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PLUTARCH'S MORALS.

TRANSLATED ΓΙΙΟΜ THE GREEK BY SEVERAL HANDS.

r/i/'^^t-c./ius

CORRECTED AND REVISED

BY

IVILLL'IM λΥ. GOODWIN, Pii. D.,

PROFESSOR OF GREEK LITERATURE IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY.

AN INTRODUCTION BY RALPH WALDO E.MERSON.

Vol. I.

BOSTON: LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.

1878.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the j'ear 1870, by

LITTLE, rRi)WN, AND COMPANlf,

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.

cambuidgk: l-kess of juhn avilson and son.

EDITOR'S PREFACE.

The translation of Plutarch's Morals "by Several Hands" was first published in London in 1684-1694. The fifth edition, « re- vised and corrected from the many errors of the former editions," published in 1718, is the basis of the present translation. The earlier translation made by Philemon Holland, Doctor of Physick, published in London in 1003 and a^ain in 1657, has often been of great use in the revision. It hardly need be stated, that the name "Morals" is used by tradition to include all the works of Plutarch except the Lives.

The original editions of the present work contained translations of every grade of merit. Some of the essays were translated by eminent scholars like William Baxter (nephew of Richard Baxter) and Thomas Creech, whose work generally required merely such revision as every translation of such an age would now need. But a large number, including some of the longest and most difficult treatises, were translated by men whose ignorance of Greek — or whatever language was the immediate ancestor of their own version — was only one of their many defects as translators. Perhaps we may gain a better idea than we have had of the scholars of Oxford whom Bentley delighted to tor- ment, from these specimens of the learning of their generation; and it may have been a fortunate thing for some of our translators that Bentley w&s too much occupied with the wise heads of Christ Church to be able to notice the blunders of men who could write notes saying that the Parthenon is "a Promontory shoot- ing into the Black Sea, where stood a Chappel dedicated to some Virgin God-head, and famous for some Victory thereabout ob- tained;"' or who could torture a plain statement that a certain water when stirred produced bubbles (^πομ(ρόλνγες'ι into a story of a

Vi EDITOR'S PREFACE.

new substance called Pompholt/x, " made by Mixture of Brass with the Air"! See Vol. V. p. 337, and Vol. III. p. 517, of the orig- inal translation.

]3esides the great variety of scholarship and ignorance, each translator had his own theory of translation. While some at- tempted a literal version, so as even to bracket all words not actually represented in the Greek, others gave a mere paraphrase, which in one case (Mr. Pulley n's " Customs of the Lacedaemo- nians •') became an original essay on the subject, based on the facts supplied by Plutarch. The present editor's duty, of course, changed with each new style of translation. It would have been impossible to bring the whole work to a uniform standard of verbal correctness, unless essentially a new translation had been made. The original version was often so hopelessly incorrect that no revision was possible; and here the editor cannot flatter him- self that he has succeeded in patching the English of the seven- teenth century with his own without detriment. Fortunately, the earlier translation of Holland supplied words, and even whole sentences, in many cases in which the other was beyond the help of mere revision. The translation of Holland is generally more accurate than the other, and, on the whole, a more con- scientious work ; its antiquated style and diffuseness, however, render it less fitted for republication at the present time. Not- withstanding all the defects of the translation which is here re- vised, it is beyond all question a more readable version than could be made now; and the liveliness of its style will more than make up to most readers for its want of literal correctness. It need not be stated to professional scholars, that translations made in the seventeenth century cannot, even by the most careful revision, be made to answer the demands of modern critical scholarship.

One of the greatest difficulties in preparing the present work has been to decide how much of the antiquated language of the old translation should be retained. On this point the editor has fortunately been able to consult the wisest and most experienced advisers, to whose aid he has been constantly indebted ; but even the highest authorities occasionally disagree on the first princi- ples. He is fully aware, therefore, that he has dissatisfied a large number of the friends of Plutarch in this respect ; but he is equally sure that he should have dissatisfied an equal number' by any other course which he might have followed. The general princi-

EDITOR'S PREFACE. VU

pie adopted has been to retain such expressions as were in good use when the translation was made, provided the meaning is obvious or easy to be learned from a dictionary, and to discard such as would be unintelligible to ordinary readers. It has, in some cases, been assumed that the use of a phrase of obvious meaning in this translation is of itself authority for accepting it. On these principles many words and expressions are retained, whicli are decidedly weaker than their modern equivalents, espe- cially many Latinisms and Gallicisms which now seem pedantic. Even here consistency has been impossible, where the duty of a reviser changed with every new treatise. Perhaps the editor can- not state his own object more correctly, than by saying that he has tried to make each treatise what the original translator would have made it if he had carried out his own purpose conscien- tiously and thoroughly. Where so many errors were to be cor- rected, it would be absurd to hope that many have not remained still uimoticed.

The corrupt state of the Greek text of many parts of Plutarch's Morals must not be overlooked. No complete edition of the Greek has been published since Wyttenbach's (1795-1800), except the French one by Diibner in the Didot collection. The latter gives no manuscript readings; and although it professes to be based partly on a new collation of the manuscripts in the pub- lic library of Paris, nothing distinguishes the changes made on this authority from conjectures of the editor and his predecessors. A slight glance at Wyttenbach will show that many parts of the text are restored by conjecture ; and many of the conjectures, though plausible and ingenious, are not such as would be ac- cepted by modern scholarship if they were made in earlier classic authors. A translator must accept many of these under silent protest; to enumerate one-half of them would introduce a critical commentary entirely out of place in a translation. In fact, no critical translation of these treatises is possible, until a thorough revision of the text, with the help of the best manuscripts, has been made; and this is a task from which most scholars would shrink in dismay. In many cases in this edition, blanks have been pre- ferred to uncertain conjectures or traditional nonsense. The treatises on Music, on the Procreation of the Soul, and the two on the Stoics, have many of their dark corners made darker by the utter uncertainty of the Greek text.

Vlll EDITOR'S PREFACE.

The essays in this edition follow the same order as in the old translation ; but those on Fortune, and on Virtue and Vice, with the Conjugal Precepts, are transferred from the beginning of vol- ume third to the end of volume second. The sections have been numbered in accordance with the modern editions of the Greek text. References to most of the classic authors quoted by Plutarch are given in the foot-notes, except where a quotation is a mere fragment of an unknown work. The tragic fragments are numbered according to the edition of Nauck (Leipsic, 1856). All notes (except these references) introduced by the editor are marked G. A few notes are taken from Holland ; and all which are not otherwise marked are retained from the old translation.

In conclusion, the editor must express his warmest thanks to his colleagues at the University and other friends who have kindly aided him with their advice and skill. Without their help, the undertaking would sometimes have seemed hopeless.

Habvard College,

November, 1870.

INTRODUCTION.

It is remarkable that of an author so familiar as Plutarch, not only to scholars, but to all reading men, and whose history is so easily gathered from his works, no accurate memoir of his life, not even tlie dates of his birth and death, slionld liave come down to us. Strange that the writer of so many illustrious biograjjhies should wait so long for his own. It is agreed that he was born about the year 50 a. d. He has been represented as having been the tutor of the Emperor Trajan, as dedicating one of ins books to him, as living long in Rome in great esteem, as having received from Trajan the consular dignity, and as having been appointed by him the governor of Greece. lie was a man whose real superiority had no need of these flatteries. Meantime, the simple truth is, that he was not the tutor of Trajan, that he dedicated no book to him, was not consul in Rome, nor governor of Greece ; appears never to have been in Rome but on two occa- sions, and then on business of the people of his native city, Chasronasa ; and thougli lie found or made friends at Rome, and read lectures to some friends or scholars, he did not know or learn tlie Latin language there ; with one or two doubtful excep- tions, never quotes a Latin book ; and thougli the contemporary in his youth, or in his old age, of Persius, Juvenal, Lucan, and Seneca, of Quintilian, Martial, Tacitus, Suetonius, Pliny the Elder, and the Younger, he does not cite them, and in return his name is never mentioned by any Roman writer. It would seem that the community of letters and of personal news was even more rare at that day than the want of printing, of railroads and telegraphs, would suggest to us.

But this neglect by his contemporaries has been compensated by an immense popularity in modern nations. Whilst his books were never known to the world in their own Greek tongue, it is

χ INTRODUCTION.

curious that the " Lives " were translated and printed in Latin, thence into Italian, French, and English, more than a century before the original " Works" were yet printed. For whilst the " Lives " were translated in Rome in 1471, and the " Morals," part by part, soon after, the first printed edition of the Greek " Works " did not appear until 1572. Hardly current in his own Greek, these found learned interpreters in the scholars of Germany, Spain, and Italy. In France, in the middle of the most turbulent civil wars, Amyot's translation awakened general attention. His genial version of the " Lives " in 1559, of the " Morals " in 1572, had signal success. King Henry IV. wrote to his wife, Marie de Medicis : " Vive Dieu. As God liveth, you could not have sent me any thing which could be more agreeable than the news of the pleasure you have taken in this reading. Plutarch always delights me with a fresh novelty. To love him is to love me ; for he has been long time the instructor of my youth. My good mother, to whom I owe all, and who would not wish, she said, to see her son an illustrious dunce, put this book into my hands almost when I was a child at the breast. It has been like my consciejice, and has whispered in my ear many good suggestions and maxims for my conduct, and the govern- ment of my affairs." Still earlier, Rabelais cites him with due respect. Montaigne, in 1589, says : " We dunces had been lost, had not this book raised us out of the dirt. By this favor of his we dare now speak and write. The ladies are able to read to schoolmasters. 'Tis our breviary." Montesquieu drew from him his definition of law, and, in his Pensees, declares, " I am always charmed with Plutarch ; in his writings are circumstances attached to persons, which give great pleasure ; " and adds examples. Saint Evremond read Plutarch to the great Condo under a tent. Rollin, so long the historian of antiquity for France, drew unhesitatingly his history from him. Voltaire honored him, and Rousseau acknowledged him as his master. In England, Sir Thomas North translated the " Lives" in 1579, and Holland the " Morals " in 1603, in time to be used by Shak- speare in his plays, and read by Bacon, Dryden, and Cudworth.

Then, recently, there has been a remarkable revival, in France, in the taste for Plutarch and his contemporaries, led, we may say, by the eminent critic Saint-Beuve. M. Octave Greard, in a critical work on the " Morals," has carefully corrected the popular

INTRODUCTION. χί

legends, and constructed from the works of Plutarch himself his true biography. M. Leveque has given an exposition of his moral philosophy, under the title of " A Physician of the Soul," in tlie Revue des Deux Mondes ; and M. C. Martha, chapters on th ; genius of Marcus Aurelius, of Persius, and Lucretius, in the same journal ; wliilst M. Fustel de Coulanges has explored from its roots in the Aryan race, then in their Greek and Roman descendants, the primeval religion of the household.

Plutarch occupies a unique place in literature as an encyclo- pgedia of Greek and Roman antiquity. Whatever is eminent in fact or in fiction, in opinion, in character, in institutions, in science — natural, moral, or metaphysical, or in memorable say- ings, drew his attention and came to his pen with more or less fulness of record. He is, among prose-writers, what Chaucer is among English poets, a repertory for those who want the story without searching for it at first hand, — a compend of all accepted traditions. And all this without any supreme intellect- ual gifts. He is not a profound mind ; not a master in any science ; not a lawgiver, like Lycurgus or Solon ; not a metaphy- sician, like Parmenides, Plato, or Aristotle ; not the founder of any sect or community, like Pythagoras or Zeno ; not a naturalist, like Pliny or LinuEeus ; not a leader of the mind of a genera- tion, like Plato or Goethe. But if he had not the highest powers, he was yet a man of rare gifts. He had that universal sympathy with genius which makes all its victories his own ; though he never used verse, he had many qualities of the poet in the power of his imagination, the speed of his mental associations, and his sharp, objective eyes. But what specially marks him, he is a chief example of the illumination of the intellect by the force of morals. Tliough the most amiable of boon-companions, this generous religion gives liim apergus like Goethe's.

Plutarch was well-born, well-taught, well-conditioned ; a self- respecting, amiable man, who knew how to better a good educa- cation by travels, by devotion to affairs private and public ; a master of ancient culture, he read books with a just criticism : eminently social, he was a king in his own house, surrounded himself with select friends, and knew the high A^alue of good conversation ; and declares in a letter written to his wife that " he finds scarcely an erasure, as in a book well-written, in the happiness of his life."

XI] INTEODUCTION.

The range of mind makes the glad writer. Tlie reason of Plutarch's vast popularity is his humanity. A man of society, of affairs; upright, practical; a good son, husband, father, and friend, — he has a taste for common life, and knows the court, the camp, and the judgment-hall, but also the forge, farm, kitchen, and cellar, and every utensil and use, and with a wise man's or a poet's eye. Thought defends him from any degradation. He does not lose his way, for the attractions are from within, not from without. A poet in verse or prose must have a sensuous eye, but an intellectual co-perception. Plutarch's memory is full, and his horizon wide. Nothing touches man but he feels to be his ; he is tolerant even of vice, if he finds it genial; enough a man of the world to give even the devil his due, and would have hugged Robert Burns, when he cried,

" 0 wad ye tak' a tliought and mend ! "

He is a philosopher with philosophers, a naturalist with natural ists, and sufficiently a mathematician to leave some of his readers, now and then, at a long distance behind him, or respectfully skipping to the next chapter. But this scholastic omniscience of our author engages a new respect, since they hope he understands his own diagram.

He perpetually suggests jMontaigne, who was the best reader he has ever found, though Montaigne excelled his master in the point and surprise of his sentences. Plutarch had a religion which Montaigne wanted, and which defends him from wanton- ness ; and though Plutarch is as plain-spoken, his moral senti- ment is always pure. What better praise has any writer received than he whom Montaigne finds " frank in giving things, not words," dryly adding, " it vexes me that he is so exposed to the spoil of those that are conversant with him." It is one of the felicities of literary history, the tie which inseparably coui)les these two names across fourteen centuries. Montaigne, wliilst he grasps Etienne de la Boece with one hand, reaches back the other to Plutarch. These distant friendships charm ns, and honor all the parties, and make the best example of the universal citizenship and fraternity of the human mind.

I do not know where to find a book — to borrow a phrase of Ben Jonson's — "so rammed with life," and this in chapters chiefly ethical, which are so prone to be heavy and sentimental.

INTRODUCTION. χϋί

No poet could illustrate his thought with more novel or striking similes or hap[)ier anecdotes. His style is realistic, picturesque, and varied ; his sharp objective eyes seeing every thing that moves, shines, or threatens in nature or art, or thought or dreams. Indeed, twilights, shadows, omens, and spectres have a charm for him. lie believes in witchcraft and the evil eye, in demons and ghosts, — but prefers, if you please, to talk of these in the morning. His vivacity and abundance never leave him to loiter or pound on an incident. 1 admire his rapid and crowded style, as if he had such store of anecdotes of his heroes that he is forced to sujjpress more than he recounts, in order to keep up Avith the hasting history.

His surprising merit is the genial facility with which he deals with his manifold topics. There is no trace of labor or pain. He gossips of heroes, philosophers, and poets ; of virtues and genius ; of love and fate and empires. It is for his pleasure that he recites all that is best in his reading: he prattles history. But he is no courtier, and no Boswell : he is ever manly, far from fawning, and would be welcome to tlie sages and wai'riors he reports, as one having a native riglit to admire and recount these stirring deeds and speeclies. I find him a better teacher of rhetoric than any modern. His superstitions are poetic, aspiring, affirma- tive. A poet might rhyme all day with hints drawn from Plutarch, page on page. No doubt, this superior suggestion for the modern reader owes much to the foreign air, the Greek wine, the religion and history of antique heroes. Thebes, Sparta, Athens, and Rome charm us away from the disgust of the passing hour. But his own cheerfulness and rude health are also magnetic. In his immense quotation and allusion, we quickly cease to discriminate between what he quotes and what he invents. We sail on his memory into the ports of every nation, enter into every private property, and do not stop to discriminate owners, but give him tlie praise of all. 'Tis all Plutarch, bv right of eminent domain, and all property vests in this emperor. This facility and abun- dance make the joy of his narrative, and he is read to tlie neglect cf more careful historians. Yet he inspires a curiosity, sometimes makes a necessity, to read them. He disowns any attempt to rival Thucydides ; but I suppose he has a hundred readers where Thucydides finds one, and Thucydides must often thank Plutarch for that one. He lias preserved for us a r-iulti-

XIV INTRODUCTION.

tude of precious sentences, in prose or verse, of authors whoso books are lost ; and these embahned fragments, through his loving selection alone, have come to be proverbs of later mankind. I hope it is only my immense ignorance that makes me believe that they do not survive out of his pages, — not only Thcspis, Polemos, Euphorion, Ariston, Evcnus, <fec., but fragments of Menander and Pindar. At all events, it is in reading the frag- ments he has saved from lost authors that I have hailed another example of the sacred care which has unrolled in our times, and still searches and unrolls papijri from ruined libraries and buried cities, and has drawn attention to what an ancient might call the politeness of Fate, — we will say, more advisedly, the benign Providence which uses the violence of war, of earthquakes, and changed watercourses, to save underground through barbar- ous ages the relics of ancient art, and thus allows us to witness the upturning of the alphabets of old races, and the deciphering of forgotten languages, so to complete the annals of the fore- fathers of Asia, Africa, and Europe.

His delight in poetry makes him cite with joy the speech of Gorgias, " that the tragic poet who deceived was juster than he who deceived not, and he that was deceived was wiser than he who was not deceived."

It is a consequence of this poetic trait in his mind, that I con- fess that, in reading him, I embrace the particulars, and carry a faint memory of the argument or general design of the chapter ; but he is not less welcome, and he leaves the reader with a relish and a necessity for completing his studies. Many examples might be cited of nervous expression and happy allusion, that indicate a poet and an orator, though he is not ambitious of these titles, and cleaves to the security of prose narrative, and only shows his intellectual sympathy with these ; yet I cannot forbear to cite one or two sentences which none Avho reads them will forget. In treating of the style of the Pythian Oracle, he says, —

" Do you not observe, some one will say, what a grace there is in Sap- pho's measures, and how tliey delight and tickle the ears and fancies of the hearers? AVhereas the Sibyl, with her frantic grimaces, uttering sen- tences altogether thoughtful and serious, neither fucused nor perfumed, continues her voice a thousand years through the favor of the Divinity that speaks within her."

INTRODUCTION. XV

Another gives an insight into his mystic tendencies, —

" Early this morning, asking Epaminondas about the manner of Lysis's burial, I found that Lysis had taught him as far as the incommunicable mysteries of our sect, and that the same D;cmon that waited on Lysis, presided over him, if I can guess at the pilot from the sailing of the ship. The paths of life ai'e large, but in few are men directed by the Demons. When Theanor had said this, he looked attentively on Epaminondas, as if he designed a fresh search into his nature and inclinations."

And here is his sentiment on superstition, somewhat condensed in Lord Bacon's citation of it : "1 had rather a great deal that men should say, There was no such man at all as Plutarch, than that they should say, that there was one Plutarch that would eat up his children as soon as they were born, as the poets speak of Saturn."

The chapter " On Fortune " should be read by poets, and other wise men ; and the vigor of his pen appears in the chapter " Whether the Athenians were more Warlike or Learned," and in his attack upon Usurers.

Tliere is, of course, a wide difference of time in the writing of these discourses, and so in their merit. Many of them are mere sketches or notes for chapters in preparation, which were never digested or finished. Many are notes for disputations in the lecture-room. His poor indignation against Herodotus was per- haps a youthful prize essay : it appeared to me captious and labored; or perhaps, at a rhetorician's school, the subject of Herodotus being the lesson of the day, Plutarch was appointed by lot to take the adverse side.

The plain-speaking of Plutarch, as of the ancient writers gen- erally, coming from tlie habit of writing for one sex only, lias a great gain for brevity, and, in our new tendencies of civilization, may tend to correct a false delicacy.

