Complete. From “Resolves, Divine, Moral, and Political.”

THERE was never a sounder truth than Nemo læditur nisi a se ipso. Had we the command of our own passions and affections, outward occasions might exercise our virtues, but could not injure them. There is a way to be wise and good, in spite of occasions. We cannot be drawn into evil courses, if we help not ourselves forward. It is our inside that undoes us. When men strive to entrap and ensnare us, they do but second our own inclinations; and if they did not see a kind of encouragement from ourselves they would never dare to attempt it. When men fall upon things which go against the genius of the mind, they then work in vain; but when the flatteries of others shall join with the great flatterer, a man’s self, he is then in the way to be wrought upon. It is true there is sometimes a self-constancy which is not to be tempted. In Athens there may be one Phocion to refuse the gold of Harpalus and Alexander; but this indeed is rare, and worthy of being magnified. Nil magnum in rebus humanis, nisi animus magna despiciens. But generally we are the authors of our own ruin; if not totally, yet primarily. A man’s own heart is as arch a traitor as any he can meet with: we trust it too much, and know it too little; and while we think it sure-footed, it slides, and does deceive us. The wise man should ever therefore maintain a double watch: one, to keep his heart from extravagancies; the other, to keep the enemy from approaching it. If they keep asunder, the harm is prevented; or if they do meet, and the heart consent not, I am in some doubt whether the offense be punishable, though the act be committed. It is no fault to let the thief have our purse, when we cannot help it. In the old law the ravished woman was to be freed; for, says the text, There is in her no cause of death. Qui volens injuste agit, malus est: qui vero ex necessitate, non dico prorsus malum. It is not the necessitated, but the willing ill that stains. Even actual sins have so far a dependency on the heart’s approbation, as that alone can vitiate or excuse the act. While we keep the heart steady, our enemies can much less hurt us. The reason of which is, that it is not in man to compel it. The mind of man, from man, is not capable of a violation. Whom then can I tax for my own yielding, but myself? No man has power over my mind, unless I myself give it him. So that this I think certain, that no man falls by free action, but is faulty in something; at least in some circumstance, though excusable in the most important. I know calumny and conjecture may injure innocence itself. In matters of censure, nothing but a certain knowledge should make us give a certain judgment; for fame and air are both too weak foundations for truth to build upon. All the precepts of wisdom we meet with are given us to guard against ourselves; and, undoubtedly, he who can do it is rising towards Deity. Listen to the harp of Horace:—

    One eye I will sure have for without; the other I will cast within me; and lest I see not enough with that, it shall ever be my prayer that I may ever be delivered from myself. A me, me salva, Domine! shall be one petition I will add to the litany of my beseechings.