Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	effect_n	natural_a	supernatural_a	1,915	5	10.5176	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53987	A miscellany of divers problems containing ingenuous solutions of sundry questions, partly moral, partly of other subjects / translated out of French by Henry Some ...; Meslange de divers problèmes. English	Pellisson-Fontanier, Paul, 1624-1693.; Some, Henry.; Thoms, Samuel.; Pellisson, Georges, d. 1677.	1662 (1662)	Wing P1108; ESTC R20442	80,919	296

have seen that the love of a Princes Vertue shines chiefly in the common people which makes the greatest part of men and is able to beget in them most exquisite and admirable motions of affections because of this mixture with Greatness which hath a certain Luster and Beauty that doth extreamly take with the people And if I may be permitted to add something upon this consideration I shall say further that it is only the baseness of his own mind that made him imagine that Gratitude shame of an unworthiness generally confest or love of a rare merit should have so little power upon our spirits for it hath been often seen that a troop of mutiners from amongst the very dregs of the people after they have contemned the fear of punishment have become calm and appeased on a sudden meerly by the presence of a man of known vertue out of reverence which it imprinted in them There are many crimes which men cease not to commit every day although they that commit them are every day hanged for it but on the contrary there are ingratitudes and unworthinesses which are committed but very rarely although the Laws have not ordained any punishment for those that are guilty of them because the greatest part of men have conceptions lively enough of the blackness and sordidness of them The fear of Death and Pain which according to Machiavel do never forsake men is overcome every day in the wars by the hope of a little pay and the contempt of them is grown common But of so many thousand men that hazzard themselves thus without doubt there would be but a very few that for a much greater summ would betray a friend by whom they had been sensibly obliged But we leave this discourse before it hath carried us very much beyond our subject and pass on to another Problem PROB. 43. What is the reason that Shame makes a redness to arise in the face AS there are not any motions more pleasant and more worthy to be known then those of Shame so there are none that seem to produce their effects in us after so obscure a manner and so difficult to explain The reason is that whatever our mind doth most genuinely and after a more natural manner is alwayes that which it is least aware of Now the impressions that Shame causes in our blood and upon our faces is so natural that Stage-players which laugh and cry though they are neither sad nor merry which can make themselves look pale as if they were afraid and can artificially draw upon their faces the redness of Anger and easily counterfeit Pitty Astonishment or Disdain cannot for all this by any cunning draw upon their faces the redness of Shame and the characters which it ought to be accompanied with Besides he that cryes hath an intention to cry and he that weeps hath an intention to weep but most commonly he that blushes hath no intention to blush and this is the reason that very modest persons blush even at their very blushing and by endeavouring to hide their Shame increase and double it Lastly that which makes the difficulty of this Problem appear greater is that it is certain the redness of Shame proceeds alwayes from some grief and pain which the soul is in Now it is the property of Grief to repress the blood and spirits and gather them together about the heart instead of spreading of them in the face as shame doth Nevertheless we will endeavour here to discover the mysterie of so handsom a passion And first we will tell you what some have thought that the soul sends forth the blood into the face in shame because it desires to cover it as with a veil whereto they endeavour to add some weight from experience which shows us that those which are surprized with Shame do naturally hold their hand before their face Now as I do not absolutely reject this consideration of theirs yet I do not think it ought to satisfie us so but that we should search for others For besides that it is perhaps a pretty fancy rather than a reason certain it is that many times they that are surprized with Shame do not desire to hide their faces from him that censures them but on the contrary do earnestly wish that he read therein his repentance and sorrow and for all this cease not to blush To search then another cause of this effect we must in the first place consider that in all the Passions the Soul imprints the images of its least motions upon the body and there figures out what it resents and what it suffers by certain dispositions which it gives it as it were by so many Emblems and Metaphorical pictures whether it doth it out of design or be constrained to it by necessity Thus for example angry people hold up their heads high and commonly set both their hands on their sides because holding the head high and taking up more room then before is a Metaphorical expression of the vain elevation of a presumptuous mind and of the greatness which it falsly attributes to it self So a man that affirms any thing with much zeal and opinionativenesse commonly bends his fists because this action hath some Analogy and correspondence with the estate in which the soul is But it were unprofitable and endless to think to prove a thing so clear and certain by enumerating all our passions wherefore supposing it rather true we say and I think with much colour of Reason that in all griefs and sadnesses when the soul flyes some external evil and considers it as external it makes the spirits of the outward parts fly towards the inward because such a motion as shews that it desires from all sides to enter into its self thereby to escape that evil which comes unto it from without is most proper to represent to the life the desire which it then hath and the condition it is in but on the contrary in the grief of Shame because it is touched with the horrour and hatred of an evil that is within it self and is fastened to its own substance since it is nothing else but its own imperfection it cannot better express this horrour and hatred then by violently thrusting forth the blood and spirits from within to the outward parts as if it would banish them from us since that indeed it is an estate that hath some Analogy with this corporal motion and that it would if it could banish it self and go out of its self by that means to fly from the vice which it finds it is defiled with Moreover Shame dilates the spirits and the blood and sheds them upon the face more subtilly then any other passion because it proceeds from a most spiritual conception to wit from the conception of a dishonest thing and that the more spiritual impressions have also more quick and suddain effects To this effusion of the blood and spirits contributes also perhaps after another sort the

