had done who seeing the yong yeres of Remus and considering well the markes of his countenance togither with the time when his daughters children were cast out began to suspect that he was one of them by his age so well agreeing thereto And being in this doubt Romulus and Faustulus came vnto him by whom he was aduertised of the trueth of all Then being auenged of Amulius whom they slew they placed Numitor in the kingdom and afterwards founded the citie of Rome ROMVLVS then the first Prince authour and founder thereof hauing composed it of Countrey people and neaâ—heards had many trauailes in doing thereof and found himselfe intangled with many wars and many daungers being constrained to fight with those that opposed themselues to the rising and foundation of this City and to the increase of this people newly planted Then afterwards as his natiuity preseruation and nourishment had bin maruailous his end was no lesse For as he spake vnto the people sodainly the weather was ouer cast and the aire was horribly chaunged The sunne lost entierly his light and there were terrible thunders impetuous winds stormes and tempests on euery side which made the coÌ„mon people to hide themselues here and there in corners But the Senatours kept themselues togither Then when the storme was past the day cleared and the weather become faire the people assembled againe as before and went to seeke their king and to aske what was become of him But the Lords would not suffer them to enquire any farther but admonished them to honour and reuerence him as one that had bin taken vp into heauen and who thence forward insteed of a good king would be a propicious and fauourable God vnto them Moreouer Iulius Proculus one of the Patricians accounted a very honest man who also had bin a great familiar friende of Romulus affirmed that as he came from Alba he met him on his way greater and fairer then euer he had seen him armed all in white armour bright shyning as fire and that being afrighted to see him in such sort he asked him wherefore he had abandoned his orphane city in such infinite sorowe To whoÌ„ Romulus answered It pleased the Gods from whoÌ„ I came that I should remain among men as long as I haue remained that after I had built a city which in glory and greatnes of Empire shall one day be the chiefe in the world I shoulde returne to dwell in heauen as before Wherefore be of good cheere and say vnto the Romains that in exercising of prowes and temperance they shall attaine to the height of humaine power and as for me I will be henceforth a God Protector and Patron of them whom they shall call QVIRINVS The auncients recited many such meruailes in the which there is no apparance of trueth endeuouring to deifie the nature of man and to associate him with the Gods It is is very true saith Plutarch that it were euil and wickedly done to deny the diuinity of vertue but yet to mingle earth with heauen were great foolishnes being a thing most certaine that after death the soule which is the ymage of eternity remaineth only aliue and retourneth to heauen wherhence it came not with the body but rather when it is farthest remoued and seperated from the body and when it is cleane and holy and holdeth nothing any longer oft he flesh Therefore it is not necessary to go about to sende against nature the bodies of vertuous men with their soules vnto heauen but we ought to thinke and firmely beleeue that their vertues and soules according to nature and diuine Iustice become saincts of men and of saints demy-Gods and of demy-gods after they are perfectly as in sacrifices of purgation cleansed purified being deliuered of al passibility and mortality they become not by any ciuile ordinance but in trueth reason liklyhood entier perfect Gods receiuing a most happy glorious end But NVMA the second king succeeding vnto Romulus had time and leasure to establish Rome and to ensure the increase thereof by meanes of the long peace which hee had with all his enemies which was to Rome as a store-house of all munition for the wars which folowed after and the people of Rome hauing exercised themselues at leasure and in quiet and rest by the space of xliij yeres after the wars which they had vnder Romulus they made themselues strong enough sufficient to make head against those which afterwards opposed themselues against them Considering that in all that time there was neither plague nor famine nor barrennes of the earth nor intemperatenes of winter or sommer that offended them as if all these yeres had bin gouerned not by humane wisdome but by the diuine prouidence For he gaue out that the goddesse Egeria was in loue with him that lying with him she taught him how to rule and gouerne his common wealth Numa then taking the city of Rome as in a turbulent tempest and in a sea tormented troubled with the enmity enuy and euil wil of all the neighbor nations and bordering peoples and moreouer exercised in it selfe with infinite troubles and partialities he extinquished and asswaged all angers and all the enuies as euil and contrary windes giuing meanes to the people being but newly planted and scarcely yet established to take roote and to fasten their footing by augmenting leasurely in al safety without wars without sicknes without peril without feare or any other hinderance whatsoeuer For in all his raigne there was neither war nor ciuil sedition nor attempt of nouelty in gouernment of the common wealth yet lesse enmity or enuy perticularly against him or conspiracy against his person forgreedines of rule And not only at Rome was the people softned reformed after the example of the Iustice clemency goodnes of the king but in all the Citieâ— also round about began a meruailous change of maners no otherwise then if it had bin a sweete breath of some wholsome and gracious winde that had breathed on them from the side of Rome to refresh them and there stole sweetly into the harts of men a desire to liue in peace to labour the earth and to bring vp their children in rest and tranquility and to serue and honour the Gods After these two raigned fiue kings at Rome and in TARQVIN the last for hate of his pride and not of the royall authority was the gouernement chaunged Rome being from that time foorth gouerned by two annuall CONSVLS and by the SENATE vnder the authoritie of the people Then from the Consuls it came to the rule of TEN MEN from whom it retourned back againe to the CONSVLS And whereas there were opposed vnto them two military TRIBVNES of equall power they were within the yere deposed and gaue place to the CONSVLS And albeit they vsed in the great affaires of the common wealth to create a DICTATOVR with absolute authority for the time neuerthelesse the Consulary
