life of john picus earl of mirandola - The Center for Thomas More ...

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Life of John Picus
Picus, by whom all the ancestors of this John Picus undoubtedly bear
that name.¦ But we shall let his ancestors pass, to whom ⌐ (though they
were right excellent) ¬ he gave again as much honour as he received,¦
⌐ and we shall speak of himself, rehearsing in part his learning and his
virtue. For these be the things which we may account for our own,
of which every man is more properly to be commended than of the
nobleness of his ancestors, whose honour maketh us not honourable.
For either they were themselves virtuous or not; if not, then had they
none° honour themselves, had they never so great possessions: for
honour is the reward of virtue. And how may they claim the reward
that properly belongeth to virtue, if they lack the virtue that the reward
belongeth to? Then, if themselves had none honour, how might
they leave to their heirs that thing which they had not themselves? On
the other side, if they be virtuous and so, consequently, honourable,
yet may they not leave their honour to us as inheritants° no more
than the virtue that themselves were honourable for. For never the
more noble be we for their nobleness, if ourselves lack those things
for which they were noble. But rather the more worshipful that our
ancestors were, the more vile and shameful be we, if we decline from
the steps of their worshipful° living, the clear beauty of whose virtue
maketh the dark spot of our vice the more evidently to appear and to
be the more marked. But Picus, of whom we speak, was himself so
honourable, for the great plenteous abundance of all such virtues the
possession whereof very° honour followeth (as a shadow followeth a
body) that he was to all them that aspire to honour a very spectacle,
in whose conditions, as in a clear polished mirror, they might behold
in what points very honour standeth: whose marvellous cunning and
excellent virtue though my rude learning be far unable sufficiently to
express, yet forasmuch as, if no man should do it but he that might
sufficiently do it, no man should do it and better it were to be unsufficiently
done than utterly undone-- I shall therefore, as I can, briefly
rehearse you his whole life: at the leastwise to give some other man
hereafter (that can do it better) occasion to take it in hand when it shall
8 none no / 14 inheritants heirs / 19 worshipful worthy, virtuous / 23 very true
¦ 1 More omits ab ipso tempore nativitatis sumemus initium, “I shall begin with the time of his own
birth” (CW 1:294, 295). / 2 More leaves out a second reason Gianfrancesco gives for omitting
an account of Picus’ ancestors, namely, that he (Gianfrancesco) will restrict his Life to “what [he]
learned with [his] own eyes and ears or what [he] heard from very reliable witnesses” (CW 1:295).
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Nobleness of
ancestors
[53]
Honour
Honour and virtue
come not by inheritance.