nor overvalue himself for them, for he had an excellent virtuous modesty, which shut out all vanity of mind, and yet admitted that true understanding of himself which was requisite for the best improvement of all his talents; he no less understood and was more heedful to remark his defects, imperfections, and disadvantages, but that too only to excite his circumspection concerning them, not to damp his spirit in any noble enterprise. He had a noble spirit of government, both in civil, military, and œcumenical administrations, which forced even from unwilling subjects a love and reverence of him, and endeared him to the souls of those rejoiced to be governed by him. He had a native majesty that struck an awe of him into the hearts of men, and a sweet greatness that commanded love. He had a clear discerning of men's spirits, and knew how to give every one their just weight; he contemned none that were not wicked, in whatever low degree of nature or fortune they were otherwise: wherever he saw wisdom, learning, or other virtues in men, he honoured them highly, and admired them to their full rate; but never gave himself blindly up to the conduct of the greatest master. Love itself, which was as powerful in his as in any soul, rather quickened than blinded the eyes of his judgment in discerning the imperfections of those that were most dear to him. His soul ever reigned as king in the internal throne, and never was captive to his sense: religion and reason, its two favoured councillors, took order that all the passions, kept within their own just bounds, there did him good service, and furthered the public weal. He found such felicity in that proportion of wisdom that he enjoyed, as he was a great lover of that which advanced it, learning and the arts, which he not only honoured in others, but had by his industry arrived to be a far greater scholar than is absolutely requisite for a gentleman. He had many excellent attainments, but he no less evidenced his wisdom in knowing how to rank and use them, than in gaining them. He had wit enough to have been both subtle and cunning, but he so abhorred dissimulation that I cannot say he was either. Greatness of courage would not suffer him to put on a vizard, to secure him from any: to retire into the shadow of privacy and

silence was all his prudence could effect in him. It will be as hard to say which was the predominant virtue in him, as which is so in its own nature. He was as excellent in justice as in wisdom -the greatest advantage, nor the greatest danger, nor the dearest interest or friend in the world could not prevail on him to prevent Justice even to an enemy. He never professed the thing he intended not, nor promised what he believed out of his own power, nor failed the performance of anything that was in his power to fulfil. Never fearing anything he could suffer for the truth, he never at any time would refrain a true or give a false witness; he loved truth so much that he hated even sportive lies and gulleries. He was so just to his own honour that he many times forbore things lawful and delightful to him, rather than he would give any one occasion of scandal. Of all lies he most hated hypocrisy in religion, either to comply with changing governments or persons, without a real persuasion of conscience, or to practise holy things to get the applause of men or any advantage. As in religion, so in friendship, he never professed love when he had it not, nor disguised hate or aversion, which indeed he never had to any party or person, but to their sins: and loved even his bitterest enemies so well that I am witness how his soul mourned for them, and how heartily he desired their conversion. If he were defective in any part of justice, it was when it was in his power to punish those who had injured him, when I have so often known him to recompense with favours instead of revenge, that his friends used to tell him, if they had any occasion to make him favourably partial to them, they would provoke him by an injury. He was as faithful and constant to his friends as merciful to his enemies, nothing grieved him more than to be obliged when he could not hope to return it. He that was a rock to all assaults of might and violence, was the greatest easy soul to kindness, that the least warm spark of that melted him into anything that was not sinful.

Nor was his soul less shining in honour than in love. Piety being still the bond of all his other virtues, there was nothing he

durst not do or suffer, but sin against God, and therefore, as he never regarded his life in any noble or just enterprise, so he never staked it in any rash or unwarrantable hazard. He was never surprised, amazed, or confounded with great difficulties and dangers, which rather served to animate than distract his spirits; he had made up his accounts with life and death, and fixed his purpose to entertain both honourably, so that no accident ever dismayed him, but he rather rejoiced in such troublesome conflicts as might signalise his generosity. A truer or more lively valour there never was in any man, but, in all his actions, it ever marched in the same file with wisdom. He understood well, and as well performed when he undertook it, the military art in all parts of it: he naturally loved the employment, as it suited with his active temper more than any, conceiving a mutual delight in leading those men that loved his conduct: and, when he commanded soldiers never was man more loved and reverenced by all who were under him; for he would never condescend to them in anything they mutinously sought, nor suffer them to seek what it was fit for him to provide, but prevented them by his loving care; and, while he exercised his authority in no way but in keeping them to their just duty, they joyed as much in his commands as he in their obedience: he was very liberal to them, but ever chose just times and occasions to exercise it. I cannot say whether he were more truly magnanimous or less proud; he never disclaimed the meanest person not flattered the greatest: he had a loving and sweet courtesy to the poorest, and would often employ many spare hours with the commonest soldiers and poorest labourers, but still so ordering his familiarity as it never raised them to a contempt, but entertained still at the same time a reverence with love of him; he ever preserved himself in his own rank, neither being proud of it so as to despise any inferior, nor letting fall that just decorum which his honour obliged him to keep up. He was as far from envy of superiors as from contemning them that were under him: he was above the ambition of vain titles, and so well contented with the even ground of a gentleman, that no invitation could have prevailed upon him to advance one step that way; he loved sub

