that he knew nothing The third is Herodotus who writeth in the Ionick Dialect that is a kinde of Greeke differing a little in phrases and pronuntiation from the common-spoken as some farre scituate shires doe from the Court or mother-Citie of their Countrie in diuers points it agreeth with the French Plutarch dealeth somewhat too roughly with this worthy Historiographer in whose defence I will oppose the authoritie of a learned man of our time who in a certaine Preface of his saith of Herodotus Narrationes eius sunt disertae iudicationes expressae speciosae explicationes accuratae euidentes collectiones certae atqueplenae in his rerum gestarum hominum temporum fides accurata compertorum relatio dubiorum coniccturasagâ—x sabulosorum verecunda commemoratio miravbique simplicitas eximius quidam candor See the great praises and perfections of a graue Historiographer The fourth is Demosthenes the prince of Greeke Orators the very rule and square of all that endeuour to speake eloquently a man that leadeth other mens mindes as he list excellent in all his discourses which are extant the most of them and read to the great vse and prosit of those that know how to apply them 25. Then he of Anthonie and Catiline great foe That is Cicero surnamed the father of Eloquence he is the first and chiefe of those that grace and maintaine the Latine tongue He was extreamely hated of Marke Anthonie and Catiline both whom he hath also bitterly pursued and touched to the quicke as his Catilinarie and Philippicke Orations declare the often printing of his workes and learned mens continuall reading of them and borrowing thence the best graces of their writings doe proue his learning eloquence and plentie of speech to be such as the Poet here describeth The second is Caesar the most valiant of eloquent men and most eloquent of valiant men as may well appeare by his life in Plutarch and his Commontaries de bello Gallico by which worke he hath wrung the pen out of learned mens hands and in a manner discouraged them all from writing Histories because they see such perfection therein as they are not able to come neere The third is the Historiographer Salust we haue of his workes besides diuers Orations two Histories remaining Coniuratio Catilinae bellum Iugurthinum short they are but full of sentence and sinewes witnessing the ancient force and vigor of the Roman tongue The Reader may hereto adde the commendations of these three Authors as they are in many learned bookes of late writers here and there scattered As for those that thinke Cicero bableth without learning and that Caesar the Dictatour and first Emperour wrote not these Commentaries that beare his name and that Salust writeth a hard and forced stile because their accusations are false and they so farre out of the way I thinke them worthy none other answer than our Poets few verses here Of the fourth which is the Poet Virgil too much cannot be spoken his bookes of Georgickes and Aeneidos being such maruellous workes and so farre exceeding all other bookes of humanitic I speake not onely for the excellence of his verse but sure in the depth of his inuentions his iudgement his decence his modestie his grauitie and his state how much he doth outstrip and goe beyond all others may be seene not onely in euery booke of his but euen in euery verse wherein is contained a thousand thousand secrets and as it were the abridgement of all kinde of Arts and knowledge besides his proper tearmes his Epythites alway fit his metaphors and figures sow'n and sprinkled in their right places and his speech quite throughout eloquent and pure without any bodging or dawberie whatsoeuer The learned Caesar Scaliger among many others hath plainly and at large declared in his Art of Poetrie the excellency of this Author 26. Th'Italian For ornament of the Italian a language risen of the Roman or Latine he nameth three Poets and one Orator slipping diuers writers of historie and Secretaries that haue left diuers excellent workes Orations and Epistles among vs. The reason is I thinke because these foure containe in them all the graces of the others He nameth also the Tuscan tongue because of all the diuers Dialects of Italie the Luquish Milanish Geneuish and Venetian none are so pure and fine as the Florentine or Tuscan Iohn Boccace hath written long time agoe but a very fine and pure stile as his Decameron his Fiametta the Philocope The Laberinth and his other bookes witnesse that with the world are in so great request Francis Petrach hath written since and inuented goodly words and partly by his owne pregnant wit partly by imitation of the best Authors hath enriched the tongue with many graces he hath ventured also farre and made Sonets Chapters and Cantoes wonderfull curious Then Ludouico Ariosto of Ferara hath set forth a legend of Loue entituled Orlando furioso in verses sweet and meet famous throughout all Italie he is full of affections in his discourse and as delightfull as is possible by reason of the varietie of that fabulous matter he writeth of which he shadoweth so cunningly that the Reader is therewith often affected and mouâ—d as if it were a true storie or at least not altogether false Torquato Tasso is last of the foure in time of writing but in account as the Poet saith the first and chiefe he was the sonne of Bernardo Tasso that eloquent man whose excellent Epistles are in print This his sonne hath written in twenty bookes or Cantoes of stately verse a poeme the best of all Italians entituled Gierusalemme liberata all the graces and riches of the Greekes and Latines are there gathered together all wrought into it after the best manner so graue so short so learned so comely so liuely so stately as if it were the worke of another Virgil. There are also printed at Ferrara three volumnes of his workes containing other kindes of verse and all sorts of fine inuentions a Comedie a Tragedie diuers Dialogues and discourses in prose all are worth reading and all make good the iudgement that our Poet hath giuen of the Authour 27. The language Arabicke This language is comen of the Hebrew among other learned mens bookes that haue made this tongue of account we haue the workes of Aben Rois that is the sonne of Kings for Ben signifieth a sonne in Hebrew and the Arabians adde to the beginning this preposition A and sometime Al. This Aben Rois is the same that we commonly call Auerroës the Commentar a very excellent Philosopher He hath commented vpon most of Aristotle and is translated into Latine printed at Venice the worke doth shew the deepe reach and subtill braine of the man Auicen was a great Rhilosopher and Physitian as his writings also declare Gesner saith Auerroës was of Cordway and Auicen of Seuill and so I thinke but it appeareth by their workes that they were both Arabians and professed the superstition
so blest That they and theirs shall golden Scepter weild Whereto must bow and yeild The proudest plant afeild Ph. So here is worke for Muses all but two What hast thou more Mu. Enough for them to do Ph. Nay vse but Clio leaue Melpomene Mu. Why leaue her out a stately Muse is she Ph. But still so sad with looke cast-downe on earth I doubt hir presence will defeat the myrth Mu. No no I will not part her from the Queere But fit her humor and to mend the cheere Out-set all other wofull destinie My fattest lambe shall make a Tragedie And sing the Muse will of no greater bug Then warre betwixt a yong child and his dug Controuling some though not of high degree As cause thereof ye Ladies pardon me The melancholie Muse yet saith not I All that your Sex dishonour I defie But your faire bottles Melpomen doth thinke Dame nature fill'd for your faire bab's to drinke Ph. Milke would she giue else only to the poore Not vnto such as drye't and spill'c a floore Mu. And this 't is like shee 'll adde vnto the rest That Ladies child deserues a Ladies brest That brauer spirit suckt shall more embraue him And make him man-grown like a knight behaue him P. Whē others make their gētle blod far-wors◠By sucking young the basenesse of their nurse Mu For as their Heathen gods the Heathen sayn No mortall blood had running in their vain But Venus wounded once by Diomed Ambrosian liquor at her finger shed Right so in blood of men there is great odds And such among them as are stiled Gods The finest haue to breed their children food Blood was late milk and milk will soone be blood Ph. And some loue more as cause of better luck Then wombe that bore them paps that gaue them luck What parent would not such a reason moue Drawne from the gain or losse of childrens loue Mu. I once beheld where Lady of high degree As with her Lord and others set was she In mids of dinner had her child brought-in And gaue it suck scarce shewing any skin Through ynch-board hole of silk pinn'd vp againe When child was fed without more taking paine Ph. And is not this instinct through all dyssown That eur'y femall hatcheth-vp her owne Well make an end Mu. How can I be too long When Muses beare the burden of my song But here 's a Trumpet Fame selfe hath no better And Clio sounds it well and I 'le entreat her Hereafter sing on high what foe shall bow To th' issues of this happie match but now To surd it as young trompeters are wont And lest it sound too lowd set stop vpon 't Yet first bid welcome with a cheerefull clank The French Deluce to Brytaines Rosy bank Phi. Well fare thine heart for thinking on these things To please the children of so mighty Kings My selfe though poore wil thereto ioine my myte On solemne day so leaue thee for to night Mu. And I so thee time is our sheepe were penn'd The Sunne is soonken at the Landskop end Then Musidor made haste home and began Take order for the busines with his man Wife had he none the more was he distrest See lad quoth he the house and garth well drest To morrow morn for then or soone at least The sweetest Nymph on earth will be my guest Without plash thistles and presumptuous thorns That neare the way grow-vp among the corns For feare they rase her hands more white thē milke Or teare her mantles windy-wauing silke Withìn if Spiders heretofore haue durst With cunning webs where through the stronger burst And weaker flies are caught presume to quyp The sacred lawes of men with besome stryp Both web and weauer downe be-rush the floore The porch and th'entries and about the doore Set eau'n the trestles and the tables wax And strew the windowes house that mistres lacks O how quoth he and deeply sigh'd therat 'T is out of order wants I know not what Haue care my lad and be as 't were my sonne He lowted low and said it should be don Much hereto more was written when the Queene Her beautie shat'd your sea and land betweene But after landing long will be my booke Held vnder presse on part then please you looke Till come the rest but ô with gratious eye And pardon for applying Maiestie To Shepherds stile so may you see conspire Th'English and French as no third tongue comes nigher No not the Greeke vnt ' either though Sir Stephen Hath made the same with French to march full As doth our English and it shall yet more Now heart and hand ye Princes ioyne wherefore eauen I pray and will with Hymen all mine houres That for the good successe of you and yours While earth stands Cent'r and Heau'n in circle goes Together spring French Lillie and English Rose Your Maiesties faithfull subiect and seruant W. L'isle To the Readers COnyes whom Salomon reckons among the wise Little-ones vpon earth do make many skraplets and profers on the ground before they dig earnestly for their neast or litter and writing-schollers draw first in blotting paper many a dash roundell and minime before they frame the perfect letters that shall stand to their coppie so entending some worke that may if I be so happie remain some while after me many waies do I essay and try first my stile and pen that according also to the wise rule of Horace I may thereby iudge my selfe and discerne quid valeant humeri quid ferre recusent Nor do I trust my owne iudgement herein so likely to be partiall but commonly present my worke in writing before it bee printed vnto some Quintilius or other whose noble disposition will authoritie may and learning is able to find fault and aduise me Yet among the sundrie versets or prosets which besides this I haue or shall set-out if you find some that sauour of my younger time passe by them I pray you or affoord them the fauour that my Quintilius doth to let them passe because they were the way that led me to a grauer kind as also the grauest of humain Poetrie brought me at last to the diuine whereof I haue many Essayes now almost readie for the presse This translation of Salust du Bartas what present occasion draweth from me you may well perceiue yet thinke me not herein Acta agere to do that which was before done and very well by Iosua Siluester for it is in a diuers kind and many yeares ere he began this had I lying by me yea partly published in print as Anno 1596 Anno 1598 and dedicated to the late Noble Charles Earle of Nottingham But now the cause why in this I beginne so abruptly is for that I was loth to come neere the booke next aforegoing which our late Soueraigne Lord King Iames in his youth so incomparably made English yet had I a desire to fall vpon that braue commendation of our late Soueraigne Ladie Queene Elizabeth
