OF AVARICE.

Thereare two sorts of avarice; the one is but of a bastard kind; and that is, the rapacious appetite of gain, not for its own sake, but for the pleasure of refunding it immediately through all the channels of pride and luxury. The other is the true kind, and properly so called; which is a restless and unsatiable desire of riches, not for any further end of use, but only to hoard, and preserve, and perpetually increase them. The covetous man of the first kind is like a greedy ostrich, which devours any metal, but it is with an intent to feed upon it, and in effect it makes a shift to digest and excern it. The second is like the foolish chough, which loves to steal money only to hide it. The first does much harm to mankind, and a little good too, to some few. The second does good to none; no, not to himself. The first can make no excuse to God, or angels, or rational men for his actions. The second can give no reason or colour, not to the devil himself, for what he does: he is a slave to Mammon without wages. The first makes a shift to be beloved; aye, and envied, too, by some people. The second is the universal object of hatred and contempt. There is no vice has been so pelted with good sentences, and especially by the poets, who have pursued it with stories and fables, and allegories and allusions; and moved, as we say, every stone to fling at it, among all which, I do not remember a more fine and gentlemen-like correction than that which was given it by one line of Ovid’s.

Desunt luxuriæ malta,avaritiæ omnia.

Much is wanting to luxury; all to avarice

To which saying I have a mind to add one member and render it thus:—

Poverty wants some, luxury many, avarice all things.

Somebody says of a virtuous and wise man, that having nothing, he has all. This is just his antipode, who, having all things, yet has nothing. He is a guardian eunuch to his beloved gold:Audivi eos amatores esse maximos sed nil potesse. They are the fondest lovers, but impotent to enjoy.

And, oh, what man’s condition can be worseThan his, whom plenty starves, and blessings curse?The beggars but a common fate deplore,The rich poor man’s emphatically poor.

I wonder how it comes to pass that there has never been any law made against him. Against him, do I say? I mean for him, as there is a public provision made for all other madmen. It is very reasonable that the king should appoint some persons (and I think the courtiers would not be against this proposition) to manage his estate during his life (for his heirs commonly need not that care), and out of it to make it their business to see that he should not want alimony befitting his condition, which he could never get out of his own cruel fingers. We relieve idle vagrants and counterfeit beggars, but have no care at all of these really poor men, who are, methinks, to be respectfully treated in regard of their quality. I might be endless against them, but I am almost choked with the superabundance of the matter. Too much plenty impoverishes me as it does them. I will conclude this odious subject with part of Horace’s first Satire, which take in his own familiar style:—

I admire, Mæcenas, how it comes to pass,That no man ever yet contented was,Nor is, nor perhaps will be, with that stateIn which his own choice plants him, or his fate.Happy the merchant! the old soldier cries.The merchant, beaten with tempestuous skiesHappy the soldier! one half-hour to theeGives speedy death or glorious victory.The lawyer, knocked up early from his restBy restless clients, calls the peasant blest.The peasant, when his labours ill succeed,Envies the mouth which only talk does feed.’Tis not, I think you’ll say, that I want storeOf instances, if here I add no more,They are enough to reach at least a mileBeyond long Orator Fabius his style.But hold, you whom no fortune e’er endears,Gentlemen, malcontents, and mutineers,Who bounteous Jove so often cruel call,Behold, Jove’s now resolved to please you all.Thou, soldier, be a merchant; merchant, thouA soldier be; and lawyer to the plough.Change all your stations straight. Why do they stay?The devil a man will change now when he may.Were I in General Jove’s abusèd case,By Jove, I’d cudgel this rebellious race;But he’s too good; be all, then, as you were;However, make the best of what you are,And in that state be cheerful and rejoice,Which either was your fate or was your choice.No; they must labour yet, and sweat and toil,And very miserable be awhile.But ’tis with a design only to gainWhat may their age with plenteous ease maintain;The prudent pismire does this lesson teach,And industry to lazy mankind preach.The little drudge does trot about and sweat,Nor does he straight devour all he can get,But in his temperate mouth carries it home,A stock for winter which he knows must come.And when the rolling world to creatures hereTurns up the deformed wrong side of the year,And shuts him in with storms and cold and wet,He cheerfully does his past labours eat.Oh, does he so? your wise example, the antDoes not at all times rest, and plenty want.But, weighing justly a mortal ant’s condition,Divides his life ’twixt labour and fruition.Thee neither heat, nor storms, nor wet, nor coldFrom thy unnatural diligence can withhold,To the Indies thou wouldst run rather than seeAnother, though a friend, richer than thee.Fond man! what good or beauty can be foundIn heaps of treasure buried under ground?Which, rather than diminished e’er to see,Thou wouldst thyself, too, buried with them beAnd what’s the difference is’t not quite as badNever to use, as never to have had?In thy vast barns millions of quarters store,Thy belly, for all that, will hold no moreThan mine does. Every baker makes much bread,What then? He’s with no more than others fed.Do you within the bounds of Nature live,And to augment your own you need not strive;One hundred acres will no less for youYour life’s whole business than ten thousand do.But pleasant ’tis to take from a great store;What, man? though you’re resolved to take no moreThan I do from a small one; if your willBe but a pitcher or a pot to fill,To some great river for it must you go,When a clear spring just at your feet does flow?Give me the spring which does to human use,Safe, easy, and untroubled stores produce;He who scorns these, and needs will drink at Nile,Must run the danger of the crocodile;And of the rapid stream itself which may,At unawares bear him perhaps away.In a full flood Tantalus stands, his skinWashed o’er in vain, for ever dry within;He catches at the stream with greedy lips,From his touched mouth the wanton torment slips.You laugh now, and expand your careful brow:’Tis finely said, but what’s all this to you?Change but the name, this fable is thy story,Thou in a flood of useless wealth dost glory,Which thou canst only touch, but never taste;The abundance still, and still the want does last.The treasures of the gods thou wouldst not spare,But when they’re made thine own, they sacred are,And must be kept with reverence; as if thouNo other use of precious gold didst knowBut that of curious pictures to delightWith the fair stamp thy virtuoso sight.The only true and genuine use is this,To buy the things which nature cannot missWithout discomfort, oil, and vital bread.And wine by which the life of life is fed,And all those few things else by which we liveAll that remains is given for thee to give.If cares and troubles, envy, grief, and fear,The bitter fruits be which fair riches bear,If a new poverty grow out of store,The old plain way, ye gods! let me be poor.

