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 AN ESSAY 
 
 on 
 
 THE LIFE AND GENIUS 
 
 ov 
 
 THOMAS FULLER 
 
 WITH SELECTJONS EROM HIS WRITINGS. 
 
 BY HEMY EOGEES. 
 
 LONDON: 
 LONGMAN, BEOWN, GKEEN, AND LONGMANS. 
 
 1856.
 
 I r- 
 
 PEEFACE. 
 
 It is a little surprising that Fuller has not furnished a title 
 to one of the many volumes of Ana which have instructed 
 and amused the world. If it be said that he left behind him 
 no collection resembling those to which the name of Ana 
 was at first applied, this is true; but it has been not unfre- 
 quently extended to compilations from the " Opera Omnia" 
 of authors of eminent merit, when their works, like those of 
 Fuller, abound in anecdote, amusing gossip, and piquant 
 reflection, or are distinguished by vigour, vivacity, and 
 epigrammatic point. The selections containing the " essential 
 extract " of voluminous authors — their most racy thoughts 
 and most striking images — differ but little from those mis- 
 cellanies, consisting of anecdotes and fragments of con- 
 versation, to which tlie term Ana was originally applied.* 
 
 * No attempt, so far as I am aware, has been made to furnish such 
 a sjncilegium of Fuller as I have here endeavoured to supply. Charles 
 Lamb has indeed given a few fragments, but they were not designed 
 to be any thing more than a specimen, and extend to only four or 
 five pages. The Kev. A. Broome, of Baliol College, Oxford, nearly, 
 
 '1 /O. .!• ■* ,
 
 IV PKEFACE. 
 
 The writings of Fuller present peculiar facilities for tlie 
 construction of such a series as the present. Indeed, their 
 digressive, fragmentary character, in general, would almost 
 entitle them to be considered, collectively, a gigantic Ana — 
 so wild and capricious is the career of his eccentric genius. 
 To compile such a work as the present is, as himself with 
 one of his quirks might say, only to select from a coflection ; 
 to choose a certain number of detached thoughts out of a 
 much larger number equally detached ; — it is not taking 
 "bricks" as a specimen of "a house," or cutting figures 
 out of a picture. The chief ornaments of his works are as 
 valuable when out of his pages as when in them. There 
 is no continuity to be dissolved — no essential unity to be 
 destroyed. 
 
 In attempting a similar task with many of our older 
 writers characterized by greater consecutiveness of thought 
 than Fuller, (a task which yet has been often performed, so as 
 to bring their chief beauties into contact with minds which 
 might otherwise never have been touched by them,) the great 
 
 half a century ago, published a little volume from Fuller and South; 
 each author had about half the book to himself. The selections 
 from Fuller -were exclusively made from the " Holy and Profane State," 
 and, if wc except a few detached sentences at the close, ai'c not so 
 much extracts from that book, as a reprint of v. part of it. A certain 
 number of the " essays and characters " are reprinted nearly entire. 
 
 In the following series of extracts, on the contrary, the object has 
 been to give only the more striking thoughts of any one " Essay," 
 unless it be in those cases — rare in any author of Fuller's age — in 
 which the whole composition is one " entire and perfect chrysolite."
 
 PREFACE. JT 
 
 difficulty is to detach tliouglits from the context without spoil- 
 ino* or impairing them. More than half the beauty of such 
 thou<^hts is from the thoughts with which they lie in contact; 
 more than half their brilliance from the light thus reflected 
 on them. In such cases, the work of " extraction " is difficult 
 indeed ; to transplant the flower is to destroy it; that which 
 bloomed beautifully in its own native dells, though half 
 concealed, as it is apt to be in our older writers, amidst 
 tanded, wild luxuriance, is no sooner removed to the trim 
 garden prepared for it, than it droops and dies. 
 
 I am far from saying that this is not the case, to a certain 
 extent, even with Fuller. On the contraiy, I have been 
 obliged to leave in their obscure recesses many flowers of his 
 genius, which either could not be removed without removing 
 so much of the surrovmding earth, that they would have 
 occupied too large a space in the following little plot, or, if 
 torn away by their bleeding roots, would be torn away only 
 to wither. To this — and not insensibility to their beauty, 
 the reader must attribute it, if he misses in the following 
 " collectanea " some ftivourite passages. Indeed, in general, he 
 must bear in mind that my space has been limited ; to give all 
 that every reader may think worth preserving would be 
 simply impossible. It is sufficient, if I have given nothing 
 but what, on one account or another, may afibrd rational 
 amusement. The reader is also reminded that some of the 
 passages for which he might naturally have looked in the 
 following pages, had already been quoted in the Introductory
 
 ■^i PREFACE. 
 
 Essav. Two of his most sti'iking compositions — on " Fancy " 
 and on " Tombs " — are thei'e given in extenso. 
 
 But though in Fuller, as in all writers, many passages are 
 not susceptible of transplantation, it is, for the reasons 
 already given, more easy to detach them from Fuller than 
 from most. His most striking "Essays" are but a series 
 of insulated thoughts, epigrammatically expressed; often 
 of great beauty, but often marred by others little worthy to 
 keep them company. In many cases, it is but to weed, and 
 the flowers, so far from being injured, are seen to greater ad- 
 vantage and bloom in greater beauty than before. 
 
 Whether, in some cases, I may not have spared a weed 
 and grubbed up a flower, will of course admit of doubts with 
 many, because taste and association in such matters so widely 
 difier. All I ask of critics is, first, that they will be 
 pleased to examine what is exscinded in any particular place, 
 and compare it with what is retained, before pronouncing 
 judgment; secondly, that they will recollect that it is 
 impossible to please all palates ; and, tliirdly, that they may 
 well believe that I have left out much that I myself should 
 have liked to put in, when I say that the passages I had 
 marked for extraction are at least twice as numerous as 
 those which can be compressed into this little volume. The 
 gi'eat difficulty has been in selection. 
 
 The extracts admitted into the Introductory Essay on 
 " Fuller s Genius and Writings," have been allowed to stand, 
 with the exception of a few sentences, which, as part of more
 
 ■PREFACE. Vll 
 
 extended extracts in the subsequent pages, have, to avoid 
 any repetition, been transferred thither. 
 
 The extracts, from No. 1 to No. 62, are from the author's 
 " Good Thoughts in Bad Times," " Good Thoughts in Worse 
 Times," and "Mixed Contemplations;" fromlSTo. 63to No. 199, 
 from the " Holj and Profane State" — unquestionably the 
 greatest work of Fuller's genius; the remainder from the 
 "Worthies," the "Church History," and the "Holy War." 
 
 Some few of the extravagances of Fuller's wit^even a 
 few of his quibbles and puns — have been admitted, just as 
 characteristic of the man. For some of his "puns," indeed, 
 he would almost deserve the treatment Sidney Smith 
 denounces against the makers of charades. " I shall say 
 nothing of charades, and such sort of unpardonable trumpery. 
 If charades are made at all, they should be made without 
 benefit of clergy ; — the offender should instantly be hurried 
 off to execution, and be cut off in the middle of his dulness, 
 without being allowed to explain to the exeputioner why his 
 first is like his second, or what is the resemblance between 
 his fourth and his ninth." 
 
 Of any such specimens of Fuller's style, I have of course 
 been sparing. They will be found in abundance in his 
 works ; for he could not find in his heart to refuse harbour- 
 age in his pages to any vagrant of his riotous fancy, however 
 ragged. But as the Introductory Essay, and the following 
 extracts will show, Fuller was as capable of rising to the 
 higher, as of sinking to the lower, forms of wit.
 
 VIU PREFACE. 
 
 On the whole, I hope that this little volume of "Fragments" 
 will not be unsuitable to the series of which it forms a part. 
 The parenthetical minutes and the transient attention which 
 are often all that the traveller can command, will not be ill- 
 bestowed, I think, on any of the ensuing extracts. While 
 none of them exact prolonged or consecutive thought, there 
 are few which will not either teach a pleasant wisdom, or 
 inspu'e innocent mirth. 
 
 I have allowed myself to make no other alterations in the 
 text than such trivial ones as were necessary, here and there, 
 to render extracts, abruptly torn from the context, intelligi- 
 ble; such as a slight change in punctuation; the occasional 
 em23hasising of a. word hy -pvintrng it in italics; the substi- 
 tution of the antecedent for its pronoun; or the transposition 
 of a word or two. Omissions of sentences are of course fre- 
 quent — but a break is generally indicated in the usual way. 
 For the /leadings of the extracts the compiler is for the most 
 part responsible. 
 
 H. R.
 
 LIFE AND WETTINGS OF THOMAS FULLER.^ 
 
 The republication, within the last few years, of all the 
 principal works of this singular author, affords us an 
 opportunity, by no means unwelcome, of canvassing his 
 merits, and assigning him his proper niche in the temple 
 of our literature. Nor is it necessary, we are sure, to 
 make any apology for dedicating a few of our pages to 
 such a subject. He cannot be unworthy of attention 
 who was a favourite author of Coleridge and Lamb, and 
 of whom the former (certainly in a moment of unreflect- 
 ing enthusiasm) could write thus : " Next to Shakspeare, 
 I am not certain whether Thomas Fuller, beyond all 
 other writers, does not excite in me the sense and 
 emotion of the marvellous ; — the degree in which any 
 
 * Edinburgh Review, Jan. 1842. 
 
 1. The Church History of Britain. By Thomas Fuller, D.D. New 
 Edition. 3 vols. 8vo. London : 1831. 
 
 2. The Worthies of England. By Thomas Fuller, D.D. New 
 Edition. 3 vols. 8vo. London : 1840. 
 
 3. The History of the Holy War. By Thomas Fuller, D.D. New 
 Edition. 12mo. London : 1840. 
 
 4. 2'Ae Holy State and the Profane State. By Thomas Fuller, D.D. 
 New Edition. 8vo. London : 1841. 
 
 5. Good Thoughts in Bad Times, and Good Thoughts in Worse Times. 
 By Thomas Fuller, D.D. New Edition, lllmo. London : 1840. 
 
 b2
 
 2 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 given faculty, or combination of faculties, is possessed 
 and manifested, so far surpassing what one would have 
 thought possible in a single mind, as to give one's 
 admiration the flavour and quality of wonder." Let 
 this statement of a critic, the soundness of whose 
 literary judgments, generally correct and often admir- 
 able, cannot always be relied upon, require what abate- 
 ment it may, it may be safely said, that there is scarcely 
 any writer whose intellectual character will better repay 
 an attempt at analysis than that of Fuller. 
 
 We set about our task the more willingly, as we be- 
 lieve it to be an act of bare justice. We are convinced 
 that posterity has dealt hardly by his memory, and that 
 thei*e are hundreds who have been better remembered 
 with far less claims to that honour. Thus it is sino-ular 
 that even Mr. Hallam, in his recent " History of 
 European Literature," should not have bestowed upon 
 him any special notice ; dismissing him with only a 
 slight allusion, in a note upon another subject.* Yet 
 Fuller was not only one of the most voluminous — an 
 equivocal indication of merit, it must be allowed — but 
 one of the most original writers in our language. If he 
 had merely resembled those of his dull contemporaries, 
 who wrote apparently for writing's sake — without genius 
 
 * Hallam, vol. iii. p. 104. It must not be supposed that any serious 
 censure of Mr. Ilallam's great work is here intended. If it be singular 
 that Fuller has been so summarily dealt with, it would have been far 
 more singular had there been no important omissions, Tlic real 
 wonder is, that the author should have been able at all to dispose of 
 subjects, so immense and so multifarious, in so moderate a compass; 
 to daguerreotype so boundless a landscape, on so small a surface, with 
 euch fidelity and distinctness.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 3 
 
 or fancy, without any of those graces of thought 
 or diction, which have a special claim on the historian 
 of literature : — if his books had been collections of third- 
 rate sermons or heavy commentaries ; of commonplace 
 spread out to the last degree of tenuity, scarcely toler- 
 able even in the briefest form in which truisms can be 
 addressed to our impatience, and perfectly insupportable 
 when prolonged into folios — there would be sufficient 
 reason for the critic's neglect. But it is far otherwise : 
 though Fuller's works, like those of many of his con- 
 temporaries, are sometimes covered with rubbish, and 
 swollen with redundancies, they are, as is the case also 
 with some of them, instinct with genius. Like Taylor, 
 and Barrow, and Sir Thomas Brown, he wrote with a 
 vigour and originality, with a fertility of thought and 
 imagery, and a general felicity of style, which, consider- 
 ing the quantity of his compositions, and the haste with 
 which he produced them, impress us with wonder at his 
 untiring activity and preternatural fecundity. He has 
 scattered with careless prodigality, over the pages of his 
 many works, thoughts and images which, if collected, 
 properly disposed, and purified from the worthless 
 matter which encrusts, and often buries them, would 
 have insured him a place beside those who, by writing 
 less and elaborating It more, by concentrating their 
 strength on works of moderate compass and high finish, 
 have secured themselves a place not only in the libraries, 
 but in the memories, of their readers ; and are not 
 simply honoured with an occasional reference, but live 
 in perpetual and familiar quotation.
 
 4 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 Before proceeding further with the analysis of Fuller's 
 intellectual character, it may be advisable to give a 
 rapid sketch of the principal events of his life. 
 
 He was born in 1608 at Aldwinckle, in Northampton- 
 shire ; his father was the Rev. T. Fuller, i-ector of 
 St. Peter's in that village. His early education seems 
 to have been conducted chiefly under the paternal roof, 
 and that so successfully, that at twelve years of age he 
 was sent to Queen's College, Cambridge ; the Master of 
 which was his maternal uncle, Dr. Davenant, afterwards 
 Bishop of Salisbury. In 1624-5, he took his degree of 
 B.A., and that of M.A. in 1628. He then removed to 
 Sidney College, and, after a short interval, was chosen 
 minister of St. Benet, Cambridge, where his great 
 talents as a preacher soon rendered him extremely 
 popular. Preferment now came rapidly. In 1631, he 
 was chosen fellow of Sidney College, and made a pre- 
 bendary of Salisbury. The same year was signalized by 
 his maiden publication. Like many other men of 
 powerful imagination, who have eventually distinguished 
 themselves as prose writers, he had in early life toyed a 
 little with the Muses. His first work was poetical, and 
 we may be sure that it was steeped in the quaintness 
 which was equally characteristic of the age and of the 
 man. The very title, indeed, smacks of that love 
 of alliteration of which his writings are so full. It was 
 entitled " David's Hainous Sin, Heartie Repentance, and 
 Heavie Punishment." It is now extremely scarce. 
 Peace to its ashes ! its author's prose writings have a 
 better and a surer claim to remembrance.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 
 
 Soon after entering priests' orders, he was presented 
 to the rectory of Broad Winsor, in Dorsetshire. In 
 1635 he repaired again to Cambridge, to take his degree 
 of Bachelor of Divinity ; and, on his return to Broad 
 Winsor, got rid of another kind of bachelorship in a 
 happy marriage. This event took place in 1638; but 
 his felicity was not of long continuance. After giving 
 birth to one son, his wife died, about the year 1641. 
 In the quietude of Broad Winsor " he began to com- 
 plete," to use a curious phrase of one of his biographers, 
 " several works he had planned at Cambridge ; " but, 
 getting sick of solitude, and impatient to know something 
 more of public affairs, he went to London, where his 
 pulpit talents soon obtained him an invitation to the 
 lectureship of the Savoy. In 1639-40 he published his 
 " History of the Holy War," which gained him some 
 money and more reputation. He was a member of the 
 Convocation which assembled at Westminster in 1640, 
 and has left us a minute account of its proceedings in 
 his " Church History." In 1643 he preached at West- 
 minster abbey, on the anniversary of the king's in- 
 auguration ; and the sermon contained some dangerous 
 allusions to the state of public affairs. His text was 
 characteristic : — '^ Yea, let him take all, forasmuch as 
 my lord the king is come again in peace." The sermon, 
 when printed, gave great vmibrage to the parliamentary 
 party, and involved the preacher in no little odium. 
 In the previous year he published his best and most 
 popular work, entitled " The Holy and Profane State." 
 Refusing to take an oath to the Parliament, except
 
 LIFE AND "WRITINGS OP 
 
 with certain reservations, Fuller left London and re- 
 paired to the king at Oxford, by whom he was well 
 received. The king was anxious to hear him pi'each. 
 Fuller complied ; but, strange to say, he managed to 
 displease the royalists as much as he had before dis- 
 pleased the patriots. His ill-success on both occa- 
 sions may be taken as an argument of his sincerity and 
 moderation, whatever may be thought of his worldly 
 wisdom. 
 
 During his stay at Oxford he resided at Lincoln Col- 
 lege ; but he was not long to escape the cup which, in 
 those sad times, came round to all parties. Sequestra- 
 tion was pronounced against him, and was embittered 
 by the loss of all his books and manuscripts. This mis- 
 fortune was partly repaired by the generosity of Henry 
 Lord Beauchamp and Lionel Cranfield, Earl of Middle- 
 sex — the latter of whom bestowed upon him the remains 
 of his father's library. In order to obviate the suspicion 
 of indifference to the king's cause, he now sought and 
 obtained, from Sir Ralph Hopton, a chaplaincy in the 
 royal army ; and employed liis leisure, while rambling 
 through t-he country, in collecting materials for his 
 future work, " The Worthies of England." It appears 
 that, in his capacity of chaplain, he could, on occasion, 
 beat " drum ecclesiastic" as well as any of the preachers 
 in Cromwell'^ army ; For we are told that, when a party 
 of the royalists were besieged at Basing-House, Fuller 
 animated the garrison to So vigorous a defence, that Sir 
 William Waller was compelled to abandon the siege. 
 When the royal forces were driven into Cornwall, Fuller,
 
 THOMAS FULLER. J 
 
 taking refuge in Exeter, resumed his studies, and 
 preached regularly to the citizens. During his stay 
 here, he was appointed chaplain to the Princess Hen- 
 rietta Maria (then an infant), and was presented to the 
 living of Dorchester. He was present at the siege of 
 Exeter, in the course of which an incident occurred, so 
 curious in itself, and narrated by Fuller (who vouches 
 for the truth of his statement) in so characteristic a 
 style, that no apology is necessary for inserting his 
 account of it here ; leaving the reader to philosophise 
 upon it in any way that may seem to him most proper. 
 The extract is from the "Worthies of England:" — 
 " When tlie city of Exeter was besieged by the par- 
 liamentary forces, so that only the south side thereof, 
 towards the sea, was open unto it, incredible numbers 
 of larks were fonnd in that open quarter, for multitude 
 like quails in the icildcrnesse, though (blessed be God !) 
 unlike them both in cause and cjfect, as not desired with 
 man's destruction, nor sent with God's anger, as ap- 
 peared by their safe digestion into wholesome nourish- 
 ment : hereof 1 was an eye and a mouth witnesse. I will 
 save my credit in not conjecturing any number, knowing 
 that herein, though I should stooj) beneath the truth, I 
 should mount above heliof. They were as fat as plentiful ; 
 so that, being sold for twopence a-dozen and under, the 
 poor, who could have no cheaper, as the rich no better 
 meat, used to make pottage of them, boyling them down 
 therein. Several natural causes were assio-ned hereof. 
 .... However, the cause of causes was Divine Pro- 
 vidence"
 
 8 ' LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 After the taking of Exeter, Fuller once more repaired 
 to London, where he obtained the lectureship at St, 
 Clement's, Lombard Street, and subsequently that of 
 St. Bride's, Fleet Street. He does not appear to have 
 long discharged the functions of either, " having been 
 forbidden" (to use his own language), " till further 
 order, the exercise of his public preaching." Silenced 
 though he was, however, this did not prevent his being 
 presented, about 1648, to the living of Waltham. For this 
 he was indebted to the Earl of Carlisle, to whom he had 
 become chaplain. To men of less activity of mind, and 
 less zealous to do good, compulsory silence might have 
 been no unacceptable concomitant of a rich living ; but 
 not to Fuller. The first two years of his time here he 
 spent chiefly in the preparation of one of the quaintest of 
 all his writings — his " Pisgah-sight of Palestine and the 
 Confines thereof, with the History of the Old and New 
 Testaments acted thereon." The work was illustrated 
 by several curious engravings, in which the artists seem 
 to have vied in quaintness with the author, and which 
 are as characteristic of the spirit of the age as the let- 
 terpress which accompanied them. In the two or three 
 following years he published several tracts and sermons, 
 which have long since passed into oblivion. In 1 654 he 
 married again, and into a noble family ; his wife being 
 the sister of Viscount Baltinglass. In 1 G55, as Mr. 
 Chalmers tells us, he persisted in the discharge of his 
 ministerial functions, " notwithstanding Cromwell's pro- 
 hibition of all persons from preaching or teaching schools, 
 who had been adherents of the late king." We shall
 
 THOMAS FULLEB. _ 9 
 
 not stop to inquire whether the biographer has beea 
 altogether just to Cromwell, in omitting to state that 
 the ordinance in question was immediately modified, on 
 Archbishop Usher's representation of its hardship, and 
 its application Hmited to such clergymen as had been 
 political oiFenders. It is more to our purpose to observe, 
 that we may account for Fuller's continuing to preach, 
 without either accusing him of rash zeal, or praising him 
 for conscientious resistance ; inasmuch as he was duly 
 authorized so to do by the Court of " Triers," before 
 whom he had been examined. Calamy has given us a 
 droll account of Fuller's perplexities when summoned to 
 this ordeal. He doubtless had some misgivings as to 
 whether he might be able to answer satisfactorily all the 
 inquisitorial inquiries of this strange court ; and whether 
 he might not get limed by some of their theological 
 subtleties. In this dilemma, he applied to the cele- 
 brated John Howe (then one of Cromwell's chaplains)^ 
 whose Catholic spirit ever pi'ompted him to exert what- 
 ever influence he possessed in behalf of the good men of 
 all parties. " You may observe, sir," said Fuller to 
 him, " that I am a somewhat corpulent man, and I am 
 to go through a very strait passage. I beg you would 
 be so good as to give me a shove, and help me through." 
 Howe gave him the best advice in his power. When 
 the "Triers" inquired, " Whether he had ever had any 
 experience of a work of grace in his heart?" Fuller 
 replied, in terms of cautious generality, that " He could 
 appeal to the Searcher of all hearts, that he made a 
 conscience of his very thoughts;" — implying, doubtless.
 
 10 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 that it was not without the most dllio^ent investisration 
 of his motives, that he had ventured on the sacred 
 office. With this answer they were satisfied, and it was, 
 perhaps, well for Fuller that it was not more specific. 
 
 In 1656, he published his " Church History of Great 
 Britain," to which was appended, " The History of the 
 University of Cambridge," and " The History of Wal- 
 thani Abbey." His " Church History" called forth 
 some animadversions from Dr. Heylyn, to which Fuller 
 replied. In 1658, Lord Berkeley, one of his many 
 patrons, made him his chaplain, and presented him to 
 the rectory of Cranford in Middlesex. Just before the 
 Restoration, he was reinstated in his lectureship In the 
 Savoy, and immediately after it, was restored to his 
 prebend at Salisbury, appointed chaplain-extraordinary 
 to the king, and created Doctor of Divinity by man- 
 damus. He was within sight of a bishopric, when death 
 brought all his earthly prospects to a close in 1661. 
 He was buried in his church at Cranford, in the chancel 
 of which there is a monument to his memory. The 
 Latin inscription, which has the rare merit of telling 
 but little more than the truth, closes with an antithe- 
 tical conceit, so much in Fuller's vein, that it would 
 have done his heart good, could he but have read the 
 following sentence : — " Hie jacet Thomas Fuller .... 
 Qui dum viros Anglias illustres opere posthumo immor- 
 talitate consecrare meditatus est, ipse immortalitatem 
 est consecutus." This alludes to the " Worthies of 
 Eno-land," partly printed before his death, but published 
 by his son.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 1 1 
 
 Fuller is one of the few voluminous authors who are 
 never tedious. No matter where we pitch, we are sure 
 to alio-ht on somethins; which stimulates attention ; and 
 perhaps there is no author equally voluminous, to whom 
 we could so fearlessly apply the ad aperturam libri test. 
 Let the subject be ever so dry or barren, he is sure to 
 suri'ound it with some unlooked-for felicity, or at least 
 some entertaining oddity of thought or expression : the 
 most mearrre matter of fact shall suggest either some 
 solid reflection or curious inference, some ingenious 
 allusion or humorous story ; or, if nothing better, some 
 sportive alliteration or ludicrous pun. To this must be 
 added, that his reflections and his images are in general 
 so exceedingly novel, foften, it is true, far-fetched and 
 quaint enough, but often also very beautiful,) that they 
 surprise as well as please, and please in a great measure 
 by surprising us. Probably there is no author who so 
 often breaks upon his readers with turns of thought for 
 which they are totally unprepared; nor would it be 
 unamusing to watch the countenance of any intelligent 
 man while perusing his pages. We will venture to 
 say, that few writers in the English language could 
 produce more rapid variations of expression. We 
 should see the face, in succession, mantling with a 
 smile — distended into a broad grin — breaking out into 
 loud laughter ; the eyebrows now arched to an expres- 
 sion of sudden wonder and pleased surprise ; the whole 
 visage now clouded with a momentary shade of vexation 
 over some wanton spoiling of a fine thought — now 
 quieted again into placidity, by the presentation of
 
 12 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 something truly wise or beautiful, and anon cliuckling 
 afresh over some outrageous pun or oddity. The same 
 expression could not be maintained for any three para- 
 graphs — perfect gravity scarcely for three sentences. 
 
 The activity of Fuller's suggestive faculty must have 
 been immense. Though his principal characteristic is 
 wit, and that too so disproportionate, that it conceals 
 in its ivy-like luxuriance the robust wisdom about 
 which it coils itself, his illustrations are drawn from 
 every source and quarter, and are ever ready at his 
 bidding. In the variety, frequency, and novelty of his 
 illustrations, he strongly resembles two of the most 
 imaginative writers in our language, though in all other 
 respects still more unlike them than they were unlike 
 one another — Jeremy Taylor and Edmund Burke. 
 Each, indeed, has his peculiar characteristics, even in 
 those very points in which they may be compared. 
 The imagination of Jeremy Taylor takes its hue from 
 Lis vast learning, and derives from classical and histori- 
 cal allusions more than half its sources of illustration ; 
 that of Fuller, from the wit which forms the prime 
 element in his intellectual constitution. Burke, on the 
 other hand, had comparatively little wit ; at least it was 
 no characteristic: the images his mind su^^plies are 
 chiefly distinguished by splendour and beauty. Still, in 
 a boundless profusion of imagery of one kind or another, 
 available on all occasions and on all subjects, and capa- 
 ble of clothing sterility itself with sudden freshness and 
 verdure, they all resemble one another, and, in this point, 
 are perhaps unequalled among English prose writers.
 
 THOMAS FULLEK. 13 
 
 Most marvellous and enviable is that fecundity of fancy, 
 which can adorn whatever it touches — which can invest 
 naked fact and dry reasoning with unlooked-for beauty 
 — make flowerets bloom even on the brow of the preci- 
 pice, and, when nothing better can be had, can turn the 
 very substance of rock itself into moss and lichens. This 
 faculty is incomparably the most important for the 
 vivid and attractive exhibition of truth to the minds of 
 men; and, taken in connection with other qualities, 
 which neither Taylor nor Fuller possessed, namely, 
 method and taste, will do more to give books permanent 
 power and popularity than even the very truths they 
 contain. Indeed, that, to a great extent, may be said 
 of every discourse, which Fuller says more particularly 
 of sermons, "that though reasons are the pillars of the 
 fabric, similitudes are the windows which give the best 
 lights." 
 
 We have said that Fuller's faculty of illustration Is 
 boundless ; surely it may be safely asserted, since it can 
 diffuse even over the driest geographical and chrono- 
 logical details an unwonted interest. We have a re- 
 markable exemplification of this In those chapters of his 
 *' Holy War," in which he gives what he quaintly calls 
 " a Pisgah-sight, or Short Survey of Palestine Ingeneral; " 
 and a still stronger, if possible, in his " Description ot 
 the Cltle of Jerusalem." In these chapters, what in 
 other hands would have proved little more than a bare 
 enumeration of names, sparkles with perpetual wit, and 
 is enlivened with all sorts of vivacious allusions. One 
 or two short specimens of the arts by which he manages
 
 14 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 to make such a " survey " attractive will be found 
 below ; * but much of the effect is lost by their being 
 presented in a detached form. 
 
 The principal attribute of Fuller's genius is unques- 
 tionably wit ; though, as Coleridge has well observed, 
 " this very circumstance has defrauded him of his due 
 praise for the practical wisdom of the thoughts — for the 
 beauty and variety of the truths into which he shaped 
 the stuff." If it be inquired what was the character of 
 his wit, it must be replied, it is so various, and assumes 
 so many different shapes, that one might as well attempt 
 to define wit itself; and this, seeing the comprehensive 
 Barrow has contented himself with an enumeration of its 
 
 * " Nain, where our Saviour raised the widow's son, so that she was 
 twice a mother, yet had but one child." " Mount Cannel, the Jewish 
 Parnassus, where the prophets were so conversant." " Aphek, whose 
 walls falling down, gave both death and gravestones (!) to 27,000 of 
 Benhadad's soldiers." " Tyre, anciently the Royal Exchange of the 
 world." " The river Kishon, the besom to sweep away Sisera's army." 
 "Gilboa, the mountain that David cursed, that neither dew nor rain 
 should fall on it ; but of late, some English travellers climbing this 
 mountain were well wetted, David not cursing it by a prophetical spirit 
 but in a poetical rapture." " Gilgal, where the manna ceased, the 
 Israelites having till then been fellow-coramoncrs with the angels." 
 " Gibeon, whose inhabitants cozened Joshua with a pass of false-dated 
 antiquity. Who could have thought that clouted shoes could have 
 covered so much subtility " " Gaza, the gates whereof Samson carried 
 nway; and being sent for to make sport in the house of Dagon, acted 
 such a tragedy as plucked down the stage, slew himself and all the 
 spectators." " Macphelah, where the patriarchs were buried, whose 
 bodies took livery and seisin in behalf of their posterity, who were to 
 possess the whole land." " Edrei, the city of Og, on whose giant-like 
 proportions the rabbis have more giant-like lies." " Pisgah, where 
 Moses viewed the land : hereabouts the angel buried him, and also 
 buried the grave, lest it should occasion idolatry."
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 15 
 
 forms, in despair of being able to include them all 
 \vitliin the circle of a precise definition, we certainly 
 shall not attempt. Suffice it to say, that all the 
 varieties recorded in that singularly felicitous passage 
 are exemplified in the pages of our author. Of Ins wit, 
 as of ivit in general, it may be truly said, that " some- 
 times it lieth in pat allusion to a known story, or in 
 seasonable application of a trivial saying, or in forging 
 an apposite tale; sometimes it playeth in words 
 and phrases, taking advantage from the ambiguity of 
 their sense, or the affinity of their sound ; sometimes it 
 is wi'apped in a dress of humorous expression ; some- 
 times it lurketh under an odd similitude; sometimes it 
 is lodged in a sly question, in a smart answer, in a quirk- 
 ish reason, in a shrewd intimation, in cunningly divert- 
 ing or cleverly retorting an objection ; sometimes it is 
 couched in a bold scheme of speech, in a tart irony, in u 
 lusty hyperbole, in a startling metaphor, in a plausible, 
 reconciling of contradictions, or in acute nonsense; 
 sometimes a scenical representation of persons or things, 
 a counterfeit speech, a mimical look or gesture, passeth 
 for it; sometimes an affected simplicity, sometimes a 
 presumptuous bluntness giveth it being ; sometimes it 
 riseth only from a lucky hitting upon what is strange ; 
 sometimes from a crafty Avresting obvious matter to the 
 purpose. Often it consisteth in one knows not what, 
 and springeth up one can hardly tell how. Its ways are 
 unaccountable and inexplicable ; being answerable to the 
 numberless rovings of fancy, and windings of language." 
 Of all the preceding varieties of wit, next to the 
 
 c
 
 16 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 " play with words and phrases," perhaps Fuller most 
 delighted in " pat allusions to a known story ; " " in 
 seasonable application of a trivial saying ; " " in a tart 
 irony " and " an affected simpHcity ; " in the " odd simi- 
 litude " and the " quirkish reason." In these he certainly 
 excelled. We have noted some brief specimens, which 
 we here give the reader. Speaking of the Jesuits he 
 says, " such is the charity of the Jesuits, that they never 
 owe any man any ill-will — making present payment 
 thereof." Of certain prurient canons, in which virtue 
 is in imminent danger of being tainted by impure descrip- 
 tions of purity, he shrewdly remarks — " One may justly 
 admire how these canonists, being pretended virgins, 
 could arrive at the knowledge of the criticisms of all ob- 
 gcenity." Touching the miraculous coffin in which St. 
 Audre was deposited, he slyly says — " Under the ruined 
 w^alls of Grantchester or Cambridge, a coffin was found, 
 with a cover correspondent, both of white marble, which 
 did fit her body so exactly, as if (which one may believe 
 was true) it was made for it." On Machiavel's saying, 
 " that he who undertakes to write a history must be of 
 no i-eligion," he observes, " if so, Machiavel himself was 
 the best qualified of any in his age to be a good historian." 
 On the unusual conjunction of great learning and great 
 wealth in the case of Selden, he remarks, " Mr. Selden 
 had some coins of the Roman emperors, and a great many 
 more of our Eno;lish kino-s." After commenting on the 
 old story of St. Dunstan's pinching the Devil's nose with 
 the red-hot tongs, he drolly cries out — " But away 
 with all suspicions and queries. None need to doubt of
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 17 
 
 the truth thereof, finding it in a sign painted in Fleet 
 Street, near Temple Bar." The bare, bald style of the 
 schoolmen, he tells us, some have attributed to design 
 *' lest any of the vermin of equivocation should hide 
 themselves under the najJ of their words." On excessive 
 attention to fashion in dress he says — " Had some of our 
 gallants been with the Israelites in the wilderness, when 
 for forty years their clothes waxed not old, they would 
 have been vexed, though their clothes were whole, to 
 have been so long in one fashion." Speaking of the 
 melancholy forebodings which have sometimes haunted 
 the death-bed of good men, he quaintly tells us, " that 
 the Devil is most busy in the last day of his term, and 
 a tenant to be outed cares not what mischief he docs.'" 
 Of unreasonable expectations he says, with characteristic 
 love of quibbling, '' those who expect what in reason they 
 cannot expect, may expect." The court jester he wittily 
 and truly characterises thus — " It is an office which none 
 but he that hath wit can perform, and none but he that 
 wants wit loill perform." Of modest women, who never- 
 theless dress themselves in questionable attire, he says — 
 *' I must confess some honest women may go thus, but no 
 whit the honester for going thus. That ship may have 
 Castor and Pollux for the sign, which, notwithstanding, 
 has St. Paul for the lading." He thus speaks of anger 
 — " He that keepeth anger long in his bosom, giveth 
 place to the Devil. And why should we make room for 
 him who will crowd in too fast of himself? ■ Heat of 
 passion makes our souls to crack, and the Devil creeps 
 in at the crannies." Of intellectual deficiencies in the
 
 18 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 very tall he remarks, " that oft-times such who are built 
 four stories high, are observed to have little in their 
 cock-loft." Of virtue in a very short man, he says, 
 " His soul had but a short diocese to visit, and therefore 
 might the better attend the effectual informinn; thereof." 
 Of the " quirkish reason," mentioned as one of the 
 species of wit in the above-recited passage of Barrow, 
 the pages of our author are full. What can be more 
 ridiculous than the reason he assigns, in his description 
 of the " good wife," for the order of Paul's admonitions 
 to husbands and wives in the third chapter of the epistle 
 to the Colossians ? " The apostle first adviseth women 
 to submit themselves to their husbands, and then coun- 
 selleth men to love their wives. And sure it was fittino; 
 that women should first have their lesson given them, be- 
 cause it is hardest to be learned, and therefore they need 
 have the more time to con it. For the same reason we 
 first begin with the character of a good wife." Not less 
 droll, or rather far more so, is the manner in which he 
 subtilizes on the command, that we arc not " to let the 
 sun go down on our wrath." " Anger kept till the next 
 morning, with manna, doth putrefy and corrupt ; save 
 that manna, corrupted not at all, (and anger most of all,) 
 kept the next Sabbath. St. Paul saith, ' 'Let not the 
 sun go down on your wrath,' to carry news to the anti- 
 podes in another world of thy revengeful nature. Yet 
 let us take the apostle's meaning rather than his words, 
 with all possible speed to depose our passion ; not 
 understanding him literally so that we may take leave to 
 be angry till sunset; then might our wrath lengthen with
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 19 
 
 the days, and men In Greenland, where day lasts above a 
 quarter of a year, have plentiful scope of revenge." * 
 
 Of all the forms of wit, Fuller affects that of the 
 satirist least. Though he can be caustic, and sometimes 
 is so, he does not often indulge the propensity; and 
 when he does it is without bitterness; a sly Irony, a 
 good-humoured gibe, which tickles, but does not stlno-, 
 is all he ventures upon. Perhaps there is no mental 
 quality whatever, which so much depends on the tem- 
 perament and moral habitudes of the individual, as this 
 of wit ; so much so, indeed, that often they will wholly 
 determine Its character. We are inclined to think, that 
 he who is master of any one species of wit, might make 
 himself no mean proficient in all ; whether it shall have 
 the quality of waspish spleen, or grave banter, or broad 
 and laughing humour, depends far more on moral than 
 on intellectual causes. Imagine Fuller's wit in a man 
 of melancholic temperament, querulous disposition, sickly 
 health, morbid sensibility, or irritable vanity — and we 
 should have a satirist whose malignity would repel, still 
 more than his wit would attract. The sallies of our 
 author are enjoyed without any drawback, even when 
 they are a little satirical ; so innocent, so childlike, so 
 
 * Ou this passage Charles Lamb makes the following characteristic 
 remarks : — " This whimsical prevention of a consequence which no one 
 would have thought of deducing, setting up an absurdum on purpose to 
 hunt it down — placing guards, as it were, at the very outposts of possi- 
 bility — gravely giving out laws to insanity, and prescribing moral fences 
 to distempered intellects, could never have entered into a head less 
 entertainingly constructed than that of Fuller or Sir Thomas Browne, 
 the very air of whose style the conclusion of this passage most aptly 
 imitates."
 
 20 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 free from malice, are they. His own temperament emi- 
 nently favoured the development of the more amiable 
 qualities of wit : he was endowed with that happy buoy- 
 ancy of spirit, which, next to religion itself, is the most 
 precious possession of man; and which is second only 
 to religion, in enabling us to bear with ease the trials 
 and burdens of humanity. Both conspired to render 
 him habitually light-hearted. With such a temperament, 
 thus added to unfeigned piety and unfeigned benevolence; 
 with a heart open to all innocent pleasures, and purged 
 from the " leaven of malice and uncharitableness," it was 
 as natural that he should be full of good-tempered mirth, 
 as it is for the grasshopper to chirp, or the bee to hum, 
 or the birds to warble, in the spring breeze and the bright 
 sunshine. His very physiognomy was an index to his 
 natural character. As described by his contemporaries, 
 he had light flaxen hair, bright blue and laughing eyes, 
 a frank and open visage. Such a flice was a sort of 
 ffuarantee, that the wit with which he was endowed 
 could not be employ ed for any purpose inconsistent with 
 constitutional good-nature. Accordingly, never was 
 mirth more devoid of malice than his ; unseasonable and 
 in excess it doubtless often is, but this is all that can 
 be charged upon it. His gibes are so pleasant, so tinc- 
 tured by an overflowing bonliommie, that Ave doubt 
 whether the very subjects of them could forbear laughing 
 in sympathy, though at their own expense. Equally 
 assured we are, that, as he never uttered a joke on 
 another with any malice, so he was quite ready to laugh 
 when any joke was uttered upon himself. Never
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 21 
 
 dreaming of ill-will to his neighbour, and equally un- 
 suspicious of any towards himself, it must have been a 
 bitter joke indeed in which he could not join. It is 
 rarely that a professed joker relishes wh when directed 
 against himself: and the manner in which he receives 
 it may usually be taken as an infallible indication of his 
 temper. He well knows the difference between laughing 
 at another, and beino; Liuo-hed at himself. Fuller was 
 not one of that irritahile genus, Avho wonder that any 
 should be offended at their innocent pleasantry, and 
 yet can never find any pleasantry innocent but their 
 own ! There is a story told, which, though not true, 
 oiKjld to have been true, and which, if not denied by 
 Fuller, would have been supposed to authenticate itself. 
 It is said that he once " caught a Tartar " in a certain 
 Mr. Sparrowhawk, of whom he asked, " What was the 
 difference between an owl and a sparrowhawk ? " The 
 reply was, that " an owl w^'s, fuller in the head, and/uZ/er 
 in the face, and fuller all over ! " We believe that if the 
 retort had been really uttered, it would have been re- 
 ceived by the object of It, not with that curious expres- 
 sion of face so common on such occasions, in which con- 
 strained mirth struggles with mortified vanity, and 
 simulated laughter vainly strives to cover real annoy- 
 ance, but with a peal of hearty gratulation.* 
 
 * This story is, however, more than doubtful; it is expressly denied 
 by Fuller himself, in his reply to Heylyn's " Examen Kistoricum." The 
 circumstances which led to the denial are curious. Fuller, in his "Ec- 
 clesiastical History," had related of Laud, that having once demanded 
 of a lady, who had lately become a proselyte to Popery, the reason of 
 the change, he received for answer, that " she hated a crowd." T^pon
 
 22 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 As the temperament of Fuller was most cheerful, and 
 a pledge for the innocence of his wit, so he jested by 
 what may be called a necessity of his nature — on all 
 subjects, at all times, under all circumstances. Wit, in 
 one or other of its multitudinous shapes, was the habi- 
 tual attire of his thoughts and feehngs. With the kindest 
 heart in the world, he could not recite even a calamitous 
 story without investing it with a tinge of the ludicrous. 
 It would seem as if, in his case, a jest were the natural 
 expression of all emotion ; he is no more to be wondered 
 at for mingling his condolence and his lamentations with 
 merriment, than are other men for accompanying them 
 with tears and sighs. An epitaph in his hand would 
 have been a sort of epigi^am, not free from grotesque 
 humour; and his ordinary pulpit discourses must, we 
 are convinced, have often contained passages which 
 severely tried the gravity of his audience. In conlir- 
 
 bcing furtlier pressed to explain so dark a saying, she said, " Your 
 Lordship and manj'- others are making for Eome as fast as ye can, aud 
 therefore, to prevent a press, I went before you." This anecdote roused 
 the indignation of Ileylyn. who by way of showing the impropriety of 
 recording in print idle rc]K)rts to the disadvantage of individuals, tells 
 of a " retort " on Fuller, substantially the same with that related of Mr. 
 Sparrowhawk, but disguised in a form, and attended with eircunistances 
 which rob it of more than half its point, and make Fuller appear to 
 greater disadvantage than that of having merely been discomfited by 
 a happy repartee. Fuller thus replied: — '■'■ My tale was true and new, 
 never printed before ; whereas his is oJd (made, it seems, on one of my 
 name, printed before I was born) and fahe, never by man or woman 
 retorted on me. I had rather my name should make many causelessly 
 merry, than any justly sad; and, seeing it lieth equally open and ob- 
 vious to praise and dispraise, I shall as little be elated when flattered — 
 'Fuller of wit and learning,' as dejected when flouted — 'Fuller of 
 folly and ignorance.' "
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 23 
 
 matlon of all we have said, we may remark, that he 
 actually finds it impossible to supress his vivacious 
 pleasantry even in the most tragical parts of his "his- 
 tories," and tells the most rueful tidings in so droll a man- 
 ner as sets all sobriety at defiance. One or two odd 
 specimens we cannotrefrain from laying before the reader. 
 He thus recounts a " lamentable accident " which befell a 
 congregation of Catholics at Blackfriars : — " The sermon 
 began to incline to the middle, the day to the end 
 thereof; when on the sudden the floor fell down whereon 
 they were assembled. It gave no charitable warning 
 groan beforehand, but cracked, broke, and fell, all in an 
 instant. Many Avere killed, more bruised, all frighted. 
 Sad sight, to behold the flesh and blood of difterent 
 persons mingled together, and the brains of one on the 
 head of ana titer ! One lacked a leg; another, an arm; 
 a third, lohole and entire, inanting nothing but breathy 
 stifled in the ruins^ Was ever such a calamity so mirth- 
 fully related ? But one of the most singular instances 
 of the peculiarity in question, is contained in his account 
 of the capture and execution of the principal conspi- 
 rators in the Gunpowder plot. Tt is so characteristic, 
 that no apology is required for inserting one or two ex- 
 tracts below.* 
 
 * " Meantime Catcshy, Percy, Rookwood, both the Wrights, and 
 Thomas Winter, were hovering about London, to attend the issue of 
 the matter. Having sate so long abrood, and hatching nothing, they 
 began to suspeet all their eggs had proved addle. Yet, betwixt hope 
 and fear, they and their servants post down into the country, through 
 Warwick and Worcester, into Staffordshire. Of traitors they turn 
 felons, breaking up stables and stealing horses as they went. But 
 many of their own men, by a far more lawful felony, stole away from
 
 24 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 So exuberant is Fuller's wit, that, as liis very me- 
 lancholy is mirthful, so his very wisdom wears motley. 
 But it is wisdom notwithstanding ; nor are there many 
 authors, in whom we shall find so much solid sense and 
 practical sagacity, in spite of the grotesque disguise in 
 which they masque themselves. Nothing can be more 
 true than the remark already quoted from Coleridge, 
 that Fuller's wit has defrauded him of some of the praise 
 of wisdom which is his due. There was nothing, how- 
 ever, of the reality, whatever there might be of the 
 appearance of profane or inhuman levity, in his mode of 
 dealing with sacred or serious subjects. His was the 
 natural expression of much hilarity conjoined with much 
 wit. He would have been mirthful, whether he had had 
 much wit or not ; having also much wit, his mirth ex- 
 pressed itself in the forms most natural to him. He 
 
 their masters, leaving them to shift for themselves. The neighbouring 
 counties, and their own consciences, rise up against these riotous rois- 
 terers, as yet unknown for traitors. At last Sir Richard Walsh, high 
 sheriff of Worcestershire, overtook them at Holbeck, in Staffordshire, 
 at the house of Mr. Stephen Littleton ; where, upon their resistance, 
 the two Wrights were killed, Rookwood and Thomas Winter shrewdly 
 wounded. As for Percy and Catesby, they fought desperately for their 
 lives, as l^nowing no quarter but quartering would be given unto them ; 
 and, as if tlicy scorned to turn their backs to any but themselves, setting 
 back to back, they fought against all that assaulted them. Many 
 swords were drawn upon them, but 'gunpowder' must do the deed, 
 ■which discharged that bullet which despatched tliem both. Never were 
 two bad men's deaths more generally lamented of all good men ; only 
 on this account— that they lived no longer, to be forced to a further 
 discovery of their secret associates. It must not be forgotten, how, 
 some hours before their appreliension, as these plotters were drying 
 dauk gunpowder in an inn, a miller casually coming in (haply not 
 heeding the black meal on the hearth), by careless casting on of a billet,
 
 THOMAS FULLEK, 
 
 25 
 
 Bpoke only as he felt ; and though we may think that 
 another mode of speech would have been more proper, 
 and better adapted to the ordinary feelings of mankind 
 under the circumstances, we cannot consent to I'ank the 
 facetice of Fuller on grave subjects, with the profane 
 heartless witticisms of those with whom nothing is 
 sacred, and who speak lightly because they feel lightly. 
 His whole life, and even his whole writings, prove him 
 to have been possessed of genuine veneration for all 
 that is divine, and genuine sympathy with all that is 
 human. 
 
 The limits within which wit and humour may be law- 
 fully used, are well laid down by himself in his " Holy 
 and Profane State," in the essays on " Jesting and 
 Gravity," and in his character of the " Faithful Minister." 
 It would be too much to say that he has always acted 
 
 fired the gunpowder: up flies the chimney with part of the house ; all 
 therein are frightened, most hurt ; hut especially Cateshy and Kook- 
 wood had their faces soundly scorched, so bearing in their bodies, not 
 e-TiVf^ara, ' the marks of Our Lord Jesus Christ,' but the print of their 
 own impieties. Well might they guess how good that their cup of 
 cruelty was, whose dregs they meant others should drink, by this little 
 sip which they themselves had unwillingly tasted thereof. The rest 
 were all at London solemnly arraigned, convicted, condemned. So 
 foul the fact, so fair the proof, they could say nothing for themselves. 
 Master Tresham dying in the prison, prevented a more ignominous 
 end." ..." They all craved testimony that they died Koman Catholics. 
 My pen shall grant them this their last and so equal petition, and bears 
 xvitness to all lolwm it nuiy concern, that they lived and died in the 
 Romish religion. And although the heinousness of their offence might, 
 with some colour of justice, have angered severity into cruelty against 
 them, yet so favourably were they jirocceded with, that most of their 
 sons or heirs, except since disinherited by their own prodigality, at 
 this day enjoy their paternal possessions."
 
