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diff --git a/586-0.txt b/586-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..22397a2 --- /dev/null +++ b/586-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6355 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the +Letter to a Friend, by Thomas Browne + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll +have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using +this ebook. + + + +Title: Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend + +Author: Thomas Browne + +Annotator: J. W. Willis Bund + +Release Date: November 11, 2019 [EBook #586] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RELIGIO MEDICI *** + + + + +Produced by Henry Flower and Judith Boss, Omaha, Nebraska + + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Note + + +The printed text contained both footnotes and endnotes. These have +been renumbered in continuous series of letters and Arabic numerals +respectively. + +Corrected errata are listed at the end of the text. + +The following List of Contents has been added by the transcriber: + + RELIGIO MEDICI + HYDRIOTAPHIA + A LETTER TO A FRIEND + NOTES TO THE RELIGIO MEDICI + NOTES TO HYDRIOTAPHIA + NOTES TO LETTER TO A FRIEND + + + + +RELIGIO MEDICI. + + + + +_RELIGIO MEDICI_, + +HYDRIOTAPHIA, AND THE LETTER TO A FRIEND. + +BY + +SIR THOMAS BROWNE, KNT. + +WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY + +J. W. WILLIS BUND, M.A., LL.B., + +GONVILLE AND CAIUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE, + +OF LINCOLN’S INN, BARRISTER-AT-LAW. + +LONDON: + +SAMPSON LOW, SON, AND MARSTON, + +CROWN BUILDINGS, 188 FLEET STREET. + +1869. + + + + +INTRODUCTION. + + +SIR THOMAS BROWNE (whose works occupy so prominent a position in the +literary history of the seventeenth century) is an author who is now +little known and less read. This comparative oblivion to which he has +been consigned is the more remarkable, as, if for nothing else, his +writings deserve to be studied as an example of the English language +in what may be termed a transition state. The prose of the Elizabethan +age was beginning to pass away and give place to a more inflated style +of writing--a style which, after passing through various stages of +development, culminated in that of Johnson. + +Browne is one of the best early examples of this school; his style, +to quote Johnson himself, “is vigorous but rugged, it is learned but +pedantick, it is deep but obscure, it strikes but does not please, it +commands but does not allure. . . . It is a tissue of many languages, a +mixture of heterogeneous words brought together from distant regions.” + +Yet in spite of this qualified censure, there are passages in Browne’s +works not inferior to any in the English language; and though his +writings may not be “a well of English undefiled,” yet it is the very +defilements that add to the beauty of the work. + +But it is not only as an example of literary style that Browne deserves +to be studied. The matter of his works, the grandeur of his ideas, the +originality of his thoughts, the greatness of his charity, amply make +up for the deficiencies (if deficiencies there be) in his style. An +author who combined the wit of Montaigne with the learning of Erasmus, +and of whom even Hallam could say that “his varied talents wanted +nothing but the controlling supremacy of good sense to place him in the +highest rank of our literature,” should not be suffered to remain in +obscurity. + +A short account of his life will form the best introduction to his +works. + +Sir Thomas Browne was born in London, in the parish of St Michael le +Quern, on the 19th of October 1605. His father was a London merchant, +of a good Cheshire family; and his mother a Sussex lady, daughter of Mr +Paul Garraway of Lewis. His father died when he was very young, and his +mother marrying again shortly afterwards, Browne was left to the care +of his guardians, one of whom is said to have defrauded him out of some +of his property. He was educated at Winchester, and afterwards sent +to Oxford, to what is now Pembroke College, where he took his degree +of M.A. in 1629. Thereupon he commenced for a short time to practise +as a physician in Oxfordshire. But we soon find him growing tired of +this, and accompanying his father-in-law, Sir Thomas Dutton, on a +tour of inspection of the castles and forts in Ireland. We next hear +of Browne in the south of France, at Montpellier, then a celebrated +school of medicine, where he seems to have studied some little time. +From there he proceeded to Padua, one of the most famous of the Italian +universities, and noted for the views some of its members held on the +subjects of astronomy and necromancy. During his residence here, Browne +doubtless acquired some of his peculiar ideas on the science of the +heavens and the black art, and, what was more important, he learnt to +regard the Romanists with that abundant charity we find throughout his +works. From Padua, Browne went to Leyden, and this sudden change from +a most bigoted Roman Catholic to a most bigoted Protestant country +was not without its effect on his mind, as can be traced in his book. +Here he took the degree of Doctor of Medicine, and shortly afterwards +returned to England. Soon after his return, about the year 1635, he +published his “Religio Medici,” his first and greatest work, which +may be fairly regarded as the reflection of the mind of one who, in +spite of a strong intellect and vast erudition, was still prone to +superstition, but having + + “Through many cities strayed, + Their customs, laws, and manners weighed,” + +had obtained too large views of mankind to become a bigot. + +After the publication of his book he settled at Norwich, where he soon +had an extensive practice as a physician. From hence there remains +little to be told of his life. In 1637 he was incorporated Doctor of +Medicine at Oxford; and in 1641 he married Dorothy the daughter of +Edward Mileham, of Burlingham in Norfolk, and had by her a family of +eleven children. + +In 1646 he published his “Pseudodoxia Epidemica,” or Enquiries into +Vulgar Errors. The discovery of some Roman urns at Burnham in Norfolk, +led him in 1658 to write his “Hydriotaphia” (Urn-burial); he also +published at the same time “The Garden of Cyrus, or the Quincunxcial +Lozenge of the Ancients,” a curious work, but far inferior to his other +productions. + +In 1665 he was elected an honorary Fellow of the College of Physicians, +“virtute et literis ornatissimus.” + +Browne had always been a Royalist. In 1643 he had refused to subscribe +to the fund that was then being raised for regaining Newcastle. He +proved a happy exception to the almost proverbial neglect the Royalists +received from Charles II. in 1671, for when Charles was at Newmarket, +he came over to see Norwich, and conferred the honour of knighthood +on Browne. His reputation was now very great. Evelyn paid a visit to +Norwich for the express purpose of seeing him; and at length, on his +76th birthday (19th October 1682), he died, full of years and honours. + +It was a striking coincidence that he who in his Letter to a Friend +had said that “in persons who outlive many years, and when there are +no less than 365 days to determine their lives in every year, that +the first day should mark the last, that the tail of the snake should +return into its mouth precisely at that time, and that they should wind +up upon the day of their nativity, is indeed a remarkable coincidence, +which, though astrology hath taken witty pains to solve, yet hath it +been very wary in making predictions of it,” should himself die on the +day of his birth. + +Browne was buried in the church of St Peter, Mancroft, Norwich, where +his wife erected to his memory a mural monument, on which was placed +an English and Latin inscription, setting forth that he was the author +of “Religio Medici,” “Pseudodoxia Epidemica,” and other learned works +“per orbem notissimus.” Yet his sleep was not to be undisturbed; his +skull was fated to adorn a museum! In 1840, while some workmen were +digging a vault in the chancel of St Peter’s, they found a coffin with +an inscription-- + + “Amplissimus Vir + D^{us} Thomas Browne Miles Medicinæ + D^r Annis Natus 77 Denatus 19 Die + Mensis Octobris Anno D^{nj} 1682 hoc. + Loculo indormiens Corporis Spagyrici + pulvere plumbum in aurum + convertit.” + +The translation of this inscription raised a storm over his ashes, +which Browne would have enjoyed partaking in, the word _spagyricus_ +being an enigma to scholars. Mr Firth of Norwich (whose translation +seems the best) thus renders the inscription:-- + + “The very distinguished man, Sir Thomas Browne, Knight, Doctor of + Medicine, aged 77 years, who died on the 19th of October, in the year + of our Lord 1682, sleeping in this coffin of lead, by the dust of his + alchemic body, transmutes it into a coffer of gold.” + +After Sir Thomas’s death, two collections of his works were published, +one by Archbishop Tenison, and the other in 1772. They contain most +of his letters, his tracts on various subjects, and his Letter to a +Friend. Various editions of parts of Browne’s works have from time to +time appeared. By far the best edition of the whole of them is that +published by Simon Wilkin. + +It is upon his “Religio Medici”--the religion of a physician--that +Browne’s fame chiefly rests. It was his first and most celebrated work, +published just after his return from his travels; it gives us the +impressions made on his mind by the various and opposite schools he had +passed through. He tells us that he never intended to publish it, but +that on its being surreptitiously printed, he was induced to do so. In +1643, the first genuine edition appeared, with “an admonition to such +as shall peruse the observations upon a former corrupt copy of this +book.” The observations here alluded to, were written by Sir Kenelm +Digby, and sent by him to the Earl of Dorset. They were first printed +at the end of the edition of 1643, and have ever since been published +with the book. Their chief merit consists in the marvellous rapidity +with which they were written, Sir Kenelm having, as he tells us, bought +the book, read it, and written his observations, in the course of +twenty-four hours! + +The book contains what may be termed an apology for his belief. He +states the reasons on which he grounds his opinions, and endeavours +to show that, although he had been accused of atheism, he was in all +points a good Christian, and a loyal member of the Church of England. +Each person must judge for himself of his success; but the effect it +produced on the mind of Johnson may be noticed. “The opinions of every +man,” says he, “must be learned from himself; concerning his practice, +it is safer to trust to the evidence of others. When the testimonies +concur, no higher degree of historical certainty can be obtained; and +they apparently concur to prove that Browne was a zealous adherent to +the faith of Christ, that he lived in obedience to His laws, and died +in confidence of His mercy.” + +The best proof of the excellence of the “Religio” is to be found in +its great success. During the author’s life, from 1643 to 1681, it +passed through eleven editions. It has been translated into Latin, +Dutch, French, and German, and many of the translations have passed +through several editions. No less than thirty-three treatises have been +written in imitation of it; and what, to some, will be the greatest +proof of all, it was soon after its publication placed in the Index +Expurgatorius. The best proof of its liberality of sentiment is in the +fact that its author was claimed at the same time by the Romanists and +Quakers to be a member of their respective creeds! + +The “Hydriotaphia,” or Urn-burial, is a treatise on the funeral rites +of ancient nations. It was caused by the discovery of some Roman urns +in Norfolk. Though inferior to the “Religio,” “there is perhaps none of +his works which better exemplifies his reading or memory.” + +The text of the present edition of the “Religio Medici” is taken from +what is called the eighth edition, but is in reality the eleventh, +published in London in 1682, the last edition in the author’s lifetime. +The notes are for the most part compiled from the observations of Sir +Kenelm Digby, the annotation of Mr. Keck, and the very valuable notes +of Simon Wilkin. For the account of the finding of Sir Thomas Browne’s +skull I am indebted to Mr Friswell’s notice of Sir Thomas in his +“Varia.” The text of the “Hydriotaphia” is taken from the folio edition +of 1686, in the Lincoln’s Inn library. Some of Browne’s notes to that +edition have been omitted, and most of the references, as they refer to +books which are not likely to be met with by the general reader. + +The “Letter to a Friend, upon the occasion of the Death of his intimate +Friend,” was first published in a folio pamphlet in 1690. It was +reprinted in his posthumous works. The concluding reflexions are the +basis of a larger work, “Christian Morals.” I am not aware of any +complete modern edition of it. The text of the present one is taken +from the original edition of 1690. The pamphlet is in the British +Museum, bound up with a volume of old poems. It is entitled, “A Letter +to a Friend, upon the occasion of the Death of his intimate Friend. +By the learned Sir Thomas Brown, Knight, Doctor of Physick, late of +Norwich. London: Printed for Charles Brone, at the Gun, at the West End +of St Paul’s Churchyard, 1690.” + + + + +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 truly 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 only printed, but many things of truth most falsely set forth; +in this latter I could not but think myself engaged: for, though we +have no power to redress the former, yet in the other reparation being +within ourselves, 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, until it +arrived in a most depraved copy at the press. He that shall peruse +that work, and shall take notice of sundry particulars and personal +expressions therein, will easily discern the intention was not publick: +and, being a private exercise directed to myself, 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 that I suspected myself. It was set down +many years past, and was the sense of my conceptions at that time, +not an immutable law unto my advancing judgment at all times; and +therefore there might be many things therein plausible unto my passed +apprehension, which are not agreeable unto my present self. There are +many things delivered rhetorically, many expressions therein merely +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. + + THOMAS BROWNE. + + + + +RELIGIO MEDICI. + + +SECT. 1.--For my religion, though there be several circumstances that +might persuade the world I have none at all,--as the general scandal of +my profession,[1]--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 despite hereof, I dare without usurpation assume +the honourable style of a Christian. Not that I merely owe this title +to the font, my education, or the 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 myself 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 myself to enjoy that happy style, +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-trimmed 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 +sword’s point with them. We have reformed from them, not against them: +for, omitting those improperations[2] 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 consequences 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 profane our prayers, or the place wherein we make them; or that a +resolved conscience may not adore her Creator anywhere, especially in +places devoted to his service; if their devotions offend him, mine may +please him: if theirs profane 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 friars; for, though misplaced in circumstances, +there is something in it of devotion. I could never hear the Ave-Mary +bell[A] 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 direct their +devotions to her, I offered mine to God; and rectify 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. + +[A] A church-bell, that tolls every day at six and twelve of the clock; +at the hearing whereof every one, 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 consider the present antipathies between +the two extremes,--their contrarieties in condition, affection, and +opinion,--may, with the same hopes, expect a union in the poles of +heaven. + +_Sect._ 5.--But, to difference myself 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, +nor 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.[3] In brief, where the Scripture is silent, the church is +my text; where that speaks, ’tis but my comment;[4] where there is a +joint silence of both, I borrow not the rules of my religion from Rome +or Geneva, but from the dictates of my own reason. It is an unjust +scandal of our adversaries, and a gross error in ourselves, to compute +the nativity of our religion from Henry the Eighth; who, though he +rejected the Pope, refused not the faith of Rome,[5] and effected no +more than what his own predecessors desired and essayed in ages past, +and it was conceived the state of Venice would have attempted in our +days.[6] 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 +a cause of passion between us: by his sentence I stand excommunicated; +heretic is the best language he affords me: yet can no ear witness I +ever returned to him the name of antichrist, man of sin, or whore of +Babylon. It is the method of charity to suffer without reaction: those +usual satires and invectives of the pulpit may perchance produce a good +effect on the vulgar, whose ears are opener to rhetoric than logic; yet +do they, in no wise, confirm the faith of wiser believers, who know +that a good cause needs not be pardoned by passion, but can sustain +itself upon a temperate dispute. + +_Sect._ 6.--I could never divide myself 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 myself. 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 ourselves; 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 maxims, 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 hazard 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 settled judgment and +more manly reason be able to resolve them; for I perceive every man’s +own reason is his best Œdipus,[7] 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 judgments. In philosophy, +where truth seems double-faced, there is no man more paradoxical than +myself: but in divinity I love to keep the road; and, though not in an +implicit, 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 have no gap for heresy, +schisms, 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,[8] though they lose their currents in one place, they rise +up again in another. One general council is not able to extirpate one +single heresy: it may be cancelled 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 +metempsychosis, 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:[B] every man is not only himself; there have been many Diogenes, +and as many Timons, though but few of that name; men are lived 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. + +[B] 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;[9] 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 +thoroughly disproved), and that both entered the grave together, yet +I held the same conceit thereof that we all do of the body, that it +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, 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 myself, because I found therein no malice, and a ready weight to +sway me from the other extreme 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 inclined from some +charitable inducements, whereby I could scarce contain my prayers for +a friend at the ringing of a bell, or behold his corpse without an +orison for his soul. ’Twas a good way, methought, to be remembered by +posterity, and far more noble than a history. These opinions I never +maintained with pertinacity, or endeavoured to inveigle any man’s +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 myself: 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 +councils, were not heresies in me, but bare errors, and single lapses +of my understanding, without a joint depravity of my will. Those have +not only depraved understandings, but diseased affections, which cannot +enjoy a singularity without a heresy, 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, +well understanding the communicable nature of sin, and that to deceive +but one was tacitly and upon consequence to delude them both. + +_Sect._ 8.--That heresies should arise, we have the prophecy 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 the doctrines heretical there will be superheresies; +and Arians, not only divided from the church, but also among +themselves: for heads that are disposed unto schism, and complexionally +propense to innovation, are naturally indisposed for a community; +nor will be ever confined unto the order or economy of one body; and +therefore, when they separate from others, they knit but loosely among +themselves; nor contented with a general breach or dichotomy[10] 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 heresy; for there is yet, after all the decrees +of councils, and the niceties of the schools, many things, untouched, +unimagined, wherein the liberty of an honest reason may play and +expatiate with security, and far without the circle of a heresy. + +_Sect._ 9.--As for those wingy mysteries in divinity, and airy +subtleties in religion, which have unhinged the brains of better +heads, they never stretched the _pia mater_[11] 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 +myself in a mystery; to pursue my reason to an _O altitudo!_ ’Tis my +solitary recreation to pose my apprehension with those involved enigmas +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 persuasion. 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 +myself, 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 passed 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 easy 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 cenotaph 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 easy 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 lie invulnerable. +Since I was of understanding to know that 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 easy and +Platonic description. That allegorical description of Hermes[C] +pleaseth me beyond all the metaphysical definitions of divines. Where +I cannot satisfy my reason, I love to humour my fancy: I had as lieve +you tell me that _anima est angelus hominis, est corpus Dei_, as +ἐντελέχεια;--_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;[12] 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 caused 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 +trial of the pucelage and virginity of women, which God ordained the +Jews, is very fallible. Experience and history informs me that, not +only 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 persuade 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. + +[C] “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 solecism, or +think thereof without an ecstasy? Time we may comprehend; ’tis but five +days elder than ourselves, 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 only 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 altogether, the +last trump is already sounded, the reprobates in the flame, and the +blessed in Abraham’s bosom. 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 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 pinnacles 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 portrait, things +are not truly, but in equivocal shapes, and as they counterfeit some +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 therein, is an ample recompense 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,[D][13] we had better known +ourselves; nor had we stood in fear to know him. I know God 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’s eye; we are ignorant of the back +parts or lower side of his divinity; therefore, to pry 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 ideas of goodness, consultations, +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[14] 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 magnify him, whose judicious enquiry into his acts, +and deliberate research into his creatures, return the duty of a devout +and learned admiration. Therefore, + +[D] “Γνῶθι σεαυτὸν.” “Nosce teipsum.” + + Search while thou wilt; and let thy reason go, + To ransom truth, e’en to th’ abyss below; + Rally the scatter’d causes; and that line + Which nature twists be able to untwine. + It is thy Maker’s 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 endeavours 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 near 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 fly, + 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 the 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. + +_Sect._ 14.--There is but one first cause, and four second causes, of +all things. Some are without efficient,[15] 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 further, and to +contemplate a reason why his providence hath so disposed and ordered +their motions in that vast circle, as to conjoin 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_,[16] as in Suarez’s +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 agit frustra_, is the only indisputable +axiom 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 +everywhere, 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, dromedaries, 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;[17] 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 farther travel, I can do in +the cosmography of myself. 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 whence I collect my +divinity. Besides that written one of God, another of his servant, +nature, that universal and publick manuscript, that lies expansed 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 join and read +these mystical letters than we Christians, who cast a more careless +eye on these common hieroglyphics, 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 straight 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 seldom 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 sweeteneth +the water with a word, preserveth the creatures in the ark, which the +blest of his mouth might have as easily created;--for God is like a +skilful geometrician, who, when more easily, and with one stroke 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 +forelaid 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 +writing. I hold there is a general beauty in the works of God, and +therefore no deformity in any kind of 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 passed 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 part, 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 is not +at variance with art, nor art with nature; they being both the 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 good part discovered; whose effects we may +foretell without an oracle. To foreshow these is not prophecy, 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 individual 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 cryptic[18] 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, or +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: human reason would have said +that mere chance conveyed Moses in the ark to the sight of Pharaoh’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 mere hand of God. +’Twas not dumb chance that, to discover the fougade,[19] or powder +plot, contrived a miscarriage in the letter. I like the victory of +’88[20] 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 armada to fight with men, and not to combat with +the winds. Where there is a manifest disproportion between the powers +and forces of two several agents, upon a maxim of reason we may promise +the victory to the superior: but when unexpected accidents slip in, and +unthought-of occurrences 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 +Seignior proudly said, if they should trouble him, as they did the +Spaniard, he would send his men with shovels and pickaxes, 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 preordinate season. All cannot be happy +at once; for, because the glory of one state depends upon the ruin of +another, there is a revolution and vicissitude of their greatness, and +must obey the swing of that wheel, not moved by intelligencies, 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 a +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 be named the effects of fortune +but in a relative way, and as we term the works of nature. It was +the ignorance of man’s 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 straggling way; nor any effect +whatsoever but hath its warrant from some universal or superior cause. +’Tis not a ridiculous devotion to say a prayer before a game at tables; +for, even in sortileges[21] and matters of greatest uncertainty, +there is a settled 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 justify 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 +judgments who thoroughly understand the justice of this proceeding; +and, being enriched 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 heresy, to adore these complimental 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 excess 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 these, 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,[22] all things begin and end in +the Almighty. There is a nearer way to heaven than Homer’s chain;[23] +an easy logick may conjoin a heaven and earth in one argument, and, +with less than a sorites,[24] resolve all things to 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 itself 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 commonwealth not less than did that other[25] 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 +sovereignty and prerogative in a due time and place, according to the +restraint and limit of circumstance. There are, 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 myself; 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 studios; 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 dissuade my belief from the miracle of +the brazen serpent; make me conceit that image worked by sympathy, and +was but an Egyptian 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 bade me mistrust a miracle in Elias, when he +intrenched 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 inveigle 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 query, +“Where was then the miracle in the days of Moses?” The Israelites saw +but that, in his time, which 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 strove 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 religion 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 inferior 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,[26] that composed that miscreant +piece of the three impostors, though divided from all religions, and +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 their 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 three +lines of Seneca,[E] that all our antidotes, drawn from both Scripture +and philosophy, could not expel the poison of his error. There are a +set of heads that can credit the relations of mariners, yet question +the testimonies of Saint 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 human 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.[27] +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 Samson; yet is all this of an easy possibility, +if we conceive a divine concourse, or an influence 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:[28] myself could show 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 upon 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 successively +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 Tartaratus, _De Modo Cacandi_.[F][29] + +[E] “Post mortem nihil est, ipsaque mors nihil, mors individua est +noxia corpori, nec patiens animæ. . . . Toti morimur nullaque pars +manet nostri.” + +[F] In Rabelais. + +_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 easy and possible truth. + +’Tis ridiculous to put off or down the general flood of Noah, in that +particular inundation of Deucalion.[30] 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[31] 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, come 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 tenets 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 lived 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[32] 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 knocked at the door, +“’Tis not he, but his angel;” that is, might some say, his messenger, +or somebody from him; for so the original signifies; and is as likely +to be the doubtful family’s meaning. This exposition I once suggested +to a young divine, that answered upon this point; to which I remember +the Franciscan opponent replied 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 choose 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 Ptolemy, that thought not his library complete +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 itself 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 +commonwealths 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 others that +writ before Moses; who, notwithstanding, have suffered the common +fate of time. Men’s works have an age, like themselves; and though +they outlive 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;[33] 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,[34] had they many +nearer authors than Josephus, or did not relish somewhat of the fable. +Some men have written more than others have spoken. Pineda[35] quotes +more authors, in one work,[G] than are necessary in a whole world. +Of those three great inventions in Germany,[36] 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 and millions of +rhapsodies, begotten only to distract and abuse the weaker judgments of +scholars, and to maintain the trade and mystery of typographers. + +[G] Pineda, in his “Monarchia 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,[37] 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 +virtue 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 often transform themselves, not unto several shapes +of Christianity, and of the same species, but unto more unnatural and +contrary forms of Jew and Mohammedan; 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.[38] There are, I +confess, some new additions; yet small to those which accrue 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 Mohammedan against both; for the Turk, in the bulk +he now stands, 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 error. 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 fetched from +the field, or drawn from the actions of the camp, are not ofttimes so +truly 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[39] 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 +easy 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 truly adore +their Saviour, and have, no doubt, a faith acceptable in the eyes of +God. + +_Sect._ 26.--Now, as all that die in the war are not termed soldiers, +so neither can I properly term all those that suffer in matters of +religion, martyrs. The council of Constance condemns John Huss for a +heretick;[40] the stories of his own party style 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) canonized 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[41] that suffered in the cause of antipodes; yet cannot choose +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 lie, 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 respect 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 untractable 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 +ourselves 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 record of +Scripture: that they outlived 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 Jesuits 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 easy as +one single creature. For this is also a miracle; not only 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 recall 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 that 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 relicks, to examine the bones, question +the habits and appertenances of saints, and even of Christ himself. I +cannot conceive why the cross that Helena[42] found, and whereon Christ +himself died, 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 Baldwin, +king of Jerusalem, returned the Genoese for their costs and pains in +his wars; 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 relicks is, I +think the slender and doubtful respect which 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:[43] 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 swoon their reasons lay, to content themselves, +and sit down with such a far-fetched and ridiculous reason as Plutarch +allegeth for it.[44] 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: the devil himself +confessed it.[H] Certainly it is not a warrantable curiosity, to +examine the verity of Scripture by the concordance of human history; +or seek to confirm the chronicle of Hester or Daniel by the authority +of Megasthenes[45] or Herodotus. I confess, I have had an unhappy +curiosity this way, till I laughed myself out of it with a piece of +Justin, where he delivers that the children of Israel, for being +scabbed, were banished out of Egypt. And truly, since I have understood +the occurrences of the world, and know in what counterfeiting shapes +and deceitful visards times present represent on the stage things past, +I do believe them little more than things to come. Some have been of my +own opinion, and endeavoured to write the history of their own lives; +wherein Moses hath outgone them all, and left not only the story of his +life, but, as some will have it, of his death also. + +[H] In his oracle to Augustus. + +_Sect._ 30.--It is a riddle to me, how the story of oracles hath not +wormed 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 only 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 made them +already in a heresy 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 puzzleth me more than the legerdemain +of changelings.[46] 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 satisfy 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 melancholy others; the spirit of delusion others: +that, as the devil is concealed and denied 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.[47] + +_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 empirically practise +without his advice; they both proceeding upon the principles of nature; +where actives, aptly conjoined 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 than 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: “_ascendens[I] +constellatum multa revelat quærentibus magnalia naturæ_, i.e. _opera +Dei_.” I do think that many mysteries ascribed to our own inventions +have been the corteous revelations of spirits; for those noble essences +in heaven bear a friendly regard unto their fellow-nature on earth; and +therefore believe that those many prodigies and ominous prognosticks, +which forerun the ruins of states, princes, and private persons, +are the charitable premonitions of good angels, which more careless +inquiries term but the effects of chance and nature. + +[I] Thereby is meant our good angel, appointed us from our nativity. + +_Sect._ 32.--Now, besides these particular and divided spirits, there +may be (for aught I know) a universal and common spirit to the whole +world. It was the opinion of Plato, and is yet of the hermetical +philosophers. If there be a common nature, that unites and ties 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 in 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 virtue of the sun; a fire quite contrary to +the fire of hell. This is that gentle heat that brooded on the waters, +and in six days hatched the world; this is that irradiation that +dispels the mists of hell, the clouds of horror, 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 truly 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 Cancer’s back, + The icy ocean cracks, the frozen pole + Thaws with the heat of the celestial coal; + So when thy absent beams begin t’ impart + Again a solstice on my frozen heart, + My winter’s o’er, 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. + Oh 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. + Oh 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 choke my devout aspires!” + +_Sect._ 33.--Therefore, for spirits, I am so far from denying their +existence, that I could easily believe, that not only 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 heresy in it: and if not manifestly defined in +Scripture, yet it is an opinion of a good and wholesome use in the +course and actions of a man’s 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 ourselves 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 mere 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 on, between man and angels +there should be yet a greater. We do not comprehend their natures, +who retain the first definition of Porphyry;[48] and distinguish them +from ourselves by immortality: for, before his fall, 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 +nature, ’tis no bad method of the schools, whatsoever perfection we +find obscurely in ourselves, in a more complete 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 only of the specifical, but numerical, forms +of individuals, and understand by what reserved difference each single +hypostatis (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 lion’s 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 reflection, 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 rejoice.” I cannot, with those in that +great father,[49] 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 near a glimpse of their nature as light in the +sun and elements: we style 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 masterpieces 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 only that amphibious piece, between a corporeal and a spiritual +essence; that middle form, that links those two together, and makes +good the method of God and nature, that jumps not from extremes, 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 near judgment 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 only 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 existencies, which comprehend the creatures, not only of the world, +but of the universe. Thus is man that great and true _amphibium_, whose +nature is disposed to live, not only 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 controversy. +And truly, for the first chapters of Genesis, I must confess a great +deal of obscurity; though divines have, to the power of human 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 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 extremest 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 ministering 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 God, not only 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 truly contrary unto God: for he only 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 only 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[50] 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 was 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 German auditories, +and with that indifferency and equality of arguments, as leave the +controversy undetermined. I am not of Paracelsus’s 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 arguments to confirm their belief than that rhetorical sentence +and _antimetathesis_[51] 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 subtleties, but from common sense and +observation; not pick’d from the leaves of any author, but bred amongst +the weeds and tares of my own brain. And this is a conclusion from the +equivocal and monstrous productions in the copulation of a man with a +beast: for if the soul of man be not transmitted and transfused in the +seed of the parents, why are not those productions merely beasts, but +have also an impression and tincture of reason in as high a measure, +as it can evidence itself in those improper organs? Nor, truly, 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, is required not only 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 corpse 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 discoveries and curious pieces I +find in the fabrick of man, I do not so much content myself, as in that +I find not,--that is, no organ or instrument for the rational soul; for +in the brain, which we term the seat of reason, there is not anything +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 entered 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 only metaphorically, but literally, true; for all those +creatures we behold are but the herbs of the field, digested into +flesh in them, or more remotely carnified in ourselves. Nay, further, +we are what we all abhor, _anthropophagi_, and cannibals, devourers +not only of men, but of ourselves; 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 devoured ourselves. 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 Lot’s wife; for that of Nabuchodonosor proceeded not so far. +In all others I conceive there is no further verity than is contained +in their implicit 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 privilege 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 wandering 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, solicitous of the affairs of the world. +But that those phantasms appear often, and do frequent cemeteries, +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 convulsed and tremble at the name of death. +Not that I am insensible of the dread and horror thereof; or, by +raking into the bowels of the deceased, continual sight of anatomies, +skeletons, or cadaverous relicks, like vespilloes, or gravemakers, I +am become stupid, or have forgot the apprehension of mortality; but +that, marshalling all the horrors, and contemplating the extremities +thereof, I find not anything therein able to daunt the courage of a +man, much less a well-resolved Christian; and therefore am not angry +at the error of our first parents, or unwilling to bear a part of this +common fate, and, like the best of them, to die; that is, to cease to +breathe, to take a farewell 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 myself without this reasonable moderator, and equal +piece of justice, death, I do conceive myself the miserablest person +extant. Were there not another life that I hope for, all the vanities +of this world should not entreat a moment’s breath from me. Could the +devil work my belief to imagine I could never die, 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 +expectation of a better, I can with patience embrace this life; yet, +in my best meditations, do often defy 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 soldier, and honour those tattered and contemptible +regiments, that will die 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[52] count Adam thirty 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 older 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 bosom of our causes, we enjoy a being and life in three +distinct worlds, wherein we receive most manifest gradations. In that +obscure world, the womb of our mother, our time is short, computed +by the moon; yet longer than the days of many creatures that behold +the sun; ourselves being not yet without life, sense, and reason;[53] +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. Entering 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 +secundine, 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 philosopher’s stone (which is +something more than the perfect exaltation[54] 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 lie obscure, and +sleep a while within this house of flesh. Those strange and mystical +transmigrations that I have observed in silkworms turned my philosophy +into divinity. There is in these works of nature, which seem to puzzle +reason, something divine; and hath more in it than 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 +truly), 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, unpitied, 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 +of playing the bungler in any part of me, or my own vicious life for +contracting any shameful disease upon me, whereby I might not call +myself 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 be a mere fallacy, unworthy the +desire 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 bare memory of my +name to be found anywhere, but in the universal register of God. I am +not yet so cynical, as to approve the testament of Diogenes,[J] nor do +I altogether allow that rodomontado of Lucan;[K] + +[J] Who willed his friend not to bury him, but to hang him up with a +staff in his hand, to fright away the crows. + +[K] “Pharsalia,” vii. 819. + + -----“_Cœlo tegitur, qui non habet urnam._” + + He that unburied lies wants not his hearse; + For unto him a tomb’s the universe. + +but commend, in my calmer judgment, 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[55] 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;[56] as +yet I have not seen one revolution of Saturn,[57] nor hath my pulse +beat thirty years, and yet, excepting one,[58] have seen the ashes of, +and left under ground, all the kings of Europe; have been contemporary +to three emperors, four grand signiors, and as many popes: methinks I +have outlived myself, 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 pantaloons and anticks, to my severer +contemplations. + +_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 die; yet, if (as divinity affirms) there shall +be no grey 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 superannuated from sin, it were worthy our knees to +implore the days of Methuselah. But age doth not rectify, 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 but +make our sins innumerable. The same vice, committed at sixteen, is not +the same, though it agrees in all other circumstances, as 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 judgment cuts off pretence unto excuse or pardon. Every sin, the +oftener 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 +thread of my days; not upon Cicero’s ground,[L] 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 make 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 stand in need of Æson’s bath[59] before threescore. + +[L] _Ep._ lib. xxiv. ep. 24. + +_Sect._ 43.--And truly there goes a deal of providence to produce a +man’s life unto threescore; there is more required than an able temper +for those years: though the radical humour contain in it sufficient oil +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 balsam, or vital sulphur of +the parts, determine not why Abel lived not so long as Adam. There is +therefore a secret gloom or bottom of our days: ’twas his wisdom to +determine them: but his perpetual and waking providence that fulfils +and accomplisheth them; wherein the spirits, ourselves, 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 completed in it, its age is accomplished; and +the last and general fever may as naturally destroy it before six +thousand,[60] as me before forty. There is therefore some other hand +that twines the thread of life than that of nature: we are not only +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 pencil 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 only, as we do at school, to construe, but understand: + + “_Victurosque Dei celant ut vivere durent, + Felix esse mori._”[M] + +[M] _Pharsalia_, iv. 519. + + 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 truly there are singular pieces +in the philosophy of Zeno,[61] and doctrine of the stoics, which I +perceive, delivered in a pulpit, pass for current divinity: yet herein +are they in extremes, that can allow a man to be his own assassin, 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, Scævola, 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 poniards in death itself, +like those in the way or prologue unto 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,[62] I should be of his desires, and wish rather to +go off at one blow, than to be sawed in pieces by the grating torture +of a disease. Men that look no further 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 only the mischief of +diseases, and the villany of poisons, 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 beholden 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 +stoic is in the right.[63] He forgets that he can die, who complains of +misery: we are in the power of no calamity while death is in our own. + +_Sect._ 45.--Now, besides this literal and positive kind of death, +there are others whereof divines make mention, and those, I think, +not merely 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_,[64] and odd days, or esteeming myself anything, before +I was my Saviour’s and enrolled 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 die 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, judgment, heaven, and hell. Neither did the contemplations +of the heathens rest in their graves, without a further thought, of +Rhadamanth[65] or some judicial proceeding after death, though in +another way, and upon suggestion of their natural reasons. I cannot but +marvel from what sibyl or oracle they stole the prophecy of the world’s +destruction by fire, or whence Lucan learned to say-- + + “_Communis mundo superest rogus, ossibus astra + Misturus----_”[N] + +[N] _Pharsalia_, vii. 814. + + 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 will ever perish upon the ruins 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 world’s 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 that 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 truly 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.--Now, to determine the day and year of this inevitable +time, is not only convincible and statute madness, but also manifest +impiety. How shall we interpret Elias’s six thousand years, or imagine +the secret communicated to a Rabbi which God hath denied 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 only mocked the predictions of sundry astrologers in ages +past, but the prophecies of many melancholy heads in these present; +who, neither understanding reasonably things past nor present, pretend +a knowledge of things to come; heads ordained only to manifest the +incredible effects of melancholy and to fulfil old prophecies,[O] +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 philosopher’s stone +in divinity, for the discovery and invention whereof, 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 near its end, hath possessed all ages past as nearly as +ours. I am afraid that the souls that now depart cannot escape that +lingering expostulation of the saints under the altar, “_quousque, +Domine?_” how long, O Lord? and groan in the expectation of the great +jubilee. + +[O] “In those days there shall come liars and false prophets.” + +_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 complete and make up the +catastrophe of this great piece. This is the day whose memory hath, +only, power to make us honest in the dark, and to be virtuous without +a witness. “_Ipsa sui pretium virtus sibi_,” that virtue is her own +reward, is but a cold principle, and not able to maintain our variable +resolutions in a constant and settled way of goodness. I have practised +that honest artifice of Seneca,[66] and, in my retired and solitary +imaginations to detain me from the foulness of vice, have fancied to +myself the presence of my dear and worthiest friends, before whom I +should lose my head rather than be vicious; yet herein I found that +there was nought but moral honesty; and this was not to be virtuous +for his sake who must reward us at the last. I have tried 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 an easy 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 +subtile verities; and atheists have been the only philosophers. + +_Sect._ 48.--How shall the dead arise, is no question of my faith; to +believe only possibilities is not faith, but mere 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 persuade 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 join 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 relicks 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 unaccessible parts; where they may best protect themselves +from the action of their antagonist. A plant or vegetable consumed +to ashes to 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 recall +it into its stalk and leaves again.[67] What the art of man can do +in these inferior pieces, what blasphemy is it to affirm the finger +of God cannot do in those 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. Saint John’s +description by emeralds, 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 completely satisfied +that it can neither desire addition nor alteration; that, I think, is +truly heaven: and this can only be in the enjoyment of that essence, +whose infinite goodness is able to terminate the desires of itself, +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 anywhere, 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 Saint Paul, whether in the body or out of the body, +was yet in heaven. To place it in the empyreal, or beyond the tenth +sphere, 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 itself, to a contradiction. Those that imagine heaven and hell +neighbours, and conceive a vicinity between those two extremes, upon +consequence of the parable, where Dives discoursed with Lazarus, in +Abraham’s bosom, do too grossly conceive of those glorified creatures, +whose eyes shall easily out-see the sun, and behold without perspective +the extremest 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 sphere, +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 purify the substance of a soul. Those flames +of sulphur, mentioned 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 whereon 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 powerfulest 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, calcined 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 only hot, +and liquefies, 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 lie immortal in the arms of fire. And surely, +if this flame must suffer only by the action of this element, there +will many bodies escape; and not only 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 +itself, its ashes. Philosophers that opinioned the world’s destruction +by fire, did never dream of annihilation, which is beyond the power of +sublunary causes; for the last and proper 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 crystalized 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 truly 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. + +_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 purlieu 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 myself; Lucifer +keeps his court in my breast; Legion is revived in me. There are as +many hells as Anaxagoras[68] conceited worlds. There was more than one +hell in Magdalene, when there were seven devils; for every devil is an +hell unto himself,[69] 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, and with joy I mention it, I was never afraid +of hell, nor ever 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 complete 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 judgments 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 unto 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 myself. 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, judgments, +misfortunes, to me, who inquire further into them than 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 to 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 murder, 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 only death but damnation, if the goodness of +God be content to traverse and pass them over with a loss, misfortune, +or disease; what frenzy were it to term this a punishment, rather than +an extremity of mercy, and to groan under the rod of his judgments +rather than admire the sceptre 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 end of those honest +worthies and philosophers which died before his incarnation. It is hard +to place those souls in hell, whose worthy lives do teach us virtue on +earth. Methinks, among 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 only 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 truly 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;[70] the stoicks, that condemn passion, and command a man +to laugh in Phalaris’s[71] bull, could not endure without a groan a +fit of the stone or colick. The scepticks, that affirmed they knew +nothing,[72] even in that opinion confute themselves, and thought +they knew more than all the world beside. Diogenes I hold to be the +most vainglorious 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,[73] I will not accuse 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.[74] There is no road or ready +way to virtue; it is not an easy point of art to disentangle ourselves +from this riddle or web of sin. To perfect virtue, as to religion, +there is required a _panoplia_, or complete armour; that whilst we +lie at close ward against one vice, we lie not open to the veney[75] +of another. And indeed wiser discretions, that have the thread of +reason to conduct them, offend without a 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 persuade another cannot persuade myself. There +is a depraved appetite in us, that will with patience hear the learned +instructions of reason, but yet perform no further 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 +than our Saviour ever meant it. + +_Sect._ 56.--The vulgarity of those judgments that wrap the church of +God in Strabo’s cloak,[76] and restrain it unto Europe, seem to me as +bad geographers as Alexander, who thought he had conquered 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 judgment) 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 judgment 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,[77] 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 other’s wills, conceits, and +opinions, and, with as much uncharity as ignorance, do err, I fear, in +points not only of our own, but one another’s 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. These acute +and subtile 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,[78] condemn not only 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 only are, and I +shall be happy therein, to be but the last man, and bring up the rear +in heaven. + +_Sect._ 59.--Again, I am confident, and fully persuaded, 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 to 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 only 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 only +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 lapped 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 only 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 +anything, or, at the most, but a remove from nothing. + +This is the tenour 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 judgments, I disclaim them, and do no further favour +them than the learned and best judgments shall authorize them. + + + + +PART THE SECOND. + + +_Sect._ 1.--Now, for that other virtue of charity, without which +faith is a mere 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 myself, I am delineated and +naturally framed to such a piece of virtue,--for I am of a constitution +so general that it consorts and sympathizeth with all things; I have +no antipathy, or rather idiosyncrasy, in diet, humour, air, anything. +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 salad gathered in a +church-yard 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 myself 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 countrymen’s, I honour, love, and +embrace them, in the same degree. I was born in the eighth climate, but +seem 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 +country; I am in England everywhere, and under any meridian. I have +been shipwrecked, 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 lie if I should say I absolutely detest +or hate any essence, but the devil; or so at least abhor anything, 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 only 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 gild 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[79] 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 +pre-eminence of his good parts. Though the corruption of these times, +and the bias 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 ordered 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 anything. + +_Sect._ 2.--This general and indifferent temper of mine doth more +nearly 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 inoculations 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 to satisfy 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 enjoined 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; and so, by relieving them, we relieve ourselves also. +It is as erroneous a conceit to redress other men’s 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 crowd 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 signature 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 is 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 joined 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 mere dashes, strokes _à 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:[80] +yet I believe the Egyptians, who were nearer addicted to those abstruse +and mystical sciences, had a knowledge therein: to which those vagabond +and counterfeit Egyptians did after[81] pretend, and perhaps retained +a few corrupted principles, which sometimes might verify 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 carelessly and without study composed out of +twenty-four 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 portrait like another. Let a painter carelessly limn out a +million of faces, and you shall find them all different; yes, let him +have his copy before him, yet, after all his art, there will remain +a sensible distinction: for the pattern or example of everything 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 its 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 anything 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 +only 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 only 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 clothe 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 itself. To be reserved and caitiff[82] in this part of +goodness is the sordidest piece of covetousness, and more contemptible +than the pecuniary avarice. To this (as calling myself 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 +myself, 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 than 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 myself, nor can be legacied among +my honoured friends. I cannot fall out or contemn a man for an error, +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 remain not +many controversies worthy a passion, and yet never any dispute without, +not only in divinity but inferior arts. What a βατραχομυομαχία and +hot skirmish is betwixt S. and T. in Lucian![83] How do grammarians +hack and slash for the genitive case in Jupiter![84] How do they +break their own pates, to salve that of Priscian![85] “_Si foret in +terris, rideret Democritus._” Yes, even amongst wiser militants, how +many wounds have been given and credits slain, for the poor victory +of an opinion, or beggarly conquest of a distinction! Scholars are +men of peace, they bear no arms, but their tongues are sharper than +Actius’s razor;[86] their pens carry farther, and give a louder report +than thunder. I had rather stand the shock of a basilisko[87] than +in the fury of a merciless pen. It is not mere 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 falsehood, 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 miscall each other, and, by an +uncharitable logick, from a disposition in a few, conclude a habit in +all. + + Le mutin Anglois, et le bravache Escossois + Le bougre Italien, et le fol Francois; + Le poltron Romain, le larron de Gascogne, + L’Espagnol superbe, et l’Alleman yvrogne. + +St Paul, that calls the Cretians liars, doth it but indirectly, and +upon quotation of their own poet.[88] It is as bloody a thought in one +way as Nero’s was in another.[89] For by a word we wound a thousand, +and at one blow assassin the honour of a nation. It is as complete a +piece of madness to miscall and rave against the times; or think to +recall 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 profaned +unto the world; and it is the privilege of a few to be virtuous. They +that endeavour to abolish vice destroy also virtue; for contraries, +though they destroy one another, are yet the 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 entire in the general inundation. I can therefore behold +vice without a satire, 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 protect 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 myself; 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 myself; those +of my near 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 help 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 laudable in ourselves, +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 do most 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 ourselves? “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 thread of his own days. Cain +was not therefore the first murderer, 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 +persuade him in the theory of himself. + +_Sect._ 5.--There is, I think, no man that apprehends his own miseries +less than myself; and no man that so nearly apprehends another’s. 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 a true passion the counterfeit griefs of those known and +professed impostures. It is a barbarous part of inhumanity to add unto +any afflicted parties misery, or endeavour 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 +breast into another, and to divide a sorrow almost out of itself; +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 myself, I can command that which I cannot entreat +without myself, 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 anything 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 myself. +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 myself, 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 myself. 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 myself 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, methinks, 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 +enigmas, mysteries, and riddles; wherein two so become one as they +both become two: I love my friend before myself, 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. United souls are not satisfied with +embraces, but desire to be truly each other; which being impossible, +these 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 selves, 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 marked for virtue. He that can love his friend with this +noble ardour will in a competent degree effect 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 myself 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, instead of imitating him, I +fall into 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;[90] 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 settled years, and Christian constitution, have +fallen upon severer resolutions. I can hold there is no such things +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 ourselves. I were unjust unto mine own conscience if I should +say I am at variance with anything like myself. 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, public and more hostile adversaries without. The devil, that +did but buffet St Paul, plays methinks at sharp[91] with me. Let me +be nothing, if within the compass of myself, I do not find the battle +of Lepanto,[92] 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 so 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 easy 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, matched with a 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 carnaled with a statua, and the +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 men’s minds also in villany and vices. Now the dulness +of my reason, and the vulgarity of my disposition, never prompted my +invention nor solicited my affection unto any of these;--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 myself, that I repute myself +the most abject 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 suit with +this action, nor my proper constitution. It is no breach of charity to +ourselves 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 ruin +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, not only 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 tower and +plume himself over a single line in Horace, and show 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 myself 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 only 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 persuade the +dulness of my spirit unto such an opinion of myself 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 only 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 country, +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 +Cheapside. For, indeed, heads of capacity, and such as are not full +with a handful or easy 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 anything. I cannot think that +Homer pined 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.[93] We do but learn, +to-day, what our better advanced judgments 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,[94] 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 satisfy 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 by the uncertain knowledge of this life with sweat and +vexation, which death gives every fool gratis, and is an accessary of +our glorification. + +_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 anything that will more deject his cooled +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 wherever there is a harmony, +order, or proportion; and thus far we may maintain “the musick of the +spheres:” 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. Whatsoever is harmonically composed +delights in harmony, which makes me much distrust the symmetry of those +heads which declaim against all church-musick. For myself, 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 +rhythm. This made Tacitus, in the very first line of his story, fall +upon a verse;[P] and Cicero, the worst of poets, but declaiming for a +poet, falls in the very first sentence upon a perfect hexameter.[Q] I +feel not in me those sordid and unchristian desires of my profession; +I do not secretly implore and wish for plagues, rejoice at famines, +revolve ephemerides and almanacks in expectation of malignant aspects, +fatal conjunctions, and eclipses. I rejoice not at unwholesome springs +nor unseasonable winters: my prayer goes with the husbandman’s; I +desire everything in its proper season, that neither men nor the times +be out of temper. Let me be sick myself, 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 any way exempt from their infirmities. There are not only +diseases incurable in physick, but cases indissolvable in law, 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 ofttimes the opinions of +his predecessors, because, though agreeable to reason, yet were not +consonant to his own rules and the logick of his proper principles. +Again,--to speak nothing of the sin against the Holy Ghost, whose cure +not only, 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 they 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 queasy stomachs, yet to prepared +appetites is nectar, and a pleasant potion of immortality. + +[P] “Urbem Romam in principio reges habuere.” + +[Q] “In qua me non inficior mediocriter esse.”--_Pro Archia Poeta_. + +_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 +so discordant and jarring a temper, to which a tuneable disposition +may not strike a harmony. _Magnæ virtutes, nec minora vitia;_ it is +the posy[95] of the best natures, and may be inverted on the worst. +There are, in the most depraved and venomous dispositions, certain +pieces that remain untouched, which by an _antiperistasis_[96] become +more excellent, or by the excellency of their antipathies are able +to preserve themselves from the contagion of their enemy vices, and +persist entire beyond the general corruption. For it is also thus in +nature: the greatest balsams do lie enveloped in the bodies of the 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 venom of themselves; without which they +were not deleterious to others only, 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 that I do infect myself; the man without a navel[97] yet lives in +me. I feel that original canker corrode and devour me: and therefore, +“_Defenda me, Dios, de me!_” “Lord, deliver me from myself!” is a +part of my litany, 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 quam cum solus,_”[R] +though it be the apothegm of a wise man is yet true in the mouth of a +fool: for 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 sequestered imaginations. And to speak more narrowly, there is no +such thing as solitude, nor anything 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 its self, which is +not truly one, and such is only God: all others do transcend an unity, +and so by consequence are many. + +[R] “Cic. de Off.,” 1. iii. + +_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 die in. The world that I +regard is myself; 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’s shoulders.[98] The earth is a point not only in respect of +the heavens above us, but of the 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 myself 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 +cœlum, 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 reality. There is surely a nearer apprehension of anything 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 the 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 mere 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 emblem or picture of the other. We are +somewhat more than ourselves 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 _Scorpio_. 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 galliardise[99] of company; yet in one +dream I can compose a whole comedy, behold the action, apprehend the +jests, and laugh myself 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 choose 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 which hath passed. +Aristotle, who hath written a singular tract of sleep, hath not, +methinks, thoroughly defined it; nor yet Galen, though he seem to have +corrected it; for those _noctambulos_ and night-walkers, though in +their sleep, do yet enjoy 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 corpses, as spirits with the bodies they assume, +wherein they seem to hear, see, 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 herself, 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 truly 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 die +daily; a death which Adam died 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 sentry 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;--Oh make me try, + By sleeping, what it is to die! + And as gently lay my head + On my grave, as now my bed. + Howe’er I rest, great God, let me + Awake again at last with thee. + And thus assured, behold I lie + Securely, or to wake or die. + These are my drowsy days; in vain + I do now wake to sleep again: + Oh come that hour, when I shall never + Sleep again, but wake for ever! + +This is the dormitive 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 myself, and +supererogate in that common principle, “Do unto others as thou wouldst +be done unto thyself.” 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 persuaded that +we are dead, is not so ridiculous, nor so many degrees beyond the power +of hellebore,[100] as this. The opinions 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 persuade 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 truly 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 myself to do good; I borrow +occasion of charity from my own necessities, and supply the wants of +others, when I am in most need myself: for it is an honest stratagem +to take advantage of ourselves, and so to husband the acts of virtue, +that, where they are 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 +centoes[101] and miserable outsides, those mutilate and semi bodies, +a soul of the same alloy with our own, whose genealogy is God’s as +well as ours, and in as fair a way to salvation as ourselves. Statists +that labour to contrive a commonwealth without our poverty take away +the object of charity; not understanding only the commonwealth of a +Christian, but forgetting the prophecy of Christ.[S] + +[S] “The poor ye have always with you.” + +_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. And 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 embrace, but that insensible part that our arms cannot embrace. God +being all goodness, can love nothing but himself; he loves us but for +that part which is as it were 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 ourselves to a woman, forgetting our mother in a wife, and +the womb that bare us in that which 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 ourselves. 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[T] will have it, above) the sun; nor any crambe[102] +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 _ideas_ 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 Bocace +or Malizspini, an apparition or neat delusion, wherein there is no more +of happiness than the name. Bless me in this life with but the peace +of my conscience, command of my affections, the love of thyself 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. + +[T] Who holds that the sun is the centre of the world. + + + + +HYDRIOTAPHIA. + + +URN BURIAL; OR, A DISCOURSE OF THE SEPULCHRAL URNS LATELY FOUND IN +NORFOLK. + + + + +TO MY WORTHY AND HONOURED FRIEND, + +THOMAS LE GROS, + +OF CROSTWICK, ESQUIRE. + +WHEN the general pyre was out, and the last valediction over, men +took a lasting adieu of their interred friends, little expecting the +curiosity of future ages should comment upon their ashes; and, having +no old experience of the duration of their relicks, held no opinion of +such after-considerations. + +But who knows the fate of his bones, or how often he is to be buried? +Who hath the oracle of his ashes, or whither they are to be scattered? +The relicks of many lie like the ruins of Pompey’s,[U] in all parts of +the earth; and when they arrive at your hands these may seem to have +wandered far, who, in a direct and meridian travel,[V] have but few +miles of known earth between yourself and the pole. + +[U] “Pompeios juvenes Asia atque Europa, sed ipsum terrâ tegit Libyos.” + +[V] Little directly but sea, between your house and Greenland. + +That the bones of Theseus should be seen again in Athens[W] was not +beyond conjecture and hopeful expectation: but that these should arise +so opportunely to serve yourself was an hit of fate, and honour beyond +prediction. + +[W] Brought back by Cimon Plutarch. + +We cannot but wish these urns might have the effect of theatrical +vessels and great Hippodrome urns[X] in Rome, to resound the +acclamations and honour due unto you. But these are sad and sepulchral +pitchers, which have no joyful voices; silently expressing old +mortality, the ruins of forgotten times, and can only speak with life, +how long in this corruptible frame some parts may be uncorrupted; yet +able to outlast bones long unborn, and noblest pile among us. + +[X] The great urns at the Hippodrome at Rome, conceived to resound the +voices of people at their shows. + +We present not these as any strange sight or spectacle unknown to your +eyes, who have beheld the best of urns and noblest variety of ashes; +who are yourself no slender master of antiquities, and can daily +command the view of so many imperial faces; which raiseth your thoughts +unto old things and consideration of times before you, when even living +men were antiquities; when the living might exceed the dead, and to +depart this world could not be properly said to go unto the greater +number.[Y] And so run up your thoughts upon the ancient of days, the +antiquary’s truest object, unto whom the eldest parcels are young, and +earth itself an infant, and without Egyptian[Z] account makes but small +noise in thousands. + +[Y] “Abiit ad plures.” + +[Z] Which makes the world so many years old. + +We were hinted by the occasion, not catched the opportunity to write +of old things, or intrude upon the antiquary. We are coldly drawn unto +discourses of antiquities, who have scarce time before us to comprehend +new things, or make out learned novelties. But seeing they arose, as +they lay almost in silence among us, at least in short account suddenly +passed over, we were very unwilling they should die again, and be +buried twice among us. + +Beside, to preserve the living, and make the dead to live, to keep +men out of their urns, and discourse of human fragments in them, is +not impertinent unto our profession; whose study is life and death, +who daily behold examples of mortality, and of all men least need +artificial _mementos_, or coffins by our bedside, to mind us of our +graves. + +’Tis time to observe occurrences, and let nothing remarkable escape us: +the supinity of elder days hath left so much in silence, or time hath +so martyred the records, that the most industrious heads do find no +easy work to erect a new Britannia. + +’Tis opportune to look back upon old times, and contemplate our +forefathers. Great examples grow thin, and to be fetched from the +passed world. Simplicity flies away, and iniquity comes at long strides +upon us. We have enough to do to make up ourselves from present and +passed times, and the whole stage of things scarce serveth for our +instruction. A complete piece of virtue must be made from the Centos +of all ages, as all the beauties of Greece could make but one handsome +Venus. + +When the bones of King Arthur were digged up,[AA] the old race might +think they beheld therein some originals of themselves; unto these +of our urns none here can pretend relation, and can only behold the +relicks of those persons who, in their life giving the laws unto their +predecessors, after long obscurity, now lie at their mercies. But, +remembering the early civility they brought upon these countries, and +forgetting long-passed mischiefs, we mercifully preserve their bones, +and piss not upon their ashes. + +[AA] In the time of Henry the Second. + +In the offer of these antiquities we drive not at ancient families, +so long outlasted by them. We are far from erecting your worth upon +the pillars of your forefathers, whose merits you illustrate. We +honour your old virtues, conformable unto times before you, which are +the noblest armoury. And, having long experience of your friendly +conversation, void of empty formality, full of freedom, constant and +generous honesty, I look upon you as a gem of the old rock,[AB] and +must profess myself even to urn and ashes.--Your ever faithful Friend +and Servant, + +[AB] “Adamas de rupe veteri præstantissimus.” + + THOMAS BROWNE. + +NORWICH, _May 1st_. + + + + +HYDRIOTAPHIA. + + +CHAPTER I. + +IN the deep discovery of the subterranean world a shallow part would +satisfy some inquirers; who, if two or three yards were open about the +surface, would not care to rake the bowels of Potosi,[AC] and regions +toward the centre. Nature hath furnished one part of the earth, and man +another. The treasures of time lie high, in urns, coins, and monuments, +scarce below the roots of some vegetables. Time hath endless rarities, +and shows of all varieties; which reveals old things in heaven, makes +new discoveries in earth, and even earth itself a discovery. That great +antiquity America lay buried for thousands of years, and a large part +of the earth is still in the urn unto us. + +[AC] The rich mountain of Peru. + +Though if Adam were made out of an extract of the earth, all parts +might challenge a restitution, yet few have returned their bones far +lower than they might receive them; not affecting the graves of giants, +under hilly and heavy coverings, but content with less than their +own depth, have wished their bones might lie soft, and the earth be +light upon them. Even such as hope to rise again, would not be content +with central interment, or so desperately to place their relicks as +to lie beyond discovery; and in no way to be seen again; which happy +contrivance hath made communication with our forefathers, and left unto +our view some parts, which they never beheld themselves. + +Though earth hath engrossed the name, yet water hath proved the +smartest grave; which in forty days swallowed almost mankind, and the +living creation; fishes not wholly escaping, except the salt ocean were +handsomely contempered by a mixture of the fresh element. + +Many have taken voluminous pains to determine the state of the soul +upon disunion; but men have been most phantastical in the singular +contrivances of their corporal dissolution: whilst the soberest nations +have rested in two ways, of simple inhumation and burning. + +That carnal interment or burying was of the elder date, the old +examples of Abraham and the patriarchs are sufficient to illustrate; +and were without competition, if it could be made out that Adam was +buried near Damascus, or Mount Calvary, according to some tradition. +God himself, that buried but one, was pleased to make choice of this +way, collectible from Scripture expression, and the hot contest between +Satan and the archangel about discovering the body of Moses. But the +practice of burning was also of great antiquity, and of no slender +extent. For (not to derive the same from Hercules) noble descriptions +there are hereof in the Grecian funerals of Homer, in the formal +obsequies of Patroclus and Achilles; and somewhat elder in the Theban +war, and solemn combustion of Meneceus, and Archemorus, contemporary +unto Jair the eighth judge of Israel. Confirmable also among the +Trojans, from the funeral pyre of Hector, burnt before the gates of +Troy: and the burning of Penthesilea the Amazonian queen: and long +continuance of that practice, in the inward countries of Asia; while as +low as the reign of Julian, we find that the king of Chionia[AD] burnt +the body of his son, and interred the ashes in a silver urn. + +[AD] Gumbrates, king of Chionia, a country near Persia. + +The same practice extended also far west; and besides Herulians, Getes, +and Thracians, was in use with most of the Celtæ, Sarmatians, Germans, +Gauls, Danes, Swedes, Norwegians; not to omit some use thereof among +Carthaginians and Americans. Of greater antiquity among the Romans +than most opinion, or Pliny seems to allow: for (besides the old table +laws[AE] of burning or burying within the city, of making the funeral +fire with planed wood, or quenching the fire with wine), Manlius the +consul burnt the body of his son: Numa, by special clause of his will, +was not burnt but buried; and Remus was solemnly burned, according to +the description of Ovid.[AF] + +[AE] XII. Tabulæ, part i., de jure sacro, “Hominem mortuum in urbe ne +sepelito neve urito.” + +[AF] “Ultima prolata subdita flamma rogo,” &c. _Fast._, lib. iv., 856. + +Cornelius Sylla was not the first whose body was burned in Rome, but +the first of the Cornelian family; which being indifferently, not +frequently used before; from that time spread, and became the prevalent +practice. Not totally pursued in the highest run of cremation; for +when even crows were funerally burnt, Poppæa the wife of Nero found a +peculiar grave interment. Now as all customs were founded upon some +bottom of reason, so there wanted not grounds for this; according +to several apprehensions of the most rational dissolution. Some +being of the opinion of Thales, that water was the original of all +things, thought it most equal[103] to submit unto the principle of +putrefaction, and conclude in a moist relentment.[104] Others conceived +it most natural to end in fire, as due unto the master principle in the +composition, according to the doctrine of Heraclitus; and therefore +heaped up large piles, more actively to waft them toward that element, +whereby they also declined a visible degeneration into worms, and left +a lasting parcel of their composition. + +Some apprehended a purifying virtue in fire, refining the grosser +commixture, and firing out the æthereal particles so deeply immersed +in it. And such as by tradition or rational conjecture held any hint +of the final pyre of all things; or that this element at last must be +too hard for all the rest; might conceive most naturally of the fiery +dissolution. Others pretending no natural grounds, politickly declined +the malice of enemies upon their buried bodies. Which consideration led +Sylla unto this practice; who having thus served the body of Marius, +could not but fear a retaliation upon his own; entertained after in the +civil wars, and revengeful contentions of Rome. + +But as many nations embraced, and many left it indifferent, so others +too much affected, or strictly declined this practice. The Indian +Brachmans seemed too great friends unto fire, who burnt themselves +alive and thought it the noblest way to end their days in fire; +according to the expression of the Indian, burning himself at Athens, +in his last words upon the pyre unto the amazed spectators, “thus I +make myself immortal.”[AG] + +[AG] And therefore the inscription on his tomb was made accordingly, +“Hic Damase.” + +But the Chaldeans, the great idolaters of fire, abhorred the burning of +their carcases, as a pollution of that deity. The Persian magi declined +it upon the like scruples, and being only solicitous about their bones, +exposed their flesh to the prey of birds and dogs. And the Persees now +in India, which expose their bodies unto vultures, and endure not so +much as _feretra_ or biers of wood, the proper fuel of fire, are led on +with such niceties. But whether the ancient Germans, who burned their +dead, held any such fear to pollute their deity of Herthus, or the +earth, we have no authentic conjecture. + +The Egyptians were afraid of fire, not as a deity, but a devouring +element, mercilessly consuming their bodies, and leaving too little +of them; and therefore by precious embalmments, depositure in dry +earths, or handsome inclosure in glasses, contrived the notablest ways +of integral conservation. And from such Egyptian scruples, imbibed by +Pythagoras, it may be conjectured that Numa and the Pythagorical sect +first waived the fiery solution. + +The Scythians, who swore by wind and sword, that is, by life and +death, were so far from burning their bodies, that they declined all +interment, and made their graves in the air: and the Ichthyophagi, or +fish-eating nations about Egypt, affected the sea for their grave; +thereby declining visible corruption, and restoring the debt of their +bodies. Whereas the old heroes, in Homer, dreaded nothing more than +water or drowning; probably upon the old opinion of the fiery substance +of the soul, only extinguishable by that element; and therefore the +poet emphatically implieth[AH] the total destruction in this kind of +death, which happened to Ajax Oileus. + +[AH] Which Magius reads ἐξαπόλωλε. + +The old Balearians had a peculiar mode, for they used great urns and +much wood, but no fire in their burials, while they bruised the flesh +and bones of the dead, crowded them into urns, and laid heaps of wood +upon them. And the Chinese without cremation or urnal interment of +their bodies, make use of trees and much burning, while they plant a +pine-tree by their grave, and burn great numbers of printed draughts +of slaves and horses over it, civilly content with their companies in +_effigy_, which barbarous nations exact unto reality. + +Christians abhorred this way of obsequies, and though they sticked +not to give their bodies to be burnt in their lives, detested that +mode after death: affecting rather a depositure than absumption, and +properly submitting unto the sentence of God, to return not unto +ashes but unto dust again, and conformable unto the practice of the +patriarchs, the interment of our Saviour, of Peter, Paul, and the +ancient martyrs. And so far at last declining promiscuous interment +with Pagans, that some have suffered ecclesiastical censures,[AI] for +making no scruple thereof. + +[AI] Martialis the Bishop. + +The Mussulman believers will never admit this fiery resolution. For +they hold a present trial from their black and white angels in the +grave; which they must have made so hollow, that they may rise upon +their knees. + +The Jewish nation, though they entertained the old way of inhumation, +yet sometimes admitted this practice. For the men of Jabesh burnt +the body of Saul; and by no prohibited practice, to avoid contagion +or pollution, in time of pestilence, burnt the bodies of their +friends.[AJ] And when they burnt not their dead bodies, yet sometimes +used great burnings near and about them, deducible from the expressions +concerning Jehoram, Zedechias, and the sumptuous pyre of Asa. And were +so little averse from Pagan burning, that the Jews lamenting the death +of Cæsar their friend, and revenger on Pompey, frequented the place +where his body was burnt for many nights together. And as they raised +noble monuments and mausoleums for their own nation,[AK] so they were +not scrupulous in erecting some for others, according to the practice +of Daniel, who left that lasting sepulchral pile in Ecbatana, for the +Median and Persian kings.[AL] + +[AJ] Amos vi. 10. + +[AK] As in that magnificent sepulchral monument erected by Simon.--1 +_Macc._ xiii. + +[AL] κατασκεύασμα θαυμασίως πεποιημένον, whereof a Jewish priest had +always custody until Josephus’ days.--_Jos. Antiq._, lib. x. + +But even in times of subjection and hottest use, they conformed not +unto the Roman practice of burning; whereby the prophecy was secured +concerning the body of Christ, that it should not see corruption, or +a bone should not be broken; which we believe was also providentially +prevented, from the soldier’s spear and nails that passed by the little +bones both in his hands and feet; not of ordinary contrivance, that +it should not corrupt on the cross, according to the laws of Roman +crucifixion, or an hair of his head perish, though observable in Jewish +customs, to cut the hair of malefactors. + +Nor in their long cohabitation with Egyptians, crept into a custom of +their exact embalming, wherein deeply slashing the muscles, and taking +out the brains and entrails, they had broken the subject of so entire a +resurrection, nor fully answered the types of Enoch, Elijah, or Jonah, +which yet to prevent or restore, was of equal facility unto that rising +power able to break the fasciations and bands of death, to get clear +out of the cerecloth, and an hundred pounds of ointment, and out of the +sepulchre before the stone was rolled from it. + +But though they embraced not this practice of burning, yet entertained +they many ceremonies agreeable unto Greek and Roman obsequies. And +he that observeth their funeral feasts, their lamentations at the +grave, their music, and weeping mourners; how they closed the eyes of +their friends, how they washed, anointed, and kissed the dead; may +easily conclude these were not mere Pagan civilities. But whether +that mournful burthen, and treble calling out after Absalom, had any +reference unto the last conclamation, and triple valediction, used by +other nations, we hold but a wavering conjecture. + +Civilians make sepulture but of the law of nations, others do +naturally found it and discover it also in animals. They that are so +thick-skinned as still to credit the story of the Phœnix, may say +something for animal burning. More serious conjectures find some +examples of sepulture in elephants, cranes, the sepulchral cells of +pismires, and practice of bees,--which civil society carrieth out their +dead, and hath exequies, if not interments. + + +CHAPTER II. + +THE solemnities, ceremonies, rites of their cremation or interment, +so solemnly delivered by authors, we shall not disparage our reader +to repeat. Only the last and lasting part in their urns, collected +bones and ashes, we cannot wholly omit or decline that subject, which +occasion lately presented, in some discovered among us. + +In a field of Old Walsingham, not many months past, were digged up +between forty and fifty urns, deposited in a dry and sandy soil, not a +yard deep, nor far from one another.--Not all strictly of one figure, +but most answering these described; some containing two pounds of +bones, and teeth, with fresh impressions of their combustion; besides +the extraneous substances, like pieces of small boxes, or combs +handsomely wrought, handles of small brass instruments, brazen nippers, +and in one some kind of opal. + +Near the same plot of ground, for about six yards compass, were digged +up coals and incinerated substances, which begat conjecture that this +was the _ustrina_ or place of burning their bodies, or some sacrificing +place unto the _Manes_, which was properly below the surface of the +ground, as the _aræ_ and altars unto the gods and heroes above it. + +That these were the urns of Romans from the common custom and place +where they were found, is no obscure conjecture, not far from a Roman +garrison, and but five miles from Brancaster, set down by ancient +record under the name of Branodunum. And where the adjoining town, +containing seven parishes, in no very different sound, but Saxon +termination, still retains the name of Burnham, which being an early +station, it is not improbable the neighbour parts were filled with +habitations, either of Romans themselves, or Britons Romanized, which +observed the Roman customs. + +Nor is it improbable, that the Romans early possessed this country. +For though we meet not with such strict particulars of these parts +before the new institution of Constantine and military charge of the +count of the Saxon shore, and that about the Saxon invasions, the +Dalmatian horsemen were in the garrison of Brancaster; yet in the time +of Claudius, Vespasian, and Severus, we find no less than three legions +dispersed through the province of Britain. And as high as the reign +of Claudius a great overthrow was given unto the Iceni, by the Roman +lieutenant Ostorius. Not long after, the country was so molested, that, +in hope of a better state, Prastaagus bequeathed his kingdom unto Nero +and his daughters; and Boadicea, his queen, fought the last decisive +battle with Paulinus. After which time, and conquest of Agricola, the +lieutenant of Vespasian, probable it is, they wholly possessed this +country; ordering it into garrisons or habitations best suitable with +their securities. And so some Roman habitations not improbable in these +parts, as high as the time of Vespasian, where the Saxons after seated, +in whose thin-filled maps we yet find the name of Walsingham. Now if +the Iceni were but Gammadims, Anconians, or men that lived in an angle, +wedge, or elbow of Britain, according to the original etymology, this +country will challenge the emphatical appellation, as most properly +making the elbow or _iken_ of Icenia. + +That Britain was notably populous is undeniable, from that expression +of Cæsar.[AM] That the Romans themselves were early in no small +numbers--seventy thousand, with their associates, slain, by Boadicea, +affords a sure account. And though not many Roman habitations are now +known, yet some, by old works, rampiers, coins, and urns, do testify +their possessions. Some urns have been found at Castor, some also +about Southcreak, and, not many years past, no less than ten in a +field at Buxton, not near any recorded garrison. Nor is it strange to +find Roman coins of copper and silver among us; of Vespasian, Trajan, +Adrian, Commodus, Antoninus, Severus, &c.; but the greater number of +Dioclesian, Constantine, Constans, Valens, with many of Victorinus +Posthumius, Tetricus, and the thirty tyrants in the reign of Gallienus; +and some as high as Adrianus have been found about Thetford, or +Sitomagus, mentioned in the _Itinerary_ of Antoninus, as the way from +Venta or Castor unto London. But the most frequent discovery is made at +the two Castors by Norwich and Yarmouth at Burghcastle, and Brancaster. + +[AM] “Hominum infinita multitudo est creberrimaque; ædificia fere +Gallicis consimilia.”--_Cæsar de Bello. Gal._, lib. v. + +Besides the Norman, Saxon, and Danish pieces of Cuthred, Canutus, +William, Matilda, and others, some British coins of gold have been +dispersedly found, and no small number of silver pieces near Norwich, +with a rude head upon the obverse, and an ill-formed horse on the +reverse, with inscriptions _Ic. Duro. T.;_ whether implying Iceni, +Durotriges, Tascia, or Trinobantes, we leave to higher conjecture. +Vulgar chronology will have Norwich Castle as old as Julius Cæsar; +but his distance from these parts, and its Gothick form of structure, +abridgeth such antiquity. The British coins afford conjecture of early +habitation in these parts, though the city of Norwich arose from the +ruins of Venta; and though, perhaps, not without some habitation +before, was enlarged, builded, and nominated by the Saxons. In what +bulk or populosity it stood in the old East-Angle monarchy tradition +and history are silent. Considerable it was in the Danish eruptions, +when Sueno burnt Thetford and Norwich, and Ulfketel, the governor +thereof, was able to make some resistance, and after endeavoured to +burn the Danish navy. + +How the Romans left so many coins in countries of their conquests +seems of hard resolution; except we consider how they buried them +under ground when, upon barbarous invasions, they were fain to desert +their habitations in most part of their empire, and the strictness +of their laws forbidding to transfer them to any other uses: wherein +the Spartans were singular, who, to make their copper money useless, +contempered it with vinegar. That the Britons left any, some wonder, +since their money was iron and iron rings before Cæsar; and those of +after-stamp by permission, and but small in bulk and bigness. That so +few of the Saxons remain, because, overcome by succeeding conquerors +upon the place, their coins, by degrees, passed into other stamps and +the marks of after-ages. + +Than the time of these urns deposited, or precise antiquity of these +relicks, nothing of more uncertainty; for since the lieutenant of +Claudius seems to have made the first progress into these parts, since +Boadicea was overthrown by the forces of Nero, and Agricola put a +full end to these conquests, it is not probable the country was fully +garrisoned or planted before; and, therefore, however these urns might +be of later date, not likely of higher antiquity. + +And the succeeding emperors desisted not from their conquests in these +and other parts, as testified by history and medal-inscription yet +extant: the province of Britain, in so divided a distance from Rome, +beholding the faces of many imperial persons, and in large account; +no fewer than Cæsar, Claudius, Britannicus, Vespasian, Titus, Adrian, +Severus, Commodus, Geta, and Caracalla. + +A great obscurity herein, because no medal or emperor’s coin enclosed, +which might denote the date of their interments; observable in many +urns, and found in those of Spitalfields, by London, which contained +the coins of Claudius, Vespasian, Commodus, Antoninus, attended with +lacrymatories, lamps, bottles of liquor, and other appurtenances of +affectionate superstition, which in these rural interments were wanting. + +Some uncertainty there is from the period or term of burning, or the +cessation of that practice. Macrobius affirmeth it was disused in his +days; but most agree, though without authentic record, that it ceased +with the Antonini,--most safely to be understood after the reign of +those emperors which assumed the name of Antoninus, extending unto +Heliogabalus. Not strictly after Marcus; for about fifty years later, +we find the magnificent burning and consecration of Servus; and, if +we so fix this period or cessation, these urns will challenge above +thirteen hundred years. + +But whether this practice was only then left by emperors and great +persons, or generally about Rome, and not in other provinces, we hold +no authentic account; for after Tertullian, in the days of Minucius, +it was obviously objected upon Christians, that they condemned the +practice of burning.[AN] And we find a passage in Sidonius, which +asserteth that practice in France unto a lower account. And, perhaps, +not fully disused till Christianity fully established, which gave the +final extinction to these sepulchral bonfires. + +[AN] “_Execrantur rogos, et damnant ignium sepulturam._”--_Min. in Oct._ + +Whether they were the bones of men, or women, or children, no authentic +decision from ancient custom in distinct places of burial. Although not +improbably conjectured, that the double sepulture, or burying-place of +Abraham, had in it such intention. But from exility of bones, thinness +of skulls, smallness of teeth, ribs, and thigh-bones, not improbable +that many thereof were persons of minor age, or woman. Confirmable also +from things contained in them. In most were found substances resembling +combs, plates like boxes, fastened with iron pins, and handsomely +overwrought like the necks or bridges of musical instruments; long +brass plates overwrought like the handles of neat implements; brazen +nippers, to pull away hair; and in one a kind of opal, yet maintaining +a bluish colour. + +Now that they accustomed to burn or bury with them, things wherein +they excelled, delighted, or which were dear unto them, either as +farewells unto all pleasure, or vain apprehension that they might use +them in the other world, is testified by all antiquity, observable +from the gem or beryl ring upon the finger of Cynthia, the mistress of +Propertius, when after her funeral pyre her ghost appeared unto him; +and notably illustrated from the contents of that Roman urn preserved +by Cardinal Farnese, wherein besides great number of gems with heads +of gods and goddesses, were found an ape of agath, a grasshopper, an +elephant of amber, a crystal ball, three glasses, two spoons, and +six nuts of crystal; and beyond the content of urns, in the monument +of Childerick the first, and fourth king from Pharamond, casually +discovered three years past at Tournay, restoring unto the world much +gold richly adorning his sword, two hundred rubies, many hundred +imperial coins, three hundred golden bees, the bones and horse-shoes of +his horse interred with him, according to the barbarous magnificence +of those days in their sepulchral obsequies. Although, if we steer by +the conjecture of many a Septuagint expression, some trace thereof may +be found even with the ancient Hebrews, not only from the sepulchral +treasure of David, but the circumcision knives which Joshua also buried. + +Some men, considering the contents of these urns, lasting pieces and +toys included in them, and the custom of burning with many other +nations, might somewhat doubt whether all urns found among us, were +properly Roman relicks, or some not belonging unto our British, Saxon, +or Danish forefathers. + +In the form of burial among the ancient Britons, the large discourses +of Cæsar, Tacitus, and Strabo are silent. For the discovery whereof, +with other particulars, we much deplore the loss of that letter which +Cicero expected or received from his brother Quintus, as a resolution +of British customs; or the account which might have been made by +Scribonius Largus, the physician, accompanying the Emperor Claudius, +who might have also discovered that frugal bit of the old Britons, +which in the bigness of a bean could satisfy their thirst and hunger. + +But that the Druids and ruling priests used to burn and bury, is +expressed by Pomponius; that Bellinus, the brother of Brennus, and King +of the Britons, was burnt, is acknowledged by Polydorus, as also by +Amandus Zierexensis in _Historia_ and Pineda in his _Universa Historia_ +(Spanish). That they held that practice in Gallia, Cæsar expressly +delivereth. Whether the Britons (probably descended from them, of like +religion, language, and manners) did not sometimes make use of burning, +or whether at least such as were after civilized unto the Roman life +and manners, conformed not unto this practice, we have no historical +assertion or denial. But since, from the account of Tacitus, the Romans +early wrought so much civility upon the British stock, that they +brought them to build temples, to wear the gown, and study the Roman +laws and language, that they conformed also unto their religious rites +and customs in burials, seems no improbable conjecture. + +That burning the dead was used in Sarmatia is affirmed by Gaguinus; +that the Sueons and Gathlanders used to burn their princes and great +persons, is delivered by Saxo and Olaus; that this was the old German +practice, is also asserted by Tacitus. And though we are bare in +historical particulars of such obsequies in this island, or that the +Saxons, Jutes, and Angles burnt their dead, yet came they from parts +where ’twas of ancient practice; the Germans using it, from whom they +were descended. And even in Jutland and Sleswick in Anglia Cymbrica, +urns with bones were found not many years before us. + +But the Danish and northern nations have raised an era or point of +compute from their custom of burning their dead: some deriving it from +Unguinus, some from Frotho the great, who ordained by law, that princes +and chief commanders should be committed unto the fire, though the +common sort had the common grave interment. So Starkatterus, that old +hero, was burnt, and Ringo royally burnt the body of Harold the king +slain by him. + +What time this custom generally expired in that nation, we discern no +assured period; whether it ceased before Christianity, or upon their +conversion, by Ausgurius the Gaul, in the time of Ludovicus Pius, the +son of Charles the Great, according to good computes; or whether it +might not be used by some persons, while for an hundred and eighty +years Paganism and Christianity were promiscuously embraced among +them, there is no assured conclusion. About which times the Danes were +busy in England, and particularly infested this country; where many +castles and strongholds were built by them, or against them, and great +number of names and families still derived from them. But since this +custom was probably disused before their invasion or conquest, and the +Romans confessedly practised the same since their possession of this +island, the most assured account will fall upon the Romans, or Britons +Romanized. + +However, certain it is, that urns conceived of no Roman original, are +often digged up both in Norway and Denmark, handsomely described, and +graphically represented by the learned physician Wormius. And in some +parts of Denmark in no ordinary number, as stands delivered by authors +exactly describing those countries. And they contained not only bones, +but many other substances in them, as knives, pieces of iron, brass, +and wood, and one of Norway a brass gilded jew’s-harp. + +Nor were they confused or careless in disposing the noblest sort, +while they placed large stones in circle about the urns or bodies +which they interred: somewhat answerable unto the monument of Rollrich +stones in England, or sepulchral monument probably erected by Rollo, +who after conquered Normandy; where ’tis not improbable somewhat might +be discovered. Meanwhile to what nation or person belonged that large +urn found at Ashbury,[AO] containing mighty bones, and a buckler; what +those large urns found at Little Massingham;[AP] or why the Anglesea +urns are placed with their mouths downward, remains yet undiscovered. + +[AO] In Cheshire. + +[AP] In Norfolk. + + +CHAPTER III. + +PLAISTERED and whited sepulchres were anciently affected in cadaverous +and corrupted burials; and the rigid Jews were wont to garnish the +sepulchres of the righteous.[AQ] Ulysses, in Hecuba, cared not how +meanly he lived, so he might find a noble tomb after death.[AR] +Great princes affected great monuments; and the fair and larger urns +contained no vulgar ashes, which makes that disparity in those which +time discovereth among us. The present urns were not of one capacity, +the largest containing above a gallon, some not much above half that +measure; nor all of one figure, wherein there is no strict conformity +in the same or different countries; observable from those represented +by Casalius, Bosio, and others, though all found in Italy; while many +have handles, ears, and long necks, but most imitate a circular figure, +in a spherical and round composure; whether from any mystery, best +duration or capacity, were but a conjecture. But the common form with +necks was a proper figure, making our last bed like our first; nor +much unlike the urns of our nativity while we lay in the nether part +of the earth,[AS] and inward vault of our microcosm. Many urns are +red, these but of a black colour somewhat smooth, and dully sounding, +which begat some doubt, whether they were burnt, or only baked in +oven or sun, according to the ancient way, in many bricks, tiles, +pots, and testaceous works; and, as the word _testa_ is properly to +be taken, when occurring without addition and chiefly intended by +Pliny, when he commendeth bricks and tiles of two years old, and to +make them in the spring. Nor only these concealed pieces, but the open +magnificence of antiquity, ran much in the artifice of clay. Hereof the +house of Mausolus was built, thus old Jupiter stood in the Capitol, +and the statua of Hercules, made in the reign of Tarquinius Priscus, +was extant in Pliny’s days. And such as declined burning or funeral +urns, affected coffins of clay, according to the mode of Pythagoras, a +way preferred by Varro. But the spirit of great ones was above these +circumscriptions, affecting copper, silver, gold, and porphyry urns, +wherein Severus lay, after a serious view and sentence on that which +should contain him.[AT] Some of these urns were thought to have been +silvered over, from sparklings in several pots, with small tinsel +parcels; uncertain whether from the earth, or the first mixture in them. + +[AQ] St Matt. xxiii. + +[AR] _Euripides._ + +[AS] Psal. lxiii. + +[AT] “Χωρήσεις τὸν ἄνθρωπον, ὂν ἡ οἰκουμένη οὐκ ἐχώρησεν.”--_Dion._ + +Among these urns we could obtain no good account of their coverings; +only one seemed arched over with some kind of brickwork. Of those found +at Buxton, some were covered with flints, some, in other parts, with +tiles; those at Yarmouth Caster were closed with Roman bricks, and +some have proper earthen covers adapted and fitted to them. But in the +Homerical urn of Patroclus, whatever was the solid tegument, we find +the immediate covering to be a purple piece of silk: and such as had +no covers might have the earth closely pressed into them, after which +disposure were probably some of these, wherein we found the bones and +ashes half mortared unto the sand and sides of the urn, and some long +roots of quich, or dog’s-grass, wreathed about the bones. + +No Lamps, included liquors, lacrymatories, or tear bottles, attended +these rural urns, either as sacred unto the _manes_, or passionate +expressions of their surviving friends. While with rich flames, and +hired tears, they solemnized their obsequies, and in the most lamented +monuments made one part of their inscriptions.[AU] Some find sepulchral +vessels containing liquors, which time hath incrassated into jellies. +For, besides these lacrymatories, notable lamps, with vessels of +oils, and aromatical liquors, attended noble ossuaries; and some yet +retaining a vinosity and spirit in them, which, if any have tasted, +they have far exceeded the palates of antiquity. Liquors not to be +computed by years of annual magistrates, but by great conjunctions and +the fatal periods of kingdoms.[AV] The draughts of consulary date were +but crude unto these, and Opimian wine but in the must unto them.[AW] + +[AU] “Cum lacrymis posuere.” + +[AV] About five hundred years. + +[AW] “Vinum Opiminianum annorum centum.”--_Petron._ + +In sundry graves and sepulchres we meet with rings, coins, and +chalices. Ancient frugality was so severe, that they allowed no gold +to attend the corpse, but only that which served to fasten their +teeth. Whether the Opaline stone in this were burnt upon the finger of +the dead, or cast into the fire by some affectionate friend, it will +consist with either custom. But other incinerable substances were found +so fresh, that they could feel no singe from fire. These, upon view, +were judged to be wood; but, sinking in water, and tried by the fire, +we found them to be bone or ivory. In their hardness and yellow colour +they most resembled box, which, in old expressions, found the epithet +of eternal, and perhaps in such conservatories might have passed +uncorrupted. + +That bay leaves were found green in the tomb of S. Humbert, after an +hundred and fifty years, was looked upon as miraculous. Remarkable it +was unto old spectators, that the cypress of the temple of Diana lasted +so many hundred years. The wood of the ark, and olive-rod of Aaron, +were older at the captivity; but the cypress of the ark of Noah was +the greatest vegetable of antiquity, if Josephus were not deceived by +some fragments of it in his days: to omit the moor logs and fir trees +found underground in many parts of England; the undated ruins of winds, +floods, or earthquakes, and which in Flanders still show from what +quarter they fell, as generally lying in a north-east position. + +But though we found not these pieces to be wood, according to first +apprehensions, yet we missed not altogether of some woody substance; +for the bones were not so clearly picked but some coals were found +amongst them; a way to make wood perpetual, and a fit associate for +metal, whereon was laid the foundation of the great Ephesian temple, +and which were made the lasting tests of old boundaries and landmarks. +Whilst we look on these, we admire not observations of coals found +fresh after four hundred years. In a long-deserted habitation even +egg-shells have been found fresh, not tending to corruption. + +In the monument of King Childerick the iron relicks were found all +rusty and crumbling into pieces; but our little iron pins, which +fastened the ivory works, held well together, and lost not their +magnetical quality, though wanting a tenacious moisture for the firmer +union of parts; although it be hardly drawn into fusion, yet that metal +soon submitteth unto rust and dissolution. In the brazen pieces we +admired not the duration, but the freedom from rust, and ill savour, +upon the hardest attrition; but now exposed unto the piercing atoms +of air, in the space of a few months, they begin to spot and betray +their green entrails. We conceive not these urns to have descended +thus naked as they appear, or to have entered their graves without the +old habit of flowers. The urn of Philopœmen was so laden with flowers +and ribbons, that it afforded no sight of itself. The rigid Lycurgus +allowed olive and myrtle. The Athenians might fairly except against +the practice of Democritus, to be buried up in honey, as fearing to +embezzle a great commodity of their country, and the best of that kind +in Europe. But Plato seemed too frugally politick, who allowed no +larger monument than would contain four heroick verses, and designed +the most barren ground for sepulture: though we cannot commend the +goodness of that sepulchral ground which was set at no higher rate than +the mean salary of Judas. Though the earth had confounded the ashes +of these ossuaries, yet the bones were so smartly burnt, that some +thin plates of brass were found half melted among them. Whereby we +apprehend they were not of the meanest caresses, perfunctorily fired, +as sometimes in military, and commonly in pestilence, burnings; or +after the manner of abject corpses, huddled forth and carelessly burnt, +without the Esquiline Port at Rome; which was an affront continued upon +Tiberius, while they but half burnt his body, and in the amphitheatre, +according to the custom in notable malefactors;[AX] whereas Nero seemed +not so much to fear his death as that his head should be cut off and +his body not burnt entire. + +[AX] “In amphitheatro semiustulandum.”--_Suetonius Vit. Tib._ + +Some, finding many fragments of skulls in these urns, suspected +a mixture of bones; in none we searched was there cause of such +conjecture, though sometimes they declined not that practice.--The +ashes of Domitian were mingled with those of Julia; of Achilles with +those of Patroclus. All urns contained not single ashes; without +confused burnings they affectionately compounded their bones; +passionately endeavouring to continue their living unions. And when +distance of death denied such conjunctions, unsatisfied affections +conceived some satisfaction to be neighbours in the grave, to lie urn +by urn, and touch but in their manes. And many were so curious to +continue their living relations, that they contrived large and family +urns, wherein the ashes of their nearest friends and kindred might +successively be received, at least some parcels thereof, while their +collateral memorials lay in minor vessels about them. + +Antiquity held too light thoughts from objects of mortality, while +some drew provocatives of mirth from anatomies,[AY] and jugglers +showed tricks with skeletons. When fiddlers made not so pleasant mirth +as fencers, and men could sit with quiet stomachs, while hanging +was played before them.[AZ] Old considerations made few mementos +by skulls and bones upon their monuments. In the Egyptian obelisks +and hieroglyphical figures it is not easy to meet with bones. The +sepulchral lamps speak nothing less than sepulture, and in their +literal draughts prove often obscene and antick pieces. Where we +find _D. M._[BA] it is obvious to meet with sacrificing _pateras_ +and vessels of libation upon old sepulchral monuments. In the Jewish +hypogæum and subterranean cell at Rome, was little observable beside +the variety of lamps and frequent draughts of Anthony and Jerome we +meet with thigh-bones and death’s-heads; but the cemeterial cells of +ancient Christians and martyrs were filled with draughts of Scripture +stories; not declining the flourishes of cypress, palms, and olive, +and the mystical figures of peacocks, doves, and cocks; but iterately +affecting the portraits of Enoch, Lazarus, Jonas, and the vision of +Ezekiel, as hopeful draughts, and hinting imagery of the resurrection, +which is the life of the grave, and sweetens our habitations in the +land of moles and pismires. + +[AY] “Sic erimus cuncti, ... ergo dum vivimus vivamus.” + +[AZ] Αγώνον παίζειν. A barbarous pastime at feasts, when men stood +upon a rolling globe, with their necks in a rope and a knife in their +hands, ready to cut it when the stone was rolled away, wherein, if they +failed, they lost their lives, to the laughter of their spectators. + +[BA] Diis manibus. + +Gentle inscriptions precisely delivered the extent of men’s lives, +seldom the manner of their deaths, which history itself so often leaves +obscure in the records of memorable persons. There is scarce any +philosopher but dies twice or thrice in Laertius; nor almost any life +without two or three deaths in Plutarch; which makes the tragical ends +of noble persons more favourably resented by compassionate readers who +find some relief in the election of such differences. + +The certainty of death is attended with uncertainties, in time, manner, +places. The variety of monuments hath often obscured true graves; and +cenotaphs confounded sepulchres. For beside their real tombs, many have +found honorary and empty sepulchres. The variety of Homer’s monuments +made him of various countries. Euripides had his tomb in Africa, but +his sepulture in Macedonia. And Severus found his real sepulchre in +Rome, but his empty grave in Gallia. + +He that lay in a golden urn eminently above the earth, was not like +to find the quiet of his bones. Many of these urns were broke by a +vulgar discoverer in hope of enclosed treasure. The ashes of Marcellus +were lost above ground, upon the like account. Where profit hath +prompted, no age hath wanted such miners. For which the most barbarous +expilators found the most civil rhetorick. Gold once out of the earth +is no more due unto it; what was unreasonably committed to the ground, +is reasonably resumed from it; let monuments and rich fabricks, not +riches, adorn men’s ashes. The commerce of the living is not to be +transferred unto the dead; it is not injustice to take that which none +complains to lose, and no man is wronged where no man is possessor. + +What virtue yet sleeps in this _terra damnata_ and aged cinders, were +petty magic to experiment. These crumbling relicks and long fired +particles superannuate such expectations; bones, hairs, nails, and +teeth of the dead, were the treasures of old sorcerers. In vain we +revive such practices; present superstition too visibly perpetuates the +folly of our forefathers, wherein unto old observation this island was +so complete, that it might have instructed Persia. + +Plato’s historian of the other world lies twelve days incorrupted, +while his soul was viewing the large stations of the dead. How to +keep the corpse seven days from corruption by anointing and washing, +without extenteration, were an hazardable piece of art, in our choicest +practice. How they made distinct separation of bones and ashes from +fiery admixture, hath found no historical solution; though they seemed +to make a distinct collection and overlooked not Pyrrhus his toe. Some +provision they might make by fictile vessels, coverings, tiles, or flat +stones, upon and about the body (and in the same field, not far from +these urns, many stones were found underground), as also by careful +separation of extraneous matter composing and raking up the burnt bones +with forks, observable in that notable lamp of Galvanus Martianus, +who had the sight of the _vas ustrinum_ or vessel wherein they burnt +the dead, found in the Esquiline field at Rome, might have afforded +clearer solution. But their insatisfaction herein begat that remarkable +invention in the funeral pyres of some princes, by incombustible sheets +made with a texture of asbestos, incremable flax, or salamander’s wool, +which preserved their bones and ashes incommixed. + +How the bulk of a man should sink into so few pounds of bones and +ashes, may seem strange unto any who considers not its constitution, +and how slender a mass will remain upon an open and urging fire of the +carnal composition. Even bones themselves, reduced into ashes, do abate +a notable proportion. And consisting much of a volatile salt, when that +is fired out, make a light kind of cinders. Although their bulk be +disproportionable to their weight, when the heavy principle of salt is +fired out, and the earth almost only remaineth; observable in sallow, +which makes more ashes than oak, and discovers the common fraud of +selling ashes by measure, and not by ponderation. + +Some bones make best skeletons, some bodies quick and speediest ashes. +Who would expect a quick flame from hydropical Heraclitus? The poisoned +soldier when his belly brake, put out two pyres in Plutarch. But in the +plague of Athens, one private pyre served two or three intruders; and +the Saracens burnt in large heaps, by the king of Castile, showed how +little fuel sufficeth. Though the funeral pyre of Patroclus took up +an hundred foot,[BB] a piece of an old boat burnt Pompey; and if the +burthen of Isaac were sufficient for an holocaust, a man may carry his +own pyre. + +[BB] “Ἑκατόμπεδον ἔνθα ἢ ἔνθα.” + +From animals are drawn good burning lights, and good medicines against +burning. Though the seminal humour seems of a contrary nature to fire, +yet the body completed proves a combustible lump, wherein fire finds +flame even from bones, and some fuel almost from all parts; though the +metropolis of humidity[BC] seems least disposed unto it, which might +render the skulls of these urns less burned than other bones. But +all flies or sinks before fire almost in all bodies: when the common +ligament is dissolved, the attenuable parts ascend, the rest subside in +coal, calx, or ashes. + +[BC] The Brain. _Hippocrates_. + +To burn the bones of the king of Edom for lime,[BD] seems no irrational +ferity; but to drink of the ashes of dead relations,[BE] a passionate +prodigality. He that hath the ashes of his friend, hath an everlasting +treasure; where fire taketh leave, corruption slowly enters. In +bones well burnt, fire makes a wall against itself; experimented in +Copels,[105] and tests of metals, which consist of such ingredients. +What the sun compoundeth, fire analyzeth, not transmuteth. That +devouring agent leaves almost always a morsel for the earth, whereof +all things are but a colony; and which, if time permits, the mother +element will have in their primitive mass again. + +[BD] Amos ii. 1. + +[BE] As Artemisia of her husband Mausolus. + +He that looks for urns and old sepulchral relicks, must not seek them +in the ruins of temples, where no religion anciently placed them. These +were found in a field, according to ancient custom, in noble or private +burial; the old practice of the Canaanites, the family of Abraham, and +the burying-place of Joshua, in the borders of his possessions; and +also agreeable unto Roman practice to bury by highways, whereby their +monuments were under eye:--memorials of themselves, and mementoes of +mortality unto living passengers; whom the epitaphs of great ones were +fain to beg to stay and look upon them,--a language though sometimes +used, not so proper in church inscriptions.[BF] The sensible rhetorick +of the dead, to exemplarity of good life, first admitted to the bones +of pious men and martyrs within church walls, which in succeeding ages +crept into promiscuous practice: while Constantine was peculiarly +favoured to be admitted into the church porch, and the first thus +buried in England, was in the days of Cuthred. + +[BF] Siste, viator. + +Christians dispute how their bodies should lie in the grave. In urnal +interment they clearly escaped this controversy. Though we decline the +religious consideration, yet in cemeterial and narrower burying-places, +to avoid confusion and cross-position, a certain posture were to be +admitted: which even Pagan civility observed. The Persians lay north +and south; the Megarians and Phœnicians placed their heads to the east; +the Athenians, some think, towards the west, which Christians still +retain. And Beda will have it to be the posture of our Saviour. That +he was crucified with his face toward the west, we will not contend +with tradition and probable account; but we applaud not the hand of +the painter, in exalting his cross so high above those on either side: +since hereof we find no authentic account in history, and even the +crosses found by Helena, pretend no such distinction from longitude or +dimension. + +To be knav’d out of our graves, to have our skulls made drinking-bowls, +and our bones turned into pipes, to delight and sport our enemies, are +tragical abominations escaped in burning burials. + +Urnal interments and burnt relicks lie not in fear of worms, or to +be an heritage for serpents. In carnal sepulture, corruptions seem +peculiar unto parts; and some speak of snakes out of the spinal marrow. +But while we suppose common worms in graves, ’tis not easy to find +any there; few in churchyards above a foot deep, fewer or none in +churches though in fresh-decayed bodies. Teeth, bones, and hair, give +the most lasting defiance to corruption. In an hydropical body, ten +years buried in the churchyard, we met with a fat concretion, where +the nitre of the earth, and the salt and lixivious liquor of the body, +had coagulated large lumps of fat into the consistence of the hardest +Castile soap, whereof part remaineth with us.[106] After a battle +with the Persians, the Roman corpses decayed in few days, while the +Persian bodies remained dry and uncorrupted. Bodies in the same ground +do not uniformly dissolve, nor bones equally moulder; whereof in the +opprobrious disease, we expect no long duration. The body of the +Marquis of Dorset[BG] seemed sound and handsomely cereclothed, that +after seventy-eight years was found uncorrupted. Common tombs preserve +not beyond powder: a firmer consistence and compage of parts might +be expected from arefaction, deep burial, or charcoal. The greatest +antiquities of mortal bodies may remain in putrefied bones, whereof, +though we take not in the pillar of Lot’s wife, or metamorphosis of +Ortelius, some may be older than pyramids, in the putrefied relicks +of the general inundation. When Alexander opened the tomb of Cyrus, +the remaining bones discovered his proportion, whereof urnal fragments +afford but a bad conjecture, and have this disadvantage of grave +interments, that they leave us ignorant of most personal discoveries. +For since bones afford not only rectitude and stability but figure +unto the body, it is no impossible physiognomy to conjecture at fleshy +appendencies, and after what shape the muscles and carnous parts might +hang in their full consistencies. A full-spread _cariola_ shows a +well-shaped horse behind; handsome formed skulls give some analogy of +fleshy resemblance. A critical view of bones makes a good distinction +of sexes. Even colour is not beyond conjecture, since it is hard to be +deceived in the distinction of the Negroes’ skulls.[107] Dante’s[BH] +characters are to be found in skulls as well as faces. Hercules is not +only known by his foot. Other parts make out their comproportions and +inferences upon whole or parts. And since the dimensions of the head +measure the whole body, and the figure thereof gives conjecture of the +principal faculties: physiognomy outlives ourselves, and ends not in +our graves. + +[BG] Who was buried in 1530, and dug up in 1608, and found perfect like +an ordinary corpse newly interred. + +[BH] Purgat. xxiii. 31. + +Severe contemplators, observing these lasting relicks, may think them +good monuments of persons past, little advantage to future beings; +and, considering that power which subdueth all things unto itself, +that can resume the scattered atoms, or identify out of anything, +conceive it superfluous to expect a resurrection out of relicks: but +the soul subsisting, other matter, clothed with due accidents, may +salve the individuality. Yet the saints, we observe, arose from graves +and monuments about the holy city. Some think the ancient patriarchs +so earnestly desired to lay their bones in Canaan, as hoping to make a +part of that resurrection; and, though thirty miles from Mount Calvary, +at least to lie in that region which should produce the first-fruits +of the dead. And if, according to learned conjecture, the bodies of +men shall rise where their greatest relicks remain, many are not like +to err in the topography of their resurrection, though their bones +or bodies be after translated by angels into the field of Ezekiel’s +vision, or as some will order it, into the valley of judgment, or +Jehosaphat. + + +CHAPTER IV. + +CHRISTIANS have handsomely glossed the deformity of death by +careful consideration of the body, and civil rites which take off +brutal terminations: and though they conceived all reparable by a +resurrection, cast not off all care of interment. And since the ashes +of sacrifices burnt upon the altar of God were carefully carried out +by the priests, and deposed in a clean field; since they acknowledged +their bodies to be the lodging of Christ, and temples of the Holy +Ghost, they devolved not all upon the sufficiency of soul-existence; +and therefore with long services and full solemnities, concluded their +last exequies, wherein to all distinctions the Greek devotion seems +most pathetically ceremonious. + +Christian invention hath chiefly driven at rites, which speak hopes of +another life, and hints of a resurrection. And if the ancient Gentiles +held not the immortality of their better part, and some subsistence +after death, in several rites, customs, actions, and expressions, they +contradicted their own opinions: wherein Democritus went high, even to +the thought of a resurrection, as scoffingly recorded by Pliny.[BI] +What can be more express than the expression of Phocylides?[BJ] Or who +would expect from Lucretius[BK] a sentence of Ecclesiastes? Before +Plato could speak, the soul had wings in Homer, which fell not, but +flew out of the body into the mansions of the dead; who also observed +that handsome distinction of Demas and Soma, for the body conjoined +to the soul, and body separated from it. Lucian spoke much truth +in jest, when he said that part of Hercules which proceeded from +Alcmena perished, that from Jupiter remained immortal. Thus Socrates +was content that his friends should bury his body, so they would not +think they buried Socrates; and, regarding only his immortal part, was +indifferent to be burnt or buried. From such considerations, Diogenes +might contemn sepulture, and, being satisfied that the soul could not +perish, grow careless of corporal interment. The Stoicks, who thought +the souls of wise men had their habitation about the moon, might make +slight account of subterraneous deposition; whereas the Pythagoreans +and transcorporating philosophers, who were to be often buried, held +great care of their interment. And the Platonicks rejected not a +due care of the grave, though they put their ashes to unreasonable +expectations, in their tedious term of return and long set revolution. + +[BI] “_Similis **** reviviscendi promissa Democrito vanitas, qui +non revixit ipse. Quæ (malum) ista dementia est iterari vitam +morte?_”--Plin. l. vii. c. 55. + +[BJ] “Καὶ τάχα δ᾽ἐκ γαίης ἐλπίζομεν ἐς φάος ἐλθεῖν λεῖψαν ἀποιχομένων.” + +[BK] “Cedit item retro de terra quod fuit ante in terras.”--_Luc._, +lib. ii. 998. + +Men have lost their reason in nothing so much as their religion, +wherein stones and clouts make martyrs; and, since the religion of +one seems madness unto another, to afford an account or rational +of old rites requires no rigid reader. That they kindled the pyre +aversely, or turning their face from it, was an handsome symbol of +unwilling ministration. That they washed their bones with wine and +milk; that the mother wrapped them in linen, and dried them in her +bosom, the first fostering part and place of their nourishment; that +they opened their eyes toward heaven before they kindled the fire, as +the place of their hopes or original, were no improper ceremonies. +Their last valediction,[BL] thrice uttered by the attendants, was +also very solemn, and somewhat answered by Christians, who thought +it too little, if they threw not the earth thrice upon the interred +body. That, in strewing their tombs, the Romans affected the rose; the +Greeks amaranthus and myrtle: that the funeral pyre consisted of sweet +fuel, cypress, fir, larix, yew, and trees perpetually verdant, lay +silent expressions of their surviving hopes. Wherein Christians, who +deck their coffins with bays, have found a more elegant emblem; for +that it, seeming dead, will restore itself from the root, and its dry +and exsuccous leaves resume their verdure again; which, if we mistake +not, we have also observed in furze. Whether the planting of yew in +churchyards hold not its original from ancient funeral rites, or as +an emblem of resurrection, from its perpetual verdure, may also admit +conjecture. + +[BL] “Vale, vale, nos te ordine quo natura permittet sequamur.” + +They made use of musick to excite or quiet the affections of their +friends, according to different harmonies. But the secret and +symbolical hint was the harmonical nature of the soul; which, delivered +from the body, went again to enjoy the primitive harmony of heaven, +from whence it first descended; which, according to its progress traced +by antiquity, came down by Cancer, and ascended by Capricornus. + +They burnt not children before their teeth appeared, as apprehending +their bodies too tender a morsel for fire, and that their gristly bones +would scarce leave separable relicks after the pyral combustion. That +they kindled not fire in their houses for some days after was a strict +memorial of the late afflicting fire. And mourning without hope, they +had an happy fraud against excessive lamentation, by a common opinion +that deep sorrows disturb their ghosts.[BM] + +[BM] “Tu manes ne lœde meos.” + +That they buried their dead on their backs, or in a supine position, +seems agreeable unto profound sleep, and common posture of dying; +contrary to the most natural way of birth; nor unlike our pendulous +posture, in the doubtful state of the womb. Diogenes was singular, who +preferred a prone situation in the grave; and some Christians[BN] like +neither, who decline the figure of rest, and make choice of an erect +posture. + +[BN] The Russians, &c. + +That they carried them out of the world with their feet forward, +not inconsonant unto reason, as contrary unto the native posture of +man, and his production first into it; and also agreeable unto their +opinions, while they bid adieu unto the world, not to look again upon +it; whereas Mahometans who think to return to a delightful life again, +are carried forth with their heads forward, and looking toward their +houses. + +They closed their eyes, as parts which first die, or first discover the +sad effects of death. But their iterated clamations to excitate their +dying or dead friends, or revoke them unto life again, was a vanity of +affection; as not presumably ignorant of the critical tests of death, +by apposition of feathers, glasses, and reflection of figures, which +dead eyes represent not: which, however not strictly verifiable in +fresh and warm _cadavers_, could hardly elude the test, in corpses of +four or five days. + +That they sucked in the last breath of their expiring friends, was +surely a practice of no medical institution, but a loose opinion that +the soul passed out that way, and a fondness of affection, from some +Pythagorical foundation, that the spirit of one body passed into +another, which they wished might be their own. + +That they poured oil upon the pyre, was a tolerable practice, while +the intention rested in facilitating the ascension. But to place good +omens in the quick and speedy burning, to sacrifice unto the winds for +a despatch in this office, was a low form of superstition. + +The archimime, or jester, attending the funeral train, and imitating +the speeches, gesture, and manners of the deceased, was too light for +such solemnities, contradicting their funeral orations and doleful +rites of the grave. + +That they buried a piece of money with them as a fee of the Elysian +ferryman, was a practice full of folly. But the ancient custom of +placing coins in considerable urns, and the present practice of +burying medals in the noble foundations of Europe, are laudable ways +of historical discoveries, in actions, persons, chronologies; and +posterity will applaud them. + +We examine not the old laws of sepulture, exempting certain persons +from burial or burning. But hereby we apprehend that these were not +the bones of persons planet-struck or burnt with fire from heaven; no +relicks of traitors to their country, self-killers, or sacrilegious +malefactors; persons in old apprehension unworthy of the earth; +condemned unto the Tartarus of hell, and bottomless pit of Pluto, from +whence there was no redemption. + +Nor were only many customs questionable in order to their obsequies, +but also sundry practices, fictions, and conceptions, discordant or +obscure, of their state and future beings. Whether unto eight or ten +bodies of men to add one of a woman, as being more inflammable and +unctuously constituted for the better pyral combustion, were any +rational practice; or whether the complaint of Periander’s wife be +tolerable, that wanting her funeral burning, she suffered intolerable +cold in hell, according to the constitution of the infernal house of +Pluto, wherein cold makes a great part of their tortures; it cannot +pass without some question. + +Why the female ghosts appear unto Ulysses, before the heroes and +masculine spirits,--why the Psyche or soul of Tiresias is of the +masculine gender, who, being blind on earth, sees more than all the +rest in hell; why the funeral suppers consisted of eggs, beans, +smallage, and lettuce, since the dead are made to eat asphodels about +the Elysian meadows:--why, since there is no sacrifice acceptable, nor +any propitiation for the covenant of the grave, men set up the deity of +Morta, and fruitlessly adored divinities without ears, it cannot escape +some doubt. + +The dead seem all alive in the human Hades of Homer, yet cannot well +speak, prophecy, or know the living, except they drink blood, wherein +is the life of man. And therefore the souls of Penelope’s paramours, +conducted by Mercury, chirped like bats, and those which followed +Hercules, made a noise but like a flock of birds. + +The departed spirits know things past and to come; yet are ignorant of +things present. Agamemnon foretells what should happen unto Ulysses; +yet ignorantly inquires what is become of his own son. The ghosts are +afraid of swords in Homer; yet Sibylla tells Æneas in Virgil, the thin +habit of spirits was beyond the force of weapons. The spirits put off +their malice with their bodies, and Cæsar and Pompey accord in Latin +hell; yet Ajax, in Homer, endures not a conference with Ulysses; and +Deiphobus appears all mangled in Virgil’s ghosts, yet we meet with +perfect shadows among the wounded ghosts of Homer. + +Since Charon in Lucian applauds his condition among the dead, whether +it be handsomely said of Achilles, that living contemner of death, that +he had rather be a ploughman’s servant, than emperor of the dead? How +Hercules his soul is in hell, and yet in heaven; and Julius his soul in +a star, yet seen by Æneas in hell?--except the ghosts were but images +and shadows of the soul, received in higher mansions, according to the +ancient division of body, soul, and image, or _simulachrum_ of them +both. The particulars of future beings must needs be dark unto ancient +theories, which Christian philosophy yet determines but in a cloud of +opinions. A dialogue between two infants in the womb concerning the +state of this world, might handsomely illustrate our ignorance of the +next, whereof methinks we yet discourse in Pluto’s den, and are but +embryo philosophers. + +Pythagoras escapes in the fabulous hell of Dante,[BO] among that swarm +of philosophers, wherein, whilst we meet with Plato and Socrates, Cato +is to be found in no lower place than purgatory. Among all the set, +Epicurus is most considerable, whom men make honest without an Elysium, +who contemned life without encouragement of immortality, and making +nothing after death, yet made nothing of the king of terrors. + +[BO] _Del Inferno_, cant. 4. + +Were the happiness of the next world as closely apprehended as the +felicities of this, it were a martyrdom to live; and unto such as +consider none hereafter, it must be more than death to die, which makes +us amazed at those audacities that durst be nothing and return into +their chaos again. Certainly such spirits as could contemn death, when +they expected no better being after, would have scorned to live, had +they known any. And therefore we applaud not the judgment of Machiavel, +that Christianity makes men cowards, or that with the confidence of +but half-dying, the despised virtues of patience and humility have +abased the spirits of men, which Pagan principles exalted; but rather +regulated the wildness of audacities in the attempts, grounds, and +eternal sequels of death; wherein men of the boldest spirits are often +prodigiously temerarious. Nor can we extenuate the valour of ancient +martyrs, who contemned death in the uncomfortable scene of their lives, +and in their decrepit martyrdoms did probably lose not many months of +their days, or parted with life when it was scarce worth the living. +For (beside that long time past holds no consideration unto a slender +time to come) they had no small disadvantage from the constitution +of old age, which naturally makes men fearful, and complexionally +superannuated from the bold and courageous thoughts of youth and +fervent years. But the contempt of death from corporal animosity, +promoteth not our felicity. They may sit in the orchestra, and noblest +seats of heaven, who have held up shaking hands in the fire, and +humanly contended for glory. + +Meanwhile Epicurus lies deep in Dante’s hell, wherein we meet with +tombs enclosing souls which denied their immortalities. But whether +the virtuous heathen, who lived better than he spake, or erring in the +principles of himself, yet lived above philosophers of more specious +maxims, lie so deep as he is placed, at least so low as not to rise +against Christians, who believing or knowing that truth, have lastingly +denied it in their practice and conversation--were a query too sad to +insist on. + +But all or most apprehensions rested in opinions of some future +being, which, ignorantly or coldly believed, begat those perverted +conceptions, ceremonies, sayings, which Christians pity or laugh at. +Happy are they which live not in that disadvantage of time, when men +could say little for futurity, but from reason: whereby the noblest +minds fell often upon doubtful deaths, and melancholy dissolutions. +With these hopes, Socrates warmed his doubtful spirits against that +cold potion; and Cato, before he durst give the fatal stroke, spent +part of the night in reading the Immortality of Plato, thereby +confirming his wavering hand unto the animosity of that attempt. + +It is the heaviest stone that melancholy can throw at a man, to tell +him he is at the end of his nature; or that there is no further state +to come, unto which this seems progressional, and otherwise made +in vain. Without this accomplishment, the natural expectation and +desire of such a state, were but a fallacy in nature; unsatisfied +considerators would quarrel the justice of their constitutions, and +rest content that Adam had fallen lower; whereby, by knowing no other +original, and deeper ignorance of themselves, they might have enjoyed +the happiness of inferior creatures, who in tranquillity possess their +constitutions, as having not the apprehension to deplore their own +natures, and, being framed below the circumference of these hopes, +or cognition of better being, the wisdom of God hath necessitated +their contentment: but the superior ingredient and obscured part +of ourselves, whereto all present felicities afford no resting +contentment, will be able at last to tell us, we are more than our +present selves, and evacuate such hopes in the fruition of their own +accomplishments. + + +CHAPTER V. + +Now since these dead bones have already outlasted the living ones of +Methuselah, and in a yard underground, and thin walls of clay, outworn +all the strong and specious buildings above it; and quietly rested +under the drums and tramplings of three conquests: what prince can +promise such diuturnity unto his relicks, or might not gladly say, + + _Sic ego componi versus in ossa velim?_[BP] + +[BP] _Tibullus_, lib. iii. el. 2, 26. + +Time, which antiquates antiquities, and hath an art to make dust of all +things, hath yet spared these minor monuments. + +In vain we hope to be known by open and visible conservatories, when +to be unknown was the means of their continuation, and obscurity their +protection. If they died by violent hands, and were thrust into their +urns, these bones become considerable, and some old philosophers would +honour them, whose souls they conceived most pure, which were thus +snatched from their bodies, and to retain a stronger propension unto +them; whereas they weariedly left a languishing corpse and with faint +desires of re-union. If they fell by long and aged decay, yet wrapt +up in the bundle of time, they fall into indistinction, and make but +one blot with infants. If we begin to die when we live, and long life +be but a prolongation of death, our life is a sad composition; we +live with death, and die not in a moment. How many pulses made up the +life of Methuselah, were work for Archimedes: common counters sum up +the life of Moses his man. Our days become considerable, like petty +sums, by minute accumulations: where numerous fractions make up but +small round numbers; and our days of a span long, make not one little +finger.[BQ] + +[BQ] According to the ancient arithmetick of the hand, wherein +the little finger of the right hand contracted, signified an +hundred.--_Pierius in Hieroglyph._ + +If the nearness of our last necessity brought a nearer conformity +into it, there were a happiness in hoary hairs, and no calamity in +half-senses. But the long habit of living indisposeth us for dying; +when avarice makes us the sport of death, when even David grew +politickly cruel, and Solomon could hardly be said to be the wisest of +men. But many are too early old, and before the date of age. Adversity +stretcheth our days, misery makes Alcmena’s nights,[BR] and time hath +no wings unto it. But the most tedious being is that which can unwish +itself, content to be nothing, or never to have been, which was beyond +the malcontent of Job, who cursed not the day of his life, but his +nativity; content to have so far been, as to have a title to future +being, although he had lived here but in an hidden state of life, and +as it were an abortion. + +[BR] One night as long as three. + +What song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he hid +himself among women, though puzzling questions,[BS] are not beyond +all conjecture. What time the persons of these ossuaries entered the +famous nations of the dead, and slept with princes and counsellors, +might admit a wide solution. But who were the proprietaries of +these bones, or what bodies these ashes made up, were a question +above antiquarism; not to be resolved by man, nor easily perhaps by +spirits, except we consult the provincial guardians, or tutelary +observators. Had they made as good provision for their names, as they +have done for their relicks, they had not so grossly erred in the +art of perpetuation. But to subsist in bones, and be but pyramidally +extant, is a fallacy in duration. Vain ashes which in the oblivion +of names, persons, times, and sexes, have found unto themselves a +fruitless continuation, and only arise unto late posterity, as emblems +of mortal vanities, antidotes against pride, vain-glory, and madding +vices. Pagan vain-glories which thought the world might last for ever, +had encouragement for ambition; and, finding no _atropos_ unto the +immortality of their names, were never dampt with the necessity of +oblivion. Even old ambitions had the advantage of ours, in the attempts +of their vain-glories, who acting early, and before the probable +meridian of time, have by this time found great accomplishment of +their designs, whereby the ancient heroes have already outlasted their +monuments and mechanical preservations. But in this latter scene of +time, we cannot expect such mummies unto our memories, when ambition +may fear the prophecy of Elias,[BT] and Charles the Fifth can never +hope to live within two Methuselahs of Hector.[BU] + +[BS] The puzzling questions of Tiberius unto grammarians.--_Marcel._ +_Donatus in Suet._ + +[BT] That the world may last but six thousand years. + +[BU] Hector’s fame outlasting above two lives of Methuselah before that +famous prince was extant. + +And therefore, restless inquietude for the diuturnity of our memories +unto the present considerations seems a vanity almost out of date, and +superannuated piece of folly. We cannot hope to live so long in our +names, as some have done in their persons. One face of Janus holds no +proportion unto the other. ’Tis too late to be ambitious. The great +mutations of the world are acted, or time may be too short for our +designs. To extend our memories by monuments, whose death we daily +pray for, and whose duration we cannot hope, without injury to our +expectations in the advent of the last day, were a contradiction to +our beliefs. We whose generations are ordained in this setting part of +time, are providentially taken off from such imaginations; and, being +necessitated to eye the remaining particle of futurity, are naturally +constituted unto thoughts of the next world, and cannot excusably +decline the consideration of that duration, which maketh pyramids +pillars of snow, and all that’s past a moment. + +Circles and right lines limit and close all bodies, and the mortal +right-lined circle[BV] must conclude and shut up all. There is no +antidote against the opium of time, which temporally considereth all +things: our fathers find their graves in our short memories, and sadly +tell us how we may be buried in our survivors. Gravestones tell truth +scarce forty years. Generations pass while some trees stand, and old +families last not three oaks. To be read by bare inscriptions like +many in Gruter, to hope for eternity by enigmatical epithets or first +letters of our names, to be studied by antiquaries, who we were, and +have new names given us like many of the mummies, are cold consolations +unto the students of perpetuity, even by everlasting languages. + +[BV] The character of death. + +To be content that times to come should only know there was such a +man, not caring whether they knew more of him, was a frigid ambition +in Cardan;[BW] disparaging his horoscopal inclination and judgment +of himself. Who cares to subsist like Hippocrates’s patients, or +Achilles’s horses in Homer, under naked nominations, without deserts +and noble acts, which are the balsam of our memories, the _entelechia_ +and soul of our subsistences? To be nameless in worthy deeds, exceeds +an infamous history. The Canaanitish woman lives more happily without a +name, than Herodias with one. And who had not rather have been the good +thief, than Pilate? + +[BW] “Cuperem notum esse quod sim non opto ut sciatur qualis sim.” + +But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and deals +with the memory of men without distinction to merit of perpetuity. +Who can but pity the founder of the pyramids? Herostratus lives that +burnt the temple of Diana, he is almost lost that built it. Time hath +spared the epitaph of Adrian’s horse, confounded that of himself. In +vain we compute our felicities by the advantage of our good names, +since bad have equal durations, and Thersites is like to live as long +as Agamemnon without the favour of the everlasting register. Who +knows whether the best of men be known, or whether there be not more +remarkable persons forgot, than any that stand remembered in the known +account of time? The first man had been as unknown as the last, and +Methuselah’s long life had been his only chronicle. + +Oblivion is not to be hired. The greater part must be content to be as +though they had not been, to be found in the register of God, not in +the record of man. Twenty-seven names make up the first story and the +recorded names ever since contain not one living century. The number +of the dead long exceedeth all that shall live. The night of time far +surpasseth the day, and who knows when was the equinox? Every hour +adds unto that current arithmetick, which scarce stands one moment. +And since death must be the _Lucina_ of life, and even Pagans[108] +could doubt, whether thus to live were to die; since our longest sun +sets at right descensions, and makes but winter arches, and therefore +it cannot be long before we lie down in darkness, and have our light +in ashes; since the brother of death daily haunts us with dying +mementoes, and time that grows old in itself, bids us hope no long +duration;--diuturnity is a dream and folly of expectation. + +Darkness and light divide the course of time, and oblivion shares +with memory a great part even of our living beings; we slightly +remember our felicities, and the smartest strokes of affliction leave +but short smart upon us. Sense endureth no extremities, and sorrows +destroy us or themselves. To weep into stones are fables. Afflictions +induce callosities; miseries are slippery, or fall like snow upon +us, which notwithstanding is no unhappy stupidity. To be ignorant of +evils to come, and forgetful of evils past, is a merciful provision +in nature, whereby we digest the mixture of our few and evil days, +and, our delivered senses not relapsing into cutting remembrances, our +sorrows are not kept raw by the edge of repetitions. A great part of +antiquity contented their hopes of subsistency with a transmigration +of their souls,--a good way to continue their memories, while having +the advantage of plural successions, they could not but act something +remarkable in such variety of beings, and enjoying the fame of their +passed selves, make accumulation of glory unto their last durations. +Others, rather than be lost in the uncomfortable night of nothing, +were content to recede into the common being, and make one particle of +the public soul of all things, which was no more than to return into +their unknown and divine original again. Egyptian ingenuity was more +unsatisfied, contriving their bodies in sweet consistences, to attend +the return of their souls. But all is vanity, feeding the wind, and +folly. Egyptian mummies, which Cambyses or time hath spared, avarice +now consumeth. Mummy is become merchandise, Mizraim, cures wounds, and +Pharaoh is sold for balsams. + +In vain do individuals hope for immortality, or any patent from +oblivion, in preservations below the moon; men have been deceived even +in their flatteries, above the sun, and studied conceits to perpetuate +their names in heaven. The various cosmography of that part hath +already varied the names of contrived constellations; Nimrod is lost +in Orion, and Osyris in the Dog-star. While we look for incorruption +in the heavens, we find that they are but like the earth;--durable in +their main bodies, alterable in their parts; whereof, beside comets and +new stars, perspectives begin to tell tales, and the spots that wander +about the sun, with Phaeton’s favour, would make clear conviction. + +There is nothing strictly immortal, but immortality. Whatever hath no +beginning, may be confident of no end;--all others have a dependent +being and within the reach of destruction;--which is the peculiar of +that necessary essence that cannot destroy itself;--and the highest +strain of omnipotency, to be so powerfully constituted as not to +suffer even from the power of itself. But the sufficiency of Christian +immortality frustrates all earthly glory, and the quality of either +state after death, makes a folly of posthumous memory. God who can +only destroy our souls, and hath assured our resurrection, either +of our bodies or names hath directly promised no duration. Wherein +there is so much of chance, that the boldest expectants have found +unhappy frustration; and to hold long subsistence, seems but a scape +in oblivion. But man is a noble animal, splendid in ashes, and pompous +in the grave, solemnizing nativities and deaths with equal lustre, nor +omitting ceremonies of bravery in the infamy of his nature. + +Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible sun within us. A +small fire sufficeth for life, great flames seemed too little after +death, while men vainly affected precious pyres, and to burn like +Sardanapalus; but the wisdom of funeral laws found the folly of +prodigal blazes and reduced undoing fires unto the rule of sober +obsequies, wherein few could be so mean as not to provide wood, pitch, +a mourner, and an urn. + +Five languages[109] secured not the epitaph of Gordianus. The man of +God lives longer without a tomb than any by one, invisibly interred +by angels, and adjudged to obscurity, though not without some marks +directing human discovery. Enoch and Elias, without either tomb or +burial, in an anomalous state of being, are the great examples of +perpetuity, in their long and living memory, in strict account being +still on this side death, and having a late part yet to act upon this +stage of earth. If in the decretory term of the world we shall not all +die but be changed, according to received translation, the last day +will make but few graves; at least quick resurrections will anticipate +lasting sepultures. Some graves will be opened before they be quite +closed, and Lazarus be no wonder. When many that feared to die, shall +groan that they can die but once, the dismal state is the second and +living death, when life puts despair on the damned; when men shall wish +the coverings of mountains, not of monuments, and annihilations shall +be courted. + +While some have studied monuments, others have studiously declined +them, and some have been so vainly boisterous, that they durst not +acknowledge their graves; wherein Alaricus seems most subtle, who +had a river turned to hide his bones at the bottom. Even Sylla, that +thought himself safe in his urn, could not prevent revenging tongues, +and stones thrown at his monument. Happy are they whom privacy makes +innocent, who deal so with men in this world, that they are not afraid +to meet them in the next; who, when they die, make no commotion among +the dead, and are not touched with that poetical taunt of Isaiah.[BX] + +[BX] Isa. xiv. 16. + +Pyramids, arches, obelisks, were but the irregularities of vain-glory, +and wild enormities of ancient magnanimity. But the most magnanimous +resolution rests in the Christian religion, which trampleth upon pride +and sits on the neck of ambition, humbly pursuing that infallible +perpetuity, unto which all others must diminish their diameters, and be +poorly seen in angles of contingency.[BY] + +[BY] The least of angles. + +Pious spirits who passed their days in raptures of futurity, made +little more of this world, than the world that was before it, while +they lay obscure in the chaos of pre-ordination, and night of their +fore-beings. And if any have been so happy as truly to understand +Christian annihilation, ecstasies, exolution, liquefaction, +transformation, the kiss of the spouse, gustation of God, and +ingression into the divine shadow, they have already had an handsome +anticipation of heaven; the glory of the world is surely over, and the +earth in ashes unto them. + +To subsist in lasting monuments, to live in their productions, to exist +in their names and predicament of chimeras, was large satisfaction unto +old expectations, and made one part of their Elysiums. But all this is +nothing in the metaphysicks of true belief. To live indeed, is to be +again ourselves, which being not only an hope, but an evidence in noble +believers, ’tis all one to lie in St Innocent’s[BZ] church-yard as in +the sands of Egypt. Ready to be anything, in the ecstasy of being ever, +and as content with six foot as the _moles_ of Adrianus.