VOLUME I

LONDON GRANT RICHARDS

1904

PREFATORY NOTE

This edition is an endeavour to arrive at a more satisfactory text of the work of Sir Thomas Browne, and to reproduce the principal part of it, as faithfully as seems advisable, in the form in which it was presented to the public at the time of his death. For this purpose, in the first volume, the text of the _Religio Medici_ follows more particularly the issue of 1682. The _Pseudodoxia Epidemica_ here given is based upon the sixth edition of ten years earlier, with careful revision. In every case in which a spelling or punctuation was dubious, a comparison was made of nearly all the issues printed during the lifetime of the writer, and their merits weighed. By this means it is hoped that the true flavour of the period has been preserved.

The Annotations upon the _Religio Medici_, which were always reprinted with the text during the seventeenth century, are here restored. They will appeal to a certain class of readers which has a right to be considered. It is to be regretted that every quotation given in these pages has not been verified. Several have been corrected; but to have worked through them all, in these busy days, would have been a labour of some years, which it is not possible to devote to the purpose. It has been thought best to leave these passages therefore, in the main, as they stand.[1]

The portrait of Sir Thomas Browne here prefixed is reproduced from the engraving published in 1672 with the edition of the _Religio Medici_ and _Pseudodoxia Epidemica_.

C.S.

_August, 1903._

[1] The quotation, now corrected, from Montaigne, on p. xxii, is a typical example of the pitfall into which one is liable to stumble. The passage there cited is in chapter xl. of the French author's later arrangement: a clear indication of the edition of the _Essais_ used by the author of the Annotations. What is one to make of the readings in Lucretius on p. xxv? No light is thrown upon these difficulties by the edition of Browne's works published in 1686. Wilkin did not reprint the Annotations, except in selection.

CONTENTS

PAGE

PREFATORY NOTE BY THE EDITOR, v

ANNOTATIONS UPON 'RELIGIO MEDICI,' ix

A LETTER SENT UPON THE INFORMATION OF ANIMADVERSIONS, 1

TO THE READER. 3

RELIGIO MEDICI, 7

PSEUDODOXIA EPIDEMICA, 113

TO THE READER, 115

THE FIRST BOOK:

1. Of the Causes of Common Errors, 121 2. A further Illustration of the same, 127 3. Of the second cause of Popular Errors; the erroneous disposition of the People, 132 4. Of the nearer and more Immediate Causes of Popular Errors, 140 5. Of Credulity and Supinity, 147 6. Of Adherence unto Antiquity, 152 7. Of Authority, 161 8. A brief enumeration of Authors, 168 9. Of the Same, 178 10. Of the last and common Promoter of false Opinions, the endeavours of Satan, 182 11. A further Illustration, 193

THE SECOND BOOK:

1. Of Crystal, 202 2. Concerning the Loadstone, 216 3. Concerning the Loadstone, 233 4. Of Bodies Electrical, 254 5. Compendiously of sundry other common Tenents, concerning Mineral and Terreous Bodies, 262 6. Of sundry Tenets concerning Vegetables or Plants, 285 7. Of some Insects, and the Properties of several Plants, 299

THE THIRD BOOK, CHAPTERS I.-X.:

1. Of the Elephant, 308 2. Of the Horse, 314 3. Of the Dove, 317 4. Of the Bever, 321 5. Of the Badger, 326 6. Of the Bear, 328 7. Of the Basilisk, 331 8. Of the Wolf, 338 9. Of the Deer, 340 10. Of the King-fisher, 348

ANNOTATIONS UPON RELIGIO MEDICI

_Nec satis est vulgasse fidem._-- Pet. Arbit. fragment.

THE ANNOTATOR TO THE READER

A. Gellius (noct. Attic. l. 20. cap. _ult._) _notes some Books that had strange Titles_; Pliny (Prefat. Nat. Hist.) _speaking of some such, could not pass them over without a jeer: So strange (saith he) are the Titles of some Books_, Ut multos ad vadimonium deferendum compellant. _And_ Seneca _saith, some such there are_, Qui patri obstetricem parturienti filiæ accersenti moram injicere possint. _Of the same fate this present Tract_ Religio Medici _hath partaken: Exception by some hath been taken to it in respect of its Inscription, which say they, seems to imply that_ Physicians _have a Religion by themselves, which is more than Theologie doth warrant: but it is their Inference, and not the Title that is to blame; for no more is meant by that, or endeavoured to be prov'd in the_ Book _then that (contrary to the opinion of the unlearned_) Physitians _have Religion as well as other men_.

_For the Work it self, the present Age hath produced none that has had better Reception amongst the learned; it has been received and fostered by almost all, there having been but one that I knew of_ (_to verifie_ that Books have their Fate from the Capacity of the Reader) _that has had the face to appear against it; that is_ Mr. Alexander[2] Rosse; _but he is dead, and it is uncomely to skirmish with his shadow. It shall be sufficient to remember to the_ Reader, _that the noble and most learned_ Knight, _Sir_ Kenelm Digby, _has delivered his opinion of it in another sort, who though in some things he differ from the_ Authors _sense, yet hath he most candidly and ingeniously allow'd it to be a_ very learned and excellent Piece; _and I think no Scholar will say there can be an approbation more authentique. Since the time he Published his Observations upon it, one_ Mr. Jo. Merryweather, _a_ Master _of_ Arts _of the_ University _of_ Cambridge, _hath deem'd it worthy to be put into the universal Language, which about the year_ 1644 _he performed; and that hath carried the Authors name not only into the_ Low-Countries _and_ France (_in both which places the Book in_ Latin _hath since been printed_) _but into_ Italy _and_ Germany; _and in_ Germany _it hath since fallen into the hands of a Gentleman of that Nation[3] (of his name he hath given us no more than_ L.N.M.E.N.) _who hath written learned_ Annotations _upon it in_ Latin, which were _Printed together with the Book at_ Strasbourg 1652. _And for the general good opinion the World had entertained both of the_ Work and Author, _this Stranger tells you_[4]: Inter alios Auctores incidi in libruni cui Titulus _Religio Medici_, jam ante mihi innotuerat lectionem istius libri multos præclaros viros delectasse, imo occupasse. Non ignorabam librum in _Anglia_, _Gallia_, _Italia_, _Belgio_, _Germania_, cupidissime legi; coustabat mihi eum non solum in _Anglia ac Batavia_, sed et _Purisiis_ cum præfatione, in qua Auctor magnis laudibus fertur, esse typis mandatum. Compertum mihi erat multos magnos atq; eruditos viros sensere Auctorem (quantum ex hoc scripto perspici potest) sanctitate vitæ ac pietare elucere, etc. _But for the worth of the_ Book _it is so well known to every_ English-man _that is fit to read it, that this attestation of a_ Forrainer _may seem superfluous_.

[2] In his _Medicus Medicatus_.

[3] That he was a _German_ appears by his notes _page_ 35, where he useth these words, _Dulcissima nostra Germania_, etc.

[4] In Præfat. Annotat.

_The_ German, _to do him right, hath in his_ Annotations _given a fair specimen of his learning, shewing his skill in the Languages, as well antient as modern; as also his acquaintance with all manner of Authors, both sacred and profane, out of which he has ammas'd a world of Quotations: but yet, not to mention that he hath not observed some Errors of the Press, and one or two main ones of the Latin Translation, whereby the Author is much injured; it cannot be denyed but he hath pass'd over many hard places untoucht, that might deserve a Note; that he hath made_ Annotations _on some, where no need was; in the explication of others hath gone besides the true sense._

_And were he free from all these, yet one great Fault there is he may be justly charg'd with, that is, that he cannot_ manum de Tabula _even in matters the most obvious: which is an affectation ill-becoming a_ Scholar; _witness the most learned Annotator_, Claud. Minos. Divion. in præfat. commentar. Alciat. Emblemat. præfix. Præstat (_saith he_) brevius omnia persequi, et leviter attingere quæ nemini esse ignota suspicari possint, quam quasi {~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO WITH DASIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER PSI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER DELTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH PERISPOMENI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}, perq; locos communes identidem expatiari.

_I go not about by finding fault with his, obliquely to commend my own; I am as far from that, as 'tis possible others will be: All I seek, by this Preface, next to acquainting the_ Reader _with the various entertainment of the Book, is, that he would be advertized that these Notes were collected ten[5] years since, long before the_ German's _were written; so that I am no Plagiary (as who peruseth his Notes and mine, will easily perceive): And in the second place, that I made this Recueil meerly for mine own entertainment, and not with any intention to evulge it; Truth is my witness, the publication proceeds meerly from the importunity of the Book-seller (my special friend) who being acquainted with what I had done, and about to set out another Edition of the Book, would not be denied these notes to attex to it; 'tis he (not I) that divulgeth it, and whatever the success be, he alone is concern'd in it; I only say for my self what my Annotations bear in the Frontispiece_--

_Nec satis est vulgasse fidem----_

_That is, that it was not enough to all persons (though pretenders to Learning) that our_ Physitian _had publish'd his Creed, because it wanted an exposition. I say further, that the_ German's _is not full_; _and that_ (----Quicquid sum Ego quamvis infra Lucilli censum ingeniumq;----) _my explications do in many things illustrate the Text of my Author_.

_24 Martii, 1654._

[5] Excepting two or three particulars in which reference is made to some Books that came over since that time.

ANNOTATIONS UPON RELIGIO MEDICI

The Epistle to the _READER_

_Certainly that man were greedy of life, who should desire to live when all the World were at an end_;] This Mr. _Merryweather_ hath rendred thus; _Cupidum esse vitæ oportet, qui universo jam expirante mundo vivere cuperet_; and well enough: but it is not amiss to remember, that we have this saying in _Seneca_ the _Tragoedian_, who gives it us thus, _Vitæ est avidus quisquis non vult mundo secum pereunte mori_.

_There are many things delivered Rhetorically_.] The Author herein imitates the ingenuity of St. _Austin_, who in his _Retract._ corrects himself for having delivered some things more like a young Rhetorician than a sound Divine; but though St. _Aug._ doth deservedly acknowledge it a fault in himself, in that he voluntarily published such things, yet cannot it be so in this Author, in that he intended no publication of it, as he professeth in this Epistle, and in that other to Sir _Kenelm Digby_.

THE FIRST PART

_Sect. 1. Pag. 1._

_The general scandal of my Profession_.] Physitians (of the number whereof it appears by several passages in this Book the Author is one) do commonly hear ill in this behalf. It is a common speech (but only amongst the unlearn'd sort) _Ubi tres Medici, duo Athei_. The reasons why those of that Profession (I declare my self that I am none, but _Causarum Actor Mediocris_, to use _Horace_ his Phrase) may be thought to deserve that censure, the Author rendreth _Sect_. 19.

_The natural course of my studies._] The vulgar lay not the imputation of Atheism only upon Physitians, but upon Philosophers in general, who for that they give themselves to understand the operations of _Nature_, they calumniate them, as though they rested in the second causes without any respect to the first. Hereupon it was, that in the tenth Age Pope _Silvester_ the second pass'd for a Magician, because he understood Geometry and natural Philosophy. _Baron. Annal._ 990. And _Apuleius_ long before him laboured of the same suspicion, upon no better ground; he was accus'd, and made a learned Apology for himself, and in that hath laid down what the ground is of such accusations, in these words: _Hæc fermè communi quodam errore imperitorum Philosophis objectantur, ut partem eorum qui corporum causas meras et simplices rimantur, irreligiosos putant, eosque aiunt Deos abnuere, ut Anaxagoram, et Lucippum, et Democritum, et Epicurum, coeterosq; rerum naturæ Patronos._ Apul. in Apolog. And it is possible that those that look upon the second Causes scattered, may rest in them and go no further, as my Lord _Bacon_ in one of his _Essayes_ observeth; but our Author tells us there is a true Philosophy, from which no man becomes an Atheist, _Sect._ 46.

_The indifferency of my behaviour and Discourse in matters of Religion._] Bigots are so oversway'd by a preposterous Zeal, that they hate all moderation in discourse of Religion; they are the men forsooth--_qui solos credant habendos esse Deos quos ipsi colunt_. _Erasmus_ upon this accompt makes a great complaint to Sir _Tho. More_ in an Epistle of his, touching one _Dorpius_ a Divine of _Lovain_, who because, upon occasion of discourse betwixt them, _Erasmus_ would not promise him to write against _Luther_, told _Erasmus_ that he was a _Lutheran_, and afterwards published him for such; and yet as _Erasmus_ was reputed no very good Catholick, so for certain he was no Protestant.

_Not that I meerly owe this Title to the Font_] as most do, taking up their Religion according to the way of their Ancestors; this is to be blamed among all persons: It was practised as well amongst Heathens as Christians.

_Per caput hoc juro per quod Pater antè solebat_, saith _Ascanius_ in _Virgil_: and _Apuleius_ notes it for an absurdity. _Utrum Philosopho, putas turpe scire ista, an neseire? negligere, an curare? nosse quanta sit etiam in istis providentiæ ratio, an de diis immortalibus Matri et Patri cedere_? saith he in _Apolog._ and so doth _Minutius_. _Unusquisq; vestrum non cogitat prius se debere deum nosse quam colere, dum inconsulte gestiuntur parentibus obedire, dum fieri malunt alieni erroris accessio, quam sibi credere_. Minut. _in_ Octav.

_But having in my ripers examined_, etc.] according to the Apostolical Precept, _Omnia probate, quod bonum est tenete_.

_Sect. 2. Pag. 8._

_There being a Geography of Religion_] _i.e._ of Christian Religion, which you may see described in Mr. _Brerewood's_ Enquiries: he means not of the Protestant Religion; for though there be a difference in Discipline, yet the _Anglican_, _Scotic_, _Belgic_, _Gallican_, and _Helvetic_ Churches differ not in any essential matter of the Doctrine, as by the _Harmony of Confessions_ appears. 5. Epist. _Theod. Bezæ Edmundo Grindallo Ep. Londinens_.

_Wherein I dislike nothing but the Name_] that is _Lutheran_, _Calvinist_, _Zuinglian_, etc.

_Now the accidental occasion wherein_, etc.] This is graphically described by _Thuanus_ in his History: but because his words are too large for this purpose, I shall give it you somewhat more briefly, according to the relation of the Author of the History of the Council of _Trent_. The occasion was the necessity of Pope _Leo_ the Tenth, who by his profusion had so exhausted the Treasure of the _Church_, that he was constrained to have recourse to the publishing of Indulgencies to raise monies: some of which he had destined to his own Treasury, and other part to his Allyes, and particularly to his Sister he gave all the money that should be raised in _Saxony_; and she, that she might make the best profit of the donation, commits it to one _Aremboldus_, a Bishop to appoint Treasurers for these Indulgences. Now the custome was, that whensoever these Indulgences were sent into _Saxony_, they were to be divulged by the Fryars _Eremites_ (of which Order _Luther_ then was), but _Aremboldus_ his Agents thinking with themselves, that the Fryars _Eremites_ were so well acquainted with the trade, that if the business should be left to them, they should neither be able to give so good an account of their Negotiation, nor yet get so much themselves by it as they might do in case the business were committed to another Order; they thereupon recommend it to (and the business is undertaken by) the _Dominican_ Fryars, who performed it so ill, that the scandal arising both from thence, and from the ill lives of those that set them on work, stirred up _Luther_ to write against the abuses of these Indulgences; which was all he did at first; but then, not long after, being provoked by some Sermons and small Discourses that had been published against what he had written, he rips up the _business_ from the beginning, and publishes xcv _Theses_ against it at _Wittenberg_. Against these _Tekel_ a _Dominican_ writes; then _Luther_ adds an explication to his. _Eckius_ and _Prierius_ Dominicans, thereupon take the controversie against him: and now _Luther_ begins to be hot; and because his adversaries could not found the matter of Indulgences upon other Foundations then the _Popes_ power and infallibility, that begets a disputation betwixt them concerning the Popes power, which _Luther_ insists upon as inferiour to that of a _general Council_; and so by degrees he came on to oppose the Popish Doctrine of _Remission of sins_, _Penances_, and _Purgatory_; and by reason of Cardinal _Cajetans_ imprudent management of the conference he had with him, it came to pass that he rejected the whole body of Popish doctrine. So that by this we may see what was the accidental occasion wherein, the slender means whereby, and the abject condition of the person by whom, the work of Reformation of Religion was set on foot.

_Sect. 3. Pag. 8._

_Yet I have not so shaken hands with those, desperate Resolutions, (Resolvers it should be, without doubt) who had rather venture at large their decayed Bottom, than bring her in to be new trimm'd in the Dock; who had rather promiscuously retain all, than abridge any; and obstinately be what they are, than what they have been; as to stand in a diameter and at swords point with them: we have reformed from them, not against them_, etc.] These words by Mr. _Merryweather_ are thus rendred, _sc_. _Nec tamen in vecordem illum pertinacium hominum gregem memet adjungo, qui lubefactatum navigium malunt fortunæ committere quam in navale de integro resarciendum deducere, qui malunt omnia promiscuè retinere quam quicquam inde diminuere, et pertinaciter esse qui sunt quam qui olim fuerunt, ita ut iisdem ex diametro repugnent: ab illis, non contra illos, reformationem instituimus_, etc. And the Latine Annotator sits down very well satisfied with it, and hath bestowed some notes upon it; but under the favour both of him and the Translator, this Translation is so far different from the sense of the Author, that it hath no sense in it; or if there be any construction of sense in it, it is quite besides the Author's meaning; which will appear if we consider the context: by that we shall find that the Author in giving an account of his Religion, tells us first, that he is a Christian, and farther, that he is of the reform'd Religion; but yet he saith, in this place, he is not so rigid a Protestant, nor at defiance with Papists so far, but that in many things he can comply with them, (the particulars he afterwards mentions in this Section) for, saith he, we have reform'd from them, not against them, that is, as the _Archbishop_ of _Canterbury_ against the _Jesuit_ discourseth well. We have made no new Religion nor Schism from the old; but in calling for the old, and desiring that which was novel and crept in might be rejected, and the Church of _Rome_ refusing it, we have reform'd from those upstart novel Doctrines, but against none of the old: and other sense the place cannot bear; therefore how the _Latine Annotator_ can apply it as though in this place the Author intended to note the _Anabaptists_, I see not, unless it were in respect of the expression _Vecordem pertinacium hominum gregem_, which truly is a description well befitting them, though not intended to them in this place: howsoever, I see not any ground from hence to conclude the Author to be any whit inclining to the _Bulk_ of Popery (but have great reason from many passages in this Book to believe the contrary,) as he that prefix'd a Preface to the Parisian Edition of this Book hath unwarrantably done.

But for the mistake of the Translator, it is very obvious from whence that arose. I doubt not but it was from mistake of the sense of the English Phrase _Shaken hands_, which he hath rendered by these words, _Memet adjungo_, wherein he hath too much play'd the Scholar, and show'd himself to be more skilful in forraign and antient customs, then in the vernacular practise and usage of the language of his own Country; for although amongst the Latines protension of the Hand were a Symbole and sign of Peace and Concord (as _Alex. ab Alexandro_; _Manum verò protendere, pacem peti significabunt_ (saith he) _Gen. Dier. lib. 4. cap. ult._ which also is confirmed by _Cicero pro Dejotaro_; and _Cæsar. l. 2. de Bellico Gallico_) and was used in their first meetings, as appears by the Phrase, _Jungere hospitio Dextras_; and by that of _Virgil_,

_Oremus pacem, et Dextras tendamus inermes_,

And many like passages that occur in the Poets, to which I believe the Translator had respect; yet in modern practise, especially with us in _England_, that ceremony is used as much in our _Adieu's_ as in the _first Congress_; and so the Author meant in this place, by saying he had not _shaken hands_; that is, that he had not so deserted, or bid farewel to the _Romanists_, as to stand at swords point with them: and then he gives his reasons at those words, _For omitting those improperations_, etc. So that instead of _memet adjungo_, the Translator should have used some word or Phrase of a clean contrary signification; and instead of _ex diametro repugnent_, it should be _repugnem_.

_Sect. 5. Pag. 11._

_Henry_ the Eighth, who, though he rejected the Pope, refused not the faith of _Rome_.] So much _Buchanan_ in his own life written by himself testifieth, who speaking of his coming into _England_ about the latter end of that King's time, saith, _Sed ibi tum omnia adeo erant incerta, ut eodem die, ac eodem igne_ (very strange!) _utriusque factionis homines cremarentur, Henrico 8, jam seniore suæ magnis securitati quam Religionis puritati intento_. And for the confirmation of this assertion of the Author, _vide Stat. 31. H. 8, cap. 14_.

_And was conceived the state of_ Venice _would have attempted in our dayes._] This expectation was in the time of Pope _Paul_ the Fifth, who by excommunicating that Republique, gave occasion to the Senate to banish all such of the Clergy as would not by reason of the Popes command administer the Sacraments; and upon that account the _Jesuits_ were cast out, and never since receiv'd into that State.

_Sect. 6. Pag. 12._

_Or be angry with his judgement for not agreeing with me in that, from which perhaps within a few days I should dissent my self._] I cannot think but in this expression the Author had respect to that of that excellent French Writer _Monsieur Mountaign_ (in whom I often trace him). _Combien diversement jugeons nous de choses? Combien de fois changeons nous nos fantasies? Ce que je tien aujourdhuy, ce que je croy, je le tien et le croy de toute ma Creance, mais ne m'est il pas advenu non une fois mais cent, mais mille et tous les jours d'avoir embrasse quelque autre chose?_ Mountaign lib. 2. _Des Essais._ Chap. 12.

_Every man is not a proper Champion for truth_, etc.] A good cause is never betray'd more than when it is prosecuted with much eagerness, and but little sufficiency; and therefore _Zuinglius_, though he were of _Carolostadius_ his opinion in the point of the Sacrament of the _Eucharist_ against _Luther_, yet he blamed him for undertaking the defence of that cause against _Luther_, not judging him able enough for the encounter: _Non satis habet humerorum_, saith he of _Carolostad_, alluding to that of _Horace_, _Sumite materiam vestris qui scribitis æquam Viribus, et versate diu quid ferre recusent Quid valeant humeri_.----So _Minutius Fælix; Plerumq; pro disserentium viribus, et eloquentiæ potestate, etiam perspicuæ veritatis conditio mutetur_. Minut. in Octav. And _Lactantius_ saith, this truth is verified in _Minutius_ himself: for _Him_, _Tertullian_ and _Cyprian_, he spares not to blame (all of them) as if they had not with dexterity enough defended the Christian cause against the _Ethniques_. _Lactant. de justitia_, cap. 1. I could wish that those that succeeded him had not as much cause of complaint against him: surely he is noted to have many errors _contra fidem_.

_Pag. 13._

_In Philosophy----there is no man more Paradoxical then my self, but in Divinity I love to keep the Road_, etc.] Appositely to the mind of the Author, saith the Publisher of Mr. _Pembel's_ Book _de origine formarum_, _Certe_ (saith he) _in locis Theologicis ne quid detrimenti capiat vel Pax. vel Veritas Christi----à novarum opinionum pruritu prorsus abstinendum puto, usq; adeo ut ad certam regulam etiam loqui debeamus, quod pie et prudenter monet Augustinus_ (_de Civ. Dei._ 1. 10, cap. 23.) [_ne verborum licentia impia vi gignat opinionem_,] _at in pulvere Scholastico ubi in nullius verba, juramus, et in utramvis partem sine dispendio vel pacis, vel salutis ire liceat, major conceditur cum sentiendi tum loquendi libertas_, etc. Capel. _in Ep. Dedicat._ _Pembel_, _de origin form. præfix_.

_Heresies perish not with their Authors, but like the River_ Arethusa, _though they lose their Currents in one place, they rise again in another._] Who would not think that this expression were taken from Mr. _Mountaigne_, _l. 2, des Ess. cap. 12_. Where he hath these words, _Nature enserre dans les termes de son progress ordinaire comme toutes autres choses aussi les creances les judgements et opinions des hommes elles ont leur revolutions_; and that _Mountaigne_ took his from _Tully_. _Non enim hominum interitu sententiæ quoque occidunt_, _Tull._ _de nat. deorum l. 1_, etc. Of the River _Arethusa_ thus _Seneca_. _Videbis celebratissimum carminibus fontem Arethusam limpidissimi ac perludicissimi ad imum stagni gelidissimas aquas profundentem, sive illas primum nascentes invenit, sive flumen integrum subter tot maria, et à confusione pejoris undæ servatum reddidit_. Senec. _de consolat. ad Martiam_.

_Sect. 7. Pag. 14._

_Now the first of mine was that of the_ Arabians.] For this Heresie, the Author here sheweth what it was; they are called _Arabians_ from the place where it was fostered; and because the _Heresiarch_ was not known, _Euseb._ St. _Aug._ and _Nicephorus_ do all write of it: the reason of this Heresie was so specious, that it drew Pope _John 22_. to be of the same perswasion. Where then was his infallibility? Why, _Bellarmine_ tells you he was nevertheless infallible for that: for, saith he, he maintained this opinion when he might do it without peril of Heresie, for that no definition of the Church whereby 'twas made Heresie, had preceded when he held that opinion. _Bellar. l. 4_, de _Pontif. Roman. cap. 4._ Now this definition was first made ('tis true) by Pope _Benedict_ in the 14 Age: but then I would ask another question, that is, If 'till that time there were nothing defined in the Church touching the beatitude of Saints, what certainty was there touching the sanctity of any man? and upon what ground were those canonizations of Saints had, that were before the 14 Age?

_The second was that of_ Origen.] Besides St. _Augustine_, _Epiphanius_, and also S. _Hierom_, do relate that _Origen_ held, that not only the souls of men, but the _Devils_ themselves should be discharged from torture after a certain time: but _Genebrard_ endeavours to clear him of this. _Vid. Coquæum, in 21. lib. Aug. de. Civ. Dei. cap. 17._

_These opinions though condemned by lawful Councils, were not Heresie in me_, etc.] For to make an Heretique, there must be not only _Error in intellectu_ but _pertinacia in voluntate_. So St. _Aug. Qui sententiam suam quamvis falsam atque perversam nulla pertinaci animositate defendunt, quærunt autem cauta solicitudine veritatem, corrigi parati cum invenerint, nequaquam sunt inter Hæreticos deputundi_. Aug. _cont. Manich. 24, qu. 3._

_Sect. 9. Pag. 16._

_The deepest mysteries ours contains have not only been illustrated, but maintained by Syllogism and the Rule of Reason_,] and since this Book was written, by Mr. _White_ in his _Institutiones Sacræ_.

_And when they have seen the Red Sea, doubt not of the Miracle._] Those that have seen it, have been better informed then Sir _Henry Blount_ was, for he tells us that he desired to view the passage of _Moses_ into the Red Sea (not being above three days journey off) but the _Jews_ told him the precise place was not known within less than the space of a days journey along the shore; wherefore (saith he) I left that as too uncertain for any Observation. _In his Voyage into the Levant._

_Sect. 10. Pag. 18._

I had as lieve you tell me that _Anima est Angelus hominis, est corpus Dei_, as _Entelechia; Lux est umbra Dei_, as _actus perspicui._] Great variety of opinion there hath been amongst the Ancient Philosophers touching the definition of the Soul. _Thales_, his was, that it is a _Nature without Repose_. _Asclepiades_, that it is _an Exercitation of Sense_. _Hesiod_, that it is _a thing composed of Earth and Water_; _Parmenides_ holds, _of Earth and Fire_; _Galen_ that it is _Heat_; _Hippocrates_, that it is _a spirit diffused through the body_. Some others have held it to be _Light_; _Plato_ saith, 'tis _a Substance moving itself_; after cometh _Aristotle_ (whom the Author here reproveth) and goeth a degree farther, and saith it is _Entelechia_, that is, that which naturally makes the body to move. But this definition is as rigid as any of the other; for this tells us not what the _essence_, _origine_ or _nature_ of the _soul_ is, but only marks an _effect_ of it, and therefore signifieth no more than if he had said (as the Author's Phrase is) that it is _Angelus hominis_, or an _Intelligence_ that moveth man, as he supposed those other to do the Heavens.

Now to come to the definition of Light, in which the Author is also unsatisfied with the School of _Aristotle_, he saith, It satisfieth him no more to tell him that _Lux est actus perspicui_, than if you should tell him that it is _umbra Dei_. The ground of this definition given by the _Peripateticks_, is taken from a passage in _Aristot. de anima l. 2, cap. 7_, where _Aristotle_ saith, That the colour of the thing seen, doth move that which is _perspicuum actu_ (i.e. _illustratam naturam quæ sit in aere aliove corpore trunsparente_) and that that, in regard of its continuation to the eye, moveth the eye, and by its help the internal _sensorium_; and that so vision is perform'd. Now as it is true that the Sectators of _Aristotle_ are to blame, by fastening upon him by occasion of this passage, that he meant that those things that made this impress upon the Organs are meer accidents, and have nothing of substance; which is more than ever he meant, and cannot be maintained without violence to Reason, and his own Principles; so for _Aristotle_ himself, no man is beholding to him for any Science acquir'd by this definition: for what is any man the near for his telling him that Colour (admitting it to be a body, as indeed it is, and in that place he doth not deny) doth move _actu perspicuum_, when as the perspicuity is in relation to the _eye_; and he doth not say how it comes to be perspicuous, which is the thing enquired after, but gives it that donation before the eye hath perform'd its office; so that if he had said it had been _umbra Dei_, it would have been as intelligible, as what he hath said. He that would be satisfied how Vision is perform'd, let him see Mr. _Hobbs_ in _Tract. de nat. human_, cap. 2.

_For God hath not caused it to rain upon the Earth._] St. _Aug. de Genes. ad literam_, cap. 5, 6, salves that expression from any inconvenience; but the Author in _Pseudodox. Epidemic._ l. 7, cap. 1, shews that we have no reason to be confident that this Fruit was an _Apple_.

_I believe that the_ Serpent (_if we shall literally understand it_) _from his proper form and figure made his motion on his belly before the curse_.] Yet the Author himself sheweth in _Pseudodox. Epidemic._ lib. 7, cap. 1, that the form or kind of the _Serpent_ is not agreed on: yet _Comestor_ affirm'd it was a _Dragon_, _Eugubinus_ a _Basilisk_, _Delrio_ a _Viper_, and others a common _Snake_: but of what kind soever it was, he sheweth in the same Volume, _lib. 5, c. 4_, that there was no inconvenience, that the temptation should be perform'd in this proper shape.

_I find the tryal of Pucelage and the Virginity of Women which God ordained the_ Jews, _is very fallible._] _Locus extat, Deut. c. 22_, the same is affirm'd by _Laurentius_ in his _Anatom._

_Whole Nations have escaped the curse of Child-birth, which God seems to pronounce upon the whole sex._] This is attested by M. _Mountaigne_. _Les doleurs de l'enfantiment par les medicins, et par Dieu mesme estimees grandes, et que nous passons avec tant de Ceremonies, il y a des nations entieres qui ne'n fuit nul conte. l. 1, des Ess. c. 14_.

_Sect 11. Pag. 19._

_Who can speak of_ Eternity _without a Soloecism, or think thereof without an Extasie?_ Time _we may comprehend_, etc.] Touching the difference betwixt _Eternity_ and _Time_, there have been great disputes amongst Philosophers; some affirming it to be no more than _duration perpetual consisting of parts_; and others (to which opinion, it appears by what follows in this Section, the Author adheres) affirmed (to use the Authors Phrase) that it hath no distinction of Tenses, but is according to _Boetius_ (_lib. 5, consol. pros. 6_), his definition, _interminabilis vitæ tota simul et perfecta possessio_. For me, _non nostrum est tantas componere lites_. I shall only observe what each of them hath to say against the other. Say those of the first opinion against those that follow _Boetius_ his definition, That definition was taken by _Boetius_ out of _Plato's Timæus_, and is otherwise applyed, though not by _Boetius_, yet by those that follow him, than ever _Plato_ intended it; for he did not take it in the Abstract, but in the Concrete, for an _eternal thing_, _a Divine substance_, by which he meant _God_, or his _Anima mundi_: and this he did, to the intent to establish this truth, That no mutation can befal the Divine Majesty, as it doth to things subject to generation and corruption; and that _Plato_ there intended not to define or describe any _species_ of duration: and they say that it is impossible to understand any such _species_ of duration that is (according to the Authors expression) but one _permanent point_.

Now that which those that follow _Boetius_ urge against the other definition is, they say, it doth not at all difference _Eternity_ from the nature of _Time_; for they say if it be composed of many _Nunc's_, or many instants, by the addition of one more it is still encreased; and by that means _Infinity_ or _Eternity_ is not included, nor ought more than _Time_. For this, see Mr. _White_, _de dial. mundo, Dial. 3. Nod. 4_.

_Indeed he only is_, etc.] This the Author infers from the words of God to _Moses_, _I am that I am_; and this to distinguish him from all others, who (he saith) have and shall be: but those that are learned in the _Hebrew_, do affirm that the words in that place (_Exod. 3_) do not signifie, _Ego sum qui sum, et qui est_, etc. but _Ero qui ero, et qui erit_, etc. _vid Gassend. in animad. Epicur. Physiolog._

_Sect. 12. Pag. 20._

_I wonder how_ Aristotle _could conceive the World Eternal, or how he could make two Eternities_:] (that is, that God, and the World both were eternal.) I wonder more at either the ignorance or incogitancy of the _Conimbricenses_, who in their Comment upon the eighth book of _Aristotle's Physicks_, treating of the matter of Creation, when they had first said that it was possible to know it, and that actually it was known (for _Aristotle_ knew it) yet for all this they afterwards affirm, That considering onely the light of Nature, there is nothing can be brought to demonstrate Creation: and yet farther, when they had defined Creation to be the production of a thing _ex nihilo_, and had proved that the World was so created in time, and refused the arguments of the Philosophers to the contrary, they added this, That the World might be created _ab æterno_: for having propos'd this question [_Num aliquid à Deo ex Æternitate procreari potuit?_] they defend the affirmative, and assert that not onely incorporeal substances, as Angels; or permanent, as the celestial Bodies; or corruptible as Men, etc. might be produced and made _ab æterno_, and be conserved by an infinite time, _ex utraq_; _parte_; and that this is neither repugnant to God the Creator, the things created, nor to the nature of Creation: for proof whereof, they bring instances of the _Sun_ which if it had been eternal, had illuminated eternally, (and the virtue of God is not less than the virtue of the Sun.) Another instance they bring of the _divine Word_, which was produced _ab æterno_: in which discourse, and in the instances brought to maintain it, it is hard to say whether the madness or impiety be greater; and certainly if Christians thus argue, we have the more reason to pardon the poor heathen _Aristotle_.

