a multitude of Miracles and Prodigies of Nature I shall now proceed to those of Art The Chineses look upon themselves as the wisest People upon the face of the Earth they use therefore to say That they see with both Eyes and all other Nations but with one only and thereupon they boast though I know not with what Truth and Justice that the most famous Inventions which have been so lately known to us in Europe have been no Strangers to them for many Ages past however I shall relate what are most observable both in these and other Nations It is likewise recorded that Augustus Caesar having several ways adorned and fortifyed the City of Rome putting it into a condition of bravery and security for after times he thereupon gloried That he found Rome of brick and left it of Marble and certainly nothing makes more for the just Glory of a Prince than to leave his Dominions in better State than he found them Yet the vast Expences of some Princes and People had been more truly commendable and their mighty works more really glorious had they therein consulted more of the Publick good and less of their own Ostentation However it may not be unpleasant nor unprofitable to describe them and likewise to relate the most curious Inventions and Rarities in all Ages even to these times which have been more favourable to Learning than the former and wherein Arts have been thereby improved to the height 1. But first concerning Buildings the most famous structure we first read of was immediately after the Universal Deluge or Noah's Flood for Nimrod the Son of Chus the Son of Cham perswaded the People to secure themselves from the like after-claps by building some stupendious Edifice which might resist the fury of a second Deluge This Counsel was generally imbraced Heber only and his Family as the Tradition goes contradicting such an unlawful attempt But the major part prevailing the Tower of Babel began to rear its Head of Majesty Five Thousand One Hundred Forty six Paces from the Ground having its Basis and circumference equal to its height The Passage to go up went winding about the outside and was of an exceeding great breadth there being not only room for Horses Carts and the likemeans of Carriage to meet and turn but lodgings also for Man and Beast And as Verslegan reports Grass and Corn-fields for their nourishment and admirable it is to consider what multitudes of men there were in the World in so short a space there being but eight persons that came out of the Ark and now this Building was carried on by Five Hundred Thousand Men the Foundation of it was nine miles compass But God by the Confusion of Tongues hindred the Proceeding of this Building one not being able to understand what his Fellow called for which Du Bartas wittily describes Bring me quoth one a Trowel quickly quick One brings him up a Hammer hew this brick Another bids and then they cleave a Tree Make fast this Rope and then they let it flee One calls for Planks Another Morter lacks They bring the first a Stone the last an Ax One would have Nails and him a Spade they give Another asks a Saw and gets a Sieve Thus crosly crost they prate and rail in vain What one hath made another spoils again This makes them leave their work and like mad Fools Scatter their Stuff and tumble down their Tools II. We read in several Ancient Histories of The seven Marvels or Wonders of the World The first whereof they reckoned to be The Walls of Babylon This City of Babylon was seated on the Banks of the River Euphrates which ran through the midst of it over which Semiramuis built a strong and stately Bridge of a mile long binding each stone together with clips of Iron fastened with melted Lead and is the ancientest City of the World first built by Nimrod in the place appointed for the raising of the Tower of Babel and by him made the Imperial Seat of the Chaldeaâ— Kings afterward much beautified and inlarged by Semiramis the Wife of Ninus one of his Successors and finally much increased both in bulk and beauty by Nebuchadnezzar for he added a new City to the old which he compassed about with three Walls and made therein three stately Gates and near his Fathers Palace he built another more stately where he raised Stone Works like mountains which he planted with all manner of Trees He made also Pensile Gardens hanging as it were in the Sky borne upon Arches four-square each square containing four hundred foot filled above with Earth wherein grew all sorts of Trees and Plants The Arches were built one upon another even to fifty Cubits high He likewise made Aquâ—â—iucts for watering these Gardens He erected an Image of Gold in the Plain of Dura sixty Cubits high and six broad These stately Buildings puft him up who therefore arrogated to himself the whole Glory of them saying in his Pride Is not this the great Babel that I have built a City of great Fame and State The compass of the Walls were 365 Furlongs or forty six some say threescore miles according to the number of the days of the year in height two hundred Cubits and fifty Cubits in bredth that six Chariots or Carriages might meet on the top they were finished in one year by the hands of Two Hundred Thousand Workmen The City was foursquare and fifteen miles from one corner to another Insomuch that Aristotle saith It ought rather to be called a Countrey than a City adding withal That when the Town was taken it was three days before the furthest