But they, placed high on the top of all
virtue, looked down on the stage of the world and contemned the play of
fortune.
virtue, looked down on the stage of the world and contemned the play of
fortune.
Ben Jonson - Discoveries Made Upon Men, and Some Poems
It runs and slides, and only
makes a sound. Women's poets they are called, as you have women's
tailors.
"They write a verse as smooth, as soft as cream,
In which there is no torrent, nor scarce stream. "
You may sound these wits and find the depth of them with your middle
finger. They are cream-bowl or but puddle-deep.
_Not. _ 6. --Some that turn over all books, and are equally searching in all
papers; that write out of what they presently find or meet, without
choice. By which means it happens that what they have discredited and
impugned in one week, they have before or after extolled the same in
another. Such are all the essayists, even their master Montaigne.
These, in all they write, confess still what books they have read last,
and therein their own folly so much, that they bring it to the stake raw
and undigested; not that the place did need it neither, but that they
thought themselves furnished and would vent it.
_Not. _ 7. --Some, again who, after they have got authority, or, which is
less, opinion, by their writings, to have read much, dare presently to
feign whole books and authors, and lie safely. For what never was, will
not easily be found, not by the most curious.
_Not. _ 8. --And some, by a cunning protestation against all reading, and
false venditation of their own naturals, think to divert the sagacity of
their readers from themselves, and cool the scent of their own fox-like
thefts; when yet they are so rank, as a man may find whole pages together
usurped from one author; their necessities compelling them to read for
present use, which could not be in many books; and so come forth more
ridiculously and palpably guilty than those who, because they cannot
trace, they yet would slander their industry.
_Not. _ 9. --But the wretcheder are the obstinate contemners of all helps
and arts; such as presuming on their own naturals (which, perhaps, are
excellent), dare deride all diligence, and seem to mock at the terms when
they understand not the things; thinking that way to get off wittily with
their ignorance. These are imitated often by such as are their peers in
negligence, though they cannot be in nature; and they utter all they can
think with a kind of violence and indisposition, unexamined, without
relation either to person, place, or any fitness else; and the more
wilful and stubborn they are in it the more learned they are esteemed of
the multitude, through their excellent vice of judgment, who think those
things the stronger that have no art; as if to break were better than to
open, or to rend asunder gentler than to loose.
_Not. _ 10. --It cannot but come to pass that these men who commonly seek to
do more than enough may sometimes happen on something that is good and
great; but very seldom: and when it comes it doth not recompense the rest
of their ill. For their jests, and their sentences (which they only and
ambitiously seek for) stick out, and are more eminent, because all is
sordid and vile about them; as lights are more discerned in a thick
darkness than a faint shadow. Now, because they speak all they can
(however unfitly), they are thought to have the greater copy; where the
learned use ever election and a mean, they look back to what they
intended at first, and make all an even and proportioned body. The true
artificer will not run away from Nature as he were afraid of her, or
depart from life and the likeness of truth, but speak to the capacity of
his hearers. And though his language differ from the vulgar somewhat, it
shall not fly from all humanity, with the Tamerlanes and Tamer-chains of
the late age, which had nothing in them but the scenical strutting and
furious vociferation to warrant them to the ignorant gapers. He knows it
is his only art so to carry it, as none but artificers perceive it. In
the meantime, perhaps, he is called barren, dull, lean, a poor writer, or
by what contumelious word can come in their cheeks, by these men who,
without labour, judgment, knowledge, or almost sense, are received or
preferred before him. He gratulates them and their fortune. Another
age, or juster men, will acknowledge the virtues of his studies, his
wisdom in dividing, his subtlety in arguing, with what strength he doth
inspire his readers, with what sweetness he strokes them; in inveighing,
what sharpness; in jest, what urbanity he uses; how he doth reign in
men's affections; how invade and break in upon them, and makes their
minds like the thing he writes. Then in his elocution to behold what
word is proper, which hath ornaments, which height, what is beautifully
translated, where figures are fit, which gentle, which strong, to show
the composition manly; and how he hath avoided faint, obscure, obscene,
sordid, humble, improper, or effeminate phrase; which is not only praised
of the most, but commended (which is worse), especially for that it is
naught.
_Ignorantia animae_. --I know no disease of the soul but ignorance, not of
the arts and sciences, but of itself; yet relating to those it is a
pernicious evil, the darkener of man's life, the disturber of his reason,
and common confounder of truth, with which a man goes groping in the
dark, no otherwise than if he were blind. Great understandings are most
racked and troubled with it; nay, sometimes they will rather choose to
die than not to know the things they study for. Think, then, what an
evil it is, and what good the contrary.
_Scientia_. --Knowledge is the action of the soul and is perfect without
the senses, as having the seeds of all science and virtue in itself; but
not without the service of the senses; by these organs the soul works:
she is a perpetual agent, prompt and subtle; but often flexible and
erring, entangling herself like a silkworm, but her reason is a weapon
with two edges, and cuts through. In her indagations oft-times new
scents put her by, and she takes in errors into her by the same conduits
she doth truths.
_Otium Studiorum_. --Ease and relaxation are profitable to all studies.
The mind is like a bow, the stronger by being unbent. But the temper in
spirits is all, when to command a man's wit, when to favour it. I have
known a man vehement on both sides, that knew no mean, either to intermit
his studies or call upon them again. When he hath set himself to writing
he would join night to day, press upon himself without release, not
minding it, till he fainted; and when he left off, resolve himself into
all sports and looseness again, that it was almost a despair to draw him
to his book; but once got to it, he grew stronger and more earnest by the
ease. His whole powers were renewed; he would work out of himself what
he desired, but with such excess as his study could not be ruled; he knew
not how to dispose his own abilities, or husband them; he was of that
immoderate power against himself. Nor was he only a strong, but an
absolute speaker and writer; but his subtlety did not show itself; his
judgment thought that a vice; for the ambush hurts more that is hid. He
never forced his language, nor went out of the highway of speaking but
for some great necessity or apparent profit; for he denied figures to be
invented for ornament, but for aid; and still thought it an extreme
madness to bind or wrest that which ought to be right.
_Stili eminentia_. --_Virgil_. --_Tully_. --_Sallust_. --It is no wonder men's
eminence appears but in their own way. Virgil's felicity left him in
prose, as Tully's forsook him in verse. Sallust's orations are read in
the honour of story, yet the most eloquent. Plato's speech, which he
made for Socrates, is neither worthy of the patron nor the person
defended. Nay, in the same kind of oratory, and where the matter is one,
you shall have him that reasons strongly, open negligently; another that
prepares well, not fit so well. And this happens not only to brains, but
to bodies. One can wrestle well, another run well, a third leap or throw
the bar, a fourth lift or stop a cart going; each hath his way of
strength. So in other creatures--some dogs are for the deer, some for the
wild boar, some are fox-hounds, some otter-hounds. Nor are all horses
for the coach or saddle, some are for the cart and paniers.
_De Claris Oratoribus_. --I have known many excellent men that would speak
suddenly to the admiration of their hearers, who upon study and
premeditation have been forsaken by their own wits, and no way answered
their fame; their eloquence was greater than their reading, and the
things they uttered better than those they knew; their fortune deserved
better of them than their care. For men of present spirits, and of
greater wits than study, do please more in the things they invent than in
those they bring. And I have heard some of them compelled to speak, out
of necessity, that have so infinitely exceeded themselves, as it was
better both for them and their auditory that they were so surprised, not
prepared. Nor was it safe then to cross them, for their adversary, their
anger made them more eloquent. Yet these men I could not but love and
admire, that they returned to their studies. They left not diligence (as
many do) when their rashness prospered; for diligence is a great aid,
even to an indifferent wit; when we are not contented with the examples
of our own age, but would know the face of the former. Indeed, the more
we confer with the more we profit by, if the persons be chosen.
_Dominus Verulamius_. --One, though he be excellent and the chief, is not
to be imitated alone; for no imitator ever grew up to his author;
likeness is always on this side truth. Yet there happened in my time one
noble speaker who was full of gravity in his speaking; his language
(where he could spare or pass by a jest) was nobly censorious. No man
ever spake more neatly, more pressly, more weightily, or suffered less
emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of his speech
but consisted of his own graces. His hearers could not cough, or look
aside from him, without loss. He commanded where he spoke, and had his
judges angry and pleased at his devotion. No man had their affections
more in his power. The fear of every man that heard him was lest he
should make an end.
_Scriptorum catalogus_. {59a} Cicero is said to be the only wit that the
people of Rome had equalled to their empire. _Ingenium par imperio_. We
have had many, and in their several ages (to take in but the former
_seculum_) Sir Thomas More, the elder Wiat, Henry Earl of Surrey,
Chaloner, Smith, Eliot, B. Gardiner, were for their times admirable; and
the more, because they began eloquence with us. Sir Nicolas Bacon was
singular, and almost alone, in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's time.