 26 
 
 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 strictly up to his own maxims; but it may be safely 
 asserted that he seldom violates the most important of 
 them, and that, when he did, it was in perfect uncon- 
 sciousness of so doing. Of profane jests, he says, in his 
 strong manner—" Jest not with the two-edged sword 
 of God's word. Will nothing please thee to wash thy 
 hands in but the font? or to drink healths in but the 
 church chalice ?" On inhuman jests, he says — " Scoff 
 not at the natural defects of any which are not in their 
 power to amend. Oh, it is cruelty to beat a cripple 
 with his own crutches !" In another place, he quaintly 
 says, " It is unnatural to laugh at a natural." Speaking 
 of the " Faithful Minister," he says—" That he will not 
 use a light comparison to make thereof a grave applica- 
 tion, for fear lest his poison go further than his antidote." 
 But his sermons on the book of " Kuth" contain manv 
 curious instances of his oblivion of this maxim ; of which, 
 a striking one is given by the editor of the recent edition 
 of his " Holy and Profane State." In his essay on 
 " Gravity," he touchingly pleads for a charitable con- 
 struction of the levities of a mirthful temperament. 
 *' Some men," says he, " are of a very cheerful dispo- 
 sition ; and God forbid that all such should be con- 
 demned for lightness ! Oh, let not any envious eye 
 disinherit men of that Avhich is their ' portion in this 
 life,' comfortably to enjoy the blessings thereof! Yet 
 gravity must prune, not root out our mirth." Gravity 
 must have had hard work to do this in his own case ; 
 for as he himself says in another place — beautifully 
 commenting on a well-known line of Horace — " That
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 27 
 
 fork must have strong tines wherewith one would thrust 
 out nature." 
 
 The imagination of Fuller, though generally display- 
 ing itself in the forms imposed by his overflowing wit, 
 was yet capable of suggesting images of great beauty, 
 and of true poetic quality. Though lost in the perpetual 
 obtrusion of that faculty to which every other was com- 
 pelled to minister, it is brilliant enough to have made 
 the reputation of any inferior writer; and w^e believe 
 that what Coleridge has said of his wisdom, might as 
 truly be said of his fancy ; — his wit has equally defrauded 
 both of the admiration due to them. 
 
 Fuller's imagination is often happily employed in em- 
 bodying some strong apophthegm, or maxim of practical 
 wisdom, in a powerful and striking metaphor ; the very 
 best form in which they can be presented to us. There 
 occur in his writings very many sentences of this kind, 
 which would not be altogether unworthy of Bacon him- 
 self, and in which, as in that far greater genius, we have 
 the combination of solid truth, beautiful imagery, and 
 graceful expression ; — where we know not which most 
 to admire — the value of the gem, the lustre of the polish, 
 or the appropriateness of the setting. 
 
 In many respects, Fuller may be considered the very 
 type and exemplar of that large class of religious writers 
 of the seventeenth century, to which we emphatically 
 apply the term " quaint." That word has long ceased 
 to mean what it once meant. By derivation, and by 
 original usage, it first signified " scrupulously elegant," 
 " refined," " exact," " accurate," beyond the reach of
 
 28 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 common art. In time it came to be applied to what- 
 ever was designed to indicate these characteristics — 
 though excogitated with so elaborate a subtlety, as to 
 trespass on ease and nature. In a word, it was applied 
 to what was ingenious and fantastic, rather than taste- 
 ful or beautiful. It is now wholly used In this accepta- 
 tion; and always implies some violation of true taste, 
 some deviation from what the " natural " requires under 
 the given circumstances. The application of the word 
 both to literary compositions and to the more material 
 products of art, of course simultaneously underwent 
 similar modifications. 
 
 Now the age in which Fuller lived was the golden 
 age of " quaintness " of all kinds ; — in gardening, in 
 architecture, in costume, in manners, in religion, in 
 literature. As men improved external nature with a 
 perverse expenditure of money and ingenuity — made 
 her yews and cypresses grow into peacocks and statues 
 ■ — tortured and clipped her luxuriance into monotonous 
 uniformity — turned her graceful curves and spirals into 
 straiglit lines and parallelograms — compelled things 
 incongruous to blend in artificial union, and then mea- 
 sured the merits of the work, not by the absurdity of 
 the design, but by the difficulty of the execution ; — so 
 in literature, the curiously and elaborately unnatural 
 was too often the sole object. Far-fetched allusions 
 and strained similitudes, fantastic conceits and pedantic 
 quotations, the eternal jingle of alliteration and antithesis, 
 puns and quirks and verbal pleasantries of all kinds — 
 these too often formed the choicest objects of the writer's
 
 TII03IAS FULLER. 29 
 
 aniLitlon. The excellence of the product was judged, 
 not by its intrinsic beauty, but by the labour it involved, 
 and the ingenuity it displayed. 
 
 But while much of the " quaint " literature of that 
 a2:e is now as little relished as the ruffs, wisfs, and hi2;h- 
 backed chairs of our great-great-grandfathers, there is 
 not a little which will be held in everlasting remem- 
 brance. Not only are the works of powerful, though it 
 may be perverted genius, full of thoughts, and images, 
 and felicities of expression, which, being the offspring of 
 truth and fancy, will be beautiful through all time ; but 
 the aspect in which the " quaint " itself appears to us, 
 will depend upon the character of the individual writer, 
 and the nature of the subjects he treats. The consti- 
 tution of Fuller's mind had such an affinity with the 
 peculiarities of the day, that what was " quaint " in 
 others seems to have been his natural element — the sort 
 of attire in which his active and eccentric Gfenius loved 
 to clothe itself. The habit which others perhaps slowly 
 attained, and at length made (by those strong associa- 
 tions which can for a while sanctify any thing in taste 
 or fashion) a second nature, seems to have cost him 
 nothing. Allusions and images may appear odd, un- 
 accountably odd, but in him they are evidently not far- 
 fetched ; they are spontaneously and readily presented 
 by his teeming fancy : even his puns and alliterations 
 seem the careless, irrepressible exuberances of a very 
 sportive mind — not racked and tortured out of an un- 
 willing brain, as is the case with so many of his con- 
 temporaries. We are aware, of course, that it is the
 
 30 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 office of a correct judgment to circumscribe the ex- 
 travagances of the suggestive faculty, and to select from 
 the materials it offers only what is in harmony with 
 Si;ood taste. All we mean is, that in the case of Fuller, 
 the suggestions, however eccentric, were spontaneous, 
 not artificial — offered, not sought for. The Avater, 
 however brackish or otherwise impure, still gushed from 
 a natural spring, and was not brought up by the wheel 
 and axle. His mind was a fountain, not a forcing-pump. 
 Thus his very " quaintness" is also " nature" — nature 
 in him, though it would not be so in others ; and we 
 therefore read his most outrageous extravagances with 
 very different feelings from those with which we glance 
 at the frigid conceits and dreary impertinences of many 
 of his contemporaries. Nor do we simply feel indul- 
 gence towards them as spontaneous ; their very spon- 
 taneity insures them an elasticity and vivacity of 
 expression, which we should seek in vain in writers 
 whose minds had less affinity with the genius of the day. 
 Nor are we to forget that there are certain subjects to 
 which the " quaint" style of those times is better 
 ada[)ted than to others ; and in w^hich it appears not 
 destitute of a certain fantastic grace and fitness. We 
 mean subjects in which little of passion or emotion 
 would be expected. When conviction or persuasion is 
 the object, and directness of purpose and earnestness of 
 feeling are essential, we will not say to success, but merely 
 to gain a hearing, nothing can be more repulsive, because 
 nothing more unnatural, than the "quaint" style; — 
 nothing being more improbable than that far-fetched
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 31 
 
 siniilitutles and laboured prettinesses should offer them- 
 selves to the mind at such a moment, except, indeed, 
 ■vrhere universal custom has made (as in the case of some 
 of our forefathers) quaintness itself a second nature. 
 When lachrymatories were the fashion, it might, for 
 aught we can tell, have been easy for the ancient mourner 
 to drop a tear into the little cruet at any given moment. 
 But, ordinarily, nothing is more certain than that the 
 very sight of such a receptacle would, as it was carried 
 round to the company, instantly annihilate all emotion, 
 even if it did not turn tears into laughter. Not less 
 repellent, under ordinary circumstances, are all the 
 forms of the " quaint" when the object is to excite 
 emotion, strong or deep. But it is not so with cer- 
 tain other subjects, in which the " quaint" itself is 
 not without its recommendations; for example, in 
 enforcinjj and illustratino; moral maxims, in inculcatincr 
 lessons of life and manners, in depicting varieties of 
 human character — in all which cases no continuous 
 reasoning, no warmth of passion, is expected or required. 
 Here the fancy may be indulged in her most sportive 
 and playful moods, and allowed to attire the sententious 
 aphorisms she is commissioned to recommend, in any 
 way that seems to her best. She may travel in any 
 circuit, however wide, for her illustrations — may employ 
 analogies, the very oddity of which shall ensure their 
 being remembered — may lock up wisdom in any cui'ious 
 casket of antithesis or alliteration — nay, may not disdain 
 even a quip or a pun, when these may serve to stimulate 
 attention, or to aid the memory. The very best speci-
 
 P2 LIFP AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 mens of the quaint style, at all events, are on such 
 themes. Such, to mention a single example, is Earle's 
 " Microcosmography;" such, also, are the best and 
 most finished of Fuller's own writings — as his " Profane 
 and Holy State," his " Good Thoughts in Bad Times," 
 his " Good Thoughts in Worse Times," and his " Mixed 
 Contemplations." The composition in such works often 
 reminds us of some gorgeous piece of cabinet-work from 
 China or India, in which ivory is richly inlaid with gems 
 and gold. Though we may not think the materials 
 always harmonious, or the shape perfectly consistent 
 with our notions of elegance, we cannot fail to admire 
 the richness of the whole product, and the costliness 
 and elaboration of the workmanship. 
 
 We have said, that in many respects Fuller may be 
 considered the nicaster of the quaint school of the seven- 
 teenth century. It is by no means to be forgotten, 
 however, that he is almost entirely free from many of 
 the most offensive peculiarities of that school. As those 
 qualities of quaintness he possesses in common with his 
 contemporaries are, as already intimated, natural to himy 
 so from those which could hardly be natural in any, he 
 is for the most part free. Thus he is almost wholly 
 untainted by that vain pedantry, which so deeply infects 
 the style of many of the greatest writers of his age ; 
 more especially Burton, Jeremy Taylor, Donne, and 
 Browne. His quotations are very rare, and generally 
 very apt, introduced for use, not ostentation. You 
 nowhere find that curious mosaic work of different 
 tongues, which is so common in the pages of Burton
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 3S 
 
 and Taylor. You never find him, as you do this last 
 writer, enforcing some commonplace of moral wisdom 
 by half a dozen quotations from different writers, as 
 though afraid to allow even a truism to walk abroad 
 except under the guard of some venerable names ; or as 
 though men would not believe their own senses, unless 
 they had the authority of antiquity for doing so. From 
 all the forms of learned pedantry. Fuller may be pro- 
 nounced almost entirely free. His reading was various, 
 and his learning great ; though not to be compared to 
 those of the above writers, whose powers, vast as they 
 were, often sank beneath the load of their more prodi- 
 gious erudition. 
 
 Fuller's style is also free to a great extent, from the 
 Latinisms which form so larsfe an element in that of 
 many of his great contemporaries. Both in style and 
 diction, he is much more idiomatic than most of them. 
 The structure of his sentences is far less involved and 
 periodic, while his words are in much larger proportion 
 of Saxon derivation. Something may no doubt be 
 attributed to the character of his mind ; his shrewd 
 practical sense leading him, as it generally leads those 
 who are strongly characterised by it, to prefer the 
 homely and universally intelligible in point of expression. 
 Still more, however, is to be attributed to the habits of 
 his life. He was not the learned recluse which many of 
 his contemporaries were, and neither read nor WTote 
 half so much in the learned tong-ues. He loved to 
 gossip with the common people ; and, when collecting 
 materials for his historical works, would listen, we are
 
 M LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 told, for hours together, to their prolix accounts of loeal 
 traditions and ftimily legends. Many, very many of the 
 good old English words now lost, may be found in his 
 writings. One passage of vigorous idiomatic English, 
 and which is, in many other respects, a striking exempli- 
 fication of Fuller's manner, we cannot refrain from 
 quoting. It is from his " Essay on Tombs : " 
 
 " Tombs are the clothes of the dead. A grave is but 
 a plain suit, and a rich monument is one embroidered. 
 Most moderate men have been careful for the decent 
 interment of their corpses ; . . . . both hereby to prevent 
 the negligence of heirs, and to mind him of his mortality. 
 Virgil tells us, that when bees swarm in the air, and 
 two armies, meeting together, fight as it were a set 
 battle with great violence — cast but a little dust upon 
 them, and they will be quiet : — 
 
 ' Hi motus animorum, alque hsec certamina tanta, 
 Pulveris exigui jactu compressa quiescunt.' 
 
 " Thus the most ambitious motions and thouGrhts of 
 man's mind are quickly quelled when dust is thrown on 
 hnn, whereof his fore-prepared sepulchre is an excellent 
 remembrancer. Yet some seem to have built their 
 tombs, therein to bury their thoughts of dying ; never 
 thinking thereof, but embracing the world with greater 
 greediness. A gentleman made choice of a fair stone, 
 and, intending the same for his gravestone, caused it to 
 be pitched up in a field a pretty distance from his house, 
 and used often to shoot at it for his exercise. ' Yea, 
 but/ said a wag that stood by, ' you would be loath, sir,
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 35 
 
 to hit the mark.' And so are many unwilling to die, 
 who, notwithstanding, have erected their monuments. 
 
 " Tombs ought, in some sort, to be proportioned, not 
 to the wealth, but deserts of the party interred. Yet 
 may we see some rich man of mean worth, loaden under 
 a tomb big enough for a prince to bear. There were 
 officers appointed in the Grecian games, who always, by 
 public authority, did pluck down the statues erected to 
 the victors, if they exceeded the true symmetry and 
 proportion of their bodies. 
 
 " The shortest, plainest, and truest epitaphs are best. 
 — I say, ' the shortest ; ' for when a passenger sees a 
 chronicle written on a tomb, he takes it on trust some 
 great man lies there buried, without taking pains to 
 examine who he is. Mr. Camden, in his ' Remains,' 
 presents us with examples of great men that had little 
 epitaphs. And when once I asked a witty gentleman, 
 an honoured friend of mine, what epitaph was fittest to 
 be written on Mr. Camden's tomb — ' Let it be,' said he, 
 *' Camden's Remains." I say also, * the plainest ; ' for, 
 except the sense lie above ground, few will trouble 
 themselves to dig for it. Lastly, it must be ' true ;' not 
 as in some monuments, where the red veins in the 
 marble may seem to blush at the falsehoods written on 
 it. He was a witty man that first taught a stone to 
 speak, but he was a wicked man that taught it first 
 to lie. 
 
 " To want a grave is the cruelty of the living, not the 
 misery of the dead. An English gentleman, not long 
 since, did lie on his death-bed in Spain, and the Jesuits
 
 36 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 did flock about him to pervert him to their religion. 
 All was In vain. Their last argument was, ' If you will 
 not turn Roman Catholic, then your body shall be 
 unburied.' ' Then,' answered he, ' I will stink ; ' and 
 so turned his head and died. Thus love, if not to the 
 dead, to the living, will make him, if not a grave a hole. 
 .... A good memory is the best monument. Others 
 are subject to casualty and time ; and we know that the 
 pyramids themselves, doting with age, have forgotten 
 the names of their founders.* To conclude ; let us be 
 careful to provide rest for our souls, and our bodies will 
 provide rest for themselves. And let us not be herein 
 like unto gentlewomen, who care not to keep the inside 
 of the orange, but candy and preserve only the outside 
 thereof." 
 
 One other Essay, which Is not only a fine specimen 
 of Fuller's best manner, but is full of sound practical 
 criticism, we cannot resist the temptation to cite. It Is 
 on " Fancy : " — 
 
 " Fancy is an inward sense of the soul, for a while 
 retaining and examining things brought In thither by 
 the common sense. It is the most boundless and 
 restless faculty of the soul ; for, whilst the understand- 
 
 * The reader may compare with this fine thought the still subliraer 
 expressions of Sir Thomas Browne : " 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 on a 
 pyramid gloriously triumphing, . . . and turning old glories into 
 dreams. History sinketh beneath her cloud. The traveller, as ho 
 paceth amazedly through those deserts, asketh of her who buildcd " the 
 pyramids ? " and she mumbleth something, but what it is he heareth 
 not."
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 37 
 
 ing and the will are kept as it were in libera custodid 
 to their objects of verum ethomim, the fancy is free from 
 all engagements. It digs without spade, sails without 
 ship, flies without wings, builds without charges, fights 
 without bloodshed ; in a moment sti-iding from the 
 centre to the circumference of the world, by a kind of 
 omnipotency creating and annihilating things in an 
 instant ; and things divorced in nature are married in 
 fancy, as in a lawful place. It is also most restless ; 
 whilst the senses are bound, and reason in a manner 
 asleep, fancy, like a sentinel, walks the round, ever 
 working, never wearied. 
 
 " The chief diseases of the fancy are either, that it is 
 too wild and hio-h-soarinjj, or else too low and grovellinffi 
 or else too desultory and over-voluble. 
 
 " Of the first : — If thy fancy be but a little too rank, 
 asfe itself will correct it. To lift too hifrh is no fault in a 
 young horse : because, with travelling, he will mend it, 
 for his own ease. Thus, lofty fancies in young men will 
 come down of themselves ; and, in process of time, the 
 overplus will shrink to be but even measure. But if this 
 will not do it, then observe these rules : — 
 
 " Take part always with thy judgment against thy 
 fancy, in any thing wherein they shall dissent. If thou 
 suspectest thy conceits too luxuriant, herein account thy 
 suspicion a legal conviction, and damn whatsoever thou 
 doubtest of Warily Tully : — Bene monent, qui vetant 
 quicquam facere de quo dubitas, cBqiium sit an iniquum. 
 
 " Take the advice of a faithful friend, and submit thy 
 inventions to his censure. When thou pennest an ora-
 
 38 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 tlon, let hira have the power of Index Expurgatorius, to 
 expunge what he pleaseth ; and do not thou, like a fond 
 mother, cry if the child of thy brain be corrected for play- 
 ins; the wanton. Mark the aro'uments and reasons of his 
 alterations — why that phrase least proper, this passage 
 more cautious and advised ; and, after a while, thou shalt 
 perform the place in thine own person, and not go out 
 of thyself for a censurer. 
 
 " If thy fancy be too low and humble, let thy judgment 
 be king, but not tyrant, over it, to condemn harmless, 
 yea commendable conceits. Some, for fear their orations 
 should giggle, will not let them smile. Give it also liberty 
 to rove, for it will not be extravagant. There is no danger 
 that weak folks, if they walk abroad, will straggle far, as 
 wanting strength. 
 
 "Acquaint thyself with reading poets, for there fancy is 
 in her throne ; and, in time, the sparks of the author's 
 wit will catch hold on the reader, and inflame him with 
 love, liking, and desire of imitation. I confess there is 
 more required to teach one to write than to see a copy. 
 However, there is a secret force of fascination in reading 
 poems, to raise and provoke fancy. 
 
 " If thy fancy be over-voluble, then whip this vagrant 
 home to the first object whereon it should be settled. 
 Indeed, nimbleness is the perfection of this faculty, but 
 levity the bane of it. Great is the difference betwixt a 
 swift horse, and a skittish that will stand on no ground. 
 Such is the ubiquitary fancy, which will keep long resi- 
 dence on no one subject, but is so courteous to strangers, 
 that it ever welcomes that conceit most which comes last,
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 39 
 
 and new species supplant the old ones, before seriously 
 considered. If this be the fault of thy fancy, I say, whip 
 it home to the first object whereon it should be settled. 
 This do as often as occasion requires, and by degrees the 
 fugitive servant will learn to abide by his work without 
 running away. 
 
 " Acquaint thyself by degrees with hard and knotty 
 studies — as school-divinity, which will clog thy over- 
 nimble fancy. True at the first, it will be as welcome 
 to thee as a prison, and their very solutions will seem 
 knots unto thee. But take not too much at once, lest 
 thy brain turn edge. Taste it first as a potion for physic ; 
 and by degrees thou shalt drink it as beer for thirst : 
 practice will make it pleasant. Mathematics are also 
 good for this purpose ; if beginning to try a conclusion, 
 thou must make an end, lest thou losest thy pains that 
 are past, and must proceed seriously and exactly. I 
 meddle not with those Bedlam fancies, all whose conceits 
 are antics ; but leave them for the physicians to purge 
 with hellebore. 
 
 " To clothe low creeping matter with high-flown lan- 
 guage is not fine fancy, but flat foolery. It rather loads 
 than raises a wren, to fasten the feathers of an ostrich to 
 her wings. Some men's speeches are like the high moun- 
 tains in Ireland, having a dirty bog in the top of them; 
 the very ridge of them in high words having nothing of 
 worth, but what rather stalls than delights the auditor. 
 
 " Fine fancies in manufactures invent engines rather 
 pretty than useful. And, commonly, one trade is too 
 narrow for them. They are better to project new ways
 
 40 LIFE AND WRITIKGS OP 
 
 than to prosecute old, and are rather skilful in many mys- 
 teries than thriving in one. They affect not voluminous 
 inventions, wherein many years must constantly be spent 
 to perfect them, except there be in them variety of plea- 
 sant employment. 
 
 "Imagination (the work of the fancy) hath produced real 
 effects. Many serious and sad examples hereof may be 
 produced. I will only insist on a merry one. A gentle- 
 man having led a company of children beyond their usual 
 journey, they began to be weary, and jointly cried to him 
 to carry them; which, because of their multitude, he 
 could not do, but told them he would provide them horses 
 to ride on. Then cutting little wands out of the hedge 
 as nags for them, and a great stake as a gelding for him- 
 self, thus mounted, fancy put mettle into their legs, and 
 they came cheerfully home. 
 
 " Fancy runs most furiously when a guilty conscience 
 drives it. One that owed much money, and had many 
 creditors, as he walked London streets in the evening, a 
 tenter-hook caught his cloak. ' At whose suit?' said he, 
 conceiving some bailiff had arrested him. Thus guilty 
 consciences are afraid where no fear is, and count every 
 creature they meet a sergeant sent from God to punish 
 them." 
 
 The historical works of Fuller are simply a caricature 
 of the species of composition to which they professedly 
 belong ; a systematic violation of all its proprieties. The 
 gravity and dignity of the historic muse are habitually set 
 at naught by him. Nay more ; not only is he continually 
 cracking his jokes, and perpetrating his puns ; his matter
 
 THOMAS FILLER. 41 
 
 is as full of treason against the laws of history as his 
 manner. His very method — if we may be allowed such 
 an abuse of language— consists in a contempt of all n^.e- 
 thod. He has so constructed his works as to secure 
 himself the indulgence of perpetual digression — of har- 
 bouring and protecting every vagrant story that may 
 ask shelter in his pages — of rambling hither and thither, 
 as the fit takes him — and of introducing all sorts of things 
 where, when, and how he pleases. To this end he has 
 cut up his " Histories " into little paragraphs or sections, 
 which often have as little connection with one another as 
 with the general subject. Any curious fact, any odd 
 anecdote, is warrant in his opinion for a digression, pro- 
 vided only it has any conceivable relation to the events 
 he happens to be narrating. A mere chronological con- 
 nection is always deemed enough to justify him in bringing 
 the most diverse matters into juxtaposition ; while the 
 little spaces which divide his sections from one another, 
 like those between the compartments in a cabinet of curi- 
 osities, are thought sufficient lines of demarcation between 
 the oddest incongruities. His " Worthies of England" 
 is in fact a rambling tour over the English Counties, 
 taken in alphabetical order, in which, though his chief ob- 
 ject is to give an account of the principal families resident 
 in each, and of the illustrious men they have severally 
 produced, he cannot refrain from thrusting in a world of 
 gossip on their natural history and geography, on their 
 productions, laws, customs, and proverbs. It may be 
 said that this was an unfinished work; that we have not 
 the fabric itself, but only the bricks and mortar of which
 
 42 
 
 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 it was to be constructed. We reply that the general 
 plan is sufficiently disclosed, and could not have been 
 materially altered had the author lived to complete the 
 work. But is his " Church History " a whit better in this 
 respect ? Never was there such a medley. First, each 
 book and section is introduced by a quaint dedication to 
 one or other of his many admirers or patrons. Nicholson 
 in his " English Historical Library " is rather severe on 
 his motives for such a multipHcation of dedications. 
 Secondly, of the several paragraphs into which the 
 "Church History" is divided (most of them introduced 
 by some quaint title), many are as little connected with 
 church history as with the history of China. Thus, in 
 one short "section" comprising the period from 1330 to 
 1361, we find " paragraphs " relating to " the ignorance of 
 the English in curious clothing" — to "fuller's earth," 
 which, he tells us, " was a precious commodity " — to the 
 manufacture of "woollen cloth" and to the sumptuary laws 
 which "resti'ained excess in apparel." 
 
 Here is a strange mixture in one short chapter ! Church 
 history, as all the world knows, is compelled to treat of 
 matters which have a very remote relation to the church 
 of Christ ; but who could have suspected that it could 
 by possibility take cognisance of fuller^'s earth and wool- 
 lens ? Even Fuller himself seems a little astonished at 
 his own hardihood ;. and lest any should at first sight 
 fail to see the perfect congruity of such topics, he en- 
 gages, with matchless effrontery, to show the connection 
 between them. His reasons are so very absurd, and 
 given so much in his own manner, that we cannot refrain
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 43 
 
 from citing them. '^But enough of this subject, which 
 let none condemn for a deviation from church history. 
 First, because it would not grieve rae to go a little out 
 of the way, if the way be good, as the digression is, for 
 the credit and profit of our country. Secondly, it reduc- 
 tively belongeth to the church history, seeing many poor 
 people, both young and old, formerly charging the 
 parishes (as appeared by the account of the church offi- 
 cers), were hereby enabled to maintain themselves !I" 
 
 It may well be supposed, after what has been said, 
 that his " Histories" are not to be judged by tlie ordi- 
 nary rules applied to that class of compositions. They 
 possess intrinsic value only as collections and repertories 
 of materials for other and less eccentric writers. In this 
 point of view he often modestly represents them ; and in 
 fact, as we conjecture, for the very purpose of securing 
 the larger licence of rambling. The praise of method 
 and regularity (if indeed he formed any notion of tliese) 
 he coveted little, compared with the free indulgence of 
 his vagrant and gossiping humour. He loved, like Edie 
 Ochiltree, " to daunder along the green lanes," to leave 
 the dusty high-road of continuous history, and solace 
 himself in every " bypath meadow " that invited his feet 
 by its softness and verdure. Even as a collector of 
 materials, his' merits have been strongly called in ques- 
 tion by Bishop Nicholson. " Through the whole of his 
 ' Church History,' " says the critic, " he is so fond of his 
 own wit, that he does not seem to have minded what he 
 was about. The gravity of an historian (much more x»f 
 an ecclesiastical one) requires a far greater care, both of
 
 44 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 the matter and style of his work, than is here to be met 
 with. If a pretty story comes in his way that affords 
 scope for clinch and droll, ofFit goes with all the gaiety of 
 the stage, without staying to inquire whether it have 
 any foundation in truth or not ; and even the most 
 serious and authentic parts of it are so interlaced with 
 pun and quibble, that it looks as if the man had designed 
 to ridicule the annals of our church into fable and ro- 
 mance. Yet if it were possible to refine it well, the work 
 would be of good use, since there are in it some things 
 of moment hardly to be had elsewhere, which may often 
 illustrate dark passages in more serious writers. These 
 are not to be despised where his authorities are cited, 
 and appear credible. But in other matters, where he is 
 singular, and without his vouchers, /xe/xvjjffo acr/ffrs/i/." 
 
 That Fuller has intermingled a great deal of gossip 
 and rubbish with his facts, is indeed most true ; but then, 
 usually, he neither receives such matter for truth him 
 self, nor delivers it for truth to others ; so that the 
 worst that can be said of him on that score is, that he 
 is content to merge his historic character in that of a 
 retailer of amusinof oddities. But that he is careless in 
 the admission or investigation of facts, we cannot admit 
 without better proof than Nicholson has furnished ; and 
 we much fear that the censure of the critic was excited 
 rather by Fuller's candour, than by either his partiality 
 or his neo;lis:;ence. If he had been a more thorou2;h 
 partisan, and on the side of his censor, we should have 
 been spared some of the indignation of this " historian " 
 of " historians." With indolence in his researches, at
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 4:5 
 
 all events, Fuller cannot be justly taxed. Frequently 
 compelled, in his capacity of chaplain to the royal army, 
 to change his quarters, often writing without the advan- 
 tage of books and access to documents, it was impossible 
 that he should not fall into serious errors ; but he dili- 
 gently availed himself of such resources as were within his 
 reach. As already intimated, he would spend hours in 
 patiently listening to the long-winded recitals of rustic 
 ignorance, in hopes of gleaning some neglected tradition, 
 or of rescuing some half-forgotten fact from oblivion. 
 His works every where disclose the true antiquarian 
 spirit, the genuine veneration for whatever bears the 
 "charming rust," or exhales the musty odour of age; 
 and it is plain, that if his opportunities had been equal 
 either to his inclinations or his aptitudes, he would have 
 been no mean proficient in the arts of spelling out and 
 piecing the mouldering records of antiquity — of de- 
 ciphering documents — of adjusting dates — of investigat- 
 ino- the origin of old customs, and the etymology of old 
 names — of interpreting proverbial sayings — of sifting the 
 residuum of truth in obscure tradition, and of showing the 
 manner in which facts have passed into fable. Like 
 many men of the same stamp, however, he had not the 
 fjiculty of discriminating the relative value of the flicts 
 thus elicited ; but frequently exhibits the most insignifi- 
 cant with as much prominence as the most valuable : 
 like them, too, he often mistakes probability for demon- 
 stration, and magnifies conjecture into certainty. In 
 some respects he bore a sort of resemblance (though in 
 others how different!) to Herodotus and Froissart. The
 
 46 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF 
 
 charm of continuous narrative, indeed, for which they are 
 so justly eminent, he possessed not ; still less the happy 
 art of a picturesque and graceful disposition of his 
 materials. But in his diligent heed to traditional 
 stories, in the personal pains and labour which he was 
 willing to take in the accumulation of his materials, in 
 the eagerness and the patience with which he prosecuted 
 the chase, in the large infusion of merely curious and 
 amusing matter amongst the sober verities of history, by 
 which his " Worthies " and his " Church History " are 
 equally marked, there is some resemblance. The tra- 
 ditions, and " the reports," and the " sayings," of the 
 common people, were as dear to him as was the wj T-.iybxjs, 
 to the father of history. Like the above writers, too, 
 he usually lets us know for what he vouches, and what 
 he gives on the report of others ; and we believe that, 
 as in their case, his principal statements will be found 
 more nearly true the more they are investigated. But, 
 after all, his professedly historical works are not to be 
 read as histories ; their strange want of method, the odd 
 intermixture of incongruous and irrelevant matter they 
 contain, and the eccentricities of all kinds with which 
 they abound, will for ever prevent that. They are 
 rather books of amusement ; in which wisdom and whim, 
 important facts and impertinent fables, solid reflections 
 and quaint drolleries, refined wit and wretched puns, 
 great beauties and great negligencies, are mingled in 
 equal proportions. Perused as books of amusement, 
 there are few in the English language which a man, with 
 the slightest tincture of love for our early literature, can
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 47 
 
 take up with a keener relish; while an enthusiast, 
 whether by natural predisposition or acquired habit, will, 
 like Charles Lamb, absolutely riot in their wild luxu- 
 riance. 
 
 Faulty as Fuller's Histories are, it will be seen that 
 he yet possessed in great perfection many of the 
 essential conditions of excellence in that department of 
 composition. His spirit of research, his love of minute 
 investigation, his fine imagination, his boundless vivacity, 
 his freedom from prejudice, his hberality and candour, 
 would seem to have ensured success ; and that success 
 would doubtless have been eminent, had he not given 
 such licence to his inordinate wit, so freely indulged his 
 oddities of manner, and set all method at defiance. 
 These defects have gone far to neutralize his other ad- 
 mirable qualifications for historical composition ; and 
 what was absurdly said of Shakspeare, might with some 
 propriety be said of him, " that a pun was the Cleopatra 
 for which he lost the world, and was content to lose it." 
 
 In a moral and religious point of view, the character 
 of Fuller is entitled to our veneration, and is altogether 
 one of the most attractive and interesting which that 
 age exhibits to us. His buoyant temper, and his per- 
 petual mirthfulness, were wholly at variance with that 
 austerity and rigour which characterised so many of the 
 religionists of his time ; but his life and conduct bore 
 ample testimony that he possessed genuine and habitual 
 piety. Amidst all his levity of manner, there was still 
 the gravity of the heart — deep veneration for all things 
 sacred; and while his wit clothed even his religious
 
 48 LIFE AND WRITINSS OF 
 
 thoughts and feelings with Irresistible pleasantry, his 
 manner is as different from that of the scorner, as the 
 innocent laugh of childhood from the malignant chuckle 
 of a demon. In all the relations of domestic and social 
 life, his conduct was most exemplary. In one point, 
 especially, does he appear in honourable contrast with 
 the bigots of all parties in that age of strife — he had 
 learnt, partly from his natural benevolence, and partly 
 from a higher principle, the lessons of " that charity 
 which thinketh no evil," and which so few of his con- 
 temporaries knew how to practise. His very moderation, 
 however, as is usually the case, made him suspected by 
 the zealots of both parties. Though a sincere friend of 
 the Church of England, he looked with sorrow (which 
 in his " Church History " he took no pains to disguise) 
 on the severities practised towards the Puritans; and 
 every where adopts the tone of apology for their supposed 
 errors, and of compassion for their undoubted sufferings. 
 His candour and impartiality in treating some of the 
 most delicate portions of our ecclesiastical history — as, 
 for example, the Hampton Court controversy, and the 
 administration of Laud — are in admirable contrast with 
 the resolute spirit of partisanship which has Inspired so 
 many of the writers of the Church of England. There 
 were not wanting persons, however, who, as we have 
 seen, insinuated that his candour In these and other in- 
 stances was nothing but a peace-offering to the men in 
 power at the time he published his " Church History." 
 But, not to urge that he has said too much on the other 
 side to justify such a supposition, his whole manner is
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 49 
 
 that of an honest man, striving to be impartial, even if 
 not always successful. Had he been the unprincipled 
 time-server this calumny would represent him, he would 
 have suppressed a little more. Coleridge says that he 
 was " incomparably the most sensible, the least preju- 
 diced, great man of an age that boasted a galaxy of great 
 men." If this statement be confined to " religious 
 prejudices," there are, it must be confessed, few of his 
 age who can be compared with him. As to prejudices 
 of other kinds, he seems to have shared in those of most 
 of his contemporaries. It is hard, or rather impossible, 
 to be wholly beyond one's age. He believed in witches; 
 he was a resolute stickler for the royal prerogative of 
 curing the king's evil, though whether his loyalty or 
 philosophy had most to do with his convictions on that 
 point, may well admit of doubt. It is true that he treats 
 the idle legends and fabled miracles of JRomish super- 
 stition with sovereign contempt ; but then his Protes- 
 tantism came to the aid of his reason, and, considering 
 the superstitions he has himself retained, the former 
 may be fairly supposed to have offered the more power- 
 ful logic of the two. 
 
 Thouo:h Fuller cannot be accused of sharing the 
 bigotry and bitterness of his age, he is by no means 
 perfectly free from a very opposite vice, with which 
 that age was nearly as chargeable — we mean flattery. 
 His multitudinous dedications to his numerous patrons, 
 contained in the " Church History," are, many of them, 
 very striking, and even beautiful compositions, and full 
 of ingenious turns of thought; but they certainly attribute
 
 50 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP 
 
 as much of excellence to the objects of them as either 
 history, or tradition, or charity can warrant us In ascribing. 
 Something may, however, be pardoned to the spirit of the 
 age, and something to the gratitude or necessities of the 
 author. But that any author, even a hungry one, could 
 be brought to write them. Is a wonder ; that any patron 
 could, either with or without a blush, appropriate them, 
 is a still greater one. It is in the conclusion to his 
 character of the " Good King," in his " Holy State," 
 that our author has fallen most unworthily Into the 
 complimentary extravagance of the times. He, of 
 course, makes the reigning monarch the reality of the 
 fair picture, and draws his character In language which 
 truth might well interpret into the severest Irony. 
 
 It would be improper to close this analysis of one of 
 the most singular intellects that ever appeared in the 
 world of letters, without saying a word or two of the 
 prodigies related of his powers of memory. That he 
 had a very tenacious one may easily be credited, though 
 seme of its traditional feats almost pass belief. It is 
 said that he could " repeat five hundred strange words 
 after once hearing them, and could make use of a 
 sermon verbatim, under the like circumstances." Still 
 further, it is said that he undertook, in passing from 
 Temple Bar to the extremity of Cheapslde, to tell, at 
 his return, every sign as it stood in order on both sides 
 of the way (repeating them either backwards or for- 
 wards), and' that he performed the task exactly. This 
 is pretty well, considering that In that day every shop 
 had Its sign. The interpretation of such hyperbolea,
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 51 
 
 however, is very easy ; they signify, at all events, thus 
 much — that he had an extraordinary memory. That 
 many of the reports respecting it were false or exag- 
 gerated, may be gathered from an amusing anecdote 
 recorded by himself. " None alive," says he, " ever 
 heard me pretend to the art of memory, who in my 
 book {Holy State) have decried it as a trick, no art ; 
 and, indeed, is more of fancy than memory. I confess, 
 some ten years since, when I came out of the pulpit of 
 St. Dunstan's East, one (who since wrote a book thereof) 
 told me in the vestry before credible people, that he, in 
 Sydney College, had taught me the art of memory. I 
 returned unto him, That it was not so^ for / could not 
 remember that I had ever seen him before! which, I con- 
 ceive, was a real refutation." 
 
 One is prepared to meet with all sorts of oddities of 
 manner about such a man ; for it would be stransre that 
 a person so eccentric in all his writings, should not have 
 been eccentric in his private habits ; but really the 
 following account of his method of composition passes 
 belief It is said that he was in " the habit of writinof 
 the first words of every line near the margin down to 
 the foot of the paper, and, that then beginning again, 
 he filled up the vacuities exactly, without spaces, 
 interlineations, or contractions ; " and that he " would so 
 connect the ends and be2;inninors that the sense would 
 appear as complete as if it had been written in a con- 
 tinued series, after the ordinary manner." Tliis, we 
 presume, is designed to be a compliment to the ease 
 with which he performed the process of mental composi-
 
 52 riFE AND WRITINGS OF THOMaS FIjLLER. 
 
 tion, and the accuracy with which his memory coukt 
 transfer what he had' meditated to paper. But though 
 he might occasionally perform such a feat for the amuse- 
 ment of his friends, it never could have been his ordi- 
 nary practice. 
 
 As we quoted, at the commencement of this essay, 
 the opinion entertained of our author by Coleridge, 
 we shall conclude it by citing that of Charles Lamb, 
 than whom there could not be a more competent judge. 
 " The writings of Fuller," says he, " are usually 
 designated by the title of quaint, and with sufficient 
 reason ; for such was his natural bias to conceits that I 
 doubt not, upon most occasions, it w^ould have been 
 going out of his way to have expressed himself out of 
 them. But his wit is not always lumen siccum, a dry 
 faculty of surjjrising; on the contrary, his conceits are 
 oftentimes deeply steeped in human feeling and jjassion. 
 Above all, his way of telling a story, for its eager liveli- 
 ness, and the perpetual running commentary of the 
 narrator, happily blended with the narration, is perhaps 
 unequalled." * 
 
 * Since the preceding essay was published, have appeared " Memo- 
 rials of the Life and Works" of Fuller, by the Rev. Arthur T, Russell, 
 B.C.L. In that volume, all that either history or tradition has left 
 respecting our author has been laboriously and faithfully compiled; 
 and thitlier the reader, curious about the biography of this eccentric 
 genius, is referred for more minute information than could be given in 
 the sketch at the commencement of this essay.
 
 FULLERIANA : 
 
 OR, 
 
 WISDOM AND WIT OF THOMAS FULLER.
 
 FULLERIANA : 
 
 OR, 
 
 WISDOM AND WIT OF THOMAS FULLEE. 
 
 I.— HOW TO MAKE ANY DAY MEMORABLE. 
 
 I DO discover a fallacy, whereby I have long deceived my- 
 self, which is this ; I have desired to begin my amendment from 
 my birthday, or from the first day of the year, or from some 
 eminent festival, that so my repentance might bear some 
 remarkable date. But when those days were come, I have 
 adjourned my amendment to some other time. Thus whilst 
 I could not agree with myself when to start, I have almost 
 lost the running of the race. I am resolved thus to befool my- 
 self no longer. I see no day to to-day, the instant time is 
 always the fittest time. . . . Grant therefore that "to-day I may 
 hear Thy voice." And if this day be obscure in the calendar, 
 and remarkable in itself for nothing else, give me to make it 
 memorable in my soul thereupon, by Thy assistance, beginning 
 the reformation of my life. 
 
 II.— IN SOME CASES TO DOUBT IS TO BE CERTAIN. 
 
 This day I disputed with myself, whether or no I had said 
 my prayers this morning, and I could not call to mind any
 
 56 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 remarkable passage whence I could certainly conclude that I 
 had offered my prayers unto Thee. Frozen affections, which 
 left no spark of remembrance behind them ! Yet at last I 
 hardly recovered one token, whence I was assured that I had 
 said my prayers. It seems I had said them, and only said 
 them — rather by heart than with my heart. 
 
 III.— THE WHOLE WORLD'S FALLACY. 
 
 Often have I thought with myself, I will sin but this one 
 sin more, and then I will repent of it, and of all the rest of 
 my sins together. " So foolish was I, and ignoi'ant." As if I 
 should be more able to pay my debts, when I owe more : or 
 as if I should say^ I will wound my friend once again, and 
 then I will lovingly shake hands with him: but what if mv 
 friend will not shake hands with me ? Besides, can one com- 
 mit one sin more, and but one sin more 1 
 
 IV.— A SERMON TO THE POINT THOUGH NOT TO THE POINT. 
 
 The preacher this day came home to my heart. A left- 
 handed Gibeonite with his sling hit not the mark more sure 
 than he my darling sins. I could find no fault with his 
 sermon, save only that it had too much truth. But this I 
 quarrelled at, that he went far from his text to come close to 
 me, and so was faulty himself in telling me of my faults. 
 Thus they will creep out at small crannies, who have a mind 
 to escape ; and yet I cannot deny, but that that which he 
 spake (though nothing to that portion of scripture which he 
 had for his text) was according to the proportion of scripture. 
 And is not Thy word in general the text at large of every 
 preacher ? Yea, rather I should have concluded, that if he 
 went from his text, Thy goodness sent him to meet me; for
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 57 
 
 •without Thy guidance it had heen impossible for him so truly 
 to have traced the intricate turnings of my deceitful heart. 
 
 v.— NO ENTAIL OF PIETY OR IMPIETY. 
 
 I FIND the genealogy of my Saviour strangely chequered 
 with four remarkable changes in four immediate generations. 
 
 1. E-oboam begat Abia; that is, a bad father begat a bad 
 son. 
 
 2. Abia begat Asa ; that is, a bad father a good son. 
 
 3. Asa begat Josaphat ; that is, a good father a bad son. 
 
 4. Josaphat begat Joram ; that is, a good father a good 
 son. 
 
 I see, from hence, that my father's piety cannot be en- 
 tailed j that is bad news for me. But I see also, that actual 
 impiety is not always hereditary ; that is good news for my 
 son. 
 
 VI.— SOLITUDE NO SOLITUDE. 
 
 I READ of my Saviour, that when he was in the wilderness, 
 then the " devil leaveth him, and behold angels came and minis- 
 tered unto him." A great change in a little time. No twilight 
 betwixt night and day. No purgatory condition betwixt hell 
 and heaven, but instantly, when out devil in angel. Such is the 
 case of every solitary soul. It will make company for itself 
 A musing mind will not stand neuter a minute, but presently 
 side with legions of good or bad thoughts. Grant, therefore, 
 that my soul, which ever will have some, may never have bad 
 company. 
 
 VII.— A FRANK CONFESSION. 
 
 I DISCOVER an arrant laziness in my soul. For when I am 
 to read a chapter in the Bible, befoi-e I begin it, I look where
 
 58 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 it endeth. And if it endeth not on tlie same side, I cannot 
 keep my hands from turning over the leaf, to measure the 
 length thereof on the other side ; if it swells to many verses, 
 I begin to grudge. Surely my heart is not rightly affected. 
 Were I truly hungry after heavenly food, I would not com- 
 plain of meat. 
 
 VIII.— TOO LONG IN TUNING. 
 The English ambassador some years since prevailed so far 
 with the Turkish emperor, as to persuade him to hear some 
 of our English music, from which (as from other liberal 
 sciences) both he and his nation were naturally averse. But 
 it happened that the musicians were so long in tuning their 
 instruments, that the great Turk, distasting their tedious- 
 ness, went away in discontent befoi'e their music began. I am 
 afraid that the differences and dissensions betwixt Christian 
 churches (being so long in reconciling their discords) will 
 breed in pagans such a disi'elish of our religion, as they will 
 not be invited to attend thereunto. 
 
 IX — THE BEST WAY OF BEING FASHIONABLE. 
 When John king of France had communicated the order 
 of the knighthood of the star to some of his guai'd, men of 
 mean birth and extraction, the nobility ever after disdained 
 to be admitted into that degree, and so that order in France 
 was extinguished. Seeing that nowadays drinking, and 
 swearing, and wantonness are grown frequent, even with 
 base beggarly people ; it is high time for men of honour, who 
 consult with their credit, to desist from such sins. Not that 
 I would have noblemen invent new vices to be in fashion
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 69 
 
 "witli themselves alone, but forsake old sins grown common 
 ■with the meanest of people. 
 
 X.— LETTERS NOT TO BE KEPT UNREAD. 
 
 The Roman senators conspired against Jidius Caesar to 
 kill him : that very next morning Artemidorus, Ccesar's 
 friend, delivered him a paper (desiring him to peruse it) 
 wherein the whole plot was discovered : but Cassar compli- 
 mented his life away, being so taken up to return the saluta- 
 tions of such people as met him in the way, that he pocketed 
 the paper, among other petitions, as unconcerned therein ; 
 and so, going to the senate-house, was slain. The world, 
 flesh, and devil have a design for the destruction of men ; we 
 ministers bring our people a letter, God's word, wherein aU 
 the conspiracy is revealed. But " who hath believed our 
 report 1 " Most men are so busy about worldly delights, they 
 are not at leisure to listen to us, or read the letter; but thus, 
 alas, run headlong to their own ruiu and destruction. 
 
 XL— AN UNLUCKY WOOING. 
 
 In the days of king Edward the sixth, the lord protector 
 marched with a powerful army into Scotland, to demand 
 their young queen Mary in marriage to our king, according 
 to their promises. The Scotch refusing to do it were beaten 
 by the English in Musselborough fight. One demanding of 
 a Scottish lord (taken prisoner in the battle), " Now, sir, 
 how do you like our king's marriage with your queen?" "I 
 always," quoth he, " did like the maniage, but I do not like 
 the wooing, that you should fetch a bride with fire and 
 sword."
 
 CO FULLEKIANA : OR, WISDOM XJiSD WIT OP 
 XII ONE-SIDED ME3I0RIES. 
 
 Jeffry, archbishop of York, and base son to king Henry 
 the second, used proudly to protest by his faith, and the 
 royalty of the king his fiither. To whom one said, You 
 may sometimes, sir, as well remember what was the honesty 
 of your mother. Good men when puffed up with pride, for 
 their heavenly extraction and paternal descent, how they are 
 God's sons by adoption, may seasonably call to mind the 
 coi'ruption which they carry about them. " T have said to 
 the worm, thou art my mother." And this consideration 
 will temper their souls with humility. 
 
 XIII.— CONSCIENCE OFTEN BURIED WITHOUT BEING DEAD. 
 
 I COULD both sigh and smile at the simplicity of a native 
 American, sent by a Spaniard, his master, with a basket of 
 figs, and a letter (wherein the figs were mentioned), to carry 
 them both to one of his master's friends. By the way, this 
 messenger eat up the figs but delivered the letter, whereby 
 his deed was discovered, and he soundly punished. Being 
 sent a second time on the like message, he first took the 
 letter (which he conceived had eyes as well as a tongue) and 
 hid it in the ground, sitting himself on the place where he 
 p'lit it ; and then securely fell to feed on his figs, presuming 
 that that paper which saw nothing could tell nothing. Then 
 taking it again out of the ground, he delivei-ed it to his 
 master's friend, whereby his fault was perceived, and he 
 worse beaten than before. Men conceive they can manage 
 their sins with secrecy ; but they carry about them a letter, 
 or book rather, written by God's finger, their conscience 
 bearing witness to all their actions. But sinners being often
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 61 
 
 detected and accused, hereby grow wary at last, and to 
 prevent this speaking paper from telling any tales, do 
 smother, stifle, and suppress it, when they go about the 
 committing of any wickedness. Yet conscience (though 
 buried for a time in silence) hath afterwards a resurrection, 
 and discovers all to their greater shame, and heavier punish- 
 ment. 
 
 XIV.— EQUIVOCAL MEASURE OF VALOUR. 
 
 A DUEL was to be fought, by consent of both kings, 
 betwixt an English and a French lord. The aforesaid John 
 Courcy, earl of Ulster, was chosen champion for the English; 
 a man of great stomach and strength, but lately much 
 weakened by long imprisonment. "Wherefore, to prepare 
 himself beforehand, the king allowed him what plenty and 
 variety of meat he was pleased to eat. But the monsieur 
 (who was to encounter him) hearing what great quantity of 
 victuals Courcy did daily devour, and thence collecting 
 his unusual strength, out of fear, refused to fight with him. 
 If by the standard of their cups, and measure of their drink- 
 ing, one might truly infer soldiers' strength by rules of pro- 
 portion, most vast and valiant achievements may justly be 
 expected from some gallants of these times. 
 
 XV.— A CASE FOR A FRIEND. 
 
 I HAVE heard that the brook near Lutterworth, in 
 Leicestershire, into which the ashes of the burnt bones of 
 Wickliffe were cast, never since doth drown the meadow 
 about it. Papists expoiind this to be, because God was well 
 pleased with the sacrifice of the ashes of such a heretic.
 
