Now to discover the cheat which these insinuations of our own worth
might put upon us (a thing that requires no ordinary circumspection),
the best way will be to give him a very absurd advice, and to
animadvert as impertinently as may be upon his works when he submits
them to your censure. For if he makes no reply, but grants and approves
of all you assert, and applauds every period with the eulogy of Very
right! Incomparably well!—then you have trepanned him, and it is plain
that, though
He counsel asked, he played another game,
To swell you with the opinion of a name.
15. But to proceed. As some have defined painting to be mute poetry, so
there is a sort of silent flattery which has its peculiar commendation.
For as hunters are then surest of their game when they pass under the
disguise of travellers, shepherds or husbandmen, and seem not at all
intent upon their sport; so the eulogies of a parasite never take more
effectually than when he seems least of all to commend you. For he who
rises up to a rich man when he comes in company, or who, having begun
a motion in the Senate, suddenly breaks off and gives some leading man
the liberty of speaking his sense first in the point, such a man’s
silence more effectually shows the deference he pays the other’s
judgment than if he had avowedly proclaimed it. And hereupon you shall
have them always placed in the boxes at the play-house, and perched
upon the highest seats at other public entertainments; not that they
think them suitable to their quality, but merely for the opportunity of
gratifying great men by giving them place. Hence it is likewise, that
they open first in all solemn and public assemblies, only that they
may give place to another as an abler speaker, and they retract their
opinion immediately, if any person of authority, riches, or quality
contradict them. So that you may perceive all their concessions,
cringes, and respects to be but mere courtship and complaisance, by
this easy observation, that they are usually paid to riches, honor, or
the like, rather than to age, art, virtue, or other personal endowments.
Thus dealt not Apelles with Megabyzus (one of the Persian nobility),
who pretending once to talk I know not what about lines, shades, and
other things peculiar to his art, the painter could not but take him
up, telling him that his apprentices yonder, who were grinding colors,
gazed strangely upon him, admiring his gold and purple ornaments, while
he held his tongue, but now could not choose but titter to hear him
offer at a discourse upon an argument so much out of his sphere. And
when Croesus asked Solon his opinion of felicity, he told him flatly,
that he looked upon Tellus, an honest though obscure Athenian, and
Biton and Cleobis, as happier than he. But the flatterer will have
kings, governors, and men of estates, not only the most signally happy,
but the most eminently knowing, the most virtuous, and the most prudent
of mankind.
16. And now some cannot endure to hear the Stoics, who centre all
true riches, generosity, nobility, and royalty itself in the person
of a wise man; but with the flatterer it is the man of money that is
both orator and poet, and, if he pleases, painter and fiddler too,
a good wrestler, an excellent footman, or any thing, for they never
stand with him for the victory in those engagements; as Crisson,
who had the honor to run with Alexander, let him designedly win the
race, which the king being told of afterwards was highly disgusted
at him. And therefore I like the observation of Carneades, who used
to say that young princes and noblemen never arrived to a tolerable
perfection in any thing they learned, except riding; for their
preceptors spoil them at school by extolling all their performances,
and their wrestling-masters by always taking the foil; whereas the
horse, who knows no distinction betwixt a private man and a magistrate,
betwixt the rich and the poor, will certainly throw his rider if he
knows not how to sit him, let him be of what quality he pleases. And
therefore it was but impertinently said of Bion upon this subject, that
he who could praise his ground into a good crop were to blame if he
bestowed any other tillage upon it. ’Tis granted: nor is it improper
to commend a man, if you do him any real kindness thereby. But here is
the disparity: that a field cannot be made worse by any commendations
bestowed upon it, whereas a man immoderately praised is puffed up,
burst, and ruined by it.
17. Thus much then for the point of praising; proceed we in the next
place to treat of freedom in their reprehensions. And indeed, it were
but reasonable that,—as Patroclus put on Achilles’s armor and led his
war-horse out into the field, yet durst not for all that venture to
wield his spear,—so, though the flatterer wear all the other badges
and ensigns of a friend, he should not dare to counterfeit the plain
frankness of his discourse, as being “a great, massy, and substantial
weapon,” peculiar to him.[109]
But because, to avoid that scandal and offence which their drunken
bouts, their little jests, and ludicrous babling humor might otherwise
create, they sometimes put on the face of gravity, and flatter under
the vizard of a frown, dropping in now and then a word of correction
and reproof, let us examine this cheat too amongst the rest.
And indeed I can compare that trifling insignificant liberty of speech
to which he pretends to nothing better than that sham Hercules which
Menander introduces in one of his comedies, with a light hollow club
upon his shoulder; for, as women’s pillows, which seem sufficiently
stuffed to bear up their heads, yield and sink under their weight,
so this counterfeit freedom in a flatterer’s conversation swells
big and promises fair, that when it shrinks and contracts itself
it may draw those in with it who lay any stress upon its outward
appearance. Whereas the genuine and friendly reprehension fixes upon
real criminals, causing them grief and trouble indeed, but only what
is wholesome and salutary; like honey that corrodes but yet cleanses
the ulcerous parts of the body, and is otherwise both pleasant and
profitable. But of this in its proper place. We shall discourse at
present of the flatterer who affects a morose, angry, and inexorable
behavior towards all but those upon whom he designs, is peevish and
difficult towards his servants, animadverts severely upon the failures
of his relations and domestics, neither admires nor respects a stranger
but superciliously contemns him, pardons no man, but by stories and
complaints exasperates one against another, thinking by these means to
acquire the character of an irreconcilable enemy to all manner of vice,
that he may be thought one who would not spare his favorites themselves
upon occasion, and would neither act nor speak any thing out of a mean
and dastardly complaisance.
And if at any time he undertakes his friend, he feigns himself a mere
stranger to his real and considerable crimes; but if he catch him in
some petty trifling peccadillo, there he takes his occasion to rant
him terribly and thunder him severely off; as, if he see any of his
goods out of order, if his house be not very convenient, if his beard
be not shaven or his clothes unfashionable, if his dog or his horse
be not well looked after. But if he slight his parents, neglect his
children, treat his wife scornfully, his friends and acquaintance
disrespectfully, and squander away his estate, here he dares not open
his mouth, and it is the safest way to hold his tongue. Just as if the
master of a wrestling-school should indulge his young champion scholar
in drinking and wenching, and yet rattle him about his oil-cruise and
body-brush; or as if a schoolmaster should severely reprove a boy
for some little fault in his pen or writing-book, but take no notice
of the barbarisms and solecisms in his language. For the parasite is
like him who hearing a ridiculous impertinent orator finds no fault
with his discourse but delivery, blaming him only for having hurt his
throat with drinking cold water; or like one who, being to peruse and
correct some pitiful scribble, falls foul only upon the coarseness of
the paper and the blots and negligence of the transcriber. Thus the
parasites about Ptolemy, when he pretended to learning, would wrangle
with him till midnight about the propriety of an expression, a verse,
or a story; but not a word all this while of his cruelty, insults,
superstition, and oppressions of the people. Just as if a chirurgeon
should pare a man’s nails or cut his hair, to cure him of a fistula,
wen, or other carnous excrescence.
18. But there are others behind, who outdo all the subtlety of
the former, such as can claw and please, even whilst they seem to
reprehend. Thus when Alexander had bestowed some considerable reward
upon a jester, Agis the Argive, through mere envy and vexation, cried
out upon it as a most absurd action; which the king overhearing, he
turned him about in great indignation at the insolence, saying, What’s
that you prate, sirrah? Why truly, replied the man, I must confess,
I am not a little troubled to observe, that all you great men who
are descended from Jupiter take a strange delight in flatterers and
buffoons; for as Hercules had his Cercopians and Bacchus his Silenuses
about him, so I see your majesty is pleased to have a regard for such
pleasant fellows too. And one time when Tiberius Caesar was present
at the senate, there stood up a certain fawning counsellor, asserting
that all free-born subjects ought to have the liberty of speaking their
sense freely, and should not dissemble or conceal any thing that they
might conceive beneficial to the public; who, having thus awakened the
attention of his audience, silence being made, and Tiberius impatient
to hear the sequel of the man’s discourse, pursued it in this manner:
I must tell you of a fault, Caesar, said he, for which we universally
blame you, though no man yet has taken the confidence to speak it
openly. You neglect yourself, endanger your sacred person by your too
much labor and care, night and day, for the public. And he having
harangued several things to the same effect, it is reported that
Cassius Severus the orator subjoined: This man’s freedom of speech will
ruin him.
