Selected quad for the lemma: love_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A25694
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An apology for lovers, or, A discourse of the antiquity and lawfulnesse of love by Erastophil, no proselyte, but a native of that religion.
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Erastophil.
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1651
(1651)
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Wing A3544; ESTC R8369
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23,849
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122
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comes not within the view of this sense of seeing yet possibly the Eare that hath heard such exquisite variety of all sorts of Musick such sublime and deep learned discourses that hath had derived and conveyed to it so many primitive and ancient traditions may have met with some strain something like it or at least may have heard some tidings of it No it fals not under the latitude of this sence neither Ear hath not heard it yea but yet notwithstanding it falls not within the knowledge of the sences which are corporeal yet surely the Vnderstanding which is inorganical and incorporeal and which needs not the support of these Crutches but is able to subsist act without them may be able to find out and discover what kind of place this is for we see we are able to conceive a great many things which never were nor shall be much more then as one would think this which we are as certain is as we are uncertain what it is by this we are able to move from the Center to the Circumference and back again in a moment we can dig as deep and low as Hell and immediately soar againe above the Stars and although there be in every thing that we have seen or heard something that displeaseth us for even the sweetest Musick is not without some discord and the most excellent Beauty hath its naevos and its blemishes and as the Optists tell us in their Maxime that Omnis visio fit per Pyramidem that every thing that we see enters into the eye by a sharp angle like the Cuspis of a Pyramid the object making the Basis so that it may seem to prick as it enters as Alexander said the beauty of the Persian Ladies did the Macedonians so that it made their Eyes sore again so me thinks every object hath in it really something of that figure something that is sharp and pungent something that pricketh and is distastfull and ingrate and yet nevertheless we are able by our Vnderstanding to sever and abstract whatsoever dislikes us and to retain onely so much as pleaseth Us I say by our Vnderstanding we are able to do this sure then although we never saw nor heard of them yet we may be able to conceive the joyes and pleasures that are there Why no not thus neither it hath not entred into the Heart of man to conceive Why then let us be satisfied and rest assured that they are beyond the perception of our sences and beyond the fancy of our imagination and apprehension of our Vnderstanding Seeing therefore then that we have so excellent a Reward proposed and set before us let us with all humble earnestness contend thither qua non passibus itur sed affectibus whither with our feete wee cannot come they are too slow and too heavie neither is the way at all pervious to them it must be the wings of devout and pious Affections that must bear us thither it must be Love by which we must be carried thither love to God and love to our Neighbour for no man saith St. Iohn loveth God and hateth his Brother and he gives an excellent Reason for it for * how saith he can he love God whom he hath not seen and hate his Brother whom he hath seen O Lord which art the true and perfect Love kindle in our Hearts we beseech thee the love of thy self and thy perfections Let our souls ascend thither upon the wings of Faith and Charity whither otherwise we cannot come let us die unto this World that we may live unto Thee let it seem bitter unto us that we may taste no sweetnesse but in thee O Lord we have had abundant experience of the Vanity and Falsenesse of it we have sought for contentment and satisfaction in it but we have not found it we have wandred up and down in the wayes of Wickednesse but we have found no rest for the soles of our feet and now at last that we are weather-beaten and weary now we are forsaken of every thing we come unto Thee As long as any thing would receive or entertain us we cared not we would not return and therefore thou mightest justly now deny us admission but yet O receive us for his sake who is our Peace-maker and hath parchased it at so dear a rate even with the effusion of his own most precious Bloud Jesus Christ the righteous our blessed Lord and onely Saviour AMEN FINIS * Punctum est in quo vivitis in quo regna desponitis in quo bella geritis Seneca in Praefat. ad Nat. Hist * Barelay in his Icon aâ—â—morum * Cantieâ—â—… 8. v. 7. Prov. cap. 31. 10. * Gen. 29. 17. * Ephes. cap. 5. ver. 26. * 2 Peter c. 3. v. 8. * Iudges 5. chap. ver. 28. Dr. Brown in his Religio Medici * Tul. de nat. Deorum Liâ— 1. * 1 Ioh. 4. v. 8â— * Dr Brown in his Religio medici * 1 Iohn c. 5. v. 19 * Theoerit Eidyll 25. * Matth. chap. 22. ver. 30. * 1 Cor. chap. 2. ver. 9. * 1 Iohn chap. 4. ver. 20.
