Indeed say they whatsoeuer is compounded of such a matter as this is of the sublunary creatures is subiect vnto corruption but the heauens haue a matter of a different and farre more excellent state than these vnder elements and that is the sum and foundation of Aristotle his opinion and reason touching the heauens incorruptible condition But we that make one matter of both may thus somewhat probably answer That though such a matter is alway accompanied with a capablenesse of corruption yet may it by some superior ouerruling power be preserued from all actuall cotruption And so standeth the case with the heauens which neuer had beene able of themselues so long to haue continued without alteration but by the helpe of some higher power not as the Peripateticks and Platonicks fondly imagine the Angels or Intelligences which Alcinous calleth Lesser gods but by the soueraigne appointment of God who to moderate and stay the too frequent and ouerhastie alteration of the vnder bodies hath allotted the heauens this regularity and vniformitie of motion But heere they will demand a reason what hath so fulfilled the matters desire of interchangeable succession of formes that it remaineth contented with that forme which it presently inioyeth The answer is That either the excellencie of the forme present causeth this contentment or els Gods appointment ouerswayeth its desire How then Are we Patrons or rather Authours of violence in those excellent agreeing bodies Nay rather by the limitation of the matters vnstayed indifferencie we doe more establish that their excellent harmonie For as in a city situate on the confines of two disagreeing kingdomes of it selfe inclining to neither side but indifferent for entertainment of either conquering aduersarie if after valourous conquest performed by one partie it yeeldeth it selfe to the vanquishers dominion and by the prouident industrious care of the new superuisor be fortified against the violent irruption of the forevanquished aduersaries by this new restraint of its old indifferencie suffereth no violence but rather is confirmed in a quiet and peaceable condition within it selfe so the matter of the celestiall bodies howsoeuer naturally indifferent to entertaine any forme if by the conquering action of some preuailing Agent it be possessed of so excellent and powerfull a forme as admits of no outward new impression in this limitation of its equall instable for disposition is not any way violenced but rather fitter for the intended harmonie of the celestiall bodies And that may serue for a sufficient reason of the hitherto-incorrupted condition of the celestiall bodies Now touching their future estate we shall after dispute if first wee haue their fourth argument for disproofe of the matter as also the substance of their opinion Auerroes therefore saith that heauen is a forme of a selfe-subsistence immaterial dimensional locally mooueable participating light and other accidents wherein me thinketh is a plaine contradiction for to omit the disquisition whether any forme can consist without matter what is more absurd then to imagine quantitie really separate from the matter quantitie hauing its basis and foundation in the matter and onely limitation from the forme farther whatsoeuer is capable of real diuision hath this capabilitie that I may so terme it from the matter Reall diuision I say for the Mathematicians proportionably to their mentall abstraction or separation of quantitie haue also a mentall diuision but whatsoeuer hath quantity is capable of such a diuision therefore also it hath a matter Ouer and beside all this whatsoeuer is perceiueable by sense hath a matter for the forme of nothing can be perceiued by sense but is vnderstood and conceiued by its operation in the matter but the heauen is sensible therefore also materiall To this adde Auerroes his owne testimonie set downe in his Comment vpon Aristotle his seuenth booke of Metaphysicks wherein himselfe confesseth that accidents are inseparable companions of the first Matter but the heauen by his owne authoritie in the first alleaged place hath in it light and other accidents inherent how then is it altogether voide of matter Other arguments taken from the inherencie of qualities peculiarly incident vnto things materiall for breuities sake I omit hastning to the second Patrons of the heauens immortalitie that doe acknowledge a composition of a matter and a forme in the celestiall bodies but will haue it a different and a distinct kinde from the elementish matter of the vnder bodies Touching the sense of the question Plato and some of his followers in this error interpret it as if when we say the heauens consist of elementary matter wee meant that they are so compounded of the elements as are mixt bodies heere below whereupon some of the more ancient sectaries in this kinde as Heraclitus and Pythagoras thought that it was made of fire Thales and Anaximenes