CHAP. III.] PRINCIPLES OF EQUITY. 347 



triumphs for their successful generals; they had donatives 

 and great largesses for the soldiers, when the army was dis 

 banded ; these are such great and dazzling things in the eyes 

 of mortals, as to be capable of firing the most frozen spirits 

 and inflaming them for war. In particular, the manner of 

 triumph among the Romans was not a thing of pageantry or 

 empty show, but deserving to be reckoned among the wisest 

 and most noble of their customs, as being attended with 

 these three particulars ; viz., 1. The glory and honour of 

 their leaders ; 2. The enriching of the treasury with the 

 spoils; and, 3. Donatives to the army. But their triumphal 

 honours were, perhaps, unfit for monarchies, unless in the 

 person of the king or his son, which also obtained at Rome 

 in the times of its emperors, who reserved the honour of the 

 triumph as peculiar to themselves and their sons upon re 

 turning from the wars whereat they were present, and had 

 brought to a conclusion, only conferring their vestments and 

 triumphal ensigns upon the other leaders. 



But to conclude, though no man, as the Scripture testifies, 

 can by taking care add one cubit to his stature, 11 that is, in 

 the little model of the human body ; yet in the vast fabric 

 of kingdoms and commonwealths, it is in the power of kings 

 and rulers to extend and enlarge the bounds of empire; for by 

 prudently introducing such laws, orders, and customs as those 

 above mentioned, and the like, they might sow the seeds of 

 greatness for posterity and future ages. But these counsels 

 seldom reach the ears of princes, who generally commit the 

 whole to the direction and disposal of fortune. 



The other desideratum we note in the art of government, 

 is the doctrine of universal justice, or the fountains of law. 

 They who iiave hitherto written upon laws were either as 

 philosophers or lawyers : the philosophers advance many 

 things that appear beautiful in discourse, but lie out of the 

 road of use; whilst the lawyers, being bound and subject to 

 the decrees of the laws prevailing in their several countries, 

 whether Roman cr pontifical, have not their judgment free, 

 but write as in fetters. This doctrine, doubtless, properly 

 belongs to statesmen, who best understand civil society, the 

 good of the people, natural equity, the customs of nations, 

 and the different forms of states; whence they are able to 

 Matt. vi. 27, and Luke xii. 25. 