SEMIRAMIS hauing giuen commaundment to all the gouernours of the prouinces of the kingdom of Assyria that they should be obedient to her sonne as to their king she vanished sodainly and it was beleeued that she was translated among the Gods The people of Rome buylded a Temple vnto IVLIVS CESAR neer vnto the place where his body was burned after his death and worshipped him as a God thinking that the Comet which arose then was his soule translated into heauen And if it were lawfull to mingle trueth with fables and diuinitie with humanitie MOSES which receiued so much grace and fauour of GOD as to speak vnto him and to be chosen to bring the children of Israel out of the miserable bondage of Pharaoh and to giue them the Law and forme of liuing he was soone after his birth exposed in a basket of bulrushes neere to the riuer Nilus and after miraculously saued by the kings daughter who brought him vp and adopted him as her sonne And when he died and was buried his sepulture was neuer afterwards knowen of any God by the mouth of his Prophet Esay calleth CYRVS who founded the kingdom of Persia his king two hundred yeares before he was borne promising to hold his right hand and to helpe him to take the strong Cities to subdue mightie Nations and to humble the kings of the earth And chose him amongst all the Princes of the Gentiles to reedifie the Temple of Ierusalem and to restore the people of Israel to their Countrie wherhence they had bin driuen out a long time ARSACES hauing conquered and established the kingdom of the Parthians was no lesse celebrated of them then Ninus and Semiramis of the Assyrians Cyrus of the Persians Alexander of the Macedonians Romulus Iulius Cesar and Augustus of the Romaines In remembrance and honour of whom the succeeding kings which raigned in that state were called of his name Arsacides as the Romain Emperours are called Cesars and Augustes in the honour and memorie of Iulius Cesar and Augustus A COMPARISON OF THE ROMAIN warfare with the Parthian Carthaginian and Assyrian THE militarie exercise of the Carthaginians was principally in matter of the sea By reason whereof they made little reckoning of footmen but gaue some order for horsemen because they were serued by strangers and mercenaries The Parthians vsed not any footmen neither fought in any order but by skirmishes confusedly and vncertainly On the contrarie the principall force of the Romaines consisted in their footmen and they fought close in rank and order neuer forsaking that place wherein they were appointed resolute to ouercome or to die The great champaignes and large countries which the Parthians inhabited far from the seas and where there are but few riuers being far distant one from an other were verie fit for their horsemen to run swiftly from one side to thother Where on the contrarie the Romaines being laden with armes could not keeping their order make hast without damage in such places where they found neither vittailes nor waters Who by militarie discipline and exercise surmounted the multitude of the Gaules the greatnes of the Germains the strength of the Spaniards the riches and cauteles of the Africans the wisdome and subtelties of the Grecians albeit they were lesse in all things then these Nations sauing in the art and exercise of warre And hauing gotten the seignorie of a great part of the world when their Empire was mounted vp to the highest of the wheele in the time of Augustus it began then to turne and to go downwards when the Citizens of Rome were left out of the hostes which the Emperours gathered and that they relied on the force of the mercenaries and of such as they had before ouercome And howbeit the great vertues which were in Augustus and his good wit preserued and vpheld the Maiestie of the Empire as long as he liued yet his successours learned of him to intertaine others in pay besides the Romaines as Gothes Lombards Germains Frenchmen Spaniards and others whereof came the ruyne of Rome for asmuch as the Emperours following kept an host of strangers called the Pretorian neere the walls of the Citie of Rome which maner albeit at the first it seemed for their aduantage yet in the end it was their ouerthrow For this number of souldiers disposed of the Imperiall dignitie at their pleasure beeing armed in the place against naked and vnarmed people Also the other armies which were in Gaule Germanie Pannonie Suria Africke and elswhere would be of aucthoritie whiles th one of them named one to be Emperour and an other named another in somuch that there were sometimes two or three pretēding at one time who thinking ech to consume the other consumed the Empire which had cost so much in the obtaining But considering that almost all the Emperours were of strange Nations as also the souldiers which had created them that made them to care lesse for the conseruing of it then if they had bin borne of the Citie Then aswel those which were elected Emperours as they which had chosen them marched against the Citie with the same mind as they would against their enemies doing in these changes many spoiles and murthers aswell on the Emperours themselues as on the Senatours and other great persons Whereas if the institution which the Romains had in the time whiles their vertue liued had bin still maintained which was to make their warres with their owne people and not to hire