We are always interested in the man Avho treats the intellect well. We expect it from the philosopher, — from Plato, Aristotle, Spinoza, and Kant ; but we know that metaphysical studies in any but minds of large horizon and incessant inspiration have their dangers. One asks sometimes whether a metaphysician can treat the intellect well. The central fact is the superhuman intelligence pouring into us from its unknown fountain, to'be received with religious awe, and defended from any mixture of our will. But

XVI INTRODUCTION.

this high Muse comes and goes ; and the danger is that, when the Muse is wanting, the student is prone to supply its place with microscopic subtleties and logomachy. It is fatal to spiritual health to lose your admiration. " Let others wrangle," said St. Augustine : " I will wonder." Plato and Plotinus are enthusiasts, who honor the race ; but the logic of the sophists and material- ists, whether Greek or French, fills us with disgust. Whilst we expect this awe and reverence of the spiritual power from the philosopher in his closet, we praise it in the man of the world, — the man who lives on quiet terms with existing institutions, yet indicates his perception of these high oracles, as do Plutarch, Montaigne, Hume, and Goetlie. These men lift themselves at once from the vulgar, and are not the parasites of wealth. Per haps they sometimes compromise, go out to dine, make and take compliments ; but they keep open the source of wisdom and health. Plutarch is uniformly true to this centre. He had not lost his Λvonder. He is a pronounced idealist, who does not hesi- tate to say, like another Berkeley, " Matter is itself privation ; " and again, " The Sun is the cause that all men are ignorant of Apollo, by sense withdrawing the rational intellect from that which is to that which appears." He thinks that " souls are naturally endowed with the faculty of prediction ; " he delights in memory, -with its miraculous power of resisting time. He thinks that " Alexander invaded Persia with greater assistance from Aristotle than from his father Philip." He thinks that " he who has ideas of his own is a bad judge of another man's, it being true that the Eleans would be the most proper judges of the Olympic games, were no Eleans gamesters." He says of Socrates, that he endeavored to bring reason and things together, and make truth consist with sober sense. He wonders with Plato at that nail of pain and pleasure which fastens the body to the mind. The mathematics give him unspeakable pleasure, but he chiefly liked that proportion which teaches us to account that which is just, equal ; and not that which is equal, just.

Of philosophy he is more interested in the results than in the method. He has a just instinct of the presence of a master, and prefers to sit as a scholar with Plato, than as a disputant ; and, true to his practical character, he wishes the philosopher not to hide in a corner, but to commend himself to men of public regards and ruling genius : " for, if he once possess such a man with

INTRODUCTION. XVU

principles of honor and religion, he takes a compendious method, by doing good to one, to oblige a great part of mankind." 'Tis a temperance, not an eclecticism, which makes him adverse to the severe Stoic, or the Gymnosophist, or Diogenes, or any other extremist. That vice of theirs shall not hinder him from citing any good word they chance to drop. He is an eclectic in su.h sense as Montaigne was, — willing to be an expectant, not a dogmatist.

In many of these chapters it is easy to infer the relation between the Greek philosophers and those who came to them for instruction. This teaching was no play nor routine, but strict, sincere, and affectionate. The part of each of the class is as im- portant as that of the master. They are like the base-ball players, to whom the pitcher, the bat, the catcher, and the scout are equally important. And Plutarch thought, with Ariston, " that neither a bath nor a lecture served any purpose, unless they were purgative." Plutarch has such a keen pleasure in realities that he has none in verbal disputes ; he is impatient of sophistry, and despises the Epicharmian disputations : as, that he who ran in debt yesterday owes nothing to-day, as being another man ; so, he that was yesterday invited to supper, the next night comes an unbidden guest, for that he is quite another person.

Except as historical curiosities, little can be said in behalf of the scientific value of the " Opinions of the Philosophers," the " Questions," and the " Symposiacs." They are, for the most part, very crude opinions ; many of them so puerile that one would believe that Plutarch in his haste adopted the notes of his younger auditors, some of tliem jocosely misreporting the dogma of the professor, who laid them aside as memoranda for future revision, which he never gave, and they were posthumously pub- lished. Now and then there are hints of superior science. You may cull from this record of barbarous guesses of shepherds and trav(^llers statements that are predictions of facts established in modern science. Usually, when Thales, Anaximenes, or Anaxi mander are quoted, it is really a good judgment. The explanation of the rainbow, of the floods of the Nile, and of the remora^&c, are just ; and the bad guesses are not worse than many of Lord Bacon's.

His Natural History is that of a lover and poet, and not of a

b

XVlll INTRODUCTION.

physicist. His humanity stooped affectionately to trace the virtues which he loved in the animals also. " Knowing and not knowing is the affirmative or negative of the dog ; knowing you is to be your friend ; not knowing you, your enemy." He quotes Thucydides, saying, "that' not the desire of honor only never grows old, but much less also the inclination to society and affection to the State, which continue even in ants and bees to the very last."

But though curious in the questions of the schools on the nature and genesis of things, his extreme interest in every trait of character, and his broad humanity, lead him constantly to MoralS; to the study of the Beautiful and Good. Hence his love of heroes, his rule of life, and his clear convictions of the high destiny of the soul. La Harpe said " that Plutarch is the genius the most naturally moral that ever existed."^

'Tis almost inevitable to compare Plutarch with Seneca, who, born fifty years earlier, was for many years his contem- porary, though they never met, and their writings were perhaps unknown to each other. Plutarch is genial, with an endless interest in all human and divine things ; Seneca, a professional philosopher, a writer of sentences, and, though he keep a sublime path, is less interesting, because less humane ; and when we have shut his book, we forget to open it again. There is a certain violence in his opinions, and want of sweetness. He lacks the sympathy of Plutarch. He is tiresome through perpetual didac- tics. He is not happily living. Cannot the simple lover of truth enjoy the virtues of those he meets, and the virtues suggested by them, so to find himself at some time purely contented ? Seneca was still more a man of the world than Plutarch ; and, by his conversation with the Court of Nero, and his own skill, like "\ ol taire's, of living with men of business, and emulating their ad- dress in atfairs by great accumulation of his owni property, learned to temper his philosophy with facts. He ventured far — appar- ently too far — for so keen a conscience as he inly had. Yet we owe to that wonderful moralist illustrious maxims ; as if the scar- let vices of the times of Nero had the natural effect of driving virtue to its loftiest antagonisms. " Seneca," says L'Estrange, " was a pagan Christian, and is very good reading for our Chris- tian pagans." He was Buddhist in his cold abstract virtue, with a certain impassibility beyond humanity. He called " pity, that

INTRODUCTION. λΙΧ

fault of narrow souls." Yet Λvhat noble words we owe to him : " God divided man into men, that they might help each other ; " and again," The good man differs from God in nothing but dura- tion." His thoughts are excellent, if only he had a right to say them. Plutarch, meantime, with every virtue under heaven, thought it the top of wisdom to philosophize, yet not appear to do it, and to reach in mirth the same ends which the most serious are proposing.

Plutarcli thought " truth to be tlie greatest good that man can receive, and the goodliest blessing that God can give." " When you are persuaded in your mind that you cannot either offer or perform any thing more agreeable to the gods than the enter- taining a right notion of them, you will then avoid superstition as a no less evil than atheism." He cites Euripides to affirm, " If gods do aught dishonest, they are no gods," and the memorable words of Antigone, in Sophocles, concerning the moral senti- ment : —

" For neitlier now nor yesterday began These thoughts, wliich have been ever, nor yet can A man be t'ound who their first entrance knew."

His faith in the immortality of the soul is another measure of his deep Immanity. He reminds his friends that the Delphic oracles have given several answers the same in substance as that formerly given to Coraz the Naxian : —

" It sounds profane impiety To teach tliat liuman souls e'er die."

He believes that the doctrine of the Divine Providence, and that of the immortality of the soul, rest on one and the same basis. He thinks it impossible either that a man beloved of tlie gods should not be happy, or that a wise and just man should not be beloved of tlie gods. To him the Epicureans are hateful, who held that the soul perislies when it is separated from the body. "The soul, incapable of death, suffers in the same manner in the body, as birds tliat are kept in a cage." He believes " that the souls of infants pass immediately into a better and more divine state."

I can easily believe that an anxious soul may find in Plutarch's chapter called " Pleasure not attainable by Epicurus," and his " Letter to his Wife Timoxena," a more sweet and reassuring argument on the immortality than in tlie Phaedo of Plato ; for

XX INTRODUCTIOX.

Plutarch always addresses the question on the human side, and not on the metaphysical ; as Walter Scott took hold of boys and young men, in England and America, and through them of their fathers. His grand perceptions of duty lead him to his stern delight in heroism ; a stoic resistance to low indulg- ence ; to a fight with fortune ; a regard for truth ; his love of Sparta, and of heroes like Aristides, Phocion, and Cato. Ele insists that the highest good is in action. He thinks that the inhabitants of Asia came to be vassals to one only, for not having been able to pronounce one syllable ; which is, No. So keen is his sense of allegiance to right reason, that he makes a fight against Fortune whenever she is named. At Rome he thinks her wings were clipped : she stood no longer on a ball, but on a cube as large as Italy. He thinks it was by superior virtue that Alexander won his battles in Asia and Africa, and the Greeks theirs against Persia.

But this Stoic in his fight with Fortune, with vices, effeminacy, and indolence, is gentle as a woman when other strings are touched. He is the most amiable of men. " To erect a trophy in the soul against anger is that which none but a great and vic- torious puissance is al)le to achieve." — "Anger turns the mind out of doors, and bolts the door." He has a tenderness almost to tears when he writes on " Friendship," on " Marriage," on " the Training of Children," and on the " Love of Brothers." " There is no treasure," he says, " parents can give to their children, like a brother ; 'tis a friend given by nature, a gift nothing can supply ; once lost, not to be replaced. The Arcadian prophet, of whom Herodotus speaks, was obliged to make a wooden foot in place of that which had been chopped off. A brother, embroiled witli his brother, going to seek in the street a stranger who can take his place, resembles him who will cut ofif his foot to give himself one of wood." *•

All his judgments are noble. He thought, with Epicurus, that it is more delightful to do than to receive a kindness. " This courteous, gentle, and benign disposition and behavior is not so acceptable, so obliging or delightful to any of those with whom we converse, as it is to those who have it." There is really no limit to his bounty: " It would be generous to lend our eyes and ears, nay, if possible, our reason and fortitude to others, whilst wc are idle or asleep." His excessive and fanciful humanity reminds

INTRODUCTION. XXi

one of Charles Lamb, whilst it much exceeds him. When the guests are gone, he " would leave one lamp burning, only as a sign of the respect he bore to fires, for nothing so resembles an animal as fire. It is moved and nourished by itself, and by its brightness, like the soul, discovers and makes every thing apparent, and in its quenching shows some power that seems to proceed from a vital principle, for it makes a noise and resists, like an animal dying, ur violently slaughtered ;" and he praises the Romans, who, when the feast was over, " dealt well with the lamps, and did not take away the nourishment they had given, but permitted them to live and shine by it."

I can almost regret that the learned editor of the present republication has not preserved, if only as a piece of history, the preface of Mr. Morgan, the editor and in part writer of this Translation of 1718. In his dedication of the work to the Arch bishop of Canterbury, Wm. Wake, he tells the Primate that " Plutarch was the wisest man of his age, and, if he had been a Christian, one of the best too ; but it ivas his severe fate to flour- ish in those daps of ignorance, which, His a favorable opinion to hope that the Almighty toill sometime loink at ; that our souls may be with these philosophers together in the same state of blissy The puzzle in the worthy translator's mind between his theology and his reason well re-appears in the puzzle of his sentence.

I know that the chapter of " Apothegms of Noble Command- ers " is rejected by some critics as not a genuine work of Plutarch ; but the matter is good, and is so agreeable to his taste and genius, that if he had found it, he would have adopted it. If he did not compile the piece, many, perhaps most, of the anecdotes were already scattered in his Avorks. If I do not lament that a work not his should be ascribed to him, I regret that he should have suffered such destruction of his own. What a trilogy is lost to mankind in his Lives of Scipio, Epaminondas, and Pindar !

His delight in magnanimity and self sacrifice has made his books, like Homer's Iliad, a bil)le for heroes ; and wherever the Cid is relished, the legends of Arthur, Saxon Alfred, and Richard the Lion-hearted, Robert Bruce, Sydney, Lord Herbert of Cher- bury, Cromwell, Nelson, Bonaparte, and Walter Scott's Chronicles in prose or verse, — there will Plutarch, who told the story of Leouidas, of Agesilaus, of Aristidcb, Phocion, Themistocles, De-

XXll INTRODUCTION

mosthenes, Epaminondas, Caesar, Cato, and the rest, sit as the Vjestower of the crown of noble knighthood, and laureate of the ancient world.

The chapters " On the Fortune of Alexander," in the " Morals," are an important appendix to the portrait in the " Lives." The union in Alexander of sublime courage with the refinement of his pure tastes, making him the carrier of civilization into the East, are in the spirit of the ideal hero, and endeared him to Plularch. That prince kept Homer's poems, not only for himself mder his pillow in his tent, but carried these for the delight of the Persian youth, and made them acquainted also with the tragedies of Euripides and Sophocles. He persuaded the Sogdians not to kill, but to cherish their aged parents ; the Persians to reverence, not marry their mothers ; the Scythians to bury, and not eat their dead parents. What a fruit and fitting monument of his best days was his city Alexandria to be the birthplace or home of Plotinus, St. Augustine, Synesius, Posidonius, Ammonius, Jam- blichus. Porphyry, Origen, Aratus, ApoUonius, and Apuleius.

If Plutarch delighted in heroes, and held the balance between the severe Stoic and the indulgent Epicurean, his humanity shines not less in his intercourse with his personal friends. He was a genial host and guest, and delighted in bringing chosen compan- ions to the supper-table. He knew the laws of conversation and the laws of good-fellowship quite as well as Horace, and has set them down with such candor and grace as to make them good reading to-day. The guests not invited to a private board by the entertainer, but introduced by a guest as his companions, the Greeks called shadows ; and the question is debated whether it was civil to bring them, and he treats it candidly, but concludes: " Therefore, wlien I make an invitation, since it is hard to break the custom of the place, I give my guests leave to bring shadows ; but when I myself am invited as a shadow, I assure you I refuse to go." He has an oljjection to the introduction of music at feasts. He thought it wonderful that a man having a muse in his own breast, and all the pleasantness that would fit an enter- tainment, would have pipes and harps play, and by that external noise destroy all the sweetness that was proper and his own.

1 cannot close these notes without expressing my sense of the valuable service which the Editor has rendered to his Author and to

INTRODUCTION. Χχίίί

his readers. Professor Goodwin is a silent benefactor to the book, wherever I have compared the editions. I did not know liow care- less and vicious in jiarts tlie old book was, until in recent reading of the old text, on coming• on any thing at)surd or unintelligible, I referred to the new text, and found a clear and accurate statement ir. its place. It is the vindication of Plutarch. The correction is not only of names of authors and of places grossly altered or misspelled, but of unpardonable liberties taken by the transla- tors, whether from negligence or freak.

One proof of Plutarch's skill as a writer is that he bears trans- lation so well. In spite of its carelessness and manifold faults, which, I doubt not, have tried the patience of its present learned editor and corrector, I yet confess my enjoyment of this old version for its vigorous English style. The work of some forty or fifty University men, some of them imperfect in their Greek, it is a monument of the English language at a period of singular vigor and freedom of style. I hope the Commission of the Pliilological Society in London, charged with the duty of preparing a Critical Dictionary, will not overlook these volumes, which show the wealth of their tongue to greater advantage than many books of more renown as models. It runs through the whole scale of conversation in the street, the market, the coffee-house, the law courts, the palace, the college, and the church. There are, no doubt, many vulgar phrases, and many blunders of the printer ; but it is the speech of business and con- versation, and in every tone, from lowest to highest.

We owe to these translators many sharp perceptions of the wit and humor of their author, sometimes even to the adding of the point. I notice one, which, although the translator has justified his rendering in a note, the severer criticism of the Editor has not retained. " \Vere there not a sun, we might, for all the other stars, pass our days in Reverend Dark, as Heraclitus calls it." I find a humor in the phrase which might well excuse its doubtful accuracy.

It is a service to our Republic to puljlish a book that can force ambitious young men, before they mount the platform of the county conventions, to read the " Laconic Apothegms " and the " Apothegms of Great Commanders." If we could keep the secret, and communicate it only to a few chosen aspirants, we

XXIV INTRODUCTION.

might confide that, by this noble infiltration, they would easily carry the victory over all competitors. But, as it was the desire of these old patriots to fill with their majestic spirit all Sparta or Rome, and not a few leaders only, we hasten to ofTer them to the American people.

Plutarch's popularity will return in rapid cycles. If over-read ill this decade, so that his anecdotes and opinions become com- tiionplace, and to-day's novelties are sought for variety, his sterling values will presently recall the eye and thought of the best minds, and his books will be reprinted and read anew by coming generations. And thus Plutarch will be perpetually rediscovered from time to time as lonji as books last.

CONTENTS OF VOLUME FIRST.

WITH THE TRANSLATORS' NAMES.

A DISCOURSE TOUCHING THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

By Simon Ford, D.D.

Effect on cliildren of impurity in tlie parents, 3 ; of intemperance in the parents, 4. Instruction and training necessary, 5. Training must assist nature, 5. Defective natural parts may be improved by instruction, 5, 6. Diligent effort may supply native deficiencies, 6. A virtuous character partly the effect of custom and habit, 7. Mothers should nurse their own children, 7, 8. Manners of children to be well-formed from the beginning, 8. Care to be taken of their associates, 9 Teachers of children to be carefully chosen, 9, 10. Moral character of teachers to be carefully regarded, 10, 11. Unhappy consequences of the ill-training of children, 11, 12. A good education preferable to the gifts of fortune, 12, 13. Learning better than bodily strength, 13. Children should be trained to think before they speak, 14, 15. A pompous style of speech to be avoided, 16. Tame- ness of speech to be avoided, 16. The principal study of youtli should be phi- losophy, 17, 18. Bodily exercise not to be neglected, 19. Gymnastic and military exercises, 19. Corporal and disgraceful punishments not to be used, 20. Motives to be addressed to the understanding and conscience, 20. Severe tasks not to be imposed on children, 21. Relaxation to be allowed them, 21. Memory to be cul- tivated, 22. A courteous manner of speaking to be inculcated. 22. Self-control to be taught, 23, 24. Restraint of tlie tongue, 23, 24. Sotades punished for free speech, 25. Severity to children unwise, 26. Young men to be restrained from vicious company, 28, 29. Flatterers to be avoided, 29. Allowance sliould be made for jrjuthful impetuosity, 30. Marriage a security for young men, 31. Fathers not to be severe and harsh, but, examples to their children, 30, 31.

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

By William Dillingham, D.D.

How may a tendency to anger be overcome ? i. 34. Not by the interference of otner persons, 35. The mind being then under the influence of stormy passion, 36. The aid of reason and judgment is more effectual, 37. Resist the beginning of anger, 37. When inclined to anger, try to be quiet and composed, 38, 39. Anger is un- reasonable and foolish, 39. It disfigures the countenance, 40. Tends to one's dishonor and discredit, 41. Produces absurd and insulting speeches, 42. Is dis- ingenuous and unmanly, 42. Indicates a weak mind, 42. Discovers meanness of spirit, 43. Fortitude consists with a mild temper, 44. Anger can destroy, it

7:XV1 CONTENTS OF VOL. I.

cannot restore, 46. It often overreaches itself, 47. Excessive urgency often fails of success, 47. Forbearance towards servants urged, 48. Anger towards servants makes them worse, 48. Never punish in anger, 49. Allow anger to cool, 49. No harm arises from deferring anger, 49. Causes of anger examined ; we think we incur contempt without it, 50 ; it arises from self-love, 52 ; and a spirit of fault- finding, 52. The absence of these makes a man gentle towards others, 53, 54 Nobody can d fvell with an angry man, 54. Anger, the essence of all bad passions, 56. Good temper in us will disarm otliers, 55. Moderate expectations prevent anger, 56. Knowledge of human nature softens anger, 57. Make trial for a few days of abstinence from anger, 59.

OF BASHFULNESS.

By Thomas Hot, Fellow of St. John's College in Oxfokd.

Bashfulness defined, 60. Two extremes : too much or too little modesty ; both tc be avoided, 61. Bashfulness, an excess of modesty, 61. 62. It is injurious, 62, leaves a person at the mercy of others, 63 ; a bashful person is liable to imposi- tion, 63 ; many are thus ruined, 64. Deny an unreasonable request, 65. The fear of giving offence — bashfulness — hinders the proper care of our health, and of our property, 67, 68 ; exposes to the very evils it seeks to avoid, 69. The people of Asia are slaves, because they cannot say, " No," 69. Deny recom- mendation to those not known to be worthy, 71. Undertake no services to which you are not competent, 72. Cheerfully render good offices to those that deserve them, 72; but deny tiiem to the unworthy, 73. We may not violate law and justice to please anybody, 74. Men who would dread to blunder in a matter of literature, often violate law, 74. Err not from tlie right, either from fear or flat- tery, 76. Remember wiiat bashfulness has cost us, 77.

THAT VIRTUE MAY BE TAUGHT. By Mr. Patrick, of the Charterhouse.

If men may be taught to sing, dance, and read ; to be skilful husbandmen and good riders, — why not to order their lives aright ? 78. The practice of virtue is im- mensely more important than graceful speecli and manners, 79. If things of trifling moment may be taught, much more things of the deepest concern, 80.

THE ACCOUNT OF THE LAWS AND CUSTOMS OF THE LACE- DAEMONIANS.

