philofopher. Which I defire fome certain gentlemen of my acquaintance to lay up in their hearts as a very feafonable innuendo.

This, indeed, was the fatal mistake of that worthy gentleman, my moft ingenious friend, Mr. Wotton; a perfon, in appearance, ordained for great defigns, as well as performances. Whether you will confider his notions or his looks, furely no man ever advanced into the public with fitter qualifications of body and mind, for the propagation of a new religion. Oh, had tho'e happy talents, mifapplied to vain philofophy, been turned into their proper channels of dreams and vifions, where distortion of mind and countenance are of fuch fovereign ufe; the base detracting world would not then have dared to report, that fomething is amifs, that his brain hath undergone an unlucky fhake; which even his brother modernists themselves, like ungrates, do whisper fo loud, that it reaches up to the very garret I am now writing in.

of

Laftly, Whofoever pleases to look into the fountains of enthufiafm, from whence, in all ages, have eternally proceeded fuch fattening ftreams, will find the fpring head to have been as troubled and muddy as the current. fuch great emolument is a tincture of this vapour, which the world calls madness, that, without its help, the world would not only be deprived of thofe two great bleffings, conquefts and fyftems, but even all mankind would unhappily be reduced to the fame belief in things invifible. Now, the former poftulatum being held, that it is of no import from what originals this vapour proceeds, but either in what angles it strikes, and spreads over the understanding, or upon what Species of brain it afcends; it will be a very delicate point, to cut the feather, and divide the feveral reafons to a nice and curious reader, how this numerical difference in the brain can produce effects of fo vaft a difference from the fame vapour, as to be the fole point of individuation between Alexander the Great, Jack of Leyden, and Monfieur des Cartes. The prefent argument is the moft abftracted that ever I engaged in; it ftrains my faculties to their highest stretch; and I defire the reader to attend with utmoft perpenfity; for I now proceed to unravel this knotty point. VOL. I.

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There

There is in mankind a certain †

*

Hic multa defiderantur.

**

* * * And this I take to be a clear folution of the matter.

Having therefore fo narrowly paffed through this intricate difficulty, the reader will, I am fure, agree with me in the conclufion, that if the moderns mean by madnefs only a disturbance or tranfpofition of the brain, by force of certain vapours iffuing up from the lower faculties, then has this madness been the parent of all thofe mighty revolutions that have happened in empire, in philofophy, and in religion. For the brain, in its natural pofition and state of ferenity, difpofeth its owner to pafs his life in the common forms, without any thoughts of fubduing multitudes to his own power, his reafons, or his vifions and the more he fhapes his understanding by the pattern of human learning, the lefs he is inclined to form parties after his particular notions; becaufe that inftructs him in his private infirmities, as well as in the ftubborn ignorance of the people. But when a man's fancy gets aftride on his reafon; when imagination is at cuffs with the fenfes; and common understanding, as well as common fenfe, is kicked out of doors; the first profelyte he makes, is himself; and when that is once. compaffed, the difficulty is not fo great in bringing over others; a ftrong delufion always operating from without, as vigorously as from within. For cant and vision are to the ear and the eye the fame that tickling is to the touch. Thofe entertainments and pleasures we molt value in life, are fuch as dupe and play the wag with the fenfes. For if we take an examination of what is generally understood by happiness, as it has refpect either to the understanding or the fenfes, we shall find all its properties and adjuncts will herd under this fhort definition, That it is a perpetual poffeffion of be

Here is another defect in the manufcript; but I think the author did wifery, and that the matter, which thus ftrained his faculties, was not worth a folution; and it were well if all metaphyfical cobweb problems were no otherwife anfwered.

ing well deceived. And first, with relation to the mind or understanding, it is manifeft, what mighty advantages fiction has over truth: and the reafon is just at our elbow ; because imagination can build nobler fcenes, and produce more wonderful revolutions, than fortune or nature will be at expence to furnish. Nor is mankind fo much to blame in his choice thus determining him, if we confider that the debate merely lies between things paft, and things conceived. And fo the queftion isonly this: Whether things that have place in the imagination, may not as properly be faid to exift, as those that are feated in the memory? Which may be justly held in the affirmative and very much to the advantage of the former; fince this is acknowledged to be the womb of things, and the other allowed to be no more than the grave. Again, if we take this definition of happinefs, and examine it with reference to the fenfes, it will be acknowledged wonderfully adapt. How fading and infipid do all objects accost us that are not conveyed in the vehicle of delufion! How fhrunk is every thing, as it appears in the glass of nature! So that if it were not for the affiftance of artificial mediums, falfe lights, refracted angles, varnish and tinfel, there would be a mighty level in the felicity and enjoyments of mortal men. If this were seriously confidered by the world, as I have a certain reafon to fufpect it hardly will, men would no longer reckon among their high points of wifdom, the art of expofing weak fides, and publishing infirmities: An employment, in my opinion, neither better nor worse than that of unmasking; which, I think, has never been allowed fair ufage, either in the world, or the play-houfe.

