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56 Erasmus Folly. And first ’tis agreed of all hands that our passions belong to Folly ; inasmuch as we judge a wise Man from a Fool by this, that the one is order’d by them, the other by Reason ; and therefore the Stoicks remove from a wise man all disturbances of Mind as so many Diseases. But these Passions do not onely the Office of a Tutor to such as are making towards the Port of Wisdome, but are in every exercise of Vertue as it were Spurs and Incentives, nay and Encouragers to well doing: which though that great Stoick Seneca most strongly denys, and takes from a wise man all affections whatever, yet in doing that he leaves him not so much as a Man, but rather a new kind of God, that was never yet, nor ever like to be. Nay, to speak plainer, he sets up a stony Semblance of a Man, void of all Sense and common feeling of Humanity. And much good to them with this Wise Man of theirs; let them enjoy him to themselves, love him without Competitors, and live with him in Plato’s Common-wealth, the Countrey of Ideas, or Tantalus’s Orchards. For who would not shun and startle at such a man, as at some unnatural accident or Spirit? A man if iti
