Observations upon Anthroposophia theomagica, and Anima magica abscondita by Alazonomastix Philalethes.

Observations upon An∣throposophia Theomagica, and Anima Magica Abscondita.

AND now, brother Philalethes; that we are so well met, let us begin to act according to the freenesse of our tempers, and play the Tom Tell∣troths. And you indeed have done your part already. My course is next. Which must be spent, in the Observations I told you of, upon those profound Trea∣tises of yours, Anthroposophia Theomagica, and Anima Magica Abscondita.

And my first and generall Observation is this, That the genius of my brother Eugenies Magicall discourse is such, that Simon Magus-like, he seems to have a very

liquoursome desire to be thought to be 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, some great man in the World. And for the prosecution of this main end, he layes himself out chiefly in these three subordinate designes. First, to be thought to have found out some new concerning truths, hitherto undiscovered. Secondly, to be more learned and knowing then Ari∣stotle, that great light of these European parts for these many hundred years toge∣ther: and not only so, but to be so far a∣bove him, that he may be his Master, that he may tew him, and lugge him, and lash him more cruelly, then any Orbilius or cho∣lerick Pedagogue, his puny scholars. Third∣ly and lastly, that he may strike home for the getting of a fame of profound learning indeed, he do's most affectedly and in∣dustriously raise in the Reader a strong surmise and suspicion that he is very deep∣ly seen in Art Magick, and is a very know∣ing Disciple of Agrippa, and puts in as far for the name of a Magician, as honesty will permit, and safety from that trou∣blesome fellow, Hopkins the Witch-finder.

And indeed the very clatter of the title of his Book, Anthroposophia Theomagica, sounds not much unlike some conjuration, or charm, that would either call up, or scare

away the Devill. And Zoroaster forsooth, at the bottome of the page, that old repu∣ted Magician, must stand as an Assistent to this preludiall Exorcism; with this Ora∣cle in his mouth, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, Audi ignis vocem. That is in plaine English, Hear the voice or noise of fire. Methinks I smell out a Gunpowder-plot. What can this voice of fire be? Why! how now An∣throposophus! you intend certainly to make the Rosy Brotherhood merry with squibs and crackers. For certainly your Myste∣riousnesse does not mean those lesser or greater fire-squirts, Carbines or Cannons. So might the Fratres R. C. be received with like solemnity that those Apostles at Rome, the Cardinals. But the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, (which implyes a subsultation, or skipping this way and that way) which is in the context of this Oracle, seemes to allude to, and prognosticate of fire-crackers and squibs rather then Cannons or Carbines. But how ever if this dog-trick fail, Anthro∣posophus has another as puerile and innocent a present, to entertain that Reverend Fra∣ternity. And that's a very queint and trim Latine Epistle, which he, like a good School-boy, to shew them what a good Pro∣ficient he is grown in his Latine Grammar,

presents to their assembled Gravities. 'Tis a good child, Anthroposophus! and 'tis well done. Qui necit obedire nescit imperare. He that knows not how to submit himself in the form of a breeching boy to the Fratres R. C. how can he know so unmercifully to whip and domineer over poor Ari∣stotle?

Surely, Anthroposophus! when the Rosy brethren, ride swooping through the Air in their Theomagicall chariots, they will hail down sugar plums, and Carua's on thy blessed pate, if thou haft but the good hap at that time, to walk abroad with thy hat off, to cool thy heated nodle.

But stay a while, I am afraid I am mista∣ken. It may well be, that Anthroposophus rides along with them, as being the Proloquu∣tour of their Assembly. For he writes him∣selfe Oratoris vestri. How can that belong to a short Epistle, unlesse it were some title of office? But it may be my Gentle∣man, being not so dextrous and quick in Latine as in English, measured the length o•• it more by his labour then the lines, and thought that that which took him so much pains could not prove so little as an E∣pistle; and therefore would insinuate that it was an Oration made to the Fratres R. C.

I suppose at their meeting at Fryer Bacons brasen head in Oxford.

Well! be it what it will be, my observa∣tion here, Anthroposophus, is, that you would also by your addresse to the Fratres R. C. make the world beleeve, that you are now mellowing apace, and are not much unripe for admission into that Society. And then Anthroposophus would be a rare Theomagici∣an indeed. But enough of this vein of mirth and levity.

Now Philalethes! your brother Tel-troth, intends to fall more closely on your bones, and to discover whether you have not a greater minde to seem to be wise then to be so indeed, or to make others so. But yet you may assure your self, I will only find flaws not make any in you; but ra∣ther candidly passe over what may receive any tolerably good interpretation, nor touch the soar any where, but where I may hope to heal it, either in your self or o∣thers. And that this may be done with∣out any tedious taking a peeces of what you have put together, I shall fairly passe from page to page without any Analytical Artifice.

