OBSERVATIONS upon Religio Medici.  
Occasionally Written By Sir Kenelme Digby, Knight  
LONDON, Printed by R. C. for Lawrence Chapman, and Daniel Frere, 1643.   

OBSERVATIONS upon Religio medicine.  
To the Right Honourable Edward Earl of Dorset, Baron of Buckhurst, &c.  
My Lord,  
I Received yesternight, your Lordships of the 19 current; wherein you are pleased to oblige me, not only by extreme gallant expressions of favour and kindness: but likewise by taking so far into your care the expending of my time during the tediousness of my restraint, as to recommend to my reading a book, that had received the honour and safeguard of your approbation, for both which I most humbly thank your Lordship. And since I cannot, in the way of gratefulness express unto your Lordship as I would those hearty sentiments I have of your goodness to me; I will at the least endeavour, in the way of Duty and observance, to let you see how the little needle of my soul is throughly touched at the great loadstone of yours, and followeth suddenly and strongly which way soever you beckon it. In this occasion, the magnetike motion, was impatience to have the book in my hands that your Lordship gave so advantageous a character of; whereupon I sent presently (as late as it was) to Paul's Churchyard, for this favourite of yours, Religio Medici: which after a while found me in a condition fit to receive a Blessing by a visit from any of such masterpieces as you look upon with gracious eyes; For I was newly gotten into my Bed. This good natured creature I could easily persuade to be my Bedfellow, and to wake with me as long as I had any edge to entertain myself with the delights I sucked from so noble a conversation. And truly (my Lord) I closed not my eyes till I had enriched myself with, (or at least exactly surveyed) all the treasures that are lapped up in the folds of those few sheets. To return only a general commendations of this curious piece, or at large to admire the author's Spirit and smartnes, were too perfunctory an account, and too slight a one, to so discerning and steady an eye as yours, after so particular and encharged a summons to read heedfully this discourse. I will therefore presume to blot a sheet or two of paper with my reflections upon sundry passages through the whole context of it, as they shall occur to my remembrance. Which now your Lordship knoweth this packet is not so happy as to carry with it any other expression of my obsequiousness to you; It will be but reasonable, you should even here, give over your further trouble of reading, what my respect engageth me to the writing of.  
Whose first step is ingenuity and a well natured evenness of judgement, shall be sure of applause and fair hopes in all men for the rest of his journey: And indeed (my Lord) me thinketh this Gentleman setteth out excellently poised with that happy temper; and showeth a great deal of judicious piety in making a right use of the blind zeal that Bigots lose themselves in. Yet I cannot satisfy my doubts throughly, how he maketh good his professing to follow the great wheel of the Church in matters of Divinity: which surely is the solid Basis of true Religion: for to do so, without jarring against the conduct of that first mover by eccentrical and irregular motions, obligeth one to yield a very dutiful obedience to the determinations of it without arrogating to one's self a controlling ability in liking or misliking the faith, doctrine and constitutions of that Church which one looketh upon as their North star: Whereas if I mistake not, this author approveth the Church of England not absolutely, but comparatively with other reformed Churches.  
My next reflection is concerning what he hath sprinkled (most wittily) in several places, concerning the nature and immortality of a human soul, and the condition and state it is in, after the dissolution of the body. And here give me leave to observe what our Countryman Roger Bacon did long ago; That those students who busy themselves much with such notions, as reside wholly to the fantasy, do hardly ever become idoneous for abstracted metaphysical speculations; the one having bulky foundation of matter, or of the accidents of it, to settle upon, (at the least, with one foot:) The other flying continually, even to a lessening pitch, in the subtle air; And dingly it hath been generally noted, that the exactest Mathematicians, who converse altogether with lines, figures, and other differences of quantity; have seldom proved eminent in metaphysics or speculative Divinity. Nor again the professors of these sciences, in the others arts. Much less can it be expected that an excellent physician whose fancy is always fraught with the material drugs that he prescribeth his Apothecary to compound his Medicines of; and whose hands are enured to the cutting up, & eyes to the inspection of anatomised bodies; should easily, and with success, fly his thoughts at so to wring a Game, as a pure intellect, a Separated and unbodied soul; surely this acute Authors sharp wit, had he orderly applied his studies that way, would have been able to satisfy himself with less labour, and others with more plenitude, than it hath been the lot of so dull a brain as mine, concerning the immortality of the soul: And yet I assure you (my Lord) the little Philosophy that is allowed me for my share, demonstrateth this proposition to me, as well as faith delivereth it: which our Physician will not admit in his.  
To make good this assertion here, were very unreasonable, since that to do it exactly, (and without exactness, it were no demonstration) requireth a total Survey of the whole science of bodies, and of all the operations that we are conversant with, of a rational creature; which I having done, with all the succinctnes I have been able to explicate so knotty a Subject with, hath taken me up in the first draught near two hundred sheets of paper. I shall therefore take leave of this point with only this note, that I take the immortality of the soul (under his favour) to be of that nature, that to them only that are not versed in the ways of proving it by reason, it is an article of faith; to others, it is an evident conclusion of demonstrative Science.  
And with a like short note I shall observe how if he had traced the nature of the soul from its first principles, he could not have suspected it should sleep in the grave till the Resurrection of the body. Nor would he have permitted his compassionative nature to imagine it belonged to God's mercy (as the Chiliasts did) to change its condition in those that are damned, from pain to happiness. For where God should have done that, he must have made that anguished soul another creature then what it was, (as to make fire cease from being hot, requireth to have it become another thing than the Element of fire;) since, that to be in such a condition as maketh us understand damned souls miserable, is a necessary effect of the temper it is in, when it goeth out of the Body, and must necessarily (out of its own nature) remain in, unvariably for all eternity; Though, for the conceptions of the vulgar part of mankind, (who are not capable of such abstruse notions) it be styled (and truly too) the sentence and punishment of a severe judge.  
I am extremely pleased with him, when he saith there are not impossibilities enough in Religion for an active faith: And no whit less, when in Philosophy he will not be satisfied with such naked terms as in Schools use to be obtruded upon easy minds, when the Master's fingers are not strong enough to untie the knots proposed unto them. I confess, when I inquire what light (to use our author's example) is, I should be as well contented with his Silence, as with his telling me it is Actus perspicui; unless he explicate clearly to me what those words mean, which I find very few go about to do. Such meat they swallow whole, and eject it as entire. But were such things, scientifically, and methodically declared, they would be of extreme satisfaction, and delight. And that work taketh up the greatest part of my formerly mentioned treatise. For I endeavour to show by a continued progress, and not by leaps, all the motions of nature; & unto them to fit intelligibly the terms used by her best Secretaries: whereby all wild fantastic qualities and moods (introduced for refuges of ignorance) are banished from my commerce.  
