"He is a diligent historiographer, and from whom, in my opinion, a man may learn the truth of affairs of his time, as exactly as from any other; in the most of which he was himself also a personal actor, and in honorable command. 'Tis not to be imagined that he should have disguised any thing, either upon. the account of hatred, favor, or vanity; of which, the liberal censures he passes upon the great ones; and particularly, those by whom he was advanced, and employed in commands of great trust and honor (as Pope Clement VII.), give ample testimony. As to that part, which he thinks himself the best at, namely, his digressions and discourses, he has, indeed, very good ones, and enriched with fine expressions; but he is too fond of them: for to leave nothing unsaid, having a subject so plain, ample, and almost infinite, he degenerates into pedantry, and relishes a little of the scholastick prattle. I have also observed this in him, that of so many souls, and so many effects; so many motives, and so many counsels as he judges of, he never attributes any one to vertue, religion, or conscience; as if all those were utterly extinct in the world: and of all the actions how brave in outward shew soever they appear in themselves, he always throws the cause and motive upon some vicious occasion, or some prospect of profit. It is impossible to imagine but that amongst such an infinite number of actions as he makes mention of, there must be some one produced by the way of reason. No corruption could so universally have infected men,. that some one would not have escaped the contagion: which makes me suspect that his own taste was vicious; from whence it might happen that he judged other men by himself." "Philip de Comines," there is this written: "You will here find the language sweet and delightful, of a native simplicity, the narration pure, and wherein the veracity of the author does evidently shine; free from vanity, when speaking of himself; and from affection or envy, when speaking of others: his discourses and exhortations more accompanied with zeal and truth than with any exquisite sufficiency; and throughout, with authority and gravity, which speak him a man of extraction, and nourished up in great affairs." Upon the "Memoirs" of Monsieur du Bellay, I find this: "Tis always pleasant to read things writ by those that have experimented how they ought to be carried on; but withal, it cannot be deny'd but there is a manifest decadence in these two lords from the freedom and liberty of writing, that shines in the ancient historians: such as the Sire de Joinville, a domestick to St. Louis; Eginard, chancellor to Charlemain; and, of latter date, in "Philip de Comines." This here is rather an apology for King Francis against the Emperor Charles V. than a history. I will not believe that they have falsified any thing, as to matter of fact; but they make a common practice of wresting the judg ment of events (very often contrary to reason) to our advantage, and of omitting whatsoever is nice to be handl'd in the life of their master; witness the relation of Messieurs de Montmorency and De Brion, which were here omitted: nay, so much as the very name of Madame d'Estampes is not here to be found. Secret actions an historian may conceal; but to pass over in silence what all the world knows, and things that have drawn after them publick consequences, is an inexcusable defect. In fine, whoever has a mind to have a perfect knowledge of King Francis, and the revolutions of his reign, let him seek it elsewhere, if my advice may prevail. The only profit a man can reap from hence is, from the particular narrative of battels, and other exploits of war, wherein these gentlemen were personally engaged; some words and private actions of the princes of their time, and the practices and negotiations carried on by the Seigneur de Lancay; where, indeed, there are, every where, things worthy to be known, and discourses above the vulgar strain." Complete. THAT MEN ARE NOT TO JUDGE OF OUR HAPPINESS TILL AFTER DEATH E scilicet ultima semper Expectanda dies homini est, dicique beatus, Ante obitum nemo supremaque funera debet. - Ovid. Met., 1. 3. VERY one is acquainted with the story of King Croesus to this purpose, who being taken prisoner by Cyrus, and by him. condemn'd to die, as he was going to execution, cry'd out, O Solon, Solon! which being presently reported to Cyrus, and he sending to enquire what it meant, Croesus gave him to understand that he now found the advertisement Solon had formerly given him true to his cost, which was, "That men, however fortune may smile upon them, could never be said to be happy, till they had been seen to pass over the last day of their lives, by reason of the uncertainty and mutability of human things, which upon very light and trivial occasions are subject to be totally chang'd into a quite contrary condition." And therefore it was, that Agesilaus made answer to one that was saying, "What a happy young man the king of Persia was, to come so young to so mighty a kingdom"; "'Tis true [said he], but neither was Priam unhappy at his years." In a short time, of kings of Macedon, successors to that mighty Alexander, were made joyners and scriveners at Rome; of a tyrant of Sicily, a pedant at Corinth; of a conqueror of one-half of the world, and general of so many armies, a miserable suppliant to the rascally officers of a king of Ægypt. So much the prolongation of five or six months of life cost the great and noble Pompey, and no longer since than our fathers' days, Ludovico Forza, the tenth duke of Milan, whom all Italy had so long truckled under, was seen to die a wretched prisoner at Loches, but not till he had lived ten years in captivity, which was the worst part of his fortune. The fairest of all queens, (Mary, Queen of Scots) widow to the greatest king in Europe, did she not come to die by the hand of an executioner? Unworthy and barbarous cruelty! and a thousand more examples there are of the same kind; for it seems that as storms and tempests have a malice to the proud, and overtow'ring heights of our lofty buildings, there are also spirits above that are envious of the grandeurs here below. Usque adeo res humanas vis abdita quædam And it should seem also that Fortune sometimes lies in wait to surprise the last hour of our lives, to shew the power she has in a moment to overthrow what she was so many years in building, making us cry out with Laborius, "Nimirum hac die una plus vixi mihi quam vivendum fuit."