SECT. III.
VIII. I was once of opinion, that in one special instance, the public voice was infallible, that is to say, in the approbation, or reprobation, of particular people. It appeared to me, that he of whom the public at large entertained a good opinion, was certainly a good man, and that he was certainly wise, who was generally allowed to be so, and so on the contrary; but upon reflection, I found that in this instance also, the popular opinion is liable to mistake. Phocion, as he was once reprehending the people of Athens with some asperity, was accosted by his enemy Democritus in these words, “Have a care what you say, for they will murder you for talking to them in this manner:” “And do you take care, answered Phocion, or they will murder you likewise, for pretending to pass your judgment.” This sentence shewed, that he thought the populace hardly ever right in their decisions, with regard to people’s qualities or characters. The hard fate of Phocion himself, confirmed in a great measure this sentiment, because he was afterwards put to death as an enemy to his country, by the furious populace of Athens, though he was the best man, which at that time could be found in all Greece.
IX. An ignorant man having passed for a wise one, and a wise one being reputed a fool, are things which have been frequent in many places; and applicable to this, is the pleasant event which happened to Democritus with his countrymen the Abderites. This philosopher, who had long meditated on the follies and vanities of mankind, was accustomed, when any occurrence brought these reflections to his mind, to burst out into immoderate fits of laughter. The Abderites having remarked this, although they before esteemed him a very wise man, concluded that he was gone mad; and they wrote to Hippocrates who flourished at that time, and earnestly intreated that he would come and cure him. The good old man suspected how the matter stood, to wit, that the people were disordered, and not Democritus, and concluded, that what they mistook for madness, was rather a symptom of great wisdom. In a letter to his friend Dionysius, informing him of his being sent for by the Abderites, and the account they had given him of Democritus’s madness, he expresses himself to this effect, Ego vero neque morbum ipsum esse puto, sed immodicam doctrinam, quæ revera non est immodica, sed ab idiotis putatur; and writing to Philopemnes, he says, Cum non insaniam, sed quandam excellente mentis sanitatem vir ille declaret. Afterwards, Hippocrates visited Democritus, and from a long conversation which he had with him, was satisfied, that his laughter was founded in wise and solid morality, the justness of which, he was convinced of and admired. Hippocrates, in a letter he wrote to Damagetus, gives a particular account of this conversation, and there may be seen his encomiums upon Democritus; among other things, he says, Democritus so far from being mad, is the wisest man I ever met with; I was much instructed by his conversation, and rendered more capable of instructing others: Hoc erat illud, Damagete, quod conjectabamus. Non insanit Democritus, sed super omnia sanit, et nos sapientiores effecit, et per nos omnes homines.
X. These letters are to be found in the works of Hippocrates, and are well deserving of being read, especially that to Damagetus; and from them may be inferred, not only how much the public at large are capable of being mistaken in their opinion of an individual; but also, with how little reason, many authors paint Democritus as a half-mad ridiculous person; for nobody disputes the judgment and wisdom of Hippocrates, who, after treating seriously and at large on the subject, gives so opposite a testimony in his discussion of the matter; for he declares, that in his judgment, Democritus was the most learned and wise man in the world; and in a letter of Hippocrates to Democritus, he recognizes him for the greatest natural philosopher upon earth: Optimum naturæ, ac mundi interpretem te judicavi. Hippocrates was then grown old, for in the same letter he says, Ego enim ad finem medicinæ perveni, etiam si jam senex sim; and consequently, capable of forming a good judgment of the abilities of Democritus.
I am disposed to think, that the accusation which some authors bring against Aristotle is a probable one, that is, that he did not fairly lay open to the world the opinions of other philosophers who preceded him, to the end, that by discrediting all those, he might establish the sovereignty of his own doctrine, and that he did by them, as the great Lord Bacon says the Ottoman Emperors do by their brothers, put them all to death, that they may reign in security.
SECT. IV.
With regard to virtue and vice, the instances of the one of them having been mistaken by the public for the other in particular people, are so numerous, that history stumbles upon them, at almost every step; nothing can illustrate this more evidently, than the greatest impostors the world has produced, having passed for repositories of the secrets of heaven. Numa Pompilius, introduced among the Romans, whatever policy and religion he thought fit, by means of the fiction, that all he proposed was dictated to him by the nymph Egeria. The Spaniards fought blindly against the Romans, under the banners of Sertorius, he having made them believe, that through a white doe, which he artfully made use of, and had trained for his purpose, he received by occult means, all sorts of information, which was communicated to the doe by the goddess Diana. Mahomed persuaded a great part of Asia, that Heaven had sent the Angel Gabriel to him as a Nuncio in the shape of a dove, which he had taught to put its bill into his ear. Most heretical opinions, although stained with manifest impurities, were reputed in many places, to proceed from the venerable archives of the divine mysteries.
XII. We have even seen such monsters, engendered in the bosom of the Roman church. In the eleventh century, Tranquilenus, a man given openly to all kinds of debauchery, was venerated as a saint by the people of Antwerp, and to such a pitch did they carry their adoration, that they preserved as a relic the water in which he had washed himself. In the republic of Florence, where the people were never thought rude, or uncultivated, Francis Jeronimo Savonarola, a man of prodigious genius, and great sagacity, was many years respected as a saint, and a person endued with the spirit of prophecy; he made the people believe, that his political predictions were divine revelations, though they were founded on secret advices which he received from France, and notwithstanding many of those predictions were proved false, such as the second coming of Charles the Eighth into Italy, the recovery of John Pico de Mirandola from a fit of sickness, of which he died two days afterwards, &c. And although he was publicly burnt on the parade at Florence for an impostor, still, all was not sufficient to eradicate his deceptions from the minds of many people; for not only the heretics venerate him as a heavenly man, and consider him as a forerunner of Luther, on account of his vehement declamations against the court of Rome, but some Catholics were his panegyrists likewise, among whom Marcus Antonius Flaminius excelled all the others, by the following beautiful though false epigram.
Dum fera flamma tuos, Hieronyme, pascitur artus,
Religio sacras dilaniata comas