Machiavelli, Volume I by Niccolò Machiavelli
page 67 of 414 (16%)
page 67 of 414 (16%)
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you. I doe not beleve that in his tyme was any manne, that so moche
detested the livyng in ease, as he did, and that so moche was a lover of the same hardenesse of life, whiche you praise: notwithstandyng he knewe not how to bee able in persone, nor in those of his sonnes to use it, beeyng borne in so corrupte a worlde, where one that would digresse from the common use, should bee infamed and disdained of every man: consideryng that if one in the hottest day of Summer being naked, should wallowe hymself upon the Sande, or in Winter in the moste coldest monethes upon the snowe, as Diogenes did, he should be taken as a foole. If one, (as the Spartans were wonte to doe) should nourishe his children in a village, makyng them to slepe in the open aire, to go with hedde and feete naked, to washe them selves in the colde water for to harden them, to be able to abide moche paine, and for to make theim to love lesse life, and to feare lesse death, he should be scorned, and soner taken as a wilde beast, then as a manne. If there wer seen also one, to nourishe himself with peason and beanes, and to despise gold, as Fabricio doeth, he should bee praised of fewe, and followed of none: so that he being afraied of this present maner of livyng, he left thauncient facions, and thesame, that he could with lest admiracion imitate in the antiquitie, he did. FABRICIO. You have excused it in this parte mooste strongly: and surely you saie the truthe: but I did not speake so moche of this harde maner of livyng, as of other maners more humaine, and whiche have with the life now a daies greater conformitie. The whiche I doe not beleve, that it hath been difficulte to bryng to passe unto one, who is nombred emongest Princes of a citee: for the provyng whereof, I will never seke other, then thexample of the Romaines. Whose lives, if thei wer well considred, and thorders of thesame common weale, there should therin be seen many thinges, not impossible to induce into a cominaltie, so that |
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