OF THE Knowledeg which maketh a wise man.  
LONDINI IN aedibus THOMAE BERTHELETI. M. D. XXXIII. cum PRIVILEGIO.   

¶ The proem of sir Thomas Elyot knight.  
GOd, unto whom all mens hartis be opened, and the will of man speakethe, is my witness, that to the desire of knowledge, whereunto I haue hither to ben ever of my nature disposed / I haue joined a constant intent to profit thereby to my natural country: whereunto acordyng to the sentence of Tully, we be most specially bound. wherefore after that I had applied the more parte of my life in perusynge diligently every ancient work, that I might come by / either greek or latin, containing any parte of philosophy necessary to the institution of mans life in virtue, I haue endeavoured myself to set forth such part of my study as I thought might be profitable to them, which should happen to rede or here it. But diuers men rather scornyng my benefit than receiving it thankfully do show themselves offended( as they say) with my strange terms.  
Other finding in my bokis the thing dispreysed / which they do commend in using it. like a galde horse abiding no plasters be alway gnappynge and kyckynge at such examples and sentences as they do feel sharp or do bite them / accomptyng to be in me no little presumption, that I coil in notynge other mens vices correct Magnificat, sens other much wiser men and better learned than I, do forbear to write any thing. And which is warse than all this: Some will maliciously divine or conject that I write to the intent to rebuk some particular person couaytinge to bring my archdukes and afterward me into the indignation of some man in authority.  
Thus unthankfully is my benefit received / my good will consumed, and all my labours devoured. Such is of some men the nature serpentine, that lappyng sweet milk they convert hit forth with in to poison, to destroy him of whose liberality they late had received it. How incomparable be these men unlike to the most excellent prince our most dere sovereign lord? whose most royal person I heartily beseech god to preserve in long life and honour. His highnesse benignly receiving my book / which I name the governor, in the redynge therof sone perceived that I intended to augment our english tongue, whereby men should as well express more abundantly the thing that they conceived in their hartis( wherefore language was ordained) having words apt for the purpose: as also interpret out of greek, latin / or any other tongue into english, as sufficiently / as out of any one of the said tongues into an other. His grace also perceived / that through out the book there was no term new made by me of a latin or french word, but it is there declared so plainly by one mean or other to a diligent reader that no sentence is thereby made dark or hard to be understand. Ne the sharp and quick sentences, or the round and plain examples set out in the versis of Claudiane the poet in the second book / or in the chapiters of Affablitie, benevolence, Beneficence / and of the diversity of flatterers / and in dyvers other places / in any parte offended his highness: but( as hit was by credible persons reported unto me) his grace not onely took hit in the better parte, but also with princely words full of majesty commended my diligence / simplicity & courage in that I spared none estate in the rebuking of 'vice: which words full of very nobility brought unto my remembrance the virtuous Emperour Antonine, called for his wisdom Antonine the philosopher, who on a time hearing that there was in the city of Rome a plain & rude person / which alway spake in the rebuk of all men, and never praised any man: he sent to him / requiring that he wolde come and speak with him. And when he was come, the Emperour had these words unto him. My friend / wherein haue I ever offended the? The fellow therwith sore abashed answered in this wise. Sir your highness never offended me, that I am ware of. Than art thou( said the Emperour) an vncourtoyse subject, that thou hast so long dissembled with me, not telling unto me my faults.  
And after the emperor retained him still giving unto him double wages / commanding him to use his old liberty. And when dyvers men marveled thereat, he affirmed openly, that princis vices were sooner espied by other men than by themselves: and that there was much more difficulty in remembering them of their 'vice or lack, than in extoling and commending their virtues.  
So well did this most noble Emperour consider, that his example might be more profitable unto the public weal of the city, than any other thing in his person or dignity.  
¶ In like wise our most dere sovereign lord perfectly knew that no writar ought to be blamed, which writeth neither for hope of temporal reward / nor for any private disdain or malice, but onely of fervent zeal toward good occupation and virtue. perdieu man is not so yet conformed in grace, that he can not do syn. And I suppose no prince thynkethe himself to be exempt from mortality. And for as much as he shall haue mo occasions to fall, he ought to haue the more friends or the more instruction to warn him. And as for my parte I eftsoons do protest, that in no book of mi making I haue intended to touch more one man than an neither. For there be Gnathos in spain as well as in Grece, Pasquilles in england as well as in Rome, Dionises in germany as well as in Sicile, Harpocrates in France as well as in egypt, Aristippus in Scotlande as well as in Cyrena, Platos be few, and them I doubt where to finde. And if men will seek for them in england / which I set in other places, I can not let them. I know well ynowghe dyvers do delight to haue their garments of the fashion of other countreyes, and that which is most plain is vnplesant: but yet it doth happen sometime that one man being in authority or favour of his prince, being sene to wear something of the old fashion: for the strangeness therof it is taken up again with many good fellows. What I do mean every wise man perceiveth. touching the title of my book, I considered that wisdom is spoken of, much more than used. For where in it resteth few men be sure. The commune opinion is into three parts divided. One saith it is in much learning and knowledge. An other affirmeth / that they which do conduct the affairs of great princis or countrayes, be onely wise men. Nay saythe the thyrde, he is wisest that leste doth meddle, and can sit quietly at home and turn a crab, and look onely unto his own business. now they which be of the first opinion be alway at varyance. For somme do chiefly extol the study of holy scripture( as it is reason) but while they do wrest it to agree with their wills, ambition, or vain glory, of the most noble and devout learning, they do endeavour them to make hit servile and full of contention. Some do prefer the study of the laws of this realm, calling it the onely study of the public weal. But a great noumbre of persons, which haue consumed in suit more joanne the value of that, that they used for, in their anger do call it a commune detriment. All though undoubtedly the very self lawe truly practised / passeth the laws of all other countrayes. In thinking on these sundry opinions, I happened for my recreacyon to reede in the book of Laertius the life of Plato, and beholding the answer that he made to king Dyonyse, at the first sight it seemed to me to be very dissolute and lacking the modesty that belonged to a philosopher: but when I had better examined it, therein appeared that which is best worthy to be called wisdom.  
wherefore to exercise my wytre, and to avoyde idleness, I took my pen and assayde / Howe in expressing my conceit I might profit to them, which without disdain or envy wolde often times read it. If any man will think the book to be very long, let him consider, that knowledge of wisdom can not be shortly declared. All be hit of them which be well wyllinge it is soon learned, in good faith sooner joanne Primero or Gleeke: such is the strange property of that excellent counnynge, that it is sooner learned, than taught, and better by a mannes reason than by an instructor.  
Finally if the readers of my warkis, by the noble example of our most dere sovereign lord do justly and lovingly interpret my labours, I during the residue of my life will now and than set forth such fruits of my study profitable( as I trust) unto this my country. And leaving malicious readers with their incurable fury, I will say unto god the words of the catholic church in the book of Sapience: 
Sap̄. 15.  To know the good lord is perfect Iustice / And to know thy justice and virtue is the very roote of Immortalite: And therein is the knowledge that is very wisdom.   


¶ Defautles in pryntynge.  ¶ lief. line.   iij. iiij. he began. viij. xxi. put out( for) and put in.( But moreover). xix. xxxi. fleshly. xxi. xviij. that hit signifieth. xxij. xliiij. to the point lxvij. xi. cautherize. lxviij. xxi. cautherization. lxxviij. xvij. Wherefore sens.   xvij. put out( sens) lxxxxi. xxiij. be the servants. Cj. xi. the dead se.   

The first dialogue.  aristippus. PLATO. aristippus. 
Who is this man / whom I perceive coming hitherwarde? It seemeth to be Plato. Let me se? It is verily Plato himself. What meaneth it / that he is in this wise aparailid? His garments be very short / and more simplo than he was accustomend to were. Well, though there were some debate between us in Sicile, yet will I salute him / and desire him to show to me the state of all his affairs.  
For in wise men resteth no malice / all though diversity in opinions or form of living causeth sometime contention between them. Plato / thou art well founden again in this contrary.  PLATO. 
Gramercie Aristippus. But yet thou hast said truer than I ween thou arte ware of.  ARISTIP. 
Why, I know the to be Plato, though thou be in this single apparel.  PLA. 
Ye that I suppose. But thou least that I was well founden: And in dede thou least true after the commune opinion. for sens thou departiddest from Sicile I haue ben twice in the point to haue died / and also twice sold for a bondman or slave. wherefore thou mayst with good reason say, that I am well founden, that haue been so often in perile to be lost. For commonly men do call him lost, which despayreth of his life / or of a free man is made a slave. But whither that opinion be true or no, we shall speak more therof hereafter. Finally Aristippus( god be thanked) I am well eskaped.  ARI. 
I do not a little marvel of this that thou tellist me. For when I went from king Dionise, he might not suffer, that thou moughtist be one hour from him.  
moreover he regarded nothing that was spoken, except it were by thy sentence approved. In the morning as sone as he was out of his bed Plato was sent for. Vneth Dion and Aristomenes could get of him one hour in the day / that thou moughtist teach them and other towardely gentlemen such part of philosophy as they desired to learn. Finally for the incomparable favour that the king bare to the, thou were had in the court almost in as much reverence as the kings own person. And when thou passiddest by, noble men & other of the kings household / would rise quickly & as a storm had fallen in their necks, duck to the with their heddis vncouered: yet diuers in their mindes grudged at thy fortune, thinking that the great pleasure / that the king had in communinge with the / withdrew him from hearing of other men, of whom there was a great noumbre, which had / some commune some private causis to treat of with him, if they might by thine absence haue found opportunity.  PLA. 
Thou sayest trouth Aristippus / & that perceive I more clearly now, than I did before those things happened unto me. But now will I recite the my story.  
¶ Sone after that thou haddist optained licence of the king to go unto Athenes / he became wonderful stourdie, in so much as no man might blame any thing / wherein he delighted: nor praise any thing, which was contrary to that / that he used. And that sober and gentle maner in hearing sundry opinions raisoned before him / whereto of a custom he was wont to provoke thee & me, was laid apart / and supposing that by hearing of sundry philosophers dispute and raisin, he himself had attained to a more perfect knowledge than any other that spake unto him, began to haue all other men in contempt. And as it were Iupyter / who( as homer saythe) with a wink made all heaven to shake / he would with a terrible countenance so visage them / whom he knew would speak their opinions freely, that they should dreede to say any thing / which they knew should be contrary unto his appetite. Not withstanding on a time he willed me to declare in his presence the majesty of a king, and howe much he excelled and was above the estate of any other person: which request I gladly herde / thinking to haue had good opportunity to warn him of his blindness and folly. Therfore I began to commend the perfect image or figure of god, which was manifest in the estate of a king, who ruled himself and his people for the universal weal of them al. And when I had described his authority and pre-eminence by the excellency of his virtues: prouinge that nothing mought be amended, but by that which surmounted or was better than it which was to be corrected / as 'vice by virtue, falsehood by truth, wrong by Iustice, folly by wisdom, ignorance by learning / and such other like. Afterward I studiousely did set out a tyrant in his proper colours, who attendeth to his own private commodity.  
¶ Here at king Dionise frowned and became angry. And interruptynge my words said unto me:  
This is a tale of old fools / that can not be otherwise occupied. And I answered again, that those words of his / savoured of Tyranny.  ARI. 
I marvel Plato that thou spakest, so vnavisedly: I do mean, sens thou knewest well enough king Dionise nature and disposition / that thou perceuinge him to be moved, wouldest so suddenly imbrayde him of his words so despitefully.  PL. 
Well as for that / we shal raisin ther of hereafter. Finally I was well auised what I wolde speak: but now will I tell forth my tale, what happened afterward to me.  
¶ sir, the king being inflamed with fury / forthwith wolde haue slain me. But being entreated importunately by Dion and Aristomenes he withdrew his sentence / not withstanding to the intent that he wolde be avenged, he gave me to Polidis / who was joanne ambassador sent to him from the Lacedemonians. Who had me with him to Aegina, and there sold me. now a little before there was an ordinance made in that country, that if any man of Athenes came in to that Ile, he should immediately lose his head: which ordinance was made by Charmander joanne being captain of that country / who espieng me / and knowing who I was, caused me to be apprehended and brought unto the place of Iudgement / requiring that on me his said ordinance might be put in execution. whereunto I made no defence, but taking mine adventure patiently, and contemning death as it became me / I abode my judgment. At the last one, either in despite / or of purpose to save thereby my life, speaking openly and with a loud voice, said to Charmander and the Iudges: The ordinance if it be well perceived, is made again men of Athenes: but Plato( that is here) is a philosopher. Which words, as it happened / were well taken & lawghed at of all them that were present. And therewith they discharged me of the said penalty.  
All be hit for the hostility that was than between them & Athenes they wolde not let me freely depart, but decreed that I should efte soones be sold. There happened to be at that time Aniceris, which dwelleth at Cyrenas / a man well learned, who payed for me. xx. li. and forthwith delivering to me his seruant, whom thou beholdist here, hath sent me as thou seest home to my contrary: The garments that I wear, he that bought me of Polidis took from one of his slaves / and gave them unto me, when he had taken from me mine apparel that I brought out of Sicile: which as thou knowest was right honest and competent.  
Not withstanding neither the cruelty of king Dionise, nor the malicious decree of the Aeginites might remove my courage from virtue and truth / no more than the twice selling of me, nor this vile habit of a slave or bondman may change mine estate or condition.  
¶ But now Aristippus I will answer the to that / wherein thou seemest to blame me of imprudence or litenes: saying, thou meruay leste that I wolde speak so vnauisedly / sens I knew the nature of king Dionise and his disposition. Remembrist thou not, that my coming in to Sicile was to behold the wonderful mountaines / which do send out of the tops of them great flames of fire and smoke, & to inserche out the natural causis therof? And that all though the king sent often times for me / yet wolde I not come unto him, for as much as through all Grece he was name a tyrant. At the last he sent unto me Dion / which is a man as thou knowest of honour and gravity almost incomparable: who said unto me that the king was incredibly moved with desire to se me, for the great famed( as he affirmed) of wisdom and knowledge / all though I myself know no such thing / to be in me. And moreover the same Dion shewed me, that he supposed much profit should happen to the royalme of Sicile by our meeting and communication / the king presently beholding and hearing in me that, whereof he hath so great expectation: that is to say( as I mought use Dions word) virtue and wisdom.  ARI. 
In dede I herde not onely Dion, but also dyvers other report every thing as thou hast spoken.  PLATO. 
Than thou knowest, that the king fervently desired to se me.  ARI. 
That is truth.  PLA. 
And moreover to speak also with me.  ARI. 
Ye verily.  PLA. 
because he herde good report of me.  ARI. 
So it appeareth.  PLA. 
Supposist thou Aristippus / that the report of wisdom and virtue is good in a ancients opinion?  ARI. 
Ye as long as he thinketh that nothing that is spoken or done repugnith against his affections.  PLA. 
What afterward?  ARI. 
He accounteth it but a vanity / judging as sick men, nothing to be good, that agreeth not with the sent of his appetite.  PLA. 
now in good faith though thou thyself hast a delicate mouth / and thy taste distempered, yet I can the thank: for now thou sayest truly. But it seemeth to the, that when Dionise sent for me, he than thought that wisdom and virtue were good / & that I having thē( as it was reported) was a good man: and therfore he desired to se me.  ARI. 
Ye so it seemeth.  PLA. 
And men do desire to se a thing either for the beauty therof / which causeth them to love it, or for the strangeness therof, whereby they be moved to wonder at it / or for commodity that they before haue received by hit.  ARI. 
I think thou sayest truly.  PLA. 
But except I be deceived by false myrrors, or like to changeable louers / which do mislike the beauty, whereof they haue daily fruition / perchance I contemn that in myself / which I would praise in an other, I am neytherin beauty nor parsonage to be compared to an infinite noumbre of young men / which be in Greece, and also in this royalme of Sicile. Besides that, I am now above the age of forty yeres, and haue also travailed in to dyvers contraies to seek for wisdom / whereby the form & strength of my body is not a little appayred. moreover thankes be to god, I suppose there is neither stature nor form in my parsonage so far out of just measure or fascion / where at any man can find occasion to wonder or marvel. And as for any commodity that king Dionise hath received of me / before my coming unto him / I can not perceive what it should be / sens I never wrote unto him / nor never before was in his company: what thinkest thou was than the cause that he desired to se me?  AR. 
What else, but to the intēr that having the in his presence, he might in demaundinge of the, here that declared by thy mouth: wherefore thou were called a wise man / & if thou didst express the same in thy demenure & countenance / which helpeth much( as I might say) to the ratifienge of good opinion.  PLA. 
What sayest thou? doth demeanour and countenance ratify the opinion of wisdom?  ARI. 
Ye verily so think I.  PLA. 
What meanest thou thereby?  ARI. 
For according to the profession or quality / wherein men haue opinion that wisdom doth rest / so ought to be the form of living / countenance, and gesture: which joined all to gether maketh one hole and perfect harmony / which sendeth in to the hartes of the beholders and herers a voluptie or fervent dilectation.  PLA. 
I can the thank Aristippus / thou hast now declared to haue ben( as I was) the disciple of Socrates. And if thou wouldest extend voluptie no further( which thou so much praisest) than thou hast done now / there should never be contention between us, but following directly the doctrine and steps of our master Socrates, not onely we two should agree in our opinions / and form of living / which should make that harmony, whereof thou speakest. For all men that know us both by the unity of our doctrine should be brought to ensue one conformity of living, or at the leste covayte to follow it / wherein should be a perfect harmony. The hole quiar synging in one tune. Where, by the discord of our two doctrines, men doubtinge which of us two speaketh most truly / I commendinge the voluptie or perfect dilectation / which is in knowledge / thou preferringe the voluptie of the body & sences, they be divided in to sundry opinions: some extollynge mine admonicions as more pure and separate from the nature of beasts, and therfore approchinge nere unto divinity: other more sensual and having lasse reason, do embrace thy persuasions, as more illecebrouse or delectable / calling thy doctrine more natural and of lasse arrogance: many there be, which do covayte learning & wisdom / but having not their minds sufficiently purged of affects / but either by nature, or by ill bringing up inclininge alway to pleasant motions or appetites of the body they admit them gladly.  
But while they study to follow both our doctrines: they of all other do make the greatest discord and unperfect music. For when they would seem to extol the dilectation in knowledge / they advance it marvelously in their disputations & raisoninges: but in pursuing their affectis and wanton apetites they destroy their first opinion: And vainly do enforce them to make a concord between that which of their own nature be most repugnant. which discord dissolveth that harmony, whereof thou spakest: for men beholding in one person such instability, they semblably do wander in sundry opinions / now praising one and using an other, as occasion happeneth. But here will I leave to dispute any more in this matter / lest I mought happen to refricate the late variance between thee and me / and now will I return again where I was.  