 62 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 Protestants ascribe it ratlier to proceed from tlie virtue of 
 the dust of such a reverent martyr. I see it is acasefora 
 friend. Such accidents signify nothing in themselves but 
 according to the pleasure of interpreters. Give me such 
 solid reasons, whereon I may rest and rely. Solomon saith, 
 " Tlie words of the wise are like nails, fastened by the masters 
 of the assembly." A nail is firm, and will hold driving in, 
 and will hold driven in. Send me such arguments. As for 
 these waxen- topical devices, I shall never think worse or 
 better of any religion for their sake. 
 
 XVL— GOD SEEN ONLY BY THE REFLECTION OF HIS GLORY. 
 
 The Sidionian servants agreed amongst themselves to 
 choose him to be their king, who, that morning, should first 
 see the sun. Whilst all others were gazing on the east, 
 one alone looked on the west. Some admired, more mocked 
 him, as if he looked on the feet, there to find the eye of the 
 face. But he first of all discovered the light of the sun 
 shining on the tops of houses. God is seen sooner, easier, 
 clearer in his operations than in his essence. Best 
 beheld by reflection in his creatures. " For the invisible 
 things of him, from the creation of the world, are clearly 
 seen, being understood by the things that are made." 
 
 XVIL— TOO CAREFUL AND TOO CARELESS, 
 
 I HAVE observed that children when they first put on new 
 shoes, are very curious to keep them clean. Scarce will they 
 set their feet on the ground for fear to dirt the soles of their 
 shoes. Yea, rather they will wipe the leather clean with 
 their coats ; and yet, perchance, the next day they will 
 trample with the same shoes in the mire up to the ankles.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 63 
 
 Alas, children's play is our earnest ! On that day wherein 
 we receive the sacrament, we are often over-precise, scruplin<5 
 to say or do those things which lawfully we may. But we, 
 who are more than curious that day, are not so much as care- 
 ful the next; and too often (what shall I say) go on in sin 
 up to the ankles : yea, " our sins go over our heads." 
 
 XVIIL— EXCESSIVE CURIOSITT. 
 
 I KNOW some men very desirous to see the devil, because 
 they conceive such an apparition would be a confirmation of 
 their faith. For then, by the logic of opposites, they will 
 conclude thei-e is a God because there is a devil. Thus they 
 will not believe there is heaven, except hell itself will be de- 
 posed for a witness thereof. 
 
 XIX.— BRASS BEFORE GOLD. 
 
 I OBSERVE that antiquaries, such as prize skill above profit 
 (as being rather curious than covetous), do prefer the brass 
 coins of the Roman emperors before those in gold and silver; 
 because there is much falseness and forgery daily detected, 
 and more suspected, in gold and silver medals, as being com- 
 monly cast and counterfeited, whereas brass coins are pre- 
 sumed upon as true and ancient, because it will not quit cost 
 for any to counterfeit them. Plain dealing. Lord, what I 
 want in wealth may I have in sincerity. I care not how 
 mean metal my estate be of, if my soul have the true stamp, 
 really impressed with the unfeigned image of the King of 
 Heaven. 
 
 XX.— ADVANTAGE OF BEING BURNED DOWN. 
 
 I HAVE observed, that towns which have been casually burat, 
 have been built again more beautiful than before ; mud walls, 
 
 F
 
 64 rULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 afterwards made of stone ; and roofs, formerly but thatched, 
 after advanced to be tiled. The apostle tells me, that I must 
 not " think strange concerning the fiery trial which is to 
 happen unto me." May I likewise prove improved by it. 
 Let my renewed soul, which grows out of the ashes of the 
 old man, be a more firm fabric, and stronger ' stracture ; so 
 shall affliction be my advantage. 
 
 XXL— TENACITY OF EVIL. 
 
 Almost twenty years since, I heard a profane jest, and still 
 remember it. How many pious passages of far later date 
 have I forgotten ! It seems my soul is like a filthy pond, 
 wherein fish die soon, and frogs live long. 
 
 XXIL— GOOD-NATURE NOT ALWAYS GOOD. 
 
 I PERCEIVE tliere is in the world a good-nature, falsely so 
 called, as being nothing else but a facile and flexible disposi- 
 tion, wax for every imiiression. What others are so bold to 
 beg, they are so bashful as not to deny. Such osiers can 
 never make beams to bear stress in churcb and state. If 
 this be good-nature, let me always be a clown ; if this be 
 good fellowship, let me always be a chmd. Give me to set a 
 sturdy porter before my soul, who may not equally open to 
 every comer. I cannot conceive how he can be a friend to 
 any who is a friend to all, and the worst foe to himself. 
 
 XXIIL— HA AND AH. 
 
 Ha is the interjection of laughter ; Ah is an interjection of 
 sorrow. The diflTerence betwixt them very small, as consist- 
 ing only in the transposition of what is no substantial letter, 
 but a bare aspiration. How quickly, in the age of a minute,
 
 THOMAS FULLKR. 65 
 
 in the very turning of a breath, is oui- mirth changed into 
 
 mourning ! 
 
 XXIV.— HEAVEN SEEN AND LOST AND SEEN AGAIN. 
 
 Tba YELLING on the plain (which notwithstanding hath its 
 risings and fallings), I discorered Salisbury steeple many 
 miles off; coming to a declivity, I lost the sight thereof; but 
 climbing up the next hill, the steeple grew out of the ground 
 attain. Yea, I often found it and lost it, till at last I came 
 safely to it, and took my lodging near it. It fareth thus 
 •with us, whilst we are wayfaring to heaven, mounted on the 
 Pisgah top of some good meditation, ,we get a glimpse of our 
 celestial Canaan. But when, either on the flat of an ordinary 
 temper, or in the fall of an extraordinary temptation, we lose 
 the view thereof Thus, in the sight of our soul, heaven is 
 discovered, covered, and recovered ; till, though late, at last, 
 though slowly, surely, we arrive at the haven of our hap- 
 piness. 
 
 XXV.- CONTROVERSY AND MEDITATION. 
 I PERCEIVE controversial writings (sounding somewhat of 
 drums and trumpets) do but make the wound the wider. 
 Meditations are like the minstrel the prophet called for, to 
 pacify his mind discomposed with passion. 
 
 XXVL— A DIFFICULT CHOICE. 
 
 Often have I thought with myself, what disease I would be 
 best contented to die of. None please me. The stone, the 
 colic, terrible as expected, intolerable when felt. The palsy 
 is death before death. The consumption a flattering disease, 
 cozening men into hope of long life at the last gasp. Some
 
 66 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 sicknesses besot, others enrage men, some are too swift, and 
 others too slow. 
 
 If I could as easily decline diseases as I could dislike them, 
 I should be immortal. 
 
 XXVII.— NOR FULL NOR FASTING. 
 
 Living in a country village where a burial was a rarity, I 
 never thought of death, it was so seldom presented unto me. 
 Coming to London, where there is plenty of funei'als (so that 
 coffins crowd one another, and corpses in the grave justle for 
 elbow-room), I slight and neglect death because grown au 
 object so constant and common. 
 
 How foul is my stomach to turn all food into bad humours? 
 Funerals neither few nor frequent, work effectually upon me. 
 London is a libi-ary of mortality. Volumes of all sorts and 
 sizes, rich, poor, infants, children, youth, men, old men, 
 daily die ; I see there is more required to make a good 
 scholar than only the having of many books : Loi'd, be thou 
 my schoolmaster, and " teach me to number my days, that I 
 may apply my heart unto wisdom." 
 
 XXVIIL— BLUSHING TO BE SOMETIMES BLUSHED FOR. 
 
 A PERSON of gi'eat quality was pleased to lodge a night in 
 my house. I durst not invite him to my family prayer, and 
 therefore for that time omitted it : thereby making a breach 
 in a good custom, and giving Satan advantage to assault it. 
 Yea, the loosening of such a link might have endangered the 
 scattering of the chain. 
 
 Bold bashfulness, which durst offend God, whilst it did 
 fear man. Especially considering, that though my guest was 
 never so high, yet, by the laws of hospitality, I was above
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 67 
 
 liim -whilst he was \mder my roof. Hereafter whosoever 
 Cometh within the doors, shall be requested to come within 
 the discipline of my house ; if accepting my homely diet, he 
 will not refuse my home devotion ; and sitting at my table, 
 will be entreated to kneel down by it. 
 
 XXIX.— LUXURIOUS DEVOTIONS. 
 
 SHAMEFUL' my sloth, that have deferred my night prayer 
 till I am in'bed. This lying along is an improper posture for 
 piety. Indeed there is no contrivance of our body, but some 
 good man in scripture hath handseled it with prayer. The 
 publican standing, Job sitting, Hezekiah lying on his bed, 
 Elijah with his face between his legs. But of all gestures, 
 give me St. Paul's : " for this cause I bow my knees to the fa- 
 ther of my Lord Jesus Christ." Knees when they may, then 
 they must be bended. 
 
 I have read a copy of a grant of liberty from queen Mary 
 to Henry Ratcliffe, earl of Sussex, giving him leave to wear 
 a nightcap or coif in her majesty's presence, counted a great 
 favour because of his infirmity. I know in case of necessity, 
 God would graciously accept my devotion, bound down in a 
 sick dressing ; but now whilst I am in perfect health it is in- 
 excusable. Christ commanded some to " take up their bed," 
 in token of their full recovery; my laziness may suspect, lest 
 thus my bed taking me up prove a presage of my ensuing 
 sickness. But may God pardon my idleness this once, I will 
 not again offend in the same kind, by his grace hereafter. 
 
 XXX._ALWAYS SEEN, NEVER MINDED. 
 
 In the most healthful times, two hundred and upwards was 
 the constant weekly tribute paid to mortality in London. A
 
 C8 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 laro'e bill, but it mvist be discliarged. Can one city spend 
 according to tliis weekly rate and not be bankrupt of peo- 
 ple 1 At leastwise, must not my shot be called for to make 
 up the reckoning i 
 
 When only seven young men, and those chosen by lot, were 
 but yearly taken out of Athens to be devoured by the monster 
 Minotaur, the whole city was in a constant fright, children for 
 themselves, and parents for their children. Yea, their escap- 
 ins of the first was but an introduction to the next year's lot- 
 tery. 
 
 Were the dwellers and lodgers in London weekly to cast 
 lots who should make up this two hundred, how would every 
 one be affrighted ? Kow none regard it. My security con- 
 cludes the aforesaid number will amouut of infants and old 
 folk. Few men of middle age, and amongst them surely not 
 myself. But oh ! is not this putting the evil day far from 
 me, the ready way to bring it the nearest to me ? The lot 
 is weekly drawn (though not by me) for me, I am therefore 
 concerned seriously to provide, lest that death's prize prove 
 my blank. 
 
 XXXI.— DAISTGEROUS EPICURISM. 
 
 ZoPHAR, the Naamathite, mentioneth a sort of men, in 
 whose mouths wickedness is sweet, " they hide it under their 
 tongues, they spare it, and forsake it not, but keep it still in their 
 mouths." ... A sin thus rolled, becomes so soft and supple, 
 and the throat is so short and slippery a passage, that in- 
 sensibly it may slide down from the mouth into the stomach ; 
 and contemplative wantonness quickly turns into practical 
 uncleanness.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 69 
 
 XXXII.— FALSE HERALDRY, AXD TRUE DIVI^^TT. 
 
 Though metal on metal, colour on colour, be false heraldry j 
 line on line, precept on pi-ecept, is true divinity. 
 
 XXXIIL— WHO IS TO BLAME. 
 
 I IT is that have sinned : good reason, for Satan hath no 
 impulsive power, he may strike fire till he be weary (if his 
 malice can be weary) ; except a man's corruption brings the 
 tinder, the match cannot be lighted. Away, then, with that 
 plea of course ; The devil owed me a shame. Owe thee he 
 might, but pay thee he could not, unless thou wert as willing 
 to take his black money, as he to tender it. 
 
 XXXIV.— A LIE PROLIFIC. 
 
 The Amalekite who brought the tidings to David began 
 with truth, rightly reportiug the overthrow of the Isx-aelites ; 
 cheaters must get some credit before they can cozen, and all 
 falsehood, if not founded in some truth, would not be fixed iii 
 any belief. 
 
 But proceeding he told six lies successively. 
 
 1. That Saul called him. 
 
 2. That he came at his calL 
 
 3. That Saul demanded who he was. 
 
 4. That he returned his answer. 
 
 5. That Saul commanded him to kill him. 
 
 6. That he killed him accordingly. 
 
 A wilful falsehood told, is a cripple not able to stand by it- 
 self, without some to support it ; it is easy to tell a lie, hard 
 to tell but a lie. 
 
 Lord, if I be so unhappy to relate a falsehood, give me to
 
 70 rULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 recall it or repent of it. It is said of the ants, that to prevent 
 the growing (and so the corrupting) of that corn which they 
 hoard up for their winter provision, they bite off both the ends 
 thereof, wherein the generating power of the grain doth con- 
 sist. When I have committed a sin, let me so order it that 
 I may destroy the procreation thereof, and, by a true sorrow, 
 condemn it to a blessed barrenness. 
 
 XXXV.— A QUAINT COMMENT. 
 
 Sometimes I have disputed with myself, which of the two 
 was most guilty, David, who "said in haste, All men are 
 liars," or that wicked man *' who sat and spake against his 
 brother, and slandered his own mother's son." 
 
 David seems the greater offender ; for mankind might have 
 an action of defamation against him, yea, he might justly be 
 challenged for giving all men the lie. But mark, David was 
 in haste, he spake it in transitu, when he was passing, or 
 rather posting by, or if you please, not David, but David's 
 haste i-ashly vented the words. Whereas the other sat, — a sad, 
 solemn, serious, premeditate, deliberate postui'e; his malice had 
 a full blow, with a steady hand, at the credit of his brother. 
 Not to say that sat carries with it the countenance of a ju- 
 dicial proceeding, as if he made a session or bench-business 
 thereof, as well condemning as accusing unjustly. 
 
 Lord, pardon my cursory, and pi-eserve me from sedentary 
 sins. If in haste or heat of passion I wrong any, give me at 
 leisure to ask thee and them forgiveness. But O let me not 
 sit by it, studiously to plot or project mischief to any out of 
 malice prepense. To shed blood in cool blood, is blood with 
 a witness.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 71 
 
 XXXVL— LAWFUL STEALTH. 
 
 T FIND two, (husband and wife), both stealing, and but one 
 of them guilty of felony. " And Rachel had stolen the images 
 that were her father's, and Jacob stole away unawares to 
 Laban the Syrian." In the former a complication of theft, 
 lying, sacrilege, and idolatry ; in the latter no sin at all. 
 For what our conscience tells us is lawful, and our discretion 
 dangerous, it is both conscience and discretion to do it with 
 all possible secrecy. It was as lawful for Jacob in that case 
 privately to steal away, as it is for that man who finds the 
 sunshine too hot for him to walk in the shade. 
 
 God keep us from the guilt of Rachel's stealth. But for 
 Jacob's stealing away, one may confess the fact, but deny the 
 fault therein. 
 
 XXXVIL— TEXT IMPKOVED. 
 
 I HEARD a preacher take for his text : " Am not I thine ass, 
 upon which thou hast ridden ever since I was thine unto this 
 day j was I ever wont to do so unto thee 1 " I wondered what 
 he would make thereof, fearing he would starve his auditors 
 for want of matter. But hence he observed : 
 
 1. The silliest and simplest, being wronged, may justly 
 speak in their own defence. 
 
 2. Worst men have a good title to their own goods. 
 Balaam a sorcerer ; yet the ass confesseth twice he was his. 
 
 3. They who have done many good offices, and fail in one, 
 ai'e often not only unrewarded for former service, but punished 
 for that one offence. 
 
 4. When the creatures, formerly officious to serve us, start 
 from their wonted obedience (as the earth to become barren.
 
 72 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 and air pestilential), man ought to reflect on his own sin as 
 the sole cause thereof. 
 
 How fruitful are the seeming barren places of scripture ! 
 Bad ploughmen, which make balks of such ground. Where- 
 soever the surface of God's word doth not "laugh and siuof with 
 corn," there the heart thei-eof within is "merry" with mines, 
 affording, where not plain matter, hidden mysteries. 
 
 XXXVIII THE FAN. 
 
 It is said of our Saviour, " his fan is in his hand." How 
 well it fits him, and he it ! Could Satan's clutches snatch the 
 fan, what work would he make ! He would fan as he doth 
 winnow, in a tempest, yea, in a whirlwind, and blow the best 
 away. Had man the fan in his hand, especially in these dis- 
 tracted times, out goes for chaff all opposite to the opinions 
 of liis party. Seeming sanctity will carry it away from such, 
 who, with true, but weak grace, have ill natures and eminent 
 corruptions. 
 
 There is a kind of darnel, called lolium murinum, because 
 so counterfeiting corn, that even the mice themselves (ex- 
 perience should make them good tasters) are sometimes 
 deceived therewith. Hypocrites in like manner so act holi- 
 ness, that they pass for saints before men, whose censures often 
 barn up the chaff, and burn up the grain. 
 
 XXXIX.— MUCH GOOD MAY IT DO YOU. 
 
 One Nicias a philosopher having his shoes stolen from him, 
 " May they," said he, " fit his feet that took them away !" A 
 wish at the first view very harmless, but thei'e was that in it 
 which poisoned his charity into a malicious revenge. For he
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 73 
 
 liimself liad hurled or crooked feet, so that iu effect lie wished 
 the thief to be lame. 
 
 Whosoever hath plundered me of my books and papers, I 
 freely forgive him ; and desire that he may fully understand 
 and make good use thereof, wishing him more joy of them 
 than he hath right to them. Nor is there any snake under 
 my herbs, nor have I (as Nicias) any reservation, or latent 
 sense to myself, but from my heart do desire, that to all pur- 
 poses and intents my books may be beneficial unto him. Only 
 requesting him, that one passage in his (lately my) Bible, 
 Eph. iv. 28, may be taken into his serious consideration. 
 
 XL.— EJACULATOKT PRATERS. 
 
 In barred havens so choked up with the envious sands that 
 great ships, drawing many feet of water, cannot come near, 
 lighter and lesser pinnaces may freely and safely arrive. 
 When we are time-bound, place-bound, or person-bound, so 
 that we cannot compose ourselves to make a large solemn 
 prayer, this is the right instant for ejaculations, whether 
 orally uttered, or only poured forth inwardly in the heart. 
 
 XLI— THEIR PRIVILEGE. 
 
 Ejaculations take not up any room in the soul. They 
 give liberty of callings, so that^at the same instant one may 
 follow his proper vocation. The husbandman may dart forth 
 an ejaculation, and not make a balk the more. The seaman 
 nevertheless steer his ship right, in the darkest night. Yea, 
 the soldier at the same time may shoot out his prayer to God, 
 and aim his pistol at his enemy, the one better hitting the 
 mark for the other. 
 
 The field wherein bees feed is no whit the barer for their
 
 74 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 biting ; when tliey have taken their full repast on flowers or 
 gi'ass, the ox may feed, the sheep fat, on their reversions. 
 The reason is because those little chemists distil only the re- 
 fined part of the flower, leaving the grosser substance thereof 
 So ejaculations bind not men to any bodily observance, only 
 busy the spiritual half, which maketh them consistent with 
 the jirosecution of any other employment. 
 
 XLII— TO GOD ALONE. 
 
 Amongst all manner of prayer to God, I find in sci'ii:)ture 
 neither promise, precept, nor precedent to warrant prayers to 
 saints. And were there no other reason, this would en- 
 courage me to pray to Christ alone, because 
 
 St. Paul struck Elimas blind ; Christ made blind Barte- 
 meus see. St. Peter killed Ananias and Sapphira with his 
 word ; Christ with his word revived dead Lazarus. The dis- 
 ciples forbade the Syrophcenician woman to call after Christ; 
 Christ called unto her after they had forbidden her. All my 
 Saviour's works are saving works, none extending to the 
 death of mankind. . . I will therefore rather present my 
 prayers to Him who always did heal, than to those who some- 
 times did hurt. And though this be no convincing areu- 
 ment to papists, it is a comfortable motive to protestants. 
 
 XLIII.— A WOLF-LION. 
 
 I FIND the natural philosopher, making a character of the 
 lion's disposition, amongst other his qualities reporteth, that 
 first the lion feedeth on men, and afterwards, if forced with 
 extremity of hunger, on women. 
 
 Satan is a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Only 
 lie inverts the method, and in his bill of fare takes the
 
 THOHAS FULLER. 75 
 
 second course first. Ever since he over-tempted our grand- 
 mother Eve, encouraged with success, he hath preyed first on the 
 ■weaker sex. It seems he hath all the vices, not the virtues, 
 of that king of beasts ; a wolf-lion, having his cruelty with- 
 out his generosity. 
 
 XLIV.— SPECULATION AND PRACTICE. 
 
 God, in the New Testament, hath placed all historical and 
 practical matter (needful for Christians to know and believe) 
 in the beginning of the gospel. All such truths lie above 
 ground, plainly visible in the literal sense. The prophetical 
 and difficult part comes in the close. But though the Testa- 
 ment svas written in Greek, too many read it like Hebrew, be- 
 ginning at the end thereof. How many trouble themselves 
 about the Revelation, who might be better busied in plain 
 divinity ! 
 
 XLV.— MAD, NOT MAD. 
 
 I FIND St. Paul in the same chapter confess and deny mad- 
 ness in himself : Acts xxvi. " And, being exceeding 
 mad against them, I persecuted them even unto strange 
 cities." When Festus challenged him to be beside him- 
 self, "I am not mad, most noble Festus." Whilst he was 
 mad indeed, then none did suspect or accuse him to be dis- 
 tracted ; but when converted, " and in his right mind," then 
 Festus taxeth him of madness. 
 
 XLVL-MIRACULOUS CURE. 
 
 We read, Luke xiii. 11, of a woman who "had a spirit of 
 infirmity eighteen years, and was bowed together, and could 
 in nowise lift up herself." This woman may pass for the
 
 76 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM A>'D WIT OP 
 
 lively emblem of the English nation ; from the year of our 
 Lord 1642 (when our wars first began) unto this present 
 1660, are eighteen years in my arithmetic; all which time 
 our land hath been bowed together, past possibility of stand- 
 ing upright. 
 
 A pitiful posture wherein the face is made to touch the 
 feet, and the back is set above the head ! God in due time 
 set us right, and keep us right, that the head may be in its 
 proper place! Next the neck of the nobility, then the breast 
 of the gentry, the loins of the merchants and citizens, the 
 thighs of the yeomanry, the legs and feet of artificers and 
 day-labourers. As for the clergy (here by me purposely 
 omitted) what place soever shall be assigned them ; if low, 
 God grant patience ; if high, give humility unto them. 
 
 XLVII.— GOOD ACCOUNTANT. 
 
 I WAS present in the west country some twenty-five years 
 since, when a bishop made a partage of money collected by a 
 brief, amongst such who in a village had been sufferers by a 
 casual fire ; one of whom brought in the inventory of his 
 losses far above all belief. 
 
 Being demanded how he could make out his losses to so 
 improbable a proportion, he alleged the burning of a pear 
 tree growing hard by his house, valuing the same at twenty 
 years' purchase, and the pears at twenty shillings per annum, 
 presuming every one would be a bearing year ; and by 
 such windy particulars did blow up his losses to the sum by 
 him nominated. 
 
 Some pretend in these wars to have lost more thousands 
 than ever they were possessed of hundreds. These I'eckon in, 
 not only what they had, but what they might, yea would
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 77 
 
 have had. They compute not only their possessions, but re- 
 versions, yea their probabilities, possibilities, and impossibili- 
 ties also, which they might desire, but could never hopo to 
 obtain. 
 
 XLVIII._THE HAND IS ALL. 
 
 A GENTLEWOMAN, some sixty years since, came to Win- 
 chester school, where she had a son, and where Dr. Love (one 
 eminent in his profession) was then schoolmaster. This tender 
 mothei-, seeing the terrible rods (the properties of that school), 
 ]3egan with tears to bemoan the condition of her son, subject 
 to so cruel correction. To whom the schoolmaster replied : 
 Blistress, content yourself, it matters not how big the rod be, 
 so it be in the hand of Love to manage it. 
 
 Alas ! he was only Love in his surname ; but what 
 saith the apostle, " God is love," even in his own essence and 
 nature. 
 
 XLIX.— ALL TONGUE AND EARS. 
 
 We read, Acts xvii. 21 : " All the Athenians, and strangers 
 which were there, spent their time in nothing else, but either 
 to tell or to hear some new thing." 
 
 How Cometh this transposition 1 tell and hear ; it should 
 be hear and tell ; they must hear it before they could tell it ; 
 and, in the very method of nature, those that are deaf are 
 dumb. 
 
 But know, it is more than probable that many Athenians 
 told what they never heard, being themselves the first findei-s, 
 founders, and forgers of false reports, therewith merely to 
 entertain the itching curiosity of others. 
 
 England aboundeth with many such Athenians ; it is hard
 
 78 FULLERIANA : OE, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 to say whether more false coin or false news be minted in. 
 our clays. One side is not more pleased with their own fac- 
 tions than the other is with their own fictions. 
 
 Some pretend to intelligence without understanding, whose 
 relations are their own confutations. I know some who 
 repair to such novelants on purpose to know what news is 
 false by their reporting thereof ! 
 
 L.— NORTHAMPTONSHIRK DIALECT, 
 
 I MUST confess myself born in Northamptonshire, and if 
 that worthy county esteem me no disgrace to it, I esteem it 
 an honour to me. The English of the common people 
 therein (lying iu the very heart of the land) is generally very 
 good. 
 
 And yet they have an odd phrase, not so usual in other 
 places. 
 
 They used to say, when at cudgel plays ("such tame were 
 far better than our wild battles) one gave his adversary such 
 a sound blow as that he knew not whether to stand or to fall, 
 that he settled him at a blow. 
 
 The relics and stump (my pen dares write no worse) of the 
 long parliament pretended they would settle the church and 
 state ; but surely had they continued, it had been done in 
 the dialect of Northamptonshire : They would so have 
 settled us we should neither have known how to have stood, 
 or on which side to have fallen. 
 
 LL— A perfect tenant. 
 
 Some of those whom they call Quakers, are, to give them 
 their due, very good moral men, and exactly just in their civil 
 transactions. In proof whereof let me mention this passage,
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 79 
 
 tlioiigli chiefly I confess for the application thereof, which 
 having done me (I praise God) some good, I am confident 
 will do no hurt to any other. 
 
 A gentleman had two tenants, whereof one, being a 
 QUAKER, repaired to his landlord on the quarter-da}^, " Here, 
 THOU, said he, tell out and take thy rent," without stirring 
 his cap, or showing the least sign of respect. 
 
 The other came cringing and congeiug : " If it please your 
 worship," said he, " the times are very hard, and trading is 
 dead. I have brought to your worship five pounds (the whole 
 due being twenty) and shall procure the rest for your worship 
 with all possible speed." 
 
 Both these tenants put together would make a perfect one, 
 the rent-completing of the one, and tongue-compliments of 
 the other. But, seeing they were divided, I am persuaded 
 that of the two the landlord was less ofiended with the former, 
 imputing his ill manners to his folly, but ascribing his good 
 dealing to bis honesty. 
 
 God expecteth and requireth both good works and good 
 words. We cannot make our addresses and applications unto 
 him in our prayers with too much awe and reverence ... It 
 is the due paying of God's quit-rents, which he expecteth; I 
 mean the i-ealizing of our gratitude unto him for his many 
 mercies, in leading the remainder of our lives according to 
 his will and his word. 
 
 LII.— IN MEDIO TUTISSIMUS. 
 Once a gaoler demanded of a prisoner newly committed 
 unto him, whether or no he were a Roman catholic 1 No 
 answered he ; what then, said he, are you an anabaptist ? 
 
 G
 
 80 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 Neither, replied the pi-isoner. What, said the other, are you 
 a Brownist, or a quakerl Nor so, said the man, I am a 
 protestant, without wealt or gard, or any addition, equally 
 opposite to all heretics and sectaries. Then, said the gaoler, 
 get you unto the dungeon, I will afford no favour to you, 
 who shall get no advantage by you. Had you been 
 of any of the other religions, some hope I had to 
 gain by the visits of such as are of your own persuasion, 
 whereas now you will prove to me but an unprofitable 
 prisoner. 
 
 This is the misery of moderation ; I recall my word, 
 seeing misery properly must have sin in it. This is an 
 affliction attending moderate men, that they have not an 
 active party to side with them and favour them. 
 
 Men of great stature will quickly be made porters to a 
 king, and those diminutively little, dwarfs to a queen, 
 whilst such who are of a middle height may get them- 
 selves masters whei'e they can. The moderate man, eminent 
 for no excess or extravagancy in his judgment, will have 
 few patrons to protect, or persons to adhere unto him. 
 But what saith St. Paul? "If in this life only we have 
 hope in Christ, we are of all men the most miserable." 
 
 Llir.— SUPPRESSION OF "CHAPTERS." 
 
 Ik these licentious times, wherein religion lay in a swoon, 
 and many pretended ministers (minions of the times) com- 
 mitted or omitted in divine service what they pleased ; sonje, 
 not only in Wales, but in England, and in London itself, on 
 the Lord's day (sometimes with, sometimes without a psalm) 
 presently popped up into the pulpit, before any portion of
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 81 
 
 scripture, either in tlie Old or New Testament, was read to 
 the people. 
 
 Hereupon one in jest-earnest said, that formerly they put 
 down BISHOPS and dkans, and now they had put down chap- 
 ters too. It is high time that this fault be reformed for 
 the future, that God's word, which is all gold, be not 
 justled out to make room for men's sermons, which are but 
 parcel-gilt at the best. 
 
 LIV.— SINS HARDEST TO CONQUER. 
 
 All bosom sins are not conquered with facility alike, 
 and these three are of the greatest difficulty : 
 
 1. Constitutionary sins, riveted in our tempers and 
 complexions. 
 
 2. Customary sins, habited in us by practice and pre- 
 sumption. 
 
 3. Such sins to the repentance whereof restitution is 
 required. 
 
 Oh ! when a man hath " not only devoured widows' 
 houses,"' but also they have passed the first and second con- 
 coction in his stomach ; yea, when they are become blood in 
 the veins, yea, sinews in the flesh of his estate, oh then to 
 refund, to mangle and disinter one's domains, this goeth 
 shrewdly against flesh and blood indeed ! But what saith 
 the apostle, " Flesh and blood shall not inherit the kingdom 
 of God." 
 
 Yet even this devil may be cast out with fasting and 
 prayer. Matt. xvii. 21, This sin, notwithstanding it holdeth 
 VIOLENT POSSESSION, may, by those good means, and God's 
 blessing thereon, have a firm ejection.
 
 82 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 LV— ALL AFORE. 
 
 A DEAR friend of mine (now I hope with God) was much 
 troubled with an impertinent and importunate fellow, desirous 
 to tell him his fortune. " For things to come," said my friend, 
 " I desire not to know them, but am contented to attend divine 
 providence : tell me, if you can, some remarkable passages of 
 my life past." But the cunning man was nothing for the 
 preter tense (where his falsehood might be discovered), but 
 all for the future, counting himself therein without the reach 
 of confutation. 
 
 There are in our age a generation of people who are the 
 best of 2:)rophets, and worst of historians ; Daniel and the 
 Eevelation are as easy to them as the ten commandments and 
 the Lord's prayer : they pretend exactly to know the time of 
 Christ's actual reign on earth, of the ruin of the Romish anti- 
 christ, yea, of the day of judgment itself. 
 
 But these oracles are struck quite dumb if demanded any 
 thing concerning the time past ; about the coming of the 
 children of Israel out of Egypt and Babylon, the oi-iginal in- 
 crease and ruin of the four monarchies ; of these and the like 
 they can give no more account than the child in the cradle. 
 They are all for things to come, but have gotten (through a 
 great cold of ignorance) such a crick in their neck, they can- 
 not look backwai'd on what was behind them. 
 
 LVL— AN ILL JIATCH. 
 
 DrviNE providence is remarkable in ordering, that a fog 
 and a tempest never did, nor can, meet together in nature. 
 For as soon as a fog is fixed, the tempest is allayed ; and as 
 soon as a tempest doth arise, the fog is dispersed. This is a
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 83 
 
 great mercy; for otherwise such small vessels as boats and 
 barges, which want the conduct of the card and compass, 
 would irrecoverably be lost. 
 
 How sad, then, is the condition of many sectaries in our 
 age; which in the same instant have a fog of ignorance in 
 their judgments, and a tempest of violence in their affections, 
 being too blind to go right, and yet too active to stand still. 
 
 LVir.— THREE MAKE UP ONE. 
 
 Young king Jehoash had only a lease of piety, and not 
 for his own but his uncle's life, 2 Kings, xii. 2 : He did that 
 which was right in the sight of the Lord all his days, wherein 
 Jehoiada the priest instructed him. 
 
 Jehu was good in the midst of his life, and a zealous refor- 
 mer to the utter abolishing of Baal out of Israel ; but in his 
 old age, 2 Kings, x. 31, he returned to the politic sins 
 of Jeroboam, worshipping the cah^es in Dan and Bethel. 
 
 Manasseh was bad in the beginning and middle of his life, 
 filling Jerusalem with idolatry; only towai'ds the end thereof, 
 when carried into a strange land, he came home to himself, 
 and destroyed the profane altars he had erected. 
 
 These three put together make one perfect servant of God. 
 Take the morning and rise with Jehoash, the noon and shine 
 with Jehu, the night and set with Manasseh. Begin with 
 youth-Jehoash, continue with man-Jehu, conclude with okl- 
 man-Manasseh, and all put together will spell one good Chris- 
 tian, yea, one good perfect reformer*. 
 
 LVIIL—ZEAL. 
 
 "When our Saviour drove the sheep and oxen out of the 
 temple, he did not drive them into his own pasture, nor
 
 84 FULLEBIANA : OR, WISDOM A\D WIT OF 
 
 swept the coin into his own pockets when he ovei*turned the 
 tables of the money-changers. But we have in our days 
 many who are forward to offer to God such zeal which not 
 only cost them nothing, but wherewith they have gained great 
 estates. 
 
 LIX.— AS IT WAS. 
 
 Some alive will be deposed for the truth of this strange 
 accident, thongh I forbear the naming of place or persons. 
 
 A careless maid, which attended a gentleman's child, fell 
 asleep whilst the rest of the family were at church ; an ape, 
 taking the child out of the cradle, carried it to the roof of the 
 house, and there (according to his rude manner) fell a dancing 
 and dandling thereof, down head, up heels, as it happened.* 
 
 The father of the child returning with his family from the 
 church, commented with his own eyes on his child's sad 
 condition. Bemoan he might, help it he could not. Dan- 
 gerous to shoot the ape where the bullet might hit the babe; 
 all fall to their prayers as their last and best refuge, that the 
 innocent child (svhose precipice they suspected) might be 
 preserved. 
 
 But when the ape was well wearied with its own activity, 
 he fairly went down, and formally laid the child where he 
 found it, in the cradle. 
 
 Fanatics have pleased their fancies these late yeai-s with 
 turning and tossing and tumbling of religion, upward and 
 downward, and backward and forward ; they have cast and 
 contrived it into a hundred antic postures of their own 
 imagining. However, it is now to be hoped, that after they 
 
 * Did this supply a hint for Swift? See Gulliver in Brobdignag.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 85 
 
 have tired themselves out with doing of nothing, but only- 
 trying and tampering this and that way to no purpose, they 
 may at last return and leave religion in the same condition 
 wherein they found it. 
 
 LX.— SOLOMON THE RICHEST AND POOREST OF PRINCES. 
 
 Solomon was the riddle of the world, being the richest and 
 poorest of princes. 
 
 Richest, for once in three years the land of Opliir sailed to 
 Jerusalem, and caused such plenty of gold therein. 
 
 Poorest, as appeareth by his imposing so intolerable taxes 
 on his subjects, the refusal of the mitigation whereof caused 
 the defection of the ten tribes from the house of David. 
 
 But how came Solomon to be so much behind hand 1 Some 
 I know score it on the account of his building of the temple, 
 as if so magnificent a structure had impaired and exhausted 
 his estate. 
 
 But, in very deed, it was his keeping of seven hundred 
 wives and three hundred concubines, and his concubines in all 
 probability more expensive than his wives, as the thief in the 
 candle wasteth more wax than the wick thereof . . . AH these 
 had their several courts, which must needs amount to a 
 vast expense, 
 
 LXI.— A HINT. 
 
 A NUNCIO of the pope's was treated at Sienna, by a prime 
 person, with a great feast. It happened there was present 
 thereat a syndick of the city (being a magistrate, parallel in 
 his place to one of our aldermen), who, as full of words as 
 empty of wit, engrossed all the discourse at the table to him-
 
 8G FULLERIANA : OK, V.'ISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 self, who might with as good manners have eaten all the meat 
 at the supper. 
 
 The entertainer, sorry to see him discover so much weak- 
 ness to the disgrace of himself, endeavoured to stop the super- 
 tiuity of his talk. All in vain. The leaks in a rotten ship 
 might sooner be stanched. At last, to excuse the matter (as 
 well as he might) he told the nuncio privately, " You, 1 am 
 sure, have some weak men at Rome, as well as we have at 
 Vienna." " We have so," said the nuncio, " but we make 
 them no syndicks." 
 
 LXir.— EXORCISM. 
 
 King James was no less dexterous at, than desirous of, the 
 discovery of such who belied the father of lies, and falsely 
 pretended themselves possessed with a devil. 
 
 Now a maid dissembled such a possession, and for the 
 better colour thereof, when the first verses of the gospel of 
 St. John were read in her hearing, she would full into strange 
 fits of fuming and foaming, to the amazement of the be- 
 holders. 
 
 But when the king caused one of his chaplains to read the 
 same in the original, the same maid (possessed it seems with 
 an English devil, who understood not a word of Gi'eek) was 
 tame and quiet, without any impression upon her. 
 
 LXIII.—TRAITS OF A GOOD WIFE. 
 
 She commandeth her husband in any equal matter, by con- 
 sfant obeying hivi. — It was always obsex'ved, that what the 
 English gained of the French in battle by valour, the French 
 regained of the English by cunning in treaties : so if the 
 husband should chance, by his power, in his passion, to pre-
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 87 
 
 judice his wife's riglit, she wisely knoweth, by compounding 
 and comijlying, to recover and rectify it again. 
 
 She never crosseth her husband in the spring -tide of his 
 anger, but stays till it be ebhing-water. — And then mildly she 
 argues the matter, not so much to condemn him, as to acquit 
 herself. Surely, men, contrary to iron, are worst to be 
 wrought upon when they are hot ; and are far more tractable 
 in cold blood 
 
 Arcana imperii {her husband's secrets) she toill not divulge. 
 — Especially she is careful to conceal his infirmities. If he 
 be none of the wisest, she so orders it that he appears on the 
 public stage but seldom ; and then he hath conned his part 
 so well, that he comes off with great applause 
 
 Ill her husband's sickness she feels more grief than she 
 shows. — Partly that she might not dishearten him, and partly 
 because she is not at leisure to seem so sorrowful, that she 
 may be the more serviceable 
 
 Tlte heaviest work of her servants she tnaketh light, by orderly 
 and seasonably enjoining it. — Wherefore her service is 
 counted a preferment, and her teaching better than her 
 wages. 
 
 LXIV.—TRAITS OF A GOOD HUSBAND. 
 His love to his wife weakeneth not his ruling her; and his 
 ruling lesseneth not his loving her. — Whei-efore he avoideth all 
 fondness, (a sick love, to be praised in none, and pardoned 
 only in the newly-married !) whereby more have wilfully be- 
 trayed their command, than ever lost it by their wives' re- 
 bellion. Methinks, that the he-viper is right enough served 
 which, as Pliny reports, puts his head into the she-viper's 
 mouth, and she bites it off. And what wonder is it if
 
 88 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 women take the rule to themselves, which their usorioii3 
 husbands first surrender unto thera 1 
 
 He is constant to his wife, and confident of her. — And, sure, 
 where jealousy is the jailer, many break the prison ; it opening 
 more ways to wickedness than it stoppeth ; so that where it 
 findeth one — it maketh ten — dishonest. 
 
 He alloweth her meet 7nainte7iance, but oneasui-es it by his 
 ownestate. — Nor will he give less, nor can she ask more. Which 
 allowance, if shorter than her deserts, and his desire, he 
 leiM'theneth it out with his courteous carriage unto her, chiefly 
 ill her sickness ; then not so much word-intying her, as provid- 
 ing necessaries for her. 
 
 That she may not intrench on his j^ferogative, he maintains 
 her propriety in feminine affairs . . . Causes that are pro- 
 perly of feminine cognizance he suffers her finally to decide ; 
 not so much as permitting an appeal to himself, thab their 
 jurisdictions may not interfere. He will not countenance a 
 stubborn servant against her ; but, in hei", maintains his own 
 authority. Such husbands as bait the mistress with her 
 maids, and clap their hands at the sport, will have cause to 
 wring them afterwards. 
 
 He is careful that the wounds betioixt them talce not air, and be 
 publicly known. — Jars concealed are half reconciled ; which, 
 if generally known, it is a double task to stop the breach at 
 home, and men's mouths abroad. To this end he never pub- 
 licly reproves her. An open reproof puts her to do penance 
 before all that are present ; after which, many rather study 
 revenge than reformation. 
 
 He keeps her in the wholesojue ignorance of unnecessary secrets. 
 — They will not be starved with the ignorance — who, per- 
 chance, may surfeit with the knowledge — of weighty counsels,
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 89 
 
 too lieavy for the weaker sex to bear. He knows little who 
 will tell his wife all he knows. 
 
 Re heats not his wife after Ms death. — One, having a shrewd 
 wife, yet loath to use her hardly in his lifetime, awed her 
 with telling her, that he would beat her when he was dead ; 
 meanincc, that he would leave her no maintenance; This 
 humour is unworthy a worthy man, who will endeavoui; to 
 provide her a competent estate. Yet he that impoverisheth 
 his children to euricli his widow, destroys a quick liedge to 
 make a dead one. 
 
 9 
 
 LXV.—TRAITS OF A GOOD PARENT. 
 
 He showeth them, in his own practice, what to follow and 
 imitate; and, in others, what to shun and avoid ... A father 
 that whipped his son for swearing, and swore himself whilst 
 he whipped him, did more harm by his example than good 
 by his correction. 
 
 He doth not ivelcome and embrace the first essays of sin in 
 his children. — Weeds are counted herbs in the beginning of 
 the spring : nettles ai'e put in pottage, and salads ar-e made 
 of elder-buds. Thus fond fathers like the oaths and wanton 
 talk of their little children ; and j^^ease themselves to hear 
 them displease God. But our wise parent both instructs his 
 children in piety, and with correction blasts the first buds of 
 profaneness in them. He that will not use the rod on his 
 child, his child shall be used as a rod on him. 
 
 He observeth gavel-kind* in dividing his affections, though 
 not his estate. — He loves them (thougli leaves them not all alike) 
 . . . Did not that mother shew little wit in her gi'eat parti- 
 ality, who, when her neglected son complained that his bro- 
 
 * Gives each child an equal portion.
 
 90 FULLEEIANA : OK, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 ther (her darling) had hit and hurt him with a stone, whipped 
 him, only for standing in the way where the stone went 
 wliich his brother cast 1 
 
 lie allows his children maintenance according to their quality. 
 — Otherwise it will make them base, acquaint them with bad 
 company and sharking tricks ; and it makes them surfeit the 
 sooner when they come to their estates. 
 
 In choosing a profession he is directed hy his child's dispo- 
 sition — Whose inclination is the strongest indenture to bind 
 him to a trade. But when they set Abel to till the ground, 
 and send Cain to keep sheep ; Jacob to hunt, and Esau to 
 live in tents ; drive some to school, and others from it ; 
 they commit a rape on nature, and it will thi-ive accord- 
 ingly 
 
 If his son prove wild, he doth not cast him off so far, hut he 
 
 marks the place where he lights. — With the mother of Moses, he 
 doth not suffer his son so to sink or swim, but he leaves one 
 to stand afar off to watch what will become of him 
 
 He doth not give away his loaf to his children, and then 
 come to them for a jnece of bread. — He holds the reins (though 
 loosely) in his own hands ; and keeps, to reward duty, and 
 punish undutifulness. Yet, on good occasion, for his children's 
 advancement, he will depart from part of his means. Base is 
 their nature who will not have their branches lopped till 
 their body be filled ; and will let go none of their goods, 
 as if it presaged their speedy death : whereas it doth not 
 follow, that he that puts off his cloak must presently go to 
 bed. 
 
 On his death- bed he bequeaths his blessing to all his children. 
 — Nor rejoiceth he so much to leave them great portions, as 
 honestly obtained. Onlv money well and lawfully gotten is
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 91 
 
 good and lawful money. And if he leaves his children yoimg, 
 he principally nominates God to be their guardian ; and, next 
 Him, is careful to appoint provident overseers. 
 
 LXVL—TRAITS OF A GOOD CHILD. 
 
 He reverenceth tlie person of his parent, tliough old, poor, 
 and froioard. — As his parent bare with him when a child, 
 he bears with his parent if twice a child ; nor doth his dig- 
 nity above him cancel his duty unto him. When Sir Thomas 
 More was Lord Chancellor of England, and Sir John his 
 father one of the Judges of the King's Bench, he would in 
 "Westminster-hall beg his blessing of him on his knees. 
 
 Having practised his parents precepts himself, he entails 
 them on his posterity. — Therefore such instructions are by 
 vSolomon (Prov. i. 9) compared to frontlets and chains, (not 
 to a suit of clothes, which serves but one, and quickly wears 
 out, or out of fashion,) which have in them a real lasting 
 worth, and are bequeathed as legacies to another age. The 
 same counsels observed, are chains to grace, which, neglected, 
 prove halters to strangle undutiful children 
 
 He is patient under correction, and thankful after it. — When 
 Mr. West, formerly tutor (such I count in loco parentis) to 
 Dr. Whitaker, was by him, then Kegius Professor, created 
 Doctor, Whitaker solemnly gave him thanks before the 
 University for giving him correction when his young 
 scholar. 
 
 He is a stork to his parent, and feeds him in his old age. — 
 Not only if his father hath been a pelican, but though he hath 
 been an ostrich unto him, and neglected him in his youth. . . 
 And yet the debt (T mean only the principal, not counting 
 the interest) cannot fully be paid ; and therefore he compounds
 
 92 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 witli his father to accept in good worth the utmost of his 
 endeavour. 
 
 I conclude this subject with the example of a Pagan's son, 
 which will shame most Christians. Pomponius Atticus, 
 makine the funeral oration at the death of his mother, did . 
 protest that, Uving with her threescore and seven years, he 
 was never reconciled unto her, because (take the comment 
 with the text) there never happened betwixt them the least 
 jar which needed reconciliation.* 
 
 LXVII.— A GOOD SERVANT 
 
 Is one that, out of conscience, serves God ia his master ; 
 and so hath the principle of obedience in himself. As for 
 those servants who found their obedience on some external 
 thing, with engines, they will go no longer than they are 
 wound or weighed up. 
 
 LXVIII.— TRAITS OF A GOOD WIDOW. 
 
 Her sorrow is no storm, but a still rain. — Indeed, some 
 foolishly discharge the surplusage of their passions on them- 
 selves, tearing their hair ; so that their friends, coming to 
 the funeral, know not which most to bemoan, — the dead 
 husband, or the dying widow. Yet commonly it comes to 
 pass, that such widows' grief is quickly emptied, which 
 streameth out at so large a vent ; whilst their tears that but 
 drop, will hold running a long time. 
 
 She continues a competent time in her widow's estate. — 
 
 Anciently they were at least to live out their annum luctits, 
 
 *' their year of sorrow." But as some erroneously compute 
 
 the long lives of the patriarchs before the flood, not by solarj 
 
 ♦ Se nunquam cum matrc in gratiam rediisse.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 93 
 
 but lunary years, making a montli a year ; so many over- 
 hasty widows cut tlieir year of mourning very short, and 
 within few weeks make post speed to a second marriage. 
 
 SJie doth not only live sole and single, hut chaste and honest. 
 — "We know pest-houses always stand alone, and yet are full 
 of infectious diseases. Solitariness is not an infallible ai-eu- 
 ment of sanctity ; and it is not enough to be unmanied, but 
 to be undefiled. 
 
 Though going abroad sometimes about her business, site never 
 makes it her business to go abroad. 
 
 She loves to look on her husband's piclitre, in ilie children 
 he hath left her. — Not foolishly fond over them for their 
 father's sake, (this were to kill them in honour of the dead !) 
 but giveth tliem careful education. Her husband's friends are 
 ever her welcomest guests, whom she entertaineth. with lier 
 best cheer, and witb honourable mention of their friend's and 
 her husband's memory. 
 
 If she can speak little good of him, sJie speaks but little of him. 
 — So handsomely folding up her discourse, that his virtues 
 are shown outwards, and his vices wrapped up in silence ; as 
 counting it barbarism to throw dirt on his niemory who hath 
 moulds cast on his body. She is a champion for his credit 
 if any speak against him. * 
 
 She putteth her especial confidence in Gods providence. — 
 Surely if He be " a Father to the fatherless," it must need 
 follow that he is "an Husband to the widow;" and there- 
 fore she seeks to gain and keep His love unto her, by her 
 constant prayer and religious life. 
 
 If she becomes a mother-in-law, there is no difference 
 between her carriage to her own and her second husband's 
 children, save that she is severest to her own, over whom s/te
 
 94 FULLEEIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 hath the sole jurisdiction. And if her second husband's chil- 
 dren, by a former wife, commit a fault, she had rather bind 
 them over to answer for it before their own fother, than to 
 correct them herself, to avoid all suspicion of hard using of 
 them. 
 
