Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

Subtle as lightning, bright, and quick, and fierce,
Gold through doors and walls did pierce.
The prudent Macedonian king,
To blow up towns, a golden mine did spring,
He broke through gates with his petar;
'Tis the great art of peace, the engine 'tis of war;
And fleets and armies follow it afar :
The ensign 'tis at land, and 'tis the seaman's star.

Let all the world slave to this tyrant be,
Creature to this disguised deity,

Yet it shall never conquer me.

A guard of virtues will not let it pass.
And wisdom is a tower of stronger brass.
The Muses' laurel, round my temples spread,
Does from this lightning's force secure my head:

Nor will I lift it up so high,

As in the violent meteor's way to lie.
Wealth for its power do we honour and adore?
The things we hate, ill-fate and death, have

more.

and draw up all bridges against so numerous an

enemy.

The truth of it is, that a man in much business must either make himself a knave, or else the world will make him a fool: and, if the injury went no farther than the being laught at, a wise man would content himself with the revenge of retaliation; but the case is much worse, for these civil cannibals too, as well as the wild ones, not only dance about such a taken stranger, but at last devour him. A sober man cannot get too soon out of drunken company, though they be never so kind and merry among themselves ; it is not unpleasant only, but dangerous, to him.

Do ye wonder that a virtuous man should love to be alone? It is hard for him to be otherwise; he is so, when he is among ten thousand : neither is the solitude so uncomfortable to be alone without any other creature, as it is to be alone in the midst of wild beasts. Man is to man all kind of beasts; a fawning dog, a roaring lion, a thieving fox, a robbing wolf, a dissembling crocodile, a

From towns and courts, camps of the rich and treacherous decoy, and a rapacious vulture. The

great,

The vast Xerxean army, I retreat;
And to the small Laconic forces fly,

Which holds the straits of poverty.
Cellars and granaries in vain we fill,

With all the bounteous Summer's store, If the mind thirst and hunger still: The poor rich man's emphatically poor.

Slaves to the things we too much prize, We masters grow of all that we despise.

A field of corn, a fountain, and a wood,
Is all the wealth by nature understood.
The monarch, on whom fertile Nile bestows
All which that grateful earth can bear,
Deceives himself, if he suppose
That more than this falls to his share.
Whatever an estate does beyond this afford,
Is not a rent paid to the lord:
But is a tax illegal and unjust,
Exacted from it by the tyrant Lust.

Much will always wanting be,

To him who much desires. Thrice happy he
To whom the wise indulgency of Heaven,
With sparing hand, but just enough has given.

VIII.

civilist, methinks, of all nations, are those whom we account the most barbarous; there is some moderation and good-nature in the Toupinambaltians, who eat no men but their enemies, whilst we learned and polite and Christian Europeans, like so many pikes and sharks, prey upon every thing that we can swallow. It is the great boast of eloquence and philosophy, that they first congregated men dispersed, united them into societies, and built up the houses and the walls of cities. I wish they could unravel all they had woven; that we might have our woods and our innocence again, instead of our castles and our policies. They have assembled many thousands of scattered people into one body: it is true, they have done so ; they have brought them together into cities to cozen, and into armies to murder, one another : they found them hunters and fishers of wild creatures: they have made them hunters and fishers of their bretheren: they boast to have reduced them to a state of peace, when the truth is, they have only taught them an art of war: they have framed, I must confess, wholesome laws for the restraint of vice, but they raised first that devil, which now they conjure and cannot bind: though there were before no punishments for wickedness, yet there was less committed, because there were no rewards for it.

But the men, who praise philosophy from this topic, are much deceived: let oratory answer

THE DANGERS OF AN HONEST MAN for itself, the tinkling perhaps of that may unite

IN MUCH COMPANY.

Is twenty thousand naked Americans were not able to resist the assaults of but twenty well-armed Spaniards, I see little possibility for one honest man to defend himself against twenty thousand knaves who are all furnished cap à pé, with the defensive arms of worldy prudence, and the offensive too of craft and malice. He will find no less odds than this against him,if he have much to do in human affairs. The only advice therefore which Ican give him is, to be sure not to venture his person any longer in the open campaign, to retreat and entrench himself, to stop up all avenues,

VOL. VII.

