great ones are two fingers thick the smaller but one Those are four hands breadth long these but three they make a sharp noise Apothecaries shut them up in glasses and hang them down from a beam and feed them with bread for a long time Sometimes they come forth of Rivers that run in Fenny grounds and come far into the Land by the veins of the banks and sometimes into Cellars Theophrastus writes That in Caves they feel nothing because their senses are stupified but when they are boyl'd in a pot and when they are dug up they will stirre In a certain River of the East-Indies there are fishes call'd Tuberones they are so greedy that one of them catcht at a man standing on the side of the Ship and first bit off his foot and next his hand Linschotten in Navigat It is almost incredible that the same man writes namely That a Ship coming from Mozambique went backward 14 dayes though the wind were good for it and nothing to hinder it and that was found by every dayes observation of the Suns heighth And when the doubtful Marriners enquired for the cause of it and thought they had been bewitched at last a fish was found under the Ship and they collected that this fish carried the Ship on his back the contrary way against the force of the wind For so soon as with much ado they had driven this fish away they sailed forward very well The History is painted in the Palace of the Deputy-King of Goanum with the Name of the Pilote the Year and the Month. Blefhenius writes in his description of Islandia That in the Island Sea there is a Monster the name he knowes not but they take it to be a kind of Whale when he puts his head above the Sea he doth so fright men that they will fall down almost dead He hath a head is four square flaming eyes and it is fenced about with black horns His body is black and set about with black feathers If he be seen at Night at any time his eyes seem fiery that all his head that is thrust above the Sea may be seen by it Olaus l. 12. makes mention of it and saith it is 12 cubits long So much for Fish The End of the Ninth Classis OF THE DESCRIPTION Of Naturall VVonders The Tenth Classis Wherein are set down the Wonders of MAN WHosoever thou art that dost unjustly determine the condition of Man consider how great things our Mother Nature hath given unto us how much more strong Creatures are under our subjection how we can catch those that are much more swifter than our selves that nothing that is mortal is not under our power We have received so many Vertues so many Arts and lastly a Soul swifter than the Stars for it will out-run them in their motions that are to be performed many years after and in one moment penetrates into whatsoever it is intent about Seneca CHAP. I. Of Man in generall HItherto I have described irrational living Creatures Man followes next of whom we shall speak in order according to his actions natural vital animal and rational And first of his proportion This is so excellent and admirable that it cannot be more The body of Adam was made out of the Earth and ours of 3. small drops of seed and as much blood poured forth like milk and framed like to cruddled cheefe of the same matter are so many and so divers parts made The whole structure consists of above 200 bones to support it and as many cartilages all the joynts are smeered with all are joyn'd together with many ligaments and cloathed with innumerable membranes the vast mass of the members are watered with above 30 paire of nervs as with little cords and all the parts are sprinkled with as many arteries as with water pipes filld with foming blood and vital Spirits the empty places are filled up and the entralls covered with almost 400 Muscles and flesh of divers sorts as with flocks and lastly all is covered about with skin The Image of God is in it his mind represents the same and it hath included in it the forces and temperament of all the creatures You shall find many men that have an Ostrich stomack many that have the Lyons Heart not a few have the heart of a Dogg many of a Sow and infinite there are that are like the Asse by nature Alexander the Great had such a symmetry of humours that his spirits and humours and also his dead body smelt as sweet as natural balsom because in man as in the Centre as in a knot or little bundle the original and seminary cause of all creatures lye bound up Vegetables are nourished and increased by the balsom-like Spirits of Mineralls animals of vegetables and by them of mineralls but man for whom all things were created is nourished and augmented by the balsamick spirits of animals vegetables and mineralls wherefore there is reason that he should consist of all â—hese Wherefore in man there do flowrish and produce fruit that are messengers of health or sicknesse both the balme violets Germander namely the Spirits of the Heart Brain and Liver the Nettle Wake-Robin Crowfoot as Pushes Scabs Creeping sores Also there are wrought in man mineral separations that appeare in paroxysms of Vitriol Alum Salt of Gemma of the Colcothat Tartar as the Leprosy Elephantiasis Morphew Cancer discovering themselves in several Tinctures and Signatures Nor are aqueal generations wanting as Gold Silver Tin Copper Iron Lead the Heart Brain Liver Reins Stomach There are found in our bodies Mines out of which stones are dug the stones of the Bladder and Kidneys not to build but to destroy the house The head is the Fort of mans mind the seat of reason the habitation of Wisdom and the shop of memory judgment and cogitations possessing the highest place doth it not represent the uppermost and angelicall part of the World You have the middle and the Caelestial part in the Thorax and in the middle belly exactly set forth For as when the Sun riseth the upper parts are enlightned and all the lower parts are enlivened but contrarily when the Sun departs they grow cold and tend to ruine so by the perpetuall motion of the heart and by the vital heat thereof all things flourish and there is a plentifull harvest of rejoycing to be perceived but when that is darkned by cares sorrows fears and other Clowds all the parts are debilitated and at last dye Who sees not the sublunary part of the World expressed in the lower belly In it are containd the parts that serve for nutrition concoction and procreation Perhaps you will want the Dukedome of the Planets in this little world Behold the flowing marrow of the brain represents the moystning power of the Moon the genital parts serve for Venus the Instruments of eloquence and comelinesse do the office of witty Mercury the Sun and the Heart hold the greatest proportion Man's Liver the
Ayre is contrary But examples will hardly make that good In the Navigations of the Portugalls some Marriners under the Equinoctiall had allmost breathed their last though it were in the middle of the Sea and a in a most open ayre And when we were present saith Scaliger Exercit 31. some Italians of Lipsia in the Stoves were like to swound and you may remember from Histories concerning the death of King Cocal Wheat in Syria laid close in Mows corrupts not but is spoild shut up in Barnes if the Windows be open it takes no harme Artic. 2. Of the Infection of the Ayre The Ayre doth not allwaies retain its own qualities it is infected somtimes with hurtful things They that go out of the Province of Peru into Chila thorow the Mountains meet with a deadly ayr and before the passengers perceive it their limbs fall from their bodies as Apples fall from Trees without any corruptions Liburius de Origine rerum In the Mount of Peru Pariacacca the ayr being singular brings them that go up in despair of their lives It causeth vomit so violent that the blood follows it afflicts them most that ascend from the Sea and not only Man but Beasts are exposed to the danger It is held to be the highest and most full of Snow in the World and in three or four houres a man may passe over it In the Mountains of Chilium a Boy sustained himself three dayes lying behind a multitude of Carcases so that at last he escaped safe from the Venomous blasts In a Book concerning the proper causes of the Elements it is written that a wind killed the people in Hadramot The same Authour reports that the same thing hapned in the time of King Philip of Macedo that in a certain way between two Mountaines at a set hour what horseman soever past he fell down ready to die The cause was not known The foot were in the same condition untill one Socrates by setting on high a steel Looking-Glasse beheld in both Mountains two Dragons casting their venomous breath one at the other and whatsoever this hit upon died Liban l. cit But the true cause of this mischief was a mineral ayr stuft with nitrous and other metallick Spirits Such a one is found in some Caves of Hungary and Sweden and we know that the Common Saltpeter is full of Spirits it is moved dangerously and forcibly if fire be put to it and cast into water it cools them much But that bodies corrupt not that we ascribe to cold but it may be attributed to the Spirits of cold by mixture such as are in some Thunder-bolts for the bodies of living Creatures killed by them do not easily corrupt and they last long unlesse some more powerfull cause coming drive it out Artic. 3. Of the Putrefaction of the Ayr. THe Pestilence comes from putrefaction of the ayr which in respect of divers constitutions is divers It is observed that there never was any at Locris or Croto Plin. l. 2.99 So in that part of Ethiopia which is by the black Sea In Mauritania it ruins all It lasted so long somtimes at Tholouse and in that Province that it continued seven years It perseveres so long and oftimes amongst the Northern people and rageth so cruelly that it depopulates whole Countries Scaliger exercit 32. It is observed in the Southern parts that it goes toward the Sun setting and scarse ever but in winter and lasts but three months at most In the year 1524 it so raged at Millan that new baked bread set into the ayr but one night was not only musty but was full of Worms those that were well died in 6 or 8 hours Cardan de rer varietat l. 8. c. 45. In the year 1500 it destroyed 30000 at London somtimes 300000 at Constantinople and as many in the Cities of the Vandalls all the autumne thorow In Petrarchs dayes it was so strong in Italy that of 1000 Men scarse ten remained Alsted in Chronolog But that in divers Countries it works so variously on some men and severall Creatures that proceeds from the force of the active causes and the disposition of the passive Forest. l. 6. observ de Febre If the active cause from the uncleanness of the Earth or water be not strong it only affects those beasts that are disposed for such a venome but if it be violent it ceazeth on Mankind yet so that of its own nature it would leave neither Countrey not Cittie nor Village nor Town free This layes hold on men in one place only But if the active force be from a superiour cause or be from the ayr corrupted below Mankind alone are endangered by it But if both a superiour and an inferiour cause concur then may all living Creatures be infected with the Plague yet it must be according to the disposition of their bodies Artic. 4. Of Attraction cooling and penetrating of the Ayr. NO man almost is ignorant but that the Ayr serves for the Life of man for the branches of arteria venosa drink in blood from the whole Lungs brought to them by the arteria venosa and it is made more pure in them The Ayr drawn in at the mouth is mingled with the blood and this mixture is carried to the left ventricle of the heart to be made spirituous blood Ludovi du Gardin Anatom c. 40. But being drawn in heaps it strangles Zwinger Physiol l. 2. c. 23. For if you compasse a burning Candle in the open ayr with wine from above you put it out because it cannot attract the Ayr prepared on each side by reason the wine is betwixt and it cannot from below draw the crude and unprepared Ayr. The desaphoretick force of it will appear in an Egg when that is new a pure spirit sweats through its shell whilest it rosts like unto dew What will this do in the body of man It will make that full of chinks if it be touched by a small heat otherwise it fills and penetrates all things It pierceth thorow a brick and there it inflates the concocted lime so that the quantity of it is increased till it break it We see that the Ayr entring by the pores of a baked brick doth swell a stone that was left there for want of diligence and is turned into Lime and so puts it up till the brick breaks Zwinger Phys. l. 2. c. 25. Farther it is concluded by certain observation That a wound is easie or hard to cure by reason of the Ayr. In Fenny grounds wounds of the head are soon cured but Ulcers of the Legs are long Hence it is that wounds of the head are light at Bonnonia and Paris but wounds of the Legs are deadly at Avignon and Rome There the Ayr is of a cold constitution and is an enemy to the brain here it is more hot whereby the humours being melted run more downwards Paâ—aeâ—s l. 10. Chirurg c. 8. It may be cooled 9 wayes by frequent ventilating of it with a fan