parts of the Town had any Intelligence thereof which taking of the Town must be understood of the surprize thereof by the Medes and Persians in the Reign of Beshazzar when Daniel the Prophet interpreted to that King the words Mene Tekel Peres which were miraculously written by a hand upon the Wall as he was banquetting with his Nobility and foretold the very day before it was taken that God had given his Kingdom to the Medes and Perfians All which was accomplished the might following when Darius King of Media and Persia besieging Babylon took it on a sudden with the help of his Nephew Cyrus the Persian in the time of a great Feast when the King Nobility and People contemning their Enemies being over-confident of their own strength minded only their Sports and Pastimes which we read was surprized after this manner The River Euphrates ran quite through the Town round about whose banks the politick Cyrus cut many and deep Channels into which he in a very short time drained and emptied the River conveying his own Forces into the Town all along the dry and yeilding Channel and in a little 〈◊〉 made himself Master of it the Babylonians being 〈◊〉 in Wine and Debauchery In the Reign of 〈◊〉 Semiramis this City revolted from her and 〈…〉 thereof coming to her as she was ordering 〈…〉 she
the death of her Husband lived in continual Tears and mourning and that she died before the Work could be fully finished having drunk the bones of her Husband beaten into Powder which she buried in her own body as the choicest Sepulchre she could provide for him 6. The Fifth Wender of the World was The Temple of Diana at Ephesus in Ionia a Province of Asia Pliny saith it was built by the Amazons and contained four hundred Twenty five foot in length and two hundred and Twenty in breadth so artificially contrived that it was two hundred and Twenty years in finishing It was founded in a Lake to prevent the danger of Earthquakes and it is said that a great quantity of Coal-dust and Wool were laid under the Foundation to secure the moist places It had one hundred and Twenty seven Pillars of Marble seventy foot in height of which Twenty seven were most curiously ingraven and all the rest of Marble polished each of these Pillars were erected at the charge of so many Kings of Asia The doors of the Temple were of Cypress which after four hundred years were as fresh as if they had been new made The roof was of Cedar The Image of Diana which the superstitious vulgar were made to believe came down from Jupiter out of Heaven was made by one Camesia some say of Ebony others of the Vine which having many holes was filled up with Spikenard the moisture whereof closed up the rifts It was adorned with rich and unvaluable Gifts It was contrived by Ctesiphon and after it was finished was fired seven times But last of all by Erostratus who observing the Soveraign Magnificence thereof was resolved to burn it to get himself a Name which he did accordingly but to disappoint him the Princes of those Countreys as some Authors affirm forbid that any man should speak write or record his name yet all this was to no purpose for latter Historians name him and call him Erostratas This glorious Temple was burnt the same night that Alexander the Great was born which gave occasion to that witty scoff That Diana who was counted one of the Goddesses of Midwifry could not attend the Preservation of her Temple being then busied at the birth of so great a Prince Some write that this Temple was afterward rebuilt much more sumptuous and magnificent than before and that the Master of the work was named Democrates 7. The sixth Wonder of the World was the Idol or Image of Jupiter Olympas which stood in his Temple at Achaia between the Cities of Elis and Pisa This Statue was much renowned as well for artificial persections and admirable Workmanship as for the greatness thereof being no less than sixty Cubits high composed by that excellent workman Phidias of Gold and Ivory Some say that Phidias was taxed with only one imperfection that he had not proportioned the Image to the bigness of the Temple because he had made it sitting and so large that if the standing upright were considered the Temple would no ways have been able to have contained it In honour of this Jupiter the Olympicks Games were instituted by Hercules and celebrared on the Plains near this City in the year of the World 2757. The exercises in them were for the most part bodily as running in Chariots running on foot wrastling fighting with Clubs and the like But yet there repaired thither Orators Poets and Musicians and all that thought themselves excellent in any laudable quality to make Tryal of their several Abilities the very cryes who proclaimed the Victories contending who should cry loudest and best play his part The rewards given to the Victors were only Garlâ—â—ds of Palm or such slight remembrances and yet the Greeks no less esteemed this small sign of Conquest and Honour than the Romans did their most magnificent Triumphs those who were Conquerors therein were met by the Principal Men of the City wherein they lived and a Passage was broken through the main VValls of the Town for their Reception as if the ordinary Gates were not capable of so high an honour or able to afford them entrance The Judges of these Games were some Citizens of Elis appointed for that purpose Of these Games Horace thus writes Some in Olympick dust take