Sir Philip Sidney and Mr. Hooker (in different matter) grew great masters
of wit and language, and in whom all vigour of invention and strength of
judgment met. The Earl of Essex, noble and high; and Sir Walter Raleigh,
not to be contemned, either for judgment or style. Sir Henry Savile,
grave, and truly lettered; Sir Edwin Sandys, excellent in both; Lord
Egerton, the Chancellor, a grave and great orator, and best when he was
provoked; but his learned and able (though unfortunate) successor is he
who hath filled up all numbers, and performed that in our tongue which
may be compared or preferred either to insolent Greece or haughty Rome.
In short, within his view, and about his times, were all the wits born
that could honour a language or help study. Now things daily fall, wits
grow downward, and eloquence grows backward; so that he may be named and
stand as the mark and ? ? ? ? of our language.
_De augmentis scientiarum_. --_Julius Caesar_. --_Lord St. Alban_. --I have ever
observed it to have been the office of a wise patriot, among the greatest
affairs of the State, to take care of the commonwealth of learning. For
schools, they are the seminaries of State; and nothing is worthier the
study of a statesman than that part of the republic which we call the
advancement of letters. Witness the care of Julius Caesar, who, in the
heat of the civil war, writ his books of Analogy, and dedicated them to
Tully. This made the late Lord St. Alban entitle his work _Novum
Organum_; which, though by the most of superficial men, who cannot get
beyond the title of nominals, it is not penetrated nor understood, it
really openeth all defects of learning whatsoever, and is a book
"Qui longum note scriptori proroget aevum. " {62a}
My conceit of his person was never increased toward him by his place or
honours; but I have and do reverence him for the greatness that was only
proper to himself, in that he seemed to me ever, by his work, one of the
greatest men, and most worthy of admiration, that had been in many ages.
In his adversity I ever prayed that God would give him strength; for
greatness he could not want. Neither could I condole in a word or
syllable for him, as knowing no accident could do harm to virtue, but
rather help to make it manifest.
_De corruptela morum_. --There cannot be one colour of the mind, another of
the wit. If the mind be staid, grave, and composed, the wit is so; that
vitiated, the other is blown and deflowered. Do we not see, if the mind
languish, the members are dull? Look upon an effeminate person, his very
gait confesseth him. If a man be fiery, his motion is so; if angry, it
is troubled and violent. So that we may conclude wheresoever manners and
fashions are corrupted, language is. It imitates the public riot. The
excess of feasts and apparel are the notes of a sick state, and the
wantonness of language of a sick mind.
_De rebus mundanis_. --If we would consider what our affairs are indeed,
not what they are called, we should find more evils belonging to us than
happen to us. How often doth that which was called a calamity prove the
beginning and cause of a man's happiness? and, on the contrary, that
which happened or came to another with great gratulation and applause,
how it hath lifted him but a step higher to his ruin? as if he stood
before where he might fall safely.
_Vulgi mores_. --_Morbus comitialis_. --The vulgar are commonly ill-natured,
and always grudging against their governors: which makes that a prince
has more business and trouble with them than ever Hercules had with the
bull or any other beast; by how much they have more heads than will be
reined with one bridle. There was not that variety of beasts in the ark,
as is of beastly natures in the multitude; especially when they come to
that iniquity to censure their sovereign's actions. Then all the
counsels are made good or bad by the events; and it falleth out that the
same facts receive from them the names, now of diligence, now of vanity,
now of majesty, now of fury; where they ought wholly to hang on his
mouth, as he to consist of himself, and not others' counsels.
_Princeps_. --After God, nothing is to be loved of man like the prince; he
violates Nature that doth it not with his whole heart. For when he hath
put on the care of the public good and common safety, I am a wretch, and
put off man, if I do not reverence and honour him, in whose charge all
things divine and human are placed. Do but ask of Nature why all living
creatures are less delighted with meat and drink that sustains them than
with venery that wastes them? and she will tell thee, the first respects
but a private, the other a common good, propagation.
_De eodem_. --_Orpheus' Hymn_. --He is the arbiter of life and death: when he
finds no other subject for his mercy, he should spare himself. All his
punishments are rather to correct than to destroy. Why are prayers with
Orpheus said to be the daughters of Jupiter, but that princes are thereby
admonished that the petitions of the wretched ought to have more weight
with them than the laws themselves.
_De opt. Rege Jacobo_. --It was a great accumulation to His Majesty's
deserved praise that men might openly visit and pity those whom his
greatest prisons had at any time received or his laws condemned.
_De Princ. adjunctis_. --_Sed vere prudens haud concipi possit Princeps_,
_nisi simul et bonus_. --_Lycurgus_. --_Sylla_. --_Lysander_. --_Cyrus_. --Wise is
rather the attribute of a prince than learned or good. The learned man
profits others rather than himself; the good man rather himself than
others; but the prince commands others, and doth himself.
The wise Lycurgus gave no law but what himself kept. Sylla and Lysander
did not so; the one living extremely dissolute himself, enforced
frugality by the laws; the other permitted those licenses to others which
himself abstained from. But the prince's prudence is his chief art and
safety. In his counsels and deliberations he foresees the future times:
in the equity of his judgment he hath remembrance of the past, and
knowledge of what is to be done or avoided for the present. Hence the
Persians gave out their Cyrus to have been nursed by a bitch, a creature
to encounter it, as of sagacity to seek out good; showing that wisdom may
accompany fortitude, or it leaves to be, and puts on the name of
rashness.
_De malign. studentium_. --There be some men are born only to suck out the
poison of books: _Habent venenum pro victu_; _imo_, _pro deliciis_. {66a}
And such are they that only relish the obscene and foul things in poets,
which makes the profession taxed. But by whom? Men that watch for it;
and, had they not had this hint, are so unjust valuers of letters as they
think no learning good but what brings in gain. It shows they themselves
would never have been of the professions they are but for the profits and
fees. But if another learning, well used, can instruct to good life,
inform manners, no less persuade and lead men than they threaten and
compel, and have no reward, is it therefore the worst study? I could
never think the study of wisdom confined only to the philosopher, or of
piety to the divine, or of state to the politic; but that he which can
feign a commonwealth (which is the poet) can govern it with counsels,
strengthen it with laws, correct it with judgments, inform it with
religion and morals, is all these. We do not require in him mere
elocution, or an excellent faculty in verse, but the exact knowledge of
all virtues and their contraries, with ability to render the one loved,
the other hated, by his proper embattling them. The philosophers did
insolently, to challenge only to themselves that which the greatest
generals and gravest counsellors never durst. For such had rather do
than promise the best things.
_Controvers. scriptores_. --_More Andabatarum qui clausis oculis
pugnant_. --Some controverters in divinity are like swaggerers in a tavern
that catch that which stands next them, the candlestick or pots; turn
everything into a weapon: ofttimes they fight blindfold, and both beat
the air. The one milks a he-goat, the other holds under a sieve. Their
arguments are as fluxive as liquor spilt upon a table, which with your
finger you may drain as you will. Such controversies or disputations
(carried with more labour than profit) are odious; where most times the
truth is lost in the midst or left untouched. And the fruit of their
fight is, that they spit one upon another, and are both defiled. These
fencers in religion I like not.
_Morbi_. --The body hath certain diseases that are with less evil tolerated
than removed. As if to cure a leprosy a man should bathe himself with
the warm blood of a murdered child, so in the Church some errors may be
dissimuled with less inconvenience than they can be discovered.
_Jactantia intempestiva_. --Men that talk of their own benefits are not
believed to talk of them because they have done them; but to have done
them because they might talk of them. That which had been great, if
another had reported it of them, vanisheth, and is nothing, if he that
did it speak of it. For men, when they cannot destroy the deed, will yet
be glad to take advantage of the boasting, and lessen it.
_Adulatio_. --I have seen that poverty makes me do unfit things; but honest
men should not do them; they should gain otherwise. Though a man be
hungry, he should not play the parasite. That hour wherein I would
repent me to be honest, there were ways enough open for me to be rich.
But flattery is a fine pick-lock of tender ears; especially of those whom
fortune hath borne high upon their wings, that submit their dignity and
authority to it, by a soothing of themselves. For, indeed, men could
never be taken in that abundance with the springes of others' flattery,
if they began not there; if they did but remember how much more
profitable the bitterness of truth were, than all the honey distilling
from a whorish voice, which is not praise, but poison. But now it is
come to that extreme folly, or rather madness, with some, that he that
flatters them modestly or sparingly is thought to malign them. If their
friend consent not to their vices, though he do not contradict them, he
is nevertheless an enemy. When they do all things the worst way, even
then they look for praise. Nay, they will hire fellows to flatter them
with suits and suppers, and to prostitute their judgments. They have
livery-friends, friends of the dish, and of the spit, that wait their
turns, as my lord has his feasts and guests.
_De vita humana_. --I have considered our whole life is like a play:
wherein every man forgetful of himself, is in travail with expression of
another. Nay, we so insist in imitating others, as we cannot when it is
necessary return to ourselves; like children, that imitate the vices of
stammerers so long, till at last they become such; and make the habit to
another nature, as it is never forgotten.
_De piis et probis_. --Good men are the stars, the planets of the ages
wherein they live and illustrate the times. God did never let them be
wanting to the world: as Abel, for an example of innocency, Enoch of
purity, Noah of trust in God's mercies, Abraham of faith, and so of the
rest. These, sensual men thought mad because they would not be partakers
or practisers of their madness.
