with all the studied ornaments of learning a good part of his life hee exercised in the Court where while the Princes ears were open to Philosophy his heart and hand were both unbent to him his favour and his noblenesse like rivalls striv'd which should with most devotion serve their Soveraigne but when debauchery usurp'd upon the Emperour the Tutor was devanced and disgraced In all these extremities Seneca in himself was so well poiz'd that neither the greatnesse of fortune could bribe him into riot the height of knowledge into pride nor the Courtier into flattery nor did he know any man great enough to make him lesse nor could his mind which Philosophie had plac'd above the World decline with fortune In his old age hee married Pompea Paulina a young faire and nobly descended Roman Lady a Lady of that worth that no Roman but hee that did enjoy her did deserve her Nero having let loose the reines of reason and himselfe to all licenciousnesse so tyranniz'd as if he did perswade himselfe that an Emperour was above the Law and must also bee without it what his will prescrib'd his tyranny did execute and so as if his actions were accountable to no power but his owne Among his chiefe and most remarked cruelties it is not the least hee exprest against his Tutor Seneca to him hee sends his Satellites to denounce his death the fashion of those times was when a person of qualitie was condemn'd to die hee was allowed the liberty to chuse his death and a time proportion'd according to the Emperours rage to dispose of his affaires but if his revenge flowed so high that it would brook no delay then hee enjoyd no time to doe any thing but die if the condemned resisted his decrees then he commonly appointed that by some slave hee should bee barbarously murdered but the nobler Romans held it nearer way to honour with their owne hands to anticipate their fates and in unhappinesse staid not the enforcement of tyranny or nature Seneca with an undaunted looke receiving the sentence of his death called for inke and paper to write his last Will and Testament which the Captaine denying him he turn'd about and then bespake his friends You see my loving friends said hee I cannot gratifie your affections with my fortunes I must therefore leave you my life and my Philosophy to enrich your minds with the invaluable and nere-to-be-depriv'd-of treasure of precept and example I shall desire you by all the tyes of friendship and by the glory you shall purchase by it to endeare my life and death which shall not staine the honour of my life unto your memory then gently reproving them who seem'd too sorrowfull hee said to what other purpose have I furnished you with precepts of Philosophie then to arme your minds against the assaults of Fortune Is Nero's tyrannie unknowne to you What man is Master of his owne life under him that massacred his Brother that us'd upon his Mother that cruelty which never yet knew name Then hee turn'd him to Paulina in whom sorrow had sweld it selfe so high that rather then break out it threatned to break her heart My Deare said hee I am now going to act what I have long taught my houre is come and nothing so welcome to me as my death now I am unloaded of this flesh that clogs my soule I shall with more ease ascend unto eternity to enjoy a condition without a change an happinesse without a period wherefore my dearest Paulina forbeare thy too immoderate passion lest thy grief disgrace my end and thou seem to value my death above mine honour enjoy thy youth but still retaine those seeds of vertue â—herewith thy mind is â—â—chly stored I confesse for thy sake I could bee content to live when I consider that in my breast lives a young Lady to whom my life may bee advantage Paulina's love now raising up her courage and her courage her dejected spirit Think not Seneca said she that like your Physitian I will leave you when the hope of life forsakes you but I will follow like your Wife your fortune This resolve shall tell you how much your life and doctrine hath availed your Paulina When can I die well but then when I cannot live well When I am bereft of thee in whom all my joyes are so wealthily summ'd up that thy losse will make my life my greatest curse then will I die in honour and think it fitter for my fame then linger out my life in sorrow Trust mee my Paulina said Seneca I cannot but admire thy love knowing from what height of vertue it proceeds as I will not envie thee thy death so I wish a glory may await thy end great as the constancie that advanc'd thee to it Then he commanded his Surgeon to cut the veins of both their armes that they might bleed to death but Seneca's veines shrunk up through age and abstinence denyed his bloud a speedy course therefore his thighs were also