sinnelesse yet for sinne of man is mockt beat The sixt vnder Iesus Christ hong And laid in graue The last is th'euerlasting rest Then shall th'embillowed Sea be downe a leuell prest The Sunne shall lose his light The last shal be the worlds rest Heau'n stay his whirling round All fruit shall cease to grow vpon th'all-bearing ground And we that haue on earth beiecued Heauenly troaths Shall keepe in Heau'nly ioy the Saboth of Sabothes What shall I hope alas of all the latter age Adam considers what shall betide his posteritie till the first world is ended by the Flood Or fierie vengeance sent to burne this worldly stage Or men who law'd by lust nere heard of God nor me What shall I hope of them when these whose pedegree So late from Eden draw'n continues liuely sense Of Heau'nly doome on me when these with mad offence Gods anger still prouoke Ha traitor and rebell soule Ha Lamech was 't a fault so light thy bed to soule To third the paire-of-man that yet more hellish wood Needs must thou dip thy blade in double-gransiers blood Nor could the Rogues pasport embrant betwixt his browes Nor his charge stay thine hand who power infernall bowes But Enos O thou Saint be bold Enos restablisheth Gods seruice and plant againe The standard of beleefe which mans vnsteddie braine Hath laied along the ground Call-on the Sou'raine Good Besprinkle his altars hornes with sacrificed blood Send vnto his sacred smell the sweet perfumie clouds And Truths bright lampe retinde in Errors ashie shroudes See Enoch thy disciple he with a godly strife Still dying to himselfe liues in the Lord of life Grace of the world Faithfull Enoch taken away to the Lord for pleasing him Heb. 11.5 Gen. 5.24 and sets t' abide th'ey daunting shine That blazeth lightning-like i'th'essence first diuine Lo how deliuered from yoake of bodies weight And sequestred from sense he meats the toplesse height Of Heau'n and borne on wing of Fasting Faith and Prayer Styes vp the tent of Saints embroyd'red all so faire He though a guest on earth in heau'nly trance doth fall Know'th all seeth all hath all in God that 's all in all He passing each degree from forme to forme ascends And O most happie man in Gods owne likenesse ends For lo th' All-goodly-faire him for his vertue loues And not in part but all from earth to heau'n remoues Gone art thou art thou gone vnto the starrie blew Adieu my sonne Enoch adieu my sonne adieu Liue happie there on high thy body now a sprite Or changed wondrously to shape of Angell bright Puts-on eternitie thine eyes now no more eyes But newly-flaming starres do beautifie the skies Thou drinkest now thy fill of Nectar wine thy day Of Saboth neuer ends the vaile now draw'n away Thou seest God face to face and holily vnite Vnto the Good Three-one thou liu'st i' th infinite An Angell new but lo thou leauest here behind The Patriarchs children corrupt themselues by marrying with the prosanerace of Cain Men of vnbounded lust their hands-rake all they find Their bellie like a gulfe is euer gluttonous Yea would a man beleeu 't the very chosen race And holy peopl ' of God th' adopted sonnes of grace They are alas the men most impudent of all They gallop after sinne with bit in teeth and fall T' embrace in lustfull heat mans daughters lewd and vaine Profanely tempering the blood of Seth and Cain So with a shamelesse eye they choose the gawdy face Before the godly mind From these foule beds a race Of Gyants God knowes what spring vp with bloodie minde Strong fierce plagues of the world and whips of humane kind Then God who sees that sinne more by the long delay Of his reuenging hand encreaseth day by day Is angrie and now no more will plead the reason why But man an all for man will sodainly destroy At least what ere with wing doth clip the yeelding aire Or haunt in mortall state the land so richly-faire With one hand sets he ope the windowes of the skie Whence on mens rebell heads there falleth from on hie A thousand showrie seas he gripes i'th'other hand The soaken spongie globe of th'all defiled land And sets it hard in presse and makes it cast anon What flouds it euer dronke sen first the world began From euery vaulted rocke great riuers gin to flow And downe-hill so encrease with flouds of moulten snow That Firre and Cedar trees scarce any bow do show The wat'r swol'n so hie and bankes are sunke so low O what posteritie for want of skill to swimme Loose I within these gulfes yet some full brauely climme The craggie peakes of hills t' escape the raging deepes And grapple about the rockes but ah the wat'r vp creeps And lesning all these hills makes all the world a meere My children whither now O whither can you steere From God but vnto God whose anger hath shooke the world Quite cut-off all your legs in flood your bodies horld Now grows the flood so high that th'erth is more then drownd The riuers and the sea haue all one onely bound To wit a clowdy skie a heau'n still full of raine As trauelling with child of many another maine To make me childerlesse O father miserable O too-to fruitfull reines O children dammageable O gulphes reuealed for me that were before vnknown O end of all O world en wrackt and ouerflow'n O Heau'n O mightie sea O land now no more land O flesh and blood but here his voice began to stand For sorrow stopt the pipe and ny of life berest him So fall'n a swoond with griefe the Prophet Spirit left him Annotations vpon the end of Adam and beginning of Noe. 1 THe wining Territorie The verses are graue and full of maiestie and agreeable to the person that speakes Adam sheweth vnto his sonne in how many daies the world was created and how many ages it shall endure To giue more weight to this declaration he brings in the first of Mankind to speake thereof as it were by the rauishing power of the holy Ghost for that his purpose was to ioine to the former discourse of Creation the sequele of diuers ages of the world which Adam could not speake of but by Spirit of prophecie 2 That first As God created Heauen and Earth in sixe daies and rested the seuenth so Adam shewes that the world shall continue sixe ages and in the seuenth shall be the eternall rest of the Church triumphant in Heauen Some there are both old and new writers who discoursing on this number of six and constring to their purpose the saying That a thousand yeares are as one day before the Lord haue imagined that the world from beginning to the end shall fulfill the number of six thousand yeares to wit two thousand before the law two thousand vnder the law and two thousand vnder Grace But this opinion hath so little foundation in holy Scripture that contrariwise
riuage Les tableaux eschapez d'vn si piteux naufrage Et ranger pour iamais les enragez efforts De l'orgeuse mer dans ses antiques bords L'immortel les oyant n'eut pas sonné si tost La retraite des caux 2. Iour de la 1. Sepmaine que soudain flot sur flot Elles gaignent au pie tous les sleuues s'abaissent Lamer rentre en prison les montagnes renaissent Les bois monstrent desia leurs limoneux rameaux Ia la campagne croist par le discroit des caux Et bref la seule main du Dieu dar-detonnerre Monstre la terre au ciel le ciel á la terre 16 Noes prayer to God O Father King of winds world-shaking taming-seas O God with gratious eye behold vs and appease The billowes of thy wroth these planchers hardly sau'n Of such a piteous wracke O bring at length to hau'n And once for eu'r againe pen-vp i'th'ancient bounds The breezy Seas mad sway that yet the land surrounds These verses are taken out of the second day of his first weeke Th' Eternall heard their voice and bid his Triton sound Retreate vnto the flood then waue by waue to bound The waters hast away all nuers know their bankes And Seas their wonted shore hils grow with swelling flanks Vpon the tufted woods appeare the slimie webbes And earth it seemes to flow as fast as water ebbes So did the Lord againe with mercy-might-full hand Shew vnto Land the Heau'n and vnto Heau'n the Land 16. O father o king of winds Moses saith Gen. 8.15 that God spake vnto Noe after that he had beene shut vp in the Aâ—ke a yeere and some daies and bade him come forth with his familie and the beasts and gaue them all a blessing which continues vnto this day The Patriarke obeying the commandement built an Altar vnto the Lord and tooke of all the cleane foure-footed and of all the cleane birds hauing learned this difference in the holy schoole of his forefathers who were taught it from God and offred thereon whole burnt Sacrifices in repentance and faith apprehending the Messias and Redeemer to come For Sacrifices were vnto the faithfull as visible witnesses of their miserable estate in Adam and Grace offred them in their Sauiour applied with the eyes and hands of a liuely faith Out of doubt these holy ceremonies were accompanied with most carnest prayers also because true faith in a heart enflamed with the loue of God could not be idle He beleeued and beleeuing spake as did the Psalmist Psal 116. This prayer of Noe supposed by the Poet is fitted vnto the consideration of time past and to come and founded vpon the text of Moses Puis croissez vous dit-il faites par tout le monde Commandemens promesses de Dieu à Noé à sa prosperité selon que Moyse le declare au 9. chap. de Genese Defense de manger le sang des bestes Le meurtre desendu Formiller dans peu d'ans vostre engeance feconde Reprenez vostresceptre imposez nouueau frein Aux animaux qui siers se sont de vostre main Iadiscomme sauuez r'entrez en l'exercice De vostre estat premier Chers enfant vostre office Est de leur commander Vsez doncques de tous Prenez tuez mangez Mais las abstenez vous De leur rougeastre esprit laissez race diuine Laviande estouffee aux oiseaux de rapine Ie hay l'homme de sang Ie suis sainct soyez saincts Done ne vous souillez point aux sang de vos germains Fuyez lacruauté detestez le carnage Et ne romp z brutaux en l'homme mon image L'homme cruel mourra d'vne cruelle mort Le meurtrier sentira quoy qu'â—l tarde l'effort D'vn paricide bras tousiours mest empestes Grondant poursuiueront les homicides testes Au reste Promesse qu'il n'y aura plus de deluge vniuersel ne craignez qu'vn Deluge second Couure de toutes pars de la terre le front Non ie le vous promets Non non ticle vous iure Et qui me vit iamais containcu de pariure Ie le reiure encor par mon Nom trois-fois-sainct Et pour seau de ma soy L'are au Ciel donné pour gage de ceste promesse dans les nues s'ay peint Ce bel Arc piolé Quand done vnlong orage Menacera ce Tout d'vn ondoyant rauage Que le ciel chargé d'caux à vos monts touchera Que lair en plain midi la terre anuitera Haussez deuers cest Arc vostre alaigre visage Car bien qu'il soit empreint dans vn moite nuage Qu'il soit tout bordé d'eaux qu'il semble humer Pour noyer l'Vniuers tous les flots de la mer Il fera qu'au plus fort de vos viues destresses Vous penserâ—z en moy moy en mes promesses Noé regard en haut Description de l'arc au ciel void esmerucillé Vn demi-cercle en l'air de cent teints esmaillé Et qui clair se poussant vers la voute atheree A pour son diametrevne ligne tiree Entre deux Orizon vn arc de toutes parts Egalement plié vn arc fait de trois ares Dont l'vn est tout au long peint de couleur dorée De verte le second le tiers d'azuree Mais de telle façon qu'en cest or vert bleu Ony voit le plus pur riolé quelque peu Arc qui lunt en la main de l'Archer du tonnerre Dont la corde subtil est comme à steur de terre Et qui mi-part le ciel se courbant sur nous Mouille dedans deux mers de ses cornes les bouts Temporel ornement des flambantes voutures Où Nature à broyé ses plus viues teintures Que si tu ne comprens que le rouge Quelles choses sont representees par cest arc le bleuâ— Pren les pour sacrement de la mer du feu Du rauage ondoyant rauage contraire Du iugement ia fait iugement à faire 17 Then blest he man and all and said againe Gods commands and promises to Noe his posteritie Gen. 6. Go breede And ouerswarme the world with fast-encreasing seede R'enhand your Princely Mace rule and hold hard againe The wildest of the beasts that erst had got the raine Commaund all as before take vse and kill for food But this Blood-eating forbidden beware my sonnes you eat no flesh in blood The life thereof beware vnto the rau'ning foule The strangled carcasse leaue you of so heau'nly soule I hate the man of blood be holy as am I. Shun all blood thirstinesse Murder forbidden but more especially Regard a brothers life and do not rase in man The likenesse of your God my soule doth curse and ban And euer shall pursue with stormie ghust of hate And strike with murdering
mon Phalec qui d'vne humblè langage S'informe auec Heber du nom du quart Image I'oy qu'il respond ainst Cher fils ce teint noignard La douceur de ces yeux ce pied qui fretillard Semble tousiours danser les guitterres les fluttes Les cistres les cornets les luths les saquebutes Et les lyres encor qu'autour d'elle tu vois Nous monstrent que c'est l'Art qui modere la voix Qui mesnage le vent qui guide maistresse Dessus les nerfs par leurs de nos nerfs la souplesse Le discordant accord la sacree harmonie Et la nombreuse loy qui te noit compaignie A Dieu lors qu'il voulut donner ingenieux A la terre repos Discours Platonique de la Musique harmoniâ— des Cieux des ailes aux cieux D'autant comme lon dit que la Voix souueraine Logea dans chaque ciel vne douce Syrene Comme sur-intendante à sin que ces bas corps Emprunt assent des hauts lâ—urs plus parfaits accords Et qu'vn Choeur aime-bal auec le choeur des Anges Dans sa Chapelle ardente entonnast ses louanges Comparaison seruant à representer plus aisement ce qu'il à touché de la musique des Cieux Ou çomme vn mesme vent artistement vomi Par le souflet Panthois se pourmetne parmi L'ingenieux Secret entre par les soupapes Qu'en battant le clauier organiste tu frapes Coule dans la graueure monte diuisé Par les conduits espars du Sommier pertuisé Anime tout d'vn câ—up les aiguës Cimbales Les flutes au-doux-air les aigres Regales De la bouche de Dieu l'Esprit tout-auinant Des cieux organisez va les rouës mounantâ— Si bien que retraçant leur orniere eternelle L'vn d'eux fait le bourdon l'autre la chanterelle Musique es humeurs saisoÌ„s elemens Le Bassus Or tous ces coâ— tr'accerts enchanteusement doux Plus clairque dans le ciel s'entendent parmi nous La plus pesante humeur l'Hyuer la Terre basse Vont tenant la partie plus lente plus casse Le Phlegme blanchissant l'humide Automne l'Eau Le Tenor. L'Altus ou Contratenor La Teneur qui tousiours coule comme au nineau Le Sang la Prime l'Air transparentement rare La Voix qui fleuretant se peint se tord s'esgare La Cholere l'Esté l'Element sec chant La corde plus tendue Le Superius le son le plus haut Efficace de la Musique Et c'est pourquoy mon fils les plus rebelles choses Se laissent veincre au chant comme tenant encloses Les semences du nombre foïbles ne viuant Qu'en vertu de l'Esprit qui va les cieux mouuant Ample description del efficace vertu de la Musique A lendroit des hommes sages fouls Le chant harmonieux fait aux plus fiers gendarmes Tout ensemble tomber la cholere les armes Sereine l'ame triste charmeusement doux Acoise peu à peu les bourrasques des fouls Donne frein au desir fait mourir la flamme De celui qui bouillant idolatre vne femme Guerit le patient des Phalanges blessé Qui proche du tombeau saute comme insensè A lendroit des bestes Le Cigne en est raui la Biche en est trompee Et des peints oisillons la simplesse pipee Le Dausin suit la Lyre le bruyant essain Des Abeilles t'arreste au tin-tin de l'airain A lendroit de Dieu mesmes Hé que ne peut le chant veu que mesme il commande A l'Esprit donne-esprit ven qu'il fait qu'il descende Dans l'ame d'vn Prophete d'vn diuin acceut Vnit l'esprit raui à l'esprit rauissant Veu que quand l'Eternel en sa fureur plus grande Fume tonne treluit que tous ses nerfs il bande Et que courbant le dos haussant ses deux bras Ses foudres plus aigus il veut lancer en bas L'accord melodieux qu'vn coeur deuot souspire Destrempe ses tendons fait rendormir son ire Et Clemence aux-doux-yeux emble d'entre ses mains Le supplice ensouffré des rebelles humains Canan entrerompt le propos d'Heber dont le Poëte lassé préd occasion de mettre conuenable sin aux beaux discours de ceste seconde Semaine Mais si tost qu'Heber veut de l'antique Musique Deschiffrer eloquent l'art la pratique Canan qui du Iourdain cerche le fatal cours Passant pres la Colomne interrompt son discours Aussi n'en puis-ie plus La longueur du voyage Que foible i'entrepren me fait perdre courage Il me faut impetrer nouueau secours d'enhaut Et reculer vn peu pour faire vn plus grand saut And how to mingl ' his drugs you passe all o're the skie In turning of an hand or twinckling of an eye You more then princely rule all countries vnder Sun You demigodly make heau'n twixt your hands to run For you ô heauenly wits my fairest painting quill Should on these folded sheets her hony-dew distill Still would I write of you but with her daintie sweets The last sist'r of the foure me calls and louely greets For I this Phaleg heare with sonly-meeke language His fath'r entreat to tell the name of th'oth'r Image And Heb'r him answer thus Deere sonne this painted girle By that her wanton foot seems still to daunce and tirle By glauncing of her eye the Cornets Guytterns Flutes Shawmes Sackbuts Vyols Harps Bandoraes Organs Musicke the fourth Image described with her Implements Lutes Which all-about her lye vpon the table and ground Appeares to be that Art which rules the voice and sound Which guides the gentle breath and mistresse-like appoints How on the tuned string we trull our nimble ioynts The sacred harmonie the discordant accord Law numbred number law'd which waited on the Lord When his creating Word spring of All-euerie Made th' earth to stand so fast and heau'n so fast to flie Platoes opinion of Harmonie among the Spheres Sith euery Sphere they say hath some Intelligent Or Angell musicall for Lady president Appointed by the Word to th' end of those aboue These lower things may learne the perfect cord of loue And that with Angell-queers a dauncing Set be seene To reuell on his praise in temple fyrie-sheene Or as from bellow-loongs a breath one and the same The Spirit of God compared to the wind of an Organ In skilfull wise put-out straies through the secret frame Of curious handyworke quits euery stop and list That opens when the keyes are tickt by th'Organist And mounting here and therefrom out the channell scored Into th'esparsed pipes o'th'Sommier thorow-bored Alliues all in a trice Recorders sweetly-still And Regals eager-tun'd and Cymballs sounding shrill So of Gods mouth
