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 EELIGIO MEDICI.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI, 
 
 UYDRIOTAPHIA, AND THE LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 BY 
 
 Sir THOMAS BROWNE, Kxt. 
 
 WITH AX INTRODUCTION AND NOTES I5Y 
 .1. W. WILLIS BUND, M.A., LL.B., 
 
 VMSSWJJL AND CAIlfi CULLEGE, CAMBRIOGR, 
 4»F L1!!00IJ*'*S INN, BARIUHTKK-AT-LAW. 
 
 LONDON: 
 SAMPSON UJW, SON, AND JIAUSTON, 
 
 • •ROWS Rl' 1 1,1)1 NOB, 188 VX.V.Kl HTUKKT. 
 
 \9m.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 |IR THOMAS BROWNE (whose works occupy 
 so prominent a position in the literary his- 
 tory of the seventeenth century) is an author 
 who is now little known and less read. This com- 
 parative oblivion to which he has been consigned is 
 the more remarkable, as, if for nothing else, his 
 writings deserve to be studied as an example of the 
 English language in what may be termed a transition 
 state. The prose of the Elizabethan age was begin- 
 ning to pass away and give place to a more inflated 
 style of writing, — a style which, after passing through 
 various stages of development, culminated in that of 
 Johnson. 
 
 Browne is one of the best early examples of this 
 Bcbool; his style, to quote Johnson himself, "is 
 vigorous but rugged, it is learned but pedantick, it 
 i.H deep but obscure, it strikes but does not please, it 
 commands but does not allure. . . . Tt is a tiasuo
 
 iv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 of many languages, a mixture of heterogeneous words 
 brought together from distant regions." 
 
 Yet in spite of this qualified censure, there are 
 passages in Browne's works not inferior to any in 
 the English language ; and though his writings may 
 not be " a well of English undefiled," yet it is the 
 very defilements that add to the beauty of the work. 
 
 But it is not only as an example of literary style 
 that Browne deserves to be studied. The matter of 
 his works, the grandeur of his ideas, the originality 
 of his thoughts, the greatness of his charity, amply 
 make up for the deficiencies (if deficiencies there be) 
 in his style. An author who combined the wit of 
 Montaigne with the learning of Erasmus, and of 
 whom even Hallam could say that " his varied talents 
 wanted nothing but the controlling supremacy of good 
 sense to place him in the highest rank of our litera- 
 ture," should not be suffered to remain in obscurity. 
 
 A short account of his life will form the best 
 introduction to his works. 
 
 Sir Thomas Browne was born in London, in the 
 parish of St Michael le Quern, on the 19th of October 
 1 605. His father was a London merchant, of a good 
 Cheshire family; and his mother a Sussex lady, 
 daughter of Mr Paul Garraway of Lewis. His 
 father died when he was very young, and his mother 
 marrying again shortly afterwards, Browne was left 
 to the care of his guardians, one of whom is said to
 
 INTRODUCTION. v 
 
 have defrauded him out of some of his property, lie 
 was educated at Winchester, and afterwards sent to 
 Oxford, to what is now Pembroke College, where he 
 took his degree of M.A. in 1629. Thereupon he 
 commenced for a short time to practise as a physician 
 in Oxfordshire. But we soon find Hm growing tired 
 of this, and accompanying Ms father-in-law, Sir 
 Thomas Button, on a tour of inspection of the castles 
 and forts in Ireland. We next hear of Browne in 
 the south of France, at Moutpeliier, then a celebrated 
 school of medicine, where he seems to have studied 
 some little time. From there he proceeded to Padua, 
 one of the most famous of the Italian universities, 
 and noted for the views some of its members 
 held on the subjects of astronomy and necromancy. 
 During his residence here, Browne doubtless acquired 
 some of his peculiar ideas on the science of the 
 heavens and the black art, and, what was more im- 
 portant, he learnt to regard the Romanists with that 
 abundant charity we find throughout his works. 
 From Padua, BrovsTie went to Leyden, and this sud- 
 den change from a most bigoted Roman Catholic to 
 a most bigoted Protestant country was not without 
 its effect on his mind, as can be traced in his book. 
 Uere he took the degree of Doctor of Medicine, and 
 shortly afterwards returned to England. Soon after 
 his return, about the year 1G35, he published his 
 " Religio Medici," his first and greatest work, wliioh
 
 vi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 may be fairly regarded as the reflection of the miDd 
 of one wlio, in spite of a strong intellect and vast 
 erudition, was still prone to superstition, but having 
 
 " Through many cities strayed, 
 Their customs, laws, and manners weighed," 
 
 had obtained too large views of mankind to become 
 a bigot. 
 
 After the publication of his book he settled at 
 Norwich, where he soon had an extensive practice 
 as a physician. From hence there remains little to 
 be told of his life. In 1637 he was incorporated 
 Doctor of Medicine at Oxford; and in 1641 he 
 married Dorothy the daughter of Edward Mileham, 
 of Burlingham in Norfolk, and had by her a family 
 of eleven children. 
 
 In 1646 he published his " Pseudodoxia Epi- 
 demica," or Enquiries into Vulgar Errors. The dis- 
 covery of some Roman urns at Burnham in Nor- 
 folk, led him in 1658 to write his " Hydriotaphia" 
 (Urn-burial); he also published at the same time 
 " The Garden of Cyrus, or the Quincunxcial Lozenge 
 of the Ancients," a curious work, but far inferior to 
 his other productions. 
 
 In 1665 he was elected an honorary Fellow of 
 the CoUege of Physicians, " virtute et literis orna- 
 tissimus." 
 
 Browne had always been a Royalist. In 1 643 he
 
 INTRODUCTION. vii 
 
 had refused to subscribe to the fund that was then 
 being raised for regaining Newcastle. He proved a 
 happy exception to the almost proverbial neglect the 
 Koyalists received from Charles II. in 1671, for when 
 Charles was at Newmarket, he came over to see Nor- 
 wich, and conferred the honour of knighthood on 
 Browne. His reputation was now very great, Evelyn 
 paid a visit to Norwich for the express purpose of 
 seeing him ; and at length, on his 7Gth birthday 
 {19th October 1G82), he died, full of years and 
 honours. 
 
 It was a striking coincidence that he who in his 
 Letter to a Friend had said that " in persons who out- 
 live many years, and when there are no less than 
 365 days to determine their lives in every year, that 
 the first day should mark the last, that the tail 
 of the snake should return into its mouth precisely 
 at that time, and that they should wind up upon the 
 tlay of their nativity, is indeed a remarkable coin- 
 cidence, which, though astrology hath taken witty 
 jjains to solve, yet hath it been very wary in making 
 predictions of it," should himself die on the day of 
 his birth. 
 
 Browne was buried in the church of St Peter, 
 Mancroft, Norwich, where his wife erected to his 
 memory a mural monument, on which was placed 
 an English and Latin in.scription, setting forth that 
 he waathe author of "Rcligio Medici," "Pseudodoxia
 
 viii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Epidemica," and other learned works " per orbem 
 notissimus. " . Yet his sleep was not to be undisturbed ; 
 his skull was fated to adorn a museum ! In 1840, 
 while some workmen were digging a vault in the 
 chancel of St Peter's, they found a coffin with an 
 
 inscription — 
 
 " Amplissimus Vir 
 U"^ Thomas Browne Miles Medicinse 
 D"^ Annis Natus 77 Denatus 19 Die 
 
 Mensis Octobris Anno D°J 1682 hoc. 
 Loculo indormiena Corporis Spagy- 
 rici pulvere plumbum in aurum 
 convertit." 
 
 The translation of this inscription raised a storm 
 over his ashes, which Browne would have enjoyed 
 partaking in, the word spagyricus being an enigma 
 to scholars. Mr Firth of Norwich (whose translation 
 seems the best) thus renders the inscription : — 
 
 " The very distinguished man, Sir Thomas Browne, Knight, 
 Doctor of Medicine, aged 77 years, who died on the 19th of 
 October, in the year of our Lord 1682, sleeping in this coffin 
 of lead, by the dust of his alchemic body, transmutes it into 
 a coffer of gold. 
 
 After Sir Thomas's death, two collections of his 
 works were published, one by Archbishop Tenison, 
 and the other in 1772. They contain most of his 
 letters, his tracts on various subjects, and his Letter 
 to a Friend. Various editions of parts of Browne's 
 works have from time to time appeared. By far the
 
 INTRODUCTION. ix 
 
 best edition of the whole of them is that published 
 by Simon Wilkin. 
 
 It is upon his " Eeligio Medici " — the religion of a 
 physician — that Browne's fame chiefly rests. It was 
 his first and most celebrated work, jjublished just after 
 his return from his travels ; it gives us the impres- 
 sions made on his mind by the various and opposite 
 schools he had passed through. He tells us that he 
 never intended to publish it, but that on its being 
 surreptitiously printed, he was induced to do so. 
 In 1G4:3, the first genuine edition appeared, with 
 " an admonition to such as shall peruse the 
 observations upon a former corrupt copy of this 
 book." The observations here alluded to, were 
 written by Sir Kenelm Digby, and sent by him to 
 the Earl of Dorset. They were first printed at the 
 end of the edition of 1G43, and have ever since been 
 published with the book. Their chief merit consists 
 in the marvellous rapidity with which they were 
 written. Sir Kenelm having, as he tells us, bought 
 the book, read it, and written his observations, in 
 the course of twenty-four hours ! 
 
 The book contains what may be termed an 
 apology for his belief. He states the reasons on 
 which he grounds his opinions, and endeavours to 
 show that, although he had been accused of atlieism, 
 he was in all points a good Cliristiaii, and a loyal 
 member of the Church of England. Each pci'Hoii
 
 X INTRODUCTION. 
 
 must judge for himself of Ms success ; but the effect 
 it produced on the mind of Johnson may be 
 noticed. " The opinions of every man," says he, 
 " must be learned from himself ; concerning his 
 practice, it is safer to trust to the evidence of others. 
 When the testimonies concur, no higher degree of 
 historical certainty can be obtained ; and they 
 apparently concur to prove that Browne was a 
 zealous adherent to the faith of Christ, that he 
 lived in obedience to His laws, and died in con- 
 fidence of His mercy." 
 
 The best proof of the excellence of the " Religio " 
 is to be found in its great success. During the 
 author's life, from 1643 to 1681, it passed through 
 eleven editions. It has been translated into Latin, 
 Dutch, French, and German, and many of the 
 translations have passed through several editions. 
 No less than thirty-three treatises have been written 
 in imitation of it ; and what, to some, will be the 
 greatest proof of all, it was soon after its publication 
 placed in the Index Expurgatorius. The best proof 
 of its liberality of sentiment is in the fact that its 
 author was claimed at the same time by the Romanists 
 and Quakers to be a member of their respective 
 creeds ! 
 
 The " Hydriotaphia," or Urn-burial, is a treatise 
 on the funeral rites of ancient nations. It was 
 caused by the discovery of some Roman urns in
 
 INTRODUCTIOX. xi 
 
 Norfolk. Though inferior to the " Religio," " there is 
 perhaps none of his works which better exemplifies 
 his reading or memory." 
 
 The text of the present edition of the "Religio 
 Medici" is taken from what is called the eiirhth 
 
 O 
 
 edition, but is in reality the eleventh, published in 
 London in 1682, the last edition in the author's life- 
 time. The notes are for the most part compiled 
 from the observations of Sir Kenelm Digby, the 
 annotation of Mr Keck, and the very valuable notes 
 of Simon Wilkin. For the account of the tindinjr 
 of Sir Thomas Browne's skull I am indebted to Mr 
 Friswell's notice of Sir Thomas in his " Varia." 
 The text of the " Hydriotaphia " is taken from the 
 folio edition of 1686, in the Lincoln's Lui 
 library. Some of Browne's notes to that edition 
 have been omitted, and most of the references, as 
 they refer to books which are not likely to be met 
 with by the general reader. 
 
 The " Letter to a Friend, upon the occasion of the 
 Death of his intimate Friend," was first published in 
 a folio pamphlet in 1090. It was reprinted in his 
 posthumous works. The concluding reflexions are 
 the basis of a larger work, " Christian Morals." I 
 am not aware of any complete modern edition of it. 
 The text of the present one is taken from the 
 original edition of 1690. The pamphlet is in the 
 I'ritish Museum, bound up with a volume of old
 
 xii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 poems. It is entitled, " A Letter to a Friend, upon 
 the occasion of the Death of his intimate Friend. 
 By the learned Sir Thomas Brown, Knight, Doctor 
 of Physick, late of Norwich. London : Printed for 
 Charles Brone, at the Gun, at the West End of St 
 Paul's Churchyard, 1690."
 
 TO THE READER. 
 
 ERTAINLY that man were greedy of life, who 
 nhoidd desire to live when all the world were 
 at an end ; and he must needs be very im- 
 patient, who would repine at death in the society of all 
 things that suirur under it. Had not abnost every man 
 suffered by the press, or were not the tyranny thereof 
 become miiversal, I had not wanted reason for com- 
 plaint : but in times wlierein I have lived to behold 
 the highest perversion of that excellent invention, the 
 name of his Majesty defamed, the honour of Parlia- 
 ment depraved, the Avritings of both depravedly, antici- 
 patively, counterfcitly, imprinted : complaints may 
 seem ridiculous in private persons ; and men of my 
 c^jndition may be as incapable of affronts, as hopeless 
 of their reparations. And truly had not the duty I 
 owe unto tiie importunity of friends, and the allegiance 
 I must ever acknowledge unto truth, jircvailcd with 
 me ; the inactivity of my disposition niiglit have made 
 these HulFeringH continual, ami time, tliat l>rings otlier 
 things to light, should have satisfied me in the remedy 
 
 A.
 
 2 TO THE READER. 
 
 of its oblivion. But because things evidently false are 
 not only printed, but many things of truth most falsely 
 set forth ; in this latter I could not but think myself 
 engaged : for, though we have no power to redress the 
 former, yet in the other reparation being within our- 
 selves, I have at present represented unto the world a 
 full and intended copy of that piece, which was most 
 imperfectly and surreptitiously published before. 
 
 This I confess, about seven years past, with some 
 others of afl&nity thereto, for my private exerqise and 
 satisfaction, I had at leisurable hours composed; which 
 being communicated unto one, it became common unto 
 many, and was by transcription successively corrupted, 
 until it arrived in a most depraved copy at the press. 
 He that shall peruse that work, and shall take notice 
 of sundry particulars and personal expressions therein, 
 wiU. easily discern the intention was not publick : and, 
 being a private exercise directed to myself, what is de- 
 livered therein was rather a memorial unto me, than an 
 example or rule unto any other : and therefore, if there 
 be any singularity therein correspondent unto the pri- 
 vate conceptions of any man, it doth not advantage 
 them ; or if dissentaneous thereunto, it no way over- 
 throws them. It was penned in such a place, and with 
 such disadvantage, that (I protest), from the first setting 
 of pen unto paper, I had not the assistance of any good 
 book, whereby to promote my invention, or relieve my 
 memory ; and therefore there might be many real lapses 
 therein, which others might take notice of, and more 
 that I suspected myself. It was set down many years 
 past, and was the sense of my conceptions at that time, 
 ' not an immutable law unto my advancing judgment at 
 all times; and therefore there might be many things 
 therein plausible unto my passed apprehension, which
 
 TO THE READER. 3 
 
 are not agreeable unto my present self. There are many 
 things delivered rhetorically, many expressions therein 
 merely tropical, and as they best illustrate my inten- 
 tion; and therefore also there are many things to be 
 taken in a soft and flexible sense, and not to be called 
 imto the rigid test of reason. Lastly, all that is con- 
 tained therein is in submission unto maturer discern- 
 ments ; and, as I have declared, shall no farther father 
 them than the best and learned judgments shaD au- 
 thorize them : under favour of which considerations, I 
 have made its secrecy publick, and conmiitted the truth 
 thereof to every ingenuous reader. 
 
 Thomas Browne.
 
 ^^^3 
 
 i 
 
 
 i 
 
 -y:^?^ 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 |ECT. 1. — For my religion, though there he several 
 circumstances that might persuade the world 1 
 liave none at all, — as the general scandal of my 
 profession,* — the natural course of my studies, — the in- 
 differency of my behaviour and discourse in matters of 
 religion (neither violently defending one, nor with that 
 common ardour and contention opposing another), — 
 yet, in despite hereof, I dare without usurpation assume 
 the honourable style of a Christian. Not that I merely 
 owe this title to the font, my education, or the clime 
 wherein I waa bom, as being bred up either to confirm 
 those principles my parents instilled into my imder- 
 standing, or by a general consent proceed in the religion 
 of my country ; but having, in my riper years and con- 
 finned judgment, seen and examined all, I find myself 
 obliged, by the principles of grace, and tlie law of mine 
 own rea-son, to embrace no other name but this. Neither 
 doth herein my zeal so far make me forget the general 
 charity I owe unto humanity, as rather to hate than 
 |iity TurkH, Infidels, and (what is worse) Jews ; rather
 
 6 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 contenting myself to enjoy that happy style, than 
 maligning those who refuse so glorious a title. 
 
 Bed. 2. — But, because the name of a Christian is be- 
 come too general to express our faith, — there being a 
 geography of religion as well as lands, and every clime 
 distinguished not only by their laws and limits, but 
 circumscribed by their doctrines and rules of faith, — to 
 be particular, I am of that reformed new-cast religion, 
 wherein I dislike nothing but the name ; of the same 
 belief our Saviour taught, the apostles disseminated, 
 the fathers authorized, and the martyrs confirmed ; but, 
 by the sinister ends of princes, the ambition and avarice 
 of prelates, and the fatal corruption of times, so decayed, 
 impaired, and fallen from its native beauty, that it re- 
 quired the careful and charitable hands of these times 
 to restore it to its primitive integrity. Now, the acci- 
 dental occasion whereupon, the slender means whereby, 
 the low and abject condition of the person by whom, 
 so good a work was set on foot, which in our adver- 
 saries beget contempt and scorn, fills me ■with wonder, 
 and is the very same objection the insolent pagans first 
 cast at Christ and his disciples. 
 
 /S'eci. 3. — Yet have I not so shaken hands with those 
 desperate resolutions who had rather venture at large 
 their decayed bottom, than bring her in to be new- 
 trimmed in the dock, — who had rather promiscuously 
 retain all, than abridge any, and obstinately be what 
 chey are, than what they have been, — as to stand in 
 diameter and sword's point with them. We have re- 
 formed from them, not against them : for, omitting 
 those improperations ^ and terms of scurrility betwixt 
 us, which only difi'erence our affections, and not our 
 cause, there is between us one common name and ap- 
 pellation, one faith and necessary body of principles
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 7 
 
 c<)mmon to us both ; and therefore I am not scrupulous 
 to converse and live with them, to enter their churches 
 in defect of ours, and either pray with them or for them. 
 I could never perceive any rational consequence from 
 those many texts which prohibit the children of Israel 
 to pollute themselves with the temples of the heathens ; 
 we being all Christians, and not divided by such de- 
 tested impieties as might profane our prayere, or the 
 place wherein we make them ; or that a resolved con- 
 science may not adore her Creator anywhere, especially 
 in places devoted to his service ; if their devotions 
 otfend him, mine may please him : if theirs profane it, 
 mine may hallow it Holy water and crucifix (danger- 
 ous to the common people) deceive not my judgment, 
 nor abuse my devotion at alL I am, I confess, natur- 
 ally inclined to that which misguided zeal terms super- 
 stition : my common conversation I do acknowledge 
 austere, my behaviour full of rigour, sometimes not 
 without morosity ; yet, at my devotion I love to use 
 the civility of my knee, my hat, and hand, with all 
 those outward and sensible motions which may express 
 or promote my invisible devotion, I should violate my 
 own arm rather than a church ; nor willingly deface 
 the name of saint or martyr. At the sight of a cross, or 
 crucifix, I can dispense with my hat, but scarce with 
 the thought or memory of my Saviour. I cannot laugh 
 at, but rather pity, the fruitless journeys of pilgrims, 
 or contemn the miserable condition of friars ; for, though 
 misplaced in circumstances, there is something in it of 
 devotion. I could never hear the Ave-Maiy bell* 
 
 • A church-bell, that tolls every day at six and twelve of 
 the clock ; at the hearing wliercof every one, in wliat phiro 
 KMTcr, cithiTof houHo or Btrcct, hctnkcs himuelf to hb {niiyur, 
 which U commonly directed to the Vir(pn.
 
 8 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 Avithout an elevation, or tliink it a sufficient warrant, 
 because they erred in one circumstance, for me to err 
 in all, — that is, in silence and dumb contempt. Whilst, 
 therefore, they direct their devotions to her, I offered 
 mine to God ; and rectify the errors of their prayers by 
 rightly ordering mine own. At a solemn procession I 
 have wept abundantly, while my consorts, blind with 
 opposition and prejudice, have fallen into an excess of 
 scorn and laughter. There are, questionless, both in 
 Greek, Eoman, and African churches, solemnities and 
 ceremonies, whereof the wiser zeals do make a Chris- 
 tian use ; and stand condemned by us, not as evil in 
 themselves, but as allurements and baits of superstition 
 to those vulgar heads that look asquint on the face of^ 
 truth, and those unstable judgments that cannot resist 
 in the narrow point and centre of virtue without a reel 
 or stagger to the circumference. 
 
 Sect. 4. — As there were many reformers, so likewise 
 many reformations ; every country proceeding in a par- 
 ticular way and method, according as their national 
 interest, together with their constitution and clime, in- 
 clined them : some angrily and with extremity ; others 
 calmly and with mediocrity, not. rending, but easily 
 dividing, the community, and leaving an honest possi- 
 bility of a reconciliation ; — which, though peaceable 
 spirits do desire, and may conceive that revolution of 
 time and the mercies of God may eiTect, yet that judg- 
 ment that shall consider the present antipathies between 
 the two extremes, — their contrarieties in condition, 
 affection, and opinion, — may, with the same hopes, 
 expect a union in the poles of heaven. 
 
 &e,d. 5. — But, to difference myself nearer, and draw 
 into a lesser circle ; there is no church whose every part 
 so squares unto my conscience, whose articles, constitii-
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 9 
 
 tions, and customs, seem so consonant unto reason, and, 
 as it were, framed to my particular devotion, as tliis 
 whereof I hold my belief — the Church of England ; to 
 whose faith I am a sworn subject, and therefore, in a 
 double obligation, subscribe unto her articles, and en- 
 deavour to observe her constitutions : whatsoever is 
 beyond, as points indifferent, I observe, according to the 
 rules of my private reason, or the humour and fashion 
 of my devotion ; neither believing this because Luther 
 aifirmed it, nor disproving that because Calvin hath dis- 
 avouched it I condemn not all things in tlie council 
 of Trent, nor approve all in the s}Tiod of Dort.3 In 
 brief, where the Scripture is silent, the church is my 
 text ; where that speaks, 'tis but my comment ; < where 
 there is a joint silence of both, I borrow not the rules of 
 my religion from Rome or Geneva, but from the dictates 
 of my own reason. It is an unjust scandal of our ad- 
 versaries, and a gross error in ourselves, to compute the 
 nativity of our religion from Henry the Eighth ; who, 
 though he rejected the Pope, refused not the faith of 
 Rome,* and effected no more than what his o^vn pre- 
 decessors desired and essayed in ages past, and it was 
 conceived the state of Venice would have attempted in 
 our days.* It is as uncliaiitable a point in us to faU 
 upon those popular scurrilities and opprobrious scoffs of 
 the Bishop of Rome, to whom, as a temporal prince, we 
 owe the duty of good language. I confess there is a 
 cause of pa.ssion between us : by his sentence I stand 
 excommunicated ; heretic is the best language he affords 
 me : yet can no ear witness I ever returned to him the 
 name of antichrist, man of sin, or wliore of Babylon. 
 It is tlie nu-thod of charity to sufFer without reaction : 
 those usual satin-s and invectives of the pulpit may per- 
 chance produce a good effect on the vulgar, whose ears
 
 lo RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 are opener to rhetoric than logic ; yet do tliey, in no 
 wise, confirm the faith of wiser believers, who know 
 that a good cause needs not be pardoned by passion, 
 but can sustain itself upon a temperate dispute. 
 
 Sect. 6. — I could never divide myself from any man 
 upon the difference of an opinion, or be angry with his 
 judgment for not agreeing with me in that from which, 
 perhaps, within a few days, I should dissent myself. I 
 have no genius to disputes in religion : and have often 
 thought it wisdom to decline them, especially upon a 
 disadvantage, or when the cause of truth might suffer 
 in the weakness of my patronage. Where we desire to 
 be informed, 'tis good to contest with men above our- 
 selves ; but, to confirm and establish our opinions, 'tia 
 best to argue with judgments below our own, that the 
 frequent spoils and victories over their reasons may 
 settle in ourselves an esteem and confirmed opinion of 
 our own. Every man is not a proper champion for 
 truth, nor fit to take up the gauntlet in the cause of 
 verity ; many, from the ignorance of these maxims, and 
 an inconsiderate zeal unto truth, have too rashly charged 
 the troops of error and remain as trophies unto the 
 enemies of truth. A man may be in as just possession 
 of truth as of a city, and yet be forced to surrender ; 'tis 
 therefore far better to enjoy her with peace than to 
 hazard her on a battle. If, therefore, there rise any 
 doubts in my way, I do forget them, or at least defer 
 them, till my better settled judgment and more manly 
 reason be able to resolve them ; for I perceive every 
 man's own reason is his best ffidipus,' and will, upon a 
 reasonable truce, find a way to loose those bonds where- 
 with the subtleties of error have enchained our more 
 flexible and tender judgments. In philosophy, where 
 truth seems double-faced, there is no man more paia-
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. ir 
 
 doxical than myself : but in div-inity I love to keep the 
 road ; and, though not in an implicit, yet an humble 
 faith, follow the great wheel of the church, by which I 
 move ; not reserving any proper poles, or motion from 
 the epicycle of my own brain. By this means I have 
 no gap for heresy, schisms, or errors, of wliich at pre- 
 sent, 1 hope I shall not injure truth to say, I have no 
 taint or tincture. I must confess my greener studies 
 have been polluted with two or three ; not any begotten 
 in the latter centuries, but old and obsolete, such as 
 could never have been revived but by such extravagant 
 and irregular heads as mine. For, indeed, heresies perish 
 not with their authors ; but, like the river Arethusa,^ 
 though they lose their currents in one place, they rise 
 up again in another. One general council is not able 
 to extirpate one single heresy : it may be cancelled for 
 the present ; but revolution of time, and the like aspects 
 from heaven, wiU restore it, when it will llouiish till it 
 be condemned again. For, as though there were metemp- 
 sychosis, and the soul of one man passed into another, 
 opinions do find, after certain revolutions, men and 
 minds like those that first begat thenu To see our- 
 selves again, we need not look for Plato's year : * every 
 man \a not only himself ; there have been many 
 Diogenes, and as many Timons, though but few of that 
 name ; men are lived over again ; the world is now as 
 it was in ages past ; there was none then, but there hath 
 l)een some one since, that parallels him, and is, as it 
 were, lus revived self. 
 
 Sect. 7. — Now, the first of mine was that of the 
 Arabians ; * that the souls of men perished with their 
 
 • A revolution of certain thousand years, when all thinpn 
 should return unto their former ehtate, and ho be tcachiu'j 
 ague in hi< school, aa when ho delivered this opinion.
 
 12 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 1)0(1168, but slioidd yet be raised again at the last day : 
 not that I did absolutely conceive a mortality of the 
 soul, but, if that were (which faith, not philosophy, 
 hath yet thoroiighly disproved), and that both entered 
 the grave together, yet I held the same conceit thereof 
 that we all do of the body, that it rise agaiu. Surely it 
 is but the merits of our unworthy natures, if we sleep 
 in darkness until the last alarm. A serious reflex upon 
 my own unworthiness did make me backward from 
 challenging this prerogative of my soul : so that I 
 might enjoy my Saviour at the last, I could with 
 patience be nothing almost unto eternity. The second 
 was that of Origen ; that God would not persist in his 
 vengeance for ever, but, after a definite time of his 
 wrath, would release the damned souls from torture ; 
 which error I fell into upon a serious contemplation of 
 the great attribute of God, his mercy ; and did a little 
 cherish it in myself, because I found therein no malice, 
 and a ready weight to sway me from the other extreme 
 of despair, whereunto melancholy and contemplative 
 natures are too easily disposed. A third there is, which 
 I did never positively maintain or practise, but have 
 often wished it had been consonant to truth, and not 
 offensive to my religion ; and that is, the prayer for the 
 dead ; whereunto I was inclined from some charitable 
 inducements, whereby I coiJd scarce contain my prayers 
 for a friend at the ringing of a bell, or behold his corpse 
 without an orison for his soul. 'Twas a good way, 
 methought, to be remembered by posterity, and far 
 more noble than a history. These opinions I never 
 maintained with pertinacity, or endeavoured to inveigle 
 any man's belief unto mine, nor so much as ever 
 revealed, or disputed them with my dearest friends ; by 
 which means I neither propagated them in others nor
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 13 
 
 confirmed them in myself : but, suffering them to flame 
 upon their oyra. substance, ^vithout addition of new 
 fuel, they went out insensibly of themselves ; therefore 
 these opinions, though condemned by lawful councils, 
 were not heresies in me, but bare errors, and single 
 lapses of my understanding, ■without a joint depravity 
 of my will. Those have not only depraved under- 
 standings, but diseased affections, which cannot enjoy a 
 singularity without a heresy, or be the author of an 
 opinion without they be of a sect also. This was the 
 villany of the first schism of Lucifer ; who was not 
 content to err alone, but drew into his faction many 
 legions ; and upon this experience he tempted only Eve, 
 well understanding the communicable nature of sin, and 
 that to deceive but one was tacitly and upon consequence 
 to delude them both. 
 
 Sect. 8. — That heresies should arise, we have the 
 prophecy of Christ ; but, that old ones should be 
 abolished, we hold no prediction. That there must 
 be heresies, is true, not only in our church, but also in 
 any other : even in the doctrines heretical there will be 
 superheresies ; and Arians, not only divided from the 
 church, but also among themselves : for heads that are 
 disposed imto schism, and complexionally propense to 
 innovation, are naturally indisposed for a community ; 
 nor will be ever confined unto the order or economy of 
 one body ; and therefore, when they separate from 
 others, they knit but loosely among themselves ; nor 
 contented with a general breach or dicliotoniy'" with 
 their churcli, do subdivide and mince themselves almost 
 into atoms. 'Tis true, that men of singular parts and 
 humours liave not been free from singular opinions and 
 conceits in all ages ; retaining soinetliiiig, not only 
 beside the opinion of his own church, or any other, but
 
 14 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 also any particular author ; ^111011, notwithstanding, a 
 sober judgment may do without offence or heresy ; for 
 there is yet, after all the decrees of councils, and the 
 niceties of the schools, many things, untouched, un- 
 imagined, wherein the liberty of an honest reason may 
 play and expatiate with security, and far without the 
 circle of a heresy. 
 
 Se,ct. 9. — As for those wingy mysteries in divinity, 
 and airy subtleties in religion, which have imhinged 
 the brains of better heads, they never stretched the fia 
 mater'^'^ of mine. Methinks there be not impossibilities 
 enough in religion for an active faith : the deepest 
 mysteries ours contains have not only been illustrated, 
 but maintained, by syllogism and the rule of reason. I 
 love to lose myself in a mystery ; to pursue my reason 
 to an altitudo ! 'Tis my solitary recreation to pose 
 my apprehension with those involved enigmas and 
 riddles of the Trinity — with incarnation and resurrec- 
 tion. I can answer all the objections of Satan and my 
 rebellious reason ■ndth that odd resolution I learned of 
 Tertullian, " Certum est quia irnpossibile est." I desire 
 to exercise my faith in the difficultest point ; for, to 
 credit ordinary and visible objects, is not faith, but 
 persuasion. Some believe the better for seeing Christ's 
 sepulchre; and, when they have seen the Red Sea, 
 doubt not of the miracle. Now, contrarily, I bless 
 myself, and am thankful, that I lived not in the days 
 of miracles ; that I never saw Christ nor his disciples. 
 I would not have been one of those Israelites that 
 passed the Red Sea ; nor one of Christ's patients, on 
 whom he wrought his wonders : then had my faith been 
 thrust upon me ; norshould I enjoy that greater blessing 
 pronounced to all that believe and saw not. 'Tis an 
 easy and necessary belief, to credit what our eye and
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 15 
 
 pon?e hath examined. I believe he was dead, and 
 buried, and rose again ; and desire to see hiin in his 
 glory, rather than to contemplate him in his cenotaph 
 or sepulchre. Nor is this much to believe ; as we have 
 reason, we owe this faitli unto history : they only had 
 the advantage of a bold and noble faith, who lived 
 before his coming, who, upon obscure prophesies and 
 mystical tj'pes, could raise a belief, and expect apparent 
 impossibilities. 
 
 Sect. 10. — 'Tis true, there is an edge in all firm belief, 
 and with an easy metaphor we may say, the sword of 
 faith ; but in these obscurities I rather use it in the 
 adjunct the apostle gives it, a buckler ; under which I 
 conceive a wary combatant may lie invulnerable. Since 
 I was of understanding to know that we knew nothing, 
 my reason hath been more pliable to the will of faith : 
 I am now content to understand a mystery, without a 
 rigid definition, in an easy and Platonic description. 
 That allegorical description of Hermes* pleaseth me 
 beyond all the metaphysical definitions of divines. 
 Where I cannot satisfy my reason, I love to humour 
 my fancy : I had as lieve you tell me that anima est 
 angeliLS hominis, est corpus Dei, as imeXix^ia -j—lwx est 
 umbra Dei, as actiLs perspicui. Wliere there is an 
 obscurity too deep for our reason, 'tis good to sit down 
 with a description, periphrasis, or adumbration ;^2 for, 
 by acquainting our reason how unable it is to disjilay 
 the visible and obvious eflfects of nature, it becomes 
 more humble and submissive unto the subtleties of faith : 
 and thus I teach my haggard and unreclaimed reason 
 to Btoop unto the lure of faith. I believe there was 
 alrca/ly a tree, whose fruit our unhai)py parents tasted, 
 tliough, in the same chapter when Uod forbids it, 'tis 
 
 • "Sphscra cuju« centrum ubi(|ue, circumferontiu nullibL"
 
 i6 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 positively said, tlie plants of the field were not yet 
 grown ; for God had not caused it to rain upon the 
 earth. I believe that the serpent (if we shall literally 
 understand it), from his proper form and figure, made 
 his motion on his helly, before the curse. I find the 
 trial of the pucelage and virginity of women, which God 
 ordained the Jews, is very fallible. Experience and 
 history informs me that, not only many particular 
 women, but likewise whole nations, have escaped the 
 curse of childbirth, which God seems to pronounce upon 
 the whole sex ; yet do I believe that all this is true, 
 which, indeed, my reason would persuade me to be 
 false : and this, I think, is no vulgar part of faith, to 
 believe a thing not only above, but contrary to, reason, 
 and against the arguments of our proper senses. 
 
 Sect. 11. — In my solitary and retired imagination 
 (" neque, enim cum porticus aut me lectulus accepit, desum 
 mihi"), I remember I am not alone ; and therefore forget 
 not to contemplate him and his attributes, who is ever 
 with me, especially those two mighty ones, his wisdom 
 and eternity. With the one I recreate, with the other 
 I confound, my understanding : for who can speak of 
 eternity without a solecism, or think thereof without 
 an ecstasy ? Time we may comprehend ; 'tis but five 
 days elder than ourselves, and hath the same horoscope 
 with the world ; but, to retire so far back as to appre- 
 hend a beginning, — to give such an infinite start for- 
 wards as to conceive an end, — in an essence that we 
 affirm hath neither the one nor the other, it puts my 
 reason to St Paul's sanctuary : my philosophy dares not 
 say the angels can do it. God hath not made a creature 
 that can comprehend him ; 'tis a privilege of his own 
 nature : " I am that I am " was his own definition unto 
 Moses ; and 'twas a short one to confound mortality,
 
 KELIGIO MEDICI. 17 
 
 that durst question God, or ask him what he was. In- 
 deed, he only is ; all others have and shall be ; but, in 
 eternity, there is no distinction of tenses ; and therefore 
 that terrible term, predestination, which hath troubled 
 so many weak heads to conceive, and the ^\^sest to ex- 
 plain, is in respect to God no prescious determination of 
 our estates to come, but a definitive blast of his will 
 already fulfilled, and at the instant that he first decreed 
 it ; for, to his eternity, which is indivisible, and alto- 
 gether, the last trump is already sounded, the reprobates 
 in the flame, and the blessed in Abraham's bosom. St 
 Peter speaks modestly, when he saith, " a thousand 
 years to God are but as one day ; " for, to speak like a 
 philosopher, those continued instances of time, which 
 flow into a thousand years, make not to him one moment. 
 "VMiat to us is to come, to his eternity is present ; his 
 whole duration being but one permanent point, -n-ithout 
 succession, parts, flux, or division. 
 
 Std. 12. — There is no attribute that adds more diffi- 
 culty to the mystery of the Trinity, Avhere, though in a 
 relative way of Father and Son, we must deny a priority. 
 I wonder how Aristotle could conceive the world eternal, 
 or how he could make good two eternities. His simili- 
 tude, of a triangle comprehended in a square, doth some- 
 what illustrate the trinity of our souls, and that the 
 triple unity of God ; for there is in us not three, but a 
 trinity of, souls ; because there is in us, if not three dis- 
 tinct souls, yet diff"ering faculties, that can and do subsist 
 apart in different subjects, and yet in ns are thus united 
 as to make but one soul and substance. If one soul 
 were so perfect as to inform three distinct bodies, that 
 were a petty trinity. Conceive the distinct number of 
 three, not divided nor separated by the intellect, but 
 actuallv comprehended in its un»ty, and that is a pcr- 
 
 B
 
 i8 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 feet trinity. I have often admired the mystical way of 
 Pythagoras, and the secret magick of numbers. " Be- 
 ware of philosophy," is a precept not to be received in 
 too large a sense : for, in this mass of nature, there is 
 a set of things that carry in their front, though not in 
 capital letters, yet in stenography and short characters, 
 something of divinity ; wliich, to wser reasons, serve as 
 luminaries in the abyss of knowledge, and, to judicious 
 beliefs, as scales and roundles to mount the pinnacles 
 and highest pieces of divinity. The severe schools shall 
 never laugh me out of the philosophy of Hermes, that 
 this visible world is but a picture of the invisible, where- 
 in, as in a portrait, things are not truly, but in equivocal 
 shapes, and as they counterfeit some real substance in 
 that invisible fabrick. 
 
 Se,ct. 13. — That other attribute, wherewith I recreate 
 my devotion, is his wisdom, in which I am happy ; and 
 for the contemplation of this only do not repent me that 
 I was bred in the way of study. The advantage I have 
 of the vulgar, with the content and happiness I conceive 
 therein, is an ample recompense for all my endeavours, 
 in what part of knowledge soever. Wisdom is his most 
 beauteous attribute : no man can attain unto it : yet 
 Solomon pleased God when he desired it. He is wise, 
 because he knows all things ; and he knoweth all things, 
 because he made them all : but his greatest knowledge 
 is in comprehending that he made not, that is, himself. 
 And this is also the greatest knowledge in man. For 
 this do I honour my own profession, and embrace the 
 counsel even of the devil himself : had he read such a 
 lecture in Paradise as he did at Delphos,*^* we had 
 better known ourselves ; nor had we stood in fear to 
 
 * " r^'wtft (Teoi'T6»'. " "Nosce teipsum."
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 19 
 
 know him. I know God is wise in all ; wonderful in 
 what we conceive, but far more in what we comprehend 
 not : for we behold him but asquint, upon reflex or 
 ahadow ; our understanding is dimmer than Moses's 
 eye ; we are ignorant of the back parts or lower side 
 of his divinity ; therefore, to pry into the maze of his 
 counsels, is not only folly in man, but presumption 
 even in angels. Like us, they are his servants, not his 
 senators ; he holds no counsel, but that mystical one of 
 the Trinity, wherein, though there be three persons, 
 there is but one mind that decrees without contradic- 
 tion. Nor needs he any ; his actions are not begot 
 with deliberation ; his wisdom naturally knows what 's 
 best : his intellect stands ready fraught with the super- 
 lative and purest ideas of goodness, consultations, and 
 election, which are two motions in us, make but one in 
 him : his actions springing from his power at the first 
 touch of his will. These are contemplations meta- 
 physical : my humble speculations have another method, 
 and are content to trace and discover those expressions 
 he hath left in his creatures, and the obvious effects of 
 nature. There is no danger to profound i* these mys- 
 teries, no sanctum sanctorum in philosophy. The world 
 waa made to be inhabited by beasts, but studied and 
 contemplated by man : 'tis the debt of our reason we 
 owe unto God, and the homage we pay for not being 
 Ixyists. Without this, the world is still as though it 
 had not been, or as it was before the sixth day, when as 
 yet there wa.s not a creature tliat could conceive or say 
 there was a world. The wisdom of God receives small 
 honour from those vulgar heads that rudely stare about, 
 anri with a groaa rusticity admire hifl works. Those 
 highly magnify liini, wliose judicious enquiry into hLs 
 acta, and deliU^rate research into his creatures, return
 
 20 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 the duty of a devout and learned admiration. There- 
 fore, 
 
 Searcli while thou wilt ; and let thy reason go, 
 
 To ransom truth, e'en to th' abyss below ; 
 
 Rally the scatter'd causes ; and that line 
 
 Which nature twists be able to untwine. 
 
 It is thy Maker's will ; for unto none 
 
 But unto reason can he e'er be known. 
 
 Tlie devils do know thee ; but those damn'd meteors 
 
 Build not thy glory, but confound thy creatures. 
 
 Teach my endeavoui-s so thy works to read, 
 
 That learning them in thee I may proceed. 
 
 Give thou my reason that instructive flight. 
 
 Whose weary ^vings may on thy hands still light. 
 
 Teach me to soar aloft, yet ever so, 
 
 When near the sun, to stoop again below. 
 
 Thus shall my humble feathers safely hover. 
 
 And, though near earth, more than the heavens discover. 
 
 And then at last, when homeward I shall drive, 
 
 Kich with the spoils of nature, to my hive, 
 
 There will I sit, like that industrious fly, 
 
 Buzzing thy praises ; which shall never die 
 
 TiU death abrupts them, and succeeding glory 
 
 Bid me go on in a more lasting story. 
 
 And this is almost all "wherein an humble creature 
 may endeavour to requite, and some way to retribute 
 unto his Creator : for, if not he that saith, " Lord, Lord, 
 but he that doth the will of the Father, shall be saved," 
 certainly our wills must be our performances, and our 
 intents make out our actions ; otherwise our pious labours 
 shall find anxiety in our graves, and our best endeavours 
 not hope, but fear, a resurrection. 
 
 Slid. 14. — There is but one first cause, and four second 
 causes, of all things. Some are without efl&cient,^^ as 
 God ; others without matter, as angels ; some -svithout
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 21 
 
 fonn, as the first matter : but every essence, created or 
 uncreated, hath its final cause, and some positive end 
 both of its essence and operation. This is the cause I 
 grope after in the works of nature ; on this hangs the 
 providence of God. To raise so beauteous a structure 
 as the world and the creatures thereof was but his art ; 
 but their siindry and divided operations, with their pre- 
 destinated ends, are from the treasure of his ^visdom. 
 In the causes, nature, and aff"ections, of the eclipses of 
 the sun and moon, there is most excellent speculation ; 
 but, to profound further, and to contemplate a reason 
 why his providence hath so disposed and ordered their 
 motions in that vast circle, as to conjoin and obscure 
 each other, is a sweeter piece of reason, and a diviner 
 point of philosophy. Therefore, sometimes, and in some 
 things, there appears to me as much divinity in Galen 
 hifl books, Dt Usu Partium,^^ as in Suarez's Meta- 
 physicks. Had Aristotle been as curious in the enquiry 
 of this cause as he was of the other, he had not left 
 l>ehind him an imperfect piece of philosophy, but an 
 absolute tract of divinity. 
 
