and these being dissipated by age the species put forth themselves by little and little as Characters engraven on wood or stone cover'd over with wax appear proportionably as it melts off And therefore he term'd all our knowledge a remembrance but although he err'd herein yet reason'd better then Aristotle who admitted the Metempsychosis but deny'd the Reminiscence both which are necessary consequents one of the other The Second said That the operations of the Intellect are so divine that not being able to believe the same could proceed from it self it refers them to superiors For it invents disposes meditates examines and considers the least differences it compounds and divides every thing apprehends simple termes conjoynes the subject and the attribute affirms denyes suspends its judgements and alone of all the Faculties reflects upon it self yea by an action wholly divine produces a word For as in speaking a word is produc'd by the mouth so in understanding is form'd the word of the Mind Yet with this difference that the former is a corporeal patible quality imprinted in the Air and not the latter for intellection is an immanent operation Hence some have thought that all these divine actions were perform'd by God himself whom they affirm'd to be that Agent Intellect which irradiating the phantasmes produces out of them the intelligible species which it presents to our Intellect Others ascrib'd them to an Assisting Intelligence Some to a particular genius But as I deny not that in supernatural cognitions God gives Faith Hope and Charity and other supernatural gifts in which case God may be said to be an Agent Intellect I conceive also that in natural and ordinary knowledge of which alone we speak now no concourse of God other then universal is to be imagin'd whereby he preserves natural causes in their being and do's not desert them in their actions ' This then the Understanding it self which performes what ever it thinks surpasses its strength which it knows not sufficiently and the Agent and Patient Intellect are but one being distinguish'd onely by reason As it formes that species 't is call'd Agent as it keeps and preserves them Patient For as the Light causes colours to be actually visible by illuminating them together with the Air with their medium so the Agent Intellect renders all things capable of being known by illustrating the phantasmes separating them from the grosness of the matter whereof they have some what when they are in the Imagination and forming intelligible species of them Otherwise if these phantasmes remain'd still in their materiality the Understanding being spiritual could know nothing since that which is sensible and material remaining such cannot act upon what is spiritual and immaterial Besides the species of the Phancy representing to us onely the accidents of things it was requisite that the Intellect by its active virtue subliming and elevating those species to a more noble degree of being should make them representative species of their own essence Which it doth by abstraction of the individual properties of their subject from which it formes universal conceptions which action is proper to the Intellect This supreme Faculty being so noble that it ennobles all beings rendring them like to it self The Third said That the Intellect is to the Soul such as the Soul is to the body which it perfectionates And as it knows all corporeal things by the senses so it knows incorporeal by it self This Faculty serves for a medium and link uniting all things to their first cause and 't is Homer's golden chain or Jacob's ladder which reaches from Earth to Heaven by which the Angels that is the species and most spiritual notions ascend to the heaven of man which is his brain to inform him and cause the spirits to descend from thence to reduce into practice the excellent inventions of the Understanding Now as Reason discriminates men from brutes so doth this Intellect men amongst themselves And if we believe Trismegistus in his Pimander God has given to all men ratiocination but not Understanding which he proposes for a reward to his favourites Aristotle saith 't is the knowledge of indemonstrable principles and immaterial forms Plato calls it Truth Philo the Jew the chief part and torch of the Soul the Master of the little world as God is of the great both the one and the other being diffus'd through the whole without being mix'd or comprehended in any part of it The fourth said That the humane is a substance wholly divine and immortal since it hath no principle of corruption in it self being most simple and having no contrary out of it self Eternal since 't is not in time but above time Infinite since its nature is no-wise limited and is every thing that it understands changing it self thereinto not by a substantial mutation but as the First Matter is united with the formes remaining alwayes the same Matter the wax remaining entire receives all sort of figures So the intellect is not really turn'd into the things which it understands but only receives their species wherewith it is united so closely that it is therefore said to be like to them As likewise though it be call'd Patient when it receives them 't is not to be inferr'd that it is material since these species are material and acting upon the Intellect alter it not but perfectionate it Moreover it hath this peculiarity that the more excellent these species are the more perfect it is render'd whence after the highest things it can as easily comprehend the less An assured token of its incorruptibility and difference from the senses which are destroy'd by the excellence of their objects But as the soul being freed from the body hath nothing to do with sensitive knowledg because then it ratiocinates no more but beholds effects in their proper causes commanding and obeying it self most perfectly exempted from the importunity of the sensitive appetite so while it is entangled in the body it receives some impressions resulting from the parts humours and spirits destinated to its service being in some sort render'd like to them So the soul of one born blind is ignorant of colours the cholerick are subject to frowardness and the melancholy timerous by reason of the blackness of that humour The Fifth said All actions of men depending on the temper those of the Understanding so long as it is entangled in the bonds of the body are not free from it For as that of Plants gives them the qualities proper to attract concoct and convert their aliments and generate their like and beasts having a temper sutable to their nature are lead as soon as they come into the world to what is convenient for them without instruction So men are lead of their own accord to divers things according as their souls meet dispositions proper to certain actions yea they are learned without ever having learn'd any thing as appears in many phrantick and distracted persons amongst whom some although ignorant
out of which the Agents which destroy the formes opposite to their own may draw forth those which they will produce which is the term of their Action Otherwise Things must become nothing to pass from one being to another which would presuppose Creation and destroy those Two Maximes That a Thing cannot be reduc'd into Nothing and Of Nothing is not made something It is defin'd An Imperfect and Incomplete Substance the First Subject of Natural Things which are compos'd of it as an Internal and Essential part not by accident It s quality is to be a pure Passive Power which is nothing distinct from it self but is taken for a Thing begun and not perfected yet design'd to be finished by the Supervening of the Form and the interposing of Agents who by their activities drawing the Form out of the bosome of it perfect and accomplish it It serves for two purposes First To give durance and Consistence to all Things which last so much the longer as their Matter is less compounded That is to say less alienated from its naked and pure Nature of First Matter As it appears in the Heavens and the Elements which I conceive are not changed one into another In the Second place it serves Agents for to act and Patients to resist Whence it comes to pass that the more compact and close their Matter is the more powerfully they resist As appears in a hot Iron which burnes more then common flame in Water which moistens more then aire though it be less humid and in Steel which resists more then Lead The Fourth said That to know what this First Matter is it behoveth to proceed thereunto by the way of the Senses and then examine whether Reason can correct what they have dictated to us Now our Senses tell us that most part of mixt Bodies are resolved into Salt Sulphur and Mercury And the Chymists affirm that these Three Bodies cannot be reduced into any other Matter by any Artifice But Reason correcting Sense teacheth us that though these Three Bodies are Chymical Sensible Principles yet they are not First Principles nor the true First Matter for that all Bodies are not made of them as 't is seen in the Coelestial and they may yet be reduc'd into another Matter viz. into the Elements For in Sulphur there is Fire seeing it is inflamable And it hath also some Aqueous or Terrestrial Substance which makes visible that Fire Likewise there is Fire in Salt seeing it is tart and biting and according to the Chymists the subject of natural heat There is Water too for it melteth and it extinguisheth Fire There is also Earth in it for it is dry fixt compact and weighty Wherefore Reason leading us as far as the Elements it remaineth to consider whether we must stop there or go yet further to find out a Matter into which these are reduc'd But not finding any I conceive they must be the First Matter The Fifth reply'd That the Elements being complete Substances and consequently compounded of Matter and Form we must not stop there but go further in search of that first and ultimate subject of all Natural Mutations it being inconsistent that a Compound of Matter and Form should be but one of those Two The sixth held That Water is the First Matter if not the Elementary at least the Aethereal Water which was for that purpose created first The Holy Scripture witnessing that In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth Where the Hebrew word that is render'd Heaven signifie The Waters and 't is added That the Spirit of God moved upon the Waters Moreover our Life consisteth solely in Humidity which failing Death ensueth The Seventh said That the First Matter being a Thing most imperfect and least active such as the Earth is too she ought rather to bear that Name then any of the Elements To shew further that the Elements are the First Matter it was alledg'd that they are not transmuted one into another but are ingenerable and incorruptible that consequently in every kind of Generation or Corruption there is not made any Substantial Mutation but only an Vnion or Separation of the Elements And therefore it is not needful to recur to another First Matter that may be Permanent under all Mutations since Entities are not to be multiply'd without necessity For as to the former They are not transmuted one into another because before the Transmutation or Substantial Generation of a Thing Alteration is requisite that is the Introduction of Quality and Dispositions sutable to the Form which is to be produc'd For Example before Fire be turn'd into Water Air or Earth it must first receive Cold Moisture and Gravity which are the Qualities sutable to those Formes which it is to receive but this is impossible For Fire while it is Fire cannot be Cold Moist and Heavy As for the Second viz. That the Elements are ingenerable and incorruptible he shew'd it by this other Example From Wood that burnes proceed the Four Elements or Four different Natures correspondent to them viz. Flame Smoke Liquor and Ashes but they were in it before because they could not be produc'd out of Nothing And in the Conflagration of this Wood there is onely the Fire that Acts which being Hot Light and Dry cannot produce such Things as are contrary to it self Here Experience was alledg'd against him which evidenceth that Water upon the Fire is turn'd into Vapour and then into Air that Air is turnd into Fire and so of the other Elements But he reply'd That the Water is not turn'd into Vapour or into Air but the Fire insinuating and joyning it self with the Water frames that Vapour composed Actually of Water and Fire Whence when you put a Cover upon a Dish of hot Viands the Particles of Fire which are in those Vapours being subtle pass through the Pores of the Cover and sever themselves from those of the Water which being unable to pass through too by reason of their grosness they adhere to the upper part of it In like manner said he when the Air seemes set on fire 't is not chang'd or turn'd into Fire but onely the Particles of Fire which were dispers'd here and there in the Air become collected and united together And when the Fire disappears it proceeds from its Particles being diffus'd amongst the other Particles of Air Water and Earth The Last strengthned this Opinion saying That the pure Elements have the same Proprieties that are attributed to the First Matter and amongst the rest fall not under the perception of Sense Yea that 't is as hard to see a pure Element as to see the First Matter For the Elementary Fire ex gr cannot be expos'd to the Air nor the Air to the Water nor the Water to the Earth and much less those which are contrary to one another without being alter'd by their mutual contract that is to say without losing their Nature of Element which moreover cannot be
else but an execess of heat which is a meer Accident as well in its little degrees as in its excesses More and less making no change in the species Our Fire then is an excessive heat which adheres to Things that have some crass and oleaginous humour in them and continues there by a continual efflux and successive Generation without any permanence like the Water of a River which Heat lasts so long till that humour be consumed If it be said that it ascends upwards seeking its own place I answer that 't is the Exhalation that carries it up yea that it descends too as we see in a Candle blown out and still smoaking if it be held beneath another burning one the flame descendeth along the smoak and lighteth it again So that the Fire is indifferent of it self where it goes for it lets it self be govern'd and carry'd by the Exhalation And it appears further That Fire is less subtile then Air for flame is not transparent and it engendreth soot which is very gross The Third added That indeed Fire cannot be a Substance because it hath a Contrary viz. The Water Besides every Substantial Form preserves its own Matter and acts not against it but Fire destroyes its own Moreover a certain degree of some Quality is never necessary to a Substantial Form as the Earth ceaseth not to be Earth though it be less cold or dry and so of the rest But Fire cannot be Fire unless the supreme degree of heat be in it Add hereunto that Fire may be produc'd in a Substance without corrupting it as we see in a Flint or a burning Bullet Now a Substantial Form is not produc'd in a Subject till the preceding be destroy'd the Generation of the one being the corruption of the other Lastly Every substance produceth by way of Generation an indivisible substantial Form But Fire produceth a divisible Quality For that which was cold becometh first warm then hot and by degrees becometh Fire which cannot be with a mixture of cold non consist therewith unless as degrees of qualities The Fourth said That Fire is a most perfect Element hot and dry according to Aristotle of the most perfect form and activity of all the Elements according to Plato the principal instrument of Nature according to Empedocles the Father of Things Whence it was that the Assyrians ador'd it The Persians carry'd it out of Honour before their Kings and at the head of their Armies The Romans made so great account of it that they assign'd it to the care of certain Virgins to be kept immortal Pythagoras believ'd it to be an Animal because it is nourish'd as Animals and for want of Aliment dyes And because a lighted Torch being cast into the Water the Fire extinguishing sendeth forth such a noyse as Animals do at the gasps of Death But he esteemed its natural place to be the Centre of the Subterranean World Whence it is said he that we see so many Volcanoes and other Fires issue out of the entrals of the Earth as those of Monte Vesuvio in the Kingdom of Naples Monte Gibello formerly Aetna in Sicily and Monte Hecla in Iseland and so many other burning Mountains The Fifth said That as the Sea is the Principle from whence all the Waters come and the end whether they return So the Sun is the Element of Fire from whence all other Fires come and whether at length they reascend as to their Source 1. For that all Effects Qualities and Properties of Fire agree particularly to the Sun seeing he heats burnes dryes and is the cause of all the Generations that are made here below 2. Because the Elements stay in their natural places Now the Fire not onely ascendeth from the Subterraneous places where it is detain'd by reason of a sulphureous and bituminous Matter which serves it for food but it passeth also beyond the Heavens of the Moon Mercury and Venus as appears by Comets which are igneous and particularly by that which appear'd in the year 1618. acknowledg'd by all the Astronomers upon the reasons of Opticks to have been above the said places The Sixth denyed That the Sun can be the Element of Fire 1. Because 't is a Coelestial and Incorruptible Body and by consequence not Igneous or Elementary 2. If all Fires come from the Sun it will follow that all his rayes are Igneous Bodies for there cannot be imagin'd other Fires to come from the Sun hither but his beams Now the Sun-beams are neither Bodies nor Igneous Not Bodies since Illumination and Eradiation being made in an instant it will follow that a Body cometh from Heaven to Earth in a Moment Which is absurd because No Motion is made in an instant Besides being those Rayes penetrate Glass and such other solid and diaphanous Bodies there would be a penetration of Dimensions which is impossible Nor are they Igneous seeing Fire being of its own nature light descendeth not but the beams of the Sun descend down hither Moreover Fire is actually hot but the Sun-beams are onely so in power viz. when they are reflected by an opake body as appears in the Middle Region of the Air where it is colder then upon the Earth though its beams are nearer Wherefore it is more reasonable to hold to the common opinion which placeth the Fire immediately under the Heaven of the Moon For there is no fear that that Fire how great soever can burn the World it s hear being allay'd and dull'd by the extreme humidity of the Air its Neighbour and by the great coldness of the same Air which is in the Middle Region and counter-checketh that heat which on one side hath already lost its violence and acrimony by its natural Rarity Nor is there any trouble to be taken for its nourishment for being in its own Centre and Empire it hath no enemies nor contraries and needeth no food for its support as our common Fire doth What if we behold it not 'T is not because there is none but because it is so rare and so pure that it cannot fall within the perception of our Senses As there is such a thing as Air though we see it not How many Colours Odours Sapours and Sounds are there which we never knew And as for what is observ'd in a Candle newly put out it is clear that the Fire descendeth not to it but inflameth the unctuous Matter which it toucheth and this the next even to the Candle from whence that Matter proceedeth II Of the Vniversal Spirit Upon the Second Point it was said That it must First be known what is meant by Universal Spirit 2. Whether there be one 3. What it is As for the First By the word Universal Spirit is understood some universal cause and principle of all the actions and motions which are made in Generation Just as they assign one same First Matter for the Subject of all Formes so they speak of an Vniversal Form which containes all the rest in
it self and causes them to act and move in the Matter rightly dispos'd As for the Second Like as they argue that the world is finite round and corruptible because its parts are so So also it may be said that the world hath a Spirit which enlivens it since all its principal parts have a particular one for their Conservation Action and Motion the parts being of the same Nature with the whole This Universal Spirit is prov'd by the impotency of the Matter which of it self having no activity or principle of Life and Motion needeth some other to animate and quicken it Now particular Forms cannot do that for then they would be principles of that Virtue that is to say principles of themselves which is impossible Wherefore there must be some Superiour Form which is the Universal Spirit the principle of Action and Motion the Uniter of the Matter and the Form the Life of all Nature and the Universal Soul of the World Whence it may confidently be affirm'd that the World is animated but with what Soul or Spirit is the difficulty For if we prove by Local Motion or by that of Generation that a Plant or Animal are animated why may we not say the same of all the World since its more noble and principal parts afford evidence thereof As for the Heaven and the Stars they are in continual Motion which the more â—ober Opinion at this day confesseth to produce from their Internal Form rather then from the Intelligences which some would have fastned to the Spheres as a Potter to his wheel The Sun besides his own Motion which some call in controversie gives Life to all things by his heat and influences The Air Water and Earth afford also instances of this Life in the production and nourishing of Plants and Animals Thus the principal parts being animated this sufficeth for the Denomination of the whole seeing even in Man there are found some parts not animated as the Hair and the Nails As for the Last Point which is to know what this Universal Soul is there are many Opinions The Rabbins and Cabalists say that it is the RVAH ELOHIM that is the Spirit of God which moved upon Waters Trismegistus saith that it is a Corporeal Spirit or a Spiritual Body and elsewhere calleth it the Blessed GreenWood or the Green Lyon which causeth all things to grow Plato affirmeth it to be the Ideas The Peripateticks a certain Quintessence above the Four Elements Heraclitus and after him the Chymists that it is a certain Aethereal Fire For my part I conceive that if by this Spirit they mean a thing which gives Life and Spirit and Motion to all which is found every where and on which all depends there is no doubt but 't is the Spirit of God or rather God himself in whom and through whom we live and move But if we will seek another in created Nature we must not seek it elsewhere then in that corporeal creature which hath most resemblance with the Deity The Sun who more lively represents the same then any other by his Light Heat Figure and Power And therefore the Sun is that Spirit of the World which causeth to move and act here below all that hath Life and Motion The Second said That that Soul is a certain common Form diffus'd through all things which are moved by it as the wind of the Bellows maketh the Organs to play applying them to that whereunto they are proper and according to their natural condition So this Spirit with the Matter of Fire maketh Fire with that of Air maketh Air and so of the rest Some give it the name of Love for that it serves as a link or tye between all Bodies into which it insinuates it self with incredible Subtility which Opinion will not be rejected by the Poets and the Amorous who attribute so great power to it The Third said That the Soul being the First Act of an Organical Body and the word Life being taken onely for Vegetation Sensation and Ratiocination the world cannot be animated since the Heavens the Elements and the greatest part of Mixed Bodies want such a Soul and such Life That the Stoicks never attributed a Soul to this world but onely a Body which by reason of its Subtility is called Spirit and for that it is expanded through all the parts of the world is termed Vniversal which is the cause of all Motions and is the same thing with what the Ancients call'd Nature which they defined the Principle of Motion The reason of the Stoicks for this Universal Spirit is drawn from the Rarefaction and Condensation of Bodies For if Rarefaction be made by the insinuation of an other subtile Body and Condensation by its pressing out it follows that since all the Elements and mixt Bodies are rarifi'd and condens'd there is some Body more subtile then those Elements and mixts which insinuating it self into the parts rarifies them and makes them take up greater space and going forth is the Cause that they close together and take up less Now Rarefaction is alwayes made by the entrance of a more subtile Body and Condensation by its going out This is seen in a very thick Vessel of Iron or Brass which being fill'd with hot Water or heated Air and being well stop'd if you set it into the cold it will condense what is contain'd therein which by that means must fill less space then before Now either there must be a Vacuum in the Vessel which Nature abhorreth or some subtile Body must enter into it which comes out of the Air or the Water which fills that space Which Body also must be more subtile then the Elements which cannot penetrate through the thickness of the Vessel There is also seen an Instance of this in the Sun-beams which penetrate the most solid Bodies if they be never so little diaphanous which yet are impenetrable by any Element how subtile soever And because a great part of the Hour design'd for Inventions was found to have slip'd away during the Reciprocation of other reasons brought for and against this opinion some curiosities were onely mention'd and the examination of them referr'd to the next Conference In which it was determin'd first to treat of the Air and then to debate that Question Whether it is expedient in a State to have Slaves CONFERENCE VII I. Of the Air. II. Whether it be best for a State to have Slaves I. Of the Air. THe First said That he thought fit to step aside a little out of the ordinary way not so much to impugne the Maximes of the School as to clear them and that for this end he propros'd That the Air is not distinguish'd from the Water because they are chang'd one into the other For what else are those Vapours which are drawn up from the Water by the power of the Sun and those which arise in an Alembic or from boyling Water if we do not call them Air Now those Vapours are
the campaigne War is the fair where wares are had best cheap and in sack'd Cities commodities are taken without weighing and Stuffs are not measur'd but with the Pike instead of the Ell if any complain there needs no more but to imitate Brennus's treating with the Romans besiedg'd in the Capitol cast the sword into the balance it will carry it Wherefore being Master of all Arts it is more necessary then they For he that is strongest finds sufficient of every thing The Seventh said As amongst the Arts some have others subservient to them as the Ephippians to the Military Art Chyrurgery Pharmacy the Gymnastick and all that relate to Health to Medicine or Physick Carpentry Masonry and others employ'd about building to Architecture and these Master Arts are call'd Architectonical So there is one above all these which is Policy the Eye and Soul of the State which governs all Arts gives them their rewards and punishes their defects sets what price it pleases upon things affords convenient place for the merit of every one sends Armies into the field and calls them back according to the necessity of affairs hath care of Piety and Justice establishes Magistracy appoints quarters to Souldiers and gives free exercise to all other Arts. All which considerations and accounts argue it the most necessary of all CONFERENCE LXXIII I. Of the Earthquake II. Of Envy I. Of the Earthquake IRregular motions are as strange as regular are agreeable especially those of bodies destinated to rest as the Earth is being the immoveable centre about which the whole fabrick of the world is turn'd For though the whole Heaven cannot rest any more then the whole Earth move yet the parts of them may the Scripture informing us that Joshuah made the Sun stand still that he might have time to pursue the Amorites and every Age having experiences of Earthquakes To which Aristotle ascribes the appearing of a new Island in the Pontick Sea call'd Heraclia and of another call'd Sacrea Many Geographers affirm that the Islands of Rhodes and Delos were produc'd by the like cause and that Sicily sometimes joyn'd to Italy was separated from it by an Earthquake whence the place of separation is still call'd by the Greek word Rhegium which signifies separation and fracture Pliny affirms that the Island of Cyprus was by this means divided from Syria and Euboea from Boeotia Histories tell of some Mountains that have clash'd together contrary to the Proverb which saith that they never meet of Towns transported to some distance from their first situation as hapned by an Earthquake in Syria in the ninth year of Constantinus Copronomus of others swallowed up as sometimes the greatest part of the City of Sparta upon which at the same time fell a part of Mount Taygetus which completed its ruine twenty thousand inhabitants of which City were also overwhelm'd by an other Earthquake by the relation of Diodorus about the 78. Olympiade Josephus reports that thirty thousand Jews were swallow'd up by another And Justin that when Tigranes King of Armenia became Master of Syria there hapned so dreadful an Earthquake that a hundred and thirty thousand Syrians perish'd by it Four hundred years agoe twelve thousand houses were shaken down at Lisbon Italy was much endamag'd in the year 1116 by one which lasted forty dayes principally Tuscany Puglia the Territory of Venice and Campagnia where twelve Cities perish'd and that of Pompey was swallow'd up in Winter which season neverthelesse is accounted free from it Four years agoe the City of Naples was horribly shaken especially the borders of Mount Visuvius The common opinion refers these effects to a dry Exhalation which makes the same concussion in the belly of the Earth as in that of a cloud shattering many times both the one and the other when it cannot otherwise get free from its confinement how hard or dense soever the bodies be that inclose it The Second said That the causes of Earthquakes are either Divine or Astrological or Physical The first have no other foundation but the Will of God who thereby oftentimes manifests to Men his justice and power and sometimes contrary to the course of ordinary and natural causes Such was that at the death of our Saviour in the 18th year of Tiberius which was universal and wherewith twelve Cities of Asia perish'd and that mention'd by Sigonius hapning in the year 343. under Constantine the Arrian Emperor whereby the City of Neocaesaria was wholly swallow'd up except the Catholick Church and its Bishop The Astrological causes are if we may credit the professors of this Art the malignant influences of Jupiter and Mars in the Houses of Taurus Virgo and Capricorn But as the first are too general so these are very uncertain being built for the most part upon false principles as also those which suppose the Earth a great Animal whose tremors are made in the same manner as those which befall other Animals Wherefore holding to the most perceptible causes I conceive with Democritus that torrents of rain coming to fill the concavities of the Earth by their impetuousnesse drive out the other waters and that upon their motion and swaying from one side to another the Earth also reels this way and by and by the other or rather that these Torrents drive out the winds impetuously as Air issues out of a bottle when it is filling which wind repells and agitates the Earth till it find some issue whence also come the sounds and lowings which accompany Earthquakes As is seen in Hydraulick instruments which by arificial mixing Air and Water when they are impell'd into pipes fit to receive the same excite sounds like those emitted by the wind-pipe of Animals agitated with the wind of their lungs and moistned with the salivous liquor or natural water The Third said That he could not be of their mind who because water is found by digging to a good depth in the Earth therefore interpret that place literally where 't is said That God hath founded the Earth upon the Water upon which it floats and that according to their agitation the Earth is like a Ship which fluctuates in a tempestuous Sea and lyes even and still in a calm since if this were so then the whole Earth should tremble at the same time which is contrary to experience The opinion of Anaximenes is more probable that as part of the Earth upon a droughth after a wet season cleaves and crackles so the same happens to Regions and whole Countries The Fourth said That if this opinion were true then they would begin increase diminish and cease by degrees nor would they last long Yet 't is observ'd some have continu'd forty days yea six moneths as that of Constantinople under Theodosius the younger and miraculously ceas'd upon the first singing of those words by all the people Sanctus Sanctus c. Aristotle also makes mention of some that lasted two years the cause whereof depends either upon the quality or