of his first booke of Antiquities saith he peopled Lybia And it was indeed in the sandie deserts thereof that the children of Cham held the Temple and Oracle of Iupiter Hammon or Chammon For the doctrine of truth by little and little being corrupted and at last quite abolished amongst them as among the Cananites the Scripture shewes Idolaters Magitians and persons euery way debauched and profane these now blind and ignorant of the true God make to themselues a God and giue him a double name one drawne from the name of the true God Ichoua turned into Jupiter and the other from their great Auncestor Cham. After this the Deuill plaid terrible pranks in this Temple and it became the most renowmed among the Gentiles as you may reade in the second booke of Herodotus And it is not vnlikely that Cham euen at the time of the Floud was plotting in his heart for such honours to be done him by his posteritie preiudiciall to the glory of Almighty God As for his obiections here they tend all as all Chamites or Atheists reasons doe first to controll the wise and vnblameable prouidence of the All good and Almighty God Secondly to shake the foundation of deuout humilitie in his Church Thirdly to censure both the mercy and iustice of the Lord. Fourthly to make the order of Nature his buckler to keepe off all apprehension of the vengeance of God whose wayes though the wicked thinke to follow them with naturall reason are all past finding out as witnesseth the Prophet Isay and S. Paul 9. Fie Father I come now to set downe in briefe the reproches and foule speeches vttered here by Cham whereof I need say but little because the Reader may very easily distinguish them sithence there is nothing in the Poets words but easie to be vnderstood The chiefe point is to consider well of Noes answers which I haue one by one obserued as they stand in the Text. 10. By this the father gauld After he hath witnessed his griefe in preface hee bestowes vpon this scoffer such titles as he deserued and then layes open the well-head of Atheisme which is for man to trust ouermuch in himselfe and little regard what is taught by the Spirit of God then foretelling the miserable end of all Atheists he answers the obiections of Cham very punctually enriching and beautifying his discourse with descriptions comparisons inductions and proofes necessarie which well considered afford much instruction and comfort vnto men of an vpright heart The two last answers are very remarkable whereunto the Patriarke most fitly adioynes the calling on the name of God of purpose to shew vnto whom the faithfull ought to flie in all their troubles and tentations I will not adde hereunto what Iosephus hath in the first of his Antiquities because there are many things little to the purpose and such as sort not with the state and maiestie of that sacred historie set downe by Moses Something it is that Philo Iudaeus hath written of Moses and the Deluge in his second booke of the life of Moses toward the end Vpon this historie of the Flood haue the Heathen people forged that fable of Deucalion described by Ouid in the first of his Metamorphosis But in these answers by our Author put vpon Noc the Reader may finde wherewithall to stop the mouth of all Atheists Epicures which are so bold to censure all that the holy Scripture saith as well of the Essence and Nature of God as of his workes whether they concerne the creation and preseruation of the world with the redemption of Mankinde or his iust iudgements vpon the profane and reprobate vnbeleeuers C'est ainsi que Noë sa prison adoucit Enchante sa tristesse Dieu fait cesser le deluge le temps acourcit Nayant espoir qu'en Dieu quiresserrant les veines D'où surgeonnoyent sans fin tant de viues fontaines Arrestant l'eau du ciel faisant que les airs Raffermissent tancez les digues de leurs mers Met les vents en besongne Pour cest effect il cōmande auxvents de faire retirer les caux dessecher la terre O balais de la terre Frais esuentaus du ciel ô des forests la guerre O mes herauts dit-il postes messagers O mes nerfs ô mèsbras vous oiscaux qui legers Parl'air trainé mon char quand ma bouche allumee Ne souffle que brassiers que souffre que sumce Que le foudre est monsceptre que l'effroy le bruit L'horreur roule à trauers l'espesseur d'vne nuict Esueillez-vous courez humez de vos haleines L'eau qui desrobe au ciel les monts les plaines Labrigade des vents à sa voix obeit Fin du deluge arrest de l'arche sur les montagnes d'Ararat L'orgueil plus escumeux de l'eau s'esuanouit La mer fait saretraite la Carraque saincte Prend terre sur vn mont dont les astres ont crainte Qui se perd dans le ciel qui void sourcilleux Presque dessous ses pieds mille monts orgueilleux Noe Le corbeau mis hors l'arche pour descouurir la terre La colombe à la seconde fois apporte au bec vn rameau d'oliuier signe de paix qui ce-pendant a'vn doux espoir s'allete Donne la clef des champs au Corbeau qui volete Antour des monts voisins voyant tout noyé Varetrouuer celuy qui l'auoit enuoyé La Colombe sortant par la fenestre ouuerte Fait quelques iours apres vne autre descouuerte Et coguoissant qu'encore la marine est sans bort Lasse de tant ramer se sauue dans le Fort. Mais sept-fois par le ciel Phebus n'a fait la ronde Qu'elle reprend le vol pour espier le Monde Et rapporte à la fin en son bec vnrameau D'Oliuier palle-gris encore mi-couuert d'eau O bien-heureux presage O plaisante nouuelle O mystere agreable Io la Colombelle Paisible port au bec le paisible rainseau Dieu fait paix auec nous d'au si sacre seau Authorize benin son auguste promesse Qu'au combat on verrasans rage la Tigresse Le Lyon sans audace le Lieure sans peur Plus-tost qu'à nos despens il se monstre trompeur O primice des fruicts ôsacré-saincte Oliue Branche annonce-salut soit que turestes viue Apre's le long degast d'vn Deluge enragé Ie m'esgaye que l'eau n'apoint tout rauagé Soit que baisé le slot ta verdeur rebourgeonne I'admire la bonté du grand Dieu qui redonne L'ame à tant darbres morts dans moins d'vn moment Decore l'Vniuers d'vn nouueau parement Noé parle en la sorte Noé ne vent sortir sans conmandemēt expres de Dieu qui l'auoit enclos en l'arche Or combien que le Monde Monstrast ja la plus part de ses Iles sur l'onde Luy presentant logis qu'enuieilli
the iawes of Hell The skarr'd inhabitants of that same floating Cell Who now a peace-offering deuoutly sacrifise And from his Alter make perfumes to Heau'n arise Of purer kinded beasts and therewithall let flie Zele-winged heartie prayers and thus aloud they crie 15. Here yet the damned Crew Before he goe-on he shewes what certaine profane wretches doe obiect who make doubt of this history concerning the Deluge because they cannot conceiue how it is possible that the Arke being but 300. cubits long and 50. broad and 30. high should liue it is the Sea-mans phrase so many moneths in so great a storme of wind raine and violence of waters with so heauy a charge and containe so many creatures together with their competent food and fodder sithence the greatest Gallion vpon the Sea hath hardly stoage for the nourishment of a Horse an Elephant a Cammell a Bull and a Rhinoceros the space of ten moneths The Poet hath diuers answers to this obiection First that the mungrell beasts of what sort soeuer since engendred as Mules Leopards and other like that Nature daily brings forth were not in the Arke And this may be gathered out of the very text of Moses who speaks of the simple and true kindes not the mingled or mungrell sort as all Expositors agree The second is that the Arke because it contained so many cubits geometricall was able to receiue of all the true and simple kinds wylde tame creeping flying both male and female This is briefly said but we will speake thereof a word more Moses hath recorded in the 6. chap. of Gen. ver 14. c. that God hauing a purpose to destroy the world said vnto Noe Make thee an Arke of Gopher-wood which is thought to be a sort of Pine or Cedar Thou shalt make cabins in the Arke and shalt pitch it inside and out with pitch And thus thou shalt make it The length thereof shall be 300 cubits and the breadth 50 cubits and the height 30 cubits a window shalt thou make in the Arke and in a cubit shalt thou finish it abone and thou shalt set a doore in the side thereof And thou shalt make it with a low second and third roome or storie The timber then of the Arke being of such a fast and sad wood not easily rotting was like to hold out and I imagine it was a kinde of Cedar such as Plinie nameth in the 15. chap. of his 13. booke saying Hanc quoque materiam siccatam mari duritie incorrupta spissari nec vllo modo vehementiùs 1. That this kinde of timber dryed with the Sea more then any wayes else growes so sad and hard that it cannot rot But sithence the Commentors vpon this place differ much in the interpretation of this word Gopher which in all the Old Testament is not found but here I leaue the Reader that will be exact and curious to search it out himselfe As for the rest it is not to be doubted but that Noe endowed with a great measure of the holy Spirit and with exquisite wisdome did herein euen to the full conceiue and execute the commandement of God So as the Arke that is the close or couered ship was surely made and finished according to the proportion set downe by Moses and that of choice well seasoned and most durable materials 100 yeare a preparing as may be gathered by comparing the 7. chap. and 6. verse with the 6.10 and the 5.32 of Genesis And for as much as the whole businesse was managed by the expresse ordinance of God who gaue a secret instinct to the beasts both cleane and vncleane to enter after Noe by payres into the Arke I conclude there was roome distinct and sufficient both for them and their prouisions Apelles an auncient Heretike and the disciple of a most vngodly Master called Marcion hauing presumptuously controuled the bookes of Moses gaue occasion to some of the Fathers and chiefly Origen among other points to treat of the capacitie and largenesse of Noes Arke wherein he accounts each cubit Geometricall the Quadrate whereof is as much as six other cubits And this I. Buteo a learned Mathematician of Daulphine very cunningly declares in a treatise purposely written of the Arke of Noe where he proues to the full whatsoeuer may be questioned concerning that admirable peece of Architecture and all the cabins that it had for the creatures and their seuerall prouisions Io. Goropius discourseth likewise hereof and at large in the second booke of his Antiquities entitled Gigantomachia inserting also some part of Buteo But to speake plainly if we take the cubit in common signification for a foot and a halfe and confider the different syze of men of that age from ours together with the length bredth and height of the Arke and three stages whereof the lowest was for the prouision the next for the foure-footed and creeping creatures and the vppermost for the birds with Noe and his familie and ouer all these a couering wee shall finde roome enough to lodge and place all according to the number in generall set downe by Moses to wit male and female of euery sort vncleane and seauen of the cleane male and female The Poet here speaking of the Geometricall cubit means a cubit solid that is in length bredth and height taken together There are that make the cubit two foot long and make difference betwixt the cubit legale as they call it and the cubit of a man glancing at that which is said Deut. 3. of the bed of Og king of Basan Looke what Arias Montanus saith in his Tubal Cain and Noah where he discourses of the measures and Architectures mentioned in holy Scripture and of the Arke These bookes are in the Volume which he calleth Apparatus ioyned to the great Bibles in Hebrue Greeke and Latine and printed at Antwerpe That which hath led these Atheists and profane wretches into errour is that they consider not that Noe and the men of that Age by reason of their higher stature had longer cubits and hard it is to giue a iust proportion of theirs vnto ours When Moses wrote certaine it is that mens bodies were abated of their bignesse yet that which he wrote was easily vnderstood of the Israelites who receiued these things by tradition and knew them as perfectly as if they saw them with their eyes The last argument here vsed by the Poet adoring the wisdome of Almighty God who made all things in number weight and measure is a reason of all reasons and altogether vnreasonable are they that reason to the contrary then beside reason were it to propound reason to them that haue lost the true vse of reason and will conceiue nothing but that which their owne mad and extrauagant reason soundeth in their eares But againe to the Text. Pere port-trident Pricre de Noé à Dieu Roy des vents dompte-mer Voy nous d'vn oeil benin O Dieu vueille calmer Les bouillons de tonire conduire au
shew his wisdome or rather to signifie that he saw both the world that was before the Flood and that which came after All this in processe of time hath beene dawbed vp with strange fables as appeares by the writings of the Gentiles That which the Poet here saith this one fit of Noes drunkennesse is touched and couched in a word by Moses Gen. 9.21 but our Author hath amplified it very artificially describing in right kind a man no man when he is ouercharged with wine of purpose to make vs abhorre and detest that vice which ouerthrew the ancient Greeks Romans though since their time it is growne a custome as may seeme by the strange debauchment and outrage of our dayes now taken for a vertue Among the works of S. Basil that ancient Greeke Bishop there is an Homilie against drunkennesse and the strange behauiour of a drunkard right so set downe in all points as liere by the Poet. That which is reported of Caesar that dying he couered himselfe with his garment when Brutus with the rest of that conspiracie killed him in open Senate is written by Plutarch in his liues The drunken man neuer thinks of his shame as Caesar did for during the fit his reason is gone which proues that a fit of drunkennesse is much more dangerous then death it selfe what 's then the habit and continuall custome thereof besides the daily and great offence giuen by these men no men to God and his Church The comparisons here vsed to shew the nature of a slanderer taken from Plutarchs flatterer c. are so fitly applied by the Poet to his purpose that they need no further exposition 21. Come brothers come Moses saith Gen. 9.22 that C ham the father of Chanaan saw the nakednesse of his father lying drunke in the tent as ver 21. and told his two brethren without and Sem and Iaphet tooke a garment and laid it vpon their shoulders and went backward and couered the nakednesse of their father and their faces were fromward and they saw not their fathers nakednesse And this is the point which the Poet handles in this section 22. Slept out the surfet was It is recorded in the foresaid chapter also that Noe awoke from his wine end knew what his younger sonne had done vnto him he knew it either by some part of his memory confusedly retained in drunkennesse or by renelation from God except we should thinke rather that Sem and Iaphet told him that he might reproue the foule impietie of their brother and he is noted the younger for aggrauation of the crime Whereupon the Father said Cursed be Canaan a seruant of seruants shall he be to his brethren and againe Blessed be the Lord God of Sem and Canaan shall be his seruant God shall enlarge Iaphet and he shall dwell in the tents of Sem and Canaan shall be his seruant The Diuines propound here many questions to be considered whereof these two are the chiefe 1. Why Noe went here so far as to denounce that curse against his grandchild Canaan and that race 2. What is the meaning of these blessings vpon Sem and Iaphet The Poet answers in a word that Noe pronounced these curses and blessings by spirit of prophecie Forasmuch as God in his infinite wisdome when he had before humbled his poore seruant Noe was pleased now to arme him againe with fatherly authoritie wherewith hee might pronounce the iust and alway venerable sentences of his eternall decree For in few words here haue we the state of the world and Gods Church set downe by this great Patriarke who could not haue spoken those things so after verified in destruction of the Canaanites and Gods extraordinarie fauour to the Israelites and faithfull Gentiles but by the Holy Ghost to whom is alway present euen that which is to come For the rest Moses compriseth all after his manner briefely but with words so liuely and significant as are easie to be vnderstood of all that weigh and reade them with reuerence and humilitie and take helpe of the good Commentaries of Fathers both old and new 23. O soule vice He detesteth in most proper termes and grauely inueigheth against drunkennesse saying that though it did no more hurt in the world then impeach the reputation of this Patriarke otherwise an example of vertue it were to be hated aboue death And further in very few lines he presseth together what the ancient Authors both holy and profane haue said against drunkennesse There are certaine eminent places of holy Scripture which I need but quote vnto the Reader See Prou. 20.1 21.17 23.20.29.30 c. 31.4 Esay 5.11 22. 