 Sect. 15. — Natura nihil agit fni.itra, is the only indis- 
 putable axiom in philosophy. There are no grotesques 
 in nature; not any thing framed to fill up empty cantons, 
 and unnecessary spaces. In the most imperfect creatures, 
 and such as were not preserved in the ark, but, having 
 their seeds and principles in the womb of nature, an- 
 everywhere, where the power of the sun is, — in these is 
 the wisdom of his hand discovered. Out of this rank 
 Solomon chose the object of his admiration ; indeed, 
 what reason may not go to school to the wisdom of bees, 
 anta, and spiders ? Wliat wise hand teacheth them to 
 «lo what reason caimot teach us ? Iluder heads stand 
 ama/ed at those prodigious pieces of nuliin", whales,
 
 22 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 elephants, dromedaries, and camels ; these, I confess, 
 are the colossus and majestick pieces of her hand ; hut 
 in these narrow engines there is more curious mathe- 
 maticks ; and the civility of these little citizens more 
 neatly sets forth the wisdom of their Maker. Who 
 admires not Regio Montanus his fly beyond his eagle ;^^ 
 or wonders not more at the operation of two souls in 
 those little bodies than but one in the tnmk of a cedar? 
 I could never content my contemplation with those 
 general pieces of wonder, the flux and reflux of the sea, 
 the increase of Nile, the conversion of the needle to the 
 north ; and have studied to match and parallel those in 
 the more obvious and neglected pieces of nat\ire which, 
 without farther travel, I can do in the cosmography of 
 myself. We carry with us the wonders we seek without 
 us : there is all Africa and her prodigies in us. We 
 are that bold and adventurous piece of nature, which 
 he that studies wisely learns, in a compendium, what 
 others labour at in a divided piece and endless volume. 
 Be,cL 16. — Thus there are two books from whence I 
 collect my divinity. Besides that written one of God, 
 another of his servant, nature, that universal and publick 
 manuscript, that lies expansed unto the eyes of all. 
 Those that never saw him in the one have discovered 
 him in the other : this was the scripture and theology 
 of the heathens ; the natural motion of the sun made 
 them more admire him than its supernatural station did 
 the children of Israel. The ordinary effects of nature 
 wrought more admiration in them than, in the other, 
 all his miracles. Surely the heathens knew better how 
 to join and read these mystical letters than we Christians, 
 who cast a more careless eye on these common hiero- 
 glyphics, and disdain to suck divinity from the flowers 
 of nature. Nor do I so forget God as to adore the name
 
 REUGIO MEDICI. 23 
 
 of nature ; which I define not, with the schools, to be 
 the principle of motion and rest, Init that straight and 
 regular line, that settled and constant course the wisdom 
 of God hath ordained the actions of his creatures, accord- 
 ing to their several kinds. To make a revolution every 
 day is the nature of the sun, because of that necessary 
 course which God hath ordained it, from which it cannot 
 swerve but by a faculty from that voice which first did 
 give it motion. Now this course of nature God seldom 
 alters or pen-erts ; but, like an excellent artist, hath so 
 contrived his work, that, with the self-same instrument, 
 without a new creation, he may effect his obscurest 
 designs. Thus he sweeteneth the water with a word, 
 preserveth the creatures in the ark, which the blast of 
 his mouth might have as easily created ; — for God is 
 like a skilful geometrician, who, when more easily, and 
 with one stroke of his compass, he might describe or 
 divide a right line, had yet rather do this in a circle or 
 longer way, according to the constituted and forelaid 
 principles of his art : yet tliis rule of his he doth some- 
 times pervert, to acquaint the world with his preroga- 
 tive, lest the arrogancy of our reason should question his 
 power, and conclude he could not. And thus I call the 
 effects of nature the works of God, whose hand and 
 in«tniment phe only is ; and therefore, to ascribe his 
 actions unto her is to devolve the honour of the prin- 
 cipal agent upon the instrument ; which if with reason 
 we may do, tln-ii let our hammers rise up and boa.st they 
 have built our houses, and our pens receive the honour 
 of our writing. I hold there is a general beauty in the 
 works of Grxl, and therefore no deformity in any kind 
 of BpcrcicK of creature whatsoever. I cannot tell by what 
 logick we call a toad, a l)ear, or an elei)hant ugly ; tlicy 
 being created in those outward shapes and figures which
 
 24 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 best express the actions of their inward forms ; and 
 having passed that general visitation of God, who saw 
 that all that he had made was good, that is, conformable 
 to his will, which abhors deformity, and is the rule of 
 order and beauty. There is no deformity but in mon- 
 strosity ; wherein, notwithstanding, there is a kind of 
 beauty ; nature so ingeniously contriving the irregular 
 parts, as they become sometimes more remarkable than 
 the principal fabrick. To speak yet more narrowly, 
 there was never any thing ugly or mis-shapen, but the 
 chaos ; wherein, notwithstanding, to speak strictly, there 
 was no deformity, because no form ; nor was it yet im- 
 pregnant by the voice of God. Now nature is not at 
 variance with art, nor art with nature ; they being both 
 the servants of his providence. Art is the perfection of 
 nature. "Were the world now as it was the sixth day, 
 there were yet a chaos. Nature hath made one world, 
 and art another. In brief, all things are artificial ; for 
 nature is the art of God. 
 
 S&ct. 17. — This is the ordinary and open way of his 
 providence, which art and industry have in good part 
 discovered ; whose eff'ects we may foretell without an 
 oracle. To foreshow these is not prophecy, but prog- 
 nostication. There is another way, full of meanders 
 and labyrinths, whereof the devil and spirits have no 
 exact ephemerides : and that is a more particular and 
 obscure method of his providence ; directing the opera- 
 tions of individual and single essences : this we call 
 fortime ; that serpentine and crooked line, whereby he 
 draws those actions his wisdom intends in a more un- 
 known and secret way ; this cryptic ^^ and involved 
 method of his providence have I ever admired ; nor 
 can I relate the history of my life, the occurrences of 
 my days, the escapes, or dangers, and hits of chance,
 
 KELIGIO MEDIC/. 25 
 
 with a hezo las manos to Fortune, or a bare gramercy to 
 1117 good stars. Abraham might have thought the ram 
 in the thicket came thither by accident : hiunan reason 
 would have said that mere chance Conveyed Moses in 
 the ark to the sight of Pharaoh's daughter. "What a 
 labyruith is there in the story of Joseph ! able to con- 
 vert a stoick. Surely there are in every man's life 
 certain rubs, doublings, and wrenches, which pass a 
 while under the effects of chance ; but at the last, well 
 examined, prove the mere hand of God. 'Twas not 
 dumb chance that, to discover the fougade,i9 or powder 
 plot, contrived a miscarriage in the letter. I like the 
 victory of '88 -" the better for that one occurrence which 
 our enemies imputed to our dishonour, and the partiality 
 of fortune ; to wit, the tempests and contrariety of 
 winds. King Philip did not detract from the nation, 
 when he said, he sent his armada to fight with men, 
 and not to combat with the winds. Where there is a 
 manifest disproportion between the powers and forces 
 of two several agents, upon a maxim of reason we may 
 promise the victory to the superior : but when unex- 
 pected accidents slip in, and unthought-of occurrences 
 intervene, these must proceed from a power that owes 
 no obedience to those axioms ; where, as in the writing 
 upon the wall, we may behold the hand, but see not 
 the spring that moves it. The success of that petty 
 province of Holland (of which tlie Grand Seignior 
 proudly said, if they should trouble him, as they did 
 the S[ianianl, he would send his men with shovels and 
 pickaxes, and throw it into the sea) I cannot altogether 
 uricribe to the ingenuity and industry of tlie people, but 
 the mercy of God, that hath disposed them to such a 
 thriving genius ; and to the will of his yirovidnnro, that 
 dirtpo.seth her favour to each country in their preordinato
 
 26 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 season. All cannot "be happy at once ; for, because the 
 glory of one state depends upon the ruin of another, 
 there is a revolution and vicissitude of their greatness, 
 and must obey the swing of that wheel, not moved by 
 intelligencies, but by the hand of God, whereby all 
 estates arise to their zenith and vertical points, accord- 
 ing to their predestinated periods. For the lives, not 
 only of men, but of commonwealths and the whole 
 worid, rim not upon a helix that still enlargeth ; but 
 on a circle, where, arriving to their meridian, they 
 decline in obscurity, and fall under the horizon again. 
 
 &e,ct. 18. — These must not therefore be named the 
 effects of fortune biit in a relative way, and as we term 
 the works of nature. It was the ignorance of man's 
 reason that begat tliis very name, and by a careless 
 term miscalled the providence of God : for there is no 
 liberty for causes to operate in a loose and straggling 
 way ; nor any effect whatsoever but hath its warrant 
 from some tmiversal or superior cause. 'Tis not a 
 ridiculous devotion to say a prayer before a game at 
 tables ; for, even in sortileges ^i and matters of greatest 
 uncertainty, there is a settled and preordered course of 
 effects. It is we that are bliad, not fortune. Because 
 our eye is too dim to discover the mystery of her effects, 
 we foolishly paint her blind, and hoodwink the pro- 
 vidence of the Almighty. I cannot justify that con- 
 temptible proverb, that " fools only are fortunate ; " or 
 that insolent parodox, that " a wise man is out of the 
 reach of fortune ; " much less those opprobrious epithets 
 of poets, — " whore," " bawd," and " strimipet." 'Tis, I con- 
 fess, the common fate of men of singular gifts of mind, to 
 be destitute of those of fortime ; which doth not any way 
 deject the spirit of wiser judgments who thoroughly 
 understand the justice of this proceeding ; and, being
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 27 
 
 enriched with liighcr donatives, cast a more careless 
 eye on these vulgar parts of felicity. It is a most un- 
 just ambition, to desire to engross the mercies of the 
 Almighty, not to be content with the goods of mind, 
 without a possession of those of body or fortune : and 
 it is an error, worse than heresy, to adore these com- 
 plimental and circumstantial pieces of felicity, and un- 
 dervalue those perfections and essential points of happi- 
 ness, wherein we resemble our Maker. To wiser desires 
 it is satisfaction enough to deserve, though not to enjoy, 
 the favours of fortune. Let providence provide for fools : 
 'tis not partiality, but equity, in God, who deals with us 
 but as our natural parents. Those that are able of body 
 and mind he leaves to their deserts ; to those of weaker 
 merits he imparts a larger portion ; and pieces out the 
 defect of one by the excess of the other. Thus have we 
 no just quarrel with nature for leaving us naked ; or to 
 envy the horns, hoofs, skins, and furs of other creatures ; 
 being provided with reason, that can supply them all. 
 We need not labour, with so many arguments, to con- 
 fute judicial astrology ; for, if there be a truth therein, 
 it doth not injure divinity. If to be bom imder Mer- 
 cury disposeth us to be witty ; under Jupiter to be 
 wealthy ; I do not owe a knee unto these, but unto 
 that merciful hand that hath ordered my indifferent 
 and uncertain nativity unto sucli benevolous aspects. 
 Those that hold that all things are governed by fortune, 
 had not erred, had they not persisted there. The 
 Romans, that erected a temple to Fortune, acknow- 
 ledged therein, though in a blinder way, somewhat of 
 divinity ; for, in a wise 8upputation,M all things begin 
 and end in tin- Almighty. There is a nearer way to 
 heaven than Homcr'H chain ;*=> an easy logick may con- 
 join a heaven and earth in one argument, and, vith leea
 
 28 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 than a soiites,^* resolve all things to God. For though 
 we christen effects by their most sensible and nearest 
 causes, yet is God the true and infallible cause of all ; 
 whose concourse, though it be general, yet doth it sub- 
 divide itseK into the particular actions of every thing, 
 and is that spirit, by which each singular essence not 
 only subsists, but performs its operation. 
 
 Be.d. 19. — The bad construction and perverse com- 
 ment on these pair of second causes, or visible hands of 
 God, have perverted the devotion of many unto atheism ; 
 who, forgetting the honest advisoes of faith, have lis- 
 tened unto the conspiracy of passion and reason. I 
 have therefore always endeavoured to compose those 
 feuds and angry dissensions between affection, faith, 
 and reason : for there is in our soul a kind of trium- 
 virate, or triple government of three competitors, which 
 distracts the peace of this our commonwealth not less 
 than did that other "^ the state of Eome. 
 
 As reason is a rebel unto faith, so passion unto reason. 
 As the propositions of faith seem absurd unto reason, 
 so the theorems of reason unto passion and both unto 
 reason ; yet a moderate and peaceable discretion may 
 so state and order the matter, that they may be all 
 kings, and yet make but one monarchy : every one 
 exercising his sovereignty and prerogative in a due 
 time and place, according to the restraint and limit of 
 circumstance. There are, as in philosophy, so in 
 divinity, sturdy doubts, and boisterous objections, 
 wherewith the unhappiness of our knowledge too 
 nearly acquainteth us. More of these no man hath 
 known than myself ; which I confess I conquered, not 
 in a martial posture, but on my knees. For our en- 
 deavours are not only to combat with doubts, but 
 always to dispute with the devil. The villany of that
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 29 
 
 epirit takes a hint of infidelity from our studies ; and, 
 by demonstrating a natnriJity in one way, makes us 
 mistrust a miracle in another. Thus, having perused 
 the Archidoxes, and read the secret sympathies of 
 things, he would dissuade my belief from the miracle 
 of the brazen serpent ; make me conceit that image 
 worked by sympathy, and was but an Egj^ptian trick, 
 to cure their diseases Avithout a miracle. Again, having 
 seen some experiments of bitumen, and having read far 
 more of naphtha, he whispered to my curiosity the fire 
 of the altar might be natural, and bade me mistrust a 
 miracle in Elias, when he intrenched the altar round 
 Avith water : for that inflamable substance yields not 
 easily unto water, but flames in the arms of its an- 
 tagonist. And thus would he iuveigle my belief to 
 think the combustion of Sodom might be natural, and 
 that there was an asphaltick and bituminous nature in 
 that lake before the fire of Gomorrah. I know that 
 manna is now plentifully gathered in Calabria ; and 
 Josephus tells me, in his days it was as plentiful in 
 Arabia. The devil therefore made the query, " Where 
 was then the miracle in the days of Moses ? " The 
 Israelites saw but that, in his time, which the natives 
 of those countries behold in ours. Thus the devil 
 played at chess with me, and, yielding a pa^ATi, thought 
 to gain a queen of me ; taking advantage of my honest 
 endeavours ; and, wlulst I laboured to raise the struc- 
 ture of my reason, he strove to imdemiine the edifice of 
 my faith. 
 
 Htci. 20. — Neither had these or any other ever such 
 advantage of me, as to incline me to any point of in- 
 fidelity or desj)erate positions of atheism ; for I have 
 been these many years of opinion there was never any. 
 Those tliat held religion was the difference of man from
 
 30 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 beasts, have spoken probably, and proceed upon a prin- 
 ciple as inductive as tbe other. That doctrine of 
 Epicurus, that denied the providence of God, was no 
 atheism, but a magnificent and high-strained conceit of 
 his majesty, which he deemed too sublime to mind the 
 trivial actions of those inferior creatures. That fatal 
 necessity of the stoicks is nothing but the immutable 
 law of his will. Those that heretofore denied the 
 divinity of the Holy Ghost have been condemned but 
 as hereticks ; and those that now deny our Saviour, 
 though more than hereticks, are not so much as atheists : 
 for, though they deny two persons in the Trinity, they 
 hold, as we do, there is but one God. 
 
 That villain and secretary of hell,^® that composed that 
 miscreant piece of the three impostors, though divided 
 from all religions, and neither Jew, Turk, nor Christian, 
 was not a positive atheist. I confess every country hath 
 its Machiavel, every age its Lucian, whereof common 
 heads must not hear, nor more advanced judgments too 
 rashly venture on. It is the rhetorick of Satan ; and 
 may pervert a loose or prejudicate belief. 
 
 &e,ct. 21. — I confess I have perused them all, and can 
 discover nothing that may startle a discreet belief ; yet 
 are their heads carried off with the wind and breath of 
 such motives. I remember a doctor in physick, of 
 Italy, who could not perfectly believe the immortality 
 of the soul, because Galen seemed to make a doubt 
 thereof. With another I was familiarly acquainted, in 
 France, a divine, and a man of singular parts, that on 
 the same point was so plunged and gravelled with three 
 lines of Seneca,* that all our antidotes, drawn from 
 
 * " Post mortem nihil est, ipsaque mors niliil, mors individua 
 est noxia corpori, nee patiens animae. . . . Toti morimur 
 nullaque pars mauet uostri."
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 31 
 
 both Scripture and philosophy, could not expel the 
 poison of his error. There are a set of heads that can 
 credit the relations of mariners, yet question the testi- 
 monies of Saint Paul : and peremptorily maintain the 
 traditions of iElian or Pliny ; yet, in histories of Scrip- 
 ture, raise queries and objections : believing no more 
 than they can parallel in human authors. I confess 
 there are, in Scripture, stories that do exceed the fables 
 of poets, and, to a captious reader, sound like Gara- 
 gantua or Bevis. Search all the legends of times past, 
 and the fabulous conceits of these present, and 'twill be 
 hard to find one that deserves to carry the buckler unto 
 Samson ; yet is all this of an ea.'iy possibility, if we con- 
 ceive a divine concourse, or an influence from the little 
 finger of the Almighty. It is impossible that, either 
 in the discourse of man or in the infallible voice of 
 God, to the wejxknesa of our apprehensions there should 
 not appear irregularities, contradictions, and antino- 
 mies i*^ myself could show a catalogue of doubts, never 
 yet imagined nor questioned, aa I know, which are not 
 resolved at the first hearing ; not fantastick queries or 
 objections of air ; for I cannot hear of atoms in divinity. 
 I can read the history of the pigeon that was sent out of 
 the ark, and returned no more, yet not question how 
 she found out her mate that was left behind : that 
 Lazarus was raised from the dead, yet not demand 
 where, in the interim, his soul awaited ; or raise a law- 
 case, whether his heir might lawfully detain his inherit- 
 ance bequeathed ujxm him by his death, and he, though 
 restored to life, have no plea or title unto his fonner 
 poHsesKions. Whether Eve was framed out of the left 
 side of Adam, 1 dispute not ; because 1 stand not yet 
 assured which is the right side of a man ; or whether 
 there be any nuch distinction in nature. That she wan
 
 32 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 edified out of the rib of Adam, I believe ; yet raise no 
 question who shall arise with that rib at the resurrection. 
 Whether Adam was an hermaphrodite, as the rabbins 
 contend upon the letter of the text ; because it is con- 
 trary to reason, there should be an hermaphrodite 
 before there was a woman, or a composition of two 
 natures, before there was a second composed. Likewise, 
 whether the world was created in autumn, summer, or 
 the spring ; because it was created in them all : for, 
 whatsoever sign the sun possesseth, those four seasons 
 are actually existent. It is the nature of this luminary to 
 distinguish the several seasons of the year ; all which it 
 makes at one time in the whole earth, and successively in 
 any part thereof. There are a bundle of curiosities, not 
 only in philosophy, but in divinity, proposed and discussed 
 by men of most supposed abilities, which indeed are not 
 worthy our vacant hours, much less our serious studies. 
 Pieces oiily fit to be placed in Pantagruel's library ,^^ or 
 bound up with Tartaratus, De, Modo Gacandi.* ^ 
 
 Sect. 22. — These are niceties that become not those 
 that peruse so serious a mystery. There are others 
 more generally questioned, and called to the bar, yet, 
 methinks, of an easy and possible truth. 
 
 'Tis ridiculous to put off or down the general flood 
 of Noah, ia that particular inundation of Deucalion. 3o 
 That there was a deluge once seems not to me so great 
 a miracle as that there is not one always. How all the 
 kinds of creatures, not only in their own bulks, but 
 with a competency of food and sustenance, might be 
 preserved in one ark, and within the extent of three 
 hundred cubits, to a reason that rightly examines it, 
 will appear very feasible. There is another secret, not 
 contained in the Scripture, which is more hard to com- 
 
 * In Rabelais.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 33 
 
 prehend, and put the honest Fathers' to the refuge of a 
 miracle ; and that is, not only how the distinct pieces 
 of the world, and divided islands, should be first planted 
 by men, but inhabited by tigers, panthers, and bears. 
 How America abounded with beasts of prey, and 
 noxious animals, yet contained not in it that necessary 
 creature, a horse, is very strange. By what passage 
 those, not only birds, but dangerous and unwelrome 
 beasts, come over. How there be creatures thcr'» 
 (which are not found in this triple continent). All 
 which must needs be strange unto us, that hold but one 
 ark ; and that the creatures began their progress from 
 the mountains of Ararat. They who, to salve this, 
 would make the deluge particular, proceed upon a 
 principle that I can no way grant ; not only upon the 
 n^ative of Holy Scriptures, but of mine o^\'n reason, 
 whereby I can make it probable that the world was as 
 well peopled in the time of Noah as in ours ; and 
 fifteen hundred years, to people the world, as full a 
 time for them as four thousand years since have been 
 to us. There are other assertions and common tenets 
 drawn from Scripture, and generally believed as Scrip- 
 ture, whereunto, notwithstanding, I would never betray 
 the liberty of my reason. 'Tis a paradox to me, that 
 Methusalem Wiis the longest lived of all the children ot 
 Adam ; and no man will be able to prove it ; when, 
 from tlie process of the text, I can manifest it may be 
 otherwise. That Judas perished by hanging hmiself, 
 there is no certainty in Scripture : though, in one 
 place, it seema to affirm it, and, by a doubtful word, 
 iiath given occasion to translate*' it ; yet, in another 
 place, in a more punctual description, it makes it im- 
 probable, and seems to overthrow it. That our fathers, 
 after the flood, erected the tower of Babel, to preserve 
 
 O
 
 34 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 themselves against a second deluge, is generally opin- 
 ioned and believed ; yet is there another intention of 
 theirs expressed in Scripture. Besides, it is improbable, 
 from the circumstance of the place ; that is, a plain in 
 the land of Sliinar. These are no points of faith ; and 
 therefore may admit a free dispute. There are yet 
 others, and those familiarly concluded from the text, 
 wherein (under favour) I see no consequence. The 
 church of Kome confidently proves the opinion of 
 tutelary angels, from that answer, when Peter knocked 
 at the door, " 'Tis not he, but his angel ; " that is, might 
 some say, his messenger, or somebody from him ; for so 
 the original signifies ; and is as likely to be the doubtful 
 family^s meaning. This exposition I once suggested to 
 a young divine, that answered upon this point ; to 
 which I remember the Franciscan opponent replied no 
 more, but, that it was a new, and no authentick inter- 
 pretation. 
 
 Bed. 23. — These are but the conclusions and fallible 
 discoiu'ses of man upon the word of God ; for such I do 
 believe the Holy Scriptures ; yet, were it of man, I 
 could not choose but say, it was the singularest and 
 superlative piece that hath been extant since the creation. 
 Were I a pagan, I should not refrain the lecture of it ; 
 and cannot but commend the judgment of Ptolemy, that 
 thought not his library complete without it. The 
 Alcoran of the Turks (I speak without prejudice) is an 
 ill-composed piece, containing in it vain and ridiculous 
 errors in philosophy, impossibilities, fictions, and vanities 
 beyond laughter, maintained by evident and open so- 
 phisms, the policy of ignorance, deposition of universities, 
 and banishment of learning. That hath gotten foot by 
 arms and violence : this, without a blow, hath dis- 
 seminated itself through the whole earth. It is not
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 35 
 
 unremarkable, what Pliilo first observed, that the law 
 of Moses continued two thousand years without the 
 least alteration ; whereas, we see, the laws of other 
 commonwealths do alter with occasions : and even those, 
 that pretended their original from some divinity, to 
 have vanished without trace or memory. I believe, 
 besides Zoroaster, there were divers others that vrrit 
 before Moses ; who, notwithstanding, have suffered the 
 common fate of time. Men's works have an age, like 
 themselves ; and though they outlive their authors, yet 
 have they a stint and period to their duration. This 
 only is a work too hard for the teeth of time, and cannot 
 perish but in the general flames, when all things shall 
 confess their ashes. 
 
 Sict. 24. — I have heard some with deep sighs lament 
 the lost lines of Cicero ; others with as many groans 
 deplore the combustion of the library of Alexandria :'* 
 for my own part, 1 think there be too many in the 
 world ; and could with patience behold the urn and 
 ashes of the Vatican, could I, with a few others, recover 
 the perished leaves of Solomon. I would not omit a 
 copy of Enoch's pillars,** had they many nearer authors 
 than Josephus, or did not relish somewhat of the fable. 
 Some men have written more than others have spoken. 
 Pineda** quotes more authors, in one work,* than are 
 necessary in a whole world. Of tliose three great inven- 
 tions in (jermauy,M there are two which are not without 
 their incommodities, and 'tis disputable whether they 
 exceed not their use and commodities. 'Tis not a melan- 
 choly uiinam of my own, but the desires of better heads, 
 tliat there were a general synod — not to unite the incom- 
 Tiatible difference of religion, but, — for the benefit of 
 
 • I'ineda, in hia "Monarchia Ecclcsiaslica," quotes one 
 tbouAaud aud furty autLora.
 
 36 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 learning, to reduce it, as it lay at first, in a few and solid 
 authors ; and to condemn to tlie fire those swarms and 
 millions of rhapsodies, begotten only to distract and 
 abuse the weaker judgments of scholars, and to maintain 
 the trade and mystery of typographers. 
 
 Bed. 25. — I cannot but wonder with what exception 
 the Samaritans could confine their belief to the Penta- 
 teuch, or five books of Moses. I am ashamed at the 
 rabbinical interpretation of the Jews upon the Old 
 Testament,^'' as much as their defection from the New : 
 and truly it is beyond wonder, how that contemptible 
 and degenerate issue of Jacob, once so devoted to ethnick 
 su.perstition, and so easily seduced to the idolatry of 
 their neighbours, should now, in such an obstinate and 
 peremptory belief, adhere unto their own doctrine, 
 expect impossibilities, and in the face and eye of the 
 church, persist without the least hope of conversion. 
 This is a vice in them, that were a virtue in us : for 
 obstmacy in a bad cause is but constancy in a good : 
 and herein I must accuse those of my own religion ; for 
 there is not any of such a fugitive faith, such an unstable 
 belief, as a Christian ; none that do so often transform 
 themselves, not vmto several shapes of Christianity, and 
 of the same species, but imtomore imnatural and contrary 
 forms of Jew and Mohammedan ; that, from the name 
 of Saviour, can condescend to the bare term of prophet : 
 and, from an old belief that he is come, fall to a new 
 expectation of his coming. It is the promise of Christ, 
 to make us all one flock : but how and when this union 
 shall be, is as obscure to me as the last day. Of those 
 four members of religion we hold a slender propor- 
 tion. ^8 There are, I confess, some new additions ; yet 
 small to those which accrue to our adversaries ; and
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 37 
 
 those only drawn from the revolt of pagans ; men but 
 of negative impieties ; and such as deny Christ, but 
 because they never heard of hira. But the religion of 
 the Jew is expressly against the Christian, and the 
 Mohammedan against both ; for the Turk, in the bulk 
 he now stands, is beyond all hope of conversion : if he 
 fall asimder, there may be conceived hopes ; but not 
 without strong improbabilities. The Jew is obstinate in 
 all fortunes ; the persecution of fifteen hundred years 
 hath but confirmed them in their error. They have 
 already endured whatsoever may be inflicted : and have 
 suffered, in a bad cause, even to the condemnation of 
 their enemies. Persecution is a bad and indirect way 
 to plant religion. It hath been the unhappy method of 
 angry devotions, not only to confirm honest religion, but 
 wicked heresies and extravagant opinions. It Avas the 
 first stone and basis of our faitli. Kone can more justly 
 boast of persecutions, and glory in the number and 
 valour of martyrs. For, to speak properly, those are 
 true and almost only examples of fortitude. Those that 
 are fetched from the field, or draA\Ti from the actions of 
 the camp, are not ofttimes so truly precedents of valour 
 as audacity, and, at the best, attain but to some bastard 
 piece of fortitude. If we shall strictly examine the 
 cijcumstances and requisites which Aristotle requires ^* 
 to true and perfect valour, we shall find the name only 
 in liis master, .tUexander, and as little in that Roman 
 worthy, Julius Cxsar ; and if any, in tliat easy ami 
 active way, have done so nobly a.s to desen-e tliat name, 
 yet, in the pa-ssive and more terrible piece, these have 
 Burpa-ssed, and in a more heroical way may claim, the 
 liouour of that title. 'Tis not in the power of every 
 honest faith to proceed thus fur, or pass to heaven
 
 38 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 through the flames. Every one hath it not in that full 
 measure, nor in so audacious and resolute a temper, as 
 to endure those terrible tests and trials ; who, notwith- 
 standing, in a peaceable way, do truly adore their 
 Saviour, and have, no doubt, a faith acceptable in the 
 eyes of God. 
 
 Scd. 26. — Now, as all that die in the war are not 
 termed soldiers, so neither can I properly term all those 
 that suffer in matters of religion, martyrs. The council 
 of Constance condemns John Huss for a heretick ; ^^ 
 the stories of his own party style him a martyr. He 
 must needs offend the divinity of both, that says he 
 was neither the one nor the other. There are many 
 (questionless) canonized on earth, that shall never be 
 saints in heaven ; and have their names in histories and 
 martyrologies, who, in the eyes of God, are not so per- 
 fect martyrs as was that wise heathen Socrates, that 
 suffered on a fundamental point of religion, — the unity 
 of God. I have often pitied the miserable bishop *i 
 that suffered in the cause of antipodes ; yet cannot 
 choose but accuse him of as much madness, for exposing 
 his living on such a trifle, as those of ignorance and 
 folly, that condemned him. I think my conscience will 
 not give me the lie, if I say there are not many extant, 
 that, in a noble way, fear the face of death less than 
 myself ; yet, from the moral duty I owe to the com- 
 mandment of God, and the natural respect that I tender 
 unto the conservation of my essence and being, I would 
 not perish upon a ceremony, politick points, or indiffer- 
 ency : nor is my belief of that untractable temper as, 
 not to bow at their obstacles, or connive at matters 
 wherein there are not manifest impieties. The leaven, 
 therefore, and ferment of all, not only civil, but re- 
 ligious, actions, is wisdom ; without which, to commit
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 39 
 
 ourselves to the flames is homicide, and (I fear) but to 
 pass through one fire into another. 
 
 Stct. 27. — That miracles are cea.sed, I can neither 
 prove nor absolutely deny, much less define the time 
 iind period of their cessation. That they survived 
 Christ is manifest upon record of Scripture : that they 
 outlived the apostles also, and were revived at the con- 
 version of nations, many years after, we cannot deny, if 
 we shall not question those writers whose testimonies 
 we do not controvert in. points that make for our own 
 opinions : therefore, that may have some truth in it, that 
 is reported by the Jesuits of their miracles in the Indies. 
 I could Ansh it were true, or had any other testimony 
 than their own. pens. Tliey may easily believe those 
 miracles abroad, who daily conceive a greater at home 
 — the transmutation of those visible elements into the 
 body and blood of our Saviour ; — for the conversion of 
 water into wine, which he wrought in Cana, or, what 
 the devil would have had him done in the Avildemess, 
 of stones into bread, compared to this, will scarce deserve 
 the name of a miracle : though, indeed, to speak pro- 
 perly, there is not one miracle greater than another ; 
 they being the extraordinary effects of the hand of God, 
 to which all things are of an equal facility ; and to 
 create tlie world as easy as one single creature. For 
 this is also a miracle ; not only to produce effects 
 against or above nature, but before nature ; and to 
 create nature, as great a miracle as to contradict or 
 transcend her. We do too narrowly define the power 
 of God, restniining it to our capacities. I hold that 
 God can do all things : how he sliould work contradic- 
 tions, I do nfit understand, yet dare not, therefore, deny. 
 I cannot see why the angel of God should question 
 Ewlras to recall the time past, if it were beyond hie
 
 40 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 owu power ; or that God should pose mortality in that 
 which he was not able to perform himseK. I wiU not 
 eay that God cannot, but he will not, perform many 
 things, which we plainly affirm he cannot. This, I am 
 sure, is the mannerliest proposition ; wherein, notwith- 
 standing, I hold no paradox : for, strictly, his power is 
 the same with his will ; and they both, with all the rest, 
 do make but one God. 
 
 Sad. 28. — Therefore, that miracles have been, I do 
 believe ; that they may yet be wrought by the living, I 
 do not deny : but have no confidence in those which are 
 fathered on the dead. And this hath ever made me 
 suspect the efficacy of rehcks, to examine the bones, 
 question the habits and appertenances of saints, and 
 even of Christ himself. I cannot conceive why the 
 cross that Helena ^^ found, and whereon Christ himself 
 died, should have power to restore others unto life. I 
 excuse not Constantine from a fall off his horse, or a 
 mischief from his enemies, upon the wearing those naUs 
 on his bridle wliich our Saviour bore upon the cross in 
 his hands. I compute among 'pite. frandes, nor many 
 degrees before consecrated swords and roses, that which 
 Baldwin, king of Jerusalem, returned the Genoese for 
 their costs and pains in his wars ; to wit, the ashes of 
 John, the Baptist. Those that hold, the sanctity of their 
 souls doth leave behind a tincture and sacred faculty 
 on their bodies, speak natujally of miracles, and do not 
 salve the doubt. Now, one reason I tender so little 
 devotion unto relicks is, I think the slender and doubt- 
 ful respect I have always held unto antiquities. For 
 that, indeed, which I admire, is far before antiquity ; 
 that is. Eternity ; and that is, God himself ; who, though 
 he be styled the Ancient of Days, cannot receive the 
 adjunct of antiquity, who was before the world, and
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 41 
 
 Bhall be after it, yet is not older than it : for, in his 
 vears there is no cliniacler : ^^ his duration is eternity ; 
 and far more venerable than antiquity. 
 
 Sect. 29. — But, above all things, I wonder how the 
 curiosity of wiser heads could pass that great and indis- 
 putable niiracle, the cessation of oracles ; and in what 
 swoon their reasons lay, to content themselves, and sit 
 down with such a far-fetched and ridiculous reason as 
 Plutarch allegeth for it.-** The Jews, that can believe 
 the supernatural solstice of the sun in the days of 
 Joshua, have yet the impudence to deny the eclipse, 
 which every pagan confessed, at his death ; but for 
 this, it is evident beyond all contradiction : the devil 
 himself confessed it. * Certainly it is not a wanant- 
 able curiosity, to examine the verity of Scripture by the 
 concordance of human liistory ; or seek to confirm the 
 chronicle of He.'^ter or Daniel by the authority of Meg- 
 asthenes** or Herodotus. I confess, I have had an un- 
 liappy curiosity this way, till I laughed myself out of 
 it with a piece of Justin, where he delivers that the 
 children of Israel, for being scabbed, were banished 
 out of Egypt. And truly, since I have understood the 
 occurrences of the world, and know in what counterfeit- 
 ing shapes and deceitful visards times present represent 
 on the stage things past, I do believe them little more 
 than things to come. Some have been of my own 
 opinion, and endeavoured to ^v^ite the history of their 
 own lives ; wherein Moses hath outgone them all, and 
 left not only the story of his life, but, as some will have 
 it, of hi.s death also. 
 
 Sect. 30. — It is a riddle to me, how this story of 
 oracles hath not wormed out of the world that doubtful 
 conceit of spirits and witches ; how so many learned 
 * In his oracle to AugUHtuH.
 
 42 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 heads should so far forget their metaphysicks, and 
 destroy the ladder and scale of creatures, as to question 
 the existence of spirits ; for my part., I have ever be- 
 lieved, and do now know, that there are witches. They 
 that doubt of these do not only deny them, but spirits : 
 and are obliquely, and upon consequence, a sort, not of 
 infidels, but atheists. Those that, to confute their in- 
 credvility, desire to see apparitions, shall, questionless, 
 never behold any, nor have the power to be so much as 
 witches. The devil hath made them already in a heresy 
 as capital as witchcraft ; and to appear to them were 
 but to convert them. Of all the delusions wherewith 
 he deceives mortality, there is not any that puzzleth 
 me more than the legerdemain of changelings.** I do 
 not credit those transfoi-mations of reasonable creatures 
 into beasts, or that the devil hath a power to transpeciate 
 a man into a horse, who tempted Christ (as a trial of his 
 divinity) to convert but stones into bread. I could 
 believe that spirits use with man the act of carnality ; 
 and that in both sexes. I conceive they may assume, 
 steal, or contrive a body, wherein there may be action 
 enough to content decrepit lust, or passion to satisfy 
 more active veneries ; yet, in both, without a possibility 
 of generation : and therefore that opinion, that Anti- 
 christ should be bom of the tribe of Dan, by conjimc- 
 tion with the devil, is ridiculous, and a conceit fitter 
 for a rabbin than a Christian. I hold that the devil 
 doth really possess some men ; the spirit of melancholy 
 others ; the spirit of delusion others : that, as the devil 
 is concealed and denied by some, so God and good 
 angels are pretended by others, whereof the late defec- 
 tion of the maid of Germany hath left a pregnant 
 example.*^ 
 Stct. 31. — Again, I believe that all that use sorceries.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI, 43 
 
 incantations, and spells, are not witches, or, as we term 
 them, magicians. I conceive there is a traditional 
 magick, not learned immediately from the devil, but 
 at second hand from his scholars, who, having once the 
 secret betrayed, are able and do empirically practise 
 without his advice ; they both proceeding upon the 
 principles of nature ; where actives, aptly conjoined to 
 disposed passives, will, under any master, produce their 
 effects. Thus, I think, at first, a great part of philosophy 
 was witchcraft ; which, being afterward derived to one 
 another, proved but philosophy, and was indeed no 
 more than the honest effects of nature : — what invented 
 by tts, is philosophy ; learned from him, is magick. 
 We do surely owe the discovery of many secrets to the 
 discovery of good and bad angels. I could never pass 
 that sentence of Paracelsus Tvdthout an asterisk, or an- 
 notation : " ascendens* constellatum multa revelat qi((pren- 
 tibus raagnalia nature, i.e. opera Dei." I do think that 
 many mysteries ascribed to our own inventions have 
 l>een tlie corteoua revelations of spirits ; for those noble 
 essences in heaven bear a friendly regard unto their 
 fellow-nature on earth ; and therefore believe that 
 those many prodigies and ominous prognosticks, which 
 forerun the ruins of states, princes, and private persons, 
 are the charitable premonitions of good angels, which 
 more careless inquiries term but the effects of chance 
 and nature. 
 
 Sect. 32. — Now, besides these particular and divided 
 spirits, there may be (for aught I know) a universal and 
 common spirit to the whole world. It was the opinion 
 of Plato, and is yet of the hermetical philosophers. 
 If there be a common nature, that unites and ties the 
 
 * Thereby ii meant our good angel, appointed us fr>m our 
 nativity.
 
 44 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 scattered and divided individuals into one species, why 
 may there not be one that unites them all ? However, 
 I am sure there is a common spirit, that plays within 
 us, yet makes no part in us ; and that is, the spirit of 
 God ; the fire and scintillation of that noble and mighty 
 essence, which is the life and radical heat of spirits, and 
 those essences that know not the virtue of the sun ; a fire 
 quite contrary to the fire of hell. This is that gentle 
 heat that brooded on the waters, and in six days hatched 
 the world ; this is that irradiation that dispels the mists 
 of hell, the clouds of horror, fear, soitow, despair ; and 
 preserves the region of the mind in serenity. Whatso- 
 ever feels not the warm gale and gentle ventilation of 
 this spirit (though I feel his pulse), I dare not say he 
 lives ; for truly without this, to me, there is no heat 
 under the tropick ; nor any light, though I dwelt in 
 the body of the sun. 
 
 " As when the labouring sun hath wrought his track 
 Up to the top of lofty Cancer's back, 
 The icy ocean cracks, the frozen pole 
 Thaws with the heat of the celestial coal ; 
 So when thy absent beams begin t' impart 
 Again a solstice on my frozen heart, 
 My winter 's o'er, my drooping spirits sing, 
 Aad every part revives into a spring. 
 But if thy quickening beams a while decline, 
 And v,-ith their light bless not this orb of mine, 
 A chilly frost surpriseth every member, 
 And in the midst of June I feel December. 
 Oh how this earthly temper doth debase 
 The noble soul, in this her humble place ! 
 Whose wingy nature ever doth aspire 
 To reach that place whence first it took its fire. 
 These flames I feel, which in my heart do dwell, 
 Are not thy beams, but take their fire from hell.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 45 
 
 Oh quench them all ! and let thy Light divine 
 lie as the sun to tliis poor orb of mine ! 
 And to thy sacred Spirit convert those fires, 
 "SVTiose earthly fumes choke my devout aspires ! " 
 
 Std. 33. — Therefore, for spirits, I am so far from 
 denying their existence, that I could easUy believe, that 
 not only whole countries, but particular persons, have 
 their tutelary and guardian angels. It is not a new 
 opinion of the Chmch of Home, but an old one of 
 Pythagoras and Plato : there is no heresy in it : and if 
 not manifestly defined in Scripture, yet it is an opinion 
 of a good and wholesome use in the course and actions 
 of a man's life ; and would serve as an hypothesis to salve 
 many doubts, whereof common philosophy affordeth no 
 solution. Now, if you demand my opinion and meta- 
 physicks of their natures, I confess them very shallow ; 
 most of them in a negative way, like that of God ; or 
 in a comparative, between ourselves and fellow- creatures : 
 for there is in this universe a stair, or manifest scale, of 
 creatures, rising not disorderly, or in confusion, but with 
 a comely method and proportion. Between creatures of 
 mere existence and things of life there is a large dispro- 
 portion of nature: between plants and animals, or creatvu-es 
 of sense, a wider difference : between them and man, a 
 far greater : and if the proportion hold on, between man 
 and angels there should be yet a greater. We do not 
 comprehend their natures, who retain the first defmition 
 of Porphyry ;^8 and distinguish them from ourselves by 
 immortality : for, before his fall, man also was im- 
 mortal : yet must we needs afiirm that he had a different 
 essence from the angels. Having, therefore, no certain 
 knowledge of their nature, 'tis no bad method of the 
 Bchools, wliateoever perfection we find obscurely in our-
 
 46 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 selves, in a more complete and absolute way to ascribe 
 unto them. I believe they have an extemporary know- 
 ledge, and, upon the first motion of their reason, do 
 what we cannot without study or deliberation : that 
 they know things by their forms, and define, by speci- 
 fical difference what we describe by accidents and pro- 
 perties : and therefore probabilities to us may be 
 demonstrations unto them : that they have knowledge 
 not only of the specifical, but numerical, forms of in- 
 dividuals, and understand by what reserved difference 
 each siQgle hypostatis (besides the relation to its species) 
 becomes its numerical self: that, as the soul hath a 
 power to move the body it informs, so there 's a faculty 
 to move any, though inform none : ours upon restraint 
 of time, place, and distance : but that invisible hand 
 that conveyed Habakkuk to the lion's den, or Philip to 
 Azotus, infrrngeth this rule, and hath a secret convey- 
 ance, wherewith mortality is not acquainted. If they 
 have that intuitive knowledge, whereby, as in reflection, 
 they behold the thoughts of one another, I cannot 
 peremptorily deny but they know a great part of ours. 
 They that, to refute the invocation of saints, have denied 
 that they have any knowledge of our affairs below, 
 have proceeded too far, and must pardon my opinion, 
 till I can thoroughly answer that piece of Scripture, 
 " At the conversion of a sinner, the angels in heaven 
 rejoice." I cannot, with those in that great father,*^ 
 securely interpret the work of the first day, jiat lux, to 
 the creation of angels ; though I confess there is not 
 any creature that hath so near a glimpse of their nature 
 as light in the sun and elements: we style it a bare 
 accident; but, where it subsists alone, 'tis a spiritual 
 substance, and may be an angel : in brief, conceive light 
 invisible, and that is a spirit.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 47 
 
 Sect. 34. — These are certainly the magisterial and 
 masterpieces of the Creator ; the flower, or, as we may- 
 say, the best part of nothing ; actually existing, what 
 \i'i are but in hopes, and probability. We are only that 
 amphibious piece, between a corporeal and a spiritual 
 essence ; that middle form, that links those two to- 
 gether, and makes good the method of God and nature, 
 that jumps not from extremes, but unites the incom- 
 patible distances by some middle and participating 
 natures. That we are the breath and similitude of God, 
 it is indisputable, and upon record of Holy Scripture : 
 but to call ourselves a microcosm, or little world, I 
 thought it only a pleasant trope of rhetorick, till my 
 near judgment and second thoughts told me there was 
 a rwd truth therein. For, first we are a rude mass, and 
 in the rank of creatures which only are, and have a dull 
 kind of being, not yet privileged with life, or preferred 
 to sense or reason ; next we live the life of plants, the 
 life of animals, the life of men, and at last the life of 
 .''pirita : running on, in one mysterious nature, those five 
 kinds of existencies, which comprehend the creatures, 
 not only of the world, but of the universe. Thus is 
 man that great and true amphibiuvi, whose nature is 
 disposed to live, not only like other creatures in divers 
 elements, but in divided and distinguished worlds ; for 
 though there be but one to sense, there are two to reason, 
 the one visible, tlie other invisible ; whereof Moses 
 seemB to have left description, and of the other so 
 obscurely, that some parts tliereof are yet in controversy. 
 And truly, for the first chapters of Genesis, I must con- 
 fess a great deal of obscurity ; though divines have, to 
 the power of human reason, endeavoured to make all 
 go in a literal meaning, yet those allegorical inteqireta- 
 tiona are also probable, and perhaps the mystical method
 
 48 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 of Moses, bred up in the hieroglypliical schools of the 
 Egyptians. 
 
