his first babling and pratling yeares are watred with nothing but with his teares His infancy full of astonishment and feare vnder the rod of his superiour His riper yeares discouer him by all the parts of his body and soule expose him to the inevitable snares of Loue to the dangerous blowes of fortune and to the stormes and fury of all sorts of Passions In his declining age as broken with so many cares calamities and labours hee flyes but with one wing and goes coasting along the riuer to land more easily possessed and tormented neuerthelesse with many vnprofitable and superfluous thoughts He is afflicted at the time present grieved at the past and in extreame care and trouble for that to come as if he now beganne to liue Hee perceiues not his age but by his gray haires and wrinkled forehead and most commonly hath nothing remaining to testifie that he hath liued so great a number of yeeres but an old withred age which enclines him to a generall distaste of all fruits that his weake stomach cannot digest which often imprints more wrinkles and furrowes in his minde then in his face His body bending and bowing which is no longer supported but by the ayde and assistance of others like an old building ruinous and vncouered in a thousand places which by little and little seemes to end and destroy itselfe Whiles his fugitiue soule which meets nothing else in this fraile Vessell but that which is either sowre or vinowed seekes by all meanes to breake her alliance and in the end retires being infinitly weary to haue so long conducted and supported so decrepit and heauy a burthen loden with all miseries as the sincke and receptacle of all griefes and euils which the influence of Heauen continually powreth downe vpon the face of Earth Nothing so weake and yet so proud Let vs heare him speake with what boldnesse doth he not praise his audacious front His heart is puffe vp and swelld with glory and many great bumbasted Words as if mounted on some Throne hee formes himselfe an imaginary Scepter for a marke of his Soueraigne greatnes Hee hath saith he the Dominion and Empire ouer all things created He commands all beasts The Sunne Heauen and Earth are but the ministers of his power But wretched and proud as thou art dost thou beleeue thou hast power to command where thou hast no right but in thy obedience Thy inclinations fortune and mis-fortune which droppe and destill on thy head through those celestiall pipes doe they not constraine thee with blowes and stripes to stoope and acknowledge their superintendency Bow downe bow downe thine eyes for it is farre more proper and conuenient for thee If not that after the custome of the Thracians thou wilt shoot arrowes against Heauen which will after returne and fall on thine owne head And if for the aduantages and priuiledges of the body thou wilt preferre thy selfe to all beasts vouchsafe onely to enter in comparison with a few of them in particular The courage of the Lyon the strength of the Elephant the swiftnesse of the Stagge and the particular qualities which are found in others will prooue thee farre inferiour to them Hauing thus walked thine eyes vpon the garden knots of this world now make a reflexion thereof in thy selfe and if thy iudgment retaine any ayre of health I know thou wilt say with me or rather with wise Solomon That man is nothing else but vanity without and within in what forme and posture of vice so euer thou contemplate him Then wee shall haue the assurance to say with the Philosophers That laughter is proper to man And proper indeed it is according to the rules of Democritus to laugh and mocke at his folly as at his Vanity That other Philosopher more pittifull then this testified by his weeping that hee had no other weapons then teares to defend the blowes and wipe the wounds of so miserable a condition as ours That if we enquire by what right he imposed on his companions the burthen of so seuere a law and so ponderous and pressing a yoke I finde that hee is no way excusable but in this that hee submitted himselfe to the same slauery and seruitude The equality of our euils herein doth some way extenuate and cut off the iust subiect of our complaints For he which sees himselfe fettered to the fortune of an iron chaine although thou haue inroled him among the number of thy slaues yet hee may neuerthelesse vaunt to see thee fight vnder the displayed Ensigne of the same misfortune not like himselfe tyed to an iron chaine but to one a little more honourable as it may be to a chaine of gold or peraduenture to a bracelet of haire which captiuates thy heart and liberty vnder the tempting lures of a young beauty or else by the linkes of thy Ambition which inseperably chaines thee to Fortune sith all sorts and degrees of liuing is but slauery that the Scepters of Princes are farre heauier in their hands then