strangers nor to admit their neighbours or allies into their campe in greater number then they were themselues their Empire had not bin diuided neither transported out of their hands neither their Citie many times destroied and abandoned as it hath bin For by maintaining their former maner of fighting they should haue auoided all these inconueniences and haue comen alwaies happely to a good end of all their enterprises as they did as long as they were serued of their owne Citizens Moreouer the Romains failed greatly in the intertaining of their ordinarie armies and prolonging of general militarie charges which fault was a great furtherance to the ouerthrow of the common wealth and destruction of the Empire But the kings of Assyria changed euery yeare their armies and their Lieutenants generall prouiding wisely by such changing that the souldiers and Captaines could not so readily vnite themselues one with the other to conspire against them For the people that are continually exercised in armes and hardned vnto labour are more couragious and the Captaines which commaund alwaies ouer the same armies make them partial to themselues and draw them oftentimes from the obedience of their common wealth or the seruice of their Prince as it hath bin discoursed more at large before speaking of the Assyrians Besides they yet made an other fault no lesse then the former changing the simplicitie of the Romains into the proud ceremonie of the barbarous kings For whereas the first Emperours accomodated themselues to the Romaine libertie not
extremitie conioyned and knit togither Moreouer it is certaine that Nature hath not created any thing vnto which she hath not giuen a contrarie to withhold it and keepe it backe where hence proceede the Antipathies or contrarie affections in all things aswell animate as inanimate lyuing as without life In beasts as betweene the Cocke and the Foxe in fishes betweene the Mullet and the fish called Lupus which some take it to be the Pike in birdes betwixt the Crow and the Kite Amongst trees the Chestnut and Oliue amongst stones the Adamant and the Diamant What then shall we say of men which are so passionate and inconstant Truely that al in all ages and all kinds of life publike priuate solitarie contemplatiue actiue are inclined to contentions and partialities euen so farre as euery one to be at variance in him selfe hauing in his bodie and soule a perpetuall combate betweene reason and concupiscence And in this maner is the strife amongst children which yet haue no knowledge and amongst the Sauages which haue nothing proper or peculier There are Sectes in the schooles of Law Physicke Diuinitie Philosophie and in the conuents and monasteries amongst the Reclus and Recluses No maruaile is it therefore if there be seditions in Cities and Countries which make people of diuers estates euen to run hedlong as was sometimes in Rome that of the common people and the Nobility Yf there be warres betweene Lordship and Lordship kingdom and kingdom which respectiuely keeps them both in feare So were aunciently in Greece the Lacedemonians to the Athenians so to the Romaines the Carthaginians and afterward the Parthians So are at this day opposed the Scots to the English the English to the French the French to the Italians The Almaines to the Suitzers the Africans to the Spaniards the Turkes to the Christians the Persians to the Turkes the Zagathaines to the Persians being deuided amongst themselues by colours redd and greene and of that are called Caselbas and Cuselbas the Moscouites to the Polonians the Tartarians to them both In the Indies Cochim to Calecut in high Africk the Moores to the Abissins thorough out the countrey of the Arabians the inhabitants of the Mountaines to those that dwel in the Plaines The Black-moores amongst themselues And in Brasil the Sauluages euen to the eating of one another when they are taken in warre And it might seeme that these diuisions were in some sort necessarie thoroughout the world and such contrarieties as God hath giuen to euery estate almost to euery person profitable to keepe them in feare and humility for men will soone waxe proud and are easily puft vp with prosperity and riches and especially when they misconceaue from whence such grace proceedeth God is wont to send them aduersities for their chastisment Wheresore it is ordinarily seene that euery mighty estate hauing no forrain enemy findeth some within it selfe and when it is come to such greatnesse that it cannot be brought vnder or kept downe by any strange or foraine force then is it afflicted with partialities and oftentimes distroied or translated into some other nation with alteration both of Iustice and politike gouernment Moreouer when the Countries are to full of inhabitants and that the malice and subtilty of man is come to the highest then are they purged and empted by famines and pestilence to the end that the people which are in it being reduced to a lesse number and chastised may liue better But if herewith they amend not but waxe worse and worse then either are they exterminated by fire and water or by Earthquakes ouerwhelmed God vsing alwaies such rigours against those which perseuer in their wickednes as he is alwaies readie to receiue to mercie such as are truely penitent which turne to him and pray to him with their harts OF THE VARIETY AND INTER course of Shadowes Daies and seasons of the yeare and diuersitie of habitations on the Earth HItherto hath bin declared how the world is not onely conserned by the intercourse of the Heauens and Elements but also tempered by contraries Now to the end we may the better consider the difference which is found in respect of the diuersitie of places and aspectes of heauen aswell in plants trees fruits mettals sauours colours and tastes as in beasts fishes birds and euen in men themselues and all their affaires we will briefly touch as far foorth as shall belong to our present purpose the fiue Zones of the habitable earth the seauen Climats fower limits East West North and South