In the next place (my Lord) I shall suspect that our author hath not penetrated into the bottom of those conceptions that deep scholars have taught us of Eternity. Methinketh he taketh it for an infinite extension of time, and a never ending revolution of continual succession: which is no more like Eternity, than a gross body is like to a pure Spirit. Nay, such an infinity of revolutions, is demonstrable to be a contradiction and impossible. In the state of eternity there is no succession, no change, no variety. Souls or angels, in that condition, do not so much as change a thought. All things, notions, and actions, that every were, are, or shall be in any creature, are actually present to such an intellect. And this (my Lord) laver, not as deriving it from Th●ologie, and having recourse to beatifike vision to make good my tenet, (for so, only glorified creatures should enjoy such immense knowledge) but out of the principles of Nature and Reason, and from thence shall demonstrate it to belong to the lowest soul of the ignorantest wretch whiles he lived in this world, since damned in Hell. A bold undertaking you will say; But I confidently engage myself to it. Upon this occasion occurreth also a great deal to be said of the nature of Predestination (which by the short touches our Author giveth of it, I doubt he quite mistakes) and how it is an unalterable Series and chain of causes, producing infallible (and in respect of them, necessary) effects: But that is too large a theme to unfold here; too vast an Ocean to describe, in the scant Map of a Letter. And therefore I will refer that to a fitter opportunity, fearing I have already too much trespassed upon your lordship's patience; but that indeed I hope you have not had enough to read thus far.  
I am sure (my Lord) that you (who never forgot any thing, which deserved a room in your memory) do remember how we are told, that Abyssus abyssum invocat: So here our Author, from the abyss of Predestination, falleth into that of the Trinity of Persons consistent with the indivisibility of the divine nature: And out of that (if I be not exceedingly deceived) into a third, of mistaking, when he goeth about to illustrate this admirable mysteryby a wild discourse of a Trinity in our souls. The dint of wit is not forcible enough to dissect such tough matter; wherein all the obscure glimmering we gain of that inaccessible light, cometh to us clothed in the dark weeds of negations, and therefore little can we hope to meet with any positive examples to parallel it withal.  
I doubt, he also mistakenth, and imposeth upon the severer schools, when he intimateth that they gainsay this visible world's being but a picture or shadow of the invisible & intellectual: which manner of Philosophising, he attributeth to Hermes Trismegistus; but is everywhere to be met with in Plato; and is raised since to a greater height in the Christian schools.  
But I am sure he learned in no good school, nor sucked from any good Philosophy to give an actual subsistence and being to first matter without a form. He that will allow that a real existence in nature is as superficially tincted in metaphysics, as an other would be in mathematics that should allow the like to a point, a line, or a superficies in Figures. These, in their strict Notions, are but negations of further extension, or but exact terminations of that quantity which falleth under the consideration of the understanding; in the present purpose; no real entities in themselves: so likewise, the notions of matter, form, act, power, existence, and the like, that are with truth considered by the understanding, and have there each of them a distinet entity, are never the less, nowhere by themselves in nature. They are terms which we must use in the negotiations of our thoughts, if we will discourse consequently, and conclude knowingly. But then again we must be very wary of attributing to things in their own natures, such entities as we create in our understandings, when we make pictures of them there; for there every different consideration arising out of the different impression, which the same thing maketh upon us, hath a distinct being by itself. Whereas in thing, there is but one single unity, that showeth (as it were in a glass, at several positions) those various faces in our understanding. In a word; all these words are but artificial terms, not real things: And the not right understanding them, is the dangerousest rock that scholars suffer ship wrack against.  
I go on with our physician's contemplations. Upon every occasion, he shewech strong parts and a vigorous brain. His wishes and aims, and what he pointeth at, speak him owner of a noble & a generous heart. He hath reason to wish that Aristotle had been as accurate in examining the causes, nature and affections of the great universe he busied himself about, as his patriarch Galen hath been in the like considerations upon his little World, man's body, in that admirable work of his de usu partium. But no great human thing, was ever borne and perfected at once. It may satisfy us, if one in our age, buildeth that magnifike structure upon the others foundations; and especially, if where he findeth any of them unsound, he eradicateth those, and fixeth new unquestionable ones in their room: but so, as they still, in gross, keep a proportion, and bear a Harmony with the others great work: This, hath now, (even now) our learned countryman done, The knowing Master White, (whose name, I believe your Lordship hath met withal) in his excellent book, De Mundo, newly printed at Paris, where he now resideth, and is admired by the world of Letterd men there, as the prodigy of these latter times. Indeed his three Dialogues upon that Subject, (if I am able to judge any thing) are full of the profoundest learning I ever yet met withal. And I believe; who hath well read and digested them, will persuade himself there is no truth so abstruse, nor hitherto conceived out of our reach, but man's wit may raise engines to scale and conquer. I assure myself, when our author hath studied him throughly, he will not lament so loud for Aristotle's mutilated and defective Philosophy; as in Boccalini, Caesar Caporali doth for the loss of Livy's shipwracked decades.  
That logic which he quarrelleth at for calling a toad, or a Serpent ugly, will in the end agree with his; for nobody ever took them to be so, in respect of the Vntverse (in which regard, he defendeth their regularity, and Symmetry) but only as they have relation to us.  
But I cannot so easily agree with him when he affirmeth that devils, or other Spirits in the intellectual world have no exact Ephemerides wherein they may read beforehand the stories of fortuite accidents: for I believe that all causes are so immediately chained to their effects, as if a perfect knowing nature get hold but of one link, it will drive the entire Series or pedigree of the whole to each utmost end; (as I think I have proved in my forenamed treatisfe) so that in truth, there is no fortuitness or contingency of things, in respect of themselves, but only in respect of us, that are ignorant of their certain, and necessary causes.  
Now a like Series or chain, and complex of all outward circumstances (whose highest link, Poets say prettily, is fastened to Jupiter's chair, and the lowest is riveted to every individual on earth) steered and leveled by God Almighty, at the first setting out of the first Mover; I conceive, to be that divine Providence and mercy, which (to use our Authors own example) giveth a thriving Genius to the Hollanders; and the like: And not any secret, invisible, mystical blessing, that falleth not under the search or cognizance of a prudent indagation.  
I must needs approve our author's aequanimity, and I may as justly say his magnanimity, in being contented so cheerfully (as he saith) to shake hands with the fading Goods of Fortune; and be deprived of the joys of her most precious blessings; so that he may in recompense, possess in ample measure the true ones of the mind, like Epictetus, that great Master of moral wisdom and piety, who taxeth them of high injustice that repine at God's distribution of his blessings, when he putteth not into their share of goods, such things as they use no industry or means to purchase. For why should that man who above all things esteemeth his own freedom; and who to enjoy that sequestereth himself from commerce with the vulgar of mankind; take it ill of his stars, if such preferments, honours, & applauses meet not him, as are painfully gained after long & tedious services of Princes, & brittle dependences of humorous favourites, & supple compliances with all sorts of natures? As for what he faith of astrology; I do not conceive that wise men reject it so much for being repugnant to Divinity (which he reconcileth well enough) as for having no solid rules, or ground in nature. To rely too far upon that vain art, I judge to be rather folly then impie●y. Unless in our censure, we look to the first Origine of it, which savoureth of the Idolatry of those Heathens that worshipping the Stars and heavenly bodies for Deities, did in a superstitious devotion, attribute unto them the causality of all effects beneath them. And for aught I know, the belief of solid orbs in the heavens, and their regularly-irregular motions, sprung from the same root.) And a like inanity, I should suspect in Chiromancy as well as astrology, (especially, in particular contingent effects) however our Author, and no less a man than Aristotle, seem to attribute somewhat more to that conjectural art of Lynes.  
I should much doubt (though our Author showeth himself of another mind) that Bernardinus Ochinus grew at the last to be a mere Atheist: 
This story I have but upon relation; yet of a very good hand  when after having been first the institutor and Patriarch of the Capucine order (so violent was his zeal then, as no former religious institution, though never so rigorous, was strict enough for him) he from thence fell to be first an heretic, than a Jew; and after a while became a Turk, and at the last wrote a furious Invective against those whom he called the three Grand-Impostors of the World; among whom he ranked our Saviour Christ, as well as Moses and Mahomet.  
I doubt he mistaketh in his chronology, or the printer in the name, when he maketh Ptolemy condemn the Koran.  
He needeth not be so serupulous, as he seemeth to be in averring down rightly, that God cannot do contradictory things, (though peradventure it is not amisle to sweeten the manner of the expression, and the sound of the words) for who understandeth the nature of contradiction, will find Non Entity in one of the terms, which of God, were impiety not to deny peremptorily, for he being in his proper nature self-entity, all being must immediately flow from him, and all not-being be totally excluded from that efflux. Now for the recalling of Time past, which the Angels posed Esdras withal; there is no contradiction in that; as is evident to them that know the essence of time (for it is but putting again, all things, that had motion, into the same state they were in, at that moment unto which time was to be reduced back and from thence, letting it travel on again, by the same motions, and upon the same wheels, it rolled upon before.) And therefore God could do this admirable work, though neither Esdras, nor all the power of creatures together could do it: And consequently it cannot in this Question be said, that he posed mortality with what himself was not able to perform.  
I acknowledge ingenuously our physician's experience hath the advantage of my Philosophy, in knowing there are witches. Yet I am sure, I have no temptation to doubt of the Deity; nor have any unsatisfaction in believing there are Spirits. I do not see such a necessary conjunction between them, as that the supposition of the one, must needs infer the other. Neither do I deny there are witches. I only reserve my assent, till I meet with stronger motives to carry it. And I confess I doubt as much of the efficacy of those magical rules he speaketh of, as also of the finding out of mysteries by the courteous Revelation of Spirits.  
I doubt, his discourse of an universal Spirit, is but a wild fancy: And that in the marshalling of it, he mistaketh the hermetical Philosophers. And surely, it is a weak argument, from a common nature that subsisteth only in our understanding, (out of which it hath no being at all) to infer, by parity, an actual subsistence of the like, in realty of nature, (of which kind of miscarriage in men's discoursings, I have spoken before) And upon this occasion, I do not see how seasonably he falleth, of a sudden, from natural speculations to a moral contemplation of God's Spirit working in us. In which also I would inquire (especially upon his sudden poetical rapture) whether the solidity of the judgement be not outweighed by the airiness of the fancy. Assuredly one cannot err in taking this Author for a very fine ingenious Gentleman: but for how deep a scholar, I leave unto them to judge, that are abler than I am.  
If he had applied himself with earnest study, and upon right grounds, to search out the nature of pure intellects: I doubt not but his great parts would have argued more efficacionsly, than he doth against those that between men and angels put only Porphyry's difference of Mortality and immortality. And he would have dived further into the tenor of their intellectual operations; in which there is no succession; nor ratiocinative discourse; for in the very first instant of their creation, they actually knew all that they were capable of knowing; and they are acquainted even with all free thoughts, past, present, and to come; for they see them in their causes, and they see them altogether at one instant: as I have in my forementioned treatise proved at large: and I think I have already touched thus much once before in this Letter.  
I am tempted here to say a great deal concerning Light, by his taking it to be a bare quality. For in physics no speculation is more useful, or reacheth further. But to set down such phenomena's of it as I have observed, and from whence I evidently collect the nature of it; were too large a theme for this place; when your lordship pleaseth I shall show you another more orderly discourse upon that Subject; wherein I have sufficiently proved it to be a solid Substance and body.  
In his proceeding to collect an intellectual world; and in his discoursing upon the place, and habitation of Angels: As also in his consideration of the activity of glorified eyes; (which shall bein a state of reft; whereas motion, is required to seeing) And in his subtle speculation upon two bodies placed in the vacuity beyond the utmost all-enclosing superficies of Heaven (which implieth a contradiction in nature) me thinks I hear Apelles crying out, Ne sutor ultra Crepidam: or rather it putteth me in mind of one of the titles in Pantagruels Library, (which he expresseth himself conversant in) namely, Quaestio Subtilissima, utrum Chimaera in vacuo bombinans possit comedere Secundas intentiones. With which short note I will leave there considerations; in which (if time and other circumstances allowed it) matter would spring up of excellent Learning.  
When our author shall have read Master White's Dialogues of the world, he will no longer be of the opinion, that the unity of the world is a conclusion of Faith: For it is there demonstrated by Reason.  
Here the thread of the discourse inviteth me to fay a great deal of the production, or creation of man's soul. But it is too tedious and too knotty a piece for a Letter. Now it shall suffice to note, that it is not Ex traduce, and yet hath a strange kind of near dependence of the body; which is, as it were, God's instrument to create it by. This, thus said, or rather rumbled out, may seem hearth; But had your Lordship leisure to peruse what I have written at full upon this point, I doubt not but it would appear plausible enough to you.  
I cannot agree with him when he seemeth to impute inconvenience to long life; & that length of time doth rather impair, then improve us: For surely if we will follow the course of nature, and of reason, it is a mighty great blessing; were it but in this regard, that it giveth time leave to vent & boil away the unquietnesses and turbulencies that follow our passions; and to wean ourselves gently from carnal affections, and at the last to drop with ease and willingness, like ripe fruit from the Tree; as I remember Plotinus finely discourseth in one of his Enneads. For when before the season, it is plucked off with violent hands, or shaken down by rude and boisterous winds, it carrieth along with it an indigested raw taste of the wood, and hath an unpleasant aigreness in its juice, that maketh it unfit for use, till long time have mellowed it: And peradventure it may be to backward, as instead of ripening, it may grow rotten in the very centre. In like manner, souls that go out of their bodies with affections to those objects they leave behind them, (which usually is as long as they can relish them) do retain still even in their separation, a bias, and a languishing towards them: which is the Reason why such terrene souls appear oftenest in Coemeteries and charnel houses; (and not, that moral one which our Author giveth:) for life which is union with the body, being that which carnal souls have straightesh affections to, and that they are loathest to be separated from; their unquiet Spirit, which can never (naturally) lose the impressions it had wrought in it at the time of its driving out, lingreth perpetually after that dear comfort of his. The impossibility cannot cure them of their impotent desires; They would fain be alive again, — Iterumque ad tarda reverti Corpora. Quae lucis miseris tam dira cupido?  
And to this cause peradventure may be reduced the strange effect which is frequently seen in England, when at the approach of the Murderer, the slain body suddenly bleedeth afreth: For certainly the souls of them that are treacherously murdered by surprise, use to leave their Bodies with extreme unwillingness, and with vehement indignation against them that force them to so unprovided & abhorred a passage. That soul then to wreak its evil talent against the hated Murderer, and to draw a just and desired revenge upon his head; would do all it can to manifest the author of the fact. To speak, it cannot; for in itself, it wanteth Organs of voice, and those it is parted from, are now grown too heavy, and are too benumbed for it, to give motion unto. Yet some change it desireth to make in the body which it hath to vehement inclinations to, & therefore is the aptest for it to work upon. It must then endeavour to cause a motion in the subtlest & most fluid parts (and consequently, the most movable ones) of it. This can be nothing but the Blood; which then being violently moved, must needs gush out at those places where it findeth issues.  
Our author cannot believe that the world will perish upon the ruins of its own principles: But Master White hath demonstrated the end of it upon natural Reason. And though the precise time for that general destruction be inscrutable; yet he learnedly showeth an ingenious rule whereby to measure in some fort the duration of it, without being branded (as our author threatneth) with convincible and Statute madness, or with impiety. And whereas he will have the work of this last great day (the summer up of all past days) to imply annihilation and thereupon interesseth God only in it: I must beg leave to contradict him namely in this point, and to affirm that the letting loose then of the activest Element to destroy this face of the World, will but beget a change in it, and that no annihilation can proceed from God Almighty: for his essence being (as I said before) self-existence, it is more impossible that Not-being should flow from him, than that cold should flow immediately from fire, or darkness from the actual presence of light.  
I must needs acknowledge that where he balanceth life and death against one another and considereth that the latter is to be a kind of nothing for a moment, to become a pure Spirit within one instant, and what followeth of this strong thought; is extreme handsomely said, and argueth very gallant and generous resolutions in him.  
To exemplify the immortality of the soul, he needeth not have recourse to the philosopher's stone. His own store furnisheth him with a most pregnant one of reviving a plant (the same numerical plant) out of his own ashes. But under his favour, I believe his experiment will fail, if under the notion of the fame, he comprehendeth all the Accidents that first accompanied that plant; for since in the ashes there remaineth only the fixed Salt, I am very confident that all the colour, and much of the odour and taste of it, is flown away with the Volatile salt.  
What should I say of his making so particular a narration of personal things, and private thoughts of his own; the knowledge whereof cannot much conduce to any man's betterment? (which I make account is the chief end of his writing this discourse) As where he speaketh of the soundness of his body, of the course of his diet, of the coolness of his blood at the Summer Solstice of his age, of his neglect of an Epitaph: how long he hath lived or may live what Popes, Emperors, Kings, Grand-Seigniors, he hath been contemporary unto, and the like: would it not be thought that he hath a special good opinion of himself, (and indeed he hath reason) when he maketh such great Princes the landmarks in the Chronology of himself? Surely if he were to write by retail the particulars of his own Story and life, it would be a notable Romanze; since he telleth us in one total sum, it is a continued miracle of thirty years. Though he creepeth gently upon us at the first, yet he groweth a giant, an Attlas (to use his own expression) at the last. But I will not censure him as he that made notes upon Balsacs' letters, and was angry with him for vexing his readers with stories of his Cholikes, and voiding of gravel. I leave this kind of his expressions, without looking further into them.  
In the next place (my Lord) I shall take occasion from our authors setting so main a difference between moral honesty and virtue, or being virtuous, (to use his own phrase) out of an inbred loyalty to virtue; and on the other side, being virtuous for a rewards sake; To discourse a little concerning virtue in this life, and the effects of it afterwards. Truly (my Lord) however he seemeth to prefer this latter, I cannot but value the other much before it, if we regard the nobleness, and heroicness of the nature and mind from whence they both proceed: And if we consider the journeys end, to which each of them carrieth us, I am confident the first yieldeth nothing to the second, but indeed both meet in the period of Beatitude. To clear this point (which is very well worth the wisest man's seriousest thoughts) we must consider, what it is that bringeth us to this excellent State, to be happy in the other world of eternity and immutability. It is agreed on all hands to be God's grace and favour to us: But all do not agree by what steps his grace produceth this effect. Herein I shall not trouble your lordship with a long discourse, how that grace worketh in us, (which yet I will in a word touch anon, that you may conceive what I understand grace to be) but will suppose it to have wrought its effect in us in this life, and from thence examine what hinges they are that turn us over to Beatitude and Glory in the next. Some consider God as a judge, that rewardeth or punisheth men, according as they cooperated with or repugned to, the grace he gave. That according as their actions please or displease him, he is well affected towards them or angry with them; And accordingly maketh them, to the purpose, and very home, feel the effects of his kindness or indignation. Others that fly a higher pitch, and are so happy, — Vt rerum poterint cognoscere causas, do conceive that Beatitude, and misery in the other life, are effects that necessarily and orderly flow out of the nature of those causes that be got them in this life, without engaging God Almighty to give a sentence, and act the part of a judge, according to the state of our cause, as it shall appear upon the accusations and pleadings at his great Bar. Much of which manner of expression, is metaphorical, and rather adapted to contain vulgar minds in their duties (that are awed with the thought of a severe judge, sifting every minute action of theirs) then such as we must conceive every circumstance to pass so in reality as the literal sound of the words seems to infer in ordinary construction: (and yet all that is true too, in its genuine sense) But (my Lord) these more penetrating men, and that I conceive are virtuous upon higher and stronger motives (for they truly and solidly know why they are so) do consider that what impressions are once made in the spiritual substance of a soul, and what affections it hath once contracted, do ever remain in it till a contrary and diametrally contradicting judgement and affection, do obliterate it, & expel it thence. This is the reason why Contrition, sorrow and hatred for past Sins, is encharged us. If then the soul do go out of the body with impressions and affections to the objects, and pleasures of this life; it continually lingreth after them, and as Virgil (learnedly as well as wittily) saith, 
— Quae gratia currûm, Armorumque fuit vivis, quae cura nitentes  
Pascere equos, eadem sequitur tellure repostos.  But that being a State wherein those objects neither are, nor can be enjoyed, it must needs follow that such a soul must be in an exceeding anguish, sorrow, & affliction, for being deprived of them; & for want of those it so much prizeth, will neglect all other contentments it might have, as not having a relish or taste moulded and prepared to the savouring of them; but like feverish tongues, that when they are even scorched with heat, take no delight in the pleasing liquours, but the sweetest drinks seem bitter to them by reason of their overflowing Gall; so they even hate whatsoever Good is in their power, and thus pine away a long eternity. In which the sharpness and activity of their pain, anguish, and sad condition, is to be measured by the sensibleness of their natures: which being then purely spiritual, is in a manner infinitely more than any torment that in this life can be inflicted upon a dull gross body. To this add, the vexation it must be to them, to see how inestimable and infinite a good, they have lost; and lost merely by their own fault; and for momentary trifles, and children's play; and that it was so easy for them to have gained it, had they remained but in their right senses, and governed themselves according to Reason. And then judge in what a tortured condition they must be, of remorse and execrating themselves for their most resupine and senseless madness. But if on the other side, a soul be released out of this Prison of clay and flesh, with affections settled upon intellectual goods as Truth, Knowledge, and the like; And that it be grown to an irksome dislike of the flat pleasures of this world; and look upon carnal and sensual objects with a disdainful eye, as discerning the contemptible inanity in them, that is set off only by their painted outside; and above all, that it have a longing desire to be in the society of that supereminent cause of causes, in which they know are heaped up the Treasures of all beauty, Knowledge, Truth, Delight, and good whatsoever; and therefore are impatient at the Delay, and reckon all their absence from him as a tedious benithment; and in that regard hate their life & body as cause of this divorce: such a soul I say must necessarily, by reason of the Temper it is wrought into enjoy immediately at the instant of the body's dissolution and its liberty, more contentment, more joy, more true happiness, than it is possible for a heart of flesh to have scarce any scantling of, much less to comprehend.  
