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The Writings 
 
 OF 
 
 Sir Thomas Browne 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI 
 
 A LETTER TO A FRIEND 
 
 CHRISTIAN MORALS 
 
 URN-BURIAL 
 
 AND OTHER 
 
 PAPERS 
 
 BY 
 
 SIR THOMAS BROWNE, Kt. M. D. 
 
 BOSTON 
 TICKNOR AND FIELDS 
 1862 
 

 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1861, by 
 TICK X OR AND FIELDS, 
 
 in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 
 
 Second Edition. 
 
 Cambridge, Mass. : 
 
 Welch, Bigelow, axd CoiiPAxy, 
 
 Peintees to the University. 
 
TO 
 
 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, M. D 
 
 AUTHOR OF "the AUTOCRAT OF THE BREAKFAST-TABLE," 
 
 JOHN BROWN, M.D. 
 
 AUTHOR OF " RAB AND HIS FRIENDS," 
 
 Z])is Tolume 
 
 OF THE ELOQUENT WRITINGS 
 
 OF AN OLD ENGLISH PHYSICIAN 
 
 IS INSCRIBED BY THE EDITOR. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Biographical Sketch of the Author 
 
 Page 
 
 vii 
 
 Religio Medici i 
 
 A Letter to a Friend .... 157 
 
 True Christian Morals . . . 183 
 
 Hydriotaphia. Urn-Burial . . . 275 
 
 From the Garden of Cyrus . . 353 
 
 From Vulgar Errors 375 
 
 Fragment on Mummies .... 409 
 
 On Dreams 416 
 
 Letters 424 
 
 Resolves 430 
 
Biographical Sketch of 
 
 The Author. 
 
 OR a more detailed account of the 
 life of Sir Thomas Browne, the 
 reader is referred to his Biography 
 by Dr. Johnson, and the Supple- 
 mentary Memoir by Simon Wilkin, Esq., both 
 included In the London edition of the Complete 
 Works, in four volumes. Coleridge, Lamb, 
 Hazlitt, Hallam, Bulwer, and other distinguished 
 writers, have put on record their estimate of 
 his genius, and Cowper was so imbued with 
 the spirit and beauty of the thought In the 
 Religio Medici and other writings of Browne, 
 that numerous resemblant passages in the Task 
 have been frequently pointed out. The present 
 Editor will content himself with giving a few 
 dates of the principal occurrences in the author's 
 life, and adding to these some interesting pas- 
 sages written by one who was for thirty years 
 
viii BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
 
 Sir Thomas Browne's intimate friend. It is to 
 be regretted that Mr. Whitefoot did not carry 
 out his intention of writing an extended memoir 
 of his well-beloved companion, for what he has 
 left to us is conceived in so attractive a manner, 
 we cannot but lament his original design was 
 not fully completed. How much he valued Sir 
 Thomas's friendship may be gathered from his 
 remark, that he " ever esteemed it a special fa- 
 vour of Divine Providence to have had a more 
 particular acquaintance with this excellent per- 
 son, for two thirds of his life, than any other 
 man that is now (1682) left alive." 
 
 Sir Thomas Browne was born in London on 
 the 19th of October, 1605, and died on his 
 birthday, at Norwich, in 1682. His father 
 came of an ancient Upton family, in Cheshire, 
 and enjoyed a good name as an honest mer- 
 chant. A daughter of Sir Thomas has recorded 
 of this worthy man an act very touching in its 
 pious significance. She says, in a memorandum 
 in her own hand, appended to a brief account of 
 her distingushed parent, "his father used to open 
 his breast when he was asleep, and kiss it in 
 prayers over him, as 't is said of Origen's father, 
 that the Holy Ghost would take possession 
 there." This excellent person dying when his 
 son Thomas was yet a lad, the boy was de- 
 frauded by one of his guardians, but found his 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 
 
 IX 
 
 way to the school of Winchester for his educa- 
 tion. In 1623 ^^ went to Oxford, entering as a 
 gentleman-commoner, and graduated from the 
 newly named Pembroke College in 1626-7. 
 Turning his attention to physic after taking his 
 degree of Master of Arts, he practised in his 
 profession some time in Oxfordshire. He after- 
 wards travelled into France and Italy, visiting 
 Montpellier and Padua, then celebrated schools 
 of physic, and, returning home through Holland, 
 was created Doctor of Medicine at Leyden. In 
 1634 he is supposed to have returned to London, 
 and to have written his " Religio Medici " * 
 during the next year. This celebrated treatise 
 was not printed till 1642, when, without his 
 consent, the book was pubHshed. It at once 
 attracted great attention, and was criticised in 
 a volume by Sir Kenelm Digby, "who," says 
 Lord Clarendon, "was a person very eminent 
 and notorious throughout the whole course of 
 his hfe, from his cradle to the grave." The 
 " Religio Medici " was very soon translated into 
 Latin, Italian, German, Dutch, and French. 
 
 Dr. Browne settled in Norwich, where his 
 practice became very extensive, many patients 
 
 * " This book paints certain parts of my moral and intellectual 
 being (the best parts, no doubt) better than any other book I 
 have ever met vi^ith 5 — and the st>'le is throughout delicious." — 
 S. T. Coleridge. 
 
X BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
 
 coming from a distance to consult so eminent a 
 physician, now made more famous by the pub- 
 lication of so admirable a book. In 1641, he 
 married Mrs. Mileham, a most excellent lady, 
 whose graces both of mind and body well fitted 
 her to become the partner of her distinguished 
 husband. They lived together forty-one years, 
 and with their ten children formed a household 
 singularly happy in all its relations. In 1646 
 Dr. Browne printed his " Enquiries into Vulgar 
 and Common Errors"; in 1658, his "Hydriota- 
 phia, or Urn Burial," adding to the treatise his 
 " Garden of Cyrus." His other writings were 
 published after his death, many of them being 
 left corrected for the press by his own hand. 
 Charles the Second conferred on him the honor 
 of knighthood in 167 1, while on a tour to Nor- 
 wich ; and Evelyn, who went down at that time 
 to join the royal party, having, as he says, "a 
 desire to see that famous scholar and physitian, 
 Dr. T. Browne," paid him a visit. He makes 
 eulogistic mention of Sir Thomas's home, and 
 tells us that " his whole house and garden was a 
 paradise and cabinet of rarities, and that of the 
 best collections, especially medails, books, plants, 
 and natural things." So the good physician's 
 days passed onward, filled with high reputation, 
 and devoted to constant usefulness in his pro- 
 fession, till in his seventy-sixth year he fell ill 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. xi 
 
 and died. Submission to the will of God and 
 fearlessness of death were among the expressions 
 last on his lips. His burial-place is in the 
 Church of St. Peter, Mancroft, in Norwich, 
 where a mural monument on the south pillar 
 of the altar records his learning and his virtues. 
 
 The Rev. John Whitefoot, who Hved so 
 many years the constant friend and neighbour 
 of Sir Thomas, was requested to draw up some 
 " minutes " after the death of his old compan- 
 ion. He complied in these fitting and worthy- 
 to-be-remembered words. 
 
 " For a character of his person, his complex- 
 ion and hair were answerable to his name ; his 
 stature was moderate, and habit of body neither 
 fat nor lean, but evVapKoj. 
 
 " In his habit of clothing, he had an aversion 
 to all finery, and affected plainness both in the 
 fashion and ornaments. He ever wore a cloak, 
 or boots, when few others did. He kept him- 
 self always very warm, and thought it most safe 
 so to do, though he never loaded himself with 
 such a multitude of garments as Suetonius re- 
 ports of Augustus, enough to clothe a good 
 family. 
 
 "The horizon of his understanding was much 
 larger than the hemisphere of the world. All 
 that was visible in the heavens he comprehended 
 6 
 
xii BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
 
 so well, that few that are under them knew so 
 much. He could tell the number of the visible 
 stars in his horizon, and call them all by their 
 names that had any ; and of the earth he had 
 such a minute and exact geographical knowl- 
 edge, as if he had been by Divine Providence 
 ordained surveyor-general of the whole terres- 
 trial orb, and its products, minerals, plants, and 
 animals. He was so curious a botanist, that, 
 besides the specifical distinctions, he made nice 
 and elaborate observations, equally useful as 
 entertaining. 
 
 " His memory, though not so eminent as that 
 of Seneca or Scaliger, was capacious and tena- 
 cious, insomuch that he remembered all that was 
 remarkable in any book that he had read, and 
 not only knew all persons again that he had ever 
 seen at any distance of time, but remembered 
 the circumstances of their bodies, and their par- 
 ticular discourses and speeches. 
 
 " In the Latin poets he remembered every- 
 thing that was acute and pungent. He had read 
 most of the historians, ancient and modern, 
 wherein his observations were singular, nor 
 taken notice of by common readers. He was 
 excellent company when he was at leisure, and 
 expressed more light than heat in the temper of 
 his brain. 
 
 " He had no despotical power over his afFec- 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. xiii 
 
 tlons and passions, (that was a privilege of original 
 perfection, forfeited by the neglect of the use of 
 it,) but as large a political power over them as 
 any Stoic or man of his time ; whereof he gave 
 so great experiment, that he hath very rarely 
 been known to have been overcome with any 
 of them. The strongest that were found in 
 him, both of the irascible and concupiscible, 
 were under the control of his reason. Of ad- 
 miration, which is one of them, being the only 
 product either of ignorance or uncommon knowl- 
 edge, he had more and less than other men, upon 
 the same account of his knowing more than oth- 
 ers ; so that, though he met with many rarities, 
 he admired them not so much as others do. 
 
 " He was never seen to be transported with 
 mirth, or dejected with sadness ; always cheer- 
 ful, but rarely merry, at any sensible rate ; sel- 
 dom heard to break a jest ; and when he did, 
 he would be apt to blush at the levity of it. His 
 gravity was natural, without affectation. 
 
 " His modesty was visible in a natural, habit- 
 ual blush, which was increased upon the least 
 occasion, and oft discovered without any observ- 
 able cause. 
 
 "They that knew no more of him than by 
 the briskness of his writings, found themselves 
 deceived in their expectation when they came 
 in his company, noting the gravity and sobriety 
 
xiv BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
 
 of his aspect and conversation, — so free from 
 loquacity or much talkativeness, that he was 
 something difficult to be engaged in any dis- 
 course, though when he was so, it was always 
 singular, and never trite or vulgar. Parsimoni- 
 ous in nothing but his time, whereof he made 
 as much improvement with as little loss as any 
 man in it ; when he had any to spare from his 
 drudging practice, he was scarce patient of any 
 diversion from his studies 5 so impatient of sloth 
 and idleness, that he would say he could not do 
 nothing. 
 
 " Sir Thomas understood most of the Euro- 
 pean languages ; viz. all that are in Hutter's 
 Bible, which he made use of. The Latin and 
 Greek he understood critically. The Oriental 
 languages, which never were vernacular in this 
 part of the world, he thought the use of them 
 would not answer the time and pains of learning 
 them J yet had so great a veneration for the 
 matrix of them, viz. the Hebrew, consecrated 
 to the oracles of God, that he was not content 
 to be totally ignorant of it, though very little 
 of his science is to be found in any books of 
 that primitive language. And though much is 
 said to be written in the derivative idioms of that 
 tongue, especially the Arabic, yet he was satis- 
 fied with the translations, wherein he found 
 nothing admirable. 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. xv 
 
 " In his religion, he continued in the same 
 mind which he had declared in his first book, 
 written when he was but thirty years old, his 
 ' Religio Medici,' wherein he fully assented to 
 that of the Church of England, preferring it 
 before any in the world, as did the learned Gro- 
 tius. He attended the public service very con- 
 stantly when he was not withheld by his practice, 
 never missed the sacrament in his parish if he 
 were in town, read the best English sermons he 
 could hear of with liberal applause, and delighted 
 not in controversies. In his last sickness, where- 
 in he continued about a week's time, enduring 
 great pain of the colic, besides a continual fever, 
 with as much patience as hath been seen in any 
 man, without any pretence of stoical apathy, 
 animosity, or vanity of not being concerned 
 thereat, or suffering no impeachment of happi- 
 ness, — ' Nihil agis, dolor.' 
 
 '' His patience was founded upon the Chris- 
 tian philosophy and a sound faith of God's 
 providence, and a meek and holy submission 
 thereunto, which he expressed in few words. 
 I visited him near his end, when he had not 
 strength to hear or speak much ; the last words 
 which I heard from him were, besides some ex- 
 pressions of dearness, that he did freely submit 
 to the will of God, being without fear. He had 
 often triumphed over the king of terrors in 
 
xvi BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
 
 others, and given many repulses in the defence 
 of patients ; but when his own turn came, he 
 submitted with a meek, rational, and religious 
 courage. 
 
 " He might have made good the old saying of 
 ' Dat Galenus opes,' had he lived in a place that 
 could have afforded it. But his indulgence and 
 liberality to his children, especially in their trav- 
 els, two of his sons in divers countries, and 
 two of his daughters in France, spent him more 
 than a little. He was liberal in his house-enter- 
 tainments and in his charity. He left a comfort- 
 able but no great estate, both to his lady and 
 children, gained by his own industry. 
 
 " Such was his sagacity and knowledge of all 
 history, ancient and modern, and his observations 
 thereupon so singular, that it hath been said by 
 them that knew him best, that if his profession 
 and place of abode would have suited his ability, 
 he would have made an extraordinary man for 
 the Privy Council, not much inferior to the fa- 
 mous Padre Paolo, the late oracle of the Vene- 
 tian state. 
 
 " Though he were no prophet, nor son of a 
 prophet, yet in that faculty which comes nearest 
 it he excelled, i. e. the stochastic, wherein he 
 was seldom mistaken as to future events, as well 
 public as private, but not apt to discover any 
 presages or superstition." 
 
OF THE AUTHOR.- xvii 
 
 Dr. Johnson affirms that "it is not on the 
 praises of others, but on his own writings, that 
 Sir Thomas Browne is to depend for the es- 
 teem of posterity ; of which he will not easily 
 be deprived while learning shall have any rever- 
 ence among men ; for there is no science in 
 which he does not discover some skill, and scarce 
 any kind of knowledge, profane or sacred, ab- 
 struse or elegant, which he does not appear to 
 have cultivated with success " : and he also 
 declares that " there is scarcely a writer to be 
 found, whose profession was not divinity, that 
 has so frequently testified his belief of the sacred 
 writings, has appealed to them with such unlim- 
 ited submission, or mentioned them with such 
 unvaried reverence." 
 
 In arranging this edition, the notes and read- 
 ings adopted by several other editors of Sir 
 Thomas Browne's writings have been largely 
 consulted. Especial use has been made of the 
 labors of Henry Gardiner, M. A. of Exeter 
 College, Oxford, and of the late Rev. Alexan- 
 der Young, D. D., of Boston. It is hoped that 
 the endeavor to supply a more perfect text than 
 has hitherto appeared has been a successful 
 effort on the part of the Editor and of those 
 friends who have kindly aided him with their 
 corrections and annotations. 
 
XVIU 
 
 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. 
 
 The portrait which accompanies this vol- 
 ume is newly engraved from the head in the 
 foHo of 1686, the original painting of which is 
 at Oxford. 
 
 J. T. F. 
 
 Boston, December, 1861. 
 
Religio Medici 
 
To THE Reader. 
 
 MRTAINLY 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 impa- 
 tient, who would repine at death in the society 
 of all things that suffer imder it. Had not 
 almost every man suffered by the press, or were 
 not the tyranny thereof become imiversal, I had 
 not wanted reason for complamt ; but in times 
 wherein I have lived to behold the highest per- 
 version of that excellent invention, the name of 
 his Majesty defamed, the honour of Parliament 
 depraved, the writings of both depravedly, an- 
 ticipatively, 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 
 
4 TO THE READER. 
 
 truly had not the duty I owe unto the Importu- 
 nity 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 tilings 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 the reparation being within our- 
 selves, I have at present re-presented imto 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 ; wliich 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 particularities and personal 
 expressions therein, will easily discern the inten- 
 tion was not publick : and being a private exer- 
 
TO THE READER. 5 
 
 cise 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, wliich 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 mito my advancing judgment at all times ; 
 and therefore there might be many tilings there- 
 in plausible unto my passed apprehension, which 
 are not agreeable unto my present self. There- 
 fore 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 discern- 
 
6 TO THE READER. 
 
 ments ; and as I have declared, shall no further 
 father them than the best and learned judgments 
 shall authorize them : under favour of wliich 
 considerations, I have made its secrecy pubhck, 
 and committed the truth thereof to every ingen- 
 uous Reader. 
 
 THOMAS BROWNE. 
 
Religio Medici. 
 
 OR my religion, though there be sev- our Phy- 
 eral circumstances that might per- christim 
 suade the world I have none at all, 
 as the general scandal of my pro- 
 fession, the natural course of my studies, the 
 indifferency of my behaviour and discourse 
 in matters of religion, neither violently de- 
 fending one, nor with that common ardour and 
 contention opposing another ; yet m despite 
 hereof I dare, without usurpation, assume the 
 honourable style of a Christian. Not that I 
 merely owe this title to the font, my educa- 
 tion, or clime wherein I was bom, as being 
 bred up either to confirm those principles my 
 parents instilled into my unwary imderstand- 
 ing, or by a general consent to proceed in 
 the religion of my country; but having, in 
 my riper years and confirmed judgment, seen 
 
8 . RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 my- 
 self to enjoy that happy style, than mahgning 
 those who refiise so glorious a title. 
 
 Quousque patiere, bone Jesu! 
 
 Judsei te semel, ego ssepius cnicifixi; 
 Illi in Asia, ego in Britannia, 
 
 Gallia, Germania; 
 Bone Jesu, miserere mei, et Judffiorum ! 
 
 His belief 11^ i3^t 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 being distinguished not only 
 by their laAvs and limits, but circumscribed by 
 their doctrines and rules of faith ; to be par- 
 ticular, 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, 
 
 * According to the Apostolical precept, "Prove all things: 
 hold fast that which is good." 1 Thess. v. 21. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 9 
 
 impaired, and fallen from its native beaut}^, that 
 it required tlie careful and charitable hands of 
 these times to restore it to its primitive integ- 
 rity. Now the accidental occasion whereon, the 
 slender means whereby, the low and abject con- 
 dition of the person by whom so good a work 
 was set on foot, which in our adversaries begets 
 contempt and scorn, fills me with wonder, and 
 is the very same objection the insolent Pagans 
 first cast at Christ and his disciples. 
 
 III. Yet have I not so shaken hands with Differences 
 those desperate resolutions, (who had rather ^68^^^ 
 venture at large their decayed bottom, than separate 
 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 m di- 
 ameter and sword's point with them : we have 
 reformed from them, not against them ; for omit- 
 ting those improperations, and terms of scurrility 
 betwixt us, Avhich only difference our affections, 
 and not our cause, there is between us one com- 
 mon name and appellation, one faith and neces- 
 sary body of principles common to us both ; and 
 therefore I am not scrupulous to converse and 
 live with them, to enter their churches in de- 
 fect of ours, and either pray with them, or for 
 them. I could never perceive any rational 
 
 consequence from those many texts which pro- 
 1« 
 
10 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 liibit tlie 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 ; 
 where, if their devotions offend him, mine may 
 please him ; if theirs profane it, mine may hal- 
 low 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 outAvard 
 and sensible motions which may express or pro- 
 mote my invisible devotion. I should violate 
 my own arm rather than a church ; nor wilhng- 
 ly deface the memory 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 pil- 
 grims, nor contemn the miserable condition of 
 friars ; for though misplaced in circumstances, 
 there is something in it of devotion. I could 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 11 
 
 never hear tlie Ave Mary bell * without an ele- 
 vation ; or think it a sufficient warrant, because 
 they erred in one circumstance, for me to err 
 in all, that is, in silence and dumb contempt: 
 whilst therefore they directed their devotions 
 to her, I offered mine to God, and rectified the 
 errors of their prayers, by rightly ordering mine 
 own. At a solemn procession I have wept abun- 
 dantly, while my consorts, blind with opposition 
 and prejudice, have fallen into an access of scorn 
 and laughter. There are, questionless, both in 
 Greek, Roman, and African churches, solemni- 
 ties 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 consist in the 
 narrow point and centre of virtue without a reel 
 or stagger to the circumference. f 
 
 IV. As there were many reformers, so like- OfRefor- 
 wise there were many reformations ; every coun- ^* ^°^* 
 
 * A church bell that tolls every dav 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. 
 
 t This figure is probably borrowed from Aristotle. Eth. Nic. 
 ii. 9. "Wherefore it is hard to be good: for in each action to 
 find the mean is difficult, as it is not every one that can find the 
 centre of a circle, but he that is skilled to do so." 
 
12 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 try 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 hon- 
 est 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 ex- 
 tremes, their contrarieties in condition, affection, 
 and opinion, may with the same hopes expect 
 an union in the poles of heaven. 
 Of the V. 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 con- 
 sonant unto reason, and as it were framed to 
 my particular devotion, as this whereof I hold 
 my belief, the Church of England, to Avhose 
 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 devo- 
 tion ; neither believing this, because Luther 
 affirmed it, nor disapproving that, because Cal- 
 
 Church of 
 England. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 13 
 
 vin liatli disavouclied it. I condemn not all 
 things in tlie council of Trent, nor approve 
 all in the synod of Dort. In brief, where the 
 Scripture is silent, the Church is my text ; 
 where that speaks, 't is but my comment : where 
 there is a joint silence of both, I borrow not the 
 rules of my religion from Rome or Geneva, but 
 the dictates of my own reason. It is an unjust 
 scandal of our adversaries, and a gross error in 
 ourselves, to compute the nativity of our relig- 
 ion from Henry the Eighth, who, though he 
 rejected the Pope, reftised not the faith of 
 Rome, and effected no more than what his own 
 predecessors desired and assayed m ages past, 
 and was conceived the state of Venice would 
 have attempted in our days. It is as unchari- 
 table a point in us to fall upon those popular 
 scurrilities and opprobrious scoffs of the bishop 
 of Rome, to whom, as a temporal prmce, we 
 owe the duty of good language. I confess there 
 is 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 him the name 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 per- 
 chance produce a good effect on the vulgar, 
 whose ears are opener to rhetoric than logic ; 
 
14 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 yet do they in no wise confirm the faith of wiser 
 behevers, who know that a good cause needs 
 not to be patron'd by passion, but can sustain 
 itself upon a temperate dispute. 
 
 VI. 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 within a few days I 
 should dissent myself. I have no genius to 
 Disputes in disputcs in religion, and have often thought it 
 wisely'^ wisdom to decline them, especially u]3on a dis- 
 avoided. advantage, or when the cause of truth might 
 suffer in the weakness of my patronage. Where 
 we desire to be informed, 't is 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 for 
 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 ; 't is therefore far better to enjoy her 
 with peace, than to hazard her on a battle ; if 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 15 
 
 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 (Edipus, and a\^11, 
 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 Fantasies 
 road ; and, though not in an implicit, yet an danglrous 
 humble faith, follow the great wheel of the as giving 
 
 ^~T 1 1 ^ . 1 T . entrance 
 
 Church, by which 1 move, not reservmg any to errors, 
 proper poles or motion from the epicycle of my 
 own brain ; by these means I leave no gap for 
 heresy, schisms, or eiTors, of which at present I whereof 
 hope I shall not injure truth to say I have no cian con- 
 taint or tincture. I must confess my greener ^^^seth to 
 
 T -. 1 n 1 • 1 ^ have had 
 
 studies have been polluted, with two or three, two or 
 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,* 
 
 * Arethusa, a nyinph of Achaia, while bathing, on her return 
 from hunting in the Stymphalian "wood, was surprised by the 
 river god Alpheus, in whose waters she was disporting herself. 
 She fled from him, and after a long chase was concealed in a 
 cloud by Diana, just as her strength was failing. She thus re- 
 
16 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 though tliey lose their currents in one place, 
 they rise up again in another. One general 
 council is not able to extirpate one single her- 
 esy; it may he 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 
 was metempsychosis, and the soul of one man 
 passed into another, opinions do find, after cer- 
 tain revolutions, men and minds like those that 
 first begat them. To see ourselves again, we 
 need not look for Plato's year : * every man is 
 not only himself; there hath been many Di- 
 ogenes, and as many Timons, though but few of 
 that name : men are lived over again, the Avorld 
 is now as it was in ages past ; there was none 
 then, but there hath been some one since that 
 parallels him, and as it were his revived self. 
 1st, That y II, ;n^ow the first of mine was that of the 
 might, in Arabians, f that the souls of men perished with 
 
 lates (Ovid. Metam. v. 574) her transformation into the stream 
 which bears her name, and with which the waters of Alpheus 
 vainly sought to unite, Diana opening a way for her under 
 ground and bringing her out again in Ortygia, near Syracuse 
 in Sicily. 
 
 * A revolution of certain thousand years, when all things 
 should i-eturn unto their former estate, and he be teaching again 
 in his school as when he delivered this opinion. 
 
 •f " It was not only in the point now mentioned, that the doc- 
 trine of the Gospel suffered, at this time, from the erroneous 
 fancies of wrong-headed doctors. For there sprung up now, in 
 Arabia, a certain sort of minute philosophers, the disciples of a 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 17 
 
 their bodies, but should yet be raised again at some sort, 
 the last day. Not that I did absolutely con- ^11^11^^ 
 ceive a mortality of the soul ; but if that were, ^i*^ ^^^ 
 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 for the body, that it should rise 
 again. Surely it is but the merits of our un- 
 worthy natures, if we sleep in darkness until 
 the last alarum. A serious reflex upon my 
 own unworthiness did make me backward from 
 challenging this prerogative of my soul : so 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 2d, That 
 not persist in his vengeance forever, but after ghouir 
 a definite time of his wrath, he would release finally be 
 the damned souls fi'om torture : which error 
 I fell into upon a serious contemplation of the 
 great attribute of God, his Mercy ; and did a 
 
 master whose obscurity has concealed him from the knowl- 
 edge of after ages, who denied the immortality of the soul, and 
 believed that it perished with the body : but maintained, at the 
 same time, that it was to be recalled to life with the body, by 
 the power of God. The pliilosophers who held this opinion 
 were called Arabians, from their countrv^ Origen was called 
 from Egypt, to make head against this rising sect ; and disputed 
 against them in full council, with such remarkable success, 
 that they abandoned their erroneous sentiments, and returned 
 to the received doctrine of the Church." Mosheim, Eccl. Hist, 
 vol. i. eh. 5, § 16, p. 307. 
 2 
 
18 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 little clierisli it in myself, because I found there- 
 in no malice, and a ready weight to sway me 
 from the other extreme of despair, whereunto 
 melancholy and contemplative natures are too 
 3d, That easily disposed. A third there is which I did 
 Ta'^for* never positively maintain or practise, but have 
 the dead, often wislicd 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 with- 
 out an orison for his soul : 't was a good way, 
 methought, to be remembered by posterity, and 
 But these far more noble than a history. These opinions 
 not^ogrlw I never maintained with pertinacy, or endeav- 
 into here- ourcd to iuvcigle 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 con- 
 firmed them in myself; but suffering them to 
 flame upon their own substance, without ad- 
 dition of new ftiel, they went out insensibly of 
 themselves : therefore these opinions, though J 
 condemned by lawful councils, were not here- ^ 
 sies in me, but bare errors, and single lapses of 
 my understanding without a joint depravity of 
 
 my will. Those have not only depraved un- 
 derstandings, but diseased affections, who can 
 
 :i 
 
ifold na- 
 ture of 
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 19 
 
 not enjoy a singularity without an 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 
 of spirits ; and upon this experience he tempted 
 only Eve, as well understanding the commu- 
 nicable nature of sin, and that to deceive but 
 one, was tacitly and upon consequence to de- 
 lude them both, 
 
 VIII. That heresies should arise, we have ofthe 
 the prophecy of Christ ; but that old ones should 
 be abolished, we hold no prediction. That there schism, 
 must be heresies, is true, not only in our church, ti^iying 
 but also in any other : even in doctrines hereti- "^eif. 
 cal, there will be super-heresies ; and Arians 
 not only divided from then' church, but also 
 among themselves : for heads that are disposed 
 unto schism and complexionably propense to 
 innovation, are naturally indisposed for a com- 
 munity ; 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 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 
 
20 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 something not only beside the opinion of their 
 own church or any other, but also of any par- 
 ticular 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 schools, many things un- 
 touched, unimagined, wherein the liberty of an 
 honest reason may play and expatiate with secu- 
 rity, and far without the circle of an heresy. 
 Mysteries IX.* As for thoso wiugy mysterics in divin- 
 oniyTo^bJ ^^7' ^^^ ^^^J subtlctics in religion, which have 
 approached unhinged the brains of better heads, they never 
 stretched the pia mater of mine : methinks there 
 be not impossibilities enough in rehgion for an 
 active faith ; the deepest mysteries ours con- 
 tains, have not only been illustrated, but main- 
 tained by syllogism, and the rule of reason. 
 I love to lose myself in a mystery, to pursue 
 my reason to an altitudo ! 'Tis my solitary 
 recreation to pose my apprehension with those 
 involved enigmas and riddles of the Trinity, 
 with Incarnation and Resurrection. I can an- 
 swer all the objections of Satan and my rebel- 
 lious reason, with that odd resolution I learned 
 of Tertulhan, Certum est quia impossibile est. 
 I desire to exercise my faith in the difficultest 
 point ; for to credit ordinary and visible objects, 
 
 * See Aids to Reflection, p. 151. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 21 
 
 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 thanldul that I live not in the days of mir- 
 acles, 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 ; Blessed are 
 then had my faith been thrust upon me ; nor ^^^J^ ^^^^ 
 should I enjoy that greater blessing pronounced seen and 
 to all that believe and saw not. 'Tis an easy ^LeveT. 
 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 ad- 
 vantage of a bold and noble faith, who lived 
 before his coming, who upon obscure prophecies 
 and mystical types could raise a behef, and 
 expect apparent impossibilities. 
 
 X. 'Tis true, there is an edge in all firm Thear- 
 behef, and with an easy metaphor we may say christian! 
 the sword of faith ; f but in these obscurities I 
 
 * " God forbede but that men should believ 
 
 Well more thing than thei han seen with eye." 
 
 Chaucer. 
 t Eph. vi. 16. 
 
22 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 rather use it in the adjunct the apostle gives it, 
 a buckler ; under which I conceive a wary com- 
 batant may he invulnerable. Since I was of 
 understanding to know we knew nothing, my 
 reason hath been more pliable to the will of 
 faith ; I am now content to understand a mys- 
 tery without a rigid definition, in an easy and 
 Platonic description. That allegorical descrip- 
 tion* of Hermes 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 evreXe^eta ; 
 Lux est umbra Dei, as actus perspicui.'f Where 
 there is an obscurity too deep for our reason, 
 'tis good to sit down with a description, peri- 
 
 * Sphcera cujus centrum ubique, circumferentia nullibi. 
 
 t Great variety of opinion there hath been amongst the an- 
 cient philosophers touching the definition of the soul. Thales's 
 was, that it is a naUire loithout repose. Asclepiades, that it is an 
 exercitation of sense : Hesiod, that it is a thing composed of earth 
 and water: Parmenides holds, of earth and fire; Galen, that it is 
 heat; Hippocrates, that it is a spirit diffused through the body: 
 some others have held it to be light; Plato saith, 'tis a substance 
 moving itself; after cometh Aristotle (whom the author here re- 
 proveth) and goeth a degree farther, and saith it is cVreXep^eta, 
 that is, that which naturally makes the body to move. But this 
 definition is as rigid as any of the other; for this tells us not what 
 the essence, origin, or nature of the soul is, but only marks an 
 effect of it, and therefore signifieth no moi*e than if he had said, 
 that it is angelus hominis, or an intelligence that moveth man, 
 as he supposed those other to do the heavens. K. Cf. Cic 
 Tusc. Disp. I. X. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 23 
 
 phrasis, or adumbration ; for bj acquainting our 
 reason liow unable it is to display the visible and 
 obvious effects of nature, it becomes more hum- 
 ble 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 unhap- 
 py parents tasted ; though in the same chapter, 
 when God forbids it, 'tis positively said the 
 plants of the fields 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 pucellage and virginity of 
 women, which God ordained the Jews, is very 
 fallible. Experience and history inform me, 
 that not only many particular women, but like- 
 wise 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 beheve a thing not only above, 
 but contrary to reason, and against the argu- 
 ments of our proper senses. 
 
 XI. In my solitary and retired imagination, The Eter- 
 nity of 
 Neque enim cum lectulus aut me God. 
 
 Porticus excepit, desum mihi — 
 
24 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 recre- 
 ate, with the other I confound my understand- 
 ing; for who can speak of eternity without a 
 solecism, or think thereof without an ecstasy ? 
 Time we may comprehend, it is but five days 
 older than ourselves, and hath the same horo- 
 scope with the world ; but to retire so far back 
 as to apprehend a beginning, to give such an 
 infinite start forward 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 ; it is a privilege of 
 his own nature : I am that I am^ was his own 
 definition unto Moses ; and it was 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 de- 
 termination of our states to come, but a defini- 
 tive blast of his will already fulfilled, and at the 
 instant that he first decreed it ; for to liis eter- 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 25 
 
 nity, which is indivisible, and all together, 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. 
 
 XII. There is no attribute that adds more ofthe 
 difficulty to the mystery of the Trinity, where, ^"""^y* 
 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 differ- 
 ent subjects, and yet in us are so united as to 
 make but one soul and substance : if one soul 
 were so perfect as to inform three distinct bod- 
 ies, that were a petty trmity : conceive the dis- 
 tinct number of three, not divided nor separated 
 
 * 2 Pet. iii. 8. 
 
26 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 by the intellect, but actually comprehended in 
 its unity, and that is a perfect trinity. I have 
 often admired the mystical way of Pythagoras, 
 and the secret magic 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, 
 wliich 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 phi- 
 The visible losopliy of Hcrmcs, that this visible world is 
 pkture ^^^ ^ picture of the invisible, wherein as in a 
 of the portrait things are not truly, but in equivocal 
 shapes, and as they counterfeit some more real 
 substance in that invisible fabric. 
 The Wis- XIII. That other attribute wherewith I rec- 
 God. reate my devotion, is his Wisdom, in which I 
 
 am happy; and for the contemplation of this 
 only, do not repent me that I was bred in the 
 way of study : the advantage I have of the vul- 
 gar, with the content and happiness I conceive 
 therein, is an ample recompense for all my en- 
 deavours, in what part of knowledge soever. 
 "Wisdom is his most beauteous attribute ; no 
 man can attain unto it, yet Solomon pleased 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 27 
 
 God when he desired it. He is wise, because he 
 knows all tilings ; 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 great- 
 est knowledge in man : for this I do 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,* we had bet- 
 ter known ourselves, nor had we stood in fear 
 to know him. I know He is wise in all, won- 
 derful in what we conceive, but far more in 
 what Ave comprehend not; for we behold him 
 but asquint, upon reflex or shadow ; our under- 
 standing is dimmer than Moses' 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 presump- 
 tion even in angels : like us, they are liis ser- 
 vants, not his senators ; he holds no council, but 
 that mystical one of the Trinity, wherein though 
 there be three persons, there is but one mind 
 that decrees AA^thout contradiction : nor needs 
 he any ; his actions are not begot with delibera- 
 tion, his wisdom naturally knows what is best ; 
 his intellect stands ready fraught with the super- 
 lative and purest ideafe of goodness ; consultation 
 and election, which are two motions in us, make 
 
 * VvaOk aeavTov, Nosce te ipsum. 
 
28 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 but one in lilm ; his actions springing from his 
 power, at the first touch of his wilL These are 
 contemplations metaphysical : my humble spec- 
 ulations have another method, and are content 
 to trace and discover those expressions he hath 
 left in his creatures, and the obvious eflPects of 
 No danger nature ; there is no danger to profound these 
 in'^to^rce i^ysteries, no sanctum sanctorum in philosophy, 
 the hand of The world was made to be inhabited by beasts. 
 Works. l^ut studied and contemplated by man : * 't is 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 vulo-ar heads 
 that rudely stare about, and with a gross rustici- 
 ty admire his works ; those highly magnify him, 
 whose judicious inquiry into his acts, and delib- 
 erate research into his creatures, return the duty 
 of a devout and learned admiration. Therefore, 
 
 Search while thou wilt, and let thy reason go 
 To ransom ti-uth, even to th' abyss below; 
 Rally the scattered causes ; and that line 
 Which nature twists, be able to untwine. 
 
 * In the MS. (in the British Museum) this clause stands thus: 
 " The world was made not so much to be inhabited by men, as 
 to be contemplated, studied, and known, by man." 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 29 
 
 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 stiD 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 
 
 Eich 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 St. Matt. 
 will of his Father," shall be saved; certainly '^"- 2^- 
 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. 
 
 XIV. There is but one first cause, and four Eyerycrea- 
 second causes of all things : some are without *"^ '!'^'''' 
 efficient, as God ; others without matter, as an- proper end 
 gels ; some without form, as the first matter : 
 but every essence created or uncreated hath its 
 
30 RELIGIO MEDICI, 
 
 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 treasury of his wisdom. In the causes, 
 nature, and affections of the eclipses of the sun 
 and moon, there is most excellent speculation ; 
 but to profound farther, and to contemplate a 
 reason why his providence hath so disposed and 
 ordered their motions in that vast circle, as to 
 conjoin and obscure each other, is a sweeter 
 piece of reason, and a diviner point of philoso- 
 phy ; therefore sometimes, and in some things, 
 there appears to me as much divinity in Galen 
 his books Be usu partium^ as in Suarez his 
 Metaphysics: 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. 
 Nature do- XV. Natura nihil agit frustra^ is the only 
 to^a^!''''^ indisputable axiom in philosophy ; there are no 
 grotesques in nature ; not any thing framed to 
 
 * " Eterne God, that thurgh thy purveance 
 Ledest this world by certain governance, 
 In idol, as men sain, ye nothing make." 
 
 Chaucer, Frankeleine's Tale, 11176. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 31 
 
 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 Pror. y\ 
 admiration; indeed, what reason may not go to ^^\l^ 
 school to the wisdom of bees, ants, and spiders ? 
 what wise hand teacheth them to do what rea- 
 son cannot teach us ? Ruder heads stand amazed 
 at those prodigious pieces of nature, whales, ele- 
 phants, dromedaries, and camels ; these, I con- 
 fess, are the colossi and majestic pieces of her 
 hand : but in these narrow engines there is 
 more curious mathematics ; and the civility of 
 these little citizens more neatly sets forth the 
 wisdom of their Maker. Who admires not 
 Regio-Montanus his fly beyond his eagle, or 
 wonders not more at the operation of two souls 
 in those httle bodies, than but one in the trunk 
 of a cedar ? f I could never content my con- 
 
 * " Miraculous may seem to him that reades 
 So strange ensample of conception ; 
 But reason teacheth that the fruitful seedes 
 
 Of all things living, thro' impression 
 Of the sun-beames in moyst complexion 
 Doe life conceive, and quick'ned are by kynd." 
 
 Faerie Queene. 
 t See Wordsworth's exquisite little poem entitled " Nutting," 
 and Landor's Fjesulan Idyl: — 
 
32 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 templation with those general pieces of wonder, 
 the flux and reflux of the sea, the increase of 
 the 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. 
 Nature a XVI. Tlius there are two books from whence 
 I collect my divinity ; besides that written one 
 of God, another of his servant nature, that uni- 
 versal and public 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 
 
 " And 'tis and ever was my wish and way 
 To let all flowers live freely, and all die, 
 Whene'er their Genius bids their souls depart, 
 Among their kindred in their native place. 
 I never pluck the rose; the violet's head 
 Hath shaken with my breath upon its bank, 
 And not reproached me ; the ever sacred cup 
 Of the pure lily hath between my hands 
 Felt safe, unsoiled, nor lost one grain of gold." 
 
 Bible open 
 to all. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 33 
 
 station did the children of Israel ; the ordinary Josh. x. 12, 
 effect of nature wrouo;ht 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 hiero- 
 glyphics, 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, ac- 
 cording 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 ex- 
 cellent artist, hath so contrived his work, that 
 with the selfsame instrument, without a new 
 
 * See Wordsworth's Ode to Duty: — 
 
 " Thou dost preserve the stars from ^vrong; 
 And the most ancient heavens thro' thee are fresh and strong." 
 
 Cf. Cowper's Task, bk. vi : — 
 
 " Some say that in the origin of things, 
 When all creation started into birth, 
 The infant elements received a law 
 3 
 
34 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 creation, he may effect his obscurest designs. 
 Ex. XV. 25. Thus he sAveeteneth the water with a wood, 
 xxLm.5. preserveth the creatures in the ark, which the 
 blast of his mouth might have as easily created ; 
 for God is like a skilful geometrician, who when 
 more easily, and with one stroke of his compass, 
 he might describe or divide a right line, had yet 
 rather do this in a circle or longer way, accord- 
 ing to the constituted and forelaid principles of 
 his art : yet this rule of his he doth sometimes 
 pervert, to acquaint the world with his preroga- 
 tive, 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 there- 
 
 From which they swerve not since. That under force 
 Of that controUing ordinance they move, 
 And need not his immediate hand who first 
 Prescribed their course, to regulate it now. 
 
 The Lord of all, himself through all diffused, 
 Sustains and is the life of all that lives. 
 Nature is but a name for an effect, 
 Whose cause is God." 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 35 
 
 fore no deformity in any kind of species wliatso- eccIus. 
 ever : I cannot tell by what logic we call a toad, g^'"'"'' ^^' 
 a bear, or an elephant ugly, they being created ^"^Jsd. xv. 
 in those outward shapes and figures which best 
 express those 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 Gen. i. 31. 
 abhors deformity, and is the rule of order and 
 beauty ; there is no deformity but in monstros- 
 ity, wherein notwithstanding there is a kind of 
 beauty, nature so ingeniously contriving the ir- 
 regular parts, that they become sometimes more 
 remarkable than the principal fabric. To speak 
 yet more narrowly, there was never any tiling 
 ugly or misshapen, but the chaos ; wherein, not- 
 withstanding, to speak strictly, there was no 
 deformity, because no form, nor was it yet im- 
 pregnate by the voice of God ; now nature is 
 not at variance with art, nor art with nature, 
 they being both servants of his providence : art 
 is the perfection of nature : were the world now " Nature 
 as it was the sixth day, there were vet a chaos ; **f ^^l 
 
 •^ ' «' ' whereby 
 
 nature hath made one world, and art another. God doth 
 In brief, all things are artificial ; for nature is ^0^1^" 
 the art of God. 
 
 XVII. This is the ordinary and open way of Providence 
 liis providence, which art and industry have in j^ ^^jj^^ 
 a good part discovered, whose effects we may Fortune. 
 
36 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 individuals and single essences ; 
 this we call fortune, that serpentine and crooked 
 hue, whereby he draws those actions his wis- 
 dom intends, in a more unknown and secret 
 way. This cryptic and involved method of his 
 providence have I ever admired ; nor can I 
 relate the history of my life, the occurrences 
 of my days, the escapes of dangers, and hits of 
 chance, with a Bezo las Manos to fortune, or 
 
 Gen. xxii. a bare gramercy to my good stars. Abraham 
 might have thought the ram in the thicket came 
 thither by accident ; human reason would have 
 
 Ex.u. said, that mere chance conveyed Moses in the 
 ark to the sight of Pharaoh's daughter : what a 
 
 Gen. labyrinth is there in the story of Joseph, able to 
 
 ^^^"' convert a stoic ! Sm-ely there are in every 
 man's life certain rubs, doubhngs, and wrenches, 
 which pass awhile under the effects of chance, 
 but at the last, well examined, prove the mere 
 hand of God. It was not dumb chance that, to 
 discover the fougade or powder-plot, contrived a 
 miscarriage in the letter. I like the victory of 
 '88 the better for that one occurrence, which 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 37 
 
 our enemies imputed to our dishonour, and tlie 
 partiality of fortune, to wit, the tempests and 
 contrariety of winds. King Philip did not de- 
 tract from the nation, when he said he sent his 
 armado to fight with men, and not to combat 
 with the winds. Where there is a manifest dis- 
 proportion 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 mi- 
 thought of occurrences intervene, these must 
 proceed from a power that owes no obedience to 
 those axioms ; where, as in the writing upon the Dan. v. 5. 
 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 Seign- 
 ior 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 de- 
 pends upon the ruin of another, there is a revo- 
 lution and vicissitude of their greatness ; and 
 they must obey the swing of that wheel, not 
 
38 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 moved by intelligences, but by the hand of 
 God, whereby all estates arise to their zenith 
 and vertical points, according to their predesti- 
 nated periods. For the lives, not only of men, 
 but of commonwealths, and the whole world, 
 run not upon an helix that still enlargeth, but 
 on a circle, where arriving to their meridian, 
 they decline in obscurity, and fall under the 
 horizon again.* 
 The term XVIII. Thcsc must uot therefore be named 
 used in a the cffects of fortuuc but in a relative way, and 
 relative ^g ^g term the works of nature : it was the 
 
 sense. 
 
 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. It is 
 not a ridiculous devotion to say a prayer before 
 a game at tables ; for even in sortilegies and 
 matters of greatest uncertainty, there is a set- 
 tled and preordered course of eflPects.f It is 
 we that are blind, not fortune : because our eye 
 is too dim to discover the mystery of her effects, 
 
 * This subject is discussed in an Essay by the Eev. A. P. 
 Stanley, to which one of the Chancellor's Prizes was awarded. 
 Oxford, 1840. 
 
 Cf. Herod, i. 207. 
 
 t " The lot is cast into the lap : but the whole disposing there- 
 of is of the Lord." Pro v. xvi. 33. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 39 
 
 we foolishly paint her blind, and hoodwink the 
 providence of the Almighty.* I cannot justify- 
 that contemptible provorb, 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., baud., 
 and strumpet.^ It is, I confess, the common 
 fate of men of singular gifts of mind, to be des- 
 titute of those of fortune, which doth not any 
 way deject the spirit of wiser judgments, who 
 thoroughly understand the justice of this pro- 
 ceeding ; and being enriched with higher dona- 
 tives, 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, with- 
 out a possession of those of body or fortune ; and 
 it is an error worse than heresy, to adore these 
 complemental and circumstantial pieces of felici- 
 ty, and undervalue those perfections and essen- 
 tial 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 ; it is not partiality, but equity m God, 
 
 * Cf. Bp. Butler's xvth Sermon, 
 t So Dryden : — 
 
 *' But when she dances on the wind, 
 And shakes her wings, and will not stay, 
 I puflf the prostitute away." 
 
40 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 who deals with us but as our natural parents : 
 those that are able of body and mmd 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 fars 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 there- 
 in, 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 na- 
 tivity unto such benevolous aspects. Those 
 
 * He were a strange fool that should be angry because dogs 
 and sheep need no shoes, and yet himself is full of care to get 
 some: God hath supplied those needs to them by natural pro- 
 visions, and to thee by an artificial, for He hath given thee rea- 
 son to learn a trade, or some means to make or buy them, so that 
 it only differs in the manner of our provision ; and which had 
 you rather want, shoes or reason? Taylor's Holy Living, p. 99. 
 So Anacreon : — 
 
 (fivais Kepara ravpois 
 SttKcis 8' k'da>K€v Ittttois 
 TrobcoKiTjv Xaycoois , 
 Xeoucri X'^^t'' odovTcoVf 
 
 Tois Ix^Va-lV TO VTJKTOV 
 
 Tois opveois neTaadai 
 Tols dvdpd(riv (ppovrjjjia. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 41 
 
 that hold that all things are governed by fortune, 
 had not erred, had they not persisted there. 
 The Romans that erected a temple to Fortmie, 
 acknowledged therein, though in a blinder way, 
 somewhat of divinity; for in a wise supputa- 
 tion all things begin and end in the Almighty. 
 There is a nearer way to heaven than Homer's 
 chain ; * an easy logic may conjoin heaven and 
 earth in one argument, and with less than a 
 sorites resolve all things into God. For though 
 we christen effects by their most sensible and 
 nearest causes, yet is God the true and infal- 
 lible cause of all, whose concourse, though it 
 be general, yet doth it subdivide itself into the 
 particular actions of everything, and is that 
 spirit, by wdiich each singular essence not only 
 subsists, but performs its operation. 
 
 XIX. The bad construction and perverse Danger of 
 
 . .1 . n 1 confound- 
 
 comment on these pair or second causes, or j^g ^^^ 
 visible hands of God, have perverted the de- First with 
 votion 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 distract the peace of this our 
 
 * Uiad, viii. 18. 
 
Reason. 
 Faith. 
 
 42 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 commonwealth, not less than did that other the 
 state of Rome. 
 Passion. As reason is a rebel mito faith, so passion 
 unto reason : as the propositions of faith seem 
 absurd unto reason, so the theorems of reason 
 mito passion, and both unto reason ; yet a mod- 
 erate 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 ch*cumstance. There are, as in 
 philosophy, so in divinity, sturdy doubts and 
 boisterous objections, wherewith the unhappi- 
 ness 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 studies, 
 and by demonstrating a naturality in one way, 
 makes us mistrust a miracle in another. Thus 
 having perused the ArcMdoxes, and read the 
 secret sympathies of things, he would dissuade 
 my belief from the miracle of the brazen ser- 
 pent, make me conceit that image worked by 
 sympathy, and was but an Egyptian trick to 
 cure their diseases without a miracle. Again, 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 43 
 
 having seen some experiments of bitumen^ and 
 having read far more of naphtha^ he whispered 
 to my curiosity the fire of the altar might be 
 natural ; and bid me mistrust a miracle in Elias, i Kings, 
 when he entrenched the altar round with water ; ^^^"' 
 for that inflammable substance yields not easily 
 unto water, but flames in the arms of its antag- 
 onist. And thus would he inveigle my belief 
 to think the combustion of Sodom might be Gen. xix. 
 
 . 24. 
 
 natural, and that there was an asphaltic 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 Ex. xri. 
 Moses? The IsraeHtes saw but that in his 
 time, which the natives of those countries be- 
 hold in ours. Thus the devil played at chess 
 with me, and yielding a pawn, thought to gain 
 a queen of me, taking advantage of my honest 
 endeavours ; and whilst I laboured to raise the 
 structure of my reason, he strived to undermme 
 the edifice of my faith. 
 
 XX. Neither had these, or any other, ever Atheism 
 such advantage of me, as to incline me to any g^j'^t^'^^'^^^ 
 point of infidelity or desperate positions of athe- 
 ism ; for I have been these many years of opin- 
 ion there was never any. Those that held 
 
44 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 relio-Ion was tlie clifFerence of man from beasts, 
 have spoken probably, and proceed upon a 
 principle as inductive as the other. That doc- 
 trine 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 necessi- 
 ty of the stoics is nothing but the immutable 
 law of his Avill. Those that heretofore denied 
 the divinity of the Holy Ghost, have been con- 
 demned but as heretics ; and those that now 
 deny our Saviour, (though more than heretics,) 
 are not so much as atheists ; for though they 
 deny two persons in the Trinity, they hold as 
 we do, there is but one God. 
 
 That villain and secretary of hell, that com- 
 posed that miscreant piece of the three impos- 
 tors, though divided from all religions, and was 
 neither Jew, Turk, nor Christian, was not a 
 positive atheist. I confess every country hath 
 its Machiavel, every age its Lucian, whereof 
 common heads must not hear, nor more ad- 
 vanced judgments too rashly venture on : it is 
 the rhetoric of Satan, and may pervert a loose 
 or prejudicate belief, 
 inconsist- XXI. I coufcss I have perused them all, 
 and can discover nothing that may startle a 
 discreet belief; yet are their heads carried off 
 
 ency of 
 unbelief. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 45 
 
 with the wind and breath of such motives. I 
 remember a Doctor in Physic of Italy, who 
 could not perfectly believe the immortahty of 
 the soul, because Galen seemed to make a doubt 
 thereof. With another I was familiarly ac- 
 quainted in France, a divine, and a man of 
 singular parts, that on the same point was so 
 plunged and gravelled with three lines of Sen- 
 eca, 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 St. Paul ; and per- 
 emptorily maintain the traditions of ^lian 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: search all the legends 
 of times past, and the fabulous conceits of these 
 present, and it will be hard to find one that 
 deserves to carry the buckler unto Samson; 
 yet is all this of an easy possibihty, if we con- 
 ceive a divine concourse, or an mfluence but 
 from the httle finger of the Almighty. It is Manyques- 
 impossible that either in the discourse of man, **°°^™'''^' 
 or in the infallible voice of God, to the weak- no word,v 
 ness of our ai^prehensions, there should not '^^''^^""°^- 
 
46 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 appear irregularities, contradictions, and an- 
 tinomies : myself could show a catalogue of 
 doubts, never yet imagined or questioned, as 
 I know, which are not resolved at the first 
 hearing; not fantastic queries or objections of 
 air, for I cannot hear of atoms in divinity.* 
 I can read the history of the pigeon that was 
 sent out of the ark and returned no more, yet 
 not question how she found out her mate that 
 was left behind: that Lazarus was raised from 
 the dead, yet not demand where in the interim 
 his soul awaited ; or raise a law-case, whether 
 his heir might lawfully detain his inheritance 
 bequeathed unto him by his death, and he, 
 though restored to life, have no plea or title 
 unto his former possessions. Whether Eve was 
 framed out of the left side of Adam, I dispute 
 not, because I stand not yet assured which is 
 the right side of a man, or whether there be 
 any such distinction in nature : that she was 
 edified out of the rib of Adam I believe, yet 
 raise no question who shall arise with that rib 
 at the resurrection : whether Adam was an 
 hermaphrodite, as the Rabbins contend upon 
 the letter of the text, because it is contrary to 
 
 * " He who believes the Scripture to have proceeded from him 
 who is the Author of Nature, may well expect to find the same 
 sort of difficulties in it as are found in the Constitution of Na- 
 ture." Origen, quoted by Butler in Introduct. to Anal. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 47 
 
 reason that there should be an hermaphrodite 
 before there was a woman, or a composition 
 of two natures before there was a second com- 
 posed. Likewise, whether the world was created 
 in autumn, summer, or spring, because it was 
 created in them all ; for whatsoever . sign the 
 sun possesseth, those four seasons are actually 
 existent. It is the nature of this luminary to 
 distinguish the several seasons of the year, all 
 which it makes at one time in the whole earth, 
 and successive in any part thereof. There are 
 a bundle of curiosities, not only in philosophy, 
 but in divinity, proposed and discussed by men 
 of most supposed abilities, which indeed are 
 not worthy our vacant hours, much less our 
 serious studies : pieces only fit to be placed in 
 Pantagruel's library, or bound up with Tarta- 
 retus de modo cacandi. 
 