By Mr. John Pulleyn, of Trinity College in Cambridge.

Institutions of Lycurgus, 82. The citizens ate at one table, 82. Conversation at the table, 82. The food: black broth, 83; spare diet, 84. Learning, philosophy, mechanic trades, theatrical performances, utterly banished, 85. Scanty apparel, 86 ; hard beds, 86 ; social attachments, 86. A strict watch kept over the } oung, 87. Respect to tiie aged, 88. Control by the aged of other people's children, 88, 89. Children allowed to -«teal, if the theft were carefully concealed, 89. Thi Spartan poetry and music, 90; martial music, 91. Tenacity of ancient customs, 92. Funerals, 92, 93 ; inscriptions, 93. Foreign travel prohibited, 93. A com-

CONTENTS OF VOL. I. XXVil

munity of children, 93 ; and of goods and estates, 94. Tlieir wavlike expeditions, 94. Tiieir religious worship, 95. The Helots, when drunk, exhibited before the children, 9G. None but grave poetry allowed, 9ΰ. Meekness and forgiveness of injuries not tolerated, 97. Λ laconic style of speaking practised, 98. Whipping of boys annually before the altar of Diana, 98. Neglect of maritime aiTairs, 99. Gold and silver banished, 99. Final overthrow of the institutions of Lycurgus 100.

CONCERNING MUSIC.

By John Philips, Gent.

Principles of Greek music : the tetrachord, heptachord, octachord ; scale of fifteen notes, 102, 103, note. History of music, 104, et seq. Tiie lyre, 105. Amphion, Linus, Antlies, Pierus, IMiilammon, Thamyras, &c., 105. Terpander, an inventor, 105, lOG, 109, 112, 122. Olympus, 107, 109, 123 ; Hyagnis, 107 ; Clonas, 107. History of wind instruments, 108 ; the flute, ih. Three musical moods, — tiie Dorian, the Phrygian, the Lydian, 109. Makers of paeans, 110. The enharmcmic species of music, 110. Its relations to the diatonic and chromatic, 111. Varieties of rhythm, 112. The harp an invention of Apollo, 113. His statue at Delos a proof of this, ib. Manly and grave music used by the ancients for its wortii, 114. The moderns have introduced an interior sort, 114. Tiie Lydian mood, 114 ; the Dorian, 115. The chromatic more ancient than the enharmonic scale, 116 ; though many of • the ancient musicians did not use it, 117. Plato's remarks on harmony, 118, Music a mathematical science, 119. Harmony as related to the senses, 121. Why the Greeks were so careful to teach their children music, 121. The high purposes of music, 121, 122. Archilochus, his improvements, 122, 123. Improvements of Polymnestus, 107, 123. Improvements of Lasus, 123. Decline of the ancient music, 123-125. To learn music, philosophy is needful, 126. Music too much a thing of chance, 126. A sound judgment is necessary, 127. A perfect judgment of music not derived from a partial knowledge, 12'J. Degeneracy of modern music, 130. Benefits of a proper acquaintance with music, 132; facts in proof of this, 133.

OF THE TRANQUILLITY OF THE MIND.

By Matthew Morgan, A.M., of St. John's College in Oxford.

Plutarch salutes his friend Paccius, 136. Worldly honor or wealth cannot procure quietness of mind, 137. We should fortify ourselves against trouble, ib. Tran- quillity of mind not to be procured by neglect of public or private duty, ib. Idleness is to many an affliction, 138. Changes in life do not remoΛ•e causes of disquiet, 140. The mind itself renders life pleasant or otherwise, 14L Make the best of our circumstances, 142. Wise men derive benefit even from affliction, 142. No trouble can arise, but good may come of it, 143. Be not soured with the perverseness of others, 144 ; nor fret at their failings, 145. A consideration of the good we enjo}' may help us bear our afflictions, 146. Thus balancing one against the other, 147. Consider what the loss would be of our present enjoy- ments, 148. Cultivate a contented mind, 148, 149. The want of whieii creates suffering, 149. Look at those worse off tiian ourselves, 150. Every one has his particular trouble, '"51; therefore give no place to envy, ib. Do not repine

XXviil CONTENTS OF VOL. I.

because some things are be3'ond your reach, 152. Let every man know what he can do and be contented with doing it, 154. Let alone what you are not capable of, 155. It is wise to call to mind past enjoyment, 156. Do not distress yourself by dwelling on past sorrows, nor give way to despondency of the future, 157, 158. Neither be too sanguine in your hopes, 159. Afflictions come as a matter of necessity, 161. Outward sufferings do not reach our nobler part, the mind, 162. Death not a real, ultimate evil, 163. The Wise man may look down on things terrible to the vulgar, 164. Guilt produces remorse, 165 A clear ijonscicnce a rich possession, 165. Life should be full of joy, 106. That it is not to some is their own fault, 167.

OF SUPERSTITION, OR INDISCREET DEVOTION.

Bt William Baxter, Gent.

Ignorance respecting God may lead either to atheism or superstition, 168. Atheism and superstition compared, 168, et seq. Atheism tends to indifference, super- stition to terror, 169. Superstition infuses into the mind a constant alarm and dread, 170. Superstition allows of no escape from fear, it jierraits no hope, 172. It perverts the moral sense, 173, 174. The atheist may be fretful and impatient ; the superstitious man charges all his misfortunes and troubles to God, 175. Is full of unreasonable apprehensions, 176. Converts tolerable evils into fatal ones, 177. Misinterprets the course of nature, 177. Is afraid of thmgs that will not hurt him, 177. Allows himself no enjoyment, 178. Entertains dishonorable thoughts of God, 180; and thus is morally wrong, 181. He secretly hates God, and \vould have no God, 181. Superstition affords an apology for atheism, 182 Superstition of the Gauls, Scythians, and Carthaginians; they offered human sac- rifices, 182, 183. In avoiding superstition do not fall into atlieism, 184.

THE APOPHTHEGMS OR REMARKABLE SAYINGS OF KINGS AND GREAT COMMANDERS, 185-250.

By E. Hinton, of Witnet in Oxfordshire,

RULES FOR THE PRESERVATION OF HEALTH. By Matthew Poole, D.D., of Northampton.

introduction, 251. Tlie hands to be kept always warm, 252. Accustom yourseli in liealth to the food proper in sickness, 2•'>8. Avoid all excess in eating and drinking, especially at feasts, 254. Be prepared to excuse yourself if invited to drink to excess, 255. Partake of agreeable food and drink, when needful; other- wise not, 256. Lean to the side of moderation and abstinence, rather than the gratification of appetite, 257. Intem[)erance is as destructive of pleasure as of health, 258. Sickness may be avoiiled by the use of a moderate diet, 259. A luxurious course of living adds to the force of other causes of disease, 260 Be especially careful of what you do, when threatened with illness, 261. When the body is out of order, things that are otherwise pleasant become disgusting, 262. Extreme carefulness in our diet should be avoided, 263. Disturbed sleep and dislressing dreams show a diseased state of body, 264. Avoid things which have

CONTENTS OF VOL. I. . XXIX

proved caii)-es of disease to others, 264, 265. Reading or speaking aloud is to a scholar conducive to health, 266. Yet tliis must not be carried to excess, 267. Tlie cold batli not to be used after exercise ; use the warm bath, 268. Use solid food cautiously and sparingly ; light food more freely, 268. Drink wine diluted with water, or water simply, 269, 270. After supper, there should be a consider- able interval, to be occupied with gentle exercise eitiier of body or mind, 271, 272. Sufferers from gluttony or excess siiould not attempt to relieve themselves by physic but by abstinence, 273. Uo not fast when there is no need, 274. Idle- ness is not conducive to health, 275. After severe labor, allow the body to rest, even from pleasure, 276. A man should well study his own case, and know what he can bear, 277. The body and the mind must deal carefully with each other, 278, 279.

flow A MAN MAY EECEIVE ADVANTAGE AND PROFIT FROM HIS

ENEMIES.

By John Hartcliffe, Fellow of King's College in Cambridge.

Ill-will always to be expected, 280. It is not enough tliat our enemies do us no harm, 281. We may not be able to change bad men into good men, 282. But it is possible to derive good even from bad men, 283. An enemy, in order to dis- cover our failings, carefully watches all our movements and affairs, 283. Learn from this to be wary and circumspect, 284. Learn to be discreet and sober, and to give offence to nobody, 285. Live above reproach, 286, 287. When censured and accused, examine if there be just cause for it, 288. Be willing to hear the truth even from the lips of enemies, 289. If accused unjustly, avoid even the appearance of the supposed wrong, 290. Have you given any occasion for the false accusation ■? 291. Learn to keep the tongue in subjection, 292. Be magnan- imous and kind to your enemy, 293. Indulge no malignant passion, 294. Envv not your enemy's success, 297.

CONSOLATION TO APOLLONIUS.

By Matthew Morgan, A.M., of St. John's College in Oxford.

The son of Apollonius had died, 299. Apathy and excessive grief are alike unnat* ural and improper, 300. Avoid both of these extremes, 300. Uninterrupted happiness is not to be expected, 302, Everj' thing is subject to change, 303. Evil is to be expected, 304, 305. Sorrow will not remove suffering, 306, 307. Others are in trouble besides oui'selves, 303. Why should death be considered so great an evil 1 308. Death is but the debt of nature, 309. Death is inevit<able, and the termination of all human calamity, 310. Death is the brother of sleep, 311. Death divests us of the body, and thus frees us from great evil, 312. The gods have often sent death as a reward for distinguished piety ; illustrated by the cases of Biton and Cleobis, of Agamedes and Trophonius, of Pindar and Euthynous, 313, 314. Even if death be the extinction of our being, it is no evil, and why, 315. i^ven untimely death may shield from evil, 317. Not long life, but virtuous is desirable, 317, 318. Sorrow for the dead may proceed from selfish considerations, 319. Does tiie mourner intend to cherish grief as long as he lives ? 320. Excessive grief is unmanly, 321. An untimely death dirters not much from that which is timely, 322. It may be desirable, 323, 324. Excessive

XXX CONTENTS OF VOL. 1.

grief is unreasonable, 325. The state of tlie dead is better than that of the living, 326. Tlie evil in the world far exceeds the good, 327. Life is a loan, soon to be recalled, 327. Some people are querulous and can never be satisfied, 329. Deatli is fixed by fate, 331. Lite is short, and should not be wasted in unavailing sorrow, 332. Derive comfort from the example of those who have borne the death of their sons bravelj', 332, 333. Providence wisely disposes, 335. Your son died at the best time for him, 335. He is now numbered with tlie blest, 33fi. The conclusion; a touching appeal to ApoUonius, 339.

CONCERNING THE VIRTUES OF WOMEN.

Br Isaac Chauncy, of the College of Physicians, London.

It is right to praise virtuous women, 340. Virtue in man and woman is the same, 340 ; even as tlie poetic art in man and woman is the same, 341. There may be variety, yet unity, 341. Virtue of the Trojan women after landing in Italy, 342. Of the Phocian women in the war with the Thessalians, 343. Of the women of Chios, 344. Of the Argive women and their repulse of the Spartan army, 346. Of the Persian women, 347. Of the Celtic women, 347. Of the Melian women, 348. Of tlie Tyrrlieiie women, 349. Of tlie Lycian women, 351. Of tiie women of Salmantica in Spain, 352. Of the maidens of Miletus, bent on self-murder, and how this was prevented, 351. Of the maids of Cios, 354. Of tlie women of Pliocis during the Sacred War, 355. Of the Roman Lucretia, Valeria, and Cloelia, 355-357. Of Micca and Megisto, and other women of Elis, during the tyranny of Aristotimus, 357-303. Of Pieria and other women of Myus, at Rliletus, 363, 364. Of Polycrita in the war between Naxos and Miletus, 364-366. Of Lampsace, 366. Of Aretaphila, and how she delivered Cyrene from tyranny, 367-37L Of Camma the Galatian, 372. Of Stratonica of Galatia, 373. Of Chiomara of Galatia, 374. Of the women of Pergamus, 374. Of Timoclea at the taking of Thebes, 376. Of Eryxo of Cyrene, 378. Of Xenocrita of Cumae, 380. Of Pythes the Lydian and his wife, 382.

OF HEARING.

By Thomas Hoy, Fellow of St. John's College in Oxford

Introduction, addressed to Nicander, a j'oung man, 441. Remarks on hearing ii. general, 442. Of the sense of hearing, as an inlet of thought and feeling, 442. A guard to be placed over it, 443. How to hear with benefit, 443. Faults to be avoided, 444. In hearing a discourse, hear with attention to the close, 445. Guard against envy and ill-nature, 445, 446. Hear with calmness and candor, 446. Endeavor to reap advantage from the speaker's faults, 447. Yield not to undue admiration, 448. Examine the argument of the speaker apart from his expres sion, 449. Separate the substance of a discourse from its accessories, 450, 451 Int(!rrupt not the speaker with trifling questions, 452. Propose no impertinent questions, 453. Wait till the proper time for asking, 453. Withhold not praise when it is due, 454. Yet bestow not inordinate praise, 455. Something worthy of praise may be found in every discourse, 456. The hearer owes a duty to the speaker no less than the speaker to the hearer, 457. Be not indiscriminate in your praises, 458. Bear admonition in a proper spirit, 459. If you find diffi- culties in tlie lecturer's instructions, ask him to explain, 460, 461. Concluding exhortation, 462, 463.

CONTENTS OF VOL. I χχχί

OF LARGE ACQUAINTANCE: OR, AN ESSAY TO PROVE THE FOLLY OF SEEKING MANY FRIENDS.

By W. G.

True friendsliip a thing of rare occurrence, 464. In the early times, friends went m pairs, Orestes and Pylades, &c., 4(J5. True friendsliip cannot embrace a multi- tude, 466. If we have numerous acquaintances, there should be one eminently a friend, 466. The requisites to a true friendship, 467. Tlie diiBculty of iinding a true friend, 467. Be not hasty in getting friends, 468. Admit none to your confidence without long and thorough trial, 468. As true friendship cements two hearts into one, so a large acquaintance divides and distracts the heart, 469. We cannot discharge the obligations of friendship to a multitude, 470 ; therefore do not attempt it, 471. Joining one's self intimately to another involves one in his calamities, 472. Real friendship always has its origin in likeness, even in brutes. 472. Tliere must be a substantial oneness, 473. Therefore it is next to a mir acle to find a constant and sure friend, 474.

CONCERNING THE FORTUNE OR VIRTUE OF ALEXANDER THl•.

GREAT.

By Johx Philips, Gent.

Did he recelA'^e his empire as the gift of Fortune ? By no means, 475. It was ac quired at the expense of many severe wounds, 476, 507; of many hardships and much daring, 477 ; as the issue of his training under Aristotle, 478. He was himself a great philosopher, 479. He was the great civilizer of Asia, 480. He realized the dreams of philosophers by making the world his country, 481. Uniting the Greeks and the barbarians, 482. Gaining the affection of the van- quished, 483. Aiming to establish universal brotherhood, 484. His philosophy as exhibited in his recorded sayings, 485-489. His generous conduct, 490. His patronage of learned men, 491. So different from other monarchs, 492. His mag- nanimity, 495. Such a man owes little to Fortune, 490. Contrasted with Sar- danapalus, 497. His greatness as seen in the confusion which followed his death, 498. Fortune cannot make an Alexander, 499. His silly imitators attest his greatness, 501. His self-government, 502. The Persian empire was overthrown, not by Fortune, but by the superior genius and virtue of Alexander, 503. Alex- ander owed nothing to Fortune, 506.• His wisdom, his jjrowess, his many wounds, his constancy and energy, procured his great success, 507-511. Com- pared with the ablest men of antiquity, he is superior to all, 512, 513. His daring courage, great dangers, and marvellous escape, while besieging a town of the Oxydracae, 513-516.

PLUTARCH'S MORALS.

PLUTARCH'S MORALS.

A DISCOURSE TOUCHING THE TRAINING OF CHIL- DREN.

1. The course which ou2rht to be taken for the trainins: of free-born children, and the means whereby their man- ners may be rendered virtuous, will, with the reader's leave, be the subject of our present disquisition.

2. In the management of which, perhaps it may be ex- pedient to take our rise from their very procreation. I would therefore, in the first place, advise those who desire to become the parents of famous and eminent children, that they keep not company with all women that they light on ; I mean such as harlots, or concubines. For such children as are blemished in their birth, either by the father's or the mother's side, are liable to be pursued, as long as they live, with the indelible infamy of their base extraction, as that which offers a ready occasion to all that desire to take hold of it of reproaching and disgracing them therewith. So that it was a wise speech of the poet who said, —

Misfortune on that family's entailed, Whose reputation in its founder failed*

Wherefore, since to be well born gives men a good stock of confidence, the consideration hereof ought to be of no small value to such as desire to leave behind them a law- ful issue. For the spirits of men who are alloyed and

* Eurip. Hercules Furens, 1261

* OF THE TRAINING OF CIULDREN.

counterfeit in their birth are naturally enfeebled and de- based ; as rightly said the poet again, —

A bold and daring spirit is often daunted,

When with the guilt of parents' crimes 'tis haunted.*

So, on the contrary, a certain loftiness and natural gal- lantry of spirit is wont to fill the breasts of those who are born of illustrious parents. Of which Diophantus, the young son of Themistocles, is a notable instance ; for he is reported to have made his boast often and in many compa- nies, that whatsoever pleased him pleased also all Athens : for whatever he liked, his mother liked ; and whatever his mother liked, Themistocles liked ; and whatever Themisto- cles liked, all the Athenians liked. AVherefore it was gallantly done of the Lacedaemonian States, when they laid a round fine on their king Archidamus for marrying a little woman, giving this reason for their so doing : that he meant to beget for them not kings, but kinglings.

8. The advice which I am, in the next place, about to give, is, indeed, no other than what hath been given by those who have undertaken this argument before me. You will ask me what is that 1 It is this : that no man keep com- pany with his wife for issue's sake but when he is sober, having drunk either no wine, or at least not such a quan- tity as to distemper him ; for they usually prove Λvine- bibbers and drunkards, whose parents begot them when they were drunk. Wherefore Diogenes said to a stripling somewhat crack-brained and half-witted : Surely, young man, thy father begot thee Avhen he was drunk. Let this suffice to be spoken concerning the procreation of children : and let us pass thence to their education.

4. And here, to speak summarily, what λΥβ are wont to say of arts and sciences may be said also concerning virtue : that there is a concurrence of three things requisite to the

^ * Eurip. Hippol. 424.

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 0

completing thereof in practice, — which are nature, reason, and use. Now by reason here I would be understood to mean learning ; and by nse, exercise. Now the principles come from instruction, the practice comes from exercise, and perfection from all three combined. And accordingly as either of the three is deficient, virtue must needs be defective. For if nature be not improved by instruction, it is blind ; if instruction be not assisted by nature, it is maimed ; and if exercise fail of the assistance of both, it is imperfect as to the attainment of its end. And as in hus- bandry it is first requisite that the soil be fertile, next that the husbandman be skilful, and lastly that the seed he sows be good; so here nature resembles the soil, the in- structor of youth the husbandman, and the rational princi- ples and precepts Avhich are taught, the seed. And I would peremptorily affirm that all these met and jointly conspired to the completing of the souls of those univer- sally celebrated men, Pythagoras, Socrates, and Plato, together Avith all others whose eminent ΛVorth hath gotten them immortal glory. And happy is that man certainly, and well-beloved of the Gods, on whom by the bounty of any of them all these are conferred.

And yet if any one thinks that those in whom Nature hath not thoroughly done her part may not in some measure make up her defects, if they be so happy as to light upon good teaching, and withal apply their ΟΛνη industry towards the attainment of virtue, he is to know that he is very much, nay, altogether, mistaken. For as a good natural capacity may be impaired by slothfulness, so dull and heavy natural parts may be improved by instruction ; and whereas negligent students arrive not at the capacity of understanding the most easy things, those who are industri- ous conquer the greatest difficulties. And many instances we may observe, that give us a clear demonstration of the mighty force and successful efficacy of labor and indus-

b OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

try. For water continually dropping will wear hard rocks hollow ; yea, iron and brass are worn out with constant handling. Nor can we, if we Avould, reduce the felloes of a cart-wheel to their former straightness, when once they have been bent by force ; yea, it is above the poAver of force to straighten the bended staves sometimes used by actors upon the stage. So far is that which labor effects, though against nature, more potent than what is produced according to it. Yea, have Ave not many millions of in- stances more which evidence the force of industry? Let us see in some few that follow. A man's ground is of itself good ; yet, if it be unmanured, it will contract barrenness ; and the better it was naturally, so much the more is it ruined by carelessness, if it be ill-husbanded. On the other side, let a man's ground be more than ordinarily rough and rugged ; yet experience tells us that, if it be well manured, it will be quickly made capable of bearing- excellent fruit. Yea, Avhat sort of tree is there which λνϊΐΐ not, if neglected, grow crooked and unfruitful ; and what but Avill, if rightly ordered, prove fruitful and bring its fruit to maturity? What strength of body is there which Λνίΐΐ not lose its vigor and fall to decay by laziness, nice usage, and debauchery? And, on the contrary, Avhere is the man of ne\^er so crazy a natural constitution, who can- not render himself far more robust, if he will only give himself to exercises of activity and strength ? What horse well managed from a colt proves not easily governable by the rider? And where is there one to be found which, if not broken betimes, proves not stiff-necked and unmanage- able ? Yea, why need we wonder at any thing else when we see the wildest beasts made tame and brought to hand by industry? And lastly, as to men themselves, that Thessalian answered not amiss, who, being asked which of his countrymen were the meekest, replied : Those that have received their discharge from the wars.