A MISCELLANY OF DIVERS Problems Containing ingenuous Solutions of sundry Questions partly Moral partly of other subjects Translated out of French by HENRY SOME M. A. late Fellow of the Kings Colledge in Cambridge LONDON Printed for Charles Adams and are to be sold at his shop at the sign of the Talbot near St. Dunstans Church in Fleet-street Anno Dom. 1662. To the vertuous Ladies Mris Elizabeth Chase Mris Frances Heywood and Mris Laetitia Briggs the three sisters of his dear friend Mr. H. Some Vertuous Ladies WHereas common and low spirits might suspect this action as a design to renew a past sorrow seeing me after a year of mourning recall the memory of so sad a loss I know your more generous souls will rather interpret my intent an endeavour to allay your too long grief when I revive the memory of a dear dead Brother Since your reason being so near of kind to his cannot but judge it a weakness to preferr the passion of an useless sorrow above the merit of a pious gratitude And yet considering that others will be so partial as to blame whatever their fancies do not approve I must forbear to heighten the cause of sadness by recounting the particulars of your loss only I would fain begg your leaves to acquaint the world that in this they and you are partners But how shall I effect that since experience hath now taught the vulgar what was formerly reserved to the knowledge of the more prudent That the commendation of our friend is frequently but the cloak of a self-conceited folly And the world having been of late so much abused by hypocrisie is now become suspicious even of vertue if once recommended especially by a person whose obscurity leaves him lyable to their censure However the love of goodness the obligation of friendship and consciousness of truth shall prevail with me to the hazard of repute I should indeed both betray an high folly in my self and injure the worth of my Friend should I considering my own disability undertake to discourse at large of all his merits and yet thus much I cannot but say his ingenuous discourse his modest deportment his humility and candour gained a more then ordinary respect from all that ever he conversed with and this they shall witness for me They that had the happy opportunity of knowing him more throughly found his Learning so great and communicated with that freeness his piety so true and practised with that innocence that they could not but love him with admiration which also increased in those that had a more special and constant intimacy with him for such knew him so passionate a Lover of all ingenuous Learning that he ever counted that hour lost which was not imployed in some kind or other of it He hated naught so much as idleness or doing nothing and that made his very recreations as serious as others studies And this gave him the advantage of being skilled in modern languages which although he attained unto by a sagacity proper to his disposition and his own industry yet his courtesie would afterwards entertain discourse with the common Tutors and professed Teachers of them upon all emergent occasions This his true love to Learning gave our Nation the opportunity of knowing the Nature and Constitution of the new Famous French Academy by his translation of their History written by Monsieur P. Pellison which was a thing so acceptable to the Author that he was pleased to write him a particular acknowledgement and communicate to him also this present Treatise which likewise at times of divertisement he taught to speak English In the perusal of which I doubt not but the more ingenuous will reap satisfaction and find sufficient cause to love the Translators memory if they consider that it is not offered as a part of his more solid labours but as a valuable Essay of wit and to be used as it was made only in a Diversion That which I offer to you worthy Ladies I give not as a Present but repay as a due which without injustice I cannot detain a greater reason then that which engageth me to a publication entituling you to the right of Patronage For the memory of a dear friendship cannot herein challenge any thing from me but what the interest of a nearer relation makes entirely yours and together with it the Devoirs of Your most humble servant Samuel Thoms Cambridge Jan. 10. 1661. TO THE READER Reader I Conceive it would be rather presumption in me than humility if before you come to read what I here present you I should not give an account of some things that respect my design and the manner of these Problems which may occasion you either to bear with their faults or to condemn them with the more reason and justice In the first place seeing me alledge commonly many several reasons of the Questions I handle you may possibly desire to know Whether I propound part of them to exercise my wit and to beautifie my work like an Oratour that saies not only all he believes to be true or like truth but also all that he thinks advantagious to his cause To this Reader let me tell you that in some places indeed the obscurity of my matter hath given me licence to make bold conjectures and such as seemed to me more likely to add Beauty than Light to my work But that these places are very rare and that everywhere else I have laboured to give only solid reasons and have alledged many of them because having considered my matter many wayes and at several distances I thought they might be all true Some indeed may here say that it is not very likely that one and the same effect should have such different causes for commonly when we think we have found one solid cause of an effect this makes us despise all others and we are apt for this reason to esteem them vain and frivilous But Reader I am not of this judgement nay on the contrary do think that when we discourse upon an effect we should scarce ever content our selves with one good and true cause of it alone because every considerable effect hath many causes which contribute to its grandeur as all Rivers are formed by the uniting of several brooks and many petty rivuletts This is very evident of its self in some kind of things as for example That which casts a man into a disease cannot be alwayes one sole cause but many causes united so when the Question is to discourse of the ruine of a State it is clear that it will never be sufficient to think of finding one solid reason only because it alwayes hath many But though I see my self confined within the bounds of a Preface which I am afraid to exceed too much yet I will in some sort shew you as much as the brevity which I study will suffer me that this is no less true in regard of our Passions Actions and Humours which are

