foresee what may come to passe within an hour how much lesse are ye able to foretell what shall come to passe after an age Doe either this or that infallibly That we may know that yee are Gods Not Devills not Idols not Diviners not Sooth-sayers not Prognosticators Nâ—y not Angels not Prophets nor Apostles no but very Gods For to foreknow and foretell things to come this is the sole property of a true God and of none else but one worthy to be so known confessed honoured and adored Yea doe good or doe evill Not Morally for so evill indeed ye may do so farre as ye are permitted yet good ye cannot doe because not thereunto endowed But Remuneratively let your Starres and Planets not onely signe but cause good fortune or reward to good men and bad fortune or punishment to evill men That we may be dismayed This benignity and severity of theirs would indeed strike us with some astonishment either of terrours or admiration But tell 's not of their indiscriminate and confused benefices or malefices to our vain hopes or fears unless you can order them so as that we may behold them together sc God as well as man to approve them and we as well as you to prove and experiment them Otherwise why should wee believe you can foresee see such things as none can see but your selves But since you are not able to let us behold your Art together with you this we can behold without you and so can all that are wise beside you Behold ye are of nothing Is not there the vanity of your persons And your works of nought is not there the invalidity of your Art An abomination is he that chooseth you Is not there the guilt and plague of every proselyte and client of yours And now think not easily to evade it is God that thus discepts with you sayth the Lord. Yea sayth the King of Jacob It is God that not only disputes against your cause but pleads the cause of his Church against you Isa 44. 25. That frustrateth the tokens of the lyars and maketh Diviners mad that turneth wise men backward and maketh their knowledge foolish How God dealeth not only with Astrologers but with their Art He frustrateth depriving that of a due end to which he never vouchsafed a true cause the tokens fancied and feigned signes from calculated and prognosticating Aspects and Conjunctions of the lyars commonly expounded of feigning and falsifying Astrologers that Predict and presage neither from the truth of nature reason nor saith And maketh Diviners mad Mad in giving them over to break their own brains about needless curiosities and abstruse vanities Mad in a proud and insolent conceit and boasting of their own art and learning above all other mad in their phrenetick suggestions sublime investigations confused apprehensions obscure expressions ambiguous presagitions superstitious Ceremonies and prestigious practices Mad at the frustration of their own bold Predictions Mad at wise mens discovery of them and consequently at the worlds derision and contempt Mad with envy at the truth of God Church and Ministry And mad in the horrour and distractions of their own hellish hearts and consciences And turneth wise men backward Such as account themselves the onely wisemen and yet while they pretend to make progresse in knowledge and vertue are themselves become retrograde and turned backward into Idolatry Superstition Atheism Prophanesse Sorcery c. Turned backward while they read the Stars now backward now forward now for a fortune now for an infortune now for this side now for that Turned backward when they find rebuke and reprehension where they lookt for praise and promotion And maketh their knowledge foolish From their own conviction confession retractation by the infallible judgement of Gods word and truth in the clear discerning of all wise-hearted Christians and to the palpable experiment of all rationall men What not only the Artists fools but the Art it self folly Away then with that excuse from the folly errour and ungroundedness of the Artsmen since there is so little ground besides errour and folly for the Art it self Isa 57 12 13 14. Stand now with thine inchantments and with the multitude of thy sorceries wherein thou hast laboured from thy youth if so be thou shalt be able to profit if so be thou mayst prevail Thou art wearied in the multitude of thy counsells Let now the Astrologers the Starre-gazers the monethly Prognosticators stand up and save thee from these things that shall come upon thee Behold they shall be as stubble the fire shall burn them they shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame there shall not be a coal to warm at nor fire to sit before What use and end of Astrologers in times of extreme and imminent dangers Can there be any help or hope in that Art or power which the Holy Ghost thus rebukingly derides Stand now he speaks to Babylon the mother of Magick Astrologie and Witchcraft and that in an admonition to all Nations Now that divine vengeance and common calamity is at hand Now indeed is the usuall time for these Arts and Artists to be boldly and busily standing up or starting out but can they upon such exigents stand up with Faith and Fortitude and Patience Alas the wretched Magicians were not able to stand before the plague of a boyle how then can they stand up in a greater judgement And if not stand up themselves how should they now stand others in stead why then should others stand with them Oh! let all take heed how they stand with such by crediting confiding countenancing or conniving lest God give them all over to fall together What more dreadfull token of judgement inevitable and ineluctable than whan God desists from his gracious and serious dehorting and ironically invites to persist one with another in evill and unlawfull wayes Stand now with thine inchantments or conjunctions Lo there may be Inchantments in Conjunctions And lo maleficall and sorcerous sinnes are not only appopriated to the actors only but to them also that consult assent credit confide countenance connive excuse justifie or in any way stand with them And with the multitude of thy sorceries Lo again how one kind of malefice induces to another and how they all agree to multiply through countenance or connivance Wherein thou hast laboured from thy youth O tedious labour in an abstruse art O vile labour in a vitious art O impious labour in a prophane art O fruitless labour in an unprofitable art O horrid labour in execrable immolation O sordid labour in loathsome inspection O ridiculous labour in vain observation O servile labour in superstitious attendance O toylsome labour in prestigious fabrefaction O lost labour and time to be instituted and educated to such a practice or profession O endless labour to begin it in youth and not to desist from it in old age But were all they of Babylon solely and wholly trained up to this sortilegious trade
