upon absurdly; care[1] not to innovate, which draws unknown inconveniences; use extreme remedies at first; and that which doubleth all errors, will not acknowledge or retract them; like an unready horse, that will neither stop nor turn. Men of age object too much, consult too long, adventure too little, repent too soon, and seldom drive business home to the full period,[2] but content themselves with a mediocrity of success. Certainly it is good to compound employments of both; for that will be good for the present, because the virtues of either age may correct the defects of both; and good for succession, that young men may be learners, while men in age are actors; and, lastly, good for extern[3] accidents, because authority followeth old men, and favour and popularity youth. But for the moral part, perhaps youth will have the pre-eminence, as age hath for the politic. A certain rabbin, upon the text, Your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams,[4] inferreth that young men are admitted nearer to God than old, because vision is a clearer revelation than a dream. And certainly, the more a man drinketh of the world, the more it intoxicateth: and age doth profit[5] rather in the powers of understanding, than in the virtues of the will and affections. There be some have an over-early ripe-
- ↑ Care not to innovate, are not careful how they innovate, that is to say, young men are incautious, heedless.
- ↑ Period. Completion.
- ↑ Extern. External.
- ↑ "And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions." Joel ii. 28.
- ↑ Profit. To improve. "Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all." I. Timothy iv. 15.
