-MEMB. II.

Deformity of body, sicknesse, basenesse of birth, peculiar discontents.

PARTICULAR discontents and grievances, are either of

body, minde, or fortune, which as they wound the soul of man, produce this melancholy, and many great inconveniences, by that antidote of good counsell and perswasion may he eased or expelled. Deformities and imperfections of our bodies, as lamenesse, crookednesse, deafenesse, blindnesse, be they innate or accidentall, torture many men: yet this may comfort them, that those imperfections of the body do not a whit blemish the soul, or hinder the operations of it, but rather help and much increase it. Thou art lame of body, deformed to the eye, yet this hinders not but that thou maist be a good, a wise, upright, honest man. "a Seldome," saith Plutarch, "honesty and beauty dwell together," and oftentimes under a thread-bare coat lies an excellent understanding, sæpè sub attrita latitat sapientia veste. * Cornelius Mussus that famous preacher in Italy, when he came first into the pulpit in Venice, was so much contemned by reason of his outside, a little, lean, poore, dejected person, + they were all ready to leave the church; but when they heard his voice they did admire him, and happy was that Senator could injoy his company, or invite him first to his house. A silly fellow to look to, may have more wit, learning, honesty then he that struts it out Ampullis jactans, &c. grandia gradiens, and is admired in the world's opinion: Vilis sape cadus nobile nectar habet, The best wine comes out of an old vessell. How many deformed princes, kings, emperours could I reckon up, philosophers, orators? Hannibal had but one eye, Appius Claudus, Timoleon, blinde, Muleasse king of Tunis, John king of Bohemia, and Tiresias the prophet. "The night hath his pleasure;" and for the losse of that one sense such men are commonly recompensed in the rest; they have excellent memories, other good parts, musick, and many recreations; much happines, great wisdom, as Tully well discourseth in his ‡ Tusculan questions: Homer was blinde, yet who (saith he) male more accurate, lively, or better descriptions, with both his eyes? Democritus was blinde, yet as Laertius writes of him, he saw

*Josephus Mussus

⚫ Raro sub codem lare honestas & forma habitant. vita ejus. + Homuncio brevis, macilentus, umbra hominus, &c. Ad stuporem ejus cruditionem & eloquentiam admirati sunt. b Nox habet suas vojuptates. ‡ Lib. 5. ad finem, cæcus potest esse sapiens & beatus, &c.

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more then all Greece besides, as Plato concludes, Tum sanè mentis oculus acutè incipit cernere, quum primùm corporis ocules deflorescit, when our bodily eyes are at worst, generally the eyes of our soul see best. Some Philosophers and Divines have evirated themselves, and put out their eyes voluntarily, the better to contemplate. Angelus Politianus had a tettur in his nose continually running, fulsome in company, yet no man so eloquent and pleasing in his works. Esope was crooked, Socrates pur-blinde, long-legged, hairy; Democritus withered, Seneca lean and harsh, ugly to behold, yet shew me so many flourishing wits, such divine spirits: Horace a little blear-eyed contemptible fellow, yet who so sententious and wise? Marcilius Picinus, Faber Stapulensis, a couple of dwarfes, * Melanethon a short hard favoured man, parvus erat, sed magnus erat, &c. yet of incomparable parts all three. Ignatius Loiola the founder of the Jesuits, by reason of an hurt he received in his leg, at the siege of Pampelona the chief town of Navarre in Spaine, unfit for wars and lesse serviceable at court, upon that accident betock himself to his beads, and by those means got more honour then ever he should have done with the use of his limbs, and propernes of person; l'ulnus non penetrat animum, a wound hurts not the soul. Galba the emperour was crook backed, Epictetus lame; that great Alexander a little man of stature, Augustus Cæsar of the same pitch: Agesilaus despicabili formá, Boccharis a most deformed prince as ever Egypt had, yet as || Diodorus Siculus records of him, in wisdome and knowledge far beyond his predecessours. 4. Dom. 1306. Uladeslaus Cubitalis that pigmy king of Poland reigned and fought more victorious battels, then any of his long-shanked predecessours. Nullam virtus respuit staturam, Vertue refuseth no stature, and commonly your great vast bodies, and fine features, are sottish, dull, and leaden spirits. What's in them? Quid nisi pondus iners stolidæq; ferocia mentis, What in Osus and Ephialles (Neptune's sons in Honer) nine akers long?

d

Cum pedes incedit, medii per maxima Nerei

Stagna, viam findens humero supereminet undas,"

What in Maximinus, Ajax, Caligula, and the rest of those

*Joachimus Camerarius vit. ejus. + Riber. Lib. 1. Corpore exili

Sueton. c. 7. 9.