¶ I trow thou least / that according to the profession or quality, wherein men haue opinion that wise doom doth rest, so ought to be the form of living, countenance / and gesture. In good say the I suppose thou sayest truly. For if Lais the harlot / in whom thou takest pleasure in fulfyllinge thy carnal appetite, should show herself to the in fluttisshe and vile apparel, her head vnkempt / her face and hands soiled and embrued with grece of the pottage that she had eaten, and her legs and feet spotted with myar / beholding thee with a sturdy countenance: thou shouldest not be much moved to embrace and kiss her, all though she spake to the words wanton and amorous, and after the custom of harlots / praise thee with rebukes, and rebuk thee with praises. In likewyfe if Diogenes / who( as thou knowest) contempneth all thing save onely poverty, wolde grind in the market place with his beard clean shaven, and his hear trussed up in a caule of gold / and having on his fingers rings with diamandes and rubies / and on his legs fine hosen well guarded, and shone of the trimmest fascion, And because perchance it is winter, and therfore the wether is cold / having a pan with hote coals standing at his elbow: If he wolde rebuk the people of to much curiosity and delicate living / and praise wilful poverty and apparel, that onely serven for necessity, also wolde exhort them to contemn or despise al riches and honour / and to embrace paynfulnes: Thinkest not thou that they would laugh him to scorn / and account him for a dissarde or with to much study fallen in to a frenzy?  ARI. 
Yes be my trouth, for it were a maruayllous folly.  PLA. 
And why supposest thou?  ARI. 
For the fresh apparel and riches that he sheweth / openly declareth to all men that he therein delighteth & taketh pleasure. And that wherein a man doth delight, in deliting therein he praiseth it: than is it not a great foolishness to praise & dispraise / as it were in one instant? That is to say in use to commend a thing openly / and in words to dispraise it expressly. And it should seem to the beholders, that he exhorteth men to contemn riches / that he might be rich onely. And that he persuadeth them to sustain could & other pains, that he might take his ease & sit by the fire / whiles other men laboured. wherefore if they regarded little his counsel / they were not to be blamed.  PLA. 
Yes, his counsel perchance were to be considered, whether it were expedient or no: but surely his person and discretion were to be little esteemed. now Aristippus, thou thinkest that king Dionise desired to se me, to the intent that he might behold, if in my countenance and form of living I did express that thing / wherefore he herde me commended. And it seemeth, that therein the king declared himself to be a very wise man, that he trusted more to the act, than to words or opinion.  ARI. 
Ye truly he hath a sharp wit, and in that a man might well praise his ymagination.  PLA. 
joanne what thinkest thou Aristippus? If I should haue laid a parte mine own aparaile, & haue bought such as thou wearest / guarded and decked with golden buttons / supposest thou not that when I cam to his presence / and that he saw me, in such wise aparailed, he would think that I would speak of the dilectation that is felt in medlynge with fair women and pleasant: or in the sundry diversities of sweet savours / & tastes of meats / that the cook hath well seasoned: and in other like things, in whose effects thou determinest to be perfect felicity? Than because he hath before herde the dispute as abundantly therof as any mannes wit might ymagine, he would little esteem my coming / and think the report, which was made of me, to be false. But if he would vouchefaufe to tarry, than if I disputed of fortitude, temperance, and other like virtues, and there with exhorted him and other princes, to abstain and be continent / blaminge their avarice, lechery, & other dissolute manners / with their curiosity & superfluous apparel: Supposest thou not that he wolde laugh at me / and in mockage bede me change mine apparel?  ARI. 
Nay, peradventure he wolde command one to fetch for you a furred hood to save with your honesty.  PLA. 
Ah, king Dionise is beholding unto the. For thou wouldest that men should think / that he were of great modesty. But what if before that he herde me speak, he had caused me to sit with him at supper / and there beheld me feed errantly / perusinge all the delicate dishes: and thereto drank stoutly of every cup that was offered me: and after supper / with such wenches as were present, devise wantonly / and also play and dalie, exceeding the terms of honesty, but when I beheld him do the semblable, I wolde than commend soberness / and dispraise gloteny: commend excedingely ꝯtinence, and dispraise vehemently wanton dalliance and lechery: howe much trowest thou would he than set by me?  ARI. 
As much as of a good fool / that should make him merry. For he would take al thy words but for iapery.  PLA. 
I ween thou sayest truly. now let us inserche somewhat on the other parte. when Dion brought me until him / and that he beheld me clad in apparel convenient & seemly to my profession, neither seant nor superfluous / neither most rude, nor yet sumptuous, my countenance thereto equivalent, which( be it spoken without any boast) with great study and diligence, I haue prepared to haue alway in such a temperance / that it shall never be founden dissolute or light / nor yet froward or sturdy / thinkest thou that he had than good opinion of me? and thought that the wisdom and virtue was in me, which men had reported?  ARI. 
Ye undoubtedly / and therfore he rejoiced much at thy coming.  PLA. 
For any other thing trowest thou, than because I was wise and virtuous, as he judged by mine apparel & countenance? And that he hoped to here of me some wisdom declared?  ARI. 
No truly / but even for that cause onely.  PLA. 
On my faith Aristippus thou well dost deserve the great gifts and benefits that thou hast received of king Dionise / sens thou so diligently hast affirmed him to be the lover of wisdom. For in that, that he couayted to here it declared / he desired it, and no man would desire that thing that he loveth not.  AR. 
So I suppose.  PLA. 
But yet hereafter it shall appear contrary: But for this time admit thy persuasion of king Dionise to be true / that he favoured wisdom and virtue, and that he hoped to here it declared better by me than by other. If now he sitting & studiously applienge his ears to give me good audience, should here me commend the pleasure that is in sumptuous and pleasant housis, in rich apparel and tapestries, in plenty of goodly and fair concubines / in abundance of delicate meats and drinks / and heapynge up great treasure of money and jewels: thinkest not thou / that I spake contrary to his expectation / which he had of me by the report of my living, confirmed by mine apparel and countenance, as thou late affirmiddest? Thinkest thou that he wolde not haue thought / that either I had mocked him, or flatered him, if he hath so sharp a wit and quick invention as thou dost suppose him to haue, and therefore haue caused me to be expelled out of his palice, as a counterfeit dysarde or spy? Or answering me that of such things as I commended he had more knowledge and experience than I / and therfore in vain I laboured to declare that to him, which I knew much lasse than he himself did? saying that he couayted to here of me, what wisdom was, whereof he had herde so many diuers opinions: And wherein as the report was made unto him, I was iustructed sufficiently, wherefore he wolde require me to declare that onely unto him / which he supposed I knew better than he did.  ARI. 
It is very likely that he would haue done so.  PLA. 
If thou hadst than ben there Aristippus / wouldest thou haue counseled me to haue resisted that gentle princis request, who with such humanity, as thou hast herde of, so much desired to se me / and to here me speak?  ARI. 
Nay that would I not.  PLA. 
Than thou wouldest that I should satisfy his desire?  ARI. 
Ye truly.  PLA. 
After that he had sene me, what remained?  ARI. 
To here the speak.  PLA. 
Any otherwise than he had opinion of me?  ARI. 
No verily.  PLA. 
And according as mine apparel / and countenance pretended, so I should do?  ARI. 
according.  PLA. 
Not usurping thy profession in persuadinge to him things that were delectable, or praising the dissolute form of his living, not onely contrary to mine apparel and countenance / but also which I myself do aborre / and haue alway reproved openly.  ARI. 
No / that dissimulation were to foul and apparent / and should haue set him( as thou say dost while ere) in great displeasure with the / supposing that thou hadst mocked him.  PLA. 
Than wouldest thou not, that I should haue used any dissimulation: for thou supposest that king Dionise wolde haue been therwith displeased. It seemeth therfore that thou concludest / that I should tell him truth / & according to my profession.  ARI. 
Ye so god help me.  PLA. 
Thou knowest well Aristippus / that my profession hath ever been, That no man is happy, 
Alcib. ●  except he be wise and also good / & that felicity is in wisdom and goodness. And contrary wise / that they which be ignorant and ill / be unhappy / and that ignorance and sin is infelicity and misery.  ARI. 
I know well thou hast ben in that tale yet continually.  PL. 
What sayest thou Aristippus / is not wisdom knowledge? Or what thing is it else?  ARI. 
Why dost thou ask me that question / whereof no man maketh any doubt?  PLA. 
For I feared leste thou wouldest haue said, that the using of things delectable had ben wisdom onely.  ARI. 
But not without knowledge, whereof proceedeth election. For than should I haue affirmed / that a horse / which delighteth in etyng / a dog in hunting, a gote in lechery, did it by wisdom: whereby I should prove myself to be folisshe and ignorant. moreover I am of that opinion, that a wise man liveth not alway in voluptie or pleasant dilectation / but that for the more parte 〈◇〉 is so affectioned. Also without knowledge the troubles & impediments whereby dilectation is letted / may not be comprehend to be eschewed.  PLA. 
Well than / although in the affect of dilectation we two disagree / thou preferrynge the dilectations of the flesh before the dilectations of the soul / I condemnyng all such affection do vtterli sever it from wisdom: yet we do agree / that knowledge is ever in a wise man. But what knowledge meanest thou? The knowledge of a good horse from a bad / a hole sheep from a cothed, or such other like? Or else the knowledge howe to build a fair house, or how to set trees, that in a little space of time thou mayst haue a faire orchard?  ARI. 
That knowledge is good.  PLA. 
Yea and proceedeth of a sharp wit / but yet it is not that knowledge that maketh him / that hath it, to be a wise man.  ARI. 
I suppose not.  PLA. 
What sayest thou by him, that findeth the means to gather great sums of money / offices, or great possessions with little labour: thinkest thou not him to haue that knowledge / which we call wisdom?  ARI. 
It approacheth very nigh, but I dare not affirm it to be so, because I se daily, that the most parte of those persons happeneth to such things more by fortune than by their own merites or Industry.  PLA. 
On my faith I love the Aristippus / for now thou sayest truly. What they / which from a poor estate do come to great rule and authority, shal I name them all wise men?  ARI. 
much lasse joanne the other. For besides that that fortune hath also there no little portion, it moreover dependeth not on the power, wit, or diligence of him, that cometh to authority, but holly on the will of a second person / that is to say of him that promoteth him to it. wherefore haue he much wit or none, as he shall like or content the person that may advance him, so shall he come to authority. wherefore sens it happeneth not onely of his own study, I se no cause why to call him a wise man.  PLA. 
Thou speakest very well and raysonably / but what supposest thou them to be, which in every matter, that is moved, can raisin fetely, making men that do here them / wonder at their conveyance, though it be sometime far from the purpose? be not they wise men? And that thing that they haue, is it not the very knowledge, that maketh wisdom?  ARI. 
No, but it is a good parte of invention, which cometh of wit. All be it because that which they do reason is never certain, it is rather opinion than wisdom, and also that maner of prompt raysonynge happeneth more of nature than study, and therfore it is more commended of vulgar persons or ignorant: than of them which be of a ripe and perfect judgment.  PLA. 
Perchance thou sayest truly: yet may it also be in them that be wise, not as wisdom itself, but as a setter forth of wisdom to him that heareth / like as the painter hath the very image in his mind, but when he would that other men should perceive it, he on a table with sundry colours painteth it / and setteth it forth:  
And yet if the painter do not before he warketh / & in the painting, conceive in his mind the hole proportion of the image when it is painted, it shal lack his {per}fection. And although the fresh colours and varnish maketh it pleasant to the eyen of the commune people, and them that be ignorant, yet to good work men / & to them that haue beholden many parfecte pieces, and delighted therein, the imperfeccyon of the work is shortly perceived: even so knowledge / wherein is wisdom / being ones truly had, if it be well set forth with eloquence and raisin / it shal the better please and profit the herers. But if he that speaketh / do lack that knowledge / howe so ever the beauty of his words and reason shall content the ears of them that be ignorant, yet therof shall come to them but little profit. And to them that haue tasted some thing of that knowledge / the error or lack shall sone be espied. But now what supposest thou is the knowledge, which we haue all this while talked of? and that wherein that wisdom is / for the which king Dionise desired to se me / and to here me speak, and the which according to my profession / apparel / and countenance, and to the expectation that he had of me / I declared unto him?  ARI. 
I wote not Plato, therfore I pray the tell me to shorten our communication.  PLA. 
I am content / but yet with a condition / that is to say, when I demand of the any question / thou shalt speak even as thou thinkest, without inforcinge any raisin to maintain therwith thine old opinion.  ARI. 
thereto I assent for this time, sens there be no mo here but we two, for our servants be now out of hearing.  PLA. 
Thou remembrest, that it is agreed by us both, that neither the knowing of good catell from bad / or howe to plant well and to make a fair orchard / ne the deuisinge of fair houses, and buyldinges / nor the increasinge of goods or possessions, or the optayninge of great offices or dignities, or the sharp wit and quickenes in raisoninge: is that knowledge / wherein is wisdom? What sayest thou to other sciences or crafts, which are not rehearsed?  ARI. 
I suppose the same of them al generally. For of eueriche of them I haue known some men to be little better than natural fools / and out of the feat / which they daily exercised, vneth perceyuinge that / which we call commune reason.  PLA. 
Ye, & that wars is / living beastly and out of all order, which is the greatest & most evident token of ignorance, which is contrary and enemy to knowledge. But now Aristippus, for as much as long disputation provoketh tediousenes, me seemeth / if we brought in some variety or change in the order of our communication, it should refresh both our wits.  ARISTIP. 
What menest thou thereby? Take hede that we run not out of our matter.  PLA. 
No, doubt thou not therof, I shall provide well enough therfore. But hark I will tell the now / what I mean. We haue hitherto spoken of knowledge, wherein is Sapience: but what or wherein hit is, we yet perceive not, but be now in seeking.  
What, and if we now used the way of a cunning painter, which in making an image of a very fair woman naked / to the intent that he will set out the figure perfaictly / &( as I might speak like a warkeman) by prospective: that it may seem to the beholders therof most lively / & therfore the body and membres should show to them as round and full, as it were imbosed and wrought in timber, metal, or ston? he maketh the ground of his work of the deepest black colour that he may come by, which the more intentifly that a man doth behold it / the more liueli or quick shal the fresshly colour of the image appear to the eye / & the proportion seem more round, and in the form of a body living. In semblable wise I intending to set out a parfeict figure of knowledge, if I treat first of ignorance / and making that to be well perceived / I suppose it shall not be inconueniente: but the true proportion of knowledge afterward, when I shall go about to declare it / shall be more apparent and easy to be understand / and the variety in our communication shall make the matter more pleasant.  ARI. 
In good faith Plato thy devise liketh me wonderful well. wherefore say on a goddes name.  PL. 
Is Ignorance any other thing Aris. than lack of knowledge?  ARI. 
No surely.  PL. 
Than nothing is so contrari to knowledge as ignorance.  ARI. 
Nothing.  PL. 
Is a brute beest inferior to mankind by any thing so much as by ignorance? For in bodily strength, long life / agility & swiftness, ther be diuers bestes which far do exceed him / onely by ignorance they be all inferiors unto him.  A. 
Thou were wont also to say, that bestes lacked the soul that man hath which is immortal.  PL. 
That is true. But thou must remembre, that the soul with the body maketh the man. For if the body lacked a soul, though it had life, yet were it no man but a beest. And that the figure maketh not a man / it aperith by those bestes, which be called satiri / fauni / hipocentauri / & diuers other / which be founden in Affrike having some the visage / some the hole figure of mans body. And in the same soul, which maketh the man, and without it man is not, nor may be, hath nothing lasse in him than ignorance, and if a man seem to be ignorant, it happeneth never a whit of the soul, but of the grossness of the body, which is bestial, as of the same matter and substance that brute beasts be of: which will not let the soul, that is of a divine substance, to show the effects and disposition of her nature, which is onely knowledge: the lack whereof being caused by the object or let of the body, is nothing but ignorance. likewise as a thick & great cloud coueringe the son / will not let him to send forth his beams on the earth, whereby the earth lacketh light / and that lack is called darkness. now lay apart all artes & sciences, which( as thou knowest well enough) were founden by mannes invention and experience, long after that man was created: and set man in the same estate that he was in before the said artes and sciences were invented: yet were he than a man as he is now, And lacketh not any thing, whereby he is name a a man. wherein now doth appear the diversity between him and a brute beast? Tell me now as thou thinkest?  ARI. 
What else but in the same thing / for the which beasts be surnamed brute.  PLA. 
Thou sayest truth: but yet leste I be deceyuid by the diversity of our two vnderstandynges: I pray the tell me in few words, what by the said word, brute, is signified.  ARI. 
Mary agreed: I take that signifieth gross, insensate / lacking capacity of knowledge / finally it amounreth to as much as ignorant.  PLA. 
By the faith of my body thou hast made an exposition very compendious and elegant. Than be we both agreed, that ignorance maketh the diversity between a beast & a man. But what Ignorance I pray the? Ignorance in building of houses, making of cloth, or warking of metal, or {per}aduenture ignorance in grammar, or logic, or making or versis / or else playing on the shawms or the lute? Doth ignorance in any of these cause the diversity?  AR. 
It seemeth nay. For thou didst presuppose, that a man were in the same estate, that all men were in / or ever any artes or sciences were founden / & than of that thing that is not / it were folly to suppose any ignorance.  PLA. 
Thou speakest not much a miss. But yet for an other cause / ignorance in any of the said artes or sciences doth not make the diversity that we now speak of.  
For if it should so do / than who so ever lacked any of the said artes or sciences: it should follow that he were ignorant, & therfore he were no man but a beast. And also bees, silkewormes, and spydars should not compare with us onely, but should seem also to exceed us in knowledge. For as much as without any instructor or teacher, they at the first without loss of any thing / can perfectli make wax / hony, silk and copwebbes: which no man can do like, nor by none invention can attain to the knowledge, how it ought to be done. And as for the bee and the spynner, who so ever studiously do behold their work / he shall se therein such order / that beside the office of nature he shal wonder at the equality or iustnes of proportion / so exactly observed / that none artificer can amend it. But now Aristip. sens this is not the ignorance / that any of us both haue mente hitherto / I pray the what ignorance supposest thou it is, that maketh this diversity?  ARI. 
I suppose hit be this, that a beast hath not the knowledge of himself and of other, in the diversity of their kindes. For my horse knoweth not that he is a horse / no more he doth that he is a beast and I a man: neither the bee / at whose industry thou hast so much wondered, when the hive is broken: he knoweth not whether it be a man or a beast that taketh his hony combs, & putteth him out of his lodging, whereon he hath bestowed so much labour.  
Nor the spainell that is so ialouse over his miaster, hath not the knowledge whether his master be a man or elles a beast as he is. Contrary wise, a man knoweth that he is a man, and knoweth also every other beast in his kind.  PLA. 
Thou comest nigh to the point Aristippus. But beware that thou be not deceived, if after Pythagoras doctrine / when men be deade their souls entre in to horsis / lions / and swine.  
And after many yeres trauaylynge they return again to be men:  
Than there might be in thy horse the soul of king Sardanapalus / whereby thy horse mought know what thou art and himself to.  ARI. 
Thou aduauncest me highly Plato / when thou supposest me to ride on a king, and on so great a king as Sardanapalus was / which reigned over Assyria and Babylon.  PLA. 
Thou art worthy to haue no worse horse Aristippus, sens by thy profession thou art deemed prelate of all voluptie or wanton appetites: unto whom much greater princis than Sardanapalus was / haue ben known to be servants.  ARI. 
Mo peradventure than of thy sour & unpleasant virtues wolde gladly be followers.  PLA. 
But now that I remember me, thou needest not to be afeard Aristippus, for thou art never the more deceived. In good feythe thy horse hath yet no more knowledge than a very horse hath in dede.  ARI. 
What meanest thou thereby?  PLA. 
