this Warfare of ours let us chearfully and resolvedly March after our General vvhich vvay soever he shall command us VVe are sworn to this saith Seneca to endure such things as Mortality is liable to and not to be disturbed in case some things fall out which it is not in our power to prevent VVe are born in a Kingdom and to obey God is Liberty it self CHAP. XV. The Second Argument for Constancy drawn from Necessity It s force and Efficacy Necessity deriv'd from two Grounds and first from the things themselves THis Lipsius is a firme and vvell temper'd Shield against all external Evils These are those golden Armes vvith vvhich being cover'd Plato vvould have us to fight against Chance and Fortune to be subject to God to think upon him and in all kind of Events to bend this Mind of ours unto that great Mind of the World I mean Providence whose pious and fortunate forces forasmuch as I have already made sufficient proof of I shall now draw forth and lead up another Squadron vvhich marches under the Standard of necessity A valiant stout and Steel temper'd Squadron it is and such as I may not unfitly compare to that Legion vvhich the Romans call'd Fulminatrix The stubborn and unbroken force of it is such as doth conquer and subdue all things and I shall vvonder Lipsius if you should be able to resist it Thales vvhen one ask'd him vvhat vvas the strongest answered rightly necessity for that Conquers all things There is an old saying too about the same thing although not so advised that the Gods themselves cannot force necessity This necessity I annex to Providence because of its near relation to it or to speak truly because it is born of it For this necessity is from God and his decrees nor is it any other thing than as the Greek Philosopher hath defin'd it A FIR ME SANCTION AND IMMUTABLE POWER OF PROVIDENCE Now that it doth intervveave and twist it self vvith publick Evils I shall evince two vvayes from things themselves and from Fate From things themselves because it is the Nature of all created beings to hasten unto their change and fall from a certain inward proneness vvhich they have thereunto As there is a kind of fretting rust vvhich doth naturally cleave to Iron and a consuming scurffe or Worme that followes Wood In like manner both Creatures Cities and Kingdomes have their internal and proper causes vvhereby they perish Look upon things above or below great or small the vvorkes of the Hand or Mind they have perished from the first Ages and shall persist so to do unto the last And as all Rivers journey towards the Ocean vvith a prone and hasty current So all humane things slide along by this Channel as I may call it of miseries unto their utmost periods That Period is Death and destruction and thereunto Pestilence vvarr and Slaughter are as subservient instruments So that if Death is necessary to these things upon the same Ground are Calamities also That this may appear to you the more evidently by Examples I shall not refuse for a vvhile to enlarge my thoughts and travel vvith you through this great universe CHAP. XVI Instances of Necessary Mutation and Death throughout the whole VVorld The Heavens and Elements change and shall pass away The same is discernable in Cities Provinces and Kingdomes All things here are wheel'd about and nothing is stable or firme THere is an eternal Law vvhich from the beginning hath equally passed upon every thing in this vvorld that it shall be Born and Dye Rise and Set. Nor vvould the great Moderatour of things have any thing firm and stable besides himself From Age and Death only the Cods are free The rest of things under Times sickle be Cryes out the Tragical Poet. All those things vvhich you behold and vvonder at do either perish in their courses or are certainly changed Do you see that Sun He is sometimes ecclipsed The Moon She suffers in the like kind and has her vvaines The Starrs They shoot and fall and howsoever the vvit of Man may seek to palliate and excuse the matter Yet there have and vvill be such accidents amongst those celestial Bodies as may pose the skill and stagger the Minds of the ablest Mathematician I omit to speak of Commets of various Form and different Scituation and Motion concerning vvhich that they all have their Birth from and Motion in the Air is a thing vvhich Philosophy it self cannot easily perswade me to believe But behold of late there are certain new kinds of Motion and Starrs found out vvhich have cut out vvork for the Astrologers There arose a Starr in this very year vvhose increment and decreases vvere throughly observ'd and we then saw vvhat will scarcely be believ'd that in Heaven it self there may be something Born and Dye Behold even Varro in St. Augustine cryes out and asserts that the Planet Venus vvhich Plautus calls Vesperugo and Homer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hath chang'd its colour magnitude figure and motion Next to the Heavens look upon the Air it is daily changed and passes into vvinds Clouds or showres Look to the vvaters and those Rivers and springs vvhich vve call everlasting Some are lost and others have altered their course and found out new Channels The Ocean it self that great and abstruse part of Nature is sometimes swell'd vvith stormes and at others smooth'd vvith calmes and though those stormes vvere not