The Major Works (English Library) (15 page)
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Authors: Sir Thomas Browne
57. I beleeve many are saved who to man seeme reprobated, and many are reprobated, who in the opinion and sentence of man, stand elected; there will appeare at the last day, strange, and unexpected examples, both of his justice and his mercy, and therefore to define either is folly in man, and insolency, even in the devils; those acute and substill spirits, in all their sagacity, can hardly divine who shall be saved, which, if they could prognostick,
344
their labour were at an end; nor need they compasse the earth, seeking whom they may devoure. Those who upon a rigid application of the Law, sentence
Solomon
unto damnation,
345
condemne not onely him, but themselves, and
the whole world; for by the letter, and written Word
346
of God, we are without exception in the state of death, but there is a prerogative of God, and an arbitrary pleasure above the letter of his owne Law, by which alone wee can pretend unto salvation, and through which
Solomon
might be as easily saved as those who condemne him.
58. The number of those who pretend unto salvation, and those infinite swarmes who thinke to passe through the eye of this Needle,
347
have much amazed me. That name and compellation of
little Flocke
,
348
doth not comfort but deject my devotion, especially when I reflect upon mine owne unworthinesse, wherein, according to my humble apprehensions, I am below them all. I beleeve there shall never be an Anarchy in Heaven, but as there are Hierarchies amongst the Angels,
349
so shall there be degrees of priority amongst the Saints. Yet is it (I protest) beyond my ambition to aspire unto the first rankes, my desires onely are, and I shall be happy therein, to be but the last man, and bring up the Rere in Heaven.
59. Againe, I am confident, and fully perswaded, yet dare not take my oath of my salvation; I am as it were sure, and do beleeve, without all doubt, that there is such a City as
Constantinople
, yet for me to take my oath thereon, were a kinde of perjury, because I hold no infallible warrant from my owne sense to confirme me in the certainty thereof. And truely, though many pretend an absolute certainty of their salvation, yet when an humble soule shall contemplate her owne unworthinesse, she shall meete with many doubts and suddainely finde how little
350
wee stand in need of the precept of Saint
Paul, Worke out your salvation with feare and trembling
.
351
That which is the cause of my election, I hold to be the cause of my salvation, which was the mercy, and beneplacit
352
of God, before I was, or
the foundation of the world.
Before Abraham was, I am
, is the saying of Christ,
353
yet is it true in some sense
354
if I say it of my selfe, for I was not onely before my selfe, but
Adam
, that is, in the Idea of God, and the decree of that Synod held from all Eternity.
355
And in this sense, I say, the world was before the Creation, and at an end before it had a beginning;
356
and thus was I dead before I was alive, though my grave be
England
, my dying place was Paradise, and
Eve
miscarried of mee before she conceiv’d of
Cain
.
60. Insolent zeales that doe decry good workes and rely onely
357
upon faith, take not away merit: for depending upon the efficacy of their faith, they enforce the condition of God, and in a more sophisticall way doe seeme to challenge Heaven. It was decreed by God, that onely those that lapt in the water like dogges, should have the honour to destroy the
Midianites
,
358
yet could none of those justly challenge, or imagine hee deserved that honour thereupon. I doe not deny, but that true faith, and such as God requires, is not onely a marke or token, but also a meanes of our Salvation, but where to finde this, is as obscure to me, as my last end. And if our Saviour could object unto
359
his owne Disciples & favourites, a faith, that to the quantity of a graine of Mustard seed, is able to remove mountaines; surely that which wee boast of, is not any thing, or at the most, but a remove from nothing. This is the Tenor of my beleefe, wherein, though there be many things singular, and to the humour of my irregular selfe, yet, if they square not with maturer Judge-ments, I disclaime them, and doe no further father them, than the learned and best Judgements shall authorize them.
