The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut,
Bounding between the two moist elements,
Like Perseus' horse: Where's then the saucy boat,
Whose weak untimber'd sides but even now
Co-rivall’d greatness ? either to harbour fled,
Or made a toast for Neptune. Even so
Doth valour's show, and valour's worth, divide,
In storms of fortune: For, in her ray and brightness,
The herd hath more annoyance by the brize,*
Than by the tiger: but when the splitting wind
Makes flexible the knees of knotted oaks,
And flies fled under shade, why, then the thing of

courage,
As roused with rage, with rage doth sympathise,
And with an accent tuned in self-same key,
Returns to chiding fortune.

26-j. 3. 150

Determinations of Anger. What to ourselves in passion we propose, The passion ending doth the purpose lose.

36-iii. 2. 151

Authority.

O place! O form! How often dost thou with thy case,f thy habit, Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wiser souls To thy false seeming?

5ii. 4. 152

False valour.
What valour were it, when a cur doth grin,
For one to thrust his hand between his teeth,
When he might spurn him with his foot away!

23–i. 4. 153

Self-praise no commendation. The worthiness of praise distains his worth, If that the praised himself bring the praise forth : But what the repining enemy commends, That breath fame follows; that praise, sole pure, transcends.

a

154

Ambition. Dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream. And I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality, that it is but a shadow's shadow.

36- i. 2. 155

Foolery.

A gibing spirit, Whose influence is begot of that loose grace, Which shallow laughing hearers give to fools.

8-v. 2. 156

Tried fidelity.

He that can endure
To follow with allegiance a fallen lord,
Does conquer him that did his master conquer,
And earns a place i’ the story.

30-iii. 11. 157

Danger of exaltation.

Our virtues
Lie in the interpretation of the time;
And power, unto itself most commendable,
Hath not a tomb so evident as a chair
To extol what it hath done.*

28-iv. 7. 158

False comfort.

Men
Can counsel, and speak comfort to that grief,
Which they themselves not feel; but tasting it,
Their counsel turns to passion, which before
Would give preceptial medicine to rage,
Fetter strong madness in a silken thread,
Charm ache with air, and agony with words:
No, no; 'tis all men's office to speak patience
To those that wring under the load of sorrow;
But no man's virtue, nor sufficiency,
To be so moral, when he shall endure
The like himself.

6-v. 1. 159

Theory and Practice
There was never yet philosopher,
That could endure the toothache patiently;

a

* That is, exaltation, by erciting envy, often is the grave of power, and sinks fame in oblivion.

*

a

However, they have writ the style

of gods,* And made a pish at chance and sufferance. 6-v. 1. 160

Cold friendship. Thou dost conspire against thy friend, If thou but think'st him wrong’d, and mak’st his ear A stranger to thy thoughts.

37-iii. 3. 161

Deceptive obedience. It is the curse of kings to be attended By slaves, that take their humours for a warrant;And, on the winking of authority, To understand a law; to know the meaning Of dangerous majesty, when, perchance, it frowns More upon humour than advised respect. 16-iv. 2. 162

Prudence. Who buys a minute's mirth, to wail a week? Or sells eternity to get a toy ? For one sweet grape, who will the vine destroy ? Or what fond beggar, but to touch the crown, Would with the sceptre straight be strucken down?

Poems, 163

Authority.
Authority, though it err like others,
Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself,
That skins the vice o' the top.

5-ii, 2. 164

The power of conscience.

A wicked conscienceMouldeth goblins swift as frenzy thoughts.

26-v. 11. 165

Superfluous excess.
To be possess’d with double pomp,
To guardt a title that was rich before,
To gild refined gold, to paint the lily,
To throw a perfume on the violet,
To smooth the ice, or add another hue

Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light
To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish,
Is wasteful, and ridiculous excess.

16-iv. 2. 166

Kings, but men. The king is but a man, as I am: the violet smells to him, as it doth to me; the element shows to him, as it doth to me; all his senses have but human conditions:* his ceremonies laid by, in his nakedness he appears but a man; and though his affections are higher mounted than ours, yet, when they stoop, they stoop with the like wing.

20-iv. 1. 167

Men often blind to their faults.
Men's faults do seldom to themselves appear,
Their own transgressions partially they srnother :
0! how are they wrapt in with infamies,
That from their own misdeeds askance their eyes !

Poems. 168

God's vengeance on the wicked. There is no king, be his cause never so spotless, if it come to the arbitrement of swords, can try it out with all unspotted soldiers. Some, peradventure, have on them the guilt of premeditated and contrived murder; some of beguiling virgins with the broken seal of perjury ; some, making the wars their bulwark, that have before gored the gentle bosom of peace with pillage and robbery. Now, if these men have defeated the law, and outrun native punishment, though they can outstrip men, they have no wings to fly from God:t war is his beadle, war is his vengeance; so that here men are punished, for beforebreach of the king's laws, in now the king's quarrel : where they feared the death, they have borne life away; and, where they would be safe, they perish. I Then, if they die unprovided, no more is the king guilty of their damnation, than he was before guilty of those impieties for the which they are now visited. Every subject's duty is the king's; but every subject's soul is his own.

20-iv. 1.

* Qualities.

Isa. X. &c., that is, punishment in their native country. (Matt. x. 39, and xvi. 25.

171

169

Man different only in exterior.
Though mean and mighty, rotting
Together, have one dust; yet reverence*
(That angel of the world) doth make distinction
Of place 'tween high and low.

31-iv. 2. 170

Death, common to all. Kings, and mightiest potentates, must die; For that's the end of human misery. 21-iii. 2.

Unwelcome news, thankless. The first bringer of unwelcome news Hath but a losing office; and his tongue Sounds ever after as a sullen bell, Remember'd knolling a departing friend. 19-i. 1. 172

Prevention.
As well the fear of harm, as harm apparent,
In my opinion, ought to be prevented. 24-ii. 2.
173

Death.
Nothing can we call our own, but death;
And that small model of the barren earth,
Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.

17-iii. 2.

174

Conflict of Grace. The flesh being proud, Desire doth fight with Grace, For there it revels, and when that decays, The guilty rebel for remission prays.

Poems. 175

The failure of Hope. The ample proposition, that hope makes In all designs begun on earth below, Fails in the promised largeness: checks and disasters Grow in the veins of actions highest rear'd: As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap, Infect the sound pine, and divert his grain Tortive and errant from his course of growth.