satisfy its own propension having agreeableness for its proper object One may desire but they cannot love for need One may honor but they cannot love for an opinion of worth One may revere and accommodate ones behaviour but one cannot love through the tyranny of duty or obligation It is so free that it cannot be constrained from without neither can the ultimate dictate as they say in the schools of the practical intellect it self command it It is not a concession or voluntary act meerly though most voluntary but anemanation Nay many excellent persons known acquainted may not be the object of any great kindness to a Good Nature for want of somewhat in them suitable to a Gentle Heart For what does it signify to be valiant learned wise it there be withal in the same person an aversation or indisposition to that that I delight in Or if he be a stranger This love is nursed with jocundity and playes where Nature or the use of fortune has prescrib'd it What though the objects be not so accomplished as others Yet they are our Brothers or our Cosins or our Comerades or our dayly Visitants Or they are most loving to us most joyous in our company most apt to please us and most concern'd to serve us in any kindness What though they may have their faults or miscarriages The love is to the person I love him as I love my self Can I hate my self for my failings or misfortunes that happen to me as their punishments Or can I but desire earnestly my own recovery and better doing There is a sort of friendship if I may so call it or benevolence rather grounded in a principle of vertue which when it failes the vertuous lover withdraws his affection misses of his object in the subject where it was before But this is more Divine and Philosophical then to be sought purely in a Good Nature which having once conceived an affection upon liking to a person cannot choose but prosecute him with a good will though he become vicious even to the gallows or to the utmost of disgraces Whence it was never counted an unseemly thing to take notice of condemned persons to salute them to cheer them up going to their executions But a base thing to be ashamed of their chains while they retain any sparks of those good qualities that we once respected in them or any Colour for their misfortunes 2. It is born to go out of it self and live among its friends to be pleased in their satisfaction and advanced in their emolument and afford its private gustoes if it have any to their content and pleasure But I 'le let this rest a little longer 3. It is not weak or apt to be discouraged Not of it self for its love is from pure Nature quea agit quando quantum potest it cannot mantle or corrupt like a standing water it is restless and never weary but in every act refresheth its own vigour and buddeth in new desires of fruition And which is more One friend cannot supply the defect of another for a Good Nature hath sympathy with them all that make up its body Politique of Civil life uno avulso non difficit alter But the pain and grief of loosing or of missing any part shewes by how quick a nerve it is united to the lover Nor by fortune which though possibly an occasion never was a cause of love And so who loved not for need will not leave for need or cease for fear of loss who never sought gain by his love or ever knew any other use of wealth but enjoyment or any enjoyment like the pleasure of serving of his friends to the utmost If he joy and grieve with them will he do 't for nothing Or stay for asking Or keep account of exchange of benefits or kindnesses to do or return only so much as he has before hand or as he owes on interest or in strict gratitude There is no account where all is common There is no incentive of love like adversity 'T was but pretense what ever flaggs or droopes while the Relative friend is in being or droopes not when he deceases Nor at last by any other impeachments or prohibitions for bars and walls cannot sever true friends and in this case if in any other Nitimur in vetitum we are the more invincible to attempt to succour when we are inhibited either raise the siege or loose the battel 4. It is hardly dissolved though possibly it may if he that was once familiar to us do utterly neglect or forget us or fall to shameful vices and so precide the continuance of our correspondency or if he proove unnatural or malitious seeking as industriously to disoblige as ever he did to oblige us Otherwise how should enmities arise Who never knew us do not hate us Nor is any disgust bitter where the sweetness of mutual favour were not more ancient We may instance in all manner of examples When Medea had left her Countrey for the love of Jason and found her self despised and forsaken she could do nothing else but meditate on revenge for as she argued with her Nurse A lofty mind cannot contain When scornful wrong it bears in vain Nullae sunt inimicitiae nisi amoris acerbae When one Octavius had layen with Pontia Posthumia at Rome and enflamed with enjoyment of her did in vain sollicit her unto marriage he slew her in revenge of that repulse When Caesar and Pompey who had served one another in the highest concerns of honour the pledge of alliance failing came to contention nothing but the ruin of one or other could determine it When Lewis II. King