so blest That they and theirs shall golden Scepter weild Whereto must bow and yeild The proudest plant afeild Ph. So here is worke for Muses all but two What hast thou more Mu. Enough for them to do Ph. Nay vse but Clio leaue Melpomene Mu. Why leaue her out a stately Muse is she Ph. But still so sad with looke cast-downe on earth I doubt hir presence will defeat the myrth Mu. No no I will not part her from the Queere But fit her humor and to mend the cheere Out-set all other wofull destinie My fattest lambe shall make a Tragedie And sing the Muse will of no greater bug Then warre betwixt a yong child and his dug Controuling some though not of high degree As cause thereof ye Ladies pardon me The melancholie Muse yet saith not I All that your Sex dishonour I defie But your faire bottles Melpomen doth thinke Dame nature fill'd for your faire bab's to drinke Ph. Milke would she giue else only to the poore Not vnto such as drye't and spill'c a floore Mu. And this 't is like shee 'll adde vnto the rest That Ladies child deserues a Ladies brest That brauer spirit suckt shall more embraue him And make him man-grown like a knight behaue him P. Whē others make their gētle blod far-wors◠By sucking young the basenesse of their nurse Mu For as their Heathen gods the Heathen sayn No mortall blood had running in their vain But Venus wounded once by Diomed Ambrosian liquor at her finger shed Right so in blood of men there is great odds And such among them as are stiled Gods The finest haue to breed their children food Blood was late milk and milk will soone be blood Ph. And some loue more as cause of better luck Then wombe that bore them paps that gaue them luck What parent would not such a reason moue Drawne from the gain or losse of childrens loue Mu. I once beheld where Lady of high degree As with her Lord and others set was she In mids of dinner had her child brought-in And gaue it suck scarce shewing any skin Through ynch-board hole of silk pinn'd vp againe When child was fed without more taking paine Ph. And is not this instinct through all dyssown That eur'y femall hatcheth-vp her owne Well make an end Mu. How can I be too long When Muses beare the burden of my song But here 's a Trumpet Fame selfe hath no better And Clio sounds it well and I 'le entreat her Hereafter sing on high what foe shall bow To th' issues of this happie match but now To surd it as young trompeters are wont And lest it sound too lowd set stop vpon 't Yet first bid welcome with a cheerefull clank The French Deluce to Brytaines Rosy bank Phi. Well fare thine heart for thinking on these things To please the children of so mighty Kings My selfe though poore wil thereto ioine my myte On solemne day so leaue thee for to night Mu. And I so thee time is our sheepe were penn'd The Sunne is soonken at the Landskop end Then Musidor made haste home and began Take order for the busines with his man Wife had he none the more was he distrest See lad quoth he the house and garth well drest To morrow morn for then or soone at least The sweetest Nymph on earth will be my guest Without plash thistles and presumptuous thorns That neare the way grow-vp among the corns For feare they rase her hands more white thē milke Or teare her mantles windy-wauing silke Withìn if Spiders heretofore haue durst With cunning webs where through the stronger burst And weaker flies are caught presume to quyp The sacred lawes of men with besome stryp Both web and weauer downe be-rush the floore The porch and th'entries and about the doore Set eau'n the trestles and the tables wax And strew the windowes house that mistres lacks O how quoth he and deeply sigh'd therat 'T is out of order wants I know not what Haue care my lad and be as 't were my sonne He lowted low and said it should be don Much hereto more was written when the Queene Her beautie shat'd your sea and land betweene But after landing long will be my booke Held vnder presse on part then please you looke Till come the rest but ô with gratious eye And pardon for applying Maiestie To Shepherds stile so may you see conspire Th'English and French as no third tongue comes nigher No not the Greeke vnt ' either though Sir Stephen Hath made the same with French to march full As doth our English and it shall yet more Now heart and hand ye Princes ioyne wherefore eauen I pray and will with Hymen all mine houres That for the good successe of you and yours While earth stands Cent'r and Heau'n in circle goes Together spring French Lillie and English Rose Your Maiesties faithfull subiect and seruant W. L'isle To the Readers COnyes whom Salomon reckons among the wise Little-ones vpon earth do make many skraplets and profers on the ground before they dig earnestly for their neast or litter and writing-schollers draw first in blotting paper many a dash roundell and minime before they frame the perfect letters that shall stand to their coppie so entending some worke that may if I be so happie remain some while after me many waies do I essay and try first my stile and pen that according also to the wise rule of Horace I may thereby iudge my selfe and discerne quid valeant humeri quid ferre recusent Nor do I trust my owne iudgement herein so likely to be partiall but commonly present my worke in writing before it bee printed vnto some Quintilius or other whose noble disposition will authoritie may and learning is able to find fault and aduise me Yet among the sundrie versets or prosets which besides this I haue or shall set-out if you find some that sauour of my younger time passe by them I pray you or affoord them the fauour that my Quintilius doth to let them passe because they were the way that led me to a grauer kind as also the grauest of humain Poetrie brought me at last to the diuine whereof I haue many Essayes now almost readie for the presse This translation of Salust du Bartas what present occasion draweth from me you may well perceiue yet thinke me not herein Acta agere to do that which was before done and very well by Iosua Siluester for it is in a diuers kind and many yeares ere he began this had I lying by me yea partly published in print as Anno 1596 Anno 1598 and dedicated to the late Noble Charles Earle of Nottingham But now the cause why in this I beginne so abruptly is for that I was loth to come neere the booke next aforegoing which our late Soueraigne Lord King Iames in his youth so incomparably made English yet had I a desire to fall vpon that braue commendation of our late Soueraigne Ladie Queene Elizabeth
l'ornement 〈…〉 â—ouâ— Ã sey vit à Dieu seulement Voy Par soy Henoca esté emporté a fin qu' il ne vist point la moir ne fut point tronué pource que Dieu l'auoit emporté Car deouÌ„t qu'il fust emporté il a cu tesmoignage d'auoit pleu a Dieu Hebr. 11.5 voy comme its s' â—werce à seussrir la lumiere Qui foudâ—â—â—-â—â—â—e luit eu l'essence premiere Comme libre duioug des corporelies loix Et sequestré des sons il vole quelque foiâ— Dans le sainâ— cabinet des Idees plus beâ—ies Ayant la Foy le Ieusne l'Oraison pour ailes Comme à certains momonts bien qu' hoste de celieu Sainct il posse de tout sent tout void tout en Dieu Comme pour quelque temps montant de forme en forme 〈◊〉 la forme de Dieu heureux il se transforme Voy comme le Tout-beau qui brulant d'amitié Pour ses rares beantez le vent non par meitié Ains tout pour tousiours dresse à son Tout â—eschelle Qui conduit d'icy bas à la gloire eternelle C'est donq fait tu t' en vas tu t' en vas donq à Dieu Adieu mon fils Hâ—â—â—c adieu mon sils adieu Vâ—ià haut bien heureux Ia ton corps que so change 〈◊〉 nature d'Esprit ou bien en forme d'Ange Vest l'immortalité Iaces youx non plus yeux Henoâ— cheminâ— seloÌ„ Dicu na'pâ—â—â—â—◠〈◊〉 â—ar Diâ—â— le tâ—ansporta Gen. 5. â—4 Decoâ—ent slamboyans d'astres nonueaux les cieux â—u humâ—â— a longs traicts la hoisson Nectaree Ton â—abat est sans fin La courtaine tiree Tâ—â—â—is Dieu front à front sainctement vni An biâ—n trinement-vn tu vis en l'infini Ce pendant icy has nouuel Ange tu laisses Vn peuple desbordâ— iâ—ses mains sont pilleresses Sa langue 〈◊〉 sâ— plaâ—sâ— qu' à semer des discors Les 〈…〉 Paâ—â—iâ—◠〈…〉 â—â—â—ampeÌ„t â—â—ioigneâ—â—aâ— fillâ—◠〈…〉 â—acâ—â—â— Caâ—â— Son ventrâ— est vn abisme inceste tont son corps Qui l'oust iamais pensè La bien heureuserace Le pâ—uple facresainct ceux que Dieu par sa grace Adopte sont helas ceux qui plus impudents Pour courre apres le vice ont pris lemors aux dents Embrassant eschaufez les impudiques silles Des prâ—phaâ—es humains confendant les familles De Seth de Cain prisant effronâ—â—â— Moius les honnestes moeurs que les fresles beautez Deces salâ—s baâ—sers a prins son origine Vne â—ngeance qui vit de sang de rapine Iene sçâ—y quels Geants cruels hauts à la main Pestes de l'Vniuers Genne engendtez de ce meslinge Coutroux de Dieu contre le premier monde Gen. 6.3 fleaux du genre humain Adonques Dieu qui voit que sa lente iustice Par ses trop longs delais confirme leur malice Ne voulant plus plaider colere se resout D' abolir soudain l'homme pour l'homme ce Tout Au moins tout ce qui fend les airs à tire d'aile Ou qui hance mortel la terre riche-belle Houure d'vne main les fenestres des cieux Deluge vniuersel sur le premice monde doÌ„t nul n' eschappe fo rs Noe ce qui estoit enclos auce lui dans l'Arche Gen. 6.7 8. D'ou tombent mille mers sur les chefs vicieux Des rebelles humains De l'autre poing il serre L' espongeuse rondeur de l'execrable terre La met dans le pressoir lui fait peu à peu Regorger tous les flots qui iadis elle a beu Dans chaque creux rocher vngrand torrent s' avine La neige à son secours des niontaigues arriùe Les Cedres Sapins ne monstrent que les bras Les fleuues se font hauts leurs bors se font bas Las qui d'arriere-fils perds-ie dans les abîmes Pour ne scauoir nager sans les aspres cimes Des monts plus éleuez sur qui les plus gaillars Pour se sanuer du flot grimpent de toutes pars Le scrois sans neneux Mais quoy las mais quoy l'onde Fait ia moindre ces monts la surface du monde Deuient vn grand estang Enfans où suyez-vous Las vos pieds sont par tout talonnâ—z du courrous Du Dieu croule Vniuers Le flot in tout ranage Les flâ—â—ues la mer n'ont desia qu' vn riuage Sçanoir vn etelaoirei vn ciel qui chargé d'eaux Vâ—nt produire irrité des Oceans nouueaux Exclamation pleine de passions affections bien accommodees à ce discours O pere sans enfans O pere miserable O riens par trop seconds O race dommageable O goussres inconus ou pour moy descouuerts O naâ—â—rage du monde O sin de l'Vniuers O ciel O vaste mer O terre non plus terre O chair sang A ces mots la tristesse lui serre Les conduits de la voix Il meurt presque d'ennui Et l'esprit prediseur se retire de lui Adam shews his sonne in how many daies the world was created THen thus he gan foretel ‑ The wauy territorie Of people skalie-backt ‑ all this high vaulted story Wherein the thundring God ‑ by his e'rlasting might Hath placed sentinel ‑ Sunne for day Moone for night The highest Aire the Mean ‑ wherin the clouds do play And this below the field ‑ appointed for the fray Of sturdie counterwinds ‑ that with a roaring sound Throw many a wood that stands ‑ betwixt them to the ground The flower-decked Inne ‑ that lodgeth crazie Man Were all by th'awfull word ‑ in six daies made How many ages it should continue and than Was hallowed the seuenth ‑ In like sort Earth Sea Aire And th' Azure-guilt that foldes ‑ the world in curtaine faire Shall last six other daies ‑ but long and farre vnlike The daies that Heauens bright eye ‑ meates-out with golden-strike That first begins at me The first age vnder AdaÌ„ The second vnder Noe. The third vnder Abraham ‑ the next at him that first Inuented Ship and taught ‑ dry hills to slake his thirst With cheerefull iuice of grapes ‑ the morning of the third Is he the mightie Groome ‑ that led his flocke and heard From home to follow God ‑ and sacrifizd his Sonne By faith in heau'nly word ‑ more than by reason woonne The fourth vnder Dauid The fift vnder Zacâ—â—â—â—hias And he begins the fourth ‑ that had the cannon-sling And changed hooke to mace ‑ great Prophet Poet King The fift a dismall day ‑ beginneth at the night Of that disastrous King ‑ whose last most-rufull fight Was of his children slaine ‑ and Iewes all droue in rankes To lead a slauish life ‑ by fat Euphrates bankes The sixt daies Sunne is Christ the Sauiour lookt-for long Who