the soul corporeal there would be a penetration of dimensions in its union with the body consequently 't is no Element nor any Compound of them as Empedocles and Plato phanci'd upon this ground that the soul being to judge of all things should therefore have all their principles and elements in it self Which is absurd for it knows divers things not compos'd of the Elements as the Angels and Heavens So that the soul must be concluded in the number of those things which 't is easier to affirm what they are not then what they are The Fifth said That the soul is a fire whose centre is Heaven and God the source who is call'd by the name of fire in the Holy Text. Hence life an effect of the soul is nothing else but heat and death cold Moreover as fire makes bodies lighter so living bodies are less heavy then dead And the Hebrews call man Isch from the word Esch fire as the Greeks do Phôs which signifies light which is a species of fire lucid but not ardent which light appears upon bodies whilst living and dis-aspears as soon as they are dead Now the different sorts of souls are produc'd of different lights Those of Plants are form'd of that of the air whence they have no sensible heat as the sensitive have which are generated of the Sun which also gives them local motion rational souls are beams diffus'd from God who inhabits light inaccessible And as waters ascend as high as their springs so the souls of Plants exalt themselves into the air whose mutations they follow those of Beasts return into the Sun and those of men are reflected towards God having this common with light that they perish not but return to the place of their nativity Agreeably whereunto Solomon saith That there is nothing new under the Sun since even the forms of things are not new but only appear in their turn one after another as when light forsakes our Hemisphere it no more perishes then shadow but they both make a continual circle which follows that of the Sun II. Of the Apparition of Spirits Upon the second Point it was said That the perfection of the Universe requires the existence of Intellectual Creatures such as Angels and Rational Souls A truth acknowledg'd by Aristotle who assigns nine Spirits subservient to the First Mover according to the number of heavens which they are to move although Mercurius Trismegistus acknowledges but two which hold the Arctick and Antarctick Poles Which Avicenna also denoted by his Chain of Intelligences Amongst these Spirits some are destinated for the preservation of men as Guardian Angels call'd by the Apostle ministring Spirits which were the Genii of the ancients by which they made their greatest Oathes Others have continual war with mankind as the Devils Others animate bodies as Rational Souls which after the bodies dissolution are happy or miserable according as they have done good or evil As for Angels and Demons History both sacred and prophane testifies their frequent apparition to men Daily experience proves the same of the souls of the dead though some question it But besides that 't is presumption to dis-believe all antiquity which tells us of a Ghost which spoke to Brutus one which shew'd a Sceleton in chains to Athenodorus the Philosopher and that of Cleonice which tormented Pausanias who had slain her as long as he liv'd as also the Ghost of Agrippina did her son Nero. The authority of Holy Scripture instructs us of the return of Samuel Moses and Elias and the same reason which makes the soul loath to part from its body argues it desirous to visit the same or the places and persons wherewith it was most delighted Nor is it more difficult to conceive how a separated soul can move it self then how it moves the body which it animates the one and the other being equally incomprehensible The Second said Spectres exist not saving in the Phancy those who think they see them conceding that they are not palpable nor beheld alike of all by standers and men being prone to acquiesce in their own imaginations though misguided by the passions of fear hope love desire especially children and women who are more susceptible of all impressions because their phancies are so weak as to be no less mov'd with its own fictions then real external representations by the Senses But strong minds are not subject to such delusions The Third said He is too sensual who believes nought but what he sees for according to this account nothing but accidents which alone fall under the cognizance of sense should be admitted So the Saduces and all Libertines deny spirits whilst they appeal only to Sense Although it be an universal Doctrine of all sober antiquity that there are spirits and that they appear oftentimes to men in cases of necessity wherewith according to Aristotle himself the souls of the dead friends are affected a manifest argument of the soul's immortality which he believ'd only by the light of nature As Apuleius reports the Platonists make three sorts of Spirits First Demons or Genii which are souls whilst they animate bodies Second Lares or Penates the souls of such as had liv'd well and after death were accounted tutelary gods of the houses which they had inhabited Third Lemures or Hobgoblins the souls of the wicked given to do mischief or folly after death as they did during their life Some others especially the Poets conceiv'd man compos'd of three parts Body Soul and Shadow which latter appeared after dissolution of the two former the body returning into its elements and the soul going either to Heaven or Hell as the shadow did into the Elysian fields from whence it had no liberty to return but only wander'd up and down so long as the body wanted burial The Fourth said We must distinguish between Vision and Apparition The former is when we think we behold a thing which afterwards comes accordingly to pass as it appear'd the latter is when some visible forms present themselves to us either waking or asleep and 't is of three sorts intellectual imaginary and corporeal The intellectual is when separated substances insinuate themselves into the mind without borrowing any external shape The imaginary is when they imprint some strange forms or species in the phancy and by this means make themselves known to us The corporeal is when they present themselves to our outward senses To omit the first which is rare and an image of the Beatifical Vision the imaginary apparition of souls is caus'd when Angels or Demons according to the quality of the souls pourtray in our phancy the species and signs of their countenance and personage which they had during life which appears sad cover'd with black whilst they yet indure the punishments of their sins but cheerful and in white habit when they are deliver'd from the same And although this apparition is imaginary yet 't is real too Thus Judas Maccabaeus knew Onias and
or triple The Second said That every thing that is mortal and corruptible is such in that it hath in it self some cause of this corruption All mortal bodies being compos'd of contrary ingredients have in themselves the principle of corruption from which as well simple bodies as the Elements and Heavens as Spirits and separate intelligences are free because a thing simple in its own nature cannot act upon it self by a destructive action though even those Spirits have but an arbitrary existence from their first cause on whom they depend But in the first sence and of their own nature they are absolutely incorruptible for were they corruptible then must some new substance be generated out of that which is corrupted which is absurd because they are simple and free from composition and consequently from corruption Now were reasonable Souls which are part of man who is compounded of matter and form again compounded of matter and form there would be a progression to infinity in causes which is contrary to natural reason Moreover nothing is corrupted but by its contrary and therefore that which hath no contrary is free from corruption But such is the rational soul which is so far from having any contrary that the most contrary things in Nature as habits and their privations being receiv'd in the Understanding are no longer opposites or enemies but friends and of the same nature whence the reason of contraries is alike and there is but one Science of them The Third said That such as a thing is such is its action A corporeal and material substance cannot produce an action which is not corporeal and an immaterial action owns no other principle but what is immaterial and incorruptible Hence the same reasons which prove the souls of brutes mortal because their operations exceed not the bounds of the body and tend onely to self-preservation and sensible good conclude also though by a contrary sense for the immortality of the rational soul whose operations are spiritual and abstracted from the body For nutrition concoction assimilation sense motion and other such actions being corporeal because terminated upon sensible and corporeal objects must consequently be produc'd by a faculty of the same nature corporeal and material But the reasonable soul besides those actions which are common to it with those of beasts hath some peculiar and much more sublime as by the Intellect to understand eternal truths to affirm deny suspend its judgement compare things together abstract them from matter time place and all other sensible accidents by the will to love and embrace vertue in spight of the contrary inclinations of the sensitive appetite to do good actions though difficult to avoid the evil which flatters the senses and the like which actions being above the body and material objects cannot be produc'd but by an immaterial and incorruptible substance such as the reasonable soul is Moreover since the soul can know all sorts of bodies it must consequently be exempt from all corporeal entity as the tongue to judge aright of sapours must have none and the eye to discern colours well The Fourth said That Nature which makes nothing in vain hath imprinted in every thing a desire of its end whereof it is capable as appears by induction of all created Beings Now the greatest desire of man is immortality whereunto he directs all his actions and intentions and therefore he must be capable of it But since he cannot accomplish this end in this life as all other things do it must be in another without which not only good men would be more unhappy then wicked but in general the condition of men would be worse then that of beasts if after having endur'd so many infelicities which brutes experience not the haven of our miseries were the annihilation of the noblest part of our selves Yea if the soul could not subsist without the body its supream good should be in this life and in the pleasures of the body and its chiefest misery in afflictions and the exercises of vertue which is absurd For whereas 't is commonly objected that the soul cannot exercise its noblest functions but by help of corporeal organs rightly dispos'd and that when it is separated from those organs it can act no longer and consequently shall exist no more action and subsistence being convertible this is to take that for granted which is in controversie namely that the soul cannot act without the organs of the body when it is separated from the same since it operates sometimes more perfectly when 't is freest from the senses as in Extasies burning Fevers in the night time and in old age The Fifth said As in Architecture the principal piece of a building is the Foundation so the most necessary of a Science is to lay good Principles without which first establish'd all our Sciences are but conjectures and our knowledge but opinion Now in order to judge whether the souls immortality be demonstrable by natural reasons 't is to be enquir'd whether we can find the principles of this truth whose terms being known may be naturally clear and granted by all The most ordinary are these 1. Every thing which is spiritual is incorruptible 2. That which is material is mortal 3. That which is immaterial is immortal 4. That which God will preserve eternally is immortal 5. A thing acts inasmuch as it exists and some other principles by which this so important verity seems but ill supported For the first is not absolutely true since habits of grace and natural habits which are spiritual are annihilated and corrupted those by sin these by intermission of the actions which produc'd them Then for the second 't is notoriously false since not only the forms of the Elements which are material and the Elements themselves consider'd according to their whole extent but also the first matter are incorruptible and eternal and according to the opinion of many Doctors of the Church 't is not an article of faith that the Angels are incorporeal although it be de fide that they are immortal to say nothing of igneous aerious demons and other corporeal genii of the Platonists As for the third the actions of the understanding and the will are immaterial and nevertheless perish as soon as they are conceiv'd and the intentional species are not incorruptible though not compos'd either of matter or form on the contrary the Heavens which are so compos'd are yet incorruptible Whereby it appears that immortality depends on something else As for the fourth 't is as difficult to prove that God will eternally preserve reasonable souls as that they are immortal And for the last 't is certain that many things act above their reach and the condition of their nature since that which exists not as the end nevertheless acts by exciting the efficient cause motion begets heat which it self hath not and light a corporeal quality is mov'd in an instant which is the property of incorporeal substances as also
the terrestrial mass and the dark the water or the contrary it will be necessary that this earth also have its Heaven that its stars and so to infinity The Fourth said That they who have imagin'd spots in the Sun had them in their Eyes it being improbable that there is any defect of light in that Star which is the fountain of it but they are produc'd by the vapours between the Sun and the Eye and therefore appear not at full noon and change with the vapours and clouds As for those which appear in the Moon 's face there is great diversity of opinions as of the Rabbines and Mahometans of the ancient Philosophers reported by Plutarch in his treatise thereof and of the moderns The first are ridiculous in believing that Lucifer by his fall and the beating of his wings struck down part of the light of this great Luminary or that the same was taken away to frame the Spirits of the Prophets Those Philosophers who attributed the cause to the violence of the Sun-beams reflected from the Moon to our Eyes would conclude well if the like spots appear'd in the Sun as do in the Moon because the rayes coming directly from the Sun to the Eyes have more brightness and dazle more then those reflected by the Moon Nor can these spots be the Images of the Sea and its Streights for the Ocean surrounding the Terrestrial Globe that part of it which remains in the lower part of the Globe cannot send its species so far as the Moon whilst she enlightens the upper part the Moon being able to receive onely the species of that part which she enlightens according to the principles of Theodosius who teaches us that from the Zenith of one Hemisphere right lines cannot be drawn to the other Hemisphere by reason of the solidity of the Globe the caliginous fire the wind the condensation of the Air and the like opinions of the Stoicks and other ancient Philosophers though erroneous yet seem to me more probable then those of some Moderns who will have the Moon inhabited not considering that 't is too small to make an habitable earth her body being the fortieth part of the Terrestrial Globe and its surface the thirteenth of that of the Earth or thereabouts besides that she comes too near the Sun whose Eclipse her interposition causeth They who make the Moon and the Earth to move about the Sun may indeed with Copernicus explicate the most signal motions and phaenomena But the stability of the Pole and the Stars about it requires a fix'd point in the Earth with which the inequality of the dayes and seasons could not consist if the Sun were stable and in one place Moreover the difference of dayes proceeds from the obliquity of the Ecliptick which is the cause that the parallels of the Solstice are nearer one to another and the dayes then less unequal then at the Equinoxes which cannot hold good in this Scheme But 't is less reasonable to say that the hollow places in the Moon seem dark for by the rules of perspective they should remit the Sun's rayes redoubled by their reflection by reason of the cone which is form'd in hollow parts nor can they be eminences which appear obscure because in this case the spots should not appear so great or not come at all to us being surpass'd by the dilatation of the rayes redoubled by the conical figure of the cavities of the Moon 'T is therefore more probable that as a Star is the thicker part of its Orbe so the Moon hath some dense then others which are the most luminous as those which are more diaphanous letting those beams of the Sun pass through them which they are not able to reflect for want of sufficient density seem more obscure and make the spots The fifth said The spots of the Sun cannot be from the same causes with those of the Moon which experience shews us changes place and figure those of the Sun remaining always alike and in the same figure whereby we may also understand the validity of what is alledg'd by some That the Sun moving upon his own Centre carries his spots about with him For granting this motion yet if these spots interr'd in the Sun they would always appear in the same manner and at regular times by reason of the Sun 's equal and uniform revolution Nevertheless the most diligent observers find that some of them are generated and disappear at the same time in the Solar face Which would incline me to their opinion who hold those spots to be generated out of the body of the Sun in the same manner that exhalations are out of the bosom of the earth did not this derogate from the receiv'd incorruptibility of the Heavens For it cannot be any defect of our sight mistaking the vapours between the eye and the Sun for spots inherent in his body since they are seen by all almost in the same number and figure which should alter with the medium if this were the cause of them and 't is impossible that vapours should follow the Sun in his course for so many days together as one of these spots appears for it must move above 6000 leagues a day though it were not much elevated above the earth Nor do our Telescopes deceive us since without them we behold these spots in a Basin of water or upon a white paper in a close Chamber whereinto the Sun is admitted only by a small hole Nor Lastly are they small Stars call'd by some Borboneae and Mediceae because we perceive both their nativity and their end II. Whether 't is best to use â—â—verity or gentleness towards our dependents Upon the second Point 't was said That he who said a man hath as many domestick enemies as servants imply'd that we are to use them as such converse with them as in an Enemy-Country and according to the Counsel of good Captains build some Fort therein for our security Which Fort is severity and its Bastions the reasons obliging us to this rigour The first of which is drawn from the contempt ensuing upon gentleness and familiarity and from the respect arising from severity and gravity especially in low and servile souls which being ill educated would easily fall into vice to which men are more inclin'd then to vertue if they be not restrain'd by fear of punishment which makes deeper impression upon their minds then the sweetness and love of virtue wherewith they are not acquainted Besides that servants are apt to grow slack and luke-warm in their duties unless they be spurr'd up by severity And 't is a great disorder when a servant becomes equal to his master as it happens by mildness nor was Paganism ever more ridiculous then in the Saturnalia when the servants play'd the masters It must likewise be confess'd that severity hath a certain majesty which exacts such honour and service as gentleness cannot obtain By this virtue Germanicus became so considerable and was
vapour hath humidity from the water and exhalation siccity from the earth yet this siccity must be joyn'd with some unctuosity to admit the heat which acts not upon bodies destitute of all humidity as the driest ashes are not alter'd by the hottest fire The driest and least unctuous of these Exhalations are in the middle Region transform'd into winds and tempests in the entrails of the earth they cause Earth-quakes and if they be somewhat more unctuous they make subterranean fires in the upper Region they form Comets and in the lower our Ignes fatui which are different according to the divers coition of their matter in length breadth or circularly whence comes the difference of these Meteors call'd falling Stars Flames leaping Goats flying Dragons Beams Lances Javelins and other like names from the figure of their matter Yet all these differences are chiefly taken from the magnitude figure colour time motion and place of these fires Magnitude because some are large and spatious others very small Their figure comes from chance their colour from the mixture rarity or density of the matter Their time is chiefly the night being then most visible Their place from the Heaven of the Moon to the centre of the Earth Their motion according to the six differences of place and the situation of their subject Hence they pursue those that fly them and on the contrary fly before those that pursue them whereupon the ignorant vulgar takes them for evil spirits because they drive and lead them into precipices and bogs which is from their following the unctuous matters which they exhale from those places whence also they commonly appear near places of execution and Church-yards II. Of Eunuchs Upon the Second Point 't was said That the Canons make three sorts of Eunuchs the natural the factitious and the voluntary congruously to our Lords division in the Gospel that some are born others are made by men and others make themselves Eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven which is no more to be taken literally then the plucking out of the eyes or the cutting off of the hands when they offend us but mystically for those who voluntarily renounce the pleasures of the flesh Their original is as ancient as the Law of Nations whereby the Conquerors giving law to the conquer'd chang'd the punishment of killing them into mutilation of some members and amongst the rest of these to make them more faithful and affectionate by depriving them of the means of getting children and more trusty in keeping of their goods and wives Hence they have come to be so highly esteem'd that not only the Emperors of Constantinople the Kings of Egypt Persia and Chaldea have entrusted them with the management of all their affairs but also in the Roman Empire an Eunuch Slave was valu'd at five times as much as another Besides that their purity has qualifi'd them amongst the Heathen for Priests of their Deities amongst which the Goddesses Isis and Cybele admitted no other which possibly by antiphrasis were call'd Galli Even in Christianity the Eunuch of the Queen Candace was the first Gentile call'd to the light of the Gospel the expressions whereof Origen understanding literally castrated himself by an example so singular that St. Jerome chose rather to admire then to blame the greatness of his courage The Second said If it be true that good consists in the perfection of all parts and evil in their least defect the deficiency of those necessary to the conservation of the species is the greatest of all since it devests us of the noble quality and character of man which an Eunuch is no longer nor yet a Woman but something less then both And as the propagation of men is an effect of the divine benediction at the beginning of the World so the barrenness and impotence of Eunuchs contrary to that fruitfulness is abhorr'd by all the world and was taken by the Jews for a curse Moreover Nature which is the principle of motions and generations seems to disown those who want the parts requisite to this action The Laws forbid them the priviledge of adoption and most Offices and Dignities God himself in the old Law prohibited them entrance into his Church and in the New the Church forbids them the use of her Sacraments namely Orders and Marriage Nor is it any wonder since every thing in nature is fruitful even accidents reproducing their species which are so many generations Wherefore finding no place among natural things nor in the Categories it follows that they are monsters The Emperor Adrian extended the penalty of the Law Cornelia against those who make Eunuchs or consent any way thereunto L. 4. S. ad L. Corn. And before him the Pretors had introduc'd divers actions touching this matter as the action of Injuries of the Edict of the Aediles and of Quadruple in the Law 27. S. ad leg Aquil. And lastly the Emperor Constantine expresly interdicted Castration in all the Empire under pain of life and others contain'd in two Laws De Eunuchis in the Code The Third said That whether you consider Eunuchs in reference to the body or the mind they are happier then others They are out of danger of being gouty and bald two maladies whereof the one extremely torments a man and the other dishonours him and it cures the most horrible of all maladies the Leprosie On the other side it puts the same difference between the manners of men as it doth between untractable horses and others Hence the Castrated are more pleasant company and to contribute thereunto Nature has afforded them the grace of a delicate voice all their lives which forsakes children as soon as they come to puberty and being exempted from the diseases which the excess of Venery brings to others they are longer-liv'd and more easily bear the excess of wine They are deliver'd from the cruel servitude of lust and all the other passions which attend it And in recompence of those parts wherewith Asses and Mules are better provided then men they are early furnish'd with wisdom and continence which as the example of Susanna's old Lovers shews happens later to man then grey hairs Moreover Eunuchs have a fit temper for goodness of wit which according to some occasion'd the Greek name Eunuch and not their charge of guarding the bed and observing the deportments of Wives whole subtilty and infidelity may delude their Husbands but could never deceive the vigilance of these Argusses who in this alone shew what they can do since they have the skill to govern that sex which is indisciplinable by all other CONFERENCE C. I. Of the Green-Sickness II. Of Hermaphrodites I. Of the Green-sickness AS women have commonly more defects in mind so their bodies are subject to more diseases then those of men amongst which this is call'd Love-sickness because it ordinarily happens to marriageable Virgins and the Green-sickness by Hippocrates Chlorosis from a colour between green and livid which it imprints upon the
it is now straitned and takes less room then before Whence Water freezing in Vessels well stopp'd the same break for the avoidance of Vacuum Moreover Humidity is not one of its essential proprieties because it may be separated from it as we see in frozen water which is less humid then when it was cold It followes then that Second Qualities being Tokens of the First and the goodness of Water requiring that it have the least weight that can be as also that it have neither Taste nor Smell the most pure i. e. the Elementary of which we are speaking is without First Qualities having been created by God onely to be the band or tye of the other parts of a mixt body The Fifth said That the Scripture divideth the Waters into those which are above the Heavens and those upon the Earth as if to teach us that Water is the Centre the Middle and the end of the Universe Which agrees with the opinion of those who establish it for the Sole Principle of all things Those Supercoelestial Waters are prov'd by the Etymology of the word for Heavens Schamaim which signifies in Hebrew There are Waters Because 't is said that God divided the Waters from the Waters and placed them above the Firmament Which Supercoelestial Waters are also invited by the Psalmist to bless the Lord And lastly because it is said that at the time of the Deluge the windows of Heaven were opened The Sixth said That the gravity of those Supercoelestial Waters would not suffer them to remain long out of the place destinated to that Element which is below the Air And therefore it were better to take the word Heaven in those places for the Air as 't is elsewhere in the Scripture which mentioneth the Dew and the Birds of Heaven Since also the Hebrew word which there signifies Firmament is also taken for the Expansion of the Air and those Supercoelestial Waters for Rain II. Of Wine and whether it be necessary for Souldiers Upon the Second Point it was said That if we speak of Wine moderately taken the Sacred Text voids the Question saying that it rejoyceth the Heart Which it performeth by supplying ample matter to the Influent Spirits which the Heart by the Arteries transmitteth to all the parts and which joyning themselves to the private Spirits strengthen them and labour in common with them And so the Souldier entring into fight with a cheerful Heart is half victorious Yea the greatest exploits of War are atchieved by the Spirits which constitute Courage the Blood heated by them over-powring the coldness of Melancholy and Phlegme which cause backwardness and slowness of Action For it is with the Virtues as with Medicines which become not active and pass not from power into act but by help of the natural faculties So the Virtues do not produce their effects but by the Spirits But Wine taken in excess is wholly prejudicial to the Valour of a Souldier who hath need of a double strength One of Mind to lead him on valiantly to dangers and keep him undaunted at dreadful occurrences The other of Body to undergo the long toiles of War and not draw back in fight Now Wine destroyes both of these For as for the former Valour or Fortitude is a Moral Virtue which as all other Virtues its companions acteth under the conduct of Prudence which alone ruleth and employeth them and knoweth where and how they ought to act So that what assists Prudence assists Valour too and that which hureth the one hurteth the other also Now excessive Wine hurteth the former very much For by its immoderate heat it causeth a tumult and disorder in the humours it maketh the Brain boyle and work and consequently embroyleth and confoundeth the Phantasines which are imprinted in it as it happeneth in sleep or in the Phrensie and by its gross vapour it obstructeth all its passages So that the Understanding cannot take its Survey there having no free access to come and form its judgements and conclusions upon the Ideas and Phantasmes And although it should have its Avenues free yet the Phantasmes being in confusion like Images in stirred waters it would be impossible for it to judge aright and prudently to discern what fear or what eagerness ought to be check'd and repel'd For all Fear is not to be rejected no more then 't is to be follow'd nor is the bridle to be let loose at all adventures nor alwayes restrain'd The strength of the Body is also impaird by Wine For though Galen and others will have it Hot and Dry yet it being so but potentially 't is as subject to deceive us as that Dutchman was who hearing that Cresses were hot commanded his Man to fill his Boots therewith to warm him For the truth is Wine is moist and vapourous and that to such a degree that by reason of its extreme humidity it cannot be corrupted with a total corruption For this happeneth when the external heat hath wholly drawn out the moisture of the corrupted Body and so dissolved the Union of all the dry parts which moisture keeps together So that the Elements flying away there remains nothing to be seen but Earth alone Which cannot come to pass in Wine by reason of the little dry substance in it and of its great humidity which cannot be wholly separated In which regard it is never corrupted but in part viz. when the external heat draws away the more pure substance and the better Spirits as we see when it grows sour thick or turbid Being then humid to such a degree and our parts partaking of the nature of their food if Souldiers nourish their Bodies excessively with Wine they must retain the qualities thereof viz. softness and weakness which follow humidity Whence possibly came the word Dissolute for such as addict themselves to this debauchery and the other which follow it Therefore the Souldier would be more robust if he never drank Wine because he would eat the more and produce the more solid substance which would make him more vigorous less subject to diseases and more fit to indure in sight and undergo the other toils of War The Second said That it belongs to the prudent States-man to weigh the benefit and the mischief which may arise from his orders So that he alwayes propose to himself that he hath to do with imperfect men and who incline rather to the abuse then the right use of things This holds principally in War Souldiers willingly aiming at nothing else but pleasure and profit Even in this Age wherein we are past the Apprentisage of War except some constant Regiments Souldiers are tumultuously chosen almost alwayes out of the dregs of the people of whom to require the exercise of Temperance in the use of that which ordinarily costs them nothing were to seek an impossibility Such is Wine that though it makes the Souldier sturdy yet it makes him unfit to govern himself much less others Whereunto notwithstanding he oftentimes
Body by the Umbilical Veins engrave upon it the Image configur'd to them The Third said That he could not ascribe this Effect to the Imagination no more then all other Monsters because the Girl resembling neither Father nor Mother seem'd to him by this uncouth and strange hairiness to deserve the name of a Monster For First The Imagination cannot produce any real Effect the Intentions of Men produce nothing such this belongs onely to the Deity Secondly All the Animal Faculties being almost intercepted in Generation how can the Formative Faculty which according to Erastus is the sole Agent conceive and apprehend those Images and Representations For there is little appearance that the formes of the Imagination are engraven upon Aerial Spirits in the same manner that these of the Formative Faculty of the Heavens or Vniversal Spirit are imprinted in the Air for the production of Mixt Bodies For if it were so then Children would have upon their Bodies marks or tokens of every thing that their Mothers had ardently desir'd and imagin'd and in their Imagination and desires they have no commendation for Constancy by reason of the continual Agitation of their blood which is incessantly attracted by the Foetus So that we should see strange portraits of the Mothers Phancies upon the Infants Body whereby would be sav'd much of the pains that Baptista Porta takes in his Natural Magick to teach how to produce Monsters Moreover as the Common Sense judgeth of the difference of Objects which it carrieth to the Imagination so the Imagination retaineth not those Species saving to present them to Reason which judgeth and determineth upon them Wherefore if for example the Common Sense represents to the Imagnation a Centaur or some other Monster and the Imagination represent the same to Reason this Reason of ours will never allow or consent that the Formative Faculty attempt to bring it to effect The Fourth said That he did not think this Girl ought to be termed a Monster unless in the large signification of the word as it comprehends every thing that is contrary to the intention of the agent or is extraordinary Thus Aristotle calls a Woman a Monster and a fault of Nature which always designes the making of a Male as the more perfect which being unable to do either in regard of the disposition of the Agent or of the Matter she makes a Woman And for the same reason he calls a Child which doth not resemble its Father a Monster because the Father design'd to beget a Man like himself But this person is not truly such since she is faulty onely in the excess of superfluities or excrements not of any part that varies the species As one that voideth more excrements then others or hath greater Nails then usual cannot be stil'd a Monster Besides what we account monstrous in this person we have the same our selves For were our Sight acute enough we might see that there is no part of the Body but is cover'd with Hair and perhaps not so fair and soft as hers in which we find nothing extraordinary but in the length For whereas she hath a light-colour'd beard of four or five fingers length the cause thereof is because the Hair is carefully shav'd off the rest of her countenance which otherwise would be all of the same length This Hair proceedeth from extreme Moisture and Moderate Coldness the former supplyeth the matter for its Generation and the latter helpeth the Action of Heat by the occlusion of the Pores which it causeth So that if among Children which according to Hippocrates are more humid then those who have attain'd to Adolescence there be found any who have such a degree of Coldness as is able to support the root of the Hair by condensing the skin it will grow in all parts of the Body though unequally according to the difference of humour The Fifth said That besides the Imagination already alledg'd which caus'd Perfina Queen of Ethiopia to bring forth a white Daughter and a Woman in our time to bring forth a Child like a Frog by having held a Frog in her hand for some disease this Hair proceeds from a certain temper proper for producing the same which temper is found in this little person as it is in other persons in some places onely and at a certain Age. This temper seemes to be cold for we see that Men and other Creatures are most hairy in the coldest Countries and cold hath a great influence upon Hair some persons having in one night had their Hair extremely grown and chang'd through an excess of fear and consequently of cold for fear causeth all the heat of the external parts to retire inwards As it hapned to a Gentleman of twenty eight years old who being condemned to death for an Adultery committed in the Palace of Charles V. the next morning was found all white in the Prison whereupon the Emperour granted him his pardon As the Grandfather of the same Emperour did formerly upon the same account to a Spaniard nam'd Osorio The like hapned to an other in shorter time who found the rope begin to break by which he was let down by the side of a steep rock to get an airy of Hawks Now this great abundance of Hair cannot proceed from extreme Humidity for then it must either be radical and consequently mild and no sit Matter for Hair or else adventitious sharp and corroding which would destroy their root Besides it is not credible that so little a Body as this can afford so much excrementitious matter Nor can it proceed from excess of Heat for we see heat makes Hair to shed in those that have a burning Fever or a Hectick and the Hair and Nails grow in dead bodies which have no natural heat II. Whether it be harder to resist Pleasure then Pain Upon the Second Point it was said That if Pleasure be consider'd as a Good and Pain as an Evil it is not to be doubted but that the latter is as insupportable to our Nature as the former is agreeable to it But there are two sorts of Good and Evil of Pain and Pleasure One of the Mind and another of the Body and many times the pains and sufferings of the Body are the joyes of the Mind and the pleasures and the gratifications of the flesh the crosses and torments of the Spirit Now there are scarce any pure and unmixt pleasures or pains in the world but they are usually mingled one with the other And if they could be separated Pain would turn the scale as being the more heavy and difficult to be supported In reference to which mixture the Greek Poet judiciously feigned that there are two vessels at the entrance of Heaven one full of Honey and sweetness the other of Gall and bitterness Of which two Liquors mingled together Jupiter makes all men to drink and tempers with them every thing that he pours down here below So that the Pains and Pleasures of the