of France came to quarrel with his Protector the Duke of Burgony When Edward the IV. King of England with his Restorer the Earl of Warwick and Richard III with his supporter the Duke of Buckingham what means to compromise those differences but extremity We see the same in private friends who once falling out run to duels the sooner by how much the Amity between them was the greater Disdain on this part blazeth suddenly and incenseth Contempt inflameth despight addeth oyl and brimstone to the fewel of discontent So that nothing resteth but a pointed most acumined revenge because there seems to be no other reparation of dishonour Love and favour howsoever generous are couditional to be understood for they cannot consist if they be not mutual and reciprocal who faileth once in such a point he is not to fail again There cannot be a reconcilement unless you can make a man to be what he is not or not to have done what he has done which is impossible Pian piano fair and softly There is no such precipitancy incident to the case if a Good Nature that is no Coward might interecede in it Medea was not the best of women and the Poet rather brings her in speaking as a fury then a Saint He could not have put those words
one courser by a single definition But the Huntsman first must appoint the grounds to us And they are thus ample 1. That Nature hath not been so much restrained unto any man as to allow him no good qualities A fool may be kind and charitable A slave obsequious and loving to his Master A deformed man ingenious Thersites did not want somewhat in him to recommend him to some mans phancy that could distinguish Neither Aesop nor the Priest whom the Queen descended to salute as he lay in sleeping Nay we see sometimes an ill-favour'd lout as he seems to others eyes to be graced with the bed and favour of a beauteous Lady whom likelier persons have sought and have been repulsed Not to speak of the most vicious whose evil parts may be but the corruptions of their excellent endowments misemployed the most contemptible have somewhat in them to bear them up against neglect A curr that is unprofitable hath exquisite wayes of fawning and insinuating with his Master to save his skin or fill his belly so that he may fare better than the Talbot As we likewise see an empty droll better feasted then a Grave Philosopher but they are not so much to be envyed for what they have as to be pityed for what they want 2. That Nature hath not given all good parts to any one man Onc ne furent a tous toutes graces don nées for if she had her prodigality upon that one would cause that all the rest that she hath bestowed on others should be in vain He while he were as a God amongst men would be insupportable in the World while all accumulation of honours and regards were devolv'd on him a general Ebbe would leave the other fishes to perish on the dry shoar and this Leviathan would scarce be covered in the middle of the waters But she hath rather so provided that somewhat there should be in one to recompence the defect of another and somewhat elsewhere to counter-balance men that are excellent that the World might not be too narrow to contain them 3. That a crooked maimed or infirm body are to be allowed for their imperfections in so many grains extraordinary whatsoever vertue you require in them for whatever noble instincts may be in them the soul cannot act without its organs but when it is about to issue it is distorted They cannot choose but be affected as they â—el within themselves when they are about to shew their courtesy somewhat indiscernable may pain and incommode them as an aking tooth may interrupt one if it be no more in the midst of his discourse and then if you wonder to see the debonnaire on a suddain to become tachy and unsociable while he perceives and strives to correct it he may falter upon some other passion or disease and make it worse by his endeavour of amending To these it may be some fair quality may want a seat of action or the faculty be sunk in the rubbish and ruine of a member 4. That there are divers other affections of the body that 〈◊〉 an influence upon the soul. A ean one preyeth on the sweet and oyly humours and so consumes the fewel of its own contentment A little body is soon agitated as if the spirits wanted room to expatiate and 't is receiv'd almost among the vulgar that little heads are testy But if there be excess of dimensions it makes the whole unactive and the parts unwieldy Besides though you see nothing but a body well-disposed the parts within may be inordinate The veins and arteries may be strait and subject to obstructions so that transpiration is not free nor the course of the bloud and spirits open to the extremities of the body whereby it cannot feel its self in an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or good estate and habit of complexion Neither is it possible for some to obtain so good a temper who are born with evi humours as we bring with us for the most part some familiar maladies like evil Geniuses attending on us all our life Either thin and fluid humors or gross and tough or fair and fiery spirits or sharp and subtle as if they were the rennet of Cold and melancholy 5. Lastly That therefore the agreement of body and mind must be considered and then the