19. Such artifices as these, I confess, are not very pernicious, but
there remains one of a most dangerous consequence to weak men; and that
is when a flatterer fastens those vices upon them which are directly
contrary to those they are really guilty of. As Himerius, an Athenian
parasite, upbraided one of the most miserable and stingy misers of the
whole town with carelessness and prodigality, telling him he was afraid
he should live to see the day when both he and his children should go
a begging. Or, on the contrary, when they object niggardliness and
parsimony to one that is lavish and profuse, as Titus Petronius did
to Nero. Or when they advise arbitrary and tyrannical princes to lay
aside their too much moderation and their unprofitable and unseasonable
clemency. And like to these are they who shall pretend to be afraid of
a half-witted idiot, as of some notable shrewd fellow; and shall tax
an ill-natured censorious man, if at any time he speak honorably of
a person of worth, of being too lavish in his commendations. You are
always, say they, praising men that deserve it not; for who is he, or
what remarkable thing did he ever say or do? But they have yet a more
signal opportunity of exercising their talent, when they meet with any
difference betwixt lovers or friends; for if they see brothers quarrel,
or children despise their parents, or husbands jealous of their
wives, they neither admonish them nor blame them for it, but inflame
the difference. You don’t understand yourself, say they; you are the
occasion of all this clutter by your own soft and submissive behavior.
If there chance to have happened some little love-skirmish betwixt a
miss and her gallant, then the flatterer interposes boldly and adds
fresh fuel to the expiring flame, taking the gentleman to task, and
telling him how many things he has done which looked a little hard,
were not kind, and deserved a chiding.
Ungrateful man! can you forget her charms,
And former soft embraces in her arms?[110]
Thus Antony’s friends persuaded him, when he was smitten with his
beloved Cleopatra, that she doted on him, still calling him haughty and
hard-hearted man. She, said they, has stripped herself of the glories
of a crown and former grandeur, and now languishes with the love of
you, attending the motion of your camp in the poor sordid figure of a
concubine.
But you have steeled your heart, and can unmoved
Behold her grief, whom once you so much loved.[111]
Now he was strangely pleased to hear of his little unkindness to his
mistress, and was more taken with such a chiding than with the highest
character they could have given him; but was not sensible that,
under the color of a friendly admonition, they really corrupted and
debauched him. For such a rebuke as this is just like the bites of a
lecherous woman, for it only tickles and provokes, and pleases even
whilst it pains you. And as pure wine taken singly is an excellent
antidote against hemlock, but if mixed with it renders the poison
incurable, because the heat of the wine quickens its circulation to the
heart; so some rascally fellows, knowing very well that the liberty of
reproving a friend is a quality very hardly compatible with flattery,
and, as I may say, the best remedy against it, mix them both together,
and flatter you under the very color and pretext of reprimanding you.
Upon the whole thereof, Bias seems not to have answered him very
pertinently, who asked him which he thought was the most hurtful
animal, when he replied, Of wild creatures a tyrant, and of tame
ones a flatterer. For he might have answered more accurately, that
some flatterers indeed are tame creatures, those shirks who ply
about your bath and your table; but they whose calumnies, malignity,
and inquisitive meddling humor, like so many gins and snares, reach
the ladies’ very closets and bed-chambers, are wild, savage, and
untractable.
