NO Tl .S Y Y Y 7. 7. A. 



with my brother, and to rejoice in the prosperity of my neighbour. You teach 

 me how I may hold my own, and keep my estate ; but I would rather learn 

 how I may lose it all, and yet be contented. It is hard, you will say, for a 

 man to be forced from the fortune of his family. This estate, it is true, was 

 my father s; but whose was it in the time of my great-grandfather 1 I do not 

 only say, What man s was it? but, what nation s! The astrologer tells me of 

 Saturn and Mars in opposition; but I say, let them be as they will, their 

 courses and their positions are ordered them by an unchangeable decree of fate. 

 Either they produce, and point out the effects of all things, or else they signify 

 them : if the former, what are we the better for the knowledge of that which 

 must of necessity come to pass 1 If the latter, what does it avail us to foresee 

 what we cannot avoid 1 So that, whether we know or not know, the event will 

 still be the same. Seneca. 



NOTE YYY. 



&quot; Men carry their minds as they carry their watches, content to be ignorant 

 of the mechanism of their movements, and satisfied with attending to the little 

 exterior circle of things, to which the passions, like indexes, are pointing. It is 

 surprising to see how little self-knowledge a person not watchfully observant of 

 himself may have gained in the whole course of an active, or even an inquisitive 

 life. He may have lived almost an age, and traversed a continent, minutely 

 examining its curiosities, and interpreting the half obliterated characters on its 

 monuments, unconscious the while of a process operating on his own mind to 

 impress or to erase characteristics of much more importance to him than all the 

 figured brass or marble that Europe contains. After having explored many a 

 cavern or dark ruinous avenue, he may have left undetected a darker recess in 

 his character. He may have conversed with many people in different lan 

 guages, on numberless subjects ; but having neglected those conversations with 

 himself by which his whole moral being should have been kept continually dis 

 closed to his view, he is better qualified perhaps to describe the intrigues of a 

 foreign court, or the progress of a foreign trade ; to represent the manners of 

 the Italians or the Turks ; to narrate the proceedings of the Jesuits, or the 

 adventures of the gypsies, than to write the history of his own mind.&quot; 



Foster s Essays, p. 6, 4th ed. 



NOTE ZZZ. 



Foster says, &quot; And perhaps still less regard will be paid to it, if it be consi 

 dered that the King, who appeareth to have had the success of the prosecution 

 much at heart, and took a part in it unbecoming the majesty of the crown, con 

 descended to instruct his attorney general with regard to the proper measures to 

 be taken in the examination of the defendant ; that the attorney at his majesty s 

 command submitted to the drudgery of sounding the opinions of the judges 

 upon the point of law, before it was thought advisable to risk it at an open 

 trial ; that the judges were to be sifted separately and soon, before they could 

 have an opportunity of conferring together; and that for this purpose four 

 gentlemen of the profession in the service of the crown were immediately dis 

 patched, one to each of the judges ; Mr. Attorney himself undertaking to prac 

 tice upon the Chief Justice, of whom some doubt was then entertained. Is it 

 possible that a gentleman of Bacon s great talents could submit to a service so 

 much below his rank and character ! But he did submit to it, and acquitted 

 himself notably in it. 



&quot; Avarice, I think, was not his ruling passion. But whenever a false ambi 

 tion, ever restless and craving, overheated in the pursuit of the honours which 

 the crown alone can confer, happeneth to stimulate an heart otherwise formed 

 for great and noble pursuits, it hath frequently betrayed it into measures full as 

 mean as avarice itself could have suggested to the wretched animals who die 

 under its dominion. For these passions, however they may seem to be at 

 variance, have ordinarily produced the same effects. Both degrade the man, 