28.1 Hosea 4.11 Luk. 21.34 Rom. 13.13 1 Cor. 6.10 Gal. 5.21 Ephes 5.18 Among the ancient Fathers S. Chrysostome and S. Basil haue in diuers their Homilies very graue and expresly condemned this vice And there is a whole Homilie against it in the first Tome of S. Basil and the 80. of the fourth Tome of S. Chrysostome vpon those words of S. Paul to Timothie Modico vino vtere See also what S. Austen writeth hereof to the holy Virgins and in his fift booke vpon Gen. where he speaks of Lot And what S. Ierome hath to Oceanus and Eustochium vpon the first to Tim. the third chap. and to Titus Among the works of the Heathen the 84. Epistle of Seneca is worthy to be read The Greeke and Latine Poets haue also infinite inuectiues against this vice so beastly nay condemned euen by nature it selfe in beasts As for the examples here alledged by the Poet of Clytus and Pentheus see Plutarch in the life of Alexander the Great and Ouid in his third booke of Metamorphosis toward the end and apparent examples hath the holy Scripture of mischiefe ensuing vpon this wine-bibbing Not Lot Nabal Ammon Ela Balthasar and others But the Histories of our time haue a thousand times worse and more tragicall which our after-beers will detest and wonder at BABILONE The second Booke of Noe called BABILON Preface representant la felicité des estats puplics gouuernez par bōs sages Princes le malheur des peuples assuicttis à vn tyran Ce que le Poëte propose proprement afin de ce donner entree en lavie esfaitz de Nembrot O QVE c'est vn grand heur de viure sous vn Prince Qui prefere â son bien le bien de sa pronince Qui fleau des vicieux des bons protectuer Ounre l'aureil au sage la ferme au flateur Qui de soy-mesme Roy chasse plustost le vices Par ses honnestes moeurs que par loix supplices Qui est humble en son ame graue par dehors Qui a l'amour de siens pour garde de son corps Qui le lustre emperlé d'vn Scepre n'idolatre Et qui se cognoissant monté sur vn Theatre Ou pour Contrerolleur tout vn Monde le voit
neuer forbeareth any thing he neuer pardoneth any man nourisheth and fatteth himselfe with blood and fire all peaceable and vertuous persons he disgraceth and ouerthroweth supporting and aduancing all peace-breakers robbers and wicked liuers he taketh bribes for all offices and oppresseth the people with the vnbrideled number of catchpole-officers that maintaine themselues only by grating vpon others his subiects he would haue liue all dayes of their life in ignorance painfull wise and learned men and those that haue well to take vnto because they need the lesse to depend on him or else sell themselues for his fauour he chaseth far from him and maketh beholding vnto him none but fooles idiots iesters anticks wranglers and such copes-mates as of naught worth are suddenly start vp that wholly depend vpon him and reuell in his cofers not giuing him as they cannot any good counsell for the common-wealth they care not which end thereof goe forward but all their care and counsell is for their priuate gaine which serues to no better vse than to intice and draw them on daily to carelesse and wicked liuing Further yet so far is he from regarding or placing neere about him men of worth and good qualities that on the contrary to the imitation of Tarquinius surnamed the proud whose storie Liuie writeth in the first booke of his second Decade concerning the Poppie heads he broke downe with his staffe to teach his sonne by a dumbe shew that he should rid out of the way all the Peeres of the Citie and forsake as another saith fifty frogs to catch one Sammon he breaketh downe the highest cares of corne that is he causeth all those to be put to death that might any wayes hinder his wicked intents What should I say more Such a cursed creature without God without conscience worse than any wilde beast spareth neither kith nor kin but either by sword or poyson maketh away the very neerest of all his blood that he may raigne alone if it were possible But notwithstanding the many bands of his guard he standeth in feare of euery man and is despised mocked and detested of all For why Besides that is aforesaid he glorieth and taketh delight to deuise new subsidies imposts and tributes whereby the comminaltie may be impouerished and held in bondage and so in steed of Homers people-feeder he becommeth a people-eater Of this image of a tyrant there are examples aboue number found both in ancient and late writers of Church histories and others So I returne to the Poet. Nen brot petit sils de Cham des son enfance veut dominer est l'image des ambitieux tyrans Ses exercices asin de se rendre maistre redoutable par succession de temps Nembrot n'a point encor atteiut le douziesme an Qeentre ceux de son âge il tranche du Tyran Paroit sur ses esgaux sous si bon augure Iette les fondemens de sa grandeur future Et portant dans sa main pour Sceptres des Roseaux Fait son aprentissage entre les pastoreanx Puis sachant que celuy qui genereux aspire A l'heur imaginé d'vn redoutable empire Doit passer enbeaux faicts le vulgaire testu Ou porter pour le moins le masque de vertu Il ne passe la nuict sous vne molle plume Le iour dedans vn poisle ains ieune s'accoustume Au bon mauuais temps ayant ambitieux Pour cheuet vn rocher pour rideau les Cieux Les ares sons sesiouets la sucur ses delices Les Moineaux ses Autours ses cher Turquets let lices Et ses mets plus friands d'vn bean Chéureul la chair Que tremblant il n'a point acheué d'escorcher Continuation des labcurieux exercices de Nembrot Quelque-sois il s'esbat à vaincre d'vne haleine L'aspreté d'vn rother qui domine vne plaine A fendre coutremont vn torrent enragé Qui d'Hyades repeucent ponts a rauagé Et d'vn flot bondissant court à bride auallâ—e Atranâ—rs les rochers a'vne estroite vallee A r'atraper le traict eschappé de sa main Aprendre à belle course ou la Biche ou le Dain Il chasse aux bestes pour chasser puis apâ—es aux hommes Mais ayant ia passé cinq lustres de son âge Et sentaint orgueilleux ses norss son courage Digne d'vn Mars plus fier s'il sçait enquelque part Vu grand Tigre vn Lyon vn Ours vn Leopart Ill ' attaque sans peur le veine l'assomme plante Es lieux plus esleuez sa de spouille sanglante Lors le peuple qui void par ses guerrieres mains Les chemins affranchis d'assassins inhumains D'horrible hurlemens les forests solitaires Et les troupeaux de crainte ayme ce domte-feres Cest Hercul chasse-mal luy monstre safaueur Et l'appelle par tout son Pere son Sauueur Nembrot par les cheueux empoignant la fortune Et battant le fer chaut flatte presse importune Ore l'vn ore l'autre hastant son bon heur De veneur d'animaux se sait d'homme veneur Car comme il employoit enses premier chasses Les glus les trebuchets les pipeaux les tirasses Et sur la fin encor contre les plus hagards Les masses les espîeux les fleches les dards I l gaigne quelques-vns par des belles promesses Les autres par presens les autres par rudesses Et rompant furieux les liens d'equité Au lieu qu'auparauant le chef de chaque race La commandoit à part sans que la ieune audace D'vn esprit fretillant brouillon ambitieux Mist comme ore sa faux en la moissons des vieux 3. Nimrods first studie and exercise to get the soueraigntie of the people surthered by nature Scarse is the sonne of Chus now waxen twelue yeere old But straight ou'r all his Peeres he playes the Tyrant bold He ouer-growes them all and of his power to come Vpon a trim foreshow he layes the ground with some And in his childish hand for scepter bearing reeds Among the shephard-swaines beginn'th his prentise-deeds Then knowing that the man whose courage doth aspire Vnto the deemed blisse of an awfull Empire Must passe in braue exploits the doltish vulgar sort Or else by seeming good obtaine a good report He wasteth not the night in downie leather-bed Nor yet the day in shade but young accustomed Himselfe to good and ill and made ambitiouslie His pillowes of a rocke his curtaines of the skie To toyle is his delight to shoot his chiefest game His baby-play the lysts his hawk some Sparrow tame His most delicious meat the flesh of tender Kid Which trembleth yet and scarse is out of skin yslid The continuance of his labours to obtaine the peoples sauour Sometime he sports himselfe to conquer with a breath Some craggy rocks ascent that ouerpeers the heath Or else some raging flood against the streame diuide
haue faid nothing nor made any mention in their bookes of the beginnings and occasions of diuersitie of tongues especially that the Grecians and other such learned people that haue professed the knowledge of all things knew not the beginning of their owne language Moses only hath set vs downe this notable history and opened to the Heathen the spring of their tongues And this further is to be wondered at in the Historie of Babel that the Hebrue tongue alone as being the first of the world hath remained among that people that were the Church of God where the Messias was borne and from whence arose the preaching of the Gospell touching the appearance of the promised Sauiour which Gospell hath sithence by the gift of tongues and ministerie of the Apostles ouerspread all the parts of the world Thus Moses handling the beginning of tongues proueth his historie to haue long fore-gone all others and therewithall engraueth vpon the gates and walls of the Citie and Tower of Babel a goodly warning to all men to flie and auoid Atheisme and all vaine-glorious folly which buildeth Towers against Heauen and rebelleth against God who suffereth the wicked to aduance and hoyse vp themselues the space of some few moneths or yeeres to the end he may giue them a fearefull ouerthrow at length What would the presumption of a man haue done saith Saint Augustine when algate the top of this Tower had raught vnto the clouds It is humilitie that lifteth vp the heart on high to the Lord not against the Lord she it is that leadeth vs the true right and sure way to heauen These few words I thought good to adde vnto the rest because the proud aspiring minde of man cannot be sufficiently discouered nor too much cried out on Whereas these builders busily forecast in their minde and laboured to make themselues renowned among their posteritie and thought men of some worth let vs remember that the true praise consisteth not in workes of goodly outward shew but in such as are good indeed and approued of God So let vs returne to the text of the Poet who hauing touched in a word the beginning of tongues and refuted some contrary objections sheweth now which of all the tongues that haue beene are or shall be in the world ought to be accounted the chiefe and most ancient and whereof a man may truely say it is the most excellent of all other 12. The Hebrew tongue He propoundeth fiue reasons whereby he is induced to beleeue that the Hebrew is the first tongue of all whatsoeuer the. Greeke and others doc alledge for themselues The first is that this tongue compriseth much matter in few words is very significant briefly and plainly expresseth whatsoeuer a man can thinke and when it is requisite to discouer the most secret and hidden plights of the heart she slippeth none but for all things hath words liuely pleasant waightie and of great import and for her circuits of speech and long discourses they are more wonderfull then the best and sweetest the Greeke hath which notwithstanding her store of selfe-meaning words her bould and far-fetcht Epithites her cunning Metaphores her words compounded her tenses and other fine deuises is no more comparable to the other then the chirping of a Goldsinch is to the song of the Nightingall Proofe hereof may bee made by the earnest and diligent consideration and waying the words sentences and discourses of the Hebrew with those of the Greeke and all others not onely in Grammers and Dictionaries but euen in whole bookes and volumes It shall suffice me to wage and lay the booke of Psalmes onely or the workes of Salomon or Iob or of Esay against all other Authours and I dare bouldly auouch that in one of these a man shall finde almost in euery chapter more elegance state and maiestie more figures and more of all kinde of ornaments for a discourse than in all the tedious workes of those that mans wisedome setteth-by so much I speake not now of the matter and substance of things which neuerthelesse is in this tongue as happily expressed as in any other let them straine themselues neuer so much they are not able but very grosly and a-farre-off to make a shew of that which this other painteth out in orient colours what matter soeuer it hath occasion to vtter The second reason is that the Rabbines or Hebrew Doctors men wondrous carefull to preseiue the whole body of the old Testament so as the least letter point and accent they haue counted ouer and againe often times haue noted in the 22. letters of the Hebrew Alphabet either apart or together considered all the secrets of diuinitie and of Philosophie both naturall and morall This is a notable thing in the Hebrew tongue that all the letters haue their proper signification and that the letters of most of the principall tongues in the world haue taken their beginning from them as also that the primitiue words and those of whom infinite others are deriued in diuers principall tongues are drawne from the letters syllables and words of the Hebrew To say nothing of the excellency of her accents and the propertie of her vowels the Rabbines haue further found out many secrets by diuers-way-turning and alter-placing the letters of Hebrew words and that which the Greekes and others haue after their example inuented is nothing in comparison For there is scarce any word in the Hebrew but being inuerted as may easily be done and sometimes two three or foure wayes as the number of the letters are offereth to our consideration another word either of like sense or contrary or making relation to the first giueth thereto such light beautie liuelihood that it is wonderfull to behold Againe oftentimes a Nowne or other word yea a letter importeth a whole sentence like vnto the Egyptians Hieroglyphikes inuented of them to the imitation of the Hebrew letters and words yet nothing in comparison of them This matter would require a whole volumne to be writting according to Art by the hand of some one that were well seene in the tongues and I could name three paire yet liuing that are well able to doe it In the meane season whosoeuer is desirous to search further herein let him read the Harmonie of the World written by Franciscus Georgius and Guido Faber the Heptap of Ioannes Picus Earle of Mirandola the Hieroglyphickes of I. Goropius from the beginning of the seuenth booke to the end of the sixteenth three bookes of I. Reuclinus De arte Cabalistica and other three bookes of his De Verbo mirabilâ— the Cabala of Picus with the interpretations of Angelus Burgoneuensis thereupon Further much good matter to this purpose a man may finde in Thesauro linguae sanctae set out by S. Pagninus after augmented by many other learned professours of this tongue See further the Syriac Institut c. of Camnius the Mithridates of C. Gâ—snerus the Alphabet in 12. tongues of Postella and