the directions which are not only inobservable by the Attenders but in explicable and so confest by the propounders themselves But wee l take them at their word let wisedome be pursued to some purpose and then all their other cautions or conditions will prove to no purpose 17. Whether the confused cautions of dayes hours minutes points numbers measures degrees orders harmonies similitudes congruities dispositions compositions elections preparations observations fabrications c. argue not their art or artifice a difficult vanity an unprobable fiction an imposible operation 18. What fickle tickle fallible arts are Magick Astrologie Alchymie to have so many cautious directions ceremonies circumstances and they so difficult to be apprehended more difficult to be observed and yet the ignorance as they say neglect or miscarriage of the least circumstance enough to frustrate the whole substance or effect 19. Upon what pretexet is it that ther are such caveats in Magick Astrologie Alchymie yea and Sorcery it self for fasting abstinence cleanness of affections members garments habitation instruments c. since the arts themselves are unclean and the best of them by their own confession not throughly purged therefrom 20. Is it not well known that the Devill even in the most execrable arts and acts of conjuration inchantment sorcery witch-craft hath cautioned admonished and exhorted to fasting prayer chastity charity justice forbearing of certain sins frequenting of divine ordinances Now will any say these arts or acts were any whit the better or safer for those cautionings and conditionatings so pâ—erequired 21. What good end else can there be of their own counselling and warning that an Astrologer be a man both expertly Ethicall and Physicall Save that as he should not exercise his own so he should not Prognosticate of others manners beyond all grounds of morality And that he should correct or rather prevent his Astrologicall Prognostications by true physicall principles 22. Whether this be not a proper caution for all Astrologers to forewarn one another of gazing so long upon the stars till they fall as one of them did into the ditch 23. Whether it be not the best caveat that can be given to an Astrologer and so confest by some of them to account it most safe and sure after all inspection of the stars to look to the Parents for the constitution to the temper for qualities to the will for actions to industry and externall means for acquisitions and to divine providence for events 24. VVhether any sound Orthodox Christian ever did write in the approof of judiciary and predicting Astrologie And if any such have treated of the speculation if their recantation followed not after it then with what moderation and reiterated caution yea and that so severe so sincere as that a Christian Reader might easily perceive it was the caution which he intended through the main of the discourse and not the Institution CHAP. XIII 13. From the contrariety of opinions IF that be not worthy to be called a Science which consists only in opinion what then shall we call that which is nothing else almost but a contrariety of opinions A contrariety about the grounds of the art about the operation upon those grounds and about the effects of those operations Such a contrariety as is irreconcilable the Opinors or Opinionists old and new each of them contending to plant his own and supplant the others opinions And such a variety of contrarieties that were all their Authors at hand it might be inquired if a glancing eye might not soon observe and a running hand transcribe about every point and particular of their art almost ten for one of these that are here set down 1. About the nature and office of the Gods Spirits Angels Demons and Heroes 2. About the principles of good and evill 3. About the originall and defect of oracles 4. About the first Author and inventors of Magick and Astrologie 5. About the causes in vaticinating good and bad 6. About the figure and durance of the world 7. About the principles of all things especially of the celestiall bodies 8. About the number and site of the celestiall orbes 9. About the solidity of the celestiall orbes 10. About the order of the orbs or sphears 11. About the motions of the eighth sphear 12. About the revolution of the ninth sphear 13. About the magnitude of the Stars 14. About their number 15. About their form 16 About their order 17. About their light 18. About their distance both one from another and from the earth 19. About their scintillation or their trepidation 20. About their fixation and volitation 21. About the motion of the fixed Stars 22. About the variation of the latitude of the fixed Stars 23. About the antick and postick the right hand and left hand of Stars 24 About the time or space of the Stars fulfilling their degrees or courses 25. About the names numbers and order of the Planets 26. About the magnitude and distance of the planets 27. About the influences of the Planets 28. About the prime generation and ultimate resolution of those influences 