The Anatomy of Melancholy Part 83

and burn them alive, best goods, servants, horses, when a grandee dies, [6541]twelve thousand at once amongst the Tartar's, when a great Cham departs, or an emperor in America: how they plague themselves, which abstain from all that hath life, like those old Pythagoreans, with immoderate fastings, [6542]as the Bannians about Surat, they of China, that for superst.i.tion's sake never eat flesh nor fish all their lives, never marry, but live in deserts and by-places, and some pray to their idols twenty-four hours together without any intermission, biting of their tongues when they have done, for devotion's sake. Some again are brought to that madness by their superst.i.tious priests (that tell them such vain stories of immortality, and the joys of heaven in that other life), [6543]

that many thousands voluntarily break their own necks, as Cleombrotus Amborciatus, auditors of old, precipitate themselves, that they may partic.i.p.ate of that unspeakable happiness in the other world. One poisons, another strangles himself, and the King of China had done as much, deluded with the vain hope, had he not been detained by his servant. But who can sufficiently tell of their several superst.i.tions, vexations, follies, torments? I may conclude with [6544]Possevinus, _Religifacit asperos mites, homines e feris; superst.i.tio ex hominibus feras_, religion makes wild beasts civil, superst.i.tion makes wise men beasts and fools; and the discreetest that are, if they give way to it, are no better than dizzards; nay more, if that of Plotinus be true, _is unus religionis scopus, ut ei quem colimus similes fiamus_, that is the drift of religion to make us like him whom we worship: what shall be the end of idolaters, but to degenerate into stocks and stones? of such as worship these heathen G.o.ds, for _dii gentium daemonia_, [6545]but to become devils themselves? 'Tis therefore _exitiosus error, et maxime periculosus_, a most perilous and dangerous error of all others, as [6546]Plutarch holds, _turbulenta pa.s.sio hominem consternans_, a pestilent, a troublesome pa.s.sion, that utterly undoeth men.

Unhappy superst.i.tion, [6547]Pliny calls it, _morte non finitur_, death takes away life, but not superst.i.tion. Impious and ignorant are far more happy than they which are superst.i.tious, no torture like to it, none so continuate, so general, so destructive, so violent.

In this superst.i.tious row, Jews for antiquity may go next to Gentiles: what of old they have done, what idolatries they have committed in their groves and high places, what their Pharisees, Sadducees, Scribes, Essei, and such sectaries have maintained, I will not so much as mention: for the present, I presume no nation under heaven can be more sottish, ignorant, blind, superst.i.tious, wilful, obstinate, and peevish, tiring themselves with vain ceremonies to no purpose; he that shall but read their Rabbins' ridiculous comments, their strange interpretation of scriptures, their absurd ceremonies, fables, childish tales, which they steadfastly believe, will think they be scarce rational creatures; their foolish [6548]customs, when they rise in the morning, and how they prepare themselves to prayer, to meat, with what superst.i.tious washings, how to their Sabbath, to their other feasts, weddings, burials, &c. Last of all, the expectation of their Messiah, and those figments, miracles, vain pomp that shall attend him, as how he shall terrify the Gentiles, and overcome them by new diseases; how Michael the archangel shall sound his trumpet, how he shall gather all the scattered Jews in the Holy Land, and there make them a great banquet, [6549] "Wherein shall be all the birds, beasts, fishes, that ever G.o.d made, a cup of wine that grew in Paradise, and that hath been kept in Adam's cellar ever since." At the first course shall be served in that great ox in Job iv. 10., "that every day feeds on a thousand hills," Psal. 1. 10., that great Leviathan, and a great bird, that laid an egg so big, [6550]"that by chance tumbling out of the nest, it knocked down three hundred tall cedars, and breaking as it fell, drowned one hundred and sixty villages:" this bird stood up to the knees in the sea, and the sea was so deep, that a hatchet would not fall to the bottom in seven years: of their Messiah's [6551]wives and children; Adam and Eve, &c., and that one stupend fiction amongst the rest: when a Roman prince asked of rabbi Jehosua ben Hanania, why the Jews'

G.o.d was compared to a lion; he made answer, he compared himself to no ordinary lion, but to one in the wood Ela, which, when he desired to see, the rabbin prayed to G.o.d he might, and forthwith the lion set forward.

[6552] "But when he was four hundred miles from Rome he so roared that all the great-bellied women in Rome made abortions, the city walls fell down, and when he came a hundred miles nearer, and roared the second time, their teeth fell out of their heads, the emperor himself fell down dead, and so the lion went back." With an infinite number of such lies and forgeries, which they verily believe, feed themselves with vain hope, and in the mean time will by no persuasions be diverted, but still crucify their souls with a company of idle ceremonies, live like slaves and vagabonds, will not be relieved or reconciled.

Mahometans are a compound of Gentiles, Jews, and Christians, and so absurd in their ceremonies, as if they had taken that which is most sottish out of every one of them, full of idle fables in their superst.i.tious law, their Alcoran itself a gallimaufry of lies, tales, ceremonies, traditions, precepts, stolen from other sects, and confusedly heaped up to delude a company of rude and barbarous clowns. As how birds, beasts, stones, saluted Mahomet when he came from Mecca, the moon came down from heaven to visit him, [6553]how G.o.d sent for him, spake to him, &c., with a company of stupend figments of the angels, sun, moon, and stars, &c. Of the day of judgment, and three sounds to prepare to it, which must last fifty thousand years of Paradise, which wholly consists in _coeundi et comedendi voluptate_, and _pecorinis hominibus scriptum, b.e.s.t.i.a.lis beat.i.tudo_, is so ridiculous, that Virgil, Dante, Lucian, nor any poet can be more fabulous.

Their rites and ceremonies are most vain and superst.i.tious, wine and swine's flesh are utterly forbidden by their law, [6554]they must pray five times a day; and still towards the south, wash before and after all their bodies over, with many such. For fasting, vows, religious orders, peregrinations, they go far beyond any papists, [6555]they fast a month together many times, and must not eat a bit till sun be set. Their kalendars, dervises, and torlachers, &c. are more [6556]abstemious some of them, than Carthusians, Franciscans, Anchorites, forsake all, live solitary, fare hard, go naked, &c. [6557]Their pilgrimages are as far as to the river [6558]Ganges (which the Gentiles of those tracts likewise do), to wash themselves, for that river as they hold hath a sovereign virtue to purge them of all sins, and no man can be saved that hath not been washed in it. For which reason they come far and near from the Indies; _Maximus gentium omnium confluxus est_; and infinite numbers yearly resort to it.

Others go as far as Mecca to Mahomet's tomb, which journey is both miraculous and meritorious. The ceremonies of flinging stones to stone the devil, of eating a camel at Cairo by the way; their fastings, their running till they sweat, their long prayers, Mahomet's temple, tomb, and building of it, would ask a whole volume to dilate: and for their pains taken in this holy pilgrimage, all their sins are forgiven, and they reputed for so many saints. And diverse of them with hot bricks, when they return, will put out their eyes, [6559]"that they never after see any profane thing, bite out their tongues," &c. They look for their prophet Mahomet as Jews do for their Messiah. Read more of their customs, rites, ceremonies, in Lonicerus _Turcic. hist. tom. 1._ from the tenth to the twenty-fourth chapter. Bredenbachius, _cap. 4, 5, 6._ Leo Afer, _lib. 1._ Busbequius Sabellicus, Purchas, _lib. 3. cap. 3, et 4, 5._ Theodorus Bibliander, &c.

Many foolish ceremonies you shall find in them; and which is most to be lamented, the people are generally so curious in observing of them, that if the least circ.u.mstance be omitted, they think they shall be d.a.m.ned, 'tis an irremissible offence, and can hardly be forgiven. I kept in my house amongst my followers (saith Busbequius, sometime the Turk's orator in Constantinople) a Turkey boy, that by chance did eat sh.e.l.lfish, a meat forbidden by their law, but the next day when he knew what he had done, he was not only sick to cast and vomit, but very much troubled in mind, would weep and [6560]grieve many days after, torment himself for his foul offence. Another Turk being to drink a cup of wine in his cellar, first made a huge noise and filthy faces, [6561]"to warn his soul, as he said, that it should not be guilty of that foul fact which he was to commit."

With such toys as these are men kept in awe, and so cowed, that they dare not resist, or offend the least circ.u.mstance of their law, for conscience'

sake misled by superst.i.tion, which no human edict otherwise, no force of arms, could have enforced.

In the last place are pseudo-Christians, in describing of whose superst.i.tious symptoms, as a mixture of the rest, I may say that which St.

Benedict once saw in a vision, one devil in the marketplace, but ten in a monastery, because there was more work; in populous cities they would swear and forswear, lie, falsify, deceive fast enough of themselves, one devil could circ.u.mvent a thousand; but in their religious houses a thousand devils could scarce tempt one silly monk. All the princ.i.p.al devils, I think, busy themselves in subverting Christians; Jews, Gentiles, and Mahometans, are _extra caulem_, out of the fold, and need no such attendance, they make no resistance, [6562]_eos enim pulsare negligit, quos quieto jure possidere se sent.i.t_, they are his own already: but Christians have that shield of faith, sword of the Spirit to resist, and must have a great deal of battery before they can be overcome. That the devil is most busy amongst us that are of the true church, appears by those several oppositions, heresies, schisms, which in all ages he hath raised to subvert it, and in that of Rome especially, wherein Antichrist himself now sits and plays his prize. This mystery of iniquity began to work even in the Apostles' time, many Antichrists and heretics' were abroad, many sprung up since, many now present, and will be to the world's end, to dementate men's minds, to seduce and captivate their souls. Their symptoms I know not how better to express, than in that twofold division, of such as lead, and are led. Such as lead are heretics, schismatics, false prophets, impostors, and their ministers: they have some common symptoms, some peculiar. Common, as madness, folly, pride, insolency, arrogancy, singularity, peevishness, obstinacy, impudence, scorn and contempt of all other sects: _Nullius addicti jurare in verba magistri_; [6563]they will approve of nought but what they first invent themselves, no interpretation good but what their infallible spirit dictates: none shall be _in secundis_, no not _in tertiis_, they are only wise, only learned in the truth, all d.a.m.ned but they and their followers, _caedem scripturarum faciunt ad materiam suam_, saith Tertullian, they make a slaughter of Scriptures, and turn it as a nose of wax to their own ends. So irrefragable, in the mean time, that what they have once said, they must and will maintain, in whole tomes, duplications, triplications, never yield to death, so self-conceited, say what you can. As [6564]Bernard (erroneously some say) speaks of P.

Aliardus, _omnes patres sic, atque ego sic._ Though all the Fathers, Councils, the whole world contradict it, they care not, they are all one: and as [6565] Gregory well notes "of such as are vertiginous, they think all turns round and moves, all err: when as the error is wholly in their own brains." Magallia.n.u.s, the Jesuit, in his Comment on 1 Tim. xvi. 20, and Alphonsus _de castro lib. 1. adversus haereses_, gives two more eminent notes or probable conjectures to know such men by, (they might have taken themselves by the noses when they said it) [6566]"First they affect novelties and toys, and prefer falsehood before truth; [6567]secondly, they care not what they say, that which rashness and folly hath brought out, pride afterward, peevishness and contumacy shall maintain to the last gasp." Peculiar symptoms are prodigious paradoxes, new doctrines, vain phantasms, which are many and diverse as they themselves. [6568]Nicholaites of old, would have wives in common: Montanists will not marry at all, nor Tatians, forbidding all flesh, Severians wine; Adamians go naked, [6569]because Adam did so in Paradise; and some [6570]barefoot all their lives, because G.o.d, Exod. iii. and Joshua v. bid Moses so to do; and Isaiah xx. was bid put off his shoes; Manichees hold that Pythagorean transmigration of souls from men to beasts; [6571]"the Circ.u.mcellions in Africa, with a mad cruelty made away themselves, some by fire, water, breaking their necks, and seduced others to do the like, threatening some if they did not," with a thousand such; as you may read in [6572]Austin (for there were fourscore and eleven heresies in his times, besides schisms and smaller factions) Epiphanius, Alphonsus _de Castro, Danaeus, Gab, Prateolus_, &c. Of prophets, enthusiasts and impostors, our Ecclesiastical stories afford many examples; of Elias and Christs, as our [6573]Eudo _de stellis_, a Briton in King Stephen's time, that went invisible, translated himself from one to another in a moment, fed thousands with good cheer in the wilderness, and many such; nothing so common as miracles, visions, revelations, prophecies. Now what these brain-sick heretics once broach, and impostors set on foot, be it never so absurd, false, and prodigious, the common people will follow and believe. It will run along like murrain in cattle, scab in sheep. _Nulla scabies_, as [6574]he said, _superst.i.tione scabiosior_; as he that is bitten with a mad dog bites others, and all in the end become mad; either out of affection of novelty, simplicity, blind zeal, hope and fear, the giddy-headed mult.i.tude will embrace it, and without further examination approve it.

_Sed vetera querimur_, these are old, _haec prius fuere._ In our days we have a new scene of superst.i.tious impostors and heretics. A new company of actors, of Antichrists, that great Antichrist himself: a rope of hopes, that by their greatness and authority bear down all before them: who from that time they proclaimed themselves universal bishops, to establish their own kingdom, sovereignty, greatness, and to enrich themselves, brought in such a company of human traditions, purgatory, _Limbus Patrum, Infantum_, and all that subterranean geography, ma.s.s, adoration of saints, alms, fastings, bulls, indulgences, orders, friars, images, shrines, musty relics, excommunications, confessions, satisfactions, blind obediences, vows, pilgrimages, peregrinations, with many such curious toys, intricate subtleties, gross errors, obscure questions, to vindicate the better and set a gloss upon them, that the light of the Gospel was quite eclipsed, darkness over all, the Scriptures concealed, legends brought in, religion banished, hypocritical superst.i.tion exalted, and the Church itself [6575]

obscured and persecuted: Christ and his members crucified more, saith Benzo, by a few necromantical, atheistical popes, than ever it was by [6576] Julian the Apostate, Porphyrius the Platonist, Celsus the physician, Libanius the Sophister; by those heathen emperors, Huns, Goths, and Vandals. What each of them did, by what means, at what times, _quibus auxiliis_, superst.i.tion climbed to this height, tradition increased, and Antichrist himself came to his estate, let Magdeburgenses, Kemnisius, Osiander, Bale, Mornay, Fox, Usher, and many others relate. In the mean time, he that shall but see their profane rites and foolish customs, how superst.i.tiously kept, how strictly observed, their mult.i.tude of saints, images, that rabble of Romish deities, for trades, professions, diseases, persons, offices, countries, places; St. George for England; St. Denis for France, Patrick, Ireland; Andrew, Scotland; Jago, Spain; &c. Gregory for students; Luke for painters; Cosmus and Damian for philosophers; Crispin, shoemakers; Katherine, spinners; &c. Anthony for pigs; Gallus, geese; Wenceslaus, sheep; Pelagius, oxen; Sebastian, the plague; Valentine, falling sickness; Apollonia, toothache; Petronella for agues; and the Virgin Mary for sea and land, for all parties, offices: he that shall observe these things, their shrines, images, oblations, pendants, adorations, pilgrimages they make to them, what creeping to crosses, our Lady of Loretto's rich [6577]gowns, her donaries, the cost bestowed on images, and number of suitors; St. Nicholas Burge in France; our St.

Thomas's shrine of old at Canterbury; those relics at Rome, Jerusalem, Genoa, Lyons, Pratum, St. Denis; and how many thousands come yearly to offer to them, with what cost, trouble, anxiety, superst.i.tion (for forty several ma.s.ses are daily said in some of their [6578]churches, and they rise at all hours of the night to ma.s.s, come barefoot, &c.), how they spend themselves, times, goods, lives, fortunes, in such ridiculous observations; their tales and figments, false miracles, buying and selling of pardons, indulgences for 40,000 years to come, their processions on set days, their strict fastings, monks, anchorites, friar mendicants, Franciscans, Carthusians, &c. Their vigils and fasts, their ceremonies at Christmas, Shrovetide, Candlemas, Palm Sunday, Blaise, St. Martin, St. Nicholas' day; their adorations, exorcisms, &c., will think all those Grecian, Pagan, Mahometan superst.i.tions, G.o.ds, idols, and ceremonies, the name, time and place, habit only altered, to have degenerated into Christians. Whilst they prefer traditions before Scriptures; those Evangelical Councils, poverty, obedience, vows, alms, fasting, supererogations, before G.o.d's Commandments; their own ordinances instead of his precepts, and keep them in ignorance, blindness, they have brought the common people into such a case by their cunning conveyances, strict discipline, and servile education, that upon pain of d.a.m.nation they dare not break the least ceremony, tradition, edict; hold it a greater sin to eat a bit of meat in Lent, than kill a man: their consciences are so terrified, that they are ready to despair if a small ceremony be omitted; and will accuse their own father, mother, brother, sister, nearest and dearest friends of heresy, if they do not as they do, will be their chief executioners, and help first to bring a f.a.ggot to burn them. What mulct, what penance soever is enjoined, they dare not but do it, tumble with St. Francis in the mire amongst hogs, if they be appointed, go woolward, whip themselves, build hospitals, abbeys, &c., go to the East or West Indies, kill a king, or run upon a sword point: they perform all, without any muttering or hesitation, believe all.

[6579] "Ut pueri infantes credunt signa omnia ahena Vivere, et esse homines, et sic isti omnia ficta Vera putant, credunt signis cor inesse ahenis."

"As children think their babies live to be, Do they these brazen images they see."

And whilst the ruder sort are so carried headlong with blind zeal, are so gulled and tortured by their superst.i.tions, their own too credulous simplicity and ignorance, their epicurean popes and hypocritical cardinals laugh in their sleeves, and are merry in their chambers with their punks, they do _indulgere genio_, and make much of themselves. The middle sort, some for private gain, hope of ecclesiastical preferment, (_quis expedivit psittaco suum [Greek: chaire]_) popularity, base flattery, must and will believe all their paradoxes and absurd tenets, without exception, and as obstinately maintain and put in practice all their traditions and idolatrous ceremonies (for their religion is half a trade) to the death; they will defend all, the golden legend itself, with all the lies and tales in it: as that of St. George, St. Christopher, St. Winifred, St. Denis, &c.

It is a wonder to see how Nic. Harpsfield, that Pharisaical impostor, amongst the rest, Ecclesiast. Hist. _cap. 22. saec prim, s.e.x._, puzzles himself to vindicate that ridiculous fable of St. Ursula and the eleven thousand virgins, as when they live, [6580]how they came to Cologne, by whom martyred, &c., though he can say nothing for it, yet he must and will approve it: _n.o.bilitavit (inquit) hoc saeculum Ursula c.u.m comitibus, cujus historia utinam tam mihi esset expedita et certa, quam in animo meo certum ac expeditum est, eam esse c.u.m sodalibus beatam in coelis virginem._ They must and will (I say) either out of blind zeal believe, vary their compa.s.s with the rest, as the lat.i.tude of religion varies, apply themselves to the times, and seasons, and for fear and flattery are content to subscribe and to do all that in them lies to maintain and defend their present government and slavish religious schoolmen, canonists, Jesuits, friars, priests, orators, sophisters, who either for that they had nothing else to do, luxuriant wits knew not otherwise how to busy themselves in those idle times, for the Church then had few or no open adversaries, or better to defend their lies, fictions, miracles, transubstantiations, traditions, pope's pardons, purgatories, ma.s.ses, impossibilities, &c. with glorious shows, fair pretences, big words, and plausible wits, have coined a thousand idle questions, nice distinctions, subtleties, Obs and Sols, such tropological, allegorical expositions, to salve all appearances, objections, such quirks and quiddities, _quodlibetaries_, as Bale saith of Ferribrigge and Strode, instances, ampliations, decrees, glosses, canons, that instead of sound commentaries, good preachers, are come in a company of mad sophisters, _primo secundo secundarii_, sectaries, Canonists, Sorbonists, Minorites, with a rabble of idle controversies and questions, [6581]_an Papa sit Deus, an quasi Deus? An participet utramque Christi naturam_? Whether it be as possible for G.o.d to be a humble bee or a gourd, as a man? Whether he can produce respect without a foundation or term, make a wh.o.r.e a virgin? fetch Trajan's soul from h.e.l.l, and how? with a rabble of questions about h.e.l.l-fire: whether it be a greater sin to kill a man, or to clout shoes upon a Sunday? whether G.o.d can make another G.o.d like unto himself? Such, saith Kemnisius, are most of your schoolmen, (mere alchemists) 200 commentators on Peter Lambard; (_Pitsius catal. scriptorum Anglic._ reckons up 180 English commentators alone, on the matter of the sentences), Scotists, Thomists, Reals, Nominals, &c., and so perhaps that of St. [6582]Austin may be verified. _Indocti rapiunt coelum, docti interim descendunt ad infernum._ Thus they continued in such error, blindness, decrees, sophisms, superst.i.tions; idle ceremonies and traditions were the sum of their new-coined holiness and religion, and by these knaveries and stratagems they were able to involve mult.i.tudes, to deceive the most sanctified souls, and, if it were possible, the very elect. In the mean time the true Church, as wine and water mixed, lay hid and obscure to speak of, till Luther's time, who began upon a sudden to defecate, and as another sun to drive away those foggy mists of superst.i.tion, to restore it to that purity of the primitive Church. And after him many good and G.o.dly men, divine spirits, have done their endeavours, and still do.

[6583] "And what their ignorance esteem'd so holy, Our wiser ages do account as folly."

But see the devil, that will never suffer the Church to be quiet or at rest: no garden so well tilled but some noxious weeds grow up in it, no wheat but it hath some tares: we have a mad giddy company of precisians, schismatics, and some heretics, even, in our own bosoms in another extreme.

