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wherein, I have not only related what I saw of their present condition, but, so far as convenience might permit, presented a brief view of the former estates and first antiquities of those peoples and countries; thence to draw a right image of the frailty of man, the mutability of whatever is worldly, and assurance that, as there is nothing unchangeable saving God, so nothing stable but by his grace and protection.

SAMUEL PURCHAS, D.D., born 1577, died 1628, gained well-deserved fame by his collections of Voyages, viz.: Haklvytvs Posthumus, or Pvrchas his Pilgrimes, contayning a History of the World, in Sea Voyages and Lande Travells, by Englishmen and others, Lond., 1625-6, 5 vols. fol.

"He has imitated Hakluyt too much, swelling

his work into five volumes in folio: yet the whole collection is very valuable, as having preserved many considerable voyages that might otherwise have perished. But, like Hakluyt, he has thrown all that came to hand to fill up so many volumes, and is excessive full of his own notions and of mean quibbling and playing words: yet for such as can make choice of the best, the collection is very valuable."-Explan. Cat. of Voy. prefixed to Churchill's Collec., ascribed to John Locke.

ON THE SEA.

As God hath combined the sea and land into one globe, so their joint combination and mutual assistance is necessary to secular happiness and glory. The sea covereth one-half of this patrimony of man, whereof God set him in possession when he said, Replenish the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."

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Thus should man at once lose half his inheritance, if the art of navigation did not enable him to manage this untamed beast, and with the bridle of the winds and saddle of his shipping to make him serviceable. Now for the services of the sea, they are innumerable: it is the great purveyor of the world's commodities to our use; conveyer of the excess of rivers; uniter, by traffick, of all nations: it presents the eye with diversified colours and motions, and is, as it were, with rich brooches, adorned with various islands. It is an open field for merchandise in peace; a pitched field for the most dreadful fights of war; yields diversity of fish and fowl for diet; materials for wealth, medicine for health, simples for medicines, pearls and other jewels for ornament; amber and ambergrise for delight;

"the wonders of the Lord in the deep" for instruction, variety of creatures for use, multiplicity of natures for contemplation, diversity of accidents for admiration, compendiousness to the way, to full bodies healthful evacuation, to the thirsty earth fertile moisture, to distant friends pleasant meeting, to weary persons delightful refreshing, to studious and religious minds a map of knowledge, mystery of temperance, exercise of continence; school of prayer, meditation, devotion, and sobriety; refuge to the distressed, portage to the merchant, passage to the traveller, customs to the prince, springs, lakes, rivers, to the earth; it hath on it tempests and calms to chastise the sins, to exercise the faith, of seamen ; manifold affections in itself, to affect and stupefy the subtlest philosopher; sustaineth movable fortresses for the soldier; maintaineth (as in our island) a wall of defence and watery garrison to guard the state; entertains the sun with vapours, the moon with obsequiousness, the stars also with a natural looking-glass, the sky with clouds, the air with temperateness, the soil with suppleness, the rivers with tides, the hills with moisture, the valleys with fertility; containeth most diversified matter for meteors, most multiform shapes, most various, numerous kinds, most immense, difformed, deformed, unformed monsters; once (for why should I longer detain you?) the sea yields action to the body, meditation to the mind, the world to the world, all parts thereof to each part, by this art of arts, navigation. Pilgrimes.

LORD EDWARD HERBERT,

of Cherbury, born 1581, and died 1648. among other productions gave to the world VIII. of England, Lond., 1649, fol. a History of the Life and Reign of Henry

"Has ever been esteemed one of the best histories in the English language; but there is not in it that perfect candour which one would wish, or expect to see, in so celebrated an historian. He than he has of Henry. He appears to have laid has given us a much juster portrait of himself open every foible or defect in his own character, but has cast the monstrous vices of that monstrous tyrant into shade, and has displayed to great advantage his gallantry, magnificence, and generosity."-GRANGER: Biog. Hist. of Eng. SIR THOMAS MORE'S RESIGNATION OF THE

GREAT SEAL.