the crookes of innocent Shepheards That if no condition haue power to exempt and dispence thee from this slauery what shall wee accuse either the vice of a malicious nature which at thy birth powred into thy breast so many miseries or rather the defect of thy knowledge and iudgement which enwrapped thee in so obscure and thicke a cloude that this blindnesse makes thee euery moment stumble against the good which presents it selfe to thy eyes as against euill And that in this ignorance thou art as a Ship abandoned to the fury of the waues which the horrour of the night hath surprised in the middest of a storme and tempest wherein in the feare of shipwrack the surest places where his good fortune throwes him giues him no lesse astonishment and feare then the most dangerous places For the fauours of Nature should still put thee out of the suspition of her malignitie What hath shee not done to preuent and remedy the discontent which may arise in thy heart through an obiect so full of discontent shee hath hid from thine eyes and sight the most secret parts which giue the life and motion as the weakest and most subiect to corruption and the most vile because they resemble the inward part of the foulest beast of all And indeede shee hath giuen thee eyes to see abroad onely and to admire in the world as in a Temple the liuely images of the Diuinitie But as for those things which are without vs could she doe any thing better or more aduantagious to man for the cōsolation of so many afflictions and griefes which incessantly assaile him then the habit or custome thereof as a sweet potion which administreth sleepe and easeth that part whereunto it is applied to operate his effect with more facilitie and lesse contradiction This fauour in my opinion is not the least Present which she could giue him For a habitude of suffering afflictions dulleth the first edge and point thereof and
I doe not wonder if the Epicuriens submit vs to the mercie of the senses with so much seuerity and tyrannie that they permit it to be more lawfull for vs to inuent all sorts of lyes and fictions then to accuse them of falshood Those Philosophers cannot chuse but establish excellent Arts and Sciences sith they are so religious in their principles and they well demonstrate by their Atomes the faith and sound beliefe which they want in their weake beginnings It is true that in the Spagerycall Art the more things are discharged from the grosse accidents and qualities which enuiron them the more they are made perfect and essentiall but it fares not with our Vnderstanding as with a Lymbecke because the labour of our minde doth in nothing touch the true being of the thing and the strongest stroake which hee can giue to apprehend it is this first communication of the Senses to the things which are neerest by their faculties relation harmony measure and true proportion which is betwixt them and their obiect by the interuention of Nature so as then when one of the Senses hath carried to Common Sense the figure of his obiect hee is so farre from being cleansed and purified by this Idea or that hee communcates more easily by the vertue of his being that he is much the further off it And as the sides of an Angle the more they are continued the more they are distant one from the other so the more those figures or Images are borne to the common sense and are purified to make them capable and worthy of our vnderstanding the more they estrange themselues from the obiect which they represent and consequently from his true being Our thoughts runne af-after obiects to embrace them but in vaine for they can ouertake nothing but shaddowes through the ayd and assistance of their weake imaginations It is a handfull of water which shee will retaine and hold and the more shee graspes fast her hand the swifter it runnes out But sith thoughts enioy nothing else of the thing then the Idâ—ea can we say that it is a subiect capable to containe him to possesse it yea in a being more certaine sure and purer then she is If wee say there is so small reason to measure a right line by a crooked one to know the true measure thereof and that a square cannot bee measured by an Orbe or circle although these lines and figures are of the same nature and differ not but accidentally is it possible that wee would so proudly measure and know the truth of things by so false an instrument and which hath so small resemblance to its true being It is to esteeme the shadowe aboue the light to giue more beliefe to dreames then watchings and more to prise and value apparance and shewe yea of not being then of the true being of the thing it selfe This faculty of sense which distills through all our body is descended from aboue and from our soule as the light of the Sunne which exposeth to our eyes the beauty but not the Essence of things that