Thus and more easily can the Devil trasfer the humours and managing them at his pleasure make them put on what figure he will to cause delusion In fine all this is perform'd by the Local Motion of the parts humours or Spirits The Fifth said That the foundation of doubting is that there is requir'd proportion between the Agent and the Patient Which is prov'd because it is requisite that the patient which is in Power be determin'd by the form receiv'd and it seemeth that a spiritual thing cannot produce a form that may determine a material thing That it produceth nothing material is evident because the action and the product are of the same Nature Now the action of a Spiritual Entity cannot be material to speak naturally Yet it is certain that God acts in corporeal things though he is a pure Spirit But it may be answered That an Infinite Power is not oblig'd to the Rules of Creatures Besides that his Ubiquitary Presence sufficeth to impart Motion to all as also that he containing all things eminently is able to produce all things But if to contain eminently is to have a more perfect Being capable to do what the lesser cannot this is not satisfactory For the Question is How that more perfect Immaterial Being can produce that which Material Beings produce To which the saying that it is a more perfect Being doth not satisfie For then an Angel should be naturally able to produce all the perfections which are inferior to him which is absurd It followes therefore that the Cause must contain the Effect that it may be able to produce it and that since a spiritual Being doth not contain material things either those which we call Immaterial are not so at all or else God immediately produceth in them the effects which we attribute to them For I see not how immateriality is infer'd from immortality since there may be an incorruptible matter such as that of the Heavens is Which nevertheless is spoken rather to make way for some better thought then that I hold it as my own The Sixth said That there may be some Medium serving for the union between the Body and the Soul beside the Animal Vital and Natural Spirits to which Medium the many wonderful effects which we are constrain'd to ascribe to Occult Qualities ought to be referd'd For as they who know not that the Ring which Juglers make to skip upon a Table according to the motion of their fingers is fasten'd to them by the long Hair of a Woman attribute that Motion to the Devil So they who cannot comprehend the subtility of the Medium uniting not onely the Body with the Soul which informes it but also the other Spirits with the Body which they agitate find no proportion therein and are constrain'd to let experience cross their reason Now to understand the Nature of this uniting Medium I conceive is as difficult as to give an account of the Sympathies and Antipathies of things II. Which is more powerfull Love or Hatred Upon the Second Point the First said That Eâ—pedocles had reason to constitute Love and Hatred for the two Principles of Nature which though Aristotle endeavours to confute yet is he constrain'd to acknowledge the same thing though disguis'd under other words For when he saith that two of his Principles are contraries and enemies namely Form and Privation and nevertheless that they are united in one common Subject which is the Matter what is it else but to confess that all things are made and compos'd by the means of Love and Hatred They who own no other Principles but the Four Elements are of the same opinion when they say that all Mixt Bodies are made with a discording concord and a concording discord For as the Elements united together will never compose an Animal unless they be reduc'd to a just proportion and animated by rebatement of some little of the vigor of their active qualities so if there be no kind of War and Amity between them if the Hot act not against the Humid the Animal will never live since Life is nothing but the action of Heat upon Humidity However Amity hath something more noble and excites greater effects then Enmity For the former is the cause of the Generation and Preservation of Mixt Bodies and the latter of their dissolution and corruption Now it is much more noble to give and preserve Being then to destroy it Whence God himself found such perfection in his Creation and was so pleas'd with his Divine Work that though it frequently deserves by its crimes to be annihilated yet his Punishments have not hitherto proceeded so far This is no less true in Spiritual and Intellectual Substances then in Natural Gods Love hath more noble effects then his Hatred For to leave to Divines the consideration of that Love which had the power to draw the Second Person of the Trinity from Heaven with that which produces the Third as also to leave them to proclaim that God loves Good Actions and that the effect of this Love is Eternal Bliss that he hates Sins and that the effects of this hatred are the punishments of Hell that it is manifest that the glory of Paradise is much greater then of those Chastisements since what ever penalties God inflicts upon Man for his mis-deeds he renders Justice to him and do's not reduce him into a state inferior to or against his Nature but when he rewards with Eternal Glory he exalts our Nature infinitely higher then it could aspire let us consider Love and Hatred in Men and particularly as Passions according as the Question propounded seemes principally to be understood and no doubt Love will be found more violent then Hatred To judge the better whereof we must not consider them nakedly and simply as Love is nothing else but an inclination towards Good and Hatred an Aversion from Evil nor yet as such Good or Evil is present For in these two manners they have no violence nor any Motions since according to the receiv'd Maxime When the End is present all Motion and Action ceaseth But to know which of these two passions acts with most force and violence for the attaining of its end we must contemplate them with all the train and attendance of the other Passions which accompany them not as the one is an inclination to Good and the other an Aversion from Evil present For in this sense no doubt a Present Evil which causeth Grief is more sensible and violent then a Present Good which causeth Pleasure but as the one is a Desire of the Absent Good which is propos'd and the other a Flight from an Absent Evil which is fear'd I conceive the Passions excited by an Absent Evil have no great violence but rather partake of heaviness and stupidity as Fear and Sadness which render us rather unmoveable and insensible then active and violent in our Motions The Passions which lead towards an Absent Good are otherwise For
our vicious inclinations other where then within our selves it being deriv'd from the structure and composition of our Bodies For he who hath not what to eat and wherewith to defend himself from cold or who fears distress finds the seeds of theft in his natural inclination of self-preservation The same Fear makes him become covetous When any thing obstructs the accomplishing of his wishes if he be weak he becomes sad thereupon if strong he falls into Choler This Passion leads him to revenge the height of whose violence is Murther If the enjoyment thereof be free to him the pleasure which he takes therein produceth Luxury and debaucheries and thus 't is with all Vices On the contrary poor Virtue meets with nothing in us but opposition The Stomack the Intestines and all the natural parts revolt against Temperance and Continence The Cholerick Humour fights against Clemency Covetousness inciteth to Injustice the Comparison of our condition with that of our betters to Ambition and Envy with that of our Inferiors to Pride and Disdain In brief Virtue finds nothing in us that makes for her interest which seems to me the reason why it is less familiar to us then Vice The Sixth said No person is either vicious or virtuous of his own nature but he becomes so by Instruction and Custome Instruction is so powerful that it makes even Beasts capable of Discipline Custome is of such influence that it is rightly term'd an other nature Wherefore our being rather vicious then virtuons is not from any natural inclination For on the contrary we have the seeds and sparks of Virtue within us and I almost believe with Plato that when Men become vicious it is by force and against their nature But the fault proceeds from our bad Education and corrupt Customes which become yet worse by the conversation of vicious persons who are very numerous The Seventh said Though we consent more easily to Virtue then to Vice yet the number of the good and virtuous being less then that of the wicked and vicious hath caus'd the contrary to be believ'd The reason whereof is not the difficulty of doing well but because Vices are esteem'd and rewarded instead of being punish'd and Virtue instead of Recompence receives nothing but Contempt So the Exorbitancy of Clothes instead of being punish'd causeth him to be honoured who is unworthy to be so Wherefore if there were a State in which Reward and Punishment were duly dispens'd from the Cradle it would be a rarer thing to see a wicked man there then a black Swan because the good which we love and the evil which we hate would be inseparably joyn'd together the one with Virtue and the other with Vice CONFERENCE XXII I. Of Judiciary Astrology II. Which is least blameable Covetousness or Prodigality I. Of Judiciary Astrology THe weakness of our reasoning is a strong argument to abate the presumption of our being able to judge of the power of the Stars For if we are ignorant of the nature of the least Herb we tread upon we must be more so of that of the Celoestial Bodies which are so remote from us and our knowledge that the greatest masters of this Art dispute still whether every Star be a several world whether they are solid or not what qualities they have and which are the true places Besides the local motion of Animals may wholly frustrate the effect of their influences And if Xanthus hindred the Sun from making his head ake when he walk'd abroad and the Moon doth not chill those that are in the house certainly the effects of less active and remoter Stars may be declin'd by the same wayes since Fire the most active thing in nature doth not burn if the hand be mov'd swiftly over it And what more was to be fear'd by Americus Vesputius Ferdinand Magellan and others who sail'd round the Earth one way whil'st the Heaven turn'd the other Why should we seek in Heaven the Causes of Accidents which befall us if we find them on Earth And why should we look so far for what is so near Is it not more fit to refer the cause of Knowledge to study of Riches and Honour to Birth Merit or Favour of Victory to the dexterity and diligence of the General who cast his contrivance well to surprize his Enemy then to attribute these Events to the Planets If experience be alledg'd to manifest the effect of many Predictions I answer that as the Animal which is said to have made a letter by chance with its Hoof in the dust was no Scribe for all that so though amongst a thousand false predictions one by chance proves true yet is not the Art ever the more certain Yea I will urge it against themselves for it is not credible that we should see so many unfortunate Astrologers if they could fore-see their own infelicity or else they must acknowledge themselves fools since they grant that the Wise-man rules over the Stars The Second said That every thing here below suffers mutation and nothing is able to change it self whence it follows that that which is the cause of Alteration must it self be exempt from the same Whence consequently the Heavens which are the sole Body that suffer no change must be the cause of all mutation For the Elements are the material cause thereof and therefore cannot be the Efficient And as the Stars are the thickest and onely visible part of Heaven so they have most light and influence by which assisted with their motions they communicate their qualities to the Air the Air to the Bodies which it toucheth especially to the humours in Man over which it hath such power that its diversity diversifyes all the complexions of Man-kind Now our Humours model our Manners and these our most particular Actions They may talk that the Wise-man over-rules the Stars but Experience shews that the Stars guide the Will not by compelling it but by inclining it in such a manner that it cannot resist because they subminister to it the means determined to the End whereunto they incline it whence it is as hard yea impossible for it to draw back as for a Drunkard to forbear drinking when he is very thirsty and hath the bottle at his command The Impostures which are affirm'd of the Casters of Nativities can no more prejudice or disparage Judiciary Astrology then Mountebanks do Physick Yea though the state of Heaven be never twice the same yet is it not so in the subjects of all other Disciplines Never were two diseases found altogether alike in Physick nor in Law two Cases alike in all their circumstances yet the Precepts of thse Sciences are nevertheless true because it sufficeth that the principal conditions concur as it is also sufficient that the same principal aspects and situations of the Stars be found in Heaven for the making of Rules in Judiciary Astrology The Third said Every Effect followeth the Nature of its Cause and therefore the Actions and
Inclinations of the Soul cannot be ascrib'd to a corporeal cause such as the Stars are For if all were govern'd by their influences we should see nothing but what were good as being regulated by so good causes I acknowledge but two virtues in the Heavens Motion and Light by which alone and not by any influences of occult qualities they produce corporeal effects Thus ought Aristotle to be understood when he referreth the cause of the continual Generation of Inferior things to the diversity of the Motions of the First Moveable and the Zodiack And Hippocrates when he foretelleth the events of Diseases by the several Houses of the Moon The Fourth said It is impossible to make an Art of predicting by the Celoestial Motions for five reasons besides the dominion which our Will hath over Effects without which it were free 1. The Connexion that is between the Celoestial Bodies and the Sublunary is unknown to Men. 2. The diversity of the Celoestial Motions causeth that the Heaven is never in the same posture as it ought to be for the making of a sure and certain Art grounded upon many repeated Experiments according to which like Effects are to be referr'd to like Causes 3. The extreme rapid and violent turning about of the Heavens doth not afford to find the precise minute of a Nativity for drawing the Theme or Figure of the true state of Heaven which they say is necessary 4. As of sixteen Consonants joyn'd with five Vowels are made words without number so of a thousand and twenty two Stars and more with seven Planets may be made Conjunctions and Combinations to infinity which surpass the comprehension of humane wit there being no Art of things infinite 5. Two persons or more born at the same time under the same Elevation of the Pole and disposition of the Heavens as they speak yea two Twins as Jacob and Esau are found oftentimes different in visage complexion inclination condition and end But is it probable that a hundred Pioneers stifled in the same Mine or ten thousand Men dying at the same battle have one and the same influence The Fifth said God having from all eternlty numbred the hairs of our Heads that is to say foreseen even the least Accidents which ought or may befall Men he hath establish'd an order for them in the Heavens disposing the course aspects and various influences of the Stars to draw out of Nothing those accidents at the time that they are to happen to Men whom they incline to meet the same yet so as to leave it in the power of their Free-will to avoid or expose themselves unto them without any constraint This truth is sufficiently confirm'd by the exact and admirable correspondence which is found between the most signal accidents of our lives and the hour of our Nativities so that Astrologers not onely conjecture by the time of the Nativity what is to come to pass but they also come to the knowledge of the true minute of the Nativity by the time at which accidents arrive and take this course to correct Horoscopes and Figures ill drawn And although long Experience may attest the certainty of this Art yet I confess since the faculties and qualities of the Stars are not perfectly known to us and we cannot alwayes precisely know the disposition of Heaven much less all the combinations of the Stars Astrology in respect of us is very uncertain and difficult but not therefore the less true and admirable in it self It is like a great Book printed in Hebrew Letters without points which is cast aside and sleighted by the ignorant and admir'd by the more intelligent So the Heavens being enamel'd by Gods Hand with Stars and Planets as with bright Characters which by their Combinations figure the various accidents which are to befall Men are never consider'd by the ignorant to dive into their Mysteries but onely by the Learned who themselves many times commit mistakes when they go about to read them because those shining Characters have no other Vowels or rather no other voice but that of God who is the true Intelligence thereof The Sixth said Three sorts of persons err touching the credit which is to be given to Astrological Predictions Some believe them not at all others believe them too little and others too much As for the first since they cannot deny that the Stars are universal causes of sublunary effects that such causes are of different natures and virtues and that their action and virtue is dispens'd by the motion which is successive and known they must of necessity confess that knowing the disposition of sublunary subjects the nature of the Stars and their motion many natural effects may be fore-seen and fore-told from them The Devil himself knows no future things certainly but by foreseeing the effects of particular causes in their universal causes which are the Stars They who believe too little confess that the Stars act upon the Elements and mixt Bodies for very Peasants know thus much besides many particular effects of the Moon But as for Man whose Soul of it self is not dependent upon any natural cause but free and Mistress of its own actions they cannot or for Religion's sake dare not affirm that it is subject to Coelestial Influences at least in reference to manners Yet it is no greater absurdity to say that the Soul is subject to the Stars then to say with Aristotle and Galen that it is subject to the Temperament of the Body which also is caus'd by the Starrs from the influence and action whereof the Soul cannot exempt its Body nor the Temperament thereof by which she acts Lastly they who give too much credit to the Stars hold that all things are guided by a fatal and irrevocable order of Nature contrary to Reason which admits the Author to be the Master of his own work and to Experience which assures us of the standing still of the Sun for Joshuah of his going backward for Hezechiah and of his Eclipse at full Moon during the Passion The Fourth Opinion is certain that there is truth in Astrological Predictions but it behoveth to believe them onely in a due measure since the Science of it self is but conjectural II. Whether is less blameable Avarice or Prodigality Upon the Second Point it was said That Avarice is less blameable then Prodigality For the latter is more fertile in bad actions then the former which though otherwise vicious yet refrains from the pleasures and debaucheries in which the Prodigal usually swims The Holy Scripture intending to set forth an example of Infinite Mercy relates that of the Prodigal Son who obtain'd pardon of the sin which is least worthy of it Moreover Prodigality doth far less good then Covetousness for this always looks at its own profit and takes care for its own benefit and the preservation of its dependents so that it exerciseth at least the first fundamental of Charity which is to do well to those who are nearest
which hath sometimes conferr'd the Scepter in elective Kingdoms And our Saviour amidst all the infirmities of our nature caus'd to shine in himself the most perfect beauty that ever was in the rest of mankind Now several beautiful things gratifie variously White is esteem'd amongst Northern Nations because there issues out of white bodies a certain brightness or light agreeable to the eyes of those people But the same colour loseth that pre-eminence proportionably to a nearer approach toward the South CONFERENCE XXVII I. Whether the World grows old II. Of Jealousie I. Whether the World grows old WEre we in those Commonwealths where the voice of the people is admitted this Question would be very easie to resolve there being no body but proclaims that the world is declining and thinks that we are now in the very dregs of Time 'T is the ordinary discourse of old men But possibly herein they resemble the old woman who when she was grown blind said the Sky was overcast or those who sailing from the shore think that the earth retreats back while 't is themselves that are in motion These good people no longer finding the same gust and pleasure in the delights of the world that they found in their youth lay the fault upon the world instead of imputing the same to themselves Indeed their accusation is too old to be receivable having been from all time which made Horace say that to represent an old man right he must be introduc'd praising the time past Yet we may give their reasons the hearing They affirm that every thing which hath had a beginning and must have an end grows old That since all the parts of the world are variously corrupted the same ought to be believ'd of the whole That as for the Heavens all the observations of Ptolomy are found at this day false unless they be rectifi'd by the addition of certain motions of Trepidation which cause all the rest to vary In the Air the inconstancy of it and the irregularity of the Seasons makes us not know when we are sure of any the Spring sometimes appearing in Winter as at present and Winter in Autumn In the Sea you see it dismembers Provinces gains and loses whole Countries by its inundations and recessions And as for the Earth it is very probably shown that in time it must naturally return to its first state in which it was all cover'd with water and consequently void of men and most part of animals and plants which make the three noblest parts of the Universe For they who endeavour the raising of low grounds know that the same is accomplish'd by giving entrance to the slime which the water brings thither and which gathers together at the bottom whence it comes to pass that Valleys through which torrents and brooks of rain-water pass grow hollower daily the impetuousness of the water sweeping the surface of the earth into rivers and thence into the Sea Wherefore though the world should not end by Conflagration as it must do since all the rain-waters those of rivers and brooks go into the Sea and carry thither with them the upper parts of the Earth which is that that makes the waters so troubled and muddy it is necessary that this earth in time fill up the cavities of the Sea and reduce it to exact roundness and then the water having no longer any channel must as necessarily cover the whole surface of the earth excepting perhaps some points of rocks which will decay and fall down in time as about fifteen years ago a mountain in Suizzerland by its fall crush'd under its ruines the Town of Pleurs which by that means made good the importance of its name And although this may not come to pass till after divers thousands of years if the world should last so long yet it is not the less feasible since it is a doing at the present though by little and little The second said That since the end of the world is to be supernatural it shall not proceed from old age that though the earth were all cover'd over with waters yet the world would not perish for all that since the Elements would subsist yea the same earth and the winds by succession of time would come to imbibe and dry up those waters and so again discover the face of the earth That if one of the Elements be diminish'd another increases if the water evaporate the air is augmented if the air be condens'd it addes to the water and so the world cannot fail by all the alterations and changes which happen in simple and mixt bodies For its order consists in the alternative succession of various dispositions and not in one sole disposition like a circle which being finite in its parts is infinite in its whole Moreover if the world perish it must be either by the annihilation of its whole or of its parts or else by their transmutation into some matter which cannot be part of the world Not the first for there needs no less a miracle to annihilate then to create and therefore nothing is annihilated Not the second for mixt bodies cannot be chang'd but either into other mixt bodies or into the Elements now these are transmuted one into another wherefore in either case they are still parts of the world The most active of the Elements Fire without the miracle of the last conflagration if you consider it in the Sphere which some have assign'd to it it cannot burn the rest for should it act in its own Sphere which it doth not it would at length be extinguish'd for want of air into which consequently part of it would be converted or if you place it in the subterranean parts the vapours and the exhalations which it would raise from the Sea and the Earth being resolv'd into water and air would always preserve the being of those Elements Moreover the world would not serve at the day of judgement as Philo the Jew saith for a Holocaust to its author if it were then found defective in any of its parts The third said If you take the world for all the inferiour bodies contain'd under the concave of the Moon it is certain that it changeth For the Heavens are not alter'd according to their substance though they be according to their places But it is impossible that the Elements acting so powerfully one against another by their contrary qualities be not at length weakned and their activities refracted and impair'd and particularly the earth wherein those subterranean fires do the same thing that natural heat doth in animals when by the consumption of their radical humidity it makes them grow dry and old External Agents as the Air and the Celestial Bodies which in time undermine Palaces of Marble Brass and other bodies contribute greatly to this alteration of the earth which is the mark and but of actions of the superiour bodies by whom it suffers incessantly This declination is observ'd in Plants which had
afforded before God had curs'd it and so inseparably connected man's labour with those fruits that now a days to express a hundred acres of Land we commonly say A hundred acres of Labour And as a place ceases to be the Court when the King is no longer in it so the Divine Benediction withdrawn from the Earth it ceas'd to be Paradise Yea Adam having ceas'd to be King of it and by his sin lost the Dominion which he had over all even the fiercest Creatures the Earth became no longer a Paradise to him But if I be requir'd to assign a particular place to this Paradise leaving the description of places which I never saw to the belief of Geographers I find none more fit for it then France Its Climate is temperate especially towards the East and South It hath four Rivers which bring into it Gold and all the other Commodities attributed unto Paradise by the first Historian It so abounds with all sorts of flowers that it hath taken three Lillies for its Arms And with fruits that it hath for it self and its Neighbours yea above any other it produces every Tree fair to look upon and good for food to use the Scripture-words One interpos'd That he should think 't was Normandie so fruitful of goodly Apples were it not that no Vines grow there whose fruit is so pleasant to behold The fourth said As there is no great certainty in the consequences drawn from Allegories so neither are Allegories very successfully drawn from Histories and substituted in their places I know not what History is if that of our first Father be not nor where to stop if people will subtilize upon the first circumstance of his Creation and what he did afterwards But if we find difficulty in according the Geographical Tables of the present time with the truth of that why do not we likewise make Allegories of the Creation and all its sequels which are so many Miracles If we see no Angel that guards the access to it no more did Balaam see that which stood in his way though visible to his Asse And being the space of the Garden of Eden is not determinately set down nothing hinders but that it might be of very vast extent and this takes away the scruple of those who object the distance which is between all those great Rivers Besides being Enoch and Elias were since Adam's fall transported into this Paradise where they must be till the coming of Antichrist 't is a certain Argument of its real subsistence II. Of Embalmings and Mummies Upon the second point it was said That the Ancients were much more careful then we not only to preserve the Images of their Fore-fathers but also to keep their Bodies which they variously embalmed The Grecians wash'd them in Wine mingled with warm Water and then put them them into oyl of Olives Honey or Wax The Aethyopians first salted them and then put them into Vessels of Glass In the Canary Islands they season them in the Sea and afterwards dry them in the Sun The Scythians place them upon Mountains cover'd with snow or in the coolest Caves Indeed every one knows there is a Cave at Tholouze which hath a particular virtue to preserve carkasses from corruption and in which is seen at this day the entire body of the fair Saint Baume and many others dead above 200 years ago The Indians cover'd them with ashes The Aegyptians conceiving that bodies corrupted rose not again and that the Soul was sensible of the Bodies corruption did not yield to any people in curiosity of preserving them they fill'd with Myrrhe Cinamon and other Spices or with Oyl of Cedar then they salted them with Nitre whose aerimony consumes all the superfluous humidities which cause putrifaction 'T is from these bodies that we have that excellent Mummie whose admirable effects I ascribe to sympathy But concerning what is affirm'd that being transported by Sea they cause tempests and strange agitations in the Ship 't is an effect which is to be attributed to a more occult cause The Second said Man is so admirable an Edifice that even his Ruines have their use His Fat is one of the most excellent Anodynes His Skull serves against the Epilepsic This liquor which is drawn from his Tomb hath several vertues and the reasons of the great and admirable effects imputed to it as the healing of inwards Ulcers and Contusions of Blood arriving to such as have fallen from on high seem to me imputable to three Causes a Spiritual a Celestial and an Elementary The first ariseth hence that so perfect a Form as the reasonable Soul having inform'd part of this Compositum which by the mixture of some Ingredients as Myrrhe and Aloes hath been preserv'd from corruption the same thing arrives to it which the Chymists say doth to their white Gold when they have extracted its Sulphur and Tincture For being re-joyn'd to other Gold it easily resumes the same form and is sooner and more inseparably combin'd with it then any other thing as having been of the same species So when you put Mummie into a body of the same species it takes part with the nature whence it proceeded and siding with it incounters the disease and its symptomes like Succour coming to relieve a besieged City with provisions and ammunition The Celestial cause is drawn from the Heavens for that the light and influence of superiour bodies act upon all the sublunary but by the consent of all none is so susceptible of their actions as man and if his soul be not subject thereunto yet his body is undoubtedly to each part of which each part of Heaven not only answers as some hold but the whole to all Whence is seen the diversity of disposition inclinations and manners such and so great that 't is a palpable mistake to attribute the same to the meer mixture of the Elements Now Mummie having receiv'd not only while it was animated but afterwards all the influences whereof the humane body is susceptible it becomes as it were the abstract of all the Celestial powers and better then Talismanical figures communicates the same to him that uses it The last reason drawn from the mixture of the Elements and their qualities might suffice alone without the preceding For Man being the abridgement of the world ought also to contain all the faculties of it and his Mummie being inanimate but having liv'd the life of a plant an animal and a man it contains all these natures eminently The Third said That Man affecting nothing so much as immortality because he fears nothing more then death and being unable to secure himself from it do's all that he can to perpetuate himself in some fashion since he cannot wholly The desire of supporting his Individual person and defending it from all inconveniences which may abridge his life makes him count nothing difficult In Propagation he seeks the eternity of his species And though he is assur'd by Reason of
