formidable from his hatred of depravity, from the punishment which he inflicts on it, from his celerity in inflicting it, and, in short, from his skill and exercise in the art of government. For venerable gravity, being a thing which imitates divinity, is capable of causing him to be admired and honoured by the multitude. Benignity will render him pleasing and beloved. And his being formidable will cause him to be terrible to and unconquered by his enemies, and magnanimous and confident to his friends. It is necessary, however, that his gravity should have nothing in it of an abject or vulgar nature, but that it should be admirable, and such as becomes the dignity of empire and a sceptre. Nor should he ever contend with his inferiors, or his equals, but with those that are greater than himself; and he should conceive, conformably to the magnitude of his empire, that those pleasures are the greatest which are derived from beautiful and great deeds, and not those which arise from sensual gratifications; separating himself indeed from human passions, and approximating to the Gods, not through arrogance, but through magnanimity and an invincible transcendency of virtue. Hence he should invest himself with such a gracefulness and majesty in his aspect and his reasonings, in the conceptions of his mind, in the manners of his soul, and in his actions and the motions and gesture of his body, that those who survey him may perceive that he is adorned and fashioned with modesty and temperance, and a decorous disposition. For a good king should convert to himself the souls of those that behold him, no less than the sound of a flute and harmony attract the attention of those that hear them. And thus much concerning the venerable gravity of a king.