the two sides or hemisphers longitude and latitude the three parts thereof Europe Asia and Africke vnto which is also added America the varietie of shadowes daies and seasons with the diuers maners of inhabiting because that all these considerations serue to the knowledge of the world and the chaunges which in times past haue happened therein and do euery day come to passe The Auncients diuided the Heauen consequently the earth into fiue Zones thinking that those two that are vttermost about the two Poles North and South did make those two parts of the earth which are subiect to them vnhabitable by their extreme continual cold Also that that part of the heauen which beholdeth the middle of the earth vnder the Equinoctiall made it likewise vnhabitable by reason that the Sunne hauing there his continuall course burneth with his beames beating on it so neere and perpendicularly all the countrie lying vnder that Zone That the two others which are betweene the burning Zone and the Poles were temperate as also those parts of the earth which are answerable vnto them But that one could not passe verie well from the one to the other because of the burning Zone being in the midst But by the latter voyages and nauigations the whole earth is found to be inhabited yea euen vnder the Poles themselues beeing both in the midst and in the vtmost parts frequented with men and with singuler commodities the heat of the middle-most accounted burning hoat being lesse vnder the Equinoctiall then the Tropicke not a whit hindering the passage from one of the temperate vnto the other For although that vnder the Equinoctiall the sunne-beames are perpendicular twice in a yeare yet do they but little harme by reason that they stay not long there the Zodiake being streight and not oblique or crooked in that place Then the nightes being there continually equall in length vnto the daies doe mitigate with their colde the heat of the dayes But vnder and neere vnto the Tropickes the Zodiacke beeing crooked the Sunne stayeth longer there and discendeth not so swiftlle vnder the Horizon makinge the dayes longer and the sunne hotter yet sufferable notwithstanding as wee see by innumerable people dwelling vnder the Equinoctial and betweene the Tropickes In the vttermost part of the North dwell the Liuonians Noruegians Lithuanians Swedens Moscouites Lapians and Brarmians last of all hauing in their depth of winter the aire full of foggs and great clouds
Italie aboue al others both for whitenesse and waight saith that nature hath shewed her selfe so friendly towards the Italians that she hath not onely made them excellent in lawes gouerment of states and maners of life customes and fashions but also hath giuen them corne and many other thinges more excelent then they are in other countries In such maner hath euery countrey his particuler gifts and singularities so distributed by the diuine prouidence which is carefull of the vniuersall good of the world that it cannot perseuer in his perfection without such variety to the end that the one hauing neede of the other they might communicate togither succour ech other OF THE VARIETY AND AL teration in Man BVt the Varietie and alteration is greater in man then in any other thing as soone as he is borne he beginneth to dye and his end dependeth of his beginning During the time while he liueth from his infancy euen til his old age he hath neuer the same things in him neither is the same but is stil renewed subiect to change as wel in his body his heare flesh bloud bones as in his minde changing his maners customes opinions appetites pleasures sorrowes feares and hopes Wee learne forget and remember the sciences Wee receaue food into our bodies and cast out the excrement by the waies and conueiances prepared for that purpose alwaies repairing the incommodities of such egestion by new norishment and by respiration or breathing of the aire The little children are foolish and old men are dotards others are either alwaies foolish or now and then at the least Others become madd either in continual feuers or by some other accident others with too much drinking lose the vse of their reason Some are naturally more heauy and dull others more quicke and ingenious others wiser better conditioned But seeing that they do al participate of one reasonable soule haue their bodies made of the selfe same matter it is a maruel from whence should come such variety as we see particulerly in euery one from his birth and generally thoroughout the nations Wherein it seemeth that nature taketh pleasure to supply the indigence of man not only producing euery one more apt for one thing then another as learning armes and the other liberal and mechanicall Arts but also making the people borne in diuers parts of the habitable earth to differ in inclinations and complexions MANY learned men haue assaied to render a reason of this so admirable a diuersitie First the natural Philosophers are of opinion that it proceedeth of the mingling of the fower humours of which mens bodies are compounded the which according as they agree or disagree one with another do change the cōplexions in disposing the natures diuersly according to their predominant qualities But principally according to the proportion of the hart being the fountaine of the vitall spirits and of the bloud and gouernor of the affections as it is diuersly affected or altered also by the disposition of the melancholick humour which is mother of the arts and of al good inuentions vnto whom they attribute all the dexterity perseuerance and perfection in them From thence comes it according to this opinion that men are merry sad diligēt slouthful tractable opiniatiue gratious merciful enuious fearful audatious foolish light wise true false lyers quarelours deceauers with the other like and ordinary affections of men more or lesse according as one humor exceedeth another To this healpeth much the corrupted estate of cōmon weales the talke which is held both openly secretly and that from their youth few do think on