like cloth of Arras,[1] opened and put abroad; whereby the imagery doth appear in figure; whereas in thoughts they lie but as in packs.[2] Neither is the second fruit of friendship, in opening the understanding, restrained[3] only to such friends as are able to give a man counsel; (they indeed are best;) but even without that, a man learneth of himself, and bringeth his own thoughts to light, and whetteth his wits as against a stone, which itself cuts not. In a word, a man were better[4] relate himself to a statua[5] or picture, than to suffer his thoughts to pass in smother.[6]
Add now, to make this second fruit of friendship complete, that other point which lieth more open and falleth within vulgar[7] observation; which is faithful counsel from a friend. Heraclitus saith well in one of his enigmas, Dry light is ever the best.[8]
- ↑ Cloth of Arras. Tapestry, from Arras, the capital of the department of Pas-de-Calais, in the north of France. The expression 'cloth of Arras' was probably used originally to distinguish tapestry from Arras from other kinds.
- ↑ Plutarch. Life of Themistocles. "Themistocles said of speech: That it was like Arras, that spread abroad shews fair images, but contracted is but like packs." Bacon. Apophthegmes New and Old. 199.
- ↑ Restrained. Restricted, limited.
- ↑ Were better. Old English idiom, with be and the dative, him were better, that is, 'it would be better for him.' The correct modern form of the idiom is had better, with the verb 'have' meaning 'hold' or 'regard,' like the Latin habere.
- ↑
"And, in his mantle muffling up his face,
Even at the base of Pompey's statua,
Which all the while ran blood, great Caesar fell."
Shakspere. Julius Caesar. iii. 2.
- ↑ Smother. The state of being stifled; suppression.
- ↑ Vulgar. Common.
"Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar."
Shakspere. Hamlet. i. 3.
- ↑ Read, for this same thought, in the Wisdom of the Ancients, The Flight of Icarus; also, Scylla and Charybdis; or the Middle Way. Also, Apophthegmes New and Old. 268 (188).