his booke De ant quitate linguae Hebraicae there are many such Treatises set forth by diuers learned men whereout and of the bookes aforenamed may be gathered infinite proofes of that which the Poet hath touched in this second reason The third is that there liues no Nation vnder the cope of heauen but keepeth still some words of Hebrew in their speech First the Caldean Syrian Arabian Egyptian Persian Ethiopian and many other as the Gotthicke Troglodyticke Punicke are so deriued thence that they come as neere it as Italian to Latine some more some lesse Secondly the Greeke Latine and those others that are farthest off haue yet here and there some words that we must needes grant are sprong from the same fountaine a man may set downe a many of them but it were too long here to coate the examples Thirdly the roots of many words that are taken to be Greeke or some other tongue are found to be Hebrew as Franciscus Iunius hath plainly shewed in his learned oration Deliuguae Hebraea antiquitate praeslantia The fourth reason is that the doctrine of the old Testament which is the doctrine of the first and most ancient people of the world was not written but in Hebrew No man denieth that the people that came of Sem the sonne of Noe is the most ancient among these remained the Church of God and the Hebrew tongue God spake not but in the Hebrew tongue by the high Priest that wore the sacred Ephod and the breast-plate of iudgement whereon was set 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vrim Thummim words signifying lights and perfections which some thinke was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or foure-letered name Iehoua contained within the brest-plate others say it was the rankes of those twelue precious stones there enchased that on them had ingrauen the names of the twelue tribes of Israel as if it were a repetition of that which Moses saith in the 17 18 19 and 20. verses of the 28. chapter of Exodus where he speaketh of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vrim Thummim in the 30. verse others hold they were certaine names others are of diuers other opinions Some late writers thinke those words were ingrauen in the breast-plate This is a secret the search whereof whether one dispute of the words or what they meant or what 's become of them c. is very painfull and needlesse for that now sithence the comming of Christ we ought to follow the truth it selfe and not stay vpon shadowes These words doubtlesse gaue to vnderstand that all light and perfection commeth of our Sauiour in whom all the fulnesse of the Godhead bodily dwelleth in whom are hid all the treasures of vnderstanding knowledge who is the light of his Church that is made vnto vs of God his father wisedome iustice redemption and holinesse In all iudgements demands oracles and reuelations that were made by Vrim and Thummim as may be gathered out of the 27. chapter of Numbers the first booke of Samuel the 13. and 30. chapters and other places where aduise and counsell was asked of God and answere was made by the mouth of the high Priest there appeared a cleere light a sure truth and perfection all which in Christ is accomplished Now these demands and answers were propounded and rendred in the Hebrew tongue long time before any other language was vsed in the world For so soone after their scattering at Babel they could not well be incorporated into a common wealth and as for religion that was not kept but in the race of Sem as Moses plainly declareth all through the historie of Abraham Concerning the Prophets their dreames and visions God spake not they vnderstood not neither answered or taught they the Church but in the Hebrew that significant vnmingled holy chaste and heauenly tongue whereas others lispe and stammer-out vncertaine sounds and are infinite wayes defiled through the dishonest foolish erronious and vngodly discourses of their inuentours I except the bookes of the new Testament and all writings drawne from the cleere fountaines of holy Scripture besides the which there is nothing but vanitie filth wickednesse and vngodlinesse in the world Moreouer the Lord himselfe setteth downe his law to his people and writing it twise with his owne finger and speaking with his owne mouth to Moses and his other seruants in the Mount vsed the Hebrew tongue So did the Angels and Prophets and Iesus Christ spake the Syriacke a tongue so deriued of the Hebrew that they are very like as their Grammars declare The Apostles spake diuers tongues and wrote also according to the people and persons with whom they had to doe yet for all that in their bookes may be noted an infinite many of phrases borrowed of the Hebrew as the learned interpreters of the new Testament haue exactly shewed The fift and last reason set downe by the Poet is that the Hebrew words especially the proper names some are alledged for example and many other may be added are of great waight and importance for sometimes they lay open vnto vs the chiefe things that doe befall the person so named Nay further if a man would take the paines to change the order of letters hee may sinde in them many goodly mysteries The Greekes haue found the way and followed it in the interpretation of their proper names but they come farre short of the liuelihood and maiestie of the Hebrewes who begun the thing before them many hundred yeeres As for other tongues the most part of their proper names haue no meaning they are deuised at-all-auentures so are they right tokens of barbarisme Some tongues there are more happy and plentious than others in this behalfe but their interpretations are for the most part vncertaine especially if the Root thereof come not from or neere the Hebrew Herehence againe the curious reader may take occasion of a large commentarie I leaue it vnto him 13. Then doe I theesalute It is not without cause that the Poet straight vpon the former discourse vseth these words considering the excellency of the Hebrew tongue and that he setteth out in so few verses her wonderfull perfections each one of them requiring a large treatise and himselfe being vnable to shut vp so great matters in so few words For example sake let vs consider but very briefly those three points that the Poet here toucheth to wit that the two and twenty Hebrew letters are full of hidden sense that the proper names of persons Countries and Cities in this tongue are as much as abridgements of their life and deedes that the names of birds beasts and fishes containe the history of their natures howbeit since the fall of Adam the knowledge thereof is greatly darkened To make the Reader somewhat more desirous to enter mediation hereon I will set him downe some examples Concerning the mysteries of the Hebrew Letter-row Eusebius and S. Ierom in his Epistle ad Paul vrbic which is the 155. expoundeth them as I
right nature of things in the right hand an Ewer because the speech of the wise dampeth and putteth out the flame of passions I might note hereof many examples but I leaue them for the diligent Reader to search meaning here to offer him but Annotations which I feare alreadie are growen too long The little chaines that come forth from the Images golden tongue and draw such a number of hearers by the eares and heart signifie the great power of a well framed speech the truth whereof appeareth chiefely in preaching the word in counsels of graue common-wealths-men and orations of good Magistrates and valiant Captaines In this manner did the ancient Frenchmen paint and set out their Hercules surnamed Ognius whereupon Alciat hath made a pretie Embleme it is the 180. expounded at large by Cl. Minos The summe of all is that Eloquence is to be preferred before force Our Poet aimeth at that description Further concerning the Bore the Tygre and the Beare lying tame at the feet of this Image it signifieth that a pleasant and learned speech appeaseth all angrie cruell and sauage men and cuen the maddest and most brutish people in the world it maketh the woods and hills to daunce and leape that is to say it moueth bendeth and instructeth very block-heads and such as are most hard of vnderstanding and this may be the meaning of those fained tales of Amphion Orpheus Arion and other like Lastly this Image is inuironed with a double ranke of pillers well and strongly grounded and vnder-pinned that beare vp in due proportion the nino languages following each by her owne chiefe authors and maintainers For euery pillar was wrought in fashion of a man and framed to the countenance of one of their best writers in a long gowne or stole And that is the meaning of the French à la Cariatide After the Carian right as Vitruuius writeth at large in the first Chapter of his first booke of Architecture This I note because the French Commenter lets it passe and it troubled my selfe to vnderstand it at the first 23. Among the blessed wits For chiefe props of the Hebrue tongue which he placeth in the fore-front of Eloquence as in euery regard it was meet whether we cofider the sweet grauitie the natural impliance the shortnes hautines liuelines of it or the sincerity holines light heauenly Maiestic he nameth first Moses because he is the most anciēt of those whose writings in this tongue are extant As for the book of the Prophesie of Henoch it was lost a long time agoe He describeth this holy Law-writer after an excellent manner as was requisite in a discourse of eloquence His face shineth like a blasing Star alluding to that in the Scripture that Moses comming downe frō the Mount where he had talked with God his face so shined that none was able to behold his countenance in so much as he was faine to weare a vaile ouer it the rest is very easie to be vnderstood especially of such as haue neuer so lightly turned ouer the history Now for the bookes of Moses they were written many hundred yeares before the Greekes were knowne who were not heard of in the world but a little before the reigne of Saul had but few workes in writing or none at all till after the time of Salomon as their owne Histories witnesse whosoeuer will take paines to turne them ouer Nay further all their knowledge came from the Aegyptians Phenicians and others who had leaned somewhat by conuersing with the Hebiues And to come againe to Moses he hath beene in maruellous account with insinite Heathen Writers If any haue lightly regarded or found fault with him it was either because they vnderstood him not at all or maliced him exceedingly which a man may easily finde in their writings The second Author of the Hebrue he counteth Dauid whose Psalmes he speaketh of much in few lines but little it is in comparison of their excellencie whereof many ancient and late Writers haue spoken notable things I will not heape them vp here assuring my selfe that all true Christians will grant me that the Book of Dauids Psalmes is as Saint Basil saith the Store-house and treasurie of all good learning for all men to come at and will confesse with Saint Ierome and Saint Chrysostome that nothing better becommeth a man be he Peasant or Crafts-man great or small than to sing vnto the Lord the praises and thankesgiuing in these excellent songs contained the very liuely and true Anatomies of a beleeuing soule O how cursed and abominable before God and his Church are those wicked ones that haue forbidden Christians the vnderstanding and vse of them and banished them out of Christendome that haue suffered allowed maintained commanded and commended vnto the people these shamefull and wanton Poesies these books of vanitie error and leasings which with their Authors deserue the fire not the quiet and peaceable persons that call vpon Iesus Christ and belecue stedfastly the life euerlasting The soule that feareth God will not take this my digression ill nor thinke it needlesse As for the vngodly let them spit at it if they will I regard them not The third Author and ornament of the Hebrue is reckoned Salomon in his Prouerbs the Booke of the Preacher and the Song of Songs bookes more besprinckled with golden words and notable sentences than his Crowne was with pretious stones and pearles embossed Happie is the man that taketh delight to marke and daily thinke vpon so profitable and necessary instructions The fourth is the Prophet Esay the sonne of Amos right such a one as the Poet hath described These foure hee thought sufficient to name because they haue most Writings extant and are withall exceeding cloquent as might easily be proued by particulars if I were to write a Commentary or a whole discourse thereof 24. The Greeke Homer his Illias and Odyssea containing 48. bookes is the most ancient Greeke Author we haue his inuentions are wonderfull his vaine naturall his verses smooth and full of Art and the more they are considered the greater grace they haue There is also in them a hidden sense and the very well-spring of all humane knowledge as may appeare by that infinite peeces of his poesies are cited in the bookes of ancient and late Phylosophers Geographers Historiographers and Orators as Plutarch and others witnesse The next to Homer is Plato not in time but in worthinesse he is called the diuine Phylosopher because he is so maruellous pure so high and lofty in all his disconrses the true scholler of him that professing himselfe to know but one thing namely that he knew nothing declared that he knew all things that might be learned in the world as touching the world For concerning the knowledge of saluation Plato and his maister both were ignorant and sith all other knowledge is nothing in comparison of that the more are we bound to God that haue it he said most truely