 XXII. These are niceties that become not And others 
 those that peruse so serious a mystery. There "^^^^ ^^^ 
 are others more generally questioned and called raised, may 
 to the bar, yet methmks of an easy and possible goivld.^ 
 truth. 
 
 It is ridiculous to put off or drown the gen- 
 eral flood of Noah, in that particular inundation 
 of Deucalion: that there was a deluge once, 
 seems not to me so great a miracle, as that 
 there is not one always. How all the kinds of 
 creatures, not only in their own bulks, but with 
 
48 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 aj)pear very feasible. There is 
 another secret not contained in the Scripture, 
 which is more hard to comprehend, and put 
 the honest Father to the refuge of a miracle ; * 
 and that is, not only how the distinct pieces of 
 the world, and divided islands, should be first 
 planted by men, but inhabited by tigers, pan- 
 thers, and bears. How America abounded with 
 beasts of prey and noxious animals, yet con- 
 tained not in it that necessary creature, a horse, 
 is very strange. By what passage those ani- 
 mals, not only birds, but dangerous and unwel- 
 come beasts, came over ; how there be creatures 
 there which are not found in this triple conti- 
 nent ; 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 
 
 * St. Augustine (De Civ. Dei, xvi. 7) says that this might 
 have been miraculously effected, but he does not say it could 
 not have been done without a miracle. See Burnet's Sacred 
 Theory of the Earth, lib. ii. c. 8. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 49 
 
 the world was as well peopled in the time of 
 Noah as in om^s ; 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. 'T is a 
 postulate to me that Methusalem was the long- Gen. v. 5. 
 est hved of all the children of Adam; and no " 
 man Avill 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 s. Matt 
 by a doubtfril word hath given occasion to trans- 
 late it ; yet in another place, in a more punctual Acts, i. is. 
 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 : be- Gen. xi. 4. 
 sides, it is improbable fr'om the circumstance of 
 the place, that is, a plain in the land of Shinar : 
 these are no points of faith, and therefore may 
 
 * His meaning is, that as Adam was created a man in the 
 prime of life, we may add forty years to the term of his actual 
 existence. 
 
 4 
 
50 RELIGIO MEDICL 
 
 admit a free dispute. There are yet others, 
 and those famiharly 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 
 Acts, xii. when Peter knocked at the door. It is not he, 
 ^^' hut his angel; that is, might some say, his mes- 
 
 senger, or somebody from him ; for so the origi- 
 nal signifies, and is as likely to be the doubtful 
 family's meaning. This exposition I once sug- 
 gested to a young divine, that answered upon 
 this point ; to which I remember the Francis- 
 can opponent replied no more, but, that it was 
 a netv, and no authentic interj}retation. 
 The Bible XXIII. Tlicse 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 
 
 * When Ptolemy Philadelphus, king of Egypt, founded the 
 library at Alexandria, he placed it under the care of Demetrius 
 Phalereus, an Athenian, who persuaded his royal master to add 
 to it the books of the Jewish law. The king wrote to Eleazar, 
 then high-priest, for them ; who not only sent him the books, but 
 with them seventy-two interpreters, skilled in both the Hebrew 
 and Greek tongues, to translate them for him into Greek. Their 
 labours produced the version called the Septuagint. 
 
 t,he best of 
 books. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 51 
 
 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 vani- 
 ties beyond laughter ; maintained by evident 
 and open sophisms, the policy of ignorance, 
 deposition of universities, and banishment of 
 learning: this hath gotten foot by arms and 
 violence : that without a blow hath disseminated 
 itself through the whole earth. It is not un- 
 remarkable what Philo first observed, that the 
 law of Moses continued two thousand years 
 without the least alteration; whereas, we see 
 the laws of other commonweals do alter with 
 occasions ; and even those that pretended their 
 original fi'om some divinity, to have vanished 
 without trace or memory. I believe, besides 
 Zoroaster, there were divers that writ before 
 Moses, who notwithstanding have suffered the 
 common fate of time. 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. 
 
 XXIV. I have heard some with deep sighs "Ofmak- 
 lament the lost lines of Cicero ; others with as J," ^^j^gj^ 
 many groans deplore the combustion of the is no end," 
 
52 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 Ecci. xii. library of Alexandria ; * for my own part, I 
 think there be too many in the world, and 
 could with patience behold the urn and ashes 
 of the Vatican, could I, with a few others, 
 
 iKingaiv. recovcr the perished leaves of Solomon. I 
 ' * would not omit a copy of Enoch's Pillars had 
 they many nearer authors than Josephus,t or 
 did not relish somewhat of the fable. Some 
 men have written more than others have spo- 
 ken: Pineda quotes more authors m one work, 
 than are necessary in a whole world. J Of 
 those three great inventions in Germany, there 
 are two which are not without their incom- 
 modities.§ It is not a melancholy utinam of my 
 
 * See D'Israeli's Curiosities of Literature. 
 
 t For this, the story is, that Enoch, or his father Seth, having 
 been informed by Adam, that the world was to perish once by 
 water, and a second time by fire, did cause two pillars to be erect- 
 ed; the one of stone against the water, and another of brick 
 against the fire ; and that upon those pillars was engraven all such 
 learning as had been delivered to, or invented by mankind ; and 
 that thence it came that all knowledge and learning was not lost 
 by means of the flood, by reason that one of the pillars (though 
 the other perished) did remain after the flood: and Josephus 
 witnesseth, till his time, lib. i. Antiq. Judaic, cap. 3. K. This, 
 though a tale, is truly moralized in the universities : Cambridge 
 (of brick) and Oxford (of stone) wherein learning and religion 
 are preserved, and where the worst college is more sightworthy 
 than the best Dutch gymnasium. Fuller's Holy State, xliv. 
 
 I Pineda, in his Monarchia Ecclesiastica, quotes one thousand 
 and forty authors. 
 
 § In all probability he means printing, gunpowder, and the 
 mariner's compass, or perhaps clocks: but it seems doubtful 
 whether all these were not known to the Chinese before the gen- 
 erally received date of their invention. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 53 
 
 own, but the desires of better heads, that there 
 were a general synod ; not to unite the incom- 
 patible 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 Aveaker 
 judgments of scholars, and to maintain the trade 
 and mystery of typographers. 
 
 XXV. I cannot but wonder w4th what ex- obstinacy 
 ceptions the Samaritans could confine their be- ^'^ "^^^ •^*'^^ 
 lief to the Pentateuch, or five books of Moses. 
 I am ashamed at the rabbinical interpretation 
 of the Jews, upon the Old Testament, as much 
 as their defection from the New i and tmly it 
 is beyond wonder, how that contemptible and 
 degenerate issue of Jacob, once so devoted to 
 ethnic 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 and want 
 
 T« n l^ • , n ^ of constan- 
 
 own religion, tor there is not any oi such a cy among 
 fugitive faith, such an unstable belief, as a christians. 
 Christian; none that do so often transform 
 
54 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 themselves, not unto several shapes of Chris- 
 tianity, and of the same species, but unto more 
 unnatural .and contrary forms of Jew and Ma- 
 hometan ; 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 prom- 
 ise of Christ to make us all one flock ; but how 
 and when this union shall be, is as obscure to 
 me as the last day. Of those four members of 
 religion we hold a slender proportion : * there 
 are, I confess, some new additions, yet small to 
 those which 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 Jews is expressly against the 
 Christian, and the Mahometan 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: 
 
 * The population of our globe has been divided thus : — 
 
 Christians 260,000,000 
 
 Jews 4,000,000 
 
 Mahometans 96,000,000 
 
 Idolaters of all sorts .... 500,000;000 
 
 Total population of the world . . 860,000,000 
 
the 
 Church. 
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 55 
 
 tliey have already endured whatsoever may be 
 inflicted, and have suffered in a bad cause, even 
 to the condemnation of their enemies. Perse- 
 cution is a bad and indirect way to plant relig- 
 ion : it hath been the mihappy 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; The wood 
 none can more justly boast of persecutions, and ^.^^ l^'^ 
 2:lorv in the number and valour of martyrs ; of 
 for, to speak properly, those are true and al- 
 most only examples of fortitude : those that are 
 fetched from the field, or drawn from the ac- 
 tions of the camp, are not ofttimes so truly 
 precedents of valour as audacity, and at the 
 best attain but to some bastard piece of forti- 
 tude : if we shall strictly examine the circum- 
 stances and requisites which Aristotle requires 
 to true and perfect valour, we shall find the 
 name only in his master Alexander, and as 
 little in that Roman worthy, Julius Caesar; 
 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. It is 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 
 
of religion 
 
 56 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 audacious and resolute a temper, as to endure 
 those terrible tests and trials; who, notwith- 
 standing, in a peaceable way do truly adore their 
 Saviour, and have, no doubt, a faith acceptable 
 in the eyes of God. 
 Not all are XXVI. Now as all that die in the war are 
 whrsuffer ^^* termed soldiers ; so neither can I properly 
 in matters term all tliosc that suffer in matters of religion, 
 martyrs. The Council of Constance condemns 
 John Huss for an heretic; 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 that miserable 
 bishop that suffered in the cause of Antipodes ; f 
 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 Bodleian MS. reads, Is it false divinity, if I say he was 
 neithei' one or the other? 
 
 t This was Virgilius, Bishop of Saltzburg. He died November 
 27, 780. See Curiosities of Literature, and Whewell's History of 
 the Inductive Sciences, vol. i. p. 256. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 57 
 
 the lie, if I say tliere are not many extant that 
 in a noble way fear the face of death less than 
 myself; yet from the moral duty I owe to the 
 commandment of God, and the natural respects 
 that I tender unto the conservation of my es- 
 sence and being, I would not perish upon a 
 ceremony, politic points, or indifferency : nor 
 is my behef 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 conmiit ourselves to the flames is 
 homicide, and, I fear, but to pass through one 
 fii'e into another. 
 
 XXVII. That miracles are ceased, I can of mira- 
 neither prove, nor absolutely deny, much less 
 define the tune 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 conver- 
 sion of nations, many years after, we cannot de- 
 ny, 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 beheve 
 
 cles. 
 
easy to 
 God 
 
 58 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 
 All equally scarco dcscrvc the name of a miracle : thouo-h 
 mdeed, 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 facihty; 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 na- 
 tm^e ; 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 God 
 cannot, but he will not, perform many things, 
 which we plainly affirm he cannot : this I am 
 sure is the mannerhest proposition, wherein. 
 
 2 Esdr 
 iv. 5. 
 
received 
 ' alike. 
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 59 
 
 notwitlistancling, I hold no paradox. For strict- 
 Ij, his power is the same with his Avill, and 
 they both with all the rest do make but one 
 God. 
 
 XXVIII. Therefore that miracles have been, ah reia- 
 I do beheve : that they may yet be wrousbt *''!''^ ?^ 
 
 '^ <J <j o miracles 
 
 by the living, I do not deny ; but have no con- not to be 
 fidence in those which are fathered on the dead 
 and this hath ever made me suspect the efficacy 
 of relics, to examine the bones, question the 
 habits and appurtenances of saints, and even 
 of Christ himself. I cannot conceive why the 
 cross that Helena found, and whereon Christ 
 himself died, should have power to restore 
 others unto life : I excuse not Constanthie from 
 a fall off his horse, or a mischief from his ene- 
 mies, upon the wearing those nails on his bridle, 
 which our Saviour bore upon the cross in his 
 hands : I compute among your pice fraudes, nor 
 many degrees before consecrated swords and 
 roses, that which Baldwyn king of Jerusalem 
 returned the Genovese for their cost and pains 
 in his war, to wit, the ashes of John the Baptist. 
 Those that hold the sanctity of their souls doth 
 leave behind a tincture and sacred faculty on 
 their bodies, speak naturally of miracles, and 
 do not salve the doubt. Now one reason I 
 tender so little devotion unto relics is, I think, 
 the slender and doubtful respect I have always 
 
60 RELIGIO MEDICI, 
 
 held unto antiquities ; for tliat indeed which I 
 admire is far before antiquity, that is, eternity ; 
 and that is, God himself; who though he be 
 
 Ban. vii. styled the Ancient of Days, cannot receive the 
 adjunct of antiquity, who was before the world, 
 and shall be after it, yet is not older than it ; 
 for in his years there is no climacter ; his dura- 
 tion is eternity, and far more venerable than 
 antiquity. 
 
 Oracles. XXIX. 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. 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.* 
 Certainly it is not a warrantable curiosity, to 
 examine the verity of Scripture by the concor- 
 dance of human history, or seek to confirm the 
 chronology of Hester or Daniel, by the author- 
 ity of Magasthenes or Herodotus ; I confess, 
 I have had an unhappy curiosity this way, 
 till I laughed myself out of it with a piece of 
 
 * In his oracle to Augustus. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 61 
 
 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 counterfeitmg shapes and deceitful viz- 
 ards times present represent on the stage things 
 past, I do believe them little more than thmgs 
 to come. Some have been of my opinion, and 
 endeavoured to write the history of their own 
 lives; wherein Moses hath outgone them all, 
 and left not only the story of his life, but, as 
 some will have it, of his death also. 
 
 XXX. It is a riddle to me, how this story witchcraft. 
 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 metaphysics, and destroy the ladder and 
 scale of creatures, as to question the existence 
 of spirits. For my part, I have ever beheved, 
 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 con- 
 sequence, a sort not of infidels, but atheists. 
 Those that to confute their incredulity desire 
 to see apparitions, shall questionless never be- 
 hold any, nor have the power to be so much 
 as witches; the devil hath them already in a 
 heresy as capital as witchcraft ; and to appear 
 
 * Justin. Hist. lib. 36. Cf. Tacitus Hist. lib. v. 
 
62 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 to tliem, were but to convert them. Of all 
 the delusions wherewith he deceives mortality, 
 there is not any that puzzle th me more than 
 the legerdemain of changelings.* I do not 
 credit those transformations of reasonable crea- 
 tures into beasts, — or that the devil hath 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 as- 
 sume, 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 : f 
 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 oth- 
 ers ; that as the devil is concealed and denied 
 
 * " From thence a Faery thee unweeting reft, 
 There as thou slepst in tender swadHng band, 
 And her base Elfin brood there for thee left: 
 Such men do Chaungelings call, so chaung'd by Faeries theft." 
 
 Faery Queene, i. x. 65. 
 See Mids. Night's Dream, ii. 1. 
 Luther's Divine Discourses, folio, p. 387. 
 t See Taylor's Holy Living, c. 2, S. 3, p. 64. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 63 
 
 by some, so God and good angels are pretended 
 by others, wliereof the late defection* of the 
 maid of Germany hath left a pregnant example. 
 
 XXXI. Again, I believe that all that use Philosophy 
 sorceries, incantations, and spells are not witch- ^^x^^^^ 
 es, or, as we term them, magicians. I conceive ^^^"^ 
 there is a traditional magic, not learned imme- 
 diately from the devil, but at second hand from 
 his scholars, who, having once the secret be- 
 trayed, 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 
 but the honest effects of nature : what invented 
 by us, is philosophy, learned from him, is magic. 
 We do surely owe the discovery of many secrets The sug- 
 to the discovery of good and bad angels. I fngei7^° 
 could never pass that sentence of Parecelsus, 
 without an asterisk, or annotation : f ascendens 
 astrum multa revelat quoerentibus magnalia na- 
 turae, i. e. opera Dei. I do think that many 
 mysteries ascribed to our own inventions have 
 
 * Defection. MS. W. reads detection. 
 
 t Thereby is meant our good angel appointed us from our 
 nativity. 
 
U RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 been the courteous revelations of spirits; for 
 those noble essences in heaven bear a friendly 
 regard unto their fellow natures on earth ; and 
 therefore believe that those many prodigies and 
 ominous prognostics, 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. 
 The Spirit XXXII. Now besidcs these particular and 
 fused ' tlivided spirits there may be (for aught I know) 
 through- an universal and common spirit to the whole 
 world. world. It was the opinion of Plato, and it 
 is yet of the Hermetical philosophers : if there 
 be a common nature that unites and ties the 
 scattered and divided individuals into one spe- 
 cies, why may there not be one that unites 
 them all ? However, I am sure there is a 
 common spirit that plays within us, yet makes 
 no part of us ; and that is, the Spirit of God, 
 the fire and scintillation of that noble and mighty 
 essence which is the life and radical heat of 
 spirits, and those essences that know not the 
 virtue of the sun ; a fire quite contrary to the 
 fire of hell : this is that gentle heat that brood- 
 Gen, i. 2. ed 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 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 65 
 
 in serenity : whosoever feels not the warm gale, 
 and gentle ventilation of this spirit, (though I 
 feel his pulse,) I dare not say he hves; for 
 truly without this, to me there is no heat under 
 the tropic ; nor any light, though I dwelt in the 
 body of the sun. 
 
 As when the labouring Sun hath wrought his track 
 
 Up to tlie 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 quick'ning beams awhile decline, 
 
 And with their light bless not this orb of mine, 
 
 A chilly frost surpriseth every member, 
 
 And in the midst of Juno I feel December. 
 
 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 ; 
 
 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. 
 
 XXXIII. Therefore for spirits, I am so far ofguar- 
 from denying their existence, that I could easily attrndant 
 believe, that not only whole countries, but par- sp^"*» 
 ticular 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 
 
66 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 Plato ; there is no heresy in it ; and if not 
 manifestly defined in Scripture, yet is it 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 a;ffordeth no solu- 
 tion. Now if you demand my opinion and met- 
 aphysics of their natures, I confess them very 
 shallow ; most of them in a negative way, like 
 that of God ; or in a comparative, between our- 
 selves and fellow-creatures ; for there is in this 
 universe a fetair, or manifest scale of creatures, 
 rising not disorderly, or in confusion, but with 
 a comely method and proportion : between crea- 
 tures of mere existence and things of life, there 
 is a large disproportion of nature ; between plants 
 and animals or creatures of sense, a wider dif- 
 ference ; 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,* and distinguish 
 them from ourselves by immortality ; for before 
 his fall man also was immortal ; yet niust we 
 needs afiirm that he had a different essence 
 from the angels : having therefore no certain 
 knowledge of their natures, 't is no bad method 
 of the schools, whatsoever perfection we find 
 
 * Essentia rationalis immortalis. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 67 
 
 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 acci- 
 dents and properties; and therefore probabili- 
 ties to us may be demonstrations unto them: 
 that they have knowledge not only of the spe- 
 cifical, but numerical forms of individuals, and 
 understand by what reserved difference each 
 single hypostasis (besides the relation to its 
 species) becomes its numerical self: that as the 
 soul hath a power to move the body it informs, 
 so there 's a faculty to move any, though inform 
 none ; ours upon restraint of time, place, and 
 distance ; but that invisible hand that conveyed Bei and the 
 Habakkuk to the lion's den, or Philip to Azo- ^^^^i. * 
 tus, infringeth this rule, and hath a secret con- 40. 
 veyance, wherewith mortality is not acquainted : 
 if they have that intuitive knowledge, whereby 
 as in reflexion they behold the thoughts of one 
 another, I cannot peremptorily deny but they 
 know a great part of ours. They that, to refute 
 the invocation of saints, have denied that tliey 
 have any knowledge of our affairs below, have 
 proceeded too far, and must pardon my opinion, 
 till I can thoroughly answer that piece of Scrip- 
 
68 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 St. Luke ture, at the conversion of a sinner^ the angels in 
 ' ' heaven rejoice,^ I cannot with those in that 
 father securely interpret the work of the first 
 day, fiat lux, to the creation of angels ; though 
 I confess, there is not any creature that hath 
 so near a glimpse of their nature as light in 
 the sun and elements : we style it a bare acci- 
 dent ; but where it subsists alone 't is a spiritual 
 substance, and may be an angel : in brief, con- 
 ceive light invisible, and that is a spirit. 
 Man a Mi- XXXIV. Tlicse are certainly the magiste- 
 plrtakhig ^^^^ ^^^ master-pieces of the Creator, the flow- 
 of the Na- er, or (as we may say) the best part of nothing, 
 created Es- actually existing, what we are but in hopes 
 sences. qj^^ probability : we are only that amphibious 
 piece between corporal and spiritual essence, 
 that middle form that links those two together, 
 and makes good the method of God and nature, 
 that jumps not jfrom extremes, but unites the 
 incompatible distances by some middle and par- 
 ticipating natures. That we are the breath 
 Gen. i. 26, and similitude of God, it is indisputable and 
 ^^' "•^* upon record of Holy Scripture: but to call our- 
 
 * " Take any moral or religious book, and instead of under- 
 standing each sentence according to the main purpose and inten- 
 tion, interpret every phrase in its literal sense as conveying, and 
 designed to convey, a metaphysical verity, or historical fact: — 
 what a strange medley of doctrines should we not educe ! And 
 yet this is the way in which we are constantly in the habit of 
 treating the books of the New Testament." — Coleridge. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 69 
 
 selves a microcosm, or little world,* I thought 
 it only a pleasant trope of rhetoric, 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 privi- 
 leged with life, or preferred to sense or reason ; 
 next we live the life of plants, the life of ani- 
 mals, the life of men, and at last the life of 
 spirits, running on in one mysterious nature, 
 those five kind of existences, Avhich comprehend 
 the creatures, not only of the Avorld, but of the 
 universe. Thus is man that great and true 
 ampMbium^ whose nature is disposed to live not 
 only like other creatures in divers elements, 
 hut in divided and distinguished worlds ; for 
 though there be but one world to sense, there 
 are two to reason; the one visible, the other 
 mvisible, whereof Moses seems to have left de- 
 scription, 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 di- 
 vines have to the power of human reason en- 
 deavoured to make all go in a literal meaning, 
 yet those allegorical interpretations are also 
 probable, and perhaps the mystical method of 
 
 * It was a saying of the Stoics : Bpaxvv [xev Koafiov top av- 
 dpanov, fieyav 5e avOpoonov top Kocrp-ou elvai. 
 
70 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 Moses bred up in the hieroglypliical schools of 
 the ^Egyptians.* 
 Of Crea- XXXV. Now for the immaterial world, me- 
 ^^^' thinks we need not wander so far as the first 
 movable ; for even in this material fabric the 
 spirits walk as freely exempt from the affection 
 of time, place, and motion, as beyond the ex- 
 tremest circumference : do but extract f from 
 the corpulency of bodies, or resolve things be- 
 yond their first matter, and you discover the 
 habitation of angels, which if I call the ubiqui- 
 tary 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 Avorld, or deter- 
 minate mansion, and therefore they are every- 
 St. Matt, where where is his essence, and do five 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 wilhng to fulfil the will 
 of God in these lower and sublunary affairs of 
 
 * " The second Chapter of Genesis from v. 4, and the third 
 Chapter, are to my mind as evidently symbolical, as the first 
 Chapter is literal. The first Chapter is manifestly by Moses 
 himself; but the second and third seem to me of far higher an- 
 tiquity, and have the air of being translated into words from 
 gi'aven stones." — Coleridge. 
 
 t Abstract, MS. 
 
 xviii. 10. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 71 
 
 man. God made all things for himself, and it 
 is impossible he should make them for any other 
 end than liis 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 m the 
 other world, angels, in this, man ; which when 
 we neglect, w^e forget the very end of our 
 creation, and may justly provoke God, not only 
 to repent that he hath made the world, but that Gen. yi. 6; 
 he hath sworn he would not destroy it. That ^"g.^y, ' 
 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 ancient philosophers, but Moses decided 
 that question, and all is salved with the new term 
 of a creation, that is, a production of sometliing 
 out of nothino; : 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 con- 
 * See Buckland's Bridgewater Treatise, vol. i. p. 22. 
 
72 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 trary unto nothing, out of which were made all 
 things, and so nothmg became something, and 
 omneity informed nullity into an essence. 
 Man the XXXVI. The wliole creation is a mystery, 
 
 *iecrof ^^^ particularly that of man: at the blast of 
 Creation, bis moutli wcrc the rest of the creatures made, 
 25. and at his bare word they started out of noth- 
 
 Gen. u. 7. ing : but in the frame of man (as the text 
 describes it) he played the sensible operator, 
 and seemed not so much to create, as make 
 him : when he had separated the materials of 
 other creatures, there consequently resulted a 
 form and soul ; but having raised the walls of 
 man, he has driven to a second and harder 
 creation of substance like himself, an incorrupt- 
 ible and immortal soul. For these two affec- 
 tions 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 pro- 
 duction) much disputed in the German audi- 
 tories, and with that indifferency and equality 
 of arguments, as leave the controversy unde- 
 termined. I am not of Paracelsus his 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, 
 
 * D'Israeli's Curiosities of Literature. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 73 
 
 having no other argument to confirm their be- 
 hef, than that rhetorical sentence, and anti- 
 metathesis of Augustme, Creancb infunditur, in- 
 fundendo creatur : either opinion will consist 
 well enough with religion : yet I should rather 
 incline to this, did not one objection haunt me, 
 not wrong from speculations and subtilties, 
 but from common sense, and observation ; not 
 picked fi'om the leaves of any author, but bred 
 amongst the weeds and tares of mine own brain; 
 and this is a conclusion from the equivocal and 
 • monstrous productions in the copulation of 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 hio;h a measure as it can evi- 
 dence 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 per- 
 formance 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 
 corps of the soul, but rather of sense, and that 
 the hand of reason. In our study of anatomy 
 there is a mass of mysterious philosophy, and 
 
74 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 snch as reduced the very heathens to divinity : 
 yet amongst all these rare discoveries, and curi- 
 ous pieces I find in the fabric 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 inconsid- 
 erable argument of the inorganity of the soul, 
 at least in that sense we usually so receive 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 can- 
 not tell how it entered in us. 
 Of the XXXVII. Now for these walls of flesh, 
 
 body. ^ ^ wherein the soul doth seem to be immured be- 
 fore the resurrection, it is nothing but an ele- 
 mental composition, and a fabric that must fall 
 Is. xi.6-8. to ashes. All flesh is grass, is not only meta- 
 phorically, but literally true ; for all those crea- 
 tures 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 al^hor, 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 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 75 
 
 in at our mouths ; this frame we look upon 
 hath been upon our trenchers ; in brief, we have 
 devoured ourselves. I cannot believe the wis- 
 dom of Pythagoras did ever positively, and in a 
 literal sense, affirm his metempsychosis, or im- 
 possible transmigration of the souls of men into 
 beasts : of all metamorphoses, or transmigra- 
 tions, I believe only one, that is of Lot's wife ; ^^^' ^^' 
 for that of Nebuchadnezzar proceeded not so far ; Dan. iv. 3 
 in all others I conceive there is no further veri- 
 ty 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 con- 
 trary 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 un- 
 quiet walks of devils, prompting and suggesting 
 us unto mischief, blood, and villany ; instilling, 
 and stealino; into our hearts that the blessed 
 spirits are not at rest in their graves, but wan- 
 der solicitous of the affairs of the world : but that 
 those phantasms appear often, and do frequent 
 cemeteries, charnel-houses, and churches, it is 
 
76 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 because those are the dormitories of the dead, 
 where the devil, Hke an insolent champion, 
 beholds with pride the spoils and trophies of 
 his victory in Adam. 
 Death XXXVIII. This IS that dismal conquest we 
 
 2 Esdr. Tii. all deplorc, that makes us so often cry, Adam, 
 ^^' quid fedsti? 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, con- 
 tinual sight of anatomies, skeletons, or cadav- 
 erous reliques, like vespilloes, or grave-makers, 
 I am become stupid, or have forgot the appre- 
 hension of mortality ; but that marshalling aU 
 the horrors, and contemplating the extremi- 
 hath no ties thereof, I find not anything therein able to 
 a Christian, dauut the couragc of a man, much less a well 
 resolved Christian ; and therefore am not angry 
 at the error of our first parents, or unwilhng 
 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 in- 
 1 Cor. XV. stant of a spirit. When I take a full view and 
 circle of myself without this reasonable mod- 
 erator, and equal piece of justice. Death, I do 
 conceive myself the miserablest person extant: 
 
 19. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 77 
 
 were there not another life that I hope for, all 
 the vanities of this world should not intreat a 
 a moment's breath from me: could the devil 
 work my behef to imagine I could never die, I 
 would not outlive that very thought. I have 
 so abject a conceit of this common way of exist- 
 ence, this retaining to the sun and elements, I 
 cannot think this to be a man, or to live accord- 
 ing 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 afr^aid 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 dilem- 
 ma, that he is too sensible of this life, or hope- 
 less of the Kfe to come. 
 
 XXXIX. Some divines count Adam thirty Man has 
 years old at his creation, because they suppose Jg^arate 
 him created in the perfect age and stature of states of 
 man. And surely we are all out of the compu- 
 tation of our age, and every man is some months 
 elder than he bethinks him ; for we hve, move, 
 have a being, and are subject to the actions of 
 the elements, and the malice of diseases, in that 
 
78 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 AAdthin the bosom 
 of our causes, we enjoy a being and life in three 
 distinct worlds, wherein we receive most mani- 
 fest graduations. In that obscure world, and 
 womb of our mother, our time is short, com- 
 puted by the moon, yet longer than the days of 
 many creatures that behold the sun ; ourselves 
 being not yet without life, sense, and reason ; 
 though for the manifestation of its actions, it 
 awaits the opportunity of objects, and seems to 
 live there but in its root and soul of vegetation. 
 Entering afterwards upon the scene of the world, 
 we rise up and become another creature, per- 
 formino; the reasonable actions of man, and ob- 
 scurely manifesting that part of divinity in us ; 
 but not in complement and perfection, till we 
 have once more cast our secondine, that is, this 
 slough of flesh, and are delivered into the last 
 2 Cor. xu. world, that is, that ineifable place of Paul, that 
 proper iihi of spirits. The smattering I have 
 of the philosopher's stone (which is something 
 more than the perfect exaltation of gold) hath 
 taught me a great deal of divinity, and instinict- 
 ed my belief, how that immortal spirit and 
 incorruptible substance of my soul may lie ob- 
 scure, and sleep a while within this house of 
 
 4. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 79 
 
 flesh.* Those strange and mystical transmigra- 
 tions that I have observed in silkworms, turned 
 my philosophy into divinity. There is in these 
 works of nature, which seem to puzzle reason, 
 somethino^ divine, and hath more in it than the 
 eye of a common spectator doth discover. 
 
 XL. I am naturally bashful; nor hath con- Death to be 
 
 , , rn , ashamed of 
 
 versation, age, or travel been able to ettront ratherthan 
 or enharden me ; yet I have one part of mod- ^®*'^^<^- 
 esty which I have seldom discovered in anoth- 
 er, 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 wilhng 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. Quan- 
 tum mutatus ah illo ! Not that I am ashamed 
 of the anatomy of my parts, or can accuse nature 
 for playing the bungler in any part of me, or 
 my own vicious life for contracting any shame- 
 
 * Compare Wordsworth's Ode, " Intimations of Immortality," 
 especially stanza v. 
 
80 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 fill disease upon me, whereby I might not call 
 myself as wholesome a morsel for the worms as 
 any. 
 Posthu- XLI. Some, upon the courage of a fi-uitfiil 
 
 rnoua fame , . . , i • i i 
 
 not to be issue, wherciu, as m the truest chronicle, they 
 seem to outlive themselves, can with greater 
 patience away with death. This conceit and 
 counterfeit subsisting in our progenies seems 
 to me a mere fallacy, unworthy the desires of a 
 man that can but conceive a thought of the 
 next world ; who, in a nobler ambition, should 
 desire to live in his substance in heaven, rather 
 than his name and shadow in the earth. And 
 therefore at my death I mean to take a total 
 adieu of the world, not caring for a monument, 
 history, or epitaph, not so much as the 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 Dio- 
 genes ; * nor do altogether follow that rodomon- 
 tado of Lucan: 
 
 Codo tegitur, qui non habet urnam. 
 
 Phars. vii. 819. 
 
 He that unburied lies wants not his herse, 
 For unto him a tomb 's the universe. 
 
 but commend, in my calmer judgment, those 
 ingenuous intentions that desire to sleep by the 
 
 * Who willed his friend not to bury him, but hang him up 
 with a staff in his hand to fright away the crows. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 81 
 
 urns of their fathers, and strive to go the neat- 
 est way unto corruption. I do not envy the 
 temper of crows and daws,* nor the numerous 
 and weary days of our fathers before the flood. 
 If there be any truth in astrology, I may out- 
 hve a jubilee ; as yet I have not seen one revo- 
 lution of Saturn, nor hath my pulse beat thirty 
 years ; and yet, excepting one, f 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. J Methinks I have outlived myself, and 
 begin to be Aveary of the sun : I have shaken 
 hands with delight in my warm blood and canic- 
 ular 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 
 antics, to my severer contemplations. 
 
 XLII. It is not, I confess, an unlawful prayer Length of 
 to desire to surpass the days of our Saviour, or ^^^ °°* *" 
 
 i- »J 'be prayed 
 
 wish to outlive that age wherein he thought for, 
 
 * As Theophrastus did, who, dying, accused nature for giving 
 them, to whom it could be of no use, so long a life, while she 
 gi-anted so short a one to man. Cf. Cic. Tusc. Disp. iii. 69. An 
 extreme longevity was ascribed to these birds. 
 
 t Excepting one ; Christiern IV., King of Denmark, who died 
 1647. 
 
 X These were Rodolph 11., Matthias, and Ferdinand II., Em- 
 perors of Germany ; Achmet I., Mustapha I., Othman II., and 
 Amurath IV., Grand Signiors ; Leo XL ? Paul V., Gregory XV., 
 and Urban VIIL, Popes. 
 6 
 
doth but 
 increase 
 our vices, 
 
 82 Rl£LIGiO MEVICL 
 
 fittest to die ; yet if (as divinity affirms) there 
 shall be no gray hairs in heaven, but all shall 
 rise in the perfect state of men, we do but out- 
 live those perfections in this world, to be re- 
 called 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 
 for age of Methusclah. 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 six- 
 teen, 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 judge- 
 ment cuts oflp pretence unto excuse or pardon : 
 every sin the oftener it is committed, the more 
 it acquireth in the quality of evil ; as it suc- 
 ceeds in time, so it proceeds in degrees of bad- 
 ness ; for as they proceed they ever multiply, 
 and, like figures in arithmetic, the last stands 
 for more than all that went before it. And 
 though I think that no man can live well once 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 83 
 
 but lie 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, because I have lived them 
 well,* but for fear I should live them worse. 
 I find my groAving judgment daily instruct 
 me how to be better, but my untamed affec- 
 tions and confirmed vitiosity makes me daily do 
 worse : I find in my confirmed age the same 
 sins I discovered in my youth ; I committed 
 many then, because I Avas a child ; and because 
 I commit them still, I am yet an infant. There- 
 fore I perceive a man may be twice a child, 
 before the days of dotage ; and stand in need 
 of ^son's bath f before threescore. 
 
 XLIII. And truly there goes a great deal a special 
 of providence to produce a man's hfe unto pre^y*"*'^ 
 threescore.: there is more required than an ourUves. 
 able temper for those years ; though the rad- 
 ical humour contain in it sufficient oil for sev- 
 enty, 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 
 
 * I suppose he alludes to an expression in an Epistle of Cicero, 
 •written in his exile, to his wife and children, where he hath these 
 words to his wife : Quod reliquum est, te sustenta, mea Terentia, ut 
 potes ; honestissime viximus, Jloruimus. Non vitium nostrum sed vir- 
 tus nostra nos afflixit : peccaturn est nullum, nisi quod non una ani- 
 mam cum ornamentis amisimus. L. xiii. Ep. 55. Cf. Cic. De 
 Senectute, xxiii. 
 
 t Ovid, Met. vii. 176. 
 
84 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 glome or bottom of our 
 days : 't was His wisdom to determine them, 
 but his perpetual and waking providence that 
 fulfils and accomplisheth them, wherein the spir- 
 its, 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 accomphshed ; and 
 the last and general fever may as naturally 
 destroy it before six thousand, as me before 
 forty. There is therefore some other hand 
 that twines the thread of life than that of 
 nature : we are not 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. 
 Tho' death XLIV. I am much taken with two verses 
 
 13 to be de- 
 sired, yet of Lucan, since I have been able not only, as 
 
 u^Tawfui. ^^ ^^ ^^ school, to construe, but understand: 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 85 
 
 Victurosque Dei celant, ut vivere durent, 
 Felix esse mori. 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 sup- 
 plied him ; and truly there are singular pieces 
 in the philosophy of Zeno, 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, Scaevola, 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 cBstumo,* I would not die, 
 but care not to be dead. Were I of Caesar's 
 religion, I should be of his desires, and wish 
 
 * Cic. Tusc. Disp. i. 8. 
 
86 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 rather to go off at one blow, than to be sawed 
 in pieces by the grating torture of a disease. 
 Men that look no farther than their ontsides, 
 tliink 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 fabric 
 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 behold- 
 ing 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, in it, 
 immortal. Certainly there is no happiness with- 
 in this circle of flesh, nor is it in the optics 
 of these eyes to behold felicity. The first day 
 
 * " Strange that a harp of thousand strings 
 Should keep in tune so long ! " 
 Fs. cxxxix. 14. "I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and 
 wonderfully made." 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 87 
 
 of our jubilee is death ; tlie 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. He forgets that he can 
 die who complains of misery ; we are in the 
 power of no calamity while death is in our 
 own. 
 
 XLV. Now besides this literal and positive Death the 
 kind of death, there are others whereof divines ^,1, ^^ 
 
 ' which we 
 
 make mention, and those I think not merely pass to im- 
 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 bap- 
 tism ; and from this do I compute or calculate 
 my nativity, not reckoning those liorce comhustcB 
 and odd days, or esteeming myself anything, 
 before I was my Saviour's, and inrolled in the 
 register of Christ : whosoever enjoys not this 
 life, I count him but an apparition, though he 
 wear about him the sensible affections of flesh. 
 In these moral acceptions, the way to be im- 
 mortal 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 
 
88 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 more Christian memorandum, memento quatuor 
 novissiyna^ those four inevitable points of us all, 
 Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell. Nei- 
 ther did the contemplations of the heathens rest 
 in their graves, without a further thought of 
 Rhadamanth or some judicial proceeding after 
 death, though in another way, and upon sug- 
 gestion 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, ossibm astra 
 Mixturus 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 ad- 
 versary, annihilation ; without which the world 
 hath not its end, but its mutation. Now what 
 
 * The Author of nature has not given laws to the universe, 
 which, like the institutions of men, carry in themselves the ele- 
 ments of their own destruction. He has not permitted in his 
 works any symptom of infancy or old age, or any sign by which 
 we may estimate either their future or their past duration. He 
 may put an end, as he no doubt gave a beginning, to the present 
 system at some determinate period of time ; but we may rest 
 assured that this great catastrophe will not be brought about by 
 the laws now existing, and that it is not indicated by anything 
 which we perceive. — Playfair's Works, vol. iv. p. 55. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 89 
 
 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 de- Gen. i. 
 scribed make not to them one moment, but 
 rather seem to manifest the method and idea 
 of that great work in 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 of- 
 ten delivered in a vulgar and illustrative way ; 
 and being written unto man, are delivered, not 
 as they truly are, but as they may be under- 
 stood; wherein, notwithstanding, the different 
 interpretations according to different capacities 
 may stand firm with our devotion, nor be any 
 way prejudicial to each single edification. 
 
 XLYI. 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 ? ^*- ^^"* 
 
 ' o xxiv. 36. 
 
 It had been an excellent qusere to have posed 
 
St. Matt. 
 xxiv. 11 
 
 90 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 or 
 present, pretend a knowledge of things to come : 
 heads ordained only to manifest the incredible 
 effects of melancholy, and to fulfil old prophecies 
 24. rather than be authors of new. In tJiose days 
 
 St. Matt, there shall come wars and rumours of wars^ to me 
 St. Mark sccms 110 propliccy, but a constant truth in all 
 ^»- '^' times verified since it was pronounced. There 
 St. Luke §Jiall he 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 : 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 induc- 
 tions, yet hath hardly any man attained the 
 perfect discovery thereof. Tliat general opin- 
 ion 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 
 
RELIGIO MEDICL 91 
 
 under the altar, Quousque Domine f How long, Rev. tI. 9, 
 O Lord ; and groan in the expectation of the ^^' 
 great jubilee. 
 
 XL VII. This is the day that must make The day of 
 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 respec- 
 tive 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 tliis great piece. 
 This is the day whose memory hath only power 
 to make us honest in the dark, and to be virtu- 
 ous without a witness. Ipsa suce pretium virtus 
 sihi — 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, 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 naught but moral 
 honesty, and this was not to be virtuous for His 
 sake who must reward us at the last. I have 
 
92 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 tried if I could reach that great resolution of 
 liis, 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 there- 
 fore and spirit of all our actions is the resurrec- 
 tion, and a stable apprehension that our ashes 
 shall enjoy the fruit of our pious endeavours : 
 without this, all religion is a fallacy, and those 
 impieties of Lucian, Euripides, and Julian are 
 no blasphemies, but subtle verities, and atheists 
 have been the only philosophers. 
 The resur- XLYIII. How shall the dead arise ? is no 
 the dead, question of my faith ; to believe only possibili- 
 1 Cor. XV. ties 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 possi- 
 ble, 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 pilgrim- 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 93 
 
 ages and transformations into the parts of min- 
 erals, 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 
 species ; 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 these corrupted reliques shall be scat- 
 tered in the wilderness of forms, and seem to 
 have forgot then' proper habits, God by a pow- 
 erful 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 magic of that sperm that hath 
 dilated into so many millions.* I have often Types of 
 beheld as a miracle that artificial resurrection *^^J'^^"'^" 
 
 rection. 
 
 and revivification of Mercury, how, being mor- 
 tified into a thousand shapes, it assumes again 
 
 * "V^Tiat is made to be immortal, nature cannot, nor will the 
 voice of God, destroy. Those bodies that "we behold to perish, 
 were in their created natures immortal, and liable unto death 
 only accidentally, and upon forfeit; and therefore they owe not 
 that natural homage unto death as other bodies do, but may be 
 restored to immortality with a lesser miracle, and by a bare and 
 easy revocation of course, return immortal. Edits. 1642. 
 
94 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 its own, and returns into its numerical self. Let 
 us speak naturally and like philosophers : the 
 forms of alterable bodies in these sensible cor- 
 ruptions perish not ; nor, as we imagine, whol- 
 ly 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 contem- 
 plative and school-philosopher seems utterly de- 
 stroyed, and the form to have taken his leave 
 forever ; but to a sensible artist the forms are 
 not perished, but withdrawn into their incom- 
 bustible part, where they lie secure from the 
 action of that devourino: 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.* What 
 
 * Sir Kenelm Digby thus describes the beautiful experiment, 
 called, from the Greek, Palingenesis : — 
 
 " Quercetanus^ the famous physician of King Henry the Fourth, 
 tells us a wonderful story of a Polonian doctor, that showed him 
 a dozen glasses hermetically sealed, in each of which was a dif- 
 ferent plant : for example, a rose in one, a tulip in another, a 
 clove gilly-flower in a third, and so of the rest. When he offered 
 these glasses to your first view, you saw nothing in them but a 
 heap of ashes in the bottom. As soon as he held some gentle 
 heat under any of them, presently there arose out of the ashes 
 the idea of a flower and the stalk belonging to those ashes, and it 
 would shoot up and spread abroad to the due height and just 
 dimensions of such a flower, and had perfect colour, shape, mag- 
 nitude, and all other accidents, as if it really were that very 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 95 
 
 the art of man can do in these inferior pieces, 
 what blasphemy is it to affirm the finger of 
 God cannot do in these more perfect and sen- 
 sible structures ! This is that mystical philoso- 
 phy, 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. 
 
 XLIX. Now the necessary mansions of our Heaven, or 
 restored selves are those two contrary and in- ^il^^na^. 
 compatible 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 i cor. u. 9. 
 heard, nor can enter into the heart of man: he ^* ^^* 
 was translated out of himself to behold it; but 
 being returned into liimself could not express it. 
 St. John's description by emeralds, chrysolites. Rev. xxi. 
 and precious stones, is too weak to express the 
 
 flower. But whenever you drew the heat from it, would this 
 flower sink down by little and little, till at length it would bury 
 itself in its bed of ashes. And thus it would do as often as you 
 exposed it to moderate heat, or withdrew it from it. I confess it 
 would be no small delight to me to see this experiment, with all 
 the circumstances that Quercetan sets down. Athnnasius Kir- 
 cherus, at Rome, assured me that he had done it ; and gave me 
 the process of it. But no industry of mine could eflect it." — 
 Treatise on the Vegetation of Plants. 
 
96 RELIGIO MEDICI, 
 
 material heaven we behold. Briefly, therefore, 
 where the soul hath the full measure and com- 
 plement of happiness ; where the boundless ap- 
 petite 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 sen- 
 sible 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 
 2Cor. xu. that St. Paul, whether in the body or out of 
 the body, was yet in heaven. To place it in 
 the empyreal, or beyond the tenth 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 
 ^2^'^"* P^^il^sophy, when with these eyes of flesh he 
 desired to see God, and petitioned his Maker, 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 97 
 
 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 st. Luke 
 discoursed with Lazarus in Abraham's bosom, 
 do too grossly conceive of those glorified crea- 
 tures, whose eyes shall easily outsee the sun, 
 and behold without a perspective the extremest 
 distances : for if there shall be in our glorified 
 eyes the faculty of sight and reception of ob- 
 jects, I could think the visible species there 
 to be in as unhmitable a way, as now the in- 
 tellectual. I grant that two bodies placed be- 
 yond the tenth sphere, or in a vacuity, accord- 
 ing 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 optics. 
 
 L. I cannot tell how to say that fire is the ofFirea? 
 essence of hell : I know not what to make of ^^^^^^_ '" 
 purgatory, or conceive a flame that can either •^ion- 
 prey upon, or purify the substance of a soul : 
 those flames of sulphur mentioned in the Scrip- 
 tures, I take not to be understood of this present 
 7 
 
98 RELIGIO MEDICI, 
 
 hell, but of tliat to come, where fire shall make 
 up the complement of our tortures, and have a 
 body or subject wherein to manifest its tyranny. 
 Some who have had the honour to be textuary 
 in divinity, are of opinion it shall be the same 
 specifical fire with ours. This is hard to con- 
 ceive ; yet can I make good: how even that may 
 prey upon our bodies, and. yet not consume us : 
 for in this material world there . are bodies that 
 persist invincible in the powerfullest flames ; 
 and though by the action of fire they fall into 
 ignition and liquation, yet will they never suffer 
 a destruction. I would gladly know how Moses 
 Exod. with an actual fire calcined or burnt the golden 
 calf unto 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 actions of flames, they shall never perish, 
 but lie immortal in the arms of fire. And 
 surely, if this frame 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 
 
 * Moses is not said to have consumed ii, but to have ground it 
 to powder. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 99 
 
 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. Philoso- 
 phers that opinioned the world's destruction by 
 fire, did never dream of annihilation, which 'is 
 beyond the power of sublunary causes; for'tlie 
 last and proper action of that element is but 
 vitrification, or a reduction of a body into 
 glass; and therefore some of our chymicks fa- 
 cetiously affirm, that at the last fire all shall be 
 crystallized 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 under- 
 standing. Thus God beholds all things, who 
 contemplates as fully his works in their epitome 
 
100 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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. 
 The heart LI. Men commouly set forth the torments 
 of man is ^£ -j^^^l ^y fire, and the extremity of corporal 
 torment, afilictions, and describe hell in the same meth- 
 od 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 rep- 
 resent hell. The heart of man is the place the 
 devil dwells 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 Anaxarchus conceited worlds: there 
 
 * So Milton, Paradise Lost, i. 254, — 
 
 " The mind is its own place, and in itself 
 Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven," — 
 
 and iv. 18. So also, Tasso, c. xii. st. 77. 
 
 " Swift from myself I run, myself I fear. 
 Yet still my hell withiji myself I bear." 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 101 
 
 was more than one hell in Magdalene, when 
 there were seven devils, for every devil is an 
 hell unto himself; he holds enough of torture 
 in his own uhi^ and needs not the misery of 
 circumference to afflict him; and thus a dis- 
 tracted conscience here is a shadow or intro- 
 duction unto hell hereafter. Who can hut pity 
 the merciful intention of those hands that do 
 destroy themselves ? the devil, were it in his 
 power, would do the like ; which being impos- 
 sible, his miseries are endless, and he suffers 
 most in that attribute wherein he is impassible, 
 his immortality. 
 
 LII. I thank God, and with joy I mention contem- 
 it, I was never afraid of hell, nor never grew Jgaven*' 
 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 Heb. xii.,2. 
 rather to dose the joys of the one, than endure 
 the misery of the other : to be deprived of them 2 Esdr. ix. 
 is a perfect hell, and needs, methmks, no addi- 
 tion 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 judg- 
 ments afraid thereof: these are the forced and 
 secondary method of his wisdom, which he 
 useth but as the last remedy, and upon provo- 
 
102 RELIGIO MEDICL 
 
 cation: 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 merce- 
 naries, that crouch unto him in fear of hell, 
 though they term themselves the servants, are 
 indeed hut the slaves of the Almighty.* 
 Thejudg- LIII. And to be true, and speak my soul, 
 
 mentsof ' . 
 
 God to be whcu I survcy the occurrences of my life, and 
 proofs o^^^ call into account the finger of God, I can per- 
 affection. ccivo 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 wliich others 
 term crosses, afflictions, judgments, misfortunes, 
 to me who inquire farther 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 pas- 
 sion, the works of God, and so well to distin- 
 guish his justice from his mercy, as not to 
 
 * Excellent throughout ! The fear of hell may indeed in some 
 desperate cases, like the moxa^ give the first rouse from a moral 
 lethargy, or like the green venom of copper, by evacuating poison 
 or a dead load from the inner man, prepare it for nobler ministra- 
 tions and medicines from the realm of light and life, that nourish 
 while they stimulate. Coleridge. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 103 
 
 miscall those noble attributes : yet it is likewise 
 an honest piece of logic, so to dispute and argue 
 the proceedings of God, as to distinguish even 
 his judgments into mercies. For God is mer- 
 ciful unto all, because better to the worst than 
 the best deserve ; and to say he pmiisheth none 
 in this world, though it be a paradox, is no 
 absurdity. To one that hath committed mur- 
 der, 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, mis- 
 fortune, or disease, what phrensy were it to 
 term this a punishment, rather than an extrem- 
 ity 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 acci- 
 dental, and not the intended work of my devo- 
 tion ; 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 
 
104 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 punishments, are mercifully ordained and dis- 
 proportionably disposed unto our actions ; the 
 one being so far beyond our deserts, the other 
 so infinitely below our demerits. 
 Salvation LIV. There is no salvation to those that 
 
 through , ,. . ^^, . , . 
 
 Christ beheve not m Christ, that is, say some, since 
 alone, j^jg 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, amongst those 
 many subdivisions of hell, there might have 
 been one limbo left for these. What a strano-e 
 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 suifer for him they never heard of! 
 when they that 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 be- 
 twixt the Creator and the creature ; or did we 
 seriously perpend that one simile of St. Paul, 
 Rom. ix. ^lall the vessel say to the potter^ Why hast thou 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 105 
 
 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 pre- 
 script of their natures, and therefore cannot 
 reasonably demand a reward of then' 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 con 
 firm, and make it good, how the perfectest 
 actions of earth have no title or claim unto 
 heaven. 
 
 LY. Nor truly do I think the lives of these. Our prac- 
 
 c* n 1 , tice incon- 
 
 or or any other, were ever correspondent, or gistentwith 
 in all points conformable unto their doctrines. o»irtiieory. 
 It is evident that Aristotle transgressed the rule 
 of his own ethics : the Stoics that condemn pas- 
 sion, and command a man to laugh in Phalaris 
 his bull, could not endure without a groan a 
 fit of the stone or colic. The sceptics, that 
 affirmed they knew nothing, even in that opin- 
 ion confute themselves, and thought they knew 
 more than all the world beside. Diogenes I 
 hold to be the most vainglorious man of his 
 tune, and more ambitious in refusing all hon- 
 ours, than Alexander in rejecting none. Vice 
 
106 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 and the devil put a fallacy upon our reasons, 
 and, provoking us too hastily to run from it, 
 entangle and profound us deeper in it. The 
 duke of Venice, that weds himself unto the 
 sea by a ring of gold, I will not argue of prodi- 
 gality, because it is a solemnity of good use 
 and consequence in the state : but the philoso- 
 pher that tlu^ew his money into the sea to avoid 
 avarice, was a notorious prodigal.* There is 
 no road or ready way to virtue : it is not an 
 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 
 veny of another: and indeed wiser discretions 
 that have the thread of reason to conduct them, 
 offend without a pardon ; whereas, underheads 
 may stumble without dishonom\ There are so 
 many circumstances to piece up one good ac- 
 tion, that it is a lesson to be good, and we are 
 
 * The Doge performs this ceremony every year, in token of 
 the sovereignty of the state of Venice over the Adriatic, and to 
 commemorate the celebrated declaration of Pope Alexander III.: 
 *' Que la mer vous soit soumise comme 1' Spouse Test a son ^poux, 
 puisque vous en avez acquis 1' empire par la victoire." ApoUo- 
 nius Thyaneus threw his gold into the sea, saying these words : 
 Pessundo diviiias, ne pessundarer ah illis. Polycrates, the tyrant 
 of Samos, cast the best jewel he had into the sea, that thereby 
 he might learn to compose himself against the vicissitudes of 
 fortune. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 107 
 
 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 pur- 
 sue what is evil : the rhetoric wherewith I per- 
 suade 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 farther than agrees to its 
 own irregular humour. In brief, we all are 
 monsters, that is, a composition of man and 
 beast, wherein we must endeavour to be as the 
 poets fancy that wise man Chiron, that is, to 
 have the region of man above that of beast, 
 and sense to sit but at the feet of reason. Last- 
 ly, I do desire with God, that all, but yet af- i Tim. a. 
 firm with men, that few shall know salvation : g'p^'t. yj. 9. 
 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. 
 