20. Now one way of arming ourselves against these assaults will be
always to remember that,—since our souls are made up of two different
parts, the one sincere, honest, and reasonable, the other brutish,
false, and governed by passion,—the friend always adapts his advice
and admonitions to the improvement of the better part (like a good
physician, who preserves and advances an healthful constitution where
he finds it), whilst the flatterer claws and tickles the irrational
part of the man only, debauching it from the rules of right reason by
the repeated suggestion of soft and sensual delights. For as there are
some sorts of meat which assimilate neither with the blood nor with
the spirits, and invigorate neither the nerves nor the marrow, but
only provoke lust, swell the paunch, and breed putrid flabby flesh;
so he who shall give himself the labor to observe will find that the
discourses of a flatterer contribute nothing to the improvement of
our prudence and understanding, but either only entertain us with
the pleasure of some love-intrigue, or make us indiscreetly angry or
envious, or blow us up into an empty troublesome opinion of ourselves,
or increase our sorrows by pretending to share in them; or else they
exasperate any inbred naughtiness that is in us, or our illiberality
or distrustfulness, making them harsh, timorous, and jealous, with
idle malicious stories, hints, and conjectures of his own. For he
always fastens upon and pampers some distemper of the mind, growing,
like a botch or bile, upon its inflamed or putrid part only. Are you
angry? Revenge yourself, says he. Covet you any thing? Have it. Are you
afraid? Fly. Suspect you this or that? Believe it.
But if we find it something difficult to discover him in these attempts
upon our passions, because they often violently overpower all the
forces of our reason to the contrary, we may then trace him in other
instances of his knavery; for he always acts consonant to himself. As,
if you are afraid of a surfeit and thereupon are in suspense about your
bath and diet, a friend indeed will advise you to act cautiously and
take care of your health; but the flatterer persuades you to the bath,
bids you feed freely and not starve yourself with mortification. If he
observes you want briskness and spirit for action, as being unwilling
to undergo the fatigue of a journey or a voyage, he will tell you
presently, there is no haste; the business may be well enough deferred,
or else transacted by proxy. If at any time you have promised to lend
or give a friend a sum of money, and upon second thoughts gladly
would, and yet are ashamed to retract your word, the flatterer puts
his advice in the worse scale, and inclines the balance to the saving
side, and strips you of your squeamish modesty, telling you that you
ought not to be so prodigal, who live at great expense and have others
to relieve besides him. And therefore, unless we be mere strangers to
ourselves,—to our own covetousness, shamelessness, or timidity,—the
flatterer cannot easily escape our discovery; for he is the great
patron of these disorderly passions, endeavoring always to wind us up
to excesses of this kind. But enough of this.
21. Let us in the next place discourse of the useful and kind offices
which the flatterer seems cheerfully ready upon every occasion to
perform, thereby rendering the disparity betwixt him and the true
friend extremely perplexed and intricate.
For the temper of a friend, like the language of truth, is (as
Euripides says) sincere, natural, without paint or varnish; but that
of a flatterer, as it is corrupt and diseased in itself, so stands
in need of many curious and exquisite remedies to correct it.[112]
And therefore you shall have friends upon an accidental rencounter,
without either giving or receiving a formal salute, content themselves
to speak their mutual kindness and familiarity in a nod and a smile;
but the flatterer pursues you, runs to meet you, and extends his hand
long before he comes at you; and if you chance but to see and salute
him first, he swears you must excuse his rudeness, and will produce
you witness that he did not see you, if you please. Thus again, a
friend dwells not upon every trifling punctilio, is not ceremonious
and punctual in the transacting of business, is not inquisitive, and
does not intrude into every piece of service; but the parasite is all
obedience, all perpetual indefatigable industry, admits no rival in his
services, but will wait your commands, which if you lay not upon him,
he seems mightily afflicted, the unhappiest man in the world!
22. Now these observations are argument enough to convince a man of any
tolerable sense, that the friendship such men pretend to is not really
virtuous and chaste, but rather a sort of impudent whorish love that
obtrudes its embraces upon you.
But, to be more particular, let us first examine the disparity betwixt
their promises. For our forefathers well observed, that the offers of a
friend run in such terms as these:
If I can serve you, sir, if your request
Be feasible by me, I’ll do my best;
but the flatterer’s thus: