Mistresse So that through the eye it seizeth upon the liver which is the first receptacle of Love then the heart then the brain and bloud and then the spirits and so consequently the imagination and reason The Liver to be the seat of Love is grounded upon the saying of Solomon in Prov. 7. That a young man void of understanding goeth after a strange woman till a dart strike through his Liver Cogit amare jecur the which being affected and inflamed setteth all the other principall parts on fire according to Senec. in Hippol Pectus insanum vapor Amorque torret intimas saevus vorat Penitus medullas atque per venas meat Visceribus ignis mersus venis latens Vt agilis altas flamma percurrit trabes Now Love within my raging bosome fumes And with a cruell fire my reins consumes The flame within my bowels hid remains Thence shooteth up and down my melting veins As agile fire over dry Timber spreads Valesius lib. 3. Contr. 13. saith that that Love which is in Men is defined to be an affection of both powers appetite and reason The rationall resides in the brain and the appetite in the Liver and the heart is diversly affected of both and carryed a thousand wayes by consent being variously inclined sometimes merry and jocond and sometimes sad and dejected The sensitive faculty over-ruling reason carryes the soul hoodwink't and hurries the understanding to Dawfair to eat a Wood-cock pie Of Jealousie in Lovers the Defininition the Signes and Symptomes of it IT is described and defined to be a certain suspicion which the Lover hath of the party he chiefly affecteth lest he or she should be enamoured of another Or an eager desire of enjoying some beauty alone and to have it proper to himself only It is a fear or doubt lest any forainer should participate or share with him in his love still apt to suspect the worst in such doubtfull cases This passion of Jealousie is more eminent among Batchelours then Marryed-men If it appear among Batchelours we commonly call them Rivals or Corrivals a similitude having its original from a River Rivales a rivo for as a River divides a common ground betwixt two Men and both participate of it So is a Woman indifferent betwixt two Suitors both likely to enjoy her and thence cometh this emulation which breaks out many times into tempestuous stormes and produceth lamentable effects murders it self with much cruelty many single combates Ariosto calls it a fury a continual Fever full of suspicion fear and sorrow a mirth-marring monster Ecclus. 28. 6. The sorrow and grief of heart of one woman jealous of another is heavier then death But true and pure Love is without jealousie for this affection springs from the love of concupiscency for jealousie is a fear as I have said which a Man hath lest another should enjoy the thing he desireth the reason thereof is because we judge it hurtfull either to our selves or to those whom we love if others should enjoy it And if they have any interest in the party beloved they have a speciall care that no other have the fruition thereof but themselves taking the matter heavily if it fall out otherwise being very much offended and full of indignation against him that should attempt any such thing being very suspicious and carrying within themselves matter of jealousie and tormenting themselves and others without cause for Love with Jealousie and a madman are cozen germans in understanding for questionlesse immoderate love is a madnesse and then had Bedlam need be a great and spacious house for he that never was in that predicament is either blinde or babish When jealousie once seiseth on these silly weak and unresisting souls 't is pitifull to see how cruelly it tormenteth them insultingly it tyrannizeth over them It insinuateth it self under colour of friendship but after it once possesseth them the same causes which served for a ground of goodwill serves for the foundation of mortal hatred Of all the mindes diseases that is it whereto most things serve for sustenance and fewest for remedy This consuming Fever blemisheth and corrupteth all that otherwise is good and goodly in them But as the most firme in Religion may have doubts so the most confident in Love are capable of some suspicion The strongest trees are shaken by the winde though the root be fixed whilst the leaves and branches be tossed Why should we not rest our selves and abandon all suspicious Ideas after having had a tryall of a person and many effects for testimonies of the affection yet all these proofs and tryals keep us not from vexing and tormenting our selves because fear which is not in our power to restrain interprets ill the least appearance and buries it self in false objections where it findes no true ones O weak jealousie did ever thy prying and suspicious sight finde thy Mistresses lip guilty of any smile or any lascivious glance from her eye doest not thou see the blushes of her cheeks are innocent her carriage sober her discourse all chast no toyish gesture no desire to see the publick shewes or haunt the Theater she is no popular Mistresse all her kisses do speak her Virgin such a bashful heat at several tides ebbes and flowes flowes and ebbes again as it were affraid to meet our wilder flame what is it then that stirs up this hot passion in thee Some will object and say All this is but cunningnesse as who knowes the sleights of Sirens It is these Idiots that have these symptomes of jealousie as fear sorrow suspicion strange actions gestures outrages lockings up oathes tryals with a thousand more devises then any pen is able to enumerate 'T is a vehement passion a furious perturbation a bitter pain a scorching fire a pernicious curiosity it fils the minde with grief half suspicion accidentall brawles compassionate tears throbbings of the heart distracted cogitations inconstant desires and a thousand the like lancing razors that cut and wound the hearts of Men as Gall corrupting the Hony of our life more then ordinarily disquieted and discontented Next time you see a jealous Lover doe but mark him and you shall see without a pair of Spectacles how he misinterprets every thing is either said or done most apt to mistake or misconster he peeps into every corner followes close observes to an hair all the postures and actions of his Mistresse he will sometimes sigh weep and sob for anger swear slander and belie any Man sometimes he will use obsequious and flattering speeches and aske forgivenesse condemning his rashnesse and folly and then immediately again he is as impatient and furious as ever he was therefore I wish Gentlewomen to beware of such infidels who wax and wane an hundred times in an hour as though they were got in the change of the Moon so strange is the inferences of this malicious jealousie that it never makes a good Logician He pries on all sides accurately
reason for it it being too high for the vulgar capacity to attain to the knowledge of it They by their influence act upon the humors and bodies and by their secret qualities tie creatures with the knot of love for how many are there who love things which are neither lovely nor good I mean not only in effect but in their own opinion and judgement yet are they fastened by some tie unknown to any but the reall sons of art and those which are acquainted with the sublime sciences nor can they free themselves from it but by the absolute power of reason Do we not dayly finde by experience that a Man who is and who knoweth himself to be deformed and wicked yet by nature falleth not in love with himself so through a love of Concupiscence he may love things which have neither beauty nor goodness although he daily hath a blinde feeling of something sutable to sensuality and an unperceptible attractive For there may be a sympathy in Nature and an antipathy in Complexion and a sympathy in Complexion and an antipathy in Nature as in animals there is amity betwixt the Black-bird and the Thrush betwixt the Crow and Hern betwixt Peacocks and Pigeons Turtles and Parrats Whence Sappho in Ovids Epist. writes to Phaon To Birds unlike oft-times joyn'd are white Doves Also the Bird that 's green black Turtle loves For of what sort the amities and enmities of the superiours be such are the inclinations of things subject to them in these inferiours These dispositions therefore of Love are nothing else but certain inclinations of things of one towards another desiring such and such a thing if it be absent and to move toward it and to acquiesce in it when it is obtained shunning the contrary and dreading the approach of it He that knowes the amities and enmities the superiours have one towards another knows my meaning and will quickly give you a reason and that none of the worst let the Priests say what they please The third Cause is from Parents and Education This cause is from our first Parents for the preservation and propagation of the Species and will so continue till nature shall be no more It is according to the old Adage Qualis Pater talis Filius like Father like Son Cat to her kinde if the Dam trot the foal will not amble Experience and nature approves it that the fruit will relish of the tree from whence it sprung Consider how Love proceeds from Parents and gradually descends that so soon as we are come to maturity and that our bloud begins to boyl in our veins we devote our selves to a Woman forgetting our Mother in a wise and the womb that bare us in that which shall bear our image This Woman blessing us with Children our affection leaves the levell it held before and sinks from our bed unto our issue and picture of posterity where affection holds no steady mansion they applying themselves to a Woman take a lawful way to love another better then our selves and thus run to posterity But Education is more potent for Themistocles in his youth as himself confesseth for want of Discipline was carryed away by the lascivious and hot passion of Love like to a young unbridled Colt untill that by Miltiades example who was then famous among the Grecians he caused the heat of his courage to be cooled and the lasciviousness which was naturally in him to attend upon virtue he fed delicately and highly Qualis cibus talis sanguis membrum such as the meat such is the broath for luscious fare is the only nurse and nourisher of sensual appetite the sole maintenance of youthful affection the fewell of this inordinate passion nothing so much feeding it nor insensates the understanding by delighting in it He was very idly educated which is one main branch that causeth love and the first arrow that Cupid shooteth into the hot Liver of a heedless Lover For the Man being idle the minde is apt to all uncleanness the minde being void of exercise the Man is void of honesty Doth not rust corrode the hardest Iron if it be not used Doth not the Moth eat the finest garment if it be not worn Doth not impiety infect the clearest and most acute wit if it be given to idleness Doth not common experience make this common unto us that the fertilest ground bringeth forth nothing but weeds if it be not tilled The particulars of idleness as immoderate sleep immodest play unsatiable drinking doth so weaken the senses and bewitch the soul that before we feel the motion of Love we are resolved to lust Cupid is a crafty Gentleman he followes those to a hair that studdy pleasure and flies those that stoutly labour Likewise though their natural inclination be to virtue if they be Educated in Dancing-schooles Schooles of Musick lead a riotous life they will be much subject to this passion they will prefer fancie before friends lay Reason in the water being too salt for their tast and follow unbridled Affection suitable to their education But let their inclinations be never so strong if they have been well brought up and instructed they are in some sort forced to moderate themselves not suffering Love to have such pernicious effects in them as naturally they are inclined to whereupon in my opinion that old proverb was not spoken without reason That Education goeth beyond Nature so that Quintilian would not have Nurses to be of an immodest or uncomely speech adding this cause Lest saith he such manners precepts and discourses as young children learn in their unriper years remain so deeply rooted as they shall scarce ever be relinquished Sure I am that the first impressions whether good or evill are most continuate and with least difficulty preserved Quo semel est imbuta recens servabit odorem Testa diu A pot well season'd holds the primitive tast A long time after Socrates confesseth in Plato that by nature he was inclined to vices and yet Philosophy made him as perfect and excellent a Man as any was in the world Besides Education and custome have power not only to change the natural inclination of some particular Men but also of whole Countries as the Histories of most Nations declare unto us and namely that of the Germans who in the time of Tacitus and Lycurgus amongst the Lacedemonians had neither Law nor Religion knowledge nor forme of Common-wealth but were led and carryed on by the current of their own inclinations and as their wils was inclined by the influence of the superiours whereas now they will give place to no Nation for good institution in all things To reform the Lacedemonians Lycurgus used this piece of policy He nourished two whelps both of one Sire and one Dam but in different manner for the one he trained up to hunt and the other to lie alwaies in the chimney-corner at the porridge-pot afterwards calling the Lacedemonians into one assembly he said Ye
Lacedemonians to the attaining of virtue education industry and exercise is the most noble means the truth of which I shall make manifest to you by tryall Then bringing forth the whelps and setting down a porridge-pot and an Hare the one run at the Hare and the other at the pot the Lacedemonians not understanding the mystery he said Both of these be of one Sire and one Dam but you see how Education altereth Nature Let us therefore that seeing our flexible nature is assaulted and provoked to the acting of any thing which is not good endevour to accustome and exercise our selves in virtue which will be as it were unto us another nature let us use the means of good Education and instruction in Wisdom whereby our souls shall be made conquerors over these hot passions and our mindes moderated and stayed in all our actions We will now proceed on to the next and fourth cause which is a certain harmony and consonancy of hearts which meeting accord upon the same tone having a natural correspondency For it is Mans nature to affect all harmony and sure it is where Cupid strikes this silent note for Love is the musick the harmony complexion the genus and very soul of nature more sweet and melodious then the sound of any instrument for there is musick wheresoever there is an harmony And thus far we maintain the musick of the spheres for these well ordered motions and regular paces though they give no sound unto the ear yet to the understanding of the parties affected they strike a love-note most full of harmony I desire leave to insist a little upon this Every body hath its projections and unperceiveable influences as we finde in the power of Amber and the Adamant which attract Iron and Straw by the expiration they scatter in the aire to serve as instruments and hands to their attractions This being common to other natures of Plants Metals and living creatures we must not think but that the body of Man participateth therein by reason of its vivacity and multitude of pores which give a more easie passage to such emissions There then cometh forth a spirituous substance which is according to Marcilius Ficinus vapour of bloud pure subtle hot and clear more strong or weak according to the interiour agitations of spirits which carryeth along with it some friendly convenient and temperate quality which insinuateth it self into the heart and soul doth if it there finde a disposition of conformity abide as a seed cast into the earth and forms there an harmony and this love of correspondency with an admirable promptness and vigor so it happeneth that the spirits being transpired from one body to another and carrying on their wings qualities consonant do infallibly excite and awaken the inclinations The eye is principally interessed herein breathing thence the most thin spirits and darting forth the visual rayes as the arrows of Love which penetrate the heart striking a most dulcisonant harmony and are united one within another then heating the bloud they strike upon the imagination and attract the will which are linked one to another that they are tyed together with an unperceiveable knot and so by this means Love entereth into the heart The fifth Cause is that of the Divines and morall Philosophers That beauty and goodness make us love Which two if they be found both in one Woman she 's rara avis a very rare thing indeed are most availeful advantages Love varies as its objects varie which is alwaies good beautiful amiable gratious and pleasant or at least which seems to be so from Goodness comes Beauty from Beauty Grace and Comeliness which result as so many rayes from their good parts makes us to love and so covet and desire it for were it not pleasing and gratious in our eyes we should not seek it Omne pulchrum amabile and what we love is fair and gratious in our eyes or at least we do so apprehend or esteem it Suum cuique pulchrum Th' perfections of his Mistress are most rare In all mens eyes yet in his own most faire Amiableness is the object of love the scope and end is to obtain it for whose sake we love and with our minds covet to enjoy Likewise Grace and Beauty are so wonderfully annexed do so sweetly and gently win our souls and strongly allure that they confound our judgement and cannot be distinguished And this makes the Poets still put the three Graces in Venus company as attending on her and holding up her train As the needle of a Diall being touched with an Adamant doth alwaies turn towards the Pole-star because the Philosophers hold that to be the element of the Load-stone or Magnet and by a natural sympathy doth attract every part of it self unto it self so a Loâ—ers heart being touched with the beauty and goodness of his Mistress doth turne it and all its thoughts towards her Poetically to explain this conception let us add The needle of a Diall Northward turns If touch'd by Adamant His heart touch'd by his Mistress burns And after her doth pant As this Magnet draweth the heavie Iron and the Harp the swift Dolphin so beauty allureth the chast minde to love In that exquisite Romance of Clytiphon and Lucippe where Clytiphon being captivated with her beauty speaking of himself ingenuously confesseth that he no sooner came in Lucippe's presence but saith he Statim ac eam contemplatus sum occidi oculos à Virgine avertere conatus sum sed illi repugnabant He was wounded at the first sight his heart panted he could not possibily turn his eyes from her This Beauty hath great power to procure love for where it appeareth in the exterior parts in any body it is as it were a witness and testimony of the beauty in the soul For the Creator created all things in such manner that he hath commonly joyned beauty and goodness together in the beginning there was nothing made but it was very good and beautiful in his kind therefore there is an agreement between the body and the soul for bodily beauty is as it were an image of the beauty of the soul and promiseth after a sort some good thing of the inward beauty for internal perfection breedeth the external whereupon the internal is called goodness and the external beauty Many would willingly die for the beauty of others and are so tormented and tossed that they become senseless and phrenetick being captivated with looking upon a beautiful face which hath such a sting that it pierceth even unto the liveliest part of their heart and soul Whereupon it falleth out that poor silly Lovers are so full of passions that they stand altogether amazed making their souls so subject to their desires that she must obey them as if she were some poor Chamber-maid or drudge It is the Witch of Nature as gold is the god of the World for a Woman without beauty hath as few followers as a Man without money hath friends
The reason why Womens beauty is of such force that it overcomes men is that the sense being too much fastened upon it doth not only as if it gazed upon an object above its strength remain dazled with the rayes thereof but reason it self is darkned the heart is fettered and the will by love made a prisoner And I must needs tell you in plain terms that beauty without the indowments of a virtuous minde is stark naught Yet most commonly the beauty of the minde is manifest in the face as it were in a looking-glass for in it is seen a modest blush the vail of shame fac'dness the true ornament of an honest minde the treasure of Chastitity the splendor of Clemency the riches of Silence the majesty of Virtue the lodge of Love and the nest of Grace because the face amongst all the other corporal parts is the more noble where the minde by those senses that are in it exerciseth its effects and operatious Having discoursed thus much of beauty in general we will now descend to the particulars of beauty and demonstrate their force in causing Love For there is not any that loves but there is some particular part either in form or condition which pleaseth most and inflameth him above the rest And first of the Eyes which Scaliger cals Cupids arrowes the black round quick sparkling eye is the most fair amorous and enticing the speaking courting enchanting eye Hesiod cals those that have fair lovely eyes {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and Pindarus {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} by a Metaphor borrowed from the Greek word {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} signifying the young tender sprigs or branches of Vines for as these alwaies embrace the neighbouring bough twining about it with many various circles in like manner the eyes of a beautiful woman apply their beames and endevour to intangle the hearts of those that earnestly behold her The Poet Propertius cals the eyes the conductors and guides in Love Si nescis oculi sunt in amore duces It is the eyes that infect the spirits by the gazing upon an object and thence the spirits infect the bloud To this effect the Lady in Apuleius complained Thou art the cause of my grief thine eyes piercing through mine eyes into mine inward parts have set my bowels on fire therefore commiserate me that am now ready to die for thy sake The eye is the judge of beauty and is as it were the looking-glasse of the soul in which are described all the affections of the Soul as Love passion anger disdain c. The eye exceedingly lusteth after beauty and whilst it contemplateth the colours formes features comeliness grace laughter and whatsoever excellent quality appertaines unto beauty is deemed fittest to be the principal judge thereof the eye being an Organ by which a Lover doth best discern the perfection of all those principal parts which are required to the framing of a compleat beauty for we often times see by the bare report of virtue in any honorable breast love imperfectly but if report be once confirmed by an interview and the eye be made judge as well as the ear it gathereth strength and exceedingly encreaseth which proceedeth from no other cause then from the great force that the eye hath in the true judgement of sensible things besides the power thereof extending it self more then all the other senses to the multitude of objects and more speedily apprehending them Pardon me for stepping a little out of the way but I shall quickly be in again Secondly Faire hair as the Poets say are the prisons of Cupid that is the cause as I suppose that Ladies make Rings and Bracelets and love-locks to send to their Lovers And that 's the cause too for I must handle both sexes that Men curle and powder their hair and prune their pickativants making the East side correspond to the West Thirdly the Tongue is called by Scaliger the lightning of love But we wil take all the actions and gestures of the mouth together with it what a bewitching force hath a gratious laughter a pleasant and eloquent delivery a modest courting a Syrens song or any other comely carriage or manifestation of the minde a corral lip a comely order and set of two Ivory rails How great force and enticements lie in kissing Balthazer Castilio saith Jam pluribus oculis labra crepitabant animarum quoque mixturam facientes inter mutuos complexus animas anhelantes They breath out their souls and spirits together with their kisses changing hearts and spirits and mingle affections as they do kisses and it is rather a connexion of the minde then of the body What 's a kisse of that pure faire But Loves lure or Adonis snare Fourthly some are enamoured of an handsome tall and slender body some again are taken with one of a middle size and plump but many are captivated with a handsome leg and foot Fiftly their breasts and paps are called the tents of Love for which cause Women do so much discover them for Women saith Aristotle are Natures Errata continually studying temptations together with their naked necks shoulders and armes having all things necessary and in readiness that may either allure the minde to love or the heart to folly What is the meaning of their affected carriages those Garments so pompous those guizes so sought after those Colours so fantastick the Jewels and Pendants so sumptuous that painting so shameless those Curles and Patches their silk and Bow-die stockins with their coats tucked up that their neat leg and foot may be seen their lac'd shooes those curtesies salutations cringings and mincing gates but to cut the throat of Chastity and are springes to catch Wood-cocks A Ship is not so long a rigging as a yong Lady is in trimming her self against the coming of her Sweet-heart Eye but the dresses of Women which are now in use and thou shall not only see the carved vizard of a lewd Woman but the incarnate visage of a lascivious wanton not only the shadow of love but the substance of lust Sir Philip Sydney in his Arcadia saith that Apparel though it be many degrees better then the wearer is a great motive and provocation to love and nothing like unto it Which doth even Beauty beautifie And most bewitch a wretched eie And as another Poet saith Love-locks and clothes which speak All Countries and no Man He layes all that ever he hath upon his back making the Meridian of his Estate stoop to his shoulders judging that Women are captivated with and marryed to Bravery Add hereunto the painting practised by Harlots adulterated complexions well agreeing with adulterous conditions They especially use to paint their eyes understand their eye-browes and eye-lids with Stibium to make them look black conceited by them an extraordinary comeliness Hereupon was Solomons caution Neither let her take thee with her eye-lids as one of her principal nets to catch wantons
therewith When aged they use in vain to make themselves fair by renting their faces with painting though more cause to rent them with their nails out of penitent indignation Thus painting used to reconcile in time widens the breaches in their faces and their flesh tainted at least with the poison thereof like rotten vessels spring the more leaks the more they are repaired And the truth is I would have such as these to joyn themselves with Souldiers for so both may fight under their colours Sixthly Pleasant and well composed looks glances smiles counter-smiles plausible gestures pleasant carriage and behaviour affable complements a comely gate and pace daliances playes revels maskes dancing time place opportunity conference and importunity are materials of which Loves torch is made also no stronger engins then to hear and read of Love toyes fables and discourses so that many by this means become distracted for these exercises do as well open the pores of the heart as the body And truly such heart-traps are laid by cunning beauties in such pretty ambuscadoes that he must be a crafty Fox that can escape them for there is still some peculiar grace in a Woman as of beauty good discourse wit eloquence or honesty which is the primum mobile or first mover and a most forcible loadstone to attract the favours and good will of Mens eyes eares and affections unto them It is a plain ornament becomes a Virgin or virtuous Woman and they get more credit in a wise mans eye and judgement by their plainness and are more comely and fair then they that are set out with their patches bables puffed up and adorned like Jayes in Peacocks feathers Ladies let the example of Lucretia be set before you who stamped a deeper impression of affection in the heart of the virtuous beholder by addressing herself to houswifery and purple spinning then others could ever do with their rare banquets and riotous spending All are not of Aegisthus minde who was taken with a complement of lightness This argued that a youthful heat had rather surprised his amorous heart then any discreet affection preferred him to his choise This love is fading for where virtue is not directrice in our choise our mindes are ever prone to change we finde not what we expected nor digest well what we formerly affected all is out of square because discretion contrived not the building It is a decent and comely habit best becomes Ladies to be wooed in and contents discreet Suitors most to have them won in Conforme then your generous dispositions to a decency of fashion that you may attract to your selves and beget in others motives of affection whose private virtues render you to the imitation and publick to the admiration of all Seventhly a tender and hot heart lucid spirits vegetous and subtle bloud are causes of amorous fires a small beauty makes a great impression in them Eightly Obsequious love-letters to insinuate themselves into their Mistresses favour are great incitements they are the life of Love The pen can furrow a fond females heart And pierce it more then Cupids faigned dart Letters a kinde of Magick virtue have And like strong Philters humane souls inslave Ninthly Words much corrupt the disposition they set an edge or glosse on depraved liberty making that member the vent and spout of their passion and making the hearts of credulous Women melt with their ear-charming Oratory The tenth Love is caused very often by the ear as Achilles Tacitus saith Ea enim hominum intemperantium libido est ut etiam fama ad amandum impellantur audientes aequè afficiantur ac videntes such is that intemperance and passion of some Men that they are as much inamoured by report as if they see them Oft-times the species of Love are received into the fantasie as well by relation as by sight for we see by the eyes of our understanding No face yet seen but shafts that Love lets flie Kils in the ear as well as in the eie Also The pleader burns his books disdains the Law And fals in love with whom his eyes ne'r saw Lycidas declaring to Cleon his Love towards Astrea said Whether she was really fair or no I know not but so it was that so soon as ever I heard the report of her I loved her Some report saith he that Love proceeds from the eyes of the party loved but this cannot be for her eye never looked upon me nor did mine see her so much as to know her again For an illustrious name is a strange course To attract Love and good report hath force We purpose now to treat of Money causing Love That is the general humour of the world and in this Iron age of ours and in that commodity stears our affections the love of riches being most respected for now a Maid must buy her husband with a great dowry if she will have him making Love mercenary and 't is the fashion altogether in use to chuse Wives as Chapmen sell their wares with Quantum dabitis what is the most you will give Witty was that young Gentlewomans answer to an inconsiderate Suitor who having solicited the Father and bargained with him for the affection of his Daughter for so much and covenants of marriage concluded This undiscreet wooer unseasonably imparts his minde to the Daughter who made strange with it saying she never heard of any such matter yea but replyed he I have bargained with your Father and he hath already consented And you may marry him too quoth she for you must hold me excused Covetousness and filthy lucre mars many a good match or some such by-respect Veniunt a dote sagitâ—ae 't is money that makes the Mare to go 't is money and a good dowry lights Hymens torches They care not for beauty education honesty or birth if they hear that she is a rich heir or hath ready cash they are frantick doting upon such a one more then if she were natures master-piece in beauty If she be never so ugly and stinking 't is money makes her kisse sweetly Has she money that 's the first question O how they love her Is she mula auro onusta nay then run Dog run Bear they 'l venture hanging to compasse their desire Auri sacra fames quid non mortalia cogis Pectora What will not this desire of money compell a Man to attempt Is she as old as Saturn deformed vitious blear-eyed though they be like two powdering tubs either running over or full of standing brine and her browes hang ore her eyes like flie flaps though her nose be like a Hunters horn and so bending up that a Man may hang a hat upon it and her cheeks may serve boys for cherry-pits doth her teeth stand like an old park pale if she have any has she a tongue would make a deaf man blesse his imperfections that frees him from the plague of so much noise and such a breath heavens shield us as
out-vies the shambles for a sent Yet if she have cash Oh how amiable is she without doubt she hath no lesse then twenty Suitors never rack she 's good enough Est natura hominum to love those that are fortunate and rich that thrive let them get it as they will by hook or crook all 's one so they have it De moribus ultima fiet qnestio to enquire of her conditions and Education is the last interrogatory But let me assure you these being joyned together the seene is altered on a suddain their love is converted into hate their mirth into melancholy having only fixed their affections upon this object of commodity the desire of which in excesse is meer covetousnesse and on the otherside their hate is furiously bent upon the Woman she becomes an abject and an odious object unto them Now to turn the current of our discourse to the other sex for this desire of lucre is not adherent to men only but that there are some of the female train of the same temper Let the Man be what he will let him be cast in Esops mould with his back like a Lute and his face like Thersites his eyes broad and tawny his lips of the largest size in folio able to furnish a Coblers shop with clouting-leather if he have but a golden hand Midas's touch or loadened with golden pockets immediately they salute him with an easement Ego te hoc fasce levabo and it is reason you should do it replies the Woodcock yielding up the souls of his pockets for the hopes of a smile embrace or a kisse And having emptied them stuffe them up again with frowning looks and serve him like a sheep in June turned forth for a bare neck'd Ewe to seek a ruffe for the piece next below his coxcombe Money hath a significant voice semper ad placitum always pleasing always grateful He that will learn to win by smooth perswasion Must practise much the Topick cal'd Donation Strowing the path by which he means to passe With the sweet flowers of yellow-fac'd Midas So shall he finde all easie to his will Come in at 's pleasure and be welcome still But the truly handsome compleat and meritorious that cannot shew the face of a Jacobus that hath not pocket Angels for his gardians shall live at a distance from gratia dei the grace of her good liking he shall passe by for vas vacuum and be embarked in the ship of Scorn to be conpucted to the haven of heavinesse and thrust upon the shore as an exile of never return again Yet I would rather wish Ladies to let the picture of Love be the emblem of their hearts and not these inferiour pictures which we call money which are so far from satisfying the affection as they are only for the Mold or Worldling whose grosser thoughts never yet aspired to the knowledge of Loves definition Also it shewes a servile nature to cashire a faithfull Lover because he is poor and to prefer another lesse desertfull because he is rich We will now declare what the Poets say is the cause of Love They say that when Jupiter first formed Man and all souls he touched every one with severall pieces of Loadstone and afterwards put all the pieces in a place by themselves likewise the souls of Women after he had touched them he put them in a Magazine by themselves afterwards when he had sent the souls into bodies he brought those of the Women to the place where the Load-stones were which touched the Men and made every one to take one piece if there were any theevish souls they took several pieces and hid them Now when that Man meets with that Woman that hath the piece which touched his soul it is impossible but he must love her the Loadstone which she hath doth attract his soul And from hence doth proceed the several effects of Love for those who are loved of many are those theevish souls who took many pieces of the Loadstone if any do love one who loves not him aagain that was one who took his Loadstone but he not hers And from hence say they comes it to passe that we do often see some persons love others who in our eyes are nothing amiable Also from hence proceed those strange loves which sometimes fals out as that a Gaul brought up amongst many beauties fals in love with a barbarous stanger Fonseca holds and I am of the same minde there is something in a Woman beyond all humane delight a magnetick virtue a charming quality and a powerful motive To illustrate this There is a story recorded in the Lives of the Fathers of a Childe whose Education was in a Desert from his infancy by an old Hermite being come to mans estate he accidentally spied two comely Women wandering in the Woods he enquired of the Hermite having never seen such before in his life what creatures they were the Hermite told him that they were Fairies after some tract of time being in discourse the Hermite demanded of him which was the pleasantest and most delectable sight that ever he saw in his life He readily replyed without any pause or further consideration the two Fairies he espied in the Desert So that indubitably there is in a fair and beautiful Woman a magnetick power and a natural imbred affection which moves our concupiscence And this surely proceeds from the particular institutes of nature and the perfections a Man imagins in another creature of his likeness which he thinks may become another self for with the distinction of sexes which nature hath bestowed on man as well as irrationall creatures she hath put certaine impressions in the brain as in this young man which makes a Man at a certain age and at a certain season to look on himself as defective and as if he were but the half of an whole whereof a person of the other sex ought to be the other half so that the acquisition of this half is represented to us confusedly by nature as the greatest of all imaginable goods and although he see many persons of the other sex he doth not therefore desire many at the same time by reason Nature makes him conceive that he hath need of no more but one half but when he observes some thing in any one that likes him better then any thing he hath marked at the same time in the rest that fixes the soul to feel all the inclination which nature hath given him to seek after that good that she represents to him as the greatest he can possibly possesse on that Woman only and this is it which furnisheth the Romancers and Poets with stuffe To conclude this Chapter It may be that some will expect that I should prescribe some things to cause love as to teach them how to temper and spice an amatorious cup and what time may be elected for the administring of it or how Love may be caused by natural Magick but not knowing into
the whole Universe too narrow a compasse to be confined unto and who disposeth of all our wils according to his pleasure be hem'd up in such strait limits as you prescribe will Love be ruled and governed by the will of any but himself he will confesse his fault yet will not insist upon any other argument or reason but his extreme affection and will not argue with you anywhere but before the throne of Love and there he will prostrate himself upon his knees and vow by all eternity ndver to rise so long as he lives unlesse he be ingratiated into his Mistresses favour And such a one is this who sues for an office in fools Paradise but let him take it for my part I le never ride like one for the County-Clerk ship when a new Sheriff is elected nor strive with him for it What saith he would you have me inconstant Oh no not for a world What would you have me mad as he is no better No I will be constant till death startling more at the word inconstancy then at a Devil so that I have often smiled at those who condemn inconstancy and are professed enemies against it considering that they themselves are not able to be as they say nor more constant then those whom they brand with the vice of inconstancy For when they fall in Love do they not fall in love with beauty or something which seems pleasing unto them now when this beauty doth fade as time doubtlesse will make all beauty do are they not then inconstant still loving those faces that are now grown ugly and retain nothing of what they were but only the very name of a face If to love that which is contrary to that which was loved be constancy and if uglinesse be contrary unto beauty then he that did love a fair face and continues loving when it is ugly must be concluded inconstant This consideration makes me think that the way to avoid inconstancy is always to love beauty and when it fades farewel Love finde some other that is faire and still love beauty if you will be loving and accounted constant and not its contrary unlesse you be unconstant to your first Love I know this is point blanck against the opinion of the vulgar but if they gainsay it I cannot help it Likewise saith this Love-simplician did you know what it is to be a fool in such occasions you would confesse that all the wisdom in the world is not comparable to this pleasing folly were you able to comprehend it you would never aske what pleasure and contentment those faithful Lovers whom you phrase melancholy and pensive do receive for you then would know that they are so ravished in the contemplation of the party whom they love and adore as scorning all that is in the whole Universe they do not repent of any thing more then the losse of that time which they spend anywhere else and their souls not being well able to contain the grandure of their contentment they stand astonished at so much treasure and so many felicities which transcends their knowledge But I am so far from thinking them felicities as my opinion of the contrary is much fortified Had I a quill pluck'd from Cupids wing and dip'd in the milke of Venus I could not record all the delight Lovers take in displaying the beauty of their Mistresses with obsequious Hyperboles and things most excellent comparing their eyes to those of night to the Sun and call them spheres of light flaming and strongly enkindling all others they compare her to Aurora or the morning to the Snow Lilly Rose to the whitenesse of the Swan sometimes to the Myrtle sometimes to Gold Rubies Diamonds Crystal sometimes they parallel her with the Heavens the Spring and whatsoever is in any degree excellent and yet they think those but beggerly similitudes and would go higher if they could tell how They suppose their cheek two fair gardens planted with the choisest flowers of Paradise making the Lilly and the Rose as obscure types and shadowes of those delicate tinctures laid on their blooming cheeks by natures pencil They imagine their necks towers of Alabaster their breasts hillocks of snow inlaid with saphires their mouthes musicks temple deckt with rails of pearl their voices the Harmony of the sphears And these they count as faint Metaphors of them to represent whom in their thoughts words are too narrow and freshest colours too dim Oh! how She-lovers fry under the torrid zone of Love hourly in that Elizium quenching and renewing their heats and letting themselves loose to the freedome of uncontrouled embraces Expressing themselves in these or such like Raptures viz. My Dearest unlesse thou be'st frosty spirited unlesse Alecto's cold poison fils thy veins I le melt thee into amorous thoughts and speak charmes to all thy senses and make thee all flame And thus they besiege and seek to storme Loves-fort with whole volly of obediential Oathes and the hollow Granado's of complement crying out to their obstinate Sweet-hearts to tell them for Loves sake if it be not better and more lovely to lie intwin'd in their folding armes freely enjoying their embraces like Lillies imprisoned in goales of snow or Ivory in bands of Alabaster then to sit muffled in furs like a bed-rid Miser They lie open to the touch the warm snow and soft polisht Ivory of their brests which excels in softnesse the ranging clouds the Indian cotton and in sleeknesse the smoothest cut Diamond and these are lures to catch buzzards Thus wounds they give and wounds they take again Nor doth it grieve them slaying to be slain Now to return again to our Loves weather-beaten widgeon he hugs and embraces all his Mistresses friends and followers her picture and what ever she wears he adores as a relique her Dog he makes his constant companion feeding him at his table verifying the proverb Love me love my Dog If he get a Ring a Ribband a shooe-tie her Garter a Bracelet of hair of hers he wears it ut pignus amoris for a favour about his arme in his hat finger or next his heart How many of such like would not let to hazzard their very souls for their Mistresses sake forsake heaven with Venus for the love of an Adonis There is no Man so pusillanimous so very a dastard whom Love would not incense making an heroical spirit For saith Sir Phil. Sydney they imagine that Valour towards Men is an emblem of ability towards Women a good quality signifying a better Nothing drawes a Woman like to it Nothing is more behooveful for that sex for with it they receive protection and in a free way too without any danger Nothing makes a shorter cut to obtaining for a Man of armes is always void of ceremony which is the wall betwixt Pyramus and Thisbe that is Man and Woman for there is no pride in Women but that which rebounds from our own basenesse as Cowards grow valiant upon those that are
