[718] {531}The famous Chancellor [Axel Oxenstiern (1583-1654)] said to his son, on the latter expressing his surprise upon the great effects arising from petty causes in the presumed mystery of politics: "You see by this, my son, with how little wisdom the kingdoms of the world are governed."
[The story is that his son John, who had been sent to represent him at the Congress of Westphalia, 1648, wrote home to complain that the task was beyond him, and that he could not cope with the difficulties which he was encountering, and that the Chancellor replied, "Nescis, mi fili, quantillâ prudentiâ homines regantur."—Biographie Universelle, art. "Oxenstierna.">[
[MZ] {532} Who are our sureties that our moral pure is.—[MS. erased.]
[NA] {533}And not to encourage whispering in the house.—[MS. erased.]
[719] {535}[Once upon a time, Tiresias, who was shepherding on Mount Cyllene, wantonly stamped with his heel on a pair of snakes, and was straightway turned into a woman. Seven years later he was led to treat another pair of snakes in like fashion, and, happily or otherwise, was turned back into a man. Hence, when Jupiter and Juno fell to wrangling on the comparative enjoyments of men and women, the question was referred to Tiresias, as a person of unusual experience and authority. He gave it in favour of the woman, and Juno, who was displeased at his answer, struck him with blindness. But Jupiter, to make amends, gave him the "liberty of prophesying" for seven, some say nine, generations. (See Ovid, Metam., iii. 320; and Thomas Muncker's notes on the Fabulae of Hyginus, No. lxxv. ed. 1681, pp. 126-128.)]
[720] [Midsummer Night's Dream, act ii. sc. i, line 168.]
[721] {536}See La Nouvelle Héloïse.
[722] Hor., Epod., II. line 1.
[723] [The Latin proverb, Noscitur ex sociis, is not an Horatian maxim.]
[NB] {537}I, therefore, deal in generals—which is wise.—[MS. erased.]