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discoursing upon the nature of cicuta, 1 he gave diligent
attention to his doctrine, and, finding out the
simple, 2 he prepared the same according as he was
instructed and presented it to his master’s son, a
child of rare towardness, 3 who no sooner tasted
thereof but with vehement and bitter agonies gave
up the ghost. The father wonderfully astonished at
this action and inquiring the cause of him with
many pitiful bemoanings, he received this answer:
“Master,” said he, “I have but put in practice
that which you have taught me in precept, and
since I find you a man of such credit, I will boldly
write under your lesson probatum est.” 4
He was naturally inclined to intort 5 all good
principles of philosophy and to apply the earnest
secrets of antiquity to notable insolency. He dissembled
most holiness when he was irreligious,
supposing it virtue to invent sin and shame to be
ignorant in sin. His provident tutor knowing (as
the proverb runneth) the tree by his fruit, the lion
by his nail, and the crocodile by his tear; 6 knowing
by daily experience that too much impunity is the
cause of too much impiety; that it is easier to stop
the river in the spring than withstand it in the
stream; 7 that the lion restrained being a whelp is
tractable in his greatest years; that custom was a
mean, 8 if not to subdue, yet to alter nature, 9
thought good by cruelty to correct that which by
lenity he could not confound. 10 For which cause,
seeing that gentle admonition prevailed nothing,
1 cicuta another name for the common hemlock, an acutely poisonous
plant.
2 simple a plant or herb employed for medicinal purposes.
3 towardness promise; natural aptitude in learning.
4 Latin, “it has been proved.”
5 intort twist, pervert.
6 Proverbs, “Such as the tree is such is the fruit” (Tilley T494) and
“Crocodile Tears” (C831). Traditionally, crocodiles were thought to
weep tears either in order to allure men into their jaws or to “grieve”
while devouring them; thus, the crocodile’s tears mark it as the type
of hypocrisy.
7 A variant on the proverb, “It is hard (folly, in vain) to strive against
the stream” (Tilley S927).
8 mean way.
9 Cf. the proverb, “Custom (use) is another (a second) nature” (Tilley
C932).
10 confound defeat.
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he exchanged his strict persuasions to stern looks,
his sound rudiments to sharp rigor, hoping to
recover that by displing which he could not
reform by discipline. 11 But as their labour is frustrate
who seek to bring Caucasus into a plain, to
bereave India of gems, Candia of oils, Cochim of
pepper, or Hybla 12 of honey, so where the unreformable
work of nature is grounded in peremptory
wickedness, it is impossible either to destroy
or disannul 13 the effects thereof, according to the
opinion of the poet:
Naturam expellas furca licet usque recurrit. 14
For, giving him ordinary correction at one time for
an erroneous 15 offence which he had committed,
instead of submission and acknowledgment of his
misdeeds he intentively employed himself to
murder, and, finding his master one day asleep, he
privily 16 took his penknife and cut his throat, smilingly
concluding his impiety in this sort:
Ille mihi feriendus aper. 17
11 displing subjecting to discipline as bodily correction, penance, or
punishment; discipline teaching, education, or instruction aimed at
forming the pupil in proper conduct and action through mental and
moral training.
12 Caucasus an extremely high range of mountains running from the
Black Sea to the Caspian (Topographical Dict., p. 107); Candia or Candy,
otherwise known as the isle of Crete, famous in the period as a
source of “currants, muscadells, and oils” (Topographical Dict., p. 96);
Cochim Cochin, in the East Indies, a source of many spices in the
period; Hybla a town in Sicily; Latin poets celebrated its honey (Topographical
Dict., p. 259).
13 disannul cancel, abolish, annul.
14 Latin, “Even if you drive out nature with a pitchfork, yet she will
always return” (Horace, Epistles, 1.10.24). This became a popular
proverb in the period: “Though you cast out nature with a fork it will
still return” (Tilley N50).
15 erroneous morally faulty; criminal.
16 privily secretly.
17 Ovid, Metamorphoses, 3.715: “Now must I rend him [i.e., that wild
boar]” (trans. F.J. Miller). So cries Agave, the mother of Pentheus,
king of Thebes, before she and her fellow Bacchae (i.e., followers of
the Bacchus, the god of wine) tear her son to pieces in a divinelyinspired
frenzy, a punishment for Pentheus for denying Bacchus’
divinity and spying on the god’s sacred rites, as well as a punishment
for Agave for also denying Bacchus’ divinity. Agave and the others,