euen the descendents of Seth also with whom the truth of God remained began to be debauched in following the course of Cainites Howsoeuer most likely it is that Enos and other good seruants of God by all meanes endeauoured to maintaine true righteousnesse and holinesse and so much the rather because they saw that issue of Cain giuen ouer wholly to the world And hence it is that we reade in the sixt Chapter of Genesis that the posteritie of Seth were called the Children of God and there also by the Daughters of Men are meant women descended of Cain 6 See Euoch Moses is briefe but as graue and pithie as may be speaking of the holy Patriarke Enoch Gen. 5.22 Enoch after he begat Methusala walked with God three hundred yeares and begat sonnes and daughters So Enoch walked with God and appeared no more for God tooke him To walke with God is to please God as the Apostle expounds it Hebr. 11. Hereto the Poet affords his learned Paraphrase As that Enoch dying to himselfe and liuing vnto the Lord was exercised daily in meditation of the ioyes of heauen and raised himself as it were aboue the world with the wings of faith fasting prayer As also the Apostle saith By saith Enoch was taken away that he might not see death neither was he found for God had taken him away Saint Iuâ—e in his generall Epistle saith that Enoch the seuenth from Adam prophecied against the wicked saying Behold the Lord commeth with thousands of his Saints to giue Iudgement against all men and to rebuke all the vngodly among them of all the wicked deeds which they haue vngodly committed and of all their cruell speeches which wicked sinners haue spoken against him The Poet holds according to the opinion of many Diuines both old and new that Enoch was taken both soule and body vp into heauen for a manifest witnesse to the former world of euerlasting life For this was no such inuisible departure or disappearance as is of the soule from the body And whereas the Apostle saith hee was not found it shewes that such as then liued in the world laid to heart this miracle and after diligent search made the godly were much comforted thereby as the wicked could not but be much dismayed Moreouer the Chronicles doe reckon but fiftie six yeares betwixt the death of Adam and the taking vp of Enoch and as the death of the one taught all After-commers to thinke on their weaknesse so the life of the other made the godly more assured of life euerlasting and glory of body and soule for euer I desire each Christian Reader to consider well the fift Chapter of Genesis that he may well compare the times of these Patriarkes and marke how long some of them liued with their fore and after-beers whereby they might the better learne of the one and teach the other what was the true seruice of God 7 Men of vnbounded lust Although the first world endured 669. yeares after the Assumption of Enoch yet true is the Poets saying that after this Patriarke was gone all godlinesse holinesse and righteousnesse began to decay howsoeuer Noe and his Father Lamech and his Grand-father Methusala who deceased not many moneths before the Floud but in the same yeare did set themselues mainly against those disorders and shewed themselues euen by way of preaching to be as it were the Heraulds of Iustice Moses shewes plainly the particulars throughout the whole fift Chapter and in the beginning of the sixt what horrible sinnes the descendants of Seth committed by ioyning themselues to those of Cain as first the neglect of Gods word then Tyranny violence oppression iniustice wantonnesse polygamie or hauing more wiues at once than one and all wickednesse growne to a height altogether vncorrigible so as the estate both of Church Kingdome and Family were all turned vpside downe and to be short a deluge of impiety and filth had couered the face of the whole earth 8 Of Gyants God knowes what Moses saith Gen. 6.4 that in those daies were Giants vpon the earth and chiefly after that the sons of God which were the posterity of Seth grew familiar with the young women descended of the line of Cain and had issue by them He saith also that these Giants were mightie men which in old time were of great renowne Some apply the word Giant to the exceeding stature of those men whereby they made all afraid that beheld them Others whom the Poet followes to the Tyranny and violence of such as Irued immediatly before the Deluge among whom some there were who bore all afore them and became a terrour to all others Goropius in his Antiquities handleth at large this point concerning Gyants especially in his second booke entituled Gygantomachia 1. Chassagnon hath answered him in a Latine Treatise where he disputeth of the exceeding height these Gyants c. 9 Then God who saw The causes of the Deluge the fore-tellinâ— and execution thereof are set downe by Moses briefly but sufficiently and hereto may be applied that which our Lord and Saâ—iour saith as touching these latter times which he compareth to the time of Noe Matth. 24. As also that of St. Peter in his first generall Epistle 3.20 and in his second 2.5 Lay also to this prediction of Adam the description of the generall Floud set downe by the Poet at the end of the second Day of his first Weeke All this requires a full Commentary but this may suffice in briefe The end of the second Weekâ—s first Day called Adam The second day is called Noe because the most remarkeable things in all the time of that holy Father and his successors vntill Abraham is there represented in foure Bookes following and thus entitled Th' Arche Babylon Colonies and Columnes or Pillars whereof the first is as it were a briefe Commentary vpon diuers passages of the six seuen eight and ninth Chapters of Genesis But heare the Poet. L'ARCHE The first Booke of Noe called the Arke Auant propos auquel par vne modeste plainte le poëte rend les lecteurs attentifs se fait voye à linuocacion du nom de Dieu SI vous ne coulez plus ainsi que de coustume Et sans peine sans art ô saincts vers de maplume Si le Laurier sacré qui m'ombrageoit le front Esueillé se sletrit si du double Mont Où loin de cest Enfer vostre Vranie habite Ma muse à corps perdu si bas se prceipite Accusez de ce temps l'ingrate cruautè Le soin de mes enfans masoible santè Accusez la douleur de mes pertes nouuelles Accusez mes preces accusez mes tuteles Voila le contrepois qui tire violant En bas les plus beaux soins de mon esprit volant La gresle de mon champ les poignantes espines Qui estoufent en sleur les semences diuines Qui germoient en mon ame O
les obiections des Atheistes D'où vient donc diras-tu ceste mer dont larage Les venteuses forests des Riphees saccage Met le Liban en friche tasche de ses eaux Enuieuse amortir les celestes flambeaux D'où vient diray-ie ô Cham que les Loups Pantheres Bridant pour quelque temps leurs fumantes choleres Et des bois ombrageux quittant le triste effroy On t adiournez du Ciel comparu deuant moy Qui tenant sous mon ioug tant de feres captiues Suis remis es honneurs estats prerogatiues Dont Adam est decheu Qu'ici de toutes pars Me sont venus au poing les oiseaux plus hagars Sans estre reclamez Que si peu de fourrage Si peu de grain froissé si peu de doux bruuage Suffit pour sustenter tant danimaux gloutons Qui viuent confinez dans ces obscurs grotons Qu'ici du sier Autour la Pordris na point crainte Ni le Leuraut ailé de la Tigresse peinte Que le flot contre nous tant de fois mutiué Nait brisé nostre nef que lair emprisonné Les sales excremens la punaise haleine Des corps dont la Carraque est confusement pleine Ne nous ait estousfez que bourgeois de l'eau Nous ne trouuons ailleurs la vie qu'au tombeau Ceste nefn'a tant d'ais tant de cloux tant de tables Que de miracles saincts prodiges notables Icy l'entendement de merueille englouti Sans pointe sans discours reste comme abruty Et Dieu n'a moins monstré quelle estoit sa puissance En restaurant ce Tout qu'en luy donnant essence Appaise ô sainct Patron appaise ton courrous Guide au port ce vaiseau seche l'onde fay nous Cognoistre soit auant soit apres la mort blesme Ta sureur sur autruy ta bonté sur nous-mesme DIuine Verse if with ease thou flow not as to fore The Poets modest complaint to breed attention and make way for his Innocation Frō out my weary quil but make me toyle the more The sacred crown of Bay that wont my fore-head shade If now decheueled it wither dwindle fade So that my Muse be falne into these earthly hels From that twypointed Mount where thine Vranie dwels Accuse the deadly fewds of this vnthankfull Age My many suits in Law mine often gardianage My houshold care my griefe at late and sundry losses And bodies crasie state these and such other crosses They downward force my thoughts aspiring heretofore And damp my Muses wings that erst so high did soare This haile beats downe my corne these bushes these weeds Before my haruest comes choak-vp those heau'nly seeds That in my soule shot-out 2. O rid me of all these lets My God and Father deerel kindle in me th' emberets Of Faith so nie put out and least mans wit deceiue me Be pleas'd ô Lord and ô let not thy spirit leaue me Paint varnish guild my Verse now better then before And grant I be not like the winde that in a rore Sends all his hurring force vpon the first he meets And proudest hils of all rooting trees scouring streets That driuing o're the plaine makes with his angry blast The stones to bound-againe and firie sparkles cast But fainteth more and more as though his winged sway Did scatter here and there her feathers by the way O rather make me like the streame that drop by drop At first beginning fals from some rocks barren top But farther from the Spring and nar to Thetis flowing Encreaseth in his waues and gets more strength by going And then enbyllowed-high doth in his pride disdaine With fome and roaring din all hugenesse of the Maine It came to passe at length as our fore-sire foretold And hausned long before that angry heau'n enrould And toomb'd the world in flood t' auenge as well it can The many plighted sinne of stubborne harted man Ne'r had the birds againe in coueys checky-pide The windy-whirled ayre with hardy flight defide Nor beast nor man had beene but on the land in vaine Had sprung all kinde of ftuit of tree of hearbe of graine Had not the godly sonne of Lamech learn'd the skill And tooke the paine to build that Arche huge as an hill Which of all breathing kinds safe from so great deluge A paire of breeders held in sakersaint refuge When all were once i'th'Arche At the end of the second day of the first weeke Th' almighty bindeth fast In Eols closest caue the cleering Northen blast And lets the South goe loose he flyes with myslie wing From each bristle of his berd there trickleth downe a spring A cloggy night of myst embowdleth round his braine His haire all bushy-shagd is turned into raine He squeaseth in his hand the sponge of cloudy soods And makes it thund'r flash powre down showry floods Forthwith the foamie drains the riuers and the brooks Are puft vp all at once their mingled water lookes And cannot finde her bound but hauing got the raine Bears haruest as it runs into the brackie Maine All Earth begins to quake to sweat to weepe for feare That nor in veine nor eye she leaueth drop or teare And thou O heau'n thy selfe draw'st all the secret sluses Of thy so mighty Pooles to wash away th' abuses That had thy sister soyld who void of law and shame Pleas'd onely to displease thy King and scorne his name Now lost is all the land 5. Now Nereus hath no shore Into the watry waste the riuers run no more Themselues are all a Meere and all the sundry Meeres That were before are one This All naught else appeares But as a mighty Poole and as it would conuent And ioyne flood with the floods aboue the firmament The Sturgeon mounting ore high Castles is abasht To see so many townes all vnder water dasht 6. The Secalues and the Seales now wand'r about the rocks Where late of bearded goats were fed the iumping flocks Camoysed Dolphins haunt the place of birds and browse Vpon the hugest hils the tallest Cedar browes A Greyhound or a Tygre a Horse a Haire a Hinde It little auailes them now to run as wight as winde They swin and try to stand and all but little auailes them The more they footing seeke alas the more it failes them The cruell Crocodile the Tortesse and the Beuer Haue now but wet aboad that wet and dry had euer The Wolfe swims with the Lambe the Lyon with the Deere And neither other frayes the Hawke and Swallow steere About with weary wings against a certaine death At length for want of perch in fierce waue loose their breath But miserable men how fare they thinke one treads On point of highest hill anoth'r on turret-leads Another in Cedars top bestirs him hand and foot To gaine of all the boughes the farthest from the root But ô alas the Flood ascending as doe they
shall be floong His angers fierie darts that as thy shamelesse toong With bould and brasen face presumes now to deny him Thy miserable estate in time to come may trie him First that God is infind◠vnchäge able Alinightie and incomprehensible I know and God be thankt this Circle all whole sound Whose cent'r hath place in all as ou'r all go'th his round This onely being power feeles not within his mind A thousand diuers fits driu'n with a counter-wind He mooues All yet vnmooud yea onely with a thought Works-vp the frame of Heau'n and pulls downe what he wrought I know his throne is built amids a flaming fire To which none other can but only of grace aspire For breathlesse is our breath and ghostlesse is our ghost When his vnbounded might in circl ' he list to coast I know I know his face how bright it thorow shines The double winged maske of glorious Cherubines That Holy Almightie Great but on his backe behinde None euer saw and then he passed like a winde The step-tracke of his feet is more then meruellable His Being vncomprisd his name vnutterable That we who dwell on earth so low thrust from the skie Do neuer speake of God but all vnproperly For call him happie Ghost ye grant him not an ase Aboue an Angells right say Strong and that 's more base Say Greatest of all Great he 's void of quantitie Say Good Faire Holy one he 's void of qualitie Of his diuine estate the full accomplishment Is meere substantiall and takes not accident And that 's the cause our tongue in such a loftie subiect Attaining not the minde Why wee cannot speake of God but in termes of manhood more then the minde her obiect Doth lispe at euery word and wanting eloquence When talke it would of God with greatest reuerence By Manly-sufferance it hath him Jealous nam'd Repenting pitifull and with iust ang'r enflam'd Repentance yet in God emplies not Repentance and change ascribed vnto God in Scripture is farre from errour and fault as in vs Misdome or ignorance nor is he enuious For all his Iealosie his pitie cannot set him In miserable estate his anger cannot fret him Calme and in quiet is the Spirit of the Lord And looke what goodly worke fraile man could ere afford Thrust headlong on with heat of any raging passion The Lord it workes and all with ripe consideration What 1. Comparison for that purpose shall the Leach behold without a weeping eye Without a change of looke without a swoone or cry The struggling of his friend with many sorts of paine And feele his fainting pulse and make him whole againe And shall not God that was and is and shall be th'same On miserable man looke downe from heau'nly frame Without a fit of griefe without a wofull crie 2. Comparison Nor heale infirmities without infirmitie Or shall a Iudge condemne without all angers sting The strange adulterer to shamefull suffering As aiming sharpe reuenge and setting his entence Not on the sinn'r at all but on the sole offence And shall the fancie of man so binde the will of God That which is Iustice in man cannot be vice in God He may not lift his arme and iust reuenging rod Without some fury against a theefe or Athean Or is' t a vice in God God punisheth not to defend his owne estate but to maintaine vertue and confoun vice that 's held a vertue in man And cannot God abhorre a sinne abominable But of some sinne himselfe he must be censurable He alwaies one-the same ne're takes vp armes to guard him Or his estate from hurt as if some treason skard him Whose campe is pight in heau'n beyond reach of our shot And fens'd with Diman wals this that-way which way not But eu'n to guid our liues to maintaine righteousnesse T' establish wholesome lawes and bridle vnrulinesse The worlds iniquities deserued extreme punishment Nor yet by drowning thus ny-all the world in flood Go'th he beyond the bounds of reason in his mood For Adam who the root was of this world and th' other Shot-forth a forked stocke of Cain and Seth his brother Two ranke and plentious armes the first a wylding bore Disrelisht verdourlesse but in aboundant store Good fruit on th' other grew yet graff'd it was ere long With thossame bastard ympes and thereof quickly sprong What lawlesse match begot Then where on all this round Could any right or good Sith all were corrupted all deserued exile or innocence be found For Sinne that was the right inheritance for Cain To Seths posteritie was giuen in dow'r againe With daughter-heires of Cain so were defiled then The dearest groomes of God by marrying brides of men Yea we we that escape this cruell influence The best without excuse A million witnesses beare in our conscience Which all and each alike vpon our guilt accords Nor haue we any excuse before the Lord of Lords Who deales not tyrant-like to whelme in wauy brees The beast that goes on foot and all on wing that flees Because for mans behoofe they were created all And he that should them vse is blotted by his fall From out the Booke of life Th'acecssory sollowes the principall and why then should they stay When he for whom they were is iustly tak'n away Man is the head of all that drawes the breath of life Let one a member loose he liueth yet but if A deadly sword the head from bodies troonke diuide How can there any life in leg or arme abide But haply God's to feirce that hath the land orewheld Yea A traitour deserues to haue his house raised had so many yeares disloiall man rebeld Against the Lord his King and had the Lord no reason To rase the traitours house for such high points of treason To sow salt on the same and mak 't a monument The flood was no naturall accident but a iust iudgement of God That his diuine reuenge not Sea or Aire hath sent This rauing water-Masse Let all the clowdie weather That round-encourtaines Earth be gathered thicke together From either cope of Heau'n and bee'tall powred downe In place what e're it would but some one countrie drowne But this our sauing ship by floating euery where Now vnd'r a Southern Crosse now vnd'r a Northen Beare And thwarting all this while so many a diuers Clime Shewes all the world is wrapt in generall abysme But if thou vanquisht here to caues in earth do flie With floods there made of Aire thy forces to supplie What are those hills and where with caues so deep wide To hold-in so much ayre as into water tri'de Might heal the proudest heights when hardly a violl 's fil'd With water drop by drop of ten-fould aire dystil'd Besides when th' aire to drops of water melts apace And lesned fals to spring what bodie filles the place For no where in this all is found roome bodilesse Sad waue