a swarm; it never was the work of philosophy to assemble multitudes, but to regulate only, and govern them, when they were assembled; to make the best of an evil, and bring them, as much as is possible, to unity again. Avarice and ambition only were the first builders of towns, and founders of empire; they said, "Go to, let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach unto Heaven, and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the earth 9." What was the beginning of Rome, the metropolis of all the world? What was it, but a concourse of thieves, and a sanctuary of crui

• Gen. xi. 4. Y

nals? It was justly named by the augury of no less than twelve vultures, and the founder cemented his walls with the blood of his brother. Not unlike to this was the beginning even of the first town too in the world, and such is the original sin of most cities: their actual increase daily with their age and growth; the more people, the more wicked all of them; every one brings in his part to inflame the contagion: which becomes at last so universal and so strong, that no precepts can be sufficient preservatives, nor any thing secure our safety, but flight from among the infected.

the cleanly; the sight of folly and impiety, vexatious to the wise and pious.

Lucretius 2, by his favour, though a good poet, was but an ill-natured man, when he said, it was delightful to see other men in a great storm: and no less ill-natured should I think Democritus, who laughed at all the world, but that he retired himself so much out of it, that we may perceive he took no great pleasure in that kind of mirth. I have been drawn twice or thrice by company to go to Bedlam, and have seen others very much delighted with the fantastical extravagancy of so many various madnesses; which upon me wrought so contrary an effect, that I always returned, not only melancholy, but even sick with the sight. My compassion there was perhaps too tender, for I meet a thousand madmen abroad, without any perturbation; tho', to weigh the matter justly, the total loss of reason is less

exact judge of human blessings, of riches, honours, beauty, even of wit itself, should pity the abuse of them, more than the want.

We ought, in the choice of a situation, to regard above all things the bealthfulness of the place, and the healthfulness of it for the mind, rather than for the body. But suppose (which is hardly to be supposed) we had antidote enough against this poison; nay, suppose further, we were always and at all points armed and provid-deplorable than the total depravation of it. An ed, both against the assaults of hostility, and the mines of treachery, it will yet be but an uncomfortable life to be ever in alarms; though we were compassed round with fire, to defend ourselves from wild beasts, the lodging would be unpleasant, because we must always be obliged to watch that fire, and to fear no less the defects of our guard, than the diligences of our enemy. The sum of this is, that a virtuous man is in dan-envy (for he will find nothing to deserve that), ger to be trod upon and destroyed in the crowd of his contraries, nay, which is worse, to be changed and corrupted by them; and that it is impossible to escape both these inconveniencies, without so much caution as will take away the whole quiet, that is the happiness, of his life.

Ye see then, what he may lose; but, I pray, what can he get there?

Quid Romæ faciam ? Mentiri nescio '.

What should a man of truth and honesty do at Rome? he can neither understand nor speak the language of the place; a naked man may swim in the sea, but it is not the way to catch fish there; they are likelier to devour him, than he them, if he bring no nets, and use no deceits. I think therefore it was wise and friendly advice, which Martial gave to Fabian, when he met him newly arrived at Rome:

Honest and poor, faithful in word and thought;
What has thee, Fabian, to the city brought?
Thou neither the buffoon nor bawd canst
play,

Nor with false whispers th' innocent betray:
Nor corrupt wives, nor from rich beldams get
A living by thy industry and sweat;
Nor with vain pronises and projects cheat,
Nor bribe or flatter any of the great.
But you 're a man of learning, prudent, just;
A man of courage, firm, and fit for trust.
Why you may stay and live unenvied here;
But (faith) go back, and keep you where you

were.

Nay, if nothing of all these were in the case, yet the very sight of uncleanness is loathsome to 'Juv. Sat. iii. 41.

Briefly, though a wise man could pass never so securely through the great roads of human life, yet he will meet perpetually with so many objects and occasions of compassion, grief, shame, anger, hatred, indignation, and all passions but

that he had better strike into some private path; nay, go so far, if he could, out of the common way, ut nec facta audiat Pelopidarum; that he might not so much as hear of the actions of the sons of Adam. But, whither shall we fly then? into the deserts, like the ancient hermits?