_There is in us not three, but a Trinity of Souls._] The _Peripatetiques_ held that men had three distinct Souls; whom the Heretiques, the _Anomæi_, and the _Jacobites_, followed. There arose a great dispute about this matter in _Oxford_, in the year 1276, and it was then determined against _Aristotle_, _Daneus Christ. Eth._ l. 1. c. 4. and _Suarez_ in his Treatise _de causa formali, Quest. An dentur plures formæ in uno composito_, affirmeth there was a Synod that did _anathematize_ all that held with _Aristotle_ in this point.

_Sect. 14. Pag. 23._

_There is but one first, and four second causes in all things._] In that he saith there is but one first cause, he speaketh in opposition to the _Manichees_, who held there were _Duo principia_; one from whom came all good, and the other from whom came all evil: the reason of _Protagoras_ did it seems impose upon their understandings; he was wont to say, _Si Deus non est, unde igitur bona? Si autem est, unde mala?_ In that he saith there are but four second Causes, he opposeth _Plato_, who to the four causes, _material_, _efficient_, _formal_, and _final_, adds for a fifth _exemplar_ or _Idæa_, sc. _Id ad quod respiciens artifex, id quod destinabat efficit_; according to whose mind _Boetius_ speaks, _lib. 3. met. 9. de cons. Philosoph_.

_O qui perpetua mundum ratione gubernas, Terrarum Coeliq; sator qui tempus ab ævo Ire jubes, stabilisq; manens das cuncta moveri: Quem non externæ pepulerunt fingere causæ Materiæ fluitantis opus, verum insita summi Forma boni livore carens: tu cuncta superno Ducis ab exemplo, pulchrum pulcherrimus ipse Mundum mente gerens, similique in imagine formans, Perfectasq; jubens perfectum absolvere partes._

And St. _Augustine l. 83. quest. 46_. where (amongst other) he hath these words, _Restat ergo ut omnia Ratione sint condita, nec eadem ratione homo qua equus; hoc enim absurdum est existimare: singula autem propriis sunt creata rationibus_. But these _ideæ Plato's_ Scholar _Aristotle_ would not allow to make or constitute a different sort of cause from the _formal_ or _efficient_, to which purpose he disputes, _l. 7. Metaphysic._ but he and his Sectators, and the _Ramists_ also, agree (as the Author) that there are but the four remembred Causes: so that the Author, in affirming there are but four, hath no Adversary but the _Platonists_; but yet in asserting there are four (as his words imply) there are that oppose him, and the _Schools_ of _Aristot._ and _Ramus_. I shall bring for instance Mr. _Nat Carpenter_, who in his _Philosophia Libera_ affirmeth, there is no such cause as that which they call the _Final cause_: he argueth thus; Every cause hath an influence upon its effect: but so has not the End, therefore it is not a Cause. The _major_ proposition (he saith) is evident, because the influence of a cause upon its effect, is either the causality it self, or something that is necessarily conjoyned to it: and the _minor_ as plain, for either the End hath an influence upon the effect immediately, or mediately, by stirring up the Efficient to operate; not immediately, because so it should enter either the _constitution_ or _production_, or _conservation_ of the things; but the constitution it cannot enter, because the constitution is only of _matter_ and _form_; nor the Production, for so it should concur to the production, either as it is _simply the end_, or as _an exciter of the Efficient_; but not simply as the end, because the end _as end_ doth not go before, but followeth the thing produced, and therefore doth not concur to its production: if they say it doth so far concur, as it is desired of the agent or efficient cause, it should not so have an immediate influence upon the effect, but should onely first move the efficient. Lastly, saith he, it doth not enter the conservation of a thing, because a thing is often conserved, when it is frustrate of its due end, as when it's converted to a new use and end. Divers other Arguments he hath to prove there is no such cause as the final cause. _Nat. Carpenter Philosoph. liber Decad. 3. Exercitat. 5_. But for all this, the Author and he differ not in substance: for 'tis not the Author's intention to assert that the end is in nature præexistent to the effect, but only that whatsoever God has made, he hath made to some end or other; which he doth to oppose the Sectators of _Epicurus_, who maintain the contrary, as is to be seen by this of _Lucretius_ which follows.

_Illud in his rebus vitium vehementer et istum, Effugere errorem vitareque premeditabor Lumina ne facias oculorum clara creata Prospicere ut possimus; et, ut proferre viai Proceros passus, ideo fastigia posse Surarum ac feminum pedibus fundata plicari: Brachia tum porro validis ex apta lacertis Esse, manusq; datas utraq; ex parte ministras, Vt facere ad vitam possimus, quæ foret usus: Cætera de genere hoc, inter quæcunq; precantur Omnia perversa præpostera sunt ratione: Nil ideo quoniam natum'st in corpore, ut uti Possemus; sed quod natum'st, id procreat usum, Nec fuit ante videre oculorum lumina nata, Nec dictis orare prius, quam lingua creata'st, Sed potius longe linguæ præcessit origo Sermonem; multoq: creatæ sunt prius aures Quam sonus est auditus, et omnia deniq; membra Ante fuere, ut opinor, eorum quam foret usus: Haud igitur potuere utendi crescere causa._

Lucret. lib. 4. [822-841.]

_Sect. 15. Pag. 24._

_There are no Grotesques in nature_, etc.] So _Monsr. Montaign_, _Il n'ya rien d'inutil en nature, non pas l'inutilité mesmes, Rien ne s'est ingeré en cet Univers qui n'y tienne place opportun._ Ess. l. 3. c. 1.

_Who admires not_ Regio-montanus _his Fly beyond his Eagle?_] Of these _Du Bartas_.

_Que diray je de l'aigle, D'ont un doct Aleman honore nostre siecle Aigle qui deslogeant de la maistresse main, Aila loin au devant d'un Empereur Germain; Et l'ayant recontré suddain d'une aisle accorte, Se tournant le suit au seuil de la porte Du fort Norembergois, que lis piliers dorez, Les tapissez chemins, les arcs elabourez, Les fourdroyans Canons, in la jeusnesse isnelle, In le chena Senat, n'honnoroit tant come elle. Vn jour, que cetominer plus des esbats, que de mets, En privé fasteyoit ses seignieurs plus amees, Vne mousche de fer, dans sa main recelee, Prit sans ayde d'autroy, sa gallard evolee: Fit une entiere Ronde, et puis d'un cerveau las Come ayant jugement, se purcha sur son bras_.

Thus Englished by _Silvester_.

_Why should not I that wooden Eagle mention? (A learned_ German's _late admir'd invention) Which mounting from his Fist that framed her, Flew far to meet an_ Almain _Emperour: And having met him, with her nimble Train, And weary Wings turning about again, Followed him close unto the Castle Gate Of _Noremberg_; whom all the shews of state, Streets hang'd with Arras, arches curious built, Loud thundring Canons, Columns richly guilt, Grey-headed Senate, and youth's gallantise, Grac'd not so much as onely this device. Once as this Artist more with mirth than meat, Feasted some friends that he esteemed great; From under's hand an Iron Fly flew out, Which having flown a perfect round about, With weary wings, return'd unto her Master, And (as judicious) on his arm she plac'd her._

_Or wonder not more at the operation of two souls in those little bodies, than but one in the Trunk of a Cedar?_] That is, the _vegetative_, which according to the common opinion, is supposed to be in _Trees_, though the _Epicures_ and _Stoiques_ would not allow any Soul in Plants; but _Empedocles_ and _Plato_ allowed them not only a _vegetative_ Soul, but affirm'd them to be _Animals_. The _Manichees_ went farther, and attributed so much of the rational Soul to them, that they accounted it _Homicide_ to gather either the flowers or fruit, as St. _Aug._ reports.

_We carry with us the wonders we seek without us._] So St. _Aug._ l. 10. de civ. c. 3. _Omni miraculo quod fit per hominem majus miraculum est homo._

_Sect. 16. Pag. 25._

_Another of his servant Nature, that publique and universal Manuscript that lies expansed_, etc.] So is the description of _Du Bartas 7. jour de la sepm._

_Oyes ce Docteur muet estudie en ce livre Qui nuict et jour ouvert t'apprendra de bien vivre._

_All things are artificial, for Nature is the Art of God._] So Mr. _Hobbes_ in his _Leviathan_ (_in initio_) Nature is the Art whereby God governs the world.

_Sect. 17. Pag. 27._

_Directing the operations of single and individual Essences_, etc.] Things singular or individuals, are in the opinion of Philosophers not to be known, but by the way of sense, or by that which knows by its Essence, and that is onely God. The Devils have no such knowledge, because whatsoever knows so, is either the cause or effect of the thing known; whereupon _Averroes_ concluded that God was the cause of all things, because he understands all things by his Essence; and _Albertus Magnus_ concluded, That the inferiour intelligence understands the superiour, because it is an effect of the superiour: but neither of these can be said of the _Devil_; for it appears he is not the effect of any of these inferiour things, much less is he the cause, for the power of Creation onely belongs to God.

_All cannot be happy at once, because the Glory of one State depends upon the ruine of another._] This Theme is ingeniously handled by Mr. _Montaigne livr. 1. des Ess._ cap. 22. the title whereof is, _Le profit de l'un est dommage de l'autre_.

_Sect. 18. Pag. 29._

_'Tis the common fate of men of singular gifts of mind, to be destitute of those of Fortune._] So _Petron. Arbiter. Amor ingenii neminem unquum divitem fecit_, in _Satyric_. And _Apuleius_ in Apolog. _Idem mihi etiam_ (saith he) _paupertatem opprobravit acceptum Philosopho crimen et ultro profitendum_; and then a little afterwards, he sheweth that it was the common fate of those that had singular gifts of mind: _Eadem enim est paupertas apud Græcos in Aristide justa, in Phocyone benigna, in Epaminonde strenua, in Socrate sapiens, in Homero diserta._

_We need not labour with so many arguments to confute judicial_ Astrology.] There is nothing in judicial _Astrology_ that may render it impious; but the exception against it is, that it is vain and fallible; of which any man will be convinced, that has read _Tully de Divinat._ and St. _Aug._ book 5. _de Civ. dei_.

_Sect. 19. Pag. 31._

_There is in our soul a kind of Triumvirate----that distracts the peace of our Commonwealth, not less than did that other the State of_ Rome.] There were two _Triumvirates_, by which the peace of _Rome_ was distracted; that of _Crassus_, _Cæsar_ and _Pompey_, of which _Lucan_, _l._ 1.

_----Tu causam aliorum---- Facta tribus Dominis communis Roma, nec unquam In turbam missi feralia foedera Regni._

And that other of _Augustus_, _Antonius_ and _Lepidus_, by whom, saith _Florus_, _Respublica convulsa est lacerataque_, which comes somewhat near the Author's words, and therefore I take it that he means this last Triumvirate.

_Sect. 19. Pag. 32._

_Would disswade my belief from the miracle of the brazen Serpent._] Vid. _Coqueum in_, _l. 10._ _Aug._ _de Civ. Dei_, c. 8.

_And bid me mistrust a miracle in_ Elias, etc.] The History is 18. 1 _Reg._ It should be _Elijah_. The Author in _15. cap. lib. 7. Pseudodox._ sheweth it was not perform'd naturally; he was (as he saith) a perfect miracle.

_To think the combustion of_ Sodom _might be natural_.] Of that opinion was _Strabo_, whereupon he is reprehended by _Genebrard_ in these words: _Strabo falsus est----dum eversionem addicit sulphuri et bitumini e terra erumpentibus, quæ erat assignanda Coelo_, i.e. _Deo irato_. _Tacitus_ reports it according to the Bible, _fulminis ictu arsisse_.

_Sect. 20. Pag. 33._

_Those that held Religion was the difference of man from Beasts_, etc.] _Lactantius_ was one of those: _Religioni ergo serviendum est, quam qui non suspicit, ipse se prosternit in terram, et vitam pecudum secutus humanitate se abdicat._ Lactant _de fals. Sapientia_, cap. 10.

_The Doctrine of_ Epicurus _that denied the providence of God, was no Atheism, but_, etc.] I doubt not but he means that delivered in his Epistle to _Menæceus_, and recorded by _Diogenes Laertius_, lib. 10. _Quod beatum æternumque est, id nec habet ipsum negotii quicquam, nec exhibit alteri, itaque neque ira, neque gratia tenetur, quod quæ talia sunt imbecillia sunt omnia_; which the _Epicurean_ Poet hath delivered almost in the same words.

_Omnis enim per se divum natura necesse 'st Immortali ævo summa cum pace fruatur, Semota à nostris rebus sejunctaq; longè: Nam privata dolore omni, privata periclis Ipsa suis pollens opibus nihil indiga nostri Nec bene pro meritis capitur, nec tangitur ira._

Lucret. _lib. 2._

_That Villaine and Secretary of Hell, that composed that miscreant piece of the three Impostors._] It was _Ochinus_ that composed this piece; but there was no less a man than the Emperour _Frederick_ the Second, that was as lavish of his tongue as the other of his pen; _Cui sæpe in ore, Tres fuisse insignes Impostores, qui genus humanum seduxerunt: Moysem, Christum, Mahumetem. Lips. monit. et exempl. Politic._ cap. 4. And a greater than he, Pope _Leo_ the Tenth, was as little favourable to our Saviour, when he us'd that speech which is reported of him, _Quantas nobis divitias comparavit ista de Christo fabula_.

_Sect. 21. Pag. 34._

_There are in Scripture, stories that do exceed the fables of Poets._] So the Author of _Relig. Laici. Certè mira admodum in_ S. S. _plus quam in reliquis omnibus Historiis traduntur_; (and then he concludes with the Author) _sed quæ non retundunt intellectum, sed exercent_.

_Yet raise no question who shall rise with that_ Rib _at the Resurrection_.] The Author _cap. 2 l. 7_. _Pseudodox_. sheweth that it appeares in Anatomy, that the Ribs of Man and Woman are equal.

_Whether the world were created in Autumn, Summer, or the Spring_, etc.] In this matter there is a consent between two learned Poets, _Lucretius_ and _Virgil_, that it begins in _Spring_.

_At novitas mundi nec frigora dura ciebat, Nec nimios æstus, nec magnis viribus auras._ Lucretius.

Which he would have to be understood of _Autumn_, because that resembles old age rather than Infancy. He speaks expresly of the Fowls.

_Principio genus alituum variæq; volucres Ova relinquebant exclusæ tempore verno._ Lucret.

Then for _Virgil_.

_Non alios prima nascentis origine mundi Illuxisse dies aliumve habuisse tenorem Crediderim, ver illud erat, ver magnus agebat Orbis, et hibernis parcebant flatibus Euri._

Virgil 2. Georgic.

But there is a great difference about it betwixt Church-Doctors; some agreeing with these Poets and others affirming the time to be in Autumn: but truly, in strict speaking, it was not created in any one, but all of the seasons, as the Author saith here, and hath shewed at large. _Pseudodox. Epidemic._ lib. 6. cap. 2.

_Sect. 22. Pag. 35._

_'Tis ridiculous to put off or down the general floud of_ Noah _in that particular inundation of_ Deucalion,] as the Heathens some of them sometimes did: _Confuderunt igitur sæpe Ethnici particularia illa diluvia, quæ longe post secuta sunt, cum illo universali quod præcessit, ut ex fabulis in Diluvio Deucalionæo sparsis colligere licet; non tamen semper nec ubique. Author. Observat. in Mytholog. Nat. Com._ Then amongst those that confound them, he reckons _Ovid_ and _Plutarch_.

_How all the kinds of Creatures, not onely in their own bulks, but with a competency of food and sustenance, might be preserved in one Ark, and within the extent of 300 Cubits, to a reason that rightly examines it will appear very feasible._] Yet _Apelles_ the Disciple of _Mercion_, took upon him to deride the History of _Moses_ in this particular, alledging that it must needs be a fable, for that it was impossible so many creatures should be contain'd in so small a space. _Origen_ and St. _Aug._ to answer this pretended difficulty, alleadge that _Moses_ in this place speakes of Geometrical (and not vulgar) cubits, of which every one was as much as six vulgar ones; and so no difficulty. But _Perer. l. 10. com. in Genes, quest. 5. de arca_, rejects this opinion of _Origen_, as being both against reason and Scripture.

1. Because that sort of Cubit was never in use amongst any people, and therefore absurd to think _Moses_ should intend it in this place.

2. If _Moses_ should not speak of the same Cubits here, that he mentions in others places, there would be great æquivocation in Scripture: now in another place, _i.e._ _Exod. 27._ he saith, God commanded him to make an Altar three Cubits high; which if it shall be meant of Geometrical Cubits it will contain 18 vulgar Cubits; which would not only render it useless, but would be contrary to the command which he saith God gave him, _Exod. 20. Thou shall not go up by steps to my Altar._ For without steps what man could reach it. It must therefore be meant of ordinary Cubits; but that being so it was very feasible. I can more easily believe than understand it.

_And put the honest Father to the Refuge of a Miracle._] This honest father was St. _Aug._ who delivers his opinion, that it might be miraculously done, _lib. 16. de Civ. Dei, cap. 7._ where having propos'd the question how it might be done, he answers, _Quod si homines eas captas secum adduxerunt, et eo modo ubi habitabant earum genera instituerunt, venandi studio fieri potuisse incredibile non est, quamvis jussu Dei sire permissu etiam opera Angelorum negandum non sit potuisse transferri_; but St. _Aug._ saith not that it could not be done without a miracle.

_And 1500 years to people the World, as full a time_, etc.]

_Pag. 36._

_That_ Methusalem _was the longest liv'd of all the children of_ Adam, etc.] See both these Points cleared by the Author, in _Pseudodox. Epidemic._ the first _lib. 6. cap. 6._ the other _lib. 7. cap. 3._

_That_ Judas _perished by hanging himself, there is no certainty in Scripture, though in one place it seems to affirm it, and by a doubtful word hath given occasion to translate it; yet in another place, in a more punctual description it makes it improbable, and seems to overthrow it_.] These two places that seem to contradict one another are _Math. 27. 5._ and _Acts 1. 8._ The doubtful word he speaks of is in the place of _Matthew_; it is {~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER GAMMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER XI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}, which signifieth suffocation as well as hanging, ({~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER LAMDA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH VARIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER GAMMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER XI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}, which may signifie literally, after he went out he was choak'd) but _Erasmus_ translates it, _abiens laqueo se suspendit_: the words in the _Acts_ are, _When he had thrown down himself headlong, he burst in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out_; which seems to differ much from the expression of _Matthew_; yet the Ancient Writers and Fathers of the Church do unanimously agree that he was hanged. Some I shall cite. _Anastas. Sinaita, l. 7. Anagog. Contempl. Unus latro ingratus cum esset typus Diaboli, et Serpentis, et Judæ, qui se in ligno suffocavit. Gaudentius Brixiens. tract. 13. de natal. Dom. Mortem debitam laqueo sibimet intulit præparato_, etc. _Droggotoshen. de sacram. dominic. pass. Jamdiu erat quidem quod Christo recesserat, et avaritiæ laqueo se suspenderat, sed quod fecerat in occulto, palam omnibus innotuit. S. Martialis in Ep. ad Tholosanos. Non sustinuit poenitentiam, donec laqueo mortis seipsum consumpsit. Ignat. ad Philippens. Diabolus laqueum ei ostendit, et suspendium docuit. Leo Serm. 3. de passion.----Ut quia facinus omnem mensuram ultionis excesserat, te haberet impietas tua judicem te pateretur sua pæna Carnificem. Theodoret. lib. 1. hæretic. fabul. Ille protinus strangulatus est, quæ fuit merces ejus proditionis. Chrysostom. Hom. 3. de proditore. Pependit Coelum Terramque intermedius vago funere suffocatus, et cum flagitio suo tumefacta, viscera crepuerunt, etc. Bernard. Serm. 8. in Psal. 9. Judas in Aere crepuit medius._

1. There are those that are so particular, that they acquaint us with the manner, as _that it was done with a Cord. Antiochus Laurensis, Spem omnem a se cum abjecisset, insiliente in eum inimico (sc. Diabolo) funiculo sibi præfocavit gulam. Oecumen. in Act. Fracto funiculo quo erat suffocatus decidit in terram præcipitio._ 2. _That it was done on a_ Fig-Tree, _Beda. Portam David egredientibus fons occurrit in Austrum per vallem directus, ad cujus medietatem ab occasu Judas se suspendisse narratur: Nam et ficus magna ibi et vetustissima stat._

Juvenc. _lib. 4. Hist. Evangelic_.

_Exorsusq; suas laqueo sibi sumere pænas, Informem rapuit ficus de vertice mortem._

3. Some acquaint us with the time when it was done, _viz. the next day after he had given the kiss_. So _Chrysostom. Homil. 1. de proditor. et Mysterio Coen. Dominic. Guttur prophanum quod hodie Christo extendis ad osculum, crastino es illud extensurus ad laqueum_. But there are two, that is _Euthymius_ and _Oecumenius_, that tell us, _that the hanging did not kill him_, but that either the Rope broke, or that he was cut down, and afterwards cast himself down headlong, as it is related in the before mentioned place of the _Acts_: _Agnitus à quibusdam depositus est ne præfocaretur, denique postquam in secreto quodam loco modico vixisset tempore præceps factus sive præcipitatus, inflatus diruptus, ac diffisus est medius, et effusa sunt omnia viscera ejus; ut in_ Actis. _Euthym._ cap. 67. _in Math. Judas suspendio è vita non decessit, sed supervixit, dejectus est enim prius quam præfocaretur, idque Apotolorum Acta indicant, quod pronus crepuit medius_. Oecumen. in Act. And this may serve to reconcile these two seemingly disagreeing Scriptures.

_Pag. 37._

_That our Fathers after the Flood erected the Tower of_ Babel.] For this see what the Author saith in his _Pseudodox. Epidemic_. l. 7, cap. 6.

_And cannot but commend the judgment of_ Ptolemy.] He means of _Ptolemæus Philadelphus_, who founded the Library of _Alexandria_, which he speaks of in the next Section. He was King of _Egypt_; and having built and furnish'd that Library with all the choicest Books he could get from any part of the world, and having good correspondence with _Eleazer_ the high Priest of the _Jews_, by reason that he had released the _Jews_ from Captivity, who were taken by his Predecessor _Ptolemæus Lagi_; he did by the advice of _Demetrius Phalereus_ the _Athenian_, whom he had made his Library-Keeper, write to _Eleazer_, desiring him that he would cause the Books of the _Jews_, which contained their Laws, to be translated for him into Greek, that he might have them to put into his Library: to which the Priest consents; and for the King's better satisfaction, sends to him Copies of the Books, and with the same 72 Interpreters skilled both in the Greek and Hebrew Language, to translate them for him into Greek; which afterwards they performed. This is for certain; but whether they translated only the _Pentateuch_, as St. _Jerome_ would have it, or together with the Books of the Prophets also, as _Leo de Castro_ and _Baronius_ contend, I undertake not to determine: but as to that part of the story, that these Interpreters were put into so many several Cells, whilst they were about the work of translation; and notwithstanding they were thus severed, that they all translated it _totidem verbis_; it is but reason to think with St. _Jerome_ (notwithstanding the great current of Authority against him) that it is no better than a fable.

_The Alcoran of the Turks_ (_I speak without prejudice_) _is an ill-composed piece, containing in it vain and ridiculous errors in Philosophy_, etc.] It is now in every mans hand, having been lately translated into English; I shall therefore observe but these few particulars in it, in regard the book it self is so common; and indeed they are not mine own, but _Lipsius_ his observations. He begins, _O nugas, O deliria! primum_ (saith he) _commentus est, Deum unum solidumq; ({~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER LAMDA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER PHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~} Græci exprimunt) eundemq; incorporeum esse. Christum non Deum, sed magnum vatem et prophetam; se tamen majorem, et proxime à Deo missum, præmia qui ipsum audient Paradisum, qui post aliquot annorum millia reserabitur, ibi quatuor flumina lacte, vino, melle, aqua fluere, ibi palatia et ædificia gemmata atque aurata esse, carnes avium suavissimarum, fructus omne genus quos sparsi jacentesque sub umbra arborum edent: sed caput fælicitatis, viros foeminasque, majores solito magnis Genitalibus assidua libidine, et ejus usu sine tædio aut fatigatione._ These and some others that are in the Alcoran he reckons up. _Sed et Physica quoq; miranda_ (saith he) _nam facit Solem et Lunam in equis vehi, illum autem in aquam calidam vespere mergi, et bene lotum ascendere atque oriri, Stellas in aere è catenis aureis pendere: terram in bovini cornus cuspide stabilitum, et agitante se bove ac succutiente fieri terræ motum; hominem autem ex hirundine aut sanguisuga nasci_, etc. Just. Lips. _Monit. et exempl. Politic._ cap. 3.

_Sect. 23. Pag. 38._

_I believe besides_ Zoroaster _there were divers others that wrote before Moses_.] _Zoroaster_ was long before _Moses_, and of great name; he was the father of _Ninus, Justin. lib. 1_. _Si quamlibet modicum emolumentum probaveritis; ego ille sim Carinondas vel Damigeron, vel is Moses, vel Joannes, vel Apollonius, vel ipse Dardanus, vel quicunq; alius_ post Zoroastrem _et Hostanem, inter Magos celebratus est_. Apuleius _in_ Apol.

_Sect. 24. Pag. 38._

_Others with as many groans deplore the combustion of the Library at_ Alexandria.] This was that Library before spoken of, set up by _Ptolemæus Philadelphus_; in which 'tis reported by _Ammianus Marcellinus_ there were 700,000 volumes; it was burnt by _Jul. Cæsar's_ means, whose Navy being environed before _Alexandria_, he had no means to keep off the Enemy, but by flinging of fire, which at length caught the Library and consumed it, as _Plutarch_ hath it in _Vita Cæsaris_: but notwithstanding we have no reason to believe it was quite consumed, because _Sueton_. in _Claudius_, tells us, that that Emperour added another to it; and there must be somewhat before, if it were an addition; but true it is, too many of the Books perished; to repair which loss, care was taken by _Domitian_ the Emperour, as the same _Sueton._ and _Aurel. Victor._ do relate.

_I would not omit a Copy of_ Enoch's _Pillars, had they many nearer Authors than_ Josephus, _etc._] For this the Story is, that _Enoch_, or his father, _Seth_, having been inform'd by _Adam_, that the world was to perish once by water, and a second time by fire, did cause two Pillars to be erected, the one of Stone against the water, and another of Brick against the fire; and that upon those Pillars was engraven all such Learning as had been delivered to, or invented by mankind; and that thence it came that all knowledge and learning was not lost by means of the Floud, by reason that one of the Pillars (though the other perished) did remain after the Floud, and _Josephus_ witnesseth, till his time, _lib. 1. Antiq. Judaic_. cap. 3.

_Of those three great inventions of_ Germany, _there are two which are not without their incommodities._] Those two he means are _Printing_ and _Gunpowder_, which are commonly taken to be _German_ Inventions; but Artillery was in _China_ above 1500 years since, and Printing long before it was in _Germany_, if we may believe _Juan Concales Mendosa_ in his _Hist._ of _China, lib. 3. cap. 15, 16_. The incommodities of these two inventions, are, well described by _Sam. Daniel_, lib. 6. of the Civil Wars.

_Fierce_ Nemesis, _mother of fate and change, Sword-bearer of th' eternal providence, Turns her stern look at last into the West, As griev'd to see on Earth such happy rest;_

_And for_ Pandora _calleth presently_, Pandora Jove's _fair gift that first deceived Poor_ Epimetheus _in his imbecility. That though he had a wondrous boon received, By means whereof curious mortality Was of all former quiet quite bereaved. To whom being come deckt with all qualities, The wrathful goddess breaks out in this wise:_

_Dost thou not see in what secure estate, Those flourishing fair Western parts remain? As if they had made covenant with fate, To be exempted free from others pain, At one with their desires, friends with debate, In peace with Pride, content with their own gain. Their bounds contain their mindes, their mindes applyed To have their bonds with plenty beautified._

_Devotion (Mother of Obedience) Bears such a hand on their credulity, That it abates the spirit of eminence, And busies them with humble piety: For see what works, what infinite expence, What Monuments of zeal they edifie, As if they would, so that no stop were found, Fill all with Temples, make all holy ground._

_But we must cool this all-believing zeal, That hath enjoy'd so fair a turn so long_, etc. _Dislike of this first by degrees shall steal, As upon souls of men perswaded wrong; And that the sacred power which thus hath wrought, Shall give her self the sword to cut her throat._

_Go therefore thou with all thy stirring train Of swelling Sciences (the gifts of grief) Go loose the links of that soul-binding chain, Enlarge this uninquisitive Belief: Call up mens spirits, that simpleness retain, Enter their hearts, and knowledge make the Thief To open all the Doors to let in Light, That all may all things see but what is right._

_Opinion arm against opinion (grown) Make new-born contradictions still arise, As if Thebes Founder_ (Cadmus) _tongues had sown Indent of teeth, for greater mutinies: Bring new defended faith against faith known, Weary the soul with contrarieties, Till all Religion become Retrograde, And that fair lye the mask of sin be made:_

_And better to effect a speedy end, Let there be found two fatal Instruments, The one to publish, th' other to defend [SN: Printing] Impious contention, and proud discontents: Make that instamped characters may send Abroad to thousands, thousand mens intents; And in a moment may dispatch much more, Than could a world of pens perform before;_

_Whereby all quarrels, titles, secrecies, May unto all be presently made known, Factions prepar'd, parties allur'd to rise, Seditions under fair pretences sown; Whereby the vulgar may become so wise That with a self-presumption overgrown, They may of deepest mysteries debate, Controul their betters, censure acts of State._

_And then when this dispersed mischief shall Have brought confusion in each mystery, Call'd up contempts of State in general, And ripen'd the humour of impiety, Then take the other engine wherewithal [SN: Guns] They may torment their self-wrought misery; And scourge each other in so strange a wise, As time or tyrants never could devise_, etc.

See _Bellermontan._ in his _Dissertat. politic. dissert._ 29. and 30.

For the other Invention, the Latine Annotator doubts whether the Author means Church-Organs, or Clocks? I suppose he means Clocks, because I find that Invention reckon'd by a _German_, with the other two, as a remarkable one. It is by _Busbequius_, speaking of the Turks, who hath these words: _Testes majores minoresque bombardæ, multaque alia quæ ex nostris excogitata ipsi ad se avertunt; at libros tamen typis excuderent, horologia in publico haberent, nondum adduci potuerunt._ _Epist. Legat. Turcic._ I suppose if he had known any Invention which next to the other two had been greater than this, he would not have named this, and this being the next considerable, we have no cause to doubt but the Author meant it.

_To maintain the Trade and Mystery of Typographers._] Of this _Cunæus_ in his _Satyre Sardi voenates_. _Qui bis in anno nomen suum ad Germanorum nundinas non transmittit, eruditionem suam in ordinem coactam credit, itaq; nunquam tot fungi una pluvia nascuntur, quot nunc libri uno die_.

_Sect. 25. Pag. 40._

_The Turk in the bulk that he now stands, is beyond all hope of conversion._] That is, in respect of his great strength, against which it is not probable the Christians will prevail, as it is observed by _Monsieur de Silhon_. _La Race des Ottomans_ (saith he) _quæ oste a Dieu la Religion qu'il a revelee, et aux hommes la liberte que le droit des Gens leur laisse a fait tant de progres depuis trois Cens et quelques annees qu'il semble qu'elle n'ait plus rien a craindre de dehorse, et que son empire ne puisse perir que par la corruption de dedans, et par la dissolution des parties qui composent un corps si vaste. Mr. de Silhon en son Minist. D'Estat. l. 1. c._

_None can more justly boast of persecutions, and glory in the number and valour of martyrs._] Of the fortitude of the Christians in this particular, _Minutius Felix_, in the person of the Ethnique, hath these words, _Per mira stultitia et incredibili audacia spernunt tormenta præsentia, dum incerta metuunt et futura; et dum mori post mortem timent, interim mori non timent._ And afterwards, when he speaks in the person of the Christian, he saith, that Christian women and children have in this surpassed _Scævola_ and _Regulus_: _Viros_ (saith he) _cum Mutio vel cum Atilio Regulo comparo: pueri et mulierculæ nostræ cruces et Tormenta, feros et omnes suppliciorum terriculas inspirata patientia doloris illudunt_. Minut. _in_ Octav. _vide Aug. de Civit. Dei, lib. 1. c. 23, 24_.

_If we shall strictly examine the circumstances and requisites which_ Aristotle _requires to true and perfect valour, we shall find the name onely in his Master_ Alexander, (_that is, no more than the name) and as little in that Roman worthy_ Julius Cæsar.] _Aristot. 3. Ethic. cap. 6._ amongst other requisites, requires to valour, that it keep a mediocrity betwixt audacity and fear; that we thrust not our selves into danger when we need not; that we spare not to shew our valour when occasion requires: he requires for its proper object, Death; and to any death, he prefers death in War, because thereby a man profits his Country and Friends; and that he calls _mors honesta_, an honest or honourable death: and thereupon he defines a valiant man to be, _Is qui morte honesta proposita, iisq; omnibus quæ cum sint repentina mortem adfuerunt metu vacat_. So that by the Author's saying, there was onely the Name in _Alexander_, he means only that which is rendred in the two last words, _metu vacans_, and not the rest that goes to make up the definition of a valiant man, which is very truly affirmed of _Alexander_, who exposed himself to hazzard many times when there was no cause for it: As you may read in _Curtius_, he did, in the siege of _Tyrus_, and many other ways. _Cettuy-cy semble rechercher et courir à force les dangiers comme un impetueux torrent, qui choque et attaque sans discretion, et sans chois tout ce qu'il rencontre_, saith _Montaign_, speaking of _Alexander, l. 2. des Ess. cap. 34_. And for _Cæsar_, it cannot be denied, but in his Wars he was many times (though not so generally as _Alexander_) more adventrous than reason military could warrant to him; and therefore _Lucan_ gives him no better Character than

_Acer et indomitus quo spes quoq; ira vocasset Ferre manum, etc._ Lucan. lib. 1.

To instance in some Particulars: with what an inconsiderable strength did he enterprize the conquest of _Egypt_, and afterwards went to attaque the forces of _Scipio_ and _Juba_, which were ten times more than his own? after the Battle of _Pharsalia_, having sent his Army before into _Asia_, and crossing the _Hellespont_ with one single Vessel, he there meets _Lucius Cassius_ with ten men of War, he makes up to him, summons him to render, and he does it. In the famous and furious siege of _Alexia_, where he had 80,000 men to make defence against him, and an Army of one hundred and nine thousand Horse, and two hundred and forty thousand foot, all marching towards him, to raise his siege; yet for all that he would not quit the siege, but first fought with those without, and obtain'd a great Victory over them, and soon afterwards brought the besieged to his mercy.

_Sect. 26. Pag. 41._

_The Council of_ Constance _condemns_ John Husse _for an Heretick, the Stories of his own Party style him a Martyr_.] _John Husse_ did agree with the Papists against us in the Point of Invocation of Saints, Prayers and Sacrifice for the Dead, free Will, Good Works, confession of Sins, seven Sacraments, etc. _Gordon. Hunt. l. contr. 3. de Sacr. Euch. cap. 17_. Yet was he condemned for maintaining certain Articles said by that Council to be heretical and seditious, and was burnt for Heresie. Now as I will not say he was an Heretick, so can I not maintain that he was a Martyr, if it be but for this one Article, which in the 15. Sess. of that Council was objected against him, which he did acknowledge, but would not recal, _i.e._ _Nullus est Dominus civilis, dum est in peccato mortali_. If that Doctrine should be believed, we shall have little obedience to Civil Magistrates; and without that, how miserable is humane condition? That which begat compassion towards _Husse_ in those of his own Party was, that he had a safe conduct from the Emperour _Sigismund_; and therefore it was, say they, a violation of publick faith in the _Council_ and _Emperour_ in putting him to death.

_That wise heathen_ Socrates _that suffered on a fundamental point of Religion, the Unity of God_.] That _Socrates_ suffered on this Point, divers Christian Writers do object to the Ethniques, as _Justin Martyr_, Apol. 2. _Euseb. l. 5. de præparat. Evangelic. c. 14. Tertul._ in _Apolog._ cap. 14. and _Lactant. de justitia_, cap. 15. whose words are these: _Plato quidem multa de uno Deo locutus est, à quo ait constitutum esse mundum, sed nihil de Religione; somniaverat enim Deum, non cognoverat. Quod si justitiæ defensionem vel ipse vel quilibet alius implere voluisset, imprimis Deorum Religiones evertere debuit, quia contrariæ pietati. Quod quidem Socrates quia facere tentavit in carcerem conjectus est, ut jam tunc appareret quid esset futurum iis hominibus qui justitiam veram defendere Deoque singulari servire coepissent_.

_I have often pitied the miserable Bishop that suffered in the cause of_ Antipodes.] The suffering was, that he lost his Bishoprick for denying the _Antipodes_. Vid. _Aventin. in Hist. Boio_. Besides him, there were other Church-men of great note, that denyed _Antipodes_, as _Lactantias_, _Augustin_, and _Bede_.

_Sect. 27. Pag. 43._

_I hold that God can do all things: How he should work contradictions, I do not understand, yet dare not therefore deny._] Who would not think the Author had taken this from Mr. _Montaign_, whose words are, _Il m'a tousjours semble qu'a un homme Christien, cette sorte de parler est plein d'indiscretion et d'irreverence [Dieu ne se peut disdire,] [Dieu ne peut faire cecy ou cela]. Je ne trouve pas bon d'enfermer ainsi la puissance divine sous les loix de nostre parole. Et l'apparence qui s' offre à nous en ses propositions, il la faudroit representer plus reverement, et plus Religieusement._ Liv. 2. des Ess. c. 12.

_I cannot see why the Angel of God should question_ Esdras _to recal the time past, if it were beyond his own power, or that God should pose mortality in that which he was not able to perform himself._] Sir _K. Digby_ in his Notes upon this place saith, There is no contradiction in this, because he saith it was but putting all things that had motion into the same state they were in at that moment, unto which time was to be reduced back, and from thence letting it travel on again by the same motions, _etc._ which God could do. But under favour, the contradiction remains, if this were done that he mentions; for Time depends not at all upon motion, but has a being altogether independent of it, and therefore the same revolution would not bring back the same time, for that was efflux'd before; as in the time of _Joshua_, when the Sun stood still, we cannot but conceive, though there were no motion of the Sun, but that there was an efflux of Time, otherwise, how could the Text have it, _That there was not any day, before or after, that was so long as that?_ for the length of it must be understood in respect of the flux of time. The reasoning of Sir _Kenelme_ is founded upon the opinion of _Aristot_. who will needs have it, that Time cannot be without mutation; he gives this for a reason, because when we have slept, and cannot perceive any mutation to have been, we do therefore use to connect the time of our sleeping and of our awaking together, and make but one of it: to which it may be answered, although some mutation be necessary, that we may mark the mix of time, it doth not therefore follow that the mutation is necessary to the flux it self.

_Sect. 28. Pag. 43._

_I excuse not_ Constantine _from a fall off his Horse, or a mischief from his enemies, upon the wearing those nails_, etc.] _Hac de re videatur P. Diac. hist. miscell._

_Sect. 29. Pag. 44._

_I wonder how the curiosity of wiser heads could pass that great and indisputable miracle, the cessation of Oracles._] There are three opinions touching the manner how the predictions of these Oracles were perform'd: Some say by vapour, some by the intelligences, or influences, of the Heavens, and others say by the assistance of the Devils. Now the indisputable miracle the Author speaks of, is, that they ceas'd upon the coming of Christ; and it is generally so believed; and the Oracle of _Delphos_ delivered to _Augustus_, mentioned by the Author in this Section, is brought to prove it, which is this:

_Me puer Hebroeus divos Deus ipse gubernans Cedere sede jubet, tristemq; redire sub orcum. Aris ergo dehinc tacitus discedito nostris._

But yet it is so far from being true that their cessation was miraculous, that the truth is, there never were any predictions given by those Oracles at all.

That their cessation was not upon the coming of Christ, we have luculent testimony out of _Tully_, in his _2. lib. de Divinat._ which he writ many years before Christ was born; who tells us that they were silent (and indeed he never thought they were otherwise) long before that time, insomuch that they were come into contempt: _Cur isto modo jam oracula Delphis non eduntur, non modo nostra oetate, sed jamdiu jam ut nihil possit esse contemptius_. So that for that of _Delphos_, which was the most famous of them all, we see we have no reason to impute the cessation of it to Christ; Why therefore should we do so for any of the rest?

For their predictions, let us consider the three several ways before mentioned, whereby they are supposed to operate; and from thence see whether it be probable that any such Oracles ever were.

The first Opinion is, that it was by exhalation or vapour drawn up from the earth; and gives this for a reason of their being, that they were for a time nourished by those exhalations; and when those ceased, and were exhausted, the Oracles famish'd and died for want of their accustom'd sustenance: this is the far-fetcht reason given by _Plutarch_ for their defect; but 'twas not devised by him, but long before, as appears, in that _Tully_ scoffs at it, _lib. de divinat_. _De vino aut salsamento putes loqui_ (saith he) _quæ evanescunt vetustate_. This seem'd absurd to others, who do therefore say this was not to be attributed to any power of the Earth, but to the power of the Heavens, or _Intelligences Coelestial_; to certain aspects whereof, they say, the Statua's of those Oracles were so adapted, that they might divine and foretel future events. But yet to others, this way seemeth as absurd as the others; for, say they, admitting that there were an efficacy in the Heavens, more than in the Earth; yet how can it be that men should come by the skill to fit the Statua's to the Aspects or influences of the Heavens? or if at any time they had such skill, why should not the same continue the rather, because men are more skilled in the motions of the Heavens, of later than in the former time? Again, they do not see how it should be that the cause should be of less excellency than the effect; for if a man (say they) can by his industry make such Oracles, why can he not produce the same effect in another man? for if you affirm that the Heavens influence is requisite, they will tell you that Influence may happen as well to a man, as to a Statue of wood or stone. Therefore the third sort being unsatisfied, which either of the former ways conclude, that this was perform'd by the Devil; but for that it will appear as contrary to Reason and Philosophy, as either of the former; for Philosophy teacheth that things singular, or individual, are to be known only by sense, or by such an Intellect, as doth know by its Essence; and Theology teacheth that God only knoweth the heart, and that the Devil doth not know by sense, nor by essence; and since 'tis admitted by all, that most of the answers that were pretended to be given by those Oracles, were _de rebus singularibus_, or _individuis_; it is evident that these predictions were not perform'd by Devils. How then? why those predictions which the ignorant Heathen took to come from Heaven, and some Christians (not less ignorant) from the Devil, was nothing but the jugling and impostures of the Priests, who from within the Statua's gave the answers; which Princes connived at, that they might upon occasion serve their turns upon the ignorance of the people; and the learned men, for fear of their Princes, durst not speak against it. _Lucian_ hath noted it, and so a more Authentick Author, _Minut. Felix._, in _Octav. Authoritatem quasi præsentis numinis consequuntur dum inspirantur interim vatibus_. But in process of time, the people grew less credulous of their Priests, and so the Oracles became to be silent: _Cum jam_ (saith he) _Apollo versus facere desisset, cujus tunc cautum illud et ambiguum deficit oraculum: Cum et politiores homines et minus creduli esse cæperunt_. Sir _H. Blount_ in his _Levantine_ voyage, saith he saw the Statua of _Memnon_ so famous of old; he saith it was hollow at top, and that he was told by the _Egyptians_ and Jews there with him, that they had seen some enter there, and come out at the Pyramid, two Bows shoot off; then (saith he) I soon believ'd the Oracle, and believe all the rest to have been such; which indeed, is much easier to imagine than that it was perform'd by any of the three wayes before mentioned. St. _Aug._ hath composed a Book, where he handleth this point at large, and concludeth that the Devils can no more foretel things come, than they are able to discern the thoughts that are within us. _Aug. lib. de Scientia Dæmon._

_Till I laughed my self out of it with a piece of_ Justin, _where he delivers that the Children of_ Israel _for being scabbed were banished out of_ Egypt.] These words of _Justin_ are, _Sed cum scabiem Ægyptii et pruriginem paterentur, responso moniti, eum (se. Moysen) cum ægris, ne pestis ad plures serperet, terminis Ægypti pellunt. l. 36._ But he is not singular in this, for _Tacitus_ tells us, _Hist. lib. 5. Plurimi authores consentiunt orta per Ægyptum tabe quoe corpora foeduret, Regem (Ochirum)_ (he means _Pharaoh_) _adito Hammonis oraculo remedium petentem purgare. Regnum et id genus hominum----alias in terras avertere jussum._ Et paulo inferius, _Quod ipsos scabies quondam turpaverat_.

_Sect. 30. Pag. 45._

_I have ever believed, and do now know that there are Witches._] What sort of Witches they were that the Author knew to be such. I cannot tell; for those which he mentions in the next Section, which proceed upon the principles of Nature, none have denyed that such there are; against such it was, that the _Lex Julia de veneficiis_ was made, that is, those, _Qui noxio poculo aut impuris medicuminibus aliquem fuerint insectati. At. ab Alex. Gen. Dier._ l. 5. c. 1. But for the opinion that there are Witches which co-operate with the Devil, there are Divines of great note, and far from any suspition of being irreligious, that do oppose it. Certainly there is no ground to maintain their being from the story of Oracles, as may be seen from what hath been said on the precedent Section.

_Nor have the power to be so much as Witches._] _Pliny_ saith, so it fared with _Nero_, who was so hot in pursuit of the Magick Arts, that he did dedicate himself wholly to it, and yet could never satisfie himself in that kind, though he got all the cunning men he could from the East, for that purpose. _Plin._ l. 3. _Nat. Hist._ c. 1.

_Pag. 46._

_By conjunction with the Devil._] Though, as the Author saith, it be without a possibility of Generation, yet there are great men that hold, that such carnality is performed; as _August, in Levit. Aquin. l. 2. de qu. 73. art. ad 2._ and _Justin Martyr, Apol. 1._

_Sect. 33. Pag. 48._

_It is no new opinion of the Church of_ Rome, _but an old one of_ Pythagoras _and_ Plato.] This appears by _Apuleius_ a Platonist, in his Book _de Deo Socratis_, and elsewhere. See _Mede's Apostasie of the latter times_, where out of this and other Authors, you shall see collected all the learning _de Geniis_.

_Pag. 50._

_I cannot with those in that great Father securely interpret the work of the first day_, Fiat lux, _to the creation of Angels_.] This great Father is S. _Chrysost. Homil. in Genes_. But yet 'tis his opinion, as also of _Athanasius_ and _Theodoret_, that there is express mention of the creation of Angels, so that they need not rest upon this place, which they admit to be somewhat obscure. The place which they take to be express, is that of the 130 _Psalm_, where _David_ begins to speak of the Majesty of God, in this manner: _Confessionem sive majestatem et decorem induisti, amictus lumine sicut vestimento_: Next he speaks of the Heavens, saying, _Thou hast stretched them out over us like a Tent._ Then he speaks of the Angels, _Qui facis Angelos tuos spiritus_. Now if it shall be objected, that this expression is onely of the time present, and without relation to the Creation: Answer is given by Divines, that the _Hebrews_ have but three Tenses in their Verbs, the Preterperfect, Present, and Future Tense; and have not the use of the Preterimperfect, and Preterpluperfect, as the _Greeks_ and _Latines_ have; whence it ariseth, that the Present Tense with the _Hebrews_, may, as the sentence will bear it, be translated by the Preterimperfect, as also by the Preterperfect and Preterpluperfect Tense; and this (they say) is practised in this very passage, where the Phrase, as it is in Hebrew, may be rendered as well _qui faciebas_, as _qui facis Angelos_, etc. Vid. _Hieronym. in Ep. ad Titum, et Thom. Aqu. 1. p. qu. 61. art. 3_. The Latine Annotator saith, the Father meant by the Author, is St. _Aug._ and quotes him, _l. II. de Civ. Dei_ cap. 9. which place I have perused, and find the expression there used by St. _Aug._ is but hypothetical; for these are his words: _Cum enim dixit Fiat lux, et facta est lux, si rectè in fine luce creatio intelligitur Angelorum_, etc. Where you see 'tis but with a _Si_, and therefore I conceive the Author intends not him, but _Chrysostom_.

_Where it subsists alone, 'tis a Spiritual Substance, and may be an Angel._] _Epicurus_ was of this opinion, and St. _Aug. in Euchirid. ad Laurentium_.

_Sect. 35. Pag. 52._

Moses _decided that Question, and all is salved with the new term of Creation._] That is it which _Aristotle_ could not understand; he had learned that _ex nihilo nihil fit_, and therefore when he found those that disputed that the World had a beginning, did maintain that it was generated, and he could not understand any generation, but out of matter præ-existent _in infinitum_, therefore he took their opinion to be absurd, and upon that ground principally, concluded the World to be eternal: whereas, if he had understood that there may be such a thing as Creation, he had not done it, for that solves his _processus in infinitum_. Take from _Plato_, that the World had a beginning, and from _Aristot._ that it was not generated, and you have the (true) Christian opinion.

_Sect. 36. Pag. 54._

_In our study of Anatomy, there is a mass of mysterious Philosophy, and such as reduced the very Heathens to Divinity._] So it did _Galen_, who considering the order, use, and disposition of the parts of the body, brake forth into these words: _Compono hic profecto Canticam in creatoris nostri laudem, quod ultra res suas ornare voluit melius quam ulla arte possent_. Galen, 3. _de usu partium_.

_Sect. 37. Pag. 55._

_I cannot believe the wisdom of_ Pythagoras _did ever positively, and in a literal sense, affirm his_ Metempsychosis.] In this the opinion of _Grotius_ is contrary to the Author, who saith this opinion was begotten by occasion of the opinion of other Philosophers, who in their discourses of the life that is to be after this, brought such arguments, _Quæ non magis de homine quam de bestiis procedunt_. And therefore, saith he, _mirandum non est, si transitum animarum de hominibus in bestias, de bestiis in homines alii commenti sunt_. _Lib. 2. de ver. Relig. Christ. (vide etiam Annotat. ejusd.)._ But yet there is a shrewd objection against the opinion of _Pythagoras_, if he did mean it literally, which is cast in by the Sectators of _Democritus_ and _Epicurus_, which _Lucretius_ remembers in these Verses:

_Præterea si immortalis natura animaï Constat, et in corpus nascentibus insinuatur, Cur super anteactam ætatem meminisse nequimus? Nec vestigia gestarum rerum ulla tenemus? Namsi tantopere 'st animi mutata potestas, Omnis ut actarum excideret retinentia rerum, Non ut opinor ea ab læto jam longiter errat._

[Lib. 3.]

This Argument, 'tis true, is _pro falso contra falsum_, but yet holds _ad hominem_ so far, that it is not likely (as the Author saith) but _Pythagoras_ would observe an absurdity in the consequence of his Metempsychosis; and therefore did not mean it literally, but desired only to express the Soul to be immortal, which he, and the other Philosophers that were of that opinion, who had not heard of Creation, could not conceive, unless it must be taken for truth, that the soul were before the body; so saith _Lactantius_ of them. _Non putaverunt aliter fieri posse ut supersint animæ post corpora, nisi videntur fuisse ante corpora. De fals. Sap._ c. 18.

_Sect. 41. Pag. 59._

_I do not envy the temper of Crows or Daws._] As _Theophrastus_ did, who dying, accused Nature for giving them, to whom it could not be of any concernment, so large a life; and to man, whom it much concern'd, so short a one. _Cic. Tusc. quæst. l. 3._ How long Daws live, see in _Not. ad Sect. 41_.

_Sect. 42. Pag. 61._

_Not upon _Cicero's_ ground, because I have liv'd them well._] I suppose he alludes to an expression in an Epistle of _Cicero_, written in his Exile, to his wife and children, where he hath these words to his wife: _Quod reliquum est, te sustenta mea Terentia ut potes, honestissime viximus, floruimus. Non vitium nostrum sed virtus nos afflixit, peccatum est nullum nisi quod non unà animum cum ornamentis amisimus_, l. 24, Ep. 4.

_And stand in need of _Eson's_ bath before threescore._] _Eson_ was the Father of _Jason_, and, at his request, was by _Medea_, by the means of this Bath, restored to his youth. Ingredients that went into it, and the description of _Medea's_ performance, _Ovid_ gives you, _l. 7. Metam._

_Interea calido positum medicamen aheno_ _Fervet et exultat, spumisq; tumentibus albet._ _Illic Æmonia radices valle resectas, Seminaq; et flores, et succos incoquit atros Adjicet extremo lapides Oriente petitos, Et quas Oceani refluum mare lavit arenas: Addidit exceptas lunæ de nocte pruinas, Et Strigis infames ipsis cum carnibus alas, Inq; virum soliti vultus mutare ferinos Ambigui prosecta lupi, nec defuit illi Squamea Cinyphei tenuis membrana Chelidri, Vivacisq; jecur cervi; quibus insuper addit Ora caputq; novem cornicis secula passæ. His et mille aliis, postquam sine nomine rebus Propositum instruxit mortali barbara munus Arenti ramo jampridem mitis olivæ Omnia confudit, summisq; immiscuit ima. Ecce vetus calido versatus stipes aheno Fit viridis primo, nec longo tempore frondes Induit, et subito gravidis oneratur olivis. At quacunq; cavo spumas ejecit aheno Ignis, et in terram guttæ cecidere calentes, Vernat humus, floresq; et mollia pabula surgunt. Quæ simulac vidit, stricto Medea recludit Ense senis jugulum, veteremq; extare cruorem Passa replet succis, quos postquam combibit Æson, Aut ore acceptas, aut vulnere, barba comoeq; Cunitie posita, nigrum rapuere colorem. Pulsa fugit macies: abeunt pallorq; situsque: Adjectoq; cavæ supplentur corpore rugæ; Membraq; luxuriant. Æson miratur, et olim Ante quater denos hunc se reminiscitur annos, Dissimilemq; animum subiit, ætate relicta._ [262-293.]

_Sect. 44. Pag. 62._

_Extol the Suicide of_ Cato.] As doth _Seneca_ in several places; but _Lactantius_ saith, he cast away his life, to get the reputation of a _Platonick_ Philosopher, and not for fear of _Cæsar_; and 'tis very probable, he was in no great fear of death, when he slept so securely the night before his death, as the story reports of him.

_Pag. 63._

_Emori nolo, sed me esse mortuum, nihil curo._ _Were I of_ Cæsar's _Religion_.] I doubt not, but here is a fault of the Press, and that instead of _Cæsar_ it should be _Cicero_. I meet not with any such saying imputed to _Cæsar_, nor any thing like it, but that he preferr'd a sudden death (in which he had his option) to any other; but I meet with such a saying in _Cicero_ quoted out of _Epicharmus_ [_Emori nolo, sed me esse mortuum nihili æstimo._] Where _Cicero_ sustaineth the part of the _Epicure_ that there is no hurt in being dead, since there remaineth nothing after it. _Cic. 1. Thusc. qu. non procul ab initio_.

_Sect. 45. Pag. 64._

Or whence _Lucan_ learn'd to say, _Communis mundo superest rogus_, etc.] Why, _Lucan_ was a Stoique, and 'twas an opinion among them almost generally, that the world should perish by fire; therefore without doubt from them he learned it. _Cælum quoque cum omnibus quæ in cælo continentur, ita ut coepisset desinere, fontium dulci aqua marisve nutriri, in vim ignis abiturum. Stoicis constans opinio est, quod consumpto humore mundus hic omnis ignescat._ _Minutius in Octav._ But _Minutius_ should have excepted _Boetius_, _Possidonius_, _Diogenes Babylonius_, and _Zeno Sidonius_, who were _Stoiques_, and yet did not think the world should be destroyed by fire, nor yet by any other means.

_Sect. 46. Pag. 65._

_How shall we interpret _Elias 6000_ years_, etc.?] _Lactant._ is very positive that the world should last but 6000 years; but his reason for it is somewhat strange; thus it is, _Quoniam sex diebus cuncta Dei opera perfecta sunt, per secula sex_, i.e. _annorum sex millia manere in hoc statu mundum necesse est_. _De Divino præmio_, cap. 14.

_Sect. 47. Pag. 67._

_Ipsa sui pretium virtus sibi, is but a cold principle._] It is a Stoical principle. _Quæris enim aliquid supra summum, interrogas quid petam extra virtutem ipsam. Nihil enim habet melius. Pretium sui est._ Senec. _de vit. beat._ c. 19.

_That honest artifice of_ Seneca.] What that article was, is to be seen in _Senec. l. 1. ep. 11_. _Aliquis vir bonus nobis eligendus est, et semper ante oculos babendus, ut sic tanquam illo spectante vivamus, et omnia tanquam illo vidente faciamus._ Et paulo post; _Elige itaq; Catonem; si hic videtur tibi nimis rigidus, elige remissioris animi virum Lælium_, etc. which though, as the Author saith, it be an honest Artifice, yet cannot I but commend the party, and prefer the direction of him (whoever he were) who in the Margin of my _Seneca_, over against those words, wrote these: _Quin Deo potius qui semper omnibus omnia agentibus non tanquam sed reipsa adest, et videt; ac etiam ut Testis, vindex et punitor est male agentis_.

_I have tried, if I could reach that great Resolution of his (that is of _Seneca_) to be honest without a thought of Heaven or Hell._] _Seneca_[6] brags he could do this, in these words: _Si scirem deos peccata ignoscituros, et homines ignoraturos, adhuc propter vilitatem peccati peccare erubescerem. Credat Judæus Appela: non ego_.----

[6] _Tho. Aquin. in com. in Boet. de Consolat. prope finem._

_And Atheists have been the onely Philosopher._] That is, if nothing remain after this life. St. _Aug._ was of this opinion. _Disputabam---- Epicurum accepturum fuisse palmam in animo meo, nisi ego credidissem post mortem restare animæ vitam_, etc. Aug. _l. 6. conf. cap. 16_.

_Sect. 48. Pag. 68._

_God by a powerful voice shall command them back into their proper shapes._] So _Minutius_. _Cæterum quis tam stultus est aut brutus, ut audeat repugnare hominem à Deo ut primum potuit fingi, ita posse denuo reformari, nihil esse post obitum, et ante ortum nihil fuisse; sicut de nihilo nasci licuit, ita de nihilo licere reparari. Porro difficilius est id quod sit incipere, quod quam id quod fuerit iterare. Tu perire Deo credis, si quid nostris oculis hebetibus subtrahitur. Corpus omne sive arescit in pulverem sive in humorem solvitur, vel in cinerem comprimitur vel in nidorem tenuatur, subducitur nobis, sed Deo elementorum custodi inseruntur. In Octav._ _Vide_ Grot. _de veritate Relig. Christian. ubi (lib. 2.) solvit objectionem, quod dissoluta corpora resititui nequeunt._

_Sect. 50. Pag. 71._

_Or conceive a flame that can either prey upon, or purifie the substance of a soul._] Upon this ground _Psellus lib 1. de Energia Dæmonum_, c. 7 holds, That Angels have bodies, (though he grants them to be as pure, or more pure than Air is) otherwise he could not apprehend how they should be tormented in Hell; and it may be upon this ground it was, that the Author fell into the error of the _Arabians_, mentioned by him, _Sect. 7_.

_Sect. 51. Pag. 73._

_There are as many Hells as _Anaxagoras_ conceited worlds._] I assure my self that this is false printed, and that instead of _Anaxagoras_ it should be _Anaxarchus_; for _Anaxagoras_ is reckon'd amongst those Philosophers that maintain'd a Unity of the world, but _Anaxarchus_ (according to the opinion of _Epicurus_) held there were infinite Worlds. That is he that caus'd _Alexander_ to weep by telling him that there were infinite worlds, whereby _Alexander_ it seems was brought out of opinion of his Geography, who before that time thought there remained nothing, or not much beyond his Conquests.

_Sect. 54. Pag. 75._

_It is hard to place those souls in Hell._] _Lactantius_ is alike charitably disposed towards those. _Non sum equidem tam iniquus ut eos putem divinare debuisse, ut veritatem per seipsos invenirent (quod fieri ego non posse confiteor) sed hoc ab eis exigo, quod ratione ipse præstare potuerunt._ Lactant. _de orig. error._ c. 3. which is the very same with Sir _K. Digbie's_ expression in his Observations on this place. I make no doubt at all (saith he) but if any follow'd in the whole tenour of their lives, the dictamens of right reason, but that their journey was secure to Heaven.

_Sect. 55. Pag. 77._

Aristotle _transgress'd the rule of his own Ethicks._] And so they did all, as _Lactantius_ hath observed at large. _Aristot._ is said to have been guilty of great vanity in his Clothes, of Incontinency, of Unfaithfulness to his Master _Alexander_, etc. But 'tis no wonder in him, if our great _Seneca_ be also guilty, whom truely notwithstanding St. _Jerome_ would have him inserted in the Catalogue of Saints, yet I think he as little deserv'd it, as many of the Heathens who did not say so well as he did, for I do not think any of them liv'd worse: to trace him a little. In the time of the Emperour _Claudius_ we find he was banish'd for suspition of incontinency with _Julia_ the daughter of _Germanicus_. If it be said that this proceeded meerly from the spight of _Messalina_, (and that _Lipsius_ did not complement with him in that kind _Apostrophe, Non expetit in te hæc culpa, O Romani nominis et Sapientiæ magne. Sol. Not. in Tacit._) why then did she not cause him to be put to death, as well as she did the other, who was her Husbands Niece? This for certain, whatever his life were, he had _paginam lascivam_, as may appear by what he hath written, _de Speculorum usu, l. 1. Nat. Qu. cap. 16_. Which (admitting it may in a Poet, yet) how it should be excus'd in a Philosopher I know not. To look upon him in his exile, we find that then he wrote his Epistle _De Consolat._ to _Polybius_, _Claudius_ his creature (as honest a man as _Pallas_ or _Narcissus_) and therein he extols him and the Emperour to the Skies; in which he did grosly prevaricate, and lost much of his reputation, by seeking a discharge of his exile by so sordid a means. Upon _Claudius_ his marriage with _Agrippina_, he was recall'd from Banishment by her means, and made _Prætor_, then he forgets the Emperour, having no need of him, labours all he can to depress him and the hopeful _Brittanicus_, and procured his Pupil _Nero_ to be adopted and design'd Successor, and the Emperours own Son to be disinherited; and against the Emperour whom he so much praised when he had need of him, after his death he writes a scurrilous Libel. In _Nero's_ Court, how ungratefully doth he behave himself towards _Agrippina_! who although she were a wicked woman, yet she deserv'd well of him, and of her Son too, who yet never was at rest till he had taken away her life, and upon suspition cast in against her by this man. Afterwards not to mention that he made great haste to grow rich, which should not be the business of a Philosopher, towards _Nero_ himself, how well did it become his Philosophy to play the Traitor against him, and to become a complice in the conspiracy of _Piso_? And then as good a Tragedian as he was, me thinks he doth in _extremo actu deficere_, when he must needs perswade _Paulina_, that excellent Lady his wife, to die with him: what should move him to desire it? it could in his opinion be no advantage to her, for he believ'd nothing of the immortality of the soul; I am not satisfied with the reason of _Tacitus_, _Ne sibi unice dilectam ad injurius relinqueret_, because he discredits it himself, in almost the next words, where he saith, _Nero_ bore her no ill will at all, (and would not suffer her to die) it must surely be then, because he thought he had not liv'd long enough (being not above 114 years old, so much he was) and had not the fortitude to die, unless he might receive some confirmation in it by her example. Now let any man judge what a precious Legacy it is that he bequeaths by his nuncupative will to his friends in _Tacitus_. _Conversus ad amicos_ (saith he) _quando meritis eorum referre gratiam prohiberetur, quod unum jam tamen et pulcherrimum habebat, imaginem vitæ suæ relinquere testatur_. It cannot be denyed of him, that he hath said very well; but yet it must as well be affirmed, that his Practice hath run counter to his Theory, to use the Author's phrase.

_The_ Scepticks _that affirmed they knew nothing_.] The ancient Philosophers are divided into three sorts, _Dogmatici_, _Academici_, _Sceptici_; the first were those that delivered their opinions positively; the second left a liberty of disputing _pro et contra_; the third declared that there was no knowledge of any thing, no not of this very proposition, that there is no knowledge, according to that,

_----Nihil sciri siquis putat, id quoq; nescit An sciri possit, quod se nil scire fatetur._

_The Duke of_ Venice _that weds himself to the Sea by a Ring of Gold_, etc.] The Duke and Senate yearly on _Ascension-day_ use to go in their best attire to the Haven of _Lido_, and there by throwing a Ring into the water, do take the Sea as their spouse. _Vid. Hist. Ital._ by _Will Thomas Cambrobrit_. _Busbequius_ reports that there is a custom amongst the Turks, which they took from the Greek Priests, not much unlike unto this. _Cum Græcorum sacerdotibus mos sit certo veris tempore aquas consecrando mare clausum veluti reserare, ante quod tempus non facile se committunt fluctibus; ab ea Ceremonia nec Turcæ absunt._ Busb. _Ep. 3. legat. Tursic._

_But the Philosopher that threw his money into the Sea, to avoid avarice_, etc.] This was _Apollonius Thyaneus_, who threw a great quantity of Gold into the Sea with these words, _Pessundo divitias, ne pessundarem ab illis_. _Polycrates_ the Tyrant of _Samos_ cast the best Jewel he had into the Sea, that thereby he might learn to compose himself against the vicissitude of Fortune.

_There go so many circumstances to piece up one good action._] To make an action to be good, all the causes that concur must be good; but one bad amongst many good ones, is enough to make it vitious, according to the rule, _Bonum ex causa integra, malum ex partiali_.

_Sect. 56. Pag. 78._

_The vulgarity of those judgements that wrap the Church of God in_ Strabo's _Cloak, and restrain it unto_ Europe.] 'Tis _Strabonis tunica_ in the translation, but _Chalmydi_ would do better, which is the proper expression of the word that _Strabo_ useth: it is not _Europe_, but the known part of the world that _Strabo_ resembleth to a Cloak, and that is it the Author here alludeth to; but we have no reason to think that the resemblance of _Strabo_ is very proper, _Vid._ Sir _Hen. Savil. in not. ad Tac. in vita Agricolæ_.

_Sect. 57. Pag. 79._

_Those who upon a rigid Application of the Law, sentence_ Solomon _unto damnation_, etc.] St. _Aug._ upon _Psal._ 126. and in many other places, holds that _Solomon_ is damned. Of the same opinion is _Lyra_, in 2 _Reg._ c. 7. and _Bellarm. 1 Tom. lib. 1. Controv._ c. 5.

THE SECOND PART

_Sect. 1. Pag. 83._

_I wonder not at the_ French _for their Frogs, Snails and Toad-stools_.] Toad-stools are not peculiar to the _French_; they were a great delicacy among the _Romans_, as appears every where in _Martial_. It was conceived the Emperor _Claudius_ received his death by Poyson, which he took in Mushroom. _Suet._ and _Tac._

_Sect. 2. Pag. 87._

_How among so many millions of faces, there should be none alike._] It is reported there have been some so much alike, that they could not be distinguished; as King _Antiochus_, and one _Antemon_, a Plebeian of _Syria_, were so much alike, that _Laodice_, the Kings widow, by pretending this man was the King, dissembled the death of the King so long, till according to her own mind, a Successor was chosen. _Cn. Pompeius_, and one _Vibius_ the Orator; _C. Plancus_, and _Rubrius_ the Stage-player; _Cassius Severus_ the Orator, and one _Mirmello_; _M. Messala Censorius_, and one _Menogenes_, were so much alike, that unless it were by their habit, they could not be distinguished: but this you must take upon the Faith of _Pliny_ (_lib. 7. c. 12._) and _Solinus_, (_cap. 6._) who as this Author tells elsewhere, are Authors not very infallible.

_Sect. 3. Pag. 89._

_What a_ {~GREEK SMALL LETTER BETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~} _and hot skirmish is betwixt_ S. _and_ T. _in Lucian_.] In his _Dialog. judicium vocalium_, where there is a large Oration made to the Vowels, being Judges, by _Sigma_ against _Tau_, complaining that _Tau_ has bereaved him of many words, which should begin with _Sigma_.

_Their Tongues are sharper than_ Actius _his razor_.] _Actius Navius_ was chief Augur, who (as the story saith) admonishing _Tarqu. Priscus_ that he should not undertake any action of moment, without first consulting the Augur, the King (shewing that he had little faith in his skill) demanded of him, whether by the rules of his skill, what he had conceived in his mind might be done: to whom when _Actius_ had answered it might be done, he bid him take a Whetstone which he had in his hand, and cut it in two with a Razor; which accordingly the Augur did. _Livy._ And therefore we must conceive it was very sharp. Here the Adage was cross'd, {~GREEK SMALL LETTER XI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH VARIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER KAPPA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}, i.e. _novacula in cotem. Vid. Erasm. Chiliad_.

_Pag. 90._

_It is not meer Zeal to Learning, or devotion to the Muses, that wiser Princes Patronize the Arts_, etc. _but a desire to have their names eterniz'd by the memory of their Writings_.] There is a great Scholar, who took the boldness to tell a Prince so much. _Est enim bonorum principum cum viris eruditis tacita quædam naturalisque Societas, ut alteri ab alteris illustrentur, ac dum sibi mutuo suffragantur, et gloria principibus, et doctis authoritas concilietur_. Politian. _Ep. Ludovic. Sfort. quæ extat, lib. 11. Ep. ep. 1_. And to this Opinion astipulates a Country man of our own, whose words are these: _Ignotus esset Lucilius, nisi eum Epistolæ Senecæ illustrarent. Laudibus Cæsareis plus Virgilius et Varus Lucanusq; adjecerunt, quam immensum illud ærarium quo urbem et orbem spoliavit. Nemo prudentiam Ithaci aut Pelidæ vires agnosceret, nisi eas Homerus divino publicasset ingenio: unde nihil mihi videtur consultius viro ad gloriam properanti fidelium favore scriptorum._ Joan. Sarisb. _Polycrat. l 8. c. 14_. And that Princes are as much beholding to the Poets Pens as their own Swords, _Horace_ tells _Censorinus_ with great confidence. _Od. 8. l. 4. Non incisa notis_, etc.

_Sect. 4. Pag. 90._

_St._ Paul _that calls the_ Cretians _Lyars, doth it but indirectly, and upon quotation of one of their own Poets_.] That is, _Epimenides_; the place is _Tit. 1. v. 12._ where _Paul_ useth this verse, taken out of _Epimenides_.

{~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER KAPPA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH PERISPOMENI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH VARIA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER PSI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH PERISPOMENI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA~}, {~GREEK SMALL LETTER KAPPA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER KAPPA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH VARIA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}, {~GREEK SMALL LETTER GAMMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER GAMMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH OXIA~}.

_It is as bloody a thought in one way, as_ Nero's _was in another_. _For by a word we wound a thousand._] I suppose he alludes to that passage in _Sueton._ in the life of _Nero_, where he relates that a certain person upon a time, spoke in his hearing these words,

{~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER EPSILON WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH PERISPOMENI~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER GAMMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH OXIA~}.

_i.e._ When I am dead let Earth be mingled with Fire. Whereupon the Emperour uttered these words, {~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER EPSILON WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH PERISPOMENI~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER ZETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH PERISPOMENI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~}, _i.e._ _Yea whilst I live_: there by one word, he express'd a cruel thought, which I think is the thing he meant; this is more cruel than the wish of _Caligula_, that the people of _Rome_ had but one Neck, that he might destroy them all at a blow.

_Sect. 6. Pag. 95._

_I cannot believe the story of the_ Italian, etc.] It is reported that a certain _Italian_ having met with one that had highly provoked him, put a Ponyard to his breast, and unless he would blaspheme God, told him he would kill him, which the other doing to save his life, the _Italian_ presently kill'd him, to the intent he might be damned, having no time of Repentance.

_Sect. 7. Pag. 97._

_I have no sins that want a Name._] The Author in _cap. ult. lib. ult. Pseudodox._ speaking of the Act of carnality exercised by the _Egyptian_ Pollinctors with the dead carcasses, saith we want a name for this, wherein neither _Petronius_ nor _Martial_ can relieve us; therefore I conceive the Author here means a venereal sin.

_This was the Temper of that Leacher that carnal'd with a Statua._] The Latine Annotator upon this hath these words: _Romæ refertur de Hispano quodam_. But certainly the Author means the Statue of _Venus Gnidia_ made by _Praxiteles_, of which a certain young man became so enamoured, that _Pliny_ relates, _Ferunt amore captum cum delituisset nocta simulachro cohæsisse, ejusq; cupiditas esse indicem masculum_. _Lucian_ also has the story in his _Dialog_. [_Amores._]

_And the constitution of_ Nero _in his Spintrian recreations._] The Author doth not mean the last _Nero_, but _Tiberius_ the Emperour, whose name was _Nero_ too; of whom _Sueton. Secessu vero Capreensi etiam sellariam excogitavit sedem arcanarum libidinum, in quam undique conquisti puellarum et exoletorum greges monstrosiq; concubitus repertores, quos spintrias apellabat, triplici serie connexi invicem incestarent se coram ipso, ut adspectu deficientes libidines excitaret._ Suet. _in Tib. 43_.

_Sect. 8. Pag. 98._

_I have seen a Grammarian toure and plume himself over a single line in_ Horace, _and shew more pride_, etc.] _Movent mihi stomachum Grammatistæ quidam, qui cum duas tenuerint vocabularum origenes ita se ostentant, ita venditant, ita circumferunt jactabundi, ut præ ipsis pro nihilo habendos Philosophos arbitrentur._ Picus Mirand. _in Ep. ad Hermol. Barb. quæ extat lib. nono Epist. Politian_.

_Garsio quisq; duas postquam scit jungere partes, Sic stat, sic loquitur, velut omnes noverit artes._

_Pag. 99._

_I cannot think that_ Homer _pin'd away upon the Riddle of the Fishermen._] The History out of _Plutarch_ is thus: Sailing from _Thebes_ to the Island _Ion_, being landed and set down upon the shore, there happen'd certain Fishermen to pass by him, and he asking them what they had taken, they made him this Enigmatical answer, That what they had taken, they had left behind them; and what they had not taken, they had with them: meaning, that because they could take no Fish, they went to loose themselves; and that all which they had taken, they had killed, and left behind them, and all which they had not taken, they had with them in their clothes: and that _Homer_ being struck with a deep sadness because he could not interpret this, pin'd away, and at last dyed. _Pliny_ alludes to this Riddle, in his _Ep._ to his Friend _Fuscus_, where giving an account of spending his time in the Country, he tells him, _Venor aliquando, sed non sine pugilluribus, ut quamvis nihil ceperim, non nihil referam._ Plin. _Ep. lib. 9, Ep. 36_.

_Or that_ Aristot.----_did ever drown himself upon the flux or reflux of_ Euripus.] _Laertius_ reports that _Aristotle_ dyed of a disease at 63 years of age. For this and the last, see the Author in _Pseudodox_.

Aristotle _doth but instruct us as_ Plato _did him, to confute himself_.] In the matter of _Idea's_, Eternity of the world, _etc._

_Sec. 9. Pag. 100._

_I could be content that we might procreate like trees without conjunction, or that there were any way to perpetuate the world without this trivial and vulgar way of Coition: It is the foolishest act a wise man commits in all his life._] There was a Physitian long before the Author, that was of the same opinion, _Hippocrates_; for which _vide A. Gel. l. 19. Noct. Attic. c. 2_. And so of late time was _Paracelsus_, who did undertake to prescribe a way for the generation of a man without coition. _Vide Campanel. de sensu rerum, in Append. ad _cap. 19._ l. 4._ _Monsieur Montaignes_ words on this subject, are worth the reading; these they are: _Je trouve apres tout, que l'amour n'est autre chose que la fame de cette jouyssance, et considerant maintes fois la ridicule titillation de ce plaiser par on il nous tient, les absurdes movements escervelez et estourdis dequoy il agite Zenon et Cratippus, ceste rage indiscrete, ce visage inflamme de fureur et de cruaute au plus doux effect de l'amour, et puis cette morgue grare severe et extatique en une action si folle, et que la supreme volupte aye du trainsy et du plaintiff commer la douleur, je croye qu'on se joue de nous, et que c'est par industrie que nature nous a laisse la plus trouble de nos actions les plus communes pour nous esgaller par la et apparier les fols et les sayes, et nous et les bestes. Le plus contemplatif et prudent homme quand je l'imagin en cette assiette je le tien pour un affronteur, de faire le prudent et le contemplatif: et sont les pieds du paon qui abbatent son orgueil. Nous mangeons bien et beuvons comme les bestes, mais ce ne sont pas actions, qui empeschent les operations de nostre ame, en celles-la nous gardons nostre advantage sur elles: cettecy met tout autre pensee sous le joug, abrutist et abesiit par son imperieuse authorite toute la Theology et Philosophy, qui est en Platon et si il ne s'en plaint pas. Par tout ailleurs vous pouvez garder quelque decence; toutes autres operations souffrent des Regles d'honestete: cettecy ne se peut sculement imaginer que vitieuse ou ridicule; trouvez y pour voir un proceder sage et discret. Alexander disoit qu'il se cognossoit principalement mortel par cette action et par le dormir: le sommeil suffoque et supprime les facultez de nostre ame, la besoigne les absorbe et dissipe de mesme. Certes c'est une marque non seulement de nostre corruption originelle, mais aussi de nostre vanite et disformite. D'un coste nature nous y pousse ayant attaché à ce desire la plan noble, utile et plaisante de toutes ses operations, et la nous laisse d'autre part accuser et fuyr comme insolent et dishoneste, en rougir et recommander l'abstinence_, etc. Montaign _liv. 3. chapit. 5_.

_Sect. 10. Pag. 103._

_And may be inverted on the worst._] That is, that there are none so abandoned to vice, but they have some sprinklings of vertue. There are scarce any so vitious, but commend virtue in those that are endued with it, and do some things laudable themselves, as _Plin._ saith in _Panegyric_. _Machiavel_ upon _Livy, lib. 1. cap. 27_. sets down the ensuing relation as a notable confirmation of this truth. _Julius Pontifex ejus nominis secundus, anno salutis 1505. Bononiam exercitus duxit, ut Bentivolorum familiam, quæ ejus urbis imperium centum jam annos tenuerat, loco moveret. Eudemque in expeditione etiam Johannem Pagolum, Bagloneum tyrannum Perusinum sua sede expellere decreverat, ut cæteros item, qui urbes Ecclesiæ per vim tenerent. Ejus rei causa cum ad Perusinam urbem accessisset, et notum jam omnibus esset quid in animo haberet: tamen impatiens moræ, noluit exercitus expectare, sed inermis quasi urbem ingressus est, in quant Johannes Pagolus defendendi sui causa, non exiguas copias contraxerat. Is autem eodem furore, quo res suas administrare solebat, una cum milite, cui custodiam sui corporis demandarat, sese in pontificis potestatem dedidit; à quo abductus est relictusque alius, qui Ecclesiæ nomine urbem gubernaret. Hac ipsu in re magnopere admirati sunt viri sapientes, qui Pontificem comitabantur, cum Pontificis ipsius temeritatem, cum abjectum vilemq; Johannis Pagoli animum: nec causam intelligebant, ob quam permotus idem Pagolus, hostem suum inermem (quod illi cum perpetua nominis sui memoria facere licebat) non subitò oppresserit, et tam pretiosa spolia diripuerit; cum Pontifex urbem ingressus fuisset, Cardinalibus tantum suis stipatus, qui pretiosissimas quasq; suarum rerum secum habebant. Neque enim credebatur Pagolus a tanto facinore vel sua bonitate, vel animi conscientia abstinuisse: quod in hominem sceleratum, qui et propria sorore utebatur, et consobrinos nepotesque dominandi causa e medio sustulerat hujusmodi pii affectus cadere non viderentur. Cum igitur hac de re variæ essent sapientum virorum sententiæ; concluserunt tandem id ei accidisse, quod ita comparatum sit_, ut homines neque plane pravi esse queant, neque perfecte boni. _Pravi perfecte esse nequeant, propterea quod, ubi tale quoddam scelus est, in quo aliquid magnifici ac generosi insit, id patrare non andeant. Nam cum Pagolus neq; incestam prius horraisset, neque patricidio abstinnisset: tamen cnm oblata esset occasio, pravi quidem sed memorabilis, atque æternæ memoriæ facinoris patrandi, id attentare non ausus fuit, cum id sine infamia prestare licuisset, quod rei magnitudo omnia priora scelera obtegere potuisset, et a periculo conservare. Quibus accedit, quod illi gratulati fuissent etiam quam plurimi, si primus ausus esset Pontificibus monstrare rationem dominandi; totiusque humanæ vitæ usum ab illis nimis parei pendi._

_Poysons contain within themselves their own Antidote._] The Poyson of a Scorpion is not Poyson to it self, nor the Poyson of a Toad is not Poyson to it self; so that the sucking out of Poyson from persons infected by Psylls, (who are continually nourished with venomous aliment) without any prejudice to themselves, is the less to be wondred at.

_The man without a Navil yet lives in me._] The Latine Annotator hath explicated this by _Homo non perfectus_, by which it seems he did not comprehend the Author's meaning; for the Author means _Adam_, and by a Metonymie original sin; for the Navil being onely of use to attract the aliment _in utero materno_, and _Adam_ having no mother, he had no use of a Navil, and therefore it is not to be conceived he had any; and upon that ground the Author calls him the man without a Navil.

_Sect. 11. Pag. 106._

_Our grosser memories have then so little hold of our abstracted understandings, that they forget the story, and can onely relate to our awaked senses a confused and broken tale of that that hath pass'd._] For the most part it is so. In regard of the Author's expression of forgetting the story, though otherwise it be not very pertinent to this place, I shall set down a relation given by an English Gentleman, of two dreams that he had, wherein he did not forget the story, but (what is more strange) found his dreams verified. This it is.

Whilst I lived at _Prague_, and one night had sit up very late drinking at a feast, early in the morning the Sun beams glancing on my face, as I lay in my bed, I dreamed that a shadow passing by told me that my Father was dead; at which awaking all in a sweat, and affected with this dream, I rose and wrote the day and hour, and all circumstances thereof in a Paper-book, which book with many other things I put into a Barrel, and sent it from _Prague_ to _Stode_, thence to be conveyed into _England_. And now being at _Nurenburgh_, a Merchant of a noble Family well acquainted with me and my friends, arrived there, who told me my Father dyed some two months ago. I list not to write any lyes, but that which I write, is as true as strange. When I returned into _England_ some four years after, I would not open the Barrel I sent from _Prague_, nor look into the Paper-book in which I had written this dream, till I had called my Sisters and some friends to be witnesses, where my self and they were astonished to see my written dream answer the very day of my Father's death.

I may lawfully swear that which my Kinsman hath heard witnessed by my brother _Henry_ whilst he lived, that in my youth at _Cambridge_, I had the like dream of my Mother's death, where my brother _Henry_ living with me, early in the morning I dreamed that my Mother passed by with a sad countenance, and told me that she could not come to my Commencement: I being within five months to proceed Master of Arts, and she having promised at that time to come to _Cambridge_. And when I related this dream to my brother, both of us awaking together in a sweat, he protested to me that he had dreamed the very same; and when we had not the least knowledge of our Mother's sickness, neither in our youthful affections were any whit affected with the strangeness of this dream, yet the next Carrier brought us word of our Mother's death. Mr. _Fiennes Morison_ in his Itinerary. I am not over-credulous of such relations, but methinks the circumstance of publishing it at such a time, when there were those living that might have disprov'd it, if it had been false, is a great argument of the truth of it.

_Sect. 12. Pag. 107._

_I wonder the fancy of _Lucan_ and _Seneca_ did not discover it._] For they had both power from _Nero_ to chuse their deaths.

_Sect. 13. Pag. 108._

_To conceive our selves Urinals is not so ridiculous._] _Reperti sunt Galeno et Avicenna testibus qui se vasa fictilia crederent, et ideirco hominum attactum ne confringerentur solicite fugerent._ Pontan. _in Attic. bellar._ (_Hist. 22._) Which proceeds from extremity of Melancholy.

_Pag. 109._

Aristot. _is too severe, that will not allow us to be truely liberal without wealth._] _Aristot. l. 1. Ethic. c. 8._

_Sect. 15. Pag. 112._

_Thy will be done though in mine own undoing._] This should be the wish of every man, and is of the most wise and knowing, _Le Christien plus humble et plus sage et mieux recognoissant que c'est que de luy se rapporte a son createur de choisir et ordonner ce qu'il luy faut. Il ne le supplie dautre chose que sa volunte soit faite._ Montaign.

_A Letter sent upon the information of_ Animadversions _to come forth, upon the imperfect and surreptitious copy of_ Religio Medici, _whilst this true one was going to Press_.

Honoured Sir, Give your Servant, who hath ever honour'd you, leave to take notice of a Book at present in the Press, intituled (as I am informed) _Animadversions_ upon a Treatise lately printed under the name of _Religio Medici_; hereof, I am advertised, you have descended to be the Author. Worthy Sir, permit your Servant to affirm there is contain'd therein nothing that can deserve the Reason of your Contradictions, much less the Candor of your _Animadversions_: and to certifie the truth thereof, That Book (whereof I do acknowledge myself the Author) was penn'd many years past, and (what cannot escape your apprehension) with no intention for the Press, or the least desire to oblige the Faith of any man to its assertions. But what hath more especially emboldened my Pen unto you at present, is, That the same Piece, contrived in my private study, and as an Exercise unto my self, rather than Exercitation for any other, having past from my hand under a broken and imperfect Copy, by frequent transcription it still run forward into corruption, and after the addition of some things, omission of others, & transposition of many, without my assent or privacy, the liberty of these times committed it unto the Press; whence it issued so disguised, the Author without distinction could not acknowledge it. Having thus miscarried, within a few weeks I shall, God willing, deliver unto the Press the true and intended Original (whereof in the mean time your worthy Self may command a view); otherwise when ever that Copy shall be extant, it will most clearly appear how far the Text hath been mistaken, and all Observations, Glosses, or Exercitations thereon, will in a great part impugn the Printer or Transcriber, rather than the Author. If after that, you shall esteem it worth your vacant hours to discourse thereon, you shall but take that liberty which I assume my self, that is, freely to abound in your sense, as I have done in my own. However you shall determine, you shall sufficiently honour me in the Vouchsafe of your Refute, and I oblige the whole World in the occasion of your Pen.

_Your Servant._ T. B.

Norwich, _March 3, 1642_.

TO THE READER

_Certainly that man were greedy of Life, who should desire to live when all the world were at an end; and he must needs be very impatient, who would repine at death in the society of all things that suffer under it. Had not almost every man suffered by the Press or were not the tyranny thereof become universal, I had not wanted reason for complaint: but in times wherein I have lived to behold the highest perversion of that excellent invention, the name of his Majesty defamed, the Honour of Parliament depraved, the Writings of both depravedly, anticipatively, counterfeitly imprinted; complaints may seem ridiculous in private persons; and men of my condition may be as incapable of affronts, as hopeless of their reparations. And truely had not the duty I owe unto the importunity of friends, and the allegiance I must ever acknowledge unto truth, prevailed with me; the inactivity of my disposition might have made these sufferings continual, and time that brings other things to light, should have satisfied me in the remedy of its oblivion. But because things evidently false are not onely printed, but many things of truth most falsely set forth, in this latter I could not but think my self engaged. For though we have no power to redress the former, yet in the other, reparation being within our selves, I have at present represented unto the world a full and intended Copy of that Piece, which was most imperfectly and surreptitiously published before._

_This, I confess, about seven years past, with some others of affinity thereto, for my private exercise and satisfaction, I had at leisurable hours composed; which being communicated unto one, it became common unto many, and was by Transcription successively corrupted, untill it arrived in a most depraved Copy at the Press. He that shall peruse that Work, and shall take notice of sundry particularities and personal expressions therein, will easily discern the intention was not publick: and being a private Exercise directed to my self, what is delivered therein, was rather a memorial unto me, than an Example or Rule unto any other: and therefore if there be any singularity therein correspondent unto the private conceptions of any man, it doth not advantage them: or if dissentaneous thereunto, it no way overthrows them. It was penned in such a place, and with such disadvantage, that (I protest) from the first setting of pen unto paper, I had not the assistance of any good Book, whereby to promote my invention, or relieve my memory; and therefore there might be many real lapses therein, which others might take notice of, and more than I suspected my self. It was set down many years past, and was the sense of my conception at that time, not an immutable Law unto my advancing judgement at all times; and therefore there might be many things therein plausible unto my passed apprehension, which are not agreeable until my present self. There are many things delivered Rhetorically, many expressions therein meerly Tropical, and as they best illustrate my intention; and therefore also there are many things to be taken in a soft and flexible sense, and not to be called unto the rigid test of Reason. Lastly, all that is contained therein is in submission unto maturer discernments; and, as I have declared, shall no further father them than the best and learned judgments shall authorize them: under favour of which considerations I have made its secrecy publick, and committed the truth thereof to every Ingenuous Reader._

_THO. BROWNE._

RELIGIO MEDICI

SECT. 1

For my Religion, though there be several Circumstances that might perswade the World I have none at all, as the general scandal of my Profession, the natural course of my Studies, the indifferency of my Behaviour and Discourse in matters of Religion, neither violently Defending one, nor with that common ardour and contention Opposing another; yet, in despight hereof, I dare, without usurpation, assume the honourable Stile of a Christian. Not that I meerly owe this Title to the Font, my Education, or Clime wherein I was born, as being bred up either to confirm those Principles my parents instilled into my Understanding, or by a general consent proceed in the Religion of my Country: But having in my riper years and confirmed Judgment, seen and examined all, I find my self obliged by the Principles of Grace, and the Law of mine own Reason, to embrace no other name but this: Neither doth herein my zeal so far make me forget the general Charity I owe unto Humanity, as rather to hate than pity _Turks_, _Infidels_, and (what is worse) _Jews_; rather contenting my self to enjoy that happy Stile, than maligning those who refuse so glorious a Title.

SECT. 2

But because the Name of a Christian is become too general to express our Faith, there being a Geography of Religion as well as Lands, and every Clime distinguished not only by their Laws and Limits, but circumscribed by their Doctrines and Rules of Faith; to be particular, I am of that _Reformed_ new-cast Religion, wherein I dislike nothing but the Name; of the same belief our Saviour taught, the Apostles disseminated, the Fathers authorized, and the Martyrs confirmed, but by the sinister ends of Princes, the ambition and avarice of Prelates, and the fatal corruption of times, so decayed, impaired, and fallen from its native Beauty, that it required the careful and charitable hands of these times to restore it to its primitive Integrity. Now the accidental occasion whereupon, the slender means whereby the low and abject condition of the Person by whom so good a work was set on foot, which in our Adversaries beget contempt and scorn, fills me with wonder, and is the very same Objection the insolent Pagans first cast at Christ and his Disciples.

SECT. 3

Yet have I not so shaken hands with those desperate Resolutions, who had rather venture at large their decayed bottom, than bring her in to be new trimm'd in the Dock; who had rather promiscuously retain all, than abridge any, and obstinately be what they are, than what they have been, as to stand in Diameter and Swords point with them: We have reformed from them, not against them; for omitting those Improperations and Terms of Scurrility betwixt us, which only difference our Affections, and not our Cause, there is between us one common Name and Appellation, one Faith and necessary body of Principles common to us both; and therefore I am not scrupulous to converse and live with them, to enter their Churches in defect of ours, and either pray with them, or for them. I could never perceive any rational Consequence from those many Texts which prohibit the Children of _Israel_ to pollute themselves with the Temples of the Heathens; we being all Christians, and not divided by such detested impieties as might prophane our Prayers, or the place wherein we make them; or that a resolved Conscience may not adore her Creator any where, especially in places devoted to his Service; where, if their Devotions offend him, mine may please him; if theirs prophane it, mine may hallow it. Holy-water and Crucifix (dangerous to the common people) deceive not my judgment, nor abuse my devotion at all: I am, I confess, naturally inclined to that which misguided Zeal terms Superstition: my common conversation I do acknowledge austere, my behaviour full of rigour, sometimes not without morosity; yet at my Devotion I love to use the civility of my knee, my hat, and hand, with all those outward and sensible motions which may express or promote my invisible Devotion. I should violate my own arm rather than a Church; nor willingly deface the name of Saint or Martyr. At the sight of a Cross or Crucifix I can dispense with my hat, but scarce with the thought or memory of my Saviour: I cannot laugh at, but rather pity, the fruitless journeys of Pilgrims, or contemn the miserable condition of Fryars; for though misplaced in Circumstances there is something in it of Devotion. I could never hear the _Ave-Mary_ Bell[7] without an elevation, or think it a sufficient warrant, because they erred in one circumstance, for me to err in all, that is, in silence and dumb contempt; whilst therefore they directed their Devotions to Her, I offered mine to God, and rectifie the Errors of their Prayers by rightly ordering mine own: At a solemn Procession I have wept abundantly, while my consorts blind with opposition and prejudice, have fallen into an excess of scorn and laughter: There are questionless both in _Greek_, _Roman_, and _African_ Churches, Solemnities and Ceremonies, whereof the wiser Zeals do make a Christian use, and stand condemned by us, not as evil in themselves, but as allurements and baits of superstition to those vulgar heads that look asquint on the face of Truth, and those unstable Judgments that cannot resist in the narrow point and centre of Virtue without a reel or stagger to the Circumference.

[7] _A Church Bell that tolls every day at six and twelve of the clock; at the hearing whereof, everyone in what place soever, either of House or Street, betakes himself to his prayer, which is commonly directed to the Virgin._

SECT. 4

As there were many Reformers, so likewise many Reformations; every Country proceeding in a particular way and method, according as their national Interest, together with their Constitution and Clime, inclined them; some angrily, and with extremity; others calmly, and with mediocrity; not rending, but easily dividing the community, and leaving an honest possibility of a reconciliation; which though peaceable Spirits do desire, and may conceive that revolution of time and the mercies of God may effect, yet that judgment that shall continue the present antipathies between the two extreams, their contrarieties in condition, affection, and opinion, may with the same hopes expect an union in the Poles of Heaven.

SECT. 5

But to difference my self nearer, and draw into a lesser Circle, There is no Church, whose every part so squares unto my Conscience; whose Articles, Constitutions, and Customs, seem so consonant unto reason, and as it were framed to my particular Devotion, as this whereof I hold my Belief, the Church of _England_, to whose Faith I am a sworn Subject; and therefore in a double Obligation subscribe unto her Articles, and endeavour to observe her Constitutions; whatsoever is beyond, as points indifferent, I observe according to the rules of my private reason, or the humour and fashion of my Devotion; neither believing this, because _Luther_ affirmed it, or disproving that, because _Calvin_ hath disavouched it. I condemn not all things in the Council of _Trent_, nor approve all in the Synod of _Dort_. In brief, where the Scripture is silent, the Church is my Text; where that speaks, 'tis but my Comment: where there is a joynt silence of both, I borrow not the rules of my Religion from _Rome_ or _Geneva_, but the dictates of my own reason. It is an unjust scandal of our adversaries, and a gross errour in our selves, to compute the Nativity of our Religion from _Henry_ the Eighth, who, though he rejected the Pope, refus'd not the faith of _Rome_, and effected no more than what his own Predecessors desired and assayed in Ages past, and was conceived the State of _Venice_ would have attempted in our days. It is as uncharitable a point in us to fall upon those popular scurrilities and opprobrious scoffs of the Bishop of _Rome_, to whom as a temporal Prince, we owe the duty of good language: I confess there is cause of passion between us; by his sentence I stand excommunicated, Heretick is the best language he affords me; yet can no ear witness I ever returned him the name of Antichrist, Man of Sin, or Whore of _Babylon_. It is the method of Charity to suffer without reaction: Those usual Satyrs and invectives of the Pulpit may perchance produce a good effect on the vulgar, whose ears are opener to Rhetorick than Logick; yet do they in no wise confirm the faith of wiser Believers, who know that a good cause needs not to be pardon'd by passion, but can sustain it self upon a temperate dispute.

SECT. 6

I could never divide my self from any man upon the difference of an opinion, or be angry with his judgment for not agreeing with me in that from which perhaps within a few days I should dissent my self. I have no Genius to disputes in Religion, and have often thought it wisdom to decline them, especially upon a disadvantage, or when the cause of truth might suffer in the weakness of my patronage: Where we desire to be informed, 'tis good to contest with men above our selves; but to confirm and establish our opinions, 'tis best to argue with judgments below our own, that the frequent spoils and Victories over their reasons may settle in ourselves an esteem and confirmed Opinion of our own. Every man is not a proper Champion for Truth, nor fit to take up the Gauntlet in the cause of Verity: Many, from the ignorance of these Maximes, and an inconsiderate Zeal unto Truth, have too rashly charged the Troops of Error, and remain as Trophies unto the enemies of Truth: A man may be in as just possession of Truth as of a City, and yet be forced to surrender; 'tis therefore far better to enjoy her with peace, than to hazzard her on a battle: if therefore there rise any doubts in my way, I do forget them, or at least defer them till my better setled judgement and more manly reason be able to resolve them; for I perceive every man's own reason is his best _OEdipus_, and will upon a reasonable truce, find a way to loose those bonds wherewith the subtleties of error have enchained our more flexible and tender judgements. In Philosophy, where Truth seems double-fac'd, there is no man more Paradoxical than my self: but in Divinity I love to keep the Road; and, though not in an implicite, yet an humble faith, follow the great wheel of the Church, by which I move, not reserving any proper Poles or motion from the Epicycle of my own brain; by this means I leave no gap for Heresie, Schismes, or Errors, of which at present I hope I shall not injure Truth to say I have no taint or tincture: I must confess my greener studies have been polluted with two or three, not any begotten in the latter Centuries, but old and obsolete, such as could never have been revived, but by such extravagant and irregular heads as mine: for indeed Heresies perish not with their Authors, but, like the river _Arethusa_, though they lose their currents in one place, they rise up again in another: One General Council is not able to extirpate one single Heresie; it may be cancell'd for the present; but revolution of time, and the like aspects from Heaven, will restore it, when it will flourish till it be condemned again. For as though there were a _Metempsuchosis_, and the soul of one man passed into another; Opinions do find, after certain Revolutions, men and minds like those that first begat them. To see ourselves again, we need not look for Plato's year:[8] every man is not only himself; there hath been many _Diogenes_, and as many _Timons_, though but few of that name; men are liv'd over again, the world is now as it was in Ages past; there was none then, but there hath been some one since that Parallels him, and is, as it were, his revived self.

[8] _A revolution of certain thousand years, when all things should return unto their former estate, and he be teaching again in his School as when he delivered this Opinion._

SECT. 7

Now the first of mine was that of the _Arabians_, That the Souls of men perished with their Bodies, but should yet be raised again at the last day: not that I did absolutely conceive a mortality of the Soul; but if that were, which Faith, not Philosophy hath yet throughly disproved, and that both entred the grave together, yet I held the same conceit thereof that we all do of the body, that it should rise again. Surely it is but the merits of our unworthy Natures, if we sleep in darkness until the last Alarm. A serious reflex upon my own unworthiness did make me backward from challenging this prerogative of my Soul; so that I might enjoy my Saviour at the last, I could with patience be nothing almost unto Eternity. The second was that of _Origen_, That God would not persist in his vengeance for ever, but after a definite time of his wrath, he would release the damned Souls from torture: which error I fell into upon a serious contemplation of the great Attribute of God, his Mercy; and did a little cherish it in my self, because I found therein no malice, and a ready weight to sway me from the other extream of despair, whereunto Melancholy and Contemplative Natures are too easily disposed. A third there is which I did never positively maintain or practise, but have often wished it had been consonant to Truth, and not offensive to my Religion, and that is the Prayer for the dead; whereunto I was inclin'd from some charitable inducements, whereby I could scarce contain my Prayers for a friend at the ringing of a Bell, or behold his Corps without an Orison for his Soul: 'Twas a good way, methought, to be remembred by posterity, and far more noble than an History. These opinions I never maintained with pertinacy, or endeavoured to inveagle any mans belief unto mine, nor so much as ever revealed or disputed them with my dearest friends; by which means I neither propagated them in others, nor confirmed them in my self; but suffering them to flame upon their own substance, without addition of new fuel, they went out insensibly of themselves: therefore these Opinions, though condemned by lawful Councels, were not Heresies in me, but bare Errors, and single Lapses of my understanding, without a joynt depravity of my will: Those have not onely depraved understandings, but diseased affections, which cannot enjoy a singularity without an Heresie, or be the Author of an Opinion without they be of a Sect also; this was the villany of the first Schism of _Lucifer_, who was not content to err alone, but drew into his Faction many Legions; and upon this experience he tempted only _Eve_, as well understanding the Communicable nature of Sin, and that to deceive but one, was tacitely and upon consequence to delude them both.

SECT. 8

That Heresies should arise, we have the Prophesie of Christ; but that old ones should be abolished, we hold no prediction. That there must be Heresies, is true, not only in our Church, but also in any other: even in doctrines heretical, there will be super-heresies; and Arians not only divided from their Church, but also among themselves: for heads that are disposed unto Schism and complexionally propense to innovation, are naturally disposed for a community; nor will be ever confined unto the order or oeconomy of one body; and therefore when they separate from others, they knit but loosely among themselves, nor contented with a general breach or dichotomy with their Church, do subdivide and mince themselves almost into Atoms. 'Tis true, that men of singular parts and humours have not been free from singular opinions and conceits in all Ages; retaining something, not only beside the opinion of his own Church or any other, but also any particular Author; which notwithstanding a sober Judgment may do without offence or heresie; for there is yet, after all the Decrees of Councils and the niceties of Schools, many things untouch'd, unimagin'd, wherein the liberty of an honest reason may play and expatiate with security, and far without the circle of an Heresie.

SECT. 9

As for those wingy Mysteries in Divinity, and airy subtleties in Religion, which have unhing'd the brains of better heads, they never stretched the _Pia Mater_ of mine. Methinks there be not impossibilities enough in Religion for an active faith; the deepest Mysteries ours contains have not only been illustrated, but maintained, by Syllogism and the rule of Reason. I love to lose my self in a mystery, to pursue my Reason to an _O altitudo!_ 'Tis my solitary recreation to pose my apprehension with those involved Ænigma's and riddles of the Trinity, with Incarnation, and Resurrection. I can answer all the Objections of Satan and my rebellious reason with that odd resolution I learned of _Tertullian, Certum est quia impossibile est_. I desire to exercise my faith in the difficultest point; for to credit ordinary and visible objects is not faith, but perswasion. Some believe the better for seeing Christ's Sepulchre; and when they have seen the Red Sea, doubt not of the Miracle. Now contrarily, I bless my self and am thankful that I lived not in the days of Miracles, that I never saw Christ nor His Disciples; I would not have been one of those _Israelites_ that pass'd the Red Sea, nor one of Christ's patients on whom he wrought his wonders; then had my faith been thrust upon me, nor should I enjoy that greater blessing pronounced to all that believe and saw not. 'Tis an easie and necessary belief, to credit what our eye and sense hath examined: I believe he was dead, and buried, and rose again; and desire to see him in his glory, rather than to contemplate him in his Cenotaphe or Sepulchre. Nor is this much to believe; as we have reason, we owe this faith unto History: they only had the advantage of a bold and noble Faith, who lived before his coming, who upon obscure prophesies and mystical Types could raise a belief, and expect apparent impossibilities.