Pride Their Chariots and themselves to hide Whom the won Mark and Palm so priz'd Like to the Gods hath Eterniz'd Such as like heavenly Angels come With an Elean Garland home VIII The seventh Wonder of the World was The Tower of Pharos which stood in an Isse of that name near the City of Alexandria in Egypt a mile distant from the Land but joyned to the Continent by Cleopatra Queen of Egypt upon this occasion The Rhodians then Lords of the Sea used to exact some Tribute and acknowledgment out of every Island within those Seas and consequently out of this Their Ambassadors being sent to Cleopatra to demand this Tribute she detained them with her 7 days under pretence of celebrating some solemn Festivals and in the mean time by making huge dams and banks in the Sea with incredible charge and speed she united Pharos to the shoar so that it was no longer an Island which finished she sent away the Rhodians empty handed with this witty jeer That they were to take Toll of the Islands but not of the Continent A work of great Rarity and magnificence both for the bigness of it taking up seven Furlongs of ground and for that incredible speed wherewith it was finished As for the Watch-Tower called Pharos by the name of the Island it was built by Ptolomy Philadelphus King of Egypt for the benefit of Saylors the Sea on that coast being very unsafe and full of flats to guide them over the Bar of Alexandria Deservedly esteemed one of the Worlds seven Wonders It was of a wonderful height ascended by degrees and having many Lanthorns on the top wherein Lights were burned every night flaming like a Beacon for direction to Seamen It was erected of Marble marvellous in curious Workmanship and scituate upon a Mountain incompassed with Water the chief Workman was Sostratus who ingraved on the work this Inscription Sostratus of Cnidos the Son of Dexiphanes to the Gods Protector for the Safeguard of Saylors This Inscription he covered with Plaister and thereon ingraved the name and Title of the King who was the Founder to the end that the Kings name being soon wasted and washed away his own which was written in Marble might be eternized to Posterity as the Founder thereof Nigh unto Pharos Caesar pursuing Pompey into Egyt and having discontented Plolomy the King thereof by demanding pay for his Souldiers Caesars Navy lying here at Anchor was assaulted by Achilles one of young Ptolomys Commanders Caesar himself being then at Alexandria but hearing of the skirmish he hastned to Pharos resolving to succour his Navy in Person but the Egyptians coming upon him on all fides he was compelled to leap into the Sea and swim for his
from the Venetians and destroy abundance of them together with divers French and Spaniards In 1506 there appeared two Comets the first on April 11. which lasted but five days the second in August following Alexander King of Poland dyes together with the King of Spain and Philip the son of Maximilian the Emperor In 1509 there was a great and terrible Earthquake in Constantinople and the Countreys thereabout by the violence whereof a great part of the Walls of that City with many stately buildings both publick and private were quite overthrown and thirteen thousand People overwhelmed and destroyed therewith The terror thereof was so great that Bajazet the Emperor himself and the People generally forsook their houses and lay abroad in the Fields It continued for a Month together with very little intermission after which ensued a great Plague whereby that City was almost made desolate there dying above an hundred and threescore thousand people Turkish Hist Pag. 476. XXX The next year 1510 there happened a Prodigy which is very strange to relate for in this year saith my Author there fell Twelve Hundred Stones from Heaven some weighing threescore pound others more Nay it is affirmed some of them weighed an Hundred and Twenty Pound which if true serves for a good Argument to prove that some other Stars or Planets may be habitable besides the Earth At this time the Lubeckers wast Denmark King Henry 8. goeth into France and besiegeth Turwiu Bajazet the Great Turk is poysoned The Spaniards take Tripoly and make war in Navar The Lubeckers worst the Danes at Sea the Switzers invade France and do much mischief there In 1512 there appeared a great Comet in Leo Pope Julius 2. and John King of Sweedland dye James 4. King of Scotland is slain at Flodden Field The King of Poland being at war with the Emperor of Muscovia kills forty thousand of his men in a pitcht battle In 1521 three Suns with a Rainbow were seen at Vienna in Germany and suddenly after a great burning Torch was visible in the Heavens which continued a Month A Circle and Cross appears with the Moon and a burning Pillar is seen in Germany Soon after the Venetians aid the Hungarians against the Turks The French lose Millain The English and French quarrel The Emperor invades Picardy in France King Henry 8. writes against the Pope Christian King of Denmark is expelled his Kingdom In 1530 a Blazing Star of wonderful greatness appeared and was visible through all Europe This year four hundred and four Parishes were drowned by a great Inundation of the Sea in Holland with all their People and Cattel the Turks take Buda in Hungary the Great Cardinal Woolsey dyes the English Clergy are fined and pay to the King an Hundred Thousand pound for divers misdemeanours the next year about Fourteen