will sooner mount and light aire downward presse Then how thou'lt aske me come these huge and raging floods That spoile on Riphean hils the Boree-shakeÌ„ woods Drowne Libanus and shew their enuious desires To quench with tost-vp waue the highest heau'nly fires He aske thee Cham how Wolues Panthers from the Wild This refutes all the obiections of Atheists At time by Heau'n design'd before me came so mild How I keepe vnder yoke so many a fierce captiue Restored as I were to th' high prerogatiue From whence fath'r Adam fell how wild foule neuer mand From euery coast of Heau'n came flying to my hand How in these cabins darke so many a gluttonous head Is with so little meat or drinke or stouer fed Nor feares the Partridge here the Falcons beake pounces Nor shuns the light-foot Hare a Tygers looke or Ounces How th' Arch holds-out so long against the wauy shot How th' aire so close the breath and dong it choaks vs not Confused as it is and that we find no roome For life in all the world but as it were in toombe Ther 's not so many planks or boords or nailes i'th'arch As holy myracles and wonders which to marke Astonnes the wit of man God shew'th as well his might By thus preseruing all as bringing all to light O holy Syre appease appease thy wroth and land In hau'n our Sea-beat ship ô knit the waters band That we may sing-of now and ours in after age Thy mercie shew'd on vs as on the rest thy rage Annotations vpon the first Booke of Noe called the Arke 1 DIvine verse He complaines of the miseries of our time of his bodies crasinesse and care of houshold affaires which hinder his bold designes and make his Muse fall as it were from heauen to earth He calls the verse diuine because of the subiect matter which he handleth acknowledging withall that as Ouid saith Carmina proueniunt anime deducta sereno and this serenitie or quietnesse of spirit which is all in all for a Christian Poem is a gift from Heauen And therefore this our Poet In stead of calling vpon his Muse which is but himselfe or helpe of profane inuentions looketh vp rather vnto that power from whence commeth euery good and perfect gift that is the father of light 2 Oh rid me This is a zealous inuocation and well beseeming the Authors intent which also is enriched with a daintie comparison For verily the chiefe grace of a Poem is that the Poet begin not in a straine ouer high to continue and so grow worse and worse to the end but rather that he increase and aduance himselfe by little and little as Virgil among the Latin Poets most happily hath done Horace also willeth a good writer in a long-winded worke ex sumo dare lucem that is to goe-on and finish more happily then he began Who so doth otherwise like is to the blustring wind which the longer it continues growes lesse and lesse by degrees but the wise Poet will follow rather the example of Riuers which from a small spring the farther they run grow on still to more and more streame and greatnesse 3 As our foresire foretold Saint Peter in his 2. chapt of his 2. Ep. calls Noe the Herault or Preacher of righteousnesse and in the eleauenth chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrewes it is said that Noe being aduertised from God of things not yet seene conceined a reuerent seare and built the Arch for safegard of his familie through the which Arch he condemned the world and was made heire of the righteousnesse which is by saâ—th By these places may be gathered that Noe laying hold on the truth of Gods threats and promises as Moses also sheweth in the sixt of Gen. prepared materials for the Arch and in building the same did as well by worke as word of a Preacher condemne the impiety and wickednesse of men warning them of the iudgement which hung ouer their heads which also was put in execution at the very time appointed by the Almighty 4 When all were once i' th' Arke This historie of the Deluge our Poet had before touched in the end of the second day of his first weeke which passage I the Translator thought good here to insert that the description might be the fuller These verses and the rest to the end of this booke shew vs the fearefull iudgement of God vpon the sinnes of that former world set downe first by Moses in the 6.7 and 8. chapters of Genesis Were I to write a full commentary thereof I should discourse of Noes Arke and diuers questions which present themselues concerning that rare subiect with the precedents consequents and coincidents but I touch lightly these things to draw the Readers care and make still more and more knowne vnto him the great learning and Art shewed in this diuine Poem To see how our Author is his crafts-master let a man conferre this decription with that of Ouid in the first booke of his Metam concerning the Deluge of Deucalion Some of his verses I thought good here to set downe for encouragement of such as haue leysure more neerely to consider and compare the French with the Latine Protinus Aeolijs Aquilonem claudit in antris Et quaecunque fugant inductas flamina nubes Ennttitque Notum madidis Notus euolat alis Terribilem piceá tectus caligine vultum Barba grauts nimbis canis fluit vnda capillis Fronte sedent nobulae rorant pennaeque sinusque Vtqué manu latè pendentia nubila pressit Fit fragor densi sunduntur ab aethere nimbi Then speaking of the land and out-let of Riuers thus Intremuit motuque vias patesecit aquarum Eupatiata ruunt per apertos slumina campos Cwnque satis arbusla trabunt pecudesque virosque Tectaque cumque sais rapiunt penetralia sacris See the rest of Ouid who hath not so exactly described these things as our Poet. 5 Nereus By this word he means the Sea which at the Deluge ouerflowed the whole Earth because it was not then held within the proper bounds thereof by the powerfull goodnesse and prouidence of the Creator Ouid expresseth it thus Omnia pontus erant deerant quoquelittora ponto Virgil thus Spumeus atque imo Nereus ciet aequora sundo Natalis Comes in his Mythologie lib. 8. cap. 6. hath much of Nereus and the Nereides where also he giues a reason why the Poets so call the Sea 6 The Sea-Calues So I translate le Manat for the Veal-like flesh thereof though this be indeed a great Sea-fish described by Rondeletius in the 18. chapter of his sixt booke He is also like a young Bull with a broad backe and a very thicke skin they say he weigheth more then two oxen are well able to draw His flesh as I said before commeth neere the taste of Yeale but it is fatter and not so well relished he will be made as tame as a dog but hath a shrewd remembrance of
dans sa nuict Il descouure vn Soleil qui sauorable luit Qu'vn air infect l'estouffe en si puante estable Il ne veut desloger que Dieu n'ait agreable Son desembar quement que deuotieux Il soit auec tout ce qui estoit enserré de viuans auec luy Iln'entende tonner quelque oracle des cieux Mais si tost que Dieu parle il sorte de sa cauerne Ou plustost des cachots d'vn pestilent Auerne Auec Sem Cham Iaphet sa femme ses trois Brus Et cent cent façons soit d'animaux pollus Soit de purs animaux Car le sainct Patriarche En auoit de tout genre enclos dedans son Arche God makes the flood to cease 11 Thus Noah past the time and lesned all their harme Of irkesome prisonment with such like gentle charme His hope was onely in God who stopping now the vaines Whence issued-out before so many wells and raines Chidde th' aire To that end commands the winds to driue backe the water and drie the earth and bid her shut the flood-gate of her seas And sent North-windes abroad go ye quoth he and case The Land of all this ill ye cooling fannes of Heau'n Earths broomes and warre of woods my herauts posts and cau'n My sinnows and mine armes ye birds that hale so lightly My charriot ore the world when as in cloud so nightly With blasting scept'r in hand I thundring rage and ire From smoaky flamed mouth breathe sulph'r and coles of fire Awake I say make hast and soop the wat'r away That hides the Land from Heau'n robs the world of day The winds obey his voice the flood beginnes t' abate The Sea retireth backe 12 The Arklanded And th' Arch in Ararate Lands on a mountains head that seem'd to threat the skie And troad downe vnd'r his feet a thousand hills full high 13 Now Noes heart reioic'd with sweet conceit of hope The Rauen sent out to discouer And for the Rau'n to flie he sets a casement ope To find some resting place the bird soares round-about And finding none returnes to him that sent her out Who few daies after sends the Doue another spie That also came againe because she found no drie But after senights rest The Doue sent out the second time brings an Oliue branch in signe of peace he sends her out againe To search if any Land yet peer'd aboue the maine Behold an Oliue branch she brings at length in beake Then thus the Patriarch with ioy began to speake O happie signe o newes the best that could be thought O mysterie most-desir'd Io the Doue hath brought The gentle Doue hath brought a peacefull Oliue-bough God makes a truce with vs and so sure sealeth now The patent of his Loue and heau'nly promises That sooner shall we see the Tyger furylesse The Lyon fight in seare the Leuret waxen bold Then him against our hope his woonted grace with-hold O first fruit of the world O holy Oliue-tree O saufty-boading branch for wheth'r aliue thou be And wert all while the flood destroyd all else I ioy That all is not destroyd or if since all th'anoy That waters brought on all so soone thou did'st rebudde I wonder at the Lord that is so mightie and good To ralliue euery plant and in so short a space Cloath all the world anew in liueries of his grace 14 So said he Noe comes not out of the Arke but by the commandement of God who sent him thereinto yet although the flood had so reflowd That all about appeerd some Islets thinly strew'd Him offring where to rest although he spied a bright And cheerefull day amid his age-encreasing night Although th' infected ayre of such a nastie stall Ny choakt him would he not come forth before the call Of God that sent him in before some thunder-steauen For warranâ— of his act gaue Oracle from Heauen No sooner spake the Lord He comes forth and all other liuing creatures that were with him but he comes out of Cell Or rath'r out of dennes of some infectious Hell With Sem Cham and laphet his wise and daughters three And all the kinds of Bruits that pure or impure be Of hundred hundred shapes for th' holy Patriarch Had some of euery sort enclosd with him i'th'Arch 11. Thus Noah In the beginning of the 8. Chap. of Gen. Moses reports that God remembred Noe and euery beast and all the cattell that were with him in the Arke and made a wind passe vpon the earth and the waters ceased This the Poet expoundeth giuing by the way very proper Epithites vnto the winds and such also as are mentioned in the Psalmes 18. and 104. This wind dried the earth by degrees and caused the waters to retire into their proper place of deepe Sea and Chanels for the waters enterlaced with the earth make but one globe And though at the Deluge by Gods appointment they went out far beyond their bounds to drowne the wicked yet when the same God would deliuer his seruant Noe out of danger at his command they remasse themselues into their wonted heap furthered thereunto by the winds and there continue so setled that they passe not the bounds of an ordinarie ebbe and flow This is done by the power of God and for the promise he made to Noe that there should be no more generall Flood to destroy the earth 12. And th'Arke The Poet here calls it the Holy Carraque as built by the commandement of God and containing his Church On the seuenth day of the seuenth moneth saith Moses Gen. 8.4 rested the Arke vpon the Mountaines of Ararat Some by this name vnderstand the great Armenia others the top of Caucasus So Goropius who thereupon discourseth at large in the 5. booke of his Antiquities entitled Indo-Scythica Iosephus in his first sheweth what thought Berosus Nicolaus Damascenus and others very auncient concerning the Arke but followeth the first opinion The Poet contents himselfe here to signifie and expresse only in generall some very high hill 13. Now Noahs heart reioyc'd From the end of the seuenth moneth to the end of the ninth saith Moses the waters began to abate daily more and more and on the first day of the tenth moneth that is eight moneths and thirteene dayes after the Flood began the tops of the hills appeared so then already were the waters soonke aboue fifteene cubits This fust made the Patriarke be of good hope For after forty dayes he opened the window of the Arke and let goe the Rauen which went and came till the waters were dried from the surface of the earth He sent out also a Doue to try if they were yet further abated but the Doue not finding where to rest the sole of her foot returnâ—d vnto him againe into the Arke for the waters were yet ouer the whole earth and he reached out his band and tooke her to him into the Arke And when he
