I wonder not at the French for their Frogs, Snails and Toad-stools.] Toad-stools are not peculiar to the French; they were a great delicacy among the Romans, as appears every where in Martial. It was conceived the Emperor Claudius received his death by Poyson, which he took in Mushroom. Suet. and Tac.

How among so many millions of faces, there should be none alike.] It is reported there have been some so much alike, that they could not be distinguished; as King Antiochus, and one Antemon, a Plebeian of Syria, were so much alike, that Laodice, the Kings widow, by pretending this man was the King, dissembled the death of the King so long, till according to her own mind, a Successor was chosen. Cn. Pompeius, and one Vibius the Orator; C. Plancus, and Rubrius the Stage-player; Cassius Severus the Orator, and one Mirmello; M. Messala Censorius, and one Menogenes, were so much alike, that unless it were by their habit, they could not be distinguished: but this you must take upon the Faith of Pliny (lib. 7. c. 12.) and Solinus, (cap. 6.) who as this Author tells elsewhere, are Authors not very infallible.

What a at??????a??a and hot skirmish is betwixt S. and T. in Lucian.] In his Dialog. judicium vocalium, where there is a large Oration made to the Vowels, being Judges, by Sigma against Tau, complaining that Tau has bereaved him of many words, which should begin with Sigma.

Their Tongues are sharper than Actius his razor.] Actius Navius was chief Augur, who (as the story saith) admonishing Tarqu. Priscus that he should not undertake any action of moment, without first consulting the Augur, the King (shewing that he had little faith in his skill) demanded of him, whether by the rules of his skill, what he had conceived in his mind might be done: to whom when Actius had answered it might be done, he bid him take a Whetstone which he had in his hand, and cut it in two with a Razor; which accordingly the Augur did. Livy. And therefore we must conceive it was very sharp. Here the Adage was cross'd, ????? e?? ??????, i.e. novacula in cotem. Vid. Erasm. Chiliad.

It is not meer Zeal to Learning, or devotion to the Muses, that wiser Princes Patronize the Arts, etc. but a desire to have their names eterniz'd by the memory of their Writings.] There is a great Scholar, who took the boldness to tell a Prince so much. Est enim bonorum principum cum viris eruditis tacita quÆdam naturalisque Societas, ut alteri ab alteris illustrentur, ac dum sibi mutuo suffragantur, et gloria principibus, et doctis authoritas concilietur. Politian. Ep. Ludovic. Sfort. quÆ extat, lib. 11. Ep. ep. 1. And to this Opinion astipulates a Country man of our own, whose words are these: Ignotus esset Lucilius, nisi eum EpistolÆ SenecÆ illustrarent. Laudibus CÆsareis plus Virgilius et Varus Lucanusq; adjecerunt, quam immensum illud Ærarium quo urbem et orbem spoliavit. Nemo prudentiam Ithaci aut PelidÆ vires agnosceret, nisi eas Homerus divino publicasset ingenio: unde nihil mihi videtur consultius viro ad gloriam properanti fidelium favore scriptorum. Joan. Sarisb. Polycrat. l 8. c. 14. And that Princes are as much beholding to the Poets Pens as their own Swords, Horace tells Censorinus with great confidence. Od. 8. l. 4. Non incisa notis, etc.

St. Paul that calls the Cretians Lyars, doth it but indirectly, and upon quotation of one of their own Poets.] That is, Epimenides; the place is Tit. 1. v. 12. where Paul useth this verse, taken out of Epimenides.

???te? ?e? ?e?sta?, ?a?? ????a, ?ast??e? ???a?.

It is as bloody a thought in one way, as Nero's was in another. For by a word we wound a thousand.] I suppose he alludes to that passage in Sueton. in the life of Nero, where he relates that a certain person upon a time, spoke in his hearing these words,

??? ?a???t?? ?a?a ????t? p???.

i.e. When I am dead let Earth be mingled with Fire. Whereupon the Emperour uttered these words, ??? ???t??, i.e. Yea whilst I live: there by one word, he express'd a cruel thought, which I think is the thing he meant; this is more cruel than the wish of Caligula, that the people of Rome had but one Neck, that he might destroy them all at a blow.

I cannot believe the story of the Italian, etc.] It is reported that a certain Italian having met with one that had highly provoked him, put a Ponyard to his breast, and unless he would blaspheme God, told him he would kill him, which the other doing to save his life, the Italian presently kill'd him, to the intent he might be damned, having no time of Repentance.

I have no sins that want a Name.] The Author in cap. ult. lib. ult. Pseudodox. speaking of the Act of carnality exercised by the Egyptian Pollinctors with the dead carcasses, saith we want a name for this, wherein neither Petronius nor Martial can relieve us; therefore I conceive the Author here means a venereal sin.

This was the Temper of that Leacher that carnal'd with a Statua.] The Latine Annotator upon this hath these words: RomÆ refertur de Hispano quodam. But certainly the Author means the Statue of Venus Gnidia made by Praxiteles, of which a certain young man became so enamoured, that Pliny relates, Ferunt amore captum cum delituisset nocta simulachro cohÆsisse, ejusq; cupiditas esse indicem masculum. Lucian also has the story in his Dialog. [Amores.]

And the constitution of Nero in his Spintrian recreations.] The Author doth not mean the last Nero, but Tiberius the Emperour, whose name was Nero too; of whom Sueton. Secessu vero Capreensi etiam sellariam excogitavit sedem arcanarum libidinum, in quam undique conquisti puellarum et exoletorum greges monstrosiq; concubitus repertores, quos spintrias apellabat, triplici serie connexi invicem incestarent se coram ipso, ut adspectu deficientes libidines excitaret. Suet. in Tib. 43.

I have seen a Grammarian toure and plume himself over a single line in Horace, and shew more pride, etc.] Movent mihi stomachum GrammatistÆ quidam, qui cum duas tenuerint vocabularum origenes ita se ostentant, ita venditant, ita circumferunt jactabundi, ut prÆ ipsis pro nihilo habendos Philosophos arbitrentur. Picus Mirand. in Ep. ad Hermol. Barb. quÆ extat lib. nono Epist. Politian.

I cannot think that Homer pin'd away upon the Riddle of the Fishermen.] The History out of Plutarch is thus: Sailing from Thebes to the Island Ion, being landed and set down upon the shore, there happen'd certain Fishermen to pass by him, and he asking them what they had taken, they made him this Enigmatical answer, That what they had taken, they had left behind them; and what they had not taken, they had with them: meaning, that because they could take no Fish, they went to loose themselves; and that all which they had taken, they had killed, and left behind them, and all which they had not taken, they had with them in their clothes: and that Homer being struck with a deep sadness because he could not interpret this, pin'd away, and at last dyed. Pliny alludes to this Riddle, in his Ep. to his Friend Fuscus, where giving an account of spending his time in the Country, he tells him, Venor aliquando, sed non sine pugilluribus, ut quamvis nihil ceperim, non nihil referam. Plin. Ep. lib. 9, Ep. 36.

Or that Aristot.——did ever drown himself upon the flux or reflux of Euripus.] Laertius reports that Aristotle dyed of a disease at 63 years of age. For this and the last, see the Author in Pseudodox.

Aristotle doth but instruct us as Plato did him, to confute himself.] In the matter of Idea's, Eternity of the world, etc.

I could be content that we might procreate like trees without conjunction, or that there were any way to perpetuate the world without this trivial and vulgar way of Coition: It is the foolishest act a wise man commits in all his life.] There was a Physitian long before the Author, that was of the same opinion, Hippocrates; for which vide A. Gel. l. 19. Noct. Attic. c. 2. And so of late time was Paracelsus, who did undertake to prescribe a way for the generation of a man without coition. Vide Campanel. de sensu rerum, in Append. ad cap. 19. l. 4. Monsieur Montaignes words on this subject, are worth the reading; these they are: Je trouve apres tout, que l'amour n'est autre chose que la fame de cette jouyssance, et considerant maintes fois la ridicule titillation de ce plaiser par on il nous tient, les absurdes movements escervelez et estourdis dequoy il agite Zenon et Cratippus, ceste rage indiscrete, ce visage inflamme de fureur et de cruaute au plus doux effect de l'amour, et puis cette morgue grare severe et extatique en une action si folle, et que la supreme volupte aye du trainsy et du plaintiff commer la douleur, je croye qu'on se joue de nous, et que c'est par industrie que nature nous a laisse la plus trouble de nos actions les plus communes pour nous esgaller par la et apparier les fols et les sayes, et nous et les bestes. Le plus contemplatif et prudent homme quand je l'imagin en cette assiette je le tien pour un affronteur, de faire le prudent et le contemplatif: et sont les pieds du paon qui abbatent son orgueil. Nous mangeons bien et beuvons comme les bestes, mais ce ne sont pas actions, qui empeschent les operations de nostre ame, en celles-la nous gardons nostre advantage sur elles: cettecy met tout autre pensee sous le joug, abrutist et abesiit par son imperieuse authorite toute la Theology et Philosophy, qui est en Platon et si il ne s'en plaint pas. Par tout ailleurs vous pouvez garder quelque decence; toutes autres operations souffrent des Regles d'honestete: cettecy ne se peut sculement imaginer que vitieuse ou ridicule; trouvez y pour voir un proceder sage et discret. Alexander disoit qu'il se cognossoit principalement mortel par cette action et par le dormir: le sommeil suffoque et supprime les facultez de nostre ame, la besoigne les absorbe et dissipe de mesme. Certes c'est une marque non seulement de nostre corruption originelle, mais aussi de nostre vanite et disformite. D'un coste nature nous y pousse ayant attachÉ À ce desire la plan noble, utile et plaisante de toutes ses operations, et la nous laisse d'autre part accuser et fuyr comme insolent et dishoneste, en rougir et recommander l'abstinence, etc. Montaign liv. 3. chapit. 5.

And may be inverted on the worst.] That is, that there are none so abandoned to vice, but they have some sprinklings of vertue. There are scarce any so vitious, but commend virtue in those that are endued with it, and do some things laudable themselves, as Plin. saith in Panegyric. Machiavel upon Livy, lib. 1. cap. 27. sets down the ensuing relation as a notable confirmation of this truth. Julius Pontifex ejus nominis secundus, anno salutis 1505. Bononiam exercitus duxit, ut Bentivolorum familiam, quÆ ejus urbis imperium centum jam annos tenuerat, loco moveret. Eudemque in expeditione etiam Johannem Pagolum, Bagloneum tyrannum Perusinum sua sede expellere decreverat, ut cÆteros item, qui urbes EcclesiÆ per vim tenerent. Ejus rei causa cum ad Perusinam urbem accessisset, et notum jam omnibus esset quid in animo haberet: tamen impatiens morÆ, noluit exercitus expectare, sed inermis quasi urbem ingressus est, in quant Johannes Pagolus defendendi sui causa, non exiguas copias contraxerat. Is autem eodem furore, quo res suas administrare solebat, una cum milite, cui custodiam sui corporis demandarat, sese in pontificis potestatem dedidit; À quo abductus est relictusque alius, qui EcclesiÆ nomine urbem gubernaret. Hac ipsu in re magnopere admirati sunt viri sapientes, qui Pontificem comitabantur, cum Pontificis ipsius temeritatem, cum abjectum vilemq; Johannis Pagoli animum: nec causam intelligebant, ob quam permotus idem Pagolus, hostem suum inermem (quod illi cum perpetua nominis sui memoria facere licebat) non subitÒ oppresserit, et tam pretiosa spolia diripuerit; cum Pontifex urbem ingressus fuisset, Cardinalibus tantum suis stipatus, qui pretiosissimas quasq; suarum rerum secum habebant. Neque enim credebatur Pagolus a tanto facinore vel sua bonitate, vel animi conscientia abstinuisse: quod in hominem sceleratum, qui et propria sorore utebatur, et consobrinos nepotesque dominandi causa e medio sustulerat hujusmodi pii affectus cadere non viderentur. Cum igitur hac de re variÆ essent sapientum virorum sententiÆ; concluserunt tandem id ei accidisse, quod ita comparatum sit, ut homines neque plane pravi esse queant, neque perfecte boni. Pravi perfecte esse nequeant, propterea quod, ubi tale quoddam scelus est, in quo aliquid magnifici ac generosi insit, id patrare non andeant. Nam cum Pagolus neq; incestam prius horraisset, neque patricidio abstinnisset: tamen cnm oblata esset occasio, pravi quidem sed memorabilis, atque ÆternÆ memoriÆ facinoris patrandi, id attentare non ausus fuit, cum id sine infamia prestare licuisset, quod rei magnitudo omnia priora scelera obtegere potuisset, et a periculo conservare. Quibus accedit, quod illi gratulati fuissent etiam quam plurimi, si primus ausus esset Pontificibus monstrare rationem dominandi; totiusque humanÆ vitÆ usum ab illis nimis parei pendi.

