The Major Works (English Library)

by Sir Thomas Browne

  24. Be not a Hercules furens40 abroad, and a Poltron41 within thy self. To chase our Enemies out of the Field, and be led captive by our Vices; to beat down our Foes, and fall down to our Concupiscences; are Solecisms in Moral Schools, and no Laurel attends them. To well manage our Affections, and wild Horses of Plato,42 are the highest Circenses;43 and the noblest Digladiation44 is in the Theater of our selves: for therein our inward Antagonists, not only like common Gladiators, with ordinary Weapons and down right Blows make at us, but also like Retiary and Laqueary Combatants,45 with Nets, Frauds, and Entanglements fall upon us. Weapons for such combats are not to be forged at Lipara:46 Vulcan’s Art doth nothing in this internal Militia: wherein not the Armour of Achilles, but the Armature of St. Paul,47 gives the Glorious day, and Triumphs not Leading up into Capitols, but up into the highest Heavens. And therefore while so many think it the only valour to command and master others, study thou the Dominion of thy self, and quiet thine own Commotions. Let Right Reason be thy Lycurgus, and lift up thy hand unto the Law of it; move by the Intelligences48 of the superiour Faculties, not by the Rapt49 of Passion, not merely by that of Temper and Constitution. They who are merely carried on by the Wheel of such Inclinations, without the Hand and Guidance of Sovereign Reason, are but the Automatous part of mankind, rather lived than living, or at least underliving themselves.

  25. Let not Fortune, which hath no name in Scripture, have any in thy Divinity. Let Providence, not Chance, have the honour of thy acknowledgments, and be thy Oedipus in Contingences.50 Mark well the Paths and winding Ways thereof; but be not too wise in the Construction, or sudden in the Application. The Hand of Providence writes often by Abbreviatures, Hieroglyphicks or short Characters,51 which, like the Laconism on the Wall,52 are not to be made out but by a Hint or Key from that Spirit which indited them. Leave future occurrences to their uncertainties, think that which is present thy own; And since ’tis easier to foretell an Eclipse, than a foul Day at some distance, Look for little Regular below. Attend with patience the uncertainty of Things, and what lieth yet unexerted53 in the Chaos of Futurity. The uncertainty and ignorance of Things to come makes the World new unto us by unexpected Emergences, whereby we pass not our days in the trite road of affairs affording no Novity;54 for the novellizing Spirit of Man lives by variety, and the new Faces of Things.

  26. Though a contented Mind enlargeth the dimension of little things, and unto some ’tis Wealth enough not to be Poor, and others are well content, if they be but Rich enough to be Honest, and to give every Man his due: yet fall not into that obsolete Affectation of Bravery to throw away thy Money, and to reject all Honours or Honourable stations in this courtly and splendid World. Old Generosity is superannuated, and such contempt of the World out of date. No Man is now like to refuse the favour of great ones, or be content to say unto Princes, stand out of my Sun.55 And if any there be of such antiquated Resolutions, they are not like to be tempted out of them by great ones; and ’tis fair if they escape the name of Hypocon-driacks from the Genius of latter times, unto whom contempt of the World is the most contemptible opinion, and to be able, like Bias, to carry all they have about them were to be the eighth Wise-man. However, the old tetrick56 Philosophers look’d always with Indignation upon such a Face of Things, and observing the unnatural current of Riches, Power, and Honour in the World, and withall the imperfection and demerit of persons often advanced unto them, were tempted unto angry Opinions, that Affairs were ordered more by Stars than Reason, and that things went on rather by Lottery, than Election.

  27. If thy Vessel be but small in the Ocean of this World, if Meanness of Possessions be thy allotment upon Earth, forget not those Virtues which the great disposer of all bids thee to entertain from thy Quality and Condition, that is, Submission, Humility, Content of mind, and Industry. Content may dwell in all Stations. To be low, but above contempt, may be high enough to be Happy. But many of low Degree may be higher than computed, and some Cubits above the common Commensuration;57 for in all States Virtue gives Qualifications, and Allowances, which make out defects. Rough Diamonds are sometimes mistaken for Pebbles, and Meanness may be Rich in Accomplishments, which Riches in vain desire. If our merits be above our Stations, if our intrinsecal Value be greater than what we go for, or our Value than our Valuation, and if we stand higher in God’s, than in the Censor’s Book;58 it may make some equitable balance in the inequalities of this World, and there may be no such vast Chasm or Gulph between disparities as common Measures determine. The Divine Eye looks upon high and low differently from that of Man.59 They who seem to stand upon Olympus, and high mounted unto our eyes, may be but in the Valleys, and low Ground unto his; for he looks upon those as highest who nearest approach his Divinity, and upon those as lowest, who are farthest from it.