“Inclusam Danaen turris ahenea.”

Atowerof brass, one would have said,And locks, and bolts, and iron bars,And guards as strict as in the heat of warsMight have preserved one innocent maidenhood.The jealous father thought he well might spareAll further jealous care;And as he walked, to himself alone he smiledTo think how Venus’ arts he had beguiled;And when he slept his rest was deep,But Venus laughed to see and hear him sleep.She taught the amorous JoveA magical receipt in love,Which armed him stronger and which helped him moreThan all his thunder did and his almightyship before.

II.

She taught him love’s elixir, by which artHis godhead into gold he did convert;No guards did then his passage stay,He passed with ease, gold was the word;Subtle as lightning, bright, and quick, and fierce,Gold through doors and walls did pierce;And as that works sometimes upon the sword,Melted the maiden dread away,Even in the secret scabbard where it lay.The prudent Macedonian king,To blow up towns, a golden mine did spring;He broke through gates with this petar,’Tis the great art of peace, the engine ’tis of war,And fleets and armies follow it afar;The ensign ’tis at land, and ’tis the seaman’s scar.

III.

Let all the world slave to this tyrant be,Creature to this disguisèd deity,Yet it shall never conquer me.A guard of virtues will not let it pass,And wisdom is a tower of stronger brass.The muses’ laurel, round my temples spread,Does from this lightning’s force secure my head,Nor will I lift it up so high,As in the violent meteor’s way to lie.Wealth for its power do we honour and adore?The things we hate, ill fate, and death, have more.

IV.

From towns and courts, camps of the rich and great,The vast Xerxean army, I retreat,And to the small Laconic forces flyWhich hold the straits of poverty.Cellars and granaries in vain we fillWith all the bounteous summer’s store:If the mind thirst and hunger still,The poor rich man’s emphatically poor.Slaves to the things we too much prize,We masters grow of all that we despise.

A field of corn, a fountain, and a wood,Is all the wealth by nature understood.The monarch on whom fertile Nile bestowsAll which that grateful earth can bear,Deceives himself, if he supposeThat more than this falls to his share.Whatever an estate does beyond this afford,Is not a rent paid to the Lord;But is a tax illegal and unjust,Exacted from it by the tyrant lust.Much will always wanting be,To him who much desires. Thrice happy heTo whom the wise indulgency of Heaven,With sparing hand but just enough has given.

Iftwenty thousand naked Americans were not able to resist the assaults of but twenty well-armed Spaniards, I see little possibility for one honest man to defend himself against twenty thousand knaves, who are all furnishedcap-à-piewith the defensive arms of worldly prudence, and the offensive, too, of craft and malice. He will find no less odds than this against him if he have much to do in human affairs. The only advice, therefore, which I can give him is, to be sure not to venture his person any longer in the open campaign, to retreat and entrench himself, to stop up all avenues, and draw up all bridges against so numerous an enemy. The truth of it is, that a man in much business must either make himself a knave, or else the world will make him a fool: and if the injury went no farther than the being laughed at, a wise man would content himself with the revenge of retaliation: but the case is much worse, for these civil cannibals too, as well as the wild ones, not only dance about such a taken stranger, but at last devour him. A sober man cannot get too soon out of drunken company; though they be never so kind and merry among themselves, it is not unpleasant only, but dangerous to him. Do ye wonder that a virtuous man should love to be alone? It is hard for him to be otherwise; he is so, when he is among ten thousand; neither is the solitude so uncomfortable to be alone without any other creature, as it is to be alone in the midst of wild beasts. Man is to man all kind of beasts—a fawning dog, a roaring lion, a thieving fox, a robbing wolf, a dissembling crocodile, a treacherous decoy, and a rapacious vulture. The civilest, methinks, of all nations, are those whom we account the most barbarous; there is some moderation and good nature in the Toupinambaltians who eat no men but their enemies, whilst we learned and polite and Christian Europeans, like so many pikes and sharks, prey upon everything that we can swallow. It is the great boast of eloquence and philosophy, that they first congregated men dispersed, united them into societies, and built up the houses and the walls of cities. I wish they could unravel all they had woven; that we might have our woods and our innocence again instead of our castles and our policies. They have assembled many thousands of scattered people into one body: it is true, they have done so, they have brought them together into cities to cozen, and into armies to murder one another; they found them hunters and fishers of wild creatures, they have made them hunters and fishers of their brethren; they boast to have reduced them to a state of peace, when the truth is they have only taught them an art of war; they have framed, I must confess, wholesome laws for the restraint of vice, but they raised first that devil which now they conjure and cannot bind; though there were before no punishments for wickedness, yet there was less committed because there were no rewards for it. But the men who praise philosophy from this topic are much deceived; let oratory answer for itself, the tinkling, perhaps, of that may unite a swarm: it never was the work of philosophy to assemble multitudes, but to regulate only, and govern them when they were assembled, to make the best of an evil, and bring them, as much as is possible, to unity again. Avarice and ambition only were the first builders of towns, and founders of empire; they said, “Go to, let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven, and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the earth.” What was the beginning of Rome, the metropolis of all the world? what was it but a concourse of thieves, and a sanctuary of criminals? it was justly named by the augury of no less than twelve vultures, and the founder cemented his walls with the blood of his brother.