of earth Empedocles of a medley of aire and fire Plato himselfe of the foure elements or as Proclus recordeth his opinion of the quintessence of them whose refutation we omit as impertinent vnto our purpose for our meaning is not that the elements are the matter whereof the heauens be made but thus we vnderstand it that the matter of the Ethereall and Elementish bodies is of the same kinde the whole first matter being diuided into these principal parts as into halfes the one halfe vnited vnto the formes celestiall the other halfe coupled vnto the formes of the elements and so as I conceiue is that place in the beginning of Genesis to be vnderstood where it is said that In the beginning God created the Heauen and the Earth that is the matter whereof heauen and the elements were afterwards made signified vnto vs by the name of those waters wherupon the spirit of God was mooued and mee thinketh the argument is very sound which is commonly alleged by our partakers for as in other kindes of causes there is one first principall whereunto all the rest are reduced so also in this kinde of the Matter there being the like reason of al. But if we distinguish the Matter of the heauens frō that of the elements we can not come to one first Matter of al things therefore there is the same Matter both of the celestial inferior bodies to which we may adde that thredbare argument of the Philosophers Wit hout necessity we must not imagine a pluralitie in Nature forasmuch as Nature abhorreth vanitie but there is no necessitie of the matters pluralitie for the maine ground of this distinction for ought that I can see is lest they should bee forced to grant a power in the heauens tending to corruption which as is before said hath no necessary illation forasmuch as the excellency of the forme present restraineth the wandring indifferent desire of the matter resisting the violent impression of forren qualities that should breed rebellion of the subiect creatures against their commander the heauens But touching their reasons in my poore opinion they are very insufficient for first thus they dispute The
principally vnderstand the frame of all things in heauen and in earth lesse principally Man as being but a part thereof As for the other terme namely Eternall that also hath two acceptions for things are said to bee Eternall two waies First improperly that which neuer shall haue end more fitly called Euiternall or Immortall Properly that is said to be Eternall which neither had beginning nor shall haue end nor as Boethius addeth any succession Now Eternall we take in the more proper and latter sense So that the Question may thus more plainlie be expressed Whether the heauen and earth with the bodily Creatures therein contained had a beginning or shall haue an end of being But because that part of the opinion which concerneth the worlds eternitie a parte ante as the schoole-men speake that is its being from euerlasting is not so directly pertinent vnto our purpose we will with all possible breuitie runne ouer the speciall reasons and foundations thereof the rather because the authors and maintainers thereof from the want of beginning inferre the vncapablenesse of an end Now the chiefe Patron and desender of this opinion in regard of authoritie though not of time was Aristotle who as I take it rather affecting singularitie than for any soundnesse of the matter or strength of argument tanght it in his Lycoeum For the Philosophers which liued before him with generall consent agreed in the contrarie opinion Trismegistus who with his learning watered the then barren countrey of Greece as Diodorus Siculus witnesseth in his first booke of Antiquities Musaeus Orpheus Linus Epicharmus Hesiodus and Homer amongst the Poets Zoroastes Anaxagoras Melissus Empedocles Pherecides Philolaus Democritus and Plato as Philo Indaeus Laertius Diogenes Sulcitius Seuerus Alexander Aphrodisiensis Plutarch and Tully witnesse which also his bookes intituled Timaeus and Critias together with those De Republica doe testifie Onely Aristotle in a selfe-conceit of singularity howsoeuer elsewhere honoring antiquitie rather liketh in this case a new broched opinion of his owne contrary to so many foregoing Philosophers and therefore Hierophantes a deuout though idolatrous Priest condemned him of arrogancie and selfe-loue not onely because contrarie to the common receiued opinion of his countrey continued so many ages vngainsaied hee denied the pluralitie of Gods but also and much more for that he stucke not to teach that the world was from euerlasting which all Greece confessed to haue had beginning in time But to fetch the beginning of this phantasticall opinion somewhat higher we will beginne with Democritus the archpatron of fortune who will haue the World Eternall and withall chanceable But Eternitie and Chance being as the learned Sir Philip obserued things vnsufferable together If Chanceable then not Eternall