enuiron vs Sith Nature it selfe according to Plato is nothing else but abstruse and Enigmaticall Poesie as an ouer-vailed painting resplending with infinite variety of false lights thereby to giue vnto the apparence of our reasons and the weakenesse of our coniectures more cause to admire the sacred and powerfull hand of our diuine Painter God who in all the corners of the world and chiefely in man hath engrauen the Caracters and Images of his Diuinity SECTION IV. Science or knowledge is the marke and seale of the Diuinity but that which resides among vs here in Earth is nothing else but abuse trumperie and vanitie OVr Knowledge is but a Vanity his assurance hath no other foundation but doubt There is nothing more weake or fraile then his principles His beginnings are tender and childish we must leade them by the hand They had neede haue ayde and support from euery one of a firme and vndoubted beliefe for want of valable reasons If our faith did not maintaine them they could not subsist of themselues Also none will permit that they be examined or proued for the triall and quest will be of too dangerous a consequence But there can be no principles if the Diuinity haue not reuealed them and therefore there is no science or knowledge All contrary presupposition hath no lesse authority one then the other If reason make not the difference That which we will establish for reason it must needes be reason it selfe and not our owne opinion If it be lawfull for vs to enforme our selues of the Principles of Sciences yea of that which is held and maintained for the most certaine and true by the common consent of all Philosophers wee shall finde that by their false presuppositions they establish a knowledge of Truth For they will measure materiall things by immateriall although neuerthelesse they will haue the thing which measureth of the same nature with the thing measured As their numbers which are not measured but by numbers and their lines by lines But the point is the principle of their measure The point is nothing they haue therefore no point of a principle in their measure There is nothing so opposite and distant as being from not being How will they then by the not being of the point passe to the infallible and sure demonstration of the true Being of the body Can they giue any other assured foundation to the point the line and the superficies then their imagination Let them not therefore attempt to measure imaginary things sith they are of the same nature and that there is nothing more different then reall Being to imaginarie froÌ„ the line to the pearch and from the Angle to the Compasse Let the Surueyer of Lands make vse of his pearch to measure the earth but let not the Astrologer forme in his head or minde any imaginary pearches to measure heauen the distance of the planets or the extent of the Zodiacke Let our grosse sense be the test of true and false sith we haue none more sure It will ill become vs to play the wise men aboue our senses and vnderstanding Our wit can neither forme nor frame any thing beyond it which hath any foundation This is to vndertake too much They make vs confesse despight of our selues that they are the expert Masters therein and that we haue no right but in obedience not in counsaile If the Mathematicians will not that the point measure the line the line the superficies nor the superficies the body Why will they that this body framed in their imaginations by the weauing and connexion of the point the line and the superficies which is but imaginarie be capable to measure a body physicall and reall which admits nor knowes any point line or superficies It is to establish Principles with too much tyrannie not to giue leaue to examine them Sith the knowledge which results thereof
things without that there proceede thereof any good effect can the industry of mâ—n make a circle so round that the right line comming to make the angle of contiguitie shall not touch it but in one point and not imaginary and that there can bee no smaller sharpe angle giuen but that as if the sharpe right-line angle being a quantitie cannot bee diuided into so many partes that it meete with a smaller then that which the angle of Contiguitie giues We must send them to the Schoole of Sense and they shall finde themselues farre wide and distant from their reckoning But how can they tearme demonstrations those apparances of reason which prooue euery thing contrary For our Mathematicians and Astrologers say that the Earth is a fixed and immoueable point about which mooues and turnes this great Masse of Heauen Cleanthes Nicetas and Copernicus haue prooued that the Heauens were immoueable and that the Earth wheeled about the Oblique circle of the Zodiacke turning round about his Axell-tree Are they not appointed and placed directly contrary haue they tane any