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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