neceffity. However, it is a sketch of human vanity, for every individual to imagine the whole univerfe is interested in his meaneft concern. If he hath got cleanly over a kennel, fome angel unfeen defcended on purpose to help him by the hand; if he hath knocked his head against a poft, it was the devil, for his fins, let loofe from hell on purpofe to buffet him. Who, that fees a little paultry mortal, droning, and dreaming, and drivelling to a multitude, can think it agreeable to common good fenfe, that either heaven or hell fhould be put to the trouble of influence or inspecti on upon what he is about? therefore, I am refolved immediately to weed this error out of mankind by making it clear, that this myftery of vending fpiritual gifts is nothing but a trade, acquired by as much instruction, and mastered by equal practice and application, as others are. This will beft appear by defcribing and deducing the whole procefs of the operation as variously, as it hath fallen under my knowledge or experience.

VOL. I.

Ff

Here

Here the whole fcheme of fpiritual mechanism was deduced and explained, with an appearance of great reading and obfervation; but it was thought neither fafe nor convenient to print it.

Here it may not be amifs to add a few words upon the laudable practice of wearing quilted caps; which is not a matter of meer custom, humour, or fashion, as fome would pretend, but an inftitution of great fagacity and use: thefe, when moistened with fweat, ftop all perspiration; and, by reverberating the heat, prevent the spirit from evaporating any way, but at the mouth; even as a fkilful housewife, that covers her ftill with a wet clout for the fame reason, and finds the fame effect. For, it is the opinion of choice virtuoft, that the brain is only a crowd of little ani

mals,

mals, but with teeth and claws extremely sharp, and therefore cling together in the contexture we behold, like the picture of Hobbes's leviathan, or likes bees in perpendicular swarm upon a tree, or like a carrion corrupted into vermin, ftill preserving the fhape and figure of the mother animal : that all invention is formed by the morfure of two or more of these animals upon certain capillary nerves, which proceed from thence, whereof three branches spread into the tongue, and two into the right hand. They hold alfo, that these animals are of a constitution extremely cold; that their food is the air we attract, their excrement phlegm; and that what we vulgarly call rheums, and colds, and diftillations, is nothing else but an epidemical looseness, to which that little common-wealth is very fubject, from the climate it lies under. Farther, that nothing less than a violent heat can disentangle these creatures from their hamated station of life, or give them vigour and humour to imprint the marks of their little teeth. That, if the morfure be hexagonal, it produces poetry; the circular gives eloquence: if the bite hath Ff2 been

been conical, the perfon, whofe nerve is fo affected, fhall be difpofed to write upon politics; and so of the rest.

I fhall now difcourfe briefly, by what kind of practices the voice is beft governed towards the compofition and improvement of the fpirit; for without a competent skill in tuning and toning each word, and fyllable, and letter, to their due cadence, the whole operation is incompleat, misses intirely of its effect on the hearers, and puts the workman himself to continual pains for new fupplies without fuccefs. For, it is to be understood, that in the language of the spirit cant and droning fupply the place of fenfe and reafon in the language of men becaufe, in fpiritual harangues the difpofition of the words according to the art of grammar hath not the leaft ufe, but the fkill and influence wholly lie in the choice and cadence of the fyllables; even as a discreet composer, who in setting a fong changes the words and order fo often, that he is forced to make it nonfenfe, before he can make it mufic. For this reafon it hath been held by fome, that the art of canting is ever in greatest perfec

tion, when managed by Ignorance; which is thought to be enigmatically meant by Plutarch, when he tells us, that the best mufical inftruments were made from the bones of an ass. And the profounder cri, tics upon that paffage are of opinion, the word, in its genuine fignification, means no other than a jaw-bone; though fome rather think it to have been the os facrum; but in fo nice a case I shall not take upon me to decide; the curious are at liberty to pick from it whatever they please.

The first ingredient towards the art of canting is a competent fhare of inward light; that is to fay, a large memory, plentifully fraught with theological polyfyllables, and myfterious texts from holy writ, applied and digested by those methods and mechanical operations already related: the bearers of this light refembling lanterns, compact of leaves from old Geneva bibles; which invention Sir Humphrey Edwin, during his mayoralty, of happy memory, highly approved and advanced; affirming the fcripture to be now fulfilled, where it says, thy word is a lantern to my feet, and a light to my paths. Ff3

Now,