For immense knowledge is natural to it; as I have touched before. Truth, which is the adaequated and satisfying object of the understanding, is there displayed in her own Colours; or rather without any.  
And that which is the Crown of all, and in respect of which all the rest is nothing; that infinite entity which above all things this soul thirsteth to be united unto, can not for his own goodness sake deny his embraces to so affectionate a Creature, and to such an inflamed love. If he should; then, were that soul, for being the best, and for loving him most, condemned to be the unhappiest. For what joy could she have in any thing, were she barred from what she so infinitely loveth? But since the nature of superior and excellent things is to shower down their propitious influences wheresoever there is a capacity of receiving them, and no obstacle to keep them out (like the Sun that illuminateth the whole air, if no cloud or solid opacous body intervene) it followeth clearly that this infinite Sun of justice, this immense Ocean of goodness, cannot choose but environ with his beams, and replenish even beyond satiety with his delightsome waters, a soul so prepared and tempered to receive them.  
Now (my Lord) to make use of this discourse and apply it to what begot it; be pleased to determine which way will deliver us evenest and smoothest to this happy end of our journey: To be virtuous for hope of a reward, and through fear of punishment, or to be so, out of a natural and inward affection to virtue, for virtues and reason's sake? surely one in this latter condition, not only doth those things which will bring him to Beatitude; but he is so secured in a manner under an Armour of proof, that he is almost invulnerable; he can scarce miscarry, he hath not so much as an inclination to work contrarily, the alluring baits of this World, tempt him not; he disliketh, he hateth, even his necessary commerce with them whiles he liveth. On the other side, the hireling that steereth his course only by his reward and punishment, doth we●l I confess; but he doth it with reluctance; he carrieth the ark, God's Image, his soul, safely home, it is true, but he loweth pitifully after his calves that he leaveth behind him among the Philistians. In a word he is virtuous, but if he might safely, he would do vicious things. (And hence he the ground in nature, if so I may say, of our Purgatory) methinks two such minds may not unfitly be compared to two maids, whereof one hath a little sprinkling of the green sickness, and hath more mind to eat ashes, chalk, or Leather, than meats of solid and good nourishment; but for beareth them, knowing the languishing condition of Health it will bring her to: But the other having a ruddy, vigorous and perfect constitution, and enjoying a complete entire eucrasy, delights in no food but of good nouriture, & loathes the others delights. Her health is discovered in her looks, and she is secure from any danger of that Malady, whereas the other, for all her good diet, beareth in her complexion some sickly testimony of her depraved appetite; and if she be not very Wary, she is in danger of a relapse.  
It falleth fit in this place to examine our author's apprehension of the end of such honest Worthies and Philosophers (as he calleth them) that died before Christ his incarnation, whether any of them could be saved or no. Truly (my Lord) I make no doubt at all, but if any followed in the whole Tenor of their lives, the dictamens of right Reason, but that their journey was secure to Heaven. Out of the former discourse appeareth what temper of mind is necessary to get thither. And, that Reason would dictate such a temper to aperfectly judicious man (though but in the state of Nature) the best and most rational for him, I make no doubt at all. But it is most true; they are exceeding few, (if any) in whom Reason worketh clearly and is not overswayed by Passion and terrene affections; they are few that can discern what is reasonable to be done in every circumstance. 
— Pauci, quos aequus amavit Jupiter, aut ardens evexit ad aethera virtus;  
Dis geniti, potuere;—  And fewer, that knowing what is best, can win of themselves to do accordingly; (video meliora proboque, deteriora sequor; being most men's cases) so that after all that can be expected at the hands of nature and reason in their best habit, since the lapse of them, we may conclude, it would have been a most difficult thing for any man, and a most impossible one for mankind, to attain unto Beatitude, if Christ had not come to teach, and by his example to show us the way.  
And this was the Reason of his incarnatiod, teaching life & death: for being God, we could not doubt his veracity, when he told us news of the other world; having all things in his power, and yet enjoying none of the delights of this life, no man should stick at foregoing them, since his example showeth all men that such a course is best; whereas few are capable of the Reason of it: And for his last act, dying in such an afflicted manner, he taught us how the securest way to step immediately into perfect happiness, is to be crucified to all the desires, delights, and contentments of this World.  
But to come back to our Physician: truly (my Lord) I must needs pay him as a due the acknowledging his pious discourses to be excellent and pathetical ones, containing worthy motives, to incite one to virtue and to deter one from vice: thereby to gain Heaven, and to avoid Hell. Assuredly he is owner of a solid head and of a strong generous heart. Where he employeth his thoughts upon such things as thoughts upon such things as resoit to no higher, or more abstruse Principles than such as occur in ordinary conversation with the world, or in the common track of study and learning, I know no man would say better. But when he meeteth with such difficulties as his next concerning the Resurrection of the body, (wherein after deep meditation, upon the most abstracted principles, and speculations of the metaphysics, one hath much ado to solve the appearing contradictions in Nature) There, I do not at all wonder he should tread a little awry, and go astray in the dark; for I conceive his course of life hath not permitted him to allow much time unto the unwinding of such entangled and abstracted subtleties. But if it had, I believe his natural parts are such as he might have kept the chair from most men I know: for even where he roveth widest, it is with so much wit and sharpness, as putteth me in mind of a great man's censure upon Joseph Scaligers Cyclometrica (a matter he was not well versed in) that he had rather err so ingeniously as he did, then hit upon Truth in that heavy manner as the Jesuite, his antagonist stuffeth his books. Most assuredly his wit and smartness in this discourse is of the finest Standard; and his insight into severer Learning will appear as piercing unto such as use not strictly the touchstone and the Test to examine everypeece of the glittering coin he payeth his reader with. But to come to the Resurrection, methinks it is but a gross conception to think that every atom of the present individual matter of a body; every grain of Ashes of a burned Cadaver, scattered by the wind throughout the world, and after numerous variations changed peradventure into the body of another man; should at the sounding of the last Trumpet be raked together again from all the corners of the earth, and be made up anew into the same Body it was before of the first man. Yet if we will be Christians, and rely upon God's promises, we must believe that we shall rise again with the same Body, that walked about, did eat, drink, and live here on earth; and that we shall see our Saviour and Redeemer with the same, the very same, eyes, wherewith we now look upon the fading Glories of this contemptible world.  
