“You shirk labour too much, messer Federico. But you shall not succeed, for you must talk on until it is time to go to bed.”
“And what, my Lady, if I have nothing to say?” replied messer Federico.
“There you shall show your wit,” said my lady Emilia. “And if what I once heard be true, that there was a man so clever and eloquent that he did not lack material to write a book in praise of a fly, others in praise of the fourth day ague, and another in praise of baldness,—will you also not have the courage to find something to say about Courtiership for one evening?”[[160]]
“We have already said enough about it to make two books,” replied messer Federico. “But since my excuse is of no avail, I will talk until you think I have fulfilled, if not my duty, at least the limit of my powers.
18.—“I think that the conversation which the Courtier ought most to try in every way to make acceptable, is that which he holds with his prince; and although this word ‘conversation’ implies a certain equality that seems impossible between a lord and his inferior, yet we will call it so for the present. Therefore, besides daily showing everyone that he possesses the worth we have already described, I would have the Courtier strive, with all the thoughts and forces of his mind, to love and almost to adore the prince whom he serves, above every other thing, and mould his wishes, habits and all his ways to his prince’s liking.”
Without waiting for more, Pietro da Napoli here said:
“We already have enough Courtiers of this kind, for methinks you have in a few words described for us a noble flatterer.”
“You are much in errour,” replied messer Federico; “for flatterers love neither their prince nor their friends, which I tell you I wish chiefly in our Courtier.
“Moreover it is possible without flattery to obey and further the wishes of him we serve, for I am speaking of those wishes that are reasonable and right, or of those that in themselves are neither good nor evil, such as would be a liking for play or a devotion to one kind of exercise above another. And I would have the Courtier bend himself to this even if he be by nature alien to it, so that on seeing him his lord shall always feel that he will have something agreeable to say; which will come about if he has the good judgment to perceive what his prince likes, and the wit and prudence to bend himself thereto, and a deliberate purpose to like that which perhaps he by nature dislikes. And adopting these precautions, he will never be out of humour or melancholy before his prince, nor so taciturn as many are who seem to bear a grudge against their patrons, which is a truly odious thing. He will not be given to evil speaking, especially against his own lords; which often happens, for in courts there seems to rage a fury[[161]] of such sort that those who have been most favoured by their lord and have been raised to eminence from the lowest state, are always complaining and speaking ill of him; which is unseemly not only in such as these, but even in those who chance to have been ill used.
“Our Courtier will show no foolish presumption; he will not be a bearer of evil tidings; he will not be thoughtless in sometimes saying things that offend instead of pleasing as he intends. He will not be obstinate and disputatious, as some are who seem to delight in nothing but to be troublesome and disagreeable like flies, and who make a point of spitefully contradicting everyone without discrimination. He will not be an idle or untruthful tattler, nor a boaster nor pointless flatterer, but modest and reserved, always and especially in public showing that reverence and respect which befit the servant towards the master; and he will not behave like many, who on meeting any great prince, with whom if only they have spoken but once, press forward with a certain smiling and friendly look, as if they wished to caress an equal or show favour to an inferior.