Page:Plutarch - Moralia, translator Holland, 1911.djvu/78

56 that is foul and ill-favoured be borne in hand that he is fair and beautiful, or one of small and low stature made believe that he is goodly and tall; he neither continueth long in this his error, neither is the damage that he sustaineth thereby grievous and great, nor unrecoverable: but the praises which induce and inure a man to believe that vice is virtue, insomuch that he is nothing at all discontented in his sin and grieved therefore, but rather taketh pleasure therein: those also which take away from us all shame and abashment to commit faults; such were they that brought the Sicihans to ruin, and gave them occasion to beautify or colour the tyranny and cruelty of Denys and Phalaris with the goodly names of justice and hatred of wickedness: These were the overthrow of Egypt, in cloaking the effeminate wantonness, the furious superstition, the yelling noises after a fanatical manner of King Ptolemseus, together with the marks that he carried of lilies and tabours in his body, with the glorious names of devotion, religion, and the service of the gods.

And this was it that at the same time went very near and had like to have corrupted and spoiled for ever the manners and fashions of the Romans, which before were so highly reputed, to wit, naming the riotousness of Antony, his looseness, his superfluous delights, his sumptuous shews and public feasts, with their profusion and wasting of so much money, by smooth and gentle terms of courtesies, and merriments full of humanity, by which disguisements and pretexts his fault was mollified or diminished in abusing so excessively the grandeur of his puissance and fortune. And what was it else that made Ptolemaeus to put on the mask or muzzle (as it were) of a piper, and to hang about him pipes and flutes? What was it that caused Nero to mount up the stage to act tragedies, with a vizor over his face and buskins on his legs? was it not the praise of such flatterers as these? And are not most of our kings being when they sing small and fine, after a puling manner, saluted Apollos for their music: and if they drink until they be drunk, honoured with the names of Bacchus, the god of wine: and when they seem a little to wrestle or try some feats of activity, styled by and by with the glorious addition of Hercules, brought (think you) to exceeding dishonour and shame by this gross flattery, taking such pleasure as they do in these gallant surnames.

And therefore we had most need to beware of a flatterer in the praises which he giveth, which himself is not ignorant of,