MADAM, I have discharged my duty thus far, that in obedience to your commands, I have given you my answers to the opinions of three of those famous and learned Authors you sent me, viz. Hobbes, Des Cartes, and More, and explained my own opinions by examining theirs; My onely task shall be now to proceed in the same manner with that famous Philosopher and Chymist, Van Helmont; But him I find more difficult to be understood then any of the forementioned, not onely by reason of the Art of Chymistry, which I confess myself not versed in, but especially, that he has such strange terms and unusual expressions as may puzle any body to apprehend the sense and meaning of them: Wherefore, if you receive not that full satisfaction you expect from me, in examining his opinions and arguments, I beg your pardon before-hand, and desire you to remember, that I sent you word in the beginning, I did undertake this work more out of desire to clear my own opinions, then a quarrelsome humor to contradict others; which if I do but obtain, I have my aim. And so to the business: When as your Author discourses of the causes and beginnings of Natural things, he is pleased to say,[1] That Souls and Lives, as they know no Degrees, so they know no Parts; which opinion is very different from mine: For although I confess, that there is but one kind of Life, and one kind of Soul in Nature, which is the sensitive Life, and the rational Soul, both consisting not onely of Matter, but of one kind of Matter, to wit, Animate; nevertheless they are of different degrees, the matter of the rational Soul being more agil, subtil and active, then the matter of the sensitive Life; which is the reason that the rational can act in its own substance or degree of matter, and make figures in it self, and its own parts; when as the sensitive, being of somewhat a grosser degree then the rational, and not so subtil and active, is confined to work with and upon the Inanimate matter. But mistake me not, Madam, for I make onely a difference of the degrees of Subtilty, Activity, Agility, Purity, betwixt rational and sensitive Matter; but as for the rational Matter it self, it has no degrees of Purity, Subtilty and Activity in its own Nature or Parts, but is always one and the same in its substance in all Creatures, and so is the sensitive. You will ask me, How comes then the difference of so many Parts and Creatures in Nature, if there be no degrees of Purity, Activity, and Subtilty in the substance of the rational, and in the substance of the sensitive Matter? As for example: if there were no such degrees of the Parts of rational Matter amongst themselves, as also of the Parts of the sensitive, there would be no difference betwixt Animals, Vegetables, Minerals, and Elements, but all Creatures would be alike without distinction, and have the same manner of sense and reason, life and knowledg. I answer, That although each sort or degree of animate Matter, rational as well as sensitive, has in it self or its own substance no degrees of purity, rarity, and subtilty, but is one and the same in its nature or essence; nevertheless, each has degrees of quantity, or parts, which degrees of quantity do make the onely difference betwixt the several creatures or parts of Nature, as well in their general, as particular kinds; for both the rational and sensitive matter being corporeal, and so dividable into parts, some creatures do partake more, some less of them, which makes them to have more or less, and so different sense and reason, each according to the nature of its kind: Nay this difference of the degrees of quantity or parts in the substance of the rational and sensitive Matter, makes also the difference betwixt particulars in every sort of Creatures, as for example, between several particular Men: But as I said, the nature or essence of the sensitive and rational Matter is the same in all; for the difference consists not in the Nature of Matter, but onely in the degrees of quantity, and parts of Matter, and in the various and different actions or motions of this same Matter. And thus Matter being dividable, there are numerous lives and souls in Nature, according to the variousness of her several Parts and Creatures. Next your Author, mentioning the Causes and Principles of natural Bodies, assigns two first or chief beginnings and corporeal causes of every Creature, to wit, the Element of Water, and the Ferment or Leaven; which Ferment he calls a formal created being; neither a substance, nor an accident, but a neutral thing. Truly, Madam, my reason is not able to conceive this neutral Being; for it must either be something or nothing in Nature: and if he makes it any thing betwixt both, it is a strange Monster; and will produce monstrous effects: and for Water, if he doth make it a Principle of Natural things, I see no reason why he excludes the rest of the Elements: But, in my opinion, Water, and the rest of the Elements, are but effects of Nature, as other Creatures are, and so cannot be prime causes. The like the Ferment, which, to my sense and reason, is nothing else, but a natural effect of natural matter. Concerning his opinion, That Causes and Beginnings are all one, or that there is but little difference betwixt them, I do readily subscribe unto it; but when he speaks of those things, which are produced without life, my reason cannot find out, what, or where they should be; for certainly, in Nature they are not, Nature being Life and Soul her self, and all her parts being enlivened and soulified, so that there can be no generation or natural production without Life. Neither is my sense and reason capable to understand his meaning, when he says, That the Seeds of things, and the Spirits, as the Dispensers thereof, are divided from the Material Cause: For I do see no difference betwixt the Seed, and the material Cause, but they are all one thing, it being undeniable, that the seed is the matter of that which is produced. But your Author was pleased to say heretofore, that there are but two beginnings or causes of natural things, and now he makes so many more; for, says he, Of Efficient and Seminal Causes, some are efficiently effecting, and others effectively effecting: which nice distinctions, in my opinion, do but make a confusion in natural knowledg, setting a mans brain on the rack; for who is able to conceive all those ChymÆras and Fancies of the Archeus, Ferment, various Ideas, Blas, Gas, and many more, which are neither something nor no-thing in Nature, but betwixt both, except a man have the same Fancies, Visions and Dreams, your Author had? Nature is easie to be understood, and without any difficulty, so as we stand in no need to frame so many strange names, able to fright any body. Neither do natural bodies know many prime causes and beginnings, but there is but one onely chief and prime cause from which all effects and varieties proceed, which cause is corporeal Nature, or natural self-moving Matter, which forms and produces all natural things; and all the variety and difference of natural Creatures arises from her various actions, which are the various motions in Nature; some whereof are Regular, some Irregular: I mean Irregular, as to particular Creatures, not as to Nature her self, for Nature cannot be disturbed or discomposed, or else all would run into confusion; Wherefore Irregularities do onely concern particular Creatures, not Infinite Nature; and the Irregularities of some parts may cause the Irregularities of other Parts, as the Regularities of some parts do cause the Regularities of others: And thus according as Regularities and Irregularities have power, they cause either Peace or War, Sickness or Health, Delight and Pleasure, or Grief and Pain, Life or Death, to particular Creatures or parts of Nature; but all these various actions are but various Effects, and not prime Causes; which is well to be observed, lest we confound Causes with Effects. And so leaving this discourse for the present, I rest, Madam, Your Faithful Friend and Servant.
II. MADAM, It is no wonder, your Author has so many odd and strange opinions in Philosophy, since they do not onely proceed from strange Visions, Apparitions, and Dreams, but are built upon so strange grounds and principles as Ideas, Archeus, Gas, Blas, Ferment, and the like, the names of which sound so harsh and terrifying, as they might put any body easily into a fright, like so many Hobgoblins or Immaterial spirits; but the best is, they can do no great harm, except it be to trouble the brains of them, that love to maintain those opinions; for though they are thought to be powerful beings, yet being not corporeal substances, I cannot imagine wherein their power should consist; for Nothing can do nothing. But to mention each apart; first his Archeus he calls[1] the Spirit of Life; a vital gas or Light; the Balsam preferring from Corruption; the Vulcan or Smith of Generation; the stirrer up, and inward director of generation; an Air; a skiey or airy Spirit; cloathing himself presently with a bodily cloathing, in things soulified, walking through all the dens and retiring places of the seed, and transforming the matter according to the perfect act of its own Image, remaining the president and overseer or inward ruler of his bounds even till death; the Principle of Life: the Inn of Life, the onely immediate Witness, Executor, and Instrument of Life; the Prince and Center of Life; the Ruler of the Stern; the Keeper of Life, and promoter of Transmutations; the Porter of the Soul; a Fountainous being; a Flint.[2] These, and many more names your Author attributes to his Archeus, but what properly it is, and what its Nature and its peculiar office, I am not able to conceive. In the next place, Gas and Blas are to your Author also true Principles of Natural things; for[3] Gas is the Vapour into which Water is dissolved by Cold, but yet it is a far more fine and subtil thing then Vapour; which he demonstrates by the Art of Chymistry. This Gas in another place he calls[4] a Wild Spirit, or Breath, unknown hitherto; which can neither be constrained by Vessels, nor reduced into a visible body; in some things it is nothing but Water, as for example in Salt, in Fruits, and the like. But[5] Blas proceeds from the local and alterative motion of the Stars, and is the general beginning of motion, producing heat and cold, and that especially with the changing of the Winds. There is also[6] Blas in all sublunary things; witness Amulets or preserving Pomanders, whereby they do constrain objects to obey them; Which Incorporeal Blas of Government acts without a Corporeal Efflux, even as the Moon makes the Sea to swell; but the fleshly generation[7] hath a Blas of its own, and it is twofold, one which existeth by a natural Motion, the other voluntary, which existeth as a mover to it self by an Internal Willing. There is also a Blas of the Heart, which is the fuel of the Vital Spirit, and consequently of its heat. The Ferment[8] he describes to be A true Principle or Original beginning of things, to wit, a Formal Created beginning, which is neither a substance, nor an accident, but a Neutral being, framed from the beginning of the World in the places of its own Monarchy, in the manner of Light, Fire, the magnal or sheath of the Air, Forms, &c. that it may prepare, stir up, and go before the Seeds. Lastly, his Ideas are Certain formal seminal Lights,[9] mutually piercing each other without the adultery of Union; For, says he, although at first, that, which is imagined, is nothing, but a meer being of reason, yet it doth not remain such; for truely the Fancy is a sealifying vertue, and in this respect is called Imaginative, because it forms the Images of Likenesses, or Ideas of things conceived, and doth characterize them in its own Vital Spirit, and therefore that Idea is made a spiritual or seminal powerful being, to perform things of great moment. And those Ideas he makes various and numerous; as Archeal Ideas, Ideas of Diseases, Sealifying Ideas, Piercing Ideas, Forreign and strange Ideas, Mad Ideas, Irrational and Incorrigible Ideas, Staggering Ideas, and a hundred others: the like of Gas, Blas, and the rest. Thus, Madam, I have made a rehearsal of your Authors strange, and hitherto unknown, Principles (as his Confession is) of Natural things, which, to my sense and reason, are so obscure, intricate and perplex, as is almost impossible exactly to conceive them; when as Principles ought to be easie, plain, and without any difficulty to be understood; Wherefore what with his Spirits, meer-beings, non-beings, and neutral-beings, he troubles Nature, and puzles the brains of his Readers so, that, I think, if all men were of his opinion, or did follow the way of his Philosophy, Nature would desire God she might be annihilated: Onely, of all other, she doth not fear his Non-beings, for they are the weakest of all, and can do her the least hurt, as not being able to obstruct real and corporeal actions of Nature; for Nature is a corporeal substance, and without a substance Motion cannot be, and without Motion opposition cannot be made, nor any action in Nature, whether Prints, Seals, Stamps, Productions, Generations, Thoughts, Conceptions, Imaginations, Passions, Appetites, or the like: and if motions cannot be without substance; then all Creatures, their properties, faculties, natures, &c., being made by corporeal motions, cannot be Non-beings, no nor anything else that is in Nature; for non-beings are not in the number of Natural things, Nature containing nothing within her, but what is substantially, really, and corporeally existent. But your Authors Ideal Entity, (whereof he is speaking in another place of his Works,)[10] which performs all the Works of Nature, seems to me, as if it were the Jack of all Offices, or like the Jack in a Clock, that makes every Wheel move; for it hath an admirable power to put off and on Corporeality and Incorporeality, and to make it self Something and Nothing as often as it has occasion; but if this Proteus have such power, it may well be named the Magick of Nature. Your Author saith, it is not the Devil, nor any effect thereof: but certainly, in my opinion, according to its description, and the effects laid to its performance, it must be more then the Devil; wherefore, in my Reason, I cannot conceive it, neither am I able to understand his Phantastick Activity, Fancy of Forms, the Souls acting by an insensible way, and many more such like expressions. But I conceive that all these can be nothing else but the several motions of the sensitive and rational matter, which is the Active, Ingenious, Distinguishing, Knowing, Wise and Understanding part of Infinite corporeal Nature; and though Infinite Matter hath Infinite parts in general, yet there is a finiteness in every part considered by it self: not that I think a Part can really subsist single and by it self, but it is onely considered so in the manner of our Conception, by reason of the difference and variousness of natural Creatures: for these being different from each other in their figures, and not all alike, so that we can make a distinction betwixt them; this difference and distinction causes us to conceive every part of a different figure by it self: but properly and according to the Truth of Nature, there is no part by it self subsisting; for all parts are to be considered, not onely as parts of the whole, but as parts of other parts, all parts being joyned in Infinite Nature, and tied by an inseparable tie one way or other, although we do not altogether perceive it. But to return to Ideas: I had almost forgot to tell you, Madam, of another kind of Ideas, by your Author named, Bewitching or Inchanting Ideas,[11] which are for the most part found in Women, against which I cannot but take exception in the behalf of our Sex: For, says he, Women stamp Ideas on themselves, whereby they, no otherwise then Witches driven about with a malignant spirit of despair, are oftentimes governed or snatched away unto those things, which otherwise they would not, and do bewail unto us their own and unvoluntary Madness: These Ideas are hurtful to themselves, and do, as it were, Inchant, Infatuate, and weaken themselves; for so (as Plutarch witnesses) a desire of death by hanging took hold of all the young Maids in the Island Chios. By this it appears, that your Author has never been in Love, or else he would have found, that Men have as well bewitching Ideas as Women, and that they are as hurtful to Men, as to Women. Neither can I be perswaded to believe, that men should not have as well Mad Ideas as Women; for to mention no other example, some, (I will not speak of your Author) their Writings and strange Opinions in Philosophy do sufficiently witness it; but whence those Ideas do proceed, whether from the Bride-bed of the Soul, or the Splene, your Author doth not declare. As for the young Maids in Chios, I must confess, it is a very strange example; but I think there have been as many Men that have killed themselves, as Women, if not more: However, I hope, by the Grace of God, the young Maids in this Kingdom are better advised; for if they should do the like, it would be a sad fate for all young Men. To conclude, Madam, all these rehearsed opinions of your Author, concerning the Grounds or Principles of Natural Philosophy, if you desire my Unfeigned Judgment, I can say no more, but that they shew more Fancy, then Reason and Truth, and so do many others; and, perhaps, my opinions may be as far from Truth as his, although their Ground is Sense and Reason; for there is no single Creature in Nature, that is able to know the perfectest Truth: but some opinions, to humane sense and reason, may have more probability then others, and every one thinks his to be most probable, according to his own fancy and imagination, and so I think of mine; nevertheless, I leave them to the censure of those, that are endued with solid judgment and reason, and know how to discern betwixt things of fancy and reason, and amongst the rest, I submit them to the censure of your Ladiship, whose solid and wise Judgment is the rule of all the actions of, Madam, Your Faithful Friend and Servant.
III. MADAM, Your Author relating how he dissents from the false Doctrine, as he terms it, of the Schools, concerning the Elements, and their Mixtures, Qualities, Temperaments, Discords, &c. in order to Diseases, is pleased to say as follows:[1] I have sufficiently demonstrated, that there are not four Elements in Nature, and by consequence, if there are onely three, that four cannot go together, or encounter; and that the fruits which Antiquity hath believed to be mixt bodies, and those composed from a concurrence of four elements, are materially of one onely Element; also that those three Elements are naturally cold; nor that native heat is any where in things, except from Light, Life, Motion, and an altering Blas: In like manner, that all actual moisture is of Water, but all virtual moisture from the property of the seeds: Likewise, that dryness is by it self in the Air and Earth, but in Fruits by reason of the Seeds and Coagulations; and that there are not Contraries in Nature. To give you my opinion hereof, first I think it too great a presumption in any man, to feign himself so much above the rest, as to accuse all others of ignorance, and that none but he alone hath the true knowledg of all things as infallible and undeniable, and that so many Learned, Wise and Ingenious Men in so many ages have been blinded with errors; for certainly, no particular Creature in Nature can have any exact or perfect knowledg of Natural things, and therefore opinions cannot be infallible truths, although they may seem probable; for how is it possible that a single finite Creature should know the numberless varieties and hidden actions of Nature? Wherefore your Author cannot say, that he hath demonstrated any thing, which could not be as much contradicted, and perhaps with more reason, then he hath brought proofs and demonstrations: And thus when he speaks of Elements, that there are not four in Nature, and that they cannot go together, or encounter, it may be his opinion; but others have brought as many reasons to the contrary, and I think with more probability; so as it is unnecessary to make a tedious discourse thereof, and therefore I'le refer you to those that have treated of it more learnedly and solidly then I can do. But I perceive your Author is much for Art, and since he can make solid bodies liquid, and liquid bodies solid, he believes that all bodies are composed out of the Element of Water, and that Water therefore is the first Principle of all things; when as Water, in my opinion, is but an Effect, as all other natural Creatures, and therefore cannot be a cause or principle of them. Concerning the Natural coldness of Water, Air, and Earth, it may be, or not be so, for any thing your Author can truly know; but to my sense and reason, it seems probable that there are things naturally hot and moist, and hot and dry, as well as cold and moist, and cold and dry: But all these are but several effects produced by the several actions of Natural Matter, which Natural Matter is the onely Principle of all Natural Effects and Creatures whatever; and this Principle, I am confident your Author can no more prove to be Water, then he can prove that Heat, Light, Life, Motion, and Blas, are not material. Concerning what he saith, That Native Heat is no where in things, except from Light, Life, Motion, and an altering Blas: I believe that motion of life makes not onely heat, but all effects whatsoever; but this native heat is not produced onely from the motions of Particular lives in particular Creatures, but it is made by the motions of Natures life; which life, in all probability, is the self-moving Matter, which no doubt, can and doth make Light and Blas without Heat, and Heat without Light or Blas; Wherefore Light and Blas are not principles of native Heat, no more then native Heat is the principle of Light and Blas. Neither is Water the Principle of Actual moisture, nor the propriety of seeds the Principle of all Virtual moisture; but self-moving Matter is the Principle of all, and makes both actual and virtual moisture, and there is no question but there are many sorts of moistures. As for Dryness, which he says, is by it self in the Air and Earth, and in Fruits by reason of the Seeds and Coagulations: I cannot conceive how any thing can be by it self in Nature, by reason there is nothing alone and single in Nature, but all are inseparable parts of one body: perchance, he means, it is naturally and essentially inherent in Air and Earth; but neither can that be in my reason, because all Creatures and Effects of Nature are Intermixt, and there is as much dryness in other Creatures, as in Air and Earth. Lastly, as for his opinion, That there are no Contraries in Nature; I believe not in the essence or nature of Matter; but sense and reason inform us, that there are Contraries in Natures actions, which are Corporeal motions, which cause mixtures, qualities, degrees, discords, as also harmonious conjunctions and concords, compositions, divisions, and the like effects whatsoever. But though your Author seems to be an enemy to the mixtures of Elements, yet he makes such a mixture of Divinity, and natural Philosophy, that all his Philosophy is nothing but a meer Hotch-potch, spoiling one with the other. And so I will leave it to those that delight in it, resting, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
IV. MADAM, Water, according to your Authors opinion,[1] is frozen into Snow, Ice, or Hail, not by Cold, but by its own Gas. But since I am not able to conceive what his Gas is, being a term invented by him self, I will briefly declare my own opinion, which is, That Snow, Ice, and Hail, in my judgment, are made in the like manner, as Passions or Colours are made and raised in Man; for a sad discourse, or a cruel object will make a Man pale and cold, and a fearful object, will make him tremble; whereas a wanton and obscene discourse will make some red and hot. But yet these discourses and objects are onely external, occasional, and not immediate efficient causes of such alterations. Also when a Man eats or drinks any thing that is actually hot or cold, or enters into a cold or hot room, bath, or air, he becomes hot or cold by the actions of those external agents that work upon him, or rather whose motions the sensitive motions of his body do pattern out. The like for diseases; for they may be caused either by hearing ill reports, or by taking either hurtful or superfluous food into the Body, or by Infections inwardly or outwardly, and many other ways. Likewise may Colours be made different ways; And so may Snow, Ice, and Hail; for all loose, rare, and porous Bodies are more apt to alter and change then close, solid, and dense bodies; and not onely to change from what they are, but to rechange to what they were. But, Madam, many studious persons study Nature more in her own substance, then in her various actions, which is the cause they arrive to no knowledg of Natures Works; for the same parts of Matter may act or work several ways: Like as a Man, or other animal creature, may put one part of his body into various and several postures, and move it many different ways. Your Author may say, that although several Creatures may be changed to our sight or perception, yet they are not really changed in Nature. I answer, Their Principle, which is a natural matter, of which all Creatures are made, cannot be changed, because it is one, simple, and unalterable in its Nature; but the figures of several Creatures are changed continually by the various motions of this matter; not from being matter, but onely from such or such a figure into another; and those figures which do change, in their room are others produced to keep up the certain kinds of Creatures by a continual successive alteration. And as there are changes of parts, so there are also mixtures of several parts, figures and motions in one and the same Matter; for there are not different kinds in the nature of Matter: But, although Matter is of several degrees, as partly animate and partly inanimate, and the animate Matter is partly rational, and partly sensitive; Nevertheless, in all those degrees it remains the same onely or meer Matter; that is, it is nothing else but Matter, and the onely ground in which all changes are made. And therefore I cannot perceive it to be impossible in Nature, as to your Author it seems, That Water should not be transchangeable into Air; for, that he says, The Air would have increased into a huge bulk, and all Water would have long since failed: It is no consequence, because there is a Mutual transmutation of all figures and parts of Nature, as I declared above; and when one part is transchanged into another, that part is supplied again by the change of another, so that there can be no total mutation of kinds or sorts of figures, but onely a mutual change of the particulars. Neither is it of any consequence, when your Author says, That if Water should once be turned into Air, it would always remain Air, because a returning agent is wanting, which may turn Air again into Water. For he might as well say, a Man cannot go or turn backward, being once gone forward. And although he brings a General Rule, That every thing, as much as in it lies, doth desire to remain in it self; Yet it is impossible to be done, by reason there is no rest in Nature, she being in a perpetual motion, either working to the consistance of a figure, or to the uniting of several parts, or to the dissolving or dividing of several parts, or any other ways. By dissolving, I do not mean annihilating, but such a dissolving of parts as is proper for the altering of such a figure into one or many other figures. But rather then your Author will consent to the transchanging of Water into Air, he will feign several grounds, soils or pavements in the Air, which he calls Peroledes, and so many Flood-gates and Folding-dores, and make the Planets their Key-keepers; which are pretty Fancies, but not able to prove any thing in Natural Philosophy. And so leaving them to their Author, I rest, Madam, Your humble and faithful Servant.
V. MADAM, I cannot in reason give my consent to your Authors opinion,[1] That Fishes do by the force or vertue of an inbred Seed transchange simple water into fat, bones, and their own flesh, and that materially they are nothing but water transchanged, and that they return into water by art. For though my opinion is, that bodies change and alter from one figure into another, yet they do not all change into water, neither is water changed into all other figures; and certainly Fishes do not live nor subsist meerly by Water, but by several other meats, as other animals do; either by feeding upon other Fishes, the stronger devouring the weaker, or upon Mud, and Grass, and Weeds, in the bottom of Seas, Rivers and Ponds, and the like: As for example, put Fish into a Pool or Sluce, wherein there is not any thing but clear, pure water, and in a short time they will be starved to death for want of Food; and as they cannot live onely by water, so neither can they breed by the power of water, but by the power of their food, as a more solid substance: And if all Creatures be nourished by those things whereof they consist, then Fishes do not consist of water, being not nourished by water; for it is not the transchanging of water, by which Fishes live, and by which they produce; but it is the transchange of food, proceeding from other Creatures, as I mentioned above. 'Tis true, Water is a proper element for them to live in, but not to live on; and though I have neither learning, nor experience in Chymistry, yet I believe, that your Author, with all the subtilest Art he had, could not turn or convert all Creatures into pure and simple water, but there would have been dregs and several mixtures left: I will not say, that the Furnace may not rarifie bodies extreamly, but not convert them into such a substance or form as Nature can. And although he thinks Gold is made of Water, yet I do not believe he could convert it into Water by the help of Fire; he might make it soluble, fluid and rare, but all things that are supple, soluble, flowing and liquid, are not Water; I am confident no Gas or Blas will, or can transform it, nor no Art whatsoever; what Nature may do, I know not. But since your Authors opinion is, that Air is also a Primigenial Element, and in its nature a substance, Why doth he not make it a Principle of natural bodies, as well as Water? I think it had not been so improper to liken Juices to Water; but to make the onely Principle of the composition and dissolution of all Creatures to be Water, seems to me very improbable. Neither can I admit in reason that the Elements should be called, first, pure, and simple beings; we might as well call all other creatures, first, pure, and simple beings: for although the word Element sounds as much as Principle, yet they are in my reason no more Principles of Nature, then other Creatures are, there being but one Principle in Nature, out of which all things are composed, viz. the onely matter, which is a pure and simple corporeal substance; and what Man names impure dregs and filths, these are onely irregular and cross motions of that matter, in respect to the nature of such or such a figure; or such motions as are not agreeable and sympathetical to our Passions, Humors, Appetites, and the like. Concerning the Contrarieties, Differences and Wars in Nature, which your Author denies, I have spoken thereof already, and though he endeavours in a long discourse to prove, that there is no War in nature; yet, in my opinion, it is to little purpose, and it makes but a war in the thoughts of the Reader; I know not what it did in his own. But I observe he appeals often to Divinity to bear him up in Natural Philosophy; but how the Church doth approve his Interpretations of the Scripture, I know not: Wherefore I will not meddle with them, lest I offend the Truth of the Divine Scripture, wherein I desire to submit to the Judgment of the Church, which is much wiser then I, or any single Person can be. However, for all what your Author says, I do nevertheless verily believe, there is a war between Natural motions: For example; between the Regular motions of Health, and the Irregular motions of Sickness; and that things applied do oftentimes give assistance to one side or other, but many times in the conflict, the applied remedies are destroyed, and sometimes they are forced to be Neutrals: Wherefore though the nature of Infinite Matter is simple, and knows of no discord, yet her actions may be cross and opposite: the truth is, Nature could never make such variety, did her actions never oppose each other, but live in a constant Peace and Unity. And thus leaving them to agree, I am confident your Ladiship and I shall never disagree; for as long as my life doth last, I shall always prove, Madam, Your constant Friend, and faithful Servant. [1] Ch. The Fiction of Elementary Complexions and Mixtures.
VI. MADAM, Your Author condemns the Schools for saying,[1] That Air is moist, or that it may be converted into Water by pressing it together; bringing an example of an Iron Pipe, wherein Air has been pressed together, which afterwards in its driving out has, like a Hand-gun discharged with Gun-powder, sent a bullet thorow a board or plank. Truly, Madam, concerning the moisture of Air, I am against it, but the transchanging of Air into Water I do verily believe, viz. that some sorts of Air may be contracted or condensed into Water, and that Water again may be dilated into Air, but not readily, commonly and easily by Art, but onely by Nature. Wherefore your Authors Experiment can serve for no proof; for an artificial trial cannot be an infallible natural demonstration, the actions of Art, and the actions of Nature being for the most part very different, especially in productions and transmutations of natural things: Neither can an alteration of parts, cause an utter destruction of the whole, because when some parts change from their figures, other parts of matter change again into the like figures, by which successive change the continuation of the whole is kept up. Next your Author reproves the Schools for maintaining the opinion, that Air is hot; for says he, Water, Air, and Earth, are cold by Creation, because without Light, Heat, and the partaking of Life. He might, in my opinion, conclude, as well, that Man is cold by Creation, because a Chameleon, or a Fish is cold, being all of animal kind: But why may not some sorts of Air, Water and Earth be hot, and some be cold, as well as some sorts of Light are hot, and some cold; and so several other Creatures? His Reasons prove nothing: for Light doth not make Heat, nor is it the principle of Heat; and it is no consequence to say, all that is without Light is without Heat, there being many things without Light, which nevertheless are Hot; But to say, Water, Air, and Earth are cold, because they are without heat, is no proof, but a meer begging of the principle; for it is but the same thing, as if I should say, this is no Stone, because it is no Glass. And that Water, Air and Earth, do not partake of Life, must be proved first, for that is not granted as yet, there being, according to my opinion, not one Creature that wants Life in all Nature. Again: your Author is of opinion, That Water is the first and chief Principle of all Natural things. But this I can no more believe, then that Water should never change or degenerate from its essence: nay, if your Author means, there shall always be Water in Nature, it is another thing; but if he thinks that not any part of water doth or can change or degenerate in its nature, and is the principle and chief producer of all other Creatures; then he makes Water rather a Creator then a Creature; and it seems, that those Gentiles which did worship Water, were of the same opinion, whereas yet he condemns all Pagan opinions and all those that follow them. Moreover, I cannot subscribe to his opinion, That Gas and Blas from the Stars do make heat: For heat is made several ways, according to its several sorts; for there is a dry heat, and a moist heat, a burning, melting, and evaporating heat, and many more. But as for Meteors, that they are made by Gas and Blas, I can say nothing, by reason I am not skilled in Astrology, and the science of the Heavens, Stars, and Planets; wherefore if I did offer to meddle with them, I should rather express my Ignorance, then give your Ladiship any solid reasons; and so I am willing to leave this speculation to others, resting content with that knowledg Nature hath given me without the help of Learning: Which I wholly dedicate and offer to your Ladiship, as becomes, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
VII. MADAM, Having made mention in my last of your Authors opinion, That Air is in its nature Cold, I thought it fit to take a stricter view of the temper of Air, and to send you withal my own opinion thereof. First of all, I would fain know, what sort of Air your Author means; for if he thinks there is but one sort of Air, he might as well say, that there is but one sort of Animals, or Vegetables; whereas yet there are not onely different sorts of animal and vegetable kind, but also different particulars in one and the same sort: As for example; what difference is not amongst Horses, as between a Barb, a Turk, a Ginnet, a Courser of Naples, a Flanders-horse, a Galloway, an English-horse, and so forth? not onely in their shapes, but also in their natures, tempers and dispositions? The like for Cows, Oxen, Sheep, Goats, Dogs, as also for Fowl and Fish, nay, for Men. And as for Vegetables, What difference is there not between Barly and Wheat, and between French-barly, Pine-barly, and ordinary Barly; as also our English-wheat, Spanish-wheat, Turkish-wheat, Indian-wheat, and the like? What difference is there not amongst Grapes, as the Malago, Muscadel, and other Grapes, and so of all the rest of Vegetables? The same may be said of the Elements; for there is as much difference amongst the Elements as amongst other Creatures. And so of Air: for Air in some places, as in the Indies, especially about Brasilia, is very much different from our air, or from the air that is in other places: Indeed, in every different Climate, you shall find a difference of air, wherefore 'tis impossible to assign a certain temper of heat or cold to air in general. But although my sense and reason inform me, that air in its own nature or essence is neither hot nor cold, yet it may become hot or cold, by hot or cold motions; for the sensitive perceptive motions of Air may pattern out heat or cold; and hence it is, that in Summer, when as heat predominates, the air is hot; and in Winter, when as cold predominates, the air is cold. But, perhaps, you will say, air may be cooled by moving it with a Fan, or such like thing which can make wind; wherefore it follows, that air must needs be naturally cold. I answer, That doth not prove Air to be in its nature cold: for this moving or making of wind may contract or condense the air into cold motions, which may cause a cold wind, like as Ventiducts, where the air running thorow narrow Pipes makes a cold wind. The same may be done with a mans breath; for if he contract his lips close, his breath will be cold, but if he opens his mouth wide, his breath will be warm. Again: you may say, that rain is congealed by the coldness of the air into Snow, Hail and Ice. I answer; Frost, Ice, Snow and Hail, do not proceed from the coldness of the air, but rather the coldness of the air proceeds from them; for Ice, Snow, and Hail, proceed from cold contraction and condensation of a vaporous or watery substance; and, as Frost and Snow cause air to be cold, so Thunder and Lightning cause it to be hot, so long as they last. Thus, Madam, though Air may be altered either to heat or cold, yet it is neither hot nor Cold in it self. And this is all for the present that I can say concerning the Temper of Air; I conclude, and rest, Madam, Your constant Friend, and faithful Servant.
VIII. MADAM, Having hitherto considered your Authors Elements or Principles of Natural things, you will give me leave to present you now with a short view of his Opinions concerning Wind, Vacuum, Rainbows, Thunder, Lightning, Earth-quakes, and the like; which I will do as briefly as I can, lest I betray my Ignorance; for I confess my self not to be well versed in the knowledg of Meteors, nor in those things which properly belong to the Mathematicks, as in Astrology, Geography, Opticks, and the like. But your Author says, in the first place,[1] That Natural Wind is nothing but a flowing Air, moved by the Blas of the Stars. Certainly, Madam, if this were so, then, in my judgment, when the Stars blaze, we should have constant Winds, and the more they blaze, the more violent winds there would be: But I have rather observed the contrary, that when the Stars blaze most apparently, we have the calmest weather either in Summer or Winter. Perchance your Author will say, he doth not mean this apparant and visible Blas, but another invisible Blas. I answer; I know not, nor cannot conceive any other Blas in the Stars, except I had seen it in a Vision; neither do I think that Nature her self knows of any other, But your Author doth refer himself upon the Authority of Hypocrates, who says, That not onely the Wind is a blast, but that all Diseases are from blasts; and that there is in us a Spirit stirring up all things by its Blas; which Spirit, by a Microcosmical Analogy, or the proportion of a little World, he compares to the blasts of the world. As for my particular, Madam, I dare say, I could never perceive, by my sense and reason, any such blazing Spirit in me; but I have found by experience, that when my mind and thoughts have been benighted with Melancholy, my Imagination hath been more active and subtil, then when my mind has been clear from dark Melancholy: Also I find that my thoughts and conceptions are as active, if not more, in the night then in the day; and though we may sometimes dream of several Lights, yet I cannot perceive a constant light in us; however Light, Blazes, and all those effects are no more then other effects of Nature are; nor can they have more power on other Creatures, then other Creatures have on them: Neither are they made otherwise then by the corporeal motions of Natural Matter, and are dissolved and transchanged as other Creatures, out of one form or figure into another. Next your Author discoursing[2] whether there be any Vacuum in Nature, doth incline to the affirming party, that there is a Vacuum in the Air; to wit, There is in the air something, that is less then a body, which fills up the emptinesses or little holes and pores in the air, and which is wholly annihilated by fire; It is actually void of all matter, and is a middle thing between a body and an Incorporeal Spirit, and almost nothing in respect of bodies; for it came from Nothing, and so may easily be reduced to nothing. All this, Madam, surpasses my capacity; for I can in no ways conceive any thing between something and nothing, as to be less then something, and more then nothing; for all that is corporeal in Nature, is to my reason something; that is, some really existent thing; but what is incorporeal in Nature, is nothing; and if there be any absolute vacuum in Nature, as your Author endeavours to prove, then certainly this Vacuum cannot be any thing whatsoever; for a Vacuum is a pure Nothing. But many ingenious and learned men have brought as many arguments and reasons against Vacuum, as others bring for it, and so it is a thing which I leave to them to exercise their brains withal. The like is the opinion which many maintain concerning Place, viz. that there is a constant succession of Place and Parts, so that when one part removes, another doth succeed in its place; the truth and manner whereof I was never able to comprehend: for, in my opinion, there can be no place without body, nor no body without place, body and place being all but one thing. But as for the perpetual Creation and annihilation of your Authors Vacuities, give me leave to tell you, Madam, that it would be a more laborious work, then to make a new World, or then it was to make this present World; for God made this World in six days, and rested the seventh day; but this is a perpetual making of something out of nothing. Again: concerning Rainbows, your Author says,[3] That a Rainbow is not a natural effect of a natural Cause, but a divine Mystery in its original; and that it has no matter, but yet is in a place, and has its colours immediately in a place, but in the air mediately, and that it is of the nature of Light. This is indeed a great mystery to my reason; for I cannot conceive, as I said before, a place without a body, nor how Light and Colours can be bodiless: But as for Rainbows, I have observed, when as water hath been blown up into the air into bubles, that by the reflexion of light on the watery bubles, they have had the like colours of the Rainbow; and I have heard, that there hath been often seen at the rising and setting of the Sun, Clouds of divers colours; Wherefore I cannot be perswaded to believe that a Rainbow should not have a natural cause, and consequently be a natural effect; For that God has made it a sign of the Covenant between him and mortal men, is no proof, that it is not a natural effect; Neither can I believe that it has not been before the Flood, and before it was made a sign by God, as your Author imagines; for though it was no sign before the Flood, yet it may nevertheless have had its being and existence before the Flood. Moreover, as for Thunder and Lightning, your Authors opinion is; That although they may have concurring natural Causes, yet the mover of them is an Incorporeal Spirit, which is the Devil; who having obtained the Principality of this world, that he may be a certain executer of the judgments of the chief Monarch, and so the Umpire and Commissioner of Lightning and Thunder, stirs up a monstrous and sudden Blas in the Air, yet under Covenanted Conditions; for unless his power were bridled by divine Goodness, he would shake the Earth with one stroke so, as to destroy all mortal men: and thus the cracking noise or voice of Thunder is nothing but a spiritual Blas of the Evil Spirit. I will not deny, Madam, that Thunder and Lightning do argue the Power of the most Glorious God, for so do all the rest of the Creatures; but that this is the onely and immediate cause, which your Author assigns of Thunder and Lightning, I cannot believe; for surely, in my opinion, Thunder and Lightning are as much natural effects as other Creatures in Nature; and are not the Devils Blas, for I think they may be made without the help of the Devil; nay, I believe, he may be as much affraid of Thunder, as those Creatures that live on Earth. But what the causes are, and how Thunder and Lightning are made, I have elsewhere declared more at large, especially in my Philosophical Opinions. Again your Author speaking[4] of the Trembling of the Earth, thinks it is nothing else but the Judgment of God for the sins of Impenitent men. For my part, Madam, I can say little to it, either concerning the divine, or the natural cause of Earthquakes: As for the divine and supernatural Cause, which your Author gives, if it was so, then I wonder much, why God should command Earth-quakes in some parts of the World more frequent then in others. As for example; we here in these parts have very seldom Earthquakes, and those we have, which is hardly one in many ages, are not so furious, as to do much harm; and so in many other places of the World, are as few and as gentle Earth-quakes as here; when as in others, Earth-quakes are very frequent and dreadful: From whence it must needs follow, if Earth-quakes be onely a Judgment from God for the sins of Impenitent Men, and not a natural effect, that then those places, where the Earth is not so apt to tremble, are the habitations of the blessed, and that they, which inhabit those parts that are apt to tremble, are the accursed; when as yet, in those places where Earthquakes are not usual and frequent, or none at all, People are as wicked and impious, if not more, then in those where Earthquakes are common. But the question is, Whether those parts which suffer frequent and terrible Earthquakes, would not be so shaken or have such trembling fits, were they uninhabited by Man, or any other animal Creature? Certainly, in my opinion, they would. But as for the Natural Cause of Earthquakes, you must pardon me, Madam, that I cannot knowingly discourse thereof, by reason I am not so well skilled in Geography, as to know the several Soils, Climats, Parts, Regions, or Countries, nor what disposed matter may be within those parts that are subject to frequent Earthquakes: Onely this I may say, that I have observed, that the light of a small Fire or Candle, will dilate it self round about; or rather that the air round about the Fire or Candle, will pattern out both its light and its heat. Also I have observed, That a Man in a raging fit of Madness will have such an unusual strength, as ten strong men shall hardly be able to encounter or bind him, when as, this violent fit being past, a single man, nay a youth, may over-master him: Whence I conclude, that the actions, as the motions of Nature, are very powerful when they use their force, and that the ordinary actions of Nature are not so forcible as necessary; but the extraordinary are more forcible then necessary. Lastly, your Author takes great pains to prove,[5] That the Sun with his light rules the Day, and the Moon with hers the Night; and that the Moon has her own Native light; and that Bats, Mice, Dormice, Owles, and many others, as also Men, which rise at night, and walk in their sleep, see by the light and power of the Moon; also that Plants are more plentifully nourished by the night. But lest it might be concluded, that all this is said without any probability of Truth, by reason the Moon doth not every night shine upon the Earth, he makes a difference between the Manner of the Sun's and Moon's enlightning the Earth; to wit, that the Sun strikes his beams in a right line towards the Earth, but the Moon doth not respect the Centre of the World, which is the Earth, in a right line; but her Centre is always excentrical, and she respects the Earth onely by accident, when she is concentrical with the World; And therefore he thinks there is another light under the Earth even at Midnight, whereby many Eyes do see, which owes also its rise to the Moon. This opinion of your Author I leave to be examined by those that have skill in Astronomy, and know both the Light and the Course of the Moon: I will onely say thus much, that when the Moon is concentrical, as he calls it, with the World, as when it is Full and New Moon, she doth not shine onely at night, but also in the day, and therefore she may rule the day as well as the night, and then there will be two lights for the ruling of the day, or at least there will be a strife betwixt the Sun and the Moon, which shall rule. But as for Men walking asleep by the light of the Moon, my opinion is, That blind men may walk as well by the light of the Sun, as sleeping men by the light of the Moon. Neither is it probable, that the Moon or her Blas doth nourish Plants; for in a cold Moon-shiny night they will often die; but it is rather the Regular motions in well tempered matter that cause fruitful productions and maturity. And so I repose my Pen, lest it trespass too much upon your Patience, resting, Madam, Your humble and faithful Servant.
IX. MADAM, In my former, when I related your Authors opinion, concerning Earthquakes, I forgot to tell you, that he counts the Doctrine of the Schools absurd, when they say that Air, or any Exhalation, is the cause of them: For, says he, There is no place in the Pavements or soils of the Earth, wherein any airy body may be entertained, whether that body be a wind, or an airy exhalation. But since I promised I would not offer to appoint or assign any natural causes of Earthquakes, I have only taken occasion hence to enquire, whether it may not be probably affirmed, that there is air in the bowels of the Earth: And to my reason it seems very probable; I mean not this Exterior air, flowing about the circumference of the Earth we inhabite; but such an airy matter as is pure, refined, and subtil, there being great difference in the Elements, as well as in all other sorts of Creatures; for what difference is there not between the natural heat of an animal, and the natural heat of the Sun? and what difference is there not between the natural moisture of an Animal, and the natural moisture of Water? And so for the Purity of Air, Dryness of Earth, and the like: Nay, there is great difference also in the production of those Effects: As for example; the heat of the Earth is not produced from the Sun, nor the natural heat in Animals, nor the natural heat in Vegetables; for if it were so, then all Creatures in one Region or place of the Earth would be of one temper. As for example: Poppy, Night-shade, Lettuce, Thyme, Sage, Parsly, &c. would be all of one temper and degree, growing all in one Garden, and upon one patch of Ground, whereon the Sun equally casts his beams, when as yet they are all different in their natural tempers and degrees. And so certainly there is Air, Fire, and Water, in the bowels of the Earth, which were never made by the Sun, the Sea, and this Exterior elemental Air. Wherefore those, in my opinion, are in gross Errors, who imagine that these Interior Effects in the Earth are produced from the mentioned Exterior Elements, or from some other forreign and external Causes; for an external cause can onely produce an external effect, or be an occasion to the production of such or such an effect, but not be the immediate efficient or essential cause of an interior natural effect in another Creature, unless the Interior natures of different Creatures have such an active power and influence upon each other, as to work interiously at a distance, such effects as are proper and essential to their Natures, which is improbable; for though their natures and dispositions may mutually agree and sympathize, yet their powers cannot work upon their Interior Natures so, as to produce internal natural effects and proprieties in them. The truth is, it cannot be; for as the Cause is, so is the Effect; and if the Cause be an exterior Cause, the Effect must prove so too: As for example; the heat of the Sun, and the heat of the Earth, although they may both agree, yet one is not the cause of the other; for the Suns heat cannot pierce into the bowels of the Earth, neither can the heat of the Earth ascend so far as to the Center of the Sun: As for the heat of the Earth, it is certain enough, and needs no proof; but as for the heat of the Sun, our senses will sufficiently inform us, that although his beams are shot forth in direct lines upon the face of the Earth, yet they have not so much force, as to pierce into a low Celler or Vault; Wherefore it is not probable, that the Earth hath its natural heat from the Sun, and so neither its dryness from the Air, nor its moisture from the Sea, but these interior effects in the Earth proceed from some other interior causes. And thus there may be great difference between the heat, cold, moisture, and drought which is in the Elements, and between those which are in Vegetables, Minerals, and Animals, not onely in their General kinds, but also in their Particulars: And not onely a difference in the aforesaid qualities of heat, cold, moisture, and drought, but also in all other motions, as Dilations, Contractions, Rarefactions, Densations, &c. nay, in their Mixtures and Temperaments: As for example; the temper of a Mineral is not the temper of an Animal, or of a Vegetable, neither is the temper of these the temper of the exterior Elements, no more then the temper of the Elements is the temper of them; for every Creature has a temper natural and peculiar to it self, nay, every particular Creature, has not onely different tempers, compositions, or mixtures, but also different productions; or else, if there were no difference in their productions, every Creature would be alike, when as yet there are seldom two that do exactly resemble each other. But I desire you to understand me well, Madam, when I speak of Particular heats, colds, droughts, and moistures; for I do not believe that all Creatures are made out of the four Elements, no more, then that the Elements are produced from other Creatures, for the Matter of all Creatures is but one and the same; but although the Matter is the same, nevertheless, the Tempers, compositions, Productions, Motions, &c. of particular Creatures, may be different, which is the cause of their different exterior figures, or shapes, as also of their different Interiour Natures, Qualities, Properties, and the like. And so, to conclude, there is no impossibility or absurdity in affirming, that there may be Air, Fire, and Water, in the bowels of the Earth proper for those Creatures, which are in her, although not such an Elemental Air, Fire and Water, as is subject here to our senses; but another kind of Air, Fire and Water, different from those. But this being a subject for Learned and Ingenious men to work and contemplate upon, better, perhaps, then I can do, I will leave it to them, and so remain, Madam, Your constant Friend, and faithful Servant.
X. MADAM, Your Author mentioning in his Works, several Seeds of several Creatures, makes me express my opinion thus in short concerning this Subject: Several Seeds seem to me no otherwise then several Humours, or several Elements, or several other Creatures made of one and the same Matter, that produce one thing out of another, and the barrenness of seeds proceeds either from the irregularity of their natural motions, or from their unaptness or unactivity of producing. But it is to be observed, Madam, that not every thing doth produce always its like, but one and the same thing, or one and the same Creature, hath many various and different productions; for sometimes Vegetables do produce Animals, Animals produce Minerals, Minerals produce Elements, and Elements again Minerals, and so forth: for proof I will bring but a mean and common example. Do not Animals produce Stones, some in one, and some in another part of their bodies, as some in the Heart, some in the Stomack, some in the Head, some in the Gall, some in the Kidnies, and some in the Bladder? I do not say, that this Generation of Stone is made the same way as the natural generation of Animals, as, for example, Man is born of his Parents; but I speak of the generation or production of Creatures in general, for otherwise all Creatures would be alike, if all generations were after one and the same manner and way. Likewise do not Fruits, Roots, Flowers and Herbs, produce Worms? And do not Stones produce Fire? witness the Flint. And doth not Earth produce Metal? 'Tis true, some talk of the seed of Metals, but who with all his diligent observations could find it out as yet? Wherefore it is, in my opinion, not probable, that Minerals are produced by way of seeds. Neither can I perceive that any of the Elements is produced by seed, unless Fire, which seems, to my sense and reason, to encrease numerously by its seed, but not any other of the Elements. And thus productions are almost as various as Creatures, or rather parts of Creatures, are; for we see how many productions there are in one animal body, as the production of flesh, bones, marrow, brains, gristles, veines, sinews, blood, and the like, and all this comes from Food, and Food from some other Creatures, but all have their original from the onely matter, and the various motions of Nature. And thus, in my opinion, all things are made easily, and not by such constrained ways as your Author describes, by Gas, Blas, Ideas, and the like; for I am confident, Nature has more various ways of producing natural things then any Creature is able to conceive. I'le give another example of Vegetables, I pray you but to consider, Madam, how many several ways Vegetables are produced, as some by seeds, some by slips, some by grafts, &c. The graft infuses and commixes with the whole stock and the branches, and these do the like with the graft: As for example; an Apple grafted in Colewort produces Apples; but those Apples will have a taste and sent of the Colewort, which shews that several parts of several Creatures mix, joyn, and act together; and as for seeds, they are transchanged wholly, and every part thereof into the produced fruit, and every part of the seed makes a several production by the help of the co-working parts of the Earth, which is the reason that so many seeds are produced from one single seed; But Producers, that waste not themselves in productions, do not produce so numerously as those that do dissolve; yet all Creatures increase more or less, according to their supplies or assistances; for seeds will encrease and multiply more in manured and fertile then in barren grounds; nay, if the ground be very barren, no production at all will be; which shews, that productions come not barely from the seed, but require of necessity some assistance, and therefore neither Archeus, nor seminal Ideas, nor Gas, nor Blas, would do any good in Vegetables, if the ground did not assist them in their generations or productions, no more then a house would be built without the assistance of labourers or workmen; for let the materials lie never so long, surely they will never joyn together of themselves to the artificial structure of an house. Wherefore since there is so much variety in the production of one kind of Creatures, nay of every particular in every kind, what needs Man to trouble his brain for the manner and way to describe circumstantially every particular production of every Creature by seminal or printing Ideas, or any other far-fetched termes, since it is impossible to be done? And as for those Creatures whose producers are of two different sorts, as a Mule bred of an Asse and a Horse, and another Creature bred of a Cony and a Dormouse; all which your Author thinks[1] do take more after their mother then their father, more after the breeder then the begetter; I will not eagerly affirm the contrary, although it seems to me more probable: But this I can say, that I have observed by experience, that Faunes and Foales have taken more after the Male then after the Female; for amongst many several colour'd Deer, I have seen but one milk white Doe; and she never brought forth a white Faun, when as I have seen a white Buck beget white and speckled Faunes of black and several coloured Does. Also in Foals I have observed, that they have taken more after the Male then after the Female, both in shape and colour. And thus I express no more, but what I have observed my self, others may find out more examples; these are sufficient for me; so I leave them, and rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
XI. MADAM, You will cease to wonder, that I am not altogether capable to understand your Authors opinions in Natural Philosophy, when you do but consider, that his expressions are for the most part so obscure, mystical and intricate, as may puzzle any brain that has not the like Genius, or the same Conceptions with your Author; wherefore I am forced oftentimes to express my ignorance rather, then to declare to you the true sense of his opinions. In the number of these is his discourse of a Middle Life,[1] viz. That the qualities of a middle life do remain in things that are transchanged: For I cannot understand what he means by a middle life; whether it be a life that is between the strongest and weakest, or whether he means a life between the time of production and dissolution, or between the time of conception and production; or whether he means a life that is between two sorts of substances, as more then an Animal, and not so high and excellent as an Angel; or whether he means a middle life for places, as neither in Heaven nor in Hell, but in Purgatory, or neither in, nor out of the world, or any other kind of life: Wherefore I'le leave this Hermaphroditical or neutral life to better understandings then mine. Likewise I must confess my disability of conceiving the overshadowing of his Archeus, and how it brings this middle life into its first life. For concerning Generation, I know of none that is performed by overshadowing, except it be the miraculous conception of the blessed Virgin, as Holy Writ informs us; and I hope your Author will not compare his Archeus to the Holy Spirit; But how a middle life may be brought again into the first life, is altogether unconceivable to me: And so is that, when he says, that the first life of the Fruit is the last of the seed; for I cannot imagine, that the seed dies in the fruit; but, in my opinion, it lives rather in the fruit, and is numerously increased, as appears by the production of seed from the fruit. But the most difficult of all to be understood, are his Ideas,[2] which he makes certain seminal Images, Formal Lights, and operative means, whereby the soul moves and governs the body; whose number and variety is so great, as it transcends my capacity, there being Ideas of Inclination, of Affection, of Consideration or Judgment, of Passion, and these either mild, or violent, besides a great number of Archeal and forreign Ideas. Truly, Madam, I cannot admire enough the powerful effects of these Ideas, they themselves being no substances or material Creatures; For how that can pierce, seal, and print a figure, which hath neither substance nor matter, my reason is not able to comprehend, since there can be no figure without matter or substance, they being inseparably united together, so, that where figure is, there is also substance, and where substance is, there is also figure; neither can any figure be made without a substance. You may say, Ideas, though they are not material or corporeal beings themselves, yet they may put on figures, and take bodies when they please: I answer, That then they can do more then Immaterial Spirits; for the Learned say, That Immaterial Spirits are Immaterial substances; but your Author says, that Ideas are no substances; and I think it would be easier for a substance to take a body, then for that which is no substance: But your Author might have placed his Ideas as well amongst the number of Immaterial Spirits, to wit, amongst Angels and Devils, and then we should not have need to seek far for the causes of the different natures and dispositions of Mankind, but we might say, that Ill-natured men proceeded from Evil, and Good-natured men from Good Spirits or Ideas. However, Madam, I do not deny Ideas, Images, or Conceptions of things, but I deny them onely to be such powerful beings and Principal efficient Causes of Natural effects; especially they being to your Author neither bodies nor substances themselves. And as for the Figure of a Cherry, which your Author makes so frequent a repetition of, made by a longing Woman on her Child; I dare say that there have been millions of Women, which have longed for some or other thing, and have not been satisfied with their desires, and yet their Children have never had on their bodies the prints or marks of those things they longed for: but because some such figures are sometimes made by the irregular motions of animate Matter, would this be a sufficient proof, that all Conceptions, Ideas and Images have the like effects, after the same manner, by piercing or penetrating each other, and sealing or printing such or such a figure upon the body of the Child? Lastly, I cannot but smile when I read that your Author makes a Disease proceed from a non-being to a substantial being: Which if so, then a disease, according to his opinion, is made as the World was, that is, out of Nothing; but surely luxurious persons find it otherwise, who eat and drink more then their natural digestive motions can dispose; for those that have infirm bodies, caused by the irregular motions of animate matter, find that a disease proceeds from more then a non-being. But, Madam, I have neither such an Archeus, which can produce, in my mind, an Idea of Consent or approbation of these your Authors opinions, nor such a light that is able to produce a beam of Patience to tarry any longer upon the examination of them; Wherefore I beg your leave to cut off my discourse here, and onely to subscribe my self, as really I am, Madam, Your humble and faithful Servant.