[6584]_Dum vitant stulti vitia in contraria currunt_; that out of too much zeal in opposition to Antichrist, human traditions, those Romish rites and superst.i.tions, will quite demolish all, they will admit of no ceremonies at all, no fasting days, no cross in baptism, kneeling at communion, no church music, &c., no bishops' courts, no church government, rail at all our church discipline, will not hold their tongues, and all for the peace of thee, O Sion! No, not so much as degrees some of them will tolerate, or universities, all human learning, ('tis _cloaca diaboli_) hoods, habits, cap and surplice, such as are things indifferent in themselves, and wholly for ornament, decency, or distinction's sake, they abhor, hate, and snuff at, as a stone-horse when he meets a bear: they make matters of conscience of them, and will rather forsake their livings than subscribe to them. They will admit of no holidays, or honest recreations, as of hawking, hunting, &c., no churches, no bells some of them, because papists use them; no discipline, no ceremonies but what they invent themselves; no interpretations of 'scriptures, no comments of fathers, no councils, but such as their own fantastical spirits dictate, or _recta ratio_, as Socinians, by which spirit misled, many times they broach as prodigious paradoxes as papists themselves. Some of them turn prophets, have secret revelations, will be of privy council with G.o.d himself, and know all his secrets, [6585]_ Per capillos spiritum sanctum tenent, et omnia sciunt c.u.m sint asini omnium obstinatissimi_, a company of giddy heads will take upon them to define how many shall be saved and who d.a.m.ned in a parish, where they shall sit in heaven, interpret Apocalypses, (_Commentatores praecipites et vertiginosos_, one calls them, as well he might) and those hidden mysteries to private persons, times, places, as their own spirit informs them, private revelations shall suggest, and precisely set down when the world shall come to an end, what year, what month, what day. Some of them again have such strong faith, so presumptuous, they will go into infected houses, expel devils, and fast forty days, as Christ himself did; some call G.o.d and his attributes into question, as Vorstius and Socinus; some princes, civil magistrates, and their authorities, as Anabaptists, will do all their own private spirit dictates, and nothing else. Brownists, Barrowists, Familists, and those Amsterdamian sects and sectaries, are led all by so many private spirits. It is a wonder to reveal what pa.s.sages Sleidan relates in his Commentaries, of Cretinck, Knipperdoling, and their a.s.sociates, those madmen of Munster in Germany; what strange enthusiasms, sottish revelations they had, how absurdly they carried themselves, deluded others; and as profane Machiavel in his political disputations holds of Christian religion, in general it doth enervate, debilitate, take away men's spirits and courage from them, _simpliciores reddit homines_, breeds nothing so courageous soldiers as that Roman: we may say of these peculiar sects, their religion takes away not spirits only, but wit and judgment, and deprives them of their understanding; for some of them are so far gone with their private enthusiasms and revelations, that they are quite mad, out of their wits. What greater madness can there be, than for a man to take upon him to be a G.o.d, as some do? to be the Holy Ghost, Elias, and what not? In [6586]Poland, 1518, in the reign of King Sigismund, one said he was Christ, and got him twelve apostles, came to judge the world, and strangely deluded the commons. [6587]One David George, an illiterate painter, not many years since, did as much in Holland, took upon him to be the Messiah, and had many followers. Benedictus Victorinus Faventinus, _consil. 15_, writes as much of one Honorius, that thought he was not only inspired as a prophet, but that he was a G.o.d himself, and had [6588]familiar conference with G.o.d and his angels. Lavat. _de spect. c. 2.

part. 8._ hath a story of one John Sartorious, that thought he was the prophet Elias, and _cap. 7._ of diverse others that had conference with angels, were saints, prophets. Wierus, _lib. 3. de Lamiis c. 7._ makes mention of a prophet of Groning that said he was G.o.d the Father; of an Italian and Spanish prophet that held as much. We need not rove so far abroad, we have familiar examples at home: Hackett that said he was Christ; Coppinger and Arthington his disciples; [6589]Burchet and Hovatus, burned at Norwich. We are never likely seven years together without some such new prophets that have several inspirations, some to convert the Jews, some fast forty days, go with Daniel to the lion's den; some foretell strange things, some for one thing, some for another. Great precisians of mean conditions and very illiterate, most part by a preposterous zeal, fasting, meditation, melancholy, are brought into those gross errors and inconveniences. Of those men I may conclude generally, that howsoever they may seem to be discreet, and men of understanding in other matters, discourse well, _laesam habent imaginationem_, they are like comets, round in all places but where they blaze, _caetera sani_, they have impregnable wits many of them, and discreet otherwise, but in this their madness and folly breaks out beyond measure, _in infinitum erumpit stult.i.tia._ They are certainly far gone with melancholy, if not quite mad, and have more need of physic than many a man that keeps his bed, more need of h.e.l.lebore than those that are in Bedlam.

SUBSECT. IV.--_Prognostics of Religious Melancholy_.

You may guess at the prognostics by the symptoms. What can these signs fore tell otherwise than folly, dotage, madness, gross ignorance, despair, obstinacy, a reprobate sense, [6590]a bad end? What else can superst.i.tion, heresy produce, but wars, tumults, uproars, torture of souls, and despair, a desolate land, as Jeremy teacheth, cap. vii. 34. when they commit idolatry, and walk after their own ways? how should it be otherwise with them? what can they expect but "blasting, famine, dearth," and all the plagues of Egypt, as Amos denounceth, cap. iv. vers. 9. 10. to be led into captivity? If our hopes be frustrate, "we sow much and bring in little, eat and have not enough, drink and are not filled, clothe and be not warm," &c.

Haggai i. 6. "we look for much and it comes to little, whence is it? His house was waste, they came to their own houses," vers. 9. "therefore the heaven stayed his dew, the earth his fruit." Because we are superst.i.tious, irreligious, we do not serve G.o.d as we ought, all these plagues and miseries come upon us; what can we look for else but mutual wars, slaughters, fearful ends in this life, and in the life to come eternal d.a.m.nation? What is it that hath caused so many feral battles to be fought, so much Christian blood shed, but superst.i.tion! That Spanish inquisition, racks, wheels, tortures, torments, whence do they proceed? from superst.i.tion. Bodine the Frenchman, in his [6591]_method. hist._ accounts Englishmen barbarians, for their civil wars: but let him read those Pharsalian fields [6592]fought of late in France for their religion, their ma.s.sacres, wherein by their own relations in twenty-four years, I know not how many millions have been consumed, whole families and cities, and he shall find ours to be but velitations to theirs. But it hath ever been the custom of heretics and idolaters, when they are plagued for their sins, and G.o.d's just judgments come upon them, not to acknowledge any fault in themselves, but still impute it unto others. In Cyprian's time it was much controverted between him and Demetrius an idolater, who should be the cause of those present calamities. Demetrius laid all the fault on Christians, (and so they did ever in the primitive church, as appears by the first book of [6593]Arn.o.bius), [6594]"that there were not such ordinary showers in winter, the ripening heat in summer, so seasonable springs, fruitful autumns, no marble mines in the mountains, less gold and silver than of old; that husbandmen, seamen, soldiers, all were scanted, justice, friendship, skill in arts, all was decayed," and that through Christians'

default, and all their other miseries from them, _quod dii nostri a vobis non colantur_, because they did not worship their G.o.ds. But Cyprian retorts all upon him again, as appears by his tract against him. 'Tis true the world is miserably tormented and shaken with wars, dearth, famine, fire, inundations, plagues, and many feral diseases rage amongst us, _sed non ut tu quereris ista accidunt quod dii vestri a n.o.bis non colantur, sed quod a vobis non colatur Deus, a quibus nec quaeritur, nec timetur_, not as thou complainest, that we do not worship your G.o.ds, but because you are idolaters, and do not serve the true G.o.d, neither seek him, nor fear him as you ought. Our papists object as much to us, and account us heretics, we them; the Turks esteem of both as infidels, and we them as a company of pagans, Jews against all; when indeed there is a general fault in us all, and something in the very best, which may justly deserve G.o.d's wrath, and pull these miseries upon our heads. I will say nothing here of those vain cares, torments, needless works, penance, pilgrimages, pseudomartyrdom, &c.