the iawes of Hell The skarr'd inhabitants of that same floating Cell Who now a peace-offering deuoutly sacrifise And from his Alter make perfumes to Heau'n arise Of purer kinded beasts and therewithall let flie Zele-winged heartie prayers and thus aloud they crie 15. Here yet the damned Crew Before he goe-on he shewes what certaine profane wretches doe obiect who make doubt of this history concerning the Deluge because they cannot conceiue how it is possible that the Arke being but 300. cubits long and 50. broad and 30. high should liue it is the Sea-mans phrase so many moneths in so great a storme of wind raine and violence of waters with so heauy a charge and containe so many creatures together with their competent food and fodder sithence the greatest Gallion vpon the Sea hath hardly stoage for the nourishment of a Horse an Elephant a Cammell a Bull and a Rhinoceros the space of ten moneths The Poet hath diuers answers to this obiection First that the mungrell beasts of what sort soeuer since engendred as Mules Leopards and other like that Nature daily brings forth were not in the Arke And this may be gathered out of the very text of Moses who speaks of the simple and true kindes not the mingled or mungrell sort as all Expositors agree The second is that the Arke because it contained so many cubits geometricall was able to receiue of all the true and simple kinds wylde tame creeping flying both male and female This is briefly said but we will speake thereof a word more Moses hath recorded in the 6. chap. of Gen. ver 14. c. that God hauing a purpose to destroy the world said vnto Noe Make thee an Arke of Gopher-wood which is thought to be a sort of Pine or Cedar Thou shalt make cabins in the Arke and shalt pitch it inside and out with pitch And thus thou shalt make it The length thereof shall be 300 cubits and the breadth 50 cubits and the height 30 cubits a window shalt thou make in the Arke and in a cubit shalt thou finish it abone and thou shalt set a doore in the side thereof And thou shalt make it with a low second and third roome or storie The timber then of the Arke being of such a fast and sad wood not easily rotting was like to hold out and I imagine it was a kinde of Cedar such as Plinie nameth in the 15. chap. of his 13. booke saying Hanc quoque materiam siccatam mari duritie incorrupta spissari nec vllo modo vehementiùs 1. That this kinde of timber dryed with the Sea more then any wayes else growes so sad and hard that it cannot rot But sithence the Commentors vpon this place differ much in the interpretation of this word Gopher which in all the Old Testament is not found but here I leaue the Reader that will be exact and curious to search it out himselfe As for the rest it is not to be doubted but that Noe endowed with a great measure of the holy Spirit and with exquisite wisdome did herein euen to the full conceiue and execute the commandement of God So as the Arke that is the close or couered ship was surely made and finished according to the proportion set downe by Moses and that of choice well seasoned and most durable materials 100 yeare a preparing as may be gathered by comparing the 7. chap. and 6. verse with the 6.10 and the 5.32 of Genesis And for as much as the whole businesse was managed by the expresse ordinance of God who gaue a secret instinct to the beasts both cleane and vncleane to enter after Noe by payres into the Arke I conclude there was roome distinct and sufficient both for them and their prouisions Apelles an auncient Heretike and the disciple of a most vngodly Master called Marcion hauing presumptuously controuled the bookes of Moses gaue occasion to some of the Fathers and chiefly Origen among other points to treat of the capacitie and largenesse of Noes Arke wherein he accounts each cubit Geometricall the Quadrate whereof is as much as six other cubits And this I. Buteo a learned Mathematician of Daulphine very cunningly declares in a treatise purposely written of the Arke of Noe where he proues to the full whatsoeuer may be questioned concerning that admirable peece of Architecture and all the cabins that it had for the creatures and their seuerall prouisions Io. Goropius discourseth likewise hereof and at large in the second booke of his Antiquities entitled Gigantomachia inserting also some part of Buteo But to speake plainly if we take the cubit in common signification for a foot and a halfe and confider the different syze of men of that age from ours together with the length bredth and height of the Arke and three stages whereof the lowest was for the prouision the next for the foure-footed and creeping creatures and the vppermost for the birds with Noe and his familie and ouer all these a couering wee shall finde roome enough to lodge and place all according to the number in generall set downe by Moses to wit male and female of euery sort vncleane and seauen of the cleane male and female The Poet here speaking of the Geometricall cubit means a cubit solid that is in length bredth and height taken together There are that make the cubit two foot long and make difference betwixt the cubit legale as they call it and the cubit of a man glancing at that which is said Deut. 3. of the bed of Og king of Basan Looke what Arias Montanus saith in his Tubal Cain and Noah where he discourses of the measures and Architectures mentioned in holy Scripture and of the Arke These bookes are in the Volume which he calleth Apparatus ioyned to the great Bibles in Hebrue Greeke and Latine and printed at Antwerpe That which hath led these Atheists and profane wretches into errour is that they consider not that Noe and the men of that Age by reason of their higher stature had longer cubits and hard it is to giue a iust proportion of theirs vnto ours When Moses wrote certaine it is that mens bodies were abated of their bignesse yet that which he wrote was easily vnderstood of the Israelites who receiued these things by tradition and knew them as perfectly as if they saw them with their eyes The last argument here vsed by the Poet adoring the wisdome of Almighty God who made all things in number weight and measure is a reason of all reasons and altogether vnreasonable are they that reason to the contrary then beside reason were it to propound reason to them that haue lost the true vse of reason and will conceiue nothing but that which their owne mad and extrauagant reason soundeth in their eares But againe to the Text. Pere port-trident Pricre de Noé à Dieu Roy des vents dompte-mer Voy nous d'vn oeil benin O Dieu vueille calmer Les bouillons de tonire conduire au
bien-nees Et puis ie parle ainsin O beaux ô clairs esprits Qui bien-heureux Southait du Poëte considerant les hommes doctes des escrits desquels la France iouit auez consacré vos escrits A l'immortalité puis que sur mes espaules Ie ne puis auec vous porter l'honneur des Gaules Que las ie ne vous puis mesme suyure desyeux Sur le Mont qui besson s'auoisine des cieux Au moins permettez moy que prosterné â—embrasse Vos genous honorez permettez que i'entasse Sur voschefs rayonneux d'vn Auril les moissons De grace permettez que mes soibles chausons Vne gloire cternelle en vostre gloire puisent Et que tousiours vos noms dans mes carmes se lisent Fin de la vision Accordant ma demande ils abaissent le front Le vallon disparoit les Colomnes s'en vont Et le songe suyeit de-mesme auecques elles Si ic ncusse englué de mon ancre ses ailes When this I wrote behold The Poet takes breath to enter afresh into the next discourse whereby way of a Vision he cunningly describeth the principall tongues with their best authors with tysing labour led Of Pallas heau'nly skill full heauy grew mine head And now and then I strike my chin vpon my brest That softly both mine eyes are closed vp to rest With sweet Ambrosian dew knit is my senses band And fairely slides my pen forth of my fainting hand Vpon my flattring couch I spread my selfe againe And plonge in Lethe-streame all troubles of my braine So drowne I all my care saue one that with no trance Is discontinued to please and profit France Whose sacred forge of loue that me enflamed keepes Will not let sleepe my soule although my body sleepes Then golden-winged dreame from of th'East-Indy shore Came forth at Christall gate and little while before The day-gate was vnlockt to valley of pleasant ayre By fancie led my soule where day night foule and faire The North winds the South the Summer Winters hew The spring and fall of leafe did neu'r each other ensue Where alway raigned May and Zepherus bedight VVith rosie coronets did breath-on day and night A young woods whizzing boughes that blossomes sweet did yeeld And ouall-wise bewald the flowre-embossed field In middle point of all this ammell-blooming glade Arose a mighty rocke in footstall-manner made Vpon the top thereof a brasse-colosse did stand That in the left hand held a flaming fierbrand And in the right a spout she shew'd a golden tongue And thence a many chaines all o're the medow sprong That worlds of hearers drew with fine deuise of art For some were held by th' eares some were held by th' hart Before her feet the Boare that forrest wilde had haunted The Tiger slept and Beare all aft'r a sort enchaunted The neighbour hillocks leapt and woods reioyced round Carranting as it were at her sweet voices sound A double circled row of pillers high and dight By cunning workmans hand all aft'r a Carian right With bases vnder-pinn'd to fasten their foundation Beset this goodly shrine of eloquent Oration And foure by foure bore-vp amid-them one language Of those that flourish most in this our learned age Among the blessed wits to whom was giu'n the grace 1. The Hebrue To beare-vp th'Ebrew tongue in such a sacred place The man whose fore-head shines as doth a blazing starre Skie-gracing frighting-men who for his scepter barre A seare yet budding rod and hath in fingers hent The ten-fould register of Gods Commandement Is he that Isac led and first authoritie Both of free stile and verse left to posteritie Such holy works as doe not onely long fore-run The writings of the Greekes but all that Greece hath done The second Dauid is whose touch right cunningly Combined with his voyce drawes downe sweet harmony From th'Organized heau'ns on harpe that aye shall sound As long as dayes great starre shall o're our heads goe round Nay long'r as who can tell when all these heau'nly lights Are at their measures end but that the blessed sprights And Champions of Christ at sound of his accords Shall honour with a dance th' Almighty Lord of Lords When all the Quire of heau'n and bands of winged ghosts Shall Holy holy sing O holy Lord of hosts The third is Salomon whose worke more bringtly beames With golden sentences then doth his crowne with gems The last is Amos sonne beset with graces all Graue holy full of threats deuout rhetoricall 2. The Greeke The Greeke on Homer leanes who sweetly versifies Whose learned schoole hath taught a many Companies Of old Philosophers and from whose cunning plea Run riuers through the world as from an Ocean Sea On Plato th'all-diuine who like the bird we call The bird of paradise ne soyles himselfe at all VVith earth or waters touch but more then hels descent Surmounted is by heau'n surmounts the firmament On Herodote the plaine and him of pleaders arts The Law Demosthenes the guilt-tongue Prince of harts Then he that thunder-speaks with lightning blast and shine 3. The Latine The Foe of Anthonie the scourge of Catiline The spring of thousand floods wherein the rarest wits Doe daily toyle themselues agast with wonder-fits And Coesar that can doe as well as he can plead And sinowie Salust next then he that Troy doth lead Againe to Tyber-shore a writer sent from heauen That neuer shuts his eyes to slumber morne or cu'n That euer treadeth sure is euer plaine and graue Demurely venterous and temperately braue That still is like himselfe and vnlike others all These hold the sweet-graue tongue was last imperiall Th'Italian founded is on Boccace pleasurous 4. The â—â—alâ—â—â— With Petrarch finely dight bould and sententious On slowing Ariost selfe-vnlike passionate With Tasso worthy wight to frame a verse of State Sharpe short fil'd figured with language rowling fast The first to be esteem'd albeet he wrote the last Th' Arabian tongue is here most worthily sustained By great Auerroes deep-reaching 5. The Arabian suttle-brained Ibunfarid the smooth allegorizing wag And faire-spoake Auicen and Satyr Eldebag The glory of Wittenberg and Isleb Martin Luther Is one that beares the Dutch 6. The Dutch another is Michael Buther Who Sleydan Almaned my Butrick is the next With Peucer who reguilds his all-entising text Then Boscan then Gueuare 7. The Spanish Grenade and Graoilas With Nectar all distain'd that mantleth in the glasse Of hony-powring Peith vpheld the Castillane And had not th' ancient grace of speaking Catallane Osias ouer-pleas'd his learning might haue bore The Spanish Crowne of Bay from one of th' other foure 8. The English The burd'n of th' English tongue I finde here vndertaken By quicke Sir Thomas More and graue Sir Nicolas Bacon They knit and rais'd the stile and were both eloquent And Keepers of the Scale and skill'd in gouernment Sir
young ones dare assay to wrastl ' against the weather Right so the men who built the great Assyrian Tower Perceiuing Gods great voice in thunder-clashing stower Of their confounded speech each barbarous vnt ' ether Betake them to their heeles all fearefull altogether Some runne the left-hand way and some acoste the right Why God would not haue the posteritie of Noe stay in the plaine of Sennaar All tread th'vnhaunted earth as God ordain'd their flight For that great King of heau'n who long ere creature breath'd In priuie counsaile had this vnder-world bequeath'd Vnto the race of Man ne would at all abide it To be a den of theeues as if men should diuide it By dreadfull dint of sword and eu'ry people border This thickned Element beast-like and out of order But fire of warre to quench he did all try-diuide The earth dinided betweene the sonnes of Noe. Among the sonnes of Noe allotting each his side So Sem enhabited the day-beginning East To Cham befell the South and Iaphet gain'd the West 3. The men who built That which the Poet saith concerning the affright of these builders is implied by the words of Moses Gen. 11.8 they ceased to build by the one is the other vnderstood for vpon the sudden chance of so strange a confusion they were scarred as with a thunder-clap and after by necessitie constrained to sunder themselues Yet I am of their opinion who thinke the diuersitie of tongues is to bee considered not in euery particular builder but only in families As that the goodnesse of God was such in his iudgement that the builders departing thence each led his wife and children with him who vnderstood and spake as he did otherwise mans life could hardly haue beene sustained They also that parted furthest at the first from those of Noes successors that were not leagued in this presumptuous enterprise soonest forgat all their former language And true it is that at the first they sundered not all very farre one from another but as it pleased God more and more to encrease them they sought further and further for new countries to dwell in and all by the secret direction of the wonderfull prouidence of God 4 That great King of heau'n Hee reacheth euen to the first cause of the Colonies and diuers-way-partings of Noes posteritie Staight after the Floud God blessed Noe and his children and said Encrease and multiply and fill the earth and the feare of you and the dread of you shall be vpon euery beast of the earth and vpon euery fowle of the heauen vpon all that moueth vpon the earth and vpon all the fishes of the sea into your hands are they deliuered Gen. 9.1 2. Therefore if the builders had continued and fast setled themselues in the Plaine of Sennaar they had as much as was in them made void the Lords blessing and berest themselues and their posteritie of those great priuiledges which he had granted them But the deree of God must needs be fulfilled and therefore according to his ordinance he chaseth farre away these donataries to the end that yeare by yeare some in one place and some in another they may take possession of that which was giuen them the whole compasse of the world Whereas the Poet saith further that the Lord diuided the whole earth into three Lots that may be gathered out of the tenth Chapter of Genesis and 32. Chap. of Deuteronom vers 8. Noe a wise and learned man and one of groat experience was the instrument of Gods blessing in this behalfe and though the bounds of these habitations be not all and throughly specisied as were the diuisions of the Land of Canaan among the Tribes of Israel yet out of the tenth Chapter of Genesis a man may gather that in those daies Noe and his sonnes and their posteritie knew more a great deale hereof than men can now perceiue as may appeare by so many diuers Colonies so many strange languages so many names changed and rechanged A good Commentary vpon this Chapter would assoile many questions hereabouts arising 5 To Sem was giuen Because the sonnes of Noe were but three therefore here are named but three quarters of the world the East West and South Some of the successors of Iaphet peopled the North also as shall be shewed hereafter Concerning the names of these foure cardinall points somewhat hath beene said vpon discourse of the winds in the second day of the first weeke verse 571. The order of the sonnes of Noe is this Iaphet is the elder Sem the second C ham the last Gen. 9.24 10.21 But Sem is named first because of the fauour of God shewed to his posteritie by thence raising the Messias and there maintaining his Church Iaphet the second for that in the vocation of the Gentiles he is receiued into the reuts of Sem that is vnited to the family of the faithfull Abraham according to the Prophecie and blessing of Noe Gen. 9.27 Now in the tenth of Gen. vers 25. Moses further affirmeth that Heber Sems vnder nephew had two sonnes the one named Peleg which signifieth Diuision or parting asunder for in his time the Earth was diuided and the other Ioktan Whereout some gather that in the time of Peleg that is as I take it before the cofusion of tongues Noe and his sonnes remembred the grant that God had made them of all the Earth and that Noe then made a kinde of partition thereof among his sonnes If we recken the confusion of the builders together with the partition of the world though about the fiftieth yeare of Peleg who was borne but an hundred yeares after the Floud and liued 239. this confusion must happen within 150. yeares after the Floud which were very soone yet some take it sooner as from the time that Peleg receiued his name for remembrance as they say of both things so note-worthy to all posteritie and especially to the Church of God which well might be aduertised therof for Peleg liued 46. yeares after the birth of Abraham as appeareth by the eleuenth Chapter of Genesis Two things then are here to be considered the one that the partition of the Earth which Noe made was to his posteritie a token of Gods great blessing which neuerthelesse the Babel-builders for their part haue turned into a curse the other that this partition as many Diuines and Chroniclers thinke was made before Nimrod and his traine came out of the East and sate downe in the plaine of Sennaar what time they were scattered thence again by the confusion Whereunto this I will adioyne that as then the builders language was confounded so by continuance of time the speech of others also was corrupted especially when they began to forget the true Religion which euen in Sems family was decayed as appeareth plainely out of the 24. Chapter of Iosua where it is said that Terah father to Abraham and Nachor had serued strange gods It was no reason that the Holy
