of Spire in Germany he was no sooner come into the Church but the Image of the Virgin saluted him and bad him Good morrow Bernard whereat he well knowing the jugling of the Friers made answer again out of St. Paul Oh said he your Ladiship hath forgot your self it is not lawful for women to speak in the Church John King of England being wished by a Courtier to untomb the bones of one who whilst he was living had been his great enemy Oh no said the King would all mine enemies were as honourably buried The Egyptian Calyph offering an English Embassador his hand in his glove the Embassador answered Sir we come not to treat with your glove but your self When a Pyrate said to one of his fellows Woe to us if we be known an honest man in the same ship replyed And woe to me if I be not known Luther was wont to say He would be unwilling to be a souldier in that army where Priests were Captains because the Church not the Camp was their proper place Plato being demanded how he knew a wiseman answered When being rebuked he would not be angry and being praised he would not be proud Marquess Pawlet there being divers factions at Court in his time yet was he beloved of all parties and being asked how he stood so right in the judgment of all He answered By being a willow and not an oak Diogenes was wont to say when the people mock't him They deride me yet I am not derided I am not the man they take me for Rather than want exercise of his patience he would crave alms of dead mens Statues and being demanded why he did so He answered That I may learn to take denial from others the more patiently Marius was never offended with any report went of him because he said If it were true it would sound to his praise if false his life and manners should prove it contrary A Steward once replyed to his passionate Lord when he called him knave c. Your Honour may speak as you please but I believe not a word that you say for I know my self an honest man Philip of Macedon professed himself much beholden to his enemies the Athenians for speaking evil of him For said he they made me an honest man to prove them lyars When Diogenes was told by a base fellow that he once had been a Coiner of money He answered 'T is true such as thou art now I once was but such as I am now thou wilt never be Socrates when one asked him why he took such a ones bitter railing so patiently Answered It is enough for one to be angry at a time Dion of Syracuse being banished came to Theodorus Court suppliant where not presently admitted he turned to his companion with these words I remember I did the like when I was in like dignity Socrates being perswaded to revenge himself of a fellow that kick'd him answered If an ass had kick'd me should I have set my wit to his and kick'd him again Another time being told that one spake evil of him He replyed Alas the man hath not as yet learned to speak well but I have learned to contemn what he speaks Diogenes being told that many despised him answered It is the wise mans portion to suffer of fools When Dionysius the Tyrant had plotted the death of his Master Plato and was defeated by Plato's escape out of his Dominions when the Tyrant desired him in writing not to speak evil of him the Philosopher replyed That he had not so much idle time as once to think of him knowing there was a just God would one day call him to a reckoning When once an hot-spur was perswaded to be patient as Job was He replyed What do ye tell me of Job Job never had any suits in the Chancery Mr. Bradford was wont to say that in Christs cause to suffer death was the way to heaven on horsback Jugo an ancient King set all his Nobles being Pagans in his Hall below and certain poor Christians in his Presence-chamber with himself at which all wondring he told them this he did not as King of the Drones but as King of another world wherein these were his fellow-Princes It was the saying of a merry fellow That in Christendom there were neither Scholars enough Gentlemen enough nor Jewes enough because if there were Scholars enough so many would not be double and treble beneficed if Gentlemen enough so many peasants would not be ranked among the Gentry and if Jewes enough so many Christians would not profess usury Socrates was wont to say to Alcibiades when he met him among gallants like himself I fear not thee but thy company Alexander when a Commander of his in the Wars spake loudly but did little told him I entertained you into my service not to rail but to fight Illyricus when one asked him why the old Translations of the Bible had no vowels I think saith he that they had no consonants for they could not agree among themselves Doctor Reynolds his Lecture in Oxford ceasing by reason of his sickness some desired him to read before he was well recovered The Doctor said He desired so to serve God that he might serve him long Erasmus was wont to say in his time That to Preach with many Ministers was but Perfricare frontem linguam voluere Epiphanius having stayd long at Constantinople and being to take ship to return home again said He was leaving three great things a great City a great Palace and great Hypocrisie Charls the Great when he was shewed by a Duke a Royal Palace and all the rings and sumptuous ornaments and jewels said Has sunt qui nos invitos faciunt mori These are the things that make us unwilling to die Erasmus was used