runs, and is swift of foot: meaning, that riches gotten by good means and just labour, pace slowly; but when they come by the death of others, as by the course of inheritance, testaments, and the like, they come tumbling upon a man. But it might be applied likewise to Pluto, taking him for the devil. For when riches come from the devil, as by fraud, and oppression, and unjust means, they come upon speed. The ways to enrich are many, and most of them foul. Parsimony is one of the best, and yet is not innocent: for it withholdeth men from works of liberality and charity. The improvement of the ground is the most natural obtaining of riches; for it is our great mother's blessing, the earth's; but it is slow. And yet, where men of great wealth do stoop to husbandry, it multiplieth riches exceedingly. I knew a nobleman in England that had the greatest audits of any man in my time; a great grazier, a great sheep-master, a great timber-man, a great collier, a great corn-master, a great lead-man ; and so of iron, and a number of the like points of husbandry; so as the earth seemed a sea to him, in respect of the perpetual importation. It was truly observed by one, that himself came very hardly to a little riches, and very easily to great riches. For when a man's stock is come to that, that he can expect the prime of markets, and overcome those bargains, which for their greatness are few mens money, and be partner in the industries of younger men, he cannot but increase mainly. The gains of ordinary trades and vocations are honest, and furthered by two things, chiefly, by diligence, and by a good name for good and fair dealing. But the gains of bargains are of a more doubtful nature, when men should wait upon others necessity; broke by servants and instruments to draw them on; put off others cunningly that would be better chapmen, and the like practices, which are crafty and naught. As for the chopping of bargains, when a man buys, not to hold, but to sell over again, that commonly grindeth double, both upon the seller, and upon the buyer. Sharings do greatly enrich, if the hands be well chosen that are trusted. Usury is the certainest means of gain, though one of the worst, as that whereby a man doth eat his bread in sudore vultus alieni; and besides, doth plough upon Sundays. But yet certain though it be, it hath flaws; for that the scriveners and brokers do value unsound men, to serve their own turn. The fortune in being the first in an invention, or in a privilege, doth cause sometimes a wonderful overgrowth in riches; as it was with the first sugar-man in the Canaries. Therefore, if a man can play the true logician, to have as well judgment as invention, he may do great matters, espe cially if the times be fit. He that resteth upon gains certain, shall hardly grow to great riches. And he that puts all upon adventures, doth oftentimes break, and come to poverty: it is good therefore to guard adventures with certainties that may uphold losses. Monopolies, and co-emption of wares for resale, where they are not restrained, are great means to enrich ; especially if the party have intelligence what things are like to come into request, and to store himself beforehand. Riches gotten by service, though it be of the best rise, yet when they are gotten by flattery, feeding humours, and other servile conditions, they may be placed amongst the worst. As for fishing for testaments and executorships, as Tacitus saith of Seneca, Testamenta et orbos tanquam indagine capi, it is yet worse; by how much men submit themselves to meaner persons, than in service. Believe not much them that seem to despise riches; for they despise them that despair of them: and none worse when they come to them. Be not penny-wise; riches have wings, and sometimes they fly away of themselves, sometimes they must be set flying to bring in more. Men leave their riches either to their kindred, or to the public: and moderate portions prosper best in both. A great estate left to an heir, is as a lure to all the birds of prey round about, to seize on him, if he be not the better established in years and judgment. Likewise glorious gifts and foundations, are like sacrifices without salt; and but the painted sepulchres of alms, which soon will putrify and corrupt inwardly. Therefore measure not thine advancements by quantity, but frame them by measure: and defer not charities till death: for certainly, if a man weigh it rightly, he that doth so, is rather liberal of another man's than of his own. XXXV. OF PROPHECIES. I MEAN not to speak of divine prophecies, nor of heathen oracles, nor of natural predictions; but only of prophecies that have been of certain memory, and from hidden causes. Saith the Pythonissa to Saul; To-morrow thou and thy son shall be with me. Virgil hath these verses from Homer: At