate and so more capable to act than the spirits which come out of sore eyes which neverthelesse do infect those that are found if they look on them nay to speak with the Poet they do bewitch the very lambs The second said we must reckon this error of a Cock scaring a Lion by crowing among divers other vulgar ones of which oftentimes the chaires and pulpits ring as if they were certaine truths when in the triall they prove stark false It may be some tame Lion growen cowardly by the manner of his breeding hath been seen affrighted by the shrill sound of some Cock crowing suddenly and neere to his eares which will seem not unlikely to them that in the beginning of March last past were present at the intended combat in the Tennis-court at Rochel between such a Lion and a Bull at the sight of whom the Lion was so afraid that he bolted thorow the nets throwing down the spectators which were there placed in great number as thinking it a place of greater security and running thence he hid himselfe and could by no meanes be made re-enter the lists Or it may be the novelty of this crowing surprised some Lion that never heard it before as having alwayes lived far from any village or countrey house where poultry are bred and thereupon the Lion at this first motion startled It is also possible and most likely too that the startle of choller whereinto the Lion fals as soone as any thing displeases him was mistaken by some body for a signe of feare whereas it was a token of his indignation For I see no shew of reason to imagine in this generous beast a true and universall feare of so small a matter as the voyce of a Cock seeing that this likenesse of nature which is attributed to them should rather produce some sympathy than any aversion and yet this enmity if any were and that as great as between wolves and sheep ought no more to scare the Lion than the bleating of a sheep affrights a wolfe But the wolfe devoures the sheep and assimilates it to his own substance rather for the good-will that he beares himselfe than for any ill-will or hatred that he beares toward the sheep Besides we ordinarily see Cocks and Hens in the court-yards of the houses where Lions are kept which never make any shew of astonishment at their crowing Nay I remember I have seen a young Lion eat a Cock 't is true he did not crow any more than those of Nibas a village neere to Thessalonica in Macedon where the Cocks never crow But the Lion would have been content with tearing the cock in pieces and not have eaten him if there had been such an antipathy between them as some imagine But this error finds entertainment for the moralls sake which they inferre upon it to shew us that the most hardy are not exempt from fear which oftentimes arises whence it is least looked for So that to ask why the crowing of a Cock scares Lions is to seek the cause of a thing that is not The third said we must not make so little account of the authority of our predecessors as absolutely to deny what they have averred the proofe of which seems sufficiently tried by the continued experience of so many ages for to deny a truth because we know not the reason of it is to imitate Alexander which cut the Gordian knot because he could not unty it It is better in the nature of the Cock and his voyce to seek a cause of the fright of the Lion who being a creature always in a fever by his excessive cholerick distemper of which his haire and his violence are tokens great noise is to him as intollerable as to those that are sick and feverish especially those in whom a cholerick humour enflamed stirrs up headach Besides there are some kinds of sound which some persons cannot endure and yet can give you no reason for it but are constrained to flie to specificall properties and antipathies and such we may conceive to be between the Cocks-crowing and a Lions eare shith much more likelihood than that the Remora staies vessels under full saile and a thousand other effects impenetrable by our reason but assured by our experience Lastly this astonishment that the Cock puts the Lion into with his crowing is not very unreasonable This king of beasts having occasion to wonder how out of so small a body should issue a voyce so strong and which is heard so farre off whereas himselfe can make such great slaughters with so little noise Which amazement of the Lion is so much the greater if the Cock bee white because this colour helps yet more to dissipate his spirits which were already scattered by the first motion of his apprehension FINIS VVhy dead Bodies bleed in the presence of their murtherers GOod Antiquity was so desirous to know the truth that as often as naturall and ordinary proofes failed them they had recourse to supernaturall and extraordinary wayes Such among the Jewes was the water of jealousie of which an Adulteresse could not drink without discovering her guiltinesse it making her burst Such was the triall of the Sieve in which the Vestall Nun not guilty of unchastity as she was accused to be did carry water of Tiber without spilling any Such were the oathes upon Saint Anthonies arme of so great reverence that it was beleeved that whosoever was there perjured would within a yeare after bee burned with the fire of that Saint and even in our times it is commonly reckoned that none lives above a yeare after they have incurred the excommunication of Saint Geneviefve And because nothing is so hidden from justice as murder they use not only torments of the body but also the torture of the soule to which its passions doe deliver it over of which Feare discovering it selfe more than the rest the Judges have forgotten nothing that may serve to make the suspected person fearefull for besides their interrogatories confronting him with witnesses sterne looks and bringing before him the instruments of torture as if they were ready to make him feele them they have invented all other meanes to surprise his resolution and break his silence especially when they have found already some signes and conjectures Wherefore they perswade him that a carkasse bleeds in the presence of the murtherers because dead bodies being removed doe often bleed and then he whose conscience is tainted with the Synteresis of the fact is troubled in such sort that by his mouth or gesture he often bewrayes his owne guiltinesse as not having his first motions in his owne power Now