more Cowards so that only by our pale asking we teach them to deny and by our shamefacednesse we put them in minde to be modest This kinde of bashfulnesse is far from Men of valorous dispositions and especially from Soudiers for such are ever Men without doubt forward and confident losing no time lest they should lose opportunity which is the best factor for a Lover And because they know Women are given to dissemble they will never believe them when they deny They will defend their Mistresses even in a wrong and unjust cause for from the first moment that they fastened their affections upon that object they prize it above their own proper essence and therefore how justly soever an injury or violence may be offered unto it they think no injustice in themselves to defend it or because winking at the wrong offered their Sweet hearts they make themselves unwortby of their grace Plato is of opinion that it was the Love of Venus made Mars couragious and valorous and truly who would not be valorous to fight under such colours Before this cowardly age there was no way known to win a Lady but by tilting and turning and riding to seek adventures through dangerous Forrests in which time these slender small bon'd striplings with little legs were held but of strength enough to marry their widowes And even in our days there can be given no reason of the inundation of Servingmen upon their Mistresses but only that usually they carry their Masters weapons and their valour It is better to be admitted to the title of valiant acts at least that imports the venturing of mortality and all Women delight to hold him fast in their armes who hath escaped thither through many dangers To speak at once Man hath a priviledge in valour In clothes and good face we do but imitate Women So then these whiffling skips these Women in Mens apparel are too neer a Woman to be beloved of her A scar in a Mans face is the same that a mole is in a Womans and a mole in a Womans face is a jewell set in white to make it seem more white so a scar in a Man is a mark of honour and no blemish for 't is a scar and a blemish in a Souldier to be without one A good face availeth nothing if it be on a Coward that is bashful the utmost of it is to be kist which rather increaseth then quencheth the appetite She cares not for a Man that wooes by Letters and through cowardlynesse dares not come into her company no Woman takes advice of any in her loving but of her own eyes and her waiting maids and there is no clothes fits so well in a Womans eye as a suit of steel though not of the fashion and no Man so soon surprizeth a Womans affections as he that is the subject of whisperings and hath alwayes some twenty stories of his own atchievements depending upon him There is one Love-simplician who is so led by the nose into fools Paradise that if he see an handsome maid smile and laugh upon him or shew a pleasant countenance or look obliquis ocellis asquint upon him or use some gratious words or amorous gestures as many are too full of he applies it all to himself as done in his favour thinking that surely she loves him to the Tavern he runs looks big erects his Mouchatoes stampes stares and cals the Drawer Rogue drinks to his Venus in a Venice-glace and thinks he sees the smile she gave him in it and to moralize her sex throwes it over his head and breaks it This fellow is like to Mullidor in Greenes never too late who said to his Mother that he compared the Church to a looking-glasse for as a Man may see himself in the one so in the other the wenches eyes are a Certificate for upon whom you see all the Girles look he for foot and face carries away the bell Phillida solus habet And I am sure sayes he for these two years I never came into the Church and was no sooner set but the Maids began to winke one upon another to look on me and laugh Oh! war Mother when a Dog wags his tail he loves his Master and when a wanton laughes for my life she is over head and ears in Love Another Gull seeks to win his Mistresses affection with gallant and costly apparell putting all he hath on his back thinking Women are marryed to fine clothes making his Taylor his Baude and hopes to inveagle her love with such a coloured suit surely the same Man hazzards the losse of her favour upon every change of his clothes Another with an affected pace Another with Musick Another with rich gifts and pleasant discourse Another with Letters Vowes and Promises to be gratious in her eyes struts like a Peacock with his train before her But there are many other who every moment declare their fervour their torment and martyrdom they serve they sooth they continually frequent they spie out all occasions they silently practise all the ways they can to come to the end of their designs and often it happeneth that as drops of water incessantly falling do hollow Rocks so ceaselesse Complements soften the most inaccessible rigors Yet some are so sottishly overcome as to waste ten years of service to kisse a Womans hand and suffer for a shameful servitude that which I professe I would not endure one year for an Empire Fond Novices you pule and continually strive to please your Mistresses which is the only way to make her flie you nothing so tiring and tedious such as thus love must needs perpetually be imprisoned never at liberty always present continually talking with her she cannot stir a foot but you must do the like If she chance to be at any time ill or frown and do not smile upon you nor please you then must you forsooth put the finger in the eye and cry cry tears Do you think this is the way no no it is in Love as in all things else the mean is the best measure so as to avoid all frivolous follies and troubles as they are no other when you have made the best of them the only way is but to love indifferently and if you will be silly fools and must needs have Mistresses your best way is never to tie your self to one for to love one only gives her an occasion to think that it is for want of courage that you dare not attempt to love any else and therefore she will scorn such a fainthearted Lover whereas did you Love all you look upon or at least a good many of them she will not think you came to her because you know not whither to go else but she will then prize you the higher and will be obliged to love you especially if you particularize her above any other and once a week is often enough to tender your service to her for oftener is a palpable doting But because
they have scarce a tooth in their heads As one reports who loved a Widow of 50 years of age she swore she was but 32 the next December and 't is a thing more familiar with stale Batchelours but Venus haec perjuria ridet Venus laughes at these perjuries They will artificially discourse of their former Husbands saying they have no memory of life unlesse it be to think of and to live in him thinking thereby to engage their Lovers the more and to let them see how much they doe deserve to be beloved in shewing them how capable they are of Love and how much they can cherrish the affections of a living Man since they so long retain those of dead ones imitating such Decoyes as to gain another Mans money doe willingly deposite some of their own O heavens saith she relating her Love to her former Husband how doe I resent his losse and have ever since preserv'd so lively a memory of him in my soul for I did love him with most perfect affection that me thinks I see him every hour before mine eyes and me thinks I hear him every minute bid me love him still making a dead Man a ground bait to draw Suitors on delighteth in the multitude of them for by them she gaines one serves to draw on another and with one at last she shoots out another as boyes do pellets in Elder-guns She has a trick to commend to them a single life just as Horse-coursers do their Jades to put them away While she is a Widow observe her she is no morning Woman the evening and a good fire may make her listen to a Husband but if ever she be made sure 't is upon a full stomach to bedward They all of them are full of suspicion of their Lovers extremely jealous lest they be deceived by young wenches exceeding hard to be won and very easily lost quickly offended but abominably hard to be pleased Really I admire at those Men who take delight to Court Widowes What a fantasticall stomach must he needs have that cannot eat of a dish of meat till another have cut of it Who would wash after another when he might have fresh water enough for asking or what a pitiful thing is it for a Man that is about to go a long journey to be tyed to Ride on a Beast that is half tyred to his hand Men will say he is benighted and is now glad of any Inne Therefore I wish you never to marry any Advowson that has had other Incumbents for he that takes her has but a Reversion in taile and if she prove good he may thank Death for his aime if evill upbraid him and not unjustly for his occasion But hold a Church-man she dares not venture upon for she hath heard Widowes complain of dilapidations Never with the Philosopher drink of that Fountain another hath dyed in Wherefore it is a resolution of the Spaniard of what mean quality soever he be he will not marry a Widow although she be very young and wealthy and it hath been a resolution of theirs from antiquity and continueth to this day and to this effect one of them made this answer I will no Widow wed my reason's sound I 'le drink no water wherein one was drown'd He that takes her halfe worne makes account she hath that will pay for new dressing she seems to promise security in her peace yet invites many times to a troublesome estate when the conquest atchieved scarce countervails the Wars the principall of her love is perished with the use But indeed rich Widowes were ordained for younger brothers for they being born to no Lands must plough in another Mans soil But I expect no thanks from them for this having trespassed a little too much upon their patience Wherefore I will proceed on to the next Chapter and discover to you the Signes of Love The Signes of Love HAving entered thus far within this melancholy Devils territories It is our purpose to set before thee Courteous Reader in this Section as in a glasse a clear representation and image of a Love-sick soul and an account of those various gestures and actions Lovers have as few Books of this nature do so copiously demonstrate Love though it be never so close and kept private may be discovered if prudence and artifice be used Yet I wish every one who deposites his judgement in the discovering of an enamorato not rashly to give credit to one testimony of contingent signes but joyn many and consider them together for the perfection of your judgement therefore Aristotle adviseth Vni signo non fidendum sed pluribus inter se collatis And first how it may be discovered by Physiognomie We commonly call Physiognomie the science whereby Men judge of the nature complexion and manners of every one by the contemplation of all the members of the body and chiefly of the face and countenance but there is no Physiognomie so certain as that we are about to touch whereby Men may be easily convinced of that which they think to hide in their hearts which notwithstanding is quickly discovered in their countenances as if we read it in a Book according to Ovid Heu quam difficile est crimen non prodere vultu How hard is it a fault with face not to bewray And to the same effect the Wise man saith Ecclus. 13. 26. Cor hominis immutat faciem sive in bono sive in malo The heat of Man changeth his countenance whether in good or evill for in anger and fear we see Men either extreme pale or high coloured in melancholy and sadnesse the eyes are heavie in joy and pleasure the motions of the eyes are lively and pleasant according to the Diverb Cor gaudens exhilarat animum A rejoycing heart maketh merry the face And it is a received opinion that Vultus est index animi the countenance is the discoverer of the minde So that one affirmes that those that are in Love semper conniventes have a continuall motion or winking with their eye-lids Tears are signums of this passion which may be observed by the Poets so often representing unto us Lovers weeping and lamenting because Love is delighted in tears but this signe is not pathognomical nor very certain especially in Women who have the command of their tears and can unsluce the floudgates of their eye when they please But as this passion enters first into the internall parts by the eyes so they send forth the first assured and undoubted tokens of the same for there is no passion but some particular gesture of the eyes declare it So soon as ever the malady hath seized upon the patient it causeth a certain kinde of modest cast of the eyes but if it begin to get strength upon the party then the eyes begin to grow hollow and dry and you may observe them to stand as if they were in some deep contemplation or else were fixed in beholding something that much delights
their intimatest friends making their eyes strangers to their hearts and conclude nothing more foolish then love if discovered and nothing more wise if artificially shadowed Some Artists will undertake to judge who are in Love by Chiromancy by the lines of the hand For say they If a little crosse be upon the line of life in the hand neer the angle it portends maladies of Love Also if the table line joyn it self with the middle naturall line so as both do make an angle this doth demonstrate one to be variously troubled with Love rendring the parties life very displeasing It seems to some how true it is I know not to be possible for a man to know whether one be in Love or no by their natural and animal dreams if the party will but relate them at his awaking for the fancy in sleep is most taken up with those things that the minde hath been busied with in the day according to that in the Poet Judicibus lites aurigae somnia currus Vanaque nocturnis meta cavatur Equis Gaudet amans furto c. The Lawyer pleads in 's sleep the careful swains Manage their pransing coursers o're the plains Lovers dream of their stoln delights c. And indeed dreams do sometimes so far ingage them as they cannot dissemble nor deny them They say that those Lovers who are very melancholy through the extremity of this passion are accustomed to horrible and fearful dreams by reason of the melancholy vapors that ascend up into the brain And because this affection of all others doth most disturbe and afflict the spirits and from that disturbance and purturbation these monstrous and horrible dreams do arise so that many times by reason of their little sleep they bewray a strange kinde of horror and astonishment in their countenances Also to dream of travelling through Woods sticking in Bushes and Bryers doth signifie much trouble and crosses in love To dream of Angling and Fishing signifies a difficulty and the party despaires of obtaining the party beloved But to dream of Banquets and Feasts doth signifie the hopes of the party loving and that his proceeding in love shall be prosperous To dream of winds stormes and showers of rain doth signifie Love passion To dream of riding on a tired Horse or drawing water out of a Well or climbing upon a steep hill is a sign of a vebement Love passion To dream of seeing ones Mistresse in a glasse is an infallible token of Love and that there shall be reciprocall affection between the parties To dream of being a Husbandman or Plowman to sow plant or dig is a signe of being in Love But Sanguine-complexioned Lovers use to dream of pleasant and delectable things as fair Gardens Orchards flowers green meadowes bedeck't with the pride of Flora pleasant Rivers dreaming that they sit culling and playing with their Sweet-hearts upon their pleasant bancks often thinking they see many little Cupids flying in the aire and all delightful dreams they say proceed from an amorous and love pierc't soul As to dream of singing or playing on any instrument doth signifie that Love hath seiz'd upon the party For if dreams and wishes had been all true there had not been since Popery one Maide to make a Nun of But whether dreams are onely the working of the fancy and imagination upon such things as have been seen and thought upon or presages of things future it is not our present purpose to determine We will now see what we can discover in a Love-sick minde by the sublime science of Astrology maugre all its Antagonists First diligently inquire whether the party hath had any crosses or troubles which might cause a dejection of the soul in him and whether they do not suspect the party to be in Love these being considered then you may safely go on to judgement Saturn generally signifies melancholy and by consequence alienation of the minde madnesse c. and therefore always when you finde him to be significator of the malady or in the ascendant or in the sixth house the sick is afflicted with care and grief and be sure the Love-sick minde suffers for it Also if Venus be author of the disease and she Lady of the ascendant sixth or twelfth houses the distemper comes from Love or something else of this nature is the cause If the ☉ or ☽ or Lord of the ascendant or two of them at the least be afflicted the disease is in the spirits together with an indisposition of the minde the reason whereof is because the Lord of the ascendant and dispositor of the ☽ are properly the significators of the animall faculties which do cause infirmities in Man or which may chance unto him a deprivation of sense madnesse or frenzie through Love melancholy Venus significatrix and afflicted argues a great desire to Women wherewith both body and minde are disturbed Wheresoever you finde Mercury afflicted and significator shewes doting fancies If the Planet who rules the sign wherein the Lord of the ascendant is and he who is dispositor of the ☽ be infortunate and in their fall detriment or otherwayes very much afflicted the disease reignes and rageth in the minde At what Age we begin to be in Love What Complexions do best sympathize What Complexions are most subject to this Malady and at what time more then another IT is most certain that there is nothing more impatient of delay then Love nor no wound more incureable whilest we live There is no exemption no age no condition are more ignorant of it then of their bread all have a taste of this potion though it have several degrees of operation and at several seasons Look all about you who so young that loves not Or who so old a comely feature moves not But the most received opinion is that Men and Women are subject to this passion as soon as they are entered into those years in which they come to their puberty which appeareth in Men chiefly by their voice which at that time growes great and harsh it may be known also in Women by observing their breasts which about this time begin to swell and grow bigger and that for the most part about the age of 12 and 14 so likewise it is the justice of nature that those creatures that soonest meet their period do as suddenly arrive at their perfection and maturity as we may observe in Women who as they are ripe sooner then Men so they commonly fail before them Some there are that would deprive men of this power or Love to have any power over them so long as they are under the age of twenty years for Homer saith Love pricks not till such time as the chin begins to bud which is altogether repugnant to truth and dayly examples for we see many to rage furiously before they come to years of discretion especially Women Quartilia in Petronius never remembered that she was a Maide Rahab the Harlot began to be a profest Quean
expell such cogitations with pious meditations I could advise Maides as the only remedy for this passion to walk early into the fields and keep themselves continually both head and hand in motion in some good exercise and not alwayes pricking a clout for many times their thought being gone a wool-gathering with Cupid they chance to prick their fingers and Cupid their hearts too if they be not aware This sedentary life is the cause of the disease called the Greensicknesse and it having seized upon their sloath affecting bodies makes them laizie and as quick as Snails in all their operations and then it is more difficult to make them marry then cure the disease St. Cyptian found nothing more powerfull to conquer the temptations of Venus then to turn the otherside of the medall But above all it behoveth us to use the example of an Arabian who presented to himself perpetually over his head an eye which enlightened him an ear which heard him a hand which measured out all his deportments and demeanors and guards of chastity which daily blunt a thousand arrowes shot against the impenetrable hearts of brave and undaunted champions that you may not fall into the fire it is good to avoid the smoke not to trust our selves too much to petty dalliances which under pretext of innocency steal in with the more liberty for to court and dally with beauty as we shall hereafter declare is an enterprise of danger for some I have known who upon their accesse to beauty have been free men but at their return have become slaves We now intend to extinguish the heat and vehemency of Love in the fourth cause which is meer beauty and the particulars of it Be not so sensual as to love only the body and to dote upon an outside but look higher and see something in the person loved of an Angelical nature that is a free and vertuous minde which to an understanding soul appears to be of a divine essence and to which he mingles his soul in love which is if really considered a far more excellent and permament love then that of an externall and fading beauty and consequently much more pleasant Do we not commonly see that in painted pots of Apothecaries are contained the deadliest poyson that the Cypresse tree bears a fair leaf but no fruit That the Estrich carryeth fair feathers but rank flesh How frantick then are those Lovers who are hurried headlong with the gay glistering of a fine face the beauty whereof is parched with the Suns blaze and chapped with a Winters blast which is of so short continuance that it fadeth before we see it flourish of so small profit that it poysoneth those that possesse it of so little value with the wise that they account it a delicate bait with a mortall hook a sweet Panther with a devowring panch a tart poyson in a silver pot But hark one word with you Love Symplicians Let your humane imaginations think and assemble into one subject whatsoever is most beautiful and delicious in nature Do you imagine a Quire of Sirens and do you joyne in consort both the harpe of Orpheus and the voice of Amphion Let Apollo and the Muses be there to bear a part and do you search within the power of nature rifle up her treasure and all the extreme pleasures which it hath produced in the world hitherto to charme our souls and to ravish our spirits what permanency and felicity do you finde in all these They are meer Chimeraes and as a vain Idea a meer shadow of a body of pleasure in comparison of vertues and those divine thoughts and pleasures which may be enjoyed in the contemplation of the Almighty and his infinite beauty glory and love and of the felicity of felicities which he hath prepared for them that love him So that happy are those but too few are they who with wise Ithacus hudwink themselves and stop their eares to those soul-tainting and sin-tempting Sirens What a great example of continency and neglect of beauty was that of Mahomet the great towards the fair Greek Irene whom albeit he entirely loved yet to shew to his Peers a princely command of himself and his affections as he had incensed them before by loving her so he regained their love by slighting her whence the Poet With that he drew his Turkish Cymeter Which he did brandish o're the Damsels head Demanding of such Janizers were there If 't were not pity she sh'd be slaughtered Pity indeed but I perforce must do That which displeaseth me to pleasure you Many such instances ancient and modern Histories afford but I must not insist on each particular lest I should enlarge my self too much and swell that into a volume which I intend but a Pamphlet How many do we finde who having their spirits possessed with other passions one of Ambition another of Avarice another of Revenge another of Envie another transported by the solitude of a Law suite and the turmoile of a family who think very little upon Love how many others are there from whom study affaires charges wherein they strive supereminently to transcend free their mindes from all other thoughts not suffering them to have any complements with Cupid And how many Ladies do we see in the World with countenances ever smiling of humours cheerfull and conversation most pleasing who make love to wits and spirits as Bees to flowers but have with the body no commerce at all The Author of the Theater of Nature holdeth that the Basilisk alone among Serpents cannot be enchanted and I dare really affirm that there are Men who have the like priviledge and have their eyes love proof and their hearts shut up and defended as with a palizado against the piercing darts of Cupid and the fiery assaults of the Idalian flame Democritus made himself blinde voluntarily by stedfastly beholding the Sunbeams to free himself from the charming beauties and inticing opportunities of Women And seriously I think he shut up two gates against Love to open a thousand to his imagination For some affirm that this malady or Love melancholy is cherished by the presence of the party affected and that the contrary to wit absence is the best remedy And this they seem to prove by resembling our passions with Ecchoes but omne simile non est idem every like is not the same thing For say they do you not see the Ecchoes the further you go from them the lesse repercussion there is they diminishing and losing themselves in the aire so the affection which is caused by the reflexion of the countenance which you dayly behold with so much entertainment will quickly vanish by a little absence But may I be so bold as to whisper my opinion in your ear craving leave to insist a little upon this To prove that absence doth more augment then decrease the heat of this passion I will be brief I confesse eyes may conceive and produce a green infant affection but
there must be something more solid and substantial to make it grow unto perfection and that must be by the knowledge of the vertues merits as well as beauty and a reciprocall affection of the party loved Now this knowledge doth take indeed its originall from the eyes but it must be the soul which must afterwards bring it to the test of judgement and by the testimonies both of the eyes and ears and all other considerations concoct a verity and so ground upon it If this verity be to our advantage then it produceth such thoughts whose sweetnesse cannot be equalled by any other kind of contentment then the effects of the same thoughts If it be advantagious to the party affected then doubtlesse it doth augment our affection but yet with violence and inquietude and therefore no question but absence doth augment love so that it be not so long as that the very image of the party loved be quite effaced whether it be that an absent Lover never represents unto his fancy but only the perfections of the person loved or whether it be that the understanding being already wounded will not fancy any thing but what pleaseth it or whether it be that the very thought of such things does add much unto the perfections of the party loved yet this is infallibly true that he does not truly love whose affection does not augment in absence from the party loved For in absence nothing can content the reall Lover not sweet harmony not beautiful Gardens or Groves not pleasant Company not eloquent tongues not civill entertainment but every sweetnesse is converted into sowrenesse all ear-pleasing harmony is turned into an obstreperous jangling and nothing can content but the wished object which being far distant from their enflamed desires do ingender a vehement grief in the heart which cannot be expressed by them that prove it much lesse by my pen which is not acquainted with such miseries Now it is objected That absence is the greatest and most potent and dangerous enemy that Love hath But with their favour presence without comparison is much more as we may dayly see by experience for you may see a thousand loves change in presence for one in absence for in presence some imperfections may be found which may cause a detestation which absence could never do and to illustrate and confirm this by example The excellent Philosopher Raymund Lullius was passionately enamoured of a Lady wise prudent and honest she purposely to cure his frenzie shewed him one of her breasts eaten and knawed through with a Canker and extremely hideous to behold Stay simple Man said she behold what you loved he at that instant coming to himself uttered Alas was it for this I lost so many good houres that I burned became entranced that I passed through fire and water All Lovers would say the like if the scarffe were taken from their eyes Consider that if one absent cease from loving which is very rare its cessation is without any violence or noise of strugling and the change through a long tract of time is only because the memory is by degrees smothered with oblivion as a fire is with its own ashes But when Love breaks off in presence it is never without a noise and extreme violence and which is a strange argument to prove my assertion converts that love into a greater hatred then if love had never been which proceeds from this reason a Lover is always either loved or hated or held in a degree of indifferency if he be loved as an abundance is apt to glut so love being loadened in presence with too many favours growes weary If he be hated then he meets with so many demonstrations of that hate every moment as at length he is forced to ease himself If he be in a degree of indifferency and findes his love still slighted he will at length if he be a Man of any courage make a retreat and resist the continual affronts which are put upon him whereas in absence all favours received cannot by their abundance glut since they do rather set an edge on desire And the knowledge of hatred entering into our souls only by the eare the blow smarts not so much as that which is received by sight and likewise disdain and slight be more tolerable in absence then presence doubtlesse absence is then more fit to preserve affection then presence for there is a vast difference betwixt the love that is nourished by the eyes and a love that is nourished by the understanding As much as the soul is superiour to the body so much is the understanding to be preferred before the eyes And absence is so far from diminishing love that it augments and begets fresh and violent desires to augment it and the contemplation of a beauty doth imprint it deeper in the fancy then any eye can Therefore you Love simplicians make a little resistance cast away those idle toyes that afflict you let not absence be so troublesome that you must torture your bodies vilifie your spirits and yeeld up your reputations as preyes to slander If you know what you desired you would be ashamed of your selves you would be amazed that so noble spirits should suffer themselves to be transported with such follies Represent to your selves that a thousand undanted courages have set themselves free at liberty and enjoyed tranquillity of spirit and you for want of a little resolution tumble and involve your selves faster and faster in these fetters Will any man in his wits be thus deluded can he be so silly as to consume himself in seeking such a toy Do you call this Love forsooth may it not rather be called madnesse and folly What languish in the lap of an ungratefull Mistresse fie fie it is an errour far unworthy of a man that pretends unto any wisdom or courage Put a stop to your passions and couragiously contend against them You shall no sooner have put the wedge of courage into the block but it shall be done you shall have your souls victoriously elevated over passion which shall rejoyce amidst the trophies thereof Never stay upon thoughts and imaginations of love but so soon as it presents it self chase it away and extinguish it in your hearts no otherwise then you should extinguish a hot Iron in a River If it be in presenim restrain your eyes for they are the windowes the allurements the snares and the conducts of Love It buddeth in the eyes that it may at leasure blossome in the heart therefore divert your sight from objects which dart a sting into the minde apt to receive and sensible of such penetrations Likewise lest it get entrance at the ear stop them against the inchanting melody of Sirens songs and charming musick of their tongues never open them to be auditors of any lascivious discourse But if you be already tainted with these charmes unloose your selves stoutly take your selves off dispute not any longer with your passions flie from it
wherein he sees me not His eye is ever fixed on me his sole discourse is to me These I must confesse are promising arguments of Love yet these may deceive you and consequently leave you in a miserable error He may prove a false-hearted Jason Demophoon or Theseus and leave you in the briers for all your confidence You say his vowes and protests have confirmed him yours and he hath attested heaven to bear record of his love But take heed he play not the part of the Ridiculous actor in Smyrna who pronouncing O heavens pointed with his finger to the ground Therefore I wish you ground your fancy with deliberation and do not affect before you finde ground of respect Entertain not a Rhetoricall Lover whose protests are formall complements and whose promises are gilded pils which cover much bitternesse Many men are flattering Gnatho's dissembling Chamelions meer outsides hypocrites that make a shew of great love but 't is no more then from the teeth outwards pretend honesty zeal modesty with affected looks and counterfeit gestures full of lip-love faigned vowes stealing away the hearts and favours of poor silly soules deceiving them Specie virtutis umbra when as in truth there is no worth of honesty at all in them no reality but meer hypocrisie subtilty and knavery Therefore Gentlewomen trials in affairs of this nature have ever a truer touch then protestations For I am confident there are some yea I really know many who make it their only study how to tip their glozing tongues with Rhetoricall phrases ear-charming Oratory vowes and protestations purposely to gull credulous creatures for the purchase of an unlawful pleasure which obtained they leave them to bewail their lost honour I exhort you to sift him narrowly to see what bran there is in him before you chuse him Taske him before you take him As thus Hath his fair carriage got him estimation where he lives Hath he never enured his tongue to play the hypocrite with his heart Hath he kept a fair quarter and been ever tender of his untainted honour Hath he never boasted of young Gentlewomens favors nor run descant on their kindnesse Hath he ever since he vowed himself your servant solely devoted himself yours and not mixt his affection with forain beauties If so then chuse him he well deserves your choise Be like the Juniper tree whose coal is the hottest and whose shadow is the coolest be hot in your affection but cool in your passion Set before your eyes the difference betwixt a wise and a wilde passion the one ever deliberates before it love and the other loves before it deliberate therefore let your fancy be grounded with deliberation If you be a Maid ever fear to become a Woman and cast not the garland of your Virginity under the feet of Hogs Give not a hair of your head to those who promise you golden mountains for such will deceive you and when they most desire you in the quest of marriage then is the time you must least be for marriage for all you grant to their importunities will be the subject of your disgrace and when they shall have marryed you though you should live as chast as Susanna they will be jealous and continually imagine you will be liberal to others of that whereof you were prodigal to them If you desire to marry by fancy rather pursuing your own wanton humors then the reasonable commands of those to whom you owe your being hold it as a crime the most capitall you can undertake and confidently believe if so you do you will open a floud-gate to a deluge of miseries and cares which will flow upon you thorow all the parts of your life Account the resolutions you make to this purpose as treasons and think whatsoever shall to you suggest the execution of them will poison you by the eare to murther your chastity But I fear Reader I have too much trespassed upon thy patience in insisting so long upon this branch And I know there are some Enamoratoes will account my precepts too difficult to be followed and set my perswasions at nought they will not desist from their melancholy thoughts not want the least Idea of their Lovers so much pleasure they take in it Therefore I will instruct their friends and see if they can withdraw their affection the which take as followeth The Arabians do advise us to take occasion to discourse of the party affected in the patients hearing and to enumerate all her imperfections and vices making-them more and more and far greater then they really are and to set out her perfections and virtues in the colours and shape of vices and to labour by probable arguments to prove unto him that that which he judgeth to be comely and handsome is in the judgment of those that are more quick sighted both ugly and deformed telling him that Cupid is blind and makes all enamoratoes so too Endevour with what possibility you can to convert his love either into hate of jealousie by preswading him that his Mistresse doth not love him so well as she makes him believe she doth and that all her entertainments favours kisses dalliances and embraces are only baits and enticements to keep him from slavery but if the party be of the other sex then may be pleaded the obsequiousnesse and dissembling of Man which is as frequently found in them as inconstancy in Women The Parthians to cause the youth to loath the alluring trains of Womens wiles and deceitful inticements had most exquisitely carved in their houses a young Man blinde besides whom was adjoyned a Woman so exquisite that in some mens judgement Pigmalions image was not half so excellent having one hand in his pocket as noting her theft and holding a knife in the other hand to cut his throat Injuries slanders contempts and disgraces are very forcible means to withdraw Mens affections for Lovers reviled or neglected contemned or abused turn love into hate Mr. Burton adviseth you to tell him she is a fool an ideot a slut and many time so nasty that one cannot touch her with a pair of tonges and that always against the time of his coming she tricks and trimmes her self up to allure him and will not be seen by him but in an inticing dresse that she is a scold a devill incarnate that she is come of a light heel'd kinde or that he or she hath some loathsome incurable disease that she is bald her breath stinks that he or she is mad and frenetick hereditarily to tell her that he is an hermophrodite an Eunuch imperfect impotent a spend-thrift a gamester a gull his Mother was a Witch his Father was hanged that he will surely beat her that he is a desperate fellow and will stab his bedfellow and that no body will lie with him If she be fair and wanton tell him she will make him a Cornuto and to sing an April song If she be virtuous that it is but a cloak for her
more secret vices a meer outside a whited Sepulchre If he be enamoured on a Widow that she will still hit him in the teeth with her first husband that she hath cast her rider and will endanger him too and that a wife and children are a perpetual bill of charges Endevour to divert the patients thoughts from his former Mistresse by making him fall in love with another upon whom when once his affection begins to take root make him hate that and fall in love with a third following this course with him still till at length he begins of his own accord to be weary of loving for I le assure you he that is in love with many Women at once will never run mad for any of them for the minde being thus disunited the desires are lesse violent so one love takes away the force of another Love is of the nature of a burning-glasse which kept still in one place fireth but changed often it doth nothing not so much as warm or a kinde of glowing cole which shifted from hand to hand a man easily endures A young man saith Lucian was pitifully in love he came to the Theater by chance and by seeing variety of objects there was fully recovered E theatro egressus hilaris ac si pharmacum oblivionis bibisset and went merrily home as if the had drunk a dram of oblivion A Mouse saith the Fabulist was brought up in a chest and there fed with fragments of Bread and Cheese thought there could be no better meat till at last coming to feed on other varieties loathed her former life just so it is with a silly Lover none so fair as his Mistresse at first he cares for none but her yet after a while when he hath compared her to others he abhors her name sight and memory If all this will do no good let us see what may be done by Physicall means Yet some there are who exclaim and cry with open throats against the Gods for ordaining for every malady a medicine for every sore a salve for every pain a plaister leaving only Love remedilesse and then exclaiming with the Inventer of Physick Apollo Hei mihi quod null is amor est medicalilis herbis Did you Oye Gods deem no man say they so mad as to be entangled with desire or thought you them worthy to be tormented that were so misled have ye dealt more favorably with brute beasts then with reasonable creatures No simple lovers you want not medicines to cure your maladies but reason to use the means Of Physicall means therefore we will treat as followeth First It is good to take away the superfluity of bloud if age and the strength of the patient will permit by opening the Liver vein I should have said Vena hepatica but I speak as well to those that do not understand Latine as them that do in the right arme let the quantity taken be according to the constitution and strength of the patient and if you see cause open the Saphaena or ankle vein for phlebotomie maketh those that are dejected merry appeaseth those that are angry and makes Lovers come to themselves and keep in their right mindes amantes ne sint amentes for saith one amantes amentes iisdem remediis curentur Lovers and madnen are cured by the self-same remedy affirming that Love extended is meer madnesse Aelian Montaltus saith Love makes the bloud hot thick and black being converted into black choler and melancholy and if the inflamation get into the brain with continual meditation it so dryes it up that a madnesse followes or they make away themselves as divers in that case have done Let him have change and variety of place for that doth awaken the spirits of melancholy Lovers let him not be without company and frequent conversation for many times that diverts the minde of a doting Lover and cheeres him up making him see his errour It is good for the Patient to be in a cold and moist aire and not to use in his diet such things as do heat the bloud and provoke lust Let him use to fast often and feed often on bread and water Sine Cerere Baccho frigâ—t Venus Love takes not up his lodging in an empty stomach but on the contrary Venus delights in dainties Let him use these simples in his broath and sallads Purslane Sorrell Endive Woodbine Ammi Succory And Lettice which is so soveraigne a remedy against this malady that Venus desiring to forget all her unchast desires buried her dear Adonis under a bed of Lettice Likewise the syrup or conserve of Red-roses or Province-roses the same virtue is attributed to Mints Let him also use to eat Grapes Mellons Cherries Plums Apples Pears Cowcumbers c. It is good to take sometimes Hempeseed Seed of water Lillies Hemlock Tuâ—san Camphire Cominseeds Coriander seeds Agnus Costus or the Chast tree not only the seeds of it used and taken in what manner soever doth restrain the instigation to venery which it doth by a specifick property seeing it is of the same teÌ„perature with Pepper which worketh contrary effects and therefore the Athenian Matrons in their Thesmophoria did use the leaves as sheets to lie on thereby to preserve their thoughts if it were possible from impurity Rue is an excellent remedy but of different operation in Men an Women One quality thereof commend I must It makes Men chast and Women fils with lust Let his Sauces with his meat be Vinegar Orenges or Verdejuyce Lemmons Sorrell Let him abstain from all Aromaticall things and all fryed or salt meats because that salt by reason of its heat and acrimony provokes to lust those that use to eat it in any great quantity Let him abstain from meats that are nutritive hot flatulent and melancholy as Soft Egges Partridges Pigeons Sparrows Testicles of creatures Quails Rabbets Hares Greengeese especially Let him not eat Pine nuts Pistachoes Small nuts Artechokes Turneps Greenginger Eringoes Mustard Coleworts Rapes Carrots Parsnips Chesnuts Pease Sweet Almonds Satyrion Onions Water nuts Rocket Cich-pease Beans Syrrups Electuaries Let him not lie upon a soft bed Also from all manner of Fish * c. And Oysters Prawnes Lobsters Crabs Muscles Cockles c. Let him exercise usque ad sudorem till he sweat again provided that the disease be not already grown to madnesse Often bathes are good Eye the heart and be sure what ever you do have a care to keep that on wheels for all melancholy vapors afflict that especially Therefore to fortifie that take Conserve of Roses Borrage flowers Buglosse flowers Rosemary flowers Marigold flowers Saffron Green walnuts preserved Juniper berries Bettony Citron pils candied c. Thebane Crates saith there is no other remedy for Love then Time and that must wear it out if time will not the last refuge saith he is an halter And that 's a speedy and sure remedy very quick of operation But when all fails apply that Cordiall salve to
your corroding sore made by loves wounding weapon that excellent remedy that soveraign balme that universal medicine which if seasonably administred will give you comfort when you are most distempered The Recipe is Divine Contemplation for certainly those spirits which are truly raised to the study and knowledge of divine things and do well know the art of celestiall contemplation are elevated above all terrestrial pleasures in as much as eternity is above time and infinite felicities above vanities And not finding any thing on earth worthy our desire and to fix our affections upon let the object of our love and felicities be in the Empyreall heaven And while we are in these divine extasies let our spirits be so strong as they may be conquerors of our bodies so heavenly that they may esteem the chiefest pleasures of the body as this of heroick love but as dung and drosse nay worse if worse may be in comparison of those sublime and celestial pleasures we enjoy in our souls And in such comparison we may rejoyce more in contemning these corporeal delights and being above them then in the fruition of them Therefore in stead of placing our affections on terrene objects let us seek after that fountain and well-spring of all love lovelinesse beauty sweetnesse and excellencies of the Creator which is infinitely more permanent and doth as much transcend all other beauties and excellencies in the world if they were all united in one so that when a soul is possessed with the beauty and love of God it will have the eye of its imagination fixed on him often soaring and mounting up to heaven as its center on the wings of contemplation and a sa vapor exhaled by the Sun often gliding after its love being thereunto attracted by the allurements of his most amiable fair and divine lustre and lovelinesse insomuch as it will be enlightened with glorious Ideas touring apprehensions ardent affections and celestial raptures We will conclude with that Poetical and Divine strain of the Nightingale of France If wanton Lovers so delight to gaze On mortall beauties brittle little blaze That not content with almost dayly sight Of those deer Idols of their appetite Nor with th' Ideas which the Idalian Dart Hath deep imprinted in their yielding heart Much more should those whose souls in sacred love Are rapt with Beauties proto-type above FINIS The Postscript READER I Know I shall come under the lash of a Satyrical dijudication and be boy'd out of countenance for presuming to appear in this Subject which would have become the neat flourishes of a more elegant pen Therefore I will acknowledge that Philomus as one of my most energetical palizadoes who will defend this Enchiridion against the malevolous aspersions of the venemous tongues of detractors that will endevour to derogate its worth by calumny But I have Herculean hopes that some will vindicate me where I cannot answer for my self against the viperous brood of backbiters And as I love not to come within the jawes of such black-mouth'd Plutonian Curs so I desire not to be bandied up and down in the Tennis Court of this World with the Racket of praise for there is a Herb called Lingua pagana I translate it a double tongue the Devill that crafty Gardner hath got a slip of it and hath set it in the heart of the Gâ—athonical Reader for Bilinguis was none of Gods making no it was of the Devils marring he loves to make that double which God made single So there will be some Cloven tongues that will disallow of that in the Writers absence which before did approve of and commend in his presence and if such distastful Criticks shall misinterpret the innocency of my harmlesse meaning I shall but reply and play with their sporting Censures as doth Ben. Johnson in his Play works Their praise or dispraise is to me alike Th' one doth not stroke me nor the other strike I will conclude with one word to Momus who like a cowardly Cur will fawn in a Mans face but bite him by the heels when his turn'd back hath given the farewell or like the Cholerick Horse-rider who being cast from a young Colt not daring to kill the Horse cut the Saddle Think Momus speak do what thou wilt th' art free Thy thoughts thy words thy deeds are nought to me FINIS The Contents Of Love the Original the Universality and the Definition of it pag. 1. THe whole Vniverse tendeth to love and that it was love which caused God to create the World pag. 1. Mans inclination to a seeming good and the cause of Womans creation 2. The sympathy that Minerals and Vegetables have one to another 3. The Definition of amorous love and the several opinions of Theophrastus Montagne Socrates Tully Seneca and others pag. 4 5. The policy of Paris in the disposal of the golden ball to Venus 5. The power of the Planet Venus pag. 6. The Concord betwixt Pallas the Muses and Venus ibid. The Conclusion 7. The Causes of Love pag. 7. THe first cause from God ibid. The second from the influence of the Stars 8 9. Parents and Education 9 10. The example of Themistocles 10. Idlenesse ibid. Luscious fair ibid. Dancing Schooles and Schooles of Musick 11. Quintilians opinion of Nurses ibid. The example of Socrates 12. A Harmony and Consonancy of spirits c. 13. That beauty and goodnesse make us love 14. The great power that beauty hath in procuring Love 16. The particulars of beauty causing Love 1. The Eyes 17. 2. Fair hair 18. 3. The Tongue a gracious Laughter Songs Kissing c. 19. 4. A tall slender body c. ibid. 5. Breasts and paps affected carriages garments guises colons jewels pendants painting c. 19. Apparel 20. 6. Pleasant looks glances c. 21. Good instruction to Ladies 21. 7. A tender and hot heart ibid. 8. Love-letters 23. 9. Words ibid. 10. Eare ibid. Lysidas love to Astrea ibid. Money causing Love in Men 23. Money causing Love in Women 25. What the Poets say are the causes of Love 26. Fonsecas opinion of the cause of Love 27. The Conclusion 29. Of the Power and Effects of Love 31. WHat Plato cals Love ibid. The effects of love in Animals 31 32. Diseases caused by Love 32. Powers and assaults of Love 33. The variousnesse of it ibid. Divers examples of the Effects of Love 35. The many dangers and hazzards Lovers undergoe 37. Loves force is shown in the continuation of a designe 39. The effects of love in Birds c. 40. The effects of love in old persons 41. In Maids ibid. Constancy in Lovers inconstancy 43. How Lovers display the beauty of their Mistresses 43. The effects of love in She-lovers with their ear-charming notes 44. A loves simplician described 47. A description a great many Guls 48. Instructions to Lovers 48 49. Love strengthened by hope c. 51. A description of the Palace of Love 57. The effects of love in Women 53 54 55 56 57. The conclusion 58. Of the Power and Effects of Love in Widows 59 WIdows compared to Heralds Hearse-clothes and how they will belie their age c. ibid. The artificial discourse of Widows ibid. Widow Courters c. 61. The cause why Spaniards will not mary Widows 61. Widows were ordained for younger brothers 62. The Signes of Love 63. CAutions before you judges of signes ibid. What Physognomie is ibid. Various signes of Love are from pag. 64. to 69. Signes of Love in Women 75 76 77. Signes of Love by Chiromancy 77. Signes of Love by Dreams 77 78. Signes of Love by Astrology 79 80. At what Age we begin to be in Love What Complexions do best sympathize What c. 81. WHen it beginneth in men 81 82. When in Women ibid. 83 84 85. What temperatures and complexions do sympathize together and are most prone to receive the impression of this passion 86 87 88 89 90. In what principal part of the Body of Man is the seat of Love 91. WHere Love first entreth 91 92. Of Jealousie in Lovers 93. THe Definition of it 93 94. The Effects Signes and symptomes of it 94. 95 96 97 98 99. How it may be known who will be subject to jealousie by every mans Nativity 101. The Remedies of Love 102. HOw to take away Love caused by the stars 102 103. How to remove it caused by Parents and Education 103 104 105 106. How to extinguish it caused by beauty 106 107. That Love is sooner extinguished in presence then absence 109. How to take away the cause of Money causing Love 113 114. A preservative and soveraign receipt for Women to fortifie themselves against the contagion of this pussion 115 116 117 118 119. How to extinguish Love according to the way of the Arabians 119. And the Parthians 120 121. Several other instructions to divert the patients thoughts 120. Physical cures by letting of bloud change and variety of places and what air is best How to diet him as what simples to use in his broaths What Syrups and Conserves he must take What fruit he may eat c. What Sauces to use with his meats 122 123 124. What the patient must abstain from 124. His Exercise 125. Fortifie the haart ibid. The remedy of Theban Crates ibid. The Conclusion 126 127. FINIS * And that is the cause why women love fish better then flesh for they will have Plaice what ever they pay for it
could but as much as with modesty I dare Let that which I borrow be surveyed and then tell me whether I have made good choise of Ornaments to beautifie and set forth the Work for I make others to relate not after my own fancy but as it best falleth out what I cannot so well expresse either through unskill of language or want of judgement I have purposely concealed the Authors of those I have transplanted into my soil and digested them with my own thereby to bridle the rashness of the hasty knit brown'd censurer I will honour him that shall trace and unfeather me by the only distinction of the force and beauty of my discourse Look how my humours or conceits present themselves so I shuffle them up for these are matters which Juniors may not be ignorant of But not to tire you with a tedious preamble like the Pulpit Cuffers of this age and a long discourse argueth folly and delicate words incur the suspicion of obsequiousness I am determined to use neither of them only intreating your milde and charitable censure of this my rude and hirsute labour untill the next occasion I conclude Your Friend W. G. To his Honoured and Ingenious Friend Mr. W. G. on his Description of the Passion of Love WHen Criticks shall but view the title they Will carp at this great enterprize and say It was too boldly done thus to comprize In this small tract Loves passion and true size To set upon it but the learned will Excuse thy little Book and praise thy quill Thy aime being only to instruct the youth In male and female thou discover'st truth Thy pencil in live colours hath limm'd out Erotick passion from its very root Causes Effects and Signes thou here discovers The jealousies and fears of wanton Lovers Physician-like thou here prescribest cures To ease poor Lovers of their Calentures My worthy friend In either Hemisphere Where ere I goe thy praise I 'le eccho there W. B. ERRATA PAge 8. line 19. dele 1. p. 19. l. 9. r. osculis p. 26. l. 19 r. conducted p. 30. l. 2. r. froward p 33. l. 30 r. magno sua p. 38 l. 10. r. torment p. 40. l. 4. r. can'st p. 42. l. 3. â— to l. 14. r. never p. 44. l. 29. r. vollyes p. 48. l. 33. r. Mistresse p. 51. l. 11. r. fairest p. 55. l. 15. r. sighes p. 64. l 7. r. heart p. 70. l. 26. r. specter p. 85. l. 20. r. prae se ferat cum pharetrâ— A DESCRIPTION OF THE PASSIONS OF LOVE Of Love the Original the Universality and the Definition of it THe nature of the whole Universe according to the primo-geniture tendeth to that which we are now determined to treat o f for it was Love that moved God not only to create the World but also to create it beautiful in every part the name whereof in Greek yieldeth a testimony of Loveliness and Beauty {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Mundus signifying a beautiful and well decked Ornament Therefore seeing God hath created and framed it by Love then indubitably Love is dispersed throughout the whole World and invested into every creature as well Mineral and Vegetable as Animal all obeying the statute of the great Law-giver instituted in primo Adami The which causeth a Sympathie or Love in all things Now to demonstrate this in Man He having by nature imprinted in his soul an affected desire or earnest inclination to that which seemeth good is drawn as it were by necessity to search it out in every thing which he esteemeth fair and good finds nothing so apt to be the center of his Affections and to correspond with his nature her creation solely tending to that as Woman For after God had created Man and placed him in the Garden to dresse it It is not good saith he that Man should be alone I will make him an help meet for him to demonstrate how this help was not only meet but also necessary for Man Moses addeth that amongst all those living creatures he found no help meet for Adam For although all the Beasts and the residue of creatures were given to Man to assist him so that being in the state of innocency wherein he was then he might receive all service and ready obedience from them nevertheless he had not yet an help of his kinde for he could not have the familiarity and society with Beasts nor receive such help from them as he could from a Creature of his own nature Now seeing Man was created for this end he could not continue without generation which could not be unless he were joyned to a Woman which was before his fall a most pure and innocent love But now because of his corruption his affections are irregular and are made extreme there is nothing so greatly exciteth and carryeth away his minde nor cometh more neer to his destruction then this foolish passion endangereth his life To prove which many presidents might be produced Galacea of Mantua declairing oftentimes to a Maid of Pavia whom he courted and made love to that he would suffer a thousand deaths for her sake which she imagining was but spoken coggingly and in jest commanded him to cast himself into the River which he presently performed and was drowned But we shall more fitly alleadge such testimonies of the effects of Love when we discourse more particularly of every Vice that proceedeth from them Yet as well as Man this amity as I have said is ingraffed into every creature this love appetite or universal inclination or complacency given to them at the creation likewise and inciteth them to desire and search out that which is consentaneous to and agreeth and sympathizeth with their own nature so that there is nothing so insensible which hath not in it self this amity innate propending and moving to its proper object as Amber and Straw Iron and Adamant and the Palme-trees of both sexes express not a sympathy only but a love passion according to that of the Poet Vivunt in Venerem frondes omnisque vicissim Foelix arbor amat nutant ad mutua Palmae Foedera Populeo suspirat Populus ictu Et Platano Platanus Alnoque assibilat Alous Which is thus paraphraz'd Leaves sing their loves each complemental tree In Courtship bowes the amorous Palmes we see Confirm their leagues with nods Poplers inchaine Their armes the Plane infettereth the Plane Now the better to illustrate this by example Florentius tels us of a Palme that loved most fervently and would receive if properly it may be so said no consolation until her Love applyed himself to her you might see the two trees bend and of their own accord stretch out their boughes to embrace and kiss each other They saith he marry one another and when the winde brings their odour unto each other they are marvellously affected they will be sick and pine away for love which the husbandman perceiving strokes his hand on those Palmes which grow
together and so stroaking again the Palme that is enamored they carry kisses from one to the other or weaving their leaves into a Love-net they will prosper and flourish with a greater bravery No creature is to be found quod non aliquid amat which doth not love something no stock nor stone which hath not some feeling of its effects yet it is more eminent in Vegetables To prosecute our discourse let us define what this Amorous Love is Theophrastus demonstrateth it to be a desire of the Soul that easily and very speedily gets entrance but retireth back again very slowly Another saith It is an invisible fire kindled within the hidden forges of the breasts of Lovers scorching and consuming their miserable hearts and burning in the flames of desire yeelding no other sign or testimony thereof then an ardent desire of the thing beloved Montag lib. 3. cap. 5. saith that Love is nothing but an insatiate thirst of enjoying a greedily desired object Socrates saith It is an appetite of generation by the mediation of beauty Others will have it to be a motion of the bloud getting strength by little and little through the hope of pleasure almost a kind of Fascination or inchantment Tully thought it to be a wishing well to the party affected Seneca a great strength of the understanding and a heat that moveth gently up and down the spirits And others say that this Erotical passion is a kinde of dotage proceeding from an irregular desire of enjoying a lovely object and is attended on by fear and sadness common symptomes of Love according to Ovid Res est solliciti plena timoris amor Thus have we been carryed away by the current of other mens judgements and now have watched our advantage to swim back again and shew our private opinion and that is That Love is an expansion of the soul towards it object which is what ever is attractive and that naturally Man loves himself best and first and all other things in subordination to himself and whatsoever hath most similitude of Man in nature is the proper object of his love then consequently in my opinion no object so proper as the princess of the female sex viz. Woman it being ordained and constituted for the propagation and preservation of every species We will illustrate this with that pretty piece of policy of Paris which prompted him to the disposal of the Golden ball he being made umpire between three Deities Juno Pallas and Venus whereof he was to make one his friend and two his enemies it was his wisdom to win favour with the most potent for his own safety which is Venus if we may take an estimate of power from the extent of Dominions and largeness of command and conquest all which are so clearly Cypria's as they leave no place for opposition It is true Juno commands the world by Riches and Pallas by wisdom but Venus monarchizeth in the most unlimited manner of soveraignty over millions of Worlds if it will passe for sterling that every Man is a microcosm or a little World the epitomy of the macrocosm or the greater World She is that powerfull Planet that makes not only the rational but irrational not only the animate but inanimate creatures and Vegetables feel her influxious power Lucr. l. 1. 22. Tu dea tu rerum naturam sola gubernas Nec sine te quicquam dias in luminis oras Exoritur neque fit laetum nec amabile quicquam Goddess thou rul'st the nature of all things Without thee nothing into this light springs Nothing is lovely nothing pleasure brings Therefore they that submit not to the Scepter of the Paphian Queen are Rebels against nature and but the shadows of Men but such stubborn ones are as rare as a Horse in the streets of Venice or a begger in Holland I know not saith Montag in his Essayes lih 3. cap. 5. who could set Pallas and the Muses at oddes with Venus and make them cold and slow in affecting of Love as for me I see no Deities that better sute together nor are more indebted one to another Whoever shall go about to remove amorous imaginations from the Muses shall deprive them of the best entertainment and of the noblest subject of their work And who shall debar Cupid the service and conversation of Poesie shall weaken him of his best weapons But for so much as I know of it the power and might of this God are found more quick and lively in the shadow of Poesie then in their own Essence It representing a kinde of air as lovely as Love it self Thus equally tendering all these opinions to the Readers discretion to reject or accept which of them he shall conclude most probable I proceed on to demonstrate the Causes of this passion in the subsequent Chapter The Causes of Love WE will now express what special causes and motives tend most to the increase of this Passion The Sages have sought the true causes which dispose the wils of Men to love and have delivered many different opinions in this point Some hold it is a quality which God imprinted on nature for it pleased him to create Adam on earth as his own image and hath drawn Eve to be unto Man a spirit of peace and a love of a perpetual lasting this indubitably is the first for we must ingenuously confess that there is no reall love no true delight but proceeds from the supreme Divinity the pure and immaterial Essence of the omnipotent Protector and sole Ruler of all Celestial and Terrestrial creatures It is a communicative delight whose chief propriety is perpetually to stream into the hearts and souls of all that are capable thereof Others imagine and 't is reall it comes from the influence of the Stars at their Nativities and these in my opinion are the second causes Prima Deus causa est causae sunt astra secundae God is of all created the prime cause Th' second in spite of Holmes are starry laws Others say it proceeds from Parents and Education and that 's very probable Others from a certain harmony and consonance of hearts which meeting in accord upon the same tone having a natural correspondencie The Maxime of Divines and morall Philosophers saith That fair and good otherwise that which seems to be so make all loves And lastly Money Now it is our intent and purpose to treat of every one of these causes distinctly the first excepted being explained in the first Chapter and likewise in the beginning of this Section therefore we will proceed to the second cause which is the Stars The fairest and enticing objects that proceed from Men and Women that most frequently captivate allure and make them dote beyond all measure one upon another aret by the force and power of the Stars quod me tibi temperat astrum such a Woman doth singularly dote upon such a Man and likewise such a Man upon such a Woman hate such again and give no