For when Sardanapalus lived, and was king of Assyria / he than knew not himself. For abandoning not onely the majesty of a king / but also the office of a man, he left the company of men / and sat continually with his concubines atyred in the form of a woman / spinnynge in the rock / and cared for nothing, but howe he might excel all his wenches in wantonness. Now sens he than being in the form of a man / so much forgot what he was, thinkest thou that there be in him lasse ignorance now that he is in the form of a horse?  ARI. 
Nay in good faith, but much more. And because thou sayest so Plato / I haue even the fondest horse that ever man road on. For when he was young, he was so mere wode / that no man might ride him. And now that he is old, & that I pitieng him do use to ride on him some small iournaies: by my trouth when we be in the broad highway, if he se. iiii. miles of, a rase of mares / he will in spite of my teeth leave the way & go to thē when he is not able to run, nor bridle nor sporre may hold him. And yet when he cometh thither / saving onely neyenge & kicking / he can do nothing. And therefore it may well be( if Pythagoras do trine be true) that the soul of Sardanapal{us} is in sorel my horse. But if I knew it for certain / bi god I would haue the fairest mares that any where might be gotten for him.  P. 
Now on mi faith that is merrily spoken. But in dede Arist. the said sentence of Pythagoras ought not to be taken as it is written without any other exposition nomore than his mystical counsels called Simbola. As / cut not the fire with a sword / leap not over the balance, Taste nothing which hath a black tail, and such other like, which thou hast often times herde of: but there in is a more secret meaning / & approchinge nere unto reason. As in mine opinion / by the translation of mans soul, whereof we haue spoken, from a man to a beast, and finally estsones unto a man again: It may be well understand in this wise. That men being in the state of Innocency haue than the figure of man, the soul having the hole pre-eminence over the body. But after if● it happen that the appetites and desires of the body so much do increase, that they haue the hole possession of the body / and that the affections of the soul, that is to say / virtues be suppressed or put to silence / than the life becometh beastly: than look in what beasts the said appetites be most vehement: he / in whom is the semblable appetite, may be said hath his soul in that best enclosed. As he that is lecherous and wanton, in such a horse as thou spakest of while ere. A cruel man or tyrant in to a tiger or lion, a glotton or drunkard in to a wolf or a swine, and so forth of other. And if one man happen to be possessed of many vices / than is his transformation more dyvers / and as I might say more monstrous. Also being in that beastly estate, & the soul with her affects being hid and not showing her pvissance, what any other thing is more in them joanne ignorance? Which being a thing beastly, is as proper to them as beastly appetite. But if god so willing after long travailing in ill affections, the soul recovereth her might / and vanquished ignorance / making the body to know his misery, than the beasts hide by little and little falleth a way as knowledge increaseth, and finally man resumeth his very figure and proportion living after the rule of the soul, and so continueth perpetually. Howe sayest thou Aristippus to this exposition?  ARI. 
It seemeth to me to stand with good reason: for ever me thought that Pythagoras sentence, which was a man of incomparable wisdom / had such a meaning.  PLA. 
Also it appeareth by the said sentence / that Ignorance maketh a man beastly, & that knowledge putteth away beastlynes, and restoreth a man to his dignity.  ARI. 
Ye verily.  PL. 
And it seemeth by that, which is rehearsed that Ignorance that we call beastly, is in that, that bestes do not know what they themselves be / nor between them and men what is the diversity. Also that men know the diversity between them and brute beasts / it happeneth of the soul, having pre-eminence over the body / that is to say while the soul doth hold the sences of the body under due rule & obedience.  ARI. 
I wote not, howe to answer the. For I haue affirmed so much before, that I can not reply now with mine honesty.  PLA. 
For they keeping of touch Aristippus I can well praise the. But howe sayest thou? Haue we not of ignorance spoken for this time sufficiently?  AR. 
Yes I suppose / and we haue now passed two miles in our iournay: therfore return where thou leftest to speak of knowledge. For thou hast laid a good ground on thy table to set out thine image.  PLA. 
I se thou forgettest nothing that I haue spoken. Therfore let us assay to express that Image, that is to say, declare what is that knowledge, wherein lieth very wisdom, which peradventure king Dionise hoped to find in me / when he first desired to se me.   

THE SECOND dialogue.  PLA. 
THou dost remember Aristippus, that we be agreed, that knowledge is contrary to Ignorance? And I suppose also they be so contrary / that they may never accord / or in any part be mingled together: but alway where the one is, the other lacketh.  ARI. 
Ye surely it must needs follow.  PLA. 
Than when Ignorance is ones put away clearly / knowledge onely remaineth.  ARI. 
Ye so I trow: or else I wote not what it is, that abideth / except I wolde call it nothing. And yet now I am advised, that same, nothing / is ignorance. For of nothing can be no knowledge.  PLA. 
Thou speakest truly / and as it beseemeth the scholar of Socrates. Now thou knowest that Ignorance is of bestes / which therfore be name brute: & that knowledge is only pertaininge to man. And that the ignorance / whereby beasts be most unlike unto man, is ignorance of themselves, in as much as they know not / that they be beasts. Than it followeth, that the knowledge, which maketh the greatest diversity between man & beast / and whereby man hath pre-eminence in dignity over beasts / is the knowledge of himself: whereby also he knoweth other.  ARI. 
Ye, supposest thou so? doth a man by knowing himself know other also?  PLA. 
No doubt therof, and that shalt thou se provid in the order of our communication / by the same raisin that shal make him to know him self. But yet left thou be deceived, I will by the way demand one question of the. Thou least while ere Aristippus, that a beast hath not the knowledge of himself and of other in the diversity of their kindes, I pray the what vnderstodest thou thereby? Any other than thou didst declare by the example of the bee and the spaynell?  ARI. 
None other: Why, thinkest thou Plato / that I said not well?  PLA. 
Thou camest( as I said) nigh to the point, but yet thou hittest it not. For peradventure thy supposell may be in some part false, although thou hast not c●pied it. Dost thou not behold, that beasts, which be savage, as they be diuers in kind, so do they couayt to be together, and will sever themselves from other? And in the act of generation will accompany with none other beast, but such as is of his own proper kind: notwithstanding that there be diuers of thē one so like an other: that vneth a man can discern the diversity. As wolfes and mastyfes: foxes and curres, hares and conyes, and many other beasts / which were tedious to be rehearsed. And as touching the bee, that we spake of, be there not diuers flies like unto him? And for all that he will company with none of them / nor yet suffer them( if he be of power to resist) entre in to his hive / but at the first sight will withstand him. moreover all the said bestes, when they perceive a man coming toward them / they will not abide, but flee sooner from him than from any beast. moreover among an infinite nombre of people, a dog will know his master / although ther were a thousand men, in parsonage, fascion, and colour of garments veri like unto him. And if thou wouldest say, that the dog doth discern that by sent of smellinge. Yet would I demand of the again, howe it happeneth / that a dog taken up at Olinthum, and brought unto Athenes / which be distant. xl. miles one place from the other, and is a very diffuse way to keep, and little travailed, yet after that the dog haue ben retained at Athenes by the space of syxe months / when he hath ben at liberty he hath returned again home to his maisters house, howe wouldest thou answer me Aristippus?  ARI. 
Howe elles? But even as thou thyself didst suppose that I wolde say, that the dog found the way by sent specially, adding to peradventure some parte of his sight.  PLA. 
But perchance or he come to Olinthum his master hath forsaken the house that he dwelled in / when he was with him, and is removed in to an other house: dost thou not think, that the dog will go to the house, where he left his master, and not to the house where he dwelleth?  AR. 
Yes in good saith.  PLA. 
And yet percase he shal finde his maisters steps in the street toward his new house. And notwithstanding as sone as he espieth the other house / he passeth forth, & goeth streight to it. But when he cometh in, and findeth not his master there, yet he layeth him down as he were at home, trusting that his master will shortly come in: doth he this by sight or by smellinge?  ARI. 
Thou makest me doubt Plato, whither he doth it by any of them.  PLA. 
What if it happen, that his master not knowing him to be ther / standing nigh to the window talketh loud with his neighbour / so that the dog heareth him: thinkest thou not / that he will rise suddenly / & with great hast come joyfully until his master?  ARI. 
Yes / I haue sene that in experience.  PLA. 
Doth he that by savour or by sight?  ARI. 
By neither of them, but onely by hearing.  PLA. 
And when he cometh to him / he streight leapeth upon him without any smelling.  aristippus. 
I am yet in doubt / what I may say.  PLATO. 
Onely by cause thou wilt not grant contrary to thine assercyon, that a beast hath knowledge of himself and other in the diversity of their kinds. But what wilt thou say / if it shall appear unto the / that bestes haue yet an other knowledge among themselves than by their sences? hast not thou sene, when men haue preparid themselves to go on hunting, and to that intent haue brought forth their leshes, colers, and lyams / or elles their hays and pursenettes, that the hounds espienge these things / haue reioyced and lept about the house / as if they knew that they should go on hunting? likewise when they here the hunter blow his horn / they do all rise, and with one voice do make a great noise, as if they consented to go to that solace.  
And if they herde one blow in a shawm or a trumpet / they wolde not do so.  
¶ The coursar / which is used to bataylle / as soon as he herethe the trumpets blown / he snorteth and brayeth, and taking to him his courage, he tredith high, & praunceth / and with such brags declareth himself redy to set forth in battle, supposest thou, that these beasts haue this knowledge onely by the senses, whereof we haue spoken?  ARI. 
No, hir semethe to me now, that they haue an other knowledge than onely by sences, but what hir is / or whereof hir procedethe / I can not discuss except I should name it natural influence, diversely disposed more or lasse, after the grosenesse or capacity of the body, whereunto it sloweth.  PLA. 
By the faith of my body, and that definition is not to be dispreised / if thou add thereunto the sences. But by this that thou and I haue now spoken / it seemeth, that beasts haue knowledge of themselves and other in the diversity of their kinds, contrary to thy first division. And if it be so, than be they equal to men / and without cause we do call them ignorant or brute.  ARI. 
I wote not what to say to the.  PLA. 
Abide Aristippus / despair not / thou hast spoken more wiseliar than thou art ware of.  ARI. 
Trowest thou so Plato?  PLA. 
Ye / and that shalt thou perceive if thou wilt here me.  ARI. 
Go to than I pray the.  PLA. 
let it not be tedious unto the to haue some things repeated, which thou hast spoken.  
¶ first if thou remember thyself, thou wouldest not deny, but that wisdom was knowledge. After ward thou grauntiddest also, that ignorance was none other thing but lack of knowledge, which concluded, that ignorance could be no wisdom. And than didst thou raisin / that the diversity between man and beast was onely ignorance. And that ignorance didst thou suppose to be the lack of knowledge of themselves / and other in the diversity of their kinds. This was very well gathered of the, in mine opinion. And the raisin that followed by the example that thou diddest put of thy horse / the bee / and the spaynell, was not unfit to the purpose, if thou wouldest haue abiden well by it. But by our merry digression in to Pythagoras regenerations / thou were brought from that argument / sooner than thou shouldest haue ben: which happened unto the / as it doth ever to them, which like unto the / do follow the concupiscence and pleasant affects of the body. For like as they be unstable, so the followers & louers of them be ever in constant: as well in their opinions as in their acts. But if thou being sometime the hearer of Socrates as well as I was, hadst followed directly his doctrine / according as he spake it / and also practised it by his example of living / and hadst not as a truant pycked out of his arguments such matter as thou supposiddest might only maintain thy sensual appetite / thou shouldest haue perceived what thou thyself hadst mente, which thou dost not now / it varieth so much from thy profession. And peradventure the knowledge that we now seek for, should never haue comen between us two in question. But it should haue sufficed to haue  told to the, what I said to king Dionise, and howe he dealt with me. And thou shouldest sone haue judged / if he had according to mi merites intreted me. But now Aristippus to thintent thou mayst take some comfort of the seeds of Socrates doctrine / which remain in thee, but they will not spring / in such wise as thou mayst see them / except I do water them with my declaration. ¶ first remember that of all that which beareth the name of a thing / there be two kinds, one hath no body & is ever steadfast and permanent / the other hath a body, but it is ever movable & vncertein, The first, because it may be understand only / it is called intelligible. The second, because it may be felt by sensis it is called Sensible. The way to know the first is called raisin, & the knowledge therof is namid understanding. The way to know the. ii. is called Sense or feeling / the knowledge therof is name Perceiuinge. More over of that which is called Intelligible there is the first & the second. In the first is that portion of divinity, which is in man, whereby he is made to the image and similitude of god. In the other be noumbres and figures. Of this beasts haue no parte, neither of the first nor yet of the second: of the first I suppose thou wilt grant me, and as for the second experience will prove it? for I dare say / thou never hardest of beasts / that could skylle of nombrynge.  ARI. 
I wote nere, I never called any yet to a reckoning.  PLA. 
And though an ape or other like beast / seem in taking of things to observe an order, as it were in nombrynge / yet if it be well considered / it shall appear that it is by an imagination engendered of custom, and not by nombrynge. I haue sene a man, which was born blind, and used to be superadd to three or four houses in the city, which hath ben a great distance a sondre, at the last by custom hath known so well where they stood / that without any man or dog leading, or any man telling him / he hath gone directly unto them. whereat first I marveled with many other, and when I communed with him, I haue perceived that he never observed nombre, but that onely custom had set the distance of the places in his imagination. Like may be spoken of figures. For that whereby beasts do discern one thing from an other / is not understanding / that is to say though they discern in quantity the more from the lasse, yet they understand it not, as round, quadraunt / or triangle / or in other like figure: but the simulacre or image / whereby they pecyue the said diversity / is only by custom, formed & imprinted in the principal sense, which is the hart. And when the thing self is removed out of sight / that impression that remaineth is called imagination / who committith it forthwith unto memory, which vndouted is not only in men but also in bestis, for they discern the time present and that which is passed, but the time to come they know not, & Memory is onely of the time passed. And therfore the bestes that thou spakest of / do perceive the diversity of things by imagination & memory, conceiuynge & reteyninge in the heart, which is the principal sense or fountain of senses, the image of the thing that is sensible. And thereby the dog perceiveth his master / & fetcheth his glove / which he hath ben before taught for to do / & goeth to the places where he hath sene his master been a little before. But that he knoweth not whether his master be a man or a horse / Plato or Demosthenes, a philosopher or an orator, it is evident enough. For although my dog had abiden ten yeres continually with me, and had herde me every day speak of Demosthenes / & name him an orator / and herd the call me every day Plato, and name me a philosopher: yet if thou wouldest deliver unto him anything, & bid him c●ry it to the orator / he wolde straight bring it unto me, and not to Demosthenes. Also if I would cast a loaf unto my spaynell / & bid him carry it to my horse, I suppose he would forthwith eat it himself, & lie down when he hath done / without seeking for mi horse / though he stood by him / is it not so?  A. 
Ye in good faith me thinketh thou saist truly.  P. 
And likewise may be raisoned of al other bestes be they never so wily / if their acts be deeply considered.  A. 
It appeareth so.  PLA. 
joanne thy saying is not to be reproved, that a beast lacked knowledge of himself and of other.  ARI. 
No, as it semethe.  PLA. 
And that lack of knowledge is ignorance.  ARI. 
Ye truly, and so said I also.  PLA. 
And that ignorance made the diuersiue between man and beast.  ARI. 
Ye and the same to.  PLA. 
Than thou wilt conclude / that man hath knowledge?  AR. 
Ye that I must needs thou knowest well enough.  PL. 
And what callest thou that knowledge? suppose●t thou it is where a man knoweth himself and other?  ARI. 
Ye so I said, and thou hast also affirmed it.  PLA. 
So I did in dede, but yet good Aristippus / suffer me to demand of the a few questions / we shall the sooner finde out the knowledge that we seek for. Is it in figure & nombre that knowledge resteth?  ARI. 
Ye so it appeareth.  PLA. 
Nay, if thou remember the. perdieu thou least thyself, that thy horse knew not, that thou were a man, or that he was a horse.  ARI. 
So said I indeed.  PL. 
Thou considerest also, that it was agreed by us both, that the figure made not the man, but it was the soul with the body / that caused the man to be so name: and that without the soul, not withstanding the figure of man, yet were he no man but a brute beast.  ARI. 
It must needs be so, I can not deny it.  PLA. 
Than is there somewhat more that maketh the said knowledge besides the figure / which is contained in the second part of that / which we called Intelligible?  ARI. 
So me thinketh. But what hit is I can not remember.  PLA. 
It is no marvel, thy wy●tes be so involved in carnal affections, that this clene and pure doctrine can not entre in to them without great difficulty, & when they be ones in, they can not long abide / thy memory is so occupied about wanton and beastly fantasy. But yet will I ones again rehearse unto the that, which thou hast so shortly forgotten. did not I say, that in the first part of that, which is name Intelligible / is that portion of divinity in man, whereby he is made to the image and similitude of god?  ARI. 
Yes I remember well that.  PLA. 
And is that form printed in any other thing than in mans soul, which is immutable and of one proportion and figure?  
All though it lieth bound in the body / as it were in a prison / considering things diversely: as the substance and qualities of the body suffereth him to take light: being deceived by the iudgement of the sences or wits, esteeming things as they be sensible & visible: where that / which the soul by himself doth consider, is intelligible and also invisible.  ARI. 
I doubt me what I shall say. But supposest thou Plato, that the image and similitude of god is not in the body of man as well as in the soul?  PLA. 
Hast thou so sone forgotten that, which I haue so often rehearsed? That if the body of man were without a soul, he were than but in the nombre of brute beasts, which haue sences as well as he / and some more sharp & quicker. And no man that will affirm that god is / will presume( as I trow) to say expressly that the image of god is in Satires / and other beasts and fishes / which haue form and shape like unto man. And to speak to the merrily without reproach unto goddes majesty, If that which is in every mannes body / were the image of god, Certes joanne the image of god were not onely diuers, but also horrible / monstrous, and in some part ridiculouse: that is to say, to be laughed at. For every man hath not in visage and parsonage, one proportion or figure. Some haue a plain and equal visage, some look as they laughed / other as they wept / diuers as they were ever angri, many haue in the quantity of their bodies or membres excess or lack. wherefore to think that all these be like unto god( which as he is the creature of them all / and may make and do what he listeth, so it agreeth with all raison● that he incomparably excelleth them all in every perfection and consequently in beauty) it were of all other the greatest madness.  ARI. 
Thou aunswerest me raysonably / but now I pray thee declare to me as plainly, howe the image of god is in the soul / as thou supposest.  PLA. 
Thou wilt not deny, that god is without any body / invisible and immortal, whose form can not be deprehended with the eyen of mortal men / nor described by any sensible knowledge?  ARI. 
No truly.  PLA. 
And the same I trow thou wilt confess of the soul?  ARI. 
Ye verily.  PLA. 
Also god is in power in all and every parte of the world: And by his providence all thing is governed and moved. And he himself is of none other moved nor governed / but is the first incomprehensible mover.  ARI. 
I can by no raisin deny it / except I would deny, that god is / & that I may not / sens that the order of al thing that is visible / declareth that there must needs be one principal cause and beginning, which we call god. And also that order can not be without providence and one perpetual governance.  PL. 
Yet thou sayest well, and as it beseemeth Socrates scholar. But now Aristippus, for as much as god is the first & principal cause. And as he is one in beginning / so is he ever one in governance: And therfore having in him al sufficiency and powar, wilt thou not grant me, that he is of an absolute and full perfection?  ARI. 
Yes that must I needs.  PLA. 
And is not perfection / in that it is perfect / good also?  ARI. 
No man will deny it.  PLA. 
Ye per adventure the same perfection is goodness / sens goodness is alway complete, profitable, and without any lack. And goodness and evil the one is contrary and ever repugnant unto the other: Howe sayest thou? is it not so?  ARI. 
Ye that is true.  P. 
Than is there ever variance between them?  ARI. 
So it appeareth.  PLA. 
But in god can never be variance, which of his nature is ever one, & may never suffer division.  ARI. 
I grant the.  PLA. 
Than in god nor about god can be none evil: therfore all evil is far from god.  
But yet me seemeth we haue spoken somewhat lasse of god than we should do.  ARI. 
What meanest thou thereby?  PLA. 
For sens we both haue agreed, that he is the first beginning and cause: we should haue also concluded / that all goodness proceeded of him / and that he was the fountain and principal goodness.  AR. 
I admit al to be true that thou sayest.  PLA. 
Than thou grauntest, that cuyll is contrary to god?  ARI. 
Ye verily.  PLA. 
And all thing that is yl, is contrary to that thing / which is good?  ARI. 
Ye surely.  PLA. 
Those things that be contrary one to an other / be they like in that, wherein they be contrary?  AR. 
No truly.  P. 
Than it seemeth / that they be unlike?  A. 
So it appeareth.  PL. 
That / wherein things be like or unlike one to an neither, do we not call it an image or similitude?  AR. 
Yes undoubtedly.  PLA. 
hitherto we haue well agreed. now let see Aristippus, Sens thou hast confessed / that the soul is invisible and immortalle howe sayest thou? shall it suffice that therein onely he be like unto god and in all other thing unlike or contrary?  ARI. 
No: for than should he be in parte like / and in parte unlike: And than were hit not well spoken to say / that man was made to the image and similitude of god / without joining thereto distinctly & particularly in what thing he was made to the said image & similitude: As if one wolde say / that in thy son / were thy {pro}pre image and similitude. If thou thyself didst perceive that he were like to the in favour, proportion of body and conditions, thou wouldest hold the pleased and say nothing. But if thou beheldeste / that in his parsonage he were like the / but in some parte of the visage as in the nose, the eyen, or the mouth he were unlike the, Also in liberality he followed thee, but in lechery he did degenerate from the: shouldest thou not than be constrained to demand of him that spake, wherein thy son is like to the / or in what parte of him thine image should appear to be most?  PLA. 
now on my faith Aristippus thou speakest very well and wisely. Lo, see, howe by our long communing thou art drawn from thy wanton affections and fantasies / whereby the sparkis of wisdom, that thou gatist of Socrates lessons / like as fire hid under asks and dead cools, when they be removed is found sindrynge in little imbres: so thyn affections being withdrawn wisdom doth begin to glyter and show / which if it would abide kend lynge, & not like unto imbres remove & fle away with every puff of wind, I doubt not but for the sharpness of thy wit, of al Socrates scholars thou should●st be at the last one of the most wisest and excellent. But I will speak therof no more / lest thou shuldist suppose I did to the that I wolde not do to king Dionise, I mean flatter the.  A. 
No no, I peciue whereabout thou goest: thou wouldest with psuasion, wherein I know thou art marvelous, withdraw me if thou moughtist from my, pfessed opinion / but that is now no part of our matter.  P. 
Yet I suppose thou art deceyued● for thou shalt find it otherwise, or we be at an end of our communication: but where left we? Thou diddest affirm( as I remembre) that for as much as man was made to the image & similitude of god / he ought to be like unto god / not in part / but in all universally.  A. 
In al such likeness as that which is creatid may be most like unto his creator, without comparison of equality. For god that is alway one may suffer no pere / or like in equality of substance.  P. 
That is verily well said Arist. Al though that was ever ment in our raisoning: for I never supposid, that thou haddist so little learning / to think that god made men equal unto him / or so ignorant that thou knewest not, what an image or similitude is, in respect of that where unto it is wrought. By that which we before haue affirmed, that god is the first cause & principal goodness / it arguith that al thing which is not the self god / is inferior unto him. wherefore the image or similitude of god / al though it be an imitation or following in likeness of that whereunto it is made & resembled / yet is it inferior to god: who by the virtue of his unity hath ever a pre-eminence, and souerayntie. Therfore we will stick no more thereupon, but now I will assay to declare / how we may understand, that the similitude of god is imprinted in man: wherein the knowledge that we began to treat of / perchance shall appear unto vs. wherefore Aristip. I pray thee as thou hast done hitherto● here me patiently, and when I shall demand of the any question, answer me simply without cavillation.  ARI. 
Contented. But be short than I pray the● for me thinketh hit long or we come to an end of our matter.  PL. 
Ye so I suppose. For as I said, the little sparks of wisdom that appeared in the, will never be brought to be a good fire / they be so mengled with asks of affection: whereby they be made so inconstant, that they will not abide the end of my raisin / where by perchance they might be caused to kendel and wax more. But sens thou hast promised to here me patiently / I will go forth with this matter: and d●ubte not but that I will make an end / or we come to the city.  ARI. 
Go to than. For I am now prepared to here the.   

THE. III. dialogue.  PLATO. 
SEns we haue treted some what of god / & of mans soul( but not sufficientli / for that would require a much longer time, & also that both thou and I had our minds more clean purged with prayer and pure sacrifice) now let us see as much as we may be suffered / what it is / wherein they most do resemble.  
☞ first all that is in god is perpetual and immutable, and by none occasion or for any cause may be appayred, minished, or corrupted. That which is in the soul, parte is perpetual and immutable / parte is not perpetual, and is also mutable. For that the soul is Immortalle and invisible, that is perpetual and may never be changed. But understanding / which I did put to: the knowledge of that, which was Intelligible, and name hit a portion of dyuinitie, is not perpetual in the soul, as hit is in god, nor all ways immutable: but during the time that hit is conserved by contemplacy on of the divine majesty, hit is perfect and maketh mannes soul like unto god. And when hit is joined unto corporaile affects / hit is made joanne unperfect / and the form of the soul, is in a parte ●ecayed from the right symilytude of god. But if the soul being depreciate to vices / be ones fallen from the possession of reason / joanne understanding is vanished away / and the soul remaynethe with the body transformed, as we spake of before.  
And joanne that Immortalytie, which being joined to understanding, made the soul like unto god / being now separate from hit, shall be to the soul confusion and tourmente.  
¶ The majesty of god, in beholding whereof the said understanding or knowledge is conserved and kept in perfection / is all his goodness / whereof I haue spoken / and his providence, which procedethe of the same goodness. In beholding the goodness of god / man doth perceive, that thereof procedethe virtue. In considering his providence, he fyndethe that nothing is made without cause / or( as I mought say) at a venture: but that all things be made for a purpose, profitable, and also necessary / and so to the respect therof al things be good.  
¶ now I will demand of the Aristippus one question. dost thou not remember / that thou thyself least late / that hit were not well spoken / to say that man was made to the image and similitude of god: if he had in him no mo things like unto god, but only that he were invisible and immortal? and that didst thou ratify with a good and familiar example.  ARI. 
It is not so long passed sens I spake it ● but that I may well remember it.  PL. 
And thou didst not deny / but that the pte Intelligible of man is a divine substance, wherein is understanding?  ARI. 
No, nor yet will I.  plate. 
Than it seemeth / that in understanding man is like unto god. And the same understanding is knowledge: but is man like to god in any other knowledge trowest thou, than in contemplacyon of the divine majesty?  ARIST. 
I pray the rehearse that more plainly unto me.  PLA. 
By my truth thou arte very dull in perceyuinge. I say in beholding perfectly the providence and goodness of god: did I not declare to the but even now / that therein was goddes majesty?  ARI. 
Well, now I perceive the. It seemeth verily Plato, that therein is the knowledge, wherein as thou hast affirmed, is a portion of divinity.  PLA. 
By that same knowledge also he knoweth that virtue is good / because it proceedeth of goodness.  AR. 
Ye.  PLA. 
Doth he not also know that evil is contrary to good?  AR. 
Why not.  PLA. 
And he knoweth that 'vice is contrary to virtue.  AR. 
Ye that is true.  PLATO. 
joanne knoweth he that 'vice is ill, by cause hit is contrary to that which is good?  aristippus. 
I agree also there to.  PLATO. 
By the same reason doth he know, that he which is vycyouse / that is to say, he which is possessed with 'vice is ill: and he that is virtuous / is good.  aristippus. 
Ye truly.  PLATO. 
joanne he that is vycyouse is contrary and unlike unto him that is virtuous.  aristippus. 
It must needs be so.  PLATO. 
In any other thing but that he is ill?  aristippus. 
In none other thing.  PLATO. 
And he that is virtuous / is he like unto god, which is all goodnes●, for any other thing but for that he is good?  ARI. 
No I suppose.  PLA. 
Than see howe he that is virtuous is like unto god. And that he which is possessyd with 'vice, is contrary and unlike unto him.  aristippus. 
I must needs agree to thy reason.  PLATO. 
now in considering the providence of god, which also belongethe to understanding, Order in every thing is perceived to be / which order like a straight line issueth out of providence, and passethe directly through all things that be created. And therein be degrees, wherein those things being set / one hath pre-eminence over a neither in goodness.  aristippus. 
So it appeareth.  PLATO. 
did not we call that goodness while ere necessary and profitable?  aristippus. 
Yes that I remember.  PLATO. 
unto whom / supposyst thou, be things profitable?  ARI. 
unto whom else but to them / which do use them?  PLA. 
And to them that do use them most / be they most profitable?  ARI. 
Ye so hit followeth.  PL. 
But if they fall from the degrees of the said line, wherein they were ordained and set / by the said providence: and change their order, than those things do cease to be necessary one to an other / because they be out of their right places, where god had ones set them for to be necessary.  ARI. 
In dede so it seemeth.  PLA. 
And where order lacketh, there is disorder.  ARI. 
Ye that is true.  PLA. 
Also either order is good and disorder ill, or else contrary.  ARI. 
No but as thou say dost first.  PLA. 
And that which is good is also profitable: and contrary wise that which is ill / is also unprofitable.  ARI. 
Ye verily.  PLA. 
Than thou wilt grant me, that order is good and profitable / and disorder is ill and unprofitable?  ARI. 
That must I needs do.  PLA. 
Than what sayfte thou, be not all things / wherein is order or disorder, either good and profitable or ill and unprofitable in using one an neither?  ARISTIPP. 
Yes doubtless.  PLA. 
And to them that do use them?  AR. 
So it appeareth.  PLA. 
More or lasse as they be much or little used?  ARI. 
I can not deny it.  PLA. 
I am very glad Aristippus / to see howe seriously and truly thou keepest tack with me, sens thou did dost promise me / that thou wouldest answer according as thou thoughtist, without leanynge to any particular opinion. And in that appeareth in the a token of more wisdom: joanne is in all the residue of thy profession.  
But now remember well what thou hast spoken: And show me if thou thinkest that any other creature hath so much use of all things that be created as man hath, revolve them well in thy mind or thou speakest / considering what commodity one thing may haue by using an other. And of howe many things one thing may receive any commodity. Howe sayest thou, hast thou now well advised the?  ARI. 
Me seemeth Plato that onely man hath the use of all things that be created, and may receive of eueriche of them a commodity. Other things do use sometime one an other / but not so generally.  PLA. 
Than it seemeth also / that all things were created for him specially.  ARI. 
What meaneste thou thereby?  PLA. 
For man doth use or may use / all thing that is / but not contrary: for the horse / the ore / or the sheep, likewise other things living, or growing can n●t use man nor receive of him any thing but for mannes proper commodity.  aristippus. 
Me thinketh thou sayest truly.  PLA. 
Ergo we be agreed, that Man useth things most of all other?  ARI. 
Ye surely.  PLA. 
Than be they to him either beste and most profitable, or elles warste and most unprofitable.  aristippus. 
Thou speakest merualously.  PLA. 
Why sayest thou so, sens this is but comune raisin, and( except I be deceived) to every man easy? but that the said things be to man beste and most profitable / it happeneth of order: that they be worst & most unprofitable / it cometh of disorder.  ARI. 
So verily hit seemeth.  PLA. 
More over the pre-eminence that man hath, being in the highest degree of the line that we spake of, augmenteth also the quality / that is to say maketh the thing that he useth better or wars. As by example. A fat sheep having much wool on his back, for as much as a man may be fed with his carcaise, and clothed with his wull, is better than a lean and poor sheep, whose wul being ●orne al of with the brembles / the ●arkais will onely feed dogges: which gnawing on the bones and bowels will therwith be nourished. likewise herbs in that 〈◇〉 be medicinable and holsom, in 〈◇〉 or restoring health unto 〈◇〉, be much better, than for that they feed cattle or beasts: so that for the benefit that every creature brin 〈◇〉 unto man / it is the better in his kind & more profitable. But sens it seemeth / that for man, specially al things were created & that unto him they be either best and most profitable / or else worst and most unprofitable / I would now know wherein they be unto man good & profitable / or ill and unprofitable.  ARI. 
What meanest thou? didst not thou declare it even no we thyself, when thou least that it happened by order and disorder?  PLA. 
I can the thank, thou art now of a good remembrance. But dost thou perceive Aristippus / what I ment ther by?  ARI. 
didst thou not mean, that some beasts were ordained for man to eat, some to clad him with, some to till his land for corn / other to ride on: likewise herbs and fruits, somme serve for meate and nourisshynge, diuers for medicine, ston and timber to build with. And whiles they be used in this wise as they be ordained / there alway is order. But if they be used for any other purpose, or one in the place of an other, there is disorder.  PLA. 
Abide Aristippus, thou hast forgotten some thing behind the, that will make much of the matter: perdieu there be some bestes / fowls / and fishes / which will serve to none of the purposes, which thou hast rehearsed: As serpentes / scorpions / and such other like: of birds the eagle / the dunkyte, the Ospraye, and the Cormorant, which do rauyn and devour that, which is necessary for mans living. Also crows and rooks may be brought into the same company: And of fishes that which in latin is called torpedo, or ever he cometh out of the water mortifieth the hands of the fysiher whiles he is drawing up of his net. An other fish called Remora / all though he be very little in body, yet will he stay and retain a great ship being under saylle, and let him that he shall not pass forth in his voyage. And dyvers other both fishes and birds there be of semblable malice: howe wilt thou bring them into the order that thou hast spoken of.  ARI. 
Mary as thou sayest Plato, I can not well tell what to say thereto.  PLA. 
I believe that well enough. For thou arte so nosilled in carnal affections, that thou kepist nothing in remembrance, but onely that / which is commodious and pleasant. But I will help the forth / as well as I can. All be it I know well enough I shall not bring these things in order sufficiently. The providence of god is so inserutable that it can n●t all be comprehended by mans imagination / not withstanding by my demanding and thine aunswerynge / I trust we shall finde therein matter competent enough to help us to that thing that we go about, that is to say, to finde out knowledge / wherein wisdom lieth hid. ¶ First Aristippus thou wilt agree / that all creatures in the final cause of their creation be good: That is to say, having respect to that they be made for?  aristippus. 
Ye, that haue I granted all redy.  PLA. 
Therfore to that respect they can not be yl?  ARI. 
That is trouth. plate. But malice is contrary to good, and also taketh his denomination of evil?  ARI. 
That I know well enough.  PLA. 
Than spake I not well when I said that dyvers beasts fishes, and birds, were of semblable malice as they were, of whom I had spoken?  AR. 
It seemeth so.  PLA. 
For as much as by their creation, they be al good?  AR. 
Ye for the same cause.  P. 
Of the said bestes, birds / & fishes / there be some partes / which by physicians, and them that seek for the natural properties of things, be founden remedies against dyvers sicknesses.  AR. 
So it hath been affirmed by Democritus, & his disciple Hippocrates. And I myself haue sene marvels, when such things haue ben practised.  PLA. 
And for as much as goodness came of them / thou didst judge all such things to be good?  ARI. 
Ye in good faith.  PLA. 
Thou didst therein iuge truly / and as it was. But when thou knewist any man to be stungen with a serpent / or Scorpion / whereby the man perished, didst thou suppose than, that the Scorpion or serpent was yl, or good still as he was when he served for a medicine / and preserved man from the death?  AR. 
I am not so mad to suppose that to be good / whereby man is destroyed.  PLA. 
I suppose thou arte not: But sens we haue affirmed al thing to be good in his creation / having respect to the end wherefore it was created. For as much as the said beasts / birds / and fishes received in their creation the disposicions before touched, which thou supposest to be ill, by cause thereby man may perish and die. Let us consider the cause final, wherefore those dispositions were put by God of nature into the said creatures, wherein I will as briefly as I can declare to the mine opinion or sentence. foreseen alway that thou remember, that the providence of god is above mans capacity to comprehend holly: But I doubt not, some part of it shal serve( as I said) to the sufficient declaration of that thing that we purpose.   

THE IIII dialogue.  PLATO. 
SHal we need Arist. to make any plainer declaration / what thing it is, for the which all other things lacking the use of raisin were created?  AR. 
No, for it appeareth to me sufficientely, that it is man: as thou hast already declared.  PLA. 
And we be agreed long ago / that man is of body & soul?  ARI. 
Ye no faylle therof.  PLA. 
And to the body the sences or wits be joined, as understanding is joined to the soul?  AR. 
according.  PL. 
Also the body is sensual & mortal / the soul is Intellectual & immortal.  A. 
So it seemeth.  PL. 
The first is in commune with bestes, & therfore it is beastly, the other is a portion of divinity / & therfore it is divine and godly.  ARIS. 
That hast thou long ago proved: wherefore I will not now reply therein again the.  P. 
I am glad that I find the so raisonable. But dost thou also remembre, that I said, that the divine portion, during the time that it is conserved by contemplation of the divine majesty / it is perfect & like unto god, and when it is joined unto corporal affectis, it is vn●fecte & vanyssheth away?  AR. 
Ye I remember it well.  P. 
