ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 261 



called by Demosthenes the baits of sloth. Again, we may 

 clearly see the crafty and ambiguous nature of some actions 

 which pass for benefits, from that trick practised by Mucianus 

 upon Antony; for after a pretended reconciliation he most 

 treacherously advanced many of Antony's friends to lieuten- 

 ancies, tribuneships, etc., and by this cunning entirely disarmed 

 and defeated him ; thus winning over Antony's friends to him- 

 self.' 



But the surest key for unlocking the minds of others turns 

 upon searching and sifting either their tempers and natures, 

 or their ends and designs; and the more weak and simple 

 are best judged by their temper, but the more prudent and 

 close by their designs. It was prudently and wittily, though 

 in my judgment not substantially, advised by the pope's nuncio 

 as to the choice of another to succeed him in his residence at a 

 foreign court, that they should by no means send one remark- 

 ably but rather tolerably wise ; because a man wiser than ordi- 

 nary could never imagine what the people of that nation were 

 likely to do. It is doubtless a cojnmon error, particularly in 

 prudent men, to measure others by the model of their own 

 capacity ; whence they frequently overshoot the mark, by sup- 

 posing that men project and form greater things to themselves, 

 and practise more subtile arts than ever entered their minds. 

 This is elegantly intimated by the Italian proverb 



" Di denari, di senno, e di fede, 

 C ne manco che non crede ;" s 



and therefore, in men of small capacities, who commit many 

 absurdities, a conjecture must rather be formed from the pro- 

 pensity of their nature than from their ends in view. Whence 

 princes also, though for a quite different reason, are best judged 

 by their tempers as private persons are by their ends; for 

 princes, who are at the top of human desires, have seldom any 

 ends to aspire after with ardor and perseverance, by the situa- 

 tion and distance whereof a direction and measure might be 

 taken of their other actions. And this among others is a prin- 

 cipal reason why their hearts, as the Scripture declares, are un- 

 searchable.' But every private man is like a traveller, who pro- 

 ceeds intently to the end of his journey, where he sets up : hence 

 one may tolerably conjecture what a private man will or will not 

 do ; for if a thing be conducive to his ends, it is probable he will 