  28. When thou lookest upon the Imperfections of others,

  allow one Eye for what is Laudable in them, and the balance they have from some excellency, which may render them considerable. While we look with fear or hatred upon the Teeth of the Viper, we may behold his Eye with love.60 In venemous Natures something may be amiable: Poysons afford Anti-poysons:61 nothing is totally, or altogether uselesly bad. Notable Virtues are sometimes dashed with notorious Vices, and in some vicious tempers have been found illustrious Acts of Virtue; which makes such observable worth in some actions of King Demetrius, Antonius, and Ahab, as are not to be found in the same kind in Aristides, Numa, or David. Constancy, Generosity, Clemency, and Liberality have been highly conspicuous in some Persons not markt out in other concerns for Example or Imitation. But since Goodness is exemplary in all, if others have not our Virtues, let us not be wanting in theirs, nor scorning them for their Vices whereof we are free, be condemned by their Virtues, wherein we are deficient. There is Dross, Alloy, and Embasement in all human Temper; and he flieth without Wings, who thinks to find Ophyr62 or pure Metal in any. For perfection is not like Light center’d in any one Body, but like the dispersed Seminalities63 of Vegetables at the Creation scattered through the whole Mass of the Earth, no place producing all and almost all some. So that ’tis well, if a perfect Man can be made out of many Men, and to the perfect Eye of God even out of Mankind. Time, which perfects some Things, imperfects also others. Could we intimately apprehend the Ideated Man,64 and as he stood in the intellect of God upon

  the first exertion by Creation, we might more narrowly comprehend our present Degeneration, and how widely we are fallen from the pure Exemplar and Idea of our Nature: for after this corruptive Elongation from a primitive and pure Creation, we are almost lost in Degeneration; and Adam hath not only fallen from his Creator, but we our selves from Adam, our Tycho and primary Generator.

  29. Quarrel not rashly with Adversities not yet understood; and overlook not the Mercies often bound up in them. For we consider not sufficiently the good of Evils, nor fairly compute the Mercies of Providence in things afflictive at first hand. The famous Andreas Doria being invited to a Feast by Aloysio Fieschi with design to Kill him, just the night before fell mercifully into a fit of the Gout and so escaped that mischief. When Cato intended to Kill himself, from a blow which he gave his servant, who would not reach his Sword unto him, his Hand so swell’d that he had much ado to Effect his design. Hereby any one but a resolved Stoick might have taken a fair hint of consideration, and that some mercifull Genius65 would have contrived his preservation. To be sagacious in such intercurrences66 is not Superstition, but wary and pious Discretion, and to contemn such hints were to be deaf unto the speaking hand of God, wherein Socrates and Cardan would hardly have been mistaken.67

  30. Break not open the gate of Destruction, and make no haste or bustle unto Ruin. Post not heedlessly on unto the non ultra of Folly, or precipice of Perdition. Let vicious ways have their Tropicks and Deflexions,68 and swim in the Waters of Sin but as in the Asphaltick Lake,69 though smeared and defiled, not to sink to the bottom. [If thou hast dipt thy foot in the Brink, yet venture not over Rubicon. Run not into Extremities from whence there is
no regression.] In the vicious ways of the World it mercifully falleth out that we become not extempore70 wicked, but it taketh some time and pains to undo our selves. We fall not from Virtue, like Vulcan from Heaven,71 in a day. Bad Dispositions require some time to grow into bad Habits, bad Habits must undermine good, and often repeated acts make us habitually evil: so that by gradual depravations, and while we are but staggeringly evil, we are not left without Parentheses of considerations, thoughtful rebukes, and merciful interventions, to recal us unto our selves. For the Wisdom of God hath methodiz’d the course of things unto the best advantage of goodness, and thinking Considerators overlook not the tract72 thereof.

  31. Since Men and Women have their proper Virtues and Vices, and even Twins of different sexes have not only distinct coverings in the Womb, but differing qualities and Virtuous Habits after; transplace not their Proprieties and confound not their Distinctions. Let Masculine and feminine accomplishments shine in their proper Orbs, and adorn their Respective subjects. However unite not the Vices of both Sexes in one; be not Monstrous in Iniquity, nor Hermaphroditically Vitious.

