So Cæsar said to the pilot in the tempest, “Cæsarem portas, et fortunam ejus.”[428] So Sylla chose the name of “Felix,”[429] and not of “Magnus;”[430] and it hath been noted, that those who ascribe openly too much to their own wisdom and policy, end unfortunate. It is written, that Timotheus[431] the Athenian, after he had, in the account he gave to the state of his government, often interlaced his speech, “and in this Fortune had no part,” never prospered in any thing he undertook afterwards. Certainly there be, whose fortunes are like Homer’s verses, that have a slide[432] and easiness more than the verses of other poets; as Plutarch saith of Timoleon’s fortune in respect of that of Agesilaus or Epaminondas; and that this should be, no doubt it is much in a man’s self. XLI.—OF USURY.[433] Many have made witty invectives against usury. They say that it is pity the devil should have God’s part, which is the tithe; that the usurer is the greatest Sabbath-breaker, because his plough goeth every Sunday; that the usurer is the drone that Virgil speaketh of:— “Ignavum fucos pecus a præsepibus arcent;”[434] that the usurer breaketh the first law that was made for mankind after the fall, which was, “in sudore vultûs tui comedes panem tuum;”[435] not, “in sudore vultûs alieni;”[436] that usurers should have orange-tawny[437] bonnets, because they do Judaize; that it is against nature for money to beget money, and the like. I say this only, that usury is a “concessum propter duritiem cordis;”[438] for, since there must be borrowing and lending, and men are so hard of heart as they will not lend freely, usury must be permitted. Some others have made suspicious and cunning propositions of banks, discovery of men’s estates, and other inventions; but few have spoken of usury usefully. It is good to set before us the incommodities and commodities of usury, that the good may be either weighed out, or culled out; and warily to provide, that, while we make forth to that which is better, we meet not with that which is worse.