Hundred Houses were overthrown by an Earthquake at Lisbon in Portugal and about six Hundred more so extreamly shattered that they were ready to fall and many of the Churches were thrown to the ground In 1533 a very great Comet was visible in the Heavens this year Pope Clement 7 dyes Alphonsus Duke of Ferrara and the Duke of Millain dye strange factions and seditions are raised about Religion in Hungary A great Plague at Noremburg in Germany In 1538 a fiery Comet appeared in the Sign Pisces with a long tail Charles Duke of Gelderland dyeth This year was made famous for divers things For then the Kingdom of Denmark imbraced the Gospel The Emperor and King of France met together to treat of Peace the Bible was Printed in English at Paris the Overseer of which work was Bishop Bonner The University of Strasburg was erected The Sect of the Antinomians was detected The Duke of Brandenburg imbraced the Augustan Confession The Sea upon the Coasts of the Kingdom of Naples was wholly dry for eight Miles together out of which Fire and Ashes broke forth so abundantly that many places were miserably destroyed thereby This year Alexander Medices who was made by the Pope Duke of Florence was Marryed to Margaret Daughter of the Emperor Charles 5. the Nuptials were celebrated with great Pomp and Military Revels at which time a great part of the body of the Sun was darkened whilst they were at the Feast which much astonished the Guests and the very next year after this Alexander was murthered by his Kinsman Lorenzo Medices who was always very great with him and privy to all his debaucheries Strada Wars Low-Countries XXXI In 1539 a bloody Star and Cross were seen flying in the Air Armed men swords and funerals were visible in the Heavens in Germany there likewise appeared a Blazing Star This year John Duke of Cleve dyeth a great fire happened in Constantinople which burnt the Jayl and consumed seven hundred Prisoners therein John King of Hungary dyes the Irish invade the English and are beaten George Duke of Saxony dyes The People of Gaunt in Flanders mutiny and behead their Magistrates Isabella Empress of Germany dyeth and shortly after Katherine Queen of England is beheaded by King Henry 8. In 1545 a Comet appeared in the West in colour like blood Lodowick Prince Elector dyes Martin Luther dyes and the next year a war in Germany breaks out A bloody French Massacre was now perpetrated King Henry 8. of England and Francis 1. King of France both dye The Earl of Surrey is this year beheaded in England In 1548 November 6 there was a great chasme or opening in the Heavens and in some places fire fell to the Earth and flew up into the Air again This Jasper Crucifiger saw and thereupon much bewailed the great Commotions and Divisions in the Church which he foresaw by this Prodigy and accordingly it came to pass In 1550 it rained Corn from Heaven in Carinthia Three Suns were seen in England an Earthquake and Globes of fire were visible in the Elements Armies of men appeared in the Air in Saxony The Sun seemed to cleave asunder after this followed great troubles in Antwerp and the sweating sickness in England The French make war with the Emperor the Duke of Somerset in England is beheaded the Queen of Sweden dyes the Turkish Pyrates carry six thousand Christians into Captivity out of the Isle of Gaul near Malta The next year a very great multitude of Men and Cattle were drowned by a terrible Tempest the Clouds suddenly dissolving and the waters pouring down with such a stupendious violence that the strong and massy Walls of many Cities with divers Vineyards and fair Houses were destroyed thereby XXXII That may be looked upon as a Prodigy in the highest degree saith Mr. John Gadbury which my worthy friend Captain George Wharton in his Ephemeris for the year 1655 hath transcribed from one Tackius a German Doctor of Physick who likewise takes it out of one Casper That in the year 1554 not far from the City of Harmsted in Transilvania there were observed in fair and legible Characters to be read in
Egyptian Kings intended these for their Sepulchres yet it happened that they were not buried therein For the People being inraged against them for the slavery and toilsomness of the work and for their Cruelty and oppression they threatned to tear in peices their dead Bodies and with scorn and ignominy to throw them out of their Sepulchres whereupon these Princes commanded their Friends that when they were dead they should bury them in some obscure place The Tomb is cut smooth and plain without any sculpture or ingraving The outsides contain in length 7 Foot 3 Inches and half in depth 3 foot 4 Inches and the same breadth the hollow part within is about six foot long the depth two foot whereby it appears that mens bodies are as big now as they were Three Thousand year ago for it is near so long since this Tomb was made The charge whereof was so great that though the workmen had no other Food but Garlick Radishes and Onions yet it cost that King eighteen Hundred Talents Some with great labor and pains have climbed to the top of this Pyramid but being above they have seemed as it were to lose their sight by looking down judging themselves to be above the clouds whereby their Brains were much troubled Next to this in bulk and beauty is said to be the Pyramid of a Daughter of Cheops who as Authors report to finish her Fathers undertaking and raise her own to the height