But they, placed high on the top of all
virtue, looked down on the stage of the world and contemned the play of
fortune. For though the most be players, some must be spectators.
_Mores aulici_. --I have discovered that a feigned familiarity in great
ones is a note of certain usurpation on the less. For great and popular
men feign themselves to be servants to others to make those slaves to
them. So the fisher provides bait for the trout, roach, dace, &c. , that
they may be food to him.
_Impiorum querela_. --_Augusties_. --_Varus_. --_Tiberius_. --The complaint of
Caligula was most wicked of the condition of his times, when he said they
were not famous for any public calamity, as the reign of Augustus was, by
the defeat of Varus and the legions; and that of Tiberius, by the falling
of the theatre at Fidenae; whilst his oblivion was eminent through the
prosperity of his affairs. As that other voice of his was worthier a
headsman than a head when he wished the people of Rome had but one neck.
But he found when he fell they had many hands. A tyrant, how great and
mighty soever he may seem to cowards and sluggards, is but one creature,
one animal.
_Nobilium ingenia_. --I have marked among the nobility some are so addicted
to the service of the prince and commonwealth, as they look not for
spoil; such are to be honoured and loved. There are others which no
obligation will fasten on; and they are of two sorts. The first are such
as love their own ease; or, out of vice, of nature, or self-direction,
avoid business and care. Yet these the prince may use with safety. The
other remove themselves upon craft and design, as the architects say,
with a premeditated thought, to their own rather than their prince's
profit. Such let the prince take heed of, and not doubt to reckon in the
list of his open enemies.
_Principum. varia_. --_Firmissima vero omnium basis jus haereditarium
Principis_. --There is a great variation between him that is raised to the
sovereignty by the favour of his peers and him that comes to it by the
suffrage of the people. The first holds with more difficulty, because he
hath to do with many that think themselves his equals, and raised him for
their own greatness and oppression of the rest. The latter hath no
upbraiders, but was raised by them that sought to be defended from
oppression: whose end is both easier and the honester to satisfy.
Beside, while he hath the people to friend, who are a multitude, he hath
the less fear of the nobility, who are but few. Nor let the common
proverb (of he that builds on the people builds on the dirt) discredit my
opinion: for that hath only place where an ambitious and private person,
for some popular end, trusts in them against the public justice and
magistrate. There they will leave him. But when a prince governs them,
so as they have still need of his administrations (for that is his art),
he shall ever make and hold them faithful.
_Clementia_. --_Machiavell_. --A prince should exercise his cruelty not by
himself but by his ministers; so he may save himself and his dignity with
his people by sacrificing those when he list, saith the great doctor of
state, Machiavell. But I say he puts off man and goes into a beast, that
is cruel. No virtue is a prince's own, or becomes him more, than this
clemency: and no glory is greater than to be able to save with his power.
Many punishments sometimes, and in some cases, as much discredit a
prince, as many funerals a physician. The state of things is secured by
clemency; severity represseth a few, but irritates more. {74a} The
lopping of trees makes the boughs shoot out thicker; and the taking away
of some kind of enemies increaseth the number. It is then most gracious
in a prince to pardon when many about him would make him cruel; to think
then how much he can save when others tell him how much he can destroy;
not to consider what the impotence of others hath demolished, but what
his own greatness can sustain. These are a prince's virtues: and they
that give him other counsels are but the hangman's factors.
_Clementia tutela optima_. --He that is cruel to halves (saith the said St.
Nicholas {74b}) loseth no less the opportunity of his cruelty than of his
benefits: for then to use his cruelty is too late; and to use his favours
will be interpreted fear and necessity, and so he loseth the thanks.
Still the counsel is cruelty. But princes, by hearkening to cruel
counsels, become in time obnoxious to the authors, their flatterers, and
ministers; and are brought to that, that when they would, they dare not
change them; they must go on and defend cruelty with cruelty; they cannot
alter the habit. It is then grown necessary, they must be as ill as
those have made them: and in the end they will grow more hateful to
themselves than to their subjects. Whereas, on the contrary, the
merciful prince is safe in love, not in fear. He needs no emissaries,
spies, intelligencers to entrap true subjects. He fears no libels, no
treasons. His people speak what they think, and talk openly what they do
in secret. They have nothing in their breasts that they need a cypher
for. He is guarded with his own benefits.
_Religio_. _Palladium Homeri_. --_Euripides_. --The strength of empire is in
religion. What else is the Palladium (with Homer) that kept Troy so long
from sacking? Nothing more commends the Sovereign to the subject than
it. For he that is religious must be merciful and just necessarily: and
they are two strong ties upon mankind. Justice the virtue that innocence
rejoiceth in. Yet even that is not always so safe, but it may love to
stand in the sight of mercy. For sometimes misfortune is made a crime,
and then innocence is succoured no less than virtue. Nay, oftentimes
virtue is made capital; and through the condition of the times it may
happen that that may be punished with our praise. Let no man therefore
murmur at the actions of the prince, who is placed so far above him. If
he offend, he hath his discoverer. God hath a height beyond him. But
where the prince is good, Euripides saith, "God is a guest in a human
body. "
_Tyranni_. --_Sejanus_. --There is nothing with some princes sacred above
their majesty, or profane, but what violates their sceptres. But a
prince, with such a council, is like the god Terminus, of stone, his own
landmark, or (as it is in the fable) a crowned lion. It is dangerous
offending such a one, who, being angry, knows not how to forgive; that
cares not to do anything for maintaining or enlarging of empire; kills
not men or subjects, but destroyeth whole countries, armies, mankind,
male and female, guilty or not guilty, holy or profane; yea, some that
have not seen the light. All is under the law of their spoil and
licence. But princes that neglect their proper office thus their fortune
is oftentimes to draw a Sejanus to be near about them, who at last affect
to get above them, and put them in a worthy fear of rooting both them out
and their family. For no men hate an evil prince more than they that
helped to make him such. And none more boastingly weep his ruin than
they that procured and practised it. The same path leads to ruin which
did to rule when men profess a licence in government. A good king is a
public servant.
_Illiteratus princeps_. --A prince without letters is a pilot without eyes.
All his government is groping. In sovereignty it is a most happy thing
not to be compelled; but so it is the most miserable not to be
counselled. And how can he be counselled that cannot see to read the
best counsellors (which are books), for they neither flatter us nor hide
from us? He may hear, you will say; but how shall he always be sure to
hear truth, or be counselled the best things, not the sweetest? They say
princes learn no art truly but the art of horsemanship. The reason is
the brave beast is no flatterer. He will throw a prince as soon as his
groom. Which is an argument that the good counsellors to princes are the
best instruments of a good age. For though the prince himself be of a
most prompt inclination to all virtue, yet the best pilots have needs of
mariners besides sails, anchor, and other tackle.
_Character principis_. --_Alexander magnus_. --If men did know what shining
fetters, gilded miseries, and painted happiness thrones and sceptres were
there would not be so frequent strife about the getting or holding of
them; there would be more principalities than princes; for a prince is
the pastor of the people. He ought to shear, not to flay his sheep; to
take their fleeces, not their the soul of the commonwealth, and ought to
cherish it as his own body. Alexander the Great was wont to say, "He
hated that gardener that plucked his herbs or flowers up by the roots. "
A man may milk a beast till the blood come; churn milk and it yieldeth
butter, but wring the nose and the blood followeth. He is an ill prince
that so pulls his subjects' feathers as he would not have them grow
again; that makes his exchequer a receipt for the spoils of those he
governs. No, let him keep his own, not affect his subjects'; strive
rather to be called just than powerful. Not, like the Roman tyrants,
affect the surnames that grow by human slaughters; neither to seek war in
peace, nor peace in war, but to observe faith given, though to an enemy.
Study piety toward the subject; show care to defend him. Be slow to
punish in divers cases, but be a sharp and severe revenger of open
crimes. Break no decrees or dissolve no orders to slacken the strength
of laws. Choose neither magistrates, civil or ecclesiastical, by favour
or price; but with long disquisition and report of their worth by all
suffrages. Sell no honours, nor give them hastily, but bestow them with
counsel and for reward; if he do, acknowledge it (though late), and mend
it. For princes are easy to be deceived; and what wisdom can escape
where so many court-arts are studied? But, above all, the prince is to
remember that when the great day of account comes, which neither
magistrate nor prince can shun, there will be required of him a reckoning
for those whom he hath trusted, as for himself, which he must provide.
And if piety be wanting in the priests, equity in the judges, or the
magistrates be found rated at a price, what justice or religion is to be
expected? which are the only two attributes make kings akin to God, and
is the Delphic sword, both to kill sacrifices and to chastise offenders.
_De gratiosis_. --When a virtuous man is raised, it brings gladness to his
friends, grief to his enemies, and glory to his posterity. Nay, his
honours are a great part of the honour of the times; when by this means
he is grown to active men an example, to the slothful a spur, to the
envious a punishment.
