THE SECOND BOOK 373 



Scriptures touching the government of God, that this 

 globe, which seemeth to us a dark and shady body, is in 

 the view of God as crystal : Et in conspectu sedis tanquam 

 mare vitreum simile crystallo. So unto princes and states, 

 and specially towards wise senates and councils, the natures 

 and dispositions of the people, their conditions and neces- 

 sities, their factions and combinations, their animosities and 

 discontents, ought to be, in regard of the variety of their 

 intelligences, the wisdom of their observations, and the 

 height of their station where they keep sentinel, in great 

 part clear and transparent. Wherefore, considering that I 

 write to a king that is a master of this science, and is so 

 well assisted, I think it decent to pass over this part in 

 silence, as willing to obtain the certificate which one of the 

 ancient philosophers aspired unto ; who being silent, when 

 others contended to make demonstration of their abilities 

 by speech, desired it might be certified for his part, ' that 

 there was one that knew how to hold his peace/ 



Notwithstanding, for the more public part of govern- 

 ment, which is Laws, I think good to note only one 

 deficience ; which is, that all those which have written of 

 laws, have written either as philosophers or as lawyers, and 

 none as statesmen. As for the philosophers, they make 

 imaginary laws for imaginary commonwealths ; and their 

 discourses are as the stars, which give little light because 

 they are so high, For the lawyers, they write according 

 to the states where they live, what is received law, and not 

 what ought to be law : for the wisdom of a lawmaker is 

 one, and of a lawyer is another. For there are in nature 

 certain fountains of justice, whence all civil laws are derived 

 but as streams ; and like as waters do take tinctures and 

 tastes from the soils through which they run, so do civil 

 laws vary according to the regions and governments where 

 they are planted, though they proceed from the same 

 fountains. Again, the wisdom of the lawmaker consisteth 

 not only in a platform of justice, but in the application 

 thereof; taking into consideration by what means laws 

 may be made certain, and what are the causes and 

 remedies of the doubtfulness and incertainty of law ; by 