launced but lest his pains might insinuate too farre into Paulina's torments and a new addition of sorrow meeting with her losse of bloud might make her faint hee sought to mitigate her feares by the discourse of death Why should said he this monster nothing so affright us while we are living wee are dying for life is but a dying being when we are dead wee are after death where then or what is death It is that inconsiderable atome of time that divides the body from the soule what is it then in this afflicts us Not the rarity for all the world that is not gone before will follow us is it the separation and tyed to that the jealousie how we shall bee dealt with upon this hinge I confesse turnes the wickeds fear but the Stoick whom Philosophy hath taught the art of living well death frees from misery and wafts him to the haven of his happinesse For this necessity of death wee are bound to thank the Gods for it redeems from a worse of being eternally miserable The separation as it is naturall so it is the only meanes conducing to our better being The body being the corruptible and ponderous part falls naturally to the earth whence it was first elemented the soul etheriall gaines by this losse for being purg'd from the drosse of weight and of corruption is made heavens richest ore so refin'd that the great Gods image may bee stamp'd upon it and ascends unto the skies from whence it first descended Nor doe I hold this dis-junction to be eternal for when the world by the revolution of times and ages whirls about into her first Chaos then shall they meet again never to bee sundred The soul shal be so purified by the immortall Gods that it shall neither hope nor feare nor grieve that it shall bee freed from all those discording passions and affections that here transport it from it selfe The body so spirited that it shall know no necessity of nourishment and therefore
no weight alteration or mortality Of great consequence then is death to our wel-being since before it wee can account none happy we see it end all miseries we see it make none miserable why then should we feare it or condemne it What have the wisest thought it but the Port wee all must touch He that scarce arrives at half a man hath as little to quarrell at his fate as hee that in a weeke reacheth his haven whereas by the troubled winds he might bee bound up in the more troubled seas a year Nor is hee that is his owne death being condemn'd to die shipwrack'd even at the very shoare for honour and the Emperour allow the liberty and to die by the most abject of men an hangman is to die dishonourable For this boone I gratulate the Gods but more that they are pleas'd to call the perfect Seneca unto their joyes the Seneca that hath not yet outliv'd himselfe nor return'd into his infancy There Paulina not through feare knowing none but what proceeded from her love but through decaying nature fainted therefore Seneca taking his leave caus'd her to be remov'd into the next chamber In Seneca all these incisions were not of force to force out life he therefore commanded his Physitian to poyson him but wanting naturall heat to convey it to his heart the poyson was rather a nourishment then a destruction to his nature then he was laid in warme bathes by this forc'd heat the poyson in his full source and violence raged in his witherd body While he had life he discours'd freely of life and death his end approaching all bloudy in his bath hee bath'd his head and said I vow this to Iupiter the Deliverer Nature at the last conquerd by those strong assaults yeelded up her Fort which weaknesse had so song fortified to death her common enemy So liv'd the famous Seneca and so hee died that with the Gods his soul 's immortaliz'd with the world his fame Nero informed of Paulina for whom hee seem'd much troubled for though pitie had no entrance at his yron breast yet feare the Tyrants tyrant â—old him that her death being one of the most nobly allyed in Rome would make his tyranny and hate the greater hee therefore sent with all possible speed to recall her life now posting to her stage and entring the dark confines of death Her servants receiving the command unbound her and clos'd up her incisions she more than halfe dead devoyd of sense thus against her will return'd unto her life and very honourably for that of life shee lost did witnesse to the world that nothing but want of power restrain'd her from her death Pro Paulina PAulina when Seneca was condemn'd to die would die her selfe was ever constancie raisd higher in a womans breast She did not die there shee exprest the true valour that derives it selfe from vertue and that spirit that issues from the truest honour That shee would but could not die are both Nero's act that shee could