by the Sun or regard several quarters of the world so the Comets have different shapes or figures which ought no more to astonish us then these of the Clouds which according to their conjunction together represent innumerable formes or at least then those of other fiery Meteors variously figur'd according to the casual occurrence of the matter which composes them Therefore Scaliger in his Exercitations holds that Comets are neither signes nor causes of the events which follow them and derides those who believe that they fore-shew the death of Great Persons or that destruction of Nations and Kingdomes alledging that many great Great Men have dy'd yea many Illustrious Families and States been destroy'd without the appearance of any Comet and on the contrary that many Comets have appear'd and no such accidents ensu'd The Fourth said That Comets are certain Stars whose motion is unknown to us and who being rais'd very high in their Apogaeum remain for a long time invisible This is of no unfrequent observation in Mars who as many Astrologers affirm is at some times lower then the Sun and at other times so high above the rest of the Planets superior to his sphere that his body remains hid when his opposition to the Sun ought to render it most conspicuous In like sort those Stars which God reserves as instruments of the greatest events which he hath fore-ordain'd to come to pass in the Universe remain a long time elevated in their Apogaeum till they come at length to descend towards the Earth from whence as soon as they begin to manifest themselves they attract great quantity of vapours which receiving the light variously according to the nature of the places whence they were rais'd represent to us sundry shapes of hairy and bearded Stars or in form of a Dart Sword Dish Tub Horns Lamps Torches Axes Rods and such others as it falls out And although those Stars incessantly act yet coming to be produc'd anew and being nearer the Earth their effects are augmented and become more sensible As the Fish ceases neither to be nor to move when it is in the bottome of the Sea yet it appears not to us to have either existence or motion unless when it comes near the surface of the Water The Fifth said that Comets must needs be some extraordinary things since they alwayes presignifie strange events especially in Religion Histories observe that of sixty six Comets which have appear'd since the Resurrection of our Saviour there is not one but hath been immediately follow'd by some disorder or division in the Church caus'd by Persecutions Schismes or Heresies That which Josephus relates to have appear'd over the Temple of Jerusalem and lasted a year contrary to the custom of others which exceed not sixty days was follow'd by the ruine of Judaism That of which Seneca speaks to have appear'd in Nero's time was the forerunner of the Heresies of Cerinthus and Ebion That of the year 1440 foreshew'd the Heresie of Nestorius That of the year 1200 the division caus'd by the Waldenses and Albingenses And lastly those which have been seen since the year 1330 have sufficiently manifested the truth of this effect by the multiplicity of Sects wherewith Christendom abounds at this day But especially the thirty Comets which have appear'd in France since the year 1556 four of which were in the same year namely in the year 1560 but too well witness the verity of their presignifications which as S. Augustine saith are ordinarily fulfill'd before the same are known by men The Sixth said That as in all things else so in Comets the magnitude demonstrates the vehemence and considerableness of the future event The colour signifies the nature of the Planet under whose dominion it is The splendor or brightness shews the quick and effectual activity thereof as its less lively colour testifies the contrary The Form is a Celestial character or hicroglyphick denoting an effect in the earth as if God spoke to us by signs or writ to us after the mode of China where the figures of things stand for letters not contenting himself to destinate to this purpose the combinations of the Planets with the other Stars which are the next causes of all natural effects here below The place of the Air or of Heaven namely the sign of the Zodiack wherein the Comet is serves to design the Country which is threatned by it and if it be in a falling House it signifies sudden death It s motion from West to East indicates some forreign enemy whose coming is to be fear'd If it move not at all 't is a sign that the enemy shall be of the same Land upon which the Meteor stops so likewise if it goes in twenty four hours from East to West because this motion is imputed to the first mover which hurries along withall the other Celestial Bodies Their effects also belong to the places towards which their hairs or tails incline Those which appear at day-break and continue long have their effects more sudden those of the evening and of less continuance later They are especially of great importance when they are found with any Eclipse and the Precept which Ptolomy and his Interpreters enjoyn principally to observe is that those are deceiv'd who believe that every Comet signifies the death of some great person but they only hold that as when the fiery Planets rise at day-break as so many attendants on the Sun he that is then born shall be a King so when a Comet is the fore-runner of the Sun at day-break it signifies the death of some great person The Seventh said That Comets do not so much foretel as cause Dearths and Famines Wars and Seditions burning Fevers and other diseases by the inflammation which they impress upon the Air and by it upon all other bodies and most easily upon our spirits For seeing twinkling and falling Stars are signs of great drought and impetuous winds when they shoot from several parts of Heaven how much more are those great fiery Meteors which we contemplate with such sollicitude and which act no less by conceit upon our souls then by their qualities upon our bodies Which being found to have place in those of delicate constitutions as great persons are occasion'd the opinion that those grand causes exercise their effects most powerfully upon people of high rank besides that the accidents which befall such persons are much more taken notice of then those of the vulgar But herein there is found less of demonstration then of conjecture II. Whether Pardon be better then Revenge Upon the second Point it was said That there is none but prizes an action of clemency and forgiveness more then an action of vengeance But all the difficulty is to distinguish what is done through fear from what proceeds from greatness of mind Thus when a Lyon vouchsafes not to rise for a Cat or little Dog that comes neer him but employs his strength only against some more stout creature
one thing rather then another infus'd into every one for the preservation of Sciences Which end of Nature would be frustrated should we run to the inquisition of new Sciences before we have attain'd the first considering the brevity of our lives compar'd with the amplitude of Arts. Wherefore it were more expedient not onely that every one apply'd himself to that whereunto he finds himself inclin'd but that there were as many distinct Artists as the Art hath principal parts and that for example as Physick hath been commodiously divided between Physitians Chirugeons and Apothecaries which were anciently but one so their functions were again subdivided Because by this means every one of them would attain a more perfect knowledge of his Subject Therefore Plato instead of cultivating as he could have done the spacious field of Philosophy apply'd himself onely to Metaphysicks Socrates to Morality Democritus to Natural Philosophy Archimedes to the Mathematicks For they who would possess all the parts of a Science at once are like those who should try to pluck off a Horse's tail at one pull instead of doing it hair by hair Whence it was said of Erasmus that he had been greater if he had been contented to be less The Fifth said That determination of the question depends upon the capacity of wits For as in a poor little Mansion where there is not room enough to place all necessary moveables 't were impertinence to desire to place such as serve onely for luxury and ornament So mean wits yea the indifferent such as most are take safer course in keeping to those few things of which they have most use then if they embrac'd too many for fear of verifying the Proverb He that grasps too much holds nothing But there are some Heroick Spirits capable of every thing and of which comparing them to others that may be said which a Father once said of the different degrees of bliss comparing the Souls of the blessed to vessels of several sizes all fill'd from the same Fountain There are little vulgar capacities which the initiation of a Science or the Etymologie of a word satisfies and they never get beyond the Apprentiship of the least trade Others are so transcendent that they go like the Sun into all corners of the world without being wearied or contaminated with several objects Nothing tires them but rest They draw every thing to themselves become Masters of what ever they undertake and reduce all Sciences to their principal study Thus the Divine the Physitian and the Lawyer will make use of History The first to enrich a Sermon or raise a Soul dejected by the consideration of its miseries whereunto it believes none equal The Second to divert his Patient whose Mind ha's no less need of redress then his body The Third to shew that the same judgement ha's been given in a parallel case They will call in the demonstrations of the Mathematicks to back their own and the experiments of other Arts to serve for examples and similitudes To these Nature how vast soever it be seemes still too little and they would complain upon occasion like Alexander that there were not worlds enough Such were of old Hippocrates and Aristotle and in the time of our Fathers the Count of Mirandula Scaliger and some others who though they writ and spoke of all things did nevertheless excel in all Besides nothing can be known perfectly without knowing a little of every thing and this by reason of the Encyclopaedie or Circle of Arts as we cannot understand a particular map without having some knowledge of the general and also of the neighbouring Countries CONFERENCE XLV I. Whether the Heavens be solid or liquid II. Whether it be harder to get then to preserve I. Whether the Heavens be solid or liquid WHen the proportion requisite to the necessary distance between the sense and its object fails either in excess or defect there is no more credit to be given to Sense That which we look upon too near and which is apply'd upon the Eye appears greater then ordinary as that which is too remote seems very small and diminishes commensurately to its distance By which also the figure or shape of the object becomes chang'd to our apprehension and we are apt to mistake a square Tower to be round one colour for another nothing for a body a tree for a living creature a beast for a man one face for another Some things likewise deceive us near hand as the certain of Timanthus But if we are abus'd in objects which are terminated by an opake surface capable of bounding our view and reflecting our visual rayes the same happens with more reason in diaphanous and transparent bodies as Light Fire Air Water Glass and every thing of that nature The two last especially have such conformity that they have divers effects alike as to serve instead of burning-glasses to recollect the Sun-beams and represent the species which are opposite to them For fill a viol with water and set it in the Sun his beams will produce the same effect with it as with a burning-glass Now by reason of the possibility that our Sight may be mistaken we are many times forc'd to have recourse to some other Sense as to that of Touching to the end the one may be back'd with the testimony of the other But this cannot be practis'd in the present Subject and therefore I conceive that the Heavens taken for the Celestial Orbes and not for the Air nor the third or Empyrreal Heaven are neither solid nor liquid because solidity is an effect of dryness and liquidity of moisture which are Elementary Qualities but the Heavens not being compos'd of the Elements cannot partake of their qualities But as they constitute a Fifth Essence of no affinity with that of the Four Elements so the accidents which belong to them are wholly different from ours and can no more be conceiv'd then those of glorifi'd bodies which if you imagine solid you can never think how they should bow the knee or exercise any the like function If they be imagin'd rare and liquid and consequently penetrable they will seem to us divisible qualities contrary to their immortality Wherefore I conclude that the things of Heaven are not to be measur'd by the standard of those on Earth The Second said That when things are remote from our external Senses we must joyn the internal in their disquisition now reason requires that there be some utmost solid surface serving as a boundary and limit to the Elements otherwise the same thing would happen to the Air or the Elementary Fire if there be any such above the Air that doth to the Water and the Earth which exhale and evaporate their more rare and subtile parts into the Air for so would the Air exhale its vapours into the Heavens and the Fire whose Nature is alwayes to mount directly upwards till the occurse of some solid body checks its course and make it circulate
would mingle it self with the substance of the Heavens which by this means would be no longer pure and free from corruption nor consequently eternal yea it might happen that such Meteors as should be form'd in the Heavens would disorder the motions of the Planets which we behold so regular And besides 't is not possible that the Stars of the Firmament should not have come nearer one another in these 6000. years and the Planets have been so exact in their wandrings unless the Heavens were solid The Third said That because the weakness of our reasoning cannot conceive how the creatures obey the Creator otherwise then by such wayes as Artificers use who fasten nails in wheels to make their motion regular therefore Men phancy the like in Heaven As if it had not been as easiy to God to have appointed a Law to the Stars to move regulary in a liquid space as fishes do in the water yea in a Vacuum if there were any in Nature as to have riveted and fix'd them to some solid body For 't is true we cannot make a durable Sphere but of solid matter But if Children make aiery spheres or balls with water and soap could not God who is an infinitely more excellent work-man make some of a more subtile matter Moreover The supposition of liquid Heavens serves better to interpret these openings of Heaven mention'd in the Scripture then if they be suppos'd solid The melted brass to which Job compares the Heavens proves the contrary to what is usually inferr'd from it for immediately after this comparison made by one of Job's friends God reproves him and taxes his discourse of ignorance Whereas it is said that Heaven is God's throne which is stable and which God hath established in the Heavens and also that it is called a Firmament the same construction is to be made of these expressions as of that in the beginning of Genesis where the Sun and the Moon are styl'd the two great Lights of Heaven not because they are so in reality but because they appear so But that which to me seemes most conclusive for the liquidity of the Heavens is That Comets have been oftentimes observ'd above some Planets which could not be were the Heavens solid Besides that all the Elements are terminated by themselves and need no vessel to be contain'd in The Fourth said If the matter of the Heavens were as firm as glass or crystal or onely as water our sight could no more perceive the Stars then it doth things in the bottome of a deep water how clear soever it be for the visual rayes or species of things cannot penetrate so thick a medium But although the Stars are exceedingly remote from us yet our eyes discern their different magnitudes colours and motions and distinguish such as twinckle from others Besides those who should behold the same Star from different places would perceive it of different magnitudes as it happens to those who look upon the same body through water or glass in regard of the diversity of the medium which is thicker in one place then in another Nor is it harder to conceive how the Stars hang in the Air then to imagine the same of the Terr-aqueous Globe The Fifth said Liquid is defin'd that which is hardly contain'd within its own bounds and easily in those of another which is the true definition of Liquid and not of Humid since Quick-silver Lead and all metals melted are difficultly contain'd in their own bounds and easily in those of another yet are not humid the Heaven must be solid and not liquid for it is contain'd within its own bounds yea according to the Scripture it upholds the Supercelestial Waters The Sixth said The great diversity found in the motions of the Celestial Bodies and especially in the Planets makes very much for the Fluidity of the Heavens For Astronomers observing that the Planets not onely go from East to West by their diurnal motion common to all the celestial bodies but have a particular one of their own after a sort contrary to the former which makes them stray from their situation whereunto they return onely at a certain time therefore they will have them to be turn'd about by a Heaven term'd by them Primum Mobile but add that each of the Planets hath a sphere of its own which is the cause of its second motion Moreover observing the Planets to be sometimes nearer and sometimes further off from the Earth therefore they assign'd them another sphere call'd an Excentrick But what needs this multiplication of spheres when as it may reasonably be affirm'd that God hath appointed to every Star the course which it is to observe as he hath assign'd to every thing its action what ever variety be found in Planetary bodies there being more in other Bodies If it be said That the wonder lies in their Regularity I answer There is nothing here below but ha's and keeps a rule Whence Monsters are so much wonder'd at Nor is there less wonder in the natural instincts of things and all their various operations which they alwayes inviolably observe then in Uniformity which hath much more ease in it as it is a more facile thing for a stone to move alwayes downwards then for an Animal to move according to all the diversities of place and exercise so many several actions The Seventh said The matter of the Heavens if they have any is according to Empedocles a most pure and subtile Air and that of the Stars is Light Wherefore they cannot be either solid or liquid Moreover the Centre of the World is most compact and it grows more and more subtile still towards the Circumference which therefore must be immaterial as Light is Now the Stars are onely the thicker parts of their Orbes like the knots in a Tree which density renders them visible to us multiplying and fortifying the degrees of Light by this union as on the contrary the rarity of the intermediate space between the Stars doth not terminate or bound our sight either because the species which it sends forth are not strong enough to act upon the Eye and cause perception which is the reason why we see not the Elementary Fire though we see the same Fire when it comes to be united and condensed into an igneous meteor or into our culinary flames The Heavens therefore may be more or less dense but not solid in that sence as we attribute solidity to Crystal Diamonds or other hard bodies which resist the touch But indeed we may call them so if we take the word solid for that which is fill'd with it self and not with any other intermix'd thing all whose parts are of the same nature according to which signification not onely the Water but the Air yea the Light it self if it be material may be said to be solid II. Whether is it easier to get or to keep Upon the Second Point it was said That the difficulty of acquiring and preserving is
should be wrought out with fear and trembling CONFERENCE XLVI I. Of Vacuity II. Of the extravagance of Women I. Of Vacuum THe Vulgar call that empty which is not fill'd with some visible body But the Philosophers give this name to a place destitute of all corporeity whatsoever yet capable of being fill'd at least if any such can be in nature For it cannot be understood of those imaginary spaces beyond the heavens which Pythagoras said serv'd for their respiration whereof he conceiv'd they stood in need as animals do Democritus and Leucippus admitted a two-fold Vacuum one in the Air serving for local motion the other in all mixt Bodies requisite to the internal growth and also to the lightness of things alledging that according as their atomes are closely or loosely connected and of various figures so bodies are light or heavy But these Opinions being antiquated I adhere to the common one which admits no vacuum at all The Second said Since Nature abhors vacuum there must be such a thing for of two contraries the one supposes the other And indeed 't is impossible for any local motion condensation or rarefaction and inward augmentation to be made without admitting vacuity For as for local motion when a body removes out of a place that into which it enters is either full or empty not full for then it could not receive a new body without penetration of dimensions which nature cannot suffer therefore it must be empty For this reason Melissus affirm'd that all things are immoveable For being unable to comprehend how motion could be made without and unwilling to admit vacuity therefore he deny'd both To say that bodies give way one to another is to increase the difficulty instead of resolving it for the body which gives place to another must displace a third and this a fourth and so to infinity So that to avoid admitting little pores or interstices in the air into which it may be compacted we must affirm that the air of our Antipodes is agitated at every the least motion of a finger here Moreover Vacuum is prov'd by condensation and rarefaction For the former being made when a body is reduc'd into a lesser extent and its parts approach neerer one another without loss of any either these parts penetrate one another or else there was some void space which is possess'd by themselves when they are thrust together seeing if they had been so contiguous as that there were not any empty pores between them they could not have come closer together Likewise rarefaction being caus'd when the parts recede one from another if no other body interpose there must needs be a vacuum between the parts or else they must have been one within another If it be said that proportionably as one thing is condens'd in one place another is as much rarefi'd somewhere else to fill up the vacuum and so on the contrary this is harder to be conceiv'd then a vacuum Lastly accretion or growth which is caus'd by the reception of aliment in the body could not be made if three were not some void passages to receive this aliment And to conclude experience shews us that a pail of water will receive its own measure of ashes or lime which it could not do if there were no vacuity The Third said That every thing affects unity not only because God who is the universal cause of all is one and most simple and every thing ought to be like its cause but for that all things find their good and conservation in unity as they do their ruine in dis-union Wherefore every thing in the world is so united that there is not any empty space between two and contiguity is as necessary in the parts of the world as continuity in those of a living creature For if there were a Vacuum in the world the Heavens could not transmit their influences into the Elements and their compounds for the preservation of which the same are absolutely necessary considering that whatever acts upon a distant thing must do it by some medium uniting the agent and the patient The Fourth said Since Nature offers violence to her self to prevent inanity and all things quit their particular interest for that of the publick undoubtedly there is no such thing as vacuum in Nature For we see that she makes heavy things to ascend light things to descend and breaks the solidest and strongest things without any external violence only to avoid the inconvenience of vacuity If bellows be compress'd and the holes stop'd no humane force can expand them without breaking a bottle of what material soever fill'd with boiling water and stop'd and put into cold immediately flies in pieces You cannot draw Wine out of a vessel unless you give entrance to the air at the bung-hole A vessel being full of heated air and its orifice apply'd to the water sucks the same upwards A Cupping-glass when the heated and subtile air in it becomes condens'd and takes up less room attracts the flesh into it self Syphons and Pumps by which the water is made to ascend higher then its source are founded wholly upon this eschewing of vacuity Our own bodies also afford us an instance for the aliment could not be assimilated in each part without the suction and attraction which is made of it to supply the place of what is consum'd by exercise or heat otherwise the blood and nourishment would tend only downwards by their own weight And what makes the effects of blood-letting and purgation so sensible but this very flight of Vacuum The Fifth said A notable vacuity and of great extent cannot be without miracle but some small interspers'd inanities may be between the particles of the Elements and Compounds like the pores of our bodies for Nature abhors the former and can do nothing without the latter it being impossible for Qualities to be transmitted to any subject through a great vacuum which would hinder the perception of our senses and the fire it self from heating at the least distance There could be no breathing in it Birds could not fly in it in brief no action could be exercis'd in it but those whereof the principle is in the thing it self and which need no medium as local motion which would be more easily made because there would be no resistance The Sixth said Nature doth what she can to hinder a vacuum yet suffers one when she is forc'd to it For if you suck out all the air out of a bottle then stop it exactly and having put it under water with the mouth downwards open it again the water will immediately ascend to fill the vacuity left by the exsuction of the air And if with a Syringe you force air into a vessel strong enough to endure such violence when the pores of the air which were empty before come to be fill'd it will of its own accord drive out the water very impetuously which was put first into it Likewise though the air
or through a colour'd glass or neer some other lively colour Are any colours fairer then those of the Rain-bow and yet they are no more real then those of the Clouds The whiteness which we behold in the milky way ariseth only from the light of many small Stars The necks of Pigeons seem of a thousand more colours then they have The Heavens the Air and the Water have none but what we phancy or what their depth and the weakness of our sight gives them The scales of Fish some small worms and certain kinds of rotten wood shining in the night seem to us to be colour'd And Pictures are apprehended well or ill drawn according to their situation The Second said The object of Vision is colour the Organ the Eye the medium is a Diaphanous body illuminated Provided these three be rightly dispos'd the Organ and the medium free from all colours and the object at a convenient distance all men will necessarily behold colours as they are and always alike which would not be so if they were imaginary or fortuitous Besides being the object of the sight the surest of all Senses they ought to have a real existence as all the objects of the other Senses have For the object of the outward sense must be real otherwise it cannot act upon the Organ and the Agent and the Patient ought to agree in the same genus The Third said Colours as all other second qualities have a real existence since they arise from the commixtion of moist and dry caus'd by heat and determin'd by cold The first thing that happens in this mixtion is that the humidity is thickned by the accession of some dry substance and of this co-agulation is made a green colour which therefore is the first of colours as may be observ'd in water the grosser parts of which become green moss and in Plants when they first spring out of the earth But if heat exceed in the mixtion then ariseth the Red Purple and other lively and bright colours which according as they degenerate attain at length to Black which is made by adustion But when mixtions take a contrary course by cold then arise all dead colours which terminate in black too by a contrary cause namely the total extinction of heat as 't is seen in old men and dead persons who are of a leaden and blackish colour As therefore green is the first so Black is the last of colours yea 't is properly no colour especially when the humidity is already all consum'd as in coals or is separated from the dry parts as in things become black by putrefaction as the gangrenous parts of an animal Neither is white a colour but a mean between colour and light The rest are true colours The Fourth said Colours cannot proceed from the temperament or mixture of the four first qualities because mixt bodies of different temperature have the same colour Sugar Arsenic and all Salts are white the Crow and Raven are black and on the contrary one and the same mixt body of the same temperature in all its parts is nevertheless of several colours which it changes without mutation of its temper Ebeny is black in its surface and grey within Marble Jasper and Porphyry delight the sight chiefly by the variety of their colours yellow Wax grows white and white becomes black in the Sun Nor can any one say that the part of a Tulip which differs in colour from all the rest is therefore distinct in quality Wherefore since colours proceed not from the first elementary qualities they are no more real then the intentional species of the sight yea they are the very same thing for the visible species are nothing else but qualities streaming from every terminated body which alter the medium filling the same with their images which they diffuse even into the Organ Now colours are the same being qualities which actually change and alter the Diaphanous and illuminated body The Fifth said This argues that we are ignorant of the reason of the mixtion of every body and why such a body hath such a colour but not that colours are not true and real Yet with this distinction that the colours alone which are seen with the conditions requisite to sensation are real that is to say exist really and not in the Imagination For if it were not so we should see them as well by night as by day and with our eyes shut as open as that foolish Antiphon did who thought he always saw his own image before him And a sensible faculty ought to have a real and sensible object since the object must be of the same nature with the faculty But there are colours which are not really in the surface of bodies though they appear so to us by reason of the divers reception of light or of some other extrinsecal colour of a transparent diaphanous body or some other external cause which hinders the eye from discerning the true colour of the mixt body which colour though appearing otherwise then it is yet really exists but is hidden under another apparent one which continues as long as its external causes And colour'd bodies are no less so by night then by day but because vision cannot be made unless the medium be illuminated 't is only through the want of light that we see them not in the night For although we perceive in the dark the eyes of Cats Toad-stools Worms certain horns and rotten wood yet 't is not their true colour but a certain splendor different from colour which proceedeth either from their igneous spirits or because they approach neer simplicity There is therefore reality in colour but it is consider'd two ways either as a quality resulting from the mixture of the four Elementary qualities in which sence 't is defin'd by Aristotle the extremity of a perspicuum terminated or as being simply visible and is defin'd by the same Philosopher a motive quality of a body actually diaphanous In the first signification the colours seen in the Rainbow or the yellow colour cast upon a white wall by the Sun-beams passing through a glass or other medium of the same colour are no more real and true colours of those subjects then the blackness upon Paper by reason of the ink hiding its natural whiteness But in the latter signification every colour whatsoever is real since the one is as well visible as the other The Sixth said Colour differs not from light saving that colour is the light of mixt and light is the colour of simple bodies which the more simple they are they are also more luminous But if they communicate not their light 't is for want of density which is the sole cause of all activity The parts of Heaven are equally luminous and yet only the more dense and thick as the Stars can diffuse their light to us If this light grows weak it degenerates into a white colour as we see in the Moon and Stars if it be
all the situations of place whereunto parts answer namely before behind above below right and left and the point of the Globe touches the point of the plain in the upper part now that which hath an upper part hath also an under part Moreover every point is part of the body in which it inheres for a Part is one finite thing united to another composing the whole with the other parts together But the point of the Globe is such else it must be said that the surface of the Globe is no part of it Seeing there is the same proportion between a point and a line a line and a surface as there is between a surface and a body and that when a Globe rouls upon many points it rouls also upon the surface which therefore differs not from them but by More and Less Whence it follows that a Mathematical point is a small term of quantity uniting and terminating Mathematical lines without length breadth and depth mensurable and consequently a body For it is compos'd of parts irrational and inexpressible that is which the Mathematician cannot tell how long broad and deep they are The Fourth said Nature has hid the highest mysteries in the lowest and seemingly vilest things which also are hardest to be understood not so much through imperfection of essence for an atome flying in the air is as true an essence as the whole earth But because our senses perceive only such objects as are able to excite a motion in the Organs now a Point cannot do this and so the Intellect which judges of things by the species receiv'd cannot receive those of a Point nor consequently have perfect knowledge of it Therefore the Philosopher defines not a point By what it is but By what it is not when he saith that a Point is something imperceptible inherent in the Continuum Yet this knowledge of a point by negation is not by negation of essence but of divisibility it being of its own nature an indivisible entity For if it can be divided into other parts 't is no longer a point 't is a line and must be so term'd how small soever it be Essence not finite is incommunicable to the Creator being a perfection of immense grandeur yet a Point may be of an essence not finite too because such essence is in a Point an imperfection and privation of greatness Moreover a Point is either continuant or terminant each of which is nothing but a mode of being a respect and correspondence of parts one to another which consequently may be produc'd and annihilated without miracle as modes forms and figures are For supposing a Globe exactly divided into two parts there 's no more inconvenience in saying that the Central point is perish'd then that when a ball of Wax is press'd flat the Spherical figure ceases to be The Fifth said That as in the Creation natural bodies were made of nothing so the production of Mathematical bodies begins by a Point which is a nothing And indeed a Point is so far from being demonstrated a reality by the application of a Globe upon a Plain which cannot touch one the other but by a line that the most slender and inperceptible point of a Needle falling perpendicularly upon the most polish'd steel yea if 't were possible upon as small a point of another Needle cannot touch one another but by the surface of their body Whence it appears that a Mathematical Point is infinitely less then any material point whatsoever which only represents the figure thereof grosly to our senses II. Whether Brutes have Reason The second Point was prefac'd with the consideration of the difficulty of a fair discussion because men are parties and none is competent to determine the question but either he that is above both man and beast or equally participates of both it being as likely in the general cause as 't is usual in all particular that men will arrogate the advantage to their own species Yet man's dominion over beasts the conformation of his body the operations of his mind and the works of both compar'd to those of other animals seem to decide the question For man alone knows not only God and the other creatures but also himself by a reflection of the Understanding which is the highest act of Reason His body alone is shap'd so that his eyes are erected towards heaven his members are flexible and versatile especially his hand the organ of organs he sits down most commodiously and gracefully at the exercising of all Arts and his manifold artificial productions perfecting and surpasing those of nature find nothing comparable to them amongst those of other animals And therefore I adhere to the Holy Scripture which denies understanding to beasts and to what antiquity especially Philosophy determines which hath found no more peculiar difference whereby to distinguish man from beast then Reason The Second said Since Reason is the hand of Judgement as the speech is of Reason and the hand it self is the instrument subservient to speech one of these degrees must lead us to the knowledge of the other I mean that since Reason is the hand of the Judgement such animals as shall be found to have judgement can no more be without Reason then a man naturally without a hand Now all are constrain'd to acknowledge some judgement in animals for otherwise they could not exercise the functions of their external and internal senses which divers have in a more eminent degree then we They have a Common Sense for they distinguish the objects of the senses a Phancy since they are all equally lead to sensible good many of them are indu'd with memory as Dogs and Horses which bark and neigh in their sleep which cannot be done but by some higher faculty uniting and enjoyning the species drawn out of their memory an effect not possible to proceed from any other cause then Reason But that which removes all scruple is that they are capable of discipline and there 's no feat of activity but they learn it sooner then Man witness the Elephants which danc'd upon the rope at Rome and the Goats which do as much here at this time not to mention Dogs Horses Apes and other Creatures which are manag'd and Birds which are taught to speak The Third confirm'd this Opinion by the Example of the Elephant who before the Tinker was paid try'd whether the kettle wherein he us'd to have his food was well mended by filling it with water of the Ox who never drew up above a certain number of buckets of water of the Fox who caus'd the water in a pitcher to ascend by filling it with stones and alwayes layes his Ear to a frozen river to hear whether the water moves under the Ice before he trusts himself upon it of the Dog who having scented two paths casts himself into the third without Smelling at all and concludes that the tract of his game of the Cat which although hungry dares