 LVI. The vulgarity of those judgments that The 
 wrap the Church of God in Strabo's cloak,* and ^^^ ^^^ 
 
 circum- 
 * 'Tis Strabonis tunica in the translation, but chlamydi -would scribed, 
 do better, wliich is the proper expression of the word that Strabo 
 useth : it is not Europe, but the known part of the world, that 
 Strabo resembleth to a cloak, and that is it the author here 
 alludeth to ; but we have no reason to think that the resemblance 
 of Strabo is very proper. 
 
108 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 restrain it unto Europe, seem to me as bad 
 geographers as Alexander, who thought he had 
 conquered all the world, when he had not sub- 
 dued the half of any part thereof: for we can- 
 not 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 diflPerences, 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 but in the sunshine. 
 A sectarian 'J is truc wc all hold tlicrc is a number of 
 
 ppirit hos- i i i 
 
 tile to elect, and many to be saved; yet take our 
 chanty. opinions together, and from the confusion there- 
 of 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 ato- 
 mist, or familist,* reprobates all these ; and all 
 these, them again. Thus whilst the mercies 
 
 * The atomists, or familisis, were religionists who sprung up 
 about the year 1575. See Hist, of the Puritans, i. 273. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. ■ 109 
 
 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 salva- 
 tion. 
 
 LVII. I believe many are saved, who to "Judge 
 
 Till -\ . not, that 
 
 man seem reprobated; and many are reprobat- ye be not 
 ed, who, in the opinion and sentence of man. Judged." 
 stand elected. There will appear at the last 
 day, strange and unexpected examples, both of 
 his justice and his mercy ; and therefore to de- 
 fine either is folly in man, and insolency even 
 in the devils : those acute and subtile spirits, 
 in all their sagacity, can hardly divine who 
 shall be saved ; which if they could prognostic, 
 their labour were at an end, nor need they 
 compass the earth seeking whom they may de- 
 vour. Those who, upon a rigid application of 
 the law, sentence Solomon unto damnation, con- 
 demn 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 
 
110 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 of his own law, by which alone we can pre- 
 tend unto salvation, and through which Solo- 
 mon might be as easily saved as those who 
 condemn him. 
 
 LVIII. 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 com- 
 
 st. Luke pellation of little flock, doth not comfort, but 
 deject my devotion ; especially when I reflect 
 upon mine own unworthiness, wherein, accord- 
 ing 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. 
 
 Our confi- LIX. Again, I am confident, and fully per- 
 
 dence can ^ t n t 
 
 only be in suadcd, yet dare not take my oath of my sal- 
 ^^^'^ vation. I am as it were sure, and do believe 
 
 mercy. ' 
 
 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 tru- 
 ly, though many pretend an absolute certainty 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. Ill 
 
 of their salvation, yet when an humble soul 
 shall contemplate her 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 pwi. u. 12. 
 and trembling. That which is the cause of 
 my election, I hold to be the cause of my sal- 
 vation, which was the mercy and heneplacit of 
 God, before I was, or the foundation of the 
 world. " Before Abraham was, I am," is the ^*- "^^^^ 
 
 Tiii. 58. 
 
 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 be- 
 fore I was alive : though my grave be England, 
 my dying place was paradise : and Eve mis- 
 carried of me, before she conceived of Cain. 
 
 LX. Insolent zeals, that do decry good works Faith. 
 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 heav- 
 en. It was decreed by God, that only those 
 that lapt in the water like dogs, should have Judges vii 
 the honour to destroy the Midianites ; yet could 
 none of those justly challenge, or imagine he 
 
112 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 
 St. Matt. j£ Q^Y Saviour could object unto his own dis- 
 ciples and favourites, a faith, that, to the quan- 
 tity of a grain of mustard-seed, is able to re- 
 move mountains ; surely, that which we boast 
 of is not anything, or at the most but a re- 
 move from nothing. This is the tenor of my 
 belief; wherein, though there be many things 
 singular, and to the humour of my irregular 
 self, yet if they square not with maturer judg- 
 ments, I disclaim them, and do no further fa- 
 vour them, than the learned and best judgments 
 shall authorize them. 
 
The Second Part. 
 
 I" OW for that other virtue of charity, charity, 
 without which faith is a mere no- icor. xiu 
 tion, and of no existence, I have ^* 
 ever endeavoured to nourish the 
 merciful disposition and humane incKnation I 
 borrowed from my parents, and regulate it 
 to the written and prescribed laws of char- 
 ity: and if I hold the true anatomy of my- 
 self, I am delineated and naturally framed to 
 such a piece of virtue ; for I am of a con- 
 stitution so general, that it consorts and sym- 
 pathizeth with all things : I have no antipathy, 
 or rather idio-syncrasy, 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 gath- 
 8 
 
114 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 ered in a cliurcliyard, 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 preju- 
 dice 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 for to be framed and 
 constellated unto all ; I am no plant that will 
 not prosper out of a garden ; all places, all airs, 
 make unto me one 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 
 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 crea- 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 115 
 
 tures of God ; but confused together, make but 
 one great beast, and a monstrosity more pro- 
 digious 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 beheve so. Neither in the name of multi- 
 tude 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 mechanics, though then- 
 fortunes^ do somewhat gild their infirmities, and 
 their purses compomid for their follies. But 
 as in casting account, three or four men to- 
 gether come short in account of one man placed 
 by himself below them; so neither are a troop 
 of these ignorant Boradoes^ 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 hun, accordmg to the quahty of his 
 
 * " Do not imagine that I consider as vulgar those only of the 
 poor and humble classes; but aU who are ignorant, even be they 
 lords or princes, they must be classed under the denomination 
 vulgar.'''' — Cervantes. 
 
 t Dorado, Spanish. Gilt-head. 
 
116 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 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 common- 
 weahhs, 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 hcense or faculty to do or purchase 
 anything. 
 Charity II. Tliis general and indifferent temper of 
 
 sprhigfrom ^^^^ ^^^^^ more nearly dispose me to this noble 
 a proper virtuc. It is a happiness to be born and framed 
 unto virtue, and to grow up from the seeds of 
 nature, rather than the inoculation and forced 
 grass of education : yet if we are directed only 
 by our particular natures, and regulate our in- 
 chnations 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 hun- 
 
 * " Nobilitas sola est atque unica, virtus." 
 
 Juvenal. 
 " Howe'er it be, it seems to me, 
 'T is only noble to be good; 
 Kind hearts are more than coronets, 
 And simple faith than Norman blood." 
 
 Tennyson. 
 
 motive. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 117 
 
 ger 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 rhetoric 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 an- 
 other upon the bare suggestion and bowels of 
 pity, doth not this so much for his sake as for 
 his own ; for by compassion we make others' 
 misery our own, and so, by relieving them, we 
 relieve 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 politic kind of charity, whereby 
 we seem to bespeak the pities of men in the 
 like occasions. And truly I have observed The nature 
 that those professed eleemosynaries, though in bdnTS-- 
 a crowd or multitude, do yet direct and place ^^ified in 
 their petitions on a few and selected persons: wardforma. 
 there is surely a physiognomy, which those 
 experienced and master mendicants observe, 
 whereby they instantly discover a merciful as- 
 pect, and will single out a face wherein they 
 spy the signatures and marks of mercy. For 
 there are mystically in our faces certain char- 
 acters wliich carry in them the motto of our 
 
118 
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 souls, wherein lie that cannot read ABC may 
 read our natures. I hold, moreover, that there 
 is a phytognomy, or physiognomy, not only of 
 men, but of plants and vegetables : and in every 
 one of them some outward figures which hang 
 as signs or bushes of their inward forms.* The 
 finger of God hath left an inscription upon all 
 his works, not graphical or composed of letters, 
 but of their several forms, constitutions, parts, 
 and operations, which, aptly joined together, do 
 make one word that doth express their natures. 
 
 Ps. cxiTii. By these letters God calls the stars by their 
 names ; and by this alphabet Adam assigned to 
 
 Gen.ii.i9, evcry crcaturc a name peculiar to its nature. 
 Now there are, besides these characters in our 
 fxces, certain mystical figures in our hands, which 
 I dare not call mere dashes, strokes a la volee^ 
 or at random, because delineated by a pencil 
 that never works in vain; and hereof I take 
 more particular notice, because I carry that 
 in mine own hand which I could never read 
 of nor discover in another. Aristotle, I confess, 
 in his acute and singular book of physiognomy, 
 hath made no mention of chiromancy; yet I 
 beheve the Egyptians, who were nearer ad- 
 
 Of chiro 
 mancy. 
 
 * Vintners were wont to hang up hushes, or garlands of ivy, 
 over their doors. See Epilogue to As you like it : " If it be true 
 that good wiue needs no bush, 't is true that a good play needs 
 no epilogue." 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 119 
 
 dieted to those abstruse and mystical sciences, 
 had a knowledge therein, to which those vag- 
 abond and counterfeit Egyptians did after pre- 
 tend, and perhaps retained a few corrupted 
 principles, which sometimes might verify their 
 prognostics. 
 
 It is the common wonder of all men, how variety of 
 among so many millions of faces there should f^^^g^j^ 
 be none alike. Now, contrary, I wonder as nature. 
 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 hun- 
 dred lines there are to be drawn in the fabric 
 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 hmn out a 
 million of faces, and you shall find them all 
 different ; yea, let him have his copy before 
 him, yet after all his art there will remain a 
 sensible distinction ; for the pattern or example 
 of everything is the perfectest in that kind, 
 whereof we still come short, though we tran- 
 scend 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 
 tlie works of God. For even in things ahke 
 
The souls 
 of our fel- 
 
 120 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 there is diversity; and those that do seem to 
 accord do manifestly disagree. And thus is 
 man Hke God ; for in the same things that 
 we resemble him, we are utterly different from 
 him. There was never anything so like an- 
 other 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 im- 
 possible. 
 
 III. But to return from philosophy to char- 
 low-crea- ity : I liold not so narrow a conceit of this vir- 
 much^the ^^®' ^^ ^^ couccivc that to givc alms is only 
 object of to be charitable, or think a piece of liberality 
 their can comprehend the total of charity. Divinity 
 bodies, liath 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 re- 
 quire the mercifril hand of our abilities. I can- 
 not 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 hveries, and their borrowed 
 understanduigs do homage to the bounty of 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 121 
 
 ours : it is tlie cheapest way of beneficence, and, 
 like the natural charity of the sun, illuminates 
 another without obscuring itself. To be re- 
 served and caitiff in this part of goodness, is 
 the sordidest piece of covetousness, and more 
 contemptible than pecuniary avarice. To this 
 (as calling myself a scholar) I am obliged by The duty 
 the duty of my condition : I make not therefore mgknowi- 
 my head a grave, but a treasury of knowledge ; ®*^se. 
 I intend no monopoly, but a community m 
 learning : I study not for my own sake only, 
 but for theu's 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 m 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. Differences 
 
 ,.™ . . . 1 ij of opinion 
 
 or conceive why a ditterence m opinion should need not 
 divide an affection : for controversies, disputes, ^^"'^^^ 
 
 , , . 1 ., 1 . affection. 
 
 and argumentations, both m philosophy and m 
 divmity, if they meet with discreet and peacea- 
 ble 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 
 
122 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 then reason, like a bad hound, spends upon a 
 false scent, and forsakes the question first start- 
 ed. And in this is one reason why contro- 
 versies are never determined ,• for though they 
 be amply proposed, they are scarce at all han- 
 dled ; they do so swell with unnecessary digres- 
 sions, and the parenthesis on the party is often 
 as large as the main discourse upon the subject. 
 The foundations of religion are already estab- 
 lished, and the principles of salvation subscribed 
 unto by all : there remain not many controver- 
 sies worth a passion ; and yet never any disputed 
 without, not only in divinity, but mferior arts. 
 What a ^arpa'^oybvoixayla and hot skirmish is 
 betwixt S and T in Lucian ? * How do gram- 
 marians hack and slash for the genitive case in 
 Jupiter ! f How they do break their own pates 
 to salve that of Priscian ! Si foret in terris, ri- 
 deret Democritus. Yea, even amongst wiser mili- 
 tants, 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 his razor ; J 
 
 * In his dialogue, judicium vocalium, where there is a large 
 oration made to the vowels, being judges, by Sigma against Tau, 
 complaining that Tau has bereaved him of many words, which 
 should begin with Sigma. 
 
 t Whether Jovis or Jupitris. 
 
 X Accius Neevius is reported by Livy, Lib. i. cap. 36, to have 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 123 
 
 their pens carry farther, and give a louder re- 
 port than thunder : I had rather stand in the 
 shock of a basihsco,* than in the fury of a mer- 
 ciless pen. It is not mere zeal to learning, or 
 devotion to the Muses, that wiser princes pat- 
 ron the arts, and carry an indulgent aspect unto 
 scholars ; but a desire to have their names eter- 
 nized 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 vir- 
 tues and vices. And surely there goes a great 
 deal of conscience to the compiling of an his- 
 tory : there is no reproach to the scandal of a 
 story ; it is such an authentic kind of falsehood 
 that with authority belies our good names to all 
 nations and posterity. 
 
 lY. There is another offence unto charity. National 
 which no author hath ever written of, and few ^^^\f 
 
 ' charity. 
 
 take notice of; and that 's the reproach, not of 
 whole professions, mysteries, and conditions, but 
 of whole nations, wherein by opprobrious epi- 
 thets we miscall each other, and by an unchari- 
 table logic, from a disposition in a few, conclude 
 
 cut a whetstone through with a razor, at the challenge of the 
 King, Tarquinius Prisons. 
 * JBasilisco, a kind of cannon. 
 
124 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 a habit in all. St. Paul, that calls the Cretans 
 liars, doth it but indirectly, and upon quotation 
 of their own poet.* It is as bloody a thought 
 in one way, as Nero's was in another ; f for by 
 a word we wound a thousand, and at one blow 
 assassine the honour of a nation. It is as com- 
 plete 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 hypochondriac as Heraclitus 
 that bewailed them. It moves not my spleen 
 to behold the multitude in their proper hu- 
 mours, that is, in their fits of folly and mad- 
 ness ; as well understanding that wisdom is not 
 profaned unto the world, and 'tis the privilege 
 of a few to be virtuous. They that endeavour 
 to abolish vice, destroy also virtue ; for contra- 
 
 * That is, Epimenides; the place is Tit. i. v. 12, where St. 
 Paul useth this verse, taken out of Epimenides : 
 
 KpJ)reff del y\rev(TTai, kuko. 6r]pia, yao-repes dpyai. 
 
 t I suppose he alludes to that passage in Sueton. 38, in the 
 life of Nero, where he relates that a certain person upon a time 
 spoke in his hearing these words, 
 
 Efxov BavovTos yaia fxix^fira) TTvpi, 
 i. e. When I am dead let earth be mingled with fii*e. Where- 
 upon the Emperor uttered these words, EfioO ^avros, i. e. Yea, 
 whilst I live : there, by one word, he expressed a cruel thought 
 which I think is the thing he meant. This is more cruel than 
 the wish of Caligula, that the people of Eome had but one neck, 
 that he might destroy them all at a blow. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICL 125 
 
 ries, thougli they destroy one another, are yet 
 the hfe of one another. Thus vu^tue (abohsh 
 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 persists entire in 
 the general inundation. I can therefore behold 
 vice without a satire, content only with an ad- 
 monition, 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 Man most 
 censure or condemn another, because indeed t^e°^*oli° 
 no man truly knows another. This I perceive edge of 
 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 
 
126 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 forms of things as we their operations. Fur- 
 ther, 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 oth- 
 ers 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 per- 
 haps of those past, that charity grows cold; 
 which I perceive most verified in those which 
 most do manifest the fires and flames of zeal ; 
 for it is a virtue that best agrees with cold- 
 est 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. 
 Mbn 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 the- 
 ory of himself. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 127 
 
 V. There is, I tliink, no man that appre- ofsym- 
 hendeth 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 party's 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 job xix. 
 expostulations of his friends, a deeper injury 
 than the downright 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 nar- 
 rower 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 invisible, at least to 
 become insensible. Now with my friend I de- 
 sire not to share or participate, but to engross 
 his sorrows, that, by making them mine o\vn 
 I may more easily discuss them ; for in mine 
 own reason, and within myself, I can com- 
 
128 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 mand that whicli I cannot intreat without my- 
 self, and within the circle of another. I have 
 often thought those noble pairs and examples of 
 jfriendship 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 heroic examples of Damon and 
 Pythias, Achilles and Patroclus, which me- 
 thinks upon some grounds I could not perform 
 within the narrow compass of myself. That 
 a man should lay down his hfe 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 fi:iends.* Next to these three, 
 I do embrace myself. I confess I do not ob- 
 serve that order that the schools ordain our 
 affections, to love our parents, wives, children, 
 and then our friends ; for excepting the injunc- 
 
 * Cf. Pope's Essay on Man: 
 
 " Self-love but serves the virtuous mind to wake, 
 As the small pebble stirs the peaceful lake ; 
 The centre moved, a circle straight succeeds, 
 Another still, and still another spreads ; 
 Friend, parent, neighbour, next it will embrace, 
 His country next, and next all human race ; 
 Wide and more wide the o'erflo wings of the mind 
 Take every creature in of every kind." 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 129 
 
 tions of religion, I do not find in myself sucli a 
 necessary and indissoluble sympathy to all those 
 of my blood. I liope 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. 
 
 VI. There are wonders in true affection : it The mys- 
 is a body of enigmas, mysteries, and riddles ; ^ffjltion "^ 
 wherein two so become one, as they both be- 
 come 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 ; when I am with him, I am not satis- 
 fied, but would still be nearer him. United souls 
 are not satisfied with embraces, but desire to be 
 truly each. other; which being impossible, their 
 
130 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 desires are infinite, and must proceed without a 
 possibility of satisfaction. Another misery there 
 is in affection, that whom we truly love like our 
 ownselves, 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 no- 
 ble 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 affect 
 all. Now if we can bring our affections to look 
 beyond the body, and cast an eye upon the 
 soul, we have found out the true object, not 
 only of friendship, but charity ; and the great- 
 est 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 invoca- 
 tions 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 can- 
 not go to cure the body of my patient, but I 
 forget my profession, and call unto God for his 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 131 
 
 soul : I cannot see one say his prayers, but, in- 
 stead of imitating him, I fall into a supplication 
 for him, who perhaps is no more to me than a 
 common nature : and if God hath vouchsafed 
 an ear to my supplications, there are surely 
 many happy that never saw me, and enjoy the 
 blessing of mine unknown devotions. To pray 
 for enemies, that is, for their salvation, is no 
 harsh precept, but the practice of our daily 
 and ordinary devotions. I cannot believe the 
 story of the Italian: our bad wishes and un- 
 charitable desires proceed no further than tliis 
 life ; it is the devil, and the uncharitable votes 
 of hell, that desire our misery in the world to 
 come. 
 
 VII. To do no injury, nor take none, was to forgive 
 a principle, which to my former years, and ''*^^ 
 
 . . nf, . ./ ' sweetest 
 
 impatient afiections, seemed to contain enough revenge. 
 of morality ; but my more settled years, and 
 Christian constitution, have fallen upon severer 
 resolutions. I can hold there is no such thing 
 as injury ; that if there be, there is no such 
 injury as revenge, and no such revenge as the 
 contempt of an injury ; that to hate another, is 
 to malign himself; that the truest way to love 
 another, is to despise 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 fabric of man ; 
 
132 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 tliis frame is raised upon a mass of antipathies : 
 I am one, metliinks, but as the world ; wherein 
 notwithstanding, there are a swarm of distinct 
 essences, and in them another world of contra- 
 rieties ; we carry private and domestic enemies 
 within, public and more hostile adversaries with- 
 out. The devil, that did but buffet St. Paul, 
 plays methinks at sharp with me : let me be 
 nothing, if within the compass of myself I do 
 not find the battle of Lepanto, passion against 
 reason, reason against faith, faith against the 
 devil, and my conscience against all. There is 
 another man within me, that 's angry with me, 
 rebukes, commands, and dastards me. I have 
 no conscience of marble to resist the hammer 
 of more heavy offences ; nor yet 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 com- 
 pute and reckon with God but from my last 
 repentance, sacrament, or general absolution ; 
 and therefore am not terrified with the sins or 
 
 * This is most true as far as the imputation of the same is 
 concerned. For where the means of avoiding its consequences 
 have been afforded, each after transgression is actual, by a 
 neglect of those means. Coleridge. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 133 
 
 madness of my youth. I thank the goodness of 
 God, I have no sins^ that want a name ; I am 
 not smgular in offences, my transgressions are 
 epidemical, and from the common breath of our 
 corruption. For there are certain tempers of 
 body which, matched with an humorous deprav- 
 ity of mind, do hatch and produce vitiosities, 
 whose ncAvness and monstrosity of nature admits 
 no name : this was the temper of that lecher that 
 carnalled with a statua, and the constitution 
 of Nero in his spintrian recreations. For the 
 heavens are not only fruitful in new and un- 
 heard-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 infirmi- 
 ties 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 other- 
 wise of myself, that I repute myself the most 
 abjectest piece of mortality. Divines prescribe 
 a fit of sorrow to repentance : there goes indig- 
 nation, anger, sorrow, hatred, into mine ; pas- 
 sions of a contrary nature, which neither seem 
 to suit with this action, nor my proper constitu- 
 tion. It is no breach of charity to ourselves, 
 to be at variance with our vices : nor to abhor 
 
 10 
 
and Con- 
 ceit. 
 
 134 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 that part of us wliich is an enemy to the ground 
 of charity, our God ; wherein we do but imitate 
 our great selves the world, whose divided antip- 
 athies and contrary faces do yet carry a chari- 
 table regard unto the whole by their particular 
 discords, preserving the common harmony, and 
 keeping in fetters those powers, whose rebel- 
 lions once masters, might be the ruin of all. 
 Of Pride VIII. 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 con- 
 ceits 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 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 135 
 
 himself either Hnmiist or critic. I have not 
 only seen several countries, beheld the nature 
 of their climes, the chorography of their prov- 
 inces, 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 mar- 
 iner, 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 fish- 
 ermen ; or that Aristotle, who understood the 
 
 * " . . . . these lisping hawthorn buds, that come like women in 
 men's apparel, and smell like Bucklersbury in simple-time." — 
 Merry Wives of Windsor, iii. 3. 
 
136 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 uncertainty of knowledge, and confessed so often 
 the reason of man too weak for the works of 
 nature, did ever drown himself upon the flux 
 and reflux of Euripus. We do but learn to- 
 day, what our better advanced judgments will 
 unteach to-morrow ; and Aristotle doth but in- 
 struct 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 Peripatetics, 
 Stoics, or Academics ; yet I perceive the wisest 
 heads prove, at last, almost all Sceptics, and 
 stand like Janus in the field of knowledge. 
 I have therefore one common and authentic 
 philosophy I learned in the schools, whereby 
 I discourse and satisfy the reason of other men ; 
 another more reserved, and drawn from expe- 
 rience, 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 knowl- 
 edge ; it is but attending a little longer, and 
 we shall enjoy that by instinct and infiision, 
 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 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI, 137 
 
 blessing of our own reasons, than buy the un- 
 certain knowledge of this life with sweat and 
 vexation, which death gives every fool gratis, 
 and is an accessary of our glorification. 
 
 IX. I was never yet once [married], and Of mar- 
 commend their resolutions who never marry ^ISiony. 
 twice : not that I disallow of second marriage ; 
 as neither in all cases of polygamy, which, con- 
 sidering some tunes, 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 con- 
 junction, or that there were any way to per- 
 petuate the world without this trivial and vulgar 
 way of coition : it is the foolishest act a wise 
 man commits in all his life ; nor is there any- 
 thing that will more deject his cooled imagina- 
 tion, 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 music even in the beauty, and the 
 
138 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 silent note which Cupid strikes, far sweeter 
 than the sound of an instrument:* for there 
 is music wherever there is harmony, order, or 
 proportion: and thus far we may maintain the 
 music of the spheres ; for those well-ordered 
 motions, and regular paces, though they give 
 no sound unto the ear, yet to the understand- 
 ing they strike a note most full of harmony.f 
 Whatsoever is harmonically composed, delights 
 in harmony ; which makes me much distrust 
 the symmetry of those heads which declaim 
 against all church music. For myself, not only 
 from my obedience, but my particular genius, 
 I do embrace it: for even that vulgar and 
 tavern music, which makes one man merry, 
 another mad, strikes in me a deep fit of de- 
 votion, and a profound contemplation of the 
 First Composer; there is something in it of 
 divinity more than the ear discovers: it is an 
 
 * So Daniell (Complaint of Kosamond): 
 
 " Ah Beauty ! Syren faire, enchanting Good, 
 Sweet silent Rhetorick of persuading eyes; 
 Dumbe eloquence, whose power doth move the blood, 
 More than the words or wisdom of the wise ; 
 Still Harmony, whose diapason lies 
 Within a brow ; the Key which passions move 
 To ravish sense and play a world in love." 
 " When Love speaks, the voice of all the gods 
 Makes heaven drowsy with the harmony." 
 
 Love's Labour 's Lost, iv. 3. 
 t See Merchant of Ven., v. 1. Milton's Arcades. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 139 
 
 hieroglypliical 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 intel- 
 lectually sounds in the ears of God. It unties 
 the ligaments of my frame, takes me to pieces, 
 dilates me out of myself, and by degrees, me- 
 thinks, resolves me into Heaven. I will not 
 say, with Plato, the soul is an harmony, but 
 harmonical, and hath its nearest sympathy unto 
 music : 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.t This made Tacitus, 
 in the very first line of his story, fall upon a 
 
 * "Is not God's Universe a Symbol of the Godlike j is not Im- 
 mensity a Temple j is not Man's History, and Men's History, a 
 perpetual Evangel ? Listen, and for Organ-music thou wilt ever, 
 as of old, hear the Morning Stars sing together." — Sartor Ke- 
 sartus, p, 299. 
 
 t " The old musician, who, rather figuratively we may sup- 
 pose, than with philosophical seriousness, declared the soul itself 
 to be nothing but harmony, provoked the sprightly remark of Cicero, 
 that he drew his philosophy from the Art which heprofessed; but if, 
 without departing from his own art, he had merely described the 
 human frame as the noblest and sweetest of musical instruments, 
 endued with a natural disposition to resonance and sympathy, 
 alternately affecting and affected by the soul which pervades it, 
 his description might, perhaps, have been physically just, and 
 certainly ought not to have been hastily ridiculed."— Asiatic 
 Eesearches, vol. iii. p. 56. 
 
140 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 verse;* and Cicero, the worst of poets, but 
 
 declaiming for a poet, falls in the very first 
 
 OurPhy- scntcnce upon a perfect hexameter.f I feel 
 
 sician hath ^^^ «^ ^^ thosc sordid and unchristian desires 
 
 the general 
 
 cause of of vdj profcssiou ; I do not secretly implore 
 atTeart/ ^1^^ wisli for pkgucs, rcjoicc at famines, re- 
 volve ephemerides and almanacks in expecta- 
 tion 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, be- 
 sides 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 
 
 * Urbem Romam. in ])7-incij3io reges habuere. Annales, i. 1. 
 t In qua me non injicior mediocriter esse. Pro Archia. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 141 
 
 fall of Adam, and are not exempt from their 
 infirmities ; tliere are not only diseases incura- 
 ble in pliysic, but cases indissolvable in laws, 
 vices incorrigible in divinity. If general coun- 
 cils may err, I do not see why particular courts 
 sliould 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 they not consonant to his own , 
 rules, and the logic of his proper principles. 
 Again, to speak nothing of the sin against the St. Matt. 
 Holy Ghost, whose cure not only, but whose g"'j/jj.ij 
 nature, is unknown ; I can cure the gout or iii- 28. 
 stone in some, sooner than Divinity, pride or 
 avarice in others. I can cure vices by physic 
 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 
 catliolicon or universal remedy I know, but this ; 
 which, though nauseous to queasie stomachs, 
 yet to prepared appetites is nectar, and a pleas- 
 ant potion of immortality. 
 
 X. For my conversation, it is like the sun's, ourPhysi- 
 with all men, and with a friendly aspect to good ''l?'^ *'^'''^' 
 
 ./ i o eth no man 
 
 and bad. Methinks there is no man bad, and so bad but 
 
142 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 that there the worst, best ; that is, while they are kept 
 IS goo^m ^-^i-^-j^ ^l^g circle of those qualities wherein they 
 are good: there is no man's mind of such dis- 
 cordant and jarring a temper, to which a tuna- 
 ble disposition may not strike a harmony. Mag- 
 nce virtutes^ nee minora vitia: it is the posie* 
 of the best natures, and may be inverted on 
 the worst. There are in the most depraved 
 and venomous dispositions, certain pieces that 
 remain untouched, which by an antiperistasis 
 become more excellent, or by the excellency of 
 their antipathies are able to preserve them- 
 selves from the contagion of their enemy vices, 
 and persist entire beyond the general corrup- 
 tion. For it is also thus in Nature. The great- 
 est 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 
 andfeareth also. But it is the Corruption that I fear within 
 me, not the contagion of commerce without me. 
 
 his own 
 corruption 
 
 more 
 
 than 'X is that unruly regiment within me, that will 
 from destroy me; 'tis I that do infect myself; the 
 
 others. jnan without a navel yet lives in me ; f I feel 
 
 * Posie. The motto on a ring. Cf. Hamlet, iii. 2. Mer. of 
 Ven., V. 1. 
 
 t That is, the old Adam. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICL 143 
 
 that original canker corrode and devour me ; 
 and therefore defenda me Dios de me, Lord, de- 
 liver 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; Nimquam minus solus quam cum solus, 
 though it be the apophthegm 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 un- 
 ruly rebel that musters up those disordered 
 motions which accompany our sequestered im- 
 aginations : 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 him- 
 self; all others, besides their dissimilary and 
 heterogeneous parts, which in a manner multi- 
 ply 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 itself, 
 which is not truly one ; and such is only God : 
 all others do transcend an unity, and so by con- 
 sequence are many. 
 
 * Publius Scipio. Cic. de Off., lib. iii. 
 
144: RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 Man's life 
 a constant 
 
 XI. Now for my life, it is a miracle of thirty 
 miracle. ycars, wliicli 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 my- 
 self; it is the microcosm of mine 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 out- 
 side, perusing only my condition and fortunes, 
 do err in my altitude ; for I am above Atlas his 
 shoulders. The Earth is a point not only in 
 respect of the heavens above us, but of that 
 heavenly and celestial part within us : that mass 
 of flesh that circumscribes me, limits not my 
 mind : that surface that tells the heavens it hath 
 an end, cannot persuade me I have any : I take 
 my circle to be above three hundred and sixty ; 
 though the number of the arc 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 
 Gen. 1.27. 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 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 145 
 
 begin the alphabet of man. Let me not injure 
 the felicity of others, if I say I am as happy as 
 any : Ruat caelum, 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 con- 
 tent to enjoy a happiness in a fancy, as others 
 in a more apparent truth and reality. There is of Dreams, 
 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 whisper- 
 ing 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 sm-ely 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 con- 
 ceits 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 some- 
 what more than ourselves in our sleeps, and 
 
146 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 the slumber of tlie body seems to be but the 
 waking of the soul. It is the ligation of sense, 
 but the liberty of reason ; and our waking con- 
 ceptions do not match the fancies of our sleeps. 
 At my nativity my ascendant was the watery- 
 sign of Scorpius; I was born in the planetary 
 hour of Saturn, and I think I have a piece of 
 that leaden planet in me.* I am no way face- 
 tious, nor disposed for the mirth and galliardize 
 of company ; yet in one dream I can compose 
 a whole comedy, behold the action, and appre- 
 hend the jests, and laugh myself awake at the 
 conceits thereof. Were my memory as faitliful 
 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 gross- 
 er memories have then so little hold of our 
 abstracted understandings, that they forget the 
 story, and can only relate to our awaked souls 
 a confused and broken tale of that that hath 
 passed. Aristotle, who hath written a singular 
 tract of sleep, hath not, methinks, thoroughly 
 defined it; nor yet Galen, though he seem to 
 have corrected it ; for those noctambuloes and 
 night-walkers, though in their sleep, do yet 
 enjoy the action of their senses : we must there- 
 fore say that there is something in us that is 
 not in the jurisdiction of Morpheus ; and that 
 * Cf. Hor. Od. ii. xvii. 17. 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 147 
 
 those abstracted and ecstatic souls do walk about 
 in their own corps, 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 them- 
 selves. For then the soul, beginning to be 
 freed from the hgaments of the body, begins to 
 reason like herself, and to discourse in a strain 
 above mortahty.* 
 
 XII. We term sleep a death; and yet it is Of sleep. 
 
 * That the soul is endowed with clearer faculties just before 
 its separation from the body, is an opinion of great antiquity. 
 See Bishop Newton's fourth Dissertation on Prophecy, and com- 
 pare Daniell (Civil Wars, iii. 62), 1562. 
 
 Whether the soul receives intelligence, 
 By her near Genius, of the body's end, 
 And so imparts a sadness to the sense, 
 Foregoing ruin, whereto it doth tend j 
 Or whether Nature else hath conference 
 With profound Sleep, and so doth warning send. 
 By prophetizing dreams, what hurt is near. 
 And gives the heavy careful heart to fear." 
 And Waller: 
 
 The soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed. 
 Lets in new light thro' chinks that time hath made: 
 Stronger by weakness, wiser men become, 
 As they draw near to their eternal home. 
 Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view. 
 That stand upon the threshold of the new." 
 
 Compare ShaJcspeare's King Richard 11., ii. 1. 
 
148 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 waking tliat kills us, and destroys those spirits 
 that are the house of hfe. 'T is 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 him- 
 self. Themistocles, therefore, that slew his sol- 
 dier 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 be- 
 fore 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. 
 Whilst I do rest, my soul advance ; 
 Make my sleep a holy trance : 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 149 
 
 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, make me try, 
 
 By sleeping, what it is to die: 
 
 And as gently lay my head 
 
 On my grave, as now ray 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 : 
 
 come that hour, when I shall never 
 
 Sleep thus 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. 
 
 XIII. The method I should use in distribu- 
 tive 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, nei- Avarice a 
 ther is it, I think, my star to be wealthy; or 
 if it were, the freedom of my mind, and frank- 
 ness 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 
 11 
 
 ridiculous 
 vice. 
 
150 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 madness ; * to conceive ourselves urinals, or be 
 persuaded that we are dead, is not so ridiculous, 
 nor so many degrees beyond the power of helle- 
 bore,! 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 philoso- 
 phy, and there is no delirium, if we do but 
 speculate the folly and indisputable dotage of 
 avarice. J 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 em- 
 poor men bracc myself. § Aristotle is too severe, that 
 
 * " That a man who is Deputy Lieutenant of the whole world, 
 should not act like a Prince within his territories, is a thing to 
 be counted more a matter of prodigy than proof." — Religio Juris- 
 prudentis. 
 
 t Hellebore was thought to be a specific against madness. 
 
 X i. e. There is nothing worthy of the name delirium when 
 compared with the folly, &c. 
 
 § There is an error here. Aristotle distinctly says (Eth. iv. 2) 
 that true liberality consists not in the magnitude of the gift, but 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 151 
 
 will not allow us to be truly liberal without maybe 
 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 st. Luke 
 only an act of wonder, but an example of the ^^'•^'^ 
 noblest charity, surely poor men may also build ^-"^^ ^^y 
 hospitals, and the rich alone have not erected Hospitals 
 cathedrals. I have a private method which ^"'^ ''**^®" 
 
 ^ _ drals. 
 
 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 were defective in one 
 circumstance, they may repay their want, and 
 multiply their goodness in another. f I have 
 not Peru in my desires, but a competence and 
 ability to perform those good works, to which 
 the Almighty 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. Re 
 
 in the disposition of the giver: but he says (Eth. iv. 5) that a 
 man with slender means cannot be munificent. 
 
 * When I am reduced to the last tester, I love to divide it with 
 the poor. MSS. and Ed. 1G42. 
 
 t Essays of Elia, 1st pai*t. 
 
152 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 prov. xix. that giveih to the poor lendeth to the Lord:* 
 ^^' there is more rhetoric in that one sentence, 
 
 than in a hbrary of sermons ; and indeed if 
 those sentences were understood by the reader, 
 with the same emphasis as they are dehvered 
 by the Author, we need 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 untouched part 
 of us both : there is under these centoes and 
 Job xxxi. miserable outsides, these mutilate and semi-bod- 
 ies, a soul of the same alloy with our own, 
 whose genealogy is God as well as ours, and 
 in as fair a way to salvation as ourselves. f 
 Statists that labour to contrive a commonwealth 
 
 * In St. George's Church, Doncaster, is to be seen this epi- 
 taph : — 
 
 That I spent, that I had: 
 That I gave, that I have : 
 That I left, that I lost. 
 
 How now, who is here ? 
 I, Robin of Doncastere 
 And Margaret my fere. 
 
 A. D. 1579. 
 Quoth Robertus Byrks, who in this world did reign 
 3 score years and 7, and yet lived not one. 
 
 t So Herbert: 
 
 " Man is God's image ; but a poor man is 
 Christ's stamp to boot: both images regard. 
 God reckons for him, counts the favour His : 
 Write, So much given to God: thou shalt be heard 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 153 
 
 without poverty, take away the object of char- 
 ity, not only not understanding!: the common- st. Matt, 
 wealth of a Christian, but forgetting the proph- cf. Deut. 
 ecy of Christ. ^^•^'• 
 
 XIV. Now there is another part of charity, Godaione 
 which is the basis and pillar of this, and that i°7own^ 
 is the love of God, for whom we love our ^ake ; and 
 neighbour ; for this I think charity, to love God bour for 
 for himself, and our neighbour for God.* All ^^'^'^' 
 that is truly amiable is God, or as it were a 
 divided piece of him, that retains a reflex or 
 shadow of himself. Nor is it strange that we 
 should place affection on that which is invisible : 
 all that we truly love is thus ; what we adore 
 under affection of our senses, deserves not the 
 honour of so pure a title. Thus we adore vir- 
 tue, though to the eyes of sense she be invisi- 
 ble : 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.f Let us call to assize the loves 
 
 * " Flatter not thyself in thy faith to God, if thou wantest 
 charity for thy neighbour : and thinic not thou hast charity for 
 thy neighbour, if thou wantest faith to God : where they are not 
 both together, they are both wanting; they are both dead if once 
 divided." — Quarles's Enchiridion, Cent. ii. 11. 1650. 
 
 t " Every true Virtue is a part of that Love with which God 
 loveth himself." — Spinosa. 
 
154 RELIGIO MEDICL 
 
 of our parents, the affection of wives and chil- 
 dren, and they are all dumh 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, forget our mother 
 in a wife, and the womb that bare us, in that 
 that shall bear our iinao;e : this woman blessino; 
 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 them- 
 selves to a woman, take a lawful way to love 
 another better than ourselves. Thus I per- 
 ceive a man may be buried alive, and behold 
 his grave in his own issue. 
 Our Physi- XV. I concludo therefore and say, there is 
 
 cian con- , . *^ , 
 
 ciudeth no happiness under (or, as Copernicus will have 
 T'^ *!!\- it? above) the sun, nor any crambe in that re- 
 
 clareth his -^ ' ./ 
 
 belief that pcatcd Verity and burthen of all the wisdom 
 happiness ^^ Solomou, All is Vanity and vexation of spirit ; 
 but in God. 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 sum- 
 mum honum is a chimera, and there is no such 
 thing as his felicity. That wherein God him- 
 self is happy, the holy angels are happy, in 
 whose defect the devils are unhappy ; that dare 
 
RELIGIO MEDICI. 155 
 
 I call happiness: whatsoever conduceth unto 
 this, may with an easy metaphor deserve that 
 name; whatsoever else the world terms hap- 
 piness, is to me a story out of Pliny, an ap- 
 parition, or neat delusion, wherein there is no 
 more of happiness than the name. Bless me 
 in this life with but peace of my conscience, 
 command of my affections, the love of Thy- 
 self and my dearest friends, and I shall be 
 happy enough to pity Ca3sar. These are, O 
 Lord, the humble desires of my most reason- 
 able 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. 
 
Letter to a Friend 
 
 Upon occasion of the Death 
 
 of his intimate 
 
 Friend. 
 
 12 
 
Letter to a Friend, 
 
 ^^^1' IVE me leave to wonder that news 
 ^ ^yfi of tliis nature should have such 
 }CK)g:^ heavy wings that you should hear 
 Sss-^'Ji) so little concerning your dearest 
 Friend, and that I must make that unwiHins: 
 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 imto that dark society ; and con- 
 sidering 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 
 
160 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 by dreams, tliouglitful whisperings, mercurisms, 
 airy nuncios, or sympathetica! 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 con- 
 founded all human predictions, yet they who 
 St. Matt, 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 httle acquaint- 
 ed with Plautus his 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, where- 
 in medical predictions fail not, as sometimes in 
 acute diseases, and wherein 't is as dangerous to 
 be sentenced by a Physician as a Judge. 
 
 * In Plutarch his Defect of Oracles, wherein he relates that a 
 voice was heard crying to mariners at sea, Great Pan is dead. 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 161 
 
 Upon my first visit I was bold to tell them 
 wlio had not let fall all hopes of his recovery, 
 that in my sad opinion he was not like to be- 
 hold a grasshopper, mjach less to pluck another 
 fig; and in no long time after, seemed to dis- 
 cover that odd mortal symptom in him not 
 mentioned by Hippocrates, that is, to lose his 
 own face, and look like some of his near rela- 
 tions : for he maintained not his proper counte- 
 nance, but looked like his uncle, the lines of 
 whose face lay deep and invisible in his health- 
 ful 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 commu- 
 nity 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,* and 
 the most healthful air of little effect, where 
 
 * The unwholesome atmosphere of Sardinia was as proverbial 
 as the salubrity of Tivoli. 
 
 " Nullo fata loco possis excludere : cum mors 
 Venerit, in medio Tibure Sardinia est." 
 
 Mart. iv. Ix. 5. 
 Cf. Tac. Annal. ii. 85. 
 13 
 
162 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 Death had set her broad arrow ; * for he Hved 
 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 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 Avith 
 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 natu- 
 rally 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 An- 
 tipodes. 
 
 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 j^oint 
 
 * In the Queen's forests the mark of a broad arrow is set upon 
 such trees as are to be cut doAvn. 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 163 
 
 scarce affords a sensible motion, and his de* 
 parture 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 eyehds. With what strife 
 and pains we come 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 Garden of 
 cross-legged at his nativity. Besides his soft cap. v.' 
 death, the incurable state of his disease might 
 somewhat extenuate your sorrow, who know 
 that monsters but seldom happen, miracles more 
 rarelv, in Physick. Angelus Yictorius gives "^ideCon- 
 
 '^. ^ . , . , sultationes. 
 
 a serious account of a consumptive, hectical, 
 phthisical woman, who was suddenly cured by 
 the intercession of lo-natius. 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 s*-Matt. 
 Galilee healing all manner of sickness, and all 
 manner of diseases. 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 ex- 
 treme consumption or marasmus, which, if other 
 
164 LETTER TO A FRIEND, 
 
 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 notwith- 
 standing, without such a lingering period, the 
 Creator may effect at his pleasure, and to make 
 Reiigio an end of all things on earth, and our planetical 
 ' system of the world, He need but put out 
 the sun. 
 
 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, al- 
 though from the time of tides in places upon or 
 near the sea, there may be considerable deduc- 
 tions, and Pliny hath an odd and remarkable 
 passage concerning the death of men and ani- 
 mals upon the recess or ebb of the sea.* How- 
 ever, 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 ChaoSy 
 the mother of Sleep and Death, according to 
 old genealogy; and so went out of this world 
 
 * Cf. Plln. Hist. Nat. ii. 98. Mead de ImpeHo Solis atque Lunce. 
 Shaks. Henry Vth, ii. 3. 
 
 Ilesiod, 
 Theog. 756. 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 165 
 
 about that liour when our blessed Saviour en- 
 tered it, and about what time many conceive 
 he will return again unto it. Cardan 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 to that purpose hath another from 
 the tip of the ear. Most men are begotten in 
 the night, animals in the day ; but whether more 
 persons have been born in the night or the 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 na- 
 tivity and death of things ; which whether they 
 happen by succession or coincidence, are best 
 computed by the natural, not artificial, day. 
 
 That Charles the Fifth was crowned upon the 
 day of his nativity, it being in his own power 
 so to order it, makes no singular animadver- 
 sion ; but that he should also take King Francis 
 prisoner upon that day Avas an unexpected co- 
 incidence, which made the same remarkable. 
 Antipater, who had an anniversary feast every 
 year upon his birthday, 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^ 
 
166 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 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 pre- 
 vailing 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 expect- 
 ed, 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 avIio outlive many years, and 
 when there are no less than three hundred and 
 sixty-five days to determine their lives 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.* In this consumptive condition, and re- 
 markable extenuation, he came to be almost 
 
 * This remarkable coincidence happened in our author's case: 
 be himself died on the seventy-sixth anniversary of his birthday. 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 167 
 
 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 Turkish 
 
 11 1 • 1 1 1 • History, 
 
 be not so easily swallowed that at his death his p. 1483. 
 heart was not found 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, but a light 
 bit for the grave. I never more lively beheld 
 the starved characters of Dante 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, sextd cervice, to the grave, 
 was but a civil unnecessity ; and the comple- 
 ments of the coffin might outweigh the subject 
 of it. Omnibonus Ferrarius, in mortal dysen- Dearte 
 
 J - medica 
 
 teries of children, looks for a spot behind the infantium. 
 ear ; in consumptive diseases some eye the com- 
 plexion of moles; Cardan eagerly views the 
 nails, some the hues of the hand, the thenar 
 or muscle of the thumb ; some are so curious as 
 
 * Dante, describing a very emaciated countenance, says : 
 
 " Who reads the name 
 
 Of man upon his forehead, there the M 
 
 Had traced most plainly." 
 
 Purg. c. xxiii. 28. 
 
 AUuding to the conceit that the letters M may be traced in 
 the human face. Cf. Hydriotaphia, cap. 3. 
 
168 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 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 
 ch'cumference of the head : but all these, with 
 many more, were so drowned in a mortal vis- 
 age, and last face of Hippocrates, that a weak 
 physiognomist might say at first eye, this was 
 
 Aoi. Geii. r^ f^ce of earth, and that Morta had set her hard 
 seal upon his temples, easily perceiving what 
 caricatura draughts Death makes upon pined 
 faces, and unto what an unknown degree a man 
 may live backward. 
 
 Though the beard be only made a distinction 
 
 Physioio- of sex, and sign of masculine heat by Ulmus, 
 
 gia barba) , . , ■■ i i p • 
 
 huniana3. J^^ ^hc prccocity aucl early growth tnereot m 
 him was not to be liked in reference unto lono; 
 life. Lewis, that virtuous but unfortunate Kino; 
 of Hungary, who lost his life at the battle of 
 Mohacz, was said to be born without a skin, 
 to have bearded at fifteen, and to have shown 
 some gray 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 tem- 
 
 Ps. xc. 10. pies early gray have outlived the Psalmist's 
 period. 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 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 169 
 
 little children in Languedoc, called the Mor- ^^^^^^^ 
 gellons^ wherein they critically break out with matismo. 
 harsh hairs on their backs, which takes off the 
 unquiet symptoms of the disease, and delivers 
 them from coughs and convulsions. 
 
 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 there- 
 fore 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 little better 
 than to have been tooth-drawer unto King Pyr- 
 rhus, who had but two in his head.* How 
 the Bannyans 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 fig- 
 ure and conformation : but sharp and corroding 
 rheums had so early mouldered those rocks and 
 hardest parts of his fabric, that a man might 
 well conceive that his years were never like 
 
 * u 
 
 ' Pyrrhus had an air of majesty rather terrible than august. 
 Instead of teeth in his upper jaw he had one continued bone, 
 marked with small lines resembling the divisions of a row of 
 teeth." — Plutarch. 
 
170 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 to double, or twice tell over liis teetli. Cor- 
 ruption had dealt more severely with them than 
 sepulchral fires and smart flames with those 
 of burnt bodies of old ; for in the burnt frag- 
 ments of urns which I have enquired into, al- 
 though I seem to find few incisors or shearers, 
 yet the dog teeth and grinders do notably resist 
 those fires. In the years of his childhood he 
 had lancruished under the disease of his coun- 
 try, 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 in- 
 firmity, may be worth the observing. Wheth- 
 er lameness and haltino; 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 in- 
 creaseth among us ; the small-pox grows more 
 pernicious than the great ; the king's purse 
 knows that the king's evil grows more com- 
 mon. Quartan agues are become no stran- 
 gers in Ireland, more common and mortal in 
 England: and though the ancients gave that 
 disease very good words,* yet now that bell 
 
 * da(f)a\ecrTaTos 8e TrdvTcov Koi prj'icTTos Koi fiaKporaros 
 6 TCTapTOLos. Hippoc. Epidem. i. 86. 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 171 
 
 makes no strange sound wliich rings out for 
 the effects thereof. 
 
 Some thmk 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 Yirgil 
 delivereth that pleurisies were rare in England, 
 who hved 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 hst. Pan- 
 dora's box would swell, and there must be a 
 strange Pathology. 
 
 Most men expected to find a consumed kell, 
 
172 LETTER TO A FRIEND, 
 
 empty and bladder-like guts, livid and marbled 
 lungs, and a withered pericardium in this ex- 
 succous 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 dif- 
 ficulty of respiration. And the same more often 
 happeneth in man 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 Car- 
 dan, and died of the stone in the bladder.* 
 Aristotle makes a query, why some animals 
 cough, as man ; some not, as oxen. If cough- 
 ing 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 reme- 
 
 * Cardan in his Encomium Podagrcs reckonetli this among the 
 dona Podagrce, that they are delivered thereby from Phthisis 
 and Calculus. 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 173 
 
 dies in Arrianus ao-ainst the couo;li of hawks. 
 And though it might he thought that all ani- 
 mals who have lungs do cough, yet in ceta- 
 ceous 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. 
 
 From the thoughts of sleep, when the soul 
 was conceived nearest unto divinity, the an- 
 cients erected an art of divination, wherein 
 while they too widely expatiated in loose and 
 inconsequent conjectures, Hippocrates wisely Deinsom- 
 considered dreams as they presaged alterations 
 in the body, and so offered hints toward the 
 preservation of health and prevention of dis- 
 eases : and therein was so serious as to ad^dse 
 alteration of diet, exercise, sweating, bathing, 
 and vomiting ; and also so religious, as to or- 
 der prayers and supplications unto respective 
 deities ; in good dreams unto Sol^ Jupiter coeles- 
 tis, Jupiter opulentus, Minerva, Mercurius, and 
 Apollo: in bad, unto Tellus, and the Heroes. 
 And therefore I could not but take 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 
 
174 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 courses. 'T was too late to dream of flying, of 
 limpid fountains, smooth waters, white vest- 
 ments, 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, inconse- 
 quently divining, that he would not be long from 
 them; for strange it was not that he should 
 sometimes dream of the dead, whose thoughts 
 i*un always upon death ; besides, to dream of 
 the dead, so they appear not in dark habits, 
 and take nothing away from us, in Hippocrates 
 his sense, was of good signification : for we live 
 by the dead, and everything is or must be so 
 before it becomes our nourishment. And Car- 
 dan, 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 no condemnable phantasm in 
 old Oneirocriticism, as having a signification of 
 liberty, vacuity from cares, exemption and free- 
 dom 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 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 175 
 
 intended journey. But why to dream of let- 
 tuce should presage some ensuing disease, why 
 to eat figs should signify foohsh talk, why to 
 eat eggs great trouble, and to dream of blind- 
 ness should be so highly commended, accord- 
 ing to the oneirocritical verses of Astrampsy- 
 chus 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 poster- 
 ity to puzzle physic, and make sad mementos 
 of their parent hereditary. Leprosy awakes 
 not sometimes before forty, the gout and stone 
 often later; but consumptive and tabid 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 ccesarean 
 nativity 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 
 
176 LETTER TO A FRIEND, 
 
 the river,* 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 notwith- 
 standing there is little redress to be hoped from 
 an Astrologer or a Lawyer, and a good discern- 
 ing Physician were like to prove the most suc- 
 cessful counsellor. 
 
 Julius Scaliger, who in a sleepless fit of the 
 gout could make two hundred verses in a night, 
 would have but five plain words upon his tomb.f 
 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 un- 
 happy great Poets have been in versifying their 
 own epitaphs: wherein Petrarcha, 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. 
 
 In this deliberate and creeping progress unto 
 the grave, he was somewhat too young, and of 
 
 * " Durum ab stirpe genus, natos ad flumina primum 
 Deferimus, ssevoque gelu duramus et undis." 
 
 Virg. Mi\. ix. 603. 
 
 t IVLII CESARIS SCALIGERI QVOD FVIT. 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 177 
 
 too noble a mind, to fall upon that stupid symp- 
 tom observable in divers persons near their 
 journey's end, and which may be reckoned 
 amono- the mortal symptoms of their last disease : 
 that is, to become more narrow-minded, misera- 
 ble, and tenacious, unready to part with any- 
 thing, 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 imagi- 
 nation, 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, con- 
 tent to think they die in good understanding, 
 and in their sober senses. 
 
 Avarice, which is not only infidelity but idol- 
 atry, either from covetous progeny or questu- 
 ary 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 ability, 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 
 14 
 
 Coloss, 
 iii. 5> 
 
 Eel. Med. 
 Pt. ii. c. 
 
178 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 such structures here, may lay good foundations 
 in Heaven.* In brief, his hfe 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 intrin- 
 sical is every man unto himself, that some 
 doubt may be made, whether any would ex- 
 change his being, or substantially become an- 
 other man. 
 
 He had wisely seen the world at home and 
 abroad, and thereby observed under what vari- 
 ety 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 esti- 
 mate of such happiness, yet his sober contempt 
 of the world wrought no Democratism or Cyni- 
 cism^ no laughing or snarling at it, as well 
 understanding there are not felicities in this 
 world to satisfy a serious mind ; and there- 
 fore 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 beati- 
 tudes, and to make ourselves happy by consor- 
 
 * So Wordsworth (Eccles. Sonnet, King's Coll. Chapel): 
 " They dreamt not of a perishable home 
 Who thus could build." 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 179 
 
 tion, opinion, or co-existimation : for strictly to 
 separate from received and customary felicities, 
 and to confine unto the rigour of realities, were 
 to contract tlie consolation of our beings unto 
 too uncomfortable circumscriptions. 
 
