found like Jupiter involved in clouds of his own raising. He was
entrenched behind a battery of ten or twelve guns, charged with a
stinking combustible called _tobacco_. Two or three of these he had
fired off, and replaced them in the same order. A fourth he levelled so
mathematically against me, that I was hardly able to maintain my post,
though I assumed the character and dignity of ambassador from the
republic of letters. 'I am sorry for your republic,' said Hobbes, 'for
if they send you to me in that capacity, they either want me or are
afraid of me: men have but two motives for their applications--interest
and fear; but the latter is in my opinion most predominant.' I told him
that my commission extended no farther than to make him their
compliments and to enquire after his health. 'If that be all,' said he,
'your republic does nothing more than negotiate by the maxims of other
states, that is, by hypocrisy: all men are necessarily in a state of
war, but all authors hate each other upon principle: for my part, I am
at enmity with the whole corps, from the bishop of Salisbury down to the
bell-man: nay, I hate their writings as much as I do themselves: there
is nothing so pernicious as reading; it destroys all originality of
sentiment. My lord Devonshire has more than ten thousand volumes in his
house; I entreated his lordship to lodge me as far as possible from that
pestilential corner: I have but one book, and that is _Euclid_, but I
begin to be tired of him; I believe he has done more harm than good; he
has set fools a reasoning.' 'There is one thing in Mr. Hobbes's
conduct,' said lord Devonshire, 'that I am unable to account for: he is
always railing at books, yet always adding to their number.' 'I write,
my lord,' answered Hobbes, 'to show the folly of writing. Were all the
books in the world on board one vessel, I should feel a greater pleasure
than that Lucretius speaks of in seeing the wreck.' 'But should you
feel no tenderness for your own productions?' 'I care for nothing,'
added he, 'but the _Leviathan_, and that might possibly escape by