the subtilest sense to wit the Sight The Fifth said That the nobleness of the Touch appears principally in that 't is the most infallible of all the senses as the most honourable persons are accounted most worthy of credit Therefore our Lord being to convince S. Thomas at that time incredulous caus'd him to feel his side and manifest things are call'd palpable because the Touch is the last sense that is deceiv'd Whence they who dream do not frequently find their errour till putting forth their hands to the phantasin they begin to be convinc'd that it is nothing but air The Sixth said That as 't is a common vice to all the Senses to be deceiv'd so that of Touch is not more exempt from it then the rest and the less because it judges of the quality of its objects only by comparison according to the diversity of which one and the same thing diversly affects it and is sometimes apprehended one way sometimes another A man that comes out of a hot Bath shivers in the same air which he accounted warm before he enter'd into the water and when he that learns to dance puts off his leaden soles he thinks his feet lighter then he did before he put them on The Seventh said The Touch is an external sense terrestrial and gross it perceives hot and cold dry and moist heavy and light hard and soft smooth and rough or unequal acide viscous or slippery thick and thin tough and friable or brittle and other such tactile and earthy qualities For as there are five simple Bodies in Nature namely the Heaven and the Elements so each of the five external Senses corresponds to one of them the Sight to Heaven in regard of its transparence and lucidity the other four to the Elements of which the Earth symbolizeth with the Touch because every thing that is felt must have some solidity and consistence which proceeds from the Earth otherwise it could not make it self felt by it self but only by some predominant quality as we feel not the air when it touches us unless it be extreamly cold or hot The Organ of Feeling is inward skin which incompasses the whole body of a creature by reason of its so perfect and equal temperature that it is neither hot nor cold dry moist but equally partakes of all these qualities a requisite condition in the Organs of the senses which must be unprovided of all the qualities whereof they are to judge So the Crystalline humour is without colour the tongue without sapour the nostrils without scent the ears without any sound And the skin is neither hard like the bones nor soft like the flesh but of a temper between both being therefore call'd a Nervous flesh and a fleshy Nerve which skin never so little touch'd feels perfectly which would not come to pass if it were not the Organ of the Touch. 'T is therefore woven of infinite nerves terminated in it and bringing the animal spirits to it which are the efficient causes of the Touch as well as of all the other Senses For what the Philosopher saith That a sensible object apply'd upon the Organ is not perceiv'd must be understood only of the three Senses which are for the convenience of an animal to wit the Sight Hearing and Smelling not of the other two which are for its absolute necessity upon which consideration Nature hath appointed them to judge more neerly exercising these two Senses by a medium internal and inseparable from the Organ II. Of Fortune Upon the second Point it was said Fortune is a cause by accident in things which are done for some end by an Agent that makes use of Reason So 't is fortune when one walking for his health or divertisement finds a Purse but chance hazard or adventure is in things which act for some end without election as brutes mad people and children who are not fortunate or unfortunate unless in hope The difficulty of understanding the nature of Fortune ariseth from the infinite abundance of things which may be causes of things which befall men And as 't is proper to man to admire what he understands not upon the observation of the many strange and unforeseen accidents in the world some say that they come to pass by a fatal destiny necessarily guiding every cause to its effect others that they fall out by chance to which the ancient Philosophers ascrib'd so much that Empedocles accounted the situation of the Elements fortuitous Democritus and Leucippus thought the production of all things was effected by the casual concourse of their atomes flying in the vacuum insomuch that out of a blind superstition they erected Temples and Altars to Fortune For indeed there is nothing divine in Fortune since there is not any cause by it self but may be a cause by accident and consequently Fortune Nor is it the Divine Providence since that which is foreseen cannot be call'd fortuitous But we give the appellation of Fortune to any cause which missing of its proper effect produceth another which it intended not The Second said 'T was the ignorance of men that invented Fortune which hath no other existence but in their imagination For every thing that is hath a certain cause determined to its effect But Fortune and Chance are uncertain and indeterminate therefore not causes And although the proximate cause of every thing be unknown to us yet 't is not the less certain for all that in respect of God who ignores nothing Therefore if there be a fortune in respect of us 't is an effect of our ignorance The Third said We must establish in Nature either Destiny or Fortune The former seems to fasten man to Ixion's wheel which permits him not to do any thing of himself and takes from him the commendation of good and blame of evil rendring him by this means guiltless of whatever he do's and laying all upon universal causes whatever distinction may be made of God's will in general and particular it not being conceivable that two contrary wills can at the same time proceed from the same source The second is more correspondent with the daily events which produce effects whereof no necessary cause can be found Indeed if effects are to be divided according to their causes 't is certain that some are necessary and some contingent whereof the latter being fortuitous cannot be referr'd to any thing but to Fortune Yea of the things which come to pass in the world some always arrive in the same manner as day and night when the Sun rises and sets others fall out ordinarily but not always as that a child is born with five fingers on a hand there being some that have six and others on the contrary arrive very rarely as Monsters But if this variety of causes and effects hath place in natural things 't is found much oftner in humane actions whose constancy is unconstancy it self there being not any whose effect is certain For what man can promise himself
as it is very excellent so 't is exceeding rare and being not us'd amongst us cannot come into comparison with the rest Whereas Sculpture and Statuary consisting only in paring away the overplus of matter or if the matter be fusible in casting it into a mould made from the original as the moulds of Plaster are from the faces of persons newly deceas'd need less industry The Second said Although Painting be sensible and visible yet it belongs to very few persons to judge well of it witness Alexander who going to see Appelles and offering to talk concerning Painting he spoke so ill that the Apprentices of that Artist could not forbear laughing Indeed Painting is one of the noblest parts of the Mechanicks and ought as well to be rank'd amongst the Mathematicks as Astronomy For if the reason of the Celestial motions gave cause for accounting this Science amongst the Mathematicks more justly may the reason of the motions and proportions of mans body the object of Painting more admirable and of which more certain and real knowledge may be had then of those remote bodies deserves to be of that rank considering that it makes use of the same Mathematical Rules Proportions whose Rules are so infallible that seven excellent Statuaries very distant one from the other being employ'd to make a brazen Colossus perform'd their tasks by the precepts of their Art and the parts which each of them made severally being put together represented a well proportion'd man According to which proportion a mans body must be eight lengths of his head from the less corner of the eye to the tip of the Ear is to be twice the length of the Eye the Feet and Hands stretch'd forth equally distant from the Navil and such other remarks The Third said The reason of the measures and proportions observ'd in Painting consists principally in four points viz. in the form and figure of the thing represented which is taken from the visual rays in the shadow which is to be taken from the rays of light in colour which is to imitate the natural and in the handsome posture or situation of the thing painted For Painting is the imitation of the affections of bodies with reference to the light made upon a solid Plane Hence a face is otherwise represented under the water then bare distant then neer in the Sun-shine then in the shadow by Candle-light or Moon-light And though the Painter represents also the dispositions of the soul as anger or sadness yet he doth it always by the features and qualities of the body The Fourth said They who blame Painting and Statuary because they represent unfitting objects and gave occasion to the Idolatry of antiquity may as justly blame beauty because 't is sometimes the occasion of sinning Painting hath this preeminence above all Arts that it imitates God more perfectly then they for God was the first Painter when he made man the goodliest piece of the world after his own image and likeness and all the bless'd spirits are but contracted copies of so perfect an original 'T is that which frees the body from the tombe and like a second table after shipwrack preserves the memory of virtuous men renders present those who are absent and makes almost as strong impressions upon our Soul as the thing it self witnesse the friendships of the greatest personages of the world contracted by its means And as if the desire of pourtraying it self were natural to all things there is no body but incessantly produces its own image which flies and wanders in the Air till it meet with some solid and smooth body whereon to represent it self as we see in Looking-glasses and polish'd marble where the images are much more exact then those which Art draws with a pencil yea then their own originals of whose corporeal matter they are wholly divested And as the beginning of all Arts are rude this of Painting is attributed to the Daughter of Belus who observing her Fathers shadow upon a wall delineated it with a coal For Pourtraiture invented by Philocles the Aegyptian is ancienter then Painting invented either by Gyges the Lydian in Aegypt according to Pliny or by Pyrhus Cousin to Daedalus according to Aristotle The Fifth said That in Painting as in other disciplines Ignorance of the principles is the cause that so few succeed well in it These principles are the methodical proportion of Mans Body Perspective the reason of shadows Natural Colours Designing and History all which must be found in a good Piece and the defect of some of them as it frequently happens causes us to wonder though we know not the reason that there is commonly something in all draughts that does not satisfie our Minds For oftentimes when all the rest is good Perspective hath not been well observ'd or the Design is nought or the History ill follow'd But as things are the more to be esteem'd which are the most simple so there is more of wonder in Painting to the life with a coal as Appelles did before Ptolomy to denote a person to him whom he could not name then with colours the least part of Painting which consists properly onely in proportion and this being the most divine action of Understanding 't is no wonder if there be so few good Painters For they are mistaken who place the excellence of painting in the smallness of the strokes because they fancy that Appelles was discover'd to Protogenes by having made a smaller line then he For on the contrary the most excellent strokes of Masters are many times the grossest and that this proportion may be exact it must imitate not onely particular subjects but generally the species of every thing Which Michel Caravague neglecting to do about 90. years since and instead of following Durer's excellent Rules addicting himself to draw onely after the life hath lead the way to all his successors who care not for his Rules but give themselves onely to imitation and this is the cause of the defects of painting at this day CONFERENCE LIX I. Of Light II. Of Age. I. Of Light I Conceive with a learned Physitian of the most worthy Chancellor that France ever had in his Treatise of this subject that Light is of two sorts one radical and essential which is found perfectly in the Stars the fire and some other subjects but imperfectly in colour'd bodies because Colour is a species of Light The other secondary and derivative which is found in bodies illuminated by the Light Both are made in Transparent Bodies those of the Stars in the Heaven and that of flame and bodies ignited in the fire whiteness in the Air and blackness in the Water But these transparent bodies must be condens'd that those Lights and Colours may appear and therefore the principle of Light is in transparence alone whereof neither purity rarity tenuity nor equality of surfaces are the causes but they all proceed from the quantity of matter some bodies having more matter then others
not by rarity alone or local extension but by formal extension or internal quantity and consequently that a little matter under a great internal quantity is the principle cause of tenuity rarity and transparence to which the evenness of surfaces is also requisite in gross bodies So that Light consists in a proportion between the quantity and the matter of its subject and Light is great when the matter is little under a great quantity as in the Heavens on the contrary the body is dark when a very small quantity is joyn'd to a great deal of matter as is seen in the Earth To prove this you must observe that all simple bodies are luminous excepting the Earth which is opake and we find Light in sundry animated bodies as in the Eyes of Cats and of those Indian Snailes which shine like torches and in our Gloe-wormes whose Light proceeds from their Spirits which being of a middle nature between the Body and the Soul are the least material thing in the world Whence it follows that Light is a form with the most of essence amongst sensible formes as obscurity hath the least The Second said The wonder of Marsilius Ficinus was with reason how 't was possible that nothing should be so obscure as Light For if Transparence be the subject of it why doth Crystal heated red hot in the fire come forth more luminous and less transparent then it was The same may be said of Rarity for we see that Air and Aqua Vitae are well rarify'd by the fire which inflames them but cease to be transparent as soon as they are made more rare and luminous which is an evident sign that rarity and transparence are not causes nor yet conditions of Light So the whole remainder of Heaven is lucid but onely the less rare parts and such as you might call vapours in respect of the pure Air. And the light which proceeds from the Sun the most luminous of all those celestial bodies would never be visible but be depriv'd of all its effects which are heating and enlightning if it were not reflected by some solid body Then it not onely appears but exerts its activity And if things be produc'd by the same causes which preserve and multiply them the solidity of burning mirrors made of Steel the hardest of all metals which make the Sun-beams do more then their own nature empowers them to shews sufficiently that their Light cannot arise from a rare and diaphanous cause Nor may the Light of rotten wood be assign'd to its rarity alone since many other bodies of greater rarity shine not at all nor that of Gloe-worms and Cats Eyes to their spirits since the flesh of some animals shines after their death as 't is affirm'd of Oxen that have frequently eaten a sort of Moon-wort and not onely the scales of divers fishes shine after separation from their bodies but sparkles of fire issue from the hair of some persons in great droughts whereunto the spirits contribute nothing Which would perswade me to believe that Light is a Form to the introduction whereof several conditions are requisite according to the diversity of subjects just as we see the Souls of some irrational creatures need great dispositions for their reception a Brain a Heart and a Liver with their dependances whereas others as Insects require lesse and are contented with something that may supply this defect some are generated in an instant without any apparent preparation as Frogs in a summer showre and therefore to assign the cause of Light is to seek the reason of Formes which is unknown to us Which similitude the vulgar speech confirmes for the people say The Candle is dead when it is extinguish'd presupposing that it had life before as an Animal hath so long as its form is conjoyn'd with its body Moreover Fire hath a Locall Motion as Animals have to obtain its food The Third said Light is a substance for it was created by God but 't is a Sixth Essence more subtile then that of Heaven which is call'd a Quintessence in respect of the Four Elements A substance which subsisted before the Sun having been created three dayes before it and nothing hinders but it may be communicated in a moment from Heaven to Earth since the intentional species of visible things is so Indeed whereunto shall we attribute the effect of Light which heats at distance and blinds being too great which colours and gives ornament to the Universe if it be not a substance And the Penetration of Dimension objected hereunto is salv'd by saying that it hath no more place here then when an Iron is red hot with the Fire which yet none will affirm to be an accident and neverthelesse it enters into the whole substance of the Iron and Light with it for 't is transparent and luminous at its centre when 't is throughly heated in the Fire The Fourth said The excellence of Light appears in that nothing hath greater resemblance with the Deity Which made some Heathen Philosophers say that Light is Gods Body and Truth his Soul Moreover the Scripture teaches us that God dwells in inaccessible Light And the blessed Spirits are stil'd Angels of Light as Daemons Spirits of darknesse Light enlivens and animates all things it rejoyces all Creatures by its presence Birds begin to sing and even flowers to display their beauties at its arrival And because Nothing gives what it hath not therefore some have conceiv'd that Light the enlivener of all the world is it self indu'd with life and that 't is the Universal Spirit and the Soul of the whole world Whence Plato in his timaeus brings no other argument to prove that Fire is an Animal but that it is luminous And in the sixth Book of his Common-wealth he makes the Sun who is the known Father of all living things the son of Light without which Pythagoras forbad to do any thing Moreover it hath no contrary Darkness being oppos'd to it onely privatively For its being is so excellent that Nature found not her self so able to make any thing that might be equall'd with it that might alter and corrupt it as the nature of Contraries require whereas all Qualities have each their particular enemy And 't is upon this very reason that Light acts in an instant because having no contrary quality to expel from its subject it needs no time or successive motion which is necessary to other qualities as to heat to warm cold water The Fifth said Light is a real form produc'd in the medium by a luminous body Aristotle calls it the act of the Perspicuum as it is Perspicuum This Form is accidental and falls under the head of Patible Qualities because 't is sensible by it self which is the property of accidents alone whereas substance is not sensible that is falls not under the perception of sense but by means of accidents and as it is the principle of action which belongs onely to a Quality For it cannot
hath found no sweeter Anodyne to the miseries and sadnesses of old people then the sight of children whom they extreamly love and then the memory of things done or learn'd in their non-age which the less distant it is from its source the Deity the more it partakes thereof The Fourth said Youth hath too many extravagancies to be accounted happy nor can Child-hood and Old-age deserve that title since 't would be contrary to the order of nature if the extreams contain'd more perfection then that which is in the middle where she hath establish'd the vertue of all things For as for Child-hood its weakness sufficiently shews that it hath not wherewith to content it self since it needs the help of others and is an object of pity a passion that never arises but from misery There 's no commendation in its innocence which depends upon impotence and the imperfection of the souls operations and they as much want the will and power to do well as the intention and means to do ill But true Innocence consists in the action of difficult good If Infancy hath no apprehension of the future it receives the present evil with much more pain and shews it self as sensible to the least displeasures as incapable of consolation and prudence to avoid them if it wants fear though indeed every thing terrifies it the hope of good to come never anticipates and prolongs its enjoyment In a word he cannot be happy who hath not the knowledge of his happiness which Children cannot have while they want the use of Reason which is peculiar to Man Old-age which is a second Childhood and the more to be dislik'd in that it always grows worse partakes all the defects of the first age and hath this besides that the desires awakened by the remembrance of pass'd conrentments are constantly jarring with his impotence and the ardency of getting and possessing hath a perpetual contract with the necessity of forsaking and losing pains and aches the forerunners of death daily attempt his patience and there 's no hope of other cure but the extremity of all evils not-being Infancy therefore is like the Spring which hath only flowers and expects the fruits afterwards 't is an age of hope without enjoyment Youth hath only Summer fruits of little lasting Old-age is a Winter without either flowers or fruits hath nothing but present evils in possession is to fear all and to lose all But Virility or Manhood holds the middle between them both and resembles Autumn denoted by the horn of Plenty possesses the happiness of life enjoys the present goods and by hope anticipates those to come the soul in this age commonly corresponds with the body its faculties make an agreeable symphonie with the actions hereof and the sweet union of a reciprocal complacency On the contrary in childhood the soul seems not yet well tun'd to the body in adolescence it always jars with the appetites of the Senses and in old age it altogether disagrees with it self and by a sudden departure endeavours to have its part separately CONFERENCE LX. I. Of Quintessence II. Which is the most in esteem Knowledge or Vertue I. Of Quintessence THe mind of man as it is the purer part of him so it is always pleas'd with that which is most pure In conversation it loves the most refin'd and prefers simplicity which is most pure above the windings and double-dealings of deceivers Amongst Metals it prefers Gold and Silver which are the purest above Lead Iron and other imperfect and course Minerals In food Physick and the stomack of the diseased chuse that which is most freed from its gross and unprofitable parts Among sounds the most subtile are the most charming Among artificial things we find more sprightliness in the gracefulness of small works then in others In the Sciences the more subtile a reason is the more 't is applauded But being health is the greatest yea the only true good being the foundation of all the rest and sickness the greatest yea the only real evil of our life therefore our minds have herein most sought after subtilety especially to subtilize aliments and medicaments not but that there may be a quintessence as well drawn from other things but it would not be so useful Now 't is to be observ'd that this word is taken either generally for any body depurated from its more course matter as Spirits Waters and Oyls excluding Magisteries which retain the intire substance of the bodies from whence they are taken only render'd more active by its subtilization or else it is taken properly and in this acception Quintessence is some thing different from all this and is compar'd to the soul which informs the body The Second said That in every compound body there is a mixture of substance besides that of qualities whence arise the occult properties and forms of things which is their fifth Essence 't is no Body for it takes not up place nor yet a Spirit since 't is found also in inanimate bodies but some thing of a middle nature between both and neither one nor the other Of which kind we want not examples in Nature Shadow the Image in a Glass yea all intentional species are neither body nor spirit Now that it takes not up place may be prov'd because a bottle of Wine expos'd unstop'd to the air is not diminish'd in its quantity yet lofes its taste smell and other qualities by which change it becomes another thing from what it was before an evidence that it hath lost its form which is nothing else but the Quintessence we speak of and should another body receive the same it would have the qualities the Wine lost which after separation of them is no more Wine then the carcase of a man is a man after his soul is departed Moreover that which nourishes in food is not a body but the form or quintessence of it since by the observation of the most Inquisitive 't is found that the excrements of all the concoctions equal the aliments both in weight and quantity as the Urine of Drunkards is commonly as much as the Wine they have drunk and Mineral waters are voided in the same quantity that they were taken This fifth Essence is found every where in the Elements and in compound bodies In those 't is the purest of the Element impregnated with the Universal Spirit in these 't is likewise the purest part of the compound animated by the same Spirit The Third said There is no other Quintessence but the Heaven in comparison of the Elements in the mixtion whereof the Heaven concurs as an universal Agent whose influence which is the soul of the World determining the matter informs and renders it active thus the Stars produce Metals even in the centre of the Earth Hence the world Heaven is taken by Chymists for Quintessence because of the simplicity and activity common both to the one and the other But because it cannot fall under the cognisance of
our Senses in regard of its aethereal nature the most searching Naturalists give its name to the most subtile extracts especially such as are made by fire although the same be not eternal as Quintessence ought to be but only of long duration The Fourth said 'T is the humour of unsetled heads instead of cultivating the precepts of antiquity to go about to fabricate new and hence comes the contemplation and the extraction of Quintessences For besides that 't is not certain that what is drawn out of a Plant was there before it being probable that the action of the fire may have introduc'd it in part or in whole into the compositum this Quintessence hath not the conditions requisite to merit that name because it has both first and second qualities and consequently is not only corporeal but also corruptible And if it were incorruptible it would be wholly unprofitable yea hurtful to mans body since it could not be chang'd or alter'd by it and none but poysons are such For Medicaments and aliments are alter'd by our nature But however the Empyrema or Adustion which these Quintessences commonly acquire in the fire renders their activity too great and disproportionate to our temper Which is the cause that things already excessive in quality as Salt and Vitriol are very hurtful being made into Quintessences because there is no more proportion between them and us And therefore I am of the judgement of the Vulgar who never speak of those drawers of Quintessences but with contempt considering that they make profession of a thing which is not and which if there were any such would be either unprofitable or hurtful The Fifth said That the Chymical Quintessence is an aethereal celestial and most subtile substance compos'd of the Salt Sulphur and Mercury of bodies dissolv'd spoil'd of all their elementary qualities corruptible and mortal united to a spiritual body or corporeal spirit which is the medium and bond uniting bodies and spirits in nature and call'd by some for its rarity Elixir for its wonderful use in preserving the health of mans body the Sovereign Medicine by which they hold that youth may be restor'd and all sorts of diseases cur'd it not being requisite in its action that it be alter'd by our natural heat which on the contrary it changes and perfectionates taking the part of nature as all poysons destroy it And 't is certain that since there are bodies which are barely alter'd by our nature as aliments others which are alter'd by it but reciprocally alter it as medicaments others which destroy it without being alter'd by it so there is a fourth sort which preserves it without being alter'd by it which is the Quintessence thoroughly separated from the four Elements yea from every thing that enters into the composition as is seen in Treacle whose vertue proceeds from some body which is not any of all the ingredients but results from them all together after convenient fermentation And possibly they who blame this curious inquisition do it to decline the pains or because they understand it not as 't is said the Fox that wanted a tail counsell'd all his fellows to cut off theirs The Sixth said Being all the Chymical Principles are resolv'd into our four Elements their Quintessence which is compounded thereof will be nothing else but these Elements more pure and refin'd and consequently no more a Quintessence then all mixts are in respect of the Elements whereof they consist For a Quintessence must be a simple body not any of the four Elements much less compounded of them and Heaven alone is such whatever certain Philosophers have said some holding it to be onely a continuation of the air others that 't is of an igneous nature because its denser parts appear such and its name Aether signifies Fire some that 't is a fluid and aqueous substance others on the contrary a pure and solid earth For Heaven hath a simple to wit a circular motion which as the most perfect of all ought to belong to the most noble of all bodies and this circular motion belongs not to any of the Elements since each of them moves in a direct line two from the Centre and two others towards the Centre But a simple body cannot have two motions it follows therefore that Heaven hath a motion different from that of the four Elements since motion particularly local the first and commonest of all is an effect of the nature of every thing which is the principle of motion Moreover Heaven alone is exempt from all elementary and corporeal qualities 'T is neither heavy nor light because it neither moves towards the Centre nor the circumference but about the Centre 'T is neither generated nor corrupted because it hath no contrary And for this reason it hath neither augmentation nor diminution inasmuch as these are species of generation and corruption 'T is not any way alter'd since alteration is caus'd by the action of some contrary Lastly it cannot enter into any composition and consequently there is indeed a Quintessence but 't is not in sublunary bodies II. Which is most in esteem Knowledge or Vertue Upon the second Point it was said That 't is first requisite to remove the equivocation of those who comprehend Knowledge under Vertue since by the word Vertuous we understand here not a Virtuoso but a good man who though he deserves to be more yet is always less esteem'd then a knowing or learned man because every one esteems that most which hath most shew and price Now a vertuous man is not only destitute of this but his greatest vertue consists in not seeking vain-glory whereof the greatest part of manking being adorers and every one affecting such as resemble themselves therefore the learned is commonly esteem'd above the other Moreover the reasoning of man being wholly deprav'd since the Fall he is rather for Verisimilitude then Verity Now the learned easily perswades that he is more to be esteem'd then the vertuous who doth good because it is good and not to be esteem'd for it whereas the other is like those bad Officers who make amends for their ill deeds by fair writing So Demosthenes having run with the first from the Battel made such an excellent Oration that he was commended for that which deserv'd perpetual shame But that which makes vertue less priz'd is because it falls upon all sorts of conditions and sexes a poor man and a poor woman exercising not less vertue in supporting their misery with constancy then a great Captain in overcoming his enemy and learning being not so common especially that which is sublime 't is the more esteem'd for its rarity They who judge of the worth of mens actions account of them according to the pains that there is in performing them But 't is judg'd more painful to become learned then to live well Others say 'T is best to be vertuous for the other world and knowing for this good Nature which is no way
