The Major Works (English Library) (73 page)

79
. i.e. adipocere or grave wax, ‘the insoluble fatty acids left as a residue of the pre-existing fats of animals, and produced by the slow hydrolysis of the fats in the wet ground’ (
§190
). This is generally regarded as Browne’s ‘one notable scientific discovery’ (ibid.), well in advance of its rediscovery by Fourcroy in the eighteenth century (see especially
§§296
,
298
).

80
. Alkaline.

81
. i.e. syphilis.

82
. ‘Of
Thomas
Marquesse of
Dorset
, whose body being buried 1530 was [in] 1608 upon the cutting open of the Cerecloth found perfect and nothing corrupted, the flesh not hardened, but in colour, proportion, and softnesse like an ordinary corps newly to be interred. Burtons
descript. of Leicestershire
’ (Browne marg.).

83
. Joining together.

84
. ‘
Arefactio
, to make drie’ (Elyot).

85
. ‘In his Map of
Russia
’ (Browne marg.), which shows in the east a group of natives turned to stone (
G2
). On Lot’s wife see Genesis 19.26.

86
. i.e. appendages.

87
. ‘That part in the Skeleton of an Horse, which is made by the hanch-bones’ (Browne suppl.).

88
. ‘For their extraordinary thicknesse’ (Browne suppl.).

89
. ‘The Poet Dante in his view of Purgatory [XXIII, 31–3], found gluttons so meagre, and extenuated, that he conceited them to have been in the Siege of Jerusalem, and that it was easie to have discovered
Homo
or
Omo
in their faces: M being made by the two lines of their cheeks, arching over the Eyebrows to the nose, and their sunk eyes making O O which makes up
Omo.

90
. i.e. assert identities.

91
. Cf. Matthew 27.52–3.

92
. Genesis 49.29.

93
. So Tirinus in annotating Ezekiel 31.1 ff. (Browne marg.).

1
. Leviticus 4.12.

2
. 1 Corinthians 6.19.

3
. i.e. the Eastern Orthodox ritual of burial appears especially to move the emotions.

4
. ‘Just like the promise that he shall come to life again, which was made by Democritus; who, however, never has come to life again himself. Out upon it! What downright madness it is, to suppose that life is to recommence after death!’ (Browne marg., quoting the Latin of Pliny, VII, lv, 189).

5
. ‘We hope that perhaps the remains of the departed may return from the earth into the light’ (Browne marg., quoted in Greek: R).

6
‘That which once came from earth, to earth returns’ (Browne marg., quoting the Latin of Lucretius, II, 999–1000). Cf. Ecclesiastes 12.7: ‘Then shall the dust return to the earth which was before the earth’.

7
.
Odyssey
, XI, 222. ‘Demas’ and ‘soma’ are the living and the dead body, respectively.

8
. Lucian,
Hermotimus
, VII.

9
. Plato,
Phaedo
, 115e (Browne marg.).

10
. i.e. philosophers who upheld the transmigration of souls.

11
. Cf. the Platonic year (above,
p. 66, note 29
).

12
. ‘Farewell, farewell, farewell. We shall follow you in the order in which nature permits’ (Browne marg., in Latin).

13
. i.e. larch.

14
. i.e. exsuccous: sapless. See the passage quoted on
p. 39
.

15
. The exit and entrance of heaven, according to Macrobius,
On ‘The Dream of Scipio
’, I, 12 (
M
).

16
. ‘Hurt not my spirit’ (Browne marg., quoting the Latin of Tibullus, I, i, 67).

17
. ‘And unlike’ (the reading of
E
) ? ‘Nor like’ (
K
) ?

18
. ‘Russians, &c.’ (Browne marg.).

19
. i.e. reiterated calls.

20
. ‘At least by some difference from living Eyes’ (Browne suppl.).

21
. As reported by Perucci (Browne marg.).

22
. Kindling.

