Page:Plutarch - Moralia, translator Holland, 1911.djvu/268

246 their understanding, in prattlers they void away and run out presently, and afterwards they go up and down like empty vessels, void of sense and full of sound.

Well, as incurable as such seem to be, yet if it may be thought available to leave no experiment untried for to do such good, we may begin our cure, and say thus unto a busy prattler:

But among the rest these be the two chief and principal, namely: to hear and to be heard; of which twain our importunate talkers can attain neither the one nor the other, so unhappy they are as to be frustrate of that which they so much desire. As for other passions and maladies of the soul, namely, avarice, ambition, love, and voluptuousness, they do all of them in some sort enjoy their desire; but the thing that troubleth and tormenteth these babbling fellows most is this: That seeking for audience so much as they do, and nothing more, they can never meet with it, but every man shunneth their company, and flieth away as fast as his legs will carry him; for whether men be set together in a knot, sadly talking in their round chairs, or walking in company, let them espy one of these prattlers coming toward them, away they go every one, that a man would say the retreat were sounded, so quickly they retire. And like as when in some assembly, if all be hushed on a sudden so as there is not a word, we use to say that Mercury is come among them; even so when a prating fool entereth into a place where friends are either set at the board to make merry, or otherwise met together in counsel, every man straightways is silent and holdeth his peace, as being unwilling to minister occasion unto him of talk; but if himself begin first to open his lips, up they rise all and are soon gone, as mariners suspecting and doubting by the whistling northern wind from the top of craggy rocks and promontories, some rough sea, and fearing to be stomach-sick, retire betimes into a bay for harbour: whereby it cometh to pass also, that neither at a supper can he meet with guests willing to eat and drink with him, nor yet companions to lodge with him, either in journey by land, or voyage by sea, unless it be by constraint. For so importunate he is always that one while he is ready to hang upon a man's cloak wheresoever he goes, another while he takes hold on the side of his beard, as if he knocked at the door with his hand to force him to speak; in which case well fare a good pair of legs, for they are worth