domus Enea cunctis dominabitur oris, Æneid. iii. 97. A prophecy, as it seems, of the Roman empire. Seneca the Tragedian hath these verses: Venient annis, Secula seris, quibus oceanus A prophecy of the discovery of America. The daughter of Polycrates dreamed, that Jupiter bathed her father, and Apollo anointed him: and it came to pass, that he was crucified in an open place, where the sun made his body run with sweat, and the rain washed it. Philip of Macedon dreamed he sealed up his wife's belly; whereby he did expound it, that his wife should be barren; but Aristander the soothsayer told him, his wife was with child: because men do not use to seal vessels that are empty." A phantasm that appeared to M. Brutus, in his tent, said to him, Philippis iterum me videbis. Tiberius said to Galba, Tu quoque, Galba, degustabis imperium. In Vespasian's time there went a prophecy in the east, that those that should come forth of Judæa, should reign over the world; which though it may be was meant of our Saviour, yet Tacitus expounds it of Vespasian. Domitian dreamed, the night before he was slain, that a golden head was growing out of the nape of his neck: and indeed the succession that followed him, for many years, made golden times. Henry the sixth of England said of Henry the seventh, when he was a lad, and gave him water; "This is the "lad that shall enjoy the crown for which we "strive." When I was in France, I heard from one Dr. Pena, that the queen-mother, who was given to curious arts, caused the king her husband's nativity to be calculated under a false name; and the astrologer gave a judgment, that he should be killed in a duel; at which the queen laughed, thinking her husband to be above challenges and duels: but he was slain, upon a course at tilt, the splinters of the staff of Montgomery going in at his beaver. The trivial prophecy, which I heard when I was a child, and queen Elizabeth was in the flower of her years, was; When Hempe is sponne, Whereby it was generally conceived, that after the princes had reigned, which had the principal letters of that word Hempe, which were Henry, Edward, Mary, Philip, and Elizabeth, England should come to utter confusion; which, thanks be to God, is verified only in the change of the name, for that the king's style is now no more of England, but of Britain. There was also another prophecy before the year of eighty-eight, which I do not well understand: There shall be seen upon a day, Between the baugh and the May, The black fleet of Norway. When that is come and gone, England build houses of lime and stone, It was generally conceived to be meant of the Spanish fleet that came in eighty-eight. For that the king of Spain's surname, as they say, is Norway. The prediction of Regiomontanus, Octogesimus octavus mirabilis annus : was thought likewise accomplished, in the sending of that great fleet, being the greatest in strength, though not in number, of all that ever swam upon the sea. As for Cleon's dream, I think it was a jest: it was, that he was devoured of a long dragon; and it was expounded of a maker of sausages, that troubled him exceedingly. There are numbers of the like. kind; especially if you include dreams, and predictions of astrology. But I have set down these few only of certain credit, for example. My judgment is, that they ought all to be despised, and ought to serve but for winter talk by the fire-side. Though when I say despised, I mean it as for belief: for otherwise, the spreading or publishing of them, is in no sort to be despised; for they have done much mischief. And I see many severe laws made to suppress them. That that hath given them grace, and some credit, consisteth in three things: first, that men mark when they hit, and never mark when they miss; as they do, generally, also of dreams. The second is, that probable conjectures, or obscure traditions, many times, turn themselves into prophecies: while the nature of man, which coveteth divination, thinks it no peril to foretel that, which, indeed they do but collect; as that of Seneca's verse. For so much was then subject to demonstration, that the globe of the earth had great parts beyond the Atlantic, which might be probably conceived not to be all sea: and adding thereto, the tradition in Plato's Timæus, and his Atlanticus, it might encourage one to turn it to a prediction. The third and last, which is the great one, is, that almost all of them, being infinite in number, have been impostures, and by idle and crafty brains, merely contrived and feigned, after the event past. XXXVI. OF AMBITION. AMBITION is like choler, which is an humour that maketh men active, earnest, full of alacrity, and stirring, if it be not stopped. But if it be stopped, and cannot have its way, it becometh adust, and thereby malign and venomous. So ambitious men, if |