live or die her owne That she was Mistris of her fortune witnesse that shee did live how she valued her Husbands death that shee would die Fame and vertue did both attend her in the progresse of her actions had she died it had been thought the wretched times had interest in her end but in her life shee conquer'd the extremities of life and death The rule of vertue ties us to live so long as we ought not as we list then is the fittest time to die when we can live no longer To die is at the height but like a Roman but to dare to live when life is tedious this is as much above the Roman as the true substance of vertue that false shade of honour Had shee then died she had acted but the Roman but she liv'd to exceed the noblest of all Romans but her selfe Contra Paulinam VVHY revolted shee from her resolve when Seneca himself allowed it Did hee teach her so to live that shee durst not die or did shee distrust his happinesse that shee would not follow him Shee had too much of death to have more and those pangs so much endeared her to her life that she would live at any rate rather then break through fleeting torments into honour While Seneca was yet alive she was dying he dead she return'd to life Was her life vowed to him when his death reviv'd her Nero call'd her back the greater was her shame to take Sanctuary in her Husbands murtherer Sure death was far more terrible then Seneca did speak it she fled to a most inhumane Tyrant for protection Seneca did not force her to die nor Nero to live one day gave her her liberty she had as much strength as life and that little power she could use was able to force out that little life she did detain She would dy in the extremity of sorrow for her husbands fate but she did live to repent her both of her sorrow and her death LVCRECIA WHen Rome in the glory of her active Spirits had prest out her youth more ambitious of honour then life for the common exployt the siege of Ardea Sextus Tarquinius entertain'd the night with the Roman Nobility in the pride of luxury and riot The ruines of Kingdomes were sacrificed to Bacchus the sea and land plow'd up to appease ingenuous gluttony They as frolick as youth and wine that made them so unlock the treasures of their hearts their Wives and their beauties to the admiration of unsound eares But Collatine the most justly prodigall of his Wives fame tels them nor Italy nor the World holds her that stands in parallell of wonder with the faire and vertuous Lucrecia Tarquin divided between astonishment and rage that Collatine his servant should be his Soveraigne in happinesse mounted upon the wings of lust and fury flies to Rome where his eyes having encountred the Idoll of his heart and he the noone of night to enjoy it with his sword and taper breaks into her chamber into her presence shee affrighted at the sword and blasted by the light that lust gave life to trembling like a prey with more horrour then attention hears him thus bespeak her Madam wonder not at my unlookt for arrivall at Collatium or at this visit so unseasonable but applaud the wonder of your beauty the silent night will speak my purpose when in my restlesse bed a flame kindled from your fair eyes burn'd through my soule consum'd my Countries service my hopes of honour then which nothing but your faire selfe is so near unto my thoughts Let not the slave Fear intrude upon your princely breast nor this steele divorce those Roses from the Lilies drawne to hew out a way through all obstacles to encounter Paradise The same love that arm'd those eyes with Lightning armes these hands with Thunder bids them grapple with great Iove were hee rivall in my affection This night I must enjoy thee Lucrecia or on thy name engrave an
THE HEROINAE OR The lives OF ARRIA PAULINA LUCRECIA DIDO THEUTILLA CYPRIANA ARETAPHILA LONDON Printed by R. Bishop for Iohn Colby and are to be sold at his Shop under the Kings head Tavern at Chancery-lane end in Fleet-street 1639. TO The true Heroine Lady the Lady DOROTHY SYDNEY The HEROINAE are humbly pâ—â—sented by G. RIVERS To receive Fame from her Favour Madam THat I approach so faire a Shrine with so course an Offering accuse not my unworthinesse but your owne worth which like a Load-star is pleas'd to attract the coursest mettle to make knowne her power Were it not a prophanation to sunder that symmetrie of Vertue and Beautie pieces of which you are the whole and which worthily beget wonder and love I might aspire to levell prayses to some few particulars but since such a disunion cannot bee made by a weake pen without cracking or disordering thâ— goodliest frame of Nature Madam you must give mee leave onely to admire you in great as the great Subject of all admiration If in writing You I fall short of sense it is