 Not to fear death, nor desire it, was short of 
 his resolution : to be dissolved, and be with 2 cor. v. 1 
 
 r^, . 1 . 1 • T TT .11. P!iili-23. 
 
 Onrist, was his dymg ditty. He conceived his 
 thread too long, in no long course of years, 
 and when he had scarce outlived the second life 
 of Lazarus ; * esteeming it enough to approach 
 the years of his Saviour, who so ordered his 
 own human state, as not to be old upon earth. 
 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 hfe 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 oen. v. 24. 
 
 -p^T Heb. xi. 5. 
 
 J^iiaS. 2 Kings ii. 
 
 Not to be content with Hfe is the unsatisfac- 
 tory state of those who destroy themselves ; who 
 
 * S. Epiphanius mentions a tradition that Lazarus had died 
 at the ago of thirty when he was raised from the dead by our 
 Lord, and that he lived thirty years afterwards. Epiphan. H^res. 
 Ixvi. c. 39. 
 
180 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 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 volun- 
 tary, and to suit with their own desires, which 
 Rei. Med. ^qq]^ Qff ^hc terror of them. But the ancient 
 martyrs were not encouraged by such fallacies ; 
 who, though they feared not death, were afraid 
 to be their OAvn 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 willino-ness 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 ob- 
 served that many, though old, oft stick fast unto 
 the world, and seem to be drawn like Cacus 
 his oxen, backward, with great struggling and 
 reluctancy, unto the grave.* The long habit 
 of living makes meer men more hardly to part 
 with hfe, 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 
 
 * Cacus was a robber, who having stolen Hercules his oxen on 
 Mount Aventine, dragged them backwards into his cave, that 
 their tracks might not be discovered. Livy, i. 7. Virg. ^n. 
 viii. 209. 
 
LETTER TO A FRIEND. 181 
 
 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 hath 
 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 com- 
 fortably imagine what face this world will car- 
 ry : 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 genera- 
 tions, and rather bless ages past, than be ambi- 
 tious 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 
 gray hair, and an unspotted hfe old age, al- 
 though his years came short, he might have 
 been said to have held up with longer livers, 
 and to have been Solomon's old man. And ^^^^- ^ 
 
 7 - 14. 
 
 surely if we deduct all those days of our life 
 which we might wish unhved, and which abate 
 the comfort of those we now live, if we reckon 
 up only those days which God hath accepted 
 
) 182 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 of our lives, a life of good years will hardly 
 be a span long, the son in this sense may out- 
 live the father, and none be climacterically old. 
 He that early arriveth unto the parts and pru- 
 dence of age, is happily old without the uncom- 
 fortable attendants of it; and 'tis superfluous 
 to live unto gray hairs, when in a precocious 
 temper we anticipate the virtues of them. In 
 brief, he cannot be accounted young who out- 
 liveth the old man. He that hath early ar- 
 Ephes. j'iyecl 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. Although 
 he attained not unto the years of his prede- 
 cessors, yet he wanted not those preserving 
 virtues which confirm the thread of weaker con- 
 stitutions. Cautelous Chastity and crafty Sobri- 
 ety were far from him ; those jewels were para- 
 gon, without flaw, hair, ice, or cloud in him: 
 which affords me a hint to proceed 
 in these good wishes, and 
 few mementos unto 
 you. 
 
True 
 
 Christian Morals. 
 
To the Right Honourable 
 DAVID, EARL OF BUCHAN, 
 
 Viscount Auchterhouse, Lord Cardross and Glendovachie, one of 
 the Lords Commissioners of Police, and Lord Lieutenant of 
 the Counties of Stirling and Clackmannan in North Britain. 
 
 My Lord, — 
 
 THE honour you have done our family obligeth 
 us to make all just acknowledgments of it ; 
 and there is no form of acknowledgment in our 
 power, more worthy of your Lordship's acceptance, 
 than this dedication of the last Work of our honoured 
 and learned Father. Encouraged hereunto by the 
 knowledge we have of your Lordship's judicious rel- 
 ish of universal learning and sublime virtue, we beg 
 the favour of your acceptance o£ it, which will very 
 much oblige our family in general, and her in partic- 
 ular, who is. 
 
 My Lord, 
 Your Lordship's most humble servant, 
 
 Elizabeth Littleton. 
 
 15 
 
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
 
 F any one, after he has read Religio 
 Medici, and the ensumg Discourse, 
 can make doubt whether the same 
 person was the Author of them 
 both, he may be assured by the testimony of 
 Mrs. Littleton, Sir Thomas Browne's daughter, 
 who hved with her father when it was com- 
 posed by him, and who, at the time, read it 
 written by his own hand ; and also by the tes- 
 timony of others (of whom I am one) who 
 read the manuscript of the Author immedi- 
 ately after his death, and who have since read 
 the same, from which it hath been faithftilly 
 and exactly transcribed for the press. The 
 reason why it was not printed sooner is, be- 
 cause it was unhappily lost, by being mislaid 
 among other manuscripts, for which search 
 
188 PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
 
 was lately made in the presence of the Lord 
 Archbishop of Canterbury, of which his Grace 
 by letter informed Mrs. Littleton, when he 
 sent the manuscript to her. There is nothing 
 printed in the Discourse, or in the short notes, 
 but what is found in the original manuscript 
 of the Author, except only where an oversight 
 had made the addition or transposition of some 
 words necessary. 
 
 JOHN JEFFERY, 
 
 ARCHDEACON OF NORWICH. 
 
 
Christian Morals. 
 
 r ■ 
 
 PART I. 
 
 ^ READ softly and circumspectly in 
 this ftinambulatcny track and nar- 
 row path of goodness : pursue virtue 
 virtuously : leaven not good actions, 
 nor render virtues disputable. Stain not fair 
 acts with foul intentions : maim not uprightness 
 by halting concomitances, nor circumstantially 
 deprave substantial goodness. 
 
 Consider whereabout thou art in Cebes his 
 table, or that old philosophical pinax of the life 
 of man : * whether thou art yet 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 
 
 * The Pinax, or tablet, of Cebes, a Theban philosopher, in 
 which the life of man is represented in a beautiful allegory. 
 15 a 
 
190 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 of sincere erudition, wliicli may send thee clear 
 and pure away unto a virtuous and happy life. 
 Milton, jj^ ^l^jg virtuous vovage of thy life hull not 
 
 Par. Lost, i "^ *' 
 
 xi 840. about like the ark, without the use of rudder, 
 mast, or sail, and bound for no port. Let not 
 disappointment cause despondency, nor difficulty 
 despair. Think not that you are sailing from 
 Lima to Manilla, when you may fasten up the 
 rudder, and sleep before the wind ; but expect 
 rough seas, flaws, and contrary blasts ; and it is 
 well if by many cross tacks and veerings you 
 arrive at the port ; for we sleep in Hons' skins 
 in our progress unto virtue, and we shde not, 
 but cHmb unto it. 
 
 Sit not down in the popular forms and com- 
 mon level of virtues. Ofler not only peace- 
 s xu;u.vo- offerings, but holocausts unto God ; where all 
 T^'Vi^^u is due make no reserve, and cut not a cumin- 
 
 Arist. ±itn. '' 
 
 iv. 1. seed with the Almighty : to serve him singly to 
 serve ourselves were too partial a piece of piety, 
 not like to place us in the illustrious mansions 
 of glory. 
 
 11. Rest not in an ovation, but a triumph 
 over thy passions. Let anger walk hanging 
 down the head ; let malice go manacled, and 
 envy fettered, after thee. Behold witliin thee 
 the long train of thy trophies, not without thee. 
 Make the quarrelhng Lapithytes sleep, and Cen- 
 taurs within he quiet. Chain up the unruly 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 191 
 
 legion of thy breast. Lead tliine own captivity 
 captive, and be Caesar within thyself. 
 
 III. He that is chaste and continent not to 
 impair his strength, or honest for fear of con- 
 tagion, will hardly be heroically virtuous. Ad- 
 journ not this vu'tue until that temper, when 
 Cato could lend out his wife, and impotent sa- 
 tyrs write satires upon lust. 
 
 IV. Show thy art in honesty, and lose not 
 thy virtue by the bad managery of it. Be 
 temperate and sober : not to preserve your body 
 in an ability for wanton ends ; not to avoid the 
 infamy of common transgressors that way, and 
 thereby to hope to expiate or palliate obscure 
 and closer vices ; not to spare your purse, nor 
 simply to enjoy health ; but in one word, that 
 thereby you may truly serve God, which every 
 sickness will tell you you cannot well do with- 
 out health. The sick man's sacrifice is but 
 a lame oblation. Pious treasures laid up in 
 healthful days, plead for sick non-performances, 
 without which we must needs look back with 
 anxiety upon the lost opportunities of health, 
 and may have cause rather to envy than pity 
 the ends of penitent public sufferers, who go 
 with healthful prayers unto the last scene of 
 their hves, and in the integrity of their faculties 
 return their spirit unto God that gave it. 
 
 V. Be charitable before wealth make thee 
 
192 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 St. Mark covetous, and lose not the glory of the mite. 
 
 xii 41 — 44 ^^ 
 
 If riches increase, let thy mind hold pace with 
 
 them ; and think it not enough to be liberal, 
 
 St. Matt. X. ]3ut munificent. Though a cup of cold water 
 
 St. Mark from somc hand may not be without its reward, 
 
 IX. 41. „g^ g^j^^jj ^Q^ ^]-^Q^ £qj, wine and oil for the 
 
 St. Luke X. '^ 
 
 34. wounds of the distressed ; and treat the poor, 
 
 12 as °^^ ^^ ^^^ Saviour did the multitude, to the reliques 
 of some baskets. Diffuse thy beneficence early, 
 and while thy treasures call thee master : there 
 may be an Atropos of thy fortunes before that 
 of thy life, and thy wealth cut off before that 
 hour when all men shall be poor ; for the justice 
 of death looks equally upon the dead, and Cha- 
 ron expects no more from Alexander than from 
 Irus.* 
 
 Ecci. xi. 2. YI. Give not only unto seven, but also unto 
 eight, that is, unto more than many. Though 
 
 St. Matt. V. to give unto every one that asketh may seem 
 severe advice, yet give thou also before asking ; 
 that is, where want is silently clamorous, and 
 men's necessities, not their tongues, do loudly 
 call for thy mercies. For though sometimes 
 necessitousness be dumb, or misery speak not 
 out ; yet true charity is sagacious, and will find 
 out liints for beneficence. Acquaint thyself 
 
 * Irus^ a beggar (Odyss. xviii. 233) whose poverty became 
 proverbial : 
 
 " Irus et est subiio, qui modo Croesus eraV — Ovid. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 193 
 
 with the physiognomy of want, and let the dead 
 colours and first lines of necessity suffice to tell 
 thee there is an object for thy bounty. Spare 
 not where thou canst not easily be prodigal, 
 and fear not to be undone by mercy ; for since ^^o^- ^^^ 
 he who hath pity on the poor lendeth unto the 
 Almighty rewarder, who observes no ides * but 
 every day for liis payments, charity becomes 
 pious usury. Christian liberahty the most thriv- 
 ing industry, and what we adventure in a cock- 
 boat may return in a carrack unto us. He who 
 thus casts his bread upon the water shall surely eccl xi. 1. 
 find it again ; for though it falleth to the bottom, 
 it sinks but like the axe of the prophet, to rise 2 Kings vl 
 again unto him. 
 
 VII. If avarice be thy vice, yet make it not 
 thy punishment. Miserable men commiserate 
 not themselves ; bowelless unto others, and mer- 
 ciless unto their own bowels. Let the fruition 
 of things bless the possession of them, and think 
 it more satisfaction to live richly than die rich. 
 For since thy good works, not thy goods, will ^'^^* ^^' 
 follow thee; since wealth is an appurtenance 
 of life, and no dead man is rich ; to famish in 
 plenty, and live poorly to die rich, were a mul- 
 tiplying improvement in madness, and use upon 
 use in folly. 
 
 * Ides, the middle day of the Eoman month, on which money 
 put out to interest was commonly repaid. 
 16 
 
194 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 VIII. Trust not to the omnipotency of gold, 
 jobxxxi. and say not unto it, Thou art my confidence. 
 
 Kiss not thy hand to that terrestrial sun, nor 
 Ex. xxi. 6. bore thy ear unto its servitude. A slave unto 
 ^1^2/" mammon makes no servant unto God. Covet- 
 st. Luke ousness cracks the sinews of faitli, 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 anoth- 
 er ; makes their own death sweet unto others, 
 bitter unto themselves; brings formal sadness, 
 scenical mourning, and no wet eyes at the 
 grave. 
 
 IX. Persons lightly dipped, not grained in 
 generous honesty, are but pale in goodness, and 
 faint-hued in integrity. But be thou what thou 
 virtuously art, and let not the ocean wash away 
 thy tincture. Stand magnetically upon that 
 axis, when prudent simplicity hath fixed there ; 
 and let no attraction invert the poles of thy 
 honesty. That vice may be uneasy and even 
 monstrous unto thee, let repeated good acts and 
 long confirmed habits make virtue almost nat- 
 ural, or a second nature in thee. Since virtu- 
 ous super structions haA^e commonly generous 
 foundations, dive into thy inclinations, and early 
 discover what nature bids thee to be, or tells 
 thee thou mayest be. They who thus timely 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 195 
 
 descend into themselves, and cultivate the good 
 seeds wliich nature hath set in them, prove not 
 shrubs but cedars in their generation. And to 
 be in the form of the best of the bad, or the 
 worst of the good, will be no satisfaction unto 
 them. 
 
 X. Make not the consequence of virtue the 
 
 ends thereof. Be not beneficent for a name or ^*' ^^^"* 
 
 vi. 1, 2. 
 
 cymbal of applause ; nor exact and just in com- 
 merce for the advantages of trust and credit, 
 which attend the reputation of true and punc- 
 tual dealmo; : for these rewards, thouo-h unsought 
 for, plain virtue will bring with her. 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. 
 
 XI. Let not the law of thy country be the 
 non ultra of thy honesty ; nor think that always 
 good enough Avhich 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 st.Matt.v. 
 
 1 r. c- • vi. Tii. 
 
 law ot omai. Ex. xx. 
 
 XII. Live by old ethics and the classical 
 
 rules of honesty. Put no new names or no- cf.Thucyd. 
 tions upon authentic virtues and vices. Think 
 not that morality is ambulatory; that vices in 
 
196 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 one age are not vices in another ; or that vir- 
 tues, which are under the everlasting seal of 
 right reason, may be stamped by opinion. And 
 therefore, though vicious times invert the opin- 
 ions of things, and set up new ethics against 
 virtue, yet hold thou unto old morality ; and 
 
 Ex.xxiii.2. rather than follow a multitude to do evil, stand 
 like Pompey's pillar conspicuous by thyself, and 
 single in integrity. And since the worst of 
 times afford imitable examples of virtue ; since 
 no deluge of vice is like to be so general but 
 more than eight vrill escape; eye well those 
 heroes who have held their heads above water, 
 wdio have touched pitch and not been defiled, 
 and in the common contagion have remained 
 uncorrupted. 
 
 XIII. Let age, not envy, draw wrinkles on 
 thy cheeks; be content to be envied, but envy 
 not. Emulation may be plausible and indigna- 
 tion 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, though not unworthy of it, is an 
 absurd depravity, sticking fast unto corrupted 
 nature, and often too hard for humility and 
 charity, the great suppressors of envy. This 
 surely is a lion not to be strangled but by 
 Hercules himself, or the highest stress of our 
 
 Phii.iii.2i. miuds, and an atom of that power which sub- 
 dueth aU things unto itself 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 197 
 
 XIV. Owe not thy humility unto humiHa- 
 tion from adversity, but look hmnbly down in 
 that state when others look upwards upon thee. 
 Think not thy own shadow longer than that 
 of others, nor delight to take the altitude of 
 thyself. Be patient in the age of pride, when 
 men live by short intervals of reason under the 
 dominion of hmnour and passion, wdien it is m 
 the power of every one to transform thee out Hor. Ep. i. 
 of thyself, and run thee into the short madness. 
 If you cannot imitate Job, yet come not short of 
 Socrates, and those patient Pagans who tned the J"^- ^-^t- 
 tongues of their enemies, while they perceived 
 they spit their malice at brazen walls and statues. 
 
 XY. Let not the sun in Capricorn* go down Eph.iv.26- 
 upon thy wrath, but write thy w^rongs in ashes. 
 Draw the curtain of night upon injuries, shut 
 them up in the tower of oblivion, f and let them 
 be as though they had not been. To forgive 
 our enemies, yet hope that God will punish 
 them, is not to forgive enough. To forgive 
 them ourselves, and not to pray God to forgive 
 them, is a partial piece of charity. Forgive 
 thine enemies totally, and without any reserve, 
 that however, God will revenge thee. 
 
 * Even when the days are shortest. 
 
 t Alluding unto the Tower of Oblivion mentioned by Proco- 
 pius, as a place 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. 
 
198 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 XVI. 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. De- 
 generous depravities, and narrow-minded vices ! . 
 not only below St. Paul's noble Christian, but 
 Aristotle's f true gentleman. Trust not wdth 
 some that the Epistle of St. James is apocry- 
 phal, and so read with less fear that stabbing 
 
 St. James, truth, that in company with this vice thy re- 
 Ex. xxxii. ligion is in vam. Moses broke the tables with- 
 ^^' out breaking of the law ; but where charity 
 
 is broke, the law itself is shattered, which can- 
 Kom. xiii. not be whole without Love, which is the fulfil- 
 ling of it. Look humbly upon thy virtues ; and 
 though thou art rich in some, yet think thyself 
 poor and naked without that crowning grace, 
 1 Cor. xiii. wliicli thiuketh no evil, which envieth not, which 
 beareth, hopeth, believeth, endureth all things. 
 With these sure graces, while busy tongues are 
 crying out for a drop of cold water, mutes 
 Rev.iv. 8. may be in happiness, and sing the Trisagion in 
 heaven. 
 
 XVII. However thy understanding may wa- 
 ver in the theories of true and false, yet fasten 
 
 * One name, 6 didlBokos, the calumniator, 
 
 t Compare Ai-ist. Ethics, iv. 7, and Romans xiii. 
 
 St. Luke 
 xvi. 24. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 199 
 
 tlie rudder of tliy will, steer straight unto good, 
 and fall not foul on evil. Imagination is apt 
 to rove, and conjecture to keep no bounds. 
 Some have run out so far, as to fancy the stars 
 might be but the light of the crystalline heaven 
 shot through perforations on the bodies of the 
 orbs. Others more ingeniously doubt whether 
 there hath not been a vast tract of land in the 
 Atlantic Ocean, which earthquakes and violent 
 causes have long ago devoured. Speculative 
 misapprehensions may be innocuous, but immo- 
 rality pernicious ; theorical mistakes and physi- 
 cal deviations may condemn our judgments, not 
 lead us into judgment. But perversity of Avill, 
 immoral and sinful enormities, walk with Adras- 
 te and Nemesis at their backs, pursue us unto 
 judgment, and leave us viciously miserable. 
 
 XVIII. Bid early defiance unto those vices 
 which are of thine inward family, and having 
 a root in thy temper plead a right and propri- 
 ety in thee. Raise timely batteries against those 
 strong-holds built upon the rock of nature, and 
 make this a great part of the militia of thy life. 
 Delude not thyself into iniquities from partici- 
 pation or community, which abate the sense 
 but not the obhquity of them. To conceive 
 sins less, or less of sins, because others also 
 transgress, were morally to commit that natu- 
 ral fallacy of man, to take comfort from society, 
 
200 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 and think adversities less because others also 
 suifer them. The politic nature of vice must 
 be opposed by policy; and, therefore, wiser 
 honesties project and plot against it : wherein, 
 notwithstanding, we are not to rest in generals, 
 or the trite stratagems of art. That may suc- 
 ceed with one, which may prove successless 
 with another: there is no community or com- 
 mon weal of virtue : every man must study his 
 own economy, and adapt such rules unto the 
 figure of himself. 
 
 XIX. 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 and 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 of designs or desires. 
 Think not that mankind hveth but for a few ; 
 and that the rest are born but to serve those 
 ambitions which 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 
 xLi2?"* ^vliich force the kingdom of heaven. If thou 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 201 
 
 must needs rule, be Zeno's king,* and enjoy 
 that empire which every man gives himself. 
 He who is thus his own monarch contentedly 
 sways the sceptre of himself, not envying the 
 glory of crowned heads and elohim of the earth. 
 Could the world unite in the practice of that 
 despised train of virtues, which the divine eth- 
 ics of our Saviour hath so inculcated upon us, 
 the furious face of things must disappear ; Eden 
 would be yet to be found, and the angels might 
 look down, not with pity, but joy upon us. 
 
 XX. Though the quickness of thine ear were 
 able to reach the noise of the moon, which some 
 think it maketh in its rapid revolution ; though 
 the number of thy ears should equal Argus his 
 eyes: yet stop them all with the wise man's 
 wax,f and be deaf unto the suggestions of tale- 
 bearers, calumniators, pick- thank or malevolent 
 delators, who, while quiet men sleep, sowing st. Matt. 
 the tares of discord and division, distract the 
 tranquillity of charity and all friendly society. 
 
 * The Stoics illustrated their doctrines by describing an ideal 
 personage whom they called "The wise man"; and he (they 
 said) " was the only King, the only Dictator, the only Rich ^Man." 
 Cic. de Finibus, iii. 22. Hor. Sat. i, iii. 
 
 " The way to subject all things to thy selfe, is to subject thy- 
 selfe to reason : thou shalt govern many, if reason govex-n thee : 
 wouldst thou be crowned the monai'ch of a little world ? com- 
 mand thy selfe." — Quarles's Enchir., ii. 19. 
 
 t Wise man's wax. Ulysses adopted this plan to escape the 
 enchantment of the Sirens. Odyss. M. 173. 
 
202 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 St. James xiiese are the tongues that set the world on 
 
 iii. 6. ^ 
 
 2Tim. ii. fire, cankers of reputation, and, like that of 
 Jonah iT Jo^^s his gourd, wither a good name in a night. 
 6, 7. Evil spirits may sit still, while these spirits walk 
 about and perform the business of hell. To 
 speak more strictly, our corrupted hearts are 
 the factories of the devil, which may be at 
 work without his presence ; for when that cir- 
 cumventing spirit hath drawn malice, envy, and 
 all unrighteousness unto well-rooted habits in 
 his disciples, iniquity then goes on upon its own 
 legs ; and if the gate of hell were shut up for a 
 time, vice would still be fertile and produce the 
 fruits of hell. Thus, when God forsakes us, 
 Satan also leaves us : for such offenders he looks 
 upon as sure and sealed up, and his temptations 
 then needless unto them. 
 
 XXI. Annihilate not the mercies of God 
 by the oblivion of ingratitude: for oblivion is 
 a kind of annihilation ; and for things to be as 
 though they had not been, is like unto never 
 being. Make not thy head a grave, but a re- 
 pository of God's mercies. Though thou hadst 
 the memory of Seneca, or Simonides, and con- 
 science, the punctual memorist within us, yet 
 trust not to thy remembrance in things which 
 need phylacteries. Register not only strange, 
 but merciful occurrences. Let ephemerides, 
 not olympiads, give thee account of His mer- 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 203 
 
 cies ; * let tliy diaries stand thick with dutiful 
 mementos and asterisks of acknowledo-ment. 
 And to be complete and forget nothing, date 
 not his mercy from thy nativity; look beyond 
 the world, and before the sera of Adam. 
 
 XXII. Paint not the sepulchre of thyself, 
 and strive not to beautify thy corruption. Be 
 not an advocate for thy vices, nor call for many 
 hour-glasses to justify thy imperfections . f Think 
 not that always good which thou thinkest thou 
 canst always make good, nor that concealed 
 which the sun doth not behold ; that which the st. Luke 
 sun doth not now see will be visible when the 
 sun is out, and the stars are fallen from heaven. 
 Meanwhile there is no darkness unto conscience, icor.iv.5. 
 which can see without light, and in the deepest 
 obscurity give a clear draught of things, Avhich 
 the cloud of dissimulation hath concealed from 
 all eyes. There is a natural standing court 
 within us, examining, acquitting, and condemn- 
 ing at the tribunal of ourselves ; wherein iniqui- 
 ties have their natural ilietas ^ and no nocent 
 is absolved by the verdict of liimself. § And 
 
 * Let ephemerides, &c., that is, Take note of God's mercies day 
 by day, not merely every four years. 
 
 t In the Athenian Courts the time allowed to each pleader 
 was measured by a kind of hour-glass, called depshydra. 
 
 t Theta, 0, was the symbol used in condemnation to capital 
 punishment, being the initial letter of Qdvaros. 
 
 § " Sejudice, nemo nocens absohitur.''^ — Juv. Sat. xiii. 2. 
 
204 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 therefore, although our transgressions shall be 
 tried at the last bar, the process need not be 
 long: for the Judge of all knoweth all, and 
 every man will nakedly know himself; and 
 when so few are like to plead not guilty, the 
 assize must soon have an end. 
 
 XXIII. Comply with some humours, bear 
 with others, but serve none. Civil compla- 
 cency consists with decent honesty. Flattery 
 is a juggler, and no kin unto sincerity. But 
 while thou maintainest the plain path, and scorn- 
 est to flatter others, fall not into self-adulation, 
 and become not thine own parasite. Be deaf 
 unto thyself, and be not betrayed at home. 
 Self-credulity, pride, and levity lead u.nto self- 
 idolatry. There is no Damocles* like unto self- 
 opinion, nor any Siren to our own fawning 
 conceptions. To magnify our minor things, or 
 hug ourselves in our apparitions ; to afford a 
 credulous ear unto the clawino; suo-o-estions of 
 fancy; to pass om' days in painted mistakes 
 of ourselves, and though we behold our own 
 blood to think ourselves the sons of Jupiter: 
 are blandishments of self-love, worse than out- 
 ward delusion. By this imposture, wise men 
 sometimes are mistaken in their elevation, and 
 look above themselves. And fools, which are 
 antipodes unto the wise, conceive themselves to 
 
 * I>amocles, the parasite and flatterer of Dionysius. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 205 
 
 be but their periceei, and in the same parallel 
 with them. 
 
 XXIV. Be not a Hercules Furens abroad, 
 and a poltroon within thyself. To chase our 
 enemies out of the field, and be led captive by 
 our vices ; to beat down our foes, and fall down 
 to our concupiscences ; are solecisms in moral 
 schools, and no laurel attends them. To well 
 manage our affections, and ^Aald horses of Plato, 
 are the highest Ch'censes : * and the noblest 
 digladiation is in the theatre of ourselves ; for 
 therein our inward antagonists, not only like 
 common gladiators, with ordinary weapons and 
 downright blows make at us, but also hke reti- 
 ary and laqueary combatants, with nets, frauds, 
 and entanglements, fall upon us. Weapons for 
 such combats are not to be forged at Lipara ; f 
 Vulcan's art doth nothing in this internal mi- 
 litia, wherein, not the armour of Achilles, but 
 the armature of St. Paul, gives the glorious Eph.vi. 
 
 • • 11 - 17. 
 
 day, and triumphs, not leading up into capitols, 
 but up into the highest heavens. And, there- 
 fore, while so many think it the only valour to 
 command and master others, study thou the 
 
 * P]ato speaks of man as a charioteer driving two refractory 
 steeds, given to quarrel ; one being immortal and heavenly, the 
 other mortal and of the earth. XaX^TTT] hr] kcll 8v(TKo\os c| 
 dvdyKrjs tj rrepl Tjfxds r]vi6xqais. Phsedrus, xxv. 
 
 t Lipara, where Vulcan's stithy was said to be. 
 
206 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 dominion of thyself, and quiet thine own com- 
 motions. Let right reason be thy Lycurgus, 
 and lift up thy hand unto the law of it : move by 
 the intelligences of the superior faculties, not by 
 the rapt of passion, nor merely by that of tem- 
 per and constitution. They who are merely 
 carried on by the wheel of such inclinations, 
 without the hand and guidance of sovereign 
 reason, are but the automatoi^s part of man- 
 kind, rather lived than hving, or at least un- 
 derliving themselves. 
 
 XXY. Let not fortune, which hath no 
 name in Scripture, have any in thy divinity. 
 Let Providence, not chance, have the honour 
 of thy acknowledgments, and be thy Qj^dipus in 
 contingencies. Mark well the paths and wind- 
 ing ways thereof; but be not too wise in the 
 construction, or sudden in the application. The 
 hand of Providence writes often by abbrevia- 
 tures, hieroglyphics, or short characters, which, 
 Dan.v. lilvc the Lacouism on the wall, are not to be 
 made out but by a hint or key from that Spirit 
 which indited them. Leave future occurrences 
 to their uncertainties, think that which is pres- 
 ent thine own : and since it is easier to foretell 
 an eclipse than a foul day at some distance, look 
 for little regular below. Attend with patience 
 the uncertainty of things, and what lieth yet 
 unexerted in the chaos of futurity. The uncer- 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 207 
 
 tainty and ignorance of things to come, makes 
 tlie world new unto us by unexpected emergen- 
 cies ; wliereby we pass not our days in the trite 
 road of affairs affording no novity ; for the nov- 
 eHzing spirit of man Hves by variety, and the 
 new faces of thino;s. 
 
 XXVI. Thouo;h a contented mind enlaro:eth 
 the dimension of Httle things ; and unto some it 
 is weakh enough not to be poor ; and others are 
 well content if they be but rich enough to be 
 honest, and to give every man his due ; yet fall 
 not into that obsolete affectation of bravery, to 
 throw away thy money, and to reject all hon- 
 ours or honourable stations in this courtly and 
 splendid world. Old generosity is superannu- 
 ated, and such contempt of the world out of 
 date. No man is now like to refuse the favour 
 of great ones, or be content to say unto princes, 
 Stand out of my sun. And if there be any of 
 such antiquated resolutions, they are not like to 
 be tempted out of them by great ones : and 't is 
 fair if they escape the name of hypochondriacs 
 from the genius of latter times ; unto whom 
 contempt of the world is the most contemptible 
 opinion , and to be able, Hke Bias, to carry all 
 they have about them, were to be the eighth 
 wise man. However, the old tetric philoso- 
 phers looked always with indignation upon such 
 a face of things ; and, observing the unnatural 
 
208 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 current of riches, power, and honour in the 
 world, and withal the imperfection and demerit 
 of persons often advanced mito them, were 
 tempted unto angry opinions, that affairs were 
 ordered more by stars than reason, and that 
 things went on rather by lottery than election. 
 XXYII. If thy vessel be but small in the 
 ocean of this world, if meanness of possessions 
 be thy allotment upon earth, forget not those 
 virtues which the great Disposer of all bids thee 
 to entertain from thy quality and condition ; 
 that is, submission, humility, content of mind, 
 and industry. Content may dwell in all sta- 
 tions. To be low, but above contempt, may be 
 high enough to be happy. But many of low 
 degree may be higher than computed, and some 
 cubits above the common commensuration ; for 
 in all states virtue gives qualifications and allow- 
 ances, which make out defects. Rough dia- 
 monds are sometimes mistaken for pebbles ; and 
 meanness may be rich in accomplishments, 
 which riches in vain desire. If our merits be 
 above om' stations, if our intrinsical value be 
 greater than what we go for, or our value than 
 our valuation, and if we stand higher in God's 
 than in the censor's book,* it may make some 
 equitable balance in the mequahties of tliis 
 
 * Censor's booh, in which the name and estate of every Roman 
 citizen was registered. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 209 
 
 world, and there may be no such vast chasm or 
 gulf between disparities as common measures 
 determine. The DiA^ine eye looks upon high 
 and low differently from that of man. They 
 who seem to stand upon Olympus, and high 
 mounted unto our eyes, may be but in the val- 
 leys and low ground unto his ; for he looks 
 upon those as highest who nearest approach his 
 divinity, and upon those as lowest who are 
 farthest from it. 
 
 XXYIII. When thou lookest upon the im- 
 perfections of others, allow one eye for what is 
 laudable in them, and the balance they have 
 from some excellency, which may render them 
 considerable. While we look with fear or 
 hatred upon the teeth of the viper, we may 
 behold his eye with love. In venomous na- cf-Rei. 
 tures somethmg may be amiable : poisons afford 2, x. 
 anti-poisons : nothing is totally, or altogether 
 uselessly bad. Notable virtues are sometimes 
 dashed with notorious vices, and in some vicious 
 tempers have been found illustrious acts of vir- 
 tue ; which makes such observable worth in 
 some actions of King Demetrius, Antonius, and 
 Ahab, as are not to be found in the same kind 
 in Aristides, Numa, or David. Constancy, 
 generosity, clemency, and liberality have been 
 highly conspicuous in some persons not marked 
 out in other concerns for example or imitation. 
 17 
 
210 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 But since goodness is exemplary in all, if others 
 have not our virtues, let us not be wanting in 
 theirs ; nor, scorning them for their vices where- 
 of we are free, be condemned by their virtues 
 wherein we are deficient. There is dross, alloy, 
 and embasement in all human tempers ; and he 
 flieth without wings, who thinks to find ophir or 
 pure metal in any. For perfection is not, like 
 light, centred in any one body; but, like the 
 dispersed seminalities of vegetables at the crea- 
 tion, scattered through the whole mass of the 
 earth, no place producing all, and almost all 
 some. So that 't is well, if a perfect man can 
 be made out of many men, and, to the perfect 
 eye of God, even out of mankind. Time, 
 which perfects some things, imperfects also oth- 
 ers. Could Ave intimately apprehend the ide- 
 ated man, and as he stood in the intellect of 
 God upon the first exertion by creation, we 
 might more narrowly comprehend our present 
 degeneration, and how widely we are fallen 
 from the pure exemplar and idea of our nature : 
 for after this corruptive elongation from a primi- 
 tive and pure creation, we are almost lost in 
 degeneration ; and Adam hath not only fallen 
 from his Creator, but we ourselves from Adam, 
 our Tycho and primary generator. 
 
 XXIX. Quarrel not rashly with adversities 
 not yet understood, and overlook not the mer- 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 211 
 
 cies often bound np in them; for we consider 
 not sufficiently the good of evils, nor fairly 
 compute the mercies of Providence in things 
 afflictive at first hand. The famous Andreas 
 Doria being invited to a feast by Aloysio Fieschi 
 with design to kill him, just the night before 
 fell mercifully into a fit of the gout, and so 
 escaped that mischief. When Cato intended to 
 kill himself, from a blow which he gave his 
 servant, who would not reach his sword unto 
 him, his hand so swelled that he had much ado 
 to effect his design. Hereby any one but a re- 
 solved Stoic might have taken a fair hint of 
 consideration, and that some merciful genius 
 would have contrived his preservation. To be 
 sagacious in such intercurrences is not super- 
 stition, but wary and pious discretion ; and to 
 contemn such hints were to be deaf unto the 
 speaking hand of God, wherein Socrates and 
 Cardan would hardly have been mistaken. 
 
 XXX. Break not open the gate of destruc- 
 tion, and make no haste or bustle unto ruin. 
 Post not heedlessly on unto the non ultra of 
 folly, or precipice of perdition. Let vicious 
 ways have their tropics and deflexions, and 
 swim in the waters of sin but as in the Asphal- 
 tic lake, though smeared and defiled, not to 
 sink to the bottom. If thou hast dipped thy 
 foot in the brink, yet venture not over Rubi- 
 
212 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 con.* Run not into extremities from whence 
 there is no regression. In the vicious ways 
 of the world it mercifully falleth out that we 
 become not extempore wicked, but it taketh 
 some time and pains to undo ourselves. We 
 Iliad A. fall not from virtue, like Vulcan from heaven, 
 
 590 
 
 in a day. Bad dispositions required some time 
 to grow into bad habits ; bad habits must under- 
 mine good, and often repeated acts make us 
 habitually evil ; so that by gradual deprava- 
 tions, and while we are but staggeringly evil, 
 we are not left without parentheses of consider- 
 ations, thoughtful rebukes, and merciful inter- 
 ventions to recall us unto ourselves. f For the 
 wisdom of God hath methodized the course of 
 things unto the best advantage of goodness, and 
 thinkino; considerators overlook not the tract 
 thereof. 
 
 XXXI. Since men and women have their 
 proper virtues and vices, and even twins of 
 different sexes have not only distinct coverings 
 in the womb, but differing qualities and virtuous 
 habits after, transplace not their proprieties, 
 and confound not their distinctions. Let mas- 
 
 * The river, by crossing which, Csesar declared war against 
 the Senate. Sueton. Jul. Goes. 32. Lucan. Phars. i. 184. 
 t " Shame leaves us by degrees, not at first coming; 
 For nature checks a new offence with loathing, 
 But use of sin doth make it seem as nothing." 
 
 Daniell. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 213 
 
 culine and feminine accomplisliments sliine in 
 their proper orbs, and adorn their respective 
 subjects. However, unite not the vices of both 
 sexes in one ; be not monstrous m iniquity, nor 
 hermaphroditically vicious. 
 
 XXXII. If generous honesty, valour, and 
 plain dealing be the cognizance of thy family, 
 or characteristic of thy country, hold fast such 
 inclinations sucked in with thy first breath, and 
 which lay in the cradle with thee. Fall not 
 into transforming degenerations, which under 
 the old name create a new nation. Be not an 
 
 alien in thine own nation ; bring not Orontes Juv. sat. 
 into Tiber ; learn the virtues, not the vices, of 
 thy foreign neighbours, and make thy imitation 
 by discretion, not contagion. Feel something 
 of thyself in the noble acts of thy ancestors, 
 and find in thine own genius that of thy pre- 
 decessors. Rest not under the expired merits 
 of others, shine by those of thine own. Flame 
 not like the central fire which enlighteneth no 
 eyes, which no man seeth, and most men think 
 there is no such thino; to be seen. Add one 
 ray unto the common lustre ; add not only to 
 the number, but the note of thy generation ; 
 and prove not a cloud, but an asterisk in thy 
 region. 
 
 XXXIII. Since thou hast an alarum in thy 
 breast, which teUs thee thou hast a hving spirit 
 
2U CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 in thee above two thousand times in an hour, 
 dull not away thy days in slothful supinity and 
 the tediousness of doing nothing. To strenu- 
 ous minds there is an inquietude in overquiet- 
 ness, and no laboriousness in labour ; and to 
 tread a mile after the slow pace of a snail, or 
 the hea\y measures of the lazj of Brazilia, were 
 a most tiring penance, and worse than a race of 
 some fiirlongs at the Olympics. The rapid 
 courses of the heavenlj bodies are rather imi- 
 table by our thoughts, than our corporeal mo- 
 tions : yet the solemn motions of our hves 
 amount imto a greater measure than is com- 
 monly apprehended. Some few men have sur- 
 rounded the globe of the earth; yet many in 
 the set locomotions and movements of their 
 days have measured the circ-uit of it, and 
 twenty" thousand miles have been exceeded by 
 them. Move circumspectly, not meticulously, 
 and rather carefully soUcitous than anxiously 
 ptot. rriL sohciturlinous. Think not there is a Hon in the 
 way, nor walk with leaden sanrlals in the paths 
 of goodness; but in all \'irtuous motions let 
 prudence determine thy measures. Strive not 
 to run, like Hercules, a furlong in a breath: 
 festination may prove precipitation; dehberat- 
 ing delay may be wise cunctation, and slowness 
 no slothfalness. 
 
 XXXIV. Since virtuous actions have their 
 
 L3. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 215 
 
 own trumpots, and, Avitliout any noise tVoni thy- 
 self, will have their resound abroad, busy not r^. cniii. i. 
 tliy best member in the eneomium of thyself. 
 Praise is a debt we owe unto the virtues o\' 
 others, and due unto our own from all, whom 
 maliee hath not made mutes, or envy struek 
 dumb. Fall not, however, into the common 
 ])revarieatino; Avay of self-eommendation and 
 boasting:;, bv denoting- the imperteetions of oth- P:mt*\ 
 ors. He who diseonnnendeth others, obliquely j^!/^"^"*' 
 oonnnendeth himself. lie who whispers their 
 intirmities, proelaims his own exemption from 
 then\ : and consequently says, I am m)t as this ?t-T>"»fp 
 publican, or hio ni^e)\ whom I talk of. Open uor.Ssit. l 
 ostentation and loiui vainglory is nuuv tolera- "'•'^ 
 ble than this obliquity, as but containino- some 
 froth, no ink : as but consisting; o\' a personal 
 piece of folly, nor complicated with uncharita- 
 bleness. Superfluously we seek a precarions 
 applause abroad ; every good man hath his 
 j^Iaui^ite within himself; anil though his tongue 
 be silent, is not without loud cymbals in his 
 breast. Conscience will become his paneg^^ist, 
 and never forovt to crown and extol him tmto 
 himseh'. 
 
 XXXV. r^less not thyself oidy that thou 
 wert born in Athens ; but, among thy nudti- 
 plied acknowledgments, lilt up one hand unto 
 heaven, that thou wert born o( honest parents; 
 
216 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 that modesty, humility, patience, and veracity 
 lay in tlie same egg., and came into the world 
 with thee. From such foundations thou may- 
 est be happy in a virtuous precocity, and make 
 an early and long walk in goodness ; so mayest 
 thou more naturally feel the contrariety of vice 
 unto nature, and resist some by the antidote of 
 thy temper. As charity covers, so modesty 
 preventeth, a multitude of sins ; withholding 
 from noonday vices, and brazen-browed iniqui- 
 ties, from sinning on the house-top, and paint- 
 ing our follies with the rays of the sun. Where 
 this virtue reigneth, though vice may show its 
 head, it cannot be in its glory. Where shame 
 of sin sets, look not for virtue to arise ; for 
 when modesty taketh wing, Astrasa* goes soon 
 after. 
 
 XXXVI. The heroical vein of mankind nms 
 much in the soldiery and courageous part of the 
 world, and in that form we oftenest find men 
 above men. History is full of the gallantry 
 of that tribe ; and when we read their notable 
 acts, we easily find what a difference there is 
 between a life in Plutarch and in Laertius. 
 Where true fortitude dwells, loyalty, bounty, 
 friendship, and fidelity may be found. A man 
 may confide in persons constituted for noble 
 
 * Asircea, goddess of Justice, and consequently of all Virtue. 
 Ovid. Met. i. 150. Faei-ie Queene, v. i. 11. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 217 
 
 ends, who dare do and suffer, and who have a Like mu- 
 hand to burn for their country and their friend. J"^^ 
 Small and creeping tilings are the product of ^i^- "• '^ 
 petty souls. He is like to be mistaken, who 
 makes choice of a covetous man for a friend, or 
 relieth upon the reed of narrow and poltroon 
 friendship. Pitiful things are only to be found 
 in the cottaojes of such breasts; but bright 
 thoughts, clear deeds, constancy, fidelity, 
 bounty, and generous honesty, are the gems 
 of noble minds ; wherein, to derogate from 
 none, the true heroic Enghsh gentleman hath 
 no peer. 
 
 18 
 
Part IL 
 
 UNISH not thyself with pleasure ; 
 glut not thy sense with palative 
 dehghts, nor revenge the contempt 
 of temperance by the penalty of 
 satiety. Were there an age of delight or any 
 pleasure durable, who would not honour Volu- 
 pia ? but the race of delight is short, and pleas- 
 ures have mutable faces. The pleasures of one 
 age are not pleasures in another, and their lives 
 fall short of our own. Even in our sensual 
 days, the strength of delight is in its seldom- 
 ness or rarity, and sting in its satiety ; medioc- 
 rity is its hfe, and immoderacy its confusion. 
 The luxurious emperors of old inconsiderately 
 satiated themselves with the dainties of sea and 
 land, till, wearied through all varieties, their 
 refections became a study unto them, and they 
 were fain to feed by invention : novices in true 
 epicurism ! which by mediocrity, paucity, quick 
 and healthful appetite, makes dehghts smartly 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 219 
 
 acceptable; whereby Epicurus himself found 
 Jupiter^ s brain* in a piece of Cytheridian 
 cheese, and the tongues of nightingales in a 
 dish of onions. Hereby healthful and tem- 
 perate poverty hath the start of nauseating 
 luxury ; unto whose clear and naked appetite 
 every meal is a feast, and in one single dish the 
 first course of Metellus ; f who are cheaply hun- 
 gry, and never lose their hunger or advantage 
 of a craving appetite, because obvious food con- 
 tents it ; while Nero, half famished, could not 
 feed upon a piece of bread, and, lingering after 
 his snowed water, hardly got down an ordinary 
 cup of calda.j^ By such circumscriptions of 
 pleasure the contemned philosophers reserved 
 unto themselves the secret of delight, which the 
 helluci's of those days lost in their exorbitances. 
 In vain we study dehght : it is at the command 
 ^-of-^very sober mind, and in every sense born 
 with us : but nature, who teacheth us the rule 
 of pleasure, instructeth also in the bounds 
 thereof, and where^ its line expireth. And 
 therefore, temperate minds, not pressing their 
 
 * Cerebrum Jovis, for a delicious bit. 
 
 t Metellus his riotous pontifical supper, the great variety 
 whereat is to be seen in Macrobius. Saturnal. iii. 13. 
 
 J Calcla, tepid water with which the ancients tempered their 
 wine. " Fameque interim et siti intetyellante^ panem quidem sor- 
 didum oblatum adspernatus est, aqu^e autem tepidce aliquantum bibit.^^ 
 — Sueton. Kero, 48. 
 
220 CHRISTIAN MORALS, 
 
 pleasures until the sting appearetli, enjoy their 
 contentations contentedly and without regret; 
 and so escape the folly of excess, to be pleased 
 unto displacency. 
 
 II. Bring candid eyes unto the perusal of 
 men's works, and let not Zoilism or detraction 
 blast well-intended labours. He that endureth 
 no faults in men's writings must only read his 
 own, wherein for the most part all appeareth 
 white. Quotation mistakes, inadvertency, ex- 
 pedition, and human lapses, may make, not 
 only moles, but warts, in learned authors ; who 
 notwithstanding, being judged by the capital 
 matter, admit not of disparagement. I should 
 unwillingly affirm that Cicero was but slightly 
 versed in Homer, because in his work De Gloria 
 he ascribed those verses unto Ajax which were 
 delivered by Hector. What if Plautus in the 
 account of Hercules mistaketh nativity for con- 
 ception? Who would have mean thoughts of 
 Apollinaris Sidonius, who seems to mistake the 
 river Tigris for Euphrates ; and though a good 
 historian and learned bishop of Auvergne had 
 the misfortune to be out in the story of David, 
 makins: mention of him when the ark was sent 
 1 Sam. Ti. back by the Pliilistines upon a cart, which was 
 before his time ? Though I have no great 
 opinion of Machiavel's learning, yet I shall not 
 presently say that he was but a novice m Ro- 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS, 221 
 
 man history, because he was mistaken in placing 
 Commodus after the Emperor Severus. Capi- 
 tal truths are to be narrowly eyed ; collateral 
 lapses and circumstantial deliveries not to be too 
 strictly sifted. And if the substantial subject 
 be well forged out, we need not examine the 
 sparks which irregularly fly from it. 
 
 III. Let well-weighed considerations, not stiff 
 and peremptory assumptions, guide thy discour- 
 ses, pen, and actions. To begin or continue 
 our works like Trismegistus of old, verum certe 
 verum atqiie verissimum est^ would sound arro- 
 gantly unto present ears in this strict inquiring 
 age ; wherein, for the most part, p-ohahly and 
 perhaps will hardly serve to mollify the spirit 
 of captious contradictors. If Cardan saith that 
 a parrot is a beautiful bird, Scaliger will set his 
 wits to work to prove it a deformed animal. 
 The compage of all physical truths is not so 
 closely jointed, but opposition may find intru- 
 sion ; nor always so closely maintamed, as not 
 to suiFer attrition. Many positions seem quod- 
 libetically constituted, and like a Delphian blade 
 will cut on both sides. Some truths seem al- 
 most falsehoods, and some falsehoods almost 
 truths ; wherein falsehood and truth seem almost 
 equilibriously stated, and but a few grains of 
 distinction to bear down the balance. Some 
 
 have digged deep, yet glanced by the royal 
 19 
 
222 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 vein ; and a man may come unto tlie pericar- 
 dimn, but not the heart of truth. Besides, 
 many things are known, as some are seen, that 
 is, by parallaxis, or at some distance from their 
 true and proper beings, the superficial regard 
 of things having a different aspect from their 
 true and central natures. And this moves so- 
 ber pens unto suspensory and timorous asser- 
 tions, nor presently to obtrude them as Sibyls' 
 leaves; which after considerations may find to 
 be but folious appearances, and not the central 
 and vital interiors of truth. 
 
 lY. Value the judicious, and let not mere 
 acquests in minor parts of learning gain thy 
 pre-existimation. It is an unjust way of com- 
 pute, to magnify a weak head for some Latin 
 abilities ; and to undervalue a solid judgment, 
 because he knows not the genealogy of Hector. 
 When that notable king of France * would have 
 his son to know but one sentence in Latin, had 
 it been a good one, perhaps it had been enough. 
 Natural parts and good judgments rule the 
 world. States are not governed by ergotisms. 
 Many have ruled well, who could not, perhaps, 
 define a Commonwealth ; and they who under- 
 stand not the globe of the earth, command a 
 great part of it. Where natural logic prevails 
 not, artificial too often faileth. Where nature 
 
 * Louis XI. " Qui nescit dissimulare nescit regnare.''^ 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 223 
 
 fills the sails, the vessel goes smoothly on ; and 
 when judgment is the pilot, the insurance need 
 not be high. When industry builds upon na- 
 ture, we may expect p^rramids: where that 
 foundation is wanting, the structure must be 
 low. They do most by books, who could do 
 much without them ; and he that chiefly owes 
 himself unto himself, is the substantial man. 
 
 V. Let thy studies be free as thy thoughts 
 and contemplations : but fly not only upon the 
 wings of imagination ; join sense unto reason, 
 and experiment unto speculation, and so give 
 life unto embryon truths and verities yet in 
 their chaos. There is nothing more acceptable 
 unto the ino-enious world, than this noble eluc- 
 tation of truth ; wherein, against the tenacity 
 of prejudice and prescription, this century now 
 prevaileth. What libraries of new volumes af- 
 ter-times will behold, and in what a new world 
 of knowledge the eyes of our posterity may be 
 happy, a few ages may joyfully declare ; and 
 is but a cold thought unto those, who cannot 
 hope to behold this exantlation of truth, or that 
 obscured virgin half out of the pit : which might 
 make some content with a commutation of the 
 time of their lives, and to commend the fancy 
 of the Pythagorean metempsychosis : whereby 
 they might hope to enjoy this happiness in 
 their third or fourth selves, and behold that 
 
224: CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 in Pythagoras, wliicli tliey now but foresee in 
 Enphorbus.* The world, which took but six 
 days to make, is hke to take six thousand to 
 make out : meanwhile old truths voted down 
 begin to resume their places, and new ones 
 arise upon us ; wherein there is no comfort in 
 the happiness of TuUy's Elysium,! or any satis- 
 faction from the ghosts of the ancients, who 
 knew so little of what is now well known. 
 Men disparage not antiquity, who prudently 
 exalt new inquiries, and make not them the 
 judges of truth, who were but fellow-inquirers 
 of it. Who can but magnify the endeavours 
 of Aristotle, and the noble start which learn- 
 ing had under him ; or less than pity the slen- 
 der progression made upon such advantages ; 
 while many centuries were lost in repetitions 
 and transcriptions sealing up the book of knowl- 
 edge ? And therefore, rather than to swell the 
 leaves of learning by fruitless repetitions, to 
 sing the same song in all ages, nor adventure 
 at essays beyond the attempt of others, many 
 would be content that some would write like 
 Helmont or Paracelsus ; and be willing to en- 
 
 * Pythagoras, in accordance with his doctrine of metempsy- 
 chosis, or more correctly metensomatosis, declared that he him- 
 self had been present at the siege of Troy as Euphorbus. Ovid. 
 Met. XV. 160. Hor. Od. I. xxviii. 11. 
 
 t In which Socrates comforted himself that he should converse 
 with the worthies of old. Tusc. Disp. i. xli. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 225 
 
 dure the monstrosity of some opinions for di- 
 vers singular notions requiting such aberrations. 
 VI. Despise not the obhquities of younger 
 ways, nor despair of better things whereof there 
 is yet no prospect. Who would imagine that 
 Diogenes, who in his younger days was a fal- 
 sifier of money, should, in the after course of 
 his life, be so great a contemner of metal ? 
 Some negroes, who beheve the resurrection, 
 think that they shall rise white. Even in this 
 life regeneration may imitate resurrection ; our 
 black and vicious tinctures may wear off, and 
 goodness clothe us with candor. Good admo- 
 nitions knock not always in vain. There will 
 be signal examples of God's mercy, and the 
 angels must not want their charitable rejoices st.Luko 
 for the conversion of lost sinners. Figures of 
 most angles do nearest approach unto circles, 
 which have no angles at all. Some may be 
 near unto goodness who are conceived far from 
 it ; and many things happen, not likely to ensue 
 from any promises of antecedencies. Culpable 
 beginnings have found commendable conclusions, 
 and infamous courses pious retractations. De- 
 testable sinners have proved exemplary converts 
 on earth, and may be glorious in the apartment 
 of Mary Magdalen in heaven. Men are not 
 the same through all divisions of their ages : 
 time, experience, self-reflections, and God's mer- 
 
23-33. 
 
 226 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 cies, make in some well-tempered minds a kind 
 of translation before death, and men to differ 
 from themselves as well as from other persons. 
 Hereof the old world afforded many examples 
 to the infamy of latter ages, wherein men too 
 often live by the rule of their inclinations ; so 
 that, without any astral prediction, the first day 
 gives the last : men are commonly as they were ; 
 or rather, as bad dispositions run into worser 
 habits, the evening doth not crown, but sourly 
 conclude, the day. 
 