_Divites_. --_Heredes ex asse_. He which is sole heir to many rich men,
having (besides his father's and uncle's) the estates of divers his
kindred come to him by accession, must needs be richer than father or
grandfather; so they which are left heirs _ex asse_ of all their
ancestors' vices, and by their good husbandry improve the old and daily
purchase new, must needs be wealthier in vice, and have a greater revenue
or stock of ill to spend on.
_Fures publici_. --The great thieves of a state are lightly the officers of
the crown; they hang the less still, play the pikes in the pond, eat whom
they list. The net was never spread for the hawk or buzzard that hurt
us, but the harmless birds; they are good meat:--
"Dat veniam corvis, vexat censura columbas. " {81a}
"Non rete accipitri tenditur, neque milvio. " {81b}
_Lewis XI_. --But they are not always safe though, especially when they
meet with wise masters. They can take down all the huff and swelling of
their looks, and like dexterous auditors place the counter where he shall
value nothing. Let them but remember Lewis XI. , who to a Clerk of the
Exchequer that came to be Lord Treasurer, and had (for his device)
represented himself sitting on fortune's wheel, told him he might do well
to fasten it with a good strong nail, lest, turning about, it might bring
him where he was again. As indeed it did.
_De bonis et malis_. --_De innocentia_. --A good man will avoid the spot of
any sin. The very aspersion is grievous, which makes him choose his way
in his life as he would in his journey. The ill man rides through all
confidently; he is coated and booted for it. The oftener he offends, the
more openly, and the fouler, the fitter in fashion. His modesty, like a
riding-coat, the more it is worn is the less cared for. It is good
enough for the dirt still, and the ways he travels in. An innocent man
needs no eloquence, his innocence is instead of it, else I had never come
off so many times from these precipices, whither men's malice hath
pursued me. It is true I have been accused to the lords, to the king,
and by great ones, but it happened my accusers had not thought of the
accusation with themselves, and so were driven, for want of crimes, to
use invention, which was found slander, or too late (being entered so
fair) to seek starting-holes for their rashness, which were not given
them. And then they may think what accusation that was like to prove,
when they that were the engineers feared to be the authors. Nor were
they content to feign things against me, but to urge things, feigned by
the ignorant, against my profession, which though, from their hired and
mercenary impudence, I might have passed by as granted to a nation of
barkers that let out their tongues to lick others' sores; yet I durst not
leave myself undefended, having a pair of ears unskilful to hear lies, or
have those things said of me which I could truly prove of them. They
objected making of verses to me, when I could object to most of them,
their not being able to read them, but as worthy of scorn. Nay, they
would offer to urge mine own writings against me, but by pieces (which
was an excellent way of malice), as if any man's context might not seem
dangerous and offensive, if that which was knit to what went before were
defrauded of his beginning; or that things by themselves uttered might
not seem subject to calumny, which read entire would appear most free.
At last they upbraided my poverty: I confess she is my domestic; sober of
diet, simple of habit, frugal, painful, a good counseller to me, that
keeps me from cruelty, pride, or other more delicate impertinences, which
are the nurse-children of riches. But let them look over all the great
and monstrous wickednesses, they shall never find those in poor families.
They are the issue of the wealthy giants and the mighty hunters, whereas
no great work, or worthy of praise or memory, but came out of poor
cradles. It was the ancient poverty that founded commonweals, built
cities, invented arts, made wholesome laws, armed men against vices,
rewarded them with their own virtues, and preserved the honour and state
of nations, till they betrayed themselves to riches.
_Amor nummi_. --Money never made any man rich, but his mind. He that can
order himself to the law of Nature is not only without the sense but the
fear of poverty. O! but to strike blind the people with our wealth and
pomp is the thing! What a wretchedness is this, to thrust all our riches
outward, and be beggars within; to contemplate nothing but the little,
vile, and sordid things of the world; not the great, noble, and precious!
We serve our avarice, and, not content with the good of the earth that is
offered us, we search and dig for the evil that is hidden. God offered
us those things, and placed them at hand, and near us, that He knew were
profitable for us, but the hurtful He laid deep and hid. Yet do we seek
only the things whereby we may perish, and bring them forth, when God and
Nature hath buried them. We covet superfluous things, when it were more
honour for us if we would contemn necessary. What need hath Nature of
silver dishes, multitudes of waiters, delicate pages, perfumed napkins?
She requires meat only, and hunger is not ambitious. Can we think no
wealth enough but such a state for which a man may be brought into a
premunire, begged, proscribed, or poisoned? O! if a man could restrain
the fury of his gullet and groin, and think how many fires, how many
kitchens, cooks, pastures, and ploughed lands; what orchards, stews,
ponds and parks, coops and garners, he could spare; what velvets,
tissues, embroideries, laces, he could lack; and then how short and
uncertain his life is; he were in a better way to happiness than to live
the emperor of these delights, and be the dictator of fashions; but we
make ourselves slaves to our pleasures, and we serve fame and ambition,
which is an equal slavery. Have not I seen the pomp of a whole kingdom,
and what a foreign king could bring hither? Also to make himself gazed
and wondered at--laid forth, as it were, to the show--and vanish all away
in a day? And shall that which could not fill the expectation of few
hours, entertain and take up our whole lives, when even it appeared as
superfluous to the possessors as to me that was a spectator? The bravery
was shown, it was not possessed; while it boasted itself it perished. It
is vile, and a poor thing to place our happiness on these desires. Say
we wanted them all. Famine ends famine.
_De mollibus et effoeminatis_. --There is nothing valiant or solid to be
hoped for from such as are always kempt and perfumed, and every day smell
of the tailor; the exceedingly curious that are wholly in mending such an
imperfection in the face, in taking away the morphew in the neck, or
bleaching their hands at midnight, gumming and bridling their beards, or
making the waist small, binding it with hoops, while the mind runs at
waste; too much pickedness is not manly. Not from those that will jest
at their own outward imperfections, but hide their ulcers within, their
pride, lust, envy, ill-nature, with all the art and authority they can.
These persons are in danger, for whilst they think to justify their
ignorance by impudence, and their persons by clothes and outward
ornaments, they use but a commission to deceive themselves: where, if we
will look with our understanding, and not our senses, we may behold
virtue and beauty (though covered with rags) in their brightness; and
vice and deformity so much the fouler, in having all the splendour of
riches to gild them, or the false light of honour and power to help them.
Yet this is that wherewith the world is taken, and runs mad to gaze
on--clothes and titles, the birdlime of fools.
_De stultitia_. --What petty things they are we wonder at, like children
that esteem every trifle, and prefer a fairing before their fathers!
What difference is between us and them but that we are dearer fools,
coxcombs at a higher rate? They are pleased with cockleshells, whistles,
hobby-horses, and such like; we with statues, marble pillars, pictures,
gilded roofs, where underneath is lath and lime, perhaps loam. Yet we
take pleasure in the lie, and are glad we can cozen ourselves. Nor is it
only in our walls and ceilings, but all that we call happiness is mere
painting and gilt, and all for money. What a thin membrane of honour
that is! and how hath all true reputation fallen, since money began to
have any! Yet the great herd, the multitude, that in all other things
are divided, in this alone conspire and agree--to love money. They wish
for it, they embrace it, they adore it, while yet it is possessed with
greater stir and torment than it is gotten.
_De sibi molestis_. --Some men what losses soever they have they make them
greater, and if they have none, even all that is not gotten is a loss.
Can there be creatures of more wretched condition than these, that
continually labour under their own misery and others' envy? A man should
study other things, not to covet, not to fear, not to repent him; to make
his base such as no tempest shall shake him; to be secure of all opinion,
and pleasing to himself, even for that wherein he displeaseth others; for
the worst opinion gotten for doing well, should delight us. Wouldst not
thou be just but for fame, thou oughtest to be it with infamy; he that
would have his virtue published is not the servant of virtue, but glory.
_Periculosa melancholia_. --It is a dangerous thing when men's minds come
to sojourn with their affections, and their diseases eat into their
strength; that when too much desire and greediness of vice hath made the
body unfit, or unprofitable, it is yet gladded with the sight and
spectacle of it in others; and for want of ability to be an actor, is
content to be a witness. It enjoys the pleasure of sinning in beholding
others sin, as in dining, drinking, drabbing, &c. Nay, when it cannot do
all these, it is offended with his own narrowness, that excludes it from
the universal delights of mankind, and oftentimes dies of a melancholy,
that it cannot be vicious enough.
_Falsae species fugiendae_. --I am glad when I see any man avoid the infamy
of a vice; but to shun the vice itself were better. Till he do that he
is but like the 'pientice, who, being loth to be spied by his master
coming forth of Black Lucy's, went in again; to whom his master cried,
"The more thou runnest that way to hide thyself, the more thou art in the
place. " So are those that keep a tavern all day, that they may not be
seen at night. I have known lawyers, divines--yea, great ones--of this
heresy.
_Decipimur specie_. --There is a greater reverence had of things remote or
strange to us than of much better if they be nearer and fall under our
sense. Men, and almost all sorts of creatures, have their reputation by
distance. Rivers, the farther they run, and more from their spring, the
broader they are, and greater. And where our original is known, we are
less the confident; among strangers we trust fortune. Yet a man may live
as renowned at home, in his own country, or a private village, as in the
whole world. For it is virtue that gives glory; that will endenizen a
man everywhere.
makes a sound. Women's poets they are called, as you have women's
tailors.