other footing then on their principles haue they aduanced any thing but by Demonstration and yet neuerthelesse we see them contradict and contend in the effect and proofe of their opinions Who then shall bee the true Iudge betweene these two different Sects for if wee permit our selues to bee carried away by the force and strength of humane reason they haue both of them spoken trueth Is there any thing truer then Demonstration there is nothing then more true then the contrary thereof consequently because one of these two opinions is necessarily false if they are not both false Then there is nothing truer then falsehood and nothing more certaine then incertainty for both of them haue operated by Demonstration But humane iudgment cannot giue more weight and beliefe to one Demonstration then to another sith by the chaine and dependance of precedent propositions you are directly led to principles the which if you haue not the liberty to contradict complaine not afterwards to see so many and so great absurdities and such resemblance of contraries likewise of so true apparances if we call that trueth which restraines hinders vs from passing beyond the necessary consequence of a proposition But for my part I am not of this opinion I call that trueth which is immoueable and which hath no other rest or refuge but in the bosom of God it is the proper place wher it reposeth she is not of our placing or disposing She doth euery where present profer her selfe vnto vs but a mortall hand is not capable to retaine or hold her We seek her we possesse her yet we cannot meet her our Wit is blinde borne which at high-noone in the fairest Summer day seekes the light of the Sunne Wee haue no nobler designe but our effects and weake reasons cannot follow or second her and when she falles into our hands haue we where withall to seize and maintaine her in our possession our meanes and powers are too weake to apprehend her we perpetually runne and wheele about her but the contrary shâ—wes which wee finde in all sorts of things and subiects make vs apparantly see that they are but the barkes and rindes of trueth and if we tearme the out-side of our Discourse Reason which euery one frames in his minde according to his capacitie to apply it to the knowledge of the thing shall we not then say that there is nothing more weake and inconstant if this reason haue trueth still on her side see how many contrary faces and semblances we giue to trueth There was neuer a proposition so firmely held or mainetained which hath not or may not receiue at least a hundred contrary reasons if wee will cast off opinion and so saile without her to what winde shall wee expose and abandon our sailes if not that being met and beaten with so many windes equally contrary wee remaine fixed and immooueable in our station This point will infallibly be both the Center of all motion and the rest and tranquillitie of a well gouerned minde But humane knowledge doeth not conduct vs shee neuer followes or shapes this course if we will follow any we must the very selfe-same houre embrace his partie and quarells If the Sophister and he which controules all knew as well how to laugh at himselfe as at others I should thinke his side and party very strong But to beleeue outward shewes or apparances it is indeed too great a simplicitie The libertie of the minde ought not to ingage it selfe except in those things wherein wee are not permitted to rest doubtfull as in our Religion and Faith where we ought to hold and retaine our written lesson from that Wise Holy and Sacred Word of God and not that so weake an Instrument as our humane reason should intermeddle to enquire or iudge for whosoeuer contesteth doeth not freely consent But it is not so with Sciences for if reason it selfe be not their foundation we are not bound to passe farther in beleeuing them that which is receiued by the opinion and common consent of many must not here passe as the forme of a reuokeable law and if all men beleeue it yet I would the more doubt it their ignorance may haue some reputation with themselues but not with others From the cradle we say that one and one are two but wee must acknowledge that the greatest reason of this principle is because it is so held receiued among vs for this Tenent holdes more of custome then of reason and of opinion then truth as we will more amply declare hereafter It is vpon this foundation that Plato by the meanes of numbers eleuates and caries his thoughts euen into the very bosome of God seeming to serue himselfe hereof as of a ladder to mount and vnite himselfe to this diuine knowledge Hath he not reason to make great esteeme thereof Sith our Cabalists haue so firmely beleeued them as it seemes that by them all thinges though neuer so farre distant doe approach and become familiar to their minds But they haue