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 7

But what need of multiplying more words in this matter, Avhen even the notion of the Avord ηΟος in the Greek lan- guage imports continuance, and he that should call moral \'irtues customary virtues would seem to speak not incon- gruously ] I shall conclude this part of my discourse, therefore, with the addition of one only instance. Lycurgus, the Lacedaemonian lawgiver, once took two whelps of the same litter, and ordered them to be bred in a quite different manner ; whereby the one became dainty and ravenous, and the other of a good scent and skilled in hunting ; which done, a Avhile after he took occasion thence in an assembly of the Lacedaemonians to discourse in this manner : Of great weight in the attainment of virtue, fellow-citizens, are habits, instruction, precepts, and indeed the whole man- ner of life, — as I will presently let you see Jby example. And, withal, he ordered the producing those two whelps into the midst of the hall, where also there were set down before them a plate and a live hare. Wherenpon, as they had been bred, the one presently flies upon the hare, and the other as greedily runs to the plate. And while the people Avere musing, not perfectly apprehending what he meant by producing those whelps thus, he added : These whelps were both of one litter, but differently bred ; the one, you see, has turned out a greedy cur, and the other a good hound. And this shall suffice to be spoken concerning custom and different ways of living.

5. The next thing that falls under our consideration is the nursing of children, which, in my judgment, the mothers should do themselves, giving their own breasts to those they have borne. For this office will certainly be performed with more tenderness and carefulness by natu- ral mothers, who will love their children intimately, as the saying is, from their tender nails.* Whereas, both wet and dry nurses, who are hired, love only for their pay,

* 'Έ,ξ ονύχων απαλών.

ο OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

and are aifected to their work as ordinarily those that are substituted and deputed in the place of others are. Yea, even Nature seems to have assigned the suckling and nurs- ing of the issue to those that bear them ; for which cause she hath bestowed upon every living creature that brings forth young, milk to nourish them withal. And, in conformity thereto, Providence hath also wisely ordered that women should have two breasts, that so, if any of them should happen to bear twins, they might have two several springs of nour- ishment ready for them. Though, if they had not that furniture, mothers would still be more kind and loving to their own children. And that not without reason ; for con- stant feeding together is a great means to heighten the affection mutually betwixt any persons. Yea, even beasts, when they are separated from those that have grazed with them, do in their way show a longing for the absent. Wherefore, as I have said, mothers themselves should strive to the utmost to nurse their own children. But if they find it impossible to do it themselves, either because of bodily weakness (and such a case may fall out), or because they are apt to be quickly with child again, then are they to chose the honestest nurses they can get, and not to take whomsoever they have offered them. And the first thino• to be looked after in this choice is, that the nurses be bred after the Greek fashion. For as it is needful that the members of children be shaped aright as soon as they are born, that they may not afterwards prove crooked and dis- torted, so it is no less expedient that their manners be well fashioned from the very beginning. For childhood is a tender thing, and easily wrought into any shape. Yea, and the very souls of children readily receive the impres- sions of those things that are dropped into them while they are yet but soft ; but when they grow older, they will, as all hard things are, be more difficult to be wrought upon. And as soft wax is apt to take the stamp of the seal, so are the

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. V

minds of children to receive the instructions imprinted on them at that age. AVhence, also, it seems to me good advice Avhich divine Plato gives to nurses, not to tell all sorts of common tales to children in infancy, lest thereby their minds should chance to be filled with foolish and corrupt notions.* The like good counsel Phocylides, the poet, seems to give in this verse of his : —

If we'll have virtuous children, we should choose Their tenderest age good principles to infuse.

6. Nor are we to omit taking due care, in the first place, that those children who are appointed to attend upon such young nurslings, and to be bred with them for play-fellows, be well-mannered, and next that they speak plain, natural Greek ; lest, being constantly used to converse with persons of a barbarous language and evil manners, they receive corrupt tinctures from them. For it is a true proverb, that if you live with a lame man, you will learn to halt.

7. Next, when a child is arrived at such an age as to be put under the care of pedagogues, great care is to be used that we be not deceived in them, and so commit our chil- dren to slaves or barbarians or cheating fellows. For it is a course never enough to be laughed at which many men nowadays take in this affair ; for if any of their servants be better than the rest, they dispose some of them to follow husbandry, some to navigation, some to merchandise, some to be stewards in their houses, and some, lastly, to put out their money to use for them. But if they find any slave that is a drunkard or a glutton, and unfit for any other business, to him they assign the government of their chil- dren ; whereas, a good pedagogue ought to be such a one in his dis])osition as Phoenix, tutor to Achilles, was.

And now I come to speak of that which is a greater matter, and of more concern than any that I have said.

* See Plato, Repub. II. p. 377 C.

10 OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

We are to look after such masters for our children as are blameless in their lives, not justly reprovable for their man- ners, and of the best experience in teaching. For the very spring and root of honesty and virtue lies in the felicity of liiihtinii on aood education, iind as husbandmen are wont to set forks to prop up feeble plants, so do honest school- masters prop up youth by careful instructions and admoni- tions, that they may duly bring forth the buds of good manners. But there are certain fathers nowadays who deserve that men should spit on them in contempt, who, before making any proof of those to whom they design to commit the teaching of their children, either through un- acquaintance, or, as it sometimes falls out, through unskil- fulness, intrust them to men of no good reputation, or, it may be, such as are branded with infamy. Although they are not altogether so ridiculous, if they offend herein through unskilfulness ; but it is a thing most extremely absurd, Avhen, as oftentimes it happens, though they know and are told beforehand, by those who understand better than themselves, both of the inability and rascality of cer- tain schoolmasters, they nevertheless commit the charge of their children to them, sometimes overcome by their fair and flattering speeches, and sometimes prevailed on to gratify friends who entreat them. This is an error of like nature with that of the sick man, who, to please his friends, forbears to send for tlie physician that might save his life by his skill, and employs a mountebank that quick- ly dispatcheth him out of the ΛVorld ; or of him who refuses a 'skilful shipmaster, and then, at his friend's en- treaty, commits the care of his vessel to one that is therein much his inferior. In the name of Jupiter and all the Gods, tell me how can that man deserve the name of a father, who is more concerned to gratify others in their requests, than to have his children well educated ? Or, is not that rather fitly applicable to this case, which Socrates,

or THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 11

that ancient philosopher, was wont to say, — that, if he could get up to the highest place in the city, he would lift up his voice and make this proclamation thence : " What mean you, fellow-citizens, that you thus turn every stone to scrape Λvealth together, and take so little care of your children, to whom, one day, you must relinquish it all ? " — to which I would add this, that such parents do like hira that is solicitous about his shoe, but neglects the foot that is to wear it. And yet many fathers there are, who so love their money and hate their children, that, lest it should cost them more than they are willing to spare to hire a good schoolmaster for them, they rather choose such per- sons to instruct their children as are of no worth ; thereby beating down the market, that they may purchase ignorance cheap. It was, therefore, a Λvitty and handsome jeer which Aristippus bestowed on a sottish father, who asked him what he would take to teach his child. He answered, A thousand drachms. Whereupon the other cried out :. Ο Hercules, what a price you ask ! for I can buy a slave at that rate. Do so, then, said the philosopher, and thou shalt have two slaves instead of one, — thy son for one, and him thou buyest for another. Lastly, how absurd it is, when thou accustomest thy children to take their food with their right hands, and chidest them if they receive it with their left, yet thou takest no care at all that the principles that are infused into them be right and regular.

And now I will tell you what ordinarily is like to befall such prodigious parents, when they have had their sons ill nursed and worse taught. For when such sons are arrived at mans estate, and, through contempt of a sound an) orderly way of living, precipitate themselves into all man- ner of disorderly and servile pleasures, then will those parents dearly repent of their own neglect of their chil- dren's education, when it is too late to amend it ; and vex

12 OF THE TRAIXIXG OF CHILDREN.

themselves, even to distraction, at their vicious courses. For then do some of those children acquaint themselves with flatterers and parasites, a sort of infamous and execra- ble persons, the very pests that corrupt and ruin young men ; others maintain mistresses and harlots, insolent and extravagant ; others waste their substance ; others, again, come to shipwreck on gaming and revelling. And some venture on still more audacious crimes, committing adul- tery and joining in the orgies of Bacchus, being ready to purchase one bout of debauched pleasure at the price of their lives. If now they had but conversed with some philosopher, they would never have enslaved themselves to such courses as these ; though possibly they might have learned at least to put in practice the precept of Diogenes, delivered by him indeed in rude language, but yet contain- ing, as to the scope of it, a great truth, when he advised a voung man to go to the public stews, that he might then inform himself, by experience, how things of greatest value and things of no value at all were there of equal worth.

8. In brief therefore I say (and what I say may justly challenge the repute of an oracle rather than of advice), that the one chief thing in this matter — which com priseth the beginning, middle, and end of all — is good education and regular instruction ; and that these two afford great help and assistance toAvards the attainment of virtue and felicity. For all other good things are but human and of small value, such as will hardly recompense the industry required to the getting of them. It is. indeed, a desirable thing to be well descended ; but the glory belongs to our ancestors. Riches are valuable ; but they are the goods of Fortune, Avho frequently takes tliem from those that have them, and carries them to those that never so much as hoped for them. Yea, the greater they are, the fairer mark are they for those to aim at who design to make our bags their prize ; I mean evil servants and accusers. But

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 13

the Aveightiest consideration of all is, that riches may be enjoyed by the Avorst as well as the best of men. Glory is a thing deserving• respect, but unstable ; beauty is a prize that men fight to obtain, but, when obtained, it is of little continuance ; health is a precious enjoyment, but easily im- paired ; strength is a thing desirable, but apt to be the prey of diseases and old age. And, in general, let any man who values himself upon strength of body know that he makes a great mistake ; for what indeed is any proportion of human strength, if compared to that of other animals, such as elephants and bulls and lions ? But learning alone, of all things in our possession, is immortal and divine. And two things there are that are most peculiar to human nature, reason and speech ; of which two, reason is the master of speech, and speech is the servant of reason, im- pregnable against all assaults of fortune, not to be taken away by false accusation, nor impaired by sickness, nor enfeebled by old age. For reason alone grows youthful by age ; and time,^ which decays all other things, increaseth knowledge in us in our decaying years. Yea, war itself, which like a Avinter torrent bears down all other things before it and carries them aAvay with it, leaves learning alone behind. Whence the answer seems to me very re- markable, which Stilpo, a philosopher of Megara, gave to Demetrius, Λνΐιο, when he levelled that city to the ground and made all the citizens bondmen, asked Stilpo whether he had lost any thing. Nothing, said he, for war cannot plunder virtue. To this saying that of Socrates also is very agreeable ; who, when Gorgias (as I take it) asked him what his opinion Avas of the king of Persia, and whether he judged him happy, returned answer, that he could not tell what to think of him, because he knew not how he was furnished with virtue and learning, — as judging humaii felicity to consist in those endowments, and not in those which are subject to fortune.

14 OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

9. Moreover, as it is my advice to parents that they make the breeding up of their children to learning the chiefest of their care, so I here add, that the learning they ought to train them up unto should be sound and wholesome, and such as is most remote from those trifles wliich suit the popular humor. For to please the many is to displease the wise. To this saying of mine that of Euripides him- self bears witness : —

I'm better skilled to treat a few, my peers,

Than in a crowd to tickle vulgar ears ;

Though others have the luck ou't, when they babble

Most to the wise, then most to please the rabble.*

Besides, I find by my own observation, that those persons who make it their business to speak so as to deserve the favor and approbation of the scum of the people, ordinarily live at a suitable rate, voluptuously and intemperately. And there is reason for it. For they who have no regard to Avhat is honest, so they may make provision for other men's pleasures, will surely not be very prepense to prefer what is right and wholesome before that Avhich gratifies their own inordinate pleasures and luxurious inclinations, and to quit that which humors them for that which restrains them.

If any one ask what the next thing is wherein I ΛνοηΜ have children instructed, and to what further good qualities I would have them inured, I answer, that I think it advisa- ble that they neither speak nor do any thing rashly ; for, according to the proverb, the best things are the most diflacult. But extemporary discourses are full of much ordinary and loose stuff, nor do such speakers Λνεΐΐ know where to begin or where to make an end. And besides other faults which those Avho speak suddenly are com- monly guilty of, they are commonly liable to this great one, that they multiply words without measure ; whereas,

* Eurip. Hippol. 986.

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 15

premeditation Λνΐΐΐ not sniFer a man to enlarge his dis- course beyond a due proportion. To this purpose it is reported of Pericles, that, being often called upon by the people to speak, he would not, because (as he said) he was unprepared. And Demosthenes also, who imi- tated him in the managery of public affairs, when the Athenians urged him to give his counsel, refused it with this answer : I have not yet prepared myself. Though it may be that this story is a mere fiction, brought down to us by uncertain tradition, without any credible author. But Demosthenes, in his oration against Midias, clearly sets forth the usefulness of premeditation. For there he says : " I confess, Ο ye Athenians ! that I came hither provided to speak ; and I will by no means deny that I have spent my utmost study upon the composing this oration. For it had been a pitiful omission in me, if, having suffered and still suffering such things, I should have neglected that Λvhich in this cause was to be spoken by me." * But here I would not be understood altogether to condemn all readi- ness to discourse extempore, nor yet to allow the use of it upon such occasions as do not require it ; but we are to use it only as we do physic. Still, before a person arrives at complete manhood, I would not permit him to speak upon any sudden incident occasion ; though, after he has attained a radicated faculty of speaking, he may allow him- self a greater liberty, as opportunity is offered. For as they who have been a long time in chains, when they are at last set at liberty, are unable to walk, on account of their former continual restraint, and are very apt to trip, so they who have been used to a fettered way of speaking a great while, if upon any occasion they be enforced to speak on a sudden, will hardly be able to express themselves without some tokens of their former confinement. But to permit those that are yet children to speak extemporally is to give them

* Demosth. in Mid. p. 576, 16.

16 OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

occasion for extremely idle talk. A wretched painter, they say, showing Apelles a picture, told him Avithal that he had taken a very little time to paint it. If thou hadst not told me so, said Apelles, I see cause enough to believe it was a hasty draught ; but I Avonder that in that space of time thou hast not painted many more such pictures.

I advise therefore (for I return now to the subject that I have digressed from) the shunning and avoiding, not merely of a starched, theatrical, and over-tragical form of speaking, but also of that which is too low and mean. For that which is too swelling is not fit for the managery of public aff"airs ; and that, on the other side, which is too thin is very inapt to Avork any notable impression upon the hearers. For as it is not only requisite that a man s body be healthy, but also that it be of a firm constitution, so ought a dis- course to be not only sound, but nervous also. For though such as is composed cautiously may be commended, yet that is all it can arrive at ; Avhereas that which hath some adventurous passages in it is admired also. And my opinion is the same concerning the afi"ections of the speaker's mind. For he must be neither of a too confident nor of a too mean and dejected spirit ; for the one is apt to lead to impudence, the other to servility ; and much of the orator's art, as well as great circumspection, is required to direct his course skilfully betwixt the two.

And now (whilst I am handling this point concerning the instruction of children) I will also give you my judgment concerning the frame of a discourse ; which is this, that to compose it in all parts uniformly not only is a great argu- ment of a defect in learning, but also is apt, I think, to nauseate the auditory when it is practised ; and in no case can it give lasting pleasure. For to sing the same tune, as the saying is, is in every thing cloying and offensive ; but men are generally pleased with variety, as in speeches and pageants, so in all other entertainments.

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 17

] 0. Wherefore, though we ought not to permit an ingen- uous child entirely to neglect any of the common sorts of learning, so far as they may be gotten by lectures or from public shows ; yet I would have him to salute these only as in his passage, taking a bare taste of each of them (seeing no man can possibly attain to perfection in all), and to give philosophy the pre-eminence of them all. I can illustrate my meaning by an example. It is a fine thing to sail round and visit many cities, but it is profitable to fix our dwellii;g in the best. Witty also was the saying of Bias, the philos- opher, that, as the wooers of Penelope, when they could not have their desire of the mistress, contented themselves to have to do with her maids, so commonly those students who are not capable of understanding philosophy waste them- selves in the study of those sciences that are of no value. \Vhence it follows, that we ought to make philosophy the chief of all our learning. For though, in order to the wel- fare of the body, the industry of men hath found out two arts, — medicine, which assists to the recovery of lost health and gymnastics, Avhich help us to attain a sound constitu- tion, — yet there is but one remedy for the distempers and diseases of the mind, and that is philosophy. For by the advice and assistance thereof it is that we come to under- stand what is honest, and what dishonest ; what is just, and what uujust ; in a word, what we are to seek, and what to avoid. AVe learn by it how we are to demean ourselves towards the Gods, towards our parents, our elders, the laws, strangers, governors, friends, wives, children, and servants. That is, we are to worship the Gods, to honor our parents, to reverence our elders, to be subject to the laws, to obey our governors, to love our friends, to use sobriety towards our wives, to be aifectionate to our children, and not to treat our servants insolently ; and (which is the chiefest lesson of all) not to be overjoyed in prosperity nor too much dejected in adversity ; not to be dissolute in our pleasures, nor in our

lii OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

anger to be transported with brutish rage and fury. These things I account the principal advantages which we gain by philosophy. For to use prosperity generously is the part of a man ; to manage it so as to decline envy, of a well governed man ; to master our pleasures by reason is the property of wise men ; and to moderate anger is the attainment only of extraordinary men. But those of all men I count most com- plete, who know how to mix and temper the managery of civil affairs with philosophy ; seeing they are thereby masters of two of the greatest good things that are, — a life of public usefulness as statesmen, and a life of calm tran- quillity as students of philosophy. For, whereas there are three sorts of lives, — the life of action, the life of contem- plation, and the life of pleasure, — the man who is utterly abandoned and a slave to pleasure is brutish and mean- spirited ; he that spends his time in contemplation without action is an unprofitable man ; and he that lives in action and is destitute of philosophy is a rustical man, and commits many absurdities. AVherefore we are to apply our utmost endeavor to enable ourselves for both ; that is, to manage public employments, and withal, at convenient seasons, to give ourselves to philosophical studies. Such statesmen were Pericles and Archytas the Tarentine ; such were Dion the Syracusan and Epaminondas the Theban, both of whom were of Plato's familiar acquaintance.

I think it not necessary to spend many more Avords about this point, the instruction of children in learning. Only it may be profitable at least, or even necessary, not to omit procuring for them the writings of ancient authors, but to make such a collection of them as husbandmen are wont to do of all needful tools. For of the same nature is the use of books to scholars, as being the tools and instruments of learning, and withal enabling them to derive knowledge from its proper fountains.

11. In the next place, the exercise of the body must not

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 19

be neglected ; but children must be sent to schools of gym- nastics, where they may have sufficient employment that Avay also. This will conduce partly to a more handsome carriage, and partly to the improvement of their strength. For the foundation of a vigorous old age is a good constitu- tion of the body in childhood. AVherefore, as it is expe- dient to provide those things in fair weather which may be useful to the mariners in a storm, so is it to keep good order and govern ourselves by rules of temperance in youth, as the best provision we can lay in for age. Yet must they husband their strength, so as not to become dried up (as it were) and destitute of strength to follow their studies. For, according to Plato, sleep and weariness are enemies to the arts.*

But why do I stand so long on these things ? I hasten to speak of that which is of the greatest importance, even beyond all that has been spoken of ; namely, I ΛνοηΜ have boys trained for the contests of wars by practice in the throwing of darts, shooting of arrows, and hunting of wild beasts. For we must remember in war the goods of the conquered are proposed as rewards to the conquerors. But war does not agree with a delicate habit of body, used only to the sliade ; for even one lean soldier that hath been used to military exercises shall overthrow whole troops of mere wrestlers who know nothing of war. But, somebody may say, whilst you profess to give precepts for the education of all free-born children, why do you carry the matter so as to seem only to accommodate those precepts to the rich, and neglect to suit them also to the children of poor men and plebeians ] To which objection it is no difficult thing to reply. For it is my desire that all children Avhatsoever may partake of the benefit of education alike ; but if yet any persons, by reason of the narrowness of their estates, cau-

* Plato, Repub. Λ^Ι. p. 537, B.

