HAPPY IS THE MAN THAT MAY CHOOSE HIS OWN BUSINESS.
Oh the blessings of privacy and leisure! The wish of the powerful
and eminent, but the privilege only of inferiors; who are the only
people that live to themselves: nay, the very thought and hope of it
is a consolation, even in the middle of all the tumults and hazards
that attend greatness. It was Augustus’ prayer, that he might live to
retire and deliver himself from public business: his discourses were
still pointing that way, and the highest felicity which this mighty
prince had in prospect, was the divesting himself of that illustrious
state, which, how glorious soever in show, had at the bottom of it
only anxiety and care. But it is one thing to retire for pleasure, and
another thing for virtue, which must be active even in that retreat,
and give proof of what it has learned: for a good and a wise man does
in privacy consult the well-being of posterity. Zeno and Chrysippus
did greater things in their studies than if they had led armies, borne
offices, or given laws; which in truth they did, not to one city alone,
but to all mankind: their _quiet_ contributed more to the common
benefit than the _sweat_ and _labor_ of other people. That retreat is
not worth the while which does not afford a man greater and nobler work
than business. There is no slavish attendance upon great officers,
no canvassing for places, no making of parties, no disappointments in
my pretension to this charge, to that regiment, or to such or such a
title, no envy of any man’s favor or fortune; but a calm enjoyment of
the general bounties of Providence in company with a good conscience.
A wise man is never so busy as in the solitary contemplation of God
and the works of Nature. He withdraws himself to attend the service of
future ages: and those counsels which he finds salutary to himself, he
commits to writing for the good of after-times, as we do the receipts
of sovereign antidotes or balsams. He that is well employed in his
study, though he may seem to do nothing at all, does the greatest
things yet of all others, in affairs both human and divine. To supply a
friend with a sum of money, or give my voice for an office, these are
only private and particular obligations: but he that lays down precepts
for the governing of our lives and the moderating of our passions,
obliges human nature not only in the present, but in all succeeding
generations.
He that would be at quiet, let him repair to his philosophy, a study
that has credit with all sorts of men. The eloquence of the bar, or
whatsoever else addresses to the people, is never without enemies; but
philosophy minds its own business, and even the worst have an esteem
for it. There can never be such a conspiracy against virtue, the world
can never be so wicked, but the very name of a _philosopher_ shall
still continue venerable and sacred. And yet philosophy itself must be
handled modestly and with caution. But what shall we say of Cato then,
for his meddling in the broil of a civil war, and interposing himself
in the quarrel betwixt two enraged princes? He that, when Rome was
split into _two factions_ betwixt Pompey and Cæsar, declared himself
against _both_. I speak this of Cato’s last part; for in his former
time the commonwealth was made unfit for a wise man’s administration.
All he could do then was but bawling and beating of the air: one while
he was lugged and tumbled by the rabble, spit upon and dragged out of
the _forum_, and then again hurried out of the senate-house to prison.
There are some things which we propound originally, and others which
fall in as accessory to another proposition. If a wise man retire, it
is no matter whether he does it because the commonwealth was wanting to
him, or because he was wanting to it. But to what republic shall a man
betake himself? Not to Athens, where Socrates was condemned, and whence
Aristotle fled, for fear he should have been condemned too, and where
virtue was oppressed by envy: not to Carthage, where there was nothing
but tyranny, injustice, cruelty, and ingratitude. There is scarce any
government to be found that will either endure a wise man, or which a
wise man will endure; so that privacy is made necessary, because the
only thing which is better is nowhere to be had. A man may commend
navigation, and yet caution us against those seas that are troublesome
and dangerous: so that he does as good as command me not to weigh
anchor that commends sailing only upon these terms. He that is a slave
to business is the most wretched of slaves.
“But how shall I get myself at liberty? We can run any hazards for
money: take any pains for honor; and why do we not venture also
something for leisure and freedom? without which we must expect to live
and die in a tumult: for so long as we live in public, business breaks
in upon us, as one billow drives on another; and there is no avoiding
it with either modesty or quiet.” It is a kind of whirlpool, that sucks
a man in, and he can never disengage himself. A man of business cannot
in truth be said to live, and not one of a thousand understands how to
do it: for how to live, and how to die, is the lesson of every moment
of our lives: all other arts have their masters.
As a busy life is always a miserable life, so it is the greatest of all
miseries to be perpetually employed upon _other people’s business_;
for to sleep, to eat, to drink, at their hour; to walk their pace, and
to love and hate as they do, is the vilest of servitudes. Now, though
business must be quitted, let it not be done unseasonably; the longer
we defer it, the more we endanger our liberty; and yet we must no more
fly before the time than linger when the time comes: or, however, we
must not love business for business’ sake, nor indeed do we, but for
the profit that goes along with it: for we love the reward of misery,
though we hate the misery itself. Many people, I know, seek business
without choosing it, and they are even weary of their lives without it
for want of entertainment in their own thoughts; the hours are long
and hateful to them when they are alone, and they seem as short on the
other side in their debauches. When they are no longer _candidates_,
they are _suffragans_; when they give over other people’s business,
they do their own; and pretend business, but they make it, and value
themselves upon being thought men of employment.