field may be discreetly beaten for our prise There is a kind of Physiognomy that discovers a good Nature wherein any ordinary man may have some insight The beggar spyeth where to be importunate The cheat where to follow The hector where to brave or to beware 〈◊〉 Courtier where to allure but some aspects there are agreeable unto every one liking where none conceiveth a suddain prejudice or hateth at the first sight or envyeth their good estate or affecteth to do them any hurt for their owe sakes but findeth that humanity in them which all the World respecteth Such is that most part that presenteth a clear and even skin a ruddy countenance a constitution full and sound that is neither apt to thrive not abate and a mine of air and behaviour neither flow nor vehement but strong and sweet and such as sheweth a promptness to intension and remission as occasion serveth A body free from uneven parts especially uneven eye-brows prominent lips or an eminent Romane nose If any other parts be unequal one cannot therefore exclude that party from having any good parts within him but we cannot lightly take him for the copy of our Character But there is nothing more regardable than the habit of the eyes which if they bear that full and steddy look that importeth Confidence and admit those repercussions that enkindle bashfulness and emit those casts and glances that are significant of gentle passions they do undoubtedly evince the tokens of a likely person § II. But to leave it unto women to be pleased in the outside of a man and to allow them what they affect in this case to be the competenter Judges Let us pass to the habits of the mind and then to be sure whatsoever we discover to be good in one is good in another and indifferent to both our Sexes I take it once for granted that a Good Nature enjoyes a constant sweetness within it self while it is endued abundantly with a free course of blood and spirits circling in its breast and filling it with love of life both in it self and others and delighting most in interchanging of vivacity 1. And first That it doth not owe its cheerfulness to any foreign cause but only to its native vigour and source of anhelation And whom doth it not revive to see alacrity in another without apparent cause Especially when there is no insolence or affected motion to be discovered Who would not wish and earn for such an acquaintance and think himself happy to have a part in one that is indeed happy of himself To see his action observe his countenance note the harmony of his heart and tongue and hear
the conjugal For so it seems by all the fables of the Poets which have raised this to admiration by variety of examples While the poor Penelope would have been but a solitary instance of Conjugal affection if the Vertuous Sir P. Sidney sensible of that defect had not once supplyed us with the story of Argalus and Parthenia And it seems in Nature that nothing can be greater then this Heroick flame for it is the first product of the excellency of strength both of soul and body When the blood is warm the spirits light and airy the humours soft and oyly when the phancy is luculent and most affected with the object of its brightness the reason ever agitated and the memory most tenacious of impressions Then the valiant youth is urg'd by nature to the uttermost knowing that youth is fleeting and once illuded conceiveth flames no more Wherefore here the incenseth him here the glories in his humbleness no less then in his bravery here she triumphs in variety of affections The mind is restless in devising how to take oblige and compass and the body as its instrument must acknowledge no weariness shrink at no danger omit no watching but hold it self still in the brightest armour as if it were to revel in the midst of a battel The eyes are scattered like wandring spirits the colour comes and goes in longing blushing and aspiring the lips tremble and the hands that took the boldness shake in the handling of the arms of love The lover strait becomes a prisoner to a labyrinth where he counts his bondage the sweetest liberty and to tread the maze more desireable then to find the clue If desire only as Des Cartes apprehendeth do comprise horror and agreement One of a sudden apprehension of miscarrying the other in a settled representation of enjoying somewhat most agreeable If doubts and fears be a tendency towards despair the wretched sciatica of the soul If hope it self be but an unquiet inmate in a lovers breast a vehement incendiary and grief do but dismally extinguish those flames Judge whether this love be not made of strong ingredients more than any other While desire ruleth the good is absent Absence of the object pines the faculty If hope relieve fear assayleth delay tormenteth disappointment driveth unto madness Longing stayeth and reduceth The sweetness of imagination dandleth and demulceth the eager spirits until that air be vented in a sigh and grief succeed to resuscitate the malignant humors Such storms are frequent in a lovers breast such change of weather such force of constellations what can there be in any other love that is not here Can we but laugh to hear a debauched gallant at last to sleight all woman-kind to mock at love as folly and in experience and to make only men to be objects to one another As if a fond fancy of some society or a proud conceit of worth and merit or in fine a sence of obligation which by bringing the obliged person into bondage through the tyranny of gratitude doth commonly undermine its own Empire with a faction of liberty since he that thinks himself more obliged to another then he can readily requite begins to hate him that hath a mortgage in him and to have a secret aversation to his person could be more available then Nature procurement which is a vertuous desire of conjunction between our sexes whilest in all motions the Natural are more strong then the moral and this then any other Natural A resolute or a valiant man cannot be by reason if he have it not in the firmness of his mold or constitution So as the soul is knit to the body it is able to act in it or above it or without it If it be weakly joyned it will be apt to serve If strongly it will make it suffer hunger or thirst or heat or cold or cast it headlong upon danger to attain its more heroick ends and this of love as its principal but heroick love cannot be but in a young and lively spirit chast and inviolable And then we may boldly say that there cannot be such affection between two parties of the same sex as between a pair of lovers because other love doth only tend to bring conveniences together but this to propagate its like the forciblest impulse and chief design of Nature to make two inclined Relations compleat in Union In a word to joyn bodies as well as soules and only so to make not as if it were another self but a real and entire combination of two in one If therefore one man can love another more then a woman either he that loves is no man or he that is beloved is an Hermophrodite or somewhat more inhumane But as this love which we value by its energy in innocence and chastity has as its noblest end the butt of wedlock so gold itself may be dear bought and a thing highly prised may sink of value fruition Who would undergoe what is necessary in love or honour if he knew the vanity of his ends Or serve an apprentiship if he knew that that should be the best of his time Suffer so much in Amorous wooing and in the remedy be worser ganched then in the malady For in marriage how early is society how ready is neglect how soon are other ends regarded and the nimia of love as much studied to be unlearned as ever conn'd before The servant practiseth now to become a Master of his wife a Father of his children a Prince or a Principal man in his country Honour Wealth and Providence do cut off all the superfluity of affection and leave little else but law to bind wedlock Whereas the Heroick love is ever longing never satisfied one desire answered or attained multiplies a thousand ever ardent and over-valuing never sleighting or remiss ever humble and obsequious never haughty or imperious ever single and solitary in its end and object never interessed or employed in any other but what may serve it In a word lives not in itself but in its love Much more of it might be said But its laws I once obey'd Therefore say no more at first 2. On the other side There is no Faith in married men some applauding it through sensuality others weary of it for want of vertuous usage Others seeming to contemn it because they have attained who were they widowed should indeed be close mourners and never rest till they had repaired it If it be the reward of noble services the best of all possessions the end and rest of all turmoiled passions We may rather blame the vanity of the World that can never answer expectation then to blast those flowers that are ready to bud and teem with the choicest fruits of life How incongruous is it to imagine that the thirst should be sweeter then the wine the hunger then the choicest fare Can Heroick love as it is accompanied with so many pangs and convulsions be its own reward Is
there any pleasure in doubts and fears Is it better to be in the storm than in the bay or to sail in a troubled sea only that one may sail than to gain the port of enjoyment Let it be the paradise of a fool to be ever in contemplation the feast of a Miser to look on precious viands unassayed or the punishment of a woman-hater to be Tantalized with female objects The noble conqueror in the midst of fruition shall find his love to beget love infinitely new delights to germinate in every change of intercourse desires to issue without pain out of pregnant satisfactions while the gathering of one crop is but to prepare the ground for another One kindness draweth another one endearment claspeth with another one heart combineth with another while the bounty of goodwil the facility of flowing spirits the cession of gentle complacency the undecaying youth of soul afford contentment to extremity of old age Those souls are now compleated in their union which a part would have been like separate souls expecting the resurrection Their joyes are conjoyned to make each other happy they live each of them a double life while a single liveth but by halves They live each of them as much again as they did before Before they knew not what it was to live Children succeed to augment and to perpetuate these felicities house and ornaments and erewhile neglected furniture press to pay their contributions and all inferiour states to veil