Not unlike to this was the beginning even of the first town, too, in the world, and such is the original sin of most cities: their actual increase daily with their age and growth; the more people, the more wicked all of them. Every one brings in his part to inflame the contagion, which becomes at last so universal and so strong, that no precepts can be sufficient preservatives, nor anything secure our safety, but flight from among the infected. We ought, in the choice of a situation, to regard above all things the healthfulness of the place, and the healthfulness of it for the mind rather than for the body. But suppose (which is hardly to be supposed) we had antidote enough against this poison; nay, suppose, further, we were always and at all places armed and provided both against the assaults of hostility and the mines of treachery, it will yet be but an uncomfortable life to be ever in alarms; though we were compassed round with fire to defend ourselves from wild beasts, the lodging would be unpleasant, because we must always be obliged to watch that fire, and to fear no less the defects of our guard than the diligences of our enemy. The sum of this is, that a virtuous man is in danger to be trod upon and destroyed in the crowd of his contraries; nay, which is worse, to be changed and corrupted by them, and that it is impossible to escape both these inconveniences without so much caution as will take away the whole quiet, that is, the happiness of his life. Ye see, then, what he may lose; but, I pray, what can he get there?Quid Romæ faciam?Mentiri nescio. What should a man of truth and honesty do at Rome? he can neither understand, nor speak the language of the place; a naked man may swim in the sea, but it is not the way to catch fish there; they are likelier to devour him than he them, if he bring no nets and use no deceits. I think, therefore, it was wise and friendly advice which Martial gave to Fabian when he met him newly arrived at Rome.

Honest and poor, faithful in word and thought;What has thee, Fabian, to the city brought?Thou neither the buffoon nor bawd canst play,Nor with false whispers the innocent betray:Nor corrupt wives, nor from rich beldams getA living by thy industry and sweat:Nor with vain promises and projects cheat,Nor bribe or flatter any of the great.But you’re a man of learning, prudent, just:A man of courage, firm, and fit for trust.Why, you may stay, and live unenvied here;But, ’faith! go back, and keep you where you were.

Nay, if nothing of all this were in the case, yet the very sight of uncleanness is loathsome to the cleanly; the sight of folly and impiety vexatious to the wise and pious.

Lucretius, by his favour, though a good poet, was but an ill-natured man, when he said, “It was delightful to see other men in a great storm.” And no less ill-natured should I think Democritus, who laughed at all the world, but that he retired himself so much out of it that we may perceive he took no great pleasure in that kind of mirth. I have been drawn twice or thrice by company to go to Bedlam, and have seen others very much delighted with the fantastical extravagancy of so many various madnesses, which upon me wrought so contrary an effect, that I always returned not only melancholy, but even sick with the sight. My compassion there was perhaps too tender, for I meet a thousand madmen abroad, without any perturbation, though, to weigh the matter justly, the total loss of reason is less deplorable than the total depravation of it. An exact judge of human blessings, of riches, honours, beauty, even of wit itself, should pity the abuse of them more than the want.

Briefly, though a wise man could pass never so securely through the great roads of human life, yet he will meet perpetually with so many objects and occasions of compassion, grief, shame, anger, hatred, indignation, and all passions but envy (for he will find nothing to deserve that) that he had better strike into some private path; nay, go so far, if he could, out of the common way,ut nec facta audiat Pelopidarum; that he might not so much as hear of the actions of the sons of Adam. But, whither shall we fly, then? into the deserts, like the ancient hermits?

Qua terra patet fera regnat Erynnis.In facinus jurasse putes.

One would think that all mankind had bound themselves by an oath to do all the wickedness they can; that they had all, as the Scripture speaks, sold themselves to sin: the difference only is, that some are a little more crafty (and but a little, God knows) in making of the bargain. I thought, when I went first to dwell in the country, that without doubt I should have met there with the simplicity of the old poetical golden age: I thought to have found no inhabitants there, but such as the shepherds of Sir Philip Sidney in Arcadia, or of Monsieur d’Urfé upon the banks of Lignon; and began to consider with myself, which way I might recommend no less to posterity the happiness and innocence of the men of Chertsey: but to confess the truth, I perceived quickly, by infallible demonstrations, that I was still in old England, and not in Arcadia, or La Forrest; that if I could not content myself with anything less than exact fidelity in human conversation, I had almost as good go back and seek for it in the Court, or the Exchange, or Westminster Hall. I ask again, then, whither shall we fly, or what shall we do? The world may so come in a man’s way that he cannot choose but salute it; he must take heed, though, not to go a whoring after it. If by any lawful vocation or just necessity men happen to be married to it, I can only give them St. Paul’s advice: “Brethren, the time is short; it remains that they that have wives be as though they had none. But I would that all men were even as I myself.”

In all cases they must be sure that they domundum ducere, and notmundo nubere. They must retain the superiority and headship over it: happy are they who can get out of the sight of this deceitful beauty, that they may not be led so much as into temptation; who have not only quitted the metropolis, but can abstain from ever seeing the next market town of their country.

