Selected quad for the lemma: heaven_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A56390
|
A free and impartial censure of the Platonick philosophie being a letter written to his much honoured friend Mr. N.B. / by Sam. Parker.
|
Parker, Samuel, 1640-1688.; Bisbie, Nathaniel, 1635-1695.
|
1666
(1666)
|
Wing P463; ESTC R18216
|
56,029
|
122
|
proportionable evidence I suppose it will not be impertinent to give you a competent proof of it if I can perform it without being tedious Which may be done by proposing one instance and referring you to an Author that will supply you with infinite more if you think it worth the while to examine them The Instance I shall give you is the known and famous Argument for the Souls Immortality in his Phaedrus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sence of which words is fully and more plainly contained in this Analysis The Soul is always in motion that which is always in motion is self moving that which is self-moving is never deserted of it self that which never deserts it self never ceases to move that which never ceases to move is the source and origine of all motion that which is the source of all motion has no beginning and that which has no beginning can have no ending To omit that every Proposition is either false or uncertain or incoherent as your self will easily observe judge whether we are not likely to have a mighty proof of the Souls immortality when it must be resolved into its own self-subsistence The Author I shall refer you to is Iohannes Baptista Crispus his Quinarius Primus de Ethnicis Philosophis caute Legendis 'T is a Book of no small bulk containing above 500 pages in folio and yet the main business of it is to display the defectiveness of Plato's arguings Where you may be supplyed with infinite apparent palpable instances thereof if you will be at the pains to read and consider them We might possibly have had a better account in Theopompus his Book 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of which thus Athenaeus 11. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plato's Dialogues are trifling and false and that many others of them are stoln out of the Discourses of Aristippus or Antisthenes or Bryson of Heraclea After this brief account of Plato's Logick I come now to his Natural Philosophie in which I shall endeavour all possible brevity because this part as well as the former doth not so directly concern my present design the intendment of my charge being chiefely against his Natural Theologie But that my Discourse may be entire in all its parts and regular in its method I shall to my account of his Logick cast in this of his Physiologie Which will be sufficiently display'd and disparaged too by telling you that in its main strokes it accords with the Aristotelean Philosophie a parallel between them was asserted and demonstrated by Ammonius Porphyrie Hierocles and others of the sacred succession among the Ancients and among Modern Writers has been attempted by Foxius Carpentarius Marronius Buratellus and others The Retail of instances you may see in them but he that tells you in gross that they agree in one Principle by which alone they solve all the appearances and productions of Nature tells you all For as Aristotle resolves all Phaenomena into his Forms which he starts from the Bosome of matter so Plato solves all by the Soul of the Universe and Ideas which in Greek are all one with Forms For the Mechanical Hypotheses having been probably advanced to a considerable Grandeur by Leucippus and Democritus of whom Plato makes not any mention in all his Writings and other Ancient Vertuosi these two great and ambitious Wits Plato and Aristotle designing a Philosophical Empire to themselves scorn'd to be so meanly employ'd as only to improve other mens principles and therefore endeavoured to amuse the world with new ones which they knew others could as little confute as themselves could prove by reason of their obscurity and remoteness from sence How little Aristotle intended his Forms should be understood is already infinitely notorious and how little mind Plato had that it should be ever known what kind of Thing his Universal Soul is is as notoriously apparent from his descriptions of it which are nothing else but some odd fantastick Schemes of numerical figures and proportions as you may see in both the Timaeus's where 't is highly pleasant to read how seriously he prescribes the Method of its Composition out of numerical Ingredients Take saith he all the numbers which make up Musical proportions as Diapente's Diatesserons and an infinite number more but be especially careful not to omit the double 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that which arises by even proportions as 1 2 4 8 c. and that whose proportions run into odd numbers as 1 3 9 27 c. Mix and pound them together with all possible exactness and if you find any void spaces between the even and odd numbers fill them with the smallest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which are some very fine and minute fragments and when you have wrought all exceeding exactly into the shape of the Letter I divide it in the middle long ways into two equal parts cross them in the form of the Letter X and be sure to fasten them very strongly at the Commissure and then bow all four joynts till at length you make them so pliable as to bring them into a Spherical figure and then 't is brought to a right Animary Temper and Harmony If this description to what ever purpose 't is design'd be not prodigiously silly and ridiculous pray tell me what is And yet this sensless insignificant Jargon is made the sole and intimate Principle of all Natural Events All Motions Generations Corruptions Alterations Sympathies Antipathies the properties of Bodies the figure of the Heavens the systeme of the Stars the motions of the Planets Eclipses Comets Meteors The roundness of the Earth the Flux and Reflux of the Sea the Original of Rivers and Fountains the Generation of Winds Thunder Lightning Clouds Rain Haile Snow Ice Dew Petrification the wonders of the Magnet the Generation and Transmutation of Metals the Powers and Specifick Vertues of Plants the Variety of Animals their Origine their Shapes their Nutrition their Faculties The Qualities of the Elements Heat Cold Gravity Levity Fluidity Firmness Rarity Density Perspicuity Opacity Hebetude Subtilty Smoothness Asperity Hardness Softness Stubbornness Flexibility Light Colours Sounds Tasts Smells and all other Phaenomena of Nature are only so many Tricks of this Magical kind of Soul If I could have satisfied my self it had been to any purpose I should have given you an account of his enormous absurdities in all the forementioned particulars as they are discoursed of in his Timaeus which contains the whole Body of his Natural Philosophy But I shall beg your leave to dismiss this Theme partly because none have more professedly disclaimed the Platonick Physiologie then they that stickle most for his other Whimsies partly because the Aristotelian Philosophy having been of late so shamefully bafled this which agrees so much with it in its main Principles and more in its Genius must of necessity perish together with it and so will as little need as deserve any particular confutation partly because their Physiologie is well nigh