neede of a very soft and tractable wit to subiect it to the beliefe of their principles as if the composition and collection of the number of two and three which make fiue the resultance thereof were the mariage of the whole body of Nature which is found conformable to the opinion of Pythagoras that two is the matter and three the forme That two is the female because it may be cuâ— in two and equally diuided and hereby to make it selfe capable to receiue in it selfe the motiue power of the forme which is the number of three as Maleâ— because it cannot be equally diuided and therefore vnworthy to receiue as the number of two which opens it selfe to receiue and growes great by this commixture which if it ingender a Male which is the number of three you shall finde that this three propagates the number
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hic vera felicitas THE IVDGMENT OF Humane Actions A most Learned Excellent Treatise of Morrall Philosophie which fights agaynst Vanytie Conduceth to the fyndinge out of true and perfect Felicytie Written in French by Monsieur Leonard Marrande And Englished by Iohn Reynolds LONDON Imprinted by A. Mathewes for Nicholas Bourne at the Royall Exchange 1629 I Cecill sculp TO THE RIGHT HONOVRABLE AND truly Noble EDWARD Earle of DORSET Lord Lieutenant of his Majesties Counties of Sussex and Middlesex Lord Chamberlaine to the Queene One of the Lords of his Majesties most Honourable Priuie Councell and Knight of the most Illustrious Order of the Garter His Singular good Lord and Master RIGHT HONOVRABLE EIther by Earthly accident or Heauenly prouidence meeting with this late imprinted French Treatise of The Iudgement of Humane Actions written by Monsieur Marande a name that I more honour then know and diuing into the perusall thereof I found it for matter so solide and for phrase so curious a Master-peece of Morall Philosophie that I sawe my selfe engaged yea and in a manner bound to deuest it from its French garbe and to sute it in our English attire and habite as desirous that England as well as France should participate of that benefit and Felicitie But as I was entering into this taske and casting my selfe vpon the resolution of this attempt I was instantly met and assayled by an obstacle of no small importance For considering that France hath now made and declared her selfe Englands enemie and consâ—quently giuen vs no iust cause or reasons to loue French men but many to hate them I therefore in honour to my Prince and Country to whose prosperity and seruice my best blood and life shall euer bee prostrated at first began to reiect this Booke because written by a French man and so to looke on the translation thereof rather with an eye of contempt then of affection But at last recollecting my thoughts and considering that Peace is the gift and blessing of God and Charâ—ty the true marke of a Christian I therefore from my heart and soule wishing and desiring a safe honorable and perdurable peace betweene these two mighty neighbour Sister Kingdomâ—s in particular and to all Christians and the whole Christian world in general And also well knowing that Learning is vniuersally to be cherished and vertue honoured in all persons times and places of the whole world without exception or distinction then these premiâ—es considered this my last consideration preuailed and vanquished my first and so I re-assumed my former designe and resolution to finish it although in regard of the deepe matter and the knottie and elegant stile thereof I ingeniously confesse that many Gentlemen both of England and Scotland had beene farre more capable for the discharge and performance thereof then my selfe Hauing thus made my selfe an English Eccho to this French Author and now in these times of Warre taken this Booke as a rich French prise and landed him on our English shores Where should this Impe of my labour looke but on your Ho on whom my hopes heart haue euer looked or to whom else should it flye for harbour and shelter but onely to your Lordship who in all the stormes and tempests of these my weather beaten fortunes haue so graciously and generously serued me both for shelter and harbour when the immerited malice of some and the vndeserued ingratitude of others haue denied it me The which yet I speake and remember more out of sensibility to my selfe â—hen any way out of passion much lesse of Enuie to them as resting contented with this resolution to keepe the griefe thereof to my selfe to leaue the shame to them and to giue the thankes and glory to your Honour As this Booke of Marande is curious so he made his Dedication thereof wherefore led by the fame and lustre of his example I could doe no lesse then immitate him herein for as he directed it to the Cardinall of Richelieu So your Lordships Merits and my dutie enforce me to inscribe it to your Honour who are as much the Cardinalls equall in Vertues as by many degrees his superiour in bloud and extraction And although I well know that shall rather wrong mine Author then right my selfe to erect or proffer any Paâ—â—gerike to his Merits and Iudgement on this his Booke because of it selfe iâ— sufficiently peâ—formes and acts that part Yet when your Lordshipâ— leasure and pleasure shall borow so much time from your great and weighty â—ffâ—ires of the State to giue it to the perusâ—ll and contemplation of this his Booke I doubt not but you will then see and acknowledge that Marande herein as another Cornelius Agrippa learnedly fights against the Vanitie of Humane Sciences and as a second Montaigne iudiciously contests against the poyson of our hearts I meane against our intemperate and therefore our pernicious Passions For in this worke of his as in a rich Treasurie and Sacrary of Nature He with a zeale and iudgement euery way worthy of himselfe laughes at the Vanitie of all Humane Artes and Actions as also generally at all the presumptuous and profane professors thereof and by reasons as cleare as the Sunne passeth his iudgement on them prouing GOD to bee the sole Author and Giuer of Wisdome and that GOD and none but GOD ought to bee the onely obiect of our desires and affections Here hee hath deuested and stript our passions naked and curiously delineated and depointed them to vs in their true colours and naturall deformity Heere he hath taught vs to beleeue and our thoughts and resolutions to know that exorbitant Ambition prooues most commonly the bane of our hearts the poyson of our mindes and the Arch-Enemie and Traytor to our owne fortunes and fâ—licitie Here hee hath curiously arraigned and anatomized the power and functions of the Senses and shewed vs how violently and maliciously they euery moment conspire to corrupt our bodies and to betray our soules to sinne and voluptuousnesse Here he hath brought home to our Vnderstanding and Iudgement what power our soules haue ouer our bodies and God ouer our soules and that our bodies can expect no true tranquillity or felicity here on Earth except our soules doe first fetch it from Heauen and deriue it from God And here hee hath crowned Reason to be the Queene of our soules and adopted Vertue to bee no lesse then a Princesse and Daughter of Heauen and taught vs how tenderly and religiously we ought to loue either and honour both of them sith thereby they will then infallibly prooue the two spirituall guides to conduct vs to true happinesse in this life and consequently to bring vs to true felicity and glory in that to come Which considered As also that such is the vniuersall iniquity of our times the generall deprauation and corruption of our liues and manners that through the darke cloudes of our humane Vanitie and Ambition we many times
deformed a countenance that albeit they are the daughters of Nature yet wee cannot loue them and behold them at one time 186 The fift Discourse Of Felicitie Section I. EVery thing naturally tends to its repose onely man strayes from his felicity or if he approach it hee stayes at the branches insteed of embracing the trunke or body of the tree 191 Section II. It is not without reason that wee complaine of Fortune because hourely shee teacheth vs her mutable and variable humour pa. 202 Section III. Wealth and Riches are too poore to giue vs the felicitie which we seeke and desire 207 Section IV. Glory and Reputation hath no thing which is solide but Vanity we must therefore else-where seeke our Soueraigne contentment 211 Section V. Honours and Dignities expose to the world all their splendour and glory But contrariwise Felicity lockes vp all her best things in her selfe and hath no greater Enemie then Shewe and Ostentation 219 Section VI. Among all the faire flowers which an extreame fauour produceth wee haue not yet seene this Felicity to bud forth and flourish 222 Section VII Kings and Soueraigne Princes owe vs their continuall care and motion as the Starres doe and therefore they haue no greater Enemie then repose and tranquility 228 Section VIII As the light is inseparable from the Sun so Felicity is an inseparable accident of Vertue 232 The sixth Discourse Of Morall Vertue Section I. SIcke or distempered mindes are not capable of all sorts of remedies but they shall finde none more Soueraigne then the diuerting thereof pag. 250 Section II. The life of a Wise man is a Circle whereof Temperance is the Centre whereunto all the lynes I meane all his actions should conduce and ayme 264 Section III. To thinke that Vertue can indifferently cure all sorts of euils or afflictions is a testimony of Vanity or else of our being Apprentices and Nouices in Philosophy 277 Section IV. As it belongs to none but to the minde to iudge of true or false so our sense