 LXIX.— THE ELDER BROTHER. 
 
 The elder brother is one who made haste to come into the 
 world, to bring his parents the first news of male-posterity; 
 and is well rewarded for his tidings. 
 
 He is thankful /or the advantage God gave him at the starting 
 in the race into this world. — When twins have been even 
 matched, one hath gained the goal but by his length, tit. 
 Augustine saith, that " it is every man's bounden duty 
 solemnly to celebrate his birth-day." If so, elder brothers 
 may best affurd good cheer on the festival. 
 
 He doth not so remember he is an heir, that he forgets he is a 
 son. — Wherefore, his can-iage to his parents is always respect- 
 ful. It may chance that his father may be kept in a charit- 
 able prison, whereof his son hath the keys ; the old man 
 being only tenant for life, and the lands entailed on our 
 young gentleman. In such a case, when it is in his power, 
 if necessity requires, he enlargeth his father to such a 
 reasonable proportion of liberty as may not be injurious to 
 himself. 
 
 His father's deeds and grants he ratifies and confirms. — If 
 a stitch be fallen in a lease, he will not widen it into a hole 
 by cavilling, till the whole strength of the grant run out 
 thereat ; oi* take advantage of the default of the clei-k in the 
 writing, where the deed appears really done, and on a valuable 
 considei'ation : he counts himself bound in honour to perform
 
 THOMAS FULLER, " 95 
 
 what, by marks and signs, he plainly iinderstands his father 
 meant, though he spake it not out. 
 
 He reflecteth his lustre, to grace and credit his younger breth- 
 ren. — Thus Scipio Africanus, after his great victories against 
 the Carthaginians, and conquering of Hannibal, was content to 
 serve as a lieutenant in the wai-s of Asia, under Lucius Scipio, 
 his vounger brother. 
 
 LXX.— THE YOUKGER BROTHER. 
 
 Some account him the better gentleman of the two, because 
 son to the more anciemt gentleman ; wherein his elder 
 brother can give him the hearing, and a smile into the 
 bargain. 
 
 He repines not at the providence of God in ordering his birth. 
 — Heirs are made, even where matches are, both in heaven. 
 Even in twins, God will have one next the door to come first 
 into the woidd. 
 
 He labours, by his endeavours, to date himself an elder brother. 
 — i^Tature makes but one, industry doth make all tlie sons of 
 the same man heirs. The fourth brother gives a martilet 
 for the difference of his arms, a bird observed to build either 
 in castles, steeples, or ships ; showing that the beai'er thereof, 
 being debarred from all hopes of his father's inheritance, 
 must seek, by war, learning, or merchandise, to advance his 
 estate. 
 
 In war he cuts out his fortunes with his own sword. — "Wil- 
 liam the Conqueror, when he first landed his forces in Eng- 
 land, burnt all his ships, that despair to return might make 
 his men the more valiant. Younger brothers, being cut off 
 at home from all hopes, are more zealous to purchase an 
 honourable support abroad. 
 
 H
 
 96 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 Nor are they less liappy, if applying themselves to their book; — 
 Nature generally giving tlieni good wits ; which, because 
 they want room to burnish, may the better afford to soar 
 high. 
 
 But he gaineth more wealth, ifhetahing himself to merchan- 
 dise — Whence often he risetli to the greatest annual honour 
 in the kingdom. Many families in England, though not 
 first raised from the city, yet thence have been so restored 
 and enriched, that it may seem to amount to an original 
 rising. 
 
 Sometimes lie raiseth his estate by applying himself to the 
 court; — a pasture wherein elder brothers are observed to grow 
 lean, and younger brothers fat. 
 
 LXXI.— A GOOD ADVOCATE 
 Is one that will not plead that cause wherein his tongue must 
 be confuted by his conscience. It is the praise of the Sj)anish 
 soldier, that — whilst all other nations are mercenary, and for 
 money will serve on any side — he will never fight against his 
 own king ; nor will our advocate, against the sovereign truth 
 plainly appearing to his conscience. 
 
 He not only hears, hut examines, his client ; and pincheth 
 the cause, ivhere he fears it is foundered. — For many clients, 
 in telling their case, rather plead than relate it ; so that the 
 advocate hears not the tx'ue state of it, till opened by the ad- 
 verse party. Surely, the lawyer that fills himself with instruc- 
 tions, will travel longest in the cause without tiring. Others, 
 that are so quick in searching, seldom search to the quick ; 
 and those miraculous apprehensions who understand more 
 than all, before the client hath told lialf, run without their 
 errand, and will return without their answer.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 97 
 
 If the matter be doubtful, lie will (rnly loarrant his own dili- 
 gence. — Yet some keep an assurance -office in their chamber, 
 and will warrant any cause brought unto them ; as knowing 
 that, if they Ml, they lose nothing but — what long since was 
 lost — their credit. 
 
 I/e makes not a Trojan siege of a suit, but seeks to bring if to a 
 set battle in a speedy trial. — Yet sometimes suits are continued 
 by their difficulty, the potency and stomach of the parties, 
 without any default in the lawyer. 
 
 He is faithful to that side that first retains him. — Not 
 like Demosthenes, who secretly wrote one oration for Phor- 
 mio,- and another in the same matter for ApoUodorus his 
 adversary. • 
 
 In i^leading, he shoots fairly at the head of the cause ; and, 
 havi?ig fastened, no frowns nor favours shall make him let go 
 his hold. — Not snatching aside here and there to no purpose, 
 speaking little in much, as it was said of Anaximenes, — " that 
 he had a flood of words, and a drop of reason." . . . 
 
 He is more careful to deserve, than greedy to take, fees. — He 
 accounts the very pleading of a poor widow's honest cause 
 sufficient fees ; as conceiving himself, then, the King of Hea- 
 ven's advocate, bound ex officio to prosecute it. 
 
 LXXIL-A GOOD PHYSICIAN 
 
 Handsels not his new experiments on the bodies of his patients; 
 — letting loose mad receipts into the sick man's body, to try 
 how well nature in him will fight against them, whilst him- 
 self stands by and sees the battle ; — except it be in desperate 
 cases, when death must be expelled by death. 
 
 To poor people he prescribes cheap) but wholesome medicines; —
 
 98 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 not removing the consumption out of their bodies into their 
 purses ; nor sending them to the East Indies for drugs, when 
 they can reach better out of their gardens. 
 
 He brings not news, with a false spy, that the coast is clear, 
 tin death surprises the sick man. — I know, physicians love to 
 make the best of their patient's estate. First, it is improper 
 that adjutores vitce should be nuncii mortis. Secondly, none, 
 with their good-will, will tell bad news. Thirdly, their fee 
 may be the worse for it. Fourthly, it is a confessing that 
 their art is conquered. Fifthly, it will poison their patient's 
 heart with grief, and make it break before the time. How- 
 ever, they may so order it, that the pax'ty may be informed 
 of his dangerous condition, that he be not outed out of this 
 world before he be provided for another. 
 
 When he can keep life no longer in, he makes a fair and easy 
 passage for it to go out. — He giveth his attendance for the 
 facilitating and assuaging of the pains and agonies of death. 
 Yet, generally, it is death to a physician to be with a dying 
 man. 
 
 Unworthy pretenders to physic are rather foils than stains to 
 the profession, . . . Well did the poets feign ^sculapius and 
 Circe brother and sister, and both children of the sun : for, 
 in all times, (in the opinion of the multitude,) witches, old 
 women, and impostors have had a competition with physicians. 
 And commonly the most ignorant are the most confident in 
 their undertakings, and will not stick to tell you what disease 
 the gall of a dove is good to cure. He took himself to 
 be no mean doctor, who, being guilty of no Greek, and 
 being demanded why it was called hectic fever ; " Because," 
 saith he, "of an hecking cough which ever attendeth that 
 disease."
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 99 
 
 LXXIII A CONTKOVERSIAL DIVINE,— AS HE OUGHT TO BE. 
 
 He is truth's champion to defend her against all adversaries, 
 — atheists, heretics, schismatics, and erroneous persons what- 
 soever, . . . 
 
 He engageth both his judgment and affections in opposing of 
 falsehood; — Not like country fencers, who play only to make 
 spt)rt ; but, like duellers indeed, as if for life and limb. Chiefly 
 if the question be of large prospect and great concernings, he is 
 zealous in the quarrel. Yet some, though their judgment 
 weigh down ou one side, the beam of their affections stands 
 so even they care not which part prevails. 
 
 He abstains from all foul and railing language. — "What ! make 
 the Muses, yea, the Graces, scolds 1 Such purulent spittle ai-- 
 gues exulcerated lungs. Why should there be so much rail- 
 ing about the body of Christ, when there was none about the 
 body of Moses in the Act kept betwixt the devil and IMichael 
 the archangel. 
 
 He tyranniseth not over a weak and undermatclied adversary 
 — but seeks rather to cover his weakness, if he be a modest man. 
 When a professor pressed an answerer (a better Christian than 
 a clerk) with an hard argument, Eeverende Professor, said he, 
 ingenue confteor me non posse respondere huic argumento. To 
 whom the professor, Jiecte respondes* 
 
 In taking away an objection, he not only puts by the thrust, but 
 breaks the weapon. — Some rather escape than defeat an argu- 
 ment; and though by such an evasion they may shut the mouth 
 of the opponent, yet may they open the difliculty wider in the 
 
 * "Reverend Professor, I frankly confess that I am unable to reply 
 to your argument." The Professor replied, "You have answered 
 well."
 
 100 FULLER! AN A : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 hearts of the hearers. But our answerer either fairly resolves 
 the doubt; or else shows the falseuess of the argument, by 
 beggaring the opponent to maintain such a fruitful genera- 
 tion of absurdities, as his argument hath begotten ; or, lastly, 
 returns and retorts it back upon him again. The first way 
 unties the knot, the second cuts it asunder, the third whips 
 the opponent with the knot himself tied. Sure, it is more 
 honour to be a clear answerer than a cunning opposer; hecatise 
 tite latter takes advantage of maiis ignorance, lohich is ten times 
 more tlian his knowledge. 
 
 What his answers want in suddenness they have in solidity. 
 — Indeed, the speedy answer adds lustre to the disputation, 
 and honour to the disputant ; yet he makes good payment 
 who, though he cannot presently throw the money out of his 
 pocket, yet will pay it, if but going home to unlock his chest. 
 Some that are not for speedy, may bo for sounder, performance. 
 When Melancthon, at the disputation of Ratisbon, was press- 
 ed with a shrewd argument by Eccius, " I will answer thee," 
 said he, "to-morrow." "Nay," said Eccius, "do it now, or it 
 is nothing worth." " Yea," said Melancthon, " I seek the 
 truth, and not mine own credit ; and therefore it will be as 
 good if I answer thee to-morrow by God's assistance." 
 
 lie affects clearness and plainness in all hisioritings. — Some 
 men's heads are like the world before God said unto it, Fiat 
 lux ! These dark-lanterns may shine to themselves, and un- 
 derstand their own conceits, but nobody else can have light 
 from them. Some affect this darkness, that they may be 
 accounted profound ; whereas one is not bound to believe, that 
 all the water is deep that is muddy. 
 
 He is not curious in searcldng matters of no 7)ioment. — Cap- 
 tain Martin Frobisher fetched from the farthest northern
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 101 
 
 countries a ship's lading of mineral stones, (as he thought,) 
 which afterwards were cast out to mend the highways. Thus 
 are they served, and miss their hopes, who, long seeking to 
 extract hidden mysteries out of nice questions, leave them off 
 as useless at last. 
 
 He neltJier multiplies needless, nor compounds necessary, con- 
 troversies. — Sure, they light on a labour in vain, who seek to 
 make a bridge of reconciliation over the ^^j^a y^aefj^u betwixt 
 Papists and Protestants ; for though we go ninety-nine steps 
 they, (I mean their church,) will not come one to give us a meet- 
 ing. 
 
 He is resolute and stable in fundamental points of religion, — - 
 These are his fixed poles and axletree, about which he moves, 
 whilst they stand unmovable. Some sail so long on the sea 
 of controversies, tossed up and down, to and fi"0, jJi'o and cu7i^ 
 that the very ground to them seems to move, and their judg- 
 ments grow sceptical and unstable in the most settled pointa 
 of diviuitv. 
 
 LXXIV.— THE GENERAL SCHOLAR. 
 
 I KNOW the general cavil against general learning is this : that 
 aliquis in omnibus est nullus in siiigidis. " He that sips of 
 many arts, drinks of none." However, we must know, that all 
 learning, which is but one gi^and science, hath so homogeneal 
 a body, that the parts thereof do, with a mutual service relate 
 to, and communicate strength antl lustre each to other . . . 
 
 His tongue, being but one by nature, he gets cloven by art and 
 industry. — Before the confusion of Babel, all the world was 
 one continent in language ; since divided into several ton- 
 gues, as several islands. Grammar is the ship by benefit; 
 whereof we pass from one to another in the learned languages,
 
 102 fulleuiana: or, wisdom and wit of 
 
 — generally spoken in no country. His motlier-tongne was 
 like the diill music of a monochord, which, by study, he turns 
 into the harmony of several instruments. 
 
 He first gaineth skill in the Latin and Greek totijues, — On 
 the credit of the former alone, he may trade in discourse over 
 all Christendom. But the Greek, though not so generally 
 spoken, is known with no less profit, and more pleasure. The 
 joints of her compounded words are so naturally oiled, that 
 they run nimbly on the tongue; which makes them, though 
 long, never tedious, because significant. . . . 
 
 T/i^i he applies his study to logic and ethics. — The latter 
 makes a man's soul mannerly and wise; but as. for logic, that 
 is the armory of reason, furnished with all offensive and 
 defensive weapons. There are syllogisms, long swords ; en- 
 thymemes, short daggers ; dilemmas, two-edged swords that 
 cut on both sides ; sorites, chain-shot : and for the defensive, 
 distinctions, which are shiekls ; retortions, which are targets 
 with a pike in the midst of them, both to defend and oppose. 
 From hence he raiseth his studies to the knowledge of physics, 
 the great hall of nature; and metaphysics, the closet thereof; 
 and is careful not to wade therein so far, till, by subtle dis- 
 tinguishing of notions, he confounds himself. 
 
 He is skilful in, rhetoric, which gives a speech colour, as logic 
 doth favour, and both together beauty.— Thowi^h. some condemn 
 rhetoric as the mother of lies, speaking more than the truth 
 in hyperboles, less in her meiosis, otherwise in her metaphors, 
 contrary in her ii-onies ; yet is there excellent use of all these, 
 when disposed of with judgment. Nor is he a stranger to 
 poetry, which is music in words ; nor to music, which is 
 poetry in sound : both excellent sauce ; but they have lived 
 and died poor that made them their meat.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 103 
 
 MatJiematics he moderately studieth, to his great contentment ; 
 — using it as ballast for liis soul ; yet to fix it, not to stall 
 it ; nor suffers he it to be so unmannerly as to justle out 
 other ai-ts. As for judicial astrology, (which hath the least 
 judgment in it,) this vagi'ant hath been whijjped out of all 
 learned corporations. If our artist lodgeth her in the out 
 rooms of his soul for a night or two, it is rather to hear than 
 believe her relations. 
 
 Hence he makes his j)'''ogress into the study of history. — 
 Nestor, who lived three ages, was accounted the wisest man 
 in the world. But the historian may make himself wise, by 
 living as many ages as have past since the beginning of the 
 world. His books enable him to maintain discourse, who, 
 besides the stock of his own expei'ience, may spend on the 
 common purse of his reading. This directs him in his life, 
 so that he makes the shipwrecks of others sea-marks to him- 
 self; yea, accidents which others start from for their strange- 
 ness, he welcomes as his wonted acquaintance, having found 
 precedents for them formerly. Without history a man's soul 
 is purblind, seeing only the things which almost touch his 
 eyes. 
 
 He is loell seen in chronology, without which history is hut a 
 lieap of tales . . . He is also acquainted with cosmogi-aphy, 
 treating of the world in whole joints ; with chorography, 
 sliredding it into countries ; and with topography, jnincing 
 it into particular places. 
 
 Thus, taking these sciences in their general latitude, he 
 hath finished the round circle, or golden ring, of the arts ; 
 only he keeps a place for the diamond to be set in ; I mean 
 for that predominant profession of law, physic, divinity, or 
 state-policy, which he intends for his principal calling hereafter.
 
 104 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 LXXV.— THE FAITHFUL MINISTER. 
 
 He endeavours to get the general love and good-will of his 
 parish. — This he doth, not so much to make a benefit of thevn, 
 as a benefit^r them, that his ministry may be more effectual; 
 otherwise he may preach his own heart out, before he preacheth 
 any thing into theirs. The good conceit of the physician is 
 half a cure ; and his practice will scarce be hapj^y where his 
 person is hated. Yet he humours them not in his doctrine, 
 to get their love; for such a spaniel is worse than a dumb dog. 
 He shall sooner get their good-will by walking uprightly, 
 than by crouching and creeping. If pious living, and painful 
 labouring in his calling, will not win their affections, he counts 
 it gain to lose them. As for those who causelessly hate him, 
 he pities and prays for them : and such there will be. I 
 should suspect his preaching had no salt in it, if no galled 
 horse did wince. 
 
 He is strict in ordering his conversation, — As for those who 
 cleanse blurs with blotted fingers, they make it the worse. 
 It was said of one who preached very well, and lived very ill, 
 " that when he was out of the pulpit, it was pity he should 
 ever go into it ; and when he was in the pulpit, it was pity 
 he should ever come out of it." But our minister lives ser- 
 mons. And yet I deny not, but dissolute men, like unskilful 
 horsemen, who open a gate on the wrong side, may, by the 
 virtue of their ofiice, open heaven for others, and shut them- 
 selves out. 
 
 His behaviour toioards his people is grave and courteous. — 
 Not too austere and retired ; which is laid to the charge of 
 good Mr. Hooper the martyr, that his rigidness frighted 
 people from consulting with him. " Let your light," saith
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 105 
 
 Christ, " shiue before men ;" whereas over reserveclness makes 
 the brightest virtue burn dim. Especially he detesteth 
 aifected gravity, (which is rather on men than in them,) 
 whereby some belie their register-book, antedate their age to 
 seem far older than they are, and plait and set their brows 
 in an affected sadness. Whereas St. Anthony the monk 
 might have been known among hundreds of his order by his 
 cheerful face, he having ever (though a most mortified man) 
 a merry countenance. 
 
 He carefully catechiseth his people in the elements of religion; 
 — except he hath (a rare thing !) a flock without Lambs, of all 
 old sheep ; and yet even Luther did not scorn to profess him- 
 self discipulum Catechismi, " a scholar of the Catechism." . . . 
 
 He will not offer to God of that tvhich costs him nothing, — 
 but takes pains aforehaud for his sermons. Demosthenes 
 never made any oi-ation on the sudden ; yea, being called 
 upon, he never rose up to speak, except he hod well studied 
 the matter : and he was wont to say, " that he showed how 
 he honoured and reverenced the people of Athens, because he 
 was careful what he spake unto them." . . . 
 
 He chiefly reproves the reigning sins of the time and place 
 he lives in. — We may observe, that our Saviour never inveighed 
 against idolatry, usury, sabbath-breaking, amongst the Jews. 
 jS'ot that these wei-e not sius, but they were not practised so 
 much in that age, whei-ein wickedness was spun with a finer 
 thread ; and therefore Christ principally bent the drift of his 
 preaching against spiritual pride, hypocrisy, and traditions, 
 then predominant amongst the people. Also our minister 
 confuteth no old heresies which time hath confuted ; nor 
 troubles his auditory with such strange hideous cases of con- 
 science, that it is more hard to find the case than the
 
 106 fulleriana: or, wisdom and wit of 
 
 resolution. lu public reproving of sin, he ever whips the 
 vice, and spares the person. . . . 
 
 His swiiles and illustrations are always familiar, n&ver con- 
 temptihle. — Indeed, reasons are the pillars of the fabric of a 
 sermon ; but similitudes are the windows which give the 
 best lights. He avoids such stories whose mention may 
 .suggest bad thoughts to the auditors, and will not use a light 
 comparison to make thereof a grave application, for fear lest 
 his poison go farther than his antidote. 
 
 He provideth not only ivholesome hut plentiful food fur his 
 •people. . . Almost incredible was the painfulness of Baronius, 
 the compiler of the voluminous " Annals of the Church," who 
 for thirty years together, preached three or four times a-week 
 to the people. As for our minister, he preferreth rather to 
 entertain his people with wholesome cold meat which was on 
 the table before, than with that which is hot from the spit, raw, 
 and half-roasted. Yet, in repetition of the same sermon, 
 every edition hath a new addition, if not of new matter, of 
 new affections. . . . 
 
 He makes not that wearisome, which should ever he welcome. 
 — Wherefore his sermons are of an ordinary length, 
 except on an extraordinary occasion. What a gift had John 
 Halsebach, Professor at Vienna, in tediousness ! who, being 
 to expound the Prophet Isaiah to his auditors, read twenty- 
 one years on the first chapter, and yet finished it not. 
 
 He counts the success of his ministry the greatest preferment. 
 — Yet herein God hath humbled many painful pastors, in 
 making them to be clouds, to rain, not over Arabia the Happy 
 l)ut over the Stony or Desert. . . Yet such pastors may com- 
 fort themselves, that great is their reward with God in heaven, 
 who measures it, not by their success, but endeavours.
 
 THOMAS IVLLER. 107 
 
 Besides, though they see not, their people may feel, benefit 
 liy their ministry. Yea, the preaching of the word in some 
 places is like the planting of woods, where, though no profit 
 is received for twenty years together, it comes afterwards. 
 And grant, that God honours thee not to build his temple in 
 thy parish, yet thou mayest, with David, provide metal and 
 materials for Solomon thy successor to build it with. 
 
 To sick folks he comes sometimes before lie is sent for, — as 
 counting his vocation a sufficient calling. None of his flock 
 shall want the extreme unction of pi-ayer and counsel. 
 Against the communion, especially, he endeavours that Janus's 
 temple be shut in the whole parish, and that all be made 
 friends. 
 
 He is never plaintiff in any suit but to be riffJifs defendant. 
 — If his dues be detained from him, he grieves more for his 
 parishioner's bad conscience than his own damage. He had 
 rather suffer ten times in his profit, than once in his title 
 where not only his person, but posterity, is wronged ; and 
 then he proceeds fairly and speedily to a trial, that he may 
 not vex and weary others, but right himself. During his 
 suit he neither breaks off nor slacks offices of courtesy to his 
 adversary; yea, though he loseth his suit, he will not also 
 lose his charity. . . . 
 
 He is careful in the discreet ordering of his own family. — 
 A good minister, and a good father, may well agree together. . . 
 
 Lying on his deathbed he bequeaths to each of his farishioners 
 his precepts and example for a legacy, — and they, in requital, 
 erect every one a monument for him in their hearts. 
 
 LXXVI.— A GOOD PARISHIONER. 
 
 Though near to iJie church, he is not far Jrom, God. — Like
 
 108 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 unto Justus : " One that worshipped God ; and his house 
 joined hard to the synagogue." * Otherwise, if his distance 
 from the church be greatj his diligence is the greater to come 
 thither in season. 
 
 He is timely at the hegvnning of Common Prayer. — As 
 Tally charged some dissolute people for being such sluggards, 
 that they never saw the sun rising or setting, as being always 
 np after the one, and a-bed before the other ; so some negli- 
 gent people never hear prayei"s begun, or sermon ended : the 
 Confession being past before they come, and the Blessing not 
 come before they are passed away. 
 
 In sermon, he sets himself to hear God in the oninister. — 
 Therefore divesteth he himself of all prejudice, — the jaundice 
 in the eye of the soul, presenting colours false unto it. He 
 hearkens very attentively. It is a shame when the church 
 itself is ccemeterium, wherein the living sleep above ground, 
 as the dead do beneath. 
 
 At every 2}oint that concerns himself, lie turns doion a leaf in 
 his heart; — and rejoiceth that God's word hath pierced him, 
 as hoping that whilst his soul smarts, it heals. . . . 
 
 He accuseth not his minister of spite for 2^articularizi7ig him. 
 — It does not follow, that the archer aimed, because the arrow 
 hit. Rather, our parishioner reasoneth thus : " If my sin be 
 notorious, how could the minister miss it ? if secret, how 
 could he hit without God's direction?" But foolish hearers 
 make even the bells of Aaron's garments to clink as they 
 think. And a guilty conscience is like a whirlpool, drawing 
 in all to itself which otherwise would pass by. One, cause- 
 lessly disaffected to his minister, complained that he, in liis 
 last sermon, had personally inveighed against him, and 
 
 * Acts xviii. 7.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 109 
 
 accused him thereof to a grave, religious gentleman in the 
 parish. " Truly," said the gentleman, " I had thought in his 
 sermon he had meant me ; for it touched my heart." This 
 rebated the edge of the other's anger. 
 
 His tithes he pays willingly with cJieerfalness. — How many 
 part with God's portion grudgingly, or else pinch it in the 
 jjaying ! Decimuvi, " the tenth," amongst the Romans was 
 ever taken for what was best or biggest. It falls out other- 
 wise in paying of tithes, where the least and leanest are shifted 
 off to make that number. 
 
 LXXVIL— THE GOOD SCHOOLMASTER. 
 
 There is scarce any profession in the commonwealth more 
 necessary, which is so slightly performed. The reasons 
 whereof I conceive to be these : First, young scholars make 
 this calling their refuge; yea, perchance, before they have 
 taken any degree in the University, commence schoolmasters 
 in the countiy ; as if nothing else were required to set up 
 this profession, but only a rod and a ferula. Secondly, others, 
 who are able, use it only as a passage to better preferment ; 
 to patch the rents in their present fortune, till they can pi-o- 
 vide a new one, and betake themselves to some more gainful 
 calling. Thirdly, they are disheartened from doing their 
 best, with the miserable reward which in some places they 
 I'eceive, — being masters to the children, and slaves to their 
 parents. Fourthly, being gi-own rich, they grow negligent ; 
 and scorn to touch the school, but by the proxy of an usher. 
 But see how well our schoolmaster behaves himself. 
 
 His genius inclines him with delight to his profession. — Some 
 men had as lieve be schooi-boys as school-masters, — to be tied 
 to the school, as Cooper's " Dictionary " and Scapula's
 
 110 fullekiana: or, wisdoji and wit of 
 
 " Lexicon" are cliained to the desk therein ; and though great 
 scholars, and skilful in otlier arts, are bunglers in this. . . . 
 
 He studieth his scholars' natures as carefully as they tlveir 
 hooks, and ranks their dispositions into several forms. And 
 though it may seem difficult for him in a great school to 
 descend to all particulars, yet experienced schoolmasters may 
 quickly make a grammar of boys' natures, and reduce them 
 all (saving some few exceptions) to these general rules : — 
 
 1. Those that are ingenious and industrious. — The con- 
 junction of two such planets in a youth pi-esage much good 
 vmto him. To such a lad a frown may be a whipping, and a 
 whipping a death ; yea, where their master whips them ouce, 
 shame whips them all the week after. Such natures he useth 
 with all gentleness. 
 
 2. Those that are ingenious and idle. — These think, with 
 the hare in the fable, that, running with snails, (so they 
 count the I'est of their school-fellows,) they shall come soon 
 enough to the post, though sleeping a good while before their 
 starting. O ! a good rod would finely take them napping ! 
 
 3. Those that are dull and diligent. — Wines, — the stronger 
 they be, the more lees they have when they are new. IMany 
 boys are muddy-headed till they be clarified with age ; and 
 such afterwards prove the best. Bristol diamonds are both 
 bright, and squared, and pointed by nature, and yet are soft 
 and worthless ; whereas orient ones, in India, are rough and 
 rugged naturally. Hard, rugged, and dull natures of youth 
 acquit themselves afterwards the jewels of the country ; and, 
 therefore, their dulness at first is to be borne with, if they be 
 diligent. That schoolmaster deserves to be beaten himself, 
 who beats nature in a boy for a fault. And I question 
 whether all the whipping in the world can make their parts
 
 THOMAS FULLER. Ill 
 
 wliicli are naturally sluggiali, rise one minute before the liour 
 nature hath appointed. 
 
 4. Those that are invincibly dull and oiet/ligent also. — 
 Correction may reform the latter, not amend the former. 
 All the whetting in the world can never set a razor's edge on 
 that which hath no steel in it. Such boys he consigneth 
 over to other professions. Shipwrights and boat-makers will 
 choose those crooked pieces of timber which other carpenters 
 refuse. Those may make excellent merchants and mechanics 
 who will not serve for scholars. 
 
 Ife is able, diligent, and methodical in his teaching. — Not 
 leading them rather in a circle than forwards. He minces 
 his precepts, for children to swallow ; hanging clogs on the 
 nimbleness of his own soul, that his scholars may go along 
 with him. 
 
 He is, and will be known to be, an absolute monarch in his 
 school. — If cockering mothers proffer him money, to purchase 
 their sons an exemption from his rod, (to live as it were, in a 
 peculiar, out of their master's jurisdiction,) with disdain he 
 refuseth it, and scorns the late custom in some places of com- 
 muting whipping into money, and ransoming boys from the 
 rod at a set price. If he hath a stubborn youth, correction- 
 proof, he debaseth not his authority by contesting with him, 
 but fairly (if he can) puts him away, before his obstinacy hath 
 infected others. 
 
 He is moderate in ivjlicting deserved correction. — Many a 
 schoolmaster better answereth the name TaidoT^iSriS than 
 Ta/Say&jyo;, rather " tearing his scholars' flesh v;ith whipping 
 than giving them good education." No wonder if his scholars 
 hate the Muses, being presented unto them in the shapes of 
 fiends and furies. ... > 
 
 1
 
 112 fulleriana: or, wisdo^i and wit op 
 
 Such an Orbilius mars more scholars than he makes. 
 Their tyranny hath caused many tongues to stammer, which 
 spake plain by nature, and whose stuttering at first was 
 nothing else but fears quavering on their speech at their 
 master's presence ; and whose mauling them about their 
 heads hath dulled those who in quickness exceeded their 
 master. 
 
 He spoils not a good School, to malce thereof a had College, — 
 therein to teach his scholars logic. For, besides that logic 
 may have an action of trespass against grammar for encroach- 
 ing on her liberties, syllogisms are solecisms taught in the 
 school ; and oftentimes youth are forced afterwai-ds, in the 
 University, to imlearn the fumbling skill they had before. 
 
 Out of his school, he is no whit j^^dantical in carriage or 
 discourse. — Contenting himself to be rich in Latin, though he 
 doth not jingle with it in every company wherein he comes. 
 
 LXXVIII.— THE GOOD MERCHANT. 
 
 The good merchant is one, who, by his trading, claspeth 
 the islands to the continent, and one country to another : an 
 excellent gardiner, who makes England bear wine, and oil, 
 and spices ; yea, herein goes beyond nature, in causing that 
 omnis fert omnia tellus. . . . 
 
 Ill', wrongs not the buyer in number, zceight, or measure. — 
 These are the landmarks of all trading, which must not be 
 removed ; for such cozenage were worse than open felony. 
 First, because they I'ob a man of his jDurse, and never bid him 
 stand. Secondly, because highway thieves defy — but these 
 pretend — justice. Thirdly, as much as lies in their power, 
 they endeavour to make God accessaiy to their cozenage, 
 deceiving by pretending his weights. For God is the prin-
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 113 
 
 cipal clerk of tlie market : " All the Aveights of the bag are 
 his work." * 
 
 He never warrants any ware for good hut what is so indeed. 
 — Otherwise he is a thief; and may be a murderer, if selling 
 such things as are appUed inwardly. ... 
 
 He either tells the faults in his wai'e, or abates proportionably 
 in the price he demands — For then the low value shows the 
 viciousness of it. Yet, commonly, when merchants pai-t with 
 their commodities, we hear (as in funeral orations) all the 
 virtues, but none of the fauHs thereof . . . 
 
 He makes not advantage of his chairman s ignorance, chiefly 
 if referring himself to his honesty; — where the seller's con- 
 science is all the buyer's skill ; who makes him both seller 
 and judge, so that he doth not so much ask as order what he 
 must pay. When one told old bishop Latimer, that the cutler 
 had cozened him, in making him pay twopence for a knife 
 not (in those days) worth a penny ; " No," quoth Latimer, 
 "he cozened not me, but his own conscience." . . . 
 
 But how long shall I be retailing out rules to this mer- 
 chant 1 It would employ a casuist an apprenticeshijJ of years. 
 Take our Saviour's wholesale rule : " Whatsoever ye would 
 have men do unto you, do you unto them ; for this is the law 
 and the prophets." 
 
 LXXIX.— THE GOOD YEOMAN. 
 
 The good yeoman is a gentleman in ore, whom the next 
 age may see refined ; and is the wax capable of a gen- 
 teel impression, when the prince shall stamp it. Wise 
 Solon (who accounted Tellus the Athenian the most happy 
 
 * Prov. xvi. 11.
 
 114 FULLERIANA : OE, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 man, for living privately on his own lands) would surely have 
 pronounced the Englisli yeomanry " a fortunate condition," 
 living in the ter perate zone betwixt greatness and want ; an 
 estate of pe( pie almost peculiar to England. France and 
 Italy are like a die, which hath no points between cinque and 
 ace, — nobility and peasantry. Their walls, though high, 
 must needs be hollow, wanting filling stones. . . . 
 
 In England, the temple of honour is bolted against none 
 who have passed through the temple of virtue ; nor is a 
 capacity to be genteel denied to our yeoman, who thus 
 behaves himself: — 
 
 lie wears russet clothes, hit snakes golden payment — having 
 tin in his buttons, and silver in his pocket. If he chance to 
 appear in clothes above his rank, it is to grace some great 
 man with his service ; and then he blusheth at his own 
 braver3^ Otherwise, he is the surest landmark whence 
 foreigners may take aim of the ancient English customs ; the 
 gentry more floating after foreign fashions. 
 
 In his house he is bountiful both to strangers and to poor 
 people.— Qorae hold, when hospitality died in England, she 
 gave her last groan amongst the yeomen of Kent. And still 
 at our yeoman's table, you shall have as many joints as dishes j 
 no meat disguised with strange sauces ; no straggling joint of 
 a sheep in the midst of a pasture of grass, beset with salads 
 on every side ; but solid, substantial food. No servitors 
 (more nimble with their hands, than the guests with their 
 teeth) take away meat, before stomachs are taken away 
 Here you have that which in itself is good, made better by 
 the store of it, and best by the welcome to it. . . . 
 
 lie seldom goes far abroad, and his credit stretclieth further 
 than his travel. — He goes not to London, but se defendendo
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 115 
 
 to save himself of a fine, being returned of a jury; where 
 seeing the king once, he prays for him ever afterwards. 
 
 In his own country he is a main man in juries; — where, if 
 the judge please to open his eyes in matter of law, he needs 
 not to be led by the nose in matters of fact. He is very 
 observant of the judge's item, when it follows the truth's 
 imprimis ; otherwise, (though not mutinous in a jury,) he 
 cares not whom he displeaseth, so he pleaseth his own con- 
 science. 
 
 He improveth his land to a double value hy his good hus- 
 bandry. — Some grounds that wept with water, or frowned 
 with thorns, by draining the one, and clearing the other, he 
 makes both to laugh and sing with corn. By marl and lime- 
 stones burnt, he bettereth his ground ; and his industry 
 worketh miracles, by turning stones into bread. Conquest 
 and good husbandry both enlarge the king's dominions ; the 
 one, by the sword, making the acres more in number ; tlie 
 other, by the plough, making the same acres more in value. 
 Solomon saith, " The king himself is maintained by hus- 
 bandry." . . . 
 
 In tim.e of famine, lie is the Joseph of tJie country, and keeps 
 the poor from starving, — Then he tameth his stacks of corn, 
 which not his covetousness but providence hath reserved for 
 time of need ; and to his poor neighbours abateth somewhat 
 of the high price of the market. 
 
 LXXX.— THE HANDICRAFTSMAN. 
 
 He is a necessary member in a commonwealth. For 
 though nature, which hath armed most other creatures, sent 
 man naked into the world, yet in giving him hands, and wit
 
 116 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 to use tliem, in effect she gave liitn shells, scales, paws, claws, 
 horns, tusks, with all offensive and defensive weapons of 
 beasts, fish, and fowl ; which, by the help of his hands in 
 imitation, he may provide for himself; and herein the skill 
 of our artisan doth consist. 
 
 His trade is such whereby he jjrovides things necessary for 
 mankind. — What St. Paul saith of the natural, is also true 
 of the politic, body : Those members of the body are much 
 more necessary which seem most feeble. Mean trades for 
 profit are most necessary in the State, and a house may better 
 want a gallery than a kitchen. The Philistines knew this 
 when they massacred all the smiths in Israel, who might 
 worse be spared than all the usurers therein ; and whose 
 hammers nail the commonwealth together, being necessary 
 both in peace and war. 
 
 Or else his trade contributefh to man's lawful j)leasure. — 
 God is not so hard a Master, but that he alloweth his servants 
 sauce (besides hunger) to eat with their meat. 
 
 £ut in no case will he be of such a tradu which is a mere 
 2Ki,iidor to mans lust ;^Si\\(\. only serves their wantonness 
 (which is pleasure run stark mad) and foolish curiosity. Yeb 
 are there too many extant of such professions ; who, one 
 would think, should stand in daily fear lest the world should 
 turn wise, and so all trades be cashiered, but that (be it 
 spoken to their shame !) it is as safe a tenure to hold a liveli- 
 hood by men's riot, as by their necessity. 
 
 The wares he makes shov) good to the eye, hut prove better in 
 fJie use. — For he knows if he sets his mark (the Tower-stamp 
 of his credit) on any bad wares, he sets a deeper brand on 
 his own conscience. Nothing liath more debased the credit 
 of our English cloths beyond the seas, than the deceitfulness
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 117 
 
 in making tliem, since the fox hath crept under the fleece of 
 the sheep.* . . . 
 
 He seldom attaineth to any very great estate; — except his 
 trade hath some outlets and excursions into wholesale and 
 merchandise ; otherwise, mere artificers cannot heap up much 
 wealth. It is difficult for gleaners, without stealing whole 
 sheaves, to fill a barn. His chief wealth consisteth in enough, 
 and that he can live comfortably, and leave his children the 
 inheritance of their education. 
 
 LXXXI.— THE TRUE GENTLE3IAN. 
 
 He is extracted from ancient and worshipful parentage. — 
 When a pippin is planted on a pippin-stock, the fruit growing 
 thence is called a " renate," — a most delicious apple, as both 
 bj sire and dam well- descended. Thus, his blood must needs 
 be well-purified who is genteelly born on both sides. 
 
 Ifkis birth be not — at least his qualities are — generous. . . . 
 
 Thus valour makes him son to Csesar, learning entitles him 
 kinsman to Tully, and piety reports him nephew to godly 
 Constantine. It graceth a gentleman of low descent and 
 high desert, when he will own the meanness of his parentage. 
 How ridiculous is it when many men brag, that their families 
 are more ancient than the moon, which, all know, are later 
 than the star which, some seventy years since, shined in 
 Cassiopeia. 
 
 He is not in his youth possessed with the great hopes of his 
 possession. — No flatterer reads constantly in his ears a survey 
 of the lands he is to inherit. This has made many boys' 
 thoughts swell so gi-eat, they could never be kept in compass 
 afterwards. Only his parents acquaint him, that he is the next 
 * A hint applicable to these times as well as those of Fuh.;..
 
 1 1 S FULLERIANA : OK, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 nndoubled heir to correction, if misbehaving himself; and. he 
 finds no more favonr from his schoolmaster, than his school- 
 master finds diligence in him, whose rod respects persons no 
 more than bullets are partial in a battle. 
 
 At the University/, he is so studious as if he intended learning 
 for his profession. — He knows well, that cunning is no burden 
 to caiTy, as paying neither i)orfcage by land, nor poundage by 
 sea. Yea, though to have land be a good First, yet to have 
 learning is the surest Second, which may stand to it when the 
 other may chance to be taken away. ... 
 
 He is courteous and affable to his neighbours. — As the swoi'd 
 of the best-tempered metal is most flexible ; so the truly gene- 
 rous are most pliant and courteous in their behaviour to their 
 inferiors. . . . 
 
 He compounds many petty differences betwixt his neigh- 
 bours, which are easier ended in his own porch than in 
 Westminster-Hall. For many people tliink, if once they 
 have fetched a warrant from a Justice, they have given 
 earnest to follow the suit ; though, otherwise, the matter be 
 so mean, that the next night's sleep would have bound both 
 jxxrties to the peace, and made them as good friends as ever 
 before. Yet, 
 
 He connives not at the smotJiering of punishable fiadts. — He 
 hates that practice, as common as dangerous amongst country- 
 people, who, having received again the goods wliich were 
 stolen from them, partly out of foolish pity, and partly out of 
 covetousness to save charges in prosecuting the law, let the 
 thief escape unpunished. Thus, whilst private losses are 
 repaired, the wounds to the commonwealth, in the breach of 
 the laws, are left uncured; and thus petty-larceners are 
 encouraged into felons, and afterwards are hanged for 2'^oundt>,
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 119 
 
 because never wliij^ped for pence ; who, if they had felt the 
 cord, had never been brought to the halter. 
 
 If chosen a Member of Parliament, he is loilling to do his 
 country service. — If he be no rhetorician, to raise affections, 
 (yea, Mercury was a greater speaker than Jupiter himself!) 
 he counts it great wisdom to be the good manager of " Yea " 
 and '• Nay." 
 
 LXXXII.—HOSPITALIXy. ' 
 
 To Jceep a disorderly house is the way to keep neither house nor 
 lands. — For whilst they keep the greatest roan'?i(jr, their state 
 steals away in the greatest silence. Yet when many consume 
 themselves with secret vices, then hospitality bears the blame; 
 whereas it is not the meat but the sauce, not the supper but 
 the gaming after it, doth undo them. 
 
 Measure not thy entertainmend of a guest hy his estate, hut 
 THINE OWN. — Because he is a lord, forget not that thou art but 
 a gentleman ; otherwise, if with feasting him thou breakest 
 thyself, he will not cure thy rupture, and (perchance) rather 
 deride than pity thee. 
 
 Mean viens 2xdates are best pleased ivith fare rather plentiful 
 than various, solid than dainty. — Dainties will cost more, 
 and content less, to those that are not critical enough to dis- 
 tinguish them. 
 
 Occasional entertainment of men greater than thyself, is better 
 tlian solemn inviting them. Then short warning is thy large 
 excuse ; whereas, otherwise, if thou dost not over-do thy 
 estate, thou shalt under-do his expectations ; for thy feast 
 will be but his ordinary fai'e. A king of France was often 
 pleased, in his hunting, wilfully to lose himself, to find the 
 house of a private park-keeper ; where, going from the school
 
 120 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 of state-aflfairs, lie was pleased to make a play-day to himself. 
 He brought sauce (that is, hunger) with him, which made 
 coarse meat dainties to his palate. At last the park-keeper 
 took heart, and solemnly invited the king to his house ; who 
 came with all his court, so that all the man's meat was not a 
 morsel for them. " Well," said the park-keeper, " I will 
 invite no more kings ; " having learnt the difference between 
 princes when they please to put on the vizard of privacy, and 
 when they will appear like themselves, both in their person 
 and attendants. 
 
 LXXXIII.— JESTING. 
 
 It is good to make a jest, but not to maJce a trade 0/ jesting. — 
 The earl of Leicester, knowing that queen Elizabeth was 
 much delighted to see a gentleman dance well, brought the 
 master of a dancing-school to dance before her. " Pish ! " 
 said the queen, " it is liis profession : I will not see him." 
 She liked it not where it was a master-quality, but where it 
 attended on other perfections. The same may we say of 
 jesting. 
 
 Jest not with the tino-edged sword of God's word. — Will 
 nothing please thee to wash thy hands in, but the font ? or 
 to di'ink healths in, but the church-chalice ? And know, the 
 whole art is learnt at the first admission, and profane jests 
 will come without calling. . . . 
 
 Wanton jests make fools laugh, and loise men frown. — 
 Seeing we are civilized Englishmen, let us not be naked 
 savages in our talk. Such rotten speeches ai'e worst in 
 withered age, when men run after that sin in tlieir words 
 which flieth from them in the deed.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 121 
 
 Let not thy jests^ Wee mummi/, be made of dead mead Jiesh. 
 — Abuse not any that are departed; for, to wrong their 
 memories, is to rob their ghosts of their winding-sheets. 
 
 Scnffnot at the natural defects of any, which are not in their 
 power to amend. — 0, it is cruelty to beat a cripple with his 
 own crutches ! 
 
 He that relates another mans loicked jest with delight, adopts 
 it to be his own. — Purge them, therefore, from their poison. 
 If the profaneness may be severed from the wit, it is like a 
 lamprey : take out the string in the back, it may make good 
 meat. But if the staple-conceit consists in profaneness, then 
 it is a viper, all poison, and meddle not with it. 
 
 He that will lose his friend for a jest, deserves to die a beg- 
 gar by the bargain. — Yet some think their conceits, like 
 mustard, not good except they bite. 
 
 No time to break jests when the heart-strings are about to be 
 broken. — No more showing of wit when the head is to be cut 
 off. Like that dying man, who, when the priest, coming to 
 him to give him extreme unction, asked of him where his feet 
 were, answered, " At the end of my legs." But, at such a 
 time, jests are an unmannerly crepitus ingenii; and let those 
 take heed who end here with Democritus, that they begin 
 not with Heraclitus hereafter. 
 
 LXXXIV.— MEMORY. 
 
 It is the treasui-e-house of the mind, wherein the monu- 
 ments thereof are kept and preserved. Plato makes it the 
 mother of the muses. Aristotle sets it one degree further, 
 making experience the mother of arts, memory the parent of 
 experience. Philosophers place it in the rear of the head; 
 and, it seems, the mine of memory lies there., because there
 
 122 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 natm-ally men dig for it, scratching it when they ai-e at a loss. 
 This again is twofold : one, the simple retention of things ; 
 the other, a regaining them when foi^gotten. 
 
 Brute creatures equal, if not exceed, men in a hare retentive 
 memory. — Through how many labyrinths of woods, without 
 other clevv of thread than natural instinct, doth the hunted 
 hare return to her muce! How doth the little bee, flying 
 into sevei-al meadows and gardens, sipping of many cups, yet 
 never intoxicated, through an ocean (as I may say) of air, 
 steadily steer hei'self home, without help of card or compass ! 
 But these cannot play an after-game, and recover what they 
 have forgotten, which is done by the mediation of dis- 
 course. 
 
 First soundly infix in thy mind tohat thou desirest to remem- 
 ber. — What wonder is it if agitation of business jog that out 
 of thy head, which was there rather tacked than fastened 1 
 whereas those notions which get in by violenta possessio will 
 abide there till ejectio firma. sickness or extreme age, dispossess 
 them. It is best knocking-in the nail over-night, and clinching 
 it tlie next morning. 
 
 Overburden not thy memory, to make sofaifJifid a servant a 
 slave. — Remember, Atlas was weary. Have as much reason 
 as a camel, — to rise when thou hast thy full load. Memory 
 like a purse, — if it be ovei'-fiill that it cmnot shut, all 
 will drop out of it. Take heed of a gluttonous curiosity to 
 feed on many things, lest the greediness of the appetite of thy 
 memory spoil the digestion thereof. Beza's case was peculiar 
 and memorable : Being above fourscoi-e years of age, he per- 
 fectly could say by heart any Greek chapter in St. Paul's 
 epistles, or any thing else which he had learned long before, 
 but forgot whatsoever was newly told him; his memory, like
 
 . THOMAS FULLEE. 123 
 
 an inn, retaining old guests, but having no room to entertain 
 newi 
 
 Spoil not thy memory hy thine own jealousy, nor make it had 
 ly suspecting it. — How canst tliou find that true wliich thou 
 wilt not trust? 
 
 Marshal thy notions into a handsome method. — One will 
 carry twice more weight trussed and packed up in bundles, 
 than when it lies untowardly flapping and hanging about his 
 shoulders. Things orderly fardled up under heads are most 
 portable. 
 
 Adventure not all thy learning in one bottom, but divide it 
 betwixt thy Tnemory and thy 7iote-bo6ks. — He that, with Bias, 
 carries all his learning about him in his head, will utterly be 
 beggared and bankrvipt, if a violent disease (a merciless thief!) 
 should i-ob and strip him. I know some have a common- 
 place against commonplace books, and yet, perchance, will 
 privately make use of what publicly they declaim against, 
 
 LXXXV.— OF NATURAL FOOLS, 
 
 They have the cases of men, and little else of them beside 
 speech and laughter. And, indeed, it may seem strange that 
 risibile being the property of man alone, they who have least 
 of man should have most thereof, laughing without cause or 
 measure. 
 
 Generally nature hangs out a sign of simplicity in the face of 
 a fool. — And there is enough in his countenance for a hue-and- 
 cry to take him on suspicion : or else it is stamped on the 
 figure of his body; their heads sometimes so little, that there 
 is no room for wit; sometimes so long, that there is no wit 
 for so much room.
 
 124 FULLERIANA : OK, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 Yet some, hy thdr faces, may pass current enough till they 
 cry themselves down hy their speaking. — Thus men know the 
 bell is cracked wlien they hear it tolled ; yet some that have 
 stood out the assault of two or three questions, and have 
 answered pretty rationally, have afterwards of their own 
 accord betrayed and yielded themselves to be fools. 
 
 One may get wisdom by looking on a fool. — In beholding 
 him, think how much thou art beholden to Hui that suffered 
 thee not to be like him. Only God's pleasure put a difference 
 betwixt you. And consider, that a fool and a wise man are 
 alike both in the starting-place — their birth, and at the post 
 — their death ; only they differ in the race of their lives. 
 