XII. MADAM, I cannot well apprehend your Authors meaning, when he says,[1] That Nature doth rise from its fall; for if he understands Nature in general, I cannot imagine how she should fall and rise; for though Man did fall, yet Nature never did, nor cannot fall, being Infinite: And therefore in another place,[2] when he saith, that Nature first being a beautiful Virgin, was defiled by sin; not by her own, but by Mans sin, for whose use she was created; I think it too great a presumption and arrogancy to say that Infinite Nature was not onely defiled by the sin of Man, but also to make Man the chief over all Nature, and to believe Nature was onely made for his sake; when as he is but a small finite part of Infinite Nature, and almost Nothing in comparison to it. But I suppose your Author doth not understand Nature in general, but onely the nature of some Particulars, when he speaks of the fall and rise of Nature; however, this fall and rise of the nature of Particulars, is nothing but a change of their natural motions. And so likewise, I suppose, he understands the nature of Particulars, when he says in another place,[3] That Nature in diseases is standing, sitting, and lying; for surely Nature in general has more several postures then sitting, standing, or lying: As also when he speaks[4] of the Vertues and Properties that stick fast in the bosom of Nature, which I conceive to be a Metaphorical expression; although I think it best to avoid Metaphorical, similizing, and improper expressions in Natural Philosophy, as much as one can; for they do rather obscure then explain the truth of Nature; nay, your Author himself is of this opinion,[5] and yet he doth nothing more frequent then bring in Metaphors and similitudes. But to speak properly, there is not any thing that sticks fast in the bosom of Nature, for Nature is in a perpetual motion: Neither can she be heightened or diminished by Art; for Nature will be Nature in despite of her Hand-maid. And as for your Authors opinion, That there are no Contraries in Nature, I am quite of a contrary mind, that there is a Perpetual war and discord amongst the parts of Nature, although not in the nature and substance of Infinite Matter, which is of a simple kind, and knows no contraries in it self, but lives in Peace, when as the several actions are opposing and crossing each other; and truly, I do not believe, that there is any part or Creature of Nature, that hath not met with opposers, let it be never so small or great. But as War is made by the division of Natures parts, and variety of natural actions, so Peace is caused by the unity and simplicity of the nature and essence of onely Matter, which Nature is peaceable, being always one and the same, and having nothing in it self to be crossed or opposed by; when as the actions of Nature, or natural Matter, are continually driving against each other, as being various and different. Again your Author says, That a Specifical being cannot be altered but by Fire, and that Fire is the Death of other Creatures: also that Alchymy, as it brings many things to a degree of greater efficacy, and stirs up a new being, so on the other hand again, it by a privy filching doth enfeeble many things. I, for my part, wonder, that Fire, being as your Author says, no substantial body, but substanceless in its nature, should work such effects; but however, I believe there are many alterations without Fire, and many things which cannot be altered by Fire. What your Authors meaning is of a new being, I know not; for, to my reason, there neither is; nor can be made any new being in Nature, except we do call the change of motions and figures a new Creation; but then an old suit turned or dressed up may be called new too. Neither can I conceive his Filching or Stealing: For Nature has or keeps nothing within her self, but what is her own; and surely she cannot steal from her self; nor can Art steal from Nature; she may trouble Nature, or rather make variety in Nature, but not take any thing from her, for Art is the insnarled motions of Nature: But your Author, being a Chymist, is much for the Art of Fire, although it is impossible for Art to work as Nature doth; for Art makes of natural Creatures artificial Monsters, and doth oftner obscure and disturb Natures ordinary actions, then prove any Truth in Nature. But Nature loving variety doth rather smile at Arts follies, then that she should be angry with her curiosity: like as for example, a Poet will smile in expressing the part or action of a Fool. Wherefore Pure natural Philosophers, shall by natural sense and reason, trace Natures ways, and observe her actions, more readily then Chymists can do by Fire and Furnaces; for Fire and Furnaces do often delude the Reason, blind the Understanding, and make the Judgment stagger. Nevertheless, your Author is so taken with Fire, that from thence he imagines a Formal Light, which he believes to be the Tip-top of Life; but certainly, he had, in my opinion, not so much light as to observe, that all sorts of light are but Creatures, and not Creators; for he judges of several Parts of Matter, as if they were several kinds of Matter, which causes him often to err, although he conceits himself without any Error. In which conceit I leave him, and rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and humble Servant. [4] Nature is ignorant of Contraries.
XIII. MADAM, The Art of Fire, as I perceive, is in greater esteem and respect with your Author, then Nature her self: For he says,[1] That some things can be done by Art, which Nature cannot do; nay he calls[2] Art The Mistress of Nature, and subjects whole Nature unto Chymical speculation; For, nothing, says he,[3] doth more fully bring a Man, that is greedy of knowing, to the knowledg of all things knowable, then the Fire; for the root or radical knowledg of natural things consists in the Fire:[4] It pierces the secrets of Nature, and causes a further searching out in Nature, then all other Sciences, being put together; and pierces even into the utmost depths of real truth:[5] It creates things which never were before. These, and many more the like expressions, he has in the praise of Chymistry. And truly, Madam, I cannot blame your Author, for commending this Art, because it was his own profession, and no man will be so unwise as to dispraise his own Art which he professes; but whether those praises and commendations do not exceed truth, and express more then the Art of Fire can perform, I will let those judg, that have more knowledg therein then I: But this I may say, That what Art or Science soever is in Nature, let it be the chief of all, yet it can never be call'd the Mistress of Nature, nor be said to perform more then Nature doth, except it be by a divine and supernatural Power; much less to create things which never were before, for this is an action which onely belongs to God: The truth is, Art is but a Particular effect of Nature, and as it were, Nature's Mimick or Fool, in whose playing actions she sometimes takes delight; nay, your Author confesses it himself, when he calls[6] the Art of Chymistry, Nature's emulating Ape, and her Chamber-maid, and yet he says, she is now and then the Mistress of Nature; which in my opinion doth not agree: for I cannot conceive how it is possible to be a Chambermaid, and yet to be the Mistress too; I suppose your Author believes, they justle sometimes each other out, or take by turns one anothers place. But whatever his opinion be, I am sure, that the Art of Fire cannot create and produce so, as Nature doth, nor dissolve substances so, as she doth, nor transform and transchange, as she doth, nor do any effect like Nature: And therefore I cannot so much admire this Art as others do, for it appears to me, rather to be a troubler, then an assistant to Nature, producing more Monsters then perfect Creatures; nay, it rather doth shut the Gates of Truth, then unlock the Gates of Nature: For how can Art inform us of Nature, when as it is but an effect of Nature? You may say, The cause cannot be better known then by its effect; for the knowledg of the effect, leads us to the knowledg of the cause. I answer, 'Tis true: but you will consider, that Nature is an Infinite cause, and has Infinite effects; and if you knew all the Infinite effects in nature, then perhaps you might come to some knowledg of the cause; but to know nature by one single effect, as art is, is impossible; nay, no man knows this particular effect as yet perfectly; For who is he, that has studied the art of fire so, as to produce all that this art may be able to afford? witness the Philosophers-stone. Besides, how is it possible to find out the onely cause by so numerous variations of the effects? Wherefore it is more easie, in my opinion, to know the various effects in Nature by studying the Prime cause, then by the uncertain study of the inconstant effects to arrive to the true knowledg of the prime cause; truly it is much easier to walk in a Labyrinth without a Guide, then to gain a certain knowledg in any one art or natural effect, without Nature her self be the guide, for Nature is the onely Mistress and cause of all, which, as she has made all other effects, so she has also made arts for varieties sake; but most men study Chymistry more for imployment, then for profit; not but that I believe, there may be some excellent Medicines found out and made by that art, but the expence and labour is more then the benefit; neither are all those Medicines sure and certain, nor in all diseases safe; neither can this art produce so many medicines as there are several diseases in Nature, and for the Universal Medicine, and the Philosophers-stone or Elixir, which Chymists brag of so much; it consists rather in hope and expectation, then in assurance; for could Chymists find it out, they would not be so poor, as most commonly they are, but richer then Solomon was, or any Prince in the World, and might have done many famous acts with the supply of their vast Golden Treasures, to the eternal and immortal fame of their Art; nay, Gold being the Idol of this world, they would be worshipped as well for the sake of Gold, as for their splendorous Art; but how many have endeavored and laboured in vain and without any effect? Gold is easier to be made, then to be destroyed, says your Author,[7] but I believe one is as difficult or impossible, nay more, then the other; for there is more probability of dissolving or destroying a natural effect by Art, then of generating or producing one; for Art cannot go beyond her sphere of activity, she can but produce an artificial effect, and Gold is a natural Creature; neither were it Justice, that a particular creature of Nature should have as much power to act or work as Nature her self; but because neither Reason, nor Art has found out as yet such a powerful opposite to Gold, as can alter its nature; men therefore conclude that it cannot be done. Your Author relates[8] to have seen the Gold-making stone, which he says, was of colour such, as Saffron is in its powder, but weighty and shining like unto powder'd Glass; one fourth part of one grain thereof, (a grain he reckons the six hundredth part of one ounce) being projected upon eight ounces of Quicksilver made hot in a Crucible, and straight way there were found eight ounces, and a little less then eleven grains of the purest Gold; therefore one onely grain of that powder had transchanged 19186 parts of Quicksilver, equal to it self, into the best Gold. Truly, Madam, I wish with all my heart, the poor Royalists had had some quantity of that powder; and I assure you, that if it were so, I my self would turn a Chymist to gain so much as to repair my Noble Husbands losses, that his noble family might flourish the better. But leaving Gold, since it is but a vain wish, I do verily believe, that some of the Chymical medicines do, in some desperate cases, many times produce more powerful and sudden effects then the medicines of Galenists, and therefore I do not absolutely condemn the art of Fire, as if I were an enemy to it; but I am of an opinion, that my Opinions in Philosophy, if well understood, will rather give a light to that art, then obscure its worth; for if Chymists did but study well the corporeal motions or actions of Natures substantial body; they would, by their observations, understand Nature better, then they do by the observation of the actions of their Art; and out of this consideration and respect, I should almost have an ambition, to become an Artist in Chymistry, were I not too lazie and tender for that imployment; but should I quit the one, and venture the other, I am so vain as to perswade my self, I might perform things worthy my labour upon the ground of my own Philosophy, which is substantial Life, Sense, and Reason; for I would not study Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury, but the Natural motions of every Creature, and observe the variety of Natures actions. But, perchance, you will smile at my vain conceit, and, it may be, I my self, should repent of my pains unsuccessfully bestowed, my time vainly spent, my health rashly endangered, and my Noble Lords Estate unprofitably wasted, in fruitless tryals and experiments; Wherefore you may be sure, that I will consider well before I act; for I would not lose Health, Wealth, and Fame, and do no more then others have done, which truly is not much, their effects being of less weight then their words. But in the mean time, my study shall be bent to your service, and how to express my self worthily, MADAM, Your Ladiships humble and faithful Servant.
XIV. MADAM, I have read your Authors discourse concerning Sensation,[1] but it was as difficult to me to understand it, ash was tedious to read it; Truly, all the business, might have been easily declared in a short Chapter, and with more clearness and perspicuity: For Sensation, is nothing else but the action of sense proceeding from the corporeal sensitive motions, which are in all Creatures or parts of Nature, and so all have sense and sensation, although not alike after one and the same manner, but some more, some less, each according to the nature and propriety of its figure. But your Author speaks of Motion without Sense, and Sense without Motion, which is a meer impossibility; for there is not, nor cannot be any Motion in Nature without Sense, nor any Sense without Motion; there being no Creature without self-motion, although not always perceptible by us, or our external senses; for all motion is not exteriously local, and visible. Wherefore, not any part of Nature, according to my opinion, wants Sense and Reason, Life and Knowledg; but not such a substanceless Life as your Author describes, but a substantial, that is a corporeal Life. Neither is Light the principle of Motion, but Motion, is the principle of Light: Neither is Heat the principle of Motion, but its effect as well as Cold is; for I cannot perceive that Heat should be more active then Cold. Neither is there any such thing as Unsensibleness in Nature, except it be in respect of some particular Sensation in some particular Figure: As for example, when an Animal dies, or its Figure is dissolved from the Figure of an Animal; we may say it hath not animal sense or motion, but we cannot say, it hath no sense or motion at all; for as long as Matter is in Nature, Sense and Motion will be; so that it is absurd and impossible to believe, or at least to think, that Matter, as a body, can be totally deprived of Life, Sense, and Motion, or that Life can perish and be corrupted, be it the smallest part of Matter conceivable, and the same turned or changed into millions of Figures; for the Life and Soul of Nature is self-moving Matter, which by Gods Power, and leave, is the onely Framer and Maker, as also the Dissolver and Transformer of all Creatures in Nature, making as well Light, Heat, and Cold, Gas, Blas, and Ferments, as all other natural Creatures beside, as also Passions, Appetites, Digestions, Nourishments, Inclination, Aversion, Sickness and Health; nay, all Particular Ideas, Thoughts, Fancies, Conceptions, Arts, Sciences, &c. In brief, it makes all that is to be made in Nature. But many great Philosophers conceive Nature to be fuller of Intricacy, Difficulty, and Obscurity, then she is, puzling themselves about her ordinary actions, which yet are easie and free, and making their arguments hard, constrained, and mystical, many of them containing neither sense nor reason; when as, in my opinion, there is nothing else to be studied in Nature, but her substance and her actions. But I will leave them to their own Fancies and Humors, and say no more, but rest, Madam, Your humble and faithful Servant.
XV. MADAM, Concerning Sympathy and Antipathy, and attractive or magnetick Inclinations, which some do ascribe to the influence of the Stars, others to an unknown Spirit as the Mover, others to the Instinct of Nature, hidden Proprieties, and certain formal Vertues; but your Author,[1] doth attribute to directing Ideas, begotten by their Mother Charity, or a desire of Good Will, and calls it[2] a Gift naturally inherent in the Archeusses of either part: If you please to have my opinion thereof, I think they are nothing else but plain ordinary Passions and Appetites. As for example: I take Sympathy, as also Magnetisme or attractive Power, to be such agreeable Motions in one part or Creature, as do cause a Fancy, love and desire to some other part or Creature; and Antipathy, when these Motions are disagreeable, and produce contrary effects, as dislike, hate and aversion to some part or Creature. And as there are many sorts of such motions, so there are many sorts of Sympathyes and Antipathyes, or Attractions and Aversions, made several manners or ways; For in some subjects, Sympathy requires a certain distance; as for example, in Iron and the Loadstone; for if the Iron be too far off, the Loadstone cannot exercise its power, when as in other subjects, there is no need of any such certain distance, as betwixt the Needle and the North-pole, as also the Weapon-salve; for the Needle will turn it self towards the North, whether it be near or far off from the North-pole; and so, be the Weapon which inflicted the wound, never so far from the wounded Person, as they say, yet it will nevertheless do its effect: But yet there must withal be some conjunction with the blood; for as your Author mentions,[3] the Weapon shall be in vain anointed with the Unguent, unless it be made bloody, and the same blood be first dried on the same Weapon. Likewise the sounding of two eights when one is touched, must be done within a certain distance: the same may be said of all Infectious and catching Diseases amongst Animals, where the Infection, be it the Infected Air, or a Poysonous Vapour, or any thing else, must needs touch the body, and enter either through the Mouth, or Nostrils, or Ears, or Pores of the body; for though the like Antipathies of Infectious Diseases, as of the Plague, may be in several places far distant and remote from each other at one and the same time, yet they cannot infect particular Creatures, or Animals, without coming near, or without the sense of Touch: For example; the Plague may be in the East Indies, and in this Kingdom, at one and the same time, and yet be strangers to each other; for although all Men are of Mankind, yet all have not Sympathy or Antipathy to each other; the like of several Plagues, although they be of the same kind of disease, yet, being in several places at one time, they may not be a kin to each other, nor one be produced by the other, except the Plague be brought over out of an infected Country, into a sound Country, by some means or other. And thus some Sympathy and Antipathy is made by a close conjunction, or corporeal uniting of parts, but not all; neither is it required, that all Sympathy and Antipathy must be mutual, or equally in both Parties, so that that part or party, which has a Sympathetical affection or inclination to the other, must needs receive the like sympathetical affection from that part again; for one man may have a sympathetical affection to another man, when as this man hath an antipathetical aversion to him; and the same may be, for ought we know, betwixt Iron and the Loadstone, as also betwixt the Needle and the North; for the Needle may have a sympathy towards the North, but not again the North towards the Needle; and so may the Iron have towards the Loadstone, but not again the Loadstone towards the Iron: Neither is Sympathy or Antipathy made by the issuing out of any invisible rayes, for then the rays betwixt the North and the Needle would have a great way to reach: But a sympathetical inclination in a Man towards another, is made either by sight, or hearing; either present, or absent: the like of infectious Diseases. I grant, that if both Parties do mutually affect each other, and their motions be equally agreeable; then the sympathy is the stronger, and will last the longer, and then there is a Union, Likeness, or Conformableness, of their Actions, Appetites, and Passions; For this kind of Sympathy works no other effects, but a conforming of the actions of one party, to the actions of the other, as by way of Imitation, proceeding from an internal sympathetical love and desire to please; for Sympathy doth not produce an effect really different from it self, or else the sympathy betwixt Iron and the Loadstone would produce a third Creature different from themselves, and so it would do in all other Creatures. But as I mentioned above, there are many sorts of attractions in Nature, and many several and various attractions onely in one sort of Creatures, nay, so many in one particular as not to be numbred; for there are many Desires, Passions, and Appetites, which draw or intice a man to something or other, as for example, to Beauty, Novelty, Luxury, Covetousness, and all kinds of Vertues and Vices; and there are many particular objects in every one of these, as for example, in Novelty. For there are so many several desires to Novelty, as there are Senses, and so many Novelties that satisfie those desires, as a Novelty to the Ear, a Novelty to the Sight, to Touch, Taste, and Smell; besides in every one of these, there are many several objects; To mention onely one example, for the novelty of Sight; I have seen an Ape, drest like a Cavalier, and riding on Horse-back with his sword by his side, draw a far greater multitude of People after him, then a Loadstone of the same bigness of the Ape would have drawn Iron; and as the Ape turn'd, so did the People, just like as the Needle turns to the North; and this is but one object in one kind of attraction, viz. Novelty: but there be Millions of objects besides. In like manner good cheer draws abundance of People, as is evident, and needs no Demonstration. Wherefore, as I said in the beginning, Sympathy is nothing else but natural Passions and Appetites, as Love, Desire, Fancy, Hunger, Thirst, &c. and its effects are Concord, Unity, Nourishment, and the like: But Antipathy is Dislike, Hate, Fear, Anger, Revenge, Aversion, Jealousie, &c. and its effects are Discord, Division, and the like. And such an Antipathy is between a Wolf and a Sheep, a Hound and a Hare, a Hawk and a Partridg, &c. For this Antipathy is nothing else but fear in the Sheep to run away from the Wolf, in the Hare to run from the Hound, and in the Partridg to flie from the Hawk; for Life has an Antipathy to that which is named Death; and the Wolf's stomack hath a sympathy to food, which causes him to draw neer, or run after those Creatures he has a mind to feed on. But you will say, some Creatures will fight, and kill each other, not for Food, but onely out of an Antipathetical nature. I answer: When as Creatures fight, and endeavour to destroy each other, if it be not out of necessity, as to preserve and defend themselves from hurt or danger, then it is out of revenge, or anger, or ambition, or jealousie, or custom of quarrelling, or breeding. As for example: Cocks of the Game, that are bred to fight with each other, and many other Creatures, as Bucks, Staggs, and the like, as also Birds, will fight as well as Men, and seek to destroy each other through jealousie; when as, had they no Females amongst them, they would perhaps live quiet enough, rather as sympathetical Friends, then antipathetical Foes; and all such Quarrels proceed from a sympathy to their own interest. But you may ask me, what the reason is, that some Creatures, as for example, Mankind, some of them, will not onely like one sort of meat better then another of equal goodness and nourishment, but will like and prefer sometimes a worse sort of meat before the best, to wit, such as hath neither a good taste nor nourishment? I answer: This is nothing else, but a particular, and most commonly an inconstant Appetite; for after much eating of that they like best, especially if they get a surfeit, their appetite is chang'd to aversion; for then all their feeding motions and parts have as much, if not more antipathy to those meats, as before they had a sympathy to them. Again, you may ask me the reason, why a Man seeing two persons together, which are strangers to him, doth affect one better then the other; nay, if one of these Persons be deformed or ill-favoured, and the other well-shaped and handsom; yet it may chance, that the deformed Person shall be more acceptable in the affections and eyes of the beholder, then he that is handsom? I answer: There is no Creature so deformed, but hath some agreeable and attractive parts, unless it be a Monster, which is never loved, but for its rarity and novelty, and Nature is many times pleased with changes, taking delight in variety: and the proof that such a sympathetical affection proceeds from some agreeableness of Parts, is, that if those persons were vail'd, there would not proceed such a partial choice or judgment from any to them. You may ask me further, whether Passion and Appetite are also the cause of the sympathy which is in the Loadstone towards Iron, and in the Needle towards the North? I answer, Yes: for it is either for nourishment, or refreshment, or love and desire of association, or the like, that the Loadstone draws Iron, and the Needle turns towards the North. The difference onely betwixt the sympathy in the Needle towards the North, and betwixt the sympathy in the Loadstone towards the Iron is, that the Needle doth always turn towards the North, but the Loadstone doth not always draw Iron: The reason is, because the sympathy of the Needle towards the North requires no certain distance, as I said in the beginning; and the North-pole continuing constantly in the same place, the Needle knows whither to turn; when as the sympathy between the Loadstone and Iron requires a certain distance, and when the Loadstone is not within this compass or distance, it cannot perform its effect, to wit, to draw the Iron, but the effect ceases, although the cause remains in vigour. The same may be said of the Flower that turns towards the Sun; for though the Sun be out of sight, yet the Flower watches for the return of the Sun, from which it receives benefit: Like as faithful Servants watch and wait for their Master, or hungry Beggers at a Rich man's door for relief; and so doth the aforesaid Flower; nay, not the Flower onely, but any thing that has freedom and liberty of motion, will turn towards those Places or Creatures whence it expects relief. Concerning ravenous Beasts that feed on dead Carcasses, they, having more eager appetites then food, make long flights into far distant Countries to seek food to live on; but surely, I think, if they had food enough at home, although not dead Carcasses, they would not make such great Journies; or if a battel were fought, and many slain, and they upon their journey should meet with sufficient food, they would hardly travel further before they had devoured that food first: But many Birds travel for the temper of the Air, as well as for food, witness Woodcocks, Cranes, Swallows, Fieldfares, and the like; some for cold, some for hot, and some for temperate Air. And as for such Diseases as are produced by conceit and at distance, the cause is, the fearfulness of the Patient, which produces Irregularities in the Mind, and these occasion Irregularities in the Body, which produce such a disease, as the Mind did fearfully apprehend; when as without that Passion and Irregularity, the Patient would, perhaps, not fall sick of that disease, But to draw towards an end, I'le answer briefly to your Authors alledged example[4] which he gives of Wine, that it is troubled while the Vine flowreth: The reason, in my opinion, may perhaps be, that the Wine being the effect of the Vine, and proceeding from its stock as the producer, has not so quite alter'd Nature, as not to be sensible at all of the alteration of the Vine; For many effects do retain the proprieties of their causes; for example, many Children are generated, which have the same proprieties of their Parents, who do often propagate some or other vertuous or vicious qualities with their off-spring; And this is rather a proof that there are sensitive and rational motions, and sensitive and rational knowledge in all Creatures, and so in Wine, according to the nature or propriety of its Figure; for without motion, sense and reason, no effect could be; nor no sympathy or antipathy. But it is to be observed, that many do mistake the true Causes, and ascribe an effect to some cause, which is no more the cause of that same effect, then a particular Creature is the cause of Nature; and so they are apt to take the Fiddle for the hot Bricks, as if the Fiddle did make the Ass dance, when as it was the hot Bricks that did it; for several effects may proceed from one cause, and one effect from several causes; and so in the aforesaid example, the Wine may perhaps be disturbed by the alteration of the weather at the same time of the flowring of the Vines; and so may Animals, as well as Vegetables, and other Creatures, alter alike at one and the same point of time, and yet none be the cause of each others alteration. And thus, to shut up my discourse, I repeat again, that sympathy and antipathy are nothing else but ordinary Passions and Appetites amongst several Creatures, which Passions are made by the rational animate Matter, and the Appetites by the sensitive, both giving such or such motions, to such or such Creatures; for cross motions in Appetites and passions make Antipathy, and agreeable motions in Appetites and Passions make Sympathy, although the Creatures be different, wherein these motions, Passions and Appetites are made; and as without an object a Pattern cannot be, so without inherent or natural Passions and Appetites there can be no Sympathy or Antipathy: And there being also such Sympathy betwixt your Ladiship and me, I think my self the happiest Creature for it; and shall make it my whole study to imitate your Ladiship, and conform all my actions to the rule and pattern of yours, as becomes, Madam, Your Ladiships faithful Friend, and humble Servant.
