Discoveries and Some Poems | Page 2

heart, An inward comeliness of bounty, knowledge, And spirit that may
conform them actually To God's high figures, which they have in
power."
Ben Jonson's genius was producing its best work in the earlier years of
the reign of James I. His Volpone, the Silent Woman, and the
Alchemist first appeared side by side with some of the ripest works of
Shakespeare in the years from 1605 to 1610. In the latter part of
James's reign he produced masques for the Court, and turned with

distaste from the public stage. When Charles I. became king, Ben
Jonson was weakened in health by a paralytic stroke. He returned to the
stage for a short time through necessity, but found his best friends in
the best of the young poets of the day. These looked up to him as their
father and their guide. Their own best efforts seemed best to them when
they had won Ben Jonson's praise. They valued above all passing
honours man could give the words, "My son," in the old poet's greeting,
which, as they said, "sealed them of the tribe of Ben."
H. M.

SYLVA

Rerum et sententiarum quasi "[Greek text] dicta a multiplici materia et
varietate in iis contenta. Quemadmodum enim vulgo solemus infinitam
arborum nascentium indiscriminatim multitudinem Sylvam dicere: ita
etiam libros suos in quibus variae et diversae materiae opuscula temere
congesta erant, Sylvas appellabant antiqui: Timber-trees.

TIMBER; OR, DISCOVERIES MADE UPON MEN AND MATTER,
AS THEY HAVE FLOWED OUT OF HIS DAILY READINGS, OR
HAD THEIR REFLUX TO HIS PECULIAR NOTION OF THE
TIMES.
Tecum habita, ut noris quam sit tibi curta supellex {11} PERS. Sat. 4.

Fortuna.--Ill fortune never crushed that man whom good fortune
deceived not. I therefore have counselled my friends never to trust to
her fairer side, though she seemed to make peace with them; but to
place all things she gave them, so as she might ask them again without
their trouble, she might take them from them, not pull them: to keep
always a distance between her and themselves. He knows not his own
strength that hath not met adversity. Heaven prepares good men with
crosses; but no ill can happen to a good man. Contraries are not mixed.
Yet that which happens to any man may to every man. But it is in his
reason, what he accounts it and will make it.
Casus.--Change into extremity is very frequent and easy. As when a
beggar suddenly grows rich, he commonly becomes a prodigal; for, to

obscure his former obscurity, he puts on riot and excess.
Consilia.--No man is so foolish but may give another good counsel
sometimes; and no man is so wise but may easily err, if he will take no
others' counsel but his own. But very few men are wise by their own
counsel, or learned by their own teaching. For he that was only taught
by himself {12} had a fool to his master.
Fama.--A Fame that is wounded to the world would be better cured by
another's apology than its own: for few can apply medicines well
themselves. Besides, the man that is once hated, both his good and his
evil deeds oppress him. He is not easily emergent.
Negotia.--In great affairs it is a work of difficulty to please all. And
ofttimes we lose the occasions of carrying a business well and
thoroughly by our too much haste. For passions are spiritual rebels, and
raise sedition against the understanding.
Amor patriae.--There is a necessity all men should love their country:
he that professeth the contrary may be delighted with his words, but his
heart is there.
Ingenia.--Natures that are hardened to evil you shall sooner break than
make straight; they are like poles that are crooked and dry, there is no
attempting them.
Applausus.--We praise the things we hear with much more willingness
than those we see, because we envy the present and reverence the past;
thinking ourselves instructed by the one, and overlaid by the other.
Opinio.--Opinion is a light, vain, crude, and imperfect thing; settled in
the imagination, but never arriving at the understanding, there to obtain
the tincture of reason. We labour with it more than truth. There is much
more holds us than presseth us. An ill fact is one thing, an ill fortune is
another; yet both oftentimes sway us alike, by the error of our thinking.
Impostura.--Many men believe not themselves what they would
persuade others; and less do the things which they would impose on
others; but least of all know what they themselves most confidently
boast. Only they set the sign of the cross over their outer doors, and
sacrifice to their gut and their groin in their inner closets.
Jactura vitae.--What a deal of cold business doth a man