Sir Thomas More, Lord Chancellor of England, after divers suits to be discharged of his place (which he had held two years and a half) did at length by the king's good

leave resign it. The example whereof being rare, will give me occasion to speak more particularly of him. Sir Thomas More, a person of sharp wit, and endued besides with excellent parts of learning (as his works may testify), was yet (out of I know not what natural facetiousness) given so much to jesting that it detracted no little from the gravity and importance of his place, which, though generally noted and disliked, I do not think was enough to make him give it over in that merriment we shall find anon, or retire to a private life. Neither can I believe him so much addicted to his private opinions as to detest all other governments by his own Utopia, so that it is probable some vehement desire to follow his book, or secret offence taken against some person or matter (among which perchance the king's new intended marriage, or the like, might be accounted) occasioned this strange counsel; though yet I find no reason pretended for it but infirmity and want of health. Our king hereupon taking the seal, and giving it, together with the order of knighthood, to Thomas Audeley, speaker of the Lower House, Sir Thomas More, without acquainting anybody with what he had done, repairs to his family at Chelsea, where, after a mass celebrated the next day in the church, he came to his lady's pew, with his hat in his hand (an office formerly done by one of his gentlemen), and says, "Madam, my lord is gone." But she thinking this at first to be but one of his jests, was little moved, till he told her sadly, he had given up the great seal; whereupon she speaking some passionate words, he called his daughters then present to see if they could not spy some fault about their mother's dressing; but they after search after search saying they could find none, he replied, "Do you not perceive that your mother's nose standeth somewhat awry?"-of which jeer the provoked lady

was so sensible that she went from him in a rage. Shortly after he acquainted his servants with what he had done, dismissing them also to the attendance of some other great personages, to whom he had recommended them. For his fool, he bestowed him on the lord mayor during his office, and afterwards on his successors in that charge. And now coming to himself, he began to consider how much he had left, and finding that it was not above one hundred pounds yearly in lands, besides some money, he advised with his daughters how to live together. But the grieved gentlewomen (who knew not what to reply, or indeed how to take these jests) remaining astonished, he says, "We will begin with the slender diet of the students of the law, and if that will not hold out, we will take such commons as they have

at Oxford; which yet if our purse will not stretch to maintain, for our last refuge we will go a-begging, and at every man's door sing together a Salve Regina to get alms." But these jests were thought to have in them more levity than to be taken everywhere for current; he might have quitted his dignity without using such sarcasms, and be taken himself to a more retired and quiet life, without making them or himself contemptible. And certainly whatsoever he intended hereby, his family so little understood his meaning that they needed some more serious instructions. So that I cannot persuade myself for all this talk, that so excellent a person would omit at fit times to give his family that sober account of his relinquishing this place which I find he did to the Archbishop Warham, Erasmus, and others.

History of the Life and Reign of Henry VIII.

SIR THOMAS OVERBURY, born 1581, became a companion of the Earl of Somerset, and for opposing his marriage with the Countess of Essex, was murdered in the Tower in 1613. See the Great Oyer of Poisoning: the Trial of the Earl of Somerset for the poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury, in the Tower of London, and various matters connected therewith, from contemporary MSS., by Andrew Amos, Lond., 1846, 8vo. Of Overbury's works, the best known is entitled A Wife, now the Widdow of Sir Thomas Overbvrye; Being a most exquisite and singular Poem of the Choice of a Wife; Wherevnto are added many witty Characters, and conceited Newes, written by himselfe and other learned Gentlemen his Friends, Lond., 1614, 4to, second edition.

"The characters, though rather too antithetical in their style, are drawn with a masterly hand, and are evidently the result of personal observation."-DRAKE: Shakspeare and his Times, i. 510.

THE TINKER.

