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XXIII. 33.) THE SECOND BOOK. 239 
he addeth that he had versatile ingenium. And thereof 
it cometh that these grave solemn wits, which must be 
like themselves and cannot make departures, have more 
dignity than felicity. But in some it is nature to be 
somewhat viscous and inwrapped, and not easy to turn. 
In some it is a conceit that is almost a nature, which is, 
that men can hardly make themselves believe that they 
ought to change their course, when they have found good 
by it in former experience. For Machiavel noted wisely, 
how Fabius Maximus would have been temporizing still, 
according to his old bias, when the nature of the war 
was altered and required hot pursuit. In some other 
it is want of point and penetration in their judgement, 
that they do not discern when things have a period, but 
come in too late after the occasion; as Demosthenes 
compareth the people of Athens to country fellows, when 
they play in a fence school, that if they have a blow, then 
they remove their weapon to that ward, and not before. 
In some other it is a lothness to leese labours passed, and 
a conceit that they can bring about occasions to their ply; 
and yet in the end, when they see no other remedy, then 
they come to it with disadvantage; as Tarquinius, that 
gave for the third part of Sibylla’s books the treble price, 
when he mought at first have had all three for the simple. 
But from whatsoever root or cause this restiveness of 
mind proceedeth, it is a thing most prejudicial; and 
nothing is more politic than to make the wheels of our 
mind concentric and voluble with the wheels of fortune. 
34. Another precept of this knowledge, which hath 
some affinity with that we last spake of, but with differ- 
ence, is that which is well expressed, ats accede deisque, 
that men do not only turn with the occasions, but also 
run with the occasions, and not strain their credit or 
