his bow to the head and aims at the white of the Clergy's innocence accusing them for covetous and loos-livers not considering how many amongst them are neither but grant they were so we ought as men to pardon them their errors and as the servants of Heaven we ought to reverence them should we be struck so surely from above for every little sinne as we do one another our whole species had before this time been utterly destroyed and had left the World to be possess'd by sensitive beings but I fear the great concern of these pretenders will onely prove that which taketh not its source from a due principle but a sensual end the desire of possessing the Churches revenues if so oh how impious is their design surely they that serve at the Altar ought to live by it if they who serve Earthly Kings ought to live gloriously according to the dignity of their Lords then à fortiori they ought to be in all things above the rest who attend upon the Monarch of Heaven and Earth but there is one thing which would in all likelihood recover the Church and that is if the Nobility and Gentry of the Nation could be perswaded to enter into Orders by their Alliance and Interest they might bulwark themselves against those who would break in upon them through the mightiest fastnesses of their Virtue no one can be too good to attend at the Altar David was King and Priest and so were all his successors in Israel and it was imputed to the Jews for sin that they chose their Priests out of the meanest of the people for their persons being held in contempt by those who were their equals before their Office comes to be so too and the best parts also suffer when clouded with poverty Raro in tenui facundia panno It is true that Heaven lately shewed its displeasure to our Church and seated Forreigners in its fattest Sees yet it was said to them as to the Israelites when they went to possess Canaan I send you up to possess the Land of the Anakim not for your own Righteousness for you are a stiffe-necked people but to scourge the Nations which enjoy it But now we may plainly see how great the concern of Heaven is for the Church since the Ecclesiastical and politick Government are so united that they both fall and both rise together Many now shoot at her foundations but I hope she is built upon Zion which cannot be moved The points of Toleration and Comprehension have been so thorowly discuss'd that here I need but mention their names onely I must say I should be very unwilling to see either of them obtain in this Kingdom Now the Churchmen ought rather Magna vivere then Magna loqui and to shew by their own practices that the Precepts which they give may be easily obeyed The fat Bulls of Basan have prevail'd now but the Almighty hath onely crowned them with success to make them fall nobler Sacrifices to his wrath The Physitian IS to the body what the Divine is to the soul though he doth not administer his province with a parallel integrity since his Knowledge is increased Diseases are so too and our bodies by his applications are become less robust and vigorous for by relying on them our natural heat and radical humours are impaired which were our supports and not seldome the very remedy of one Malady is the cause of another but not onely from this natural cause but a more inhumane one resulteth as great an evil for to swell his own profit he often prolongeth the Agonies the Miseries of his poor Patient making himself seem to him a greater distemper then that he is already travailed with From those dry bones which none who passe by can think could live he will extract a lively and sparkling Essence to himself and he will draw sweetness from the most putrified Carcasse his Recipe whose barbarous Character fully speaketh his manners produceth two Pieces to himself then if you should recover which is more the effect of Providence then his Care the Apothecary or Chirurgeon giveth with a cruel Bill the lately cicatrized wound a new gash he visiteth you as long as the pulse of your Purse beateth high but when he findeth it to decline then he saith you grow so well that you need not his Art or your disease is so desperate that it cannot assist you his thoughts of God are not so as they ought to be for by his so frequently viewing the works of Nature he is apt to misapply and attribute too much to second Causes He adoreth that great principle of Nature Self-preservation but neglecteth that as great one of Christianity to preserve his Brother nay rather like a Cannibal he preyeth upon him though I very much honour this profession yet I must not the abuses of it though it be very necessary yet the neglects and the ill ends of the professors of it render it often dangerous for it is most certain that they not seldome by their Clothes do transferre the disease of one to the other and it is as sure that many suffer by their applying Medicines to diseases which plain Care or Nature would work off If his Fees were more moderate the Patient would receive a greater advantage and himselfe no detriment for now by the excess of them the sick person cannot see him above once in a day and there being so many critical minutes in a disease it is impossible he should prescribe for them in his absence Thus also the inferior sort of the Nation will enjoy a benefit for many who are lost for want of advice are able to give a