His indifference to danger was that of the Stoic or the Mussulman.

During a period of fifteen years he knew that restless foes were continually lying in wait to compass his death by poison or the dagger.

Yet he could hardly be persuaded to use the most ordinary precautions.

'I am resolved,' he wrote, in 1609, 'to give no thought whatever to these wretchednesses.

He who thinks too much of living knows not how to live well.