to say That the dunsery and idleness of the Monks of his time made him a Student The Athenian Commander being asked what God was said He was neither bow-man nor pike-man nor hors-man nor footman but one that did know istis omnibus imperare A noble Commander in the Wars having taken great spoils said to a souldier behind him Tolle istos Ego Christianus When Cajetan told Luther he should be banished Luther answered Si non capiat terra capiat coelum A great man comming to Aquinas and offering him a Bishoprick he leaning on his elbow in his Study replyed Mallem Chrysostomum in Matthaeum The â—ame Aquinas when he was entreated to take a Cardinals place answered Sepulchrum cogito non gradum sublimiorem Luther and his Wife with four children were in a boat and being in a great storm were like to be cast away Luther laughing aloud said Oh how the Devil would rejoyce if we were all drowned Plato discoursing unto one of the contempt of death and speaking strangely upon it was answered That he spake more couragiously than he lived To whom Plato replyed that he spake not as he lived but as he should live Caesar Borgia
turns goe before and not alwayes come lagging behind which the Head having yielded unto was the first that repented it not knowing how or whither she should goe and besides was all rent and bruised being forced against nature to follow a member that had neither seeing nor hearing to conduct it Our factions fractions and lawless liberty render us like the poor Bactrans of whom it is said that they are Sine Fide sine Rege sine Lege But whither is my pen running Since I began with the Excise in England I will waft you over into Holland where it first began and was invented there you shall see how ill the Dutchmen at first relished this Tax upon their drink It occasioned this Libel in Dutch which you shall read in English I wish long life may him befall And not one good day there withal And Hell-fire after this life here Who first did raise this Tax on Beer With this Postscript The Word of God and the Tax on Beer last for ever and ever But it is no wonder the Dutchman should be so angry with this charge upon his drink since you know it is said Germanorum vivere est bibere And they account the turning of water into wine the greatest Miracle that ever Christ did which miracle onely made one of them wish that Christ had lived in their Country No more now but that I am still as always Sir your Servant T. F. To Mr. T. C. Sir WE have now thanks to our Preserver lived to see those men confuted to their faces who would needs determine the end of the world before the end of the year and upon no better ground that I could hear from any of them than this because say they the old world was drowned in the year from the Creation 1657. And I find the Learned Alstedius fathering of this fancie because he found the same number of yeares in the Chronogram of Conflagratio Mundi How miserably and yet how often have the too credulous vulgar been deluded by the vain Predictions of such idle Astrologasters I remember Hollingshed tells a storie of the Prior of St. Bartholomews London who built him an house on Harrow-hill to secure himself from a supposed flood foretold by an Astrologer But at last he with the rest of his seduced company came down again as wise as they went up Such is the fate and folly of those false prophets that they often live to see themselves confuted It is a witty jeer the Cambro-Britannian Epigrammatist puts upon the Scotch Napier who more wisely had determined the end of the world at a farther distance Cor mundi finem propiorem non facis ut ne ant◠obitum mendax arguerere Sapis Thus as is well observed by a late and Learned Author Astrologers have told of a sad and discontented day which would weep it's eyes out in showers which when 't was born proved a Democritus and did nothing but laugh at their ignorance and folly Infinite are the Stories upon Record of the madness of those men and the vanitie and credulity of the easie multitude Strange that they should be so grossely and yet so often cheated with the same bait But I conclude with a more serious observation of Ludolphus of the two destructions of the world As the first sayes he was by water for the heat of their lust so the second shall be by fire for the coldnesse of their love In hopes that ours is not yet grown cold I subscribe my self Sir your loving Friend T. F. To Mr. E. M. Sir BOdin the Frenchman in his Method of History accounts Englishmen barbarous for their Civil Wars But his Countrymen at this time have no great reason to cast dirt in our faces till they have wash'd their own They who have hitherto set us on fire and warm'd their hands by it are now in the like flames themselves It hath been one of their Cardinal Policies to divide us lest our union should prove their ruine It was the saying of the D. of Rohan a great States-man That England was a mighty Animal and could never die unless it kill'd it self Certainly we have no worse enemies than our selves as if we had conspired our own ruine For Plutarch calls the ardent desire of the Graecians to make Civil Wars in Greece a Conspiracie against themselves But well may the winds and waves be Pilots to that ship whose inferiour Mariners have thrown their Pylot over-board Dum ille regnabat tranquillè vivebamus neminem metuebamus said the people of the Emperour