SECT. 10

'Tis true, there is an edge in all firm belief, and with an easie Metaphor we may say, the Sword of Faith; but in these obscurities I rather use it in the adjunct the Apostle gives it, a Buckler; under which I conceive a wary combatant may lye invulnerable. Since I was of understanding to know we knew nothing, my reason hath been more pliable to the will of Faith; I am now content to understand a mystery without a rigid definition, in an easie and Platonick description. That[9] allegorical description of _Hermes_, pleaseth me beyond all the Metaphysical definitions of Divines; where I cannot satisfie my reason, I love to humour my fancy: I had as live you tell me that _anima est angelus hominis, est Corpus Dei_, as _Entelechia; Lux est umbra Dei_, as _actus perspicui_; where there is an obscurity too deep for our Reason, 'tis good to sit down with a description, periphrasis, or adumbration; for by acquainting our Reason how unable it is to display the visible and obvious effects of nature, it becomes more humble and submissive unto the subtleties of Faith; and thus I teach my haggard and unreclaimed reason to stoop unto the lure of Faith. I believe there was already a tree whose fruit our unhappy Parents tasted, though, in the same Chapter when God forbids it, 'tis positively said, the plants of the field were not yet grown, for God had not caus'd it to rain upon the earth. I believe that the Serpent (if we shall literally understand it) from his proper form and figure, made his motion on his belly before the curse. I find the tryal of the Pucellage and virginity of Women, which God ordained the _Jews_, is very fallible. Experience and History informs me, that not onely many particular Women, but likewise whole Nations have escaped the curse of Childbirth, which God seems to pronounce upon the whole Sex; yet do I believe that all this is true, which indeed my Reason would perswade me to be false; and this I think is no vulgar part of Faith, to believe a thing not only above, but contrary to Reason, and against the Arguments of our proper Senses.

[9] _Sphæra cujus centrum ubique, circumferentia nullibi._

SECT. 11

In my solitary and retired imagination (_Neque enim cum porticus, aut me lectulus accepit, desum mihi_) I remember I am not alone, and therefore forget not to contemplate him and his Attributes who is ever with me, especially those two mighty ones, his Wisdom and Eternity; with the one I recreate, with the other I confound my understanding: for who can speak of Eternity without a soloecism, or think thereof without an Extasie? Time we may comprehend; 'tis but five days elder then our selves, and hath the same Horoscope with the World; but to retire so far back as to apprehend a beginning, to give such an infinite start forwards as to conceive an end in an essence that we affirm hath neither the one nor the other, it puts my Reason to _St. Paul's_ Sanctuary: my Philosophy dares not say the Angels can do it; God hath not made a Creature that can comprehend him; 'tis a privilege of His own nature. _I am that I am_, was his own definition unto _Moses_; and 'twas a short one, to confound mortality, that durst question God, or ask him what he was; indeed he onely is; all others have and shall be; but in Eternity there is no distinction of Tenses; and therefore that terrible term _Predestination_, which hath troubled so many weak heads to conceive, and the wisest to explain, is in respect to God no prescious determination of our Estates to come, but a definitive blast of his Will already fulfilled, and at the instant that he first decreed it; for to his Eternity which is indivisible and all together, the last Trump is already sounded, the reprobates in the flame, and the blessed in _Abraham's_ bosome. _St. Peter_ speaks modestly, when he saith, a thousand years to God are but as one day: for to speak like a Philosopher, those continued instances of time which flow into a thousand years, make not to Him one moment; what to us is to come, to his Eternity is present, his whole duration being but one permanent point, without Succession, Parts, Flux, or Division.

SECT. 12

There is no Attribute that adds more difficulty to the mystery of the Trinity, where, though in a relative way of Father and Son, we must deny a priority. I wonder how _Aristotle_ could conceive the World eternal, or how he could make good two Eternities: his similitude of a Triangle, comprehended in a square, doth somewhat illustrate the Trinity of our Souls, and that the Triple Unity of God; for there is in us not three, but a Trinity of Souls, because there is in us, if not three distinct Souls, yet differing faculties, that can and do subsist apart in different Subjects, and yet in us are thus united as to make but one Soul and substance: if one Soul were so perfect as to inform three distinct Bodies, that were a pretty Trinity: conceive, the distinct number of three, not divided nor separated by the Intellect, but actually comprehended in its Unity, and that is a perfect Trinity. I have often admired the mystical way of _Pythagoras_, and the secret Magick of numbers. Beware of Philosophy, is a precept not to be received in too large a sense; for in this Mass of Nature there is a set of things that carry in their Front, though not in Capital Letters, yet in Stenography and short Characters, something of Divinity, which to wiser Reasons serve as Luminaries in the Abyss of Knowledge, and to judicious beliefs as Scales and Roundles to mount the Pinacles and highest pieces of Divinity. The severe Schools shall never laugh me out of the Philosophy of _Hermes_, that this visible World is but a Picture of the invisible, wherein as in a Pourtraict, things are not truely, but in equivocal shapes, and as they counterfeit some more real substance in that invisible Fabrick.

SECT. 13

That other Attribute wherewith I recreate my devotion, is his Wisdom, in which I am happy; and for the contemplation of this only, do not repent me that I was bred in the way of Study: The advantage I have of the vulgar, with the content and happiness I conceive therein, is an ample recompence for all my endeavours, in what part of knowledge soever. Wisdom is his most beauteous Attribute, no man can attain unto it, yet _Solomon_ pleased God when he desired it. He is wise, because he knows all things; and he knoweth all things, because he made them all: but his greatest knowledge is in comprehending that he made not, that is, himself. And this is also the greatest knowledge in man. For this do I honour my own profession, and embrace the Counsel even of the Devil himself: had he read such a Lecture in Paradise as he did at _Delphos_,[10] we had better known our selves; nor had we stood in fear to know him. I know he is wise in all, wonderful in what we conceive, but far more in what we comprehend not; for we behold him but asquint, upon reflex or shadow; our understanding is dimmer than _Moses_ Eye; we are ignorant of the back-parts or lower side of his Divinity; therefore to prie into the maze of his Counsels is not only folly in man, but presumption even in Angels; like us, they are his Servants, not his Senators; he holds no Counsel, but that mystical one of the Trinity, wherein though there be three Persons, there is but one mind that decrees without Contradiction: nor needs he any; his actions are not begot with deliberation, his Wisdom naturally knows what's best; his intellect stands ready fraught with the superlative and purest _Idea's_ of goodness; consultation and election, which are two motions in us, make but one in him; his actions springing from his power at the first touch of his will. These are Contemplations Metaphysical: my humble speculations have another Method, and are content to trace and discover those expressions he hath left in his Creatures, and the obvious effects of Nature; there is no danger to profound these mysteries, no _sanctum sanctorum_ in Philosophy: the World was made to be inhabited by Beasts, but studied and contemplated by Man: 'tis the Debt of our Reason we owe unto God, and the homage we pay for not being Beasts; without this, the World is still as though it had not been, or as it was before the sixth day, when as yet there was not a Creature that could conceive, or say there was a World. The wisdom of God receives small honour from those vulgar Heads that rudely stare about, and with a gross rusticity admire his works; those highly magnifie him, whose judicious inquiry into His Acts, and deliberate research into His Creatures, return the duty of a devout and learned admiration. Therefore,

Search while thou wilt, and let thy reason go, To ransome truth, even to th' Abyss below; Rally the scattered Causes; and that line Which Nature twists, be able to untwine It is thy Makers will, for unto none, But unto reason can he e'er be known. The Devils do know Thee, but those damn'd Meteors Build not thy Glory, but confound thy Creatures. Teach my indeavours so thy works to read, That learning them in thee, I may proceed. Give thou my reason that instructive flight, Whose weary wings may on thy hands still light. Teach me to soar aloft, yet ever so, When neer the Sun, to stoop again below. Thus shall my humble Feathers safely hover, And, though near Earth, more than the Heavens discover And then at last, when homeward I shall drive, Rich with the Spoils of nature to my hive, There will I sit like that industrious Flie, Buzzing thy praises, which shall never die, Till death abrupts them, and succeeding Glory Bid me go on in a more lasting story.

And this is almost all wherein an humble Creature may endeavour to requite and some way to retribute unto his Creator: for if not he that saith, _Lord, Lord_, but _he that doth the will of his Father, shall be saved_; certainly our wills must be our performances, and our intents make out our Actions; otherwise our pious labours shall find anxiety in our Graves, and our best endeavours not hope, but fear a resurrection.

[10] {~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER GAMMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH PERISPOMENI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH VARIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}, Nosce teipsum.

SECT. 14

There is but one first cause, and four second causes of all things; some are without efficient, as God; others without matter, as Angels; some without form, as the first matter: but every Essence created or uncreated, hath its final cause, and some positive end both of its Essence and Operation; this is the cause I grope after in the works of Nature; on this hangs the providence of God: to raise so beauteous a structure as the World and the Creatures thereof, was but his Art; but their sundry and divided operations, with their predestinated ends, are from the Treasure of his wisdom. In the causes, nature, and affections of the Eclipses of the Sun and Moon, there is most excellent speculation; but to profound farther, and to contemplate a reason why his providence hath so disposed and ordered their motions in that vast circle as to conjoyn and obscure each other, is a sweeter piece of Reason, and a diviner point of Philosophy; therefore sometimes, and in some things, there appears to me as much Divinity in _Galen_ his books _De Usu Partium_, as in _Suarez_ Metaphysicks: Had _Aristotle_ been as curious in the enquiry of this cause as he was of the other, he had not left behind him an imperfect piece of Philosophy, but an absolute tract of Divinity.

SECT. 15

_Natura nihil aget frustra_, is the only indisputed Axiome in Philosophy; there are no _Grotesques_ in nature; not any thing framed to fill up empty Cantons, and unnecessary spaces: in the most imperfect Creatures, and such as were not preserved in the Ark, but having their Seeds and Principles in the womb of Nature, are every where, where the power of the Sun is; in these is the Wisdom of his hand discovered. Out of this rank _Solomon_ chose the object of his admiration; indeed what reason may not go to School to the wisdom of Bees, Ants, and Spiders? what wise hand teacheth them to do what reason cannot teach us? ruder heads stand amazed at those prodigious pieces of Nature, Whales, Elephants, Dromidaries and Camels; these, I confess, are the Colossus and Majestick pieces of her hand: but in these narrow Engines there is more curious Mathematicks; and the civility of these little Citizens, more neatly sets forth the Wisdom of their Maker. Who admires not _Regio-Montanus_ his Fly beyond his Eagle, or wonders not more at the operation of two Souls in those little Bodies, than but one in the Trunk of a Cedar? I could never content my contemplation with those general pieces of wonder, the Flux and Reflux of the Sea, the increase of _Nile_, the conversion of the Needle to the North; and have studied to match and parallel those in the more obvious and neglected pieces of Nature, which without further trouble I can do in the Cosmography of my self; we carry with us the wonders we seek without us: There is all _Africa_ and her prodigies in us; we are that bold and adventurous piece of nature, which he that studies wisely learns in a _compendium_ what others labour at in a divided piece and endless volume.

SECT. 16

Thus there are two Books from which I collect my Divinity; besides that written one of God, another of his servant Nature, that universal and publick Manuscript, that lies expans'd unto the Eyes of all, those that never saw him in the one, have discovered him in the other: this was the Scripture and Theology of the Heathens: the natural motion of the Sun made them more admire him, than its supernatural station did the Children of _Israel_; the ordinary effects of nature wrought more admiration in them than in the other all his Miracles; surely the Heathens knew better how to joyn and read these mystical Letters than we Christians, who cast a more careless Eye on these common Hieroglyphicks, and disdain to suck Divinity from the flowers of Nature. Nor do I so forget God as to adore the name of Nature; which I define not with the Schools, to be the principle of motion and rest, but that streight and regular line, that settled and constant course the Wisdom of God hath ordained the actions of His creatures, according to their several kinds. To make a revolution every day, is the Nature of the Sun, because of that necessary course which God hath ordained it, from which it cannot swerve but by a faculty from that voice which first did give it motion. Now this course of Nature God seldome alters or perverts, but like an excellent Artist hath so contrived his work, that with the self same instrument, without a new creation, he may effect his obscurest designs. Thus he sweetneth the Water with a Word, preserveth the Creatures in the Ark, which the blast of his mouth might have as easily created; for God is like a skilful Geometrician, who when more easily and with one stroak of his Compass he might describe or divide a right line, had yet rather do this in a circle or longer way; according to the constituted and fore-laid principles of his Art: yet this rule of his he doth sometimes pervert, to acquaint the World with his Prerogative, lest the arrogancy of our reason should question his power, and conclude he could not; and thus I call the effects of Nature the works of God, whose hand and instrument she only is; and therefore to ascribe his actions unto her, is to devolve the honour of the principal agent upon the instrument; which if with reason we may do, then let our hammers rise up and boast they have built our houses, and our pens receive the honour of our writings. I hold there is a general beauty in the works of God, and therefore no deformity in any kind or species of creature whatsoever: I cannot tell by what Logick we call a _Toad_, a _Bear_, or an _Elephant_ ugly, they being created in those outward shapes and figures which best express the actions of their inward forms. And having past that general Visitation of God, who saw that all that he had made was good, that is, conformable to his Will, which abhors deformity, and is the rule of order and beauty; there is no deformity but in Monstrosity; wherein, notwithstanding, there is a kind of Beauty. Nature so ingeniously contriving the irregular parts, as they become sometimes more remarkable than the principal Fabrick. To speak yet more narrowly, there was never any thing ugly or mis-shapen, but the Chaos; wherein, notwithstanding, to speak strictly, there was no deformity, because no form; nor was it yet impregnant by the voice of God; now Nature was not at variance with Art, nor Art with Nature, they being both servants of his providence: Art is the perfection of Nature: were the World now as it was the sixth day, there were yet a Chaos: Nature hath made one World, and Art another. In brief, all things are artificial; for Nature is the Art of God.

SECT. 17

This is the ordinary and open way of his providence, which Art and Industry have in a good part discovered, whose effects we may foretel without an Oracle: to foreshew these, is not Prophesie, but Prognostication. There is another way, full of Meanders and Labyrinths, whereof the Devil and Spirits have no exact Ephemerides, and that is a more particular and obscure method of his providence, directing the operations of individuals and single Essences: this we call Fortune, that serpentine and crooked line, whereby he draws those actions his wisdom intends, in a more unknown and secret way: This cryptick and involved method of his providence have I ever admired, nor can I relate the History of my life, the occurrences of my days, the escapes of dangers, and hits of chance, with a _Bezo las Manos_ to Fortune, or a bare Gramercy to my good Stars: _Abraham_ might have thought the _Ram_ in the thicket came thither by accident; humane reason would have said, that meer chance conveyed _Moses_ in the Ark to the sight of _Pharoh's_ daughter: what a Labyrinth is there in the story of _Joseph_, able to convert a Stoick? Surely there are in every man's Life certain rubs, doublings, and wrenches, which pass a while under the effects of chance, but at the last well examined, prove the meer hand of God. 'Twas not dumb chance, that to discover the Fougade or Powder-plot, contrived a miscarriage in the Letter. I like the victory of 88. the better for that one occurrence, which our enemies imputed to our dishonour and the partiality of Fortune, to wit, the tempests and contrariety of Winds. King _Philip_ did not detract from the Nation, when he said, he sent his Armado to fight with men, and not to combate with the Winds. Where there is a manifest disproportion between the powers and forces of two several agents, upon a Maxime of reason we may promise the Victory to the Superiour; but when unexpected accidents slip in, and unthought of occurences intervene, these must proceed from a power that owes no obedience to those Axioms; where, as in the writing upon the wall, we may behold the hand, but see not the spring that moves it. The success of that petty province of _Holland_ (of which the Grand _Seignour_ proudly said, if they should trouble him as they did the _Spaniard_, he would send his men with shovels and pick-axes, and throw it into the Sea,) I cannot altogether ascribe to the ingenuity and industry of the people, but the mercy of God, that hath disposed them to such a thriving Genius; and to the will of his Providence, that disposeth her favour to each Country in their pre-ordinate season. All cannot be happy at once; for, because the glory of one State depends upon the ruine of another, there is a revolution and vicissitude of their greatness, and must obey the swing of that wheel, not moved by Intelligences, but by the hand of God, whereby all Estates arise to their _Zenith_ and Vertical points according to their predestinated periods. For the lives, not only of men, but of Commonwealths, and the whole World, run not upon an Helix that still enlargeth; but on a Circle, where arriving to their Meridian, they decline in obscurity, and fall under the Horizon again.

SECT. 18

These must not therefore he named the effects of Fortune, but in a relative way, and as we term the works of Nature: it was the ignorance of mans reason that begat this very name, and by a careless term miscalled the Providence of God: for there is no liberty for causes to operate in a loose and stragling way; nor any effect whatsoever, but hath its warrant from some universal or superiour Cause. 'Tis not a ridiculous devotion to say a prayer before a game at Tables; for even in _sortilegies_ and matters of greatest uncertainty, there is a setled and preordered course of effects. It is we that are blind, not Fortune: because our Eye is too dim to discover the mystery of her effects, we foolishly paint her blind, and hoodwink the Providence of the Almighty. I cannot justifie that contemptible Proverb, _That fools only are Fortunate_; or that insolent Paradox, _That a wise man is out of the reach of Fortune_; much less those opprobrious epithets of Poets, _Whore_, _Bawd_, and _Strumpet_. 'Tis, I confess, the common fate of men of singular gifts of mind to be destitute of those of Fortune, which doth not any way deject the Spirit of wiser judgements, who throughly understand the justice of this proceeding; and being inrich'd with higher donatives, cast a more careless eye on these vulgar parts of felicity. It is a most unjust ambition to desire to engross the mercies of the Almighty, not to be content with the goods of mind, without a possession of those of body or Fortune: and it is an error worse than heresie, to adore these complemental and circumstantial pieces of felicity, and undervalue those perfections and essential points of happiness wherein we resemble our Maker. To wiser desires it is satisfaction enough to deserve, though not to enjoy the favours of Fortune; let Providence provide for Fools: 'tis not partiality, but equity in God, who deals with us but as our natural Parents; those that are able of Body and Mind, he leaves to their deserts; to those of weaker merits he imparts a larger portion, and pieces out the defect of one, by the access of the other. Thus have we no just quarrel with Nature, for leaving us naked; or to envy the Horns, Hoofs, Skins, and Furs of other Creatures, being provided with Reason, that can supply them all. We need not labour with so many Arguments to confute Judicial Astrology; for if there be a truth therein, it doth not injure Divinity: if to be born under _Mercury_ disposeth us to be witty, under _Jupiter_ to be wealthy; I do not owe a Knee unto those, but unto that merciful Hand that hath ordered my indifferent and uncertain nativity unto such benevolous Aspects. Those that hold that all things are governed by Fortune, had not erred, had they not persisted there: The _Romans_ that erected a temple to Fortune, acknowledged therein, though in a blinder way, somewhat of Divinity; for in a wise supputation all things begin and end in the Almighty. There is a nearer way to Heaven than _Homer's_ Chain; an easy Logick may conjoin heaven and Earth, in one Argument, and with less than a _Sorites_ resolve all things into God. For though we christen effects by their most sensible and nearest Causes, yet is God the true and infallible Cause of all, whose concourse though it be general, yet doth it subdivide it self into the particular Actions of every thing, and is that Spirit, by which each singular Essence not only subsists, but performs its operation.

SECT. 19

The bad construction, and perverse comment on these pair of second Causes, or visible hands of God, have perverted the Devotion of many unto Atheism; who, forgetting the honest Advisoes of Faith, have listened unto the conspiracy of Passion and Reason. I have therefore always endeavoured to compose those Feuds and angry Dissensions between Affection, Faith and Reason: For there is in our Soul a kind of Triumvirate, or triple Government of three Competitors, which distracts the Peace of this our Common-wealth, not less than did that other the State of _Rome_.

As Reason is a Rebel unto Faith, so Passion unto Reason: As the Propositions of Faith seem absurd unto Reason, so the Theorems of Reason unto Passion, and both unto Reason; yet a moderate and peaceable discretion may so state and order the matter, that they may be all Kings, and yet make but one Monarchy, every one exercising his Soveraignty and Prerogative in a due time and place, according to the restraint and limit of circumstance. There is, as in Philosophy, so in Divinity, sturdy doubts and boisterous Objections, wherewith the unhappiness of our knowledge too nearly acquainteth us. More of these no man hath known than my self, which I confess I conquered, not in a martial posture, but on my Knees. For our endeavours are not only to combat with doubts, but always to dispute with the Devil: the villany of that Spirit takes a hint of Infidelity from our Studies, and by demonstrating a naturality in one way, makes us mistrust a miracle in another. Thus having perused the _Archidoxes_ and read the secret Sympathies of things, he would disswade my belief from the miracle of the Brazen Serpent, make me conceit that Image worked by Sympathy, and was but an _Ægyptian_ trick to cure their Diseases without a miracle. Again, having seen some experiments of _Bitumen_, and having read far more of _Naphtha_, he whispered to my curiosity the fire of the Altar might be natural; and bid me mistrust a miracle in _Elias_, when he entrenched the Altar round with Water: for that inflamable substance yields not easily unto Water, but flames in the Arms of its Antagonist. And thus would he inveagle my belief to think the combustion of _Sodom_ might be natural, and that there was an Asphaltick and Bituminous nature in that Lake before the Fire of _Gomorrah_. I know that _Manna_ is now plentifully gathered in _Calabria_; and _Josephus_ tells me, in his days it was as plentiful in _Arabia_; the Devil therefore made the _quære_, Where was then the miracle in the days of _Moses_: the _Israelite_ saw but that in his time, the Natives of those Countries behold in ours. Thus the Devil played at Chess with me, and yielding a Pawn, thought to gain a Queen of me, taking advantage of my honest endeavours; and whilst I laboured to raise the structure of my Reason, he strived to undermine the edifice of my Faith.

SECT. 20

Neither had these or any other ever such advantage of me, as to incline me to any point of Infidelity or desperate positions of Atheism; for I have been these many years of opinion there was never any. Those that held was the difference of Man from Beasts, have spoken probably, and proceed upon a principle as inductive as the other. That doctrine of _Epicurus_, that denied the Providence of God, was no Atheism, but a magnificent and high strained conceit of his Majesty, which he deemed too sublime to mind the trivial Actions of those inferiour Creatures. That fatal Necessity of the Stoicks, is nothing but the immutable Law of his will. Those that heretofore denied the Divinity of the Holy Ghost, have been condemned, but as Hereticks; and those that now deny our Saviour (though more than Hereticks) are not so much as Atheists: for though they deny two persons in the Trinity, they hold as we do, there is but one God.

That Villain and Secretary of Hell, that composed that miscreant piece of the Three Impostors, though divided from all Religions, and was neither Jew, Turk, nor Christian, was not a positive Atheist. I confess every country hath its _Machiavel_, every Age its _Lucian_, whereof common Heads must not hear, nor more advanced Judgments too rashly venture on: It is the Rhetorick of Satan, and may pervert a loose or prejudicate belief.

SECT. 21

I confess I have perused them all, and can discover nothing that may startle a discreet belief; yet are there heads carried off with the Wind and breath of such motives. I remember a Doctor in Physick of _Italy_, who could not perfectly believe the immortality of the Soul, because _Galen_ seemed to make a doubt thereof. With another I was familiarly acquainted in _France_, a Divine, and a man of singular parts, that on the same point was so plunged and gravelled with [11]three lines of _Seneca_, that all our Antidotes, drawn from both Scripture and Philosophy, could not expel the poyson of his errour. There are a set of Heads, that can credit the relations of Mariners, yet question the Testimonies of St. _Paul_; and peremptorily maintain the traditions of _Ælian_ or _Pliny_, yet in Histories of Scripture raise Queries and Objections, believing no more than they can parallel in humane Authors. I confess there are in Scripture Stories that do exceed the Fables of Poets, and to a captious Reader sound like _Garagantua_ or _Bevis_: Search all the Legends of times past, and the fabulous conceits of these present, and 'twill be hard to find one that deserves to carry the Buckler unto _Sampson_; yet is all this of an easie possibility, if we conceive a divine concourse, or an influence but from the little Finger of the Almighty. It is impossible that either in the discourse of man, or in the infallible Voice of God, to the weakness of our apprehensions, there should not appear irregularities, contradictions, and antinomies: my self could shew a Catalogue of doubts, never yet imagined nor questioned, as I know, which are not resolved at the first hearing; not fantastick Queries or Objections of Air; for I cannot hear of Atoms in Divinity. I can read the History of the Pigeon that was sent out of the Ark, and returned no more, yet not question how she found out her Mate that was left behind: That _Lazarus_ was raised from the dead, yet not demand where in the interim his Soul awaited; or raise a Law-case, whether his Heir might lawfully detain his inheritance bequeathed unto him by his death, and he, though restored to life, have no Plea or Title unto his former possessions. Whether _Eve_ was framed out of the left side of _Adam_, I dispute not; because I stand not yet assured which is the right side of a man, or whether there be any such distinction in Nature: that she was edified out of the Rib of _Adam_, I believe, yet raise no question who shall arise with that Rib at the Resurrection. Whether _Adam_ was an Hermaphrodite, as the Rabbins contend upon the Letter of the Text, because it is contrary to reason, there should be an Hermaphrodite before there was a Woman; or a composition of two Natures before there was a second composed. Likewise, whether the World was created in Autumn, Summer, or the Spring, because it was created in them all; for whatsoever Sign the Sun possesseth, those four Seasons are actually existent: It is the Nature of this Luminary to distinguish the several Seasons of the year, all which it makes at one time in the whole Earth, and successive in any part thereof. There are a bundle of curiosities, not only in Philosophy, but in Divinity, proposed and discussed by men of most supposed abilities, which indeed are not worthy our vacant hours, much less our serious Studies. Pieces only fit to be placed in _Pantagruel's_ Library, or bound up with Tartaretus, _De modo Cacandi_. [SN: _In Rabbelais._]

[11] _Post Mortem nihil est, ipsaque Mors nihil. Mors individua est, noxia corpori, nec patiens animæ ... Toti morimur, nullaque pars manet nostri._

SECT. 22

These are niceties that become not those that peruse so serious a Mystery: There are others more generally questioned and called to the Bar, yet methinks of an easie and possible truth.

'Tis ridiculous to put off, or down the general Flood of _Noah_ in that particular inundation of _Deucalion_: that there was a Deluge once, seems not to me so great a Miracle, as that there is not one always. How all the kinds of Creatures, not only in their own bulks, but with a competency of food and sustenance, might be preserved in one Ark, and within the extent of three hundred Cubits, to a reason that rightly examines it, will appear very feasible. There is another secret not contained in the Scripture, which is more hard to comprehend, and put the honest Father to the refuge of a Miracle: and that is, not only how the distinct pieces of the World, and divided Islands should be first planted by men, but inhabited by Tigers, Panthers, and Bears. How _America_ abounded with Beasts of prey, and noxious Animals, yet contained not in it that necessary Creature, a Horse, is very strange. By what passage those, not only Birds, but dangerous and unwelcome Beasts, came over: How there be Creatures there (which are not found in this Triple Continent); all which must needs be strange unto us, that hold but one Ark, and that the Creatures began their progress from the Mountains of _Ararat_: They who to salve this would make the Deluge particular, proceed upon a principle that I can no way grant; not only upon the negative of holy Scriptures, but of mine own Reason, whereby I can make it probable, that the World was as well peopled in the time of _Noah_, as in ours; and fifteen hundred years to people the World, as full a time for them, as four thousand years since have been to us. There are other assertions and common Tenents drawn from Scripture, and generally believed as Scripture, whereunto notwithstanding, I would never betray the liberty of my Reason. 'Tis a Paradox to me, that _Methusalem_ was the longest liv'd of all the Children of _Adam_: and no man will be able to prove it; when from the process of the Text, I can manifest it may be otherwise. That _Judas_ perished by hanging himself, there is no certainty in Scripture: though in one place it seems to affirm it, and by a doubtful word hath given occasion to translate it; yet in another place, in a more punctual description, it makes it improbable, and seems to overthrow it. That our Fathers, after the Flood, erected the Tower of _Babel_ to preserve themselves against a second Deluge, is generally opinioned and believed, yet is there another intention of theirs expressed in Scripture: Besides, it is improbable from the circumstance of the place, that is, a plain in the Land of _Shinar_: These are no points of Faith, and therefore may admit a free dispute. There are yet others, and those familiarly concluded from the Text, wherein (under favour) I see no consequence: the Church of _Rome_, confidently proves the opinion of Tutelary Angels, from that Answer when _Peter_ knockt at the Door; _'Tis not he, but his Angel_; that is, might some say, his Messenger, or some body from him; for so the Original signifies, and is as likely to be the doubtful Families meaning. This exposition I once suggested to a young Divine, that answered upon this point; to which I remember the _Franciscan_ Opponent replyed no more, but That it was a new, and no authentick interpretation.

SECT. 23

These are but the conclusions and fallible discourses of man upon the Word of God, for such I do believe the holy Scriptures: yet were it of man, I could not chuse but say, it was the singularest and superlative piece that hath been extant since the Creation: were I a Pagan, I should not refrain the Lecture of it; and cannot but commend the judgment of _Ptolomy_, that thought not his Library compleat without it. The Alcoran of the _Turks_ (I speak without prejudice) is an ill composed Piece, containing in it vain and ridiculous Errors in Philosophy, impossibilities, fictions, and vanities beyond laughter, maintained by evident and open Sophisms, the Policy of Ignorance, deposition of Universities, and banishment of Learning, that hath gotten Foot by Arms and violence: This without a blow, hath disseminated it self through the whole Earth. It is not unremarkable what _Philo_ first observed, That the Law of _Moses_ continued two thousand years without the least alteration; whereas, we see, the Laws of other Common-weals do alter with occasions; and even those, that pretended their Original from some Divinity, to have vanished without trace or memory. I believe besides _Zoroaster_, there were divers that writ before _Moses_, who, notwithstanding, have suffered the common fate of time. Mens Works have an age like themselves; and though they out-live their Authors, yet have they a stint and period to their duration: This only is a work too hard for the teeth of time, and cannot perish but in the general Flames, when all things shall confess their Ashes.

SECT. 24

I have heard some with deep sighs lament the lost lines of _Cicero_; others with as many groans deplore the combustion of the Library of _Alexandria_: for my own part, I think there be too many in the World, and could with patience behold the urn and ashes of the _Vatican_, could I, with a few others, recover the perished leaves of _Solomon_. I would not omit a Copy of _Enoch's_ Pillars, had they many nearer Authors than _Josephus_, or did not relish somewhat of the Fable. Some men have written more than others have spoken; [12]_Pineda_ quotes more Authors in one work, than are necessary in a whole World. Of those three great inventions in _Germany_, there are two which are not without their incommodities, and 'tis disputable whether they exceed not their use and commodities. 'Tis not a melancholy _Utinam_ of my own, but the desires of better heads, that there were a general Synod; not to unite the incompatible difference of Religion, but for the benefit of learning, to reduce it as it lay at first, in a few, and solid Authors; and to condemn to the fire those swarms & millions of _Rhapsodies_ begotten only to distract and abuse the weaker judgements of Scholars, and _to maintain the trade and mystery of Typographers_.

[12] Pineda _in his_ Monarchica Ecclesiastica _quotes one thousand and forty Authors_.

SECT. 25

I cannot but wonder with what exception the _Samaritans_ could confine their belief to the _Pentateuch_, or five Books of _Moses_. I am ashamed at the Rabbinical Interpretation of the Jews, upon the Old Testament, as much as their defection from the New. And truly it is beyond wonder, how that contemptible and degenerate issue of _Jacob_, once so devoted to Ethnick Superstition, and so easily seduced to the Idolatry of their Neighbours, should now in such an obstinate and peremptory belief adhere unto their own Doctrine, expect impossibilities, and, in the face and eye of the Church, persist without the least hope of Conversion. This is a vice in them, that were a vertue in us; for obstinacy in a bad Cause is but constancy in a good. And herein I must accuse those of my own Religion; for there is not any of such a fugitive Faith, such an unstable belief, as a Christian; none that do so oft transform themselves, not unto several shapes of Christianity and of the same Species, but unto more unnatural and contrary Forms, of Jew and Mahometan; that, from the name of Saviour, can condescend to the bare term of Prophet; and from an old belief that he is come, fall to a new expectation of his coming. It is the promise of Christ to make us all one Flock; but how and when this Union shall be, is as obscure to me as the last day. Of those four Members of Religion we hold a slender proportion; there are, I confess, some new additions, yet small to those which accrew to our Adversaries, and those only drawn from the revolt of Pagans, men but of negative Impieties, and such as deny Christ, but because they never heard of him: but the Religion of the Jew is expressly against the Christian, and the Mahometan against both. For the Turk, in the bulk he now stands, he is beyond all hope of conversion; if he fall asunder, there may be conceived hopes, but not without strong improbabilities. The Jew is obstinate in all fortunes; the persecution of fifteen hundred years hath but confirmed them in their Errour: they have already endured whatsoever may be inflicted, and have suffered, in a bad cause, even to the condemnation of their enemies. Persecution is a bad and indirect way to plant Religion: It hath been the unhappy method of angry Devotions, not only to confirm honest Religion, but wicked Heresies, and extravagant Opinions. It was the first stone and Basis of our Faith; none can more justly boast of Persecutions, and glory in the number and valour of Martyrs; for, to speak properly, those are true and almost only examples of fortitude: Those that are fetch'd from the field, or drawn from the actions of the Camp, are not oft-times so truely precedents of valour as audacity, and at the best attain but to some bastard piece of fortitude: If we shall strictly examine the circumstances and requisites which _Aristotle_ requires to true and perfect valour, we shall find the name only in his Master _Alexander_, and as little in that Roman Worthy, _Julius Cæsar_; and if any, in that easie and active way have done so nobly as to deserve that name, yet in the passive and more terrible piece these have surpassed, and in a more heroical way may claim the honour of that Title. 'Tis not in the power of every honest Faith to proceed thus far, or pass to Heaven through the flames; every one hath it not in that full measure, nor in so audacious and resolute a temper, as to endure those terrible tests and trials; who notwithstanding, in a peaceable way do truely adore their Saviour, and have (no doubt) a Faith acceptable in the eyes of God.

SECT. 26

Now as all that dye in the War are not termed Souldiers; so neither can I properly term all those that suffer in matters of Religion, Martyrs. The Council of _Constance_ condemns _John Huss_ for an Heretick; the Stories of his own Party stile him a Martyr: He must needs offend the Divinity of both, that says he was neither the one nor the other: There are many (questionless) canonised on earth, that shall never be Saints in Heaven; and have their names in Histories and Martyrologies, who in the eyes of God are not so perfect Martyrs, as was that wise Heathen _Socrates_, that suffered on a fundamental point of Religion, the Unity of God. I have often pitied the miserable Bishop that suffered in the cause of _Antipodes_, yet cannot chuse but accuse him of as much madness, for exposing his living on such a trifle; as those of ignorance and folly, that condemned him. I think my conscience will not give me the lye, if I say there are not many extant that in a noble way fear the face of death less than myself; yet, from the moral duty I owe to the Commandment of God, and the natural respects that I tender unto the conservation of my essence and being, I would not perish upon a Ceremony, Politick points, or indifferency: nor is my belief of that untractible temper, as not to bow at their obstacles, or connive at matters wherein there are not manifest impieties: The leaven therefore and ferment of all, not only Civil, but Religious actions, is Wisdom; without which, to commit our selves to the flames is Homicide, and (I fear) but to pass through one fire into another.