yet it hath its own Ebbs and Flowes and to convince us that it may totally perish It doth daily increase or decrease in its parts Look now upon the Earth vvhich alone some vvould have immoveable and to stand by its own strength Behold there it totters and is shaken into a palsy fit by the struggling of those vapours that are pent up in the Bowels of it and elsewhere it is corrupted by Waters or Fires For even these are at contest vvith one another and that you may not resent it over deeply that there are vvarrs amongst Men The very Elements have theirs also How many Countryes hath a sudden Deluge or inundation of the Sea either lessen'd or intirely swallowed up Of old that great Island Atlantis for I think it no Fable afterwards Helice and Bura And that vve may not have recourse only to ancient and remote times amongst us Belgians in the Memory of our Fathers two Islands together vvith their Townes and inhabitants Even at this very day that blew Deity is forcing open to it self new creeks and daily frets and vveares away the unfaithfull shores of the Frisians and Hollanders Nor doth the Earth her self alvvayes give vvay by a Womannish sloth but doth sometimes vindicate its losses and in the midst of the Sea frames Islands for its self to the vvonder and displeasure of that hoary god Now if those great and in our imagination eternal Bodies are destined to their destruction and change vvhat shall vve think of Cities Common-wealths and Kingdomes which must
of the Athenians heretofore they used money only to count it so these their knowledge only to know So utterly regardless are they of their lives and of what they do that even in my judgement the vulgar seem vvith some reason to look upon learning as the Mistress of vice But it is indeed the Directress to vertue if we use it as we ought and conjoyn it with wisdom to which learning should prepare our Minds but not seize upon them and detain them to it self For as there are some forts of Trees that will bear no fruit unless they are planted by other male ones as I may call them so will the Virgin Muses remain barren unless wedded to the Masculine strength of wisdom To what end dost thou correct Tacitus and at the same time suffer so many Errata's in thine own life Why dost thou illustrate Tranquillus and yet permit thy self to be benighted vvith Errour Dost thou carefully expunge the faults out of Plautus vvhen thou sufferest thy Mind to be over-grown and neglected Espouse at the last more worthy designs and look after such a kind of learning as may serve not only for austentation and applause but also for use Betake your self unto Wisdom which may reforme your manners calme and enlighten your troubled and dark Soul For 't is she alone that can fix upon you the impress of vertue and consigne you to Constancy and give you a free admission into the Temple of a good Mind CHAP. V. Wisdom is not acquir'd by wishes but endeavours The discourse of Constancy renew'd The desire of knowledge a happy presage in a Young Man THis admonition so inflam'd me that not able to dissemble it My Father said I with my Mind I follow you already but when shall I with my Actions also When shall that day appear which releasing me from these cares shall place me in the path of true vvisdom that thereby I may attain to true Constancy Langius as one reproving me Do you then said he choose rather to wish than to act It is to no purpose at all and as the vulgar use to do However Ceneus in the Fable was transformed from a Woman to a Man by wishing Yet hope not you after the same manner to pass from a fool to a wise or from a wavering to a constant Man It will concern you to use your utmost endeavour to turn every stone and that vvith an industrious diligence you must seek read and learn Here interrupting him I know it Langius reply'd I but do you also I beseech you lend me your assistance and continue the thread of Yesterdays discourse vvhich our summons to supper did unhappily break off Return I say unto Constancy vvhose intermitted rites it vvill be dangerous to deferre Langius as refusing shall I again said he be shut up in that School I vvill not Lipsius at least not in this place vvhich you should consider I have devoted to my recreations and not to business another time vve will attend it Yes at this time reply'd I for vvhat place is more fit for a discourse of vvisdom than this her dwelling I mean that Arbour vvhich to me seems a Temple and the little Table in it no other than an Altar at vvhich sitting down let us Sacrifice to the Goddess Besides I take an Omen from the very place What Omen sayes Langius 'T is this faid I that as he who sits in a place where Odors and sweet Unguents are carrys along with him in his Garments the perfume and scent of the place So I am not without hope that some Air and Odour of Wisdom may adhere unto my Mind by sitting in this her Store-house I am afraid sayes Langius smiling there is but little of vveight in so light an Omen Howsoever Lipsius let us set forward for not to dissemble with you this so ingenious heat of yours does excite and vvarm me too And as the searchers after springs when in the Morning they observe a certain vapour exhailing from the Earth do forthwith conclude that there they shall meet vvith vvater So have I hopes of a plentiful spring of vertue wheresoever