Now here me out patiently, and we shall come shortly to an end of this matter. Thou knowest well enough Aristippus, that the body, and consequently the sences or wyt●es that do pertain thereunto, is the habitation or vessel, which receiveth the soul. Also affects or affections al though while ere I name them corporal, yet in very dede they be first in the soul, as intencions be in the work man before he doth work: And when the soul doth exercise them / having his chief respect to understanding / whereof we haue so much spoken: than be they virtues. But if they being mixed with the sences, be all ruled by them in having onely respect to the body, than be they vices, and the soul by the excludyng of understanding being made subject unto the body, they may than be well called corporal: as that ought to be called the goods of the vaynquysshour, which were the prisoners before he was taken: or the goods of the bondman be called the lords. now so it is that god, of whose majesty we haue spoken, and be yet in speaking, when he hath put the soul( accompanied with affects as hir perpetual servants and ministres) into the body / as into hir proper habitation, he giveth to hir the sences, to be as hir slaucs or drudges. And commyttynge to hir for a chief counsayllour understanding / he leaveth with her also, Free will to be hir secretary.  
now if she might alway keep hir habitation and company in that estate, as they were left unto hir: than should men be as goddis. And those things which brought any annoyance to men, should alway be ill, and be made by nature in vain. And also god should seem to do ill in the ordeynynge of them. Or else that in things there were no providence. But sens of so many men as now be, haue been / and shall be in the world / the bodies in the principal humours, whereof they be compact( which as thou knoweste is blood, red collar ●●me, and black co●er called melancholy) be of dyvers temperatures. Therfore be they in ●ondry wise ●●lyned in the operation of their sences or wits: As some to acts terrestial and highnes of courage, other more to get possessions and richesse / dyvers for every little displeasure to be cruelly revenged. Many to employ all their study and labour in yl craft and deceit: other do abhor all travail as well of mind as of body / de●yrynge onely( as the block which jupiter did send down into the water to haue rule over the paddockes) to lyestyll and do nothing. As soon as any of the said inclinations be conceived in the sences / the mind beginneth to haue dilectation therein / and offereth it to us, as it were good pleasant & profitable: than if our affects / by whom we be moved to do any thing, do consent to the said dilectation, and than immediately will is corrupted / so that she as false and disloyal, writeth in the heart of man( which is the souls book, wherein all thoughts be written) that she said Inclination moved and set forth by the said affects, is profitable and good. If the soul hastily without asking counsel of understanding, do approve the said {per}swasion, bileuing will, without any other inuestigation or search: Than she being abandoned of understanding, loseth hir dignity, & becommith minister unto the sences / which before were her slaves / who usurping the pre-eminence, & having the affectis & coil holly at their commandment● do possede the body as their proper mansion, leaving nothing to the soul, but to use onely her powers after their sensual appetites. And so Man bireft of that portion / where in he was like unto god, is become equal or rather inferior to brute beasts, for such causes as I before haue rehearsed. now Aristippus, when Man is ones brought unto this estate / dost not thou suppose, that he forgetteth now or knoweth not what he is? or to express more plainly to the what I mean / Is he not ignorant / that he is transformed from a man to a beast? And supposeth still that he is like unto god, and in the order that we spake of, superior unto al other creatures and do n●●ator over them al?  AR. 
Ye that is true, he believeth so verily.  PLA. 
But yet it is not so. For when understanding was excluded by the soul, and that she was subdued or maistred by the sences, than the similitude of god / which was in understanding / vanished from him. And when he left his own place of pre-eminence / and did participate in carnal affects with creatures, which were to him inferiors, he broke the line of order / and lost his superiority: and consequently brought himself and other into disorder, which as we haue agreed is euylle and contrary unto good, and by the same reason is enemy unto god / which is onely goodness. For no man will deny, but that thing / which is so contrary unto an other, that in no parte they may accord / but be alway repougnaunt: they be mutually ennemyes one to an other.  ARIST. 
I suppose it be even as thou sayest.  ☞ PLATO. 
now call to thy remembrance● that we were agreed that al creatures were made for man, and that he had the most use of them all. Also they all were good in the order of their creation / and that to man they were best & most profitable as long as they continued in the said order / And being in disorder they were also to man warste, and most unprofitable.  
moreover all though some beasts, souls, and fishes seem to haue in them a malice, whereby man may be hurt or annoyed: yet having respect to the cause fynalle / wherefore they were made / they were / not withstanding necessary unto man specially.  aristippus. 
I thank the heartily Plato for this repetition: whereby thou hast well revived my remembrance, which was well nigh oppressed with the abundance of matter, wherewith thou hast as I mought say infar●id this communication.  PLATO. 
I know well enough Aristippus, that in matter of great importance / to men that be sensual, having their minds engrossed with carnal affections, there is required a plain and sensible form of raisoning, broken now and thou with often repetitions: which all though to froward herers it seemeth to make the matter tedious, yet if they can abide it / they shal thereby retain some seeds of knowledge, like as in a land that was never well husbonded, corn will grow & spring in ere / when men little looked, for to haue gotten such fruit by their ill husbondry. But now set up thyn ears Aristippus / and dyligentlye here the mystery of the wonderful goodness and providence of god, which shall be declared in the said cause final: which I intend now to express & open unto thee without further delay.  ARI. 
Go to now Plato I haue al my hole mind setlyd and prepared to here thee, and I shall not willingly let one word that passeth from thy mouth / escape me.  ¶ PLA. 
Thou hast all redy granted / that a counning Artifycer foreseethe in his ymagination the figure of the thing that he warketh, and to what effect it is wrought, which is properly called the cause final.  
And when it is made / he delighteth in the beholding it. And the more perfect and excellent that the work is / the more he therein reioycethe, and prepareth some mean to preserve it from breaking or other destruction. But there is none Artificer to be compared unto god, either in foresyght / or in care to preserve that which he himself wrought. Nor there is any mannes warkemanship like to his in perfection. wherefore he most excellently reioicith in his creatures. And by cause he consyderith / that Man is the most wonderful of all his archdukes, he rejoiceth therein most and incomparably. Also because he made him to his own similitude, he loveth him / according to the commune proverb: All thing loveth that, which is most like to himself. And therfore he is most circumspectly in the preservation therof. wherefore considering that by coil, perchance corrupted, as I late declared, Man might decline from that perfection, wherein he was made / and by the parte sensible induced to rebel again his own creature / thinking that of his own power he hath all other creatures under his subiection / and that all that he willeth is good / not as understanding would instruct him, but as his affections deceived by his sences do falsely persuade him. This eternal and incomprehensible goodness / which we call GOL, loving man as his image incomparably, hath provided to sit in the way, whereby behoveful shall pass many sundry obstacles and lets to cause him to tarry / that in his course he ●all not heedling in the botomlas pit of Ignorance, while he is in the way to rebel again his maker & most merciful lord. These necessary lets be diseases & siknessis, whereby bodily strength is abated, and therwith carnal affectis oppressid or minished / adversity, vexation & trouble wherbi stordy courage pride & ambition, & other like malanders of the mind may be curid / or at the lest ways reformed. And besides these, be other obstacles, whereby man shall be war●id of his arrogance / when he to much presumeth on his proper power, knowledge, and industry. And therfore he will freely use all things at his pleasure / wherein his sences haue dilectation, and his appetite moveth him. These things god foreseinge( as I said before) most louingely and wisely prouydynge for his most dereste creature, against the said peril of forgettefulnesse, like as he made man of soul and body, so with things necessary and profitable to the body he ordaynid things also necessary & profitable unto the soul, sowinge among the herbis, that be wholesome or pleasant, other noisome and venomous. In the green bank lieth the serpent hid / redy with his trembling tongue to strike mortally them which do approach him. The scorpion wounden in the green grass / lieth watching with his forked tail in a readiness to styng thē / which look not down to their feet. The body infected or wounded, findeth in pain & anguish his own, {pro}pre ignorance / in that / that he so much esteemed dilectation & pleasure / which in so short a moment vanished away. Also sens a little herb / which is inanimate, may change pleasure in to pain / and health into sickness / or a little vile worm at one stroke may bircue him of all dilectation and pleasure, and fill him with so much anguish and dolour, that the life / which he desired ever to continue becometh to him tedious and loathsome / he shall thereby not onely remember / that he is passable / & therefore no god, but also perceive and consider of how little importance or valour is than his strength / authority / or puis●ance, were he never so mighty a champion or so puissant a king or Emperour. And with that remembrance the parte sensible being rebuked, understanding eftsoons resorteth unto the soul, and helpeth her to reform all her whole household / setting eftsoons every thing in his proper place and office, as it was before free coil was corrupted. And if than the soul be circumspect / & do restrain will of hir liberty, compellynge hir to be subject and so obedient to raisin, that without hir consent she shall dare to do nothing: than the crafty persuasions of the sencis shall no thing avail, but they themselves will they or no, shall be constrained to be still drudges unto the soul as they were ordained. But if man do forget to set will under the governance of reason / and with a circumspectly deliberation, to appoint unto hir limits and bonds which she shall not be so hardy to pass or exceed. After the body is eskaped from adversity, or is delivered of vehement pain and anguish, forth with the senses do prepare themselves eftsoons to rebel. And affects which as wanton girls be flexible or redy to incline to every motion, do prepare them with wanton countenance and pleasant promises to 'allure eftsoons will to their appetite: whereby the soul shalbe again in danger to perish / onelasse she retaynynge still with hir understanding, in considering hir proper state and condition, and reuoluinge what she before had suffered / do put will in to the prison of dread / under the perfit custody of Remembraunce and reason. And in this wise as I haue rehearsed / not onely he that suffereth, receiveth commodity of this wonderful providence: but also other which do behold him that sufferith, or heareth it sufficiently reported may and ought ther by examine the state of his own person / and as mortal and passable and no god / but the image of god by understanding, endeavour themself to keep that in perfection, having in good await, that they let not affects become to malapert / but that the soul haue understanding alway at her elbow, which shall bid raisin correct coil, if he be conversant with these affects. And than shall man still remain without any of the said transformations that we before spake of: and use every thing according to the effect that they were first ordained for him: which is the cause final, whereof I haue spoken / and promisyd to declare unto the, wherein shynethe the wonderful providence, whereby god is best known. Howe sayest thou Aristippus? dost thou bear away & perceive what I haue al this while spoken?  ARI. 
ye that I do Plato, all though hit be meruayllous: but yet me seemeth thou hast omitted somewhat / which should make of all that which thou spakest a perfect conclusion.  PLA. 
Trowest thou so? Mary I pray the tell me what lacketh, as thou dost suppose, and I will amend that gladly / for I would be loth that in that, which we go about / should be found imperfection.  AR. 
I remember / thou hast affirmed through al thy resoning, that al●hinges in respect of their creatyon be good / and that all was created for man: More over that some things, which do seem to be ill, in very dede be not so, but be all good in their order of their creatyon.  
And for proof of that thou didst induce by example, that adversity / and sickness, did cure or mitigate affects and vanites of the mind. Also that venomous herbs, serpentes, and worms / which seemed to haue in them nothing but malice onely, by anoyinge of men that were sensual, following their affects, and forgetting their state / with pain and anguish, birefte them their pleasure, wherein they delighted, and made them remember / that they were passable: and by that consideration to reform themselves according to their first perfection / where in they were ordained. And so didst thou conclude / that adversity, sickness, venomous herbs and bestes were good to that respect. And therfore necessary provided of god to the use of man. now for as much as all men be not sensual / nor superadd with carnal affects or vanities: but some men keeping the sences in their proper office or duty / also keeping will( as I mought use thy words) within the precinct prescribed to hir by understanding: need not so sharp a monytion, as thou hast spoken of, where adversity / sickness, venomous matter / or bestes do as sone and grievously annoy or hurt those good men / as them that be vicious: howe dareste thou affirm them to be good? or declare them to be a parte of providence, whereby the goodness of god is expressed? These things considered me thinketh Plato, thy conclusion( as I said) is yet insufficient.  PLA. 
In dede Aristippus it seemeth, that thou hast diligently herd me: but I fear me, that for the old controversies between us thou markest more what I say, to take me with some l●cke / than to bear away & observe any thing that may profit the to know, in as much as my conclusion / which thou reprovest is not so insufficient as thou dost suppose. Thou knowest that Scammony given where need is, and in a due and convenient proportion, healeth them which be vexed with melancholy, but exceeding his measure / or taken where that humour doth not abound / in the stede of health bringeth mortal sickness almost incurable. The same doth Thapsia, Agaricus, and dyvers other / which do purge the body of superfluous humours. The fruits name Millones and Cocombres aswageth the inordinate heat that procedethe of colere: yet in them which either by nature or occasion haue their belies cold / they procure intolerable torments or frettinges. Mandragora / and the iuise of poppy, called Opium, to them which by some innaturall cause be let from sleep / do profit much, if they be measurably taken: contrary wise if they be taken by him that is much phlegmatic, and of nature disposed to sleep very soundly, and also the medicine exceedeth his portion / he bringethe the patient in to so deep a sleep / that he never awakethe. But all though these things, which I haue rehearsed yf they haue not joined unto them opportunity and measure, do bring either damage or death to them which receive them: yet no man do account them for ill: but being put in the nombre of medicines, whereby mannes body is cured● they be called good.  
¶ Is there any thing among men better or reputed more profitable than laws: And yet was there never law made by any man so perfect, but that diverse haue thereby sustained detriment, ye some that willingly never offended. Also some laws by adding to sundry opinions, be so involved or wrapped in doubtis, that they which ones were and ought to be open and plain to the people / which liveth under them, and be bound to obey them, may not without long debatynge and great chargis / be declared sufficiently And yet who is so much displeased with any lawe, but that he will affirm, that laws be good / ye & all though it happen sometime that they be ill executed.  
¶ like wise the venomous herbs / beasts and fishes to that end and purpose, which I haue declared / whereunto they be ordeinid, be good / which thou dost not deny me.  
And than by the examples that I haue rehearsed / my conclusion in declaration of providence is good & sufficient. For if thou thinkest, that I should haue proved those things to haue ben so absolutely good / that they might not be to any respect il, than thou lackest that natural wit, which all this while I supposed had ben in the. For I wolde haue thought that thou hadst known, that nothing is in this world so good / but that hit may bring damage to some man. finally that under the region of the moon is nothing so good that it is not mixed with some ill / but remaining in their {pro}pre degrees of order / whereof I haue spoken, one is better than an other, and be never ill but by disorder: and there also one is wars than an other, by the degrees, I do mean the causes wherefore they were ordained. As by example to declare it more plainly: dost thou remember Aristippus, when we were speaking of order & disorder, that thou saidst, that some beasts were ordained for man to ●ate, some to clad him with, some to till his land, other to ride on, likewise herbs / fruits, and trees / some to serve for nouryshyng, diuers for medicine / and other to build with?  ARI. 
Ye I do remembre that well.  PLA. 
now mark well Arist. The ox, which tilleth the land, beareth beef / wherewith man is nourished / & his hide serveth to make shone to save mens feet from cold and other annoyance. The sheep beareth wool to clad with the body of man commodiously. And his flesh is good to be eaten / and where he lacketh puissance to draw the thorough or the wain / in stede therof he going and lying on the land with his ordure and piss / compasseth the ground, and maketh it fertile and able to bear plenty of corn. wherefore these two be set in one degree in the line of order. The horse and all other beasts / which be like to that kind, coil draw or carry. And also their hides coil serve to that purpose / that the ox hide doth. But their flesh is not apt to be eaten of men. wherefore they be a degree under the other: And so consequently all things as they be profitable more or lasse unto man / if he do use them, so be they higher or lower in degree in the said line of order.  
And yf an ox or a sheep haue much flesh on him and sweet, he is name therfore a good ox or a good sheep. If a horse or a mule will bear a great weight, & go far iournayes, he is name a good horse or a good mule. And although a man advisedly or unadvisedly do eat more beoffe or mutton than his stomach will bear, and therwith is sick / the ox or the sheep ought not therfore to be called ill. Nor if a man take away thy money or garments / and lay it on thine own horse or mule, and carry hit away with him: this letteth not, but that thy horse or mule shall be called still good. But if thou wilt ride by post on thine ox / or thy sheep, or roast thy horse or thy mule to banquet with thy friends, to those purposes thou canst not call any of them good. For they be out of their proper degrees or placis in the line of order: and therfore they be now ill. Semblably if in to thy pottage / wherewith thou intendest to be nourished / thou dost cause to be put such herbs as do serve for violent purgations: or into thy salade chips of ooke, or of mapull, or buyldeste thy house with stalks of fennel or mallows / or couerest it with the leues of letis or beetis: these herbs or trees so used do cease to be good, and may to these purposes be now called ill. So there is nothing that is perfectly good but god onely / and all other things the near they approach toward his similitude / the more do they draw to that perfection / and the higher be they in the line of order / whereof I spake at the beginning.  
¶ This that I haue now said Aristippus, if thou dost well revolve in thy mind & consider, thou shalt not finde that lack in my conclusion, that thou hast objected. But yet to satisfi the thoroughly, that in no part thou shalt think my raisin vain or unprofitable / wilt thou see / that I shall sufficiently prove / that sickness, adversity / matter, or bestes venomous, being in their degrees in the line of order, be never ill: but to that end and purpose that they were made for, they be alway good?  AR. 
I think, to prove that it shalbe impossible.  PLA. 
Perchance nay. But forget not that I protested, that the hole providence and judgements of god be to man, while he is mortal inscrutable / & far above his imagynation or knowledge: yet of his infinite goodness he holdeth him contented / that with due reverence we shal measurably search for them / only to the intent thereby the more to know him, honour him, and love him: & after that maner do I now endeavour me with the help of his spirit to prove, that his providence is excellent and most to be wondered at / in that thing wherein thou and many other do suppose that providence lacketh.  AR. 
If thou canst bring that well to pass, I coil than say that the same and renome of thy wisdom / that is sprung through out Grece, is well employed. And I will affirm also, that king Dyonise, when he gave the to Dolidis / was more liberal than wise. For he had been better to haue given to him six the beste cities in Sicile, than to haue departed from such a counsayllour.  PLA. 
Well I trust to verify thy good opinion. But now alyttel while answer to such questions as I coil demand the.  
¶ Be not we agreed that man is of soul and body, And that the soul is immortal and intelligible, but the body is mortal and sensible?  aristippus. 
Yes, no doubt thereof.  PLATO. 
We be also accorded, that all other things in this world were made chiefly for man.  ARI. 
Ye so god help me.  PLA. 
And I trow thou wilt not deny, that god is all goodness, and that he made man unto his own image and similitude.  ARI. 
No verily.  PLA. 
If god made any thing to the intent that it should be ill unto man, which is his proper similitude, it should than seem that there should be some malice in god / which were not onely untrue / but also to affirm horrible & unleeful. wherefore the contrary must needs be true, that god made every thing to the intent that it should be good unto man: But how that may appear in such things as thou hast rehearsed, which seem to be ill / thereon restethe our question. now take hede Aristippus. The soul of man being immortal never dieth or ceaseth to be / but after that it is joined with the body / the body living / hit liveth also / showing thereby hir operations. And when life departith from the body, the soul also departith immediately notwithstanding she afterward liveth. Than if when she was joined to the body / she retained the sencis and affects in due obedience, not suffering them to exceed their duty or offices, And haue vntylle the separation of hir from the body, ensued alway the counsel of understanding and reason, and so haue continued in the form of a man, Surely after hir departing from the body, according as by hir operation the body abounded in virtues so is she than immediately with god, whose similitude she so well hath kept, and there is promoted to joy and pleasure perpetual more or lasse after hir merites.  
And that pleasure being intellectual / shall more exceed the dilectations of the body, which onely be sensual / than perfect health doth exceed sickness, or the greatest rejoicing of the mind that man might possible haue of a sensual motion, might surmount the greatest discomfort or henynesse. God desiring that all souls mought come to this joy / to warn them of their office whom he seeth neelygent, he sufferith the body, wherewith they be joined( as I said before) to be touched with sundry afflictions, to the intent that they perceyuinge howe unable they be, the lechor to execute his beastly pleasure in the fever double tertian or ●●thyke, the proud man to advance himself above other, being infected with lepry, or the lowsy sickness called phthuta / is, or stungen with the little and feeble scorpion / he that is cruel and fierce howe little he may prevail again the colike passion the ston or the gout / or the falsehood of the adder / which as soon as he hath stung the man, he glideth forthwith in to the hedge, & eskapith the fury of him, which being hurt is not able to follow him: The couaytouse merchant with his ship curtith the sees, and with his sayies and steerne presumeth to enforce the winds to bring him in to those costs from whence he may bring home that my serable traffic / whereon he will comsume al his study & wit, and at the last leave it to be consumed by other while he is in the mids of his iornay under all his sails the wind blowing a good koole, and having therwith a faire water, cometh the fish called Remora / little more than a gurnard / & kleuing fast to the keel of the ship maketh hir tarry, & holdeth hir still without me●ing until some time risyth a pyrry and breaketh all the tackelinge, so that the merchant is fain if he will save his life / to flee away in a boat, and return home again without money or merchandise. among those things adversity, or as it is more commonly called, frowarde or contrarious fortune, countreuayleth as much as all this, whereof we haue spoken, and proceedeth to the same effect.  AR. 
