The Anatomy of Melancholy

And as he said of that oak of Marius, now cut down and dead, “no tree tended by a farmer’s hand lasts so long as one that can be sown in a poet’s verse.” No plant can grow so long as one “sown by genius,” planted and tended by those ever-living minds.

Allon-bacuth, that weeping oak under which Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, died and was buried, may not outlast the memory of such everlasting monuments. Vainglory and rivalry, as with most people, were the motivating cause. To trumpet his own fame was Cosimo’s sole purpose in doing good, so that the whole world might notice it.

Such, for the most part, is the charity of our times; such are our benefactors, our Maecenases and patrons. Show me among so many thousands a truly devout person, just, honourable, upright, meek, humble, patient, harmless, innocent, merciful, loving and charitable! “What good man lives among us?” Show me a Caleb or a Joshua!

Tell me, Muse, of the man—

Show me a virtuous woman, a faithful wife, a good neighbour, a trustworthy servant, an obedient child, a true friend, and so on. Crows in Africa are not so scarce.

Anyone who examines this iron age in which we live, where love is cold “and now Astraea has left the earth,” Justice has fled with her attendants and virtue has been expelled—

Justice’s sister, Incorruptible Faith, and naked Truth—

All goodness gone, vice abounding, the devil loose—and sees one person vilify and exult over his brother as though he were a simpleton or a block of wood, oppress and tyrannize over him, prey on and torture him, vex, chafe, torment, crucify and starve him: where is charity?

Anyone who sees people swear oaths and break them, lie and bear false witness to benefit themselves and harm others, risk goods, lives, fortunes, reputation—everything—to revenge themselves on their enemies; people unspeakable in their desires, unnatural in their malice, with such murderous schemes, Italian blaspheming, Spanish renouncing and the like, may well ask: where is charity?

Anyone who observes so many lawsuits, such endless disputes, such plotting and undermining, so much money spent with such eagerness and fury—everyone for himself and his own ends, the devil for all—so many distressed souls, such pitiful complaints, so many factions, conspiracies, rebellions, oppressions, abuses and injuries, such grudging, resentment and discontent, so much rivalry and envy, so many brawls, quarrels and duels, may well ask what has become of charity.