[CA] + +[BZ] In Paris, where bodies soon consume. + +[CA] A stately mausoleum or sepulchral pile, built by Adrianus in Rome, +where now standeth the castle of St Angelo. + + ----“_Tabésne cadavera solvat, + An rogus, haud refert._”--LUCAN. viii. 809. + + + + +A LETTER TO A FRIEND, + +UPON OCCASION OF THE DEATH OF HIS INTIMATE FRIEND. + + + + +LETTER TO A FRIEND. + + +GIVE me leave to wonder that news of this nature should have such heavy +wings that you should hear so little concerning your dearest friend, +and that I must make that unwilling repetition to tell you “_ad portam +rigidos calces extendit_,” that he is dead and buried, and by this time +no puny among the mighty nations of the dead; for though he left this +world not very many days past, yet every hour you know largely addeth +unto that dark society; and considering the incessant mortality of +mankind, you cannot conceive there dieth in the whole earth so few as a +thousand an hour. + +Although at this distance you had no early account or particular of his +death, yet your affection may cease to wonder that you had not some +secret sense or intimation thereof by dreams, thoughtful whisperings, +mercurisms, airy nuncios or sympathetical insinuations, which many +seem to have had at the death of their dearest friends: for since +we find in that famous story, that spirits themselves were fain to +tell their fellows at a distance that the great Antonio was dead, we +have a sufficient excuse for our ignorance in such particulars, and +must rest content with the common road, and Appian way of knowledge +by information. Though the uncertainty of the end of this world hath +confounded all human predictions; yet they who shall live to see the +sun and moon darkened, and the stars to fall from heaven, will hardly +be deceived in the advent of the last day; and therefore strange +it is, that the common fallacy of consumptive persons who feel not +themselves dying, and therefore still hope to live, should also reach +their friends in perfect health and judgment;--that you should be so +little acquainted with Plautus’s sick complexion, or that almost an +Hippocratical face should not alarum you to higher fears, or rather +despair, of his continuation in such an emaciated state, wherein +medical predictions fail not, as sometimes in acute diseases, and +wherein ’tis as dangerous to be sentenced by a physician as a judge. + +Upon my first visit I was bold to tell them who had not let fall all +hopes of his recovery, that in my sad opinion he was not like to behold +a grasshopper,[110] much less to pluck another fig; and in no long time +after seemed to discover that odd mortal symptom in him not mentioned +by Hippocrates, that is, to lose his own face, and look like some of +his near relations; for he maintained not his proper countenance, but +looked like his uncle, the lines of whose face lay deep and invisible +in his healthful visage before: for as from our beginning we run +through variety of looks, before we come to consistent and settled +faces; so before our end, by sick and languishing alterations, we put +on new visages: and in our retreat to earth, may fall upon such looks +which from community of seminal originals were before latent in us. + +He was fruitlessly put in hope of advantage by change of air, and +imbibing the pure aerial nitre of these parts; and therefore, being +so far spent, he quickly found Sardinia in Tivoli,[CB] and the +most healthful air of little effect, where death had set her broad +arrow;[CC] for he lived not unto the middle of May, and confirmed the +observation of Hippocrates of that mortal time of the year when the +leaves of the fig-tree resemble a daw’s claw. He is happily seated +who lives in places whose air, earth, and water, promote not the +infirmities of his weaker parts, or is early removed into regions that +correct them. He that is tabidly[111] inclined, were unwise to pass his +days in Portugal: cholical persons will find little comfort in Austria +or Vienna: he that is weak-legged must not be in love with Rome, nor +an infirm head with Venice or Paris. Death hath not only particular +stars in heaven, but malevolent places on earth, which single out +our infirmities, and strike at our weaker parts; in which concern, +passager and migrant birds have the great advantages, who are naturally +constituted for distant habitations, whom no seas nor places limit, +but in their appointed seasons will visit us from Greenland and Mount +Atlas, and, as some think, even from the Antipodes.[CD] + +[CB] “Cum mors venerit, in medio Tibure Sardinia est.” + +[CC] In the king’s forests they set the figure of a broad arrow upon +trees that are to be cut down. + +[CD] _Bellonius de Avibus._ + +Though we could not have his life, yet we missed not our desires in his +soft departure, which was scarce an expiration; and his end not unlike +his beginning, when the salient point scarce affords a sensible motion, +and his departure so like unto sleep, that he scarce needed the civil +ceremony of closing his eyes; contrary unto the common way, wherein +death draws up, sleep lets fall the eyelids. With what strife and pains +we came into the world we know not; but ’tis commonly no easy matter +to get out of it: yet if it could be made out, that such who have easy +nativities have commonly hard deaths, and contrarily; his departure was +so easy, that we might justly suspect his birth was of another nature, +and that some Juno sat cross-legged at his nativity. + +Besides his soft death, the incurable state of his disease might +somewhat extenuate your sorrow, who know that monsters but seldom +happen, miracles more rarely in physick.[CE] _Angelus Victorius_ gives +a serious account of a consumptive, hectical, phthisical woman, who +was suddenly cured by the intercession of Ignatius. We read not of any +in Scripture who in this case applied unto our Saviour, though some +may be contained in that large expression, that he went about Galilee +healing all manner of sickness and all manner of diseases.[CF] Amulets, +spells, sigils, and incantations, practised in other diseases, are +seldom pretended in this; and we find no sigil in the Archidoxis of +Paracelsus to cure an extreme consumption or marasmus, which, if other +diseases fail, will put a period unto long livers, and at last makes +dust of all. And therefore the Stoics could not but think that the +fiery principle would wear out all the rest, and at last make an end of +the world, which notwithstanding without such a lingering period the +Creator may effect at his pleasure: and to make an end of all things on +earth, and our planetical system of the world, he need but put out the +sun. + +[CE] “Monstra contingunt in medicina.” _Hippoc._--“Strange and rare +escapes there happen sometimes in physick.” + +[CF] Matt. iv. 23. + +I was not so curious to entitle the stars unto any concern of his +death, yet could not but take notice that he died when the moon was in +motion from the meridian; at which time an old Italian long ago would +persuade me that the greatest part of men died: but herein I confess +I could never satisfy my curiosity; although from the time of tides +in places upon or near the sea, there may be considerable deductions; +and Pliny[CG] hath an odd and remarkable passage concerning the death +of men and animals upon the recess or ebb of the sea. However, certain +it is, he died in the dead and deep part of the night, when Nox might +be most apprehensibly said to be the daughter of Chaos, the mother of +sleep and death, according to old genealogy; and so went out of this +world about that hour when our blessed Saviour entered it, and about +what time many conceive he will return again unto it. Cardan[112] hath +a peculiar and no hard observation from a man’s hand to know whether he +was born in the day or night, which I confess holdeth in my own. And +Scaliger[113] to that purpose hath another from the tip of the ear:[CH] +most men are begotten in the night, animals in the day; but whether +more persons have been born in the night or day, were a curiosity +undecidable, though more have perished by violent deaths in the day; +yet in natural dissolutions both times may hold an indifferency, at +least but contingent inequality. The whole course of time runs out +in the nativity and death of things; which whether they happen by +succession or coincidence, are best computed by the natural, not +artificial day. + +[CG] “Aristoteles nullum animal nisi æstu recedente expirare affirmat; +observatum id multum in Gallico Oceano et duntaxat in homine +compertum,” lib. 2, cap. 101. + +[CH] “Auris pars pendula lobus dicitur, non omnibus ea pars, est +auribus; non enim iis qui noctu sunt, sed qui interdiu, maxima ex +parte.”--_Com. in Aristot. de Animal._ lib. 1. + + +That Charles the Fifth[114] was crowned upon the day of his nativity, +it being in his own power so to order it, makes no singular +animadversion: but that he should also take King Francis[115] prisoner +upon that day, was an unexpected coincidence, which made the same +remarkable. Antipater, who had an anniversary feast every year upon +his birth-day, needed no astrological revolution to know what day he +should die on. When the fixed stars have made a revolution unto the +points from whence they first set out, some of the ancients thought +the world would have an end; which was a kind of dying upon the day of +its nativity. Now the disease prevailing and swiftly advancing about +the time of his nativity, some were of opinion that he would leave +the world on the day he entered into it; but this being a lingering +disease, and creeping softly on, nothing critical was found or +expected, and he died not before fifteen days after. Nothing is more +common with infants than to die on the day of their nativity, to behold +the worldly hours, and but the fractions thereof; and even to perish +before their nativity in the hidden world of the womb, and before +their good angel is conceived to undertake them. But in persons who +outlive many years, and when there are no less than three hundred and +sixty-five days to determine their lives in every year; that the first +day should make the last, that the tail of the snake should return into +its mouth precisely at that time, and they should wind up upon the day +of their nativity, is indeed a remarkable coincidence, which, though +astrology hath taken witty pains to salve, yet hath it been very wary +in making predictions of it.[CI] + +[CI] According to the Egyptian hieroglyphic. + +In this consumptive condition and remarkable extenuation, he came to +be almost half himself, and left a great part behind him, which he +carried not to the grave. And though that story of Duke John Ernestus +Mansfield[116][CJ] be not so easily swallowed, that at his death his +heart was found not to be so big as a nut; yet if the bones of a good +skeleton weigh little more than twenty pounds, his inwards and flesh +remaining could make no bouffage,[117] but a light bit for the grave. +I never more lively beheld the starved characters of Dante[CK] in any +living face; an _aruspex_ might have read a lecture upon him without +exenteration, his flesh being so consumed, that he might, in a manner, +have discerned his bowels without opening of him; so that to be +carried, _sexta cervice_[CL] to the grave, was but a civil unnecessity; +and the complements of the coffin might outweigh the subject of it. + +[CJ] Turkish history. + +[CK] In the poet Dante’s description. + +[CL] i.e. “by six persons.” + +_Omnibonus Ferrarius_ in mortal dysenteries of children looks for a +spot behind the ear; in consumptive diseases some eye the complexion of +moles; Cardan eagerly views the nails, some the lines of the hand, the +thenar or muscle of the thumb; some are so curious as to observe the +depth of the throat-pit, how the proportion varieth of the small of the +legs unto the calf, or the compass of the neck unto the circumference +of the head; but all these, with many more, were so drowned in a +mortal visage, and last face of Hippocrates, that a weak physiognomist +might say at first eye, this was a face of earth, and that _Morta_[CM] +had set her hard seal upon his temples, easily perceiving what +_caricatura_[CN] draughts death makes upon pined faces, and unto what +an unknown degree a man may live backward. + +[CM] Morta, the deity of death or fate. + +[CN] When men’s faces are drawn with resemblance to some other animals, +the Italians call it, to be drawn _in caricatura_. + +Though the beard be only made a distinction of sex, and sign of +masculine heat by _Ulmus_,[CO] yet the precocity and early growth +thereof in him, was not to be liked in reference unto long life. +Lewis, that virtuous but unfortunate king of Hungary, who lost his +life at the battle of Mohacz,[118] was said to be born without a skin, +to have bearded at fifteen, and to have shown some grey hairs about +twenty; from whence the diviners conjectured that he would be spoiled +of his kingdom, and have but a short life; but hairs make fallible +predictions, and many temples early grey have outlived the psalmist’s +period.[CP] Hairs which have most amused me have not been in the face +or head, but on the back, and not in men but children, as I long ago +observed in that endemial distemper of children in Languedoc, called +the _morgellons_,[CQ] wherein they critically break out with harsh +hairs on their backs, which takes off the unquiet symptoms of the +disease, and delivers them from coughs and convulsions. + +[CO] _Ulmus de usu barbæ humanæ._ + +[CP] The life of man is threescore and ten. + +[CQ] See _Picotus de Rheumatismo_. + +The Egyptian mummies that I have seen, have had their mouths open, and +somewhat gaping, which affordeth a good opportunity to view and observe +their teeth, wherein ’tis not easy to find any wanting or decayed; and +therefore in Egypt, where one man practised but one operation, or the +diseases but of single parts, it must needs be a barren profession to +confine unto that of drawing of teeth, and to have been little better +than tooth-drawer unto King Pyrrhus,[CR] who had but two in his head. + +[CR] His upper jaw being solid, and without distinct rows of teeth. + +How the banyans of India maintain the integrity of those parts, I find +not particularly observed; who notwithstanding have an advantage of +their preservation by abstaining from all flesh, and employing their +teeth in such food unto which they may seem at first framed, from their +figure and conformation; but sharp and corroding rheums had so early +mouldered these rocks and hardest parts of his fabric, that a man might +well conceive that his years were never like to double or twice tell +over his teeth.[CS] Corruption had dealt more severely with them than +sepulchral fires and smart flames with those of burnt bodies of old; +for in the burnt fragments of urns which I have inquired into, although +I seem to find few incisors or shearers, yet the dog teeth and grinders +do notably resist those fires. + +[CS] Twice tell over his teeth, never live to threescore years. + +In the years of his childhood he had languished under the disease of +his country, the rickets; after which, notwithstanding many have become +strong and active men; but whether any have attained unto very great +years, the disease is scarce so old as to afford good observation. +Whether the children of the English plantations be subject unto the +same infirmity, may be worth the observing. Whether lameness and +halting do still increase among the inhabitants of Rovigno in Istria, +I know not; yet scarce twenty years ago Monsieur du Loyr observed +that a third part of that people halted; but too certain it is, that +the rickets increaseth among us; the small-pox grows more pernicious +than the great; the king’s purse knows that the king’s evil grows more +common. Quartan agues are become no strangers in Ireland; more common +and mortal in England; and though the ancients gave that disease[CT] +very good words, yet now that bell[CU] makes no strange sound which +rings out for the effects thereof. + +[CT] Ασφαλέστατος καὶ ῥήϊστος, securissima et facillima.--_Hippoc._ + +[CU] Pro febre quartana raro sonat campana. + +Some think there were few consumptions in the old world, when men lived +much upon milk; and that the ancient inhabitants of this island were +less troubled with coughs when they went naked and slept in caves and +woods, than men now in chambers and feather-beds. Plato will tell us, +that there was no such disease as a catarrh in Homer’s time, and that +it was but new in Greece in his age. Polydore Virgil delivereth that +pleurisies were rare in England, who lived but in the days of Henry the +Eighth. Some will allow no diseases to be new, others think that many +old ones are ceased: and that such which are esteemed new, will have +but their time: however, the mercy of God hath scattered the great heap +of diseases, and not loaded any one country with all: some may be new +in one country which have been old in another. New discoveries of the +earth discover new diseases: for besides the common swarm, there are +endemial and local infirmities proper unto certain regions, which in +the whole earth make no small number: and if Asia, Africa, and America, +should bring in their list, Pandora’s box would swell, and there must +be a strange pathology. + +Most men expected to find a consumed kell,[119] empty and bladder-like +guts, livid and marbled lungs, and a withered pericardium in this +exsuccous corpse: but some seemed too much to wonder that two lobes of +his lungs adhered unto his side; for the like I have often found in +bodies of no suspected consumptions or difficulty of respiration. And +the same more often happeneth in men than other animals: and some think +in women than in men: but the most remarkable I have met with, was in a +man, after a cough of almost fifty years, in whom all the lobes adhered +unto the pleura, and each lobe unto another; who having also been much +troubled with the gout, brake the rule of Cardan,[CV] and died of the +stone in the bladder. Aristotle makes a query, why some animals cough, +as man; some not, as oxen. If coughing be taken as it consisteth of +a natural and voluntary motion, including expectoration and spitting +out, it may be as proper unto man as bleeding at the nose; otherwise we +find that Vegetius and rural writers have not left so many medicines +in vain against the coughs of cattle; and men who perish by coughs die +the death of sheep, cats, and lions: and though birds have no midriff, +yet we meet with divers remedies in Arrianus against the coughs of +hawks. And though it might be thought that all animals who have lungs +do cough; yet in cataceous fishes, who have large and strong lungs, +the same is not observed; nor yet in oviparous quadrupeds: and in the +greatest thereof, the crocodile, although we read much of their tears, +we find nothing of that motion. + +[CV] Cardan in his _Encomium Podagrae_ reckoneth this among the _Dona +Podagræ_, that they are delivered thereby from the phthisis and stone +in the bladder. + +From the thoughts of sleep, when the soul was conceived nearest unto +divinity, the ancients erected an art of divination, wherein while +they too widely expatiated in loose and in consequent conjectures, +Hippocrates[CW] wisely considered dreams as they presaged alterations +in the body, and so afforded hints toward the preservation of health, +and prevention of diseases; and therein was so serious as to advise +alteration of diet, exercise, sweating, bathing, and vomiting; and also +so religious as to order prayers and supplications unto respective +deities, in good dreams unto Sol, Jupiter cœlestis, Jupiter opulentus, +Minerva, Mercurius, and Apollo; in bad, unto Tellus and the heroes. + +[CW] Hippoc, _de Insomniis_ + +And therefore I could not but notice how his female friends were +irrationally curious so strictly to examine his dreams, and in this +low state to hope for the phantasms of health. He was now past the +healthful dreams of the sun, moon, and stars, in their clarity and +proper courses. ’Twas too late to dream of flying, of limpid fountains, +smooth waters, white vestments, and fruitful green trees, which are the +visions of healthful sleeps, and at good distance from the grave. + +And they were also too deeply dejected that he should dream of his dead +friends, inconsequently divining, that he would not be long from them; +for strange it was not that he should sometimes dream of the dead, +whose thoughts run always upon death; beside, to dream of the dead, +so they appear not in dark habits, and take nothing away from us, in +Hippocrates’ sense was of good signification: for we live by the dead, +and everything is or must be so before it becomes our nourishment. And +Cardan, who dreamed that he discoursed with his dead father in the +moon, made thereof no mortal interpretation; and even to dream that we +are dead, was having a signification of liberty, vacuity from cares, +exemption and freedom from troubles unknown unto the dead. + +Some dreams I confess may admit of easy and feminine exposition; he who +dreamed that he could not see his right shoulder, might easily fear +to lose the sight of his right eye; he that before a journey dreamed +that his feet were cut off, had a plain warning not to undertake his +intended journey. But why to dream of lettuce should presage some +ensuing disease, why to eat figs should signify foolish talk, why to +eat eggs great trouble, and to dream of blindness should be so highly +commended, according to the oneirocritical verses of Astrampsychus and +Nicephorus, I shall leave unto your divination. + +He was willing to quit the world alone and altogether, leaving no +earnest behind him for corruption or after-grave, having small content +in that common satisfaction to survive or live in another, but amply +satisfied that his disease should die with himself, nor revive in a +posterity to puzzle physic, and make sad mementoes of their parent +hereditary. Leprosy awakes not sometimes before forty, the gout and +stone often later; but consumptive and tabid[CX] roots sprout more +early, and at the fairest make seventeen years of our life doubtful +before that age. They that enter the world with original diseases as +well as sin, have not only common mortality but sick traductions to +destroy them, make commonly short courses, and live not at length +but in figures; so that a sound Cæsarean nativity[CY] may outlast a +natural birth, and a knife may sometimes make way for a more lasting +fruit than a midwife; which makes so few infants now able to endure the +old test of the river,[CZ] and many to have feeble children who could +scarce have been married at Sparta, and those provident states who +studied strong and healthful generations; which happen but contingently +in mere pecuniary matches or marriages made by the candle, wherein +notwithstanding there is little redress to be hoped from an astrologer +or a lawyer, and a good discerning physician were like to prove the +most successful counsellor. + +[CX] Tabes maxime contingunt ab anno decimo octavo and trigesi mum +quintum.--_Hippoc._ + +[CY] A sound child cut out of the body of the mother. + +[CZ] Natos ad flumina primum deferimus sævoque gelu dura mus et undis. + +Julius Scaliger, who in a sleepless fit of the gout could make two +hundred verses in a night, would have but five[DA] plain words upon his +tomb. And this serious person, though no minor wit, left the poetry of +his epitaph unto others; either unwilling to commend himself, or to be +judged by a distich, and perhaps considering how unhappy great poets +have been in versifying their own epitaphs; wherein Petrarch, Dante, +and Ariosto, have so unhappily failed, that if their tombs should +outlast their works, posterity would find so little of Apollo on them +as to mistake them for Ciceronian poets. + +[DA] Julii Cæsaris Scaligeri quod fuit.--_Joseph. Scaliger in vita +patris._ + +In this deliberate and creeping progress unto the grave, he was +somewhat too young and of too noble a mind, to fall upon that stupid +symptom observable in divers persons near their journey’s end, and +which may be reckoned among the mortal symptoms of their last disease; +that is, to become more narrow-minded, miserable, and tenacious, +unready to part with anything, when they are ready to part with +all, and afraid to want when they have no time to spend; meanwhile +physicians, who know that many are mad but in a single depraved +imagination, and one prevalent decipiency; and that beside and out of +such single deliriums a man may meet with sober actions and good sense +in bedlam; cannot but smile to see the heirs and concerned relations +gratulating themselves on the sober departure of their friends; and +though they behold such mad covetous passages, content to think they +die in good understanding, and in their sober senses. + +Avarice, which is not only infidelity, but idolatry, either from +covetous progeny or questuary[120] education, had no root in his +breast, who made good works the expression of his faith, and was big +with desires unto public and lasting charities; and surely where +good wishes and charitable intentions exceed abilities, theorical +beneficency may be more than a dream. They build not castles in the +air who would build churches on earth; and though they leave no such +structures here, may lay good foundations in heaven. In brief, his +life and death were such, that I could not blame them who wished the +like, and almost to have been himself; almost, I say; for though we +may wish the prosperous appurtenances of others, or to be another in +his happy accidents, yet so intrinsical is every man unto himself, +that some doubt may be made, whether any would exchange his being, or +substantially become another man. + +He had wisely seen the world at home and abroad, and thereby observed +under what variety men are deluded in the pursuit of that which is not +here to be found. And although he had no opinion of reputed felicities +below, and apprehended men widely out in the estimate of such +happiness, yet his sober contempt of the world wrought no Democratism +or Cynicism, no laughing or snarling at it, as well understanding +there are not felicities in this world to satisfy a serious mind; and +therefore, to soften the stream of our lives, we are fain to take in +the reputed contentations of this world, to unite with the crowd in +their beatitudes, and to make ourselves happy by consortion, opinion, +and co-existimation; for strictly to separate from received and +customary felicities, and to confine unto the rigour of realities, +were to contract the consolation of our beings unto too uncomfortable +circumscriptions. + +Not to fear death,[DB] nor desire it, was short of his resolution: to +be dissolved, and be with Christ, was his dying ditty. He conceived +his thread long, in no long course of years, and when he had scarce +outlived the second life of Lazarus;[DC] esteeming it enough to +approach the years of his Saviour, who so ordered his own human state, +as not to be old upon earth. + +[DB] Summum nec metuas diem nec optes. + +[DC] Who upon some accounts, and tradition, is said to have lived +thirty years after he was raised by our Saviour.--_Baronius._ + +But to be content with death may be better than to desire it; a +miserable life may make us wish for death, but a virtuous one to rest +in it; which is the advantage of those resolved Christians, who looking +on death not only as the sting, but the period and end of sin, the +horizon and isthmus between this life and a better, and the death of +this world but as a nativity of another, do contentedly submit unto the +common necessity, and envy not Enoch or Elias. + +Not to be content with life is the unsatisfactory state of those who +destroy themselves,[DD] who being afraid to live run blindly upon +their own death, which no man fears by experience: and the Stoics had +a notable doctrine to take away the fear thereof; that is, in such +extremities, to desire that which is not to be avoided, and wish what +might be feared; and so made evils voluntary, and to suit with their +own desires, which took off the terror of them. + +[DD] In the speech of Vulteius in Lucan, animating his soldiers in a +great struggle to kill one another.--“Decernite letum, et metus omnis +abest, cupias quodcumque necesse est.” “All fear is over, do but +resolve to die, and make your desires meet necessity.”