UC-NRLF 
 
 B 3 311 DMA 
 
 WILLIAM DRUMMOND 
 OF HAWTHORNDEN 
 HIS "CYPRESS GROVE" 
 
BERKELEY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 ssm of 
 
A 
 CYPRESS 
 GROVE 
 
*J. 
 
 
 
 
 A CYPRESS GROVE 
 
 
 
 BY WILLIAM DRUMMOND 
 
 
 
 OF HAWTHORN DEN 
 
 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 
 
 AND NOTES BY 
 
 
 
 SAMUEL CLEGG 
 
 
 
 AT THE HAWTHORNDEN 
 
 
 
 PRESS - - DEC. MDCOCCXIX 
 
 
 ■7/ 
 
 
 ^ 
 
It is not growing like a tree 
 
 In bulk, doth make Man better be ; 
 
 Or standing long an oak, three hundred year, 
 
 To fall a log at last, dry, bald and sere : 
 A lily of a day 
 Is fairer far in May, 
 Although it fall and die that night — 
 It was the plant and flower of Light. 
 
 In small proportions we just beauties see ; 
 
 And in short measures life may perfect be. 
 
 —BEN JONSON. 
 
PJUZfcZ 
 
 MAfK 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THE poems of William Drummond are 
 familiar to readers of anthologies and 
 to students alike, and with good reason, 
 for as a Poet his place is high and assured. 
 As a master of the sonnet form he ranks 
 with Sidney, Drayton and Shakespeare ; his 
 prose is less well known. 
 
 Drummond was born in 1585 at Haw- 
 thornden, his father's house overlooking 
 the Vale of the North Esk. 
 
 His is one of a small group of names, rug- 
 gedly termed autochthonal but peculiarly 
 pleasant to the ear, whose possessors one 
 likes to think were as lovely and pleasant 
 in their lives. 
 
 It includes Sir Thomas Browne of Nor- 
 wich, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, and a 
 few others. As country Scotsmen are so 
 generally known among themselves by their 
 home names Drummond's inclusion in the 
 group is perhaps less remarkable, but with all 
 is associated something of staid constancy, 
 some suggestion of the simple and pardon- 
 able pride of home. 
 
 3 J- 
 
Educated at the High School and Univer- 
 sity of Edinburgh, Drummond took his 
 degree of M.A. in 1605. Two years earlier 
 his father and uncle had shared in the 
 exodus of the Scottish Court consequent on 
 the accession of King James to the English 
 Throne, and m 1606 the young collegian 
 visited London. 
 
 His father's place and interest at Court 
 served Drummond well. His letters shew 
 with what zest he enjoyed the life of the 
 Town — seeing Court tourneys and masks — 
 coming, too, into touch with some of the 
 great writers of that stupendous time. 
 
 His diary gives a list of his reading — 
 including Shakespeare's "Love's Labours 
 Lost," " Romeo and Juliet," "A Midsummer 
 Night's Dream," Montemayor's "Diana," 
 Alexander's "Aurora," Sidney's "Arcadia," 
 and Lyly's " Euphues." 
 
 The permanence of the impressions he 
 received at this time is shown in his writ- 
 ings — then and later. 
 
 From London Drummond went to 
 Bourges where he stayed for about three 
 years. His reading at this time was largely 
 French, and again of writers who have their 
 reflection in his own writings, e.g., Ronsard 
 and Du Bartas. 
 
 In 1609 he was back in Scotland intend- 
 ing to enter the Law, for which he had 
 studied — a purpose frustrated by the death 
 of his father in 1610. 
 
 So as laird of Hawthornden, Drummond 
 
—putting aside Courtiersbip, Arms and Law 
 — entered on the life of the literate Scotch 
 landowner, carefully developing his estates 
 while— as says Bishop Sage— "the most part 
 of his time was spent in reading the best 
 books and conversing with the learnedest 
 men, which he improved to great advantage." 
 His' diary mentions as reading, Petrarch, 
 Tasso, Guarini, Sana^aro, Spenser, Drayton, 
 Bacon, and Jonson. 
 
 In 1612 commenced his long and honour- 
 able friendship with Sir William Alexander, 
 afterwards Earl of Stirling— the most con- 
 siderable Scots poet of the time. Next year 
 Alexander and Drummond published elegies 
 on the death of Henry, Prince of Wales. 
 
 In 1616 Drummond published a book of 
 lyric verse, and, in the following year, on 
 the occasion of the visit of King James to 
 Scotland, wrote a panegyrical welcome en- 
 titled " Forth Feasting." 
 
 An interesting correspondence with the 
 poet Drayton commenced in 1618, and, 
 what is much more interesting, Ben Jonson 
 visited Hawthornden the same year. 
 
 In 1623 appeared "Flowres of Sion," by 
 William Drummond, of Hawthonvdennc, 
 to which is adjoyned his "Cypresse Grove." 
 "A Cypress Grove" is the first of 
 DrummondV: prose works, and the only one 
 published m his life time. 
 
 Later works are " The History of Scot- 
 land from 1423 to 1542 "—published m 
 1655, and a number of essays, letters and 
 
 XI 
 
treatises whieh did not appear until the 
 publication of Drummond's collected works 
 in 1711, though some were evidently circu- 
 lated in manuscript when written. 
 
 In 1638 Drummond brought to com- 
 pletion his partial re -building of Hawthorn- 
 den, which had occupied many years. He 
 had built, as says the inscription over the 
 door, "ut honesto otio quiesceret." But 
 dour men in wynd and on moor were sign- 
 ing " The Covenant M before the mortar of 
 the new Hawthornden was dry, and the 
 following years were filled with fierce civil 
 strife, abhorrent in its sinful stupidity to so 
 retiring and philosophic a spirit as that of 
 Drummond. 
 
 His even mind saw both sides of a ques- 
 tion. Partisans thought so latitudinarian a 
 person saw too much of the other side and 
 treated him accordingly. 
 
 He had, however, his own quiet revenge, 
 for in successive papers — "The Magical 
 Mirror," "A Speech to the Noble Men, 
 Barons and Gentlemen who have leagued 
 themselves for the Defence of the Religion 
 and Liberty of Scotland," " The Loadstar," 
 and "Consideration to the Parliament," — 
 all written in 1639, he was faithful with 
 both sides, though ineffectually, for the strife 
 rose yet more high. 
 
 In 1640 Drummond lost his most es- 
 teemed friend Lord Stirling. He wrote a 
 further treatise, " SKIAMACHIA," blam- 
 ing " new presbyter " and " old priest " 
 
alike, and, for his pains, was still further 
 suspect of both parties. 
 
 Through the vicissitudes of the civil wars 
 DrummoncTs sympathy and active interest 
 were undoubtedly most largely with the 
 King, whose execution he survived less than 
 a year. 
 
 He died Dec. 4th, 1649, "to the great 
 grief and loss of all learned and good men," 
 and was buried in Lasswade church, close 
 by his beloved Hawthornden. 
 
 "A Cypress Grove " is the most consider- 
 able of Drummond's prose writings — all the 
 others being political and of comparatively 
 slight interest to-day. 
 
 Its faults are evident enough — it is long 
 drawn out and wordy. 
 
 But m those spacious times brevity was 
 not a common failing, and in his liking for 
 the phrase Drummond links with Sidney 
 and Raleigh rather than Bacon — though he 
 derives from all three. 
 
 To " derive " is perhaps a questionable 
 word to use, for in that great day pens 
 seem to have been dipped in common ink. 
 Possibly Drummond borrowed ; probably 
 he had a note book ; most writers of the 
 time seem to have had, — Bacon, Webster, 
 Jonson, certainly. 
 
 Some of the felicities we feel to be most 
 Drummond's own are — attributable. 
 
Drummond says : — "That is ever terrible 
 which is unknown ; so do little children 
 fear to go in the dark, and their fear is in- 
 creased with tales." 
 
 But Bacon had written : — "Men fear 
 death as children fear to go m the dark ; 
 and as that natural fear in children is 
 increased with tales — so is the other." 
 
 Drummond says : — "Days are not to be 
 esteemed after the number of them but 
 after the goodness ; more compass maketh 
 not a sphere more complete but as round is 
 a little as a large ring ; nor is that musician 
 more praiseworthy who hath longest played, 
 but he in measured accents who hath made 
 sweetest melody/ 1 
 
 But in Sylvester's translation of "Memor- 
 ials of Mortality," by Pierre Mathieu is : — 
 "Man's not more happy for long 
 living here 
 Number of Days do not more 
 
 Blisses bring 
 More compass makes not a more 
 
 complete sphere 
 As round's a little as a larger 
 
 rin g" 
 and in 1597 Lyly had written in "Euphues : 
 
 " For as neither he that singeth most or 
 
 prayeth longest, or ruleth the stern oftenest, 
 
 but he that doeth it best deserveth great- 
 
 est praise, so he not that hath most years 
 
 but many virtues, nor he that grayest hairs 
 
 but greatest goodness liveth longest. The 
 
 chief beauty of life consisteth not in the 
 
 xiv 
 
numbering of many days but in the using 
 of virtuous doings." 
 
 One of Drummond's loftiest passages is 
 that beginning : "Heaven, fore knowing 
 imminent harms taketh those which it loveth 
 to itself before they fall forth' 1 . . . which 
 but slightly paraphrases the great sonnet of 
 Pico della Mirandola : "It is a happy thing 
 when Heaven is friendly to us — to die 
 young, to complete one day then is better 
 than to wait until the evening/ 1 
 
 It is in the highest degree probable that 
 Drummond knew of Philippe de Mornay 
 whose person and writings were given a like 
 welcome at Elizabeth's Court. 
 