stantial not airy honour: as he was above seeking or delighting in empty titles for himself, so he neither denied nor envied any man's due precedency, but pitied those that took a glory in that which had no foundation of virtue. As little did he seek after popular applause or pride himself in it, if at any time it cried up his just deserts; he more delighted to do well than to be praised, and never set vulgar commendations at such a rate as to act contrary to his own conscience or reason for the obtaining them, nor would forbear a good action which he was bound to, though all the world disliked it, for he never looked on things as they were in themselves, nor through the dim spectacles of vulgar estimation. As he was far from a vain affectation of popularity, so he never neglected that just care that an honest man ought to have of his reputation, and was as careful to avoid the appearances of evil as evil itself; but, if he were evil spoken of for truth or righteousness' sake, he rejoiced in taking up the reproach; which all good men that dare bear their testimony against an evil generation must suffer. Though his zeal for truth and virtue caused the wicked, with the sharp edges of their malicious tongues, to attempt to shave off the glories from his head, yet his honour, springing from the vast root of virtue, did but grow the thicker and more beautiful for all their endeavours to cut it off. He was

as free from avarice as from ambition and pride. Never had any man a more contented and thankful heart for the estate that God had given, but it was a very narrow compass for the exercise of his great heart. He loved hospitality as much as he hated riot: he could contentedly be without things beyond his reach, though he took very much pleasure in all those noble delights that exceeded not his faculties. In those things that were of mere pleasure, he loved not to aim at that he could not attain'; he would rather wear clothes absolutely plain, than pretending to gallantry, and would rather choose to have none than mean jewels or pictures, and such other things as were not of absolute necessity he would rather give nothing than a base reward or present; and, upon that score lived very much retired, though his nature was very sociable, and delighted in going into and re

ceiving company, because his fortune would not allow him to do it in such a noble manner as suited with his mind. He was so truly magnanimous, that prosperity could never lift him up in the least, nor give him any tincture of pride or vain glory, nor diminish a general affability, courtesy, and civility, that he had always to all persons. When he was most exalted, he was most merciful and compassionate to those that were humbled. At the same time that he vanquished any enemy, he cast away all his ill-will to him, and entertained thoughts of love and kindness as soon as he had ceased to be in a posture of opposition. He was as far from meanness as from pride, as truly generous as humble, and showed his noble spirit more in adversity than in his prosperous condition: he vanquished all the spite of his enemies by his manly suffering, and all the contempts they could cast upon him were their, not his, shame.

The Death of Socrates.

[FROM TAYLOR'S TRANSLATION OF THE "PHÆDON."]

PLATO.

[A CELEBRATED philosopher of Athens, son of Aristo and Parectonia. His original name was Aristocles, and he received that of Plato from the largeness of his shoulders. As one of the descendants of Codrus, and the offspring of a noble, illustrious, and opulent family, Plato was educated with care, his body formed and invigorated with gymnastic exercises, and his mind cultivated and enlightened by the study of poetry and geometry, from which he derived that warmth of imagination, and acuteness of judgment, which have stamped his character as the most flowery and subtle writer of antiquity. It is from the writings of Plato chiefly that we are to form a judgment of his merit as a philosopher, and of the service which he rendered to science. No one can be conversant with these without perceiving that his diction always retained a strong tincture of that poetical spirit which he discovered in his first productions. This is the principal ground of those lofty encomiums, which both ancient and modern critics have passed on his language, and particularly of the high estimation in which it was held by Cicero, who, treating of the subject of language, says, "that if Jupiter were to speak in the Greek tongue, he would use the language of Plato." The accurate Stagyrite describes it as "a middle species of diction, between verse and prose." Some of his Dialogues are elevated by