ace the king was distinguished from his people after a very
pleasant and especial manner; he had a religion by himself, a god all his
own, and which his subjects were not to presume to adore, which was
Mercury, whilst, on the other hand, he disdained to have anything to do
with theirs, Mars, Bacchus, and Diana. And yet they are no other than
pictures that make no essential dissimilitude; for as you see actors in a
play representing the person of a duke or an emperor upon the stage, and
immediately after return to their true and original condition of valets
and porters, so the emperor, whose pomp and lustre so dazzle you in
public:

"Scilicet grandes viridi cum luce smaragdi
Auto includuntur, teriturque thalassina vestis
Assidue, et Veneris sudorem exercita potat;"

["Because he wears great emeralds richly set in gold, darting green
lustre; and the sea-blue silken robe, worn with pressure, and moist
with illicit love (and absorbs the sweat of Venus)."
--Lucretius, iv. 1123.]

do but peep behind the curtain, and you will see no thing more than an
ordinary man, and peradventure more contemptible than the meanest of his
subjects:

"Ille beatus introrsum est, istius bracteata felicitas est;"

["The one is happy in himself; the happiness of the other is
counterfeit."--Seneca, Ep., 115.]

cowardice, irresolution, ambition, spite, and envy agitate him as much as
another:

"Non enim gazae, neque consularis
Submovet lictor miseros tumultus
Mentis, et curas laqueata circum
Tecta volantes."

["For not treasures, nor the consular lictor, can remove the
miserable tumults of the mind, nor cares that fly about panelled
ceilings."--Horace, Od., ii. 16, 9.]

Care and fear attack him even in the centre of his battalions:

"Re veraque metus hominum curaeque sequaces
Nec metuunt sonitus armorum, nee fera tela;
Audacterque inter reges, rerumque potentes
Versantur, neque fulgorem reverentur ab auro."

["And in truth the fears and haunting cares of men fear not the
clash of arms nor points of darts, and mingle boldly with great
kings and men in authority, nor respect the glitter of gold."
--Lucretius, ii. 47.]

Do fevers, gout, and apoplexies spare him any more than one of us? When
old age hangs