and their duration is their age the second are successive whose duration is time For duration follows the existence of every thing as necessarily as existence follows essence Existence is the term of production Duration is the term of conservation So that to doubt whether there be such a real thing in Nature as Time is to doubt of the duration and existence of every thing although the Scripture should not assure us that God made the day and the night which are parts of time Moreover the contrary reasons prove nothing saving that time is not of the nature of continuous beings but of successive which consists in having no parts really present This Time is defin'd by the Philosopher The Number of Motion according to its prior and posterior parts that is to say by means of time we know how long the motion lasted when it begun and when it ended For being Number may serve for Measure and Measure for number therefore they are both taken for one and the same thing Indeed when a thing is mov'd 't is over some space whose first parts answer to the first parts of motion and the latter parts of the space to the latter parts of the motion and from this succession of the latter parts of the motion to the former ariseth a duration which is time long or short according to the slowness or quickness of this motion And because by means of this duration we number and measure that of motions and of all our actions therefore it is call'd Number or Measure although it be onely a Propriety of Time to serve for a Measure and no ways of its essence The Fourth said That to understand time 't is requisite to understand the motion and two moments one whereof was at the beginning of that motion and the other at the end and then to imagine the middle or distance between those two extreams which middle is Time Therefore man alone being able to make comparison of those two extreams only he of all animals understands and computes time Hence they who wake out of a deep and long sleep think it but a small while since they first lay down to rest because they took no notice of the intermediate motions and think the moment wherein they fell asleep and that wherein they wak'd is but one single moment The same also happens to those who are so intent upon any action or contemplation that they heed not the duration of motions Now not only the motions of the body but those of the mind are measured by time Therefore in the dark he that should perceive no outward motion not even in his own body might yet conceive time by the duration of his soul's actions his thoughts desires and other spiritual motion And as Time is the Measure of Motion so it is likewise of rest since the reason of contraries is the same And consequently motion and rest being the causes of all things time which is their duration is also their universal cause The Fifth said That 't is ordinary to men to attribute the effects whereof they know not the causes to other known causes though indeed they be nothing less so they attribute misfortunes losses death oblivion and such other things to Heaven to Time or to place although they cannot be the causes thereof Hence some certain days have been superstitiously accounted fortunate or unfortunate as by the Persians the third and sixth of August in regard of the losses which they had suffer'd upon those days the first of April by Darius and the Carthaginians because upon the same day he had lost a Battle to Alexander and these were driven out of Sicily by Timoleon who was always observ'd to have had some good fortune upon his birth day Moreover the Genethliacks affirm that the day of Nativity is always discriminated by some remarkable accident for which they alledge the example of Charles V. whose birth day the 24th of February was made remarkable to him by his election to the Empire and the taking of Francis I. before Pavia Such was also that day afterwards solemniz'd in which Philip of Macedon receiv'd his three good tidings But as there is no hour much less day but is signaliz'd by some strange accidents so there is not any but hath been both fortunate and unfortunate As was that of Alexander's birth who saw Diana's Temple at Ephesus burnt by Herostratus and the Persians put wholly to the rout Yet the same Alexander as likewise Attalus Pompey and many others dy'd upon the day of their Nativity so did Augustus upon that of his Inauguration Wherefore 't is no less ridiculous to refer all these accidents to Time then to attribute to it the mutation oblivion and death of all things whereof it is not the cause although for this purpose Saturn was painted with a sickle in his hand with which he hew'd every thing down and devour'd his own children For Time as well as Place being quantities which are no ways active they cannot be the causes of any things The Sixth said Time is diversly taken and distinguish'd according to the diversity of Professions Historians divide it into the four Monarchies of the Medes the Persians the Greeks and the Romans and the States and Empires which have succeeded them The Church into Working-days and Festivals the Lawyers into Terms and Vacations the Naturalists consider them simply as a property of natural body Astronomers as an effect of Heaven Physitians as one of the principal circumstances of Diseases which they divide into most acute acute and chronical or long which exceed 40 days and each of them into their beginning augmentation state and declination as distinguish'd by the common indicatory and critical days II. Whether 't is best to overcome by open force or otherwise Upon the second Point it was said That Force being that which first caus'd obedience and admiration in the world the strongest having ever over-mastered others it cannot enter into comparison with a thing that passes for a Vice and even amongst Women as sleight and and subtlety doth and crafts in any action otherwise glorious greatly diminisheth its lustre So Hercules is more esteem'd for having slain the Nemaean Lion with his club then Lysimachus for having taken away the life of another by dextrously thrusting his hand wrap'd up in a piece of cloth into his open'd throat and so strangling him of which no other reason can be given but that the former kil'd him by his cunning and the other by plain strength Moreover General things are made of Particular duels and single fights are little pictures of battles Now every one knows what difference there is between him that overcomes his Enemy without any foul play and another that makes use of some invention or artisice to get advantage of him For though Duels are justly odious to all good men yet he that hath behav'd himself gallantly therein even when he is overcome gains more Honour then he that by some fraud
hath gotten the life of his Enemy Indeed the word Virtue coming from the Latine which signifies Man implyes that to be virtuous 't is requir'd to overcome as a Man and leave tricks sleights and subtleties to Women to supply their weakness and yet Women too when they see the masculine vigorous deportment and feats of Arms of a Cavalier that has won the victory over his Enemy will prefer him before an other who hath had the same advantage without striking a blow Whence it appears that in all sort of Minds Generosity and Courage finds more favour then subtlety The Second said That the Emblem of the Wind and the Sun trying which should make the Traveller quit his Cloak attributing the mastery to the Sun above the Wind shews that Force is not alwayes the most efficacious For he who aimes to overcome must accomplish it by the most facile way which being ordinarily the gentlest because it finds least resistance brings about its designes more easily then violence which giving the Alarm makes every one stand upon his guard and renders all enterprizes dangerous Therefore the wise General who commits his affairs to Chance as little as he can assayes all other means before he comes to open force imitating a discreet Master of a Family who never falls to blows either in his house or out of it so long as he hath any hope from wayes of gentleness Moreover the means which peculiarly belong to Man ought to be prefer'd before those which are common to him with brutes yea in which they go beyond him And you see that they are not the most strong and robust that command in Monarchies and States but the most wise and prudent whose bodies are commonly more weak through their great watchings and toils and because these delicate bodies are more easie to be govern'd by the powers of the Soul which consequently are more worthily exercis'd therein The Third said That Philip of Macedon had reason to compare subtlety to the Foxes skin as force to the Lion's saying that the former was to be made use of when the latter hapened to be too short For he who employes subtlety in war thereby acknowledges his weaknesse which made an old Captain say when he was advis'd to set upon his Enemy in the night That he would win not steal a Victory For he that is vanquish'd onely by stratagem does not acknowledge himself worsted and they who make use of wiles when they think they have done they are alwayes to begin again as the Barretors who by some subtlety have procur'd a Verdict are never secure against new Sutes So a little man skill'd in wrastling may haply trip up his more sturdy Antagonist and so be counted more dextrous or nimble but not more strong then he Moreover since all actions take their rule from Justice which cannot consist with fraud he is not to be reputed a Conqueror that hath gotten a Victory unjustly The Fourth said That if we receive the judgement of the vanquish'd the Victors are alwayes faulty Therefore it matters not by what means we defeat our Enemies provided those means be lawful and transgress not the maxime of Divines That evil is not to be done to the end good may come of it This premiz'd 't is not onely lawfull for the chief of an Army but perfectly his duty to deprive his Enemies of all advantages before the fight in it and afterward besieging places defending them or giving them relief So Joshuah to encourage the Israelites to make an invasion into the land of Canaan caus'd Grapes of prodigious greatness which grew in that Country to be shew'd them in the Desart Cato to animate the Romans to the Carthaginian War let fall in the Senate some of the large African Figgs crying that there were but three days sail from the place where they grew An other by letting loose a Hare from the walls of Thebes thereby assur'd his Souldiers that they had to do onely with cowards since they suffer'd those Animals to come amongst them M. Antonius to exasperate the Romans against the murtherers of Caesar display'd his shirt to them all bloody And Augustus to convince them of ingratitude publish'd his Testament true or fictitious whereby he made those very murtherers his heirs Others of whom Examples are infinite by continual Alarms oblige their Enemies to watch and stand for some dayes in armes before the fight to the end to tire them out by those toiles they weaken them by delights cut off their provisions hinder their relief raise false reports and intercept Letters on purpose to abate their Courage or that of their Allies In the fight they strive to give their Enemies the disadvantage of the wind dust smoak and Sun in their faces they possess the highest and most advantagious places and drive them upon precipices ditches bogs and other incommodious places they let loose mad beasts upon them as Elephants of old to break their ranks and strike terror into them which others do also by their cryes words armes engines and other uncouth inventions the strangeness whereof making a great impression in their Minds puts them into disorder They make shew of assailing them on one side whilst on the other where they are weakest they give an assault in good earnest Some have overcome them by their celerity surprizing them asleep feasting playing or wearied others by a contrary stratagem get the better of them by patience undermining and consuming them by little and little After the fight when the Enemies are defeated they hinder them from getting together again in a body In brief all the sleight and artifice that humane invention can imagine to confound the counsels and dissipate the forces of the Enemy hath been in all times employ'd to that end and they who have best practis'd the same have gotten the name of great Captains Therefore Virgil had reason to say That it was not to be consider'd whether fraud or force were to be us'd against an Enemy but to conclude both are succesfully joyn'd together CONFERENCE LXIII I. Of Motion II. Of Custome I. Of Motion MOtion is consider'd variously in the Sciences By Metaphysicks inasmuch as Entity is divided into Moveable and Immoveable By Natural Philosophy as 't is an internal propriety of a Natural Body By Logick so far as 't is inseparable from Contrariety whereof it treats amongst the Opposites By Physick as being comprehended amongst the six things not-natural By Astronomy as it is annex'd to the Heavens and by them is the cause of all those here below By the Mechanicks as 't is the Agent of all their Engines And 't were to be wish'd for the perfection of the Mathematicks that as some of them treat of continuous Quantity permanent as Geometry others of discrete Quantity as Arithmetick considering them abstracted from their matter so there were some that treated purely of the nature and properties of continuous Quantity successive which is Motion For the doctrine of Motion
them by the underminings of the wicked and envious who are the greatest number then obtain new by performing as much good as he will either because they who are able to reward him are not always well inform'd thereof or because they want both the means and the will to do it Therefore although God would have us hope for Paradise yet he requires that we serve him in fear and draw neer to him with trembling So that the thing we most hope for eternal life mixing our hope with fear 't is not credible that any other thing is exempt from it Yet there are some fears without any hope Now the passion which acts powerfully alone is stronger then that which acts onely in the company of another The Second said That if the greatness of causes is to be judg'd by that of their effects that Passion must be strongest which leads us to the greatest attempts And so Hope will carry it above Fear since 't is that which makes a Souldier run up a breach and which hath induc'd so many illustrious men both ancient and modern to generous actions whereas Fear by its coldness chilling the spirits and penning them within renders them incapable of any action For all our actions depending on the dispositions of the spirits the instruments of all motions both Internal and External if these spirits be heated active and nimble as they are render'd by Hope then the Mind is boldly carry'd to the most difficult actions On the contrary if they be cool'd and fix'd by Fear then the soul finding her self enfeebled can do nothing but what is mean and pusillanimous The Third said To examine the power of Hope and Fear aright we must look upon them as two Champions who are to encounter But Fear already shews by the paleness of its Countenance that it wants Heart and yields to Hope which animates it self to the pursuite of the good it aims at by driving away all sort of Fear which would cause apprehension of obstacles and crosses opposing the enjoyment of that good Moreover Fear is contemptible and not found but in abject spirits whereas Hope resides in sublime souls where it produces actions worthy of its grandeur and original which is Heaven towards which men naturally lift their eyes in their adversities as Fear derives its original from below towards which it depresses the bodies and minds of those whom it possesses So that to compare Hope with Fear is to put Heaven in parallel with Earth The Fourth said That both these Passions belong to the Irascible Appetite both of them look to the future and are employ'd to surmount the difficulties which are presented to the Concupiscible Appetite Hope is the expectation of a good hard to be obtain'd yet apprehended possible It is found most frequently in young men because they live onely upon the future and 't is the Anchor of all unfortunate persons none of which are out of Hope of being deliver'd from their miseries 'T is Physick to all our evils never abandoning the most desperately sick so long as they breathe Yea 't is the refuge of all man-kind of what sex age or condition soever herein the more miserable in that being destitute of real good there remains no more for them but imaginary and phantastick Hence the Hebrews denote Hope and Folly by the same word Chesel The truth is as if the evils that oppress us were not numerous enough our souls frame and phancy infinite more through Fear which dreads as well that which is not as that which is being properly the Expectation of an approaching evil which gives horrour to our senses and cannot easily be avoided For men fear not the greatest evils but those which are most contrary to their nature Whence it is that they more apprehend the halter the gallies or infamy then falling into vices or losing the Grace of God For although these be the greatest evils of the world yet men do not acknowledge them such but by a reflection of the Understanding Hence also the wicked fear the wheel more then Hell because Gods punishments of sin are accounted slow and those of men speedy But to judge of the strength of Hope and Fear by their proper essence we must consider that Good being much less delightful to Nature then Evil is painful and sensible because Good onely gives a better being Evil absolutely destroyes being Fear which is the expectation of this Evil is much more powerful then Hope which is the expectation of that Good Which appears further by its effects far more violent then those of Hope for it makes the Hair stand an end and hath sometimes turn'd it white in one night it makes the Countenance pale the whole body quake and tremble the Heart beat and not onely alters the whole habit of it but perverts Reason abolishes Reason and Memory intercepts the use of Speech and of all the Senses so that it hath caus'd sudden death to divers persons But Hope never gave life to any Fear adds wings wherewith to avoid an Evil Hope barely excites to move towards Good In a word Fear needs sometimes the whole strength of all the Virtues to repress its violence and check its disorders CONFERENCE LXV I. Of the Intellect II. Whether the Husband and Wife should be of the same humour I. Of the Intellect THe Intellect is a Faculty of the Soul whereby we understand For of the Faculties some are without knowledge as the natural common to man and inanimate bodies and the vegetative which he hath in common with plants namely the powers of Nutrition Accretion and Generation others are with the knowledge And these again are either exercis'd without the use of Reason as the Internal and External Senses or else stand in need of Reason as the Intellect and the Rational Appetite which is the Will the former to distinguish true from false the latter good from evil Now as the Understanding acquires its notions from the inferior powers so it imitates their manner of perception and as sensible perception is passion so is intellectual and the intelligible species are receiv'd in the Intellect after the same manner that the sensible are in the organs of the outward senses For as their organs must be free from all the qualities whereof they are to judge so must the Understanding which is to judge of every thing be from all intelligible species yea more then the organs of the Senses For the Crystalline humour of the Eye hath tangible qualities the hand visible because the former is not destinated to touch withall nor the latter to see But the Intellect being to understand every thing because every thing is intelligible must be wholly clear of all Anticipations contrary to Plato's opinion who admitting a Transmigration of souls conceiv'd that entring into other bodies they carryed with them the species of things which they had known before but darkn'd and veil'd with the clouds and humidities of the bodies which recloth'd them
same with perfect freedom CONFERENCE LXVIII I. Of the Magnetical Cure of Diseases II. Of Anger I. Of the Magnetical cure of Diseases 'T Is requisite to agree upon the Facts before inquiry into Right Now many Authors report that wounds have been cur'd by the sole application of a certain Unguent which for this reason they call Armarium to the instrument or offensive weapon that made it And Goclenius a German Physitian affirms that he saw a Swedish Lady cure one of her servants so that had been hurt by a blow with a knife by his companion and that this cure is very common having been practis'd in presence of the Emperour Maximilian Yea that 't is ordinary for the Peasants of his Country to cure hurts in their feet by sticking the nails or thorns which made them in Lard or Bacon Many Farriers cure prick'd horses by digging up as much ground as their foot cover'd Behold the ordinary composition of the aforesaid Oyntment Take an ounce of the unctuous matter that sticks on the inside of the Scull of one hang'd and left in the air let it be gather'd when the Moon encreases and is in the Sign either of Pisces Taurus or Libra and as neer as may be to Venus of Mummie and man's blood yet warm of each as much of man's fat two ounces of Lin-seed-oyl Turpentine and Bole Armenick of each two drams mingle altogether in a Morter and keep the mixture in a long-neck'd glass well stop'd It must be made while the Sun is in the Sign Livra and the Weapon must be anointed with it beginning from that part which did the mischief from the point to the hilt if it be a thrust and from the edge if it be a cut or blow Every morning the Patient must wash his hurt with his own Urine or else with warm water wiping away the pus which would hinder unition The weapon must be swath'd as the wound uses to be and kept in a temperate place For otherwise they say the Patient will feel pain If you would hasten the cure the weapon must be dress'd often and if you doubt of the part which did the mischief it must be dip'd all over in unguent If the hurt be small 't will be enough to dress the weapon every other day washing the hurt every morning and evening But this is not to be practis'd in wounds of the Arteries Heart Liver and Brain because it would be to no purpose Now by the nature of the ingredients and their conformity with us their effect seems to be natural and grounded upon the sympathy that there is between the blood issu'd from the wound and remaining on the weapon and that which is left in the wounded body so that the one communicates to the other what good or evil it receives although it be separated from the whole As they affirm that those whose leg or arm is cut off endure great pains when those parts that were lop'd off corrupt in the earth Which happens not if they be carefully embalm'd So the Bee the Viper and the Scorpion heal the hurts made by themselves Of which no other reason is alledg'd but this correspondence and similitude of the parts to their whole the bond of which is very strong although to us invisible The Second said There 's no need of recurring to these superstitious remedies since Nature of her own accord heals wounds provided they be not in the noble parts and be kept clean from the impurities generated in them through their weakness which hinder unition which is an effect of the natural Balsam of the blood and therefore not to be attributed to those Chimerical inventions which have no affinity with the cure whereunto they are intitl'd For every natural agent is determin'd to a certain sphere of activity beyond which it cannot act so the fire burns what it touches heats what approaches it but acts not at any remote distance whatever Moreover time and place would in vain be accounted inseparable accidents from natural motions if this device held good considering that contact is requisite to every natural action which is either Mathematical when surfaces and extremities are together or Physical when the agents touch the Patients by some vertue that proceeds from them Neither of which can be unless the body which heals touches that which is heal'd For all Medicinal effects being to be referr'd to Elementary qualities there is none of them more active then heat which being circumscrib'd within its bounds even in the aliment of fire can be no less elsewhere The Third said That the doctrine of the common Philosophy which teacheth that natural agents always touch one the other is erroneous or else ill explain'd and dependent upon other false principles which attribute all actions to elementary qualities which are taken for univocal causes whereas themselves are but equivocal effects of other supream causes the first of which is Heaven For when God created the world immediately with his own hands he was pleas'd to commit the conduct of natural causes to the Heavens that he might not be oblig'd to make every day new miracles as were those of the Creation For this end he fill'd them with spirits sufficient to inform all sorts of matters whose mixture requir'd some new form and change This made the Philosopher say that the Sun and Man beget Man and Hermes in his Smaragdine Table that the things which are below are as those which are on high And the Astrologers hold that there is nothing here below but hath some proper and peculiar Star some of which appear but far more appear not in the Heavens in regard of their disproportion to our sight or their neer conjunction as in the milky way But if the respective correspondencies of all the Celestial Bodies be not so clearly evident in other sublunary bodies as that of the Pole-star is with the Load-stone of dew with the Sun of this and the Moon with the Heliotrope and Selenotrope yet are they no less true 'T is credible therefore that the Weapon-salve hath such sympathy with the Constellation which is to make the cure of the wound that by its magnetick vertue it attracts its influence from Heaven and reunites it as a Burning-glass doth the Sun-beams at as great distance by which means it is deriv'd to the instrument that made the wound communicating its healing vertue to the same as the Sun likewise communicates his heat to the earth which heats us afterwards and thus this instrument being indu'd with a sanative vertue communicates the same to the wound made by it the cure of which besides the form and connexion of the instrumental cause with the effect is further'd by Nature which always tends to preserve it self and the imagination of the wounded person which induces Hippocrates to require that the Patient have hope and confidence in his Physitian for this as its contrary ruines many by dejecting their strength doth miracles towards a recovery
And as gesture is more expressive then words so á contempt signifi'd by it touches more to the quick then any other because he that contemns us with a simple gesture accounts us unworthy of all the rest Now if this contempt be offer'd in the presence of those that honour us or by whom we desire to be valu'd and admir'd it excites our choler the more if it be truth which always displeases us when it tells our defects especially by the mouth of our enemy But none are so soon provok'd as they that are desirous of some good For then the least things incense because desire being of an absent good cannot subsist with the least present evil the object of anger because of their contrariety importuning the actions of the soul which is troubled in the pursute of good by the presence of evil Whence saith Aristotle there needs but a small matter to anger Lovers sick people indigent those that miscarry in their affairs and are excruciated with hunger or thirst 'T is therefore an error to say that choler is the cause of anger and 't is vain to purge this humour in order to remedy this passion since the cause is external not internal and is form'd first in the brain by the imagination of an injury receiv'd after which the Soul desirous of revenge stirs the motive power this the blood and spirits which cause all the disorders observ'd in angry persons The Fourth said That disorders caus'd by Anger are not to be wonder'd at since 't is compos'd of the most unruly passions love hatred grief pleasure hope and boldnesse For the source of anger is self-love we hate him that doth the injury we are troubled at the offence and receive contentment in the hope of being reveng'd and this hope gives boldnesse Now Anger is one of the most deform'd and monstrous passions so violent that it enervates not onely the contractive motion of the Heart by dilating it too much and sending forth the blood and spirits which cause an extraordinary heat and force in all the members and sometimes a Fever but also that of dilation by shutting it too much in case the grief for the evil present be great and there be hopes of revenging it The Countenance looks pale afterwards red the Eye sparkles the Voice trembles the Pulse beats with violence the Hair becomes stiff the Mouth foams the Teeth clash the Hand cannot hold the Mind is no longer in its own power but is besides it self for some time Anger not differing from Rage but in duration Which made a Philosopher tell his servant That he would chastise him were he not in Anger And the Emperor Theodosius commanded his Officers never to execute any by his command till after three dayes and the Philosophers Xenodorus to counsel Augustus not to execute any thing when he found himself in choler till after he had repeated softly the twenty four letters of the Greek Alphabet The truth is if this passion be not repress'd it transports a man so out of himself that he is incens'd not against men onely but even against beasts plants and inanimate things such was Ctesiphon who in great fury fell to kicking with a mule and Xerxes who scourg'd the Sea Yea it reduces men to such brutality that they fear not to lose themselves for ever so they may but be reveng'd of those that have offended them as Porphyrie and Tertullian did the former renouncing Christianity and the other embracing Montanus's Heresie to revenge themselves of some wrong which they conceiv'd they had receiv'd from the Catholicks And our damnable Duels caus'd by this passion have oftentimes to satisfie the revenge of one destroy'd two Body and Soul CONFERENCE LXIX I. Of Life II. Of Fasting I. Of Life THe more common a thing is the more difficult it is to speak well of it witnesse sensible objects the nature whereof is much in the dark to us although they alwayes present themselves to our senses Thus nothing is more easie then to discern what is alive from what is not and yet nothing is more difficult then to explicate the nature of Life well because 't is the union of a most perfect form with its matter into which the mind of man sees not a jot even that of accidents with their subject being unknown although it be not so difficult to conceive as the first Some have thought that the form which gives life is not substantial but onely accidental because all except the rational arise from the Elementary Qualities and accidents can produce nothing but accidents But they are mistaken since whereas nothing acts beyond its strength if those forms were accidents they could not be the causes of such marvellous and different effects as to make the fruits of the Vine Fig-tree c. and blood in Animals to attract retain concoct expell and exercise all the functions of the Soul which cannot proceed from heat alone or any other material quality Besides if the forms of animated bodies were accidents it will follow that substance which is compounded of Form as well as of Matter is made of accidents and consequently of that which is not substance contrary to the receiv'd Axiom Therefore Vital Forms are substances though incomplete whose original is Heaven the Author of Life and all sublunary actions The Second said That the Soul being the principle of Life according to the three sorts of Souls there are three sorts of Life namely the Vegetative Sensitive and Rational differing according to several sublimations of the matter For the actions of attracting and assimilating food and the others belonging to Plants being above those of stones and other inanimate things argue in them a principle of those actions which is the Vegetative Soul Those of moving perceiving imagining and remembring yet nobler then the former flow from the Sensitive Soul But because the actions of the Intellect and the Will are not onely above the matter but are not so much as in the matter as those of Plants and Animals being immanent and preserv'd by the same powers that produc'd them they acknowledge for their principle a form more noble then the rest which is the Rational Soul the life of which is more perfect And as the Plantal Life is the first and commonest so it gives the most infallible vital tokens which are nutrition growth and generation Now that all three be in all living bodies For Mushrooms live but propagate not as some things propagate yet are not alive so bulls blood buried in a dung-hill produces worms others are nourish'd but grow not as most Animals when they have attain'd their just stature yea not every thing that lives is nourish'd for House-leek continues a whole year in its verdure and vivacity being hung at the seeling Nor dos every thing grow alike for we see Dodder which resembles Epithymum clinging to a bunch of grapes or other fruit hanging in the Air grows prodigiously without drawing any nourishment from it
