heat, sands, serpents, were pleasant to a valiant man; honourable
enterprises are accompanied with dangers and damages, as experience
evinceth: they will make the rest of thy life relish the better. But
put case they continue; thou art not so poor as thou wast born, and as
some hold, much better to be pitied than envied. But be it so thou hast
lost all, poor thou art, dejected, in pain of body, grief of mind,
thine enemies insult over thee, thou art as bad as Job; yet tell me
(saith Chrysostom) was Job or the devil the greater conqueror? surely
Job; the [3792]devil had his goods, he sat on the muck-hill and kept
his good name; he lost his children, health, friends, but he kept his
innocency; he lost his money, but he kept his confidence in God, which
was better than any treasure. Do thou then as Job did, triumph as Job
did, [3793]and be not molested as every fool is. Sed qua ratione
potero? How shall this be done? Chrysostom answers, facile si coelum
cogitaveris, with great facility, if thou shalt but meditate on heaven.
[3794]Hannah wept sore, and troubled in mind, could not eat; but why
weepest thou, said Elkanah her husband, and why eatest thou not? why is
thine heart troubled? am not I better to thee than ten sons? and she
was quiet. Thou art here [3795]vexed in this world; but say to thyself,
Why art thou troubled, O my soul? Is not God better to thee than all
temporalities, and momentary pleasures of the world? be then pacified.
And though thou beest now peradventure in extreme want, [3796]it may be
'tis for thy further good, to try thy patience, as it did Job's, and
exercise thee in this life: trust in God, and rely upon him, and thou
shalt be [3797]crowned in the end. What's this life to eternity? The
world hath forsaken thee, thy friends and fortunes all are gone: yet
know this, that the very hairs of thine head are numbered, that God is
a spectator of all thy miseries, he sees thy wrongs, woes, and wants.
[3798]'Tis his goodwill and pleasure it should be so, and he knows
better what is for thy good than thou thyself. His providence is over
all, at all times; he hath set a guard of angels over us, and keeps us
as the apple of his eye, Ps. xvii. 8. Some he doth exalt, prefer, bless
with worldly riches, honours, offices, and preferments, as so many
glistering stars he makes to shine above the rest: some he doth
miraculously protect from thieves, incursions, sword, fire, and all
violent mischances, and as the [3799]poet feigns of that Lycian
Pandarus, Lycaon's son, when he shot at Menelaus the Grecian with a
strong arm, and deadly arrow, Pallas, as a good mother keeps flies from
her child's face asleep, turned by the shaft, and made it hit on the
buckle of his girdle; so some he solicitously defends, others he
exposeth to danger, poverty, sickness, want, misery, he chastiseth and
corrects, as to him seems best, in his deep, unsearchable and secret
judgment, and all for our good. The tyrant took the city (saith
[3800]Chrysostom), God did not hinder it; led them away captives, so
God would have it; he bound them, God yielded to it: flung them into
the furnace, God permitted it: heat the oven hotter, it was granted:
and when the tyrant had done his worst, God showed his power, and the
children's patience; he freed them: so can he thee, and can [3801]help
in an instant, when it seems to him good. [3802] Rejoice not against
me, O my enemy; for though I fall, I shall rise: when I sit in
darkness, the Lord shall lighten me. Remember all those martyrs what
they have endured, the utmost that human rage and fury could invent,
with what [3803]patience they have borne, with what willingness
embraced it. Though he kill me, saith Job, I will trust in him. Justus
[3804]inexpugnabilis, as Chrysostom holds, a just man is impregnable,
and not to be overcome. The gout may hurt his hands, lameness his feet,
convulsions may torture his joints, but not rectam mentem his soul is
free.
[3805]———nempe pecus, rem,
Lectos, argentum tollas licet; in manicis, et
Compedibus saevo teneas custode———
Perhaps, you mean,
My cattle, money, movables or land,
Then take them all.—But, slave, if I command,
A cruel jailor shall thy freedom seize.
[3806]Take away his money, his treasure is in heaven: banish him his
country, he is an inhabitant of that heavenly Jerusalem: cast him into
bands, his conscience is free; kill his body, it shall rise again; he
fights with a shadow that contends with an upright man: he will not be
moved.
