OF BOLDNESS.* It is a trivial grammar-school text, but yet worthy a wise man's consideration. Question was asked of Demosthenes what was the chief part of an orator? he answered, action: what next? action: what next again? action. He said it that knew it best, and had by nature himself no advantage in that he commended. A strange thing, that that part of an orator which is but superficial, and rather the virtue of a player, should be placed so high above those other noble parts of invention, elocution, and the rest; nay almost alone, as if it were all in all. But the reason is plain. There is in human nature generally more of the fool than of the wise; and therefore those faculties by which the foolish part of men's minds is taken, are most potent. Wonderful like is the case of boldness in civil business; what first? boldness: what second and third? boldness. † And yet boldness is a child of ignorance and baseness, far inferior *This essay comes very appropriately after the one "Of Great Place," for both are dedicated to the consideration of the one subject which so occupied the mind of Bacon, i. e. success in life. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, writing to Mr. Wortley Montagu, says: "Riches being another word for power, to the obtaining of which the first necessary qualification is impudence, and (as Demosthenes said of pronunciation [sic] in oratory) the second is impudence, and the third still impudence, no modest man ever did or ever will make his fortune."- Memoirs and Letters. Vol. I., 215. The coin of this impudence and boldness is current in a vicious market, where there "is generally more of the fool than the wise." The more a community advances in culture the less influence, power or success have the unblushing pretenders to merit. Bacon was himself of a timid nature, and was often embarrassed by the rude, overbearing boldness of Coke and others, and probably to other parts: but nevertheless, it doth fascinate, and bind hand and foot those that are either shallow in judgment or weak in courage, which are the greatest part: yea, and prevaileth with wise men at weak times: therefore we see it hath done wonders in popular States, but with senates and princes less; and more, ever upon the first entrance of bold persons into action than soon after; for boldness is an ill keeper of promise. Surely as there are mountebanks for the natural body, so are there mountebanks for the politic body; men that undertake great cures, and perhaps have been lucky in two or three experiments, but want the grounds of science, and therefore cannot hold out: nay, you shall see a bold fellow many times do Mahomet's miracle. Mahomet made the people believe that he would call a hill to him, and from the top of it offer up his prayers for the observers of his law. The people assembled: Mahomet called the hill to come to him again and again; and when the hill stood still, he was never a whit abashed, but said, "If the hill will not come to Mahomet, Mahomet will go to the hill." So these men, when they have promised great matters and failed most shamefully, yet (if they have the perfection of boldness) they will but slight it over, and make a turn, and no more ado. Certainly to men of great judgment, bold persons are a sport to behold; nay, and to the vulgar also boldness hath somewhat of the ridiculous: for if absurdity be the subject of laughter, doubt you not but great boldness is seldom without some absurdity; especially assigned to impudence more power as an aid to success than it possessed. Elsewhere he says: "Ostentation is rather a vice in manners than in policy. Not a few solid natures that want this ventosity are not without some prejudice and disadvantage.”—“Advancement of Learning." "Win power with craft, wear it with ostentation, For confidence is half security; Deluded men think boldness conscious strength, And grow the slaves of their own want of doubt." — Walpole, “Mysterious Mother,” Act I., sc. 3. it is a sport to see when a bold fellow is out of countenance, for that puts his face into a most shrunken and wooden posture as needs it must; for in bashfulness the spirits do a little go and come; but with bold men, upon like occasion, they stand at a stay; like a stale at chess, where it is no mate, but yet the game cannot stir: but this last were fitter for a satire than for a serious observation. This is well to be weighed, that boldness is ever blind; for it seeth not dangers and inconveniences: therefore it is ill in counsel, good in execution; so that the right use of bold persons is, that they never command in chief, but be seconds and under the direction of others; for in counsel it is good to see dangers, and in execution not to see them except they be very great. OF GOODNESS, AND GOODNESS OF NATURE. I take goodness in this sense, the affecting