in purpose vnconstant; light to promise any thing, redy to forget euery thing, both benefite and iniury, and therby neither fast to frend, nor fearfull to foe; inquisitiue of euery trifle; not secret in greatest affaires; bold with any person; busy in euery matter; soothing such as be present; nipping any that is absent; of nature also, alwayes flattering their betters, enuying their equals, despysing their inferyors, and, by quicknes of wit, very quick and ready to like none so well as themselues. (The Scholemaster, f. 4. edit. Lond. 1579, 4to.)

THOMAS WILSON, LL. D.

(Died 1581.)

In the thirde part, I will open diuers contractes and bargaynes that are vsed to auoide vsurye.—I haue neede of money, and deale wyth a broaker; hee aunswereth me that hee cannot helpe me with moneye, but yf I list to haue wares, I shall speede. Well, my necessitie is great: he bryngeth mee blotting paper, pakthreede, fustians, chamlets, haukes bels and hoodes, or I wote not what: I desire hym to make sale for mine aduantage, askyng what he thinketh willbe my losse ; he aunswereth, not paste twelue pounde in the hundred. When I come to receiue, I do finde that I lose more then twentye in the hundred (yea, woulde God that none had loste more). I beinge greeved wyth my losse, doe charge the broaker, and saye that I wil not receiue the money wyth suche losse: the merchaunt aunswereth that he wyl not take his wares

againe, and, hauing my bille, careth not what become of me that haue borowed. This is called a double stoccado, that is to saye, the stycking blowe, or the double stabbe. For at the firste, the poore gentleman is borne in hande, there is no money to be had, but is promised wares, to auoyde, or rather to mocke the daunger of the statute (but God is not mocked) and so wyth thys cruell blowe of wares, hee is made beleeue that they will falle out not aboue twelue pound, or 20 marks at the most; but when hee commethe to receiue the nete money, the merchant and broker being agreed togeather, he is stabbed at the very hart, paying somtimes twenty pound, nay, shal I say thirty pound, I would it had been noe more with some; a wicked and a most horrible cruel dealinge: and once in for a hundred pound, he can neuer come out cleare againe, til hauynge mortgaged his landes (whiche is the next parte to be played and practised) hee bee forced in the ende to sell the same outeright. And so, betwene the merchaunt and the broaker, the poore gentleman is caught in the cony clapper, to liue with the losse of thirty pound in the hundred at the least. And yet if there were plaine dealyng in the matter, it were the more sauourye but the merchaunt is agreed with the broaker, to buy his own wares agayne, and to pay 70. 1. for that which the gentleman must paye him a hundred pound for, at the yeres ende. Is not this vsury? is it not vsurye, thynke you, in the deuils name? Now surely vnhappye is hee that dealeth with such diuelish merchaunts, or others whatsoeuer; for of all cutthrotes in the world, these are the absolute horrible, and most detestable monsters that liue. And God kepe

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all playne and true dealing men from the dangers of all suche false and craftie hipocriticall harlottes,* and greedye cormorantes in a common weale. (A Discourse vppon Vsurye, by waye of Dialogue and Oracions, for the better varietye, and more delite of all those that shall reade thys treatise, f. 99. b. Lond. 1572, 8vo.)

SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

(Born 1552. died 1618.)

If we seeke a reason of the succession and continu-' ance of this boundlesse ambition in mortall men, we adde to that which hath been alreadie said, that may the kings and princes of the world have alwaies laid before them the actions, but not the ends of those great ones which preceded them. They are alwayes transported with the glorie of the one, but they never minde the miserie of the other, till they finde the experience in themselves. They neglect the advice of God, while they enjoy life, or hope it; but they follow the counsell of Death, upon his first approach. It is

This word, which merely denotes a person hired, was original. ly applied to males as well as females. See Tooke's Diversions of Purley, part ii. p. 149. Bellenden, archdeacon of Moray, expresses himself in the following terms:

Sen thow contenis mo vailzeand men and wyse

Than euir was red in ony buke but doubt,

Gif ony churle or velane the dispyse,

Byd hence hym, harlot, he is not of this rout.

he that puts into man all the wisedome of the world, without speaking a word; which God with all the words of his law, promises, or threats, doth infuse. Death, which hateth and destroyeth man, is beleeved; God, which hath made him, and loves him, is alwaies deferred. "I have considered (saith Salomon) all the workes that are under the sunne, and behold, all is vanitie and vexation of spirit:" but who beleeves it till Death tels it us? It was Death which, opening the conscience of Charles the fift, made him enjoyne his sonne Philip to restore Navarre; and King Francis the first of France, to command that justice should be done upon the murderers of the Protestants in Merindol and Cabrieres, which till then he neglected. It is therefore Death alone that can suddenly make man to know himselfe. He tels the proud and insolent, that they are but abjects, and humbles them at the instant; makes them crie, complaine, and repent; yea, even to hate their forepassed happinesse. He takes the account of the rich, and proves him a beggar; a naked beggar, which hath interest in nothing, but in the gravell that fils his mouth. He holds a glasse before the eyes of the most beautifull, and makes them see therein their deformitie and rottennesse; and they acknowledge it.

O eloquent, just, and mightie Death! whom none could advise, thou hast perswaded; what none hath dared, thou hast done; and whom all the world hath flattered, thou only hast cast out of the world and despised: thou hast drawne together all the farre stretched greatnesse, all the pride, crueltie, and ambition of man, and covered it all over with these two narrow words,

Hic jacet. (The Historie of the World, book v. p. 669. Lond. 1614, fol.)

SIR PHILIP SIDNEY.

(Born 1554. died 1586.)

Let learned Greece in any of her manifold sciences be able to shew me one booke before Musæus, Homer, and Hesiodus, all three nothing els but poets. Nay, let any historie be brought, that can say any writers were there before them, if they were not men of the same skil, as Orpheus, Linus, and some other are named; who hauing beene the first of that country. that made pens deliuerers of their knowledge to their posterity, may iustly chalenge to bee called their fathers in learning: for not only in time they had this priority (although in it self antiquity be venerable) but went before them, as causes to drawe, with their charming sweetnes, the wild vntamed wits to an admiration of knowledge. So as Amphion was sayde to moue stones with his poetrie to build Thebes, and Orpheus to be listened to by beastes, indeed stony and beastly people: so among the Romans were Liuius Andronicus, and Ennius: so in the Italian language, the first that made it aspire to be a treasure-house of science, were the poets Dante, Boccace, and Petrarch: so in our English, were Gower and Chawcer; after whom, encouraged and delighted with theyr excellent fore-going, others haue followed to beautifie our mother tongue, as wel in the same kinde as in other arts. This did so notably shewe it selfe, that the phylo