 Se,ct. 35. — Now for that immaterial world, methinks 
 we need not wander so far as the first moveable ; for, 
 even in this material fabrick, the spirits walk as freely 
 exempt from the affection of time, place, and motion, as 
 beyond the extremest circumference. Do but extract 
 from the corpulency of bodies, or resolve things beyond 
 their first matter, and you discover the habitation of 
 angels ; which if I call the ubiquitary and omnipresent 
 essence of God, I hope I shall not offend divinity : for, 
 before the creation of the world, God was really all 
 things. For the angels he created no new world, or 
 determinate mansion, and therefore they are everywhere 
 where is his essence, and do live, at a distance even, in 
 himself. That God made all things for man, is in some 
 sense true ; yet, not so far as to subordinate the creation 
 of those purer creatures unto ours ; though, as minister- 
 ing spirits, they do, and are willing to fulfil the will of 
 God in these lower and sublunary affairs of man. God 
 made all things for himself; and it is impossible he 
 should make them for any other end than his own glory: 
 it is all he can receive, and all that is without himself. 
 For, honour being an external adjunct, and in the 
 honourer rather than in the person honoured, it was 
 necessary to make a creature, from whom he might re- 
 ceive this homage : and that is, in the other world, 
 angels, in this, man ; which when we neglect, we forget 
 the very end of our creation, and may justly provoke 
 God, not only to repent that he hath made the world, 
 but that he hath sworn he would not destroy it. That 
 there is but one world, is a conclusion of faith ; Aristotle 
 with all his philosophy hath not been able to prove it : 
 and as weakly that the world was eternal ; that dispute
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 49 
 
 much troubled the pen of the philosophers, but Moeee 
 tlecided that question, and all is salved with the 
 new term of a creation, — that is, a production of some- 
 thing out of nothing. And what is that ? — whatsoever 
 is opposite to something ; or, more exactly, that which 
 is truly contrary unto God : for he only is ; all others 
 have an existence with dependency, and are something 
 but by a distinction. And herein is divinity conformant 
 unto pliilosophy, and generation not only founded on 
 contrarieties, but also creation. God, being all things, 
 is contrary unto nothing ; out of which were made all 
 things, and so nothing became something, and omneity ^ 
 informed nullity into an essence. 
 
 Btd. 36. — The whole creation is a mystery, and par- 
 ticularly that of man. At the blast of his mouth were 
 the rest of the creatures made ; and at his bare word 
 they started out of nothing : but in the frame of man 
 (as the text describes it) he played the sensible operator, 
 and seemed not so much to create as make him. When 
 he had separated the materials of other creatures, there 
 consequently resulted a form and soul ; but, having 
 raised the walls of man, he was driven to a second and 
 harder creation, — of a substance like himself, an incor- 
 ruptible and immortal soul. For these two affections 
 we have the philosophy and opinion of the heathens, 
 the flat affirmative of Plato, and not a negative from 
 Ariiitotle. There is another scruple cast iu by tliviuity 
 concerning its production, much disputed in the German 
 auditories, and with that indiflerency and equality of 
 arguments, as leave the controversy undetennined. I 
 am not of Paracelsus's mind, that boldly delivers a re- 
 ceipt to make a man without conjunction ; yet cannot 
 but wonder at the multitude of heads that do deny 
 traduction, having no other arginiicnt to confirm their 
 
 u
 
 so RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 belief than that rhetorical sentence and antimetathesis si 
 of Augustine, " creando infunditur, infundendo creatur." 
 Either opinion will consist well enough with religion : 
 yet I should rather incline to this, did not one objection 
 iiaunt me, not wrung from speculations and subtleties, 
 but from common sense and observation ; not pick'd 
 from the leaves of any author, but bred amongst the 
 weeds and tares of my o-mi braia. And this is a con- 
 clusion from the equivocal and monstrous productions 
 in the copulation of a man with a beast : for if the soul 
 of man be not transmitted and transfused in the seed of 
 the parents, why are not those productions merely 
 beasts, but have also an impression and tincture of 
 reason in as high a measure, as it can evidence itself in 
 those improper organs ? Nor, truly, can I peremptorily 
 deny that the soul, in this her sublunary estate, is 
 wholly, and in all acceptions, inorganical : but that, 
 for the performance of her ordinary actions, is required 
 not only a symmetry and proper disposition of organs, 
 but a crasis and temper correspondent to its operations ; 
 yet is not this mass of flesh and visible structure the 
 instrument and proper corpse of the soul, but rather of 
 sense, and that the hand of reason. In our study of 
 anatomy there is a mass of mysterious philosophy, and 
 such as reduced the very heathens to divinity ; yet, 
 amongst all those rare discoveries and curious pieces I 
 iind in the fabrick of man, I do not so much content 
 myself, as in that I find not,— that is, no organ or 
 instrument for the rational soul ; for in the brain, 
 which we term the seat of reason, there is not anything 
 of moment more than I can discover in the crany of a 
 beast : and this is a sensible and no inconsiderable 
 argimient of the inorganity of the soul, at least in that 
 sense we usually so conceive it. Thus we are men, and
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 5 1 
 
 we know not how ; there is somethinp; in us that can 
 be •nithout us, and will be after us, though it is strange 
 that it hath uo history what it was before us, nor cannot 
 tell how it entered in us. 
 
 Bed. 37. — Now, for these walls of flesh, wherein the 
 eoul doth seem to be immured before the resurrection, 
 it is nothing but an elemental composition, and a 
 fabrick that must fall to ashes. " All flesh is grass," is 
 not only metaphorically, but literally, true ; for all 
 those creatures we behold are but the herbs of the field, 
 digested into flesh in them, or more remotely camified 
 in ourselves. Nay, further, we arc what we all abhor, 
 anthropophagi, and cannilials, devourersnot only of men, 
 but of ourselves ; and that not in an allegory but a 
 positive truth : for all this mass of flesh which we be- 
 hold, came in at our mouths : this frame we look upon, 
 hath been upon our trenchers ; in brief, we have devoured 
 ourselves. I cannot believe the wisdom of Pythagoras 
 did ever positively, and in a literal sense, affirm his 
 metempsychosis, or impossible transmigration of the 
 souls of men into beasts. Of all metamorphoses or 
 tramsmigrations, I believe only one, that is of Lot's 
 ■\vife ; for that of Nabuchodonosor proceeded not so far. 
 In all others I conceive there is no further verity than 
 ifl contained in their implicit sense and morality. I 
 believe that the whole frame of a beast doth perish, and 
 is left in the same state after death as before it v/as 
 materialled unto life : that the souls of men know 
 neither contrary nor corruption ; that they subsist be- 
 yond the bo<Jy, and outlive death by the privilege of 
 their proper natures, and without a miracle : that the 
 souls of the faithful, OS they leave earth, take possession 
 of heaven ; that those a]i])arition8 and ghosts of dcjiarted 
 persons are not the wandering souls of men, but the
 
 52 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 unquiet walks of devils, prompting and suggesting us 
 unto mischief, blood, and villany ; instilling and steal- 
 ing into our hearts that the blessed spirits are not at 
 rest in their graves, but wander, solicitous of the affairs 
 of the world. But that those phantasms appear often, 
 and do frequent cemeteries, charnel-houses, and churches, 
 it is because those are the dormitories of the dead, where 
 the devil, like an insolent champion, beholds with pride 
 the spoils and trophies of his victory over Adam. 
 
 ySeci. 38. — This is that dismal conquest we all deplore, 
 that makes us so often cry, O Adam, quid fecisti ? I 
 thank God I have not those strait ligaments, or narrow 
 obligations to the world, as to dote on life, or be con- 
 vulsed and tremble at the name of death. Not that I 
 am insensible of the dread and horror thereof ; or, by 
 raking into the bowels of the deceased, continual sight 
 of anatomies, skeletons, or cadaverous relicks, like ves- 
 pilloes, or gravemakers, I am become stupid, or have 
 forgot the apprehension of mortality ; but that, marshal- 
 ling all the horrors, and contemplating the extremities 
 thereof, I find not anything therein able to daunt the 
 courage of a man, much less a well-resolved Christian ; 
 and therefore am not angry at the error of our first 
 parents, or unwilling to bear a part of this common 
 fate, and, like the best of them, to die ; that is, to 
 cease to breathe, to take a farewell of the elements ; to 
 be a kind of nothing for a moment ; to be within one 
 instant of a spirit. When I take a full view and circle 
 of myself without this reasonable moderator, and equal 
 piece of justice, death, I do conceive myself the miser- 
 ablest person extant. Were there not another life that 
 I hope for, all the vanities of this world should not 
 entreat a moment's breath from me. Could the devil 
 work my belief to imagine I could never die, I would
 
 RELIGIO MEDICT. 53 
 
 not outlive that very tliouglit. I have so abject a con- 
 ceit of this common way of existence, this retaining to 
 the 6un and elements, I cannot think this is to he a 
 man, or to live according to the dignity of humanity. 
 In expectation of a better, I can \\'ith patience embrace 
 this life ; yet, in my best meditations, do often defy 
 death. I honour any man that contemns it ; nor can I 
 highly love any that is afraid of it : this makes me 
 naturally love a soldier, and honour those tattered and 
 contemptible regiments, that will die at the command 
 of a sergeant For a pagan there may be some motives 
 to be in love ^nth life ; but, for a Cliristian to be amazed 
 at death, I see not how he can escape this dilemma — 
 that he is too sensible of this life, or hopeless of the 
 life to come. 
 
 Sect. 39. — Some divines ^2 count Adam thirty years 
 old at his creation, because they suppose him created in 
 the perfect age and stature of man : and surely we are 
 all out of the computation of our age ; and every man 
 is some months older than he bethinks him ; for we 
 live, move, have a being, and are subject to the actions 
 of the elements, and the malice of diseases, in that other 
 world, the truest microcosm, the womb of our mother ; 
 for besides that general and common existence we are 
 conceived to hold in our chaos, and whilst we sleep 
 witliin the bosom of our causes, we enjoy a being and 
 life in three distinct worlds, wherein we receive most 
 manifest gradations. In that obscure world, the womb 
 of our mother, our time is short, computed by the 
 moon ; yet longer than the days of many creatures that 
 behold the sun ; ourselves being not yet without life, 
 sense, and reason ;53 though, iux the manifestation of 
 it« actions, it awaits the op])ortunity of objects, and 
 seems to live there but in its root and soul of vegetation.
 
 54 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 Entering afterwards upon the scene of tlie world, we 
 arise up and become another creature ; performing the 
 reasonable actions of man, and obscurely manifesting 
 that part of divinity in us, but not in complement and 
 perfection, till we have once more cast oiu" secundine, 
 that is, this slough of flesh, and are delivered into the 
 last world, that is, that ineffable place of Paul, that 
 proper \M of spirits. The smattering I have of the 
 pliilosophers' stone (which is something more than the 
 perfect exaltation 5i of gold) hath taught me a great deal 
 of divinity, and instructed my belief, how that immortal 
 spirit and incorruptible substance of my soul may lie 
 obscure, and sleep a while within this house of flesh. 
 Those strange and mystical transmigrations that I have 
 observed in silkworms turned my philosophy into 
 divinity. There is in these works of nature, which 
 seem t.o puzzle reason, something divine ; and hath 
 more in it than the eye of a conxmon spectator doth 
 discover. 
 
 ^tct. 40. — I am naturally bashful ; nor hath conver- 
 sation, age, or travel, been able to effront or euharden 
 me ; yet I have one part of modesty, which I have 
 seldom discovered in another, that is (to speak truly), 
 I am not so much afraid of death as ashamed thereof ; 
 'tis the very disgrace and ignominy of our natures, that 
 in a moment can so disfigure us, that our nearest 
 friends, wife, and children, stand afraid, and start at us. 
 The birds and beasts of the field, that before, in a 
 natural fear, obeyed us, forgetting all allegiance, begin 
 to prey upon us. This very conceit hath, in a temgest, 
 disposed and left me willing to be swallowed up in the 
 abyss of Avaters, wherein I had perished unseen, im- 
 pitied, without wondering eyes, tears of pity, lectures 
 of mortality, and none had said, " Quantum imitatus ah
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 55 
 
 illo ! " Not that I am ashamed of the anatomy of my 
 parte, or can accuse nature of playing the bungler in 
 any part of me, or my own vicious life for contracting 
 anv tjhamefiil disease upon me, whereby I might not 
 call myself as wholesome a morsel for the worms as 
 any. 
 
 Sect. 41. — Some, upon the courage of a fruitful issue, 
 wherein, as in the truest chronicle, they seem to outlive 
 themselves, can with greater patience away with death. 
 This conceit and counterfeit subsisting in our progenies 
 seems to be a mere fallacy, imworthy the desire of a 
 man, that can but conceive a thought of the next world ; 
 who, in a nobler ambition, should desire to live in his 
 substance in heaven, rather than his name and shadow 
 in the eai'th. And therefore, at my death, I mean to 
 take a total adieu of the world, not caring for a monu- 
 ment, history, or epitaph ; not so much as the bare 
 memorj' of my name to be found anywhere, but in the 
 xmiversal register of God. I am not yet so cynical, aa 
 to approve the testament of Diogenes,* nor do I alto- 
 gether allow that rodomontade of Lucan ;t 
 
 " CceIo tegitur, qui non habet umam." 
 
 He that unbiiried lies wants not his hearse ; 
 For unto him a tomb 'a the universe. 
 
 but commend, in my calmer judgment, those ingenuous 
 intentions that desire to sleep by the urns of their 
 fatliers, and strive to go the neatest Avay unto corruption. 
 I do not envy the temper *" of crows and daws, nor the 
 numerous and weary days of our fathers before the 
 Hood. If there be any truth in astrology, I may outlive 
 
 • Who willed his friend not to bury him, but to hang him 
 up with II Mtuff in liin liund, to fright away the crows. 
 t "Pharrolia," vii. 819.
 
 56 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 a jubilee ;58 as yet I have not seen one revolution of 
 Saturn,''' nor hatli my pulse beat thirty years, and yet, 
 excepting one,58 have seen the ashes of, and left under 
 ground, all the kings of Europe ; have been contem- 
 porary to three emperors, four grand signiors, and as 
 many popes : methinks I have outlived myself, and 
 begin to be weary of the sun ; I have shaken hands with 
 delight in my warm blood and canicular days ; I 
 perceive I do anticipate the vices of age ; the world to 
 me is but a dream or mock-show, and we all therein but 
 pantaloons and anticks, to my severer comtemplations. 
 Se,d. 42. — It is not, I confess, an unlawful prayer to 
 desire to surpass the days of our Saviour, or wish to 
 outlive that age wherein he thought fittest to die ; yet, if 
 (as divinity affirms) there shall be no grey hairs in. heaven, 
 but all shall rise in the perfect state of men, we do 
 but outlive those perfections in this world, to be recalled 
 imto them by a greater miracle in the next, and run on 
 here but to be retrograde hereafter. Were there any 
 hopes to outlive vice, or a point to be superannuated 
 from sin, it were worthy our knees to implore the days 
 of Methuselah. But age doth not rectify, but incurvate 
 our natures, turning bad dispositions into worser habits, 
 and (like diseases) brings on incurable vices ; for every 
 day, as we grow weaker in age, we grow stronger in sin, 
 and. the number of our days doth but make our sins 
 innumerable. The same vice, committed at sixteen, is 
 not the same, though it agrees in all other circimi- 
 stances, as at forty ; but swells and doubles from the 
 circumstance of our ages, wherein, besides the constant 
 and inexcusable habit of transgressing, the maturity of 
 our judgment cuts off pretence unto excuse or pardon. 
 Every sin, the oftener it is committed, the more it 
 acquireth in the quality of evil ; as it succeeds in time,
 
 KELIGIO MEDICT. 57 
 
 80 it proceeds in degrees of badness ; for as they proceed 
 they ever multiply, and, like figures in arithmetick, the 
 last stands for more than all that went before it. And, 
 though I think no man can live well once, but he that 
 could live twice, yet, for my own part, I would not live 
 over my hours past, or begin again the thread of my 
 days ; not upon Cicero's ground,* because I have lived 
 them well, but for fear I should live them worse. I 
 find my growing judgment daily instruct me how to 
 be better, but my untamed aftections and confirmed 
 vitiosity make me daily do worse. I find in my con- 
 firmed age the same sins I discovered in my youth ; I 
 committed many then because I was a chlid ; and, 
 because I conmiit them still, I am yet an infant. 
 Therefore I perceive a man may be twice a child, 
 l>efore the days of dotage ; and stand in need of ^son's 
 bath *' before tlueescore. 
 
 Sect 43. — And truly there goes a deal of providence 
 to produce a man's life unto threescore ; there is more 
 required than an able temper for those years : though 
 the radical humour contain in it sufficient oil for seventy, 
 yet I perceive in some it gives no light past thirty : men 
 assign not all the causes of long life, that write whole 
 books thereof. They that found themselves on the 
 radical balsam, or vital sulphur of the parts, determine 
 not why Abel lived not bo long as Adam. There is 
 therefore a secret gloom or bottom of our days : 'twas 
 liis wisdom to determine them : but his perpetual and 
 waking providence that fulfils and accomplLsheth them ; 
 wherein the spirits, ourselves, and all the creatures of 
 (j<^, in a secret and disputed way, do execute his will. 
 Let them not therefore complain of immaturity that die 
 about thirty : they fall but like the whole world, whose 
 • F.i>. lib. xxiv. cp. 24.
 
 58 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 solid and "well-composed substance must not expect the 
 duration and period of its constitution : wlien all things 
 are completed in it, its age is accomplished ; and the 
 last and general fever may as naturally destroy it before 
 six thousand/" as me before forty. There is therefore 
 some other hand that twines the thread of life than that 
 of nature : we are not only ignorant in antipathies and 
 occult qualities ; our ends are as obscure as our begin- 
 nings ; the line of our days is drawn by night, and the 
 various effects therein by a pencil that is invisible ; 
 wherein, though we confess our ignorance, I am sure 
 we do not err if we say, it is the hand of God. 
 
 Bed. 44. — I am much taken with two verses of Lucan, 
 since I have been able not only, as we do at school, to 
 construe, but understand : 
 
 " Victurosque Dei celant ut vivere durent, 
 Felix esse mori.'" * 
 
 We 're all deluded, vainly searching ways 
 To make us happy by the length of days ; 
 For cunningly, to make 's protract this breath. 
 The gods conceal the happiness of death. 
 
 There be many excellent strains in that poet, where- 
 with his stoical genius hath liberally supplied him : 
 and truly there are singular pieces in the philosophy 
 of Zeno,^i and doctrine of the stoics, which I perceive, 
 delivered ia a pulpit, pass for current divinity : yet 
 herein are they in extremes, that can allow a man to be 
 his own assassin, and so highly extol the end and suicide 
 of Cato. This is indeed not to fear death, but yet to be 
 afraid of life. It is a brave act of valour to contemn 
 death ; but, where life is more terrible than death, it 
 is then the truest valour to dare to lire : and herein 
 religion hath taught us a noble example ; for all the 
 * Pharsalia, iv. 519.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 59 
 
 valiant acts of Curtius, Scoevola, or Codrui?, do not 
 parallel, or match, that one of Job ; and sure there is 
 no torture to the rack of a disease, nor any poniards in 
 death itself, like those in the way or prologue unto it. 
 "Emori yiclo, sed me esse viortuum nihil euro;" I would 
 not die, but care not to be dead, "Were I of Caesar's 
 reli>non,*^ I should be of his desires, and wish rather to 
 go off at one blow, than to be sawed in pieces by the 
 grating torture of a disease. Men that look no further 
 than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto 
 life, and quarrel A\'ith their constitutions for being sick ; 
 but I, that have examined the parts of man, and know 
 upon what tender filaments that fabrick hangs, do 
 wonder that we are not always so ; and, considering the 
 thousand doors that lead to death, do thank my God 
 that we can die but once. 'Tis not only the mischief 
 of diseases, and the villany of poisons, that make an 
 end of us ; we vainly accuse the fury of guns, and the 
 new inventions of death : — it is in the power of every 
 hand to destroy us, and we are beholden unto every 
 one Me meet, he doth not kill us. There is therefore 
 but one comfort left, that though it be in the power of 
 the weakest arm to take away life, it is not in the 
 strongest to deprive us of death. God would not ex- 
 empt himself from that ; the. misery of immurtulity 
 in the He.<h he undertook not, that was immortal. 
 Certainly there is no happiness within this circle of 
 flesh ; nor is it in the opticks of these eyes to behold 
 felicity. The first day of our jubilee is death ; the 
 devil hath therefore failed of his desires ; we are hap- 
 pier with death tlian we should have been without it : 
 there is no nii.ser)' but in himself, where there is no 
 end of misery ; and so indeed, in his own sense, the 
 stoic is in the right.''^ lie forgets that he can die, who
 
 to RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 complains of misery : we are in tlie power of no calamity 
 whUe death, is in our own, 
 
 8e,d. 45. — Now, besides this literal and positive kind 
 of death, there are others whereof divines make men- 
 tion, and those, I think, not merely metaphorical, as 
 mortification, dying unto sin and the world. There- 
 fore, I say, every man hath a double horoscope ; one of 
 tiis humanity, — his birth, another of his Christianity, — 
 tiis baptism : and from this do I compute or calculate 
 my nativity ; not reckoning those lioTtz combustce,^* and 
 odd days, or esteeming myself anything, before I was 
 my Saviom''s and enrolled in the register of Christ. 
 Whosoever enjoys not this life, I coimt him but an 
 apparition, though he wear about him the sensible 
 affections of flesh. In these moral acceptions, the way 
 to be immortal is to die daily ; nor can I think I have 
 the true theory of death, when I contemplate a skull or 
 behold a skeleton with those viJgar imaginations it 
 casts upon us. I have therefore enlarged that common 
 memento mori into a more Christian memorandum, 
 memento quatuor novissima, — those four inevitable 
 points of us all, death, judgment, heaven, and hell. 
 Neither did the contemplations of the heathens rest in 
 their graves, without a further thou^ght, of Rhada- 
 manth^^ or some judicial proceeding after death, though 
 in another way, and upon suggestion of their natural 
 reasons. I cannot but marvel from what sibyl or oracle 
 they stole the prophecy of the world's destruction by 
 fire, or whence Lucan learned to say — 
 
 *' Communis mundo superest rogus, ossibus astra 
 Misturus " * 
 
 There yet remains to th' world one common fire, 
 Wherein our bones with stars shall make one pyre. 
 * Fharsalia, vii. 814.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 6l 
 
 I lielieve the world grows near its end ; yet is neither 
 old nor decayed, nor will ever perish upon the ruins of 
 its o^ra. principles. As the work of creation was above 
 nature, so is its adversary, anniliilation ; wthout which 
 the world hath not its end, but its mutation. Now, 
 what force should be able to consume it thus far, with- 
 out the breath of Gud, which is the truest consundug 
 flame, my philosophy cannot inform me. Some believe 
 there went not a minute to the world's creation, nor 
 shall there go to its destruction ; those six days, so 
 punctually described, make not to them one moment, 
 but rather seem to manifest the method and idea of 
 that great work of the intellect of God than the manner 
 how he proceeded in its operation. I cannot dream that 
 there should be at the last day any such judicial pro- 
 ceeding, or calling to the bar, as indeed the Scripture 
 seems to imply, and the literal commentators do con- 
 ceive : for unspeakable mysteries in tlie Scriptui'es are 
 often delivered in a vulgar and illustrative way, and, 
 l)eing written unto man, are delivered, not as they truly 
 are, but as they may be understood ; wherein, notwith- 
 ptanding, the different interpretations according to dif- 
 ferent capacities may stand firm with our devotion, nor 
 be any way prejudicial to each single edification. 
 
 ikd. 46. — Now, to determine the day and year of this 
 inevitable time, is not only convincible and statute 
 madness, but also manifest impiety. How shall we 
 interpret Elias's six thousand years, or imagine the 
 secret communicated to a Rabbi which God hath de- 
 nied unto his angels ? It had been an excellent quajre 
 to have posed the devil of Delphos, and must needs 
 have forced him to some strange amphibology. It hath 
 not only mocked tlie predictions of sundry astrologers 
 in ages past, but tlie prophecies of many melancholy
 
 62 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 heads in these present ; who, neither understanding 
 reasonably things past nor present, pretend a know- 
 ledge of tilings to come ; heads ordained only to mani- 
 fest the incredible effects of melancholy and to fulfil old 
 prophecies,* rather than be the authors of new. " In 
 those days there shall come wars and rumours of wars " 
 to me seems no prophecy, but a constant truth in all 
 times verified since it was pronounced. " There shall 
 be signs in the moon and stars ; " how comes he then 
 like a thief in the night, when he gives an item of his 
 coming ? That common sign, drawn from the revela- 
 tion of antichrist, is as obscure as any ; in our common 
 compute he hath been come these many years ; but, 
 for my own part, to speak freely, I am half of opinion 
 that antichrist is the philosopher's stone in divinity, for 
 the discovery and invention whereof, though there be 
 prescribed rules, and probable inductions, yet hath 
 hardly any man attained the perfect discovery thereof. 
 That general opinion, that the world grows near its 
 end, hath possessed all ages past as nearly as ours. I 
 am afraid that the souls that now depart cannot escape 
 that lingering expostulation of the saints under the 
 altar, "quousque, Domine?" how long, Lord? and groan 
 in the expectation of the great jubilee. 
 
 Sect. 47. — This is the day that must make good that 
 great attribute of God, his justice ; that must reconcile 
 those unanswerable doubts that torment the wisest 
 understandings ; and reduce those seeming inequalities 
 and respective distributions in this world, to an equality 
 and recompensive justice in the next. This is that one 
 day, that shall include and comprehend all that went 
 before it ; wherein, as in the last scene, all the actors 
 must enter, to complete and make up the catastrophe of 
 * " In those days there shall come liars and false prophets."
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 63 
 
 this <^reat piece. This is the day whose memory hath, 
 onlv, power to make us honest iu the dark, and to be 
 virtuous ^^-ithout awitness. "/j)sa s^tipretiuvi virtus sibi," 
 that virtue is her own reward, is but a cold principle, 
 and not able to maintain our variable resolutions in a 
 constant and settled way of goodness. I have practised 
 that honest artifice of Seneca,** and, in my retired and 
 solitary imaginations to detain me from the foulness of 
 ^^ce, have fimcied to myself the presence of my dear and 
 worthiest friends, before whom I should lose my head 
 rather than be \'icious ; yet herein I foimd that there 
 was nought but moral honesty ; and tliis was not to be 
 virtuous for his sake who must reward us at the last. I 
 have tried if I could reach that great resolution of his, 
 to be honest without a thouglit of heaven or hell ; and, 
 indeed I found, upon a natural inclination, and inbred 
 loyalty unto virtue, that I coxild serve her without a 
 livery, yet not in that resolved and venerable way, but 
 that the frailty of my nature, upon an easy temptation, 
 might be induced to forget her. The life, therefore, and 
 spirit of all our actions is the resurrection, and a stable 
 apprehension that our a.shes shall enjoy the fruit of our 
 pious endeavours ; without this, all religion is a fallacy, 
 and those impieties of Lucian, Euripides, and Julian, are 
 no blasjihemies, but subtile verities ; and atheists have 
 been the only philosophers. 
 
 Sect. 48. — How shall the dead arise, is no question of 
 my faith ; to believe only possibilities is not faith, but 
 mere philosojihy. Many things are true in divinity, 
 which are neither inducible by reason nor confirmable 
 by sense ; and many things in phU<).sf)phy confirmable 
 by sense, yet not inducible by reason. Thus it is im- 
 possible, by any m\i'\ or demonstrative reasons, to per- 
 suade a man to believe the conversion of the needle to
 
 64 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 the north ; thoiigli this be possible and true, and easily 
 credible, upon a single experiment unto the sense. I 
 believe that our estranged and divided ashes shall unite 
 again ; that our separated dust, after so many pilgrim- 
 ages and transformations into the parts of minerals, 
 plants, animals, elements, shall, at the voice of God, 
 return into their primitive shapes, and join again to 
 make up their primary and predestinate forms. As at 
 the creation there was a separation of that confused 
 mass into its pieces ; so at the deslSTiction thereof there 
 shall be a separation into its distinct individuals. As, 
 at the creation of the world, all the distinct species that 
 we behold lay involved in one mass, till the fndtful 
 voice of God separated this iinited multitude into its 
 several species, so, at the last day, when those corrupted 
 relicts shall be scattered in the wilderness of forms, and 
 seem to have forgot their proper habits, God, by a power- 
 ful voice, shall command them back into their proper 
 shapes, and call them out by their single individuals. 
 Then shall appear the fertility of Adam, and the magick 
 of that sperm that hath dilated into so many millions. 
 I have often beheld, as a mii-acle, that artificial resur- 
 rection and revivification of mercmy, how being morti- 
 fied into a thousand shapes, it assumes again its own, 
 and returns into its numerical self. Let us speak 
 naturally, and like philosophers. The forms of alter- 
 able bodies in these sensible corruptions perish not ; 
 nor, as we imagine, wholly quit their mansions ; but 
 retire and contract themselves into their secret and 
 unaccessible parts ; where they may best protect them- 
 selves from the action of their antagonist. A plant or 
 vegetable consumed to ashes to a contemplative and 
 school-philosopher seems utterly destroyed, and the 
 form to have taken his leave for ever ; but to a sensible
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 65 
 
 artist the forms are not perished, but withdrawii into 
 their incombustible part, where they lie secure from the 
 action of that devouring element. This is made good 
 by experience, which can from the ashes of a plant 
 revive the plimt, and from its cinders recall it into its 
 stalk and leaves again.67 What the art of man can do 
 in these inferior pieces, what blasphemy is it to affinn 
 the finger of God cannot do in those more perfect and 
 sensible structures ? This is that mystical philosophy, 
 from whence no true scholar becomes an atheist, but 
 from the visilde effects of nature grows up a real 
 lUvine, and beholds not in a dream, as Ezekiel, but 
 in an ocular and visible object, the types of his resur- 
 rection. 
 
 Sect. 49. — Now, the necessary mansions of our restored 
 selves are those two contrary and incompatible places 
 we call heaven and hell. To define them, or strictly to 
 determine what and where these are, surpasseth my 
 divinity. That elegant apostle, which seemed to have 
 a glimpse of heaven, hath left but a negative descrip- 
 tion thereof; which "neither eye hath seen, nor ear hath 
 heard, nor can enter into the heart of man : " he was 
 translated out of himself to behold it ; but, being re- 
 turned into himself, could not express it. Saint John's 
 description by emeralds, chrj'solites, and precious stones, 
 is too weak to express the material heaven we behold. 
 Briefiv, therefore, where the soul hath the full measure 
 and complement of happiness ; where the boundless 
 apjK'tite of that sjiirit remains completely satisfied that 
 it can neither desire addition nor alteration ; that, I 
 think, is truly heaven : and this can only be in the 
 enjovment of that essence, whose infinite goodness is 
 able to tenninate tlie desires of itself, and the unsatiable 
 wishes of ours. Wherever God will thus manifest him- 
 
 E
 
 66 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 self, there is heaven, though, within the circle of this 
 sensible world. Thus, the soul of man may be in 
 heaven anywhere, even within the limits of his own 
 proper body ; and when it ceaseth to live in the body it 
 may remain in its own soul, that is, its Creator. And 
 thus we may say that Saint Paul, whether in the body 
 or out of the body, was yet in heaven. To place it in 
 the empyreal, or beyond the tenth sphere, is to forget 
 the world's destruction ; for when this sensible world 
 shall be destroyed, all shall then be here as it is now 
 there, an empyreal heaven, a quasi vacuity ; when to 
 ask where heaven is, is to demand where the presence of 
 God is, or where we have the glory of that happy 
 vision. Moses, that was bred up in all the learning of 
 the Egyptians, committed a gross absurdity in philo- 
 sophy, when with these eyes of flesh he desired to see God, 
 and petitioned his Maker, that is truth itself, to a contra- 
 dictioiL Those that imagine heaven and hell neighbours, 
 and conceive a vicinity between those two extremes, 
 upon consequence of the parable, where Dives discoursed 
 with Lazarus, in Abraham's bosom, do too grossly con- 
 ceive of those glorified creatures, whose eyes shall easily 
 out-see the sun, and behold without perspective the 
 extremest distances : for if there shall be, in our glori- 
 fied eyes, the faculty of sight and reception of objects, 
 I could think the visible species there to be in as un- 
 limitable a way as now the intellectual. I grant that 
 two bodies placed beyond the tenth sphere, or in a 
 vacuity, according to Aristotle's philosophy, could not 
 behold each other, because there wants a body or 
 medium to hand and transport the visible rays of the 
 object unto the sense ; but when there shall be a general 
 defect of either medium to convey, or light to prepare 
 and dispose that medium, and yet a perfect vision, we
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 67 
 
 must suspend the rules of our philosophy, and make all 
 good by a more absolute piece of opticks. 
 
 /Sec/. 50. — I cannot tell how to say that fire is ths 
 essence of hell ; I know not what to make of purgatory, 
 or conceive a llame that can either prey upon, or purify 
 the substance of a soul. Those flames of sulphur, men- 
 tioned in the scriptures, I take not to be understood of 
 this present hell, but of that to come, where fire shall 
 make up the complement of our tortures, and have a 
 body or subject whereon to manifest its tyranny. Some 
 who have had the honour to be textuary in divinity are 
 of opinion it shall be the same specifical tire with ours. 
 This is hard to conceive, yet can I make good how even 
 that may prey upon our bodies, and yet not consume 
 us : for in this material world, there are bodies that 
 persist invincible in the powerf ulest flames ; and though, 
 by the action of fire, they fall into ignition and liquation, 
 yet will they never sufier a destruction. I would gladly 
 know how Piloses, with an actual fire, calcined or burnt 
 the golden calf into powder : for that mystical metal of 
 gold, whose solary and celestial nature I admire, ex- 
 posed unto the violence of fire, grows only hot, and 
 liquefies, but consumeth not ; so when the consvunable 
 and volatile pieces of our bodies shall be refined into a 
 more impregnable and fixed temper, like gold, though 
 they suffer from the action of flames, they shall never 
 perish, but lie immortal in the arms of fire. And 
 surely, if this flame must suffer only by the action of 
 this element, there will many bodies escape ; and not 
 only heaven, but earth will not be at an end, but 
 rather a beginning. For at present it is not earth, but 
 a composition of fire, water, earth, and air ; but at that 
 time, spoiled of these ingredients, it sliall appear in a 
 suljstance more like itself, its ashes. Philosophers that
 
 68 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 opinioned the world's destruction, by fire, did never 
 dream of annihilation, wMcli is beyond the power of 
 sublunary causes ; for the last and proper action of that 
 element is but vitrification, or a reduction of a body into 
 glass ; and therefore some of our chyniicks facetioiusly 
 affirm, that, at the last fire, all shall be crystalized and 
 reverberated into glass, which is the utmost action of 
 that element. Nor need we fear this term, annihilation, 
 or wonder that God will destroy the works of his crea- 
 tion : for man subsisting, who is, and will then truly 
 appear, a microcosm, the world cannot be said to be 
 destroyed. For the eyes of God, and perhaps also of 
 our glorified selves, shall as really behold and contem- 
 plate the world, in its epitome or contracted essence, as 
 now it doth at large and in its dilated substance. In 
 the seed of a plant, to the eyes of God, and to the under- 
 standing of man, there exists, thovigh in an invisible 
 way, the perfect leaves, flowers, and fruit thereof ; for 
 things that are in fosse to the sense, are actually existent 
 to the imderstanding. Thus God beholds all things, 
 who contemplates as fully his works in their epitome 
 as in their full volume, and beheld as amply the whole 
 world, in that little compendium of the sixth day, as 
 in the scattered and dilated pieces of those five before. 
 
 Bed. 51. — Men commonly set forth the torments of hell 
 by fije, and the extremity of corporal afilictions, and 
 describe hell in the same method that Mahomet doth 
 heaven- This indeed makes a noise, and drums in 
 popular ears : but if this be the terrible piece thereof, it 
 is not worthy to stand in diameter with heaven, whose 
 happiness consists in that part that is best able to com- 
 prehend it, that immortal essence, that translated divinity 
 and colony of God, the soul. Surely, though we place 
 hell imder earth, the devil's walk and purlieu is about
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 69 
 
 it. Men speak too popidtirly who place it in those 
 flaming mountains, which to grosser apprehensions re- 
 present hell. The heait of man is the place the devils 
 dwell in ; I feel sometimes a hell witliin myself ; 
 Lucifer keeps his court in my breast ; Legion is revived 
 in me. There are as many hells as Anaxagoras^ 
 conceited worlds. There was more than one hell 
 in Magdalene, when there were seven devils ; for every 
 devil is an hell imto himself,® he holds enough of 
 torture in his own uhi ; and needs not the misery of cir- 
 cumference to afflict him : and thus, a distracted con- 
 science here is a shadow or introduction imto hell here- 
 after. Who can but pity the merciful intention of those 
 hands that do destroy themselves / The devil, were it 
 in his power, would do the like ; which being im- 
 possible, his miseries are endless, and he suflers most 
 in that attribute wherein he is impassible, his im- 
 mortality. 
 
 Sect. 52. — I thank God, and with joy I mention it, I 
 was never afraid of hell, nor ever grew pale at the 
 description of that place. I have so fixed my contempla- 
 tions on heaven, that I have almost forgot the idea of 
 hell ; and am afraid rather to lose the joys of the one, 
 than endure the miserj' of the other : to be deprived of 
 them is a perfect hell, and needs methiuks no addition 
 to complete our atllictions. That terrible term hath 
 never detained me from sin, nor do I owe any good 
 action to the name thereof. I fear God, yet am not 
 afraid of him ; his mercies make me ashamed of my 
 sins, lx;fore his judgments afraid thereof : these are the 
 forced and Bccondary method of his wisdom, which he 
 useth but as the last remedy, and u])on provocation ; — 
 a course rather to deter the wicked, than incite the 
 virtuous to his worsliip. I can hardly think there was
 
 70 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 ever any scared into heaven : tliey go tlie fairest way to 
 heaven that would serve God without a hell : other 
 mercenaries, that crouch unto him in fear of hell, though 
 they term themselves the servants, are indeed but the 
 slaves, of the Almighty, 
 
 S>ed. 53. — And to he true, and speak my soul, when I 
 survey the occurrences of my life, and call into account 
 the finger of God, I can perceive nothing but an abyss 
 and mass of mercies, either in general to mankind, or in 
 particular to myself. And, whether out of the prejudice 
 of my affection, or an inverting and j)artial conceit of 
 his mercies, I know not, — ^but those which others term 
 crosses, afflictions, judgments, misfortunes, to me, who 
 inquire further into them than their visible effects, they 
 both appear, and in event have ever proved, the secret 
 and dissembled favours of his affection. It is a singular 
 piece of wisdom to apprehend truly, and without passion, 
 the works of God, and so well to distinguish his justice 
 from his mercy as not to miscall those noble attributes ; 
 yet it is likemse an honest piece of logick so to dispute 
 and argue the proceedings of God as to distinguish even 
 his judgments into mercies. For God is merciful unto 
 all, because better to the worst than the best deserve ; 
 and to say he punisheth none in this world, though it 
 be a paradox, is no absurdity. To one that hath com- 
 mitted murder, if the judge should only ordain a fine, 
 it were a madness to call this a punishment, and to re- 
 pine at the sentence, rather than admire the clemency 
 of the judge. Thus, our offences being mortal, and 
 deserving not only death but damnation, if the goodness 
 of God be content to traverse and pass them over with 
 a loss, misfortune, or disease ; what frenzy were it to 
 term tliis a pimishment, rather than an extremity of 
 mercy, and to groan under the rod of his judgments
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 71 
 
 rather tbaii admire the sceptre of his mercies ! Tliere- 
 Ibre to adore, honour, and admire hiiu, is a debt of 
 gratitude due from the obligation of oiir nature, states, 
 and conditions : and with these thoughts he that knows 
 them best will not deny that 1 adore him. That 1 
 obtain heaven, and the bliss thereof, is accidental, and 
 not the intended work of my devotion ; it being a 
 felicity I can neither think to deserve nor scarce in 
 modesty to expect. For these two ends of us all, either 
 as rewjuds or punishments, are mercifully ordained and 
 disproportionably disposed unto our actions ; the one 
 being so far beyond our deserts, the other so infinitely 
 below our demerits. 
 
 Stci. 54. — There is no salvation to those that believe 
 not in Christ ; that is, say some, since his nativity, and, 
 SB divinity athrnieth, before also ; wliich makes me 
 much apprehend the end of those honest worthies and 
 ]ihilosophers which died before his incarnation. It is 
 liard to place those souls in hell, Avhose worthy lives do 
 teach us virtue on earth. Methinks, among those many 
 Bubdivisions of hell, there might have been one limbo 
 left for these. What a strange vision wUl it be to see 
 their poetical fictions converted into verities, and their 
 imagined and fancied furies into real devils ! How 
 strange to them will sound the history of Adam, when 
 they shall suffer for him they never heard of ! Whoii 
 they who derive their genealogy from the gods, shall 
 know they are the unhappy issue of sinful nuiu ! It is 
 an insolent part of reason, to controvert the works of 
 G(xl, or (luestion the justice of his proceedings. Could 
 humility teach others, as it hath instructed me, to con- 
 template the infinite and incomprehensible distance be- 
 twixt the Creator and the creature ; or did we seriously 
 perjJtud that one simile of St Taul, "shall the ves.sel say
 
 72 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 to the potter, why hasst thou made me thus 1 " it would 
 prevent these arrogant disputes of reason : nor would 
 we argue the definitive sentence of God, either to heaven 
 or hell. Men that live according to the right rule and 
 law of reason, live but in their own kind, as beasts do 
 in theirs ; who justly obey the prescript of their natures, 
 and therefore cannot reasonably demand a reward of 
 their actions, as only obeying the natural dictates of 
 their reason. It will, therefore, and must, at last 
 appear, that all salvation is through Christ ; which 
 verity, I fear, these great examples of virtue must con- 
 firm, and make it good how the perfectest actions of 
 earth have no title or claim unto heaven. 
 
 Sect. 55. — Nor truly do I tliink the lives of these, or 
 of any other, were ever correspondent, or in all points 
 conformable, imto their doctrines. It is evident that 
 Aristotle transgressed the rule of his own ethicks ; ^" 
 the stoicks, that condemn passion, and command a man 
 to laugh in Phalaris's ^^ bull, could not endure without a 
 groan a fit of the stone or colick. The scepticks, that 
 affirmed they knew nothing,'^^ even in that opinion con- 
 fute themselves, and thought they knew more than all 
 the world beside. Diogenes I hold to be the most vain- 
 glorious man of his time, and more ambitious in refus- 
 ing all honours, than Alexander in rejecting none. Vice 
 and the devil put a fallacy upon our reasons ; and, 
 provoking us too hastily to run from it, entangle and 
 profound us deeper in it. The duke of Venice, tliat 
 weds himself unto the sea, by a ring of gold, ''3 I will 
 not accuse of prodigality, because it is a solemnity of 
 good use and consequence in the state : but the philoso- 
 pher, that threw his money into the sea to avoid avarice, 
 was a notorious prodigal. 7* There is no road or ready 
 way to virtue ; it is not an easy point of art to dis-
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 73 
 
 entangle ourselves from this riddle or web of sin. To 
 perfect virtue, as to religion, there is required a panoplia, 
 or complete armour ; that whilst we lie at close ward 
 against one vice, we lie not open to the veney ^5 of 
 another. And indeed wiser discretions, that have the 
 thread of reason to conduct them, oflend without a 
 pardon ; whereas under heiids may stumble without 
 dishonour. There go so many circumstances to piece 
 up one good action, that it is a lesson to be good, and 
 M-e are forced to be virtuous by the book. Again, the 
 practice of men holds not an equal pace, yea and often 
 runs counter to their theory ; we naturally know what 
 is good, but naturally pursue what is evil : the rhetorick 
 wherewith I persuade another cannot pei-suade myself. 
 There is a depraved appetite in us, that will with 
 patience hear the learned instructions of reason, but 
 yet perfoma no further than agrees to its own irregular 
 humour. In brief, we all are mojisters ; that is, a com- 
 position of man and beast : wherein we must endeavour 
 to be as the poets fancy that wise man, Chiron ; that is, 
 to have the region of man above that of beast, and sense 
 to sit but at the feet of reason. Lastly, I do desire with 
 God that all, but yet atlirm with men that few, shall 
 know salvation, — that the bridge is narrow, the p;^ssJ:^;e 
 strait unto life : yet those who do confine the church 
 of God either to particular nations, churches, or 
 families, have made it far narrower than our Saviour 
 ever meant it. 
 