———si fractus illabatur orbis,
Impavidum ferient ruinae.
Though heaven itself should fall on his head, he will not be offended.
He is impenetrable, as an anvil hard, as constant as Job.
[3807]Ipse deus simul atque volet me solvet opinor.
A God shall set me free whene'er I please.
Be thou such a one; let thy misery be what it will, what it can, with
patience endure it; thou mayst be restored as he was. Terris
proscriptus, ad coelum propera; ab hominibus desertus, ad deum fuge.
The poor shall not always be forgotten, the patient abiding of the meek
shall not perish for ever, Psal. x. 18. ver. 9. The Lord will be a
refuge of the oppressed, and a defence in the time of trouble.
Servus Epictetus, multilati corporis, Irus
Pauper: at haec inter charus erat superis.
Lame was Epictetus, and poor Irus,
Yet to them both God was propitious.
Lodovicus Vertomannus, that famous traveller, endured much misery, yet
surely, saith Scaliger, he was vir deo charus, in that he did escape so
many dangers, God especially protected him, he was dear unto him: Modo
in egestate, tribulatione, convalle deplorationis, &c. Thou art now in
the vale of misery, in poverty, in agony, [3808]in temptation; rest,
eternity, happiness, immortality, shall be thy reward, as Chrysostom
pleads, if thou trust in God, and keep thine innocency. Non si male
nunc, et olim sic erit semper; a good hour may come upon a sudden;
[3809] expect a little.
Yea, but this expectation is it which tortures me in the mean time;
[3810] futura expectans praesentibus angor, whilst the grass grows the
horse starves: [3811]despair not, but hope well,
[3812]Spera Batte, tibi melius lux Crastina ducet;
Dum spiras spera———
Cheer up, I say, be not dismayed; Spes alit agricolas: he that sows in
tears, shall reap in joy, Psal. cxxvi. 7.
Si fortune me tormente,
Esperance me contente.
Hope refresheth, as much as misery depresseth; hard beginnings have
many times prosperous events, and that may happen at last which never
was yet. A desire accomplished delights the soul, Prov. xiii. 19.
[3813]Grata superveniet quae non sperabitur hora:
Which makes m'enjoy my joys long wish'd at last,
Welcome that hour shall come when hope is past:
a lowering morning may turn to a fair afternoon, [3814]Nube solet pulsa
candidus ire dies. The hope that is deferred, is the fainting of the
heart, but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life, Prov. xiii.
12, [3815]suavissimum est voti compos fieri. Many men are both wretched
and miserable at first, but afterwards most happy: and oftentimes it so
falls out, as [3816]Machiavel relates of Cosmo de Medici, that
fortunate and renowned citizen of Europe, that all his youth was full
of perplexity, danger, and misery, till forty years were past, and then
upon a sudden the sun of his honour broke out as through a cloud.
Huniades was fetched out of prison, and Henry the Third of Portugal out
of a poor monastery, to be crowned kings.
Multa cadunt inter calicem supremaque labra,
Many things happen between the cup and the lip,
beyond all hope and expectation many things fall out, and who knows
what may happen? Nondum omnium dierum Soles occiderunt, as Philippus
said, all the suns are not yet set, a day may come to make amends for
all. Though my father and mother forsake me, yet the Lord will gather
me up, Psal. xxvii. 10. Wait patiently on the Lord, and hope in him,
Psal. xxxvii. 7. Be strong, hope and trust in the Lord, and he will
comfort thee, and give thee thine heart's desire, Psal. xxvii. 14.
Sperate et vosmet rebus servate secundis.
Hope, and reserve yourself for prosperity.
Fret not thyself because thou art poor, contemned, or not so well for
the present as thou wouldst be, not respected as thou oughtest to be,
by birth, place, worth; or that which is a double corrosive, thou hast
been happy, honourable, and rich, art now distressed and poor, a scorn
of men, a burden to the world, irksome to thyself and others, thou hast
lost all: Miserum est fuisse, felicem, and as Boethius calls it,
Infelicissimum genus infortunii; this made Timon half mad with
melancholy, to think of his former fortunes and present misfortunes:
this alone makes many miserable wretches discontent. I confess it is a
great misery to have been happy, the quintessence of infelicity, to
have been honourable and rich, but yet easily to be endured:
[3817]security succeeds, and to a judicious man a far better estate.