How shall these seeming contrarieties be reconciled? if the latter be true why should not the former be admitted? To explicate this riddle the better, give me leave to ask your Lordship if you now see the Cannons, the ensigns, the arms and other martial preparations at Oxford, with the same eyes, wherewith many years agone you looked upon Porphyry's and Aristotle's glearned leases there? I doubt not but you will answer me, Assuredly with the very same. Is that noble and graceful person of yours, that begetteth both delight and Reverence in every one that looketh upon it? Is that body of yours, that now is grown to such comely and full dimensions, as Nature can give her none more advantageous, the same person, the same body, which your virtuous and excellent Mother bore nine months in her chaste and honoured womb, and that your Nurse gave suck unto? most certainly it is the same. And yet if you consider it well, it cannot be doubted but that sublunary matter, being in a perpetual flux, and in bodies which have internal principles of heat and motion, much continually transpiring out to make room for the supply of new aliment; at the length, in long process of time, all is so changed, As that Ship at Athens may as well be called the same ship that was there two hundred years before, and whereof (by reason of the continual reparations) not one foot of the timber is remaining in her that builded her at the first; As this Body now, can be called the same it was, forty years agone unless some higher consideration keep up the Identity of it. Now what that is, Let us examine, and whether or no, it will reach to our difficulty of the Resurrection. Let us consider then how that which giveth the numerical individuation to a Body, is the substantial form. As long as that remaineth the same, though the matter be in a continual flux and motion, yet the thing is still the same. There is not one drop of the same water in the Thames that ran down by Whitehall yesternight, yet no man will deny, but that it is the same River that was in Queen Elizabeth's time, as long as it is supplied from the same Common stock, the Sea. Though this example reacheth not hom, it illustrateth the thing. If then the form remain absolutely the same after separation from the matter, that it was in the matter, (which can happen only to forms, that subsist by themselves; as human souls) it followeth then, that whensoever it is united to matter again, (all matter coming out of the same common Magazine) it maketh again the same man, with the same eyes, and all the same limbs that were formerly Nay, he is composed of the same individual matter: for it hath the same distinguisher and individuator; to wit, the same form, or soul. Matter considered singly by itself, hath no distinction: All matter is in itself the same; we must fancy it, as we do the indigested Chaos; It is an uniformly wild Ocean. Particularize a few drops of the Sea, by filling a glass full of them; then that glass full is distinguished from all the rest of the watery bulk: But return back those few drops to from whence they were taken, and the glass-full that even now had an individuation by itself, loseth that, and groweth one and the same with the other main stock: Yet if you fill your glass again, whersoever you take it up, so it be of the same uniform bulk of water you had before, it is the same glass-full of water that you had. But as I said before, this example fitteth entirely, no more than the other did. In such abstracted speculations, where we must consider matter without form (which hath no actual being) we must not expect adaequated examples in nature. But enough is said to make a speculative man see, that if God should join the soul of a lately dead man (even whiles his dead corpse should lie entire in his winding sheet here) unto a Body made of earth taken from foam mountain in America; it were most true and certain that the body he should then live by, were the same. Identical body he lived with before his Death and late Resurrection. It is evident that sameness, thisness, and thatness, belongeth not to matter by itself, (For a general indifference runneth through it all) but only as it is distinguished and individuated by the form. Which, in our case, whensoever the same soul doth, it must be understood always to be the same matter and body.  
This point thus passed over; I may piece to it what our Author saith of a Magazine of Subsistent forms residing first in the Chaos, & hereafter (when the world shall have been destroyed by fire) in the general heap of Ashes; out of which God's voice did, & shall, draw them out & clothe them with matter. This language were handsome for a Poet or a Rhetorician to speak. But in a Philosopher, that should ratiocinate strictly and rigorously, I can not admit it, for certainly there are no subsistent forms of corporeal things: (excepting the soul of man, which besides being an informing form, hath another particular consideration belonging to it; too long to speak of here) But whensoever that compound is destroyed, the form perisheth with the whole. And for the natural production of corporeal things I conceive it to be wrought out by the action and passion of the Elements among themselves; which introducing new tempers and dispositions, into the bodies where these conflicts pass; new forms succeed old ones, when the dispositions are raised to such a height as can no longer consist with the preceding form, and are in the immediate degree to fit the succeeding one, which they usher in. The mystery of all which I have at large unfolded in my above mentioned treatise, of the immortality of the soul.  
I shall say no more to the first part of our physician's discourse, after I have observed how his consequence is no good one, where he inferreth that if the devils foreknew, who would be damned or saved, it would save them the labour, and end their work of tempting mankind to mischief and evil. For whatsoever their moral design, and success be in it, their nature impelleth them to be always doing it. For on the one side, it is active in the highest degree (as being pure Acts, that is Spirits,) so on the other side, they are malign in as great an excess: By the one they must be always working wheresoever they may work; (like water in a vessel full of holes, that will run out of every one of them which is not stopped) By the other, their whole work must be malicious and mischievous. Joining then both these qualities together, it is evident they will always be tempting mankind, though they know they shall be frustrate of their moral end.  
But were it not time that I made an end? Yes, it is more than time. And therefore having once passed the limit that confined what was becoming, the next step carried me into the Ocean of Error; which being infinite, and therefore more or less bearing no proportion in it; I will proceed a little further, to take a short survey of his Second part; And hope for as easy Pardon after this addition to my sudden and indigested remarkes, as if I had closed them up now.  
methinks, he beginneth with somewhat an affected discourse to prove his natural inclination to Charity which virtue is the intended theme of all the remainder of his discourse. And I doubt he mistaketh the lowest orb or Lembe of that high seraphic virtue, for the top and perfection of it; and maketh a kind of human compassion to be divine Charity. he will have it to be a general way of doing good: It is true, he addeth then, for God's sake; But he allayeth that again, with saying he will have that good done as by obedience, and to accomplish God's will; and looketh at the effects it worketh upon our souls but in a narrow compass; like one in the vulgar throng, that considereth God as a judge, & as a rewarder or a punisher. Whereas perfect Charity, is that vehement love of God for his own sake, for his goodness, for his beauty, for his excellency that carrieth all the motions of our soul directly and violently to him; and maketh a man difdaine, or rather hate all obstacles that may retard his journey to him. And that face of it that looketh toward mankind with whom we live, & warmeth us to do others good, is but like the overflowings of the main stream, that swelling: above its banks runneth over in a multitude of little Channels.  