ought to be the onely Iudge either of Pleasure or Paine 288 Section V. Although wee graunt that Mans felicity consists in Vertue yet I affirme against the Stoicks that Felicity is incompatible with Griefe and Paine 299 Section VI. Mans life is a harmony composed of so many different tones that it is very difficult for Vertue to hold and keepe them still in tune pag. 310 THE IVDGEMENT OF HVMANE ACTIONS The first Discourse Of Vanitie SECTION I. Man diuerteth his eyes from his condition not to know the deformitie thereof and abandoneth them to follow his owne vaine imaginations MY enterprise to depaint and chalke out the vanitie of Man hath it may be no lesse vanitie in his designe then in his subiect but it greatly skils not to what I intend to speake for whatsoeuer I say or doe I still aduance I say it imports not where I strike for all my blowes are directed and bent to fall on Vanitie and if the Pensill be not bold and the Colours liuely enough we will imitate the industry of that Painter who being to represent in a Table the sorrowes of those who assisted at the sacrifice of Iphigenia most ingeniously ouervayled the face of this Virgins Father with a Courtaine as well knowing that all his art and industry was incapable and confused herein if hee should vndertake to represent at life all the parts and passions which sorrow had so liuely imprinted on his face It were a happinesse if onely to overvaile the face of Man were to couer all his Vanities but when wee haue extended this vaile or courtaine ore all his body I much feare there will yet remaine more to be concealed and hidden then that which wee haue already couered For this imagination cannot suffer this constraint and his desire which followes him with out-spred wings findes no limmits but in her infinity Man is composed of body spirits and soule This animated body participates most of earth as neerest to the place of his extraction and to say truely is a straying and a vagabond plant The spirits participate most of the ayre and serue as the meanes or medium to fasten ioyne and stay the soule which falles from heauen into the body of men as a ray or sparkle of the Diuinitie that comes to reside in an vnknowne place Those spirits which dwell in the bloud are as little chaines to vnite and fasten the soule to the body which comming to dissolue from thence followes the entire dissolution of this compound They participate as partakers of these two contrary natures by the extremities that which is most pure and subtill in them is vnited to the superiour parts as that which is grosser is vnited and fastned to the affluence of bloud and these are they that so dexterously make affections to flye from one to the other subiect which they embrace so strictly and deerely and in this marriage is sworne communitie of goods and wealth or rather of misery they haue no longer but one and the same interest and in this mixture actions as passions distill from these different springs by one onely and the selfe same pipe They wedde themselues to contentions and quarrels which are not easily appeased but notwithstanding this discord they maintaine themselues in their perpetuall warre fearing nothing but peace which is separation Doth it not seeme to thee O man that thou much deseruest to bee lamented and pittied sith in the composition of such different pieces thou findest thy selfe engaged to calme the stormes and tempests which arise in thy breast by the contrary motion of so many different passions If thou wilt cast thine eyes vpon thy birth thou shalt see that after hauing languished nine monthes in prison fedd and nourished with the waters of rottennesse and corruption it selfe thou commest into the world with cryes and teares for thy welcome as if despight of thee that Destiny had placed thee on Earth to sweat vnder the heauy yoke and burthen of a miserable slauery but grieue not at thy teares for they cannot be imployed to weepe at a more miserable condition then thine owne because among other creatures thou art the most disgraced by nature abandoned naked on earth without couering or Armes swathed and bound and without knowledge of any thing which is fit or proper for thy necessities And reason it selfe which befalls thee afterwards as the onely aduantage whereof thou mayst vaunt and glory doth most commonly turne to thy shame and confusion through vices and interiour diseases which it ingendreth in thee Vnfortunate that thou art those weapons which thou imployest to thy ruine were giuen thee for thy conseruation Me thinkes those barbarous Indians of Mexico doe singular well who at the birth of their Children exhort them to suffer and endure as if nature gaue no other prerogatiue to man then miserie whereunto hee is lincked and chained by the misfortune and dutie of his condition Let vs consider a little that