& despecto, sed ingenio & prudentia longe ante se reges cæteros præveniens. Alexander Gaguinis hist. Polandiæ. Corpore parvus eram, cubito vix altior ano, Sed tamen in parvo corpore magnus eram.

Enei. 10.

§ Ovid.

¶ Vir.

great

great Zanzummins, or giganticall Anakims, heavie, vast, barbarous lubbers?

-" si membra tibi dant grandia Parcæ,

Mentis eges?"

*

Their body, saith Lemnius, " is a burden to them, and their spirits not so lively, nor they so erect and merry:" Non est in magno corpore mica salis: a little diamond is more worth then a rocky mountain: Which made Alexander Aphrodiseus positively conclude, "The lesser, the wiser, because the soul was more contracted in such a body." Let Bodine in his 5. c. method. hist. plead the rest: the lesser they are, as in Asia, Greece, they have generally the finest wits. And for bodily stature which some so much admire, and goodly presence, 'tis true, to say the best of them, great men are proper, and tall, I grant,caput inter nubila condunt; but belli pusilli, little men are pretty:

"Sed si bellus homo est Cotta, pusillus homo est." Sickness, diseases, trouble many, but without a cause; " It may be 'tis for the good of their souls:" Pars fati fuit, the flesh rebels against the spirit; that which hurts the one, must needs help the other. Sicknesse is the mother of modesty, putteth us in minde of our mortality; and when we are in the full career of worldly pomp and jollity, she pulleth us by the ear, and maketh us know our selves. h Pliny calls it, the sum of philosophy," If we could but perform that in our health, which we promise in our sicknesse." Quum infirmi sumus, optimi sumus; for what sick man (as + Secundus expostulates with Rufus) was ever "lascivious, covetous, or ambitious? he envies no man, admires no man, flatters no man, despiseth no man, listens not after lyes and tales, &c." And were it not for such gentle remembrances, men would have no moderation of themselves, they would be worse then tygers, wolves, and lions: who should keep them in awe? "princes, masters, parents, magistrates, judges, friends, enemies, fair or foul meanes cannot contain us, but a little sickness, (as Chrysostome observes) will correct and amend us." And therefore with good

Petrarch.

Lib. 2. cap. 20. oneri est illis corporis moles, et spiritus minus vividi. * Corpore breves prudentiores quum coarctata sit anima. Ingenio pollet cui vim natura negavit. & Multis ad salutem animæ protuit corporis ægritudo, Lib. 7. Summa est totius Philosophiæ, si tales &c. + Plinius epist. 7. lib. Quem infirmum libido solicitat, aut avaritia, aut honores? nemini invidet, neminem miratur, neminem despicit, sermone maligno non alitur. Non terret princeps, magister, parens, judex; at ægritudo superveniens, emnia correxit.

discretion,

discretion, *Jovianus Pontanus caused this short sentence to be engraven on his tombe in Naples: "Labour, sorrow, grief, sicknesse, want and woe, to serve proud masters, bear that superstitious yoke, and bury your dearest friends, &c. are the sawces of our life." If thy disease be continuate and painfull to thee, it will not surely last: "and a light affliction, which is but for a moment, causeth unto us a far more excellent and eternall weight of glory," 2 Cor. 4. 17. bear it with patience: women endure much sorrow in child-bed, and yet they will not contain; and those that are barren, wish for this pain: "be couragious, there is as much valour to be shewed in thy bed, as in an army, or at a sea fight:" aut vincetur, aut vincet, thou shalt be rid at last. In the mean time, let it take his course, thy minde is not any way disabled. Bilibaldus Pirkimerus, Senator to Charles the fifth, ruled all Germany, lying most part of his days sick of the gout upon his bed. The more violent thy torture is, the lesse it will continue: and though it be severe and hideous for the time, comfort thy self as martyrs do, with honour and immortality. That famous philosopher Epicurus, being in as miserable paine of stone and collick, as a man might endure, solaced himself with a conceit of immortaJity; "the joy of his soul for his rare inventions, repelled the pain of his bodily torments."