We heap upon ourselves unnecessary troubles, observations; we punish our bodies, as in Turkey (saith [6595]Busbequius _leg. Turcic. ep. 3._) "one did, that was much affected with music, and to hear boys sing, but very superst.i.tious; an old sibyl coming to his house, or a holy woman," (as that place yields many) "took him down for it, and told him, that in that other world he should suffer for it; thereupon he flung his rich and costly instruments which he had bedecked with jewels, all at once into the fire.

He was served in silver plate, and had goodly household stuff: a little after, another religious man reprehended him in like sort, and from thenceforth he was served in earthen vessels, last of all a decree came forth, because Turks might not drink wine themselves, that neither Jew nor Christian then living in Constantinople, might drink any wine at all." In like sort amongst papists, fasting at first was generally proposed as a good thing; after, from such meats at set times, and then last of all so rigorously proposed, to bind the consciences upon pain of d.a.m.nation. "First Friday," saith Erasmus, "then Sat.u.r.day," _et nunc peric.l.i.tatur dies Mercurii_) and Wednesday now is in danger of a fast. [6596]"And for such like toys, some so miserably afflict themselves, to despair, and death itself, rather than offend, and think themselves good Christians in it, when as indeed they are superst.i.tious Jews." So saith Leonardus Fuchsius, a great physician in his time. [6597]"We are tortured in Germany with these popish edicts, our bodies so taken down, our goods so diminished, that if G.o.d had not sent Luther, a worthy man, in time, to redress these mischiefs, we should have eaten hay with our horses before this." [6598]As in fasting, so in all other superst.i.tious edicts, we crucify one another without a cause, barring ourselves of many good and lawful things, honest disports, pleasures and recreations; for wherefore did G.o.d create them but for our use? Feasts, mirth, music, hawking, hunting, singing, dancing, &c. _non tam necessitatibus nostris Deus inservit, sed in delicias amamur_, as Seneca notes, G.o.d would have it so. And as Plato _2. de legibus_ gives out, _Deos laboriosam hominum vitam miseratos_, the G.o.ds in commiseration of human estate sent Apollo, Bacchus, and the Muses, _qui c.u.m voluptate tripudia et soltationes n.o.bis ducant_, to be merry with mortals, to sing and dance with us. So that he that will not rejoice and enjoy himself, making good use of such things as are lawfully permitted, _non est temperatus_, as he will, _sed superst.i.tiosus._ "There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour," Eccles. ii. 24. And as [6599]one said of hawking and hunting, _tot solatia in hac aegri orbis calamitate, mortalibus taediis deus objecit_, I say of all honest recreations, G.o.d hath therefore indulged them to refresh, ease, solace and comfort us. But we are some of us too stern, too rigid, too precise, too grossly superst.i.tious, and whilst we make a conscience of every toy, with touch not, taste not, &c., as those Pythagoreans of old, and some Indians now, that will eat no flesh, or suffer any living creature to be killed, the Bannians about Guzzerat; we tyrannise over our brother's soul, lose the right use of many good gifts; honest [6600]sports, games and pleasant recreations, [6601]punish ourselves without a cause, lose our liberties, and sometimes our lives. Anno 1270, at [6602]Magdeburg in Germany, a Jew fell into a privy upon a Sat.u.r.day, and without help could not possibly get out; he called to his fellows for succour, but they denied it, because it was their Sabbath, _non licebat opus manuum exercere_; the bishop hearing of it, the next day forbade him to be pulled out, because it was our Sunday. In the mean time the wretch died before Monday. We have myriads of examples in this kind amongst those rigid Sabbatarians, and therefore not without good cause, [6603]_Intolerabilem pertubationem_ Seneca calls it, as well he might, an intolerable perturbation, that causeth such dire events, folly, madness, sickness, despair, death of body and soul, and h.e.l.l itself.

SUBSECT. V.--_Cure of Religious Melancholy_.

To purge the world of idolatry and superst.i.tion, will require some monster-taming Hercules, a divine Aesculapius, or Christ himself to come in his own person, to reign a thousand years on earth before the end, as the Millenaries will have him. They are generally so refractory, self-conceited, obstinate, so firmly addicted to that religion in which they have been bred and brought up, that no persuasion, no terror, no persecution, can divert them. The consideration of which, hath induced many commonwealths to suffer them to enjoy their consciences as they will themselves: a toleration of Jews is in most provinces of Europe. In Asia they have their synagogues: Spaniards permit Moors to live amongst them: the Mogullians, Gentiles: the Turks all religions. In Europe, Poland and Amsterdam are the common sanctuaries. Some are of opinion, that no man ought to be compelled for conscience' sake, but let him be of what religion he will, he may be saved, as Cornelius was formerly accepted, Jew, Turks, Anabaptists, &c. If he be an honest man, live soberly, and civilly in his profession, (Volkelius, Crellius, and the rest of the Socinians, that now nestle themselves about Krakow and Rakow in Poland, have renewed this opinion) serve his own G.o.d, with that fear and reverence as he ought. _Sua cuique civitati_ (Laeli) _religio sit, nostra n.o.bis_, Tully thought fit every city should be free in this behalf, adore their own _Custodes et Topicos Deos_, tutelar and local G.o.ds, as Symmachus calls them. Isocrates adviseth Demonicus, "when he came to a strange city, to [6604]worship by all means the G.o.ds of the place," _et unumquemque, Topic.u.m deum sic coli oportere, quomodo ipse praeceperit_: which Cecilius in [6605]Minutius labours, and would have every nation _sacrorum ritus gentiles habere et deos colere municipes_, keep their own ceremonies, worship their peculiar G.o.ds, which Pomponius Mela reports of the Africans, _Deos suos patrio more venerantur_, they worship their own G.o.ds according to their own ordination.

For why should any one nation, as he there pleads, challenge that universality of G.o.d, _Deum suum quem nec ostendunt, nec vident, discurrantem silicet et ubique praesentem, in omnium mores, actus, et occultas, cogitationes inquirentem_, &c., as Christians do: let every province enjoy their liberty in this behalf, worship one G.o.d, or all as they will, and are informed. The Romans built altars Diis Asiae, Europae, Lybiae, _diis ignotis et peregrinis_: others otherwise, &c. Plinius Secundus, as appears by his Epistle to Trajan, would not have the Christians so persecuted, and in some time of the reign of Maximinus, as we find it registered in Eusebius _lib. 9. cap. 9._ there was a decree made to this purpose, _Nullus cogatur invitus ad hunc vel illum deorum cultum_, "let no one be compelled against his will to worship any particular deity,"

and by Constantine in the 19th year of his reign as [6606]Baronius informeth us, _Nemo alteri exhibeat molestiam, quod cujusque animus vult, hoc quisque transigat_, new G.o.ds, new lawgivers, new priests, will have new ceremonies, customs and religions, to which every wise man as a good formalist should accommodate himself.

