CHAP. XVIII.
IT is an honour to know how to commaund a mans seruants mo∣destly,* 1.1 and in our slaue wee are to thinke not how much punish∣ment he may endure and we inflict vpon him without reproofe, but what the nature of right and justice will permit thee: which commandeth vs to spare our Captiues and such whom we haue bought to be our bond-slaues. How much more just is it for thee not to abuse men free, ingenious, and honest, as thy bond men, but to entertaine them, for such as are vnder thy gouernment•• to defend them as thy subjects, and not af∣flict them as thy slaues. It is lawfull for bond-men to flie to Caesars statue. Al∣though wee haue authoritie to doe what wee list with our slaues, there is some∣what which the common right of liuing Creatures permitteth vs not to exe∣cute vpon a man, because he is of the same nature that thou art. Who hated not Vedius Pollio more worse then his owne slaues did, because hee fatted his Lam∣proies with mans bloud? and commanded those that offended him to bee cast into the fish-poole to what other end then to feede Serpents? O wretched man worthie a thousand deaths, whether he presented his slaues to be deuoured by those Lamproies hee would feed vpon, or whether to this only end hee nouri∣shed them, that in that sort he might nourish them. Euen as cruell Masters are pointed at thorow the whole Citie, and are reputed both hatefull and detesta∣ble: so the cruell demencie of Princes, who haue contracted infamie and hatred against them selues, are inregistred in Histories to bee a hatred to posteritie, Had it not beene better neuer to haue beene borne then to bee numbered amongst those that are borne for a publique miserie?