 Drummond has "They which have the 
 longest time lent ;hem to live in have almost 
 no part of it at all, measuring it either by 
 that space of time which is past, when they 
 were not or by that which is to come. . . . 
 . . . When thou hast lived to that age thou 
 desirest thou wilt . . . expect more to 
 come, 11 which is almost a repetition of 
 Mornay's "The longest age in comparison 
 of all that is past or all that is to come is 
 nothing ; and when thou hast lived to the 
 age thou now desirest all the past will be 
 nothing ; thou wilt still gape for that is to 
 come. 1 * The " Discours de la vie et de 
 !a mort 11 had been translated by Edward 
 Aggis and by the famous Countess of 
 Pembroke, the latter of whom has " So that 
 it is that not simply to live is a good — but 
 well and happily to live. 11 
 
 XV 
 
And to come to the fountain head of so 
 much that is wise and fine in the writings of 
 that splendid time — Seneca in Epistle 71 
 says " For to live is not absolutely good but 
 to live well/ 1 
 
 Like references could be multiplied over 
 and over again, but after all there is no 
 patent in a trope. If Drummond takes what 
 he wants from his foregoers he gives rich 
 gifts to those who come after him. If 
 Sidney influenced Drummond, Drummond 
 influenced Brown and Sterne, and so in our 
 later time Stevenson. 
 
 Writers of Drummond's temperament lie 
 peculiarly open to the charge of plagiarism. 
 The moderate man is as near one extreme 
 as the other, and thus is the common 
 denominator of opinion and expression. 
 
 Drummond was a forerunner of Halifax, 
 and like him might rightly have been dubbed 
 Trimmer. Like Falkland he was " of no 
 faction,' 1 and, a lonely figure amid the clash 
 of arms, ingeminated peace. 
 
 Like Montaigne he had the cross-bench 
 type of mind, and in his questioning and 
 tolerance lies his singular modernity. 
 
 Drummond's sober appeal to the common 
 experience owes its unwithstandable force to 
 its freedom from violence. His high and 
 serious mind is untroubled in contemplation 
 — as later in the hour and article — of death. 
 
 There is no note, however faint, of 
 regret, and always a careful avoidance of 
 the morbid. 
 
 xv\ 
 
His fancy dwells on the releases and 
 reliefs of death, so much so indeed, that in 
 one passage, with sudden apprehension of 
 the danger of his conclusions, he fears he 
 makes it a martyrdom to live. 
 
 A Platonist, his clear-eyed speculations 
 and frank reasonings with himself prove 
 how deeply he had drunk of the new -old 
 wine of Renaissance. 
 
 His style is as even and measured as his 
 thought. He has none of the crooked splen- 
 dours of Sir Thomas Browne, though the 
 two writers have not seldom been compared. 
 
 Like his philosophy his prose is ordered 
 and placid, save only where lifts and swells 
 the strong tide of Christian hope. 
 
 And in his pure serene, as in his lofty 
 courage in the face of fate, we may find 
 heart in the fears, and comfort for the 
 sorrows of this our own day. 
 
 S.C. 
 
 XYii 
 
^ 
 
 A Cypress Grove J^ #© J^ 
 
 THOUGH IT HATH BEEN 
 DOUBTED IF THERE BE 
 IN THE SOUL SUCH IM- 
 PERIOUS AND SUPEREXCEL- 
 LENT POWER, AS THAT IT 
 CAN, BY THE VEHEMENT AND 
 EARNEST WORKING OF IT, 
 DELIVER KNOWLEDGE TO 
 ANOTHER WITHOUT BODILY 
 ORGANS, AND BY ONLY CON- 
 CEPTIONS AND IDEAS PRO- 
 DUCE REAL EFFECTS ; YET IT 
 HATH BEEN EVER, AND OF 
 ALL, HELD, AS INFALLIBLE 
 AND MOST CERTAIN, THAT 
 IT OFTEN (EITHER BY OUT- 
 WARD INSPIRATION OR SOME 
 SECRET MOTION IN ITSELF) IS 
 AUGUR OF ITS OWN MISFOR- 
 TUNES, AND HATH SHADOWS 
 OF APPROACHING DANGERS 
 PRESENTED UNTO IT BEFORE 
 THEY FALL FORTH. HENCE 
 SO MANY STRANGE APPARI- 
 TIONS AND SIGNS, TRUE VIS- 
 
 18 
 
k 
 
 IONS, UNCOUTH HEAVINESS, 
 AND CAUSELESS LANGUISH- 
 INGS : OF WHICH TO SEEK A 
 REASON, UNLESS FROM THE 
 SPARKLING OF GOD IN THE 
 SOUL, OR FROM THE GODLIKE 
 SPARKLES OF THE SOUL, WERE 
 TO MAKE REASON UN- 
 REASONABLE, BY REASONING 
 OF THINGS TRANSCENDING 
 HER REACH. 
 
 HAVING, WHEN I HAD 
 GIVEN MYSELF TO REST IN 
 THE OUIET SOLITARINESS OF 
 THE NIGHT, FOUND OFTEN 
 MY IMAGINATION TROUBLED 
 WITH A CONFUSED FEAR, OR 
 SORROW ORHORROR, WHICH, 
 INTERRUPTING SLEEP, DID 
 ASTONISH MY SENSES, AND 
 ROUSE ME, ALL APPALLED 
 AND TRANSPORTED IN A 
 SUDDEN AGONY AND AMAZ- 
 EDNESS; OF SUCH AN UN- 
 ACCUSTOMED PERTURBA- 
 TION, NOT KNOWING, NOR 
 BEING ABLE TO DIVE INTO 
 
 19 
 
iiny apparent cause, carried away with the 
 stream of my (then doubting) thoughts, I 
 began to ascribe it to that secret fore- 
 knowledge and presaging power of the 
 prophetic mind, and to interpret such an 
 agony to be to the spirit, as a sudden faint- 
 ness and universal weariness useth to be 
 to the body, a sign of following sickness ; 
 or, as winter lightnings, earthquakes, and 
 monsters prove to commonwealths and 
 great cities, harbingers of wretched events, 
 and emblems of their hidden destinies. 
 
 Hereupon, not thinking it strange if 
 whatsoever is human should befall me, 
 knowing how Providence overcometh 
 grief, and discountenances crosses ; and that 
 as we should not despair in evils which 
 may happen us, we should not be too 
 confident, nor too much lean to those goods 
 we enjoy ; I began to turn over in my 
 remembrance all that could afflict miserable 
 mortality, and to forecast every accident 
 which could beget gloomy and sad appre- 
 hensions, and with a mask of horror show 
 itself to human eyes. Till in the end (as 
 by unities and points mathematicians are 
 brought to great numbers, and huge great- 
 
 20 
 
ness), after many fantastical glances of the 
 woes of mankind, and those encumbrances 
 which follow upon life, I was brought to 
 think, and with amazement, on the last of 
 human terrors, or, as one termed it, the last 
 of all dreadful and terrible evils — Death. 
 For to easy censure 1 it would appear that 
 the soul, if it can foresee that divorcement 
 which it is to have from the body, should 
 not without great reason be thus over- 
 grieved, and plunged in inconsolable and 
 unaccustomed sorrow ; considering their 
 near union, long familiarity and love, with 
 the great change, pain, and ugliness, which 
 are apprehended to be the inseparable 
 attendants of Death. 
 
 They had their being together ; parts 
 they are of one reasonable creature ; the 
 harming of the one is the weakening of the 
 working of the other. What sweet con- 
 tentments doth the soul enjoy by the senses ! 
 They are the gates and windows of its 
 knowledge, the organs of its delight. If it 
 be tedious to an excellent player on the 
 lute to endure but a few months the want 
 of one, how much more must the being 
 without such noble tools and engines be 
 
 21 
 
plaintfull to the soul ! And if two pilgrims 
 which have wandered some painful few 
 miles together, have an heartVgrief when 
 they are near to part, what must the sorrow 
 be at the parting of two so loving friends 
 and never-loathing lovers as are the body 
 and soul ! 
 
 Death is the sad estranger of acquaint- 
 ance, the eternal divorcer of marriage, the 
 ravisher of the children from their parents, 
 the stealer of parents from the children, 
 the interrer of fame, the sole cause of 
 forgetfulness, by which the living talk of 
 those gone away as of so many shadows, or 
 fabulous Paladins. 1 All strength by it is 
 enfeebled, beauty turned in deformity and 
 rottenness, honour in contempt, glory into 
 baseness : it is the unreasonable breaker-off 
 of all the actions of virtue ; by which we 
 enjoy no more the sweet pleasures on earth, 
 neither contemplate the stately revolutions of 
 the heavens. The sun perpetually setteth, 
 stars never rise unto us. It in one moment 
 depriveth us of what with so great toil and 
 care in many years we have heaped together. 
 By this are successions of lineages cut short, 
 kingdoms left heirless, and greatest states 
 
orphaned. It is not overcome by pride, 
 smoothed by flattery, tamed by entreaties, 
 bribed by benefits, softened by lamentations, 
 diverted by time. Wisdom, save this, can 
 alter and help anything. By Death we are 
 exiled from this fair city of the world ; it is 
 no more a world unto us, nor we anymore 
 people into it. The rums of fanes, palaces, 
 and other magnificent frames, yield a sad 
 prospect to the soul : and how should it 
 consider the wrack of such a w T onderful 
 masterpiece as is the body, without horror ? 
 Though it cannot well and altogether be 
 denied but that death naturally is terrible 
 and to be abhorred ; it being a privation of 
 life, and a not being, and every privation 
 being abhorred of nature and evil in itself, 
 the fear of it too being ingenerate 1 universally 
 in all creatures ; yet I have often thought 
 that even naturally, to a mind by only 
 nature resolved and prepared, it is more 
 ternble in conceit than in verity, and at the 
 first glance than when well pried into ; and 
 that rather by the weakness of our fantasy, 
 than by what is in it ; and that the marble 
 colours of obsequies, weeping, and funeral 
 pomp (with which we ourselves limn it 
 
 23 
 
forth) did add much more ghastliness unto 
 it than otherwise it hath. To aver which 
 conclusion, when I had recollected my over- 
 charged spirits, I began thus with myself. 
 
