36 ESS A YS CIVIL AND MORAL. 



which maketh the effect more pernicious is, that all proportion is lost : 

 it were disproportion enough for the servant s good to be preferred 

 before the master s ; but yet it is a greater extreme, when a little good 

 of the servant shall carry things against a great good of the master s. 

 And yet that is the case of bad officers, treasurers, ambassadors, 

 generals, and other false and corrupt servants ; which set a bias upon 

 their bowl of their own petty ends and envies, to the overthrow of their 

 masters great and important affairs. And for the most part, the good 

 such servants receive, is after the model of their own fortune ; out the 

 hurt they sell for that good, is after the model of their master s fortune. 

 And certainly it is the nature of extreme self-lovers, as they wiii set an 

 house on fire, and it were but to roast their eggs : and yet these men 

 many times hold credit with their masters, because their study is but 

 to please them, and profit themselves : and for either respect they will 

 abandon the good of their affairs. 



Wisdom for a man s self is in many branches thereof a depraved 

 thing. It is the wisdom of rats, that will be sure to leave a house 

 somewhat before it fall. It is the wisdom of the fox, that thrusts out 

 the badger, who digged and made room for him. It is the wisdom of 

 crocodiles, that shed tears when they would devour. Bat that which 

 is specially to be noted is, that those which, as Cicero says of Pompey, 

 are &quot; sui amantes sine rivale,&quot; are many times unfortunate. And 

 whereas they have all their time sacrificed to themselves, they become 

 in the end themselves sacrifices to the inconstancy of fortune, whose 

 wings they thought by their self-wisdom to have pinioned. 



XXIV. OF INNOVATIONS. 



As the births of living creatures at first are ill shapen ; so are all 

 innovations, which are the births of time. Yet notwithstanding as 

 those that first bring honour into their family, are commonly more 

 worthy than most that succeed : so the first precedent, if it be good, 

 is seldom attained by imitation. For ill, to man s nature, as it stands 

 perverted, hath a natural motion strongest in continuance : but good, 

 as a forced motion, strongest at first. Surely every medicine is an 

 innovation, and he that will not apply new remedies, must expect new 

 evils ; for time is the greatest innovator : and if time of course alter 

 things to the worse, and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to 

 the better, what shall be the end ? It is true, that what is settled by 

 custom, though it be not good, yet at least it is fit. And those things 

 which have long gone together, are, as it were, confederate within 

 themselves : whereas new things piece not so well ; but though they 

 help by their utility, yet they trouble by their inconformity. Besides, 

 they are like strangers, more admired, and less favoured. All this is 

 true if time stood still ; which contrariwise moveth so round, that a 

 froward retention of custom is as turbulent a thing as an innovation : 

 and they that reverence too much old times are but a scorn to the 

 new. It were good therefore, that men in their innovations would 

 follow the example of time itself, which indeed innovateth greatly, but 



