In like manner, the mists of sadness dissolved, I came to myself and
recovered my judgment, so that I knew my Physician's face; wherefore
casting mine eyes upon her somewhat stedfastly, I beheld my nurse
Philosophy, in whose house I had remained from my youth, and I said: "O
Mistress of all virtues, for what cause art thou come from heaven into
this our solitary banishment? Art thou come to bear me company in being
falsely accused?"
"Should I," saith she, "forsake thee, my disciple, and not divide the
burden, which thou bearest through hatred of my name, by partaking of
thy labour? But Philosophy never thought it lawful to forsake the
innocent in his trouble. Should I fear any accusations, as though this
were any new matter? For dost thou think that this is the first time
that Wisdom hath been exposed to danger by wicked men? Have we not in
ancient times before our Plato's age had oftentimes great conflicts with
the rashness of folly? And while he lived, had not his master Socrates
the victory of an unjust death in my presence, whose inheritance, when
afterward the mob of Epicures, Stoics, and others (every one for his own
sect) endeavoured to usurp, and as it were in part of their prey, sought
to draw me to them, exclaiming and striving against them; they tore the
garment which I had woven with my own hands, and having gotten some
little pieces of it, thinking me to be wholly in their possession,
departed. Some of whom, because certain signs of my apparel appeared
upon them, were rashly supposed to be my familiar friends, and condemned
accordingly through the error of the profane multitude.
But if thou hast not heard of the flight of Anaxagoras, the poison of
Socrates, nor the torments of Zeno, because they are foreign examples;
yet thou mayst have heard of Canius, of Seneca, of Soranus,[83] whose
memory is both fresh and famous, whom nothing else brought to their
overthrow but that they had been instructed in our school and were
altogether disliking to the humours of wicked men; wherefore thou hast
no cause to marvel, if in the sea of this life we be tossed with
boisterous storms, whose chiefest purpose is to displease the wicked; of
which though there be an huge army, yet it is to be despised, because it
is not governed by any captain, but is carried up and down by
fantastical error without any order at all. And if at any time they
assail us with great force, our captain retireth her band into a
castle,[84] leaving them occupied in sacking unprofitable baggage. And
from above we laugh them to scorn for seeking so greedily after most
vile things, being safe from all their furious assault, and fortified
with that defence which aspiring folly cannot prevail against.
[83] On Julius Kanius or Canius the Stoic cf. Seneca, _De Tranq._ xiv.
4-9; on Soranus cf. Tac. _Annal._ i. 16.
[84] Cf. _arce religionis nostrae, Tr._ iv. (_supra_, p. 54).