Happythe man who his whole time doth boundWithin the enclosure of his little ground.Happy the man whom the same humble place(The hereditary cottage of his race)From his first rising infancy has known,And by degrees sees gently bending down,With natural propension to that earthWhich both preserved his life, and gave him birth.Him no false distant lights by fortune set,Could ever into foolish wanderings get.He never dangers either saw, or feared,The dreadful storms at sea he never heard.He never heard the shrill alarms of war,Or the worse noises of the lawyers’ bar.No change of consuls marks to him the year,The change of seasons is his calendar.The cold and heat winter and summer shows,Autumn by fruits, and spring by flowers he knows.He measures time by landmarks, and has foundFor the whole day the dial of his ground.A neighbouring wood born with himself he sees,And loves his old contemporary trees.Has only heard of near Verona’s name,And knows it, like the Indies, but by fame.Does with a like concernment notice takeOf the Red Sea, and of Benacus lake.Thus health and strength he to a third age enjoys,And sees a long posterity of boys.About the spacious world let other roam,The voyage Life is longest made at home.

Ifyou should see a man who were to cross from Dover to Calais, run about very busy and solicitous, and trouble himself many weeks before in making provisions for the voyage, would you commend him for a cautious and discreet person, or laugh at him for a timorous and impertinent coxcomb? A man who is excessive in his pains and diligence, and who consumes the greatest part of his time in furnishing the remainder with all conveniences and even superfluities, is to angels and wise men no less ridiculous; he does as little consider the shortness of his passage that he might proportion his cares accordingly. It is, alas, so narrow a strait betwixt the womb and the grave, that it might be called thePas de Vie, as well as thePas de Calais. We are all ἐφήμειροι asPindarcalls us, creatures of a day, and therefore our Saviour bounds our desires to that little space; as if it were very probable that every day should be our last, we are taught to demand even bread for no longer a time. The sun ought not to set upon our covetousness; no more than upon our anger; but as to God Almighty a thousand years are as one day, so, in direct opposition, one day to the covetous man is as a thousand years,tam brevi fortis jaculatur ævo multa, so far he shoots beyond his butt. One would think he were of the opinion of theMillenaries, and hoped for so long a reign upon earth. The patriarchs before the flood, who enjoyed almost such a life, made, we are sure, less stores for the maintaining of it; they who lived nine hundred years scarcely provided for a few days; we who live but a few days, provide at least for nine hundred years. What a strange alteration is this of human life and manners! and yet we see an imitation of it in every man’s particular experience, for we begin not the cares of life till it be half spent, and still increase them as that decreases. What is there among the actions of beasts so illogical and repugnant to reason? When they do anything which seems to proceed from that which we call reason, we disdain to allow them that perfection, and attribute it only to a natural instinct. If we could but learn to number our days (as we are taught to pray that we might) we should adjust much better our other accounts, but whilst we never consider an end of them, it is no wonder if our cares for them be without end too. Horace advises very wisely, and in excellent good words,spatio brevi spem longam reseces; from a short life cut off all hopes that grow too long. They must be pruned away like suckers that choke the mother-plant, and hinder it from bearing fruit. And in another place to the same sense,Vitæ summa brevis spem nos vetat inchoare longam, which Seneca does not mend when he says,Oh quanta dementia est spes longas inchoantium! but he gives an example there of an acquaintance of his named Senecio, who from a very mean beginning by great industry in turning about of money through all ways of gain, had attained to extraordinary riches, but died on a sudden after having supped merrily,In ipso actu bené cedentium rerum,in ipso procurrentis fortunæ impetu; in the full course of his good fortune, when she had a high tide and a stiff gale and all her sails on; upon which occasion he cries, out of Virgil:

Insere nunc Melibæe pyros,pone ordine vites:

Go to, Melibæus, now,Go graff thy orchards and thy vineyards plant;Behold the fruit!

For this Senecio I have no compassion, because he was taken, as we say, inipso facto, still labouring in the work of avarice; but the poor rich man in St. Luke (whose case was not like this) I could pity, methinks, if the Scripture would permit me, for he seems to have been satisfied at last; he confesses he had enough for many years; he bids his soul take its ease; and yet for all that, God says to him, “Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee, and the things thou hast laid up, whom shall they belong to?” Where shall we find the causes of this bitter reproach and terrible judgment; we may find, I think, two, and God perhaps saw more. First, that he did not intend true rest to the soul, but only to change the employments of it from avarice to luxury; his design is to eat and to drink, and to be merry. Secondly, that he went on too long before he thought of resting; the fulness of his old barns had not sufficed him, he would stay till he was forced to build new ones, and God meted out to him in the same measure; since he would have more riches than his life could contain, God destroyed his life and gave the fruits of it to another.

Thus God takes away sometimes the man from his riches, and no less frequently riches from the man: what hope can there be of such a marriage where both parties are so fickle and uncertain; by what bonds can such a couple be kept long together?

Why dost thou heap up wealth, which thou must quit,Or, what is worse, be left by it?Why dost thou load thyself, when thou’rt to fly,O man ordained to die?

II.

Why dost thou build up stately rooms on high,Thou who art underground to lie?Thou sow’st and plantest, but no fruit must see;For death, alas? is sowing thee.

III.

Suppose, thou fortune couldst to tameness bring,And clip or pinion her wine;Suppose thou couldst on fate so far prevailAs not to cut off thy entail.

IV.

Yet death at all that subtlety will laugh,Death will that foolish gardener mockWho does a slight and annual plant engraff,Upon a lasting stock.

Thou dost thyself wise and industrious deem;A mighty husband thou wouldst seem;Fond man! like a bought slave, thou, all the whileDost but for others sweat and toil.

VI.

Officious fool! that needs must meddling beIn business that concerns not thee!For when to future years thou extend’st thy cares,Thou deal’st in other men’s affairs.

VII.

Even aged men, as if they truly wereChildren again, for age prepare,Pro visions for long travail they designIn the last point of their short line.

VIII.

Wisely the ant against poor winter hoardsThe stock which summer’s wealth affords,In grasshoppers, that must at autumn die,How vain were such an industry.

IX.