23
. i.e. Charon, who ferried the dead across the river Styx to Hades for the price of an obol.

24
. i.e. said to have been killed by a malign planet’s influence.

25
. i.e. the lowest of low regions (the double plural of Tartarus). ‘Pluto’ in the next line, and in the next paragraph, corrects the erroneous ‘Plato’ of the 1st edition.

26
. Melissa, in Herodotus, V, 92.

27
.
Odyssey
XI, 225 ff.

28
. As Homer’s grammar suggests in
Odyssey
, XI, 90 (Browne suppl., quoting the Greek).

29
. ‘In Lucian’ (Browne marg.).

30
. See
below, p. 397, note 34
.

31
. The paragraph draws on Homer (
Odyssey
, XI, 141 ff., and XXIV, 6–9), and Leviticus 17.11 and 14.

32
. The paragraph draws on Homer (
Odyssey
, XI, 48–50, 443–61, and 543–64), Virgil (
Aeneid
, VI, 494–7), and Dante (
Inferno
, X, 97–108).

33
. Cf. Lucian’s dialogue
Charon
; and
Odyssey
, XI, 485–91.

34
.
Odyssey
, XI, 601–4; Horace,
Odes
, I, xii, 46–8; and
Aeneid
, VI, 826 ff.

35
. The Cave in
The Republic
, VII, 514 ff.

36
.
Inferno
, IV (Browne marg.), where Pythagoras is not in fact mentioned, and
Purgatorio
, I, 31 ff. But ‘escapes’ may mean ‘escapes notice’ or ‘escapes condemnation’ (
G2
).

37
. On Epicurus see also above,
p. 258
.

38
. In
Discourses
, II, 2.

39
. i.e. temperamentally outgrown.

40
. High spirits, courage, bravery (
OED
;
§176
).

41
. Cf. below,
p. 405
.

42
.
Inferno
, X, 13–15.

43
. i.e. the
Pbaedo
. So Plutarch in
Cato Minor
, LXVIII, 2, and LXX, 1.

44
. i.e. the soul.

1
. i.e. the Anglo-Saxon, the Danish, and the Norman (always assuming the urns to have been Roman). On this paragraph cf. De Quincey’s ‘annotation’, above,
p. 38
.

2
. ‘Long continuance’ (Bullokar).

3
. ‘Thus, when naught is left of me but bones, would I be laid to rest’ (Tibullus, III, ii, 26).

4
. As above,
p. 287, note 21
.

5
. So the
Oracula magica
with the scholia by Psellus and Gemistus Plethon (Browne marg.).

6
. ‘proneness, propensity’ (Blount).

7
. i.e. undistinguishableness.

8
. ‘In the Psalme of
Moses
’ (Browne marg.): i.e. Psalm 90.10. The reference to Archimedes involves his directions in
The Sand Reckoner
for numbering the grains of sand in the universe.

9
. ‘According to the ancient Arithmetick of the hand wherein the little finger of the right hand contracted, signified an hundred. Pierius in
Hieroglyph
.’ (Browne marg.).

10
. 2 Samuel 8.2 and 1 Kings 11.1 ff.

11
. ‘One night as long as three’ (Browne marg.) so that Zeus could enjoy her the more.

12
. Job 3.1 ff.

13
. ‘The puzling questions of Tiberius unto Grammarians’ as reported by Suetonius,
Tiberius
, LXX (Browne add.). See also
below, p. 438, note 22
.

14
.
Odyssey
, X, 526 (Browne add.).

15
. Job 3.13–15 (Browne add.).

16
. Cf. above,
p. 101
: ‘not onely whole Countries, but particular persons have their Tutellary, and Guardian Angels’.

17
. About 1000
B
.
C
., the mid-point of the world’s history (see next note).

18
. ‘That the world may last but six thousand years’ (Browne marg.) – i.e. from 4000
B
.
C
. to
A
.
D
. 2000. See also
below, p. 439, note 31
.

19
. ‘Hectors fame lasting above two lives of
Methuselah
[2 x 969 or 1938 years], before that famous Prince was extant’ (Browne marg.); so the fame of Charles V (b. 1500) can only extend some 500 years before the expected end of the world.

20
. i.e. in the Lord’s prayer, ‘Thy Kingdom come’.

21
. ‘
θ
The character of death’ (Browne marg.). The Greek letter
theta
(
θ
) is the initial of
thanatos
or death: ‘a theta described upon the judges’ tessera or ballot was a mark for death or capital punishment’ (
SJ
).

22
. ‘Old ones being taken up, and other bodies laid under them’ (Browne marg.).

23
. Gruterus’s
Ancient Inscriptions
(Browne marg.).

24
. ‘Which men show in several Countries, giving them what Names they please; and unto some the Names of the old Ægyptian Kings out of Herodotus’ (Browne suppl.).

25
. ‘I want it to be known that I exist, I do not wish it to be known what [sort of person] I am’ (Browne marg., quoting Cardan’s Latin, itself an adaptation of a phrase in Seneca’s
On Benefits
, VII, 19).

26
. The patients are named as medical cases in several Hippocratic treatises. On Achilles’s horses see
Iliad
, XVI, 149–52.

27
. As above,
p. 71, note 50
.

28
. The one offered water to Christ (Matthew 15.22 ff.), while the other demanded the head of John the Baptist (14.6 ff.).

29
. Chersiphon (according to Pliny, XXXVI, 21).

30
. ‘Before the flood’ (Browne suppl.).

31
. Referring to the widespread belief in nature’s decay (see
§53
).

32
. ‘Euripides’ (Browne marg.), in a fragment from a lost play quoted by Plato,
Gorgias
, 492e.

33
. i.e. our longest possible life is but as a winter’s day (
R
).

34
. ‘According to the custome of the Jewes, who place a lighted waxcandle in a pot of ashes by the corps’ (Browne suppl.), as reported by Leon of Modena.

35
. i.e. sleep (cf. below,
p. 475
). In Greek mythology, death and sleep are the children of Night.

36
. i.e. callousness.

37
. Changed to ‘continuing’ (
K
): a conjectural reading.

38
. Ecclesiastes 1.14 (Browne marg.).

39
. As a drug (
M
).

40
. Telescopes (‘perspectives’) had in Browne’s time confirmed what had been observed by the naked eye, that comets and novae intruded upon the very regions above the moon declared by Aristotle to have been ‘incorruptible’ (
On the Heavens
, II, 1). Cf.
§69
.

41
. Cicero,
On the Laws
, II, 23 (59).

42
. According to the epitaph of Rufus and Veronica in Gruterus, ‘From their goods no more was found than was sufficient to pay for the pyre and pitch for cremating their bodies, and for the hired female mourner and the urn’ (Browne marg., quoting the epitaph in Latin). On Gruterus see
above, p. 309, note 23
.

43
. ‘In Greek, Latine, Hebrew, Ægyptian, Arabick, defaced by
Licinus
the Emperor’ (Browne suppl.).

44
. Enoch and Elijah were sometimes identified with the ‘two witnesses’ of Revelation 11.3 ff. who are yet to come.

45
. i.e. the Last Judgement.

46
. Revelation 20. 14 and 21. 8. See
below, p. 445, note 48
.

47
. According to Jordandes (Browne marg.).

48
. Isaiah 14.4–17 (Browne marg.).

49
. ‘
Angulus contingentiæ
, the least of Angles’ (Browne marg.).

50
. The rhythm of the mystical phrases is distinctly Browne’s, but the phrases themselves are commonplace. ‘Exolution’ intimates the soul’s release; ‘the Spouse’ is the Church (in the light of the Song of Solomon); ‘ingression into the divine shadow’ suggests entry into the paradoxical state wherein
Lux est umbra Dei
(as above, p. 71); etc.