29. About the benevolence and malevolence of Planets generall and particular corporall and mentall 30. About the proper Houses of the Planets and their efficacities there 31. About the fabrefaction of the twelve Houses 32. About the Suns being the center of the visible world 33. About the latitude of the Moon 34. About the Semidameters of the Sun Moon and shadow of the earth 35. About the proportion and magnitude of the three great bodies the Sun the Moon and the Earth 36. About the tearms limits bounds or ends of the Planets 37. About the new Stars 38. About Comets their nature substance site figure portent 39. About the appellations and the operations of the twelve Signs 40. About the assigning of the severall parts of the body to severall Planets and Signs 41. About the subjecting of such and such Cities and Countries to such and such Stars and Planets and parts of the Zodiack 42. About the visible and invisible Sun and Moon 43. About the motion and quiescency of the Earth 44. About the Earths being a meer Star one of the Planets and having her annuall motion round about the Sun 45. About the propriety and inconstancy of the Moons light 46. About the more powerfull acting of the Stars whether from their light or motion 47. About the Galaxia or milkie way 48. About the number of the zones the torrid the frigid and their habitableness 49. About the elevation of the Pole and its investigation 50. About the Meridian the constitution elevation and the difference thereof from divers Cities and places 51. About the circumference of the sensible Horizon 52. About the computation of times 53. About the Kalendar and its reformation or correction 54. About the beginning and end of the year 55. About the Solar year and the quantity thereof 56. About the beginning of the naturall day 57. About the equation of civill dayes 58.
the body is there not a medicine and meat to cure it but if it could intend any evill upon the soul or mind yet is there not education and discipline to prevent it Many things may be effected besides nature may they not much more then besides Fate If every man may fabricate his own Fortune why not also contrive his own Fate If Fate had never had name or nature or power would things have fallen out otherwise than they doe fall out why then should Fate be inculcated since without Fate there is Nature and Fortune to which all things necessary or casuall may be aptly referred In this old Philosophicall dispute what easie Moderator would not give this censure That either side hath said sufficient to overthrow his Adversaries opinion but neither of them enough to establish his own 7. Hath not the constellatory Fatation introduced so many starry Gods into the world Yea made so many providentiall and tutelary Gods and Goddesses some Select others Ascriptitious to have a hand in the whole administration of the Universe But particularly so many Geniall or Genitall Gods and Goddesses and their sundry ordinations and offices at every mans geniture As of Janus Jupiter Saturn Genius Mercury Apollo Mars Vulcan Neptune Sol Orcus Liber Pater Tellus Ceres Juno Lucina Fluona Luna Diana Minerva Venus Vesta Moreover Vitumnus Sentinus Mens Mena Iterduca Domiduca Abaona Adeona and Dea Fatua too not of the least ordination and operation either in the birth or life or death And no marvell that they make so many Consent-Gods goe to the fate of a Man when they will have so many to be busie about the fate of an herb As Seia fatally president of the sowing Segetia or Segesta at the comming up of the Corn Nodotus or Nodinus at the knitting or knotting Volutina at the involving of the leaves Batellina or Datellea at the opening of the blade Proserpina at the budding Hostilina at the equall shaping of the eare Flora at the flourishing Lasturtia at the nourishing Tutilina in the keeping Matuta or Matura at the ripening Messia at the mowing and Runcina not only at the weeding but at the plucking up by the roots 8. Whether Fate be one or many If it be one simply then what needs any reduction if it many why is it not reduced to one And then in vain is that done by many which may be done by one and it is prophane l to ascribe that to many which ought to be a scribed to one If it be one truly then is it undivided in it self and divided from all others which how can that which is a series or connexion of so many things be especially having its inherence in movables or mutables If it be but one accident why should it imply all under a necessity If it be but one by aggregation collection connexion so are things fortuitous as well as fatall Besides such an unity is in the meanest degree of entity Wherefore then should it order and subordinate things of a more perfect degree then it self If it be many or a multiplicity then is it unequall indeterminate uncertain and next to a nullity If it be one why then so they make it do diverse according to divers conjuctions and constellations If it be many how can they make any certain and particular pronouncing upon it 9. Whether that they call Fate be in the first or among the second Causes If in the first that is as much as to make it equall unto God If among the second then is it inferiour unto man For among second causes and especially in involuntary actions and all such as fall under humane counsell and deliberation the intellectuall mind and rationall will hath no superiour And what more contrary to the order of nature and creatures than that the lesse noble should be disposing and governing those more noble than themselves 10. Whether there be a fatall necessity upon all acts or events If upon all acts where 's Liberty if upon all events where 's contingency And whether upon these both good and evill and that whether naturall civill or spirituall If upon naturall acts and events good or evill then what use of means either to preserve or to prevent If upon acts civill and good what merit what praise if upon acts civill and evill what laws what punishments If upon events civill and good what thanks if upon events civill and evill what hopes If upon acts spirituall and good what free grace if upon acts spirituall and evill what free will If upon events spirituall and good what free bounty If upon events spirituall and evill what free mercy 11. How can there or why should there be such a thing as Fate imposing a necessity upon actions and events when as divine providence it self doth it not so as to exclude liberty contingency or casualty from things But works with second causes according to their own motion and manner Permitting sometimes their exuberancy sometimes their deficiency preserving to them their sundry orders offices and degrees of efficiency Suffering the remoter causes or agents to be impedited by the more proximate that all effects might not be taken for naturall and necessary but that his own free disposing might appear Although nature and every naturall agent be of it self and ordinarily determinated to one effect and to the producing of it after the same way yet he suffers it to be impedited by one debility and indisposition or another either to come to pass otherwise or else to be altogether prevented that so he might preserve a contingency in all naturall causes to the intent nothing might be thought absolutely necessitating but his own will and pleasure above Much more doth he confirm a freedom to the rationall will not only that good may the more chearfully be done and accepted but the evill also that is done or suffered may not unjustly be imputed to providence because of a necessity imposed 12. If fate be as they define it the Series order nexure ligation complication constitution disposition of second causes c. what feeble things are all those seconds put together without the first what can their own motion work to without his speciall concurrence what if he work not with them what if without them what if against them Leave them to themselves and what knot in a rope of Sand Can there be a perpetuall series or indissoluble connexion betwixt causes so disparate yea so adverse as naturall internall necessary and arbitrary adventitious accidentall yet after this order is fate oftentimes finished A languishing man not only consumes away within himself but the ayr meats drinks poyson act the fatall consummation To an ordinated destiny of an unfortunate end comes in inordinately fire water a fall a gun a sword an unlucky hand c. and hath not this necessitating fate now the complement by accident and is there not a casuall intervention of more force to the fatall effect than all the causall connexion How
experimenting Augur And is not that such a Prognosticating Sooth-sayer or Sooth-saying Prognosticator as doth it only from his own conjecture and hath nothing to proove it but meerly the experiment 4. Who is a Witch Not only he that acts by a diabolicall compact and power but he that acts praestigiously and delusively upon any part of nature whatsoever Such were the Magicians of Egypt Exod 7. 11. And if they will rest with the Rabbinicall description of the word and the man that is meant by it it signifies such an one as professeth the art of the Stars to deduce a Genius down from heaven and inâ—ice it by certain characters and figures fabricated at certain hours and under certain courses of the Stars and so using or imploying it to any mans commodity or discommodity as he listeth yea and for the presagition and praediction of things hidden absent and future 5. Who is a Charmer He that useth spels figures characters ligatures suspensions conjurations or as the word it self speaketh conjoyneth conjunctions Now if you aske what kind of conjunctions I answer besides that with the Devill in a compacted confederacy and that with those of their own society why not those also amongâ—t the Starrs and Planets Seeing those also are conjunctions of mens own conjoyning that is made to conspire to those significations and events to which themselves were never yet agreed 6. Who is a consulter with familiar spirits What he that hath consociation with a wretched Imp or confariation with a petty Maisterell or that mutters and mumbles from a Spirit in a bottle in a bag or in his own belly or he that interrogates such a Familiar either mediately by consulting and assenting or immediatly by tempting and provoking Yea and he too that can whisper if not with the Spirits that rule in the ayr yet with those spirits which he sayes not only move but animate the celestiall bodyes And then proclame you a pleasing presage if you will but fill either his bottle or his belly or his bag For he tells you the Spirit will not speak to your advantage if these be empty 7. Who is a Wizzard A cunning man a wise-man a Magician an Artist or in truth a Sciolist That is one whose idle speculation of vain curiosities makes him arrogantly to presume or superstitiously to be presumed to know and foreknow that which in good earnest he knows not neither is well and throughly able to judge of it after it is now not unknown to all For saving the sagacâ—ty of Satans suggestions he knows as much by the understanding of a reasonable man as he doth by the corner of a Chimera-beast Ask the Rabbinicall Magician and he has so much understanding as to tell you what is meant by that I count the Jewish wizzardly fable not here worth the relating no though the wizzard himself be translated from it 8. who is a Necromancer He that takes upon him to Presage or Divine to the living from the dead idest Dead corps dead sacrifices dead idols dead pictures dead figures yea and dead or liveless Signes and Planets too The Holy Ghost uses other words plain enough expressing both their votes and feats or arts and acts Exod. 7. 11. Isay 47. 13. Ezek. 21. 21 22. Hos 4. 12. Dan. 5 11. to let them understand it is not in all their evasion to escape his comprehension yea and that in some such words as were otherwise of honest signification and laudable use To let them know again that it is not the arrogation or attribution of a good name or tearm that can make it a good art or lawfull profession And therefore they have small cause to glory in usurping to themselves such an appellation as the Scripture sometimes retains in a middle acception But have I not said enough both to include them according to the scope of the place as also to exclude them according to the tenour of the case I have here handled Isa 41. 21 22 23 24. Produce your cause saith the Lord bring forth your strong reasons saith the King of Jacob. Let them bring them forth and shew us what shall happen Let them shew the former things what they be that we may consider them and know the latter end of them or declare us things for to come Shew the things that are to come hereafter that we may know that ye are Gods yea doe good or doe evill that we may be dismayed and behold it together Behold ye are of nothing and you work of nought an abomination is he that chooseth you Whether the Devill and his prognosticating Divines be able to indure the disquisition and examination of God and of his divine Prophets Produce your cause make manifest if you can your whole art and profession Wherefore doe ye adjure one another to Sorcerie in your half-hinted mysteries are neither God nor good men capable of them nor worthy to receive them Come produce your causes let us hear what naturall causes there can be for your so peremptory predictions upon arbitrary notions and fortuitous events Bring forth your strong men your Artists and your strong reasons the true Demonstrations of your Art Let them the Idols their Oracles Augurs and all the aruspicate Presagers bring forth into reall art or effect and shew us by true propositions what shall happen by way of contingent or meer accident Let them shew the former things what they be For if they be ignorant of things past heretofore how can they be intelligent of things future or that shall be hereafter And if things past be not yet present to them doubtless things to come are farre absent from them But let them shew the former things that we may consider them How recollect them as if out of our mind and memory Nay that we may see whether their recollection of them be worth our consideration Or set our heart upon them to give credit or assent unto them And know the latter end of them For if they can recall things from the first they are the better able to inform us what shall become of them to the very last And if things be present to them from the beginning we may the rather believe them that things are not absent or hidden from them as touching their latter end Or declare us things for to come If they be blind behind so that they cannot look back but have only their eyes in their foreheads to see before them then let them even as concerning those things make us to hear sc both infuse a faith and bind a conscience to believe them as touching the futures which they take upon them to foretell What talk ye of some immediate and imminent probables such as even sense may ghesse at or present hopes or fears easily suggest Shew the things that are to come hereafter Manifest your prescience of things aâ—ar off as well as your present sense of things neer at hand But alas ye are not able certainly to
the friendship and hatred the complyance and adversness of men is not the service or disservice of the brute creature the vertue or venome of an herb or minerall yea the defence or offence of a sword a knife a spear a gun a club c. are not all these more sensibly apprehended to be more neerly advantagious or prejudiciall to health or sicknesse riches or poverty honour or disgrace prosperity and adversity life or death than are all the joynt benevolences or malevolencies of the fatall Starres If therefore a fatidicall prognostication may be made from the Caelestiall why not rather from the terrestriall motions 20. Whether Fate be above the Starres as their governour or else under them as their minister If above them why make they the starres to be the causes of fate For so they must needs be superiour to it If under them how then are the starres themselves subject to fate for so they must needs be inferiour How then should the starres dispose of others fate that are not able to dispose of their own Is it for creatures terrestriall or caelestiall to perform that to others which they are not able to preserve to themselves Ought not therefore such a disposition to be referred solely to him that hath the ordination and gubernation of all things both in heaven and earth simply freely eternally and immutably in himself 21. How can the fatall series of causes be from the starres when as the starres themselves are not causes as in humane and arbitrary actions Not causes where they may be signes as of things already done and past Yea God himself may signifie many things whereof he is not the cause as in evill and sinfull actions Nay have not the fatidicall Vaticinators themselves made many fatall signes which could never be causes nor yet once come into any series or necessary connexion As in their aruspicies and anguries from the entrailes of beasts flight and noise of birds c. as also from lots dreams prodigies casualties yea and physiognomies c. 22. How can the starres be the first in the fatall series of second causes When as of all creatures the spirituall intellectuall or rationall are the supreme and the corporeall animate or inanimate their inferiours Now the starres are both corporeall and inanimate Spirits and souls as they have more similitude to so they participate more vertue of divine providence than all other creatures For they are both the cognoscitive and the operative instruments of providence which the other are not For these being but the executive only may either be directed or diverted by the iutellectuall and ordinative As acting of themselves with liberty deliberation