Wealth, where it minds to go, meets with no stay;
For where it finds not, it can make a way;
Many fair offers doth the poor let go,
And lose his prize because his purse is low;
The fair tongue makes, where wealth can purchase it,
The foul face beautiful, the fool a wit:—
here the reader may set in opposition divers other sayings of the same
author. For example,
From honor poverty doth not debar,
Where poor men virtuous and deserving are.
Whate’er fools think, a man is ne’er the worse
If he be wise, though with an empty purse
The comfort which he gets who wealth enjoys,
The vexing care by which ’tis kept destroys.
And Menander also somewhere magnifies a voluptuous life, and inflames
the minds of vain persons with these amorous strains,
The glorious sun no living thing doth see,
But what’s a slave to love as well as we.
But yet elsewhere, on the other side, he fastens on us and pulls us
back to the love of virtue, and checks the rage of lust, when he says
thus,
The life that is dishonorably spent,
Be it ne’er so pleasant, yields no true content.
For these lines are contrary to the former, as they are also better and
more profitable; so that by comparing them considerately one cannot but
either be inclined to the better side, or at least flag in the belief
of the worse.
But now, supposing that any of the poets themselves afford no such
correcting passages to solve what they have said amiss, it will then be
advisable to confront them with the contrary sayings of other famous
men, and therewith to sway the scales of our judgment to the better
side. As, when Alexis tempts to debauchery in these verses,
The wise man knows what of all things is best,
Whilst choosing pleasure he slights all the rest.
He thinks life’s joys complete in these three sorts,
To drink and eat, and follow wanton sports;
And what besides seems to pretend to pleasure,
If it betide him, counts it over measure,
we must remember that Socrates said the contrary, to wit: Bad men live
that they may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they
may live. And against the man that wrote in this manner,
He that designs to encounter with a knave,
An equal stock of knavery must have,
seeing he herein advises us to follow other vicious examples, that of
Diogenes may well be returned, who being asked by what means a man
might revenge himself upon his enemy, answered, By becoming himself a
good and honest man. And the same Diogenes may be quoted also against
Sophocles, who, writing thus of the sacred mysteries, caused great
grief and despair to multitudes of men:
Most happy they whose eyes are blest to see
The mysteries which here contained be,
Before they die! For only they have joy
In th’ other world; the rest all ills annoy.
This passage being read to Diogenes, What then! says he, shall the
condition of Pataecion, the notorious robber, after death be better
than that of Epaminondas, merely for his being initiated in these
mysteries? In like manner, when one Timotheus on the theatre, in the
praise of the Goddess Diana, called her furious, raging, possessed,
mad, Cinesias presently cried out to him aloud, May thy daughter,
Timotheus, be such a Goddess! And witty also was that of Bion to
Theognis, who said,—
One can not say nor do, if poor he be;
His tongue is bound to th’ peace, as well as he.[39]
How comes it to pass then, said he, Theognis, that thou thyself being
so poor pratest and gratest our ears in this manner?
5. Nor are we to omit in our reading those hints which, from some
other words or phrases bordering on those that offend us, may help to
rectify our apprehensions. But as physicians use cantharides, believing
that, though their bodies be deadly poison, yet their feet and wings
are medicinal and can even kill the poison of the flies themselves, so
must we deal with poems. If any noun or verb near at hand may assist to
the correction of any such saying, and preserve us from putting a bad
construction upon it, we should take hold of it and employ it to assist
a more favorable interpretation. As some do in reference to those
verses of Homer,—
Sorrows and tears most commonly are seen
To be the Gods’ rewards to wretched men:—
The Gods, who have no cause themselves to grieve,
For wretched man a web of sorrow weave.[40]
For, they say, he says not of men simply, or of all men, that the Gods
weave for them the fatal web of a sorrowful life; but he affirms it
only of foolish and imprudent men, whom, because their vices make them
such, he therefore calls wretched and miserable.
