(17) Consider further, for tropes of rhetoric, that excellent use of a metaphor or translation, wherewith he taxeth Antipater, who was an imperious and tyrannous governor; for when one of Antipater’s friends commended him to Alexander for his moderation, that he did not degenerate as his other lieutenants did into the Persian pride, in uses of purple, but kept the ancient habit of Macedon, of black.  “True,” saith Alexander; “but Antipater is all purple within.”  Or that other, when Parmenio came to him in the plain of Arbela and showed him the innumerable multitude of his enemies, specially as they appeared by the infinite number of lights as it had been a new firmament of stars, and thereupon advised him to assail them by night; whereupon he answered, “That he would not steal the victory.”

(18) For matter of policy, weigh that significant distinction, so much in all ages embraced, that he made between his two friends Hephaestion and Craterus, when he said, “That the one loved Alexander, and the other loved the king:”  describing the principal difference of princes’ best servants, that some in affection love their person, and other in duty love their crown.

(19) Weigh also that excellent taxation of an error, ordinary with counsellors of princes, that they counsel their masters according to the model of their own mind and fortune, and not of their masters.  When upon Darius’ great offers Parmenio had said, “Surely I would accept these offers were I as Alexander;” saith Alexander, “So would I were I as Parmenio.”

(20) Lastly, weigh that quick and acute reply which he made when he gave so large gifts to his friends and servants, and was asked what he did reserve for himself, and he answered, “Hope.”  Weigh, I say, whether he had not cast up his account aright, because hope must be the portion of all that resolve upon great enterprises; for this was Caesar’s portion when he went first into Gaul, his estate being then utterly overthrown with largesses.  And this was likewise the portion of that noble prince, howsoever transported with ambition, Henry Duke of Guise, of whom it was usually said that he was the greatest usurer in France, because he had turned all his estate into obligations.

(21) To conclude, therefore, as certain critics are used to say hyperbolically, “That if all sciences were lost they might be found in Virgil,” so certainly this may be said truly, there are the prints and footsteps of learning in those few speeches which are reported of this prince, the admiration of whom, when I consider him not as Alexander the Great, but as Aristotle’s scholar, hath carried me too far.