Love if I overreach it it is Wonder so is sense and language oppress'd or heightned by the subject that admits no meane Madam if this Pamphlet of You rise in the opinion of the World it is You if it fall it is I I that have batter'd my braines against as great a miracle as the Philosophers stone If you please to receive it with a favour answerable to the ambition it is offered I shall account it the greatest honour that can bee done to him in whose esteem Madam You are the first and last of these Stories the unparallel'd Lady DOROTHY SYDNEY the incoÌ„parable ARETAPHILA ARRIA WHilest the Roman State was govern'd or rather mangled between the Fencer the Fidler the Jugler and the Player liv'd Cecinna Paetus sometimes Consull a man every way worthy that high title of a Spirit moulded for great designes that would breake through all interruptions to advance his Honour Hee a faithfull friend to Scribonianus in whose faction he had engaged his life and fortunes after his overthrow was taken prisoner by the Souldiers of Claudius Nero. When hee was taking Ship a Triumph for Rome he desired the Officers that Arria his Wife might accompanie him holding it a grand discourtesie since shee had shared his prosperous fortunes to deny her his miseries but the Souldiers of men the best studied in crueltie were more ambitious to tyrannize over his mind the greater Triumph than his body and well advised how sorrowes are substracted by being divided denyed his most passionate prayers and hoised saile Many of them were flies engendred from his heat who now fled him as an inhospitable clyme too cold to nourish flattery They beheld him as one whose misfortunes were infectious not to bee sympathiz'd or as a Rock that stands the shock of the impetuous Wind to ruine those that touch it Adversity is the true touchstone of Vertue and Friendship Friendship followes the good fortune but Vertue the bad That calmenesse of mind which attends some high fortunes is grounded rather upon Policie than Vertue hee that swels when he is full intends to break himselfe who then will be proud when he is prosperous As it is an argument of basenesse to bee elated so it is true magnanimity not to bee dejected Friendly offices like Rivulets to the Ocean are tributes reflecting to the fortunes not the men let these once decline the other like Frie will swimme against the sinking streame or like Mice shelter themselves from the approaching storme So Paetus out liv'd his happinesse and his friends onely his deare Arria having hired a Fish-boat followed along by the Shore of Sclavonia so noble was her piety as if shee did congratulate those extremities as the tryall of that unshaken faith that well-knit affection not to bee ravel'd from her Paetus by the strongest battery of fortune With so meane advantage as one small Bark so small attendance as one mean Fisherman no Saile but Resolution no Pilot but that high Spirit that threatned destinie and dar'd the utmost power of Fate shee imbarqu'd her selfe into the dangers of the Seas When shee was arriv'd at Rome and in the Emperours presence Iunia the Widow of Scribonianus chiefe partner in her captivity did familiarly accost her to whom with words made for disdaine shee made reply doest thou live said shee shame of our sexe and monument of our shame Thou in whose armes Scribonianus thy Husband was slaine What stands between thee and death now hee is removed that hindred thy prospect Unworthy woman that prizest loathed life above thine honour and lovest thy selfe above thy Lord Arria thy courage said Iunia is ill plac'd the Gods that sent us hither gave us life as their greatest blessing not to be appropriated to our selves but communicated to our friends and Countrey if wee should live onely to our selves wee should live onely to undoe all since this great All subsists by each particular is then the whole of us our owne when the least part of us is not only ours Grant our lives were intirely ours yet are they not of that small consequence that like our clothes wee may devest us of them when our mis-guided fancies tell us they are out of fashion Then if Scribonianus to whose departed soule thou slanderest my affection had held an end like this an end of misery or a way to happinesse and honour hee had counsel'd mee to die and had not liv'd himselfe to have been slaine Fond Woman replyed Arria how thine owne arguments condemn thee If the Gods give us life as their greatest blessing then surely blessednesse is the quality and vertue of life when they withdraw this they call us if our faint soules could heare them nay even nature her selfe whispers to us to bee gone to some better place If our Friends and Countrey have part or all of us to whom do we belong if they discard us must