- Macrob., 1. 2., c. 2. "I have liv'd longer by this one day than I ought to have done." And in this sense, this good advice of Solon may reasonably be taken; but he being a philosopher, with which sort of men the favors and disgraces of fortune stand for nothing, either to the making a man happy or unhappy, and with whom grandeurs and powers, accidents of quality, are upon the matter indifferent: I am apt to think that he had some further aim, and that his meaning was that the very felicity of life it self, which depends upon the tranquillity and contentment of a well-descended spirit, and the resolution and assurance of a well-order'd soul, ought never to be attributed to any man, till he has first been seen to play the last, and doubtless the hardest act of his part, because there may be disguise and dissimulation in all the rest, where these fine philosophical discourses are only put on; and where accidents do not touch us to the quick, they give us leisure to maintain the same sober gravity; but in this last scene of death, there is no more counterfeiting, we must speak plain, and must discover what there is of pure and clean in the bottom. Nam veræ voces tum demum pectore ab imo “Then that at last truth issues from the heart, Wherefore at this last all the other actions of our life ought to be try'd and sifted. 'Tis the master-day, 'tis the day that is judge of all the rest, 'tis the day (says one of the Ancients) that ought to judge of all my foregoing years. To death do I refer the essay of the fruit of all my studies. We shall then see whether my discourses came only from my mouth or from my heart. I have seen many by their death give a good or an ill repute to their whole life. Scipio, the father-in-law of Pompey the Great, in dying well, wip'd away the ill opinion that till then every one had conceiv'd of him. Epaminondas being ask'd which of the three he had in the greatest esteem, Chabrias, Iphicrates, or himself; "You must first see us die (said he) before that question can be resolv'd": and, in truth, he would infinitely wrong. that great man, who would weigh him without the honor and grandeur of his end. God Almighty has order'd all things as it has best pleased him; but I have in my time seen three of the most execrable persons that ever I knew in all manners of abominable living, and the most infamous to boot, who all dy'd a very regular death, and in all circumstances compos'd even to perfection. There are brave, and fortunate deaths. I have seen death cut the thread of the progress of a prodigious advancement, and in the height and flower of its encrease of a certain person, with so glorious an end, that in my opinion his ambitious and gener ous designs had nothing in them so high and great as their interruption; and he arrived without compleating his course, at the place to which his ambition pretended with greater glory than he could himself either hope or desire, and anticipated by his fall the name and power to which he aspir'd, by perfecting his career. In the judgment I make of another man's life, I always observe how he carried himself at his death; and the principal concern I have for my own is that I may die handsomely, that is patiently and without noise. Complete. OF LIBERTY OF CONSCIENCE Is usual to see good intentions, if carried on without modera Ttion, push men on to very vicious effects. In this dispute, which has at this time engag'd France in a civil war, the better and the soundest cause, no doubt, is that which maintains the ancient religion and government of the kingdom. Nevertheless, amongst the good men of that party (for I do not speak of those that only make a pretence, either to execute their own particular revenges, or to gratifie their avarice, or to pursue the favor of princes; but of those who engage in the quarrel out of true zeal to religion, and a vertuous affection to maintain the peace and government of their country) of these, I say, we see many whom passion transports beyond the bounds of reason, and sometimes inspires them with counsels that are unjust and violent, and moreover inconsiderate and rash. It is true, that in those first times when our religion began to gain authority with the laws, zeal arm'd many against all sorts of Pagan books, by which the learned suffer'd an exceeding great loss. A disorder that I conceive did more prejudice to letters than all the flames of the barbarians. Of this Cornelius Tacitus is a very good testimony; for though the Emperour Tacitus, his kinsman, had by express order furnish'd all the libraries in the world with it, nevertheless one entire copy could not escape the curious examination of those who desir'd to abolish it, for only five or six idle clauses that were contrary to our belief. They had also the trick easily to lend undue praises to all the emperours who did any thing for us, and universally to condemn all the actions of those who were our adversaries, as is evidently manifest in the Emperour Julian, surnamed the Apostate; who was in truth a very great |