may aske How falls it out that the Nations of the world comming all of one father Noe doe varie so much one from another both in body and minde The Poet therefore making this obiection most worthy to be considered giueth also answer thereunto first in generall by way of exclamation and maruaile then in particular manner setting downe some speciall reasons of this wonderfull diuersitie that appeareth in the stature complexion strength colour and custome of people wheresoeuer dispersed ouer the face of the earth The first and principall cause is Nature it selfe that is the wise prouidence of God maruellous in all his workes If God had made the earth in all places alike all flowers of one colour and sauour all beasts fowles fishes and creeping things of one kinde had he made the heauen without starres or the starres all of one bignesse and men all of the same hew beauty feature strength and disposition as well of bodie as minde the diuers colours of his infinite wisdome had not so shined in them But as he is aboue all yea onely wise good and beautifull so would he in his workes keepe a certaine resemblance of his owne perfection prouoking vs thereby daily to aduance and raise our thoughts vnto the high consideration perfect loue and due reuerence of himselfe Now if we consider all his workes the light of his wonderfull glory no where appeareth more then in the diligent view of Man who is very fitly called of the Greekes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the little world For in this little table hath he lymbed-out in orient colours for all that will behold the wonders of his vnsearchable wisdome and they are here some of them by the Poet well pointed-out And a wonderfull thing indeed it is that among so many men as haue beene since the beginning are or shall be to the worlds end there neuer was nor is nor can be any one but differing much from all the rest both in bodie and minde and in many things else that ensue thereon This I am content to note but in a word leauing all the particulars of this miracle for the Reader priuatly to consider that he may wonder the more thereat and praise there-according th' almighty Creator the Soueraigne Good neither will I now take in hand to dispute against those that in searching the causes of this diuersitie ascribe all to Fortune or Nature as they call it meaning a secret propertie and power of the creatures or to the starres and other heauenly bodies to mans lawes custome or nourishment in stead of God who is indeed the first and only working cause of all things in whom we liue moue and are This matter would require a long discourse and though the Poet here beside the chiefe and only tine cause reckoneth certaine vnder-causes as custome growing to Nature th' example of Elders prouinciall Lawes and the influence of Stars it is not his meaning to take from the Lord of Nature this honour due vnto him for the diuersitie of his wonderfull works but only to lay open vnto vs a few such instruments as his incomprehensible wisdome vseth to make vs the better conceiue the manner of his heauenly working The Philosophers Astronomers Physicians and Politicks discourse at large vpon these differences he that would see them well handled let him reade the fift chapter of Bodines Method entituled de recto historiarum indicio and the first chapter of his fift booke de Republica which is the summe of all that he writes thereof in his Method Peucer also in the 13. and 14. bookes of his discourse vpon the principall sorts of diuinations and Hippocrates in his booke de Aëre aquis locis but especially Bodin may ferue to expound our Poet who in very few lines hath penned matter of so long discourse 59 The Northen man He entreth consideration of many points wherein the North and Southerne people differ Bodin in the places afore-quoted shewes the causes thereof according to Philosophie and Physicke because his bookes are common specially his Politicks I will not here set downe what he saith nor examine his opinions but leaue that wholly to the diligent Reader Concerning that the Poer noteth the best Histories auerre the same and namely for the Southerne people Iohannes Leo and Franciscus Aluares for the Northen Olaus Magnus the Baron of Herbestan in his Muscouie Buchanan in the historie of Scotland and diuers others 60 The Middle Man Bodm in the fift booke of his Politickes the first chapter diuideth all people dwelling on this side the Aequator into 3. kinds to wit the hot and Southerne people from the Aequator 30. degrees vpward the Meane and temperate in the next 30. and the Extreame cold and Northen people from the 60. degree to the Pole And so of the nations and countries beyond the Aequator The reason hereof he setteth downe in his Method chap. 5. 61 For in the sacred close The Poet goes on according to the said diuision and in few words implies all that discourse of Bodin who saith among other matters there that the people dwelling in the middle Regions haue more strength and lesse wit then the Southerne better parts of minde and lesse bodily force then the Northen and are moreouer the fittest for gouernment of Common-wealths and iustest in their actions And if a man doe marke well the histories of the world he shall finde that the greatest and most valiant Armies came euer out of the North the deepest and subtilest knowledge of Philosophie Mathematickes and all other contemplatiue Arts from the South and the best gouernment the best lawes Lawyers and Orators from the Middle countries and that the greatest Empires were founded and established there c. What reason there is for this he sheweth also in his fift chap. of his Meth. Looke more thereof in L. Regius de vicissitudine varietate rerum For my part I am of opinion that Almighty God as he hath knit and bound together the Elements and Creatures made of them with a maruellous compasse in number weight and measure best for continuance of the whole worke and mutuall agreement of the parts so hee hath also placed the chiefe subtiltie and liuely-hood of spirit farthest from the greatest bodily force either in beast or man for the better maintenance of humane societie in a iust counterpoys and gaue the middle kinde of people a nature of either tempered though if a man enter into particular discourse he may easily finde the northerne southerne and middle Nature in euery Nation What say I euery Nation nay I dare say in euery one of vs so fitly is Man called a little world But the southerne men for the most part hauing so quick and liuely parts of minde in a bodie lesse charged with flesh they represent the contemplatiue and studious kinde of life the northerne that haue their vvit in their fingers ends that is that are so cunning craftesmen inuenters of warlike engins artillerie and
all sorts of needfull instruments they may well be likened vnto the actiue and trading life and the middle sort vnto the ciuill gouernment and politicke life which is a meane betwixt the other two Yet this the Poet well restraineth saying that the northerne people also in these latter dayes haue beene renowmed for the Tongues the Lawes the Mathematicks Poesie Oratorie and all good learning as well as in times past they were and are still for warlike valour and cunning hand-works Not without cause for in England Scotland Polonie Denmarke and other such countries are and haue beene diuers very learned men flourishing and Germanie especially which is as it were Vuleans forge and the Campe of Mars hath brought forth many men excelent well seene in all kinde of learning it were needlesse to name them they are so well knowne 62 But eu'n among our selues The more to magnifie the vnsoundable wisdome of God appearing in the creation of so diuers-disposed people he noteth out many points of great difference euen among those Nations that liue neare together and are seuered only by certaine hilles riuers and forrests as the French Dutch Jtalian and Spanish He paints them out all in their kinde for such properties as are daily seene in them and may be easily gathered out of their owne Histories for there are not the like-differing neighbour-nations in all Europe no not in the world Let me consider and all my Countrey-men with me what he saith of the French the other three may doe the like by themselues if they list The French he saith is in Warre impatient in Counsaile wauering in Diet sumptuous gentle in Speech diuers in Apparell out-facing his Enemie a sweet Singer a swift Paser a merty Louer If any man can draw a righter counterfeit of our Nation let him take the pensill 63 Yet would the immortall God He shewes for what cause it pleased God the earth should be inhabited by men of so diuers natures As first to the end he might shew forth his mercy and louing kindnesse in raising his chosen out of the sincks of sinne wherewith each of their birth soiles were bestained Secondly That it might appeare how neither the soiles nor yet the heauenly Signes though they haue great power ouer earthly bodies can force the minds of men especially such as God himselfe hath blessed Thirdly That there might be some in all places of the world to acknowledge his manifold goodnesse and glorifie his Name And fourthly that whatsoeuer needfull things the earth any where by his gartious blessing bringeth forth proper and seuerally they might be enterchanged and carried from place to place for the vse of man 64 For as a Citie The last consideration giues the Author occasion to compare the world vnto a great Citie such as Paris Roan Tolouse Lyons or any other like where there are merchants and craftesmen for all kinde of wares each in their seuerall wards buying selling changing and trading one with another And euen so one Countrey affordeth Suger another Spice another Gummes and Gold Alabaster Iuory Heben-wood Horses Amber Furres Tynne and Silke they are brought from diuers coasts all the more to furnish with things necessary this great Citie of the world Whereby we may note that no Countrie be it neuer so well appointed can say that it needs not the commodities of another And againe that there is no Land so barren but hath some good thing or other which the rest want For euen in men we see the like there is none so poore but hath some speciall gift none so rich but hath need of the poorest Our Poet therefore hauing so fitly resembled the world by a great Citie he brings-in thereupon a sine example of the Persian Queene who as Herodotus Xenophon and Plutarch report called one Prouince her lewell-house another her Wardrope c. for euen so may euery man say that hath the true knowledge and feare of God such a man may say Peru brings forth Gold for me the Moluckes or Chaldea Spice Damaske Alabaster and Italy Silke Germany sends me great Horses Moscouie rich Furres Arabia sweet Parfumes Spaine Saffron Prusse Amber England Cloth and Tinne France Corne and Wine Yea more the childe of God may say the Earth the Sea the Aire and all that is therein the Sunne the Moone the Heauens are mine for he that needeth nothing made all things of nothing to serue me and mee to worship him But of this let the Diuines discourse more at large I will goe on with the Poet who saith further against the carping Atheist that nothing was created in vaine but euen the most vnlikely places bring forth many good fruits and very necessary for the life of Man And hee proues it plainly by some notable particulars that follow 65 The Moores enameled First The Fenny Valleyes though too moist they are and ouer-low for men to build and dwell vpon yet are they so beset with diuers harbes and flowers so lagged garded and enter-trailed with riuers that they are as it were the common gardens of the world as also the plaine fields are our seed-plots and the stony grounds our Vineyards Secondly The huge Mountaines about whose tops are engendred thunders lightnings and tempests for which cause the Atheists count them hurtfull or at least superfluous or made by chance and errour they are in truth cleane contrary as Thâ—odoret hath long agoe shewed in his Sermons of Gods Prouidence â—uen the sure standing Bounds and Land-markes of euery Kingdome and Countrie they beare great store of timber-trees for ships and houses and fuell to burne from them spring the great riners that breed much fish and helpe the conueyance of prouision and other merchandise vnto many people dwelling farre-off by them are stayed and gathered the clowdes and thicke mists that manure and fatten the lower grounds the Wind-milles are much helped by them as if they were the the store houses of winde like rampiers and bulwarkes they keepe-of the sudden force of warlike neighbours and to conclude they are as it were the very morter that ioynes Land and Sea together Thirdly The great Deserts and wast-grounds that are for men by reason of some wants searse habitable yet like huge Commons they feed an infinit sort of beasts great and small whereof we haue good vse and commoditie Fourthly The Sea it breeds fish maintaines many Cities encreases Trafficke and makes the wayes for trauell easier and shorter And lastly thereout the Sunne draweth vapours which after turned into raine doe refresh the Aire and make the ground fruitfull The like good vses may be found in all other the Creatures of God how vnlikely foeuer they seeme to wicked Atheists Looke more in S. Basil Chrysostome Ambrose and others who write of the Creation and at large haue declared what excellent commodities man may reape of euery creature 66 But shall I still be toss'd Fitly and in very good time the Poet hauing ouerslipt nothing worthy note in this discourse