  32. If generous Honesty, Valour, and plain Dealing, be the Cognisance of thy Family or Characteristick of thy Country, hold fast such inclinations suckt in with thy first Breath, and which lay in the Cradle with thee. Fall not into transforming degenerations, which under the old name create a new Nation. Be not an Alien in thine own Nation; bring not Orontes into Tiber;73 learn the Virtues not the Vices of thy foreign Neighbours, and make thy imitation by discretion not contagion. Feel something of thy self in the noble Acts of thy Ancestors, and find in thine own Genius that of thy Predecessors. Rest not under the Expired merits of others, shine by those of thy own. Flame not like the central fire which enlightneth no Eyes, which no Man seeth, and most men think there’s no such thing to be seen. Add one Ray unto the common Lustre; add not only to the Number but the Note of thy Generation; and prove not a Cloud but an Asterisk74 in thy Region.

  33. Since thou hast an Alarum in thy Breast,75 which tells thee thou hast a Living Spirit in thee above two thousand times in an hour; dull not away thy Days in sloathful supinity and the tediousness of doing nothing. To strenuous Minds there is an inquietude in overquietness, and no laboriousness in labour; and to tread a mile after the slow pace of a Snail, or the heavy measures of the Lazy of Brazilia, were a most tiring Pennance, and worse than a Race of some furlongs at the Olympicks. The rapid courses of the heavenly bodies are rather imitable by our Thoughts than our corporeal Motions; yet the solemn76 motions of our lives amount unto a greater measure than is commonly apprehended. Some few men have surrounded the Globe of the Earth; yet many in the set Locomotions and movements of their days have measured the circuit of it, and twenty thousand miles have been exceeded by them. Move circumspectly not meticulously, and rather carefully sollicitous than anxiously sollicitudinous. Think not there is a Lyon in the way,77 nor walk with Leaden Sandals in the paths of Goodness; but in all Virtuous motions let Prudence determine thy measures. Strive not to run like Hercules78 a furlong in a breath: Festination79 may prove Precipitation: Deliberating delay may be wise cunctation,80 and slowness no sloathfulness.

  34. Since Virtuous Actions have their own Trumpets, and without any noise from thy self will have their resound abroad; busy not thy best Member in the Encomium of thy self. Praise is a debt we owe unto the Virtues of others, and due unto our own from all, whom Malice hath not made Mutes, or Envy struck Dumb. Fall not however into the common prevaricating way of self commendation and boasting, by denoting the imperfections of others. He who discommendeth others obliquely commendeth himself. He who whispers their infirmities proclaims his own Exemption from them, and consequently says, I am not as this Publican, or Hic Niger,81 whom I talk of. Open ostentation and loud vain-glory is more tolerable than this obliquity, as but containing some Froath, no Ink, as but consisting of a personal piece of folly, nor complicated with un-charitableness. Superfluously we seek a precarious applause abroad: every good Man hath his plaudite82 within himself; and though his Tongue be silent, is not without loud Cymbals in his Breast. Conscience will become his Panegyrist, and never forget to crown and extol him unto himself.

  35. Bless not thy self only that thou wert born in Athens;83 but among thy multiplyed acknowledgments lift up one hand unto Heaven, that thou wert born of Honest Parents, that Modesty, Humility, Patience, and Veracity lay in the same Egg, and came into the World with thee. From such foundations thou may’st be Happy in a Virtuous precocity, and make an early and long walk in Goodness; so may’st thou more naturally feel the contrariety of Vice unto Nature, and resist some by the Antidote of thy Temper. As Charity covers, so Modesty preven-teth a multitude of sins; withholding from noon day Vices and brazen-brow’d Iniquities, from sinning on the house top, and painting our follies with the rays of the Sun. Where this Virtue reigneth, though Vice may show its Head, it cannot be in its Glory: where shame of sin sets, look not for Virtue to arise; for when Modesty taketh Wing, Astræa84 goes soon after.

  36. The Heroical vein of Mankind runs much in the Souldiery, and couragious part of the World; and in that form we oftenest find Men above Men. History is full of the gallantry of that Tribe; and when we read their notable Acts, we easily find what a difference there is between a Life in Plutarch and in Laërtius.85 Where true Fortitude dwells, Loyalty, Bounty, Friendship, and Fidelity, may be found. A man may confide in persons constituted for noble ends, who dare do and suffer, and who have a Hand to burn for their Country and their Friend.86 Small and creeping things are the product of petty Souls. He is like to be mistaken, who makes choice of a covetous Man for a Friend, or relieth upon the Reed of narrow and poltron Friendship. Pityful things are only to be found in the cottages of such Breasts; but bright Thoughts, clear Deeds, Constancy, Fidelity, Bounty, and generous Honesty are the Gems of noble Minds; wherein, to derogate from none, the true Heroick English Gentleman hath no Peer.

