(continued)

Walled towns, stored arsenals and armories, goodly races of horse, chariots of war, elephants, ordnance, artillery, and the like;  all this is but a sheep in a lion's skin, except the breed and disposition of the people, be stout and warlike.  Nay, number (itself) in armies importeth not much, where the people is of weak courage;  for (as Virgil saith) It never troubles a wolf, how many the sheep be.  The army of the Persians, in the plains of Arbela, was such a vast sea of people, as it did somewhat astonish the commanders in Alexander's army;  who came to him therefore, and wished him to set upon them by night;  and he answered, He would not pilfer the victory.  And the defeat was easy.  When Tigranes the Armenian, being encamped upon a hill with four hundred thousand men, discovered the army of the Romans, being not above fourteen thousand, marching towards him, he made himself merry with it, and said, Yonder men are too many for an embassage, and too few for a fight.  But before the sun set, he found them enow to give him the chase with infinite slaughter.  Many are the examples of the great odds, between number and courage;  so that a man may truly make a judgment, that the principal point of greatness in any state, is to have a race of military men.  Neither is money the sinews of war (as it is trivially said), where the sinews of men's arms, in base and effeminate people, are failing.  For Solon said well to Croesus (when in ostentation he showed him his gold), Sir, if any other come, that hath better iron, than you, he will be master of all this gold.  Therefore let any prince or state think solely of his forces, except his militia of natives be of good and valiant soldiers.  And let princes, on the other side, that have subjects of martial disposition, know their own strength;  unless they be otherwise wanting unto themselves.  As for mercenary forces (which is the help in this case), all examples show, that whatsoever estate or prince doth rest upon them, he may spread his feathers for a time, but he will mew them soon after.

The blessing of Judah and Issachar will never meet;  that the same people, or nation, should be both the lion's whelp and the ass between burthens;  neither will it be, that a people overlaid with taxes, should ever become valiant and martial.  It is true that taxes levied by consent of the estate, do abate men's courage less:  as it hath been seen notably, in the excises of the Low Countries;  and, in some degree, in the subsidies of England.  For you must note, that we speak now of the heart, and not of the purse.  So that although the same tribute and tax, laid by consent or by imposing, be all one to the purse, yet it works diversely upon the courage.  So that you may conclude, that no people overcharged with tribute, is fit for empire.

Let states that aim at greatness, take heed how their nobility and gentlemen do multiply too fast.  For that maketh the common subject, grow to be a peasant and base swain, driven out of heart, and in effect but the gentleman's laborer.  Even as you may see in coppice woods;  if you leave your staddles too thick, you shall never have clean underwood, but shrubs and bushes.  So in countries, if the gentlemen be too many, the commons will be base;  and you will bring it to that, that not the hundred poll, will be fit for an helmet;  especially as to the infantry, which is the nerve of an army;  and so there will be great population, and little strength.  This which I speak of, hath been nowhere better seen, than by comparing of England and France;  whereof England, though far less in territory and population, hath been (nevertheless) an overmatch;  in regard the middle people of England make good soldiers, which the peasants of France do not.  And herein the device of king Henry the Seventh (whereof I have spoken largely in the History of his Life) was profound and admirable;  in making farms and houses of husbandry of a standard;  that is, maintained with such a proportion of land unto them, as may breed a subject to live in convenient plenty and no servile condition;  and to keep the plough in the hands of the owners, and not mere hirelings.  And thus indeed you shall attain to Virgil's character which he gives to ancient Italy:

Terra potens armis atque ubere glebae.

2