SECT. 27

That Miracles are ceased, I can neither prove, nor absolutely deny, much less define the time and period of their cessation: that they survived Christ, is manifest upon the Record of Scripture: that they out-lived the Apostles also, and were revived at the Conversion of Nations, many years after, we cannot deny, if we shall not question those Writers whose testimonies we do not controvert in points that make for our own opinions; therefore that may have some truth in it that is reported by the Jesuites of their Miracles in the _Indies_; I could wish it were true, or had any other testimony than their own Pens. They may easily believe those Miracles abroad, who daily conceive a greater at home, the transmutation of those visible elements into the Body and Blood of our Saviour: for the conversion of Water into Wine, which he wrought in _Cana_, or what the Devil would have had him done in the Wilderness, of Stones into Bread, compared to this, will scarce deserve the name of a Miracle. Though indeed to speak properly, there is not one Miracle greater than another, they being the extraordinary effects of the Hand of God, to which all things are of an equal facility; and to create the World as easie as one single Creature. For this is also a Miracle, not onely to produce effects against, or above Nature, but before Nature; and to create Nature as great a Miracle as to contradict or transcend her. We do too narrowly define the Power of God, restraining it to our capacities. I hold that God can do all things; how he should work contradictions, I do not understand, yet dare not therefore deny. I cannot see why the Angel of God should question _Esdras_ to recal the time past, if it were beyond his own power; or that God should pose mortality in that, which he was not able to perform himself. I will not say God cannot, but he will not perform many things, which we plainly affirm he cannot: this I am sure is the mannerliest proposition, wherein, notwithstanding, I hold no Paradox. For strictly his power is the same with his will, and they both with all the rest do make but one God.

SECT. 28

Therefore that Miracles have been, I do believe; that they may yet be wrought by the living, I do not deny: but have no confidence in those which are fathered on the dead; and this hath ever made me suspect the efficacy of reliques, to examine the bones, question the habits and appurtenances of Saints, and even of Christ himself. I cannot conceive why the Cross that _Helena_ found, and whereon Christ himself dyed, should have power to restore others unto life: I excuse not _Constantine_ from a fall off his Horse, or a mischief from his enemies, upon the wearing those nails on his bridle, which our Saviour bore upon the Cross in his hands. I compute among _Piæ fraudes_, nor many degrees before consecrated Swords and Roses, that which _Baldwyn_, King of _Jerusalem_, return'd the _Genovese_ for their cost and pains in his War, to wit, the ashes of _John_ the Baptist. Those that hold the sanctity of their Souls doth leave behind a tincture and sacred faculty on their bodies, speak naturally of Miracles, and do not salve the doubt. Now one reason I tender so little Devotion unto Reliques, is, I think, the slender and doubtful respect I have always held unto Antiquities: for that indeed which I admire, is far before Antiquity, that is, Eternity; and that is, God himself; who, though he be styled the ancient of days, cannot receive the adjunct of Antiquity, who was before the World, and shall be after it, yet is not older than it; for in his years there is no Climacter; his duration is Eternity, and far more venerable than Antiquity.

SECT. 29

But above all things I wonder how the curiosity of wiser heads could pass that great and indisputable Miracle, the cessation of Oracles; and in what swoun their Reasons lay, to content themselves, and sit down with such a far-fetch'd and ridiculous reason as _Plutarch_ alleadgeth for it. The Jews, that can believe the supernatural Solstice of the Sun in the days of _Joshua_, have yet the impudence to deny the Eclipse, which every Pagan confessed, at his death: but for this, it is evident beyond all contradiction,[13] the Devil himself confessed it. Certainly it is not a warrantable curiosity, to examine the verity of Scripture by the concordance of humane history, or seek to confirm the Chronicle of _Hester_ or _Daniel_ by the authority of _Megasthenes_ or _Herodotus_. I confess, I have had an unhappy curiosity this way, till I laughed my self out of it with a piece of _Justine_, where he delivers that the Children of _Israel_ for being scabbed were banished out of _Egypt_. And truely since I have understood the occurrences of the World, and know in what counterfeit shapes, and deceitful vizards times present represent on the stage things past; I do believe them little more then things to come. Some have been of my opinion, and endeavoured to write the History of their own lives; wherein _Moses_ hath outgone them all, and left not onely the story of his life, but as some will have it, of his death also.

[13] _In his Oracle to_ Augustus.

SECT. 30

It is a riddle to me, how this story of Oracles hath not worm'd out of the World that doubtful conceit of Spirits and Witches; how so many learned heads should so far forget their Metaphysicks, and destroy the ladder and scale of creatures, as to question the existence of Spirits: for my part, I have ever believed, and do now know, that there are Witches: they that doubt of these, do not onely deny them, but spirits; and are obliquely and upon consequence a sort not of Infidels, but Atheists. Those that to confute their incredulity desire to see apparitions, shall questionless never behold any, nor have the power to be so much as Witches; the Devil hath them already in a heresie as capital as Witchcraft; and to appear to them, were but to convert them. Of all the delusions wherewith he deceives mortality, there is not any that puzleth me more than the Legerdemain of _Changelings_; I do not credit those transformations of reasonable creatures into beasts, or that the Devil hath a power to transpeciate a man into a Horse, who tempted Christ (as a trial of his Divinity) to convert but stones into bread. I could believe that Spirits use with man the act of carnality, and that in both sexes; I conceive they may assume, steal, or contrive a body, wherein there may be action enough to content decrepit lust, or passion to satisfie more active veneries; yet in both, without a possibility of generation: and therefore that opinion that Antichrist should be born of the Tribe of _Dan_, by conjunction with the Devil, is ridiculous, and a conceit fitter for a Rabbin than a Christian. I hold that the Devil doth really possess some men, the spirit of Melancholly others, the spirit of Delusion others; that as the Devil is concealed and denyed by some, so God and good Angels are pretended by others whereof the late defection of the Maid of _Germany_ hath left a pregnant example.

Sect. 31

Again, I believe that all that use sorceries, incantations, and spells, are not Witches, or, as we term them, Magicians; I conceive there is a traditional Magick, not learned immediately from the Devil, but at second hand from his Scholars, who having once the secret betrayed, are able, and do emperically practise without his advice, they both proceeding upon the principles of Nature; where actives, aptly conjoyned to disposed passives, will under any Master produce their effects. Thus I think at first a great part of Philosophy was Witchcraft, which being afterward derived to one another, proved but Philosophy, and was indeed no more but the honest effects of Nature: What invented by us is Philosophy, learned from him is Magick. We do surely owe the discovery of many secrets to the discovery of good and bad Angels. I could never pass that sentence of _Paracelsus_, without an asterisk, or annotation; [14]_Ascendens constellatum multa revelat, quærentibus magnalia naturæ_, i.e. _opera Dei_. I do think that many mysteries ascribed to our own inventions, have been the courteous revelations of Spirits; for those noble essences in Heaven bear a friendly regard unto their fellow Natures on Earth; and therefore believe that those many prodigies and ominous prognosticks, which fore-run the ruines of States, Princes, and private persons, are the charitable premonitions of good Angels, which more careless enquiries term but the effects of chance and nature.

[14] _Thereby is meant out good Angel appointed us from our Nativity._

SECT. 32

Now, besides these particular and divided Spirits, there may be (for ought I know) an universal and common Spirit to the whole World. It was the opinion of _Plato_, and it is yet of the _Hermetical_ Philosophers: if there be a common nature that unites and tyes the scattered and divided individuals into one species, why may there not be one that unites them all? However, I am sure there is a common Spirit that plays within us, yet makes no part of us; and that is the Spirit of God, the fire and scintillation of that noble and mighty Essence, which is the life and radical heat of Spirits, and those essences that know not the vertue of the Sun, a fire quite contrary to the fire of Hell: This is that gentle heat that broodeth on the waters, and in six days hatched the World; this is that irradiation that dispels the mists of Hell, the clouds of horrour, fear, sorrow, despair; and preserves the region of the mind in serenity: Whatsoever feels not the warm gale and gentle ventilation of this Spirit, (though I feel his pulse) I dare not say he lives; for truely without this, to me there is no heat under the Tropick; nor any light, though I dwelt in the body of the Sun.

_As when the labouring Sun hath wrought his track Up to the top of lofty_ Cancers _back, The ycie Ocean cracks, the frozen pole Thaws with the heat of the Celestial coale; So when thy absent beams begin t' impart Again a Solstice on my frozen heart, My winter 's ov'r; my drooping spirits sing, And every part revives into a Spring. But if thy quickening beams a while decline, And with their light bless not this Orb of mine, A chilly frost surpriseth every member, And in the midst of_ June _I feel_ December. _O how this earthly temper doth debase The noble Soul in this her humble place. Whose wingy nature ever doth aspire To reach that place whence first it took its fire. These flames I feel, which in my heart do dwell, Are not thy beams, but take their fire from Hell. O quench them all, and let thy light divine Be as the Sun to this poor Orb of mine; And to thy sacred Spirit convert those fires, Whose earthly fumes choak my devout aspires._

SECT. 33

Therefore for Spirits, I am so far from denying their existence, that I could easily believe, that not onely whole Countries, but particular persons, have their Tutelary and Guardian Angels: It is not a new opinion of the Church of _Rome_, but an old one of _Pythagoras_ and _Plato_; there is no heresie in it; and if not manifestly defin'd in Scripture, yet is it an opinion of a good and wholesome use in the course and actions of a mans life, and would serve as an _Hypothesis_ to salve many doubts, whereof common Philosophy affordeth no solution. Now if you demand my opinion and Metaphysicks of their natures, I confess them very shallow, most of them in a negative way, like that of God; or in a comparative, between our selves and fellow-creatures; for there is in this Universe a Stair, or manifest Scale of creatures, rising not disorderly, or in confusion, but with a comely method and proportion. Between creatures of meer existence and things of life, there is a large disproportion of nature; between plants and animals or creatures of sense, a wider difference; between them and man, a far greater: and if the proportion hold one, between Man and Angels there should be yet a greater. We do not comprehend their natures, who retain the first definition of _Porphyry_, and distinguish them from our selves by immortality; for before his Fall, 'tis thought, Man also was Immortal; yet must we needs affirm that he had a different essence from the Angels; having therefore no certain knowledge of their Natures, 'tis no bad method of the Schools, whatsoever perfection we find obscurely in our selves, in a more compleat and absolute way to ascribe unto them. I believe they have an extemporary knowledge, and upon the first motion of their reason do what we cannot without study or deliberation; that they know things by their forms, and define by specifical difference what we describe by accidents and properties; and therefore probabilities to us may be demonstrations unto them: that they have knowledge not onely of the specifical, but numerical forms of individuals, and understand by what reserved difference each single _Hypostasis_ (besides the relation to its species) becomes its numerical self. That as the Soul hath a power to move the body it informs, so there's a faculty to move any, though inform none; ours upon restraint of time, place, and distance; but that invisible hand that conveyed _Habakkuk_ to the Lyons Den, or _Philip_ to _Azotus_, infringeth this rule, and hath a secret conveyance, wherewith mortality is not acquainted: if they have that intuitive knowledge, whereby as in reflexion they behold the thoughts of one another, I cannot peremptorily deny but they know a great part of ours. They that to refute the Invocation of Saints, have denied that they have any knowledge of our affairs below, have proceeded too far, and must pardon my opinion, till I can thoroughly answer that piece of Scripture, _At the conversion of a sinner the Angels in Heaven rejoyce._ I cannot with those in that great Father securely interpret the work of the first day, _Fiat lux_, to the creation of Angels, though I confess there is not any creature that hath so neer a glympse of their nature, as light in the Sun and Elements. We stile it a bare accident, but where it subsists alone, 'tis a spiritual Substance, and may be an Angel: in brief, conceive light invisible, and that is a Spirit.

SECT. 34

These are certainly the Magisterial and master-pieces of the Creator, the Flower, or (as we may say) the best part of nothing, actually existing, what we are but in hopes and probability; we are onely that amphibious piece between a corporal and spiritual Essence, that middle form that links those two together, and makes good the Method of God and Nature, that jumps not from extreams, but unites the incompatible distances by some middle and participating natures: that we are the breath and similitude of God, it is indisputable, and upon record of holy Scripture; but to call ourselves a Microcosm, or little World, I thought it only a pleasant trope of Rhetorick, till my neer judgement and second thoughts told me there was a real truth therein: for first we are a rude mass, and in the rank of creatures, which onely are, and have a dull kind of being, not yet privileged with life, or preferred to sense or reason; next we live the life of Plants, the life of Animals, the life of Men, and at last the life of Spirits, running on in one mysterious nature those five kinds of existences, which comprehend the creatures not onely of the World, but of the Universe; thus is man that great and true _Amphibium_, whose nature is disposed to live not onely like other creatures in divers elements, but in divided and distinguished worlds: for though there be but one to sense, there are two to reason, the one visible, the other invisible, whereof _Moses_ seems to have left description, and of the other so obscurely, that some parts thereof are yet in controversie. And truely for the first chapters of _Genesis_, I must confess a great deal of obscurity; though Divines have to the power of humane reason endeavoured to make all go in a literal meaning, yet those allegorical interpretations are also probable, and perhaps the mystical method of _Moses_ bred up in the Hieroglyphical Schools of the Egyptians.

SECT. 35

Now for that immaterial world, methinks we need not wander so far as beyond the first moveable; for even in this material Fabrick the spirits walk as freely exempt from the affection of time, place, and motion, as beyond the extreamest circumference: do but extract from the corpulency of bodies, or resolve things beyond their first matter, and you discover the habitation of Angels, which if I call the ubiquitary and omnipresent essence of God, I hope I shall not offend Divinity: for before the Creation of the World God was really all things. For the Angels he created no new World, or determinate mansion, and therefore they are everywhere where is his Essence, and do live at a distance even in himself. That God made all things for man, is in some sense true, yet not so far as to subordinate the Creation of those purer Creatures unto ours, though as ministring Spirits they do, and are willing to fulfil the will of God in these lower and sublunary affairs of man: God made all things for himself, and it is impossible he should make them for any other end than his own Glory; it is all he can receive, and all that is without himself: for honour being an external adjunct, and in the honourer rather than in the person honoured, it was necessary to make a Creature, from whom he might receive this homage; and that is in the other world Angels, in this, Man; which when we neglect, we forget the very end of our Creation, and may justly provoke God, not onely to repent that he hath made the World, but that he hath sworn he would not destroy it. That there is but one World, is a conclusion of Faith. _Aristotle_ with all his Philosophy hath not been able to prove it, and as weakly that the world was eternal; that dispute much troubled the Pen of the Philosophers, but _Moses_ decided that question, and all is salved with the new term of a Creation, that is, a production of something out of nothing; and what is that? Whatsoever is opposite to something; or more exactly, that which is truely contrary unto God; for he onely is, all others have an existence with dependency, and are something but by a distinction; and herein is Divinity conformant unto Philosophy, and generation not onely founded on contrarieties, but also creation; God being all things, is contrary unto nothing, out of which were made all things, and so nothing became something, and _Omneity_ informed _Nullity_ into an Essence.

SECT. 36

The whole Creation is a Mystery, and particularly that of Man; at the blast of his mouth were the rest of the Creatures made, and at his bare word they started out of nothing: but in the frame of Man (as the Text describes it) he played the sensible operator, and seemed not so much to create, as make him; when he had separated the materials of other creatures, there consequently resulted a form and soul; but having raised the walls of man, he has driven to a second and harder creation of a substance like himself, an incorruptible and immortal Soul. For these two affections we have the Philosophy and opinion of the Heathens, the flat affirmative of _Plato_, and not a negative from _Aristotle_: there is another scruple cast in by Divinity (concerning its production) much disputed in the _Germane_ auditories, and with that indifferency and equality of arguments, as leave the controversie undetermined. I am not of _Paracelsus_ mind, that boldly delivers a receipt to make a man without conjunction; yet cannot but wonder at the multitude of heads that do deny traduction, having no other argument to confirm their belief, then that Rhetorical sentence, and _Antimetathesis_ of _Augustine_, _Creando infunditur, infundendo creatur_: either opinion will consist well enough with Religion; yet I should rather incline to this, did not one objection haunt me, not wrung from speculations and subtilties, but from common sense and observation; not pickt from the leaves of any Author, but bred amongst the weeds and tares of mine own brain: And this is a conclusion from the equivocal and monstrous productions in the copulation of Man with Beast: for if the Soul of man be not transmitted, and transfused in the seed of the Parents, why are not those productions meerly beasts, but have also an impression and tincture of reason in as high a measure, as it can evidence it self in those improper Organs? Nor truely can I peremptorily deny, that the Soul in this her sublunary estate, is wholly, and in all acceptions inorganical, but that for the performance of her ordinary actions, there is required not onely a symmetry and proper disposition of Organs, but a Crasis and temper correspondent to its operations. Yet is not this mass of flesh and visible structure the instrument and proper corps of the Soul, but rather of Sense, and that the hand of Reason. In our study of Anatomy there is a mass of mysterious Philosophy, and such as reduced the very Heathens to Divinity: yet amongst all those rare discourses, and curious pieces I find in the Fabrick of man, I do not so much content my self, as in that I find not, there is no Organ or Instrument for the rational soul: for in the brain, which we term the seat of reason, there is not any thing of moment more than I can discover in the crany of a beast: and this is a sensible and no inconsiderable argument of the inorganity of the Soul, at least in that sense we usually so conceive it. Thus we are men, and we know not how; there is something in us that can be without us, and will be after us, though it is strange that it hath no history, what it was before us, nor cannot tell how it entred in us.

SECT. 37

Now for these walls of flesh, wherein the Soul doth seem to be immured, before the Resurrection, it is nothing but an elemental composition, and a Fabrick that must fall to ashes. _All flesh is grass_, is not onely metaphorically, but litterally, true; for all those creatures we behold, are but the herbs of the field, digested into flesh in them, or more remotely carnified in our selves. Nay further, we are what we all abhor, _Anthropophagi_ and Cannibals, devourers not onely of men, but of our selves; and that not in an allegory, but a positive truth: for all this mass of flesh which we behold, came in at our mouths; this frame we look upon, hath been upon our trenchers; in brief, we have devour'd our selves. I cannot believe the wisdom of _Pythagoras_ did ever positively, and in a literal sense, affirm his _Metempsychosis_, or impossible transmigration of the Souls of men into beasts: of all Metamorphoses, or transmigrations, I believe only one, that is of _Lots_ wife; for that of _Nebuchodonosor_ proceeded not so far; in all others I conceive there is no further verity than is contained in their implicite sense and morality. I believe that the whole frame of a beast doth perish, and is left in the same state after death as before it was materialled unto life; that the souls of men know neither contrary nor corruption; that they subsist beyond the body, and outlive death by the priviledge of their proper natures, and without a Miracle; that the Souls of the faithful, as they leave Earth, take possession of Heaven: that those apparitions and ghosts of departed persons are not the wandring souls of men, but the unquiet walks of Devils, prompting and suggesting us unto mischief, blood, and villany; instilling and stealing into our hearts that the blessed spirits are not at rest in their graves, but wander sollicitous of the affairs of the World; but that those phantasms appear often, and do frequent Coemeteries, Charnel-houses, and Churches, it is because those are the dormitories of the dead, where the Devil like an insolent Champion beholds with pride the spoils and Trophies of his Victory over _Adam_.

SECT. 38

This is that dismal conquest we all deplore, that makes us so often cry _(O) Adam, quid fecisti_? I thank God I have not those strait ligaments, or narrow obligations to the World, as to dote on life, or be convulst and tremble at the name of death: Not that I am insensible of the dread and horrour thereof, or by raking into the bowels of the deceased, continual sight of Anatomies, Skeletons, or Cadaverous reliques, like Vespilloes, or Gravemakers, I am become stupid, or have forgot the apprehension of Mortality; but that marshalling all the horrours, and contemplating the extremities thereof, I find not any thing therein able to daunt the courage of a man, much less a well-resolved Christian: And therefore am not angry at the errour of our first Parents, or unwilling to bear a part of this common fate, and like the best of them to dye, that is, to cease to breathe, to take a farewel of the elements, to be a kind of nothing for a moment, to be within one instant of a spirit. When I take a full view and circle of my self, without this reasonable moderator, and equal piece of Justice, Death, I do conceive my self the miserablest person extant; were there not another life that I hope for, all the vanities of this World should not intreat a moment's breath from me: could the Devil work my belief to imagine I could never dye, I would not outlive that very thought; I have so abject a conceit of this common way of existence, this retaining to the Sun and Elements, I cannot think this is to be a man, or to live according to the dignity of humanity: in exspectation of a better, I can with patience embrace this life, yet in my best meditations do often defie death: I honour any man that contemns it, nor can I highly love any that is afraid of it: this makes me naturally love a Souldier, and honour those tattered and contemptible Regiments, that will dye at the command of a Sergeant. For a Pagan there may be some motives to be in love with life; but for a Christian to be amazed at death, I see not how he can escape this Dilemma, that he is too sensible of this life, or hopeless of the life to come.

SECT. 39

Some Divines count Adam 30 years old at his creation, because they suppose him created in the perfect age and stature of man. And surely we are all out of the computation of our age, and every man is some months elder than he bethinks him; for we live, move, have a being, and are subject to the actions of the elements, and the malice of diseases, in that other world, the truest Microcosm, the Womb of our Mother. For besides that general and common existence we are conceived to hold in our Chaos, and whilst we sleep within the bosome of our causes, we enjoy a being and life in three distinct worlds, wherein we receive most manifest graduations: In that obscure World and womb of our mother, our time is short, computed by the Moon; yet longer then the days of many creatures that behold the Sun, our selves being not yet without life, sense, and reason; though for the manifestation of its actions, it awaits the opportunity of objects, and seems to live there but in its root and soul of vegetation; entring afterwards upon the scene of the World, we arise up and become another creature, performing the reasonable actions of man, and obscurely manifesting that part of Divinity in us, but not in complement and perfection, till we have once more cast our secondine, that is, this slough of flesh, and are delivered into the last world, that is, that ineffable place of _Paul_, that proper _ubi_ of spirits. The smattering I have of the Philosophers Stone (which is something more then the perfect exaltation of Gold) hath taught me a great deal of Divinity, and instructed my belief, how that immortal spirit and incorruptible substance of my Soul may lye obscure, and sleep a while within this house of flesh. Those strange and mystical transmigrations that I have observed in Silk-worms, turned my Philosophy into Divinity. There is in these works of nature, which seem to puzzle reason, something Divine, and hath more in it then the eye of a common spectator doth discover.

SECT. 40

I am naturally bashful, nor hath conversation, age or travel, been able to effront, or enharden me; yet I have one part of modesty which I have seldom discovered in another, that is, (to speak truely) I am not so much afraid of death, as ashamed thereof; 'tis the very disgrace and ignominy of our natures, that in a moment can so disfigure us, that our nearest friends, Wife, and Children stand afraid and start at us. The Birds and Beasts of the field, that before in a natural fear obeyed us, forgetting all allegiance, begin to prey upon us. This very conceit hath in a tempest disposed and left me willing to be swallowed up in the abyss of waters; wherein I had perished unseen, unpityed, without wondering eyes, tears of pity, Lectures of mortality, and none had said, _Quantum mutatus ab illo!_ Not that I am ashamed of the Anatomy of my parts, or can accuse Nature for playing the bungler in any part of me, or my own vitious life for contracting any shameful disease upon me, whereby I might not call my self as wholesome a morsel for the worms as any.

SECT. 41

Some upon the courage of a fruitful issue, wherein, as in the truest Chronicle, they seem to outlive themselves, can with greater patience away with death. This conceit and counterfeit subsisting in our progenies, seems to me a meer fallacy, unworthy the desires of a man, that can but conceive a thought of the next World; who, in a nobler ambition, should desire to live in his substance in Heaven, rather than his name and shadow in the earth. And therefore at my death I mean to take a total adieu of the world, not caring for a Monument, History, or Epitaph, not so much as the memory of my name to be found any where, but in the universal Register of God. I am not yet so Cynical, as to approve the [15]Testament of _Diogenes_, nor do I altogether allow that _Rodomontodo_ of _Lucan_;

_----Coelo tegitur, qui non habet urnam._

_He that unburied lies wants not his Herse, For unto him a Tomb's the Universe._

But commend in my calmer judgement, those ingenuous intentions that desire to sleep by the urns of their Fathers, and strive to go the neatest way unto corruption. I do not envy the temper of Crows and Daws, nor the numerous and weary days of our Fathers before the Flood. If there be any truth in Astrology, I may outlive a Jubilee; as yet I have not seen one revolution of Saturn, nor hath my pulse beat thirty years; and yet excepting one, have seen the Ashes, & left under ground all the Kings of _Europe_; have been contemporary to three Emperours, four Grand Signiours, and as many Popes: methinks I have outlived my self, and begin to be weary of the Sun; I have shaken hands with delight: in my warm blood and Canicular days, I perceive I do anticipate the vices of age; the World to me is but a dream or mock-show, and we all therein but Pantalones and Anticks, to my severer contemplations.

[15] _Who willed his friend not to bury him, but hang him up with a staff in his hand to fright away the crows._

SECT. 42

It is not, I confess, an unlawful prayer to desire to surpass the days of our Saviour, or wish to outlive that age wherein he thought fittest to dye; yet if (as Divinity affirms) there shall be no gray hairs in Heaven, but all shall rise in the perfect state of men, we do but outlive those perfections in this World, to be recalled unto them by a greater Miracle in the next, and run on here but to be retrograde hereafter. Were there any hopes to outlive vice, or a point to be super-annuated from sin, it were worthy our knees to implore the days of _Methuselah_. But age doth not rectifie, but incurvate our natures, turning bad dispositions into worser habits, and (like diseases) brings on incurable vices; for every day as we grow weaker in age, we grow stronger in sin; and the number of our days doth make but our sins innumerable. The same vice committed at sixteen, is not the same, though it agree in all other circumstances, at forty, but swells and doubles from the circumstance of our ages, wherein, besides the constant and inexcusable habit of transgressing, the maturity of our judgement cuts off pretence unto excuse or pardon: every sin the oftner it is committed, the more it acquireth in the quality of evil; as it succeeds in time, so it proceeds in degrees of badness; for as they proceed they ever multiply, and like figures in Arithmetick, the last stands for more than all that went before it. And though I think no man can live well once, but he that could live twice, yet for my own part I would not live over my hours past, or begin again the thred of my days: not upon _Cicero's_ ground, because I have lived them well, but for fear I should live them worse: I find my growing Judgment daily instruct me how to be better, but my untamed affections and confirmed vitiosity makes me daily do worse; I find in my confirmed age the same sins I discovered in my youth; I committed many then because I was a Child, and because I commit them still, I am yet an infant. Therefore I perceive a man may be twice a Child before the days of dotage; and stands in need of _Æsons_ Bath before threescore.

SECT. 43

And truely there goes a great deal of providence to produce a mans life unto three-score: there is more required than an able temper for those years; though the radical humour contain in it sufficient oyl for seventy, yet I perceive in some it gives no light past thirty: men assign not all the causes of long life, that write whole Books thereof. They that found themselves on the radical balsome, or vital sulphur of the parts, determine not why _Abel_ lived not so long as _Adam_. There is therefore a secret glome or bottome of our days: 'twas his wisdom to determine them, but his perpetual and waking providence that fulfils and accomplisheth them; wherein the spirits, our selves, and all the creatures of God in a secret and disputed way do execute his will. Let them not therefore complain of immaturity that die about thirty; they fall but like the whole World, whose solid and well-composed substance must not expect the duration and period of its constitution: when all things are compleated in it, its age is accomplished; and the last and general fever may as naturally destroy it before six thousand, as me before forty; there is therefore some other hand that twines the thread of life than that of Nature: we are not onely ignorant in Antipathies and occult qualities; our ends are as obscure as our beginnings; the line of our days is drawn by night, and the various effects therein by a pensil that is invisible; wherein though we confess our ignorance, I am sure we do not err if we say it is the hand of God.

SECT. 44

I am much taken with two verses of _Lucan_, since I have been able not onely as we do at School, to construe, but understand.

_Victurosque Dei celant ut vivere durent. Felix esse mori._

_We're all deluded, vainly searching ways To make us happy by the length of days; For cunningly to make's protract this breath, The Gods conceal the happiness of Death._

There be many excellent strains in that Poet, wherewith his Stoical Genius hath liberally supplied him; and truely there are singular pieces in the Philosophy of _Zeno_, and doctrine of the Stoicks, which I perceive, delivered in a Pulpit, pass for current Divinity: yet herein are they in extreams, that can allow a man to be his own _Assassine_, and so highly extol the end and suicide of _Cato_; this is indeed not to fear death, but yet to be afraid of life. It is a brave act of valour to contemn death; but where life is more terrible than death, it is then the truest valour to dare to live; and herein Religion hath taught us a noble example: For all the valiant acts of _Curtius_, _Scevola_, or _Codrus_, do not parallel or match that one of _Job_; and sure there is no torture to the rack of a disease, nor any Ponyards in death it self like those in the way or prologue to it. _Emori nolo, sed me esse mortuum nihil curo_; I would not die, but care not to be dead. Were I of _Cæsar's_ Religion, I should be of his desires, and wish rather to go off at one blow, then to be sawed in pieces by the grating torture of a disease. Men that look no farther than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto life, and quarrel with their constitutions for being sick; but I, that have examined the parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that Fabrick hangs, do wonder that we are not always so; and considering the thousand doors that lead to death, do thank my God that we can die but once. 'Tis not onely the mischief of diseases, and villany of poysons, that make an end of us; we vainly accuse the fury of Guns, and the new inventions of death; it is in the power of every hand to destroy us, and we are beholding unto every one we meet, he doth not kill us. There is therefore but one comfort left, that, though it be in the power of the weakest arm to take away life, it is not in the strongest to deprive us of death: God would not exempt himself from that, the misery of immortality in the flesh; he undertook not that was immortal. Certainly there is no happiness within this circle of flesh, nor is it in the Opticks of these eyes to behold felicity; the first day of our Jubilee is Death; the Devil hath therefore failed of his desires; we are happier with death than we should have been without it: there is no misery but in himself, where there is no end of misery; and so indeed in his own sense the Stoick is in the right. He forgets that he can dye who complains of misery; we are in the power of no calamity while death is in our own.

SECT. 45.

Now besides the literal and positive kind of death, there are others whereof Divines make mention, and those I think, not meerly Metaphorical, as mortification, dying unto sin and the World; therefore, I say, every man hath a double Horoscope, one of his humanity, his birth; another of his Christianity, his baptism, and from this do I compute or calculate my Nativity; not reckoning those _Horæ combustæ_ and odd days, or esteeming my self any thing, before I was my Saviours, and inrolled in the Register of Christ: Whosoever enjoys not this life, I count him but an apparition, though he wear about him the sensible affections of flesh. In these moral acceptions, the way to be immortal is to dye daily; nor can I think I have the true Theory of death, when I contemplate a skull, or behold a Skeleton with those vulgar imaginations it casts upon us; I have therefore enlarged that common _Memento mori_, into a more Christian memorandum, _Memento quatuor Novissima_, those four inevitable points of us all, Death, Judgement, Heaven, and Hell. Neither did the contemplations of the Heathens rest in their graves, without further thought of Rhadamanth or some judicial proceeding after death, though in another way, and upon suggestion of their natural reasons. I cannot but marvail from what _Sibyl_ or Oracle they stole the Prophesie of the worlds destruction by fire, or whence _Lucan_ learned to say,

_Communis mundo superest rogus, assibus astra Misturus.

There yet remains to th' World one common Fire, Wherein our bones with stars shall make one Pyre._

I believe the World grows near its end, yet is neither old nor decayed, nor shall ever perish upon the ruines of its own Principles. As the work of Creation was above nature, so its adversary annihilation; without which the World hath not its end, but its mutation. Now what force should be able to consume it thus far, without the breath of God, which is the truest consuming flame, my Philosophy cannot inform me. Some believe there went not a minute to the Worlds creation, nor shall there go to its destruction; those six days, so punctually described, make not to them one moment, but rather seem to manifest the method and Idea of the great work of the intellect of God, than the manner how he proceeded in its operation. I cannot dream that there should be at the last day any such Judicial proceeding, or calling to the Bar, as indeed the Scripture seems to imply, and the literal Commentators do conceive: for unspeakable mysteries in the Scriptures are often delivered in a vulgar and illustrative way; and being written unto man, are delivered, not as they truely are, but as they may be understood; wherein notwithstanding the different interpretations according to different capacities may stand firm with our devotion, nor be any way prejudicial to each single edification.

SECT. 46

[Sidenote: _In those days there shall come lyars and false prophets._]

Now to determine the day and year of this inevitable time, is not onely convincible and statute-madness, but also manifest impiety: How shall we interpret _Elias_ 6000 years, or imagine the secret communicated to a Rabbi, which God hath denyed unto his Angels? It had been an excellent Quære to have posed the Devil of _Delphos_, and must needs have forced him to some strange amphibology; it hath not onely mocked the predictions of sundry Astrologers in Ages past, but the prophesies of many melancholy heads in these present, who neither understanding reasonably things past or present, pretend a knowledge of things to come; heads ordained onely to manifest the incredible effects of melancholy, and to fulfil old prophecies rather than be the authors of new. In those days there shall come Wars and rumours of Wars, to me seems no prophecy, but a constant truth, in all times verified since it was pronounced: There shall be signs in the Moon and Stars; how comes he then like a Thief in the night, when he gives an item of his coming? That common sign drawn from the revelation of Antichrist, is as obscure as any: in our common compute he hath been come these many years; but for my own part to speak freely, I am half of opinion that Antichrist is the Philosophers stone in Divinity; for the discovery and invention thereof, though there be prescribed rules and probable inductions, yet hath hardly any man attained the perfect discovery thereof. That general opinion that the World grows neer its end, hath possessed all ages past as neerly as ours; I am afraid that the Souls that now depart, cannot escape that lingring expostulation of the Saints under the Altar, _Quousque, Domine? How long, O Lord?_ and groan in the expectation of that great Jubilee.