wee live wretched till the decay of nature doth remove us So patiently the poor silly Cottager awaites the good houre his house shall fall upon his head If Scribonianus thy Husband had not dyed honourably in the Camp so great an opinion have I of his Vertue hee had dyed as honourably in his Tent but when thou leav'st the World the World shall not leave to say of thee that Iunia outliv'd her Vertue and her Love died sooner then her selfe The Emperour by these passages perceiv'd whereto shee tended that shee would live no longer then till shee had a power to die commanded her to be streightly guarded but this restraint was rather a spur then a bridle to her actions travelling to fame for shee enraged that her death was denyed her flung out of the Chaire where shee sate and violently ranne her head against the Wall with which blow shee much wounded fell into a deadly swoone but as soon as her keepers had recall'd the unwelcom'd life to her the life that
griev'd her not that it was gone but returned she thus bespake them You see how vainly you imploy your care to keep a prisoner that will be free you may make mee die with more paine and lesse honour but not to die at all this is beyond your power whilst I wear a hand commanded by a heart that knowes no feare I shall not despaire of death nor shall I long protract a loathed breath in such wretched times that make life but the nursery of sorrowes and seminary of misfortunes Some few dayes she wasted in comforting and condoling with her friends the generall calamities wherein the most vertuous were involv'd under that monster of men Nero then tyrannizing Then she retired into Paetus lodging and there thus spake her last The soule imprison'd in a necessity of being miserable must break through all fence of nature into an honourable end This very precept nature her selfe imprinteth in us shee denyeth not the iron-bound Slave a death to free him from the toylsome Oare doth she deny the Sun-scorch'd Pilgrim his nights sleep no nor the world-beaten man his eternall rest Surely then shee allowes us to shake off her interest when we are sunke below her succour Paetus thy life is not link'd to nature but to fame fall then by thine owne sword and thy spirit wound up in thine honour mounts to the Palaces of the immortall Gods If thou faintest under so brave a resolution or enviest thy selfe the glory of thy end know that ere two dayes expire thou thy selfe expirest but how by whose hands beheaded by a base hangman offered up a tame sacrifice to insated tyranny Awake the Roman in thee shall high Paetus whom when the World unworthy of his Vertue ingratefully flung off claspe broken hopes and fortunes to save himselfe with the shipwrack of his fame shall hee to whom thousand servile necks did bow stoop to the basenesse to beg life while his death is in his hands Cato and Scipio whom this age is more prone to adore then admire held it not honourable to begg life though they might expect more from Caesars Vertue But what canst thou hope for from a Tyrant abjur'd by all the Vertues one that approves nothing in Soveraigntie but Power and that guided by Passion to insatiate revenge Then as if shee had distrusted her Husbands spirit shee drew out the poyniard from his side Paetus said shee how I have not entertain'd life nor death but for thy sake this last act of honour be my witnesse Doe this Paetus then she plung'd the dagger into her heart and having drawne it out shee delivered it to him againe trust my departing breath Paetus said shee not the wound it gives mee but thee afflicts mee There died the noble Arria there did that soule flie to eternity that soule that was too great to owe her liberty to any power but to her owne Paetus blushing to be indebted to a president for his death especially his Wife took to him the dagger that was so lately guilded in his Arria's bloud and with these words hastned to his end Had fortune answered my resolution and crown'd my enterprize with happinesse I had entered Rome envied by the most noble not pitied by the basest I now see how the successe of humane affaires depends not upon valour but uncertain fates and our actions elevated by the height of spirit do but intrench us deeper into misery But though I am bereft of all the advantages of fortune and of honour yet am I Master of a mind unconquered over which nor Tyrannie nor Fate shall triumph Then embracing her dead hee sigh'd and said Pardon blest spirit my too long absence from thee I have borrowed this little leave of life but to admire thy Vertue which being above my wonder I must soare unto that height where it is ascended to search out her true perfection Pardon my soule that she ascends not to thee in an extasie faine would shee but this dagger