A tinker is a moveable, for he hath no abiding in one place; by his motion he gathers heat, thence his choleric nature. He seems to be very devout, for his life is a continual pilgrimage; and sometimes in humility goes barefoot, therein making necessity a virtue. His house is as ancient as Tubal Cain's, and so is a renegade by antiquity; yet he proves himself a gallant, for he carries all his wealth upon his back; or a philosopher, for he bears all his substance about him. From his art was music first invented, and therefore is he always furnished with a song, to which his hammer keeping tune, proves that he was the first founder of

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the kettle-drum. Note, that where the best ale is, there stands his music most upon crotchets. The companion of his travels is some foul, sun-burnt quean; that, since the terrible statute, recanted gipsyism, and is turned pedlaress. So marches he all over England with his bag and baggage; his conversation is irreproveable, for he is ever mending. He observes truly the statutes, and therefore had rather steal than beg, in which he is irremoveably constant, in spite of whips or imprisonment; and so strong an enemy to idleness, that in mending one hole he had rather make three than want work; and when he hath done he throws the wallet of his faults behind him. He embraceth, naturally, ancient customs, conversing in open fields and lowly cottages; if he visit cities or towns, 'tis but to deal upon the imperfections of our weaker vessels. His tongue is very voluble, which, with canting, proves him a linguist. He is entertained in every place, but enters no farther than the door, to avoid suspicion. Some would take him to be a coward, but, believe it, he is a lad of mettle; his valour is commonly three or four yards long, fastened to a pike in the end for flying off. He is very provident, for he will fight with but one at once, and then also he had rather submit than

be counted obstinate. To conclude, if he scape Tyburn and Banbury, he dies a beggar.

Characters.

A FRANKLIN.

snares for the snipe, or pitfalls for the blackbird; nor oppression, but when in the month of July he goes to the next river and shears his sheep. He allows of honest pastime, and thinks not the bones of the dead anything bruised, or the worse for it, though the country lasses dance in the church-yard after even-song. Rock-Monday, and the wake in summer, shrovings, the wakeful catches on Christmas-eve, the hoky, or seedcake, these he yearly keeps, yet holds them no relics of Popery. He is not so inquisitive after news derived from the privy-closet, when the finding an eyry of hawks in his own ground, or the foaling of a colt come of a good strain, are tidings more pleasant and more profitable. He is lord paramount within himself, though he hold by never so mean a tenure, and dies the more contentedly (though he leave his heir young), in regard he leaves him not liable to a covetous guardian. Lastly, to end him, he cares not when his end comes: he needs not fear his audit, for his quietus is in heaven. Characters.

JOHN HALES,

a famous divine of the Church of England, styled from his learning "The Ever-Memorable," was born 1584, and died 1658.

"He had read more and carried more about him, in his excellent memory, than any man I ever knew. He was one of the least men in the kingdom, and one of the greatest scholars in Europe."

His outside is an ancient yeoman of Eng--Lord Clarendon.

land, though his inside may give arms (with OF INQUIRY AND PRIVATE JUDGMENT IN

the best gentleman) and never fee the herald. There is no truer servant in the house than himself. Though he be master, he says not to his servants, go to field, but, let us go; and with his own eye doth fatten his flock, and set forward all manner of husbandry. He is taught by nature to be contented with a little; his own fold yields him both food and raiment; he is pleased with any nourishment God sends, whilst curious gluttony ransacks, as it were, Noah's ark for food, only to feed the riot of one meal. He is never known to go to law; understanding to be law-bound among men, is like to be hidebound among his beasts; they thrive not under it, and that such men sleep as unquietly as if their pillows were stuffed with lawyers' pen-knives. When he builds, no poor tenant's cottage hinders his prospect; they are, indeed, his alms-houses, though there be painted on them no such superscription. He never sits up late, but when he hunts the badger, the vowed foe of his lambs; nor uses he any cruelty, but when he hunts the hare; nor subtlety, but when he setteth

RELIGION.