 If on the great theatre of this earth, 
 amongst the numberless number of men, 
 to die were only proper to thee and thine, 
 then undoubtedly thou hadst reason to 
 repine at so severe and partial a law. But 
 since it is a necessity, from the which never 
 an age by-past hath been exempted, and 
 unto which these which be, and so many 
 as are to come, are thralled (no consequent 
 of life being more common and familiar), 
 why shouldst thou, with unprofitable and 
 nothing availing stubbornness, oppose to so 
 unevitable and necessary a condition. This 
 is the highway of mortality, our general 
 home : behold, what millions have trod it 
 before thee, what multitudes shall after thee, 
 with them which at that same instant run ! 
 In so universal a calamity, if Death be one, 
 private complaints cannot be heard ? With 
 so many royal palaces, it is small loss to see 
 ihy poor cabin burn. Shall the heavens 
 stay their ever-rolling wheels (lor what is 
 the motion of them but the motion of 
 
 24 
 
a swift and ever-whirling wheel, which 
 twinneth 1 forth and again up-wmdeth our 
 life ?) and hold still Time, to prolong thy 
 miserable days, as if the highest of their 
 working were to do homage unto thee ? 
 Thy death is a piece of the order of this 
 All j a part of the life of this world ; for 
 while the world is the world, some crea- 
 tures must die, and others take life. Eternal 
 things are raised far above this orb of 
 generation and corruption, where the first 
 matter, like a still flowing and ebbing sea, 
 with diverse waves, but the same water, 2 
 keepeth a restless and never tiring current. 
 What is below, in the universality of the 
 kind, not in itself, doth abide ; Man a long 
 line of years hath continued, this man 
 every hundredth is swept away. This air- 
 encircled globe is the sole region of Death, 
 the grave, where everything that taketh life 
 must rot, the lists of fortune and change, 
 only glorious in the inconstancy and vary' 
 ing alterations of it ; which, though many, 
 seem yet to abide one, and being a certain 
 entire one, are ever many. The never- 
 agreeing bodies of the elemental brethren* 
 turn one in another : the earth changeth 
 
 25 
 
her countenance with the seasons, some- 
 times looking cold and naked, other times 
 hot and flowery. Nay, I can not tell how, 
 but even the lowest of those celestial bodies, 
 that mother of months, 1 and empress of 
 seas and moisture, as if she were a mirror 
 of our constant mutability, appeareth (by 
 her great nearness unto us) to participate of 
 our alterations, never seeing us twice with 
 that same face, now looking black, then 
 pale and wan, sometimes again in the per- 
 fection and fulness of her beauty shining 
 over us. Death here no less than life doth 
 act a part ; the taking away of what is old 
 being the making way for what is young. 
 This earth is as a table-book, and men are 
 the notes ; the first are washen out, that 
 new may be written in. They which fore- 
 went us did leave a room for us, and should 
 we grieve to do the same to those which 
 should come after us ? Who, being admitted 
 to see the exquisite rarities of some antiquary's 
 cabinet, is grieved, all viewed, to have the 
 curtain drawn, and give place to new 
 pilgrims ? And when the Lord of this 
 universe hath showed us the various wonders 
 of his amazing frame, should we take it to 
 
 26 
 
heart, when he thinketh time to dislodge ? 
 This is his unalterable and unevitable decree : 
 as we had no part of our will in our entrance 
 into this life, we should not presume of any 
 in our leaving it, but soberly learn to will 
 that which he wills, whose very willing 
 giveth being to all that it wills ; and adoring 
 the Orderer, not repine at the order and 
 laws, which ail-where, and all-ways, are so 
 perfectly established, that who would essay 
 to alter and amend any of them, he should 
 either make them worse, or desire things 
 beyond the level of possibility. All that is 
 necessary and convenient for us they have 
 bestowed upon us, and freely granted ; and 
 what they have not bestowed nor granted 
 us, neither is it necessary nor convenient 
 that we should have it. 
 
 If thou dost complain that there shall be 
 a time in the which thou shalt not be, why 
 dost thou not too grieve that there was a 
 time in the which thou wast not, and so that 
 thou art not as old as that enlifening planet 
 of time ? For, not to have been a thousand 
 years before this moment, is as much to be 
 deplored, as not to be a thousand after it, the 
 effect of them both being one : that will be 
 
 27 
 
after us which long long ere we were was. 
 Our children's children have that same 
 reason to murmur that they were not young 
 men in our days, which we have, to complain 
 that we shall not be old in theirs. The 
 violets have their time, though they empurple 
 not the winter, and the roses keep their 
 season, though they disclose not their beauty 
 in the spring. 
 
 Empires, states, kingdoms, have, by the 
 doom of the supreme providence, their fatal 
 periods ; great cities lie sadly buried in their 
 dust ; arts and sciences have not only their 
 eclipses, but their wanings and deaths ; the 
 ghastly wonders of the world, raised by the 
 ambition of ages, are overthrown and 
 trampled ; some lights above, deserving to 
 be entitled stars, are loosed and never more 
 seen of us ; the excellent fabric of this 
 universe itself shall one day suffer ruin, or a 
 change like a ruin ; and poor earthlings thus 
 to be handled complain ! 
 
 But is this life so great a good that the loss 
 of it should be so dear unto man ? If it be, 
 the meanest creatures of nature thus be 
 happy, for they live no less than he. If it 
 be so great a felicity, how is it esteemed of 
 
 28 
 
man himself at so small a rate, that for so 
 poor gains, nay, one disgraceful word, he 
 will not stand to lose it ? What excellency 
 is there in it, for the which he should desire 
 it perpetual, and repine to be at rest, and 
 return to his old Grandmother Dust ? Of 
 what moment are the labours and actions 
 of it, that the interruption and leaving-off 
 of them should be to him so distasteful, and 
 with such grudging lamentations received ? 
 
 Is not the entering into life weakness ? 
 the continuing sorrow ? In the one he is 
 exposed to all the injuries of the elements, 
 and like a condemned trespasser (as if it 
 were a fault to come to light), no sooner 
 born than fast manacled and bound : in the 
 other he is restlessly, like a ball, tossed in 
 the tennis-court of this world ; when he is 
 in the brightest meridian of his glory there 
 needeth nothing to destroy him but to let 
 him fall his own height ; a reflex of the sun, 
 a blast of wind, nay, the glance of an eye is 
 sufficient to undo him. How can that be 
 any great matter, of which so small instru- 
 ments and slender actions are masters ? 
 
 His body is but a mass of discording 
 humours, composed and elemented by the 
 
 29 
 
conspiring influences of superior lights, 1 
 which, though agreeing for a trace of time, 
 yet can never be made uniform and kept in 
 a just proportion. To what sickness is it 
 subject unto, beyond those of the other 
 sensible creatures ! no part of it being which 
 is not particularly infected and afflicted by 
 some one ; nay, every part with many, yea, 
 so many that the masters of that art can 
 scarce number or name them. So that the 
 life of divers of the meanest creatures of 
 nature hath with great reason by the most 
 wise been preferred to the natural life of 
 man ; and we should rather wonder how 
 so fragile a matter should so long endure, 
 than how so soon dissolve and decay. 
 
 Are the actions of the most part of men 
 much differing from the exercise of the 
 spider, that pitcheth toils and is tapist, 2 to 
 prey on the smaller creatures, and for the 
 weaving of a scornful web eviscerateth itself 
 many days ; which when with much in- 
 dustry finished, a little puff of wind carrieth 
 away both the work and the worker ? Or 
 are they not like the plays of children, or 
 (to bold them at their highest rate) as is a 
 May-game, a masque, or, what is more 
 
 30 
 
earnest, some study at chess ? Every day 
 we rise and lie down, apparel our bodies 
 and disapparel them, make them sepulchres 
 of dead creatures, weary them and refresh 
 them ; which is a circle of idle travails and 
 labours, like Penelope's task, unprofitably 
 renewed. Some time we are in a chase 
 after a fading beauty ; now we seek to 
 enlarge our bounds, increase our treasure, 
 living poorly, to purchase what we must 
 leave to those we shall never see, or, haply, 
 to a fool or a prodigal heir. Raised with 
 the wind of ambition, we court that idle 
 name of honour, not considering how they 
 mounted aloft in the highest ascendant of 
 earthly glory are but tortured ghosts, 
 wandering with golden fetters in glistering 
 prisons, having fear and danger their un- 
 separable executioners, in the midst of 
 multitudes rather guarded than regarded. 
 They whom opaque imaginations, and 
 inward thoughtfulness, have made weary of 
 the world's eye, though they have with- 
 drawn themselves from the course of vulgar 
 affairs, by vain contemplations, curious 
 searches, think their life away, are more 
 disquieted, and live worse than others, their 
 
 31 
 
wit being too sharp to give them a true 
 taste of present infelicities and to aggravate 
 their woes ; while they of a more shallow 
 and blunt conceit have want of knowledge 
 and ignorance of themselves, for a remedy 
 and antidote against all the grievances and 
 encumbrances of life. 
 
 What chameleon, what Euripe, 1 what 
 rainbow, what moon doth change so 
 oft as man ? He seemeth not the same 
 person in one and the same day ; what 
 pleaseth him in the morning is in the even- 
 ing distasteful unto him. Young, he scorneth 
 his childish conceits, and wading deeper in 
 years (for years are a sea, into which he 
 wadeth until he drown) he esteemeth his 
 youth unconstancy, rashness, folly ; old, he 
 beginneth to pity himself, plaining, because 
 he is changed, that the world is changed, 
 like those in a ship, which, when they 
 launch from the shore, are brought to think 
 the shore doth fly from them. He hath no 
 sooner acquired what he did desire, but he 
 beginneth to enter into new cares, and 
 desire what he shall never be able to acquire. 
 When he seemeth freed of evil in his own 
 estate, he grudgeth and vexeth himself at 
 
 32 
 
the happiness and fortunes of others. He 
 is pressed with eare for what is present, 
 with grief for what is past, with fear for 
 what is to eome, nay, for what will never 
 eome ; and as in the eye one tear draweth 
 another after it, so maketh he one sorrow 
 follow upon a former, and every day lay up 
 stuff of grief for the next. 
 