Againe what is more absurd then to thinke the World was made by the vntended and casuall concourse of indiuisible substances for whence came these substances If you say they came from Euerlasting so were Eternall can you conceiue such chanceable effects to proceed from so certaine necessary causes Nay rather if you wil needs maintane the infinitenes of these diminitiue bodies grant they had beginning from that Infinite One that glued the Infinite parts of your Infinite All together by his vnmeasurable Power and Wisedome For can we imagine such a perfect Order and Stabilitie to consist in these disioined substances Order Constancie are children onely of Wisdome sooner may we prooue Darknesse to proceed from the Sunne than Constancie and Order from inconstant chance constant in nothing but in Inconstancie Finally we must either exclude Gods Wisedome and prouident care of the World made or els Fortune from making of the World for the World is Gods possession onely by right of creation vnlesse we imagine a deed of gift passed by Fortune at her death or Fortune the true Owner if the true Maker disinherited by violence driuen out of her dominion by God as an Vsurper But God hauing nothing to plead for his title vnto his kingdome but the right of creation if that plea be improoued God cannot any longer call the World his owne and therefore without crueltie may cast off all care of this his supposed ofspring For it is onely Gods Fatherhood that bindes him vnto his Prouidence Therefore not to stay long in this opinion of Fortune let vs now come vnto Nature deified especially by Strato a Naturalist who fearing to ouersway God with the weight of this burthen either in the making or gouerning of the World hath granted hm a Remedie or Otium as they terme it thinking it more reason that God should haue an exemption from trouble than Gods priests who for his sake be dispensed withall But let vs see what this Nature may bee so highly by Strato magnified There is a particular Nature and there is a generall or vniuersall Nature The particular is that which in euery seuerall single substance ministreth Essence to the whole compound and withall is author of such action and motion as is agreeable to the subiect wherein it is as the Nature of fire causeth the fires ascention the Nature of earth the earths going downward and in regard of this Nature we say it is Naturall to the fire to ascend to the earth to descend the bodies hauing in them cuen of themselues by their inherent forme a promptnesse and inclination vnto these motions Now if by the conspiring of these many manifold Natures this All we now speake of were made as if the Elements Ethereall parts should in their town-house set downe the bounds of euery ones office then consider what followeth that there must needs haue beene a wisdome ouerruling power which made them concur for their natures being so diuers and contrary would rather haue wrought each others destruction than so friendly haue cōsorted to make vp so vnexpressable an harmony For to grant knowledge vnto them whereby to moderate the extremity of their naturall fury or intendment of such agreement were to enter into a bottomlesse pit of absurdities seeing that knowledge alway presupposeth roason reason sense both which are neuer found either iointly or in part in bodilie senselesse creatures Now touching the Vninersall Nature which some will haue to be nothing but an influent virtue helping furthering the actions of euery particular naturall body others an Vniuersall ouerruling and as it were an Ideall Nature subsisting For as the particular nature of euery particular body causeth and mainetaineth the particular actions of the body wherein it is so this generall Nature is the author and maintainer of all actions and bodies to which the single seuerall bodies are in subiection by their obedience acknowledging a kinde of superiority in that nature which we call vniuersall And in the respect of this nature the fire is said in some cases to goe downeward by nature as to hinder the discontinuitie of things in the world and so that emptines which nature so much abhorreth Now if by this vniuersall nature
formes of the sublunary bodies may be separated from their matter but the heauens forme is vnseparable when in my iudgement they proue rather a distinction of formes than any diuerfity of the matter Or if they thence prooue a diuersity of matter because the formes incident are of greater and lesse excellency one in respect of an other we may as well say that the body of a man is of distinct matter from that of the other more base creatures because his form is so passing excellent Or if they restraine their comparison onely to the power of separation that because the matter of the heauens is ioyned inseparably to the forme when contrariwise the elementish matter hath often separation therefore there is not the same matter of both wee answer that the same matter