Of Seditions

AND TROUBLES



SHEPHERDS of people, had need know the
calendars of tempests in state; which are com-
monly greatest, when things grow to equality; as
natural tempests are greatest about the Equinoc-
tia. And as there are certain hollow blasts of wind,
and secret swellings of seas before a tempest, so
are there in states:


--Ille etiam caecos instare tumultus
Saepe monet, fraudesque et operta tunescere bella.


Libels and licentious discourses against the state,
when they are frequent and open; and in like sort,
false news often running up and down, to the dis-
advantage of the state, and hastily embraced; are
amongst the signs of troubles. Virgil, giving the
pedigree of Fame, saith, she was sister to the Giants:


Illam Terra parens, irra irritata deorum,
Extremam (ut perhibent) Coeo Enceladoque sororem