of Mahomet As for Eldebag Iohannes Leo writeth of him in the fift booke of his description of Asticke This poet borne at Malaga in Grenade of great name thorough all the parts of Buggie and Thunes was very eloquent in the Arabian tongue and wonderfull sharpe in railing on those that did him hurt he made the men of Tebesse feele it in a Satyre he wrote against them the effect whereof is this that Nature knowing the Tebessians should be men of little worth and very swine would make no good thing grow about their Citie but Nuts The last to wit Ibnu-farid the French Commentar knoweth not what he was and I cannot learne 28. The Dutch For the Dutch or Almaine tongue hee setteth vs downe Michaell Beuther who very well hath translated the Latine Commentaries of Sleidan the next is Luther borne at Islebe as learned and eloquent a man as any was among the Diuines and Preachers of Germanie as all will confesse that haue read his workes in Dutch he Preached and read Diuinitie the space of many yeeres at Wytteberg in Saxony Then Gasper Peucer son in law to Phillip Melancibon an excellent Philosopher Mathematician and Phisitian as his workes declare And lastly Peter Beutricke Counceller to Duke Iohn Cosimer and chiefe dealer for him with diuers Princes lately deceased I could name you many more but I content my selfe as the poet hath done with these foure 29. Then Gueuare The Bookes of Anthony de Gueuare du Bosean de Grenade de Gracylace haue beene for the most part translated into Latine Italian and French but they are farre better in their Castilian which is the most pure Dialect of the Spanish tongue and wherein the men of learning and good nourtriture are wont ordinarily to write and speake And these foure the poet hath chosen for the most eloquent writers in this tongue yet nothing foredeeming diuers others that haue written well both in verse and prose as namely Osias whom but for his old Dialect he iudgeth as good an author as the other 30. The speech of English For ornament of the English tongue he nameth Sir Thomas Moore and Sir Nicholas Bacon both Lord Chauncellours the first of them was very learned in the Arts and tongues the second exceeding well seene in the common lawes of England and both very eloquent in their mother language As for Sir Philip Sidney he deserueth no lesse commendation then the poet hath giuen him Chaucer deserueth the like commendation here that Osias did among the Spanish Authors 31. But what new Sunne is this He maketh a digression in praise of the Queene of England who the space of seuen and thirty yeeres hath gouerned her Realme in great prosperitie so as during the troubles and ouerthrowes of other kingdomes about her herselfe and her people haue beene preserued from infinite dangers This famous Queene hath also the tougues here mentioned by the poet very par fit and at this day by the singular grace of God she is accounted the precious pearle of the North and very fortunate in all the warres she taketh in hand her happy successe and victories are euery way so memorable that they deserue to be written in a large historie and reuerenced of all posteritic 32. But what are these of France Clement Marot worthy to be admired for his time in regard of the ignorance and barbarisme that raigned in Europe many yeeres before him hath led the Muses ouer the Alpes and arrayed them after the French fashion as witnesseth among other his workes the translation of nine and fortie Psalmes of Dauid a worke that will continue in account as long as Yea and Nay are spoken euen to the worlds end Indeed he wanteth that Art and those fine deuices that some later Writers haue but euen in this want and these imperfections he hath done wonderous well and sheweth in his naturall vaine that if he had list he could haue beene excellent yea in some points and places he hath so done alreadie as the best of them all could haue done no better For translations wee haue Iacques Amiot who hath turned into French the Aethiopian Historie of Heliodorus seuen bookes of Diodorus Siculus and all Plutarch wherein he hath laboured to very good purpose and with happie successe I would to God he had set his hand also to Thucidides Xenophon and Seneca his stile is pure and naturall not affected not forced right good and true French Blase Viginere hath also translated many bookes as the Polonian History a part of Liuie Caesar Chalcondylas Philostratus three Dialogues of Friendship and the Psalmes in free verse all which I haue read ouer and againe yet doe I preferre Amiot before him Indeed I finde in Viginere a very ready stile and matter well chosen but the other I know not how me thinkes hath a better cariage of himselfe The Sâ—iour de Vauprinas in his French Librarie saith of all the foster-children of the Muses that were bred in France Viginere hath so written that as well for learning as for eloquence of speech he hath preuented all that shall come after him and as it were shut the gate against them See what a commendation here is I leaue the Reader to iudge of our opinions Our Poet stayeth in doubt but I haue beene bold to goe further I trust without any great offence in this consisteth not the good or bad state of France Concerning Poets he nameth Peter Ronsard who hath made himselfe rich with Greeke and Latine spoiles as his Treatises of Loue his Odes Elegies and Hymnes doe witnesse wherein a man may reade all sorts of verses and all kinde of matter sometimes in a low stile sometimes in a meane sometimes in a loftie stile For which the Poet calleth him Great Ronsard I will note here a notable speech of his After our Poets first Weeke was come forth in Print being asked his opinion of the worke he answered alluding to the title Mounsieur du Bartas hath done more in one weeke than I haue done in all my life time As for Philip de Mornay Lord of Plessie Marly his learned worke of the truth of Christian Religion honoured thus by the true title and written in good French with liuely reasons there gathered together moueth and draweth to his purpose that is to acknowledge the truth all that reade it with a heart desirous of peace and good The like may be said of his Discourse of Life and Death of his Treatise of the Church his Meditations and some Epistles and Demonstrations of his For all his Writings are strengthened with Arguments Inductions and proofes inuincible and all in a stile with grauitie and sweetnesse mixed well knit and well sounding and easie enough to those that are neuer so little acquainted with it The Poet hauing so liuely represented his Vision endeth his discoarse of Elequence and her most renowned sauourer in euery Language and so shut vp his sixt Booke Which is the second of the second day of
frozen alleyes Glide swiftly-teemed carres insted of winged gallies Vnto the Genoan Tyrrhene and prouence Seas With those of learned Greece and of Peoloponese Accoast the goodly shore of Asia the lesse The second paradise th'worlds chiefe happinesse And Tartarie the ground that reacheth from Amane Vnto the springs of Rha and pleasant bankes of Tane All those braue men at armes that France haue ouer-spred Of Gomers fruitfull seed themselues professe are bred And so the Germans are sometime hight Gomerites Of Tubal Spaniards came of Mosoch Moscouites Of Madai sprong the Medes of Magog Scythians Of Iauan rose the Greekes of Thyras Thracians 10. Now Japhet Moses reciting Genesis 9.27 how Noe blessed his two children sets downe two notable points the one concerning the great and many Countries which Iaphet and his posteritie should possesse the other of the fauour that God should shew them by lodging them in the tents of Sem that is by receiuing them at length into his Church which hath beene fulfilled in the calling of the Gentiles For the first point whereas he saith God enlarge Iaphet For so the Hebrew word signifieth although some translate it Persuade it is as much as if he had said Let Iaphet and his race possesse the Countries round about him farre and neere And this hath also beene accomplished in that so infinite a multitude of people hath issued out of the stocke of Iaphet and peopled Europe which though it appeare lesser then the other parts hath alwayes had more inhabitants and fewer void Countries The Poet hath set downe so perfect a description thereof as it needes no further to be opened if the Reader haue neuer so little beheld the Maps On the East it is parted from the greater Asia by the Maior Sea the Meotis Lake called by Ortelius the Zabach sea the Riuer Tane or Deu which voids into the Lake and the Spring-herds of Rha Edel or Volga running by Tartarie into the Caspian Sea and from Asia the lesse sometime the honour of the world exceeding rich as still it hath sufficient it is deuided by the Straight of Gallipoli sometime called Hellespont On the West it hath the Straight of Gibraltar the Spanish and Brittish Oceans on the North the Frozen Sea and on the South the Midland Sea which is diuersly called to wit the Sea of Marseil by the coast of Genes the Adriaticke about Athens and Morea and otherwise according to the places adioyning This goodly part of the world beside the Romaine Empire hath many great kingdomes full of people well set forth by the Card-men Daniell Cellarius accounts it in length from Lisbon to Constantinople about six hundred leagues Almaine and very neere as much in breadth from Scrifinie to Sicily 11 Gomer Moses reckeneth seuen sonnes of Iaphet Gen. 10.2 So doth here the Poet not standing much vpon the order of them to follow the verse of Gomer are come the Gomerites whom the Greekes called Galates and Gaules of them came the people that spoiled Delphos and then sate downe about Troas in Asia and were called Gaule-Greekes or Asian Galates who afterward seized a good part of Phrygia The Lord threatning by Ezechiel 38. Chapter Gog chiefe of the Princes of Mesech and Tubal saith he will destroy him with this Gomer and all his bands and the house of Togarmah of the North-quarters They that expound the Prophesie gather out of this place that the Gomerites were people bordering on the North of Asia and brought by the Kings of Syria and Asia to destroy the Iewes after their returne from Babylon They preased forth of Asia and enlarged their dominions greatly as hath beene said for they were a very warlike Nation Of them the Poet saith are come the Germanes so Melancthon affirmeth vpon Carion so doe others also and chiefly Goropius in his fift booke But there is great diuersitie in these outworne matters betweene the late and ancient Writers A diligent conference of places in the old Testament and the ancient Latine Greeke and Chaldean translations serue best for the purpose next a carefull examining of the best Greeke and Latine Histories but this requires a whole volume whereunto the searches of Goropius being so well handled might afford a man great helpe Concerning Tubal the Poet followes the opinion of Iosephus that he was Author of the Spanish which must be rightly vnderstood that is after a long tract of time For by the 38. and 39. of Ezechiel it seemes that the people issued from Tubal Mosoch which were neighbours dwelt neare Arabia and were gouerned or led to war by the Kings of Asia and Syria And in the 32. chap. where is mention made of the mourning that should be among the Nations for the King of Aegypt there are named among others Ashur Elam Mosoch and Tubal whereby it may be gathered they were of Asia As for their Colonies and outcreases into Spaine they are very darke and hardly proued Vasaeus indeed in his Chronicle of Spaine and Taraphe in his Historie and others that haue written of Spaine in diuers languages following Ioseph and Berose make Tubal first King of Spaine but sithence they declare not what time he came thither I leaue the Reader to consider of and search further into the matter Looke the historicall Library of N. Vignier the first part page 15. where he treateth of the people of Europe Magog as the Poet saith is father of the Scythians his first habitation and Colonie was in Coelesyria as may be gathered out of the fift booke and 23. chapter of Plinie and the 37 38 and 39. chapters of Ezechiel At this time the right Scythians are the Selauonians Moscouites and Tartarians who vaunt of their descent from Iaphet This might haue beene by tract of time but not so soone as the Poet in the sequele Melancthon in his first vpon Carion takes the prophecies against Gog and Magog to be meant especially of the Turkes whom he calleth by the name of Scythians and applieth also vnto them that which is written in the Reuelation And in the end of his second Booke he giues the name to all people that professe Mahomet I thinke my selfe that some while after Noes partition of the lands Magog and his people dwelt in Coelesyria or there abouts and thence by succession of time thrust vp into the higher Countries Now as the ancient people of God were much vexed and outraged by the Kings of Syria and Asia successours of Seleucus Nicanor and signified by the name of Gog who aiding the people of Magog Mosoch and Tubal their subiects greatly annoyed the Iewes then returned from Babylon so hath Satan in these later daies against the holy Citie the Church of God stirred vp againe Gog and Magog many Kings and Princes enemies to the Faith who haue conspired together and made a League to ouerthrow it vtterly but the Almightie in due time and season shall confound them Reade the 20. Chapter of the Reuelation and the 89. Sermon of