in kinde may so inseparably bee vnited to its forme as that it can neuer be seioyned not that we deny a power of future separation of the heauens matter from the present forme but that this may bee a sufficient reason of their hitherto inseparable vnion A second argument is that of Aristotle saith he whatsoeuer things participate the same matter are capable of mutable transmutation but the heauens can neuer bee changed into the inferior bodies for somuch as the elements are altogether passiuely disposed for receit of the heauens action without any reaction vpon the heauens therefore there is not the same matter of both To which we answer that the proposition or first sentence must be vnderstood of a potentiall transmutation and that with this exception vnlesse the matters imperfectiō be perfected by the formes inherent excellency or resistance be made of some superiour forme to turne away the violence of the oppugning agent We say that the forme now being in the heauens is of so powerfull and vnconquerable a nature as that no naturall contrary agent is able to compasie any the least new impression Thirdly thus they reason Were the heauens of the same matter with the bodies of the elements then in like fort should they at least by nature be corruptible but the corruption is altogether abhorrent from the heauens nature To which assumption Damascen answers by a flat deniall for euen the heauens in his Philosophie are naturally subiect to corruption To which accordeth that of Plato in his Timaeus that attributes the heauens incorruptiblenes to a superior more powerfull cause For so hee brings in the maker of the world speaking vnto the celestiall bodies By nature you are dissoluble but through my will preserued from dissolution Nor shall the destintes of death preuaile ouer you to destroy you because my will is a bond of more power to keepe you from corruption than that wherewith at your first making you were holden together And thus haue we hastily runne ouer the difficult question of the heauens matter Touching the certainty and meanes of their dissolution we will briefly speake by and by after the resolution of the other ar-arguments for the non-dissolution of the world Simon Magus as it is recorded lib. 3. Recog Beati Petri. cap. 3. if the records be true thus replied vpon the learned Apostle for the worlds immortalitie If God be infinitely and only good and the world also good how shall God in the end destroy the world If hee destroy that which is good how shall himselfe continue good If hee pull it downe because it is euill how shall he then be free from euill that made it euill To which wee answer with S. Peter in the same place That the world in its first originall state was good yet so as it was foreordeined to dissolution nor doe wee thereby detract from Gods goodnesse for the heauens the most excellent part of the world being not made for themselues but for some end after to be reuealed how good soeuer yet were to be dissolued that that for which they were ordeined might appeare which also Peter thus familiarlie sheweth Who seeth not how cunningly an egshell is framed yet for manifestation of the end of its making it must be broken of necessitie So must the present estate of the world of necessitie be destroyed that the more excellent condition of the kingdome of heauen may be made manifest at which time also this degenerated euill state of corruption shall be done away that a more glorious estate of incorruption may be restored So then that the world shall haue an end I take it it is manifest and that not an end of annihilation but of corruption which indeed shall be a way vnto its perfection Now concerning the times and seasons of the worlds dissolution we will not take vpon vs curiously to determine seeing God the beginning and end of all things hath left the time vnreuealed vnto vs. Touching the means and maner of the dissolution the Stoicks glanced at it a farre off being of opinion that the world should by fire be dissolued For thinking the starres and the skies fire to haue a wasting action vpon the inferiour elements their nourishing moisture by little and little decaying when neither the earth can haue refection by the water nor the aire procreation after its absolute consumption there shall-remaine nothing but fire to consume both the heauens and the earth of which afterward a new world should be made whose opinion is very consonant vnto that of Peter saue onely that they thought this destruction should come of a natural necessity for Peter also taugnt it should be by fire wherewith God withdrawing his hand of preseruation should consume this world and of the ashes heereof create a new yet so as neither the seate of the blessed souls in heauen nor the dungeon of the damned in hell should be destroied that neither the iotes of the Saints nor the torments of the wicked should be interrupted As for the firmament and the other inferiour