HOW A MAN MAY RECEIVE PROFIT BY HIS ENEMIES
THE SUMMARY
[Among the dangerous effects of envy and hatred, this is not the least nor one of the last, that they shoot (as it were) from within our adversaries, for to slide and enter into us and take possession in our hearts, making us believe that we shall impeach one evil by another; which is as much as to desire to cleanse one ordure by a new, and to quench a great fire by putting into it plenty of oil. As for hatred, it hath another effect nothing less pernicious, in that it maketh us blind, and causeth us that we cannot tell at which end or turning to take our enemies, nor know ourselves how to re-enter into the way of virtue. Plutarch, willing to cut off such effects by the help of moral philosophy, taketh occasion to begin this discourse with a sentence of Xenophon; and proveth in the first place by divers similitudes: That a man may take profit by his enemies: and this he layeth abroad in particulars, shewing that their ambushes and inquisitions serve us in very great stead. After this, he teacheth us the true way how to be revenged of those that hate us, and what we ought to consider in blaming another. Now forasmuch as our life is subject to many injuries and calumniations, he instructeth us how a man may turn all to his own commodity: which done, he presenteth four remedies and expedient means against their slanderous language, and how we should confound our enemies: The first is, To contain our own tongues, without rendering evil for evil; the second is, To do them good, to love and praise their virtues; the third, To outgo them in well-doing; and the last, To provide that virtue remain always on our side, in such sort, that if our enemies be vicious, yet we persist in doing good; and if they carry some shew and appearance of goodness, we endeavour to be indeed and without all comparison better than they.]
I see that you have chosen by yourself (O Cornelius Pulcher) the meetest course that may be in the government of common-wealth; wherein having a principal regard unto the weal-public, you shew yourself most gracious and courteous in private to all those that have access and repair unto you. Now forasmuch as a man may well find some country in the world wherein there is no venomous beast, as it is written of Candie, but the management and administration of state affairs was never known yet to this day clear from envy, jealousy, emulation, and contention,
