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And, certes, after the same manner that study is a torment to an idle man, abstinence from wine to a drunkard, frugality to the spendthrift, and exercise to a lazy, tender-bred fellow, so it is of all the rest. The things are not so painful and difficult of themselves, but our weakness or cowardice makes them so.
Of all the follies of the world, that which is most universally received is the solicitude of reputation and glory; which we are fond of to that degree as to abandon riches, peace, life, and health, which are effectual and substantial goods, to pursue this vain phantom and empty word, that has neither body nor hold to be taken of it:
“We argue rashly and adventurously,” says Timaeus in Plato, “by reason that, as well as ourselves, our discourses have great participation in the temerity of chance.”
I should willingly pardon our people for admitting no other pattern or rule of perfection than their own peculiar manners and customs; for ‘tis a common vice, not of the vulgar only, but almost of all men, to walk in the beaten road their ancestors have trod before them.
In summer they had a contrivance to bring fresh and clear rills through their lower rooms, wherein were great store of living fish, which the guests took out with their own hands to be dressed every man according to his own liking.
Aristo wisely defined rhetoric to be “a science to persuade the people;” Socrates and Plato “an art to flatter and deceive.”
Of the Inconstancy of Our Actions
If to philosophise be, as ‘tis defined, to doubt, much more to write at random and play the fool, as I do, ought to be reputed doubting, for it is for novices and freshmen to inquire and to dispute, and for the chairman to moderate and determine.
Of Books
I seek, in the reading of books, only to please myself by an honest diversion; or, if I study, ‘tis for no other science than what treats of the knowledge of myself, and instructs me how to die and how to live well.
“Has meus ad metas sudet oportet equus.”1
Will the licence of the time excuse my sacrilegious boldness if I censure the dialogism of Plato himself as also dull and heavy, too much stifling the matter, and lament so much time lost by a man, who had so many better things to say, in so many long and needless preliminary interlocutions?
“In much wisdom there is much sorrow;” and “Who gets wisdom gets labour and trouble.”
If a man inquire of Zeno what nature is? “A fire,” says he, “an artisan, proper for generation, and regularly proceeding.”
Archimedes, master of that science which attributes to itself the precedency before all others for truth and certainty; “the sun,” says he, “is a god of red-hot iron.”
“Who makes himself too wise, becomes a fool.”
As we see in the bread we eat, it is nothing but bread, but, by being eaten, it becomes bones, blood, flesh, hair; and nails:—
“What a vile and abject thing,” says he, “is man, if he do not raise himself above humanity!”
We go into Italy to learn to fence, and exercise the art at the expense of our lives before we have learned it; and yet, by the rule of discipline, we should put the theory before the practice.
Therefore it is, say the Sages, that to make a right judgment of a man, you are chiefly to pry into his common actions, and surprise him in his everyday habit.
events cause knowledge, but knowledge does not cause events.
In that place where he speaks of his, passage over the Rhine to Germany, he says that, thinking it unworthy of the honour of the Roman people to waft over his army in vessels, he built a bridge that they might pass over dry-foot.
how shall the physician find out the true sign of the disease, every disease being capable of an infinite number of indications?
Drinking them is not at all received in Germany; the Germans bathe for all diseases, and will lie dabbling in the water almost from sun to sun; in Italy, where they drink nine days, they bathe at least thirty, and commonly drink the water mixed with some other drugs to make it work the better.
Is it not to build a wall without stone or brick, or some such thing, to write books without learning and without art? The fancies of music are carried on by art; mine by chance.
I never travel without books, either in peace or war;
I every day hear fools say things that are not foolish: they say a good thing; let us examine how far they understand it, whence they have it, and what they mean by it.
I write my book for few men and for few years.
Almost all the opinions we have are taken on authority and trust; and ‘tis not amiss; we could not choose worse than by ourselves in so weak an age.
for a certain degree of intelligence is required to be able to know that a man knows not, and we must push against a door to know whether it be bolted against us or no:
all the fruit I have reaped from my learning serves only to make me sensible how much I have to learn.
Plato requires three things in him who will examine the soul of another: knowledge, benevolence, boldness.
