Page:Plutarch - Moralia, translator Holland, 1911.djvu/370

348 supposition of theirs hath caused that this progress and proceeding to virtue, called Προκοπή, seemeth to be a dark and obscure riddle unto them, or a mere fiction little wanting of extreme folly; and those who by the means of this amendment be delivered from all passions and vices that be, are held thereby to be in no better state, nor less wretched and miserable, than those who are not free from any one of the most enormous vices in the world; and yet they refute and condemn their own selves; for in the disputations which they hold in their schools they set the injustice of Aristides in equal balance to that of Phalaris; they make the cowardice and fear of Brasides all one with that of Dolon; yea, and compare the folly or error of Miletus and Plato together, as in no respect different; howbeit, in the whole course of their life and management of their affairs they decline and avoid those as implacable and intractable; but these they use and trust in their most important business as persons of great worth and regard: but we who know and see that in every kind of sin or vice, but principally in the inordinate and confused state of the soul, there be degrees according to more or less; and that herein differ our proceedings and amendments, according as reason by little and little doth illuminate, purge, and cleanse the soul in abating and diminishing evermore the viciosity thereof, which is the shadow that darkeneth it, are likewise fully persuaded that it is not without reason to be assured that men may have an evident sense and perceivance of this mutation, but as if they were raised out of some deep and dark pit, that the same amendment may be reckoned by degrees in what order it goeth forward. In which computation we may go first and foremost directly after this manner, and consider whether, like as they who under sail set their course in the main and vast ocean, by observing together with the length and space of time, the force of the wind that driveth them, do cast and measure how far they have gone forward in their voyage, namely, by a probable conjecture how much in such a time and with such a gale of wind it is like that they may pass; so also in philosophy a man may give a guess and conjecture of his proceeding and going forward, namely, what he may gain by continual marching on still, without stay or intermission otherwhiles in the midst of the way, and then beginning afresh again to leap forward, but always keeping one pace, gaining and getting ground still by the guidance of reason. For this rule: