Gentleman of ours exceedingly subject to the gout, being instantly solicited by his physicians to leave all manner of salt meats, was wont to answer pleasantly that when the fits or pangs of the disease took him, he would have somebody to quarrel with, and that, crying and cursing, now against Bologna sausage and sometimes by railing against salted meat, tongues, and gammons of bacon, he found some ease.
But in good earnest, even as the arm being lifted up to strike, if the stroke hit not but fall void, we feel some pain in it, and many times strike it out of joint; and that to yield our sight pleasant, it must not be lost and dispersed in the vast air, but ought rather to have a limited bound to sustain it by a reasonable distance. “Ventus ut amittit vires, nisi robore densus/ Occurrant silvae, spatio diffasus inani” — Lucan, 1. iii. 362.
As winds in empty air diffused, strength loses unless thick, old-grown woods their strength opposes. So it seems that the soul, moved and tossed, if she has not some hold to take, loses itself in itself and must ever be stored with some object on which it can light and work. Plutarch says fitly of those affectionate to themselves with monkeys and little dogs that the loving part, which is in us, for want of a lawful hold, rather than it will be idle, does forge a false and frivolous hold unto itself.
And we see that the soul in her passions does rather deceive herself by framing a false and fantastical subject unto itself, yea against her own conceit, than not to work upon something. So does their own rage transport beasts to set upon the stone or weapon that has hurt them; yea, and sometimes with ireful teeth to revenge themselves against themselves for the hurt or smart they feel.
“Pannonis haud aliter post utum saevior ursa/ Cui jaculum parva Lybis amentavit habena,/ Se rotat in vulnus, telumque irata receptum/ Impetit, et secum fugientem circuit hastam” — Lucan, lib. vi. 220. Even so, the wound-enraged Austrian bear, on whom a Moor has thrilled his slinged spear, wheels on her wound and raging bites the dart, circling that flies with her and cannot part. What causes do we not invent for the crosses that happen to us, be it right or wrong? What do we not take hold of to have something to strive with?
It is not the golden locks thou tearest, nor the whiteness of the breast which thou, through vexation, so cruelly dost smite, that have by means of an unlucky bullet lost thy dear-beloved brother. On something else shouldst thou wreak thyself. Livius, speaking of the Roman army in Spain after the loss of two great captains who were brothers, wrote, “Flere omnes repente, et offensare capita” (“They all wept and often beat their heads”). It is an ordinary custom, and the philosopher Byon was very pleasant with the king that, for grief, tore his hair, when he said, “Does this man think that baldness will assuage his grief? Who has not seen someone chew and swallow cards, and well-nigh choke themselves with balls of dice, only to be revenged for the loss of some money?” Xerxes whipped the sea and wrote a cartel of defiance to the hill Athos. Cyrus, for many days together, amused his whole army to be revenged of the river Gyndus for the fear he took passing over the same. Caligula caused a very fair house to be defaced for the pleasure his mother had received in the same.
When I was young, my countrymen were wont to say that one of our neighbour Kings, having received a blow at God’s hand, swore to be revenged on him and ordained that for ten years’ space, no man should pray unto him, nor speak of him, nor, so long as he were in authority, believe in him. By which report, they do not so much publish the foolishness as the ambitious glory peculiar unto that nation of whom it was spoken. They are vices that ever go together. But, in truth, such actions incline rather unto self-conceit than to fondness.
Augustus Caesar, having been beaten by a tempest on the sea, defied the god Neptune. In the celebration of the Circensian games, so he might be avenged on him, he caused his image to be removed from out the place where it stood amongst the other gods. Herein he is also less excusable than the former, and less than he was afterward, when having lost a battle under Quintilius Varus in Germany, all in a rage and desperate, he went up and down beating his head against the walls, mainly crying out, “Oh! Varus, restore me my soldiers again.” For those exceed all folly inasmuch as impiety is joined unto it that will wreak themselves against God or fortune, as if she had ears subject to our battery. This is in imitation of the Thracians who, when it lightens or thunders, begin with a Titanian revenge to shoot against heaven, thinking by shooting of arrows to draw God to some reason.
Now, as that ancient poet in Plutarch says, “Point ne se faut corroucer aux affaires, Il ne leur chaut de toutes noz coleres” (“We ought not angry be at what God doth, For he cares not who bears an angry tooth”). But we shall never rail enough against the disorder and unruliness of our mind.