 Sect. 5G. — The vulgarity of those judgments that wrap 
 the church of God in Strabo's cloak, T" and restrain it 
 unto Europe, seem to me as bad geographers as Alex- 
 ander, who thought he had conquered all the world, 
 when he had not suljdued the half of any part thereof. 
 For we cannot deny the church of God both in Asia
 
 74 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 and Africa, if we do not forget the peregrinations of 
 tlie apostles, the deaths of the martyrs, the sessions of 
 many and (even in our reformed judgment) lawful 
 councils, held in those parts in the minority and 
 nonage of ours. Nor must a few differences, more re- 
 markable in the eyes of man than, perhaps, in the 
 judgment of God, excommunicate from heaven one an- 
 other ; much less those Christians who are in a manner 
 all martyrs, maintaining their faith in the noble way 
 of persecution, and serving God in the fire, whereas 
 we honour him in the sunshine. 
 
 'Tis true, we all hold there is a number of elect, and 
 many to be saved ; yet, take our opinions together, and 
 from the confusion thereof, there will be no such thing 
 as salvation, nor shall any one be saved : for, first, the 
 church of Rome condemneth us ; we likewise them ; 
 the sub-reformists and sectaries sentence the doctrine of 
 our church as damnable ; the atomist, or familist,'^ re- 
 probates all these ; and all these, them again. Thus, 
 whilst the mercies of God do promise us heaven, our 
 conceits and opinions exclude us from that place. There 
 must be therefore more than one St Peter ; particular 
 churches and sects usurp the gates of heaven, and turn 
 the key against each other ; and thus we go to heaven 
 against each other's wills, conceits, and opinions, and, 
 with as much uncharity as ignorance, do err, I fear, in 
 points not only of our own, but one another's salvation. 
 
 &e,d. 57. — I believe many are saved who to man 
 seem reprobated, and many are reprobated who in the 
 opinion and sentence of man stand elected. There will 
 appear, at the last day, strange and unexpected examples, 
 both of his justice and his mercy ; and, therefore, to 
 define either is folly in man, and insolency even in the 
 devils. Those acute and subtile spirits, in all their
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 75 
 
 sagacity, can hardly diNine who shall be saved ; which 
 if they could prognostick, their labour were at an end, 
 nor need they compass the earth, seeking whom they 
 may devour. Those who, upon a rigid application of 
 the law, sentence Solomon unto damnationj^i* condemn 
 not only him, but themselves, and the whole world ; 
 for by the letter and written word of God, we are with- 
 out exception in the state of death : but there is a pre- 
 rogative of God, and an arbitrary pleasure above the 
 letter of his own law, by which alone we can pretend 
 unto salvation, and through which Solomon might be as 
 easQy saved as those who condemn him. 
 
 Sect. 58. — The number of those who pretend unto 
 salvation, and those infinite swarms who think to pass 
 through the eye of tliis needle, have much amazed me. 
 That name and compellation of " little flock " doth not 
 comfort, but deject, my devotion ; especially when I 
 reflect upon mine ONvn unwortliiness, wherein, accord- 
 ing to my humble apprehensions, I am below them all. 
 I believe there shall never be an anarchy in heaven ; 
 but, as there are hierarchies amongst the angels, so shall 
 there be degrees of priority amongst the saints. Yet is 
 it, I protest, beyond my ambition to aspire \mto the 
 first ranks ; my desires only are, and I shall be hapi)y 
 therein, to be but the last man, and bring up the rear 
 in heaven. 
 
 Htci. 59. — Again, I am confident, and fully persuaded, 
 yet dare not take my oath, of my salvation. I am, as it 
 were, sure, and do believe without all doubt, that there 
 is such a city as Constantinople ; yet, for me to take 
 my oath thereon were a kind of perjury, because I hold 
 no infallible warrant from my own sense to confirm 
 me in the certainty thereof. And truly, though many 
 pretc'ud to an absolute certainty of their tsalvatiou, yet
 
 76 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 when an humble soul shall contemplate our own un- 
 worthiness, she shall meet with many doubts, and sud- 
 denly find how little we stand in need of the precept of 
 St Paul, " work out your salvation with fear and trem- 
 hling." Thatwhich is the cause of my election, Ihold to 
 be the cause of my salvation, which was the mercy and 
 heneplacit of God, before I was, or the foundation of the 
 world. " Before Abraham was, I am," is the saying of 
 Christ, yet is it true in some sense if I say it of myself; 
 for I was not only before myseK but Adam, that is, in 
 the idea of God, and the decree of that synod held from 
 all eternity. And in this sense, I say, the world was 
 before the creation, and at an end before it had a 
 beginning. And thus was I dead before I was alive ; 
 though my grave be England, my dying place was 
 Paradise ; and Eve miscarried of me, before she con- 
 ceived of Cain. 
 
 Sect. 60. — Insolent zeals, that do decry good works 
 and rely only upon faith, take not away merit : for, 
 depending upon the efficacy of their faith, they enforce 
 the condition of God, and in a more sophistical way do 
 seem to challenge heaven. It was decreed by God that 
 only those that lapped in the water like dogs, should 
 have the honour to destroy the Midianites ; yet could 
 none of those justly challenge, or imagine he deserved, 
 that honour thereupon. I do not deny but that true 
 faith, and such as God requires, is not only a mark or 
 token, but also a means, of our salvation ; but, where 
 to find this, is as obscure to me as my last end. And 
 if our Saviour could object, unto his own disciples and 
 favourites, a faith that, to the quantity of a grain of 
 mustard seed, is able to remove mountains ; surely that 
 which we boast of is not anything, or, at the most, but 
 a remove from nothing.
 
 REIJGIO MEDICI. 77 
 
 This is the tenoiir of my belief ; wherein, though 
 there be many things eingular, and to the humour of 
 my irreguL-u: self, yet-, if they square not ^vith matiirer 
 judgments, I disclaim them, and do no further favoui 
 them than the learned and best judgments shall authorize 
 them. 
 
 PART THE SECOND. 
 
 S^d. 1. — Now, for that other virtue of charity, without 
 which faith is a mere notion and of no existence, I have 
 ever endeavoured to nourish the merciful disposition 
 and humane inclination I borrowed from my parents, 
 and regulate it to the wTitten and prescribed laws of 
 charity. And, if I hold the true anatomy of myself, I 
 am delineated and naturally framed to such a piece of 
 \'irtue, — for I am of a constitution so general that it 
 consorts and sympathizeth witli aU things ; I have no 
 antipatliy, or rather idiosyncrasy, in diet, humour, air, 
 anything. I wonder not at the French for their dishes 
 of frogs, snails, and toadstools, nor at the Jews for locusts 
 and grasshoppers ; but, being amongst them, make 
 them my common viands ; and I find they agree with 
 my stomach as well as theirs. I could digest a salad 
 gathered in a church-yard as well as in a garden. I 
 cannot start at tlie presence of a serpent, scorpion, lizard, 
 or salamander ; at the sight of a toad or viper, I find in 
 me no desire to take up a stone to destroy them. I feel 
 not in myself those common antipatliies that I can dis- 
 cover in others : those national repugnances do not 
 touch me, nor do I beliold with prejudice the French, 
 Italian, Spaniard, or Dutcli ; but, where I find their
 
 78 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 actions in balance with my countrymen's, I honour, love, 
 and embrace them, in the same degree. I was born in 
 the eighth climate, but seem to be framed and constel- 
 lated unto all. I am no plant that will not prosper out 
 of a garden. All places, aU airs, make unto me one 
 country ; I am in England everywhere, and under any 
 meridian. I have been shipT\Tecked, yet am not enemy 
 with the sea or winds ; I can study, play, or sleep, in a 
 tempest. In brief I am averse from nothing : my con- 
 science would give me the lie if I should say I abso- 
 lutely detest or hate any essence, but the devil ; or so 
 at least abhor anything, but that we might come to 
 composition. If there be any among those common 
 objects of hatred I do contemn and laugh at, it is that 
 great enemy of reason, virtue, and religion, the mul- 
 titude ; that numerous piece of monstrosity, which, 
 taken asunder, seem men, and the reasonable creatures 
 of God, but, confused together, make but one great 
 beast, and a monstrosity more prodigious than Hydra. 
 It is no breach of charity to call these fools ; it is the 
 style all holy writers have afforded them, set down by 
 Solomon in canonical Scripture, and a point of our faith 
 to believe so. Neither in the name of multitude do I 
 only include the base and minor sort of people : there 
 is a rabble even amongst the gentry; a sort of plebeian 
 heads, whose fancy moves with the same wheel as these ; 
 men in the same level with mechanicks, though their 
 fortunes do somewhat gild their infirmities, and their 
 purses compovmd for their follies. But, as in casting 
 account three or four men together come short in account 
 of one man placed by himself below them, so neither 
 are a troop of these ignorant Doradoes''^ of that true 
 esteem and value as many a forlorn person, whose con- 
 dition doth place him below their feet. Let us speak
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 79 
 
 like politicians ; there is a nobility without hemlilry, a 
 natural dignity, whereby one man is ranked with 
 another, another filed before him, according to the 
 quality of his desert, and pre-eminence of his good parts. 
 Though the corruption of these times, and the bias of 
 present practice, wheel another way, thus it was in the 
 first and primitive commonwealths, and is yet in the in- 
 tegrity and cradle of well ordered polities : till corrup- 
 tion getteth ground ; — ruder desires labouring after that 
 which wiser considerations contemn ; — every one having 
 a liberty to amass and heap up riches, and they a licence 
 or faculty to do or purchase anything. 
 
 Sect. 2. — This general and indilferent temper of mine 
 doth more nearly dispose me to this noble virtue. It is 
 a happiness to be born and framed unto virtue, and to 
 grow up from the seeds of nature, rather than the 
 inoculations and forced grafts of education : yet, if we 
 are directed only by our particular natures, and regulate 
 our inclinations by no higher rule than that of our 
 reasons, we are but moralists ; divinity will still call us 
 heathens. Therefore tliis great work of charity must 
 have other motives, ends, and impulsions. I give no 
 alms to satisfy the hunger of my brother, but to fulfil 
 and accomplish the will and command of my God ; I 
 draw not my purse for his sake that demands it, but his 
 that enjoined it ; I relieve no man upon the rhetorick 
 of his miseries, nor to content mine own commiserating 
 disposition ; for this is still but moral charity, and an 
 act that oweth more to passion than reason. He that 
 relieves another upon the bare suggestion and bowels of 
 pity doth not this so much for his sake as for his own : 
 for by compassion we make another's misery our own ; 
 and so, by relieving them, we relieve ourselves also. 
 It is as erroneous a conceit to redress other men's
 
 8o RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 misfortunes upon the common considerations of merciful 
 natures, that it may be one day our own case ; for this 
 is a sinister and politick kind of charity, whereby we 
 seem to bespeak the pities of men in the like occasions. 
 And truly I have observed that those professed eleemo- 
 synaries, though in a crowd or multitude, do yet direct 
 and place their petitions on a few and selected persons ; 
 there is surely a physiognomy, which those experienced 
 and master mendicants observe, whereby they instantly 
 discover a merciful aspect, and will single out a face, 
 wherein they spy the signatures and marks of mercy 
 For there are mystically in our faces certain character? 
 which carry in them the motto of our soids, wherein he 
 that can read A, B, C, may read our natures. I hold, 
 moreover, that there is a phytognomy, or physiognomy, 
 not only of men, but of plants and vegetables ; and in 
 every one of them some outward figures which hang as 
 signs or bushes of their inward forms. The finger of 
 God hath left an inscription upon aU his works, not 
 graphical, or composed of letters, but of their several 
 forms, constitutions, parts, and operations, which, aptly 
 joined together, do make one word that doth express 
 their natures. By these letters God calls the stai's by 
 their names ; and by tliis alphabet Adam assigned to 
 every creature a name peculiar to its nature. Now, 
 there are, besides these characters in our faces, certain 
 mystical figures in our hands, which I dare not call 
 mere dashes, strokes d la volee or at random, because 
 delineated by a pencil that never works in vain ; and 
 hereof I take more particular notice, because I cany 
 that in mine own hand wliich I could never read of nor 
 discover in another. Aristotle, I confess, in his acute 
 and singular book of physiognomy, hath made no 
 mention of chiromancy : ^^ yet I believe the Egyptians,
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 8i 
 
 who were nearer addicted to those abstruse aiid mysti- 
 cal sciences, had a knowledge therein : to which those 
 vagabond and counterfeit Egj^tians did after " pretend 
 iind perhaps retained a few corrupted principles, which 
 sometimes might verify their prognosticks. 
 
 It is the common wonder of all men, how, among so 
 many millions of faces, there should be none alike : 
 now, contrary-, I wonder as much how there should be 
 any. He that shall consider how many thousand 
 several words have been cartdessly and without study 
 composed out of twenty-four letters ; withal, how many 
 liundred lines there are to be drawn in the fabrick of 
 one man ; shall easily find that this variety is necessary' : 
 and it will be very hard that they shall so concur as to 
 make one portrait like another. Let a jiainter carelessly 
 limn out a million of faces, and you shall find them all 
 different ; yea, let him have his copy before him, yet, 
 after aU his art, there wiU remain a sensible distinction : 
 for the pattern or example of everything is the perfectest 
 in that kind, whereof we still come short, though we 
 transcend or go beyond it ; because herein it is wide, 
 and agrees not in all points unto its copy. Nor doth 
 the similitude of creatures disparage the variety of 
 nature, nor any way confound the works of God. For 
 even in things alike there is diversity ; and those that 
 do seem to accord do manifestly disagree. And thus is 
 man like Gfxl ; for, in tlie same things that we resemble 
 liim we are utterly different from him. There was 
 never anytliing so like another as in all points to 
 concur ; there will ever some reserved diflfereuce sli]) 
 in, to prevent tlie identity ; without whicli two several 
 things would not be alike, but tlie same, which is 
 imjxMwible. 
 
 ^cl. 3.— But, to return from philosoi)hy to charity, I 
 
 I'
 
 82 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 liold not so narrow a conceit of this virtue as to con- 
 ceive that to give alms is only to be charitable, or thiak 
 a piece of liberality can comprehend the total of charity. 
 Divinity hath wisely divided the act thereof into many 
 branches, and hath taught us, in this narrow way, many 
 paths imto goodness ; as many ways as we may do good, 
 so many ways we may be charitable. There are in- 
 firmities not only of body, but of soul and fortunes, 
 which do require the merciful hand of our abilities. I 
 cannot contemn a man for ignorance, but behold him 
 with as much pity as I do Lazarus. It is no greater 
 charity to clothe his body than apparel the nakedness 
 of his soul. It is an honourable object to see the 
 reasons of other men wear our liveries, and their 
 borrowed understandings do homage to the bounty of 
 ours. It is the cheapest way of beneficence, and, like 
 the natural charity of the sun, illuminates another 
 without obscuring itself. To be reserved and caitifif^ 
 in this part of goodness is the sordidest piece of covetous- 
 ness, and more contemptible than the pecuniary avarice. 
 To this (as calling myself a scholar) I am obliged by 
 the duty of my condition. I make not therefore my 
 head a grave, but a treasure of knowledge. I intend no 
 monopoly, but a community in learning, I study not 
 for my own sake only, but for theirs that study not for 
 themselves. I envy no man that knows more than 
 myself, but pity them that know less. I instruct no 
 man as an exercise of my knowledge, or with an intent 
 rather to nourish and keep it alive in mine own head 
 than beget and propagate it in his. And, in the midst 
 of all my endeavours, there is but one thought that 
 dejects me, that my acquired parts must perish with 
 myself, nor can be legacied among my honoured friends. 
 I cannot fall out or contemn a man for an error, or
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 83 
 
 conceive why a difference in opinion should di\'ide an 
 aft'ection ; for controversies, disputes, and argumenta- 
 tiou.-s, both in pliilosoi^hy and in divdnity, if they meet 
 with discreet and ijeaceable natures, do nut infringe the 
 laws of charity. In all disputes, so much as there is of 
 I>assion, so much there is of notliing to the purpose ; for 
 then reason, like a bad hound, spends upon a false scent, 
 and forsakes the question first started. And tliis is one 
 reason why controversies are never determined ; for, 
 though they be amply proposed, they are scarce at all 
 handled ; they do so swell \s-ith unnecessary digressions; 
 and the parenthesis on the party is often as large as the 
 main discourse upon the subject. The foundations of 
 religion are already established, and the principles of 
 salvation subscribed unto by alL There remain not 
 many controversies worthy a passion, and yet never any 
 dispute •without, not only in divinity but inferior arts. 
 "Wliat a paTpaxo/ji.vofiaxia and hot skirmish is betwixt S. 
 and T. in Lucian ! ** How do grammarians hack and 
 slash for the genitive case in Jupiter V* How do they 
 break their own pates, to salve that of Priscian !'* "Si 
 foret in terris, rideret Democritus." Yea, even amongst 
 wiser militants, how many wounds have been given and 
 credits slain, for the poor victory of an opinion, or 
 beggarly conquest of a distinction ! Scholars are men 
 of peace, they bear no arms, but their tongues are 
 sharper than Actius's razor ;" their pens carry farther, 
 and give a louder report than thimder. I had rather 
 stand the shock of a ba-silisko" than in the fury of 
 a merciless pen. It is not mere zeal to learning, or 
 devotion to the muses, that wiser princes patron the 
 arts, and carry an indulgent aspect unto scholars ; but 
 a deaire to have their names eternized by the memory 
 of their writings, and a fear of the revengeful pen of
 
 84 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 succeeding ages : for these are the men that, when they 
 have played their parts, and had their exits, must step 
 out and give the moral of their scenes, and deliver imto 
 posterity an inventory of their virtues and vices. And 
 surely there goes a great deal of conscience to the 
 compiling of an history : there is no reproach to the 
 scandal of a story ; it is such an authentick kind of 
 falsehood, that with authority helies our good names to 
 all nations and posterity. 
 
 Bed. 4. — There is another offence unto charity, which 
 no author hath ever written of, and few take notice of, 
 and that 's the reproach, not of whole professions, mys- 
 teries, and conditions, but of whole nations, whereia by 
 opprobrious epithets we miscall each other, and, by an 
 imcharitable logick, from a disposition in a few, con- 
 clude a habit in alL 
 
 Le mutin Anglois, et le bravache Escossois 
 Le bougre Italien, et le fol Fran9ois ; 
 Le i^oltron Eomain, le larron de Gascogne, 
 L'Espagnol superbe, et rAlleman yvrogne. 
 
 St Paul, that calls the Cretians liars, doth it but in- 
 directly, and upon quotation of their own poet.*' It is 
 as bloody a thought in one way as Nero's was in 
 another.^' For by a word we wound a thousand, and 
 at one blow assassin the honour of a nation. It is as 
 complete a piece of madness to miscall and rave against 
 the times ; or think to recall men to reason by a fit of 
 passion. Democritus, that thought to laugh the times 
 into goodness, seems to me as deeply hypochondriack 
 as Heraclitus, that bewailed them. It moves not my 
 spleen to behold the multitude in their proper humours ; 
 that is, in their fits of folly and madness, as well tmder- 
 Btanding that wisdom is not profaned imto the world ;
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. S5 
 
 and it is the privilege of a few to be Wrtuous. They 
 that endeavour to abolish \'ice destroy also \irtue ; for 
 contraries, though they destroy one another, are yet 
 the life of one another. Thus Wrtue (abolish \'ice) is 
 an idea. Again, the community of sin doth not dis- 
 pai-age goodness ; for, when Adce gains upon the major 
 part, virtue, in whom it remains, becomes more excel- 
 lent, and, being lost in some, multiplies its goodness in 
 others, which remain untouched, and persist entire in 
 the general inundation. I can therefore behold vice 
 without a satire, content only with an admonition, or 
 instructive reprehension ; for noble natures, and such 
 as are capable of goodness, are railed into vice, that 
 might as easily be admonished into virtue ; and we 
 should be all so far the orators of goodness as to protect 
 her from the power of vice, and maintain the cause of 
 injured truth. No man can justly censure or coudo.nin 
 another ; because, indeed, no man truly knows another. 
 This I perceive in myself ; for I am in the dark to all 
 the world, and my neiirest friends behold me but in a 
 cloud. Those that know me but superficially think 
 k-ss of me than I do of myself ; those of my near ac- 
 quaintance think more ; God who truly knows me, 
 knows that I am nothing : for he only beholds me, and 
 all the world, who looks not on us through a derived 
 ray, or a trajection of a sensible species, but beholds the 
 substance witliout the help of accidents, and the forms 
 of things, as we their operations. Further, no man can 
 judge another, because no man knows himself; for we 
 (•ensure others but as they disagree from that humour 
 which we fancy laudable in ourselves, and commend 
 others but fur that wherein they seem to quadrate and 
 consent with us. So that in conclusion, all is but tliat 
 we all condemn, self-love. 'Tis the general complaint
 
 86 RELIGIO MEDICL 
 
 of these times, and perhaps of those past, that charity 
 grows cold ; which I perceive most verified in those 
 which most do manifest the fires and flames of zeal ; 
 for it is a virtue that best agrees with coldest natures, 
 and such as are complexioned for humility. But how 
 shall we expect charity towards others, when we are 
 uncharitable to ou.rselves ? " Charity begins at home," 
 is the voice of the world ; yet is every man his greatest 
 enemy, and as it were his own executioner. " Non occides" 
 is the conunandment of God, yet scarce observed by any 
 man ; for I perceive every man is his own Atropos, and 
 lends a hand to cut the thread of his o-\\ti days. Caia 
 was not therefore the first murderer, but Adam, who 
 brought in death ; whereof he beheld the practice and 
 example in his own son Abel ; and saw that verified in 
 the experience of another which faith could not per- 
 suade liini in the theory of himself. 
 
 Beet 5. — There is, I think, no man that apprehends 
 his owTi miseries less than myself ; and no man that so 
 nearly apprehends another's. I could lose an arm 
 without a tear, and with few groans, methinks, be 
 quartered into pieces ; yet can I weep most seriously 
 at a play, and receive with a true passion the counter- 
 feit griefs of those known and professed impostures. It 
 is a barbarous part of inhmnanity to add unto any 
 afflicted parties misery, or endeavour to multiply in 
 any man a passion whose single natiixe is already above 
 his patience. This was the greatest affliction of Job, 
 and those oblique expostulations of liis friends a deeper 
 injury than the do-wm-right blows of the devil. It is 
 not the tears of our own eyes only, but of our friends 
 also, that do exhaust the current of our sorrows ; which, 
 falling into many streams, rims more peaceably, and is 
 contented with a narrower channel. It is an act wathin
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 87 
 
 the power of charity, to translate a passion out of one 
 breast into another, and to divide a sorrow almost out 
 of itself ; for an affliction, like a dimension, may be so 
 divided as, if not indivisible, at least to become in- 
 sensible. Now with my friend I desire not to share or 
 j)articipate, but to engross, his sorrows ; that, by mak- 
 ing them mine own, I may more easily discuss them : 
 for in mine own reason, and within myself, I can com- 
 mand that which I cannot entreat without myself, and 
 within the cii'cle of another. I have often thought 
 those noble paii-s and examples of friendship, not so 
 truly histories of what had been, as fictions of what 
 should be ; but I now perceive nothing in them but 
 possibilities, nor anything in the heroick examples of 
 Damon and Pythias, Acliilles and Patroclus, whicli, 
 methinks, upon some grounds, I could not perform 
 within the narrow com])ass of myself. That a man 
 should lay down his life fur his friend seems strange to 
 vulgar affections and such as confine themselves within 
 that worldly principle, " Charity begins at home." For 
 mine o^^'n part, I could never remember the relations 
 that I held unto myself, nor the respect that I owe imto 
 my own nature, in the cause of God, my country, and 
 my friends. Next to these three, I do embrace myself. 
 1 confess 1 do not observe that order that the schools 
 ordain our affections, — to love our parents, wives, chil- 
 dren, and then our friends ; fur, excepting the injimc- 
 tions of religion, I do not find in myself such a neces- 
 sarj' and indissoluble sympathy to all those of my blood. 
 I hope I do not break the fifth commandment, if I 
 conceive I may love my friend before tlie nearest of my 
 blood, even those to whom I owe the principles of life. 
 I never yet cast a true aflfection on a woman ; but I 
 have loved my friend, as I do virtue, my soul, my God.
 
 88 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 From hence, methinks, I do conceive how God loves 
 man ; what happiness there is' in the love of God. 
 Omitting all other, there are three most mystical 
 unions ; two natures in one person ; thi-ee persons in 
 one nature ; one soul in two bodies. For though, in- 
 deed, they be really divided, yet are they so united, as 
 they seem but one, and make rather a duality than two 
 distinct souls. 
 
 S&d. 6. — There are wonders in true affection. It is a 
 body of enigmas, mysteries, and riddles ; wherein two 
 so become one as they both become two : I love my 
 friend before myself, and yet, methinks, I do not love 
 him enough. Some few months hence, my multiplied 
 affection will make me believe I have not loved him at 
 all. When I am from him, I am dead till I be with 
 hini. United souls are not satisfied with embraces, but 
 desii'e to be truly each other ; which being impossible, 
 these desires are infijiite, and must proceed without a 
 possibility of satisfaction. Another misery there is in 
 affection ; that whom we truly love like our own selves, 
 we forget their looks, nor can our memory retain the 
 idea of their faces : and it i3 no wonder, for they are 
 ourselves, and our affection makes their looks our own. 
 This noble affection falls not on vulgar and common 
 constitutions ; but on such as are marked for vu-tue. 
 He that can love his friend with this noble ardour will 
 in a competent degree effect all. Now, if we can bring 
 our affections to look beyond the body, and cast an eye 
 upon the soul, we have found out the true object, not 
 only of friendship, but charity : and the greatest happi- 
 ness that we can bequeath the soul is that wherein we 
 all do place our last felicity, salvation ; which, though 
 it be not in our power to bestow, it is in our charity and 
 pious invocations to desire, if not procure and further.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. gg 
 
 I cannot contentedly frame a prayer for myself in par- 
 ticular, without a catalog:ue for my friends ; nor request 
 a happiness wherein my sociable disposition doth not 
 desire the fellowship of my neighbour. I never hear 
 the toll of a passing bell, though in my mirth, with- 
 out my prayers and best wishes for the departing spirit. 
 I caimot go to cure the body of my patient, but I forget 
 my profession, and cull luito God for his soul. I can- 
 not see one say his prayers, but, instead of imitating 
 liim, I fall into supplication for him, who perhaps is no 
 more to me than a common nature : and if God hath 
 vouchsafed an ear to my supplications, there are surely 
 many happy that never saw me, and enjoy the blessing 
 of mine unkno^vn devotions. To pray for enemies, that 
 is, for their salvation, is no harsh precept, but the practice 
 of our daUy and ordinary devotions. I cannot believe 
 the story of the Italian ; *" our bad -ft-ishes and imcharit- 
 able desires proceed no furtlier than this life ; it is the 
 devil, and the imcharitable votes of hell, that desire our 
 misery in the world to come. 
 
 Sect. 7. — " To do no injury nor take none" was a prin- 
 ciple which, to my former years and impatient allections, 
 seemed to contain enough of morality, but my more 
 settled years, and Christian constitution, have fallen 
 upon severer resolutions. I can hold there is no such 
 thing as injury ; that if there be, there is no such injury 
 as revenge, and no such revenge as the contempt of an 
 injury : that to hate another is to malign himself; that 
 the truest way to love another is to despise ourselves. 
 I were unjust unto mine own conscience if I should say 
 I am at variance with anything like myself. I find 
 there are many pieces in this one fabrick of man ; this 
 frame is raised upon a mass of antipathies : I am one 
 mcthinks but as the world, wherein notwithstanding
 
 90 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 there are a swarm of distinct essences, and in them 
 another world of contrarieties ; we carry private and 
 domestick enemies witliin, public and more hostile ad- 
 versaries without. The devil, that did but buffet St 
 Paul, plays methihks at sharp 9^ with me. Let me be 
 nothing, if within the compass of myself, I do not find 
 the battle of Lepanto,^^ passion against reason, reason 
 against faith, faith against the devil, and my conscience 
 against all. There is another man within me that's 
 angry with me, rebukes, commands, and dastards me. 
 I have no conscience of marble, to resist the hammer of 
 more heavj'' offences : nor yet so soft and Avaxen, as to 
 take the impression of each single peccadillo or scape of 
 infimiity. I am of a strange belief, that it is as easy to 
 be forgiven some sins as to commit some others. For 
 my original sin, I hold it to be washed away in my 
 baptism ; for my actual transgressions, I compute and 
 reckon with God but from my last repentance, sacra- 
 ment, or general absolution ; and therefore am not 
 terrified with the sins or madness of my youth. I thank 
 the goodness of God, I have no sins that want a name. 
 I am not singular in offences ; my transgressions are 
 epidemical, and from the common breath of our corrup- 
 tion. For there are certain tempers of body which, 
 matched with a humorous depravity of mind, do hatch 
 and produce vitiosities, whose newness and monstrosity 
 of nature admits no name ; this was the temper of that 
 lecher that carnaled with a statua, and the constitution 
 of Nero in his spintrian recreations. For the heavens 
 are not only fruitful in new and imheard-of stars, the 
 earth in plants and animals, but men's minds also in 
 villany and vices. Now the dulness of my reason, and 
 the vulgarity of my disposition, never prompted my in- 
 vention nor solicited my affection unto any of these ;■—
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 91 
 
 yet even those common and quotidian infirmities that 
 60 necessarily attend me, and do seem to be my very 
 nature, have so dejected me, so broken the estimation 
 that I should have otherwise of myself, that I repute 
 myself the most abject piece of mortality. Divines pre- 
 scribe a fit of sorrow to repentance : there goes indigna- 
 tion, anger, sorrow, hatred, into mine, passions of a cou- 
 trar}' nature, which neither seem to suit with this action, 
 nor my proper constitution. It is no breach of charity 
 to ourselves to be at variance with our vices, nor to 
 abhor that part of us, which is an enemy to the ground 
 of charity, our God ; wherein we do but imitate our 
 great selves, the world, whose divided antipatliies and 
 contrarj- faces do yet cany a charitable regard unto the 
 whole, by their particular discords preser\ing the com- 
 mon harmony, and keeping in fetters those powers, 
 whose rebellions, once masters, might be the ruin of all. 
 Btd. 8. — I thank God, amongst those millions of vices 
 I do inherit and hold from Adam, I have escaped one, 
 and that a mortal enemy to charity, — the first and 
 father sin, not only of man, but of the devil, — pride ; a 
 \"ice whose name is comprehended in a monosyllable, 
 but in its nature not circumscribed with a world, I have 
 escaped it in a condition that can hardly avoid it. Tliose 
 petty acquisitions and reputed perfections, that advance 
 and elevate the conceits of other men, add no feathers 
 unto mine. I have seen a grammarian tower and plume 
 himself over a single line in Horace, and show more 
 pride, in the con.struction of one ode, than the author 
 in the composure of the whole book. For my o\vn part, 
 besides the jargon and patois of several provinces, I 
 understand no less than six languages ; yet I protest I 
 have no higher conceit of myself than had our fathers 
 >>efore the confusion of Babel, when there was but one
 
 92 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 language in tlie world, and none to boast himseK either 
 linguist or critick. I have not only seen several coun- 
 tries, beheld the nature of tbeir climes, the cborograpby 
 of their provinces, topography of their cities, but under- 
 stood their several laws, customs, and policies ; yet 
 cannot all this persuade the dulness of my spirit unto 
 such an opinion of myself as I behold in nimbler and 
 conceited heads, that never looked a degree beyond 
 their nests. I know the names and somewhat more of 
 all the constellations in my horizon ; yet I have seen 
 a prating mariner, that could only name the pointers 
 and the north-star, out-talk me, and conceit himself a 
 whole sphere above me. I know most of the plants of 
 my country, and of those about me, yet methinks I do 
 not know so many as when I did but know a hundred, 
 and had scarcely ever simpled further than Cheapside. 
 For, indeed, heads of capacity, and such as are not full 
 with a handful or easy measure of knowledge, think 
 they know nothing till they know all ; which being 
 impossible, they fall upon the opinion of Socrates, and 
 only know they know not anything. I cannot think 
 that Homer pined away upon the riddle of the fisher- 
 men, or that Aristotle, who understood the imcertainty 
 of knowledge, and confessed so often the reason of man 
 too weak for the works of nature, did ever drown him- 
 self upon the flux and reflux of Euripus.^^ We do but 
 learn, to-day, what our better advanced judgments will 
 unteach to-morrow ; and Aristotle doth but instruct us, 
 as Plato did him, that is, to confute himself. I have 
 run through all sorts, yet find no rest in any : though 
 our first studies and junior endeavours may style us 
 Peripateticks, Stoicks, or Academicks, yet I perceive 
 the wisest heads prove, at last, almost all Scepticks," 
 and stand like Janus in the field of knowledge. I have
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 93 
 
 therefore one common and autheutick pliilosopty I 
 learned in the schools, whereby I discoiirse and satisfy 
 the reason of other men ; another more reserved, and 
 drawTi from experience, whereby I content mine own. 
 Solomon, that complained of ignorance in the height of 
 knowledge, hath not only himibled my conceits, but 
 discouraged my endeavours. There is yet another con- 
 ceit that hath sometimes made me shut my books, which 
 tells me it is a vanity to waste our days in the blind 
 pursuit of knowledge : it is but attending a little longer, 
 and we shall enjoy that, by instinct and infusion, which 
 we endeavour at here by labour and inquisition. It is 
 better to sit doN\Ti in a modest ignorance, and rest con- 
 tented with the natural blessing of our own reasons, 
 than by the imcertain knowledge of tliis life with sweat 
 and vexation, which death gives every fool gratis, and is 
 an accessar}' of our glorification. 
 
 Sect. 9. — I was never yet once, and commend their 
 resolutions who never marry twice. Not that I dis- 
 allow of second marriage ; as neither in all cases of poly- 
 gamy, which considering some times, and the unequal 
 number of both sexes, may be also necessary. The 
 whole world was made for man, but the twelfth part of 
 man for woman. Man is the whole world, and the 
 breath of God ; woman the rib and crooked piece of 
 man. I could be content that we might procreate like 
 trees, without conjunction, or that there were any way 
 to perpetuate the world without this trivial and vulgar 
 way of coition : it is the foolishest act a wise man com- 
 mits in all his life, nor is there anything that will more 
 deject his rooled imagination, when he shall consider 
 what an odd and unworthy piece of folly ho hath com- 
 mitted. I speak not in prejudice, nor am averse from 
 tliat Bweet sex, but naturally amorous of all that si
 
 94 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 beautiful. I can look a whole day with delight upon a 
 handsome picture, though it be but of an horse. It is 
 my temper, and I like it the better, to affect all harmony ; 
 and sure there is musick, even in the beauty and the 
 silent note which Cupid strikes, far sweeter than the 
 sound of an instrument. For there is a musick wher- 
 ever there is a harmony, order, or proportion ; and thus 
 far we may maintain " the musick of the spheres : " for 
 those well-ordered motions, and regular paces, though 
 they give no sound unto the ear, yet to the understand- 
 ing they strike a note most full of harmony. Whatso- 
 ever is harmonically composed delights in harmony, 
 which makes me much distrust the symmetry of those 
 heads which declaim against all church-musick. For 
 myself, not only from my obedience but my particular 
 genius I do embrace it : for even that vulgar and tavern- 
 musick which makes one man merry, another mad, 
 strikes in me a deep fit of devotion, and a profound 
 contemplation of the first composer. There is some- 
 thing in it of divinity more than the ear discovers : it is 
 an hieroglyphical and shadowed lesson of the whole 
 world, and creatures of God, — such a melody to the ear, 
 as the whole world, well understood, would afford the 
 understanding. In brief, it is a sensible fit of that 
 harmony which intellectually sounds in the ears of God. 
 I win not say, with Plato, the soul is an harmony, but 
 harmonical, and hath its nearest sympathy unto musick : 
 thus some, whose temper of body agrees, and humours 
 the constitution of their souls, are born poets, though 
 indeed all are naturally inclined unto rhythm. This 
 made Tacitus, in the very first line of his story, fall upon 
 a verse ; * and Cicero, the worst of poets, but declaim- 
 ing for a poet, falls in the very first sentence upon a 
 * " Urbem Eomam in principio reges habuere."
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 95 
 
 perfect hexameter.* I feel not in me those sordid and 
 unchristian desires of my profession ; I do not secretly 
 implore and wish for plagues, rejoice at famines, revolve 
 ephemerides and almanacks in expectation of mali<'nant 
 aspects, fatal conjunctions, and eclipses. I rejoice not 
 at unwholesome springs nor unseasonable winters : my 
 prayer goes with the husbamlman's ; I desire everything 
 in its proper season, that neither men nor the times he 
 out of temper. Let me be sick myself, if sometimes the 
 malady of my patient be not a disease imto me. I 
 desire rather to cure his infirmities than my own neces- 
 sities. "Where I do him no good, methinks it is scarce 
 honest gain, though I confess 'tis but the worthy salarj^ 
 of our well intended endeavours. I am not only 
 ashamed but heartily sorry, that, besides death, there 
 are diseases incurable ; yet not for my own sake or that 
 they be beyond my art, but for the general cause and 
 sake of humanity, whose common cause I apprehend as 
 mine own. And, to speak more generally, those three 
 noble professions which all ci\'il commonwealtlis do 
 honour, are raised upon the fall of Adam, and are not 
 any way exempt from their infirmities. There are not 
 only diseases incurable in physick, but cases indissolv- 
 able in law, vices incorrigible in divinity. If general 
 councils may err, I do not see why particular courts 
 should Imj infallible : their perfectest rules are raised 
 upon the erroneous reasons of man, and the laws of one 
 do 1)ut condemn the rules of another ; as Aristotle oft- 
 times the opinions of his predecessors, because, though 
 agreeable to reason, yet were not consonant to his own 
 rules and the logick of his proper principles. Again, — 
 to speak nothing of the sin against the Holy Ghost, 
 
 • "In qua me uon inficior mediocritcr esse." — Pro Arcfiia 
 Poeta.
 
 96 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 whose cure not only, but whose nature is unknown, — I 
 can cure the gout or stone in some, sooner than divinity, 
 pride, or avarice in others. I can cure vices by physick 
 when they remain incurable by divinity, and they shall 
 obey my pills when they contemn their precepts. I 
 boast nothing, but plainly say, we all labour against our 
 own cure ; for death is the cure of all diseases. There 
 is no catholicon or tmiversal remedy I know, but this, 
 which though nauseous to queasy stomachs, yet to pre- 
 pared appetites is nectar, and a pleasant potion of im- 
 mortality. 
 
 Sect. 10. — For my conversation, it is, like the sun's, 
 with all men, and with a friendly aspect to good and 
 bad. Methinks there is no man bad ; and the worst 
 best, that is, while they are kept within the circle of 
 those qualities wherein they are good. There is no 
 man's mind of so discordant and jarring a temper, to 
 which a tuneable disposition may not strike a harmony. 
 Magnce virtutes, nee minora vitia; it is the posy*^ of 
 the best natures, and may be inverted on the worst. 
 There are, in the most depraved and venomous disposi- 
 tions, certain pieces that remain untouched, which by 
 an antiperistasis ^ become more excellent, or by the 
 excellency of their antipathies are able to preserve them- 
 selves from the contagion of their enemy vices, and 
 persist entire beyond the general corruption. For it is 
 also thus in nature : the greatest balsams do lie en- 
 veloped in the bodies of the most powerful corrosives. 
 I say moreover, and I ground upon experience, that 
 poisons contain witliin themselves their own antidote, 
 and that which preserves them from the venom of them- 
 selves ; without which they were not deleterious to 
 others only, but to themselves also. But it is the cor- 
 ruption that I fear within me ; not the contagion of
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. gj 
 
 commerce -without me. "Tis that unruly regiment 
 within me, that will destroy me ; 'tis I that do infect 
 myself ; the man -without a navel " yet lives in me. 
 I feel that original canker corrode and devoxir me : and 
 therefore, ^'Defcnda me, Dios, de me !" "Lord, deliver me 
 from myself !" is a part of my litany, and the first voice 
 of my retired imaginations. There is no man alone, 
 because every man is a microcosm, and carries the -whole 
 ■world about him. " Nunquam minus solus quam cum 
 solus,"* though it be the apothegm of a -nise man is yet 
 true in the mouth of a fool : for indeed, though in a 
 •wilderness, a man is never alone ; not only because he 
 is -with himself, and his o-mi thoughts, but because he 
 is -with the devil, who ever consorts vnth. our solitude, 
 and is that unruly rebel that musters up those disordered 
 motions which accompany our sequestered imaginations. 
 And to speak more narrowly, there is no such thing as 
 solitude, nor anything that can be said to be alone, and 
 by itself, but God ; — who is his o-wn circle, and can sub- 
 gist by himself ; all others, besides their dissimilary and 
 heterogeneous parts, -which in a manner multiply their 
 natures, cannot subsist -svithout the concourse of God, 
 and the society of that hand wliich doth uphold their 
 natures. In brief, there can be nothing truly alone, 
 and by its self, which is not truly one, and such is only 
 God : all others do transcend an unity, and so by con- 
 sequence are many. 
 
 Sect. 11. — Now for my life, it is a miracle of thirty 
 years, which to relate, were not a history, but a piece of 
 poetry, and would sound to common ears like a fable. 
 For the world, I count it not an inn, but an hospital ; 
 and a place not to live, but to die in. The world that I 
 regard is myself ; it is the microcosm of my own frame 
 
 • "Cic. deOff.."l. iii. 
 
 G
 
 98 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 that I cast mine eye on : for the other, I use it but like 
 my globe, and turn it round sometimes for my recrea- 
 tion. Men that look upon my outside, perusing only 
 my condition and fortunes, do err in my altitude ; for I 
 am above Atlas's shoulders.^^ The earth is a point not 
 only in respect of the heavens above us, but of tha 
 heavenly and celestial part within us. That mass of 
 flesh that circumscribes me limits not my mind. That 
 surface that tells the heavens it hath an end cannot 
 persuade me I have any. I take my circle to be above 
 tliree hundred and sixty. Though the number of the 
 ark do measure my body, it comprehendeth not my 
 mind. Wliilst I study to find how I am a microcosm, 
 or little world, I find myself something more than the 
 great. There is surely a piece of divinity in us ; some- 
 thing that was before the elements, and owes no homage 
 unto the sun. Nature tells me, I am the image of God, 
 as well as Scripture. He that understands not thus 
 much hath not his introduction or first lesson, and is 
 yet to begin the alphabet of man. Let me not injure the 
 felicity of others, if I say I am as happy as any. " 'Ruat 
 coslum, fiat voluntas tua," salveth all; so that, what- 
 soever happens, it is but what our daily prayers desire. 
 In brief, I am content ; and what should providence 
 add more ? Surely this is it we call happiness, and this 
 do I enjoy ; with this I am happy in a dream, and as 
 content to enjoy a happiness in a fancy, as others in a 
 more apparent truth and reality. There is surely a 
 nearer apprehension of anything that delights us, in our 
 dreams, than in our waked senses. Without this I were 
 unhappy ; for my awaked judgment discontents me, 
 ever whispering unto me that I am from my friend, but 
 my friendly dreams in the night requite me, and make 
 me think I am within his arms. I thank God for my
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 99 
 
 happy dreams, as I do for my good rest ; for there is a 
 satisfaction in them unto reasonable desires, and such 
 aa can be content with a fit of happiness. And surely 
 it is not a melancholy conceit to think we are all asleep 
 in this world, and that the conceits of this life are as 
 mere dreams, to those of the next, as the phantasms of 
 the night, to the conceits of the day. There is an equal 
 delusion in both ; and the one doth but seem to be the 
 emblem or picture of the other. "We are somewhat 
 more than ourselves in our sleeps ; and the slumber of 
 the body seems to be but the waking of the soul. It is 
 the ligation of sense, but the liberty of reason ; and our 
 waking conceptions do not match the fancies of our 
 sleeps. At my nativity, my ascendant was the watery 
 sign of Scorpio. I was born in the planetary hour of 
 Saturn, and I think I have a piece of that leaden planet 
 in me. I am no way facetious, nor disposed for the 
 mirth and galliardise'-^ of company ; yet in one dream 
 I can compose a whole comedy, behold the action, ap- 
 prehend the jests, and laugh myself awake at the con- 
 ceits thereof. Were my memory as faithful as my 
 reason is then fruitful, I would never study but in my 
 dreams, and this time also would I choose for my devo- 
 tions : but our grosser memories have then so little hold 
 of our abstracted understandings, that they forget the 
 story, and can only relate to our awaked souls a con- 
 fused and broken tale of that which hath passed. Aris- 
 totle, who liath written a singular tract of sleep, hath 
 not, methinks, thoroughly defined it ; nor yet Galen, 
 though he seem to have corrected it ; for tliose noctam- 
 bulos and night-walkers, though in their sleep, do yet 
 enjoy the action of their senses. We must therefore say 
 that there is something in us that is not in the juris- 
 diction of Moqjhcus ; and that those abstracted and
 
 lOO RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 ecstatick souls do walk about in their own corpses, as 
 spirits with the bodies they assume, whereia they seem 
 to hear, see, and feel, though indeed the organs axe 
 destitute of sense, and their natures of those faculties 
 that should inform them. Thus it is observed, that men 
 sometimes, upon the hour of their departure, do speak 
 and reason above themselves. For then the soul begin- 
 ning to be freed from the ligaments of the body, begins 
 to reason like herself, and to discourse in a strain above 
 mortality. 
 
