Since, Therefore, No Man Is Born Without Faults, And He Is Esteemed
The Best Whose Errors Are The Least, Let The Wise Man Consider
Everything Human As Connected With Himself; For In Worldly Affairs
There Is No Perfect Happiness Under Heaven.
Evil borders upon
good, and vices are confounded with virtues; as the report of good
qualities is delightful to a well-disposed mind, so the relation of
the contrary should not be offensive.
The natural disposition of
this nation might have been corrupted and perverted by long exile
and poverty; for as poverty extinguisheth many faults, so it often
generates failings that are contrary to virtue.
CHAPTER I
Of the inconstancy and instability of this nation, and their want
of reverence for good faith and oaths
These people are no less light in mind than in body, and are by no
means to be relied upon. They are easily urged to undertake any
action, and are as easily checked from prosecuting it - a people
quick in action, but more stubborn in a bad than in a good cause,
and constant only in acts of inconstancy. They pay no respect to
oaths, faith, or truth; and so lightly do they esteem the covenant
of faith, held so inviolable by other nations, that it is usual to
sacrifice their faith for nothing, by holding forth the right hand,
not only in serious and important concerns, but even on every
trifling occasion, and for the confirmation of almost every common
assertion. They never scruple at taking a false oath for the sake
of any temporary emolument or advantage; so that in civil and
ecclesiastical causes, each party, being ready to swear whatever
seems expedient to its purpose, endeavours both to prove and
defend, although the venerable laws, by which oaths are deemed
sacred, and truth is honoured and respected, by favouring the
accused and throwing an odium upon the accuser, impose the burden
of bringing proofs upon the latter. But to a people so cunning and
crafty, this yoke is pleasant, and this burden is light.
CHAPTER II
Their living by plunder, and disregard of the bonds of peace and
friendship
This nation conceives it right to commit acts of plunder, theft,
and robbery, not only against foreigners and hostile nations, but
even against their own countrymen. When an opportunity of
attacking the enemy with advantage occurs, they respect not the
leagues of peace and friendship, preferring base lucre to the
solemn obligations of oaths and good faith; to which circumstance
Gildas alludes in his book concerning the overthrow of the Britons,
actuated by the love of truth, and according to the rules of
history, not suppressing the vices of his countrymen. "They are
neither brave in war, nor faithful in peace." But when Julius
Caesar, great as the world itself,
"Territa quaesitis ostendit terga Britannis,"
were they not brave under their leader Cassivellaunus? And when
Belinus and Brennus added the Roman empire to their conquests?
What were they in the time of Constantine, son of our Helen?
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