  PART II

  1. Punish not thy self with Pleasure; Glut not thy sense with palative Delights; nor revenge the contempt of Temperance by the penalty of Satiety. Were there an Age of delight or any pleasure durable, who would not honour Volupia? but the Race of Delight is short, and Pleasures have mutable faces. The pleasures of one age are not pleasures in another, and their Lives fall short of our own. Even in our sensual days the strength of delight is in its seldomness or rarity, and sting in its satiety: Mediocrity is its Life, and immoderacy its Confusion. The Luxurious Emperors of old inconsiderately satiated themselves with the Dainties of Sea and Land, till, wearied through all varieties, their refections became a study unto them, and they were fain to feed by Invention. Novices in true Epicurism! which by mediocrity, paucity, quick and healthful Appetite, makes delights smartly acceptable; whereby Epicurus himself found Jupiter’s brain in a piece of Cytheridian Cheese, and the Tongues of Nightingals in a dish of Onyons.1 Hereby healthful and temperate poverty hath the start of nauseating Luxury; unto whose clear and naked appetite every meal is a feast, and in one single dish the first course of Metellus;2 who are cheaply hungry, and never loose their hunger, or advantage of a craving appetite, because obvious food contents it; while Nero3 half famish’d could not feed upon a piece of Bread, and lingring after his snowed water, hardly got down an ordinary cup of Calda.4 By such circumscriptions of pleasure the contemned Philosophers reserved unto themselves the secret of Delight, which the Helluo’s5 of those days lost in their exorbitances. In vain we study Delight: It is at the command of every sober Mind, and in every sense born with us: but Nature, who teacheth us the rule of pleasure, instructeth also in the bounds thereof and where its line expireth. And therefore Temperate Minds, not pressing their pleasures until the sting appeareth, enjoy their contentations6 contentedly, and without regret, and so escape the folly of excess, to be pleased unto displacency.7

  2. Bring candid8 Eyes unto the perusal of mens works, and let not Zoilism or Detraction9 blast well intended labours. He that endureth no faults in mens writin
gs must only read his own, wherein for the most part all appeareth White. Quotation mistakes, inadvertency, expedition, and human Lapses may make not only Moles but Warts in Learned Authors, who notwithstanding being judged by the capital matter admit not of disparagement. I should unwillingly affirm that Cicero was but slightly versed in Homer, because in his Work de Gloria10 he ascribed those verses unto Ajax, which were delivered by Hector. What if Plautus in the account of Hercules mistaketh nativity for conception? Who would have mean thoughts of Apollinaris Sidonius, who seems to mistake the River Tigris for Euphrates, and though a good Historian and learned Bishop of Auvergne had the misfortune to be out in the Story of David, making mention of him when the Ark was sent back by the Philistins upon a Cart; which was before his time. Though I have no great opinion of Machiavel’s Learning, yet I shall not presently say, that he was but a Novice in Roman History, because he was mistaken in placing Commodus after the Emperour Severus. Capital Truths are to be narrowly eyed, collateral Lapses and circumstantial deliveries not to be too strictly sifted. And if the substantial subject be well forged out, we need not examine the sparks, which irregularly fly from it.

  3. Let well weighed Considerations, not stiff and peremptory Assumptions, guide thy discourses, Pen, and Actions. To begin or continue our works like Trismegistus of old, verum certè verum atque verissimum est,11 would sound arrogantly unto present Ears in this strict enquiring Age, wherein, for the most part, Probably, and Perhaps, will hardly serve to mollify the Spirit of captious Contradictors. If Cardan saith that a Parrot is a beautiful Bird, Scaliger will set his Wits o’ work to prove it a deformed Animal. The Compage12 of all Physical Truths is not so closely jointed, but opposition may find intrusion, nor always so closely maintained, as not to suffer attrition. Many Positions seem quodlibetically13 constituted, and like a Delphian Blade14 will cut on both sides. Some Truths seem almost Fals hoods, and some Falshoods almost Truths; wherein Falshood and Truth seem almost æquilibriously stated, and but a few grains of distinction to bear down the ballance. Some have digged deep, yet glanced by the Royal Vein;15 and a Man may come unto the Pericardium,16 but not the Heart of Truth. Besides, many things are known, as some are seen, that is by Parallaxis, or at some distance from their true and proper beings, the superficial regard of things having a different aspect from their true and central Natures. And this moves sober Pens unto suspensory17 and timorous assertions, nor presently to obtrude them as Sibyls leaves,18 which after considerations may find to be but folious19 apparences, and not the central and vital interiours of Truth.