eness we have are purely forced by art, and are so ready
to lapse into barbarity. This, among the Romans, was the raillery of
slaves, of which we have many instances in Plautus. It seemeth to have
been introduced among us by Cromwell, who, by preferring the scum of the
people, made it a court-entertainment, of which I have heard many
particulars; and, considering all things were turned upside down, it was
reasonable and judicious; although it was a piece of policy found out to
ridicule a point of honour in the other extreme, when the smallest word
misplaced among gentlemen ended in a duel.

There are some men excellent at telling a story, and provided with a
plentiful stock of them, which they can draw out upon occasion in all
companies; and considering how low conversation runs now among us, it is
not altogether a contemptible talent; however, it is subject to two
unavoidable defects: frequent repetition, and being soon exhausted; so
that whoever valueth this gift in himself hath need of a good memory, and
ought frequently to shift his company, that he may not discover the
weakness of his fund; for those who are thus endowed have seldom any
other revenue, but live upon the main stock.

Great speakers in public are seldom agreeable in private conversation,
whether their faculty be natural, or acquired by practice and often
venturing. Natural elocution, although it may seem a paradox, usually
springeth from a barrenness of invention and of words, by which men who
have only one stock of notions upon every subject, and one set of phrases
to express them in, they swim upon the superficies, and offer themselves
on every occasion; therefore, men of much learning, and who know the
compass of a language, are generally the worst talkers on a sudden, until
much practice hath inured and emboldened them; because they are
confounded with plenty of matter, variety of notions, and of words, which
they cannot readily choose, but are perplexed and entangled by too great
a choice, which is no disadvantage in private conversation; where, on the
other side, the talent of haranguing is, of all others, most
insupportable.

Nothing hath spoiled men more for conversation than the character of
being wits; to support which, they never fail of encouraging a number of
followers and admirers, who list themselves in their service, wherein
they find their accounts on both sides by pleasing their mutual vanity.
This hath given the former such an