[6607] "Saturnus periit, perierunt et sua jura, Sub Jove nunc mundus, jussa sequare Jovis."

The said Constantine the emperor, as Eusebius writes, flung down and demolished all the heathen G.o.ds, silver, gold statues, altars, images and temples, and turned them all to Christian churches, _infestus gentilium monumentis ludibrio exposuit_; the Turk now converts them again to Mahometan mosques. The like edict came forth in the reign of Arcadius and Honorius. [6608]Symmachus the orator in his days, to procure a general toleration, used this argument, [6609]"Because G.o.d is immense and infinite, and his nature cannot perfectly be known, it is convenient he should be as diversely worshipped, as every man shall perceive or understand." It was impossible, he thought, for one religion to be universal: you see that one small province can hardly be ruled by one law, civil or spiritual; and "how shall so many distinct and vast empires of the world be united into one? It never was, never will be" Besides, if there be infinite planetary and firmamental worlds, as [6610]some will, there be infinite genii or commanding spirits belonging to each of them; and so, _per consequens_ (for they will be all adored), infinite religions. And therefore let every territory keep their proper rites and ceremonies, as their _dii tutelares_ will, so Tyrius calls them, "and according to the quarter they hold," their own inst.i.tutions, revelations, orders, oracles, which they dictate from time to time, or teach their own priests or ministers. This tenet was stiffly maintained in Turkey not long since, as you may read in the third epistle of Busbequius, [6611]"that all those should partic.i.p.ate of eternal happiness, that lived a holy and innocent life, what religion soever they professed." Rustan Ba.s.sa was a great patron of it; though Mahomet himself was sent _virtute gladdi_, to enforce all, as he writes in his Alcoran, to follow him. Some again will approve of this for Jews, Gentiles, infidels, that are out of the fold, they can be content to give them all respect and favour, but by no means to such as are within the precincts of our own church, and called Christians, to no heretics, schismatics, or the like; let the Spanish inquisition, that fourth fury, speak of some of them, the civil wars and ma.s.sacres in France, our Marian times. [6612]Magillia.n.u.s the Jesuit will not admit of conference with a heretic, but severity and rigour to be used, _non illis verba reddere, sed furcas, figere oportet_; and Theodosius is commended in Nicephorus, _lib. 12. cap. 15._ [6613]"That he put all heretics to silence." Bernard. _Epist. 180_, will have club law, fire and sword for heretics, [6614]"compel them, stop their mouths not with disputations, or refute them with reasons, but with fists;" and this is their ordinary practice. Another company are as mild on the other side; to avoid all heart-burning, and contentious wars and uproars, they would have a general toleration in every kingdom, no mulct at all, no man for religion or conscience be put to death, which [6615]Thua.n.u.s the French historian much favours; our late Socinians defend; Vatica.n.u.s against Calvin in a large Treatise in behalf of Servetus, vindicates; Castilio, &c., Martin Ballius and his companions, maintained this opinion not long since in France, whose error is confuted by Beza in a just volume. The medium is best, and that which Paul prescribes, Gal. i. "If any man shall fall by occasion, to restore such a one with the spirit of meekness, by all fair means, gentle admonitions;" but if that will not take place, _Post unam et alteram admonitionem haeretic.u.m devita_, he must be excommunicate, as Paul did by Hymenaeus, delivered over to Satan. _Immedicabile vulnus ense recidendum est._ As Hippocrates said in physic, I may well say in divinity, _Quae ferro non curantur, ignis curat._ For the vulgar, restrain them by laws, mulcts, burn their books, forbid their conventicles; for when the cause is taken away, the effect will soon cease. Now for prophets, dreamers, and such rude silly fellows, that through fasting, too much meditation, preciseness, or by melancholy, are distempered: the best means to reduce them _ad sanam mentem_, is to alter their course of life, and with conference, threats, promises, persuasions, to intermix physic.

Hercules de Saxonia, had such a prophet committed to his charge in Venice, that thought he was Elias, and would fast as he did; he dressed a fellow in angel's attire, that said he came from heaven to bring him divine food, and by that means stayed his fast, administered his physic; so by the meditation of this forged angel he was cured. [6616]Rhasis an Arabian, _cont. lib. 1. cap. 9_, speaks of a fellow that in like case complained to him, and desired his help: "I asked him" (saith he) "what the matter was; he replied, I am continually meditating of heaven and h.e.l.l, and methinks I see and talk with fiery spirits, and smell brimstone, &c., and am so carried away with these conceits, that I can neither eat, nor sleep, nor go about my business: I cured him" (saith Rhasis) "partly by persuasion, partly by physic, and so have I done by many others." We have frequently such prophets and dreamers amongst us, whom we persecute with fire and f.a.ggot: I think the most compendious cure, for some of them at least, had been in Bedlam. _Sed de his satis._

MEMB. II.

SUBSECT. I.--_Religious Melancholy in defect; parties affected, Epicures, Atheists, Hypocrites, worldly secure, Carnalists; all impious persons, impenitent sinners, &c._

In that other extreme or defect of this love of G.o.d, knowledge, faith, fear, hope, &c. are such as err both in doctrine and manners, Sadducees, Herodians, libertines, politicians: all manner of atheists, epicures, infidels, that are secure, in a reprobate sense, fear not G.o.d at all, and such are too distrustful and timorous, as desperate persons be. That grand sin of atheism or impiety, [6617]Melancthon calls it _monstrosam melancholiam_, monstrous melancholy; or _venenatam melancholiam_, poisoned melancholy. A company of Cyclops or giants, that war with the G.o.ds, as the poets feigned, antipodes to Christians, that scoff at all religion, at G.o.d himself, deny him and all his attributes, his wisdom, power, providence, his mercy and judgment.

[6618] "Esse aliquos manes, et subterranea regna, Et contum, et Stygio ranas in gurgite nigras, Atque una transire vadum tot millia cymba, Nec pueri credunt, nisi qui nondum aere lavantur."

That there is either heaven or h.e.l.l, resurrection of the dead, pain, happiness, or world to come, _credat Judaeus Apella_; for their parts they esteem them as so many poet's tales, bugbears, Lucian's Alexander; Moses, Mahomet, and Christ are all as one in their creed. When those b.l.o.o.d.y wars in France for matters of religion (saith [6619]Richard Dinoth) were so violently pursued between Huguenots and Papists, there was a company of good fellows laughed them all to scorn, for being such superst.i.tious fools, to lose their wives and fortunes, accounting faith, religion, immortality of the soul, mere fopperies and illusions. Such loose [6620]atheistical spirits are too predominant in all kingdoms. Let them contend, pray, tremble, trouble themselves that will, for their parts, they fear neither G.o.d nor devil; but with that Cyclops in Euripides,

"Haud ulla numina expavesc.u.n.t caelitum, Sed victimas uni deorum maximo, Ventri offerunt, deos ignorant caeteros."

"They fear no G.o.d but one, They sacrifice to none.

But belly, and him adore, For G.o.ds they know no more."