to this their Paramount Besides whatever was in Heroick love or is in any other friendship is here more compleatly Such benevolence in either breast as meeteth all evils to anticipate them from the other Such a well-wishing to one another as is purely for one anothers sake though pleasure or advantage be removed and sickness poverty or disgrace come instead thereof Such impatience of absence as testifieth what the dolor of loss would be such grief of loosing as can only shew how exquisitly a loving heart may be pained with compunction how intolerable how inexpressible this resentment is In brief such constancy of obliging such transcendency in vigour such inalterable honor and esteem such vindication such condescension such harmony and symbolizing of joyes and griefs that are able to make a palace of a Cottage and turn the darkest night of adversity into a ballet till the morning And these undoubtedly are in wedlock they effects of a Good Nature but if the same that mock at love abandon such marriages as we haue magnified to the idolizing of their Paisans it is because no doubt by thinking to be exquisite in the objects of their pleasures they have misplaced the true object of their felicity which is in one and not in many Lust will incommode itself sundry wayes and vitiate all those purest jewels that seem to be left in another place and at a distance from it Who reproaches another behind his back thinketh that other who thinketh nothing doth the like by him and when he meets him shuns him to the others admiration and at last brings insensibly upon himself and beyond intention what at first he suspected So he that wrongs his marriage-bed makes himself jealous at the first without a cause and at last not without reason Howsoever it will with-draw affection which is the true bond of happiness and not any sensual fruition and then he shall at once dissolve all the ligaments of his house the contignation of his family for as he stands affected to the tree he will stand to the branches and the children reciprocally to them both Luxury will not flow in without other violations But who think to retain the vice and to provide against the inconveniencies will hardly scape others that they foresaw not Although what arguments to such as can collude with vertue Their prudence cannot be upheld long as it is disjoyned from that connexion nor misfortunes be declined Non potest jucundè vivo nisi cum virtute vivatur But shall we dare to oppose the Maxims of our Grandsirs That persons are equal fortunes only do incline that marriage is only for conveniency love will follow where 't is well provided that a beauty is no attractive or vertue any motive to a wise-man That the fondnesses of youth are to be broken otherwayes that wealth and honour may be espoused at the last and a potent family rather then a most accomplisht person Italian Contracts where the son seeth not the daughter which the Gente honorate have adjusted for him till the wedding-day As many of our heirs here until conveighances and settlements be ready for the sealing If these be occasion of like accord to follow indeed there is need of caution in the contract but whether a Good Nature can suffice to all adventures I must rather crave time for experience than undertake to argue here § VI. While we treat only of the Amicable bent of a Good Nature with the Acts and characters thereof though we may intrench somewhat upon the Topick of friendship yet we are not bound to follow the extent of that vertue if I may so call it or systan rather of many singular excellencies but only to trace the rudiments of Social Amity in an incorrupted Nature A sociable Nature I take to be most humane and apt to Amity and the more Amicable the more sociable Therefore first let us take some notice wherein it seems to suffer violence or restraint 1. In altitudes or acts of bravery which extend the habit either of the mind or of the object when it is discerned we discover a ridiculous pusillanimity one makeing ombrage of a petty office with much estate another prodigal of officiousness about nothing We despise a little spirit in attempting a great matter which we call offering at a thing and an ostentator of magnanimity in a thing mean and ordinary Who would not laugh at a Spanish smith coming with his long cloak and sword to be put off and laid aside in order to shooe an horse Or a Mountebank descending from his Coach or litter to draw a tooth upon the stage So in morals to do any little acts of kindness with a flourish and vapour shewes that there is not much goodness to be expected there but that it is intended a little should go far and be more requited then deserveth When we see another as busy as a nurse to please a child when she gives it Porcelain or Venice-glasses to break for its pleasure to obtain a little breath of favour Do we not think strange of his profusion If real kindnesses be squandred away without respect of times or persons only that abundance of good will may be noted those-uneven stretches will render Nature low at another time when it should rise up to be adequate to occasion whereas she delights to keep an even course of bounty and not to strain but for some advantage to herself in the same individual or another 2. In indifferency and remissness nature