But what sayest thou, if he that is sick / hurt with venom / or vexed with fortune / do in nothing reform his living / but in his pains or trouble do blaspheme god and when they be withdrawn from him he is as ill / or perchance wars than he was before, shall we than suppose that thing to be good or profitable, whereby he not onely is not reformed, but also made w●rs than he was erst?  PLA. 
I 〈◇〉 aylle that thou wilt demand ●ny such question. I pray the is the art of a surgeon good and profitable or ill and unprofitable? answer me thereto.  AR. 
Good & profitable, who coil deny it?  PL. 
And he which in that arte is counnynge and perfect, is to that respect good: and therfore is called a good surgeon.  AR. 
Ye that is true.  PL. 
Than thou dost admit, that a surgeon is good, and that his arte is good and profitable. But is his art declared by any thing elles but by his medicines, or instruments wherewith he doth cut / pierce, or cantherize / as necessity of the wound or sore doth require?  AR. 
Yes / there requireth also / that he know the nature and cause of the wound or sore / and that he can well order his plasters and ointments, and also use handsomely the said instruments.  PLA. 
O Aristippus thou arte now importunate / and wouldest put me to more business than needeth, sins I rehearsed that surgeon, which in his arte is counnynge and perfect, what meueth the to put to this addition / which is vain and superfluous? as if that in him which is {pro}fect / might any thing lack, or that in perfect, thou wouldest set degrees of comparison. But admit for the case that our surgeon haue all thing that in that arte may be required, and also that he be thy natural father, which above all other and with great affection loveth the, suppose also now for this time that in euery●he of thyn eyen grew a fistula, whereby thou arte in icoperdie to lose thy sight, and also to haue thy visage thereby deformed. If thy father desiring to haue the healed, and knowing( as thou spakeste) the nature and cause of the said fistula, wolde prepare such remedies as were most expedient to cure the: wouldest thou refuse him for thy good father, & account him thyn enemy?  AR. 
Nay I trow, than were it alms to hang me.  PL. 
That is heartily spoken Aristippus I make god a vow: therfore I commend the. Than wilt thou love him better than thou didst before?  AR. 
So ought I. For to that natural benefit, that I received of him by my generation, he addeth to much humanity and kindness in helping that I lose not my sight, whereby I should be deprived from all worldly comfort / and be also deformed in my visage / which blemysshe should cause men that were honourable to adhorre my presence.  PL. 
Thou speakest raisonably. And therfore see that thou change not hereafter this good opinion. Now thy father doth perceive by his counnyng / that this disease requirith sharp medicines as those which be mordicatife or biting, abstersife or clensinge / or {per}chance cantherization / that is to say, that the place corrupted be skorched with a hot bournynge iron: which if thou wilt pacientlye suffer / and use ever after such order in diet as thy father appoyntethe the / thou shalt alway haue thy sight sound, and thy visage sauce and vndeformed, which shall be not to thyself only / but also to thy father and surgeon that cureth thee, great joy and comfort. But contrary wise when thou feelest the medicine work sharply, fretting and gnawing in the flesh that is putrefied / or else art touched with the fire which is in the hote glowyng iron, wherewith he doth cantherize the sore: If than thou dost strive again thy surgeon and father / that goth about to hele the / murmuryng against him with all disobedience and words of villainy, despising his humanity and kindness, and re●usynge to be cured by the said remedies, either thou rubbest thine eyen & remeuest the medicine from the sore into all the sight of thine eyen, or else strugglynge contemptuously again the wholesome hand of thy father / dost wylfullye thraste the bournynge iron into thyn eyen: than what maruaylle is it, if that which thy father ordained to cure the, now by thine impatience and disobedience, turn to thy damage: that is to say as well put clene out thy sight / as also deform thy visage for ever? which thing hapnynge, mayst thou Aristippus by any reason / blame therfore thy surgeon?  AR. 
Nay in good faith to say truly.  PL. 
What the medicine or instrument which by thyn impatience and folly thou didst convert from the place where they should haue wrought for thy health / and didst thraste them into thyn cien / whereby ensued to the more grief and peril / shal we iuge the medicine or instrument therfore to be ill? And here remember well Aristippus the cause final, and the degree and place in the line of order which I haue before sufficiently declared.  ARI. 
In good faith I will not dissemble, I see nothing here / that ought to be called ill, but I myself / if I were in the case that thou hast now purposid.  PLA. 
If thou hold the there, we shall soon be agreed. Also if now thou being blind / and the fistula growing every day greater and greater, the deformite of thi visage more and more / thou not onely refusest to receive any medicine, but also dost murmur against thy good father cursing, him for his medicine giving, which through thyn own folly and wilfulness is converted from remedy unto thy damage. If than thy father beholding the to be incurable, and also malicious toward him without hope of amendmente did exclude the out of his company, refusing thee for his son, supposist thou that for this he should be called an ill father or surgeon?  AR. 
No in good faith: seeing that every thing that he doth is with good Iustice & raisin.  PL. 
But he is still good as he was before / & also that which he doth now for the due punishing of a dissobedient & unnatural son, is as well good, as that which he did before / to the intent to cure him of his malady / if he would haue ben patient & suffer those medicines which were prepared to hele him.  A. 
Ye in good faith.  PLA. 
Well said Aristippus. now wilt thou see what I mean hereby? Is any so properly thy father as god which is the first / the chief / and immediate cause of thy generation? or is any surgeon so counnynge as he, which seeth more plainly the original motion & cause of every disease of the soul, that is to say of vicious affects, than any man can see the outeward sore or skurfe of the fistula? And more perfectly knoweth the best remedy therfore / than any surgeon knoweth howe to heal a small whelke in a chyldes fyngre.  AR. 
No surely in that thou sayest truly.  P. 
Now sens ones thou hast granted to me / that 'vice is ill, because it is contrary to virtue / which thou affyrmiddest to be good● suppose 'vice to be the sickness of the soul as it is in dede: and for as much as it bringeth in ignorance / which is enemy to reason and knowledge / who be as the eyen of the soul, and if it grow much it deformeth the soul and putteth clene away understanding / which is the visage, wherein( as I said) is the similitude of god / therfore resemble it unto the fistula. which foul & daungerous disease God as a loving father and good surgeon espyinge in the / and desiring to heal the therof, doth his cure more speedily and quickly / he useth sharp medicines / touching thee with sickness( wherein I reckon as well diseases growing in the body, as also hurt or griefs by outward occasion or chance) or with adversity, by wrongful imprisonment / death of assured friends, towardly children, or of a wife, constant and patient, loss of thy princis favour, or great authority / possessions / or movable richesse, or other like temporal benefit. If thou suffering this patiently dost thankfully receive thy fathers kindness & industry in curing of the / and exactly observe the diet, whereto he doth appoint the: that is to say dost live in the custom of virtue, eschuynge vicious communication, yl counsel, and flattery / which be the vnholsom and quaysy meats of the soul, whereby is engendered the venomous humour of ill opinion, whereof cometh 'vice / which I haue resembled unto the fistula: thou shalt be cured and haue the sight and visage of thy soul preserved pure and clene: contrary wise if thou mourmour or grudge at the said remedies / esteeming thē as griefs & no medicines, blaming or repriuynge god as vndiserete or cruel in the ministration of them and striving there against / with the powar of thy sencis, using them dishonestly in some pleasure voluptuous / thou tournest them from the sore / whereon they should work, and with them dost thou put out reason and knowledge, the eyen of the soul: And than for thy folysshenesse, impatience, and blasphemy / God suffering thy soul to be both blind with ignorance, and deformed with 'vice, sens thou hast utterly lost his glorious similitude, he coil from thence forth abject the, and for thine unkindness commit the to perpetual prison / there to be punished in darkness, where thy foul deformed visage shall never be sene / to the reproach of him, unto whose similitude thou were created. now Aristipp. sens thou didst approve that which was done by the carnal father & surgeon to be good, because he did it with Iustice & raisin / what saist thou to that which god ordaineth & doth who so far excelleth in those two qualities: that the iustice executed among men that be mortal / in comparison of his Iustice / is wrong: & that which we take for raisin, in regard of his wisdom is foolishness & fantasi, not because it is not iustice & resō that we haue: but because that which is in god is ever one & {per}fect / without any division or mixture?  A. 
In good faith Plato, I wote not well what to say to the. Finally I am compelled by that argument that thou hast made, to agree / that such things which before seemed to me to be yl, be to that respect which thou hast reher●ed / good and profitable: that is to say / in the refourmyng of mans soul where it is curable / and in the declaration of the justice of god, where man is incurable. But what sayest thou to that which h●u hast so lightly passed over? I mean where the said diseases and afflixions happeneth to him, which is already good / and needeth not so sharp reformation?  PL. 
Why Aristippus, supposest thou that ever any man was so good / that in him were never vicious affection? Perdic our may ●ier Socrates, when he was young, and wrought in a Masons shop with his ●ather, was not so pure from affects as he was after that he had ben the hearer of Anaxagoras: by whose doctrine, and also being continually vexed with poverty / sundry reproaches, and sometime stripes of malicious & quarellyng {per}sons: Also with the continual & never ceasing brawling & chiding of his most cursed wife Xanthippa which he called his domestical exercise / he by the gentle virtue of patience became a good man as he was called and taken. But to the intent that thy mind may be satysfied, Let us now admit / that men which be good / or at the left haue such abundance of virtue, and so little do incline to vicious affects / that hit requireth not, that they be purged with such sharp afflixions, as we haue spoken of. Howe sayest thou? supposist thou that unto them the said afflixions be ill and unprofitable?  AR. 
Ye verily. And also if it were leeful to speak it / me seemeth that therein, god dealith not with al men indifferently.  PL. 
Surely Aristippus that is not onely unleeful to speak, but also to think it, hit is great presumption and folly. And that shall I well prove if thou wilt attentifely here me.  AR. 
speak on hardily.  PL. 
In all the train of our communication hitherto, sens we began to speak of providence, it hath alway appeared, that god is father to man by creation, and loveth man above all his creatures: But what sayest thou / Is there any more token of love than when the father with al his study & power endeavoureth himself to bring his son to great honour which if he may bring to good pass / there is nothing may cause him so much to rejoice?  AR. 
Suerey nothing.  PL. 
And to the intent that his son may be deemed of all men worthy to be promotid to honour he accustometh him to travail either in learning and study, or else in corporal exercise, the one to make him wise / the other to make him strong and valiant in body / whereby he may declare himself worthy to haue promotion. And wise fathers the better that they love their sons / the more diligent be they, And as I mowghte say the more importune in keeping them in continual exercise, thinking that thereby the strength and delyuernesse of the body increacith / and if hit be in study of mind / wit is augmented: like as contrary wise by sluggardy & idleness the said actiuite is apalled and the wits consumed: whereby men be made unapt for the life which is active or politic.  AR. 
I suppose that hitherto thou hast said truly.  PL. 
If the son be of gentill disposition / and like to his father / perceyuinge his fathers honest desire and purpose / and therwith being inflamed with desire of glory / he will not onely content him with labour, but also if his father do bring him unto any great tournament or wrestling, he will prepare himself to refuse no man, which will offer to assail him. And when he beholdith one come again him, which is of such pvissance / that in his sight hath vaynquished or over thrown men mo than a hundred / all though nature somewhat touchethe him with fear, yet remembering that his father beholdeth him, who hath so tawght him and given him comfort that he shall not be vaynquished except he will / and that his heart fail him, considering also the price of the battle or wrastlinge, which is honour lasse or more after the estimation of his prowess in vanquyshynge the most strong and dangerous champions, will he not troweste thou abide sternely his adversary / and receive his assaults ioyousely / without any shrinkynge? And await when his aduersaries strength doth decrese / or his breath failith that he than inforsynge his might ioininge thereunto policy may overthrow him. And so with much gladenesse and commendation of all the beholdars / of whom some peradventure at the beginning judged him foolehardy, he shall receive the honour that he hath deseruid: to his own comfort & to the incredible joy of his good father / who above all things wished to see this conclusion?  AR. 
This accordeth well / and standithe with good reason.  P. 
Now hath he that thing / wherefore his father brought him up so delygently. And the which he himself being like to his father, of his natural inclination desired.  AR. 
Ye verily.  PL. 
had he it given to him for any thing else but by cause he approved himself to be valiant and hardy / whereof honour was the price and reward?  AR. 
No I suppose.  PL. 
wherewith did he approve himself in such wise to haue won that ho●oure? By any other thing than by overthrowing or van quishinge his puissant adversary?  AR. 
No truly.  PL. 
Than it seemeth that without a puissant aduersarye● his hardiness and prowess could never haue been proved?  AR. 
No, that well appeareth.  PL. 
And without prose● hardiness or strength is a voice vain and of none effect or profit?  AR. 
That is very true.  PL. 
For as much as prose is the operation / whereby the said qualities, hardiness and strength be expressed / is it not so?  AR. 
Yes verily.  PL. 
Yet am I glad, that thou art so raisonable: It may perchance turn the to some commodity. But Aristippus, as we remembered while ere, in those exercises which be commonly called games / be dyvers prices one more than an other, and they be given to men according to the strength that they haue employed, which is judged by the comparison of their strength whom they haue excelled: to some the first game or price / to an other the second / and so in order.  ARI. 
And that is but reason.  PL. 
And dost thou not think these exercises to be good and profitable / whereby thou shalt win a reward, and also worship, with comfort also unto thy father, and increase of his love and favour toward the?  AR. 
Yes in good faith.  PLA. 
And also thou wouldest love him better than ever thou diddest, If often times he brought the to that / whereby thou shouldest receive such profit and worship?  ARI. 
Ye I were bound so to do.  PLA. 
Aristippus wottest thou where we be now?  ARI. 
What is that Plato?  PLA. 
We be now at that conclusion, the which thou hast so long gaped and looked for. That is to say? It shall plainly appear unto the / that the sundry afflixions that do happen to good men, come not without providence / and the goodness of god / ne be ill and unprofitable to them that do patiently suffer them. Therfore I pray the Aristippus, while I declare to the patience / do thou patiently here me, And I shall sooner than thou weenest / set out to thine eye / that we two haue sought for: I mean that knowledge wherein wisdom is hide. And than like as the mynar / which after he hath found the place where the vain of gold lieth / labourethe busily to dig up the ore / and after ceaseth not to try it from the stones / and with continual travail to finde out the pure gold: so shalt thou ones having the said knowledge, never cease to trauaylle in the exercise of thy life, to finde out wisdom.  AR. 
I am very well content and desirous to here / howe thou wilt bring to pass that marvelous conclusion.  PLA. 
Thou remembreste Aristippus, that we were agreed long ago / that for as much as God, is perfectly good, and the fountain from whence all goodness proceedeth: All that is ill is contrary and enemy to god?  AR. 
Ye, I am not so short witted but that I remember al that thou hast spoken, if thou in this wise dost eftsoons rehearse it.  PL. 
That is well said. And thou hast not denied / but that he is the first mover, and without him nothing is moved / or done.  AR. 
No I coil not deny it.  PL. 
Sens good and ill can not procede from one fountain, god never moveth to ill, nor doth any thing that is ill: what sayest thou thereto?  AR. 
I must needs grant that, except I coil repugn unto raisin.  PL. 
We were also agreed, that god created the serpent, the scorpion, the venomous fishes and herbs, as well as them / which were commodious and wholesome: & that he made all thing for man, whom he loved above all his creatures?  ARI. 
Ye that is truth.  PLA. 
Also nothing happeneth without him which is the first & principal mover, either health or sickness, prosperity or adversity / riches or poverty / and he beareth the kais of life and death, for he that made and did put the soul in to the body, hath the power to pluck it out: supposist thou that any other hath with him equal authority?  AR. 
No. I granted long ago, that as he is one in beginning / so is he ever one in governance / and may suffer no ptere or like in equality.  PLA. 
That is remembered very well of the Arystippus. now by that we two haue gatherid / it appeareth( & if thou look well) that nothing is made ill of god. And than need we no further argument, But s●ns god made al things for man, whom he loveth / what exterior thing so ever happeneth to any good man, it is good. And therfore siknesse, adversity, and death if they happen to a good man be good.  
And therfore hit should suffice to a good man if he suffer any of the said afflixions / to think and say to himself: God which sent to me this, is all good, & hath in him none ill / nor any ill proceedeth of him, and I am one of the nombre of those creatures, whom he loveth beste: wherefore this that he hath sent me / is good and not ill, sens hit is necessary that I be therwith contentid / and take heed that with mine opinion I make not that ill which is good.  
¶ But although this were sufficient to satisfy a good man, who wolde not labour to seek any further in the providence of god: yet to the Aristippus who being long nosyllyd in worldly pleasures, wilt not admit that any thing, which is thereunto contrari, may be expedient or necessary unto a man that is virtuous / and lacketh such 'vice / which requireth sharp admonition, and therfore thou requirest a more ample & large declaration: I will set out a more plain proof in applieng my raisins to the examples & similitudes / which I haue already induced.  
¶ God who made man unto his image, and louethe him with more fervent affection than any carnal father loveth his child, bringeth us up in the exercise of the commune imbecility or feebleness of our nature, as hunger / thirst / cold, weariness after labour / annoyance, displeasures / which do happen in the society or living of men together, diseases wherein is no indemnify / and such other little incommodities / incident to mortality: of al the which no man may be quiter, declaring unto us by understanding / that in this life we must of necessity travail and suffer / therwith giving us conforte / that who so ever by this exercise waxeth strong and hardy, hereafter being brought where he shal prove his strength against puissant & mighty aduersaries / that is to say anguish and pain / sharp and perillouse sickness / cruel adversity in any thing that fortune seemeth to rule / loss of children / friends / or favour of princis / prisomment / or exile / and like other torments / and vexations of body and mind: if he valiantli do resist and with fortitude which is the strength of the mind, do subdue and vanquisshe those aduersaries, he shall haue the reward that belongeth to good men / which no time can consume, no powar can minisshe / none evil can deface. And to whet the courage of man to desire this enterprise / god giveth to him this comfort, that these things which shall so sharply assail him, be ordaynedde only to prove his strength, and that they be inferiors unto him, if he put out his strength to the uttermost / sens god which loveth him above all his creatures / hath ordained nothing to the intent to destroy him, but to his benefit, if he do employ his power and will thereunto, according as he hath receyuid them.  