20

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

not make use of my precepts, let them not blame me that give them, but Fortune, which disableth them from makin;^ the advantage by them they otherwise might. Though CYQU poor men must use their utmost endeavor to give their children the best education ; or, if they cannot, they must bestow upon them the best that their abilities will reach. Thus much I thought fit here to insert in the body of my discourse, that I might the better be enabled to annex what I have yet to add concerning the right training of children.

12. I say now, that children are to be won to follow liberal studies by exhortations and rational motives, and on no account to be forced thereto by whipping or any other contumelious pimishments. I will not urge that such usage seems to be more agreeable to slaves than to ingenu- ous children ; and even slaves, when thus handled, are dulled and discouraged from the performance of their tasks, partly by reason of the smart of their stripes, and partly because of the disgrace thereby inflicted. But praise and reproof are more eff"ectual upon free-born children than any such dissrraceful handling ; the former to incite them to what is good, and the latter to restrain them from that which is evil. J3ut we must use reprehensions and commendations alter- natclyf and of various kinds according to the occasion ; so that when they grow petulant, they may be shamed by rep- rehension, and again, Λνΐιβη they better deserve it, they may be encouraged by commendations. Wherein Ave ought to imitate nurses, who, when they have made their infants cry, stop their mouths with the nipple to quiet them again. It is also useful not to give them such large commendations as to puff them up with pride ; for this is the ready way to fill them with a vain conceit of themselves, and to enfeeble their minds.

13. Moreover, I have seen some parents whose too much love to their children hath occasioned, in truth, their not loving them at all. I will give light to this assertion by an

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 21

example to those who ask what it means. It is this : while they are over-hasty to advance their children in all sorts of learning beyond their eqnals, they set them too hard and laborious tasks, whereby they fall under discouragement ; and this, with other inconveniences accompanying it, caus- eth them in the issue to be ill affected to learning• itself. For as plants by moderate watering are nourished, but with over- much moisture are glutted, so is the spirit improved by moderate labors, but overwhelmed by such as are excessive. W(; ought therefore to give children some time to take breath fiom their constant labors, considering that all human life is divided betwixt business and relaxation. To which purpose it is that we are inclined by nature not only to wake, but to sleep also ; that as we have sometimes wars, so like- wise at other times peace ; as some foul, so other fair days ; and, as Λνβ have seasons of important business, so also the vacation times of festivals. And, to contract all in a word, rest is the sauce of labor. Nor is it thus in livinof creatures only, but in things inanimate too. For even in bows and harps, we loosen their strings, that we may bend and wind them up again. Yea, it is universally seen that, as the body is maintained by repletion and evacuation, so is the mind by employment and relaN:ation.

Those parents, moreover, are to be blamed who, when they have committed their sons to the care of pedagogues or schoolmasters, never see or hear them perform their tasks ; Λvherein they fiiil much of their duty. For they ought, ever and anon, after the intermission of some days, to make trial of their children's proficiency ; and not in- trust their hopes of them to the discretion of a hireling. For even that sort of men will take more care of the children, when they know that they are regularly to be called to account. And here the saviui? of the kind's groom is very applicable, that nothing made the horse so fat as the king's eye.

22 OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

But we must most of all exercise and keep in constant em- ployment the memory of children ; for that is, as it were, the storehouse of all learning. Wherefore the mytholo- gists have made Mnemosyne, or Memory, the mother of the Muses, plainly intimating thereby that nothing doth so beget or nourish learning as memory. AVherefore we must employ it to both those purposes, whether the children be naturally apt or backward to remember. For so shall we both strengthen it in those to Avhom Nature in this respect hath been bountiful, and supply that to others wherein she hath been deficient. And as the former sort of boys will thereby come to excel others, so will the latter sort excel themselves. For that of Hesiod Avas well said, —

Oft little add to little, and tiic account Will swell : lieapt atoms thus produce a mount.*

Neither, therefore, let the parents be ignorant of this, that the exercising of memory in the schools doth not only give the greatest assistance towards the attainment of learning, but also to all the actions of life. For the remem- brance of things past affords us examples in our consults about things to come.

14. Children ought to be made to abstain from speaking filthily, seeing, as Democritus said, words are but the shadows of actions. They are, moreover, to be instructed to be affable and courteous in discourse. For as churlish manners are always detestable, so children may be kept from being odious in conversation, if they will not be l)ertinaciously bent to maintain all they say in dispute. For it is of use to a man to understand not only how to overcome, but also how to give ground when to conquer would turn to his disadvantage. For there is such a thing sometimes as a Cadmean victory ; which the wise Euripides attesteth, when he saith, —

* Hesiod, \Yorks and Days, 371.

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 2f3

Where two discourse, if the one's anger rise, Tlie man wlio lets the contest fall is wise. *

Add we now to these things some others of which chil- dren ought to have no less, yea, rather greater care ; to wit, that they avoid luxurious living, bridle their tongues, sub- due anger, and refrain their hands. Of how great moment each of these counsels is, I now come to inquire ; and we may best judge of them by examples. To begin with the last : some men there have been, who, by opening their hands to take what they ought not, have lost all the honor they got in the former part of their lives. So Gylippus the Lacedaemonian,! for unsewing the public money-bags, was condemned to banishment from Sparta. And to be able also to subdue anger is the part of a \vise man. Such a one was Socrates ; for when a hectoring and debauched young man rudely kicked him, so that those in his com- pany, being sorely offended, were ready to run after him and call him to account for it, AVhat, said he to them, if an ass had kicked me, would you think it handsomely done to kick him again ? And yet the young man himself escaped not unpunished ; for when all persons reproached him for so unworthy an act, and gave him the nickname of Αα•/.τιςτ)[ς, or the kicker, he hanged himself. The same Socrates. — when Aristophanes, publishing his play which he called the Clouds, therein threw all sorts of the foulest reproaches upon him, and a friend of his, who was pres-

* From the Protesilaus of Euripides, Frag. 656.

t The story is related by our author at large, in the Life of Lysander. It is this : Lysander sent by Gylippus to the Ephori, or chief magistrates of Sparta, a great sum of money, sealed up in bags. Gylippus unsews the bags at the bottom, and takes what he thinks fit out of each bag, and sews them up again ; but was dis- covered, partly by the notes which \vere put in the bags by Lysander, mentioning the sums in each bag; and partly by his own servant, who, when the magistrates were solicitous to find what was become of the money that was wanting, told them jestingly that there were a great many owls under the tiles at his master's house <for the money had that bird, as the badge of Athens, where it was coined, stamped on it) ; whither they sent, and found it.

4 s;'». nm tm m. ^i »■ Μ Ρ ft ft m ;

fSii ^ t?. ft m i». je m.m. $^ f ^ /»' ,ai^ ίΐ?ϊ 3M fc fc, *, fe'K'lK h. I< ■:

24

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

ent at the acting of it, repeated to him what was there said in the same comical manner, asking him Avithal, Does not this offend you, Socrates? — repUed: Not at all, for I can as well bear with a fool in a play as at a great feast. And something of the same nature is reported to have been done by Archytas of Tarentum and Plato. Archytas, when, upon his return from the war, wherein he had been a general, he was informed that his land had been impaired by his bailiff's negligence, sent for him, and said only thus to him when he came : If I were not very angry with thee, I would severely correct thee. And Plato, being offended with a gluttonous and debauched servant, called to him Speusippus, his sister's son, and said unto him : Go beat thou this fellow ; for I am too much offended with him to do it myself.

These things, you will perhaps say, are very difficult to be imitated. I confess it ; but yet we must endeavor to the utmost of our power, by setting such examples before us, to repress the extravagancy of our immoderate, furious anger. For neither are we able to rival the experience or virtue of such men in many other matters ; but we do, nevertheless, as sacred interpreters of divine mysteries and priests of wisdom, strive to follow these examples, and, as it were, to enrich ourselves with what we can nibble from them.

And as to the bridling of the tongue, concerning which also I am obliged to speak, if any man think it a small matter or of mean concernment, he is much mistaken. For it is a point of wisdom to be silent when occasion re- quires, and better than to speak, though never so well. And, in my judgment, for this reason the ancients insti- tuted mystical rites of initiation in religion, that, being in them accustomed to silence, we might thence transfer the fear we have of the Gods to the fidelity required in human secrets. Yea, indeed, experience shows that no man ever

OF THE TRxilNING OF CHILDREN.

25

repented of having kept silence ; but many that they have not done so. And a man may, when he Λνίΐΐ, easily utter what he hath by silence concealed ; but it is impossible for him to recall what he hath once spoken. And, moreover, I can remember infinite examples that have been told me of those that have procured gi-eat damages to themselves by intemperance of the tongue ; one or two of which I will give, omitting the rest. AVhen Ptolemaeus Philadelphus had taken his sister Arsinoe to wife, Sotades for breaking an obscene jest* upon him lay languishing in prison a great while ; a punishment which he deserved for his un- seasonable babbling, whereby to provoke laughter in others he purchased a long time of mourning to himself. Much after the same rate, or rather still worse, did Theocritus the Sophist both talk and suffer. For when Alexander com- manded the Grecians to provide him a purple robe, where- in, upon his return from the wars, he meant to sacrifice to the Gods in gratitude for his victorious success against the barbarians, and the various states were bringing in tlie sums assessed upon them, Theocritus said : I now see clearly that this is what Homer calls purple death, which I never understood before. By which speech he made the king liis enemy from that time forwards. Tlie same person provoked Antigonus, the king of Macedonia, to great wrath, by reproaching him with his defect, as having but one eye. Thus it was. Antigonus commanded Entropion his master- cook (then in waiting) to go to this Theocritus and settle some accounts with him. And when he announced his errand to Theocritus, and called frequently about the busi- ness, the latter said: I know that thou hast a mind to dish me up raw to that Cyclops ; thus reproaching at once the king with the Λvant of his eye, and the cook with his em- ployment. To which Entropion replied : Then thou shalt lose thy head, as the penalty of thy loquacity and madness

* Ei'f ονχ όσίην τρνμαλίι/ν το κέντρον ώβεΐς.

24- OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

ent at the acting of it, repeated to him what was there said in the same comical manner, asking him Avithal, Does not this offend you, Socrates? — repUed: Not at all, for I can as well bear with a fool in a play as at a great feast. And something of the same nature is reported to have been done by Archytas of Tarentum and Plato. Archytas, when, upon his return from the war, wherein he had been a general, he was informed that his land had been impaired by his bailiff's negligence, sent for him, and said only thus to him when he came : If I were not very angry with thee, I would severely correct thee. And Plato, being offended with a gluttonous and debauched servant, called to him Speusippus, his sister's son, and said unto him : Go beat thou this fellow ; for I am too much offended with him to do it myself.

These things, you will perhaps say, are very difficult to be imitated. I confess it ; but yet we must endeavor to the utmost of our power, by setting such examples before us, to repress the extravagancy of our immoderate, furious anger. For neither are we able to rival the experience or virtue of such men in many other matters ; but we do, nevertheless, as sacred interpreters of divine mysteries and priests of wisdom, strive to follow these examples, and, as it were, to enrich ourselves with what we can nibble from them.

And as to the bridling of the tongue, concerning which also I am obliged to speak, if any man think it a small matter or of mean concernment, he is much mistaken. For it is a point of wisdom to be silent when occasion re- quires, and better than to speak, though never so well. And, in my judgment, for this reason the ancients insti- tuted mystical rites of initiation in religion, that, being in them accustomed to silence, we might thence transfer the fear Λνο have of the Gods to the fidelity required in human secrets. Yea, indeed, experience shows that no man ever

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 25

repented of having kept silence ; but mEiny that they have not done so. And a man may, when he ΛνϊΠ, easily utter what he hath by silence concealed ; but it is impossible for him to recall what he hath once spoken. And, moreover, I can remember infinite examples that have been told me of those that have procured great damages to themselves by intemperance of the tongue ; one or two of which I will give, omitting the rest. AVlien Ptolemaeus Philadelphus had taken his sister Arsinoe to wife, Sotades for breaking an obscene jest* upon him lay languishing in prison a great while ; a punishment which he deserved for his un- seasonable babbling, whereby to provoke laughter in others he purchased a long time of mourning to himself. Much after the same rate, or rather still worse, did Theocritus the Sophist both talk and suffer. For when Alexander com- manded the Grecians to provide him a purple robe, where- in, upon his return from the wars, he meant to sacrifice to the Gods in gratitude for his victorious success against the. barbarians, and the various states were bringing in the sums assessed upon them, Theocritus said : I now see clearly that this is what Homer calls purple death, which I never understood before. By which speech he made the king his enemy from that time forwards. The same person provoked Antigonus, the king of Macedonia, to great wrath, by reproaching him with his defect, as having but one eye. Thus it was. Antigonus commanded Entropion his master- cook (then in waiting) to go to this Theocritus and settle some accounts with him. And when he announced his errand to Theocritus, and called frequently about the busi- ness, the latter said: I know that thou hast a mind to dish me u\) raw to that Cyclops ; thus reproaching at once the king with the want of his eye, and the cook with his em- ployment. To Λvllich Entropion replied : Then thou shalt lose thy head, as the penalty of thy loquacity and madness

* Eif ονχ όσίην τρνμαλίην το κέντρον ώϋεϊς.

26

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

And he was as good as his word ; for he departed and in- formed the king, who sent and put Theocritus to death.

Besides all these things, we are to accustom children to speak the truth, and to account it, as indeed it is, a matter of religion for them to do so. For lying is a servile quality, deserving the hatred of all mankind ; yea, a fault for which we ought not to forgive our meanest servants.

15. Thus far have I discoursed concerning the good- breeding of children, and the sobriety requisite to that age, Λvithout any hesitation or doubt in my own mind concern- ing any thing that I have said. But in what remains to be said, I am dubious and divided in my own thoughts, which, as if they were laid in a balance, sometimes incline this, and sometimes that way. I am therefore loath to persuade or dissuade in the matter. But I must venture to answer one question, which is this : whether we ought to ad.mit those that make love to our sons to keep them company, or whether Ave should not rather thrust them out of doors, and banish them from their society. For when 1 look upon those straightforward parents, of a harsh and austere tem- per, who think it an outrage not to be endured that their sons should have any thing to say to lovers, I am tender of being the persuader or encourager of such a practice. But, on the other side, Avhen I call to mind Socrates, and Plato, and Xenophon, and Aeschines, and Cebes, with an whole troop of other such men, who have approA^d those masculine loves, and still have brought up young men to learning, public employments, and virtuous living, I am again of another mind, and am much influenced by my zeal to imitate such great men. And the testimony also of Euripides is favorable to their opinion, when he says, —

Another love there is in mortals found ;

The love of just and chaste and virtuous souls.*

And yet I think it not improper here to mention withal

* From the Dictys of Euripides, Frag. 312.

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. Ζ ι

that saying of Plato, spoken betwixt jest and earnest, that men of great eminence must be allowed to show aifection to what beautiful objects they please.* I would decide then that parents are to keep off such as make beauty the object of their affection, and admit altogether such as direct the love to the soul ; whence such loves are to be avoided as are in Thebes and Elis, and that sort which in Crete they call ravishment (άοΛαγμός) ; -j* and such are to be imitated as are in Athens and Sparta.

16. But in this matter let every man follow his ολνη judgment. Thus far have I discoursed concerning the right ordering and decent carriage of children. I will now pass thence, to speak somewhat concerning the next age, that of youth. For I have often blamed the evil custom of some, Avho commit their boys in childhood to pedagogues and teachers, and then suffer the impetuosity of their youth to range Avithout restraint ; Avhereas boys of that age need to be kept under a stricter guard than children. For who does not know that the errors of childhood are small, and perfectly capable of being amended ; such as slighting their pedagogues, or disobedience to their teachers' instructions. But when they begin to grow towards maturity, their offences are oftentimes very great and heinous ; such as gluttony, pilfering money from their parents, dicing, revel- lings, drunkenness, courting of maidens, and defiling of marriage-beds. AVherefore it is expedient that such im- petuous heats should with great care be kept under and restrained. For the ripeness of that age admits no bounds in its pleasures, is skittish, and needs a curb to check it ; so that those parents ΛνΙιο do not hold in their sons with great strength about that time find to their surprise that they are giving their vicious inclinations full swing in the pursuit of the vilest actions. Wherefore it is a dut} in-

* See Plato, Repub. V. p. 468, C. t See Strabo X. pp. 483, 484.

28 OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

cumbent upon wise parents, in that age especially, to set a strict watch upon them, and to keep them within the bounds of sobriety by instructions, threatenings, entreaties, counsels, promises, and by laying before them examples of those men (on one side) Avho by immoderate love of pleasures have brought themselves into great mischief, and of tliose (on the other) who by abstinence in the pursuit of them have purchased to themselves very great praise and glory. For these two things (hope of honor, and fear of punish- ment) are, in a sort, the first elements of virtue ; the former whereof spurs men on the more eagerly to the pursuit of honest studies, while the latter blunts the edge of their inclinations to vicious courses.

17. And in sum, it is necessary to restrain young men from the conversation of debauched persons, lest they take infection from their evil examples. This was taught by Pythagoras in certain enigmatical sentences, which I shall here relate and expound, as being greatly useful to further virtuous inclinations. Such are these. Taste not of fish that have black tails ; that is, converse not with men that are smutted \vith vicious qualities. Stride not over the beam of the scales ; wherein he teacheth us the regard we ought to have for justice, so as not to go beyond its meas- ures. Sit not on a choenix ; wherein he forbids sloth, and requires us to take care to provide ourselves with the neces- saries of life. Do not strike hands with every man ; he means we ought not to be over hasty to make acquaintances or friendships with others. Wear not a tight ring ; that is, we are to labor after a free and independent way of living, and to submit to no fetters. Stir not up the fire with a sword ; signifying that Ave ought not to provoke a man more when he is angry already (since this is a most unseemly act), but we should rather comply with him while his passion is in its heat. Eat not thy heart ; which forbids to afflict our souls, and waste them with vexatious cares,

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 29

Abstain from beans ; that is, keep out of public offices, for anciently the choice of the officers of state was made by beans. Put not food in a chamber-pot ; Avherein he declares that elegant discourse ought not to be put into an impure mind ; for discourse is the food of the mind, which is rendered unclean by the foulness of the man λυΙίο receives it. When men are arrived at the goal, they should not turn back ; that is, those who are near the end of their days, and see the period of their lives approaching, ought to entertain it contentedly, and not to be grieved at it.

But to return from this digression, — our children, as 1 have said, are to be debarred the company of all evil men, but especially flatterers. For I would still affirm what I have often said in the presence of divers fathers, that there is not a more pestilent sort of men than these, nor any that more certainly and speedily hurry youth into precipices. Yea, they utterly ruin both fathers and sons, making the old age of the one and the youth of the other full of sorrow, while they cover the hook of their evil counsels Λvith the un- avoidable bait of voluptuousness. Parents, Λvhen they have good estates to leave their children, exhort them to sobriety, flatterers to drunkenness ; parents exhort to continence, these to lasciviousness ; parents to good husbandry, these to prodigality ; parents to industry, these to slothfulness. And they usually entertain them with such discourses as these : The whole life of man is but a point of time ; let us enjoy it therefore while it lasts, and not spend it to no purpose. Why should you so much regard the displeasure of your father? — an old doting fool, with one foot already in the grave, and 'tis to be hoped it will not be long ere we carry him thither altogether. And some of them there are Avho procure young men foul harlots, yea, prostitute wives to them ; and they even make a prey of those things which the careful fathers have provided for the sustenance of their

30 OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN

old age. A cursed tribe ! True friendship's hypocrites, they have no knowledge of plain dealing and frank speech. They flatter the rich, and despise the poor ; and they seduce the young, as by a musical charm. When those who feed them begin to laugh, then they grin and show their teeth. They are mere counterfeits, bastard pretenders to humanity, living at the nod and beck of the rich ; free by birth, yet slaves by choice, who always think themselves abused when they are not so, because they are not supported in idleness at others' cost. Wherefore, if fathers have any care for the good breeding of their children, they ought to drive such foul beasts as these out of doors. They ought also to keep them from the companionship of vicious school-fellows, for these are able to corrupt the most in- genuous dispositions.