remedying of it by good noriture disciplin and studies Whereunto the Physitians do adde eating and drinking with exercise shewing that they are sufficiently seruiceable to the disposition of maners Besides the waters windes and aire enuironing and that there is great difference in the places which are inhabited So that commonly the Spaniards are proud and haughty Egiptians light Africans disloyal Englishmen and Scots couragious Greekes crafty and subtill Italians wise and warie Frenchmen bold and hardy And thence is it that amongst the Scithians there was neuer but one Philosopher and in Athens haue ben many THE ASTROLOGERS affirme all these inferiour natures to be gouerned and disposed by the superiors And that by the mouing of heauen all things here below are engendred and distroyed or enter changed one into another Moreouer that by the reuolutions and influences of the Plannets assisted with the other starres there commeth such a diuersitie of bodies and mindes vnto men some being stirred vp to one action others moued to another euen as shippes in the sea by the windes so that they cannot of them selues either moue or stirre any waies Likewise the humors of the bodies to be moued by the irradiations of the starres of whom they receiue diuers dispositions which the soule representeth afterward in her actions Insomuch that in their opinion none can learne any art or disiplin whatsoeuer nor become excellent therein if he haue not the original and cause of his excellency from the heauen and constellations They say moreouer that howsoeuer the pouertie situation nature and customes of countries lawes and statutes of gouernment religions and maners of people do often contrarie their fatall destiny neuerthelesse that the destiny bee it to good or euill doth ordinarilye returne to his course and accommodate it selfe as neere as is possible to his first order not denying notwithstanding but that by good education and laudable exercises it may greatly be holpen euen as it commeth to passe in grounds which by care and diligence are made more fertile but being left wast do soone returne to their first nature SOME auncient Philosophers considering that in the minds of men do appeare the seeds of al disciplines with some knowledge of God of vertue and of vice without any former teaching or institution haue thought that the reasonable soules were taken and extracted from the Godhead And that before they came downe from heauen to the earth which place is contrary to their diuine and immortall nature they were full of vniuersall intelligences and of sciences which they forgot by the contagion of the body as soone as they came to dwell therein But that afterwards by care study and exercise they recouered the remembrance of them Thinking these first sparkes and faculties of the minde to be quickned and reuiued againe by learning and vse which for that respect they called remembrance That discoursing teaching learning prouiding numbring inuenting iudging and other actions of the vnderstanding soule did not proceed of any elementarie matter in any sort disposed affected or ordered by the heauenly bodies but of a more noble and sempiternall coming from without and being separable from the bodie as the eternall from the corruptible THE CHRISTIANS being better instructed in the trueth haue not sought the cause of this variety either in complexions or constellations nor yet posted it ouer
variable and to vnderstand the causes therof cherishing principally amongst all their senses their sight and hearing which do helpe them to haue knowledge but the sight most of all where hence hath begun this knowledge by admiration for seeing the Heauen the Sunne the Moone the Starres and hauing knowen by their eyes the difference of daies and nights the reuolutions of the monethes and the yeares they applied themselues to contemplate the disposition of the world and to seeke out the secrets of nature First necessitie as hath bin said taught them the arts necessarie vnto life after followed those which serue for pleasure ornament and magnificence And after they had gotten opportunitie and leasure they began to consider all things contayned in the world being innumerable in multitude and admirable in beautie inquiring after their properties agreements and differences whereof they were made what they became when and how they perished what in them was mortall and corruptible and what diuine and perpetual They were so desirous to learne that dwelling and liuing here on earth so little while they durst vndertake to know not onely what is aboue vnder and in the earth as the nature of all sortes of liuing creatures and qualities of mettals but also the nature of the Ocean and of all waters and fishes that liue therein Then mounting into the aire they inquired of the winds of the raines haile snow thunder lightning and other accidents appearing in the middle Region thereof they ascended by vnderstanding and by art euen into Heauen which they haue indeuoured to compasse round imagining two Poles and one Axeltree to sustain it distinguishing the planets from the fixed starres inuenting the Zodiack obseruing the Solstices and Equinoxes the causes of the equalitie shortnes and length of daies and nights the reasons of shadowes the maner of discribing and measuring the world of sayling out of one Countrie into an other guiding the way by the windes and starres whose mouings coniunctions and oppositions they haue diligently obserued their greatnes quicknes or slownes colours shinings serenities heats colds and the power which they haue on theis inferiour things and the good or ill which they signifie And wholie and altogether the agreement and sympathie of heauen and earth from whence as from a perpetuall spring floweth this vniuersall aboundance by which this world is vncessantly restored and renewed Their industrie hath pierced thorough all neither the thicknesse of the earth nor the depth of the Sea nor the varietie of the aier neither the heat and brightnes of the fire nor the spacious