he read and preached openly Furthermore being made Doctor of the Laws in the University of Colen he read there and expounded the Civil and Canon Law repeating by heart the texts which he had never read and at last died at Colen in the yeare 1492. We will conclude this Chapter with an example of one borne blind in whom nature made supplie of that defect with a marvelous recompence other ways The story is mentioned by Antonius de Palermo thus I learnt saith he of King Alphonsus that there was a Sicilian borne blind living still at that time in the Citie Gergento called in old time Agrigentum who had followed him oftentimes a hunting shewing to the Hunts-men who had their sights well ynough the retraits and repairing places of the wild beasts He added further touching the industry of this blind man that having by his sparing and scraping gotten together about five hundred Crowns which put him to a great deale of care he resolved at last to hide them in a field As he was making a hole in the ground to that end a gossip of his being his neighbour espied him who so soon as the blind man was gon searched in the earth found the money and caried it cleane away Two or three dayes after the blind man returning thither to visit his cash and finding nought there like one altogether forlorne he frets and torments himselfe and after much debating and discoursing concludes that no man but his gossip could have played him such a trick Whereupon finding him out he thus began to say unto him Gossip I am come to you to have your opinion I have a thousand Crowns and the one half of them I have hid in a safe place and for the other halfe I know not what to do with them having not my sight and being very unfit to keep any such thing therefore what think you might I not hide this other halfe with the rest in the same place of safetie The gossip approved and commended his resolution and going speedily to the place carried back againe the five hundred Crowns that he had taken away before hoping that he should have all the whole thousand together A while after the blind man goes to his hole and finding there his Crowns againe took them up and comming home calleth for his gossip saying unto him with a cheerfull voice Gossip the blind man hath seen better than he that hath two eyes Article 9. Of Nations of divers forms WHat I said in the 8th Article of Monstrous Births happens but seldom yet some thought that happened commonly amongst some Nations Not far from the Troglodites in Aethiopia there is a people that have no heads and their eyes are in their breasts Augustine saw them Serm. ad Fratr in Eremo Solinus confirms it c. 53. Pliny l. 5. c. 8. In Peru in the Province of Caraqui Hispalensis sayes they want the forepart and hinder part of the head Sylvius p. 5. c. 35. For he adds That so soon as they are born they make their heads level with boards Rawleigh in his Navigations to Guiana speaks of some that are call'd Epumerocaci The Circades a people beyond Taprobana are long visaged with horse heads if we credit Arrianus Ramus tom 1. In the Mountains of the Indies they have Dogs heads and claws and hides like beasts they cannot speak but bark saith Megastenes Aelian l. 10. c. 26. saith they are in Egypt in the way to Ethiopia and he describes them that they are black visaged having no voyce they make a thrill noise and their chin is so far beneath their beards that it is like to a Serpent They live by hunting Oxen and Does Augustin de civitate Dei l. 16. c. 6. thinks that is not incredible Amongst the Scythians there are some with such large ears that they will cover all their bodies Isidor l. 11. c. 3. Some have their feet so broad that they can shadow their whole bodies with them when they lie down from the heat I may here adde that there are Sea-Men Anno 1403 a Sea-Woman was taken in the Lake of Holland and brought to Harlem she was ready to learn some things that women do but she could not speak Anno 1526 in Frisland a Sea-Man was taken with a beard and hairy he lived some years but could never speak Libav l. 6. de universitat rerum And not long since when the Denmark Ambassadors sail'd into Norway they saw a man in the Sea that had a swathband of corn they took him and put him into the Ship and he dyed they cast him into the Sea again and he revived Historians approved do write these things We will not here add what we think onely the Devill hath many wiles and great is the force of Imagination and sometimes beasts are taken for men if they be but like them We read in the Scotch History that the Kings Embassadours were brought by a storm into Norway and saw hairy beasts in the Mountains wandring like to men they thought they had been men the Inhabitants told them they were wild beasts Let every man think what he please I may have occasion to speak more of this elsewhere Article 10. Of a wonderfull Antipathy betweeen the Father and the Sonne THere was a Father that hated his child as much as some men do Cats for if he were present though he saw him not he would swoond Georgius Mylius a Divine of Jena related it Libavius sought the cause diligently And if the reason of antipathy in naturall things be worth enquiry that is most worthy to be searched out that is between children and parents This is certain that the cause of this discord cannot be found nor in the rational nor the sensual part For he wished his son no harm nor can sympathy or antipathy be called love or hatred in parents For they are to be found in things that are not living and if they be in living creatures they are not in them as they are living but as they are natural things Yet because he did not abhor his other son nor hate his off-spring for which cause he married it is certain that was no hereditary infirmity It is probable the son was changed into a disposition the father could not away with and that might proceed from the seminary body ill disposed from the womb or by the confluence of impure blood that had in it some ground for this alteration or from the blood the Embryo was nourished with For this growes divers from the matter of the nourishment or may degenerate from some other inward cause or from the place sometimes the spirits that assist the blood and the whole nature cause a change Therefore either the mother had a great longing for some meat the father hated or else she was frighted at something the father could not endure To say nothing of the Midwife or of hidden causes So a Maid at Uratislavian drank Cats blood and became of a Cats qualities and
hardly extinguish flames and it is easily 〈…〉 that are washed in it are quickly dryed 3. 〈…〉 as Britanny and France hotter V. The Sea is not onely salt but bitter therefore it is 〈…〉 called Mare than Sâ—â—um VI. The salt and bitternesse of the Sea iâ— from a subterraneal 〈…〉 fire 1. Bitumen is perceived so bitter in taste that it may be known to be the first subject of it 2. Bitumen hath great force to cause iâ— salt and bitter taste The bituminous Lake of Palestina is so salt and bitter that no Fish is bred in it it scours cloaths if one wet them and shake it well out 3. Pliny reports that a bituminous water thaâ— is also salt at Babylon is cast out of their Wells into salt Piâ—â— and is thickned partly into Bitumen partly into Salt VII A salt Exhalation proceeding froâ—â—hose Deâ—pâ— iâ— easily divided by the body of the Sea For as fine flower or 〈…〉 thing else casâ— into 〈…〉 boyling liquor is cast from the place that boyls unto other parts 〈…〉 on one side to the other if in the middle to the circumference 〈…〉 bituminous Exhalation from thence where it boyleth most and the Sea is most hot is cast and dispell'd into the whole body of it So 〈…〉 Artic. 5. Of the Ebbing and Flowing of the Sea ANother great miracle of Nature is the Ebbing and Flowing of the Sea When the Philosopher sought for the cause of it hâ— grew desperate Possidonius in Strabo l. 3. Geograph makes 3. Circuits of the Sea's motion The diurnall monethly and yearly The first is when the Moon is risen above the Horizon but one sign of the Zodiack or is gone down under the Horizon then the Sea swells untill the Moon comes to the midst of the Heaven 〈…〉 it above or beneath the Earth When it declines from thence the Sea begins to retire untill the Moon is but one sign distant from the East or West and then it stops Pliny assents thus far to him that the flowing of the Sea begins about two equinoctiall hours after the rising or setting of the Moon and ends just so long before its setting or rising He determines the other to be monethly in the conjunction when he saith That the greatest and quickest returnings of the Sea do happen about the new and full Moon the mean about the Quarters of the Moon And Marriners approve this when they call it the Living Sea by reason of the great ebbings and flowings in the new and full Moons but the dead Sea in the half Moons because of the lesser and slower motions of it Possidonius addes more That one Sâ—leucus observed a Sea that was derived from the red Sea and was different from it that kept the monethly course of returning namely according to the Lunar moneth which men call periodicall For he had observed in the Moon being in the Equinoctiall signs that the Tides were equall but in the solstices they were unequall both for quantity and swiftnesse and the same inequality held in the rest so far as any of them happened â—ear to the foresaid places Lastly Possidonius saith That he learned the yearly motions from the Mariners of Gades For they say that about the summer Solstice the ebbing and flowing of the Sea increaseth much and that he conjectured the same did diminish as far as the Equinoctial and again to increase untill Winterâ— from 〈…〉 to decrease untill the spring Equinox â— and so increase again untill the Summer solstice Pliny determines the contraâ—◠〈…〉 reason of the Equinox But Patricius witnesseth That iâ— Libâ—â—â—ia in January great part of the strandâ— are naked and continue dry for some dayes The same Pliny l. â— c. 97. observes That in every eight years in the Moons 100 circumvolution the Tides are called back to their first motions and like increasings that is to say the Sun and Moon then returning to a conjunction in the same sign and degree wherein they were in conjunction eight years before But for the daily Tides there is a differeâ—â—e amongst Writers In the Sicilian Sea 〈…〉 and flowings are twice a day and twice in the night 〈…〉 in the Sinâ—s of Aegeum repeats its motion 7. times a day and sometimes is seen thrown down from the highest Mountains and so steep down that no ships can be safe there Basil iâ— Hexaemex In England at Bristoll the Ebb is daily twice and so great that the ships that were in the Sea stand dry and are twice on dry Land twice in the Sea Pitheas Massiliensis as Pliny testifies l. 2. c. 67. writes that it swâ—lls fourscore cubits higher than Britanny In the Southern part of the New World the Sea rising flowes two Leagues Ovetan summ c. 9. But in a certain Northern Sea there iâ— no flowing or ebbing observed by the waves of it Petrus Hispan p. 5. c. 1. Not far from Cuba Promontory and by the shores of Margaret Island and Paria the Sea flowes naturally nor can ships by any means though they have a prosperous gale sayl against the floods nor make a mile in a whole day Petrus Martyâ—â—â—n sum Indiae In the Adriatick Sea formerly there was wont to be a very great flowing forth early in the morning the Sea being so advanced into the Continent that it went as far up as a strong man could run in a day Procop. l. 1. Belli Gothici â—ut singular was that Tide and a wonder of the World which in particular which proceed from whirlepools by which the waters are suckt up and spued out again by turns It is very probable this happens in Charybdis the Syrtes and Chalcydis about Eubaea This represents a true flowing and comes from winds breaking forth of the Caves of the Earth and forcing forward the waters or to the Waves running back again and sinking down But the fourth is 〈…〉 true ebbing and flowing which runs neither Eastward nor Westward but begins from the Navel of the Sea and that boyls up and as the waters rise thus they are powred forth toward the Banks more or lesse as the cause is more or lesse violent unlesse something hinder the cause whereof we shall seek last of all And true it is that Marriners in the straights of Magellan where the South Sea is seperated from the North by a notable difference marking diligently the Tydes of both Seas have observed what they could not do in the vast Ocean namely that both Seas do not begin to flow at the same time And that it is not moved by any outward cause not from the Heavens nor is it brought in from the East or West but comes from the bottom of it and boyles out from thence the superfluity running toward the Land variously as the swelling is great or small the shores high or low and the cause that moves it from the bottom upwards weaker or stronger This is confirmed by the nature of the water which casts up from the bottom whatsoever it sucks in if it be not