discretion observation of right rules application of fit means and intention to a due end And therefore are the more eminent ministers of providence than all things else in heaven or earth 23. Whether any such cut as fatation may be properly sayd to be in or from the starres For fatation imports a primordiall law or decree not an influence only or effect what sacrilege is it then to ascribe that to the instrument which is only peculiar to the principall agent Since it is for instruments especially the inanimate not to ordain but execute only Yea it is a question whether there be any fatation even in fate it self it being accepted and discerned not for a seminall disposition but for an ultimate execution and that inherent in the moveable or mutable subject Wherefore seeing fatation is neither in the starres nor in fate it self whether can any thing be sayd to be fatall with respect to the starres For the starres are but second causes And with respect to all such some things may be sayd to be naturall some things arbitrary some things indifferent some things contingent some things uncertain some things casuall but few or none fatall 24 Whether it be in the power and validity of the celestiall bodyes to impose a fatall necessity either upon humane actions or yet upon naturall things For if the starres be any such causes then must they cause principally of themselâ—es intentionally directly immutably Now how can they be principall causes when providence is above them how of themselves when they work not upon humane actions but by accident how intentionally since they want a mind or soul how directly when they operate upon humane actions but indirectly how immutably when their ordination or disposition may be impedited Again were they thus acting then should there be no contingents or accidents no libertie or free actions nor prevention of any events or issues no particular causes should be defective nor distance of place nor indisposition of the mean no neglect of the means no endeavour to the contrary or opposition should be available nay not only the understanding but the will should be tyed to corporall organs and matter yea and the starres should not only be of sufficient but of infinite power 25. How doe the celestiall bodyes work so fatally upon these inferiours when as they here operate not upon a necessity as to the producing of the effect For albeit their impressions be naturall yet are they not received but according to the manner of the receivers which are fluxible and not having themselves still after the same way Because of the matter that is in a potentiality to many yea and to contrary formes The matter also is movable and corruptable and may easily defect of it self may be intrinsecally indisposed and extrinsecally impedited And the starres themselves are but indefinite and remote causes to which the effect can never follow determinatly and necessarily unless the middle causes be necessary and then they follow them and not the other But in the foresaid series the middle causes are most of them contingent and from many contingent causes can come no effect of necessity because any one of them and all of them together may be defective and not attain unto their end 26. Seeing the heavenly bodyes act not upon these inferiours but by their light and motion and so communicate nothing to the matter they work upon but light motion and heat Now why may not all these flow from all the starres in generall And why then should such and such fatall inclinations be attributed to such or such positions or conjunctions And if there be any particular vertues of the light and motion of some stars contrary to the vertues of the light and motion of other starres how is that demonstrated And how comes it to passe that they should be operative and effectuall one way in their simple natures or qualities and yet another way in their relative aspects and positions Is an imaginary relation or respect of more validity than a reall substance or propriety 27. They seem to define fate more acurately that make it to be the â—eries or connext order of naturall causes Now till they can directly and successively deduce those naturall causes down from the starres to those fatall events what
reason is there to credit their proposition much lesse their prognostication They likewise will have fate in the best sense they can take it to digest and distribute all things according to certain motions successions orders forms places times Now if their fate cannot be well understood or discerned without these same astrictions why are they so confounded at the inexplicableness of the circumstances Otherwise why doe they not predict usually the very times and places together with the fates themselves Moreover the first definers of fate held it to be not in the superiors but in the inferiors themselves Namely a disposition inherent in the moveable thing and that urging to an immoveable event If indeed it be such ought not every mans fate to be collected from himself rather than from his Stars 28. How should the things of fate and fortune be foretold when it is not yet with one consent told what things they are themselves Some have gone so high as to say that they are Deities or Gods others are fallen so low as to make them vanities and nothing Some confound these two together some set them so opposite as that they make them confound one another Some admit many things of both as they say at the fore-gate and exclude all again at the back door Some place them in the beginning in the middle in the end of a business Some make us to be in their power Some them in our power Some would have us believe both but inquire neither But if they would no inquiry after their nature and properties why make they such inquiry into their operations and effects 29. Whether fate be mutable or immutable If mutable how is it fate Is there not then a contingency of fate as well as a fate of contingencies