6. Another way whereby those passages which are suspicious in poets
may be transferred to a better sense may be taken from the common
use of words, which a young man ought indeed to be more exercised in
than in the use of strange and obscure terms. For it will be a point
of philology which it will not be unpleasant to him to understand,
that when he meets with ῥιγεδανή in a poet, that word signifies an
_evil death_; for the Macedonians use the word δάνος to signify
_death_. So the Aeolians call victory gotten by patient endurance
of hardships καμμονίη; and the Dryopians call daemons πόποι.
But of all things it is most necessary, and no less profitable if
we design to receive profit and not hurt from the poets, that we
understand how they make use of the names of Gods, as also of the terms
of Evil and Good; and what they mean by Fortune and Fate; and whether
these words be always taken by them in one and the same sense or rather
in various senses, as also many other words are. For so the word οἶκος
sometimes signifies a _material house_, as, Into the high-roofed
house; and sometimes _estate_, as, My house is devoured. So
the word βίοτος sometimes signifies _life_, and sometimes
_wealth_. And ἀλύειν is sometimes taken for being _uneasy_
and _disquieted in mind_, as in
Ὡς ἔφαθ’· ἡ δ’ ~ἀλύουσ~’ ἀπεβήσατο,
τείρετο δ’ αἰνῶς,[41]
and elsewhere for boasting and rejoicing, as in
Ἢ ~ἀλύεις~, ὅτι Ἶρον ἐνίκησας τὸν ἀλήτην.[42]
In like manner θοάζειν signifies either _to move_, as in Euripides
when he saith,
Κῆτος ~θοάζον~ ἐκ Ἀτλαντικῆς ἁλός,—
or _to sit_, as in Sophocles when he writes thus,
Τίνας πόθ’ ἕδρας τάσδε μοι ~θοάζετε~,
Ἱκτηρίοις κλάδοισιν ἐξεστεμμένοι.[43]
It is elegant also when they adapt to the present matter, as
grammarians teach, the use of words which are commonly of another
signification. As here:—
Νῆ’ ὀλίγην αἰνεῖν, μεγάλῃ δ’ ἐνὶ φορτία θέσθαι.
For here αἰνεῖν signifies _to praise_ (instead of ἐπαινεῖν), and
_to praise_ is used for _to refuse_. So in conversation it
is common with us to say, καλῶς ἔχει, _it is well_ (i.e., _No,
I thank you_), and to bid any thing _fare well_ (χαίρειν);
by which forms of speech we refuse a thing which we do not want, or
receive it not, but still with a civil compliment. So also some say
that Proserpina is called ἐπαινή in the notion of παραιτητή, _to be
deprecated_, because death is by all men shunned.
And the like distinction of words we ought to observe also in things
more weighty and serious. To begin with the Gods, we should teach our
youth that poets, when they use the names of Gods, sometimes mean
properly the Divine Beings so called, but otherwhiles understand
by those names certain powers of which the Gods are the donors and
authors, they having first led us into the use of them by their own
practice. As when Archilochus prays,
King Vulcan, hear thy suppliant, and grant
That which thou’rt wont to give and I to want,
it is plain that he means the God himself whom he invokes. But when
elsewhere he bewails the drowning of his sister’s husband, who had not
obtained lawful burial, and says,
Had Vulcan his fair limbs to ashes turned,
I for his loss had with less passion mourned,
he gives the name of Vulcan to the fire and not to the Deity. Again,
Euripides, when he says,
No; by great Jove I swear, enthroned on high,
And bloody Mars,[44]
means the Gods themselves who bare those names. But when Sophocles
saith,
Blind Mars doth mortal men’s affairs confound,
As the swine’s snout doth quite deface the ground,
we are to understand the word Mars to denote not the God so called, but
war. And by the same word we are to understand also weapons made of
hardened brass, in those verses of Homer,
These are the gallant men whose noble blood
Keen Mars did shed near swift Scamander’s flood.[45]
Wherefore, in conformity to the instances given, we must conceive and
bear in mind that by the names of Jupiter also sometimes they mean the
God himself, sometimes Fortune, and oftentimes also Fate. For when they
say,—
Great Jupiter, who from the lofty hill
Of Ida govern’st all the world at will;[46]
That wrath which hurled to Pluto’s gloomy realm
The souls of mighty chiefs:—
Such was the sovereign doom, and such the will of Jove;[47]
For who (but who himself too fondly loves)
Dares lay his wisdom in the scale with Jove’s?—
they understand Jupiter himself. But when they ascribe the event of all
things done to Jupiter as the cause, saying of him,—
Many brave souls to hell Achilles sent,
And Jove’s design accomplished in th’ event,—
they mean by Jove no more but Fate. For the poet doth not conceive that
God contrives mischief against mankind, but he soundly declares the
mere necessity of the things themselves, to wit, that prosperity and
victory are destined by Fate to cities and armies and commanders who
govern themselves with sobriety, but if they give way to passions and
commit errors, thereby dividing and crumbling themselves into factions,
as those of whom the poet speaks did, they do unhandsome actions,
and thereby create great disturbances, such as are attended with sad
consequences.