The loss of thy goods and money is no loss; [3818] thou hast lost them,
they would otherwise have lost thee. If thy money be gone, [3819]thou
art so much the lighter, and as Saint Hierome persuades Rusticus the
monk, to forsake all and follow Christ: Gold and silver are too heavy
metals for him to carry that seeks heaven.
[3820]Vel nos in mare proximum,
Gemmas et lapides, aurum et inutile,
Summi materiam mali
Mittamus, scelerum si hene poenitet.
Zeno the philosopher lost all his goods by shipwreck, [3821]he might
like of it, fortune had done him a good turn: Opes a me, animum auferre
non potest: she can take away my means, but not my mind. He set her at
defiance ever after, for she could not rob him that had nought to lose:
for he was able to contemn more than they could possess or desire.
Alexander sent a hundred talents of gold to Phocion of Athens for a
present, because he heard he was a good man: but Phocion returned his
talents back again with a permitte me in posterum virum bonum esse to
be a good man still; let me be as I am: Non mi aurum posco, nec mi
precium[3822]—That Theban Crates flung of his own accord his money into
the sea, abite nummi, ego vos mergam, ne mergar, a vobis, I had rather
drown you, than you should drown me. Can stoics and epicures thus
contemn wealth, and shall not we that are Christians? It was mascula
vox et praeclara, a generous speech of Cotta in [3823]Sallust, Many
miseries have happened unto me at home, and in the wars abroad, of
which by the help of God some I have endured, some I have repelled, and
by mine own valour overcome: courage was never wanting to my designs,
nor industry to my intents: prosperity or adversity could never alter
my disposition. A wise man's mind, as Seneca holds, [3824] is like the
state of the world above the moon, ever serene. Come then what can
come, befall what may befall, infractum invictumque [3825] animum
opponas: Rebus angustis animosus atque fortis appare. (Hor. Od. 11.
lib. 2.) Hope and patience are two sovereign remedies for all, the
surest reposals, the softest cushions to lean on in adversity:
[3826]Durum sed levius fit patientia,
Quicquid corrigere est nefas.
What can't be cured must be endured.
If it cannot be helped, or amended, [3827]make the best of it; [3828]
necessitati qui se accommodat, sapit, he is wise that suits himself to
the time. As at a game at tables, so do by all such inevitable
accidents.
[3829]Ita vita est hominum quasi cum ludas tesseris,
Si illud quod est maxime opus jactu non cadit,
Illud quod cecidit forte, id arte ut corrigas;
If thou canst not fling what thou wouldst, play thy cast as well as
thou canst. Everything, saith [3830]Epictetus, hath two handles, the
one to be held by, the other not: 'tis in our choice to take and leave
whether we will (all which Simplicius's Commentator hath illustrated by
many examples), and 'tis in our power, as they say, to make or mar
ourselves. Conform thyself then to thy present fortune, and cut thy
coat according to thy cloth, [3831]Ut quimus (quod aiunt) quando quod
volumus non licet, Be contented with thy loss, state, and calling,
whatsoever it is, and rest as well satisfied with thy present condition
in this life:
Este quod es; quod sunt alii, sine quamlibet esse;
Quod non es, nolis; quod potus esse, velis.
Be as thou art; and as they are, so let
Others be still; what is and may be covert.
