Hospitium fuerat calamitatis. {34a} Was not
this man like to sell it?
Vulgi expectatio.--Expectation of the vulgar is more drawn and held
with newness than goodness; we see it in fencers, in players, in
poets, in preachers, in all where fame promiseth anything; so it be
new, though never so naught and depraved, they run to it, and are
taken. Which shews, that the only decay or hurt of the best men's
reputation with the people is, their wits have out-lived the
people's palates. They have been too much or too long a feast.
Claritas patriae.--Greatness of name in the father oft-times helps
not forth, but overwhelms the son; they stand too near one another.
The shadow kills the growth: so much, that we see the grandchild
come more and oftener to be heir of the first, than doth the second:
he dies between; the possession is the third's.
Eloquentia.--Eloquence is a great and diverse thing: nor did she
yet ever favour any man so much as to become wholly his. He is
happy that can arrive to any degree of her grace. Yet there are who
prove themselves masters of her, and absolute lords; but I believe
they may mistake their evidence: for it is one thing to be eloquent
in the schools, or in the hall; another at the bar, or in the
pulpit.
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