I observe in Youth an early desire of knowledge to betray it self And vvith this he led me into the Arbour and seated himself at the Table But I first turning my self and calling to the Boyes stay there said I and vvaite but be sure you lock the door and observe vvhat I say upon your lives see that no Man nor Dog nor Woman enter no though good Fortune her self should come and vvith that I sat down But Langius laughing out-right did you ever sway Scepter Lipsius said he so Princelike and so severe are your edicts Yesterdays misfortune reply'd I has dictated to me this necessary caution and now in Gods name proceed CHAP. VI. A third Argument for Constancy drawn from utility Calamities are good both in their Original and End Their Original is from God who being eternally and immutably good cannot be the cause of any Evil. LAngius without any considerable pawse thus began In my discourse of Constancy it is fit I be constant I shall therefore observe the same order and method vvhich Yesterday I propounded Then as you know I form'd Four Squadrons as I call them to fight in its behalf against grief and dejectedness The two former of these from Providence and Necessity I have already drawn forth and have sufficiently evinc'd that publick evils are sent down from God as also that they are necessary and impossible to be declin'd I shall now therefore bring up my Third Squadron led by Utility vvhich I may truly call the Legion Adjutrix a Valiant and subtile power vvhich I know not how doth convey and insinuate it self into the Minds of Men and with a pleasing kind of violence so overcomes them as that themselves are not unwilling to be conquer'd It rather gains upon us by degrees than by violent impressions and rather perswades than compells us For we as readily permit our selves to be led by Utility as drawn by Necessity This Lipsius I now oppose against you and your failing troops For these publick evils vvhich we suffer are profitable and contribute much to our inward advantage Did I call them Evils They are rather goods if removing this veil of Opinion we have a due recourse unto their Original and End of vvhich the former is from good and the latter is for good For the Original of these Calamities as Yesterday I sufficiently prov'd is certainly from God That is not only from the chiefest good it self but from the Author cause and Fountain of all other good vvhatsoever from vvhom it is as utterly impossible that any evil should proceed as that himself should be evil That power is only benign and healthful equally despising to receive and to do vvrong and vvhose sole and chief prerogative it is to benefit And therefore those ancient and blinder sort of Men conceiving something of the supream Being in their
Calamities do check and retard them For otherwise they vvould endanger and bring damage to this beautiful frame of the World But those things especially vvould exceed these bounds very often that are under the command of Encrease and Multiply Look upon Men who can deny that by nature vve are born faster than we naturally dye So that in a few years from two persons a family of a hundred may be propagated of vvhich in that space not above ten or twenty may dye Look upon a flock of Sheep how numerous would the encrease be if the Shepheard should not yearly choose out and set apart some to the Slaughter The Birds and Fishes vvould in a short time fill the Air and Waters if there vvere not certain dissentions and as it vvere vvarrs amongst themselves and the endeavours of Men to diminish them Every age is building of Cities and Towns and if fire or other wayes of destruction should not interpose neither this vvorld of ours nor the other vvorld vvould be able to contain them The same may vve imagine of the vvhole Creation What wonder therefore is it if our Saturn doth sometimes thrust his Sickle into this over-grown Field and reap thence some superfluous thousands either by the pestilence or vvarr Which if he should not do vvhat Country vvould be able to hold us or vvhat Land could afford us sustenance It is therefore requisite that something should perish from the parts that so the vvhole may be eternal For as to Rulers in States the safety of the People is the supream Law So is it to God in respect of the World For the beauty or Ornament of the World I conceive calamities make two vvayes First because I apprehend no beauty any where in this great frame without variety and a distinct succession and change of things I acknowledge the Sun is exceedingly beautiful but he becomes more acceptable to us at his return through the interposition of the dew-engendring Night and those black Curtains vvhich she shuts him out vvith The Summer is a most pleasant season but yet the vvinter sets it off vvith it's icy marbles and hoary Frosts Which if you take away you really destroy the true rellish and that particular gust of Joy which it's light and Warmth afford us In this Country of ours one and the same face of things delights me not but I am pleasingly affected to behold the Valleys and Hills and Rocks fruitful and vvast places Meadows and Woods for satiety and loathing are alwayes the Companions of Equality And vvhy then in this Scene of life as I may so call it should the same dress and countenance of things delight us In my Mind it should