 It is unnatural to laugh at a natural. — How can the object 
 of thy pity be the subject of thy pastime 1 
 
 To make a trade of laughing at a fool, is the highway to 
 become one. — Tully confessed, that whilst he laughed at one 
 Hircus, a very ridiculous man, duvi ilium rideo pene factus 
 sum ille. And one telletli us of Gallus Vibius, a man first of 
 gi-eat eloquence, and afterwards of great madness, which seized 
 not on him so much by accident as his own affectation, — so 
 long mimically imitating madmen that he became one. 
 
 LXXXVL— THE WISDOM OF FOOLS AND FOLLIES OF THE WISE. 
 
 Many have been the wise speeches of fools, though not so many 
 as the foolish s2)eeches of wise men. — Now, the wise speeches of 
 these silly souls proceed from one of these reasons : — either 
 because, talking much, and shooting often, they must needs 
 hit the mark sometimes, though not by aim, by bap : — or 
 else because a fool's mediocriter is optime; sense fi-om liis 
 mouth, a sentence ; and a tolerable speech cried up for an 
 apophthegm : — or, lastly, because God may sometimes illu-
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 125 
 
 mlnate them, and (especially towards their death) admit them 
 to the possession of some part of reason. A poor beggar in 
 Paris, being very hungry, stayed so long in a cook's shop, who 
 was dishiug-up of meat, till his stomach was satisfied with 
 only the smell thereof. The choleric, covetous cook de- 
 manded of him to piiy for his breakfast. The poor man 
 denied it, and the controversy was referred to the deciding of 
 the next man that should pass by, who chanced to be the 
 most notorious idiot in the whole city. He, on the relation 
 of the mattei", determined that the jjoor man's money should 
 be put betwixt two empty dishes, and the cook shovUd be re- 
 compensed with the gingling of the poor man's money, as 
 he was satisfied with only the smell of the cook's meat. 
 And this is afl&rmed by credible writers as no fable, but au 
 undoubted fact. More waggish was that of a rich-lauded 
 fool, whom a courtier had begged, and carried about to wait 
 on him. He, coming with his master to a gentleman's house 
 where the picture of a fool was wrought in a fair suit of arras, 
 cut the picture out with a penknife. And being chidden for 
 so doing, " You have more cause," said he, " to thank me ; 
 for if my master had seen the j)icture of the fool, he would 
 have begged the hangings of the king as he did my lands."' 
 "When the standers-by comforted a natural who lay on his 
 death-bed, and told him that four proper fellows should 
 carry his body to the church : " Yea," quoth he, " but I had 
 rather by half go thither myself;" and then prayed to God, 
 at his last gasp, not to require more of him than he gave 
 him. 
 
 LXXXVII.— OF RECKEATIONS. 
 
 Recreation is a second creation, when weariness hath 
 almost annihilated one's spirits. It is the breathing of the
 
 126 FULLEEIANA : 01^ WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 soul, whicli otherwise would be stifled with contiuual busi- 
 ness. We may trespass in them, if using such as are for- 
 bidden by the — lawyer, as against the statutes — physician, as 
 against health — -divine, as against conscience. 
 
 Spill not the morning (the quintessence of the day /) in recrea- 
 tions. — For sleep itself is a recreation. Add not, therefore, 
 sauce to sauce ; and he cannot properly have any title to lie 
 refreshed, who was not first faint. Pastime, like wine, is 
 poison in the morning. It is then good husbandry to sow 
 the head, which hath lain fallow all night, with some serious 
 work. Chiefly, intrench not on the Lord's-day to use un- 
 lawful sports ; this were to spare thine own flock, and to 
 shear God's lamb. 
 
 Let thy recreations he ingenious, and hear proportion with 
 thine age. — If thou sayest with Paul, " When I was a child, 
 I did as a child ;" say also with him, " But when I was a 
 man, I put away childish things." Wear also the child's 
 coat, if thou usest his sports. 
 
 Refresh that part of thyself which is most wearied. — If thy 
 life be sedentary, exercise thy body ; if stirring and active 
 recreate thy mind. But take heed of cozening thy mind, in 
 setting it to do a double task, under pretence of giving it a 
 play-day, as in the labyrinth of chess, and other tedious and 
 studious games. 
 
 Tet recreations distasteful to some dispositions relish hest to 
 others. — Fishing with an angle is, to some, rather a torture 
 than a pleasure, — to stand an hour as mute as the fish they 
 mean to take ; yet herewi thai Dr. Whitaker was much de- 
 lighted. When some noblemen had gotten William Cecil, 
 lord Burleigh, and Treasurer of England, to ride with them 
 a-hunting, and the sport began to be cold, " What call you
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 
 
 127 
 
 this ? " said the Treasurer. " O ! now," said they, " the dogs 
 are at a fault." " Yea," quoth the Treasurer, '' take me again 
 in such a fault, and 1 will give you leave to punish me ! " 
 Thus, as soon may the same meat please all palates, as the 
 same sport suit with all dispositions. 
 
 Running, leaping, and dancing, the descants on the plain 
 song of walking, are all excellent exercises. — And yet those are 
 the best recreations which, beside refreshing, enable, at least 
 dispose, men to some other good ends. Bowling teaches 
 men's hands and eyes mathematics and the rules of proportion. 
 Swimming hath saved many a man's life, when himself hath 
 been hoth the wares and the ship. Tilting and fencing is war 
 without anger ; and manly sports are the grammar of mili- 
 tary performance. 
 
 But above all, shooting is a noble recreation, and a half- 
 liberal art. — A i-ich man told a poor man, that he walked to 
 get a stomach for his meat. " And I," said the poor man, 
 " walk to get meat for my stomach." !Now, shooting would 
 have fitted both their turns ; it provides food when men are 
 hungry, and helps digestion when they are full. 
 
 LXXX VIII.— DEFORMITY. 
 
 Some people, liandsome by nature, have wilfully deformed 
 themselves; — such as wear Bacchus's colours in their faces, 
 arising not from having — but being — bad Uvei's. 
 
 Nature often-times recompenseth deformed bodies with excellent 
 wits ; — witness ^sop, than whose Fables children cannot 
 read an easier, nor men a wiser, book ; for all the latter 
 moralists do but write comments upon them. Many jeering 
 ■wits who have thought to have rid at their ease on the bowed
 
 128 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 backs of some cripples, have, by tlieir unhappy answers been 
 unhorsed and thrown flat on their own backs. A jeering 
 gentleman commended a beggai", who was deformed, and little 
 better than blind, for having an excellent eye. " True," said 
 the beggar, " for I can discern an honest man from such a 
 knave as you are ! " 
 
 Some souls have been the chapels of sanctity, lohose bodies 
 have been the spitals of deformity. — An emperor of Germany, 
 coming by chance on a Sunday into a church, found there a 
 most misshapen priest, pene portentum naturce, insomuch as 
 the emperor scorned and contemned him. But when he 
 heard him read those words in the service, " For it is He that 
 made us, and not we ourselves," the emperor checked his own 
 proud thoughts, and made inquiry into the quality and con- 
 dition of the man, and finding him, on examination, to be most 
 learned and devout, he made him archbishop of Cologne, 
 which place he did excellently discharge. 
 
 LXXXIX.— OF BOOKS. 
 
 Solomon saith truly, " Of making many books there is no 
 end;" so insatiable is the thirst of men therein: as also 
 endless is the desire of many in buying and reading them. 
 
 It is a vanity to persuade the vjorld one hath much learning, 
 by getting a great library. — As soon shall I believe every one 
 is valiant that hath a well-furnished armory. I guess good 
 housekeeping by the smoking, not the number, of the tunnels, 
 as knowing that many of them (built merely for uniformity) 
 are without chimneys, and more without fires. Once a dunce, 
 void of learning but full of books, flouted a library -less scho- 
 lar with these words : Salve, Doctor sine libris ! But, the
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 129 
 
 next day, the scholar coming into the jeerer's study crowded 
 with books, Salvete, lihrl, saith he, sine Doctore ! 
 
 Few books well i>elected are best. — Yet, as a certain fool 
 bought all the pictures that came out, because he might have 
 his choice ; such is the vain humour of many men in gather- 
 ing of books. Yet, when they have done all, they miss their 
 end ; it being in the editions of authors as in the fashions of 
 clothes, — when a man thinks he hath gotten the latest and 
 newest, presently another newer comes out. 
 
 Some books are only cursorili/ to he tasted of; — namely, first, 
 voluminous books, the task of a man's life to read them over. 
 Secondly, auxiliary books, only to be repaired-to on occasions. 
 Thirdly, such as are mere pieces of formality, so that if you 
 look on them you look through them ; and he that peeps 
 throu,"-h the casement of the index, sees as much as if he were 
 in the house. 
 
 The genius of the author is commonly discovered in the Dedi- 
 catory Epistle. — Many place the purest grain in the mouth of 
 the sack, for chapmen to handle or buy : and from the dedi- 
 cation one may probably guess at the work, saving some rare 
 and peculiar exceptions. Thus, when once a gentleman ad- 
 mired how so pithy, learned, and witty a dedication was 
 matched to a flat, dull, foolish book ; " In truth," said another, 
 " they may be well matched together, for I profess they bo 
 nothing akin." 
 
 Proportion an hour's rtieditation to an hour's reading of a 
 staple author. — This makes a man master of his learning, and 
 dis-spirits the book into the scholar. 
 
 When a French pi'inter complained that he was utterly un- 
 done by printing a solid, serious book of Rabelais concerning 
 2)liysic, Rabelais, to make him recompense, made that his
 
 130 FULLEKIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 jesting, scurrilous work, which repaired the printer's loss 
 with advantage. Such books the world swarms too much 
 with. When one had set out a witless pamphlet, writing 
 Finis at the end thereof, another wittily wrote beneath it, — ■ 
 
 "Nay, there thou liest, my friend, 
 In writing foolish books there is no end." 
 
 XC — OF FAME, 
 
 Fame is the echo of actions, resounding them to the world, 
 save that the echo repeats only the last part, but feme 
 relates all and often more than all. 
 
 Fame sometimes hath created something of nothing. — She 
 hath made whole countries, more than ever nature did, 
 especially near the poles ; and then hath peopled them like- 
 wise with inhabitants of her own invention, — pigmies, giants, 
 and Amazons. Yea, fame is sometimes like unto a kind of 
 mushroom, which Pliny recounts to be the gi-eatest miracle 
 in nature, because growing and having no root as fame no 
 groimd of her reports. 
 
 Fame often makes a great deal of a little. — Absalom killed 
 one of David's sons,* and fame killed all the rest ; and 
 generally she magnifies and multiplies matters. 
 
 Politicians some'imes raise fames [reports^ on purpose, — as 
 that such things are done already, which they mean to do 
 afterwards. By the light of those false fires, they see into 
 men's hearts ; and these false rumours are true scouts to dis- 
 cover merHs dispositions. Besides, the deed, though strange in 
 itself, is done afterwards with the less noise, men having 
 vented their wonder beforehand ; and the strangeness of the 
 
 * 2 Sam. xiii. 30.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 131 
 
 action is abated, because formerly made stale in report. But 
 if the rumour startles men extremely, and draws with it 
 dangerous consequences, then they can presently confute it, 
 let their intentions fall, and prosecute it no further. 
 
 Strange was that plot of Stratocles, who gave it out that 
 he had gotten a victory ; and the constant report thereof 
 continued three days, and then was confuted : and Stratocles 
 being charged with abusing his people with a lie, " Why," 
 said he, " are ye angry with me for making you pass three 
 days in mirth and jollity, more than otherwise you should^'" 
 
 Incredible is the swiftness of fame in carrying reports. — 
 First, she creeps through a village, then she goes through a 
 town, then she runs through a city, then she flies through a 
 country, still the farther the faster. 
 
 Fame is apt to be antedated and raised before the fact, 
 being related at guess before it was acted. Thus, some have 
 been causelessly commended for early rising in the morning, 
 who indeed came to their journey's end over-night. If such 
 fore-made reports prove true, they are admired and registered ; 
 if false, neglected and forgotten : as those only which escaped, 
 shipwreck hung up votivas tabulas, " tablets with their names," 
 in those haven-towns where they came ashore. But as for 
 those who are drowned, their memorials are drowned with 
 them. 
 
 A fond fame is best confuted by neglecting it. — By " fond " 
 understand such a report as is rather ridiculous, than danger- 
 ous, if believed. It is not worth the making a schism betwixt 
 newsmongers to set up an anti-fame against it. 
 
 And fame hath much of the scold in her ; the best way to 
 silence her is, to be silent, and then at last she will be out of 
 breath with blowing her own trumpet.
 
 132 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 Faine sometimes reports things less than they are, — pardon 
 her for offending herein, she is guilty so seldom. 
 
 But fame falls most short in those transcendents which are 
 above her predicaments ; as in Solomon's wisdom : " And, 
 behold, one half was not told me ; thy wisdom and prosperity 
 exceedeth the fame that I heard." But chiefly in fore- 
 reporting the happiness in heaven, " which eye hath not seen 
 nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man 
 to conceive." 
 
 XCI.— THE GOOD JUDGE. 
 
 The good advocate, whom we formerly described, is since, 
 by his prince's flivonr and own deserts, advanced to be a 
 Judge ; which his place he freely obtained with sir 
 Augustine NicoUs, whom king James used to call " the 
 Judge that would give no money." Otherwise, they that 
 buy justice by wholesale, — to make themselves savers, must 
 sell it by retail. 
 
 He rs patient and attentive in hearing the pleadings on both 
 sides; — and hearkens to the witnesses, though tedious. He 
 may give a waking testimony, who hath but a dreaming utter- 
 ance ; and many country people must be impertinent, before 
 they can be pertinent, and cannot give evidence about a hen, 
 but fii-st they must begin with it in the e^^. All which our 
 Judge is contented to hearken to. . . . 
 
 Having lienrd with patience, he gives sentence loith tipright- 
 ness.-^FoT when he put on his robes, he put off his i-e- 
 lations to any ; and, like Melchisedec, becomes without i^edi- 
 gree, . . He therefore allows of no noted favourites, which 
 eannot but cause multiplication of fees, and suspicion of 
 by-laws.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 133 
 
 He so liates bribes, that he is jealous to receive any kindness 
 above the ordinary proportion of friendship, lest, like the ser- 
 mons of wandering preachers, they should end in begging. 
 And, surely, integrity is the proper portioii of a Judge. Men 
 have a touchstone whereby to try gold, but gold is the touch- 
 stone whereby to try men. It was a shrewd gird which Catulus 
 gave the Roman Judges for acquittnig Clodius, a great malefac- 
 tor, when he met them going home well attended with officers : 
 " You do well," quoth he, " to be well guarded for your safety, 
 lest the money be taken away from you you took for 
 bribes." Our Judge also detesteth the trick of Mendicant 
 Friars, who will touch no money themselves, but have a boy 
 with a bag to receive it for them. 
 
 When he sits upon life, in judgment he remembereth 
 mercy . . . Oh let him take heed how he strikes that hath 
 a dead hand ! . . . 
 
 The sentence of condemnation he j)Tonounceth with all gravity. 
 — It is best when steeped in the Judge's tears. He avoideth 
 all jesting on men in misery : easily may he put them out of 
 countenance, whom he hath power to put out of life. 
 
 He is exact to do justice in civil suits betwixt sovereign and 
 subject. — This will most ingratiate him with his prince at 
 last. Kings neither are, can, nor should be lawyers them- 
 selves, by reason of higher State-employments ; but herein 
 they see with the eyes of their Judges, and at last will break 
 those fi dse spectacles which, in point of law, shall be found 
 to have deceived them. 
 
 XCII.— TRAITS OF A GOOD BISHOP. 
 He is very merciful in p)unishing offenders. . . He had rather 
 draw tears tlian blood. O let not the " stars of our church" be
 
 134 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 herein turned to comets ; whose aj^pearing in place of judicature 
 presagetli to some death or destruction. I confess, that even 
 justice itself is a kind of mercy. But God grant, that my 
 portion of mercy be not paid me in that coin ! And though 
 the highest detestation of sin best agreeth with clergymen, 
 yet ought they to cast a severe eye on tUe vice and example, 
 and a merciful eye on the person. 
 
 None more forward to forgive a wrong done to himself. — 
 Worthy archbishop Whitgift interceded to queen Elizabeth 
 for remitting of heavy fines laid on some of his adversaries, 
 (learning from Christ his Master to be a mediator for them,) 
 till his importunity had angered the queen ; yea, and till his 
 importunity had pleased hei- again ; and gave not over till he 
 got theni to be forgiven. 
 
 He meddlcth as little as may be willt temporal matters — 
 Having little skill in them, and less will to them. Not that 
 he is unworthy to manage them, but they unworthy to be 
 managed by him. Yea, generally, the most dexterous in 
 spiritual matters are left-handed in temporal businesses, and 
 go but untowardly about them. Heaven is his vocation, and 
 therefore he counts earthly employments avocations ; except 
 in such cases which lie, as I may say, in the Marches of 
 Divinity, and have connexion with his calling ; or else, when 
 temporal matters meddle with him, so that he must rid them 
 out of his way. . . . 
 
 Jf called to the court he there doth all good offices. — Betwixt 
 prince and people, striving to remove all misprisions and dis- 
 afTections, and advancing unity and concord. They that 
 think the church may flourish when the commonwealth doth 
 wither, may as well conceive that the brains may be sound 
 when pi'a mater is perished. When, in the way of the con-
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 135 
 
 fessor, he privately tells his prince of his faults, he knows, "by 
 Nathan's parable, to go the nearest way home by going iar 
 about. . . . 
 
 His mortified mind is no u'hit moved with the magnificent 
 vanities of the court; — No more than a dead corpse is affected 
 with a velvet hearse-cloth over it. 
 
 XCIIL— THE ATHEIST. 
 
 The word " atheist " is of a very large extent : every poly- 
 theist is, in effect, an atheist; for he that multiplies a deity, 
 annihilates it ; and he that divides it, destroys it. 
 
 But, amongst the Heathen, we may observe, that whoso- 
 ever sought to withdraw people from their idolatry was pre- 
 sently indicted and arraigned of atheism. If any philosopher 
 saw God through their gods, this dust was cast in his eyes for 
 being more quick-sighted than others, — that presently he was 
 condemned for an atheist ; and thus Socrates, the Pagan 
 martyr, was put to death wj afJso;. 
 
 At this day three sorts of atheists are extant in the 
 world : — 
 
 1. In life and conversation. — "God is not in all his 
 thoughts ] " not that he thinks there is no God ; but thinks 
 not there is a God, never minding or heeding Him in the 
 whole course of his life and actions. 
 
 2. In will and desii-e. — Such could wish there were no God 
 or devil ; as thieves would have no judge nor jailor. Quod 
 metuunt periisse expetunt, 
 
 3. In judgment and opinion. — Of tlie former two sorts of 
 atheists, there are more in tlie world than are generally 
 thought; of this latter, more are thouglit to be than there 
 are; — a contemplative atheist being very rare. . . .
 
 136 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 First, he quarrels at the diversities of religions in the world; 
 — Complaining liow great clerks dissent in their judgments, 
 wliich makes him sceptical iu all opinions : whereas such 
 ditferences should not make men careless to have any — but 
 careful to have the best — religion ... He keeps a register of 
 many difficult j^laces of Scripture; not that he desires satis- 
 fection therein, but delights to puzzle divines therewith; and 
 coimts it a great conquest when he hath posed them. Unne- 
 cessary questions out of the Bible are his most necessary 
 study; and he is more curious to know where Lazarus's soul 
 was, the four days he lay in the grave, than careful to provide 
 for his own soul when he shall be dead . . . 
 
 Hefurnisheth himself with an armory of arguments to fight 
 against his own conscience, — Some taken from 
 
 1. The impunity and outward happiness of wicked men. — 
 As the Heathen poet, whose verses for me shall pass un- 
 Englished : — 
 
 Esse Deos credamne ? fidem jurata fefdlit, 
 Et fades illi, qucefuit ante, manet. 
 
 And no wonder if an atheist breaks his neck thereat, whereat 
 the foot of David himself did almost slip, when he saw the 
 prosperity of the wicked;* whom God only i-eprieves fur 
 punishment hereafter. 
 
 2. From the afflictions of the godly ;— Whilst, indeed, God 
 only tries their faith and patience. As Absalom complained 
 of his father David's government, that none were deputed to 
 redress people's grievances; so he objects, that none righteth 
 the wrongs of God's people, and thinks (proud dust!) the 
 world would be better steered if he were the pilot thereof. 
 
 * Psalm Ixxiii. 2, 3.
 
 THOMAS FULLEK. 137 
 
 3. From the delaying of the day of judgment; — "With those 
 mockers, whose objections tlie apostle fully answereth,* And 
 in regard of his own particular, the atheist hath as little cause 
 to rejoice at the deferring of the day of judgment, as the thief 
 hath reason to be glad that the Assizes be put oflf, who is to 
 be tried, and may be executed before, at the Quarter-Sessions : 
 so death may take our atheist off, before the day of judgment 
 come. 
 
 With these and other arguments he struggles with his own 
 conscience, and long in vain seeks to conquer it, even fearing 
 that Deity he flouts at, and dreading that God whom he 
 denies. And as that famous Athenian soldier, Cynjegirus, 
 catching hold of one of the enemies' ships, held it first with 
 his right hand, and, when that was cut off, with his left, and 
 when both were cut off, yet still kept it with his teeth ; so 
 the conscience of our atheist— though he bruise it, and beat 
 it, and maim it never so much — still keeps him by the teeth, 
 still feeding and gnawing upon him, torturing and tormenting 
 him with thoughts of a Deity, which the other desires to 
 suppress. 
 
 At last he himself is utterly overthrown by conquering his 
 own conscience. — God in justice takes from him the light 
 which he thrust from himself, and delivers him up to a seared 
 conscience and a reprobate mind, whereby hell takes posses- 
 sion of him. The apostle saith, that a man "may feel God 
 in his works."+ But now our atheist hath a dead palsy, is 
 past all sense, and cannot perceive God, who is every where 
 presented unto him . . , However, descending impenitent into 
 hell, there he is atheist no longer, but hath as much religion 
 as the devil, to confess God and tremble:— 
 
 * 2 Peter iii. -j- Acts xvii. 27.
 
 138 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 Nidlus in inferno est atJieos, ante fuit : 
 
 " On earth were atlieists many, 
 In hell there is not any." 
 
 All speak truth, when they are on the rack; but it is a woful 
 thing to be hell's convert. 
 
 XCIV.— THE HYPOCRITE. 
 
 By hypocrite we understand such a one as doth " practise 
 hypocrisy," (Isaiah xxxii. 6,) make a trade or work of dissem- 
 bling : for otherwise, " It is the lot of very few, if of any at 
 all, to be free from every stain of hypocrisy." * The best of 
 God's children have a smack of hypocrisy. 
 
 A hypocrite is himself both the archer and the mark, in all 
 actions shooting at his own praise or projit, — And therefore he 
 doth all things that they may be seen. What, with others, 
 is held a principal point in law, is his main maxim in divinity, 
 — to hav6 good witness ! Even fasting itself is meat and 
 drink to him, whilst others behold it. 
 
 In the outside of religion he outshines a sincere Christian. — 
 G ilt cups glitter more than those of massy gold, whicli are 
 seldom burnished. Yea, well may the hypocrite affoixl gaudy 
 facing, who cares not for any lining ; brave it in the shop, 
 that hath nothinar in the warehouse. Nor is it a wonder if in 
 outward service he outstrips God's servants, who out-doeth 
 God's command by loill-iuorship, giving God more than he 
 requires; though not what he most requires, I mean, his 
 heart. 
 
 His vizard is commonly pluched off in this loorld. — Sincerity 
 is an entire thing in itself; hypocrisy consists of several 
 pieces cunningly closed together .... Now by these shrewd 
 
 • Hypocriseorum macula carere, aut paucorum est, aut uullorura.
 
 THOiLA.S FULLEK. 139 
 
 signs a dLjsembler is often discovered : First, heavy censuring 
 of others for light faults. Secondly, boasting of his own 
 goodness. Thirdly, the unequal beating of his pulse in mat- 
 ters of i)iety ; hard, strong, and quick, in public actions ; weak, 
 soft, and dull, in private matters. Fourthly, shrinking in pro- 
 secution ; for painted faces cannot abide to come nigh the fire. 
 
 Yet sometimes he goes to the grave neitloer detected nor sus- 
 pected: — if masters in their art, and living in peaceable times, 
 wherein piety and prosperity do not fall out, but agree 
 well together. Maud, mother to king Henry II., being be- 
 siejred in Winchester Castle, counterfeited herself to be dead, 
 and so was carried out in a coffin, whereby she escaped. An- 
 other time, being besieged at Oxford in a cold winter, with 
 wearing white apparel she got away in the snow undiscovered. 
 Thus, some hypocrites, by dissembling mortification, that they 
 are dead to the world, and by professing a snow-like purity 
 in their conversations, escape all their lifetime undiscerned by 
 mortal eyes. 
 
 £y long dissemhling jyiety, he deceives himself at last. — Yea, 
 he may grow so infatuated, as to conceive himself no dissem- 
 bler, but a sincere saint. A scholar was so possessed with 
 his lively personating of king Richard III., in a College- comedy, 
 that ever after he was ti*ansported with a royal humour in his 
 large expenses ; which brought him to beggary, though he 
 had great preferment. Thus the hypocrite, by long acting 
 the part of piety, at last believes himself really to be such a 
 one, whom at first he did but counterfeit. 
 
 God liere knows, and hereafter will inake hypocrites hnoion to 
 the whole world. — Ottochar, king of Bohemia, refused to do 
 homage to Rodolphus I., emperor, till at last, chastised with 
 war, he was content to do him homage privately in. a tent ;
 
 1 to FULLERIANA : OR, WISBOM AND WIT OF 
 
 whicli tent was so contrived by the emperor's servants, that, 
 by drawing one cord, it was all taken away, and so Ottocliar 
 presented on his knees, doing his homage, to the view of three 
 armies in presence. Thus God, at last, shall uncase the clos- 
 est dissembler, to the sight of men, angels, and devils, having 
 removed all veils and pretences of piety : no goat in a sheep- 
 skin shall steal on his right hand at the last day of judg- 
 ment. 
 
 XCV.— THE LIAR. 
 
 The liar is one that makes a trade to tell falsehoods, with 
 intent to deceive. He is either open or secret. A secret liar 
 or equivocator is such a one, as, by mental reservations and 
 other tricks, deceives him to whom he speaks, being lawfully 
 called to deliver all the truth. And, sure, speech being but 
 a copy of the heart, it cannot be avouched for a true copy that 
 hath less in it than the original. . . . 
 
 At first he tells a lie with some shame and reluctancy. — For 
 then, if he cuts off but a lap of truth's garment, his heart 
 smites him ; but, in process of time, he conquers his consci- 
 ence, and, from quenching it, there ariseth a smoke which 
 soots and fouls his soul, so that afterwards he lies without any 
 regret. 
 
 Having raade one lie, he is fain to make more to maintain it. 
 — For an untruth, wanting a firm foundation, needs many 
 buttresses. The honour and happiness of the Israelites is 
 the misery and mischief of lies: "Not one amongst them 
 shall be barren," (Deut. vii. 14,) but miraculously procreative 
 to beget others. 
 
 lie hath a good memory which he badly abuseth. — Memory 
 in a liar is no more than needs. For, first, lies are hard to 
 be remembered, because many, whereas truth is but one.
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 141 
 
 Secondly, because a lie cursorily told, takes little footing and 
 settled fastness in the teller's memory, but prints itself deeper 
 in the hearers', who take the greater notice, because of the 
 improbability and deformity thereof; and one will remember 
 the si£;ht of a monster lonfjer than the sight of a handsome 
 body. Hence comes it to pass, that when the liar hath for- 
 gotten himself, his auditoi's put Jiim iu mind of the lie, and 
 take him thei'ein. 
 
 Sometimes, thovgh his memory cannot help him from being 
 arrested for lying, his wit rescues him: — which needs a long 
 reach to bring all ends presently and probably together, glu- 
 ing the splinters of his tales so cunningly, that the cracks 
 cannot be perceived. Thus the relic-monger bragged, he 
 could show a feather of the dove at Christ's baptism ; but V)e- 
 ing to show it to the people, a wag had stolen away the fea- 
 ther, and put a coal in the room of it. " Well," quoth he to 
 the spectators, " I cannot be so good as my word for the pre- 
 sent ; but here is one of the coals that broiled St. Lawrence, 
 and that is worth the seeing." * 
 
 Being challenged for telling a lie, no man is more furiously 
 angry. — Then he draws his sword and threatens, because he 
 thinks that an offer of revenge, to show himself moved at the 
 accusation, doth in some sort discharge him of the imputation ; 
 . . . and the party charged doth conceive, that, if he vindicates 
 valour, his truth will be^iven him into the bargain. 
 
 At last lie believes his own lies to be true. — He hath told 
 them over and over so often, that prescription makes a right ; 
 and he verily believes, that at the first he gathered the story 
 out of some authentical author, which only ^-^y^ in his own 
 brain. 
 
 * See this story told with exquisite humour in "Eulenspiegel."
 
 H'2 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 iVo mail else believes him when he speaks the truth. — How 
 much gold soever he hatli in his chest, his word is but brass, 
 and passeth for notliing : yea, he is dumb in effect ; for it is 
 all one whether one cannot speak, or cannot be believed. 
 
 XCVr.— THE TYRANT. 
 
 A TYRANT is one whose list is his law, making his subjects 
 his slaves. Yet this is but a tottering kingdom which is 
 founded on trembling people, who fear and hate their 
 sovereign. 
 
 lie gets all places of advantage into his own hands. — Yea, 
 he would disarm his subjects of all scythes and pruniug-hooks, 
 but for fear ol a general rebellion of weeds and thistles in the 
 land. 
 
 He takes the laws at the first, rather hy undermining than 
 assault. — And therefore, to do unjustly with the more justice, 
 he counterfeits a legality in all his proceedings, and will not 
 butcher a man without a statute for it. 
 
 Afterwards, he rageth freely in innocent blood. — Is any man 
 virtuous 1 Then he is a traitor, and let him die for it, who 
 durst presume to be good when his prince is bad. Is he 
 beloved 1 He is a rebel, hath proclaimed himself king, and 
 rei"'ns already in people's affections ; it must cost him his 
 life. Is he of kin to the crown, though so far off that his 
 alliance is scarce to be derived 1 All the veins of his body 
 must be drained and emptied, to find there, and fetch thence, 
 that dangerous drop of royal blood. And thus, having taken 
 the prime men away, the rest are easily subdued. In all 
 these particulars, Machiavel is his only counsellor ; who, in 
 his " Prince," seems to him to resolve all these cases of 
 conscience to be very lawful.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 143 
 
 Worst men a/re Ms greatest favourites. — He keeps a con- 
 stant kennel of blood-hounds, to accuse whom he pleaseth. 
 These will depose more than any can suppose, not sticking to 
 swear that they heard fishes speak, and saw through a mill- 
 stone at midnight. These fear not to fm-swear, but fear they 
 shall not forswear enough — to cleave the pin and do the deed. 
 The less credit they have, the more they are believed, and 
 their very accusation is held a proof. . . . 
 
 He counts men in miseri/ the most melodious instruments. — 
 Especially if they be well-tuned and played upon by cunning 
 musicians, who are artificial in tormenting them, the more the 
 merrier ; and if he hath a set and full concert of such tortured 
 miserable souls, he danceth most cheerfully at the pleagant 
 ditty of their dying groans. He loves not to be prodigal of 
 men's lives, but thriftily improves the objects of his cruelty, 
 — spending them by degrees, and epicurizing on their pain ; 
 so that, as Philoxenus wished a crane's throat, he could desire 
 asses' ears, the longer to entertain their hideous and miserable 
 roaring. Thus nature had not racks enough for men, (the 
 colic, goxit, stone,) but art must add to them, and devils in 
 flesh antedate hell here in inventing torments ; which, when 
 inflicted on malefactors, extort pity from merciful beholders, 
 and make them give what is not due ; but, when used by 
 tyrants on innocent people, such tender hearts as stand by 
 suff'er what they see, and, by the proxy of sympathy, feel 
 what tliey behold. 
 
 He seeks to suppress all memorials and vyritings of his 
 actions. — And as wicked Tereus, after he had ravished 
 Philomela, cut out her tongue; so when tyrants have wronged 
 and abused the times they live in, they endeavour to make 
 them speecliless, to tell no tales to posterity. . . .
 
 144 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 A t last lie is haunted with the terrors of his own conscience. 
 — If any two do but whisper together, (whatsoever the 
 propositions be,) he conceives their discourse concludes against 
 liim. Company and solitai'iness are equally dreadful unto 
 him, being never safe ; and he wants a guard to guard him 
 from his guard, and so proceeds in infinitum. The scouts of 
 Charles duke of Burgundy brought him news, that the 
 French army was hard by, — being nothing else but a field full 
 of high thistles, whose tops they mistook for so many spears. 
 On lesser ground, this tyrant conceives greater fears. Thus 
 in vain doth he seek to fence himself from without, whose 
 foe is within him. 
 
 He is glad to patch up a bad nigMs sleep, out of pieces of 
 slumber. — They seldom sleep soundly, who have blood for 
 their bolster. His fancy presents him with strange masks, 
 wherein only fiends and fui'ies are actors. The fright awakes 
 him ; and he is no sooner glad that it was a dream, but fears 
 it is prophetical. 
 
 XCVII.— FORCED MARRIAGES. 
 
 Affections, like the conscience, are rather to be led than 
 drawn; and, it is to be feared, they that marry where they 
 do not love, will love where they do not marry. 
 
 XCVIII.— THE "WORST METALLIC POISON. 
 
 The same word in the Greek, /&j, signifies "rust" and 
 "poison:" and some strong poison is made of the rust of 
 metals ; but none more venomous than the rust of money iii 
 the rich man's purse unjustly detained from the labourer, 
 which will poison and infect his whole estate.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 145 
 
 XCIX.— THE LAST WORD. 
 
 Some servants are so talkative, one may as well command 
 the echo as them, not to speak last ; and then they count 
 themselves conquerors, because last they leave the field. 
 Others, though they seem to yield, and go away, yet, with 
 the flying Parthians, shoot backward over their shoulders, 
 and dart bitter taunts at their masters ; yea, though, with 
 the clock, they have given the last stroke, yet they keep a 
 jarring, muttering to themselves a good while after. 
 
 C— KEEP CLOSE TO THE LIGHT. 
 
 If in a dark business we perceive God to guide us by the 
 lantern of his providence, it is good to follow the light close, 
 lest we lose it by our lagging behind. 
 
 CL— CANONICAL HOURS. 
 
 The apostle's precept is the plain song, " Pray continually;" 
 and men's inventions ran their descants upon it, and confined 
 it to certain hours : a practice in itself not so bad for those 
 who have leisure to observe it, save that when devotion is 
 thus artificially plaited into hours, it may take up meii's minds 
 informalities to neglect the substance. 
 
 CII.— DISCREET CHARITY. 
 
 Sure, none need be more bountiful in giving than the sun 
 is in shining ; which, though freely bestowing his beams on 
 the world, keeps, notwithstanding, the body of light to him- 
 self. Yea, it is necessary that liberality should as well have 
 banks as a stream.* 
 
 * Or, as Fuller has it in his Holy War: — " Charity's eyes must be 
 open as well as her hands."
 
 146 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 cm.— CELIBACY. 
 
 Celibacy is none of those things to be desired in and for 
 itself, but because it leads a more convenient way to the wor- 
 shipping of God, especially in time of persecution. For, then, 
 if Christians be forced to run races for their lives, the unmar- 
 ried have the advantage, — lighter by many ounces, and freed 
 from much incumbrance, which the married are subject to ; 
 who, though private persons, herein are like princes, — they 
 must have their train follow them.* 
 
 CIV.— MISOGYNISTS. 
 
 Unworthy is the practice of those who in their discourse 
 plant all their arguments poiut-blauk to batter down the 
 married estate, bitterly inveighing against it ; yea, base is 
 the behaviour of some young men, who can speak nothing 
 but satires against God's ordinance of matrimony, and the 
 whole sex of women. This they do, either out of deep dis- 
 simulation, to divert suspicion, that they may prey the 
 farthest from their holes : or else they do it out of revenge ; 
 having themselves formerly lighted on bad women, (yet no 
 worse than they deserved,) they curse all adventures, because 
 of their own shipwreck : or, lastly, they do it out of mere 
 spite to nature and God himself: and pity it is but that their 
 fathers had been of the same opinion ! Yet it may be toler- 
 able, if only in harmless mirth they chance to bestow a jest 
 upon the follies of married people. Thus when a gentle- 
 woman told an ancient bachelor who looked very young, that 
 she thought he had eaten a snake; " No, mistress," saith he, 
 
 * Something like what Bacon says : " lie that hath wife and children 
 hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great 
 euterprises."
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 147 
 
 " it is because I never meddled with any stiakes wliich maketh 
 me look so young." 
 
 CV.— A MODEST VTOMAN 
 
 Blusheth at the wanton discourse of others in her comipany, 
 — as fearing tliat, being in the presence where treason against 
 modesty is spoken, all in the place will be arraigned for pnn- 
 cipal . . . Wherefore, tliat she may not suffer in her 
 title to modesty, to px'eserve her right she enters a silent 
 caveat by a blush in her cheeks, and embraceth the next op- 
 portunity to get a gaol-delivery out of that company where 
 she was detained in durance. Now, because we have men- 
 tioned blushing, which is so frequent with virgins that it is 
 called " a maiden's blush," (as if they alone had a patent to 
 dye this colour,) give us leave a little to enlarge ourselves on 
 this subject. 
 
 1. Blushing of te^itimes proceeds from guiltiness ; — when the 
 offender, being pursued after, seeks as it were to hide 
 himself under the vizard of a new face. 
 
 2. Blushing is other-times rather a compurgator than an 
 accuser. . . . 
 
 3. WJiere small faults are committed, blushing obtains a par- 
 don of course ivith ingenuous beholders: — As, if one be guilty 
 of casual incivilities, or solecisms in mannei-s, occasioned by 
 invincible ignorance and unavoidable mistakes ; in such a 
 case, blushing is a sufficient penance to restore to state of 
 innocency. 
 
 CVI— CELIBACY. 
 
 Though there be no fire seen outwardly, as in the English 
 cWnmeys, it may be hotter within, as in the Dutch stoves ;
 
 148 FULLERIAXA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 and as well the devils as the angels in heaven, " neither 
 marry nor are given in marriage." 
 
 CVII.— GOOD— " TIME OUT OF MIND." 
 
 Those whose childhood, with Hildegardis, hath had the 
 advantage of pious education, may be said to have been good 
 " time out of mind," as not able to remember the beginning 
 of their own goodness. 
 
 CVIir.— AN OLD TRUTH IN A NEW SETTING. 
 Men commonly do beat and braise their links before they 
 light them, to make them burn the brighter : God first humbles 
 and afflicts whom he intends to illuminate with more than 
 ordinary grace. 
 
 CIX MONKISH VISIONS. 
 
 St. Paul, in his revelations, was '' caught up into the third 
 heaven ;" whereas most monk.s, with a contrary motion, were 
 carried into hell and purgatory, and there saw apparitions of 
 strange torments.* 
 
 ex.— MIRACLES OF HILDEGARDIS. 
 
 I MUST confess, at my first reading of them, my belief di- 
 gested some, but surfeited on the rest : for she made no more 
 to cast out a devil than a barber to draw a tooth, and witli 
 less pain to the patient. 1 never heard of a great feast made 
 all of cordials : and it seems improbable that miracles (which 
 
 * Fuller in liis Holy War, si)ciiking of the " superabumlance" of reve- 
 lations in the middle ages, siys, speaking of I'etcr the Hermit : " One 
 may wonder that the world should see most visions when it was most 
 blind."
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 149 
 
 in Scripture are used sparingly, and chiefly for conversion of 
 unbelievers) should be heaped so many together, made every- 
 day 's work, and by her commonly, constantly, and ordinarily 
 wrought. And, I pray, why is the Popish church so barren 
 of true works no\v-a-days here wrought at home amongst us'? 
 For, as for tliose reported to be done far off, it were ill for 
 some if the gold from the Indies would abide the touch no 
 better than the miracles. 
 
 CXL— WISE PATRONAGE. 
 Whex one, being a husbandman, challenged kindred of 
 Robert Grosthead, bishop of Lincoln, and thereupon requested 
 favour of him to bestow an office on him ; " Cousin," quoth 
 the bisliop, " if your cart be broken, I will mend it ; if your 
 plough be old, I will give you a new one, and seed to sow 
 your laud. But a husbandman I found you, and a husband- 
 man I will leave you." It is better to ease poor kindred in 
 their profession than to ease them from their profession. 
 
 CXIL— CLAIMS OF CHRISTIAN AND SIRNAME. 
 
 When men leave all to the eldest, and make no provision 
 for the rest of their children, it is against all rules of religion, 
 —forgetting their Christian-name to remember their sirname. 
 
 CXIIL— IMPOSSIBLE LEARNING OF PARACELSUS. 
 
 It is too ridiculous what a scholar of his relates, — that he 
 lived ten years in Arabia to get learning, and conversed in 
 Greece with the Athenian philosophers ! Wliereas, in that 
 age, Arabia the Happy was accursed with barbarism, and 
 Athens grown a stranger to herself ; both which places being 
 then subjected to the Turks, the very ruins of all learning
 
 150 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM ANB WIT OF 
 
 "were ruined there. Thus we see how he better knew to act 
 his part than to lay his scene, and had not chronology enough 
 to tell the clock of time, when and where to place his lies to 
 make them like truth. 
 
 CXIV.— THE TRUE CHURCH ANTIQUARY. 
 
 He is a traveller into former times, whence he hath learnt 
 their language and fashions. If he meets with an old manu- 
 script, which hath the mark worn out of its mouth, and hath 
 lost the date, j^et he can tell the age thereof either by the 
 phrase or charactei". 
 
 He baits at middle antiquity, hut lodges not till lie comes at 
 that which is ancient indeed. — Some scour off the rust of old 
 inscriptions into their own souls, cankering themselves with 
 superstition, having read so often, Orate pro animd,* that at 
 last they fall a-praying for the departed; and they more la- 
 ment the ruin of monasteries than the decay and ruin of 
 monks' lives, degenerating from their ancient piety and pain- 
 fulness. Indeed, a little skill in antiquity inclines a man to 
 Popery; but depth in that study brings him about again to 
 our religion. t A nobleman who had heard of the extreme 
 
 * Pray for the sonl. 
 
 f One of Fuller's editors asks, " Who will he hardy enough 
 to assert, that Alexander Popk had never perused this passage? 
 especially when he recollects the,-e celebrated lines in the ' Essay on 
 Criticism : ' — 
 
 " ' A little learning is a dangerous thing : 
 Drink d'.ep, or taste not the Pierian spring ; 
 There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain. 
 And drinking largely sobers us again.' " 
 
 It is yet more clear that Fuller is applying the similar but more 
 memorable saying of Bacon, in reference to Atheism.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 151 
 
 age of one dwelling not far off, made a journey to visit liim ; 
 and, finding an aged person sitting in the chimney-corner, 
 addressed himself unto him with admiration of his age, till 
 his mistake was rectified : for, " O sir !" said the young-old 
 man, " I am not he whom you seek for, but his son ; my 
 father is farther ofi" in the field." The same error is daily 
 committed by the Romish church, adoring the reverend brow 
 and grey hairs of some ancient ceremonies, perchance but of 
 some seven or eight hundred years' standing in the church ; 
 and they mistake these for their fathers, of far greater age 
 in the primitive times. . . 
 
 He is not zealous for the introducing of old useless ceremonies. 
 — The mischief is, some that are most violent to bring such 
 in, are most negligent to preach the cautions in using them ; 
 and simple people, like children in eating of fish, swallow 
 bones and all, to their danger of choking.* . . . When many 
 Popish tricks are abroad in the country, if then men meet 
 with a ceremony which is a stranger, especially if it can give 
 but a bad account of itself, no wonder if the watch take it up 
 for one on suspicion. 
 
 He affects not fanciful singularity in his behaviour: — Nor 
 cares to have a proper mark, in writing of words, to disguise 
 some peculiar letter from the ordinary character. Others, 
 for fear travellers should take no notice that skill in anti- 
 quity dwells in such an head, hang out an antique hat for 
 tlie sign, or use some obsolete garb in their garments, gestures, 
 or discourse. 
 
 CXV.— CHARA.CTER OF MR. PERKINS. 
 His sermons were not so plain but that the piously learned 
 * A hint good for all times, and not least for these.
 
 152 FULLEKIANA : OK, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 did admire them, nor so learned but that the yAain did under- 
 stand them. What was said of Socrates, " tliat he first 
 humbled the towering speculations of philosophers into prac- 
 tice and morality;" so our Perkins brought the schools into 
 the pulpit, and, unshelling their controversies out of their 
 hard school terms, made thereof plain and wholesome meat 
 for his people. For he had a capacious head, with angles 
 winding and I'oomy enough to lodge all controversial 
 inti'icacies ; and, had not preaching diverted him from that 
 way, he had no doubt attained to emiuency therein. An 
 excellent surgeon he was at jointing of a broken sovil, and at 
 stating of a doubtful conscience. And, sure, in case-divinity 
 Protestants are defective. For (save that a Smith or two of 
 late have built them forges, and set up shop) we go down 
 to our enemies to sharpen all our instruments, and ai'e 
 beholden to them for offensive and defensive weapons in 
 cases of conscience. 
 
 He would pronounce the word damn with such an em- 
 phasis, as left a doleful echo in his auditors' ears a good 
 while after; and when catechist of Christ- College, in expound- 
 ing the Commandments, applied them so home, able almost 
 to make his hearers' hearts fall down, and hairs to stand up- 
 right. But in his older age he altered his voice, and 
 remitted much of his former rigidness ; often 2^i'ofe3sing that 
 to preach mercy was the proper office of the ministers of the 
 Gospel. 
 
 CXVI.— PRIMITIVE ECCLESIASTICAL ELECTIONS. 
 
 These popular elections were well discharged in those 
 purer times, when men, being scoured with constant persecu- 
 tion, had little leisure to rust with factions ; and when there
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 153 
 
 . were no baits for corruption, the places of ministers being 
 then of great pains and peril, and small profit, 
 
 CXVIL— A WISE LANDLORD. 
 
 His rent doth quicken his tenant, hut not gall him. — Indeed, 
 it is observed, that where landlords are very easy, the tenants 
 (but this is per accidens, out of their own laziness) seldom 
 thrive, contenting themselves to make up the jvist measure of 
 their rent, and not labouring for any surplusage of estate. 
 But our landlord puts some metal into his tenant's industry ; 
 yet not granting him too much, lest the tenant revenge the 
 landlord's cruelty to him upon his land, 
 
 CXVIII,_WORSE THAN FAIRIES. 
 A FARMER rented a grange, generally reported to be 
 haunted by fairies, and paid a shrewd rent for the same at 
 each half-year's end. Now, a gentleman asked him how he 
 durst be so hardy as to live in the house, and whether no 
 spirits did trouble him, " Truth," said the farmer, " there be 
 two saints in heaven vex me more than all the devils in hell ; 
 namely, the Virgin Mary, and Michael the Archangel;" 
 on which days he paid his rent. 
 
 CXIX.-MEDIOCRITY SOMETIMES BEST. 
 
 Sometimes ordinaiy scholars make extraordinary good 
 masters. Every one who can play well on Apollo's harp, 
 cannot skilfully drive his chariot; there being a peculiar 
 mystery of government. Yea, as a little alloy makes gold to 
 work the better, so, perchance, some dulness in a man makes 
 him fitter to manage secular affairs ; and those who liave 
 climbed up Parnassus but half-way, better behold worldly
 
 154 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 business (as lying low and nearer to tlieir sight) than such 
 as have climbed up to the top of the mount. 
 
 CXX.— KENT OF COLLEGE-LANDS. 
 
 Sure, College-lands were never given to fat the tenants 
 and starve the scholars, but that both might comfortably sub- 
 sist. Yea, generally I hear the Muses commended for the 
 best landladies, and a College-lease is accounted but as the 
 worst kind of freehold. 
 
 CXXI.— PUBLIC INGRATITUDE. 
 Mark generally the grand deservers in States, and you shall 
 find them lose their lustre before they end their life ; the 
 world, out of covetousness to save charges to pay them their 
 wages, quarrelling with them, as if an overuierit were an 
 offence. And, whereas some impiite this to the malignant 
 influence of the heavens, I ascribe it rather to a pestilent 
 vapour out of the earth ; I mean, that rather men, than stars, 
 are to be blamed for it. 
 
 cxxiL— golden poverty. 
 Pythis, a king, having discovered rich mines in his king- 
 dom, employed all his people in digging of them ; whence 
 tilling was wholly neglected, insomuch as a great famine 
 ensued. His queen, sensible of the calamities of the country, 
 invited the king her husband to dinner, as he came liome 
 hungry from overseeing his workmen in the mines. She so 
 contrived it, that the bread and meat were most artificially 
 made of gold ; and the king was much delighted with the 
 conceit thereof, till at last he called for real meat to satisfy 
 his hunger. " Nay," said the queen, " if you employ all your
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 155 
 
 subjects in yom* mines, you must expect to feed upon gold ; 
 for nothing else can your kingdom afford." 
 
 CXXIII.— SOLDIERS-A NECESSITY, 
 
 Though many hate soldiers as the twigs of the rod war, 
 wherewith God scourgeth wanton countries into repentance ; 
 yet is their calling so needful, that were not some soldiers we 
 must be all soldiers, daily employed to defend our own, — the 
 world would grow so licentious. 
 
 CXXIV.— A SOLDIER'S DUTY. 
 