-Quà terra patet, fera regnat Erinnys, In facinus jurâsse putes-3

One would think that all mankind had bound themselves by an oath to do all the wickedness they can; that they had all (as the scripture speaks) "sold themselves to sin :" the difference only is, that some are a little more crafty (and but a little, God knows) in making of the bargain.

thought, when I first went to dwell in the country, that without doubt I should have met there with the simplicity of the old poetical golden age; I thought to have found no inhabitants there, but such as the shepherds of sir Phil. Sydney in Arcadia, or of Monsieur d'Urfé upon the banks of Lignon; and began to consider with myself, which way I might recommend no less to posterity the happiness and innocence of the men of Chertsea: but to confess the truth, I perceived quickly, by infallible demonstrations, that I was still in Old England, and not in Arcadia or La Forrest; that, if I could not content myself with any thing less than exact fidelity in human conversation, I had almost as good go back and seek for it in the Court, or the Exchange, or Westminster-hall. I ask again, then, whither shall we fly, or what shall we do? The world may so come in a man's way, that he cannot choose but salute it; he must take heed, though, not to go a whoring after it. If, by any lawful vocation, or just

2 Lucr. lib. ii.

3 Ovid. Metam. i. 241.

necessity, men happen to be married to it, I can only give them St. Paul's advice: "Brethren, the time is short; it remains, that they, that have wives, be as though they had none.-But I would that all men were even as I myself4." In all cases, they must be sure, that they do mundum ducere, and not mundo nubere. They must retain the superiority and headship over it: happy are they, who can get out of the sight of this deceitful beauty, that they may not be led so much as into temptation; who have not only quitted the metropolis, but can abstain from ever seeking the next market-town in their country.

coxcomb? A man, who is excessive in his pains and diligence, and who consumes the greatest part of his time in furnishing the remainder with all conveniences and even superfluities, is to angels and wise men no less ridiculous; he does as little consider the shortness of his passage, that he might proportion his cares accordingly. It is, alas, so narrow a strait betwixt the womb and the grave, that it might be called the Pas de Vie,

as well as that the Pas de Calais.

We are all phuego (as Pindar calls us), creatures of a day, and therefore our Saviour bounds our desires to that little space: as if it were very probable that every day should be our last, we are taught to demand even bread for no longer a time. The Sun ought not to set upon our cove

CLAUDIAN'SOLD MAN OF VERONA. tousness, no more than upon our anger; but, as

DE SENE VERONENSI, QUI SUBURBIUM NUNQUAM

EGRESSUS EST.

FELIX, qui patriis, &c.

HAPPY the man, who his whole time doth bound
Within th' enclosure of his little ground.
Happy the man, whom the same humble place
(Th' hereditary cottage of his race)
From his first rising infancy has known,
And by degrees sees gently bending down,
With natural propension, to that earth
Which both preserv'd his life, and gave him birth.
Him no false distant lights, by fortune set,
Could ever into foolish wanderings get.
He never dangers either saw or fear'd:
The dreadful storms at sea he uever heard.
He never heard the shrill alarms of war,
Or the worse noises of the lawyers' bar.
No change of consuls marks to him the year,
The change of seasons is his calendar.
The cold and heat, winter and summer shows;
Autumn by fruits, and spring by flowers, he knows
He measures time by land-marks, and has found
For the whole day the dial of his ground.

A neighbouring wood, born with himself, he sees,
And loves his old contemporary trees.
He 'as only heard of near Verona's name,
And knows it, like the Indies, but by fame.
Does with a like concernment notice take
Of the Red-sea, and of Benacus' lake.
Thus health and strength he to a third age enjoys,
And sees a long posterity of boys.
About the spacious world let others roam,
The voyage, life, is longest made at home.

IX.

to God Almighty a thousand years are as one day, so, in direct opposition, one day to the covetous man is as a thousand years; tam brevi fortis jaculatur ævo multa, so far he shoots beyond his butt: one would think, he were of the opinion of the Millenaries, and hoped for so long a reign upon Earth. The patriarchs before the flood, who enjoyed almost such a life, made, we are sure, less stores for the maintaining of it; they, who lived nine hundred years, scarcely provided for a few days; we, who live but a few days, provide at least for nine hundred years. What a strange alteration is this of human life and manners! and yet we see an imitation of it in every man's particular experience; for we begin not the cares of life, till it be half spent, and still increase them, as that decreases.

What is there among the actions of beasts so illogical and repugnant to reason? When they do any thing, which seems to proceed from that which we call reason, we disdain to allow them that perfection, and attribute it only to a natural instinct and are not we fools, too, by the same kind of instinct? If we could but learn to " nummight), we should adjust much better our other ber our days" (as we are taught to pray that we

accounts; but, whilst we never consider an end of them, it is no wonder if our cares for them be without end, too. Horace advises very wisely, and in excellent good words,

-Spatio brevi

Spem longum reseces-5

from a short life cut off all hopes that grow too long. They must be pruned away like suckers, that choak the mother-plant, and hinder it from bearing fruit. And in another place, to the same

sense,

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE, AND UN- Vitæ summa brevis spem nos vetat inchoare

CERTAINTY OF RICHES.