"They write a verse as smooth, as soft as cream,
In which there is no torrent, nor scarce stream. "
You may sound these wits and find the depth of them with your middle
finger. They are cream-bowl or but puddle-deep.
_Not. _ 6. --Some that turn over all books, and are equally searching in all
papers; that write out of what they presently find or meet, without
choice. By which means it happens that what they have discredited and
impugned in one week, they have before or after extolled the same in
another. Such are all the essayists, even their master Montaigne.
These, in all they write, confess still what books they have read last,
and therein their own folly so much, that they bring it to the stake raw
and undigested; not that the place did need it neither, but that they
thought themselves furnished and would vent it.
_Not. _ 7. --Some, again who, after they have got authority, or, which is
less, opinion, by their writings, to have read much, dare presently to
feign whole books and authors, and lie safely. For what never was, will
not easily be found, not by the most curious.
_Not. _ 8. --And some, by a cunning protestation against all reading, and
false venditation of their own naturals, think to divert the sagacity of
their readers from themselves, and cool the scent of their own fox-like
thefts; when yet they are so rank, as a man may find whole pages together
usurped from one author; their necessities compelling them to read for
present use, which could not be in many books; and so come forth more
ridiculously and palpably guilty than those who, because they cannot
trace, they yet would slander their industry.
_Not. _ 9. --But the wretcheder are the obstinate contemners of all helps
and arts; such as presuming on their own naturals (which, perhaps, are
excellent), dare deride all diligence, and seem to mock at the terms when
they understand not the things; thinking that way to get off wittily with
their ignorance. These are imitated often by such as are their peers in
negligence, though they cannot be in nature; and they utter all they can
think with a kind of violence and indisposition, unexamined, without
relation either to person, place, or any fitness else; and the more
wilful and stubborn they are in it the more learned they are esteemed of
the multitude, through their excellent vice of judgment, who think those
things the stronger that have no art; as if to break were better than to
open, or to rend asunder gentler than to loose.
_Not. _ 10. --It cannot but come to pass that these men who commonly seek to
do more than enough may sometimes happen on something that is good and
great; but very seldom: and when it comes it doth not recompense the rest
of their ill. For their jests, and their sentences (which they only and
ambitiously seek for) stick out, and are more eminent, because all is
sordid and vile about them; as lights are more discerned in a thick
darkness than a faint shadow. Now, because they speak all they can
(however unfitly), they are thought to have the greater copy; where the
learned use ever election and a mean, they look back to what they
intended at first, and make all an even and proportioned body. The true
artificer will not run away from Nature as he were afraid of her, or
depart from life and the likeness of truth, but speak to the capacity of
his hearers. And though his language differ from the vulgar somewhat, it
shall not fly from all humanity, with the Tamerlanes and Tamer-chains of
the late age, which had nothing in them but the scenical strutting and
furious vociferation to warrant them to the ignorant gapers. He knows it
is his only art so to carry it, as none but artificers perceive it. In
the meantime, perhaps, he is called barren, dull, lean, a poor writer, or
by what contumelious word can come in their cheeks, by these men who,
without labour, judgment, knowledge, or almost sense, are received or
preferred before him. He gratulates them and their fortune. Another
age, or juster men, will acknowledge the virtues of his studies, his
wisdom in dividing, his subtlety in arguing, with what strength he doth
inspire his readers, with what sweetness he strokes them; in inveighing,
what sharpness; in jest, what urbanity he uses; how he doth reign in
men's affections; how invade and break in upon them, and makes their
minds like the thing he writes. Then in his elocution to behold what
word is proper, which hath ornaments, which height, what is beautifully
translated, where figures are fit, which gentle, which strong, to show
the composition manly; and how he hath avoided faint, obscure, obscene,
sordid, humble, improper, or effeminate phrase; which is not only praised
of the most, but commended (which is worse), especially for that it is
naught.
_Ignorantia animae_. --I know no disease of the soul but ignorance, not of
the arts and sciences, but of itself; yet relating to those it is a
pernicious evil, the darkener of man's life, the disturber of his reason,
and common confounder of truth, with which a man goes groping in the
dark, no otherwise than if he were blind. Great understandings are most
racked and troubled with it; nay, sometimes they will rather choose to
die than not to know the things they study for. Think, then, what an
evil it is, and what good the contrary.
_Scientia_. --Knowledge is the action of the soul and is perfect without
the senses, as having the seeds of all science and virtue in itself; but
not without the service of the senses; by these organs the soul works:
she is a perpetual agent, prompt and subtle; but often flexible and
erring, entangling herself like a silkworm, but her reason is a weapon
with two edges, and cuts through. In her indagations oft-times new
scents put her by, and she takes in errors into her by the same conduits
she doth truths.
_Otium Studiorum_. --Ease and relaxation are profitable to all studies.
The mind is like a bow, the stronger by being unbent. But the temper in
spirits is all, when to command a man's wit, when to favour it. I have
known a man vehement on both sides, that knew no mean, either to intermit
his studies or call upon them again. When he hath set himself to writing
he would join night to day, press upon himself without release, not
minding it, till he fainted; and when he left off, resolve himself into
all sports and looseness again, that it was almost a despair to draw him
to his book; but once got to it, he grew stronger and more earnest by the
ease. His whole powers were renewed; he would work out of himself what
he desired, but with such excess as his study could not be ruled; he knew
not how to dispose his own abilities, or husband them; he was of that
immoderate power against himself. Nor was he only a strong, but an
absolute speaker and writer; but his subtlety did not show itself; his
judgment thought that a vice; for the ambush hurts more that is hid. He
never forced his language, nor went out of the highway of speaking but
for some great necessity or apparent profit; for he denied figures to be
invented for ornament, but for aid; and still thought it an extreme
madness to bind or wrest that which ought to be right.
_Stili eminentia_. --_Virgil_. --_Tully_. --_Sallust_. --It is no wonder men's
eminence appears but in their own way. Virgil's felicity left him in
prose, as Tully's forsook him in verse. Sallust's orations are read in
the honour of story, yet the most eloquent. Plato's speech, which he
made for Socrates, is neither worthy of the patron nor the person
defended. Nay, in the same kind of oratory, and where the matter is one,
you shall have him that reasons strongly, open negligently; another that
prepares well, not fit so well. And this happens not only to brains, but
to bodies. One can wrestle well, another run well, a third leap or throw
the bar, a fourth lift or stop a cart going; each hath his way of
strength. So in other creatures--some dogs are for the deer, some for the
wild boar, some are fox-hounds, some otter-hounds. Nor are all horses
for the coach or saddle, some are for the cart and paniers.
_De Claris Oratoribus_. --I have known many excellent men that would speak
suddenly to the admiration of their hearers, who upon study and
premeditation have been forsaken by their own wits, and no way answered
their fame; their eloquence was greater than their reading, and the
things they uttered better than those they knew; their fortune deserved
better of them than their care. For men of present spirits, and of
greater wits than study, do please more in the things they invent than in
those they bring. And I have heard some of them compelled to speak, out
of necessity, that have so infinitely exceeded themselves, as it was
better both for them and their auditory that they were so surprised, not
prepared. Nor was it safe then to cross them, for their adversary, their
anger made them more eloquent. Yet these men I could not but love and
admire, that they returned to their studies. They left not diligence (as
many do) when their rashness prospered; for diligence is a great aid,
even to an indifferent wit; when we are not contented with the examples
of our own age, but would know the face of the former. Indeed, the more
we confer with the more we profit by, if the persons be chosen.
_Dominus Verulamius_. --One, though he be excellent and the chief, is not
to be imitated alone; for no imitator ever grew up to his author;
likeness is always on this side truth. Yet there happened in my time one
noble speaker who was full of gravity in his speaking; his language
(where he could spare or pass by a jest) was nobly censorious. No man
ever spake more neatly, more pressly, more weightily, or suffered less
emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of his speech
but consisted of his own graces. His hearers could not cough, or look
aside from him, without loss. He commanded where he spoke, and had his
judges angry and pleased at his devotion. No man had their affections
more in his power. The fear of every man that heard him was lest he
should make an end.
_Scriptorum catalogus_. {59a} Cicero is said to be the only wit that the
people of Rome had equalled to their empire. _Ingenium par imperio_. We
have had many, and in their several ages (to take in but the former
_seculum_) Sir Thomas More, the elder Wiat, Henry Earl of Surrey,
Chaloner, Smith, Eliot, B. Gardiner, were for their times admirable; and
the more, because they began eloquence with us. Sir Nicolas Bacon was
singular, and almost alone, in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's time.
Sir Philip Sidney and Mr. Hooker (in different matter) grew great masters
of wit and language, and in whom all vigour of invention and strength of
judgment met. The Earl of Essex, noble and high; and Sir Walter Raleigh,
not to be contemned, either for judgment or style. Sir Henry Savile,
grave, and truly lettered; Sir Edwin Sandys, excellent in both; Lord
Egerton, the Chancellor, a grave and great orator, and best when he was
provoked; but his learned and able (though unfortunate) successor is he
who hath filled up all numbers, and performed that in our tongue which
may be compared or preferred either to insolent Greece or haughty Rome.