inflammations of the eys it was as cold as Snow But Mindererus l. de Peste writes That when he went to visit sick persons and had swallowed a small piece of it he perceived nothing within him but like a very small fire CHAP. X. Of Amber or Electrum SOme think it to be the juice of Trees but amisse There stand no Trees by the Sea that Gums drop from them falling into the Sea of which Amber is made It is more certain that it is a thick juice of the Earth The most part is found in Borussia also in Curlandia on the part of Sarmatia but not so plentiful It is taken in nets like fish When the North-west or West wind blowes hard at Sea they all run to the shore with casting nets of yarn in their hands Agricol in l. de Fossil The winds being allayed but the Sea flowing when the waves return back they draw the Amber from the bottom and an herb like pennyroyall that growes in it When they have taken it they carry it to the Magistrates who give them the weight of it in salt Every Moneth it is said to be sold for ten thousand German Crowns At Buchania in Schetland a masse came to shore greater than a horse The ignorant Clowns used it for Frankincense Hector Boetius in histor Scot. Precious figures are made of it the Romans were so taken with it that a little picture of it was more than the price of a living man Plin. Histor. natural Rubb'd it drawes straws if it be not smeared with oyl or water Some seek the cause in a dry spirit But Scaliger Exerc. 104. s. 12. saw it draw a green Lettice some in the super elementary quality others think it comes by accident Fernel l. 3. Med. c. 4. For it hath piercing and sharp spirits and withal glutinous and fat Being attenuated by rubbing they wax hot and they easily pierce into light things as they break forth Libavius in lib. singular When they meet with cold things they congele congealed they return toward their beginning for the heat is driven back by its contrary If you make a fine powder of chaff and iron the Amber draws forth the chaff the Loadstone the iron In the shore at Puceca of former times they digged up some of ash colour which when it was broken with iron it drew unto it leaves that were upon the ground and two foot from it when they were blown up into the Ayr The white smells the best Because of the Plague Chambers are perfumed with the scrapings of it the sent lasts for 3. dayes every thin piece of it burnt in fire flames away CHAP. XI Of Ambergreece Jet and Earthy Bitumen AMbergreece is a Juice in Asia amongst the Moors Some think it growes like Mushrooms out of the Earth under the Sea Others say that the Cod-fish doth greedily follow after it and kills it self by devouring it which the Fisheâ—s knowing taking him in their Nets when he is dead they unbowel him Maâ—hiolus in Dioscor l. 1. The truth is it runs out of the Fountains into the Sea and being hardned there it is cast upon the shore It is good for the brain that is cold Libav l. 3. Singul. It may hurt the heart unlesse the cause be cold that molests it namely if the spirits be hot and too much attenuated Heurn l. 2. Medic. A Plaister of Amber is good for bald and weak heads from a cold cause He that carrieth it after a little use perceiveth it not The weaker a woman is and the Matrix moveable the more easily is it disquieted by Musk and Amber and her head will ake Infused in wine it will make men drunk Black Bitumen hardned in the Sea is called Jet which the floods use to cast upon the shores of the Aestyi with Amber Earthen vessels that are glazed with it are not defaced Plin. l. 36. c. 19. When it is burned it smells like brimstone It is a wonder that it kindleth with water but is extinguished with oyl It discovers the Falling-sicknesse and Virginity by the smell of it drank by a Virgin fasting it causeth her to make water Dalechamp in Notis ad l. c. Nicander in his Theriacks calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Interpreter expounds that Jet which is found great and of a pale colour oâ— the shore at the Town of Ganges in Lycia Strabo saith That creeping things fly from the sent of Jet It is called Earthy Bitumen otherwise burning stone because it will flame and is good for Iron-Smiths Furnaces It is called Ampelitis because it kills little Worms called Caipas Also Pharmacitis because it is good in Physick I saw it dug up in Scotland So in the Jurisdiction of Leids where if it be hard they make Chapelets of it to say their prayers upon Hitherto belong the bituminous Furrs that being dryed make the Dutch fuel Also theâ— are dug forth in Collaum a Province of Peru which Monardus describes in these words In Collaum a Province of Peru there is a place all bare no Tree nor plant growes upon it because the Earth is bituminous out of which the Indians extract a liquour good for many diseases The way to extract it is this They cut the ground into Turfs and in an open place they lay it upon rods or greater â—eeds putting vessels under it to receive it for by the heat of the Sun this Bitumen melts then the dry turfs remain without liquor fit to make fires Moreover on the left hand in the shore of the Sinus Pucicus not far from the Monastery there are found clots of congealed Bitumen very hard about the bignesse of Eggs. They all burn being kindled Agricol in l. de Fossil Near these there grow pale-coloured shrubs that smell like fish they are 3 or 4 hands breadths high They have no roots and are like little dishes the Greeks call them Lepadas they stick to the clods CHAP. XII Of Corall COrall otherwise Stone-tree It comes from a juice that is stony when it growes under the Sea water it is a small Tree green and soft bearing Berries like the Cornus Tree in shape and magnitude but soft and white it presently growes hard before it is cut it appears all green Sometimes also the stalks of one Corall Tree are partly red partly white and partly black In the Mediterranean they gather great quantity of it and those of Massilia go yearly to fish for it and draw it from the bottom of the Sea with Nets Dispens Chymic l. 2 c. 49. Linschot part 3. orient Ind. c. 1. At the Cape Bon Esperance he saith there are Rocks on which Coral grows of all colours The Indians weare it because Southsayers think it avoids dangers The vulgar thinks it can preserve their Children from Witches This is superstitious but certain it is it will quench thirst being extreme cold Mercurial l. 3. de curand affect Tied to the neck it drives away troublesome dreams and stills the nightly feares of Children
hath two motions the greatest is Southward Let it suffice what Scaliger writes Exerc. 131. Nature saith he is at concord and agrees with her self she unites by an admirable order all things above and below that it may be one by a perpetual necessity So that there are in things seperated not only steps entrances and retreats but also minglings of those things which seem to be wholly parted Bodinus pronounceth that all the 4 parts of the world are equally respected by the Loadstone Theatr. natur l. 2. For saith he the steel needle easily rubbed upon the Loadstone from that part of the Loadstone that pointed North before it was cut out of the rock if the needle be equally ballanced the end rubbed with the Loadstone will turn to the North. The same force there is to the South part if he needle be rubbed on the South part of the Loadstone Nor is the force lesse for the East or West part of the Loadstone though the stone cannot turn it self to the Poles of the world but only the steel needle that is touched with it But this I have said cannot be understood but by experience for if you put a peice of Loadstone upon a peice of Wood swimming in the water and you apply that side of the Loadstone that looked Southward before it was cut out of the Rock to the side of another Lodstone that looked Southward also before it was hewen forth the stone that swims will fly unto the opposite part of the Vessel with water but if you turn the Northern part of the Loadstone to the Southern part of another Loadstone swimming in the water the Loadstone that swims presently comes and joyns with it so that thâ—â— both unite by an admirable harmony of nature though the Wood or the Vessell of water be between The same will be done if you put only an iron Needle thrust through a quil into a Vessell of water and hold in your hand a peice of a Loadstone one side of the Loadstone will drive off the needle the other will draw it So saith Bodin What concerns drawing that the Loadstone doth draw is maintained of the Aethiopian Loadstone Plin. l. 36. c. 16. experience hath proved it Libavius I saith he when I proved this wiped off all dust from the Loadstone and then I scraped away some powder of its own substance this was laid upon a paper or plank of wood and the powder scraped from it was laid under it the Loadstone moved and attracted The Loadstone draws the Loadstone by a certain line because there is a spirit in it like to the other and nature enclines and is carried to its like as much as may be It is as certain that it draws Iron also The hardnesse of Iron gives way and obeys and that matter which tames all things runs to I know not what empty thing and as it comes nearer it stands still and is held and sticks in imbraceings Plin. l. 36. c. 26. The vertue of it was found out when the nails of his shoos and top of his crook stuck fast for the first inventor was a Heyward Nor doth it draw Iron on each part with the same force The rule seems to be a right line Therefore where the vertue comes not the ends are turned and whilst one of them inclines to the needle the other accidentally turns from it and seems to reject it The same reason serves for divers Loadstones In the Midland Seas of Sardinia at the foot of the Mountaines that part they bend Eastward they say there is a Loadstone that draws Iron but on the opposite part one that drives it off and therefore it is called Theamedes Plin. l. 2. Wherefore do we go to Mountaines We may see it in every laboratory if we will beleive Libavius Syntagm Art Chymic Tract 1. l. 1. c. 19. There are opposite parts in one and the same stone contrary to the rest and it hath an example of sympathy and antipathy in it self as Vipers Scorpions and venemous Creatures have in themselves both their friends and their enemies I shall set down some examples of attraction Severus Milevitanus saw when Bathanarius heretofore governour of Africa put Silver under between the Stone and the Iron the Iron on the top moved and the Silver was in the middle and suffered nothing but with a most swift retrait the Man drew the stone downward and the stone drew the Iron upward August de civitat Dei lib. 21. cap. In Alexandria in Aegypt at the roof of the Temple of Serapus there was a Loadstone fastned in which held an Idol that had an Iron in the head so fast that it hung between the roof and the ground Euseb in Histor. Eccles. Agricola said he saw a round looking glasse that was three hands breadth broad and two high in the concave part whereof there was a Loadstone included above Agricola de subterâ—â—n that drew an Iron boul placed at the bottom of the glasse unto it self so that the thick body of the glasse could not hinder the force of it the Iron Globe that useth to fall down was carried up Let us come to the cause and inquire whence comes this force in the Loadstone Each man speaks diversly and so many men allmost so many opinions Libav l. 1. de Bitum c. 12 saith that there is a bituminous nature in the Loadstone reduced to the disposition of Iron by a similitude of sympathy and mixture whereby the same principles grow in Iron And he adds that there is an Iron bituminous spirit common to them both but it flows not out continually and as strong from Iron as from the Loadstone by reason of the diversity of coagulation or commisâ—ion Others attribute that to the hidden forme Others alleage a mutual harmony of naturall things There are in the great world saith Langius l. 2. Epist. 55 under the concave of the Moon some things that by a secret consent agree wonderfully together The truth is the Loadstone is some kind of vein of Iron and Iron may be generated of it Sennert l. 8. Epit. c. 4. But the Loadstone loseth its attractive force if you work it in the fire For whilest it burns the brimstony spirit of it flyes forth as Libav l. 2. singul thinks We saw saith Porta Mag. natur l. 7. c. 7. with great delight the Loadstone buried in burning Coles to cast forth a blew brimstony Iron kind of flame which being dispersed the quality of its life departed and it lost its power to attract It yields to the injuries of the weather and dies with old age The expiring of it is hindred by oyntments rub'd upon it and the tenacious juice of Leeks others add oyle of Bricks Lem. l. 4. c. 10. de occult But Cardanus l. 7. de subtil denyeth this It will not lay hold on rusty Iron and much lesse on rust Scaliger Exerc. 112. Otherwise if Iron-filings were buried in dust or the Iron be on the other side of the
pearl with the ear-jewel when 4. or 5. hours were past the Pearl and Jewel were mist. A certain Maid thought the Hen had swallowed it because some dayes before the said Hen had swallowed one the Italians call Gazetta Wherefore the hen was killed and presently her Gisard being parted and cut we found the pearel with the earing not yet passed into the cavity of the stomach but contained in the orifice thereof extream hot and yielding to the touch like wax and the ornaments of it almost consumed by the heat thereof which Jewel in a short space when it grew cold and the heat was gon became hard as it was before the forme was spoiled and when it was weighed with another caring like it it wanted a third part in weight But to return to Gold No Mettal is drawn out further or can be more divided for one ounce of it will be hammer'd into 750 and more leaves of 4. fingers broad and long Plin. l. 33. c. 3. That it may be wire-drawn and spun without silk I need not approve of The Luxury of the Age is well known Pliny lived when Agrippina as Claudius made a shew of a Sea-sight sate by him clothed in a robe of woven gold without any other addition Now though it consumes not in the fire yet it is resolved Chymically and becomes so aërial that if it be but stirred with an iron Spatula or grow hot any other way it will presently take fire and make a great noise and one scruple of it shall work more forcibly than half a pound of Gun-powder Crollius cited by Sennert c. 18. de Consens et dissens Chymicor A few grains of it if they flye down perpendicularly can strike through a Table of wood Quercetan The cause is the contrariety of the spirit of Nitre and the brimstone of gold for when as oyl or salt of Tartar is poured into the solution of gold the salt of Tartar unites it self with common salt and also with Allum and Ammoniac and hence it is that gold left to it self sinks to the bottom and if any of these salts is left with the gold it is washed off with hot water Sennertus de consens et dissens Chymic et Galen c. 19. onely the spirit of Nitre is left which perfectly unites with the Gold If that therefore grow hot so soon as it perceives that the Sulphur of gold is there present it opposeth it self against its Enemy and breaks forth with a mighty noise in flame It hath been long disputed whether it can be made potable experience shews that it may For that famous man Dr. Francis Antony Physitian of London brought it into a consistence like honey and sent certain portions of it to the Physitians of Germany to try it Johan Vincent Finckius in Enchiridio dogmatico Hermetico Yet Heurn l. 1. Aph. 24 thinks it hath no nutritive faculty because between potable and solid Gold there is no difference but the liquefaction and if a man cannot be nourished by the pure Elements he can hardly be fed with things inanimate and distilled Also it may be made nay it was made Kelleius an English man converted one pound of quick-Silver with one drop of a liquor of a deep red colour into Gold that with one grain he tainted 5000 and with one he extracted about ten Ounces of pure Gold Sennert de consens et diss cap. 2. And what Theophrastus did is known out of Neander it is known out of Oporinus Neander in Geographia Oporinus in Epistolis Nicolaus Mirandulanus made an Ingot of Gold out of Brasse he did it also at Jerusalem and there are so many witnesses that it were impudence to deny it Picus Mirandula Apollinaris did aver sincerely that he had above 20 ways to make Gold Hence was made that Epitaph at Rome To the collector of Gold out of Lead Some think they may be changed in shape but not in substance I see not what hinders The forme of Lead is not turned into Gold but that departing this succeeds Where there is community of matter there must be symbolization of necessity Plants have a perfect form in their kind yet are they turned into Chylus and it is no sophistication The forms of things are unknown to us we know them but by their properties and when as they all inhere in that what place is there for doubting Yet that is difficult and to be attempted warily Penotus was an excellent Chymist learned men know how miserably he was deceived in his old age His words were If there were any man whom he could not hurt by open violence he would perswade him to turn Chymist Sennert lib. cit It is known to all Men that divers works are made out of Gold Heliogabalus unloaded his belly in Golden Vessells Xerxes had a Golden Tree under which he was wont to sit A King of Aegypt buried his daughter in a Coat of Coffin Agricola in observ Metal In lower Germany on Danubius there were Vines that had tendrels and somtimes white leaves of pure Gold Alexander The cause is assigned That there are Gold Mines and that Gold grows about their roots and being bred with it and hardned by a secret Original whilst Vines send out their branches by a wonderfull work of nature or decree of the Starrs the Gold grows out with them Alexander ab Alexandro l. 4. Genial dier CHAP. XXVII Of Silver PUre Silver is dug up in many places but especially out of two places in Germany So much was dug forth of the Mine at Sueberg that it was worth 1000000 Rhenish Nobles That of Abertham afforded 150000 Nobles About some hundreds of yeares since the Mine at Friberg yeelded enough to buy all the Kingdom of Bohemia Agricola in praefat in decemfossil libros ad Henricum Principem Mâ—senae Wherefore Prince Henry neere Northusa set a great Tree of Silver that he might bestow some of the leavs of it which were partly Silver and partly Gold on those Noble Men that had gallantly discharged themselves in fighting on horsback Somtimes great lumps are dug forth In the time of Albertus the Saxon the pieces were so great that he used them in the Mines for a Table saying Frederick the Emperour is powerfull and rich yet he hath not at this time such a Table In the Valley Joachim they report that there was a Lump dug forth that weighed ten Attick Talents Nature makes it of many fashions sometimes like Trees sometimes like hairs It is white yet some hath been found green Put rude suddenly into the fire it will leap forth When black Lead is mingled with it it is melted in a great vessel and part is turned into Lead ore part into Lytharg but when it burns long it loseth something sharp things corrode it Divers works are made of it Amongst the Tectosages there are made silver Mills An Historian writes that the Buckler of Barchinus Asarubal weighed 138 pounds The History of the Passion was made in pure silver
pressing and moving it with his tongue he breaks them and chews them as it were and then swallows them Nature gave this bird a crooked bill like halfe a circle it is very strong Because she is of a clambering disposition and hath not feathers in her taile that she can fasten into a Tree she had need of a strong beck that she might first cast it in like a hook and by that she might raise her body and then take hold with her feet They live in hot Countries In the Country of Parrots they are so cheap that one may be bought for two pence They alwaies flye by couples and lest they should hurt their weak feet when they light upon the ground they trust to their strong beck and break the fall with lighting upon that They imitate a man they learn his words and will pronounce all almost with an articulate voyce One was taught that would say the Creed to a Cardinal Scalig. exerc 238. He will answer questions Henry the eight King of England had one that fell into the Sea and cried for help promising 20 pounds but when he was pull'd forth he bad Give a Groat If you stroke her gently she will kisse you Scalig. exerc 236. Amongst mourners she will lament also Tiraquel saith that the females do never or very seldome speak like to Men. They are so simple that when a Parrot cries in a Tree and the fowler sits close in the boughs of the same Tree great multitudes of them will flye thither and suffer themselves to be easily taken Pet. Martyr in Decad. Oceani They are fed and grow fat on wild saffron seed that is a purgative to men They will hang by the heels with their heads down toward the water and their tails upwards They build in a high Tree They bind a branch that hangs down with small twigs to the top and they hang their nest upon it as round as a ball with a little hole in it They lay eggs fit for their bignesse They dye by much rayn They are sacred amongst the Indians but not so in Columbus days CHAP. XXVII Of the Phoenix and Woodpecker CLaudian describes the Phoenix thus A fiery mouth with sparkling eys A glittring crest like Sun it 'h Skies The legs are of a Tyrian dye Lightning the Ayre as she doth fly She is reported to inhabit Arabia and chiefly Heliopolis a City of Aegypt where she was seen Her nest is made of spices namely Cinamon and Cassia neere to Nilus she sits in it and by waving her wings she kindles a fire from her ashes a Worme breeds from that a young Phoenix Oppian doth not so much as speak of the Worm Men write diversly of her age The common opinion is 500 years some say she lives 1461 years But all this is false The Woodpickers have a sharp bill that is hard round and strong to pick holes in Trees with They have a long tongue that is extended to the hinder part of their head and is wrapped up over all the crown of the head like a clue of yarn it is exceeding sharp and the end of it is gristly They feed on Wormes and when they seek for them they will so exceedingly make Trees hollow that they will throw them down Arist. l. 9. hist. c. 9. Their nest is made so artificially that the sticks put together they make it of are better to pull a sunder with ones hands than to cut in peices with a sword Pliny reports that the young ones come forth of their eggs with the tayle first because the weight of their heads turns the eggs upside down and so the dam sits on their tails They never sit on stones for fear of hurting their sharp claws They climb unto the top like Cats and that backwards In what Tree soever they breed no naile nor wedge can stick in it but when it is fastned it will fall out with a cracking of the Tree Plin. l. 10. c. 18. Men suppose that she hath the greater Moon-light an herb that increaseth and diminisheth CHAP XXVIII Of the Pie. THe Pie almost every hour changeth her note she learnes and loves to speak as men do One at Rome hearing the Trumpet sound at first was astonished but came to her self and did perfectly imitate the same Plutarch If she be catcht in a Snare she will move nothing but her beck lest moving her body she should be more ensnared when rapes are sowed then is the time for her to moult her feathers Her feathers being pul'd off and her guts taken out if she be boyl'd in White Wine till the Wine be consumed and the flesh part from the bones and then she be bray'd with the broth and so set for three days in the Sun and then applyed to the eys with a fine rag it will cure the roughnesse darknesse and rednesse of the eyes The Pye that feeds on mosse hath blew ouerthwart marks on the sides of her wings you shall seldome see the like in any other bird she hath a throat so wide that she will swallow Chestnuts The Pye in Brasil hath a bill two hands breadth long and one almost in breadth measured from the bottom of the lower part to the top of the upper part The substance of it is very thin like a parchment yet bony shining hollow and most capacious as the Ear also it is dented and made up as it were with certain skales she feeds on pepper but she presently casts it up again raw and indigested CHAP. XXIX Of the Peacock OF old Peacocks were rare in Europe when Alexander saw one in India he forbad to kill it on pain of death but afterwards in Athenaeus his time they grew so common that they were as ordinary as Quails In the Land Temistana they lay sometimes 20 or 30 eggs Martyr They are so cleanly that when they are young they will die if they be wet Albert. When they want cooling they spread their wings and bending them forward they cover their bodies with them and so drive off the force of heat but if the wind blow on their back-parts they will open their wings a little and so are they cooled by the wind blowing between They are said to know when any venomous medicament is prepared and they will fly thither and cry Aelian reports that a Peacock will seek out the root of flax as a natural Amulet against Witchcraft and will carry it thrust close under one of its wings The Peacock suffers such languishing pains as children are wont to suffer when their teeth first come forth and they are in great danger when their crest first grows out Palladius l. 1. de re rustica c. 20. When in the night they double their clanging note it foreshews rains at hand The cause is said to be that by doubling of that troublesome noise is shewed that with heat that sharp vocal spirit breaks forth Mizaldus Their flesh will not corrupt easily After a whole year it will not