Of power and honour the deceitful lightMight half excuse our cheated sight,If it of life the whole small time would stay,And be our sunshine all the day.

Like lightning that, begot but in a cloud,Though shining bright, and speaking loud,Whilst it begins, concludes its violent race,And where it gilds, it wounds the place.

XI.

Oh, scene of fortune, which dost fair appearOnly to men that stand not near.Proud poverty, that tinsel bravery wears,And like a rainbow, painted tears.

XII.

Be prudent, and the shore in prospect keep,In a weak boat trust not the deep.Placed beneath envy, above envying rise;Pity great men, great things despise.

XIII.

The wise example of the heavenly lark.Thy fellow poet, Cowley, mark,Above the clouds let thy proud music sound,Thy humble nest build on the ground.

A letter to Mr.S.L.

Iamglad that you approve and applaud my design of withdrawing myself from all tumult and business of the world and consecrating the little rest of my time to those studies to which nature had so motherly inclined me, and from which fortune like a step-mother has so long detained me. But nevertheless, you say—which But is ærugo mera, a rust which spoils the good metal it grows upon. But, you say, you would advise me not to precipitate that resolution, but to stay a while longer with patience and complaisance, till I had gotten such an estate as might afford me, according to the saying of that person whom you and I love very much, and would believe as soon as another man,cum dignitate otium. This were excellent advice to Joshua, who could bid the sun stay too. But there’s no fooling with life when it is once turned beyond forty. The seeking for a fortune then is but a desperate after game, it is a hundred to one if a man fling two sixes and recover all; especially if his hand be no luckier than mine. There is some help for all the defects of fortune, for if a man cannot attain to the length of his wishes, he may have his remedy by cutting of them shorter. Epicurus writes a letter to Idomeneus, who was then a very powerful, wealthy, and it seems bountiful person, to recommend to him, who had made so many men rich, one Pythocles, a friend of his, whom he desired to be made a rich man too: But I entreat you that you would not do it just the same way as you have done to many less deserving persons, but in the most gentlemanly manner of obliging him, which is not to add anything to his estate, but to take something from his desires. The sum of this is, that for the uncertain hopes of some conveniences we ought not to defer the execution of a work that is necessary, especially when the use of those things which we would stay for may otherwise be supplied, but the loss of time never recovered. Nay, further yet, though we were sure to obtain all that we had a mind to, though we were sure of getting never so much by continuing the game, yet when the light of life is so near going out, and ought to be so precious,Le jeu ne vaut pas la chandelle, the play is not worth the expense of the candle. After having been long tossed in a tempest, if our masts be standing, and we have still sail and tackling enough to carry us to our port, it is no matter for the want of streamers and topgallants;utere velis totes pande sinus. A gentleman in our late civil wars, when his quarters were beaten up by the enemy, was taken prisoner and lost his life afterwards, only by staying to put on a band and adjust his periwig. He would escape like a person of quality, or not at all, and died the noble martyr of ceremony and gentility. I think your counsel offestina lenteis as ill to a man who is flying from the world, as it would have been to that unfortunate well-bred gentleman, who was so cautious as not to fly undecently from his enemies, and therefore I prefer Horace’s advice before yours.

—Sapere ande;incipe.

Begin: the getting out of doors is the greatest part of the journey. Varro teaches us that Latin proverb,Portam itineri longissimam esse. But to return to Horace,

—Sapere aude;Incipe.Virendi qui recte prorogat horamRusticus expectat dum labitur amnis;at illeLabitur,et labetur is omne volubilis ævum.Begin, be bold, and venture to be wise;He who defers the work from day to day,Does on a river’s bank expecting stay,Till the whole stream which stopped him should be gone,That runs, and as it runs, for ever will run on.

—Sapere aude;Incipe.Virendi qui recte prorogat horamRusticus expectat dum labitur amnis;at illeLabitur,et labetur is omne volubilis ævum.

Begin, be bold, and venture to be wise;He who defers the work from day to day,Does on a river’s bank expecting stay,Till the whole stream which stopped him should be gone,That runs, and as it runs, for ever will run on.

Cæsar (the man of expedition above all others) was so far from this folly, that whensoever in a journey he was to cross any river, he never went one foot out of his way for a bridge, or a ford, or a ferry; but flung himself into it immediately, and swam over; and this is the course we ought to imitate if we meet with any stops in our way to happiness. Stay till the waters are low, stay till some boats come by to transport you, stay till a bridge be built for you; you had even as good stay till the river be quite past. Persius (who, you used to say, you do not know whether he be a good poet or no, because you cannot understand him, and whom, therefore, I say, I know to be not a good poet) has an odd expression of these procrastinations, which, methinks, is full of fancy.

Jam cras hesterum consumpsimus,ecce aliud cras egerit hos annos.Our yesterday’s to-morrow now is gone,And still a new to-morrow does come on;We by to-morrows draw up all our store,Till the exhausted well can yield no more.

Jam cras hesterum consumpsimus,ecce aliud cras egerit hos annos.

Our yesterday’s to-morrow now is gone,And still a new to-morrow does come on;We by to-morrows draw up all our store,Till the exhausted well can yield no more.

And now, I think, I am even with you, for yourotium cum dignitateandfestina lente, and three or four other more of your new Latin sentences: if I should draw upon you all my forces out of Seneca and Plutarch upon this subject, I should overwhelm you, but I leave those astriariifor your next charges. I shall only give you now a light skirmish out of an epigrammatist, your special good friend, and so,vale.

To-morrow you will live, you always cry;In what far country does this morrow lie,That ’tis so mighty long ere it arrive?Beyond the Indies does this morrow live?’Tis so far-fetched, this morrow, that I fear’Twill be both very old and very dear.To-morrow I will live, the fool does say;To-day itself’s too late, the wise lived yesterday.

