Of Concords and Discords.
BEing that Concordance (as saith Boêtius) is the due mingling of two or more voices, and neither can be made without a Sound, nor a Sound without beating, nor beating without Motion, it is necessary motion be diuided. Of motions therefore some be equall, some vne∣quall. Now it is plaine, that out of the equality of Motions doe proceed equall sounds, and out of the inequality of it, vnequal sounds: and out of the mean inequalitie doe proceed consonant Sounds, out of the greater inequalitie, Discords. Hence is it, that the Pythagoreans concluded, that no Concord could be beyond the Disdiapason (as before appeared lib. 1. cap. 5.) because of the too great distance of the extreames. By how much therefore Sounds are neerer one another, they are so much the sweeter? and the further they are distant one from another, the lesse they agree. Which I doe chiefly proue to come by the inequall falling of such sounds into the eares, because a Con∣sonance is a mixture of two Sounds, falling into the eares vniformely. For high Sounds are heard sooner, than base Sounds. As a sharpe Sword pier∣ceth quicker, whereas a blunt one doth not so, but enters slowly: euen so when we heare an high forced Voyce, it strikes into one: but a base voyce doth dully, as it were thrust at one, saith Coelius lib. 10. cap. 53.