And as he that is [3832]invited to a feast eats what is set before him,
and looks for no other, enjoy that thou hast, and ask no more of God
than what he thinks fit to bestow upon thee. Non cuivis contingit adire
Corinthum, we may not be all gentlemen, all Catos, or Laelii, as Tully
telleth us, all honourable, illustrious, and serene, all rich; but
because mortal men want many things, [3833]therefore, saith Theodoret,
hath God diversely distributed his gifts, wealth to one, skill to
another, that rich men might encourage and set poor men at work, poor
men might learn several trades to the common good. As a piece of arras
is composed of several parcels, some wrought of silk, some of gold,
silver, crewel of diverse colours, all to serve for the exornation of
the whole: music is made of diverse discords and keys, a total sum of
many small numbers, so is a commonwealth of several unequal trades and
callings. [3834]If all should be Croesi and Darii, all idle, all in
fortunes equal, who should till the land? As [3835]Menenius Agrippa
well satisfied the tumultuous rout of Rome, in his elegant apologue of
the belly and the rest of the members. Who should build houses, make
our several stuffs for raiments? We should all be starved for company,
as Poverty declared at large in Aristophanes' Plutus, and sue at last
to be as we were at first. And therefore God hath appointed this
inequality of states, orders, and degrees, a subordination, as in all
other things. The earth yields nourishment to vegetables, sensible
creatures feed on vegetables, both are substitutes to reasonable souls,
and men are subject amongst themselves, and all to higher powers, so
God would have it. All things then being rightly examined and duly
considered as they ought, there is no such cause of so general
discontent, 'tis not in the matter itself, but in our mind, as we
moderate our passions and esteem of things. Nihil aliud necessarium ut
sis miser (saith [3836]Cardan) quam ut te miserum credas, let thy
fortune be what it will, 'tis thy mind alone that makes thee poor or
rich, miserable or happy. Vidi ego (saith divine Seneca) in villa
hilari et amaena maestos, et media solitudine occupatos; non locus, sed
animus facit ad tranquillitatem. I have seen men miserably dejected in
a pleasant village, and some again well occupied and at good ease in a
solitary desert. 'Tis the mind not the place causeth tranquillity, and
that gives true content. I will yet add a word or two for a corollary.
Many rich men, I dare boldly say it, that lie on down beds, with
delicacies pampered every day, in their well-furnished houses, live at
less heart's ease, with more anguish, more bodily pain, and through
their intemperance, more bitter hours, than many a prisoner or
galley-slave; [3837]Maecenas in pluma aeque vigilat ac Regulus in
dolio: those poor starved Hollanders, whom [3838]Bartison their captain
left in Nova Zembla, anno 1596, or those [3839]eight miserable
Englishmen that were lately left behind, to winter in a stove in
Greenland, in 77 deg. of lat., 1630, so pitifully forsaken, and forced
to shift for themselves in a vast, dark, and desert place, to strive
and struggle with hunger, cold, desperation, and death itself. 'Tis a
patient and quiet mind (I say it again and again) gives true peace and
content. So for all other things, they are, as old [3840]Chremes told
us, as we use them.
Parentes, patriam, amicos, genus, cognates, divitias,
Haec perinde sunt ac illius animus qui ea possidet;
Qui uti scit, ei bona; qui utitur non recte, mala.
Parents, friends, fortunes, country, birth, alliance, &c., ebb and flow
with our conceit; please or displease, as we accept and construe them,
or apply them to ourselves. Faber quisque fortunae suae, and in some
sort I may truly say, prosperity and adversity are in our own hands.
Nemo laeditur nisi a seipso, and which Seneca confirms out of his
judgment and experience. [3841]Every man's mind is stronger than
fortune, and leads him to what side he will; a cause to himself each
one is of his good or bad life. But will we, or nill we, make the worst
of it, and suppose a man in the greatest extremity, 'tis a fortune
which some indefinitely prefer before prosperity; of two extremes it is
the best. Luxuriant animi rebus plerumque secundis, men in
[3842]prosperity forget God and themselves, they are besotted with
their wealth, as birds with henbane: [3843] miserable if fortune
forsake them, but more miserable if she tarry and overwhelm them: for
when they come to be in great place, rich, they that were most
temperate, sober, and discreet in their private fortunes, as Nero,
Otho, Vitellius, Heliogabalus (optimi imperatores nisi imperassent)
degenerate on a sudden into brute beasts, so prodigious in lust, such
tyrannical oppressors, &c., they cannot moderate themselves, they
become monsters, odious, harpies, what not? Cum triumphos, opes,
honores adepti sunt, ad voluptatem et otium deinceps se convertunt:
'twas [3844]Cato's note, they cannot contain. For that cause belike
[3845]Eutrapilus cuicunque nocere volebat,
Vestimenta dabat pretiosa: beatus enim jam,
Cum pulchris tunicis sumet nova consilia et spes,
Dormiet in lucem scorto, postponet honestum
Officium———
Eutrapilus when he would hurt a knave,
Gave him gay clothes and wealth to make him brave:
Because now rich he would quite change his mind,
Keep whores, fly out, set honesty behind.