In short, within his view, and about his times, were all the wits born
that could honour a language or help study. Now things daily fall, wits
grow downward, and eloquence grows backward; so that he may be named and
stand as the mark and ? ? ? ? of our language.
_De augmentis scientiarum_. --_Julius Caesar_. --_Lord St. Alban_. --I have ever
observed it to have been the office of a wise patriot, among the greatest
affairs of the State, to take care of the commonwealth of learning. For
schools, they are the seminaries of State; and nothing is worthier the
study of a statesman than that part of the republic which we call the
advancement of letters. Witness the care of Julius Caesar, who, in the
heat of the civil war, writ his books of Analogy, and dedicated them to
Tully. This made the late Lord St. Alban entitle his work _Novum
Organum_; which, though by the most of superficial men, who cannot get
beyond the title of nominals, it is not penetrated nor understood, it
really openeth all defects of learning whatsoever, and is a book
"Qui longum note scriptori proroget aevum. " {62a}
My conceit of his person was never increased toward him by his place or
honours; but I have and do reverence him for the greatness that was only
proper to himself, in that he seemed to me ever, by his work, one of the
greatest men, and most worthy of admiration, that had been in many ages.
In his adversity I ever prayed that God would give him strength; for
greatness he could not want. Neither could I condole in a word or
syllable for him, as knowing no accident could do harm to virtue, but
rather help to make it manifest.
_De corruptela morum_. --There cannot be one colour of the mind, another of
the wit. If the mind be staid, grave, and composed, the wit is so; that
vitiated, the other is blown and deflowered. Do we not see, if the mind
languish, the members are dull? Look upon an effeminate person, his very
gait confesseth him. If a man be fiery, his motion is so; if angry, it
is troubled and violent. So that we may conclude wheresoever manners and
fashions are corrupted, language is. It imitates the public riot. The
excess of feasts and apparel are the notes of a sick state, and the
wantonness of language of a sick mind.
_De rebus mundanis_. --If we would consider what our affairs are indeed,
not what they are called, we should find more evils belonging to us than
happen to us. How often doth that which was called a calamity prove the
beginning and cause of a man's happiness? and, on the contrary, that
which happened or came to another with great gratulation and applause,
how it hath lifted him but a step higher to his ruin? as if he stood
before where he might fall safely.
_Vulgi mores_. --_Morbus comitialis_. --The vulgar are commonly ill-natured,
and always grudging against their governors: which makes that a prince
has more business and trouble with them than ever Hercules had with the
bull or any other beast; by how much they have more heads than will be
reined with one bridle. There was not that variety of beasts in the ark,
as is of beastly natures in the multitude; especially when they come to
that iniquity to censure their sovereign's actions. Then all the
counsels are made good or bad by the events; and it falleth out that the
same facts receive from them the names, now of diligence, now of vanity,
now of majesty, now of fury; where they ought wholly to hang on his
mouth, as he to consist of himself, and not others' counsels.
_Princeps_. --After God, nothing is to be loved of man like the prince; he
violates Nature that doth it not with his whole heart. For when he hath
put on the care of the public good and common safety, I am a wretch, and
put off man, if I do not reverence and honour him, in whose charge all
things divine and human are placed. Do but ask of Nature why all living
creatures are less delighted with meat and drink that sustains them than
with venery that wastes them? and she will tell thee, the first respects
but a private, the other a common good, propagation.
_De eodem_. --_Orpheus' Hymn_. --He is the arbiter of life and death: when he
finds no other subject for his mercy, he should spare himself. All his
punishments are rather to correct than to destroy. Why are prayers with
Orpheus said to be the daughters of Jupiter, but that princes are thereby
admonished that the petitions of the wretched ought to have more weight
with them than the laws themselves.
_De opt. Rege Jacobo_. --It was a great accumulation to His Majesty's
deserved praise that men might openly visit and pity those whom his
greatest prisons had at any time received or his laws condemned.
_De Princ. adjunctis_. --_Sed vere prudens haud concipi possit Princeps_,
_nisi simul et bonus_. --_Lycurgus_. --_Sylla_. --_Lysander_. --_Cyrus_. --Wise is
rather the attribute of a prince than learned or good. The learned man
profits others rather than himself; the good man rather himself than
others; but the prince commands others, and doth himself.
The wise Lycurgus gave no law but what himself kept. Sylla and Lysander
did not so; the one living extremely dissolute himself, enforced
frugality by the laws; the other permitted those licenses to others which
himself abstained from. But the prince's prudence is his chief art and
safety. In his counsels and deliberations he foresees the future times:
in the equity of his judgment he hath remembrance of the past, and
knowledge of what is to be done or avoided for the present. Hence the
Persians gave out their Cyrus to have been nursed by a bitch, a creature
to encounter it, as of sagacity to seek out good; showing that wisdom may
accompany fortitude, or it leaves to be, and puts on the name of
rashness.
_De malign. studentium_. --There be some men are born only to suck out the
poison of books: _Habent venenum pro victu_; _imo_, _pro deliciis_. {66a}
And such are they that only relish the obscene and foul things in poets,
which makes the profession taxed. But by whom? Men that watch for it;
and, had they not had this hint, are so unjust valuers of letters as they
think no learning good but what brings in gain. It shows they themselves
would never have been of the professions they are but for the profits and
fees. But if another learning, well used, can instruct to good life,
inform manners, no less persuade and lead men than they threaten and
compel, and have no reward, is it therefore the worst study? I could
never think the study of wisdom confined only to the philosopher, or of
piety to the divine, or of state to the politic; but that he which can
feign a commonwealth (which is the poet) can govern it with counsels,
strengthen it with laws, correct it with judgments, inform it with
religion and morals, is all these. We do not require in him mere
elocution, or an excellent faculty in verse, but the exact knowledge of
all virtues and their contraries, with ability to render the one loved,
the other hated, by his proper embattling them. The philosophers did
insolently, to challenge only to themselves that which the greatest
generals and gravest counsellors never durst. For such had rather do
than promise the best things.
_Controvers. scriptores_. --_More Andabatarum qui clausis oculis
pugnant_. --Some controverters in divinity are like swaggerers in a tavern
that catch that which stands next them, the candlestick or pots; turn
everything into a weapon: ofttimes they fight blindfold, and both beat
the air. The one milks a he-goat, the other holds under a sieve. Their
arguments are as fluxive as liquor spilt upon a table, which with your
finger you may drain as you will. Such controversies or disputations
(carried with more labour than profit) are odious; where most times the
truth is lost in the midst or left untouched. And the fruit of their
fight is, that they spit one upon another, and are both defiled. These
fencers in religion I like not.
_Morbi_. --The body hath certain diseases that are with less evil tolerated
than removed. As if to cure a leprosy a man should bathe himself with
the warm blood of a murdered child, so in the Church some errors may be
dissimuled with less inconvenience than they can be discovered.
_Jactantia intempestiva_. --Men that talk of their own benefits are not
believed to talk of them because they have done them; but to have done
them because they might talk of them. That which had been great, if
another had reported it of them, vanisheth, and is nothing, if he that
did it speak of it. For men, when they cannot destroy the deed, will yet
be glad to take advantage of the boasting, and lessen it.
_Adulatio_. --I have seen that poverty makes me do unfit things; but honest
men should not do them; they should gain otherwise. Though a man be
hungry, he should not play the parasite. That hour wherein I would
repent me to be honest, there were ways enough open for me to be rich.
But flattery is a fine pick-lock of tender ears; especially of those whom
fortune hath borne high upon their wings, that submit their dignity and
authority to it, by a soothing of themselves. For, indeed, men could
never be taken in that abundance with the springes of others' flattery,
if they began not there; if they did but remember how much more
profitable the bitterness of truth were, than all the honey distilling
from a whorish voice, which is not praise, but poison. But now it is
come to that extreme folly, or rather madness, with some, that he that
flatters them modestly or sparingly is thought to malign them. If their
friend consent not to their vices, though he do not contradict them, he
is nevertheless an enemy. When they do all things the worst way, even
then they look for praise. Nay, they will hire fellows to flatter them
with suits and suppers, and to prostitute their judgments. They have
livery-friends, friends of the dish, and of the spit, that wait their
turns, as my lord has his feasts and guests.
_De vita humana_. --I have considered our whole life is like a play:
wherein every man forgetful of himself, is in travail with expression of
another. Nay, we so insist in imitating others, as we cannot when it is
necessary return to ourselves; like children, that imitate the vices of
stammerers so long, till at last they become such; and make the habit to
another nature, as it is never forgotten.
_De piis et probis_. --Good men are the stars, the planets of the ages
wherein they live and illustrate the times. God did never let them be
wanting to the world: as Abel, for an example of innocency, Enoch of
purity, Noah of trust in God's mercies, Abraham of faith, and so of the
rest. These, sensual men thought mad because they would not be partakers
or practisers of their madness.