 >Seci. 12. — We term sleep a death ; and yet it is wak- 
 ing that kills us, and destroys those spirits that are the 
 house of life. Tis indeed a part of life that best ex- 
 presseth death ; for every man truly lives, so long as he 
 acts his natm-e, or some way makes good the faculties 
 of himself. Themistocles therefore, that slew his soldier 
 in his sleep, was a merciful executioner : 'tis a kind of 
 punishment the mildness of no laws hath invented ; I 
 wonder the fancy of Lucan and Seneca did not discover 
 it. It is that death by Avhich we may be literally said 
 to die daily ; a death which Adam died before his mor- 
 tality ; a death whereby we live a middle and moderat- 
 ing point between life and death. In fine, so like death, 
 I dare not trust it without my prayers, and an half 
 adieu unto the world, and take my farewell in a col- 
 loquy with God : — 
 
 The night is come, like to the day ; 
 Depart not thou, great God, away. 
 Let noi; my sins, black as the night, 
 Eclipse the lustre of thy light. 
 Keep still in my horizon ; for to me 
 The sun makes not the day, but thee. 
 Tliou whose nature cannot sleep, 
 On my temples sentry keep ;
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. loi 
 
 Guard me 'gainst those watchful foes. 
 Whose eyes are open while mine close. 
 Let no dreams my head infest. 
 But such as Jacob's temples blest. 
 "While I do rest, my soul advance : 
 Make my sleep a holy trance : 
 That I may, my rest being wrought, 
 Awake into some holy thought, 
 And with as active vigour run 
 My course as doth tlie nimble sun. 
 Sleep is a death ; — Oh make me try, 
 By sleeping, what it is to die ! 
 And as gently lay my head 
 On my grave, as now my bed. 
 Howe'er I rest, great God, let me 
 Awake again at last with thee. 
 And thus assured, behold I lie 
 Securely, or to wake or die. 
 These are my drowsy days ; in vain 
 I do now wake to sleep again : 
 Oh come that hour, when I shall never 
 Sleep again, but wake for ever ! 
 
 TLifl is the dormitive I take to bedward ; I need no other 
 laudanum than this to make me sleep ; after which I 
 close mine eyes in security, content to take my leave of 
 the sun, and sleep unto the resurrection. 
 
 SecC. 13. — The method I should use in distributive 
 justice, I often observe in commutative ; and keep a 
 geometrical proportion in both, whereby becominj]; 
 equable to others, I become unjust to myself, and 
 supererogate in that common principle, " Do unto 
 others aa tliou wouldst be done unto thyself." I was 
 not bom unto riches, neither is it, I tliink, my star to 
 )>c woaltliy ; or if it were, the freedom of my mind, and 
 frankness of my disposition, were able to contradict and 
 CTOAs ray fates : for to me avarice seems not so much a
 
 102 RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 vice, as a deplorable piece of madness ; to conceive our- 
 selves urinals, or be persuaded that we are dead, is not 
 so ridiculous, nor so many degrees beyond the power of 
 hellebore,^"*^ as this. The opinions of theory, and posi- 
 tions of men, are not so void of reason, as their practised 
 conclusions. Some have held that snow is black, that 
 the earth moves, that the soul is air, fire, water ; but 
 all this is philosophy : and there is no delirium, if we 
 do but speculate the folly and indisputable dotage of 
 avarice. To that subterraneous idol, and god of the 
 earth, I do confess I am an atheist. I cannot persuade 
 myself to honour that the world adores ; whatsoever 
 virtue its prepared substance may have within my 
 body, it hath no influence nor operation without. I 
 would not entertain a base design, or an action that 
 should call me villain, for the Indies ; and for this only 
 do I love and honour my own soul, and have methiaks 
 two arms too few to embrace myself. Aristotle is too 
 severe, that will not allow us to be truly liberal with- 
 out wealth, and the bountiful hand of fortune ; if this 
 be true, I must confess I am charitable only in my 
 liberal intentions, and bountiful well wishes. But if 
 the example of the mite be not only an act of wonder, 
 but an example of the noblest charity, surely poor men 
 may also build hospitals, and the rich alone have not 
 erected cathedrals. I have a private method which 
 others observe not ; I take the opportunity of myself 
 to do good ; I borrow occasion of charity from my own 
 necessities, and supply the wants of others, when I am 
 in most need myseK : for it is an honest stratagem to 
 take advantage of ourselves, and so to husband the acts 
 of virtue, that, where they are defective in one circum- 
 stance, they may repay their want, and multiply their 
 goodness in another. I have not Peru in my desires,
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 103 
 
 but a competence and ability to perform those {^ood 
 works to -which he hath inclined my nature. He is 
 rich who hath enough to be charitable ; and it is hard 
 to be so poor that a noble mind may not find a way to 
 this piece of goodness. " He that giveth to the poor 
 lendeth to the Lord : " there is more rhetorick in that 
 one sentence than in a library of sermons. And indeed, 
 if those sentences were understood by the reader with 
 the same emphasis as they are delivered by tlie author, 
 •we needed not those volumes of instructions, but might 
 be honest by an epitome. Upon this motive only I 
 cannot behold a beggar without relieving his necessities 
 with my purse, or his soul with my prayere. These 
 scenical and accidental differences between us cannot 
 make me forget that common and imtoucht part of us 
 both : there is under these centoes '"^ and miserable 
 outsides, those mutilate and semi bodies, a soul of the 
 same alloy with our o\\ti, whose genealogy is God's as 
 well as ours, and in as fair a way to salvation as oiu- 
 selves. Statists that labour to contrive a commonwealth 
 without our poverty take away the object of charity ; 
 not understanding only the commonwealth of a Cliris- 
 tian, but forgetting the prophecy of Christ* 
 
 Sect. 14. — Now, there is another part of charity, which 
 is the basis and pillar of this, and that is the love of 
 God, for whom Ave love our neighbour ; for this I think 
 charity, to love God for himself, and our neighbour for 
 God. All that is truly amiable is God, or as it were a 
 divided piece of hirn, that retains a reflex or shadow of 
 himself. Nor is it strange that we should place affec- 
 tion on that which is invisible : all that we truly love 
 is thus. What we adore under aflV-ction of our senses 
 deserves not the honour of so pure a title. Thus we 
 
 * " The poor ye have always with you."
 
 £04 RELIGIO MEDICL 
 
 adore virtue, though, to the eyes of sense she be in- 
 visible. Thus that part of our noble friends that we 
 love is not that part that we embrace, but that insen- 
 sible part that our arms cannot embrace. God being 
 all goodness, can love nothing but himself ; he loves us 
 but for that part which is as it were himself, and the 
 traduction of his Holy Spirit. Let us call to assize the 
 loves of our parents, the affection of our wives and 
 children, and they are all dumb shows and dreams, 
 without reality, truth, or constancy. For first there is 
 a strong bond of affection between us and our parents ; 
 yet how easily dissolved ! We betake ourselves to a 
 woman, forgetting our mother in a wife, and the womb 
 that bare us in that which shall bear our image. This 
 woman blessing us with children, our affection leaves 
 the level it held before, and sinks from our bed unto 
 our issue and picture of posterity : where affection holds 
 no steady mansion ; they growing up in years, desire 
 our ends ; or, applying themselves to a woman, take a 
 lawful way to love another better than ourselves. Thus 
 I perceive a man may be buried alive, and behold his 
 srrave in his own issue. 
 
 Se,ct. 15. — I conclude therefore, and say, there is no 
 happiness under (or, as Copernicus * will have it, above) 
 the sun ; nor any crambe i''^ in that repeated verity and 
 burthen of all the wisdom of Solomon : " All is vanity 
 and vexation of spirit ; " there is no felicity in that the 
 world adores. Aristotle, whilst he labours to refute 
 the ide,as of Plato, falls upon one himself : for his 
 summum bonum is a chimsera ; and there is no such 
 thing as his felicity. That wherein God himself is 
 happy, the holy angels are happy, in whose defect the 
 devils are unhappy ; — that dare I call happiness : what- 
 * 'Who holds that the sun is the centre of the worW.
 
 RELIGIO MEDICI. 105 
 
 soever conduceth unto this, may, with an easy metaphor, 
 deserve that name ; "whatsoever else the world terms 
 happiness is, to me, a story out of Pliny, a tale of Bocace 
 or MaLLzspiui, an apparition or neat delusion, wherein 
 there is no more of happiness than the name. Bless 
 me in this life with hut the peace of my conscience, 
 command of my affections, the love of thyself and my 
 dearest friends, and I shall be happy enough to pity 
 Cajsar ! These are, Lord, the humble desires of my 
 most reasonable ambition, and all. I dare call happiness 
 on earth ; wherein I set no rule or limit to thy hand or 
 providence ; dispose of me according to the wisdom of 
 thy pleasure. Thy will be done, though in my own 
 undoing.
 
 H Y D HI T A P H I A, 
 
 DRM BORIAL; or, a discourse op the sepulchral CBN3 
 LATELY FOUND IN NORFOLK. 
 
 i^3^?S>,
 
 TO MY WOKTHY AND HONOURED FRIEND, 
 
 THOMAS LE GROS, 
 
 OF CROSTWICK, ESQUIRE. 
 
 IIF-]X tlie general pyre was out, and the last 
 \ ak-diction over, men took a lasting adieu of 
 tlieir interred friends, little expecting the 
 curiosity of future ages should comment upon their 
 ashes ; and, having no old experience of the duration 
 of their relicks, held no opinion of such after-considera- 
 lions. 
 
 But who knows the fate of his bones, or how often he 
 iri to be buried 1 Who hath the oracle of his ashes, or 
 wliither they are to be scattered ? The relicks of many 
 lie like the ruins of Pompey's,* in all parts of the earth ; 
 and when they arrive at your hands these may seem to 
 liave wandered far, who, in a direct and meridian travel,t 
 
 ♦ " Pompeios juvencH Asia atque Europa, sed ipsura tcrrS 
 tegit LibyoH." 
 
 t Little directly but nea, between your house and Groen- 
 l.-ind.
 
 no TO THOMAS LE GROS. 
 
 have but few miles of known earth, between yourself 
 and the pole. 
 
 That the bones of Theseus should be seen again in 
 Athens* was not beyond conjecture and hopefiU. expecta- 
 tion : but that these should arise so opportunely to serve 
 yourself was an hit of fate, and honour beyond prediction, 
 
 "We cannot but wish these urns might have the effect 
 of theatrical vessels and great Hippodrome urnsf in 
 Rome, to resound the acclamations and honour due unto 
 you. But these are sad and sepulchral pitchers, which 
 have no joyful voices ; silently expressing old mortality, 
 the ruins of forgotten times, and can only speak with 
 life, how long in this corruptible frame some parts may 
 be uncorrupted ; yet able to outlast bones long unborn, 
 and noblest pile among us. 
 
 We present not these as any strange sight or spectacle 
 unknown to your eyes, who have beheld the best of 
 urns and noblest variety of ashes ; who are yourself no 
 slender master of antiquities, and can daily command 
 the view of so many imperial faces ; which raiseth your 
 thoughts imto old things and consideration of times 
 before you, when even living men were antiquities ; 
 when the living might exceed the dead, and to depart 
 this world could not be properly said to go unto the 
 greater number. J And so run up your thoughts upon 
 the ancient of days, the antiquary's truest object, unto 
 whom the eldest parcels are young, and earth itself an 
 infant, and without Egyptian § account makes but small 
 noise in thousands. 
 
 * Brought back by Cimon Plutarcb. 
 
 t The great urns at the Hippodrome at Rome, conceived to 
 resound the voices of people at their shows. 
 X " Abiit ad plures." 
 § Which makes the world so many years old.
 
 TO THOMAS LE GROS. in 
 
 We were hinted by the occasion, not catched the 
 opportunity to write of old things, or intrude upon the 
 antiquary. "We are coldly dra^\^l unto discourses of 
 antiquities, who have scarce tiiue before us to compre- 
 hend new things, or make out learned novelties. But 
 seeing they arose, as they lay almost in silence among 
 us, at least in short account sudderdy passed over, we 
 were very unwilling they shovdd die again, and be 
 buried twice among us. 
 
 Beside, to preserve the living, and make the dead to 
 live, to keep men out of their urns, and discourse of 
 human fragments in them, is not impertinent unto our 
 profession ; whose study is life and death, who daily 
 behold examples of mortality, and of all men least need 
 artificial mementos, or collins by our bedside, to mind us 
 of our graves. 
 
 Tis time to observe occurrences, and let nothing 
 remarkable escape us : the supiuity of elder days hath 
 left so much in silence, or time hath so martyred the 
 records, that the most industrious heads do find no easy 
 work to erect a new Britannia. 
 
 'Tis opportune to look back upon old times, and con- 
 template our forefathers. Great examples grow thin, 
 and to be fetched from the passed world. Simplicity 
 flies away, and iniquity comes at long strides upon us. 
 "We have enough to do to make up ourselves from 
 present and passed times, and the whole stage of things 
 scarce 8er\-eth for our instruction. A complete piece of 
 virtue must be made from the Centos of all ages, as all 
 the beauties of Greece could make but one handsome 
 Venus. 
 
 When the bones of King Arthur were digged up,* the 
 old race might think they beheld therein some original^ 
 * In the time of Uenry the SecomL
 
 112 TO THOMAS LE GROS. 
 
 of themselves ; unto these of our urns none here can 
 pretend relation, and can only behold the relicts of 
 those persons who, in their life giving the laws unto 
 their predecessors, after long obscurity, now lie at their 
 mercies. But, remembering the early civility they 
 brought upon these countries, and forgetting long-passed 
 mischiefs, we mercifully preserve their bones, and piss 
 not upon their ashes. 
 
 In the offer of these antiquities we drive not at 
 ancient families, so long outlasted by them. We are 
 far from erecting your worth upon the pillars of your 
 forefathers, whose merits you illustrate. We honour 
 your old virtues, conformable imto times before you, 
 which are the noblest armoury. And, having long 
 experience of your friendly conversation, void of empty 
 formality, full of freedom, constant and generous 
 honesty, I look upon you as a gem of the old rock,* 
 and must profess myself even to urn and ashes. — Your 
 ever faithful Friend and Servant, 
 
 Thomas Browne. 
 
 Norwich, May \&l. 
 
 * " Adamas de rupe veteri prsestantissimus."
 
 HYDRTOTAPHIA. 
 
 CHAPTER r. 
 
 N the deep discovery of the subterranean world 
 a shallow part would satisfy some inquirers ; 
 who, if two or three yards were open about 
 the surface, would not care to rake the bowels of Potosi,* 
 and r^ions towards the centre. Nature hath furnished 
 one part of the earth, and man another. The treasures 
 of time lie high, in urns, coins, and monuments, scarce 
 below the roots of some vegetables. Time hath endless 
 rarities, and shows of all varieties ; which reveals old 
 things in heaven, makes new discoveries in earth, and 
 even earth itself a discovery. That great anti(|uity 
 America lay buried for thousands of years, and a large 
 part of the earth is still in the urn unto us. 
 
 Though if Adam were made out of an extract of the 
 earth, all parta might challenge a restitution, yet few 
 have returned their bones far lower than they might 
 receive them ; not affecting the graves of giants, under 
 
 * The rich mountain of Pcni.
 
 1 14 HYDRIO TAPHIA. 
 
 hilly and lieavy coverings, but content with, less than 
 their own depth, have wished their hones might lie 
 soft, and the earth be light upon them. Even such as 
 hope to rise again, would not be content with central 
 interment, or so desperately to place their relicts as to 
 lie beyond discovery ; and in no way to be seen again ; 
 which happy contrivance hath made communication 
 with our forefathers, and left unto our view some parts, 
 which they never beheld themselves. 
 
 Though earth hath engrossed the name, yet water 
 hath proved the smartest grave ; which in forty days 
 swallowed almost mankind, and the living creation ; 
 fishes not whoUy escaping, except the salt ocean were 
 handsomely contempered by a mixture of the fresh 
 element. 
 
 Many have taken voluminous pains to determine the 
 state of the soul upon disunion ; but men have been 
 most phantastical in the singular contrivances of their 
 corporal dissolution : whilst the soberest nations have 
 rested in two ways, of simple inhumation and burning. 
 That carnal interment or burying was of the elder 
 date, the old examples of Abraham and the patriarchs 
 are sufficient to illustrate ; and were without com- 
 petition, if it could be made out that Adam was buried 
 near Damascus, or Mount Calvary, according to some 
 tradition. God himself, that buried but one, was pleased 
 to make choice of this way, collectible from Scripture 
 expression, and the hot contest between Satan and the 
 archangel about discovering the body of Moses. But 
 the practice of burning was also of great antiquity, and 
 of no slender extent. For (not to derive the same from 
 Hercules) noble descriptions there are hereof in the 
 Grecian funerals of Homer, in the formal obsequies of 
 Patroclus and Achilles ; and somewhat elder in the
 
 H YD RIO TAPHIA. 1 1 5 
 
 Theban war, and solemn combustion of Mencceus, and 
 Archemorus, contemporary imto Jair the eighth judge 
 of IsraeL Contirniable also among the Trojans, from 
 the funeral pyre of Hector, burnt before the gates of 
 Troy : and the burning of Penthesilea the Amazonian 
 queen : and long continuance of that practice, in the 
 inward coimtries of Asia ; while as low as the reign of 
 Julian, we find that the king of Chionia* burnt the 
 body of his son, and interred the ashes in a silver um. 
 
 The same practice extended also far west ; and 
 besides Herulians, Getes, and Thracians, was in use 
 with most of the Ccltoe, Sarmatiaus, Germans, Gauls, 
 Danes, Swedes, Norwegians ; not to omit some use 
 thereof among Carthaginians and Ameiicaus. Of 
 greater antiquity among the Romans than most opinion, 
 or PUny seems to allow : for (beside the old table laws t 
 of burning or burying within the city, of making the 
 funeral tire with planed wood, or quenching the fire 
 with wine), Manlius the consul burnt the body of his 
 son : Numa, by special clause of his will, was not burnt 
 but buried ; and Remus was solemnly burned, according 
 to the description of Ovid- X 
 
 Cornelius SyUa was not the first whose body was 
 burned in Rome, but the first of the Cornelian family ; 
 which being indifferently, not frequently used before ; 
 from that time spread, and became the prevalent 
 practice. Not totally pursued in the highest run of 
 cremation ; for when even crows were funerally burnt, 
 Poppaja the wife of Nero found a pecvdiar grave in- 
 
 • Gumbrateg, king of Chionia, a country near Persia. 
 
 t XII. Tabula-, jiart i., de jure sacro, " Hominem mortuum 
 in urbe no Hci><,-lilo neve unto." 
 
 X "Ultima prolata Hubdita flamma rogo," he. Fast., lib. 
 iv., 856.
 
 1 1 6 HYDRIO T A PHI A . 
 
 terment Now as all customs were founded upon some 
 bottom of reason, so there wanted not grounds for this ; 
 according to several apprehensions of the most rational 
 dissolution. Some being of the opinion of Thales, that 
 water was the original of all things, thought it most 
 equal 1 to submit imto the principle of putrefaction, and 
 conclude in a moist relentment.^ Others conceived it 
 most natural to end in fire, as due unto the master 
 principle in the composition, according to the doctrine 
 of Heraclitus ; and therefore heaped up large piles, 
 more actively to waft them toward that element, 
 whereby they also declined a visible degeneration into 
 worms, and left a lastiug parcel of their composi- 
 tion. 
 
 Some apprehended a purifying virtue in fire, refining 
 the grosser commixture, and firing out the asthereal 
 particles so deeply inunersed in it. And such as by 
 tradition or rational conjecture held any hint of the 
 final pyre of all things ; or that this element at last 
 must be too hard for ail the rest ; might conceive most 
 naturally of the fiery dissolution. Others pretending 
 no natural grounds, politickly declined the malice of 
 enemies upon their biuied bodies. "Which consideration 
 led Sylla xmto this practice ; who having thus served 
 the body of Marius, could not but fear a retaliation 
 upon his o^vn ; entertained after in the civil wars, and 
 revengeful contentions of Eome. 
 
 But as many nations embraced, and many left it in- 
 different, so others too much affected, or strictly de- 
 clined tliis practice. The Indian Brachmans seemed 
 too great friends xmto fire, who burnt themselves alive 
 and thought it the noblest way to end their days in 
 fire ; according to the expression of the Indian, burning 
 himself at Athens, in his last words upon the pyre
 
 HYDRIOTAnriA. ri; 
 
 unto the amazed spectators, " thus I make myself im- 
 mortal."* 
 
 But the Chaldeans, the great idolaters of tiro, ab- 
 horred the burning of their carcases, as a pollution of 
 that deity. The Persian magi declined it upon the 
 like scruple, and being only solicitous about their bones, 
 exposed their Hesh to the prey of birds and dogs. And 
 the Persees now in India, which expose their bodies 
 unto ■siiltures, and endure not so much as feretra or 
 biers of wood, the proper fuel of fire, are led on with such 
 niceties. But whether the ancient Genuans, who burned 
 their dead, held any such fear to pollute their deity of 
 Herthus. or the earth, we have no authentic conjecture. 
 
 The Egyptains were afraid of fire, not as a deity, but 
 a devouring element, mercilessly consuming their 
 bodies, and lea^•ing too little of them ; and therefore 
 by precious embalmments, depositure in dry earths, or 
 handsome inclosure in glasses, conti-ived the notablest 
 ways of integral conserv-ation. And from such Egj^p- 
 tian scruples, imbibed by Pj-thagoras, it may be con- 
 jectured that Xuma and the Pytliagorical sect first 
 waived the fiery solution. 
 
 The Scythians, who swore by -nind and sword, that 
 is, by life and death, were so far from burning their 
 bodies, that they declined all interment, and made their 
 graves in the air : and the Ichthyophagi, or fish-eating 
 nations about Eg3*pt, affected the .sea for their grave ; 
 thereby declining visible corruption, and restoring the 
 debt of their bodies. Whereas the old heroes, in 
 Homer, dreaded nothing more than water or drowning; 
 probably upon the old opinion of the fiery substance of 
 the soul, only extinguishable by that element ; and 
 
 • And therefore tho inscription on his tomb was made ac- 
 cordinglv, "Hie Dumase."
 
 1 1 8 HYDRIO TAPHIA. 
 
 therefore the poet emphatically implieth* the total 
 destruction in this Mnd of death, which happened to 
 Ajax Oileus. 
 
 The old Balearians had a peculiar mode, for they 
 used great iirns and much wood, but no fire in their 
 burials, while they bruised the flesh and bones of the 
 dead, crowded them into urns, and laid heaps of wood 
 upon them. And the Chinese without cremation or 
 nmal interment of their bodies, make use of trees and 
 much burning, while they plant a pine-tree by their 
 grave, and bum great numbers of printed draughts of 
 slaves and horses over it, civilly content with their 
 companies in e.ff.gy, which barbarous nations exact unto 
 reality. 
 
 Christians abhorred this way of obsequies, and though 
 they sticked not to give their bodies to be burnt in their 
 lives, detested that mode after death : affecting rather a 
 depositure than absumption, and properly submitting 
 unto the sentence of God, to return not unto ashes but 
 unto dust again, and comformable unto the practice of 
 the patriachs, the interment of our Saviour, of Peter, 
 Paul, and the ancient martyrs. And so far at last de- 
 clining promiscuous interment with Pagans, that some 
 have suffered ecclesiastical censures,t for making no 
 scruple thereof. 
 
 The Mussulman believers will never admit this fiery 
 resolution. For they hold a present trial from their 
 black and white angels in the grave ; which they must 
 have made so hollow, that they may rise upon their 
 knees. 
 
 The Jewish nation, though they entertained the old 
 way of inhumation, yet sometimes admitted thi? 
 
 * Which Magius reads i^airoXoAe. 
 
 •}• Martialis the Bishop.
 
 H YD RIO TAPHIA. 1 1 9 
 
 practice. For the men of Jabesli burnt the 'body of 
 Saul ; and by no px-ohibited practice, to avoid contagion 
 or pollution, in time of pestilence, burnt the bodies of 
 their friends.* And -when they burnt not their dead 
 bodies, yet sometimes used great burnings near and 
 about them, deducible from the expressions concerning 
 Jehoram, Zedechias, and the siuuptuous pyre of Asa, 
 ^\jid were so little averse from Pagan burning, that the 
 Jews lamenting the death of Ciesar their friend, and 
 revenger on Pompey, frequented the place where his 
 body was burnt for many nights together. And as 
 they raised noble monuments and mausoleums for their 
 own nation,t so they were not scrupulous in erecting 
 some for others, according to the practice of Daniel, who 
 left that lasting sepulchral pile in Ecbatana, for the 
 Median and Persian kings. % 
 
 But even in times of subjection and hottest use, they 
 conformed not unto the Roman practice of burning ; 
 whereby the prophecy was secured concerning the body 
 of Christ, that it shoiUd not see corruption, or a bone 
 should not be broken ; which we believe was also pro- 
 videntially prevented, from the soldier's spear and nails 
 tliat passed by the little bones both in his hands and 
 feet ; not of ordinary contrivance, that it should not 
 corrupt on the cross, according to the laws of Roman 
 crucifixion, or an hair of his head perish, though observ- 
 able in Jewish customs, to cut the hair of male- 
 factors. 
 
 • Amos vi. 10. 
 
 + Aa in that magnificent sepulchral monument erected hy 
 Simon. — 1 Marc. xiii. 
 
 X KaracrKtvaffixa Oavf/iaaiwi irtTroirjfj.^fov, whereof a Jewish 
 )irie«t had always custody until Jo!i<.'i)hu«' i\ny». -Jus. A>iti(j.f 
 Lb. X.
 
 I20 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 Nor in theix long cohabitation witli Egyptains, crept 
 into a custom of their exact embalming, wherein deeply 
 slashing the muscles, and taking out the brains and en- 
 trails, they had broken the subject of so entire a resur- 
 rection, nor fully answered the types of Enoch, Elijah, 
 or Jonah, which yet to prevent or restore, was of equal 
 facility unto that rising power able to break the fascia- 
 tions and bands of death, to get clear out of the cerecloth, 
 and an hundred pounds of ointment, and out of the 
 sepulchre before the stone was rolled from it. 
 
 But though they embraced not this practice of burn- 
 ing, yet entertained they many ceremonies agreeable 
 unto Greek and Roman obsequies. And he that ob- 
 serveth their funeral feasts, their lamentations at the 
 grave, their music, and weeping mourners ; how they 
 closed the eyes of their friends, how they washed, 
 anointed, and kissed the dead ; may easily conclude 
 these were not mere Pagan civilities. But whether 
 that mournful burthen, and treble calling out after 
 Absalom, had any reference unto the last conclamation, 
 and triple valediction, used by other nations, we hold 
 but a wavering conjecture. 
 
 Civilians make sepulture but of the law of nations, 
 others do naturally found it and discover it also in 
 animals. They that are so thick-skinned as still to 
 credit the story of the Phoenix, may say something for 
 animal burning. More serious conjectures find some 
 examples of sepulture in elephants, cranes, the sepul- 
 chral cells of pismires, and practice of bees, — which 
 civil society carrieth out their dead, and hath exequies, 
 if not interments.
 
 IIYDRIOTAPHIA. 121 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 The solemnities, ceremonies, rites of tlieir cremation 
 or interment, so solemnly delivered by antliors, we 
 aliall not disparage our reader to repeat. Only the last 
 and lasting part in their iims, collected bones and ashes, 
 we cannot wholly omit or decline that subject, which 
 occasion lately presented, in some discovered among us. 
 
 In a field of Old TValsingham, not many months past, 
 were digged up between forty and fifty urns, deposited 
 in a dry and sandy soil, not a yard deep, nor far from 
 one another. — Not all strictly of one figure, but most 
 answering these described ; some containing two pounds 
 of bones, distinguishable in skulls, ribs, jaws, thigh 
 bones, and teeth, with fresh impressions of their com- 
 bustion ; besides the extraneous substances, like pieces 
 of small boxes, or combs handsomely wrought, handles 
 of small bra.ss instruments, brazen nippers, and in one 
 some kind of opal. 
 
 Near the same plot of ground, for about six yards 
 compass, were digged up coals and incinerated sub- 
 stances, which begat conjecture that this was theiw^nwa 
 or place of burning their bodies, or some sacrificing 
 place unto the Manes, which was properly below the 
 surface of the ground, as the ara and altars unto tlie 
 god-s and heroes above it. 
 
 That these were the urns of Romans from the common 
 custom and place where they were found, is no obscure 
 conjecture, not far from a Roman garrison, and but five 
 miles from Brancaster, set down by ancient record under 
 the name of Branodunum. And where the adjoining
 
 122 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 town, containing seven parislies, in no very different 
 sound, but Saxon termination, still retains the name of 
 Bumham, which, being an early station, it is not im- 
 probable the neighbour parts were filled with habitations, 
 either of Romans themselves, or Britons Romanized, 
 which observed the Roman customs. 
 
 Nor is it improbable, that the Romans early possessed 
 this country. For though we meet not with such strict 
 particulars of these parts before the new institution of 
 Constantine and military charge of the count of the 
 Saxon shore, and that about the Saxon invasions, the 
 Dalmatian horsemen were in the garrison of Brancaster ; 
 yet in the time of Claudius, Vespasian, and Severus, we 
 find no less than three legions dispersed through the 
 province of Britain. And as high as the reign of 
 Claudius a great overthrow was given unto the Iceni, 
 by the Roman lieutenant Ostorius. Not long after, the 
 coimtry was so molested, that, in hope of a better state, 
 Prastaagus bequeathed his kingdom unto Nero and his 
 daughters ; and Boadicea, his queen, fought the last 
 decisive battle with Paulinus. After which time, and 
 conquest of Agricola, the lieutenant of Vespasian, pro- 
 bable it is, they wholly possessed this country ; ordering 
 it into garrisons or habitations best suitable with their 
 securities. And so some Roman habitations not im- 
 probable in these parts, as high as the time of Vespasian, 
 where the Saxons after seated, in whose thin-filled maps 
 we yet find the name of Walsingham. Now if the Iceni 
 were but Gammadims, Anconians, or men that lived in 
 an angle, wedge, or elbow of Britain, according to the 
 original etymology, this country will challenge the 
 emphatical appellation, as most properly making the 
 elbow or ih^n of Icenia. 
 
 That Britain was notably populous is undeniable, from
 
 HYDRIOTAFHIA. 123 
 
 that expression of Caesar.* That the Romans themselves 
 were early in no small numbers — seventy thousand, 
 with their associates, slain, by Boadicea, affords a sure 
 account And though not many Roman habitations 
 are now known, yet some, by old works, rampiers, 
 coins, and urns, do testify their possessions. Some urns 
 have been found at Castor, some also about Southcreak, 
 and, not many years past, no less than ten in a field at 
 Buxton, not near any recorded garrison. Nor is it 
 strange to find Roman coins of copper and silver among 
 us ; of Vespasian, Trajan, Adrian, Commodus, Anto- 
 ninus, Severus, &c. ; but the greater number of Dio- 
 clesian, Constantine, Constans, Valens, with many of 
 Victorinus Posthiunius, Tetricus, and the thirty tyrants 
 in the reign of Gallienus ; and some as high as Adrianus 
 have been found about Thetford, or Sitomagus, mentioned 
 in the Itinerary of Antoninus, as the way from Venta or 
 Castor unto London. But the most frequent discovery 
 is made at the two Castors by Norwich and Yarmouth 
 at Burghcastle, and Brancaster. 
 
 Besides the Norman, Saxon, and Danish pieces of 
 Cuthred, Canutus, William, Matilda, and others, some 
 British coins of gold have been dispersedly found, and 
 no small number of silver pieces near Norwich, with a 
 rude head upon the obverse, and an ill-formed horse 
 on the reverse, ■with inscriptions Ic. Duro. T. ; whether 
 implying Iceni, Durotriges, Tascia, or Trinobantes, we 
 leave to higher conjecture. Vulgar chronology will 
 liave Norwich Castle as old as Julius Ca;sar ; but his 
 distance from these parts, and its Gothick form of 
 structure, abridgeth such antiquity. The British coins 
 afford conjecture of early habitation in these parts, 
 
 • " Ilorainum infinita multitudo est cre1)errimaque ; aedi- 
 ficia fere GalliciH cuiiHiinilia." — C'lesar de Btllo. (JaL, lib. v.
 
 124 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 though the city of Norwich arose from the ruins of 
 Venta ; and though, perhaps, not without some habi- 
 tation before, was enlarged, builded, and nominated by 
 the Saxons. In what bulk or populosity it stood in the 
 old East-Angle monarchy tradition and history are 
 silent. Considerable it was in the Danish eruptions, 
 when Sueno burnt Thetford and Norwich, and Ulfketel, 
 the governor thereof, was able to make some resistance, 
 and after endeavoured to bum the Danish navy. 
 
 How the Eomans left so many coins in countries of 
 their conquests seems of hard resolution ; except we 
 consider how they bxiried them under ground when, 
 upon barbarous invasions, they were fain to desert their 
 habitations in most part of their empire, and the strict- 
 ness of their laws forbidding to transfer them to any 
 other uses : wherein the Spartans were singular, who, 
 to make their copper money tiseless, contempered it wdth 
 vinegar. That the Britons left any, some wonder, since 
 their money was iron and iron rings before Ceesar ; and 
 those of after-stamp by permission, and but small in 
 bulk and bigness. That so few of the Saxons remain, 
 because, overcome by succeeding conquerors upon the 
 place, their coins, by degrees, passed into other stamps 
 and the marks of after-ages. 
 
 Than the time of these urns deposited, or precise 
 antiquity of these reHcks, notliing of more uncertainty ; 
 for since the lieutenant of Claudius seems to have made 
 the first progress into these parts, since Boadicea was 
 overthro-\vn by the forces of Nero, and Agricola put a 
 fuU end to these conquests, it is not probable the country 
 was fully garrisoned or planted before ; and, therefore, 
 however these urns might be of later date, not likely of 
 higher antiquity. 
 
 And the succeeding emperors desisted not from their
 
 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 125 
 
 conquests in these and other parts, as testified by liistorj- 
 and medal-inscription yet extant : the province of 
 Britain, in so divided a distance from Rome, beholding 
 the faces of many imperial persons, and in large account ; 
 no fewer than Caesar, Claudius, Britannicus, Vespasian, 
 Titus, Adrian, Severus, Commodus, Geta, and Cara- 
 calla. 
 
 A great obscurity herein, because no medal or em- 
 peror's coin enclosed, which might denote the date of 
 their interments ; observable in m;iny urns, and found 
 in those of Spitalfields, by London, which contained the 
 corns of Claudius, Vespasian, Commodus, Antoninus, 
 attended with lacrymatories, lamps, bottles of liquor, 
 and other appurtenances of affectionate superstition, 
 which in these rural interments were wanting. 
 
 Some uncertainty there is from the period or term of 
 burning, or the cessation of that practice. Macrobius 
 atlirmeth it was disused in his days ; but most a^ree, 
 though without authentic record, that it ceased with the 
 Antonini, — most safely to be understood after the reign 
 of those emperors which assumed the name of Antoninus 
 extending unto Heliogabalus. Not strictly after Marcus ; 
 for about fifty years later, we find the magnificent burn- 
 ing and consecration of Serv'us ; and, if we so fix this 
 period or cessation, these urns will challenge above 
 thirteen hundred years. 
 
 But whether this practice was only then left by em- 
 perors and great persons, or generally about Rome, and 
 not in other provinces, we hold no authentic account ; 
 for after TertuUian, in the days of Minucius, it was 
 obviously objected upon Christians, that they con- 
 demned the ]>ractice of buniing.* And we find a pass- 
 
 Exccrantur royos, et damnanl ujaium iiepuUu7-am."—Min. 
 in Oct.
 
 125 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 age in Sidonius, which asserteth. that practice in France 
 unto a lower account. And, perhaps, not folly disused 
 till Christianity fully established, which gave the final 
 extinction to these sepulclu-al bonfires. 
 
 Whether they were the bones of men, or women, or 
 children, no authentic decision from ancient custom in 
 distinct places of burial. Although not improbably 
 conjectured, that the double sepulture, or burying-place 
 of Abraham, had in it such intention. But from exility 
 of bones, thinness of skulls, smallness of teeth, ribs, and 
 thigh-bones, not improbable that many thereof were 
 persons of minor age, or woman. Confirmable also from 
 things contained in them. In most were found sub- 
 stances resembling combs, plates like boxes, fastened 
 with iron pins, and handsomely overwrought like the 
 necks or bridges of musical instruments ; long brass 
 plates overwTought like the handles of neat implements ; 
 brazen nippers, to pull away hair ; and in one a kind 
 of opal, yet maintaining a bluish colour. 
 
 Now that they accustomed to burn or bury with them, 
 things wherein they excelled, delighted, or which were 
 dear unto them, either as farewells unto all pleasure, or 
 vain apprehension that they might use them in the 
 other world, is testified by all antiquity, observable 
 from the gem or beryl ring upon the finger of Cynthia, 
 the mistress of Propertius, when after her funeral pyre 
 her ghost appeared imto htm ; and notably illustrated 
 from the contents of that Roman urn preserved by 
 Cardinal Farnese, wherein besides great number of 
 gems with heads of gods and goddesses, were found an 
 ape of agath, a grasshopper, an elephant of amber, a 
 crystal ball, three glasses, two spoons, and six nuts of 
 crystal ; and beyond the content of urns, in the monu- 
 ment of Childerick the first, and fourth king from
 
 HYDRIO TAPHTA. 1 27 
 
 Pharamond, casually discovered three years pa^^t at 
 Toumay, restoring unto the world much gold richly 
 adorning his sword, two hundred rubies, many hundred 
 imperial coins, three hundred golden bees, the bones 
 and horse-shoes of his horse interred with him, accord- 
 ing to the barbarous magnificence of those days in 
 their sepulchral obsequies. Although, if we steer by 
 the conjecture of many a Septuagint expression, some 
 trace thereof may be found even with the ancient 
 Hebrews, not only from the sepulchral treasure of David, 
 but the circumcision knives which Joshua also buried. 
 
 Some men, considering the contents of these urns, 
 la.^ting pieces and toys included in them, and the custom 
 of burning \\'ith many other nations, might somewhat 
 doubt whether all urns foimd among ils, were properly 
 Roman relicks, or some not belonging unto our British, 
 Saxon, or Danish forefathers. 
 
 In the form of burial among the ancient Britons, the 
 large discourses of Cajsar, Tacitus, and Strabo are silent. 
 For the discovery whereof, Avith other particulars, we 
 much deplore the loss of that letter which Cicero ex- 
 ])ected or received from his brother Quintus, as a resolu- 
 tion of British customs ; or the account which might 
 liave been made by Scribonius Largus, the j)hysician, 
 accompanying the Emperor Claudius, who might have 
 also discovered that frugal bit of the old Britons, which 
 in the bigness of a bean could satisfy their thirst and 
 hunger. 
 
 But that the Druids and ruling priests used to bum 
 and burj", is expressed by Pomponius ; that Bellinus, 
 the brother of Brcnnus, and King of the Britons, was 
 burnt, is acknowledged by Polydorus, as also by Am- 
 andus Zierexensis in Historia and Pineda in his Universa 
 Ilistoria (Spanish). That they held that practice in
 
 128 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 Gallia, Caesar expressly deliverethi. Whether the Britons 
 (probably descended from them, of like religion, lan- 
 guage, and manners) did not sometimes make use of 
 burning, or whether at least such as were after civilised 
 \mto the Roman life and manners, conformed not imto 
 this practice, we have no historical assertion or denial. 
 But since, from the account of Tacitus, the Romans 
 early wrought so much civility upon the British stock, 
 that they brought them to build temples, to wear the 
 gown, and study the Roman laws and language, that 
 they conformed also imto their religious rites and cus- 
 toms in burials, seems no improbable conjecture. 
 
 That bumiug the dead was used in Sarmatia is aflBrmed 
 by Gaguinus ; that the Sueons and Gathlanders used to 
 burn their princes and great persons, is delivered by 
 Saxo and Olaus ; that this was the old German practice, 
 is also asserted by Tacitus. And though we are bare in 
 historical particulars of such obsequies in this island, or 
 that the Saxons, Jutes, and Angles burnt their dead, 
 yet came they from parts where 'twas of ancient practice ; 
 the Germans usmg it, from whom they were descended. 
 And even in Jutland and Sleswick in Anglia Cymbrica, 
 urns with bones were found not many years before us. 
 
 But the Danish and northern nations have raised an 
 era or point of compute from their custom of burning 
 their dead : some deriving it from Unguinus, some from 
 Frotho the great, who ordained by law, that priuces and 
 chief commanders should be committed unto the fire, 
 though the common sort had the common grave inter- 
 ment. So Starkatterus, that old hero, was burnt, and 
 Ringo royally burnt the body of Harold the king slain 
 by him. 
 
 What time this custom generally expired in that na- 
 tion, we discern no assured period ; whether it ceased
 
 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 129 
 
 before Christianity, or upon their conversion, by Ans- 
 gurius the Gaul, in the time of Ludovicus Pius, the son 
 of Charles the Great, according to good computes ; or 
 ■whether it might not be used by some persons, while 
 for an hundred and eighty years Paganism and Christi- 
 anity were promiscuously embraced among them, there 
 is no assured conclusion. About ■which times the Danes 
 ■were busy in England, and particularly infested this 
 country ; ■where many castles and strongholds ■were 
 built by them, or against them, and great nimiber of 
 names and families still derived from them. But since 
 this custom ■was probably disused before their invasion 
 or conquest, and the Romans confessedly practised the 
 eame since their possession of this iskmd, the most 
 assured account ^^'ill f;ill upon the Romans, or Britons 
 Romanized. 
 
 However, certain it is, that urns conceived of no 
 Roman original, are often digged up both in Norway 
 and Denmark, handsomely described, and graphically 
 represented by the learned physician Wormius. And 
 in some parts of Denmark in no ordinary number, as 
 stands delivered by authors exactly describing those 
 countries. And they contained not only bones, but 
 many other substances in them, as knives, pieces of 
 iron, brass, and wood, and one of Norway a brass gilded 
 jew's-harp. 
 
 Nor were they confused or careless in disposing the 
 noblest sort, while they placed large stones in circle 
 about the urns or bodies which they interred : somewhat 
 answerable unto the monument of RoUrich stones in 
 England, or sepulchral monument probably erected by 
 RoUo, who after conquered Normandy ; where 'tis not 
 improbable somewhat might be discovered. Meanwhile 
 to what nation or person belonged that large urn found 
 
 I
 
 I30 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 at Ashbury,* containing mighty bones, and a buckler ; 
 what those large urns found at Little Massingham ;t 
 or why the Anglesea urns are placed with their mouths 
 downward, remains yet undiscovered. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Plaistebed and whited sepulchres were anciently 
 affected in cadaverous and corrupted burials ; and the 
 rigid Jews were wont to garnish the sepulchres of the 
 righteous.^ Ulysses, va. Hecuba, cared not how meanly 
 he lived, so he might find a noble tomb after death.§ 
 Great princes affected great monuments ; and the fair 
 and larger urns contained no vulgar ashes, which makes 
 that disparity in those which time discovereth among 
 us. The present urns were not of one capacity, the 
 largest containing above a gallon, some not much above 
 half that measure ; nor all of one figure, wherein there 
 is no strict conformity in the same or different countries ; 
 observable from those represented by Casalius, Bosio, 
 and others, though all found in Italy ; while many 
 have handles, ears, and long necks, but most imitate a 
 circular figure, in a spherical and round composure ; 
 whether from any mystery, best duration or capacity, 
 were but a conjecture. But the common form with 
 necks was a proper figure, making our last bed like our 
 first ; nor much unlike the urns of our nativity while 
 we lay in the nether part of the earth,|| and inward 
 vault of our microcosm. Many urns are red, these but 
 of a black colour somewhat smooth, and dully sounding, 
 
 *• In Cheshire. t In Norfolk. % St Matt, xxiii. 
 § Euripides. || Psal. Ixiii.
 