SECT. 47

This is the day that must make good that great attribute of God, his Justice; that must reconcile those unanswerable doubts that torment the wisest understandings, and reduce those seeming inequalities, and respective distributions in this world, to an equality and recompensive Justice in the next. This is that one day, that shall include and comprehend all that went before it; wherein, as in the last scene, all the Actors must enter, to compleat and make up the Catastrophe of this great piece. This is the day whose memory hath onely power to make us honest in the dark, and to be vertuous without a witness. _Ipsa sui pretium virtus sibi_, that Vertue is her own reward, is but a cold principle, and not able to maintain our variable resolutions in a constant and setled way of goodness. I have practised that honest artifice of _Seneca_, and in my retired and solitary imaginations, to detain me from the foulness of vice, have fancied to my self the presence of my dear and worthiest friends, before whom I should lose my head, rather than be vitious: yet herein I found that there was nought but moral honesty, and this was not to be vertuous for his sake who must reward us at the last. I have tryed if I could reach that great resolution of his, to be honest without a thought of Heaven or Hell; and indeed I found, upon a natural inclination, and inbred loyalty unto virtue, that I could serve her without a livery; yet not in that resolved and venerable way, but that the frailty of my nature, upon[A] easie temptation, might be induced to forget her. The life therefore and spirit of all our actions, is the resurrection, and a stable apprehension that our ashes shall enjoy the fruit of our pious endeavours: without this, all Religion is a fallacy, and those impieties of _Lucian_, _Euripides_, and _Julian_, are no blasphemies, but subtle verities, and Atheists have been the onely Philosophers.

[A] _Insert_ any, 1672.

SECT. 48

How shall the dead arise, is no question of my Faith; to believe only possibilities, is not Faith, but meer Philosophy. Many things are true in Divinity, which are neither inducible by reason, nor confirmable by sense; and many things in Philosophy confirmable by sense, yet not inducible by reason. Thus it is impossible by any solid or demonstrative reasons to perswade a man to believe the conversion of the Needle to the North; though this be possible and true, and easily credible, upon a single experiment unto the sense. I believe that our estranged and divided ashes shall unite again; that our separated dust after so many Pilgrimages and transformations into the parts of Minerals, Plants, Animals, Elements, shall at the Voice of God return into their primitive shapes, and joyn again to make up their primary and predestinate forms. As at the Creation there was a separation of that confused mass into its pieces; so at the destruction thereof there shall be a separation into its distinct individuals. As at the Creation of the World, all the distinct species that we behold lay involved in one mass, till the fruitful Voice of God separated this united multitude into its several species: so at the last day, when those corrupted reliques shall be scattered in the Wilderness of forms, and seem to have forgot their proper habits, God by a powerful Voice shall command them back into their proper shapes, and call them out by their single individuals: Then shall appear the fertility of _Adam_, and the magick of that sperm that hath dilated into so many millions. I have often beheld as a miracle, that artificial resurrection and revivification of _Mercury_, how being mortified into a thousand shapes, it assumes again its own, and returns into its numerical self. Let us speak naturally, and like Philosophers, the forms of alterable bodies in these sensible corruptions perish not; nor as we imagine, wholly quit their mansions, but retire and contract themselves into their secret and inaccessible parts, where they may best protect themselves from the action of their Antagonist. A plant or vegetable consumed to ashes, by a contemplative and school-Philosopher seems utterly destroyed, and the form to have taken his leave for ever: But to a sensible Artist the forms are not perished, but withdrawn into their incombustible part, where they lie secure from the action of that devouring element. This is made good by experience, which can from the Ashes of a Plant revive the plant, and from its cinders recal it into its stalk and leaves again. What the Art of man can do in these inferiour pieces, what blasphemy is it to affirm the finger of God cannot do in these more perfect and sensible structures? This is that mystical Philosophy, from whence no true Scholar becomes an Atheist, but from the visible effects of nature grows up a real Divine, and beholds not in a dream, as _Ezekiel_, but in an ocular and visible object the types of his resurrection.

SECT. 49

Now, the necessary Mansions of our restored selves, are those two contrary and incompatible places we call Heaven and Hell; to define them, or strictly to determine what and where these are, surpasseth my Divinity. That elegant Apostle which seemed to have a glimpse of Heaven, hath left but a negative description thereof; _which neither eye hath seen, nor ear hath heard, nor can enter into the heart of man_: he was translated out of himself to behold it; but being returned into himself, could not express it. St. _John's_ description by Emerals, Chrysolites, and precious Stones, is too weak to express the material Heaven we behold. Briefly therefore, where the Soul hath the full measure and complement of happiness; where the boundless appetite of that spirit remains compleatly satisfied, that it can neither desire addition nor alteration; that I think is truly Heaven: and this can onely be in the injoynient of that essence, whose infinite goodness is able to terminate the desires of it self, and the unsatiable wishes of ours; wherever God will thus manifest himself, there is Heaven though within the circle of this sensible world. Thus the Soul of man may be in Heaven any where, even within the limits of his own proper body; and when it ceaseth to live in the body, it may remain in its own soul, that is, its Creator: and thus we may say that St. _Paul_, whether in the body, or out of the body, was yet in Heaven. To place it in the Empyreal, or beyond the tenth sphear, is to forget the world's destruction; for when this sensible world shall be destroyed, all shall then be here as it is now there, an Empyreal Heaven, a _quasi_ vacuity; when to ask where Heaven is, is to demand where the Presence of God is, or where we have the glory of that happy vision. _Moses_ that was bred up in all the learning of the _Egyptians_, committed a gross absurdity in Philosophy, when with these eyes of flesh he desired to see God, and petitioned his Maker, that is, truth it self, to a contradiction. Those that imagine Heaven and Hell neighbours, and conceive a vicinity between those two extreams, upon consequence of the Parable, where _Dives_ discoursed with _Lazarus_ in _Abraham's_ bosome, do too grosly conceive of those glorified creatures, whose eyes shall easily out-see the Sun, and behold without a perspective the extreamest distances: for if there shall be in our glorified eyes, the faculty of sight and reception of objects, I could think the visible species there to be in as unlimitable a way as now the intellectual. I grant that two bodies placed beyond the tenth sphear, or in a vacuity, according to _Aristotle_'s Philosophy, could not behold each other, because there wants a body or Medium to hand and transport the visible rays of the object unto the sense; but when there shall be a general defect of either Medium to convey, or light to prepare and dispose that Medium, and yet a perfect vision, we must suspend the rules of our Philosophy, and make all good by a more absolute piece of opticks.

SECT. 50

I cannot tell how to say that fire is the essence of Hell: I know not what to make of Purgatory, or conceive a flame that can either prey upon, or purifie the substance of a Soul: those flames of sulphur mention'd in the Scriptures, I take not to be understood of this present Hell, but of that to come, where fire shall make up the complement of our tortures, and have a body or subject wherein to manifest its tyranny. Some who have had the honour to be textuary in Divinity, are of opinion it shall be the same specifical fire with ours. This is hard to conceive, yet can I make good how even that may prey upon our bodies, and yet not consume us: for in this material World there are bodies that persist invincible in the powerfullest flames; and though by the action of fire they fall into ignition and liquation, yet will they never suffer a destruction. I would gladly know how _Moses_ with an actual fire calcin'd, or burnt the Golden Calf into powder: for that mystical metal of Gold, whose solary and celestial nature I admire, exposed unto the violence of fire, grows onely hot, and liquifies, but consumeth not; so when the consumable and volatile pieces of our bodies shall be refined into a more impregnable and fixed temper, like Gold, though they suffer from the action of flames, they shall never perish, but lye immortal in the arms of fire. And surely if this frame must suffer onely by the action of this element, there will many bodies escape, and not onely Heaven, but Earth will not be at an end, but rather a beginning. For at present it is not earth, but a composition of fire, water, earth, and air; but at that time, spoiled of these ingredients, it shall appear in a substance more like it self, its ashes. Philosophers that opinioned the worlds destruction by fire, did never dream of annihilation, which is beyond the power of sublunary causes; for the last[B] action of that element is but vitrification, or a reduction of a body into glass; and therefore some of our Chymicks facetiously affirm, that at the last fire all shall be christallized and reverberated into glass, which is the utmost action of that element. Nor need we fear this term annihilation, or wonder that God will destroy the works of his Creation: for man subsisting, who is, and will then truely appear, a Microcosm, the world cannot be said to be destroyed. For the eyes of God, and perhaps also of our glorified selves, shall as really behold and contemplate the World in its Epitome or contracted essence, as now it doth at large and in its dilated substance. In the seed of a Plant to the eyes of God, and to the understanding of man, there exists, though in an invisible way, the perfect leaves, flowers, and fruit thereof: (for things that are in _posse_ to the sense, are actually existent to the understanding). Thus God beholds all things, who contemplates as fully his works in their Epitome, as in their full volume; and beheld as amply the whole world in that little compendium of the sixth day, as in the scattered and dilated pieces of those five before.

[B] Last and proper, 1672.

SECT. 51

Men commonly set forth the torments of Hell by fire, and the extremity of corporal afflictions, and describe Hell in the same method that _Mahomet_ doth Heaven. This indeed makes a noise, and drums in popular ears; but if this be the terrible piece thereof, it is not worthy to stand in diameter with Heaven, whose happiness consists in that part that is best able to comprehend it, that immortal essence, that translated divinity and colony of God, the Soul. Surely though we place Hell under Earth, the Devil's walk and purlue is about it: men speak too popularly who place it in those flaming mountains, which to grosser apprehensions represent Hell. The heart of man is the place the Devils dwell in; I feel sometimes a Hell within my self; _Lucifer_ keeps his Court in my breast; _Legion_ is revived in me. There are as many Hells, as _Anaxagoras_ conceited worlds; there was more than one Hell in _Magdalene_, when there were seven Devils; for every Devil is an Hell unto himself; he holds enough of torture in his own _ubi_, and needs not the misery of circumference to afflict him. And thus a distracted Conscience here, is a shadow or introduction unto Hell hereafter. Who can but pity the merciful intention of those hands that do destroy themselves? the Devil, were it in his power, would do the like; which being impossible, his miseries are endless, and he suffers most in that attribute wherein he is impassible, his immortality.

SECT. 52

I thank God that with joy I mention it, I was never afraid of Hell, nor never grew pale at the description of that place; I have so fixed my contemplations on Heaven, that I have almost forgot the Idea of Hell, and am afraid rather to lose the Joys of the one, than endure the misery of the other: to be deprived of them is a perfect Hell, and needs methinks no addition to compleat our afflictions; that terrible term hath never detained me from sin, nor do I owe any good action to the name thereof; I fear God, yet am not afraid of him; his mercies make me ashamed of my sins, before his Judgements afraid thereof: these are the forced and secondary method of his wisdom, which he useth but as the last remedy, and upon provocation; a course rather to deter the wicked, than incite the virtuous to his worship. I can hardly think there was ever any scared into Heaven; they go the fairest way to Heaven that would serve God without a Hell; other Mercenaries, that crouch into him in fear of Hell, though they term themselves the servants, are indeed but the slaves of the Almighty.

SECT. 53

And to be true, and speak my soul, when I survey the occurrences of my life, and call into account the Finger of God, I can perceive nothing but an abyss and mass of mercies, either in general to mankind, or in particular to my self: and whether out of the prejudice of my affection, or an inverting and partial conceit of his mercies, I know not; but those which others term crosses, afflictions, judgements, misfortunes, to me who inquire farther into them then their visible effects, they both appear, and in event have ever proved, the secret and dissembled favours of his affection. It is a singular piece of Wisdom to apprehend truly, and without passion, the Works of God, and so well to distinguish his Justice from his Mercy, as not miscall those noble Attributes: yet it is likewise an honest piece of Logick, so to dispute and argue the proceedings of God, as to distinguish even his judgments into mercies. For God is merciful unto all, because better to the worst, than the best deserve; and to say he punisheth none in this world, though it be a Paradox, is no absurdity. To one that hath committed Murther, if the Judge should only ordain a Fine, it were a madness to call this a punishment, and to repine at the sentence, rather than admire the clemency of the Judge. Thus our offences being mortal, and deserving not onely Death, but Damnation; if the goodness of God be content to traverse and pass them over with a loss, misfortune, or disease; what frensie were it to term this a punishment, rather than an extremity of mercy; and to groan under the rod of his Judgements, rather than admire the Scepter of his Mercies? Therefore to adore, honour, and admire him, is a debt of gratitude due from the obligation of our nature, states, and conditions; and with these thoughts, he that knows them best, will not deny that I adore him. That I obtain Heaven, and the bliss thereof, is accidental, and not the intended work of my devotion; it being a felicity I can neither think to deserve, nor scarce in modesty to expect. For these two ends of us all, either as rewards or punishments, are mercifully ordained and disproportionably disposed unto our actions; the one being so far beyond our deserts, the other so infinitely below our demerits.

SECT. 54

There is no Salvation to those that believe not in _Christ_, that is, say some, since his Nativity, and as Divinity affirmeth, before also; which makes me much apprehend the ends of those honest Worthies and Philosophers which dyed before his Incarnation. It is hard to place those Souls in Hell, whose worthy lives do teach us Virtue on Earth: methinks amongst those many subdivisions of Hell, there might have been one Limbo left for these. What a strange vision will it be to see their Poetical fictions converted into Verities, and their imagined and fancied Furies into real Devils? how strange to them will sound the History of _Adam_, when they shall suffer for him they never heard of? when they who derive their genealogy from the Gods, shall know they are the unhappy issue of sinful man? It is an insolent part of reason, to controvert the Works of God, or question the Justice of his proceedings. Could Humility teach others, as it hath instructed me, to contemplate the infinite and incomprehensible distance betwixt the Creator and the Creature; or did we seriously perpend that one simile of St. _Paul_, _Shall the Vessel say to the Potter, Why hast thou made me thus?_ it would prevent these arrogant disputes of reason, nor would we argue the definitive sentence of God, either to Heaven or Hell. Men that live according to the right rule and law of reason, live but in their own kind, as beasts do in theirs; who justly obey the prescript of their natures, and therefore cannot reasonably demand a reward of their actions, as onely obeying the natural dictates of their reason. It will therefore, and must at last appear, that all salvation is through _Christ_; which verity I fear these great examples of virtue must confirm, and make it good, how the perfectest actions of earth have no title or claim unto Heaven.

SECT. 55

Nor truely do I think the lives of these or of any other, were ever correspondent, or in all points conformable unto their doctrines. It is evident that _Aristotle_ transgressed the rule of his own Ethicks; the Stoicks that condemn passion, and command a man to laugh in _Phalaris_ his Bull, could not endure without a groan a fit of the Stone or Colick. The _Scepticks_ that affirmed they knew nothing, even in that opinion confute themselves, and thought they knew more than all the World beside. _Diogenes_ I hold to be the most vain-glorious man of his time, and more ambitious in refusing all Honours, than _Alexander_ in rejecting none. Vice and the Devil put a Fallacy upon our Reasons, and provoking us too hastily to run from it, entangle and profound us deeper in it. The Duke of _Venice_, that weds himself unto the Sea by a Ring of Gold, I will not argue of prodigality, because it is a solemnity of good use and consequence in the State: but the Philosopher that threw his money into the Sea to avoid Avarice, was a notorious prodigal. There is no road or ready way to virtue; it is not an easie point of art to disentangle our selves from this riddle, or web of Sin: To perfect virtue, as to Religion, there is required a _Panoplia_, or compleat armour; that whilst we lye at close ward against one Vice, we lye not open to the venny of another. And indeed wiser discretions that have the thred of reason to conduct them, offend without pardon; whereas, under-heads may stumble without dishonour. There go so many circumstances to piece up one good action, that it is a lesson to be good, and we are forced to be virtuous by the book. Again, the Practice of men holds not an equal pace, yea, and often runs counter to their Theory; we naturally know what is good, but naturally pursue what is evil: the Rhetorick wherewith I perswade another, cannot perswade my self: there is a depraved appetite in us, that will with patience hear the learned instructions of Reason, but yet perform no farther than agrees to its own irregular humour. In brief, we all are monsters, that is, a composition of Man and Beast; wherein we must endeavour to be as the Poets fancy that wise man _Chiron_, that is, to have the region of Man above that of Beast, and Sense to sit but at the feet of Reason. Lastly, I do desire with God that all, but yet affirm with men, that few shall know Salvation; that the bridge is narrow, the passage strait unto life: yet those who do confine the Church of God, either to particular Nations, Churches or Families, have made it far narrower then our Saviour ever meant it.

SECT. 56

The vulgarity of those judgements that wrap the Church of God in _Strabo's_ cloak, and restrain it unto _Europe_, seem to me as bad Geographers as _Alexander_, who thought he had Conquer'd all the World, when he had not subdued the half of any part thereof. For we cannot deny the Church of God both in _Asia_ and _Africa_, if we do not forget the Peregrinations of the Apostles, the deaths of the Martyrs, the Sessions of many, and, even in our reformed judgement, lawful Councils, held in those parts in the minority and nonage of ours. Nor must a few differences, more remarkable in the eyes of man than perhaps in the judgement of God, excommunicate from Heaven one another, much less those Christians who are in a manner all Martyrs, maintaining their Faith, in the noble way of persecution, and serving God in the Fire, whereas we honour him in the Sunshine. 'Tis true, we all hold there is a number of Elect, and many to be saved; yet take our Opinions together, and from the confusion thereof there will be no such thing as salvation, nor shall any one be saved. For first, the Church of _Rome_ condemneth us, we likewise them; the Sub-reformists and Sectaries sentence the Doctrine of our Church as damnable; the Atomist, or Familist, reprobates all these; and all these, them again. Thus whilst the Mercies of God do promise us Heaven, our conceits and opinions exclude us from that place. There must be, therefore, more than one St. _Peter_: particular Churches and Sects usurp the gates of Heaven, and turn the key against each other: and thus we go to Heaven against each others wills, conceits and opinions; and with as much uncharity as ignorance, do err I fear in points not only of our own, but one an others salvation.

SECT. 57

I believe many are saved, who to man seem reprobated; and many are reprobated, who in the opinion and sentence of man, stand elected: there will appear at the Last day, strange and unexpected examples both of his Justice and his Mercy; and therefore to define either, is folly in man, and insolency even in the Devils: those acute and subtil spirits in all their sagacity, can hardly divine who shall be saved; which if they could Prognostick, their labour were at an end; nor need they compass the earth seeking whom they may devour. Those who upon a rigid application of the Law, sentence _Solomon_ unto damnation, condemn not onely him, but themselves, and the whole World: for by the Letter and written Word of God, we are without exception in the state of Death; but there is a prerogative of God, and an arbitrary pleasure above the Letter of his own Law, by which alone we can pretend unto Salvation, and through which _Solomon_ might be as easily saved as those who condemn him.

SECT. 58

The number of those who pretend unto Salvation, and those infinite swarms who think to pass through the eye of this Needle, have much amazed me. That name and compellation of _little Flock_, doth not comfort, but deject my Devotion; especially when I reflect upon mine own unworthiness, wherein, according to my humble apprehensions, I am below them all. I believe there shall never be an Anarchy in Heaven, but as there are Hierarchies amongst the Angels, so shall there be degrees of priority amongst the Saints. Yet is it (I protest) beyond my ambition to aspire unto the first ranks; my desires onely are, and I shall be happy therein, to be but the last man, and bring up the Rere in Heaven.

SECT. 59

Again, I am confident and fully perswaded, yet dare not take my oath, of my Salvation: I am as it were sure, and do believe without all doubt, that there is such a City as _Constantinople_; yet for me to take my Oath thereon were a kind of Perjury, because I hold no infallible warrant from my own sense to confirm me in the certainty thereof: And truly, though many pretend an absolute certainty of their Salvation, yet when an humble Soul shall contemplate our own unworthiness, she shall meet with many doubts, and suddenly find how little we stand in need of the Precept of St. _Paul_, _Work out your salvation with fear and trembling._ That which is the cause of my Election, I hold to be the cause of my Salvation, which was the mercy and beneplacit of God, before I was, or the foundation of the World. _Before Abraham was, I am_, is the saying of Christ; yet is it true in some sense, if I say it of myself; for I was not onely before myself, but _Adam_, that is, in the Idea of God, and the decree of that Synod held from all Eternity. And in this sense, I say, the World was before the Creation, and at an end before it had a beginning; and thus was I dead before I was alive: though my grave be _England_, my dying place was Paradise: and _Eve_ miscarried of me, before she conceived of Cain.

SECT. 60

Insolent zeals that do decry good Works, and rely onely upon Faith, take not away merit: for depending upon the efficacy of their Faith, they enforce the condition of God, and in a more sophistical way do seem to challenge Heaven. It was decreed by God, that only those that lapt in the water like Dogs, should have the honour to destroy the _Midianites_; yet could none of those justly challenge, or imagine he deserved that honour thereupon. I do not deny, but that true Faith, and such as God requires, is not onely a mark or token, but also a means of our Salvation; but where to find this, is as obscure to me, as my last end. And if our Saviour could object unto his own Disciples and Favourites, a Faith, that, to the quantity of a grain of Mustard-seed, is able to remove Mountains; surely that which we boast of, is not any thing, or at the most, but a remove from nothing. This is the Tenor of my belief; wherein, though there be many things singular, and to the humour of my irregular self; yet if they square not with maturer Judgements I disclaim them, and do no further favour them, than the learned and best judgements shall authorize them.

THE SECOND PART

SECT. 1

Now for that other Virtue of Charity, without which Faith is a meer notion, and of no existence, I have ever endeavoured to nourish the merciful disposition and humane inclination I borrowed from my Parents, and regulate it to the written and prescribed Laws of Charity; and if I hold the true Anatomy of my self, I am delineated and naturally framed to such a piece of virtue. For I am of a constitution so general, that it comforts and sympathizeth with all things; I have no antipathy, or rather Idio-syncrasie, in dyet, humour, air, any thing: I wonder not at the _French_ for their dishes of Frogs, Snails, and Toadstools, nor at the Jews for Locusts and Grasshoppers; but being amongst them, make them my common Viands, and I find they agree with my Stomach as well as theirs. I could digest a Sallad gathered in a Churchyard, as well as in a Garden. I cannot start at the presence of a Serpent, Scorpion, Lizard, or Salamander: at the sight of a Toad or Viper, I find in me no desire to take up a stone to destroy them. I feel not in my self those common Antipathies that I can discover in others: Those National repugnances do not touch me, nor do I behold with prejudice the _French_, _Italian_, _Spaniard_, or _Dutch_; but where I find their actions in balance with my Country-men's, I honour, love, and embrace them in the same degree. I was born in the eighth Climate, but seem for to be framed and constellated unto all: I am no Plant that will not prosper out of a Garden: All places, all airs make unto me one Countrey; I am in _England_, every where, and under any Meridian. I have been shipwrackt, yet am not enemy with the Sea or Winds; I can study, play, or sleep in a Tempest. In brief, I am averse from nothing; my Conscience would give me the lye if I should absolutely detest or hate any essence but the Devil; or so at least abhor any thing, but that we might come to composition. If there be any among those common objects of hatred I do contemn and laugh at, it is that great enemy of Reason, Virtue and Religion, the Multitude; that numerous piece of monstrosity, which taken asunder seem men, and the reasonable creatures of God; but confused together, make but one great beast, and a monstrosity more prodigious than Hydra: it is no breach of Charity to call these Fools; it is the style all holy Writers have afforded them, set down by _Solomon_ in Canonical Scripture, and a point of our Faith to believe so. Neither in the name of Multitude do I onely include the base and minor sort of people; there is a rabble even amongst the Gentry, a sort of Plebeian heads, whose fancy moves with the same wheel as these; men in the same Level with Mechanicks, though their fortunes do somewhat guild their infirmities, and their purses compound for their follies. But as in casting account, three or four men together come short in account of one man placed by himself below them: So neither are a troop of these ignorant Doradoes, of that true esteem and value, as many a forlorn person, whose condition doth place him below their feet. Let us speak like Politicians, there is a Nobility without Heraldry, a natural dignity, whereby one man is ranked with another; another filed before him, according to the quality of his Desert, and preheminence of his good parts: Though the corruption of these times, and the byas of present practice wheel another way. Thus it was in the first and primitive Commonwealths, and is yet in the integrity and Cradle of well-order'd Polities, till corruption getteth ground, ruder desires labouring after that which wiser considerations contemn; every one having a liberty to amass and heap up riches, and they a licence or faculty to do or purchase any thing.

SECT. 2

This general and indifferent temper of mine doth more neerly dispose me to this noble virtue. It is a happiness to be born and framed unto virtue, and to grow up from the seeds of nature, rather than the inoculation and forced grafts of education: yet if we are directed only by our particular Natures, and regulate our inclinations by no higher rule than that of our reasons, we are but Moralists; Divinity will still call us Heathens. Therefore this great work of charity must have other motives, ends, and impulsions: I give no alms only to satisfie the hunger of my Brother, but to fulfil and accomplish the Will and Command of my God: I draw not _my_ purse for his sake that demands it, but his that enjoyned it; I relieve no man upon the Rhetorick of his miseries, nor to content mine own commiserating disposition: for this is still but moral charity, and an act that oweth more to passion than reason. He that relieves another upon the bare suggestion and bowels of pity, doth not this so much for his sake, as for his own: for by compassion we make others misery our own, and so by relieving them, we relieve our selves also. It is as erroneous a conceit to redress other Mens misfortunes upon the common considerations of merciful natures, that it may be one day our own case; for this is a sinister and politick kind of charity, whereby we seem to bespeak the pities of men in the like occasions: and truly I have observed that those professed Eleemosynaries, though in a croud or multitude, do yet direct and place their petitions on a few and selected persons: there is surely a Physiognomy, which those experienced and Master Mendicants observe; whereby they instantly discover a merciful aspect, and will single out a face, wherein they spy the signatures and marks of Mercy: for there are mystically in our faces certain Characters which carry in them the motto of our Souls, wherein he that can read _A. B. C._ may read our natures. I hold moreover that there is a Phytognomy, or Physiognomy, not only of Men but of Plants and Vegetables; and in every one of them, some outward figures which hang as signs or bushes of their inward forms. The Finger of God hath left an Inscription upon all his works, not graphical, or composed of Letters, but of their several forms, constitutions, parts, and operations; which aptly joyned together do make one word that doth express their natures. By these Letters God calls the Stars by their names; and by this Alphabet _Adam_ assigned to every creature a name peculiar to its nature. Now there are, besides these Characters in our Faces, certain mystical figures in our Hands, which I dare not call meer dashes, strokes _a la volee_, or at random, because delineated by a Pencil that never works in vain; and hereof I take more particular notice, because I carry that in mine own hand, which I could never read of, nor discover in another. _Aristotle_ I confess, in his acute and singular Book of Physiognomy, hath made no mention of Chiromancy; yet I believe the _Egyptians_, who were neerer addicted to those abstruse and mystical sciences, had a knowledge therein; to which those vagabond and counterfeit _Egyptians_ did after pretend, and perhaps retained a few corrupted principles, which sometimes might verifie their prognosticks.

It is the common wonder of all men, how among so many millions of faces, there should be none alike: Now contrary, I wonder as much how there should be any. He that shall consider how many thousand several words have been carelesly and without study composed out of 24 Letters; withal, how many hundred lines there are to be drawn in the Fabrick of one Man; shall easily find that this variety is necessary: And it will be very hard that they shall so concur, as to make one portract like another. Let a Painter carelesly limb out a million of Faces, and you shall find them all different; yea let him have his Copy before him, yet after all his art there will remain a sensible distinction; for the pattern or example of every thing is the perfectest in that kind, whereof we still come short, though we transcend or go beyond it, because herein it is wide, and agrees not in all points unto the Copy. Nor doth the similitude of Creatures disparage the variety of Nature, nor any way confound the Works of God. For even in things alike there is diversity; and those that do seem to accord, do manifestly disagree. And thus is man like God; for in the same things that we resemble him, we are utterly different from him. There was never any thing so like another, as in all points to concur; there will ever some reserved difference slip in, to prevent the identity, without which, two several things would not be alike, but the same, which is impossible.

SECT. 3

But to return from Philosophy to Charity: I hold not so narrow a conceit of this virtue, as to conceive that to give Alms is onely to be Charitable, or think a piece of Liberality can comprehend the Total of Charity. Divinity hath wisely divided the act thereof into many branches, and hath taught us in this narrow way, many paths unto goodness: as many ways as we may do good, so many ways we may be charitable: there are infirmities, not onely of Body, but of Soul, and Fortunes, which do require the merciful hand of our abilities. I cannot contemn a man for ignorance, but behold him with as much pity as I do _Lazarus_. It is no greater Charity to cloath his body, than apparel the nakedness of his Soul. It is an honourable object to see the reasons of other men wear our Liveries, and their borrowed understandings do homage to the bounty of ours: It is the cheapest way of beneficence, and like the natural charity of the Sun, illuminates another without obscuring it self. To be reserved and caitiff in this part of goodness, is the sordidest piece of covetousness, and more contemptible than pecuniary Avarice. To this (as calling my self a Scholar) I am obliged by the duty of my condition: I make not therefore my head a grave, but a treasure of knowledge; I intend no Monopoly, but a community in learning; I study not for my own sake only, but for theirs that study not for themselves. I envy no man that knows more than my self, but pity them that know less. I instruct no man as an exercise of my knowledge, or with an intent rather to nourish and keep it alive in mine own head, then beget and propagate it in his; and in the midst of all my endeavours, there is but one thought that dejects me, that my acquired parts must perish with my self, nor can be Legacied among my honoured Friends. I cannot fall out, or contemn a man for an errour, or conceive why a difference in Opinion should divide an affection: For Controversies, Disputes, and Argumentations, both in Philosophy and in Divinity, if they meet with discreet and peaceable natures, do not infringe the Laws of Charity: in all disputes, so much as there is of passion, so much there is of nothing to the purpose; for then Reason, like a bad Hound, spends upon a false Scent, and forsakes the question first started. And this is one reason why Controversies are never determined; for though they be amply proposed, they are scarce at all handled, they do so swell with unnecessary Digressions; and the Parenthesis on the party, is often as large as the main discourse upon the subject. The Foundations of Religion are already established, and the Principles of Salvation subscribed unto by all: there remains not many controversies worth a Passion, and yet never any disputed without, not only in Divinity, but inferiour Arts: What a {~GREEK SMALL LETTER BETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~} and hot skirmish is betwixt S. and T. in _Lucian_: How do Grammarians hack and slash for the Genitive case in _Jupiter_? How do they break their own pates to salve that of _Priscian! Si foret in terris, rideret Democritus_. Yea, even amongst wiser militants, how many wounds have been given, and credits slain, for the poor victory of an opinion, or beggerly conquest of a distinction? Scholars are men of Peace, they bear no Arms, but their tongues are sharper than Actus his razor; their Pens carry farther, and give a lowder report than Thunder: I had rather stand the shock of a Basilisco, than the fury of a merciless Pen. It is not meer Zeal to Learning, or Devotion to the Muses, that wiser Princes Patron the Arts, and carry an indulgent aspect unto Scholars; but a desire to have their names eternized by the memory of their writings, and a fear of the revengeful Pen of succeeding ages: for these are the men, that when they have played their parts, and had their _exits_, must step out and give the moral of their Scenes, and deliver unto Posterity an Inventory of their Virtues and Vices. And surely there goes a great deal of Conscience to the compiling of an History: there is no reproach to the scandal of a Story; it is such an authentick kind of falshood, that with authority belies our good names to all Nations and Posterity.

SECT. 4

There is another offence unto Charity, which no Author hath ever written of, and few take notice of; and that's the reproach, not of whole professions, mysteries and conditions, but of whole Nations; wherein by opprobrious Epithets we miscal each other, and by an uncharitable Logick, from a disposition in a few, conclude a habit in all.

_Le mutin Anglois, & le bravache Escossois; Le bougre Italian, & le fol François; Le poultron Romain, le larron de Gascongne, L'Espagnol superbe, & l'Aleman yurongne_.

St. _Paul_, that calls the _Cretians_ lyars, doth it but indirectly, and upon quotation of their own Poet. It is as bloody a thought in one way, as _Nero's_ was in another. For by a word we wound a thousand, and at one blow assassine the honour of a Nation. It is as compleat a piece of madness to miscal and rave against the times, or think to recal men to reason, by a fit of passion: _Democritus_, that thought to laugh the times into goodness, seems to me as deeply Hypochondriack, as _Heraclitus_ that bewailed them. It moves not my spleen to behold the multitude in their proper humours, that is, in their fits of folly and madness, as well understanding that wisdom is not prophan'd unto the World, and 'tis the priviledge of a few to be Vertuous. They that endeavour to abolish Vice, destroy also Virtue; for contraries, though they destroy one another, are yet in life of one another. Thus Virtue (abolish vice) is an Idea; again, the community of sin doth not disparage goodness; for when Vice gains upon the major part, Virtue, in whom it remains, becomes more excellent; and being lost in some, multiplies its goodness in others, which remain untouched, and persist intire in the general inundation. I can therefore behold Vice without a Satyr, content only with an admonition, or instructive reprehension, for Noble Natures, and such as are capable of goodness, are railed into vice, that might as easily be admonished into virtue; and we should be all so far the Orators of goodness, as to protract her from the power of Vice, and maintain the cause of injured truth. No man can justly censure or condemn another, because indeed no man truly knows another. This I perceive in my self; for I am in the dark to all the world, and my nearest friends behold me but in a cloud: those that know me but superficially, think less of me than I do of my self; those of my neer acquaintance think more; God, who truly knows me, knows that I am nothing; for he only beholds me and all the world; who looks not on us through a derived ray, or a trajection of a sensible species, but beholds the substance without the helps of accidents, and the forms of things, as we their operations. Further, no man can judge another, because no man knows himself; for we censure others but as they disagree from that humour which we fancy laudible in our selves, and commend others but for that wherein they seem to quadrate and consent with us. So that in conclusion, all is but that we all condemn, Self-love. 'Tis the general complaint of these times, and perhaps of those past, that charity grows cold; which I perceive most verified in those which most do manifest the fires and flames of zeal; for it is a virtue that best agrees with coldest natures, and such as are complexioned for humility. But how shall we expect Charity towards others, when we are uncharitable to our selves? Charity begins at home, is the voice of the World; yet is every man his greatest enemy, and as it were, his own Executioner. _Non occides_, is the Commandment of God, yet scarce observed by any man; for I perceive every man is his own _Atropos_, and lends a hand to cut the thred of his own days. _Cain_ was not therefore the first Murtherer, but _Adam_, who brought in death; whereof he beheld the practice and example in his own son _Abel_, and saw that verified in the experience of another, which faith could not perswade him in the Theory of himself.

