De arte praedicatoria

If anyone wishes to have teaching about prudence, let him proceed in this way: Be prudent as serpents, and simple as doves.¹ Likewise: Wisdom conquers malice.² And elsewhere: Blessed is the man who dwells in wisdom.³ Likewise: A fool stirs up quarrels, but the wise man calms those that have been stirred up.⁴

Seneca says: "Whoever desires to follow prudence should begin to live well under the guidance of reason, and establish the worth of things not by opinion but by their nature." Prudence is the discernment of good and evil things, and of both kinds among themselves, together with the avoidance of evil and the choosing of good. It is said "of both" because it is not enough to divide good things from evil things, but also to distinguish good things from one another, and evil things likewise; and good things from better and lesser goods; and evil things from worse and lesser evils. It is not enough to discern these, unless the choosing of good and the rejection of evil follow. Prudence teaches which things seem to be good and are not, and which do not seem to be good and are.

O man, prudence teaches you not to marvel at the transitory things you possess, nor to consider great what is perishable. Prudence will teach you to dispense prudently those things you possess as if belonging to another, and to allow to pass fruitfully those things you cannot hold forever. If you embrace prudence, you remain the same everywhere, you will suffer loss in nothing, and as the variety of circumstances or times demands, so you will accommodate yourself to time, place, person, cause, nor will you change in some respects, but rather adapt in all; just as the hand is the same whether extended flat or clenched into a fist.

Prudence neither wishes to deceive nor can be deceived. Prudence praises sparingly, and blames still more sparingly; for excessive praise is just as reprehensible as immoderate blame; the former indeed is suspected of flattery, the latter of malice. Prudence bears witness to truth, not to friendship. It promises with discretion, hastens what it has promised, and delivers more fully than it promised.

Prudence is exercised in three times: it orders the present, foresees the future, and remembers the past; for whoever thinks nothing of the past loses his life; whoever does not premeditate on the future proceeds incautiously into everything. The prudent man keeps in mind both future evils and goods, so that he may be able to endure the former and moderate the latter. He is not always in action, but sometimes refreshes his mind with a pause of rest. And this rest itself is full of studies of wisdom and good thoughts; for the prudent man never withers in idleness, never grows sluggish in laziness, sometimes has his mind relaxed but never slackened, he speeds up slow things, disentangles perplexing ones, softens hard ones, undertakes difficult ones.

The wise man is not moved by the authority of the speaker, nor by the loftiness of his lineage, nor by what he says or does, nor by how much, but he considers by what kind of things he is pleased. He desires and seeks that which can be desired before everyone. Nor does he set himself upon a height where either standing is dreadful or descending brings a fall.

Then he calls upon healthy counsels for himself, when the prosperity of life, worldly dignity, flatters him, then, as though on slippery ground, he holds back his foot and stops; and he does not let his step proceed impetuously, but circumspectly. To prudence belong circumspection and caution. Prudence measures the future according to the past; so that if a prudent man sees someone fall into some vice through some occasion, he measures the future accordingly, lest he fall into a similar sin through a similar occasion. O how great a mark of prudence it is to measure the future from the past! to gauge what is imminent from what has already happened, similar things from similar, consequences from signs!

To this same prudence belongs circumspection, which is nothing other than caution against opposite vices, by which we so avoid one vice that we do not fall into its contrary. For example: thus we guard against avarice so that we do not fall into prodigality; Solomon urged this virtue, saying: Keep your heart with all watchfulness.⁵ About to say "watchfulness," he prefaced it with "all," lest, if you shut the bolts on this door, you should open an entrance on another side. For there are many who so escape the assault of one vice that they fall into the snare of another. For vices thus supply one another in turn, so that while someone secretly escapes one, another retains the fugitive by a reciprocal exchange.

To this same prudence belongs caution, by which prudence discerns vices that display the appearance of virtues. Whence Isidore says: "Vices display the appearance of virtues, whereby they more perniciously deceive their followers, because they cover themselves under the veil of virtue; for under the pretext of justice cruelty is practiced, and slack laziness is believed to be gentleness: Often the negligence of sloth does what is believed to be done by indulgence." From this it is clear that the prudent man is content with himself for living happily. Whence Crispus says, "the wise man needs nothing," for he has the highest good within himself, and therefore it is not fitting to seek instruments of goodness from outside. Within, in the mind, the highest good is cultivated, within it embraces the whole, because it does not embrace external form. For he begins to be subject to fortune who seeks any part of goodness from outside. But the prudent man limits every good within himself, and if he loses every good of fortune, he will cry out: All my goods are with me, namely prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance. He does not consider goods to be those things which can be snatched away. Nothing suffices for the imprudent man; but he who is not content should not be left to himself. If he has need of nothing, he knows how to use nothing, but is in want of everything.