OF SEDITIONS AND TROUBLES 33 



As if fames were the relics of seditions past ; but they are 

 no less indeed the preludes of seditions to come. Howso- 

 ever he noteth it right, that seditious tumults and seditious 

 fames differ no more but as brother and sister, masculine 

 and feminine ; especially if it come to that, that the best 

 actions of a state, and the most plausible, and which ought 

 to give greatest contentment, are taken in ill sense, and 

 traduced : for that shews the envy great, as Tacitus saith, 

 conflata magna invidia, sen bene seu male gesta premunt. 

 Neither doth it follow, that because these fames are a sign 

 of troubles, that the suppressing of them with too much 

 severity should be a remedy of troubles. For the despis- 

 ing of them many times checks them best ; and the going 

 about to stop them doth but make a wonder long-lived. 

 Also that kind of obedience which Tacitus speaketh of, is 

 to be held suspected : Erant in officio, sed tamen qui mallent 

 mandata imperantium interpretari, quam exequi ; disputing, 

 excusing, cavilling upon mandates and directions, is a kind 

 of shaking off the yoke, and assay of disobedience ; especi- 

 ally if in those disputings they which are for the direction 

 speak fearfully and tenderly, and those that are against it 

 audaciously. 



Also, as Machiavel noteth well, when princes, that ought 

 to be common parents, make themselves as a party, and 

 lean to a side, it is as a boat that is overthrown by un- 

 even weight on the one side ; as was well seen in the time 

 of Henry the Third of France ; for first himself entered 

 league for the extirpation of the Protestants ; and presently 

 after the same league was turned upon himself. For 

 when the authority of princes is made but an accessary 

 to a cause, and that there be other bands that tie faster 

 than the band of sovereignty, kings begin to be put almost 

 out of possession. 



Also, when discords, and quarrels, and factions, are 

 carried openly and audaciously, it is a sign the reverence 

 of government is lost. For the motions of the greatest 

 persons in a government ought to be as the motions of 

 the planets under primum mobile ; (according to the old 

 opinion,) which is, that every of them is carried swiftly 



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