It were a thing worth looking into, to know the reason why men are so generally willing, in point of religion, to cast themselves into other men's arms, and, leaving their own reason, rely so much upon another man's. Is it because it is modesty and humility to think another man's reason better than our own? Indeed, I know not how it comes to pass, we account it a vice, a part of envy, to think another man's goods, or another man's fortunes, to be better than our own; and yet we account it a singular virtue to esteem our reason and wit meaner than other men's. Let us not mistake ourselves: to contemn the advice and help others, in love and admiration to our own conceits, to depress and disgrace other men's, this is the foul vice of pride; on the contrary, thankfully to entertain the advice of others, to give it its due, and ingenuously to prefer it before our own if it deserve it, this is that gracious virtue of modesty; but altogether to mistrust and relinquish our own

faculties, and commend ourselves to others, this is nothing but poverty of spirit and indiscretion. I will not forbear to open unto you what I conceive to be the causes of this so general an error amongst men. . . . To return, therefore, and proceed in the refutation of this gross neglect in men of their own reason, and casting themselves upon other wits. Hath God given you eyes to see, and legs to support you, that so yourselves might lie still or sleep, and require the use of other men's eyes and legs? That faculty of reason which is in every one of you, even in the meanest that hears me this day, next to the help of God, is your eyes to direct you, and your legs to support you, in your course of integrity and sanctity; you may no more refuse or neglect the use of it, and rest yourselves upon the use of other men's reason, than neglect your own and call for the use of other men's eyes and legs. The man in the gospel, who had bought a farm, excuses himself from going to the marriage-supper, because himself would go and see it: but we have taken an easier course; we can buy our farm, and go to supper too, and that only by saving our pains to see it; we profess ourselves to have made a great purchase of heavenly doctrine, yet we refuse to see it and survey it ourselves, but trust to other men's eyes, and our surveyors and wot you to what end? I know not, except it be that so we may with the better leisure go to the marriagesupper; that, with Haman, we may the more merrily go in to the banquet provided for us; that so we may the more freely betake ourselves to our pleasures, to our profits, to our trades, to our preferments and ambition. ... Would you see how ridiculously we abuse ourselves when we thus neglect our own knowledge, and securely hazard ourselves upon others' skill? Give me leave, then, to show you a perfect pattern of it, and to report to you what I find in Seneca the philosopher recorded of a gentleman in Rome, who, being purely ignorant, yet greatly desirous to seem learned, procured himself many servants, of whom some he caused to study the poets, some the orators, some the historians, some the philosophers, and, in a strange kind of fancy, all their learning he verily thought to be his own, and persuaded himself that he knew all that his servants understood; yea, he grew to that height of madness in this kind, that, being weak in body and diseased in his feet, he provided himself of wrestlers and runners, and proclaimed games and races, and performed them by his servants; still applauding himself, as if himself had done them. | Beloved, you are this man: when you neglect to try the spirits, to study the means

of salvation yourselves, but content your-
selves to take them upon trust, and repose
yourselves altogether on the wit and knowl-
edge of us that are your teachers, what is
this in a manner but to account with your-
selves, that our knowledge is yours, that
you know all that we know, who are but
your servants in Jesus Christ?
Sermons in Golden Remaines.

JOHN SELDEN,

one of the most learned men whom England has produced, was born at Salvington, Sussex, 1584, occupied many important public posts, and died 1654. His erudite works are now known only to scholars and antiquaries, but the volume of his Table-Talk, published by his amanuensis, Richard Milward, "who had observed his discourses for twenty years together," Lond., 1689, 4to, and later editions, still commands the attention of the general reader.

"Mr. Selden was a person whom no character can flatter, or transmit in any expressions equal to his merit and virtue. He was of such stupendous learning in all kinds and in all languages, as may appear from his excellent and transcendent writings, that a man would have thought he had been entirely conversant among books, and had never spent an hour but in reading and writing; yet his humanity, courtesy, and affability were such, that he would have been thought to have been bred in the best courts, but that his good nature, charity, and delight in doing good, and in communicating all he knew, exceeded that breed

ing."-EARL OF CLARENDON (his intimate friend for many years): Life.

When Selden was dying, he said to Archbishop Usher:

"I have surveyed most of the learning that is among the sons of men, and my study is filled with books and manuscripts [he had 8000 volumes in his library] on various subjects; but at present I cannot recollect any passage out of all my books and papers whereon I can rest my soul, save this from the sacred Scriptures: The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.' (Tit. ii. 14.)"