 He counts his princess lawful command to be his sufficient war- 
 rant iojight. — In a defensive war, when his country is hos- 
 tilely invaded, it is pity but his neck should hang in suspense 
 with his conscience that doubts to fight. In offensive war, 
 though the case be harder, the common soldier is not to dis- 
 pute, but do, his prince's command. Otherwise princes, 
 before they levy an army of soldiers, must first levy an army 
 of casuists and confessors to satisfy each scrupulous soldier iu 
 point of right to the war ; and the most cowardly will be the 
 most conscientious, to multiply doubts eternally. . . . 
 
 He is contented, though in cold weather his hands must 
 be their own fire, and warm themselves with working ; though 
 he be better armed against their enemies than the weathei-, 
 and his corslet wholler than his clothes ; though he hath 
 more fasls and vigils in his almanack than the Romish church 
 did ever enjoy. He patiently endureth drought for desire 
 of honour; and one thirst quencheth another. In a word : 
 though much indebted to his own back and belly, and unable
 
 156 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 to pay tliem, yet lie hatli credit himself, and confidently runs 
 on ticket with himself, hoping the next victory will discharge 
 all scores with advantage. . . , 
 
 He attends with all readiness on tJie commands of his cjen- 
 eral; — rendering up his own judgment, in obedience to the 
 vvill and pleasure of his leader, andbyan implicit faith believing 
 all is best which he enjoineth ; lest otherwise he be served as 
 the French soldier was in Scotland, some eighty years since, 
 who first mounted the bulwark of a fort besieged, whereupon 
 ensued the gaining of tlie fort : but marshal de Thermes, the 
 Fi'ench general, first knighted him, and then hanged him 
 within an hour after, because he had done it without com- 
 mandment. 
 
 He will not in a bravery expose himself to needless peril. — It 
 is madness to holloa in the ears of sleeping temptation, to 
 awaken it against one's self, or to go out of his calling to fi.nd a 
 danger. But if a danger meets him as he walks in his voca- 
 tion, he neither stands still, starts aside, nor steps backward, 
 but either goes over it with valour, or under it with patience. 
 All single duels he detesteth, as having, fiirst, no command in 
 God's word ; yea, this arbitrary deciding causes by the sword 
 subverts the fundamental laws of the Scripture ; secondly, no 
 example in God's word, — that of David and Goliath moving 
 in a higher sphere, as extraordinary ; thirdly, it tempts God 
 to work a miracle for man's' pleasure, and to invert the course 
 of nature, whereby, otherwise, the stronger will beat the 
 weaker ; fourthly, each dueller challengeth his king as unable 
 or unwilling legally to right him, and therefore he usurps the 
 office himself; fifthly, if slaying, he hazards his neck to the 
 halter ; if slain, in heat of malice, without repentance, he 
 adventures his soul to the devil.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 157 
 
 CXXV.— THEORY AND EXPERIMENT. 
 
 Lions, they say, except forced with hunger, will not prey 
 on women and children ; though I would wish none to try the 
 truth thereof. 
 
 CXXVL— A GOOD SEA-CAPTAIN. 
 
 The more power he liath, tlie more careful he is not to abuse it, 
 — Indeed, a sea-captain is a kiug in the island of a ship ; 
 supi-eme judge, above appeal, in causes civil and criminal ; and 
 is seldom brought to an account, in courts of justice on land, 
 for injuries done to his own men at sea. 
 
 He is careful in observing of the Lord's-day. — He hath a 
 watch in his heart, though no bells in a steeple, to proclaim 
 that day by ringing to prayers. Sir Francis Drake, in three 
 years' sailing about the world, lost one whole day, which was 
 scarce considerable in so long time. It is to be feared, some 
 captains at sea lose a day every week, one in seven, neglectiug 
 the sabbath. 
 
 He is as pious and thankful when a tempest is past, as 
 devout when it is present, — not clamorous to receive mercies, 
 and tongue-tied to return thanks. Many marinei-s are calm 
 in a storm, and storm in a calm, blustering with oaths. In a 
 tempest, it comes to their turn to be religious whose piety is 
 but a fit of the wind; and, when that is allayed, their devo- 
 tion is ended. . . . 
 
 1)1 taking a prize, he most prizeth the mens lives whom lie 
 takes; — though some of them may chance to be negroes or 
 savages. It is the custom of some to cast them overboard, 
 and there is an end of them : for the dumb fishes will tell no 
 tales. But the murder is not so soon drowned as the men.
 
 158 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 What, is a brotlier by false blood no kin 1 A savage bath 
 God to his Father by creation, though not the church to his 
 mother; and God will revenge his innocent blood. But our 
 captain counts the image of God nevertheless his image, cut in 
 ebony as if done in ivory ; and in the blackest Moors he sees 
 the representation of the King of heaven. 
 
 In dividing the gains, he wrongs none who tooh pains to get 
 them; — not shifting off his poor mariners with nothing, or 
 giving them only the garbage of the prize, and keeping all the 
 flesh to himself. In time of peace he quietly returns home ; 
 and turns not to the trade of pirates, who are the worst sea- 
 vermin, and the devil's water-rats. 
 
 His voyages are not only for profit, but some for honour and 
 knowledge ; — to make discoveries of new countries, imitating 
 the worthy Columbus. Before his time, the world was cut off 
 at the middle; Hercules's pillars (which indeed are the navel) 
 being made the feet and utmost bounds of the continent, till 
 his successful industiy enlarged it. 
 
 Our sea-captain is likewise ambitious to perfect what the 
 other began. He counts it a disgrace, seeing all mankind is 
 one family, sundry countries but several rooms, that we who 
 dwell in the parlour (so he counts Eui'ope) should not know 
 the outlodgings of the same house, and the world be scarce 
 acquainted with itself before it be dissolved from itself at the 
 day of judgment, 
 
 CXXVn.— ELOQUENT AND ODD. 
 
 Tell me, ye naturalists. Who sounded the first march and 
 retreat to the tide, " Hither shalt thou come, and no further?" 
 Why doth not the water recover his right over the earth, 
 being higher in nature ? Whence came the salt, and who
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 159 
 
 first boiled it, which made so much brine 1 When the winds 
 are not only wild in a storm, but even stark-mad in a hurri- 
 cane, who is it that restores them again to their wits, and 
 brings them asleep in a calm ? Who made the mighty whales, 
 which swim in a sea of water, and have a sea of oil swimming 
 in them ? Who first taught the water to imitate the 
 creatures on land? so that the sea is the stable of horse-fishes, 
 the stall of kine-fishes, the sty of hog-fishes, the kennel of dog- 
 fishes, and, in all things, the sea the ape of the land ! Whence 
 grows the ambergris in the sea 1 which is not so hard to find 
 where it is, as to know what it is. Was not God the first 
 shipwright ? and all vessels on the water descended from the 
 loins (or ribs rather) of Noah's ark ; or else who durst be so 
 bold, with a few ci'ooked boards nailed together, a stick 
 standing upright, and a rag tied to it, to adventure into the 
 ocean 1 What loadstone first touched the loadstone 1 Or 
 how first fell it in love with the North, rather affecting that 
 cold climate than the pleasant East, or fruitful South, or West? 
 How comes that stone to know more than men, and find the 
 way to the land in a mist ? In most of these men take sanc- 
 tuary at occulta qucditas ; and complain that the room is dark 
 when their eyes are blind. Indeed, they are God's wonders ; 
 and that seaman the greatest wonder of all for his blockish- 
 ness, who, seeing them daily, neither takes notice of them, 
 admires at them, nor is thankftd for them. 
 
 CXXVIII.— DRAKE'S SniPWRECK, 1579. 
 
 On January 9th following (1579), his ship, having a large 
 wind and a smooth sea, ran aground on a dangerous shoal, 
 and struck twice on it ; knocking twice at the door of death, 
 which no doubt had opened the third time. Here they stuck
 
 160 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 from eight o'clock at night till four the next afternoon, having 
 ground too much, and yet too little to land on ; and water 
 too much, and yet too little to sail in. Had God (who, 
 as the wise man saith, "holdeth the winds in his fist,") 
 but opened his little finger and let out the smallest blast, 
 they had undoubtedly been cast away ; but there blew 
 not any wind all the while. Then they, conceiving aright 
 that the best way to lighten the ship was, first, to ease it of 
 the burden of their sins by true repentance, humbled them- 
 selves, by fasting, under the hand of God, Afterwards they 
 received the communion, dining on Christ in the sacrament, 
 expecting no other than to sup with him in heaven. Then 
 they cast out of their ship six great pieces of ordnance, threw 
 overboard as much wealth as would break the heart of a 
 miser to think on it, with much sugar and packs of spices, 
 making a caudle of the sea round about ! 
 
 CXXIX.— SHAPE OF AMERICA. 
 
 America is not unfitly resembled to an hour-glass, whicb 
 hath a narrow neck of land (suppose it the hole where the 
 sand passeth) betwixt the parts thereof, — Mexicana and 
 Peruana. 
 
 CXXX.— AN ANTIQUARY'S "HUE AND CRY." 
 
 It is most worthy observation with what diligence Camden 
 inquired after ancient places, making "hue and cry" after 
 many a city which was run away^ and, by certain marks and 
 tokens, pursuing to find it ; as, by the situation on the 
 Roman highways, by just distance from other ancient cities, 
 by some afiinity of name, by tradition of the inhabitants, by 
 Roman coins digged up, and by some appearance of ruins. A 
 broken urn is a whole evidence, or an old gate still surviving,
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 161 
 
 out of which the city is run out. Besides, commonly some new, 
 spruce town, not far off, is grown out of the ashes thereof, 
 which yet hath so much natural affection as dutifully to own 
 those reverend ruins for her mother. 
 
 By these and other means, he arrived at admirable know- 
 ledge, and restoi-ed Britain to herself. And let none tax him 
 for presumption in conjectures where the matter was doubt- 
 ful; for many probable conjectures have stricken the fire out 
 of which truth's candle hath been lighted afterwards. 
 Besides, conjectures, like parcels of unknown ore, are sold but 
 at low rates : if they prove some rich metal, the buyer is a 
 great gainer ; if base, no loser, for he pays for it accordingly. 
 
 CXXXI.— GENUINE OBJECTS OF CHARITY. 
 
 Those are ripe for charity who are loithered by age or impo- 
 tency; — especially if maimed in following their calling ; for, 
 such are industry's Martyrs, at least her Confessors. Add to 
 these, those that with diligence fight against poverty, though 
 neither conquer till death make it a drawn battle. Expect 
 not, but prevent, their craving of thee ; for God forbid the 
 heavens should never rain till the earth first opens her mouth, 
 seeing some grounds will sooner burn than chap ! 
 
 The House of Correction is the fittest Hospital for those 
 criiyples whose legs are lame through their own laziness. — 
 Surely, king Edward VI. wa.s as truly charitable in granting 
 Bridewell for the punishment of sturdy rogues, as in giving 
 St. Thomas's Hospital for the relief of the poor. 
 
 CXXXri.— OF SELF-PRAISING. 
 
 He whose own worth doth speak, need not speak his own 
 worth. ...
 
 162 FULLERIANA.; OR, WISDOM AXD WIT OF 
 
 It showelh more wit hut no less vanity, to commend one^a 
 self, not in a straight line, but by reflexion. — Some sail to the 
 port of their own praise by a side-wind : as when they ais- 
 praise themselves, stripping themselves naked of what is their 
 due, that the modesty of the beholders may clothe them with 
 it again ; or when they flatter another to his face, tossing the 
 ball to him, that he may throw it back again to theni ; or 
 when they commend that quality, wherein themselves excel, 
 in another man, (though absent,) whom all know f\r their 
 inferior in that faculty ; or, lastly, (to omit other ambushes 
 men set to surprise praise,) when they send the children of 
 their own brain to be nursed by another man, and commend 
 their own works in a third person ; but, if challenged by the 
 company that they were authors of them themselves, with 
 their tongues they faintly deny it, and with their faces 
 strongly afiirm it. 
 
 Self-praising comes most naturally from a man when it 
 comes most violently from him in his own defence. — For though 
 modesty binds a man's tongue to the peace in this point, yet, 
 being assaulted in his credit, he may stand upon his guard, 
 and then he doth not so much praise as purge himself. One 
 braved a gentleman to his face, that in skill and valour he 
 came fer behind him. " It is true," said the other ; " for when 
 I fought with you, you ran away before me." In such a case 
 it was well returned, and without any just aspersion of 
 pride. 
 
 CXXXIII.— GLORYING IN SHAME. 
 He that falls into sin is a man; that griefoes at it, is a saint; 
 that boasteth of it, is a devil. — Yet some glory in their shame, 
 counting the stains of sin the best complexion for their souls.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 
 
 1G3 
 
 These men make me believe it may be true, what MaBdeville 
 writes of the Isle of Somabarre, in the East Indies, that all 
 the nobility thereof brand their faces with a hot iron, in token 
 of honour. 
 
 He that boasts of sins never committed is a double devil. — 
 Many brag how many gardens of virginity they have de- 
 flowered, who never came near the walls thereof, . . . with 
 slanderous tongues committing rapes on chaste women's 
 reputations. Others (who would sooner creep into a scabbard 
 than draw a sword) boast of their robberies, to usurp the 
 esteem of valour : whereas first let them be well whipped for 
 theii- lying ; and, as they like that, let them come afterward, 
 and entitle themselves to the gallows. 
 
 O" 
 
 CXXXIV.— HINTS TO TRAVELLERS. 
 Be well-settled in thine own religion, lest, travelling out of 
 England into Spain, thou goest out of God's blessing into the 
 warm sun. — They that go over, maids for their religion, will 
 be ravished at the sight of the first Popish church they enter 
 into. But if first thou be well grounded, their fooleries shall 
 rivet thy fiiith the faster, and travel shall give thee confirmation 
 in that baptism thou didst receive at home. 
 
 Know most of the rooms of thy native country, before thou 
 goest over the threshold ^Aereo/;— especially, seeing England 
 presents thee with so many observables. But late writers 
 lack nothing but age, and home-wonders but distance, to make 
 them admired. . • 
 
 Be wise in choosing objects, diligent in marking, careful in 
 remembering of them. — Yet herein men much follow their own 
 humours. One asked a barber, who never before had been at 
 the court, what he saw there. " !" said he, " the king was
 
 1G4 FULLER! ANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 excellently well trimmed!" Thus merchants most mark 
 foreign havens, exchanges, and marts ; soldiers note forts, 
 armories, and magazines ; scholars listen after libraries, 
 disputations, and professors ; statesmen observe courts of 
 justice, councils, &c. Every one is partial in his own pro- 
 fession. 
 
 Labour to distil and unite into thyself the scattered perfec- 
 tions of several natio?is. — But (as it was said of one, who with 
 more industry than judgment frequented a College-library, 
 and commonly made use of the worst notes he met with in 
 any authors, that " he weeded the library") many weed 
 foreign countries, bringing home Dutch drunkenness, Spanish 
 pride, French wantonness, and Italian atheism. As for the 
 good herbs, Dutch industry, Spanish loyaltj^, French courtesy, 
 and Italian frugality, — these they leave behind them. Others 
 bring home just nothing ; and because they singled not them- 
 selves from their countrymen, though some years beyond sea, 
 were never out of England. , . 
 
 Let discourse rather be easily dravm, than willingly flow, 
 from thee; — that thou mayest not seem weak to hold — or 
 desirous to vent — news, but content to gratify thy friends. 
 Be sparing in reporting improbable truths, especially to the 
 vulgar, who, instead of informing their judgments, Avill sus- 
 pect thy credit. Disdain their peevish pride ■who rail on 
 theiy native land, (whose worst fault is, that it bred such un- 
 grateful fools,) and in all their discourses prefer foreign 
 countries ; herein showing themselves of kin to the wild Irish, 
 in loving their nurses better than their mother's.
 
 TH03IAS FULLER. 1G5 
 
 CXXXY FOLLY OF FOPPERY. 
 
 He that is proud of the rustling of his silks, like a madman, 
 laughs at the rattling of his fetters. — For, indeed, clothes 
 ought to be our i-emembraucers of our lost innocency. 
 Besides, why should any brag of what is but borrowed ] 
 Should the ostrich snatch oflf the gallant's feather, the beaver 
 his hat, the goat his gloves, the sheep his suit, the silk-worm 
 his stockings, and neat his shoes, (to strip him no farther than 
 modesty will give leave,) he would be left in a cold condition. 
 And yet it is more pardonable to be proud, even of cleanly 
 rags, than, as many are, of affected slovenliness. 
 
 CXXXVL— OF BUILDING. 
 
 He that alters an old house is tied, as a translator, to the 
 original, and is confined to the fancy of the first builder. 
 Such a man were unwise to pluck down good old building, to 
 erect (perchance) worse new. 
 
 Chiefly choose a wholesome air. — For air is a dish one feeds 
 on every minute, and therefore, it need be good. 
 
 Wood and water are two staple commodities ivhere they may 
 he had. . . It is as well plea,sant as profitable to see a house 
 cased with trees, like that of Anchises in Troy : — 
 
 quanqiiam seer eta parentis 
 
 Anchisce domus arboribusqiie obtecta recessit. 
 
 The worst is, where a place is bald of wood, no art can make 
 it a periwig. . . 
 
 A fair entrance, with an easy ascent, gives a great grace to 
 a building. — Where the haU is a preferment out of the court,
 
 166 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 the parlour out of the hall ; not, as in some old buildings, 
 where the doors are so low pigmies must stoop, and the 
 rooms so high that giants may stand upright. . . . 
 
 Light [God's eldest daughter!) is a principal beauty in a 
 building. — Yet it shines not alike from all parts of heaven. 
 An east window welcomes tlie infant beams of the sun before 
 they are of strength to do any harm, and is offensive to none 
 but a sluggard. A south window in summer is a chimney 
 with a fire in it, and needs the screen of a curtain. In a 
 west window in summer-time, towards night, the suu grows 
 low and over-familiar, witli more light than delight. A 
 north window is best for butteries and cellars, where the beer 
 will be sour for the sun's smiling on it. 
 
 CXXXVII.— A CAVEAT FIT FOR ALL TIMES. 
 
 In building, rather believe any man than an artificer in 
 his own art, for matter of charges ; not that they cannot — 
 but will not — be faithful. Should they tell thee all the cost 
 at the first, it would blast a young builder in the budding, 
 and therefore they soothe thee up till it hath cost thee some- 
 thing to confute them. The spirit of building first possessed 
 people after the flood, which then caused the confusion of lan- 
 guages, and since of the estate of many a man. 
 
 CXXXVIIL— COUNT NOT CHICKENS BEFORE HATCHED. 
 
 Proportion thy expenses to what thou hast in j^ossession, 
 not to thy expectancies ; Otherwise, he that feeds on wind 
 must needs be griped with the colic at last. And if the 
 ceremonial law forbade the Jews to seethe a kid in the 
 mother's milk, the law of good husbandry forbids us to eat a
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 167 
 
 kid in the mother's belly — spending our pregnant hopes 
 before they be delivered. 
 
 CXXXTX.— MURDER IN THOUGHT. 
 
 Imhrue not thy soul in hloody wishes of his death who parts 
 thee and thy preferment : A murder the more common, because 
 one cannot be arraigned for it on earth. But those are 
 charitable murderers who wish them in heaven, not so much 
 that they may have ease at their journey's end, but because 
 they must needs take death in the way. 
 
 CXL.— ANTICIPATION. 
 
 In earthly matters, expectation talces up more joy on trust, 
 than the fruition of the thing is able to discharge. — The lion 
 is not so fierce as painted ; nor are matters so fair as the 
 pencil of the expectant limns them out in his hopes. 
 They fore-count their wives, fair, fruitful, and rich, without 
 any fault ; their chiklren witty, beautiful, and dutiful, with- 
 out any frowardness ; and as St. Basil held, that roses in 
 Paradise before man's fall grew without prickles, they abstract 
 the pleasures of things from the troubles annexed to them, 
 which, when they come to enjoy, they must take both together. 
 Surely, a good unlooked for is a virgin-happiness ; whereas 
 those who obtain what long they have gazed on in expectation, 
 only marry what themselves have deflowered before. 
 
 CXLI.— WHO SHOULD BE COLONISTS. 
 
 Let the planters he Itonest, skilful, and painfid people. — For 
 
 if they be such as leap thither from the gallows, can any 
 
 hope for cream out of scum % when men send, as I may say, 
 
 Christian savages to Heathen savages ] It was rather bitterly
 
 168 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 than falsely spoken concerning one of onr Western Planta- 
 tions, consisting most of dissolute people, that it was " very 
 like unto England, as being spit out of the very mouth of it." 
 Nor must the planters be only honest, but industrious also. 
 What hope is there that they who were drones at home, will 
 be bees abroad ? 
 
 CXLII.— OF CONTENTMENT. 
 
 It is one property which (they say) is required of those 
 who seek for the philosopher's stone, that they must not do 
 it with any covetous desire to be rich ; for otherwise they 
 shall never find it. But most true it is, that whosoever 
 would have this jewel of contentment, (which turns all into 
 gold, yea, want into wealth,) must come with minds divested 
 of all ambitious and covetous thoughts, else are they never 
 likely to obtain it. . . 
 
 It is no In-each of contentment for men to complain, that their 
 sufferings are unjust, as offered by men — Provided they allow 
 them for just, as proceeding from God, who useth wicked 
 men's injustice to correct his children. But let us take heed 
 that we bite not so high at the handle of the rod, as to fasten 
 on His hand that holds it ; our discontentments mounting 
 so high as to quarrel with God himself. 
 
 It is no breach of contentment for men, by lawful means, to 
 seek the removal of their misery, aiid bettering of their estate, — 
 Thus men ought, by industry, to endeavour the getting of 
 more wealth, ever submitting themselves to God's will. A 
 lazy hand is no argument of a contented heart. Indeed, he 
 that is idle, and foUoweth after vain persons, shall have 
 enough : but how ? " Shall have poverty enough." * . . . 
 
 » Prov. xxviii. 19.
 
 THOMAS FULLEK. 169 
 
 Contentment consisteth not in adding move fuel, but in iaki/ig 
 away some fire. — Not in multiplying of wealth, but iu sub- 
 tracting men's desires. Worldly riches, like nuts, tear many 
 clothes in getting them, spoil many teeth in cracking them, 
 but fill no belly with eating them, obstructing only the 
 stomach with toughness, and filling it with windiness. 
 Yea, our souls may sooner surfeit, than be satisfied, with 
 earthly things. He that at first thought ten thousand 
 pounds too much for any one man, will afterwards think 
 ten millions too little for himself. . . 
 
 I have heard how a gentleman, travelling in a misty morn- 
 ing, asked of a shepherd (such men being generally skilled in 
 the physiognomy of the heavens) what weather it would be. 
 " It will be," said the shepherd, " what weather shall please 
 me ; " and, being courteously requested to express his meaning, 
 " Sir," said he, " it shall be what weather pleaseth God ; and 
 what weather pleaseth God, pleaseth me." Thus contentment 
 maketh men to have even what they think fitting themselves, 
 because submitting to God's will and pleasure. 
 
 To conclude : A man ought to be like a cunning actor, 
 who, if he be enjoined to represent the jDcrson of some prince 
 or nobleman, does it with a grace and comeliness ; if, by and 
 by, he be commanded to lay that aside, and play the beggar, 
 he does that as willingly and as well. But, as it happened in 
 a tragedy, (to spare naming the person and place,) that one, 
 being to act Theseus (in Hercules Furens) coming out of hell, 
 could not for a long time be persuaded to wear old sooty 
 clothes proper for his part, but would needs come out of hell 
 in a white satin doublet : so we are generally loath, and it 
 goes against flesh and blood, to live in a low and poor estate, 
 but would fain act in richer and handsomer clothes, till grace.
 
 170 rULLERIANA : OE, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 with much ado, subdues our rebellious stomachs to God's 
 will. 
 
 CXLIII.— PARDONABLE COWARDICE. 
 
 Ileart-ofoak hath sometimes warped a little in the scorching 
 heat of persecution. — Their want of true courage herein can- 
 not be excused. Yet many censure them for surrendering up 
 their forts after a long siege, who would have yielded up their 
 own at the first summons. ! thei'e is moi"e required to 
 make one valiant, than to call Cranmer or Jewel " coward ;" 
 as if the fire in Smithfield had been no hotter than what is 
 painted in " the Book of Martyrs." 
 
 CXLI v.— CR ANME R. 
 
 The constant blushing for shame of their former coward- 
 liness hath made the souls of some ever after look more 
 modest and beautiful. Thus Cranmer, who subscribed to 
 Popeiy, grew valiant afterwards, and thrust his right hand, 
 which subscribed, first into the fire ; so that that hand died 
 (as it were) a malefactor, and all the rest of his body a mar- 
 tyr. 
 
 CXLV.-UNCONSCIOUS TIME-SERVERS. 
 
 Some have served the times out of mere ignorance; — gaping, 
 for company, as others gaped before them. Pater noster, or 
 " Our Father." I could both sigh and smile at the witty 
 simplicity of a poor old woman, who had lived in the days of 
 queen Mary and queen Elizabeth, and said her prayers daily 
 both in Latin and English ; and " Let God," said she, " take 
 to himself which he likes best."
 
 THOilAS FULLER. 171 
 
 CXLVI.-OF MODERATION. 
 
 " Moderation is the silken string ninning througL the 
 pearl-chain of all virtues." 
 
 Moderation is not a halting betwixt two opinions, when the 
 thorough believing of otie of them is necessary to salvation — 
 No pity is to be shown to such voluntary cripples. We read 
 of a haven in Crete, " which lay toward the south-west, and 
 towards the north-west."* Strange, that it could have part 
 of two opposite points, north and south; sure it must be very 
 •winding. And thus, some men's souls are in such intricate 
 postures, they lie towards the Papists and towards the Pro- 
 testants ; such we count not of a moderate judgment, but of 
 an immoderate unsettleduess. 
 
 Nor is it a lukewarmness in those things wherein God's glory 
 is concerned, but it is a mixture of discretion and chanty in 
 one's judgment. . . 
 
 Yet such moderate men are commonly crushed betwixt the 
 extreme parties on both sides. . . In this woidd generally they 
 get the least preferment ; it faring with them, as with the 
 guest that sate in the midst of the table, who could reach to 
 neither mess, above or beneath him. 
 
 Yet these temporal inconveniences of moderation are abun- 
 dantly recompensed with other better benefits : for, — 
 
 A well-informed judgment in itself is a preferment. . . . 
 As the moderate man's temporal hopes are not great, so 
 his fears are the less. He fears not to have the splinters of 
 his party, when it breaks, fly into his eyes, or to be buried 
 under the ruins of his side, if suppressed. . . 
 
 His religion is moi'e constant and durable ; being here in 
 * Acts xxvii. 12.
 
 172 FULLEEIAKA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 vid, " in his way" to heaven, and, jogging-on a good traveller's 
 pace, he overtakes and outgoes many violent men, whose over- 
 hot, ill-gi-ounded zeal was quickly tired. 
 
 CXLVII.— PEIDE OF OPINION. 
 
 This makes men stickle for their opinions, to make them 
 fundamental. Proud men, having deeply studied some addi- 
 tional point in divinity, will strive to make the same neces- 
 sary to salvation, to enhance the value of their own worth and 
 pains ; and it must be fundamental in religion, because it is 
 fundamental to their reputation. Yea, as love doth descend, 
 and men doat most on their grandchildren ; so these are in- 
 dulgent to the deductions of their deductions and consequen- 
 tial inferences to the seventh generation, making them all of 
 the foundation, though scarce of the building, of religion. 
 
 CXLVIII.-AFFECTED GRAVITY. 
 
 They do wisely to counterfeit a reservedness, and to keep 
 their chests always locked, not for fear any should steal trea- 
 sure thence, but lest some should look in, and see that there 
 is nothint^ within them. But they who are born eunuchs, 
 deserve no such great commendation for their chastity. Won- 
 der not much, that such men are grave, but wonder at them 
 if they be not grave. 
 
 Affected gravity passes often for that which is true. — I mean, 
 with dull eyes, for in itself nothing is more ridiculous. When 
 one shall use the preface of a mile to bring in a furlong of 
 matter, set his face and speech in a frame, and, to make men 
 believe it is some precious liquor, their words come out drop 
 by drop : such men's vizards do sometimes fall from them, 
 not without the laughter of the beholders.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 173 
 
 CXLIX.-LOQUACITY REPROVED. 
 
 A MAN full of wovlIs, who took himself to be a grand wit 
 made his brag that he was the leader of the discourse in what 
 company soever he came, and, "ISTone," said he, " dare speak 
 in my presence, if I hold my peace." " No wonder," answered 
 one, "for they are all struck dumb at the miracle of your 
 silence." 
 
 CL — APPARENT LEVITY NOT ALWAYS LIGHT. 
 
 Gracious deportment may sometimes unjustly be accused of 
 lightness. — Had one seen David " dancing before the ark," * 
 Elijah in his praying-posture when he put his head betwixt 
 his legs, I perchance he might have condemned them of unfit- 
 ting behaviour. Had he seen Peter and John posting to 
 Christ's grave, % Rhoda running into the liouse, || he would 
 have thought they had left their gravity behind them. But 
 let none blame them for their speed until he knows what 
 were their spurs, and what were the motives that urged them 
 to make such haste. These their actions were the tnie con- 
 clusions, following from some inward premises in their own 
 souls ; and that may lie a syllogism in grace which appears 
 a solecism in manners. 
 
 CLI — OF MARRIAGE. 
 
 Though bachelors be the strongest stakes, married men are 
 the best hinders, in tice hedge of the commonioealth. — It is the 
 policy of the Londoners, when they send a ship into the Le- 
 vant or Mediterranean Sea, to make every mariner therein a 
 
 * 2 Sam. vi. 16. f 1 Kings xviii. 42. 
 
 X John XX. 4. 11 Acts xii. 14,
 
 174 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 merchant, — each seaman adventuring somewhat of his own, 
 which will make him more wary to avoid, and more valiant 
 to undergo, dangers. Thus married men, especially if having 
 posterity, are the deeper sharers in that State wherein they 
 live ; which engageth their affections to the greater loyalty. 
 
 It is the worst clandestine 7namage, when God is not invited 
 to it. — Wherefore, beforehand beg his gracious assistance. 
 Marriage shall prove no lottery to thee, when the hand of 
 Providence chooseth for thee ; who, if drawing a blank, can 
 tui*n it into a prize, by sanctifying a bad wife unto thee. 
 
 Deceive not thyself by over-expecting happiness in the married 
 estate. — Look not therein for contentment greater than God 
 will give, or a creature in this world can receive ; namely, to 
 be free from all inconveniences. Marriage is not like the hill 
 Olympus, oXog Xa/M-roog, "wholly clear," without clouds. Yea, 
 expect both wind and storms sometimes, which, when blown 
 over, the air is the clearer and wholesomer for it. Moke ac- 
 count of certain cares and troubles which will attend thee. 
 Remember the nightingales, which sing only some months in 
 the spring, but commonly are silent when they have hatched 
 their ecErs, as if their mirth were turned into care for their 
 young ones. . . 
 
 Let grace and goodness he the principal loadstone of thy affec- 
 tions. — For love which hath ends, will have an e7id ; whereas 
 that *vhich is founded in true virtue, will always continue. . . 
 
 Neither choose all, nor not at all, for heauty. — A cried-up 
 beauty makes more for her own praise than her husband's pro- 
 fit. They tell us of a floating-island in Scotland ; but, sure, 
 no wise pilot will cast anchor there, lest the land swim away 
 with his ship. So are they served, and justly enough, who 
 only fasten their love on fading beauty, and both fail together.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 175 
 
 Let there he no great dispro2iortion in age. — They that marry 
 ancient people merely in exi^ectation to bury them, hang 
 themselves in hope that one will come and cut the halter. . . 
 
 This shall serve for a conclusion : A bachelor was saying, 
 " Next to no wife, a good wife is best." " Nay," said a gentle- 
 woman, " next to a good wife, no wife is the best." I wish 
 to all married j^eople the outward happiness which, anno 
 1605, happened to a couple in the city of Delph in Holland, 
 living most lovingly together seventy-five years in wedlock ; 
 till the man being one hundred and three, the woman ninety- 
 nine years of age, died within three hours each of other, and 
 were buried in the same grave. 
 
 CLII— HEATHEN TEMPLES— GODS IN PEISON. 
 
 Amongst Pagan temples, there is much justliug for 
 precedency ; though some think that of Apis in Egypt shows 
 the best evidence for her seniority, wherein was worshipped 
 an ox, of whose herd {not to say breed) was the calf which the 
 Israelites worshipped in the wilderness, being made in imita- 
 tion thereof. But the Heathen had this gross conceit, — that 
 their gods were affixed to their statues, as their statues were 
 confined in their temples ; so that, in efiect, they did not so 
 much build temples for their gods, as thereby lay nets to catch 
 them in, inviting them thither as into a palace, and then 
 keeping them there as in a prison. 
 
 CLIIL— THE FAVOURITE. 
 
 A FAVOURITE is a coi;rt-dial, whereon all look whilst the 
 king shines on him j and none when it is night with him.
 
 176 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 CLIV— FOLLY SOMETIMES THE MASK OF WISDOM. 
 
 A NOTABLE fellow, and a soldier to Alexander, finding first 
 admission to be tlie greatest difficulty, put feathers into his 
 nose and ears, and danced about the court in an antic fashion, 
 till the sti'angeness of the show brought the king himself to 
 be a spectator. Then this mimic, throwing off his disguise, 
 " Sir," said he to the king, "thus I first arrive at your majes- 
 ty's notice in the fashion of a fool, but can do you service in 
 the place of a wise man, if you please to employ me." 
 
 CLV.— BLUNTNESS, 
 
 Bluntness of speech hath become some, and made them more 
 acceptable. — Yea, this hath been counted free-heartedness in 
 courtiers ; conscience and Christian simplicity in clergymen ; 
 valour in soldiers. " I love thee the better," said queen Eliza- 
 beth to archbishop Grindal, " because you live unmarried." 
 "And I, madam," replied Grindal, "because you live unmar- 
 ried, love you the worse." But those who make music with 
 so harsh an instrument, need have their bow well rosined be- 
 fore, and to observe time and place, lest that gall which would 
 tickle at other times. 
 
 CLVI.— AN HONEST STATESMAN, 
 
 In giving counsel to his prince, had rat/ier displease than 
 hurt him. — Plain-dealing is one of the daintiest rarities can 
 be presented to some princes, as being a novelty to them all 
 times of the year. 
 
 CL VII.— OBSTINACY IN OPINION. 
 
 Some think it beneath a wise man to alter their opinion : 
 a maxim both false and dangerous. We know what worthy
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 
 
 177 
 
 Father wrote his own " Retractations ;" and it matters not 
 though we go back from our word, so we go forward in the 
 truth and a souud judgment. Such an one changeth not his 
 main opinion, which ever was this, — to embrace that course 
 which, upon mature deliberation, shall appear tinto him the 
 most advised. 
 
 CLVIII.— A WISE MAN 
 
 Trusteth not any vnth a secret which may endanger his estate. 
 — For if he tells it to his sei-vant, he makes him his master ; if 
 to his friend, he enables him to be a foe, and to undo him at 
 pleasure; whose secrecy he must buy at the party's own price, 
 and, if ever he shuts his purse, the other opens his mouth. 
 
 CLIX.— PASSION NO HYPOCRITE. 
 
 Physicians, to make some small veins in their patients' 
 arms plump and full, that they may see them the better to let 
 them blood, use to put them into hot water : so the heat of 
 passion presenteth many invisible veins in men's hearts to the 
 eye of the beholder ; yea, the sweat of anger washeth off their 
 paint, and makes them appear in their true colours. 
 
 CLX.— A "DROP" SOMETIMES MORE THAN A STREAM. 
 
 More hold is to be taken of a few words casually uttered, 
 than of set, solemn speeches, which rather show men's arts 
 than their natures, as indited rather from their brains tlian 
 hearts. The drop of one word may show more than the stream 
 of a whole oration ; and the statesman, by examining such 
 fugitive passages, (which have stolen on a sadden out of the 
 party's mouth,) arrives at his best intelligence.
 
 178 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 CLXI.— SYMPATHY WITH FOREIGN PROTESTANTS A DEBT. 
 
 English charity to foreign Protestant cliurclies, in some 
 respect, is payment of a debt : their children deserve to be 
 our welcome guests ivhose grandfathers were our loving hosts 
 in the days of queen Mary. 
 
 CLXII.— " MERCY," AND NOT " SACRIEICE." 
 
 In case of great want, Augustine would sell the very 
 ornaments of the church, and bestow the money on the poor ; 
 contrary to the opinion of many, (the thorn of superstition 
 began very soon to prick !) who would not have such things 
 in any case to be alienated. Sure, a communion-table will 
 not catch cold with wanting a rich carpet, nor stumble for 
 lack of the candles thereon in silver candlesticks. Besides, 
 the church might afterwards be seasonably replenished with 
 new furniture ; whereas, if the poor were once starved, they 
 could not bs revived again. But let not sacrilege in the 
 disguise of charity make advantage hereof, and covetousness, 
 which is ever hungry till it surfeits, make a constant ordinary 
 on church-bread, because David in necessity fed one meal 
 thereon. 
 
 CLXIIL— MARIAN MARTYRS. 
 
 When I was a child, I was possessed with a reverend 
 esteem of them, as most holy and pious men, dying Martyrs, 
 in the days of queen Mary, for the profession of the truth ; 
 which opinion having, from my parents, taken quiet possession 
 of my soul, they must be very forcible reasons which eject it. 
 
 Since that time, they have been much cried down in the
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 179 
 
 moutlis of many who, making a coroner's inquest upon their 
 death, have found them little better than felons de se. . . 
 
 By such the coronet of martyrdom is plucked off from 
 their memories ; and others, more modei'ate, equally part 
 their death betwixt their enemies' cruelty and their own 
 over-forwardness. 
 
 Since that, one might have expected that these wortliy 
 men should have been re-estated in their former honour ; 
 whereas the contrary hath come to pass. For some who 
 have an excellent faculty in uncharitable synecdoches, to 
 condemn a life for an action, and taking advantage of some 
 faults in them, do much condemn them . . . Yea, that very 
 verse which Dr. Smith, at the burning of Kidley, used 
 against him, " has been" by the foresaid author, (though not 
 with so full a blow,) with a slanting stroke, applied to those 
 Martyrs : " A man may give his body to be burnt, and yet 
 have not charity." 
 
 Thus the prices of Martyrs' ashes rise and fall in Smith- 
 field market. However, their real worth floats not with 
 people's fancies, no moi'e than a rock in the sea rises and falls 
 with the tide. St. Paul is still St. Paul, though the Lycaonians 
 now would sacrifice to him, and presently after would 
 sacrifice him. 
 
 CLXIV.— EFFECTS OF PKOLONGED QUARRELS. 
 
 When worthy men fall out, only one of them may be faulty 
 at the first ; but, if such strifes continue long, commonly 
 both become guilty. But thus God's diamonds often cut one 
 another, and good men cause afflictions to good men.
 
 180 FULLERTANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 CLXV.— LATIMER AND RIDLEY. 
 
 Though Latimer came after EicUey to the stake, he got 
 before him to heaven : his body, made tinder by age, was no 
 sooner touched by the fire, but instantly this old Simeon had 
 his Nunc dimittis, and brought the news to heaven that his 
 brother was following after. But Ridley suffered with far 
 more pain, the fire about him being not well-made : and yet 
 one would think that age should be skilful in making such 
 bon-fires, as being much practised in them. The gunpowder 
 that was given him, did him little service ; and his brother- 
 in-law, out of desii'e to rid him out of pain, increased it, (great 
 grief will not give men leave to be wise with it !) heaping 
 fuel upon him to no purpose ; so that neither the fagots 
 which his enemies' anger, nor his brother's good-will, cast 
 upon him, made the fire to burn kindly. 
 
 In like manner, not much before, his dear friend Master 
 Hooper sufiered with great torment ; the wind (which too 
 often is the bellows of great fires) blowing it away from him 
 once or twice. Of all the Martyrs in those days, these two 
 endured most pain ; it being true that each of them qucerebat 
 in ignibus ignes : both desiring to burn, and yet both their 
 upper parts were but Confessors, when their lower parts were 
 Martyrs, and burnt to ashes ! Thus God, where he hath given 
 the stronger faith, he layeth on the stronger pain. And so 
 we leave them going up to heaven, like Elijah, in a chariot 
 of fire. 
 
 CLXVI.— THE COUNTRY GENTLEMAN'S HOSPITALITY. 
 
 In proportion to his means, he keeps a liberal house, — This 
 much takes the afiections of country people, Avhose love is
 
 THOMAS FULLER. ISl 
 
 much -warmed in a good kitchen, and turneth much on the 
 hinges of a buttery-door often open, Francis Eussell, second 
 earl of Bedford of that sirname, was so bountiful to the poor, 
 that queen Elizabeth would merrily complain of him, that he 
 made all the beggars. Sure, it is more honourable for noble- 
 men to make beggars by their liberality than by their 
 oppression. 
 
 CLXVIL— A LADY'S KEPUTATION. 
 
 There is a tree in Mexicana which is so exceedingly 
 tender, that a man cannot touch any of his branches but it 
 withers presently. A lady's credit is of equal niceness : a 
 small touch may wound and kill it ; which makes her very 
 cautious what company she keeps. 
 
 CLXVIIL— A TRUE LADY'S DIALECT. 
 
 In discourse, her words are rather fit than fine, very choice, 
 and yet 7iot chosen. — Though her language l)e not gaudy, yet 
 the plainness thereof pleaseth, it is so proper and handsomely 
 put on. Some, having a set of fine phrases, will hazard an 
 impertinency to use them all, as thinking they give full satis- 
 faction for dragging in the matter by head and shoulders, if 
 they dress it in quaint expressions. Others often repeat the 
 same things ; the Platonic year of their discourses beino- not 
 above three days long, in whicli term all the same matter 
 returns over again, threadbare talk ill-suiting with the variety 
 of their clothes. 
 
 CLXIX.— TERRA INCOGKITA OP WOMEN'S WARDROBES. 
 
 The ancient Latins called a woman's wardrobe, mundus, 
 "a world;" wherein, notwithstanding, was much terra
 
 182 rULLERIANA : OK, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 incognita then Tindiscovered, but since foimd out by the 
 curiosity of modern fashion-mongers. We find a map of this 
 " world " drawn by God's Spirit, Isaiah iii. 18 — 24, wherein 
 one-and-twenty women's ornaments, all superfluous, are 
 reckoned up ; which at this day are much increased. The 
 " moons," there mentioned, which they wore on their heads, 
 may seem since grown to i\\Qfall in the luxury of after-ages. 
 
 CLXX.— THE BEST ORIGENS. 
 
 It must be a diy flower indeed, out of which the bee sucks 
 no honey. They are the best Oi'igeus who do allegorize all 
 earthly vanities into heavenly truths. 
 
 CLXXI.— NOTIONS OF HEAVEN. 
 
 If a herd of kine should meet together to fancy and define 
 happiness, they would place it to consist in fine pastures, 
 sweet grass, clear water, shadowy gi-oves, constant Summer ; 
 but if any Winter, then warm shelter and dainty hay, with 
 company after their kind ; counting these low things the 
 highest happiness, because their conceit can reach no higher. 
 Little better do the Heathen poets describe heaven, paving 
 it with pearl, and roofing it with stars, filling it with gods 
 and goddesses, and allowing them to drink (as if without it 
 no poet's paradise !) nectar and ambrosia ; heaven, indeed, 
 being poetarum dedecus, " the shame of poets," and the dis- 
 grace of all their hyperboles, falKng as far short of truth 
 herein, as they go beyond it in other fables. 
 
 CLXXII.— THOUGHTS OF OUR MORTALITY. 
 
 To smell to a turf of fresh earth is wholesome for the body ; 
 no less are thoughts of mortality cordial to the soul. " Earth 
 thou art, to earth thou shalt return."
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 183 
 
 CLXXIII.— LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 She had the innocency of childhood, the beauty of youth, 
 the solidity of middle, the gravity of old, age, and all at 
 eighteen ; the birth of a princess, the learning of a clerk, the 
 life of a saint, yet the death of a malefactor, for her parents' 
 offences. 
 
 CLX XI v.— ANAGRAM ON ELIZABETH. 
 
 A Jesuit made this false anagram on her name, Elizcv- 
 heth, Jesabel ; false both in matter and manner. For, 
 allow it the abatement of H, (as all anagrams must sue in 
 chancery for moderate favour,) yet was it both unequal and 
 ominous that T, a solid letter, should be omitted, — the pre- 
 sage of the gallows, — whereon this anagram matist was after- 
 wards justly executed. 
 
 CLXXV.— AN AMBASSADOR'S WILY IGNORANCE. 
 
 He well understandeth the language of that country to ivhich 
 he is sent, — And yet he desires rather to seem ignorant of it, 
 (if such a simulation, which stands neuter betwixt a truth 
 and a lie, be lawful,) and that for these reasons : First, be- ' 
 cause, though he can speak it never so exactly, his eloquence 
 therein will be but stammering, compared to the ordinary 
 talk of the natives. Secondly, hereby he shall, in a manner, 
 stand invisible, and view others ; and as Joseph's deafness 
 heard all the dialogues betwixt his brethren, so his not own- 
 ing to understand the language shall expose their talk the 
 more open unto him. Thirdly, he shall have the more 
 advantage to speak and negotiate in his own language ; at 
 the leastwise, if he cannot make them come over to him, he
 
 184 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 may meet them in the midway, in the Latin, — a speech com- 
 mon to all learned nations. 
 
 CLXXVI— LATE CONDOLENCE. 
 
 It is ridiculous to condole griefs almost forgotten ; for, be- 
 sides that with a cruel courtesy it makes their sorrows bleed 
 afresh, it foolishly seems to teach one to take that which he 
 hath formerly digested. When some Ti-ojan ambassadors 
 came to comfort Tiberius Csesar for the loss of his son, dead 
 well nigh a twelvemonth before : " And I," said the 
 emperor, " am very sorry for your grief for the death of your 
 Hectoi', slain by Achilles a thousand years since." 
 
 CLXXVIL— ITALIAN AND SWISS ESTIMATE OF AMBASSADORIAL 
 
 ELOQUENCE. 
 
 The Italians, whose country is called " the country of good 
 words," love the circuits of courtesy, that an ambassador 
 should not, as a sparrow-hawk, fly outright to its prey, and 
 meddle presently with the matter in hand ; but, with the 
 noble falcon, mount in language, soar high, fetch compasses 
 of compliment, and then, in due time, stoop to game, and 
 seize on the business propounded. Clean contrary the 
 Switzers: — who sent word to the king of France, not to send 
 them an ambassador with store of words, but a treasurer with 
 plenty of money. 
 
 CLXXVin.—MEN OF ACTION. 
 
 Generally, great soldiers have their stomachs sharp-set, 
 to feed on the matter, loathing long speeches, as wherein 
 they conceive themselves to lose time, in which they could 
 
 J
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 1 85 
 
 conquer half a country ; and, counting bluntness tlieii- best 
 eloquence, love to be accosted in their own kind. 
 
 CLXXIX.—COUKAGE OP DESPAIE. 
 
 Men forced to a battle against their intention, often con- 
 quer beyond their expectation. Stop a flying coward, and 
 he will turn his legs into arms, and lay about him manfully; 
 whereas open him a passage to escape, and he will quickly 
 shut up his coux'age. 
 
 CLXXX._THE SOLDIERS OF GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS. 
 
 It was said of his armies, that they used to rise when the 
 swallows went to bed, when winter began, — his forces most 
 consisting of northern nations, and a Swede fights best when 
 he can see his own breath. He always kept a long vacation 
 in the dog-days, being only a saver in the summer, and a 
 gainer all the year besides. His best harvest was in the snow ; 
 and his soldiers had most life in the dead of winter. 
 
 CLXXXL-GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS ON THE JESUITS. 
 
 The very Jesuits themselves tasted of his courtesy, though 
 merrily he laid it to their charge, that they would neither 
 preach faith to — nor keep faith with — others. 
 
 CLXXXIL— JESUITS ON GUSTAVUS-TEIFLING EXCEPTIONS. 
 
 The Jesuits made Gustavus to be the Antichrist, and 
 allowed him three years and a half of reign and conquest. 
 But, had he lived that full term out, the true Antichrist 
 might have heard further from him, and Rome's tragedy 
 might have had an end, whose fifth and last act is still behind. 
 Yet one Jesuit, more ingenuous than the rest; gives him this
 
 186 FULLERIAI^A : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 testimony, that, " save the badness of his cause and religion, 
 lie had nothing defective in him which belonged to an excellent 
 king and a good captain^ 
 
 CLXXXIII.— CONTRADICTIONS KECONCILED. 
 
 Solomon saith, "The throne is establislied by justice :"* 
 and Solomon saith, "The throne is upholden by mercy :"t 
 which two proverbs speak no more contradiction, than he 
 that saith that the two opposite side-walls of a house hold up 
 the same roof. 
 
 CLXXXIV.—MISERY OF DESPOTISM. 
 
 How poor is that prince, amidst all bis wealth, whose sub- 
 jects are only kept by a slavish fear, the jailor of the soul . . . 
 Besides, where subjects are envassalled with fear, prince and 
 peoj)le mutually watch their own advantages; which, being 
 once offered them, it is vronderful if they do not, and woful if 
 they do, make use thereof. 
 
 CLXXXy.— A HEEDLESS AUDIENCE. 
 
 A MOTHEB-iN-LAw's sermon seldom takes well with an 
 audience of daughter-in-laws. 
 
 CLXXXVI.— DANGEROUS PLACES. 
 
 It is dangerous to gather flowers that grow on the banks 
 of the pit of hell, for fear of falling in. 
 
 CLXXXVII.— WITCHES' FANCIES. 
 