Pertinax We remember the time when we lived in peace and plenty till we surfeited of our happiness and as our peace begat plenty so our plenty begat pride and pride brought forth animosities and factions and they if not prevented will be delivered of our ruine and destruction In times past sayes Cornelius Tacitus of our Countrymen they lived under a Monarchy now that they are subject to divers Masters one can see nothing but faction and divisions amongst them This was spoken of our forefathers and our Posteritie will think it meant onely of us The God of union re-unite us and out of this Chaos of confusion create an happy concord amongst us before our rents prove our ruine and our distractions our destruction This is the constant and hearty prayer of Sir your assured Servant T. F. To Mr. T. C. Sir I Must tell you you are not justly troubled at the injustice of our new Judges since they have thereby rendred those brave men Martyrs which otherwise had died as Criminals Socrates his wife exasperated her grief by this circumstance Good Lord said she how unjustly doe these bad Judges put him to death What wouldst thou rather they should execute me justly replyed he to her The injustice of the Judges sentence declare the justness of the condemned's cause It is not the being a Judge that makes his sentence just or the prisoner guilty There have been those and we have seen them who have committed murther with the Sword of Justice and executed Justice as a malefactor Nor have the friends of those happy Martyrs any cause to be ashamed of or grieved for their death or manner of it Damnari dissecari suspendi decolari piis cum impiis sunt communia sayes Erasmus Varia sunt hominum judicia Ille foelix qui judice Deo absolvitur The old Martyrs have accounted martyrdom the way to heaven on hors-back The first man that died went to heaven but the first man that went to heaven died a Martyr suffered a violent death by the hands of a cruel and unmerciful brother We have lived to see that politick principle of Periander put in practice who being consulted with how to preserve a tyranny bid the messenger stand still whilest he walking in a garden topt all the highest flowers thereby signifying the cutting off and bringing low of the Nobility Yet will not this do with us it is but like Cadmus his sowing of
in My breast nor shall it meet or be put out With any cold extinguisher but death If many shoulders make griefs burthen light Then so shall ours and may mine cease to be When they shall cease to bear their equal part And sympathize with thee as doth my heart Seph Uncle my thanks How rare it is to find A friend in misery Men run from such Like Deer from him is hunted with the dogs As if that misery infectious were Men fly with Eagles wings away But creep like snails when they should succour lend I cannot therefore chuse but prize your love Who dare be true unto your friend a name Nearer than that of kindred or of blood This is th' effect of noblest virtue which Ties firmer knots than age can e're undo Such is the knot my Maximus and I Have tied spight of my fathers anger it Shall hold when envy 's tired to invent Mischiefs in vain to cut the knot in two Which heaven hath knit too fast to loose again Alas fond man who thinks to unravel what The gods have wove together 'T is in vain Scaen. 3. 1 Lo. Lady time cals upon you not to stay Lest by a fond delay you call upon His fury to convert into some worse And sudden punishment which may deny All hopes of future safety of all ills The least is always wisely to be chosen Seph Go and prepare that floting grave which must Devour's alive I will attend you here Before when will my dearest find his grief In finding me thus lost without relief Exeunt Manet Sephestia Why doth my Love thus tarry surely he Forgotten hath the place or time or else He would not stay thus long but can I blame Him to be slow to meet his ruine I Could wish he would not come at all that so He yet might live although I perish but How fondly do I wish to be without Him without whom alas I cannot live 'T were as impossible as without air He 'tis for whom I suffer and with him All places are alike to me See where He comes who is sole keeper of my heart Enter Maximus Max. My dear Seph Ah dear indeed for whom thy life Must pay the shot of cruelty enrag'd Max. What meanes my love is 't she or do I dream Sure this cannot be she whose words were wont To be more sweet than honey soft as oil These words more sharp than daggers points nâ—'re came From her I know What sayst thou my sweet Seph The same truth will not suffer me to speak Other lest I should injure her O that 'T were possible so to dispense with truth Not to betray our selves I know not what to say Max. Heavens bless us what a sudden change is here Love who hath wrong'd thee tell me that I may Thrid their lives upon my sword make their Dead trunks float in their own blood till they blush At their own shame Tell me my heart who is 't Seph Alas poor soul thou little dreamst what sad News do's await thine ears my tongue doth fail Not daring once to name the thing must be Our loves sad end and dire Catastrophe My fathers fury Oh that that name I once delighted in should odious be To mine affrighted senses But for thee Alone it is I grieve not for my self Max. Be 't what it will so that it be but in Relation to thy love I will