"Their G.o.d is their belly," as Paul saith, _Sancta mater saturitas;--quibus in solo vivendi causa palato est._ The idol, which they worship and adore, is their mistress; with him in Plautus, _mallem haec mulier me amet quam dii_, they had rather have her favour than the G.o.ds'. Satan is their guide, the flesh is their instructor, hypocrisy their counsellor, vanity their fellow-soldier, their will their law, ambition their captain, custom their rule; temerity, boldness, impudence their art, toys their trading, d.a.m.nation their end. All their endeavours are to satisfy their l.u.s.t and appet.i.te, how to please their genius, and to be merry for the present, _Ede, lude, bibe, post mortem nulla voluptas_. [6621]"The same condition is of men and of beasts; as the one dieth, so dieth the other," Eccles. iii.

19. The world goes round,

[6622] ------"truditur dies die, Novaeque pergunt interire Lunae:"

[6623]They did eat and drink of old, marry, bury, bought, sold, planted, built, and will do still. [6624]"Our life is short and tedious, and in the death of a man there is no recovery, neither was any man known that hath returned from the grave; for we are born at all adventure, and we shall be hereafter as though we had never been; for the breath is as smoke in our nostrils, &c., and the spirit vanisheth as the soft air." [6625]"Come let us enjoy the pleasures that are present, let us cheerfully use the creatures as in youth, let us fill ourselves with costly wine and ointments, let not the flower of our life pa.s.s by us, let us crown ourselves with rose-buds before they are withered," &c. [6626]_Vivamus mea Lesbia et amemus_, &c. [6627] "Come let us take our fill of love, and pleasure in dalliance, for this is our portion, this is our lot."

_Tempora labuntur, tacitisque senescimus annis_.[6628] For the rest of heaven and h.e.l.l, let children and superst.i.tious fools believe it: for their parts, they are so far from trembling at the dreadful day of judgment that they wish with Nero, _Me vivo fiat_, let it come in their times: so secure, so desperate, so immoderate in l.u.s.t and pleasure, so p.r.o.ne to revenge that, as Paterculus said of some caitiffs in his time in Rome, _Quod nequiter ausi, fort.i.ter executi_: it shall not be so wickedly attempted, but as desperately performed, whatever they take in hand. Were it not for G.o.d's restraining grace, fear and shame, temporal punishment, and their own infamy, they would. Lycaon-like exenterate, as so many cannibals eat up, or Cadmus' soldiers consume one another. These are most impious, and commonly professed atheists, that never use the name of G.o.d but to swear by it; that express nought else but epicurism in their carriage, or hypocrisy; with Pentheus they neglect and contemn these rites and religious ceremonies of the G.o.ds; they will be G.o.ds themselves, or at least _socii deorum. Divisum imperium c.u.m Jove Caesar habet._ "Caesar divides the empire with Jove."

Aproyis, an Egyptian tyrant, grew, saith [6629]Herodotus, to that height of pride, insolency of impiety, to that contempt of G.o.ds and men, that he held his kingdom so sure, _ut a nemine deorum aut hominum sibi eripi posset_, neither G.o.d nor men could take it from him. [6630]A certain blasphemous king of Spain (as [6631]Lansius reports) made an edict, that no subject of his, for ten years' s.p.a.ce, should believe in, call on, or worship any G.o.d.

And as [6632]Jovius relates of "Mahomet the Second, that sacked Constantinople, he so behaved himself, that he believed neither Christ nor Mahomet; and thence it came to pa.s.s, that he kept his word and promise no farther than for his advantage, neither did he care to commit any offence to satisfy his l.u.s.t." I could say the like of many princes, many private men (our stories are full of them) in times past, this present age, that love, fear, obey, and perform all civil duties as they shall find them expedient or behoveful to their own ends. _Securi adversus Deos, securi adversus homines, votis non est opus_, which [6633] Tacitus reports of some Germans, they need not pray, fear, hope, for they are secure, to their thinking, both from G.o.ds and men. Bulco Opiliensis, sometime Duke of [6634]Silesia, was such a one to a hair; he lived (saith [6635]Aeneas Sylvius) at [6636]Vratislavia, "and was so mad to satisfy his l.u.s.t, that he believed neither heaven nor h.e.l.l, or that the soul was immortal, but married wives, and turned them up as he thought fit, did murder and mischief, and what he list himself." This duke hath too many followers in our days: say what you can, dehort, exhort, persuade to the contrary, they are no more moved,--_quam si dura, silex aut stet Marpesia cautes_, than so many stocks, and stones; tell them of heaven and h.e.l.l, 'tis to no purpose, _laterem lavas_, they answer as Ataliba that Indian prince did friar Vincent, [6637]"when he brought him a book, and told him all the mysteries of salvation, heaven and h.e.l.l, were contained in it: he looked upon it, and said he saw no such matter, asking withal, how he knew it:" they will but scoff at it, or wholly reject it. Petronius in Tacitus, when he was now by Nero's command bleeding to death, _audiebat amicos nihil referentes de immortalitate animae, aut sapientum placitis, sed levia carmina et faciles versus_; instead of good counsel and divine meditations, he made his friends sing him bawdy verses and scurrilous songs. Let them take heaven, paradise, and that future happiness that will, _bonum est esse hic_, it is good being here: there is no talking to such, no hope of their conversion, they are in a reprobate sense, mere carnalists, fleshly minded men, which howsoever they may be applauded in this life by some few parasites, and held for worldly wise men. [6638]"They seem to me" (saith Melancthon) "to be as mad as Hercules was when he raved and killed his wife and children."

A milder sort of these atheistical spirits there are that profess religion, but _timide et haesitanter_, tempted thereunto out of that horrible consideration of diversity of religions, which are and have been in the world (which argument Campanella, _Atheismi Triumphati, cap. 9._ both urgeth and answers), besides the covetousness, imposture, and knavery of priests, _quae faciunt_ (as [6639]Postellus observes) _ut rebus sacris minus faciant fidem_; and those religions some of them so fantastical, exorbitant, so violently maintained with equal constancy and a.s.surance; whence they infer, that if there be so many religious sects, and denied by the rest, why may they not be all false? or why should this or that be preferred before the rest? The sceptics urge this, and amongst others it is the conclusion of s.e.xtus Empericus, _lib. 3. advers. Mathematicos_: after many philosophical arguments and reasons pro and con that there are G.o.ds, and again that there are no G.o.ds, he so concludes, _c.u.m tot inter se pugnent, &c. Una tantum potest esse vera_, as Tully likewise disputes: Christians say, they alone worship the true G.o.d, pity all other sects, lament their case; and yet those old Greeks and Romans that worshipped the devil, as the Chinese now do, _aut deos topicos_, their own G.o.ds; as Julian the apostate, [6640]Cecilius in Minutius, Celsus and Porphyrius the philosopher object: and as Machiavel contends, were much more n.o.ble, generous, victorious, had a more flourishing commonwealth, better cities, better soldiers, better scholars, better wits. Their G.o.ds overcame our G.o.ds, did as many miracles, &c. Saint Cyril, Arn.o.bius, Minutius, with many other ancients of late, Lessius, Morneus, Grotius _de Verit. Relig.

Christianae_, Savanarola _de Verit. Fidei Christianae_, well defend; but Zanchius, [6641]Campanella, Marinus Marcennus, Bozius, and Gentillettus answer all these atheistical arguments at large. But this again troubles many as of old, wicked men generally thrive, professed atheists thrive,

[6642] "Nullos esse Deos, inane coelum, Affirmat Selius: probatque, quod se Factum, dum negat haec, videt beatum."