spheres together with the elements they shal be indued with another that a far more excellent cnodition putting off these accidents and affections of corruption fit for the continuall generation and corruption of the naturall bodies and receiuing other qualities agreeable to the incorruptible estate of the world to come so that their substance shall be all one howsoeuer they alter their qualities As in the resurrection mens bodies shall bee of the same substance but of a different disposition For this corruption must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality So that as Saint Paul said our imperfect knowledge which we haue in this life shall in the after-world be abolished because then we shall haue a morefull and perfect knowledge of God and his Christ So may we well say this world shall be destroied because it shall lose this present estate of imperfection and put on a more glorious condition fit for the world to come And so as I take it are those places of scripture to bee vnderstood where niention is made of the worlds perishing that is the present estate of this world shall
cause of life nor the best moisture in euery quantity there are one or two requisite conditions annexed first concerning the qualitie that it be not too thinne and fluid such as is the naturall disposition of water but more cleauing and fat such as may resemble the nature of oile for its better preseruation from putrefaction secondly that it haue some competent degree of heat to keepe it from congealing last of all that it be pure not mingled with excrementall superfluities forasmuch as all mixture of superfluities is against nature enemie to good digestion and sound nutrition Those things thus obserued our moisture shall be sufficiently qualified for our liues maintenance Touching the quantitie in a word as is before said it must neither bee excessiue lest the too great quantitie oppresse our heat as wee see infusion of too much oile oftentimes put out the lampe nor yet defectiue lest the deuouring action of our heat too soone consume it but in a competent mediocrity such as the heat may neither ouer-hastily vanquish nor with the violence of excessiue inequalitie too suddenly be extinguished Where briefly wee may see the reason why man is longer liued than other creatures of more vast bodies for though in the large capacitie of their great receiuers they haue a greater quantity of this naturall moisture than is incident vnto mans small body yet haue they it not so well tempered and proportioned to their heat which may well bee gathered by their slowe and seldome breathing So that it is true which the Philosopher hath that the great or little quantitie of the bodie is no sufficient cause of long life And yet this is withall most true that where there is greatest store of humiditie with a competent proportion of heat there is greatest fitnesse naturally for long life And that is the reason why those that in their infancie are most subiect to a languishing diseasednesse are afterward most healthfull and for the most part longest liued For the abundance of their naturall moisture hindreth the too speedy preuailing of the heat by resisting its action and so is it the lesse mingled with forren impurities For as we see the Smiths fire by the moderate sprinckling of water though at first for a time its force is somewhat abated yet it at length hauing ouercome its weake aduersary as in triumph burneth the cleerer and lasteth longer so fareth it in our bodies for our heat not able on the sudden to ouersway our multitude of moisture is the longer hindred from consuming it whence proceedeth long life and after it hath gotten the vpper hand performeth with more facility its naturall functions whence commeth healthfulnesse where wee may also explane that Probleme why children that are too ripe witted in their childhood are for the most part either shortest liued or els toward their old age most sottish according to our Prouerbe Soone ripe soone rotten for hence wee may gather that from the beginning they had but little moisture ouer which their heat soone preuailed for much humiditie is cause of blockishnesse and folly whence is that of Galen that fleame being a cold waterish humour is of no force for ornament of good conditions and Plato doubted not to say that looke how much moisture there is in vs so much also is our folly and thereof it is as the same Plato obserueth that children and women are for the most part most foolish For the glorious light and Sunne-like splendour of the soule is therwith as with a cloud obscured and intercepted which is an euident proofe of the small store of moisture in these quicke witted forward children ouer which the heat so much the sooner obtaining dominion and in processe of time drying the braine the subordinate instrument of vnderstanding either quite destroieth it and so bringeth death or els so corrupts it that it is altogether