which I understand not reproach to him his contradictions fight against him with those arms which he hath put into my hands and appear more able and more understanding by this censure of him then indeed I am On the contrary to commend any one with success one must not suppose for ttue any thing that he saies but must prove and maintain it by reasons fetcht elswhere PROB. 35. What is the reason that when the Winter hath been very cold they commonly say the Summer that follows will be very hot THere are sometimes some slight things the clearing whereof fails not to bring some light to our common sense and in this number one may reckon this which at first sight hath some difficulty by reason that one would think the quite contrary that if the Winter hath very much cooled the Earth and Air they should be the more difficultly heated by the following Summer Is it therefore quite otherwise that the heat of the Summer finding the earth and air very cold doth redouble its violence by the opposition of its contrary Or else do they say so because they see that one contrary doth naturally succeed another in the same degree as for example the water doth naturally ascend as much as it hath descended the excess of heat in a feaver ariseth to the same violence with the excess of cold great friendships leave behind them great enmities and great displeasures when they end produce extream contentments after an extraordinary cloudy and wet season we enjoy an extraordinary serenity and purity of air and much fairer then that which went before it and one that is recovered from a great sickness hath commonly better health then he had before and recovers a soundness that is more firme and of a greater value then that which he had lost Or else is it that when the Winter hath been extraordinary cold it hath also been necessarily dry by the same reason the earth being very dry is disposed to receive a great heat Or else that when it hath been long cold it is a sign that the matter of the cold and Northern wind or of the other causes that do cool the air is spent for a long time and therefore it is likely it will be very hot PROB. 36. What is the reason that Fear makes ones hair stand on end FOr the clearing of this Problem I think it is needful to consider in the first place that Admiration and Fear have some affinity and do often accompany one another Which being so it seems that as Admiration makes a Chilness run through ones whole body by reason that it brings into the soul a certain shadow of Fear So Fear makes the hair stand on end out of some mixture of Admiration Indeed this seems so much the more probable because the frights which make the hair stand on end must spring from a danger whose image presently strikes the soul and yet it knows no cause of it and that those frights which come upon us when we think we see dead men or Ghosts or Devils do chiefly produce this effect because they are not only fearful things but also very admirable as being supernatural Virgil hath excellently well comprized this for when he would expresse the Fear which the ghost of his wife Creusa strook into Aeneas the prodigy of Polydorus's tomb the arrival of Mercury that came to bring him a message from Jupiter or the Fear that Turnus was in seeing an infernal monster flap his buckler with its wings upon all these occasions he puts down this circumstance that their hair stood up right because that all these things were as Admirable as terrible But in other kinds of fear he is contented to mention only coldness and trembling And if any demand of me why Admiration makes the hair to stand up right I answer that the soul having its faculties intent on the consideration of that which appears admirable doth also contract the organs of the brain and with them the skin that covers the head Now a man may easily imagine that we cannot contract this skin but by pulling it up nor pull it up but the hairs will stare a little It is true that the motion of fear doth also contribute thereto because it makes one cold and that a part of our body cannot be cold without being a little more contracted then before PROB. 37. Whence comes it that many being in a frenzy have spoke Latin or Greek without having ever learned either of these languages MAny of those that have examined this Question endeavouring to rid themselves of the great difficulty which it presents at first to the mind have in my judgement made use of such answers as are more against all appearance of reason then the Question it self and given us remedies worse then the disease For they would give such strange force to our imagination that no man of a sound judgement is able to give credit to their vain discourses Wherefore omiting all that they have said of it we will search only amongst known causes according to our custom the reason of so marvellous an effect First then it is remarkable that those words which many being in a frenzy have pronounced in a tongue which they knew not have been ordinarily Latin or Greek or sometimes Hebrew according to the report of those that have treated of them In the second place I suppose that the words which they have thus spoken did not make any discourse that was coherent or that was pertinent to that which was asked them since that the transports of their frenzy hindred them from discoursing rationally These two things being thus supposed one may add that although those that have spoken Latin Greek or Hebrew in a frenzy never studied it and yet they easily may have heard those words before which they spoke seeing that these three languages are commonly taught throughout Europe and that private houses and those places which are set apart for speaking in publick do very often retain them Now it is possible that these words at the same time when they heard them made some impression in the organs of their memories which through its weakness did not appear to them untill they fell into madness because that the heat of the frenzy by its immoderate subtilizing of the spirits of the brain renders the sense of the imagination so quick and so delicate that there cannot be in its organs any impressions so weak which it discovers not and is lively enough affected with it And that the images of certain things can lodge in our memories and we have no knowledge of them at all because they are only painted very weakly and as it were with dead colours may sufficiently be proved by Reminiscence which brings to our minds many things which we thought we had utterly forgotten Besides many otherlike impressions are also made oftentimes in the other organs of our faculties and we never perceive it and it is not to be doubted