claimes her liberty that gave thee thine Then he thrust it into his heart and there the dagger acted his last and most faithfull service slew his Master Pro Arria THE first Being tyed the first two into one and formed two different sexes into one body and one soule the bodies by alternate use so proprietated not to one but both the soules so sympathizing in affections and in passions as both became one to both They that keep this mystery inviolable know no outward respects of power to divide them into two If Paetus be unhappy Arria is unfortunate Paetus is doom'd to die and shall Arria live to see him slaine Hath hee outliv'd his hopes and can shee hope to outlive him But why would she die was the feare of the Emperours cruelty mingled in her cause What feares she that feares not death what Emperour is cruell to her that dares die what cruelty is to be parallel'd to that which bereft her of her life It was Paetus slew her Paetus had Arria liv'd Paetus had not slaine himselfe therefore Arria died died because Paetus should die Oh unheard of cruelty oh unparallel'd affection Arria died because Paetus could not live Paetus by death redeem'd himself from what was worse than death from torture Arria redeem'd her honour and her Paetus from torture and dishonour Fortune made her miserable that Vertue might make her happie her faith so firmly tyed her love that death could not undo it with her life Her fortunes were so ingrafted in her Paetus that with his they did bud flourish and wither Her life was fastned to his strings of life with him she liv'd with him she died Contra Arriam THrough what forbidden pathes doth passion hurrie us when once our reason is unseated Arria would die rather then bee led in triumph did death redeem her No death was but fortunes headsman to execute her she had condemn'd The Emperors power extended no faerther then to afflict her withred body not able to endure this weak revenge shee yeelded up her mind a triumph to her fortune and her selfe unto her sorrow If fear did not surprize her then engag'd in Paetus treason she was her own wrack and torture scorning all Executioners but her self Who then condemns her death when it was due to justice But what law exacts of her this justice The Gods forbid her to kill another much more her self being nearer to her selfe than any other Nature by her law claims life as her due debt payable when shee demands it If she died because Paetus should die shee did but invite him to her rage not to her vertue But I think fear the common defect of Nature in women depriv'd her of her life for death appeard so accoutred in the terrours of wrack and hangman that she died for fear of death PAVLINA LVcius Annaeus Seneca the Philosopher and Tutor to Nero the Emperour was Lord of great Revenues to which his vertue not his fortune was his title his mind was richly embroydered
in view of the Byzantium Towers the great Seraglio and his own Pallace may he bee betrayd by his nearest friend to a rock that splits him from thence let him sink into the lowest dungeon of Avernus Pro Cypriana THE Countrey is wasted and spoyled of her riches but honour is shipp'd up a prisoner to Byzantium Is there no refuge no redemption sword and fire can preserve this as well as sword and fire consume the other Policie allowes not captivitie a sword but crueltie allowes her a candle the clearer to see her slavery Ignorance is the happinesse of misery which is not felt before it bee understood Had Cypriana a slavish mind in a slavish body shee had owed her attempt to fortune not to vertue and merited more scorn then praise but Nature that gave her a soule above her sexe studied a discretion proportionable to manage it Had shee well weighed alwaies to redeem her honour with honour she could not better informe or in a more ingenuous way relieve her selfe then to make the embleme of her slavery the instrument of her freedome her justice was wittie to punish the Turke by the same means he had punish'd them Was it their misery or their cruelty to which she owed her life Shee was halde from a glorious death to an ignominious life to an inglorious death Shee was captivated by her owne beauty and felt the greatest tyranny of it her selfe why then also should her greatest offender bee unpunish'd shee did not kill her selfe for feare of the Turke for her brest was arm'd to meet death in any shape of horrour shee had before beheld him unaffrighted in all his ghastly formes Life was below her honour her honour not above her friends which nor life nor death shall divorce from her affection As they had accompanied her to her slavery so it was equall to her libertie Vnworthy is she of life that lives by unworthinesse unworthy is she of an handsome death that seeks it by