is able to trample upon all extremities of heat and cold and set the Wind and Weather at defiance Certainly whatsoever it be it hath occasioned a great deal of wrangling amongst Philosophers and some of them as * Cicero saith of Velleius Epicurus de nullo magis dubitans quam ne de aliqua re dubitare videretur doubting of nothing more then least they should seem to doubt of any thing and fearing least their silence should seem to confess and acknowledge their Ignorance have given us a Definition of it such as it is Love say they is an Appetition of a Good which is present if there be an Appetition when the Good is absent it is then called Desire If there be a possibility of obtaining this absent Good why then it is Hope but how far short this comes of giving us any true knowledge what Love is I leave every one to judge For the truth of it is the Essence of it is not capable of a definition neither is it demonstrable a priori but we must content our selves with such a rude Description of it as we are able to gather from the Effects taking an imperfect and short View from thence And here me thinks Xenophon gives us some little light who as my Lord of St. Albans saith in his Advancement of Learning observeth truly That all other affections though they raise the Mind yet they do it by distorting and uncomlinesse of extasies and Excêsses onely Love doth exalt the mind and neverthelesse at the same instant doth settle and compose it strange that so different and repugnant Effects should proceed and flow from one and the same Cause and therefore it is elegantly said by Menander saith the same Lord of St. Albans elsewhere Amor melior Sophista lavo ad humanum vitam That Love teacheth a man to carry himself better then the Sophist or Preceptor which he calleth left-handed because with all his Rules and Preceptions he cannot form a man so Dexterously nor with that facility to carry and govern himself as Love can do Let us give a guesse then at the Cause by the Effects for that is all we are able to do and from these gracefull and amiable Operations imagine and conjecture how much more excellent and beautifull that must necessarily be from whence all these beauties and excellencies proceed and are derived For we know the Old Maxime Quod efficit tale illud est magis tale That which makes a thing to be so be it good or bad must needs be more and in a far greater measure so it selfe Now some have undertaken to discover and find out the intricacie of this involv'd and hidden Mystery by several Symptomes some by one and some by another as by the Eye the Pulse c. Concerning the Eye there have been great questions mov'd which are the amourous or the loving Eys Whether the dying or the smiling or the wild such as Aristotle calls in sani the mad eys for all of these have found their assertors who have tooke up the Gauntlet in maintainance and defence of them or again whether it be true what some of the Platonists held That the Spirits of the Lover do pass by the Eye into the Spirits of the Person loved which causeth the desire of return into the body whence they were emitted whereupon say they followeth that Appetite of Vnion which is in Lovers So likewise about the Pulse Whether there be not a love-Pulse or a Pulse proper and peculiar to discover Love by as wee read in Plutarch of Erasistratus the Physitian that found out that young Antiochus the son of Seleucus was in love with the fair Stratonica his fathers Wife by the unusual beating of his Pulse and then again what kind of motion it causeth whether great or little quick or slow or rather quite irregular and altogether confused like to that which is observ'd to be at the point of death at which time the Heart doth so palpitate and tremble that the Systole and Diastole are in a manner confounded This I onely mention to shew how hard a matter it is amidst so many difficulties and diversities of Opinion to state any thing aright concerning this subject Give me leave therefore to draw over the Curtain again and to leave it here seeing we may be rather said to admire then know it as long as we are here upon Earth where we see but onely in Aenigmate tanquam per speculum darkly and in much obscurity To conclude then I say that even God Almighty himself is most happy in that he is most loving infinitly loving or rather * Love it self as St. Iohn speaks the Devil is most unhappy in that he is not capable of this excelleÌ„cy and Divine perfection Having therefore the example pattern of so great a Patriarch before us let no Lover hereafter be asham'd to imitate it or write after so excellent a Copy when he reads that Iacob served seven years for Rachel and they seemed to him but a few dayes for the love he had unto her I have now done with the literall and Historicall parts of the Text I shall a little touch upon the allegoricall and so make an end This indeed is the kernel and the marrow the other is but the bone and the shell this is the spirit that quickneth and giveth life the other is but a dead letter for so Saint Paul saith Litera occidit spiritus autem vivificat By Iacob therefore is here meant every Christian Militant upon earth by the service which he indures the afflictions and crosses which he must abide and undergoe in this world by Rachel the Kingdome of Heaven By Seven Years the whole time of his life which will then seeme short and pleasing to him when his Heart is kindled and inflamed with Love towards God and Charity towards his Neighbour Let us but a little consider the vast infinite disparity and disproportion betwixt these things and surely we shall be ashamed to have made the Comparison For what shall Iacob undergo so much sufferance and hardship and that with so great delight and pleasure for a temporal Remand and should not every Christianâ—â—dure much more 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nall and far more 〈◊〉 weight of Glory For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is this life but a Stage 〈◊〉 of Misery and Discontent whereon every one acts a sad and sorrowfull part some more some less but every one hath a share Man is born to Misery saith Job as the Sparks fly upwards and how natural it is for light bodies to ascend such as sparks are every one knows What is this life but a Repetition of the same things over and over or as * one elegantly saith a Dull retaining to the Sun and Moon we eat we drink we sleep that we may eat and drink and sleep again and thus the Year runs round And as the same seasons return which were before so do we reiterate the same