XVI. MADAM, My opinion of Witches and Witchcraft, (of whose Power and strange effects your Author is pleased to relate many stories) in brief, is this; My Sense and Reason doth inform me, that there is Natural Witchcraft, as I may call it, which is Sympathy, Antipathy, Magnetisme, and the like, which are made by the sensitive and rational motions between several Creatures, as by Imagination, Fancy, Love, Aversion, and many the like; but these Motions, being sometimes unusual and strange to us, we not knowing their causes, (For what Creature knows all motions in Nature, and their ways?) do stand amazed at their working power; and by reason we cannot assign any Natural cause for them, are apt to ascribe their effects to the Devil; but that there should be any such devillish Witchcraft, which is made by a Covenant and Agreement with the Devil, by whose power Men do enchaunt or bewitch other Creatures, I cannot readily believe. Certainly, I dare say, that many a good, old honest woman hath been condemned innocently, and suffered death wrongfully, by the sentence of some foolish and cruel Judges, meerly upon this suspition of Witchcraft, when as really there hath been no such thing; for many things are done by slights or juggling Arts, wherein neither the Devil nor Witches are Actors. And thus an Englishman whose name was Banks, was like to be burnt beyond the Seas for a Witch, as I have been inform'd, onely for making a Horse shew tricks by Art; There have been also several others; as one that could vomit up several kinds of Liquors and other things: and another who did make a Drum beat of it self. But all these were nothing but slights and jugling tricks; as also the talking and walking Bell; and the Brazen-Head which spake these words, Time was, Time is, and Time is past, and so fell down; Which may easily have been performed by speaking through a Pipe conveighed into the said head: But such and the like trifles will amaze many grave and wise men, when they do not know the manner or way how they are done, so as they are apt to judg them to be effected by Witchcraft or Combination with the Devil. But, as I said before, I believe there is Natural Magick; which is, that the sensitive and rational Matter oft moves such a way, as is unknown to us; and in the number of these is also the bleeding of a murdered body at the presence of the Murderer, which your Author, mentions;[1] for the corporeal motions in the murthered body may move so, as to work such effects, which are more then ordinary; for the animal Figure, being not so quickly dissolved, the animal motions are not so soon altered, (for the dissolving of the Figure is nothing else but an alteration of its Motions;) and this dissolution is not done in an instant of time, but by degrees: But yet I must confess, it is not a common action in Nature, for Nature hath both common, and singular or particular actions: As for example, Madness, natural Folly, and many the like, are but in some particular persons; for if those actions were general, and common, then all, or most men would be either mad, or fools, but, though there are too many already, yet all men are not so; and so some murthered bodies may bleed or express some alterations at the presence of the Murtherer, but I do not believe, that all do so; for surely in many, not any alteration will be perceived, and others will have the same alterations without the presence of the Murtherer. And thus you see, Madam, that this is done naturally, without the help of the Devil; nay, your Author doth himself confess it to be so; for, says he, The act of the Witch is plainly Natural; onely the stirring up of the vertue or power in the Witch comes from Satan. But I cannot understand what your Author means, by the departing of spiritual rays from the Witch into Man, or any other animal, which she intends to kill or hurt; nor how Spirits wander about in the Air, and have their mansions there; for men may talk as well of impossibilities, as of such things which are not composed of Natural Matter: If man were an Incorporeal Spirit himself, he might, perhaps, sooner conceive the essence of a Spirit, as being of the same Nature; but as long as he is material, and composed of Natural Matter, he might as well pretend to know the Essence of God, as of an Incorporeal Spirit. Truly, I must confess, I have had some fancies oftentimes of such pure and subtil substances, purer and subtiler then the Sky or Æthereal substance is, whereof I have spoken in my Poetical Works; but these substances, which I conceived within my fancy, were material, and had bodies, though never so small and subtil; for I was never able to conceive a substance abstracted from all Matter, for even Fancy it self is material, and all Thoughts and Conceptions are made by the rational Matter, and so are those which Philosophers call Animal Spirits, but a material Fancy cannot produce immaterial effects, that is, Ideas of Incorporeal Spirits: And this was the cause that in the first impression of my Philosophical Opinions, I named the sensitive and rational Matter, sensitive and rational Spirits, because of its subtilty, activity and agility; not that I thought them to be immaterial, but material Spirits: but since Spirits are commonly taken to be immaterial, and Spirit and Body are counted opposite to one another, to prevent a misapprehension in the thoughts of my Readers, as if I meant Incorporeal Spirits, I altered this expression in the last Edition, and call'd it onely sensitive and rational Matter, or, which is all one, sensitive and rational corporeal motions. You will say, perhaps, That the divine Soul in Man is a Spirit: but I desire you to call to mind what I oftentimes have told you, to wit, that when I speak of the Soul of Man, I mean onely the Natural, not the Divine Soul; which as she is supernatural, so she acts also supernaturally; but all the effects of the natural Soul, of which I discourse, are natural, and not divine or supernatural. But to return to Magnetisme; I am absolutely of opinion, that it is naturally effected by natural means, without the concurrence of Immaterial Spirits either good or bad, meerly by natural corporeal sensitive and rational motions; and, for the most part, there must be a due approach between the Agent and the Patient, or otherwise the effect will hardly follow, as you may see by the Loadstone and Iron; Neither is the influence of the Stars performed beyond a certain distance, that is, such a distance as is beyond sight or their natural power to work; for if their light comes to our Eyes, I know no reason against it, but their effects may come to our bodies. And as for infectious Diseases, they come by a corporeal imitation, as by touch, either of the infected air, drawn in by breath, or entring through the pores of the Body, or of some things brought from infected places, or else by hearing; but diseases, caused by Conceit, have their beginning, as all alterations have, from the sensitive and rational Motions, which do not onely make the fear and conceit, but also the disease; for as a fright will sometimes cure diseases, so it will sometimes cause diseases; but as I said, both fright, cure, and the disease, are made by the rational and sensitive corporeal motions within the body, and not by Supernatural Magick, as Satanical Witchcraft, entering from without into the body by spiritual rays. But having discoursed hereof in my former Letter, I will not trouble you with an unnecessary repetition thereof; I conclude therefore with what I begun, viz. that I believe natural Magick to be natural corporeal motions in natural bodies: Not that I say, Nature in her self is a Magicianess, but it may be called natural Magick or Witchcraft, meerly in respect to our Ignorance; for though Nature is old, yet she is not a Witch, but a grave, wise, methodical Matron, ordering her Infinite family, which are her several parts, with ease and facility, without needless troubles and difficulties; for these are onely made through the ignorance of her several parts or particular Creatures, not understanding their Mistress, Nature, and her actions and government, for which they cannot be blamed; for how should a part understand the Infinite body, when it doth not understand it self; but Nature understands her parts better then they do her. And so leaving Wise Nature, and the Ignorance of her Particulars, I understand my self so far that I am, Madam, Your humble and faithful Servant.
XVII. MADAM, I am not of your Authors[1] opinion, That Time hath no relation to Motion, but that Time and Motion are as unlike and different from each other as Finite from Infinite, and that it hath its own essence or being Immoveable, Unchangeable, Individable, and unmixed with things, nay, that Time is plainly the same with Eternity. For, in my opinion, there can be no such thing as Time in Nature, but what Man calls Time, is onely the variation of natural motions; wherefore Time, and the alteration of motion, is one and the same thing under two different names; and as Matter, Figure, and Motion, are inseparable, so is Time inseparably united, or rather the same thing with them, and not a thing subsisting by it self; and as long as Matter, Motion and Figure have been existent, so long hath Time; and as long as they last, so long doth Time. But when I say, Time is the variation of motion, I do not mean the motion of the Sun or Moon, which makes Days, Months, Years, but the general motions or actions of Nature, which are the ground of Time; for were there no Motion, there would be no Time; and since Matter is dividable, and in parts, Time is so too; neither hath Time any other Relation to Duration, then what Nature her self hath. Wherefore your Author is mistaken, when he says, Motion is made in Time, for Motion makes Time, or rather is one and the same with Time; and Succession is no more a stranger to Motion, then Motion is to Nature, as being the action of Nature, which is the Eternal servant of God. But, says he, Certain Fluxes of Formerlinesses and Laternesses, have respect unto frail moveable things in their motions, wherewith they hasten unto the appointed ends of their period, and so unto their own death or destruction; but what relation hath all that to Time: for therefore also ought Time to run with all and every motion? Verily so there should be as many times and durations as there are motions. I answer: To my Reason, there are as many times and durations as there are motions; for neither time nor duration can be separated from motion, no more then motion can be separated from them, being all one. But Time is not Eternity, for Eternity hath no change, although your Author makes Time and Eternity all one, and a being or substance by it self: Yet I will rather believe Solomon, then him, who says, that there is a time to be merry, and a time to be sad; a time to mourn, and a time to rejoyce, and so forth: making so many divisions of Time as there are natural actions; whenas your Author makes natural actions strangers to Nature, dividing them from their substances: Which seemeth very improbable in the opinion of, Madam, Your Ladiships faithful Friend, and humble Servant.
XVIII. MADAM, Your Authors[1] opinion is, That a bright burning Iron doth not burn a dead Carcass after an equal manner as it doth a live one; For in live bodies, saith he, it primarily hurts the sensitive Soul, the which therefore being impatient, rages after a wonderful manner, doth by degrees resolve and exasperate its own and vital liquors into a sharp poyson, and then contracts the fibres of the flesh, and turns them into an escharre, yea, into the way of a coal; but a dead Carcass is burnt by bright burning Iron, no otherwise, then if Wood, or if any other unsensitive thing should be; that is, it burns by a proper action of the fire, but not of the life. To which opinion, I answer: That my Reason cannot conceive any thing to be without life, and so neither without sense; for whatsoever hath self-motion, has sense and life; and that self-motion is in every Creature, is sufficiently discoursed of in my former Letters, and in my Philosophical Opinions; for self-motion, sense, life, and reason, are the grounds and principles of Nature, without which no Creature could subsist. I do not say, That there is no difference between the life of a dead Carcass, and a live one, for there is a difference between the lives of every Creature; but to differ in the manner of life, and to have neither life nor sense at all, are quite different things: But your Author affirms himself, that all things have a certain sense of feeling, when he speaks of Sympathy and Magnetisme, and yet he denies that they have life: And others again, do grant life to some Creatures, as to Vegetables, and not sense. Thus they vary in their Opinions, and divide sense, life, and motion, when all is but one and the same thing; for no life is without sense and motion, nor no motion without sense and life; nay, not without Reason; for the chief Architect of all Creatures, is sensitive and rational Matter. But the mistake is, that most men, do not, or will not conceive, that there is a difference and variety of the corporeal sensitive and rational motions in every Creature; but they imagine, that if all Creatures should have life, sense, and reason, they must of necessity have all alike the same motions, without any difference; and because they do not perceive the animal motions in a Stone or Tree, they are apt to deny to them all life, sense, and motion. Truly, Madam, I think no man will be so mad, or irrational, as to say a Stone is an Animal, or an Animal is a Tree, because a Stone and Tree have sense, life, and motion; for every body knows, that their Natural figures are different, and if their Natures be different, then they cannot have the same Motions, for the corporeal motions do make the nature of every particular Creature, and their differences; and as the corporeal motions act, work, or move, so is the nature of every figure, Wherefore, nobody, I hope, will count me so senseless, that I believe sense and life to be after the like manner in every particular Creature or part of Nature; as for example, that a Stone or Tree has animal motions, and doth see, touch, taste, smell and hear by such sensitive organs as an Animal doth; but, my opinion is, that all Sense is not bound up to the sensitive organs of an Animal, nor Reason to the kernel of a man's brain, or the orifice of the stomack, or the fourth ventricle of the brain, or onely to a mans body; for though we do not see all Creatures move in that manner as Man or Animals do, as to walk, run, leap, ride, &c. and perform exterior acts by various local motions; nevertheless, we cannot in reason say, they are void and destitute of all motion; For what man knows the variety of motions in Nature: Do not we see, that Nature is active in every thing, yea, the least of her Creatures. For example; how some things do unanimously conspire and agree, others antipathetically flee from each other; and how some do increase, others decrease; some dissolve, some consist, and how all things are subject to perpetual changes and alterations; and do you think all this is done without motion, life, sense, and reason? I pray you consider, Madam, that there are internal motions as well as external, alterative as well as constitutive; and several other sorts of motions not perceptible by our senses, and therefore it is impossible that all Creatures should move after one sort of motions. But you will say, Motion may be granted, but not Life, Sense, and Reason. I answer, I would fain know the reason why not; for I am confident that no man can in truth affirm the contrary: What is Life, but sensitive Motion? what is Reason, but rational motion? and do you think, Madam, that any thing can move it self without life, sense and reason? I, for my part, cannot imagine it should; for it would neither know why, whither, nor what way, or how to move. But you may reply, Motion may be granted, but not self-motion; and life, sense, and reason, do consist in self-motion. I answer: this is impossible; for not any thing in Nature can move naturally without natural motion, and all natural motion is self-motion. If you say it may be moved by another; My answer is, first, that if a thing has no motion in it self, but is moved by another which has self-motion, then it must give that immovable body motion of its own, or else it could not move, having no motion at all; for it must move by the power of motion, which is certain; and then it must move either by its own motion, or by a communicated or imparted motion; if by a communicated motion, then the self-moveable thing or body must transfer its own motion into the immoveable, and lose so much of its own motion as it gives away, which is impossible, as I have declared heretofore at large, unless it do also transfer its moving parts together with it, for motion cannot be transfered without substance. But experience and observation witnesseth the contrary. Next, I say, if it were possible that one body did move another, then most part of natural Creatures, which are counted immoveable of themselves, or inanimate, and destitute of self-motion, must be moved by a forced or violent, and not by a natural motion; for all motion that proceeds from an external agent or moving power, is not natural, but forced, onely self-motion is natural; and then one thing moving another in this manner, we must at last proceed to such a thing which is not moved by another, but hath motion in it self, and moves all others; and, perhaps, since man, and the rest of animals have self-motion, it might be said, that the motions of all other inanimate Creatures, as they call them, doth proceed from them; but man being so proud, ambitious, and self-conceited, would soon exclude all other animals, and adscribe this power onely to himself, especially since he thinks himself onely endued with Reason, and to have this prerogative above all the rest, as to be the sole rational Creature in the World. Thus you see, Madam, what confusion, absurdity, and constrained work will follow from the opinion of denying self-motion, and so consequently, life and sense to natural Creatures. But I, having made too long a digression, will return to your Authors discourse: And as for that he says, A dead Carcass burns by the proper action of the fire, I answer, That if the dissolving motions of the fire be too strong for the consistent motions of that body which fire works upon, then fire is the cause of its alteration; but if the consistent motions of the body be too strong for the dissolving motions of the fire, then the fire can make no alteration in it. Again: he says, Calx vive, at long as it remains dry, it gnaws not a dead Carcass; but it presently gnaws live flesh, and makes an escharre; and a dead carcass is by lime wholly resolved into a liquor, and is combibed, except the bone and gristle thereof; but it doth not consume live flesh into a liquor, but translates it into an escharre. I will say no more to this, but that I have fully enough declared my opinion before, that the actions or motions of life alter in that which is named a dead Carcass, from what they were in that which is called a Living body; but although the actions of Life alter, yet life is not gone or annihilated; for life is life, and remains full the same, but the actions or motions of life change and differ in every figure; and this is the cause that the actions of Fire, Time, and Calx-vive, have not the same effects in a dead Carcass, as in a living Body; for the difference of their figures, and their different motions, produce different effects in them; and this is the cause, that one and the same fire doth not burn or act upon all bodies alike: for some it dissolves, and some not; and some it hardens, and some it consumes; and some later, some sooner: For put things of several natures into the same Fire, and you will see how they will burn, or how fire will act upon them after several manners; so that fire cannot alter the actions of several bodies to its own blas; and therefore, since a living and a dead Body (as they call them) are not the same, (for the actions or motions of life, by their change or alteration, have altered the nature or figure of the body) the effects cannot be the same; for a Carcass has neither the interior nor exterior motions of that figure which it was before it was a Carcass, and so the figure is quite alter'd from what it was, by the change and alteration of the motions. But to conclude, the motions of the exterior Agent, and the motions of the Patient, do sometimes joyn and unite, as in one action, or to one effect, and sometimes the motions of the Agent are onely an occasion, but not a co-workman in the production of such or such an effect, as the motions of the Patient do work; neither can the motions of the Agent work totally and meerly of themselves, such or such effects, without the assistance or concurrence of the motions of the Patient, but the motions of the Patient can; and there is nothing that can prove more evidently that Matter moves it self, and that exterior agents or bodies are onely an occasion to such or such a motion in another body, then to see how several things put into one and the same fire, do alter after several modes; which shews, it is not the onely action of fire, but the interior motions of the body thrown into the fire, which do alter its exterior form or figure. And thus, I think I have said enough to make my opinions clear, that they may be the better understood: which is the onely aim and desire of, Madam, Your humble and faithful Servant. [1] Of the disease of the Stone, Ch. 9.
XIX. MADAM, Your Author is not a Natural, but a Divine Philosopher, for in many places he undertakes to interpret the Scripture; wherein, to my judgment, he expresseth very strange opinions; you will give me leave at this present to note some few. First, in one place,[1] interpreting that passage of Scripture, where it is said,[2] That the sons of God took to wives the daughters of men: He understands by the Sons of God, those which came from the Posterity of Adam, begotten of a Man and a Woman, having the true Image of God: But by the Daughters of Men, he understands Monsters; that is, those which through the Devils mediation, were conceived in the womb of a Junior Witch or Sorceress: For when Satan could find no other ways to deprive all the race of Men of the Image of God, and extinguish the Immortal mind out of the flock of Adams Posterity, he stirr'd up detestable copulations, from whence proceeded savage Monsters, as Faunes, Satyrs, Sylphs, Gnomes, Nymphs, Driades, Najades, Nereides, &c. which generated their off-springs amongst themselves, and their posterities again contracted their copulations amongst themselves, and at length began Wedlocks with Men; and from this copulation of Monsters and Nymphs, they generated strong Gyants. Which Interpretation, how it agrees with the Truth of Scripture, I will leave to Divines to judg: But, for my part, I cannot conceive, how, or by what means or ways, those Monsters and Nymphs were produced or generated. Next, his opinion is, That Adam did ravish Eve, and defloured her by force, calling him the first infringer of modesty, and deflourer of a Virgin; and that therefore God let hair grow upon his chin, cheeks, and lips, that he might be a Compere, Companion, and like unto many four-footed Beasts, and might bear before him the signature of the same; and that, as he was lecherous after their manner, he might also shew a rough countenance by his hairs; which whether it be so, or not, I cannot tell, neither do I think your Author can certainly know it himself; for the Scripture makes no mention of it: But this I dare say, that Eves Daughters prove rather the contrary, viz. that their Grandmother did freely consent to their Grandfather. Also he says, That God had purposed to generate Man by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, but Man perverted the Intent of God; for had Adam not sinned, there had been no generation by the copulation of a Man and Woman, but all the off-springs had appear'd out of Eve, a Virgin, from the Holy Spirit, as conceived from God, and born of a woman, a virgin, To which, I answer, first, That it is impossible to know the Designs and secret purposes of God: Next, to make the Holy Spirit the common Generator of all Man-kind, is more then the Scripture expresses, and any man ought to say: Lastly, it is absurd, in my opinion, to say, that frail and mortal Men, can pervert the intent and designs of the Great God; or that the Devil is able to prevent God's Intent, (as his expression is in the same place.) But your Author shews a great affection to the Female Sex, when he says, that God doth love Women before Men, and that he has given them a free gift of devotion before men; when as others do lay all the fault upon the Woman, that she did seduce the Man; however in expressing his affection for Women, your Author expresses a partiality in God. And, as for his opinion, that God creates more Daughters then Males, and that more Males are extinguished by Diseases, Travels, Wars, Duels, Shipwracks, and the like: Truly, I am of the same mind, that more Men are kill'd by Travels, Wars, Duels, Shipwracks, &c. then Women; for Women never undergo these dangers, neither do so many kill themselves with intemperate Drinking, as Men do; but yet I believe, that Death is as general, and not more favourable to Women, then he is to Men; for though Women be not slain in Wars like Men, (although many are, by the cruelty of Men, who not regarding the weakness of their sex, do inhumanely kill them,) yet many do die in Child-bed, which is a Punishment onely concerning the Female sex. But to go on in your Authors Interpretations: His knowledg of the Conception of the Blessed Virgin, reaches so far, as he doth not stick to describe exactly, not onely how the blessed Virgin conceiv'd in the womb, but first in the heart, or the sheath of the heart; and then how the conception removed from the heart, into the womb, and in what manner it was performed. Certainly, Madam, I am amazed, when I see men so conceited with their own perfections and abilities, (I may rather say, with their imperfections and weaknesses) as to make themselves God's privy Councilors, and his Companions, and partakers of all the sacred Mysteries, Designs, and hidden secrets of the Incomprehensible and Infinite God. O the vain Presumption, Pride, and Ambition of wretched Men! There are many more such expressions in your Authors works, which, in my opinion, do rather detract from the Greatness of the Omnipotent God, then manifest his Glory: As for example; That Man is the clothing of the Deity, and the sheath of the Kingdom of God, and many the like: which do not belong to God; for God is beyond all expression, because he is Infinite; and when we name God, we name an Unexpressible, and Incomprehensible Being; and yet we think we honour God, when we express him after the manner of corporeal Creatures. Surely, the noblest Creature that ever is in the World, is not able to be compared to the most Glorious God, but whatsoever comparison is made, detracts from his Glory: And this, in my opinion, is the reason, that God forbad any likeness to be made of him, either in Heaven, or upon Earth, because he exceeds all that we might compare or liken to him. And as men ought to have a care of such similizing expressions, so they ought to be careful in making Interpretations of the Scripture, and expressing more then the Scripture informs; for what is beyond the Scripture, is Man's own fancy; and to regulate the Word of God after Man's fancy, at least to make his fancy equal with the Word of God, is Irreligious. Wherefore, men ought to submit, and not to pretend to the knowledg of God's Counsels and Designs, above what he himself hath been pleased to reveal: as for example, to describe of what Figure God is, and to comment and descant upon the Articles of Faith; as how Man was Created; and what he did in the state of Innocence; how he did fall; and what he did after his fall: and so upon the rest of the Articles of our Creed, more then the Scripture expresses, or is conformable to it. For if we do this, we shall make a Romance of the holy Scripture, with our Paraphrastical descriptions: which alas! is too common already. The truth is, Natural Philosophers, should onely contain themselves within the sphere of Nature, and not trespass upon the Revelation of the Scripture, but leave this Profession to those to whom it properly belongs. I am confident, a Physician, or any other man of a certain Profession, would not take it well, if others, who are not professed in that Art, should take upon them to practise the same: And I do wonder, why every body is so forward to encroach upon the holy Profession of Divines, which yet is a greater presumption, then if they did it upon any other; for it contains not onely a most hidden and mystical knowledg, as treating of the Highest Subject, which is the most Glorious, and Incomprehensible God, and the salvation of our Souls; but it is also most dangerous, if not interpreted according to the Holy Spirit, but to the byass of man's fancy. Wherefore, Madam, I am afraid to meddle with Divinity in the least thing, lest I incur the hazard of offending the divine Truth, and spoil the excellent Art of Philosophying; for a Philosophical Liberty, and a Supernatural Faith, are two different things, and suffer no co-mixture; as I have declared sufficiently heretofore. And this you will find as much truth, as that I am, Madam, Your constant Friend, and faithful Servant.
XX. MADAM, Although your Author[1] is of the opinion of Plato, in making Three sorts of Atheists: One that believes no Gods; Another, which indeed admits of Gods, yet such as are uncarefull of us, and despisers of small matters, and therefore also ignorant of us: And lastly, a third sort, which although they believe the Gods to be expert in the least matters, yet do suppose that they are flexible and indulgent toward the smallest cold Prayers or Petitions: Yet I cannot approve of this distinction, for I do understand but one sort of Atheists; that is, those which believe no God at all; but those which believe that there is a God, although they do not worship him truly, nor live piously and religiously as they ought, cannot, in truth, be called Atheists, or else there would be innumerous sorts of Atheists; to wit, all those, that are either no Christians, or not of this or that opinion in Christian Religion, besides all them that live wickedly, impiously and irreligiously; for to know, and be convinced in his reason, that there is a God, and to worship him truly, according to his holy Precepts and Commands, are two several things: And as for the first, that is, for the Rational knowledg of the Existence of God, I cannot be perswaded to believe, there is any man which has sense and reason, that doth not acknowledg a God; nay, I am sure, there is no part of Nature which is void and destitute of this knowledg of the existence of an Infinite, Eternal, Immortal, and Incomprehensible Deity; for every Creature, being indued with sense and reason, and with sensitive and rational knowledg, there can no knowledg be more Universal then the knowledg of a God, as being the root of all knowledg: And as all Creatures have a natural knowledg of the Infinite God, so, it is probable, they Worship, Adore, and Praise his Infinite Power and Bounty, each after its own manner, and according to its nature; for I cannot believe, God should make so many kinds of Creatures, and not be worshipped and adored but onely by Man: Nature is God's Servant, and she knows God better then any Particular Creature; but Nature is an Infinite Body, consisting of Infinite Parts, and if she adores and worships God, her Infinite Parts, which are Natural Creatures, must of necessity do the like, each according to the knowledg it hath: but Man in this particular goes beyond others, as having not onely a natural, but also a revealed knowledg of the most Holy God; for he knows Gods Will, not onely by the light of Nature, but also by revelation, and so more then other Creatures do, whose knowledg of God is meerly Natural. But this Revealed Knowledg makes most men so presumptuous, that they will not be content with it, but search more and more into the hidden mysteries of the Incomprehensible Deity, and pretend to know God as perfectly, almost, as themselves; describing his Nature and Essence, his Attributes, his Counsels, his Actions, according to the revelation of God, (as they pretend) when as it is according to their own Fancies. So proud and presumptuous are many: But they shew thereby rather their weaknesses and follies, then any truth; and all their strict and narrow pryings into the secrets of God, are rather unprofitable, vain and impious, then that they should benefit either themselves, or their neighbour; for do all we can, God will not be perfectly known by any Creature: The truth is, it is a meer impossibility for a finite Creature, to have a perfect Idea of an Infinite Being, as God is; be his Reason never so acute or sharp, yet he cannot penetrate what is Impenetrable, nor comprehend what is Incomprehensible: Wherefore, in my opinion, the best way is humbly to adore what we cannot conceive, and believe as much as God has been pleased to reveal, without any further search; lest we diving too deep, be swallowed up in the bottomless depth of his Infiniteness: Which I wish every one may observe, for the benefit of his own self, and of others, to spend his time in more profitable Studies, then vainly to seek for what cannot be found. And with this hearty wish I conclude, resting, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
XXI. MADAM, Your Author is so much for Spirits, that he doth not stick to affirm,[1] That Bodies scarce make up a moity or half part of the world; but Spirits, even by themselves, have or possess their moity, and indeed the whole world. If he mean bodiless and incorporeal Spirits, I cannot conceive how Spirits can take up any place, for place belongs onely to body, or a corporeal substance, and millions of immaterial Spirits, nay, were their number infinite, cannot possess so much place as a small Pins point, for Incorporeal Spirits possess no place at all: which is the reason, that an Immaterial and a Material Infinite cannot hinder, oppose, or obstruct each other; and such an Infinite, Immaterial Spirit is God alone. But as for Created Immaterial Spirits, as they call them, it may be questioned whether they be Immaterial, or not; for there may be material Spirits as well as immaterial, that is, such pure, subtil and agil substances as cannot be subject to any humane sense, which may be purer and subtiller then the most refined air, or purest light; I call them material spirits, onely for distinctions sake, although it is more proper, to call them material substances: But be it, that there are Immaterial Spirits, yet they are not natural, but supernatural; that is, not substantial parts of Nature; for Nature is material, or corporeal, and so are all her Creatures, and whatsoever is not material is no part of Nature, neither doth it belong any ways to Nature: Wherefore, all that is called Immaterial, is a Natural Nothing, and an Immaterial Natural substance, in my opinion, is non-sense: And if you contend with me, that Created Spirits, as good and bad Angels, as also the Immortal Mind of Man, are Immaterial, then I say they are Supernatural; but if you say, they are Natural, then I answer they are Material: and thus I do not deny the existence of Immaterial Spirits, but onely that they are not parts of Nature, but supernatural; for there may be many things above Nature, and so above a natural Understanding, and Knowledg, which may nevertheless have their being and existence, although they be not Natural, that is, parts of Nature: Neither do I deny that those supernatural Creatures may be amongst natural Creatures, that is, have their subsistence amongst them, and in Nature; but they are not so commixed with them, as the several parts of Matter are, that is, they do not joyn to the constitution of a material Creature; for no Immaterial can make a Material, or contribute any thing to the making or production of it; but such a co-mixture would breed a meer confusion in Nature: wherefore, it is quite another thing, to be in Nature, or to have its subsistence amongst natural Creatures in a supernatural manner or way, and to be a part of Nature. I allow the first to Immaterial Spirits, but not the second, viz. to be parts of Nature. But what Immaterial Spirits are, both in their Essence or Nature, and their Essential Properties, it being supernatural, and above natural Reason, I cannot determine any thing thereof. Neither dare I say, they are Spirits like as God is, that is, of the same Essence or Nature, no more then I dare say or think that God is of a humane shape or figure, or that the Nature of God is as easie to be known as any notion else whatsoever, and that we may know as much of him as of any thing else in the world. For if this were so, man would know God as well as he knows himself, but God and his Attributes are not so easily known as man may know himself and his own natural Proprieties; for God and his Attributes are not conceiveable or comprehensible by any humane understanding, which is not onely material, but also finite; for though the parts of Nature be infinite in number, yet each is finite in it self, that is, in its figure, and therefore no natural Creature is capable to conceive what God is; for he being infinite, there is also required an infinite capacity to conceive him; Nay, Nature her self, although she is Infinite, yet cannot possibly have an exact notion of God, by reason she is Material, and God is Immaterial; and if the Infinite servant of God is not able to conceive God, much less will a finite part of Nature do it. Besides, the holy Church doth openly confess and declare the Incomprehensibility of God, when in the Athanasian Creed, she expresses, that the Father is Incomprehensible, the Son Incomprehensible, and the Holy Ghost Incomprehensible, and that there are not three, but one Incomprehensible God: Therefore, if any one will prove the contrary, to wit, that God is Comprehensible, or (which is all one) that God is as easie to be known as any Creature whatsoever, he surely is more then the Church: But I shall never say or believe so, but rather confess my ignorance, then betray my folly; and leave things Divine to the Church; to which I submit, as I ought, in all Duty: and as I do not meddle with any Divine Mysteries, but subject my self, concerning my Faith or Belief, and the regulating of my actions for the obtaining of Eternal Life, wholly under the government and doctrine of the Church, so, I hope, they will also grant me leave to have my liberty concerning the contemplation of Nature and natural things, that I may discourse of them, with such freedom, as meer natural Philosophers use, or at least ought, to do; and thus I shall be both a good Christian, and a good Natural Philosopher: Unto which, to make the number perfect, I will add a third, which is, I shall be, Madam, Your real and faithful Friend and Servant.
XXII. MADAM, Though I am loth (as I have often told you) to imbarque my self in the discourse of such a subject, as no body is able naturally to know, which is the supernatural and divine Soul in Man; yet your Author having, in my judgment, strange opinions, both of the Essence, Figure, Seat and Production of the Soul, and discoursing thereof, with such liberty and freedom, as of any other natural Creature, I cannot chuse but take some notice of his discourse, and make some reflections upon it; which yet, shall rather express my ignorance of the same subject, then in a positive answer, declare my opinion thereof; for, in things divine, I refer my self wholly to the Church, and submit onely to their instructions, without any further search of natural reason; and if I should chance to express more then I ought to do, and commit some error, it being out of ignorance rather then set purpose, I shall be ready upon better information, to mend it, and willingly subject my self under the censure and correction of the holy Church, as counting it no disgrace to be ignorant in the mysteries of Faith, since Faith is of things unknown, but rather a duty required from every Layman to believe simply the Word of God, as it is explained and declared by the Orthodox Church, without making Interpretations out of his own brain, and according to his own fancy, which breeds but Schismes, Heresies, Sects, and Confusions. But concerning your Author, I perceive by him, first, that he makes no distinction between the Natural or Rational Soul or Mind of Man, and between the Divine or Supernatural Soul, but takes them both as one, and distinguishes onely the Immortal Soul from the sensitive Life of Man, which he calls the Frail, Mortal, Sensitive Soul. Next, all his knowledg of this Immortal Soul is grounded upon Dreams and Visions, and therefore it is no wonder, if his opinions be somewhat strange and irregular. I saw, in a Vision, says he,[1] my Mind in a humane shape; but there was a light, whose whole homogeneal body was actively seeing, a spiritual substance, Chrystalline, shining with a proper splendor, or a splendor of its own, but in another cloudy part it was rouled up as it were in the husk of it self; which whether it had any splendor of it self, I could not discern, by reason of the superlative brightness of the Chrystal Spirit contain'd within. Whereupon he defines the Soul to be a Spirit, beloved of God, homogeneal, simple, immortal, created into the Image of God, one onely Being, whereto death adds nothing, or takes nothing from it, which may be natural or proper to it in the Essence of its simplicity. As for this definition of the Soul, it may be true, for any thing I know: but when your Author makes the divine Soul to be a Light, I cannot conceive how that can agree; for Light is a Natural and Visible Creature, and, in my opinion, a corporeal substance; whereas the Soul is immaterial and incorporeal: But be it, that Light is not a substance, but a neutral Creature, according to your Author; then, nevertheless the Immortal Soul cannot be said to be a light, because she is a substance. He may say,[2] The Soul is an Incomprehensible Light. But if the Soul be Incomprehensible, how then doth he know that she is a light, and not onely a light, but a glorious and splendorous light? You will say, By a Dream, or Vision. Truly, Madam, to judg any thing by a Dream, is a sign of a weak judgment. Nay, since your Author calls the soul constantly a light; if it were so, and that it were such a splendorous, bright and shining light, as he says; then when the body dies, and the soul leaves its Mansion, it would certainly be seen, when it issues out of the body. But your Author calls the Soul a Spiritual Substance, and yet he says, she has an homogeneal body, actively seeing and shining with a proper splendor of her own; which how it can agree, I leave to you to judg; for I thought, an Immaterial spirit and a body were too opposite things, and now I see, your Author makes Material and Immaterial, Spiritual and Corporeal, all one. But this is not enough, but he allows it a Figure too, and that of a humane shape; for says he, I could never consider the Thingliness of the Immortal Mind with an Individual existence, deprived of all figure, neither but that it at least would answer to a humane shape; but the Scripture, as much as is known to me, never doth express any such thing of the Immortal Soul, and I should be loth to believe any more thereof then it declares. The Apostles, although they were conversant with Christ, and might have known it better, yet were never so inquisitive into the nature of the Soul, as our Modern divine Philosophers are; for our Saviour, and they, regarded more the salvation of Man's Soul, and gave holy and wise Instructions rather, how to live piously and conformably to God's Will, to gain eternal Life, then that they should discourse either of the Essence or Figure, or Proprieties of the Soul, and whether it was a light, or any thing else, and such like needless questions, raised in after-times onely by the curiosity of divine Philosophers, or Philosophying Divines; For though Light is a glorious Creature, yet Darkness is as well a Creature as Light, and ought not therefore to be despised; for if it be not so bright, and shining as Light, yet it is a grave Matron-like Creature, and very useful: Neither is the Earth, which is inwardly dark, to be despised, because the Sun is bright. The like may be said of the soul, and of the body; for the body is very useful to the soul, how dark soever your Author believes it to be; and if he had not seen light with his bodily eyes, he could never have conceived the Soul to be a Light: Wherefore your Author can have no more knowledg of the divine soul then other men have, although he has had more Dreams and Visions; nay, he himself confesses, that the Soul is an Incomprehensible Light; which if so, she cannot, be perfectly known, nor confined to any certain figure; for a figure or shape belongs onely to a corporeal substance, and not to an incorporeal: and so, God being an Incomprehensible Being, is excluded from all figure, when as yet your Author doth not stick to affirm, that God is of a humane figure too, as well as the humane Soul is; For, says he, Since God hath been pleased to adopt the Mind alone into his own Image, it also seems to follow, that the vast and unutterable God is of a humane Figure, and that from an argument from the effect, if there be any force of arguments in this subject. Oh! the audacious curiosity of Man! Is it not blasphemy to make the Infinite God of a frail and humane shape, and to compare the most Holy to a sinful Creature? Nay, is it not an absurdity, to confine and inclose that Incomprehensible Being in a finite figure? I dare not insist longer upon this discourse, lest I defile my thoughts with the entertaining of such a subject that derogates from the glory of the Omnipotent Creator; Wherefore, I will hasten, as much as I can, to the seat of the Soul, which, after relating several opinions, your Author concludes to be the orifice of the stomack, where the Immortal Soul is involved and entertained in the radical Inn or Bride-bed of the sensitive Soul or vital Light; which part of the body is surely more honoured then all the rest: But I, for my part, cannot conceive why the Soul should not dwell in the parts of conception, as well, as in the parts of digestion, except it be to prove her a good Huswife; however, your Author allows her to slide down sometimes: For, The action of the Mind, says he, being imprisoned in the Body, doth always tend downwards; but whether the Soul tend more downwards then upwards, Contemplative Persons, especially Scholars, and grave States-men, do know best; certainly, I believe, they find the soul more in their heads then in their heels, at least her operations. But, to conclude, if the Soul be pure and single of her self, she cannot mix with the Body, because she needs no assistance; nor joyn with the Body, though she lives in the Body, for she needs no support; and if she be individable, she cannot divide her self into several Parts of the Body; but if the Soul spread over all the Body, then she is bigger, or less, according as the Body is; and if she be onely placed in some particular part, then onely that one part is indued with a Soul, and the rest is Soul-less; and if she move from place to place, then some parts of the Body will be sometimes indued with a Soul, sometimes not; and if any one part requires not the subsistence of the Soul within it, then perhaps all the Body might have been able to spare her; neither might the Soul, being able to subsist without the body, have had need of it. Thus useless questions will trouble men's brains, if they give their fancies leave to work. I should add something of the Production of the Soul; but being tyred with so tedious a discourse of your Author, I am not able to write any more, but repose my Pen, and in the mean while rest affectionately, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
XXIII. MADAM, Your Authors comparison[1] of the Sun, with the immaterial or divine Soul in Man, makes me almost of opinion, that the Sun is the Soul of this World we inhabit, and that the fixed Stars, which are counted Suns by some, may be souls to some other worlds; for every one man has but one immaterial or divine soul, which is said to be individable and simple in its essence, and therefore unchangeable; and if the Sun be like this immaterial soul, then the Moon may be like the material soul. But as for the Production of this immaterial and divine Soul in Man, whether it come by an immediate Creation from God, or be derived by a successive propagation from Parents upon their Children, I cannot determine any thing, being supernatural, and not belonging to my study; nevertheless, the Propagation from Parents seems improbable to my reason; for I am not capable to imagine, how an immaterial soul, being individable, should beget another. Some may say, by imprinting or sealing, viz. that the soul doth print the Image of its own figure upon the spirit of the seed; which if so, then first there will onely be a production of the figure of the soul, but not of the substance, and so the Child will have but the Image of the soul, and not a real and substantial soul. Secondly, Every Child of the same Parents would be just alike, without any distinguishment; if not in body, yet in the Faculties and Proprieties of their Minds or Souls. Thirdly, There must be two prints of the two souls of both Parents upon one Creature, to wit, the Child; for both Parents do contribute alike to the Production of the Child, and then the Child would either have two souls, or both must be joyned as into one; which how it can be, I am not able to conceive. Fourthly, If the Parents print the Image of their souls upon the Child, then the Childs soul bears not the Image of God, but the Image of Man, to wit, his Parents. Lastly, I cannot understand, how an immaterial substance should make a print upon a corporeal substance, for Printing is a corporeal action, and belongs onely to bodies. Others may say, that the soul is from the Parents transmitted into the Child, like as a beam of Light; but then the souls of the Parents must part with some of their own substance; for light is a substance dividable, in my opinion; and if it were not, yet the soul is a substance, and cannot be communicated without losing some of his own substance, but that is impossible; for the immaterial soul being individable, cannot be diminished nor increased in its substance or Nature. Others again, will have the soul produced by certain Ideas; but Ideas being corporeal, cannot produce a substance Incorporeal or Spiritual. Wherefore I cannot conceive how the souls of the Parents, being individable in themselves, and not immoveable out of their bodies until the time of death, should commix so, as to produce a third immaterial soul, like to their own. You will say, As the Sun, which is the fountain of heat and light, heats and enlightens, and produces other Creatures. But I answer, The Sun doth not produce other Suns, at least not to our knowledg. 'Tis true, there are various and several manners and ways of Productions, but they are all natural, that is, material, or corporeal; to wit, Productions of some material beings, or corporeal substances; but the immaterial soul not being in the number of these, it is not probable, that she is produced by the way of corporeal productions, but created and infused from God, according to her nature, which is supernatural and divine: But being the Image of God, how she can be defiled with the impurity of sin, and suffer eternal damnation for her wickedness, without any prejudice to her Creator, I leave to the Church to inform us thereof. Onely one question I will add, Whether the Soul be subject to Sickness and Pain? To which I answer: As for the supernatural and divine Soul, although she be a substance, yet being not corporeal, but spiritual, she can never suffer pain, sickness, nor death; but as for the natural soul, to speak properly, there is no such thing in Nature as pain, sickness, or death; unless in respect to some Particular Creatures composed of natural Matter; for what Man calls Sickness, Pain, and Death, are nothing else but the Motions of Nature; for though there is but one onely Matter, that is, nothing but meer Matter in Nature, without any co-mixture of either a spiritual substance, or any thing else that is not Matter; yet this meer Matter is of several degrees and parts, and is the body of Nature; Besides, as there is but one onely Matter, so there is also but one onely Motion in Nature, as I may call it, that is, meer corporeal Motion, without any rest or cessation, which is the soul of that Natural body, both being infinite; but yet this onely corporeal Motion is infinitely various in its degrees or manners, and ways of moving; for it is nothing else but the action of natural Matter, which action must needs be infinite, being the action of an infinite body, making infinite figures and parts. These motions and actions of Nature, since they are so infinitely various, when men chance to observe some of their variety, they call them by some proper name, to make a distinguishment, especially those motions which belong to the figure of their own kind; and therefore when they will express the motions of dissolution of their own figure, they call them Death; when they will express the motions of Production of their figure, they call them Conception and Generation; when they will express the motions proper for the Consistence, Continuance and Perfection of their Figure, they call them Health; but when they will express the motions contrary to these, they call them Sickness, Pain, Death, and the like: and hence comes also the difference between regular and irregular motions; for all those Motions that belong to the particular nature and consistence of any figure, they call regular, and those which are contrary to them, they call irregular. And thus you see, Madam, that there is no such thing in Nature, as Death, Sickness, Pain, Health, &c. but onely a variety and change of the corporeal motions, and that those words express nothing else but the variety of motions in Nature; for men are apt to make more distinctions then Nature doth: Nature knows of nothing else but of corporeal figurative Motions, when as men make a thousand distinctions of one thing, and confound and entangle themselves so, with Beings, Non-beings, and Neutral-beings, Corporeals and Incorporeals, Substances and Accidents, or manners and modes of Substances, new Creations, and Annihilations, and the like, as neither they themselves, nor any body else, is able to make any sense thereof; for they are like the tricks and slights of Juglers, 'tis here, 'tis gone; and amongst those Authors which I have read as yet, the most difficult to be understood is this Author which I am now perusing, who runs such divisions, and cuts Nature into so small Parts, as the sight of my Reason is not sharp enough to discern them. Wherefore I will leave them to those that are more quick-sighted then I, and rest, Madam, Your constant Friend, and faithful Servant.
XXIV. MADAM, Your Author relates,[1] how by some the Immortal Soul is divided into two distinct parts; the Inferior or more outward, which by a peculiar name is called the Soul, and the other the Superior, the more inward, the which is called the bottom of the Soul or Spirit, in which Part the Image of God is specially contained; unto which is no access for the Devil, because there is the Kingdom of God: and each part has distinct Acts, Proprieties, and Faculties. Truly, Madam, I wonder, how some men dare discourse so boldly of the Soul, without any ground either of Scripture or Reason, nay, with such contradiction to themselves, or their own opinions; For how can that be severed into parts, which in its nature is Individable? and how can the Image of God concern but one Part of the Soul, and not the other? Certainly, if the Soul is the Image of God, it is his Image wholly, and not partially, or in parts. But your Author has other as strange and odd opinions as these, some whereof I have mentioned in my former Letters, the Souls being a Light, her Figure, her Residence, and many the like: Amongst the rest, there is one thing which your Author frequently makes mention of;[2] I know not what to call it, whether a thing, or a being, or no-thing; for it is neither of them; not a substance, nor an accident; neither a body, nor a spirit; and this Monster (for I think this is its proper name, since none other will fit it) is the Lacquey of the Soul, to run upon all errands; for the Soul sitting in her Princely Throne or Residence, which is the orifice of the stomack, cannot be every where her self; neither is it fit she should, as being a disgrace to her, to perform all offices her self for want of servants, therefore she sends out this most faithful and trusty officer, (your Author calls him Ideal Entity) who being prepared for his journey, readily performs all her commands, as being not tied up to no commands of places, times or dimensions, especially in Women with Child he operates most powerfully; for sometime he printed a Cherry on a Child, by a strong Idea of the Mother; but this Ideal Entity or servant of the Soul, hath troubled my brain more, then his Mistress the Soul her self; for I could not, nor cannot as yet conceive, how he might be able to be the Jack of all offices, and do Journies and travel from one part of the body to another, being no body nor substance himself, nor tyed to any place, time, and dimension, and therefore I will leave him. Your Author also speaks much of the Inward and Outward Man; but since that belongs to Divinity, I will declare nothing of it; onely this I say, that, in my opinion, the Inward and Outward man do not make a double Creature, neither properly, nor improperly; properly, as to make two different men; improperly, as we use to call that man double, whose heart doth not agree with his words. But by the Outward man I understand the sinful actions of flesh and blood, and by the Inward man the reformed actions of the Spirit, according to the Word of God; and therefore the Outward and Inward man make but one Man. Concerning the Natural Soul, your Author[3] speaks of her more to her disgrace then to her honor; for he scorns to call her a substance, neither doth he call her the Rational Soul, but he calls her the Sensitive Soul, and makes the Divine Soul to be the Rational Natural Soul, and the cause of all natural actions; for he being a Divine Philosopher, mixes Divine and Natural things together: But of the Frail, Mortal, Sensitive Soul, as he names her, which is onely the sensitive Life, his opinions are, that she is neither a substance, nor an accident, but a Neutral Creature, and a Vital Light, which hath not its like in the whole World, but the light of a Candle; for it is extinguished, and goes out like the flame of a Candle; it is locally present, and entertained in a place, and yet not comprehended in a place. Nevertheless, although this sensitive soul is no substance, yet it has the honor to be the Inn or Lodging-place of the Immortal Soul or Mind; and these two souls being both lights, do pierce each other; but the Mortal soul blunts the Immortal soul with its cogitation of the corruption of Adam. These opinions, Madam, I confess really, I do not know what to make of them; for I cannot imagine, how this Mortal soul, being no substance, can contain the Immortal soul, which is a substance; nor how they can pierce each other, and the Mortal soul being substanceless, get the better over an Immortal substance, and vitiate, corrupt, and infect it; neither can I conceive, how that, which in a manner is nothing already, can be made less and annihilated. Wherefore, my opinion is, that the Natural Soul, Life, and Body, are all substantial parts of Infinite Nature, not subsisting by themselves each apart, but inseparably united and co-mixed both in their actions and substances; for not any thing can and doth subsist of it self in Nature, but God alone; and things supernatural may, for ought I know: 'Tis true, there are several Degrees, several particular Natures, several Actions or Motions, and several Parts in Nature, but none subsists single, and by it self, without reference to the whole, and to one another. Your Author says, the Vital Spirit sits in the Throne of the Outward man as Vice Roy of the Soul, and acts by Commission of the Soul; but it is impossible, that one single part should be King of the whole Creature, since Rational and sensitive Matter is divided into so many parts, which have equal power and force of action in their turns and severall imployments; for though Nature is a Monarchess over all her Creatures, yet in every particular Creature is a Republick, and not a Monarchy; for no part of any Creature has a sole supreme Power over the rest. Moreover, your Author[4] says, That an Angel is not a Light himself, nor has an Internal Light, natural and proper to himself, but is the Glass of an uncreated Light: Which, to my apprehension, seems to affirm, That Angels are the Looking-glasses of God; a pretty Poetical Fancy, but not grounded on the Scripture: for the Scripture doth not express any such thing of them, but onely that they are[5] Ministring Spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of Salvation: Which, I think, is enough for us to know here, and leave the rest until we come to enjoy their company in Heaven. But it is not to be admired, that those, which pretend to know the Nature and Secrets of God, should not have likewise knowledg of Supernatural Creatures; In which conceit I leave them, and rest, Madam, Your real and faithful Friend and Servant.
XXV. MADAM, Reason and Intellect are two different things to your Author;[1] for Intellect, says he, doth properly belong to the Immortal Soul, as being a Formal Light, and the very substance of the Soul it self, wherein the Image of God onely consists; But Reason is an uncertain, frail faculty of the Mortal Soul, and doth in no ways belong, nor has any communion with the Intellect of the Mind. Which seems to me, as if your Author did make some difference between the Divine, and the Natural Soul in Man, although he doth not plainly declare it in the same Terms; for that which I name the Divine Soul, is to him the Immortal Mind, Intellect, or Understanding, and the Seat of the Image of God; but the Natural Soul he calls the Frail, Mortal, and Rational Soul; and as Understanding is the Essence of the Immortal, so Reason is to him the Essence of the Mortal Soul; which Reason he attributes not only to Man, but also to Brutes: For Reason and Discourse, says he, do not obscurely flourish and grow in brute Beasts, for an aged Fox is more crafty then a younger one by rational discourse; and again, That the Rational Part of the Soul doth belong to brutes, is without doubt: Wherein he rightly dissents from those, which onely do attribute a sensitive Soul to brutes; and Reason to none but Man, whom therefore they call a Rational Creature, and by this Rational Faculty do distinguish him from the rest of Animals. And thus I perceive the difference betwixt your Authors opinion, and theirs, is, That other Philosophers commonly do make the Rational soul, to be partly that which I call the supernatural and divine Soul, as onely belonging to man, and bearing the Image of God, not acknowledging any other Natural, but a Sensitive soul in the rest of Animals, and a Vegetative soul in Vegetables; and these three souls, or faculties, operations, or degrees, (call them what you will, for we shall not fall out about names,) concurr and joyn together in Man; but the rest of all Creatures, are void and destitute of Life, as well as of Soul, and therefore called Unanimate; and thus they make the natural rational soul, and the divine soul in man to be all one thing, without any distinguishment; but your Author makes a difference between the Mortal and Immortal soul in Man; the Immortal he calls the Intellect or Understanding, and the Mortal soul he calls Reason: but to my judgment he also attributes to the immortal soul, actions which are both natural, and supernatural, adscribing that to the divine soul, which onely belongs to the natural, and taking that from the natural, which properly belongs to her. Besides, he slights and despises the Rational soul so, as if she were almost of no value with Man, making her no substance, but a mental intricate and obscure Being, and so far from Truth, as if there were no affinity betwixt Truth and Reason, but that they disagree in their very roots, and that the most refined Reason may be deceitful. But your Author, by his leave, confounds Reason, and Reasoning, which are two several and distinct things; for reasoning and arguing differs as much from Reason, as doubtfulness from certainty of knowledg, or a wavering mind from a constant mind; for Reasoning is the discoursive, and Reason the understanding part in Man, and therefore I can find no great difference between Understanding and Reason: Neither can I be perswaded, that Reason should not remain with Man after this life, and enter with him into Heaven, although your Author speaks much against it; for if Man shall be the same then, which he is now, in body, why not in soul also? 'Tis true, the Scripture says, he shall have a more glorious body; but it doth not say, that some parts of the body shall be cast away, or remain behind; and if not of the body, why of the soul? Why shall Reason, which is the chief part of the natural Soul, be wanting? Your Author is much for Intellect or Understanding; but I cannot imagine how Understanding can be without Reason. Certainly, when he saw the Immortal Soul in a Vision, to be a formal Light, how could he discern what he saw, without Reason? How could he distinguish between Light and Darkness, without Reason? How could he know the Image of the Mind to be the Image of God, without the distinguishment of Reason? You will say, Truth informed him, and not Reason. I answer, Reason shews the Truth. You may reply, Truth requires no distinguishment or judgment. I grant, that perfect Truth requires not reasoning or arguing, as whether it be so, or not; but yet it requires reason, as to confirm it to be so, or not so; for Reason is the confirmation of Truth, and Reasoning is but the Inquisition into Truth: Wherefore, when our Souls shall be in the fulness of blessedness, certainly, they shall not be so dull and stupid, but observe distinctions between God, Angels, and sanctified Souls; as also, that our glory is above our merit, and that there is great difference between the Damned, and the Blessed, and that God is an Eternal and Infinite Being, and onely to be adored, admired, and loved, and that we enjoy as much as can be enjoyed: All which the Soul cannot know without the distinguishment of Reason; otherwise we might say, the Souls in Heaven, love, joy, admire and adore, but know not what, why, or wherefore; For, shall the blessed Souls present continual Praises without reason? Have they not reason to praise God for their happiness, and shall they not remember the Mercies of God, and the Merits of his Son? For without remembrance of them, they cannot give a true acknowledgment, although your Author says there is no use of Memory or remembrance in Heaven: but surely, I believe there is; for if there were not memory in Heaven, the Penitent Thief upon the Cross his Prayers had been in vain; for he desired our Saviour to remember him when he did come into his Kingdom: Wherefore if there be Understanding in Heaven, there is also Reason; and if there be Reason, there is Memory also: for all Souls in Heaven, as well as on Earth, have reason to adore, love, and praise God. But, Madam, my study is in natural Philosophy, not in Theology; and therefore I'le refer you to Divines, and leave your Author to his own fancy, who by his singular Visions tells us more news of our Souls, then our Saviour did after his Death and Resurrection: Resting in the mean time, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant. [1] Ch. The hunting or searching out of Sciences. It. Of the Image of the Mind.
XXVI. MADAM, Concerning those parts and chapters of your Authors Works, which treat of Physick; before I begin to examine them, I beg leave of you in this present, to make some reflections first upon his Opinions concerning the Nature of Health and Diseases: As for Health, he is pleased to say,[1] That it consists not in a just Temperature of the body, but in a sound and intire Life; for otherwise, a Temperature of body is as yet in a dead Carcass newly kill'd, where notwithstanding there is now death, but not life, not health: Also he says,[2] That no disease is in a dead carcass. To which I answer, That, in my opinion, Life is in a dead Carcass, as well as in a living Animal, although not such a Life as that Creature had before it became a Carcass, and the Temperature of that Creature is altered with the alteration of its particular life; for the temperature of that particular life, which was before in the Animal, doth not remain in the Carcass, in such a manner as it was when it had the life of such or such an Animal; nevertheless, a dead Carcass hath life, and such a temperature of life, as is proper, and belonging to its own figure: for there are as many different lives, as there be different creatures, and each creature has its particular life and soul, as partaking of sensitive and rational Matter. And if a dead Carcass hath life, and such a temperature of motions as belong to its own life, then there is no question, but these motions may move sometimes irregularly in a dead Carcass as well, as in any other Creature; and since health and diseases are nothing else but the regularity or irregularity of sensitive corporeal Motions, a dead Carcass having Irregular motions, may be said as well to have diseases, as a living body, as they name it, although it is no proper or usual term for other Creatures, but onely for Animals. However, if there were no such thing as a disease (or term it what you will, I will call it Irregularity of sensitive motions) in a dead Carcass, How comes it that the infection of a disease proceeds often from dead Carcasses into living Animals? For, certainly, it is not meerly the odour or stink of a dead body, for then all stinking Carcasses would produce an Infection; wherefore this Infection must necessarily be inherent in the Carcass, and proceed from the Irregularity of its motions. Next I'le ask you, Whether a Consumption be a disease, or not? If it be, then a dead Carcass might be said to have a disease, as well as a living body; and the Ægyptians knew a soveraign remedy against this disease, which would keep a dead Carcass intire and undissolved many ages; but as I said above, a dead Carcass is not that which it was being a living Animal, wherefore their effects cannot be the same, having not the same causes. Next, your Author is pleased to call, with Hippocrates, Nature the onely Physicianess of Diseases. I affirm it; and say moreover, that as she is the onely Physicianess, so she is also the onely Destroyeress and Murtheress of all particular Creatures, and their particular lives; for she dissolves and transforms as well as she frames and creates; and acts according to her pleasure, either for the increase or decrease, augmentation or destruction, sickness or health, life or death of Particular Creatures. But concerning Diseases, your Authors opinion is, That a Disease is as Natural as Health. I answer; 'tis true, Diseases are natural; but if we could find out the art of healing, as well as the art of killing and destroying; and the art of uniting and composing, as well as the art of separating and dividing, it would be very beneficial to man; but this may easier be wished for, then obtained; for Nature being a corporeal substance, has infinite parts, as well as an infinite body; and Art, which is onely the playing action of Nature, and a particular Creature, can easier divide and separate parts, then unite and make parts; for Art cannot match, unite, and joyn parts so as Nature doth; for Nature is not onely dividable and composeable, being a corporeal substance, but she is also full of curiosity and variety, being partly self-moving: and there is great difference between forced actions, and natural actions; for the one sort is regular, the other irregular. But you may say, Irregularities are as natural as Regularities. I grant it; but Nature leaves the irregular part most commonly to her daughter or creature Art, that is, she makes irregularities for varieties sake, but she her self orders the regular part, that is, she is more careful of her regular actions; and thus Nature taking delight in variety suffers irregularities; for otherwise, if there were onely regularities, there could not be so much variety. Again your Author says,[3] That a disease doth not consist but in living bodies. I answer, there is not any body that has not life; for if life is general, then all figures or parts have life; but though all bodies have life, yet all bodies have not diseases; for diseases are but accidental to bodies, and are nothing else but irregular motions in particular Creatures, which may be not onely in Animals, but generally in all Creatures; for there may be Irregularities in all sorts of Creatures, which may cause untimely dissolutions; but yet all dissolutions are not made by irregular motions, for many creatures dissolve regularly, but onely those which are untimely. In the same place your Author mentions, That a Disease consists immediately in Life it self, but not in the dregs and filthinesses, which are erroneous forreigners and strangers to the life. I grant, that a Disease is made by the motions of Life, but not such a life as your Author describes, which doth go out like the snuff of a Candle, or as one of Lucian's Poetical Lights; but by the life of Nature, which cannot go out without the destruction of Infinite Nature: and as the Motions of Nature's life make diseases or irregularities, so they make that which man names dregs and filths; which dregs, filths, sickness, and death, are nothing but changes of corporeal motions, different from those motions or actions that are proper to the health, perfection and consistence of such or such a figure or creature. But, to conclude, there is no such thing as corruption, sickness, or death, properly in Nature, for they are made by natural actions, and are onely varieties in Nature, but not obstructions or destructions of Nature, or annihilations of particular Creatures; and so is that we name Superfluities, which bear onely a relation to a particular Creature, which hath more Motion and Matter then is proper for the nature of its figure. And thus much of this subject for the present, from, Madam, Your faithful Friend and humble Servant.