If immutable what hope what colour what means what remedy Nay if immoveable how moves it as they say according to the nature and order of all moveable things That is to say with naturall things naturally with necessary necessarily with voluntary voluntarily with contingent contingently with violent violently with remiss remissely And all this not as a prime and free but as a second and necessary cause Why may we not as well say with rationall things â—…tionally with brute brutishly with sensuall sensually with â—…tuous vertuously with vitious vitiously with prosperous pâ—oâ—perously with adverse adversely with uncertain uncertainly 〈◊〉 And then what irrefragable law of fate is that which is fain to conform to and comply with every ones manners and manner of working 30. Whether fate be absolute in decree or conditionate If absolute then can it not be otherwise and what remedy Nay then is it infinite omnipotent eternall and with superiority If conditionate and that not from a liberall dispensation of its own but a naturall ordination from another what fatation is that then that comes upon condition that depends upon others actions not its own determination If it be absolute then is it cruell and unjust in many things if it be conditionate then is it variable and certain in nothing Set aside the first act which is the eternall decree and the last act which is death these indeed may be said to be both absolute and conditionate but Christians are not taught to call these fate But take it as they doe for the middle act then can they make it to be neither absolute nor conditionate 31. Whether fate and fatall events follow the body or the mind If the body what difference betwixt the fate of a man and of a beast In events good or evill who is worthy who is guilty And how follow they the mind seeing the stars necessarily and directly make no impression there Because it is superiour according to the order of nature and not subject to matter time or place but united to an intellectuall and spirituall substance and therefore cannot suffer from corporeall things although celestiall Nor can they so exceed their own sphear and species as to act directly upon it And if not upon the intellective faculty which acts necessarily much less upon the elective power which is free and never acts but freely nor is subject to fatality or fatall necessity For then should the election of the will be no more but a meer naturall instinct should be determined to one thing should act but one way should have the like motions in all upon the like representations should not have any thing in its own power to discern deliberate choose refuse c. but must be carryed on either naturally or violently as the Stars doe incline or enforce 32. Whether fate or fortune be either in good or evill actions If fate be iâ— good actions are they not necessitated and inforced if fortune 〈◊〉 there are they not fortuitous and accidentall And so what â—…e of them what reward The like may be affirmed of evill actions and if likewise thus inferred what shame what punishment In vitious actions either fate offers violence to a mans will or leaves to its own liberty If the first is not a mans will to be excused in evill and if the last is not every mans will the cause of his own fate yea and of the hardest and heaviest fates For they are such which follow sin and wickedness 33. Wherefore should man or his actions be made the subject yea the slave of fate when as indeed man as man is superiour thereto For fate being but a sydereall service of second causes must be reduced to the providence of the first cause and in that reduction man himself hath place or preferment before all the stars of heaven Because the divine providence receives to it self or extends it self in a more speciall way to intellectuall or rationall than it doth to all other creatures else In as much as they excell all others both in the perfection of nature and in the dignity of end In the perfection of nature Because the rationall creature hath the dominion over his own actions and operates voluntarily whereas the other act not so much as are acted In the dignity of the end because the intellectuall creature only by his operation reaches to the ultimate end of the universe sc to know and love God But the other creatures touch not that end by an inspired intention but only according to some participated similitude Furthermore God provides for the intellectuall nature principally and as it were for selfs sake and but for all other crtatures secondarily and in order to it The rationall creature is Gods agent the other are but his instrumens Now God cares more for his agents than he doth for his instruments Yea they are the instruments of this very agent and he makes use of them either in his practice or contemplation God hath more regard to the free and liberall than to the necessitated and servile acts of his creatures The rationall creatures are the more noble in themselves and of more neer accession to the divine similitude and therefore tendred by
search out what houre and day the nativity of Romulus was who having throughly considered the adventures acts and gests of Romulus how long he lived and how he died all these being conferred he did boldly judge that Romulus was conceived in his mothers womb in the first yeere of the second Olympiad the 23 day of the moneth which the Aegyptians call Câ—aeas and now is called December about three of the clock in the morning in which houre there was a totall ecclipse of the Sunne and that he was born into the world the 21 of the moneth of Thoth which is the moneth of September about the rising of the Sunne Now is not this old way of calculating a Nativity quite contrary to the new But of the twaine which is the most certain that a priori or a posteriori sc from the acts and accidents of life to the birth or from the birth to the acts and accidents of life The Historian notes the one for false