 HYDRIOTAFHIA. 131 
 
 which bofjat some doubt, whether they were l>umt, or 
 only baked in oven or sun, accoi-ding to the ancient way, 
 in many bricks, tiles, pots, and testaceous works ; and, 
 as the word testa is properly to be taken, when occur- 
 ring without addition and chiefly intended by Pliny, 
 when he commendeth bricks and tiles of two years old, 
 and to make them in the spring. Nor only these con- 
 cealed pieces, but the open magnificence of antiquity, 
 ran much in the artifice of clay. Hereof the house of 
 Mausolus was built, thus old Jupiter stood in the Capitol, 
 and the statua of Hercules, made in the reign of Tar- 
 quinius I*riscus, was extant in Pliny's days. And such 
 as declined burning or funeral urns, afl'ected coffins of 
 clay, according to the mode of Pythagoras, a way pre- 
 ferred by Varro. But the spirit of great ones was above 
 these circumscriptions, affecting copper, silver, gold, and 
 jjorphyry urns, wherein Severus lay, after a serious 
 view and sentence on that which should contain him.* 
 Some of these urns were thought to have been silvered 
 over, from sparklings in several pots, with small tinsel 
 parcels ; uncertain whether from the earth, or the first 
 mixture in them. 
 
 Among these urns we could obtain no good account 
 of their coverings ; only one seemed arched over with 
 some kind of brickwork. Of those found at Buxton, 
 some were covered with flints, some, in other parts, with 
 tiles ; those at Yarmouth Caster were closed with Roman 
 bricks, and some have proper earthen covers adapted 
 and fitted to them. But in the Homerical um of 
 Patroclus, whatever was the solid tegument, we find the 
 immediate covering to be a purple piece of silk : and 
 such as had no covers might have the earth closely 
 
 • " Xa)/»i(rc(S Thv S-vOpuTTov, bv i} olKOVnivri ovk ix^PVffev." — 
 Dion.
 
 132 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 j)ressed into them, after which, disposure were probably 
 some of these, wherein we found the bones and ashes 
 haK mortared unto the sand and sides of the urn, and 
 some long roots ofquich, or dog's-grass, wreathed about 
 the bones. 
 
 No Lamps, included liquors, lacrymatories, or tear 
 bottles, attended these rural urns, either as sacred unto 
 the man&s, or passionate expressions of their surviving 
 friends. While with rich flames, and liired tears, they 
 solemnized their obsequies, and in the most lamented 
 monuments made one part of their inscriptions.* Some 
 find sepulchral vessels containing liquors, which time 
 hath incrassated into jellies. Tor, besides these lacry- 
 matories, notable lamps, with vessels of oils, and aro- 
 matical liquors, attended noble ossuaries ; and some 
 yet retaining a vinosity and spirit in them, which, if 
 any have tasted, they have far exceeded the palates of 
 antiquity. Liquors not to be computed by years of 
 aimual magistrates, but by great conjunctions and the 
 fatal periods of kingdom s.t The draughts of consulary 
 date were but crude unto these, and Opimian wine but 
 in the must imto them.J 
 
 In sundry graves and sepulchres we meet with rings, 
 coins, and chalices. Ancient frugality was so severe, 
 that they allowed no gold to attend the corpse, but only 
 that which served to fasten their teeth, AVhether the 
 Opaline stone in this were biu'nt upon the finger of the 
 dead, or cast into the fire by some afi'ectionate friend, 
 it will consist Avith either custom. But other inciner- 
 able substances were found so fresh, that they could 
 feel no singe from fire. These, upon view, were judged 
 
 * "Cum lacrymis posuere." 
 t About five hundred years. 
 i " Vinuni Opiminiamim annorum centum."— Pe<»'or!,.
 
 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 133 
 
 to be wood ; but, sinkiug in water, and tried by the 
 fire, we found them to be bone or ivory. In their 
 hardness and yellow colour they most resembled box, 
 which, in old expressions, found the epithet of eternal, 
 and perhaps in such conservatories might have passed 
 uncorrupted. 
 
 That bay leaves were found green in the tomb of S. 
 Humbert, after an hundred and fifty years, was looked 
 upon as miraculous. Remarkable it was unto old 
 spectators, that the cypress of the temple of Diana lasted 
 so many hundred years. The wood of the ark, and 
 olive-rod of Aaron, were older at the captivity ; but 
 the cj-press of the ark of Noah was the greatest vegetable 
 of antiquity, if Josephus were not deceived by some 
 fragments of it in his days : to omit the moor logs 
 and fir trees found underground in many parts of 
 England ; the undated ruins of winds. Hoods, or earth- 
 quakes, and which in Flanders still show from what 
 quarter they fell, as generally lying in a north-east 
 position. 
 
 But though we found not these pieces to be wood, ac- 
 cording to first apprehensions, yet we missed not alto- 
 gether of some woody substance ; for the bones were 
 not 80 clearly picked but some coals wore found amongst 
 them ; a way to make wood perpetual, and a fit associate 
 for metal, whereon was laid the foundation of the great 
 Ephesian temple, and which were made the lasting tests 
 of old boundaries and landmarks. Whilst we look on 
 these, we admire not observations of coals found fresh 
 after four hundred years. In a long-deserted habitation 
 even egg-shella have been found liesli, not tending to 
 corruption. 
 
 In tlie monument of King Childerick the iron relicks 
 were found all rusty and crunilding into pieces ; but
 
 134 HYDRIOTAFHIA. 
 
 our little iron pins, which, fastened the ivory works, 
 held well together, and lost not their magnetical quality, 
 though wanting a tenacious moisture for the firmer 
 union of parts ; although it be hardly drawn into fusion, 
 yet that metal soon submitteth unto rust and dissolu- 
 tion. In the brazen pieces we admired not the duration, 
 but the freedom from rust, and ill savour, upon the 
 hardest attrition ; but now exposed unto the piercing 
 atoms of air, in the space of a few months, they begin 
 to spot and betray their green entrails. We conceive 
 not these urns to have descended thus naked as they 
 appear, or to have entered their graves without the old 
 habit of flowers. The urn of PhUopcemen was so laden 
 with flowers and ribbons, that it afforded no sight of 
 itself. The rigid Lycurgus allowed olive and myrtle. 
 The Athenians might fairly except against the practice 
 of Democritus, to be buried up in honey, as fearing to 
 embezzle a great commodity of their country, and the 
 best of that kiud in Europe. But Plato seemed too 
 frugally politick, who allowed no larger monument 
 than would contain four heroick verses, and designed 
 the most barren ground for sepulture : though we can- 
 not conamend the goodness of that sepulchral ground 
 which was set at no higher rate than the mean salary 
 of Judas. Though the earth had confounded the ashes 
 of these ossuaries, yet the bones were so smartly burnt, 
 that some thin plates of brass were found half melted 
 among them. Whereby we aj)prehend they were not 
 of the meanest carcases, perfunctorily fired, as some- 
 times in military, and commonly in pestUence, burn- 
 ings ; or after the manner of abject corpses, huddled 
 forth and carelessly burnt, without the Esquiline Port 
 at Rome ; which was an affront continued upon Tiberius, 
 while they but half burnt his body, and in the amphi-
 
 HYDRlOTAnilA. 135 
 
 theatre, according to the custom in notable malefac- 
 tors ;♦ whereas Nero seemed not so much to fear his 
 death as that his head should be cut oflF and his body- 
 not burnt entire. 
 
 Some, finding many fragments of skidls in these ume, 
 suspected a mixture of bones ; in none we searched was 
 there cause of such conjecture, though sometimes they 
 declined not that practice. — The ashes of Domitiau 
 were mingled with those of Julia ; of Achilles Avith 
 those of Patroclus. All urns contained not single ashes ; 
 without confused buiniugs they affectionately com- 
 pounded their bones ; passionately endeavouring to 
 continue their living unions. And when distance of 
 death denied such conjunctions, unsatisfied affections 
 conceived some satisfaction to be neighbours in the 
 grave, to lie urn by urn, and touch but in their manes. 
 And many were so curious to continue tlieir living rela- 
 tions, that they contrived large and family ums, where- 
 in the ashes of their nearest friends and kindred might 
 successively be received, at least some parcels thereof, 
 while their collateral memorials lay in minor vessels 
 about them. 
 
 Antiquity held too light thoughts from objects of 
 mortality, while some drew provocatives of mirth from 
 anatomies,t and jugglers showed tricks \s\\\\ skeletons. 
 "WTien fiddlers made not so pleasant mirth as fencers, 
 and men could sit with quiet stomachs, while hanging 
 was played before theui. X Old considerations made few 
 
 • "In amjihitheatro Bemiuatulanduin." — HMcUmiui Vit. 
 Tib. 
 
 t " Sic erimus cuncti, ... ergo dum vivimuB vivamuB." 
 
 * Aydiyof irotfti^. A barbarous pastime at feasts, when 
 men stood upon u rolling globe, with their necks in a roi)e and 
 a knife in tbeir hands, ready to cut it when the stone was
 
 136 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 mementos by skulls and bones upon their monuments. 
 In the Egyptian obelisks and hieroglyphical figures it 
 is not easy to meet with bones. The sepulchral lamps 
 speak nothing less than sepulture, and in their literal 
 draughts prove often obscene and antick pieces. Where 
 ■we find B. M. * it is obvious to meet with sacrificing 
 pater as and vessels of libation upon old sepulchral 
 monuments. In the Jewish hypogseum and subter- 
 ranean cell at Eome, was little observable beside the 
 variety of lamps and frequent draughts of the holy 
 candle-stick. In authentick draughts of Anthony and 
 Jerome we meet with thigh-bones and death's-heads ; 
 but the cemeterial cells of ancient Christians and 
 martyrs were filled with draughts of Scripture stories ; 
 not declining the flourishes of cypress, palms, and olive, 
 and the mystical figures of peacocks, doves, and cocks ; 
 but iterately aifecting the portraits of Enoch, Lazarus, 
 Jonas, and the vision of Ezekiel, as hopeful draughts, 
 and hinting imagery of the resurrection, which is the 
 life of the grave, and sweetens our habitations in the 
 land of moles and pismires. 
 
 Gentle inscriptions precisely delivered the extent of 
 men's lives, seldom the manner of their deaths, which 
 history itself so often leaves obscure in the records of 
 memorable persons. There is scarce any philosopher but 
 dies twice or thrice in Laertius ; nor almost any life 
 without two or three deaths in Plutarch ; which makes 
 the tragical ends of noble persons more favourably re- 
 sented by compassionate readers who find some relief 
 in the election of such differences. 
 
 The certainty of death is attended with uncertainties, 
 
 rolled away, wherein, if they failed, they lost their lives, to 
 the laughter of their spectators. 
 * Diis maiiibus.
 
 HYDRIOTAPIIIA. 137 
 
 ill time, manner, places. The variety of monitmcnt.s 
 hath ofteu obscured true graves ; and cenotaphs con- 
 founded sepulchres. For beside their real tombs, many- 
 have found honorary and empty sepulclires. The 
 vai'iety of Homer's monuments made him of various 
 countries. Euripides had his tomb in Africa, but his 
 sepulture in Macedonia. And Severus found his real 
 sepulchre in Rome, but his empty grave in Gallia. 
 
 He that lay in a golden urn eminently above the earth, 
 was not like to find the quiet of his bones. Many of 
 these urns were broke by a ■\'ulgar discoverer in hope of 
 enclosed treasure. The a^^hes of Marcellus were lost 
 above ground, upon the like account. "\Miere profit 
 hath prompted, no age hath wanted such miners. For 
 which the most barbarous expilators found the most 
 civil rhetorick- Gold once out of the earth is no more 
 due tmto it ; what was unreasonably committed to the 
 ground, is reasonably resumed from it ; let monuments 
 and rich fabricks, not riches, adorn men's ashes. The 
 commerce of the living is not to be transferred unto the 
 dead ; it is not injustice to take that which none com- 
 plains to lose, and no man is wronged where no man is 
 possessor. 
 
 What virtue yet sleeps in this terra damnata and aged 
 cinders, were petty magic to experiment. These crumb- 
 ling relicks and long tired particles superannuate sucli 
 expectations ; bones, hairs, nails, and teeth of the dead, 
 were the trea-sures of old sorcerers. In vain we revive 
 Buch practices ; present superstition too visibly per- 
 petuates the folly of our forefatliers, wherein imto old 
 observation this island was so complete, that it might 
 have instructed Persia. 
 
 Plato's historian of the other world lies twelve days 
 iacorrupted, while his soul was viewing the large stations
 
 138 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 of the dead. How to keep tlie corpse seven days from 
 corruption by anointing and washing, without exentera- 
 tion, were an hazardable piece of art, in our choicest 
 practice. How they made distinct separation of bones 
 and ashes from fiery admixture, hath foimd no historical 
 solution ; though they seemed to make a distinct col- 
 lection and overlooked not Pyrrhus his toe. Some pro- 
 vision they might make by fictile vessels, coverings, 
 tiles, or flat stones, upon and about the body (and in 
 the same field, not far from these urns, many stones were 
 found underground), as also by careful separation of 
 extraneous matter composing and raking uj) the burnt 
 bones with forks, observable in that notable lamp of 
 Galvanus Martianus, who had the sight of the vm 
 ustrinum or vessel wherein they burnt the dead, found 
 in the Esquiline field at Rome, might have afforded 
 clearer solution. But their insatisfaction herein begat 
 that remarkable invention in the funeral pyres of some 
 princes, by incombustible sheets made with a texture of 
 asbestos, incremable flax, or salamander's wool, which 
 preserved their bones and ashes incommixed. 
 
 How the bulk of a man should sink into so few pounds 
 of bones and ashes, may seem strange unto any who 
 considers not its constitution, and how slender a mass 
 will remain upon an open and urging fire of the carnal 
 composition. Even bones themselves, reduced into 
 ashes, do abate a notable proportion. And consisting 
 much of a volatile salt, when that is fired out, make a 
 light kind of cinders. Although their bulk be dis- 
 proportion able to their weight, when the heavy principle 
 of salt is fired out, and the earth almost only remaineth ; 
 observable in sallow, which makes more ashes than oak, 
 and discovers the conmion fraud of selling ashes by 
 measure, and not by ponderation.
 
 ]i \ DKIO TA nil A . 139 
 
 Some bones make best skeletons, some bodies ciuick 
 and speediest ashes. "Who would expect a quick tiauie 
 from hydropical Heraclitus ? The poisoned soldier 
 when his belly brake, put out two pyres in Plutarch. 
 But in the plague of Athens, one private pjTe sensed 
 two or three intruders ; and the Saracens burnt in large 
 heaps, by the king of Castile, showed how little fuel 
 sufficeth. Though the funeral pyre of Patroclus took 
 up an hundred foot,* apiece ol' an old boat burnt Pompey ; 
 and if the burthen of Isaac were sufficient for an holo- 
 caust, a man may carr\- his own pyre. 
 
 From animals are drawn good burning lights, anil 
 good medicines against burning. Though the seminiil 
 humour seems of a contrary nature to fire, yet the body 
 completed proves a combustible lump, wherein fire 
 finds llame even from bones, and some fuel almost from 
 all parts ; though the metropolis of humidity t seems 
 least disposed untu it, which might render the skulls of 
 these urns less burned than other bones. But all llies 
 or sinks before fire almost in all bodies : when the com- 
 mon ligament is dissolved, the attenuable parts ascend, 
 the rest subside in coal, caLx, or ashes. 
 
 To bum the bones of the king of Edom for lime,+ 
 seems no irrational ferity ; but to drink of the ashes 
 of dead relations,§ a passionate jirodigality. He that 
 hath the ashes of his friend, liuth an everlasting 
 treasure ; where fire taketh leave, corruption slowly 
 enters. In bones well bunit, fire makes a wall against 
 itself ; experimented in C(jpels,'< and tests of metals, 
 which consist of such ingredients. AMiat the sun com- 
 poondcth, fire analyzeth, not transmuteth. That de- 
 
 ♦ '''EKarSnTtoovlfOa 1j tvdoL." 
 
 t The Brain. Ilijipucraten. * Amos ii. 1. 
 
 § As Art4:miiiia of her hubbaud Mausuluu.
 
 I40 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 vouring agent leaves almost always a morsel for the 
 earth, whereof all things are but a colony ; and which, 
 if time permits, the mother element will have in their 
 primitive mass again. 
 
 He that looks for urns and old sepulchral relicks, must 
 not seek them in the ruins of temples, where no religion 
 anciently placed them. These were found in a field, 
 according to ancient custom, in noble or private burial ; 
 the old practice of the Canaanites, the family of Abra- 
 ham, and the burying-place of Joshua, in the borders 
 of his possessions; and also agreeable unto Eoman 
 practice to bury by highways, whereby their monu- 
 ments were under eye : — memorials of themselves, and 
 mementoes of mortality unto living passengers ; whom 
 the epitaphs of great ones were fain to beg to stay and 
 look upon them, — a language though sometimes used, 
 not so proper in church inscriptions.* The sensible 
 rhetorick of the dead, to exemplarity of good life, first 
 admitted to the bones of pious men and martyrs within 
 church walls, which in succeeding ages crept into pro- 
 miscuous practice : while Constantine was peculiarly 
 favoured to be admitted into the church porch, and the 
 first thus buried in England, was in the days of Cuthred. 
 
 Christians dispute how their bodies should lie in. the 
 grave. In umal interment they clearly escaped this 
 controversy. Though we decline the religious considera- 
 tion, yet in cemeterial and narrower burying-places, to 
 avoid confusion and cross-position, a certain posture 
 were to be admitted : which even Pagan civility observed. 
 The Persians lay north and south ; the Megarians and 
 Phoenicians placed their heads to the east ; the Athen- 
 ians, some think, towards the west, which Christians 
 still retaiu. And Beda will have it to be the posture 
 
 * Siste, viator.
 
 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 141 
 
 tif our Saviour. That he was crucified with his face 
 toward the west, we will not contend with tradition and 
 probable account ; but we applaud not the hand of the 
 painter, in exalting his cross so high above those on 
 either side : since hereof we find no autlientic account 
 in history, and even the crosses found by Helena, pre- 
 tend no such distinction from longitude or dimension. 
 
 To be kna\''d out of our graves, to have our skulls 
 made drinking-bowls, and our bones turned into pipes, 
 to delight and sport our enemies, are tragical abomina- 
 tions escaped in burning burials. 
 
 Umal interments and burnt relicks lie not in fear of 
 worms, or to be an heritage for serpents. In carnal 
 sepulture, corruptions seem peculiar unto parts ; and 
 some speak of snakes out of the spinal maiTow. But 
 while we suppose common worms in graves, 'tis not 
 easy to find any there ; few in churchyards above a foot 
 deep, fewer or none in churches though in fresh-decayed 
 bodies. Teeth, bones, and hair, give the most lasting 
 defiance to corruption. In an hj'dropical body, ten 
 years buried in the churchyard, we met with a fat con- 
 cretion, where the nitre of the earth, and the salt and 
 lixivious litjuor of the body, had coagulated large lumps 
 of fat into the consistence of the hardest Castile soap, 
 whereof part remaineth with \is.* After a battle with 
 the Persians, the Roman corpses decayed in few days, 
 while the Persian bodies remained dry and imcorrupted. 
 Bodies in the same ground do not uniformly dissolve, nor 
 bones equally moulder ; whereof in the opprobrious 
 disease, we expect no long duration. The body of the 
 Marquis of Dorset * seemed sound and handsomely cere- 
 clothed, that after seventy-eight years was found uncor- 
 
 • 'Who was buried in 1530, and dug up in 1C08, and found 
 perfect like an ordinary corpse newly interred.
 
 142 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 rupted. Common tombs preserve not beyond powder : 
 a firmer consistence and compage of parts might be ex- 
 pected from arefaction, deep burial, or charcoal. The 
 greatest antiquities of mortal bodies may remain in 
 putrefied bones, whereof, though we take not in the 
 pillar of Lot's wife, or metamorphosis of Ortelius, some 
 may be older than pyramids, in the putrefied relicks of 
 the general inundation. When Alexander opened the 
 tomb of Cyrus, the remaining bones discovered his pro- 
 portion, whereof umal fragments afi"ord but a bad 
 conjecture, and have this disadvantage of grave inter- 
 ments, that they leave us ignorant of most personal dis- 
 coveries. For since bones afi'ord not only rectitude and 
 stability but figure unto the body, it is no impossible 
 physiognomy to conjecture at fleshy appendencies, 
 and after Avhat shape the muscles and carnous parts 
 might hang in their full consistencies. A full-spread 
 cariola shows a well-shaped horse behind ; handsome 
 formed skulls give some analogy of fleshy resemblance. 
 A critical view of bones makes a good distinction of 
 sexes. Even colour is not beyond conjecture, since it 
 is hard to be deceived in the distinction of the Negroes' 
 skulls.s Dante's* claaracters are to be foimd in skulls as 
 weU as faces. Hercules is not only known by his foot. 
 Other parts make out their comproportions and infer- 
 ences upon whole or parts. And since the dimensions 
 of the head measure the whole body, and the figure 
 thereof gives conjecture of the principal faculties : 
 physiognomy outlives ourselves, and ends not in our 
 graves. 
 
 Severe contemplators, observing these lasting relicks, 
 may think them good monuments of persons past, little 
 advantage to future beings ; and, considering that power 
 * Purgat. xxiii. 31.
 
 // } -DRIO TA PHI A . 143 
 
 which siibdueth all tilings unto itself, that can resume 
 the scattered atoms, or identiiy out of auythiug, conceive 
 it superfluous to expect a resurrection out of relicks : 
 but the soul subsisting, other matter, clothed with due 
 accidents, may salve the indiWduality. Yet the saints, 
 we observe, arose from graves and monuments about 
 the holy city. Some think the ancient patriarchs so 
 earnestly desired to lay their bones in Canaan, as hoping 
 to make a part of that resurrection ; and, though thirty 
 mUes from Mount Calvary, at least to lie in that region 
 which should produce the tirst-fniits of the dead. And 
 if, according to learned conjecture, the bodies of men 
 shall rise where their greatest relicks remain, many are 
 not Uke to err in the topography of their resurrection, 
 though their bones or bodies be after translated by 
 an-rels into the held of Ezekiel's vision, or as some will 
 order it, into the vaUey of judgment, or Jehosaphat. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Christians have handsomely glossed the deformity 
 of death by careful consideration of the body, and civil 
 rites which take off brutal terminations : and though 
 they conceived all reparable by a resurrection, cast not 
 off all care of interment. And since the aslies of sacrifices 
 burnt upon the altar of God were carefully carried out 
 by the prie.st,s, and deposed in a clean field ; since they 
 acknowledged their bodies to be the lodging of Christ, 
 luid t*;mple.s rjf the Holy Ghost, tliey devolved not aU 
 upon the sufficiency of soul-existence ; and therefore 
 with long services and full soleuudties, concluded thoir
 
 144 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 last exequies, wlierein to all distinctions the Greek 
 devotion seems most pathetically ceremonious. 
 
 Christian invention hath chiefly driven at rites, which 
 speak hopes of another life, and hints of a resurrection. 
 And if the ancient Gentiles held not the immortality of 
 their better part, and some subsistence after death, in 
 several rites, customs, actions, and expressions, they 
 contradicted their own opinions : wherein Democritus 
 went high, even to the thought of a resurrection, as 
 scoffingly recorded by Pliny.* What can be more 
 express than the expression of Phocylides ?t Or who 
 would expect from Lucretius % a sentence of Ecclesiastes ? 
 Before Plato could speak, the soul had wings in Homer, 
 which fell not, but flew out of the body into the man- 
 sions of the dead ; who also observed that handsome 
 distinction of Demas and Soma, for the body conjoined 
 to the soul, and body separated from it. Lucian spoke 
 much truth in jest, when he said that part of Hercules 
 which proceeded from Alcmena perished, that from 
 Jupiter remained immortal. Thus Socrates was con- 
 tent that his friends should bury his body, so they 
 would not think thej'' buried Socrates ; and, regarding 
 only his immortal part, was indifferent to be burnt or 
 buried. From such considerations, Diogenes might 
 contemn sepulture, and, being satisfied that the soul 
 could not perish, grow careless of corporal interment. 
 The Stoicks, who thought the souls of wise men had 
 
 *■ " Similis * * * * reviviscendi promissa Democrito vanitas, 
 qui non revixit ipse. Quce {malum) ista dementia est ilerari 
 vitam morte ? " — Plin. 1. vii. c. 55. 
 
 f " Kai rdxa §' £k yalTjs iXirl^o/j-ev ii (pdos eX^et;/ \e?-if/av 
 diroixoiJ-^vuv." 
 
 J " Cedit item retro de terra quod fiiit ante in terras." — 
 Luc, lib. ii. 998.
 
 HYDRIOTAFIIIA. 145 
 
 their habitation about the moon, might make sliglit 
 jiccount of subten'aneous deposition ; whereas the 
 Pythagoreans and transcorporating philosophers, wlio 
 were to be often buried, held great care of their inter- 
 ment. And the Platonicks rejected not a due caie of 
 the grave, though they jtut their ashes to unreasonable 
 expectations, in their tedious term of return and long 
 set revolution. 
 
 Men have lost their reason in nothing so much as 
 their religion, wherein stones and clouts make martyrs ; 
 and, since the religion of one seems madness xmto 
 another, to afford an account or rational of old rites 
 requires no rigid reader. That they kindled the pyre 
 aversely, or turning their face from it, was an handsome 
 sjTnbol of unwilling ministration. That they washed 
 their bones with wine and milk ; that the mother 
 wrapped them in linen, and dried them in her bosom, 
 the first fostering part and place of their nourishment ; 
 that they opened their eyes towanls heaven before they 
 kindled the fire, as the place of their hopes or original, 
 were no improper ceremonies. Their last valediction,* 
 thrice uttered by the attendants, was also very solemn, 
 and somewhat answered by Christians, who thought it 
 too little, if they threw not the earth thrice upon the 
 interred body. That, in strewing their tombs, the 
 Romans affected the rose ; the Greeks amaranthus and 
 myrtle : that the funeral pyre consisted of sweet fuel, 
 cypress, fir, larix, yew, and trees perpetually verdant, 
 lay silent expres-sions of their surviving hopes. Wherein 
 (Christians, who deck their culiius with bays, have found 
 a more elegant emblem ; for that it, seeming dead, will 
 restore itself from the root, and its dry and exsuccous 
 
 • " Vale, vale, nos te ordine quo natum i>ennittet sequa- 
 mur." 
 
 K
 
 146 HYDRIOTAFHIA. 
 
 leaves resume their verdure again ; which, if we mis- 
 take not, we have also observed in furze. Whether the 
 planting of yew in churchyards hold not its original 
 from ancient funeral rites, or as an emblem of resur- 
 rection, from its perpetual verdure, may also admit 
 conjecture. 
 
 They made use of miisick to excite or quiet the 
 affections of their friends, according to different har- 
 monies. But the secret and symbolical hint was the 
 harmonical nature of the soul ; which, delivered from 
 the body, went again to enjoy the primitive harmony 
 of heaven, from whence it first descended ; which, 
 according to its progress traced by antiquity, came 
 down by Cancer, and ascended by Capricornus. 
 
 They burnt not children before their teeth appeared, 
 as apprehending their bodies too tender a morsel for 
 fire, and that their gristly bones would scarce leave 
 separable relicks after the pyral combustion. That they 
 kindled not fixe in their houses for some days after was 
 a strict memorial of the late affiicting fiie. And mourn- 
 ing without hope, they had an happy fraud against 
 excessive lamentation, by a common opinion that deep 
 sorrows disturb their ghosts.* 
 
 That they buried their dead on their backs, or in a 
 supine position, seems agreeable unto profound sleep, 
 and common posture of dying ; contrary to the most 
 natural way of birth ', nor unlike our pendulous 
 posture, in the doubtful state of the womb. Diogenes 
 was singular, who preferred a prone situation in 
 the grave ; and some Christians t like neither, who 
 decline the figure of rest, and make choice of an 
 erect posture. 
 
 That they carried them out of the world with their 
 
 * "Tu manea ne loede meos." t The Russians- &c.
 
 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 147 
 
 feet font'ard, not inconsonant unto reason, as contrarj 
 unto the native posture of man, and his production first 
 into it ; and also agreeable unto their opinions, while 
 they bid adieu unto the world, not to look again upon 
 it ; whereas Maliometans who think to return to a 
 delightful life again, are carried forth with their heads 
 forward, and looking toward their houses. 
 
 They closed their eyes, as parts which first die, or 
 first discover the sad effects of death. But their iterated 
 clamations to excitate their dying or dead friends, or 
 revoke them unto life again, was a vanity of affection ; 
 as not presumably ignorant of the critical tests of death, 
 by apposition of feathers, glasses, and reflection of 
 figures, which dead eyes represent not : which, however 
 not strictly verifiable in fresh and warm cadavers, 
 could hai-dly elude the test, in corpses of four or five 
 days. 
 
 That they sucked in the last breath of their expiring 
 friends, was surely a practice of no medical institution, 
 but a loose opinion that the soul passed out that way, 
 and a fondness of afi"ection, from some Pj"thagorical 
 foundation, that the spirit of one body passed into 
 another, which they wished might be their own. 
 
 That they poured oil upon the pyre, was a tolerable 
 practice, while the intention rested in facilitating the 
 ascension. But to place good omens in the quick and 
 speedy burning, to sacrifice unto the winds for a 
 despatch in this office, was a low form of supersti- 
 tion- 
 
 The archimime, or jester, attending the funeral train, 
 and imitating the speeches, gesture, and manners of the 
 deceased, was too light for such solemnities, contradict- 
 ing their funeral orations and doleful rites of the
 
 148 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 That they buried a piece of money with them as a fee 
 of the Elysian ferryman, was a practice full of folly. 
 But the ancient custom of placing coins in considerable 
 urns, and the present practice of burying medals in the 
 noble foundations of Europe, are laudable ways of his- 
 torical discoveries, in actions, persons, chronologies ; 
 and posterity will applaud them. 
 
 We examine not the old laws of sepulture, exempting 
 certain persons from burial or burning. But hereby we 
 apprehend that these were not the bones of persons 
 planet-struck or burnt with fire from heaven ; no relicks 
 of traitors to their country, self-killers, or sacrilegioiis 
 malefactors ; persons in old aprehension unworthy of the 
 earth ; condemned unto the Tartarus of hell, and bottom- 
 less pit of Pluto, from whence there was no redemp- 
 tion. 
 
 Nor were only many customs questionable in order 
 to their obsequies, but also sundry practices, fictions, 
 and conceptions, discordant or obscure, of their state 
 and future beings. Whether unto eight or ten bodies 
 of men to add one of a woman, as being more in- 
 flammable and unctuously constituted for the better 
 pyral combustion, were any rational practice ; or 
 whether the complaint of Periander's wife be toler- 
 able, that wanting her funeral burning, she suffered 
 intolerable cold in hell, according to the constitution 
 of the infernal house of Pluto, wherein cold makes a 
 great part of their tortures; it cannot pass without 
 some question. 
 
 Why the female ghosts appear imto Ulysses, before 
 the heroes and masculine spirits, — why the Psyche or 
 soul of Tiresias is of the masculine gender, who, being 
 blind on earth, sees more than all the rest in hell ; why 
 the funeral suppers consisted of eggs, beans, smallage.
 
 H \ 'DRIO TA nil A . 1 49 
 
 and lettuce, since the dead are made to eat asphodels 
 about the Elysian meadows: — why, since there Ls no 
 sacrifice acceptable, nor any propitiation for the cove- 
 nant of the grave, men set up the deity of Morta, and 
 fruitlessly adored divinities without ears, it cannot 
 escape some doubt. 
 
 The dead seem all alive in the human Hades of 
 Homer, yet cannot well speak, prophesy, or know the 
 living, except they drink blood, wherein is the life of 
 man. And therefore the souls of Penelope's paramours, 
 conducted by Mercury', chirped like bats, and those 
 which followed Hercules, made a noise but like a flock 
 of birds. 
 
 The departed spirits know things past and to come ; 
 yet are ignorant of things present. Agamemnon fore- 
 tells what should happen unto Ulysses ; yet ignorantly 
 inquires what is become of his own son. The ghosts 
 are afraid of swords in Homer ; yet Sibylla tells Jilneas 
 in VirgO, the thin habit of spirits was beyond the force 
 of weapons. Tlie spirits put oft" their malice with their 
 Ixxiies, and Caesar and Pompey accord in Latin hell ; yet 
 Ajax, in Homer, endures not a conference with Ulysses; 
 and Deiphobus appears all mangled in Virgil's ghosts, 
 yet we meet with perfect shadows among the wounded 
 ghosts of Homer. 
 
 Since Charon in Lucian applauds his condition among 
 the dead, whether it be handsomely said of Achilles, 
 that li\Tng contemner of death, that he had rather be a 
 ploughman's servant, than emperor of the dead ? How 
 Hercules his soul is in hell, and yet in heaven ; and 
 Julius his soul in a star, yet seen by ^neas in hell ? — 
 except the ghosts were but images and shadows of tlie 
 soul, received in higher mansions, according to the 
 ancient division of body, soul, and image, or simulachrum
 
 ISO H YD R IOTA PHI A. 
 
 of them both. The particulars of future beings must 
 needs be dark unto ancient theories, which Christian 
 philosophy yet determines but in a cloud of opinions 
 A dialogue between two infants in the womb concerning 
 the state of this world, might handsomely illustrate 
 our ignorance of the next, wliereof methinks we 
 yet discourse in Pluto's den, and are but embryo 
 philosophers. 
 
 Pythagoras escapes in the fabulous hell of Dante,* 
 among that swarm of philosophers, wherein, whilst we 
 meet with Plato and Socrates, Cato is to be found in no 
 lower place than purgatory. Among all the set, 
 Epicurus is most considerable, whom men make honest 
 without an Elysium, who contemned life without en- 
 couragement of immortality, and making nothing after 
 death, yet made nothing of the king of terrors. 
 
 "Were the happiness of the next world as closely appre- 
 hended as the felicities of this, it were a martjrrdom to 
 live ; and imto such as consider none hereafter, it must be 
 more than death to die, which makes us amazed at those 
 audacities that durst be nothing and return into their 
 chaos again. Certainly such spirits as could contemn 
 death, when they expected no better being after, would 
 have scorned to live, had they known any. And there- 
 fore we applaud not the judgment of Machiavel, that 
 Christianity makes men cowards, or that with the con- 
 fidence of but half-dying, the despised virtues of 
 patience and humility have abased the spirits of men, 
 which Pagan principles exalted ; but rather regulated 
 the wUdness of audacities in the attempts, grounds, and 
 eternal sequels of death ; wherein men of the boldest 
 spirits are often prodigiously temerarious. Nor can we 
 extenuate the valour of ancient martyrs, who contemned 
 
 * Del Inferno, cant. 4.
 
 HVDRIO TAPHJA. 1 5 1 
 
 (leatL in the uncomfortable scene of their lives, and in 
 their decreint martynloms did probably lose not many 
 months of their days, or parted with life when it was 
 scarce worth the living. For (beside that long time 
 past holds no consideration unto a slender time to come) 
 they had no small (.lisadvantage from the constitution 
 of old age, which naturally makes men fearful, and 
 complexionally superannuated from the bold and 
 courageous thoughts of youth and fervent years. But 
 the contempt of death from corporal animosity, pro- 
 moteth not our felicity. They may sit in the orchestra, 
 and noblest seats of heaven, who have held up 
 shaking hands in the fire, and humanly contended 
 for glory. 
 
 Meanwhile Epicurus lies deep in Dante's hell, when! 
 in we meet with tombs enclosing souls which denietv. 
 their immortalities. But whether the virtuous heathen, 
 who lived better than he spake, or erring in the prin- 
 ciples of himself, yet lived above philosophers of more 
 specious maxims, lie so deep as he is placed, at least so 
 low as not to rise against Christians, who believing or 
 knowing that truth, have lastingly denied it in their 
 practice and conversation — were a query too sad to 
 insist on. 
 
 But all or most apprehensions rested in opinions of 
 some future Ijeing, which, ignorantly or coldly believed, 
 begat those perverted conceptions, ceremonies, sayings, 
 which Christians pity or laugh at. Happy are they 
 which live not in that disadvantage of time, when men 
 could hay little for futurity, but from reason : whereby 
 the noblest minds fell often upon doubtful deaths, and 
 melancholy dissolutions. With these hopes, Socrates 
 wanned hi.s doubtful spirits against that cold jiotion ; 
 and Cato, before he dun^t give the fatal stroke, spent part
 
 1 52 H YD RIO TAPHIA. 
 
 of the night in reading the Immortality of Plato, thereby 
 confirming his wavering hand unto the animosity of 
 that attempt. 
 
 It is the heaviest stone that melancholy can throw at 
 a man, to tell him he is at the end of his nature ; or 
 that there is no further state to come, unto which 
 this seems progressional, and otherwise made in vain. 
 Without this accomplishment, the natural expectation 
 and desire of such a state, were but a fallacy in nature ; 
 unsatisfied considerators would quarrel the justice of 
 their constitutions, and rest content that Adam had 
 fallen lower ; whereby, by knowing no other original, 
 and deeper ignorance of themselves, they might have 
 enjoyed the happiness of inferior creatures, who in 
 tranquillity possess their constitutions, as having not 
 the apprehension to deplore their own natures, and, 
 being framed below the circumference of these hopes, 
 or cognition of better being, the wisdom of God hath 
 necessitated their contentment : but the superior in- 
 gredient and obscured part of ourselves, whereto all 
 present felicities afford no resting contentment, will be 
 able at last to tell us, we are more than our present 
 selves, and evacuate such hopes in the fruition of their 
 own accomplishments. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Now since these dead bones have already outlasted 
 the living ones of Methuselah, and in a yard under- 
 ground, and thin walls of clay, outworn all the strong 
 and specious buildings above it ; and quietly rested 
 under the drums and tramplings of three conquests :
 
 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 153 
 
 wliat prince can promise such diuturnity unto his relicks, 
 or might not gladly say, 
 
 Sic (go componi versus in ossa velim f * 
 
 Time, •which antiquates antiquities, and hath an art to 
 make dust of all things, hath yet spared these minor 
 monuments. 
 
 In vain we hope to be known by open and visible 
 conser\-atories, when to be unknown was the means of 
 their continuation, and obscurity their protection. If 
 they died by violent hands, and were thrust into their 
 urns, these bones become considerable, and some old 
 philosophers would honour them, wliose souls they 
 conceived most pure, which were thus snatched from 
 their bodies, and to retain a stronger proponsion unto 
 them ; whereas they weariedly left a languishing corpse 
 and ^\'ith faint desires of re-union. If they fell by 
 long and aged decay, yet wrapt up in the bundle of 
 time, they fall into indistinction, and make but one 
 *'''t with infants. If we begin to die when we live, 
 and long life be but a prolongation of death, our life is 
 a sad composition ; we live with death, and die not in 
 a moment. How many pulses made up the life of 
 Methuselah, were work for Archimedes : common 
 counters sum up the life of Moses his man. Our days 
 become considerable, like petty sums, by minute ac- 
 cumulations : wliere numerous fractions make up but 
 small round numbers ; and our days of a span long, 
 make not one little finger, t 
 
 If the nearness of our last necessity brought a nearer 
 conformity into it, there were a happiness in hoary 
 
 ♦ TibuUtu, lib. iii. eL 2, 26. 
 
 + Acconling to the ancient arithmetick of the hand, wherein 
 the little finger of the riglit hand contracted, signified an 
 hundre<l. — Pierius in HUroglijph.
 
 154 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 hairs, and no calamity in haK-senses. But the long 
 habit of living indisposeth us for dying ; when avarice 
 makes us the sport of death, when even David grew 
 politickly cruel, and Solomon could hardly be said to 
 be the wisest of men. But many are too early old, and 
 before the date of age. Adversity stretcheth our days, 
 misery makes Alcmena's nights,* and time hath no 
 wings unto it. But the most tedious being is that which 
 can imwish itself, content to be nothing, or never to 
 have been, which was beyond the malcontent of Job, 
 who cursed not the day of his life, but his nativity ; con- 
 tent to have so far been, as to have a title to future being, 
 although he had lived here but in an hidden state of 
 life, and as it were an abortion. 
 
 What song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles 
 assumed when he hid himself among women, though 
 puzzling questions, t are not beyond all conj ecture. What 
 time the persons of these ossuaries entered the famous 
 nations of the dead, and slept with priuces and coun- 
 sellors, might admit a wide solution. But who were 
 the proprietaries of these bones, or what bodies these 
 ashes made up, were a question above antiquarism ; not 
 to be resolved by man, nor easily perhaps by spirits, 
 except we consult the provincial guardians, or tutelary 
 observators. Had they made as good provision for 
 their names, as they have done for their relicks, they 
 had not so grossly erred in the art of perpetuation. But 
 to subsist in bones, and be but pyramidally extant, is a 
 fallacy in duration. Vaiu ashes which in the oblivion 
 of names, persons, times, and sexes, have found unto 
 themselves a fruitless continuation, and only arise unto 
 
 * One night as long as three. 
 
 t The puzzling questions of Tiberius unto grammarians. — 
 Marcel. Donatus in Suet.
 
 HYDRlOTArHIA. 155 
 
 late posterity, as emblems of mortal vanities, antidotes 
 jigainst pride, vain-glorv, and madding vices. Pagan 
 vain-glories which thought the world might l;xst for 
 ever, had encouragement for ambition ; and, linding no 
 atropos unto the immortality of their names, were never 
 dampt with the necessity of oblivion. Even old ambi- 
 tions had the advantage of ours, in the attempts of 
 their vain-glories, who acting early, and before the 
 probable meridian of time, have by tliis time found 
 great accomplishment of their designs, whereby the 
 ancient heroes have already outlasted their monuments 
 and mechanical preservations. But in this latter scene 
 of time, we cannot expect such mummies unto our 
 memories, when ambition may fear the prophecy of 
 Eliiis,* and Charles the Fifth can never hope to live 
 within two Methuselahs of Hector.f 
 
 And therefore, restless inquietude for the diutumity 
 of our memories unto the present considerations seems 
 a vanity almost out of date, and superannuated piece of 
 folly. We cannot hope to live so long in our names, 
 as some have done in their persons. One face of Janus 
 holds no proportion unto the other. 'Tis too late to be 
 ambitious. The great mutations of the world are acted, 
 or time may be too short for our designs. To extend 
 our memories by monuments, whose death we daily 
 pray for, and whose duration we cannot hope, without 
 injur)' to our expectations in the advent of the last day. 
 were a contradiction to our beliefs. We whose genera- 
 tions are ordained in this setting part of time, are pro- 
 videntially taken off from such ims^nations ; and, 
 being necessitated to eye the remaining pailicle of 
 
 • Tliat the world muy liwt but six thousand years. 
 + Hector's fame outlasting above two lives of MetLuselaL 
 before that fiunoui prince was extant.
 
 156 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 futurity, are naturally constituted unto thouglits of tlie 
 next world, and cannot excusably decline the considera- 
 tion of that duration, which maketh pyramids pillars 
 of snow, and all that 's past a moment. 
 
 Circles and right lines limit and close all bodies, and 
 the mortal right-lined circle * must conclude and shut 
 up all. There is no antidote against the opium of time, 
 which temporally considereth all things : our fathers 
 find their graves in our short memories, and sadly tell 
 us how we may be buried in our survivors. Grave- 
 stones tell truth scarce forty years. Generations pass 
 while some trees stand, and old families last not three 
 oaks. To be read by bare inscriptions like many in 
 Gruter, to hope for eternity by enigmatical epithets or 
 first letters of our names, to be studied by antiquaries, 
 who we were, and have new names given us like many 
 of the mummies, are cold consolations unto the students 
 of perpetuity, even by everlasting languages. 
 
 To be content that times to come should only know 
 there was such a man, not caring whether they knew 
 more of him, was a frigid ambition in Cardan ;+ dispar- 
 aging hishoroscopal inclination and judgment of himself. 
 Who cares to subsist like Hij)pocrates's patients, or 
 AchilLes's horses in Homer, under naked nominations, 
 without deserts and noble acts, which are the balsam 
 of our memories, the entelechia and soul of our sub- 
 sistences ? To be nameless in worthy deeds, exceeds 
 an infamous history. The Canaanitish woman lives 
 more happily without a name, than Herodiaa with 
 one. And who had not rather have been the good 
 thief, than Pilate ? 
 
 * The character of death. 
 
 •f" " Ouperem notum esse quod sim non op to ut sciatur 
 qualis sim."
 
 HYDRIO TA PI I I A. 1 5 7 
 
 But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her 
 poppy, and deals with the memory of men without 
 distinction to merit of perpetuity, "Who can but 
 pity the founder of the p^Tamids ? Herostratus lives 
 that burnt the temple of Diana, he is almost lost tliat 
 built it. Time hath spared the epitaph of Adrian's 
 horse, confounded that of himself. In vain we com- 
 pute our felicities by the advantage of our good 
 names, since bad have equal durations, and Thersites 
 is like to live as long as Agamemnon without the 
 favour of the everlasting register. Who knows 
 whether the best of men be kno^vn, or whether there 
 be not more remarkable persons forgot, than any 
 that stand remembered in the kno^vn account of time ? 
 The first man had been as unknown as the last, 
 and Methuselah's long life had been his only 
 chronicle. 
 