XXVII. MADAM, In my last, I remember, I told you of your Authors opinion concerning the seat of Diseases, viz. that Diseases are properly in living bodies, and consist in the life it self; but when I consider his definition of Life, and of a Disease, I cannot conceive how they should consist together; for he describes[1] a Disease to be a real, material and substantial being, truly subsisting in a body; but life to be a meer nothing, and yet the immediate mansion of a disease, the inward subject, yea, and workman of the same; and that with the life all diseases depart into nothing. Surely, Madam, it exceedeth my understanding; for, first, I cannot conceive how life, which is a meer Nothing, can be a lodging to something? Next, how Nothing can depart and die? and thirdly how Something can become Nothing? I think your Author might call a dead Carcass as well No-thing, as Life; and since he names Diseases the Thieves of Life, they must needs be but poor Thieves, because they steal No-thing. But your Author compares Life to Light, and calls it an Extinguishable Light, like the light of a Candle; which if so, then the old saying is verified, That life goes out like the snuff of a Candle. But I wonder, Madam, that grave and wise men will seriously make use of a similising old Proverb, or of a Poetical Fancy, in matter of natural Philosophy; for I have observed, that Homer, Lucian, Ovid, Virgil, Horace, &c. have been very serviceable to great Philosophers, who have taken the ground of their Fictions, and transferred them into Natural Philosophy, as Immaterial substances, Non-beings, and many the like; but they can neither do any good nor hurt to Nature, but onely spoil Philosophical Knowledg; and as Nature is ignorant of Immaterials and Non-beings, so Art is ignorant of Nature; for Mathematical Rules, Measures, and Demonstrations, cannot rule, measure nor demonstrate Nature, no more, then Chymical Divisions, Dissolutions and Extractions (or rather distractions, nay, I may say destructions) can divide, dissolve, extract, compose, and unite, as Nature doth; Wherefore their Instruments, Figures, Furnaces, Limbecks, and Engines, cannot instruct them of the truth of Natures Principles; but the best and readiest way to find out Nature, or rather some truth of Nature, is sense and reason, which are Parts of Natures active substance, and therefore the truest informers of Nature; but the Ignorance of Nature has caused Ignorance amongst Philosophers, and the Ignorance of Philosophers hath caused numerous Opinions, and numerous Opinions have caused various Discourses and Disputes; which Discourses and Disputes, are not Sense and Reason, but proceed from Irregular Motions; and Truth is not found in Irregularities. But to return to Life: it seems your Author hath taken his opinion from Lucian's Kingdom of Lights, the Lights being the Inhabitants thereof; and when any was adjudged to die, his Light was put out, which was his punishment: And thus this Heathenish Fiction is become a Christian Verity; when as yet your Author rayls much at those, that insist upon the Opinions and Doctrine of Pagan Philosophers. Wherefore I will leave this Poetical Fancy of Life, and turn to Death, and see what opinion your Author hath of that. First, concerning the cause or original of Death; Neither God, says he,[2] nor the Evil Spirit, is the Creator of Death, but Man onely, who made Death for himself; Neither did Nature make death, but Man made death natural. Which if it be so, then Death being, to my opinion, a natural Creature, as well as Life, Sickness, and Health; Man, certainly, had great Power, as to be the Creator of a natural Creature. But, I would fain know the reason, why your Author is so unwilling to make God the Author of Death, and Sickness, as well as of Damnation? Doth it imply any Impiety or Irreligiousness? Doth not God punish, as well as reward? and is not death a punishment for our sin? You may say, Death came from sin, but sin did not come from God. Then some might ask from whence came sin? You will say, From the Transgression of the Command of God, as the eating of the Forbidden Fruit. But from whence came this Transgression? It might be answer'd, From the Perswasion of the Serpent. From whence came this Perswasion? From his ill and malitious nature to oppose God, and ruine the race of Mankind. From whence came this ill Nature? From his Fall. Whence came his Fall? From his Pride and Ambition to be equal with God. From whence came this Pride? From his Free-will. From whence came his Free-will? From God. Thus, Madam, if we should be too inquisitive into the actions of God, we should commit Blasphemy, and make God Cruel, as to be the Cause of Sin, and consequently of Damnation. But although God is not the Author of Sin, yet we may not stick to say, that he is the Author of the Punishment of Sin, as an Act of his Divine Justice; which Punishment, is Sickness, and Death; nay, I see no reason, why not of Damnation too, as it is a due punishment for the sins of the wicked; for though Man effectively works his own punishment, yet Gods Justice inflicts it: Like as a just Judg may be call'd the cause of a Thief being hang'd. But these questions are too curious; and some men will be as presumptuous as the Devil, to enquire into Gods secret actions, although they be sure that they cannot be known by any Creature. Wherefore let us banish such vain thoughts, and onely admire, adore, love, and praise God, and implore his Mercy, to give us grace to shun the punishments for our sins by the righteousness of our actions, and not endeavour to know his secret designs. Next, I dissent from your Author,[3] That Death and all dead things do want roots whereby they may produce: For death, and dead things, in my opinion, are the most active producers, at least they produce more numerously and variously then those we name living things; for example, a dead Horse will produce more several Animals, besides other Creatures, then a living Horse can do; but what Archeus and Ideas a dead Carcass hath, I can tell no more, then what Blas or Gas it hath; onely this I say, that it has animate Matter, which is the onely Archeus or Master-workman, that produces all things, creates all things, dissolves all things, and transforms all things in Nature; but not out of Nothing, or into Nothing, as to create new Creatures which were not before in Nature, or to annihilate Creatures, and to reduce them to nothing; but it creates and transforms out of, and in the same Matter which has been from all Eternity. Lastly, your Author is pleased to say, That he doth not behold a disease as an abstracted Quality; and that Apoplexy, Leprosie, Dropsie, and Madness, as they are Qualities in the abstract, are not diseases. I am of his mind, that a disease is a real and corporeal being, and do not understand what he and others mean by abstracted qualities; for Nature knows of no abstraction of qualities from substances, and I doubt Man can do no more then Nature doth: Besides, those abstractions are needless, and to no purpose; for no Immaterial quality will do any hurt, if it be no substance; wherefore Apoplexy, Leprosie, Dropsie, and Madness, are Corporeal beings, as well as the rest of Diseases, and not abstracted Qualities; and I am sure, Persons that are affected with those diseases will tell the same. Wherefore leaving needless abstractions to fancies abstracted from right sense and reason, I rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
XXVIII. MADAM, I am very much troubled to see your Authors Works fill'd with so many spiteful reproaches and bitter taunts against the Schools of Physicians, condemning both their Theory and Practice; nay, that not onely the Modern Schools of Physicians, but also the two ancient and famous Physicians, Galen, and Paracelsus, must sufficiently suffer by him; especially Galen; for there is hardly a Chapter in all his Works, which has not some accusations of blind errors, sloth, and sluggishness, Ignorance, Covetousness, Cruelty, and the like: Which I am very sorry for; not onely for the sake of your Author himself, who herein doth betray both his rashness, and weakness, in not bridling his passions, and his too great presumption, reliance and confidence in his own abilities, and extraordinary Gifts; but also for the sake of the Fame and Repute of our Modern Physicians; for without making now any difference betwixt the Galenists and Paracelsians, and examining which are the best, (for I think them both excellent in their kinds, especially when joyned together) I will onely say this in general, that the Art of Physick has never flourish'd better then now, neither has any age had more skilful, learned, and experienced Physicians, then this present; because they have not onely the knowledg and practise of those in ages Past, but also their own experience joyned with it, which cannot but add perfection to their Art; and I, for my part, am so much for the old way of Practice, that if I should be sick, I would desire rather such Physicians which follow the same way, then those, that by their new Inventions, perchance, cure one, and kill a hundred. But your Author[1] will have a Physician to be like a Handycrafts man, who being call'd to a work, promises that work, and stands to his promise; and therefore, It is a shame, says he, in a Physician, being call'd to a sick man in the beginning of the disease, and when his strength is yet remaining, to suffer the same man to die. This, in my opinion, is a very unreasonable comparison, to liken a Handicrafts man to a Physician, and the art of Curing to the art of Building, or any the like, without regard of so many great differences that are between them, which I am loth to rehearse, for brevities sake, and are apparant enough to every one that will consider them: but this I may say, that it is not always for want of skill and industry in a Physician, that the cure is not effected, but it lies either in the Incureableness of the disease, or any other external accidents that do hinder the success: Not but that the best Physicians may err in a disease, or mistake the Patients inward distemper by his outward temper, or the interior temper by his outward distemper, or any other ways; for they may easily err through the variation of the disease, which may vary so suddenly and oft, as it is impossible to apply so fast, and so many Medicines, as the alteration requires, without certain death; for the body is not able, oftentimes, to dispose and digest several Medicines so fast, as the disease may vary, and therefore what was good in this temper, may, perhaps, be bad in the variation; insomuch, that one medicine may in a minute prove a Cordial, and Poyson. Nay, it may be that some Physicians do err through their own ignorance and mistake, must we therefore condemn all the skill, and accuse all the Schools of Negligence, Cruelty, and Ignorance? God forbid: for it would be a great Injustice. Let us rather praise them for the good they do, and not rashly condemn them for the evil they could not help: For we may as well condemn those holy and industrious Divines, that cannot reform wicked and perverse Sinners, as Physicians, because they cannot restore every Patient to his former health, the Profession of a Physician being very difficult; for they can have but outward signs of inward distempers. Besides, all men are not dissected after they are dead, to inform Physicians of the true cause of their death; nay, if they were, perchance they would not give always a true information to the Physician, as is evident by many examples; but oftentimes the blame is laid upon the Physician, when as the fault is either in Nature, or any other cause, which Art could not mend. And if your Author had had such an extraordinary Gift from God as to know more then all the rest of Physicians, why did he not accordingly, and as the Scripture speaks of Faith, shew his skill by his Works and Cures? certainly, could he have restored those that were born blind, lame, deaf and dumb, or cured the spotted Plague, or Apoplexy after the third fit, or the Consumption of Vital parts, or a Fever in the Arteries, or dissolved a Stone too big to go through the passage, and many the like; he would not onely have been cried up for a rare Physician, but for a miracle of the World, and worshipped as a Saint: But if he could not effect more then the Schools can do, why doth he inveigh so bitterly against them? Wherefore I cannot commend him in so doing; but as I respect the Art of Physick, as a singular Gift from God to Mankind, so I respect and esteem also learned and skilful Physicians, for their various Knowledg, industrious Studies, careful Practice, and great Experiences, and think every one is bound to do the like, they being the onely supporters and restorers of humane life and health: For though I must confess, with your Author, that God is the onely giver of Good, yet God is not pleased to work Miracles ordinarily, but has ordained means for the restoring of health, which the Art of Physick doth apply; and therefore those Persons that are sick, do wisely to send for a Physician; for Art, although it is but a particular Creature, and the handmaid of Nature, yet she doth Nature oftentimes very good service; and so do Physicians often prolong their Patients lives. The like do Chirurgeons; for if those Persons that have been wounded, had been left to be cured onely by the Magnetick Medicine, I believe, numbers that are alive would have been dead, and numbers would die that are alive; insomuch, as none would escape, but by miracle, especially if dangerously hurt. Concerning the Coveteousness of Physicians, although sickness is chargeable, yet I think it is not Charitable to say or to think, that Physitians regard more their Profit, then their Patients health; for we might as well condemn Divines for taking their Tithes and Stipends, as Physicians for taking their Fees: but the holy Writ tells us, that a Labourer is Worthy of his hire or reward; and, for my part, I think those commit a great sin, which repine at giving Rewards in any kind; for those that deserve well by their endeavours, ought to have their rewards; and such Meritorious Persons, I wish with all my Soul, may prosper and thrive. Nevertheless, as for those persons, which for want of means are not able to reward their Physicians, I think Physicians will not deal so unconscionably, as to neglect their health and lives for want of their Fees, but expect the reward from God, and be recompenced the better by those that have Wealth enough to spare. And this good opinion I have of them. So leaving them, I rest, Madam, Your constant Friend and faithful Servant.
XXIX. MADAM I am of your Authors mind, That heat is not the cause of digestion; but I dissent from him, when he says, That it is the Ferment of the stomach that doth cause it: For, in my opinion, Digestion is onely made by regular digestive motions, and ill digestion is caused by irregular motions, and when those motions are weak, then there is no digestion at all, but what was received, remains unaltered; but when they are strong and quick, then they make a speedy digestion. You may ask me, what are digestive motions? I answer, They are transchanging, or transforming motions: but since there be many sorts of transchanging motions, digestive motions are those, which transchange food into the nourishment of the body, and dispose properly, fitly and usefully of all the Parts of the food, as well of those which are converted into nourishment, as of those which are cast forth. For give me leave to tell you, Madam, that some parts of natural Matter, do force or cause other parts of Matter to move and work according to their will, without any change or alteration of their parts; as for example, Fire and Metal; for Fire will cause Metal to flow, but it doth not readily alter it from its nature of being Metal; neither doth Fire alter its nature from being Fire. And again, some parts of Matter will cause other parts to work and act to their own will, by forcing these over-powred parts to alter their own natural motions into the motions of the victorious Party, and so transforming them wholly into their own Figure; as for example, Fire will cause Wood to move so as to take its figure, to wit, the figure of Fire, that is, to change its own figurative motions into the motions of Fire: and this latter kind of moving or working is found in digestion; for the regular digestive motions do turn all food received from its own nature or figure, into the nourishment, figure, or nature of the body, as into flesh, blood, bones, and the like. But when several parts of Matter meet or joyn with equal force and power, then their several natural motions are either quite altered, or partly mixt: As for example; some received things not agreeing with the natural constitution of the body, the corporeal motions of the received, and those of the receiver, do dispute or oppose each other: for the motions of the received, not willing to change their nature conformable to the desire of the digestive motions, do resist, and then a War begins, whereby the body suffers most; for it causes either a sickness in the stomack, or a pain in the head, or in the heart, or in the bowels, or the like: Nay, if the received food gets an absolute victory, it dissolves and alters oftentimes the whole body, it self remaining entire and unaltered, as is evident in those that die of surfeits. But most commonly these strifes and quarrels, if violent, do alter and dissolve each others forms or natures. And many times it is not the fault of the Received, but of the Receiver; as for example, when the digestive and transforming motions are either irregular, or weak; for they being too weak, or too few, the meat or food received is digested onely by halves; and being irregular, it causes that which we call corruption. But it may be observed, that the Received food is either agreeable, or disagreeable, to the Receiver; if agreeable, then there is a united consent of Parts, to act regularly and perfectly in digestion; if disagreeable, then the Received acts to the Ruine, that is, to the alteration or dissolution of the Nature of the Receiver; but if it be neutral, that is, neither perfectly agreeable, nor perfectly disagreeable, but between both, then the receiver, or rather the digestive Motions of the receiver, use a double strength to alter and transform the received. But you may ask me, Madam, what the reason is, that many things received, after they are dissolved into small parts, those parts will keep their former colour and savour? I answer; The cause is, that either the retentive Motions in the Parts of the received, are too strong for the digestive and alterative Motions of the receiver, or perchance, this colour and savour is so proper to them, as not to be transchanged: but you must observe, that those digestive, alterative and transchanging motions, do not act or move all after one and the same manner; for some do dissolve the natural figure of the received, some disperse its dissolved parts into the parts of the body, some place the dispersed parts fitly and properly for the use, benefit, and consistence of the body; for there is so much variety in this one act of digestion, as no man is able to conceive; and if there be such variety in one Particular natural action, what variety will there not be in all Nature? Wherefore, it is not, as I mentioned in the beginning, either Ferment, or Heat, or any other thing, that causes digestion; for if all the constitution and nature of our body was grounded or did depend upon Ferment, then Brewers and Bakers, and those that deal with Ferments, would be the best Physicians. But I would fain know the cause which makes Ferment? You may say, saltness, and sowreness. But then I ask, From whence comes saltness and sowreness? You may say, From the Ferment. But then I shall be as wise as before. The best way, perhaps, may be to say, with your Author, that Ferment is a Primitive Cause, and a beginning or Principle of other things, and it self proceeds from nothing. But then it is beyond my imagination, how that can be a Principle of material things, which it self is nothing; that is, neither a substance, nor an accident. Good Lord! what a stir do men make about nothing! I am amazed to see their strange Fancies and Conceptions vented for the Truest Reasons: Wherefore I will return to my simple opinion; and as I cannot conceive any thing that is beyond Matter, or a Body; so I believe, according to my reason, that there is not any part in Nature, be it never so subtil or small, but is a self-moving substance, or endued with self-motion; and according to the regularity and irregularity of these motions, all natural effects are produced, either perfect, or imperfect; timely births, or untimely and monstrous births; death, health, and diseases, good and ill dispositions, natural and extravagant Appetites and Passions, (I say natural, that is, according to the nature of their figures;) Sympathy and Antipathy, Peace and War, Rational and Phantastical opinions. Nevertheless, all these motions, whether regular or irregular, are natural; for regularity and irregularity hath but a respect to particulars, and to our conceptions, because those motions which move not after the ordinary, common or usual way or manner, we call Irregular. But the curiosity and variety in Nature is unconceiveable by any particular Creature; and so leaving it, I rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
XXX. MADAM, Your Author says,[1] it is an ancient Truth, That whatsoever things, meats being digested and cast out by vomit, are of a sowre taste and smell, yea, although they were seasoned with much sugar. But I do not assent to this opinion; for I think that some Vomits have no more taste then pure Water hath. Neither am I of his mind, That Digestion is hastened by sharpness or tartness: For do but try it by one simple experiment; take any kind of flesh-meat, boyl or stew it with Vinegar, or sowre wine, or with much salt; and you will find, that it doth require a longer time, or rather more motions to dissolve, then if you boyl it in fair water, without such ingredients as are sowre, sharp, or salt; also if you do but observe, you will find the dregs more sandy, stony and hard, being drest with much salt, and sharp wine, or vinegar, then when they are not mixt with such contracting and fixing Ingredients. Wherefore, if the Ferment of the stomack hath such a restringent and contracting quality, certainly digestions will be but slow and unprofitable; but Nature requires expulsion as much as attraction, and dilation as much as contraction, and digestion is a kind of dilation. Wherefore, in my judgment; contracting tartness and sharpness doth rather hinder digestion then further it. Next I perceive, your Author inclines to the opinion, That Choler is not made by meat:[2] But I would ask him, whether any humor be made of meat, or whether blood, flesh, &c. are made and nourished by meat? If they be not, then my answer is, That we eat to no purpose; but if they be, then Choler is made so too. But if he says, That some are made, and some not; then I would ask, what that humor is made of, that is not made by meat or food received into the body? But we find that humors, blood, flesh, &c. will be sometimes more, sometimes less, according either to feeding, or to digestion, which digestion is a contribution of food to every several part of the body for its nourishment; and when there is a decay of those parts, then it is caused either by fasting, or by irregular digestion, or by extraordinary evacuation, or by distempered matter, &c. all which, causes sickness, paleness, leanness, weakness, and the like. Again: your Author is against the opinion of the Schools, That the Gall is a receptacle of superfluous humors and dregs: for he says, it has rather the constitution of a necessary and vital bowel, and is the balsom of the liver and blood. Truly, it may be so, for any thing I know, or it may be not; for your Author could but guess, not assuredly know, unless he had been in a man as big as the Whale in whose belly Jonas was three days, and had observed the interior parts and motions of every part for three years time, and yet he might perchance have been as ignorant at the coming forth, as if he never had been there; for Natures actions are not onely curious, but very various; and not onely various, but very obscure; in so much, as the most ingenious Artists cannot trace her ways, or imitate her actions; for Art being but a Creature, can do or know no more then a Creature; and although she is an ingenious Creature, which can and hath found out some things profitable and useful for the life of others, yet she is but a handmaid to Nature, and not her Mistress; which your Author, in my opinion, too rashly affirms, when he says,[3] That the Art of Chymistry is not onely the Chambermaid and emulating Ape, but now and then the Mistress of Nature: For Art is an effect of Nature, and to prefer the effect before the cause, is absurd. But concerning Chymistry, I have spoken in another place; I'le return to my former Discourse: and I wonder much why your Author is so opposite to the Schools, concerning the doctrine of the Gall's being a receptacle for superfluities and dregs; for I think there is not any Creature that has not places or receptacles for superfluous matter, such as we call dregs; for even the purest and hardest Mineral, as Gold, has its dross, although in a less proportion then some other Creatures; nay, I am perswaded, that even Light, which your Author doth so much worship, may have some superfluous matter, which may be named dregs; and since Nature has made parts in all Creatures to receive and discharge superfluous matter, (which receiving and discharging is nothing else but a joyning and dividing of parts to and from parts,) why may not the Gall be as well for that use as any other part? But I pray mistake me not, when I say superfluous matter or dregs; for I understand by it, that which is not useful to the nourishment or consistence of such or such a Creature; but to speak properly, there is neither superfluity of matter nor dregs in Nature. Moreover, your Author mentions a six-fold digestion, and makes every digestion to be performed by inbreathing or inspiration; For in the first digestion, he says, The spleen doth inspire a sowre Ferment into the Meat: In the second, The Gall doth inspire a ferment, or fermental blas into the slender entrails: In the third, The Liver doth inspire a bloody ferment into the veins of the Mensentery, &c. I answer, first, I am confident Nature has more ways then to work onely by Inspirations, not onely in General, but in every Particular. Next, I believe there are not onely six, but many more digestions in an animal Creature; for not onely every sort of food, but every bit that is eaten, may require a several digestion, and every several part of the body works either to expel, or preserve, or for both; so that there are numerous several Motions in every Creature, and many changes of motions in each particular part; but Nature is in them all. And so leaving her, I rest, Madam, Your Faithful Friend and Servant.
XXXI. MADAM, Your Author, in opposition to the Schools, endeavouring to prove that there are no humors in an animal body, except blood, proves many humors in himself. But I can see no reason, why Nature should not make several humors, as well as several Elements, Vegetables, Minerals, Animals, and other Creatures; and that in several parts of the body, and many several ways; for to mention but one sort of other Creatures, viz. Vegetables, they are, as we see, not onely produced many several ways, but in many several grounds; either by sowing, setting, or grafting, either in clayie, limy, sandy, chalky, dry, or wet grounds: And why may not several humors be produced as well of other Creatures and parts, as others are produced of them? for all parts of Nature are produced one from another, as being all of one and the same Matter, onely the variation of corporeal motions makes all the difference and variety between them, which variety of motions is impossible to be known by any particular Creature; for Nature can do more then any Creature can conceive. Truly, Madam, I should not be of such a mind, as to oppose the Schools herein so eagerly as your Author doth; but artificial actions make men to have erroneous opinions of the actions of Nature, judging them all according to the rule and measure of Art, when as Art oft deludes men under the cover of truth, and makes them many times believe falshood for truth; for Nature is pleased with variety, and so doth make numerous absurdities, doubts, opinions, disputations, objections, and the like. Moreover, your Author is as much against the radical moisture, as he is against the four humors; saying, that according to this opinion of the Schools, a fat belly, through much grease affording more fuel to the radical moisture, must of necessity live longer. But this, in my opinion, is onely a wilful mistake; for I am confident, that the Schools do not understand radical moisture to be gross, fat radical oyl, but a thin oylie substance. Neither do they believe radical heat to be a burning, fiery and consuming heat, but such a degree of natural heat, as is comfortable, nourishing, refreshing, and proper for the life of the animal Creature: Wherefore radical heat and moisture doth not onely consist in the Grease of the body; for a lean body may have as much, and some of them more Radical moisture, then fat bodies. But your Author instead of this radical moisture, makes a nourishable moisture, onely, as I suppose, out of a mind to contradict the Schools; when as I do not perceive, that the Schools mean by Radical moisture, any other then a nourishable moisture, and therefore this distinction is needless. Lastly, he condemns the Schools, for making an affinity betwixt the bowels and the brain. But he might as will condemn Politicians, for saying there is an affinity betwixt Governors and Subjects, or betwixt command and obedience; but as the actions of Particulars, even from the meanest in a Commonwealth, may chance to make a Publick disturbance, so likewise in the Common-wealth of the body, one single action in a particular part may cause a disturbance of the whole Body, nay, a total ruine and dissolution of the composed; which dissolution is called Death; and yet these causes are neither Light, nor Blas, nor Gas, no more then men are shining Suns, or flaming Torches, or blazing Meteors, or azure Skies. Wherefore leaving your Author to his contradicting humor, I rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
XXXII. MADAM, I do verily believe, with the Schools, the Purging of the Brain, against your Author;[1] For I know no reason, why all the parts of a man's body should not stand in need of evacuation and Purging, as well as some. 'Tis true, if the substance or nourishment received were all useful, and onely enough for the maintenance, subsistance and continuance of the Creature, and no more, then there would be no need of such sort of evacuation; but I believe the corporeal self-motions in a body, discharge the superfluous matter out of every part of the body, if the motions of the superfluous matter be not too strong, and over-power the motions in the parts of the body; but some parts do produce more superfluities then others, by reason their property is more to dilate, then to contract, and more to attract, then to retain or fix; which parts are the brain, stomack, bowels, bladder, gall, and the like: wherefore, as there is nourishment in all parts of the body, so there are also excrements in all parts, for there is no nourishment without excrement. Next your Author says, That the nourishment of the solid parts is made with the transmutation of the whole venal blood into nourishment, without a separation of the pure from the impure. But I pray give me leave to ask, Madam, whether the solid Parts are not Instruments for the nourishment of the Venal blood? Truly, I cannot conceive, how blood should be nourished, wanting those solid parts, and their particular motions and imployments. Again: his opinion is, That the brain is nourished by a few and slender veins; neither doth a passage or channel appear whereby a moist excrement may derive, or a vapour enter. And by reason of the want of such a passage, in another place[2] he is pleased to affirm, That nothing can fume up from the stomack into the brain, and therefore Wine doth not make drunk with fuming from the stomach into the head, but the Winie spirit is immediately snatched into the arteries out of the stomach without digestion, and so into the head, and there breeds a confusion. First, I am not of the opinion, that all nourishment comes from the veins, or from one particular part of the body, no more do Excrements; neither do I believe that every passage in the body is visible to Anatomists, for Natures works are too curious and intricate for any particular Creature to find them out, which is the cause that Anatomists and Chymists are so oft mistaken in natural causes and effects; for certainly, they sometimes believe great Errors for great Truths. Next, as for Drunkenness, I believe that many, who drink much Wine, are drunk before such time as the Wine spirit can get into the Arteries; but if there be Pores to the Brain, as it is most probable, the spirit of Wine may more easily ascend and enter those Pores, then the Pores of the Arteries, or the Mouth-veins, and so make a circular journey to the Head. But as for Excrements, whereof I spake in the beginning, as they are made several manners or ways, and in several parts of the body, so they are also discharged several ways from several parts, and several ways from each particular part, indeed so many several ways and manners, as would puzzle the wisest man in the world, nay your Authors Interior keeper of the Brain, to find them out. Wherefore, to conclude, he is the best Physician, that can tell how to discharge superfluity, and to retain useful nourishments; or to restore by the application of proper Medicines, decaying parts, or to put in order Irregular motions; and not those that have Irregular opinions of Immaterial causes: To which, I leave them, and rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and humble Servant.