all manner Cors-solids The Cubes Dodechedrons Cylinders Pyramids And wond'r here at the 22. Globe which all doth comprehend So like the world it selfe and hath nor mid nor end The highest point of Art and top of all his kynt A maruaile that containes much counter-maruaile in 't Moouabl ' and immoouabl ' inward-bent and bent-out Composed of a straight yet crooked round about Behold at any time when on a plaine 't is throne It downe and vpward stirs back forward all in one Nor stirs it all alone when cunning force it moues But neighbour moouables proportionally shoues As by the heau'ns appears nay more though still it bide It seemes to threat'n a fall and shake on eu'ry side Because a point is all it hath for standing-place And halfe on eu'ry side hangs o're so small a base And much more wond'r it is how this great earthie ball Whereon we dwell sans-base hangs fast and cannot fall Amids the yeelding ayre it selfe is out of doubt The commyd bodies midst that are not press'd without All bodies other-shap'd into the water cast Make shapes vnlike their owne but alway round do last Th'impressions of a Round because it cannot strike With any diuers part all are vnt'all so like Beside as moe may stand in houses Amblygons Then can in equall-bought of any Oxygons Because the sharpe and right take not so large a stride As corner blunt so doth the Round in cloyster wide More hold then all the rest And other bodies breake With eu'ry knock because they haue both bay and peake Beginning end and ioynts whereas the bodie round Is creastlesse cornerlesse and eu'ry-side-way sound Son summon here thy wits and marke that few haue found 23. The doubling of a Cube and squaring of a Round Such hundred-folded knots such hidden mysteries As shall troubl ' all the schooles of our posterities 24. Keepe faster then in brasse for euer grau'n in minde In faithfull minde these rules which thou shalt proued finde Not by vaine syllogismes or probable arguments But whose vndoubted truth appears eu'n vnto sence An Art of certainties whose euer-fruitfull wombe With wonders new-deuis'd shall fill the world to come 25. By her the gentle streame by her the feeble winde Shall driue the whirling presse and so be taught to grinde The graine of life to meale that with increase it may Vnto the sparing Dames all that is due repay By her the brasen throat shall vomit Iron balles With smoake and roaring noyse vpon besieged walles The force whereof shall rent the hardestrocks asunder And giue more fearefull thumps then any bolt of thunder By her the borrowed wings of some assisting winde Shall beare from out Bresile vnto the rich East-Inde And to the frozen Sea from Affricks boyling flood A iogging towre or eu'n a floating towne of wood Wherein the Pylot set shall with a leauer light Most huge waights easily moue and make all coast aright So shall one Printer worke more learned sheets aday Then eu'n a thousand hands of ready-writers may One Crane shall more auaile then Porters many a score And then a thousand men one Staffe shall profit more To measure-out the fields to part th' earth into lines And all the cope of heau'n in t ' eight and fortie signes So shall the wat'r and sand the Style and clock in towers Most euenly part the day to foure and twentie howers An Image made of wood some voice shall vtter plaine An artificiall globe heau'ns wonders shall containe Men through th'ayres emptinesse their bodies peysing right Shall ouer-mount the Seas with bold-aduentring flight And doubtlesse if the wise Geometer had place To plant his engins on and stand himselfe in case To stirre them aft'r his Art so could he thrust and shoue That like some pettie-god the world he might remoue 19. Geometrie Shee is described as a Nymph that frownes or hath a wrinkled forehead because the studie of this Art is very painfull and makes the student waxe old apace and crookbackt also by reason of their much stooping downward to measure and compasse their plots Shee is sad and looks stedfastly on the ground because all hard works make men pensiue and full of care Geometrie especially which causeth a man to six his eye wholly vpon that he goes about Shee hath a wand or straight rod also in her hand wherewith shee drawes certaine figures and shapes in the dust for that in this Art aboue others must be demonstrations vsed without which the Theoremes and Propositions cannot be vnderstood And for as much as Shee measures the whole Earth the breadth and deepnesse of Riuers high Mountaines low Valleyes and Mines with pleasant Medowes prospects of Seas and Climats from one end of the world to the other therefore hath the Poet her so apparelled as we see in his verse Furthermore She is called the Guide of Artisans because they without her can doe nothing answerable to the expectation of an vnderstanding eye and in this respect also is shee called the mother of Symmetrie or proportion requisite in all Crafts Mechanicall yea the soule or life of all those different instruments which without due measure and proportion would doe more hurt then good as we finde by experience Whereas shee is called The law euen of that law which framed all this All the Poet herein expounds well that saying of Plato That God exerciseth Geometric from day to day This also Moses well signifieth in those words And God saw all that he had made was perfectly good and the Wiseman in those God made all things in number weight and measure as indeed a man shall not finde any creature small or great in heauen earth or Sea that is not made as it were by the rounding-toole weight-beame and squire by the compasse leuell and perpendicular of an infinite wisdome 20. Here 's nothing else First he shewes the tooles and instruments necessarie for the practise of Geometrie then draughts of one dimension as of leggth only to wit Lines straight for Opticks and planting of Ordnance and crooked for mynes wayes vnder ground and Labyrinths as we are taught by the storie of Theseus and Ariadne Thirdly shapes of two dimensions as of length and breadth also to wit Triangles for commanders in warre to range their battailes thereby Quadrangles for building because they are most sound and fast-standing and other figures wreathed bulked longer-one-way-then-other Ovalls Lozenges and Rounds all which are set-downe particularly in the Commentaries of Candales Pellitier Clauius and others vpon Euclide 21. Here measure In the third place hee propounds certaine figures called Bodies solide because they haue both length breadth and thicknesse As the Cube fouresquare euery way like a dye the Dodecacdron of twelue corners or angles the Cylinder long and round like a rouller the Pyramis which hath three or foure corners in base and but one aboue in point These foure together with the Sphere which is round through all dimensions are called the fiue Bodies regular
whereof Euclide and his Expositors haue spoken at large in their sixt booke as they haue also many propositions touching the same before 22. The Globe This is a kind of Geometricall Solide most excellent and perfect aboue all others as all men that haue written thereof doe plainly declare whom the Poet here also followeth Their chiefe reasons are 1. That it hath the same fashion and shape that the world hath 2. That it hath neither beginning mids nor end 3. That it is moueable in place and immoueable out of place That it is concaue and conuex which is as much to say as Inbent and Out-bent or crusye and bulked that it is made of straight lines meaning the diameters and yet crooked round about as is the surface thereof that it mooueth euery way at once vpward downward backward forward rightway leftway that it swayes and mooues with it according to proportion all round bodies next it This we may well perceiue by that heauen called Primum mobile which drawes with it the firmament of fixed starres together with the seauen spheres of Planets That although it stand still as when the sphere is laid on a plaine yet seemes it to be in continuall motion and euery way nods and threatens to fall because the base or foot it stands-on is but a point from whence on euery-side halfe hangs-ouer This may seeme strange then euen where there is a foundation to rest-on Much more in the Earth that hath no foundation to sense but hangs in the Ayre whereof the Poet giues a good reason because it selfe is the resting-place or middle point of all the bodies concentrike and round of it selfe is not by any promontorie or corner forced from abroad More ample reasons hereof shall yee finde in the Commentaries of Clauius Junctinus Schreckensuschius and others vpon the Spheare of Iohn of Hallifax commonly called Iohannes de sacro Bosco and in the Commentarie of Millichius vpon the second booke of Plinie 4. The Sphere is alwaies and euery where throughout like it selfe so are not other bodies Geometricall 5 As houses that are blunt-cornerd receiue more into them then do the straight or sharp-cornerd because these stride not so wide as the other so the Sphere being as it were euery way blunt containes more then any Geometricall bodie of other shape 6. Other Solides are broken oft-times by reason of their beginnings ends plights knobs and ioynts whereas the Sphere is voide of all those and therefore must needs be more perfect and sound as all Astronomers and Geometricians doe proue both by their owne experience and to the view of others 23. The doubling of a Cube and squaring of a Round About these two secrets of Geometrie diuers learned men of our Age haue taken great pains as well in their Commentaries vpon Euclide as in Bookes and Treatises printed apart But because these matters doe require demonstrations with distinct number and figure it was impossible for me to set them downe here and my ayme is at things of more vse and profit He that would be further satisfied herein let him repaire to the learned Mathematicians or to their Bookes set forth in Print Nicolas de Cusa Orontius Cardan in his worke de proportionibus Pelletier Clauius Candales in diuers demonstrations vpon Euclide haue largely discoursed vpon these Secrets and others drawing neere vnto them 24. Keepe faster The Theoremes Problemes and Propositions of Geometrie contained in the books of Euclide are most certaine and out of all controuersie among people endued with reason as the Expositors of this Author doe plainly shew Howbeit the Sceptikes and Pyrrhonians both old and new do oppose them But the Poet simply considers the truth of things reiecting all Sophistrie which deserues not to be disputed withall especially when it denies principles and such as these whereby Geometrie hath filled the whole world and that but a hundred yeares since with an infinite sort of rare and admirable inuentions 25. By her the gentle streame For proofe of that last point he brings in 1. The vse of Wind-mills and Water-mills 2. Artillerie 3. The Saile mast sterne and other furniture of a ship 4. Printing 5. The Crane or wheele deuised to draw or lift-vp great stones to a high building and other Engines to command and beat downe pyles planks and whole trees if need be into the earth vnder water 6. The Crosse-staffe or Iacobs-staffe as we call it to measure the Earth Ayre Heauen and Sea and vnder this may be comprised all other instruments which the Surveyours of Land Camp-masters Geometors Astronomers and other men vse to that purpose or the like 7. All kinde of howre-glasses of sand or water Dyals of all sorts and sounding clocks to marke how the time passes both by day and night 8. Certaine statues and deuises of wood which by meanes of sundry gynnes of motion within them haue beene made to pronounce some words of mans voice whereto may be added the woodden Pigeon of Archytas the Eagle and Flie of Iohn de Montroyall the brasen head of Albertus Magnus the clock-cock of Strausburg 9. The deuise of Daedalus to flie in the ayre which hath beene imitated since by others In the tenth and last place he glaunceth at the vaunt which Archimedes made that he would mooue the Earth out of place if he had but elsewhere to stand These all deserue throughly to be considered but for the present I will content my selfe thus only to haue pointed at them And so come to the third Image which is Astronomie 3. L'Astronomie ne peut estre bien veue que de ceux qui conoissent l'Arithmetique la Germetrie Or d'autant que ces deux nous donnent seure entree Dans le sainct Cabinet où l'Vranie astree Tient sa ceinture d'or ses lumineux pendans Ses Perles ses rubis ses saphirs ardans Qu'homme ne peut monter sur les croupes iumelles Du Parnasse estoillé que guindé sur leurs ailes Que quiconque est priué de l'vn de ces deux yeux Contemple vainement l'artifice des cieux Le sculpteur a dressé pres de l'Arithmetique Et l'Art mesure-champ l'image Astronomique Ornemens de l'Astronomie Elle a pour Diademe vn argentè Croissant Sous qui iusqa'aux talons à iaunes flots descend Vn Comet allumé pour yeux deux Escarboucles Pour robe vn bleu Rideau que deux luisantes boucles Attachent sur l'espaule vn damas azurè D'estoilles d'animaux richement figuré Et pour plumes encor elle porte les ailes De l'oiseau moucheté de brillantes rouëles Now these two Arts because they lead vs onward right Into that sacred tent where Vranie the bright Sits guirt in golden belt with spangles albedight Of carbuncl ' and of pearle of rubye and chrysolite And that a man withou the help of eithers quill May neuer mount the twyns of starrie Pernas hill But whosoeuer wants one of these Eagles eies In vaine
it had a being So first the great Three-One with drift ingenious Diplaid of shining heau'n the curtaine precious And as vpon a slate or on a painters frame The shape of things to-be portrayed on the same Loe is not there the draught of some gold-sandy brooke On the beauens are the models of all on earth That on this azure ground glydes as it were acrooke There softly fannes a Rav'n here swiftly an Eagle driues There walloweth a Whale and here a Dolphin diues A Dragon glisters here a Bull there sweating frets Here runs the light-foot Rid and there the horse curuets What thing so goodly abides in ayre at sea aground But some right shape thereof in heau'n aloft is found Our ballances our crownes our arrowes darts and maulles What are they but estreats of those originals Whereof th' Almighty word engroue the portraiture Vpon the books of heau'n for euermore t' endure 28 But what quoth Phaleg Phaleg asketh Heber concerning the two Globes that Astronomic held in her hands Heber makes answer that in her right hand is the Globe of Sea and Earth and because there-ouer could not be painted the Elements of Aire and Fire nor ouer them the heauens of Starres wandring and fixed the Primum mobile and Empirean they are all here together tepresented by ten Circles whereof I shall speake hereafter but first concerning the Seas interlacement with the Earth to make on Globe 29 The Sea doth cou'r all eu'ry where But onely in certaine parts dâ—sparpled here and there All the points hence arising tò be considered may be drawne to eight Articles 1 Concerning the diuers names of the Sea 2. Concerning the place or Channell thereof 3. To shew the parts thereof and whether it composse the Earth and how 4. Why it is not encreased by the waters continually falling into it 5 Concerning the Ebbe and Flow. 6. Why the Sea-water is salt 7. Of the Enterlacement of the Sea with the Land 8. Whether the Earth be round or flat Of them all in order 1 For the Names of the Sea it is called of our Poet Th' Ocean Neptune Neree and La-Mer Some thinke this last was drawne from the Latine Amarum because the Sea-water is salt and bitter Why not rather of Mare which commeth of Marath signifying the same The word Ocean hath diuers Etymologies For Suidas holds the Sea so called of a priuatiue turned into 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 diuido because the waues thereof so follow one another as they cannot be seuered Others deriue it of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that signifies Swift because the Sea hath so quicke a continuall motion The other two names are meerely poeticall and vsed by a Metonymie 2 Now concerning the place or Channell of the Sea It is said in the 33. Psalme That God hath gathered the waters together as into a vessell and heaped them vp as a treasure Whereto not vnlike is the Philosophers opinion that the Earth is the Center of the world girt and compassed though here and there vncouered by the Sea which also falles-into and filles vp the hollow deepes thereof and so becomes a huge masse and treasure as it were of waters from whence the Diuine prouidence drawes innumerable Riuers to runne thorow the vaines and ouer the face of the Earth And further that the Sea is not only the receptacle of all riuers thereinto falling but is also the great store-house of waters both for the Earth and Sunne which haling-vp the steeme of waters from Sea to mid region of the Aire makes thereof diuers Meteors but most store of Raine Our Terrestriall Globes and the report of Pilots and Nauigators that within this hundred yeares haue tâ—auelled all Seas make-good that is said of the great bed or channell of the waters And thereto also accords that which Ouid hath 1. Metam Tum freta dissundit rapidisque tumescere ventis Iussit ambitae circundare littora terrae Then spred the Seas them bad with boistrous wind To swell and all the Shores of Earth imbind 3 Whereas