of the Book of seven horns of the Lamb and seven eyes which are the seven Spirits of God sent throughout all the earth of the seven heads and seven questions of the Dragon of the seven heads of the Woman which are seven hills of seven Kings seven Angels seven Trumpets seven vials seven plagues The Scripture makes mention of seven resurrections to that of our Saviours The 1. of the Widows Son of Sarepta by Elias The 2. of the Shunamite's Son by Elisha The 3. of the Souldier who touch'd the bones of that Prophet The 4. of the Daughter of the Ruler of the Synagogue The 5. of the Widows Son of Naim The 6. of Lazarus And the 7. of our Lord. The Rabbins say that God employ'd the power of this Number to make Samuel so great as he was his name answering in value of the Letters to the Hebrew word which signifies seven whence Hannah his Mother in her thanks to God saith That the barren had brought forth seven Solomon spent seven years in building Gods Temple Jacob serv'd seven years for Leah and as many for Rachel The wall of Jericho fell down at the sound of Joshuah's seven Trumpets after the Israelites had gone seven times about it on the seventh day Nabuchadononosor did penance for his pride seven years amongst the beasts Moreover there are seven Penitential Psalms The Nile and the Danow have seven mouths There are seven hills at Rome Prague and Constantinople Noah entred into the Ark with seven persons and seven pairs of all clean Animals After seven dayes the waters fell from Heaven during seven times seven dayes On the seventh moneth the Ark rested upon the Mountain of Ararat The Ecclesiastes limits mourning to seven dayes There were seven years of plenty and as many of famine in Aegypt There were seven Lamps in the Tabernacle typifying seven gifts of the Spirit The Jews ate unleavened bread seven dayes and as many celebrated the Feast of Tabernacles They let their land rest every seventh year and after seven times seven had their Jubilee The strength of Sampson lay in seven locks of his Hair There are seven Sacraments in the Church as in Heaven seven Planets seven Pleiades seven Stars in the two Bears The Periodical course of the Moon is made in four times seven days at each of which septenaries it changes its face In brief there were seven miracles of the World and seven Sages of Greece There are seven Electors seven liberal Arts seven pairs of Nerves seven Orifices serving for gates to the Senses Natural sleep is limited to seven hours and this Number is by some justly esteem'd the knot or principal band of all things and the symbol of Nature The Fifth said It was not without cause that Augustus was so extreamly fearful of the Climactericals that when he had pass'd his 63d year he writ in great joy to all his friends but he dy'd in the second Climacterick after his 77th year consisting of eleven septenaries which was also fatal to Tiberius Severus T. Livius Empedocles S. Augustin Bessarion as the sixty third was to Aristotle Cicero who also was banish'd in his Climacterick of 49 Demosthenes Trajan Adrian Constantine S. Bernard the blessed Virgin and many others And the next Climacterick of 70 to three of the Sages of Greece to Marius Vespasian Antoninus Golienus David who was also driven from his Kingdom by his Son at his sixty third year and committed his adultery and homicide at his forty nineth both climactericals And as much might be observ'd of the fates and actions of other men were regard had of them Our first Father dy'd at the age of 931 years which was climacterical to him because it contains in it self seven times 133. Lamech dy'd at 777 years climacterical likewise as Abraham dy'd at 175 which contains 25 times seven Jacob at 147 consisting of 21 times seven Judas at 119 made of 17 times seven the power of which Climactericals many make to extend to the duration of States which Plato conceiv'd not to be much above 70 weeks of years The Sixth said That regular changes proceeding necessarily from a regular cause and no motion being exactly regular in all nature but that of the Heavens supposing there be climacterical years and not so many deaths and remarkable accidents in all the other numbers of days moneths and years had they been all as carefully observ'd as some of them have been their power of alteration cannot but be ascrib'd to the celestial bodies That which befalls us every seventh year arises hence as every Planet rules its hour so it makes every day moneth and year septenary beginning by Saturn and ending at the Moon which governs the seventh and therein causes all mutations which acquire malignity by the approach of Saturn presiding again over the eighth which is the cause why births in the eighth moneth are seldom vital II. Of Shame Upon the second Point it was said That the Passions consider evil and good not only absolutely but also under certain differences Desire hath regard to absent good not in general but in particular sometimes under the respect of Riches and then 't is call'd Covetousness sometimes of Honour and then 't is call'd Ambition sometimes of Beauties and then 't is an amorous inclination So grief looks upon present evil if it be in another it causes compassion in us if in our selves and apprehended prejudicial to our honour it causes shame which is a grief for an evil which we judge brings ignominy to us a grief so much the greater in that no offence goes more to the quick then that which touches our reputation It occasion'd the death of a Sophist because he could not answer a question and of Homer because he could not resolve the riddle of the Fishers and of others also upon their having been non-plus'd in publick For as nothing is more honorable then vertue and knowledge so nothing is so ignominious as ignorance and vice nor consequently that makes us so much asham'd being reproaches of our falling short of our end which is to understand and to will and so of being less then men but as Plato said Monsters of nature But amongst all the vices Nature hath render'd none so shameful as that of lasciviousness whereof not only the act but also the gestures and signs cause shame Hence an immodest or ambiguous word and a fix'd look make women and children blush whom shame becomes very well being the guard of chastity and the colour of vertue as it ill becomes old men and persons confirm'd in vertue who ought not to commit any thing whereof they may be asham'd The Second said That shame is either before vice and the infamy which follows it or after both In the first sence shame is a fear of dishonour In the second 't is a grief for being fallen thereinto Neither of the two is ever wthout love of honesty but lies between the two extreams or sottish and rustick
others and the Apostle saith Widows in deed are worthy of double honour The Conjugal hath also made Penelope renown'd and hath for example the Etnaean fish of which the male and female never part The Second said Virgineal Chastity is not absolutely vertuous of it self having been practis'd by Pagans and Idolaters who devoted themselves to their false gods and being found in children newly born which cannot be said of vertues which are acquir'd by precepts and good manners not by nature Moreover it may be lost without sin as in Virgins violated or those that are married yea sometimes with merit as when Hosea the Prophet took a Harlot to wife by God's express command And being once lost it cannot be repair'd by repentance as other vertues may Whence S. Jerome writing to Eustochium saith that God who is able to do all things yet cannot restore virginity 'T is therefore commendable so far as it is referr'd to God in which case 't is a most admirable thing and the more because 't is above nature which by Marriage peoples the Earth but Virginity peoples Heaven where there shall be no marrying but we shall be as the Angels of God who being a pure Spirit loves purity above all things The Third said That Virginity is wholly contrary to the nature of man who desires nothing so much as immortality which being not attainable in his own person he seeks in his successors who are part of himself Yea it seems to have somewhat of insensibility the vicious excess of temperance since it wholly abstains from all pleasures some of which are lawful Therefore Plato sacrific'd to Nature as if to make her satisfaction for his having continu'd a virgin all his life and the Romans laid great fines upon such as would not marry as on the other side they granted immunities to those that brought children into the world whence remains at this day the right of three four and five children observ'd still amongst us those that have five children being exempted from Wardships Yea among the Jews it could not be without reproach since sterility was ignominious among them and was accounted the greatest curse Moreover Marriage not only supplies Labourers Artisans Souldiers and Citizens to the State but Kings and Princes to the People Prelates and Pastors to the Church and a Nursery to Paradise which would not be peopled with Virgins did not the married give them being Whence S. Austustin justly makes a Question Who merited most before God Abraham in Marriage or S. John Baptist in the Virgineal State The Fourth said That being things are term'd vertuous when they are according to right reason which requires that we make use of means proportionately to their end therefore Virginity is a vertue and the more sublime in that it is in order to the most excellent end namely the contemplation of Divine Mysteries For amongst the goods of men some are external as riches others of the body as health others of the soul amongst which those of the contemplative life are more excellent then those of the active As therefore 't is according to right reason that external goods are made subservient to those of the body and these to the goods of the soul so is the denying the pleasures of the body the better to intend the actions of the contemplative life as Virginity do's which freeing us from carnal thoughts affords us more convenience to mind the things of God and to be pure in body and spirit 'T is therefore the end which makes Virginity to be vertuous Whence those Roman Vestals and the Brachmans among the Indians who abstain'd wholly from Marriage nevertheless deserve the name of Virgins And Spurina mention'd by Valerius Maximus so chaste that perceiving himself as much lov'd by the Thuscan Ladies as he was hated by their Husbands disfigur'd his face with voluntary wounds had indeed some shadow but not the body of this vertue The invention of Gaila and Papa Daughters of Gisuphe Duke of Friuli was much more ingenious who at the sacking of their City beholding the chastity of their sex prostituted to the lust of the Souldiers fill'd their laps with stinking flesh whose bad smell kept those from them who would have attempted their honour The fifth said That the excellence of Virgineal Chastity is such that it hath no vitious excess for the more we abstain from pleasures the more pure we are And as it is blemish'd many wayes so it is preserv'd by many others Amongst which is first Employment or Business whence Cupid in Lucian excuses himself to his Mother that he could not wound Minerva because he never found her idle Modesty is also the Guardian of it as to appear seldome in publick whence the Hebrews call'd their Virgins Almach which signifies Recluses Moreover dishonest gestures words and looks are to be avoided And amongst corporeal means Abstinence and Maceration of the body are very effectual as amongst Aliments such as are cold as Nenuphar or Water-lilly call'd therefore Nymphaea and Lettice which the Pythagoreans for this reason Eunuch and under which upon the same account the Poets feign Venus to have hid Adonis As likewise the leaves of Willows bruised the ashes of Tamarisk and the flowers of Agnus Castus which is a sort of Ozier so call'd by the Greeks because the Athenian Ladies lay upon them during the festivals of Ceres to represse the ardour of Love whereof they say such are not sensible as have drunk wine wherein the fish nam'd Trigla is suffocated or who have eaten Rue But because these remedies are not infallible Origen took another course making himself actually an Eunuch for fear of losing that rare treasure of Virginity whose loss is both inestimable and irreparable CONFERENCE LXXII I. Of Thunder II. Which of all the Arts is the most necessary I. Of Thunder AS Water and Earth are the grossest of the Elements so they receive most sensibly the actions of the Celestial Bodies chiefly the Sun's heat which exhaling and drawing up their purer parts vapours from the Water and exhalations from the Earth forms meteors of them And as the cold and moist vapours make tempests dew and frost in the lower Region and in the middle clouds rain hail snow Exhalations if fat and unctuous cause Comets in the higher Region and in the lower the two Ignes Fatui if dry and subtile they make Earth-quakes in the bowels of the Earth in its surface winds and tempests in the middle Region of the Air Lightning Fulgur or the Thunder-bolts and Thunder For these three commonly follow and produce one another Lightning is the coruscation or flashing of the matter inflam'd And though produc'd by Thunder yet is sooner perceiv'd then the other heard because the Sight is quicker then the Hearing by reason its object the visible species are mov'd in an instant but sound successively because of the resistance of the Air its medium Thunder is the noise excited by the shock and shattering of the
quantity of the Exhalations which cannot all get forth but in a long time or are not strong enough to break the gates of their prison The Fifth said That to move the most ponderous Body the Earth requires the most active of all Agents which is fire whose centre the Pythagoreans therefore plac'd in the middle of the Earth because the noblest Element deserves the noblest place which is the middle and for that 't is necessary to the generations which are made there Hence Maritime places where most Vulcano's are observ'd whose Fire is fed with the oylie and unctuous humours of the adjacent Sea are more obnoxious to Earthquakes and the last eruption of Mount Vesuvius was preceded by a horrible Earthquake As likewise the Island Sacrea above mention'd being first lifted up with a great noise and concussion open'd it self and cast forth flame and ashes as far as the City Lipara and some others of Italy Now according to the different matter of these Fires the concussions which they produce by attenuation of the inflam'd Air are different if it be nitrous they are very violent because Salt Petre being very Dry is suddenly fir'd in all its parts and being of a terrestrial nature takes up more room when inflam'd then Sulphur which is fat and aerious and consequently not so quickly inflameable in the whole but only in its surface by reason of its extreme humidity which checks the Fire and when it is inflam'd it takes not up so much room being of it self aerious and consequently needing less space when it is rarifi'd to be converted into Fire whence the tremors caus'd by it are less But when the matter which feeds those Fires is bituminous the tremors are moderate because Bitumen is of a middle nature between the two former Now because these materials when they begin to be inflam'd have not strength enough to make the Earth tremble till their Fire be increas'd proportionately to the enormous weight of the load which they are to move their first effect reaches no farther then to trouble and infect by their vapors the springs of Subterranean Waters as most susceptible of impression Hence according to the different taste smell and consistence of the water of Fountains and Wells some have fore-told Earthquakes as Apollonius saith that Pherecides having tasted the water of a spring in Scyros fore-told one which hapned three dayes after Moreover if these vapors infect the Air too the Earthquakes are follow'd by contagions The Sixth said That without determining the famous Question of the Earth's Motion it may be said that it moves about the Heaven as a stone in a circle it would have the same tremors and titubatious as those which Astronomers attribute to the Bodies of the Planets besides the regular motions of their spheres of which Agitations 't is not strange if Men who are mov'd with it discern not the differences so well as they do those of the Heavens since they who are in a Ship do not so well discern their own motion as that of others II. Of Envy Upon the Second Poynt it was said That 't is no wonder Man is so miserable since not onely the evil but also the good of others render him equally unhappy For if we think them unworthy of it it afflicts us and raises indignation If it begets sadnesse in us for not having obtain'd as much it causes Emulation but if this good disgusts us meerly because we are sorry that another enjoyes it it produces Envy and these several affections are not to be confounded For the two former are not any wayes vicious but oftentimes virtuous and signes of a Soul well dispos'd whereas the last is a grosse vice directly opposite to Charity which is the life of the Soul and to Humane Society violating virtue which is the principal bond of it and when the same is so bright and manifest as not to fear its assaults whose lustre it obscures as much as possible by its stinking breath and black calumnies Pride is the Mother of it Self-love the Father Treachery Dissimulation Detraction and Ruine its Daughters And as 't is the eldest of all vices so 't is the most enormous having cast Lucifer and millions of Angels out of Heaven and by his snares caus'd the fall of Man through the perswasion of the Woman who was ambitious to become a Goddess and who as more weak and proud is more inclin'd to this passion then Man Therefore Aristotle saith that the Peacock the proudest is also the most envious of all Animals The Second said Other Vices have alwayes some sort of pretext Covetousnesse the fear of want and Ambition doing service to the publick but Envy cannot find any because it malignes what ever is laudable and good out of it self herein much more pernicious then all other vices each of which is opposite but to one good as Lust to Continence Pride to Humility But this sets it self to ruine if it can all the goods of the Body of Forutne and of the Mind and so is a sworn Enemy of Mankind Such it was in extremity in that Man-hater Timon who invited all his fellow Citizens to come and hang themselves upon his Fig-tree before he cut it down to build with in one Mutius a Roman who being very sad it was said of him Either some Evill is hapned to Mutius or some good to some other For the Envious looks only askew upon others prosperity the thought of which incessantly gnaws his heart and consumes him by drying up the blood in his veins Which made the Poets represent Envy in the shape of a squinting woman with a dull dejected countenance of a livid complexion her head wreath'd with vipers and all the rest of the body lean and ugly Physitians say Melancholy persons are most subject to it by reason of that black humour which produces and is produc'd by it 'T was through envy that Tyberius put to death an excellent Architect being unable to behold with a good eye a pendant Porch which he had built and much less his invention of malleable Glass and it so tormented the spirit of Caligula that he burnt all he could of Virgil's Works and he could not endure the sight of handsome youths but caus'd their goodly locks to be cut off that they might become deform'd The Third said That envy as vicious as it is hath nevertheless some utility not only amongst private persons to excite emulation amongst Artists and make them strive who shall sell the best peny-worths but also for the State it being held a political maxime to hinder as much as possible the grandeur of neighbouring States And the Ostracism of Athens although a balance to preserve democratical equality was nevertheless an effect of Envy against such as had gotten most credit and authority in the City whom they banish'd for ten years Yea had envy no other good in it but to afford occasion of exercising vertue it were not unprofitable The attempt to
foal'd whence it must be taken betimes else the Mare bites it off and if she be deceiv'd of it never affects the foal afterwards and therefore 't is call'd by Virgil Matri praereptus Amor. The same effect is attributed to the seed of Mares to a plant call'd Hippomanes and by Pliny to the hair of a Wolfs tail the fish Remora the brain of a Cat and a Lizard and by Wierus to Swallows starv'd to death in an earthen pot the bones of a green Frog excarnated by Pismires the right parts of which he saith conciliate Love and the left hatred But to shew the vanity and impurity of these inventions most Philtres are taken from Animals generated of corruption excrements and other filthy and abominable things and commonly all rather excite Fury then Love as appears by many to whom Cantharides have been given and Caligula who was render'd mad by a drink of his wife Cesonia one Frederick of Austria and the Poet Lucretius by a Philtre given him by his Wife Lucilia Love is free and fixes not by constraint 't is not taken in at the mouth but the eyes the graces of the body being the most powerful charm as Olympia Wife of Philip of Macedon acknowledg'd when being jealous that her Husband lov'd a young Lady that was said to have given him amorous potions the Queen sent for her and having beheld her great Beauty said that she had those Philtres in her self Now if these gifts of the body be accompany'd with those of the mind and the party endu'd therewith testifie Love to another 't is impossible but the affection will become mutual Love being the parent of Love whence the Poets feign'd two Cupids Eros and Anteros and Ovid an intelligent person in this matter knew no surer course then this Vt ameris amabilis esto The Fourth said Love is a spiritual thing and consequently produc'd by means of the same nature Hence an ill report which is a thing not onely incorporeal but commonly phantastical and imaginary extinguishes all Love for a person otherwise lovely as to the graces of the body And the choice between equal Beauties shews that Love is not founded upon the outside Wherefore they take the wisest course to get themselves lov'd who use inductions and perswasions which are the common means to make marriages By all which it appears that Amorous Madness is a distemper of the mind and as such to be cur'd CONFERENCE LXXVIII I. Why the Sensitive Appetite rules over Reason II. Whether Speech be natural and peculiar to Man I. Why the Sensitive Appetite rules over Reason APpetite is an inclination of every thing to what is good for it self There are three sorts in Man First the Natural which is in plants who attract their nourishment and also in some inanimate things as the Load-stone and Iron yea in the Elements as the dry earth covets water and all heavy bodies tend to their centre 'T is without Knowledge and Will even in Man for all natural actions are perform'd best in sleep Secondly the Sensitive common to Man and Beast which some erroneously deny to be a humane faculty because 't is the seat of the Passions the enemies of Reason which constitutes Man But the encounter of it with Reason argues their distinction Thirdly the Rational call'd the Will which is Mistress of the former two and besides makes use of Reason for the knowing of one or more things And because desire cannot be without knowledge therefore the Sensitive Appetite presupposes the knowledge of the Imagination and the Will that of the Understanding but the Natural Appetite depends on that of a First Cause which directs every natural form to its particular good though it know not the same Now 't is demanded how the Mistresse comes to obey the Servants notwithstanding the Maxime That the Will tends to nothing but what is good which cannot be without truth and this is not such unless it be approv'd by the Intellect It seems to me improper to say that the Sensitive Appetite prevails over Reason but rather hinders it by its disturbance from pronouncing sentence as a brawling Lawyer doth a Judge by his noise The Second said That Reason is alwayes Mistress For Men govern themselves according to Nature the universal rule of all things and this nature being rational they cannot be guided otherwise then the motions of Reason But some find Reason where other finds none The Thief accounts riches ill divided and therefore he may justly possess himself of what he wants and however he sees evil in the action yet he conceives more in his necessity which his Reason makes him account the greatest of all evils So that comparing them together he concludes the less evil to be good and wittingly attempts the crime not owning it for such whilst he commits it The same may be said of all other sins wherein the present sweetness exceeds the fear of future punishment If Conscience interpose they either extinguish it or else wholly forbear the action Unless the Mind happen to be balanc'd and then they are in confusion like the Ass which dy'd of hunger between two measures of corn not knowing which to go to For 't is impossible for the Will to be carry'd to one thing rather then another unless it find the one better and more convenient The Third said 'T is congruous to nature for the Inferior to receive Law from the Superior So Man commands over beasts and amongst Men some are born Masters and others slaves the Male hath dominion over the Female the Father over his Children the Prince over his Subjects the Body receives Law from the Soul the Matter from its Form the Angels of Inferior Hierarchies receive their intelligence from the Superior and the lower Heavens the rule of their motions from the higher the Elements are subject to the influences of those celestial bodies and in all mixts one quality predominates over the rest Since therefore the Sensitive Appetite is as much below Reason as a beast below a Man and the Imagination below the Intellect according to the same order establish'd in Nature Reason ought alwayes to have the command over it because having more knowledge 't is capable to direct it to its end But through the perversity of our Nature we more willingly follow the dictates of Sense then Reason of the Flesh then the Spirit because the former being more familiar and ordinary touch us nearer then Reason whose wholsome counsels move not our Will so much which being Mistress of all the faculties according to its natural liberty may sometimes command a virtuous action of whose goodnesse Reason hath inform'd it sometimes a vitious one by the suggestion of the Sensitive Appetite which makes it taste the present sweetness and delight whose attraction is greater then that of future rewards promis'd by virtue to her followers Hence the Law of the members so prevails over the law of the mind as sometimes wholly to eclipse the
and use specially by the hearing whnce people deaf by nature are also dumb yea 't is very peculiare to man Wherefore Speech is improperly figuratively artificially or else miraculously ascrib'd to other things as when The Heavens are said to declare the glory of God one deep to call on another c. When Balaams Ass spoke 't was by Miracle But when Magus's dog spoke to Saint Peter 't was by operation of the Devil as also what is reported of the two Pigeons the Oke at Achilles's Horse the keel of Argo and that Elm of the Gymnosophists mention'd by Philostratus to have saluted Apollonius at his arrival as the River Causus bid Pythagoras good-morrow But Speech properly belongs onely to man other creatures are incapable of it both because they want Reason which is the principle of it and organs which are a tongue a palate teeth and lipps all rightly proportionated for the articulation of voice for man's tongue alone is soft large moveable and loose to which qualities those of Pies and Parrots come nearest The Third said A natural thing is either born with us as sense and motion or comes afterwards of it self as laughter or whereof we are naturally capable and inclin'd to as Arts and Sciences In the first and second signification speech is not natural to man who could not speak without learning whence the two children caus'd by Psammetichus King of Egypt to be nurs'd in a Desart by two dumb Nurses pronounc'd no other word but Bec which they had heard of the Goats But in the last signification 't is peculiar to man who is so inclin'd to it that were children let alone from their Cradle they would in time make some language by signs or words 'T is to be understood too that 't is articulate speech such as may be written that is peculiar to man not inarticulate which though a natural sign of the affections within yet cannot properly be called speech because found also in beasts whose jargon Apollonius and some others are said to have understood for hearing the chattering of a Swallow to her companions he told those that were present that this bird advertis'd the others of a sack of Wheat fallen off an Asse's back neer the City which upon trial was found to be true CONFERENCE LXXIX I. What the Soul is II. Of the apparition of Spirits I. What the Soul is THe difference of inanimate living and dead bodies manifestly evince the existence of a soul. But its essence is so unknown that Philosophers doubt in what degree of Category to put it For 't is of that kind of things which are not known by themselves but only by their effects as local motion and substance which is not perceptible but by its accidents So the outward shape of animated bodies acquaints us with their inward form For the soul shapes all the external parts after the same manner as Plants and Animals of the same species have commonly their leaves and members of the same external figure whereas you scarce find two stones or other inanimate bodies of the same shape The Second said That the soul according to Aristotle is the first act of a natural body organiz'd having life in power or potentially Meaning by act perfection which he expresses by the word Entellechie which signifies to be in its end and form which two are the same in natural things 'T is call'd Form upon account of its beauty and divine from heaven its original and 't is the first of all other second acts which are produc'd by it such as all vital actions are For as in the most imperfect of beings Matter there is a First or remote power as in water to become fire another second or next as in the same water to become air by rarefaction so in the nature of Forms the noblest created Beings there is a First act the source of all vital actions and a Second comprehending the faculties and functions Now this Soul is not a pure act as God and Angels are but an act of the Body on whom it depends either in its being and preservation or else only in operation Hence Sensitive and Vegetable Souls cease to be upon the change of the dispositions which produc'd and supported them The reasonable Soul too in some manner depends upon the Bodies disposition as to its operation not as to its being and preservation being immaterial and immortal 'T is call'd an act of a natural Body to distinguish it from Machines or Engines which move artificial and inanimate Bodies organical because Organs are requisite to its action It must also have life in power that is be able to exercise the vital functions For want of which a carcase though organiz'd yet cannot be said to be animated no more then Egges and Seed for want of Organs although they have life in power The Third said He was of Pythagoras's opinion who call'd it a number there being nothing in the world wherewith it hath more correspondence and proportion 'T is one in its essence it makes the binary which is the first number by its conjunction with the body and division of its Faculties into the Intellect and Will the ternary by its three species of soul Vegetative Sensitive Rational the quaternary by the four qualities constituting the temper requisite to its introduction into the body of which four numbers put together is form'd the number ten whence all others proceed as from simple Apprehension Enuntiation Argumentation and Method which are the four operations of the reasonable soul whence all its notions proceed The Fourth said 'T is not enough to say with the Philosopher that the soul is an act or perfection or that by whose means we live it must be shewn what this act is whether Substance or Accident Pythagoras by calling the soul a number moving it self reduces it under Quantity According to Galen who acknowledges no other Soul but the Temper 't is a Quality as also according to Clearchus who defines it harmony Of those who believ'd the soul a substance some have call'd it the purest part of some Element as Heraclitus of fire Anaximenes of air and Thales of water none of earth in regard of its gross matter Critelaus said 't was a Quintessence Democritus a substance compos'd of round Atoms and therefore easily movable Now the soul is a substance not an accident because it composes a substance making with the body a total by it self Nor is it Quantity because Quantity is not active much less a self-moving number because number is an Entity of Reason and nothing is mov'd of it self but of some other Nor is it any of the four qualities which being indifferent of themselves must be determin'd by some form much less a temper which is found in all mixts of which some are inanimate nor a harmony for this is compos'd of contrarieties but the soul is simple and consequently not susceptible of contraries 'T is therefore an incorporeal substance otherwise were
sign so neither is an effect to be infer'd from one line so and so but from many together although they are commonly fallacious too unless the inclinations likewise be known by Physiognomy and Astrology The Fifth said All effects are either natural or free those come from a necessary and infallible which hath no affinity with the lines of the hand erroneously alledg'd to signifie the same and these being from the Will cannot be caus'd by a concurrence of lines differing either fortuitously or according to the various situations of the bones or several foldings of the child's hands in his mothers belly or by different exercises and variety of Climates they of hot Countries having scorch'd skins and more lines otherwise configurated then Northern people and Artisans then Courtiers and idle people And so there would need different rules of Palmistry according to Countries and qualities which is absurd The truth is if any thing may be conjectur'd 't is from the parts which contribute something to what they are signes of So a large fore-head may be the note of good capacity because it shews that the Ventricles of the Brain are large and a bony and sinewy man is with reason judg'd strong But the hand can afford no indication if you except its largenesse or thicknesse by proportion of which with the other parts that are not seen one may judge of its strength 'T is therefore a fallacious Art which takes that for a cause and a sign which is nothing lesse The sixth said Chiromancy is of two sorts Physical or Astrological The former is grounded upon the same principles with Physiognomy and is a part of it discovering by the several accidents of the hand it s own temper with that of the whole body and consequently the manners and inclinations Hence the Chiromancers affirm with great probability that those that have thick hands have the other parts which are unseen alike and consequently a dull wit and so on the contrary But that which is purely Astrological and is founded upon imaginary principles seems not only faulty but very ridiculous yea and pernitious too and therefore is prohibited by Laws both Humane and Divine II. Which is the noblest part of the Body Upon the Second Point 't was said That man's body being a structure compos'd of many parts not onely similary as in plants and stones but organical destinated to each action which being their end will also be the measure and standard of their noblenesse as Officers and Ministers of State or Family are esteem'd according to their imployment Now an Animals noblest action is Life and therefore the Heart the author thereof and source of heat and spirits is the noblest of all parts Moreover Aristotle sayes it lives first and dyes last and is in the little world what the Sun is in the great imparting light and motion to all the parts of the body as the Heavens do to all sublunary things Therefore many Animals want other parts but none a heart which is so absolutely necessary that its least wound is mortall The Second said Whether Nobility betaken from Antiquity or necessity the Liver is the noblest of all For the Animal at first lives the life of a Plant and so needed nourishment first the supplying of which being the Livers office it is therefore form'd before any of the entrails Nor could we exercise our senses or reasonable actions if we were not nourish'd the functions of all faculties ceasing as soon as the Livers provision is spent Yea no animal action can be perform'd without spirits the matter of which is blood elaborated in the Liver Which as 't is the cause of the four humours and consequently of Health or Sicknesse so 't is the seat of Love the noblest of all the passions The Third said As much nobler as the species is then the Individual comprehended under it so much are the parts serving to its conservation nobler then others which conserve onely the particular Therefore Galen reckons them among the principal parts They serve to enliven the body whose temper colour beauty voice and other qualities their deprivation not only destroys but also changes the manners of the Mind and extinguishes Courage as appears in cocks when castrated Add hereunto that they are hardest to be tam'd and therefore most noble The Fourth said That Generation being common to men not onely with beasts but also with plants being an action of the natural faculty it cannot be the noblest action of man but rather the Understanding which being exercis'd in the brain the seat of the Rational Soul this without dispute is the noblest of all whence 't is call'd Heaven by Homer a divine member by Plato and generally accounted the mansion of wisdom and temple of divinity which appears chiefly in the structure of its rete mirabile labyrinth and ventricles Moreover all the parts were made for the brain For man was born to understand and the intellectual faculty holds its seat in the brain To understand well it needed phantasmes and species which were to be receiv'd by the senses plac'd for that purpose in the head and to judge of the diversity of sensible objects it ought to have local motion and in order thereunto muscles tendons nerves and bones These actions of the Understanding are perform'd by help of the Animal Spirits the matter whereof are the vital of the Heart as the matter of these are the natural whence learned men are commonly lean and unhealthy because their natural spirits go to the brain instead of being carry'd to the parts in order to nutrition The Fifth said That to omit Aesop's opinion who prefer'd the tongue before any other part and found it most powerful to do either good or evil the hand seem'd to him as much more excellent then the brain as the active is to be estimated above the contemplative Therefore Aristotle calls it the Organ of Organs and 't is the symbol of faith strength and civility whence remain still the termes of kissing the hands CONFERENCE LXXXII I. Which is most powerful Art or Nature II. Whether Wine is most to be temper'd in Winter or in Summer I. Which is most powerful Art or Nature THe power of Nature and Art cannot be better judg'd then by their opposition yet how should any be between them whilst Art can do nothing without Nature For if the hand be off of Industry 't was Nature that made it a hand If the Sword be valued for the Art which fashion'd it and brought it into a condition to give Law to him that hath none 't is to the Iron produc'd by Nature in the Mines that it owes its matter And thus making the same induction through all disciplines 't will be found that they cannot be imagin'd without Nature not Logick without natural reason nor Grammar without speech nor Speech without a tongue nor writing without ink and paper nor these without the matter whereof they are made no more then a