 VII. If the Almighty will not spare us ac- 
 Gen. xviii. cording to his merciful capitulation at Sodom; 
 if his goodness please not to pass over a great 
 deal of bad for a small pittance of good, or to 
 look upon us in the lump ; there is slender hope 
 for mercy, or sound presumption of fulfilling 
 half his will, either in persons or nations : they 
 who excel in some virtues being so often de- 
 fective in others ; few men driving at the extent 
 and amplitude of goodness, but computing them- 
 selves by their best parts, and others by their 
 worst, are content to rest in those virtues which 
 others commonly want. Which makes this spec- 
 kled face of honesty in the world ; and which 
 was the imperfection of the old philosophers and 
 gi-eat pretenders unto virtue ; who well declin- 
 ing the gaping vices of intemperance, inconti- 
 nency, violence, and oppression, were yet blind- 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 227 
 
 \j peccant in iniquities of closer faces ; were 
 envious, malicious, contemners, scoffers, cen- 
 surers, and stuffed with vizard vices, no less 
 depraving the ethereal particle and diviner por- 
 tion of man. For envy, malice, hatred, are 
 the qualities of Satan, close and dark like him- 
 self; and where such brands smoke, the soul 
 cannot be white. Vice may be had at all prices; 
 expensive and costly iniquities which make the 
 noise, cannot be every man's sins ; but the soul 
 may be foully inquinated at a very low rate, 
 and a man may be cheaply vicious to the per- 
 dition of himself. 
 
 VIII. Opinion rides upon the neck of reason ; 
 and men are happy, wise, or learned, according 
 as that empress shall set them down in the 
 register of reputation. However, weigh not 
 thyself in the scales of thy own opinion, but 
 let the judgment of the judicious be the stand- 
 ard of thy merit. Self-estimation is a flatterer 
 too readily entithng us unto knowledge and 
 abilities, which others solicitously labour after, 
 and doubtfully think they attain. Surely, such 
 confident tempers do pass their days in best 
 tranquillity ; who, resting in the opinion of their 
 own abilities, are happily gulled by such con- 
 tentation ; wherein pride, self-conceit, confi- 
 dence, and opiniatrity will hardly suffer any 
 to complain of imperfection. To think them- 
 
228 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 selves in tlie right, or all that riglit, or only 
 that, which they do or think, is a fallacy of 
 high content ; though others laugh in their 
 sleeves, and look upon them as in a deluded 
 state of judgment: wherein, notwithstanding, 
 it were but a civil piece of complacency to suffer 
 them to sleep who would not wake, to let them 
 rest in their securities, nor by dissent or oppo- 
 sition to stagger their contentments. 
 
 IX. Since the brow speaks often true, since 
 eyes and noses have tongues, and the counte- 
 nance proclaims the heart and inclinations, let 
 observation so far instruct thee in physiognomi- 
 cal lines, as to be some rule for thy distinction, 
 and guide for thy affection unto such as look 
 most like men. Mankind, methinks, is compre- 
 hended in a few faces, if we exclude all visages 
 which any way participate of symmetries and 
 schemes of look common unto other animals. 
 For as thouo;h man were the extract of the 
 world, in whom all were in coagulato^ which in 
 their forms were in soluto and at extension ; we 
 often observe that men do most act those crea- 
 tures, whose constitution, parts, and complexion 
 do most predominate in their mixtures. This 
 is a corner-stone in physiognomy, and holds 
 some truth not only in particular persons, but 
 also in whole nations. There are, therefore, 
 provincial faces, national hps and noses, which 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 229 
 
 testify not only the natures of those countries, 
 but of those which have them elsewhere. Thus 
 we may make England the whole earth, divid- 
 ing it not only into Europe, Asia, Africa, but 
 the particular regions thereof ; and may in some 
 latitude affirm, that there are Egyptians, Scy- 
 thians, Indians among us, who, though born in 
 England, yet carry the faces and air of those 
 countries, and are also agreeable and corre- 
 spondent unto their natures. Faces look uni- 
 formly unto our eyes : how they appear unto 
 some animals of a more piercing or diifering 
 sight, who are able to discover the inequalities, 
 rubs and hairiness of the skin, is not without 
 good doubt ; and, therefore, in reference unto 
 man, Cupid is said to be blind. Affection 
 should not be too .sharp-eyed, and love is not 
 to be made by magnifying-glasses. If things 
 were seen as they truly are, the beauty of bod- 
 ies would be much abridged. And, therefore, 
 the Wise Contriver hath drawn the pictures 
 and outsides of \hings softly and amiably unto 
 the natural edge of our eyes, not leaving them 
 able to discover those uncomely asperities, which 
 make oyster-shells in good faces, and hedgehogs 
 even in Venus's moles. 
 
 X. Court not felicity too far, and weary not 
 the favourable hand of fortune. Glorious ac- 
 tions have their times, extent, and non ultra's. 
 
230 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 To put no end unto attempts were to make pre- 
 scription of successes, and to bespeak unliappi- 
 Aii 's Well ness at the last ; for the hue of our hves is 
 Well iv. 3. drawn with white and black vicissitudes, where- 
 in the extremes hold seldom one complexion. 
 That Pompey should obtain the surname of 
 Great at twenty-five years ; that men in their 
 young and active days should be fortunate and 
 perform notable things ; is no observation of 
 deep wonder, they having the strength of their 
 fates before them, nor yet acted their parts in 
 the world for which they were brought into it ; 
 whereas men of years, matured for counsels and 
 designs, seem to be beyond the vigour of their 
 active fortunes, and high exploits of life, provi- 
 dentially ordained unto ages best agreeable unto 
 them. And, therefore, many brave men, find- 
 ing their fortune grow faint, and feeling its 
 declination, have timely withdrawn themselves 
 from great attempts, and so escaped the ends of 
 mighty men, disproportionable to their begin- 
 nings. But magnanimous thoughts have so 
 dimmed the eyes of many, that forgetting the 
 Seethe Very csscuce of fortune, and the vicissitude of 
 Poi^^crates go<^^ ^1^^ ^^-t ^^J apprehend no bottom in 
 andAma- felicity, and so have been still tempted on unto 
 iii-'io, seq. Hiiglity actious, reserved for their destructions. 
 For fortune lays the plot of our adversities in 
 the foundation of our felicities, blessing us in 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 231 
 
 the first quadrate, to blast us more sharply in 
 the last. And since in the highest felicities 
 there lieth a capacity of the lowest miseries, 
 she hath this advantage from our happiness to 
 make us truly miserable ; for to become acutely 
 miserable we are to be first happy. Affliction 
 smarts most in the most happy state, as having 
 somewhat in it of Belisarius at beggar's bush, 
 or Bajazet in the grate. And this the fallen 
 angels severely understand, who having acted 
 their first part in Heaven, are made sharply 
 miserable by transition, and more afflictively 
 feel the contrary state of Hell. 
 
 XI. Carry no careless eye upon the unex- 
 pected scenes of things, but ponder the acts of 
 Providence in the public ends of great and 
 notable men, set out unto the view of all for 
 no common memorandums. The tragical exits 
 and unexpected periods of some eminent per- 
 sons cannot but amuse considerate observators ; 
 wherein, notwithstanding, most men seem to 
 see by extramission, without reception or self- 
 reflection, and conceive themselves uncon- 
 cerned by the fallacy of their own exemption ; 
 whereas, the mercy of God hath singled out 
 but few to be the signals of his justice, leaving 
 the generality of mankind to the paedagogy of 
 example. But the inadvertency of our natures 
 not well apprehending this favourable method 
 
1 Cor. XV, 
 43. 
 
 232 CHRISTIAN MORALS, 
 
 and merciful decimation, and that He slioweth 
 in some what others also deserve ; they enter- 
 tain no sense of his hand beyond the stroke of 
 themselves. Whereupon the whole becomes 
 necessarily punished, and the contracted hand 
 of God extended unto universal judgments ; 
 from whence, nevertheless, the stupidity of our 
 tempers receives but faint impressions, and in 
 the most tragical state of times holds but starts 
 of good motions. So that to continue us in 
 goodness there must be iterated returns of mis- 
 ery, and a circulation in affliction is necessary. 
 And since we cannot be wise by warnings ; 
 since plagues are insignificant, except we be 
 personally plagued ; since also we cannot be 
 punished unto amendment by j^roxy or commu- 
 tation, nor l)y vicinity, but contaction ; there is 
 an unhappy necessity that we must smart in 
 our own skins, and the provoked arm of the 
 Almighty must fall upon ourselves. The capi- 
 tal sufferings of others are rather our monitions 
 than acquitments. There is but One who died 
 salvifically for us, and able to say unto death. 
 Hitherto shalt thou go, and no farther; only 
 one enlivening death, which makes gardens of 
 graves, and that which was sowed in corruption 
 to arise and flourish in glory : when death itself 
 shall die, and living shall have no period ; when 
 the damned shall mourn at the funeral of death ; 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 233 
 
 when life, not death, shall be the wages of sin : Rom. vi. 
 when the second death shall prove a miserable f ' . 
 
 - ^ -Kev. VI. 
 
 lite, and destruction shall be courted. 15-17. 
 
 XII. Although their thoughts may seem too 
 severe, who think that few ill-natured men go to 
 heaven ; yet it may be acknowledged that good- 
 natured persons are best founded for that place, 
 who enter the world with good dispositions 
 and natural graces, more ready to be advanced 
 by impressions from above, and Christianized 
 unto pieties, who carry about them plain and 
 downright dealing minds, humility, mercy, char- 
 ity, and virtues acceptable unto God and man. 
 But whatever success they may have as to 
 heaven, they are the acceptable men on earth, 
 and happy is he who hath his quiver full 
 of them for his friends. These are not the 
 dens wherein falsehood lurks, and hypocrisy 
 hides its head, wherein frowardness makes its 
 nest, or where malice, hard-heartedness, and 
 oppression love to dwell; not those by whom 
 the poor get little, and the rich some time lose 
 all ; men, not of retracted looks, but who carrv 
 their hearts in their faces, and need not to be 
 looked upon with perspectives ; not sordidly or 
 mischievously ingrateful ; who cannot learn to 
 ride upon the neck of the afflicted, nor load the 
 heavy laden, but who keep the temple of Janus 
 shut by peaceable and quiet tempers ; who make 
 
234 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 not only the best friends, but the best enemies, 
 as easier to forgive tlian offend, and ready to 
 pass by the second offence before they avenge 
 the first ; who make natural Royalists, obedient 
 Subjects, kind and merciful l^rinces, verified 
 in o\u* own, one of the best-natured Kinixs of 
 this throne. Of the old Roman Em})er()rs the 
 best were the best-natured, though they made 
 but a small number, and might be writ in a 
 ring. Many of the rest were as bad men as 
 princes ; humourists, rather than of good hu- 
 mours ; and of good natural parts, rather than 
 of good natures, which did but arm tlieir bad 
 inclinations, and make them wittily wicked. 
 
 XIII. With what shift and pains we come 
 into the world we remember not, but 't is com- 
 monly found no easy matter to get out of it. 
 Many have studied to exasperate the wavs of 
 death, but fewer hours have been spent to 
 soften that necessity. That the smoothest wav 
 unto the grave is made by bleeding, as common 
 opinion presumeth, beside the sick and fainting 
 languors which accompany that effusion, the 
 Tacitus, experiment in Lucan and Seneca will make us 
 
 Anual. XV. 
 
 03. 70, doubt : under which the noble Stoic so deeply 
 laboured, that, to conceal his afHiction, he was 
 fain to retire from the sight of his wife, and 
 not ashamed to implore the merciful hand of 
 his physician to shorten his misery therein. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 235 
 
 Ovid, the old lierocs, and the Stoics, who wore Ovia.Trist 
 so afraid of drowninc, as dreadinix therebv the '" "' " ' 
 extinction of their soul, which they conceived 
 to be a fire, stood probably in fear of an easier 
 way of death ; wheri'in the water, entering: tlie 
 possessions of air, makes a temperate suffocation, 
 and kills, as it were, without a fever. Surely 
 many who have had the spirit to destroy them- 
 selves, have not been ingenious in the contri- 
 vance thereof. 'Twas a dull way practised by 
 Themistocles, to overwhelm himsi'lf with bull's vide 
 blood, who bc'inii; an Athenian, mii^ht have held 
 an easier theory of death from the state potion 
 of his country ; from which S(X'rates, in Plato, 
 seemed not to suffer much more than from the 
 fit of an ague. Cato is much to be pitied, who 
 mangled himself with poniards ; and Hannibal 
 seems more subtle, who carried his deliver^', 
 not in the point, but the ])uninu'l of his sword.* 
 The Egyptians were merciful contriveiN, who 
 destroyed their malefactors by asps, charming 
 their senses into an invincible sleep, and killing 
 as it were with Hennes his rod. The Turkish 
 emperor, odious for other cruelty, was herein 
 a remarkable master of mercy, killing his fa- 
 vourite in his sleep, and sending him from the 
 
 * "Wherein he is said to have carried something, whereby upon 
 a struggle or despair he might deliver himself from all misfor- 
 tunes. Juvenal says it was carried in a ring. Sat. x. 165. 
 
236 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 shade into the house of darkness. He who had 
 been thus destroyed would hardly have bled 
 at the presence of his destroyer: when men 
 are already dead by metaphor, and pass but 
 from one sleep unto another, wanting herein 
 the eminent part of severity to feel themselves 
 to die ; and escaping the sharpest attendant of 
 death, the lively apprehension thereof. But to 
 learn to die is better than to study the ways 
 of dying. Death will find some ways to untie 
 or cut the most Gordian knots of life, and make 
 men's miseries as mortal as themselves ; where- 
 as evil spirits, as undying substances, are insep- 
 arable from their calamities ; and, therefore, 
 they everlastingly struggle under their angus- 
 tias, and, bound up with immortahty, can never 
 get out of themselves. 
 
Part III. 
 
 is hard to find a whole age to imi- 
 - ![ tate, or what century to propose for 
 example. Some have been far more 
 approvable than others ; but virtue 
 and vice, panegyrics and satires, scatteringly 
 to be found in all. History sets down not only 
 things laudable, but abominable ; things which 
 should never have been, or never have been 
 knoAvn ; so that noble patterns must be fetched 
 here and there from single persons, rather than 
 whole nations ; and from whole nations rather 
 than any one. The world was early bad, and 
 the first sin the most deplorable of any. The 
 younger world afforded the oldest men, and 
 perhaps the best and the worst, when length of 
 days made virtuous habits heroical and immov- 
 able ; vicious, inveterate and irreclaimable. 
 And since 't is said that the imaginations of Gen. vi. 5 
 
 their hearts were evil, only evil, and continu- 
 20 
 
238 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 ally evil ; it may be feared that their sins held 
 pace with their lives, and their longevity swell- 
 ing their impieties, the longanimity of God 
 would no longer endure such vivacious abomi- 
 nations. Their impieties were surely of a deep 
 dye, which required the whole Element of 
 Water to wash them away, and overwhelmed 
 their memories with themselves; and so shut 
 up the first windows of Time, leaving no his- 
 tories of those longevous generations, when 
 men might have been properly historians, when 
 Adam might have read long lectures mito Me- 
 thuselah, and Methuselah unto Noah. For had 
 Ave been happy in just historical accounts of 
 that unparalleled world, we might have been 
 acquainted with wonders, and have understood 
 not a little of the acts and undertakings of 
 Moses his mighty men, and men of renown of 
 old, which might have enlarged our thoughts, 
 and made the world older unto us. For the 
 unknown part of time shortens the estimation, 
 if not the compute of it. What hath escaped 
 our knowledge, falls not under our considera- 
 tion ; and what is and will be latent, is little 
 better than non-existent. 
 
 II. Some things are dictated for our instruc- 
 tion, some acted for our imitation ; wherein it is 
 best to ascend unto the highest conformity, and 
 to the honour of the exemplar. He honours 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 239 
 
 God, who imitates him;* for what we virtu- 
 ously imitate we approve and admire ; and since 
 we delight not to imitate inferiors, we aggran- 
 dize and magnify those we imitate ; since also 
 we are most apt to imitate those we love, we 
 testify our affection in our imitation of the inim- 
 itable. To affect to be like, may be no imita- 
 tion ; to act, and not to be what we pretend to 
 imitate, is but a mimical conformation, and car- 
 rieth no virtue in it. Lucifer imitated not God, 
 when he said he would be like the Highest; 
 and he imitated not Jupiter, who counterfeited saimoneus. 
 
 . Virs. Mn. 
 
 thunder. Where imitation can go no farther, vi. 585. 
 let admiration step on, whereof there is no end 
 in the wisest form of men. Even angels and 
 spirits have enough to admire in their sublimer 
 natures ; admiration being the act of the crea- 
 ture, and not of God, who doth not admire 
 himself. Created natures allow of swelling 
 hyperboles ; nothing can be said hyperbolically 
 of God, nor will his attributes admit of expres- 
 sions above their own exuperances. Trisme- 
 
 * " He prayeth well, who loveth well 
 Both man and bird and beast. 
 He prayeth best, who loveth best 
 All things both great and small ; 
 For the dear God who loveth us, 
 He made and loveth all." 
 
 Coleridge. 
 Cf. St. Matt. vi. 12, 14, 15. 
 
240 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 gistus his circle, whose centre is everywhere 
 and circumference nowhere, was no hyperbole. 
 Words cannot exceed, where they cannot ex- 
 press enough. Even the most winged thoughts 
 fall at the setting out, and reach not the portal 
 of Divinity. 
 
 III. In bivious theorems, and Janus-faced 
 doctrines, let virtuous considerations state the 
 determination. Look upon opinions as thou 
 dost upon the moon, and choose not the dark 
 hemisphere for thy contemplation. Embrace 
 not the opacous and blind side of opinions, but 
 that which looks most luciferously or influen- 
 tially unto goodness. It is better to think that 
 there are Guardian Spirits, than that there are 
 no spirits to guard us ; that vicious persons are 
 slaves, than that there is any servitude in vir- 
 tue ; that times past have been better than 
 times present, than that times were always 
 bad; and that to be men it sufficeth to be 
 no better than men in all ages, and so promis- 
 cuously to swim down the turbid stream, and 
 make up the grand confusion. Sow not thy 
 understanding with opinions, which make noth- 
 ing of iniquities, and fallaciously extenuate trans- 
 gressions. Look upon vices and vicious objects 
 with hyperbolical eyes ; and rather enlarge their 
 dimensions, that their unseen deformities may 
 not escape thy sense, and their poisonous parts 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 241 
 
 and stings may appear massy and monstrous 
 unto tliee : for the undiscerned particles and 
 atoms of evil deceive us, and we are undone 
 by the invisibles of seeming goodness. We are 
 only deceived in what is not discerned, and to 
 err is but to be blind or dim-sighted as to some 
 perceptions. 
 
 IV. To be honest in a right line, and virtu- Linea recta 
 ous by epitome, be firm unto such principles ^^^''''^'°'''- 
 of goodness as carry in them volumes of in- 
 struction and may abridge thy labour. And 
 since instructions are many, hold close mito 
 those, whereon the rest depend ; so may we 
 have all in a few, and the law and the prophets 
 in a rule ; the Sacred Writ in stenography, and 
 the Scripture in a nut-shell. To pursue the 
 osseous and solid part of goodness, which gives 
 stabihty and rectitude to all the rest ; to settle 
 on fundamental virtues, and bid early defiance 
 unto mother-vices, which carry in their bowels 
 the seminals of other iniquities, makes a short 
 cut in goodness, and strikes not off a head, but 
 the whole neck of Hydra. For we are carried 
 into the dark lake, like the Egyptian river into 
 the sea, by seven principal ostiaries : the mother- 
 sins of that number are the deadly engines of 
 evil spirits that undo us, and even evil spirits 
 themselves ; and he who is under the chains 
 thereof is not without a possession. Mary Mag- 
 21 
 
242 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 St. Luke dalene had more than seven devils, if these 
 with their imps were in her; and he who is 
 
 viii. 30. thus possessed, may hterally be named Legion. 
 Where such plants grow and prosper, look for 
 no champaign or region void of thorns ; but 
 productions like the tree of Goa,* and forests 
 of abomination. 
 
 Y. Guide not the hand of God, nor order 
 the finger of the Almighty unto thy will and 
 j)leasure ; but sit quiet in the soft showers of 
 Providence, and favourable distributions in this 
 world, either to thyself or others. And since 
 not only judgments have their errands, but 
 mercies their commissions, snatch not at every 
 favour, nor think thyself passed by if they fall 
 upon thy neighbour. Rake not up envious 
 displacences at things successful unto others, 
 which the Wise Disposer of all things thinks not 
 fit for thyself. Reconcile the events of things 
 unto both beings, that is, of this world and the 
 next ; so will there not seem so many riddles in 
 Providence, nor various inequalities in the dis- 
 pensation of things below. If thou dost not 
 anoint thy face, yet put not on sackcloth at the 
 
 Faerie felicities of otliers. Repining; at the good draws 
 
 Queenei. ... . 
 
 iv. 30. on rejoicing at the evils of others, and so falls into 
 
 * Arbor Goa de Ruyz^ or Ficus Indica, whose branches send 
 down shoots which root in the ground, from whence there suc- 
 cessively rise others, till one tree becomes a wood. Plin. H. N. 
 xii. 5. Milton, P. L. ix. 1101. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 243 
 
 tliat inhuman vice for which so few languages 
 have a name. The blessed spirits above rejoice 
 at our happiness below ; but to be glad at the 
 evils of one another is beyond the malignity 
 of hell, and falls not on evil spirits, who, though 
 they rejoice at our unhappiness, take no pleas- 
 ure at the afflictions of their own society or of 
 their fellow natures. Degenerous heads ! who 
 must be fain to learn from such examples, and 
 to be taught from the School of Hell. 
 
 VI. Grain not thy vicious stains, nor deepen 
 those swart tinctures which temper, infirmity, 
 or ill habits have set upon thee ; and fix not, by 
 iterated depravations, what time might efface, or 
 virtuous washes expunge. He who thus still ad- 
 vanceth in iniquity, deepeneth his deformed hue, 
 turns a shadow into night, and makes himself a 
 negro in the black jaundice ; and so becomes one 
 of those lost ones, the disproportionate pores of 
 whose brains afford no entrance unto good mo- 
 tions, but reflect and frustrate all counsels, deaf 
 unto the thunder of the laws, and rocks unto the 
 cries of charitable commiserators. He who hath 
 had the patience of Diogenes, to make orations 
 unto statues, may more sensibly apprehend how 
 all words fall to the ground, spent upon such a 
 surd and earless generation of men, stupid unto 
 all instruction, and rather requiring an exorcist 
 than an orator for their conversion ! 
 
244 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 VII. Burden not the back of Aries, Leo, or 
 Taurus with thy faults ; nor make Saturn, Mars, 
 or Venus guilty of thy follies. Think not to 
 fasten thy imperfections on the stars, and so de- 
 spairingly conceive thyself under a fatality of 
 being evil. Calculate thyself within ; seek not 
 thyself in the moon, but in thine own orb or mi- 
 crocosmical circumference. Let celestial aspects 
 admonish and advertise, not conclude and deter- 
 mine thy ways. For since good and bad stars 
 moralize not our actions, and neither excuse or 
 commend, acquit or condemn our good or bad 
 deeds at the present or last bar ; since some 
 are astrologically well disposed who are mor- 
 ally highly vicious ; not celestial figures, but vir- 
 tuous schemes, must denominate and state our 
 Ps. cxivii. actions. If we rightly understood the names 
 Is. xi. 26. whereby God calleth the stars ; if we knew his 
 cf. Job i^iame for the Dog-star, or by what appellation 
 31,82. Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn obey his will; it 
 might be a welcome accession unto astrology, 
 which speaks great things, and is fain to make 
 use of appellations from Greek and Barbaric 
 systems. Whatever influences, impulsions, or 
 inclinations there be from the lights above, it 
 were a piece of wisdom to make one of those 
 Sapiens do- "vrisc men who overrule their stars, and with 
 
 minabitur , ivt-t • i • i i tt t* 
 
 astris. their own Militia contend with the Host of 
 Heaven. Unto which attempt there want not 
 
 4. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 245 
 
 auxiliaries from the whole strength of morality, 
 supplies from Christian ethics, influences also 
 and illuminations from above, more powerful 
 than the Lights of Heaven. 
 
 YIII. Confound not the distinctions of thy 
 life which nature hath divided ; that is, youth, 
 adolescence, manhood, and old age : nor in 
 these divided periods, wherein thou art in a 
 manner four, conceive thyself but one. Let 
 every division be happy in its proper virtues, 
 nor one vice run through all. Let each dis- 
 tinction have its salutary transition, and criti- 
 cally deliver thee from the imperfections of the 
 former ; so ordering the whole, that prudence 
 and virtue may have the largest section. Do i cor. xiii. 
 as a child but when thou art a child, and ride Hor.sat.ii. 
 not on a reed at twenty. He who hath not 3.248. 
 taken leave of the follies of his youth, and in 
 his maturer state scarce got out of that division, 
 disproportionately divideth his days, crowds up 
 the latter part of his life, and leaves too narrow 
 a corner for the age of wisdom ; and so hath 
 room to be a man, scarce longer than he hath 
 been a youth. Rather than to make this confu- 
 sion, anticipate the virtues of age, and live long 
 without the mfirmities of it. So mayest thou 
 count up thy days as some do Adam's, that is, 
 by anticipation ; so mayest thou be coetaneous Cf- Rei. 
 unto thy elders, and a father unto thy contem- ^^^^ 
 poraries. 
 
246 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 IX. While others are curious in the choice of 
 good air, and chiefly sohcitous for healthful hab- 
 itations, study thou conversation, and be critical 
 in thy consortion. The aspects, conjunctions, 
 and configurations of the stars, which mutually 
 diversify, intend, or qualify their influences, are 
 but the varieties of their nearer or farther con- 
 versation with one another, and like the con- 
 sortion of men, whereby they become better or 
 worse, and even exchange their natures. Since 
 men live by examples, and will be imitating 
 something, order thy imitation to thy improve- 
 ment, not thy ruin. Look not for roses in At- 
 tains his garden,* or wholesome flowers in a 
 venomous plantation. And since there is scarce 
 any one bad, but some others are the worse for 
 him, tempt not contagion by proximity, and haz- 
 ard not thyself in the shadow of corruption. 
 He who hath not early suffered this shipwreck, 
 Vide The- ^nd in his younger days escaped this Charybdis, 
 Plutarch, ^^ay make a happy voyage, and not come in 
 with black sails into the port. Self-conversation, 
 or to be alone, is better than such consortion. 
 Some schoolmen tell us, that he is properly 
 alone, with whom in the same place there is 
 Dan. iv. no otlier of the same species. Nebuchadnezzar 
 
 * Omissa deinde regni administratione^ Jiortos fodiebat, gramina 
 seminabai, et noxia innoxiis permiscebat ; eaque omnia veneni 
 succo infecia, velui pecullare munus, amicis mittebat. Justin. Hist, 
 xxxvi. 4. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 247 
 
 was alone, though among the beasts of the field ; 
 and a wise man may be tolerably said to be 
 alone, though with a rabble of people little 
 better than the beasts about him. Unthinking 
 heads, who have not learned to be alone, are in 
 a prison to themselves, if they be not also mth 
 others : whereas, on the contrary, they whose 
 thoughts are in a fair, and hurry within, are 
 sometimes fain to retire into company, to be 
 out of the crowd of themselves. He who must 
 needs have company, must needs have some- 
 times bad company. Be able to be alone. Lose 
 not the advantage of solitude, and the society of 
 thvself ; nor be only content, but delight to be 
 alone and single with Omnipresency. He who 
 is thus prepared, the day is not uneasy, nor the 
 night black unto him. Darkness may bound 
 his eyes, not his imagination. In his bed he 
 may lie, like Pompey and his sons, in all quar- 
 ters of the earth ; * may speculate the universe, 
 and enjoy the whole world in the hermitage of 
 himself. Thus the old ascetic Christians found 
 a paradise in a desert, and with httle converse 
 on earth held a conversation in heaven ; thus 
 they astronomised in caves, and, though they 
 beheld not the stars, had the glory of heaven 
 before them. 
 
 * " Pompeios Juvenes Asia aique Eurqpa, sed ipsum terra iegit 
 Lihyes.^^ 
 
248 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 X. Let the characters of good things stand 
 indehbly in thy mind, and thy thoughts be ac- 
 tive on them. Trust not too much unto suo;- 
 gestions from reminiscential amulets, or artificial 
 memorandums. Let the mortifying Janus of 
 Covarrubias* be in thy daily thoughts, not only 
 on thy hand and signets. Rely not alone upon 
 silent and dumb remembrances. Behold not 
 death's heads till thou dost not see them, nor 
 look upon mortifying objects till thou overlook- 
 est them. Forget not how assuefaction unto 
 anything minorates the passion from it ; how 
 constant objects lose their hints, and steal an 
 inadvertisement upon us. There is no excuse 
 to forget what everything prompts unto us. To 
 thoughtful observators, the whole world is a 
 phylactery ; and everything we see, an item of 
 the wisdom, power, or goodness of God. Hap- 
 py are they who verify their amulets, and make 
 their phylacteries speak in their lives and ac- 
 tions. To run on in despite of the revulsions 
 and pull-backs of such remoras, aggravates our 
 transgressions. When death's heads on our 
 hands have no influence upon our heads, and 
 
 * Don Sebastian de Covarrubias writ three centuries of moral 
 emblems, in Spanish. In the 88th of the second century, he sets 
 down two faces averse, and conjoined, Janus-like; the one a gal- 
 lant beautiful face, the other a death's-head face, with this motto 
 out of Ovid his Metamorphosis, 
 
 " Quid fuerim, quid simque, vide." 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 249 
 
 fleshless cadavers abate not the exorbitances of 
 the flesh ; when crucifixes upon men's hearts 
 suppress not their bad commotions, and His 
 image who was murdered for us withholds not 
 from blood and murder ; phylacteries prove but 
 formalities, and their despised hints sharpen our 
 condemnations. 
 
 XI. Look not for whales in the Euxine Sea, 
 or expect great matters where they are not to 
 be found. Seek not for profundity in shallow- 
 ness, or fertility in a wilderness. Place not the 
 expectation of great happiness here below, or 
 think to find heaven on earth ; wherein we 
 must be content with embryon felicities, and 
 fruitions of doubtful faces : for the circle of our 
 felicities makes but short arches. In every 
 clime we are in a periscian state ; * and, with 
 our light, our shadow and darkness walk about 
 us. Our contentments stand upon the tops of 
 pyramids, ready to fall off, and the insecurity 
 of their enjoyments abrupteth our tranquillities. 
 What we magnify is magnificent, but, like to 
 the Colossus, noble without, stuffed with rub- 
 bish and coarse metal within. Even the sun, 
 whose glorious outside we behold, may have 
 dark and smoky entrails. In vain we admire 
 
 * The Periscii are those who, living within the polar circle, 
 see the sun move round them, and consequently project their 
 shadows in all directions. 
 
250 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 the lustre of anything seen : that which is truly 
 glorious, is invisible. Paradise was but a part 
 of the earth, lost not only to our fruition but 
 our knowledge. And if, according to old dic- 
 tates, no man can be said to be happy before 
 death ; the happiness of this life goes for noth- 
 ing before it be over, and while we think our- 
 selves happy we do but usurp that name. Cer- 
 tainly, true beatitude groweth not on earth, nor 
 hath this world in it the expectations we have 
 of it. He swims in oil, and can hardly avoid 
 sinking, who hath such light foundations to sup- 
 port him : 't is therefore happy, that we have 
 two worlds to hold on. To enjoy true happi- 
 ness we must travel into a very far country, 
 and even out of ourselves ; for the pearl we 
 seek for is not to be found in the Indian, but in 
 the empyrean ocean. 
 Ecci.vii. 9. XII. Answer not the spur of fary, and be 
 not prodigal or prodigious in revenge. Make 
 See Vedius uot ouc in the Hlstoria horrihilis ; flay not thy 
 pun^H N ^^^'^^^i^t f*^^ ^ broken glass, nor pound him in 
 ix.23. a mortar who oflFendeth thee; supererogate not 
 Prov.xxTH. ^^^ ^^^ worst scusc, aud overdo not the neces- 
 22. sities of evil ; humour not the injustice of re- 
 
 venge. Be not stoically mistaken in the equal- 
 ity of sins, nor commutatively iniquous in the 
 valuation of transgressions ; but weigh them in 
 the scales of heaven, and by the weights of 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 251 
 
 righteous reason. Think that revenge too high 
 which is but level with the offence. Let thy 
 arrows of revenge fly short ; or be aimed like 
 those of Jonathan, to fall beside the mark. Too i ^am. xs. 
 
 20. 
 
 many there be to whom a dead enemy smells 
 well, and who find musk and amber in reveno-e. 
 The ferity of such minds holds no rule in re- 
 taliations ; requiring too often a head for a 
 tooth, and the supreme revenge for trespasses 
 which a nio^ht's rest should obliterate. But 
 patient meekness takes injuries like pills, not 
 chewing, but swallowing them down, laconically 
 suffering, and silently passing them over ; while 
 angered pride makes a noise, like Homerican Juv. Sat. 
 
 • xiii 112 
 
 Mars, at every scratch of offences. Since wo- 
 men do most delight in revenge, it may seem ^■■^*^- xiu. 
 but feminine manhood to be vindictive. If thou 
 must needs have thy revenge of thine enemy, 
 with a soft tongue break his bones, heap coals ^^'^^ 
 of fire on his head, forgive him and enjoy it. 
 To forgive our enemies is a charming way of 
 revenge, and a short Csesarean conquest, over- 
 coming without a blow ; laying our enemies at 
 our feet, under sorrow, shame, and repentance ; 
 leaving our foes our friends, and sohcitously 
 inclined to grateful retaliations. Thus to re- 
 turn upon our adversaries is a healing way of 
 revenge ; and to do good for evil a soft and 
 meltino; ultion, a method tauorht from heaven to 
 
 XXV. 
 
 15, 21, 22. 
 
252 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 keep all smooth on earth.* Common forcible 
 ways make not an end of evil, but leave hatred 
 and malice behind them. An enemy thus rec- 
 onciled is little to be trusted, as wanting the 
 foundation of love and charity, and but for a 
 time restrained by disadvantage or inability. 
 If thou hast not mercy for others, yet be not 
 cruel unto thyself. To ruminate upon evils, 
 to make critical notes upon injuries, and be too 
 acute in their apprehensions, is to add unto our 
 own tortures, to feather the arrows of our en- 
 emies, to lash ourselves with the scorpions of 
 our foes, and to resolve to sleep no more ; for 
 injuries long dreamt on, take away at last all 
 rest ; and he sleeps but like Regulus who busi- 
 eth his head about them.f 
 
 XIII. Amuse not thyself about the riddles 
 of future things. Study prophecies when they 
 are become histories, and past hovering in their 
 causes. Eye well things past and present, and 
 let conjectural sagacity suffice for things to come. 
 There is a sober latitude for prescience in con- 
 tingencies of discoverable tempers, whereby dis- 
 cerning heads see sometimes beyond their eyes, 
 
 * " Hath any wronged thee ? be bravely revenged ; sleight it, 
 and the Avork 's begun; forgive it, 'tis finisht: he is below liim- 
 selfe that is not above an injury." — Quarles's Enchir. ii. 86. 
 
 t Like Regulus. Dion Cassius relates that, when Eegulus fell 
 into the hands of the Carthaginians, he was kept shut up with an 
 Elephant, in order that his sleep might be disturbed. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 253 
 
 and wise men become prophetical. Leave 
 cloudy predictions to their periods, and let ap- 
 pointed seasons have the lot of their accom- 
 plishments. It is too early to study such proph- 
 ecies before they have been long made, before 
 some train of their causes have already taken 
 fire, laying open in part what lay obscure and 
 before buried unto us. For the voice of proph- 
 ecies is like that of whispering-places ; they who 
 are near, or at a little distance, hear nothing; 
 those at the farthest extremity will understand 
 all. But a retrograde cognition of times past, 
 and things which have already been, is more . 
 satisfactory than a suspended knowledge of what 
 is yet unexistent. And the greatest part of 
 time being already wrapt up in things behind 
 us, it is now somewhat late to bait after things 
 before us ; for fnturity still shortens, and time 
 present sucks in time to come. What is pro- 
 phetical in one age, proves historical in another, 
 and so must hold on unto the last of time ; 
 when there will be no room for prediction, when 
 Janus shall lose one face, and the long beard of 
 time shall look like those of David's servants, 2Sam.x.4. 
 shorn away upon one side ; and when, if the 
 expected Elias should appear, he might say 
 much of what is past, not much of what is to 
 come. 
 
 XIV. Live unto the dignity of thy nature, 
 
254 CHRISTIAN MORALS, 
 
 and leave it not disputable at last, whether 
 thou hast been a man ; or, smce thou art a com- 
 position of man and beast, how thou hast pre- 
 dominantly passed thy days, to state the denom- 
 ination. Unman not, therefore, thyself by a 
 bestial transformation, nor realize old fables. 
 Expose not thyself by four-footed manners unto 
 monstrous draughts, and caricatura representa- 
 tions. Think not after the old Pythagorean 
 conceit, what beast thou mayest be after death. 
 Be not under any brutal metempsychosis while 
 thou livest, and walkest about erectly under 
 the scheme of man. In thine own circumfer- 
 ence, as in that of the earth, let the rational 
 horizon be larger than the sensible, and the 
 circle of reason than of sense ; let the divine 
 part be upward, and the region of beast below ; 
 otherwise, it is but to live invertedly, and with 
 thy head unto the heels of thy antipodes. De- 
 sert not thy title to a divine particle and union 
 with invisibles. Let true knowledge and vir- 
 tue tell the lower world thou art a part of the 
 higher. Let thy thoughts be of things which 
 have not entered into the hearts of beasts ; think 
 of things long passed, and long to come : ac- 
 quaint thyself with the choragium of the stars, 
 and consider the vast expansion beyond them. 
 Let intellectual tubes give thee a glance of 
 things, which visive organs reach not. Have 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 255 
 
 a glimpse of incomprehensibles, and tliouglits 
 of things which thoughts but tenderly touch. 
 Lodge immaterials in thy head; ascend unto 
 invisibles ; fill thy spirit with spirituals, with 
 the mysteries of faith, the magnalities of relig- 
 ion, and thy life with the honour of God ; with- 
 out which, though giants in wealth and dignity, 
 we are but dwarfs and pigmies in humanity, 
 and may hold a pitiful rank in that triple di^ds- 
 ion of mankind into heroes, men, and beasts. 
 For though human souls are said to be equal, 
 yet is there no small inequality in their opera- 
 tions ; some maintain the allowable station of 
 men ; many are far below it ; and some have been 
 so divine as to approach the apogeum of their 
 natures, and to be in the confinium of spirits. 
 
 XV. Behold thyself by inward optics and 
 the crystalline of thy soul. Strange it is, that 
 in the most perfect sense there should be so 
 many fallacies, that we are fain to make a doc- 
 trine, and often to see by art. But the great- 
 est imperfection is in our inward sight, that is, 
 to be ghosts unto our own eyes ; and while we 
 are so sharp-sighted as to look through others, 
 to be invisible unto ourselves ; for the inward 
 eyes are more fallacious than the outward.* 
 
 * " Is it because the mind is like the eye 
 
 (Through which it gathers knowledge by degrees), 
 Whose rays reflect not, but spread outwardly ; 
 Not seeing itself when other things it sees? 
 
256 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 The vices we scoff at in others laugh at us 
 within ourselves. Avarice, pride, falsehood lie 
 undiscerned and blindly in us, even to the age 
 of blindness ; and, therefore, to see ourselves 
 interiorly, we are fain to borrow other men's 
 eyes ; wherein true friends are good informers, 
 and censurers no bad friends. Conscience only, 
 that can see without light, sits in the Areopa- 
 gy and dark tribunal of our hearts, surveying 
 our thoughts and condemning their obliquities. 
 Happy is that state of vision that can see with- 
 out light, though all should look as before the 
 creation, when there was not an eye to see, or 
 light to actuate a vision : wherein, notwithstand- 
 ing, obscurity is only imaginable respectively 
 unto eyes : for unto God there was none ; eter- 
 nal Light was ever ; created light was for the 
 creation, not himself; and as he saw before the 
 sun, may still also see without it. In the city 
 ReT. xxi. Qf ^^Q j^g^ Jerusalem there is neither sun nor 
 
 23. 
 
 xxii. 5. moon ; where glorified eyes must see by the 
 archetypal Sun, or the light of God, able to 
 illuminate intellectual eyes, and make unknown 
 visions. Intuitive perceptions in spiritual be- 
 
 " No, doubtless; for the mind can backward cast 
 Upon herself her understanding light ; 
 But she is so corrupt, and so defaced, 
 As her own image doth herself affright," 
 
 Sir John Davies. 
 Cf. Troilus and Cressida, iii. 3. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 257 
 
 ings may, perhaps, hold some analogy unto 
 vision ; but yet how they see us, or one another, 
 what eye, what light, or what perception is 
 required unto their intuition, is yet dark unto 
 our apprehension : and even how they see God, 
 or how unto our glorified eyes the beatifical cf- ^^ei. 
 vision will be celebrated, another world must 
 tell us, when perceptions will be new, and we 
 may hope to behold invisibles. 
 
 XYI. When all looks fair about, and thou 
 seest not a cloud so bio; as a hand to threaten ^ ^J^s^ 
 
 xviii. 44. 
 
 thee, forget not the wheel of things : think of 
 sullen vicissitudes, but beat not thy brains to 
 foreknow them. Be armed against such ob- 
 scurities, rather by submission than foreknowl- 
 edo;e. The knowleda;e of future evils mortifies 
 present felicities, and there is more content in 
 the uncertainty or ignorance of them. This 
 favour our Saviour vouchsafed unto Peter, when ^"^^ *^°^° 
 
 xxi. 18,19. 
 
 he foretold not his death in plain terms, and so 
 by an ambiguous and cloudy delivery damped 
 not the spirit of his disciples. But in the as- 
 sured foreknowledge of the deluge, Noah lived 
 many years under the affliction of a flood ; and 
 Jerusalem was taken unto Jeremiah before it 
 was besieo;ed. And therefore the wisdom of 
 astrologers, who speak of future things, hath 
 wisely softened the severity of their doctrines ; 
 and even in their sad predictions, while they 
 22 
 
258 CHRISTIAN MORALS, 
 
 tell us of inclination, not coaction, from the 
 stars, they kill us not with Stygian oaths and 
 merciless necessity, but leave us hope of evasion. 
 XVII. If thou hast the brow to endure the 
 name of traitor, perjured, or oppressor, yet cov- 
 er thy face when ingratitude is thrown at thee. 
 If that degenerous vice possess thee, hide thy- 
 self in the shadow of thy shame, and pollute 
 not noble society. Grateful ingenuities are con- 
 tent to be obliged within some compass of ret- 
 ribution ; and being depressed by the weight 
 of iterated favours, may so labour under their 
 inabilities of requital, as to abate the content 
 from kindnesses. But narrow, self-ended souls 
 make prescription of good offices, and, obliged 
 by often favours, think others still due unto 
 them : whereas, if they but once fail, they prove 
 so perversely ungrateful as to make nothing of 
 former courtesies, and to bury all that is past. 
 Such tempers pervert the generous course of 
 things ; for they discourage the inclinations of 
 noble minds, and make beneficency cool unto 
 acts of obligation, whereby the grateful world 
 should subsist, and have their consolation. Com- 
 mon gratitude must be kept alive by the addi- 
 tionary fuel of new courtesies : but generous 
 gratitudes, though but once well obliged, with- 
 out quickening repetitions or expectation of new 
 favours, have thankful minds forever ; for they 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 259 
 
 write not tlieir obligations in sandy, but marble 
 memories, which wear not out but with them- 
 selves. 
 
 XVIII. Think not silence the wisdom of 
 fools, but, if rightly timed, the honour of wise 
 men who have not the infirmity but the virtue 
 
 of taciturnity ; and speak not out of the abun- st. Matt 
 dance, but the well-weio-hed thouo;hts of their ^'' ' 
 hearts . Siich silence may be eloquence, and speak 
 thy worth above the power of words. Make 
 such a one thy friend, in whom princes may be 
 happy, and great counsels successful. Let him 
 have the key of thy heart, who hath the lock of 
 his own, which no temptation can open ; * where 
 thy secrets may lastingly lie, like the lamp in 
 Olybius his urn, alive, and light, but close and 
 invisible. 
 
 XIX. Let thy oaths be sacred, and promises 
 
 be made upon the altar of thy heart. Call not ^^<'- ^p- ^^ 
 
 T . -1 . Ill Fam. vii. 
 
 Jove to witness, with a stone m one hand, and 12. 
 a straw in another; and so make chaff and 
 stubble of thy vows. Worldly spirits, whose 
 interest is their belief, make cobwebs of obliga- 
 tions ; and, if they can find ways to elude the 
 urn of the Praetor, f will trust the thunderbolt 
 
 * " keep thy friend 
 
 Under thy own life's key." 
 
 All 's Well that Ends Well, i. 1. Cf. Ham. iii. 2. 
 t The vessel into which the ticket of condemnation or acquittal 
 was cast. Dr. Johnson. 
 
260 CHRISTIAN MORALS, 
 
 of Jupiter ; and, therefore, if tliey should as 
 Knoiies's deeply swear as Osman to Bethlem Gabor, yet 
 Turks, whether they would be bound by those chains, 
 p. 1383. g^j^(j j-^Q^ -Qj^d ways to cut such Gordian knots, 
 we could have no just assurance. But honest 
 men's words are Stygian oaths, and j^i'oniises 
 inviolable. These are not the men for whom 
 the fetters of law were first forged ; they needed 
 Coiendofi- not the solemnness of oaths ; by keeping then' 
 cS™^ faith they swear, and evacuate such confirma- 
 tions. 
 
 XX. Though the world be histrionical, and 
 most men live ironically, yet be thou what thou 
 singly art, and personate only thyself. Swim 
 smoothly in the stream of thy nature, and live 
 but one man. To single hearts doubling is dis- 
 cruciating: such tempers must sweat to dis- 
 semble, and prove but hypocritical hypocrites. 
 Simulation must be short : men do not easily 
 continue a counterfeiting life, or dissemble unto 
 death. He who counterfeiteth, acts a part ; 
 and is, as it were, out of himself: which, if 
 long, proves so irksome, that men are glad to 
 pull oflp their vizards, and resume themselves 
 again ; no practice being able to naturalize such 
 unnaturals, or make a man rest content not to 
 be himself. And therefore, since sincerity is 
 thy temper, let veracity be thy virtue, in words, 
 manners, and actions. To offer at iniquities, 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. ^ 261 
 
 which have so Httle foundations in thee, were to 
 be vicious up-hill, and strain for thy condem- 
 nation. Persons viciously inchned want no 
 wheels to make them actively vicious ; as hav- 
 ing the elater and spring of their own natures 
 to facilitate their iniquities. And therefore so 
 many who are sinistrous unto good actions, are 
 ambidexterous unto bad ; and Vulcans in virtu- 
 ous paths, Achilleses in vicious motions. 
 
 XXI. Rest not in the high-strained para- 
 doxes of old philosophy, supported by naked 
 reason and the reward of mortal felicity ; but 
 labour in the ethics of faith, built upon heavenly 
 assistance, and the happiness of both beings. 
 Understand the rules, but SAvear not unto the 
 doctrines of Zeno or Epicurus. Look beyond 
 Antoninus, and terminate not thy morals in 
 Seneca or Epictetus. Let not the twelve, but 
 the two tables be thy Law : let Pythagoras be 
 thy remembrancer, not thy textuary and final 
 instructor ; ancl learn the vanity of the world 
 rather from Solomon than Phocylides. Sleep 
 not in the dogmas of the Peripatus, Academy, 
 or Porticus. Be a morahst of the Mount,* 
 an Epictetus in the faith, and Christianize thy 
 notions. 
 
 XXII. In seventy or eighty years a man 
 
 * That is, Live according to the rules laid down in our Sav- 
 loui-'s Sermon on the Mount. St. Matt, v., vi., vii. 
 
262 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 may have a deep gust of the world, know what 
 it is, what it can afford, and what it is to have 
 been a man. Such a latitude of years may 
 hold a considerable corner in the general map 
 of time ; and a man may have a curt epitome of 
 the whole course thereof in the days of his own 
 life ; may clearly see he hath but acted over his 
 forefathers, what it was to live in ages past, and 
 what living will be in all asjes to come. 
 
 He is like to be the best judge of time who 
 hath lived to see about the sixtieth part thereof. 
 Persons of short times may know what it is to 
 live, but not the life of man, who, having little 
 behind them, are but Januses of one face, and 
 know not singularities enough to raise axioms 
 of this world : but such a compass of years will 
 show new examples of old things, parallelisms 
 of occurrences through the whole course of 
 time, and nothing be monstrous unto him, who 
 may in that time understand not only the va- 
 rieties of men, but the variation of himself, and 
 how many men he hath been in that extent of 
 time. 
 
 He may have a close apprehension what it 
 is to be forgotten, while he hath lived to find 
 none who could remember his father, or scarce 
 the friends of his youth ; and may sensibly see 
 with what a face in no lono; time oblivion will 
 look upon himself. His progeny may never be 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 263 
 
 his posterity ; lie may go out of the world less 
 related than he came into it ; and, considering 
 the frequent mortality in friends and relations, 
 in such a term of time, he may pass away divers 
 years in sorrow and black habits, and leave none 
 to mourn for himself; orbity may be his inher- 
 itance, and riches his repentance. 
 
 In such a thread of time, and long observa- 
 tion of men, he may acquire a physiognomi- 
 cal intuitive knowledge ; judge the interiors by 
 the outside, and raise conjectures at first sight ; 
 and knowing what men have been, what they 
 are, what children probably will be, may in 
 the present age behold a good part and the 
 temper of the next ; and since so many live 
 by the rules of constitution, and so few over- 
 come their temperamental inclinations, make no 
 improbable predictions. 
 
 Such a portion of time will afford a large 
 prospect backward, and authentic reflection 
 show how far he hath performed the great in- 
 tention of his being, in the honour of his Maker ; 
 whether he hath made good the principles of 
 his nature, and what he was made to be ; what 
 characteristic and special mark he hath left, 
 to be observable in his generation ; whether 
 he hath lived to purpose or in vain ; and what 
 he hath added, acted, or performed, that might 
 considerably speak him a man. 
 
264 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 Eccies. xii. In sucli an age, delights will be undeliglitful, 
 and pleasures grow stale unto him ; antiquated 
 theorems will revive, and Solomon's maxims 
 be demonstrations unto him ; hopes or presump- 
 tions be over, and despair grow up of any satis- 
 faction below. And having been long tossed 
 in the ocean of this world, he will by that time 
 feel the in-draught of another, unto which this 
 seems but preparatory and without it of no 
 high value. He will experimentally find the 
 emptiness of all things, and the nothing of 
 what is past ; and wisely grounding upon true 
 Christian expectations, finding so much past, 
 will wholly fix upon what is to come. He will 
 long for perpetuity, and live as though he made 
 haste to be happy. The last may prove the 
 prime part of his life, and those his best days 
 which he lived nearest heaven. 
 
 XXIII. Live happy in the Elysium of a 
 virtuously composed mind, and let intellectual 
 contents exceed the delights wherein mere pleas- 
 urists place their paradise. Bear not too slack 
 reins upon pleasure, nor let complexion or conta- 
 gion betray thee unto the exorbitancy of delight. 
 Make pleasure thy recreation or intermissive 
 relaxation, not thy Diana, life, and profession. 
 Voluptuousness is as insatiable as covetousness. 
 Tranquillity is better than jollity, and to appease 
 pain than to invent pleasure. Our hard en- 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 265 
 
 trance into tlie world, our miserable going out 
 of it, our sicknesses, disturbances, and sad ren- 
 counters in it, do clamorously tell us we came 
 not into the world to run a race of delight, 
 but to perform the sober acts and serious pur- 
 poses of man ; which to omit were foully to 
 miscarry in the advantage of humanity, to play 
 away an uniterable life, and to have lived in 
 vain. Forget not the capital end, and frustrate 
 not the opportunity of once living. Dream 
 not of any kind of metempsychosis or trans- 
 animation, but into thine own body, and that 
 after a long time ; and then also unto wail or 
 bhss, according to thy first and fundamental 
 life. Upon a curricle in this world depends a 
 long course of the next, and upon a narrow 
 scene here an endless expansion hereafter. In 
 vain some think to have an end of their beinofs 
 with their lives. Things cannot get out of their 
 natures, or be, or not be, in despite of their 
 constitutions. Rational existences in heaven 
 perish not at all, and but partially on earth: 
 that which is thus once, will in some way be 
 always : the first living human soul is still alive, 
 and all Adam hath found no period. 
 
 XXIV. Since the stars of heaven do differ ^ <^o^- ^^• 
 in glory; since it hath pleased the Almighty 
 hand to honour the north pole with lights above 
 the south ; since there are some stars so bright 
 
 41. 
 
266 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 that they can hardly be looked upon, some so 
 dim that they can scarcely be seen, and vast 
 numbers not to be seen at all even by artificial 
 eyes ; read thou the earth in heaven, and things 
 below from above. Look contentedly upon the 
 scattered difference of things, and expect not 
 equality in lustre, dignity, or perfection, in re- 
 gions or persons below ; where numerous num- 
 bers must be content to stand like lacteous or 
 nebulous stars, little taken notice of, or dim in 
 their generations. All which may be content- 
 edly allowable in the affairs and ends of this 
 world, and in suspension unto what will be in 
 the order of things hereafter, and the new sys- 
 tem of mankind which will be in the world to 
 
 St. Matt, come ; when the last may be the first, and the 
 first the last ; when Lazarus may sit above 
 
 St. Matt. Caesar, and the iust obscure on earth shall 
 
 xiii. 43. . . ^ . 
 
 shine like the sun in heaven ; when persona- 
 tions shall cease, and histrionism of happiness 
 be over ; when reality shall rule, and all shall 
 be as they shall be forever. 
 
 XXV. When the Stoic said that life would 
 not be accepted if it were offered unto such 
 as knew it,* he spoke too meanly of that state 
 of being which placeth us in the form of men. 
 It more depreciates the value of this life, that 
 men would not live it over again ; for although 
 
 * Vitam nemo acciperet, si dareiur scientibus. — Seneca. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 267 
 
 they would still live on, yet few or none can 
 endure to think of being twice the same men 
 upon earth, and some had rather never have 
 lived, than to tread over their days once more. 
 Cicero in a prosperous state had not the pa- DeSenec- 
 
 -.,„-.. . ,. . tute, xxiii. 
 
 tience to tnnik ot begmnmg m a cradle agam. 
 Job would not only curse the day of his nativity, Job m. 
 but also of his renascency, if he were to act 
 over his disasters and the miseries of the duns;- 
 hill. But the greatest underweening of this 
 life is to undervalue that unto which this is 
 but exordial, or a passage leading unto it. The 
 great advantage of this mean life is thereby to 
 stand m a capacity of a better ; for the colonies 
 of heaven must be drawn from earth, and the 
 sons of the first Adam are only heirs unto the 
 second. Thus Adam came into this world with 
 the power also of another ; not only to replen- 
 ish the earth, but the everlasting mansions of 
 heaven. Where we were when the foundations Jobxxxvm. 
 