 The air, the sea, the fire, the beasts be 
 eruel executioners of man ; yet beasts, fire, 
 sea, and air, are pitiful to man in comparison 
 of man, for more men are destroyed by men, 
 than by them all. What scorns, wrongs, con- 
 tumelies, imprisonments, torments, poisons, 
 receiveth man of man ! What engines 
 and new works of death are daily found 
 out by man against man ! What laws to 
 thrall his liberty, fantasies and bugbears to 
 infatuate and inveigle his reason ! Amongst 
 the beasts is there any that hath so servile 
 a lot m another's behalf as man ? Yet 
 neither is content, nor he who reineth, nor 
 he who serveth. 
 
 The half of our life is spent in sleep ; 
 which hath such a resemblance to death, 
 that often it separates the soul from the 
 body, and teacheth it a sort of being above 
 
 33 
 
it, making it soar beyond the sphere of sensual 
 delights, and attain to knowledge unto 
 whieh, while the body did awake, it dared 
 scarce aspire. And who would not, rather 
 than remain chained in this loathsome galley 
 of the world, sleep ever (that is, die) having 
 all things at one stay, be free from those 
 vexations, disasters, contempts, indignities, 
 and many many anguishes, unto which this 
 life is envassaled and made thrall ? And, 
 well looked unto, our greatest contentment 
 and happiness here seemeth rather to consist 
 in an absence of misery, than in the enjoying 
 of any great good. 
 
 What have the dearest favourites of the 
 world, created to the patterns of the fairest 
 ideas of mortality, to glory in ? Is it 
 greatness ? Who can be great on so small 
 a round as is this earth, and bounded with 
 so short a course of time ? How like is 
 that to castles or imaginary cities raised in 
 the skies by chance-meeting clouds ; or to 
 giants modelled, for a sport, of snow, which 
 at the hotter looks of the sun melt away, 
 and lie drowned in their own moisture ! 
 Such an impetuous vicissitude touseth 1 the 
 estate of this world. But we have not yet 
 
 34 
 
attained to a perfect understanding of the 
 smallest flower, and why the grass should 
 rather be green than red. The element of 
 fire is quite put out, the air is but water 
 rarefied, the earth is found to move, and is 
 no more the centre of the universe, is turned 
 into a magnet ; stars are not fixed, but swim 
 in the ethereal spaces, comets are mounted 
 above the planets. Some affirm there is 
 another world of men and sensitive creatures, 
 with cities and palaces, in the moon : the 
 sun is lost, for it is but a light made of the 
 conjunction of many shining bodies together, 
 a cleft in the lower heavens, through which 
 the rays of the highest diffuse themselves ; 
 is observed to have spots. Thus sciences, 
 by the diverse motions of this globe of the 
 brain of man, are become opinions, nay, 
 errors, and leave the imagination in a 
 thousand labyrinths. What is all we know, 
 compared with what we know not ? We 
 have not yet agreed about the chief good 
 and felicity. It is perhaps artificial cunning. 
 How many curiosities be framed by the least 
 creatures of nature (who like a wise painter 
 showeth in a small portrait more ingine than 
 in a great) unto which the industry of the 
 
 35 
 
most curious arti^ns doth not attain ! Is 
 it riches ? What are they, but the idols of 
 fools, the casting out of friends, snares of 
 liberty, bands to such as have them, pos- 
 sessing rather than possessed, metals which 
 nature hath hid (foreseeing the great harms 
 they should occasion), and the only opinion 
 of man hath brought in estimation ? They 
 are like to thorns, which laid on an open 
 hand are easily blown away, and wound the 
 closing and hard-gripping. Prodigals mis- 
 spend them, wretches mis-keep them : when 
 we have gathered the greatest abundance, 
 we ourselves can enjoy no more of them 
 than so much as belongs to one man. They 
 take not away want, but occasion it : what 
 great and rich men do by others, the meaner 
 and more contented sort do by themselves. 
 Will some talk of our pleasures ? It is not, 
 though in the fables, told out of purpose, that 
 Pleasure, in haste being called up to heaven, 
 to disburthen herself and become more light, 
 did here leave her apparel, which Sorrow 
 (then naked, forsaken, and wandering) 
 finding, did afterwards attire herself with 
 And if we would say the truth of most of 
 our joys, we must confess them to be but 
 
 3* 
 
disguised sorrows : remorse ever ensueth 
 them, and (being the heirs of displeasure) 
 seldom do they appear, exeept sadness and 
 some wakening grief hath really preeeded 
 and forewent them. Will some ladies 
 vaunt of their beauty ? That is but skin- 
 thiek, of two senses only known, short 
 even of marble statues and pictures ; not 
 the same to all eyes, dangerous to the be- 
 holder, and hurtful to the possessor ; an 
 enemy to chastity, a frame made to delight 
 others more than those which have it, a 
 superficial varnish hiding bones and the 
 brains, things fearful to be looked upon : 
 growth in years doth blast it, or sickness or 
 sorrow preventing them. Our strength, 
 matched with that of the unreasonable 
 creatures, is but weakness. All we can set 
 our eyes upon in these intricate mazes of 
 life is but alchemy, vain perspective, and 
 deceiving shadows, appearing far otherwise 
 afar off, than when enjoyed and looked 
 upon at a near distance. O ! who, if before 
 he had a being he could have knowledge 
 of the manifold miseries of it, would enter 
 this woeful hospital of the world, and 
 accept of life upon such hard conditions ? 
 
 37 
 
If death be good, why should it be feared, 
 and if it be the work of nature, how should 
 it not be good ? For nature is an ordi- 
 nance, disposition, and rule which God 
 hath established in creating this universe, 
 as is the law of a King which can not err. 
 For how should the maker of that ordi- 
 nance err, sith in him there is no impotency 
 and weakness, by the which he might bring 
 forth what is unperfect, no perverseness of 
 will, of which might proceed any vicious 
 action, no ignorance, by the w T hich he might 
 go wrong in working ; being most power- 
 ful, most good, most wise, nay, all-wise, 
 all-good, all-powerful ? He is the first 
 orderer, and marshalleth every other order; 
 the highest essence, giving essence to all 
 other things ; of all causes the cause. He 
 worketh powerfully, bounteously, wisely, 
 and maketh nature (his artificial organ) do 
 the same. How is not death of nature, sith 
 what is naturally generate is subject to cor- 
 ruption, and sith such an harmony, which 
 is life, arising of the mixture of the four 
 elements, which are the ingredients of our 
 bodies, can not ever endure ; the contrarie- 
 ties of their qualities, as a consuming rust 
 
 38 
 
in the baser metals, being an inward cause 
 of a necessary dissolution ? O of frail and 
 instable things the constant, firm, and eternal 
 order ! For even in their changes they 
 keep ever universal, ancient, and uncor- 
 ruptible laws. 
 
 Again, how (jan death be evil, sith it is 
 the thaw of all these vanities which the 
 frost of life bindeth together ? If there be 
 a satiety in life, then must there not be a 
 sweetness in death ? Man were an intoler- 
 able thing, were he not mortal ; the earth 
 were not ample enough to contain her off- 
 spring, if noAe died. In two or three ages, 
 without death, what an unpleasant and 
 lamentable spectacle were the most flourish- 
 ing cities ! For, what should there be to be 
 seen in. them, save bodies languishing and 
 courbing again unto the earth, pale dis- 
 figured faces, skeletons instead of men ? 
 And what to be heard, but the exclama- 
 tions of the young, complaints of the old, 
 with the pitiful cries of sick and pining 
 persons ? There is almost no infirmity 
 worse than age. 
 
 If there be any evil in death, it would 
 appear to be that pain and torment which 
 
 39 
 
we apprehend to arise from the breaking of 
 those strait bands which keep the soul and 
 body together ; which, sith not without 
 great struggling and motion, seemeth to 
 prove itself vehement and most extreme. 
 The senses are the only cause of pain, but 
 before the last trances of death they are so 
 brought under, that they have no, or very 
 little, strength ; and their strength lessening, 
 the strength of pain too must be lessened. 
 How should we doubt but the weakness 
 of sense lesseneth pain, sith we know 
 that weakened and maimed parts which 
 receive not nourishment, are a great deal 
 less sensible than the other parts of the 
 body ; and see that old, strengthless, 
 decrepit persons leave this w T orld almost 
 without pain, as in a sleep ? If bodies of 
 the most sound and wholesome constitution 
 be those which most vehemently feel pain, 
 it must then follow that they of a dis- 
 tempered and crazy constitution have least 
 feeling of pain ; and by this reason, all weak 
 and sick bodies should not much feel pain ; 
 for if they were not distempered and evil 
 complexioned, they would not be sick. 
 That the sight, hearing, taste, smelling, leave 
 
 40 
 
us without pain, and unawares, we are 
 undoubtedly assured ; and why should we 
 not think the same of the feeling ? That 
 by which we are capable of feeling, is the 
 vital spirits animated by the brain, which, 
 in a man in perfect health, by veins and 
 arteries are spread and extended through the 
 whole body, and hence it is that the whole 
 body is capable of pain ; but in dying 
 bodies we see that by pauses and degrees 
 those parts which are furthest removed 
 from the heart become cold, and being 
 deprived of natural heat, all the pain which 
 they feel, is that they do feel no pain. 
 Now, even as, ere the sick be aware, the 
 vital spirits have withdrawn themselves 
 from the whole extension of the body, to 
 succour the heart (like distressed citizens 
 which, finding their walls battered down, 
 fly to the defence of their citadel), so do 
 they abandon the heart without any sen- 
 sible touch ; as the flame, the oil failing, 
 leaveth the wick, or as the light the air 
 which it doth invest. As to those shrink- 
 ing motions and convulsions of sinews and 
 members, which appear to witness great 
 pain, let one represent to himself the strings 
 
 u 
 
of a high-tuned lute, which, breaking, retire 
 to their natural windings, or a piece of ice, 
 that without any outward violence cracketh 
 at a thaw : no otherwise do the sinews of 
 the body, finding themselves slack and un- 
 bended from the brain, and their wonted 
 labours and motions cease, struggle, and 
 seem to stir themselves, but without either 
 pain or sense. Swooning is a true portrait 
 of death, or rather it is the same, being a 
 cessation from all action, motion, and func- 
 tion of sense and life ; but in swooning 
 there is no pain, but a silent rest, and so 
 deep and sound a sleep, that the natural is 
 nothing in comparison of it. What great 
 pain then can there be in death, which is 
 but a continued swooning, a sweet ignor- 
 ance of cares, and a never again returning 
 to the works and dolorous felicity of life ? 
 The wise and all-provident Creator hath 
 made death by many signs of pain appear 
 terrible, to the effect, that if man, for relief 
 of miseries and present evils, should have 
 unto it recourse, it being (apparently) a 
 worser, he should rather constantly endure 
 what he knoweth, than have refuge unto 
 that which he feareth and knoweth not. 
 