SECT. 5

There is, I think, no man that apprehends his own miseries less than my self, and no man that so neerly apprehends anothers. I could lose an arm without a tear, and with few groans, methinks, be quartered into pieces; yet can I weep most seriously at a Play, and receive with true passion, the counterfeit grief of those known and professed Impostures. It is a barbarous part of inhumanity to add unto any afflicted parties misery, or indeavour to multiply in any man, a passion, whose single nature is already above his patience: this was the greatest affliction of _Job_; and those oblique expostulations of his Friends, a deeper injury than the down-right blows of the Devil. It is not the tears of our own eyes only, but of our friends also, that do exhaust the current of our sorrows; which falling into many streams, runs more peaceably, and is contented with a narrower channel. It is an act within the power of charity, to translate a passion out of one brest into another, and to divide a sorrow almost out of it self; for an affliction, like a dimension, may be so divided, as if not indivisible, at least to become insensible. Now with my friend I desire not to share or participate, but to engross, his sorrows; that by making them mine own, I may more easily discuss them; for in mine own reason, and within my self, I can command that, which I cannot intreat without my self, and within the circle of another. I have often thought those noble pairs and examples of friendship not so truly Histories of what had been, as fictions of what should be; but I now perceive nothing in them but possibilities, nor any thing in the Heroick examples of _Damon_ and _Pythias_, _Achilles_ and _Patroclus_, which methinks upon some grounds I could not perform within the narrow compass of my self. That a man should lay down his life for his Friend, seems strange to vulgar affections, and such as confine themselves within that Worldly principle, Charity begins at home. For mine own part I could never remember the relations that I held unto my self, nor the respect that I owe unto my own nature, in the cause of God, my Country, and my Friends. Next to these three I do embrace my self: I confess I do not observe that order that the Schools ordain our affections, to love our Parents, Wives, Children, and then our Friends; for excepting the injunctions of Religion, I do not find in my self such a necessary and indissoluble Sympathy to all those of my blood. I hope I do not break the fifth Commandment, if I conceive I may love my friend before the nearest of my blood, even those to whom I owe the principles of life: I never yet cast a true affection on a woman, but I have loved my friend as I do virtue, my soul, my God. From hence me thinks I do conceive how God loves man, what happiness there is in the love of God. Omitting all other, there are three most mystical unions, two natures in one person; three persons in one nature; one soul in two bodies. For though indeed they be really divided, yet are they so united, as they seem but one, and make rather a duality than two distinct souls.

SECT. 6

There are wonders in true affection; it is a body of _Enigma's_, mysteries, and riddles; wherein two so become one, as they both become two: I love my friend before my self, and yet methinks I do not love him enough: some few months hence, my multiplied affection will make me believe I have not loved him at all: when I am from him, I am dead till I be with him; when I am with him, I am not satisfied, but would still be nearer him. United souls are not satisfied with imbraces, but desire to be truly each other; which being impossible, their desires are infinite, and must proceed without a possibility of satisfaction. Another misery there is in affection, that whom we truly love like our own, we forget their looks, nor can our memory retain the Idea of their faces; and it is no wonder, for they are ourselves, and our affection makes their looks our own. This noble affection falls not on vulgar and common constitutions, but on such as are mark'd for virtue: he that can love his friend with this noble ardour, will in a competent degree affect all. Now if we can bring our affections to look beyond the body, and cast an eye upon the soul, we have found out the true object, not only of friendship, but Charity; and the greatest happiness that we can bequeath the soul, is that wherein we all do place our last felicity, Salvation; which though it be not in our power to bestow, it is in our charity and pious invocations to desire, if not procure and further. I cannot contentedly frame a prayer for my self in particular, without a catalogue for my friends; nor request a happiness wherein my sociable disposition doth not desire the fellowship of my neighbour. I never hear the Toll of a passing Bell, though in my mirth, without my prayers and best wishes for the departing spirit: I cannot go to cure the body of my patient, but I forget my profession, and call unto God for his soul: I cannot see one say his prayers, but in stead of imitating him, I fall into a supplication for him, who perhaps is no more to me than a common nature: and if God hath vouchsafed an ear to my supplications, there are surely many happy that never saw me, and enjoy the blessing of mine unknown devotions. To pray for Enemies, that is, for their salvation, is no harsh precept, but the practice of our daily and ordinary devotions. I cannot believe the story of the Italian: our bad wishes and uncharitable desires proceed no further than this life; it is the Devil, and the uncharitable votes of Hell, that desire our misery in the World to come.

SECT. 7

To do no injury, nor take none, was a principle, which to my former years, and impatient affections, seemed to contain enough of Morality; but my more setled years, and Christian constitution, have fallen upon severer resolutions. I can hold there is no such thing as injury; that if there be, there is no such injury as revenge, and no such revenge as the contempt of an injury: that to hate another, is to malign himself; that the truest way to love another, is to despise our selves. I were unjust unto mine own Conscience, if I should say I am at variance with any thing like my self. I find there are many pieces in this one fabrick of man; this frame is raised upon a mass of Antipathies: I am one methinks, but as the World; wherein notwithstanding there are a swarm of distinct essences, and in them another World of contrarieties; we carry private and domestick enemies within, publick and more hostile adversaries without. The Devil, that did but buffet St. _Paul_, plays methinks at sharp with me. Let me be nothing, if within the compass of my self I do not find the battail of _Lepanto_, Passion against Reason, Reason against Faith, Faith against the Devil, and my Conscience against all. There is another man within me, that's angry with me, rebukes, commands, and dastards me. I have no Conscience of Marble, to resist the hammer of more heavy offences; nor yet too soft and waxen, as to take the impression of each single peccadillo or scape of infirmity: I am of a strange belief, that it is as easie to be forgiven some sins, as to commit some others. For my Original sin, I hold it to be washed away in my Baptism, for my actual transgressions, I compute and reckon with God, but from my last repentance, Sacrament, or general absolution; and therefore am not terrified with the sins or madness of my youth. I thank the goodness of God, I have no sins that want a name; I am not singular in offences; my transgressions are Epidemical, and from the common breath of our corruption. For there are certain tempers of body, which matcht with an humorous depravity of mind, do hatch and produce vitiosities, whose newness and monstrosity of nature admits no name; this was the temper of that Lecher that fell in love with a Statua, and constitution of _Nero_ in his Spintrian recreations. For the Heavens are not only fruitful in new and unheard-of stars, the Earth in plants and animals; but mens minds also in villany and vices: now the dulness of my reason, and the vulgarity of my disposition, never prompted my invention, nor sollicited my affection unto any of those; yet even those common and quotidian infirmities that so necessarily attend me, and do seem to be my very nature, have so dejected me, so broken the estimation that I should have otherwise of my self, that I repute my self the most abjectest piece of mortality. Divines prescribe a fit of sorrow to repentance; there goes indignation, anger, sorrow, hatred, into mine; passions of a contrary nature, which neither seem to sute with this action, nor my proper constitution. It is no breach of charity to our selves, to be at variance with our Vices; nor to abhor that part of us, which is an enemy to the ground of charity, our God; wherein we do but imitate our great selves the world, whose divided Antipathies and contrary faces do yet carry a charitable regard unto the whole by their particular discords, preserving the common harmony, and keeping in fetters those powers, whose rebellions once Masters, might be the ruine of all.

SECT. 8

I thank God, amongst those millions of Vices I do inherit and hold from _Adam_, I have escaped one, and that a mortal enemy to Charity, the first and father-sin[C], not onely of man, but of the devil, Pride; a vice whose name is comprehended in a Monosyllable, but in its nature not circumscribed with a World. I have escaped it in a condition that can hardly avoid it. Those petty acquisitions and reputed perfections that advance and elevate the conceits of other men, add no feathers unto mine. I have seen a Grammarian towr and plume himself over a single line in _Horace_, and shew more pride in the construction of one Ode, than the Author in the composure of the whole book. For my own part, besides the _Jargon_ and _Patois_ of several Provinces, I understand no less than six Languages; yet I protest I have no higher conceit of my self, than had our Fathers before the confusion of _Babel_, when there was but one Language in the World, and none to boast himself either Linguist or Critick. I have not onely seen several Countries, beheld the nature of their Climes, the Chorography of their Provinces, Topography of their Cities, but understood their several Laws, Customs, and Policies; yet cannot all this perswade the dulness of my spirit unto such an opinion of my self, as I behold in nimbler and conceited heads, that never looked a degree beyond their Nests. I know the names, and somewhat more, of all the constellations in my Horizon; yet I have seen a prating Mariner, that could onely name the pointers and the North Star, out-talk me, and conceit himself a whole Sphere above me. I know most of the Plants of my Countrey, and of those about me; yet methinks I do not know so many as when I did but know a hundred, and had scarcely ever Simpled further than _Cheap-side_. For indeed, heads of capacity, and such as are not full with a handful, or easie measure of knowledge, think they know nothing, till they know all; which being impossible, they fall upon the opinion of _Socrates_, and only know they know not any thing. I cannot think that _Homer_ pin'd away upon the riddle of the fishermen; or that _Aristotle_, who understood the uncertainty of knowledge, and confessed so often the reason of man too weak for the works of nature, did ever drown himself upon the flux and reflux of _Euripus_. We do but learn to-day, what our better advanced judgements will unteach to-morrow; and _Aristotle_ doth but instruct us, as _Plato_ did him; that is, to confute himself. I have run through all sorts, yet find no rest in any: though our first studies and _junior_ endeavours may style us Peripateticks, Stoicks, or Academicks, yet I perceive the wisest heads prove, at last, almost all Scepticks, and stand like _Janus_ in the field of knowledge. I have therefore one common and authentick Philosophy I learned in the Schools, whereby I discourse and satisfie the reason of other men; another more reserved, and drawn from experience, whereby I content mine own. _Solomon_, that complained of ignorance in the height of knowledge, hath not only humbled my conceits, but discouraged my endeavours. There is yet another conceit that hath sometimes made me shut my books, which tells me it is a vanity to waste our days in the blind pursuit of knowledge; it is but attending a little longer, and we shall enjoy that by instinct and infusion, which we endeavour at here by labour and inquisition. It is better to sit down in a modest ignorance, and rest contented with the natural blessing of our own reasons, than buy the uncertain knowledge of this life, with sweat and vexation, which Death gives every fool _gratis_, and is an accessary of our glorification.

[C] Farther-sin, 1682.

SECT. 9

I was never yet once, and commend their resolutions who never marry twice: not that I disallow of second marriage; as neither in all cases, of Polygamy, which considering some times, and the unequal number of both sexes, may be also necessary. The whole World was made for man, but the twelfth part of man for woman: Man is the whole World, and the Breath of God; Woman the Rib and crooked piece of man. I could be content that we might procreate like trees, without conjunction, or that there were any way to perpetuate the World without this trivial and vulgar way of coition; it is the foolishest act a wise man commits in all his life; nor is there any thing that will more deject his cool'd imagination, when he shall consider what an odd and unworthy piece of folly he hath committed. I speak not in prejudice, nor am averse from that sweet Sex, but naturally amorous of all that is beautiful; I can look a whole day with delight upon a handsome Picture, though it be but of an Horse. It is my temper, and I like it the better, to affect all harmony; and sure there is musick even in the beauty, and the silent note which _Cupid_ strikes, far sweeter than the sound of an instrument. For there is a musick where ever there is a harmony, order or proportion; and thus far we may maintain the musick of the Sphears: for those well-ordered motions, and regular paces, though they give no sound unto the ear, yet to the understanding they strike a note most full of harmony. Whosoever is harmonically composed, delights in harmony; which makes me much distrust the symmetry of those heads which declaim against all Church-Musick. For my self, not only from my obedience, but my particular Genius, I do embrace it: for even that vulgar and Tavern-Musick, which makes one man merry, another mad, strikes in me a deep fit of devotion, and a profound contemplation of the first Composer. There is something in it of Divinity more than the ear discovers: it is an Hieroglyphical and shadowed lesson of the whole World, and creatures of God; such a melody to the ear, as the whole World well understood, would afford the understanding. In brief, it is a sensible fit of that harmony, which intellectually sounds in the ears of God. I will not say with _Plato_, the soul is an harmony, but harmonical, and hath its nearest sympathy unto Musick: thus some whose temper of body agrees, and humours the constitution of their souls, are born Poets, though indeed all are naturally inclined unto Rhythme. [16]This made _Tacitus_ in the very first line of his Story, fall upon a verse, and _Cicero_ the worst of Poets, but [17]declaiming for a Poet, falls in the very first sentence upon a perfect [18]Hexameter. I feel not in me those sordid and unchristian desires of my profession; I do not secretly implore and wish for Plagues, rejoyce at Famines, revolve Ephemerides and Almanacks, in expectation of malignant Aspects, fatal Conjunctions, and Eclipses: I rejoyce not at unwholesome Springs, nor unseasonable Winters; my Prayer goes with the Husbandman's; I desire every thing in its proper season, that neither men nor the times be put out of temper. Let me be sick my self, if sometimes the malady of my patient be not a disease unto me; I desire rather to cure his infirmities than my own necessities: where I do him no good, methinks it is scarce honest gain; though I confess 'tis but the worthy salary of our well-intended endeavours. I am not only ashamed, but heartily sorry, that besides death, there are diseases incurable; yet not for my own sake, or that they be beyond my Art, but for the general cause and sake of humanity, whose common cause I apprehend as mine own. And to speak more generally, those three Noble Professions which all civil Commonwealths do honour, are raised upon the fall of _Adam_, and are not exempt from their infirmities; there are not only diseases incurable in Physick, but cases indissolvable in Laws, Vices incorrigible in Divinity: if general Councils may err, I do not see why particular Courts should be infallible; their perfectest rules are raised upon the erroneous reasons of Man; and the Laws of one, do but condemn the rules of another; as _Aristotle_ oft-times the opinions of his Predecessours, because, though agreeable to reason, yet were not consonant to his own rules, and Logick of his proper Principles. Again, to speak nothing of the Sin against the Holy Ghost, whose cure not onely, but whose nature is unknown; I can cure the Gout or Stone in some, sooner than Divinity Pride or Avarice in others. I can cure Vices by Physick, when they remain incurable by Divinity; and shall obey my Pills, when they contemn their precepts. I boast nothing, but plainly say, we all labour against our own cure; for death is the cure of all diseases. There is no Catholicon or universal remedy I know but this, which, though nauseous to queasie stomachs, yet to prepared appetites is Nectar, and a pleasant potion of immortality.

[16] _Urbem Roman in principio Reges habuere._

[17] _Pro Archiâ Poëtâ._

[18] _In qua me non inficior mediocriter esse._

SECT. 10

For my Conversation, it is like the Sun's with all men, and with a friendly aspect to good and bad. Methinks there is no man bad, and the worst, best; that is, while they are kept within the circle of those qualities, wherein they are good; there is no man's mind of such discordant and jarring a temper, to which a tunable disposition may not strike a harmony. _Magnæ virtutes, nee minora vitia_; it is the posie of the best natures, and may be inverted on the worst; there are in the most depraved and venemous dispositions, certain pieces that remain untoucht, which by an _Antiperistasis_ become more excellent, or by the excellency of their antipathies are able to preserve themselves from the contagion of their enemy vices, and persist intire beyond the general corruption. For it is also thus in nature. The greatest Balsomes do lie enveloped in the bodies of most powerful Corrosives; I say moreover, and I ground upon experience, that poisons contain within themselves their own Antidote, and that which preserves them from the venome of themselves, without which they were not deleterious to others onely, but to themselves also. But it is the corruption that I fear within me, not the contagion of commerce without me. 'Tis that unruly regiment within me, that will destroy me; 'tis I that do infect my self; the man without a Navel yet lives in me; I feel that original canker corrode and devour me; and therefore _Defenda me_ Dios _de me_, Lord deliver me from my self, is a part of my Letany, and the first voice of my retired imaginations. There is no man alone, because every man is a _Microcosm_, and carries the whole World about him; _Nunquam minus solus quàm cum solus_, though it be the Apothegme of a wise man, is yet true in the mouth of a fool; indeed, though in a Wilderness, a man is never alone, not only because he is with himself and his own thoughts, but because he is with the Devil, who ever consorts with our solitude, and is that unruly rebel that musters up those disordered motions which accompany our sequestred imaginations. And to speak more narrowly, there is no such thing as solitude, nor any thing that can be said to be alone and by itself, but God, who is his own circle, and can subsist by himself; all others, besides their dissimilary and Heterogeneous parts, which in a manner multiply their natures, cannot subsist without the concourse of God, and the society of that hand which doth uphold their natures. In brief, there can be nothing truly alone and by it self, which is not truly one; and such is only God: All others do transcend an unity, and so by consequence are many.

SECT. 11

Now for my life, it is a miracle of thirty years, which to relate, were not a History, but a piece of Poetry, and would sound to common ears like a Fable; for the World, I count it not an Inn, but an Hospital; and a place not to live, but to dye in. The world that I regard is my self; it is the Microcosm of my own frame that I cast mine eye on; for the other, I use it but like my Globe, and turn it round sometimes for my recreation. Men that look upon my outside, perusing only my condition and Fortunes, do err in my Altitude, for I am above _Atlas_ his shoulders. The earth is a point not only in respect of the Heavens above us, but of that heavenly and celestial part within us: that mass of Flesh that circumscribes me, limits not my mind: that surface that tells the Heavens it hath an end, cannot persuade me I have any: I take my circle to be above three hundred and sixty; though the number of the Ark do measure my body, it comprehendeth not my mind: whilst I study to find how I am a Microcosm, or little World, I find my self something more than the great. There is surely a piece of Divinity in us, something that was before the Elements, and owes no homage unto the Sun. Nature tells me I am the Image of God, as well as Scripture: he that understands not thus much, hath not his introduction or first lesson, and is yet to begin the Alphabet of man. Let me not injure the felicity of others, if I say I am as happy as any: _Ruat coelum, Fiat voluntas tua_, salveth all; so that whatsoever happens, it is but what our daily prayers desire. In brief, I am content, and what should providence add more? Surely this is it we call Happiness, and this do I enjoy; with this I am happy in a dream, and as content to enjoy a happiness in a fancy, as others in a more apparent truth and realty. There is surely a neerer apprehension of any thing that delights us in our dreams, than in our waked senses; without this I were unhappy: for my awaked judgment discontents me, ever whispering unto me, that I am from my friend; but my friendly dreams in night requite me, and make me think I am within his arms. I thank God for my happy dreams, as I do for my good rest, for there is a satisfaction in them unto reasonable desires, and such as can be content with a fit of happiness. And surely it is not a melancholy conceit to think we are all asleep in this World, and that the conceits of this life are as meer dreams to those of the next, as the Phantasms of the night, to the conceits of the day. There is an equal delusion in both, and the one doth but seem to be the embleme or picture of the other; we are somewhat more than our selves in our sleeps, and the slumber of the body seems to be but the waking of the soul. It is the ligation of sense, but the liberty of reason, and our waking conceptions do not match the Fancies of our sleeps. At my Nativity, my Ascendant was the watery sign of _Scorpius_; I was born in the Planetary hour of _Saturn_, and I think I have a piece of that Leaden Planet in me. I am no way facetious, nor disposed for the mirth and galliardize of company; yet in one dream I can compose a whole Comedy, behold the action, apprehend the jests, and laugh my self awake at the conceits thereof: were my memory as faithful as my reason is then fruitful, I would never study but in my dreams; and this time also would I chuse for my devotions: but our grosser memories have then so little hold of our abstracted understandings, that they forget the story, and can only relate to our awaked souls, a confused and broken tale of that that hath passed. _Aristotle_, who hath written a singular Tract of Sleep, hath not methinks throughly defined it; nor yet _Galen_, though he seem to have corrected it; for those _Noctambuloes_ and night-walkers, though in their sleep, do yet injoy the action of their senses: we must therefore say that there is something in us that is not in the jurisdiction of _Morpheus_; and that those abstracted and ecstatick souls do walk about in their own corps, as spirits with the bodies they assume; wherein they seem to hear, and feel, though indeed the Organs are destitute of sense, and their natures of those faculties that should inform them. Thus it is observed, that men sometimes upon the hour of their departure, do speak and reason above themselves; for then the soul beginning to be freed from the ligaments of the body, begins to reason like her self, and to discourse in a strain above mortality.

SECT. 12

We term sleep a death, and yet it is waking that kills us, and destroys those spirits that are the house of life. 'Tis indeed a part of life that best expresseth death; for every man truely lives, so long as he acts his nature, or some way makes good the faculties of himself: _Themistocles_ therefore that slew his Soldier in his sleep, was a merciful Executioner: 'tis a kind of punishment the mildness of no laws hath invented; I wonder the fancy of _Lucan_ and _Seneca_ did not discover it. It is that death by which we may be literally said to dye daily; a death which _Adam_ dyed before his mortality; a death whereby we live a middle and moderating point between life and death; in fine, so like death, I dare not trust it without my prayers, and an half adieu unto the World, and take my farewell in a Colloquy with God.

_The night is come, like to the day; Depart not thou great God away. Let not my sins, black as the night, Eclipse the lustre of thy light. Keep still in my Horizon; for to me The Sun makes not the day, but thee. Thou whose nature cannot sleep, On my temples centry keep; Guard me 'gainst those watchful foes, Whose eyes are open while mine close. Let no dreams my head infest, But such as_ Jacob's _temples blest. While I do rest, my Soul advance; Make my sleep a holy trance. That I may, my rest being wrought, Awake into some holy thought; And with as active vigour run My course, as doth the nimble Sun. Sleep is a death; O make me try, By sleeping, what it is to die; And as gently lay my head On my grave, as now my bed. Howere I rest, great God, let me Awake again at last with thee. And this assur'd, behold I lie Securely, or to awake or die. These are my drowsie days; in vain I do now wake to sleep again: O come that hour, when I shall never Sleep again, but wake for ever._

This is the Dormative I take to bedward; I need no other _Laudanum_ than this to make me sleep; after which, I close mine eyes in security, content to take my leave of the Sun, and sleep unto the resurrection.

SECT. 13

The method I should use in distributive Justice, I often observe in commutative; and keep a Geometrical proportion in both; whereby becoming equable to others, I become unjust to my self, and supererogate in that common principle, _Do unto others as thou wouldst be done unto thy self_. I was not born unto riches, neither is it I think my Star to be wealthy; or if it were, the freedom of my mind, and frankness of my disposition, were able to contradict and cross my fates. For to me avarice seems not so much a vice, as a deplorable piece of madness; to conceive ourselves Urinals, or be perswaded that we are dead, is not so ridiculous, nor so many degrees beyond the power of Hellebore, as this. The opinion of Theory, and positions of men, are not so void of reason as their practised conclusions: some have held that Snow is black, that the earth moves, that the Soul is air, fire, water; but all this is Philosophy, and there is no _delirium_, if we do but speculate the folly and indisputable dotage of avarice, to that subterraneous Idol, and God of the Earth. I do confess I am an Atheist; I cannot perswade myself to honour that the World adores; whatsoever virtue its prepared substance may have within my body, it hath no influence nor operation without: I would not entertain a base design, or an action that should call me villain, for the Indies; and for this only do I love and honour my own soul, and have methinks two arms too few to embrace myself. _Aristotle_ is too severe, that will not allow us to be truely liberal without wealth, and the bountiful hand of Fortune; if this be true, I must confess I am charitable only in my liberal intentions, and bountiful well-wishes. But if the example of the Mite be not only an act of wonder, but an example of the noblest Charity, surely poor men may also build Hospitals, and the rich alone have not erected Cathedrals. I have a private method which others observe not; I take the opportunity of my self to do good; I borrow occasion of Charity from mine own necessities, and supply the wants of others, when I am in most need my self; for it is an honest stratagem to make advantage of our selves, and so to husband the acts of vertue, that where they were defective in one circumstance, they may repay their want, and multiply their goodness in another. I have not _Peru_ in my desires, but a competence, and ability to perform those good works to which he hath inclined my nature. He is rich, who hath enough to be charitable; and it is hard to be so poor, that a noble mind may not find a way to this piece of goodness. _He that giveth to the poor, lendeth to the Lord_; there is more Rhetorick in that one sentence, than in a Library of Sermons; and indeed if those Sentences were understood by the Reader, with the same Emphasis as they are delivered by the Author, we needed not those Volumes of instructions, but might be honest by an Epitome. Upon this motive only I cannot behold a Beggar without relieving his Necessities with my Purse, or his Soul with my Prayers; these scenical and accidental differences between us, cannot make me forget that common and untoucht part of us both; there is under these _Cantoes_ and miserable outsides, these mutilate and semi-bodies, a soul of the same alloy with our own, whose Genealogy is God as well as ours, and in as fair a way to Salvation as our selves. Statists that labour to contrive a Common-wealth without our poverty, take away the object of charity, not understanding only the Common-wealth of a Christian, but forgetting the prophecie of Christ.

SECT. 14

Now there is another part of charity, which is the Basis and Pillar of this, and that is the love of God, for whom we love our neighbour; for this I think charity, to love God for himself, and our neighbour for God. All that is truly amiable is God, or as it were a divided piece of him, that retains a reflex or shadow of himself. Nor is it strange that we should place affection on that which is invisible; all that we truly love is thus; what we adore under affection of our senses, deserves not the honour of so pure a title. Thus we adore virtue, though to the eyes of sense she be invisible: thus that part of our noble friends that we love, is not that part that we imbrace, but that insensible part that our arms cannot embrace. God being all goodness, can love nothing but himself, and the traduction of his holy Spirit. Let us call to assize the loves of our parents, the affection of our wives and children, and they are all dumb shows and dreams, without reality, truth or constancy: for first, there is a strong bond of affection between us and our Parents; yet how easily dissolved? We betake our selves to a woman, forget our mother in a wife, and the womb that bare us, in that that shall bear our Image: this woman blessing us with children, our affection leaves the level it held before, and sinks from our bed unto our issue and picture of Posterity, where affection holds no steady mansion. They, growing up in years, desire our ends; or applying themselves to a woman, take a lawful way to love another better than our selves. Thus I perceive a man may be buried alive, and behold his grave in his own issue.

SECT. 15

I conclude therefore and say, there is no happiness under (or as _Copernicus_ will have it, above) the Sun, nor any Crambe in that repeated verity and burthen of all the wisdom of _Solomon, All is vanity and vexation of Spirit_. There is no felicity in that the World adores: _Aristotle_ whilst he labours to refute the Idea's of _Plato_, falls upon one himself: for his _summum bonum_ is a _Chimæra_, and there is no such thing as his Felicity. That wherein God himself is happy, the holy Angels are happy, in whose defect the Devils are unhappy; that dare I call happiness: whatsoever conduceth unto this, may with an easy Metaphor deserve that name: whatsoever else the World terms Happiness, is to me a story out of _Pliny_, a tale of _Boccace_ or _Malizspini_; an apparition or neat delusion, wherein there is no more of Happiness, than the name. Bless me in this life with but peace of my Conscience, command of my affections, the love of thy self and my dearest friends, and I shall be happy enough to pity _Cæsar_. These are, O Lord, the humble desires of my most reasonable ambition, and all I dare call happiness on earth; wherein I set no rule or limit to thy Hand or Providence; dispose of me according to the wisdom of thy pleasure. Thy will be done, though in my own undoing.

FINIS

PSEUDODOXIA EPIDEMICA

OR ENQUIRIES

INTO VERY MANY RECEIVED

TENENTS AND COMMONLY

PRESUMED TRUTHS

TO THE READER

_Would Truth dispense, we could be content, with_ Plato, _that knowledge were but remembrance; that intellectual acquisition were but reminiscential evocation, and new Impressions but the colouring of old stamps which stood pale in the soul before. For what is worse, knowledge is made by oblivion, and to purchase a clear and warrantable body of Truth, we must forget and part with much we know. Our tender Enquiries taking up Learning at large, and together with true and assured notions, receiving many, wherein our reviewing judgments do find no satisfaction. And therefore in this_ Encyclopædie _and round of Knowledge, like the great and exemplary Wheels of Heaven, we must observe two Circles: that while we are daily carried about, and whirled on by the swing and rapt of the one, we may maintain a natural and proper course, in the slow and sober wheel of the other. And this we shall more readily perform, if we timely survey our knowledge; impartially singling out those encroachments, which junior compliance and popular credulity hath admitted. Whereof at present we have endeavoured a long and serious_ Adviso; _proposing not only a large and copious List, but from experience and reason attempting their decisions._

_And first we crave exceeding pardon in the audacity of the Attempt, humbly acknowledging a work of such concernment unto truth, and difficulty in it self, did well deserve the conjunction of many heads. And surely more advantageous had it been unto Truth, to have fallen into the endeavors of some co-operating advancers, that might have performed it to the life, and added authority thereto; which the privacy of our condition, and unequal abilities cannot expect. Whereby notwithstanding we have not been diverted; nor have our solitary attempts been so discouraged, as to dispair the favourable look of Learning upon our single and unsupported endeavours_.

_Nor have we let fall our Pen, upon discouragement of Contradiction, Unbelief and Difficulty of disswasion from radicated beliefs, and points of high prescription, although we are very sensible, how hardly teaching years do learn, what roots old age contracteth unto errors, and how such as are but acorns in our younger brows, grow Oaks in our elder heads, and become inflexible unto the powerfullest arm of reason. Although we have also beheld, what cold requitals others have found in their several redemptions of Truth; and how their ingenuous Enquiries have been dismissed with censure, and obloquie of singularities_.

[Sidenote: _Inspection of Urines._]

_Some consideration we hope from the course of our Profession, which though it leadeth us into many truths that pass undiscerned by others, yet doth it disturb their Communications, and much interrupt the office of our Pens in their well intended Transmissions. And therefore surely in this work attempts will exceed performances; it being composed by snatches of time, as medical vacations, and the fruitless importunity of_ Uroscopy _would permit us. And therefore also, perhaps it hath not found that regular and constant stile, those infallible experiments and those assured determinations, which the subject sometime requireth, and might be expected from others, whose quiet doors and unmolested hours afford no such distractions. Although whoever shall indifferently perpend the exceeding difficulty, which either the obscurity of the subject, or unavoidable paradoxology must often put upon the Attemptor, he will easily discern, a work of this nature is not to be performed upon one legg; and should smel of oyl, if duly and deservedly handled_.

_Our first intentions considering the common interest of Truth, resolved to propose it unto the Latine republique and equal Judges of_ Europe, _but owing in the first place this service unto our Country, and therein especially unto its ingenuous Gentry, we have declared our self in a language best conceived. Although I confess the quality of the Subject will sometimes carry us into expressions beyond meer English apprehensions. And indeed, if elegancy still proceedeth, and English Pens maintain that stream, we have of late observed to flow from many; we shall within few years be fain to learn Latine to understand English, and a work will prove of equal facility in either. Nor have we addressed our Pen or Stile unto the people (whom Books do not redress, and are this way incapable of reduction), but unto the knowing and leading part of Learning. As well understanding (at least probably hoping) except they be watered from higher regions, and fructifying meteors of Knowledge, these weeds must lose their alimental sap, and wither of themselves. Whose conserving influence, could our endeavours prevent; we should trust the rest unto the sythe of_ Time, _and hopefull dominion of Truth_.

[Sidenote: {~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH VARIA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH PERISPOMENI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER PSI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER DELTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH PERISPOMENI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}, _Athenæi_, lib. 7.]

_We hope it will not be unconsidered, that we find no open tract, or constant manuduction in this Labyrinth; but are oft-times fain to wander in the_ America _and untravelled parts of Truth. For though not many years past, Dr._ Primrose _hath made a learned Discourse of vulgar Errors in Physick, yet have we discussed but two or three thereof._ Scipio Mercurii _hath also left an excellent tract in_ Italian, _concerning popular Errors; but confining himself only unto those in Physick, he hath little conduced unto the generality of our doctrine._ Laurentius Ioubertus, _by the same Title led our expectation into thoughts of great relief; whereby notwithstanding we reaped no advantage; it answering scarce at all the promise of the inscription. Nor perhaps (if it were yet extant) should we find any farther Assistance from that ancient piece of_ Andreas, _pretending the same Title. And therefore we are often constrained to stand alone against the strength of opinion, and to meet the_ Goliah _and Giant of Authority, with contemptible pibbles, and feeble arguments, drawn from the scrip and slender stock of our selves. Nor have we indeed scarce named any Author whose name we do not honour; and if detraction could invite us, discretion surely would contain us from any derogatory intention, where highest Pens and friendliest eloquence must fail in commendation_.

_And therefore also we cannot but hope the equitable considerations, and candour of reasonable minds. We cannot expect the frown of_ Theology _herein; nor can they which behold the present state of things, and controversie of points so long received in Divinity, condemn our sober Enquiries in the doubtfull appertinancies of Arts, and Receptaries of Philosophy. Surely Philologers and Critical Discoursers, who look beyond the shell and obvious exteriours of things, will not be angry with our narrower explorations. And we cannot doubt, our Brothers in Physick (whose knowledge in Naturals will lead them into a nearer apprehension of many things delivered) will friendly accept, if not countenance our endeavours. Nor can we conceive it may be unwelcome unto those honoured Worthies, who endeavour the advancement of Learning: as being likely to find a clearer progression, when so many rubs are levelled, and many untruths taken off, which passing as principles with common beliefs, disturb the tranquility of Axioms, which otherwise might be raised. And wise men cannot but know, that arts and learning want this expurgation: and if the course of truth be permitted unto its self, like that of time and uncorrected computations, it cannot escape many errors, which duration still enlargeth_.

_Lastly, we are not Magisterial in opinions, nor have we Dictator-like obtruded our conceptions; but in the humility of Enquiries or disquisitions, have only proposed them unto more ocular discerners. And therefore opinions are free, and open it is for any to think or declare the contrary. And we shall so far encourage contradiction, as to promise no disturbance, or re-oppose any Pen, that shall fallaciously or captiously refute us_; _that shall only lay hold of our lapses, single out Digressions, Corollaries, or Ornamental conceptions, to evidence his own in as indifferent truths. And shall only take notice of such, whose experimental and judicious knowledge shall solemnly look upon it; not only to destroy of ours, but to establish of his own; not to traduce or extenuate, but to explain and dilucidate, to add and ampliate, according to the laudable custom of the Ancients in their sober promotions of Learning. Unto whom notwithstanding, we shall not contentiously rejoin, or only to justifie our own, but to applaud or confirm his maturer assertions; and shall confer what is in us unto his name and honour; Ready to be swallowed in any worthy enlarger: as having acquired our end, if any way, or under any name we may obtain a work, so much desired, and yet desiderated of Truth._

_THOMAS BROWN._

THE POSTSCRIPT

Readers,

_To enform you of the Advantages of the present Impression, and disabuse your expectations of any future Enlargements; these are to advertise thee, that this Edition comes forth with very many Explanations, Additions, and Alterations throughout, besides that of one entire Chapter: But that now this Work is compleat and perfect, expect no further Additions._

THE FIRST BOOK

OR GENERAL PART