main in a body, and are used to donatives; whereof we see examples in
the janizaries, and pretorian bands of Rome; but trainings of men, and
arming them in several places, and under several commanders, and without
donatives, are things of defence, and no danger.

Princes are like to heavenly bodies, which cause good or evil times; and
which have much veneration, but no rest. All precepts concerning kings,
are in effect comprehended in those two remembrances: memento quod es
homo; and memento quod es Deus, or vice Dei; the one bridleth their
power, and the other their will.

Of Counsel

THE greatest trust, between man and man, is the trust of giving counsel.
For in other confidences, men commit the parts of life; their lands,
their goods, their children, their credit, some particular affair; but
to such as they make their counsellors, they commit the whole: by how
much the more, they are obliged to all faith and integrity. The
wisest princes need not think it any diminution to their greatness, or
derogation to their sufficiency, to rely upon counsel. God himself is
not without, but hath made it one of the great names of his blessed Son:
The Counsellor. Solomon hath pronounced, that in counsel is stability.
Things will have their first, or second agitation: if they be not tossed
upon the arguments of counsel, they will be tossed upon the waves of
fortune; and be full of inconstancy, doing and undoing, like the reeling
of a drunken man. Solomon's son found the force of counsel, as his
father saw the necessity of it. For the beloved kingdom of God, was
first rent, and broken, by ill counsel; upon which counsel, there are
set for our instruction, the two marks whereby bad counsel is for ever
best discerned; that it was young counsel, for the person; and violent
counsel, for the matter.

The ancient times, do set forth in figure, both the incorporation, and
inseparable conjunction, of counsel with kings, and the wise and politic
use of counsel by kings: the one, in that they say Jupiter did marry
Metis, which signifieth counsel; whereby they intend that Sovereignty,
is married to Counsel: the other in that which followeth, which was
thus: They say, after Jupiter was married to Metis, she conceived by
him, and was with child, but Jupiter suffered her not to stay, till she
brought forth, but eat her up; whereby he became himself with child, and
was delivered of Pallas armed, out of his head. Which monstrous fable
co