largenesse of Heauen could amaze their vnderstanding Moreouer they which were most speculatiue considering the feeblenes of the senses the multitude of sensible things so small that they can not be perceiued or so moueable that they are without certaintie that our life is short all full of opinions and customes and all enuironed with darknes and hidden haue thought that by humane discourse nothing could be certainly knowen nothing vnderstood and comprehended but that separating our selues from sight and hearing and from the whole bodie we ought to take the thought of the mind and by the vnderstanding which is in the Soule as the sight is in the bodie to endeuour to know the reason of euery thing and that which is in it pure and cleane alwaies simple and vniforme without euer being changed by generation and corruption These haue passed the vault of heauen so far distant from the earth and came to the place aboue with-drawing themselues by contemplation from the world towards God from darknes to light from corruption to eternitie from ignorance to wisdom satisfied as they say of all their desire and inioying the knowledge of the trueth which is of things that are alwaies alike not receiuing any mutation wherefore they haue called this inferiour part of the world where there is almost nothing certain and few things certainly knowen the region of falshod and opinion and the other superiour knowen by reason and intelligence where are the formes and exemplaries of things the seat of trueth In this progresse of knowledge they haue knowen some things by natural instinct without learning others by obseruation vse and experience others by reasonable discourse and demonstrations and others by diuine inspiration But there is such pleasure in this contemplation that they which with a good will giue themselues to it do easily forgo all other delights and are so constant and perseuerant that they admit them not at any time neither fearing domage nor losse of goods nor the blame of the people and ignominie but are readie to endure all kind of crosses and calamities euen to the suffering of voluntarie pouertie which gaue occasion to people in times past to say that Atlas sustained heauen on his shoulders and that Endymion had long time slept with the Moone and that Prometheus was tied to the high mountain Caucasus with a Vulture feeding on his liuer Meaning by such tales to signifie vnto vs the great and maruailous studie which these excellent persons bestowed in contemplation of celestiall and naturall things Democritus hauing begun to withdraw his mind from his senses put out his owne eies Anaxagoras forsook his patrimonie What exceeding pleasure had Aristotle teaching not onely Athens and all Greece but also the vniuersal world discouering the secrets of nature before vnknowen and hidden in profound obscuritie magnifying and boasting himselfe with good reason that he had attayned thither whereno other Greeke nor Egiptian had euer come What contentment receiued Plato who did write at 90. yeares of age and euen the verie day that he deceased who was for his excellent knowledge honoured in Greece Sicile and Italie aboue the common estimation of men esteemed by Kings admired of people and hath alwaies bin reuerenced by all such as desired to haue knowledge of diuine and humaine things So men moued by nature with a desire of knowledge and of the pleasure which is found therein haue inuented Grammer Rhetoricke and Logicke for speach Oration and disputation Poesie for composition of verses and rimes Arithmeticke to number Geometrie for measure and weight And passing farther haue come to Musicke consisting in concord of voices and sounds and in obseruation of due proportions Astrologie which serues for consideration of celestiall things Physicke of naturall things and Metaphysicke of supernaturall Theologie of diuine things Ethicke for institution of priuate maners Economicke for houshold Politicke for gouernments and states and Nomotechnicke for knowledge exposition or interpretation of Lawes Such hath bin their dexteritie in the inuenting of liberall and mechanicall sciences But although there are euery where found people capable of knowledge so that they be duely instructed yet notwithstanding there are some more ingenious and inuentiue then the rest and more apt to certaine sciences either by naturall inclination and influence of the heauens or by the situation of the Countrie wherein they are borne or by exercise which they vse
for the most part to other nations And although Philip by his trauailes and labours magnified them greatly notwithstanding his authoritie neuer went out of the countrie of Greece Touching the Empire of Alexander it is most certain that it was glorious and excellent both for the greatnes thereof as also for the celeritie of his conquests But after it was once come to an infinite degree and impossible to imitate it diuided it selfe soone into many parts Euen as a flash of lightning which giueth sodainly a great light and runneth hither and thither and then is extinguished But if the great God saith Plutarch which sent the soule of Alexander here below had not sodainly called it vnto him againe peraduenture there had bin but one only law which had gouerned all men and all this world had bin ruled vnder one selfesame Iustice euen as by one light But as soone as he was deceased his Armie and power wandering and hurting it selfe was like vnto a man who hauing lost his sight feeleth euery where with his hand without knowing whether he goeth so the greatnes of his power he being dead went astray and wandered hither and thither reeling and stumbling at euery thing because there was not any to whom it obeyed Or rather as the bodie when the soule is once out of it the parts do not sustaine one another neither find themselues vnited one to the other but they leaue each other and disioine themselues one from the other and withdraw themselues So the Armie of Alexander after it had lost him did nothing but tremble and shake in a continuall