vnable and vnfit to steed the inner senses in their functions whereon the vnderstanding in this prison of the boby principally dependeth which may no lesse fitly serue for answer vnto that consequent demand why those infants for the most part are soonest able to walke to talke to conceiue to remember and such like the reason is taken from the little quantitie of moisture which may bee gathered by the contrary disposition in the otherwise affected subiects as also by that which we see in daily experience in creatures of other kinds For whereas man by reason of his fluid vnsetled substance hath for the better strengthning of his ioints his bodie swathed and is a long time before he is able to stand or walke or performe any such like his vitall functions we see other creatures almost in the same moment borne and inabled to stand walke and such like for their vnequall quantitie of heat preuailing ouer the little store of moisture soone sitteth them for the performance of vitall actions that being the soules chiefe instrument in the discharge of her duties Now if any man shall aske what this iust proportion is and when they are tempred so as may best be auaileable for long life the answer is that heat and moisture are then well proportioned when neither the moisture with its too great quantity deuoureth the heat nor the ouermuch heat too suddenlie consumes and eateth vp the moisture Yet must the heat haue a kind of dominion ouer the moisture else can it not be able to nourish the bodie For in nutrition the thing nourished by reason of the instrument ordained for that purpose must actually worke vpon that whereby it is nourished And because that euery Agent must be proportioned vnto the patient in the inequality of excesse therefore must the heat being the soules sole actiue instrument of nutrition haue dominion ouer the moisture the subiect matter of that facultie Touching the complexions the question is which of them is best disposed and fitted for length of life To take that for granted which Fernelius doubteth of namely that there are foure if not onely yet chiefely notable complexions we answer that those of a sanguine constitution are by nature capable of the longest life as hauing the two qualities of life best tempred And therefore is compared vnto the aire which is moderatly hot and in the highest degree moist Yet not with that too thinne and fluid watrish moisture but more oily oile it selfe resembling the true nature of the aire Therefore the sanguine complexion is fittest for long life For choler is an humor like vnto fire extreame hot and moderatly drie and so vnsufficient to make supply of moisture to the deuouring operation of that firie heat which is in it In the flegmaticke the copiousnesse of that humour resembling water oppresseth the heat and so hindreth good digestion whence proceed crudities in the stomacke and liuer from whence they are diffused into the veines and so vnto all the parts of the body and at length the body is ouergrowen with corruption Lastly melancholy resembling the earth and its qualities
spirits whereby the heat was as it were with smoke chaoked The like is reported of Diodorus a logician who for shame that he could not at the first answer the trifling question which Stilpo put out suddenly ended his daies Which is also written of Homer who in the I le Ios sitting on the sea shore demanded of the fisher-men if they had taken any thing they thus obscurely in riddle-wise made ananswer Those that we tooke we left behind those that we could not catch we bring with us For in the sun-shine as they say it is shipmens fashions they made inquisition for their backbiting familiars and some they tooke and cruelly pressed vnto death leauing their liuelesse carcases to bee deuoured of the fishes those that craftily had insinuated themselues either into their flesh or into the inside of their apparrell they were faine to bring away with them But quicke witted Homer not able on the sudden to expound this probleme for shame as Plutarch and Herodotus write of him gaue vp the ghost For the spirits and blood as in all kinde of feare it falleth out retiring to the inward parts as to a tower of defence by their sudden retrait and reuerberation redouble the heate and so inflaming the heart not able to be cooled againe by respiration stifles the patient Concerning Venery deaths best harbinger I shall not neede to recite the infinite examples of them that by meanes therof haue hastened their deaths nor indeed is it possible to number those innumerable troops that through lust either before the actuall accomplishment or after the too frequent satisfying the same haue ended their youthfull daies It was well said of one that Venus prouideth not for those that are already borne but for those that shal be borne and therefore Auicenna a learned Philosopher Physitian doubted not to say that the emission of a little seed more than the body could