Bullinger thereupon As for Mosoch Ioseph saith of him are come the Cappadocians and for proofe thereof alledgeth a certaine Towne of their Country called Mazaca It may be gathered out of the 120. Psalme that Mesech or Mosoch was a neighbour people to Syria and Arabia which place the Chalde Paraphrast expounding vseth words of this import O wretch that I am for I haue beene a stranger among the Asians and dwelt in the Arabian tents The Poet considereth what might haue beene in continuance of time and how farre the mans posterity might haue stretched Madai sure was Author of the name of Medes whose Empire was very great in the higher Asia they destroyed the Chaldean Monarchie as may be noted out of Ierem. 51.11 Dan. 5.18 The Thracians Ioseph saith and the Poet are descended of Thyras Melancthou thinkes that of him are come the Russians but the Scripture speaketh not of his posteritie Plinie makes mention of a Riuer Tyra in the Russian or European Sarmatia Melancthon Goropius and others call it Nester Goropius in his seuenth Booke puts the Getes Daces and Bastarnes among the Thracians as all of one stocke and speaking almost the selfe-same tongue which also as he saith comes very neare the Cimbricke and Brabantish Iauan the fourth sonne of Iaphet gaue names to the Ionians who after with their neighbours were called Greekes and therefore the Latine Interpreter translating the place of Ezech. 27.19 for the Hebrue Iauan hath put Graecia so haue the seuenty put 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the name of Greece for the same word As also in the 13. verse of the same Chapter and in the 19. of the 66. of Esay they both haue translated the Hebrue Jeuanim 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Graeci The Country of Athens hath in old time beene called Ionie as Plutarch saith in the life of Theseus and Strabo in his ninth Booke recites out of Hecataeus that the Ionians came out of Asia into Greece Now the Greekes as they were great discoursers they haue deuised a thousand tales of their first beginning but I let them passe because my notes are already waxen ouer long Ioy si-ie voulois ie ferois vne liste Discrete modestie du Poëte qui ayme mieux se taire que traiter de choses obscures cachees sous le voile de l'Antiquité De tous nos deuanciers marchannt sur la piste D'vn supposé Berose d'antres qui menteurs Abusent du loisir bonté des lecteurs Hardi i'entreprendrois de toutes les prouinces Nommer de pere en sils les plus antiques Princes Chanter de l'Vniuers les diuers peuplemens Et des moindres citez fouiller les fondemens Mais quoy ie ne veux pas abandonner ma voile Au premier vent qui souffle sans la clair estoile Qui luit sur touâ— les cieux temeraire ramer Sur les flos inconus de si lontaine mer Toute pleine d'escueils de Scilles profondes Où ne roulle pas moins de naufrages que d'ondes N'ayant autres Patrons que certains escriuains Forgeurs denoms de Roys autheurs decontes vains Qui sont tout à leur poste conuoiteux de gloire Sur vn pied de Ciron bastissent vne histoire He will not enter into matter farre out of knowledge Here if I were dispos'd vpon the ground to treade Of that suppos'd Berose abusing all that reade As he and others doe well might I let you see Of all our Ancestors a fained pedegree I boldly might assay of all the worlds Prouinces From father vnto sonne to name the former Princes To sing of all the world each peoples diuers lot And of the meanest to wâ—â—es to lay the grunsill-plot But what I meane not I as eu'ry wind shall blow To leaue the former course and rashly assay to row The bright Load-starre vnseene vpon the waues vnknow'n Of such an Ocean sea so full of rockes bestrow'n And Scyllaes glutton gulfes where tumbleth equall store Of shipwracks on the sands and billowes to the shore Not hauing other guide then writers such as faine The names of ancient Kings and romants tell vs vaine Who make all for themselues and gaping after glory On footing of a flie can frame a perfect story 12 Now. The like is seene in many bookes of late times and ancient that treat of the Kingdomes Countries and people of the world for many labour more to come neare Noes Arke and to finde there the foundation of their Townes and names of their first Princes then about other more certaine and sure grounds And they had rather forge names and deuise matter of their owne head than leaue to packe huge volumes full of tales witnessing the strange vanity of mans braine The Poet condemnes this foolish ambition and by good â—â—ght all the matter when it is at the best being very doubtfull and vnprofitâ—ble for man was placed on the earth to thinke rather on the seruice of God than so to trouble his head with curious out-search of his ancestors names 13 Of that suppos'ed Berose Who so desires to know that the Berose late printed is false supposed and cleane contrary to the right Chaldean cited often by Ioseph in his Antiquities against Apion let him reade the fourth booke of Goropius his Origines Antuerpianae And so let him thinke also of Manetho Metasthenes Fabius Pictor Sempronius Myrsilus Lesbius and others packt as they are into one volume by some one that thought to doe great matters by abusing so the Readers and holding them in amuse by false deuises from further search of the truth I will not here set downe the words of Goropius who at large discouers the forgednesse of this new Berose and his followers let it suffice to haue pointed at the place The true Berose was one of the Priests of Bel and at the commandement of Antiochus the third who succeeded Seleucus wrote three bookes of the Chaldean Historie so saith Tatianus Ioseph and Clemens Alexandrinus Some fragments of his we reade in Ioseph against Apion and they make flat against that other Berose published in our time Pourquoy la recerche de l'Antiquité est obscure coÌ„bien sont mal apuyez ceux qui sondent sur les etymologies allusions des mots L'allusion des mots n'est vn seur fondement Poury sur-maçonner vn ferme bastiment Veu que les monts plus hauts les riuieres plus belles Et les plus grandes mers changent bien qu'eternelles De nom à chaque coup que la posterité De celuy quibastit les murs d'vne cité N'en est point heritiere qu'ici nullerace En fief perpetuel ne possede vne place Ains qu'a ferme à louage ou par forme de prest Elle possede vn champ vn mont vne forest Et comme quand l'orage esmeut la mer profonde Migrations diuerses habitations des peuples Le flot chasse
of late from out the tombe of Leath And giu'n it as it were a liuing by a death How was 't inhabited if long agone The first obiection how is' t Nor Persians nor Greeks nor Romans euer wist Or inkling heard thereof whose euer conquering hosts Haue spred abroad so farre and troad so many coasts Or if it were of late The second obiection how could it swarme so thicke In euery towne and haue such workes of stone and bricke As passe the tow'rs of Rome th'antike Egyptian Pyramis The King Mausolus tombe the wals of Queene Semiramis How thinke you then Answer negatiue by an Ironie belike these men fell from the skie All ready-shap'd as doe the srogges rebounding frie That ast'r a sulty day about the sun-set houre Are powred on the meads by some warme Aprill-showre And entertouch themselues and swarme amid the dust All or'e the gaping clists that former drought had brust Or grew of tender slips and were in earthly lap Instead of cradle nurst and had for milke the sap Or as the Musherome the Sowbread and the Blite Among the fatter clods they start vp in a night Or as the Dragons teeth sow'n by the Duke of Thebes They brauely sprong all-arm'd from-out the fertill glebes Indeede this mighty ground The first earnest answer ycleaped Americke Was not enhabited so soone as Affericke Nor as that learned soyle tow'r-bearing louing-right Which after Iupiter his deare-beloued hight Nor as that other part which from cold Bosphers head Doth reach the pearly morne at Titons saffran bed For they much more approach the diaprized ridges And faire-endented bankes of Tegil bursting-bridges From whence our ancestors discamp'd astonished And like to Partridges were all-to-scattered Then doth that newfound world whereto Columbus bore First vnder Ferdinand the Castill armes and lore Generall But there the baildings are so huge and brauely dight So differing the states the wealth so infinite That long agone it seemes some people thither came Although not all atonce nor all by way the same For some by cloudy drift of tempest raging-sore Percase with broken barks were cast vpon the shore Some others much auoid with famine plague and warre Particular Their ancient seats forsooke and sought them new so farre Some by some Captaine led who bare a searching minde With weary ships arriu'd vpon the Westerne Inde Or could not long ere this The second the Quinsay vessels finde A way by th'Anien straight from th' one to th' other Inde As short a cut it is Colonies according to the cond Answer noting by the way certaine meruailes of the countrie as that of Hellespont From Asia to Greece or that where-ore they wont Saile from the Spanish hill vnto the Realme of Fesse Or into Sicilie from out the hau'n of Resse So from the Wastes of Tolme and Quiuer where the kine Bring calues with weathers fleece with Camels bunchie chine And haire as Genets slicke they peopled Azasie Cosse Toua Caliquas Topira Terlichie And Florida the faire Auacal Hochilega The frosen Labour-lands Canada Norumbega They sow'd ath'other side the land of Xalisco Mechuacan Cusule and founded Mexico Like Venice o're a Lake and saw astonished The greenest budding trees become all withered As soone as euer touch'd and eke a mountaine found Vesevus-like enflam'd about Nicargua ground So passing forth along the straight of Panama Vpon the better hand they first Oucanama Then Quito then Cusco then Caxamalca built And in Peruuiland a country thorow-guilt They wondred at the Lake that waters Colochim All vnder-paued salt and fresh about the brim And at the springs of Chinke whose water strongly-good Makes pebble-stones of chalke and sandy stones of mood Then Chili they possest whose riuers cold and bright Run all the day apace and rest them all the night Quinteat Patagonie and all those lower seats Whereon the foamy bracke of Magellanus beats Vpon the left they spread along by Darien side Where Huo them refresh'd then in Vraba spide How Zenu's wealthie waves adowne to Neptune rould As bid as pullets egges the massie graines of gould A mount of Emeralds in Grenad saw they shine But on Cumana banks hoodwinked weare their eyne With shady night of mist so quickly from Cumane They on to Pary went Omagu and Caribane Then by Maragnon dwelt then entred fierce Bresile Then Plata's leauell fields where flowes another Nile Moreouer The third answer one may say that Picne by Grotland The land of Labour was by Brittish Iserland Replenished with men as eke by Terminan By Tombut and Melli the shore of Corican 40 But all this other world This is the first of the foresaid questions how it came to passe that the new world discouered in these latter times could be so replenished with people as the Spaniards who haue thereof written very much did finde it He speaketh of the West India which is called another world or the new world for the hugenesse thereof being more then 9300. leagues about as Gomara saith in his Indian Historie 1. book 12. chap. it is longer then all the other three parts of the world and two or three waies as broad as Asia and Europe laid together This quarter so great and full of kingdomes and people if it haue been long agone inhabited how hap saith our Poet the Perstans Greeks and Remans who vndertooke so many far voyages came neuer there nor once heard thereof For Ptolomee Strabo Mela and other ancient writers make no mention of it and if it were peopled but of late yeares he asketh how came so many people there so many great Cities and stately monuments as Gomara Benzo Cieque Ouiede Cortes and others write of Benzo and Barthelemi de las Casas doe report that in that little the Spaniards haue there gotten within these thirtie or fortie yeares they haue slaine aboue twentie millions of people vndone and brought to great distresse as many or more and wasted and vnpeopled twice as much ground as is contained in Europe and a part of Asia to that Neuerthelesse in many places and euen in Mexico New Spaine and Peru where they haue vsed all the crueltie wickednesse and villanie that mans heart or the deuils rage could imagine there are yet liuing many thousand Indians Concerning the ancient Monuments of this new world I will reckon at this time but one of them taken out of the fourth booke and 194. chapter of Gomara There are saith he in Peru two great high-wayes â—eaching the one thorow the hilles the other ouer the plaines from Quito to Cusco which is aboue fiue hundred leagues out-right a worke so great and chargeable that it is well worthy noting that ouer the plaines is 25. foot broad and walled on either side and hath little brookes running along in it with store of the trees called Molli planted on the bankes The other is of like breadth cutting thorow the rockes and filling vp the lower grounds with stone worke for they
are both of them leuell without mounting or descending any hill and straight without stopping at any lake or poole In a word whosoeuer hath seene either of them will say it is a worke farre surpassing all the great buildings and paued causies of the Romanes or the walles of Babylon built by Queene Semyramis or those most wonderfull Pyramides of Aegypt Guaynacapa a certaine King of the Indians who liued about an hundred yeares agoe caused these waies to be repaired and enlarged but he was not the first beginner of them as some would make vs beleeue for he could not haue finished them in all his life-time and the stone-worke semes to be much more ancient There are built vpon them a daies iourney asunder many goodly Pallaces called Tambos wherein the Court and armies of the Princes wont to lodge But Gomara saith our Spanyards haue by their ciuill warres vtterly destroyed these causies and cut them asunder in many places that they might not come one to another yea the Indians themselues haue broke off and seuered their parts in time of warre Now let vs heare the Poets answer 41 What then alas belike His first answer is that the people of the West-Indies fell not out of the ayre as many little frogs doe in a warme shower framed by the vertue of the Sunne of the dust or vapours arising out of the earth nor that they grew not out of the ground like roots or plants nor by any strange or vaine inchantment as of the Serpents teeth sowne by Cadmus the Poets faine grew souldiers in compleat harnesse But these they are men well-featured stout and long-liuing chiefly in the North and South-parts of the Country where both men and women in stature strength and continuance farre excell the people of Europe Asia and Affricke The commodities they haue for health their meat drinke and dwelling their ceremonies ciuill gouernment and other properties duly noted by the Historians make very good proofe of the Poets saying 42 Indeed this mightie ground This new-found world is called America of the name of Americus Vespusius a certaine famous Pilot of Florence one of the first discouerers of the Countrey not much more than an hundred yeares agoe His second answer is that this part of the world could not be so soone inhabited as the other three because it is discoasted further from the plaine of Sennaar for in Asia the plaine it selfe was And Arabia being peopled Affrick was very neare at hand and Europe from the lesser Asia is parted but with a narrow Phare whereas America is farre beyong all these which way soeuer we coast He calleth Europe a learned Soyle tower-bearing louing-right for the number of learned men and cunning Artisans of Kingdomes and States well gouerned and Fortresses that are there That after Iupiter his deare-beloued hight lo wit Europa that was the daughter of Agenor King of Phaenicia For the prophane Poets faine their great god being in loue with her to haue taken the shape of a Bull and on his backe to haue carried her ouer Hellespont and therefore the place where he first landed her was called by her name From this fable seemes to be drawne the name of Besphore which is as much to say as Bull-ferry Perhaps this Iupiter was some notable Pirate or Tyrant there-about raigning who in a Ship called the Bull stole away some young Lady and fled for safetie into Europe These words which from cold Bosphors head Doth reach the pearly dow of Tithons saffron bed set downe the length of Asia that is from the Bosphere of Thrace vnto the East-Ocean The Castile armes and lore that is the Spanish Religion and forces which Christopher Columbus brought first into America and there planted in the name of the Spanish King 43 But there the buildings The third answer is