But they, placed high on the top of all
virtue, looked down on the stage of the world and contemned the play of
fortune. For though the most be players, some must be spectators.
_Mores aulici_. --I have discovered that a feigned familiarity in great
ones is a note of certain usurpation on the less. For great and popular
men feign themselves to be servants to others to make those slaves to
them. So the fisher provides bait for the trout, roach, dace, &c. , that
they may be food to him.
_Impiorum querela_. --_Augusties_. --_Varus_. --_Tiberius_. --The complaint of
Caligula was most wicked of the condition of his times, when he said they
were not famous for any public calamity, as the reign of Augustus was, by
the defeat of Varus and the legions; and that of Tiberius, by the falling
of the theatre at Fidenae; whilst his oblivion was eminent through the
prosperity of his affairs. As that other voice of his was worthier a
headsman than a head when he wished the people of Rome had but one neck.
But he found when he fell they had many hands. A tyrant, how great and
mighty soever he may seem to cowards and sluggards, is but one creature,
one animal.
_Nobilium ingenia_. --I have marked among the nobility some are so addicted
to the service of the prince and commonwealth, as they look not for
spoil; such are to be honoured and loved. There are others which no
obligation will fasten on; and they are of two sorts. The first are such
as love their own ease; or, out of vice, of nature, or self-direction,
avoid business and care. Yet these the prince may use with safety. The
other remove themselves upon craft and design, as the architects say,
with a premeditated thought, to their own rather than their prince's
profit. Such let the prince take heed of, and not doubt to reckon in the
list of his open enemies.
_Principum. varia_. --_Firmissima vero omnium basis jus haereditarium
Principis_. --There is a great variation between him that is raised to the
sovereignty by the favour of his peers and him that comes to it by the
suffrage of the people. The first holds with more difficulty, because he
hath to do with many that think themselves his equals, and raised him for
their own greatness and oppression of the rest. The latter hath no
upbraiders, but was raised by them that sought to be defended from
oppression: whose end is both easier and the honester to satisfy.
Beside, while he hath the people to friend, who are a multitude, he hath
the less fear of the nobility, who are but few. Nor let the common
proverb (of he that builds on the people builds on the dirt) discredit my
opinion: for that hath only place where an ambitious and private person,
for some popular end, trusts in them against the public justice and
magistrate. There they will leave him. But when a prince governs them,
so as they have still need of his administrations (for that is his art),
he shall ever make and hold them faithful.
_Clementia_. --_Machiavell_. --A prince should exercise his cruelty not by
himself but by his ministers; so he may save himself and his dignity with
his people by sacrificing those when he list, saith the great doctor of
state, Machiavell. But I say he puts off man and goes into a beast, that
is cruel. No virtue is a prince's own, or becomes him more, than this
clemency: and no glory is greater than to be able to save with his power.
Many punishments sometimes, and in some cases, as much discredit a
prince, as many funerals a physician. The state of things is secured by
clemency; severity represseth a few, but irritates more. {74a} The
lopping of trees makes the boughs shoot out thicker; and the taking away
of some kind of enemies increaseth the number. It is then most gracious
in a prince to pardon when many about him would make him cruel; to think
then how much he can save when others tell him how much he can destroy;
not to consider what the impotence of others hath demolished, but what
his own greatness can sustain. These are a prince's virtues: and they
that give him other counsels are but the hangman's factors.
_Clementia tutela optima_. --He that is cruel to halves (saith the said St.
Nicholas {74b}) loseth no less the opportunity of his cruelty than of his
benefits: for then to use his cruelty is too late; and to use his favours
will be interpreted fear and necessity, and so he loseth the thanks.
Still the counsel is cruelty. But princes, by hearkening to cruel
counsels, become in time obnoxious to the authors, their flatterers, and
ministers; and are brought to that, that when they would, they dare not
change them; they must go on and defend cruelty with cruelty; they cannot
alter the habit. It is then grown necessary, they must be as ill as
those have made them: and in the end they will grow more hateful to
themselves than to their subjects. Whereas, on the contrary, the
merciful prince is safe in love, not in fear. He needs no emissaries,
spies, intelligencers to entrap true subjects. He fears no libels, no
treasons. His people speak what they think, and talk openly what they do
in secret. They have nothing in their breasts that they need a cypher
for. He is guarded with his own benefits.
_Religio_. _Palladium Homeri_. --_Euripides_. --The strength of empire is in
religion. What else is the Palladium (with Homer) that kept Troy so long
from sacking? Nothing more commends the Sovereign to the subject than
it. For he that is religious must be merciful and just necessarily: and
they are two strong ties upon mankind. Justice the virtue that innocence
rejoiceth in. Yet even that is not always so safe, but it may love to
stand in the sight of mercy. For sometimes misfortune is made a crime,
and then innocence is succoured no less than virtue. Nay, oftentimes
virtue is made capital; and through the condition of the times it may
happen that that may be punished with our praise. Let no man therefore
murmur at the actions of the prince, who is placed so far above him. If
he offend, he hath his discoverer. God hath a height beyond him. But
where the prince is good, Euripides saith, "God is a guest in a human
body. "
_Tyranni_. --_Sejanus_. --There is nothing with some princes sacred above
their majesty, or profane, but what violates their sceptres. But a
prince, with such a council, is like the god Terminus, of stone, his own
landmark, or (as it is in the fable) a crowned lion. It is dangerous
offending such a one, who, being angry, knows not how to forgive; that
cares not to do anything for maintaining or enlarging of empire; kills
not men or subjects, but destroyeth whole countries, armies, mankind,
male and female, guilty or not guilty, holy or profane; yea, some that
have not seen the light. All is under the law of their spoil and
licence. But princes that neglect their proper office thus their fortune
is oftentimes to draw a Sejanus to be near about them, who at last affect
to get above them, and put them in a worthy fear of rooting both them out
and their family. For no men hate an evil prince more than they that
helped to make him such. And none more boastingly weep his ruin than
they that procured and practised it. The same path leads to ruin which
did to rule when men profess a licence in government. A good king is a
public servant.
_Illiteratus princeps_. --A prince without letters is a pilot without eyes.
All his government is groping. In sovereignty it is a most happy thing
not to be compelled; but so it is the most miserable not to be
counselled. And how can he be counselled that cannot see to read the
best counsellors (which are books), for they neither flatter us nor hide
from us? He may hear, you will say; but how shall he always be sure to
hear truth, or be counselled the best things, not the sweetest? They say
princes learn no art truly but the art of horsemanship. The reason is
the brave beast is no flatterer. He will throw a prince as soon as his
groom. Which is an argument that the good counsellors to princes are the
best instruments of a good age. For though the prince himself be of a
most prompt inclination to all virtue, yet the best pilots have needs of
mariners besides sails, anchor, and other tackle.
_Character principis_. --_Alexander magnus_. --If men did know what shining
fetters, gilded miseries, and painted happiness thrones and sceptres were
there would not be so frequent strife about the getting or holding of
them; there would be more principalities than princes; for a prince is
the pastor of the people. He ought to shear, not to flay his sheep; to
take their fleeces, not their the soul of the commonwealth, and ought to
cherish it as his own body. Alexander the Great was wont to say, "He
hated that gardener that plucked his herbs or flowers up by the roots. "
A man may milk a beast till the blood come; churn milk and it yieldeth
butter, but wring the nose and the blood followeth. He is an ill prince
that so pulls his subjects' feathers as he would not have them grow
again; that makes his exchequer a receipt for the spoils of those he
governs. No, let him keep his own, not affect his subjects'; strive
rather to be called just than powerful. Not, like the Roman tyrants,
affect the surnames that grow by human slaughters; neither to seek war in
peace, nor peace in war, but to observe faith given, though to an enemy.
Study piety toward the subject; show care to defend him. Be slow to
punish in divers cases, but be a sharp and severe revenger of open
crimes. Break no decrees or dissolve no orders to slacken the strength
of laws. Choose neither magistrates, civil or ecclesiastical, by favour
or price; but with long disquisition and report of their worth by all
suffrages. Sell no honours, nor give them hastily, but bestow them with
counsel and for reward; if he do, acknowledge it (though late), and mend
it. For princes are easy to be deceived; and what wisdom can escape
where so many court-arts are studied? But, above all, the prince is to
remember that when the great day of account comes, which neither
magistrate nor prince can shun, there will be required of him a reckoning
for those whom he hath trusted, as for himself, which he must provide.
And if piety be wanting in the priests, equity in the judges, or the
magistrates be found rated at a price, what justice or religion is to be
expected? which are the only two attributes make kings akin to God, and
is the Delphic sword, both to kill sacrifices and to chastise offenders.
_De gratiosis_. --When a virtuous man is raised, it brings gladness to his
friends, grief to his enemies, and glory to his posterity. Nay, his
honours are a great part of the honour of the times; when by this means
he is grown to active men an example, to the slothful a spur, to the
envious a punishment.
_Divites_. --_Heredes ex asse_. He which is sole heir to many rich men,
having (besides his father's and uncle's) the estates of divers his
kindred come to him by accession, must needs be richer than father or
grandfather; so they which are left heirs _ex asse_ of all their
ancestors' vices, and by their good husbandry improve the old and daily
purchase new, must needs be wealthier in vice, and have a greater revenue
or stock of ill to spend on.