and vaine what then is to be thought of the other In the time of Kenneth King of Scots appeared two dreadfull Comets one before the Sun-rising the other after the setting also armies were seen in the ayre and noyses of armes and horses heard Also a Bishops Crosier staffe was burned as he held it in his hand in time of service and could not be quenched But the prodigies were not so various as were the prognosticators interpretations whereof some were delivered for good some for bad but none for true When the Image of Apollo Cumanus wept some of the Aruspects were for the casting of it into the sea because of the terrible portent but other more skilful heruspicks were for the intercession because the Images weeping portended prosperous things Proteus is a proverb of versatile mutability And of him that part of story which is least fabulous is this Proteus was an Astrologicall magician and is said therefore to transforme himselfe into so many shapes because of his various and contrarious opinions vaticinations predictions and prestigious prankes A fit emblem of all such that are seldome like themselves Colophonius Xenophanes one who confessed there to be Gods denied all divination All the rest besides Epicurus babling about the nature of the Gods approved of divination although not after one way Dicaearcâ—us the Peripatetick took away all other kind of divination and onely left those of Dreams and Fury And besides those Cratippus rejected all the rest Panaetius indeed durst not deny the power of divining altogether yet he said he doubted of it Xenophon took all kinds of divination quite away The chiefe articles that were objected against Socrates were contempt and rejection of Oracles Eudoxus Gâ—idius was wont to say that the Chaldaeans were by no means to be credited in their observations or predictions upon the lives and fortunes of men from the day and houre of their nativity Two men before their contest at the Olympick games dreamed the like dream viz. that they were drawn by four swift coursers in a Chariot they both consulted one Prophet and he prophecied to the one that he should winne and to the other that he should lose the prize One told Vitellius that the circles which appeared in the waters like crownes were abodes of Empire another of them boded thereupon that either they signified no such thing or else but the instability thereof The fame is that Iulian on a certaine time inspecting the entrayles there appeared in them the signe of the Crosse invironed with a crown Some that partooke of the divination were cast into a feare hereat that the Christian Religion should gather strength and that the doctrine of Christ should be perpetuall taking it for a signe both of victory and eternity But the chiefe divining Artist among them bad the Emperour be of good cheere for the victimes portended prosperous things according to his own desire because the marke of the Christian religion was circumscribed and coarcted as a token that it should have no large spreading in the world Iulian again meditating warre against the Persians sent to the Oracles at Delphos Delos and Dodona and they all consented to incourage him promising him undoubted successe But there was an old prophecy of former diviners that utterly thwarted them all for it foretold that it should be exitiall to the Emperour and people of Rome whensoever he passed with his army beyond the River Euphrates and the City Ctesipâ—on And thereabouts was Iulian slain and his army overthrown 22. Of jugling predictions forged divinations and ludibrious mock-charms as operative as the rest and all alike effectuall not from themselves but from the Agents or Patients superstition and credulity SErtorius a notable Captaine was wont to faine visions dreams and divinations and pretended himselfe to be informed of many future events by a white Hinde that a skilfull friend had sent him to be his instructor in those mysteries and by these very devices kept his Souldiers in order and courage and so atchieved many notable feates and victories Two Countrey fellows came to Vespasian intreating his helpe in their cure as the Oracle of Serapis had shewed unto them One of them was blind and he was told that if Vespasian did but spit in his eyes that should restore his sight The other was lame of his thighs and he was told he should be cured if Vespasian did but touch the part affected with his heele The good Emperour was somewhat scrupulous to make experiment of a thing so vaine and improbable but at the importunity of his friends and earnest suite of the parties he was drawn to doe as the Oracle or vision had directed and the effect presently followed thereupon Namely upon their superstition and the divels illusion for the Serapidane Divel was aâ—raid that his divining Oracle would fall to the ground now that Christianity began somewhat to appeare in Aegypt and therefore he sent his patients to implore the help of Vespasian that by the rarity of the miracle he might hold up the majesty of the Oracle Alexanders souldiers being greatly terrified and disheartned because of a bloody Ecclipse of the Moon hereupon he secure of all events called for the Aegyptian presagers and commanded them to expresse their skill They concealed the cause of the Ecclipse and their own suspicions from the common sort but forged this interpretation That the Sunne was over the Gâ—eekes and the Moon over the Persians and as often as she was in an Ecclipse did portend the slaughter and ruin of that Nation The credulous souldiers hereupon conceived hope went on and prospered Pheron an Aegyptian King had a disease of a strange cause but of a stranger cure He was struck blind for casting a dart into Nilus and so continued for the space of eleven yeeres then consulting the Oracle about his recovery it was answered he must wash his eyes with the urine of a woman that had never known other then her own husband First he made tryall of that