162 WE MAY EMBRACE VERTUE SO HARD, TILL IT BECOMES VICIOUS.

will present you with another of a more gay and frolick air, from the same hand, and writ at the same age."

CHAP. XXVIII.-NINE AND TWENTY SONNETS OF ESTIENNE DE LA BOETIE, TO MADAM DE GRAMMONT COUNTESS OF GUISSON. MADAM, I offer to your ladiship nothing of mine, either because it is already yours, or because I find nothing in my writings worthy of you but I have a great desire that these verses, into what part of the world soever they may travel may carry your name in the front, for the honour will accrue to them, by having the great Corisanda de Andonis for their safe conduct: I conceive this present, Madam, so much the more proper for you, both by reason there are few ladies in France who are so good judges of poetry, and make so good use of it as you do ; as also, that there is none who can give it that spirit and life your ladyship does, by that incomparable voice nature has added to your other perfections; you will find, Madam, that these verses deserve your esteem, and will, I dare say, concur with me in this, that Gascony never yielded more invention, finer expression, or that more evidence themselves to flow from a masters hand. And be not jealous, that you have but the remainder of what I publisht some years since, under the name of Monsieur de Foix, your brave kinsman; for certainly these have something in them more spritely, and luxuriant, as being writ in a greener youth, and enflam'd with the noble ardour that I will tell your ladyship in your ear. The other were writ since, when he was a suitor in the honour of his wife, already relishing of I know not what matrimonial coldness: and for my part, I am of the same opinion with those, who hold, that poesie appears no where so gay, as in a wanton and irregular subject.

These nine and twenty sonnets that were inserted here, are since printed with his other works.

CHAP. XXIX.-OF MODERATION.

As if we had an infectious touch, we by our manner of handling corrupt things, that in themselves are laudable and good: we may grasp vertue so hard, till it become vicious, if we embrace it too streight, and with too violent a desire. Those who say, there is never any excess in vertue, for as much as it is no vertue, when it once becomes excess, only play upon words.

Insani sapiens nomen ferat, æquus iniqui,

Ultra quam satis est, virtutem si petat ipsam.-Horace l. 1. Epist. 6. The wise for mad, the just for unjust pass,

When more than needs, ev'n vertue they embrace.

This is a subtle consideration in philosophy. A man may both be too much in love with vertue, and be excessive in a just action. Holy writ agrees with this, “Be not wiser than you should ;" but be soberly wise. I have known a great man prejudice the opinion men had of his devotion, by pretending to be devout beyond all examples of others of his condition. I love temperate and moderate natures. An immoderate zeal, even to that which is good, though it does not offend, does astonish me; and puts me to study what name to give it. Neither the mother of Pausanias, who was the first instructer of her son's process, and threw the first stone towards his death: nor Posthumus the dictator, who put his son to death, whom the ardour of youth had fortunately pusht upon the enemy a little more advanc'd than the rest of his squadron, do appear to me so just as strange; and I should neither advise, nor like to follow so savage a vertue, and that costs so dear. The archer that shoots over, misses as well as he that falls short, and 'tis equally troublesome to my sight, to look up at a great light, and to look down into a dark abyss. Callides in Plato, says, that the extremity of philosophy is hurtful, and advises not to dive into it beyond the limits of profit: that taken moderately, it is pleasant and useful, but that in the end, it renders a man brutish and vicious: a contemner of religion, and the common laws, an enemy to civil conversation, and all human pleasures, incapable of all publick administration, unfit either to assist others, or to relieve himself, and a fit object for all sorts of injuries and affronts, without remedy, or satisfaction: he says true, for in its excess, it enslaves our natural freedom, and by an impertinent subtilty, leads us out of the fair and beaten way that nature has plain'd out for us. The love we bear to our wives is very lawful, and yet theology thinks fit to curb and restrain it. As I remember, I have read in one place of St. Thomas of Aquin, where he condemns marriages within any of the forbidden degrees, for this reason, amongst others, that there is some danger, lest the friendship a man bears to such a woman, should be immoderate; for if the conjugal affection be full and perfect betwixt them, as it ought to be, and that it be over and above surcharg'd with that of kindred too, there is no doubt, but such an addition will carry the husband beyond the bounds of reason. Those sciences that regulate the manners of men, divinity and philosophy, will have a saying to every thing. There is no action so private can escape their inspection and jurisdiction, but they are best taught, who are best able to censure and curb their own liberty. Marriage is a so

* 'Tis like he means Henry the 3rd of France.

