Our greatest agitations have ridiculous springs and causes: what ruin did our last Duke of Burgundy run into about a cartload of sheepskins! And was not the graving of a seal the first and principal cause of the greatest commotion that this machine of the world ever underwent? --[The civil war between Marius and Sylla; see Plutarch's Life of Marius, c. 3.]--for Pompey and Caesar were but the offsets and continuation of the two others: and I have in my time seen the wisest heads in this kingdom assembled with great ceremony, and at the public expense, about treaties and agreements, of which the true decision, in the meantime, absolutely depended upon the ladies' cabinet council, and the inclination of some bit of a woman.

Place: CHAPTER X · ¶4885
License: Public domain · Source
The text is given as in the edition, unedited.

Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (WLC), CC BY 4.0

Our greatest agitations have ridiculous springs and causes: what ruin … — Essays