prostituted her body to all Comers requiring but one stone toward the work from each one of her Customers Treasury of Time Not far from this Pyramid are the Egyptian Mummies which are the Graves of the ancient Egyptians into which are descents like the narrow mouths of Wells some near Ten Fathoms deep leading into long Vaults hewn out of the Rock with Pillars of the same Between every Arch lye the Corps ranked one by another of all sides which are innumerable shrouded in a number of Folds of Linnen and swathed with Bands of the same the breasts of many being marked with strange Hieroglyphick Characters The Linnen being pull'd off the bodies appear solid uncorrupt and perfect in all their dimensions To keep these from Putrefaction they draw the Brains out at the Nostrils with an Iron Instrument filling the head with preservative spices then cutting up the Belly with an Ethiopian Stone they take forth the Bowels cleanse the inside with wine and so stuffing it with a composition of Myrrhe Cassia and other odours they closed it up again The same the poorer sort effected with Bitumen fetched from the Lake of Sodom whereby they have been preserved to this day having lain there for above Three Thousand years Clarks Mirrour First Part. On the Bank of the River Nilus stood that famous Labyrinth built by Psammiticus King of Egypt situate on the South side of the Pyramids and North of Arsinoe It contained within the compass of one continued Wall a Thousand Houses Herodotus says three Thousand five hundred and twelve Royal Palaces all covered with Marble and had one only entrance but innumerable turnings and returnings sometimes one over another and all very difficult to such as were not acquainted with them The Building was more under ground than above the Marblestones being laid with such Art that neither wood nor cement was imployed in any part of the Fabrick The chambers were so ordered that the doors upon there opening gave a Report no less terrible than a crack of Thunder The chief entrance was all of white Marble adorned with stately Columns and most curious Imagery Having got to the end of it a pair of stairs of ninety steps conducted into a gallant Porch or Portico supported with Pillars of Theban Marble which was the entrance into a fair and stately Hall the place of the General Convention or meeting of the Nobles of the Kingdom all of polished marble set out with the Statues of their Gods A work which afterward was imitated by Dedalus in the Cretan Labyrinth though it fell as short of the Glories of this as Minos the King who was at the charge thereof was inferiour to Psammiticus in power and Riches Heylins Cosmography The lake of Maeris was likewise a most admirable work undertaken and finished by Maeris one of the Egyptian Kings which for greatness and colour is like the Sea It is about six hundred furlongs from the City of Memphis the circumference thereof containing some hundreds of furlongs the depth fifty fathom or three hundred feet many Millions of men were imployed several years about it the benefit of it to the Egyptians and the wisdom of that King cannot be sufficiently commended for since the rising of the River Nilus is not alwayes alike and the Countrey is more fruitful by the moderateness thereof He digged this Lake to receive the superfluity of the waters that neither by the greatness of the Inundation it should cause Marishes or by the scarcity of water the Earth should not yield her strength â—he therefore cut a ditch from the River to this Lake fourscore furlongs long and three hundred feet in breadth by which sometimes receiving in and sometimes diverting the River he gave at his pleasure a sufficient quantity of water to the Husbandmen In the midst of this Lake King Maeris built a Sepulcher and 2 Pyramids each of them an hundred fathoms high placing upon them two Marble Statues fitting on a Throne one representing himself the other his wife designing hereby to make his Memory Immortal The Revenues which rise by the Fish of this Lake he gave to his wife to buy sweet Ointments Ornaments and Jewels which was so great that it amounted to above a Thousand pound a day For it was mightily replenished with Fish of Twenty sorts so that very many were continually imployed in catching and salting of them Diodorus Siculus Hist 5. The Fourth Marvel or Wonder of the World was the Tomb of Mausolus King of Caria a Province in the Greater Asia built by his Queen Artemisia who as Historians report so dearly affected her husband that she is by many recorded as an absolute pattern of Conjugal Affection After his death she lamented his loss with extraordinary Sorrow and Complaints and resolved to erect a Tomb or Sepulcher for him answerable to the extream Love she had for him and such indeed it proved to be being accounted for rare workmanship and costly magnificence one of the Worlds Wonders The Stone of the whole Structure was of most curious Marble four hundred and eleven foot in Circuit and 25 Cubits high supported with Thirty gallant Pillars excellently ingraven This building was open on all sides with Arches 73 foot wide framed by the most exquisite workmen of that Age and the perfection of the work was so admirable that ever after all sumptuous and beautiful Tombs were called Mausolaea of which Martial thus writeth Mausolus Tomb which hangeth in the skie The Men of Caria's Praises Deifie It is recorded that Artemisia after