IF you should see a man, who were to cross from Dover to Calais, run about very busy and solicitous, and trouble himself many weeks before in making provisions for his voyage, would you commend him for a cautious and discreet person, or laugh at him for a timorous and impertinent

1 Cor. vii. 29. 7.

longam 6;

[blocks in formation]

sudden, after having supped merrily, in ipso actu benè cedentium rerum, in ipso procurrentis fortunæ impetu, in the full course of his good fortune, when she had a high tide, and a stiff gale, and all her sails on; upon which occasion he cries, out of Virgil',

|

Thou dost thyself wise and industrious deem;
A mighty husband thou would'st seem;
Fond man! like a bought slave, thou all the while
Dost but for others sweat and toil.
Officious fool! that needs must meddling be
In business, that concerns not thee!

Insere nunc, Melibæe, pyros; pone ordine For when to future years thou' extend'st thy vites!

[blocks in formation]

For this Senecio I have no compassion, because he was taken, as we say, in ipso facto, still labouring in the work of avarice; but the poor rich man in St Luke (whose case was not like this) I could pity, methinks if the Scripture would permit me; for he seems to have been satisfied at last, he confesses he had enough for many years, he bids his soul take its ease; and yet for all that, God says to him, "Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee; and the things thou hast laid up, who shall they belong to 8?" Where shall we find the causes of this bitter reproach and terrible judgment? We may find, I think, two; and God, perhaps, saw more. First, that he did not intend true rest to his soul, but only to change the employments of it from avarice to luxury; his design is, to eat, and to drink, and to be merry. Secondly, that he went on too long before he thought of resting; the fullness of his old barns had not sufficed him, he would stay till he was forced to build new ones: and God meted out to him in the same measure; since he would have more riches than his life could contain, God destroyed his life, and gave the fruits of it to another.

Thus God takes away sometimes the man from his riches, and no less frequently riches from the man: what hope can there be of such a marriage, where both parties are so fickle and uncertain ? by what bonds can such a couple be kept long together?

Why dost thou heap up wealth, which thou must Or, what is worse, be left by it? [quit, Why dost thou load thyself, when thou 'rt to fly, Oh man, ordain'd to die?

Why dost thou build up stately rooms on high,
Thou who art under ground to lie?
Thou sow'st and plantest, but no fruit must see,
For Death, alas! is sowing thee.

Suppose, thou Fortune couldst to tameness bring,
And clip or pinion her wing;
Suppose, thou could'st on Fate so far prevail,
As not to cut off thy entail;

Yet Death at all that subtilty will laugh;
Death will that foolish gardener mock,
Who does a slight and annual plant engraff
Upon a lasting stock,

7 Buc. i. 4.

Luke xii. 20.

cares,

[blocks in formation]

Of power and honour the deceitful light

Might half excuse our cheated sight, If it of life the whole small time would stay And be our sunshine all the day;

Like lightning, that, begot but in a cloud

(Though shining bright, and speaking loud)

Whilst it begins, concludes its violent race, And where it gilds, it wounds the place.

Oh scene of fortune, which dost fair appear Only to men that stand not near! Proud poverty, that tinsel bravery wears! And, like a rainbow, painted tears!

Be prudent, and the shore in prospect keep; In a weak boat trust not the deep; Plac'd beneath envy, above envying rise;

Pity great men, great things despise. The wise example of the heavenly lark,

Thy fellow-poet, Cowley, mark; Above the clouds let thy proud music sound, Thy humble nest build on the ground.

X.

THE DANGER OF PROCRASTINATION.

A Letter to Mr. S. L.

I AM glad that you approve and applaud my design of withdrawing myself from all tumult and business of the world, and consecrating the little rest of my time to those studies, to which Nature had so motherly inclined me,and from which Fortune, like a step-mother, has so long detained But nevertheless (you say, which but is ærugo mera, a rust which spoils the good metal it grows upon. But you say) you would advise me not to precipitate that resolution, but to stay a while longer with patience and complaisance, till I had gotten such an estate as might afford me (according to the saying of that per

me.

um.

son, whom you and I love very much, and would | believe as soon as another man) cum dignitate otiThis were excellent advice to Joshua, who could bid the Sun stay too. But there is no fooling with life, when it is once turned beyond forty. The seeking for a fortune then, is but a desperate after-ganie: it is a hundred to one, if a man fling two sixes and recover all; especially, if his hand be no luckier than mine.