--_Phars._ iv. +486. + +But the ancient martyrs were not encouraged by such fallacies; who, +though they feared not death, were afraid to be their own executioners; +and therefore thought it more wisdom to crucify their lusts than their +bodies, to circumcise than stab their hearts, and to mortify than kill +themselves. + +His willingness to leave this world about that age, when most men think +they may best enjoy it, though paradoxical unto worldly ears, was +not strange unto mine, who have so often observed, that many, though +old, oft stick fast unto the world, and seem to be drawn like Cacus’s +oxen[121], backward, with great struggling and reluctancy unto the +grave. The long habit of living makes mere men more hardly to part with +life, and all to be nothing, but what is to come. To live at the rate +of the old world, when some could scarce remember themselves young, +may afford no better digested death than a more moderate period. Many +would have thought it an happiness to have had their lot of life in +some notable conjunctures of ages past; but the uncertainty of future +times have tempted few to make a part in ages to come. And surely, he +that hath taken the true altitude of things, and rightly calculated the +degenerate state of this age, is not like to envy those that shall live +in the next, much less three or four hundred years hence, when no man +can comfortably imagine what face this world will carry: and therefore +since every age makes a step unto the end of all things, and the +Scripture affords so hard a character of the last times; quiet minds +will be content with their generations, and rather bless ages past, +than be ambitious of those to come. + +Though age had set no seal upon his face, yet a dim eye might clearly +discover fifty in his actions; and therefore, since wisdom is the grey +hair, and an unspotted life old age; although his years come short, +he might have been said to have held up with longer livers, and to +have been Solomon’s[DE] old man. And surely if we deduct all those +days of our life which we might wish unlived, and which abate the +comfort of those we now live; if we reckon up only those days which +God hath accepted of our lives, a life of good years will hardly be a +span long: the son in this sense may outlive the father, and none be +climacterically old. He that early arriveth unto the parts and prudence +of age, is happily old without the uncomfortable attendants of it; and +’tis superfluous to live unto grey hairs, when in precocious temper we +anticipate the virtues of them. In brief, he cannot be accounted young +who outliveth the old man. He that hath early arrived unto the measure +of a perfect stature in Christ, hath already fulfilled the prime and +longest intention of his being; and one day lived after the perfect +rule of piety, is to be preferred before sinning immortality. + +[DE] Wisdom, cap. iv. + +Although he attained not unto the years of his predecessors, yet he +wanted not those preserving virtues which confirm the thread of weaker +constitutions. _Cautelous_ chastity and _crafty_ sobriety were far from +him; those jewels were _paragon_, without flaw, hair, ice, or cloud in +him; which affords me a hint to proceed in these good wishes, and few +mementoes unto you. + +Tread softly and circumspectly in this funambulous[122] track and +narrow path of goodness; pursue virtue virtuously, be sober and +temperate, not to preserve your body in a sufficiency for wanton ends, +not to spare your purse, not to be free from the infamy of common +transgressors that way, and thereby to balance or palliate obscure +and closer vices, nor simply to enjoy health, by all of which you +may leaven good actions, and render virtues disputable, but, in one +word, that you may truly serve God, which every sickness will tell you +you cannot well do without health. The sick man’s sacrifice is but a +lame oblation. Pious treasures, laid up in healthful days, excuse the +defect of sick non-performance; without which we must needs look back +with anxiety upon the last opportunities of health; and may have cause +rather to envy than pity the ends of penitent malefactors, who go with +clear parts unto the last act of their lives, and in the integrity of +their faculties return their spirit unto God that gave it. + +Consider whereabouts thou art in Cebe’s[123] table, or that old +philosophical pinax[124] of the life of man; whether thou art still in +the road of uncertainties; whether thou hast yet entered the narrow +gate, got up the hill and asperous way which leadeth unto the house +of sanity; or taken that purifying potion from the hand of sincere +erudition, which may send thee clear and pure away unto a virtuous and +happy life. + +In this virtuous voyage let no disappointment cause despondency, +nor difficulty despair. Think not that you are sailing from Lima to +Manilla,[DF] [125] wherein thou mayest tie up the rudder, and sleep +before the wind, but expect rough seas, flaws and contrary blasts; and +’tis well if by many cross tacks and veerings thou arrivest at the +port. Sit not down in the popular seats and common level of virtues, +but endeavour to make them heroical. Offer not only peace-offerings but +holocausts unto God. To serve him singly to serve ourselves were too +partial a piece of piety, not like to place us in the highest mansions +of glory. + +[DF] Through the Pacifick Sea with a constant gale from the east. + +He that is chaste and continent not to impair his strength or +terrified by contagion will hardly be heroically virtuous. Adjourn +not that virtue until those years when Cato could lend out his wife, +and impotent satyrs write satires against lust, but be chaste in thy +flaming days when Alexander dared not trust his eyes upon the fair +sisters of Darius, and when so many think that there is no other way +but Origen’s.[DG] + +[DG] Who is said to have castrated himself. + +Be charitable before wealth make thee covetous, and lose not the glory +of the mitre. If riches increase, let thy mind hold pace with them, and +think it is not enough to be liberal but munificent. Though a cup of +cold water from some hand may not be without its reward, yet stick not +thou for wine and oil for the wounds of the distressed, and treat the +poor as our Saviour did the multitude to the reliques of some baskets. + +Trust not unto the omnipotency of gold, or say not unto it, thou art +my confidence. Kiss not thy hand when thou beholdest that terrestrial +sun, nor bore thy ear unto its servitude. A slave unto Mammon makes +no servant unto God. Covetousness cracks the sinews of faith, numbs +the apprehension of anything above sense; and only affected with the +certainty of things present, makes a peradventure of things to come; +lives but unto one world, nor hopes but fears another: makes their own +death sweet unto others, bitter unto themselves, brings formal sadness, +scenical mourning, and no wet eyes at the grave. + +If avarice be thy vice, yet make it not thy punishment. Miserable men +commiserate not themselves, bowelless unto themselves, and merciless +unto their own bowels. Let the fruition of things bless the possession +of them, and take no satisfaction in dying but living rich. For since +thy good works, not thy goods will follow thee; since riches are an +appurtenance of life, and no dead man is rich, to famish in plenty, and +live poorly to die rich, were a multiplying improvement in madness and +use upon use in folly. + +Persons lightly dipt, not grained, in generous honesty are but pale in +goodness and faint-hued in sincerity. But be thou what thou virtuously +art, and let not the ocean wash away thy tincture. Stand majestically +upon that axis where prudent simplicity hath fixed thee; and at no +temptation invert the poles of thy honesty that vice may be uneasy and +even monstrous unto thee; let iterated good acts and long confirmed +habits make virtue natural or a second nature in thee; and since few or +none prove eminently virtuous but from some advantageous foundations +in their temper and natural inclinations, study thyself betimes, and +early find what nature bids thee to be or tells thee what thou mayest +be. They who thus timely descend into themselves, cultivating the good +seeds which nature hath set in them, and improving their prevalent +inclinations to perfection, become not shrubs but cedars in their +generation. And to be in the form of the best of bad, or the worst of +the good, will be no satisfaction unto them. + +Let not the law of thy country be the _non ultra_ of thy honesty, nor +think that always good enough that the law will make good. Narrow not +the law of charity, equity, mercy. Join gospel righteousness with legal +right. Be not a mere Gamaliel in the faith, but let the Sermon on the +Mount be thy Targum unto the law of Sinai. + +Make not the consequences of virtue the ends thereof. Be not beneficent +for a name or cymbal of applause; nor exact and punctual in commerce +for the advantages of trust and credit, which attend the reputation of +just and true dealing: for such rewards, though unsought for, plain +virtue will bring with her, whom all men honour, though they pursue +not. To have other by-ends in good actions sours laudable performances, +which must have deeper roots, motives, and instigations, to give them +the stamp of virtues. + +Though human infirmity may betray thy heedless days into the popular +ways of extravagancy, yet, let not thine own depravity or the torrent +of vicious times carry thee into desperate enormities in opinions, +manners, or actions. If thou hast dipped thy foot in the river, yet +venture not over Rubicon; run not into extremities from whence there +is no regression, nor be ever so closely shut up within the holds +of vice and iniquity, as not to find some escape by a postern of +recipiscency.[126] + +Owe not thy humility unto humiliation by adversity, but look humbly +down in that state when others look upward upon thee. Be patient in the +age of pride, and days of will, and impatiency, when men live but by +intervals of reason, under the sovereignty of humour and passion, when +it is in the power of every one to transform thee out of thyself, and +put thee into short madness.[DH] If you cannot imitate Job, yet come +not short of Socrates, and those patient Pagans, who tired the tongues +of their enemies, while they perceived they spit their malice at brazen +walls and statues. + +[DH] Iræ furor brevis est. + +Let age, not envy, draw wrinkles on thy cheeks; be content to be +envied, but envy not. Emulation may be plausible, and indignation +allowable, but admit no treaty with that passion which no circumstance +can make good. A displacency at the good of others, because they enjoy +it although we do not want it, is an absurd depravity sticking fast +unto nature, from its primitive corruption, which he that can well +subdue were a Christian of the first magnitude, and for ought I know +may have one foot already in heaven. + +While thou so hotly disclaimest the devil, be not guilty of Diabolism. +Fall not into one name with that unclean spirit, nor act his nature +whom thou so much abhorrest, that is, to accuse, calumniate, backbite, +whisper, detract, or sinistrously interpret others. Degenerous +depravities and narrow-minded vices! not only below St Paul’s noble +Christian, but Aristotle’s true gentleman.[DI] Trust not with some +that the Epistle of St James is apocryphal, and so read with less fear +that stabbing truth that in company with this vice, “thy religion is +in vain.” Moses broke the tables without breaking the law, but where +charity is broke the law itself is shattered, which cannot be whole +without love that is “the fulfilling of it.” Look humbly upon thy +virtues, and though thou art rich in some, yet think thyself poor +and naked without that crowning grace which “thinketh no evil, which +envieth not, which beareth, believeth, hopeth, endureth all things.” +With these sure graces while busy tongues are crying out for a drop of +cold water, mutes may be in happiness, and sing the “Trisagium,”[DJ] in +heaven. + +[DI] See Aristotle’s Ethics, chapter Magnanimity. + +[DJ] Holy, holy, holy. + +Let not the sun in Capricorn[DK] go down upon thy wrath, but write thy +wrongs in water, draw the curtain of night upon injuries, shut them up +in the tower of oblivion,[DL] and let them be as though they had not +been. Forgive thine enemies totally, without any reserve of hope that +however God will revenge thee. + +[DK] Even when the days are shortest. + +[DL] Alluding to the tower of oblivion, mentioned by Procopius, which +was the name of a tower of imprisonment among the Persians; whoever was +put therein was as it were buried alive, and it was death for any but +to name him. + +Be substantially great in thyself, and more than thou appearest unto +others; and let the world be deceived in thee, as they are in the +lights of heaven. Hang early plummets upon the heels of pride, and +let ambition have but an epicycle[127] or narrow circuit in thee. +Measure not thyself by thy morning shadow, but by the extent of thy +grave; and reckon thyself above the earth, by the line thou must be +contented with under it. Spread not into boundless expansions either +to designs or desires. Think not that mankind liveth but for a few; +and that the rest are born but to serve the ambition of those who make +but flies of men, and wildernesses of whole nations. Swell not into +vehement actions, which embroil and confound the earth, but be one of +those violent ones that force the kingdom of heaven.[DM] If thou must +needs rule, be Zeno’s king, and enjoy that empire which every man gives +himself: certainly the iterated injunctions of Christ unto humility, +meekness, patience, and that despised train of virtues, cannot but +make pathetical impression upon those who have well considered the +affairs of all ages; wherein pride, ambition, and vain-glory, have led +up to the worst of actions, whereunto confusions, tragedies, and acts, +denying all religion, do owe their originals. + +[DM] St Matt. xi. + +Rest not in an ovation,[DN] but a triumph over thy passions. Chain +up the unruly legion of thy breast; behold thy trophies within thee, +not without thee. Lead thine own captivity captive, and be Cæsar unto +thyself. + +[DN] Ovation, a petty and minor kind of triumph. + +Give no quarter unto those vices that are of thine inward family, and, +having a root in thy temper, plead a right and propriety in thee. +Examine well thy complexional inclinations. Rain early batteries +against those strongholds built upon the rock of nature, and make +this a great part of the militia of thy life. The politic nature of +vice must be opposed by policy, and therefore wiser honesties project +and plot against sin; wherein notwithstanding we are not to rest in +generals, or the trite stratagems of art; that may succeed with one +temper, which may prove successless with another. There is no community +or commonwealth of virtue, every man must study his own economy and +erect these rules unto the figure of himself. + +Lastly, if length of days be thy portion, make it not thy expectation. +Reckon not upon long life; but live always beyond thy account. He that +so often surviveth his expectation lives many lives, and will scarce +complain of the shortness of his days. Time past is gone like a shadow; +make times to come present; conceive that near which may be far off. +Approximate thy latter times by present apprehensions of them: be like +a neighbour unto death, and think there is but little to come. And +since there is something in us that must still live on, join both lives +together, unite them in thy thoughts and actions, and live in one but +for the other. He who thus ordereth the purposes of this life, will +never be far from the next, and is in some manner already in it, by a +happy conformity and close apprehension of it. + + + + +NOTES TO THE RELIGIO MEDICI. + + +1. It was a proverb, “Ubi tres medici duo athei.” + +2. A Latinised word meaning a taunt (impropero.) + +3. The synod of Dort was held in 1619 to discuss the doctrines of +Arminius. It ended by condemning them. + +4. Hallam, commenting on this passage, says--“That Jesuit must be a +disgrace to his order who would have asked more than such a concession +to secure a proselyte--the right of interpreting whatever was written, +and of supplying whatever was not.”--_Hist. England_, vol. ii. p. 74. + +5. See the statute of the Six Articles (31 Hen. VIII. c. 14), which +declared that transubstantiation, communion in one kind, celibacy +of the clergy, vows of widowhood, private masses, and auricular +confession, were part of the law of England. + +6. In the year 1606, when the Jesuits were expelled from Venice, Pope +Paul V. threatened to excommunicate that republic. A most violent +quarrel ensued, which was ultimately settled by the mediation of France. + +7. Alluding to the story of Œdipus solving the riddle proposed by the +Sphynx. + +8. The nymph Arethusa was changed by Diana into a fountain, and was +said to have flowed under the sea from Elis to the fountain of Arethusa +near Syracuse.--Ov. _Met._ lib. v. fab. 8. + +9. These heretics denied the immortality of the soul, but held that it +was recalled to life with the body. Origen came from Egypt to confute +them, and is said to have succeeded. (See Mosh. _Eccl. Hist._, lib. i. +c. 5. sec. 16.) Pope John XXII. afterwards adopted it. + +10. A division from the Greek διχοτομια. + +11. The brain. + +12. A faint resemblance, from the Latin _adumbro_, to shade. + +13. Alluding to the idea Sir T. Browne often expresses, that an oracle +was the utterance of the devil. + +14. To fathom, from Latin _profundus_. + +15. Beginning from the Latin _efficio_. + +16. Galen’s great work. + +17. John de Monte Regio made a wooden eagle that, when the emperor was +entering Nuremburg, flew to meet him, and hovered over his head. He +also made an iron fly that, when at dinner, he was able to make start +from under his hand, and fly round the table.--See De Bartas, 6^{me} +jour 1^{me} semaine. + +18. Hidden, from the Greek κρυπτω. + +19. A military term for a small mine. + +20. The Armada. + +21. The practice of drawing lots. + +22. An account. + +23. See Il. VIII. 18-- + + “Let down our golden everlasting chain, + Whose strong embrace holds heaven, and earth, and main.” + --_Pope_, Il. viii. 26. + +24. An argument where one proposition is accumulated upon another, from +the Greek σωρειτης, a heap. + +25. Alluding to the second triumvirate--that of Augustus, Antony, and +Lepidus. Florus says of it, “Respublica convulsa est lacerataque.” + +26. Ochinus. He was first a monk, then a doctor, then a Capuchin friar, +then a Protestant: in 1547 he came to England, and was very active +in the Reformation. He was afterwards made Canon of Canterbury. The +Socinians claim him as one of their sect. + +27. The father of Pantagruel. His adventures are given in the first +book of Rabelais, Sir Bevys of Hampton, a metrical romance, relating +the adventures of Sir Bevys with the Saracens.--Wright and Halliwell’s +_Reliquiæ Antiquæ_, ii. 59. + +28. Contradictions between two laws. + +29. On his arrival at Paris, Pantagruel visited the library of St +Victor: he states a list of the works he found there, among which was +“Tartaretus.” Pierre Tartaret was a French doctor who disputed with +Duns Scotus. His works were republished at Lyons, 1621. + +30. Deucalion was king of Thessaly at the time of the deluge. He and +his wife Pyrrha, with the advice of the oracle of Themis, repeopled the +earth by throwing behind them the bones of their grandmother,--_i.e._, +stones of the earth.--See Ovid, _Met._ lib. i. fab. 7. + +31. St Augustine (De Civ. Dei, xvi. 7). + +32. απηγξατο (St Matt. xxvii. 5) means death by choking. Erasmus +translates it, “abiens laqueo se suspendit.” + +33. Burnt by order of the Caliph Omar, A.D. 640. It contained 700,000 +volumes, which served the city for fuel instead of wood for six months. + +34. Enoch being informed by Adam the world was to be drowned and +burnt, made two pillars, one of stone to withstand the water, and one +of brick to withstand the fire, and inscribed upon them all known +knowledge.--See Josephus, _Ant. Jud._ + +35. A Franciscan friar, counsellor to the Inquisition, who visited the +principal libraries in Spain to make a catalogue of the books opposed +to the Romish religion. His “index novus librorum prohibitorum” was +published at Seville in 1631. + +36. Printing, gunpowder, clocks. + +37. The Targums and the various Talmuds. + +38. Pagans, Mahometans, Jews, Christians. + +39. Valour, and death in battle. + +40. Held 1414-1418. + +41. Vergilius, bishop of Salzburg, having asserted the existence of +Antipodes, the Archbishop of Metz declared him to be a heretic, and +caused him to be burnt. + +42. On searching on Mount Calvary for the true cross, the empress found +three. As she was uncertain which was the right one, she caused them to +be applied to the body of a dead man, and the one that restored him to +life was determined to be the true cross. + +43. The critical time in human life. + +44. Oracles were said to have ceased when Christ came, the reply to +Augustus on the subject being the last-- + + “Me puer Hebræus divos Deus ipse gubernans + Cedere sede jubet tristemque redire sub Orcum + Aris ergo de hinc tacitus discedito nostris.” + +45. An historian who wrote “De Rebus Indicis.” He is cited by Pliny, +Strabo, and Josephus. + +46. Alluding to the popular superstition that infant children were +carried off by fairies, and others left in their places. + +47. Who is said to have lived without meat, on the smell of a rose. + +48. “Essentiæ rationalis immortalis.” + +49. St Augustine, De Civ. Dei, lib. x., cc. 9, 19, 32. + +50. That which includes everything is opposed to nullity. + +51. An inversion of the parts of an antithesis. + +52. St Augustine--“Homily on Genesis.” + +53. Sir T. Browne wrote a dialogue between two twins in the womb +respecting the world into which they were going! + +54. Refinement. + +55. Constitution another form of temperament. + +56. The Jewish computation for fifty years. + +57. Saturn revolves once in thirty years. + +58. Christian IV., of Denmark, who reigned from 1588-1647. + +59. Æson was the father of Jason. By bathing in a bath prepared for him +by Medæa with some magic spells, he became young again. Ovid describes +the bath and its ingredients, _Met._, lib. vii. fab. 2. + +60. Alluding to the rabbinical tradition that the world would last for +6000 years, attributed to Elias, and cited in the Talmud. + +61. Zeno was the founder of the Stoics. + +62. Referring to a passage in Suetonius, Vit. J. Cæsar, sec +87:--“Aspernatus tam lentum mortis genus subitam sibi celeremque +optaverat.” + +63. In holding + + “Mors ultima pœna est, + Nec metuenda viris.” + +64. The period when the moon is in conjunction and obscured by the sun. + +65. One of the judges of hell. + +66. To select some great man for our ideal, and always to act as if he +was present with us. See Seneca, lib. i. Ep. 11. + +67. Sir T. Browne seems to have made various experiments in this +subject. D’Israeli refers to it in his “Curiosities of Literature.” Dr +Power, a friend of Sir T. Browne, with whom he corresponded, gives a +receipt for the process. + +68. The celebrated Greek philosopher who taught that the sun was a mass +of heated stone, and various other astronomical doctrines. Some critics +say Anaxarchus is meant here. + +69. See Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” lib. I. 254-- + + “The mind is its own place, and in itself + Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.” + +And also Lucretius-- + + “Hic Acherusia fit stultorum denique vita.”--iii. 1023. + +70. Keck says here--“So did they all, as Lactantius has observed +at large. Aristotle is said to have been guilty of great vanity in +his clothes, of incontinency, and of unfaithfulness to his master, +Alexander II.” + +71. Phalaris, king of Agrigentum, who, when Perillus made a brazen bull +in which to kill criminals, placed him in it to try its effects. + +72. Their maxim was + + “Nihil sciri siquis putat id quoque nescit, + An sciri possit quod se nil scire fatetur.” + +73. Pope Alexander III., in his declaration to the Doge, said,--“Que +la mer vous soit soumise comme l’epouse l’est à son epoux puisque vous +in avez acquis l’empire par la victorie.” In commemoration of this the +Doge and Senate went yearly to Lio, and throwing a ring into the water, +claimed the sea as their bride. + +74. Appolonius Thyaneus, who threw a large quantity of gold into the +sea, saying, “Pessundo divitias ne pessundare ab illis.” + +75. The technical term in fencing for a hit-- + + “A sweet touch, a quick venew of wit.” + _Love’s Labour Lost_, act v. sc. 1. + +76. Strabo compared the configuration of the world, as then known, to a +cloak or mantle (_chalmys_). + +77. Atomists or familists were a Puritanical sect who appeared about +1575, founded by Henry Nicholas, a Dutchman. They considered that the +doctrine of revelation was an allegory, and believed that they had +attained to spiritual perfection.--See Neal’s Hist. of Puritans, i. 273. + +78. From the 126th psalm St Augustine contends that Solomon is damned. +See also Lyra in 2 Kings vii. + +79. From the Spanish “Dorado,” a gilt head. + +80. Sir T. Browne treats of chiromancy, or the art of telling fortunes +by means of lines in the hands, in his “Vulgar Errors,” lib. v. cap. 23. + +81. Gypsies. + +82. S. Wilkin says that here this word means niggardly. + +83. In the dialogue, “judicium vocalium,” the vowels are the judges, +and Σ complains that T has deprived him of many letters that ought to +begin with Σ. + +84. If Jovis or Jupitris. + +85. The celebrated Roman grammarian. A proverbial phrase for the +violation of grammar was “Breaking Priscian’s head.” + +86. Livy says, Actius Nevius cut a whetstone through with a razor. + +87. A kind of lizard that was supposed to kill all it looked at-- + + “Whose baneful eye + Wounds at a glance, so that the soundest dye.” + --_De Bartas_, 6^{me} jour 1{me} sem. + +88. Epimenides (Titus x. 12)-- + + “Κρῆτες ἀεὶ ψεῦσται κακὰ θηριά γαστέρες αργαὶ.” + +89. Nero having heard a person say, “When I am dead, let earth be +mingled with fire,” replied, “Yes, while I live.”--Suetonius, _Vit. +Nero._ + +90. Alluding to the story of the Italian, who, having been provoked by +a person he met, put a poniard to his heart, and threatened to kill him +if he would not blaspheme God; and the stranger doing so, the Italian +killed him at once, that he might be damned, having no time to repent. + +91. A rapier or small sword. + +92. The battle here referred to was the one between Don John of Austria +and the Turkish fleet, near Lepanto, in 1571. The battle of Lepanto +(that is, the capture of the town by the Turks) did not take place till +1678. + +93. Several authors say that Aristotle died of grief because he could +not find out the reason for the ebb and flow of the tide in Epirus. + +94. Who deny that there is such a thing as science. + +95. A motto on a ring or cup. In an old will, 1655, there is this +passage: “I give a cup of silver gilt to have this posy written in the +margin:-- + + “When the drink is out, and the bottom you may see, + Remember your brother I. G.” + +96. The opposition of a contrary quality, by which the quality it +opposes becomes heightened. + +97. Adam as he was created and not born. + +98. Meaning a world, as Atlas supported the world on his shoulders. + +99. Merriment. Johnson says that this is the only place where the word +is found. + +100. Said to be a cure for madness. + +101. Patched garments. + +102. A game. A kind of capping verses, in which, if any one repeated +what had been said before, he paid a forfeit. + + + + +NOTES TO HYDRIOTAPHIA. + + +103. Just. + +104. Destruction. + +105. A chemical vessel made of earth, ashes, or burnt bones, and in +which assay-masters try their metals. It suffers all baser ones when +fused and mixed with lead to pass off, and retains only gold and silver. + +106. This substance known to French chemists by the name “adipo-cire,” +was first discovered by Sir Thomas Browne. + +107. From its thickness. + +108. Euripides. + +109. Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Egyptian, Arabic defaced by the Emperor +Licinius. + + + + +NOTES TO LETTER TO A FRIEND. + + +110. Will not survive until next spring. + +111. Wasting. + +112. An eminent Italian Physician, lecturer in the University of Pavia, +died 1576. He was a most voluminous medical writer. + +113. An eminent doctor and scholar who passed his time at Venice and +Padua studying and practising medicine, died 1568. + +114. Charles V. was born 24th February, 1500. + +115. Francis I. of France was taken prisoner at the battle of Pavia, +24th February, 1525. + +116. One of the greatest Protestant generals of the seventeenth +century. He died at Zara, 1626. + +117. An inflation, or swelling, from the French bouffée. + +118. August 20th, 1526. He was defeated by Solyman II., and suffocated +in a brook, by a fall from his horse, during the retreat. + +119. The caul. + +120. Money-seeking. + +121. Cacus stole some of Hercules’ oxen, and drew them into his cave +backward to prevent any traces being discovered. Ovid Fast, 1. 554. + +122. Narrow, like walking on a rope. + +123. A Greek philosophical writer. This Πιναξ is a representation of a +table where the whole human life with its dangers and temptations is +symbolically represented. + +124. Picture. + +125. The course taken by the Spanish Treasure ships. See Anson Voyages. + +126. A recommencement. + + “Dulcique senex vicinus Hymetto + Qui partem acceptæ sava inter vincla cicutæ + Accusatori nollet dare,”--Juv. Sat. xiii. 185. + +127. A small revolution made by one planet in the orbit of another. + + + + +BALLANTYNE AND COMPANY, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH. + + + + +Transcriber's Note + + +The following errata have been corrected: + + p. viii "coffer of gold." changed to "coffer of gold.”" + p. 31 "Bevis." missing endnote anchor inserted and + following anchor renumbered + p. 32 "Pantagruel's library," extraneous endnote anchor removed + p. 56 "comtemplations." changed to "contemplations." + p. 93 "that si" changed to "that is" + p. 117 "Egyptains" changed to "Egyptians" + p. 120 "Egyptains" changed to "Egyptians" + p. 148 "aprehension" changed to "apprehension" + p. 162 "viii 809" changed to "viii. 809" + p. 176 "limped" changed to "limpid" + p. 180 (note) "Decernite lethum" changed to "Decernite letum" + p. 180 (note) "quodcunqne" changed to "quodcumque" + p. 186 "Socrates," extraneous endnote anchor removed + p. 187 "all things.’" changed to "all things.”" + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the +Letter to a Friend, by Thomas Browne + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RELIGIO MEDICI *** + +***** This file should be named 586-0.txt or 586-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/8/586/ + +Produced by Henry Flower and Judith Boss, Omaha, Nebraska + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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