Wonder not, sir (you who instruct the townIn the true wisdom of the sacred gown),That I make haste to live, and cannot holdPatiently out, till I grow rich and old.Life for delays and doubts no time does give,None ever yet made haste enough to live.Let him defer it, whose preposterous careOmits himself, and reaches to his heir,Who does his father’s bounded stores despise,And whom his own, too, never can suffice:My humble thoughts no glittering roofs require,Or rooms that shine with ought be constant fire.We ill content the avarice of my sightWith the fair gildings of reflected light:Pleasures abroad, the sport of Nature yieldsHer living fountains, and her smiling fields:And then at home, what pleasure is ’t to seeA little cleanly, cheerful family?Which if a chaste wife crown, no less in herThan fortune, I the golden mean prefer.Too noble, nor too wise, she should not be,No, nor too rich, too fair, too fond of me.Thus let my life slide silently away,With sleep all night, and quiet all the day.

Itis a hard and nice subject for a man to write of himself; it grates his own heart to say anything of disparagement and the reader’s ears to hear anything of praise for him. There is no danger from me of offending him in this kind; neither my mind, nor my body, nor my fortune allow me any materials for that vanity. It is sufficient for my own contentment that they have preserved me from being scandalous, or remarkable on the defective side. But besides that, I shall here speak of myself only in relation to the subject of these precedent discourses, and shall be likelier thereby to fall into the contempt than rise up to the estimation of most people. As far as my memory can return back into my past life, before I knew or was capable of guessing what the world, or glories, or business of it were, the natural affections of my soul gave me a secret bent of aversion from them, as some plants are said to turn away from others, by an antipathy imperceptible to themselves and inscrutable to man’s understanding. Even when I was a very young boy at school, instead of running about on holidays and playing with my fellows, I was wont to steal from them and walk into the fields, either alone with a book, or with some one companion, if I could find any of the same temper. I was then, too, so much an enemy to all constraint, that my masters could never prevail on me, by any persuasions or encouragements, to learn without book the common rules of grammar, in which they dispensed with me alone, because they found I made a shift to do the usual exercises out of my own reading and observation. That I was then of the same mind as I am now (which I confess I wonder at myself) may appear by the latter end of an ode which I made when I was but thirteen years old, and which was then printed with many other verses. The beginning of it is boyish, but of this part which I here set down, if a very little were corrected, I should hardly now be much ashamed.

IX.

This only grant me, that my means may lieToo low for envy, for contempt too high.Some honour I would have,Not from great deeds, but good alone.The unknown are better than ill known.Rumour can ope the grave;Acquaintance I would have, but when it dependsNot on the number, but the choice of friends.

Books should, not business, entertain the light,And sleep, as undisturbed as death, the night.My house a cottage, moreThan palace, and should fitting beFor all my use, no luxury.My garden painted o’erWith Nature’s hand, not Art’s; and pleasures yield,Horace might envy in his Sabine field.

XI.

Thus would I double my life’s fading space,For he that runs it well twice runs his race.And in this true delight,These unbought sports, this happy state,I would not fear, nor wish my fate,But boldly say each night,To-morrow let my sun his beams displayOr in clouds hide them—I have lived to-day.

You may see by it I was even then acquainted with the poets (for the conclusion is taken out of Horace), and perhaps it was the immature and immoderate love of them which stamped first, or rather engraved, these characters in me. They were like letters cut into the bark of a young tree, which with the tree still grow proportionably. But how this love came to be produced in me so early is a hard question. I believe I can tell the particular little chance that filled my head first with such chimes of verse as have never since left ringing there. For I remember when I begun to read and to take some pleasure in it, there was wont to lie in my mother’s parlour. (I know not by what accident, for she herself never in her life read any book but of devotion), but there was wont to lie Spenser’s works; this I happened to fall upon, and was infinitely delighted with the stories of the knights, and giants, and monsters, and brave houses, which I found everywhere there (though my understanding had little to do with all this); and by degrees with the tinkling of the rhyme and dance of the numbers, so that I think I had read him all over before I was twelve years old, and was thus made a poet as immediately as a child is made an eunuch. With these affections of mind, and my heart wholly set upon letters, I went to the university, but was soon torn from thence by that violent public storm which would suffer nothing to stand where it did, but rooted up every plant, even from the princely cedars to me, the hyssop. Yet I had as good fortune as could have befallen me in such a tempest; for I was cast by it into the family of one of the best persons, and into the court of one of the best princesses of the world. Now though I was here engaged in ways most contrary to the original design of my life, that is, into much company, and no small business, and into a daily sight of greatness, both militant and triumphant, for that was the state then of the English and French Courts; yet all this was so far from altering my opinion, that it only added the confirmation of reason to that which was before but natural inclination. I saw plainly all the paint of that kind of life, the nearer I came to it; and that beauty which I did not fall in love with when, for aught I knew, it was real, was not like to bewitch or entice me when I saw that it was adulterate. I met with several great persons, whom I liked very well, but could not perceive that any part of their greatness was to be liked or desired, no more than I would be glad or content to be in a storm, though I saw many ships which rid safely and bravely in it. A storm would not agree with my stomach, if it did with my courage. Though I was in a crowd of as good company as could be found anywhere, though I was in business of great and honourable trust, though I ate at the best table, and enjoyed the best conveniences for present subsistence that ought to be desired by a man of my condition in banishment and public distresses, yet I could not abstain from renewing my old schoolboy’s wish in a copy of verses to the same effect.

Well then; I now do plainly see,This busy world and I shall ne’er agree, etc.