18. These counsels Λvhich I have now given are of great worth and importance ; Avhat I have now to add touches certain allowances that are to be made to human nature. Again therefore I would not have fathers of an over-rigid and harsh temper, but so mild as to forgive some slips of youth, remembering that they themselves were once young. But as physicians are wont to mix their bitter medicines with sweet syrups, to make what is pleasant a vehicle for what is wholesome, so should fathers temper the keenness of their reproofs with lenity. They may occasionally loosen the reins, and allow their children to take some liberties they are inclined to, and again, when it is fit, manage them with a straighter bridle. But chiefly should they bear their errors without passion, if it may be ; and if they chance to be heated more than ordinary, they ou^ht not to sufier the flame to burn long. For it is better that a father's anger be hasty than severe ; because the heaviness of his Avrath, joined with unplacableness, is no small argument of hatred towards the child. It is good also not to discover the notice they take of divers faults, and to transfer to such

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN. 31

cases that dimness of sight and hardness of hearing that are wont to accompany old age ; so as sometimes not to hear what they hear, nor to see what tliey see, of their children's miscarriages. We use to bear with some faiUngs in our friends, and it is no wonder if we do the like to our children, especially Avhen we sometimes overlook drunken- ness in our very servants. Thou hast at times been too straight-handed to thy son ; make him at other whiles a larger allowance. Thou hast, it may be, been too angry with him ; pardon him the next fault to make him amends. He hath made use of a servant's wit to circumvent thee in sometliing ; restrain thy anger. He hath made bold to take a yoke of oxen out of the pasture, or he hath come home smelling of his yesterday's drink ; take no notice of it ; and if of ointments too, say nothing. For by this means the wild colt sometimes is made more tame. Besides, fo) those who are intemperate in their youthful lusts, and will not be amended by reproof, it is good to provide wives ; for marriage is the strongest bond to hamper wild youth withal. But we must take care that the wives we procure for them be neither of too noble a birth nor of too great a portion to suit their circumstances ; for it is a wise saying, drive on your own track.* Wiiereas men that marry women very much superior to themselves are not so truly husbands to their wives, as they are unawares made slaves to their por- tions. I will add a few words more, and put an end to these advices. The chiefest thing• that fathers are to look to is, that they themselves become effectual examples to their children, by doing all those things which belong to them and avoiding all vicious practices, that in their lives, as in a glass, their children may see enough to give them an aversion to all ill words anl actions. For those that chide children for such faults as they themselves fall into

* This sayinc:, Την κατά σαυτόν Άα. is attributed to Pittacus of Mitylene by Dio genes Laertius, I. 4, 8. See also Aristoph. Nub. 25, and Aesch. Prom 8y0. (G.)

32

OF THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.

unconsciously accuse themselves, under their children's names. And if they are altogether vicious in their own lives, they lose the right of reprehending their very ser- vants, and much more do they forfeit it towards their sons. Yea, what is more than that, they make themselves even counsellors and instructors to them in Avickedness. For where old men are impudent, there of necessity must the young men be so too. AVherefore we are to apply our minds to all such practices as may conduce to the good breeding of our children. And here we may take example from Eurydice of Hierapolis, who, although she was an Illyrian, and so thrice a barbarian, yet applied herself to learning ΛνΙιοη she was well advanced in years, that she miiilit teach her children. Her love towards her children appears evidently in this Epigram of hers, which she dedi- cated to the Muses : —

Eurydice to the Muses here doth raise This monument, her honest love to praise; Who her grown sons that she might sciiolars breed, Then well in yeais, heraelf first learned to read.

And thus have I finished the precepts which I designed to give concerning this subject. But that they should all be followed by any one reader is rather, I fear, to be wished than hoped. And to follow the greater part of them, though it may not be impossible to human nature, yet will need a concurrence of more than ordinary diligence joined with good fortune.

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

A DIALOGUE.

SYLLA, FUNDANUS.

1. Sylla. Those painters, Ο Fundaniis, in my opinion do very wisely, who never finish any piece at the first sitting, but take a review of it at some convenient distance of time ; because the eye, being relieved for a time, renews its power by making frequent and fresh judgments, and becomes able to observe many small and critical diiFerences which con- tinual poring and familiarity Avould prevent it from notic- ing. Now, because it cannot be that a man should stand off from himself and interrupt his consciousness, and then after some interval return to accost himself again (which is one principal reason why a man is a Avorse judge of him- self than of other men), the next best course that a man can take will be to inspect his friends after some time of absence, and also to offer himself to their examination, not to see whether he be grown old on the sudden, or whether the habit of his body be become better or Avorse than it was before, but that they may take notice of his manner and behavior, whether in that time he hath made any advance in goodness, or gained ground of his vices. Wherefore, being after two years' absence returned to Rome, and having since conversed with thee here again for these five months, 1 think it no great matter of wonder tnat those good qualities which, by the advantage of a good natural disposition, von were formerly possessed of

34: CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

have in this time received so considerable an increase. But truly, when I behold how that vehement and fiery dis- position which you had to anger is now through the con- duct of reason become so gentle and tractable, my mind prompts me to say, with Homer, —

0 wonder ! how much gentler is he grown ! *

Nor hath this gentleness produced in thee any laziness or irresolution ; but, like cultivation in the earth, it hath caused an evenness and a profundity very effectual unto fruitful action, instead of thy former veheraency and over- eagerness. And therefore it is evident that thy former 2:)roneness to anger hath not been withered in thee by any decay of vigor which age might have effected, or spontane- ously ; but that it hath been cured by making use of some mollifying precepts.

And indeed, to tell you the truth, when I heard our friend Eros say the same thing, I had a suspicion that he did not report the thing as it was, but that out of mere good-will he testified those things of you which ought to be found in every good and virtuous man. And yet you know he cannot be easily induced to depart from what he judges to be true, in order to favor any man. But now, truly, as I acquit him of having therein made any false report of thee, so I desire thee, being now at leisure from thy journey, to declare unto us the means and (as it were) the medicine, by use whereof thou hastWought thy mind to be thus manageable and natural, thus gentle and obedient unto reason.

FuNDANus. But in the mean while, Ο most kind Sylla, you had best beware, lest you also through affection and friendship may be somewhat careless in making an esti- mate of my affairs. For Eros, having himself also a mind oft-times unable to keep its ground and to contain itself

* II. XXn. 373.

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 35

within that obedience which Homer mentions, but subject to be exasperated through an hatred of men's wickedness, may perhaps think I am grown more mikl ; just as in music, when the key is changed, that note which before was the base becomes a higher note Avith respect to oth- ers which are now below it.

Sylla. Neither of these is so, Fundanus ; but, I pray you, gratify us all by granting the request I made.

2. Fundanus. This then, Ο Sylla, is one of those excellent rules given by Musonius which I bear in memo- ry,— that those who would be in sound health must physic themseh^es all their lives. Now I do not think that reason cures, like hellebore, by purging out itself together with the disease it cures, but by keeping possession of the soul, and so governing and guarding its judgments. For the power of reason is not like drugs, but like wholesome food ; and, with the assistance of a good natural disposition, it produceth a healthful constitution in all with whom it hath . become familiar.

And as for those good exhortations and admonitions Avhicli are applied to passions while they swell and are at their height, they work but slowly and with small success ; and they differ in nothing from those strong-smelling things, which indeed do serve to put those that have the falling sickness upon their legs again after they are fallen, but are not able to remove the disease. For whereas other passions, even when they are in their ruff and acme, do in some sort yield and admit reason into the soul, which comes to help it from without ; anger does not, as Melan- thius says, —

Displace the mind, and then act dismal things ;

but it absolutely turns the mind out of doors, and bolts the door against it ; and, like those who burn their houses and themselves within them, it makes all things within full

86 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

of confusion, smoke, and noise, so that the soul can neither see nor hear any thing that might reheve it. AVherefore sooner will an empty ship in a storm at sea admit of a pilot from without, than a man tossed with anger and rage listen to the advice of another, unless he have his own reason first prepared to entertain it.

But as those who expect to be besieged are wont to gather together and lay in provisions of such things as they are like to need, not trusting to hopes of relief from Avithout, so ought it to be our special concern to fetch in from philosophy such foreign helps as it affords against anger, and to store them up in the soul beforehand, seeing that it will not be so easy a matter to provide ourselves when the time is come for using them. For either the soul cannot hear what is spoken without, by reason of the tumult, unless it have its own reason (like the director of the rowers in a ship) ready to entertain and understand whatsoever precept shall be given ; or, if it do chance to hear, yet ΛνΠΙ it be ready to despise what is patiently and mildly offered, and to be exasperated by what shall be pressed upon it with more vehemency. For, since wrath is proud and self-conceited, and utterly averse from compli- ance Avith others, like a fortified and guarded tyranny, that which is to overthrow it must be bred within it and be of its own household.

3. Now the continuance of anger and frequent fits of it produce an evil habit in the soul called Avrath fulness, or a propensity to be angry, Λvhich oft-times ends in choleric temper, bitterness, and moroseness. Then the mind be- comes ulcerated, peevish, and querulous, and like a thin, weak plate of iron, receives impression and is wounded by even the least occurrence ; but when the judgment pres- ently seizes upon wrathful ebullitions and suppresses them, it not only Λvorks a cure for the present, but renders the soul firm and not so liable to such impressions for the fu-

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 37

tare. And truly, when I myself had twice or thrice made a resolute resistance unto anger, the like befell me that did the Thebans ; who, having• once foiled the Lacedaemonians, that before that time had held themselves invincible, never after lost so much as one battle Avhich they fought against them. For I became fully assured in my mind, that anger might be overcome by the use of reason. And I perceived that it might not only be quieted by the sprinkling of cold Avater, as Aristotle relates, but also be extinguished by put- ting one into a fright. Yea, according to Homer, many men have had their anger melted and dissipated by sudden surprise of joy. So that I came to this firm resolution, that this passion is not altogether incurable to such as are but Avilling to be cured ; since the beginnings and occa- sions of it are not always great or forcible ; but a scoif, or a jest, or the laughing at one, or a nod only, or some other matter of no great importance, Λνϋΐ put many men into a passion. Tbus Helen, by addressing her niece in the words beginning, —

Ο my Electra, now a virgin stale,

provoked her to make this nipping return : —

Thou'rt wise too late, thou sliouldst have kept at home.*

And so did Callisthenes provoke Alexander by saying, when the great bowl was going round, I will not drink so deep in honor of Alexander, as to make work for Aescu- lapius.

4. As therefore it is an easy matter to stop the fire that is kindled only in hare's wool, candle-wick, or a little chaff, but if it have once taken hold of matter that hath solidity and thickness, it soon inflames and consumes, as Aeschylus says, —

With youthful vigor the carpenter's lofty work ;

SO he that «.loserves anger w^iile it is in its beginning, and

* Eurip. Orestes, 72 and 99.

38 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

sees it by degrees smoking and taking fire from some speech or chafF-like scurrility, need take no great pains to extinguish it, but oftentimes can put an end to it only by silence or neglect. For as he that adds no fuel to the fire hath already as good as put it out, so he that doth not feed anger at the first, nor blow the fire in himself, hath pre- vented and destroyed it. Wherefore Hieronymus, although he taught many other useful things, yet hath given me no satisfaction in saying that anger is not perceptible in its birth, by reason of its suddenness, but only after its birth and Avhile it lives ; for there is no other passion, while it is gathering and stirring up, which hath its rise and increase so conspicuous and observable. This is very skilfully taught by Homer, by making Achilles suddenly surprised with grief as soon as ever the word fell on his ear, saying of him, —

This said, a sable cloud of grief covered him o'er ; *

but making Agamemnon grow angry slowly and need many words to inflame him, so that, if these had been stopped and forbidden when they began, the contest had never grown to that degree and greatness which it did. Where- fore Socrates, as oft as he perceived any fierceness of spirit to rise within him towards any of his friends, setting him- self like a promontory to break the Avaves, Avould speak Avith a lower voice, bear a smiling countenance, and look Avith a more gentle eye ; and thus, by bending the other way and moving contrary to the passion, he kept himself from falling or being Avorsted.

5. For the first way, my friend, to suppress auger, as you would a tyrant, is not to obey or yield to it when it commands us to speak high, to look fiercely, and to beat ourselves ; but to be quiet, and not increase the passion, as we do a disease, by impatient tossing and crying out. It is

* n. XVII. 591.

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 39

true that lovers' practices, such as revelling, singing, crown- ing tlie door with garlands, have a kind of alleviation in them which is neither rude nor unpleasing : —

Coming, I asked not who or wliose she was, But kissed lier door full sweetly, — that I wot ; If this be sin, to sin I can but choose.

So the weeping and lamentation which we permit in mourn- ers doubtless carry forth much of the grief together with the tears. But anger, quite on the contrary, is more in- flamed by what the angry persons say or do.

The best course then is for a man to compose himself, or else to run away and hide himself and retreat into quiet, as into an haven, as if he perceived a flt of epilepsy com- ing on, lest he fall, or rather fall upon others ; and truly we do most and most frequently fall upon our friends. For we neither love all, nor envy all, nor fear all men ; but there is nothing untouched and unset upon by anger. AVe are angry with our foes and with our friends ; with our own children and our parents ; nay, with the Gods above, and the very beasts below us, and instruments that have no life, as Thamyras was, —

His horn, though bound with gold, lie brake in's ire. He brake his melodious and well-strung lyre ; *

and Pandarus, wishing a curse upon himself if he did not burn his bow,

First broken by his hands.t

But Xerxes dealt blows and marks of his displeasure to the sea itself, and sent his letters to the mountain in the style ensuing : " Ο thou wretched Athos, whose top now reaches to the skies, I charge thee, put not in the way of my Λvorks stones too big and difficult to be wrought. If thou do, I will cut thee into pieces, and cast thee into the sea.

For anger hath many terrible effects, and many also that

* From the Thamyras of Sophocles, Frag. 224. t H- V. 216

40 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

are ridiculous ; and therefore of all passions, this of anger is iTiost hated and most contemned, and it is good to con- sider it in both respects.

6. I therefore, whether rightly or not I know not, began this cure with learning the nature of aiiger by be- holding it in other men, as the Lacedaemonians learned what drunkenness was by seeing it in the Helots. And, in the iirst place, as Hippocrates said that that was the most dan- gerous disease which made the sick man's countenance most unlike to what it was, so I observed that men trans- ported with anger also exceedingly change their visage, color, gait, and voice. Accordingly I formed a kind of image of that passion to myself, withal conceiving great in dignation against myself if I should at any time appear to my friends, or to my wife and daughters, so terrible and dis- composed, not only Avith so wild and strange a look, but also with so fierce and harsh a voice, as I had met with in some others of my acquaintance, who by reason of anger were not able to observe either good manners or countenance or graceful speech, or even their persuasiveness and aff"ability in conversation.

Wherefore Cains Gracchus, the orator, being of a rugged disposition and a passionate kind of speaker, had a pipe made for him, such as musicians use to vary their voice higher or lower by degrees ; and with this pipe his ser- vant stood behind him while he pronounced, and gave him a mild and gentle note, Avhereby he took him down from his loudness, and took off the harshness and angriness of his voice, assuaging and charming the anger of the orator.

As their shrill wax-joined reed who herds do keep Sounds forth sweet measures, which invite to sleep. *

For my own part, had I a careful and pleasant compan- ion who would show me my angry face in a glass, I should not at all take it ill. In like manner, some are wont to

* Aesch. Prometheus, 574.

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 41

have a looking-glass held to them after they have bathed, though to little purpose ; but to behold one's self unnaturally disguised and disordered will conduce not a little to the impeachment of anger. For those who delight in pleas- ant fables tell us, that Minerva herself, playing on a pipe, was thus admonished by a satyr : —

That look becomes you not, lay down your pipes, And take your arms, and set your cheeks to rights ;

but would not regard it ; yet, when by chance she beheld the mien of her countenance in a river, she was moved with indignation, and cast her pipes away ; and yet here art had the delight of melody to comfort her for the deformity. And Marsyas, as it seems, did Avith a kind of muzzle and mouth-piece restrain by force the too horrible eruption of his breath when he played, and so corrected and concealed the distortion of his visage : —

With shining gold he girt his temples rough, And his wide mouth with thongs that tied behind.

Now anger doth swell and puff up the countenance very in- decently, and sends forth a yet more indecent and unpleasant voice, —

Moving the heart-strings, which should be at rest.

For when the sea is tossed and troubled with winds, and casts up moss and sea-weed, they say it is purged ; but those impure, bitter, and vain words which anger tlirows up when the soul has become a kind of Λvhirlpool, defile the speakers, in the first place, and fill them with dishonor, ar- guing them to have always had such things in them and to be full of them, only now they are discovered to have them by their anger. So for a mere word, the lightest of things (as Plato says), they undergo the heaviest of punishments, being ever after accounted enemies, evil speakers, and of a ma- lignant disposition.

7. While now I see all this and bear it in mind, the

42 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

thought occurs to me, and I naturally consider by myself, that as it is good for one in a fever, so much better is it for one in anger, to have his tongue soft and smooth. For if the tongue in a fever be unnaturally affected, it is indeed an evil symptom, but not a cause of harm ; but when the tongue of angry men becomes rough and foul, and breaks out into absurd speeches, it produces insults which work ir- reconcilable hatred, and proves that a poisonous malevo- lence lies festering within. For wine does not make men vent any thing so impure and odious as anger doth ; and, besides, what proceeds from wine is matter for jest and laughter, but that from anger is mixed with gall and bitter- ness. And he that is silent in his cups is counted a burthen, and a bore to the company, whereas in anger there is nothing more commended than peace and silence ; as Sappho adviseth, —

Wlien anger once 13 spread within thy breast, Shut up thy tongue, that vainly barking beast.

8. Nor doth the constant observation of ourselves in anger minister these things only to our consideration, but it also gives us to understand another natural property of anger, how disingenuous and unmanly a thing it is, and how far from true wisdom and greatness of mind. Yet the vulgar account the angry man's turbulence to be his activity, his loud threats to argue boldness, and his refractoriness strength ; as also some mistake his cruelty for an under- taking of great matters, his implacableness for a firmness of resolution, and his morosity for an hatred of that Avhich is evil. For, in truth, both the deeds and motions and the whole mien of angry men do accuse them of much little- ness and infirmity, not only when they vex little children, scold silly women, and think dogs and horses and asses Avorthy of their anger and deserving to be punished (as Ctesiphon the Pancratiast, who vouchsafed to kick the ass

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 43

that had kicked him first) ; but even in their tyrannical slaughters, their mean-spiritedness appearing in their bitterness, and their suffering exhibited outwardly in their actions, are but like to the biting of serpents λυΙιο, when they themselves become burnt and full of pain, violently thrust the venom that inflames them from themselves into those that have hurt them. For as a great blow causes a great swelling in the flesh, so in the softest souls the giving Λvay to a passion for hurting others, like a stroke on the soul, doth make it to swell with anger ; and all the more, the greater is its weakness.

For this cause it is that women are more apt to be angry than men are, and sick persons than the healthful, and old men than those who are in their perfect age and strength, and men in misery than such as prosper. For the covetous man is most prone to be angry Avith his steward, the glutton with his cook, the jealous man with his wife, the vain- glorious person with him that speaks ill of him ; but of all men there are none so exceedingly disposed to be angry as those who are ambitious of honor, and affect to carry on a fiiction in a city, which (according to Pindar) is but a splendid vexation. In like manner, from the great grief and suffering of the soul, through weakness especially, there ariseth anger, which is not like the nerves of the soul (as one spake), but like its straining and convulsive motions when it vehemently stirs itself up in its desires and endeav- ors of revenge.

9. Indeed such cAdl examples as these afford ns specula- tions which are necessary, though not pleasant. But now, from those who have carried themselves mildly and gently in their anger, I shall present you with most excellent sayings and beautiful contemplations ; and I begin to con- temn such as say. You have wronged a man indeed, and is a man to bear this 1 — Stamp on his neck, tread him down in the dirt, — and such like provoking speeches, Avhere-

44 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

by some do very unhandsomely translate and remove anger from the Avomen's to the men's apartment. For fortitude, which in other respects agrees with justice, seems only to disagree in respect of mildness, which she claims as more properly her own. For it sometimes befalls even worser men to bear rule over those who are better than them- selves ; but to erect a trophy in the soul against anger (which Ileraclitus says it is an hard thing to fight against, because whatever it resolves to have, it buys at no less a price than the soul itself) is that which none but a great and A'ictorious power is able to achieve, since that alone can bind and curb the passions by its decrees, as with nerves and tendons.

\Vherefore I always strive to collect and read not only the sayings and deeds of philosophers, who (wise men say) had no gall in them, but especially those of kings and tyrants. Of this sort Avas the saying of Antigonus to his soldiers, when, as some were reviling him near his tent, supposing that he had not heard them, he stretched his staff out of the tent, and said : AVhat ! Avill you not stand somewhere farther off, while you revile me ? So was that of Arcadio the Achaean, who was ever speaking ill of Philip, exhorting men to flee

Till they should come where none would Philip know.