embrace And hug and thank that malice too that so Invented hath a means whereby I may But testifie my loyalty to thee For whose sweet sake I would encounter with Legions of armed furies sacrifice My dearest blood unto thy service which I more esteem than all the wealth the world Can boast of 'T is thee alone I value Above whatever mens ambitious thoughts Can fathom with their boundless appetites Seph This flame of love must now be quenched in Tâ—â— foaming sea we are design'd a prey Unto the fury of winds and waves The deadly Barque's providing which must be Our moving habitation the sea Must be our Kingdom and the scaly frie Our subjects This this the portion is Of fortunes frowns and fathers fiercer hate Fly fly my dearest Maximus and save My life in thine oh stay no longer here weeps Max. Why dost thou torment thy self before Thy time wilt thou anticipate the sea And drown thy self in â—ears Deny me not To share with thee in suffering as well As I have done in pleasure 't is for me This storm is rais'd were I once cast away His rage would cease I I have wrong'd thee And I 'll be just to thee and to my word draws I 'll ope the sluces of my fullest veins And set them running till they make a flood Wherein I 'll drown my self He offers to kill himself She stays his hand Seph Thine heart lies here 'T is here lock't up securely in my brest First open that and take it out for death Shall ne're divorce me from thy company I will attend thee through those shady vaults Of death or thou shalt live with me Dost think This body possible to live without A soul or without thee Have pitie on Thy tender babe whose life depends on thine And make not me widow and him orphan With unadvised rashness Sheath thy sword Max. Mine eyes will ne're endure it to behold Thee miserable no no death first shall draw A sable veil of darkness over them Pardon my rashuess I will live with thee And tire thy fathers rage with suffering So he 'l but suffer thee to live in mirth The greatest sorrow shall not make me sad Seph Here comes my father cerainly his rage Will know no bounds I fear it will Break forth into some desperate act on me Max. Although he be a King which sacred name I reverence and as a mortal god Adore he shall not dare to injure you Before my face first shall he wear my life Upon his sword if he but dare to touch Thy sacred self Sâ—â—n 4. Enter Damocles Kin. How now light-skirts have you got your Champion To shield you from our anger know I have Not yet forgot the name of father though You thus have slighted it but as a King We must be just to punish your contempt Did you so well know your beauty to be Proud of it and yet so little value it As thus to throw it all away at once Well get you gone Since that you have esteem'd A strangers love before your lovalty To me or my care to you a stranger shall Inherit what you were born to had not Your fond affections forc'd this vile exchange Max. Sir for your fury will not suffer me To call you father think not your daughter Undervalued by her love to me Her love ran not so low as to be stoâ—p'd To meet with crime who am a Prince nâ— less Than is your self Cyprus my Kingdome is Kin. What drew you hither then you must needs know It is no less than treason for to steal An heir to
preserve it And although me thinks I hear you tell me that my sounding on so slight a knock doth but argue me the empter vessel whilst you who are more full fraught give no answer though with much importunity I have no other excuse but to tell you that I do it to let you see I had rather seem to be a troublesome than a forgetful friend Truly sayes our English Proverb He loves not at all that knows when to make an end And the Italians are not amiss who say L'amore senza fine non ha fine Love that has no by-end will know no end For my part I profess no other end in my affections but your service for which I once gave you my Heart and now my Hand that the World may see whose servant is T. F. To Mr. C. H. Mr. Ch. AS I was going to Church to keep the Fast your Letter encounter'd me and as good reason turn'd my Fast into a Feast but such a one as my Senses were more employ'd on than my Palat It rejoyc'd me exceedingly to hear of that ingenious Fl. though I expected to have heard from him before this But I see Non factis sequimur omnia quâ— loquimur I am sure Non passibus aequis To those Poesies you tell me of I shall only answer them with expectation since the Instructer of the Art of Poetry tells me Nec verbum verbo curabis reddere And to return you something for your Newes I can only tell you this that our streets abound with Grashoppers silenc'd by our great Hercules and others that look like horses thrown into a certain River in Italy which are consumed to the bare bones For your desire to be made merry I must confess Laeta decet laetis pascere corâ—a jocis But for you to desire it of me seems to be a jest it self I doubt to be tedious and well know Seneca's rule That an Epistle should not Manum legentis implere I onely take time to subscribe my self Your true Friend T. F. To Mr. S. M. at Barbados Friend I Received your as welcome as unexpected Letter of which I will say in the words of Seneca that famous Moralist in an Epistle to his friend Lucilius Exulto quoties lego Epistolam tuam implet me bonâ spe jam non promittit de te sed spondet And God forbid that I should be so