work on the duty of a king. This work incloses the leading treasures of divinity, politics, and ethics, besides a sprinkling of all other arts; and I am not afraid to pronounce it one of the soundest and most profitable works I have ever read. It does not swell with the heat of invention, or flag with the coldness of negligence. The author is nowhere seized with that dizziness which confuses his sight of the main subject, and consequently avoids those digressions which, by a sort of circuitous method, descants on matter foreign to the purpose. Neither are its pages disfigured with the arts of rhetorical perfumes and paintings, designed rather to please the reader than to corroborate the argument. But they contain life and spirit, as well as solidity and bulk, containing excellent precepts, adapted as well to theoretical truth as to the expediency of use and action. The work is also entirely exempt from that vice even more censured, and which, if it were tolerable, it were so in kings, and in works on regal majesty, viz., that it does not exaggerate the privileges of the crown or invidiously exalt their power. For your Majesty has not described a king of Persia or Assyria, shining forth in all their pomp and glory, but a Moses and a David, pastors as well as rulers of their people. Nor can I forget that memorable saying which your Majesty delivered on an important point of judicature-That kings rule by the laws of their kingdoms, as God by the laws of nature, and ought as rarely to exercise their prerogative, which transcends law, as God exercises his power of working miracles. And in your Majesty's other book on a free monarchy, you give all men to understand that your Majesty knows and comprehends the plenitude of the regal power, as well as its limits; I, therefore, have not shrunk from citing this book as one of the best treatises ever published upon particular and respective duties. I can also assure your Majesty, that had the book been a thousand years in existence it would not have lost any of the praises I have bestowed upon it; nor am I prescribed by the adage which forbids praise in presence; since this rule of decorum applies only to unseasonable and excessive eulogy. Surely Cicero, in his excellent oration in defence of Marcellus, is only bent upon drawing a picture with singular art, of Cæsar's virtues, though in his presence, as the second Pliny did for Trajan. But let us proceed with our subject. To this part of the respective duties of vocations and particular professions belongs another, as a doctrine relative or opposite to it, viz., the doctrine of cautions, frauds, impostures, and their vices; for corruptions and vices are opposite to duties and virtues; not but some mention is already made of them in writings, though commonly but cursorily and satirically, rather than seriously and gravely; for more labor is bestowed in invidiously reprehending many good and useful things in arts and exposing them to ridicule, than in separating what is corrupt and vicious therein from what is sound and serviceable. Solomon says excellently, "A scorner seeks wisdom, and finds it not; but knowledge is easy to him that understands";" for whoever comes to a science with an intent to deride and despise, will doubtless find things enough to cavil at, and few to improve by. But the serious and prudent treatment of the subject we speak of may be reckoned among the strongest bulwarks of virtue and probity; for as it is fabulously related of the basilisk, that if he sees a man first, the man presently dies; but if the man has the first glance, he kills the basilisk: so frauds, impostures, and tricks do not hurt, if first discovered; but if they strike first, it is then they become dangerous, and not otherwise: hence we are beholden to Machiavel, and writers of that kind, who openly and unmasked declare what men do in fact, and not what they ought to do; for it is impossible to join the wisdom of the serpent and the innocence of the dove, without a previous knowledge of 12 Prov. xiv. 6. 18 13 Perhaps the treatise of Hieron. Cardan "De Arcanis Prudentiæ Civilis," is a capital performance in this way; as exposing numerous tricks, frauds and stratagems of government, so as to prevent the honest-minded from being imposed upon by them.-Shaw. the nature of evil; as without this, virtue lies exposed and unguarded. And further, a good and just man cannot correct and amend the vicious and the wicked, unless he has first searched into all the depths and dungeons of wickedness; for men of a corrupt and depraved judgment ever suppose that honesty proceeds from ignorance, or a certain simplicity of manners, and is rooted only in a belief of our tutors, instructors, books, moral precepts, and vulgar discourse, whence unless they plainly perceive that their perverse opinions, their corrupt and distorted principles, are thoroughly known to those who exhort and adinonish them as well as to themselves-they despise all wholesome advice; according to that admirable saying of Solomon, “A fool receives not the words of the wise, unless thou speakest the very things that are in his heart. And this part of morality, concerning cautions and respective vice, we set down as wanting, under the name of sober satire, or the insides of things. 