A good name once lost, very hardly recovered again. [ 547]
THere is a fable, how that Reputation, Love and Death,* 1.1 made a covenant to travail all the world over, but each was to take a several way; when they were ready to depart, a mutual enquiry was made how they might find each o∣ther again; Death said, they should be sure to hear of him in Battels, Hospitals, and in all parts where either famine or diseases were rife; Love bad them hearken after him amongst the children of poor people, whose Parents had left them no∣thing; at Marriages, at Feasts, and amongst the professed servants of vertue, the onely places for him to be in: They long expected a direction from Reputation, who stood silent; but being urged to assign them places where they might find him,* 1.2 He sullenly answered, His nature was such, that if once he departed from any Man, he never came to him more: And it is most true, that honour or credit, or a good name, being once lost, seldom or never returns again; a crack'd credit will hardly be sodred anew, and Credit is said to be a good fore-game, but a bad af∣ter one, very hardly and with much difficulty to be recovered.