I am not satisfied, that in the likeness which he putteth between God and Man, he maketh the difference between them, to be but such as between two creatures that resemble one another. For between these, there is some proportions; but between the others, none at all. In the examining of which discourse, wherein the Author observeth that no two faces are ever seen to be perfectly alike; Nay no two Pictures of the same face, were ever exactly made so; I could take occasion to insert a subtle & delightful demonstration of Mr. White's, wherein he showeth how it is impossible that two bodies (for example, two Boules) should ever be made exactly like one another; Nay, not rigorously equal in any one accident, as namely in weight, but that still there will be some little difference, and inequality between them, (the Reason of which observation, our Author meddleth not with) were it not that I have been so long already, as digressions were now very unseasonable.  
Shall I commend or censure our Author for believing so well of his acquired knowledge as to be dejected at the thought of not being able to leave it a Legacy among his friends? Or shall I examine whether it be not a high injury to wife and gallant Princes, who out of the generousness and nobleness of their Nature do patronize arts and learned men, to impute their so doing to vanity of desiring praise, or to fear of reproach?  
But let these pass: I will not engage any that may befriend him, in a quarrel against him. But I may safely produce Epictetus to contradict him when he letteth his kindness engulfe him in deep afflictions for a friend: For he will not allow his wise man to have an inward relenting, a troubled feeling, or compassion of another's misfortunes. That disordereth the one, without any good to the other. Let him afford all the assistances and relievings in his power; but without intermingling himself in the others Woe. As Angels that do us good, but have no passion for us. But this gentleman's kindness goeth yet further: he compareth his love of a friend to his love of God; the union of friends souls by affection, to the union of three persons in the Trinity; and to the hypostatical union of two natures in one Christ, by the Words Incarnation. Most certainly he expresseth himself to be a right good natured man: But if Saint Augustine retracted so severely his pathetical expressions for the death of his friend, saying they favoured more of the rhetorical declamations of a young Orator, then of the grave confession of a devout Christian, (or somewhat to that purpose) what censure upon himself may we expect of our Physician, if ever he make any retractation of this discourse concerning his Religion?  
It is no small misfortune to him, that after so much time spent, and so many places visited in curious search by travelling after the acquisition of so many languages; after the wading so deep in Sciences, as appeareth by the ample Inventory and particular he maketh of himself: The result of all this, should be to profess ingenuously he had studied enough, only to become a sceptic: and that having run through all sorts of Learning, he could find rest and satisfaction in none. This I confess is the unlucky fate of those that light upon wrong Principles. But Master White teacheth us how the Theorems and demonstrations of physics, may be linked & chained together as strongly & as continuedly as they are in the mathematics, if men would but apply themselves to a right method of Study. And I do not find that Solomon complained of ignorance in the height of knowledge; (as this Gentleman saith) but only, that after he hath rather acknowledged himself ignorant of nothing, but that he understood the natures of all Plants from the Cedar to the Hyssop, and was acquainted with all the ways, and paths of wisdom and knowledge; he exclaimeth that all this is but toil, and vexation of Spirit: and therefore adviseth men to change human Studies into divine contemplations and affections.  
I cannot agree to his Resolution of shutting his books, and giving over the search of knowledge, and resigning himself up to ignorance, upon the Reason that moveth him; as though it were extreme vanity to wait our days in the pursuit of that, which by attending but a little longer (till Death hath closed the eyes of our body, to open those of our soul) we shall gain with ease, we shall enjoy by infusion, and is an accessary of our Glorification. It is true, as soon as Death hath played the Midwife to our second birth, our soul shall then see all truths, more freely than our corporal eyes at our first birth see all bodies and colours, by the natural power of it (as I have touched already) and not only upon the grounds our Author giveth. Yet far be it from us to think that time lost which in the mean season we shall laboriously employ to warm ourselves with blowing a few little sparks of that glorious fire which we shall afterwards in one instant leap into the middle of, without danger of Scorching. And that for two important Reasons; (besides several others, too long to mention here) the one, for the great advantage we have by learning in this life; the other, for the huge contentment that the acquisition of it here (which implieth a strong affection to it) will be unto us in the next life. The want of knowledge in our first Mother (which exposed her to be easily deceived by the serpent's cunning) was the root of all our ensuing Misery and Woe. It is as true (which we are taught by irrefragable authority) that Omnis peccans ignorat: And the well head of all the Calamties and mischiefs in the world, eonsisteth of the trouble and bitter waters of ignorance, folly and rashness; to cure which, the only remedy and antidote, is the salt of true Learning, the bitter Wood of Study, painful meditation, and orderly consideration. I do not mean such Study, as armeth wrangling Champions for clamorous schools, where the ability of subtle disputing to and fro, is more prised than the retrieveing of truth; But such as filleth the mind with solid and useful notions, and doth not endanger the swelling it up with windy vanities. Besides the sweetest companion and entertainment of a well tempered mind is to converse familiarly with the naked and bewitching beauties of those Mistresses, those Verities, and Sciences, which by fair courting of them, they gain and enjoy; & every day bring new fresh ones to their Seraglio; where the ancientest never grow old or stale. Is there any thing so pleasing or so profitable as this?  
— Nil dulcius est, bene quam inunita tenere  
Edita doctrinae sapientum templa serena;  
Despicere unde queas alios, passimque videre  
Errare atque viam palanteis quaerere vitae.  
But now if we consider the advantage we shall have in the other life by our affection to Sciences, and conversation with them in this, it is wonderful great. Indeed that affection is so necessary, as without it we shall enjoy little contentment in all the knowledge we shall then be replenished with: for every one's pleasure in the possession of a good, is to be measured by his precedent Desire of that good; and by the quality of the taste and relish of him that feedeth upon it. We should therefore prepare and make our ●ast beforehand by assuefaction unto, and by often relishing, what we shall then be nourished with. That Englishman that can drink nothing but beer, or Ale, would be ill bestead, were he to go into Spain or Italy where nothing but Wine groweth: whereas a well experienced Goinfre that can criticise upon the several tastes of liquours, would think his Palate in Paradise among those delicious Nectars, (to use Aretine's phrase upon his eating of a Lamprey.) Who was ever delighted with Tobacco the first time he took it? & who could willingly be without it, after he was a while habituated to the use of it? How many examples are there daily of young men, that marrying upon their father's command, not through precedent affections of their own, have little comfort in worthy and handsome wives, that others would passionately effect? Archímedes lost his life for being so ravished with the delight of a mathematical demonstration, that he could not of a sudden recall his extasied Spirits to attend the rude soldier's Summons: But instead of him, whose mind had been always said with such subtle diet, how many plain Country Gentlemen doth your Lordship and I know, that rate the knowledge of their husbandry at a much higher pitch; and are extremely delighted by conversing with that; whereas the other would be most tedious and importune to them? We may then safely conclude, that if we will joy in the Knowledge we shall have after Death, we must in our life time raise within ourselves, earnest affections to it, and desires of it: which cannot be barren ones; but will press upon us to gain some knowledge by way of advance here; and the more we attain unto the more we shall be in Louè with what remaineth behind. To this reason then adding the other, how knowledge is the surest prop, and guide of our present life: and how it perfecteth a man in that which constituteth him a man; his Reason; and how it enableth him to read boldly, steadily, constantly, and knowingly in all his ways: And I am confident, All men that shall hear the case thus debated, will join with me in making it a Suit to our physician, that he will keep his books open, and continue that progress he hath so happily begun.  