_Fures publici_. --The great thieves of a state are lightly the officers of
the crown; they hang the less still, play the pikes in the pond, eat whom
they list. The net was never spread for the hawk or buzzard that hurt
us, but the harmless birds; they are good meat:--
"Dat veniam corvis, vexat censura columbas. " {81a}
"Non rete accipitri tenditur, neque milvio. " {81b}
_Lewis XI_. --But they are not always safe though, especially when they
meet with wise masters. They can take down all the huff and swelling of
their looks, and like dexterous auditors place the counter where he shall
value nothing. Let them but remember Lewis XI. , who to a Clerk of the
Exchequer that came to be Lord Treasurer, and had (for his device)
represented himself sitting on fortune's wheel, told him he might do well
to fasten it with a good strong nail, lest, turning about, it might bring
him where he was again. As indeed it did.
_De bonis et malis_. --_De innocentia_. --A good man will avoid the spot of
any sin. The very aspersion is grievous, which makes him choose his way
in his life as he would in his journey. The ill man rides through all
confidently; he is coated and booted for it. The oftener he offends, the
more openly, and the fouler, the fitter in fashion. His modesty, like a
riding-coat, the more it is worn is the less cared for. It is good
enough for the dirt still, and the ways he travels in. An innocent man
needs no eloquence, his innocence is instead of it, else I had never come
off so many times from these precipices, whither men's malice hath
pursued me. It is true I have been accused to the lords, to the king,
and by great ones, but it happened my accusers had not thought of the
accusation with themselves, and so were driven, for want of crimes, to
use invention, which was found slander, or too late (being entered so
fair) to seek starting-holes for their rashness, which were not given
them. And then they may think what accusation that was like to prove,
when they that were the engineers feared to be the authors. Nor were
they content to feign things against me, but to urge things, feigned by
the ignorant, against my profession, which though, from their hired and
mercenary impudence, I might have passed by as granted to a nation of
barkers that let out their tongues to lick others' sores; yet I durst not
leave myself undefended, having a pair of ears unskilful to hear lies, or
have those things said of me which I could truly prove of them. They
objected making of verses to me, when I could object to most of them,
their not being able to read them, but as worthy of scorn. Nay, they
would offer to urge mine own writings against me, but by pieces (which
was an excellent way of malice), as if any man's context might not seem
dangerous and offensive, if that which was knit to what went before were
defrauded of his beginning; or that things by themselves uttered might
not seem subject to calumny, which read entire would appear most free.
At last they upbraided my poverty: I confess she is my domestic; sober of
diet, simple of habit, frugal, painful, a good counseller to me, that
keeps me from cruelty, pride, or other more delicate impertinences, which
are the nurse-children of riches. But let them look over all the great
and monstrous wickednesses, they shall never find those in poor families.
They are the issue of the wealthy giants and the mighty hunters, whereas
no great work, or worthy of praise or memory, but came out of poor
cradles. It was the ancient poverty that founded commonweals, built
cities, invented arts, made wholesome laws, armed men against vices,
rewarded them with their own virtues, and preserved the honour and state
of nations, till they betrayed themselves to riches.
_Amor nummi_. --Money never made any man rich, but his mind. He that can
order himself to the law of Nature is not only without the sense but the
fear of poverty. O! but to strike blind the people with our wealth and
pomp is the thing! What a wretchedness is this, to thrust all our riches
outward, and be beggars within; to contemplate nothing but the little,
vile, and sordid things of the world; not the great, noble, and precious!
We serve our avarice, and, not content with the good of the earth that is
offered us, we search and dig for the evil that is hidden. God offered
us those things, and placed them at hand, and near us, that He knew were
profitable for us, but the hurtful He laid deep and hid. Yet do we seek
only the things whereby we may perish, and bring them forth, when God and
Nature hath buried them. We covet superfluous things, when it were more
honour for us if we would contemn necessary. What need hath Nature of
silver dishes, multitudes of waiters, delicate pages, perfumed napkins?
She requires meat only, and hunger is not ambitious. Can we think no
wealth enough but such a state for which a man may be brought into a
premunire, begged, proscribed, or poisoned? O! if a man could restrain
the fury of his gullet and groin, and think how many fires, how many
kitchens, cooks, pastures, and ploughed lands; what orchards, stews,
ponds and parks, coops and garners, he could spare; what velvets,
tissues, embroideries, laces, he could lack; and then how short and
uncertain his life is; he were in a better way to happiness than to live
the emperor of these delights, and be the dictator of fashions; but we
make ourselves slaves to our pleasures, and we serve fame and ambition,
which is an equal slavery. Have not I seen the pomp of a whole kingdom,
and what a foreign king could bring hither? Also to make himself gazed
and wondered at--laid forth, as it were, to the show--and vanish all away
in a day? And shall that which could not fill the expectation of few
hours, entertain and take up our whole lives, when even it appeared as
superfluous to the possessors as to me that was a spectator? The bravery
was shown, it was not possessed; while it boasted itself it perished. It
is vile, and a poor thing to place our happiness on these desires. Say
we wanted them all. Famine ends famine.
_De mollibus et effoeminatis_. --There is nothing valiant or solid to be
hoped for from such as are always kempt and perfumed, and every day smell
of the tailor; the exceedingly curious that are wholly in mending such an
imperfection in the face, in taking away the morphew in the neck, or
bleaching their hands at midnight, gumming and bridling their beards, or
making the waist small, binding it with hoops, while the mind runs at
waste; too much pickedness is not manly. Not from those that will jest
at their own outward imperfections, but hide their ulcers within, their
pride, lust, envy, ill-nature, with all the art and authority they can.
These persons are in danger, for whilst they think to justify their
ignorance by impudence, and their persons by clothes and outward
ornaments, they use but a commission to deceive themselves: where, if we
will look with our understanding, and not our senses, we may behold
virtue and beauty (though covered with rags) in their brightness; and
vice and deformity so much the fouler, in having all the splendour of
riches to gild them, or the false light of honour and power to help them.
Yet this is that wherewith the world is taken, and runs mad to gaze
on--clothes and titles, the birdlime of fools.
_De stultitia_. --What petty things they are we wonder at, like children
that esteem every trifle, and prefer a fairing before their fathers!
What difference is between us and them but that we are dearer fools,
coxcombs at a higher rate? They are pleased with cockleshells, whistles,
hobby-horses, and such like; we with statues, marble pillars, pictures,
gilded roofs, where underneath is lath and lime, perhaps loam. Yet we
take pleasure in the lie, and are glad we can cozen ourselves. Nor is it
only in our walls and ceilings, but all that we call happiness is mere
painting and gilt, and all for money. What a thin membrane of honour
that is! and how hath all true reputation fallen, since money began to
have any! Yet the great herd, the multitude, that in all other things
are divided, in this alone conspire and agree--to love money. They wish
for it, they embrace it, they adore it, while yet it is possessed with
greater stir and torment than it is gotten.
_De sibi molestis_. --Some men what losses soever they have they make them
greater, and if they have none, even all that is not gotten is a loss.
Can there be creatures of more wretched condition than these, that
continually labour under their own misery and others' envy? A man should
study other things, not to covet, not to fear, not to repent him; to make
his base such as no tempest shall shake him; to be secure of all opinion,
and pleasing to himself, even for that wherein he displeaseth others; for
the worst opinion gotten for doing well, should delight us. Wouldst not
thou be just but for fame, thou oughtest to be it with infamy; he that
would have his virtue published is not the servant of virtue, but glory.
_Periculosa melancholia_. --It is a dangerous thing when men's minds come
to sojourn with their affections, and their diseases eat into their
strength; that when too much desire and greediness of vice hath made the
body unfit, or unprofitable, it is yet gladded with the sight and
spectacle of it in others; and for want of ability to be an actor, is
content to be a witness. It enjoys the pleasure of sinning in beholding
others sin, as in dining, drinking, drabbing, &c. Nay, when it cannot do
all these, it is offended with his own narrowness, that excludes it from
the universal delights of mankind, and oftentimes dies of a melancholy,
that it cannot be vicious enough.
_Falsae species fugiendae_. --I am glad when I see any man avoid the infamy
of a vice; but to shun the vice itself were better. Till he do that he
is but like the 'pientice, who, being loth to be spied by his master
coming forth of Black Lucy's, went in again; to whom his master cried,
"The more thou runnest that way to hide thyself, the more thou art in the
place. " So are those that keep a tavern all day, that they may not be
seen at night. I have known lawyers, divines--yea, great ones--of this
heresy.
_Decipimur specie_. --There is a greater reverence had of things remote or
strange to us than of much better if they be nearer and fall under our
sense. Men, and almost all sorts of creatures, have their reputation by
distance. Rivers, the farther they run, and more from their spring, the
broader they are, and greater. And where our original is known, we are
less the confident; among strangers we trust fortune. Yet a man may live
as renowned at home, in his own country, or a private village, as in the
whole world. For it is virtue that gives glory; that will endenizen a
man everywhere.
