64] Admonish thy friend in
secret, commend him in public. Keep good company. [4065]Love others to be
beloved thyself. _Ama tanquam osurus_. _Amicus tardo fias_. Provide for a
tempest. _Noli irritare crabrones_. Do not prostitute thy soul for gain.
Make not a fool of thyself to make others merry. Marry not an old crony or
a fool for money. Be not over solicitous or curious. Seek that which may be
found. Seem not greater than thou art. Take thy pleasure soberly. _Ocymum
ne terito_. [4066]Live merrily as thou canst. [4067]Take heed by other
men's examples. Go as thou wouldst be met, sit as thou wouldst be found,
[4068]yield to the time, follow the stream. Wilt thou live free from fears
and cares? [4069]Live innocently, keep thyself upright, thou needest no
other keeper," &c. Look for more in Isocrates, Seneca, Plutarch, Epictetus,
&c., and for defect, consult with cheese-trenchers and painted cloths.

MEMB. VIII.
_Against Melancholy itself_.

"Every man," saith [4070]Seneca, "thinks his own burthen the heaviest," and
a melancholy man above all others complains most; weariness of life,
abhorring all company and light, fear, sorrow, suspicion, anguish of mind,
bashfulness, and those other dread symptoms of body and mind, must needs
aggravate this misery; yet compared to other maladies, they are not so
heinous as they be taken. For first this disease is either in habit or
disposition, curable or incurable. If new and in disposition, 'tis commonly
pleasant, and it may be helped. If inveterate, or a habit, yet they have
_lucida intervalla_, sometimes well, and sometimes ill; or if more
continuate, as the [4071]Vejentes were to the Romans, 'tis _hostis magis
assiduus quam gravis_, a more durable enemy than dangerous: and amongst
many inconveniences, some comforts are annexed to it. First it is not
catching, and as Erasmus comforted himself, when he was grievously sick of
the stone, though it was most troublesome, and an intolerable pain to him,
yet it was no whit offensive to others, not loathsome to the spectators,
ghastly, fulsome, terrible, as plagues, apoplexies, leprosies, wounds,
sores, tetters, pox, pestilent agues are, which either admit of no company,
terrify or offend those that are present. In this malady, that which is, is
wholly to themselves: and those symptoms not so dreadful, if they be
compared to the opposite extremes. They are most part bashful, suspicious,
solitary, &c., therefore no such ambitious, impuden