In the proportion that credulity is a more peaceful poffeffion of the mind, than curiofity, fo far preferable is that wisdom which converfes about the furface, to that pretended philofophy which enters into the depth> of things, and then comes gravely back with informa tions and difcoveries, that in the infide they are good for nothing. The two fenfes to which all objects first addrefs themselves, are the fight and the touch. These never examine farther than the colour, the fhape, the fize, and whatever other qualities dwell, or are drawn

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by!

by art upon the outward of bodies; and then comes reafon officioufly with tools for cutting, and opening, and mangling, and piercing, offering to demonstrate, that they are not of the fame confiftence quite through. Now, I take all this to be the laft degree of perverting nature; one of whofe eternal laws it is, to put her best furniture forward. And therefore, in order to fave the charges of all fuch expenfive anatomy for the time to come, I do here think fit to inform the reader, that in fuch conclufions as thefe, reafon is certainly in the right; and that in moft corporeal beings which have fallen under my cognifance, the outside hath been infinitely preferable to the in. Whereof I have been farther convinced from fome late experiments. Laft week I faw a woman flayed, and you will hardly believe how much it altered her perfon for the worfe. Yesterday I ordered the carcafe of a beau to be stripped in my prefence; when we were all amazed to find fo many unfufpected faults under one fuit of cloaths. Then laid open his brain, his heart, and his spleen. But I plainly perceived at every operation, that the farther we proceeded, we found the defects increafe upon us in number and bulk. From all which I juflly formed this conclufion to myself, That whatever philofopher or projector can find out an art to folder and patch up the flaws and imperfections of nature, will deferve much better of mankind, and teach us a more useful science, than that fo much in prefent efteem, of widening and expofing them, like him who held anatomy to be the ultimate end of phyfick. And he whofe fortunes and difpofitions have placed him in a convenient ftation to enjoy the fruits of this noble art; he that can, with Epicurus, content his ideas with the films and images, that fly off upon his fenfes from the fuperficies of things; fuch a man, truly wife, creams off nature, leaving the four and the dregs for philofophy and reafon to lap up. This is the fublime and refined point of felicity, called the poffefion of being well deceived; the ferene peaceful state of being a fool among knaves.

But to return to madness: It is certain, that, according to the fyftem I have above deduced, every Species thereof proceeds from a redundancy of vapours; there

fore,

fore, as fome kinds of phrenzy give double strength to the finews, fo there are of other fpecies, which add vigour, and life, and spirit to the brain. Now, it ufually happens, that these active fpirits, getting poffeffion of the brain, resemble thofe that haunt other wafte and empty dwellings, which, for want of bufinefs, either vanish, and carry away a piece of the house, or else stay at home, and fling it all out of the windows. By which are myftically difplayed the two principal branches of madness and which fome philofophers, not confidering fo well ast I, have mistaken to be different in their caufes; overhaftily affigning the first to deficiency, and the other to›› redundance.

I think it therefore manifeft, from what I have here advanced, that the main point of skill and addreís is, to furnish employment for this redundancy of vapour, and prudently to adjust the season of it; by which means it may certainly become of cardinal and catholic emolument in a commonwealth. Thus one man, choosing a proper juncture, leaps into a gulf, from thence proceeds a hero, and is called the faver of his country: another atchieves the fame enterprize; but, unluckily timing it, has left the brand of madness fixed as a reproach upon his memory. Upon so nice a distinction are we taught to repeat the name of Curtius with reverence and love; that of Empedocles with hatred and contempt. Thus alfo it is ufually conceived, that the elder Brutus only perfonated the fool and madman for the good of the public. But this was nothing else than a redundancy of the fame vapour long mifapplied, called by the Latins, ingenium. par negotiis; or, to tranflate it as nearly as I can, a » fort of phrenzy, never in its right element, till you take it up in the bufinefs of the ftate.

Upon all which, and many other reafons of equal weight, though not equally curious, I do here gladly embrace an opportunity I have long fought for, of recommending it as a very noble undertaking to Sir Edward Seymour, Sir Chriftopher Mufgrave, Sir John Bowls, John How, Efq; and other patriots concerned, that they would move for leave to bring in a bilk for

* Tacit.

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appointing