it hath beene aforesaid in ordering the Elements that the Water is aboue the Earth this breeds a scarre to the third Article for if the Sea lye higher then the Land and doth the same round about enuiron how comes it to passe that the Land is not ouerflowed thereby Considering this Element is not easily kept within bounds but of a moist and flowing nature still running downward But this is before answered in the second Article where it is said that the Sea is gathered together on a heape to a large compasse so as the parts thereof next the land tending toward the proper Center of their whole masse draw not from but rather to the Sea which hath for maine bed or channell that large extent of the East West Oâ—ean where what doe we see to speake of but waters For a few Islands here and there scattered are nothing to the huge wasternes of the Sea And that is moued three kinde of waies One way as it is Water another way as it is the Sea the third as it is accidentally forced by the winds Of the later I will not here speake but of the two former together It is the nature indeed of all water to runne downwards but the Sea as well in proper channell where it is hoised farre aboue the land as also in the parts and armes thereof hath set-limits and bounds which it cannot passe For so Almightie God the Creator hath ordained who shut the Sea with doâ—res when it bâ—ake forth as if it had issâ—od out of the wombe Iob. 38.8 Who bound the Sea with Sand by a perpetuall decree which it cannot passe and though the waues thereof tosse themselues yet can they not preuaile though they roare yet can they not passe ouer it Ier. 5.22 and diuers like places there are in holy Scripture Now whereas the Sea and Land doe make one Globe together certaine it is that the highest part of the Land is commonly furthest from the sea as plainly appeares by the current of Riuers and the highest of Sea furthest from Land This also is proued by diuers of the learned and men expert in Nauigation who say that comming to land they perceiue the Sea still to decline and that vnder the Equator it is higher than in any place else the reason is I thinke because there it hath in furface the largest compasse and highest Arch of a Circle or Globe as appeares by the Card. How then doth the Sea compasse and enuno on the whole Earth First by the great body thereof which is the Ocean then by the Midland-sea the Sound and other like Bayes by the Cimbrian Arabian Persian Gulphes and many other little Seas and great Riuers which are to that bodie as armes legges vaines and haire whereby it is ioyned to the Earth The particulars of both are plainly set forth vnto vs both in our globy and flat Mappes of the world
the bitter and saltnesse of the Sea-water Plutarch hath spoke thereof in his booke of the Philosophers Opinions 3.16 see what he saith there and in the ninth question of his first booke of Table-talke and in the first question of his Naturall causes Aristotle in the 23. Section of his Problemos Pliny in his second booke from the 97. chap. to the 101. where he assoiles the most obiections that are made concerning this point of the Sea but especially in the 110. he ascribes there to the Sunne the Saltnesse of Sea-water at the top not at the bottome With him agrees Mellichius vpon the same Chapter of Plinie Garcaeus in the 36. Chapter of his Meteorologie Danaeus in his Christian Physickes 2.11 And Velcurio in his Comment vpon Aristolles Naturall Philosophie 3.7 7 Of the seuenth Article enough hath beene said in the third and the Terrestriall Globe and Mappes doe make all very plaine 8 There rests for the eight Article a word to be said concerning the forme or shape of the Sea whether it be round or flat That which hath beene afore-said shewes plainly it is round but neither in it whole selfe nor parts how then Only as it is enterlaced with the whole body of the Earth and hath for bed the great deepe If any be so curious as to seeke herein further satisfaction let him reade Scaliger against Card. Exercit. 37. c. So much for these eight Articles touching the Sea 30 Here should th' Aire The Poet goes about here to range in proper place both the Elements and Heauens to wit The Earth lowest the Water next thereupon then the Aire then the Fire next ouer these the seuen Planets and aboue them the fix-star-Fix-star-heauen embrased with the primouable and ouer that the glorious habitation of Saints This is the common opinion of Christian Astronomie agreed-on by most Winters both of late and former times Some few as Copernicus and his followers gainsay it but the Poet takes after that opinion which is most likely and most receiued 31 Among the greater Six The Terestriall Globe hath Ten Rings or Circles six great ones so called because they diuide the Sphere after the full compasse thereof into equall parts and foure called leste because they diuide it into parts vnequall The first of the great here mined by the Poet is the Equator or Equinoctiall which I tearme The Circl ' of Match-day night This Circle in euery part therof is like distant from the Poles of the world diuideth the Globe into two equall parts and is the greatest of all the Circles by reason whereof it comes to passe that the Sunne and other Planets haue vnder this a swifter course than other of those heauenly bodies as contrariwise they runne slower when they come nearer the Poles And when the Sunne is vnder this Line day and night is equall throughout the world and that caused the name There are two such times in the yeare the one called of the Spring the Vernall Equinox about the eleuenth of March the other the Autumnall of that Season and falleth commonly neare the thirteenth of September For when the Sunne first entreth Aries or Libra then is he vnder the Equinoctiall and stayeth as long aboue as vnder euery Horison that is twelue houres a peece halfe the naturall day This and the rest would better be vnderstood with an Armillary Sphere in hand 32 This other The second great Circle is called the Zodiake which diuides the Equator into two equall parts at the beginning of Aries and Libra and the one toward the North is called the Articke halfe and the other toward the South the Antarticke halfe of the Equator The Zodiake hath other Poles or Axelpoints than those of the world and from them also distant 24. degrees which also in the Globes turning draw-out the Tropicke Circles of Cancer and Capricorne whereof hereafter 33 This other passing-through The Astronomers imagine also two other great Circles called the Colures which a man may thinke doe stead the Globe no more than to hold the parts thereof together For the office that some giue them to distinguish the Night-qualles and Sunstaies belongeth more properly to the Equator and Tropickes The Poet here exactly describes the first Colure and saith it is drawne from one of the Tropickes to the other to note the staies of the Sunne who comming thereto neere goes not so fast as afore 34 And this here crossing This is the description of the second Colure that shewes the equall space betwixt the two Equinoxes or Eauen-nights of Spring and Autumne and the two Solstices or Sun-stayes of Summer and Winter The word Colure comes of the Greeke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies curtolled or cut off by the taile because onely one part appeares vnto vs and the other is hid and so saith Proclus 35 And this the circl ' of Noon That is the Meridian which passing through the Poles and our Zenith or Crowne-point diuides the Globe into halues the one East the other West It is called the Noon-line or Meridian because alwaies when the Sunne by sway of the Primovable comes thereto at what time or place soeuer then there it is Noone and Noone is nothing else but the midday Naturall or Artificiall Whereupon it followes that all Cities vnder the same Meridian stand alike distant from East and West and contrary-wise if one be neerer East or West then another they haue not the same Meridian but diuers Th'arke then or round parcell of th'Equator reckoning from West to East which is betweene the Meridian of the Fortunate Isles and the noon-point of any place or Citie is colled the longitude or length of that Citie or place and their Latitude or bredth is the Arke of their Noon-circle from th'Equator to the Crowne-point Hence also arises the distinction of Climats implied here in the word Horison which moueth as farre as you will to North or South The Ancient Astionomers saith Appian in the 6. Chapter of his Cosmography diuided the whole Earth into seuen Climats or degrees of heat and cold but we now obserue nine by reason of our late more exact discoueries A Climate is a space of the Earth betweene two paralels or lines of Latitude differing halfe an houre in Sunne-dyall one from other for the Sunne drawing from the Equator toward the Poles must needs make the daies vnequall And so much is one Climat remoued from the Equato as makes the daies there differ halfe an houre from the Equinox from Day-and night-cauen Heere further is to be noted that euery Climate takes 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 enâ—â—keble Citie Riuer Country Isle or Mountaine c. From the â—â—quâ—â—â— then to reckon Northward the first Climate is câ—lled of Mâ—â—â— because it runnes thorow the midst of that Citie in dâ—â—â—ke 〈◊〉 second of Sieâ—â— a Citie in Egypt vnder the Tropick of Caâ—â—â— the third of Alexandria the fourth of Rhodes the fift of Rome the sixt of Pontus the seuenth of Boristhenes
the breath and Spirit all-aliuing Stirres of the tuned heau'n these wheeles all louely striuing And as their wonted way eternally they trace Some of them trill the Treblâ— and some bomb-out the Base Now all these counter-notes so charmy-sweet Musicke in our Humours Seasons and Elements Bâ—ssâ— appeere Yet not so plainly in heau'n as eu'n among vs heere Th' humour Melancholike the Wint'r and cold dry ground They beare the Bases part and soft and slowly sound The white phleame th'Autom-time the water cold and wet They all aleauell run Tenr and are for Tenor set The Blood the prime of yere the moist and luke-warme Aire Play Descant florisher deuider painter Countertenor strayer The Choller Summer Fire that are so hot and dry Treble Resembl ' a strained chord that soundeth eu'r on high The reason and force of Musicke See then the cause my son why song doth ofteÌ„ win them That are most fierce by kinde there are inclos'd within them The seeds of numb'r and time nor can their life hold-out But by the Spirits helpe that whirleth heau'n about With wisemen Sweet harmony it makes the fiercest Army stay Their deadly fewd and force the griefe it doth allay Of eu'ry pained soule and with a gentle charme And Fooles Withdraweth by degrees the Foole from trickes of harme It bridleth hot desire and putteth-out the flame That makes a louers-heart Idolatrize a dame It heales a man that 's hurt with fly Phalangy's sting That eu'n at point of death will madly daunce and fling With Beasts The Swan delights therein deceiu'd thereby we finde The shye discoullard fowle and fearefull starting hinde The Dolphin loues the Leere th'vnhiued swarme of Bees With tinkling sound of brasse are clustred on the trees With God himselfe O what 's to Musick hard which wont so much to merit Which wont so to preuaile eu'n with th'enspiring Spirit As bring him downe on Saul and in Elisha wed The Spirit rauisher vnto the rauished Yea when th' eternall God to sharpest anger bent Smoakes thunders lightens hailes with all his pow'rs assent And with his heau'd-vp arme and with his backe enfoul't Is ready to discharge his forest blasting-boult Th'armonyons accord that hearts deuout shall weepe His sinnowes albenombes and brings his ang'r asleepe Then sweet-ey'd mercy steales as well shee wont and can From vnd'r his hand the rod deseru'd by rebell man But now as Heb'r had thought t' haue further gon told The practise and the skill of all the Musicke old See Canan searching-out his Iordans fatall walke Vnto the Pillernies and breakes-off all the talke Nor can I further goe this iourneyes irksome length In weaknesse vndertooke hath wasted all my strengthe I must anew entreat some helpe of heau'nly grace And somewhat need recoile to leape a greater space 48 For you ô heauenly wits Shewing that he had a good minde to dilate vpon the praise of this Art he breaks-off to come to the description of the fourth Image which is Musick and her he sets-out with all the most necessarie and gracefull attire both for voice and instruments of diuers sorts It requires a long dispute and hard to resolue what manner of Instruments and how framed they were which we reade by translated names to haue beene in vse among the Hebrues Greeks and other people of old time This would take-vp a whole Volume as also that other question what was their vocall Musicke whereof Plutarch and Boetius both haue treated I perswade my selfe they had in those dayes a kinde of skill in making and managing their musicall Instruments and ioyning voice thereto which is hardly well knowne or conceiued now of vs though some of our Musicians we finde both in voice and vpon instrument so exceeding skilfull that they are able much to moue our affections but short of that wonderfull power which hath been ascribed to the ancient Musicke 49. Sith eu'ry Sphere they say The Poet vpon this occasion of Musicke raiseth himselfe to consider the accord and harmony of the Heauens borrowing his discourse from the Philosophie of Plato whereof I shall endeuour here to set downe the summe He saith then that our Musicke on earth is but a shadow of that superlatiue harmonie which God hath ordained the great Cymbals as it were of heauen to make by their so swift and orderly mouing sithence vnlikely it is but that the Primovable and other Spheres that whirle-about continually and haue done so long should make some noise answerable to their compasse and cadence so proportionall And rather may we presume they make a most excellent melody and far exceeding our earthly Musicke which from that heauenly borroweth her perfection For so it being that God hath made all things in number weight and measure very likely it is that he kept a due proportion in the heauens and that more exactly than on the earth because this is the lowest part of all for habitation of the meanest creatures when they as their English name signifies are heauen-vp on high to make a beautifull and glorious palace for th'All-Creator To consider the matter yet more particularly the Platonikes doe say that God who is the Voice Soueraigne and giueth voice sound and harmony to all things high and low hath in euery Sphere of heauen set an Intelligence some call it Scule some Angell some morion quickned by the Primouable whereby the heauens are moued to their cadence appointed so exactly as no melody can be more pleasing As for mine owne opinion hereof I thinke the Platonicks who say also that God still exerciseth Geometry meant hereby to commend the perfection of Mathematicks and chiefely Astronomy which is most excellent and certaine of them all And because the minde is maruellously delighted with Musicall proportions which no where can be found more perfect then in the heauens who so hath the gift to vnderstand them enioyes a contentment surpassing all sweetnesse of earthly and eare-pleasing Musicke Now to the end this heauenly Musicke may be the better conceiued our Poet here vseth a very choice and daintie comparison and saith the Spirit of God giues the heauens a Musicall motion which breeds a sweet harmony among them euen as an Organist by due fingring the keys of his Instrument stirres vp therein a melodious sound Thus much by the way that the Reader may thereby take occasion to stop his eares against the tempestuous broyles and discords of this world and raise-vp himselfe toward this heauenly concord or rather to fly-vp thither with the wings of faith and learne in the company of Saints and blessed Soules to vnderstand those excellent Songs which are partly set-downe for vs in diuers passages of the Apocalyps 50. Now all these counter-notes Leauing that heauenly Musicke of the Spheres he shewes now that we haue a Musicke also contained euen in the humors of our bodies answerable to the foure Seasons of the yeare and the Elements Our Melancholy like the Earth