well beare was a great deale more hurtfull than the losse of fortie times so much blood For it wasteth the spirits weakeneth the stomack enfeebleth and drieth vp the braine and marrow whereby especially it hastneth death And the truth heereof Aristotle prooueth by his experimentall obseruation for so hath he noted the cocke-sparow by immoderate and too frequent vse of Venery very seldome to liue out the tearme of two yeeres and the same reason hee giueth why the Mule a mixt creature begotten betweene an horse an asse is longer liued thā either of them for his insting in that kinde is but once only through the whole course of his life To which we may adde the diuersity of the sex for the male according vnto Aristotle in euerie kinde almost is by nature better fitted for long life than the female hauing greater force of heat and the moisture more firm better able to resist than the fluid substance of the female and thence it is that women for the most part are sooner perfected than men being sooner fit for generation sooner in the flower and prime of their age and finally sooner old for their heat though little yet sooner preuaileth ouer that fluid thinne substance and moisture of theirs than it possibly can ouer that solid and compact humiditie which is in man But lest our Treatise grow too big we wil proceed to those other outward causes of long life such as bee the influences of the Stars either in our conception and birth or in the country soile wherin we liue as also the goodnesse of the soile it selfe both of the earth aire For though it be true that the celestiall bodies haue no direct action either of inclination or constraint vpon the reasonable soule of man which is immateriall yet is it as true that they haue singular and especiall operations vpon our bodies for so wee see the fruitfulnesse and barrennesse of the earth depends vpon the heauens good and bad aspect the sea followes the motion and alteration of the Moone the yeere distinguished into its foure parts according to the accesse or farther absence of the Sun and therefore Galen the father of Physitians counselled his scholers to haue especiall respect vnto the coniunction of the Planets in their signes whensoeuer they vndertake any cure and which is more fit for the present purpose the Astrologers haue assigned vnto euery Planet a monthly dominion ouer the childe conceiued in the wombe according to their order and situation The first moneth is allotted vnto Saturne the second vnto Iupiter and so foorth in order vntill they haue all finished their dominion and then they begin againe which is the especiall reason alleaged by some why the childe that is borne in the eight moneth for the most part dieth when as oftentimes those that are brought foorth a moneth sooner or later liue in verie good health for Saturne is a planet whose influence causeth colde and drinesse which both are qualities enemies vnto life Now followeth the last though not the least cause of long life and that is the goodnesse of the soile and wholesomnesse of the aire for it is so recorded in Histories and approoued by the testimonie of our late trauellers that in that part of India which is called Oner the inhabitants are very long liued and for the most part very healthfull insomuch that many of them liue vntill they bee aboue an hundred yeeres old and wee see by experience in our country how perilous not onely pestilent aire is but euen the vnholesomnes of the fennie countries that are often anoied with stinking and vnsauorie fogges Aristotle in his treatise of the length and shortnesse of life maketh choice of a hot countrey as fittest for preseruation and maintenance of life for so he obserueth it that serpents bred and brought vp in hot countries are generally bigger bodied then those that are found in colder climets and those fishes that breed in the red sea are also longer than those in the seas which are not so hot and that though they bee of the same kinde which is a manifest proofe of their longer continuance els how commeth it to passe that they haue greater growth and againe those creatures that liue in cold climets haue a more waterish kinde of humour and fitter for congelation whence followeth the speedier destruction of the inhabitants but the trueth is that neither hot countries nor colder climets are of themselues any furtherance vnto long life for those that are of a cholericke fierie constitution liue longer in cold countries and such as be of colder complexion liue best and longest in hot regions but according to the diuersitie of mens complexions so liue they better or worse in diuers countries Those that are too hot of cōstitution by my counsell shall make choice of a country in some measure and degrees cold lest the outward heat of the circumiacent aire increase the fire within and make it more vehement and thence is it that those in the hottest part of Ethiopia are shortest liued hauing that