XXXIII. MADAM, I do not approve of your Authors Doctrine, forbidding Phlebotomy or blood-letting in Fevers, opposite to the received Practice of the Schools; his reason is, that he believes there can be no corruption in the blood. Corrupted blood, says he,[1] cannot be in the veins, neither doth a state of ill juice consist in the veins; for Gangrenes do teach, that nothing of Putrified matter can long persist without a further contagion of it self. Also he says, That the blood of the Veins is no otherwise distinguished by its several colours and signs, then as wine is troubled when the vine flourisheth. To which I answer, first, That I can see no reason why there should not be as well corrupt blood, or an ill state of juice in the veins, as ill humors in the body. Perchance he will say, There is no corruption in the body. But Ulcers do teach the contrary. He may reply, Ulcers are not parts of the body. I answer, 'Tis true; but yet they are evil Inhabitants in the body, and the like may be in the Veins. But surely some men may have corrupted parts of their bodies, and yet live a great while; witness Ulcers in the Lungs, and other parts. But your Author may say, When a part of the body is corrupted, it is no longer an animal Part. I grant it: but yet, as I said, that transformed part may remain in the body some time without destruction of the whole body; and so likewise, when some of the blood, is transchanged from being blood, so as not to be capable to be reduced again, it may nevertheless remain in the veins without definition of the veins, or of the whole body: Neither do I conceive any reason, why corrupt blood should Gangrene in the veins, and infect the adjoyning parts more then corrupted lungs do. Next, as for the comparison of the various colours and signs of the blood, with Wine being troubled when the Vine is flourishing; I answer, That it doth not prove any thing; for we speak of such colours, as are signs of corrupted, and not such as are signs of troubled blood: Besides, it is an unlike comparison; for though Wine may become thick by much fermentation, yet it doth not turn into water, as blood in some sick and diseased persons will do. But corrupted blood may be, not onely in the veins of sick, but also of healthy persons; and the story says, that Seneca, when his veins were cut, they would not bleed, although in a hot Bath, by reason that which was in the veins, was rather like a white jelly, then blood, and yet he was healthy, though old; which proves, that it is not necessary for the blood to be so pure and fluid as your Author will have it. The truth is, the more fluid the blood is, the weaker it is; like balsam, the more gummy it is, the stronger it is: but veins, which are the mouth, to receive or suck in juices, as also the stomack which digests the meat that after is turned into blood, may be defective either through weakness, superfluity, obstruction, corruption, or evil and hurtful diet, or through the disorders of other particular parts, which may disturb all the parts in general, as skilful Physicians have observed, and therefore apply remedies accordingly; for if the defect proceeds from weakness, they give strengthening remedies; if from superfluities, they give evacuating remedies; if from evil diets, they prescribe such a course of diet as shall be beneficial, and conducing for the restoring of health to the whole body. But your Author, as I perceive, believes the blood to be the chief vital part of the body; which surely it is not: for if it were, the least disturbance of the blood would endanger the life of the whole body, and the least diminution would cause a total dissolution of that animal Creature which has blood: Not but that blood is as necessary as breath for respiration, and food for nourishment of the body; but too much blood is as dangerous to the life of the animal body, as too great a piece of food, which cannot be swallowed down, but doth stick in the throat, and stop the breath, or so much quantity as cannot be digested, for too great a fulness or abounding makes a stoppage of the blood, or which is worse, causes the veins to break, and an evil digestion, makes a corruption, or at least such disorder as to indanger the whole animal Figure. But some veins breed more blood, and some less, and some better, and some worse blood, some hotter, and some colder, some grosser, and some purer, some thicker, and some thinner; and some veins breed rather an evil juice or corrupt matter then pure blood; the truth is, blood is bred somewhat after the manner of Excrements, for the veins are somewhat like the guts, wherein the excrements are digested. But you will say, A man may live without excrements, but not without blood. I answer: a man can live no more without excrements and excremental humors, then he can without blood: but yet I am not of your Authors mind, that bleeding and purging are destructive; for superfluities are as dangerous as scarcities, nay more; like as an house filled with rubbish is in more danger to sink or fall, then that which is empty; and when a house is on fire, it is wisdom to take out the Moveables, but a folly to let them increase the flame. But your Author says, Blood-letting takes not onely away the bad, but also the good blood, by which it diminishes and impairs much the strength of the body. I will answer by way of question, Whether in War men would not venture the loss of some few friends, to gain the victory, or save the whole body of the Army: or whether the destroying of the enemies Army be not more advantageous, then the loss of some few friends? For although some good blood may issue out with the bad, yet the veins have more time, room, and some more power to get friendly juices from the several parts of the body, which will be more obedient, trusty, and true to the life and service of the whole body. But neither Fevers, nor any other distempers, will be more afraid of your Authors words, Stones, Spirits, as also Rings, Beads, Bracelets, and the like toys, fitter for Children to play withal, then for Physicians to use; then an Army of men will be of their enemies Colours, Ensigns, Feathers, Scarfs, and the like; knowing it must be Swords, Pistols, Guns, Powder and Bullets, that must do the business to destroy the enemy, and to gain the victory: Wherefore in Diseases it must be Bleeding, Purging, Vomiting, using of Clysters, and the like, if any good shall be done. 'Tis true, they must well be ordered, otherwise they will do more hurt then good; for Diseases are like Enemies, which sometimes take away our Armes for their own uses. But your Author says again, That the Matter of a Fever floats not in the veins, nor sits nigh the heart. I answer: There are several sorts of Fevers; for all Fevers are not produced after one and the same manner, or from one and the same cause, as is very well known to wise and experienced Physicians; but although some Fevers are not in the blood, yet that doth not prove, that the blood is never in a Fever; for sometimes the blood is in a Fever, and not the solid parts; and sometimes the fluid and moveable humors, and not the blood, or solid parts; and sometimes the solid parts, and not the blood, nor the liquid and moveable humors; and sometimes they are all in a Fever; and sometimes onely the radical parts, and neither the blood, humors, nor solid parts: and this last kind of Fever, which is a hectick Fever, in my opinion, is incureable; but the others may be cureable, if there be not too many varieties of distempers, or irregular motions. And as for a Fever in the solid parts, Letting of blood, and taking away the humor, may cure it; for the veins being empty, suck the heat out of the solid parts, which solid parts cannot draw out a distempered heat in the veins, and the opening of the veins gives vent to some of the interior heat to issue forth: Wherefore it is very requisite, that in all sorts of Fevers, except Hectick-Fevers, blood-letting should be used, not onely once, but often; for 'tis better to live with a little blood, and a little strength, which will soon be recovered, then to die with too much, or too hot and distempered blood. Also Purging, but especially Vomiting is very good; for if the humors be in a Feaver, they may infect the vital parts, as also the blood; but if they be not in a Fever, yet the solid parts or blood may do the same, and so make the contagion greater; for the humors are as the moveables in a house, which ought to be cast out if either they or the house should be on fire; and if a disorder proceeds from the error of a particular part, then care must be taken to rectifie that part for the health of the whole: Wherefore Physicians use in some cases Blood-letting, in some Purging, in some Vomiting, in some Bathing, in some Sweating, in some Cordials, especially after much evacuation, in some they prescribe a good diet, and in some they mix and prescribe partly one and partly the other, and in some cases they are forced to use all these remedies; for though great evacuations may cause weakness, yet they often save the life; and there is no Patient, but had rather lose some strength, then life; for life can gather strength again; but all strong men are not always long lived, nor all long-lived men very strong; for many that are but weak, will live to a very old age. Lastly, concerning what your Author says, that there is but one Choler and Phlegme in Nature; I answer, That is more then he knows: for all that is in Nature, is not nor cannot be known by any Particular Creature; and he might say, as well, the same of particular Metals, as that there is but one sort of Gold or Silver, when as there is great difference in the weight, purity, colour, and gloss, of several parts of Gold and Silver; Neither is all Gold found in one place; but some is found in Rocks, some in Sand, some in Mines, some in Stones; and so Silver, some is found in the bowels of the Earth, some in the veins of Stones, and some in other Metals, as Lead, and Iron, and some in Coals. And the like may be said of Choler and Phlegme; for they may be several in several places or parts of the body, and be of different colours, tastes, odours, and degrees of heat or cold, thinness or thickness, or the like; for though there is but one Matter in Nature, yet this onely Matter by its several actions or motions changes into several figures, and so makes several sorts of Creatures, and different particulars in every sort. And thus, Madam, I have delivered unto you my opinion concerning the cure of Fevers by Blood-letting: Which I submit to the correction of your better judgment, and rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant. [1] In his Treatise of Fevers, c. 4.
XXXIV. MADAM, Your Author is not onely against Phlebotomy or Blood-letting, but against all Purging Medicines, which he condemns to carry a hidden poyson in them, and to be a cruel and stupid invention. But certainly he shall not have my assent; for if they be Poyson, they are a very beneficial Poyson; and Physical Purgations, in my opinion, are very necessary and profitable for the prolonging of life, and taking away of diseases, provided they be proper for those diseases in which they are used; and so is Phlebotomy, Vomits, and the like: but Medicines are often wrong applyed, and many times the disease is so various, that it is as hard for a Physician to hit right with several Medicines, as for a Gunner or Shooter to kill with Powder and small Shot a Bird flying in the Air; not that it is not possible to be done, but it is not ordinary, or frequent: neither doth the fault onely lie in the Gun, Powder, or Shot, but in the swiftness of the flight of the Bird, or in the various motion of the air, or in a hidden wind, or mist, or the like; for the same Gunner may perhaps easily kill a Bird sitting in a bush, or hopping upon the ground. The like may be said of Diseases, Physicians, and Medicines; for some diseases have such hidden alterations, by the sudden changes of motions, that a wise Physician will not, nor cannot venture to apply so many several medicines so suddenly as the alteration requires; and shall therefore Physicians be condemned? and not onely condemned for what cannot be helped by reason of the variety of irregular motions, but what cannot be helped in Nature? For some diseases are so deadly, as no art can cure them, when as otherwise Physicians with good and proper medicines, have, and do as yet rescue more people from death, then the Laws do from ruine. Nay, I have known many that have been great enemies to Physick, die in the flower of their age, when as others which used themselves to Physick, have lived a very long time. But you may say, Country-people and Labourers, take little or no Physick, and yet grow most commonly old, whereas on the contrary, Great and rich Persons take much Physick, and do not live so long as the common sort of men doth. I answer: It is to be observed, first, that there are more Commons, then Nobles, or Great and rich persons; and there is not so much notice taken of the death of a mean, as of a noble, great, or rich person; so that for want of information or knowledg, one may easily be deceived in the number of each sort of persons. Next, the Vulgar sort use laborious exercises, and spare diet; when as noble and rich persons are most commonly lazie and luxurious, which breeds superfluities of humors, and these again breed many distempers: For example, you shall find few poor men troubled with the Gout, Stone, Pox, and the like diseases, nor their Children with Rickets; for all this cometh by luxury, and no doubt but all other diseases are sooner bred with luxury, then temperance; but whatsoever is superfluous, may, if not be taken away, yet mediated with lenitive and laxative medicines. But as for Physicians, surely never age knew any better, in my opinion, then this present, and yet most of them follow the rules of the Schools, which are such as have been grounded upon Reason, Practice, and Experience, for many ages: Wherefore those that will wander from the Schools, and follow new and unknown ways, are, in my opinion, not Orthodoxes, but Hereticks in the Art of Physick. But to return to your Author, give me leave, Madam, to consider what his opinions are concerning the Purging of Choler; Come on, says he to the Schools,[1] Why doth that, your Choler following with so swift an efflux, stink so horribly, which but for one quarter of an hour before did not stink? To which it may be answered, That though humors may not stink in themselves, yet the excrements mixt with the humors may stink; also the very passing thorow the excrements will cause a strong savour. But your Author thinks, That by passing through so suddenly, the humors cannot borrow such a smell of stinking dung from the Intestines. Truly, 'tis easily said, but hardly proved, and the contrary is manifest by putting clear, pure water into a stinking vessel, which straightway is corrupted with an ill smell. He talks also of Vitriol dissolved in Wine, which if it be taken, presently provokes vomit; but if after drinking it, any one shall drink thereupon a draught of Ale or Beer, or Water, &c. he indeed shall suffer many stools, yet wholly without stink. I answer: This expresses Vitriol to be more poysonous, by taking away the natural savour of the bowels, then Scammony, Coloquintida, Manna, Cassia, Sena, Rhubarb, &c. to all which your Author is a great enemy; and it is well known to experienced Physicians, that Medicines prepared by the art of fire are more poysonous and dangerous then natural drugs; nay, I dare say, that many Chymical Medicines, which are thought to be Cordials, and have been given to Patients for that purpose, have proved more poysonous then any Purging Physick. Again your Author says, It is worthy of Lamentation, that Physicians would have loosening things draw out one humor, and not another, by selection or choyce. My answer is, That natural drugs and simples are as wise in their several operations, as Chymists in their artificial distillations, extractions, sublimations, and the like; but it has long been observed by Physicians, that one simple will work more upon one part of the body, then upon another; the like may be said of humors. But give me leave to tell you, Madam, that if your Author believes magnetick or attractive cures (as he doth, and in whose behalf he makes very long discourses) he doth in this opinion contradict himself. He may say, perhaps, There is no such thing as what Physicians name humors. But grant there be none, yet he cannot deny that there are offensive juices, or moveable substances made by evil, as irregular digestions, which may be troublesom and hurtful to the nature of the body. Or perchance he will say, There are such humors, but they are beneficial and not offensive to the nature of the body. I answer: Then he must make an agreement with every part of the body, not to make more of these humors then is useful for the body. Also he mentions some few that took Purging Physick, and died. Truly so they might have done without taking it: but he doth not tell, how many have died for want of proper and timely Purges. In truth, Madam, 'tis an easie thing to find fault, but not so easie to mend it. And as for what he speaks of the weighing of those humors and excrements, which by purging were brought out of some Princes body, and how much by the Schools rules remained, and of the place which should maintain the remainder; I onely say this, that all the several sorts of juices, humors, or moveable substances in a body, do not lie in one place, but are dispersed, and spread all about and in several parts and places in the body; so that the several Laxative medicines do but draw them together, or open several parts, that they may have freedom to travel with their chief Commanders, which are the Purging medicines. But your Author says, the Loadstone doth not draw rust. And I say, no more do Purging drugs draw out pure Matter: for it may be as natural for such medicines to draw or work onely upon superfluities, that is, corrupted, or evil-affected humors, juices or moveable substances, as for the Loadstone to draw Iron; and so it may be the property of Purges to draw onely the rust of the body, and not the pure metal, which are good humors. But few do consider or observe sufficiently the variety of Natures actions, and the motions of particular natural Creatures, which is the cause they have no better success in their cures. And so leaving them to a more diligent inquisition and search into Nature, and her actions, I rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and humble Servant.
XXXV. MADAM, I find your Author to be as great an enemy to Issues, Cauteries, Clysters, and the like, as he is to Blood-letting and Purging; especially to Issues, which he counts to be blasphemous against the Creator, and blames much the Schools for prescribing them. But concerning Blood-letting and Purging, I have declared my opinion in my former Letters; and if you desire my judgment of Clysters and Issues, I must needs tell you, that it is well known these many ages, that in such diseases which lie in the guts, and cause pain in the head, and stop the ureteres, Clysters have been very beneficial, but wise Physicians do not prescribe them, unless upon necessity: As for example; if the disease in the Guts proceed from cold or wind, they prescribe a Sack-Clyster, with oyl of Walnuts; and if the disease in the guts proceed from a sharp or bitter humor, then they prescribe Milk, or Posset, sweetned with Sugar: the same if the guts be too full of excrements or slime. But in case of diseases in the head or stomack, they prescribe attractive Clysters, to wit, such as draw down from the upper into the lower parts, wherein the Physical drugs are; and if the guts be too dry, or dryer then their nature requires, they prescribe moistening Clysters, such as have not onely wetting, but slimy qualities. And surely Clysters properly and timely applyed, are a safe, speedy, easie and profitable medicine, and far more safe then Chymical Salts, Tartars, Spirits, or the like. Next concerning Issues and Cauteries, your Author, I say, is so much against them, as he counts them a blasphemy; for says he,[1] I have beheld always an implicite blasphemy in a Cautery, whereby they openly accuse the Creator of insufficiency in framing the emunctories; for I have bidden above a thousand Issues to be filled up with flesh. Also, That which God hath made whole and entire, that it might be very good, seems to the Schools, that it should be better if it be kept wounded. Truly, Madam, in my opinion, it is no blasphemy at all, neither directly nor indirectly, to make Issues, but a meer superstition to believe the contrary, viz. that they are blasphemy, and a great folly not to make them when need requires it to the preservation of ones health. God has made our body whole and intire, says your Author: by which he will prove that no holes must be made in the body to let out excrementious matter, and therefore he thinks that body to be whole and intire which is without an Issue, when as yet our bodies have numerous issues, which are the pores of the skin, to let out sweat; and therefore if he counts that body not to be whole and intire that has Issues, then no humane body is intire. Certainly, no Artificial Issue will make the body maimed, but it will nevertheless continue whole and intire although it has Issues. He says it is Blasphemy; But how will he prove it? Surely not by the Scripture; and if not by the Scripture, then it is a blasphemy according to his own brain and fancy. 'Tis true, God gave no express Command to make Issues; but according to your Author, God did never create Diseases, and so there was no need either to make such Issues in bodies as to let out distempered Matter, or to give any command for them; but we might as well say, we must not use any Physick, because it is not so natural to man as food, and serves not for the nourishment of the body, but onely to keep off, or drive out diseases: Also no stone must be cut, but man must rather indure torment and death. But setting aside this superstitious doctrine of your Author, it is evident enough, and needs no proof, that Cancers, Fistulas, Wenns, Eating-evils, Madness, Fevers, Consumptions, Rheumes, Pleurisies, and numerous other diseases, are not better cured then by Issues, or making of wounds, either by Lancets, Pen-knifes, Scissers, Rasors, Corrosives, Causticks, Leeches, or the like. And although your Author says, That that Matter which proceeds from, or out of an Issue, is made in the lips of the wound, and not in the body; for it cannot possibly drain or draw out any moisture, either from within or between the skin and the flesh, having no passages: Yet if this were so, how come Fistulas, Cancers, and the like diseases, to have passages from within the body to the exterior parts, so, as to make a wound, out of which much sharp and salt humor issues? which humor certainly is not made in the lips of the wound, but in the body: Also whence comes the humor that makes the Gout? For though the swelling and inflammation will sometimes appear exteriously, yet after some time those tumors and humors retire back into the body from whence they did flow; but he might as well say that Pit-falls or Sluces do not drain Land from a superfluity of Water, as that Issues do not drain the body of superfluous humors. Wherefore I am absolutely of opinion, that the Practice of the Schools is the best and wisest Practice, as well in making Issues, letting blood, Purging by Siege or Vomits, as any other means used by them; for by Issues I have seen many cured, when no other medicines would do any good with them; and letting blood, I am confident, hath rescued more lives, then the Universal Medicine, could Chymists find it out, perchance would do. So also Clysters and Vomits, skilfully applied, have done great benefits to the life of men; for every part and member hath its peculiar way to be purged and cleansed; for example, Clysters principally cleanse the Guts, Purges the Stomack, Vomits the Chest, Sneezing the Head, Bleeding the Veins, and Issues drain the whole body of naughty humors: All which remedies, properly and timely used, keep the body from being choak'd with superfluities. There are several other ways of cures besides for several diseases, but I leave those to learned and skilful Physicians, who know best how and when to use them to the benefit and health of their Patients, although your Author finds much fault with them, and blames them for suffering men to die miserably; but God has given power to Nature to make certain dissolutions, although uncertain diseases, and uncertain remedies. Neither hath she in her power to give Immortal Life to particular Creatures, for this belongs to God alone, and therefore no Universal Medicine will keep out death, or prolong life further then its thread is spun, which I doubt is but a ChymÆra, and an impossible thing, by reason there are not onely so many different varieties in several diseases, but in one and the same disease, as no Universal remedy would do any good. But your Author is much pleased with Paradoxes, and Paradoxes are not certain Truths: Wherefore it is better, in my judgment, to follow the old approved and practised way of the Schools, grounded upon Experience and Reason, then his Paradoxical Opinions. To which Schools, as your Author is a great Enemy, so I am a great Friend, as well as, Madam, Your Ladiships humble Servant.
XXXVI. MADAM, I approve well of your Authors opinion,[1] That Drink ought not to be forbidden in Fevers; but yet I would not allow so much as to drown and oppress the Patients life, but onely so much as to refresh and moisten him; and therefore the best way is to drink little and often. But as for Wine, which your Author commends in Fevers, I am utterly against it, unless the Fever proceed from a cold or crude cause, otherwise cooling Ptisans are most beneficial to those that are sick of a continual Fever, which for the most part is a general Fever throughout the whole body, one part infecting the other, until they be all infected, like as in the Plague. And to let you know the proof of it; when I was once sick beyond the Seas, I sent for a Doctor of Physick who was an Irish-man: and hearing of some that knew him, and his practice, that he was not successful in his Cures, but that his Patients most commonly died, I asked him what he used to prescribe in such or such diseases? where amongst the rest, as I remember, he told me, That he allowed his Patients to drink Wine in a Fever. I thought he was in a great error, and told him my opinion, that though Wine might be profitable, perhaps, to some few, yet for the most part it was very hurtful and destructive, alledging another famous Physician in France, Dr. Davison, who used in continual Fevers, to prescribe onely cooling Ptisan, made of a little Barley, and a great quantity of Water, so thin as the Barley was hardly perceived, and a spoonfull of syrup of Limmon put into a quart of the said Ptisan; but in case of a Flux, he ordered some few seeds of Pomegranats to be put into it, and this cold Ptisan was to be the Patients onely drink: Besides, once in Twenty four hours he prescribed a couple of potched Eggs, with a little Verjuice, and to let the Patient blood, if he was dry and hot; I mean dry exteriously, as from sweat; and that either often or seldom, according as occasion was found: Also he prescribed two grains of Laudanum every night, but neither to give the Patient meat nor drink two hours before and after: Which advice and Practice of the mentioned Physician concerning Fevers, with several others, I declared to this Irish Doctor, and he observing this rule, cured many, and so recovered his lost esteem and repute. But your Author being all for Wine, and against cooling drinks, or Julips, in hot Fevers, says, That cooling means are more like to death, to cessation from motion, and to defect; but heat from moderate Wine is a mean like unto life. To which I answer, first, That cold, or cooling things, are as active as hot or heating things; neither is death more cold then hot, nor life more hot then cold; for we see that Frost is as active and strong as burning heat; and Water, Air, and Earth, are as full of life, as Fire; and Vegetables, Minerals, and Elements, have life as well as Animals: But we, feeling a Man's flesh cold when he is dissolving from an Animal, think death is cold; and seeing he was hot before the same alteration, say, Life is hot: Also finding an animal, when it is dissolving, to be without external local Motion, we say it is dead; and when it hath as yet this local motion before its alteration, we call it alive; which certainly is not proper. Next I say, that a wise Man when his house is fired, will fling or squirt water upon it, to quench it, and take out all moveables lest they should increase the flame; likewise he will make vent for the flame to issue forth. But perchance your Author may say, that Fevers are not hot. Truly, in my opinion, he might say as well that Fire is cold. Again, he may say, That although the effect be hot, yet the cause is cold. I answer: That in some diseases, the effects become so firmly rooted, and so powerfull, that they must be more look'd upon then the cause: for such variety there is in Nature, that oftentimes, that which was now an effect, turns to be a cause, and again a cause an effect: For example; A cold cause often produces a hot effect, and this hot effect becomes again a cause of a cold effect: Which variation is not onely a trouble, but a great obstruction to wise Physicians; for Nature hath more varieties in diseases, then Physicians have remedies, And as for drink, if Fevers be neither hot, nor dry, nor require drink for want of moisture; then I see no reason why drink should be urged, and those Physicians blamed that forbid it; for if thirst proceed from an evil digestion, drink will rather weaken the stomack; for heat and driness draw soon away the drink in the stomack, and putting much into a weak stomack doth rather hurt then good. But if necessity require it, then I approve rather of raw and crude Water, then of hot inflaming Wine. And so taking my leave, I rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and humble Servant.