Crown who cannot afford a Guinny it is in fine a profession which employeth the industry and study of its Professors and chargeth them with the greatest duties and care and therefore ought to be most countenanced if it impose not too much upon the World The Lawyer FRom Adam to the Flood the Law of Nature onely reigned but when wickednesses increased upon the surface of the earth God laid his commands against Murther and Bloud and afterwards as the age degenerated Laws increased and became an Asylum to the Good and a terror to the Bad. Since the concord of brethren is rare because every man preferreth his own interest Law is appointed for the preservation of the world therefore the approaches to it ought to be easie for if a Sanctuary be locked of what advantage is it to that miserable man who flieth to its protection the Law which God gave to his peculiar people which he often called stiff-neck'd and perverse was comprised within the narrow compass of two Tables and this he thought enough to bridle their greatest exorbitancies the Twelve Tables nay the Roman or Civil Law it self governed a Nation the most Great most Glorious and most Adventrous in the World which without the impertinent and indigested glosses of Bartolus and Baldus and others is of very little volume
Angliae Speculum Morale THE Moral State OF ENGLAND WITH The several Aspects it beareth TO VIRTUE and VICE With the LIFE of THEODATVS And Three Novels Viz. The LAND-MARINERS FRIENDSHIP SUBLIMED The FRIENDLY RIVALS 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oh veré Phrygiae neque enim Phryges LONDON Printed for Henry Herringman and are to be sold at the Blew Anchor in the lower Walk of the New Exchange 1670. TO THE READER IT may be thought that these ensueing Characters are meant for reflexions upon particular persons but I here assure the World that I onely strike at general practices I do no more then what my self would willingly receive from any hand and I shall always write his name with the first in the Roll of my friends who telleth me wherein I have transgress'd for they are most happy who are most innocent now since humanity is naturally prone to ill it ought to be our care to avoid and hate it and the way to do so is first to know it I think he who striveth to wound his Brother's existimation at the same time stabbeth his own for thus he brandeth himself with the infamous name of a malicious person and is avoided by all as noxious to civil Converse Most ages have brought forth those publick spirits those friends to their Country who have dissected Vice and shew'd it in it's ugliest colours of most note amongst the Ancients were Juvenal Persius Horace and almost every Age and every Nation since have been happy in such and doubtless they wrought a greater Reformation with them down right blows then 〈◊〉 Pythâ—â—â—ras Socrates Plato Aristotle Theophrastus nay then that profess'd Master of Ethicks Zeno or any of the numerous Schools of Moralists have with their most perswasive reasons Vice from the least of familiarity slippeth into an habit and in the end infatuateth and how it hath insinuated it self into the affections of the English nay how it is incorporate with their Natures their daily actions shew The Nations obstinacy I fear is a sad presage of it's fate for it turneth not from its wonted courses though the will of Heaven hath been spoken in Plague and War nay though 't hath giv'n its commandment like the Levitical Law in a dreadful Fire And we know that God hardened Pharaoh's heart before he drowned him and his host in the red sea In this juncture of time it resembleth Crispinus in the account which Juvenal gives of him in these words Ecce iterum Crispinus est mihi saepe vocandus Ad partes monstrum nulla virtute redemptum A vitijs Aeger solaque libidine fortis If I can by these Lines oblige my Country-men to better courses I shall attain my end if I cannot I have done my duty as a free-born Subject who ought to be sollicitous for his Countrys good The experienced may see farther then the tender Rays of my young Eyes will reach for I pretend to set down nothing here but what is obvious to the weakest sight MAN THe transactions of this World are the most unpleasant speculations that ever entertain'd my mind All affairs do resemble the great Machines of Heaven and Earth in their motion and volubility but not in their regularity for the Sun riseth from the East at noon visiteth the South and maketh the West his Bed the Moon swerveth not from her appointed limits observeth her times of Change and influenceth the Sea that also keepeth its hours of flux and reflux and generally the whole off-spring of Nature moveth as at first but only Man who was design'd Master of the whole though he partaketh of the Heavenly soul liveth in opposinon to all Laws and Sanctions of God and 〈◊〉 runneth a course contrary to all Order and in his Actions if not in his Heart saith Tush there is no all-seeing Providence no God T is true the whole progeny of Adam is obnoxious to his original guilt but Baptism is the Lavre of Regeneration we have innate affections and propensities to do evil since our Mothers convers with the serpent But Grace is in the World which will resine our natures Doubtless no evil is in us but the cure is in our own power no poysonous Herb as Naturalists observe sprouteth out but in the same field its Antidote is plac'd 'T is a prodigie that Men since they know they have a rational soul which is to measure out Eternity and after according to the habits and inclinations it serv'd most here is to receive a Crown or a Scorpion should follow the dictates of Sence wholly deposing Reason from her Empire over the passions and be as Kings though partaking of all the inconveniencies of Humanity for one hour to be afterwards most miserable for Myriads of Myriads of ages which like a Circle will never have an end Did not Heaven oftner stretch out a staffe then a rod apply Gileads Balme then pursue revenge the World had many Centuries of years since been past the frontiers where now it stands and immersed in the very centre of the Valley of Tears and Death From Adam through the wide Organs of the depraved species the sad effects of his fate are deriv'd to all but yet these Miseries by the mercy of Heaven being salved every heady appetite which we caress and embrace is the Serpent which betrayeth our souls anew into that infinity of inconveniencies which attendeth the eating of forbidden fruit These unhappy and often repeated actions have created parallel habits in us which have changed the whole Mass of our Nature and have set us in a diametrical opposition to all that is called good to prove this if we examine the intrigues and daily occurrences in the World we shall find nothing if apply'd to the Divine Rule conformable nothing if laid in the ballance of the Sanctuary of just weight every rational Being like the ambitious Angels hath perverted the intent of its creation none but sensitive and vegetative Creatures pursue the primitive end of their institutions There is no Medium betwixt good and evil They admit of no mixture or mutual commerce Whoever is not good is its contrary if a good Action be leaven'd with the least Vice it is overcome by its powers and degenerateth into bad the least Sin stamps Ignominy on the fairest Virtue the Scripture says He who breaketh but one Commandment though he have inviolably observed all the rest is guilty of the breach of the whole Table If thus then alas what should we be if all our actions were put to the Test how few do oblige without the hope of a threefold return who loves without a sensual or avaritious end who will serve their King and Country without the hope of Reward from him or applause from her in fine we undertake nothing but we consider our selves first and if we cannot work our own interests we will let the other fall though of the most publick nature We obey no Parent but the Flesh we hugg no Brother but a son of Belial
be praised by us his mean subjects here yet the Angels whom he honoureth with a nearer converse with more close approaches to his radiant Majesty give him more magnifying praises more elevated Halleluiahs He who truly intends to make a Court the Scene of his life ought above all to practice sincerity and to value his faith for the addresses of the people to their Sovereign of all kinds being convey'd through him as a conduct it should be his care that they arrive at the Royal Ear without addition or diminution lest he wrong them in their affairs and so alienate their affections from him to whom they are due and purchase to himselfe in the end shame if not death He ought to appear in a garb not above his place for so he may procure envy to himself nor below the dignity of his Master lest he wrong him He ought to use all means to advance him in the affections of the people to indear his interest to them to exercise an obliging mien to all but especially to forreigners under what Character soever they remain here to shew himself in all splendor due to the Office he holdeth to them that he may create a Reverence in them for the Author of it He must be seen in the intrigues and interests of transmarine states and know their benigne and malevolent Aspects one to the other to be ready upon all emergencies to meet the maladies of the body politick by his Head or Arm to espouse its fortune onely and to do his devoir to it by freely sacrificing his life and posterity and by returning without regret his goods to that service from whence he received them imitating in that his Master who though he hath large incomes from the people yet restoreth them by expending them upon all exigencies for their good as the Sun draweth off exhalations and vapors from the Earth but sendeth them into her Lap again in gentle and fruitful showrs which assist her nature and make her bring forth in larger proportions But 't is wonderful to see how farr men are from what they really ought to be his moral parts seem to be subject to the same vicissitudes with the state he feareth for now you shall behold him like the lazy Leviathan taking his sport in the deepest Abysses of pleasure preying upon those smaller Fish whose strength cannot resist his power he is drowsie and backwards to the advantages of his Prince but always vigilant for his own he runneth in ways excentrique to all Vertue and knoweth no Friend or Divinity but Venus Bacchus and his Mammon his motion is perpetually in bowing and cringing but he is as constant in directing his Eye to the pole of his interests as the magnetick Needle is to the North he is that true Chymist who extracts by the calcining fire of his feigned-ardent affections gold out of the bleeding estates of unhappy delinquents and of those whom the Law adjudgeth to punishment and sometimes of innocent offenders and pretended Criminals But though these may be the principles of some yet there are many whose integrity and fidelity to their Prince renders them worthy of those advantages they enjoy yet their carriage cannot excuse others There is an impertinent thing called a young Courtier whom I shall draw as near the life as I can His discourse is that which profaneth the ears of the Good and the wise and proveth troublesome even to the most impertinent his remarques are of the most inconsiderable encounters of the day in which himself is always a principal Actor either how many Women by his false vows he hath overcome or where he hath made the greatest debauches in Burgundy or Campaigne at Jero's Shattelin's or Lafroons or if his happy invention doth supply him with a distorted Rebus or an ugly dismembred Anagram an unnatural Antithesis a forced quibble or an uncivil repartie that bites ones reputation which all are the dry scabs of a corrupted wit he must be admir'd for being Master of a greater ingenuity than Ben Johnson He is sure to have three or four verses of Love and Honour ready out of the latest Play and the last new Song in his pocket which he hath coppied in false English 'T is fit his dress should be gay because Embroideries are for the Palaces of Kings but it is not fit that many poor families to supply his extravagancies should want bread 't is miserable to think that a thousand curses should attend his steps and not one good wish should be sent up for him but why should prayers be offered for him who never prays who contemneth Religion as a vile thing who never nameth God but in his Oaths or Burlesque The Gentleman IN the frame of the State is like the Tuscan Pillar in Architecture which though it be not so Polite as the other Orders nor can boast a well proportion'd neatness like the Ionick nor an handsomely adorn'd head like the Corinthian Column yet it is in building the foundation of all their Beauties so though he be inferiour in Title yet in Power and interest he is equal if not superior to the Nobleman for in all Records we find the House of Commons to have been very considerable in the Government though the Lords make a Court of Judicature it is his Duty to serve his Countrey by his Presence there to preserve her Peace and to defend her Priviledges and Immunities to be hospitable to his indigent neighbours to receive the stranger and way-faring-man with Chearfulness and Civility In fine to open his Napkin to all and not to employ it in wrapping up his Talent But alas is it not miserable that Vanity like Romes Eagles at the Meridian of her power should carry Conquest on her Wings to all places where she is pleas'd to flee who of the wisest nay what Diviner if any such there be could have foreseen that vice should have found out the once Sacred Groves the quiet and innocent recesses of a Countrey the Gentleman now hath chang'd the Plow and Cart which did feed his Grandsire and a brave Train of stout attendants in his great Hall whose Labour well deserv'd their Hire for a Gilded Coach and a numerous Train of debauch'd and insignisicant Lacqueys and now by an unhappy Thrift hath converted his long Table well covered and well filled into a little round one which holds one Dish and three People and hath turn'd his great Hall into a little Parlour He once in a year arriveth at London with his Lady a rich or handsome Daughter or a Neice with whom they fail not daily to visit the Theatre giving to her the accomplishments of the Town who ought rather to be seen in the misteries of a Countrey life If her fortune be great 't is unfortunately ship-wrack'd upon some Lord who after the enjoyment of her revenue loaths her person He places his Son perhaps at the Inns of Court who knoweth he is to heir an Estate and thinketh it but washing
which at last he expireth either from a bed of loathsome diseases and rottenness or from a disgraceful Gibbet with common Malefactors The Virtuoso DId rise Gloriously like light out of the Chaos and dazled the Eyes of the astonished world triumphing with a Masculine Gallantry over the impracticable Notions of the Antients but now he seemeth not to pursue his advantage with his primitive vigor which hath diminished his Fame a little for whoever treadeth the paths of Virtue ought always to be in a forward motion and by equal degrees as he advanceth in the way to double his pace till he cometh to the Goal The Great Chancellor Bacon was the Columbus who led us to this unknown America of new Philsophy since him Cartesius and Gassendus have made the greatest discoveries in her Continent to whom we shall with all willingness yield the Bays if we consider the advantages we now enjoy from their labour for all Precepts all Notions are given us from above to regulate and direct our Actions and the best of speculations are buried in oblivion if they do not produce their due effects now it is most certain that most or all of the principles of the Paripatetic Philosophy were meer Entia Rationis in intellectu tantum which now give place to Entia realia to true and beneficial Experiments doubtless it was the attempt of a most Heroick Virtue to storm the whole Circle of ancient Learning so much reverenced by Men though for 〈◊〉 other cause then its Antiquity and the perswasions they had their Fathers esteemed it as 〈◊〉 old times they honoured aged Oaks because they thought some God had kept his residence under their shades It is admirable how a body made up of 〈◊〉 many jarring and disagreeing Elements I mean opposite opinions should have obtain'd so much and gain'd so mighty at Ascendant over the affections of men of parts enough refined that they should pronounce him an Heretick who should dare to contradict the meanest of its Members bearing it up against experience which ought to be out general Mistress The English Literati have presented the World with Effects of Industry and Ingenuity most worthy of their causes they have improved the Art of Grinding Glasses which is a great advantage to Astronomy and Sea-affairs by the study of Micrography and the Anatomy of insects they have displaied a new Page of the Book of Nature they have by more exact scrutiny into humane bodies discovered the circulation and the source of many diseases and have lately oblig'd us with an experiment of the transfusion of the blood of one Animal into another which is never enough to be gratefully admired though it hath the ill fortune to be little esteemed of now but in ensuing ages it will certainly be crowned with its due applause for it is always seen that great Actions are deny'd their Bay's in that age in which they are born because Envy and prejudicate Malice the off-springs of the old Serpent detract from them The Hypothesis of Water and Air the advance of the latter being in the Air-pump a Noble mechanick invention are very rational and the inspection into the Nature of Vegetables hath much advantaged Man in the support his body will receive from them Their progress in all Physical Learning hath generally been great but upon Chymistry particularly they have spent much Labour and Oyl And here I must declare that though I honour all the ingenious and industrious I cannot be reconcil'd to those who are in pursuit of that great Magistery of Nature as they call it the Philosophers stone it is wonderful that they should consume so considerable a portion of their lives in the search of that which they know not really to be in the Created substances or if it should exist which hath so mean an end as the bringing Gold into the World which is the efficient cause of all strises and evils whose converse the good avoid because it commonly turneth even the souls of its votaries into its own Hypostasis how cruelly do they macerate themselves who search for this how they foment those scourges of our lives Hope and Fear each minute bringeth with it a promise of success which expiteth in Fumc and at last when they are just upon the Frontiers of bliss and think the next minute to embrace their wish'd for Elixit they find in their Arm onely a Caput mortuum a Terra Damnata in which they have buried perhaps their whole fortunes and the greatest number of their most hopeful years and all which at last ariseth from the expence is summed up in two or three moral Corollaries and they end their days with this Prayer in their mouths O si praeteritos reparet mihi Jupiter annes Now to return to the Virtuoso when I consider what small returns of civility we make to these ingenious persons who have obliged us so much I can find our coldness to have no other cause then what themselves do give they so readily admitting all persons into their Society who will pay the Duties of the house though they know not the terms of Philosophy make the multitude who never see the bottom of an affair judge of all from their weakness they commonly entertain the company of a Coffee-house with some refuse notions gleaned from the ingenious which they pronounce as Magisterially as if they had been secretary's to Nature and discourse as confidently of the harmony of her parts as a Countrey Musician playeth who never learned his Gam-ut From the impertinencies of these pretenders this Royal Corporation suffereth when it ought rather to be encouraged and caressed by all the Great and Learned for all the great advantages it promiseth in the future for it is most true that whosoever is a good Philosopher is a good man because no one looketh into the recesses of Nature who is not induced to extoll the Author of it and so gratefully maketh his return for the immense favours in serving and honouring him who conferred them Thus out of a Physical knowledge a Moral one starts and we see Science and Virtue have the same Basis It is certain Learning hath no Enemies but the Envious and Ignorant and even from these evils she reapeth good for from the detraction of the former she raiseth repute since nothing but Virtue is the subject of Envy and from the inveterateness of the latter she hath a benefit too since the praises of the unwise are reproaches and whosoever delighteth in them wrappeth himself in the better half of his Fools-coat and E converso his reproaches must be praises The Divine HAth the powers of cursing and absolving upon Earth and therefore ought to be reverenc'd as Gods immediate instrument Now though his injuries be many from the disaffected yet under these great pressures he ought with the Palme to lift up his head highest and to exalt his voice like a Trumpet to maintain warre against all the Champions of Vice every one bendeth