 4-7. 
 
 of the earth were laid, when the morning stars 
 sancf together, and all the sons of God shouted 
 for joy. He must answer who asked it ; who 
 understands entities of preordination, and beings 
 yet unbeing ; who hath in his intellect the ideal 
 existences of things, and entities before their 
 extances. Though it looks but like an imagi- 
 nary kind of existency, to be before we are ; 
 yet since we are under the decree or prescience 
 
268 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 of a sure and omnipotent power, it may be' 
 cf. Ps somewhat more than a nonentity to be in that ; 
 cxxxix. mind, unto ^diich all things are present. 
 
 XXVI. If the end of the world shall have 
 the same foregoing signs as the period of em- 
 pires, states, and dominions in it, that is, cor- 
 ruption of manners, inhuman degenerations, and 
 deluge of iniquities; it may be doubted whether 
 that final time be so far off, of whose day and 
 hour there can be no prescience. But while 
 all men doubt, and none can determine how 
 long the world shall last, some may wonder 
 that it hath spun out so long and unto our days. 
 For if the Almighty had not determined a fixed 
 duration unto it, according to his mighty and 
 merciful designments in it ; if he had not said 
 Jobxxxriu. ^^j^^Q -^^ ^^ j^g jj^ ^^^^ ^ ^^^^^ ^^ .^^ hitherto 
 
 shalt thou go and no further; if we consider 
 the incessant and cutting provocations from the 
 earth; it is not without amazement, how his 
 patience hath permitted so long a continuance 
 unto it ; how he, who cursed the earth in the 
 first days of the first man, and drowned it m 
 the tenth generation after, should thus lastingly 
 contend with flesh, and yet defer the last flam'es. 
 For since he is sharply provoked every moment, 
 yet punisheth to pardon, and forgives to forgive 
 again; what patience could be content to act 
 over such vicissitudes, or accept of repentances 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 269 
 
 wliicli must have after-penitences, His goodness 
 can only tell us. And surely if the patience 
 of Heaven were not proportionable unto the 
 provocations from earth, there needed an in- 
 tercessor not only for the sins, but the duration 
 of this world, and to lead it up unto the present 
 computation. Without such a merciful longa- 
 nimity, the heavens would never be so ao;ed ^s. cii.25 
 
 . . . 26. 
 
 as to grow old like a garment. It were in vain 
 
 to infer from the doctrine of the sphere, that 
 
 the time might come, when Capella, a noble 
 
 northern star, would have its motion in the 
 
 equator ; that the northern zodiacal signs would 
 
 at leno;th be the southern, the southern the 
 
 northern, and Capricorn become our Cancer. 
 
 However therefore the wisdom of the Creator 
 
 hath ordered the duration of the Avorld, yet 
 
 since the end thereof brings the accomplishment 
 
 of our happiness, since some would be content 
 
 that it should have no end, since evil men and 
 
 spirits do fear it may be too short, since good 
 
 men hope it may not be too long ; the prayer 
 
 of the saints under the altar will be the sup- Kev.Ti. 
 
 9 10. 
 plication of the righteous world, that his mercy 
 
 would abridge their languishing expectation, and 
 
 hasten the accomplishment of their happy state 
 
 to come. 
 
 XXYII. Though good men are often taken is. ivii. 1. 
 
 away from the evil to come ; though some in 
 
270 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 evil days have been glad that they were old, 
 nor long to behold the iniquities of a wicked 
 world, or judgments threatened by them ; yet 
 is it no small satisfaction unto honest minds 
 to leave the world in virtuous well-tempered 
 times, under a prospect of good to come, and 
 continuation of worthy ways acceptable unto 
 God and man. Men who die in deplorable 
 days, which they regretfully behold, have not 
 their eyes closed with the like content ; while 
 they cannot avoid the thoughts of proceeding 
 or growing enormities, displeasing unto that 
 Spirit unto whom they are then going, whose 
 honour they desire in all times and throughout 
 all generations. If Lucifer could be freed from 
 his dismal place, he would little care though 
 the rest were left behind. Too many there 
 may be of Nero's mind, who, if their own turn 
 were served, would not regard what became 
 cf. Rei. of others ; and, when they die themselves, care 
 jj^ j^^^ ■ not if all perish. But good men's wishes ex- 
 tend beyond their lives, for the happiness of 
 times to come, and never to be known unto 
 them. And, therefore, while so many question 
 prayers for the dead, they charitably pray for 
 those who are not yet alive ; they are not so 
 enviously ambitious to go to heaven by them- 
 selves ; they cannot but humbly wish that the 
 xij*.32. little flock might be greater, the narrow gate 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS. 271 
 
 wider, and that, as many are called, so not a st.Matt. 
 few might be chosen. xxu. u. 
 
 XXVIII. That a greater number of angels 
 remamed in heaven than fell from it, the school- 
 men will tell us; that the number of blessed 
 souls will not come short of that vast number 
 of fallen spirits, we have the favourable calcu- 
 lation of others. What age or century hath 
 sent most souls unto heaven, He can tell who 
 vouchsafeth that honour unto them. Though 
 the number of the blessed must be complete 
 before the world can pass away ; yet since the 
 world itself seems in the wane, and we have 
 no such comfortable prognostics of latter times ; 
 since a greater part of time is spun than is to 
 come, and the blessed roll already much replen- 
 ished ; happy are those pieties, which solicitous- 
 ly look about, and hasten to make one of that 
 already much filled and abbreviated hst to come. 
 XXIX. Think not thy time short in this 
 world, since the world itself is not long. The 
 created world is but a small parenthesis in 
 eternity ; and a short interposition, for a time, 
 between such a state of duration as was before 
 it and may be after it. And if we should allow 
 of the old tradition, that the world should last 
 six thousand years, it could scarce have the 
 name of old, since the first man lived near a 
 sixth part thereof, and seven Methuselahs would ^«°- ''• 5. 
 
 97 
 
272 CHRISTIAN MORALS. 
 
 exceed its whole duration. However, to pal- 
 liate the shortness of our lives, and somewhat 
 to compensate our brief term in this world, it 
 is good to know as much as we can of it ; and 
 also, so far as possibly in us lieth, to hold such 
 a theory of times past, as though we had seen 
 the same. He who hath thus considered the 
 world, as also how therein things long past have 
 been answered by things present ; how matters in 
 one acre have been acted over in another ; and 
 Ecci. i. 9, ]^Q^y there is nothing new under the sun ; may 
 conceive himself in some manner to have lived 
 from the beginning, and to be as old as the 
 world ; and if he should still live on, it would 
 be but the same thing. 
 
 XXX. Lastly ; if length of days be thy per- 
 nor. Ep. i. tion, make it not thy expectation. Reckon not 
 upon long life : think every day the last, and 
 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 
 time to come present. Approximate thy latter 
 times by present apprehensions of them : be 
 like a neighbour unto the grave, and think 
 there is but little to come. And since there 
 is something of us that will still live on, join 
 both lives together, and hve in one but for the 
 other. He who thus ordereth the purposes of 
 
 iv. 13. 
 
CHRISTIAN MORALS, 
 
 273 
 
 this life, will neA^er be far from the next ; and 
 is in some manner already in it, by a happy con- 
 formity and close apprehension of it. And if, 
 as we have elsewhere declared, any have been ^° ^'^ ^y- 
 so happy as personally to understand Christian or um-^"^' 
 annihilation, ecstasy, exolution, transformation, ^"^• 
 the kiss of the spouse, and ingression into the di- 
 vine shadow, according to mystical theology, they 
 have already had a handsome anticipation 
 of heaven, the world is in a man- 
 ner over, and the earth 
 in ashes unto 
 them. 
 
 23 
 
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, ESQ, 
 
 1) HEN the funeral pyre was out, and 
 the last valediction over, men took 
 a lasting adieu of their interred 
 friends, little expecting the curi- 
 osity of future ages should comment upon their 
 ashes ; and having no old experience of the 
 duration of their relics, 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 scat- 
 tered ? The relics of many lie, like the ruins 
 of Pompey's,* in all parts of the earth ; and 
 these may seem to have wandered far, when 
 
 * " Pompeios juvenes Asia atque Europa, sed ipsum terra tegit 
 Libyse." 
 
 24 
 
278 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 they arrive at your hands, who, in a direct 
 
 and meridian travel, have but a few miles of 
 
 known earth between yourself and the pole.* 
 
 Brought That the bones of Theseus should be seen 
 
 cimon. again in Athens, was not beyond conjecture 
 
 Plutarch. ^^^ hopeful expectation ; but that these should 
 
 arise so opportunely to serve yourself, was a hit 
 
 of fate and honour beyond prediction. 
 
 We cannot but wish these urns might have 
 the effect of theatrical vessels, and great Hip- 
 podrome urns in Rome,t to resound the accla- 
 mations 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 out- 
 last bones long unborn, and noblest pile among 
 us. 
 
 We present not these as any strange sight or 
 spectacle unknown to your eyes, who have be- 
 held 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 
 
 * Little directly but sea between your house and Greenland. 
 
 t The great urns in the Hippodi-ome at Eome, conceived to re- 
 sound the voices of the people at their shows. 
 
 X Worthily possessed by that true gentleman, Sir Horatio 
 Townshend, my honoured friend. 
 
DEDICATION. 279 
 
 thoughts unto old things and consideration of 
 times before you, when even living men w^ere 
 antiquities j w^hen the hving might exceed the 
 dead, and to depart this vv^orld could not be 
 properly said to go unto the greater number j * 
 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 account makes but which 
 
 , 1 . . , J makes the 
 
 small noise m thousands. world so 
 
 We were hinted by the occasion, not catched niany years 
 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. 
 
 Besides, 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 
 Hfe and death, who daily behold examples of 
 mortality, and of all men least need artificial 
 mementos or coffins by our bed-side to mind 
 us of our graves. 
 
 * Abiit adplures. 
 
280 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 'T Is 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.* 
 
 'T is opportune to look back upon old times 
 and contemplate our forefathers. Great exam- 
 ples 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 up from the centos of 
 all ages, as all the beauties of Greece could 
 make but one handsome Venus. 
 In the time When the bones of King Arthur were dig- 
 the Second, gcd up, the old racc might think they beheld 
 Cambdea. therein some originals of themselves. Unto 
 these of our urns none here can pretend rela- 
 tion, and can only behold the relics 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 mer- 
 
 * "Wherein Mr. Dugdale hath excellently well endeavoured. 
 
DEDICATION. 281 
 
 cifully preserve their bones, and insult not over 
 their ashes. 
 
 In the offer of these antiquities, we drive not 
 at ancient famiHes, so long outlasted by them ; 
 we are far from erecting your worth upon the 
 pillars of your forefathers, whose merits you 
 illustrate. We honor your old virtues, con- 
 formable 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 gener- 
 ous honesty, I look upon you as a gem of the 
 old rock,* and must profess myself, even to urn 
 and ashes, 
 
 Your ever faithful friend, 
 
 and servant, 
 
 Thomas Browne. 
 
 Norwich, May i, 1658. 
 
 * Adamas de rupe veieri prcestantissimus. 
 
 24 A 
 
Hydriotaphia 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 N the deep discovery of the subter- 
 ranean 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, and regions towards the centre. Nature The rich 
 hath furnished one part of the earth, and man of peru. 
 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 re- 
 veals old things in heaven, makes new discover- 
 ies in earth, and even earth itself a discovery. 
 That great antiquity, America, lay buried for a 
 thousand years ; and a large part of the earth 
 is still in the urn unto us. 
 
 Though if Adam were made out of an ex- 
 
Sit tibi 
 terra levis. 
 
 284 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 tract 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 
 hea^-y 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 intennent, or so desper- 
 ately to place their relics as to he beyond dis- 
 covery and in no way to be seen again ; wliich 
 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 
 hvmg creation, fishes not wholly escaping, ex- 
 cept the salt ocean were handsomely contem- 
 pered by a mixture of the fresh element. 
 
 Many have taken voluminous pains to deter- 
 mine the state of the soul upon disunion ; but 
 men have been most fantastical in the singu- 
 lar contrivances of their corporal dissolution ; 
 whilst the soberest nations have rested in two 
 ways, of simple inhumation and bui-ning. 
 
 That carnal interment or burying was of the 
 elder date, the old examples of Abraham and 
 the patriarchs are sufficient to illustrate, and 
 
URN-BURIAL. 285 
 
 were without competition, if it could be made 
 out that Adam was buried near Damascus, or 
 Mount Calvary, accorchng 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 be- 
 tween Satan and the Archangel about discover- 
 ing 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 Aix'he- 
 morus, contemporary unto Jair, the eighth judge 
 of Israel ; confirmable also among the Trojans 
 from the funeral p^TC of Hector, burnt before 
 the gates of Troy, and the burning of Pen- 
 thesilea, the Amazonian queen, and long con- 
 tinuance of that practice in the inward coun- 
 tries of Asia ; while as low as the reign of 
 Julian, we find that the king of Chionia burnt Gumbrates, 
 the body of his son, and mterred the ashes in chionia, a 
 a silver urn. ^^'^^^'-^ 
 
 near Persia. 
 
 The same practice extended also far west, 
 
 and, besides Heruhans, Getes, and Thracians, 
 
 was in use with most of the Celtae, Sarmatians, 
 
 Germans, Gauls, Danes, Swedes, Norwegians, 
 25 
 
286 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 not to omit some use thereof among Cartha- 
 ginians and Americans ; of greater antiquity 
 among the Romans than most opinion, or Phny 
 seems to allow. For (besides the old table 
 laws 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 buried, ac- 
 cording to the description of Ovid.f 
 
 Cornelius Sylla was not the first whose body 
 was burned in Rome, but of the Cornelian 
 family, which being indifferently, not frequent- 
 ly, used before, from that time spread, and be- 
 came the prevalent practice ; not totally pur- 
 sued in the highest run of cremation ; for when 
 even crows were fonerally burnt, Poppasa, the 
 Avife 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 ori- 
 ginal of all things, thought it most equal to 
 submit unto the principle of putrefaction, and 
 
 * 12 Tab. Pars i. de jure sacro. " Hominem mortmim in urbe 
 lie sepelito, neve urito." (Tom. 2.) " Kogum ascia ne polito." 
 (Tom. 4.) 
 
 t " Ultima prolate subdita flamma rogo." 
 
URN-BURIAL. 287 
 
 conclude in a moist relentment. Others con- 
 ceived 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 Avaft them toward that element, whereby 
 they also declined a visible degeneration into 
 worms, and left a lasting parcel of their com- 
 position. 
 
 Some apprehended a purifying vu'tue in fire, 
 refining the grosser commixture, and firing out 
 the ethereal 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, pretendmg no 
 natural grounds, politicly declmed 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, enter- 
 tained after in the civil wars and revengefiil 
 contentions of Rome. 
 
 But as many nations embraced, and many 
 left it inchfierent, so others too much afiected 
 or strictly declined this practice. The Indian 
 Brachmans seemed too great friends unto fire, 
 who burnt themselves alive, and thought it the 
 
288 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 noblest way to end tlieir 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." 
 
 But the Chaldeans, the great idolaters of 
 fire, abhorred the burning of their carcasses, as 
 a pollution of that deity. The Persian Magi 
 declined it upon the like scruple, and, being 
 only solicitous about their bones, exposed their 
 fiesh to the prey of birds and dogs. And the 
 Parsees now in India, which expose their bod- 
 ies 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 wheth- 
 er 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 embalm- 
 ments, depositure in dry earths, or handsome 
 enclosure 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 Pytha- 
 gorical sect first waved the fiery solution. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 289 
 
 The Scythians, who swore by wmd and. sword, 
 that is, by Hfe and death, were so far from burn- 
 ing their bodies, that they dechned all inter- 
 ment, 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 extinguish- 
 able by that element; and therefore the poet 
 emphatically implieth the total destruction in 
 this kind of death,* which happened to Ajax 
 Oileus. 
 
 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, wdiile they plant a pine-tree by their 
 grave, and burn great numbers of printed 
 draughts of slaves and horses over it, civilly 
 content with then' companies in effigy, which 
 barbarous nations exact unto reality. 
 
 Christians abhorred this way of obsequies, 
 
 * Which Magius reads e|a7roX<BXe. 
 
290 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 and though they sticked not to give their bod- 
 ies to be burnt in their Hves, 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, conformable unto the prac- 
 tice of the patriarchs, the interment of our Sav- 
 iour, of Peter, Paul, and the ancient martyrs ; 
 and so far at last declining promiscuous inter- 
 ment with Pagans, that some have suffered ec- 
 clesiastical censures* for making no scruple 
 thereof. 
 
 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 ad- 
 mitted this practice. For the men of Jabesh 
 burnt the body of Saul ; and, by no prohibited 
 practice, to avoid contagion or pollution in time 
 Amosvi.io. of pcstilencc, burnt the bodies of their friends. 
 And when they burnt not their dead bodies, 
 yet sometimes used great burnings near and 
 about them, deducible from the expressions con- 
 cerning Jehoram, Zedechiah, and the sumptu- 
 ous pyre of Asia; and were so little averse 
 
 * Martialis, the Bishop. Cypriau. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 291 
 
 from Pagan burning, that the Jew, lamenting 
 the death of Caesar, then' friend and revenger 
 on Pompey, frequented the place where his 
 body was burnt, for many nights together. And Sueton. in 
 as they raised noble monuments and mauso- cjes. 
 leums for their own nation,* so they were not 
 scrupulous in erecting some for others, accord- 
 ing to the practice of Daniel, who left that last- 
 ing sepulchral pile in Ecbatana for the Median 
 and Persian kings. f 
 
 But even in times of subjection and hottest 
 use they conformed not unto the Roman prac- 
 tice of burning ; whereby the prophecy was se- 
 cured concerning the body of Christ, that it 
 should not see corruption, or a bone should not 
 be broken ; which we believe was also provi- 
 dentially prevented, from the soldier's spear 
 and nails that past by the little bones both in 
 his hands and feet ; not of ordinary contrivance, 
 that it should not corrupt on the cross, accord- 
 ing to the laws of Roman crucifixion, or a hair 
 of his head perish, though observable in Jewish 
 customs to cut the hairs of malefactors. 
 
 Nor in their long cohabitation with Egyp- 
 tians crept into a custom of their exact embalm- 
 
 * As that magnificent sepulchral monument erected by Simon. 
 1 Mace. xiii. 27. 
 
 t Karao-KeiiacrfjLa 'iiavfiaalcos 7r€7roir][X€vov, whereof a Jewish 
 priest had always the custody unto Josephus's days. Jos. b. 10, 
 Antiq. 
 
292 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 ing, wlierein 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 a 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 cere- 
 monies agreeable unto Greek and Roman ob- 
 sequies. 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 con- 
 clude 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 valedic- 
 tion used by other nations, we hold but a wa- 
 vering conjecture. 
 
 Civilians make sepulture but of the law of 
 nations ; others do naturally found it and dis- 
 cover it also in animals. They that are so 
 thick-skinned as still to credit the story of the 
 
 * " Absalom, Absalom, Absalom! " 2 Sam. xviii. 33. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 
 
 293 
 
 phoenix, may say something for animal burning. 
 More serious conjectures find some examples 
 of sepulture in elephants, cranes, the sepul- 
 chral cells of pismires, and practice of bees ; 
 which civil society carrieth out their dead, and 
 hath exequies, if not interments. 
 
 26 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 ^^^^^HE solemnities, ceremonies, rites of 
 Itig^Il^aul i}iq[y cremation or interment, so 
 solemnly delivered by authors, we 
 i 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, not far from one another ; not 
 all strictly of one figure, but most answering 
 these described ; some containing two pounds 
 of bones, distinguishable in skulls, ribs, jaws, 
 thigh-bones, and teeth, with firesh impressions 
 of their combustion ; besides the extraneous 
 substances, like pieces of small boxes, or combs, 
 handsomely wrought, handles of small brass 
 
URN-BURIAL. 295 
 
 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 incin- 
 erated substances, wliich begat conjecture that 
 tliis 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 arse 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 Brannodunum ; 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 neigh- 
 bour 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 
 w4th such strict particulars of these parts, be- 
 fore the new institution of Constantine, and 
 military charge of the Comit of the Saxon shore, 
 and that about the Saxon invasions, the Dal- 
 
296 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 matian horsemen were in the garrison of Bran- 
 caster ; 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 over- 
 throw was given unto the Iceni, by the Roman 
 lieutenant Ostorius. Not long after, the coun- 
 try was so molested, that, in hope of a better 
 state, Prasutagus bequeathed his kingdom un- 
 to Nero and his daughters; and Boadicea, his 
 queen, fought the last decisive battle with Paul- 
 linus. After which time and conquest of Agri- 
 cola, 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 seat- 
 ed, 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, accord- 
 ing to the original etymology, this comitry will 
 challenge the emphatical appellation, as most 
 properly making the elbow or iken of Icenia. 
 
 That Britain was notably populous, is unde- 
 niable, from that expression of Caesar.* That 
 
 * " Hominum infinita multitudo est, creberrimaque ^dificia 
 fere Gallicis cousimilia." — Gees, de Bello Gal., 1. 5. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 297 
 
 tlie 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, rampires, coins, 
 and urns, do testify their possessions. Some 
 urns have been found at Castor, some also about 
 Southcreek, and, not many years past, no less 
 than ten in a field at Buxton, not near any re- 
 corded garrison. Nor is it strange to find Ro- 
 man coins of copper and silver among us, of 
 Vespasian, Trajan, Adrian, Commodus, Anto- 
 ninus, Severus, &c. ; but the greater number of 
 Diocletian, Constantine, Constans, Valens, with 
 many of Victorinus Posthumius, Tetricus, and 
 the thirty tyrants in the reign of Gallienus; 
 and some as hio;h as Adrlanus 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 dis- 
 covery is made at the two Casters, by Norwich 
 and Yarmouth, at Burghcastle and Brancaster. 
 
 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 these inscriptions, Ic, Duro, jP., 
 27 
 
298 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 whether implying Iceni, Durotriges, Tascia or 
 Trinobantes, we leave to higher conjecture. 
 Vulgar chronology will have Norwich castle as 
 old as Julius Caesar ; but his distance from 
 these parts, and its Gothic 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 si- 
 lent. Considerable it was in the Danish erup- 
 tions, 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 coun- 
 tries of their conquests seems of hard resolu- 
 tion, except we consider how they buried them 
 under ground, Avhen, 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 
 Plutarch, other uses ; wherein the Spartans were singu- 
 Lycurgus. ^^^» wlio, to make their copper money useless, 
 contemj)ered it with vinegar. That the Britons 
 left any, some wonder, since their money was 
 
URN-BURIAL. 299 
 
 iron and iron rings before Caesar; and those 
 of after stamp by permission, and but small in 
 bulk and bigness. That so few of the Saxons 
 remain, neither need any wonder, because, over- 
 come by succeeding conquerors upon the place, 
 their coins by degrees passed into other stamps, 
 and the marks of after ao;es. 
 
 Than the time of these urns deposited, or 
 precise antiquity of these relics, nothing is 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, it is not likely they were 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 Csesar, Claudius, Britannicus, 
 Vespasian, Titus, Adrian, Severus, Commo- 
 dus, Geta, and Caracalla. ^ 
 
 A great obscurity herein, because no medal 
 or emperor's coin enclosed, which might denote 
 
300 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 the date of tlieir interments ; — observable in 
 stowes many urns, and found in those of Spittle- 
 London, fields, by London ; which contained the coins 
 of Claudius, Vespasian, Commodus, Antoninus, 
 attended with lacrymatories, lamps, bottles of 
 liquor, and other appui'tenances 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 prac- 
 tice. Macrobius affirmeth it was disused in 
 his days ; but most agree, though without au- 
 thentic record, that it ceased with the Anto- 
 nini, — most safely to be understood after the 
 reign of those emperors who assumed the name 
 of Antoninus, extending unto Heliogabalus ; — 
 not strictly after Marcus ; for about fifty years 
 later we find the magnificent burning; and con- 
 secration of Severus ; and if we so fix this pe- 
 riod of 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 Tertul- 
 lian, in the days of Minucius, it was obviously 
 objected upon Christians, that they condemned 
 the practice of burning.* And we find a pas- 
 
 * " Execrantur rogos, et damnant ignium sepulturam." 
 
URN-BURIAL. 301 
 
 sage In Sidonius, which asserteth that practice 
 in France unto a lower account ; and perhaps 
 not fi-illy disused till Christianity was fully es- 
 tablished, which gave the final extinction to 
 these sepulchral bonfires. 
 
 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 Abra- 
 ham,* 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 women ; confirmable also fi'om things con- 
 tained in them. In most were found sub- 
 stances resembling combs, plates like boxes, 
 fastened with iron pins, and handsomely over- 
 wrought like the necks or brido;es of musical 
 instruments, long brass plates overwrought like 
 the handles of neat implements, brazen nip- 
 pers to pull away hair, and in one a kind of 
 opal yet maintaining a bluish color. 
 
 NoAV that they accustomed to burn or bury 
 with them things wherein they excelled, de- 
 lighted, or which were dear unto them, either 
 as farewells unto all pleasure, or vain appre- 
 
 * Gen. xxiii. In the cave of a field called Hebron, in the land 
 of Canaan. 
 
302 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 hension that they might use them in the other 
 world, is testified by all antiquity; — observa- 
 ble 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 con- 
 tents 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 agate, a grasshopper, an elephant of 
 amber, a crystal ball, three glasses, two spoons, 
 and six nuts of crystal. And beyond the con- 
 tent of urns, in the monument of Childeric the 
 First, and fourth king from Pharamond, casu- 
 ally 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 con- 
 jecture of many, and Septuagint expression, 
 some trace thereof may be found even with 
 the ancient Hebrews, not only from the sepul- 
 chral 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, 
 
URN-BURIAL. 303 
 
 and the custom of burning with many other 
 nations, might somewhat doubt whether all urns 
 found among us were properly Roman relics, 
 or some not belonging unto our British, Saxon, 
 or Danish forefathers. 
 
 Of the form of burial amono; the ancient 
 Britons, the large discourses of Caesar, Taci- 
 tus, and Strabo are silent. For the discovery 
 whereof, with other particulars, we much de- 
 plore the loss of that letter which Cicero ex- 
 pected or received fi'om his brother Quintus, 
 as a resolution of British customs ; or the ac- 
 count which might have been made by Scribo- 
 nius Largus, the physician accompanying the 
 Emperor Claudius, who might have also dis- 
 covered 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 
 Polydoryis, as also by Amandus Zierexensis in 
 Historia, and Pineda in his Universa Historia 
 (Spanish). That they held that practice in 
 Gallia, Caesar 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 
 
304 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 least such as were after civilized unto the Ro- 
 man life and manners, conformed not unto this 
 practice, we have no historical assertion or de- 
 nial. 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 con- 
 formed also unto their religious rites and cus- 
 toms in burials, seems no improbable conjec- 
 ture. 
 
 That burning the dead was used in Sarmatia 
 is affirmed by Gaguinus ; that the Sueons and 
 Gothlanders 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 it was of ancient practice ; the Germans 
 using it, from whom they were descended. And 
 even in Jutland and Sleswick in Anglia Cym- 
 brica, 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 deriviifg 
 it from Unguinus, some from Frotho the Great, 
 
URN-BURIAL. 305 
 
 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 a 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 strong-holds were built 
 by them or against them, and great numbers 
 of names and families still derived from them. 
 But since this custom was probably disused be- 
 fore theu' invasion or conquest, and the Romans 
 confessedly practised the same since their pos- 
 session of this island, the most assured account 
 will fall upon the Romans, or Britons Roman- 
 ized. 
 
 . However, certain it is that urns, conceived 
 of no Roman original, are often digged up both 
 28 
 
306 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 in Norway and Denmark, handsomely described 
 and graphically represented by the learned phy- 
 sician 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 jews-harp. 
 
 Nor were they confused or careless in dis- 
 posing the noblest sort, while they placed large 
 stones in circle about the urns or bodies which 
 they interred, somewhat answerable unto the 
 monument of RoUrich stones in England, or 
 sepulchral monument probably erected by Rol- 
 lo, who after conquered Normandy, where it 
 is not improbable somewhat might be discov- 
 ered. Meanwhile, to what nation or person 
 belonged that large urn found at Ashbury, con- 
 taining mighty bones and a buckler ; what those 
 large urns found at Little Massingham ; or why 
 the Anglesea urns are placed with their mouths 
 downward, remains yet undiscovered. 
 
XXIU. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 LASTERED and wliited sepulchres 
 were anciently affected in cadaver- 
 ous and corruptive burials ; and the 
 rigid Jews were wont to garnish st.Matt. 
 the sepulchres of the righteous. Ulysses, in 
 Hecuba, cared not how meanly he hved, so he 
 might find a noble tomb after death. 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 contain- 
 ing 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 rep- 
 resented by Casalius, Bosio, and others, though 
 all found in Italy; while many have handles, 
 ears, and long necks, but most imitate a cir- 
 cular figure, in a spherical and round com- 
 
308 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 posure ; whether from any mystery, best dm^a- 
 tion, or capacity, were but a conjecture. But 
 the common form with necks was a proper 
 figure, making our last bed hke our first ; not 
 much unhke the urns of our nativity, while 
 Ps. cxxxix. "we lay in the nether part of the earth," 
 and inward vault of our microcosm. Many 
 urns are red, these but of a black color, some- 
 Avhat smooth, and dully sounding, which be- 
 gat some doubt whether they were burnt, or 
 only baken in oven or sun, according to the 
 ancient way, in many bricks, tiles, pots, and 
 testaceous works ; as the word " testa " is prop- 
 erly to be taken, when occuring without addi- 
 tion, 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 magnifi- 
 cence 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 statue of Hercules, made in the reign 
 of Tarquinius Priscus, was extant in Pliny's 
 days. And such as declined burning or fu- 
 neral 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 Seve- 
 
URN-BURIAL. 309 
 
 rus lay, after a serious view and sentence on 
 that which should contain him. Some of these 
 urns were thought to have been silvered over 
 from sparklings in several pots, with small tin- 
 sel parcels, uncertain whether from the earth 
 or the first mixture in them. 
 
 Among these urns we could obtain no good 
 account of their coverings ; only one seemed 
 arched over with some kind of brick- work. 
 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 earth- 
 en 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 dis- 
 posure 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, lachrymatories, or 
 tear-bottles attended these rural urns, either as 
 sacred unto the Manes, or passionate expres- 
 sions of their surviving friends ; while with 
 
 rich flames and hired tears they solemnized 
 29 
 
310 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 Cum their obsequies, and in tlie most lamented 
 posuire. monuments made one part of tlieir inscrip- 
 tions. Some find sepulchral vessels containing 
 liquors which time hath incrassated into jel- 
 lies. For besides these lachrymatories, nota- 
 ble lamps, with vessels of oils and aromatical 
 hquors, 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 com- 
 puted by years of annual magistrates, but by 
 great conjunctions and the fatal periods of king- 
 doms.* The draughts of consulary date were 
 but crude unto these, and Opimian f wine but 
 in the must unto them. 
 
 In sundry graves and sepulchres we meet 
 with rings, coins, and chalices. Ancient frugal- 
 ity was so severe, that they allowed no gold to 
 attend the corpses, but only that which served 
 to fasten their teeth. % Whetlier the opaline 
 stone in this urn 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 
 
 * About 500 years. Plato. 
 
 t " Vimim Opiminianum annoram centum." Petron. 
 
 X 12 Tabul. 1. xi. dejure sacro. "Neve aurum addito; ast quo 
 auro dentes vincti erunt, imo cum illo sepelire et urere, ne fraud! 
 esto." 
 
URN-BURIAL. 311 
 
 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 color, 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 St. Humbert, after a hundred and fifty 
 years, was looked upon as miraculous. Re- 
 markable 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 antiquity, if Josephus were not de- 
 ceived by some fragments of it in his days ; — 
 to omit the moor-logs and fir-trees, found under 
 ground in many parts of England ; the undated 
 ruins of winds, floods, and earthquakes ; and 
 which, in Flanders, still show from what quar- 
 ter they fell, as generally lying in a northeast 
 position. 
 
 But though we found not these pieces to be 
 wood, according to first apprehension, 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 
 
 * Plin. lib. xvi. " Inter ^(iKa acranri numerat Theophrastus." 
 
312 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 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 lastino; tests of old boundaries and land- 
 marks. 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 tend- 
 ing to corruption. 
 
 In the monument of King Childeric, the 
 iron relics 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 
 wantino- 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 savor 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 con- 
 ceive 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 Philopoemen was so laden with flowers 
 and ribbons, that it afforded no sight of itself. 
 The rigid Lycurgus allowed olive and myrtle. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 313 
 
 The Athenians might fairly except against the 
 practice of Democritus, to be buried up in hon- 
 ey ; as fearing to embezzle a great commodity 
 of their country, and the best of that kind 
 in Europe. But Plato seemed too frugally 
 politic, who allowed no larger monument than 
 would contain four heroic verses, and designed 
 the most barren ground for sepulture; though 
 we cannot commend the goodness of that se- 
 pulchral ground which was set at no higher rate 
 than the mean salary of Judas. Though the 
 earth had confounded the ashes of these ossua- 
 ries, yet the bones were so smartly burnt, that 
 some thin plates of brass were found half melt- 
 ed among them ; whereby we apprehend, they 
 were not of the meanest carcasses, perfunctorily 
 fired, as sometimes m mihtary, 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 ; whereas Nero seemed not so much 
 to fear his death, as that his head should be cut 
 off, and his body not burnt entire. 
 
 Some, finding many fi-agments of skulls in 
 these urns, suspected a mixture of bones. In 
 none we searched was there cause of such con- 
 
314 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 jecture, though sometimes they dedined not 
 that practice. The ashes of Domitian were 
 mingled with those of JuHa, of Achilles with 
 those of Patroclus. All urns contained not 
 single ashes. Without confused burnings, they 
 effectually compounded their bones, passionately 
 endeavourino; to continue their livino; unions ; 
 and when distance of death denied such con- 
 junctions, unsatisfied affections conceived some 
 satisfaction to be neighbours in the grave, to lie 
 urn by urn, and touch but in their names. 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,* 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.f Old considerations made few 
 
 * Sic erimus cuncti^ ^c. Ergo^ dum vivimus, vivamus. 
 
 t 'A-yxo"^" irai^eiv. 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 the spectators. Athenseus. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 315 
 
 mementos by skulls and bones upon their mon- 
 uments. In the Egyptian obelisks and liiero- 
 glyphical 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 antic pieces. Where 
 we find D. M. it is obvious to meet with sacri- ^^isMani- 
 
 bus, 
 
 ficing " pateras," and vessels of libation, upon old 
 sepulchral monuments. In the Jewish Hypo- 
 gaeum and subterranean cell at Rome was little 
 observable beside the variety of lamps, and fre- 
 quent draughts of the holy candlestick. In 
 authentic draughts of Antony 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 af- 
 fecting the portraits of Enoch, Lazainis, 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 habita- 
 tions in the land of moles and pismires. 
 
 Gentile 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 
 
316 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 or thrice in Laertius ; nor almost any life with- 
 out two or three deaths in Plutarch ; which 
 makes the tragical ends of noble persons more 
 favorably resented by compassionate readers, 
 who find some relief in the election of such 
 differences. 
 
 The certainty of death is attended w^th un- 
 certainties, in time, manner, places. The va- 
 riety 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 sepulture in Rome, but his empty 
 grave in Gallia. 
 Trajanus. Hc that lay \\\ a golden urn eminently above 
 the earth, was not like to find the quiet of these 
 bones. Many of these urns were broke by 
 a vulgar discoverer in hope of enclosed treas- 
 ure. The ashes of Marcellus were lost above 
 ground upon the like account. Where profit 
 hath prompted, no age hath wanted such min- 
 ers ; for which the most barbarous expilators 
 found the most civil rhetoric. 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 
 
 Dion 
 
URN-BURIAL. 317 
 
 and rich fabrics, not riches, adorn men's ashes. 
 The commerce of the hving is not to be trans- 
 ferred 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 dam- 
 nata " and aged cinders, were petty magic to 
 experiment. These crumbling relics and long- 
 fired particles superannuate such expectations. 
 Bones, hairs, nails, and teeth of the dead, were 
 the treasures of old sorcerers. In vain we re- 
 vive 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 Per- 
 sia.f 
 
 Plato's historian of the other world lies twelve 
 days uncorrupted, 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 exenteration, 
 were a 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 
 
 * The commission of the Gothic King Theodoric, for finding 
 out sepulchral treasure. Cassiodor. Var. hb. 4, 
 
 t " Britannia hodie eam attonite celebrat tantis ceremoniis, ut 
 dedlsse Persis videri possit." — Plin. lib. 30. 
 
318 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 to make a distinct collection, and overlooked 
 not Pyrrlius's 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 those urns, many stones 
 were found under ground,) as also by careful 
 separation of extraneous matter, composing and 
 raking up the burnt bones with forks, — observ- 
 able in that notable lump of Galvanus Martia- 
 nus» who had the sight of the " vas ustrinum," 
 or vessel wherein they burnt the dead, found 
 in the Esquiline field at Rome, might have af- 
 forded clearer solution. But their insatisfac- 
 tion herein begat that remarkable invention in 
 the funeral pyres of some princes, by incom- 
 bustible sheets made with a texture of asbes- 
 tos, incremable flax, or salamander's wool, 
 which preserved their bones and ashes incom- 
 mixed. 
 
 How the bulk of 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 
 
 * Which could not be burnt. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 319 
 
 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 ^^^ ^*'^^^' 
 
 according 
 
 quick and speediest ashes.* Who would ex- toLjserus. 
 pect 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, show how little 
 fuel sufficeth. Though the funeral pyre of Pa- 
 troclus took up a hundred feet,f a piece of an 
 old boat burnt Pompey ; and if the burthen of 
 Isaac were sufficient for a holocaust, a man may 
 carry his own pyre. 
 
 From animals are drawn good burning lights, 
 and good medicines against burning. Though 
 the seminal humor seems of a contrary nature 
 to fire, yet the body completed proves a com- 
 bustible lump, wherein fire finds flame even 
 from bones, and some fuel almost from all 
 parts ; though the metropolis of humidity $ 
 
 * Those of yoxmg persons not tall nor fat, according to Co- 
 lumbus. 
 
 t 'Efcaro/xTrfSoj' iv6a kcll ev6a. 
 X The brain. Hippocrates. 
 
320 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 seems least disposed unto it, which might ren- 
 der the skulls of these urns less burned than 
 other bones. But all flies or sinks before fire 
 almost in all bodies. When the common liga- 
 ment is dissolved, the attenuable parts ascend; 
 the rest subside in coal, calx, or ashes. 
 
 To burn the bones of the king of Edom for 
 lime (Amos ii. 1) seems no irrational ferity; 
 but to drink of the ashes of dead relations,* a 
 passionate prodigality. He that hath the ashes 
 of his friend, hath an everlasting treasure. 
 Where fire taketh leave, corruption slowly en- 
 ters. In bones well burnt, fire makes a wall 
 against itself, experimented in copels and tests 
 of metals, which consist of such ingredients. 
 What the sun compoundeth, fire analyzeth, not 
 transmuteth. That devouring agent leaves al- 
 most always a morsel for the earth, whereof all 
 things are but a colony, and which, if time per- 
 mits, the mother element will have in their 
 primitive mass again. 
 
 He that looks for urns and old sepulchral rel- 
 ics, must not seek them in the ruins of temples, 
 where no religion anciently placed them. These 
 were found in a field, according to ancient cus- 
 tom, 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 
 
 * As Artemisia of her husband, Mausokis. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 321 
 
 his possessions ; and also agreeable unto Koman 
 practice to bury by highways, whereby their 
 monuments were under eye, memorials of them- 
 selves and mementos of mortality unto living 
 passengers ; whom the epitaphs of great ones 
 were fain to beg to stay and look upon them, — ^^'^'J^^ 
 a lan^uacre, though sometimes used, not so 
 proper in church inscriptions. The sensible 
 rhetoric of the dead, to exemplarity of good 
 life, first admitted the bones of pious men and 
 martyrs within church walls, which, in suc- 
 ceeding ages, crept into promiscuous practice. 
 While Constantine was peculiarly favored to be 
 admitted unto the church porch ; and the first 
 thus buried in England was in the days of 
 Cuthred. 
 
 Christians dispute how their bodies should he 
 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 Mega- 
 rians and Phoenicians placed their heads to the 
 east ; the Athenians, some think, towards the 
 west, wdiich Christians still retain ; and Beda 
 will have it to be the posture of our Saviour. 
 That he was crucified with his face towards the 
 
322 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 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 dis- 
 tinction from longitude or dimension. 
 
 To be knaved out of our graves, to have 
 our skulls made drinking-bowls, and our bones 
 turned into pipes, to delight and sport our ene- 
 mies, are tragical abominations escaped in burn- 
 ing burials. 
 
 Urnal interments and burnt relics lie not in 
 fear of worms, or to be a 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, 't is 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 a hydropical body, ten years buried in a 
 church-yard, 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. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 323 
 
 After a battle with the Persians, the Roman 
 corpses decayed in a few days, while the Per- 
 sian 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 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 petrified bones, where- 
 of, though we take not in the pillar of Lot's 
 wife, or metamorphosis of Ortelius,f some may 
 be older than pyramids, in the petrified relics 
 of the general inundation. When Alexander 
 opened the tomb of Cyrus, the remaining bones 
 discovered his proportion, whereof urnal frag- 
 ments afford but a bad conjucture, and have 
 this disadvantage of grave-interments, that they 
 leave us ignorant of most personal discoveries. 
 
 * Of Thomas, Marquis of Dorset, whose body being buried, 
 1530, was, 1608, upon the cutting open of the cerecloth, found 
 perfect, and nothing corrupted, the flesh not hardened, but in 
 color, proportion, and softness like an ordinary corpse, newly to 
 be interred. See Burton's Description of Leicestershire. 
 
 t In his Map of Russia. 
 
324 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 For since bones afford not only rectitude and 
 stability, but figure unto the body, it is no im- 
 possible physiognomy to conjecture at fleshy 
 appendencies, and after what shape the mus- 
 cles 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 fleshly resemblance. 
 A critical view of bones makes a good dis- 
 tinction of sexes. Even color is not beyond 
 conjecture ; since it is hard to be deceived 
 in the distinction of negroes' skulls.f Dante's 
 characters are to be found in skulls as well as 
 faces. J 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. 
 
 * That part next the haunch-bones, 
 t For their extraordinary thickness. 
 
 X The poet Dante, in his view of Purgatory, found gluttons so 
 meagre and extenuated, that he conceited them to have been in 
 the siege of Jerusalem, and that it was easy to have discovered 
 Homo or Omo in their faces ; M being made by the two lines of 
 their cheeks, arching over the eyebrows to the nose, and their 
 sunk eyes making 0, which makes up Omo. 
 
 " Parean 1' occhiaje anella senza gemme: 
 Chi nel viso degli uomini legge omo, 
 Ben avria quivi conosciuto 1' emme." 
 
 Purg. xxiii. 31. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 325 
 
 Severe contemplators observing these lasting 
 relics, may think them good monuments of per- 
 sons past, little advantage to future beings ; 
 and, considermg that power which subdueth all 
 things unto itself, that can resume the scattered 
 atoms, or identify out of anything, conceive it su- 
 perfluous to expect a resurrection out of relics. 
 But the soul subsisting, other matter, clothed 
 with due accidents, may salve the individuahty. 
 Yet the saints, we observe, arose fi'om graves 
 and monuments about the holy city. Some 
 think the ancient patriarchs so earnestly de- 
 sired 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 learn- 
 ed conjecture, the bodies of men shall rise 
 where their greatest relics remain, many are 
 not like to err in the topography of their resur- 
 rection, 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. 
 
 30 
 
CHAPTER IV, 
 
 HRISTIANS have handsomely 
 glossed the deformity of death, hy 
 careful consideration of the hody, 
 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 priest, and deposed in a 
 clean field ; since they acknowledged their bod- 
 ies 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 
 
URN-BURIAL. 327 
 
 Gentiles held not the immortality of their bet- 
 ter 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.* 
 What can be more express than the expression 
 of Phocyllides ? f or who could expect from Lu- 
 cretius % a sentence of Ecclesiastes ? Before 
 Plato could speak, the soul had wings in Ho- 
 mer, which fell not, but flew out of the body 
 into the mansions of the dead; who also ob- 
 served 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 Her- 
 cules 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 immor- 
 tal part, was indifferent to be burnt or buried. 
 From such considerations Diogenes mio-ht con- 
 
 * " Similis reviviscendi promissa Democrito vanitas, qui non 
 revixit ipse. Quae, malum, ista dementia est, iterari vitam 
 morte ! " — Plin. lib. 7, c. 56. 
 
 t Kai raxa. S' 6k yal-qs iXni^ofiev is (fidos iXdelv 
 
 Aei'^av dTroi^ofxevcov, k. t. X. 
 X " Cedit enira retro de terra quod fuit ante 
 In terram," &c. 
 
328 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 demn sepulture, and, being satisfied that his soul 
 could not perish, grow careless of corporal in- 
 terment. The Stoics, who thought the souls of 
 wise men had their habitation about the moon, 
 mis:ht make slight account of subterraneous de- 
 position ; whereas the Pythagoreans and trans- 
 corporating philosophers, who were to be often 
 buried, held great care of their interment. And 
 the Platonics rejected not a due care of the 
 grave, though they put their ashes to unreason- 
 able expectations, in their tedious term of return 
 and long-set revolution. 
 
 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 ac- 
 count or rational of old rites, requires no rigid 
 reader. That they kindled the pyre aversely, 
 or turning their face from it, was a 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 towards heaven before they Idndled 
 the fire, as the place of their hopes or original, 
 were no improper ceremonies. Their last vale- 
 diction, thrice uttered by the attendants,* was 
 
 * " Vale, vale, vale ; nos te ordine, quo natura permittet, se- 
 quemur." 
 
URN-BURIAL. 329 
 
 also very solemn, and somewhat answered by 
 Cliristians, who thought it too little, if they 
 threw not the earth thrice upon the interred 
 body. That in strewing then' tombs, the Ro- 
 mans 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 tree 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 frirze. Whether the planting of yew in 
 churchyards holds not its original from ancient 
 funeral rites, or as an emblem of resurrection 
 from its perpetual verdure, may also admit con- 
 jecture. 
 
 They made use of music to excite or quiet 
 the affections of their friends, according to dif- 
 ferent harmonies. But the secret and symbol- 
 ical 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 
 31 
 
&c. 
 
 330 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 appeared, as apprehending their bodies too ten- 
 der a morsel for fire, and that their gristly- 
 bones would scarce leave separable relics 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 a hap- 
 py fraud against excessive lamentation, by a 
 common opinion that deep sorrows disturbed 
 their ghosts.* 
 
 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 like neither, who decline 
 the figure of rest, and make choice of an erect 
 posture. 
 
 That they carried them out of the world with 
 their feet forward, not inconsonant unto rea- 
 son, 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 
 
 * Tu manes ne Icede rneos. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 331 
 
 their heads forward, and lookmg toward their 
 houses. 
 
 They closed theu' 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 presum- 
 ably 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 sac- 
 rifice unto the winds for a despatch in this 
 office, was a low form of superstition. 
 
 The Archimime, or jester, attending the fu- 
 neral train, and imitating the speeches, gesture, 
 and manners of the deceased, was too light for 
 
332 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 such solemnities, contradicting their funeral ora- 
 tions 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 m considerable urns, and the present prac- 
 tice of burying medals in the noble foundations 
 of Europe, are laudable ways of historical dis- 
 coveries, in actions, persons, chronologies ; and 
 posterity will applaud them. 
 
 We examine not the old laws of sepulture, 
 exempting certain persons from burial or burn- 
 ing. But hereby we apprehend that these were 
 not the bones of persons planet-struck or burnt 
 with fire from heaven ; no relics of traitors to 
 their country, self-killers, or sacrilegious male- 
 factors, 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 prac- 
 tices, fictions, and conceptions, discordant or ob- 
 scure, of their state and future beings. Wheth- 
 er unto eight or ten bodies of men to add one 
 of a woman, as being more inflammable, and 
 unctuously constituted for the better pyral com- 
 bustion, were any rational practice ; or whether 
 the complaint of Periander's wife be tolerable, 
 
URN-BURIAL. 333 
 
 that, wanting her funeral hurning, she suffered 
 intolerable cold m hell, according to the con- 
 stitution 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 mas- 
 cuhne gender,* who, being bhnd 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 aspho- 
 dels f about the Elysian meadows ; why, since 
 there is no sacrifice acceptable, nor any propi- 
 tiation 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, prophesy, or 
 know the living, except they drink blood, where- 
 in is the life of man. And therefore the souls 
 of Penelope's paramours, conducted by Mer- 
 cury, chirped like bats, and those which fol- 
 lowed Hercules made a noise, but like a flock 
 of birds. 
 
 The departed spirits know things past and to 
 
 * ^fX"? ©T/iSaiou Tetpeo-tao o-KrJTTTpov excov. Homer. 
 f Lucian. 
 
334 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 come, yet are ignorant of things present. Aga- 
 memnon foretells what should happen unto Ulys- 
 ses, yet ignorantly inquires what is become of 
 his own son. The ghosts are afraid of swords 
 in Homer; yet Sibylla tells jEneas in Virgil, 
 the thin habit of spirits was beyond the force of 
 weapons. The spirits put off their malice with 
 their bodies, and Caesar and Pompey accord in 
 Latin hell ; yet Ajax, in Homer, endures not a 
 conference with Ulysses ; and Deiphobus ap- 
 pears all mangled in Yirgil's ghosts ; yet we 
 meet with perfect shadows among the wounded 
 ghosts of Homer. 
 
 Since Charon, in Lucian, applauds his condi- 
 tion among the dead, whether it be handsomely 
 said of Achilles, that hving contemner of death, 
 that he had rather be a ploughman's servant 
 than emperor of the dead ; how Hercules 's soul 
 is in hell and yet in heaven, and Juhus's soul in 
 a star, yet seen by ^neas 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 
 simulacrum of them both,) we leave our read- 
 ers to judge. 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 in- 
 fants in the womb, concerning the state of this. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 335 
 
 world, might handsomely illustrate our igno- 
 rance of the next, whereof methinks we yet 
 discourse in Plato's den, and are but embryon 
 philosophers. 
 
 Pythagoras escapes, in the fabulous hell of 
 Dante, among that swarm of philosophers, 
 wherein, whilst we meet with Plato and Soc- 
 rates, 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 with- 
 out encouragement of immortahty, and, making 
 nothing after death, yet made nothing of the 
 king of terrors. 
 
 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 ap- 
 plaud not the judgments of Machiavel, that 
 Christianity makes men cowards ; or that with 
 the confidence of but half dying, the despised 
 virtues of patience and humihty have abased 
 the spirits of men, which Pagan principles ex- 
 
336 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 alted ; but rather regulated the wildness of au- 
 dacities, in the attempts, grounds, and eternal 
 sequels of death, wherein men of the boldest 
 spirits are often prodigiously temerarious. Nor 
 can we extenuate the valor of ancient martyrs, 
 who contemned death in the uncomfortable 
 scene of their lives, and in their decrepit mar- 
 tyrdoms 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 natu- 
 rally 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 pro- 
 moteth 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, 
 
URN-BURIAL. 337 
 
 who, believing or knowing that truth, have last- 
 ingly denied it in their practice and conversa- 
 tion, — were a query too sad to insist on. 
 
 But all or most apprehensions rested in opin- 
 ions of some future being, which, ignorantly 
 or coldly believed, begat those perverted con- 
 ceptions, 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 those hopes Socrates warmed his doubt- 
 ful spirits against that cold potion ; and Cato, 
 before he durst give the fatal stroke, spent part 
 of the night in reading the immortality of Pla- 
 to, 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 farther state to 
 come, unto which this seems progressional, and 
 otherwise made in vain. Without this accom- 
 plishment, the natural expectation and desire 
 of such a state were but a fallacy in nature. 
 Unsatisfied considerators would quarrel at the 
 justice of their constitutions, and rest content 
 that Adam had fallen lower ; whereby, by 
 knowing no other original, and deeper igno- 
 32 
 
338 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 ranee of tliemselves, they might have enjoyed 
 the happiness of inferior creatures, who in tran- 
 quilhty possess their constitutions, as having 
 not the apprehension to deplore their own na- 
 tures ; and being framed below the circumfer- 
 ence of these hopes, or cognition of better being, 
 the wisdom of God hath necessitated their con- 
 tentment. But the superior ingredient and ob- 
 scured 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. 
 
 OW, since these dead bones have 
 already outlasted the livmg ones of 
 Methuselah, and, in a yard under 
 ground, and thin walls of clay, out- 
 worn 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 rehcs, or might 
 not gladly say, 
 
 " Sic ego componi versus in ossa velim." 
 
 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 honor them, 
 
340 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 whose souls they conceived most pure, which 
 were thus snatched from their bodies,* and to 
 retain a stronger propension unto them ; where- 
 as, they weariedly left a languishing corpse, and 
 with faint desires of reunion. If they fell by 
 long and aged decay, yet wrapped up in the 
 bundle of time, they fall into indistinction, and 
 make but one blot with infants. If we beo-in to 
 die when we live, and long life be but a prolon- 
 gation 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 Methu- 
 selah, were work for Archimedes. Common 
 counters sum up the life of Moses's man.f Our 
 days become considerable, like petty sums by 
 minute accumulations, where numerous frac- 
 tions make up but small round numbers, and 
 our days of a span long make not one little 
 finger. J 
 
 If the nearness of our last necessity brought 
 a nearer conformity unto it, there were a hap- 
 piness 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 
 
 * Bt?7 XtTTOKTo)!/ a-Q)/Aa ^v)(a\ KaOapoiTaraL. " Vi corpus 
 relinquentium anim» purissimse." — Oracula Chaldaica cutq 
 scholiis Pselli et Phethonis. 
 
 t In the psalm of Moses. 
 
