men of their Nobility shall find ease 19 in employing them, and a better slide into their business;20 for people naturally bend to them as born in some sort to command. I. NOTES ON ESSAY XIV. ‘estatə’—¿.e. state, constitution; the general body politic; or, as we say, 'the state.' Cf. the common expression, 'Church and State." 2. 'attempers'-modifies, moderates. The nobles being nearer in degree to the monarch than other subjects are, the monarchy is less likely to become a despotism. 3. 'stirps'-families, races; literally stems, stocks (Latin stirps, stirpis). Bacon uses the Latin word without any alteration, except that he here makes it plural. 4. flags'-armorial bearings; the arms of noble houses. 5. pedigree '-descent, lineage, line of ancestors. The word is a corruption of the French par degrés, by degrees, pedigree really being a genealogical table showing in all their degrees the relationships of the members of a family. 6. utility. ... respects.' Their object as a nation is to secure and advance the common interests (‘utility'), and not personal considerations ('respects'), i.e. to favour and enrich certain privileged individuals in the state. 7. consultations are more indifferent.' The deliberations and decisions (of the government) are more impartial (in those states in which all men are upon an equal footing) than in countries where the government is in the hands of one class. Cf. Truly and indifferently minister justice'—Prayer for Church militant in Communion Service. 8. 'diminisheth power'-puts a check upon the power of the sovereign, and prevents his authority from becoming arbitrary. 9. too great for sovereignty nor for justice -so powerful as to be beyond the control of the king, and out of the reach of the laws. 6 The Dukes of Burgundy and Brittany were often too powerful to be submissive to the French king. In Scotch history, when Bothwell was tried for the murder of Lord Darnley, he came to the court with such a number of armed attendants, that an impartial and just trial was an impossibility. 10. broken upon them '-spend its whole force upon the nobles, and thus lose itself before reaching the sovereign. II. 'surcharge '-overcharge, great expense, overload. To sur charge is still the legal term used to denote the putting of more cattle to graze on a common than the commoner has a right to, or more than the herbage will sustain, 12. The prefix sur is merely the Latin super, shortened in passage through the French, as in surcease, surface, surname, surfeit, surmount, survey, surprise, surrender, etc. disproportion between honour and means.' In the reign of Edward IV, George Neville, Duke of Bedford, was degraded from his noble rank because his means were adjudged too poor to support his dignity. 13. 'weathers'-winds, tempests. So also weather-cock, to indicate the direction of the wind; weather-board, for the windward side of a ship; the weather of a windmill, i.e. the obliquity of its sail. In weather-bow, weather-brace, weather-helm, and most other nautical terms in which it occurs, weather denotes wholly or chiefly the wind. 14. 15. 'more virtuous but less innocent'-having more of the 16. remain. Subjunctive mood: the indicative would be remains. 17. motions of envy'-incitements to envy. So in the PrayerBook: We may ever obey Thy godly motions.' 'Let a good man obey every good motion rising in his heart, knowing that every such motion proceeds from God'-SOUTH. We have a trace of the same use of the word in emotion, and in the verb to move, for to arouse, to excite. 18. passive envy '-i.e. being envied. 19. ease '-help, ease from difficulty or labour. 20. 'better slide into their business'-gentler and safer means for maintaining their authority and carrying on their govern ment. ANALYSIS OF ESSAY XIV. I. Nobility as part of an estate: 1. Its effects are beneficial in (a.) Modifying the power of a sovereign. (b.) Making government peaceful and respected. The peace and contentment of democracies is produced by (1.) Self-interest (Swiss). (2.) Impartiality (Netherlands). 2. Its effects are detrimental in (a.) Danger of becoming too powerful for justice. II. Nobility in reference to individuals: 1. An old nobility is venerable. 2. Nobility induces virtue in descendants, though it may have been attained originally through crime. 3. It gives occasion for envy by- (b.) The advance of inferiors. 4. It renders nobles less liable to be envied. 5. Common people naturally obey men of noble birth. XV. OF SEDITIONS AND TROUBLES. (1625) SHEPHERDS of people had need know the Calendars1 of tempests in state, which are commonly greatest when things grow to equality;2 as natural tempests are greatest about the equinoctia; and as there are certain hollow blasts of wind and secret swellings of seas before a tempest, so are there in states: 'Ille etiam cæcos instare tumultus Sæpe monet, fraudesque et operta tumescere bella.'4 Libels and licentious discourses against the state, when they are frequent and open; and in like sort false news, often running up and down, to the disadvantage of the state, and hastily embraced, are amongst the signs of troubles. Virgil, giving the pedigree of Fame, saith she was sister to the giants: 'Illam Terra parens, irâ irritata Deorum, Extremam (ut perhibent) Coeo Enceladoque sororem As if fames 6 were the relics of Seditions past; but they are no less indeed the preludes of Seditions to come. Howsoever he noteth it right, that seditious tumults and seditious fames differ no more but as brother and sister, masculine and feminine; especially if it come to that, that the best actions of a state, and the most plausible, and which ought to give greatest contentment, are taken in ill sense and traduced:8 for that shows the envy great, as Tacitus saith, 'Conflatâ magna invidiâ, seu bene, seu male, gesta premunt.'9 Neither doth it follow, that because these fames are a sign of troubles, that 10 the suppressing of them with too much severity should be a remedy of troubles; for the despising of them many times checks them best, and the going about 11 to stop them doth but make a wonder long-lived. Also that kind of obedience, which Tacitus speaketh of, is to be held suspected: 'Erant in officio, sed tamen qui mallent imperantium mandata interpretari, quam exsequi;' 12 disputing, excusing, cavilling upon mandates and directions, is a kind of shaking off the yoke, and assay 13 of disobedience; especially if in those disputings they which are for 14 the direction speak fearfully and tenderly, and those that are against it audaciously. Also, as Machiavel noteth well, when princes, that ought to be common parents,15 make themselves as a party, and lean to a side, it is as a boat that is overthrown by uneven weight on the one side; as was well seen in the time of Henry the Third of France; for first himself entered League 16 for the extirpation of the Protestants, and presently after the same League was turned upon himself: for when the authority of princes is made but an accessary 17 to a cause, and that there be other bands 18 that tie faster than the band of sovereignty, kings begin to be put almost out of possession. Also, when discords, and quarrels, and factions, are carried openly and audaciously, it is a sign the reverence of government is lost; for the motions of the greatest persons in a government ought to be as the motions of the planets under 'primum mobile,' 19 according to the 20 of them is carried old opinion, which is, that every swiftly by the highest motion, and softly in their own motion; and therefore, when great ones in their own particular motion move violently, and as Tacitus expresseth it well, liberius quam ut imperantium meminissent,' ,'21 it is a sign the orbs are out of frame: for reverence is that wherewith princes are girt from God, who threateneth the dissolving thereof;22 Solvam cingula regum.' So when any of the four pillars of government are mainly shaken or weakened (which are Religion, Justice, Counsel, and Treasure), men had need to pray for fair weather. But let us pass from this part of predictions (concerning which, nevertheless, more light 23 may be taken from that which followeth), and let us speak first of the materials of Seditions; then of the motives of them; and thirdly of the remedies. Concerning the materials of Seditions, it is a thing well to be considered; for the surest way to prevent Seditions (if the times do bear it 24) is to take away the matter of them; for if there be fuel prepared, it is hard to tell whence the spark shall come that shall set it on fire. The matter of Seditions is of two kinds; much poverty and much discontentment. It is certain-so many overthrown estates, so many votes for troubles.25 Lucan noteth well the state of Rome before the civil war: 'Hinc usura vorax, rapidumque in tempore foenus, : This same 'multis utile bellum' is an assured and infallible sign of a state disposed to Seditions and Troubles; and if this poverty and broken estate in the better sort be joined with a want and necessity in the mean people, the danger is imminent and great: for the rebellions of the belly 27 are the worst. As for discontentments, they are in the politic body like to humours in the natural, which are apt to gather a preternatural heat and to inflame; and let no prince measure the danger of them by this-whether they be just or unjust for that were to imagine people to be too reasonable, who do often spurn at their own good; nor yet by this, whether the griefs whereupon they rise 28 be in fact great or small; for they are the most dangerous discontentments where the fear is greater than the feeling: Dolendi modus, timendi non item;' 29 besides, in great oppressions, the same things. that provoke the patience, do withal mate 30 the courage; but in fears it is not so; neither let any prince or state be secure 31 concerning discontentments, because they have been often, or have been long, and yet no peril hath ensued for as it is true that every vapour or fume doth not turn into a storm, so it is nevertheless true that |