Poysons contain within themselves their own Antidote.] The Poyson of a Scorpion is not Poyson to it self, nor the Poyson of a Toad is not Poyson to it self; so that the sucking out of Poyson from persons infected by Psylls, (who are continually nourished with venomous aliment) without any prejudice to themselves, is the less to be wondred at.

The man without a Navil yet lives in me.] The Latine Annotator hath explicated this by Homo non perfectus, by which it seems he did not comprehend the Author's meaning; for the Author means Adam, and by a Metonymie original sin; for the Navil being onely of use to attract the aliment in utero materno, and Adam having no mother, he had no use of a Navil, and therefore it is not to be conceived he had any; and upon that ground the Author calls him the man without a Navil.

Our grosser memories have then so little hold of our abstracted understandings, that they forget the story, and can onely relate to our awaked senses a confused and broken tale of that that hath pass'd.] For the most part it is so. In regard of the Author's expression of forgetting the story, though otherwise it be not very pertinent to this place, I shall set down a relation given by an English Gentleman, of two dreams that he had, wherein he did not forget the story, but (what is more strange) found his dreams verified. This it is.

Whilst I lived at Prague, and one night had sit up very late drinking at a feast, early in the morning the Sun beams glancing on my face, as I lay in my bed, I dreamed that a shadow passing by told me that my Father was dead; at which awaking all in a sweat, and affected with this dream, I rose and wrote the day and hour, and all circumstances thereof in a Paper-book, which book with many other things I put into a Barrel, and sent it from Prague to Stode, thence to be conveyed into England. And now being at Nurenburgh, a Merchant of a noble Family well acquainted with me and my friends, arrived there, who told me my Father dyed some two months ago. I list not to write any lyes, but that which I write, is as true as strange. When I returned into England some four years after, I would not open the Barrel I sent from Prague, nor look into the Paper-book in which I had written this dream, till I had called my Sisters and some friends to be witnesses, where my self and they were astonished to see my written dream answer the very day of my Father's death.

I may lawfully swear that which my Kinsman hath heard witnessed by my brother Henry whilst he lived, that in my youth at Cambridge, I had the like dream of my Mother's death, where my brother Henry living with me, early in the morning I dreamed that my Mother passed by with a sad countenance, and told me that she could not come to my Commencement: I being within five months to proceed Master of Arts, and she having promised at that time to come to Cambridge. And when I related this dream to my brother, both of us awaking together in a sweat, he protested to me that he had dreamed the very same; and when we had not the least knowledge of our Mother's sickness, neither in our youthful affections were any whit affected with the strangeness of this dream, yet the next Carrier brought us word of our Mother's death. Mr. Fiennes Morison in his Itinerary. I am not over-credulous of such relations, but methinks the circumstance of publishing it at such a time, when there were those living that might have disprov'd it, if it had been false, is a great argument of the truth of it.

I wonder the fancy of Lucan and Seneca did not discover it.] For they had both power from Nero to chuse their deaths.

To conceive our selves Urinals is not so ridiculous.] Reperti sunt Galeno et Avicenna testibus qui se vasa fictilia crederent, et ideirco hominum attactum ne confringerentur solicite fugerent. Pontan. in Attic. bellar. (Hist. 22.) Which proceeds from extremity of Melancholy.

Aristot. is too severe, that will not allow us to be truely liberal without wealth.] Aristot. l. 1. Ethic. c. 8.

Thy will be done though in mine own undoing.] This should be the wish of every man, and is of the most wise and knowing, Le Christien plus humble et plus sage et mieux recognoissant que c'est que de luy se rapporte a son createur de choisir et ordonner ce qu'il luy faut. Il ne le supplie dautre chose que sa volunte soit faite. Montaign.

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