 Oblivion is not to be hired. The greater part must 
 be content to be as though they had not been, to be 
 found in the register of God, not in the record of man. 
 Twenty-seven names make up the first story and the 
 recorded names ever since contain not one living cen- 
 tur)-. The number of the dead long exceedeth all that 
 shall live. The night of time far surpasseth the day, 
 and who knows when was the equinox ? Every hour 
 adds unto that current arithmetick, which scarce stands 
 one moment. And since death must be the Lucina 
 of life, and even Pagans'* could doubt, whether 
 thus to live were to die ; since our longest sun sets 
 at right descensions, and mukes but winter arches, 
 and therefore it cannot be long before we lie down 
 in darkness, ami liave our light in ashes ; since tlie 
 brother of death daily haunts us with dying memen- 
 toes, and time that grows old in itself, bids us hope
 
 158 HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 no long duration ; — diutui-nity is a dream and folly 
 of expectation. 
 
 Darkness and light divide the course of time, and 
 oblivion shares with memory a great part even of our 
 living beings ; we slightly remember our feKcities, and 
 the smartest strokes of affliction leave but short smart 
 upon us. Sense endureth no extremities, and sorrows 
 destroy us or themselves. To weep into stones are 
 fables. Afflictions induce callosities ; miseries are slip- 
 pery, or fall like snow upon us, which notwithstanding 
 is no unhappy stupidity. To be ignorant of evils to 
 come, and forgetful of evils past, is a merciful provision 
 in nature, whereby we digest the mixture of our few 
 and evil days, and, our delivered senses not relapsing 
 into cutting remembrances, our sorrows are not kept 
 raw by the edge of repetitions. A great part of antiquity 
 contented their hopes of subsistency with a transmigra- 
 tion of their souls, — a good way to continue their me- 
 mories, while having the advantage of plural successions, 
 they could not but act something remarkable in such 
 variety of beings, and enjoying the fame of their passed 
 selves, make accumulation of glory unto their last dura- 
 tions. Others, rather than be lost in the uncomfortable 
 night of nothing, were content to recede into the common 
 being, and make one particle of the public soul of all 
 things, which was no more than to retui'n into their un- 
 known and divine original again. Egyptian ingenuity 
 was more imsatisfied, contriving their bodies in sweet 
 consistences, to attend the return of their souls. But 
 all is vanity, feeding the wind, and folly. Egyptian 
 miimmies, which Cambyses or time hath spared, 
 avarice now consumeth. Mummy is become mer- 
 chandise, Mizraim, cures wounds, and Pharaoh is sold 
 for balsams.
 
 H YD RIO TAPHIA . 1 59 
 
 In vain do individuals hojie for immortality, or any 
 patent from oblivion, in preservations below the moon ; 
 men have been deceived even in their flatteries, above 
 the sun, and studied conceits to perpetuate their names 
 in heaven. The various cosmography of that part hath 
 alreaily varied the names of contrived constellations ; 
 Nimrod is lost in Orion, and Osyris in the Dog-star. 
 While we look for incorruption in the heavens, we find 
 that they are but like the earth ; — durable in their main 
 bodies, alterable in their parts ; whereof, beside comets 
 and new stars, perspectives begin to tell tales, and the 
 spots that wander about the sun, with Phaeton's favour, 
 would make clear conviction. 
 
 There is nothing strictly immortal, but immortality. 
 Wliatever hath no beginning, may be confident of no 
 end ; — all others have a dependent being and within 
 the reach of destruction ; — which is the peculiar of 
 that necessary essence that cannot destroy itself ; — and 
 the highest strain of omnipotency, to be so powerfully 
 constituted as not to suffer even from the power of 
 itself. But the sufficiency of Christian immortality 
 frustrates all earthly glory, and the quality of either 
 state after death, makes a folly of posthumous memory. 
 God. who can only destroy our souls, and hath assured 
 our resurrection, either of our bodies or names hath 
 directly promised no duration. Wlierein there is so 
 much of cliance, that the boldest expectants have found 
 unhappy frustration ; and to hold long subsistence, 
 seems but a scape in oblivion. But man is a noble 
 animal, splendid in ashes, and pompous in the grave, 
 solemnizing nativities and deaths with equal lustre, 
 nor omitting ceremonies of bravery in the infamy of 
 his natuH'. 
 
 Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible sun
 
 l6o HYDRIOTAPHIA. 
 
 within us. A small fire sufficeth for life, great flames 
 seemed too little after deatli, wliile men vainly afi'ected 
 precious pyres, and to hum like Sardanapalus ; but 
 the wisdom of funeral laws found the folly of prodigal 
 blazes and reduced undoing fires unto the rule of sober 
 obsequies, wherein few could be so mean as not to pro- 
 vide wood, pitch, a mourner, and an urn. 
 
 Five languages 7 secured not the epitaph of Gordianus. 
 The man of God lives longer without a tomb than any 
 by one, invisibly interred by angels, and adjudged to 
 obscurity, though not without some marks directing 
 human discovery. Enoch and Elias, without either 
 tomb or burial, in an anomalous state of being, are 
 the great examples of perpetuity, in their long and 
 living memory, in strict account being still on this 
 side death, and having a late part yet to act upon this 
 stage of earth. If in the decretory term of the world 
 we shall not all die but be changed, according to re- 
 ceived translation, the last day will make but few graves ; 
 at least quick resurrections will anticipate lasting 
 sepultures. Some graves will be opened before they 
 be quite closed, and Lazarus be no wonder. When many 
 that feared to die, shall groan that they can die but once, 
 the dismal state is the second and living death, when 
 life puts despair on the damned ; when men shall wish 
 the coverings of mountains, not of monuments, and 
 annihilations shall be courted. 
 
 While some have studied monuments, others have 
 studiously declined them, and some have been so vainly 
 boisterous, that they durst not acknowledge their graves; 
 wherein Alaricus seems most subtle, who had a river 
 turned to hide his bones at the bottom. Even Sylla, 
 that thought himself safe in his urn, could not prevent 
 revenging tongues, and stones thrown at his monument.
 
 HYDRIOTAPHIA. i6i 
 
 Happy are they whom privacy makes innocent, who 
 cK-al so with men in this world, that they are not 
 afraid to meet them in the next ; who, when they die, 
 make no commotion among the dead, and are not 
 touched -with that poetical taunt of Isaiah.* 
 
 Pyramids, arches, obelisks, were but the irregularities 
 of vain-glor)-, and wild enormities of ancient magna- 
 nimity. But the most magnanimous resolution rests in 
 the Christian religion, which trampleth upon pride and 
 sits on the neck of ambition, humbly pursuing that 
 infallible perpetuity, unto which all others must 
 diminish their diameters, and be poorly seen in angles 
 of contingency. t 
 
 Pious spirits who passed their days in raptures of 
 futurity, made little more of this world, than the world 
 that was before it, while they lay obscure in the chaos 
 of pre-ordination, and night of their fore-beings. And 
 if any have been so happy as truly to understand 
 Cliristian annihilation, ecstasies, exolution, liquefaction, 
 transformation, the kiss of the spouse, gustation of 
 God, and ingression into the divine shadow, they have 
 already had an handsome anticipation of heaven ; the 
 glory of the world is surely over, and the earth in ashes 
 unto them. 
 
 To subsist in lasting monuments, to live in their pro- 
 ductions, to exist in their names and predicament of 
 chimera.«, was large satisfaction unto old expectations, 
 and made one part of their Elysiums. But all this 
 is nothing in the metaphysicks of tnie belief. To live 
 indeed, is to be again ourselves, which being not only an 
 hope, but an evidence in noble believers, 'tis all one to 
 lie in St Innocent's J church-yard as in the sands of 
 
 • Ika, xiv. 10. + The least of angles. 
 
 X In Paris, wliere bodicH soon consume.
 
 1 52 
 
 HYDRIOTAPHTA. 
 
 Egypt. Ready to be anything, in the ecstasy of 
 being ever, and as content with six foot as the inoh?, 
 of Adrianus.* 
 
 Tabesne cadavera solvat. 
 
 An ro(jus,haud refert.^' — Lucan. viii 809. 
 
 * A stately mausoleum or sepulchral pile, built by Adrianus 
 in Rome, where now standeth the castle of St Angelo.
 
 A LETTER TO A FRIEND, 
 
 UroS OCCASION OF THE DEATH OF UIS INTIMATE FKIENP.
 
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 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 I VE me leave to wonder that news of this nature 
 should have such hea\'y wings that you should 
 hear so little concerning your dearest friend, 
 and that I must make that imwiLling repetition to tell 
 you, " ad portam rigidos calces exteiidit," that he is dead 
 and buried, and by this time no puny among the mighty 
 nations of the dead ; for though he left this world not 
 very many days past, yet every hour you know largely 
 addeth imto that dark society ; and considering the 
 incessant mortality of mankind, you cannot conceive 
 there dieth in the whole earth so few as a thousand an 
 hour. 
 
 Although at this distance you had no early account 
 or particular of his death, yet your affection may cease 
 to wonder that you had not some secret sense or intima- 
 tion thereof by dreams, thoughtful whisperings, mer- 
 curLsms, airy nuncios or sympathetical insinuations, 
 ■which many seem to have had at the death of their 
 dearest friends : for since we find in tliat famous story, 
 that spirits tliemselves were fain to tell their fellows 
 at a distance that tlie great Antonio was dead, we have 
 a sufficient excuse for our ignorance in such particulars.
 
 1 66 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 and must rest content with tlie common road, and Ap- 
 pian way of knowledge by information. Though the 
 imcertainty of the end of this world hath confounded 
 all human predictions ; yet they who shall live to see 
 the sun and moon darkened, and the stars to fall from 
 heaven, will hardly he deceived in the advent of the 
 last day ; and therefore strange it is, that the common 
 fallacy of consiunptive persons who feel not themselves 
 dying, and therefore still hope to live, should also reach 
 their friends in perfect health and judgment ; — that you 
 should be so little acquainted with Plautus's sick com- 
 plexion, or that almost an Hippocratical face should 
 not alarum you to higher fears, or rather despair, of 
 his continuation in such an emaciated state, wherein 
 medical predictions fail not, as sometimes in acute dis- 
 eases, and wherein 'tis as dangerous to be sentenced by 
 a physician as a judge. 
 
 Upon my first visit I was bold to tell them who had 
 not let fall all hopes of his recovery, that in my sad 
 opinion he was not like to behold a grasshopper,^ much 
 less to pluck another fig ; and in no long time after 
 seemed to discover that odd mortal symptom in him 
 not mentioned by Hippocrates, that is, to lose his own 
 face, and look like some of his near relations ; for he 
 maintained not his proper countenance, but looked like 
 his uncle, the lines of whose face lay deep and invisible 
 in his healthful visage before : for as from our begin- 
 ning we run through variety of looks, before we come 
 to consistent and settled faces ; so before our end, by 
 sick and languishing alterations, we put on new visages : 
 and in our retreat to earth, may fall upon such looks 
 which from community of seminal originals were before 
 latent in us. 
 
 He was fruitlessly put in hope of advantage by change
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 167 
 
 of air, and inibibing the pure aerial nitre of these parts ; 
 and therefore, being so far spent, he quickly found Sar- 
 dinia in Tivoli,* and the most heiilthful air of little 
 effect, where death had set her broad arrow ; f for he 
 lived not unto tlie middle of May, and confirmed the 
 observation of Hippocrates of that mortal time of the 
 year when the leaves of the fig-tree resemble a daw's 
 claw. He is happily seated who lives in places whose 
 air, earth, and water, promote not the infirmities of his 
 weaker parts, or is early removed into regions that 
 correct them. He that is tabidly ^ inclined, were unwise 
 to pass his days in Portugal : cholical persons will find 
 little comfort in Austria or Vienna : he that is weak- 
 legged must not be in love witli Home, nor an infirm 
 head with Venice or Paris. Death hath not only par- 
 ticular stars in heaven, but malevolent places on ejirth, 
 which single out our infirmities, and strike at our 
 weaker parts ; in which concern, passager and migrant 
 birds have the great advantages, who are naturally 
 constituted for distant habitations, whom no seas nor 
 jilaces limit, but in their appointed seasons will visit 
 U8 from Greenland and Mount Atlas, and, as some think, 
 even from the Antipodes.^ 
 
 Though we could not have his life, yet we missed not 
 our desires in Jiis soft departure, which was scarce an 
 expiration ; and his end not unlike his beginning, when 
 the salient point scarce affords a sensible motion, and 
 his departure so like unto sleep, that he scarce needed 
 the ci\'il ceremony of closing his eyes ; contrary imto tbt^ 
 common way, wlierein death draws up, sleep lets fall 
 
 • "Cum mom venerit, in medio Tibure Sardinia est." 
 t In the king'H forcstH tliey net the figure of a broad iirrow 
 nfton trees that are to be cut down. 
 1 Bellonitit dc Avibtu.
 
 1 68 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 the eyelids. With what strife and pains we came into 
 the world we know not ; but 'tis commonly no easy 
 matter to get out of it : yet if it could be made out, 
 that such who have easy nativities have commonly hard 
 deaths, and contrarily ; his departure was so easy, that 
 we might justly suspect his birth was of another nature, 
 and that some Juno sat cross-legged at his nativity. 
 
 Besides his soft death, the incurable state of his 
 disease might somewhat extenuate your sorrow, who 
 know that monsters but seldom happen, miracles more 
 rarely in physick.* Angelus Vidorius gives a serious 
 account of a consimiptive, hectical, phthisical woman, 
 who was suddenly cured by the intercession of Ignatius. 
 We read not of any in Scripture who in this case applied 
 unto our Saviour, though some may be contained in 
 that large expression, that he went about GaUlee healing 
 all manner of sickness and all manner of diseases.f 
 Amulets, spells, sigils, and incantations, practised in 
 other diseases, are seldom pretended in this ; and we 
 find no sigil in the Archidoxis of Paracelsus to cure 
 an extreme consumption or marasmus, which, if other 
 diseases fail, will put a period unto long livers, and at 
 last makes dust of all. And therefore the Stoics could 
 not but think that the fiery principle would wear out 
 all the rest, and at last make an end of the world, which 
 notwithstanding without such a lingering period the 
 Creator may eff'ect at his pleasure : and to make an end 
 of all things on earth, and our planetical system of the 
 world, he need but put out the sun. 
 
 I was not so cuiious to entitle the stars unto any 
 concern of his death, yet could not but take notice that 
 
 * " Monstra contingunt in medicina." Hippoc. — "Strange 
 and rare escapes there happen sometimes in physick." 
 t Matt. iv. 23.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 169 
 
 he died when the moon was in motion from the meri- 
 dian ; at which time an old Italian long ago would per- 
 suade me that the greatest part of men died : but herein 
 I confess I could never satisfy my curiosity ; although 
 from the time of tides in places upon or near the sea, 
 there may be considerable deductions ; and Pliny * hath 
 an odd and remarkable passage concemLiig the death of 
 men and animals upon the recess or ebb of the sea. 
 However, certain it is, he died in the dead and deep 
 part of the night, when Nox might be most apprehen- 
 sibly said to be the daughter of Chaos, the mother of 
 sleep and death, according to old genealogy ; and so 
 went out of this world about that hour when our blessed 
 Saviour entered it, and about what time many conceive 
 he will return again unto it. Cardan 3 hath a peculiar 
 and no hard observation from a man's hand to know 
 whether he was bom in the day or night, which I con- 
 fess holdeth in my own. And Scaliger* to that purpose 
 hath another from the tip of the ear : t most men are 
 begotten in the night, animals in the day ; but whether 
 more persons have been born in the night or day, were 
 a curiosity xindecidable, though more have persislied by 
 violent deaths in the day ; yet in natural dissolutions 
 both times may hold an indifferency, at least but con- 
 tingent inequality. The whole course of time runs out 
 in the nativity and death of things ; which whether 
 they happen by succession or coincidence, are best com- 
 puted by the natural, not artificial day. 
 
 • " Ariiitotelcs nullum animal nisi a'stu reccilento cxi)irare 
 afCrmat ; observatuin iil multum in Gallico Oceanoetduntaxat 
 in bomine cornpertuni," lib. 2, cij). 101. 
 
 f " Auria pars iiciululn lubuii dicitur, non omnibus ea para, 
 eat auribiu ; non enim lis qui noctu sunt, scd qui inturdiu, 
 maxima ex parte."— Cam. in Aristot. dc Animal, lib. 1.
 
 I70 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 That Charles the Fifth^ was crowned upon the day 
 of his nativity, it being in his own power so to order 
 it, makes no singular animadversion : but that he 
 should also take King Francis^ prisoner upon that 
 day, was an unexpected coincidence, which made the 
 same remarkable. Antipater, who had an anniversary 
 feast every year upon his birth-day, needed no astro- 
 logical revolution to know what day he should die on. 
 When the fixed stars have made a revolution unto the 
 points from whence they first set out, some of the 
 ancients thought the world would have an end ; which 
 was a kind of dying upon the day of its nativity. Now 
 the disease prevailing and swiftly advancing about the 
 time of his nativity, some were of opiriion that he 
 would leave the world on the day he entered into it ; 
 but this being a lingering disease, and creeping softly 
 on, nothing critical was found or expected, and he died 
 not before fifteen days after. Nothing is more common 
 with infants than to die on the day of their nativity, to 
 behold the worldly hours, and but the fractions thereof ; 
 and even to perish before their nativity in the hidden 
 world of the womb, and before their good angel is con- 
 ceived to undertake them. But in persons who out- 
 live many years, and when there are no less than three 
 hundred and sixty-five days to determine their lives in 
 every year ; that the first day should make the last, 
 that the tail of the snake should return into its mouth 
 precisely at that time, and they should wind up upon 
 the day of their nativity, is indeed a remarkable 
 coLncidence, which, though astrology hath taken witty 
 pains to salve, yet hath it been very wary in making 
 predictions of it.* 
 
 In this consumptive condition and remarkable exten- 
 * According to the Egyptian hieroglyphic.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 171 
 
 uation, he came to be almost half himself, and left a 
 ^Teat part behind him, which he carried not to the 
 grave. And though that story of Duke John Emestus 
 Mansfield^* be not so easUy swallowed, that at his death 
 his heart was found not to be so big as a nut ; yet if 
 the bones of a good skeleton weigh little more than 
 twenty pounds, his inwards and ilesh remaining could 
 make no boufl'age,8 but a light bit for the grave. I 
 never more lively beheld the starved characters of 
 Dante t in any li^'ing face ; an aruspcx might have read 
 a lecture upon him -without exenteration, his flesh 
 l)eing so consumed, that he might, in a manner, have 
 discerned his bowels without opening of him ; so that 
 to be carried, sexta cervices to the grave, was but a 
 civil imnecessity ; and the complements of the cofl&n 
 might outweigh the subject of it. 
 
 Chnnibonus Ferrarius in mortal dysenteries of chil- 
 dren looks for a spot behind the ear ; in consumptive 
 diseases some eye the complexion of moles ; Cardan 
 eagerly views the nails, some the lines of the hand, the 
 thenar or muscle of the thumb ; some are so curious as 
 to observe the depth of the throat-pit, how the pro- 
 ])ortion varieth of the small of the legs unto the calf, 
 (»r the compass of the neck unto the circumference of 
 the head ; but all these, with many more, were so 
 drowned in a mortal visage, and last face of Hippocra- 
 tes, that a weak pliysiognomist might say at first eye, this 
 was a face of earth, and that Morta^ had set her liard seal 
 upon his temples, easily perceiving what caricaturaW 
 
 •Turkish hiBtorj". 
 t In the poft l^aute'a description. 
 JLe. " by six pereonB." 
 § Morta, the deity of death or fate. 
 
 II When inen'B faces are drawn with resemblance to Bome 
 other animalB, the Italianu call it, to be drawn in caricatura.
 
 172 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 draughts deatli makes upon pined faces, and unto what 
 an unknown degree a man may live backward. 
 
 Though the heard be only made a distinction of sex, 
 and sign of masculine heat by Ubnus,* yet the 
 precocity and early growth thereof in liim, was not 
 to be Uked in reference unto long life. Lewis, 
 that virtuous but unfortunate king of Hungary, 
 who lost his life at the battle of Mohacz,^ was 
 said to be born without a skin, to have bearded at 
 fifteen, and to have shown some grey hairs about 
 twenty ; from whence the diviners conjectured that he 
 would be spoiled of his kingdom, and have but a short 
 life ; but hairs make fallible predictions, and many 
 temples early grey have outlived the psalmist's period, f 
 Hairs which have most amused me have not been in the 
 face or head, but on the back, and not in men but 
 children, as I long ago observed in that endemial 
 distemper of children in Languedoc, called the mor- 
 gellons,t wherein they critically break out with harsh 
 hairs on their backs, which takes off the unquiet symp- 
 toms of the disease, and delivers them from coughs and 
 convulsions. 
 
 The Egyptian mummies that I have seen, have had 
 their mouths open, and somewhat gaping, which afiord- 
 eth a good opportunity to view and observe their teeth, 
 wherein 'tis not easy to find any wanting or decayed ; 
 and therefore in Egypt, where one man practised but 
 one operation, or the diseases but of single parts, it 
 m.ust needs be a barren profession to confine unto that of 
 drawing of teeth, and to have been little better than tooth- 
 
 * Ulmus de usu harbce humance. 
 
 t The life of man is threescore and ten. 
 
 4 See Picotus de Bheumatismo.
 
 LETTER TO A ERIEND. 173 
 
 drawer unto Kin? Pvrrhus.* "svbo had but two in his head. 
 How the banyans of India maintain the integrity oi 
 those parts, I find not particularly observed ; who not- 
 withstanding have an advantage of their preservation by 
 abstaining from all flesh, and employing their teeth in 
 such food unto which they may seem at first framed, 
 from their figure and conformation ; biit sharp and 
 corroding rheums had so early mouldered those rocks 
 and hardest parts of his fabric, that a man might well 
 conceive that his years were never like to double or 
 twice tell over his teeth.f Corruption had dealt more 
 severely with them than sepulchral fires and smart 
 flames M'ith those of burnt bodies of old ; for in the 
 burnt fragments of urns which I have inquired into, 
 although I seem to find few incisors or shearers, yet the 
 dog teeth and grinders do notably resist those fires. 
 
 In the years of his childhood he had languished 
 under tlie disease of his covmtry, the rickets ; after 
 Avhich, not^rithstanding many have become strong and 
 active men ; but whether any have attained unto very 
 great years, the disease is scarce so old as to afi'ord good 
 observation. Wliether the children of the Englisli 
 plantations be subject unto the same infirmity, may be 
 worth the observing. Whether lameness and halting do 
 still increase among the inhabitants of Rovigno in Istria, 
 I know not ; yet scarce twenty years ago Monsieiir du 
 Loyr observed that a third part of that people halted ; 
 but too certain it is, that the rickets increaseth among 
 us ; the sniall-pox grows more pernicious than the great ; 
 the king's purse knows that the king's evil grows more 
 common- Quartan agues are become no strangers in 
 
 • Ilia upper jaw being Bolid, and without distinct rows of 
 teeth- 
 t Twice tell over bis teeth, never live to threescore yeanu
 
 174 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 Ireland ; more common and mortal in England ; and 
 thougli the ancients gave that disease* very good •words, 
 yet now that beUt makes no strange sound which rings 
 out for the effects thereof. 
 
 Some tliink there were few consumptions in the old 
 world, when men lived much upon milk ; and that the 
 ancient inhabitants of this island were less troubled 
 with coughs when they went naked and slept in caves 
 and woods, than men now in chambers and feather-beds. 
 Plato will tell us, that there was no such disease as a 
 catarrh in Homer's time, and that it was but new in 
 Greece in his age. Polydore Virgil delivereth that 
 pleurisies were rare in England, who lived but in the 
 days of Henry the Eighth. Some will allow no diseases 
 to be new, others think that many old ones are ceased : 
 and that such which are esteemed new, will have but 
 their time : however, the mercy of God hath scattered 
 the great heap of diseases, and not loaded any one 
 country with all : some may be new in one country 
 which have been old in another. New discoveries of 
 the earth discover new diseases : for besides the common 
 swarm, there are endemial and local infirmities proper 
 unto certain regions, which in the whole earth make no 
 small number : and if Asia, Africa, and America, should 
 bring in their list. Pandora's box would swell, and there 
 must be a strange pathology. 
 
 Most men expected to find a consumed keU,i» empty 
 and bladder-like guts, livid and marbled lungs, and a 
 withered pericardium in this exsuccous corpse : but some 
 seemed too much to wonder that two lobes of his lungs 
 adhered unto his side ; for the like I have often found 
 
 * Aa-<p(x\i<7TaTOS koL prjl'crTos, securissima et facillima.— 
 Ilippoc. 
 f Pro febre quartana raro sonat campana.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 175 
 
 in bodies of no suspected consumptions or difficulty of 
 respiration. And the same more often happenotli in 
 men than other animals : and some think in women 
 than in men : but the most remarkable I have met 
 with, was in a man, after a cough of almost fifty years, 
 in whom all the lobes adhered unto the pleura, and 
 each lobe unto another ; who having also been much 
 troubled with the gout, brake the rule of Cardan,* and 
 died of the stone in the bladder. Aristotle makes a 
 query, why some animals cough, as man ; some not, as 
 oxen. If coughing be taken as it consisteth of a 
 natural and voluntary motion, including exi^ectoration 
 and spitting out, it may be as proper unto man as 
 bleeding at the nose ; otherwise we find that Vegetius 
 and rural ^Titers have not left so many medicines in vain 
 against the coughs of cattle ; and men who perish by 
 coughs die the death of sheep, cats, and lions : and 
 though buds have no midrili", yet we meet with divers 
 remedies in Arrianus against the coughs of hawks. 
 And though it might be thought that all animals who 
 liave lungs do cough ; yet in cataceous fishes, who have 
 large and strong lungs, the same is not observed ; nor 
 yet in oviparous quadrupeds : and in the greatest 
 thereof, the crocodile, although we read much of their 
 tears, we find nothing of that motion. 
 
 From the thoughts of sleep, when the soul waa con- 
 ceived neare.st unt(j divinity, the ancients erected an 
 art of divination, wherein while they too widely ex- 
 patiated in loose and in consequent conjectures, Hippo- 
 crates t wiHely considered dreams as they presaged 
 
 • Cardan in liiii Encomium Podagrae reckoneth this among 
 the Duna Podatp-a, that they are delivered thereby from the 
 I>)ithiiiiB and atone in the bladder. 
 
 + Hil»I>oc, de Ituomnii*
 
 176 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 alterations in the body, and so afforded Mnts toward 
 the preservation of health, and prevention of diseases ; 
 and therein, was so serious as to advise alteration of 
 diet, exercise, sweating, bathing, and vomiting ; and 
 also so religious as to order prayers and supplications 
 unto respective deities, in good dreams unto Sol, 
 Jupiter ccelestis, Jupiter opulentus, Minerva, Mer- 
 curius, and Apollo ; in bad, unto TeUus and the 
 heroes. 
 
 And therefore I could not but notice how his female 
 friends were irrationally curious so strictly to examine 
 his dreams, and in this low state to hope for the 
 phantasms of health. He was now past the healthful 
 dreams of the sun, moon, and stars, in their clarity and 
 proper courses. 'Twas too late to dream of flying, of 
 limped fountains, smooth waters, white vestments, and 
 fruitful green trees, which are the visions of healthful 
 sleeps, and at good distance from the grave. 
 
 And they were also too deeply dejected that he should 
 dream of his dead friends, inconsequently divining, that 
 he would not be long from them ; for strange it was not 
 that he should sometimes dream of tlie dead, whose 
 thoughts run always upon death ; beside, to dream of 
 the dead, so they appear not in dark habits, and take 
 notliing away from us, in Hippocrates' sense was of good 
 signification : for we live by the dead, and everything 
 is or miist be so before it becomes our nourishment. 
 And Cardan, who dreamed that he discoursed with his 
 dead father in the moon, made thereof no mortal in- 
 terpretation ; and even to dream that we are dead, was 
 no condemnable phantasm in old onciro-criticism, as 
 having a signification of liberty, vacuity from cares, 
 exemption and freedom from troubles unknown imto 
 the dead.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 177 
 
 Some dreams I confess may admit of easy and femi- 
 nine exposition ; he who dreamed that he could not see 
 his riglit shoulder, might easily fear to lose the sight of 
 his right eye ; he that before a journey dreamed that 
 his feet were cut off, had a plain waming not to under- 
 take his intended journey. But why to dream of lettuce 
 should presage some ensuing disease, why to eat figs 
 should signify foolish talk, why to eat eggs great trouble, 
 and to dream of blindness should be so highly com- 
 mended, accoi-ding to the oneirocritical verses of As- 
 tranipsychus and Nicephorus, I shall leave unto your 
 divination. 
 
 He was willing to quit the world alone and altogether, 
 leaN-ing no earnest beliind him for corruption or after- 
 grave, ha'STng small content in that common satisfaction 
 to sun'ive or live in another, but amply satisfied that 
 his disease should die with himself, nor revive in a pos- 
 terity to puzzle physic, and make sad mementoes of their 
 parent hereditary. Leprosy awakes not sometimes before 
 forty, tlie gout and stone often later ; but consumptive 
 an<l tabid* roots sprout more early, and at the fairest 
 make seventeen years of our life doubtful before that 
 age. They that enter the world with original diseases 
 as well as sin, have not only common mortality but sick 
 traductions to destroy them, make commonly short 
 courses, and live not at length but in figures ; so that a 
 sound Ca»arean nati\'ityt may outlast a natural birth, 
 and a knife may sfjmetimes make way for a more last- 
 ing fruit than a midwife ; which makes so few infants 
 now able to endure the old test of the river,t and many 
 
 • Tabes maxime contingunt abanno decimo octavo ad trigesi 
 mum quintum. — //i/^/>oc. 
 
 t A Huund cliild cut out of the body of the mother. 
 
 X NatoM ad tluuiiuu priiuuui deferimus aa^voquo gulu dura 
 Diu» et uiidit.
 
 178 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 to have feeble cliildren who could scarce have been mar- 
 ried at Sparta, and those provident states who studied 
 strong and healthful generations ; which happen but 
 contingently in mere pecuniary matches or marriages 
 made by the candle, wherein notwithstanding there is 
 little redress to be hoped from an astrologer or a lawyer, 
 and a good discerning physician were Like to prove the 
 most successful counsellor. 
 
 Julius Scaliger, who in a sleepless fit of the gout could 
 make two hundred verses in a night, would have but 
 five* plain words upon his tomb. And this serious per- 
 son, though no minor wit, left the poetry of his epitaph 
 unto others ; either unwilling to commend liimself, or 
 to be judged by a distich, and perhaps considering how 
 unhappy great poets have been in versifying their own 
 epitaphs ; wherein Petrarch, Dante, and Ariosto, have 
 so unhappily failed, that if their tombs should outlast 
 their works, posterity would find so little of Apollo on 
 them as to mistake them for Ciceronian poets. 
 
 In this deliberate and creeping progress imto the 
 grave, he was somewhat too young and of too noble a 
 mind, to fall upon that stupid symptom observable in 
 divers persons near their journey's end, and which may 
 be reckoned among the mortal symptoms of their last 
 disease ; that is, to become more narrow-minded, miser- 
 able, and tenacious, unready to part with anything, 
 when they are ready to part with all, and afraid to want 
 when they have no time to spend ; meanwhile physi- 
 cians, who know that many are mad but in a single 
 depraved imagination, and one prevalent decipiency ; 
 and that beside and out of such single deliriums a man 
 may meet with sober actions and good sense in bedlam ; 
 
 * Julii Cajsaris Scaligeri quod fxiit.— Joseph. Scaliger in vita 
 patris.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 179 
 
 cannot but sniile to see the heirs and concerned relations 
 gratulating themselves on the sober departure of their 
 friends ; and though they behold such mad covetous 
 passages, content to think they die in good undersUiml- 
 ing, and in their sober senses. 
 
 Avarice, which is not only infidelity, but idolatry, 
 either from covetous progeny or questuary" education, 
 had no root in his breast, who made good works the 
 expression of his faith, and was big with desires unto 
 public and lasting charities ; and surely where good 
 wishes and charitable intentions exceed abilities, theori- 
 cal beneficency may be more than a dream. They build 
 not castles in the air who would build churches on 
 earth ; and though they leave no such structures here, 
 may lay good foundations in heaven. In brief, his life 
 and death were such, that I could not blame them who 
 wished the like, and almost to have been himself ; 
 almost, I say ; for though we may wish the prosperous 
 aj)purtenances of others, or to be another in his happy 
 accidents, yet so intrinsical is everj' man unto himself, 
 that some doubt may be made, whether any would 
 exchange his being, or substantially become another 
 man. 
 
 He had wisely seen the world at home and abroad, 
 and thereby observed under what variety men are de- 
 luded in the pursuit of that which is not here to be 
 found. And although he had no ojiinion of reputed 
 felicitieij below, and apprehended men widely out in the 
 estimate of such hajijiiness, yet his sober contempt of the 
 world wrought nu Democratism or Cynicism, no laugh- 
 ing or snarling at it, as well understanding there are not 
 felicities in this world to satisfy a serious mind ; and 
 therefore, to soften tlie stream of our lives, we are fain 
 \n take in the reputed couteutatious of this world, to
 
 i8o LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 unite witli the crowd in their beatitudes, and to make 
 ourselves happy by consortion, opinion, and co-existi- 
 mation ; for strictly to separate from received and cus- 
 tomary felicities, and to confine unto the rigour of 
 realities, were to contract the consolation of our beings 
 unto too uncomfortable circumscriptions. 
 
 Not to fear death,* nor desire it, was short of his re- 
 solution : to be dissolved, and be with Christ, was his 
 dying ditty. He conceived his thread long, in no long 
 course of years, and when he had scarce outlived the 
 second life of Lazarus ;+ esteeming it enough to approach 
 the years of his Saviour, who so ordered his own human 
 state, as not to be old upon earth. 
 
 But to be content with death may be better than to 
 desire it ; a miserable life may make us wish for death, 
 but a virtuous one to rest in it ; which is the advantage 
 of those resolved Christians, who looking on death not 
 only as the sting, but the period and end of sin, the 
 horizon and isthmus between this life and a better, and 
 the death of this world but as a nativity of another, 
 do contentedly submit unto the common necessity, and 
 envy not Enoch or Elias. 
 
 Not to be content with life is the unsatisfactory state 
 of those who destroy themselves,! who being afraid to 
 live run bUndly upon their own death, which no man 
 fears by experience : and the Stoics had a notable doc- 
 
 * Summum nee metuas diem nee optes. 
 
 t Who upon some accounts, and tradition, is said to have 
 lived thirty years after he was raised by our Saviour. — 
 Baronius. 
 
 X In the speech of Vulteius in Lucan, animating his soldiers 
 in a great struggle to kill one another. — " Decernite lethum, 
 et metus omnis abest, cupias quodcunqne necesse est." " All 
 fear is over, do but resolve to die, and make your desires meet 
 necessity." — Phars. iv. 486.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. i8i 
 
 trine to take away the fear thereof ; that is, in such ex- 
 tremities, to desire that which is not to be avoided, and 
 wish what might be feared ; and so made evils voluntary, 
 and to suit ■with their own desires, which took off tlie 
 terror of them. 
 
 But the ancient martjTS were not encouraged by such 
 fallacies ; who, though they feared not death, were afraid 
 to be their own executioners ; and therefore thought it 
 more wisdom to crucify their lusts than their bodies, to 
 circumcise than stab their heai-ts, and to mortify than 
 kill themselves. 
 
 His willingness to leave this world about that age, 
 when most men think they may best enjoy it, though 
 paradoxical unto worldly ears, was not strange unto 
 mine, who have so often observed, that many, though 
 old, oft stick fast unto the world, and seem to be drawn 
 like Cacus's oxen'^, backward, with great struggling and 
 reluctancy unto the grave. The long habit of living 
 makes mere men more hardly to part with life, and all 
 to be nothing, but what is to come. To live at the rate 
 of the old world, when some could scarce remember 
 themselves young, may afford no better digested death 
 tlian a more moderate period. Many would have 
 thought it an happiness to have had their lot of life 
 in some notable conjunctures of ages past ; but the 
 uncertainty of future times have tempted few to make 
 a part in ages to come. And surely, he that hath taken 
 the true altitude of things, and rightly calculated the 
 degenerate state of this age, is not like to en\'y those 
 that shall live in the next, much less three or four hun- 
 dred years hence, when no man can comfortably imagine 
 what face this world will carry : and tlierefore since 
 every age maken a step unto the end of all things, and 
 the Scripture alfords so hard a character of the liust
 
 i82 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 times ; quiet minds will be content "nath their genera- 
 tions, and rather bless ages past, than be ambitious of 
 those to come. 
 
 Though age had set no seal upon his face, yet a dim 
 eye might clearly discover fifty in his actions ; and 
 therefore, since wisdom is the grey hair, and an un- 
 spotted life old age ; although his years come short, he 
 might have been said to have held up with longer 
 livers, and to have been Solomon's* old man. And 
 surely if we deduct all those days of our life which 
 we might wish xinlived, and which abate the comfort of 
 those we now live ; if we reckon up only those days 
 which God hath accepted of our Lives, a life of good 
 years will hardly be a span long : the son in this sense 
 may outlive the father, and none be climacterically 
 old. He that early arriveth unto the parts and pru- 
 dence of age, is happily old without the uncomfortable 
 attendants of it ; and 'tis superfluous to live unto grey 
 hairs, when in precocious temper we anticipate the 
 virtues of them. In brief, he cannot be accounted 
 young who outliveth the old man. He that hath early 
 arrived unto the measure of a perfect stature in Christ, 
 hath already fulfilled the prime and longest inten- 
 tion of his being ; and one day lived after the perfect 
 rule of piety, is to be preferred before sinning immor- 
 tality. 
 
 Although he attained not imto the years of his prede- 
 cessors, yet he wanted not those preserving virtues 
 which confirm the thread of weaker constitutions. Gau- 
 telous chastity and crafty sobriety were far from him ; 
 those jewels were paragon, without flaw, hair, ice, or 
 cloud in him ; which aftbrds me a hint to proceed in 
 these good wishes, and few mementoes unto you. 
 * Wisdom, cap. iv.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 1S3 
 
 Tread softly and circumspectly in this funambulous " 
 track and narrow path of goodness ; pursue virtue 
 \'irtuously, be sober and temperate, not to preserve your 
 body in a sufficiuncy for wanton ends, not to spare your 
 purse, not to be free from the infamy of common trans- 
 gressors that way, and thereby to balance or palliate 
 obscure and closer vices, nor simply to enjoy health, by 
 all of which you may leaven good actions, and render 
 virtues disputable, but, iu one word, that you may truly 
 serve God, wliich every sickness -will tell you you cannot 
 well do without health. The sick man's sacrifice is but 
 a lame oblation- Pious treasures, laid up in healtliful 
 days,exciU5e the defect of sick non-performances ; without 
 which we must needs look back with anxiety upon the 
 last opportunities of health ; and may have cause rather 
 to env)' than pity the ends of penitent malefactors, who 
 go with clear parts unto the last act of tlieir lives, and 
 in the integrity of their faculties return theii' spiiit unto 
 God that gave it. 
 
 Consider whereabouts thou art in Cebe's" table, or 
 that old philosophical pinax" of the life of man ; 
 whether thou art still in the road of uncertainties ; 
 whether thou hast yet entered the narrow gate, got up 
 tlie liill and asperous way which leadeth unto the house 
 of sanity ; or taken that purifying potion from the hand 
 of sincere erudition, which may send thee clear and pure 
 away unto a virtuous and happy lii'e. 
 
 In this virtuous voyage let no disappointment cause 
 despondency, nor ditliculty despair. Think not thai 
 you are sailing from Lima to Manilla,* '" wherein 
 thou mayeiit tie up the nidfler, and sleep befcjre tlie 
 wind, but expect rough seas. Haws and contrary blasts ; 
 
 • Through the Pacifick Sea with a constant gale from the 
 eaat.
 
 184 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 and 'tis well if by many cross tacks and veerings thou 
 arrivest at the port. Sit not down in the popular 
 seats and common level of virtues, hut endeavour to 
 make them heroical. Offer not only peace-offerings but 
 holocausts unto God. To serve him singly to serve our- 
 selves were too partial a piece of piety, not like to place 
 us in the highest mansions of glory. 
 
 He that is chaste and continent not to impair his 
 strength or terrified by contagion wUl hardly be heroically 
 virtuous. Adjourn not that virtue untU those years 
 when Cato could lend out his wife, and impotent satyrs 
 ^vrite satires against lust, but be chaste in thy flaming 
 days when Alexander dared not trust his eyes upon the 
 fair sisters of Darius, and when so many think that 
 there is no other way but Origen's.* 
 
 Be charitable before wealth make thee covetous, and 
 lose not the glory of the mitre. If riches increase, let 
 thy mind hold pace with them, and think it is not 
 enough to be liberal but munificent. Though a cup of 
 cold water from some hand may not be without its 
 reward, yet stick not thou for wine and oil for the 
 wounds of the distressed, and treat the poor as our 
 Saviour did the multitude to the reliques of some 
 baskets. 
 
 Trust not unto the omnipotency of gold, or say not 
 unto it, thou art my confidence. Kiss not thy hand 
 when thou beholdest that terrestrial sun, nor bore thy 
 ear imto its servitude. A slave unto Mammon makes 
 no servant unto God. Covetousness cracks the sinews 
 of faith, numbs the apprehension of anything above' 
 sense ; and only affected with the certainty of things 
 present, makes a peradventure of things to come ; lives 
 but imto one world, nor hopes but fears another : makes 
 * Who is said to have castrated liimself.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 1S5 
 
 their own death sweet unto others, bitter unto them- 
 selves, brings formal sadness, scenical mourning, and 
 no wet eves at the grave. 
 
 If avarice be thy vice, yet make it not thy punish- 
 ment. Miserable men commiserate not themselves, 
 bowelless unto themselves, and merciless unto their 
 own bowels. Let the fruition of things bless the 
 possession of them, and take no satisfaction in dying 
 but living rich. For since thy good works, not thy 
 goods will follow thee ; since riches are an appurtenance 
 of life, and no dead man is rich, to famish in plenty, 
 and live poorly to die rich, were a multiplying im- 
 provement in madness and use upon use in folly. 
 
 Persons lightly dipt, not grained, in generous honesty 
 are but pale in goodness and faint-hued in sincerity. 
 But be thou what thou virtuously art, and let not the 
 ocean wash away thy tincture. Stand majestically upon 
 that axis where prudent suiiplicity hath fixed thee ; 
 and at no temptation invert the poles of thy honesty 
 that vice may be imeasy and even monstrous unto 
 thee ; let iterated good acts and long confinned habits 
 make virtue natural or a second nature in thee ; and since 
 few or none prove eminently virtuous but from some 
 advantageous foimdations in their temper and natural 
 inclinations, study thyself betimes, and early find what 
 nature bids thee to be or tells thee what thou mayest 
 Ije. Tliey who thus timely descend into themselves, 
 cultivating the goo<I seeds which nature hath set in them, 
 and improving their prevalent inclinations to perfection, 
 become not shrubs but cedars in their generation. And 
 to Ixj in the fona of the best of bad, or the worst of tlie 
 good, will be no satisfaction unto them. 
 
 Let not the law of thy country be the non ultra of 
 thy honesty, nor think lliat always good enougli li;at
 
 186 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 the law will make good. Narrow not the law of 
 charity, equity, mercy. Join gospel righteousness with 
 legal right. Be not a mere Gamaliel in the faith, but 
 let the Sermon on the Mount be thy Targum unto the 
 law of Sinai, 
 
 Make not the consequences of virtue the ends 
 thereof. Be not beneficent for a name or cymbal 
 of applause ; nor exact and punctual in commerce for 
 the advantages of trust and credit, which attend the 
 reputation of ju.st and true dealing : for such rewards, 
 though unsought for, plain virtue will bring with her, 
 whom all men honour, though they pursue not. To 
 have other by-ends in good actions sours laudable 
 performances, which must have deeper roots, motives, 
 and instigations, to give them the stamp of virtues. 
 
 Though human infirmity may betray thy heedless 
 days into the popular ways of extravagancy, yet, let 
 not thine own depravity or the torrent of vicious times 
 carry thee into desperate enormities in opinions, manners, 
 or actions. If thou hast dipped thy foot in the river, 
 yet venture not over Rubicon ; run not into extremities 
 from whence there is no regression, nor be ever so closely 
 shut up within the holds of vice and iniquity, as not 
 to find some escape by a postern of recipiscency.-^'' 
 
 Owe not thy hiunility unto humiliation by adversity, 
 but look humbly down in that state when others look 
 upward upon thea Be patient in the age of pride, 
 and days of will, and impatiency, when men live but by 
 intervals of reason, under the sovereignty of humour and 
 passion, when it is in the power of every one to trans- 
 form thee out of thyself, and put thee into short mad- 
 ness.* If you cannot imitate Job, yet come not short of 
 Socrates,^* and those patient Pagans, who tired the 
 * Irae furor brevis est.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 1S7 
 
 tongues of their enemies, while they perceived they 
 spit their malice at brazen walls and statues. 
 
