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Page 77
1. Never to do more mischief to another than was necessary to the
effecting his purpose; for that mischief was too precious a thing
to be thrown away.
2. To know no distinction of men from affection; but to sacrifice
all with equal readiness to his interest.
3. Never to communicate more of an affair than was necessary to
the person who was to execute it.
4. Not to trust him who hath deceived you, nor who knows he hath
been deceived by you.
5. To forgive no enemy; but to be cautious and often dilatory in
revenge.
6. To shun poverty and distress, and to ally himself as close as
possible to power and riches.
7. To maintain a constant gravity in his countenance and
behaviour, and to affect wisdom on all occasions.
8. To foment eternal jealousies in his gang, one of another.
9. Never to reward any one equal to his merit; but always to
insinuate that the reward was above it.
10. That all men were knaves or fools, and much the greater number
a composition of both.
11. That a good name, like money, must be parted with, or at least
greatly risqued, in order to bring the owner any advantage.
12. That virtues, like precious stones, were easily counterfeited;
that the counterfeits in both cases adorned the wearer equally,
and that very few had knowledge or discernment sufficient to
distinguish the counterfeit jewel from the real.
13. That many men were undone by not going deep enough in roguery;
as in gaming any man may be a loser who doth not play the whole
game.
14. That men proclaim their own virtues, as shopkeepers expose
their goods, in order to profit by them.
15. That the heart was the proper seat of hatred, and the
countenance of affection and friendship.
He had many more of the same kind, all equally good with these,
and which were after his decease found in his study, as the twelve
excellent and celebrated rules were in that of king Charles the
first; for he never promulgated them in his lifetime, not having
them constantly in his mouth, as some grave persons have the rules
of virtue and morality, without paying the least regard to them in
their actions: whereas our hero, by a constant and steady
adherence to his rules in conforming everything he did to them,
acquired at length a settled habit of walking by them, till at
last he was in no danger of inadvertently going out of the way;
and by these means he arrived at that degree of greatness, which
few have equalled; none, we may say, have exceeded: for, though it
must be allowed that there have been some few heroes, who have
done greater mischiefs to mankind, such as those who have betrayed
the liberty of their country to others, or have undermined and
overpowered it themselves; or conquerors who have impoverished,
pillaged, sacked, burnt, and destroyed the countries and cities of
their fellow-creatures, from no other provocation than that of
glory, i. e., as the tragic poet calls it,
a privilege to kill,
A strong temptation to do bravely ill;
yet, if we consider it in the light wherein actions are placed in
this line,
Laetius est, quoties magno tibi constat honestum;
when we see our hero, without the least assistance or pretence,
setting himself at the head of a gang, which he had not any shadow
of right to govern; if we view him maintaining absolute power, and
exercising tyranny over a lawless crew, contrary to all law but
that of his own will; if we consider him setting up an open trade
publickly, in defiance not only of the laws of his country but of
the common sense of his countrymen; if we see him first contriving
the robbery of others, and again the defrauding the very robbers
of that booty, which they had ventured their necks to acquire, and
which without any hazard, they might have retained; here sure he
must appear admirable, and we may challenge not only the truth of
history, but almost the latitude of fiction, to equal his glory.
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