Page:Plutarch - Moralia, translator Holland, 1911.djvu/175



[ this treatise a man may see the excellent discourses and most sound arguments of moral philosophy; the scope whereof is to make the scholars and students therein resolute, and to keep them from wavering and tottering to and fro; notwithstanding that either the sky were ready to fall upon their heads, or the earth to chink and open under their feet. True it is, that in this place Plutarch sheweth sufficiently what blindness there is in human wisdom, when the question is to pronounce and speak precisely, Wherein consisteth true repose and assured felicity? For to teach a man whom he calleth virtuous, to search for contentment and quiet rest in his own reason, were as much as to fetch light out of darkness and life out of death itself. And therefore (for this time) needless it is to treat long upon this point, considering that we mind not to dispute or declare how insufficient human learning and philosophy is, in comparison of true divinity and theology. For the present this may suffice, that seeing he was no better than a pagan who hath disputed of this theme, let us receive both this discourse and other such, wherein he endeavoureth to withdraw us from vice, and bring us unto virtue, as written and penned by a man, guided and conducted by a dim and dark light: in which notwithstanding appear certain sparks of the truth, which as they are not able to shew the way sufficiently, so they give them to understand, who be far remote from the true light, how miserable and wretched they are every way. Proved he had before, that flattery, choler, and curiosity are vices that overturn the soul upside down, and transport it so far off that it is not at home, nor mistress of herself: and after he had taught how a man might reclaim and reduce her again to her own house, lie treateth now of those means whereby she may be kept quiet, peaceable, joyous and contented within. For the effecting hereof, it the very entry of this treatise, he proposeth one expedient mean to attain thereto, requiring that a man should fortify and defend his mind with reasons against the evils and dangers to come: then he confuteth the Epicureans, who for to set a man in peace, would make him blockish, senseless, and good for nothing: he answereth likewise to those who are of opinion that a man may find a certain and of vacation and impassibility without all trouble and molestation: which done, he sheweth that reason well ruled and ordered as the foundation and ground of our tranquillity: and all in one and the same train, he teacheth how a man may be furnished and assisted with this reason. Having thus sufficiently in general terms discoursed of these premises, he doth particularise and decipher