 \ According to the ancient arithmetic of the hand, wherein 
 the little finger of the right hand, contracted,, signified a hundred. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 341 
 
 of death ; when even David grew poUtically cru- 
 el ; 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, and ^°®^'siit 
 
 J T J o ' as long as 
 
 time hath no wings unto it. But the most te- three. 
 dious being is that which can unwish itself, con- 
 tent to be nothing, or never to have been ; which 
 was beyond the malecontent 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 a hid- 
 den state of life, and as it were an abortion. 
 
 What song the Sirens sang, or what name 
 Achilles assumed when he hid himself among 
 women, though puzzling questions,* are not be- 
 yond all conjecture. What time the persons of 
 these ossuaries entered the famous nations of the 
 dead,f 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 an- 
 tiquarianism ; 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 
 
 * The puzzling questions of Tiberius unto grammarians. 
 Marcel. Donatus in Suet, 
 t KXtira e^j/ea vcKpciv' Horn. Job. 
 33 
 
342 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 names as tliey have done for tlieir relics, they 
 had not so grossly erred in the art of perpetua- 
 tion. But to subsist in bones, and be but py- 
 ramidally 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, anti- 
 dotes against pride, vainglory, and madding 
 vices. Pagan vainglories, which thought the 
 world might last forever, had encouragement 
 for ambition ; and finding no Atropos unto the 
 immortality of their names, were never damped 
 with the necessity of oblivion. Even old ambi- 
 tions had the advantage of ours, in the attempts 
 of their vainglories, who, acting early, and be- 
 fore the probable meridian of time, have by this 
 time found great accomplishment of their de- 
 signs, whereby the ancient heroes have already 
 outlasted their monuments and mechanical pres- 
 ervations. But in this latter scene of time we 
 cannot expect such mummies unto our memo- 
 Thatthe ries, whcu ambition may fear the prophecy of 
 list buTX Ehas, and Charles the Fifth can never expect to 
 thousand Y\YQ withiu two Methusckhs of Hector.* 
 
 And therefore restless inquietude fbr the diu- 
 turnity of our memories unto present considera- 
 
 * Hector's fame lasting above two lives of Methuselah, before 
 that famous prince, Charles, was extant. 
 
URN-BUntAL. W^ 
 
 tlons, seems a vanity almost out of date, and 
 superannuated piece of folly. We cannot hope 
 to live so lono; in our names as some liave done 
 in their persons. One face of Janus holds no 
 proportion unto the other. 'T is too late to be 
 ambitious. The great mutations of the world 
 are acted, or time may be too short for our de- 
 signs. To extend our memories by monuments, 
 whose death we daily pray for, and whose dura- 
 tion we cannot hope, without injury to our ex- 
 pectations, in the advent of the last day, were a 
 contradiction to our beliefs. We, whose gener- 
 ations are ordained in this setting part of time, 
 are providentially taken off from such imagina- 
 tions ; and being necessitated to eye the remain- 
 ing particle of futurity, are naturally constituted 
 unto thoughts of the next world, and cannot ex- 
 cusably decline the consideration of that dura- 
 tion, 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 must ©^ t^e 
 conclude and shut up all. There is no antidote of Xath!^ 
 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.* 
 
 * Old ones being taken up, and other bodies laid under them. 
 
344 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 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 an- 
 tiquaries, 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. 
 
 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, J disparaging his horosco- 
 pal inclination and judgment of himself. Who 
 cares to subsist like Hippocrates's patients, or 
 Achilles's horses in Homer, under naked nomi- 
 nations, without deserts and noble acts, which 
 are the balsam of our memories, the " entele- 
 chia " and soul of our subsistences ? Yet 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 ? 
 
 * Gruteri Inscriptiones Antiquse. 
 
 t Which men show in several countries, giving them what 
 names they please, and unto some the names of the old Egyptian 
 kings out of Herodotus. 
 
 X " Cuperem notum esse quod sim, non opto ut sciatur qualis 
 sim." — Card, in Vita propria. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 345 
 
 But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scatter- 
 eth her poppy, and deals with the memory of 
 men without distinction to merit of perpetuity. 
 Who can but pity the founder of the pyra- 
 mids ? Erostratus lives that burnt the Temple 
 of Diana ; he is almost lost that built it. Time 
 hath spared the epitaph of Adrian's horse, con- 
 founded 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. 
 Who knows whether the best of men be known, 
 or whether there be not more remarkable per- 
 sons forgot than any that stand remembered 
 in the known account of time? Without the 
 favor of the everlasting register, the first man 
 had been as unknown as the last, and Methu- 
 selah's long life had been his only chronicle. 
 
 Oblivion is not to be hired. The greater 
 part mvist 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 '^^^^^^ ti^e 
 ever since contam not one hvmg 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 equi- 
 nox? Every hour adds unto that current 
 
 arithmetic, which scarce stands one moment. 
 83* 
 
346 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 And since death must be the Luclna of life, and 
 even Pagans could doubt whether thus to live 
 were to die ; since our longest sun sets at right 
 declensions, and makes but winter arches, and 
 therefore it cannot be long before we lie down 
 in darkness, and have our Hght in ashes ; * 
 since the brother of death daily haunts us with 
 dying mementos, and time, that grows old it- 
 self, 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 remem- 
 ber 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 fa- 
 bles. Afflictions induce callosities ; miseries are 
 slippery, or fall like snow upon us, which, not- 
 withstanding, 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 cut- 
 ting remembrances, our sorrows are not kept 
 raw by the edge of repetitions. A great part 
 of antiquity contented their hopes of subsistency 
 
 * According to the custom of the Jews, who placed a lighted 
 wax-candle in a pot of ashes by the corpse. 
 
URN-BURIAL. 347 
 
 with a transmigration of their souls ; a good way 
 to continue then' 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 con- 
 tent 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, con- 
 triving their bodies in sweet consistencies to 
 attend the return of their souls. But all 
 was vanity, feeding the wind and folly.* The 
 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 be- 
 low 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 al- 
 ready varied the names of contrived constella- 
 
 * Omnia vanitas et pastio venti, vofir] dvefiov Koi ^oaKrjaLs^ 
 ut olim Aquila et Symmachus. 
 
348 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 tions. Nimrod is lost in Orion, and Osiris in 
 the Dog-star. While we look for incorruption 
 in the heavens, we find 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 Pha- 
 ethon's favor, would make clear conviction. 
 
 There is nothing strictly immortal but immor- 
 tality. Wliatever hath no beginning, may be 
 confident of no end ; 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. All others have a de- 
 pendent being, and within the reach of destruc- 
 tion. But the sufficiency of Christian immor- 
 tality frustrates all earthly glory, and the qual- 
 ity of either state after death makes a folly of 
 posthumous memory. God, who can only de- 
 stroy our souls, and hath assured our resurrec- 
 tion, 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 nativi- 
 ties and deaths with equal lustre, nor omitting 
 
URN-BURIAL. 349 
 
 ceremonies of bravery in the infamy of his 
 nature. 
 
 Life is a pure flame, and we Hve by an invis- 
 ible sun within us. A small fire sufficeth for 
 Hfe ; 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 flres 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! secured not the epitaph of 
 Gordianus. The man of God lives longer with- 
 out a tomb than any by one, invisibly interred 
 by angels, and adjudged to obscurity, though 
 not without some marks directing human dis- 
 covery. 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 
 
 * According to the epitaph of Rufus and Beronica in Gruterus : 
 
 *' Nee ex 
 Eorum bonis plus inventum est, quam 
 Quod sufficeret ad emendam pyram 
 Et picem quibus corpora cremai*entur, 
 Et praefica conducta et olla empta." 
 
 t Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Egyptian, and Arabic, defaced by 
 Licinius the Emperor. 
 
350 HYDRIOTAPHIA, 
 
 upon this stage of earth. K 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 sepul- 
 tures. 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 cover- 
 ings of mountains, not of monuments, and anni- 
 hilation shall be courted. 
 
 Wliile 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 more subtle, who had a river turned to 
 hide his bones at the bottom. Even Sylla, who 
 thought himself safe in his urn, could not pre- 
 vent 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 com- 
 motion among the dead, and are not touched 
 Isaiah xiv. ^y-^i^ ^j^^^ poetical taunt of Isaiah. 
 
 9 et seq. ^ 
 
 Pyramids, arches, obelisks, were but the ir- 
 regularities of vainglory and wild enormities of 
 
URN-BURIAL. 351 
 
 ancient magnanimity. But the most magnani- 
 mous resolution rests in the Christian rehgion, 
 which trampleth upon pride, and sits on the 
 neck of ambition, humbly pursuing that infal- 
 lible perpetuity, unto which all others must 
 diminish their diameters, and be poorly seen in 
 angles of contingency. Anguius 
 
 ~ o ./ ^ ^ continger 
 
 Pious spirits, who passed their days in rap- tia;,the 
 twees of faturity, made little more of this world 
 than the world that was before it, while they 
 lay obscure in the chaos of preordination and 
 night of their forebeings. And if any have 
 been so happy as truly to understand Christian 
 annihilation, ecstasis, exolution, liquefaction, 
 transformation, the kiss of the spouse, gustation 
 of God, and ingression into the divine shadow, 
 they have already had a 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 Elysium. But all this is nothing in the 
 metaphysics of true belief. To live indeed, 
 is to be again ourselves, which being not only 
 a hope but an evidence in noble believers, 'tis 
 all one to lie in St. Innocent's churchyard,* 
 
 * In Paris, where bodies soon consume. 
 
352 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 as in the sands of Egypt,* ready to be any- 
 thing, in the ecstasy of being ever, and as 
 content with six feet as the " moles " of Adri- 
 anus.f 
 
 " Tabesne cadavera solvat 
 An rogus, baud refert." ' 
 
 LUCAN. 
 
 * Beneath the pyramids- 
 
 t A stately mausoleum, or sepulchral pile, built by Adrianus 
 in Rome, where now standeth the castle of St. Angelo. 
 
FROM 
 
 The Garden of Cyrus. 
 
 34 
 
FROM 
 
 The Garden of Cyrus, 
 
 OR THE QUINCUNCIAL* LOZENGE. 
 
 ND therefore Providence hatli arched 
 and paved the great house of the 
 world, with colours of mediocrity, 
 that is, blue and green, above and 
 below the sight, moderately terminating the 
 acies of the eye. For most plants, though green 
 above ground, maintain their original white be- 
 low it, according to the candour of their seminal 
 pulp : and the rudimental leaves do first appear 
 in that colour, observable in seeds sprouting 
 in water upon their first foliation. Green seem- 
 ing to be the first supervenient, or above-ground 
 complexion of vegetables, separable in many 
 upon ligature or inhumation, as succory, endive, 
 artichokes, and which is also lost upon fading 
 in the autumn. 
 
 * Quincunx. An arrangement or disposition of things hj Jives 
 in a square, one being placed in the middle of the square. 
 
356 THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 And this Is also agreeable unto water itself, 
 tlie alimental vehicle of plants, which first alter- 
 eth into this colour. And, containing many 
 vegetable seminalities, revealeth their seeds by- 
 greenness ; and therefore soonest expected in 
 rain or standing water, not easily found in dis- 
 tilled or water strongly boiled ; wherein the 
 seeds are extinguished by fire and decoction, 
 and therefore last long and pure without such 
 alteration, affording neither uliginous coats, gnat- 
 worms, acari, hair-worms, like crude and com- 
 mon water; and therefore most fit for whole- 
 some beverage, and with malt makes ale and 
 beer without boiling. What large water-drink- 
 ers some plants are, the canary- tree and birches 
 in some northern countries, drenching the fields 
 about them, do sufficiently demonstrate. How 
 water itself is able to maintain the growth of 
 vegetables, and without extinction of then' gen- 
 erative or medical virtues, — besides the ex- 
 periment of Helmont's tree, we have found in 
 some Avhich have lived six years in glasses. 
 The seeds of scurvy-grass growing in water- 
 pots, have been fruitfiil in the land; and as- 
 sarum after a year's space, and once casting 
 its leaves in water, in the second leaves hath 
 handsomely performed its vomiting operation. 
 
 Nor are only dark and green colours, but 
 shades and shadows, contrived through the great 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 357 
 
 volume of nature, and trees ordained not only 
 to protect and shadow others, but by their 
 shades and shadowing parts to preserve and 
 cherish themselves: the whole radiation or 
 branchings shadowing the stock and the root; 
 — the leaves, the branches and fruit, too much 
 exposed to the winds and scorching sun. The 
 calicular leaves enclose the tender flowers, and 
 the flowers themselves lie wrapped about the 
 seeds, in their rudiment and first formations, 
 which being advanced, the flowers fall aAvay; 
 and are therefore contrived in variety of figures, 
 best satisfying the intention; handsomely ob- 
 servable in hooded and gaping flowers, and the 
 butterfly blooms of leguminous plants, the lower 
 leaf closely involving the rudimental cod, and 
 the alary or wingy divisions embracing or hang- 
 ino; over it. 
 
 But seeds themselves do he in perpetual 
 shades, either under the leaf, or shut up in 
 coverings; and such as he barest have their 
 husks, skins, and pulps about them, wherein 
 the nib and generative particle heth moist and 
 secured from the injury of air and sun. Dark- 
 ness and light hold interchangeable dominions, 
 and alternately rule the seminal state of things. 
 Light unto Pluto* is darkness unto Jupiter. 
 
 * "Lux orco, tenebras Jovi; tenebrse orco, lux Jovi." — Hip- 
 pocr. de Diseta. S. Hevelii Selenographia. 
 35 
 
358 THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 Legions of seminal ideas lie in tlieir second 
 chaos and Orcus of Hippocrates ; till, putting 
 on the habits of their forms, they show them- 
 selves upon the stage of the world, and open 
 dominion of Jove. They that held the stars 
 of heaven were but rays and flashing glimpses 
 of the empyreal light, through holes and per- 
 forations of the upper heaven, took off the natu- 
 ral shadows of stars ; while according to better 
 discovery the poor inhabitants of the moon have 
 but a polary life, and must pass half their days 
 in the shadow of that luminary. 
 
 Light that makes things seen, makes some 
 thino-s invisible : were it not for darkness and 
 the shadow of the earth, the noblest part of 
 the creation had remained unseen, and the stars 
 in heaven as invisible as on the fourth day, 
 when they were created above the horizon with 
 the sun, or there was not an eye to behold 
 them. The greatest mystery of religion is ex- 
 pressed by adumbration, and in the noblest part 
 of Jewish types we find the cherubims shad- 
 owing the mercy-seat. Life itself is but the 
 shadow of death, and souls departed but the 
 shadows of the living. All things fall under 
 tliis name. The sun itself is but the dark 
 simulacJirum^ and light but the shadow of God. 
 
 Lastly, it is no wonder that this quincuncial 
 order was first and is still affected as grateful 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 359 
 
 unto the eye. For all things are seen quin- 
 cuncially; for at the eye the pyramidal rays 
 from the object receive a decussation, and so 
 strike a second base upon the retina or hinder 
 coat, the proper organ of vision ; wherein the 
 pictures from objects are represented, answer- 
 able to the paper, or wall in the dark chamber ; 
 after the decussation of the rays at the hole of 
 the horny-coat, and their refraction upon the 
 crystalline humour, answering the foramen of 
 the window, and the convex or burnincr-slasses, 
 which refract the rays that enter it. And if 
 ancient anatomy would hold, a like disposure 
 there was of the optic or visual nerves in the 
 brain, wherein antiquity conceived a concur- 
 rence by decussation. And this not only ob- 
 servable in the laws of direct vision, but in 
 some part also verified in the reflected rays of 
 sight. For making the angle of incidence equal 
 to that of reflection, the visual ray returneth 
 quincuncially, and after the form of a Y; and 
 the line of reflection being continued unto the 
 place of vision, there ariseth a semi-decussation 
 which makes the object seen in a perpendicular 
 unto itself, and as far below the reflectent, as 
 it is from it above ; observable in the sun and 
 moon beheld in water. 
 
 And this is also the law of reflection in 
 moved bodies and sounds, which, though not 
 
330 THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 made by decussation, observe the rule of equal- 
 ity between incidence and reflection : whereby 
 whispering places are framed by elliptical arches 
 laid sidewise ; where the voice being delivered 
 at the focus of one extremity, observing an 
 equality unto the angle of incidence, it will re- 
 flect unto the focus of the other end, and so 
 escape the ears of the standers in the middle. 
 
 A like rule is observed in the reflection of 
 the vocal and sonorous line in echoes, which 
 cannot therefore be heard in all stations. But 
 happening in woody plantations, by waters, and 
 able to return some words, if reached by a 
 pleasant and well dividing voice, there may be 
 heard the softest notes in nature. 
 
 And this not only verified in the way of 
 sense, but in animal and intellectual receptions : 
 things entering upon the intellect by a pyramid 
 from without, and thence into the memory by 
 another from within, the common decussation 
 being in the understanding as is delivered by 
 Car BoTii- Bovillus. Whether the intellectual and fan- 
 
 1U3 de In- 
 
 teiiectu. tastical lines be not thus rightly disposed, but 
 magnified, diminished, distorted, and ill-placed, 
 in the mathematics of some brains, whereby 
 they have irregular apprehensions of things, 
 perverted notions, conceptions, and incurable 
 hallucinations, were no unpleasant speculation. 
 And if Egyptian philosophy may obtain, the 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 361 
 
 scale of influences was thus disposed, and the 
 genial spirits of both worlds do trace their way 
 in ascending and descending pyramids, mystic- 
 ally apprehended in the letter X, and the open 
 bill and straddling legs of a stork, which was 
 imitated by that character. 
 
 Of this figm-e Plato made choice to illustrate 
 the motion of the soul, both of the world and 
 man : while he delivereth that God divided the 
 whole conjunction lengthwise, according to the 
 figure of a Greek X, and then turning it about 
 reflected it into a circle ; by the circle imply- 
 ing the uniform motion of the first orb, and 
 by the right lines, the planetical and various 
 motions within it. And this also with aj)phca- 
 tion unto the soul of man, which hath a double 
 aspect, one right, whereby it beholdeth the body, 
 and objects without ; another circular and re- 
 ciprocal, whereby it beholdeth itself. The cir- 
 cle declaring the motion of the indivisible soul, 
 simple, according to the divinity of its nature, 
 and returning into itself; the right lines re- 
 specting the motion pertaining unto sense and 
 vegetation ; and the central decussation, the 
 wondrous connection of the several faculties 
 conjointly in one substance. And so conjoined 
 the unity and duality of the soul, and made 
 out the three substances so much considered by 
 him ; that is, the indivisible or divine, the divisi- 
 
362 THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 ble or corporeal, and that third, which was the 
 sy stasis or harmony of those two, in the mystical 
 decussation. 
 
 And if that were clearly made out which 
 Justin Martyr took for granted, this figure hath 
 had the honour to characterize and notify our 
 blessed Saviour, as he delivereth in that bor- 
 rowed expression from Plato, " Decussavit eum 
 in universo," the hint whereof he would have 
 Plato derive from the figure of the brazen ser- 
 pent, and to have mistaken the letter X for 
 T. Whereas it is not improbable he learned 
 these and other mystical expressions in his 
 learned observations of Egypt, where he might 
 obviously behold the mercurial characters, the 
 handed crosses, and other mysteries not thor- 
 oughly understood in the sacred letter X ; 
 which, being derivative from the stork, one 
 of the ten sacred animals, might be originally 
 Egyptian, and brought into Greece by Cadmus 
 of that country. 
 
 To enlarge this contemplation unto all the 
 mysteries and secrets accommodable unto this 
 number, were inexcusable Pythagorism, yet 
 cannot omit the ancient conceit of five surnamed 
 the number of justice ; * as justly dividing be- 
 tween the digits, and hanging in the centre of 
 nine, described by square numeration, which 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 363 
 
 angularly divided will make the decussated num- 
 ber ; and so agreeable unto the quincuncial or- 
 dination, and rows divided by equality, and just 
 decorum, in the whole com-plantation ; and 
 might be the original of that common game 
 among us, wherein the fifth place is sovereign, 
 and carrieth the chief intention ; — the ancients 
 wisely instructing youth, even in their recrea- 
 tions, unto virtue, that is, early to drive at the 
 middle point and central seat of justice. 
 
 Nor can we omit how agreeable unto this 
 number an handsome division is made in trees 
 and plants, since Plutarch, and the ancients have 
 named it the divisive number ; justly dividing 
 the entities of the world, many remarkable 
 things in it, and also comprehending the general 
 division of vegetables.* And he that considers 
 how most blossoms of trees, and greatest num- 
 ber of flowers, consist of five leaves, and therein 
 doth rest the settled rule of nature, — so that 
 in those wdiich exceed there is often found, or 
 easily made, a variety, — may readily discover 
 how nature rests in this number, which is in- 
 deed the first rest and pause of numeration in 
 the fingers, the natural organs thereof. Nor in 
 
 * Aevbpovj Gdnvos, ^pvyavov, Uoa, arbor, fruiex, suffrutex, 
 herba, and that fifth which comprehencleth the fungi and tuber a, 
 Avhether to be named " Ka-xf-ov or yvfxvov, comprehending also 
 conferva marina salsa, and sea-cords, of so many yards length. 
 
Plato de 
 Leg. 6. 
 
 364 THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 the division of the feet of perfect animals doth 
 nature exceed this account. And even in the 
 joints of feet, which in birds are most muhi- 
 pUed, surpasseth not this number ; so progres- 
 sionally making them out in many,* that from 
 five in the fore-claw she descendeth unto two 
 in the hindmost ; and so in four feet makes up 
 the number of joints in the five fingers or toes 
 of man. 
 
 Not to omit the quintuple section of a cone,f 
 of handsome practice in ornamental garden- 
 plots, and in same way discoverable in so many 
 works of nature, in the leaves, fi'uits, and seeds 
 of vegetables, and scales of some fishes ; so much 
 considerable in glasses, and the optic doctrine ; 
 wherein the learned may consider the crystalline 
 humour of the eye in the cuttle-fish and lohgo. 
 
 He that forgets not how antiquity named this 
 the conjugal or wedding number, and made it 
 the emblem of the most remarkable conjunction, 
 will conceive it duly appliable unto this hand- 
 some economy and vegetable combination : and 
 may hence apprehend the allegorical sense of 
 that obscure expression of Hesiod,f and afford 
 no improbable reason why Plato admitted his 
 nuptial guests by fives, in the kindred of the 
 married couple. 
 
 * As herons, bitterns, and long-clawed fowls. 
 
 t Elleipsis, parabola, hyperbole, circulus, iriangulum. 
 
 X Tre/XTTxas', id est, nuptias mulias. Ehodig. 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 365 
 
 And though a sharper mystery might be im- 
 phed in the number of the five wise and foohsh 
 virgins, which were to meet the bridegroom, 
 yet was the same agreeable unto the conjugal 
 number, which ancient numerists made out by 
 two and three, the first parity and imparity, 
 the active and passive digits, the material and 
 formal principles in generative societies. And 
 not discordant even from the customs of the 
 Romans, who admitted but five torches in their riutarch. 
 nuptial solemnities. Whether there were any j,^^^^ j^ * 
 mystery, or not, implied, the most generative 
 animals were created on this day, and had ac- 
 cordingly the largest benediction. And under 
 a quintuple consideration, wanton antiquity con- 
 sidered the circumstances of generation, wliile 
 by this number of five they naturally divided 
 the nectar of the fifth planet.* 
 
 The same number in the Hebrew mysteries 
 and cabalistical accounts was the character of 
 generation,! declared by the letter E, the fifth 
 in their alphabet, according to that cabalistical 
 dogma ; if Abram had not had this letter added 
 unto his name, he had remained fruitless, and 
 without the power of generation : not only be- 
 cause hereby the number of his name attained 
 
 * " oscula quae Venus 
 
 Quinta parte sui nectaris imbuit." 
 
 Hor. lib. i. od. 13. 
 t Archang. Dog. Cabal. 
 
SQQ THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 two hundred fortj-eiglit, the number of the 
 affirmative precepts, but because, as m created 
 natures there is a male and female, so in divine 
 and intelligent productions, the mother of life 
 and fountain of souls in cabalistical technology 
 is called BinaJi, whose seal and character was 
 E. So that, being sterile before, he received 
 the power of generation from that measure and 
 mansion in the archetype : and was made con- 
 formable unto Binah. And upon such involved 
 considerations, the ten of Sarai was exchanged 
 into five.* If any shall look upon this as a 
 stable number, and fitly appropriable unto trees, 
 as bodies of rest and station, he hath herein a 
 great foundation in nature, who observing much 
 variety in legs and motive organs of animals, 
 as two, four, six, eight, twelve, fourteen, and 
 more, hath passed over five and ten, and as- 
 signed them unto none, or very few, as the 
 Phalangium monstrosum Brasiliaiium QClusii et 
 Jac. de Laet. Cur. Poster. Americce Descrvpt.^, 
 if perfectly described. And for the stability 
 of this number, he shall not want the sphericity 
 of its nature, wdiich multiplied in itself will 
 return into its own denomination, and bring 
 up the rear of the account. Which is also one 
 of the numbers that makes up the mystical 
 name of God, which consisting of letters de- 
 
 * Jod into He. 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 367 
 
 noting all the spherical numbers, ten, five, and 
 six, emphatically sets forth the notion of Tris- 
 megistus, and that intelligible sphere, which is 
 the nature of God. 
 
 Many expressions by this number occur in 
 Holy Scripture, perhaps unjustly laden with 
 mystical expositions, and httle concerning our 
 order. That the Israelites were forbidden to 
 eat the fruit of their new-planted trees beforo 
 the fifth year, was very agreeable unto the nat- 
 ural rules of husbandry ; fruits being unwhole- 
 some and lash,* before the fourth or fifth year. 
 In the second day or feminine part of five, there 
 was added no approbation. For in the third or 
 masculine day, the same is twice repeated ; and 
 a double benediction enclosed both creations, 
 whereof the one, in some part, was but an 
 accomplishment of the other. That the tres- Lev. vi. 
 passer was to pay a fifth part above the head or 
 principal, makes no secret in this number, and 
 implied no more than one part above the prin- 
 cipal ; which being considered in four parts, the 
 additional forfeit must bear the name of a fifth. 
 The five golden mice had plainly their determi- 
 nation from the number of the princes. That 
 five should put to flight an hundred might have 
 nothing mystically implied ; considering a rank 
 
 * " lashJ] Soft and watery, but without flavour." — Forby's 
 Vocabulary of East Anglia. 
 
368 THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 of soldiers could scarce consist of a lesser num- 
 ber. Saint Paul had rather speak five words in 
 a known, than ten thousand in an unknown 
 tongue ; that is, as little as could well be 
 spoken ; a simple proposition consisting of three 
 words, and a complexed one not ordinarily 
 short of five. 
 
 More considerables there are in this mystical 
 account, which we must not insist on. And 
 therefore, wdiy the radical letters in the Penta- 
 teuch should equal the number of the soldiery 
 of the tribes ? Why our Saviour in the wilder- 
 ness fed five thousand persons with five barley 
 loaves ; and again, but four thousand with no 
 less than seven of wheat ? Why Joseph de- 
 signed five changes of raiment unto Benjamin ; 
 and David took just five pebbles* out of the 
 brook against the Pagan champion ; — we leave 
 it unto arithmetical divinity, and theological 
 explanation. 
 
 Yet if any delight in new problems, or think 
 it worth the enquiry, whether the critical phy- 
 sician hath rightly hit the nominal notation 
 of quinque ^ Why the ancients mixed five or 
 three, but not four parts of water unto their 
 wine ; and Hippocrates observed a fifth propor- 
 tion in the mixture of water with milk, as in 
 dysenteries and bloody fluxes? Under what 
 
 * T€(Tcrapa cvKe, four and one, or five. Scalig. 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 369 
 
 abstruse foundation astrolog-ers do figure the 
 good or bad fate from our children, in good 
 fortune ; * or the fifth house of their celestial 
 schemes? Whether the Eg}^tians described a 
 star by a figure of five points, with reference 
 unto the five capital aspects,! whereby they 
 transmit their influences, or abstruser considera- 
 tions ? "Why the cabalistical doctors, who con- 
 ceive the whole sephiroth, or divine emanations 
 to have guided the ten-stringed harp of David, 
 whereby he pacified the evil spirit of Saul, in 
 strict numeration do begin with the perihypate 
 meson, or si fa ut, and so place the tijjhereth an- 
 swering c sol fa ut, upon the fifth string? or 
 whether this number be oftener applied unto 
 bad things and ends, than good in Holy Scrip- 
 ture, and why ? he may meet with abstrusities 
 of no ready resolution. 
 
 If any shall question the rationality of that 
 magic, in the cure of the blind man by Serapis, 
 commanded to place five fingers on his altar, 
 and then his hand on his eyes ? Why, since 
 the whole comedy is primarily and naturally 
 comprised in four parts, J and antiquity per- 
 mitted not so many persons to speak in one 
 scene, yet would not comprehend the same in 
 
 * ^Ayadf] Tvxn^ bonafortuna, the name of the fifth house, 
 t Conjunct, opposite, sextile, trigonal, tetragonah 
 t UpoTacris, eViVacrts, KardcrTaacs, KaraaTpocjir]. 
 
370 THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 more or less than five acts ? Why amongst 
 sea-stars nature chiefly delighteth in five 
 points? And since there are found some of 
 no fewer than twelve, and some of seven, and 
 nine, there are few or none discovered of six or 
 eight?* If any shall enquire why the flowers 
 of rue properly consist of four leaves, the first 
 and third flower have five ? Why, since many 
 ■umnuiii- flowers have one leaf or none, as Scaliger will 
 folium, liave it, divers three, and the greatest number 
 consist of five divided from their bottoms, there 
 are yet so few of two ? or why nature, gener- 
 ally beginning or setting out with two opposite 
 leaves at the root, doth so seldom conclude with 
 that order and number at the flower? He 
 shall not pass his hours in vulgar speculations. 
 If any shall further query why magnetical 
 philosophy excludeth decussations, and needles 
 transversely placed do naturally distract their 
 verticities? Why geomancers do imitate the 
 quintuple figure, in their mother characters of 
 acquisition and amission, &c., somewhat answer- 
 ing the figures in the lady or speckled beetle ? 
 
 * Why amongst sea-stars, (f c] The far greater number of this 
 group of Radiaia is pentagonal, or five-rayed. But there occur 
 in many species individuals which vaiy from the rule. In the 
 British Museum there are specimens of Ophiura elegans and 
 Asterias reticulata with but four rays ; of some unnamed species 
 with 4, 5, 6, and 7; of ^. variolata with 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 rays; of 
 A. endica with 8 and 9; and A.papposa with from 12 to 15 rays. 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 371 
 
 With what equity chiromantical conjecturers de- 
 cry these decussations in the hues and mounts 
 of the hand ? What that decussated figure in- 
 tendeth in the medal of Alexander the Great ? 
 Why the goddesses sit commonly cross-legged 
 in ancient draughts, since Juno is described in 
 the same as a veneficial posture to hinder the 
 birth of Hercules ? If any shall doubt why at 
 the amphidromical feasts, on the fifth day after 
 the child was born, presents were sent from 
 friends, of polypuses and cuttle-fishes? Why 
 five must be only left in that symbolical mutiny 
 among the men of Cadmus ? Why Proteus in 
 Homer, the symbol of the first matter, before 
 he settled himself in the midst of his sea-mon- 
 sters, doth place them out by fives ? Why the 
 fifth year's ox was acceptable sacrifice unto Ju- 
 piter? Or why the noble Antoninus in some 
 sense doth call the soul itself a rhombus? He 
 shall not fall on trite or trivial disquisitions. 
 And these we invent and propose unto acuter 
 inquirers, nauseating crambe verities and ques- 
 tions over-queried. Flat and flexible truths are 
 beat out by every hammer ; but Vulcan and his 
 whole forge sweat to work out Achilles his ar- 
 mour. A large field is yet lefl unto sharper 
 discerners to enlarge upon this order, to search 
 out the quaternios and figured draughts of this 
 nature, and (moderating the study of names, 
 
372 THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 
 
 and mere nomenclature of plants), to erect 
 generalities, disclose unobserved proprieties, not 
 only in the vegetable shop, but the whole vol- 
 ume of nature ; affording delightful truths, con- 
 firmable by sense and ocular observation, which 
 seems to me the surest path to trace the laby- 
 rinth of truth.* For though discursive inquiry 
 and rational conjecture may leave liandsome 
 gashes and flesh-wounds ; yet without conjunc- 
 tion of this, expect no mortal or dispatching 
 blows unto error. 
 
 But the quincunx t of heaven runs low, and 
 't is time to close the five ports of knowledge. 
 We are unwilling to spin out our awaking 
 thoughts into the phantasms of sleep, which 
 often continueth precogitations ; making cables 
 of cobwebs, and wildernesses of handsome 
 Deinsom- grovcs. Bcsidc, Hippocratcs hath spoke so 
 little, and the oneirocritical masters have left 
 such frigid interpretations from plants, that 
 there is little encouragement to dream of Para- 
 dise itself. Nor will the sweetest delight of 
 gardens afford much comfort in sleep ; wherein 
 the dulness of that sense shakes hands with de- 
 
 * and {moderating the study of names, and mere nomenclature of 
 plants), to erect generalities, ^c] In these observations the im- 
 portance and necessity of endeavouring to approximate to the 
 true natural system of plants, is very curiously and sagaciously 
 anticipated by our author. 
 
 t Eyades, near the horizon about midnight, at that time. 
 
 mis. 
 Artemido- 
 rus et 
 Apomazar. 
 
 J 
 
THE GARDEN OF CYRUS. 373 
 
 lectable odours ; and though in the bed of Cle- 
 opatra,* can hardly with any delight raise up 
 the ghost of a rose. 
 
 Night, wliich Pagan theology could make the 
 daughter of Chaos, affords no advantage to the 
 description of order ; although no lower than 
 that mass can we derive its genealogy. All 
 things began in order, so shall they end, and so 
 shall they begin again; according to the or- 
 dainer of order and mystical mathematics of 
 the city of heaven. 
 
 Though Somnus in Homer be sent to rouse 
 up Agamemnon, I find no such effects in these 
 drowsy approaches of sleep. To keep our eyes 
 open longer, were but to act our Antipodes. 
 The huntsmen are up in America, and they are 
 already past their first sleep in Persia. But 
 who can be drowsy at that hour wliich freed us 
 from everlasting sleep? or have slumbering 
 thoughts at that time, when sleep itself must 
 end, and as some Conjecture all shall awake 
 again. 
 
 * Strewed with roses. 
 
 36 
 
FROM 
 
 Vulgar Errors. 
 
[The following passages are selected as specimens 
 from different parts of the " Enquiries into Vulgar 
 and Common Errors. ""I 
 
Vulgar Errors. 
 
 ;V 
 
 ^^^ DAM, upon the expostnlatioii of God, 
 replied, "I heard thy voice in the 
 garden, and because I was naked I 
 liid myseltV In which reply there 
 
 5 included a very gross mistake, and if with 
 pertinacity maintained, a high and capital error. 
 For thinking: hy this retirement to obscure him- 
 self from God, he infringed the omnisciency 
 and essential ubiquity of his Maker; who, as 
 he created all things, so is he beyond and in 
 them all, not only in power, as under his sub- 
 jection, or in his presence, as being in his cc^- 
 nition, but in his reiy essence, as being the 
 soul of their causalities and the essential cause 
 of their existences. Certainly his posteritr, a^ 
 this distance and after so perpetuated an im- 
 pairment, caimot but condemn the poverty of 
 his conception, that thought to obscure him- 
 self from his Creator in the shade of the garden. 
 
378 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 who liad beheld him before m the darkness of 
 his chaos and the great obscurity of nothing; 
 that thought to fly from God which could not fly 
 himself ; or imagined that one tree should con- 
 ceal his nakedness from God's eye, as another 
 had revealed it unto his own. Those tormented 
 spirits, that wish the mountains to cover them, 
 have fallen upon desires of minor absurdity, and 
 chosen ways of less improbable concealment. 
 Though this be also as ridiculous unto reason 
 as fruitless unto their desires ; for he that laid 
 the foundations of the earth cannot be excluded 
 the secrecy of the mountains ; nor can there 
 anything escape the perspicacity of those eyes, 
 which were before light, and in whose optics 
 there is no opacity. This is the consolation of 
 all good men, unto whom his ubiquity affordeth 
 continual comfort and security ; and this is the 
 affliction of hell, unto whom it affordeth de- 
 spair and remediless calamity. For those rest- 
 less spirits that fly the face of the Almighty, 
 being deprived of the fruition of his eye, would 
 also avoid the extent of his hand ; which being 
 impossible, their sufferings are desperate and 
 their afflictions without evasion, until they can 
 get out of Trismegistus's circle, that is, to ex- 
 tend their Avings above the miiverse and pitch 
 beyond ubiquity. 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 379 
 
 BUT tlie mortalest enemy unto knowledo;e, Ofadher- 
 11 1-1111 1 enceunto 
 
 and tnat wliicn hath done the greatest antiquity. 
 
 execution upon truth, hath been a peremptory- 
 adhesion unto authority, and more especially 
 the establishing of our belief upon the dictates 
 of antiquity. For (as every capacity may 
 observe) most men of ages present so super- 
 stitiously do look on ages past, that the authori- 
 ties of the one exceed the reasons of the other ; 
 whose persons indeed, being far removed from 
 our times, their works, which seldom with us 
 pass uncontrolled either by contemporaries or 
 immediate successors, are now become out of 
 the distance of envies ; and the further removed 
 from present times, are conceived to approach 
 the nearer unto truth itself. Now hereby me- 
 thinks we manifestly delude ourselves, and 
 widely walk out of the track of truth. 
 
 For, first, men hereby impose a thraldom on 
 their times, which the ingenuity of no age 
 should endure, or indeed the presumption of 
 any did ever yet enjoin. Thus Hippocrates, 
 about two thousand years ago, conceived it no 
 injustice either to examine or refute the doc- 
 trines of his predecessors ; Galen the hke, and 
 Aristotle most of any. Yet did not any of 
 these conceive themselves infallible, or set down 
 their dictates as verities irrefragable ; but wdien 
 they either deliver their own inventions or 
 
380 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 reject other men's opinions, tliey proceed with 
 judgment and ingenuity, estabhshing their as- 
 sertions, not only with great solidity, but sub- 
 mittino; them also unto the correction of future 
 discovery. 
 
 Secondly, men that adore times past, con- 
 sider not that those times were once present ; 
 that is, as our own are at this instant, and we 
 ourselves unto those to come as they unto us 
 at present. As we rely on them, even so will 
 those on us, and magnify us hereafter, who at 
 present condemn ourselves ; which very absurd- 
 ity is daily committed amongst us even in the 
 esteem and censure of our own times. And, 
 to speak impartially, old men, from whom we 
 should expect the greatest example of wisdom, 
 do most exceed in this point of folly ; commend- 
 ing the days of their youth they scarce remem- 
 ber, at least well understood not ; extolling 
 those times their younger years have heard 
 their fathers condemn, and condemning those 
 times the gray heads of their posterity shall 
 commend. And thus is it the humor of many 
 heads to extol the days of their forefathers and 
 declaim against the wickedness of times pres- 
 ent ; which notwithstanding they cannot hand- 
 somely do, without the borrowed help and satires 
 of times past, condemning the vices of their 
 times by the expressions of vices in times which 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 381 
 
 they commend, which cannot but argue the 
 community of vice in both. Horace, therefore, 
 Juvenal, and Persius were no prophets, although 
 their lines did seem to indigitate and point at 
 our times. There is a certain list of vices 
 committed in all ages and declaimed against by 
 all authors, which will last as long as human 
 nature ; or digested into commonplaces may 
 serve for any theme, and never be out of date 
 until doomsday. 
 
 A 
 
 S for popular errors, they are more nearly Theerrone- 
 founded upon an erroneous inclination of sition of 
 the people, as being the most deceptible part *^® p<^"p'«- 
 of mankind, and ready with open arms to re- 
 ceive the encroachments of error; which con- 
 dition of theirs, although deducible from many 
 grounds, yet shall we evidence it but from a 
 few, and such as most nearly and undeniably 
 declare their natures. 
 
 How unequal discemers of truth they are, 
 and openly exposed unto error, will first ap- 
 pear from their unqualified intellectuals, unable 
 to umpire the difficulty of its dissensions. For 
 error, to speak largely, is a false judgment of 
 things, or an assent unto falsity. Now whether 
 the object whereunto they deliver up their as- 
 sent be true or false, they are inccmpetent 
 iudp;es. 
 
382 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 For the assured truth of things is derived 
 from the principles of knowledge, and causes 
 which determine their verities ; whereof their 
 uncultivated understandings scarce holding any 
 theory, they are but bad discerners of verity, 
 and in the numerous track of error but casual- 
 ly do hit the point and unity of truth. 
 
 Their understanding is so feeble in the dis- 
 cernment of falsities and averting the errors of 
 reason, that it submitteth unto the fallacies of 
 sense, and is unable to rectify the error of its 
 sensations. Thus the greater part of mankind, 
 having but one eye of sense and reason, con- 
 ceive the earth far bigger than the sun, the 
 fixed stars lesser than the moon, their figures 
 plain, and their spaces from earth equidistant. 
 For thus their sense informeth them, and herein 
 their reason cannot rectify them; and there- 
 fore hopelessly continuing in mistakes, they live 
 and die in their absurdities, passing their days 
 in perverted apprehensions and conceptions of 
 the world, derogatory unto God and the wis- 
 dom of the creation. 
 
 Again, being so illiterate in the point of in- 
 tellect and their sense so incorrected, they are 
 further indisposed ever to attain unto truth, as 
 commonly proceeding in those ways which have 
 most reference unto sense, and wherein there 
 Heth most notable and popular delusion. For 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 383 
 
 beinor unable to wield the intellectual arms of 
 reason, they are fain to betake themselves unto 
 wasters and the blunter weapons of truth, af- 
 fecting the gross and sensible ways of doctrine, 
 and such as will not consist with strict and 
 subtile reason. Thus unto them a piece of 
 rhetoric is a sufficient argument of logic, an apo- 
 logue of ^sop beyond a syllogism in Barbara ; 
 parables than propositions, and proverbs more 
 powerful than demonstrations. And therefore 
 are they led rather by example than precept, 
 receiving persuasions from visible inducements 
 before intellectual instructions. And therefore 
 also they judge of human actions by the event ; 
 for being uncapable of operable circumstances 
 or rightly to judge the prudentiality of affairs, 
 they only gaze upon the visible success, and 
 thereafter condemn or cry up the whole pro- 
 gression. And so from this ground in the lec- 
 ture of Holy Scripture, their apprehensions are 
 commonly confined unto the literal sense of 
 the text ; from whence have ensued the gross 
 and duller sort of heresies. For not attaining: 
 the deuteroscopy and second intention of the 
 words, they are fain to omit their superconse- 
 quences, coherencies, figures, or tropologies, and 
 are not sometimes persuaded by fire beyond 
 their literalities. And therefore all thino^s in- 
 visible but unto intellectual discernments, to 
 
384 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 humour the grossness of their comprehensions, 
 have been degraded from their proper forms, 
 and God himself dishonoured into manual ex- 
 pressions. And so likewise, being unprovided 
 or unsufficient for higher speculations, they will 
 always betake themselves unto sensible repre- 
 sentations, and can hardly be restrained the 
 dulness of idolatry ; a sin or folly not only 
 derogatory unto God, but men ; overthrowing 
 their reason as well as his divinity ; in brief, a 
 reciprocation, or rather an inversion of the cre- 
 ation, making God one way, as he made us 
 another; that is, after our image, as he made 
 us after his own. 
 
 Moreover, their understanding, thus weak in 
 itself, and perverted by sensible delusions, is yet 
 further impaired by the dominion of their appe- 
 tite, that is, the irrational and brutal part of the 
 soul ; which, lording it over the sovereign fac- 
 ulty, interrupts the actions of that noble part, 
 and chokes those tender sparks which Adam 
 hath left them of reason ; and therefore they do 
 not only swarm with errors, but vices depend- 
 ing thereon. Thus they commonly affect no 
 man any further than he deserts his reason or 
 complies with their aberrancies. Hence they 
 embrace not virtue for itself, but its reward ; 
 and the argument from pleasure or utility is far 
 more powerful than that from virtuous honesty ; 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 385 
 
 which Mahomet and his contrivers well under- 
 stood, when he set out the felicity of his heaven 
 by the contentments of flesh and the delights of 
 sense, slightly passing over the accomplishment 
 of the soul and the beatitude of that part which 
 earth and visibilities too weakly affect. But 
 the wisdom of our Saviour and the simplicity 
 of his truth proceeded another way, defying the 
 popular provisions of happiness from sensible 
 expectations, placing his felicity in things re- 
 moved from sense, and the intellectual enjoy- 
 ment of God. And therefore the doctrine of 
 the one was never afraid of universities, or en- 
 deavoured the banishment of learning like the 
 other. And thouo;h Galen doth sometimes nib- 
 ble at Moses, and beside the Apostate Christian, 
 some heathens have questioned his philosophical 
 part or treatise of the creation ; yet is there 
 surely no reasonable Pagan that will not admire 
 the rational and well-grounded precepts of 
 Christ, w^hose life, as it was conformable unto 
 his doctrine, so was that unto the highest rules 
 of reason, and must therefore flourish in the 
 advancement of learning, and the perfection of 
 parts best able to comprehend it. 
 
 Again, their individual imperfections being 
 great, they are moreover enlarged by their ag- 
 gregation ; and being erroneous in their single 
 numbers, once huddled together they will be 
 
386 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 error itself. For being a confusion of knaves 
 and fools, and a farraginous concurrence of all 
 conditions, tempers, sexes, and ages, it is but 
 natural if their determinations be monstrous 
 and many ways inconsistent with truth. And 
 therefore wise men have always applauded their 
 own judgment in the contradiction of that of the 
 people ; and their soberest adversaries have ever 
 afforded them the style of fools and madmen ; 
 and to speak impartially, their actions have 
 often made good these epithets. Had Orestes 
 been judge, he would not have acquitted that 
 Lystrian rabble of madness, who, upon a visible 
 miracle, falling into so high a conceit of Paul 
 and Barnabas, that they termed the one Jupi- 
 ter, the other Mercurius ; that they brought 
 oxen and garlands, and were hardly restrained 
 from sacrificing unto them ; did notwithstand- 
 ing suddenly after fall upon Paul, and, having 
 stoned him, drew him for dead out of the city. 
 It might have hazarded the sides of Democri- 
 tus had he been present at that tumult of De- 
 metrius, when, the people flocking together in 
 great numbers, some cried one thing and some 
 another, and the assembly was confused, and 
 the most part knew not wherefore they were 
 come together; notwithstanding, all with one 
 voice for the space of two hours cried out, 
 *' Great is Diana of the Ephesians." It had 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 387 
 
 overcome the patience of Job, as it did the 
 meekness of Moses, and would surely have 
 mastered any but the longanimity and lasting 
 sufferance of God, had they beheld the mutiny 
 in the wilderness, when, after ten great miracles 
 in Egypt and some in the same place, they 
 melted down their stolen ear-rings into a calf, 
 and monstrously cried out, " These be thy gods, 
 O Israel, w^hich brought thee up out of the land 
 of Egypt." It much accuseth the impatience 
 of Peter, who could not endure the staves of 
 the multitude, and is the greatest example of 
 lenity in our Saviour, Avhen he desired of God 
 forgiveness unto those, who, having one day 
 brought him into the city in triumph, did pres- 
 ently after act all dishonour upon him, and noth- 
 ing could be heard but " Crucifis-e " in their 
 courts. Certainly he that considereth these 
 things in God's peculiar people will easily dis- 
 cern how httle of truth there is in the ways of 
 the multitude ; and though sometimes they are 
 flattered with that aphorism, will hardly believe 
 the voice of the people to be the voice of God. 
 
 Lastly, being thus divided from truth in them- 
 selves, they are yet farther removed by adve- 
 nient deception. For true it is, (and I hope I 
 shall not offend their vulgarities if I say,) they 
 are daily mocked into error by subtler devisors, 
 and have been expressly deluded by all profes- 
 
388 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 sions and ages. Thus the priests of elder time 
 have put upon them many incredible conceits, 
 not only deluding their apprehensions with ario- 
 lation, soothsaying, and such oblique idolatries, 
 but winning their credulities unto the literal and 
 downright adorement of cats, lizards, and bee- 
 tles. And thus also in some Christian churches, 
 wherein is presumed an irreprovable truth, if all 
 be true that is suspected, or half what is related, 
 there have not wanted many strange deceptions, 
 and some thereof are still confessed by the name 
 of pious frauds. Thus Theudas, an impostor, 
 was able to lead away four thousand into the 
 wilderness, and the delusions of Mahomet al- 
 most the fourth part of mankind. Thus all her- 
 esies, how gross soever, have found a welcome 
 with the people. For thus many of the Jews 
 were wrought into the belief that Herod was 
 the Messias ; and David George of Leyden, and 
 Arden, were not without a party amongst the 
 people, who maintained the same opinion of 
 themselves almost in our days. 
 
 Saltinbancoes, quacksalvers, and charlatans 
 deceive them in lower degrees. Were ^sop 
 alive, the Piazza and Pont-Neuf could not but 
 speak their fallacies ; meanwhile there are too 
 many, whose cries cannot conceal their mischief. 
 For their impostures are full of cruelty and 
 worse than any other, deluding not only unto 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 389 
 
 pecuniary defraudations, but the irreparable de- 
 ceit of deatlio 
 
 Astrologers, which pretend to be of Cabala 
 with the stars, (such I mean as abuse that wor- 
 thy inquiry,) have not been wanting in their 
 deceptions ; who, having won their belief unto 
 principles whereof they make great doubt them- 
 selves, have made them believe that arbitrary 
 events below have necessary causes above ; 
 whereupon their credulities assent unto any 
 prognostics, and daily swallow the predictions 
 of men, which, considering the independency 
 of their causes and contingency in their events, 
 are only in the prescience of God. 
 
 Fortune-tellers, jugglers, geomancers, and the 
 like incantatory impostors, though commonly 
 men of inferior rank, and from whom without 
 illumination they can expect no more than from 
 themselves, do daily and professedly delude 
 them ; unto whom (what is deplorable in men 
 and Christians) too many applying themselves, 
 betwixt jest and earnest, betray the cause of 
 truth, and insensibly make up the legionary 
 body of error. 
 
 Statists and politicians, unto whom " ragione 
 di stato" is the first considerable, as thouo-h it 
 were their business to deceive the people, as a 
 maxim do hold that truth is to be concealed 
 from them ; unto whom although they reveal 
 
390 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 the visible design, yet do they commonly con- 
 ceal the capital intention. And therefore have 
 they ever been the instruments of great designs, 
 yet seldom understood the true intention of any ; 
 accomplishing the drifts of wiser heads, as inan- 
 imate and ignorant agents the general design of 
 the world ; who though in some latitude of sense 
 and in a natural cognition perform their proper 
 actions, yet do they unknowingly concur unto 
 higher ends, and blindly advance the great in- 
 tention of nature. Now how far they may be 
 kept in ignorance, a great example there is in 
 the people of Rome, who never knew the true 
 and pro2:)er name of their own city. For beside 
 that common appellation received by the citi- 
 zens, it had a proper and secret name concealed 
 from them. " Cujus alterum nomen dicere se- 
 cretis ceremoniarum nefas habetur," says Pliny ; 
 lest the name thereof being discovered unto 
 their enemies, their penates and patronal gods 
 might be called forth by charms and incanta- 
 tions. For accordinor unto the tradition of ma- 
 gicians, the tutelary spirits will not remove at 
 common appellations, but at the proper names 
 of things whereunto they are protectors. 
 
 Thus having been deceived by themselves, 
 and continually deluded by others, they must 
 needs be stuffed with errors, and even overrun 
 with these inferior falsities ; whereunto whoso- 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 391 
 
 ever shall resign their reasons, either from the 
 root of deceit in themselves, or inability to re- 
 sist such trivial ingannations from others, al- 
 though their condition and fortunes may place 
 them many spheres above the multitude, yet 
 are they still within the line of vulgarity, and 
 democratical enemies of truth. 
 
 THE falling of salt is an authentic presage- of the faii- 
 ment of ill luck, nor can every temper '°^° ^ 
 contemn it ; from whence notwithstandino; noth- 
 ing can be naturally feared ; nor was the same 
 a general prognostic of future evil among the 
 ancients, but a particular omination concerning 
 the breach of friendship. For salt, as incor- 
 ruptible, was the symbol of friendship, and, be- 
 fore the other service, was offered unto their 
 guests ; which, if it casually fell, was accounted 
 ominous, and their amity of no duration. But 
 whether salt were not only a symbol of friend- 
 ship with man, but also a figure of amity and 
 reconciliation with God, and was therefore ob- 
 served in sacrifices, is a higher speculation. 
 
 TO break the egg-shell after the meat Is of break- 
 out, we are taught in our childhood, and sheu/^^^" 
 practise it all our hves; which nevertheless is 
 
392 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 but a superstitious relic, according to the judg- 
 ment of Pliny, " Hue pertinet ovorum, ut ex- 
 sorbuerit quisque, calices protinus frangi, aut 
 eosdem cochlearibus perforari " ; and tlie intent 
 hereof Avas to prevent witchcraft ; for lest witch- 
 es should draw or prick their names therein, and 
 veneficiously mischief their persons, they broke 
 the shell, as Dalecampius hath observed. 
 
 Of the true- / I AHE truc lovcr's knot is very much magni- 
 t°no[ ^ JL fied, and still retained in presents of love 
 
 among us ; which, though in all points it doth 
 not make out, had perhaps its original from 
 " Nodus Herculanus," or that which was called 
 Hercules's knot, resembhng the snaky compli- 
 cation in the caduceus or rod of Hermes ; and 
 in which form the zone or woollen girdle of the 
 bride was fastened, as Turnebus observeth in 
 his " Adversaria." 
 
 Of the "XT THEN our cheek burnetii or ear tin 
 
 cheek V W 
 
 or ear 
 tingling. 
 
 burning ▼ ▼ glcth, we usually say that somebody is 
 
 talking of us, which is an ancient conceit, and 
 ranked among superstitious opinions by Pliny. 
 " Absentes tinnitu aurium prsesentire sermones 
 de se receptum est," according to that distich 
 noted by Dalecampius. 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 393 
 
 " Gamila, quid totis resonas mihi noctibus, auris ? 
 Nescio quern dicis nunc meminisse mei." 
 
