Page:Essays Vol 1 (Ives, 1925).pdf/100

80 great number killed themselves: ferox gens nullam vitam rati sine armis esse. (b) How many men we know who have fled from the enjoyment of a quiet life in their own house, among their acquaintance, to seek the frightfulness of uninhabitable deserts, and who have cast themselves into abjection and degradation and the world’s contempt, and have delighted therein, even in preference to all else. Cardinal Borromeo, who died recently at Milan, maintained, in the midst of debauchery, to which his noble birth and his great wealth and the air of Italy and his youth all invited him, a mode of life so vigorous that he wore the same coat in winter as in summer, had nothing but straw for his bed, and passed what hours remained to him after discharging the duties of his office in constant study, resting on his knees, with a little bread and water beside his book, which was all that he had to eat and all the time that he gave to eating. I know some men who have derived both profit and advancement from cuckoldry, of which the mere name frightens so many persons. If sight be not the most necessary of our senses, it is certainly the most agreeable; but the most agreeable and useful of our members seem to be those which serve the purpose of generation; and yet many persons have held them in mortal hatred solely for the reason that they were too delightful, and have rejected them because of their value. So opined of his eyes the man who put them out.

(c) The greater number and most healthy-minded among men consider it great good fortune to have an abundance of children; I and some others consider the lack of them equally good fortune. And when some one asks Thales why he does not marry, he replies that he does not desire to leave any descendants of himself. That our opinion gives their value to things is seen by those, many in number, which we do not regard solely by themselves in estimating them, but