an ignominious life but shee soared to the height of glory for shee would not goe a voluntary slave to her dishonour when death might releeve her but shee died and in her selfe bequeath'd three wonders to the World a free Slave a vertuous Prostitute and an innocent Murderesse Contra Cyprianam VVHether was the Turk or shee more cruell he slew his enemies and strangers shee her friends kindred and her self Had she life to revenge it with self-murder or were she wronged by another must she therefore be reveng'd on her selfe Was a life freely given bought at too dear a rate or because shee might feel their power must she use her owne What was it that look'd on her more terrible then death or that she look'd on through a multiplying glasse was it slavery that is the common fate of vertue that stands unmov'd by misery unshaken by despair Had the Turk slaine her he had not depriv'd the world of the opinion of her vertue but the very substance is shipwrack'd by her selfe The Turks cruelty was her courtesie for though hee triumph'd over her yet hee gave her the opportunity to triumph over misery and shew that height of spirit that scornes any thing without her should afflict her but shee disdain'd to bee beholding to their courtesie or her owne vertue Was dishonour the thing beyond death or captivity had she asmuch of woman as not to feare a death from her selfe and not asmuch as not to feare a dishonour from another Could shee hate her vertue and her sin could she better revenge her of her vertue then by her dishonour Why should she feare what might befall her in life who was regardlesse what might befall her after death Then was slavery the terrible joyn'd with dishonour her twin sister Had she been transported to a Nunnery where vertue is necessitated had not that been a slavery would not her will break into a thousand sins who broke through life into a false liberty But lesse then death slavery or dishonour onely sense of her dishonour depriv'd her of her sense why should she be affrighted by a shadow when her sense could bee wrong'd by none but her selfe ARETAPHILA ARetaphila a Cyrenaean the last rank'd in these Stories but first in my thoughts which by the order of birth may claim the priviledge to do wonders As some things are lesse curiously perform'd which are ordain'd for common use not for the ornament or wonder of the world so have I like a French Volunteir on a Lute all this while scatter'd slight aires which may perchance surprize an indifferent eye but now like the glasse that twists the Sun-beames to steale fire from heaven I must in writing her so lessen and contract so much of her as may sinke into our narrow faith or narrower reason If our Poets prophanely rake heaven for comparisons for each part of a rotten Mistris that shall nere bee part of it one whom sinne to prevent age hath carcass'd in her cradle to what heights must I ascend to reach a Subject fit for all fancy to work not play upon one that is above all heights Sometimes she is pleas'd to stoop to bee admir'd ador'd not that shee falls lower to rebound higher but that wee are admir'd for admiring her and we her prisoners feast our selves with the fragmentarie offalls of her Fame Thus doe I admire her till I admire my selfe out of breath then shee beckens to my soule the reason I cannot reach but I obey to come whither I will not tell you but now I am return'd a re-transmigrated-mountebank-Pedler I will open to your Opticks that which shall purblind the whole art at your two nostrils you shal snuffe in both the Indies for your pallats because the cleanest feeders are the cleanest meat you shall have the whole sect of Epicures if their opinions stick in your stomacks you shall take all the sumes of Arabia in a Tobacco-pipe to concoct them Here is that will chaine your care to the perpetuall sound of Aretaphila For your touch are you a Midas here is a Diamond set in gold within two dayes it will bee a Rhodian Colosse then will it magnifie to an Escuriall then to a World then to tenne Worlds then to Aretaphila thus Fortune blows dust up to a Lady then to a Countesse then to a Queen thus Gold and Diamonds at length come to be Aretaphila in whose name they have been valued Please you to look into this inward Drawer you shall see all the secrets of nature that have befool'd the grand Clarks of all the World Here shall you see reason for the ebb and flow of Seas and of an Ague that resembles it here shall you see the wrack of your bodies wracks how he is the onely Physician of himselfe The wounded Roman State like a broken Tobacco-pipe was cured by bloud Warre cures the Turkish Lethargie The Aegyptian Dropsie is cured by drinking one month in a year the whole Countrey is drunk The Plague cures Grand-Cairo of