whose hands the Book might come neither do I write it to be an instrument ready tun'd for every wanton eye tongue and hand to play upon I forbear lest more hurt then good come thereby For Pliny reporteth that Lucullus a most brave General and Captain of great execution lost his life by a Love-potion Love hath us'd against frail hearts Unlawful weapons shooting poyson'd darts That there is things that have power and virtue to cause Love is not to be doubted for the Soul of the World according to Corn Agrip. by its vertue doth make all things that are naturally generated and artificially made fruitfull by infusing into them Celestial properties for the working of these effects then those things themselves not only administred by potions or any other such like way but also when they being conveniently wrapped up and bound to or hanged about the neck or any other way applyed although by never so small a contact do impresse their virtue upon us For by those applications or contacts the accidents of the body and minde are changed causing them to whom they are administred to love and render them that carry them to be beloved But if these be not done under a sutable and proper Constellation you may as well go about to pick stravvs as effect any thing by them no more but verbum sat sapienti Also there are certain seasons which I will conceal for modesties sake when Women though never so forward at other times may be won in the which moment they have neither will to deny nor wit to mistrust such a time is recorded in History a young Gentleman found to obtain the love of the Dutchesse of Millaine such a time a poor Yeoman elected and in it purchased the love of the fairest Lady in Mantua Sed vulgo prodere grande nefas If I have displeased any fools in concealing such things as are to be concealed I hope the wise will hold me excused whilst I proceed to declare unto them in the next Chapter the Power and Effects of Love Of the Power and Effects of Love THe Reader shall pay nothing but his pains in following me whilest I shew him the great power and various effects of Love and yet I think I may as well go about to number the leaves of trees and sands of the Sea the grasse piles upon the Land and the stars in the firmament as enumerate the different effects and disorders that Love produceth in mortals What poyson may be dissolved which Love mingleth not What weapons can be forged and filed to transfix the sides of innocent creatures which Love hammereth and polisheth not in his shop or what precipices are there which Love prepareth not All the mischiefs and crimes which have in former ages been perpetrated Love hath acted and dayly invented them Plato cals it Magnus Daemon or the great Devill for its vehemency and soveraingty over all other passions For saith one I had rather contend with Tygers Wolves Dragons Lions Buls Bears and Gyants then with Love he is so powerfull Regnat in superos jus habet ille Deus saith Ovid he enforceth all to become tributary to him he domineers over all and can make mad and sober whom he list and strikes with sickness and cures whom he list he is of such power and majesty that no creature can withstand him he is to be seen in creatures void of reason for the Pelican gores her brest to feed her young ones and the Storke is not unkinde to feed her old one in her age We are informed by common experience how violently brute Beasts are carryed away with this passion Lions Buls Dogs and Cocks are so furious in this kinde that they will kill one another but especially Harts are so fierce that they may be heard fight at a great distance Pliny saith Fishes pine away for love and wax lean For saith he a Dolphin so loved a Boy that when he dyed the Fish came on Land and so perished This Love is the most fatall plague amongst all the passions it hath the shiffering and heat of Fevers the ach and striking of the Meagrim the rage of Teeth the stupefaction of the Vertigo the furies of Frenzie the black vapors of the Hypochondry the stupidities of the Lethargie the fits of the Mother and Spleen the faintness of the Ptisick the tremblings and palpitations of the heart It is wils darling the triall of patience passions torture the pleasure of melancholy the sport of madnesse the delight of varieties and the deviser of vanities After all this it is made a God called Cupid to whom Poems Elogies Hymnes Songs and Victimes are offered Empire over the heart is given to it There are many millions of Men in the World who would be most fortunate and flourishing if they knew how to avoid the mischievous power of this passion What a sweet poyson is the beauty and comelinesse of one sex to another which entereth in by the eye and maketh a strange havock I wonder not at all why the Scriptures compare it to a Panther a savage and cruell Beast which with teeth teareth those she hath amazed with the mirour-like spots of her skin and drawn to her by the sweet exhalation of her body Love hath walked on Scepters parched the Lawrels of Victors thrown trouble into States Schismes into Churches corruption among Judges and furies into Arms It assaulteth in company in solitude at windowes at Prison gates at Theaters and in Cabinets at sports in a feast at a Comedy and many times at Church like the simple old woman belull'd with a sleepy zeal had a minde to go to Church purposely to take a nap so many of our dainty ones desire nothing more then to go to the Temple to present to the deluded eye a new dresse and captivating Love-tainted hearts and who can assure us against it When it once gets the master-head of reason and passion prevails there is nothing left but wandering of the soul a Fever a perpetual Frenzie a neglect of operations of affaires of functions sadnesse languor and impatience they think businesse is done when 't is but thought on Amor ordinem nescit Love knows nor keeps no order O the inexpressible variousnesse of this Love in some it is sharp and violent in others dull and impetuous in others toyish and wanton in others turbulent and cloudy in others brutish and unnatural in others mute and shamefaced in others perplexed and captious in others light and transitory in others fast and retentive in others fantastick and inconstant in others weak and foppish in others stupid and astonished in others distempered and in some furious and desperate Magna suo ardent furore pectora It inflameth the bloud it weakens the body it wanneth the colour it holloweth the eyes it totally subverts the minde it hath somewhat of being possessed something of Idolatry for those that are thus Love-stricken make lust the idoll of their souls and the person loved
the idoll of their lust You may behold in those that are far entred into this passion floods and ebbs of thoughts fits and countenances of persons possessed and it is in all of them to deifie the creature on whom they are so passionately enamored and would willingly place them among the Stars yea upon the Altars Chaines and wounds are honorable if they come from a beloved hand making their heads cushions for their Mistresses feet shewing that they finde more force in their eyes then in their own hearts They would die a thousand deaths for them so they throw but so much as a handful of flowers or distill but a poor tear on their tombs This Love awakeneth excludeth none all other passions and garboyles them and makes them all Lacques to wait upon it It makes Lovers through immoderate watching giddy brain'd having their spirits troubled and become very fools Fears and joyes hopes and desires mixt with despairs and doubts do make the sport in Love they are the very Dogs by which the Hare is hunted and being flesh'd in the chase neither stop nor give ore passion being in a hot sent till they have killed her It is a natural distemper a kinde of Smal-pox every one hath had it or is to expect it and the sooner the better It is of so great force and authority that it subjugateth unto its will the greatest power of the minde that is Will which ruleth and governeth all the other both interiour and exteriour powers and yet the will is constrained many times for the better pleasing and content of Love to follow those things which it doth altogether abhor and detest so that having so wonderful an Empire and command over all the powers both inward and outward of the body and of the minde no wonder if Love both will and can do what it will It was Love that betrayed Sampson by Dalila it was Love made Colomon brutish by his Concubines and turn Idolater 't was Love caused Ahab to be rooted out through Jesabel Marc. Anthony slew himself for the love of Cleopatra the destruction of Troy was caused by Helena the Pandora of Hesiodus the pitifull death of Hercules by Deianira and many other miserable events procured through the Love of Women and plentifully declared in Histories How was Loves great-master Ovid inamoured of bright Julia the jewell of his soul and celebrated her excellencies and their love stealths under the mask of Corinna Nay Apollo himself the inventer of Poesie Musick and Physick elated for his victory over the ugly Python found Cupids shaft the most prevalent when he pursued the too much loved but overmuch hating Daphne over the uncouth rocks craggy cliffes and untrod mazes of the Woods Cupid is more then Quarter-master among the Gods Capiumque Jovem coelo traxit he made Jupiter metamorphose himself for Europa into a Bull and put himself to graze that he might lick her hands who fed him with flowers for Danae into a shower of gold for Astrea into an Eagle for Leda into a Swan for Antiope into a Satyr for Egina into a flame for Mnemosyne into a Shepherd for Dois into a Serpent for Calysto into a Wood-nymph or Nun so by this you may see that Love made him esteem his pleasure above his state so as Lucian Juno called him Ludus Amoris Cupids whirligig Sen. in Herc. oet. Tu fulminantem saepe domuisti Jovem Likewise all faigned Romances do continually chant forth the complaints of millions of Lovers and the infidelity of their Mistresses on the other side Women waging war with Men cease not to accuse their inconstancy which were able to tire spirits any thing serious A Lovers heart is Cupids quiver an inextinguishable fire more hot and vehement then any material fire it is the quintessence of fire no water can quench Sen. Hippol Quis meas miserae Deus Aut quis juvare Daedalus flammas queat What God can ease What Daedalus can quench such flames as these Or according to the eloquent poesie of another For Love hath nets there laid to serve his turn And in the water will his wildfire burn O! how many Men do wander in this way how many persons in this age are corrupted too much with the extremity of this passion lulling themselves asleeep in the laps of such as seek to strangle them How many excellent spirits are recorded in History which were in excellent state and in full vigour of the functions of an intellectual life who by approaching over-neer to this sex have entred into affections of fire and flames which like little creeping Serpents have stolne into their hearts I cannot sufficiently admire at the sottishnesse and drowsinesse of many Noble spirits who are so delighted and captivated with the vain dreams of their own fancies that they imploy all the gifts and graces of the minde and incline to some beautiful object What a ridiculous thing is it to see Men fall from their primitive goodnesse as to lose their selves in dotage and that dotage on one creature and that creature a Woman really next to a miracle is my only admiration O traitresse Dalila which seekest by thy inticings to deliver Mans soul to an enemy far worse then the Philistines Such pleasures are like gilded pils which under their external beauty include bitternesse They are also like fresh Rivers that end their course in the Sea losing their sweet relish in an Ocean of saltness Man cannot love and be wise both together the very best of them is betwixt hawke and buzzard if once they be overtaken with this passion It being the first and chief mistresse of all the passions the most furious and severest of all he that suffers himself to be seduced by it he is no more himself his body endureth a thousand labours in the search of his pleasure his minde a thousand hels to satisfie his desire and desire it self increasing growes into fury As it is natural so it is violent and common to all It maketh all the wisdom resolution contemplation and the operation of the soul brutish It is impossible to reckon up the many great dangers and hazzards they undergoe they undertake single combates venture their lives creep in at windowes gutters go down chimnies in ropes and climbe over wals to come to their Sweet-hearts anoint the doores and hinges with oil lest they should make a noise tread softly whisper c. and if they be surprised leap out at windowes and cast themselves down headlong What a passionate speech was that of Callicratides in Lucian Dial. amorum Mihi ô dii coelestes ultra sit vita haec perpetua exadverso amicae sedere suave loquentem audire c. si moriatur vivere non sustinebo idem erit sepulchrum utrisqueThe which we thus paraphase O ye Gods celestial grant me this life for ever to sit opposite to her I love that I may continually be an auditor of her mellifluous speeches to go in and
out with her he that frowns upon her shall frown upon me if she should die I would not live and one tombe should contain us both When the King of Babylon would have punished one of his Courtiers for loving a young Lady of the Royal blood far transcending his fortunes Apollonius being in his presence by all means perswaded him to let him alone For to love and not enjoy was most inexpressible tornent Loves force is shown in the continuation of a design in spight of all impeachment and crosses how great was that of Psyche in the search of Cupid she saw three Goddesses set against her pretensions Juno Ceres and Venus and yet her passion became victorious over their malevolence she did things that seemed impossible she went down to hell and spoke to Preserpina passing without much difficulty many obstructions in the way But where it cannot effect its designes it causes revenge For when Edward Courtney Earl of Devonshire being released by Queen Mary long detained prisoner in the Tower a Gentleman of a beautiful body sweet nature and royall descent intending him as it was generally conceived to be an husband for herself For when the said Earl Petitioned the Queen for leave to travell she advised him rather to marry assuring him that no Lady in the Land how high soever would refuse him for an husband and urging him to make his choice where he pleased she pointed out her self unto him as plainly as might stand with the modesty of a Maid and the Majesty of a Queen Hereupon the young Earl whether because his long durance had some influence on his brain or that naturally as I rather suppose his face was better then his head or out of some private fancy and affection to the Lady Elizabeth or out of loyall bashfulnesse not presuming to climbe higher but expecting to be called up is said to have requested the Queen for leave to marry her Sister the Lady Elizabeth unhappy was it that his choice either went so high or no higher for who could have spoken worse treason against Mary though not against the Queen then to prefer her Sister before her and she innocent Lady did afterwards dearly pay the score of this Earls indiscretion for the Queen having no cause of revenge against the Earl yet she under a colour imposed greater affliction and closer imprisonment against Elizabeth Love causeth him that doth love to ingrave and imprint in his heart that face and image which he loveth so that the heart of him that loveth is like unto a looking-glasse in which the image of the party beloved shineth and is represented and doth as it were deprive himself of himself and giveth himself to whom he loveth for the delights of love are commonly more in the imagination then in the thing it self and the soul doth cast her eye upon those images which remain in the fancy and looks upon them as if they were present When Venus commands all things lose their antipathy such is the power of Love that for the thing beloved they neglect their own good they fear not to expose their bodies to the edge of the sword deny unto themselves whatsoever to them is profitable as sleep to their eyes quietnesse to their mindes rest to their members ease to their bodies yea more then all this they glory in those vain glorious attempts those labours sweatings watchings wounds burnings and freezings all which they endure and undergo for their Mistresses as Sir Jo. Suckling sings Ah cruell Love how great a power is thine Under the Pole although we lie Thou mak'st us frie And thou cast make us freeze beneath the line Yet this amorous passion is not more frequent with Men and Women then it is with the airy quiristers the nimble birds who are overtaken with Cupids nimbler wings annually electing their Valentines What a perfect harmonie of affection is there betwixt the Turtle and his dear mate whose continual billing shames Diana and her frigid train What a zealous adorer of Venus is the wanton Sparrow as Pliny reporteth in his Natural History who empties himself of all his radical moisture in her rites and at three years end when the Columne of his life fails him offers up his dry bones a sacrifice to her Aristotle will have Birds sing ob futuram venerem for joy and hope of their Love stealth to come Cupid is as familiar with Lions as children with cosset Lambs and oftentimes mounts on their backs holding by their brisly mains and riding them about like Horses whilest they fawn upon him with their tails He blunts the horns of the Bull and muzzels the fierce Tyger and makes the sluggish Bear nimbly dance a Corranto Omne adeo genus in terris hominumque ferarumque Et genus aequoreum pecudes pictaeque volucres In furias ignemque ruunt amor omnibus idem All kinde of creatures on the earth beasts grim And Men and Fish with golden fins that swim And painted Birds alike to rage doth flie Thus Love bears equall sway in earth sea skie It is Love makes old Men and Women that have more toes then teeth dance and frisk like Goats it makes old Gowty fellowes break their Cruches I and shins too dance after Fidlers Hei go mad and 't is no new thing take the Poets reason which seems to me to be as true as ever fiction was and that is Cupid and Death met in an Inne and being merrily disposed they did exchange some arrowes out of eithers quiver which is the cause that young men die and oft-times old men dote And who can withstand the force of it saith Mr. Burton if once it pricks us at the heart young or old though our teeth shake in our heads like Virginal jacks or stand parallel asunder like arches in a bridge there 's no remedy we must dance and caper Candlestick height leap over tables chaires and stools though we be 60 years above waste scarce 30 below Maides when they get together pardon me Ladies for 't is my design to touch all are still either reading or telling of Love-stories singing Love-songs or Sonnets talking of this or that young man such a Man is proper fair and handsome saith one and such a Man is black and comely O! what a pearl is he in mine eye saith another and thus they chat when they meet never thinking or willingly discoursing upon any other subject And forfoorh they must fast St. Agnes Eve to see who must be their first husbands and flock to the Artist to know who they shall marry and how many husbands they shall have nay what would they not give if they might but see him in a glasse This is no Court complement or allegation but a downright truth We will now turn to the enamorate and suppose one should endevour to reform him then which one had better strive and tame a Panther immediately he will burst out in Choler saying Do you think that Love that thinks