There is some help for all the defects of fortune; for, if a man cannot attain to the length of his wishes, he may have his remedy by cutting of them shorter. Epicurus writes a letter to Idomeneus (who was then a very powerful, wealthy, and, it seems, bountiful person) to recommend to him, who had made so many men rich, one Pythocles, a friend of his, whom he desired might be made a rich man too; "but I entreat you that you would not do it just the same way as you have done to many less deserving persons, but in the most gentlemanly manner of obliging him, which is not to add any thing to his estate, but to take something from his desires."

Begin, be bold, and venture to be wise;
He who defers this work from day to day,
Does on a river's bank expecting stay,
Till the whole stream, which stopt him, should
be gone,

That runs, and as it runs, for ever will run on.

Cæsar (the man of expedition above all others) was so far from this folly, that whensoever, in a journey, he was to cross any river, he never went one foot out of his way for a bridge, or a ford, or a ferry; but flung himself into it immediately, and swam over and this is the course we ought to imitate, if we meet with any stops in our way to happiness. Stay, till the waters are low; stay, till some boats come by to transport you; stay, till a bridge be built for you; you had even as good stay till the river be quite past. Persius (who, you use to say, you do not know whether he be a good poet or no, because you cannot understand him, and whom therefore, I say, I know to be not a good poet) has an odd expression of these procrastinators, which, methinks, is full of fancy :

Jam cras hesternum consumpsimus; ecce aliud
Egerit hos annos.
[cras

Our yesterday's to morrow now is gone.
And still a new to morrow does come on;
We by to morrows draw up all our store,
Till the exhausted well can yield no more.

The sum of this is, that, for the uncertain hopes of some conveniences, we ought not to defer the execution of a work that is necessary; especially, when the use of those things, which we would stay for, may otherwise be supplied; but the loss of time, never recovered: nay, farther yet, though we were sure to obtain all that we had a mind to, though we were sure of getting never so much by continuing the game, yet, when the light of life is so near going out, and ought to be so precious, le jeu ne vaut pas la chandelle, the play is not worth the expense of the candle: after having been long tost in a tempest, if our masts be standing, and we have still sail and tackling enough to carry us to our port, it is no matter for the want of streamers and top-gal-as Triarii, for your next charge. lants;

-utere velis,

Totos pande sinus-9

A gentleman in our late civil wars, when his quarters were beaten up by the enemy, was taken

And now, I think, I am even with you, for ́your otium cum dignitate, and festina lente, and three or four other more of your new Latin sentences: if I should draw upon you all my forces out of Seneca and Plutarch upon this subject, I should overwhelm you; but I leave those, I shall only

give you now a light skirmish out of an epigrammatist, your special good friend; and so, vale.

MARTIAL, Lib. V. Epigr. lix.

prisoner, and lost his life afterwards, only by Cras te victurum, cras dicis, Posthume, sem

staying to put on a band, and adjust his periwig: he would escape like a person of quality, or not at all, and died the noble martyr of ceremony and gentility. I think, your counsel of festina

lente is as ill to a man who is flying from the world, as it would have been to that unfortunate well-bred gentleman, who was so cautious as not to fly undecently from his enemies; and therefore I prefer Horace's advice before yours,

[blocks in formation]

Incipe vivendi rectè qui prorogat horam,
Rusticus expectat, dum labitur annis: at ille
Labitur, & labetur in omne volubilis ævum1.”

per; &c.

TO MORROW you will live, you always cry:
In what far country does this morrow lie,
That 'tis so mighty long ere it arrive?
Beyond the Indies does this morrow live?
'Tis so far fetch'd this morrow, that I fear
"Twill be both very old and very dear.
To morrow I will live, the fool does say:
To day itself's too late; the wise liv'd yesterday.

MARTIAL, Lib. II. Epigr. xc. Quinctiliane, vagæ moderator summe juventæ, &c.

WONDER not, sir, (you who instruct the town
In the true wisdom of the sacred gown)
That I make haste to live, and cannot hold

Juv. i. 150. 'Lib. 1. Agric. 1 Ep. ii. 4). Patiently out till I grow rich and old.

« AnteriorContinuar »