Aâ—â—obroges one was seen that caught a Maid and carried her to his den and wooed her venereously and fed her with Apples growing in the Woods Swidrigelus the Prince of Lithuania hath tryed it that they will grow tame For he bred up a Shee-Bear which he was wont to feed by hand and she was wont to run into the Woods and come home again and would come home into the Prince his bed-Chamber Volater l. 7. CHAP. XLII Of the Fox IN Caspia there is such abundance of Foxes that they will go into Country houses and come into Cities Aelian and will be so tame that they will fawn like dogs They are very strong in Sardinia for they will kill the fiercest Rams and young Calves Munster They are white in Muscovy in Arabia they are of an ill-favoured hair and exceeding bold At night they rowze one the other by barking and seeking for their prey they will snatch away mens very shooes Scalig. When they are to passe over frozen Rivers in Thracia they will lay their ears to the Ice and so judge whether it be thick enough Plin. When they see a flock of birds flying they will roll themselves in red clay that they may appear like blood and they counterfeit themselves dead but when the birds come to sit upon them they catch them and eat them Herus When they are troubled with fleas they will take some soft straw and dip their hinder parts into the water the Fleas when they feel the cold water will creep up toward their heads and then they put their heads under water and the Fleas will leap into the straw the Foxes let go the straw and run away CHAP. XLIII Of the Unicorn AUthors ore of divers opinions concerning the Unicorn They doubt whether there be such a creature some affirm it and some deny it Garzias ab Horto Physitian to the Kings Deputy in India observed a creature like to the description of an Unicorn It had a wonderfull Horne that he would turn somtimes on one side somtimes on the other and somtimes he would lift it up and somtimes let it down Ludovicus Vartomannus saith that he saw two of them sent to the Sultan at Machae out of Aethiopia to Mahomets Tomb they were shut up in Lattises and were not fierce The Horns of this creatures are shew'd in many places At the Monastery of St. Denys there is a whole one in a dark vault of the Sanctuary and the end of it stands in water The water is given to drink to those that go under that hollow arch so soon as they have drank that they suddenly fall into a great sweat There is one also seen at Venice in St. Marks Church and another at Rome covered with a Purple covering Aldrovandus writes that there was a Jew at Venice that boasted he had a true one and proved it by a wonderfull example for he laid a Scorpion and Spider on a Table and compassed the place in with the Unicorns Horn these creatures were not able to passe out but were killed either by the shade or the vertue of it Cardanus describes it That it is a rare creature as big as a horse with hair like a Weasil a head like a Stag that hath one Horn growing on it 3 Cubits long it stands in the middle of the forehead and is right and strait it is broad at the bottom it hath a short neck a thin mane lying but on one side with small feet like a Goat c Pliny saith that it is a most rough creature and the rest of the body is like to a horse the head like a Stags the feet like an Elephants the taile like a Borâ—s with one black Horn sticking out of the middle of the forehead two cubits length what ever it be here is cause enough to doubt of it For first there are many kinds of Unicorns described and we know not whether they be of the same kind In India there be Oxen that have their hoofs undivided and they have but one Horn if we credit Pliny There are Bulls in Aonia if we beleive Aelian and Oppianus There were some in the Wood Hercynia if Caesar be to be believed Ludovicut Barthema saith that he saw in Zeilam a City of Aethiopia a kind of Cows that had but one Horn in their forehead that was but a hand breadth long and turned backwards As for the Horns there is much sophistication in them There was one found upon the shore of the River Arula in Helvetia nere to Bruga who shall certainly make choice of these for the Unicorns Horn. That which Albertus saw was a hand breadth and a half thick ten foot long without any spirall lines and like to a Stags Horn And a Horn so thick and long seems to appertain to a living creature as great as a great Ship Aldrovandus thinks that the cup which Alvarez Mendosa gave to the great Duke of Hetruria which he had from the King of Narsinga was rather made of one of those creatures Horns which are seen in Basma and Macinum Countries of Tartary that are as big as Elephants The Diameter of that cup was as much as both hands could hardly compasse He that would read more of the Unicorn let him read Andreas Marinus Andreas Baccius and Casparus Bartholinus I for a conclusion will add somthing omitted concerning the Mule The common opinion is that the Mule is barren and if they do bring forth it is held for a monstrous thing Yet in some Countries of Africa they are ordinarily with young and do bring them forth Varro It appears by the Monuments of the Athenians that one lived 80 yeares And they took pleasure in it when they built a Temple in the Fort that this old Mule would encourage their Cattel that fell down with accompaning them and labouring with them wherefore they made a decree that no men that cleansed Corne should drive the Mule from their sieves Plin. Some write they will not kick if they drink Wine They have an excellent smell Hence those Mules that are out of the way will return into the way when they smell it and they easily are infected with the contagious force of the Ayre and fall sick of the Plague Aldrovandus l. 4. de Quadrup There is something in them that is death to Mice for the fume of the hoofe of a Mule will drive them from the house Columella saith That the pain of their guts is abated by the sight of swimming Ducks Cardinal Ponzettus bids us to inclose one that is infected with the Plague into the belly of a Mule newly slain and Marantha de simplicibus saith he must be shut in so long untill all the heat of the Mule be vanished and this must be done oft times The End of the Seventh Classis OF THE DESCRIPTION OF Naturall VVonders The Eighth Classis Wherein are contained the Wonders of Creatures that want blood Plin. Histor. Natural l. 11. c. 2. THe Nature of things is
his own observation I thought fit to joyn his historicall observation as an Appendix to the end of this Classis for the benefit of those that search the Secrets of Nature CHAP. V. Of the Spanish Fly and the Glo-worm CAntharides are bred from a Worm in a spungy substance especially of the sweet-brier but most fruitfully in the Ash. If they breed in Fig-trees it is likely that the Tree will die Plin l. 29. Their venom is most tart A Physitian call'd out of Egypt kill'd Cossinus a Roman Knight whom Nero loved with Cantharides in drink when he was sick of a Tetter which was a peculiar disease in Egypt Plin l. 1. c. 4. The same thing happened to an Abbot from a whore Paraeus l. 20. c. 28. A Glo-worm hath a belly with roundles divided with many segments in the end whereof there are two spots very light like to fire tending toward a kind of sky-colour Then is she most conspicuous when her belly is pressed and that transparent humour goes to the end of her belly and her brest against the light shines like to fire Aldrovand de Insect l. 4. c. 8. There is something spoken of this in the Second Classis Adrianus Junius when he was in the Country of Bononia drew the liquor of them upon Papers that shined like Stars what is writ with that in the day may be read in the night Many have shewed the way to compound it Baptista Porta doth it thus We did cut their tails from their bodies taking care that nothing should mingle with the shining parts we ground it on a Porphyr stone and 15 dayes or longer we buried it in dung in a glasse vessel and it is best that these parts should not touch the sides but hang in it for these dayes being over the glasse being put into a hot oven or a bath of hot water and â—itted you may by degrees receive that clear distilled liquor in a receiver underneath and so putting it into a fine Crystall glasse you may hang this water that causeth light in your private Chamber and it will so enlighten the Ayr that you may read great letters Albertus de sensu et sensato shews why their light cannot be extinguished by water For their light cannot be said to be of a coelestiall body because a coelestiall nature comes not into composition of bodies generative and corruptible But the determination of this question and the like is fetched from what we determined in our second de Anima where we shew That the nature of perspicuity is not proper to any Element but it is common to many and is participated by them per prius et posterius which is the more pure the farther it is from darknesse and this is so by how much it is more like to the nature of superiour bodies and the proper act of this is light which hath to do in that nature Now this falls out in it as often as the parts of it are very noble and clear and therefore all such things do shine Now this composition sometime is in the whole body sometimes not in the whole but in some externall parts the cause whereof is that when such a nature is from the Elements that are light it proceeds more from the internall parts to the external because such things will swim And so it is found in the heads and sins and bones of some Fish and in the shells of some eggs because such parts are lesse rosted and heat hath wrought in them much nature of perspicuous bodies condensed Sometimes this heat acts in the externall parts of some things when it exhales from them and that which is subtile brings with it much perspicuity so the parts of Okes corrupted do shine But all those things that have but a weak light are hid when a clearer light appears CHAP. VI. Of the Grashopper ISidore writes that Grashoppers breed of Cuccow-spit Plutarch in Sympos saith Out of the Earth Baldangelus saith they breed out of the earth not tilled that looks Eastward toward the Sun-rising and that white ones were dug up under Okes but their form was as the rest were Aristotle l. 5. hist. c. 30. saith they breed by copulation Pliny sets down the manner First there is a Worm bred then of that Tettigometra or Mother of the Grashopper the shell of it being broken about the Solstices they fly forth alwaies in the night being first black and hard but when he strives to come forth of his Tettigometra You may observe that Grashoppers and Butterflies breed alike for what is in these at first a Caterpillar is in them first a little worm and that case call'd Chrysalis or Aurelia for the Catterpillar is call'd Tettigometra for the Grashopper Yet you shall know that they differ For a rude Chrysalis is a lump wherein no parts of the body are distinguished as we can discern but in the Tettigometra you may see the head eys feet breast and all the parts except the wings it is whitish in colour and sprinkled with small lines First he gets up a Tree and sticks to some branch of the Tree then at the upper end where a cleft is first seen he comes forth his whole body is then almost green shortly his upper part enclines to Chestnut colour and that in one day becomes of a black colour and because his legs and wings are weak at first he sits upon his cast skin till be can fly In Cephalenia there is a River where Grashoppers are on one side but none on the other Plin. l. 11. c. 27. And Antigonus writes that the same thing happeneth in Dulichium an Island of the Ionian Sea Ambrosius Nolanus writes the same of Nola and the hill Vesuvius In the Country of Rhegium they are all mute In Locris beyond the River they sing in Acanthus also they are mute Pliny l. 12. c. 27. If you ask the reason Strabo thinks that at Rhegium the Country is dark and shady at Locris the heat is great and therefore he thinks that the dewy skins of their wings are not there extended but here he thinks they have dry and as it were horny skins But because they do that when they fly and when they stand which the others are thought not to do the heat is the cause of it For being hotter by nature they need more cooling and move the Ayr the stronger The others do not need so much either because they are but of a weak heat they are not heard to do it therefore it may be thought they are said not to do it Nicolaus Leonicus CHAP. VII Of the Crabfish and the Shell-fish breeding Pearls CAmmarus is a River-Crab in his head are two little stones In the full Moon they are seen in figure of a Globe divided into two Agricola It is said to eat flesh It will eat the Pike in a net And Gesner writes That in Danubius when flesh is tyed to their ships and hang'd down into the water multitudes of
nourished is very great at the place he comes forth of his shell This is very brittle milk white shining polished altogether representing the form of a round ship for it swims on the top of the Sea arising from the bottom and the shell comes the bottom upwards that it may ascend the better and sail with an empty Boat and when she is come above the water then she turns her shell Moreover there is a membrane that lyes between the fore-legs of the Boat-fish as there is between the toes of water-fowl but this is more thin like a cobweb but strong and by that she sails when the wind blowes the many tufts she hath on both sides she useth for rudders and when she is afraid then she presently sinks her shell full of Sea water Farther she hath a Parrots bill and she goes with her tufts as the Polypus doth and after the same manner she conceives in hollow partitions CHAP. XVIII Of Oysters and Muscles THough Oysters love sweet waters yet Pliny reports that they are found in stony places but Aristotle saith that though they live in water and cannot live without it yet they take in no moysture nor Ayre When in the time of the Warr with Mithridates the earth parted at Apumaea a City of Phrygia Rivers did suddenly appeare and not only sweet but salt waters brake out of the bowels of the earth though the Sea were farr distant so that they filled all that Coast with Oysters Athen. l. 8. The Oysters are of divers colours In Spain they are red in Sclavonie brown in the red Sea they are so distinguished with flaming Circles that by mixture of divers colours it is like the Rainbow Aelian l. 10. c. 13. At the beginning of Summer they are great and full of milk At Constantinople they cast this wheish matter into the water which cleaving to stones will beget Oysters Gillius writes it and it is very probable For of the decoction of Mushroms powred on the ground it is certain that Mushroms will grow the Crabfish doth wonderfully desire the meat of them but he comes hardly by them because they have a strong shell by nature wherefore he useth his cunning For when in places where the wind blows not he sees them taking pleasure in the Sun and to open their shells against the Suns beams he privately casts in a stone that they cannot shut again and so he conquers them CHAP. XIX Of the Butterflye and the Polypus THe Butterflies couple after August the male dying after copulation the female lays egs and dieth also How they are preserved in winter is hardly discovered by any man except by Aldrovandus de Insectis But he enquired of Country people and they hold him that the leaves were great with the Butterflies seed at what time they plowed the ground they were hid in the bowells of it and fostered by its heat yet he thinks that they only are preserved that lye hid in the hollow barks of Trees but what lyes on leaves is quickned the same yeare And Aldrovandus adds I saw eggs layd under the leaves of Chamaeficus out of which about the end of August little Catterpillars naturally came forth They were wrapped in a thin down that the ayre might not hurt them and these little Catterpillars falling did not fall to the ground but hung by a small thred like Spiders in the Ayre When they lay under leaves they fold them so that the rain cannot hurt them and lay them up as under a penthouse I twice observed one Catterpillar that I took amongst the Coleworts first to lay yellow eggs wrapt up also in fine down and when they were laid she turned into a Chrysalis of the same colours that she was that is yellow green and black and that which seemed strange to me out of those eggs little flying creatures came forth that I could hardly see them such as are wont to be found in the bladders of Elms when they are in great abundance they shew contagion of the Ayre Anno 1562 they flew at Bannais neere the waters in such multitudes that they darkned the course of the River especially after Sun set then coming hither about night they wandred through the Villages as in Battel aray little differing from Moths Cornelius Gemma testifieth that that was a tempestuous yeare The Polypus in time grows so great that it is taken for a kind of Whale In the bowells of them there is a strange thing like a Turbane that you would say it had the nature of the Heart or of the Liver but it suddenly dissolves and runs away They exceedingly love the Olive-Tree For if a bough on which Olives hang be let down into the Sea and held there you may catch abundance of them hanging about the bough Somtimes they are taken sticking to Figg-Trees growing by the Seaside and they eat the fruit of them They also delight wonderfully in Locusts of which you shall find a cleare Testimony in Petrus Berchorius I have heard saith he that some Fishermen in the Sea of Province had set Locusts on the shore to boyle over burning coles and a Polypus smelling the Locust came forth of the Sea and coming to the fire would with his foot have taken a Locust forth but he feared the heat of the fire and so went back to the Sea and filâ—'d a coat which he had on his head like a Friers cowle with water and went and came so often with it and cast it on the fire that he put the fire out and so taking the Locust he had carryed it to the Sea unlesse one of the Fishermen that saw him had caught him and broyl'd him to eat instead of the Locust CHAP. XX. Of a Lowse and a Flea SOme think that Lice are bred of flesh others of blood but both opinions are false For first they breed in the skin of the head and we know they abound in the second and third kind of hectick feavers when as there is little flesh and here they are almost consumed Again in putrid Feavers they breed not and things bred do confirm their principles Their colour shews they proceed not from blood Wherefore some think they breed from putrid matter that is cold and moyst which abounds in the skin in places where they cannot be blown away Experience teacheth that they will leave those that are dead either because the blood is cold in the body when the heat is gone or because the dead body is cold and they fly from the cold Nolanus Problem 225. They that eat figs often are thought to be troubled with them Nolanus makes the juice of them to be the cause For this increasing in the veins heats the blood and makes it moyst and frothy which because it naturally tends to the skin and retain'd under that it putrefies it turns to lice Truly they that feed on figs have little knots and warts on their skins A Flea is a small Creature yet Africanus a cunning
Ayre and sents that they take in by their nostrills they take no meat nor drink but only the diversity of smells from roots and flowers and wild Apples that they carry with them in long Voyages that they may not want sweet smells and if the sents be too strong a little they easily are killed thereby Pliny l. 7. c. 3. Yet surely sents being but qualities can nourish no man they may out of all question refresh and cherish the brain Artic. 3. Of prodigious Eaters THere was a Woman once at Alexandria as Athenaeus sets it down he saith She eat 12 pound of flesh four chaevice of bread that is more than 12 pound and she drank a gallon of wine and upward Maximinus the Emperour would drink often in one day 9. Gallons of Wine of the Capitol measure he eat 40 pound of flesh and as Cordus saith 60 pound Capitolinus is my Authour now an Amphora is 8 congii that is about 9 Gallons One Phagon in Vopiscus who was in great respect with Aurelianus the Emperour eat so much in one day that he devoured a whole Bore a hundred Loafs a Wether and a young Hogg and he drank more than an Orca of Wine with a tunnel put into it now an Orca was a Vessel of Wine greater than an Amphora What shall I say of Clodius Albinus the Emperour He as Capitolinus writes devoured so much fruit as is incredible to speak for Cordus saith that he eat 500 dried Figs which the Graecians call Callistruas for a breakfast and a hundred Peaches of Campania and ten Melons of Ostia and 20 pounds of Grapes of Lovinium and a hundred Gnatsappers and 400 Oysters Uguccio Fagiolanus being a banish'd old man did glory at the Table before Scaliger at Verona that when he was a young man he eat four fat Capons and so many Partridges and the roasted hinder parts of a Kid and the breast of a Calf stuft beside salt fish at one Supper To this appertains that prodigious man in the time of Caesar Maximilian who eat a raw Calf and a Sheep at one meal Suidrigellus Duke of Lithuania sate 6. hours at Supper and fed on 130 dishes Sylv. l. 2. Comment in Pannormit The Epitaph of Thymocreon Rhodius was this Here Lies Timocreon Rhodius who had skill To eat and drink and rail and speak much ill Now over-great appetite if it proceed from a praeternatural cause it is called Bulimos and if it be with vomiting it is call'd dogs appetite And it proceeds from some gnawing humour in the stomach or from a consumption of the whole body or by reason of the operation of the cold ayr or lastly from Worms Brutus when he went from Dyrrachium to Apollonia through the Snow had like to have got this disease and a woman that cast up a Worm of twelve fingers breadth long lost her great stomach and so did another that voided 100 worms Brasavolus testifies that this disease was epidemical at Ferrara and Anno 1535 it was so in Borussia Leonellus Faventinus writes it Gemma Frisius speaks of a woman not very aged that could not live one moment without eating He gives the cause to be the greatnesse of her Liver and the prodigious peculiar temperament of it For her fat being increased unmeasurably and her heat choaked her belly was opened and about 20 pounds of fat were taken out her Liver was found to be sound swelling with blood and spirits but extream red and huge great that by its very weight it pressed the vitall parts Frisius l. 1. c. 6. Cosmocrit Article 4. Of monstrous drinkers IT is no hard matter to find men that sail in drink and rowe in their cups You see that drunkennesse abates in no part of the World and as if we were born to consume Wines and they could not be poured forth but through the bodies of Men. What Seneca foretold That a time should come when drunkennesse should be honour'd and to drink abundance of Wine should be esteemed Vertue is come to passe in our dayes He is counted best not he that can speak knowingly of Philosophy but he that can drink off many great cups Galen And not onely wine and waters but smokes and fumes are introduced to make men mad Yet all go not an equal pace some will win the garland In that publick drinking for a wager before Alexander there was one Promachus that drank four Congii that is 40 pound We read the same of Proteus of Macedonia in Athenaeus Novellius Torquatus of Millan drank 30 pints at one draught Tiberius the Emperour standing by to see this wonder Plin. l. 14. hist. Natur And which is more wonderfull in him they are Pliny his words He wan the glory of it that is very rare for he never fail'd in his speech nor did he vomit or void any thing any way when he drank nor did he sleep he drank most at one draught and drank many more little draughts and he was faithfull in the businesse not to take his breath when he drank nor to spit any out nor did he cast away any snuff that could be heard dash on the pavement Cicero the son drank two gallons Bonesus as the words of Spartianus confirm drank more than any man Aurelianus said often of him He was not born to live but to drink Yet he long honour'd him for military affairs For if any Embassadours of barbarous people came from any Country he drank with them to make them drunk and so in their cups he would find out their secrets He drank what he pleased and was alwaies sober and as Onesimus the writer of Probus his Life He was wiser in his drink This was farther admirable in him that so much as he drank the like quantity he pissed and his belly or stomach or bladder were never burthened A certain man drank 6 gallons at a marriage of a Noble-man in the dayes of Lipsius Nicetas l. 3. Histor. writes of Camaterus Logotheta that drank two gallons Article 5. Of some Secrets concerning Drunkennesse DRunkards differ in their manner of their drunkennesse for some are drunk before others And some when they are drunk fall backwards some forward some sing some quarrel Writers give many reasons for this They that are soonest drunk are not accustomed to Wine or they have drank more then their ability for naturally one cannot go from one extream to another without inconvenience or they have narrower veins that are too hot or have a thicker constitution of body or they prate too much when they drink For speaking out augmenteth natural heat that is inflamed by wine and fills the head with vapours and heaps up abundance of them which being corrupted by continuall motion are distributed through the whole body distending the eyes inflating the temples offending the brain The same reason serves for such who at Feasts eat hot bread drink strong wine and eat abundance of meats that are salt and talk continually For all these things increase thirst