not Let there be sometimes some smooth and Halcyon Calmes and let those after a while be discompos'd and ruffled vvith the vvhirlevvinds of Warr and the boysterous stormes of succeeding Tyrannies For who would wish that this Universe should be like the dead Sea without Wind or Motion But there is also another Ornament vvhich I guess at vvhich is more serious and inwardly fruitful Histories informe me that better and smoother times do still succeed storms Do Warrs molest any people Yet for the most part they refine and sharpen them by introducing the Arts and a various culture of ingenuity The Romans of old impos'd a heavy yoke upon the world but vvithall it prov'd a happy one in the event for as the Sun chases away darkness from our Eyes So did that ignorance and barbarisme from their Minds What had the Gaules or we Germans now been if the light of that great Empire had not risen to us A sort of wild and inhumane savages glutting our selves with our own and others blood and despisers both of God and Man And if I rightly divine the same will befal this new World vvhich the Spaniards with an advantageous kind of cruelty have exhausted but vvill again restore and otherwise replenish And as those vvho have great plantations remove some trees elsewhere and cut down others Skilfully disposing all things to make them more fruitful and to prosper the better So doth God in this vast Field of the World For he is the most excellent improver in some places he prunes and cuts off the luxuriant branches of some Families and in others as I may so say he plucks off some leaves of persons This helps the stock though the branches fall and the leaves that drop off become the mockery of the vvinds He sees this Nation scorched and vvithered away as having out-liv'd their Vertues and he casts them out That other he observes to be vvild and unfruitful he therefore transfers them and others he mingles together and engrafts them as it vvere into one another You Italians in the declining of the Empire being now decayed and enfeebled Why cumber you any longer that choice part of Earth Depart and let those hardy and unbroken Lombards more happily improve that soil You vicious and effeminate Graecians perish and let the harsh and sowre Scythians be mellowed there So also by a kind of confusion of Nations you French possess Gaul you Saxons Brittain you Normans Belgia and the places adjoyning All which and more Lipsius will readily occurre to him that is versed in Histories and the Events of things Let us take courage then and know that whatever private Calamity comes upon us is some way or other advantageous to some part of the Universe The setting of this Nation or Kingdom shall be the rise of another The ruines of this City the foundation of a new one nor can any thing here be properly said to dye but to change only Shall we Belgians think to be the only choice ones with God that shall be perpetually wedded to felicity and the only white boyes of Fortune Fooles that we are That great Father hath many more Children whom because he will not all at once permit to cherish and receive by turnes into his bosome We have already had our Sun-shines let the Night succeed awhile and let those beauteous rayes withdraw to the Western Nations Seneca as he uses speaks aptly and wisely to this purpose Let a wise Man repine at nothing that befalls him but let him know that those very things under which he seems to suffer do make to the conservation of the Visiverse and are of that number which fullfil that Law and Order which the World is confin'd to CHAP. XII An old and common objection against the Divine Iustice why punishments are unequal It s inquisition remov'd from Man and therefore unlawful LAngius paws'd here and thus I broke forth What a spring of water is to the thirsty Traveller in the heats of Summer such is this your discourse to me It refreshes it enlivens and vvith its cooling juice it mitigates and allayes my heat and Feaver But it doth but allay it does not quench it for that thorne which also molested the ancients about the inequality of punishments remains still fixed in my
do you not reply I see that old Sarcasme is true all the good Princes may be registred in a Ring For it is natural to Man to use authority insolently and hardly to keep a mean in that which it self is above it Even we our selves who complain of Tyranny do yet carry the feeds of it inclosed in our bosoms Nor is there a Will wanting in most of us to discover them but the power A Serpent vvhen he is benummed with cold hath poyson within him though he do not exert it 'T is the same in us whom only weakness keeps innocent and a kind of Winter in our Fortunes Give but power give means and I fear that the most of those that accuse would transcend the example of their superiours This is every dayes instance see that Father stern with his Children that Master with his Servants and that School-Master with his Scholars Each of them is a Phalaris in his kind and raise the same waves in their Brooks as Kings do in their greater Seas The same Nature is discernible in other creatures most of which prey upon their own kind both in the Air the Earth and the Water So greater Fish devaour the smaller fry And weaker Fowle under the Goshauks die sayes Varro truly but you will say these are the oppressions