uncharitable as not to believe it Yet let me tell you that without the reality of the actions it is but a dead letter nay 't will prove a deadly for should you neglect to do what you there promise or speak there more than you do that very letter will one day rise up in judgment against you Pardon my plainness and think never the worse of the Truth for my bad language Truth may many times have bad cloaths yet has she alwayes a good face It is a good mark of the moral Philosopher that sheep do not come to their shepherd and shew him how much they eat but make it appear by the fleece that they wear on their backs and the milk which they give I will not wrong the sharpness of your judgment by applying the Moral I have read of two famous Painters who to shew their skill the one drew a bunch of grapes so lively that he cozened the Birds the other drew a veil so perfectly over his grapes that he deceiv'd the Artificer himself Could we draw the colour of our good works never so lively as to cozen every mortal eye and draw so fine a veil over our evil deeds as to conceit our selves into a conceit we had none yet is there an All-seeing eye to whom the darkest secret is most apparâ—nt Did we but truly consider this it could not chuse but hinder us from committing those things we would be ashamed to do in the sight of Man which we daily doe in the sight of an Omniscient God Therefore the advice of the Heathen Philosopher may be made good Christian practice who advised to set the conceit of Cato or like Grave man alwayes before us to keep us from doing what might mis-befit their presence It is a Character of the wicked man drawn by the Divine hand that in all his wayes he sets not God before his eyes There is also another witness within us that can neither be brib'd not blinded O te miserum si contemnis hunc testem O have a care to offend that Bird in the breast that must one day sing either your joyful Elogie or more doleful Dirge Camdâ—n our English Historiographer tells us of a place in Stafordshire call'd Wotton in so doleful a place under the barren Hill Weaver that it is a common Proverb of the neighbours Wotton under Weaver Where God came never But alas there 's no such place on Earth to be found yet can I tell a place where his pure Spirit abhors to enter namely into a person contaminated and defiled with sin and thereby made the harbour of Satan and hatred of the most High Whereas you tell me you are faln to labour let me comfort you with this that it is as universal as unavoidable a Fate laid on us by the mouth of Truth Man is born to labour as the sparks to fly upward As if Man and Labour were Termini Convertibiles But that you take more pleasure now in Labour than you did before in your Pleasure it much comforts me assuring me that you are now sensible of that which the Romans taught by placing Angina the goddess of sorrow and pain in the Temple of Volupeia the goddess of Pleasure as if that pain and sorrow were the necessary consequences of pleasure Whereas on the contrary Goodness is like the Image of Diana Pliny speaks of Intrantes tristem Euntes exhilerantem How wretched therefore is their condition that have their portion in this life Well may we be strangers in this worldly Aegypt so we may be inhabitants hereafter of the Heavenly Canaan And you and I may say in the words of Seneca Satis multam temporis sparsimus incipiamus nunc in vasa colligerâ— We have spent time enough already and 't is high time now to save the rest and to make the best of the remnant of our life because we know not how short it is It was a wise caution of Eleazer a Jew who being demanded When it would be time to repent and amend Answered One day before death And when the other replied That no man knew the day of his death Begin then said he even to day for fear of failing Hoc proprium inter caetera mala hoc quoque habet stultitia proprium semper incipit vivere quid est enim turpius quam senex vivere insipieâ—s Give me leave not to instruct you but to tell you what counsel I desire to practise for it was an envious disposition of that Musician that would play so softly on his Harp that none could hear but himself First 'T is my
willingly retract whatever suspition you have formerly had of any ingenuity in me However lest a continued silence should cast me in and out of your affection I am resolved to say something though it be but to confess my self guilty of that most unpardonable offence in friendship Ingratitude Yet am I not without some excuses which would be ready to plead in my behalf did I not rather wish to receive a new life of happiness by your pronouncing my pardon I am your prisoner deal with me as you please onely grant me my liberty without which I cannot make good as I desire the title of Sir your though rude yet real Friend and Servant T. F. To Mr. D. P. Sir PResuming your goodness will pardon the rudeness of the address I have sent a brace of Pamphlets to kiss your hands Being conscient to themselves of their own unworthinesse like trewant Scholars they durst not appear without an Apologie neither should they or this but that I know you daily meet with such Exercises of your patience and that I know you have indulgent charitie enough to cover the faults of those you love Please you to suspend your severer thoughts and to make a small truce with your nobler employments I shall humbly