feuer vnder Perdiccas Meleager Seleucus Antigonus Eumenes Lysimachus Ptolemeus Lacomedon Antipater Philotas and Leonatus his successours which were euen as spirits yet warme and poulses beating sometimes here sometimes there by spaces and fits vntill that finally comming to waste and perish in it selfe it crauled all with wormes which were the chiefe Captaines being become kings by vsurpation of his Lordships not like to him in valure and generositie Amongst whom and their offspring arose great ciuill warres a long time continued whereof followed the desolation of their kingdomes so that by little and little they fell into the hands of the Parthians or of the Romains or had particular Lordes A COMPARISON OF ALEXANDER the great vnto Cyrus Agesilaus Themistocles Pericles Agamemnon Achilles Vlisses Diomedes Bacchus Hercules and others IF we consider in Alexander his deuotion towards the Gods affiance in his friends his suffisance with a little his continencie beneficence contempt of death magnanimitie humanitie gratious intertainment easie accesse frank disposition of nature not counterfaited nor fained his constancie in counsailes readines in executions his will to be the chief of men in glorie and resolution to do whatsoeuer his will commaunded we shall find that God who composed him of many vertues gaue him the courage of Cyrus the temperance of Agesilaus the sharp vnderstanding of Themistocles the experience of Philip the hardines of Brasidas and the sufficiencie of Pericles in matters of state and gouernment And in respect of the more auncients that he was more continent then Agamemnon who preferred a captiue prisoner before the loue of his lawfull wife and he would neuer once touch a captiue vntill he had first maried her more magnanimious then Achilles who for a little ransom sold the body of Hector being dead wheras he bestowed a great summe of money in burying that or Darius and the other to appeale his choler as being mercenarie tooke presents of his friends for his hire and this man being victorious enriched his enemies He was more religious then Diomedes who was readie to fight with the Gods them selues and he accounted that all his victories and happie successes came vnto him by fauour of the Gods He was more charitable to his parents then Vlisses whose mother died for sorrow whereas the mother of his enemie for loue and good will which shee bore vnto him died with him for griefe of his death Solon ordained at Athens an abolishment of all debts Alexander paied his souldiers debts to their creditors Pericles hauing taxed the Greekes of the money which came of this taxe beautified the Citie of Athens with faire Temples especially the castle on the contrarie Alexander hauing taken the treasure of the Barbarians sent into Greece the summe of six Millions of gold to build temples for the Gods in steed of those which they had ouerthrowen Brasidas got great reputation of valiancie amongst the Grecians because he trauersed and passed thorough the enemies host from th one end to the other being incamped before the Towne of Methona along the sea shore whereas the meruailous leape which Alexander made in the Citie of the Oxydraques to those which heare it told is incredible and to those which saw it most terrible when he threw himselfe from the height of the walles into the midst of his enemies who receiued him with darts and arrowes pikes and swords Whereunto might one compare this deede but vnto the flash of lightning which breaketh forceably out of the cloude and being caried by the wind striketh on the earth euen as an apparition shining out of flaming armour Insomuch that those which saw him at the instant were so frighted therewith that they retired back but when they saw that it was one man alone assailing a great many then they returned to make head against him That which led Alexander against all Nations was nothing but a desire of glorie and of rule hauing proposed vnto himselfe by iealousie and emulation to surpasse the deedes of Bacchus and of Hercules by making his armes to be seen yet farther then they had made theirs Moreouer it was a great happines vnto him and such as neuer hapned to any other Monarke to haue in his time the most excellent men in all knowledge and the best worke men that euer were towards whom he was verie liberal as also to them it was a great aduantage to haue such a beholder who knew most ingeniously to iudge of that which they had done and to recompence it most liberally For euen as the humanitie the honour and liberalitie of the Prince is that which prouoketh and setteth forward the aduancement of arts and of good inuentions so on the contrarie all that languisheth and is extinguished by the enuie and nigardnes of those that rule Then as Alexander after his Conquests had in treasure a hundred thousand Talents and thirtie thousand of yearely reuenew which iâ— eighteene Millions of Crownes by the yeare he vsed these great treasures magnificently with meruailous and well ordered liberalitie hauing respect to the merits of men and bestowing his benefits in those places where he thought the memorie of them could not be lost He gaue charge vnto Aristotle to reduce into writing the natures of all liuing creatures and for this effect caused to be deliuered to him eight hundred Talents comming to CCCClxxx thousand Crownes of our money commaunding many