Basenesse of birth is a great disparagement to some men, especially if they be wealthy, bear office, and come to promotion in a commonwealth; then (as he observes) if their birth be not answerable to their calling, and to their fellowes, they are much abashed and ashamed of themselves. Some scorn their own father and mother, deny brothers and sisters, with the rest of their kindred and friends, and will not suffer them to come near them, when they are in their pomp, accounting it a scandal to their greatness to have such beggarly beginnings. Simon in Lucian, having now got a little wealth, changed his name from Simon to Simonides, for that there were so many beggars of his kin, and set the house on fire where he was born, because no body should point at it. Others buy titles, coats of armes, and by all means screw themselves into ancient families, falsifying pedegrees, usurping scutchions, and all because they would not seem to be base. The reason is, for that this genti

*Nat. Chytræus Europ. deliciis. Labor, dolor, ægritudo, luctus, servire superbis dominis, jugum ferre superstitionis, quos habet charos sepelire, &c. condimenta vitæ sunt. Non tam mari quàm prœlio virtus, etiam lecio exhibetur : vincetur aut vincet; aut tu febrem relinques, aut ipsa te. Seneca. + Tullius lib. 7. fam. ep. Vesicæ morbo laborans, & urinæ mittendæ difficultate tantâ, ut vix incrementum caperet; repellebat hæc omnia animi gaudium ob memoriam inventorum. Boeth. lib. 2. pr. 4. Huic sensus exuperat, sed est pudori degener sanguis.

lity

lity is so much admired by a company of outsides, and such honour attributed unto it, as amongst Germans, Frenchmen, and Venetians, the gentry scorn the commonalty, and will not suffer them to match with them; they depresse, and make them as so many asses, to carry burdens. In our ordinary talk and fallings out, the most opprobrious and scurrile name we can fasten upon a man, or first give, is to call him base rogue, beggarly rascall, and the like: Whereas in my judgement, this ought of all other grievances to trouble men least. Of all vanities and fopperies, to brag of gentility is the greatest; for what is it they crack so much of, and challenge such superiority, as if they were demi-gods? Birth?

"Tantane vos generis tenuit fiducia vestri ?”

66 m

It is non ens, a mear flash, a ceremony, a toy, a thing of nought. Consider the beginning, present estate, progresse, ending of gentry, and then tell me what it is. Oppression, fraud, cosening, usury, knavery, baudery, murther and tyranny, are the beginning of many ancient families; " One hath been a bloud-sucker, a parricide, the death of many a silly soul in some unjust quarrels, seditions, made many an orphan and poor widow, and for that he is made a Lord or an Earl, and his posterity gentlemen for ever after. Another hath been a bawd, a pander to some great men, a parasite, a slave, ° prostituted himself, his wife, daughter," to some lascivious prince, and for that he is exalted. Tiberius preferred many to honours in his time, because they were famous whore-masters and sturdy drinkers; many come into this parchment-row (so * one cas it) by flattery or cosening; search your old families, and you shall scarce find of a multitude (as Eneas Sylvius observes) qui sceleratum non habent ortum, that have not a wicked beginning; Aut qui vi & dolo eo fastigii non ascendunt, as that plebian in P Machiavel in a set oration proved to his fellows, that do not rise by knavery, force, foolery, villany, or such indirect means." They are commonly able that are wealthy; vertue and riches seldome settle on one man: who then sees not the beginning of nobility? spoiles enrich one, usury another, trea

1 Gaspar Ens polit. thes. Alii pro pecunia emunt nobilitatem, ali illam lenocinio, alii veneficiis alii parricidiis; multis perditio nobilitate conciliat, pleriq; adulatione, detraotione, calüniis, &c. Agrip. de vanit. scien. " Ex homicidio sæpe orta nobilitas et strenua carnificina. • Plures ob prostitutas filias, uxores, nobiles facti; multos venationes, rapinæ, cædes, præstigia, &c. * Sat. Menip. Cum enim hos dici nobiles videmus, qui divitiis abundant, divitiæ vero raro virtutis sunt comites, quis non videt ortum nobilitatis degenerem? hunc usuræ ditârunt, illum spolia, proditiones; hic veneficiis ditatus, ille adulationibus, huic adulteria lucrum præbent, nonullis mendacia, quidam ex conjuge quæstum faciunt, pleriq; ex natis, &c. Florent. hist. lib. 3.

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