XXXVII. MADAM, In your Authors Treatise of Fevers, I find one Chapter[1] whose Inscription is, A Perfect Curing of all Fevers, wherein he declares the secrets of the Cures of Fevers, consisting all in Chymical Medicines. But considering, that if all Fevers could be cured by such Medicines, then all Physicians would strive to obtain them; I can hardly believe (by your Authors favour) that any such perfect curing of all Fevers can be effected, but that your Authors prescriptions, if they should come to the tryal, might fail as well as any other. Likewise he mentions a Medicine of Paracelsus, Named Diaceltesson, or the Coraline Secret; which, he says, cures radically the Gout no less then Fevers: Which if so, I wonder why so many Great, Noble and Rich Persons, groan so much under the pains of the Gout; certainly it is not for want of cost to have them prepared, nor for want of an ingenious and experienced Chymist; for this age doth not want skilful workmen in that Art, nor worthy and wise Physicians, which if they knew such soveraign medicines, would soon apply them to their Patients; but I suppose that they finding their effects to be less then the cost and labour bestowed upon them, forbear to use them. Moreover, he mentions[2] another remedy for most diseases, by him call'd Driff, prepared also by the Art of Chymistry; but I believe all those remedies will not so often cure, as fail of cure, like as the Sympathetical Powder; for if there were such soveraign medicines that did never fail of a successful effect, certainly men being curious, inquisitive, and searching, would never leave till they had found them out. Also amongst Vegetables, the herb Chameleon and Arsmart are in great request with your Author; For, says he, they by their touching alone, do presently take away cruel diseases, or at leastwise ease them. Which if so, I wonder that there is not more use made of them, and they held in greater esteem then they are; Also that your Author doth not declare the vertue of them, and the manner and way how, and in what diseases to use them, for the benefit of his neighbour, to which end, he says, all his labours and actions are directed? But again, your Author confirms, as an Eye-witness, That the bone of the arm of a Toad presently has taken away the Tooth-ach at the first co-touching. Which remedy, if it was constant, few, in my opinion, would suffer such cruel pains, and cause their teeth to be drawn out, especially if sound. Likewise of the mineral Electrum or Amber of Paracelsus, he affirms[3] to have seen, that hung about the neck, it has freed those that were persecuted by unclean spirits, and that many simples have done the like effects; but surely, Madam, I cannot be perswaded that the Devil should be put away so easily; for he being a Spirit, will not be chased by corporeal means, but by spiritual, which is Faith, and Prayer; and the cure of dispossessing the Devil belongs to Divines, and not to Natural Philosophers or Physicians. But though exterior remedies, as Amulets, Pomanders, and the like, may perform sometimes such effects as to cure or preserve from some diseases, yet they are not ordinary and constant, but meerly by chance. But there are more false remedies then true ones, and if one remedy chance to work successfully with one distempered person, it may fail of its success applyed to others in the same kind of distemper; nay, it may cure perhaps one and the same person of a distemper once, and in the return of the same disease effect little or nothing; witness those remedies that are applyed in Agues, Tooth-aches, and the like, especially Amulets; for one and the same disease in several persons, or in one and the same person at several times, may vary and change so often, and proceed from so different causes, and be of so different tempers, and have such different motions, as one and the same medicine can do no good: And what would the skill of Physicians be, if one remedy should cure all diseases? Why should they take so much pains in studying the various causes, motions, and tempers of diseases, if one medicine had a general power over all? Nay, for what use should God have created such a number of different simples, Vegetables, and Minerals, if one could do all the business? Lastly, your Author rehearses[4] some strange examples of Child-bearing Women, who having seen terrible and cruel sights, as Executions of Malefactors, and dismembring of their bodies, have brought forth monstrous births, without heads, hands, arms, leggs, &c. according to the objects they had seen. I must confess, Madam, that all Creatures are not always formed perfect; for Nature works irregularly sometimes, wherefore a Child may be born defective in some member or other, or have double members instead of one, and so may other animal Creatures; but this is nevertheless natural, although irregular to us: but to have a Child born perfect in the womb, and the lost member to be taken off there, and so brought forth defective, as your Author mentions, cannot enter my belief; neither can your Author himself give any reason, but he makes onely a bare relation of it; for certainly, if it was true, that the member was chopt, rent or pluckt off from the whole body of the Child, it could not have been done without a violent shock or motion of the Mother, which I am confident would never have been able to endure it; for such a great alteration in her body, would of necessity, besides the death of the Child, have caused a total dissolution of her own animal parts, by altering the natural animal motions: But, as I said above, those births are caused by irregular motions, and are not frequent and ordinary; for if upon every strange sight, or cruel object, a Child-bearing-woman should produce such effects, Monsters would be more frequent then they are. In short, Nature loves variety, and this is the cause of all strange and unusual natural effects; and so leaving Nature to her will and pleasure, my onely delight and pleasure is to be, Madam, [Your] faithful Friend, and humble Servant.
XXXVIII. MADAM, Your Author reproving the Schools, that they forbid Salt to some diseased persons, as pernicious to their health: Good God, says he,[1] how unsavoury are the Schools, and how unsavoury do they bid us to be! But I suppose the Schools do not absolutely forbid all diseased persons to abstein from salt, but onely not to use it excessively, or too frequently; for experience proves, that salt meats have not onely increased, but caused diseases, as the Stone, the Gout, Sciatica, Fistula's, Cancers, sore Eyes, sore Throats, and the like: I do not say, that those diseases are always bred with the excess of salt diets; for diseases of one and the same kind, may be bred variously; but this hath been observed, that whosoever is affected with such diseases, shall after a salt meal find himself in more pain then before; wherefore a constant or common salt diet cannot but be hurtful. Neither are those persons that feed much on salt meats, or use strong drinks, take number for number, so healthful or long-lived, as those that are temperate and abstaining. Next, your Author[2] bewails The shameful simplicity of those, that give their Patients Leaf-Gold, Pearls, and bruised or powder'd pretious Stones, as Cordials, in fainting fits, and other distempers: For, says he, they may be dissolved, but not altered; wherefore they cannot produce any powerful effect to the health of the Patient. Truly, Madam, I am not of his mind; for were it that those remedies or cordials could not be transchanged, yet their vertues may nevertheless be very beneficial to the sick: For example; a man that is assaulted by enemies, or by chance is fallen into a deep Pit, or is ready to be strangled, and in all not able to help himself, yet by the help of another man, may be rescued and freed from his danger, and from death, using such means as are able to release him, which either by drawing his Sword against his enemies, or by throwing a rope down into the Pit, and haling him out, or by cutting the rope by which he hung, may save him, and yet neither the man, nor any of his Instruments, as Sword, Rope, Knife, and the like, need to be transchanged. The like may be said of the aforementioned medicines or remedies; which if they be not transchangeable, yet they may nevertheless do such operations, as by their natural active qualities and proprieties to over-power the irregular motions in the natural parts of the body of the Patient; for many diseases proceed more from irregular motions then irregular parts: and although there is no motion without matter, yet one and the same matter may have divers and various changes of motions, and moving parts will either oppose or assist each other without transchanging. And truly, Madam, I wonder that your Author doth condemn such Cordials made of Leaf-gold, Pearls, powdered precious Stones, or the like, and yet verily believe, that Amber, Saphires, Emeraulds, Beads, Bracelets, &c. outwardly applied or worn, can cure more then when inwardly taken; surely, if this be so, they cure more by Faith, then by Reason. But it seems your Author regulates the actions of Nature to the artificial actions of his Furnace, which although sometimes they produce wonderful effects, yet not such as Nature doth; for if they cure one, they commonly kill ten; nay, the best of their Medicine is so dangerous, as it ought not to be applied but in desperate cases: Wherefore Wise Physicians must needs be Provident and Cautious when they use them. And so leaving them, I rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and humble Servant.
XXXIX. MADAM, I will not dispute your Authors opinion concerning the Plague of Men, which he says,[1] doth not infect Beasts, neither doth the plague of Beasts infect Men; but rather believe it to be so: for I have observed that Beasts infect onely each other, to wit, those of their own kind, as Men do infect other Men. For example: the Plague amongst Horses continues in their own kind, and so doth the Plague amongst Sheep; and for any thing we know, there may be a plague amongst Vegetables, as well as amongst Animals, and they may not onely infect each other but also those Animals that do feed on those infectious Vegetables: so that Infections may be caused several ways; either by inbreathing and attracting or sucking in the Poyson of the Plague, or by eating and converting it into the substance of the body; for some kinds of poyson are so powerful, as to work onely by way of inbreathing. Also some sorts of Air may be full of infection, and infect many Men, Beasts, Birds, Vegetables, and the like; for Infections are variously produced, Internally as well as Externally, amongst several particular Creatures; for as the Plague may be made internally, or within the body of a particular Creature, without any exterior infection entring from without into the body, so an external Infection again may enter many several ways into the body. And thus there be many contagious diseases caused meerly by the internal motions of the body, as by fright, terror, conceit, fancy, imagination, and the like, and many by the taking of poysonous matter from without into the body; but all are made by the natural motions or actions of animate matter, by which all is made that is in Nature, and nothing is new, as Solomon says; but what is thought or seems to be new, is onely the variation of the Motions of this old Matter, which is Nature. And this is the reason that not every Age, Nation, or Creature, has always the like diseases; for as all the actions of Nature vary, so also do diseases. But to speak of the Plague, although I am of opinion, that the Plague of Beasts doth not infect Men, unless they be eaten; nor the plague of Men, Beasts; yet Magistrates do wisely in some places, that in the beginning of the plague of Men, they command Dogs and Cats to be kill'd, by reason, as your Author saith, The skins and flesh of Brutes may be defiled with our Plague, and they may be pestiferous contagions unto us. I will add one thing more, which doth concern the Poyson of Measels, whereof your Author is saying,[2] That it is onely proper to humane kind. What kind of Measles he means, I know not; but certainly Hogs are often affected with that disease, as is vulgarly known; but whether they be different diseases in their kinds, and proceed from different motions, I will let others inquire. And so I rest, Madam, Your faithful Friend and Servant.
XL. MADAM, Concerning the disease of the Stone, your Author seems to be of an opinion, That the stone in the Bladder, and the stone in the Kidnies, are not made after one and the same manner: For, says he,[1] The Bladder and the same Urine in number procreates a duelech of another condition, then that which is made in the Kidney. And truly, Madam, it may be so; for there are several ways or modes in irregularities, as well as regularities, and not every kind is alike, no not every Particular, but there is some difference between them: Wherefore, it may very well be, that the corporeal motions that make the stone in the Kidneys, are not just alike to those that make the stone in the Bladder; and as each sort of stone is different, so their particular causes ought to be different; but this is to be observed, that generally all diseases which produce hardness, are made by contracting, condensing and retenting motions, and therefore the remedies of them must be dilating, rarifying and dissolving. Next your Author says, The Stone is not bred by heat, but heat is rather an effect of the stone; neither is a certain muscilage, or a slimy, snivelly Phlegme the cause or matter of the stone, but the stone is the cause of the phlegme. But, in my judgment, it seems more probable, that a slimy matter is more proper for a stone to be made of, then that a stone should make slime, except it be in its dissolution; that is, when the stone, as in its generation or production it did change from a slimy or liquid substance to a stone by condensing and contracting motions, doth, by dilating and rarifying motions, dissolve again into such a liquid and slimy body. I will not say always, to wit, that the stone must needs be resolved into a slimy matter, but oftentimes it may be so. Neither can I absolutely affirm that either heat or cold onely is the cause of a stone; for some may be produced by hot, and some by cold contractions and densations, there being as many several sorts of stones as there are of other Creatures: But this is to be well noted, that as some sorts of hot contractions do make stones, so some sorts of hot dilations do dissolve them: The like of cold contractions and dilations. Again: your Author speaking of the womb wherein the stone is made; Every generated thing or being, says he, must of necessity have a certain place or womb where it is produced; for there must needs be places wherein things may be made before they are bred. I answer: As there is not any body without place, nor any place without body, so the womb is not the place of the body generated, neither before nor after its generation, no more then a man can be said to be in a room when he is not there, but every body carries its place along with it. Moreover, concerning the voiding of bloody Urine, which happens sometimes in the disease of the Stone, my opinion is, That it doth not always proceed from the Stone, but many times from the breaking or voluntary opening of some Veins. But as for the cure of the disease of the Stone your Author,[2] is pleased to affirm, That no disease is incurable, and so neither the disease of the Stone, For he himself has cured many of the Stone to which they had been obedient for some years. Indeed, Madam, I fear his words are more cheerful then effectual; however it may be possible, if the Kidneys be no ways impaired, or the Bladder hurt; but if there be some such imperfection in either or both, then it is as much, in my opinion, as to say, Man can do more then Nature doth: Neither can I believe, that then any of your Authors Chymical preparations, as Aroph, Ludus, Alkahest, and the like, if they were to be had, would do any good, no nor Daucus, or wild Carrot-seed, if the disease be as yet curable, will prove an effectual remedy for it, although your Author is pleased to relate an example of a man, to whom it did much good; for I can affirm the contrary by other the like Examples, that it never did any good to those that used it; nor the liquor of the Birch-tree, whose venue and efficacy I do not believe to be so great as your Author describes:[3] But for the stoppage of Urine, Marsh-mallow and oyl of Almonds, which he despises, I approve to be good, and better then any of his Unknown, Chymical Secrets; for those Chymical Medicines, as he himself confesses, are hard to be had, especially Alkahest, which is onely to be obtained by a Particular favour from Heaven, and is rather a supernatural Gift, then a natural remedy. But your Author doth wisely, to commend such remedies as can never, or with great difficulty be obtained, and then to say that no disease is incurable. And so leaving him to his unknown secrets, and those to them that will use them, I am resolved to adhere to the Practice of the Schools, which I am confident will be more beneficial to the health of, Madam, Your real and faithful Friend and Servant.
XLI. MADAM, Your Author speaking of the Gout, and of that kind of Gout which is called Hereditary, says, It consists immediately in the Spirit of Life. First, as for that which is called an Hereditary Disease, propagated from Parents upon their Children; my opinion is, That it is nothing else but the same actions of the animate matter, producing the same effect in the Child as they did in the Parent: For example; the same motions which made the Gout in the Parent, may make the same disease in the Child; but every Child has not his Parents diseases, and many Children have such diseases as their Parents never had; neither is any disease tied to a particular Family by Generation, but they proceed from irregular motions, and are generally in all Mankind; and therefore properly there is no such thing as an hereditary propagation of diseases; for one and the same kind of disease may be made in different persons, never a kin to one another, by the like motions; but because Children have such a neer relation to their Parents by Generation, if they chance to have the same diseases with their Parents, men are apt to conclude it comes by inheritance; but we may as well say, that all diseases are hereditary; for there is not any disease in Nature but is produced by the actions of Nature's substance; and if we receive life and all our bodily substance by Generation from our Parents, we may be said to receive diseases too; for diseases are inherent in the matter or substance of Nature, which every Creature is a part of, and are real beings made by the corporeal motions of the animate matter, although irregular to us; for as this matter moves, so is Life or Death, Sickness or Health, and all natural effects; and we consisting of the same natural matter, are naturally subject as well to diseases as to health, according as the Matter moves. Thus all diseases are hereditary in Nature; nay, the Scripture it self confirms it, informing us, that diseases, as well as death, are by an hereditary propagation derived from Adam upon all Posterity. But as for the Gout, your Authors doctrine is,[1] That Life is not a body, nor proper to a body, nor the off-spring of corporeal Proprieties,[2] but a meer No-thing; and that the Spirit of Life is a real being, to wit, the arterial blood resolved by the Ferment of the heart into salt air, and enlightned by life,[3] and that the Gout doth immediately consist in this spirit of life. All which how it doth agree, I cannot conceive; for that a real being should be enlightned by Nothing, and be a spirit of Nothing, is not imaginable, nor how the Gout should inhabit in the spirit of life; for then it would follow, that a Child, as soon as it is brought forth into the world, would be troubled with the Gout, if it be as natural to him as life, or have its habitation in the Spirit of Life. Also your Author is speaking of an Appoplexy in the head, which takes away all sense and motion. But surely, in my opinion, it is impossible that all sense and motion should be out of the head; onely that sense and motion, which is proper to the head, and to the nature of that Creature, is altered to some other sensitive and rational motions, which are proper to some other figure; for there is no part or particle of matter that has not motion and sense. I pray consider, Madam, is there any thing in Nature that is without motion? Perchance you will say, Minerals; but that is proved otherwise; as for example, by the sympathetical motion between the Loadstone and Iron, and between the Needle and the North, as also by the operation of Mercury, and several others; Wherefore there is no doubt, but all kinds, sorts and particulars of Creatures have their natural motions, although they are not all visible to us, but not such motions as are made by Gas, or Blas, or Ideas, &c. but corporeal sensitive and rational motions, which are the actions of Natural Matter. You may say, Some are of opinion, that Sympathy and Antipathy are not Corporeal motions. Truly, whosoever says so, speaks no reason; for Sympathy and Antipathy are nothing else but the actions of bodies, and are made in bodies; the Sympathy betwixt Iron and the Loadstone is in bodies; the Sympathy between the Needle and the North is in bodies; the Sympathy of the Magnetic powder is in bodies. The truth is, there is no motion without a body, nor no body without motion. Neither doth Sympathy and Antipathy work at distance by the power of Immaterial Spirits, or rays, issuing out of their bodies, but by agreeable or disagreeable corporeal motions; for if the motions be agreeable, there is Sympathy; if disagreeable, there is Antipathy; and if they be equally found in two bodies, then there is a mutual Sympathy or Antipathy; but if in one body onely, and not in the other, there is but Sympathy or Antipathy on one side, or in one Creature. Lastly, concerning swoonings or fainting fits, your Authors opinion is, that they proceed from the stomack: Which I can hardly believe; for many will swoon upon the sight of some object, others at a sound, or report, others at the smell of some disagreeable odour, others at the taste of some or other thing that is not agreeable to their nature, and so forth: also some will swoon at the apprehension or conceit of something, and some by a disorder or irregularity of motions in exterior parts. Wherefore, my opinion is, that swoonings may proceed from any part of the body, and not onely from the stomack. But, Madam, I being no Physicianess may perhaps be in an error, and therefore I will leave this discourse to those that are thorowly learned and practised in this Art, and rest satisfied that I am, Madam, Your Ladiships humble Servant. [1] Of the disease of the Stone, c. 9.
XLII. MADAM, Your Author[1] is inquiring whether some cures of diseases may be effected by bare co-touchings; and I am of his opinion, they may; for co-touchings of some exterior objects may cause alterations of some particular motions in some particular parts of matter, without either transferring their own motions into those parts, (for that this is impossible, I have heretofore declared) or without any corporeal departing from their own parts of matter into them, and alterations may be produced both in the motions and figures of the affected parts: but these cures are not so frequent as those that are made by the entring of medicines into the diseased parts, and either expel the malignant matter, or rectifie the irregular and disordered motions, or strengthen the weak, or reduce the straying, or work any other ways according to the nature and propriety of their own substance, and the disposition of the distempered parts: Nevertheless, those cures which are performed exteriously, as to heal inward affects by an outward bare co-touching, are all made by natural motions in natural substances, and not by Non-beings, substancelesse Ideas, or spiritual Rays; for those that will cure diseases by Non-beings, will effect little or nothing; for a disease is corporeal or material, and so must the remedies be, there being no cure made but by a conflict of the remedy with the disease; and certainly, if a non-being fight against a being, or a corporeal disease, I doubt it will do no great effect; for the being will be too strong for the non-being: Wherefore my constant opinion is, that all cures whatsoever, are perfected by the power of corporeal motions, working upon the affected parts either interiously or exteriously, either by applying external remedies to external wounds, or by curing internal distempers, either by medicines taken internally, or by bare external co-touchings. And such a remedy, I suppose, has been that which your Author speaks of, a stone of a certain Irish-man, which by a meer external contact hath cured all kinds of diseases, either by touching outwardly the affected parts, or by licking it but with the tip of the Tongue, if the disease was Internal: But if the vertue of the Stone was such, as your Author describes, certainly, what man soever he was that possessed such a jewel, I say, he was rather of the nature of the Devil, then of man, that would not divulge it to the general benefit of all mankind; and I wonder much, that your Author, who otherwise pretends such extraordinary Devotion, Piety, and Religiousness, as also Charity, viz. that all his works he has written, are for the benefit of his neighbour, and to detect the errors of the Schools meerly for the good of man, doth yet plead his cause, saying, That secrets, as they are most difficultly prepared, so they ought to remain in secret forever in the possession of the Privy Councel, what Privy Counsels he means, I know not; but certainly some are more difficult to be spoken to, or any thing to be obtained from, then the preparation of a Physical Arcanum. However, a general good or benefit ought not to be concealed or kept in privy Councels, but to be divulged and publickly made known, that all sorts of People, of what condition, degree, or Nation soever, might partake of the general blessing and bounty of God. But, Madam, you may be sure, that many, who pretend to know Physical secrets, most commonly know the least, as being for the most part of the rank of them that deceive the simple with strange tales which exceed truth; and to make themselves more authentical, they use to rail at others, and to condemn their skill, onely to magnifie their own: I say, many, Madam, as I have observed, are of that nature, especially those, that have but a superficial knowledg in the Art of Physick; for those that are thorowly learned, and sufficiently practised in it, scorn to do the like; which I wish may prosper and thrive by their skill. And so I rest, Madam, Your Ladiships humble Servant.
XLIII. MADAM, Your Author is pleased to relate a story[1] of one that died suddenly, and being dissected, there was not the least sign of decay or disorder found in his body. But I cannot add to those that wonder, when no sign of distemper is found in a man's body after he is dead; because I do not believe, that the subtillest, learnedst, and most practised Anatomist, can exactly tell all the Interior Government or motions, or can find out all obscure and invisible passages in a mans body; for concerning the motions, they are all altered in death, or rather in the dissolution of the animal figure; and although the exterior animal figure or shape doth not alter so soon, yet the animal motions may alter in a moment of time; which sudden alteration may cause a sudden death, and so the motions being invisible, the cause of death cannot be perceived; for no body can find that which is not to be found, to wit, animal motions in a dead man; for Nature hath altered these motions from being animal motions to some other kind of motions, she being as various in dissolutions, as in productions, indeed so various, that her ways cannot be traced or known thorowly and perfectly, but onely by piece-meals, as the saying is, that is, but partly: Wherefore man can onely know that which is visible, or subject to his senses; and yet our senses do not always inform us truly, but the alterations of grosser parts are more easily known, then the alterations of subtil corporeal motions, either in general, or in particular; neither are the invisible passages to be known in a dead Carcass, much less in a living body. But, I pray, mistake me not, when I say, that the animal motions are not subject to our exterior senses; for I do not mean all exterior animal motions, nor all interior animal motions; for though you do see no interior motion in an animal body, yet you may feel some, as the motion of the Heart, the motion of the Pulse, the motion of the Lungs, and the like; but the most part of the interior animal motions are not subject to our exterior senses; nay, no man, he may be as observing as he will, can possibly know by his exterior senses all the several and various interior motions in his own body, nor all the exterior motions of his exterior parts: and thus it remains still, that neither the subtillest motions and parts of matter, nor the obscure passages in several Creatures, can be known but by several parts; for what one part is ignorant of, another part is knowing, and what one part is knowing, another part is ignorant thereof; so that unless all the Parts of Infinite Matter were joyned into one Creature, there can never be in one particular Creature a perfect knowledg of all things in Nature. Wherefore I shall never aspire to any such knowledg, but be content with that little particular knowledg, Nature has been pleased to give me, the chief of which is, that I know my self, and especially that I am, Madam, Your constant Friend, and faithful Servant.
XLIV. MADAM, I perceive you are desirous to know the cause, Why a man is more weak at the latter end of a disease then at the beginning, and is a longer time recovering health, then loosing health; as also the reason of relapses and intermissions? First, as for weakness and strength, my opinion is, they are caused by the regular and irregular motions in several parts, each striving to over-power the other in their conflict; and when a man recovers from a disease, although the regular motions have conquered the irregular, and subdued them to their obedience, yet they are not so quite obedient as they ought, which causes weakness: Neither do the regular motions use so much force in Peace, as in War; for though animate matter cannot lose force, yet it doth not always use force; neither can the parts of Nature act beyond their natural power, but they do act within their natural power; neither do they commonly act to the utmost of their power. And as for Health, why it is sooner lost then recovered; I answer, That it is easier to make disorders then to rectifie them: as for example, in a Common-wealth, the ruines of War are not so suddenly repaired, as made. But concerning Relapses and Intermissions of diseases, Intermissions are like truces or cessations from War for a time; and Relapses are like new stirs or tumults of Rebellion; for Rebels are not so apt to settle in peace as to renew the war upon slight occasions; and if the regular motions of the body be stronger, they reduce them again unto obedience. But diseases are occasioned many several ways; for some are made by a home Rebellion, and others by forreign enemies, and some by natural and regular dissolutions, and their cures are as different; but the chief Magistrates or Governors of the animal body, which are the regular motions of the parts of the body, want most commonly the assistance of forreign Parts, which are Medicines, Diets, and the like; and if there be factions amongst these chief Magistrates, or motions of the parts of the body, then the whole body suffers a ruine. But since there would be no variety in Nature, nor no difference between Natures several parts or Creatures, if her actions were never different, but always agreeing and constant, a war or rebellion in Nature cannot be avoided: But, mistake me not, for I do not mean a war or rebellion in the nature or substance of Matter, but between the several parts of Matter, which are the several Creatures, and their several Motions; for Matter being always one and the same in its nature, has nothing to war withal; and surely it will not quarrel with its own Nature. Next you desire to know, that if Nature be in a Perpetual motion, Whence comes a duration of some things, and a Tiredness, Weariness, Sluggishness, or Faintness? I answer, first, That in some bodies, the Retentive motions are stronger then the dissolving motions; as for example, Gold, and Quicksilver or Mercury; the separating and dissolving motions of Fire have onely power to melt and rarifie them for a time, but cannot alter their nature: so a Hammer, or such like instrument, when used, may beat Gold, and make it thin as a Cobweb, or as dust, but cannot alter its interior nature: But yet this doth not prove it to be either without motion, or to be altogether unalterable, and not subject to any dissolution; but onely that its retentive motions are too strong for the dissolving motions of the Fire, which by force work upon the Gold; and we might as well say, that Sand, or an Earthen Vessel, or Glass, or Stone, or any thing else, is unalterable, and will last eternally, if not disturbed. But some of Natures actions are as industrious to keep their figures, as others are to dissolve, or alter them; and therefore Retentive motions are more strong and active in some figures, then dissolving motions are in others, or producing motions in other Figures. Next, as for Tiredness, or Faintness of motions, there is no such thing as tiredness or faintness in Nature, for Nature cannot be tired, nor grow faint, or sick, nor be pained, nor die, nor be any ways defective; for all this is onely caused through the change and variety of the corporeal motions of Nature, and her several parts; neither do irregular motions prove any defect in Nature, but a prudence in Natures actions, in making varieties and alterations of Figures; for without such motions or actions, there could not be such varieties and alterations in Nature as there are: neither is slackness of some motions a defect, for Nature is too wise to use her utmost force in her ordinary works; and though Nature is infinite, yet it is not necessary she should use an infinite force and power in any particular act. Lastly, you desire my opinion, Whether there be motion in a dead animal Creature. To which, I answer: I have declared heretofore, that there is no such thing as death in Nature, but what is commonly named death, is but an alteration or change of corporeal motions, and the death of an animal is nothing else but the dissolving motions of its figure; for when a man is dying, the motions which did formerly work to the consistence of his figure do now work to the dissolution of his figure, and to the production of some other figures, changing and transforming every part thereof; but though the figure of that dead animal is dissolved, yet the parts of that dissolved figure remain still in Nature although they be infinitely changed, and will do so eternally, as long as Nature lasts by the Will of God; for nothing can be lost or annihilated in Nature. And this is all, Madam, that I can answer to your questions, wherein, I hope, I have obeyed your commands, according to the duty of, Madam, Your faithful Friend and humble Servant.
XLV. MADAM, I have thus far discharged my duty, that according to your commands, I have given you my judgment of the works of those four famous Philosophers of our age, which you did send me to peruse, and have withal made reflexions upon some of their opinions in Natural Philosophy, especially those, wherein I did find them dissent from the Ground and Principles of my own Philosophy. And since by your leave I am now publishing all those Letters which I have hitherto written to you concerning those aforesaid Authors, and their Works, I am confident I shall not escape the censures of their followers; But, I shall desire them, that they will be pleased to do me this Justice, and to examine first my opinions well, without any partiality or wilful misinterpretation of my sence, before they pass their censure: Next, I desire them to consider, That I have no skill in School-learning, and therefore for want of terms of Art may easily chance to slip, or at least, not express my opinions so clearly as my readers expected; However, I have done my endeavour, and to my sense and reason they seem clear and plain enough, especially as I have expressed them in those Letters I have sent you; for concerning my other Work, called Philosophical Opinions, I must confess, that it might have been done more exactly and perspicuously, had I been better skilled in such words and expressions as are usual in the Schools of Philosophers; and therefore, if I be but capable to learn names and terms of Art, (although I find my self very untoward to learn, and do despair of proving a Scholar) I will yet endeavour to rectifie that work, and make it more intelligible; for my greatest ambition is to express my conceptions so, that my Readers may understand them: For which I would not spare any labour or pains, but be as industrious as those that gain their living by their work; and I pray to God, that Nature may give me a capacity to do it. But as for those that will censure my works out of spite and malice, rather then according to justice, let them do their worst; for if God do but bless them, I need not to fear the power of Nature, much less of a part of Nature, as Man. Nay, if I have but your Ladiships approbation, it will satisfie me; for I know you are so wise and just in your judgment, that I may safely rely upon it: For which I shall constantly and unfeignedly remain as long as I live, Madam, Your Ladiships most faithful Friend and humble Servant.
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