And I never then proposed to myself another advantage from His Majesty’s happy restoration, but the getting into some moderately convenient retreat in the country, which I thought in that case I might easily have compassed, as well as some others, with no greater probabilities or pretences have arrived to extraordinary fortunes. But I had before written a shrewd prophecy against myself, and I think Apollo inspired me in the truth, though not in the elegance of it.

Thou, neither great at court nor in the war,Nor at th’ exchange shalt be, nor at the wrangling bar;Content thyself with the small barren praise,Which neglected verse does raise, etc.

However, by the failing of the forces which I had expected, I did not quit the design which I had resolved on; I cast myself into itA corps perdu, without making capitulations or taking counsel of fortune. But God laughs at a man who says to his soul, “Take thy ease”: I met presently not only with many little encumbrances and impediments, but with so much sickness (a new misfortune to me) as would have spoiled the happiness of an emperor as well as mine. Yet I do neither repent nor alter my course.Non ego perfidum dixi sacramentum. Nothing shall separate me from a mistress which I have loved so long, and have now at last married, though she neither has brought me a rich portion, nor lived yet so quietly with me as I hoped from her.

—Nec vos,dulcissima mundiNomina,vos Musæ,libertas,otia,libri,Hortique sylvesque anima remanente relinquam.

Nor by me e’er shall you,You of all names the sweetest, and the best,You Muses, books, and liberty, and rest;You gardens, fields, and woods forsaken be,As long as life itself forsakes not me.

But this is a very petty ejaculation. Because I have concluded all the other chapters with a copy of verses, I will maintain the humour to the last.

Vitam quæ faciunt beatiorem,etc.

Since, dearest friend, ’tis your desire to seeA true receipt of happiness from me;These are the chief ingredients, if not all:Take an estate neither too great nor small,Whichquantum sufficitthe doctors call;Let this estate from parents’ care descend:The getting it too much of life does spend.Take such a ground, whose gratitude may beA fair encouragement for industry.Let constant fires the winter’s fury tame,And let thy kitchens be a vestal flame.Thee to the town let never suit at law,And rarely, very rarely, business draw.Thy active mind in equal temper keep,In undisturbèd peace, yet not in sleep.Let exercise a vigorous health maintain,Without which all the composition’s vain.In the same weight prudence and innocence takeAnaof each does the just mixture make.But a few friendships wear, and let them beBy Nature and by Fortune fit for thee.Instead of art and luxury in food,Let mirth and freedom make thy table good.If any cares into thy daytime creep,At night, without wines, opium, let them sleep.Let rest, which Nature does to darkness wed,And not lust, recommend to thee thy bed,Be satisfied, and pleased with what thou art;Act cheerfully and well the allotted part.Enjoy the present hour, be thankful for the past,And neither fear, nor wish the approaches of the last.

Me, who have lived so long among the great,You wonder to hear talk of a retreat:And a retreat so distant, as may showNo thoughts of a return when once I go.Give me a country, how remote so e’er,Where happiness a moderate rate does bear,Where poverty itself in plenty flowsAnd all the solid use of riches knows.The ground about the house maintains it there,The house maintains the ground about it here.Here even hunger’s dear, and a full boardDevours the vital substance of the lord.The land itself does there the feast bestow,The land itself must here to market go.Three or four suits one winter here does waste,One suit does there three or four winters last.Here every frugal man must oft be cold,And little lukewarm fires are to you sold.There fire’s an element as cheap and freeAlmost as any of the other three.Stay you then here, and live among the great,Attend their sports, and at their tables eat.When all the bounties here of men you score:The Place’s bounty there, shall give me more.

Hic,O viator,sub Lare parvuloCouleius hic est conditus,hic jacet;Defunctus humani laborisSorte,supervacuâgue vilâ.Nonindecora pauperienitens,Et noninertinobilisotio,Vanoque dilectis popelloDivitiisanimosus hostis.Possis ut illum diceremortuum,En terra jam nuncquantulasufficit!Exempta sit curis, viator;Terra sit illa levis,precare.Hic spargeflores,sparge brevesrosas,Nam vita gaudet mortua floribus,Herbisque odoratis coronaVatis adhuccinerem calentem.

Hic,O viator,sub Lare parvuloCouleius hic est conditus,hic jacet;Defunctus humani laborisSorte,supervacuâgue vilâ.

Nonindecora pauperienitens,Et noninertinobilisotio,Vanoque dilectis popelloDivitiisanimosus hostis.

Possis ut illum diceremortuum,En terra jam nuncquantulasufficit!Exempta sit curis, viator;Terra sit illa levis,precare.

Hic spargeflores,sparge brevesrosas,Nam vita gaudet mortua floribus,Herbisque odoratis coronaVatis adhuccinerem calentem.

[Translation.]

Owayfarer, beneath his household shrineHere Cowley lies, closed in a little den;A life too empty and his lot combineTo give him rest from all the toils of men.

Not shining with unseemly shows of want,Nor noble with the indolence of ease;Fearless of spirit as a combatantWith mob-loved wealth and all its devotees.That you may fairly speak of him as dead,Behold how little earth contents him now!Pray, wayfarer, that all his cares be fled,And that the earth lie lightly on his brow.Strew flowers here, strew roses soon to perish,For the dead life joys in all flowers that blow;Crown with sweet herbs, bank blossoms high, to cherishThe poet’s ashes that are yet aglow.

Not shining with unseemly shows of want,Nor noble with the indolence of ease;Fearless of spirit as a combatantWith mob-loved wealth and all its devotees.

That you may fairly speak of him as dead,Behold how little earth contents him now!Pray, wayfarer, that all his cares be fled,And that the earth lie lightly on his brow.

Strew flowers here, strew roses soon to perish,For the dead life joys in all flowers that blow;Crown with sweet herbs, bank blossoms high, to cherishThe poet’s ashes that are yet aglow.