I say a mediocrity in Love is the best me thinks I see one of these melancholy Lovers setting a frowning tart Saturnine face upon me Objecting that he that loves not in the highest point of extremity does not love one jot he that can be indifferent and love all alike cannot love one as he ought to do or he that can measure or think any greater then his own is not a Lover worth a rush for to injoyn a mediocrity in Love is to impose an impossibility And then poor soul he shakes his head at me saying Ah you little know what belongs to Love and then having recovered his breath for through the vehemency of anger towards me he had almost lost it he begins to object again saying Those effects which belong to an extreme Love and one that knowes what Sacrifice and Duties belong unto the Altars of Love is so far from calling those effects troubles or follies as you terme them as they think them felicities and perfect contentments Likewise he saith that Love is to die in ones self that he may live in another Never to love any thing but what is pleasing and agreeable to the party loved The will must be transformed into a night toy he cals a Mistresse And can you think saith he that one who Loves thus will ever be troubled with the presence of her whom he loves If you did but know what it is to Love you would never think that he who loves can do any thing to displease If he chance to commit any fault the fault it self pleaseth considering with what intention it was committed The very desire of being amiable has such a vigour in a right Lover as though he be rough to the World in general yet will he be sure smooth and spruce up himself towards her he loves Nay he thinks himself in the Orchard of Adonis or the Elizium fields if he injoy her company he is so taken with delight And these and an hundred such like whimsical Chymâ—raes hot brained Lovers conceive and do affect a vainglorious humor which Lovers use to attribute to themselves and it is to be reputed constant They suffer themselves wholly to be led by sense and are so far from repressing these rebellious inclinations that they give all incouragement unto them leaving the reigns and using all provocations to further them bad by nature worse by art education and a perverse will of their own they follow on wheresoever their unbridled affections will transport them doing all out of self-will casting reason at their heels this stubborn-will of theirs perverts judgement which sees and knows what should and ought to be done and yet will not do it slaves to their lusts and appetite they precipitate and plunge themselves into a Labyrinth of cares blinded with lust For her they do depart even from their reason Bids welcome unto Manacles and Prison In sharpest torments think themselves at ease So they thereby their fair Saint shall please And all without expectance of reward To love her is the honour they regard But if this be Love heaven shield us from it and preserve our eye-sight This love gathereth its heat and redoubleth its force by hope which inflameth with the soft and gentle aire thereof our foolish desires kindleth in our mindes a fire from whence ariseth a thick smoak which blindeth our understanding carryeth with it our thoughts holds them hanging in the clouds and makes us dream waking Although she be all soveraignty As high as heaven and be a Deity Yet still my high-blown hopes will have the glory To enterprise an act beyond all story If you narrowly survey the Palace of this amorous passion the plague and frenzie of the soul you shall finde it to be built all upon hopes The Staires are of ice made in such wise that he who most ascendeth most descendeth the Hals Chambers and Wardrobes are all furnished and hanged with idlenesse dreams desires and inconstancies the Seats and Chaires are made of false contentment It hath affliction torment and fraud for engineers uncertainty fear false opinion and distrust for guard The Court being all composed of heartlesse soft and effeminate men the Counsellors are lying and deceit and the Steward suspicion It is a play-game wherewith Nature busieth our mindes contrarywise when despair is once londged neer us it torments our souls in such a sort with an opinion of never obtaining that we desire that all businesse besides must yeeld unto it And for the love of that which we think never to obtain we lose even the rest of whatsoever we possesse This passion is like unto little children who to be revenged of him who hath taken one of their play games from them cast the rest into the fire It is angry with it self and requireth of its self the punishment of its own folly and seeming felicity and hence it is that many despairing of ever having them whom they affect make themselves away either by strangling or drowning or some such like miserable end or continually deploring their dysasterous condition Plant me where nothing growes but cruelty ' Amongst Lions Bears and other savage Beasts To see if they that mercy will deny Which I in vain implore from humane breasts How justly are those cruel Ladies to be condemned who being rich in beauty scorning art suffer their loyall amorists to die for love of them unpityed They are so nice they scorn all Suitors crucifie their poor enamoratoes and think no body good enough for them as dainty to please as Daphne herself they take a pride to prank up themselves to make young men enamored but 't is a lamentable thing to see a silly soul so profuse of Love as to confer it upon such ingrate and disdainful Women as if one took delight to feed and flatter Owles And on the other side to make neither barrell better herring some young men are so obstinate and as curious in their choise and tyrannically proud insulting deceitful and false hearted Therefore let these go together for love and hanging go by destiny Yet there are some feminine humours so tractable that they are won with a small intreaty according to that of the Comedian Such rape thou act'st upon my soul and with such pleasing violence dost inforce it that when it should resist it tamely yeelds making a kinde of haste to be undone as if the victory were losse and conquest came by overthrow Wounded with Love they yeeld up Natures treasure To be all ransackt at the victors pleasure There are others who are more taken with a soothing observance or handsome congie making then all the fair qualities or good parts can be in a Man or the faithfullest service can be rendered them There are others who lay snares and keep alwayes a kinde of order in the receit of such as they intend to in register in the number of their subjects But at length this Idalian fire kindles in them and then are they unable to suffer
the absence of their Lover yet modesty will not suffer them to intrrude into his presence they desire with all impatience to see him yet shun all occasions of seeing him seeking and fearing in one and the same time to meet him a troublesome passion that brings them to will and not to will in the same time one and the same thing She is peevish and sick till she see him discontent heavy sad and why comes he not where is he why bteaks he promise why tarries he so long sure he is not well he hath some mischance certainly he forgets himself and me And when he comes then with a seeming coynesse she looks upon him with a cold look though she be all flame within Some are as Sappho who was subtle to allure and slippery to deceive having their hearts made of wax ready to receive every impression not content till they have as many Lovers as their hearts have entrances for Love their hearts being like Pumice stones light and full of holes Some are as inconstant as Cressida that be Troylus never so true yet out of sight out of minde and so soon as Dâ—omede begins to court she like Venetian traffick is for his penny currant à currendo sterling coyne passable from man to man in way of exchange Others are as Lydia cruell whose hearts are hammered in the forge of pride thinking themselves too good for all when as in truth they are too bad for any and none worthy of them and oft-times nestling all day with the Beetle are at night contented with a Cowsherd for a shelter These have eyes of Basilisks that are prejudiciall to every object and hearts of Adamant not any way to be pierced Some are as if they were votaries unto Venus and at their nativities had no other influence take no pleasure but in amorous passions no delight but in Madrigals of Love wetting Cupids wings with Rose-water and tricking up his Quiver with sweet perfumes they set out their faces as Fowlers doe their Daring-glasses that the Larkes that sore highest may stoop lowest as soon as the poor loving fools are wrapped within their nets then they sue with signes and plead with Sonnets faign tears and paint out passions to win her that seeming to be coy comes at the first lure There ate others taken as Schoole boyes catch Squirrels hunting them up and down till they be weary and fall down before them All melted in pure love languidly sweet She lets her self fall at the Victors feet The coyest she that is may be won by fair opportunity being the strongest plea in the Court of Venus able to overthrow her be she never so coy for it is more easie for some Maides to suffer themselves to be martyred by Tyrants in defence of their Chastity then if opportunity pleasing courtship and importunity serve not to yield that to a Lover which they would have denyed to an Executioner and there are some so strongly inclined by nature and assaulted with such violent temptations that if they resist and become victors over passion may well be recorded among noble and heroick Women yet time may be so elected that he that takes it wisely shall be sure never to misse he that can temper toyes with art she being in a merry vein may bring that Love which swimmeth in her eyes to dive into her heart but other times they are so squeemish so skittish and demure that one may better catch and tame a wilde Horse then win their favour no not a look not a smile not a kisse for a Kingdome this being one of their subtle arts as one wittily saith Quanquam natura arte eram formosissima isto tamen astu tanto speciosior videbar quod enim oculis cupitum agrè praebetur multo magis affectus humanos incendit Though I was by Nature and Art most beautifull yet by those tricks I seemed to be far more amiable then I was for that which Men earnestly seek and cannot attain draw on their affections with a most furious desire And to gull their Lovers the more and fetch them over they will shew them Rings Gloves Scarffes c. saying that such a Gallant sent them when there is no such matter but meerly to circumvent them O the subtilty of Women to whet their Lovers appetite they will fall out and quarrell with them on set purpose pick quarrels upon no occasion because they would be reconciled unto them again according to the old Grammar rule Amantium irae amoris redintegratio est The falling out of Lovers is a renewing of love The blunt Countrey wench did as eloquently as she could expresse her self in these words There is something runs in my minde I wish it were out but I wish somebody loved me as well as I love somebody Poor girl both at milking walking and working still something troubles her at last she cryes out Hai-ho for an husband a bad husband nay the worst that ever was is better then none How earnestly do they seek marriage and are never well till they have effected it O how sweet is the contemplation of marriage to them And likewise we Batchelours when we see and behold those angelical faces observe their pleasant gestures and graces lend an ear to their Siren-like Songs see them dance c. we think their conditions are as fine as their faces we are taken with dumb signes we rave we burn and how gladly would we be marryed but when we feel the cares and miseries of it then we wish to be single again as the story goes of a Good-fellow which whilest he was a Batchelour was a Boon companion and would spend his money freely and therefore with his hostess he was termed a Good-fellow but so it happened that at length he was marryed and coming not so frequently to his Hostess as formerly nor spending his cash so freely when he came was by one of them demanded the reason of this his unwonted strangenesse and great change who replying said I am now married why then quoth she Thou art now an honest Man but he sighingly made answer in these words Ha but if I were once a Good-fellow again I would never be an honest Man whilest I lived If this be true as some out of disconsolate experience will informe us farewell wiving for my part But to put a period to this Section Volumes would not be sufficient for him who should write all the passions which dayly arise as members from this passion all pens would be weak words would be dried up and wits lost therein The Power and Effects of Love in Widowes REader I pray thee smile but do not jear at my curiosity in describing the Effects of Love in Widowes who like Heralds Herse-clothes serve to many Funerals with a little altering the colour and the wylie lures they lay to bring on their Suitors It would make a Dog laugh to hear how they will belie their age saying they are little past 30 when
that are sick of love melancholy are generally lean throughout the whole body facit amor maciem as well by reason of their little eating and drinking as also for their bad digestion by reason that the spirits and natural heat are withdrawn from the stomach to the brain Another will have leannesse to be caused in a Lover by reason of too much intention of the minde pensivenesse and anxietie the Lover loseth the fulnesse of flesh and good liking of his body that before he enjoyed A third will have leannesse caused in Lovers by a direction of vitall heat from the circumference to the Center thereby consuming the vitall spirits drying the body and causing leannesse They are troubled with immoderate watchings wakings and sighings because in Lovers are divers imaginations and fancies that steal into the brain and never suffers them to take any quiet repose whence the brain becomes dry and cold and if by chance they be surprised by any light slumber which is the provision Nature hath made for the repairing of the animal spirits which in them are wasted and much impaired by the violence of their imagination and excessive wakings that slumber is attended on by a thousand phantasmes and fearful dreams so that they awake oft-times more discontented sad pensive and melancholy then before and for the most part they finde themselves more tormented sleeping then waking They are vexed with immoderate sighings by reason that they many times are oblivious of drawing their breath being wholly taken up with the strong imagination that they love either in beholding the beauty of their objects or else in their absence contemplating on their rare perfections and contriving the means how to come to their desires so that recollecting themselves Nature is constrained to draw in as much air at once as before it should have done at two or three times And such a respiration is called a sigh which indeed is nothing else but a double respiration Observe one tranfixed with violent Love whose minde is bewitched brain dislocated and reason eclipsed and you shall finde that all he holdeth all he meditateth on all he speaketh all he dreameth is of the creature he loveth He hath her in his head and heart painted graved carved in the most pleasing formes For her he entereth sometimes into quakings sometimes into faintings another while into fits of fire Ice he soreth in the aire and instantly is drenched in the abysse he attendeth he espieth he fears he hopes he despaires he sighes he blushes he waxeth pale he doteth in the best company he addresses his colloquiums to Woods Groves and Fountains he writeth he blots out he teareth he lives like a spittler estranged from the conversation of Men Repose which charmeth all the eares of the World is not made for him still this fair one still this cruel one tormenteth him Plutarch saith the heart of a Lover was a City in which upon one and the same day were seen sports and banquets battles and funerals You shall see another of Cupids slaves burthen himself with Newes of no value he makes a secret of every thing and gives out those for mysteries to his Mistresse which are proclaimed with a trumpet Another is so extremely open breasted that you need look for no other signe he tels all his thoughts and as if his heart were a Sieve it keeps nothing which it sends not out by the lips He becomes an extreme babler which proceeds from the influence of the heart for Plutarch saith that Love is naturally a great babler chiefly when it chanceth to light upon the commendation of those things that are its objects For that Lovers have a strong desire to induce others to give credence to that whereof themselves are already perswaded which is that they love nothing but what is absolutely perfect both for goodnesse and beauty and they would willingly have these opinions of theirs confirmed also by all other judgements He is importunate and unseasonable in complements he pratles with his friends whilest he hath a fever he tels extravagant tales wherein he makes himself very facetious although at the latter end of the discourse he askes where the conceit to be laughed at lies He is very merry and then within a moment he fals to be very melancholy and extreme sad pensive and dejected then by and by he entertains himself with some merry pleasant conceits and then within a small tract of time the contrary by this weather cock you may perceive in what quarter the winde is This passion makes him very simple next door to sottishnesse and makes him do many extravagancies so that through these fooleries he brings to himself a turbulent life a continual torment a hasty death and his salvation doubtful All of them are restlesse casting their weariâ—d members upon their loathed beds in their solitary Chambers filling the aire with a thousand throbs and interrupted sighes sometimes disturbed with the rivality of others sometimes afflicted and fear those manifold mischances that may befall the person beloved so that the many passions that multiply in the breast of a Lover do bring with them an extenuation and impairing of the complexion and sometimes a strange kinde of alteration in the individual essence from whence doe arise those furies of Love and potent frenzies and insensible astonishments which happen many times to those that love either because they make not reason the forerunner of their sense or because they directed not their loves by the rules of wisdome which teacheth the only means to the attaining of all other virtues They are guided with the blind Lanthorne of sense whilest rambling in the streets they leave reason sleeping with the Constable Never raged Alcides on mount Oeta nor fierce Orlando for his Angelica more then these Vtopian Lovers for their imaginary shadowes You may observe this passion drawn to the life by Virgil in his Dido Aeneid 4. Uritur infelix Dido totaque vagatur Urbe furens c. She was so tormented with the heat of her love that she ran up and down the City as if she had been distracted For Lovers through despair of obtaining their desires through the inflamation of the vitals become nelancholy which is to speak truth a madnesse for all passions that produce strange and unusuall behaviour are called by the general terme of madnesse And of the severall kinds of madnesse caused by Love he that would take the paines might enroll a legion By reason of these perturbations of the minde the bloud becomes adust as in all other violent passions excepting joy according to Galen by which means divers have fallen into strange and desperate diseases growing foolish mad Cynicall and Wolvish The learned Avicen reporteth in his Chapter de amore that from this passion proceeds the Green sicknesse in Women which is sometimes accompanyed with a gentle Fever called by our modern Writers an amorous Fever Suffocations Head-ach Epilepsies and divers other desperate symptomes which for the most
at ten years of age and was but 15 when she hid the spies as some report Leo saith that in Africk one shall scarce finde a Maid at 14 years of age for when the vehemency of Adolescency which is betwixt the age of 14 and 28 beginneth to tickle them and when they have greatest need of a bridle then they let loose the raines committing themselves to the subjection of this passion There are many forward Virgins of our age are of opinion that this commodity can never be taken up too soon and howsoever they neglect in other things they are sure to catch time by the forelock in this if you aske them this question they will resolve you 14 is the best time of their age if 13 be not better then that and they have for the most part their Mothers example before them to confirme and prove their ability and this withall they hold for a certain ground that be they never so little they are sure thereby to become no lesse yet let me tell these forward Girles the effects that most commonly ensue are dangerous births diminution of statute brevity of life and such like This passion is more tolerable in youth and such as are in their hot bloud and shall I be bold to speak it without offence to the stale Batchelors that Love is not properly nor naturally in season but in that age next unto infancy Nunc grata juveni Venus Venus to young men is a welcome guest But for an amorous complexion to cover glowing fires beneath the embers of a gray-beard to see an old man to dote upon Women what more odious what more absurd yet in some this Idalian fire flameth more in their old age then in their youth Aristotle saith that old men are not out of the reach of Cupid nor bid defiance to Venus till they have passed the age of 70 years And truly a gray-head and a wanton-heart are ill suited it is more ridiculous to see it in Women then men It rageth in all ages yet is it most common and evident among young and lusty persons in the flower of their age high fed and living idly for such as are continually imployed it scarce touches them till they come to be 24 or 25 years of age and then but very lightly according to the speech of Lyndamor to Pallemas that he had arrived to the age of 25 years before he ever felt any effects as Love useth to produce in hearts of his age Not but that he was of his naturall inclination as much devoted servant unto Ladies but being continually exercised in businesse much different from idlenesse he had no pleasure to let Love sow any seeds in his soul for ever since he was able to bear armes moved by a generous instinct which invites noble spirits unto dangerous enterprizes he was perpetually in wars where he did most heroically signalize himself Some have given two reasons why youth is more subject to this illimited passion then any other age The first is That naturall heat or vigour which is most predominant in youth provoking him to attempt the greatest of difficulties rather then suffer the repulse where he affects The second is Want of imployment which begets this distemperature Vacuo pectore regnat amor Love playes hai-day in an idle person Amor otiosae cura est solicitudinis saith Theophrastus it is an affection of an idle minde Also it fosters it self by a writ of Priviledge in the hearts of young men who abounding with much bloud and consequently with great store of Vitall spirits are more fiery and ardent making them full of wanton and youthfull desires I have many times observed a great sympathy and affection young boyes and girles have one to another and indeed there is a pretty pleasing kind of wooing drawn from a conceived but concealed fancy which suits well with these amorous younglings they could wish with their hearts ever to be in the presence of those they love so they might not be seen by them Might they chuse they would converse with them freely consort with them friendly and impart their truest thoughts fully yet would they not have their bashful loves finde discovery They would be seen yet seem obscured Love but not disclose it see whom they love but not be eyed Yea which hath struck me into more admiration I have known divers whose unripe years half assured me that their green youth had never instructed them in the knowledge nor brought them to conceit of such vanities excellently well read in Love Lectures and prompt enough to shew proofes of their reading in publick places The amorous toyes of Venus and Adonis with other Poems of like nature they peruse with such devotion and retain with such delectation as no subject can equally relish their unseasoned palats like those lighter discourses If this passion begin in infancy and so continue it is more affectionate and strong because that custom which is taken in that age doth by degrees become a nature which growing up with years growes solid and unalterable Fronutus saith of Love Juvenis pingitur quod amore plerumque Juvenes capiuntur sic mollis formosus nudus quod simplex apertus hic affectus ridet quod oblectamentum prae ase ferat cum phiretra c. The reason why Love was painted young is because young men are most apt to Love soft fair and fat because such folks are soon captivated naked because all true affection is simple and open he smiles because merry and given to delights hath a Quiver to shew his power and none can escape him old nor young is blinde because he sees not where he shootes nor whom he hits c. Let us now Demonstrate what temperatures and complexions do sympathize together and are most prone and apt to receive the impression of this Passion THe diversitie of complexions breeds a diversity of desires whereby they judge diversly of things present and follow those which do best agree with their constitutions whereby we see that in the election of any thing whatsoever the appetite doth accommodate it self to the temperature of the body for we see Men fit themselves in their customs and carriages to their corporeal temperature ever desiring to converse with their like for Nature would so have it to this only end that every one should be esteemed and be loved and they that are not absolutely faire in every part should not be despised but being received into grace and favour with their Lovers might live honestly in mutuall society and in good esteem with them Every like desireth and loveth his like whereby ever for the publick good there remaineth nothing despised because there is nothing but hath its like And therefore to the eyes of a Moor the black or tawny countenance of his Moorish Damosel pleaseth best and yet such a one would almost turn the stomach of a Sanguine complexioned English man to look upon Now to discover those who are