THE SECOND PART
1. Now for that other Vertue of Charity,
1
without which Faith is a meer notion, and of no existence, I have ever endeavoured to nourish the mercifull disposition, and humane inclination I borrowed from my Parents, and regulate it to the written and prescribed Lawes of Charity; and if I hold the true Anatomy of my selfe, I am delineated & naturally framed to such a piece of vertue: for I am of a constitution so generall, that it consorts, and sympathizeth with all things; I have no antipathy, or rather Idio-syncrasie,
2
in dyet, humour, ayre, any thing; I wonder not at the
French
, for their dishes of frogges, snailes, and toadstooles, nor at the Jewes for Locusts and Grasse-hoppers, but being amongst them, make them my common viands; and I finde they agree with my stomach as well as theirs; I could digest a Sallad gathered in a Church-yard, as well as in a Garden. I cannot start at the presence of a Serpent, Scorpion, Lizard, or Salamander; at the sight of a Toad, or Viper, I finde in me no desire to take up a stone to destroy
them. I feele not in my selfe those common antipathies that I can discover in others: Those nationall repugnances doe not touch me, nor doe I behold with prejudice the
French, Italian, Spaniard
, or
Dutch
; but where I finde their actions in ballance with my Countreymens, I honour, love, and embrace them in the same degree; I was borne in the eighth Climate,
3
but seeme for to bee framed, and constellated unto all; I am no Plant that will not prosper out of a Garden. All places, all ayres make unto me one Country; I am in
England
, every where, and under any meridian; I have beene shipwrackt,
4
yet am not enemy with the sea or winds; I can study, play, or sleepe in a tempest. In briefe, I am averse from nothing, my conscience would give mee the lie if I should say I absolutely detest or hate any essence but
the Devill, or so at least abhorre any thing but that wee might come to composition. If there be any among those common objects of hatred I doe contemne and laugh at, it is that great enemy of reason, vertue and religion, the multitude, that numerous piece of monstrosity, which taken asunder seeme men, and the reasonable creatures of God; but confused together, make but one great beast, & a monstrosity more prodigious than Hydra; it is no breach of Charity to call these fooles, it is the stile all holy Writers have afforded them, set downe by
Solomon
in canonicall Scripture,
5
and a point of our faith to beleeve so. Neither in the name of multitude doe I onely include the base and minor sort of people; there is a rabble even amongst the Gentry, a sort of Plebeian heads, whose fancy moves with the same wheele as these; men in the same Levell
with Mechanickes,
6
though their fortunes doe somewhat guild their infirmities, and their purses compound for their follies. But as in casting account, three or foure men together come short in account of one man placed by himself below them:
7
So neither are a troope of these ignorant Doradoes,
8
of that true esteeme and value, as many a forlorne person, whose condition doth place them below their feet. Let us speake like Politicians, there is a Nobility without Heraldry, a naturall dignity, whereby one man is ranked with another, another Filed before him, according to the quality of his desert, and preheminence of his good parts.
9
Though the corruption of these times, and the byas of present practise wheele another way, thus it was in the first and primitive Common-wealths, and is yet in the integrity and Cradle of well-ordered polities, till corruption getteth ground, ruder desires labouring after that which wiser considerations contemn, every one having a liberty to amasse &
heape up riches, and they a license or faculty to doe or purchase any thing.
2. This generall and indifferent temper of mine, doth more neerely dispose mee to this noble vertue. It is a happinesse to be borne and framed unto vertue, and to grow up from the seeds of nature, rather than the inoculation and forced graftes of education; yet if we are directed only by our particular Natures, and regulate our inclinations by no higher rule than that of our reasons, we are but Moralists; Divinity will still call us Heathens. Therfore this great worke of charity, must have other motives, ends, and impulsions: I give no almes
10
to satisfie the hunger of my Brother, but to fulfill and accomplish the Will and Command of my God; I draw not my purse for his sake that demands it, but his that enjoyned it; I relieve no man upon the Rhetorick of his miseries, nor to content mine own commiserating disposition, for this is still but morall charity, and an act that oweth more to passion than reason. Hee that
relieves another upon the bare suggestion and bowels of pity, doth not this so much for his sake as for his own: for by compassion we make anothers misery our own, & so by relieving them, we relieve our selves also. It is as erroneous a conceite to redresse other mens misfortunes upon the common considerations of mercifull natures, that it may bee one day our own case, for this is a sinister and politick kind of charity, whereby we seem to bespeak the pities of men, in the like occasions; and truly I have observed that those professed Eleemosynaries,
11
though in a croud or multitude, doe yet direct and place their petitions on a few and selected persons; there is surely a Physiognomy, which those experienced and Master Mendicants observe, whereby they instantly discover a mercifull aspect, and will single out a face, wherein they spy the signatures and markes of mercy: for there are mystically in our faces certaine characters which carry in them the motto of our Soules, wherein he that cannot read
A.B.C
. may read our natures. I hold moreover that there is a Phytognomy,
12
or Physiognomy, not onely
of men, but of Plants, and Vegetables; and in every one of them, some outward figures which hang as signes or bushes of their inward formes. The finger of God hath left an inscription upon all his workes, not graphicall or composed of Letters, but of their severall formes, constitutions, parts, and operations, which aptly joyned together doe make one word that doth expresse their natures. By these Letters God cals the Starres by their names, and by this Alphabet
Adam
assigned to every creature a name peculiar to its Nature.
13
Now there are besides these Characters in our faces, certaine mysticall figures
14
in our hands, which I dare not call meere dashes, strokes,
a la volèe
, or at randome, because delineated by a pencill, that never workes in vaine; and hereof I take more particular notice, because I carry that in mine owne hand, which I could never read of, nor discover in another.
Aristotle
, I confesse, in his acute, and singular booke of Physiognomy,
15
hath made no mention of Chiromancy, yet I beleeve the
Egyptians
, who were neerer addicted to those abstruse and mysticall sciences, had a knowledge therein, to which those vagabond and counterfeit
Egyptians
16
did after pretend, and perhaps retained a few corrupted principles, which sometimes might verifie their prognostickes.
It is the common wonder of all men, how among so many millions of faces, there should be none alike; Now contrary, I wonder as much how there should be any; he that shall consider how many thousand severall words have beene carelesly and without study composed out of 24. Letters;
17
withall how many hundred lines there are to be drawn in the fabrick of one man; shall easily finde that this variety is necessary: And it will bee very hard that they shall so concur as to make one portract like another. Let a Painter carelesly limbe out a Million of faces, and you shall finde them all different, yea let him have his copy
18
before him, yet after all his art there will remaine a sensible
distinction; for the patterne or example of every thing is the perfectest in that kind, whereof wee still come short, though wee transcend or goe beyond it, because herein it is wide and agrees not in all points unto its Copy.
19
Nor doth the similitude of creatures disparage the variety of nature, nor any way confound the workes of God. For even in things alike, there is diversitie, and those that doe seeme to accord doe manifestly disagree. And thus is Man like God, for in the same things that wee resemble him, wee are utterly different from him. There was never any thing so like another, as in all points to concurre, there will ever some reserved difference slip in, to prevent the Identity, without which, two severall things would not be alike, but the same, which is impossible.
3. But to returne from Philosophy to Charity, I hold not so narrow a conceit of this vertue, as to conceive that to give almes, is onely to be Charitable, or thinke a piece of Liberality can comprehend the Totall of Charity; Divinity hath wisely divided the act thereof into many branches, and hath taught us in this narrow way, many pathes unto goodnesse; as many wayes as we may doe good, so many wayes we may bee Charitable; there are infirmities, not onely of body, but of soule, and fortunes, which doe require the mercifull hand of our abilities. I cannot contemn a man for ignorance but behold him with as much pity as I doe
Lazarus
.
20
It is no greater Charity to cloath his body, then apparell the nakednesse of his Soule. It is an honourable object to see the reasons of other men weare our Liveries, and their borrowed understandings doe homage to the bounty of ours. It is the cheapest way of beneficence, and like the naturall charity of the Sunne illuminates another without obscuring it selfe. To be reserved and caitif in this part of goodnesse, is the sordidest piece of covetousnesse, and more contemptible than the pecuniary avarice. To this (as calling my selfe a Scholler) I am obliged by the duty of my condition, I make not therefore my head a grave, but a treasure of knowledge; I intend no Monopoly, but a Community in learning; I
study not for my owne sake onely, but for theirs that study not for themselves. I envy no man that knowes more than my selfe, but pity them that know lesse. I instruct no man as an exercise of my knowledge, or with an intent rather to nourish and keepe it alive in mine owne head, than beget and propagate it in his; and in the midst of all my endeavours there is but one thought that dejects me, that my acquired parts must perish with my selfe, nor can bee Legacyed among my honoured Friends. I cannot fall out or contemne a man for an errour, or conceive why a difference in opinion should divide an affection: for controversies, disputes, and argumentations, both in Philosophy, and in Divinity, if they meete with discreet and peaceable natures, doe not infringe the Lawes of Charity. In all disputes so much
21
as there is of passion, so much there is of nothing to the purpose, for then reason like a bad hound spends upon a false sent, and forsakes the question first started. And
this is one reason why controversies are never determined, for though they be amply proposed, they are scarse at all handled, they doe so swell with unnecessary Digressions, and the Parenthesis on the party, is often as large as the maine discourse upon the Subject. The Foundations of Religion are already established, and the principles of Salvation subscribed unto by all, there remaines not many controversies worth a passion, and yet never any disputed without, not onely in Divinity, but in inferiour Arts: What a
Βατραχομυομαχíα
,
22
and hot skirmish is betwixt
S
. and
T
. in
Lucian
?
23
How doth Grammarians hack and flash for the Genitive case in
Jupiter
?
24
How doe they breake their owne pates to salve that of
Priscian?