"There are no G.o.ds, heavens are toys, Selius in public justifies; Because that whilst he thus denies Their deities, he better thrives."

This is a prime argument: and most part your most sincere, upright, honest, and [6643]good men are depressed, "The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong" (Eccles. ix. 11.), "nor yet bread to the wise, favour nor riches to men of understanding, but time and chance comes to all."

There was a great plague in Athens (as Thucydides, _lib. 2._ relates), in which at last every man, with great licentiousness, did what he list, not caring at all for G.o.d's or men's laws. "Neither the fear of G.o.d nor laws of men" (saith he) "awed any man, because the plague swept all away alike, good and bad; they thence concluded it was alike to worship or not worship the G.o.ds, since they perished all alike." Some cavil and make doubts of scripture itself: it cannot stand with G.o.d's mercy, that so many should be d.a.m.ned, so many bad, so few good, such have and hold about religions, all stiff on their side, factious alike, thrive alike, and yet bitterly persecuting and d.a.m.ning each other; "It cannot stand with G.o.d's goodness, protection, and providence" (as [6644]Saint Chrysostom in the Dialect of such discontented persons) "to see and suffer one man to be lame, another mad, a third poor and miserable all the days of his life, a fourth grievously tormented with sickness and aches, to his last hour. Are these signs and works of G.o.d's providence, to let one man be deaf, another dumb?

A poor honest fellow lives in disgrace, woe and want, wretched he is; when as a wicked caitiff abounds in superfluity of wealth, keeps wh.o.r.es, parasites, and what he will himself:" _Audis Jupiter haec? Talia multa connectentes, longum reprehensionis sermonem erga Dei providentiam contexunt._ [6645]Thus they mutter and object (see the rest of their arguments in Marcennus in Genesin, and in Campanella, amply confuted), with many such vain cavils, well known, not worthy the recapitulation or answering: whatsoever they pretend, they are _interim_ of little or no religion.

Cousin-germans to these men are many of our great philosophers and deists, who, though they be more temperate in this life, give many good moral precepts, honest, upright, and sober in their conversation, yet in effect they are the same (accounting no man a good scholar that is not an atheist), _nimis altum sapiunt_, too much learning makes them mad. Whilst they attribute all to natural causes, [6646]contingence of all things, as Melancthon calls them, _Pertinax hominum genus_, a peevish generation of men, that misled by philosophy, and the devil's suggestion, their own innate blindness, deny G.o.d as much as the rest, hold all religion a fiction, opposite to reason and philosophy, though for fear of magistrates, saith [6647]Vaninus, they durst not publicly profess it. Ask one of them of what religion he is, he scoffingly replies, a philosopher, a Galenist, an [6648]Averroist, and with Rabelais a physician, a peripatetic, an epicure.

In spiritual things G.o.d must demonstrate all to sense, leave a p.a.w.n with them, or else seek some other creditor. They will acknowledge Nature and Fortune, yet not G.o.d: though in effect they grant both: for as Scaliger defines, Nature signifies G.o.d's ordinary power; or, as Calvin writes, Nature is G.o.d's order, and so things extraordinary may be called unnatural: Fortune his unrevealed will; and so we call things changeable that are beside reason and expectation. To this purpose [6649]Minutius in _Octavio_, and [6650] Seneca well discourseth with them, _lib. 4. de beneficiis, cap.

5, 6, 7._ "They do not understand what they say; what is Nature but G.o.d?

call him what thou wilt, Nature, Jupiter, he hath as many names as offices: it comes all to one pa.s.s, G.o.d is the fountain of all, the first Giver and Preserver, from whom all things depend," [6651]_a quo, et per quem omnia, Nam quocunque vides Deus est, quocunque moveris_, "G.o.d is all in all, G.o.d is everywhere, in every place." And yet this Seneca, that could confute and blame them, is all out as much to be blamed and confuted himself, as mad himself; for he holds _fatum Stoic.u.m_, that inevitable Necessity in the other extreme, as those Chaldean astrologers of old did, against whom the prophet Jeremiah so often thunders, and those heathen mathematicians, Nigidius Figulus, magicians, and Priscilianists, whom St. Austin so eagerly confutes, those Arabian questionaries, Novem Judices, Alb.u.mazer, Dorotheus, &c., and our countryman [6652]Estuidus, that take upon them to define out of those great conjunction of stars, with Ptolomeus, the periods of kingdoms, or religions, of all future accidents, wars, plagues, schisms, heresies, and what not? all from stars, and such things, saith Maginus, _Quae sibi et intelligentiis suis reservavit Deus_, which G.o.d hath reserved to himself and his angels, they will take upon them to foretell, as if stars were immediate, inevitable causes of all future accidents. Caesar Vaninus, in his book _de admirandis naturae Arcanis, dial. 52. de oraculis_, is more free, copious, and open, in this explication of this astrological tenet of Ptolemy, than any of our modern writers, Cardan excepted, a true disciple of his master Pomponatius; according to the doctrine of Peripatetics, he refers all apparitions, prodigies, miracles, oracles, accidents, alterations of religions, kingdoms, &c. (for which he is soundly lashed by Marinus Mercennus, as well he deserves), to natural causes (for spirits he will not acknowledge), to that light, motion, influences of heavens and stars, and to the intelligences that move the orbs. _Intelligentia quae, movet orbem mediante coelo_, &c. Intelligences do all: and after a long discourse of miracles done of old, _si haec daemones possint, cur non et intelligentiae, coelorum motrices_? And as these great conjunctions, aspects of planets, begin or end, vary, are vertical and predominant, so have religions, rites, ceremonies, and kingdoms their beginning, progress, periods, _in urbibus, regibus, religionibus, ac in particularibus hominibus, haec vera ac manifesta, sunt, ut Aristoteles innuere videtur, et quotidiana docet experientia, ut historias perlegens videbit; quid olim in Gentili lege Jove sanctius et ill.u.s.trius? quid nunc vile magis et execrandum? Ita coelestia corpora pro mortalium beneficio religiones aedificant, et c.u.m cessat influxus, cessat lex_, [6653]&c. And because, according to their tenets, the world is eternal, intelligences eternal, influences of stars eternal, kingdoms, religions, alterations shall be likewise eternal, and run round after many ages; _Atque iterum ad Troiam magnus mittetur Achilles; renascentur religiones, et ceremoniae, res humanae in idem recident, nihil nunc quod non olim fuit, et post saeculorum revolutiones alias est, erit,[6654] &c.

idem specie_, saith Vaninus, _non individuo quod Plato significavit._ These (saith mine [6655]author), these are the decrees of Peripatetics, which though I recite, _in obsequium Christianae fidei detestor_, as I am a Christian I detest and hate. Thus Peripatetics and astrologians held in former times, and to this effect of old in Rome, saith Dionysius Halicarna.s.sus, _lib. 7_, when those meteors and prodigies appeared in the air, after the banishment of Coriola.n.u.s, [6656] "Men were diversely affected: some said they were G.o.d's just judgments for the execution of that good man, some referred all to natural causes, some to stars, some thought they came by chance, some by necessity" decreed _ab initio_, and could not be altered. The two last opinions of necessity and chance were, it seems, of greater note than the rest.