this party or another fasted 30 years Mago Carthaginensis and Lasyrtas Lasionensis lived without taking any liquid substance all their lives Athen. l. 2. c. 2. One that Coelius speaks of that was by Country of Tomos did the like at Naples and Aristotle speaks of Andronis of Greece I will not speak of Conflana and Bernenses two Maids in Quercetanus l. 2. Diaetetica c. 6. nor the Maid of Colen in Albertus l. 7. de animal nor her of Hay in Namelius nor yet of the Aunt of Timon in Athenaeus l. 2. nor yet of the French-man that came from his Pilgrimage from Jerusalem Yet there is no man I think but will say that all these things are preternatural The cause is in what takes away or augments the appetite and that is done either when the meseraique veins do not attract the Chylus and draw it out of the stomach or when their sucking is not perceived in the orifice of the stomach That is caused by stopping of the veins or by a hot distemper or want of evacuation of the excrements that abound or when the orifice of the stomach is beset with flegmatick humours This either from the inhibition of the influence of the animall spirits and the fainting of them or from the distraction of the faculty or from the distemper of the stomach and stupidity of it But because death doth not follow this taking away of the appetite there must be some other cause besides Some make this to be the relaxation of the nerves in the orifice of the stomach as Langius others think the Ayr drawn in feeds the spirits as Quercetan But since they do not shew the cause of life and this opinion is yet doubtful and they which make the cause to be abundance of flegmatique humours confesse there are plenty of them in cachecticall bodies Sennertus his Judgment pleaseth me best who sayes that such bodies are almost immortall and little or nothing exhales from them because they consist of a tenacious humour well compacted and growing fast together and that will not yield to the action of heat that feeds on nutriment and their heat is most mild and gentle and requires not much nourishment Instit. l. 2. Part. 3. Sect. c. 2. CHAP. III. Of Concoction Article 1. Of the Liver and Spleen NUtrition hath attraction retention expulsion concoction subordinate unto it Concoction is either in the Stomach the Liver or the Spleen or in other parts In the first the Chylus is made of the meat the faeces and watry excrements are cast forth In the second blood yellow choler whey and urine are sent forth in the third dew glew and that which is call'd Cambium some thicker some thinner are thrust forth As for the Liver there was none found in Mathias Ortelius a Merchant of Antwerp Though it be one entire body in Man yet in bruit beasts it is divided into many Laps In one Maid it was found with three laps In Carolus Sabaudus it haâ— four little coats Francisc. Puteus l. 5 Apol. In Colet the outmost fibres of it were adorned with hairy tufts sticking forth Camerar When the heat of it growes weak a Dropsie followes I will say a few things of the Spleen There was a woman at Paris was found to have none Holler in observ And Pliny l. 1â— saith That in Cawnus men are born without it Natur. Histor. c. 73. Hence the common people think it may without hurt be cut out of Footmen and Horses Pallopius observed 3. that lay one upon another Posthius observes two at Montpelier Where it increaseth the body decayes For then it sucks away too much Chylus from the Liver Hence Trajan call'd the Spleen the Treasury For as this growes rich the common people grow poor so as the Milt increaseth the body decreaseth One was seen so great that it weighed above 20 pounds Câ—lumb l. 15. Anatom A Marriner had a Milt 23 pound weight and his Liver eleven pounds In Jacobus Antonellius it was no bigger than a Pigeons Egge In one of Spoletum it was empty like a purse Article 2. Of Humours in generall THere is scarce any question to be made but that the Humourâ— cannot he defined by the onely force of the Elementary qualities For Man lives upon Plants and they contain in them sharp bitter and sometimes Minerall juices They are alter'd indeed by that internall Archaeus which is naturall heat but when they are unmingled unfit and robustous they cannot be changed Hence it is that Urines are made somtimes that will corrode cloth and somtimes blood falne from the nose will do the like Doring l. 1 de medicin et medic Somtimes things are cast up so hot by vomit that they will boyle in the bason and dye Silver Chargers with a brasen colour that no washing nor strong rubbing can take off Schenk obs l. 3. Sometimes things yellow like Saffron are voided so sweet that they tast like liccoris when as they should be bitter Cardan contra 9. l. 2. tract 5. reports that a woman that had drank Poyson had a vein opened and no blood would run forth but a green juice as from herbs to 9. ounces in quantity and a mans blood was like to milk The humours have wonderfull conveyances in the body and certain periods The blood doth grow vigorous saith Soranus Ephesinus which like the Evangelists doth measure the spaces and course of day and night by equall hours from 9 a clock at night till 3. a clock in the morning in which time the blood in Man is concocted and elaborated Thence is the mind of Man cheerfull at Sun-rising Yellow choler is concocted from 3. in the morning untill 9 a clock in which time the naturall faculty separates choler from blood and sends it to the gall bladder Thence a man is prone to anger Black choler is elaborated from 9. a clock of the day till 3. at night In this time the Liver is purified and made clean of grosse blood and this Nature as some say ordains for the Spleen From hence is the mind of Man darkned Flegme is concocted from 3. at night till nine For then Supper being ended concoction begins to be made in the stomach and the meat to be liquified From hence Flegme swimming upon the stomach and carried to the brain makes a man sleepy But if they be over-much and joyn'd one with another then they do not keep their times Moreover the Persians by reason of their moderate exercises being children grew so dry of body that they neither spit nor did blow their noses nor were their bodies puft up Varro in fragment Artic. 3. Of Blood BLood is stopt by some wonderfully Gesner notes that Frederick Duke of Saxony gave a Toad that was thrust through with a woodden spit and well dryed in the Sun and wrapt in Sarsnet for them that bled at the nose to hold in their hands till it grew hot and so the blood was stopt A hens chicken will do the same if the
part hurt be thrust into that place where Cocks use to be gelt a hole being cut open Platerus l. 2. de vit c. 5. proved it and found it so A noble Matron stayd bleeding at the nose by holding a bit of white chalk under the ring-finger on that side the nostrill bled Forest. l. 13. c. 10. Osorius writes also of Nahodaguca a Prince in the Kingdome of Malacca who was hurt with many wounds and fell down yet not one drop of blood came forth when he was stript and a bracelet of gold was taken off then it began to run That stone was said to have power to stop blood that was set in it It is taken out of beasts which the Sinenses call Cabrisias Osor. l. 7. de reb Afric et Indicis That it comes forth of a vein cut the distending of the vessels is the cause For the continuall motion of the arteries added to the veins doth presse the veins but if the veins be opened the blood comes forth because there is nothing to hinder it Hence when a vein is opened if one swoond the blood stops For the vitall spirit doth no longer distend the vessels Bartholin Probl. 5. It is observed that when a man is killed it will run forth if the murderer be present but when a man is drown'd it runs forth when friends are present When you ask the cause it is either motion and agitation that opens the orifices of the veins or Sympathy and Antipathy The revenge of the person is put for an Argument He that is grievously wounded becomes the Assailer saith Rhodigiâ— Thought greedily desires revenge choler burns suddenly for it the blood is presently inflamed with it and runs with all its force to the wound both to foment it and to revenge The spirits fly together and by an inbred leightnesse do fly about the Author of it by whose heat they continue and remain for some time Rhodig 3. Antiq. c. 12. It was of old thought to be a remedy for the Falling-sicknesse to drink man's blood yet warm It was the Devil's Invention who delights in the slaughter of men and to do them mischief The Wife of Marcus Antonius the Philosopher fell in love with a Fencer the Wizards were enquired of and they gave counsel to kill him and that Faustina should drink his blood the next time she lay with Caesar. It was so done and her love was ended but the boy born was of a fighting disposition and destroy'd the Common-wealth Jul. Capitolin Langius reports that the Son of a certain shepherd was faint-hearted for robberies but when he had eaten a crust of bread dipt in mans blood he was flesh'd for all villany The Carmani had this custom that at Feasts they would open a vein in their face and mingle the blood that ran forth with wine and so drink it holding it the end of their friendship to taste one the others blood But these things belong to the description of Wonders in Customes There is compounded a Lamp of life and death with mans blood whereof Ernestus Burgravius writes thus This Lamp or Light once lighted burns continually so long as that man of whose blood it was made doth live and at the very same moment that he diâ—s it will go out Know also that if the flame be bright rising high and quiet that Man feels nothing that troubles his Mind or Body But if it be otherwise and the flame rising twinckles diversly or is lower and clowdy and troubled it gives thee a sign of great sorrow and other passions For perpetually from the coelestiall influences bred with the Microcosme and from the naturall inclinations since that blood is nourished by the blood of that man and the body of the same from the substance of this very blood from which blood was as it were mutually taken to prepare it that flame shines according to the state and habit of that man in prosperity or adversity and so shews it self Sennertus and Deodate call this Pyromantia Artic. 4. Of Urine and Reins MAny things perswade us that there is somthing else contain'd in Urines beside the watery substance For in diseases they are made plentifully though men have drank nothing And it is observed that creatures that drink nothing will make water Physitians foretell many things by their colours thinnesse and thicknesse And Chymists find salt in Urine resolved But whatsoever that is it is call'd Serum and it is the superfluous salt matter in meats and drinks and is not fit for nutriment Salt is hid in meats to season them and that plants are full of salt you may find by distilling them It is very well known that divers kinds of salt may be fetched out of Urines Aegineta saith that artificiall Chrysocolla is made with Urine Nitre is made of earth moystned with the Urine and dung of living creatures Baccius shews the way His words are Saltpeter is made now a days by industry of a most sharp Lixivium that drains forth from old dung or rotten ordure from the matter of Churchyards and some earths that are rotted together the sane water being often powred on in wodden Vessels This Lixivium is boyld in great Cauldrons and Salt-peter is made long fibres growing hard in the bottom like to salt Hence Ruffus Ephesmus said that Urine was a nitrous humour that falls into the bladder de appel corp human c. 36. The Arabians write that in the Urine of those are bit with mad dogs the pictures of dogs may be seen Abenzoar But that seems to be attributed to the force of the Venom because it changeth exceedingly a mans constitution and makes it like to a doggs For the humours are so corrupted by it that some little creatures like to puppies are bred in the body Sennert l. 2. p. 2. s. 2. c. 4. Truly we find Worms to breed in the bladder for a woman voided one a span long and a noble maid voided many as great as wiglice Schenck l. 3. obs Also Charls Count of Mansfield voided one like a Magpie Duretus like a Hog-louse But one that had the stone of the bladder voided two with a sharp head with horns the back and belly were crusty and they were black and like Tortoises but that their belly was red Pareus l. 19. c. 3. Holler de morb intern Another voided a living Scorpion another shell-fish Schenk observ All know the urinary passage yet somtimes other things are voided by it The Sonne of Boninus made water a little beneath the glans and a Maid of a noble family at the Hague urin'd her Navel An old Vine dresser had it coming forth at an Ulcer of his left buttock a Souldier Voided it by his hip and thigh others by their belly Schenk in obser Fernel l. 6. Pathal c. 13. As for the Kidneys Gemma saw 3 or 4 Lib. 6 Cyclogn Wolphius and Columbus l. 15. Anatom saw but one They were seen fastned to the Liver by Holtzapfelius at Auspurg The fat of them
