The idleness of drunkards, women’s nothing,
Jesters’ simplicity, all, all is good
That can be catch’d at.’
’Tis a pretty picture; and the duplicates of it, though multiplied without end, are seldom out of request.
The following portrait of a prince besieged by flatterers (taken from Tiberius) has unrivalled force and beauty, with historic truth.
——‘If this man
Had but a mind allied unto his words,
How blest a fate were it to us, and Rome?
Men are deceived, who think there can be thrall
Under a virtuous prince. Wish’d liberty