Liberty is the thing which they are perpetually a-wishing, and never
come to obtain: a thing never to be bought nor sold, but a man must
ask it of himself, and give it to himself. He that has given proof of
his virtue in public, should do well to make a trial of it in private
also. It is not that solitude, or a country life, teaches innocence or
frugality; but vice falls of itself, without witnesses and spectators,
for the thing it designs is to be taken notice of. Did ever any man
put on rich clothes not to be seen? or spread the pomp of his luxury
where nobody was to take notice of it? If it were not for admirers and
spectators there would be no temptations to excess: the very keeping
of us from exposing them cures us of desiring them, for vanity and
intemperance are fed with ostentation.
He that has lived at sea in a storm, let him retire and die in the
haven; but let his retreat be without ostentation, and wherein he may
enjoy himself with a good conscience, without the want, the fear, the
hatred, or the desire, of anything, not out of malevolent detestation
of mankind, but for satisfaction and repose. He that shuns both
business and men, either out of envy, or any other discontent, his
retreat is but to the life of a mole: nor does he live to himself, as
a wise man does, but to his bed, his belly, and his lusts. Many people
seem to retire out of a weariness of public affairs, and the trouble of
disappointments; and yet ambition finds them out even in that recess
into which fear and weariness had cast them; and so does luxury, pride,
and most of the distempers of a public life.
There are many that lie close, not that they may live securely, but
that they may transgress more privately: it is their conscience, not
their states, that makes them keep a porter; for they live at such a
rate, that to be seen before they be aware is to be detected. Crates
saw a young man walking by himself; “Have a care,” says he “of lewd
company.” Some men are busy in idleness, and make peace more laborious
and troublesome than war; nay, and more wicked too, when they bestow it
upon such lusts, and other vices, which even the license of a military
life would not endure. We cannot call these people men of leisure that
are wholly taken up with their pleasures. A troublesome life is much
to be preferred before a slothful one; and it is a strange thing,
methinks, that any man should fear death that has buried himself alive;
as privacy without letters is but the burying of a man quick.
There are some that make a boast of their retreat, which is but a kind
of lazy ambition; they retire to make people talk of them, whereas I
would rather withdraw to speak to myself. And what shall that be, but
that which we are apt to speak of one another? I will speak ill of
myself: I will examine, accuse, and punish my infirmities. I have no
design to be cried up for a great man, that has renounced the world in
a contempt of the vanity and madness of human life; I blame nobody but
myself, and I address only to myself. He that comes to me for help is
mistaken, for I am not a physician, but a patient: and I shall be well
enough content to have it said, when any man leaves me, “I took him
for a happy and a learned man, and truly I find no such matter.” I had
rather have my retreat pardoned than envied.
There are some creatures that confound their footing about their dens,
that they may not be found out, and so should a wise man in the case of
his retirement. When the door is open, the thief passes it by as not
worth his while; but when it is bolted and sealed, it is a temptation
for people to be prying. To have it said “that such a one is never
out of his study, and sees nobody,” etc.; this furnishes matter for
discourse. He that makes his retirement too strict and severe, does as
good as call company to take notice of it.
Every man knows his own constitution; one eases his stomach by
vomit—another supports it with good nourishment; he that has the gout
forbears wine and bathing, and every man applies to the part that is
most infirm. He that shows a gouty foot, a lame hand, or contracted
nerves, shall be permitted to lie still and attend his cure; and why
not so in the vices of his mind! We must discharge all impediments and
make way for philosophy, as a study inconsistent with common business.
To all other things we must deny ourselves openly and frankly, when we
are sick refuse visits, keep ourselves close, and lay aside all public
cares, and shall we not do as much when we philosophize? Business is
the drudgery of the world, and only fit for slaves, but contemplation
is the work of wise men. Not but that solitude and company may be
allowed to take their turns: the one creates in us the love of mankind,
the other that of ourselves; solitude relieves us when we are sick of
company, and conversation when we are weary of being alone; so that
the one cures the other. “There is no man,” in fine, “so miserable as
he that is at a loss how to spend his time.” He is restless in his
thoughts, unsteady in his counsels, dissatisfied with the present,
solicitous for the future; whereas he that prudently computes his
hours and his business, does not only fortify himself against the
common accidents of life, but improves the most rigorous dispensations
of Providence to his comfort, and stands firm under all the trials of
human weakness.