of all the bands taking no care of prouiding for the back for the sides and the innermost rankes as if the formost rankes were the whole hope of the victorie and that the rest serued only to make vp a number For by this meanes they hazard the whole on two or three rankes as if they were immortal or sufficient alone to make resistance without the help of the rest which are behind them which is directly contrarie to that order which the Auncients obserued which was to receiue one rank into another and one battaile into an other and to fight obstinately euen to the last For without this maner it is not possible to succour or to defend the first nor yet by withdrawing them within their rankes to come to fight in their place With which meane the ROMAINS knew how to help themselues often and to this end they parted their Legions into three maners of men which were called Hastarii Principes and Triarii The Hastarii made the front and had their rankes furnished with good store of men The Principes made the second battaile and were aranged with thinner rankes then the first The Triarii made the third and last with their rankes so thin that when need was they could receiue within them both the former battailes Moreouer they had their Velites which were lightly armed who did such seruices as the harquebuziers do with vs and were placed in the winges between the batalion and the horsemen These being lightly armed began the battaile And if it hapned that they ouercame their enemies they pursued the victorie but if they were beaten back they retired into the flankes of the Battalion After whose retreat the Hastaries or pikemen came to fight with their enemies and if they found themselues to weake to withstand them and that the enemies ouercame them they retired then by little and little into the thin rankes of the Princes with whom they renewed the battaile And if it so fell out that againe they were beaten then both the one and the other withdrew themselues within the Triaries with whom they altogether began the fight a new And if these three sorts of souldiers were ouerthrowen they had then no farther remedie to relieue themselues Which maner of repairing themselues three times seemeth to be inuincible because that fortune must thrice abandon vs and there with also our enemie must fight with vs and ouercome vs three times The GREEKES with all their Phalanges had not this meanes of renewing themselues and although in them they had many chiefes and many rankes yet notwithstanding of all together there was made but one head and one bodie And the maner which they had to succour one another was not to retire the one rankes into the other as the Romains did but for one souldier to step into the place of another and this they did in the maner as followeth The Phalange was ordred by rankes as is our Battalion yet was it not confusedly for euery band knew his owne place and the Decuries that is to say the chambers or squadrons were aranged in such sort that the souldiers followed one another and were in file and not in front as we place ours Whereof the first was called the Deane or Decurion whom we may call the Chiefe of the Chamber and the last was called the Guide of the back The second was called Substes and the former Prestes and consequently the rest called on the other Substes and Prestes euen to the said guide which made vp the end Of these rankes there were a good many and more in somuch that one Phalange had two hundred fiftie and six men in front and Lxiiij rankes in length True it is that they were diuided vnder fower Colonels which marched all in front with certaine spaces between them But let vs put the case that in each rank there were CCLvj men and that they came to encounter with their enemies if it came to passe that in going or in fighting any one of them were slaine or ouerthrowen he that was in the second rank and right against the place of the man that was falne namely his Substes est soones aduanced himselfe and stepped into the place of the former And by this meanes the men of that rank remayned alwaies complete and full And to fill vp the second rank they of the third namely the Prestes stepped forward and put them selues into the void places and those of the fourth furnished the third and so successiuely and almost at one instant the latter rankes supplied and filled vp the former In such sort that the first rankes were alwaies whole and entier and there was no place that remayned voide sauing in the last rank which consumed it selfe hauing none behind to fill it vp in such sort that the domage which the first rankes receiued was the cause of consuming the last So these Phalanges by meanes of their order might sooner be consumed then broken for to ouerthrow them was to difficult a thing by reason of their great number The Romains vsed Phalanges at the beginning and had their legions also ordered after the Greeke maner but that order afterwards misliked them Wherfore they diuided their men into many bodies as namely into Cohortes and Manipulos accounting that the bodie which had most soules must haue most life being also compounded of most members The Battalions of the Switzers Almaines Frenchmen and others do imitate at this time in some part the maner of the Phalanges â— aswell in that they arange a great number of men together as also in that they place them in such sort that one may step into the place of another But that this maner is not so good as that of the Romains many examples of the Romain legions do tell vs because that whensoeuer the Romains fought against the Greekes their Phalanges were consumed and ouerthrowen by the Romain legions for the difference of the armes which these Nations did vse and also the Romain maner of relieuing themselues three times was of more force then the great number and the soliditie of the Grecian Phalanges In ordering a BATALION then after all these examples it were good to retaine in part the armes and fashions of the Greek Phalanges and in part of the Romain Legions and of our modern men of warre Wherefore in one Legion now adaies there should be three thousand and fiue hundred ordinarie pikemen to make the bodie of the Batalion and fower hundred and twentie for the flankes one hundred and seuentie extraordinarie for the forlorne hope which are the armes of the Phalanges Besides the pikemen were requisite fiue hundred Halebardiers which are weapons found out in our time and moreouer CCCCxx Harquebuziers for the flankes DClxxx for the forlorne hope The bodie of the Batalion is diuided into ten bands as the Romans parted their Legions into ten Cohortes The Harquebuziers are ordained to begin the battaile and for skirmishes as the Romains had their