164 PLEASURES NOT FITLY CONFERRED UPON ALL PERSONS.

sure.

lemn and religious tie, and therefore the pleasure we extract from thence, should be a sober and serious delight, and mixt with a certain kind of gravity; it should be a kind of discreet and conscientious pleaThe kings of Persia were wont to invite their wives to the beginning of their festivals; but when the wine began to work in good earnest, and that they were to give the reins to pleasure, they sent them back to their private apartments, that they might not participate of their immoderate lust. All pleasures, and all sorts of gratifications, are not properly and fitly conferr'd upon all sorts of persons. Epaminondas had committed a young man for certain debauches; for whom Pelopidas mediated, that at his request he might be set at liberty, which, notwithstanding the great intelligence betwixt them, Epaminondas resolutely deny'd to him, but granted it at the first word to a wench of his, that made the same intercession; saying, that it was a gratification fit for such a one as she, but not for a captain. Sophocles being joint prætor with Pericles, seeing accidentally a fine boy pass by: "O what a delicate boy is that” said he; "aye, that were a prize,” answered Perides, "for any other than a prætor, who ought not only to have his hands, but his eyes chaste too." There is no just and lawful pleasure, wherein the intemperance and excess, is not to be condemn'd. but, to speak the truth, is not man a most miserable creature the while? It is scarce, by his natural condition, in his power to taste one pleasure pure and entire; and yet must he be contriving doctrines and precepts, to curtail that little he has; he is not yet wretched enough unless by art and study, he augment his own misery.

Fortunæ miseras auximus arte vias.-Propert. lib. 3. Ele. 6.

We with misfortune 'gainst our selves take part,

And our own miseries encrease by art.

Human wisdom makes as ill use of her talent, when she exercises it in rescinding from the number and sweetness of those pleasures, that are naturally our due, as she employs it favourably, and well, in artificially disguising and tricking out the ills of life, to alleviate the sense of them. Had I rul'd the roast, I should have taken another, and more natural course, which, to say the truth, is both commodious and sacred, and should peradventure have been able to have limited it too. Notwithstanding that both our spiritual and corporal physicians, as by compact betwixt themselves, can find no other way to cure, nor other remedy for the infirmities of the body, and the soul, than what is oft times worse than the disease, by tormenting us more and by adding to our misery and pain. To this end watchings, fastings, hair-shirts, remote and solitary banishments, perpetual imprisonments, whips, and other afflictions, have been introduc'd amongst men: but so, that they should carry a sting with them, and be real afflictions indeed; and not fall out so, as it once did to one Gallio, who having been sent an exile