most prone and apt to love The fairest are inclined to love because the cause of love is beauty and he or she that hath the cause in potentia doth easily produce the effect And therefore saith the divine Plato that Love reigneth most in the hearts of those young men the which he that hath but half an eye may dayly see that are honorably born and tenderly brought up who as apt receptacles receive into them that passion Or more probably Venus being the giver of beauty likewise inclineth those to love upon whose nativity she cast her influence for it seldome falleth out that beauty is separated from the force of love and for as much as custome in all things hath the force of Love they that are beautiful following custome cannot but Love Galen saith that the manners of the minde do follow the temperature of the body We see those that are of a sanguine complexion are generally very amorous Hairinesse saith Aristotle is a signe of abundance of excrements and therefore much addicted to this passion Venus tickling them with a delight of emptying of their seminal vessels for a Woman cannot endure a Man with a little beard for that they are commonly cold and impotent The aire Climate and place of ones birth are of very great consideration in this particular And now being in the bowels of Love some will ask Whether Men or Women be soonest allured and whether be most constant the male or the female I answer That most Women are to be won with every pleasing winde in whose sex there is neither force to withstand the assaults of Love as we shall hereafter more fully declare neither constancy to remain faithful therefore Women are the soonest allured and most inconstant Likewise a hot and dry temperature or else such a one as is only hot is much inclined to love for a Man that is hot is hairy high coloured with a black thick curled head of hair great veines and big voice and what a pretious thing a black Man is in a Womans eye I will refer to the judgement of their own sex I dare boldly affirme that that man hath a hot and dry Liver and his generative parts are also of the same temper and so consequently very much inclined to this passion which is also confirmed by that of Galen that a hot complexion or such a one that is hot and dry is much more prone and subject to a violent and irregular love then any other temperature or complexion whatever from whence we may infer that Men are oftner and more grievously tormented with this malady then Women whose temperature is lesse hot and lesse dry But Women are naturally of meaner spirits and lesse courage then Men having weaker reasons and therefore are lesse able to make resistance against so strong a passion And hereto accords that of Hero in her Epist. to Leander in Ovid Vrimur igne pari sed sum tibi viribus impar Fortius ingenium suspicor esse viris Vt corpus teneris sic mens infirma puellis Our flames are equall but your kinder fate Hath lent you strength your hearts to temperate But in our weaker sex our passions finde A feeble body bears a feeble minde Women often become frenetick and mad for Love but rarely men unlesse it be some effeminate weak spirited fellowes Upon this I took occasion one day to visite Bedlam and for one Man that was there for Love I found five Women and those Men that were there were such as had lived effeminately idly and dieted themselves riotously and delicately Ficinus cap. 19. Comment. in convivium Platonis saith Irretiuntur cito quibus nascentibus Venus fuerit in Leone vel Luna Venerem vehementer aspexerit quia eadem complexione sunt praediti They are most prone to burning lust or the vehement scorching of the Idalian flame that have ♀ in ♌ in their Horoscope when the ☽ and ♀ be mutually aspected or when ♄ is in a △ or ⚹ aspect with the ☉ or ☿ especially if it happen in the second or fifteenth day of the ☽ or such as be of the complextion of ♀ and that is a white ruddy complexon fair and lovely eyes a little black a round and fleshie face fair hair and smooth a rolling eye and one desirous of trimming and making himself neat both in clothes and body In whose geniture ♂ and ♀ are in ☌ ⚹ or △ Plerumque amatores sunt si foemina meritrices they are undobtedly inclined to love and erorick melancholy and if Women Queans for Martialists and Men of War are easily taken prisoners by Cupid Cardan saith of himself in the judgement of his geniture that a ☌ of ♀ and ☿ in the dignities of ☿ perpetually troubled him with venereal thoughts that he could never rest so strong was their influence upon him In whose genesis ♀ shall be in a masculine signe and in the termes or ☠of ♃ signifies the parties to be very much inclined to the sports of ♀ Phlegmatick persons are rarely captivated and those who are naturally melancholy lesse then they but if they once be catched in the snare unlesse they hang themselves which they will be much inclined to they will never be free But as Mr. Burton saith the Colts evil is common to all complexions whilest they are young and lusty And some refer it adtesticulorum crisin to the hot temperature of the resticles Now to declare what time is most fit and delightfull to Lovers It is that time of the year when the longest dayes make the evenings most delightful and dispose Lovers to accommodate their ears to the chirping melody of the airy Quire which awakeneth a marvellous desire in their hearts May is called Loves moneth either because the temperature of the season which is hot and moist of the nature of Venus doth incline all creatures to chuse and select their mates or because Venus at that time doth usher in Aurora and by her influence doth excite the hearts of Lovers to rise early to view the richnesse of Flora and the ear-pleasing harmony and love-exciting melody of the Nightingale In what principal part of the Microcosme or Body of Man is the seat of Love LOve having his first entrance in at the eyes which are the faithful spies and intelligencers of the soul stealing gently through those sluces and so passing insensibly to the liver it there presently imprinteth an ardent desire of the object which is either really lovely or at least appears to be so But distrusting its own strength and fearing it is not able to overthrow the reason it presently layeth siege to the heart of which having once fully possest it self as being the strongest fort of all it assaults so violently the reason and all the noble parts of the brain that they are suddenly forced to yield themselves up to its subjection So that now the poor enamorato or Loves weather beaten widgeon thinks of nothing but his
How light these Males are in their affection This may seem to you an easie errour but were I judge of Birds it should receive due censure Why Lady replyed he these poor Birds doe but according to their kinde Yea but what do ye Men then who ingage your selves interest your selves empawn your souls to be constant where you professe Love and perform nothing lesse then what you professe most Nor would her long intended revenge admit more liberty to her tongue for with a passionate enterbreath she closed this speech with a fatall stab leaving so much time to her unfortunate and dysasterous Lover as to discover to one of that sorrowfull family the ground of her hate the occasion of his fall which hastened on the dolefull Scene of her Tragedy And these are the products of that Hell-born fiend Jealousie An Astrologer may give a probable conjecture by every Mans Nativity if it may be had whether he will be jealous or no and at what time by the direction of the Significators to their severall promissors of which you may read many Aphorismes in Sconer Junctine Pontanus Ptolemy Albubator c. The Remedies of Love THat we may use the Method of Art To cure the effects is first to take away the cause Cessante causa cessat effectus take away the cause and the effect ceaseth It was the scope of our discourse in the second Section of this Treatise to discover the Causes those incendiaries and fomenters of this inordinate passion or this intoxicating poyson in the third Section we demonstrated the Effects arising from them now in this last Section it is our purpose to treat of the Cure and Remedies of them We will begin at the second cause viz. the Stars for the first cause instituted by the Creator was moderate and good As the minde hath its natural principles of knowledge so the will hath her natural inclinations and affections from the influence of the Stars for they do incline the will to love but do not compell it agunt non cogunt of their own nature they are good as they are taken from the first nature created of God neither would they be at any time hurtfull if there were not excesse in us proceeding from nature corrupted which afterwards by the force of their influence breed in us such inclinations and affections as are these passions For God in the beginning made all things good neither doth he forbid and condemn this love and affection in his Law so far forth as it is ruled thereby but approveth it being instituted in the Creation But when this love and affection is disordered in us and is inflamed giving way to the power of the superiours to work together with it it is not only vitious but is as it were the originall and fountain of all vices for what vice would a Man whose reason is governed by will and that will inclined by the Stars leave unperpetrated to effect them whereas if it were well ordered and ruled according to the will and institutes of God it would be the original and well-spring of all vertues Sapiens dominabitur astris a wise man through grace and the strength of reason can moderate and divert their evill influences and convert them into good seeds of virtue but if they be not well ordered and ruled they corrupt and degenerate As if Venus be Lady of the Nativity she giveth to the native a sanguine complexion whose nature is bloud and beareth greatest sway among the other humors and qualities or if she be in a ☌ ⚹ or △ of ♂ inclineth the native naturally to love if this be not moderated and well guided by reason but letteth the will receive their influence and their work upon it without any obstruction it easily passeth measure and falleth into this foolish doting passion of Love Therefore seek for grace of him that can give it and that he will grant strength of reason to divert the influxious power of the superiours and to moderate the vehement heat of this Idalian fire Let us now remove the third cause and that is Education for to remove that which comes gradually from Parents we cannot unlesse we seek to subvert Nature and utterly extinguish the race of Man but according to the old proverbe That which is bred in the bone will never out of the flesh If you finde that your Parents have been addicted to this folly and that they brought you up delicately and idly and that you feel in your self an inlcination to the same passions Corripite lora manu take up the slackned rains in time before you run your selves past recovery Addict your selves to the study of good letters flying idlenesse as a mortall enemy reading of Love books Comedies looking upon immodest Pictures feasts private familiarities loose company and have in derision even the shadow of impurity Love has no subject so apt to work upon as idlenesse therefore handle the matter so that he may alwayes finde you busied for Vitia otii negotio discutienda sunt the vices of idlenesse should be shaken off with businesse and to this effect speaks the Poet Otia si tollas frangis Cupidinis arcum An idle life forsake What made thee love a lover makes thee still The cause of nourishment of that sweet ill Shun idlenesse and Cupids bow will break His slighted flames flie out disarm'd and weak As Reeds in Marishes affect their site As Poplars in the running brooks delight So Venus joyes in sloth Let Cupid be By action tam'd live busie and live free Faint ease long sleeps which no cōmand controls Time spent in sport drench't in flowing bowls Without a wound th' enfeebled minde surprize Then in unspi'd insidious Cupid flies That sloth-affecting boy doth toyle detest Do something to imploy thy empty brest Witty and proper was that elegant invention of Lucian who faigned Cupid to invite the Gods to an amorous feast prevailed with all of them to give way to Love till he came to Pallas but she was found conversing with the Muses and would admit of no time to enter parley with Cupid By this you may see that exercise draweth the minde from effeminacy and remisnesse feeds the desire and adds fuell to Loves fires And no lesse occasion gives wanton discourse or lascivious books to the inraged affections of distempered youth Therefore as Love is entertained with idlenesse and feasts subdue him with austerity and exercise He will fall upon some object scatter and confound him As he laboureth to finde out a loose and unbridled spirit hold yours extended upon the study of some good science He requires liberty private places and night let him have witnesses and enlighten him on every side He will be governed by fantasie keep him obedient both by admonition and menaces so by this means you will banish the wanton Jack of Apes out of house and harbour The bed being a sensitive nourishment renders many lascivious fancies therefore no sooner wake but arise and
part saith he admit neither cure nor mitigation The poor inamorato loves to be in melancholy Saturnine places where he may best contemplate the beauty of his Mistresse and not be obstructed by other objects where he may best remember any one action of hers nay the very place where he last saw her for love breedeth melancholy and melancholy requires solitarinesse and solitarinesse setteth the thoughts on worke Do you think he would change his contentment for any thing in the whole Universe he is so jealous and so careful to entertain this very thought that lest he should make any a sharer with him he will retire unto the most solitary and unfrequented places that he can finde he cares not for the society of Men or all the delight that Men can devise and use to court with such care so he may enjoy his own thoughts He may be styled an Astronomer for he fixes the eye of his meditation upon the wandring Venerean Planet If you go into his study you shall finde ten amorous volumes for one pamphlet of Theologie and scarce that too O! how the shelves are stuft with Romances and his pockets with Songs and Sonnets he longs to be graduate in the University of Venus he accounts himself already Master in this art in actu designato and thinks long till he be in actu exercito nothing now in his judgement is wanting to compleate his degree but a Pone manum in manum maritae If you observe a Lover in the presence of his Mistresse you shall see him either struck dumbe or when he speaks it is but stammeringly not knowing how to speak And this is because the sense of a Lover being too earnestly intent and setled in the contemplation of the beauty of his Mistresse he doth as it were altogether forget himself and being lull'd asleep in his beloved object the over vehement intention of the minde taketh away the outward use of the tongue for experience the best Schoole-mistris whilest a Man attentively hearing any delightful musick all his other senses are out of joynt and uselesse the powers being hindered from their due operation by the concourse of the vitall spirits to that power only which so attentively worketh and therefore it is no great wonder if Men stand as mute as Fishes in the presence of their Mistresses when they have most need to speak Or because as an Amorist saith that a Lover fearing that he should not speak so as may please and tickle the ears of his Mistresse chuseth rather to be silent making his tongue more a stock then a Lambes tail then to utter his minde imperfectly and if he dare proceed so far as to open his mouth still fearing that he cannot speak as he should nor so eloquently as he would utters his minde stammeringly and interceptedly Also at that present he is of a flushing colour and looks as though he were drunk because the object from which his love taketh greatest force being present he by reason of the great joy that he feeleth in the presence thereof sendeth forth those lively flames which being plainly descried in the superficiall parts of the face do commonly give such a vermilian tincture that the whole countenance seems to be covered with a flashing kind of ardor and that by reason of the great store of spirits gathered into that place An unfortunate Lover speaks of nothing but his Mistresse and his flames he is alwayes in the fire like the Salamander he has a perpetual Mount Aetna in his breast nay saith he I will touch a Forrest with my finger and it will totally burn and waste it But contrarily he that prospers and speeds in his love or gets a pleasing answer from his Mistresse he alwayes shews a merry cheerfull countenance jocond and laughing full of spirit quick eyed eloquent and in his whole carriage full of joy and consolation This passion cannot be concealed for amorous passions do prick and wound the hearts of inamoratoes and therefore provoked by the sharpenesse of such a spur they cannot but manifest their grief for it is some comfort to him that is assailed to vent that which went in at the eye by the mouth by the help of his tongue by sighing by making complaints to senselesse creatures many times to his bed-curtains It requires much subtlety and craft to discover this passion in Women they conceal and smother it so closely that they will seem to be in a great fury and hatred when they most of all love giving peevish answers and refuse seemingly the affections presented unto them but Licet ipsa neget Vultus loquitur quodcunque teget They are like those Physitians and Lawyers that refuse a fee yet put out their hand to take it Or She 'l flie away and yet would fain With all her heart be overtain She will deny yet seem to dant A Lover when she fain would grant She will resist that you at length May seem to vanquish her by strength For thus her honour does ordain She should resist and yet but faign Yea Ladies you shall see some of your own sex so surprized with affection as it bursts out into violent extremes their discourse is semibrev'd with sighs their talk with tears they walke desperately forlorn making Woods and Groves their disconsolate consorts Their eyes are estranged from sleep their weakened appetite from repast their wearied limbs from repose Melancholy is their sole melody they have made a contract with grief till grief bring them to their graves And truely those poor Maids are to be pityed because their own tender hearts brought them to this exigent have either set their affections where they thought verily they might be requited and were not or else where they received like seeming tender of affection but afterwards rejected what they wished to effect they could not So as in time they fall in a poor Maudlins distemper by giving rains to passion till it estrange them from the soveraignty of reason I could say more but modesty will not permit me Yet some there are who are not such kinde souls nor half so passionate more discreet in their choise and in the passages of Love more temperate These will not daigin to cast a loose look upon their beloved but stand so punctually upon their termes as if they stood indifferent for their choise albeit constantly though privately resolved never to admit of any change These scorn to paint out their passions in their colours or utter their thoughts in sighes or shed one dispassionate tear for an incompassionate Lover Their experience hath taught them better notions they will seemingly flie as I have said to make them more eagerly follow and to take them by whom they are most taken They can play with the flame and never singe their wings look Love in their face and preserve their eyes converse where they take delight and colour their affection with a faigned disdain These are they who can walke in the clouds to