 42 
 
The terrors of death seem the guardians 
 of life. 
 
 Now although death were an extreme 
 pain, sith it comes in an instant, what can 
 it be ? Why should we fear it, for, while 
 we are, it cometh not, and it being come, 
 we are no more ? Nay, though it were 
 most painful, long continuing, and terrible- 
 ugly, why should we fear it, sith fear is a 
 foolish passion but where it may preserve ? 
 But it cannot preserve us from death ; yea, 
 rather fear maketh us to meet with that 
 which we would shun, and banishing the 
 comforts of present contentments, bringeth 
 death more near unto us. That is ever 
 terrible which is unknown ; so do little 
 children fear to go in the dark, and their 
 fear is increased with tales. 
 
 But that, perhaps, which auguisheth thee 
 most, is to have this glorious pageant of the 
 world removed from thee in the prime and 
 most delicious season of thy life ; for, 
 though to die be usual, to die young may 
 appear extraordinary. If the present fruition 
 of these things be unprofitable and vain, 
 what can a long continuance of them be ? 
 If God had made life happier, he had also 
 
 43 
 
made it longer. Stranger and new Halcyon, 
 why wouldst thou longer nestle amidst 
 these unconstant and stormy waves ? Hast 
 thou not already suffered enough of this 
 world, but thou must yet endure more ? 
 To live long, is it not to be long troubled ? 
 But number thy years, which are now ( ), 
 and thou shalt find, that whereas ten have 
 over4ived thee, thousands have not at- 
 tained this age. One year is sufficient to 
 behold all the magnificence of nature, nay, 
 even one day and night ; for more, is but 
 the same brought again. This sun, that 
 moon, these stars, the varying dance of the 
 spring, summer, autumn, winter, is that very 
 same which the golden age did see. They 
 which have the longest time lent them to 
 live in, have almost no part of it at all, 
 measuring it either by that space of time 
 which is past, when they were not, or by 
 that which is to come. Why shouldst thou 
 then care whether thy days be many or 
 few, which, when prolonged to the utter- 
 most, prove, paralleled with eternity, as a 
 tear is to the ocean ? To die young, is to 
 do that soon, and in some fewer days, 
 which once thou must do ; it is but the 
 
 44 
 
giving over of a game that (after never so 
 many hazards) must be lost. When thou 
 hast lived to that age thou desirest, or one 
 of Plato's years, 1 so soon as the last of thy 
 days riseth above thy horizon, thou wilt 
 then as now demand longer respite, and 
 expect more to come. The oldest are most 
 unwilling to die. It is hope of long life 
 that maketh life seem short. Who will 
 behold, and with the eyes of judgment 
 behold, the many changes depending on 
 human affairs, with the after-claps of for- 
 tune, shall never lament to die young. 
 Who knoweth what alterations and sudden 
 disasters in outward estate, or inward con- 
 tentments, in this wilderness of the world, 
 might have befallen him who dieth young, 
 if he had lived to be old ? Heaven, fore- 
 knowing imminent harms, taketh those 
 which it loveth to itself, before they fall 
 forth. Death in youth is like the leaving a 
 superfluous feast, before the drunken cups be 
 presented and walk about. Pure and (if we 
 may so say) virgin souls carry their bodies 
 with no small agonies, and delight not to 
 remain long in the dregs of human corrup- 
 tion, still burning with a desire to turn back 
 
 45 
 
to the place of their rest ; for this world is 
 their inn, and not their home. That which 
 may fall forth every hour, can not fall out of 
 time. Life is a journey in a dusty way, the 
 furthest rest is death ; in this some go more 
 heavily burthened than others : swift and 
 active pilgrims come to the end of it in the 
 morning, or at noon, which tortoise-paced 
 wretches, clogged with the fragmentary 
 rubbish of this world, scarce with great 
 travel crawl unto at midnight. Days arc 
 not to be esteemed after the number of 
 them, but after the goodness : more com- 
 pass maketh not a sphere more complete, 
 but as round is a little as a large ring ; nor 
 is that musician most praiseworthy who 
 hath longest played, but he in measured 
 accents who hath made sweetest melody ; 
 to live long hath often been a let to live 
 well. Muse not how many years thou 
 might'st have enjoyed life, but how sooner 
 thou might'st have lost it ; neither grudge 
 so much that it is no better, as comfort thy- 
 self that it hath been no worse : let it suffice 
 that thou hast lived till this day, and (after 
 the course of this world) not for nought ; 
 thou hast had some smiles of fortune, 
 
 46 
 
favours of the worthiest, some friends, and 
 thou hast never been disfavoured of the 
 heaven. 
 
 Though not for life itself, yet that to after 
 worlds thou might'st leave some monument 
 that once thou wast, haply in the clear light 
 of reason it would appear that life were 
 earnestly to be desired : for sith it is de- 
 nied us to live ever (said one), let us leave 
 some worthy remembrance of our once 
 here being, and draw out this span of life 
 to the greatest length and so far as is 
 possible. O poor ambition ! to what, I pray 
 thee, may'st thou concredit 1 it ? Arches 
 and stately temples, which one age doth 
 raise, doth not another rase ? Tombs and 
 adopted pillars lie buried with those which 
 were in them buried. Hath not avarice 
 defaced what religion did make glorious ? 
 All that the hand of man can uprear, is 
 cither overturned by the hand of man, or 
 at length by standing and continuing con- 
 sumed : as if there were a secret opposition 
 m Fate (the unevitable decree of the 
 Eternal) to control our industry, and 
 countercheck all our devices and proposing. 
 Possessions are not enduring, children lose 
 
 47 
 
their names, families glorying, like marigolds 
 in the sun, on the highest top of wealth 
 and honour, no better than they which are 
 not yet born, leaving off to be. So doth 
 heaven confound what we endeavour by 
 labour and art to distinguish. That renown 
 by papers, 1 which is thought to make men 
 immortal, and which nearest doth approach 
 the life of those eternal bodies above, how 
 slender it is, the very word of paper doth 
 import ; and what is it when obtained, but 
 a flourish of words, which coming times 
 may scorn ? How many millions never 
 hear the names of the most famous writers ; 
 and amongst them to whom they are 
 known, how few turn over their pages ; 
 and of such as do, how many sport at their 
 conceits, taking the verity for a fable, and 
 oft a fable for verity, or (as we do pleasants)* 2 
 use all for recreation ? Then the arising of 
 more famous, doth darken, put down, and 
 turn ignoble the glory of the former, being 
 held as garments worn out of fashion. 
 Now, when thou hast attained what praise 
 thou couldst desire, and thy fame is em- 
 blazoned in many stories, never after to be 
 either shadowed or worn out, it is but an 
 
 48 
 
echo, a mere sound, a glow-worm, which, 
 seen afar, casteth some cold beams, but 
 approached is found nothing, an imaginary 
 happiness, whose good depends on the 
 opinion of others. Desert and virtue for the 
 most part want monuments and memory, 
 seldom are recorded in the volumes of 
 admiration, nay, are often branded with 
 infamy, while statues and trophies are 
 erected to those whose names should have 
 been buried in their dust, and folded up in 
 the darkest clouds of oblivion: 1 so do the 
 rank weeds in this garden of the world 
 choke and over-run the sweetest flowers. 
 Applause w T hilst thou livest, serveth but to 
 make thee that fair mark against which 
 envy and malice direct their arrows, and 
 when thou art wounded, all eyes are turned 
 towards thee (like the sun, which is most 
 gased on in an eclipse), not for pity or 
 praise, but detraction. At the best, it but 
 rcsembleth that Syracusan's sphere of crys- 
 tal, not so fair as frail ; and, born after thy 
 death, it may as well be ascribed to some of 
 those were in the Trojan horse, or to such 
 as are yet to be born an hundred years 
 hereafter, as to thee, who nothing knows, 
 
 49 
 
and art of all unknown. What can it 
 avail thcc to be talked of, whilst thou art 
 not ? Consider in what bounds our fame is 
 confined, how narrow the lists are of human 
 glory, and the furthest she can stretch 
 her wings. This globe of the earth and 
 water, which seemeth huge to us, in respect 
 of the universe, compared with that wide, 
 wide pavilion of heaven, is less than little, 
 of no sensible quantity, and but as a point : 
 for the horizon, which boundeth our sight, 
 divideth the heavens as in two halves, hav- 
 ing always six of the Zodiac signs above, 
 and as many under it, which, if the earth 
 had any quantity compared to it, it could 
 not do. More, if the earth were not as a 
 point, the stars could not still in all parts of 
 it appear to us as of a like greatness ; for 
 where the earth raised itself in mountains, 
 we being more near to heaven, they would 
 appear to us of a greater quantity, and 
 where it is humbled in valleys, we being 
 further distant, they would seem unto us 
 less : but the stars in all parts of the earth 
 appearing of a like greatness, and to every 
 part of it the heaven imparting to our sight 
 the half of its inside, we must avouch it to 
 
 50 
 
be but as a point. Well did one compare 
 it to an ant-hill, and men (the inhabitants) 
 to so many pismires and grasshoppers, m 
 the toil and variety of their diversified 
 studies. Now of this small indivisible thing, 
 thus compared, how much is covered with 
 waters ? How much not at all discovered ? 
 how much uninhabited and desert ? and 
 how many millions of millions are they, 
 which share the remnant amongst them, in 
 languages, customs, divine rites differing, 
 and all almost to others unknown ? But 
 let it be granted that glory and fame are 
 some great matter, are the life of the dead, 
 and can reach heaven itself, sith they are 
 oft buried with the honoured, and pass 
 away in so fleet a revolution of time, what 
 great good can they have in them ? How 
 is not glory temporal, if it increase with 
 years and depend on time? Then 
 imagine me (for what can not imagination 
 reach unto ?) one could be famous in all 
 times to come, and over the whole world 
 present ; yet shall he be for ever obscure 
 and ignoble to those mighty ones, which 
 were only heretofore esteemed famous, 
 amongst the Assyrians, Persians, Romans, 
 
 51 
 
Again, the vain affectation of man is so sup- 
 pressed, that though his works abide some 
 space, the worker is unknown : the huge 
 Egyptian pyramids, and that grot in 
 Pausilipo, 1 though they have wrestled with 
 time, and worn upon the waste of days, 
 yet are their authors no more known, than 
 it is known by what strange earthquakes 
 and deluges isles were divided from the 
 continent, or hills bursted forth of the 
 valleys. Days, months, and years are swal' 
 lowed up in the great gulf of time (which 
 puts out the eyes of all their glory), and 
 only a fatal oblivion remains : of so many 
 ages past, we may well figure to ourselves 
 some likely appearances, but can affirm little 
 certainty. 
 