that the stately buildings infinite treasures and diuers gouernments that are there will witnesse that the country hath beene long inhabited although hard it is to learne how I haue already spoke of the great Causeyes of Peru. Now the sumptuousnesse of Themixtetan the great Citie of the Kingdome of Mexico and the Kings Pallaces of Peru such they are described by the Spaniards make further proofe of the Poets saying As for the vncountable wealth of the Indies it plainly appeares that aboue ten thousand millions of gold haue beene brought thence into Europe beside heapes of Rubies Emerauds and Pearle much wracked in the sea and much brought for a yearely tribute into Spaine Whereunto I will adde what Franciscus Lopes de Gomara saith concerning the vnualuable riches of Guainacapa the name signifieth young and rich the father of Antibalippa last King of Peru whom the Spaniards put to death All the furniture of his house table and kitchin saith he in the 120. chapter of his fourth booke were of gold and siluer and the meanest of siluer somewhat embased with copper for the more strength He had in his Wardrop Giant-like Images of gold liuely featured as also all kinde of beasts fowles trees herbes and flowers that the Land there beareth and all kinde of fishes that either the Sea there or any fresh water of his Kingdome breedeth in the said mettals well and proportianably resembled not so much as cords paniers troughes billets and other such implements but were so to conclude there was nothing in his Kingdome whereof he had not the counfeit in gold or siluer It is also said that the Kings of Peru called Ingaes haue a garden in a certaine Isle neare Puna where they delight themselues when they list take the Sea that hath in gold and siluer all herbes slowers and trees and other things whatsoeuer meet for a pleasant garden such a sumptuous deuice as neuer was heard-of or seene elsewhere Besides all this that King last but one had gathered into Cusco huge masses of gold and siluer vnfined which the Indians hid so secretly as the Spaniards could neuer come by it there was also in and about Cusco great store of picture-tables and tombes all of sine siluer worth some thirtie some fiftie some threescore thousand Ducats a peece also dining-tables vessels and Images a great number all of fine gold The Spaniards at the taking of Antibalippa found as good as 252000. pounds of siluer and of gold 1300265. pezoes euery pezo valued at a Ducat and a halse Besides the great golden table of Antibalippa worth nigh 40000. Crownes Now for all this great spoile that the Spaniards got and hauock that they made as well in Peru as other the Prouinces there-about yet the Indians as Benzo reports who stayed there with the Spaniards fourteene yeares and wrote in three bookes worthy reading that whole story they sticke not to say they haue yet more remaining than all that the Spaniards euer had And to make their meaning plainer they will take out of a great vessel ful of wheat one grain betwixt their singers say See you this the Viracochie so they call the
of Nicaragua is by Gomara described in his fist booke chap. 203. so are the other wonders which the Poet here notes in his fourth booke chap. 194. 47 Then Chili they possest Gomara in his fourth booke chap. 131. holds opinion that the men of Chili are the right Antipodes or Counter-walkers vnto Spaine and that the country there is of the same temper with Andaluzie This Chili lyeth on the shore of el Mar Pacisico so also doth Quintete which I haue put for Chinca both neere the Panagones or Giants whose country is full of people and hath certaine riuers that runne by day and stand by night some thinke because of the snowes which in the day time are melted by the Sunne and frozen by the Moone in the night but I take it rather to be some great secret and miracle of nature The cause why here I made exchange of Chinca was first for that the Poet had spoke before of the springs of Chink which I take for the same then because it is so diuerfly placed of the Card-men for Ortelius in his Map of the New World sets it aboue and Theuet beside Chili in either place it stands well to be taken for the Chink aforenamed but Mercator placeth it a great deale lower and on the contarry coast neere the riuer of Plata where indeed is a country called Chica that perhaps hath bred this error Lastly Quintete stands so right in way which the Poet followes from Chili to the Patagones that I thought it not amisse to take the same rather then the doubtfull Chinca By the somie Brack of Magellanus he meanes the Sea and Straight of Magellan close by terra Australis Gomara describeth it well in the beginning of the third booke of his Portugall Historie The Poet hath already shewed how people came first on the North America from the kingdome of Anian ouer the maine land to the Atlantick sea shore then on all the further coasts from Quiuir to the Magellan Straight along the Archipelago de San Lazaro Mar del Zur Pacifico and now hee takes the higher side on the left hand from the Land-Straight of Panama to the riuer of Plata which is not farre from the Magellan noting by the way the most note-worthy places of all this huge reach of ground represented as it is by our late writers in their generall and particular Maps of the New-found world Huo is a great sweat-water streame arising at Quillacingas that lieth vnder the Equator and running athwart the country called Caribage into the Sea at Garra Vraba is the country that lieth betwixt that riuer and Carthagene Concerning Zenu marke what Gomara saith thereof in his second booke and 69. chapter It is the name of a Riuer and Citie both and of a Hauen very large and sure The Citie is some 8. leagues from the Sea There is a great Mart for Salt and Fish Gold the inhabitants gather all about and when they set themselues to get much they lay sine-wrought nets in the riuer of Zenu and others and oftentimes they draw-vp graines of pure gold as big as eggs This country is not farre from the Straight of Darien In the said second booke chap. 72. He describes also Noua Grenada and the Mount of Emeraudes which is very high bare and peeld without any herbe or tree thereon growing and lyeth some fiue degrees on this side the Equator The Indians when they goe-about to get the stones first vse many enchauntments to know where the best veine is The first time the Spaniards came there they drew thence great and little 1800. very faire and of great price but for this commoditie the country is so barren that the people were faine to feed on Pismers till of late the Spanish couetousnesse hath made them know the value of their Mountaine Cumana is described in the foresaid booke chap. 79. in the end whereof Gomara saith the vapours of the riuer Cumana engender a certaine little mist or slime vpon mens eyes so as the people there are very pore-blind Parie is described in the 84 chapter of the said second booke Maragnon a Riuer which as Gomara saith 2 booke 87 chapter is threescore miles ouer It emprieth at the Cape of Alinde three degrees beyond the Aequator but springeth a great way further South by Tarama in Peru thence running Eastward it casteth only an Arme into the Amazon about Picora Which hath caused many the first writers of America to count from that place both but one riuer So also doth our Poet here otherwise he would haue msntioned first how the people passed the Amezon that other great streame now knowne by the name of Orenoque which riseth about Carangui and emptieth as Theuet saith 104. leagues aboue the mouth of Maragnon Bresile which the Spaniard discouered in the yeare 1504. is surnamed fierce because of the Canibales Caribes and other man-eating people there I. de Leri hath written very fully all the historie of his aduenture in part of the country where dwell the people called Toupinamboes The riuer of Plata the Indians call Paranagacuc which word importeth as much as a great water Gomara speaking thereof in the 89. chapter of his second booke saith In this riuer is found siluer pearles and other things of great price It containes in breadth 25. leagues making many Islands and swels like Nilus and about the selfe-same time It springeth first out of the mountaines of Peru and is after increased by the infall of many riuers for the country thereabout is leuell or slat whereof it seemes to haue receiued the name of Plate Thus the Poet guesseth at the manner of this new-found worlds empeopling by the coast of Asia Whereunto I will adde what Arias Mont that learned Spaniard hath written thereof in his booke entituled Phaleg He saith Ioktan the double pety-sonne of Sem that is whose double grandfather Sem was had thirteene sonnes which are named by Moses in the 10. of Genesis and some of them peopled the West Indies from the East That which Moses saith Genesis 10. chap. 30. vers concerning Sephar a mountaine of the East Arias applies to the great hills of Peru which the Spaniards call Andes they reach out further in length then any other in the world and neere them stands an ancient towne called Iuktan Moreouer there lies higher a neere-Isle betwixt Cuba and Mexico called Iukatas which may bee thought to resemble still the name of him that first brought people into the country To Ophir one of the sonnes of Ioktan Arias allots the land of Peru for as much as in the third chapter and six verse of the second booke of Chron. there is mention made of the gold of Paruaim To Iobab the country of Paria which is neere the Straight of Panama very â—iâ—h also in gold and pearle I haue said else-where that Arias Montanus tooke Asia to be all one main-land with America and knew no Anian Straight If that be true sure the
may aske How falls it out that the Nations of the world comming all of one father Noe doe varie so much one from another both in body and minde The Poet therefore making this obiection most worthy to be considered giueth also answer thereunto first in generall by way of exclamation and maruaile then in particular manner setting downe some speciall reasons of this wonderfull diuersitie that appeareth in the stature complexion strength colour and custome of people wheresoeuer dispersed ouer the face of the earth The first and principall cause is Nature it selfe that is the wise prouidence of God maruellous in all his workes If God had made the earth in all places alike all flowers of one colour and sauour all beasts fowles fishes and creeping things of one kinde had he made the heauen without starres or the starres all of one bignesse and men all of the same hew beauty feature strength and disposition as well of bodie as minde the diuers colours of his infinite wisdome had not so shined in them But as he is aboue all yea onely wise good and beautifull so would he in his workes keepe a certaine resemblance of his owne perfection prouoking vs thereby daily to aduance and raise our thoughts vnto the high consideration perfect loue and due reuerence of himselfe Now if we consider all his workes the light of his wonderfull glory no where appeareth more then in the diligent view of Man who is very fitly called of the Greekes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the little world For in this little table hath he lymbed-out in orient colours for all that will behold the wonders of his vnsearchable wisdome and they are here some of them by the Poet well pointed-out And a wonderfull thing indeed it is that among so many men as haue beene since the beginning are or shall be to the worlds end there neuer was nor is nor can be any one but differing much from all the rest both in bodie and minde and in many things else that ensue thereon This I am content to note but in a word leauing all the particulars of this miracle for the Reader priuatly to consider that he may wonder the more thereat and praise there-according th' almighty Creator the Soueraigne Good neither will I now take in hand to dispute against those that in searching the causes of this diuersitie ascribe all to Fortune or Nature as they call it meaning a secret propertie and power of the creatures or to the starres and other heauenly bodies to mans lawes custome or nourishment in stead of God who is indeed the first and only working cause of all things in whom we liue moue and are This matter would require a long discourse and though the Poet here beside the chiefe and only tine cause reckoneth certaine vnder-causes as custome growing to Nature th' example of Elders prouinciall Lawes and the influence of Stars it is not his meaning to take from the Lord of Nature this honour due vnto him for the diuersitie of his wonderfull works but only to lay open vnto vs a few such instruments as his incomprehensible wisdome vseth to make vs the better conceiue the manner of his heauenly working The Philosophers Astronomers Physicians and Politicks discourse at large vpon these differences he that would see them well handled let him reade the fift chapter of Bodines Method entituled de recto historiarum indicio and the first chapter of his fift booke de Republica which is the summe of all that he writes thereof in his Method Peucer also in the 13. and 14. bookes of his discourse vpon the principall sorts of diuinations and Hippocrates in his booke de Aëre aquis locis but especially Bodin may ferue to expound our Poet who in very few lines hath penned matter of so long discourse 59 The Northen man He entreth consideration of many points wherein the North and Southerne people differ Bodin in the places afore-quoted shewes the causes thereof according to Philosophie and Physicke because his bookes are common specially his Politicks I will not here set downe what he saith nor examine his opinions but leaue that wholly to the diligent Reader Concerning that the Poer noteth the best Histories auerre the same and namely for the Southerne people Iohannes Leo and Franciscus Aluares for the Northen Olaus Magnus the Baron of Herbestan in his Muscouie Buchanan in the historie of Scotland and diuers others 60 The Middle Man Bodm in the fift booke of his Politickes the first chapter diuideth all people dwelling on this side the Aequator into 3. kinds to wit the hot and Southerne people from the Aequator 30. degrees vpward the Meane and temperate in the next 30. and the Extreame cold and Northen people from the 60. degree to the Pole And so of the nations and countries beyond the Aequator The reason hereof he setteth downe in his Method chap. 5. 61 For in the sacred close The Poet goes on according to the said diuision and in few words implies all that discourse of Bodin who saith among other matters there that the people dwelling in the middle Regions haue more strength and lesse wit then the Southerne better parts of minde and lesse bodily force then the Northen and are moreouer the fittest for gouernment of Common-wealths and iustest in their actions And if a man doe marke well the histories of the world he shall finde that the greatest and most valiant Armies came euer out of the North the deepest and subtilest knowledge of Philosophie Mathematickes and all other contemplatiue Arts from the South and the best gouernment the best lawes Lawyers and Orators from the Middle countries and that the greatest Empires were founded and established there c. What reason there is for this he sheweth also in his fift chap. of his Meth. Looke more thereof in L. Regius de vicissitudine varietate rerum For my part I am of opinion that Almighty God as he hath knit and bound together the Elements and Creatures made of them with a maruellous compasse in number weight and measure best for continuance of the whole worke and mutuall agreement of the parts so hee hath also placed the chiefe subtiltie and liuely-hood of spirit farthest from the greatest bodily force either in beast or man for the better maintenance of humane societie in a iust counterpoys and gaue the middle kinde of people a nature of either tempered though if a man enter into particular discourse he may easily finde the northerne southerne and middle Nature in euery Nation What say I euery Nation nay I dare say in euery one of vs so fitly is Man called a little world But the southerne men for the most part hauing so quick and liuely parts of minde in a bodie lesse charged with flesh they represent the contemplatiue and studious kinde of life the northerne that haue their vvit in their fingers ends that is that are so cunning craftesmen inuenters of warlike engins artillerie and