beg their pardon in a very few words That they came no sooner was out of necessity that I shall crave you will vouchsafe to indulge that they come now is out of duty and that I shall promise my self you will deign to accept Sir I hate to be officiously injurious to my friends and therefore I will not increase my fault in excusing theirs only let me impetrate one thing more which I conceive will deceive your expectation It is not that you will correct their faults that the world knows you can do nor that you will forgive them that your wonted candor flatters me you will doe but that having atteined your hands which are the bounds of their ambition they believe they have obteined their end and they desire not to out-live that happinesse but that you will condescend as I have made them an offering to make them a sacrifice be you the Priest your harth the Altar and their Urne and besides the courtesie you shall do your self in saving the reading of such nugacities you shall thereby answer their desert and my desire who am so far from craving their reprieve I would my self be the hastener of their punishment Here would I cease but I am loth to lessen the noble office of your mercie by what impulse of spirit I know not but such is the tendencie of my desires to expresse the realitie of their professions to your service that to say I love you is beneath the ardor of my affection I am ready to professe with that old Roman who proclamed he was not onely in love with Cato but inchanted with him Onely here is the defect that as the Italians say He that paints the flower cannot paint the smell So in professing my service to you I cannot discover the realitie farther than you will please to give me credit and believe that I am Sir your most real Friend and Servant T. F. To Mr. T. J. Sir WHat in Superiors is counted gift and bounty in Inferiors amounts to no more than homage and gratitude And well it is if in stead of abating it increase not the audit of their Obligations Such is the nature of the present and though it pretend not to acquit the least part of that debt your civilitie hath involved me in yet shall I hope it may arrive at the tender of a grateful acknowledgment and I wish my thanks may prove but as large as you were liberal Think it not strange that I have been thus long silent nor account me an unclean beak if I still chew the chud in a thankful remembrance Sir the noble entertainment you vouchsafed to me a stranger hath cherished the inclosed pamphlets into a confidence that you will deign them not onely a favourable acceptance but that your goodnesse will also grant them the benefit of the late Act of Pardon without which they will seem as much strangers to our Common-wealth as their Author was to your self who should now too much wrong your noble nature if he should not professe himself Sir your most indebted Servant T. F. To Mr. C. A. Sir I Being of late arrested at the suit of some importunate occasions which would willingly be called necessary I have been so much their prisoner that till I had satisfied the utmost minute I was so far from a possibilitie of being your servant that I was not my own Master Now must I compound with you and intreat that if my so long silence deserve not to be answered with a repeated act of that dormant pardon you long since pleased to grant me yet that you will at least accept of this as Interest till opportunitie shall enable me to discharge the whole I shall now begin to turn the weekly hour-glasse of our Commerce and hereafter measure my life by my letters For though I have intermitted my constant course you are in no more likelyhood to be rid of this trouble than you have hopes of losing your Ague by the alteration of the fits If friendship be the incorporating of two bodies by an union of souls making but one of two Me thinks this constant correspondence fitly answers to that deservedly applauded notion of the Circulation of the Blood It shall be my care that no stop be made on my side that we may preserve the life of our Friendship during the life of Sir your Servant T. F. To Mr. T. P. Sir BEsides the natural Antipathy of my Genius to Controversies I have been of late so divorced from my self and my own thoughts by the motion of an higher wheel than my own occasions that I am altogether discouraged to give you any account of this piece upon so transient a view that I fear I shall give you as ill an account of it as he did of Venice to King James that told him He knew nothing of it for he rode post through it Yet to satisfie your command against all these discouragements I shall adventure a few hasty lines to your more setled judgment Sir did not the Authors worth out-poize those petty exceptions that might be taken in advantage as the scarce sense of the title and some other inconsiderate expressions in the whole that seem to clash one against another I shall onely commend to your consideration these few thoughts The Proverb is common wherein wit and experience club to say much in a little That marriages are made on Earth but matches are made in Heaven I am easily induced to believe that the omniscient providence which descends to take care of the falling of a sparrow and the number of our hairs should much more take care of that grand Climacterical Action of a mans life the restoraration of his lost rib I shall therefore not