 But, my soul, what aileth thee, to be thus 
 backward and astonished at the remem- 
 brance of death, sith it doth not reach thee, 
 more than darkness doth those far-shining 
 lamps above ? Rouse thyself for shame ; 
 why shouldst thou fear to be without a 
 body, sith thy Maker, and the spiritual and 
 supercelestial inhabitants have no bodies ? 
 Hast thou ever seen any prisoner, who, 
 when the jail gates were broken up, and he 
 
 52 
 
enfranchised and set loose, would rather 
 plain and sit still on his fetters than seek his 
 freedom ? Or any mariner, who, in the 
 midst of storms arriving near the shore, 
 would launch forth again unto the main, 
 rather than strike sail and joyfully enter 
 the leas of a safe harbour ? If thou rightly 
 know thyself, thou hast but small cause of 
 anguish ; for, if there be any resemblance 
 of that which is infinite in what is finite 
 (which yet by an infinite imperfection is 
 from it distant), if thou be not an image, 
 thou art a shadow of that unsearchable 
 Trinity, m thy three essential powers, 
 Understanding, Will, Memory ; which, 
 though three, are in thee but one, and 
 abiding one, are distinctly three. But in 
 nothing more comest thou near that sover- 
 eign Good than by thy perpetuity, which 
 who strive to improve, 1 by that same do it 
 prove : like those that by arguing them- 
 selves to be without all reason, by the very 
 arguing show how they have some. For, 
 how can what is wholly mortal more think 
 upon, consider, or know that which is 
 immortal, than the eye can know sounds, 
 or the ear discern of colours ? If none had 
 
 53 
 
eyes, who would ever dispute of light or 
 shadow ? And if all were deaf, who would 
 descant of music ? To thee nothing in this 
 visible world is comparable : thou art so 
 wonderful a beauty, and so beautiful a 
 wonder, that if but once thou couldst be 
 gased upon by bodily eyes, every heart 
 would be inflamed with thy love, and rav- 
 ished from all servile baseness and earthly 
 desires. Thy being depends not on matter; 
 hence by thine understanding dost thou dive 
 into the being of every other thing ; and 
 therein art so pregnant, that nothing by 
 place, similitude, subject, time, is so con- 
 joined, which thou canst not separate ; as 
 what neither is, nor any ways can exist 5 
 thou canst feign and give an abstract being 
 unto. Thou seemest a world in thyself, 
 containing heaven, stars, seas, earth, floods, 
 mountains, forests, and all that lives : yet 
 rests thou not satiate with what is in thy- 
 self, nor with all in the wide universe 
 (because thou knowest their defects), until 
 thou raise thyself to the contemplation of 
 that first illuminating Intelligence, far above 
 time, and even reaching eternity itself, into 
 which thou art transformed ; for, by receiv- 
 
 $4 
 
ing, thou, beyond all other things, art made 
 that which thou receivcst. The more thou 
 knowest the more apt thou art to know, 
 not being amazed 1 with any object that 
 excelleth in predominance, as sense by 
 objects sensible. Thy will is uncompellable, 
 resisting force, daunting necessity, despising 
 danger, triumphing over affliction, unmoved 
 by pity, and not constrained by all the toils 
 and disasters of life. What the arts- master 
 of this universe is in governing this uni- 
 verse, thou art in the body ; and as he is 
 wholly in every part of it, so art thou 
 wholly in every part of the body : like 
 unto a mirror, every small parcel of which 
 apart doth represent and do the same, what 
 the whole did entire and together. By thee 
 man is that Hymen of eternal and mortal 
 things, that chain, together binding un- 
 bodied and bodily substances, without 
 which the goodly fabric of this world were 
 unperfect. Thou hast not thy beginning 
 from the fecundity, power, nor action of the 
 elemental qualities, being an immediate 
 masterpiece of that great Maker. Hence 
 hast thou the forms and figures of all things 
 imprinted in thee from thy first original, 
 
 55 
 
Thou only at once art capable of contraries ; 
 of the three parts of time thou makest but 
 one ; thou knowest thyself so separate, 
 absolute, and diverse an essence from thy 
 body, that thou disposest of it as it pleaseth 
 thee, for in thee there is no passion so weak 
 which mastereth not the fear of leaving it. 
 Thou shouldst be so far from repining at 
 this separation, that it should be the chief 
 of thy desires ; sith it is the passage and 
 means to attain thy perfection and happi- 
 ness. Thou art here, but as in an infected 
 and leprous inn, plunged in a flood of 
 humours, oppressed with cares, suppressed 
 with ignorance, defiled and distained 1 with 
 vice, retrograde in the course of virtue ; 
 small things seem here great unto thee, and 
 great things small, folly appeareth wisdom 
 and wisdom folly. Freed of thy fleshly 
 care, thou shalt rightly discern the beauty 
 of thyself and have perfect fruition of that 
 all-sufficient and all-sufficing happiness, 
 which is God Himself : to whom thou 
 owest thy being, to Him thou owest thy 
 well being ; He and happiness are the same. 
 For, if God had not happiness, He were not 
 God, because happiness is the highest and 
 
 56 
 
greatest good : if then God have happiness, 
 it ean not be a thing differing from Him, 
 for, if there were anything in Him differing 
 from Him, He should be an essence com- 
 posed and not simple. More, what is differ- 
 ing in anything, is either an accident or a 
 part of itself : in God happiness can not be 
 an accident, because He is not subject to 
 any accidents ; if it were a part of Him 
 (since the part is before the whole) we 
 should be forced to grant that something 
 was before God. Bedded and bathed in 
 these earthly ordures, thou canst not come 
 near this sovereign Good, nor have any 
 glimpse of the far-off dawning of his un- 
 accessible brightness, no, not so much as 
 the eyes of the birds of the night have of 
 the sun. Think then, by death that thy 
 shell is broken, and thou then but even 
 hatched ; that thou art a pearl, raised from 
 thy mother, to be enchased in gold, and 
 that the deathday of thy body is thy birth- 
 day to eternity. 
 
 Why shouldst thou be fear-stricken and 
 discomforted for thy parting from this 
 mortal bride, thy body ; sith it is but for a 
 time, and such a time as she shall not care 
 
 57 
 
for, nor feel anything in, nor thou have 
 much need of her; nay, sith thou shalt 
 receive her again more goodly and beautiful 
 than when in her fullest perfection thou 
 enjoyed her ; being by her absence made 
 like unto that Indian crystal, which after 
 some revolutions of ages is turned into 
 purest diamond ? If the soul be the form 
 of the body, and the form separated from 
 the matter of it can not ever so continue, 
 but is inclined and disposed to be reunited 
 thereinto ; what can let and hinder this 
 desire, but that some time it be accomplished, 
 and obtaining the expected end, rejoin itself 
 again unto the body ? The soul separate 
 hath a desire, because it hath a will, and 
 knoweth it shall by this reunion receive 
 perfection : too, as the matter is disposed, 
 and inclineth to its form when it is without 
 it, so would it seem that the form should 
 be towards its matter in the absence of it. 
 How is not the soul the form of the body, 
 sith by it it is, sith it is the beginning and 
 cause of all the actions and functions of the 
 body ? For though in excellency it pass 
 every other form, yet doth not that excel- 
 lency take from it the nature of a form. 
 
 58 
 
If the abiding of the soul from the body be 
 violent, then ean it not be everlasting, but 
 have a regress. How is not such an estate 
 of being and abiding not violent to the soul, 
 if it be natural to it to be in its matter, and, 
 separate, after a strange manner, many of 
 the powers and faculties of it, which never 
 leave it, are not duly exercised ? This 
 union seemeth not above the horizon of 
 natural reason, far less impossible to be done 
 by God ; and though reason can not 
 evidently here demonstrate, yet hath she a 
 misty and groping notice. If the body 
 shall not arise, how can the only and sover- 
 eign Good be perfectly and infinitely good ? 
 For, how shall He be just, nay, have so much 
 justice as man, if He suffer the evil and 
 vicious to have a more prosperous and 
 happy life than the followers of religion 
 and virtue, which ordinarily useth to fall 
 forth in this life ? For the most wicked 
 are Lords and Gods of this earth, sleeping 
 in the lee port of honour, as if the spacious 
 habitation of the world had been made only 
 for them ; and the virtuous and good are 
 but forlorn castaways, floating in the surges 
 of distress, seeming here either of the eye 
 
 59 
 
of Providence not pitied or not regarded ; 
 being subject to all dishonours, wrongs, 
 wracks ; in their best estate passing away 
 their days, like the daisies in the field, in 
 silence and contempt. Sith then He is most 
 good, most just, of necessity there must be 
 appointed by Him another time and place 
 of retribution, in the which there shall be 
 a reward for living well, and a punishment 
 for doing evil, with a life whereinto both 
 shall receive their due, and not only in 
 their souls divested ; for, sith both the 
 parts of man did act a part in the right or 
 wrong, it carrieth great reason with it that 
 they both (entire man) be arraigned before 
 that high justice, to receive their own : 
 Man is not a soul only, but a soul and 
 body, to which either guerdon or punish' 
 ment is due. This seemeth to be the voice 
 of nature in almost all the religions of the 
 world ; this is that general testimony, 
 charactered in the minds of the most bap 
 barous and savage people ; for all have had 
 some roving guesses at ages to come, and a 
 glow 'Worm light of another life, all appeal- 
 ing to one general judgment throne. To 
 what eke could serve so many expiations, 
 
 60 
 
sacrifices, prayers, solemnities, and mystical 
 ceremonies ? To what such sumptuous 
 temples, and care of the dead ? To what 
 all religion, if not to show that they ex- 
 pected a more excellent manner of being, 
 after the navigation of this life did take an 
 end ? And who doth deny it, must deny 
 that there is a Providence, a God ; confess 
 that his worship, and all study and reason 
 of virtue are vain , and not believe that 
 there is a world, are creatures, and that he 
 himself is not what he is. 
 
