Amongst those empty favours of hers, there is none that so much pleases vain humour natural to my country, as an authentic bull of a Roman burgess-ship, that was granted me when I was last there, glorious in seals and gilded letters, and granted with all gracious liberality. And because 'tis couched in a mixt style, more or less favourable, and that I could have been glad to have seen a copy of it before it had passed the seal.
Being before burgess of no city at all, I am glad to be created one of the most noble that ever was or ever shall be. If other men would consider themselves at the rate I do, they would, as I do, discover themselves to be full of inanity and foppery; to rid myself of it, I cannot, without making myself away. We are all steeped in it, as well one as another; but they who are not aware on't, have somewhat the better bargain; and yet I know not whether they have or no.
This opinion and common usage to observe others more than ourselves has very much relieved us that way: 'tis a very displeasing object: we can there see nothing but misery and vanity: nature, that we may not be dejected with the sight of our own deformities, has wisely thrust the action of seeing outward. We go forward with the current, but to turn back towards ourselves is a painful motion; so is the sea moved and troubled when the waves rush against one another. Observe, says every one, the motions of the heavens, of public affairs; observe the quarrel of such a person, take notice of such a one's pulse, of such another's last will and testament; in sum, be always looking high or low, on one side, before or behind you. It was a paradoxical command anciently given us by that god of Delphos: "Look into yourself; discover yourself; keep close to yourself; call back your mind and will, that elsewhere consume themselves into yourself; you run out, you spill yourself; carry a more steady hand: men betray you, men spill you, men steal you from yourself. Dost thou not see that this world we live in keeps all its sight confined within, and its eyes open to contemplate itself? 'Tis always vanity for thee, both within and without; but 'tis less vanity when less extended. Excepting thee, O man, said that god, everything studies itself first, and has bounds to its labours and desires, according to its need. There is nothing so empty and necessitous as thou, who embracest the universe; thou art the investigator without knowledge, the magistrate without jurisdiction, and, after all, the fool of the farce."
ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
A man may govern himself well who cannot govern others so
A man should diffuse joy, but, as much as he can, smother grief
A well-bred man is a compound man
All over-nice solicitude about riches smells of avarice
Always complaining is the way never to be lamented
Appetite comes to me in eating
Better to be alone than in foolish and troublesome company
By suspecting them, have given them a title to do ill
Change only gives form to injustice and tyranny
Civil innocence is measured according to times and places
Conclude the depth of my sense by its obscurity
Concluding no beauty can be greater than what they see
Confession enervates reproach and disarms slander
Counterfeit condolings of pretenders
Crates did worse, who threw himself into the liberty of poverty
Desire of travel
Enough to do to comfort myself, without having to console others
Friend, it is not now time to play with your nails
Gain to change an ill condition for one that is uncertain
Giving is an ambitious and authoritative quality
Good does not necessarily succeed evil; another evil may succeed
Greedy humour of new and unknown things
He must fool it a little who would not be deemed wholly a fool
I always find superfluity superfluous
I am disgusted with the world I frequent
I am hard to be got out, but being once upon the road
I am very willing to quit the government of my house
I content myself with enjoying the world without bustle
I enter into confidence with dying
I grudge nothing but care and trouble
I hate poverty equally with pain
I scorn to mend myself by halves
I write my book for few men and for few years
Justice als takes cognisance of those who glean after the reaper
Known evil was ever more supportable than one that was, new
Laws (of Plato on travel), which forbids it after threescore.
Liberty and laziness, the qualities most predominant in me
Liberty of poverty
Liberty to lean, but not to lay our whole weight upon others
Little affairs most disturb us
Men as often commend as undervalue me beyond reason
Methinks I promise it, if I but say it
My mind is easily composed at distance
Neither be a burden to myself nor to any other
No use to this age, I throw myself back upon that other
Nothing falls where all falls
Nothing presses so hard upon a state as innovation
Obstinate in growing worse
Occupy our thoughts about the general, and about universal cause
One may regret better times, but cannot fly from the present
Opposition and contradiction entertain and nourish them
Our qualities have no title but in comparison
Preferring the universal and common tie to all national ties
Proceed so long as there shall be ink and paper in the world
Satisfied and pleased with and in themselves
Settled my thoughts to live upon less than I have
Some wives covetous indeed, but very few that are good managers
That looks a nice well-made shoe to you
There can be no pleasure to me without communication
Think myself no longer worth my own care
Tis for youth to subject itself to common opinions
Tis more laudable to obey the bad than the good
Titles of my chapters do not always comprehend the whole matter
Travel with not only a necessary, but a handsome equipage
Turn up my eyes to heaven to return thanks, than to crave
Weigh, as wise: men should, the burden of obligation
What sort of wine he liked the best: "That of another,"
What step ends the near and what step begins the remote
When I travel I have nothing to care for but myself
Wise man to keep a curbing hand upon the impetus of friendship
World where loyalty of one's own children is unknown
Wretched and dangerous thing to depend upon others
You have lost a good captain, to make of him a bad general