So was it in the decay of the Roman empire; and likewise in the empire of Almaigne," after Charles 32 the Great, every bird taking a feather; and were not unlike to befall to Spain, if it should break. The great accessions and unions of kingdoms do likewise stir up wars: for when a state grows to an over-power, it is like a great flood, that will be sure to overflow. As it hath been seen in the states of Rome, Turkey, Spain, and others. Look when the world hath fewest barbarous peoples, but such as commonly will not marry or generate, except they know means to live (as it is almost everywhere at this day, except Tartary), there is no danger of inundations of people: but when there be great shoals of people, which go on to populate, without foreseeing means of life and sustentation, it is of necessity that once in an age or two they discharge a portion of their people upon other nations; which the ancient northern people were wont to do by lot; " casting lots what part should stay at home, and what should seek their fortunes. When a warlike state grows soft and effeminate, they may be sure of a war. For commonly such states are grown rich in the time of their degenerating; and so the prey inviteth, and their decay in valor encourageth a war.34

35

3

As for the weapons, it hardly falleth under rule and observation: yet we see even they have returns and vicissitudes. For certain it is, that ordnance was known 36 in the city of the Oxidrakes in India; and was that which the Macedonians called thunder and lightning, and magic. And it is well known that the use of ordnance hath been in China above two thousand years. The conditions of weapons, and their improvement, are: First, the fetching afar off; for that outruns the danger; as it is seen in ordnance and

muskets. Secondly, the strength of the percussion; wherein likewise ordnance do exceed all arietations 37 and ancient inventions. The third is, the commodious use of them; as that they may serve in all weathers; that the carriage may be light and manageable; and the like.

For the conduct of the war: at the first, men rested extremely upon number: they did put the wars likewise upon main force and valor; pointing days for pitched fields, and so trying it out upon an even match: and they were more ignorant in ranging and arraying their battles. After they grew to rest upon number rather competent than vast; they grew to advantages of place, cunning diversions, and the like: and they grew more skilful in the ordering of their battles.

In the youth of a state, arms do flourish; in the middle age of a state, learning; and then both of them together for a time; in the declining age of a state, mechanical arts and merchandize. Learning hath his infancy, 38 when it is but beginning and almost childish; then his youth, when it is luxuriant and juvenile; then his strength of years, when it is solid and reduced; and lastly, his old age, when it waxeth dry and exhaust.39 But it is not good to look too long upon these turning wheels of vicissitude, lest we become giddy. As for the philology 40 of them, that is but a circle of tales,11 and therefore not fit for this writing.

41

LIX

OF FAME

A Fragment

THE poets make Fame a monster. They describe her in part finely and elegantly, and in part gravely and sententiously. They say,' look how many feathers she hath, so many eyes she hath underneath; so many tongues; so many voices; she pricks up so many

ears.

This is a flourish. There follow excellent parables; as that she gathereth strength in going; that she goeth upon the ground and yet hideth her head in the clouds; that in the daytime she sitteth in a watch tower and flieth most by night; that she mingleth things done with things not done; and that she is a terror to great cities. But that which passeth all the rest is: They do recount that the Earth, mother of the giants that made war against Jupiter and were by him destroyed, thereupon in an anger brought forth Fame. For certain it is that rebels, figured by the giants, and seditious fames and libels are but brothers and sisters, mascu-line and feminine. But now, if a man can tame this monster, and bring her to feed at the hand, and govern her, and with her fly other ravening fowl and kill them, it is somewhat worth. But we are infected with the style of the poets. To speak now in a sad and serious manner: There is not in all the politics a place less handled and more worthy to be handled than this of fame. We will therefore speak of these points: What are false fames; and what are true fames; and how they may be best discerned; how fames may be sown

anus

3

and raised; how they may be spread and multiplied; and how they may be checked and laid dead. And other things concerning the nature of fame. Fame is of that force, as there is scarcely any great action wherein it hath not a great part; especially in the war. Muci2 undid Vitellius by a fame that he scattered: that Vitellius had in purpose to remove the legions of Syria into Germany and the legions of Germany into Syria; whereupon the legions of Syria were infinitely inflamed. Julius Cæsar took Pompey unprovided and laid asleep his industry and preparations by a fame that he cunningly gave out: how Cæsar's own soldiers loved him not, and being wearied with the wars and laden with the spoils of Gaul, would forsake him as soon as he came into Italy. Livia settled all things for the succession of her son Tiberius by continual giving out that her husband Augustus was upon recovery and amendment. And it is an usual thing with the pashas to conceal the death of the Great Turk from the janizaries and men of war, to save the sacking of › Constantinople and other towns, as their manner is. Themistocles made Xerxes, king of Persia, post apace out of Grecia by giving out that the Grecians had a purpose to break his bridge of ships which he had made athwart Hellespont. There be a thousand such like examples; and the more they are, the less they need to be repeated; because a man meeteth with them everywhere. Therefore let all wise governors have as great a watch and care over fames as they have of the actions and designs themselves.

5

[The essay was not finished.]

NOTES

The following abbreviations will be used: cf., compare; A., Abbott; B., Bacon; R., Reynolds; S., Spedding; W., Wright; Adv., The Advancement of Learning; Life, Spedding's Letters and Life. Plutarch's Morals, unless otherwise noted, is quoted from Holland's translation, 2d edition, 1657; his Lives, from North's translation, ed. G. Wyndham, Tudor Translations, 1895.

NOTE

I. OF TRUTH

1 Jesting Pilate: John xviii, 38. Was Pilate jesting? B., at any rate, makes him a type of the cynical skeptic.

2 In giddiness: Lat. "in a whirl of thoughts." 3 Philosophers of that kind: the Skeptics, of whom Pyrrho of Elis (365-c. 275 B. C.) was the first; he taught that if sense and reason singly deceive us, the two together cannot be expected to give us truth. We perceive things not as they really are, but as they appear in accidental relations; hence absolute knowledge is impossible. Other skeptics were Arcesilaus (315-241 B. C.) and Carneades of Cyrene (d. 129 B. C.), who represent the Middle and the New Academy respectively.

4 Discoursing wits: Lat. "windy and rambling." B. may here refer to Francisco Sanchez, the Portuguese-Spanish physician and skeptical philosopher (1562-1632), whose treatise That Nothing is Known (1581) begins: "I do not know even this, that I know nothing. I guess, however, that neither I nor others know anything." This treatise made a great stir at the time.

5 One of the later school: Lucian, Philopseudes, i. Cf. Essay xvi, note 15.

6 As candle-lights: cf. Essay xxxvii, p. 120, 11. 24 ff.

7 One of the fathers: R. thinks that here B. confuses two sayings: one by Jerome in a letter to Damasus, "Devil's food are the songs of poets;" the other by Augustine (Confessions, i, 16) in which he speaks of poetry as "wine of error furnished by drunken teachers." In Adv. xxii, 13, B. says: "Did not one of the fathers in great indignation call poesy vinum dæmonum, because it increaseth temptations, perturbations, and vain opinions?"

8 The poet: Lucretius, regarded as the ornament of the Epicureans; On the Nature of Things, ii, 1-13. Cf. Adv. viii, 5. 9 Move in charity: the figure is drawn from the Ptolemaic astronomy, thus outlined by Masson: The earth was regarded as the fixed centre of the universe, and the apparent