Look you to it, where there is tumbling and
tossing upon the bed of sickness, it must end in death or
recovery. Though the people of the world, in the dregs of the
Gothic empire, be yet tumbling and tossing upon the bed of
sickness, they cannot die; nor is there any means of recovery for
them but by ancient prudence, whence of necessity it must come to
pass that this drug be better known. if France, Italy, and Spain
were not all sick, all corrupted together, there would be none of
them so; for the sick would not be able to withstand the sound,
nor the sound to preserve their health, without curing of the
sick. The first of these nations (which if you stay her leisure,
will in my mind be France) that recovers the health of ancient
prudence, shall certainly govern the world; for what did Italy
when she had it? and as you were in that, so shall you in the
like case be reduced to a province; I do not speak at random.
Italy, in the consulship of Lucius AEmilius Papus and Caius
Attilius Regulus, armed, upon the Gallic tumult that then
happened of herself, and without the aid of foreign auxiliaries,
70,000 horse and 700,000 foot; but as Italy is the least of those
three countries in extent, so is France now the most populous.
"'I, decus, I, nostrum, melioribus utere fatis.
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