And truly from the first page to middle of the fourth page of you

to the Reader, there be many pretty, smart, elegant, humorous contextures of phrases and things. But there, presently after Fryer Bacons Fool and his fellow, you fall upon our Peripateticks as such superfici∣all Philosophasters, because they cannot lay open to you the very essence of the soul. Why! Anthroposophus! can you tell the very essence of any substantiall thing? Hereby you show your self very raw and unex∣ercised in meditation, in that you have not yet taken notice what things are knowable, what not. And thus may you have as ill a trick put upon you, for want of this discerning, as the old dim and doting woman had, that with her rotten teeth endeavoured to crack a round pebble stone instead of a nut, which was a thing im∣possible. Nor will any mans understand∣ing, be it as sharp as it will, enter the bare essence of any thing. But the nearest wee can get, is, to know the powers, and ope∣rations, the respects and fitnesses that things have in themselves or toward others. Which is so true, that any man in a little search, will presently satisfie himself in the evi∣dence thereof.

From the middle of this fourth page to the middle of the six, is continued a dance

of Anticks, or various ridiculous shiftings and postures of phansie, to make Aristotle and his followers contemptible. But such generall railings, as they are mis-beseem∣ing the Writer, so they teach the Reader nothing but that the Authour of them is a Mome, or a Mimick, and more like an Ape by far then him that he compares to one. If this man clap the wings so when hee has really got the foil (for hitherto hee has charged Aristotle with no particular piece of ignorance, but of what is im∣possible to be known) what would he doe if he had the victory?

The second particular taxation (for ge∣nerals I hold nothing, Dolosus ambulat in u∣niversalibus) is that the Peripateticks fan∣cy God to have made the World, as a Carpenter of stone and timber. But this is false: because they give an inward principle of motion to all naturall bodies, and there is one continuity of all, as much as of the parts of water among them∣selves. But their grand fault is, that they doe not say the World is Animate. But is not yours far greater, Anthroposophus! that gives so ridiculous unproportionable ac∣count of that Tenet? The whole World is an Animal, say you, whose flesh is the

earth, whose bloud is the water, the air the outward refreshing spirit in which it breaths, the interstellar skies his vitall wa∣ters, the Stars his sensitive fire. But are not you a mere Animal your self to say so? For it is as irrationall and incredible, as if you should tell us a tale of a Beast whose bloud and flesh put together, bears not so great a proportion to the rest of the more fluid parts of the Animal, suppose his vitall and animal spirits, as a mite in a cheese to the whole globe of the earth. And beside this, how shall this water which you call bloud, be refreshed by the air that is warmer then it? And then those waters which you place in the outmost parts towards his dappeld or spotted skin the coelum stellatum, what over-proportionated plenty of them is there there? In so much that this creature you make a diseased Animall from its first birth, and ever labouring with an Ana∣sarca. Lastly, how unproperly is the air said to be the outward refreshing spirit of this Animal, when it is ever in the very midst of it? And how rashly is the Flux and Reflux of the Sea assimilated to the pulse, when the pulse is from the heart not the brain, but the flux and reflux of the Sea from the Moon not the Sun, which

they that be more discreetly phantasticall then your self, doe call Cor Mundi. Where∣fore, Anthroposophus! your phansies to sober men, will seem as vain and puerile, as those of idle children that imagine the for∣tuitous postures of spaul and snivell on plaster-walls, to bear the form of mens or dogs faces, or of Lyons and what not.

And yet see the supine stupidity and senslesnesse of this mans judgment, that he triumphs so in this figment of his as so rare and excellent a truth, that Aristotles Phi∣losophy must be groundlesse superstition and popery in respect of it, this the prime∣vall truth of the creation; when as it is a thousand times more froth, then His is vomit. My friend Anthroposophus! is this to appear for the truth in a day of necessity? Certainly shee'll be well holpe at a dead lift, if shee find no better champions then your self.

Verily Philalethes if you be no better in your Book then in your Preface to the Reader, you have abused Moses his Text beyond measure. For your Principles will have neither heaven nor earth in them, head nor foot, reason nor sense. They will be things extra intellectum, and extra

sensum, mere vagrant imaginations seated in your own subsultorious and skip-jack phansy only. But what they are we shal now begin to examine, according to the number of pages.

Anthroposophia Theomagica.

Pag. 2.

Lio. 11. So have all souls before their en∣trance, &c. But hear you me Mr. Anthropo∣sophus! are you in good earnest that all souls before their entrance into the body have an explicite methodicall knowledge? and would you venture to lose your wit so much by inprisoning your selfe in so darke a dungeon, as to be able to write no better sense in your Preface to the Reader? But I'le excuse him, it may be he was ri∣ding before his entrance into the body on some Theomagicall jade or other, that stumbled and flung him into a mysticall quagmire against his will, where he was so soused and doused and bedaubed and dirtyed, face and eyes and all, that hee could never since the midwife raked him out all wet and dropping like a drown'd mouse, once see cleerly what was sense

and what nonsense to this very day. Wherefore we will set the saddle on the right Horse; and his Theomagick Nag shall bear the blame of the miscarriage.