of the weal of men, which is that the Grecians call Philanthropia; and the word humanity (as it is used), is a little too light to express it. Goodness I call the habit, and goodness of nature the inclination. This of all virtues and dignities of the mind, is the greatest, being the character of the Deity: and without it man is a busy, mischievous, wretched thing, no better than a kind of vermin. Goodness answers to the theological virtue charity, and admits no excess but error. The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall: but in charity there is no excess, neither can angel or man come in danger by it. The inclination to goodness is imprinted deeply in the nature of man; insomuch, that if it issue not towards men, it will take unto other living creatures; as it is seen in the Turks, a cruel people, who nevertheless are kind to beasts, and give alms to dogs and birds; insomuch, 99 66 as Busbechius * reporteth, a Christian boy in Constantinople had like to have been stoned for gagging in a waggishness a long-billed fowl. Errors indeed, in this virtue, of goodness or charity, may be committed. The Italians have an ungracious proverb, " Tanto buon che val niente; so good, that he is good for nothing;" and one of the doctors of Italy, Nicholas Machiavel, † had the confidence to put in writing, almost in plain terms, "That the Christian faith had given up good men in prey to those that are tyrannical and unjust;" which he spake, because, indeed, there was never law or sect or opinion did so much magnify goodness as the Christian religion doth: therefore, to avoid the scandal and the danger both, it is good to take knowledge of the errors of a habit so excellent. Seek the good of other men, but be not in bondage to their faces or fancies; for that is but facility or softness, which taketh an honest mind prisNeither give thou Æsop's cock a gem, who would be better pleased and happier if he had had a barley-corn. The example of God teacheth the lesson truly: "He sendeth His rain, and maketh His sun to shine upon the just and the unjust; " but He doth not rain wealth, nor shine honour and virtues upon men equally: common benefits are to be communicated with all, but peculiar benefits with choice. And beware how in making the portraiture thou breakest the pattern: for divinity maketh the love of ourselves the pattern; the love of our neighbours but the portraiture: "Sell all thou hast and give it to the poor, and follow Me:" but sell not all thou hast except thou come and follow Me; that is, except thou have a vocation wherein thou mayest do as much good with little means as with great; for otherwise, in feeding the streams, thou driest the fountain. oner. Neither is there only a habit of goodness directed by * Native of Flanders, born 1522; was a great traveller. † A Florentine, author of "The Prince," and protégé of Cæsar Borgia. right reason; but there is in some men, even in nature, a disposition towards it; as, on the other side, there is a natural malignity: for there be that in their nature do not affect the good of others. The lighter sort of malignity turneth but to a crossness, or frowardness, or aptness to oppose, or difficileness,* or the like; but the deeper sort to envy, and mere mischief. Such men in other men's calamities, are, as it were, in séason, and are ever on the loading part: not so good as the dogs that licked Lazarus' sores, but like flies that are still buzzing upon anything that is raw; misanthropi, that maketh it their practice to bring men to the bough, and yet have never a tree for the purpose in their gardens, as Timon† had: such dispositions are the very errors of human nature, and yet they are the fittest timber to make great politics of; like to knee-timber, ‡ that is good for ships that are ordained to be tossed, but not for building houses that shall stand firm. The parts and signs of goodness are many. § If a man be gracious and courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world, and that his heart is no island cut off from other lands, but a continent that joins to them: if he be compassionate towards the afflictions of others, it shows that his heart is like the noble tree that is wounded itself when it gives the balm: || if he easily pardons and remits *Difficileness, i. e. stubbornness. † Timon of Athens, a typical misanthrope. Timber used in ship-building; so called because of its angular shape. §"Wealth may be courted, wisdom be revered, And beauty praised, and brutal strength be feared; - Mrs. Barbauld. This is the nature of gratitude and true thankfulness; for time, which knaws and diminisheth all things else, augments and increases benefits, because a noble action of liberality done to a man of reason doth grow continually by his generous thinking of it and remembering it." — Rabelais, Bk. I., ch. L. |