 The witch taheth her free progress from one place to another. — 
 Sometimes the devil doth locally transport her : but he will 
 * Prov. xvi. 12. t ^lO'*'- ^^' 28-
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 187 
 
 not be her constant hackney, to cany such luggage about, 
 but oftentimes, to save portage, dekides her brains in her 
 sleep; so that they brag of long journeys whose heads never 
 travelled from their bolsters. These, with Drake, sail about 
 the world; but it is on an ocean of their own fancies, and in a 
 ship of the same. They boast of bi-ave banquets they have 
 been at, but they would be very lean should they eat no 
 other meat. Others will persuade, if any list to believe, that 
 by a witch-bridle they can make a fair of horses of an acre of 
 besom-weed. 
 
 CLXXXVIIL— JOAN OF ARC. 
 Some conceive that the English conquests, being come to 
 the vertical point, would have decayed of themselves had 
 this woman never been set up, who now reaps the honour 
 hereof as her action ; though, thus, a very child may seem to 
 turn the waves of the sea with his breath, if casually blowing 
 on them at that very instant when the tide is to turn of 
 itself Sure, after her death, the French went on victoriously ; 
 and won all from the English, partly from their valour, but 
 more by our dissensions; for then began the cruel wars 
 betwixt the Houses of York and Lancaster, till the red rose 
 riiight become white^ hy losing so much blood, and the ivhite rose 
 red by shedding it. 
 
 CLXXXIX.— CiESAR BORGIA 
 
 Was perfect in the devilish art of dealing an ill-turn ; doing 
 it so suddenly, his enemies should not hear of him before; 
 and so soundly, that he should never hear of them after- 
 wards, — either striking always surely or not at all.
 
 188 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM ANB WIT QF 
 
 CXC— CURIOUS C05I3IENT. 
 
 Jehu revengetli God's prophets on cruel Jezebel, whose 
 wicked carcass was devoured by dogs to a small rever- 
 sion, as if a bead tbat plotted, and bands tbat practised, 
 so mucb mischief, and feet so swift to shed blood, were not 
 meat good enough for dogs to eat ! 
 
 CXCL— PIOUS FRAUDS. 
 
 In " holy fraud " I like the Christian but not the surname 
 thereof; and wonder how any can marry these two together 
 in the same action, seeing, surely, the parties were never 
 agreed. 
 
 CXCII.— THE HERETIC 
 
 Having first hammered the heresy in himself, tJien falls to 
 seducing of others. — So hard is it for one to have the itch, 
 and not to scratch. Yea, Babylon herself will allege, that 
 " for Sion's sake slie will not hold her peace." The necessity 
 of propagating the truth is error's jilea to divulge her false- 
 hoods. Men, as naturally they desire to know, so they desire 
 what they know should be known. 
 
 CXCIII.—THE RIGID DONATISTS. 
 
 The Donatists were so called from a double Donatns, 
 whereof the one "planted" the sect, (a.d. 331,) the other 
 "watered" it, and the devil, by God's permission, '-'gave the 
 increase." The elder Donatus, being one of tolerable j^arts 
 and intolerable pride, raised a schism in Carthage against good 
 Cecilian, the bishop there, whom he loaded unjustly with 
 many crimes, which he was not able to prove ; and, vexed
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 1 S9 
 
 with this disgrace, he thought to right his credit by wronging 
 religion, and no began the heresy of Dunatists. 
 
 CXCIV.-ZEAL WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Igxorant zeal is too blind to go right, and too active to 
 stand still : yea, all errors are of kin, at the farthest but 
 cousins once removed ; and when men have once left the 
 truth, their only quiet home, they will take up their lodging 
 under any opinion which hath the least shadow of proba- 
 bility. 
 
 CXCV.— EXTREMES. 
 
 Men may fly so far from mystical Babylon, as to run to 
 literal Babel ; I mean, bring all to confusion, and founder the 
 commonwealth. 
 
 CXCVI.— TRUE AND FALSE MARTYRS. 
 
 PoR martyrs are to die willingly but not wilfully ; and 
 though to die be a debt due to nature, yet he that pays it 
 before the time may be called upon for repayment, — to die 
 the second death. 
 
 Once many Donatists met a noble gentleman, and gave 
 him a sword into his hand, commandinfj him to kill them, or 
 threatening to kill him. Yet he refused to do it, unless first 
 they would suffer him to bind them all : " For fear," said he, 
 " that when I have killed one or two of j'^ou, the rest alter 
 their minds and fall upon me." Having fast bound them all, 
 he soundly whipped them, and so let them alone. Herein 
 he showed more wit than they wanted, and more charity than 
 Avit, — denying them their desires, and giving them their 
 
 o
 
 1 90 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT Of 
 
 deserts, seeking to make true saints by marring of false 
 mai'tyrs. 
 
 CXCVII.— A PETTIFOGGER 
 
 Trades only in tricks and quirks. His highway is in by- 
 patlis, and he loveth a cavil better than an argument, an 
 evasion than an answer. There be two kinds of them : either 
 such as fight themselves, or are trumpeters in a battle to set 
 on others. 
 
 The former is a professed dueller in the law, that will chal- 
 lenge any, and in all suit-combats be either principal or 
 second. 
 
 References and compositions he hates^ as bad as a hangman 
 hates a pardon. — Had he been a scholar, he would have main- 
 tained all paradoxes ; if a surgeon, he would never have cured 
 a wound, but always kept it raw. . . . 
 
 He is half-starved in a Lent of a long vacation, for loant of 
 employment. — Save only that then he brews work to broach 
 in tei-m-time. I find one so much delighted in law-sport, 
 that when Lewis the king of France offered to ease him of a 
 number of suits, he earnestly besought his Highness to leave 
 him some twenty or thirty behind, wherewith he might merrily 
 pass away the time. 
 
 He hath this property of an honest man, that his word is as 
 good as his bond. — For he will pick the lock of the strongest 
 conveyance, or creep out at the lattice of a word. . . . 
 
 He falls in with all his oieighbours that fall out, and spurs 
 them on to go to law. — A gentleman, who in a duel was rather 
 scratched than wounded, sent for a surgeon, who, having 
 opened the wound, charged his man with all speed to fetch 
 such a salve from such a place in his study. " Why," said
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 191 
 
 the gentleman, "is the hurt so dangerous?" "0 yes!" 
 answered the surgeon, "if he returns not in post-haste, the 
 wound will cure itself, and so I shall lose mv fee." 
 
 But I have done with this wi'angliug companion half afraid 
 to meddle with him any longer, lest he should commence a 
 suit against me for describing him. 
 
 CXCVIIL— THE DEGENERATE GENTLEMAN 
 
 Goes to school to learn in jest, and play in earnest. — Now 
 this gentleman, now that gentlewoman, begs him a play-day ; 
 and now the hooh must be thrown away, that he may see the 
 buck hunted. He comes to school late, departs soon, and the 
 whole year with him (like the fortnight when Christmas-day 
 falls on a Tuesday) is all holidays and half-holidays. As 
 the poets feign of Thetis, that she drenched Achilles her sou 
 in the Stygian waters, that he might not be wounded with 
 any weapon ; so cockering mothers enchant their sons, to 
 make them rod-free ; which they do, by making some golden 
 circles iu the hand of the schoolmaster. Thus these two, 
 conjoining together, make the indentures to bind the youth 
 to eternal ignorance ; yet perchance he may get some alms of 
 learning, here a snap, there a piece of knowledge, but nothing 
 to purpose. 
 
 His father s serving-men {which he counts no mean prefer- 
 ment I) admit him into tlieir society. . . . 
 
 Coming to the University, his clue/ study is to study nothing. 
 — What is learning but a cloak -bag of books, cumbersome 
 fur a gentleman to carry? and the Muses? — fit to make wives 
 for farmers' sons! . . . 
 
 At the Inns of Court, under pretence to learn law., he learns 
 to he lawless. — Kot knowing by his study so much as what an
 
 l9'2 fulleriana: or, wisdom and wit of 
 
 execution meaiis, till he learns it by his own dear expe- 
 rience. 
 
 Through the mediation of a scrivener, he grows acquainted 
 with some great usurer. . . . 
 
 After hisfath'irs death, lie flies out more than ever before. — 
 Formerly he took care for means for his spending, now he 
 takes care for spending of his means . . . Such dancing by 
 day, such masking by night, such roaring, such revelling, able 
 to awake the sleeping ashes of his great-great-grandfather, 
 and to fright all blessing from his house. 
 
 Meantime the old sore of Ids London-dehts corrupts and 
 festers . . . 'Nov can he be more careless to pay, than the 
 usurer is willing to continue, the debt; knowing that his 
 bonds, like infants, batten best with sleeping. . . . 
 
 Vacation is his vocation, and he scorxs to follow an^ profes- 
 sion, and will not be confined to any laudable employment. 
 But they who count a calling a prison, shall at last make a 
 pi-ison their calling. 
 
 Drinking is one of the j^rincipal liberal sciences he vrofesseth. 
 — A most imgenteel quality, fit to be banished to rogues 
 and rags . . . Some plead, when overwhelmed with liquor, 
 that their thirst is but quenched : as well may they say, that 
 in Noah's flood the dust was but sufiiciently allayed. 
 
 Gaming is another art he studies much. — An enticing witch, 
 that hath caused the ruin of many. Hannibal said of Mar- 
 cellus, that nee honam nee malam fortunam ferre potest ; "he 
 could be quiet neither conqueror nor conquered;" thus, such 
 is the itch of play, that gamesters, neither winning nor losing, 
 can rest contented. ... 
 
 By this time the long-dormant usurer ramps for the j'^ayment 
 of his money. — The principal, (the grandmother,) and the use,
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 193 
 
 (the daughter,) and the use upon use, (the grandchild,) and 
 perchance a generation farther, have swelled the debt to au 
 incredible sum; for the satisfying whereof our gallant sells 
 the moiefcy of his estate. 
 
 Having sold half his land, he abates nothing of his expenses: 
 — But thinks five hundred pounds a-year will be enough to 
 maintain that, for which a thousand pounds was too little. 
 He will not stoop till he falls, nor lessen his kennel of dogs, 
 till, with Acteon, he be eaten Tip with his own hounds. . . . 
 
 Having lost his own legs, he relies on the staff of his kindred. 
 — First visiting them as an intermitting ague, but afterwards 
 turns a quotidian, wearing their thresholds as bare as his own 
 coat. At last, he is as welcome as a storm; he that is abroad 
 shelters himself from it, and he that is at home shuts the 
 door. 
 
 CXCIX.-SECRETS. 
 
 Some men's souls are not strong enough, but that a weighty 
 secret will work a hole through them. 
 
 CC— LOCAL CURIOSITIES. 
 
 "Wonders, like prophets, are not without honour save in 
 their own country, where constancy, or at least commonness 
 of converse, with them, abateth their respect and reputation. 
 
 CGI.— REASONS OF THE LEGENDARY LIVES OF SAINTS. 
 
 Inquiring into the causes of this grand abuse, I find them 
 reducible to five heads. 1. Want of honest hearts in the 
 biographists of these saints, which betrayed their jieus to 
 such abominable untruths. 2. AVant of able heads, to 
 distinguish rumours from reports, reports from recoi'ds; not
 
 191 FULLERIANA : OK, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 choosing, but gatliering; or ratlier not gathering, hut scrap- 
 ing what could come to their hands. 3. Want of true 
 matter, to furnish out those lives in any proportion, as 
 cooks are sometimes fain to lard lean meat, not for fashion 
 but for necessity, as which otherwise would hardly be eatable 
 for the dryness thereof; so these, having little of these saints 
 more than their names, and dates of their deaths, and those 
 sometimes not certain, do plump up their emptiness with 
 such fictitious additions. 4. Hope of gain; so bringing iu 
 more custom of pilgrims to the shrines of their saints. 
 5. Lastly, for the same reason for which Herod persecuted 
 St. Peter, (for I count such lies a persecuting of the saints' 
 memories,) merely because they " saw it pleased the people." 
 
 ecu CANONIZATION. 
 
 Since 1282, no English, and few foreigners, have attained 
 that honoui', which the Pope is very sparing to confer: First, 
 because sensible that multitude of saints abateth veneration. 
 Secondly, the calendar is filled, not to say pestered, with 
 them, jostling one another for room, many holding tlie same 
 day in copartnership of festivity. Thirdly, the charge of 
 canonization is great ; few so charitable as to buy it, the 
 Pope too covetous to give it to the memories of the deceased. 
 Lastly, Protestants daily grow more prying into the Pope's 
 proceedings, and the perfections of such persons who ai-e to 
 be sainted ; which hath made his Holiness the more cautious 
 to canonize none whilst their memories are on the must, 
 immediately after their deaths, before the same is fined in 
 the cask with some competent continuance of time after 
 their decease.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 195 
 
 CCIIL— ESTIMATE OF THE LORD TREASURER'S OFFICE. 
 
 The office of Lord Treasurer was ever beheld as a place of 
 great charge and profit. One well skilled in the perquisites 
 thereof, being demanded what he conceived the yearly value 
 of the place was worth, made this return, " That it might be 
 worth some thousands of pounds to him who, after death, 
 would go instantly to heaven; twice as much to him who 
 would go to purgatory; and a nemo sclL — nobody knows 
 what — to him who would adventure to go to a icorse ]»lace. 
 
 CCIV.— THE NURSERY OF THE NAYT. 
 
 It were to be wished that more care were taken for, and 
 encouragement given to, the breeding of fishermen, whom 
 1 may call the spawn, or young fry of seamen; yea, such as 
 hope that mariners will hold up if fishermen be destroyed, 
 may as rationally expect plenty of honey and wax, though 
 only old stocks of bees were kept, without either casts or 
 swarms. . . . These fishermen set forth formerly with all their 
 male family; sea-men, sea-youths, I had almost said sea- 
 children, too, (seeing some learned the language of larboard 
 and starboard with bread and butter,) graduates in naviga- 
 tion ; and indeed the fishery did breed the natural and best 
 elemented seamen. 
 
 CCV MUSIC. 
 
 Music is nothmg else but wild sounds civilized into time 
 and tune. Such the extensiveness thereof, that it stoopeth 
 as low as brute beasts, vet mounteth as high as angels : for 
 hoi'ses will do more for a whistle than for a whip, and, by 
 hearing their bells, jingle away their weariness.
 
 196 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 CCTI.— MULTIPLICATION OF BOOKS. 
 
 The aufclior of an idle and imperfect book endetli with a 
 ccetera desiderantur ; one altered it, — non desiderantur, sed 
 desunt. Indeed they were not, though wanting, wanted, 
 the world having no need of them ; many books being like 
 king Joram, (who lived, not being desired :) yea, the press 
 beginneth to be an oppression of the land, such the burden of 
 needless books thei-ein. 
 
 Some will say, the charge may most justly be brought 
 against yourself, who have loaded the land with more books 
 than any of your age. To this I confess my fault, and 
 promise amendment. 
 
 CCVIL— DISHONEST EXECUTORS. 
 Shem will not be angry with me for saying Ham was a 
 mocker of his lather. Peter will not be offended if I call 
 Judas a betrayer of his Master. Honest executors will take 
 no exception if I jvxstly bemoan that too many dishonest 
 ones have abused the good intents of the testators. How 
 many legacies, sound and whole in themselves, have pfoved, 
 before they were paid, as maimed as the cripples in the hos- 
 pitals to whom they were bequeathed ! Yea, as the blinded 
 Syrians (desiring to go, and believing they went to Damas- 
 cus) were led to their enemies, and into the midst of Samaria ; 
 so is it more than suspicious that many blind and concealed 
 legacies, intended for the temple of God, have been employed 
 against the God of the temple. 
 
 CCVin—MASTERS AND SERVANTS. 
 
 I CONFESS, such is the cruelty of some masters, no servant 
 can, and such the fickleness of others, no servant may, stay
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 197 
 
 long with tliem. Such a master was he, who, being suitor to 
 a gentlewoman, came, every time he visited her, waited on 
 by a new man, though keeping bu.t one at once ; such was 
 his inconstancy and delight in change. Whereupon, when, 
 taking leave of his mistress, he proffered to salute her, 
 " Spare your compliments," said she unto him, " for pro- 
 bably I shall shortly see you again ; but let me, I pray 
 you, salute your servant, whom I shall never behold any 
 more." 
 
 However, though sometimes the fault may be in the 
 masters or mistresses, yet generally servants are to be blamed 
 in our age, shifting their places so often without cause. The 
 truth is, the age that makes good soldiers mars good servants, 
 cancelling their obedience, and allowing them too much 
 liberty. What l^abal applied falsely and spitefully to David, 
 " There be many servants now-a-days which break away 
 every man from his master," was never more true than now. 
 Yea, what Tully said of the Roman consul, (chose in the 
 morning, and put out before night,) some servants have been 
 so vigilant, that they never slept in their masters' houses ; — 
 so short their stay, so soon their departure. 
 
 ccix.— HorE. 
 Hope is the only tie which keeps the heart from breaking. 
 
 CCX.—NOVEL PUNCTUATION. 
 
 Though a truce may give a comma or colon to the war, 
 nothing under a peace can put a perfect period thereunto. 
 
 CCXr.-HINT FOR PUBLIC SPEAKERS. 
 
 Let US " think" and judge "with the wise;" but, if we
 
 198 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 do uot speak witli the vulgar, we sliall be dumb to the vul- 
 
 gar. 
 
 CCXII.— GOWNSMEN OR SWORDSMEN FIRST. 
 
 The question, " An Doctor pra3cedat Militem 1 " hangeth 
 as yet on the file, and I believe ever will, as which is often 
 determined afiirmatively in time of peace, but always 
 negatively in time of war. 
 
 CCXIII.— REASON FOR GIVING PRECEDENCE IN HIS 
 "WORTHIES" TO MARTYRS AND CONFESSORS. 
 
 If any grudge them this their high place, let them but give 
 the same price they paid for it, and they shall have the same 
 superiority. 
 
 CCXIV.— ADAM'S EXCUSE. 
 
 When Adam complained that he was naked, God de- 
 manded of him, "Who told thee that thou wast naked?" 
 Intimating thus much, that if he could not produce the per- 
 son who first so informed him, he might justly be suspected, 
 as indeed he was, the author as well as utterer of that sad 
 truth, 
 
 CCXV.— A MERRY CHALLENGE. 
 
 I REMEMBER a merry challenge at court, which passed 
 betwixt the king's porter and the queen's dwarf; the latter 
 provoking him to fight with him, on condition that he might 
 but choose his own place, and be allowed to come thither 
 first, — assigning the great oven in Hampton court for that 
 purpose. Thus easily may the lowest domineer over the
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 199 
 
 highest skill, if having the advantage of the ground within his 
 own private concernments. 
 
 CCX VI.— MINERVA, 
 
 Well may the poets feign Minerva the goddess of wit and — 
 the foundress of weaving, so great is the ingenuity thereof. 
 
 CCXVII A PROFITABLE MONOPOLY. 
 
 I HAVE heard that, when monopolies began to grow common 
 
 in the court of France, the king's jester moved to have this 
 
 monopoly for himself, a gardesque of every one who carried 
 
 a watch about him and cared not how he employed his 
 
 time. 
 
 CCXVIII.— DERIVATION OF ELY. 
 
 This northern part is called the Isle of Ely, which one will 
 have so named from the Greek word sXiiog, fenny or marshy 
 ground. But our Saxon ancestors were not so good 
 Grecians ; and it is plain that plenty of eels gave it its 
 denomination. Here, I hope, I shall not trespass on gravity, 
 in mentioning a passage observed by the reverend professor 
 of Oxford, Doctor Prideaux, — referring the reader to him for 
 the authors attesting the same. When the pi-iests in this 
 part of the covmtry would still retain their wives, in despite 
 of whatever the Pope and monks could do to the contrary, 
 their wives and children wei-e miraculously turned all into 
 eels, (surely the greater into congers, the less into griggs,) 
 whence it had the name of Eely. I understand him a lie 
 of Eels. 
 
 CCXIX.— JOHN CUTS, KNIGHT; CAMBRIDGESHIRE. 
 
 He was a most bountiful housekeeper as any of his estate; 
 in so much that queen Elizabeth, in the beginning of her
 
 200 FULLERIAXA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 reign (whilst as yet she had peace with Spain), the sickness 
 being at London, consigned the Spanish ambassador to this 
 knight's house in this county. The ambassador coming 
 thither, and understanding his name to be John Cuts, con- 
 ceived himself disparaged to be sent to one of so shart a 
 name ; the Spanish gentlemen generally having voluminous 
 surnames (though not so long as the deity in 'New Spain, 
 called Yocahuvaovaviaorocoii), usually adding the place of 
 their habitation for the elongation thereof. But, soon after, 
 the Don found that what the knight lacked in length of 
 names he made up in the largeness of his entertainment. 
 
 CCXX.— BISHOP'S CHAIR WITHOUT A CUSHION. 
 
 John Booth built the bishop's chair, or seat, in his cathe- 
 dral of Exeter, which, in the judicious eye of Bishop Godwin, 
 hath not his equal in England. Let me add, that though this 
 be the parish chair, the soft cushion thereof was taken away 
 when Bishop Vescy alienated the lands thereof. The worst was, 
 when Bishop Booth had finished this chair, he could not 
 quietly sit down therein, so troublesome the times of the civil 
 wai's betwixt York and Lancaster. 
 
 CCXXI.— court AND PEOPLE. 
 
 The country hath constantly a smile for him for whom the 
 court hath a frown, 
 
 CCXXII.— ROMANCING JOHN SMITH. 
 
 John Smith achieved many strange performance.^, the 
 scene whereof is laid at such a distance, they are cheaper 
 
 credited than confuted Yet have we two witnesses 
 
 to attest them, the prose and the pictures, both in his own
 
 THOMAS FULLER, 201 
 
 book ; and it soiindeth much to the diminution of his deeds, 
 that he alone is the herald to publish and proclaim them. 
 
 Two captains being at dinner, one of them fell into a large 
 relation of his own achievements, concluding his discourse 
 with this question to his fellow, " And pray, sir," said he, 
 " what service have you done V To whom he answered, "Other 
 
 men can tell that " Smith was buried in Sepulchre's 
 
 church choir, on the south side thereof, having a ranting 
 epitaph inscribed in a table over him, too long to transcribe. 
 Only we will insert the first and last verses, the rather 
 because the one may fit Alexander's life for his valour, the other 
 his death for his religion : 
 
 " Here lies one conquer'd that bath conquer'd kings ! " 
 " Oh! may his soul in sweet Elysium sleep." 
 
 The orthography, poetry, history, and divinity in this epitaph, 
 are much alike. He died on the 21st of June 1631. 
 
 CCXXIIL— LOGIC AND RHETORIC. 
 It is seldom seen that the clunch-fist of logic (good to 
 knock down a man at a blow) can so open itself as to 
 smooth and stroke one with the palm thereof. 
 
 ccxxiv.— devotion of moss troopers. 
 They come to church as seldom as the twenty-ninth of 
 February comes into the calendar. 
 
 CCXXV.— description of the "CUBBINGS" IN DEVON. 
 
 They live in cots (rather holes than houses) like swine, 
 having all in common ; multiplied without marriage into 
 many hundreds. Their language is the dross of the dregs of
 
 202 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 the vulgar Devonian ; and tlie more learned a man is, the 
 worse he can understand them. During our civil wars, no 
 soldiers were quartered amongst them, for fear of bein<T 
 quartered amongst them. Their wealth consisteth in other 
 men's goods, and they live by stealing the sheep on the moor; 
 and vain it is for any to search their houses, being a work 
 beneath the pains of a sheriff, and above the power of any 
 constable. 
 
 CCXXVI.— THOMAS STUCKLET. 
 
 So confident his ambition, that he blushed not to tell 
 queen Elizabeth, " That he preferred rather to be sovereign of 
 a mole-hill, than the highest subject to the greatest king in 
 Christendom;" adding, moreover, that he was assured "He 
 should be a prince before his death." " I hope," said Queen 
 Elizabeth, " I shall hear from you when you are stated iu 
 your principality." " I will write unto you," quoth Stuckley. 
 "In what language?" said the queen. He returned, "In 
 the style of princes — To our dear sister." 
 
 CCXXVII.— WILLTAM DE RALEIGH, BISHOP OF WINCHESTER. 
 
 Raleigh had (besides his own merits) two good friends, 
 his purse and the Pope, the former procuring the latter. 
 He presented his Holiness with six thousand marks, which 
 effected his work. Here two persons were at once deceived, 
 the Poje not expecting so great a sum should be tendered 
 hiin, and Raleigh not susjjecting he would take all, but leave 
 at least a morsel for manners. But his hands will take 
 whatever is tendered him, if not too hot or too heavy.
 
 THOMAS FULLEK. 203 
 
 CCXX VIII.— HOOKER AS A PREACHER. 
 
 Hk may be said to have made good music with his 
 fiddle and stick alone, without any resin; having neither 
 pronunciation nor gesture to grace his matter. 
 
 CCXXIX.— IGNORANCE AND DEVOTION. 
 
 "Would all men were Moses-minded, " That all the people 
 of God might prophesy;" the rather, because I am sure that 
 ignorance is no more the mother of devotion, than the lying 
 harlot, which pleaded before Solomon, was mother to the 
 living child. 
 
 CCXXX.— EVERY GENTLEMAN SHOULD LEARN A PROFESSION. 
 We may observe how happy a liberal (at least lawful) 
 vocation hath proved to younger brethren, whereby Ephraim 
 hath outgrown Manasseh, the younger outstripped the heir 
 of the family. I knew a schoolboy, not above twelve years 
 old, and utterly ignoi'ant in all logical terms, who was com- 
 manded to English the following distich : 
 
 "Dat Galenits opes, dat JusUniatms honores; 
 Cum genus, et species, cogitur ire pedes." 
 
 Only they favoured the boy so far to inform him, that 
 Galenus did signify the profession of physic, Justinianus of 
 law; on which ground he thus proceeded : — "The study of 
 physic giveth wealth; the study of law giveth honours; 
 when genus et species — high birth and beauty^'' (haviu"- no 
 other calling, saith the boy, to support them,) " are compelled 
 to go on foot." 
 
 To prevent such foot-travelling, it is good to be mounted
 
 204 FULLEMANA : OR, WISDOM AKD WIT OF 
 
 ou a gainful vocation, to cany one out of tlie mire on all 
 occasions. 
 
 CCXXXL— A RUEFUL JEST. 
 
 The ancient Bfitons are reported to go naked, clothed 
 only with colours painted; custom making them insensible 
 of cold, with the beggar, who, being demanded how he could 
 go naked, returned, " All my body is face," 
 
 I 
 
 CCXXXII.— " THE VICAR OF BRAY WILL BE VICAR OF BRAY STILL." 
 
 Bray, a village well known in this county (Berks) ; so 
 called from the Bihroces, a kind of ancient Britons inhabit- 
 ing thereabouts. The vivacious vicar thereof, living under 
 King Henry the Eighth, King Edward the Sixth, Queen 
 Mary, and Queen Elizabeth, was first a Papist, then a Pro- 
 testant, then a Papist, then a Protestant again. He had seen 
 some martyrs burnt (two miles oflf) at Windsor, and found this 
 fire too hot for his tender temper. This vicar being taxed by 
 one for being a turncoat, and an inconstant changeling — 
 "Not so," said he; "for I always kept my principle, 
 which is this, to live and die the vicar of Bray." Such many 
 now-a-days, who, though they cannot turn the wind, will turn 
 their mills, and set them so, that wheresoever it bloweth 
 their grist shall certainly be grinded. 
 
 CCXXXin.— CORNWALL TIN. 
 
 The most and best in Christendom this county Corn- 
 wall dotli produce. Yea, it was the only tin in Europe, 
 until a fugitive miner, running hence, discovered tin in 
 Voiteland, in the confines of Bohemia. God may be said in 
 this county " to rain meat," such the plenty thereof, and give
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 205 
 
 dishes too, made of pewter, whicli liatli tin for tlie father, 
 and lead for the mother thereof, and in our age doth matrizare 
 too much. 
 
 CCXXXIV GUNPOWDER. 
 
 Gunpowder is the emblem of politic revenge; for it biteth 
 first, and barketh afterwards, the bullet being at the mark 
 before the report is heard; so that it maketh a noise, not by 
 way of warning, but triumph. 
 
 CCXXXV TRAVELLER'S TALE. 
 
 There was a traveller who affirmed that he saw bees as 
 big as dogs, and yet their hives of our ordinary size ; and 
 being demanded what shift they made to get in, " Let them,'* 
 said he, " look to that." 
 
 CCXXXVI.— FRANCIS QUARLES. 
 
 He was a most excellent poet, and had a mind biassed to 
 devotion. Had he been contemporary with Plato (that 
 great hack-friend to poets) he would not only have allowed 
 him to live, but advanced him to an oifice iu his Common- 
 wealth. 
 
 Some poets, if debarred profaneness, wantonness, and satiri- 
 calness, (that they may neither abuse God, themselves, nor 
 their neighbours,) have their tongues cut out in efifect. Others 
 only trade in wit at the second hand, being all for translations, 
 nothing for invention. Our Quarles was free from the faults of 
 the first, as if he had drank of Jordan, instead of Helicon^ 
 and slept on Mount Olivet for his Parnassus.
 
 206 FULLERIANA ; OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 CCXXXVII.— WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR. 
 
 As Augustus Csesar is said to have said of Herod king of 
 Judea, that it was better to be his hog than his child ; so 
 was it most true of king William, that it was better to 
 have been his stag than his subject ; the one being by him 
 spared and preserved, the other ruined and destroyed : such 
 was the devastation he made of towns in this county (Hamp- 
 shire) to make room for his game. 
 
 CCSXXVIIL— POPE NICHOLAS AND THE FLY. 
 
 He held his place four years, eight months, and eight-and- 
 twenty days : and, anno 1158, as he was drinking, was 
 choked with a fly, which, in the large territory of St. Peter's 
 patiimony had no place but his throat to get into. 
 
 CCXXXIX.— A CONSCIENTIOUS PREACHER; EDMUND SYMONDS. 
 
 Being once requested by me to preach for me, he excused 
 himself for want of competent wai'ning ; and when I pleaded, 
 " that mine, being a country parish, would be well pleased 
 with his performance : " "I can," saith he, " content them, 
 but not mine own conscience, to preach with so little jDrepara- 
 tion." 
 
 CCXL.— UEBAN'S URBANITY, 
 
 Urban (VI.) suspecting treachery in some of his cardinals, 
 imprisoned seven of them at once, and, putting five of them in 
 sacks, sank them into the sea. Oh, most barbarous ur- 
 banity!
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 207 
 
 CCXLI.— ON MANDEVILLE'S TRAVELS. 
 
 Now, thougli far travellers are suspected in their I'elations 
 to wander from the truth, yet all things improbable are not 
 impossible ; and the reader's ignorance is sometimes all the 
 writer's falsehood. 
 
 CCXLIL— ST. ELFRED. 
 
 When her candle, as she read the lesson, casually weni out, 
 there came such a brightness from the fingers of her right 
 hand, that it enlightened the whole choir ; which is as true 
 as the new lights to which our modern sectaries do pretend : 
 the one having miracles, the other revelations, at their fingers' 
 ends. 
 
 CCXLIIL— W. RAMSEY. 
 
 He was a natural poet ; and therefore no wonder if faults 
 be found in the feet of his verses ; for it is given to thorough- 
 paced nags, that amble natui-ally, to trip much ; whilst artifi- 
 cial pacers go surest on foot. 
 
 CCXLIV.— STEPHEN MARSHALL. 
 
 He was of so supi^le a soul, that he brake not a joint, yea, 
 sprained not a sinew, in all the alterations of the times ; and 
 his friends put all on the account, not of his inconstancy but 
 prudence, who in his own practice, as they conceive, reconciled 
 the various lections of St. Paul's precept, — " serving the Lord 
 and the — times'^ 
 
 CCXLV.— ANECDOTE OF ELIZABETH. 
 
 A prime officer with a white staff, whose name I purposely 
 forbear, coming into her presence, the queen willed him to
 
 208 fullertana; or, wisdom and wit op 
 
 confer such a place now void on one of her servants whom 
 she commended unto him. "Pleaseth your highness, madam," 
 saith the lord, " the disposal thereof pertaineth to me by 
 virtue of this white staff conferred upon me." " True," said 
 the queen ; " yet I never gave you your office so absolutely, 
 but I still reserved myself of the quorum." " But of the 
 quarum, madam ! " returned the lord, presuming on the 
 favour of her highness. Hereat the queen, in some passion, 
 snatching the staff out of his hand, " You shall acknowledge 
 me/' said she, " of the quoruiii quaritm qitorum before you 
 have it again." The lord waited staffless almost a day 
 (which seemed so long unto him as if the sun stood still) 
 before the same was reconferred upon him. 
 
 CCXLVI.— OPTIMUS AND MAXIMUS. 
 God having two grand epithets, Optimus and Maximus, 
 most give the former the go-by, and strive only for the latter 
 — to be the greatest ; though greatness without goodness 
 is both destructive to him that hath it, and dangerous to all 
 others about him. 
 
 CCXLVII.— WATCHES. 
 
 I CONFESS the modern mystery of watchmaking is much 
 completed, — men never being more curious to divide, more 
 cai-eless to employ, their time. 
 
 CCXLVIII.— CHARACTER OF WALSINGHAM. 
 
 None alive did better ken the secretary craft, to get 
 
 counsels out of others and keep them in himself. Marvellous 
 
 his sagacity in examining suspected persons, either to make 
 
 them confess the truth, or confound themselves by denying it
 
 THOMAS FULLE2. 205 
 
 to tlieir detection. Cunning liis Lands, who could unpick 
 the cabinets in the Pope's conclave ; quick his ears, who 
 could hear at London what was whispered at Rome ; and 
 numerous the spies and eyes of this Argus dispersed in all 
 places. 
 
 The Jesuits, being outshot in their own bow, complained 
 that he out-equivocated their equivocation, having a mental 
 reservation deeper and farther than theirs. They tax him 
 for making heaven bow too much to earth, oft-times borrow- 
 ing a point of conscience, with full intent never to pay it 
 again ; whom othei-s excused by reasons of state and danger 
 of the times. Indeed his simulation (which all allow lawful) 
 was as like dissimulation (condemned by all good men) as 
 two things could be which were not the same, 
 
 CCXLIX.— OATS ; FULLER versus JOHNSON. 
 
 Sat not oats are horse-grain, and fitter for a stable than a 
 table ; for, besides that the meal thereof is the distinguishing 
 form of gruel or broth from water, most hearty and wholesome 
 bread is made thereof 
 
 CCL.— MAKTYES. 
 
 If they had. not been flesh and blood, they could not have 
 been burnt ; and, if they had been no more than flesh and 
 blood, they would not have been burnt. 
 
 CCLT ALEXANDER NO WELL: ORIGIN OF BOTTLED ALE. 
 
 Without offence it may be remembered, that leaving a 
 bottle of ale, when fishing, in the grass, he found it some days 
 after, no bottle, l)ut a gun — such the sovTnd at the opening 
 thereof: and this is believed (casualty is mother of more
 
 210 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 inventions tlian industry) the original of bottled ale in 
 England. 
 
 CCLII.— FENTON AND FELTON. 
 
 Once my own father gave Dr. Fenton a visit, who excused 
 himself from entertaining him any longer. " Mr. Fuller," 
 said he, " hear how the passing-bell tolls at this very instant 
 for my dear friend, Dr. Felton, now a-dying ; I must to my 
 study, it being mutually agreed upon betwixt us in our healths, 
 that the survivor of us should pi'each th6 other's funeral ser- 
 mon." But see a sti-ange change ! God, " to whom belong 
 the issues from death," was pleased (with the patriarch Jacob 
 blessing his grandchildren) " wittingly to guide hia hands 
 across," reaching out death to the living, and life to the dying. 
 So that Dr. Felton recovered, and not only pei-formed that 
 last office to his friend, Dr. Fenton, but also survived him 
 more than ten years, and died bishop of Ely. 
 
 CCLIII.— FATHER WOKTHINGTON. 
 
 He dining, some thirty years since, with a person of honour 
 in this land, (at whose table I have often eaten,) was very 
 obstreperous in arguing the case for transubstantiation and the 
 ubiquitariness of Christ's body : " Suppose," said he, " Christ 
 were here." To whom the noble master of the house (who 
 till then was silent) returned, " If you were away, I believe 
 lie would be here." Worthington, perceiving his room more 
 welcome than his company, embraced the next opportunity of 
 departure. 
 
 CCLIV CONFABULATION WITH THE DETIL. 
 
 I KNOW that such confabulations are common in the 
 Church of Rome ; to whose exorcists, Satan's language is as
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 211 
 
 familial- as Erasmus' Dialogues are well known to men, or 
 those of Corderius to schoolboys. But such accidents amongst 
 Protestants are very rare, and therefore the more to be 
 observed. There are, I confess, more Thomases than myself 
 much siven to mistrust, whose faith will be at a stand 
 herein. 
 
 CCLV.— CECIL, LOKD BURLEIGH. 
 
 Incredible was the kindness which queen Elizabeth had 
 for him, or rather for herself in him, being sensible that he 
 was so able a minister of state. Coming once to visit him, 
 being sick of the gout at Burleigh house in the Strand, and 
 being much heightened with her head attire (then in fashion), 
 the lord's servant who conducted her through the door, 
 " May your highness," said he, " be pleased to stoop." The 
 queen returned, " For your master's sake I will stoop, but net 
 for the king of Spain's." 
 
 CCLXIV PIN AND NEEDLE, 
 
 A pin is a blind 7ieedle, a needle a pin with an eye. What 
 nails do in solid, needles do in supple bodies, putting them 
 together ; only they remain not there formally, but virtually, 
 in the thread which they leave behind them. It is the 
 woman's pencil ; and embroidery " vestis acu picta " is the 
 masterpiece thereof .... 
 
 This industrious instrument, needle, quasi " ne idle " (as 
 some will have it), maintaineth many millions. Yea, he who 
 desireth the blessing on the plough and the needle (including 
 that in the card and compass), comprehendeth most employ- 
 ments at home and abroad, by land and by sea.
 
 212 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 CCL VII.— ANECDOTE OF SIR THOMAS MOEE. 
 
 In his time (as till our memory) Tower prisoners were 
 not dieted on their own, but on the king's charges; the 
 lieutenant of the Tower providing their fare for them. And 
 when the lieutenant said, " That he was sorry the commons 
 were no better," " I like," said Sir Thomas, " your diet very 
 well ; and, if I dislike it, I pray turn me out of doors." 
 
 CCLVIII.— JULIANA BARNES. 
 
 Juliana Barnes was born ex antiqud et illustri domo, 
 " from an ancient and illustrious house." Understand it 
 not in the sense wherein the same was said of a certain Pope, 
 born in a ruinous cottage where the sun did shine through 
 the rotten walls and roof thereof . . . Our Juliana also wrote 
 a book of heraldry. Say not the needle is the more proper 
 pen for the woman, and that she ought to meddle with making 
 no "coats," save such as Dorcas made for the widows. 
 
 CCLIX.— JOHN EAST ALL 
 Was a good mathematician, and made a comedy of Europe, 
 Asia, and Africa, which, my author saith, was very witty and 
 very large ; and I can believe the latter, seeing he had three 
 parts of the world for his subject ; and how long would it have 
 been, had America been added ? 
 
 CCLX.— ANDREW PERNE. 
 
 He was of a veiy facetious nature, excellent at hlunt-sharp 
 
 jests, and perchance sometimes too tart in true ones. One 
 
 instance of many : — This dean chanced to call a clergyman fool 
 
 (who indeed was little better), who returned, " That he
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 213 
 
 would complain thereof to the lord bishop of Ely." — " Do," 
 saith the dean, " when you please ; and my lord bishop will 
 confirm you." Yet was Doctor Perne himself at last heart- 
 broken with a jest (as I have been most credibly informed 
 from excellent hands) on this occasion. He was at court with 
 his pupil archbishop Whitgift, in a rainy afternoon, when the 
 queen was (I dare not say wilfully, but) really resolved to 
 ride abroad, contrary to the mind of her ladies, who were on 
 horseback (coaches as yet being not common) to attend her. 
 Now one Clod,the queen's jester, was employed by the courtiers 
 to laugh the queen out of so inconvenient a journey, " Hea- 
 ven," saith he, " madam, dissuades you, it is cold and wet ; 
 earth dissuades you, it is moist and dirty ; Heaven dissuades 
 you — this heavenly-minded man, archbishop Whitgift ; and 
 earth dissuades you— your fool Clod, such a lump of clay as 
 myself. And if neither will prevail with you, here is one 
 that is neither heaven nor earth, but hangs betwixt both — 
 Doctor Perne, and he also dissuades you." Hereat the queea 
 and the courtiers laughed heartily ; whilst the Doctor looked 
 sadly, and going over with his Grace to Lambeth, soon saw 
 the last of his life. 
 
 CCLXI.— AN AMBIGUITY. 
 
 The cathedral of Norwich is large and spacious, though 
 the roof in the cloisters be most commended. When, some 
 twenty years since, I was there, the top of the steeple was 
 blown down ; and an officer of the church told me, " That the 
 wind had done them much wrong, but they meant not to 
 put it up ;" whether the ivrong or the steeple, he did not 
 declare.
 
 214 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 CCLXII.— KORTHAMPTON, 
 The town of Nortliampton may be said to stand chiefly 
 on other men's legs ; where (if not the best) the most and 
 clieapest boots and stockings are bought in England. 
 
 CCLXIII.— JOHN FLETCHER THE DRAMATIST. 
 
 He had an excellent wit, which the fictc^-friends to stage- 
 plays will say was neither idle nor well employed ; for he 
 and Francis Beaumont, Esq. (most happy when in conjunction) 
 raised the English to equal the Athenian and Roman 
 theatre; Beavimont bringing the ballast of judgment, Fletcher 
 the sail of phantasy ; both compounding a poet to admiration. 
 Meeting once in a tavern, to couti-ive the rude di'aught of a 
 ti'agedy, Fletcher undertook to kill the king therein ; whose 
 words being overheard by a listener (though his loyalty not 
 to be blamed herein) he was accused of high treason; till the 
 mistake soon appearing, that the plot was only against a 
 dramatic and scenical king, all wound off in merriment. 
 
 CCLXIV.— JUDGE MARKHAM, 
 
 • A LADY would traverse a suit of law, against the will of her 
 husband ; who was contented to buy his quiet by giving her 
 her way therein, though otherwise persuaded in his judgment 
 the cause would go against her. 
 
 This lady, dwelling in the shire town, invited the judge to 
 dinner, and (though thrifty enough of herself) treated him 
 with sumptuous entertainment. Dinner being done, and the 
 caiise being called, the judge clearly gave it against her. 
 And when in passion she vowed never to invite any judge
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 215 
 
 again, " Nay wife," said he, " vow never to invite a just judge 
 any more." 
 
 CCLXV.— HISTORIC PARALLELS. 
 
 A TOWNSMAN and mercLant of Newcastle, talking with a 
 friend on Newcastle bridge, and fingering his ring, before he 
 •was aware let it fall into the river, and was much troubled 
 with the loss thereof, until the same was found in a fish 
 caught in the river, and restored unto him. The same is 
 reported by Herodotus, in his third book, of Polycrates, a 
 petty king, and the minion of fortune, and may be an instance 
 of the recurrency of remarkable accidents, according to Solo- 
 mon's observation, " There is no new thing under the sun." 
 
 CCLXVL— PROVERB, " THE WEAVERS' BEEF OF COLCHESTER." 
 
 These are sjrrats, caught hereabouts, and brought hither 
 in incredible abundance, whereon the poor weavers (nume- 
 rous in this city) make much of their repast, cutting rands, 
 rumps, sirloins, chines, and all joints of beef out of them, as 
 lasting in season wellnigh a quarter of a year. They are 
 the minims of the sea ; and their cheapness is the worst 
 thing (well considered the best) which can be said of them. 
 Were they as dear, they would be as toothsome (being alto- 
 gether as wholesome) as anchovies ; for then their price 
 would give a high gust unto them in the judgment of palate- 
 men. 
 
 CCLXVIL— SAXON " FLESH " AND NORMAN " MEAT." 
 
 I KNOW not whether his observation, with the reason 
 thereof, be worth the inserting, who first took notice, that
 
 216 fulleriana; or, wisdom and wit op 
 
 our cattle for food are English when feeding in the field, hut 
 French when fed on in a family. 
 
 English. 1. Sheep. 2. Ox. 3. Calf. 4. Hog. 5. Pig. 
 French. 1. Mutton. 2. Beef. 3. Veal. 4. Bacon. 5. Pork. 
 
 Whereof he assigned this reason, that, after the Norman 
 Conquest, the French so tyrannized over the English tenants, 
 that they forced them to keep and feed their cattle ; but the 
 Monsieui'S ate all their good meat after it was slaughtered.* 
 
 CCLXVIII.— BISHOP FOLIOT— A COMMON CASE. 
 He was observed, when a common brother of his convent, 
 to inveigh against the prior ; when prior, against the abbot ; 
 when abbot, against the pride and laziness of bishops ; but 
 when he himself was bishop, all was well, and Foliot's mouth, 
 when full, was silent. 
 
 CCLXIX.— ST. OSITH. 
 
 Her head, after it was cut oif, was carried by Saint Osith — 
 Oh wonder ! Oli lie ! — three furlongs ; and then she fell down 
 and died. The same, mutatis onutandis^ is told of Saint Denis, 
 in France, Saint Winefride in "Wales, and others ; such being 
 the barrenness of monkish invention, that, unable to furnish 
 their several saints with variety of fictions, their tired fancy 
 is fain to make the same miracle serve many saints. 
 
 CCLXX.— ceremonious POLITENESS. 
 
 John Lawrence at the stake was permitted a posture 
 peculiar to himself ; for, being so enfeebled with long durance 
 
 * The reader will recollect the sage Wamba's dissertation on this sub- 
 ject in Ivanhoe.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 217 
 
 and hard usage that he could not stand, he had a chair 
 allowed him, and had the painful ease to sit therein. 
 
 CCLXXL— SIK JOHN WALTER, CHIEF JUSTICE: "MERRY ENOUGH 
 
 FOR A JUDGE." 
 
 "When judge Denham, his most upright and worthy associate 
 in the western circuit, once said to him, " My Lord, you are 
 not merry !" " Merry enough," returned the other, " for a 
 judge." 
 
 CCLXXII DR. HOLLAND : " A GOOD HATER." 
 
 De. Holland was born in this county (Shropshire), " in 
 finibus et limitibus Cambrise (in the confines and marches of 
 Wales) ; bred in Exeter College in Oxford, and at last became 
 rector thereof. He did not, with some, only sip of learning, 
 or at the best but drink thereof, but was " mersus in libris " 
 (drowned in his books) ; so that the scholar in him almost 
 devoured all other relations. He was, saith the author of 
 his funeral sermon, so familiar with the Fathers, as if he him- 
 self had been a Father. This quality commended him to 
 succeed in the place of regius professoi-, which place he dis- 
 charged with good credit for twenty years together. 
 
 Wlien he went forth of his college on any journey for any 
 long continuance, he always took this solemn valediction of 
 the fellows : " I commend you to the love of God, and to the 
 hatred of Poj^ery and superstition !" 
 
 CCLXXIII.— RICHARD MULCASTER : PRECEPT AND EXAMPLE. 
 
 His method in teaching was this : — In a morning he would 
 exactly and plainly construe and parse the lessons of his 
 scholars; which done, he slept his hour (custom made him
 
 218 fulleriana; ok, wisdom and wit of 
 
 critical to proportion it,) in his desk in the school ; but woe 
 be to the scholar that slept the while ! Awaking, he heard 
 them accurately ; and Atropos might be persuaded to pity 
 as soon as he to jiai'don, where he found just fault. The 
 prayers of cockering mothers prevailed with him as much as 
 the requests of indulgent fathei's, rather increasing than 
 mitigating his severity on their offending child. 
 
 In a word, he was jjlagosios Orbilius; though it may be 
 truly said (and safely for one out of his school), that others 
 have taught as much learning with fewer lashes. Yet his 
 sharpness was the better endured, because impai'tial ; and 
 many excellent scholars wei*e bred under him, whereof bishop 
 Andrews was most remarkable. 
 
 CCLXXIV.— A WILLING DEMONIAC. 
 
 About this time a boy dwelling at Bilston in Staffordshire, 
 William Perry by name, not full fifteen years of age, but 
 above forty in cunning, was practised on by some Jesuits to 
 dissemble himself possessed. This was done on design, that 
 the priests might have the credit to cast out that devil (which 
 was never in), so to grace their religion with the reputation 
 of a miracle. 
 
 But now the best of the jest (or rather the worst of the 
 earnest) was, the boy, having gotten a habit of counterfeiting, 
 leading a lazy life thereby, to his own ease and parents' profit 
 (to whom he was more worth than the best plough-land in 
 the shire), would not be undeviled by all their exorcisms, so 
 that the priests raised up a spirit which they could not allay. 
 At last, by the industry of Dr. Morton, bishop of Coventry 
 and Lichfield, the juggling was laid open to the world by the 
 boy's own confession and repentance; who, being bound
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 219 
 
 apprentice at the bishoja's cost, verified tlie proverb, tliat " an 
 untoward boy may make a good man." 
 
 CCLXXV.— CHARACTER OF LORD BACON. 
 
 None can character bim to the life save himself. He was 
 in parts more than a man, who in any liberal profession 
 might be whatsoever he would himself : a great honourer of 
 ancient authors, yet a great deviser and practiser of new ways 
 in learning : privy counsellor, as to king James, so to natiu-e 
 itself, diving into many of her abstruse mysteries. New con- 
 clusions he would dig out with mattocks of gold and silver ; 
 not caring what his experience cost him, expending on the 
 trials of nature all and more than he got by the trials at the 
 bar; posterity being the better for his — though he the worse 
 for his own — dear experiments. He and his servants had all 
 in common, the men never wanting what their master hadj 
 and thus what came flowing in unto him was sent flying away 
 from him, who, in giving of rewards, knew no bounds but the 
 bottom of his own purse. Wherefore, when king James 
 heard that he had given ten pounds to an nnderkeeper, by 
 whom he had sent him a buck, the king said merrily, " I and 
 he shall both die beggars ;" which was condemnable prodi- 
 gality in a subject. He lived many years after; and in his 
 books will ever survive: in reading thereof, modest men 
 commend him in what they cZo— condemn themselves in what 
 they do not — understand, as believing the fault in their own 
 eyes, and not in the object. 
 
