The Advancement of Learning
apply, and accommodate the will of man thereunto.
(4) The doctrine touching the platform or nature of good considereth it
either simple or compared; either the kinds of good, or the degrees of
good; in the latter whereof those infinite disputatious which were
touching the supreme degree thereof, which they term felicity, beatitude,
or the highest good, the doctrines concerning which were as the heathen
divinity, are by the Christian faith discharged. And as Aristotle saith,
“That young men may be happy, but not otherwise but by hope;” so we must
all acknowledge our minority, and embrace the felicity which is by hope
of the future world.
(5) Freed therefore and delivered from this doctrine of the philosopher’s
heaven, whereby they feigned a higher elevation of man’s nature than was
(for we see in what height of style Seneca writeth, _Vere magnum_,
_habere fragilitatem hominis_, _securitatem Dei_), we may with more
sobriety and truth receive the rest of their inquiries and labours.
Wherein for the nature of good positive or simple, they have set it down
excellently in describing the forms of virtue and duty, with their
situations and postures; in distributing them into their kinds, parts,
provinces, actions, and administrations, and the like: nay further, they
have commended them to man’s nature and spirit with great quickness of
argument and beauty of persuasions; yea, and fortified and entrenched
them (as much as discourse can do) against corrupt and popular opinions.
Again, for the degrees and comparative nature of good, they have also
excellently handled it in their triplicity of good, in the comparisons
between a contemplative and an active life, in the distinction between
virtue with reluctation and virtue secured, in their encounters between
honesty and profit, in their balancing of virtue with virtue, and the
like; so as this part deserveth to be reported for excellently laboured.
(6) Notwithstanding, if before they had come to the popular and received
notions of virtue and vice, pleasure and pain, and the rest, they had
stayed a little longer upon the inquiry concerning the roots of good and
evil, and the strings of those roots, they had given, in my opinion, a
great light to that which followed; and specially if they had consulted
with nature, they had made their doctrines less prolix and more profound:
which being by them in part omitted and in part handled with much
confusion, we will endeavour to resume and open in a more clear manner.
(7) There is formed in everything a double nature of good—the one, as
everything is a total or substantive in itself; the other, as it is a
part or member of a greater body; whereof the latter is in degree the
greater and the worthier, because it tendeth to the conservation of a
more general form. Therefore we see the iron in particular sympathy
moveth to the loadstone; but yet if it exceed a certain quantity, it
forsaketh the affection to the loadstone, and like a good patriot moveth
to the earth, which is the region and country of massy bodies; so may we
go forward, and see that water and massy bodies move to the centre of the
earth; but rather than to suffer a divulsion in the continuance of
nature, they will move upwards from the centre of the earth, forsaking
their duty to the earth in regard of their duty to the world. This
double nature of good, and the comparative thereof, is much more engraven
upon man, if he degenerate not, unto whom the conservation of duty to the
public ought to be much more precious than the conservation of life and
being; according to that memorable speech of Pompeius Magnus, when being
in commission of purveyance for a famine at Rome, and being dissuaded
with great vehemency and instance by his friends about him, that he
should not hazard himself to sea in an extremity of weather, he said only
to them, _Necesse est ut eam_, _non ut vivam_. But it may be truly
affirmed that there was never any philosophy, religion, or other
discipline, which did so plainly and highly exalt the good which is
communicative, and depress the good which is private and particular, as
the Holy Faith; well declaring that it was the same God that gave the
Christian law to men, who gave those laws of nature to inanimate
creatures that we spake of before; for we read that the elected saints of
God have wished themselves anathematised and razed out of the book of
life, in an ecstasy of charity and infinite feeling of communion.
(8) This being set down and strongly planted, doth judge and determine
most of the controversies wherein moral philosophy is conversant. For
first, it decideth the question touching the preferment of the
contemplative or active life, and decideth it against Aristotle. For all
the reasons which he bringeth for the contemplative are private, and
respecting the pleasure and dignity of a man’s self (in which respects no
question the contemplative life hath the pre-eminence), not much unlike
to that comparison which Pythagoras made for the gracing and magnifying
of philosophy and contemplation, who being asked what he was, answered,
“That if Hiero were ever at the Olympian games, he knew the manner, that
some came to try their fortune for the prizes, and some came as merchants
to utter their commodities, and some came to make good cheer and meet
their friends, and some came to look on; and that he was one of them that
came to look on.” But men must know, that in this theatre of man’s life
it is reserved only for God and angels to be lookers on. Neither could
the like question ever have been received in the Church, notwithstanding
their _Pretiosa in oculis Domini mors sanctorum ejus_, by which place
they would exalt their civil death and regular professions, but upon this
defence, that the monastical life is not simple contemplative, but
performeth the duty either of incessant prayers and supplications, which
hath been truly esteemed as an office in the Church, or else of writing
or taking instructions for writing concerning the law of God, as Moses
did when he abode so long in the mount. And so we see Enoch, the seventh
from Adam, who was the first contemplative and walked with God, yet did
also endow the Church with prophecy, which Saint Jude citeth. But for
contemplation which should be finished in itself, without casting beams
upon society, assuredly divinity knoweth it not.
(9) It decideth also the controversies between Zeno and Socrates, and
their schools and successions, on the one side, who placed felicity in
virtue simply or attended, the actions and exercises whereof do chiefly
embrace and concern society; and on the other side, the Cyrenaics and
Epicureans, who placed it in pleasure, and made virtue (as it is used in
some comedies of errors, wherein the mistress and the maid change habits)
to be but as a servant, without which pleasure cannot be served and
attended; and the reformed school of the Epicureans, which placed it in
serenity of mind and freedom from perturbation; as if they would have
deposed Jupiter again, and restored Saturn and the first age, when there
was no summer nor winter, spring nor autumn, but all after one air and
season; and Herillus, which placed felicity in extinguishment of the
disputes of the mind, making no fixed nature of good and evil, esteeming
things according to the clearness of the desires, or the reluctation;
which opinion was revived in the heresy of the Anabaptists, measuring
things according to the motions of the spirit, and the constancy or
wavering of belief; all which are manifest to tend to private repose and
contentment, and not to point of society.
(10) It censureth also the philosophy of Epictetus, which presupposeth
that felicity must be placed in those things which are in our power, lest
we be liable to fortune and disturbance; as if it were not a thing much
more happy to fail in good and virtuous ends for the public, than to
obtain all that we can wish to ourselves in our proper fortune: as
Consalvo said to his soldiers, showing them Naples, and protesting he had
rather die one foot forwards, than to have his life secured for long by
one foot of retreat. Whereunto the wisdom of that heavenly leader hath
signed, who hath affirmed that “a good conscience is a continual feast;”
showing plainly that the conscience of good intentions, howsoever
succeeding, is a more continual joy to nature than all the provision
which can be made for security and repose.
(11) It censureth likewise that abuse of philosophy which grew general
about the time of Epictetus, in converting it into an occupation or
profession; as if the purpose had been, not to resist and extinguish
perturbations, but to fly and avoid the causes of them, and to shape a
particular kind and course of life to that end; introducing such a health
of mind, as was that health of body of which Aristotle speaketh of
Herodicus, who did nothing all his life long but intend his health;
whereas if men refer themselves to duties of society, as that health of
body is best which is ablest to endure all alterations and extremities,
so likewise that health of mind is most proper which can go through the
greatest temptations and perturbations. So as Diogenes’ opinion is to be
accepted, who commended not them which abstained, but them which
sustained, and could refrain their mind _in præcipitio_, and could give
unto the mind (as is used in horsemanship) the shortest stop or turn.
(12) Lastly, it censureth the tenderness and want of application in some
of the most ancient and reverend philosophers and philosophical men, that
did retire too easily from civil business, for avoiding of indignities
and perturbations; whereas the resolution of men truly moral ought to be
such as the same Consalvo said the honour of a soldier should be, _e telâ
crassiore_, and not so fine as that everything should catch in it and
endanger it.
XXI. (1) To resume private or particular good, it falleth into the
division of good active and passive; for this difference of good (not
unlike to that which amongst the Romans was expressed in the familiar or
household terms of _promus_ and _condus_) is formed also in all things,
and is best disclosed in the two several appetites in creatures; the one
to preserve or continue themselves, and the other to dilate or multiply
themselves, whereof the latter seemeth to be the worthier; for in nature
the heavens, which are the more worthy, are the agent, and the earth,
which is the less worthy, is the patient. In the pleasures of living
creatures, that of generation is greater than that of food. In divine
doctrine, _beatius est dare quam accipere_. And in life, there is no
man’s spirit so soft, but esteemeth the effecting of somewhat that he
hath fixed in his desire, more than sensuality, which priority of the
active good is much upheld by the consideration of our estate to be
mortal and exposed to fortune. For if we might have a perpetuity and
certainty in our pleasures, the state of them would advance their price.
But when we see it is but _magni æstimamus mori tardius_, and _ne
glorieris de crastino_, _nescis partum diei_, it maketh us to desire to
have somewhat secured and exempted from time, which are only our deeds
and works; as it is said, _Opera eorum sequuntur eos_. The pre-eminence
likewise of this active good is upheld by the affection which is natural
in man towards variety and proceeding, which in the pleasures of the
sense, which is the principal part of passive good, can have no great
latitude. _Cogita quamdiu eadem feceris_; _cibus_, _somnus_, _ludus per
hunc circulum curritur_; _mori velle non tantum fortis_, _aut miser_,
_aut prudens_, _sed etiam fastidiosus potest_. But in enterprises,
pursuits, and purposes of life, there is much variety; whereof men are