of Bodies only But this is the peculiar of our age that ours are of the Soul also Take heed you speak not this with more malice than truth That Man seems to me to be little skilled in the knowledge of himself and the heavenly nature of the Soul that thinks it can be forced or compelled For no outward violence whatsoever can make you will that which you do not will or to yield to that which you do not assent to Some have power over the bond and tye of the Soul but none over it self A tyrant may loose it from the Body but he cannot dissolve the nature of it which being pure eternal fiery dispises every external or violent attempt But we may not speak our own thoughts Be it so The bridle then curbs your Tongue only not your Mind your Actions but not your Judgment But even this is new and unheard of Good Man how are you mistaken How many can I point you out who have suffered under Tyrants for their opinions through the heedlesness of their tongues How many of those Tyrants have endeavoured to compel mens Judgements and their Judgements too in matters of Religion It vvas the common custom of the Persians and the Eastern Nations to adore their Kings and we know that Alexander challenged to himself that divine adoration with the ill will of his ruder Macedonians Amongst the Romans that good and moderate Emperour Augustus had in the Provinces yes in every house Flamens and Priests as a God Caligula cutting off the Heads from the Statues of the Gods with a ridiculous impiety caused his own to be placed upon them The same instituted a Temple Priests and chosen Sacrifices to his own deity Nero would be taken for Apollo and the most illustrious of the City were slain under this accusation that they had never sacrificed to the heavenly voice Domitian was openly called our Lord and God Which vanity or impiety if it were found at this day in any of our Kings what would you then say Lipsius I vvill sail no nearer this Scylla into which no vvinds of ambition shall either betray or force me For a secure old age is the reward of silence I will bring in only one testimony of the ancient slavery in this respect and that shall be out of an Author you are well acquainted vvith and I vvould have you to attend him 'T is Tacitus in the reign of Domitian We read sayes he that when Petus Thrasea was praised by Arulenus Rusticus and Priscus Helvidius by Herennius Senecio it was capital to them both Nor did the cruelty extend it self only to the Authors but also to their Works Charge being given to the Triumvirs that the monuments of those excellent wits should be burnt in the Forum and Comitium supposing by that one fire to have suppressed the voice of the people of Rome the liberty of the Senate and the conscience of Mankind The professours also of Wisdom were banished and all ingenious arts proscribed lest there should any where appear the least footsteps of honesty We gave certainly a grand example of our patience and as the foregoing ages saw the utmost height of liberty so did we of slavery the commerce of hearing and speaking being barred and in danger by informers VVe had certainly lost our memories together vvith our speech if it had been as much in our power to forget as it was to be silent CHAP. XXVI Lastly that these evils are neither strange nor new But common to all Nations and Men whence we may derive comfort I Have done vvith comparison and now I bring up the other Brigade of my Legion vvhich opposes the novelty of these Calamities But briefly and by vvay of Triumph For it rather takes the spoiles of the already conquered enemy than fights vvith him And to speak truth vvhat is there in these things that can appear new to any man that is not himself a gross Ignaro in humane affairs Crantor said excellently and vvisely who alwayes had this verse in his Mouth Ah me and why ah me VVe suffered but a humane misery For these Calamities do daily move in a Circle and in a kind of round pass through this round World Why do you sigh that these sad things fall out Why do you vvonder at it O Agamemnon thou wert not To pleasing things alone begot But to equal hopes and fears Interchange of joys and tears For thou art mortal humane born and though Thou should'st refuse the Gods will have it so It vvere rather a vvonder that any should be exempted from this common Law and should not have his part in that burthen vvhich lyes upon the backs of all Solon vvhen a friend of his at Athens was sadly be wailing himself he brings him into the Tower and from the top of it shews him all the houses of that great City Think vvith your self sayes he how many sorrows have heretofore been under these roofs now are and hereafter shall be And then cease to lament the evils of Mankind as if they vvere your own only I vvish I could give you the like prospect of this vvide World Lipsius but since it is not to be done actually let us imagine it I place you upon the top of some high Mountain Olympus if you please look down now upon all those Cities provinces and Kingdoms beneath And think that you see but so many inclosures of humane Calamities the Amphitheatres and as it vvere the Sands in vvhich the bloody sports of Fortune are exhibited You need not look farr from hence do you see Italy It is not yet thirty years since it rested from sharp and cruel vvarrs on every side See you