For to all unadvised acts, in fine,
The Fates unhappy issues do assign.[48]
But when Hesiod brings in Prometheus thus counselling his brother
Epimetheus,
Brother, if Jove to thee a present make,
Take heed that from his hands thou nothing take,[49]
he useth the name of Jove to express Fortune; for he calls the good
things which come by her (such as riches, and marriages, and empires,
and indeed all external things the enjoyment whereof is unprofitable
to them who know not how to use them well) the gifts of Jove. And
therefore he adviseth Epimetheus (an ill man, and a fool withal) to
stand in fear of and to guard himself from prosperity, as that which
would be hurtful and destructive to him.
Again, where he saith,
Reproach thou not a man for being poor;
His poverty’s God’s gift, as is thy store,[50]
he calls that which befalls men by Fortune God’s gift, and intimates
that it is an unworthy thing to reproach any man for that poverty which
he falls into by Fortune, whereas poverty is then only a matter of
disgrace and reproach when it is attendant on sloth and idleness, or
wantonness and prodigality. For, before the name of Fortune was used,
they knew there was a powerful cause, which moved irregularly and
unlimitedly and with such a force that no human reason could avoid it;
and this cause they called by the names of Gods. So we are wont to call
divers things and qualities and discourses, and even men themselves,
divine. And thus may we rectify many such sayings concerning Jupiter as
would otherwise seem very absurd. As these, for instance:—
Before Jove’s door two fatal hogsheads, filled
With human fortunes, good and bad luck yield:—
Of violated oaths Jove took no care,
But spitefully both parties crushed by war:—
To Greeks and Trojans both this was the rise
Of mischief, suitable to Jove’s device.[51]
These passages we are to interpret as spoken concerning Fortune or
Fate, of the causality of both which no account can be given by us,
nor do their effects fall under our power. But where any thing is said
of Jupiter that is suitable, rational, and probable, there we are to
conceive that the names of that God is used properly. As in these
instances:—
Through others’ ranks he conquering did range,
But shunned with Ajax any blows t’ exchange;
But Jove’s displeasure on him he had brought,
Had he with one so much his better fought.[52]
For though great matters are Jove’s special care,
Small things t’ inferior daemons trusted are
And other words there are which the poets remove and translate
from their proper sense by accommodation to various things, which
deserve also our serious notice. Such a one, for instance, is ἀρετή,
_virtue_. For because virtue does not only render men prudent,
just, and good, both in their words and deeds, but also oftentimes
purchaseth to them honor and power, therefore they call likewise these
by that name. So we are wont to call both the olive-tree and the fruit
ἐλαία, and the oak-tree and its acorn φηγός, communicating the name of
the one to the other. Therefore, when our young man reads in the poets
such passages as these,—
This law th’ immortal Gods to us have set,
That none arrive at virtue but by sweat;[53]
The adverse troops then did the Grecians stout
By their mere virtue profligate and rout;[54]
If now the Fates determined have our death,
To virtue we’ll consign our parting breath;—
let him presently conceive that these things are spoken of that most
excellent and divine habit in us which we understand to be no other
than right reason, or the highest attainment of the reasonable nature,
and most agreeable to the constitution thereof. And again, when he
reads this.
Of virtue Jupiter to one gives more,
And lessens, when he lifts, another’s store;
and this,