On the other side, in adversity many mutter and repine, despair, &c.,
both bad, I confess,
[3846]———ut calceus olim
Si pede major erit, subvertet: si minor, uret.
As a shoe too big or too little, one pincheth, the other sets the foot
awry, sed e malis minimum. If adversity hath killed his thousand,
prosperity hath killed his ten thousand: therefore adversity is to be
preferred; [3847]haec froeno indiget, illa solatio: illa fallit, haec
instruit: the one deceives, the other instructs; the one miserably
happy, the other happily miserable; and therefore many philosophers
have voluntarily sought adversity, and so much commend it in their
precepts. Demetrius, in Seneca, esteemed it a great infelicity, that in
his lifetime he had no misfortune, miserum cui nihil unquam accidisset,
adversi. Adversity then is not so heavily to be taken, and we ought not
in such cases so much to macerate ourselves: there is no such odds in
poverty and riches. To conclude in [3848]Hierom's words, I will ask our
magnificoes that build with marble, and bestow a whole manor on a
thread, what difference between them and Paul the Eremite, that bare
old man? They drink in jewels, he in his hand: he is poor and goes to
heaven, they are rich and go to hell.
MEMB. IV.
_Against Servitude, Loss of Liberty, Imprisonment, Banishment_.
Servitude, loss of liberty, imprisonment, are no such miseries as they
are held to be: we are slaves and servants the best of us all: as we do
reverence our masters, so do our masters their superiors: gentlemen
serve nobles, and nobles subordinate to kings, omne sub regno graviore
regnum, princes themselves are God's servants, reges in ipsos imperium
est Jovis. They are subject to their own laws, and as the kings of
China endure more than slavish imprisonment, to maintain their state
and greatness, they never come abroad. Alexander was a slave to fear,
Caesar of pride, Vespasian to his money (nihil enim refert, rerum sis
servus an hominum), [3849] Heliogabalus to his gut, and so of the rest.
Lovers are slaves to their mistresses, rich men to their gold,
courtiers generally to lust and ambition, and all slaves to our
affections, as Evangelus well discourseth in [3850]Macrobius, and
[3851]Seneca the philosopher, assiduam servitutem extremam et
ineluctabilem he calls it, a continual slavery, to be so captivated by
vices; and who is free? Why then dost thou repine? Satis est potens,
Hierom saith, qui servire non cogitur. Thou carriest no burdens, thou
art no prisoner, no drudge, and thousands want that liberty, those
pleasures which thou hast. Thou art not sick, and what wouldst thou
have? But nitimur in vetitum, we must all eat of the forbidden fruit.
Were we enjoined to go to such and such places, we would not willingly
go: but being barred of our liberty, this alone torments our wandering
soul that we may not go. A citizen of ours, saith [3852]Cardan, was
sixty years of age, and had never been forth of the walls of the city
of Milan; the prince hearing of it, commanded him not to stir out:
being now forbidden that which all his life he had neglected, he
earnestly desired, and being denied, dolore confectus mortem, obiit, he
died for grief.
What I have said of servitude, I again say of imprisonment, we are all
prisoners. [3853]What is our life but a prison? We are all imprisoned
in an island. The world itself to some men is a prison, our narrow seas
as so many ditches, and when they have compassed the globe of the
earth, they would fain go see what is done in the moon. In
[3854]Muscovy and many other northern parts, all over Scandia, they are
imprisoned half the year in stoves, they dare not peep out for cold. At
[3855]Aden in Arabia they are penned in all day long with that other
extreme of heat, and keep their markets in the night. What is a ship
but a prison? And so many cities are but as so many hives of bees,
anthills; but that which thou abhorrest, many seek: women keep in all
winter, and most part of summer, to preserve their beauties; some for
love of study: Demosthenes shaved his beard because he would cut off
all occasions from going abroad: how many monks and friars, anchorites,
abandon the world. Monachus in urbe, piscis in arido. Art in prison?