77 14 To the doctrine of respective duties belong also the mutual duties between husband and wife, parent and child, master and servant, as also the laws of friendship, gratitude, and the civil obligations of fraternities, colleges, neighborhoods, and the like, always understanding that these things are to be treated, not as parts of civil society, in which view they belong to politics, but so far as the minds of particulars ought to be instructed and disposed to preserve these bonds of society. The doctrine of the good of communion, as well as of self-good, treats good not only simply, but comparatively, and thus regards the balancing of duty between man and man, case and case, private and public, present and future, etc.-as we may observe in the cruel conduct of Lucius Brutus to his own sons, which by the generality was extolled to the skies; yet another said, "Infelix, utcunque ferent ea facta minores." 15 14 Prov. xviii. 2. 15 Virg. Æn. vi. 823. So in the discourse between Brutus, Cassius, and others, as to the conspiracy against Cæsar, the question was artfully introduced whether it were lawful to kill a tyrant;" the company divided in their opinions about it, some saying it was lawful, and that slavery was the greatest of evils; others denying it, and asserting tyranny to be less destructive than civil war; while a third kind, as if followers of Epicurus, made it an unworthy thing that wise men should endanger themselves for fools. But the cases of comparative duties are numerous, among which this question frequently occurs, whether justice may be strained for the safety of one's country, or the like considerable good in future? as to which Jason the Thessalian used to say, Some things must be done unjustly, that many more may be done justly. But the answer is ready-Present justice is in our power, but of future justice we have no security: let men pursue those things which are good and just at present, and leave futurity to Divine providence." And thus much for the doctrine of the image of good." CHAPTER III The Culture of the Mind divided into the Knowledge of Characteristic Differences of Affections, of Remedies and Cures. Appendix relating to the Harmony between the Pleasures of the Mind and the Body WR 7E NEXT proceed to the cultivation of the mind, without which the preceding part of morality is no more than an image or beautiful statue, withAristotle expressly acknowledges as out life or motion. 16 Plut. Life Brut. 17 Plutarch, Moral. Præc. Gerend. Reip. i. 24. 18 Such was the pretext of Titus Quintius Flaminius, who, perceiving that the Achæan League, by which all the Grecian states were associated in one grand confederation, imposed the principal obstacle to the arms of Rome, deceitfully alleged that his sole design was to free each individual state from the thraldom of one dominant power, and leave it to the action of its own laws. The sequel showed, however, that his policy was only an exemplification of the old fable, for the untying the bundle was immediately followed by the subjugation of each community.-Ed. much "It is, therefore, necessary," says he, "to speak of virtue, what it is, and whence it proceeds; for it were in a manner useless to know virtue, and yet be ignorant of the ways to acquire her."" Concerning virtue, therefore, we must ascertain both what kind it is and by what means it may be acquired; for we desire a knowledge of the thing itself and the manner of procuring its pleasures.' And though he has more than once repeated the same thing, yet himself does not pursue it. And so Cicero gives it as a high commendation to the younger Cato, that he embraced philosophy, not for the sake of disputing, as most do, but of living philosophically. And though at present few have any great regard to the cultivation and discipline of the mind and a regular course of life, as Seneca phrases it— "De partibus vitæ quisque deliberat, de summa nemo". whence this part may appear superfluous, yet we cannot be persuaded to leave it untouched, but rather conclude with the aphorism of Hippocrates, that those who labor under a violent disease, yet seem insensible of their pain, are disordered in their mind. And men in this case want not only a method of cure, but a particular remedy, to bring them to their senses. If any one shall object, that the cure of the mind is the office of divinity, we allow it; yet nothing excludes moral philosophy from the train of theology, whereto it is as a prudent and faithful handmaid, attending and administering to all its wants. But though, as the Psalmist observes, "the eyes of the maid are perpetually waiting on the hands of the mistress," yet doubtless many things must be left to the care and judgment of the servant. So ethics ought to be entirely subservient to theology, and obedient to the precepts thereof, though it may still contain many wholesome and useful instructions within its own limits. And therefore, when we consider the excellence of this part of morality, we cannot but greatly wonder it 2 Mag. Moral. i. 1 Eth. Mag. ad init. 3 Juv. Muræn. xxx. 62. 5 Psal. cxxii. 3. |