Malum consilium consultori pessimum.

Evil counsel is most pernicious to the giver of it. The adage is applicable to persons who find the mischief they intended for others, fall upon themselves. «He hath graven and digged a pit, and hath fallen into the midst of it himself». Advice is of a sacred nature, and should he given faithfully, and those who prostitute it to evil purposes, are deserving of the severest punishment. The following story is related as having given rise to this apothegm. The statue of Horatius Codes, who had defended the passage of a bridge singly against the whole Etrurian army, being struck with lightning, the augurs were consulted as to the expiation proper to be made to the offended deities, for to that cause the Romans attributed these and similar accidents; and they advised, among other things, that the statue should be placed in a lower situation; meaning, perhaps, where it would be less liable to a similar injury. But the advice being supposed to be given through treachery, they were accused, convicted, and put to death. This was so agreeable to the superstitious people, that for a long time after they sang the verse which forms this adage, in triumph, about the streets. The augurs are said to have acknowledged their guilt, as many poor old women, accused of witchcraft, have done in this country. The story is more circumstantially related by Aulus Gellius. See Beloe's translation of that entertaining work. Though augury was held in high estimation by the Greeks and Romans, scarcely any great action being undertaken among them without having recourse to it; and the common people in both countries, as well as many eminent for their rank, and for their literary attainments, placed an entire confidence in it, yet there were not wanting, at all times, persons who held it in contempt. Cato, the censor, Cicero tells us, expressed his astonishment, that the auspices could keep their countenance when two of them met. «Mirari se aiebat, quod non rideret haruspex haruspicem cum videret» And Homer makes Hector say to Polydamus, advising him not to attack the Grecian camp, on account of some sinister omen.

«Ye vagrants of the sky! your wings extend,
Or where the suns arise, or where descend;
To right, to left, unheeded take your way»–––

«Without a sign, his sword the brave man draws,
And asks no omen but his country's cause».

When Cassius was advised by the augurs not to fight with the Parthians until the moon had passed the scorpion, he said, «he was not afraid of the scorpion, but of the arrows of the enemy». But some of the augurs were, doubtless, dupes to their own art, and as credulous, and as foolish, as any modern old witch.