Make right use of it, and mortify thyself; [3856] Where may a man
contemplate better than in solitariness, or study more than in
quietness? Many worthy men have been imprisoned all their lives, and it
hath been occasion of great honour and glory to them, much public good
by their excellent meditation. [3857]Ptolomeus king of Egypt, cum
viribus attenuatis infirma valetudine laboraret, miro descendi studio
affectus, &c. now being taken with a grievous infirmity of body that he
could not stir abroad, became Strato's scholar, fell hard to his book,
and gave himself wholly to contemplation, and upon that occasion (as
mine author adds), pulcherrimum regiae opulentiae monumentum, &c., to
his great honour built that renowned library at Alexandria, wherein
were 40,000 volumes. Severinus Boethius never writ so elegantly as in
prison, Paul so devoutly, for most of his epistles were dictated in his
bands: Joseph, saith [3858]Austin, got more credit in prison, than when
he distributed corn, and was lord of Pharaoh's house. It brings many a
lewd, riotous fellow home, many wandering rogues it settles, that would
otherwise have been like raving tigers, ruined themselves and others.
Banishment is no grievance at all, Omne solum forti patria, &c. et
patria est ubicunque bene est, that's a man's country where he is well
at ease. Many travel for pleasure to that city, saith Seneca, to which
thou art banished, and what a part of the citizens are strangers born
in other places? [3859]Incolentibus patria, 'tis their country that are
born in it, and they would think themselves banished to go to the place
which thou leavest, and from which thou art so loath to depart. 'Tis no
disparagement to be a stranger, or so irksome to be an exile. [3860]The
rain is a stranger to the earth, rivers to the sea, Jupiter in Egypt,
the sun to us all. The soul is an alien to the body, a nightingale to
the air, a swallow in a house, and Ganymede in heaven, an elephant at
Rome, a Phoenix in India; and such things commonly please us best,
which are most strange and come the farthest off. Those old Hebrews
esteemed the whole world Gentiles; the Greeks held all barbarians but
themselves; our modern Italians account of us as dull Transalpines by
way of reproach, they scorn thee and thy country which thou so much
admirest. 'Tis a childish humour to hone after home, to be discontent
at that which others seek; to prefer, as base islanders and Norwegians
do, their own ragged island before Italy or Greece, the gardens of the
world. There is a base nation in the north, saith [3861]Pliny, called
Chauci, that live amongst rocks and sands by the seaside, feed on fish,
drink water: and yet these base people account themselves slaves in
respect, when they come to Rome. Ita est profecto (as he concludes)
multis fortuna parcit in poenam, so it is, fortune favours some to live
at home, to their further punishment: 'tis want of judgment. All places
are distant from heaven alike, the sun shines happily as warm in one
city as in another, and to a wise man there is no difference of climes;
friends are everywhere to him that behaves himself well, and a prophet
is not esteemed in his own country. Alexander, Caesar, Trajan, Adrian,
were as so many land-leapers, now in the east, now in the west, little
at home; and Polus Venetus, Lod. Vertomannus, Pinzonus, Cadamustus,
Columbus, Americus Vespucius, Vascus Gama, Drake, Candish, Oliver
Anort, Schoutien, got, all their honour by voluntary expeditions. But
you say such men's travel is voluntary; we are compelled, and as
malefactors must depart; yet know this of [3862]Plato to be true,
ultori Deo summa cura peregrinus est, God hath an especial care of
strangers, and when he wants friends and allies, he shall deserve
better and find more favour with God and men. Besides the pleasure of
peregrination, variety of objects will make amends; and so many nobles,
Tully, Aristides, Themistocles, Theseus, Codrus, &c. as have been
banished, will give sufficient credit unto it. Read Pet. Alcionius his
two books of this subject.
MEMB. V.
_Against Sorrow for Death of Friends or otherwise, vain Fear, &c._