It should be stated, however, that in a preceding paragraph, the author has just very pointedly expressed it as his opinion, that men who are supposed, by common consent, to be so far above the rest of mankind in their single virtue and judgment, that they are permitted to govern them at their discretion, should by no means undertake to maintain that view, by exhibiting that supposed kingly and divine faculty in the way of _speech_ or _argument_; thus putting themselves on a level with their subjects, and by meeting them on their own ground, with their own weapons, giving occasion for comparisons, perhaps not altogether favourable to that theory of a superlative and divine difference which the doctrine of a divine right to rule naturally presupposes. 'For,' he says, 'neither is it enough for those _who govern and command us, and have all the world in their hand_, to have a common understanding, and to be able to do what the rest can' [their faculty of judgment must match their position, for if it be only a common one, the difference will make it despised]: 'they are very much below us, if they be not _infinitely above us_. And, therefore, _silence_ is to them not only a countenance of respect and gravity, but very often of good profit and policy too; for, Megabysus going to see _Apelles_ in his _painting_ room, stood a great while without speaking a word, and at last began to talk of his paintings, for which he received this rude reproof. '_Whilst thou wast silent_, thou seemedst to be something great, by reason of thy chains and pomp; _but now that we have heard thee speak_, there is not the meanest boy in my shop that does not despise thee.' But after the author's subsequent reference to 'those animals' that were to be made competent by a vote of the Athenian people for the work of their superiors, to which he adds the custom of people who canonize the kings they have chosen out of their own body, which comes so near, he goes on thus:--_I differ from this common fashion_, and am more apt to suspect capacity when I see it accompanied with grandeur of fortune and _public applause_. We are to consider of what advantage it is, _to speak when one pleases, to choose the subject one will speak of_--[an advantage not common with authors then]--TO INTERRUPT OR CHANGE OTHER MEN'S ARGUMENTS, WITH A MAGISTERIAL AUTHORITY, to protect oneself from the opposition of others, by a nod, a smile, or silence, in the presence of an assembly that trembles with reverence and respect. _A man of a prodigious fortune_, coming to give his judgment upon some slight dispute that was foolishly set on foot at his _table_, began in these words:--'It can only be a liar or a fool that will say otherwise than so and so.' '_Pursue this philosophical point with a dagger in your hand_.'