 Let age, not envy, draw wrinkles on thy cheeks ; be 
 content to be enAned, but envy not. Emulation may be 
 plausible, and indignation allowable, but admit no treaty 
 with that passion which no circumst;mce can make 
 good. A displacency at the good of others, because 
 they enjoy it although we do not want it, is an absurd 
 depravity sticking fast unto nature, from its primitive 
 comiption, which he that can well subdue were a 
 Christian of the tirst magnitude, and for ought I know 
 may have one foot already in heaven. 
 
 Wliile thou so hotly disclaimest the devil, be not 
 guilty of Diabolism. Fall not into one name •with that 
 uncle^in spirit, nor act his nature whom thou so much 
 abhorrest, that is, to accuse, calumniate, backbite, 
 whisper, detract, or sinistrously interpret others. Degen- 
 t-rous depravities and narrow-minded vices ! not only 
 below St Paul's noble Christian, but Aristotle's true gen- 
 tleman.* Trust not with some that the Epistle of St 
 James is apocryyjhal, and so read wth less fear that 
 stabbing truth that in company with this vice, "thy 
 religion is in vain." Moses broke the tables without 
 breaking the law, but where charity is broke the law 
 itself is shattered, which cannot be whole wthout love 
 that is "the fultilling of it." Look humbly upon thy 
 virtues, and th(jugh thou art rich in some, yet think 
 thyself poor and naked \vithout that crowning grace 
 which "tliinketh no evil, which envieth not, which 
 iK-areth, l>elieveth, hopcth, endureth all things.' 
 With these sure graces while busy tongues are crjing 
 out for a drop of cold water, mutes maylHi in happi- 
 ness, and sing the "Trisagium,"t in heaven. 
 
 • Sec Arintotle's Ethics, chapter Magnaniinity. 
 t Holy, holy, holy.
 
 1 88 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 Let not the sun in Capricorn * go do-wn 'upon tliy 
 •wrrath, "but write thy wrongs in water, draw the curtain 
 of night upon injuries, shut them up in the tower of 
 oblivion,t and let them be as though they had not been. 
 Forgive thine enemies totally, without any reserve of 
 hope that however God will revenge thee 
 
 Be substantially great in thyself, and more than thou 
 appearest unto others ; and let the world be deceived 
 in thee, as they are in the lights of heaven. Hang early 
 plummets upon the heels of pride, and let ambition 
 have but an epicycleis or narrow circuit in thee. 
 Measure not thyseK by thy morning shadow, but by 
 the extent of thy grave ; and reckon thyself above 
 the earth, by the line thou must be contented with 
 under it. Spread not into boundless expansions either 
 to designs or desires. Think not that mankind liveth 
 but for a few ; and that the rest are bom but to serve 
 the ambition of those who make but flies of men, and 
 wildernesses of whole nations. Swell not into vehement 
 actions, which embroQ and confound the earth, but be 
 one of those violent ones that force the kingdom of 
 heaven.+ If thou must needs rule, be Zeno's king, and 
 enjoy that empire which every man gives himself: 
 certainly the iterated injunctions of Christ unto humility, 
 meekness, patience, and that despised train of virtues, 
 cannot but make pathetical impression upon those 
 who have well considered the aflfairs of all ages ; 
 wherein pride, ambition, and vain-glory, have led 
 
 * Even when the days are shortest. 
 
 ■{■Alluding to the tower of oblivion mentioned by Pro- 
 copius, which was the name of a tower of imprisonment among 
 the Persians ; whoever was put therein was as it were buried 
 alive, and it was death for any but to name him. 
 
 + St Matt. xi.
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 1S9 
 
 up to the worst of actions, whereiinto confusions, 
 tragedies, and acts, denying all religion, do owe their 
 originals. 
 
 Rest not in an ovation,* but a triumph over thy 
 passions. Chain up the unruly legion of thy breast ; 
 behold thy trophies ^vithin thee, not without thee. 
 Lead thine own captivity captive, and be Caesar unto 
 thyselL 
 
 Give no quarter imto those vices that are of thine 
 inward family, and, having a root in thy temper, plead 
 a right and propriety in thee. Examine well thy com- 
 plexional inclinations. Rain early batteries against 
 those strongholds built upon the rock of nature, and 
 make this a great part of the militia of thy life. The 
 politic natiire of vice must be opposed by policy, and 
 therefore wiser honesties project and plot against sin ; 
 wherein notwithstanding we are not to rest in generals, 
 or the trite stratagems of art ; that may succeed with 
 one temper, which may prove successless with another. 
 There is no community or commonwealth of virtue, 
 every man must study his own economy and erect 
 these rules imto the figure of himself. 
 
 Lastly, if length of days be thy portion, make it not 
 thy expectation. Reckon not upon long life ; but live 
 always beyond thy account. He that so often sur- 
 viveth his expectation lives many Uves, and will scarce 
 complain of the shortness of his days. Time past is 
 gone like a shadow ; make times to come present ; con- 
 ceive that near which may be far off. Appro.vimate 
 thy latter times by present apprehensions of them : be 
 like a neighbour unto death, and think there is but 
 little to come. And since there is something in us tliat 
 must still live on, join both lives together, unite them 
 • Ovation, a petty and minor kind of triumph.
 
 igo 
 
 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 in thy tliouglits and actions, and live in. one but for the 
 other. He who thus ordereth the purposes of this life, 
 will never be far from the next, and is ia some manner 
 already in it, by a happy conformity and close appre- 
 hension of it.
 
 NOTES TO THE RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 10. 
 
 n. 
 
 12. 
 
 13. 
 
 14. 
 15. 
 11, 
 
 It was a proTerb, " Ubi tres medici duo athei.'" 
 
 A LatinisL-d word meaning a taunt (impropero.) 
 
 The synod of Dort was held in 1619 to discuss the doctrines of 
 Arminius. It ended by condemning them. 
 
 Uallam, commenting on this passage, says — " That Jesuit must be a 
 disgrace to his order who would have asked more than such a con- 
 cession to secure a proselyte — the right of interi)retiug whatever 
 was written, and of supplying whatever was not." — Hiit. Eno- 
 land, Tol. ii. p. 74. 
 
 See the statute of the Six Articles (31 Hen. VIII. c. 14), which de- 
 clared that transubstantiation, communion in one kind, celibacy 
 of the clergy, vows of widowhood, private masses, and auricular 
 confession, were nart of the law of England. 
 
 In the year 1606, when the Jesuits were expelled from Venice, Pope 
 Paul V. threatened to excommunicate that republic. A most 
 Tiolent quarrel ensued, which was ultimately settled by the media- 
 tion of France. 
 
 Alluding to the story of CEdipus solving the riddle proposed by the 
 Sphynx. 
 
 The nymph Arethu.sa was changed by Diana into a fountain, and 
 was said to have (lowed under the sea from Elis tu the fountain of 
 Arethusa near .Syracuse. — Ov. Met. lib. v. fab. 8. 
 
 These herctici denied the immortality of the soul, but held that it 
 was recalled to life with the body. Origen came from Epyi)t to 
 confute them, and Lt said to have succeeded. See Mosh. Kixi. 
 nut., lib. I. c. 6. sec. 16.) Pope John XXII. afterwards 
 a<lMpt4.'d it. 
 
 A divLtion from the Qreek Sixoro/ua. 
 
 The brain. 
 
 A faint resemblance, flrom the Latin ailtmtrro, to shade. 
 
 Alluding to the idea t<ir T. Ilrowne often expresseti, that an oracle 
 
 was the utterance of the devil. 
 To fathom, (rom Ijitin jrrofundut. 
 Ik-ginning from the Latin ejficiQ. 
 (JaJeu'a great work.
 
 192 NOTES TO THE RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 17. John de Monte Regio made a wooden eagle that, when the emperor 
 
 was entering Nuremburg, flew to meet him, and hovered over his 
 head. He also made an iron fly that, when at dinner, he was 
 able to make start from under his hand, and fly round the table, 
 — See De Bartas, 6me jour Ime semaine. 
 
 18. Hidden, from the Greek KpvirTW. 
 
 19. A military term for a small mine. 
 
 20. The Armada. 
 
 21. The practice of drawing lots. 
 
 22. An account. 
 
 23. See II. VIII. 18— 
 
 " Let down our golden everlasting chain, 
 Whose strong embrace holds heaven, and earth, and main." 
 
 —Pope, II. viii. 26. 
 
 24. An argument where one proposition is accumulated upon another, 
 
 from the Greek awpeirris, a heap. 
 
 25. Alluding to the second triumvirate — that of Augustus, Antony, and 
 
 Lepidus. Florus says of it, "Respublica convulsa est lacerata- 
 que." 
 
 26. Ochinus. He was first a monk, then a doctor, then a Capuchin friar, 
 
 then a Protestant : in 1647 he came to England, and was very 
 active in the Reformation. He was afterwards made Canon of 
 Canterbury. The Socinians claim him as one of their sect. 
 
 27. The father of Pantagruel. His adventures are given in the first book 
 
 of Rabelais, Sir Bevys of Hampton, a metrical romance, relating 
 the adventures of Sir Bevys with the Saracens. — Wright and 
 Halliwell's Rdiquioe Antiquce, ii. 59. 
 
 28. Contradictions between two laws. 
 
 29. On his arrival at Paris, Pantagruel visited the library of St Victor : 
 
 he states a list of the works he found there, among which was 
 " Tartaretus." Pierre Tartaret was a French doctor who disputed 
 with Duns Scotus. His works were republished at Lyons, 1621. 
 
 30. Deucalion was king of Thessaly at the time of the deluge. He and 
 
 his wife Pyrrha, with the advice of the oracle of Themis, repeopled 
 the earth by throwing behind them the bones of their grand- 
 mother, — i.e., stones of the earth. — See Ovid. Met. lib. i. 
 fab. 7. 
 
 31. St Augustine (De Civ. Dei, xvi. 7). 
 
 32. airriy^aTO (St Matt, xxvii. 5) means death by choking. Erasmus 
 
 translates it, " abiens laqueo se suspendit." 
 
 33. Burnt by order of the Caliph Omar, A.D. 640. It contained 700,000 
 
 volumes, which served the city for fuel instead of wood for six 
 months. 
 
 34. Enoch being informed by Adam the world was to be drowned and 
 
 burnt, made two pillars, one of stone to withstand the water, and 
 one of brick to withstand the fire, and inscribed upon them all 
 known knowledge. — See Josephus, Ant. Jud. 
 
 35. A Franciscan friar, counsellor to the Inquisition, who visited tne 
 
 principal libraries in Spain to make a catalogue of the books op- 
 posed to the Romish religion. His "Index novus librorum pro- 
 hibitorum" was published at Seville in 1631. 
 
 36. Printing, gunpowder, clocks. 
 
 37. The Targums and the various Talmuds.
 
 NOT£S TO THE RELIGJO MEDICI. 193 
 
 r'.S. Pa^Ds, Mahometans. Jews, Christians. 
 
 39. Talour. and death in battle. 
 ¥i. }Ield 1414-141S. 
 
 •41. Verpilius. bishop of Salzburg, h.iTinp asserted the existence of 
 Antipodes, the Ai-chbisliop of Metz declared him to be a heretic, 
 and caused him to be burnt. 
 
 4-. On searching on Mount Calvary for the true cross, the empress 
 found three. As she was uncertain whicli was the right one, she 
 caused them to be applied to the body of a dead man, and the 
 one that restored him to life was determined to be the true cross. 
 
 43. The critical time in human life. 
 
 44. Oracles were said to have cea.sed when Christ came, the reply to 
 
 Augustus on the subject being the last — 
 
 " Me puer Ilebraius divos Deus ipse gubernans 
 Cedere sede jubet tristemque redire sub Orcum 
 Aris ergo de hinc tacitus discedito nostris." 
 
 40. An historian who wrote "De Rebus Indicis." lie is cited by Pliny, 
 
 Strabo, and Josephus. 
 
 46. Alluding to the popular superstition that infant children were carried 
 
 off by fairies, and others left in their places. 
 
 47. Who is said to have lived without meat, on the smell of a rose. 
 
 48. "Essentia; rationalis immortalis." 
 
 49. St Augustine, De Civ. Dei. lib. x., cc. 9, 19, 32. 
 
 50. That which includes everything is opposed to nullity. 
 
 61. An inversion of the parts of an antithesis. 
 
 62. St Au,{ustine — " Homily on (jenesis." 
 
 53. Sir T. Browne wrote a dialogue between two twins in the womb 
 
 respecting the world into which they were going 1 
 M. Refinement. 
 66. Constitution another form of temperament. 
 
 66. The Jewish computation for fifty years. 
 
 67. Saturn revolves once in thirty years. 
 
 68. Christian IV. of Denmark, who reigned from 1588-1647. 
 
 69. S^on wa.s the father of Jason. Ey Ijathing in a bath prepared for him 
 
 by .Me<la.-a with some magic spells, hebecame young again. Ovid 
 
 describes the bath and its ingredients, Mtt., lib. vii. fab. '1. 
 60. Alluding to the rabbinical tradition that the world would last for 
 
 6000 years, attributed to Ellas, and cited in the Talmud. 
 6'-. Zeno was the founder of the Stoics. 
 VI. Referring to a passage in Suetonlu.s, Tit. J Cajsar, sec 87 :— 
 
 " AspiTnatus tam lentum mortis grnus subitam sibi celeremque 
 
 optaverat." 
 
 63. In holding 
 
 " .Mors ultima poena est, 
 Nee metaenda viris." 
 
 64. The period when the moon is in conjunction and obscured by the 
 
 ■un. 
 fl5. One of the Jiidgen of helL 
 M. To Kclrct Home great man for our Ideal, and always to act as if be 
 
 was present with ui. See Seneca, lib. 1. Ep. 11, 
 C7. Sir T. Browne leeroa to have made v:irioiiH experlmentH In this
 
 194 NOTES TO THE RELIGIO MEDICI. 
 
 suhject. D'Israeli refers to it in his "Curiosities of Literature." 
 Kr Power, a friend of Sir T. Browne, with whom he corresponded, 
 gives a receipt for the process. 
 
 68. The celebrated Greek philosopher who taught that the sun was a 
 
 mass of heated stone, and various other astronomical doctrines. 
 Some critics say Anaxarchus is meant here. 
 
 69. See Milton's " Paradise Lost," lib. i. 254— 
 
 " The mind is its own place, and in itself 
 Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven." 
 
 And also Lucretius — 
 
 " Hie Acherusia fit stultorum denique vita." — iii. 1023. 
 
 70. Keck says here — "So did they all, as Lactantius has observed at 
 
 large. Aristotle is said to have been guilty of great vanity in 
 his clothes, of iucontinency, and of unfaithfulness to his master, 
 Alexander II." 
 
 71. Phalaris, king of Agrigentum, who, when Perillus made a brazen 
 
 bull in which to kill criminals, placed him in it to try its effects. 
 
 72. Their maxim was 
 
 " Nihil sciri siquis putat id quoque nescit, 
 An sciri possit quod se nil scii'e fatetur." 
 
 73. Pope Alexander III., in his declaration to the Doge, said,—" Que 
 
 la mer vous soit soumise comme I'epouse Test \ son epoux 
 puisque vous in avez acquis I'empire par la victorie." In com- 
 memoration of this the Doge and Senate went yearly to Lio, and 
 throwing a ring into the water, claimed the sea as their bride. 
 
 74. Appolonius Thyaneus, who threw a large quantity of gold into the 
 
 sea, saying, " Pessundo divitias ne pessundare ab illis." 
 
 75. Tbe technical term in fencing for a hit — 
 
 " A sweet touch, a quick venew of wit." 
 
 Love's Labour Lost, act v. sc. 1. 
 
 76. Strabo compared the configuration of the world, as then known, to 
 
 a cloak or mantle (chalmys). 
 
 77. Atomistsorfamilists were a Puritanical sect who appeared about 1576, 
 
 founded by Henry Nicholas, a Dutchman. They considered that 
 the doctrine of revelation was an allegory, and believed that 
 <hey had attained to spiritual perftction. — Sjb Neal's Hist, of 
 Puritans, i. 273. 
 
 78. From the 126th psalm St Augustine contends that Solomon is 
 
 damned. See also Lyra in 2 Kings vii. 
 
 79. From the Spanish "Dorado," a gilt head. 
 
 80. Sir T. Browne treats of chiromancy, or the art of telling fortunes by 
 
 means of lines in the hands, in his "Vulgar Errors," lib. v. 
 cap. 23. 
 
 81. Gypsies. 
 
 82. S. Wilkin says that here this word means niggardly. 
 
 !>3. In the dialogue, "judicium vocalium," the vowels are the judges, 
 and S complains that T has deprived him of many letters that 
 ought to begin with S. 
 
 84. If Jovis or Jupitris. 
 
 35. The celebrated Roman grammarian. A proverbial phrase for the 
 violation of grammar was " Breaking Priscian's head."
 
 NOTES TO HVDRIOTAPHIA. 195 
 
 H6. Livj saf3, Actius Nevius cut a whetstone through \ritb a razor. 
 ST. A kiad of lizard that was supposed to kill all it looked at — 
 
 "Whose baneful eye 
 Wounds at a glance, so that the soundest dye." 
 
 — Dt Bartas, 6uie jour Imc sem. 
 M. Epimenidea (Titus x. 12)— 
 
 " KpTJTes del ^edcFTai KaKO. Orjpid yacrr^pes apyal." 
 
 89. Nero haring heard a person say, "When I am dead, let earth be 
 
 mingled with fire," replied, "Yea, while I live." — Suetonius, 
 Vit. Nero. 
 
 90. Alluding to the story of the Italian, who, having been provoked by 
 
 a person he met, put a poniurd to his heart, and threatened to 
 kill him if he would not blaspheme God; and the stranger doing 
 so, the Italian killed him at once, that he might be damned, hav- 
 ing no time to repent. 
 
 91. A rapier or small sword. 
 
 1*3. The battle here referred to was the one between Don John of 
 Austria and the Turkish fleet, near Lepanto, in 1571. The battle 
 of Lepanto (that is, the capture of the town by the Turks) did not 
 take place till ir.TS. 
 
 93. Several authors say that Aristotle died of grief because he could 
 not find out the reason for the ebb and flow of the tide in Epirus. 
 
 M. Who deny that there is such a thing as science. 
 
 95. A motto on a ring or cup In an old will, 1655, there is this 
 passage : " I give a cup of silver gilt to have this posy written ia 
 the margin : — 
 
 " When the drink is out, and the bottom you may see, 
 Remember your brother I. O." 
 
 06. The opposition of a contrary quality, by which the quality it opposes 
 becomes heightened. 
 
 97. Adam as he was created and not born. 
 
 98. Meaning a world, as Atlas supported the world on his shoulders. 
 09. Merriment. Johnson says that this is the only place where the 
 
 word is found. 
 100. Said to be a cure for madness. 
 1(>1. Patched garments. 
 102. A game. A kind of capping verses, in which, if any one repeated 
 
 what liad been said before, he paid a forfeit. 
 
 NOTES TO HYDKIOTAPHIA. 
 
 1. Just. 
 
 'i. Destruction. 
 
 3 K chemical vessel made of earth, ashes, or burnt bone.^, and in 
 which a»sav-masters try their metals. It sufTers all baser one.t 
 when fused and mixed with lead to pass off, and retains oaly 
 gold aod silver.
 
 196 NOTES TO LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 4. This substance known to French chemists by the name " adipo-cire," 
 
 was first discovered by Sir Xhomas Browne. 
 
 5. From its thickness. 
 
 6. Euripides. 
 
 7. Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Egyptian, Arabic defaced by the Emperor 
 
 Licinius. 
 
 NOTES TO LETTER TO A FRIEND. 
 
 1. Will not survive until next spring, 
 
 2. Wasting. 
 
 3. An eminent Italian Physician, lecturer in the University of Pavia, 
 
 died 1576. He was a most voluminous medical writer. 
 
 4. An eminent doctor and scholar who passed his time at Venice and 
 Padua studying and practising medicine, died 1558. 
 
 5. Charles V. was born 24th Februaiy, 1500. 
 
 6. Francis I. of France was taken prisoner at the battle of Pavia, 24th 
 
 February, 1525. 
 
 7. One of the greatest Protestant generals of the seventeenth centuiT. 
 
 He died at Zara, 1626. 
 
 8. An inflation, or swelling, from the French bouff^e. 
 
 9. August 29th, 1526. He was defeated by Solymanll., and suffocated 
 
 in a brook, by a fall from his horse, during the retreat. 
 
 10. The caul. 
 
 11. Money-seeking. 
 
 12. Cacus stole some of Hercules' oxen, and drew them into his cave 
 
 backward to prevent any traces being discovered. Ovid Fast, 1. 
 554. 
 
 13. Narrow, like walking on a rope. 
 
 14. A Greek philosophical writer. This T\iva% is a representation of a 
 
 table where the whole human life with its dangers and temptations 
 is symbolically represented, 
 
 15. Picture. 
 
 16. The course taken by the Spanish Treasure ships. See Anson Voyages. 
 
 17. A recommencement. 
 
 " Dulcique senex vicinus Hymetto 
 Qui partem acceptas sava inter vincla cicutae 
 Accusatori nollet dare," — Juv. Sat. xiii. 185. 
 
 19. A small revolution made by one planet in the orbit of another. 
 
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 I. 
 
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 ABOUT IN THE WOELD. Essays by the Author of " The 
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 List of Publications. 
 
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 ESSAYS BY MONTAIGNE. Edited, Compared, Revised, and 
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 VII. 
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 X. 
 
 THE SILENT HOUR : Essays, Original and Selected. By 
 
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 ESSAYS ON ENGLISH WRITERS, for the Self-improve- 
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 between m/in's life aiul the forces of nature, so 0.1 to bring to their highest 
 points the fertility of the soil, the vigour of the animai life, and the salubrity 
 of the climate, on iiliirh we have to depend for the physical well-being of 
 mankind." — Examiner. 
 
 Her Majesty's Mails: a History of the Post Office, and an 
 Industrial Account of its Present Condition. By Wm. Lewins, of the 
 General Post Office. '2nA Edition, revised and enlarged, with a Photo- 
 graphic Portrait of Sir Ilowland Hill. Small post Svo. 6s. 
 
 A HisUiry of Banks for Savings ; including a full account of the 
 
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 William Lewins, Author of" Her Majesty's Mails." Svo. cloth. 12s. 
 
 The Engli.-»h Catalogue of Bookd : giving the date of publication 
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 of Subjects, 8vo. 5». 
 
 Index to the Subjects of BcMiks published in the United Kingdom 
 
 during the lant 'rwenty Vears — ISIiT-lS.")?. Coiituining as many as 7-1,000 
 referencen, under »ubje«'l«, so as to ensure inimedinte reference to the 
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 of all Libraries, Collections, Heries, and Miscellanies — and li, a List of 
 Literary HfH-jeties, Printing Societies, and their Issues. One vol. royal 
 8vo. Morocco, 1/. ft». 
 
 •,• Volume II. from 18.17 in Preparation, 
 
 Outlines of Moral Piiilosophy, By DiigaM Stewart. Professor 
 rjf .Moral PbiloMiphy in the I'niversity of Kiliiiburgli. with Memoir, &c, 
 \iy James McC'osh, LL,U. New Edition, Vimo. 'ia. lid.
 
 10 Sampson Low and Co.^s 
 
 A Dictionary of Photography, on the Basis of Sutton's Dictionary. 
 
 Rewritten by Professor Dawson, of King's College, Editor of the " Journal 
 of Photography;" and Thomas Suttoa, B.A., Editor of " Photogi-aph 
 Notes." 8vo. with numerous Illustrations. 8s. 6d. 
 
 Dr. Worcester's New and Greatly Enlarged Dictionary of the 
 English Language. Adapted for Library or College Reference, compris- 
 ing 40,000 Words more than Johnson's JJictionary. 4to. cloth, 1,834 pp. 
 price 31s. 6d. well bound. 
 
 " The volumes before us show a vast amount of diligence; but with 
 Webster it is diligence in combination with fancifuluess, — with Wor- 
 cester in combination with good sense and judgment. Worcester's is the 
 soberer and safer book, and maybe pronounced the best existing English 
 Lexicon." — Athenceum. 
 
 The Publishers' Circular, and General Pecord of British and 
 
 Foreign Literature; giving a transcript of the title-page of every work 
 published in Great Britain, and every work of interest published abroad, 
 with lists of all the publishing houses. 
 
 Published regularly on the 1st and 1.5th of every Month, and forwarded 
 post free to all parts of the world on payment of 8s. per annum. 
 
 A Handbook to the Charities of London. By Sampson Low, 
 
 Jun. Comprising an Account of upwards of 800 Institutions chiefly in 
 London and its Vicinity. A Guide to the Benevolent and to the Unfor- 
 tunate. Cloth limp, Is. 6rf. 
 
 Prince Albert's Golden Precepts. Second Edition, with Photo- 
 graph. A Memorial of the Prince Consort : comprising Maxims and 
 Extracts from Addresses of His late Royal Highness. Many now for 
 the first time collected and carefully arranged. With an Index. Royal 
 16mo. beautifully printed on toned paper, cloth, gilt edges, 2s. 6d. 
 
 Our Little Ones in Heaven : Thoughts in Prose and Verse, se- 
 lected from the Writings of favourite Authors ; with Frontispiece after 
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 BIOGRAPHY, TRAVEL, AND ADVENTURE. 
 
 HE Life of John James Audubon, the Naturalist, in- 
 cluding his Romantic Adventures in the back woods of 
 America, Correspondence with celebrated Europeans, &c. 
 Edited, from materials supplied by his widow, by Robert Bu- 
 chanan. 8vo. With portraits, price 15s. 
 
 " A readable book, with many interesting and some thrilling pages in 
 
 it_" Athenaeum. " From first to last, the biography teems with interesting 
 
 adventures, with amusing or perilous incidents, with curious gossip, tcith 
 picturesque description." — Daily News. " But, as ice have said, Audubon 
 could write as well as draw ; and while his portfolio was a cause of wonder 
 to eveji such men as Cuvier, Wilson, and Sir Thomas Lawrence, hii diary 
 contained a number of spirited sketches of the places he hid visited, which 
 cannot fail to interest and even to delight the reader."— Examiner.
 
 List of Publications. 11 
 
 Leopold the First, Kin" of the Belgfians; from Unpublished 
 UooamenU, by Theodore Juste. Translated by Ivobert Black, M.A 
 
 " A rfndabU bicxjrnphy of the tcise and t/cxid King I^opo/d is crrUiin to 
 bf read in England." — Daily News. " A mure important cvntrUmtion to 
 historical littrature has not for a long uhi/e been furnished." — Hell's 
 Messenfrer. " Of great value to the ptture historian , and xcill interest 
 politici/ins ei-en now." — Spectator. " J'he subject is of interest, and the 
 story is narrated without ejrcess of e7ithu.<!iasm or depreciation. The trans- 
 LilioH by Mr. Btnck is executed with correctness, yet not without a grace- 
 ful ease. This end is not often attained in translations so nearly verbal at 
 this; the book itself desen-es to become popular in Englaiul." — Atbeua^Dm. 
 
 Fredrika Bremer's Life, Letters, and Poslhiimous AVnrks. 
 Kdited by her sister, Charlotte Bremer; translated from the Swedish 
 by Fred. Milow. Post 8vo. cloth. lOs. 6d. 
 
 The Rise and Fall of the Emperor Maximilian: an Authentic 
 History of the Mexican Kmpire, 1S61-7. Topether with the Imperial 
 Correspondence. With Portrait, 8vo. price 10s. 6d. 
 
 Madame Recamier, Memoirs and Correspondence of. Trans- 
 lated from the French and edited by J. M. Luyster. With Portrait. 
 Crown »vo. 7*. 6rf. 
 
 Plutarch's Lives. An entirely new Library Edition, carefully 
 revised and corrected, with some Original Translations by the Kditor. 
 Edited by A. U. Clongh, Ksq. sometime Fellow of Uriel College, Oxford, 
 and late Professor of English Language and Literature at University 
 College. 6 vols. 8vo. cloth. 21. lOs. 
 
 Soc-ial Life of the Chinese: a Dnguerreotype of Dai))' Life in 
 China. Condensed from the Work of the Rev. J. Doolittle, by the Rev. 
 PaxtoQ Hood. With above 100 Illustrations. Post Svo. price 8s. 6(i. 
 
 The Open Polar Sea : a Narrative of a Voyage of Discovery 
 towards the North Pole. By Ur. Isaac I. Hayes. An entirely new and 
 cheaper edition. With Illustrations. Small post 8vo. 6s. 
 
 The Physical Geography of the Sea and its Meteorology ; or, the 
 
 Economy of the Sea and its Adapt at ions, its Salts, its Waters, its Climates, 
 itii Inhabitants, and whatever there may be of general interest in its Com- 
 mercial U»e»or Industrial Pursuits. Uy Commander M. F. Maury, LL.D 
 New Edition. With Charts. Post 8vo. cloth extra. 
 
 Captain Hall's Life with the Esquimaux. New and cheaper 
 
 Edition, with Coloured Engravings and upwards of 100 Woodcuts. W ith 
 • Map. Price 7». tW. cloth extra. Forming the dieajiest and most popu- 
 lar Edition of a work on Arctic Life and Exploration ever published. 
 
 Christian Heroes in the Army and Navy. By Charles Rogers, 
 LL.O. Author of" Lyra Bntiinnica." Crown 8vo. 3*. tW. 
 
 The Black Country and iis Green liorder Land ; or, Expedi- 
 li'>n» and Expl'irii'iions round Itinningliuni, Wolverhampton, &c. By 
 Elihu llurritt. Second and cheaper edition, [lOst 8vo. (S». 
 
 A Walk from Ixndon to .lolm O'Groats, and from London to 
 the I..and'ii End ond Back With Notes by the Way. By Elihu Bnrritt. 
 Two volt, price «j. each, with lUastrutiuua.
 
 12 Sampson Low and Co.^s 
 
 The Voyage Alone ; a Sail in the " Yawl, Eob Roy." By John 
 M'Gregor. With Illustrations. Price bs. 
 
 Also, uniform, by the same Author, with Maps and rMmerous Illus- 
 trations, price 5s. each. 
 
 A Thousand Miles in the Rob Roy Canoe, on Rivers and Lakes of 
 Europe. Fifth edition. 
 
 The Rob Roy on the Baltic. A Canoe Voyage in Norway, Sweden, &c. 
 
 NEW BOOKS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE. 
 
 ILD Life under the Equator. By Paul Du Chaillu, 
 Author of " Discoveries in Equatorial Africa." With 40 
 Original Illustrations, price 6s. 
 
 31. du Chaillu's name will be a sufficient guarantee for the interest of 
 
 Wild Life under the Equator, uhich he has narrated for young people in 
 
 a very readable volume." — Times. " M. Du Chaillu proves a good writer 
 
 for the young, and he has skilfully utilized his experience for their benefit." 
 
 Economist. " The author possesses an immense advantage over other 
 
 writers of Adventures for boys, and this is secure for a popular run : it 
 is at once light, racy, and ai^rarfiue."— Illustrated Times. 
 
 Also by the same Author, uniform. 
 
 Stories of the Gorilla Country, 36 Illustrations. Price 6s. 
 
 " It would be hard to find a more interesting book for boys than this." — 
 Times. " Young people will obtain from it a very considerable amount 
 of information touching the manners and customs, ways and means of 
 Africans, and of course great amusement in the accounts of the Gorilla. 
 The book is really a meritorious work, and is elegantly got up." — Athenaeum. 
 
 Cast Away in the Cold. An Old Man's Story of a Young Man's 
 Adventures. By the Author of " The Open Polar Sea." With Illus- 
 trations. Small 8vo. cloth extra, price 6s. 
 
 " The result is delightful. A story of adventure of the most telling 
 local colour and detail, the most exciting danger, and ending icith the most 
 natural and effective escape. There is an air of veracity and reality 
 about the tale which Capt. Hayes could scarcely help giving to an Arctic 
 adventure of any kind. There is great vivacity and picturesqucness in 
 the style, trie illustrations are admirable, atid there is a novelty in the 
 ' denouement' tchich greatly enhances the pleasure with ichich we lay the 
 book down. This story of the two Arctic Crusoes will long remain one of 
 the most powerful of children's stories, as it assuredly deserves to be one 
 of the most popular." — Spectator. 
 
 The Silver Skates; a Story of Holland Life. By Mrs. M. A. 
 Dodge. Edited by W. H. Q. Kingston. Illustrated, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. 
 
 The Voyao-e of the Constance ; a tale of the Polar Seas. By 
 Mary Gitlies. With 8 Illustrations by Charles Keene. Fcap. 3s. 6d.
 
 List of Puhllcaiioiis. 13 
 
 Life amon^t the North and South American Indians. By 
 
 George Catlin. And Last Rambles araoiipst the Iijiliiiiis beyoud the 
 Rofky Mountuins and the Andes. With numerous Illustrations by the 
 Author. 2 vols, small post 8vo. bs. each, cloth extra. 
 
 " An admirnble book, full of usrfitl information, u-rnpt up in stories 
 pecuiutrly adiipteit to rouse the imayinatwn and stimulate the curiosity of 
 boys mid girls. To compare a book icith ' Hobinson Crusoe,' and to say 
 
 that it sustains such comparison, is to give it high praise indeed." 
 
 Atbenicum. 
 
 Oiir Salt and Fre.sh Wator Tutors ; a Story of that Good Old 
 Time— Our School Days at the Cape. Edited by \V. H. G. Kingston. 
 With Illustrations, jirice 3«. 6d. 
 
 " One of the best books of t/ie kind that the .reason has given us. This 
 little book is to be commended warmly." — Illastrated Times. 
 
 The Boy's Own Book of Boats. A Description of every Craft 
 that sails upon the waters ; and how to JMuke, Kip, and Sail Model 
 Boats, by W. H. O. Kingston, with numerous Illustrations by £. Weedoo. 
 Second edition, enlarged. Fcup. 8vo. \is. 6d. 
 
 " This weU-uiitten, well-wrought book." — Athenieam. 
 
 Also by the same Author, 
 Ernest Urarebridge ; or. Boy's Own Book of Sports. 3.?. 6rf. 
 The Fire Ships. A Ptory of the Days of Lord Cochrane. 6*. 
 The Cruise of the Frolic. 5.?. 
 Jack Buntliue: the Life of a Sailor Boy. 2s. 
 
 The Autobiography of a Small Boy. By the Author of" School 
 Days at Saxonborst." Fcap. 8vo. cloth, &s. [Nearly ready. 
 
 Also now ready. 
 Alwyn Morton, hia School and his Schoolfellows, bs. 
 Stanton Grange; or, Life at a Tutor's, By the Rev. C, J, Atkinson. 5s. 
 
 Phcnumona and Laws of Ileat : a Volume of Marvels of Science. 
 By .\chille C«zin. Translated and Edited by Elihn Rich. With 
 nameroiu Illnntrations. Fcup. 8vo. price bs. 
 
 Also, uniform, same price. 
 
 Marvels of Optica. By F. .Marion. Edited and Translated by C. W. 
 Quin, With 70 Ulu.strationg. bs. 
 
 Marvel* of Thundrr and Lightning. By De Fonvielle. Edited by Or. 
 i'bipfton. Full of Illustrations, bs. 
 
 Stories of the Great Prairie. From the Novels of J. F. Cooper. 
 IlloMrated. Brice 5<. 
 
 Also, unifiirm, same price, 
 
 8torie« of the Wood», from the Adventures of Leather-Stocking. 
 
 Btorieii of the Sea, from Cooper's Naviil Novels. 
 
 The Voyage of the Constance. By .Mary Gilli.-s. '.is. M. 
 
 The Hwiu Family llobinson, and 8e<|iiel. In 1 vol. :u. 6rf. 
 
 The Story Without an End. Translated by Sarah Austin. 2s. 6>l.
 
 14 Sampson Low and Co.*s 
 
 Under the Waves ; or the Hermit Crab in Society. By Annie 
 E. Ridley. Impl. 16mo. cloth extra, -with coloured illustration Cloth, 
 is. ; gilt edges, is. 6a!. 
 
 Also beautifully Illustrated: — 
 
 Little Bird Red and Little Bird Blue. Coloured, 5s. 
 Snow-Flakes, and what they told the Children. Coloured, 6s. 
 Child's Book of the Sagacity of Animals. 5s. ; or coloured, 7s. 6rf. 
 Child's Picture Fable Book. 5s. ; or coloured, 7s. 6a!. 
 Child's Treasury of Story Books. 5s. ; or coloured, 7s. 6rf. 
 The Nursery Playmate. 200 Pictures. 5s. ; or coloured, 9s. 
 
 Adventures on the Great Huntinnj-Grounds of the World. From 
 the Frence of Victor Meunier. With additional matter, including the 
 Duke of Edinburgh's Elephant Hunt, &c. With 22 Engravings, 
 price 5s. 
 
 " The book for all boys in whom the lore of travel and adventure is 
 strong. The}/ will find here plenty to amuse them and much to instruct 
 them besides." — Times. 
 
 Also, lately published. 
 
 One Thousand Miles in the Rob Roy Canoe. By John Macgregor, M.A. 5s. 
 
 The Rob Roy on the Baltic. By the same Author. 5s. 
 
 Sailing Alone; or, 1,500 Miles Voyage in the Yawl Rob Roy. By the 
 
 same Author. 5s. 
 Golden Hair; aTaleof t'ne Pilgrim Fathers. By Sir Lascelles Wraxall. 5s. 
 Black Panther ; a Boy's Adventures amongst the Red Skins. By the 
 
 same Author. 5s. 
 
 Anecdotes of the Queen and Eoyal Family of England. Collected, 
 arranged, and edited, for the more especial use of Colonial Readers, by 
 J. George Hodgins, LL.B , F.R.G.S., Deputy-Superintendent of Educa- 
 tion for the Province of Ontario. With Illustrations. Price 5s. 
 
 Geo]^aphy for my Children. By Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe. 
 Author of " Uncle Tom's Cabin," &c. Arranged and Edited by an Eng- 
 lish Lady, under the Direction of the Authoress. With upwards of Fifty 
 Illusti'ations. Cloth extra, 4s. 6rf. 
 
 Child's Play. Illustrated with Sixteen Coloured Drawings by 
 
 E. V. B., printed in fac-simile by W. Dickes' process, and ornamented 
 with Initial Letters. Kew edition, with India paper tints, royal 8vo. 
 cloth extra, bevelled cloth, 7s. 6c(. The Original Edition of this work 
 was published at One Guinea. 
 
 Little Gerty ; or, the First Prayer, selected and abridged from 
 " The Lamplighter." By a Lady. Price 6d. Particularly adapted 
 for a Sunday School Gift Book. 
 
 Great Fun and More Fun for our Little Friends. By Harriet 
 Myrtle. With Edward Wehnert's Pictures. 2 vols, each 5s.
 
 List of PuhUcations. 15 
 
 BELLES LETTRES, FICTION, &c. 
 HE LOG OF MV LEISURE HOURS: a Story of 
 
 Real Life. By an Old i^ailor. 3 vols, post 8vo. 24s. 
 
 " If people do not rend ' The Log ' it uill have failed ns 
 regards them ; but tt is a success m eveiy sense of the xtord as 
 regards its author. It deserves to succeed." — Moruing Post. 
 
 David Gray ; and other Essays, chiefly oa Poetry. By Robert 
 Bacbauan. In one vol. fcap. 8to. price 6s. 
 
 The Book of the Sonnet; being Selections, with an Essay on 
 Sonnets and Souuetoers. By the late Leigh Hunt. Edited. I'rom the 
 original MS. with Additions, by S. Adams Lee. 2 vols, price 18ji. 
 
 " Htading a book of this sort should make us feel proud of our language 
 and of our ttt'Vature, aiui vroud also of t hut cultivated common nature 
 urhich can rame so many nolle thoughts and images out of this hunt, sullen 
 world into a thuu.ianJ enduring forms of beauty. The ' Hook of the Son- 
 net ' should be a classic, ami the professor as icell as the student of English 
 IL'UI find it a work of deep uitcrat and completeness." — Loudon Keview. 
 
 Lyra Sacra Americana: Gems of American Poetry, selecttd 
 with Notes and Uiugruphical Skett-has by C. U. Cleveland, U.O., Author 
 of the " Milton Concordance." Ismo., cloth, gilt edges. Price is. 6d. 
 
 Poems uf the Inner Life. Selected chiefly from modern Authors, 
 by permission. Small post ijvo. 6.f. ; gilt edges, 6s. 6d. 
 
 English and Scotch Ballads, &c. An extensive Colleclion. 
 with Notices of the kindred Ballads of other Nations. Edited by h\ J. 
 Child. 8 vols. fcap. cloth, 3s. tx/ each 
 
 The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table. By Oliver Windell 
 Holmes, LL.D Popalar Edition, Is. lilastruted Edition, choicely 
 printed, cloth extra, 6s. 
 
 The Professor at the Brcnkfa.st Table. By Oliver Wendell Holmes, 
 Author of "The -\ut'jcrat of the Breakfust-Table." Cheap Edition, 
 fcap. 3s. Hd. 
 
 Bee-kteiiin;;. By " The Times " Bee-master. Small post 8vo. 
 numerous illustrations, rlotli, 5s. 
 
 " Ourfrunulthf lire-tiuister htuthehnack nf erposition, and knows hoio 
 to ttU a ftory well ; over and above which, he t •Us a story so t/uil thousands 
 am take a practical, aiuI nut merely a speculative interest m it." — Times. 
 
 Queer Little People. By the Author of " Uncle Tom's Cabin." 
 
 Flap. Is. Also by the mine Author. 
 
 The Little Foxei (hat Hpuil the lirapes. Is. 
 
 TlouMT and llurae I'upiTK, |i. 
 
 The I'l-url ol <)rr'» Ii.l.iiid, llliistrateil by Gilbert, 5s. 
 
 The Miuitter's Wooing. lUuslralvd by I'biz, 5s.
 
 16 Sampson Loiv and CoJs List of Publications. 
 
 The Story of Four Little Women : Meg, Joe, Beth, and Am}'. 
 By Louisa M. Alcott. With Illustrations. 16mo, cloth 3s. (kl. 
 
 " A bright, cheerful, healthy story — icith a tinge of thoughtful gravity 
 about it which reminds one of John Hunyan. Meg going to Vanity Fair 
 is a chapter icritten with great cleverness and a pleasant humour."— 
 Guardian. 
 
 Also, Entertaining Stories for Young Ladies, Zs. dd. each, cloth, gilt edges. 
 
 Helen Felton's Question : a Book for Girls. By Agnes Wylde. 
 
 Faith Gartney's Girlhood. By Mrs. D. T. Whitney. Seventh thousand. 
 
 The Gayworthys. By the same Author. 'Ihird Edition. 
 
 A Summer in Leslie Goldthwaite's Life. By the same Author. 
 
 The Masque at Ludlow. By the Author of " Mary Powell." 
 
 Miss Biddy Frobisher: a Salt Water Story. By the same Author. 
 
 Selvaggio; a Story of Italy. By the same Author. New Edition. 
 
 The Journal of a Waiting Gentlewoman. By a new Author. New Edition 
 
 The Shady Side and the Sunny Side. Two Tales of New England. 
 
 Marian ; or, the Light of Some One's Home. By Maud Jeanne 
 Fi'anc. Small post 8vo., 5s. 
 
 Also, by the .■same Author. 
 Emily's Choice : an Australian Tale. 5s. 
 Vermont Vale : or, Home Pictures in Australia. 5s. 
 
 Tauchnitz's English Editions of German Authors. Each volume 
 cloth flexible, 2s. ; or sewed, Is. 6rf. The following are now ready : — 
 
 1. On the Heights. By B. Auerbach. 3 vols. 
 
 2. In the Year '13. By Fritz Reuter. 1 vol. 
 
 3. Faust. By Goethe. 1 vol. 
 
 4. Undine, and other Tales. By Fouque. 1 vol. 
 5 L'Arrabiata. By Paul Heyse. 1 vol. 
 
 6. The Princess, and other Tales. By Heinrieh Zschokke. 1 vol. 
 
 7. Lessing's Nathan the Wise. 
 
 8. Hacklander's Behind the Counter, translated by Mary Howitt. 
 
 Low's Copyright Cheap Editions of American Authors. A 
 
 thoroughly good and cheap series of editions, which, whilst combining 
 every advantage that can be secured by the best workmanship at the 
 lowest possible rate, will possess an additional claim on the reading 
 public by providing for the remuneration of the American author and 
 the legal protection of the English publisher. Ready : — 
 
 1. Haunted Hearts. By the Author of " The Lamplighter." 
 
 2. The Guardian Angel. By " The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table." 
 
 3. The Minister's Wooing. By the Author of " Uncle Tom's Cabin." 
 
 To be followed by a New Volume on the first of every alternate month. 
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