beware the sun, and hold Daedalus’ axiom authentical, medium tenere tutissimum.  Low shrubs have deep roots, and poor cottages great patience.  Fortune looks ever upward, and envy aspireth to nestle with dignity.  Take heed, my sons, the mean is sweetest melody; where strings high stretched, either soon crack, or quickly grow out of tune.  Let your country’s care be your heart’s content, and think that you are not born for yourselves, but to level your thoughts to be loyal to your prince, careful for the common weal, and faithful to your friends; so shall France say, ’These men are as excellent in virtues as they be exquisite in features.’  O my sons, a friend is a precious jewel, within whose bosom you may unload your sorrows and unfold your secrets, and he either will relieve with counsel, or persuade with reason:  but take heed in the choice:  the outward show makes not the inward man, nor are the dimples in the face the calendars of truth.  When the liquorice leaf looketh most dry, then it is most wet:  when the shores of Lepanthus are most quiet, then they forepoint a storm.  The Baaran leaf the more fair it looks, the more infectious it is, and in the sweetest words is oft hid the most treachery.  Therefore, my sons, choose a friend as the Hyperborei do the metals, sever them from the ore with fire, and let them not bide the stamp before they be current:  so try and then trust, let time be touchstone of friendship, and then friends faithful lay them up for jewels.  Be valiant, my sons, for cowardice is the enemy to honor; but not too rash, for that is an extreme.  Fortitude is the mean, and that is limited within bonds, and prescribed with circumstance.  But above all,” and with that he fetched a deep sigh, “beware of love, for it is far more perilous than pleasant, and yet, I tell you, it allureth as ill as the Sirens.  O my sons, fancy is a fickle thing, and beauty’s paintings are tricked up with time’s colors, which, being set to dry in the sun, perish with the same.  Venus is a wanton, and though her laws pretend liberty, yet there is nothing but loss and glistering misery.  Cupid’s wings are plumed with the feathers of vanity, and his arrows, where they pierce, enforce nothing but deadly desires:  a woman’s eye, as it is precious to behold, so is it prejudicial to gaze upon; for as it affordeth delight, so it snareth unto death.  Trust not their fawning favors, for their loves are like the breath of a man upon steel, which no sooner lighteth on but it leapeth off, and their passions are as momentary as the colors of a polype, which changeth at the sight of every object.  My breath waxeth short, and mine eyes dim:  the hour is come, and I must away:  therefore let this suffice, women are wantons, and yet men cannot want one:  and therefore, if you love, choose her that hath eyes of adamant, that will turn only to one point; her heart of a diamond, that will receive but one form; her tongue of a Sethin leaf, that never wags but with a south-east wind:  and yet, my sons,