Henry Morley.

Page 15.Fertur equis, &c. From the close of Virgil’s first Georgic:

said of horses in a chariot race,Nor reins, nor curbs, nor threatening cries they fear,But force along the trembling charioteer.Dryden’s translation.

said of horses in a chariot race,Nor reins, nor curbs, nor threatening cries they fear,But force along the trembling charioteer.

Dryden’s translation.

Page 16.En Romanos, &c. Virgil, Æneid I., when Jove says,

The people Romans call, the city Rome,To them no bounds of empire I assign,Nor term of years to their immortal line.Dryden’s Virgil.

The people Romans call, the city Rome,To them no bounds of empire I assign,Nor term of years to their immortal line.

Dryden’s Virgil.

Page 18. “Laveer with every wind.” Laveer is an old sea term for working the ship against the wind. Lord Clarendon used its noun, “the schoolmen are the best laveerers in the world, and would have taught a ship to catch the wind that it should have gained half and half, though it had been contrary.”

Page 24.Amatorem trecentæ Pirithoum cohibent catenæ. Horace’s Ode, Bk. IV., end of ode 4. Three hundred chains bind the lover, Pirithous:

Wrath waits on sin, three hundred chainsPirithous bind in endless pains.Creech’s Translation.

Wrath waits on sin, three hundred chainsPirithous bind in endless pains.

Creech’s Translation.

Page 25.Aliena negotia, &c. From Horace’s Satires, sixth of Book II.

Page 25.Dors, cockchafers.

Page 26.Pan huper sebastos. Lord over All.

Page 27.Perditur hæc inter misero Lux. Horace, Satires, II., 6. This whole Satire is in harmony with the spirit of Cowley’s Essays.

Page 29.A slave in Saturnalibus. In the Saturnalia, when Roman slaves had licence to disport themselves.

Page 29.Unciatim, &c. Terence’s Phormio, Act I., scene 1, in the opening: “All that this poor fellow has, by starving himself, bit by bit, with much ado, scraped together out of his pitiful allowance—(must go at one swoop, people never considering the price it cost him the getting).”Eachard’s Terence.

Page 30.κακὰ θηρία, &c. Paul to Titus, “The Cretans are always liars,evil beasts,slow bellies.”

Page 31.Quisnam igitur, &c. Horace’s Satires, II., 7. “Who then is free? The wise man, who has absolute rule over himself.”

Page 31. Oenomaus, father of Hippodameia, would give her only to the suitor who could overcome him in a chariot race. Suitors whom he could overtake he killed. He killed himself when outstripped by Pelops, whom a god assisted, or, according to one version, a man who took the nails out of Oenomaus’ chariot wheels, and brought him down with a crash.

Page 41.Nunquam minus solus quam cum solus. Never less alone than when alone.

Page 47.Sic ego, &c. From Tibullus, IV., 13.

Page 51.O quis me gelidis, &c. From the Second Book of Virgil’s Georgics, in a passage expressing the poet’s wish:

Ye sacred Muses, with whose beauty fired,My soul is ravished and my brain inspired;Whose priest I am, whose holy fillets wear,Would you your poet’s first petition hear:Give me the ways of wandering stars to know;The depths of Heaven above, and Earth below;Teach me, &c. . . .. . .But if my heavy blood restrain the flightOf my free soul aspiring to the heightOf Nature, and unclouded fields of light:My next desire is, void of care and strife,To lead a soft, secure, inglorious life.A country cottage near a crystal flood,A winding valley and a lofty wood;Some god conduct me to the sacred shadesWhere bacchanals are sung by Spartan maids,Or lift me high to Hæmus hilly crown,Or in the vales of Tempè lay me down,Or lead me to some solitary place,And cover my retreat from human race.Dryden’s translation.

Dryden’s translation.

Page 56.Nam neque divitibus. Horace’s Epistles, I., 18.

Page 58. Tankerwoman, “water-bearer, one who carried water from the conduits.”

Page 60.Bucephalus, the horse of Alexander. Domitian is said to have given a consulship to his horseIncitatus.

Page 60. The glory of Cato and Aristides. See the parallel lives in Plutarch.

Page 64.O fortunatos nimium, &c. Men all too happy, and they knew their good.

Page 70.Hinc atque hinc. From Virgil’s Æneid, Book I.

Page 75. Mr. Hartlib . . .if the gentleman be yet alive. Samuel Hartlib, a public-spirited man of a rich Polish family, came to England in 1640. He interested himself in education and other subjects, as well as agriculture. In 1645 he edited a treatise of Flemish Agriculture that added greatly to the knowledge of English farmers, and thereby to the wealth of England. He spent a large fortune among us for the public good. Cromwell recognised his services by a pension of £300 a year, which ceased at the Restoration, and Hartlib then fell into such obscurity that Cowley could not say whether he were alive or no.

Page 75.Nescio qua, &c. Ovid. Epistles from Pontus.

Page 76.Pariter, &c. Ovid’s Fasti, Book I. Referring to the happy souls who first looked up to the stars, Ovid suggests that in like manner they must have lifted their heads above the vices and the jests of man. Cowley has here turned “locis” into “jocis.”

Page 80.Ut nos in Epistolis scribendis adjuvet. That he might help us in writing letters.

Page 81.Qui quid sit pulchrum, &c. Who tells more fully than Chrysippus or Crantor what is fair what is foul, what useful and what not.

Page 92.Swerd of bacon, skin of bacon. First Englishsweard. So green sward is green surface covering.

Page 100. The Country Life is a translation from Cowley’s own Latin Poem on Plants.

Page 105. Evelyn had dedicated to Cowley his Kalendarium Hortense.

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