Dr. Johnson and Hallam considered Selden's Table-Talk to be far superior to the Ana of the Continent; and another eminent authority thus speaks of Selden's volume:

"There is more weighty bullion sense in this book than I ever found in the same number of pages of any uninspired writer.. O to have been with Selden over his glass of wine, making every accident an outlet and a vehicle of wisdom." -COLERIDGE: Lit. Remains, ii. 361, 362.

EVIL SPEAKING.

1. He that speaks ill of another, commonly, before he is aware, makes himself such a one as he speaks against; for if he had civility or breeding, he would forbear such kind of language.

bid him kill me. With that I began to be afraid, and thought he was mad. He said he knew I could cure him, and therefore entreated me to give him something, for he was resolved he would go to nobody else. I perceiving what an opinion he had of me, and that it was only melancholy that troubled him, took him in hand, warranted him, if he would follow my directions, to cure him in a short time. I desired him to let me be alone about an hour, and then to come

again; which he was very willing to. In the mean time I got a card, and wrapped it

handsome in a piece of taffeta, and put strings to the taffeta; and when he came, gave it to him to hang about his neck; withal charged him, that he should not disorder himself, neither with eating nor drink

2. A gallant man is above ill words. An example we have in the old Lord of Salis-up bury, who was a great wise man. Stone had called some lord about court fool; the lord complains, and has Stone whipped; Stone cries, "I might have called my Lord of Salis-ing, but eat very little of supper, and say his bury fool often enough before he would have had me whipped."

3. Speak not ill of a great enemy, but rather give him good words, that he may use you the better, if you chance to fall into his hands. The Spaniard did this when he was dying; his confessor told him, to work him to repentance, how the devil tormented the wicked that went to hell; the Spaniard replying, called the devil my lord: "I hope my lord the devil is not so cruel." His confessor reproved him. "Excuse me," said the don, "for calling him so; I know not into what hands I may fall; and if I happen into his, I hope he will use me the better for giving him good words."

Table-Talk.

HUMILITY.

1. Humility is a virtue all preach, none practice, and yet everybody is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.

2. There is humilitas quædam in vitio. If a man does not take notice of that excellency and perfection that is in himself, how can he be thankful to God, who is the author of all excellency and perfection? Nay, if a man hath too mean an opinion of himself, it will render him unserviceable both to God and man.

3. Pride may be allowed to this or that degree, else a man cannot keep up his dignity. In gluttons there must be eating, in drunkenness there must be drinking; it is not the eating, nor it is not the drinking, that is to be blamed, but the excess. So in pride.

Table-Talk.

DEVILS IN the Head.

A person of quality came to my chamber in the Temple, and told me he had two devils in his head (I wondered what he meant), and just at that time one of them

prayers duly when he went to bed; and I made no question but he would be well in three or four days. Within that time I went to dinner to his house, and asked him how he did. He said he was much better, but not perfectly well; for, in truth, he had not dealt clearly with me; he had four devils in his head, and he perceived two of them were gone, with that which I had given him, but the other two troubled him still. "Well,” said I, "I am glad two of them are gone: I make no doubt to get away the other two likewise." So I gave him another thing to hang about his neck. Three days after, he came to me in my chamber, and professed he was now as well as ever he was in his life, and did extremely thank me for the great care I had taken of him. I, fearing lest he might relapse into the like distemper, told him that there was none but myself and one physician more in the whole town that could cure the devils in the head, and that was Dr. Harvey (whom I had prepared), and wished him, if ever he found himself ill in my absence, to go to him, for he could cure his disease as well as myself. The gentleman lived many years, and was never troubled after.

Table-Talk.

THOMAS HOBBES, born 1588, and died 1679, was the author of Human Nature; or, the Fundamental Principles of Policy concerning the Faculties and Passions of the Human Soul, Lond., 1650, 12mo, Leviathan; or, the Matter, Forme, and Power of a Commonwealth, ecclesiasticall and civill, 1651, fol., and other works.

"A permanent foundation of his fame remains in his admirable style, which seems to be the very perfection of didactic language. Short, clear, precise, pithy, his language never has more than one

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