a gold ring in a swine's snout?" Thou art a brute. Like a
bad actor (so [3971]Plutarch compares such men in a tragedy, _diadema fert,
at vox non auditur_: Thou wouldst play a king's part, but actest a clown,
speakest like an ass. [3972]_Magna petis Phaeton et quae non viribus
istis_, &c., as James and John, the sons of Zebedee, did ask they knew not
what: _nescis temerarie nescis_; thou dost, as another Suffenus, overween
thyself; thou art wise in thine own conceit, but in other more mature
judgment altogether unfit to manage such a business. Or be it thou art more
deserving than any of thy rank, God in his providence hath reserved thee
for some other fortunes, _sic superis visum_. Thou art humble as thou art,
it may be; hadst thou been preferred, thou wouldst have forgotten God and
thyself, insulted over others, contemned thy friends, [3973]been a block, a
tyrant, or a demigod, _sequiturque superbia formam_: [3974]"Therefore,"
saith Chrysostom, "good men do not always find grace and favour, lest they
should be puffed up with turgent titles, grow insolent and proud."

Injuries, abuses, are very offensive, and so much the more in that they
think _veterem ferendo invitant novam_, "by taking one they provoke
another:" but it is an erroneous opinion, for if that were true, there
would be no end of abusing each other; _lis litem generat_; 'tis much
better with patience to bear, or quietly to put it up. If an ass kick me,
saith Socrates, shall I strike him again? And when [3975]his wife Xantippe
struck and misused him, to some friends that would have had him strike her
again, he replied, that he would not make them sport, or that they should
stand by and say, _Eia Socrates, eia Xantippe_, as we do when dogs fight,
animate them the more by clapping of hands. Many men spend themselves,
their goods, friends, fortunes, upon small quarrels, and sometimes at other
men's procurements, with much vexation of spirit and anguish of mind, all
which with good advice, or mediation of friends, might have been happily
composed, or if patience had taken place. Patience in such cases is a most
sovereign remedy, to put up, conceal, or dissemble it, to [3976]forget and
forgive, [3977]"not seven, but seventy-seven times, as often as he repents
forgive him;" Luke xvii. 3. as our Saviour enjoins us, stricken, "to turn
the other side:" as our [3978]Apostle persuades us, "to recompense no man
evil for evil, but as much as is possible to have peace with