An
exact judge of human blessings, of riches, honours, beauty, even of
wit itself, should pity the abuse of them more than the want.
Briefly, though a wise man could pass never so securely through the
great roads of human life, yet he will meet perpetually with so many
objects and occasions of compassion, grief, shame, anger, hatred,
indignation, and all passions but envy (for he will find nothing to
deserve that) that he had better strike into some private path; nay,
go so far, if he could, out of the common way, ut nec facta audiat
Pelopidarum; that he might not so much as hear of the actions of the
sons of Adam. But, whither shall we fly, then? into the deserts,
like the ancient hermits?
Qua terra patet fera regnat Erynnis.
In facinus jurasse putes.
One would think that all mankind had bound themselves by an oath to
do all the wickedness they can; that they had all, as the Scripture
speaks, sold themselves to sin: the difference only is, that some
are a little more crafty (and but a little, God knows) in making of
the bargain. I thought, when I went first to dwell in the country,
that without doubt I should have met there with the simplicity of
the old poetical golden age: I thought to have found no inhabitants
there, but such as the shepherds of Sir Philip Sidney in Arcadia, or
of Monsieur d'Urfe upon the banks of Lignon; and began to consider
with myself, which way I might recommend no less to posterity the
happiness and innocence of the men of Chertsey: but to confess the
truth, I perceived quickly, by infallible demonstrations, that I was
still in old England, and not in Arcadia, or La Forrest; that if I
could not content myself with anything less than exact fidelity in
human conversation, I had almost as good go back and seek for it in
the Court, or the Exchange, or Westminster Hall.
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