\Yhen afterwards by some accident he appeared in Mace- donia, Philip's friends were of opinion that he ought not to be suffered, but be punished ; but Philip meeting him and speaking courteously to him, and then sending him gifts, particularly such as were wont to be given to strangers, bade him learn for the time to come Λvhat to speak of him to the Greeks. And when all testified that the man was become a great praiser of Philip, even to ad- miration. You see, said Philip, I am a better physician than you. And Λvhen he had been reproached at the

CONCERNING THE CUllE OF ANGER. 45

Olympic solemnities, and some said it was fit to make the Grecians smart and rue it for reviling Philip, who had dealt well with them, What then, said he, Λνϋΐ they do, if I make them smart ? Those things also which Pisistra- tus did to Thrasybulus, and Porsena to Mutius, were bravely done ; and so was that of Magas to Philemon, for having been by him exposed to laughter in a comedy on the public stage, in these words : —

Magas, the king hath sent thee letters : Unliappy Magas, thou dost know no letters.

And having taken Philemon as he was by a tempest cast on shore at Paraetonium, he commanded a soldier only to touch his neck Avith his naked SAVord and to go quietly away ; and then having sent him a ball and huckle-bones, as if he were a child that wanted understanding, he dismissed him. Ptolemy was once jeering a grammarian for his Avant of learning, and asked him who was the father of Peleus : I will answer you (quoth he) if you will tell me first who Avas the father of Lagus. This jeer gave the king a rub for the obscurity of his birth, whereat all were moved Avith indignation, as a thing not to be endured. But, said Pto- lemv, if it is not fit for a king to be jeered, then no more is it fit for him to jeer others. But Alexander was more severe than he was wont in his carriage towards Calisthenes and Clitus. AVherefore Porus, being taken captive by him, desired him to treat him like a king ; and when Alexander asked him if he desired no more, he answered, When I say like a king, I have comprised all. And hence it is that they call the king of the Gods Meilichius, while the Athenians, I think, call him Maimactes ; but the office of punishing they ascribe to the Furies and evil Genii, never giving it the epithet of divine or heavenly.

10. As therefore one said of Philip, when he razed the city of Olynthus, But he is not able to build such another

^6 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

city ; so may it be said to anger, Thou canst overthrow, and destroy, and cut down ; but to restore, to save, to spare, and to bear with, is the work of gentleness and moderation, of a Camilkis, a Metellus, an Aristides, and a Socrates ; but to strike the sting into one and to bite is the part of pismires and horse-flies. And truly, while I well consider revenge, 1 fmd that the way which anger takes for it proves for the most part ineifectual, being spent in biting the lips, gnash- ing the teeth, vain assaults, and railings full of silly threats ; and then it acts like children in a race, who, for want of governing themselves, tumble down ridiculously before they come to the goal towards which they are has- tening. Hence that Rhodian said not amiss to the servant of the Roman general, who spake loudly and fiercely to him. It matters not much what thou sayest, but what this your master in silence thinks. And Sophocles, having in- troduced Neoptolemus and Eurypylus in full armor, gave a high commendation of them when he said, —

Into the liosts of brazen-armed men

Eacli boldly charged, but ne'er reviled liis foe.

Some indeed of the barbarians poison their swords ; but true valor has no need of choler, as being dipped in reason ; but anger and fury are weak and easily broken. Where- fore the Lacedaemonians are wont by the sounding of pipes to take off the edge of anger from their soldiers, when they fight ; and before they go to battle, to sacrifice to the Muses, that they may have the steady use of their reason ; and when they have put their enemies to flight, they pursue them not, but sound a retreat (as it were) to their wrath, which, like a short dagger, can easily be han- dled and drawn back. But anger makes slaughter of thou- sands before it can avenge itself, as it did of Cyrus and Pelopidas the Theban. Agathocles, being reviled by some whom he besieged, bore it with mildness ; and when one

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. " 47

said to him, Ο Potter, Avhence wilt thou have pay for thy mercenary soldiers? he answered with laughter, From your city, if I can take it. And when some one from the Avail derided Antigonus for his deformity, he answei'ed, I thought surely I had a handsome face : and when he had taken the city, he sold those for slaves who had scoffed at him, protesting that, if they reviled him so again, he would call them to account before their masters.

Furthermore, I observe that hunters and orators are wont to be much foiled by anger. Aristotle reports that the friends of Satyrus once stopped his ears with wax, when he was to plead a cause, that so he might not confound the matter through anger at the revilings of his enemies. Do we not ourselves oftentimes miss of punishing an offending servant, because he runs away from us in fright when he hears our threatenino; words ? That therefore which nurses say to little children — Do not cry, and thou shalt have it — may not unfitly be applied to our mind Avhen angry. Be not hasty, neither speak too loud, nor be too urgent, and so what you desire will be sooner and better accomplished. For as a father, when he sees his son about to cleave or cut something witli an hatchet, takes the hatchet himself and doth it for him ; so one taking the work of revenge out of the hand of anger doth himself, without danger or hurt, yea, with profit also, inflict punishment on him that deserves it, and not on him- self instead of him, as anger oft-times doth.

11. Now, whereas all passions do stand in need of dis- cipline, which by exercise tames and subdues their un- reasonableness and stubbornness, there is none about which we have more need to be exercised in reference to servants than that of anger. For neither do we envy nor fear them, nor have we any competition for honor Avith them ; but we have frequent fits of anger with them, which cause many offences and errors, by reason of the very power possessed

48 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

by US as masters, and which bring us easily to the ground, as if we stood in a slippery place with no one standing by to save us. For it is impossible to keep an irresponsible poΛver from offending in the excitement of passion, unless we gird up that great power with gentleness, and can slight the frequent speeches of wife and friends accusing us of remissness. And indeed I myself have by nothing more than by such speeches been incensed against my servants, as if they were spoiled for want of beating. And truly it was late before I came to understand, that it was better that servants should be something the worse by indulgence, than that one should distort himself through wrath and bit- terness for the amendment of others. And secondly, observ- ing that many by this very impunity have been brought to be ashamed to be wicked, and have begun their change to virtue more from being pardoned than from being pun- ished, and that they have obeyed some upon their nod only, peaceably, and more willingly than they have done others with all their beating and scourging, I became persuaded of this, that reason Avas fitter to govern with than anger. For it is not as the poet said, —

Wherever fear is, there is modesty ;

but, on the contrary, it is in the modest that that fear is bred which produces moderation, Avhereas continual and unmerci- ful beating doth not make men repent of doing evil, but only devise plans for doing it without being detected. And in the third place I always remember and consider with my- self, that as he who taught us the art of shooting did not forbid us to shoot, but only to shoot amiss, so no more can it be any hindrance from punishing to teach us how Ave may do it seasonably and moderately, with benefit and decency. I therefore strive to put away anger, especially by not denying the punished a liberty to plead for them- selves, but granting them an hearing. For time gives a

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. -19

breathing-space unto passion, and a delay which mitigates and dissolves it ; and a man's judgment in the mean while finds out both a becoming manner and a proportionable measure of punishing. And moreover hereby, he that is punished hath not any pretence left him to object against the correction given him, if he is punished not out of anger, but being first himself convinced of his fault. And finally we are here saved from the greatest disgrace of all, for by this means the servant Avill not seem to speak mo -e just things than his master.

As therefore Phocion after the death of Alexander, to hinder the Athenians from rising too soon or believing it too hastily, said : Ο Athenians, if he is dead to-day, he will be so to-morrow, and on the next day after that ; in like manner do I judge one ought to suggest to himself, who through anger is making haste to punish : If it is true to-day that he hath thus wronged thee, it will be true to-morrow, and on the next day, also. Nor will tliere any. inconvenience follow upon the deferring of his punishment for a while ; but if he be punished all in haste, he will ever after seem to have been innocent, as it hath oftentimes fallen out heretofore. For which of us all is so cruel as to torment or scourge a servant because, five or ten days before, he burnt the meat, or overturned the table, or did not soon enough what he was bidden ? And yet it is for just such tilings as these, while they are fresh and newly done, that we are so disordered, and become cruel and implacable. For as bodies through a mist, so actions through anger seem greater than they are. AVherefore we ought speedily to recall such considerations as these are to our mind ; and when we are unquestionably out of passion, if then to a pure and composed reason the deed do appear to be wicked, we ought to animadvert, and no longer neglect or abstain from pun- ishment, as if we had lost our appetite for it. For there is nothing to which we can more justly impute men's punish-

50 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

ing others in their anger, than to a habit of not punishing them when their anger is over, but growing remiss, and doing like lazy mariners, who in fair weather keep loiter- ing within the haven, and then put themselves in danger by setting sail when the Avind blows strong. So Λνο like- wise, condemning the remissness and over-calmness of our reason in punishing, make haste to do it while our anger is up, pushing us forward like a dangerous wind.

He that useth food doth it to gratify his hunger, which is natural ; but he that inflicts punishment should do it without either hungering or thirsting after it, not needing anger, like sauce, to whet him on to punish ; but when he is farthest off from desiring it, then he should do it as a deed of necessity under the guidance of reason. And though Aristotle reports, that in his time servants in Etruria were Avont to be scourged while the music played, yet they who punish others ought not to be carried on Avith a desire of punishing, as of a thing they delight in, nor to rejoice when they punish, and then repent of it when they have done, — whereof the first is savage, the last womanish ; but, without either sorrow or pleasure, they should inflict just punishment when reason is free to judge, leaving no pretence for anger to intermeddle.

12. But this perhaps may seem to be not a cure of anger, but only a thrusting by and avoiding of such mis- carriages as some men fall into when they are angry. And yet, as Hieronymus tells us, although the swelling of the spleen is but a symptom of the fever, the assuaging thereof abates the disease. But, considering well the origin of anger itself, I have observed that divers men fall into anger for different causes ; and yet in the minds of all of them was probably an opinion of being despised and neglected. We must therefore assist those Avho Avould avoid anger, by removing the act which roused their anger as far as possible from all suspicion of contempt or insult,

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 51

and by imputing it rather to folly or necessity or disorder of mind, or to the misadventure of those that did it. Thus Sophocles in Antigone : —

The best resolved mind in misery Can't keep its ground, but suffers ecstasy.*

And so Agamemnon, ascribing to Ate the taking away of Briseis, adds : —

Since I so foolish was as thee to wrong,

I'll please thee now, and give thee splendid gifts.t

For supplication is an act of one who is far from con- temning ; and when he that hath done an injury appears submissive, he thereby removes all suspicion of contempt. But he that is moved to anger must not expect or wait for such a submission, but must rather take to himself the saying of Diogenes, who, when one said to him, They de- ride thee, Ο Diogenes, made answer, But I am not derided; and he must not think himself contemned, but rather him- self contemn that man that offends him, as one acting out of weakness or error, rashness or carelessness, rudeness or dotage, or childishness. But, above all, we must bear with our servants and friends herein ; for surely they do not despise us as being impotent or slothful, but they think less of us by reason of our very moderation or good-will towards them, some because we are gentle, others be- cause we are loving towards them. But now, alas ! out of a surmise that Ave are contemned, we not onlv become exasperated against our Avives, our servants, and friends, but we oftentimes fall out also Avith drunken inn- keepers, and mariners and ostlers, and all out of a suspicion that they despise us. Yea, we quarrel with dogs because they bark at us, and asses if they chance to rush against us ; like him who was going to beat a driver of asses, but

* Soph. Antig. 563. t II. XIX. 138.

52 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

when the latter cried out, I am an Athenian, fell to beating the ass, saying, Thou surely art not an Athenian too, and so accosted him with many a bastinado.

13. And especially self-love and morosity, together Avith luxury and effeminacy, breed in us long and frequent fits of anger, which by little and little are gathered together into our souls, like a swarm of bees or \vasps. AVherefore there is nothing more conducing to a gentle behavior towards our wife and servants and friends than contentedness and sim- plicity, if Ave can be satisfied with what we have, and not stand in need of many superfluities. Whereas the man described in the poet, —

Who never is content with boiled or roast, Nor likes his meat, what way soever drest, —

λ\Λ\ο can never drink unless he have snow by him, or eat bread if it be bought in the market, or taste victuals out of a mean or earthen vessel, or sleep on a bed unless it be swelled and puffed up wdth feathers, like to the sea when it is heaved up from the bottom ; but who with cudgels and blows, with running, calling, and sweating doth hasten his servitors that wait at table, as if they were sent for plasters for some inflamed ulcer, he being slave to a weak, morose, and fault-finding style of life, — doth, as it were by a contin- ual cough or many buffetings, breed in himself, before he is aware, an ulcerous and defluxive disposition unto anger. And therefore the body is to be accustomed to contentment by frugality, and so be made sufficient for itself. For they who need but few things are not disappointed of many ; and it is no hard matter, beginning with our food, to accept quietly whatever is sent to us, and not by being angry and querulous at every thing, to entertain ourselves and our friends with the most unpleasant dish of all, Avhich is anger. And surely

Than that supper nought can more unpleasant be,* * Odyss. XX. 392.

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 53

where the servants are beaten and the wife railed at, because something is burnt or smoked or not salt enough, or because the bread is too cold. Arcesilaus was once enter- taining his friends and some strangers at a feast ; the supper Λvas set on the board, but there wanted bread, the serA^aiits having, it seems, neglected to buy any. Now, on such an occasion, which of us would not have rent the very walls with outcries 1 But he smiling said only : What a fine thing it is for a philosopher to be a jolly feaster! Once also when Socrates took Euthydemus from the wrest- ling-house home with him to supper, his wife Xanthippe fell upon him in a pelting cliase, scolding him, and in con- clusion overthrew the table. Whereupon Euthydemus rose up and went his way, being very much troubled at what had happened. But Socrates said to him : Did not a hen at your house the other day come flying in, and do the like ] and yet I was not troubled at it. For friends are to be entertained by good-nature, by smiles, and by a hospitable welcome; not by knitting brows, or by striking horror and tremblin» into those that serve.

We must also accustom ourselves to the use of any cups indifferently, and not to use one rather than another, as some are wont to single some one cup out of many (as they say Marius used to do) or else a drinking-horn, and to drink out of none but that ; and they do the same with oil-glasses and brushes, affecting one above all the rest, and when any one of these chances to be broken or lost, then they take it heinously, and punish severely those that did it. And therefore he that is prone to be angry should refrain from such things as are rare and curiously Avrought, such ay cups and seals and precious stones ; for such things dis- tract a man by their loss more than cheap and ordinary things are apt to do. Wherefore when Nero had made an octagonal tent, a wonderful spectacle for cost and beauty, Seneca said to him : You have proved yourself to be a

54 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

poor man ; for if you chance to lose tliis, you cannot tell where to get such another. And indeed it so fell out that the ship was sunk, and this tent was lost with it. But Nero, rememberino; the words of Seneca, bore the loss of it with greater moderation.

But this contentedness in other matters doth make a man good-tempered and gentle towards his servants ; and if towards servants, then doubtless towards friends and sub- jects also. We see also that newly bought servants enquire concerning him that bought them, not whether he be su- perstitious or envious, but whether he be an angry man or not ; and that universally, neither men can endure their wives, though chaste, nor women their husbands, though kind, if they be ill-tempered withal ; nor friends the con- versation of one another. And so neither wedlock nor friendship with anger is to be endured ; but if anger be away, even drunkenness itself is counted a light matter For the ferule of Bacchus is a sufficient chastiser of a drunken man, if the addition of anger do not change the God of wine from Lyaeus and Choraeus (the looser of cares and the leader of dances) to the savage and furious deity. And Anticyra (with its hellebore) is of itself able to cure simple madness ; but madness mixed with anger furnishes matter for tragedies and dismal stories.

14. Neither ought any, even in their playing and jesting, to give way to their anger, for it turns good-will into hatred ; nor when they are disputing, for it turns a desire of know- ing truth into a love of contention ; nor when they sit in judgment, for it adds violence to authority ; nor when they are teaching, for it dulls the learner, and breeds in him a hatred of all learning ; nor if they be in prosperity, for it increases envy ; nor if in adversity, for it makes them to be unpitied, if they are morose and apt to quarrel with those Λνΐιο commiserate them, as Priam did : —

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 55

Be gone, ye upbraiding scoundrels, haven't ye at home Enougli, that to help bear my grief ye come 1 *

On the other hand, good temper doth remedy some thmgs, put an ornament upon others, and sweeten others ; and it wholly overcomes all anger and moroseness, by gen- tleness. As may be seen in that excellent example of Euclid, who, when his brother had said in a quarrel, [iOt me perish if I be not avenged of you, replied, And let me perish if I do not persuade you into a better mind ; and by so saying he straightway diverted him from his purpose, and changed his mind. And Polemon, being reviled by one that loved precious stones well and was even sick with the love of costly signets, answered nothing, but noticed one of the signets which the man wore, and looked Avistfully upon it. Whereat the man being pleased said : Not so, Polemon, but look upon it in the sunshine, and it will appear much better to you. And Aristippus, when there happened to be a falling out between him and Aeschines, and one said to him, Ο Aristippus, what is now become of the friendship that Λvas between you two? answered. It is asleep, but I will go and awaken it. Then coming to Aeschines, he said to him, What? dost thou take me to be so utterly wretched and incurable as not to be worth thy admonition ? No Avonder, said Aeschines, if thou, by nature so excelling me in every thing, didst here also discern before me what was right and fitting to be done.

A woman's, nay a little child's soft hand, With gentle stroking easier doth command, And make the bristling boar to couch and fall. Than any boisterous wrestler of them all.

But we that can tame wild beasts and make them gentle, carrying young Avolves and the whelps of lions in our arms, do in a fit of anger cast our own children, friends, and companions out of our embraces ; and we let loose our

* II. XXIV. 239.

56 CONCERNING THE CURE OE ANGER.

ΛΥΓαΛ like a wild beast upon our servants and fellow citi- zens. And we but poorly disguise our rage wiien we giA^e it the specious name of zeal against wickedness ; and it is with this, I suppose, as with other passions and diseases of the soul, — although we call one forethought, another liber- ality, another piety, we cannot so acquit and clear ourselves of any of them.

15. And as Zeno has said that the seed was a mixture drawn from all the powers of the soul, in like manner an- ger seems to be a kind of universal seed extracted from all the passions. For it is taken from grief and pleasure and insolence ; and then from envy it hath the evil property of rejoicing at another's adversity ; and it is even worse than murder itself, for it doth not strive to free itself from suf- fering, but to bring mischief to itself, if it may thereby but do another man an evil turn. And it hath the most odious kind of desire inbred in it, if the appetite for grieving and hurting another may be called a desire.

AVherefore, Avhen we go to the houses of drunkards, we may hear a Avench playing the flute betimes in the morn- ing, and behold there, as one said, the muddy dregs of wine, and scattered fragments of garlands, and servants drunk at the door ; and the marks of angry and surly men may be read in the faces, brands, and fetters of the servants. '• But lamentation is the only bard that is always to be heard beneath the roof" of the angry man, while his stewards are beaten and his maid-servants tormented ; so that the spec- tators, in the midst of their mirth and delight, cannot but pity those sad effects of anger.

16. And even those who, out of a real hatred of wicked- ness, often happen to be surprised with anger, can abate the excess and vehemence of it so soon as they give up their excessive confidence in those with Avhom they con- verse. For of all causes this doth most increase anger, when one proves to be wicked whom Ave took for a good

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 57

man, or when one Avho we thought had loved us falls mto some difference and chiding witli us.

As for my own disposition, thou knowest very well with how strong inclinations it is carried to show kindness to men and to confide in them ; and therefore, like those who miss their step and tread on nothing, when I most of all trust to men's love and, as it were, prop myself up with it, I do then most of all miscarry, and, finding myself disap- pointed, am troubled at it. And indeed I should never succeed in freeing myself from this too great eagerness and forwardness in my love ; but against excessive confi- dence perhaps I can make use of Plato's caution for a bridle. For he said that he so commended Helicon, the mathematician, because he thought him a naturally versa- tile animal ; but that he had a jealousy of those who had been well educated in the city, lest, being men and the offspring of men, they should in something or other dis- cover the infirmity of their nature. But when Sophocles says. If you search the deeds of mortals, you Λνϋΐ find the most are base, he seems to insult and disparage us over much. Still even such a harsh and censorious judg- ment as this may make us more moderate in our anger ; for it is the sudden and the unexpected which do most drive us to frenzy. But we ought, as Panaetius somewhere said, to imitate Anaxagoras ; and as he said upon the death of his son, I knew before that I had begotten but a mortal, so should every one of us use expressions like these of those offences which stir up to anger : I knew, when I bought mv servant, that I was not baying a philosoph(.'r ; I knew that I did not get a friend that had no passiims ; I knew that I had a wife that was but a woman. But if every one would always repeat the question of Plato to himself. But am not I perhaps such a one myself? and turn his reason from abroad to look into himself, and put restraint upon his reprehension of others, he would not

58 CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER.

make so much use of his hatred of evil in reprovii.g other men, seeing himself to stand in need of great indulgence. But now every one of us, when he is angry and punishing, can bring the words of Aristides and of Cato : Do not steal, Do not lie, and Why are ye so slothful? And, what is most truly shameful of all, we do in our anger reprove others for being angry, and what was done amiss through anger we punish in our passion, therein not acting like physicians, who

Purge bitter choler with a bitter pill,*

but rather increasing and exasperating the disease which we pretend to cure.