 Whicli is a conceit hardly to be made out with- 
 out the concession of a signifying Genius, or 
 universal Mercury, conducting sounds unto their 
 distant subjects, and teaching us to hear by 
 touch. 
 
 w 
 
 HEN we desire to confine our words, ofspeak- 
 
 1 , , ing under 
 
 we commonly say they are spoken un- the rose. 
 
 der the rose ; which expression is commenda- 
 ble, if the rose, from any natural property, may 
 be the symbol of silence, as Nazianzen seems 
 to imply in these translated verses : — 
 
 " Utque latet rosa verna suo putamine clausa, 
 Sic OS vincla ferat, validisque arctetui* habenis, 
 Indicatque suis prolixa silentia labris." 
 
 And is also tolerable, if by desiring a secrecy 
 to words spoke under the rose, we only mean 
 in society and compotation, from the ancient 
 custom in symposiac meetings to wear chaplets 
 of roses about their heads ; and so we condemn 
 not the German custom, which over the table 
 describeth a rose in the ceiling. But more 
 considerable it is, if the original were such as 
 Lemnius and others have recorded, that the 
 rose was the flower of Venus, which Cupid 
 consecrated unto Harpocrates, the god of si- 
 
394 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 lence, and was therefore an emblem thereof, 
 to conceal the pranks of venery ; as is declared 
 in this tetrastich : — 
 
 " Est rosa flos Veneris, cujus quo facta laterent, 
 Harpocrati matris, dona dicavit Amor; 
 Inde rosam mensis hospes suspendit amicis, 
 ConvivEe ut sub ea dicta tacenda sciant." 
 
 Of smoke rT^HAT smoke doth follow the fairest, is a 
 the fair. -■- usual sajing with us and in many parts 
 of Europe ; whereof although there seem no 
 natural ground, yet is it the continuation of a 
 very ancient opinion, as Petrus Victorius and 
 Casaubon have observed from a passage in Athe- 
 nseus ; wherein a parasite thus describeth him- 
 self:— 
 
 " To every table first I come, 
 Whence Porridge I am called by some ; 
 A Capaneus at stairs I am. 
 To enter any room a ram ; 
 Like whips and thongs to all I ply, 
 Like smoke unto the fair I fly." 
 
 cross- 
 
 Of sitting r ■ \Q sit cross-legged, or with our fingers pec- 
 JL tinated or shut together, is accounted bad, 
 and friends will persuade us from it. The same 
 conceit religiously possessed the ancients, as is 
 observable from Pliny, — " Poplites alternis ge- 
 nibus imponere nefas olim " ; and also from 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 395 
 
 Atlienseus, that it was an old veneficious prac- 
 tice, and Juno is made in tliis posture to hin- 
 der the dehvery of Alcmsena. And therefore, 
 as Pierius observeth, in the medal of Julia Pia, 
 the right hand of Venus was made extended, 
 with the inscription of Venus Genetrix ; for the 
 complication or pectination of the fingers was 
 a hieroglyphic of impediment, as in that place 
 he declareth. 
 
 THE set and statary time of paring of nails Of the par- 
 and cutting of hair is thought by many a ^"^^ "*^ 
 point of consideration ; which is perhaps but the 
 continuation of an ancient superstition. For 
 piaculous it was unto the Romans to pare their 
 nails upon the Nundinse, observed every ninth 
 day; and was also feared by others in certain 
 days of the week, according to that of Auso- 
 nius, " Ungues Mercurio, barbam Jove, Cypride 
 crines," and was one part of the wickedness 
 that filled up the measure of Manasses, when 
 't is delivered that " he observed times." * 
 
 A COMMON fashion it is to nourish hair Ofhair 
 upon the moles of the face ; which is ^0^3. 
 the perpetuation of a very ancient custom, and, 
 
 * 2 Clirouicles xxxiii. 6. 
 
396 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 though innocently practised among ns, may have 
 a superstitious original, according to that of Pli- 
 ny, " Ntevos in facie tondere religiosum habent 
 nunc multi." From the like might proceed the 
 fears of polling elvelocks, or complicated hairs 
 of the head, and also of locks longer than the 
 other hair ; they being votary at first, and dedi- 
 cated upon occasion, preserved with great care, 
 and accordingly esteemed by others, as appears 
 by that of Apuleius, " Adjuro per dulcem ca- 
 pilli tui nodulum." 
 
 Of lions' y4 CUSTOM there is in most parts of Eu- 
 
 heads upon L\ , . 
 
 spouts. X A. rope to adorn aqueducts, spouts, and cis- 
 terns Avith lions' heads ; which, though no illaud- 
 able ornament, is of an Egyptian genealogy, 
 who practised the same under a symbolical 
 illation. For because, the sun being in Leo, 
 the flood of Nilus was at the full, and water 
 became conveyed into every part, they made the 
 spouts of their aqueducts through the head of a 
 lion. And upon some celestial respects it is not 
 improbable the great Mogul or Indian king doth 
 bear for his arms a lion and the sun. 
 
 Of the pic- rr^HE picture of the Creator, or God the 
 X Father, in the shape of an old man, is a 
 
 tureofGod. 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 397 
 
 dangerous piece, and in this fecundity of sects 
 may revive the Anthropomorphites ; which, al- 
 though maintained from the expression of Dan- 
 iel, " I beheld where the Ancient of days did 
 sit, whose hair of his head was like the pure 
 wool," yet may it be also derivative from the 
 hieroglyphical description of the Egyptians, who, 
 to express their Eneph, or Creator of the world, 
 described an old man in a blue mantle, with an 
 egg in his mouth, which was the emblem of the 
 world. Surely those heathens, that, notwith- 
 standing the exemplary advantage in heaven, 
 would endure no pictures of sun or moon, as 
 being visible unto all the world, and needing 
 no representation, do evidently accuse the prac- 
 tice of those pencils that will describe invisi- 
 bles. And he that challenged the boldest hand 
 imto the picture of an echo, must laugh at 
 this attempt, not only in the description of 
 invisibility, but circumscription of ubiquity, and 
 fetcliing under hues incomprehensible circu- 
 larity. 
 
 The pictures of the Egyptians were more 
 tolerable, and in their sacred letters more ve- 
 niably expressed the apprehension of Divinity. 
 For though they implied the same by an eye 
 upon a sceptre, by an eagle's head, a crocodile, 
 and the like, yet did these manual descriptions 
 
 pretend no corporal representations ; nor could 
 39 
 
398 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 the people misconceive the same unto real cor- 
 respondencies. So though the Cherub carried 
 some apprehension of Divinity, yet was it not 
 conceived to be the shape thereof; and so per- 
 haps, because it is metaphorically predicated 
 of God that he is a consuming fire, he may be 
 harmlessly described by a flaming representa- 
 tion. Yet if, as some will have it, all mediocrity 
 of folly is foolish, and, because an unrequitable 
 evil may ensue, an indifferent convenience must 
 be omitted, we shall not urge such represent- 
 ments; we could spare the holy lamb for the 
 picture of our Saviour, and the dove or fiery 
 tongues to represent the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Of the sun, f | ^HE suu and moon are usually described 
 winds'. A with human faces. Whether herein there 
 
 be not a Pagan imitation, and those visages at 
 first implied Apollo and Diana, we may make 
 some doubt ; and we find the statue of the sun 
 was fi:amed with rays about the head, which 
 were the indeciduous and unshaven locks of 
 Apollo. We should be too iconomachal* to 
 question the pictures of the winds as commonly 
 drawn in human heads, and with their cheeks 
 distended ; which notwithstanding we find con- 
 demned by Minucius, as answering poetical 
 
 * Quarrelsome with pictures. 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 399 
 
 fancies, and the gentile description of ^olus, 
 Boreas, and the feigned deities of the winds. 
 
 WE shall not, I hope, disparage the resur- of the sun 
 rection of our Redeemer, if we say '^'^''"^s- 
 the sun doth not dance on Easter day. And 
 though we would willingly assent unto any sym- 
 pathetica! exultation, yet cannot conceive therein 
 any more than a tropical expression. Whether 
 any such motion there were in that day wherein 
 Christ arose. Scripture hath not revealed, which 
 hath been punctual in other records concerning 
 solary miracles ; and the Areopagite that was 
 amazed at the echpse took no notice of this. 
 And if metaphorical expressions go so far, we 
 may be bold to affirm, not only that one sun 
 danced, but two arose that day ; that light 
 appeared at his nativity, and darkness at his 
 death, and yet a light at both ; for even that 
 darkness was a light unto the Gentiles, illumi- 
 nated by that obscurity ; that 't was the first 
 time the sun set above the horizon ; that al- 
 though there were darkness above the earth, 
 there was light beneath it ; nor dare we say that 
 hell was dark if he were in it. 
 
400 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 devil. 
 
 ?i*!'^ \ CONCEIT there is, that the devil 
 x\. commonly appeareth with a cloven hoof; 
 wherein, although it seem excessively ridiculous, 
 there may be somewhat of truth ; and the ground 
 thereof at first might be his frequent appear- 
 ing in the shape of a goat, which answers that 
 description. This was the opinion of ancient 
 Christians concerning the apparition of Panites, 
 Fauns, and Satyrs ; and in this form we read 
 of one that appeared unto Antony in the wil- 
 derness. The same is also confirmed from ex- 
 positions of Holy Scripture , for whereas it is 
 said, " Thou shalt not offer unto devils," the 
 original word is " seghnirim," that is, rough 
 and hairy goats, because in that shape the devil 
 most often appeared; as is expounded by the 
 rabbins, as Tremellius hath also explained, and 
 as the word Ascimah, the god of Emath, is 
 by some conceived. Nor did he only assume 
 this shape in elder times, but commonly in later 
 days, especially in the place of his worship, if 
 there be any truth in the confession of witches, 
 and as in many stories it stands confirmed by 
 Bodinus. And therefore a goat is not improp- 
 erly made the hieroglyphic of the devil, as Pie- 
 rius hath expressed it. So might it be the 
 emblem of sin, as it was in the sin-offering; 
 and so likewise of wicked and sinful men, ac- 
 cording to the expression of Scripture in the 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 401 
 
 method of the last distribution, when our Sav- 
 iour shall separate the sheep from the goats, 
 that is, the sons of the Lamb from the children 
 of the devil. 
 
 T 
 
 HAT temperamental dignotions and con- of spots on 
 jecture of prevalent humours may be col- 
 
 lected from spots in our nails, we are not averse 
 to concede, but yet not ready to admit sundry 
 divinations vulgarly raised upon them. Nor do 
 we observe it verified in others, what Cardan 
 discovered as a property in himself, to have 
 found therein some signs of most events, that 
 ever happened unto him ; or that there is much 
 considerable in that doctrine of chiromancy, that 
 spots in the top of the nails do signify things 
 past, in the middle things present, and at the 
 bottom events to come ; that white specks pre- 
 sage our felicity, blue ones our misfortunes ; 
 that those in the nail of the thumb have sig- 
 nifications of honor, those in the forefinger of 
 riches, and so respectively in other fingers, (ac- 
 cording to plane tical relations, fr'om whence they 
 receive their names,) as Tricassus hath taken 
 up, and Picciolus well rejecteth. 
 
 We shall not proceed to query what truth 
 there is in palmistry, or divination from those 
 lines in our hands of high denomination. Al- 
 39* 
 
402 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 though, if anything be therein, it seems not 
 confinable unto man; but other creatures are 
 also considerable ; as is the forefoot of the mole, 
 and especially of the monkey; wherein we 
 have observed the table line, that of life, and 
 of the liver. 
 
 Of lights rr^HAT candles and lights bum dim and 
 ^urnmg j^ ^^^^ ^^ ^^^ apparition of spirits, may be 
 true, if the ambient air be full of sulphurous 
 spirits, as it happeneth ofttimes in mines, where 
 damps and acid exhalations are able to extin- 
 guish them ; and may be also verified, when 
 spirits do make themselves visible by bodies of 
 such effluviums. But of lower consideration is 
 the common foretelling of strangers, from the 
 fungus parcels about the wicks of candles ; 
 which only signifieth a moist and pluvious air 
 about them, hindering the avolation of the hght 
 and favillous particles ; whereupon they are 
 forced to settle upon the snast. 
 
 Of the ^ I THOUGH coral doth properly preserve 
 
 wearing of I , „ . , . . . 
 
 coral. -■- and fasten the teeth m men, yet is it 
 
 used in children to make an easier passage for 
 them, and for that intent is worn about their 
 necks. But whether this custom were not su- 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. .403 
 
 perstitiously founded, as presumed an amulet or 
 defensative against fascination, is not beyond all 
 doubt. For the same is delivered by Pliny. 
 " Aruspices religiosum coralli gestamen amoli- 
 endis periculis arbitrantur; et surculi infanti^ 
 adalligati, tutelam habere creduntur.!' 
 
 A STRANGE kind of exploration and pe- oftJiedi- 
 culiar way of rhabdomancy is that which 
 is used in mineral discoveries, that is, with a 
 forked hazel, commonly called Moses's rod, 
 which, freely held forth, will stir and play if 
 any mine be under it. And though many there 
 are who have attempted to make it good, yet, 
 until better information, we are of opinion with 
 Agricola, that in itself it is a fruitless explora- 
 tion, strongly scenting of Pagan derivation and 
 the " virgula divina," proverbially magnified of 
 old. The ground whereof were the magical 
 rods in poets, that of Pallas hi Homer, that of 
 Mercury that charmed Argus, and that of Circe 
 which transformed the followers of Ulysses ; too 
 boldly usurping the name of Moses's rod, from 
 which notwithstanding, and that of Aaron, were 
 probably occasioned the fables of all the rest. 
 For that of Moses must needs be famous unto 
 the Egyptians, and that of Aaron unto many 
 other nations, as being preserved in the ark 
 
404 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 until the destruction of tlie temple built by Sol- 
 omon. 
 
 ermg mat 
 ters by 
 book or 
 
 of^scoT- 74 PRACTICE there is among us to deter- 
 1~\. mine doubtful matters by the opening of 
 a book, and letting fall a staff; which notwith- 
 standing are ancient fragments of Pagan divi- 
 nations. The first an imitation of " Sortes Ho- 
 mericae" or " Virgilianae," drawing determina- 
 tions from verses casually occurring. The same 
 was practised by Severus, who entertained omi- 
 nous hopes of the empire, from that verse in 
 Virgil, " Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, 
 memento " ; and Gordianus, who reigned but 
 few days, was discouraged by another, that is, 
 " Ostendent terris hunc tantum fata, nee ultra 
 Esse sinunt." Nor was this only performed in 
 heathen authors, but upon the sacred texts of 
 Scripture, as Gregorius Turonensis hath left 
 some account, and as the practice of the Em- 
 peror HeracHus, before his expedition into Asia 
 Minor, is delivered by Cedrenus. 
 
 As for the divination or decision from the 
 staff, it is an augurial relic, and the practice 
 thereof is accused by God himself. " My peo- 
 ple ask counsel at their stocks, and their staff 
 declare th unto them." * Of this kind of rhab- 
 
 * Hosea iv. 12. 
 
VULGAR ERRORS. 405 
 
 domancy was that practised by Nabuchadonosor 
 in that Chaldean miscellany delivered by Eze- 
 kiel, — " The king of Babylon stood at the part- 
 ing of the way, at the head of two ways, to use 
 divination ; he made his arrows bright, he con- 
 sulted with images, he looked in the liver; at 
 his riffht hand was the divination for Jerusa- 
 lem."* That is, as Estius expounded it, the 
 left way leading unto Rabbah, the chief city of 
 the Ammonites, and the right unto Jerusalem, 
 he consulted idols and entrails, he threw up a 
 bundle of arrows to see which way they would 
 light ; and falling on the right hand, he marched 
 towards Jerusalem. A like way of belomancy, 
 or divination by arrows, hath been in request 
 with Scythians, Alanes, Germans, with the Af- 
 ricans and Turks of Algiers. But of another 
 nature was that which was practised by EHsha, 
 when, bv an arrow shot from an eastern win- 
 dow, he presignified the destruction of Syria; 
 or when, according unto the three strokes of 
 Joash with an arrow upon the ground, he fore- 
 told the number of his victories. For thereby 
 the spirit of God particulared the same, and de- 
 termined the strokes of the king unto three, 
 which the hopes of the prophet expected in twice 
 that number. 
 
 We are unwilling to enlarge concerning many 
 
 * Ezekiel xxi. 21. 
 
406 VULGAR ERRORS. 
 
 other; only referring unto sober examination, 
 what natural effects can reasonably be expected, 
 when to prevent the ephialtes or nightmare we 
 hang up a hollow stone in our stables ; when for 
 amulets against agues we use the chips of gal- 
 lows and places of execution ; when for warts 
 we rub our hands before the moon ; or commit 
 any maculated part imto the touch of the dead. 
 Swarms hereof our learned Selden and critical 
 philologers might illustrate, whose abler per- 
 formances our adventures do but solicit. Mean- 
 while I hope they will plausibly receive our 
 attempts, or candidly correct our misconjec- 
 tures. 
 
Miscellaneous Papers 
 
Fragment on Mummies. 
 
 ISE Egypt, prodigal of lier embalm- 
 ments, wrapped up her princes and 
 great commanders in aromatical 
 folds, and, studiously extracting 
 from corruptible bodies tlieir corruption, am- 
 bitiously looked forward to immortality; from 
 which vainglory we have become acquainted 
 with many remnants of the old world, who 
 could discourse unto us of the great things of 
 yore, and tell us strange tales of the sons of 
 Misraim, and ancient braveries of Egypt. Won- 
 derful indeed are the preserves of time, which 
 openeth unto us mummies from crypts and pyr- 
 amids, and mammoth bones from caverns and 
 excavations ; whereof man hath found the best 
 preservation, appearing unto us in some sort 
 fleshly, while beasts must be fain of an osseous 
 continuance. 
 
 In what original this practice of the Egyp- 
 40 
 
410 FRAGMENT ON MUMMIES. 
 
 tians had root, divers authors dispute ; while 
 some place the origin hereof in the desire to 
 prevent the separation of the soul, by keeping 
 the body untabified, and alluring the spiritual 
 part to remain by sweet and precious odours. 
 But all this was but fond inconsideration. The 
 soul, having broken its * * * *, is not stayed 
 by bands and cerecloths, nor to be recalled by 
 Sabsean odours, but fleeth to the place of invisi- 
 bles, the uhi of spirits, and needeth a surer than 
 Hermes's seal to imprison it to its medicated 
 trunk, which yet subsists anomalously in its 
 indestructible case, and, like a widow looking 
 for her husband, anxiously awaits its return. 
 
 Of Joseph it is said, that they embalmed 
 him; and he was put in a coffin in Egypt. 
 When the Scripture saith that the Egyptians 
 mourned for him three score and ten days, 
 some doubt may be made, from the practices 
 as delivered by Herodotus, who saith that 
 the time allowed for preserving the body and 
 mourning was seventy days. Amongst the 
 Rabbins, there is an old tradition, that Joseph's 
 body was dried by smoke, and preserved in the 
 river Nile, till the final departure of the children 
 of Israel from Eg^^^t, according to the Targum 
 of Uzziel. Sckichardus delivereth it as the 
 opinion of R. Abraham Seba, that this was 
 
FRAGMENT ON MUMMIES. 411 
 
 done in contempt of Egypt, as unworthy of the 
 depositure of that great patriarch ; also as a 
 type of the infants who were drowned in that 
 river, whereto Sckichardus subjoineth that it 
 was physically proper to prevent conniption. 
 The Kabbins likewise idly dream that these 
 bones were carried away by Moses about a 
 century after, when they departed into Egypt, 
 though how a coffin could be preserved m that 
 large river, so as to be found again, they are 
 not agreed ; and some fly after their manner 
 to Schem-hamphorasch, which most will regard 
 as vain babbhngs. 
 
 That mummy is medicinal, the Arabian Doc- 
 tor Haly delivereth, and divers confirm; but 
 of the particular uses thereof, there is much 
 discrepancy of opinion. While Hofmannus pre- 
 scribes the same to epileptics, Johan de Muralto 
 commends the use thereof to gouty persons ; 
 Bacon likewise extols it as a stiptic : and Jun- 
 kenius considers it of efficacy to resolve coagu- 
 lated blood. Meanwhile, we hardly applaud 
 Francis the First of France, who always car- 
 ried mummies with him as a panacea against 
 all disorders; and were the efficacy thereof 
 more clearly made out, scarce conceive the use 
 thereof allowable m physic, exceeding the bar- 
 barities of Cambyses, and turning old heroes 
 unto unworthy potions. Shall Egypt lend out 
 
412 FRAGMENT ON MUMMIES. 
 
 her ancients unto chirurgeons and apothecaries, 
 and Cheops and Psammitticus be weighed unto 
 us for druixs ? Shall we eat of Chamnes and 
 Amosis in electuaries and pills, and be cured 
 by cannibal mixtures ? Surely such diet is dis- 
 mal vampirism ; and exceeds in horror the black 
 banquet of Domitian, not to be paralleled except 
 in those Arabian feasts, wherein Ghoules feed 
 horribly. 
 
 But the common opinion of the virtues of 
 mummy bred great consumption thereof, and 
 princes and great men contended for this strange 
 panacea, wherein Jews dealt largely, manufac- 
 turing mummies from dead carcasses, and giving 
 them the names of kings, while specifics were 
 compounded from crosses and gibbet leavings. 
 There wanted not a set of Arabians who coun- 
 terfeited mummies so accurately, that it needed 
 great skill to distinguish the false from the tnie. 
 Queasy stomachs would hardly fancy the doubt- 
 ful potion, wherein one might so easily swallow 
 a cloud for his Juno, and defraud the fowls of 
 the air while in conceit enjoying the conserves 
 of Canopus. 
 
 Radzivil hath a strange story of some mum- 
 mies which he had stowed in seven chests, 
 and was carrying on shii)board from Egypt, 
 when a priest on the mission, wliile at his 
 
FRAGMENT ON MUMMIES. 413 
 
 prayers, was tormented by two ethnic spectres 
 or devils, a man and a woman, botli black and 
 horrible ; and at the same time a great storm 
 at sea, which threatened shipwreck, till at last 
 they were enforced to pacify the enraged sea, 
 and put those demons to flight by throwing 
 their mummy freight overboard, and so with 
 difficulty escaped. Wliat credit the relation 
 of the Avorthy person deserves, we leave unto 
 others. Surely, if true, these demons were Sa- 
 tan's emissaries, appearing in forms answerable 
 unto Hoinis and Mompta, the old deities of 
 Egypt, to delude unhappy men. For those 
 dark caves and mummy repositories are Saturn's 
 abodes, wherein he speculates and rejoices on 
 human vainglory, and keeps those kings and 
 conquerors, whom alive he bewitched, whole 
 for that great day, wlien he will claim his own, 
 and marshal the kings of Nilus and Thebes 
 in sad procession unto the pit. 
 
 Death, that fatal necessity which so many 
 would overlook, or blinkingly survey, the old 
 Egyptians held continually before their eyes. 
 Their embalmed ancestors they carried about 
 at their banquets, as holding them still a part 
 of their families, and not thrusting them from 
 their places at feasts. They wanted not like- 
 wise a sad preacher at their tables to admonish 
 them daily of death, surely an unnecessary 
 
414 FRAGMENT ON MUMMIES. 
 
 discourse while they banqueted in sepulchres. 
 Whether this were not making too much of 
 death, as tending to assuefaction, some reason 
 there is to doubt ; but certain it is that such 
 practices would hardly be embraced by our 
 modem gourmands, who like not to look on 
 faces of morta, or be elbowed by mummies. 
 
 Yet in those huge structures and pyramidal 
 immensities, of the builders whereof so little 
 is known, they seemed not so much to raise 
 sepulchres or temples to death, as to contemn 
 and disdain it, astonishing heaven with their 
 audacities, and looking forward with delight to 
 their interment in those eternal piles. Of their 
 living habitations they made little account, con- 
 ceiving of them but as hospitia, or inns, while 
 they adorned the sepulchres of the dead, and, 
 planting thereon lasting bases, defied the crum- 
 bling touches of time and the misty vaporous- 
 ness of oblivion. Yet all were but Babel vani- 
 ties. Time sadly overcometh all things, and 
 is now dominant, and sitteth upon a sphinx, 
 and looketh unto Memphis and old Thebes, 
 while his sister Oblivion reclineth semisomnous 
 on a pyramid, gloriously triumphing, making 
 puzzles of Titanian erections, and turning old 
 glories into dreams. History sinketh beneath 
 her cloud. The traveller, as he paceth amaz- 
 edly through those deserts, asketh of her, who 
 
FRAGMENT ON MUMMIES, 415 
 
 builded them? and she mumbleth somethino-, 
 but what it is he heareth not. 
 
 Egypt itself is now become the land of obliv- 
 iousness, and doteth. Her ancient civility is 
 gone, and her glory hath vanished as a phan- 
 tasma. Her youthfnl days are over, and her 
 face hath become wrmkled and tetric. She 
 poreth not upon the heavens, astronomy is dead 
 unto her, and knowledge maketh other cycles. 
 Canopus is afar oif, Memnon resoundeth not 
 to the sun, and Nilus heareth strange voices. 
 Her monuments are but hieroglyphically sem- 
 piternal. Osms and Anubis, her averruncous 
 deities, have departed, while Orus yet remains 
 dimly shadowing the principle of vicissitude 
 and the effluxion of tilings, but receive th little 
 oblation. 
 
On Dreams. 
 
 ALF our days we pass in tlie shadow 
 of the earth ; and the brother of 
 I death exacteth a third part of our 
 |r Hves. A good part of our sleep 
 is peered out with visions and fantastical ob- 
 jects, wherein we are confessedly deceived. 
 The day supplieth us with truths ; the night 
 with fictions and falsehoods, which uncomforta- 
 bly divide the natural account of our beings. 
 And, therefore, having passed the day in sober 
 labours and rational enquiries of truth, we are 
 fain to betake ourselves unto such a state of 
 being, wherein the soberest heads have acted 
 all the monstrosities of melancholy, and which 
 unto open eyes are no better than folly and 
 madness. 
 
 Happy are they that go to bed with gi'and 
 music, like Pythagoras, or have ways to com- 
 pose the fantastical spirit, whose unruly wan- 
 
ON DREAMS. . 417 
 
 clerings take off inward sleep, filling our heads 
 with St. Anthony's visions, and the di'eams of 
 Lipara in the soher chambers of rest. 
 
 Virtuous thoughts of the day lay up good 
 treasures for the night; whereby the impres- 
 sions of imaginary forms arise into sober simili- 
 tudes, acceptable unto our slumbering selves and 
 preparatory unto divine impressions.* Hereby 
 Solomon's sleep was happy. Thus prepared, 
 Jacob might well dream of angels upon a pillow 
 of stone. And the best sleep of Adam might 
 be the best of any after.f 
 
 That there should be divine dreams seems 
 unreasonably doubted by Aristotle. That there 
 are demoniacal dreams we have little reason to 
 doubt. Why may there not be angelical ? If 
 there be guardian spirits, they may not be in- 
 actively about us in sleep ; but may sometimes 
 order our dreams: and many strange hints, 
 instigations, or discourses, which are so amazing 
 unto us, may arise from such foundations. 
 
 But the phantasms of sleep do commonly 
 walk in the great road of natm^al and animal 
 
 * M,rtuous thoughts, ^-c] See an exquisite passage on Dreams 
 in Religio Medici {ante, pp. 145-147). 
 
 t the best sleep of Adam, ^-c] The only sleep of Adam re- 
 corded is that which God caused to fall upon him, and which 
 resulted in the creation of woman. It does not very clearly ap- 
 pear whether Sir Thomas calls it the best sleep of Adam in allu- 
 sion to its oriorin or its result. 
 
418 . ON DREAMS. 
 
 dreams, wherein the thoughts or actions of the 
 day are acted over and echoed in the night. 
 Who can therefore wonder that Chrysostom 
 should dream of St. Paul, who daily read liis 
 epistles ; or that Cardan, whose head was so 
 taken up about the stars, should dream that 
 his soul was in the moon ! Pious persons, 
 whose thoughts are daily busied about heaven, 
 and the blessed state thereof, can hardly escape 
 the nightly phantasms of it, which though some- 
 times taken for illummations, or divine dreams, 
 yet rightly perpended may prove but animal 
 visions, and natural night-scenes of their awak- 
 ing contemplations. 
 
 Many dreams are made out by sagacious 
 exposition, and from the signature of their 
 subjects ; carrying their interpretation in their 
 fundamental sense and mystery of similitude, 
 whereby, he that understands upon what natu- 
 ral fundamental every notion dependeth may, 
 by s}anbolical adaptation, hold a ready way to 
 read the characters of Morpheus. In dreams 
 of such a nature, Artemidorus, Aclmaet, and 
 Astrampsichus, from Greek, Eg^q^tian, and 
 Arabian oneiro-criticism, may hint some mter- 
 pretation: who, while we read of a ladder in 
 Jacob's dream, will tell us that ladders and 
 scalary ascents signify preferment; and wliile 
 we consider the dream of Pharaoh, do teach 
 
ON DREAMS. 419 
 
 us that rivers overflowing speak plenty, lean 
 oxen, famine and scarcity ; and therefore it 
 was but reasonable in Pharaoh to demand the 
 interpretation from his magicians, who, being 
 Eg\^otians, should have been well versed in 
 symbols and the hierogl}^hical notions of things. 
 The greatest tyrant in such divinations was 
 Nabuchodonosor, while, besides the interpre- 
 tation, he demanded the dream itself; which 
 being probably determined by divine immission, 
 might escape the common road of phantasms, 
 that might have been traced by Satan. 
 
 When Alexander, going to besiege Tyre, 
 dreamt of a Satyr, it was no hard exposition 
 for a Grecian to say, " Tyre will be thine." 
 He that dreamed that he saw his father washed 
 by Jupiter and anointed by the sun, had cause 
 to fear that he might be crucified, whereby his 
 body would be washed by the rain, and drop 
 by the heat of the sun. The dream of Ves- 
 pasian was of harder exposition ; as also that 
 of the Emperor Mauritius, concerning his suc- 
 cessor Phocas. And a man mio;ht have been 
 hard put to it to interpret the language of 
 ^sculapius, when to a consumptive person 
 he held forth his fingers ; implying thereby 
 that his cure lay in dates, from the homo- 
 nomy of the Greek, which signifies dates and 
 fingers. 
 
420 ON DREAMS. 
 
 We owe unto dreams that Galen was a phy- 
 sician, Dion an historian, and that the world 
 hath seen some notable pieces of Cardan ; yet, 
 he that should order his affairs by dreams, or 
 make the night a rule unto the day, might be 
 ridiculously deluded ; wherein Cicero is much 
 to be pitied, who having excellently discoursed 
 of the vanity of dreams, w^as yet undone by the 
 flattery of his own, which urged him to apply 
 himself unto Augustus. 
 
 However dreams may be fallacious concern- 
 ing outward events, yet may they be truly 
 significant at home ; and whereby we may more 
 sensibly understand ourselves. Men act in sleep 
 with some conformity unto their awaked senses; 
 and consolations or discouragements may be 
 drawn from dreams which intimately tell us 
 ourselves. Luther was not like to fear a spirit 
 in the night, when such an apparition would 
 not terrify him in the day. Alexander would 
 hardly have mn away in the sharpest combats 
 of sleep, nor Demosthenes have stood stoutly 
 to it, who was scarce able to do it in his pre- 
 pared senses. 
 
 Persons of radical integrity will not easily be 
 perverted in their dreams, nor noble minds 
 do pitifld things in sleep. Crassus would have 
 hardly been bountiful in a dream, whose fist 
 was so close awake. But a man might have 
 
ON DREAMS. 421 
 
 lived all his life upon the sleeping hand of An- 
 tonius.* 
 
 There is an art to make dreams, as well as 
 their interpretations ; and physicians will tell 
 us that some food makes turbulent, some gives 
 quiet dreams. Cato, who doated upon cab- 
 bage, might find the crude effects thereof in his 
 sleep ; wherein the Egyptians might find some 
 advantage by their superstitious abstinence from 
 onions. Pythagoras might have [had] calmer 
 sleeps, if he [had] totally abstained from beans. 
 Even Daniel, the great interpreter of dreams, 
 in his leguminous diet seems to have chosen 
 no advantageous food for quiet sleeps, accord- 
 ing to Grecian physic. 
 
 To add unto the delusion of dreams, the 
 fantastical objects seem greater than they are ; 
 and being beheld in the vaporous state of sleep, 
 enlarge their diameters unto us ; whereby it 
 may prove more easy to dream of giants than 
 pigmies. Democritus might seldom dream of 
 atoms, who so often thought of them. He 
 almost might dream himself a bubble extending 
 unto the eighth sphere. A little water makes 
 a sea ; a small puff of wind a tempest. A grain 
 of sulphur kindled in the blood may make a 
 
 * sleeping hand of Antonius.'] Who awake was open-handed 
 and liberal, in contrast with the close-Jistedness of Crassus, and 
 therefore would have been munificent in his dreams. 
 
422 ON DREAMS. 
 
 flame like ^tna; and a small spark in the 
 bowels of Olympias a lightning over all the 
 chamber. 
 
 But, beside these innocent delusions, there 
 is a sinful state of dreams. Death alone, not 
 sleep, is able to put an end unto sin ; and there 
 may be a night-book of our iniquities ; for beside 
 the transgressions of the day, casuists Avill tell 
 us of mortal sins in dreams, arising from evil 
 precogitations ; meanwhile human law regards 
 not noctambulos ; and if a night-walker should 
 break his neck, or kill a man, takes no notice 
 of it. 
 
 Dionysius was absurdly tyrannical to kill a 
 man for dreaming that he had killed him ; and 
 really to take away his life, who had but fan- 
 tastically taken away his. Lamia was ridicu- 
 lously unjust to sue a young man for a reward, 
 who had confessed that pleasure from her in a 
 dream which she had denied unto his awaking 
 senses: conceiving that she had merited some- 
 what from his fantastical fruition and shadow 
 of herself. If there be such debts, we owe 
 deeply unto sympathies ; but the common spirit 
 of the world must be ready in such arrearages. 
 
 If some have swooned, they may have also 
 died in dreams, since death is but a confirmed 
 swoonino;. Whether Plato died in a dream, 
 as some deliver, he must rise again to inform 
 
ON DREAMS. 
 
 423 
 
 us. That some have never dreamed is as im- 
 probable as that some liave never laiio-hed. 
 That children dream not the first half-year; 
 that men dream not in some countries, with 
 many more, are unto me sick men's dreams; 
 dreams out of the ivory gate,* and visions be- 
 fore midniojht. 
 
 * the ivory gate.] The poets suppose two gates of sleep, the 
 one of horn, from which true dreams proceed; the other of ivory, 
 which sends forth false dreams. 
 
 :^-^^ 
 
Letters. 
 
 To his Son, a Lieutenant of his Majesty's 
 ship the Marie Rose, at Portsmouth, 
 
 [May or June, 1667.] 
 
 ^'^ EAR SONNE, — I am very glad 
 yon are returned from the strayglits 
 month once more in health and 
 safetie. God continne his mercifull 
 providence over yon. I hope yon maintaine a 
 thankful heart and daylie bless him for your 
 great deliverances in so many fights and dan- 
 gers of the sea, whereto you have been exposed 
 upon several seas, and in all seasons of the 
 yeare. When you first under tooke this service, 
 you cannot butt remember that I caused you to 
 read the description of all the sea fights of note, 
 in Plutark, the Turkish history, and others; 
 and withall gave you the description of fortitude 
 left by Aristotle, " Fortitndinis est inconcussum 
 Bvo-irXyKTov a mortis metu et constantem in 
 
LETTERS. 425 
 
 malls et intrepidum ad pericula esse, et malle 
 honeste mori quam turpiter servari et victoria 
 causam praestare. Praeterea autem fortitudinis 
 est laborare et tolerare. Accedit autem fortitu- 
 dlni audacia et animi prsestantia et fiducia, et 
 confidentia, ad liasc industria et tolerantia." 
 That wliicli I then proposed for your example, 
 I now send you for your commendation. For, 
 to give you your due, in the whole cours of 
 this warre, both in fights and other sea affairs, 
 liazards and perills, you have very well fullfilled 
 this character in yourself. And allthough you 
 bee not forward in commending yourself, yett 
 others have not been backward to do it for you, 
 and have so earnestly expressed your courao-e, 
 valour, and resolution; your sober, studious, 
 and observing cours of life ; your generous and 
 obliging disposition, and the notable knowledge 
 you have obtayned in military and all kind of 
 sea affayres, that it aifoordeth no small comfort 
 unto mce. And I would by no meanes omitt 
 to declare the same unto yourself, that you 
 may not want that encouragement which you 
 so well deserve. They that do well need not 
 commend themselves ; others will be readie 
 enough to do it for them. And because you 
 may understand how well I have heard of you, 
 I would not omitt to communicate this unto 
 you. Mr. Scudamore, ygur sober and learned 
 41 
 
426 LETTERS. 
 
 cliaplaine, in your voyage witli Sir Jeremie 
 Smith, gives you no small commendations for 
 a sober, studious, courageous, and diligent per- 
 son ; tliat he had not met with any of the fleet 
 like you, so civill, observing, and diligent to 
 your charge, with the reputation and love of 
 all the shippe ; and that without doubt you 
 would make a famous man, and a reputation 
 to your country. Captain Fenne, a meere 
 rough seaman, sayd that if hee were to choose, 
 hee would have your company before any he 
 knewe. Mr. W. B. of Lynn, a stout volunteer 
 in the Dreadnought, sayd, in my hearing, that 
 you were a deserving person, and of as good 
 a reputation as any young man in the fleet. 
 Another, who was with you at Schellinck's, 
 highly commended your sobrietie, carefullnesse, 
 undaunted and lasting courage through all the 
 cours of the warre ; that you had acquired no 
 small knowledge in navigation, as well as the 
 military part. That you understood every thing 
 that belonged unto a shippe; and had been 
 so strict and criticall an observer of the shipps 
 in the fleet, that you could name any shippe 
 sayling at some distance ; and by some private 
 mark and observation which you had made, 
 would hardly mistake one, if seventie sliippes 
 should sayle at a reasonable distance by you. 
 You are much obliged to Sir Thomas Allen, 
 
LETTERS. 427 
 
 who upon all occasions speakes liiglily of you ; * 
 and is to be lielcl to the fleet by encouragement 
 and preferment: for I would not have him 
 leave the sea, which otherwise probably he 
 might, having parts to make himself consider- 
 able by divers other wayes. Mr. I. told mee 
 you were compleately constituted to do your 
 country service, honour, and reputation, as be- 
 ing exceeding faythfull, vaHant, diligent, gen- 
 erous, vigilant, observing, very knowing, and 
 a scholar. How you behaved yourself m the 
 Foresight, at the hard service at Bergen, in 
 Norway, captain Brookes, the commander, ex- 
 pressed unto many before his death, not long 
 after, in Suffolk ; and particularly unto my lord 
 of Sandwich, then admiral, which thoughe you 
 would not tell me yourself, yet was I informed 
 from a person of no ordinary qualitie, C. Har- 
 land, who when you came aboard the admiral 
 after the taking of the East India shippes, heard 
 my lord of Sandwich, to speak thus unto you. 
 '' Sir, you are a person Avliom I am glad to 
 see, and must be better acquainted with you, 
 upon the account which captain Brooke gave 
 mee of you. I must encom-age such persons 
 and give them their due, which will stand so 
 
 * There is evidently some omission here, either in the original 
 or the copy ; the following sentence appears to be Sir Thomas 
 Allen's remark, the beginning of which is apparently wanting. 
 
428 LETTERS. 
 
 firmelj and courageously unto it upon extrem- 
 ities, wherein true valour is best discovered. 
 Hee told mee you were the only man that 
 stuck closely and boldly to him unto the last, 
 and that after so many of his men and his 
 lieutenant was slayne, hee could not have well 
 knowne what to have done without you." Butt 
 beside these I must not fayle to tell you how 
 well I like it, that you are not only INIarti but 
 Mercurio, and very much pleased to find how 
 good a student you have been at sea, and 
 particularly with what success you have read 
 divers bookes there, especially Homer and Ju- 
 venal with Lubines notes. Beino; much sur- 
 prised to find you so perfect therein that you 
 had them in a manner without booke, and 
 could proceed in any verse I named unto you. 
 I am glad you can overcome Lucan. The 
 other bookes which I sent, are, I perceive, 
 not hard unto you, and having such industrie 
 adjoined unto your apprehension and memorie, 
 you are like to proceed [not only] a noble 
 navigator, butt a great schollar, which will be 
 much to your honour and my satisfaction and 
 content. I am much pleased to find that you 
 take the drauo;hts of remarkable things where 
 ere you go ; for that may bee very usefull, 
 and will fasten themselves the better in your 
 memorie 
 
LETTERS. 429 
 
 To his Son Edward, 
 
 Feb. 25, [1676 ?] 
 
 DEAR SONNE, — My neibour, Mr. Bick- 
 erclik, going towards London to-morrowe, 
 I would not deny him a letter ; and I have sent 
 by him Lucretius his six bookes Be Rerum 
 Natura, because you lately sent mee a quota- 
 tion out of that author, that you might have 
 one by you to find out quotations, which shall 
 considerably offer themselves at any time. Oth- 
 erwise I do not much recommend the reading 
 or studying of it, there being divers impieties 
 in it, and 't is no credit to be punctually versed 
 in it ; it containeth the Epicurean naturall phi- 
 losophie. Mr. Tenison, I told you, had written 
 a good poem, " contra huius sceculi Lucretianos^'^ 
 illustrating God's wisdome and providence from 
 anatome, and the rubrick, and use of parts, in 
 a manuscript dedicated to mee and Dr. Lawson, 
 in Latin, after Lucretius his style. With it 
 goes along a very litle Tullies offices, which 
 was either yours or your brothers ; 't is as re- 
 markable for the litle sise as the good matter 
 contained in it, and the authentick and classi- 
 call Latin. I hope you do not forgett to carry 
 a Greeke testament allwayes to church, you have 
 also the Greek or septuagent translation of the 
 other parts of scripture ; in reading those bookes, 
 
430 LETTERS. 
 
 a man learnes two good things together, and 
 
 profiteth doubly, in the language and the subject. 
 
 Happy is the temperate man. God send 
 
 all my friends that virtue. God blesse my 
 
 daughter Fairfax, my daughter Browne, and the 
 
 litle ones. 
 
 Your lovino; father. 
 
 To his Son Edward. 
 
 Dec. 15, [1679.] 
 
 DEARE SONNE, — Some thinck that 
 great age superannuates persons from the 
 vse of physicall meanes, or that at a hundred 
 yeares of age 'tis either a folly or a shame to 
 vse meanes to Hue longer, and yet I haue 
 knowne many send to mee for their seuerall 
 troubles at a hundred yeares of age, and this day 
 a poore woeman being a hundred and three 
 yeares and a weeke old sent to mee to giue her 
 some ease of the colick. The macrohii and long 
 liuers Avhich I haue knowne heere haue been of 
 the meaner and poorer sort of people. Tho. 
 Parrot was butt a meane or rather poore man. 
 Your brother Thomas gaue two pence a weeke 
 to John More, a scauenger, who dyed in the 
 hundred and second yeare of his life : and 't was 
 taken the more notice of that the father of 
 
LETTERS. 431 
 
 Sir John Sliawe, wlio marry ed my Lady Kill- 
 morey, and liuetli in London, I say that his 
 father, who had been a vintner, hued a hundred 
 and two yeares, or neere it, and dyed about 
 a yeare agoe. God send us to number our 
 dayes and fitt ourselues for a better world. 
 Times looke troublesomely ; butt you haue an 
 honest and peaceable profession which may em- 
 ploy you, and discretion to guide your words 
 
 and actions 
 
 Your lovinn father. 
 
 To his Son Edward. 
 
 Aug. 22, [i68o.] 
 
 DEAR SONNE, — I was very glad to re- 
 ceaue your last letter. God hath heard 
 our prayers, and I hope will blesse you still. If 
 the profitts of the next yeare come not up to 
 this, I would not haue you discouraged ; for the 
 profitts of no practise are equall or regular : and 
 you haue had some extraordinary patients this 
 yeare, which, perhaps, some yeares will not af- 
 ford. Now is your time to be frugall and lay 
 up. I thought myself rich enough till my chil- 
 dren grew up. Be carefull of your self, and 
 temperate, that you may bee able to go through 
 your practise ; for to attayne to the getting of 
 a thousand pounds a yeare requires no small 
 
432 LETTERS. 
 
 labour of body and mind, and is a life not much 
 lesse paynfull and laborious then that wch the 
 meaner sort of people go through. When you 
 putt out your money, bee well assured of the 
 assurance ; and bee wise therein from what your 
 father hath suffered. It is laudable to dwell 
 handsomely ; butt be not too forward to build, 
 or sett forth another mans howse, or so to fill it 
 that it may increase the fuell, if God should 
 please to send fire. The mercifiill God direct 
 you in all. Excesse in apparell and chargeable 
 dresses are got into the country, especially 
 among woemen ; men go decently and playn 
 enough. The last assizes tliere was a concourse 
 of woemen at that they call my lords garden in 
 Cunsford, and so richly dressed that some stran- 
 gers sayd there was scarce the like to bee seen 
 at Hide Park, which makes charity cold 
 
 Your loving father. 
 
 To his Son Edward, 
 
 Feb. 28, [1680-1.] 
 
 EAR SONNE, — I trust in God that you 
 are in health, which I dayly pray for. 
 A great part of our newes hath been, of late, 
 made out [of] severall elections, and the cir- 
 cumstances of them I am sorry to find 
 
 that the King of England is fayne to reduce his 
 
 D 
 
LETTERS. 433 
 
 howsehold expences to twelve thousand pounds 
 p. annum, especially hee having a farre greater 
 revenue then any of his predecessors. God 
 keepe all honest men from penury and want; 
 men can bee honest no longer then they can 
 give every one his due : in fimdo pardmonia 
 seldome recovers or restores a man. This rule 
 is to bee earned by all, vtere divitiis tanquam 
 moriturus^ et idem tanquam victurus parcito divi- 
 tiis. So may bee avoyded sordid avarice and 
 improvident prodigallity ; so shall not a man 
 deprive himself of God's blessings, nor throwe 
 away God's mercies ; so may hee bee able to 
 do good and not suffer the worst of evils. Two 
 earthern bottles floatting upon the sea, with 
 this motto, '•'• si collidimur fraiigimur^'^ is apply- 
 cable unto any two concernes whose interest 
 is united, and is to conserve one another ; which 
 makes mee sorry for this dissention between 
 the king and the people, that is, the major part 
 of them, as the elections declare. God send a 
 happy conclusion, and bee reconciled unto us, 
 and give us grace to forsake our sinnes, the 
 houtefeux and incendiaries of all. God blesse 
 you all. 
 
 Your loving father. 
 
 Dr. Donnes sermon is a very good one, and 
 so is Dr. Burnets and the Bishop of Oxford's. 
 
 42 
 
434 LETTERS. 
 
 To his Daughter, Mrs. Lyttktoji, 
 
 Sept. 15, [1681.] , 
 
 DEARE BETTY, — Tho it were noe 
 wonder this very tempestious and stormy 
 winter, yet I am sorry you had such an un- 
 comfortable sight as to behold a ship cast away 
 so neer you ; this is noe strange tho unwxlcom 
 sight at Yarmouth, Cromer, Winterton, and 
 sea towns : tho you could not saue them, I 
 hope they were the better for your prayers, 
 both those that perishd and those that scapd. 
 Some wear away in calmes, some are caried 
 away in storms: we come into the world one 
 way, there are many gates to goe out of it. 
 God giue us grace to fit and prepare our selues 
 for that necessity, and to be ready to leaue all 
 when and how so ever he shall call. The prayers 
 of health are most like to be acceptable ; sickness 
 may choak our devotions, and w^e are accepted 
 rather by our life then our death: we have a 
 rule how to lead the one, the other is uncertain, 
 and may come in a moment. God, I hope, 
 will spare you to serve him long, who didst 
 
 begin early to serve him Your self is not 
 
 impatient, you will haue noe cause to be sad : 
 giue no way unto melancholy, which is purely 
 sadnes without a reasonable cause 
 
LETTERS. 435 
 
 To his Son Edward. 
 
 Jan. 9, [1681 - 2.] 
 
 DEAR SONNE, — I presume you are care- 
 full of youi* health, and not only to 
 rega^Tie butt to conserve it. Long health is 
 apt to begett security, and God mercifully in- 
 terposeth some admonitions and rubbs to make 
 us consider ourselves, and to carry a warie 
 hand in our affayres of all kinds. The merciful 
 providence of God go ever with you, and contin- 
 ue to blesse you. Mr. Carpenter, who brought 
 the letters, is secretary of Jersey, and when 
 or whether hee goes back to Guernzey, I be- 
 leeve is uncertaine ; for, to obtaine com-eniency 
 of passage, the Jersey men come commonly to 
 Guernzey. I thinck you did wfell not to hazard 
 your self at that time by such a journey as to 
 Lewys, whereof part is very bad waye. I re- 
 member, when I was Y^ry yong, and I thinck 
 butt in coates, my mother carryed mee to my 
 grandfather Garawayes howse in Lewys. I 
 retaine only in my mind the idea of some roomes 
 of the howse, and of the church. Our maior 
 w^as sent for by a letter to appeare before the 
 king and counsell the weeke before Xmas ; 
 some chief brewers of Norwich and excisemen 
 had accused him for putting downe some ale- 
 houses, and denying to licence others, and hin- 
 
 42* 
 
436 LETTERS. 
 
 dring the kings profitt. Butt when hee had 
 shewen that he did butt what the law required 
 of him, that there were still an unreasonable 
 number of alehouses, and that they were a 
 great occasion of debaucherie and povertie in 
 the towne, so that the rates to the poore have 
 beene encreased eight hundred pounds more 
 then formerly, hee was dismissed with commen- 
 dations. His maiestie soone perceaved the ex- 
 cisemen and brewers made a cloake of his in- 
 terest for their owne, and would not have his 
 subjects debauched and impoverished upon his 
 
 account A great part of our newes is 
 
 of the king of Fez and Morocco's embassa- 
 dour, with his presents of lyons and oestridges. 
 I remember an embassadour who, in King 
 Charles the First's time, came from the king 
 of Morocco to help him to besiedge Sally, then 
 revolted from him ; hee besiedged it by land, 
 and the English with eight shipps by sea, and 
 so the town was taken. Hee brought with 
 him many gallant horses, for a present, with 
 strong tayles and very long maines, and pictures 
 thereof were taken ; and there is one still in 
 this towne ; and, at a gentleman's howse in the 
 country, the picture of the Moorish embassa- 
 dour on horseback, as hee rid through London 
 at his entry, as bigge as the life, which cost 
 fiftie pounds, and is a noble peece, about as 
 
LETTERS. 437 
 
 bigge as Titian's Charles the First on horse- 
 back, in the hall of the Duke's place. I am 
 glad my cosen Cradock is come of so well. Tis 
 hke my L. S. will sett still, and content to have 
 escaped such a danger. Love and blessing to 
 you, my daughter Browne, and you all, as also 
 from my wife; love from Franck, duty from 
 Tom. 
 
 Your loving father. 
 
 I doubt all my letters sent [to] Guernsey 
 within these two moneths lye still at South- 
 ampton ; the wind having continued southerly 
 and westerly at this time of yeare beyond ob- 
 servation, to the great detriment of many mar- 
 chands. 
 
Resolves. 
 
 [Found in one of Sir Thomas Browne's 
 
 CoMMONPLACE-BoOKS.] 
 
 Wl O be sure that no day pass, with- 
 out calhng upon God in a solemn 
 formed prayer, seven times within 
 the compass thereof; that is, in the 
 morning, and at night, and five times between ; 
 taken up long ago from the example of David 
 and Daniel, and a compunction and shame that 
 I had omitted it so long, when I heedfully read 
 of the custom of the Mahometans to pray five 
 times in the day. 
 
 To pray and magnify God in the night, and 
 my dark bed, when I could not sleep : to have 
 short ejaculations whenever I awaked ; and when 
 the four-o'clock bell * awoke me, or my first dis- 
 
 * A bell which tolls (or ought to toll, if the old sexton does 
 not oversleep himself ) in pursuance of the will of a person who, 
 after wandering about for a considerable time on Household 
 
RESOLVES. 439 
 
 covery of the light, to say the collect of our 
 liturgy, Eternal God, who hath safely brought 
 me to the beginning of tliis day, &c. 
 
 To pray in all places where privacy inviteth ; 
 in any house, highway, or street ; and to know 
 no street or passage in this city which may not 
 witness that I have not forgot God and my 
 Sa^TLOur in it : and that no parish or town where 
 I have been may not say the like. 
 
 To take occasion of praying upon the sight 
 of any church, which I see or pass by, as I ride 
 about. 
 
 Since the necessities of the sick, and una- 
 voidable diversions of my profession, keep me 
 often from church, yet to take all possible care 
 that I might never miss sacraments upon their 
 accustomed days. 
 
 To pray daily and particularly for sick pa- 
 tients, and in general for others, wheresoever, 
 howsoever, and under whose care soever ; and 
 at the entrance into the house of the sick, to 
 say. The peace and mercy of God be in this 
 place. 
 
 Heath, having lost his way in a winter-night's storm, at length 
 was directed to the city by the tolling of a bell in the Church of 
 St. Peter, Mancroft, the residence of Sir Thomas Browne. 
 
440 RESOLVES. 
 
 After a sermon, to make a thanksgiving, and 
 desire a blessing, and to pray for the minister. 
 
 In tempestuous weather, hghtning, and thun- 
 der, either night or day, to pray for God's 
 mercifol protection upon all men, and His mer- 
 cy upon their souls, bodies, and goods. 
 
 Upon sight of beautiful persons, to bless God in 
 his creatures, to pray for the beauty of their 
 souls, and to enrich them with inward 
 graces to be answerable unto the out- 
 ward. Upon sight of deformed 
 persons, to send them inward 
 graces, and enrich their 
 souls, and give them 
 the beauty of the 
 resurrection. 
 
 Cambridge : Electrotyped and Printed by "Welch, Bigelow, & Co. 
 
 * 740 
 
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