25
Si foret in terris, rideret Democritus
.
26
Yea, even amongst wiser militants,
how many wounds have beene given, and credits slaine for the poore victory of an opinion or beggerly conquest of a distinction? Schollers are men of peace, they beare no armes, but their tongues are sharper then
Actius
his razor,
27
their pens carry farther, and give a lowder report than thunder; I had rather stand in the shock of a Basilisco
28
than in the fury of a mercilesse Pen. It is not meere zeale to Learning, or devotion to the Muses, that wiser Princes Patron the Arts, and carry an indulgent aspect unto Schollers, but a desire to have their names eternized by the memory of their writings, and a feare of the revengefull pen of succeeding ages: for these are the men,
29
that when they have played their parts, and had their
exits
, must step out and give the morall of their Scenes, and deliver unto posterity an Inventory of their vertues and vices. And surely there goes a great deale of conscience to the compiling of an History, there is no reproach to the scandall of a Story; It is such an Authenticke kinde of falsehood that with authority belies our good names to all Nations and Posteritie.
4. There is another offence unto Charity, which no Author hath ever written of, and few take notice of, and that’s the reproach, not of whole professions, mysteries and conditions, but of whole nations, wherein by opprobrious Epithets wee miscall each other, and by an uncharitable Logicke from a disposition in a few conclude a habit in all.
Le mutin Anglois, et le bravache Escossois;
Le bougre Italien, et le fol Francois;
Le poultron Romaine, le larron de Gascongne,
L’Espagnol superbe, et l’ Aleman yurongne.
30
Saint
Paul
that cals the
Cretians
lyers, doth it but indirectly and
upon quotation of their owne Poet.
31
It is as bloody a thought in one way as
Neroes
32
was in another. For by a word wee wound a thousand, and at one blow assassine the honour of a Nation. It is as compleate a piece of madnesse to miscall and rave against the times, or thinke to recall men to reason, by a fit of passion:
Democritus
that thought to laugh the times into goodnesse, seemes to mee as deepely Hypochondriack, as
Heraclitus
that bewailed them; it moves not my spleene to behold the multitude in their proper humours, that is, in their fits of folly and madnesse, as well understanding that Wisedome is not prophan’d
33
unto the World, and ’tis the priviledge of a few to be vertuous. They that endeavour to abolish vice destroy also vertue, for contraries, though they destroy one another, are yet the life of one another.
34
Thus vertue (abolish vice) is an Idea; againe, the communitie of sinne doth not disparage goodnesse; for when vice gaines upon the major part, vertue, in whom it remaines, becomes more excellent, and being lost in some, multiplies its goodnesse in others which remaine untouched,
and persists intire in the generall inundation. I can therefore behold vice without a Satyre content onely, with an admonition, or instructive reprehension; for Noble natures, and such as are capable of goodnesse, are railed into vice, that might as easily bee admonished into vertue; and we should be all so farre the Orators of goodnesse, as to protect her from the power of vice, and maintaine the cause of injured truth. No man can justly censure or condemne another, because indeed no man truely knowes another. This I perceive in my selfe, for I am in the darke to all the world, and my nearest friends behold mee but in a cloud, those that know mee but superficially, thinke lesse of me than I doe of my selfe; those of my neere acquaintance thinke more; God, who truely knowes me, knowes that I am nothing, for hee onely beholds me, and all the world, who
lookes not on us through a derived ray, or a trajection of a sensible species,
35
but beholds the substance without the helpes of accidents, and the formes of things, as wee their operations. Further, no man can judge another, because no man knowes himselfe; for we censure others but as they disagree from that humour which wee fancy laudable in our selves, and commend others but for that wherein they seeme to quadrate
36
and consent with us. So that in conclusion, all is but that we all condemne, selfe-love. ’Tis the generall complaint of these times, and perhaps of those past, that charity growes cold; which I perceive most verified in those which most doe manifest the fires and flames of zeale; for it is a vertue that best agrees with coldest
natures, and such as are complexioned for humility: But how shall we expect charity towards others, when we are uncharitable to our selves? Charity begins at home, is the voyce of the world, yet is every man his greatest enemy, and as it were, his owne executioner.
Non occides
,
37
is the Commandement of God, yet scarse observed by any man; for I perceive every man is his owne
Atropos
, and lends a hand to cut the thred of his owne dayes.
Cain
was not therefore the first murtherer, but
Adam
, who brought in death;
38
whereof hee beheld the practise and example in his owne sonne
Abel
, and saw that verified in the experience of another; which faith could not perswade him in the Theory of himselfe.