While therefore I am thus reasoning with myself, I en- deavor also to abate something of my curiosity ; because for any one over curiously to enquire and pry into every thing, and to make a public business of every employment of a servant, every action of a friend, every pastime of a son, every whispering of a wife, causes great and long and daily fits of anger, whereof the product and issue is a peevish and morose disposition. Wherefore God, as Euri- pides says,

Afiairs of greatest weight himself directeth, But matters small to Fortune he committeth.t

But I tliink a prudent man ought not to commit any thing at all to Fortune, nor to neglect any thing, but to trust and commit some things to his Avife, some things to his servants, and some things to his friends (as a prince to certain vice- gerents and accountants and administrators), while he him- self is employing his reason about the weightiest matters, and those of greatest concern.

For as small letters hurt the sight, so do small matters him that is too much intent upon them ; they vex and stir

* Sophocles, Frag. 769 t Euripides, Frag. 964.

CONCERNING THE CURE OF ANGER. 59

up anger, which begets an evil habit in him in reference to greater affairs. But above all the rest, I look on that of Empedocles as a divine thing, '' To fast from evil." And ΐ commended also those vows and professions made in prayers, as things neither indecent in themselves nor unbecoming a philosopher, — for a whole year to abstain from venery and Avine, serving God with temperance all the while ; or else again, for a certain time to abstain from lying, minding and watching over ourselves, that we speak nothing but what is true, either in earnest or in jest. After the manner of these vows then I made my own, supposing it would be no less acceptable to God and sacred than theirs ; and I set myself first to observe a few sacred days also, wherein I would abstain from being angry, as if it were from being drunk or from drinking Avine, celebrating a kind of i^ephalia and Melisponda * with respect to my anger. Then, making trial of myself little by little for a month or two, I by this means in time made some good progress unto further patience in bearing evils, diligently observing and keeping myself courteous in language and behavior, free from anger, and pure from all wicked words and absurd actions, and from passion, which for a little (and that no grateful) pleasure brings Avith itself great perturbations and shameful repentance. ΛVhence experi- ence, not without some divine assistance, hath, I suppose, made it evident that that was. a very true judgment and assertion, that this courteous, gentle, and kindly disposition and behavior is not so acceptable, so pleasing, and so de- lightful to any of those Avith whom we converse, as it is to those that have it.

* Nephalia {νηψω, to be sober) were wineless offerings, like those to the Eumen- ides. See Aesch. Eumen. 107 : Χοός r' άοίνονς, νηφάλια μειλίγματα. Melisponda {μ^) were offerings of honey. (G.)

OF BASHFULNESS.

1. Some plants there are, in their own nature wild and barren, and hurtful to seed and garden-sets, Avhich yet among able husbandmen pass for infallible signs of a rich and promising soil. In like manner, some passions of the mind not good in themselves yet serve as first shoots and promises of a disposition which is naturally good, and also capable of much improvement by cultivation. Among these I rank bashfulness, the subject of our present dis- course ; no ill sign indeed, but the cause and occasion of a great deal of harm. For the bashful oftentimes run into the same enormities as the most hardened and impudent, with this difference only, that the former feel a regret for such miscarriages, but the latter take a pleasure and satis- faction therem. The shameless person is without sense of grief for his baseness, and the bashful is in distress at the very appearance of it. For bashfulness is only modesty in the excess, and is aptly enough named δνσωττία {the being put out of countenance), since the face is in some sense confused and dejected with the mind. For as that grief Λvhich casts down the eyes is termed dejection, so tliat kind of modesty which cannot look another in the face is called bashfulness. The orator, speaking of a shameless fellow, said he carried harlots, not virgins, in his eyes ; * on the other hand, the sheepishly bashful be-

♦ Oil κόρας ύλλα πόρνος. Κόρη means either maiden or the pupil of the eye. (G.)

BASHFTJLNESS. f) 1

trays no less the eiFeminacy and softness of his mind in his looks, palHating his weakness, which exposes him to the mercy of impudence, with the specious name of mod- esty. Cato indeed was wont to say of young persons, he had a greater opinion of such as were subject to color than of those that looked pale ; teaching us thereby to look with greater apprehension on the heinousness of an action than on the reprimand which might follow, and to be more afraid of the suspicion of doing an ill thing than of the danger of it. However, too much anxiety and timidity lest we may do wrong is also to be avoided; because many men have become cowards and been deterred from generous undertakings, no less for fear of calumny and detraction than by the danger or difficulty of such attempts.

2. AVliile therefore v/e must not suffer the weakness in the one case to pass unnoticed, neither must Ave abet or countenance invincible impudence in the other, such as is reported of Anaxarchus, —

Whose dosi-like carriage and effrontery, Despising infamy, out-faceil disgrace.

A convenient mien betAveen both is rather to be endeav- ored after, by repressing the over impudent, and ani- mating the too meek temper. But as this kind of cure is difficult, so is the restraining such excesses not without danger ; for as a gardener, in stubbing up some wild or useless bushes, makes at them careless- ly with his spade, or burns them off the ground, but in dressing a vine, or grafting an apple, or pruning an olive, carries his hand with the greatest wariness and de- hberation, that he may not unluckily injure the tree ; so a philosopher, in removing envy, that useless and untractable plant, or covetousness or immoderate love of pleasure from the mind of youth, may cut deep safely, and make a large scar ; but if he be to apply his discourse to some more sen- sible or delicate part, such as the restraining excess of

62 BASHFULNESS.

bashfulness, it lies upon him to be very careful not to cut off or eradicate modesty with the contrary vice. For nurses who too often wipe away the dirt from their infants are apt to tear their flesh and put them to pain. x\nd in like man- ner we must not so far extirpate all bashfulness in youth as to leave them careless or impudent; but as those that pull down private houses adjoining to the temples of the Gods prop up such parts as are contiguous to them, so in un- dermining bashfulness, due regard is to be had to adjacent modesty, good nature, and humanity. And yet these are the very qualities by which bashfulness insinuates itself and becomes fixed in a man, flattering him that he is good- natured, courteous, and civil, and has common sense, and that he is not obstinate and inexorable. The Stoics, there- fore, in their discourses of modesty, distinguish all along betwixt that and bashfulness, leaving not so much as ambiguity of terms for a pretence to the vice. How- ever, asking their good leave, we shall make bold to use such words indifferently in either sense ; or rather we shall follow the example of Homer, whose authority we have for it, that

Much harm oft-times from modesty befalls, Much good oft-times. *

And it was not done amiss of him to make mention of the hurtfulness of it first, because modesty becomes profita- ble only through reason, which cuts off what is superflu- ous and leaves a just mean behind.

3. In the first place, therefore, the bashful man must be persuaded and satisfied that that distemper of the mind is prejudicial to him, and that nothing which is so can be eligible. And withal, he must be cautious how he suffers himself to be cajoled and led by the nose with the titles of courteous or sociable, in exchange for those of grave,

• II. XXIV. 44.

BASHFULNESS 63

great, and just ; nor like Pegasus in Euripides, who, when Bellerophon mounted him,

With trembling stooped more than his lord desired,*

must he debase himself and yield to all who make their addresses to him, for fear of appearing hard and ungentle.

It is recorded of Bocchoris, king of Egypt, a man of a very cruel nature, that the goddess Isis sent a kind of a serpent (called aspis), which winding itself about his head cast a shadow over him from above, and was a means to him of determining causes according to equity. But bash- fidness, on the contrary, happening upon remiss and spirit- less tempers, suffers them not to express their dislike of any thing or to argue against it, but perverts many times the sentence of arbitrators, and stops the mouths of skilful pleaders, forcing them often to act and speak coiitrary to their conviction. And the most reckless man Avill always tyrannize and domineer over such a one, forcing his bash- fulness by his own strength of impudence. Upon this account it is that bashfulncss, like a low piece of soft ground, can make no resistance and decline no encounter, but is exposed to the meanest actions and vilest passions. But, above all, this is the worst guardian of raw and inex- perienced youth. For, as Brutus said, he seems to have had but an ill education that has not learned to deny any thing. And no better overseer is it of the marriage-bed or the woman's apartment ; as the repentant lady in Sophocles accuses the spark that had debauched her, —

Thy tongue, tliy flattering tongue prevailed.t

So this vice, happening upon a disposition inclinable to debauchery, prepares and opens the way, and leaves all things easy and accessible to such as are ready to prefer their Λvicked designs. Presents and treats are irresistible baits for common mercenary creatures ; but importunity,

* Eurip. Bellerophon, Frag. 311. t• Sophocles, Frag. 772.

64 BASHFULNESS.

befriended with bashfiilness on their side, has sometimes undone the modestest women. I omit what inconveniences this kind of modesty occasions, Λvhen it obhges men to lend their money to such Avhose credit is blown upon in the workl, or to give bail for those they dare not trust ; we do this, it is true, with an ill-will, and in our heart reflect upon that old saying. Be bail, and pay for it, yet cannot make use of it in our practice.

4. How many this fault has ruined, it is no easy thing to recount. Creon in the play gave a very good lesson for others to follow, when he told Medea, —

'Tis better now to brave thy direst hate, Than curse a foolish easiness too late.*

Yet afterwards, being wrought upon through his bashful- ness to grant her but one day longer, he ruined himself and family by it. For the same reason, some, suspecting designs against them of murder or poisoning, have ne- glected to provide for their safety. Thus Dion could not be ignorant of the treachery of Callippus, yet thought it unfit to entertain such thoughts of his pretended friend and guest, and so perished. So again, Antipater, the son of Cassander, having entertained Demetrius at supper, and being engaged by him for the next night, because he was unwilling to distrust one who had trusted him, went, and had his throat cut after supper. Polysperchon had prom- ised Cassander for an hundred talents to murder Her- cules, the son of Alexander by Barsine. Upon this he invites him to sup ; but the young man, having some suspicion of the thing, pretends himself indisposed. Poly- sperchon coming to him said : Sir, above all things en- deavor after your father s courteous behavior and obliging way to his friends, unless haply you look on us with sus- picion as if we were compassing your health. The young man out of mere modesty was prevailed upon to go, and

» Eurip. Medea, 290.

BASHFULNESS. 65

was strangled as he sat at meat. It is not therefore (as some will have us believe) insignificant or ridiculous, but on the contrary very wise advice, which Hesiod gives, —

Welcome a friend, but never call thy foe.*

Be not bashful and mealy-mouthed in refusing him that you are satisfied has a pique against you ; but never reject him that seemeth to put his trust in you. For if you invite, you must expect to be invited again ; and some time or other your entertainment will be repaid you, if bashfulness have once softened or turned the edge of that diffidence which ought to be your guard.

5. To the end therefore that we may get the better of this disease, which is the cause of so many evils, we must make our first attempts (as our custom is in other things) upon matters of no great difficulty. As, if one drink to you after you have taken what is sufficient, be not so fool- ishly modest to do violence to your nature, but rather venture to pass the glass. Another, it may be, would tempt you to play at dice while drinking ; be riot over-persuaded into a compliance, for fear of being the subject of his drollery, but reply with Xenophanes, when Lasus of Hermione called him coward because he refused to play at dice : Yes, said he, I confess myself the greatest cow- ard in the world, for I dare not do an ill thing. Again, you light upon an impertinent talker, that sticks upon you like a burr ; don't be bashful, but break off the discourse, and pursue your business. These evasions and repulses, whereby our resolution and assurance are exercised in mat- ters of less moment, Avill accustom us to it by degrees in greater occasions. And here it will be but seasonable to give you a passage, as it is recorded of Demosthenes. The Athenians having one time been moved to send succors to Harpalus, and themselves to engage in a war against Alex- ander, it happened that Philoxenus, Alexander's admiral,

* Hesiod, Works and Days, 342

VOL. I. ό

66 BASHFULNESS.

unexpectedly arrived on their coast ; and the people being so astonished as to be speechless for very fear, Demos- thenes cried out : How would they endure the sun, who are not able to look against a lamp ! Or how would you comport yourself in weightier concerns, Avhile youi prince or the people had an awe over you, if you cannot refuse a glass of wine when an acquaintance offers it, or turn off an impertinent babbler, but suffer the eternal trifler to Avalk over you without telling him, Another time, good sir, at present I am in haste.

6. Besides all this, the exercising such a resolution is of great use in praising others. If one of my friend's harpers play lewdly, or a comedian he has hired at a great rate murder a piece of Menander in the acting, although the vulgar clap their hands and admire, I think it no moroseness or ill-breeding to sit silently all the while, without servilely joining in the common applauses con- trary to my judgment. For if you scruple to deal openly with him in these cases, what will you do, should he repeat to you an insipid composition of his own, or submit to your revisal a ridiculous oration ] You will applaud, of course, and enter yourself into the list of common parasites and flatterers ! But hoAv then can you direct him impartially in the greatest administrations of his life ? how be free with him where he fails in any duties of his trust or marriage, or neolects the offices incumbent on him as a member of the community ? I must confess, I cannot by any means approve of the reply Pericles made to a friend who be- sought him to give false evidence, and that too upon oath, when he thus answered : As far as the altar I am wholly at your service. Methinks he Avent too far. But he that has long before accustomed himself not to commend any thing against his judgment, or applaud an ill voice, or seem pleased with indecent scurrilities, will never suffer things to come to that issue ; nor will any one be so bold

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as to solicit him in this manner: Swear on my side, give false evidence, or bring in an unjust verdict.

7. After the same manner we may learn to refuse such as come to borrow considerable sums of us, if we have used to deny in little matters where refusal is easy. As Arche- laus, king of Macedon, sat at supper, one of his retinue, a fellow who thought there was nothing so honest as to re- ceive, begged of him a golden cup. But the king com- manded a waiter to give it immediately to Euripides : For you, sir, said he, are fit indeed to ask any thing, but to re- ceive nothing ; and he deserves to receive, thougli he lacks the confidence to ask. Thus Avisely did he make his judg- ment, and not bashful timidity, his guide in bestowing favors. Yet we oftentimes, when the honesty, nearness, and neces- sities of our friends and relations are not motives sufficient to prevail Avith us to their relief, can give profusely to im- pudence and importunity, not out of any willingness to bestow our money so ill, but merely for want of confidence and resolution to deny. This was the case of Antigonus the elder. Being wearied out with the importunity of Bias, Give, said he to his servants, one talent to Bias and neces- sity. A^et at other times he was as expert at encountering such addresses as any prince, and dismissed them with as remarkable answers. Thus a certain Cynic one day beg- ging of him a groat, he made answer, That is not for a prince to give. And the poor man replying. Then bestow a talent, he reparteed briskly, Nor that for a Cynic (or, for a dog) to receiA^e. Diogenes went about begging to all the statues in the Ceramicus ; and his answer to some that wondered at his fancy in it was, he was practising how to beai a repulse. But indeed it chiefly lies upon us to exer- cise ourselves in smaller matters to refuse an unreasonal)k' request, that we may not be at loss how to refuse on occa- sions of greater magnitude. For no one, as Demosthenes says, who has spent all the money that he had in unneces-

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sary expenses, will have plenty of money that he has not for his necessary expenses.* And our disgrace is increased many fold, if Ave want what is necessary or decent, and abound in trifles and fopperies.

8, Yet bashfulness is not only a bad steward of our es- tate, but even in weightier concerns it refuses to hearken to the wholesome advice of right reason. Thus, in a danger- ous fit of sickness, we send not to the ablest physician, for fear of giving off'ence to another of our acquaintance. Or, in taking tutors and governors for our children, we make choice of such as obtrude themselves upon us, not such as are better qualified for that service. Or, in our laAvsuits, we regard not to obtain counsel learned in the laAv, be- cause we must gratify the son of some friend or relation, and give him an opportunity to show himself in the Avorld. Nay, lastly, you shall find some that bear the name of philosophers, λνΐιο call themselves Epicureans or Stoics, not out of choice, or upon the least conviction, but merely to oblige their friends or acquaintance, who have taken advantage of their modesty. Since then the case is so with us, we ought to prepare and exercise ourselves in things that we daily meet with and of course, not so much as indulging that foolish weakness in the choice of a bar- ber or fuller, or in lodging in a paltry inn Avhen better accommodation is to be had, to oblige the landlord who has cringed to us. But if it be merely to break ourselves of such follies, in those cases still \ve should make use of the best, though the difference be but inconsiderable ; as the Pythagoreans were strict in observing not to cross their right knee with the left, or to use an even number with an odd, though all things else were indiiferent. We must ob- serve also, when we celebrate a sacrifice or keep a wedding or make a public entertainment, to deny ourselves so far as not to invite any that have been extremely complacent to us or

♦ Demosth. Olynth. III. p. 33, 25. § 19.

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that put themselves upon us, before those who are known for their good-humor or Avhose conversation is like to prove beneficial. For he that has accustomed himself thus far will hardly be caught and surprised, nay, rather he shall not so much as be tempted, in greater instances.

9. And thus much mav suffice concernino• exercisinir ourselves. My first use of what has been said is to observe, that all passions and distempers of the mind are still ac- companied with those very evils which by their means we hoped to avoid. Thus disgrace pursues ambition ; pain and indisposition, sensuality ; softness and effeminacy are fretted with troubles ; contentiousness with disappointment and defeats. But this is nowhere more conspicuous than in bashfulness, which, endeavoring to avoid the smoke of re- proach, throws itself into the fire. Such men, wanting confidence to withstand those that unreasonably importune them, afterwards feel shame before those who justly accuse them, and for fear of a slight private rebuke incur more public disgrace. For example, not having the heart to deny a friend that comes to borrow, in short time they are reduced to the same extremity themselves, and exposed openly. Some again, after promising to help friends in a lawsuit, are ashamed to face the opposite party, and are forced to hide their heads and run away. Many have been so unreasonably %veak in this particular as to accept of dis- advantageous proposals of marriage for a daughter or sister, and upon second thoughts have been forced to bring them- selves off with an arrant lie.

10. One made this observation of the people of Asia, that they were all slaves to one man, merely because they could not pronounce that syllable No ; but he spake only in raillery. But now the bashful man, though he be notable to say one word, has but to raise his brows or nod down- ward, as if he minded not, and he may decline many ungrateful and unreasonable offices. Euripides was wont

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to say, Silence is an answer to a Avise man ; * but we seem to have greater occasion for it in our dealings with fools and unreasonable persons, for men of breeding and sense will be satisfied with reason and fair words. Upon this ac- count we should be always provided Avith some notable sayings and choice apothegms of famous and excellent men, to repeat to the bashful, — such as that of Phocion to Antipater, You cannot have me for both a friend and a flatterer ; and that of his to the Athenians, when they called upon him to come in for his share to defray the ex- penses of a festival ; I am ashamed, said he. pointing to Callicles his creditor, to contribute towards your follies, with- out paying this man his due. For, as Thucydides says, It is an ill thing to be ashamed of one's poverty, but much Avorse not to make use of lawful endeavors to avoid it.f But he that is so foolishly good-natured that he cannot an- swer one that comes to borrow, —

My friend, no silver white liave I in all my caves, —

but gives him a promise to be better provided, —

The wretch has made himself a slave to sliame, And drags a tiresome, though an unforged chain.!

Persaeus, being about to accommodate a friend with a sum of money, paid it publicly in the market, and made the conditions before a banker, remembering, it may be, that of Hesiod, —

Seem not thy brother's honesty to doubt ; Yet, smiling, call a witness to liis hand. Il

But when his friend marvelled and asked, How now, so formally and according to law"? Yea, quoth he, because I would receive my money again as a friend, and not have to trouble the laAV to recover it. For many out of bashfulness, not taking, care to have good security at

* Eurip. Frag. 967. The verse is found also in Menander, Monos. 222. (G.) t Thucyd. II. 40. J Eurip. Pirithous, Frag. 598.

U Hesiod, Works and Days, 371.

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first, have been forced afterwards to break with their friends, and to have recourse to hiw for their moncv.

11. Again, Ph\to writing to Dionysius, by llehcon of Cyzicus, gives the bearer a good character for honesty and moderation, but withal in the postscript tells him, Yet this I Avrite of a man, Avho, as such, is by nature an animal subject to change. Xenocrates, though a man of rigid morals, was prevailed upon by this kind of modesty to recommend to Polysperchon a person, as it proved in the end, not so honest as he Avas reputed. For Avhen the Macedonian in compliment bade him call for whatever he wanted, he presently desired a talent of silver. Poly- sperchon ordered it accordingly to be paid him, but des- patched away letters immediately to Xenocrates, advising him for the future to be better acquainted with those he recommended. Now all this came to pass through Xeno- crates's ignorance of