¶ Now if the soul haue in the body entire dominion and rule, And that man be in his right fascion( as I said long ago) that is to say like to his father: of his noble nature he desyrithe to win that in comparable price, which is promised to them that shal be so happy to get the victory, wherefore in this wise he armith thereto his courage / ¶ first he consydereth that his father is good, and that he most tenderly louethe him. Also that he brought him not up from the first time that he lived, in those little exercises of natural infirmity in vain or without any purpose. But to the intent that thereby he shall feel( as it were) the sent of more grievous afflictions, whereof they be but the shadows, and by a little labour and sufferance / he shal prepare himself, to sustain and contemn a more greater travail and patience. He reuoluith also in his mind, that every man which in his heart desireth honour, couayteth some honest occupaion or labour, and is prompt and alway forward to do his office or duty in every peril or danger. For / to what wise and diligent man is it not a pain to be idle? And yet where idleness is not, needs must be labour. And where an adversary lacketh, prowess lieth hide & unknown. What a man may or may not patience declareth. The fathers bedeth their children to apply them earnestly to study or labour / and will not let them be idle although it be holy day, and do capitain them to sweat and often times to weep.  
Where the mothers would set thē on their laps, and keep them at home all the day in the shadow for burning their white. God hath toward good men and women the mind of a father & best doth love them: & therfore he vexith thē with sundry business, griefs, & damages, that they may thereby gather a substantial strength, sins they which be frankid up in idleness do become unlusty and with their own burdon be shortly suffocat. It is to men no little pleasure to be hold a young man that with a good courage receiver 〈◇〉 on his spear a wild bore or a grea● heart coming vpon him: or without fear abideth with his swor●● in his hand the fierce lion, whic●● cometh to assail him. But the●● are not the things where to go● daynethe to turn ones his lok●, being but trifles and onely pleasures of mannes vanity and litenes. For the sight which is worthy to haue god the beholder therof / is to se the creature, which he loveth best to try his strength with fortune or anguish, if he be chalengid / for thereby strength which is a virtue and part of that divine portion, whereby man is like unto god, is provid, the other strength as it is of the body, so is hit as the body is, commune with bestes: and as it is more fra●● and uncertain than the self body, in like wise the price or reward that it deseruith or rather lokith for, is uncertain and also inconstant.  
But look to the other fortitude or strength, which is a patient resistance of such things, which opinion doth set forth, with a terrible visage of damage or grief. It thou be sick, the humours whereof thy body is made do but their nature / col●r contendeth with fleume / blood with melancholy: the one couaiteth to vanquysshe the other: that which is hot refuseth to be cold, moisture and drowthe will not abide in one place, by this variance they hast them to their dissolution, If this contention be curable, hope maketh hit tolerable. And if the warste fall, death shall dissolve it / for it is not for ay or perpetual.  
¶ adversity is not so grievous, because it is out of the body, and nothing compelleth us to suffer but our own wills. For if we were content with that which onely our nature hath given us, we should not be constrained to know what that word adversity mente, But sens we contemn hir as needy and miserable / and sue to come in to the service of fortune / whose nature is to be alway mutable and ever inconstant, nor giveth any thing, but lendethe hit onely. If we receive any thing of hir mocky she hand what shall it grieve us to pay that again which we haue borrowed? why should we either be vngentyll creditours / or be angry that we can not turn the nature of hir that coil not obey or follow any mans commandment or counsel / but may be subdued with patience, where she can never be vanquished with raisin? moreover god is content that we shall excel him in that that he may not suffer ill, and we may by sufferance subdue hit. For he is in more estimation that hath overcome a puissant and valiant enemy, than he which hath none enemy at all. Thou receyueste of thy father this comfort, that no man liveth so poorly in the world as he came into hit. And he hath need of a little that measureth abundance by natures necessity / and not by superfluity of ambitious desire. grief shall dissolve or elles be dissolved. Fortune hath not so sharp a weapon that it may bite on the soul. And whom she longest supporteth & with most abundance of all thing, them for a general rule god little favoureth: sens there is no reward, where lacketh merit. contrariwise the end of trauaylle is ease: And the father which beholdeth his son labour mightily / rejoiceth thereat, and prepareth that after his labour he may live pleasantly. Who, knowing a great heap of gold to be hid on the top of a rough hill / wolde not creep up through thorns and brembles to fetch it? and although his visage & handis were scratched, and his body and legs grievously pricked, yet would he not cease until he came to the top. And if any man which beheld him thus trauayllynge, would call him wretched and foolish: he saying nothing, wolde think how happy and wealthy he shall be, when he hath opteined that thing / wherefore he laboureth, And doth laugh at the ignorance or folly of them / which for a pain that dureth not long, will for bear to go with him and to be partners of that, whereby they shall ever after be wealthy.  
¶ gold is a coruptible matter, and shall ones be consumed, but that treasure, wherefore mannes soul ought to labour / may never be wasted / or in any quality or quantity appayred or minysshed: that is to say, it shall ever be like good and like much. wherefore what pain so ever be taken about the getting therof, it is not grievous, having respect to the gain. Nor he that travaileth therefore may be name miserable or wretched: sens misery is the priuacion or lack of all maner of comfort. For in hope of victory if thou faylle not thyself, comfort is redy, if thou dost not refuse it. In so much as nothing is miserable, but if thou dost so think it. For all Fortune is good to him that constantly suffereth. And who was ever so fortunate, that when he was subdued with impatience / did not desire to change his estate? sufficeth it not to the that he that vanquyssheth is deemed honourable, and he that is recreant is wretched and miserable? Howe shall it be known / on what part thou standist without an experience? If thou haue alway good will, strength never faileth the: but if by the puisanee of fortune thou be set on thy knee / haue a good heart, for god standeth at thyn elbow / and if thou think on him, he will set the up and make thy strength double as much as it was. wilt thou learn one good point of defence, which may perchance do the ease again some daungerous assaults?  
¶ Fortune hath taken from the that, which she had lent to the. revolve than in in thy mind, that either those things were not good in dede as they were supposed to be / or else man is in better estate than god is himself, for them / which we haue, god useth not, as carnal dilectation, pleasant and dainty meatis / orient jewels / or great treasure of money / these pertain not to god. Than is it to be thought that either god lackith those things / that be good / & than lackith in him beatitude or perfection of joy: or else hit is a 〈◇〉 argument that those things 〈◇〉 not good, that god will not use, 〈◇〉 is contented to lack. finally 〈◇〉 be veri goods that be within 〈◇〉 given by raisin. For they be sure 〈◇〉 during / nor can not decay or 〈…〉 she for any occasion. They that 〈◇〉 without us / lent onely by fortune 〈◇〉 be good by opinion onely / And ●●ough they participate their name 〈◇〉 the other / yet is there not 〈◇〉 them the property or nature of 〈…〉 odnes / for they be not durable: & 〈◇〉 they be oftentimes the occasion 〈◇〉 evil: wherefore they be for the 〈…〉 ore parte with ill men as most 〈◇〉 for their nature. And few good 〈◇〉 haue them, or they do continue 〈◇〉 a little time with them / by the just ordinance of god leste the mo 〈◇〉 using of them should bring di 〈…〉 tation into the sences, whereby they might be provoked to rebel. And understanding / which is occupied in comtemplation of the divine majesty might be suddenly expelled, And the soul lacking counsel should give place to carnal affections and appetites. Thou remembrest Theognides verses.  
¶ God giveth to yffe men good fortune and substance.  
which be not the better to themself nor their friend:  
There is ay lack, where is inconstance.  
But honour of virtue doth endure without end.  
☞ finally there is no greater comfort to him that is good, than to be sene in the company of good men. If thou sekeste for a good carpenter or a good smith, as thou goeste through the city, thou harkneste where is most hewyng or betynge with hamers, and there thou goest in and supposest to finde him, that thou lokest for. Semblably if thou wilt haue a good man, go look him out, where thou herist that sharp sicnes raineth / or where injustice governeth / coil ruleth, great power oppresseth: there shalt thou finde him that thy heart desireth. Thou mayst well account him for a great fool, that to live double his natural life / wolde not abide to be ones or twice lanced in the most tender parte of his body / or wolde not beg his bread for one twelve month to be a king afterward during his life. grind boldly again sickness and fortune, the one is natural the other is casualle / In the first is necessity / which coil thou or no, thou must suffer: If thou dost hit willingly, thou knoweste the price / If thou addest to anger / thou doubleste thy pain. In the second is no necessity, for thou moughteste alway refuse hit, as well when it was prosperous, knowing it to be unstable / and burdaynous / as also when hit is adverse or contrarious, considering that hit was never ●oo much thine own / that thou haddeste any right to retain hit: sens it was ordained for other as well as for the. And Fortune which is the disposer thereof / never made bargain with the / that thou shuldeste still keep hit: And if she did / bring forth thy records. She lacketh not witnesses innumerable to prove that she hath been ever inconstant. defy hir malice: for when she hath done hir warste, yet shalt thou haue more than thou broughteste with the. And that which aboundeth / shall comme of thine industry, and not of hir false liberality. And if thou dost boldly resist hir, thou shalt haue that aduauncemente and richesse given the of god, wherein she shall haue no powar or authority, which shal be such as the hundred thousand parte thereof, shall sourmount al that ever she gave sens she was first called Fortune.  
¶ now howe sayest thou Aristippus / be those things / which thou didst suppose to be annoyances & incommodities, injustly sent unto good men? or having respect to order and the cause final, that is to say to the end whereunto they were ordained, which I haue declared / be they unto them necessary & most expedient?  AR. 
Now in good faith thou hast brought me to that point, that I wote not what to say to the.  PL. 
But yet keep thy promise / and tell to me what thou thynkist in this matter.  AR. 
Me seemeth by thy raisin / that pain and adversity be as expedient to them / which be good, as labour and business are to them which be industrious.  PLA. 
And wherefore? Go to Aristippus, be not ashamed to confess the truth / though it be contrary to thy profession.  AR. 
In dede thou hast almost made me change mine old opinion. But sens thou hast gotten me into such a straight, that I can not start from that I haue promised: I will now confess / that the cause why the said afflixions be expedient for good men, is for as much as thereby they be not onely preserved still in their right image or figure: but also for their constance in trauaylle, they shall receive that inestimable reward, which thou least was ordained for good men.  PLA. 
Ah good Aristip. now I perceive that the seeds which Socrates had sown in thy mind, do begin now to spring with this little waterynge: whereunto if thou wilt add to thy diligence in pluckynge up the weedis of wanton affections / as sone as they begin to appear in thy mind: thou shalt shortly perceive the fruits of wisdom( for the which we do seek) spring abundantly, with whose most delectable ●ruition thou shalt never be satiate.  
¶ But now sens we haue treated of sundry matters / sith we first entred into communication, leste hereafter thou mayst repute me for one of them which do speak of many things and conclude vpon none, and so account me but for a babbler: let us examine if our matter haue hitherto hanged well together / or if there haue ben any vain digression / which served nothing to the purpose that we first intended: or what thing lacketh now, which may make to our communication a sufficient end or conclusion. And I pray the think not the time tedious / that is saved from idleness, and we haue now little more than two miles to ride. And I trust so to moderate myself / that we shall at one time arrive both at the city, and at the conclusion of our matter that we haue pourposed.  ARI. 
Shall I tell the truth Plato, hir is lasse grief to me to abide the residual though thou woldeste talk two dayes continually / than hit was at the beginning to abide hearing one hour / such sweetness I feel now in thy raisonyng. Therfore do what thou wilt / for I haue both my neares and my mind wide open to receive all that thou speakest.  PLA. 
I am glad therof. Therfore prepare now thy memory redy / or yf thou hast any thing forgotten, call it again with thy remembrance.  ARIST. 
I will do as thou byddest me, therfore say on Plato and spare not.   

THE. V. dialogue.  PLATO. 
THe first entre into our disputation Aristippus,( if I be not forgetful & unlike to that I was wont to be) was that thou beheldest me in this poor estate and apparaylle, the occasion whereof I declared to the in the form of a story: which although it seemed to the to be more than in the answer of a Philosopher was expedient / which should use in few words much matter and quick to the purpose: yet examinynge diligently every thing therein included, it shal well appear unto the / that nothing therof might haue ben omitted, the words which we spake before / with my profession being well ponderid.  AR. 
Me thinketh thou sayest truly, now that I haue consyderid every thing deeply.  PL. 
But yet Aristippus as I do consider, me seemeth to that purpose that we go about, the argument which I haue made lacketh yet some what to make hir perfect.  AR. 
Trowist thou so? In good faith I do not perceive hir, for as me semith thou hast touchid every thing handsomely.  PL. 
I am glad that it doth so well please the. But Aristipp. thou dost remember that we were both agreed that wisdom is knowledge?  AR. 
Ye that is truth, and so haue I herde it alway defined.  PL. 
But se whither that knowledge only maketh one to be called a wise man. Is not wisdom good? What sayest thou thereto?  AR. 
Why thinkest thou that I am such a fool that I will deny it?  PL. 
No so I trow. now admit that a man knew all that we haue hitherto talked of, concerning the goodness and providence of god, but in dede he lereth his sencis and affectis haue the rule over his soul / & in his acts abuseth the said goodness & providence. If thou pecyuiddest him to do this / wouldest thou suppose him to be a good man.  AR. 
No verily.  PLA. 
Thou wouldest say perchance that he were ill / because that his acts were contrari to good, but to his knowledge thou wouldest take little regard.  AR. 
In good faith thou sayest truly.  PL. 
If a man name to be a tilar wolde tell the that thy house were ill tiled, and that the mortar was ill tempered, by reason that the lime was to hote, & the holes of the tiles were made to wide for the pings, & that the laths were rent in the nailing / & thou foundest al that he said to be true: thou wouldest suppose him to be a good tylar. But if coming to his own house thou shouldest find it necligently couerid by him, his tiles & lath so set out of order, that the rain and snow did bete into every place, whereby the beams and rafters of the house were decayid and rotten / & thereby all the house in jeopardy to fall down every hour: wouldest thou call him than a good tylar or no?  AR. 
Nay in good faith, I wolde call him but a prater.  PL. 
because that where he ought most, he did not practise his cunnyng, which he had often auanted.  AR. 
Ye in good faith.  PL. 
And that were but raisin. Than ● seemeth that knowledge is indifferent to good & to ill: but although goodness being in knowledge / maketh that knowledge to be good, yet he which hath that goodness is never the more ● good mā● except by the exercise of the same goodness the thing that is good appeareth in his act. For that is manifest, and declareth what the man is / knowledge is secret and bringeth forth no fruit but by operation. And thou arte agreed, that wisdom is good. wherefore no more than knowledge of goodness maketh one to be name a good man, No more doth knowledge of wisdom onely cause any person to be name a wise man. And that was affirmed bi thee in the beginning of our communication: where it was agreed that king Dionise desired to see me, to the intent that he mought behold, if in my countenance, speech, or form of living I did express that thing, wherefore he herde me commended, which was nothing but wisdom. Than if I were a wise man / it ought to be declared by operation, which is not in man without knowledge preceding or going before / whereof proceedeth election, which lacketh naturally in other beasts. Wherefore all though wisdom be knowledge, yet by knowledge onely none may be called a wise man, but operation of that which is in knowledge called wisdom / expressing the wisdom, maketh the user or exercisar therof to be justly name a wise man.  AR. 
Now on my faith Plato thou art a wonderful fellow, for by the subtle persuasions brought in by induction, which form of arguynge I know is most natural, thou compelest me to assent alway to thy raisin. For now me thinketh that none may be called a wise man, except unto that knowledge, wherein is wisdom, he joineth operation: but for what purpose I pray the hast thou brought in now this last conclusion?  PL. 
Arte thou so dull witted Aristip. that all this while thou dost not perceive hit? perdieu the occasion of all our long raisoning did rise of that / that I assayed to prove that if I were a wise man in dede / mine answer to king Dionyse declared me to be so, according to his expectation. And therfore first as reason was / I sought for wisdom And in our communication it appeared to be in man onely, and not in beasts: & that it was in knowledge of himself and other. And that knowledge was in this wise declared. First to know his own pre-eminence and dignity over al other creatures, hir was remembered that he was of body and soul, whereby he was man, and was made to the image & similitude of god, and that all other creatures were made onely for him and to his use principally. The said similitude was expressed to be in the soul as well for that it is visible and immortal / as also in understanding, whereby she hath souerayntie and rule in the body, as god hath over all universally. moreover that the sences / affects / and coil, be he servants and ministers: which if she do keep in such obedience and order / as she received them, she shal ever remain in authority. But if she let them to haue more liberty than pertaineth to them, that is to say / to delight in things which be corruptible, they will than conspire and rebel again understanding, and drive him from the soul / & than should man be transformed from the image of god until a brute beest / being governed and ruled onely by sensis. ¶ The second parte of the said knowledge was opened bi the description of the goodness and providence of god. In describynge his goodness, was declared his powar, his perfection / and love that he hath unto man / as unto his child more than natural. In setting out his {pro}uidence appeared his inscrutable wisdom / magnificence / prudence, & policy in his wonderful order / wherein were his creatures in their sundry degrees higher or lower, as they did participate in goodness more or lasse. In the top whereof above a●l other, Man was set next unto god, from whom order proceeded.  
moreover by the said providence hir was declared, that nothing kep●nge his place in order / shewed to man by understanding / might be ill unto him, but alway profitable, all though to the sences some things did s●me to be ill and unprofitable. And last of all it was proved in a few sentences, that adversity was sent by god unto a good man, nor injustly or cruelly, but for a good 〈◇〉 〈…〉 ion and lovingly / as of a good father / which with an in 〈…〉 parable charity desiring to advance his son to perpetual ho 〈…〉 and dignity / by such maner of exercise proveth his virtue.  
¶ now Aristippus reuoluyng all this in thy mind / which in a short Epilogation I haue endeavoured myself to reduce unto thy remenbrance, consider well both me and king Dionise / as we were at that time, when we were together. Thou knowest well that from the time that I was. xx.yeres old I alway continued disciple of Socrates, until that he dyed. Who( as thou knowist) the answer of god determined to be of al mortal men the wisest. And that which I learned of him was wisdom: which as he ever affirmed was included in these two words, know thyself. And by that doctrine( as thou mayst remember) he abated the presumption of dyvers, which supposed themself to be excellent wise men. Also revoked many that were dissolute and resolved into 'vice, and made them to ensue virtue. And by his example of living he provoked men to contemn fortune, and to haue onely virtue in reverence. And also thereby, last of all, when he was injustly condemned to death he constantly and joyfully sustained to haue the mortal body dissolved / that the soul might be at rest and haue her immortal reward. which example given of him was the corroboration of al his doctrine / and no lasse part of learning unto his scholars, but rather much more than his often disputations or lessons. Imagine Aristippus, that I was so studious and industrious about the said learning / that I most curiously &( as I might say) superstitiously obseruid every point of the said doctrine. And that therfore all men in Grece, and also king Dionyse had conceived of me an opinion, that I was a wise man. And that the same king sent for me, onely to that intent( as I said at the beginning) to see and here / whether I were according to his expectation.  