is somtimes found so hard and congeal'd that it is almost as hard as a stone Eustach de Renib c. 45. Saxonia saw the substance of them resolved into little peices of flesh Stones also are bred in them of a faeculent matter mingled with a salt and stony juyce Somtimes they are very great A Father general of the Carmelites had a stone in one of his Kidneys which growing from a large root was divided into eight branches according to the forme of the Channels of the urinary Vessels and the number of them this excellently resembled the stock and branches of Corall moreover the flesh much contracted and diminished with the Veins stuck so fast to this stone all about that it had lost its own form and seem'd to be a thick skin that covered it round Eustach ad c. 44. de Renib Artic. 5. Of Marrow PLinie writeth that a Serpent is ingendred of the Marrow of the back-bone of a man The truth of this testimony appeareth by experience and is made manifest by an example that we read in Plutarch For the King of Aegypt having made the dead body of Cleomenes to be hanged up and they that watched it having spied a great Serpent winding about his head and covering the face in such sort as no bird that preyes upon carrion durst soare thereabouts the people of Alexandria running thither saith he in troupes to see this spectacle called Cleomenes a demi-god and the sonne of the Gods untill such time as the best in knowledg among them had called to mind that as of the putrified flesh of a dead Oxe there grow Bees of a horse Wasps and of an Asse Beetles so likewise when the matterie substance which invironneth the Marrow gathereth together and thickneth Serpents are ingendred thereof Camerarius saith he hath oftentimes seen in a well-known place of Germany a yong gentlemans tombe who was buried in a Chappell where his predecessors lay It is said that he was the fairest yong man of his time and being troubled with a grievous sicknesse in the flower of his age his friends could never get so much of him no more than Agesilaus friends could get of him as to suffer himself to be represented in sculpture or picture to serve for posteritie only this through their importunitie he agreed unto that after he should be dead and some daies in the ground they should open his grave and cause him to be represented as they then found him They kept promise with him and found that the Worms had half gnawne his face and that about the midriffe and the back-bone there were many Serpents Upon this they caused the spectacle such as they found it to be cut in stone which is yet at this present to be seen among the armed Statues of the Ancestors of this yong gentleman A notable example of the fragilitie of mans body how faire and goodly so ever it be and that all the splendor and magnificall shew that may be seen therein is nothing else but rottennesse and Wormes-meat as the Author of Ecclesiasticus saith When a man dieth he is the heritage of Serpents Beasts and Worms Which is confirmed by a certaine inscription graven upon a tombe at Rome in Saint Saviours Church where are two Latine Verses to this effect When in my bodies prison I was pent I was compact of shamefull filth and ordure Now to this lower dungeon being sent To crawling Wormes I serve for food and pasture Saint Bernard aymed at the same when he said That man was nothing but stinking seed a sack of excrements and the food of Worms Of bodies dead ingender Worms of Wormes a rotten stink And then as horrible a state as mind of man can think This is our very case for all our pride and hie conceit Nor can we stay the stroake of death when he our life doth threat So then nature ingendring of the carrion of our bodies a Serpent or a Dragon it seemeth to shew unto us as it were with the finger the author of our calamities and corruptions as also the enemie that hath an unreconcileable warre with us to wit that old dragon and serpent who not only layeth traps for the living but besides never leaveth rending and devouring those that be dead and buried Article 6. Of Sweat ARistotle reports that some have sweat blood And Fernel l. 6. de part morb c. 4. observed that sometimes blood will run forth of the ends of the veins that end in the skin in many places There was one that every month about a pound of blood run forth of a vein opened by the skin near the lower part of the Liver when it was voided none could discern where it came forth Beneven Lastly the President of Mons Marinus when he was besieged by Augustus the base son of the Prince of Salucia and was called forth as it were to parley and then held prisoner and he was threatned with death if he yielded not up the place was so frighted with this undeserved death that he sweat blood all over his body Thuan. l. 11 Histor. The causes are two saith Aristotle The thinnesse of the blood the rariâ—y of the skin and the opening of the pores To this may be added the weaknesse of the parts that serve for nutrition if the retentive faculty hold not and the expulsive cast forth strongly Anno 1486 there was a kind of disease call'd the English Sweat It first fell out in England and in Germany Anno 1529 it so spread that it brake off the Treaty of Zwinglius and Luther The force was so great that it killed men in 24 hours or else they recovered if it did breathe forth by sweat Thuan. lib. 6. Physicall observations shew that one recovered who went into a very hot oven and sweat violently But as many as eat of the bread was baked in the same oven were all consumed by a consumption Riqu de febre sudor in Epist. And though Sweat when other signs are good be a Token of a good Crisis yet a cold sweat is certainly mortall for it comes from the decayd heat of the solid parts When as it breaks forth from a great feavorish heat within it is cooled in the Externall parts that are now void of all heat Whence our Hippocrates l. 4. Aphor. 37. saith If cold Sweats come forth upon a hot Feaver they signifie Death but if the Feaver be mild a Chronicall disease Article 6. Of insensible Transpiration AS in the great World vapours are drawn forth from moyst places by the heat of the Sun and the Stars so in Man the litle world we must grant the same is caused by force of the inward heat Yet lest they being united in mans body should cause distemper and make Feavers God made mans body open and full of pores through which the vapours breathe out and that so finely that the senses can scarce perceive them Yet Sanctor Sanctorius did observe and weigh them as fine as they are Hence grew
Mountain of the Gentils and those ways and breaking one leg between his horns he ran upon his fore parts yet the Oxe stood fast again and fell not but the Rams grieved exceedingly and those that adored the Rams wept because God preserved him and sent him food from India that strengthned him And behold on the otherside of the River stood an Armenian Tyger with the Moon upon his Head and he said I will prey on both the conquerer and the conquered and the Ram with three horns was devoured by the Tyger and conquered him The other Ram fled to his Mountain and the grasse withered but the Oxes horns grew and the Tyger fled from him and the Ram did not escape into the Mountain and I was glad that God preserved the Oxe Artic. 6. Of Walkers in the Night THere are many examples of Night-walkers A certain young man rising out of his bed putting on his Cloths and his Boots and Spurs got astride above the window upon a Wall and spurd the Wall as if it had been a horse Another went down into a Well and came not up again till he had touched the water Horstius tells of a Noble Man that went to the top of a Tower and robb'd a birds nest and came down again by a rope It is reported that one at Paris girt with his sword swam over the Seyn and killed one he was minded to kill before when he had done this villany he return'd home Aleman comm ad libr. Hippocrat de Aere c. As for the cause many men are of divers minds The best opinion ascribes it to Imagination for the sensitive soul in sleep not onely rouzed by an external object converts her self to be sensible and first perceives darkly afterwards more clearly but being affected by the inward object represented in a dream rouzeth the moving faculty The Imagination is rouzed by the species of things reserved about which whilest it acts intentively it stirs up the moving faculty That this is so appears by daily experience For who knowes not but we are troubled in our sleep That we rise not is because our phantasie is not altogether so busie about the Images reserved as in some other men Yet the stronger motion doth not alwaies proceed from the same cause For some think the same thing may be caused from diurnal cogitation especially in younger people that are more bold and more lustfull Others suffer this from an internal affection of their body yet they are not all of the same kind Some have more cheerful and more phantastick animal spirits some seem to do this out of simplicity That they wake not is caused by the stiffnesse of the vapours For these not suffering them to be easily awaked and on the other side the animal spirits being lively it falls out that they are half awake half asleep yet it is not likely that all are of the same kind For that boy Libavius speaks of that went naked to the door and came home again observed a Watchman sitting in the streets Lastly the cause they do those things in their sleep they cannot do waking is their ignorance of the danger the action of reason is darkned and they cannot hinder the motions raised by Phantasie Libav in Noctambulis Article 7. Of some things observable concerning the Head and the Senses THere was one born and grew to be a man Anno 1516 that put forth another head at the navel Lycosthen Anno 1487 there was a boy at Venice that had his mouth cut divers wayes and a genital member growing to his crown Some of years have had horns grow on their heads A Virgin had them about the joynts of her Feet and Arms like to Calves horns she was cured afterward Schenk l. 1. observ The Egyptians had such hard heads that you could hardly break them with throwing a stone at them The Persians heads were so weak that a little stone would break them Herodot The Indians heads in Hispaniola are so hard that they will break swords Cardan l. 12. de variet rer Beniventus saith de abdit c. 10. that a Monk had his forehead bone eaten naked by a sharp humour Tyrrhenus Torcon and Cyonus Trojanus were grey when they were young Cal. l. 3. c. 27. Antiq. And Ctesias writes that in a part of the Indies the women never breed but once and presently grow grey after the first child The Miconii are born without hair Plin. l. 14. c. 37. It is rare for a woman to grow bald no Eunuchs ever do nor any man before he hath known a woman Pliny There was a woman seen at Paris with a black upper beard that began to be hoary of a great magnitude her chin also was moderately hairy Also they report that in the company of women that Albertus the Duke of Bavaria kept one of them had a long beard Wolsius There was a child born in Lombardy in the time of Pope Gregory that had ears big enough to cover the whole body Thomaius in horto mundi c. 19. Many men could move their ears and the skin of their heads at pleasure Dalechamp Men say that in the inward parts of the East there are people without any nose and their face is flat others that want their upper lip others without tongues Plin. l. 6. c. 30. They write also that there is a part of Aethiopia where the Inhabitants are born with a flexible body that they can wind themselves easily every way they please and they have two tongues and can use them both and speak plainly with them aâ— pleasure Gem. Fris. l. 1. c. 7. Cosmocrit Mutianus saith he saw Zanes a Samothracian Citizen who had his teeth grew again after 104 years Plin. l. 11. c. 17. Aristotle l. 2. c. 4. de histor animal makes mention of a woman that had her cheek teeth come forth with pain in her 80 year Pliny writes that some had teeth bred in their palates Pliny l. 11. c. 37. Moecenas never slept in three whole years at last he was cured by gentle Musick Seneca de provident Nizolius call'd Ciceronianus never slept in ten years Heurn c. 16. de morb cap Cardan when he pleased could be so taken up in his thoughts that he would feel no pain in that state And Augustine l. 14. de Civ Dei c. 24. reports the same of a Presbyter restored He lay as though he were dead and did not feel those that pulled him nor would he stirre though they burn'd him with fire yet he confessed that he could then hear men speak if they spake aloud as though they were far off from him And it was confirmed by this Argument that he did not do it by resisting but by not feeling that he moved not his body for he lay as dead and drew no breath The English History relates that Elizabeth Burton a Maid of Canterbury had contracted the same custom of taking away her senses from a disease she had CHAP. VIII Of the faculty of moving