into the isle of Lesbos, news was not long after brought to Rome, that he there liv'd as merry, as the day was long; and that what had been enjoyn'd him for a penance, turn'd to his greatest pleasure and satisfaction whereupon the senate thought fit to recall him home to his wife and family, and confine him to his own house, to accommodate their punishment to his feeling and apprehension. For to him whom fasting would make more healthful and more spritely, and to him to whose palate fish were more acceptable than flesh, it would be no proper, nor sanative receipt; no more than in the other sort of physick, where the drugs have no effect upon him who swallows them with appetite and pleasure. The bitterness of the potion, and the abhorrency of the patient, are necessary circumstances to the operation. The nature that would eat rheubarb like butter'd turnips, would frustrate the use and virtue of it; it must be something to trouble and disturb the stomach, that must purge and cure it: and here the common rule, that things are cur'd by their contraries, fails; for in this, one ill is cur'd by another. This belief a little resembles that other so ancient one, of thinking to gratifie the Gods and nature, by self-murther; an opinion universally once receiv'd in all religions, and to this day retain'd in some. For in these latter times wherein our fathers liv'd, Amurath at the taking of Isthmus, immolated six hundred young Greeks to his father's soul, in the nature of a propitiatory sacrifice for the sins of the deceased. And in those new countries discover'd in this age of ours, which are pure, and virgins yet, in comparison of ours, this practice is in some measure every where receiv'd. All their idols reek with humane bloud, not without various examples of horrid cruelty. Some they burn alive, and half broil'd take them off the coals to tear out their hearts and entrails others, even women, they fley alive, and with their bloudy skins cloth and disguise others. Neither are we without great examples of constancy and resolution in this affair: the poor souls that are to be sacrific'd, old men, women and children, going some days before to beg alms for the offering of their sacrifice, and so singing and dancing, present themselves to the slaughter. The ambassadors of the king of Mexico, setting out to Fernando Cortez the power and greatness of their master, after having told him, that he had thirty vassals, of which each was able to raise an hundred thousand fighting men, and that he kept his court in the fairest and best fortified city under the sun, added at last, that he was oblig'd yearly to offer the Gods fifty thousand men. And it is confidently affirm'd, that he maintain'd a continual war, with some potent neighbouring nations, not only to keep the young men in exercise, but principally, to have wherewithal to furnish his sacrifices with his prisoners of war. At a certain town in another place, for the welcome of the said Cortez, they sacrificed fifty men at once. I will tell you this one tale more, and I have done; some of these people being beaten by him, sent to compliment him, and to treat with him of a peace, whose

;

166 MEN SHOULD BE CAUTIOUS OF TRUSTING TO VULGAR OPINION.

messengers carried him three sorts of presents, which they presented in these terms: "behold, lord, here are five slaves, if thou beest a furious god that feedest upon flesh and bloud, eat these, and we will bring thee more; if thou beest an affable god, behold here incense and feathers; but if thou beest a man, take these fowls and these fruits, that we have brought thee."

CHAP. XXX.-OF CANNIBALS.

WHEN Pyrrhus king of Epire invaded Italy, having view'd and consider'd the order of the army, the Romans sent out to meet him; "I know not," said he, "what kind of barbarians (for so the Greeks call'd all other nations) these may be ; but the discipline of this army that I see, has nothing of barbarity in it." As much said the Greeks of that Flaminius brought into their country; and Philip beholding from an eminence, the order and the distribution of the Roman camp, led into his kingdom by Publius Sulpitius Galba, spake to the same effect. By which it appears, how cautious men ought to be, of taking things upon trust from vulgar opinion, and that we are to judge by the eye of reason, and not from common report. I have long had a man in my house, that liv'd ten or twelve years in the new world discover'd in these latter days, and in that part of it where Velegaignon landed, which he call'd Antartick France. This discovery of so vast a country seems to be of very great consideration; and we are not sure, that hereafter there may not be another, so many wiser men than we have been deceiv'd in this. I am afraid our eyes are bigger than our bellies, and that we have more curiosity than capacity: for we grasp at all, but catch nothing but air. Plato brings in Solon, telling a story, that he had heard from the priests of Sais in Ægypt, that of old, and before the deluge, there was a great island call'd Atlantis, situate directly at the mouth of the streight of Gibralter, which contained more ground, than both Africk and Asia put together; and that the kings of that country, who not only possest that isle, but extended their dominion so far into the continent, that they had a country, as large as Africk to Ægypt, and as long as Europe to Tuscany, attempted to encroach even upon Asia, and to subjugate all the nations that border upon the Mediterranean Sea, as far as the gulf, of Mare Maggiore; and to that effect, over-ran all Spain, the Gauls, and Italy, so far, as to penetrate into Greece, where the Athenians stopt the torrent of their arms: but sometime after, both the Athenians, they, and their island, were swallowed by the flood.

It is very likely, that this violent irruption and inundation of water, made a wonderful change, and strange alteration, in the habitations of the earth as 'tis said that the sea then divided Sicily from Italy: