the lion, the fox would beguile thee: if thou wert the lamb, the fox would eat thee: if thou wert the fox, the lion would suspect thee, when peradventure thou wert accused by the ass.

(Tim. Ath. iv. 3, 300, 345.)

1445. Solon's law that in states every man should declare himself of one faction Neutralitye

Neither let them fear Solon's law, which compelled in factions every particular person to range himself on the one side; nor yet the fond calumny of neutrality; but let them know what is true which is said by a wise man, that neuters in contentions are neither better nor worse than either side.

(Controversies of the Church.) Like a neutral to his will and matter, did nothing.

One that's of a neutral heart. (Lear, iii. 7.)

(Ham. ii. 2.)

1446. Utinam esses calidus aut frigidus sed quoniam tepidus es eveniet ut te expuam ex ore meo.-Rev. iii. 16. Cleo. What was he sad or merry ?

Alex. Like to the time o' the year, between the extremes

Of hot and cold: he was nor sad nor merry.

Cleo. O well-divided disposition! (Ant. Cl. i. 5.)

(About one hundred passages about behaviour or speech too 'cold' or too hot.')

1447. Dixerunt fatui medium tenuere beati. (Fools have said, the blessed [or happy] have kept the mean.)

A smiling with a sigh, as if the sigh

Was that it was, for not being such a smile;
The smile mocking the sigh, that it would fly
From so divine a temple, to commix

With winds that sailors rail at. (Cymb. iv. 2.)

1448. Cujus origo occasio bona bonum: cujus mala malum. (That of which the origin is a good incident is itself good; that of which the origin is bad, is bad.)

The corruption of a blemished stock.1

Nature cannot choose his origin.

Oft it chances in particular men,

(R. III. iii. 7, 121 and 126.)

(Ham. i. 4.)

That for some vicious mole of nature in them,
As in their birth, wherein they are not guilty,

Since nature could not choose his origin,

That these men, carrying . . . the stamp of one defect,

Shall in the general censure take corruption

From that particular fault. (Ib. i. 5.)

Virtue cannot so innoculate our old stock, but we shall relish

of it. (Ib. iii. 1.)

That nature, which contemns its origin,

Cannot be border'd certain in itself. (Lear, iv. 2.)

She's such a one that, were I well assured

She came of gentle mind and noble stock,

I'd wish no better choice. (Per. v. 1.)

You recoil from your great stock. (Cymb. i. 7.)

O noble strain!

O worthiness of nature! breed of greatness!

Cowards, father, cowards, and base things, sire, base:
Nature hath meal and bran, contempt and grace. (Ib. iv. 2.)

O thou goddess,

Thou divine Nature, how thyself thou blazon'st

In these two princely boys. . . . 'Tis wonderful
That an invisible instinct should frame them
To royalty unlearned, honour untaught,
Civility not seen from other; valour,
That grows wildly in them, but yields a crop
As if it had been sow'd. (Ib.)

Nature shows above her breeding. (Ib. v. 2.)

There are also eighteen passages on the 'stock' from which persons and their virtues and vices were derived; but such passages in the early Plays seem to owe their origin to a different train of thought from the present entry.

(Temp. iv. 1; and see ib. i. 2, 320, 345-366.) (Compare Nos. 1449 to 1451.)

1449. Non tenet in ijs malis quæ vel mentem informant, vel affectum corrigunt sive resipicientiam (sic) inducendo sive necessitatem nec etiam in fortuitis. (It does not hold of those evils which either inform [shape] the mind or correct passion [by the application of necessity or by causing a man to come to himself] nor of casual things.)

To

You were used

say, extremities were triers of the spirits.
Fortune's blows,

When most struck home, being gentle-minded, craves
A noble cunning. (Cor. iv. 1.)

Hath brought me to thy hearth: not out of hope,
Mistake me not, to save my life.

Auf.

O Marcius, Marcius!

Each word thou hast spoke hath weeded from

A root of ancient envy.

...

O come; go in.

Cor.

my heart

You bless me, gods! (Cor. iv. 6.)

Time, force, and death,

Do to this body what extremes they can,

But the strong base and building of my love

Is as the

very centre of the earth,

Drawing all things to it. (Tr. Cr. iv. 2.)

Thou look'st

Like Patience, gazing on kings' graves, and smiling Extremity out of act. (Per. v. 1; Tw. N. ii. 4, 114, 115.)

1450. No man gathereth grapes of thornes nor figges

of thistells.'-Matt. vii. 16.

The royal tree hath left us royal fruit. (R. III. ii. 7.)
King Edward's fruit, truc heir to the English crown.

(3 Hen. VI. iv. 4; and ib. v. 6, 51, 52.)

There's one grape yet. I am sure your father drank wine.
But if thou be'st not an ass, I am a youth of fourteen.

Adoption strives with nature. (Tb. i. 2.) (See 2 Hen. VI. iii. 2, 213.)

(All's W. ii. 3.)

1451. The nature of everything is best consydered in the seed

There is a history in all men's lives

Figuring the nature of the times deceased,
The which observed, a man may prophesy

With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life, which, in their seeds

And weak beginnings lie intreasured.

Such things become the hatch and brood of time;
And by the necessary form of this

King Richard might create a perfect guess,
That great Northumberland, then false to him,
Would, of that seed, grow to a greater falseness.

(2 Hen. IV. iii. 2.)

If you can look into the seeds of time,
And say which grain will grow, and which will not,

Speak then to me.

Seeds and roots of

(Macb. i. 3.)

shame and iniquity.

(Per. iv. 6; and see M. M. i. 2, 93–97.)

1452. Primum mobile turnes about all the rest of the orbes

He maketh his lordship. to [be the primum mobile in every action. (Obsn. on a Libel, 1592.)

It is right It is a poor centre of a man's actions, himself. earth for that only stands upon his own centre; whereas all things

Is it possible to gather grapes of thornes, or figges of thistles, or to cause anything to strive against nature?-Lyly's Euphues, p. 42.

that have affinity with the heavens move upon the centre of another which they benefit. (Ess. Of Wisdom for a Man's Self.)

There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st

But in his motion like an angel sings,

Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubims.

Such harmony is in immortal souls. (Mer. Ven. v. 1.)

Will you

move in that obedient orb again,

Where you did give a fair and natural light? (1 H. IV. v. 1.)

1453. A good or yll foundačon

Then comes my fit again: I had else been perfect,
Whole as the marble, founded as the rock,

As broad and general as the casing air:

But now I am cabin'd, cribbed, confined, bound in
To saucy doubts and fears. (Macb. iii. 4.)

You may as well
Forbid the sea for to obey the moon,
As or by oath remove or counsel shake
The fabric of his folly, whose foundation
Is piled upon his faith, and will continue
The standing of his body. (Win. T. i. 2.)
If I mistake

In those foundations which I build upon,
The centre is not big enough to bear
A schoolboy's top. (Ib. ii. 1)

There is no foundation set on blood,

No certain life achieved by other's deed.

(John, iv. 1.)

A man that . . . hath founded his good fortunes on your love.

Were 't aught to me I bore the canopy,

Or laid great bases for eternity. (Sonn. cxxv.)

Foundations fly the wretched. (Cymb. iii. 6.)

(Oth. iii. 4.)

1454. Ex malis moribus bonæ leges. (Out of bad customs, good laws.)

(This and the five following entries contain the same idea, that good comes out of evil.)

1455. παθηματα μαθηματα. (Our sufferings are our schoolmasters.)