¶ Consider also on the other parte, that my coming into Sicile / was narro serve king Dionise, or to receive by him any commodity / but onely to augment wisdom by addition of knowledge. And that he desired to haue me with him for the cause that I before haue rehersid. wherefore it semith that he had need of that, which by seeing & hering of me / he trusted to know, that is to say wisdom. For no man couayteth that thing, which he all redy hath / or whereof in his own opinion he hath no need. Now I knew partly by common report / partly by thinformation of Dion / which is a just man & an honest / that king Dionise was a Tyrant, that is to sai commen to that dignity bi vsurpacion and violence, and not by just succession or lawful election. Also that he was a man of quick & subtle wit, but therwith he was wonderful sensual, unstable, & wandring in sundry affections. Delytinge sometime in voluptuous pleasures, an other time in gathering of great treasure and richesse, oftentimes resolved into a beastly rage and vengeable cruelty / about the public weal of his country alway remysse, in his own desires studious and diligent. And all this I perceived very well or I spake to him any thing. Onely I exercised myself with the Aristippus, Dion, and other, in such part of Philosophy as might induce you unto the laid knowledge, whereof I haue spoken, approving alway my doctrine with the form of living by the example of my master Socrates: abiding opportunity to speak, which might rise of some special demand of king Dionise. In the mean time to such lyte questions and problems as he did purpose, concerning natural causes / rhetoric / or poetry / or of the dueties and manners of private persons / I resolved them so as he held him contented / and delighted not a little in the form of my raysonyng.  
At the last( as I haue told to the at the beginning) he required me to declare openly, the state and pre-eminence of a king / which ruled over other. thereat I reioyced, weening to haue found the opportunity to speak that I so long looked for. And than forth with I considered that the sentence, which I should pronounce, should either commend and approve me for a wise man / as I was supposed to be: or else condemn that opinion that king Dionise and other had of me / as false and vntru, I declaring myself unworthy to haue it. I remembered also, that like as ignorance and knowledge / or ill and good may never accord: no more may falsehood and truth be joined in one. And what so ever appeareth other wise than it is in dede, it is other than truth: and that which is not truth must needs be falsehood. More over as truth is good / so falsehood is yl. wherefore what so ever is other than truth, can not be in a wise man, who by the consent of al men is good. having still in my mind this consideration / I described a king, not {per}chance as he would haue had me / but as truth & the trust that he had in me compelled me. Therfore bi the said knowledge, of the which we so long haue disputed / I set out & expressed such a man, in whom the soul had entire & full authority over the sensis, & alway kept the affectis in due rule & obedience, following only the counsel of understanding, & by that governance was most like unto god. This man I called a king / although he had no more in his possession than had Crates the Theban. And if that such one were by the free consent of the people / chosen or received to be a principal ruler and governor / governing thē in like maner as he doth himself, than is he a great king or emperor / & to be had in reverence & n/a above any mortal man, saving to god that excellent honor, that is due to the creator & first cause of al thing. Not only for the pre-eminence given unto him bi a commun consent / but also for as much as by his knowledge / example / & authority the people shal daily receive of him an incomparable profit & benefit / being alured & provoked by him to set their souls in the said estate & authority, as they may also be kings, & be ever like unto god. More over this king by that knowledge that he hath of himself, he also knoweth other men: for by the operation which proceedeth of their affects / he perceiveth howe far they be removed from their right place in the line of order / that is to say, leaving knowledge and reason / whereby they were in the highest top of the line / they descend to the places of brute beasts by participatyng with them in sensual appetites. And than will he endeavour himself by all good means to restore them again( if he may) to their proper place in order.  
¶ Also such a king stablished in the said knowledge, can never be deceived by his most pernicious or mischievous ennemyes / which be flatterers and glosers, by whom princis be devoured alive / and their souls utterly consumed with most mortal pestilence, wherewith their countries and people be also in perile to be lost & destroyed. For as sone as either in their counsels / or in their praises & dispreises / or in their own order of living / he by the said knowledge perceiveth and noteth / to what affectis they be inclined, he awaytith them / and by avoiding their company eskapeth their snares.  
¶ Finally to the intent that the excellency of such a king should be more evident / like as I did set out while ere knowledge by ignorance( for every thing sheweth most perfectly, and after the common proverb of marchantis, best to the sale, when ●t is joined or compared with his contrary) I began to describe a tyrant, which in every thing, &( as I might ●ay) by rule / repugneth and is most unlike unto the said king / whose ●oule rulith not / but excludinge from ●●r, knowledge and raisin, suffereth ●ir self to be governed bi the sensis / ●nd obeyeng to the foolish affectis le●●th them lead hir out of hir high ●lace in the line of Order, into a more ●ase degree, and to be made equal or ●nferior to beasts, and to lose the figure or image of God / wherī she was ●reated: and by that transformation she loseth also understanding / so that a tyrant, is willingly taken in the said snares, which a king doth escape, and perceiveth not that he is deceived, until he sensibly feeleth some grievous damage. And if any man expert in the said knowledge / of a sincere love that he beareth toward him, wolde warn him of the said snares, and perchance show them unto him, as they be laid: yet knowledge and reason the two eyen of the soul, being put out with affections, And understanding hir chief counsellor being excluded, the man giveth no credence, but rebuking perchance his most assured friend that warned hymn suffereth gladly himself to be taken in the snare of Hipocrisye or Dissimulation, where for lack of liberty he shalbe constrained to abide all dangers, which mought hap●en unto him. And he that is such one / howe poor so ever he be, he is a tyrant, and if he haue rule over other / the more is he unlike unto god, sens by god / man is made and preserved, by cruelty and ill example man both in body and soul is destroyed.  
¶ This description king Dionyse might not abide to here, but thinking the time lost that I had spent for his profit, said that these were but words of idle dotardes / whereby hir seemeth that he understood not my words / for if he had, he wolde haue thanked me, for declaring that thing so plainly unto him, which he had so long desired to here / that is to say wisdom / which( as we two be agreed) consisteth in knowledge. Or elles he required some act of me to be ●hewed, which agreinge with my words should approve me to be a wise man, according to his first opinion. Howe sayest thou, was it not for one of these causes, that he spake those words unto me?  AR. 
Yes in good faith, I suppose that verily.  PLA. 
We were agreed while ere, that he had need of me, when he sent for me, and therfore he desired to se me and to speak with me: but when I was with him / although I endeavoured myself to satisfy him of that which he had need of / & so much desired / yet if he did not understand what I said, in dede my words were in y●le. I put case Aristippus / that one of the philosophers of ind or of other countrayes speaking no greek had come unto him / whom he would haue required by an interpreter to haue taught him wisdom, howe should he haue instructed king Dionise to haue satisfied his gentle desire?  AR. 
Howe else but by an interpreter.  PLA. 
What yf zeno Eleates after that he had byt of his own tongue, and spit it in the face of the tyrant that tormented him, had been sent for to king Dionise, whom he wolde haue desired to teach him wisdom, howe should zeno / which lacked his tongue, satisfy / the request of so good a prince and so well disposed?  AR. 
I know not howe, except it should be by signs and tokens. which were a diffuse way to instruct a man in so high ● learning.  PL. 
Yes / he might do it sooner by writing.  AR. 
Ye that is truth. But I ment the answering his demand without any tarrying.  PLA. 
Yet than perchance, he should also haue need of an interpretoure, that knew his tokens, leste king Dionyse, which had not been used unto them, should not vnderstonde what he ment by them. But supposest thou Aristip. that any man can better interpret an other mans sentence / either spoken in a strange language, or signified by tokens, than I could expound mine own intent or meaning:  AR. 
Nay surely. For every wise man is of his own sentence the beste expositor.  PL. 
And if it be expouned sufficiently in a few words, it is the more commendable.  AR. 
Ye that is sure.  PL. 
might I haue used any plainer and shorter way / than in fewer words than king Dionise reproved me with to remember him● that in his own words he might deprehende that thing that he sought for / sens that which I spake before was in his own language, and therfore he understood the words sufficiently? and if there were any thing which he understood not, it was in the sentence.  ARIS. 
What meanest thou thereby?  PLA. 
Mary I will tell thee. In the definition of a king I instructed him howe he might be in the hygheste dignity next unto god / and also in most perfect surety, which was no small benefit of so poor a person as I am to give to a prince.  
wherefore if the eyen of king Dionyse soul, Knowledge and reason, had not ben out, he should sone haue perceived the said benefit, and like a noble man haue given to me thankes, which I well deserved. And in the description of a tyrant I warned him of al dangers / whereby he might lose the said dignity. In the which two declarations was holly comprehended all that / for the which he so much desired to se me. And all this while I knew not, but that he had ben a good man, because he desired to know that / which thou hast granted is good, that is to say / wisdom. now when he gave not to me condign thankes, as my benefit deserved, but accounted me to haue bē idle, whiles I instructed him, than it seemed / that understanding was absent & fled from the soul, & that he rulid not as a king but that he was rulid bi his affections: wherefore his ingratitude declared his words to savour of tyranny: which I rehearsed unto him to thintent that he perceiving by my words in what peril he was in / might by the remembering of my first instruction concerning a king, revoke 〈◇〉 understanding, and subduynge the affects, be e●tesones restored unto his dignity. Howe sayste thou, considering well all that, which is before said, were my words ill as they were spoken?  AR. 
Nay, as thou hast declared them, but yet me seemeth they were very sharp.  PL. 
wottest thou what maketh the to think so? because they were short. But thou must consider, that he that lacketh, in that 〈◇〉 he doth lack / he is inferior to him of whom he desireth it / wherefore in as much as king Dionyse to haue benefit of me, became my hearer / he was inferior unto me. And therfore respect ought to be alway had to that, whereunto the raisin extendeth, and not to the estate of the person that heareth. And that I alway considered. And therfore spake I as I did to king Dionise. Yet did I it with such a temperance / that if he had not been a tyrant in dede / he wolde never haue been discontented. For I did not call him a tyrant or reproached him of any tyranny: But only said that his words savoured of tyranny.  
¶ I put the case thou gavest to me wine out of a vessel / and when I had drunk of it, I wolde say that it had a sent of mustynes / it argueth not that the vessel in musty. For perchance within five or six days that sent will be gone, & the wine will drink clene and gently. And therfore I suppose for my words thou wouldest not be angry. What if that king Dionise had desired me to teach him rhetoric: And when I herde him declaim, or saw his writing, If I finding any fault in his words wolde warn him in this wise. sir your words do favour of to much arrogance, or that they savoured of suet and payntinge, or be like unto apple of the dead so / which be delicate in colour without but within ther is nothing but coals and powder unsavoury. Reuokynge him thereby to such rules as I had before radde unto him, whereby yf he would be diligent, he should bring the form of speaking and writing into a perfection. Supposist thou / that this maner of instruction should provoke king Dionyse to be angry with me?  aristippus. 
No, For hir were no reason.  PLATO. 
Than hath he not so sharp a wit as thou hast supposed, sens he perceiveth not, howe much the learning of wisdom, exceedeth the learning of Rhethorike. And therfore he that teacheth wisdom ought to be of a greater authority, than he which teacheth rhetoric. And therfore sens thou dost confess that king Dionyse in learning rhetoric would take in good worth / what so ever I wolde say, in correctyng his words concerning eloquence: Howe much more ought he joanne to take in good {per}te those words that I spake, in correcting his words, whereby he seemed to refuse wisdom / which a little before he so much couaited to here declared? And one thing might haue contented him: that al that I had spoken was at his desire & for his commodite. Where if I had purposed to haue gotten any thing by him, my wit was not so single, but that I knew howe to speak words as well as thou, which should delight him. But when he deemed me to be a wise man, he with that opinion bound me that I could not deceive him.  AR. 
In good faith and that is very well spoken. But per adventure thou spakeste to soon. And if thou haddi●t forborn a day, two, or three, until his fume had ben passed, and that he had used e●tsones with the some familiarity: peradventure thi words would haue ben more easily taken, and thereunto thou shuldist haue founden more opportunity.  PL. 
But take one thing with the Aristippus, In the office of a wise man, that word( peradventure) is never herde spoken: 
〈◇〉 peraduenture, had ● wist.  No more than in the end of his works these words, Had I wist. For he hath alway the three times in remenbrance, Time present, time passed, and time to come. And referringe all thing to necessary causes, or( as I said long a gone) unto providence / reputeth nothing to Fortune. Therfore the deferringe of time should haue nothing availed / but rather should haue ben the cause of much damage.  AR. 
How so I pray the?  PLA. 
Take hede / & I shall tell the. Thou hast granted al redy, that king Dionyse desired to se me, to the intent that in beholding and hering me / he might perceive, whether I were a wise man or no: and than desiring me to describe unto him the excellency of a king, supposist not thou that he made that request unto me for some laudable purpose?  ARI. 
Yes doubtless.  PL. 
thinking that by no question he might either prove me more sooner to be a wise man / or else that he might learn more wisdom.  ARIST. 
I think both for the one & the other.  PL. 
Thou hast not denied hitherto, but that wisdom, which king Dionyse supposed to be in me / is in the knowledge that I haue declared: what remained than to prove me to be a wise man? dost not thou remembre that we were agreed while ere that hir was operation?  AR. 
Yes mary do I.  PL. 
And that operation was parte of that which king Dionyse desired to know, and not onely parte but also the principal portion.  ARIST. 
It hath hitherto agreed so with reason.  PLA. 
If I had hold my pecae, and said nothing, after that king Dyonyse had spoken / what should haue ensued of all mine instruction?  AR. 
I suppose nothing. For he wolde haue let the depart without thank or damage, and that which thou hadst spoken should haue been lightly forgotten.  PLATO. 
And than his words had been verified / that my words had ben ydelly spoken. But howe sayest thou / supposeste thou that he said truly?  ARIST. 
nay in good faith. For me seemeth that thy description of a king was wonderful true and necessary, and also therein was the knowledge, whereof thou hast treated compendiously / and plainly declared. And me thinketh that the words that king Dionise spake, beseemed not a king, but were much rather the words of one that lacked that knowledge, wherein is wisdom.  PLATO. 
now I am glad Aristippus, that I finde in the so much conformity in raisin. Than sens these vngentyll words of king Dionise beseemed not a king to speak it appeareth that they beseemed him that was contrary unto a king / which is a Tyrant. And being the words of one that lacked knowledge / it accordethe also that they were the words of one that was ignorant / and ignorance is most contrary to wisdom / and as I haue said transformeth a man into a beast or a monster. But what ignorance is it / that thou supposiste by the said words was declared to be in king Dionise?  AR. 
what other but that ignorance, whereby he knew not himself.  PL. 
And what supposist thou that he was / when he spake( as thou hast grantid) words that be seemed a Tyrant?  ARIS. 
what else but as thou hast rehearsed.  PL. 
what a Tyrant Aristippus? thou speakest now more plainly than I did. God for bede that I should suffer so gentle a prince to be transformed in to such a monster / if I could help him. But I pray the / which benefit wouldest thou prefer / either that which is given or employed forthwith / or that which is longer differred?  ARIS. 
what question is that? That kindness or benefit that is most prompt or sonist employed, is to be chieffely ei●emed.  PL. 
Than if forthwith & as sone as I perceived the transformation of gentle king Dionyse, I endeavoured myself to make him to know by his own words what he was, whereby if he wolde, he might by the expellynge of Ignorance haue ben not only restored unto the form of a man: but also haue been made a great Emperour by the well using of his dignity. Supposest not thou that I did as it be came me? and for that benefit so soon offered, was I not worthy a great gramercy?  AR. 
Yes if he would haue so taken it. But or thou camest to him, thou kneweste by credible report, that he was obstinately inclined to all vicious affections / and therwith impatient and cruel, wherefore when thou didst perceive that he contemned thi doctrine, thou shouldest than haue ceased / and not haue offered thyself to peril without hope of benefit.  PL. 
That advantage onely thou hast of me Aristippus: for thou that dost profess pleasure, moughtst haue done so leefully, but I that haue professed wisdom & virtue might by no means haue done it. For if I had not re〈…〉 unto him, I had left that 〈◇〉 declared, which he required to 〈◇〉, which by his own wor 〈…〉, as by an example in other artis or se 〈…〉 ces was plainly set out and expressed. And like wise as I knew that he was impatient and cruel.  
So more certeynely I knew that he had no power to endamage my soul, by whose operation I was called a wyle man. And if I should haue holden my peace than, it should haue ben for fear of damage, which might happen by his impatience and cruelty toward my body, than should I haue proved myself to haue ben a fool and no wise man / that I had not holden my peace at the beginning / and joanne should king Dionise haue found no cause to haue taken displeasure. But sens he desired to know, if I were a wise man, and for that opinion that he had in me / he favoured me, and also thou dost confess that my description of a king by his definition / and also by comparyng him to his contrary / contained that knowledge, wherein is wisdom: now remained nothing but operation to prove me to be a wise man. wherefore contemnynge or little regarding that vain fear, to bring king Dionise to knowledge, which he desired / declared that my mind was not subject to corporal passions, and consequently not to sensual affections, which might haue incensed or stered me to speak that thing that might haue pleased king Dionyse appetite, which was corrupt and vicious, hoping to haue had thereby preferment and singular favour: and herein began the operation which agreed with my said knowledge. And afterward by taking liberty from me, and making me a slave, he more declared mi words to be true, and thereby had the larger example, whereby he might the better haue known himself. And after when he herde( as I doubt not but that he hath) howe constantly I contemned the peril that I was in / of my life at Egina: he might well perceive that operation in patience to agree with my knowledge. And thereby he had fully all that knowledge of me, wherefore he desired to se me. where contrariwise, if I should haue holden my peace, as well my coming to king Dionise had ben frustrate and vain, and his gentile desire had ben unsatisfied, as also by my silence being thought( as raisin was that I should be) to be subdued either with fear or affection: I should seem to condemn min own doctrine, wherefore I should be demid vnworthi that good opinion, that king Dionise had of me.  AR. 
well Plato in such experience of wisdom I will not follow the.  PL. 
Therfore when any adversity shall happen unto thee, as I suppose thou hast not fortune locked fast in a cof●er no more than had Cresus the rich king of Lidia / for all that he thought that all goddes and men were his friends, and yet was he openly burned by Cyrus, whom he little feared, Thou shalt feel both adversity & grief, & also make thy soul subject unto thy sences, whereof what doth follow, thou dost yet remember what we haue already discussed. Where I or any other by the said knowledge & operation thereunto joined, shal be so armed again adversity, that what so ever the body feeleth, yet the very man which is the soul fealeth no disease / or as I might say is never inquieted, but is ever entire and in his true proportion and figure: that is to say like unto god. And also shall haue the price that he hath deserved, by vanquysshynge of his adversary, that is to say corporal disease or adversity.  
But now Aristippus / sens by any thing that hath happened I never fell from that place in the line of order / wherein god had set me, but my mind was ever in one state and condition / & there as it was at my coming into Sicile / there it hath hitherto ever continued, mayst thou raisonably say, that I was ever lost / in so much as I was never transformed or out of that estate, where in a wise man ought alway to be?  ARI. 
No in good faith as it now seemeth.  PL. 
What sayest thou than by king Dionise? whom instructinge to know himself I thus much displeased, & in stede of thank and prefermente hath rewarded me with danger and bondage?  ARI. 
On my faith I think that he hath both lost himself / by refusing the said knowledge / whereby he should haue ben delivered from the said transformation, and also he hath most folishly lost the Plato, in putting thee from him, which by thy counsel shuldist haue ben to him so royal a treasure, and the same do I think also of Polides the ambassador, & of the Egenites.  PLA. 
Gramercy Aristippus for thy gentile audience: now be we come to the town / and haue made a good end both of our iournaye and also of our communication.  AR. 
Farewell Plato, and for my parte I wolde not haue lacked it for the horse that I ride on. And to say the truth it hath made me to change some what of mine old opinion.  PLATO. 
The next time that we ●ete I will make the to change all / if thou wilt here and abide reason.  
FINIS.