recedes from a perpendicular falling upon the common surface of the two mediums as on the contrary entring into a less diaphanous medium out of one more diaphanous it breaks and Cones neerer a perpendicular then it would have done had it continu'd directly Secondly 'T is to be observ'd that bodies which cause reflection or refraction are either smooth or unequal and rough Smooth bodies make reflection and refraction with order and the reflected or refracted image resembles its object although it may be alter'd by the various figures of the reflecting or refracting bodies as convex Looking-glasses diminish it hollow enlarge it whereas on the contrary convex Perspective Glasses enlarge and concave lessen the object but both the Looking-glasses and the other represent the Image perfect Unequal and scabrous bodies reflect or refract confusedly without distinct representation of the Image because these Bodies being terminated with infinite little imperceptible surfaces looking every way they also reflect every way as is seen in stones wood and other bodies of different ruggedness and so causing different reflections and refractions in the third place we must observe some prime properties of Looking-glasses as That if a species fall perpendicularly upon the surface 't is likewise perpendicularly reflected and consequently upon its own object as when the Eye beholds it self in the glass But if the species fall obliquely upon the glass it will be reflected as obliquely the other way making the angles of the incidence equal to those of reflection as when the Eye beholds something else then it self in the glass And an Eye constituted in the place where it may receive the reflection shall see the image of the object by help of the glass But if the mirror reflect no species to the place where the Eye is then the surface of the mirror shall appear so much more dark as the mirror is exact that is smooth and more opake the greater the light is As the Eye being in the place of reflection cannot bear the Sun-beams reflected from the mirror no more then the Sun it self but being in another place it shall see nothing but darkness and take the glass for a hole especially if it lie upon the ground Moreover a Convex Spherical glass hath this property that it represents the image very small and more small when the Eye and object are remote from the mirror which is small or appears such In which glasses also the Image never takes up the whole plane of the glass but a very small part of it Lastly Every object which appears lucid and not by its own light transmits light to us either by reflection or refraction after having receiv'd the same from some other luminous object From these truths here suppos'd but clearly demonstrated in the Catoptricks I conclude necessarily That the body of the Moon is not smooth but rough or scabrous For 't is manifest by its various faces that it borrows from the Sun the greater light of the two which appear in her the least whereof namely that which appears in the part which the Sun enlightens not in the increase and decrease many think to be her own which borrow'd light increases or diminishes according as she removes farther from or comes nearer to the Sun whence the diversity of her faces From which diversity of faces 't is concluded further that the figure of the face towards us is spherical convex either rough or smooth But smooth it cannot be because then it would represent the very Image of the Sun to us very small and in a small part of its face the rest remaining dark by the aforesaid observations of Looking-glasses wherefore it must be rough or unequal because the whole face appears lucid when 't is beheld by the Sun at the full and no image of the Sun appears distinctly in it For 't is certain that the Moon sends her borrow'd light by reflection and not by refraction otherwise she should be diaphanous and would appear most illuminated when near the Sun and be full in her conjunction and obscure in her full because she 's lower then the Sun and so in conjunction his light would appear through her and in her full which is her opposition the Sun's light would pass through her towards Heaven not towards us Wherefore as to the spots of the Moon it may be said in general that she is unequally seabrous and the dark parts are nearest smoothness and so make a more orderly reflection but another way then to the Earth the Angles of Incidence and Reflection being not dispos'd thereunto But they are not perfectly smooth because they transmit a little light to us which they could not do being perfectly smooth unless at a certain time when the Sun were so dispos'd as that his Image might be seen in those parts as in a Spherical Mirror The other more scabrous parts making a disorderly and irregular reflection are seen on all parts as if you fasten pieces of glass marble or the like smooth bodies to a wall enlighten'd by the Sun the rough parts of the wall will appear very bright and the smooth obscure But because we know not truly what is the matter of the Heavenly Bodies we can onely say for proof of this unevenness in the Moon 's body that the rougher parts are more hard and the less rough are liquid for then the liquor surrounding the centre of the Moon as the water doth about that of the earth will have a surface more approaching to smoothness as the water hath and this without inferring it compos'd of earth and water but of some celestial matter like to our elementary and whose fluidity or hardness doth not prejudice its incorruptibility those who hold the Heavens solid or liquid holding them equally incorruptible Unless we had rather say that the body of the Moon being all of the same hardness may nevertheless have parts unequally rough and smooth The Third said That he apprehended two causes of these spots First the diverse conformation of these celestial bodies which being no more perfectly round then the earth which nevertheless would appear spherical to us if it were luminous make shadows inseparable from bodies of other figure then the plain Secondly from the weakness of our Sight which as it phancies colours in the clouds which are not in them no more then the Air is blew though it appear to us and we paint it such so being dazled by a luminous body and the visual ray being disgregated it makes sundry appearances therein which can be onely dark and obscure in a thing which is lucid For I would not attribute these spots which represent the lineaments of a face to such a phancy as that of Antiphon who saw his own picture in the Air since they are observ'd by all people after the same manner but the weakness of our Sight may contribute something thereunto For if we say that every celestial body is an earth and that the bright part is
That the three sorts of goods being found in the reception of presents sent us by friends for they testifie the honour which they do us the least present brings some profit to the receiver and no benefit is receiv'd without some pleasure 't is no wonder if men who have from all time assign'd some day to every thing which they esteem'd good have also thought fit to solemnize the Feast of Presents or Benefits and to testifie their esteem thereof have made the Year begin by it for good augury Indeed nothing is so powerful as Presents because they make and reconcile amity the greatest Gift which God hath given to men They pierce the best-guarded Gates as Philip of Macedon said and Jupiter found nothing so fitting as a Golden-showre whereby to convey himself into Danae's lap Homer with his Muses is thrust out by the shoulders if he brings nothing with him whereas a course Varlet laden with booty is admitted even into the Closet Whereof men are so perswaded that there was never a Religion but had its offerings And God forbids any to come before him with empty hands Especially gifts are agreeable when the proportion of the receiver with the giver is observ'd So the poverty of the Greek Epigrammatist made Augustus well pleas'd with the peny which he presented to him But the price of a thing or in defect thereof its novelty or the excellence of the work-man-ship the place and time is most considerable this latter making such things as would have no acceptance at another season pass for courtesies in the beginning of the year CONFERENCE XCVI I. Of Place II. Of Hieroglyphicks I. Of Place ALL created things having a finite and circumscrib'd essence have also a proper place which serves for a bound to their nature which is the principle of their motions and actions which cannot be but in some place the six differences whereof namely above below before behind the right side and the left sufficiently prove its existence since differences presuppose a genus But its nature and essence is no less hard to be known then its existence is plain To omit the sundry considerations of its several Sciences here we understand by place that which contains things plac'd and 't is either common to more or proper to one alone this either external or internal and generally 't is either Physical or Mathematical or rather the same sometimes provided and sometimes devested of accidents in its pure dimensions This place cannot be the space of every body because space is nothing else but a vacuum which is wholly opposite to place which being an affection ' of body must be something of reality 'T is therefore well defin'd the first internal and unmoveable surface of the ambient body First that is immediate and proximate because it must be equal to the body which it contains internal for if it were the external surface it would be greater as vessels are larger then what they contain Lastly it must be immoveable which is not to be understood of the real place or real surface environing the body because this surface changes when the body changes place or whilst the body remains unmov'd the ambient air is chang'd every moment but of that place or imaginary surface which encompasses the body on all sides remaining always immoveable Which is more satisfactory then to say as some do that the place of bodies is immoveable although they and their surfaces change place because from thence to the centre and principal parts of the world there is always the same distance and respect The Second said That Aristotle shew'd more subtilety then truth when in stead of defining place internally corresponding to the extension of the parts he defin'd it by an outward circumference by which account Souls Angels and other spiritual substances should not be contain'd in a place as 't is certain they are though definitively not circumscriptively in regard they move from one place to another Yea the whole world should not have a place since it cannot be contain'd by any thing but contains all 'T is also incongruous to say with some that the place of the world is its centre which is too small to design the place of so great a body and if a point were the place of the world the place of a Pismire should be greater then that of the world What others say That place is only the extension of things cannot consist with the place of spiritual forms which yet have a distinct extension as other corporeal forms have and we change place every moment although we have always the same extension I conceive therefore the place being relative to the thing plac'd ought to be defin'd by it according to the nature of relatives and so place is nothing but the space occupi'd by the body plac'd which is that long broad and deep interval which receives the same Moreover space which would be void if one body did not succeed another hath all the conditions requisite to the nature of place For first 't is nothing of the thing plac'd being a pure nothing 2. 'T is immoveable being of it self incapable of motion 3. 'T is equal to the body plac'd the whole space answering to the whole body and every part to every part 4. It receives sometimes one body and sometimes another And lastly two equal spaces contain as much the one as the other The Third said That place defin'd the immoveable surface of an ambient body cannot agree to the air because its surface is not immoveable But if this immobility be meant of the whole body of the air this inconvenience will follow that the external surface of the air is not proportionate to the quantity of the particular body which it encompasseth The defining of place to be the space occupi'd by the body plac'd explicates the place of bodies but not of incorporeal things as the Soul and Angels which having no extension should have no space and consequently be in no place Wherefore I conceive that place being an external affection of figure and quantity must not be taken in the concave superficies of the body which touches it but in the convex of that which is contain'd And so this superficies will be immoveable since the quantity of the body remains the same and always equal to the body contain'd without penetration because it hath no profundity Likewise every body will be likewise in its own place And as for things incorruptible and incorporeal the Angels and the Heavens their place will be always the extremity of their substance The Fourth said That if there were any place in nature which receives bodies it must either be a body it self or a vacuum A body it cannot be for then two absurdities will follow namely penetration of dimensions one body being within another and a progress to infinity for place being a body it must be in another place this in a third this third in a fourth and so to
infinity Nor can it be a vacuum which receives bodies For either this vacuum remains after the admission of a body and so the same place will be full and empty both together or this vacuum recedes to make place for supervening bodies which cannot be for then it will be capable of local motion which is an affection and property of body Or else lastly this vacuum perishes and is annihilated which is impossible too for then it should be subject to generation and corruption which are found only in bodies Wherefore if ever the Scepticks had reason to suspend their judgement 't is in the nature of place which they justly doubted whether it were something or nothing The Fifth said That to doubt of place is to doubt of the clearest thing in the world nothing being so certain as the existence of things which cannot be but in some place And we see a thing no sooner exists in nature but it hath its place and its station which alone made the distinction of the parts of the world from their ancient Chaos in which things were confus'd and without order which is not found saving when every entity occupies the place due to its nature which is preserv'd therein Amongst simple bodies Heaven hath the highest place Fire and Air the next Water and Earth the lowest amongst mixts Minerals and Metals are form'd in the Entrails of the Earth Plants and Animals are preserv'd upon the earth and in the air and the centre of every thing is nothing else but its place Wherefore as God contains in himself all the perfections of his creatures so he is in all places by his presence his essence and his power II. Of Hieroglyphicks Upon the second Point it was said That the Ancient Sages were always curious to hide the mysteries of their learning under some obscure things the Poets under the shell of Fables whom Plato and Aesop imitated the Pythagoreans under their Riddles Solomon under Parables the Chaldeans in the sacred Letters of their Cabala But especially the Egyptians have observ'd this mystery For having learn'd from the Jews and the Chaldeans the principal notions of the Sciences and the Deity the Principles whereof were taken from those famous Columns which preserv'd the Characters thereof after the Deluge they transmitted the same to posterity by the figures and images of things engraven upon Pyramids and Obeliscks whereof we still see some fragments in their Hieroglyphicks which signifies sacred and mysterious figures or sculpture not so much for the things employ'd to that purpose which oftentimes were common and natural as for the mystical and hidden sence which they attributed to the same The use of these figures was the more profitable in that having some similitude and correspondence to the quality of the thing signifi'd they not only denoted the same but also its nature and property So painting an Eye upon a Scepter which signifi'd God they intimated also his properties by the Scepter his Omnipotence and by the Eye his Providence Another advantage of these Hieroglyphicks is that they were equally understood by all Nations of several Languages as at this day the Chineses and Japoneses make use of some Letters like Hieroglyphicks which signifie rather things then words Which would be a good way to reduce all Tongues into one and so to facilitate all Sciences were not this Hieroglyphical writing too diffuse For there must be as many Characters as there are things in the World which being almost infinite and every day new would render this Art endless which hath made the use of it laid aside as it would also be among the Chineses were not honour which supports and feeds all other Arts annex'd to this knowledge of Characters which advances those alone who are skill'd in their Letters to Magistracies and the chief charges of that great State The Second said That the signs for representing things are either Natural or Artificial Amongst the natural employ'd by men to express their conceptions are the pictures and images of thigns as to represent a Man or a Tree they paint a man and a Tree by which way Philomela describ'd the wrong which had been done her The Aegyptians had the same design in their Hieroglyphicks but finding that it would never have an end they in this imitated the Hebrews who make the same Root serve to produce a great number of words and employ'd one figure to signifie first one thing namely that whose image it is and afterwards many others wherewith it hath some affinity So the figure of a Serpent signifies a Serpent and the Prudence which is attributed to that animal and because they observ'd that the last day of the year joynd to the first and made a continual circle they represented the year by a Serpent with his tail in his mouth Upon the same ground Emblems were invented So Alciate to represent Fortitude and Wisedom gives the pourtraicts of Ajax and Vlisses to signifie a good Merchant who trusts only to what he holds he paints a hand with an eye in the middle of it the Fox signifies cunning the Pismire Providence the Bee Policie an earthen pot joyn'd to an iron pot dangerous Alliance In brief so many fables and phancies are so many writings after this manner from which to speak truth if you abstract the reverence which is due to Antiquity I see nothing that comes neer the marvel of our Letters which in respect of other inventions I cannot but compare to the Philosophers Stone so much talk'd of which whoso possesses may by its projection make as much gold as he needs to travel over the world and those other inventions to the money or if you please the provisions which a Traveller carries with him For these are incommodious and serve but to one or few uses whereas writing by combination of sixteen several characters the rest being found superfluous is sufficient to represent what ever hath been is may or may not be The Third said That no doubt 't was necessity which put the Aegyptians first upon the invention of Hieroglyphicks then which our Letters are much less significative because they express not the nature of natural things as their figures do but only words Yet the use of Hieroglyphicks was very pernicious to the vulgar who seeing the Attributes of God represented under the shapes of Animals and Plants took occasion to adore those corporeal things and became the most superstitious of all Nations going so far as to deifie garlick onyons rats and toads Moreover Mans life is too short for this Art his wit too weak to invent figures sutable to all the parts of speech diversifi'd by numbers cases persons tenses and other Grammatical differences of words and his memory too slippery to retain all those figures because they represented not one single thing but many different and for that one and the same thing was diversly figur'd as God was express'd by an Eye a Circle and an Unite Prudence by a double head
the phancy Upon which the Intellect making reflection formes the like in it self and thus all Notions are produc'd it follows that neither the great stature nor the little are to be esteem'd But 't is demanded Which of the two is the less evil I conceive with the Physitians that the great is less incommodious in youth as being then more proper for exercises whose toyle it can better under-go especially those of Warr. And therefore when Marius levy'd Souldiers he suffer'd none to pass the Muster but such as could not walk under a measure rais'd six foot from the ground But in old age when the natural heat is more languid and consequently less able to discharge all its functions in a large Body the small size is best And little old men are never so crooked as others besides that their coldness serves to moderate the ardour of the choler which is attributed to little men because their spirits having not so much room to run about agitate them sooner and more violently then others The Fourth said As every living thing hath bounds of its perfection so it hath of its greatness or smallness which if it exceeds or falls short of 't is held monstrous and besides Nature as Gyants and Dwarfes But because this term of magnitude hath a great latitude 't is hard to know precisely which is the least or greatest stature whereunto Man may naturally attain and which is the middle and consequently who deserve the name of great or little considering that the same is various according to places and climates and according to every one's particular temper or first conformation which ordinarily follows the proportion which the seed of the Father and Mother bears with the Idea of their species if the too great or too little quantity of the matter or the capacity of the place permit For the Northern people are large the Southern small Those between the 28. and the 38. climate are of middle stature and one that would be call'd a tall person among the little will be accounted little among the tall Constitutions likewise contribute very much hereunto Those who are dry by Nature are usually small Such as are too moist grow more in thickness then in the other dimension it being the property of humidity not to mount easily upwards unless it be accompany'd with heat for then the Agent and the Patient being rightly dispos'd to extend every part the whole is augmented Therefore as the Phegmatick temper is most prone to fatness so the sanguine contributes to tallness especially if the persons live idly and feed well Hence it is that the men before the Deluge are noted by the Scripture to have been Gyants because they lead idle and voluptuous lives As on the contrary Fasting Watching and immoderate Labour in the time destinated for men to grow which reaches not much beyond twenty five years of age hinder the attaining of the just measure intended by nature which Divines refer to that of Adam and our Saviour as their bodies were also the rule of the proportion which our members ought to have one to another and the temper of their humours the standard of ours whence they were the healthfullest and goodliest of all men but they were of tall stature CONFERENCE XLIII I. Of the Philosopher's stone II. Of Mont de piete or charitable provision for the Poor I. Of the Philsopher's stone THe Poets not without reason feign'd that the gods left hope to men in the bottom of Pandora's box after all their other goods were flown out of it For nature being unwilling to shew her self a Step-mother to man hath made such provision that the almost infinite unhappy accidents of life cannot so much cast him down on one hand as hope raises him up on the other And not to speak of that first of Christian virtues which accompanies him even in death and serves him for an Anodyne in all his miseries is he under the rod he comforts himself with hope to get free from it is he of mean extraction he hopes to ennoble himself by his exploits is he poor he encourages himself to labour with the possibility of becoming rich is he sick the hope of recovery supports his fainting Spirits yea when ordinary means fail him he is not out of heart But if there be any thing worthy of laughter to those who cannot apprehend it or of admiration to him that will further philosophize about the odd motions of humane minds this is one how 't is possible that an old decrepit poor diseased person should nevertheless not despair of having the train of a Prince one day and not onely hope to be cur'd but to become a young man again Yet all this is phancy'd by the seekers of the Philosophers stone which is the grand work the Panacea the Elixir and the Universall Restaurator Now this most extravagant conceit joyn'd to the other absurdities of that Chimerical Art makes me believe that it is good for nothing but to serve for imaginary consolation to the miserable The Second said That the Chymists who exercise it are of two sorts Some by their sophistications give tinctures to Metals which they promise to transmute by their mixture fixation cementation and other operations Others who are call'd the true Sons of Art do not amuse themselves about particular things but solely about the grand work at which they all aime though by several courses Some think to attain it by blowing and usually make a mixture of Quick-silver and Gold which they keep nine moneths in a small furnace over the flame of a lamp Some conceive that 't is a very plain operation terming it Children's work and that there needs onely the knowledge of the matter the fire the vessel and the manner the rest being done of it self Yet others attribute this work onely to Revelation saying that the Artist must onely pray to God and they believe it is mention'd in the Holy Scripture where it is said That much clay is requisite to the making of pots but onely a little dust to the making of Gold that 't was this Wisedom which made Solomon so rich that by the testimony of Scripture Gold was common in his dayes as stones that the Gold of Ophir was that which this Philosophical stone had transmuted far more excellent then the natural and that the ships he set forth to fetch it were onely parables and figures like the golden fleece which was nothing but a parchment wherein this secret was written But most hold an opinion compos'd of these two saying that the Manual operation must be assisted by extraordinary favour from Heaven I conceive with them that there is such a thing as the Philosophers stone or at least that it is possible that Salt is its matter and Motion its fire For since these two are found every where this property agrees very well to them Salt being extracted out of all Bodies and Heat proceeding from their friction one against another
in imitation of that which the Heavens excite here below The Third said The Philosophers stone is a Powder of Projection a very little of which being cast upon imperfect Metals as all are except Gold purifies and cures them of their Leprosie and impurity in such a manner that having first taken away their feculency and then multiply'd their degrees they acquire a more perfect nature Metals not differing among themselves but in degrees of perfection It is of two sorts the white which serves to make Silver and the red which being more concocted is proper to make Gold Now to attain it you need onely have the perfect knowledge of three things to wit the Agent the Matter and the Proportion requisite to the end the Agent may educe the form out of the bosome of that Matter duly prepar'd by the application of actives to passives The first two are easie to be known For the Agent is nothing else but Heat either of the Sun or of our common fire or of a dunghill which they call a Horse's belly or of Balneum Mariae hot water or else that of an Animal The patients are Salt Sulphur or Mercury Gold Silver Antimony Vitriol or some little of such other things the experience whereof easily shews what is to be expected from them But the Application of the Agent to the Patient the determination of the degrees of Heat and the utmost preparation and disposition of the Matter cannot be known but by great labour and long experience Which being difficult thence we see more delusions and impostures in this Art then truths Nevertheless Histories bear witness that Hermes Trismegistus Glauber Raimond Lully Arnauld Flamel Trevisanus and some others had knowledge of it But because for those few that are said to have it almost infinite others have been ruin'd by it therefore the search of it seemes more curious then profitable The Fourth said That as Mathematicians have by their search after the Quadrature of a circle arriv'd to the knowledge of many things which were before unknown to them so though the Chymists have not discover'd the Philosophers stone yet they have found out admirable secrets in the three families of Vegetables Animals and Minerals But it not the less possible although none should ever attain it not onely for this general reason that Nature gives us no desire in vain but particularly because all Metals are of the same species being made of one and the same Matter Sulphur and Mercury and concocted by one and the same celestial heat not differing but in concoction alone as the grains of the same raisin do which ripen at several times This is evident by the extraction of Gold and Silver out of all Metals even out of Lead and Iron the most imperfect of them So that the Art ought not to be judg'd inferior in this matter to all others which it perfectionates Moreover the Greek Etymology of Metals shews that they are transmutable one into another The Fifth said That as in the production of Corn by Nature the seed and the fat of the Earth are its matter and its efficient is partly internal included in the grain and partly external viz. the heat of the Sun and the place in the bosome of the Earth so in the production of Gold by Art its matter is Gold it self and its Quick-silver and the efficient cause is partly in the Gold partly in the external heat the place is the furnace containing the Egg of Glass wherein the matter is inclos'd dissolve'd and grows black call'd the Crowes head waxes white and then is hardned into a red mass the hardness whereof gives it the name of a stone which being reduc'd into powder and kept three dayes in a vessel hermetically seal'd upon a strong fire acquires a purple colour and one dram of it converts two hundred of Quicksilver into pure Gold yea the whole Sea were it of like substance The Sixth said That Art indeed may imitate but cannot surpass Nature But it should if we could change other metals into Gold which is impossible to Nature it self even in the Mines in how long time soever those of Iron Lead Tin or Copper never becoming Mines of Gold or Silver Therefore much less can the Alchymist do it in his furnaces no more then he can produce some thing more excellent then Gold as this Philosophical stone would be Gold being the most perfect compound of all mixt bodies and for that reason incorruptible And indeed how should these Artists accomplish such a work when they are not agreed upon the next matter of it nor upon the efcien tcause time place and manner of working there being as many opinions as there are different Authors Moreover 't is untrue that all Metals are of one species and differ onely in degree of concoction for Iron is more concocted then Silver as also more hard and less fusible and their difference was necessary in reference to humane uses Now perfect species which are under the same next genius as Metals are can never be transmuted one into another no more then a Horse into a Lyon Yea could this Philosophical stone act upon Metals yet it would not produce Gold or Silver but other stones like it self or onely imprint upon them its own qualities according to the ordinary effects of all natural Agents And if it were true that the powder of Gold produc'd other Gold being cast upon Metals as a grain of wheat brings forth many others being cast into the Earth it would be requisite to observe the same order and progress in the multiplication of Gold which Men do in that of grains of Wheat Yet the Chymists do not so but will have their multiplication to be made in an instant The Seventh said That since Art draws so many natural effects out of fitting matter as Worms Serpents Frogs Mice Toads and Bees although the subject of these Metamorphoses be much more difficult to be dispos'd and made susceptible of a sensitive soul then insensible metal is to receive a Form divisible like its matter he saw no absurdity in it but that at least by the extraordinary instruction of good or bad spirits some knowledge of this operation may be deriv'd to men considering that we see other species naturally trans-form'd one into another as Egyptain Nitre into stone a Jasper into an Emerald the herb Basil into wild Thyme Wheat into Darnel a Caterpiller into a Butter-fly yea if we will believe the Scotch they have a Tree whose fruit falling into the water is turn'd into a Bird. II. Of a Mont de Pieté or Bank for lending to the Poor Upon the second Point it was said That Charity toward our Neighbour being the most certain sign of Piety towards God and Hills having been chosen almost by all Nations to sacrifice upon as neerest to Heaven upon these accounts the name of Mont de Pieté hath been given to all institutions made for relief of the poor whereof lending