 But it is not of death, perhaps, that we 
 complain, but of time, under the fatal 
 shadow of whose wings all things decay 
 and wither. This is that tyrant, which, 
 executing against us his diamantine laws, 
 altereth the harmonious constitution of our 
 bodies, benumbing the organs of our know- 
 ledge, turneth our best senses senseless, 
 makes us loathsome to others, and a burthen 
 to ourselves ; of which evils death relieveth 
 us. So that, if we could be transported 
 (O happy colony !) to a place exempted from 
 the law r s and conditions of time, where 
 neither change, motion, nor other affection 
 of material and corruptible things were, but 
 
 61 
 
an immortal, unchangeable, impassible, all- 
 sufficient, kind of life, it were the last of 
 things wishable, the term and centre of all 
 our desires. Death maketh this transplanta- 
 tion ; for the last instant of corruption, or 
 leaving-off of anything to be what it was, 
 is the first of generation, or being of that 
 which succeedeth. Death then, being the 
 end of this miserable transitory life, of 
 necessity must be the beginning of that 
 other all excellent and eternal : and so 
 causelessly of a virtuous soul it is either 
 feared or complained on. 
 
 As those images were limned in my mind 
 (the morning star now almost arising in the 
 east) I found my thoughts in a mild and 
 quiet calm ; and not long after, my senses 
 one by one forgetting their uses, began to 
 give themselves over to rest, leaving me in 
 a still and peaceable sleep ; if sleep it may 
 be called, where the mind awaking is carried 
 with free wings from out fleshly bondage. 
 For heavy lids had not long covered their 
 lights, when methought, nay, sure I was, 
 where I might discern all in this great All ; 
 the large compass of the rolling circles, the 
 brightness and continual motion of those 
 
 t-2 
 
rubies of the night, which, by their distance, 
 here below can not be perceived ; the 
 silver countenance of the wandering moon, 
 shining by another's light ; the hanging of 
 the earth, as environed with a girdle of 
 crystal ; the sun enthroniz^d in the midst 
 of the planets, eye of the heavens, gem of 
 this precious ring the world. But whilst 
 with wonder and amazement I gazed on 
 those celestial splendours, and the beaming 
 lamps of that glorious temple (like a poor 
 countryman brought from his solitary 
 mountains and flocks, to behold the mag- 
 nificence of some great city), there was 
 presented to my sight a man, as in the 
 spring of his years, with that self-same 
 grace, comely feature, majestic look, which 
 
 the late ' was wont to have : on whom 
 
 I had no sooner fixed mine eyes, when, 
 like one planet-strucken, I became amazed : 
 but he, with a mild demeanour, and voice 
 surpassing all human sweetness, appeared, 
 methought, to say : 
 
 What is it doth thus pain and perplex 
 thee ? Is it the remembrance of death, the 
 last period of wretchedness, and entry to 
 these happy places ; the lantern which 
 
 63 
 
lighteneth men to see the mystery of the 
 blessedness of spirits, and that glory which 
 transcended* the curtain of things visible ? 
 Is thy fortune below on that dark globe 
 (which scarce by the smallness of it appear- 
 eth here) so great, that thou art heart-broken 
 and dejected to leave it ? What if thou 
 wert to leave behind thee a — so glorious 
 in the eye of the world (yet but a mote of 
 dust encircled with a pond) as that of mine, 
 so loving — , such great hopes ? these had 
 been apparent occasions of lamenting, and 
 but apparent. Dost thou think thou lea vest 
 life too soon ? Death is best young ; things 
 fair and excellent are not of long endurance 
 upon earth. Who liveth well, liveth long ; 
 souls most beloved of their Maker are soonest 
 relieved from the bleeding cares of life, and 
 with almost a spherical swiftness wafted 
 through the surges of human miseries. 
 Opinion (that great enchantress and peiser 
 of things, not as they are, but as they seem) 
 hath not in anything more than in the 
 conceit of death abused man : who must 
 not measure himself, and esteem his estate, 
 after his earthly being, which is but as a 
 dream : for, though he be born on the 
 
 64 
 
earth, he is not born for the earth, more 
 than the embryon for the mother's womb. 
 It plaineth to be relieved of its bands, and 
 and to eome to the light of this world, and 
 and man waileth to be loosed from the 
 chains with which he is fettered in that 
 valley of vanities : it nothing knoweth 
 whither it is to go, nor ought of the beauty 
 of the visible works of God, neither doth 
 man of the magnificence of the intellectual 
 world above, unto which (as by a midwife) 
 he is directed by death. Fools, which think 
 that this fair and admirable frame, so 
 variously disposed, so rightly marshalled, so 
 strongly maintained, enriched with so many 
 excellencies, not only for necessity, but for 
 ornament and delight, was by that Supreme 
 Wisdom brought forth, that all things in a 
 circulary course should be and not be, arise 
 and dissolve, and thus continue, as if they 
 were so many shadows carelessly cast out 
 and caused by the encountering of those 
 superior celestial bodies, changing only their 
 fashion and shape, or fantastical imageries, 
 or shades of faces into crystal. But more 
 they, which believe that He doth no other- 
 wise regard this His work than as a theatre, 
 
 65 
 
raised for bloody sword-players, wrest! 
 chasers of timorous and combatters of 
 terrible beasts, delighting in the daily 
 torments, sorrows, distress and misery of 
 mankind. No, no, the eternal Wisdom 
 created man an excellent creature, though 
 he fain would unmake himself and return 
 into nothing ; and though he seek his 
 felicity among the reasonless wights, He 
 hath fixed it above. He brought him into 
 this w r orld as a master to a sumptuous, well- 
 ordered, and furnished inn, a prince to a 
 populous and rich empery, a pilgrim and 
 spectator to a stage full of delightful 
 wonders and wonderful delights. And as 
 some emperor or great monarch, when he 
 hath raised any stately city, the work being 
 achieved, is wont to set his image in the 
 midst of it, to be admired and ga^ed upon ; 
 no otherwise did the sovereign of this 
 world, the fabric of it perfected, place man, 
 (a great miracle) formed to His own pattern, 
 in the midst of this spacious and admirable 
 city, by the divine splendour of his reason 
 to be an interpreter and trunchman 1 of His 
 creation, and admired and reverenced by all 
 His other creatures. God containeth all 
 
 M 
 
in Him, as the beginning of all ; Man 
 containeth all in him, as the midst of all ; 
 inferior things be in man more nobly than 
 they exist, superior things more meanly ; 
 celestial things favour him, earthly things 
 are vassaled unto him, he is the knot and 
 band of both ; neither is it possible but that 
 both of them have peace with man, if man 
 have peace with Him who made the 
 covenant between them and him. He was 
 made that he might in the glass of the 
 world behold the infinite goodness, power, 
 magnificence, and glory of his Maker, and 
 beholding know, and knowing love, and 
 loving enjoy, and to hold the earth of Him 
 as of his Lord paramount, never ceasing to 
 remember and praise Him. It exceedeth 
 the compass of conceit, to think that that 
 wisdom which made everything so orderly 
 in the parts, should make a confusion in the 
 whole, and the chief masterpiece ; how 
 bringeth forth so many excellencies for man, 
 it should bring forth man for baseness and 
 misery. And no less strange were it that 
 so long life should be given to trees, beasts, 
 and the birds of the air, creatures inferior to 
 .man, which have less use of it, and which 
 
 «7 
 
cannot judge of this goodly fabric, and that 
 it should be denied to man ; unless there 
 were another manner of living prepared for 
 him, in a place more noble and excellent. 
 
 But, alas ! said I, had it not been better 
 that for the good of his country a ,* en- 
 dued with so many peerless gifts, had yet 
 lived upon earth ? How long will ye, 
 replied he, like the ants, think there are no 
 fairer palaces than their hills ; or like to 
 purblind moles, no greater light than that 
 little which they shun ? As if the master 
 of a camp knew when to remove a sentinel, 
 and He who placeth man on the earth knew 
 not how long He had need of him ? Life is 
 a government and office, wherein man is so 
 long continued as it pleaseth the installer ; 
 of the administration and charge of which, 
 and what hath passed during the time of 
 his residence, he must render an account, 
 so soon as his term expireth, and he hath 
 made room for others. As men's bodies 
 differ in stature, which none can make more 
 long or short after their desire, so do they 
 vary in that length of time which is ap- 
 pointed for them to live upon the earth. 
 That Providence which prescribeth causes 
 
 68 
 
to every event, hath not only determined 
 a definite and certain number of days, but 
 of actions, to all men, which they cannot 
 go beyond. 
 