 CCLXXVI.— TRICK ON SPALATO. 
 One of his sarcasms he unhappily bestowed on count Gonde- 
 mar, the Spanish ambassador, telling him that three turns at
 
 220 PULLBRIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 Tyburn was the only way to cure liis fistula. The don, highly 
 oifended thereat, pained for the present more with this flout 
 than his fistula, meditates revenge, and repairs to king James. 
 He told his majesty, "that his charity, an error common in 
 good princes, abused his judgment in conceiving Spalato a 
 true convert, who still in heart remained a Roman Catholic, 
 (indeed his majesty had a rare felicity in discovering the 
 falsity of witches, and forgery of such who pretended them- 
 selves possessed,) but, under favour, was deluded with this 
 man's false spirit, and, by his majesty's leave, he would detect 
 onto him this hypocrisy." The king cheerfully embraced his 
 motion, and left him to the liberty of his own under- 
 takings. 
 
 The ambassador writeth to his Catholic majesty; he to his 
 holiness, Gregory XV., that Spalato might be pardoned and 
 preferred in the church of Rome, which was easily obtained. 
 Letters are sent from Rome to count Gondemar, written by 
 the cardinal Millin, to impart them to Spalato, informing 
 him that the Pope had forgiven and forgotten all that he had 
 done or written against the- Catholic religion; and, upon his 
 return, would prefer him to the bishopric of Salerno in JNaples, 
 worth twelve thousand crowns by the year. A cardinal's hat 
 should also be bestowed upon him. And if Spalato, with his 
 hand subscribed to this letter, would renounce and disclaim 
 what formerly he had printed, an apostolical brief with par- 
 don should solemnly be sent to Brussels. Spalato embraceth 
 the motion, likes the paxxlon well, the preferment better, 
 accepts both, recants his opinions largely, subscribes solemnly; 
 and thanks his Holiness affectionately for his favour. Gonde- 
 mar carries his subscription to king James, who is glad to 
 behold the hypocrite unmasked, appearing in his own colours;
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 221 
 
 yet the discovery was concealed, and lay dormant some days 
 in the desk, which was in due time to be awakened. 
 
 CCLXXVII.— A SHREWD REIIARK— DIFFERENCE BETWEEN 
 HEBREW AND ITALIAN. 
 
 In the Hebrew tongue, nephews and nieces are called 
 "sons and daughters j" but the Italian clergy, on the con- 
 trary, often term their sons and daughters " nephews and 
 nieces." 
 
 CCLXXVIIL— THOMAS TUSSER ;— " ONE NOT WISE FOR HIMSELF," 
 
 Was born at Rivenhall, in this county (Essex), of an 
 ancient family, since extinct, if his own pen may be believed. 
 Whilst as yet a buy, he lived in many schools, Wallingford, 
 Saint Paul's, Eton, whence he went to Trinity Hall, in Cam- 
 bridge ; when a man, in Staffordshire, Suifolk, Norfolk, 
 Cambridge, London, and where not? so that this stone of 
 Sisyphus could gather no moss. He was successively a 
 musician, schoolmaster, serving-man, husbandman, grazier, 
 poet ; more skilful in all, than thriving in any vocation. 
 He traded at large in oxen, sheep, dairies, gi-ain of all kinds, 
 to no profit. Whether he bought or sold, he lost ; and, 
 when a renter, impoverished himself, and never enriched his 
 landlord. Yet hath he laid down excellent rules in his 
 " Book of Husbandry and Housewifery " (so that the obsei-ver 
 thereof must be rich) in his own defence. He spread his 
 bread with all sorts of butter ; yet none would .stick thereon. 
 Yet I hear no man charge him with vicious extravagancy or 
 visible carelessness, imputing his ill success to some occult 
 cause in God's counsel. 
 
 Q
 
 222 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 CCLXXIX.— A COSTLY JOKE. 
 
 Sir Robert Naunton was sworn secretary of state to 
 King James, on Thursday the eighth of January, 1617 ; 
 which place he discharged with great ability and dexterity. 
 And I hope it will be no offence here to insert a pleasant 
 passage : — 
 
 One INIr. Wiemark, a wealthy man, great novellant, and 
 constant Paul's-walker, hearing the news that day of the 
 beheading of Sir Walter Raleigh, " His head," said he, " would 
 do very well on the shoulders of Sir Robert Naunton, 
 secretary of state." These words were complained of, and 
 "Wiemark summoned to the privy council, where he pleaded 
 for himself, " That he intended no disrespect to Mr. Secretary, 
 whose known worth was above all detraction ;" only he spake 
 in reference to an old proverb, " Two heads are better than 
 one," and so for the present he was dismissed. Not long after, 
 when rich men were called on for a contribution to Saint 
 Paul's, Wiemark at the council-table subscribed a hundred 
 pounds, but Mi'. Secretary told him two hundred were 
 better than one ; which, betwixt fear and charity, Wiemark 
 was fain to subscribe. 
 
 CCLXXX.— DUNSTAN'S TOMB. 
 
 His tomb was famous for some time, till Thomas Becket 
 eclipsed the same; seeing saints, like new besoms, sweep 
 clean at the first, and afterwards are clean swept out by 
 newer saints which succeed them. Yea, Dunstan's grave 
 grew so obscure at Canterbury, that the monks of Glastonbury, 
 taking heart thereat, and advantaged by John Capgrave's 
 report, that, anno 1012, Dunstan's corpse were translated
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 223 
 
 thither, pretended bis burial, and built him a shrine in their 
 convent. Men and money met at Glastonbury on this 
 mistake ; and their convent got more by this eight feet 
 length of ground (the supposed tomb of Dunstan), than eight 
 hundred acres of the best land they possessed elsewhere. 
 Whereupon, William Wareham, archbishop of Canterbury, 
 to try the truth, and to prevent fai'ther fraud herein, caused 
 a solemn search to be made in the cathedral of Canterbury 
 after Dunstan 's corpse, in the place ti'adition reported him, 
 to be interred. Four of the friars, fittest for the work, 
 (to wit, of stronger bodies than brains), undertook to make 
 this scrutiny, anno 1508, the 22nd of Aprih Great caution, 
 was used that all should be done semotis laicis, " no laymeu 
 being present ; " whether because their eyes were too profane 
 to behold so holy an object, or too prying to discover the 
 default if the seai'ch succeeded not. In the night they so 
 plied their work, that ere morning they discovered Dunstan's 
 coffin, and rested the day following from more digging ; aa; 
 well they might, having taken so much pains and gained so 
 much profit by their endeavours. 
 
 CCLXXXI.— ETHELRED THE UNREADY. 
 
 The Danes were also advantaged by the inactiveness of 
 king Ethelred, therefore surnamed the " Unready " in our 
 chronicles. The clock of his consultations and executions 
 was always set some hours too late, vainly striving with much 
 industry to redress what a little providence might seasonably 
 have, prevented. 'Now, when this unready king met with 
 the Danes, his over-ready enemies, no wonder if lamentable 
 was the event thereof.
 
 224: FULLERIAXA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 CCLXXXII.— BATTLE ABBEY. 
 
 Here tlie monks flourislied in all affluence ; as the old 
 world in the days of Noah, " they ate, they drank, they 
 bought, they sold;" would I might add, "They married 
 wives and were given in marriage " (foi- want of which they 
 did worse), till, in the days of King Harry VIII., they were 
 all drowned in the general '■ deluge " of the dissolution. 
 
 CCLXXXIII.— KAPACITY OF WILLIAM RUFUS. 
 
 This year died Lanfrank, archbishop of Canterbury : after 
 whose death the king seized the profits of that see into his 
 own hand, and kept the church vacant for some yeai-s ; know- 
 ing the emptiness of bishopricks caused the fulness of his 
 coffers. 
 
 Thus archbishop Eufus, bishop Rufus, abbot Eufus (for 
 so may he be called, as well as king Ptufus ; keej^ing at the 
 same time the archbishoprick of Canterbury, the bishopricks 
 of Winchester and Durham, and thii'teen abbeys in his -hand), 
 brought a mass of money into his excheqiier. All places 
 which he parted with was upon present payment. Simon 
 Magus, with his hands full of money, would carry any thing 
 fi'om Simon Peter, with his " silver and gold have I none." 
 
 Yea, John bishop of Wells could not remove his seat to 
 Bath, nisi albo unguento manibus regis delibatis, " unless he 
 had moistened the king's hands with white ointment ; * 
 though a less proportion of a yellow colour would have been 
 more sovereign to the same use. . . . But in the midst of his 
 mirth, king Rufus, coming to Gloucester, fell desperately sick, 
 and began to bethink himself of his ill-led life. As all 
 
 * Mat. Paris.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 225 
 
 aches and wounds prick and pain most the nearer it draweth 
 to night; so, a guilty conscience is most active to torment 
 men, the nearer they conceive themselves approaching to their 
 death. 
 
 CCLXXXIV.— AN EXPRESSION OF ANSELM QUESTIONED. 
 
 There passeth a memorable expression of Anselni's, cried 
 up and commended by some for a masterpiece of devotion ; 
 namely, " that he had rather be in hell without sin, than in 
 heaven with sin ; " which others condemn as an unsavoury 
 speech, not according to scripture-phrase j as from one not 
 sufficiently acquainted with the justification of a Christian 
 man. Indeed, some high-flown expressions often knock at 
 the door of blasphemy, but yet not with any intention to 
 enter in thereat ; in which we are more to mind the sense 
 than the sound of the words. Amongst those may this of 
 Anselm's be ranked, uttered, no doubt, in a zealous detestation 
 of sin ; yea which charitably may be defended in the very 
 letter thei-eof For Adam, we know, was somewhile in 
 Paradise (heaven's suburbs) after the eating of the forbidden 
 fruit, yet was sensible of no pleasure therein, which made 
 him hide himself, as prosecuted by his guilty conscience. 
 
 ccLXXxv.—CRrricisM on geoffrey of monmoutii. 
 
 Geoffrey of Monmouth tells us, that at this time* there 
 
 were in England twenty-eight cities, each of them having a 
 
 Jlamen, or pagan priest ; and three of them, namely, London, 
 
 York, and Caerleon in Wales, had archjlamens, to which the 
 
 rest were subjected ; and Lucius placed bishops in the room 
 
 of the Jlamens, and archbishops metropolitans in the places of 
 
 * Id the days of the fabulous Lucius.
 
 226 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 arch Jlamens : " All which," saith he, " solemnly received their 
 confirmation from the pope." But herein our author seems 
 not well acquainted with the propriety of the word flamen, 
 their use and office amongst the Romans ; who were not set 
 severally, but many together in the same city. Nor were 
 they subordinate one to another, but all to the priests' 
 college; and therein to the Pontifex Maximus. Besides, 
 the British manuscript, which Monmouth is conceived to 
 have translated, makes no mention of these ^anie?zs. Lastly, 
 these words, " archbishop" and " metropolitan," are so far 
 from being current in the days of king Lucius, that they 
 were not coined till after ages. So that in plain English, his 
 Jiamens and arch Jlamens seem flams and arch flams, even no- 
 torious falsehoods. 
 
 CCLXXXVL— FORGOTTEN MARTYRS. 
 
 God's calendar is more complete than man's best 
 martyrologies ; and their names are written in the book of 
 life who on earth are wholly forgotten. 
 
 CCLXXXVII.-A "PARAMOUNT MIRACLE "OF ST. DAVID. 
 
 I AM sensible that I have spent, to my shame, so much 
 precious time in reading the legend of his life, that I will not 
 wilfully double my guiltiness in writing the same, and tempt 
 the reader to offend in like nature. This miracle I cannot 
 omit. David one day was preaching in an open field to the 
 multitude, and could not be well seen because of tlie con- 
 course (though they make him four cubits high, a nian-and- 
 half in stature); when, behold, the earth whereon lie stood, 
 officiously heaving itself up, mounted him to a competent 
 visibility above all his audience. Whereas, our Saviour him-
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 227 
 
 self, when he taught the people, "was pleased to choose a 
 mountain ; making use of the advantage of nature without 
 improving his miraculous power. 
 
 CCLXXXVIII.— MONKISH LEGENDS. 
 
 As for those spurious tracts, which monks in after ages set 
 out under these worthy men's names, they are no more to be 
 accounted the true offspx'ing of these learned saints, than that 
 common manna, ordinarily sold in apothecaries' shops, is the 
 self same with that angels' food which fell down from heaven, 
 and feasted the Israelites. 
 
 CCLXXXIX.— ON A MONSTROUS LEGEND RESPECTING ILTUTUS. 
 
 SuRELT some blind monk, having one of his eyes put out 
 with ignorance, and the other with superstition, was the first 
 founder of this fable. Thus godly saints in that age were 
 made martyrs after their death ; persecuted (though in their 
 commendation) with impudent and improbable lies. It is 
 reported also of the same Iltutus, that he tui'ned men into 
 stones. Had it been stones into men (converting stupid 
 souls into Christians by his preaching), it had been capable 
 of an allegorical construction : whereas, as now told, it is a 
 lie in the literal, and nonsense in the mystical meaning 
 thereof 
 
 CCXC— INFANTS. 
 
 Some, admiring what motives to mirth infants meet with 
 in their silent and solitary smiles, have resolved — how truly 
 I know not — that then they converse with angels ; as indeed 
 such cannot among mortals find any fitter companions.
 
 2 28 FULLERIANA. ; OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 CCXCI— MUSIC. 
 
 Such is the sociableness of music, it conforms itself to all 
 companies botli in mirth and mourning ; complying to im- 
 prove that passion witn which it finds the auditors most 
 affected. In a word, it is an invention which might have 
 beseemed a son of Seth to have been the father thereof : 
 though better it was that Cain's great grandchild should have 
 the credit first to find it, than the world the unhappiness 
 longer to have wanted it. 
 
 '^JD^ 
 
 CCXCII— ST. MONICA. 
 
 Drawing near her death, she sent most pious thoughts as 
 harbingers to heaven, and her soul saw a glimpse of hap- 
 piness through the chinks of her sickness-broken body.* 
 
 CCXCIII.— THE VIRGIN. 
 
 No lordlins; husband shall at the same time command her 
 presence and distance, to be always near in constant attend- 
 ance, and always to stand aloof in awfid observance. 
 
 CCXCIV.— BISHOP FLETCHER. 
 
 His pride was rather on him than in him, as only gait 
 and gesture deep, not sinking to his heart, though causelessly 
 condemned for a proud man, as who was a good hypocrite 
 and far more humble than he appeared. 
 
 * On which passage Charles Lamb aptly quotes "Waller's lines: — 
 
 " The soul's dark cottage, batter'd and decay'd 
 Lets in new lights through chmks which time has made."
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 229 
 
 CCXCV HENEY THE EIGHTH'S DIVORCE. 
 
 For seven years was this suit depending in the Pope's 
 court ; after which apprenticeship the indentures were not 
 intended to be cancelled, but the cause still to be kept ou 
 foot, it being for the interest to have it always in doing, and 
 never done. For, whilst it depended, the Pope was sure of 
 two great friends : but, when it was once decided, he was 
 sure of one great foe, either the Emperor, or our King of 
 England. 
 
 CCXCVI.— WOLSET'S SUPPRESSION OF THE FORTY SMALL 
 
 MONASTERIES. 
 
 This dissolution of forty small houses, caused by the car- 
 dinal, made all the foi'est of religious foundations in England 
 to shake, justly fearing the king would finish to fell the oaks, 
 seeing the cardinal began to cut the underwood. 
 
 CCXCVIL— LEGEND OF SAINT NICHOLAS. 
 
 And now let me make you smile a little, acquainting you 
 with a passage in the Legend of Nicholas, a popish saint. 
 They report of him that, when an infant hanging on his 
 mother's breast, he fasted Wednesdays and Fridays, and could 
 not be urged to suck more than once a-day. 
 
 CCXC VIII.— MINORITES, OR FRANCISCAN FRIARS. 
 
 Conceiving the comparative minor too high, they have 
 descended to minimus, according to our Saviour's own words : 
 " He that is a minime, or the least among you, the same shall 
 be greatest," and I much admire that none have since begun 
 an order of minor-mi nimoes : the rather because of the
 
 230 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AXD AVIT OF 
 
 apostle's words of himself : " wlio am less than the least of all 
 saints," 
 
 CCXCIX.— THE " FRATRES FLAGELLIFERI." 
 The " fratres flagelliferi, or scourging friars," religious 
 bedlams, used publicly to whip themselves in the market-place, 
 TCifikm^ vellum of their own skin, tliereon to write their follies 
 in legible characters." 
 
 ^o 
 
 CCC— AN APOLOGY FOR THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Some zealots of our age will condemn the Laodicean temper 
 of the Protestant bishops: because, if stickling to purpose 
 and improving their power to the utmost, they might have 
 set forth a more pure and perfect religion. Such men see the 
 faults of reformers, but not the difficulties of reformation. 
 These Protestant bishops were at this time to encounter with 
 the Popish clergy, equal in number, not inferior in learning, 
 but far greater in power and dependencies. Besides, the 
 generality of the people of the land being nustled in ignoi'ance 
 and superstition, could not on a sudden endure the extremity 
 of an absolute Eeformation. Should our eyes be instantly 
 posted out of midnight into noonday, certainly we should be 
 blinded with the suddenness and excellency of the lustre 
 thereof. Nature therefore hath wisely provided the twilight 
 as a bridge by degrees to pass us from darkness to light. Yea, 
 our Saviour himself did at the first connive at the carnality 
 of his apostles, and would not "put new wine into old 
 bottles" for fear of breaking. Yea, he had some command- 
 ments, which as yet they were " not able to bear," and there- 
 fore, till they could bear them, his wisdom did bear with 
 them.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 231 
 
 CCCL— ST. APOLLONIA'S TEETH, 
 
 Chejinitius affirnieth from the mouth of a grave author, 
 that the teeth of St. Apollouia being conceived effectual to 
 cure the toothache, in the reign of King Edward VI. (when 
 many ignorant people in England relied on that receipt to 
 carry one of her teeth about them) the king gave command, 
 in extirpation of superstition — that all her teeth should be 
 brought in to a public officer deputed for that purpose ; and 
 they filled a tun therewith. Were her stomach proportionable 
 to her teeth, a county could scarcely afford her a meal's 
 meat. 
 
 CCCIL— CHIEF SEATS OF THE 3IARIAX PERSECUTION. 
 
 Under the same torrid zone of persecution (but a little 
 moi-e temperate) lay Norfolk and Suffolk, in the diocese of 
 Norwich. Bishop Hopton was unmerciful in his visitations, 
 but Downing the chancellor played the devil himself; enough 
 to make wood dear in those jicbTts — so many did he consume 
 to ashes. 
 
 CCCIIL— A FOOL'S COUNSEL, AND HIS REASONS. 
 
 The queen sent an herald to Sir Thomas "VVyatt's house, 
 deeply moated round about, the bridge being drawn up, yet 
 so that a place like a ford pretended a safe passage thereunto. 
 On the inside thereof walked the proper case of a man well 
 habited, and his ftice carrying no despair of wisdom therein. 
 The herald asked him whether he might safely go over there? 
 to whom the other lightly answered, '* Yea, yea." But. had 
 not the strength of his horse been more than ordinary, he 
 either had been drowned in the water or buried in the mud.
 
 232 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 The herald hardly escaping, fills all the house with complaints, 
 that being an officer sent from the queen, under the pi'otection 
 of the public faith (having his coat, his conduct, upon him), he 
 should be so wilfully abused by false directions to the danger 
 of his life, by one of Sir Thomas's servants. The knight, 
 highly offended at the fault (as gentleman enough and enemy 
 to actions of baseness), summons all his servants to appear 
 before the herald, vowing that the oflender should be sent 
 prisoner to the queen, with his legs bound beneath his horse's 
 belly, to receive from her the reward of his wickedness. The 
 herald challengeth the party at the first sight of him. "Alas ! " 
 said Sir Thomas, " he is a mere natural ; as will appear, if you 
 please to examine him." "Wliy, sirrah!" said the herald, 
 " did von direct me to come over where it was almost im- 
 possible to pass without drowning 1 " To whom the other 
 answered, " The ducks came over, not long before, whose legs 
 were shorter than your horse's." Hereat the herald smiled 
 out his anger, adding withal, " Sir Thomas, hereafter let your 
 fool wear the badge of liis profession on him, that he may 
 deceive no more in this kind." 
 
 CCCiy.— STERNHOLD'S TRANSLATION OF THE PSALMS. 
 
 Men have vented their just exceptions against the baldness 
 of the translation, so that sometimes they make the Maker of 
 the tongue to speak little better than barbarism, and have 
 in many verses such poor rhyme, that two hammers on a 
 smith's anvil would make better music. Whilst others 
 (rather to excuse it than defend it) do plead, that English 
 poetry was then in the nonage, not to say infancy thereof; 
 and that, match these verses for their age, they shall go a- 
 breast with the best poems of those times. Some, in favour
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 233 
 
 of the translators, allege, that to be curious therein, and over- 
 descanting with wit, had not become the plain song and 
 simplicity of a holy style. But these must know there is 
 a great difference between painting a face and not washing it. 
 
 CCCV.— AN UNCONSCIOUS BEGGAE. 
 
 • It happened, two or three gentlemen, the king's servants 
 and Mr. Champernoun's acquaintance, waited at a door where 
 the king, Henry Eighth, was to pass forth, with purpose to 
 beg of his highness a large parcel of abbey -lands, specified in 
 their petition. Champernoun was very inquisitive to know 
 their suit, but they would not impart the nature thereof. 
 This while, out comes the king ; they kneel down, so doth Mr. 
 Champei*noun, being assured by an implicit faith that courtiers 
 would beg nothing hurtful to themselves ; they prefer their 
 petition, the king grants it : they render him humble thanks, 
 and so doth Mr. Champernoun. Afterwards he requires 
 his share, they deny it : he appeals to the king, the king 
 avows his equal meaning in the largess. Whereupon 
 his companions were fain to allot this gentleman the pi'iory 
 of St, Germain's in Cornwall (valued at two hundred forty- 
 three pounds and eight shillings of yearly rent, since by him 
 or his heirs sold to Mr. Elliot) for his partage. Here a 
 dumb beggar met with a blind giver ; the one as little knowing 
 what he asked, as the other what he granted. Thus King 
 Henry made cursory charters, and in transitu transacted abbey- 
 lands. 
 
 CCCVI— SALE OF ABBEY-LANDS. 
 
 Alas! those abbeys were now sold to such chajDmen, in 
 ■whom it was questionable whether their ignorance or avarice
 
 234 FULLEKIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 were greater, and they made havoc and destruction of all 
 As brokers in Longlane, when they buy an old suit buy the 
 linings together with the outside, so it was conceived meet 
 that such as purchased the buildings of monasteries should, 
 in the same grant, have the libraries (the stuffing thereof) con- 
 veyed unto them. . . . The covers of books with curious brass 
 bosses and clasps, intended to protect, proved to betray them, 
 being the baits of covetousness. And so many excellent authors 
 stripped out of their cases, were left naked, to be burned or 
 thrown away. Thus ^sop's cock, casually lighting on a pearl, 
 preferred a grain before it ; yet he left it as he found it ; and, 
 as he reaped no profit by the pearl, it received no damage by 
 him. Whereas these cruel cormorants, with their barbarous 
 beaks and greedy claws, rent, tore, and tattered these inesti- 
 mable pieces of antiquity. 
 
 CCCVII.- ECCLESIASTICAL SPOLIATION— SCRUPLES REMOVED. 
 
 How much the yearly revenue of all these chantries, free 
 chapels, and colleges amounted to, God knows ; for the king 
 knew as little as some in our age. Indeed, some of his officers 
 did but xoould not know — as wilfully concealing their know- 
 ledge therein. Yea, some of these chantries may be said in a 
 double sense to be suppressed, as not only put down but also 
 concealed, never coming into the exchequer, being silently 
 pocketed up by private (but potent) persons. True it is, the 
 courtiers were more rapacious to catch, and voracious to 
 swallow, these chantries than abbey-lands. For at the first 
 many were scrupvilous in mind, or modest in manners, 
 doubting the acceptance of abbey-land, though offered unto 
 them, till profit and custom, two very able confessors, had by 
 degrees satisfied their consciences, and absolved them from
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 235 
 
 any fault therein. Now, all scruples removed, chantry-land 
 went down without any regret, yea, such who mannerly ex- 
 pected till the king carved for them out of abbey-lands, 
 scrambled for themselves out of chantry revenues, as knowing 
 this was the last dish of the last course, and after chantries, as 
 after cheese, nothing to be expected. 
 
 CCCYIII.— DESTRUCTION OF THE ABBEY LIBRARIES. 
 
 I DENY not, but that in this heap of books there was miTch 
 rubbish ; legions of lying legends, good for nothing but fuel, 
 whose keeping would have caused the loss of much precious 
 time in reading them. I confess also, there were many 
 volumes full fraught with superstitions, which notwithstand- 
 ing might be useful to learned men : except any will deny apo- 
 thecaries the privilege of keeping poison in their shops, when 
 they can make antidotes of them. But besides these, what 
 beautiful bibles, rare fathers, subtle school-men ; useful 
 historians, ancient, middle, modern : what painful comments 
 were here amongst them ! What monuments of mathematics 
 all massacred together ! seeing every book with a cross was 
 condemned for popish ; with circles for conjuring. Yea, I 
 may say, that then holy divinity W2is, profaned, physic itself 
 hurt, and a trespass, yea, a riot, committed on the law itself. 
 And more particulai'ly, the history of former times then and 
 there received a dangerous wound, whereof it halts at this 
 day, and, without hope of a perfect cure, must go a cripple to 
 the grave. 
 
 CCCIX.— PARSONS THE JESUIT. 
 
 When Parsons was apprehended by a pursuivant at 
 Northwich in Cheshire, and put into a chamber fast bolted?
 
 236 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 and locked upon him, tlie door did three times togetlier miracu- 
 lously, and of its own accord, fly open. By the reader's favour, 
 as I dare not deny belief in this passage, attested by a Catholic 
 Father ; so I cannot but wonder thereat. Peter and Paiil, 
 each of them, had once their prison doors opened. Parsons 
 exceeds them both; three several solemn times his prison was 
 set open. Did he not tempt Divine Pi-ovidence, which once 
 and again offered unto him a way to escape, to expect a third 
 call to come forth ? Had Providence (angry that the cour- 
 tesy twice tendered was not accepted) left him alone, none 
 would have pitied him if caught, and sent to keep company 
 with his dear friend, Father Campian, in the tower, 
 
 CCCX.— A GOOD MASTER. 
 
 In correcting his servant, he becomes not a slave to his 
 own passion, not cruelly making new indentures of the 
 flesh of his apprentice. He is tender of his servant in sick- 
 ness and age. If crippled in his service his house is his hos- 
 pital. Yet now many throw away those dry bones, out of 
 the which themselves have sucked the marrow. 
 
 CCCXI.— HORSES. 
 
 These are men^s wings, wherewith they make such speed. 
 A generous creature a horse is, sensible in .some sort of hon- 
 our ; and made most handsome by that which deforms men 
 most — pride. 
 
 CCCXII.— THE WOUNDED SOLDIER. 
 
 Halting is the stateliest march of a soldier ; and 'tis a 
 brave sight to see the flesh of an ancient as torn as his 
 colours.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 237 
 
 CCCXIII.— HENRY DE ESSEX. 
 
 He is too well known in our English chronicles, being 
 baron of Kaleigh, in Essex, and hereditary standard-bearer 
 of England. It happened in the reign of Henry II. there 
 was a fierce battle fought in Flintshire, at Coleshull, between 
 the English and Welsh, wherein this Henry de Essex, 
 animum et signum simul abjecit, betwixt traitor and coward, 
 cast away both his courage and banner together, occasioning 
 a wreat overthrow of Ena;lish. But he that had the baseness to 
 do, had the boldness to deny the doing of, so foul a fact-^j 
 until he was challenged in combat by Kobert de Momford, 
 a knight, eyewitness thereof, and by him overcome in a 
 duel. Whereupon his large inheritance v.-as confiscated to 
 the king, and he himself, partly thrust, partly going, into a 
 convent, hid his head in a cowl, under wliich, betwixt 
 shame and sanctity, he blushed out the remainder of his 
 life. 
 
 CCCXIV.— SIR EDWARD HARWOOD. 
 I HAVE read of a bird which hath a face like, and yet will 
 prey upon, a man ; who, coming to tlie water to drink, and 
 finding there by reflection that he had killed one like him- 
 self, pineth away by degrees, and never afterwards enjoyeth 
 itself. Such in some sort the condition of Sir Edward. 
 This accident, that he had killed one in a private quarrel, put 
 a period to his carnal mirth, and " was a covering to his 
 eyes" all the days of his life. No possible pi'ovocations could 
 afterwards tempt him to a duel ; and no wonder if one's 
 conscience loathed that whereof he had surfeited. He re- 
 fused all challenges with more honour than others accepted 
 
 E
 
 '238 FULLERIANA: Oil, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 them ; it being well known that he would set his foot as far 
 in the face of his enemy as any man alive. 
 
 CCCXV.— DECAYED GENTRY. 
 
 I HAVE reason to believe that some who justly own the 
 surnames and blood of Bohuns, Mortimers, and Plantagenets 
 (though ignorant of their own extractions), are hid in the 
 heap of common people, where they find that under a thatched 
 cottage, which some of their ancestors could not enjoy in a 
 leaded castle — contentment, with quiet and security. 
 
 CCCXVI.— TENDERNESS OF CONSCIENCE. 
 
 Thomas Anson, born in Allhallows, Lombard-street, 
 armourer, dwelt without Bishopsgate. It happened that a 
 stage-player borrowed a rusty musket, which had lain long 
 leger in his shop : now, though his part was comical, he there- 
 with acted an unexpected tragedy, killing one of the stauders- 
 by ; the gnu casually going off on the stage, which he sus- 
 pected not to be charged. Oh, the difference of divers men 
 in the tenderness of their consciences ! Some are scarce 
 touched with a wound, whilst others are wounded with a 
 'touch therein. This poor armourer was highly afilicted 
 therewith, though done against his will, yea, without his 
 knowledge, in his absence, by another, out of mere 
 chance. Hereupon he resolved to give all his estate to pious 
 uses. No sooner had he gotten a round sum, but presently 
 he posted with it in his apron to the Court of Aldermen, and 
 was in pain till, by their direction, he had settled it for the 
 relief of poor in his own and other parishes, and disposed of 
 some hundreds of pounds accordingly, as I am credibly 
 informed by the then churchwardens of the said parish.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 239 
 
 Thus, as lie conceived himself casually (though at a great 
 distance) to have occasioned the death of one, he was the 
 immediate and direct cause of giving a comfortable liviu^ 
 to many. 
 
 CCCXVIL— BURNING OF WICKLIFFE'S BODY BY ORDER OF THE 
 COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 
 
 Hitherto (a. d., 1428) the corpse of John Wicklifle had 
 quietly slept in his grave about forty-one years after his 
 death, till his body was reduced to bones, and liis bones 
 almost to dust. For though the earth in the chancel of 
 Lutterworth, in Leicestershire, where he was interred, hath 
 not so quick a digestion with the earth of Aceldama, to 
 consume flesh in twenty-four hours, yet such the appetite 
 thereof, and all other English graves, to leave small reversions 
 of a body after so many yeai's. But now such the sjileen of 
 the Council of Constance, as they not only cursed his memory 
 as dying an obstinate heretic, but ordered that his bones 
 (with this charitable caution, " if it may be discerned from the 
 bodies of other faithful people ") be taken out of the ground, 
 and thrown far off from any Christian burial. In obedience 
 hereunto, Richard Fleming, bishop of Lincoln, diocesan of 
 Lutterworth, sent his officers (vultures with a quick sight 
 scent at a dead carcass !) to ungrave him accordingly. To 
 Lutterworth they come, sumner, commissary, official, chan- 
 cellor, proctors, doctors, and the servants (so that the 
 remnant of the body would not hold out a bone amongst so 
 many hands), take what was left out of the grave, and burnt 
 them to ashes, and cast them into Swift, a neighbouring 
 brook, running hard by. Thus this brook hath conveyed his 
 ashes into Avon, Avon into Severn, Severn into the narrow seas,
 
 240 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 they into the main ocean ; and thus the ashes of WicklifFe 
 are the emblem of Lis doctrine, which now is dispersed all 
 the world ovex*. 
 
 CCCXVIII.— HERALDS. 
 
 Heralds new mould men's names — taking from them, 
 adding to them, melting out all the liquid letters, torturing 
 mutes to make them speak, and making vowels dumb — 
 to bring it to a fallacious homonoviy at the last, that their names 
 may be the same with those noble houses they pretend to. 
 
 CCCXIX.— A RECEIPT FOR LONGEVITY. 
 
 This lord, Lyonel Cranfield, by losing his office, saved 
 himself departing from his treasurer's place, which in that 
 age was hard to keep ; insomuch that one asking, " What was 
 good to preserve life ? " was answei-ed, " Get to be lord trea- 
 sui'er of England, for they never do die in their place ; " 
 which was indeed true for four successions. 
 
 CCCXX.— EFFECT OF ANCIENT PERSECUTION. 
 
 They who sought to put out the truth of Christ's words — 
 by snuffing it, made it burn the brighter. 
 
 CCCXXL— SUPERSTITIOUS VENERATION FOR CHRIST'S 
 SEPULCHRE. 
 
 The angel sent the women away from looking into the 
 sepulchre, with He is risen, he is not here; and thereby did 
 deliort them and us, from burying our affections in Clirist's 
 grave, but rather to seek him whei'e he was to be found. 
 At this day, a gracious heart maketh every place a Jerusalem, 
 wliere God may as well and as accejitably be worshipped.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 241 
 
 CCCXXII— BUYING EARTH CHEAP AND SELLING HEAVEN DEAR. 
 
 As the Pope, so most of the clergy improved their estates 
 by this war;* for the secular princes who went this voyage 
 sold or morgaged most of their means (selling for gold to 
 purchase with steel and iron), and the clergy were generally 
 their chapmen. For they advised these undex'takers, seeing 
 this action was for Christ and his church, rather to make 
 over their estates to spiritual men, of whom they might again 
 i-edeem the same, and from whom they should be sure to Hnd 
 the fairest dealing, thau to laymen. Godfrey Duke of 
 Bouillon sold that dukedom to the Bishop of Liege, and the 
 castle of Sartensy and Monsa to the Bishop of Verdun. 
 Baldwin his brother sold him the city of Verdun. Yea, by 
 these sales the third part of the best feofs iu France came to 
 be possessed by the clergy ; who made good bargains for 
 themselves, and had the conscience to buy earth cheap, and 
 to sell heaven dear. Yea, this voyage laid the foundation of 
 their temporal greatness, till at last the daughter devoured 
 the mother, and wealth impaired religion. 
 
 CCCXXIII.— DESCRIPTION OF THE CRUSADERS. 
 
 It is not to be expected that all should be fish which is 
 caught in a drag-net, neither that all should be good and 
 religious people who were adventurers in an action of so lai-ge 
 a capacity as this war was. We must in charity allow, that 
 many of them were truly zealous, and went with pious intents. 
 These were like to those of whom Bellarmine speaketh, who 
 had no fault prceter nimiam sanctitatem, " too much sanctity," 
 
 * The Crusades.
 
 242 FULLEUIANA : OR, "WISDOM AND WIT OP 
 
 ■which a learned man interpreteth, " too much superstition." 
 But besides these well-meaning people, there went also a 
 rahble-rout, rather for company than conscience. Debtors 
 took this voyage on them as an acquittance from their debts, 
 to the defrauding of their creditors; servants counted the 
 conditions of their service cancelled by it, going away 
 against their masters' will; thieves and murderers took upon 
 them the cross, to escajie the gallows; adulterers did penance 
 in their armour. A lamentable case that the devil's black 
 guard should be God's soldiers ! And no wonder if the 
 success was as bad as some of the adventurei's, especially 
 seeing they retained their old conditions under a new climate. 
 And (as if this voyage had been like to repentance, never too 
 soon, nor too late, for any to begin) not only green striplings 
 unripe for war, but also decayed men to whom age had given 
 a writ of ease, became soldiers; and those who ut home 
 should have waited on their own graves, went far to visit 
 Christ's sepulchre. And which was more, women (as if they 
 woidd make the tale of the Amazons truth) went with 
 weapons in men's clothes ; a behaviour at the best immodest, 
 and modesty being the case of chastity, it is to be feared that, 
 where the case is broken, the jewel is lost. This enterprise 
 was also the mother of much non-residence, many Prelates and 
 Friars (fitter to handle a penknife than a sword) left their 
 convents and pastoral charges to follow this business. The 
 total sum of those pilgrim soldiers amounted to three hundred 
 thousand; and some writers do double that number. No 
 doubt the Chi'istians' army had been greater, if it had been 
 less ; for the belly was too big for the head; and a medley of 
 nations did rather burden than strengthen it. Besides, the 
 army was like a cloth of many colours, and more seams ;
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 213 
 
 which, seams though they were curiously clrawen up for tlie 
 present, yet after long wearing began to be seen, and at last 
 brake out into open rents. 
 
 CCCXXIV.— PALESTINE. 
 The soil was transcendently fruitful, as appeareth by the 
 great bunch of grapes carried by two men; for though many 
 a man hath not been able to bear wine, it is much that one 
 should be loaden with one cluster of grapes. 
 
 CCCXXV.— COURSE OF THE JORDAN. 
 This ariseth from the springs of Jor and Dan, whence 
 running south he enlargeth himself first into the waters of 
 Merom, then into the lake of Genesareth or Tiberias; and 
 hence recovering his stream, as if sensible of his sad fate, and 
 desirous to defer what he cannot avoid, he fetcheth many 
 turnings and windings, but all will not excuse him from 
 falling into the Dead Sea. Authors are vqvj fruitful on the 
 barrenness of this sea (where Sodom once stood), writing how 
 on the banks thereof groio those hypocrite apples and well com- 
 plexioned dust {tlhe true emblems of the false pleasures of this 
 world) which touched fall to ashes. 
 
 CCCXXVI.— ABSALOSI'S PILLAR. 
 
 This Absalom built to continue his memory ; thougli lie 
 might have saved that cost, having eternized his infamy by 
 his unnatural rebellion. 
 
 CCCXXVIL— A COMMENT ON SOLOMON'S SAYING— " THAT THE 
 DAY OF ONE'S DEATH IS BETTER THAN THE DAY OF ONE'S 
 BIRTH." 
 
 Pierce Plowman maketh a witty wonder why friars should
 
 244 FULLERIANA : OR, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 covet rather to confess and bury than to christen children; 
 intimating it proceeded from covetousness, there being gain 
 to be gotten by the one, none by the other. And this was 
 the age wherein the convents got their best living by the 
 dyhig ; which made tliem (contrary to all other people) most 
 to worship the setting sun. 
 
 CCCXXVIir.— A PRUDENT RULE OF LIFE. 
 
 It is not good to exasperate anj'- — though far inferior ; for 
 as the fable telleth us, the beetle may annoy the eagle, and 
 the mouse befriend the lion. 
 
 cccxxix.- saint milburgii. 
 
 She departed this life about the year 664. . . . Four hun- 
 dred yeai's after, in the reign of William the Conqueror, her 
 corpse (discovered by miracles wrought thereby) was taken 
 up sound and uncorrupted, to the admiration of the beholders 
 (saith my author) ; and surely, had I seen the same, I would 
 have contributed my share of wondering thereunto. This I 
 am sure of, that as good a saint, Lazarus by jiame, by tlie 
 confession of his own sister, did stink when but four days 
 
 buried. 
 
 CCCXXX.— STEPHEN GARDINER. 
 
 He is repoi'ted to have died more than half a Protestant, 
 avouching that he believed himself and all others only to be 
 justified by the merits of Christ ; which if so, then did he 
 verify the Greek and Latin proverb, 
 
 noXXaHif xai XdTOupoj avijfj jWaXa xatpisv Eiwev. 
 
 Sajpc Olitor valde verba o]iportuna loquutus. 
 
 The Gardiner oft-times in due season, 
 Speaks what is true and solid reason.
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 245 
 
 CCCXXXI.— CAVERN AT RTEGATE. 
 
 Nor may we forget a vault (wherein the finest sand I ever 
 saw) nigh Ryegate, capable conveniently to receive five 
 hundred men ; which subterranean castle, in ancient time, was 
 the receptacle of some great person, having several rooms 
 therein. If it he merely natural, it doth curiously imitate art; 
 if purely artificial, it doth most lively simulate nature. * 
 
 CCCXXXII.— A BOOTLESS JOURNEY. 
 
 About the third of the reign of Queen Mary, a pursuivant 
 was sent with a commission into Ireland, to empower some 
 eminent persons to proceed, with fire and fagot, against poor 
 Protestants. It happened, by divine providence, this pur- 
 suivant at Chester lodged in the house of a Protestant inn- 
 keeper, who, having gotten some inkling of the matter, 
 secretly stole his commission out of his cloak-bag, and put the 
 knave of clubs in the room thereof. Some weeks after, he 
 appeared before the lords of the privy-council, at Dublin, and 
 produced a card for his pretended commission. They caused 
 him to be committed to prison for such an afii'ont, as done 
 on design to deride them. Here he lay for some mouths, 
 till witli much ado at last he got his enlargement. Then 
 over he returned to England ; and, quickly getting his com- 
 mission renewed, makes with all speed for Ireland again. 
 
 But, before his arrival there, he was prevented with the 
 news of Queen Mary's death ; and so the lives of many, and 
 the liberties of more, poor servants of God, were preserved. 
 
 CCCXXXIIL— ROBERT THORN. 
 
 I SEE it matters not what the name be, so the nature be
 
 24G FULLERIANA : OK, WISDOM AJ^D WIT OF 
 
 good. I confess, thorns came in by " man's curse ; " and our 
 Saviour saitli, " Do men gather grapes of thorna 1 " But this 
 our Thorn (may God send us many coppices of them !) was a 
 blessing to our nation, and wine and oil may be said freely 
 to flow from him. Being bred a merchant-tailor in London, 
 he gave more than four thousand four hundred forty-five 
 pounds to pious uses ; a sum sufiicient therewith to build and 
 endow.a college, the time being well considered, being towards 
 the beginning of the reign of King Heniy the Eighth. 
 
 I have observed some at the church-door cast in sixpence 
 with sucb ostentation, that it rebounded from the bottom, 
 and rung against both the sides of the basin, (so that the 
 same piece of silver was the alms and the giver's trumpet ;) 
 whilst otbers have dropped down, silent, five shillings with- 
 out any noise. Our Thorn was of the second sort, doing his 
 charity effectually, but with all possible privacy. Nor was 
 this good Christian abroad worse (in the apostle-phrase) than 
 an infidel at home, in not providing for his family ; who 
 gave to his poor kindred (besides debt forgiven unto them) 
 the sum of five thousand one hundred forty-two pounds. 
 
 CCCXXXIV.— SHAKSPEAKE. 
 
 Heraglitus himself (I mean if secret and unseen) might 
 afford to smile at his comedies, they were so mei-ry ; and 
 Democritus scarce forbear to sigh at his tragedies, they were 
 so mournful. . . . He was an eminent instance of the truth 
 of that rule, " Poeta non fit, sed nascitur ; " one is not made 
 but born a poet. Indeed his learning was very little; so that 
 as Cornish diamonds are not polished by any lapidary, but 
 are pointed and smoothed even as they are taken out of
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 247 
 
 the earili, so nature itself was all tlie art which, was used upon 
 him.* 
 
 Many were the wit combats betwixt him and Ben Jonson, 
 which two I beheld like a Spanish great galleon, and an 
 English man-of-war. Master Jonson (like the former) was 
 built far higher in learning, solid but slow in his performances. 
 Sliakespear, with the English man-of-war, lesser in bulk, but 
 lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, tack about and 
 take advantage of all winds, by the quickness of his wit and 
 invention. 
 
 CCCXXXV.— PASQUIL. 
 
 This Pasquil is an author eminent on many accounts. 
 First, for his self-concealment, being " noscens omnia, et uotus 
 nemini." Secondly, for his intelligence, who can display the 
 deeds of midnight at high noon, as if he hid himself in the holes 
 of their bed-staves, knowingwho werecardinal's children better 
 than they knew their fathers. Thirdly, for his impai'tial 
 boldness. He was made all of tongue and teeth, biting what- 
 ever he touched, and it bled whatever he bit ; yea, as if a 
 general council and Pasquil were only above the Pope, he 
 would not stick to tell where he trod his holy sandals awry. 
 Fourthly, for his longevity, having lived (or rather lasted) ia 
 Rome some hundreds of years ; whereby he appears no 
 particular person, but a successive corpoi'ation of satirists. 
 Lastly, for his impunity, escaping the Inquisition ; whereof 
 some assign this reason, because hei'eby the court of Rome 
 comes to know her faults, or rather to know that their faults 
 are known ; which makes Pasquil's converts (if not more 
 honest) more wary in their behaviour. 
 
 * Few modern readers will agree with Fuller here.
 
 248 
 
 fullertaxa; ob, wisdom and wit of 
 
 CCCXXXVI— THOMAS TARLTON, ELIZABETH'S JESTEK. 
 
 He was in the field keeping his father's swine, when a 
 servant of Robert Earl of Leicester (passing this way to his 
 lord's lands in his barony of Denbigh) was so highly pleased 
 with his liappy unhappy answers, that he brought him to 
 court, where he became the most famous jester to queen 
 Elizabeth. 
 
 Many condemned his (vocation I cannot term it, for is a 
 coming without a calling) employment as unwarrantable. 
 Such maintain, that it is better to be a fool of God's making, 
 born so into the world, or a fool of man's making, jeered 
 into it by genei-al derision, than a fool of one's own making, 
 by his voluntary affecting thei'eof. Such say also, he had 
 better continued in his trade of swine keeping, which (though 
 more painful, and less profitable) his conscience changed to 
 loss, for a jester's place in the court, who, of all men, have the 
 hardest accoxmt to make for every idle word that they 
 abundantly utter. 
 
 Others allege, in excuse of their practices, that princes in 
 all ages were allowed their aosraXo'yo/, whose virtue con- 
 sisted in speaking any thing without control : that jesters 
 often heal what flatterers hurt, so that princes by them arrive 
 at the notice of their errors, seeing jesters carry about with 
 them an act of indemnity for whatsoever they say or do. . . . 
 Our Tarlton was master of his faculty. When Queen Eliza- 
 beth was serious (I dare not say sullen), and out of good 
 humour, he could unduvipisli, her at his pleasure. Her 
 highest favourites would, in some cases, go to Tarlton, before 
 they would go to the queen, and he was their usher to pre- 
 pare their advantageous access unto her. In a woi'd, he told
 
 THOMAS FULLER. 249 
 
 the queen more of her faults than most of her chaplains, and 
 cured her melancholy better than all her physicians. 
 
 Much of his merriment lay in his very looks and actions 
 according to the epitaph written upon him : 
 
 "Hie situs est cujus poterat vox, actio, vultus, 
 Ex Heraclito reddere Democritum." 
 
 Indeed, the selfsame words, spoken by another, would hardly 
 move a merry man to smile ; which, uttered by him, would 
 force a sad soul to laughter. 
 
 This is to be reported to his praise, that his jests never 
 wei'e profane, scurrilous, nor satirical ; neither trespassing on 
 piety, modesty, or charity, as in which phirimum inerat salis, 
 muUum aceti, aliquid sinapis, nihil veneni, 
 
 CCCXXXVI — JEFFREY, THE DWARF OP CHARLES I. 
 
 Jeffrey was born in the parish of Okeham in this county,* 
 where his father was a very proper man, broad-shouldered 
 and chested, though his son never arrived at a full ell in 
 stature. ... It seems that families sometimes are checquered, as 
 in brains so in bulk, that no certainty .can be concluded from 
 such alternations. 
 
 His father, who kept and ordered the baiting bulls for 
 George Duke of Buckingham (a place, you will say, requiring 
 a robustious body to manage it), presented him, at Burleigh 
 on the Hill, to the duchess of Buckingham, being then nine 
 years of age, and scarce a foot and a half in height, as I am 
 informed by credible persons, then and there present, and 
 still alive. Instantly Jeffrey was heightened (not in stature 
 but in condition) from one degree above I'ags into silk and 
 satin, and two tall men to attend him. 
 
 * Rutland.
 
 250 FULLEKIANA : OK, WISDOM AND WIT OF 
 
 He was, without any deformity, wholly proportionable ; 
 whereas often dwarfs, pigmies in one part, are giants in. 
 another. ... 
 
 It was not long before he was presented in a cold baked 
 pie to king Charles and queen Mary at an entertainment ; 
 and ever after lived (whilst the court lived) in great plenty 
 therein, wanting notjiing but humility (high mind in a low 
 body), which made him that he did not know himself, and 
 would not know his father, and which by the king's command 
 caused justly his sound correction. 
 
 He was, though a dwarf, no dastard ; a captain of horse in 
 the king's army in these late civil wars^ and afterwards went 
 over to wait on the queen in France. 
 
 Here being provoked by Mr. Crofts, who accounted him 
 the object not of his anger but contempt, he shewed to all, 
 that habet musca suum splenum ; and they must be little 
 indeed that cannot do mischief, especially seeing a pistol is a 
 pure leveller, and puts both dwarf and giant into equal capa- 
 city to kill and be killed. Tor the shooting the same Mr. 
 Ci'ofts he was imprisoned. And so I may take my leave of 
 Jeffrey, the least man of the least county in England. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 P. 
 
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