But I believe your Lordship will scarcely join with him in his with that we might procreate and beget Children without the help of women or without any conjunction or commerce with that sweet, and bewitching Sex. Plato taxed his fellow Philosopher, (though other wise a learned and brave man) for not sacrificing to the Graces; those gentle female goddesses. What thinketh your Lordship of our physicians bitter censure of that action which Mahomet maketh the essence of his Paradise? Indeed besides those his unkindnesses, or rather frowardnesses, at that tender-hearted Sex (which must needs take it ill at his hands) me thinketh he setreth marriage at too low a rate, which is assuredly the highest and divinest link of human society. And where he speaketh of Cupid, and of Beauty, it is in such a phrase, as putteth me in mind of the Learned Greek Reader in Cambridge his courting of his Mistress out of Stephens his Thesaurus.  
My next observation upon his discourse draweth me to a logical consideration of the nature of an exact syllogism: which kind of reflection, though it use to open the door in the course of Learning and study; yet it will ne'er shut it in my discourse; which my following the thread that my Author spinneth, assigneth to this place. If he had well and throughly considered all that is required to that strict way of managing our Reason, he would not have censured Aristotle for condemning the fourth figure, out of no other motive, but because it was not consonant to his own principles; that it would not fit with the foundations himself had laid; though it do with reason, (saith he) and be consonant to that; which indeed it doth not, at all times and in all Circumstances. In a perfect syllogism the predicate must be identified with the subject, and each extreme with the middle term, and so consequently, all three with one another. But in Galen's fourth figure the case may so fall out, as these rules will not be current there.  
As for the good and excellency that he considereth in the worst things; and how far from solitude, any man is in a wilderness; These are (in his discourse) but equivocal considerations of Good, and of loneliness: nor are they any ways pertinent to the morality of that part where he treateth of them.  
I have much ado to believe what he speaketh confidently: that he is more beholding to Morpheus for Learned and rational, as well as pleasing dreams; then to Mercury for smart and facetious conceptions; whom Saturn (it seemeth by his relation) hath looked asquint upon in his geniture.  
In his concluding Prayer, wherein he summeth up all he wisheth; me thinketh his arrow is not winged with that fire which I should have expected from him upon this occasion; for it is not the peace of Conscience, nor the bridling up of one's affections, that expresseth the highest delightfulness and happiest state of a perfect Christian. It is love only that can give us Heaven upon earth, as well as in Heaven; and bringeth us thither too: so that the Tuscan Virgil had reason to say, 
— In alte dolcezze  
Non si puo gioir, se non amando.   
And this love must be employed upon the noblest and highest object; not terminated in our friends. But of this transcendent and divine part of Charity that looketh directly and immediately upon God himself; and that is the intrinsical form, the utmost perfection, the scope and final period of true Religion, (this gentleman's intended theme; as I conceive) I have no occasion to speak any thing, since my Author doth but transiently mention it; and that too, in such a phrase as ordinary catechisms speak of it to vulgar capacities.  
Thus (my Lord) having run through the book (God knows how slightly, upon so great a sudden) which your Lordship commanded me to give you an account of, there remaineth yet a weightier task upon me to perform; which is to excuse myself of presumption for daring to consider any moles in that face which you had marked for a beauty. But who shall well consider my manner of proceeding in these remarkes, will free me from that censure. I offer not at judging the prudence and wisdom of this discourse: Those are fit inquiries for your lordship's Court of highest appeal; in my inferior one, I meddle only with little knotty pieces of particular Sciences; (Matinae apis instar, operosa parvus carmina fingo) In which it were peradventure a fault for your Lordship to be too well versed; your employments are of a higher and nobler strain; and that concern the welfare of millions of men: 
Tu regere imperio populos (Sackville) memento  
(Hae tibi erunt arts) pacique imponere morem.   
Such little Studies as these, belong only to those persons that are low in the rank they hold in the Commonwealth, low in their conceptions, and low in a languishing and justing leisure, such a one as Virgil calleth Ignobile otium, and such a one as I am now dulled withal. If Alexander or Caesar should have commended a tract of Land, as fit to fight a battle in for the Empire of the World, or to build a City upon, to be the Magazine and staple of all the adjacent countries; nobody could justly condemn that husbandman, who according to his own narrow art and rules, should censure the plains of Arbela, or Pharsalia for being in some places sterile; or the meadows about Alexandria, for being sometimes subject to be overflowen; or could tax ought he should say in that kind for a contadiction unto the others commendations of those places; which are built upon higher, and larger principles. So (my Lord) I am confident I shall not be reproached of unmannerliness for putting in a demurrer unto a few little particularities in that Noble discourse which your Lordship gave a general applause unto; And by doing so, I have given your Lordship the best account I can of myself, as well as of your Commands. You hereby see what my entertainments are, and how I play away my time, 
— Dorset dum magnus ad alrum  
Fulminat Oxonium bello, victorque volentes  
Per populos dat jura; viamque affectat Olympo.   
May your Counsels there be happy, and successful ones, to bring about that Peace which if we be not quickly blessed withal, a general ruin threatneth the whole kingdom. From Winchester house the 22. (I think I may lay the 23. for I am sure it is morning, and I think it is day) of December. 1642.  
Your lordship's most humble and obedient servant, KENELME DIGBY.   

The Postscript.  
My Lord,  
LOoking over these loose papers to point them, I perceive I have forgotten what I promised in the eight she to touch in a word concerning Grace: do not conceive it to be a quality, in fused by God Almighty into a soul.  
Such kind of discoursing, satisfiet me no more in Divinity, then in Philosophy. I take it to be the whole complex of such real motives (as a soli● account may be given of them) that incline a man to virtue, and piety; an● are set on foot by God's particular Grace and favour, to bring that work to pass. As for example: To à man planged in Sensuality, some great misfortune happeneth, that mouldeth his heart to a tenderness, and inclineth him to much thoughtfulness: In this temper, he meeseth with a book, or a Preacher, that representeth lively to him the danger of his own condition; and giveth him hopes of greater contentment in other objects, after he shall have taken leave of his former beloved sins. This begetteth further conversation with prudent and pious men, and experienced physicians in curing the souls Maladies; whereby he is at last perfectly converted and settled in a coure of Solid virtue, and Piety.  
Now ithese accidents of his misfortune, the gentleness and softness of his nature, his falling upon a good book, his encountering with a patheticke Preacher, the impremeditated Chance that brought him to hear his Sermon, his meeting with other worthy men, and the whole concatenation of all the intervening accidents to work this good effect in him; and that were ranged and disposed from all Eternity, by God's particular goodness and providence for his Salvation; and without which he had inevitably been damned; this chain of causes, ordered by God to produce this effect, I understand to be Grace.  
FINIS.