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could tell you; what listening there would be to this man! Oh! for the Lord's sake, tell me what this is, I will give you any content for your pains.

Equity.

1. Equity in law is the same that the spirit is in religion, what every one pleases to make it. Sometimes they go according to conscience, sometimes according to law, sometimes according to the rule of court.

2. Equity is a roguish thing. For law we have a measure, we know what to trust to; equity is according to the conscience of him that is chancellor, and as that is larger or narrower, so is equity. "Tis all one, as if they should make the standard for the measure, a chancellor's foot. What an uncertain measure would this be! One chancellor has a long foot, another a short foot, a third an indifferent foot: "Tis the same thing in the chancellor's conscience.

3. That saying, Do as you would be done to, is often misunderstood; for it is not thus meant, that I, a private man, should do to you, a privateman, as I would have you to me, but do as we have agreed to do one to another by public agreement. If the prisoners should ask the judge, whether he

would be content to be hanged, were he in his case, he would answer, no. Then, says the prisoner, do as you would be done to. Neither of them must do as private men, but the judge must do by him, as they have publicly agreed; that is, both judge and prisoner have consented to a law, that if either of them steal, they shall be hanged.

Evil Speaking.

1. He that speaks ill of another, commonly before he is aware, makes himself such a one as he speaks against: for if he had civility or breeding, he would forbear such kind of language.

2. A gallant man is above ill words: An example we have in the old lord of Salisbury, who was a great wise man. Stone had called some lord about court, fool; the lord complains, and has Stone whipped; Stone cries, "I might have called my lord of Salisbury fool often enough, before he would have had me whipped."

3. Speak not ill of a great enemy, but rather give him good words, that he may use you the better, if you chance to fall into his hands. The Spaniard did this when he was dying; his confessor told him, to work him to repentance, how the devil tormented the wicked that went to hell: the Spaniard replying,

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called the devil, my lord; I hope my lord the devil is not so cruel: his confessor reproved him. Excuse me, said the Don, for calling him so, I know not into what hands I may fall; and if I happen into his, I hope he will use me the better, for giving him good words.

Friars.

1. The friars say they possess nothing; whose then are the lands they hold? Not their superior's, he hath vowed poverty as well as they. Whose then? To answer this, it was decreed, they should say they were the pope's. And why must the friars be more perfect than the pope himself?

2. If there had heen no friars, Christendom might have continued quiet, and things remained at a stay.

3. If there had been no lecturers, who succeed the friars in their way, the Church of England might have stood and flourished at this day.

Humility.

1. Humility is a virtue all preach, none practice, and yet every body is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.

2. There is humilitas quædam in vitio. If a man does not take notice of that excellency and perfection that is in himself, how can he be thankful to God, who is the author of all excellency and perfection? Nay, if a man hath too mean an opinion of himself, it will render him unserviceable both to God and

man.

3. Pride may be allowed to this or that degree, else a man cannot keep up his dignity. In gluttons there must be eating, in drunkenness there must be drinking; it is not the eating, nor it is not the drinking, that is to be blamed, but the excess. in pride.

So

Public Interest.

All might go well in the commonwealth, if every one in the parliament would lay down his own interest, and aim at the general good. If a man was sick, and the whole college of physicians should come to him, and administer to him severally, haply so long as they observed the rules of art, he might recover; but if one of them had a great deal of scammony by him, he must put off that, therefore he prescribes scammony; another had a great deal of rhubarb, and he must put off that, and therefore he prese bes rhubard, &c. they would certainly kill

the man. We destroy the commonwealth, while we preserve our own private interests, and neglect the public,

King.

1. A king is a thing men have made for their own sakes, for quietness sake. Just as in a family one man is appointed to buy the meat; if every man should buy, or if there were many buyers, they would never agree; one would buy what the other liked not, or what the other had bought before, so there would be a confusion. But that charge being committed to one, he, according to his discretion, pleases all, If they have not what they would have one day, they shall have it the next, or something as good.

2. The word king directs our eyes. Suppose it had been consul or dictator, To think all kings alike, is the same folly, as if a consul of Aleppo or Smyrna, should claim to himself the same power that a consul of Rome. Or a duke of England the duke of Florence. the word Bus did as the Hebrew word

What, am not I consul? should think himself like Nor can it be imagined that signify the same in Greek, did with the Jews. Be

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sides, let the divines in their pulpits say what they will, they in their practice deny, that all is the

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