be seene in Syria This doth Iosephus report vpon heare-say which the Poet termes an old Tradition or Cabala Thus Josephus thrusts-in many things among his Antiquities that haue no good ground but are taken vpon trust of the Caballists and Rabbins who neuer considering the maiestie and sufficiencie of holy Scripture thought to helpe out and adorne it with fillets and labels of their owne Many learned men thinke that Noe and his sonnes had the Arts well setled in their mindes and the Arke is a sufficient proofe of Noes skill in Arithmetike and Geometrie but the Reader may if he will ascribe the inuention to Noes predecessors so doth the Poet following the opinion of Iosephus For the rest he giues the whole discourse of Mathematikes to Heber and Phaleg because the earth being in their time diuided it was requisite that these Arts were knowne to be carried euery way for comfort and helpe of Colonies in peopling the world Cylinderwise it lay So I translate that is along the ground like a rouller supposing the waters had ouerthrowne it 3. Seth. Polidore Virgil in his first booke de Inuentoribus rerum chap. 14.17.18 19. speakes of the first finders-out of the liberall Sciences alledging the testimonie of diuers Authors But it came neuer into his minde to deriue all from the spring-head as here the Poet hath done who shewes with great probabilitie that Adam being endowed with excellent knowledge of hidden things concerning both great and little world taught it his sonne and schollar Seth and others that conuersed with him who also conueyed it ouer to their descendants And this was not hard to be done considering the long life of them all So the true Cabala of inheritance left to posteritie was the instruction which they receiued one from other by word of mouth and this might be so continued from father to sonne as it need not be graued in brick or stone But sithence the Poet was content to set-out the opinion of Iosephus rather then his owne I le say no more against it The meanes and order kept by Seths posteritie to continue the knowledge of the Mathematicks was not all of one sort though the Poet propounds but one which was very likely 4. Thus hauing said he went That is Heber Poets missing sometime the certaine truth are wont yet to stand-vpon that is likely wherefore this our Author hauing before spoke-of the pillar of stone which stood still vpright brings-in Heber opening the doore thereof by a sleight and finding therein a burning lampe or candle This secret of burning lamps of some vnquenchable stone or other matter of that nature hath beene vsed in the world long agoe and proued true by diuers ancient sepulchers found vnder the ground Selinus in his 12. chap. saith there is in Arcadia a certaine stone of the colour of Iron which once set a fire cannot be quenched and therefore is called Asbeslos which signifies as much Plutarch in the beginning of his booke De cessatione Oraculorum saith as much of the vnquenchable lampe in the Temple of Jupiter Hammon which was the most ancient and of most renowme among the Chamites who soone fell from the true Religion Plinie in the first chapter of his 19. booke tells also a great maruaile of a kinde of linnen cloth which consumes not in the fire I thinke the immediate successors of Adam and Noe had knowledge of many secrets in Nature which we now would thinke incredible impossible or altogether miraculous if we saw the experience thereof 5. As when a priuate man By an excellent comparison the Poet here describes the affection that Phaleg had to vnderstand these things and so makes way to his discourse of the Mathematike Arts which he faines to be sisters and one much like another because they are all composed as it were of numbers concords and proportions which by Addition Multiplication Substraction and Diuision doe bring forth great varietie of rare and dainty secrets 6. My sonne He shewes in few words the iust commendation of these Liberall Sciences called here Virgins because of their simplicitie and puritie Daughters of Heauen because they are placed in the vnderstanding the principall facultie of our soule which is from Heauen though the vnderstanding adorned with Mathematikes doe many times bring forth effects which depart farther and farther from their spring-head and so by little and little fall among the Mechanicks or Handycrafts He saith also further that these foure Sciences are the fairest which that one Spirit issuing from two that is the Holy Ghost proceeding from the Father and the Sonne did euer beget or mans soule conceiue he speaks this only of such gifts as the Holy Ghost hath imparted vnto men for the maintenance of their societie For what were the life of man if it had neither number waight nor measure neither sight nor hearing well gouerned as needs it must be while it wants the Mathematikes whose due praise and profit ensuing with what other Arts depend thereon you may reade at large in the Prefaces before Euclideâ— especially in one of Christopher Clanius and another of our English Iohn Dee 7. She there The learned differ concerning the order and disposition of these foure Arts some set Geometrie in the first place Arithmeticke in the second Musicke in the third and Astronomie last Others cleane contrary Our Author hath followed the most receiued opinion Reade Scaliger against Cardan Exer. 321. The chiefe thing is to consider well the bounds and coherences of these Arts that we neither confound nor seuer them among themselues nor mingle them with others for this doing sometimes hath brought most dangerous errours both into Church and Common-wealth To proceed In this description which the Poet makes of Arithmetikes both habit and gesture we may see what is required to the right vnderstanding that abstract Arte now adayes farre out of the way or soyled with grosse materials 8. Vnitie In fortie verses or thereabouts the Poet hath set downe the grounds of infinite Arithmeticall secrets He that will search what the ancient and late Authors haue written shall finde matter enough for a good thicke booke I speake here but briefly so much as may serue for vnderstanding the text leauing the rest to a larger Commentarie First he calls Vnitie or One the root of all numbers because euery number great and small ariseth from One. Secondly he calls it also the root of Infinitie for the greatest numbers and such as vnto vs are vncountable or infinite what are they but multiplied Vnities Thirdly he tearmes Vnitie True friendships deare delight because the faithfull louer delights in one onely and seeks no more Fourthly The renowme of Harmonie which tends to one sweet consort of diuers voyces Fiftly The seed-plot of all that is because by one spice or kinde of man beast fish fowle c. was filled the whole world Sixtly he calls it the Aime of Polymnie I thinke by this he meanes the intent that all learned men
haue in their discourses by word or writing to tend alwayes to some one certaine point or end as the only marke they aime or leuell-at Let the Reader finde out some better note hereupon for mine owne scarse contents me Seuenthly this Vnitie is said to be no number because a number taken as it is commonly for a name of multitude is composed of many vnities and more then number because it giues a being to all numbers and thus it hath a power to comprehend all numbers and is actually in all Let vs adde a word more to the praise of Vnitie God is one and the Church of many gathered together is but one yea there was but one Creator one world one man for of him was the woman framed one language before the confusion of Babel one Law one Gospell one Baptisme one Supper of the Lord one hope one loue one Paradise one life euerlasting Concerning the diuers significations of one and other numbers in holy Scripture I forbeare to speake because the Poet makes no plaine mention thereof But this I note further that out of these verses so artificially couched together nothing can be drawne which may any way seeme to fauour their vaine speculations who goe about to build vpon numbers the rules of Religion and such as are of force to establish or ouerthrow Common-wealths and least of all hath any support or rellyance for Arithmanticall Cheaters Magicians and other like mischiefes of the world who abusing the passages of holy Scripture where numbers are vsed thinke they haue found therein the way to foretell what is to come or power to raise vp Spirits and in a word to practise many things vnlawfull which the curious and profane haue taught by their bookes published in Print but let their names bee buried in euerlasting silence 9. Twaine The Pythagorians called the number of two or twaine Isis and Diana because as Diana was barren saith Plato in his Thâ—â—teâ—us so Two being the head and beginning of Diuersitie and vnlikenesse hath no such power as other numbers haue It is the father of numbers huen which the Poet calles esseminate because they bring forth nothing but are cause rather of the ruine of Vnitie For to diuide a thing is to destroy it as Aristotle argues very punctually in the eight Booke of his Metaphysickes Plutarch in his Treatise of the Soules creation saith that Zaratas the Master of Pythagoras called Two the mother of Numbers and One the father whereof he yeelds a reason which our Author hath in a word 10. Three Some account Three the first of all numbers for as for Two the Pythagorians doe not vouchsafe it the name of a number but call it a confounding of Vnities which are to speake properly no numbers but the roots and beginnings of numbers I will say nothing here of the praise of Three set downe by Plutarch in his Treatise of Isis and Osiris and elsewhere nor yet what say the Poets whose Chiefe hath this Numero Deus impare gaudet meaning not an odde number whatsoeuer as Fiue or Seuen but only Three which is the first of all the odde numbers and makes in Geometry of three surfaces only the first body that hath length breadth and thicknesse called a Triangle The Pythagoreans call this kinde of Solide Minerua and in their purifications and washings doe vse much the number of Three Virgil also toucheth vpon this secret in the 6. of his Aeneids Thus Idem ter socios purâ circumtulit vndâ and in the first of his Georg. thus Terque nouas circum saelix cat hoslia fruges And Ouid. 2. Fast thus Et digitis tria thura tribus sublimine ponit And in the 6. Protinus arbuteâ postes terin ordine tangit Fronde ter arbuteâ lamina fronde notal Infinite authorities haue we to this purpose to name one Plinie saith in translating I searched out the place Nat. Hist 28.4 Ternâ despuere deprecatione in omni medicinâ mes suit atque ex hec effectus adiuâ—are But for as much as this and the like fauours of superstition and witchcraft I leaue it and for beare also to shew further how curiously some apply this number vnto diuers mysteries of Religion contenting my selfe onely to expound the Poets words First hee saith it is a number proper vnto God and I thinke he meanes it of the holy Trinitie Father Sonne and Holy Ghost which is one true God for of nothing else can it be said that Three are One and One is Three Againe he saith it is the eldest brother of all the Odde numbers but of that wee spoke before Thirdly he saith that in this number Three is No number and Number well met Then he saith further it is a number well beloued of Almightie God I translate it Heau'ns fauour winning and it hath respect either to the sore-alledged place of Virgil or rather to the effects that God worketh in his creatures which would make a large Commentary for the number of three hath beene obserued by some in the Order of Angels sent downe vnto Men in Men themselues in Sciences in Vertues and other things so many as can hardly be numbred Moreouer he saith the number Three hath a Center and two Extremities of equall distance one from another which is easie to be vnderstood for the Center of Three is the second Vnitie which is equally distant from the first and the third and by this reason also is it the first of all number that hath End Middle and Beginning which is also very plaine to conceiue 11 Foure The Cube or perfect Square body in Geometrie hath a piedestall or base of foure corners and is the most perfect of Solide bodies representing stedfastnesse continuance and vertue whereof came the prouerbe of Homo quadratus not square faced like the Chinois Trigault in expedit one Iesuitica but a man disposed and dealing squarely a man sound constant and vertuous Reade Pierius his Exposition of this number with the rest before and after it I haue said much thereof in my Commentaries vpon the Quartaines of le Sieur de Pybrac Expos 39. where he saith that Truth is framed of a perfect Cube Now to the rest of our Poets words Secondly then he ascribes to the number of Foure this property that with his owne contents which are one two three he makes vp I en this is plaine Thirdly he saith it is the number of the name most to be feared that is the name of God For the Hebrues write the name of God with foure letters and say it is vn-vtterable and pronounce euer Adonai for Ichoua which name the Diuines call Tetragramaton Iohn Reuelm hath discoursed largely thereof in his Cabala and in his bookes de Verbo Mirifico Other Nations also haue giuen to God a name of foure letters The Assyrians Adad the Aegyptians Amun the Persians Syre the old Romans Aius the Greekes ΘΕΟΣ the Mahumetans Alla the Goths Thor the Spaniards Dios the Italians Idio the