redipetae (for so they were called of old) will seek after thee, bribe
and flatter thee for thy favour, to be thine heir or executor: Aruntius and
Aterius, those famous parasites in this kind, as Tacitus and [5812]Seneca
have recorded, shall not go beyond them. Periplectomines, that good
personate old man, _delicium senis_, well understood this in Plautus: for
when Pleusides exhorted him to marry that he might have children of his
own, he readily replied in this sort,

"Quando habeo multos cognatos, quid opus mihi sit liberis?
Nunc bene vivo et fortunate, atque animo ut lubet.
Mea bona mea morte cognatis dicam interpartiant.
Illi apud me edunt, me curant, visunt quid agam, ecquid velim,
Qui mihi mittunt munera, ad prandium, ad coenam vocant."

"Whilst I have kin, what need I brats to have?
Now I live well, and as I will, most brave.
And when I die, my goods I'll give away
To them that do invite me every day.
That visit me, and send me pretty toys,
And strive who shall do me most courtesies."

This respect thou shalt have in like manner, living as he did, a single
man. But if thou marry once, [5813]_cogitato in omni vita te servum fore_,
bethink thyself what a slavery it is, what a heavy burden thou shalt
undertake, how hard a task thou art tied to, (for as Hierome hath it, _qui
uxorem habet, debitor est, et uxoris servus alligatus_,) and how
continuate, what squalor attends it, what irksomeness, what charges, for
wife and children are a perpetual bill of charges; besides a myriad of
cares, miseries, and troubles; for as that comical Plautus merrily and
truly said, he that wants trouble, must get to be master of a ship, or
marry a wife; and as another seconds him, wife and children have undone me;
so many and such infinite encumbrances accompany this kind of life.
Furthermore, _uxor intumuit_, &c., or as he said in the comedy, [5814]_Duxi
uxorem, quam ibi miseriam vidi, nati filii, alia cura_. All gifts and
invitations cease, no friend will esteem thee, and thou shalt be compelled
to lament thy misery, and make thy moan with [5815]Bartholomeus Scheraeus,
that famous poet laureate, and professor of Hebrew in Wittenberg: I had
finished this work long since, but that _inter alia dura et tristia quae
misero mihi pene tergum fregerunt_, (I use his own words) amongst many
miseries which almost broke my back, [Greek: syzygia] _ob Xantipismum