 Most then, answered I, death i^ not 
 
 such an evil and pain as it is of the vulgar 
 esteemed. Death, said he, nor painful is 
 nor evil, except in contemplation of the 
 cause, being of itself as indifferent as birth ; 
 yet can it not be denied, but amidst those 
 dreams of earthly pleasures, the uncouth- 
 ness of it, with the wrong apprehension of 
 what is unknown m it, are noisome : but 
 the soul sustained by its Maker, resolved, 
 and calmly retired in itself, doth find that 
 death (sith it is in a moment of time) is but 
 a short, nay, sweet sigh ; and is not worthy 
 the remembrance, compared with the 
 smallest dram of the infinite felicity of this 
 place. Here is the palace royal of the 
 Almighty King, in which the uncompre- 
 hensible comprehensibly manifesteth 
 Himself ; in place highest, in substance not 
 subject to any corruption or change, for it 
 is above all motion, and solid turneth not ; 
 in quantity greatest, for if one star, one 
 sphere, be so vast, how large, how huge in 
 
 69 
 
exceeding dimensions must those bounds be 
 which do them all contain ! In quality 
 most pure and orient, heaven here is all but 
 a sun, or the sun all but a heaven. If to 
 earthlings the footstool of God, and that 
 stage which He raised for a small course of 
 time, seemeth so glorious and magnificent, 
 how highly would they prise (if they could 
 see) His eternal habitation and throne ! 
 And if these be so dazzling, what is the 
 sight of Him, for whom and by whom all 
 was created ; of whose glory to behold the 
 thousand thousand part, the most pure 
 intelligences are fully satiate, and with 
 wonder and delight rest amazed ; for the 
 beauty of His light and the light of His 
 beauty are uncomprehensible. Here doth 
 that earnest appetite of the understanding 
 content itself, not seeking to know any 
 more ; for it seeth before it, in the vision of 
 the divine essence (a mirror in the which 
 not images or shadows, but the true and 
 perfect essence of every thing created, is 
 more clear and conspicuous than in itself), 
 all that is known or understood : and 
 whereas on earth our senses show us the 
 Creator by His creatures, here we see the 
 
creatures by the Creator. Here doth the 
 will pause itself, as in the centre of its 
 eternal rest, glowing with a fervent affection 
 of that infinite and all -sufficient Good ; 
 which, being fully known, cannot (for the 
 infinite motives and causes of love which 
 are in Him) but be fully and perfectly loved : 
 as He is only true and essential bounty, so 
 is He only essential and true beauty, deserv- 
 ing alone all love and admiration, by which 
 the creatures are only in so much fair and 
 excellent, as they participate of his beauty and 
 excelling excellencies. Here is a blessed com- 
 pany, every one joying as much in another's 
 felicity, as in that which is proper, because 
 each seeth another equally loved of God : 
 thus their distinct joys are no fewer than 
 the copartners of the joy ; and as the 
 assembly is in number answerable to the 
 large capacity of the place, so are the joys 
 answerable to the numberless number of 
 the assembly. No poor and pitiful mortal, 
 confined on the globe of earth, who hath 
 never seen but sorrow, or interchangeably 
 some painted superficial pleasures, and had 
 but guesses of contentment, can rightly 
 think on, or be sufficient to conceive, the 
 
 7i 
 
termless delights of this place. So many 
 feathers move not on birds, so many birds 
 dint not the air, so many leaves tremble not 
 on trees, so many trees grow not in the 
 solitary forests, so many waves turn not in 
 the ocean, and so many grains of sand limit 
 not those waves as this triumphant court 
 hath variety of delights, and joys exempted 
 from all comparison. Happiness at once 
 here is fully known and fully enjoyed, and 
 as infinite in continuance as extent. Here 
 is flourishing and never-fading youth with- 
 out age, strength without weakness, beauty 
 never blasting, knowledge without learning, 
 abundance without loathing, peace without 
 disturbance, participation without envy, 
 rest without labour, light without rising or 
 setting sun, perpetuity without moments ; 
 for time (which is the measure of motion) 
 did never enter in this shining eternity. 
 Ambition, disdain, malice, difference of 
 opinions, cannot approach this place, re- 
 sembling those foggy mists which cover 
 those lists of sublunary things. All pleasure, 
 paragoned with what is here, is pain, all 
 mirth mourning, all beauty deformity : here 
 one day's abiding is above the continuing 
 
 72 
 
in the most fortunate estate on the earth 
 many years, and sufficient to eountervail 
 the extremest torments of life. But, al- 
 though this bliss of souls be great, and 
 their joys many, yet shall they admit 
 addition, and be more full and perfeet, at 
 that long wished and general reunion with 
 their bodies. 
 
 Amongst all the wonders of the great 
 Creator, not one appeareth to be more 
 wonderful, nor more dagde the eye of 
 reason, replied I, than that our bodies 
 should arise, having suffered so many 
 ehanges, and nature denying a return from 
 privation to a habit. 
 
 Sueh power, said he, being above all that 
 that the understanding of man ean eonceive, 
 may well work sueh wonders ; for, if man's 
 understanding eould eomprehend all the 
 secrets and counsels of that eternal Majesty, 
 it would of necessity be equal unto it. The 
 Author of nature is not thralled to the laws 
 of nature, but worketh with them, or con' 
 trary to them, as it pleaseth Him ; what He 
 hath a will to do, He hath power to perform. 
 To that power which brought all this round 
 All from nought, to bring again in one 
 
 73 
 
instant any substance which ever was into 
 it, unto what it was once, should not be 
 thought impossible ; for, who can do more, 
 can do less ; and His power is no less, after 
 that which was by Him brought forth is 
 decayed and vanished, than it was before 
 it was produced ; being neither restrained 
 to certain limits or instruments, or to any 
 determinate and definite manner of working : 
 where the power is without restraint, the 
 work admitteth no other limits than the 
 worker's will. This world is as a cabinet 
 to God, in which the small things (however 
 to us hid and secret) are nothing less keepcd 
 than the great. For, as He was wise and 
 powerful to create, so doth His knowledge 
 comprehend His own creation ; yea, every 
 change and variety in it, of which it is the 
 very source. Not any atom of the scattered 
 dust of mankind, though daily flowing under 
 new forms, is to Him unknown ; and His 
 knowledge doth distinguish and discern 
 what once His power shall awake and raise 
 up. Why may nor the arts-master of the 
 world, like a moulder, what he hath framed 
 in divers shapes, confound in one mass, and 
 then severally fashion them again out of the 
 
 74 
 
same ? Can the spagyric 1 by his art restore 
 for a space to the dry and withered rose the 
 natural purple and blush ; and cannot the 
 Almighty raise and refine the body of man, 
 after never so many alterations in the earth ? 
 Reason herself finds it more possible for 
 infinite power to cast out from itself a finite 
 world, and restore anything in it, though 
 decayed and dissolved, to what it was first ; 
 than for man, a finite piece of reasonable 
 misery, to change the form of matter made to 
 his hand : the power of God never brought 
 forth all it can, for then were it bounded, and 
 no more infinite. That time doth approach 
 (O haste ye times away !) in which the 
 dead shall live, and the living be changed, 
 and of all actions the guerdon is at hand : 
 then shall there be an end without an end, 
 time shall finish, and place shall be altered, 
 motion yielding unto rest, and another 
 world of an age eternal and unchangeable 
 shall arise. Which when he had said, 
 methought, he vanished, and I all astonished 
 did awake. 
 
 75 
 
NOTES. 
 
 Pa?e 
 
 21—1 easy censure ... 
 
 •22—1 Paladins 
 
 23—1 ingenerate 
 
 25 — 1 twinncth 
 
 ,, — 2 the same water 
 
 „— 3 elemental brethren 
 
 26 — i mother of months 
 
 30—1 superior lights 
 
 ,, — 2 tapist 
 
 32—1 Euripe ••• 
 
 31—1 touzeth 
 
 45—1 Plato's year ... 
 
 47 — 1 concredit 
 
 48 — 1 by papers 
 
 ,, — 2 pleasaats 
 
 49 — 1 oblivion 
 
 evidently 
 
 The Knights of Charlemagne, 
 
 1711 edition—" age-worn stories." 
 
 engendered 
 spins 
 
 The Platonic philosophy, 
 of- Wordsworth : Duddon, Afterthought 
 " Still glides the stream and shall for 
 ever glide, 
 The form remains, the function 
 never dies." 
 
 earth, air, lire, water 
 
 the moon 
 
 sun, moon, and planets 
 
 in ambush 
 
 The stormy strait between Bceotia and 
 Enbcea 
 
 disturbs 
 
 the time taken in a complete precession 
 
 of the equinoxes, about 25,000 years 
 
 entrust 
 
 in writing or books 
 
 humorists — "They bestow their silver on 
 courtesans pleasants and flatterers." 
 
 — Philn. Holland, "Plutarch." 
 
 cf. Sir Thomas Browne, "Hydriotaphia ' ? 
 " But ihe iniquity of oblivion blindly 
 scattereth her poppy and deals with 
 the memory of man without distinc- 
 tion to merit of perpetuity" 
 
 76 
 
Pa-e 
 
 52—1 Pausilipo 
 
 58 — 1 improve 
 
 55 -1 -\ : 1 1 a 
 
 5C. — 1 distained 
 
 63—1 
 
 Dear Naples — one of th<.' sights seen by 
 the travelled Englishman of the time 
 
 disprove 
 
 or amated, • iipefled— overcome 
 
 -tained 
 
 Drnmmond's first pnblishcil work was an 
 elegy on (he death of Henry Prince 
 ol Wales, who died in lol'J, ana in 
 whose grave were bnried th< 
 hopes of the Stuarts. "ACypresa 
 Grove" i3 a prose elegy on dead 
 youth, hnt here makes allusion to 
 the national lo<-^ which probably 
 called it forth 
 
 04—1 
 
 
 
 
 ... princedom 
 ... subjects 
 
 
 
 ,,—3 
 
 peiser 
 
 ... weigher 
 
 68—1 
 
 trunchman 
 
 ... proxy — representative 
 
 
 
 ... prince 
 
 
 75—1 
 
 Spagyric 
 
 ... the art of the alchemist 
 
 □ □ □ 
 
 'Jlie Portrait— facing title — of Drummond 
 Finlayson's engraving 1766. 
 
 77 
 
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