Pag. 3.

Lin. 3. I tooke to task the fruits of one Spring, &c. Here Anthroposophus is turned Herbalist for one whole Spring, damned to the grasse and fields like Nebuchadnezzar when he went on all four among the Beasts. But see how slow this Snail a∣mongst the herbs is, in finding out the truth; when he confesses it was the work of one whole Spring to find out, that the Earth or seeds of flowers are nothing like the flowers. There's not any old Garden∣weeder in all London, but without a pair of spectacles will discover that in four mi∣nutes, which he has beene a full fourth part of a year about. But certainely, he intends a great deal of pomp and ceremony, that will not take up such a conclusion as this, (viz. That things that are produced in Na∣ture are out of something in Nature which is not like the things produced) but upon the full experience and meditation of one entire Spring. And now after this whole Springs meditation and experience, hee is

forced to turn about to him whom hee so disdainfully flies, and confesse two of the three principles of the Aristotelean Physicks, viz. Matter and Privation, that homo is ex non homine, arbor ex non arbore, &c. But this Matter, he says (and it is the wisest word he has spoken yet) he knowes not what it is. But presently blots his credit again with a new peece of folly, intima∣ting hee will finde it it out by experience. Which is as good sense as if hee should say, hee would see it when his eyes are out. For it is alike easie to see visibles without eyes, as to see invisibles with eyes. But he flyes off hence, and is in quest after a sub∣stance which he smels out like a nosegay in Natures bosome. Which substance hee hopes to see by Art. Why! Eugenius are you so sharp sighted that you can see sub∣stances? A kind of Philosophick Hog, he can see the wind too I warrant you. But how can you hope to see that substance when Nature only exposes it to her own vitall celestiall breath? And tell what this Breath is, and doe not amaze us with strange words, or else keep your breath to your self to cool your poctage.

Pag. 4.

Here a fit of devotion has taken him, and I am neither so irreligious nor uncivill as to interrupt him. But now Sir you have done, I hope it will not be any offence to addresse my discourse to you again. And it will not be unseasonable to tell you, that truth is not to be had of God Almighty for an old song, no nor yet for a new one. And that no man is to measure his wisdom by his devotion, but by his humility & pu∣rity of mind and unprejudicate reason; nor that any man is wiser by making others seem more contemptibly foolish, as your juvenility has thought good to deal with poor Aristotle, and his Orthodox Disciples all this time. Nay, and that you may not take Sanctuary at Moses his Text, let mee also tell you, that before you prove any thing thence, you ought first to make good, that Scripture is intended for naturall Phi∣losophy as well as a divine life. But we need not arm our selves so well yet; for from the fourth page to the eight page nothing is said, but that God from a knowing Principle made the World. Which Aristotle also seems to assert, while he is so frequent in telling the ends of naturall things,

which could not be sense, unlesse he sup∣posed that Nature was guided by a know∣ing Principle, which is to acknowledge a God after the best manner. And that sub∣til Philosopher Julius Scaliger uses no con∣temptible arguments to prove, that Aristotles Philosophy furnisheth us also with the knowledge of a Trinity in God, so that Anthroposophus is very unkind and uncivill to so good a Master.

Pages 8. and 9.

What an Aristotelean would dispatch in a word or two, viz. that life is alwayes ac∣companied with a naturall warmth, hee is mysteriously sumbling out and drayling on to the length of almost two whole pages.

Pag. 9.

Lin. 10. the divine light pierced the bosome of the matter, &c. This compared with what is at the bottome of the fourth page, wee see that this rare philosopher tells us, that the matter is an horrible emptie darknesse. And me thinks his description is an hide∣ous empty phansie, and conveys not so much to the understanding as Aristotles de∣scription of the Matter, which hee would

describe to be, The first subject out of which every thing is. This latter is more cleane and sober, the other more slabby and phan∣tasticall. And to call it Primitive waters 〈…〉〈…〉s but yet metaphors and poetry. For you doe not mean waters such as we wash our hands in. But they must be waters and dark, that you may bring in the conceit of the light shining in them that like rivers and pooles the images of trees and birds, and clouds and stars, and what not, may bee seen in them. And this must help us coconceive, that upon the breaking through of the light, the divine idea's shone in the waters, and that the holy Spirit, not being able to see till then, by looking then upon those images, framed the matter into form. But I pray you tell mee, Mr. Anthro∣posophus! that would be so wise as if you stood by while God made the world, doe not you think that God can now see in the dark or behold his own idea's in the depth of the Earth? You'll say you doe not mean this naturall light but a divine light. If so, was ever the matter so stiff and clammy dark, as to be able to keepe it out? So that the divine idea's shone in the water so soon as God was, and the Spiritus Opifex could see to begin his work

ab cmni retro aeternitate. And it could never be dark in your blind sense. Is it not so Anthroposophus?

Lin. 25. Si plantam quasi momento nasci, &c. If Anthroposophus had such a device a〈…〉〈…〉 this in a glasse, what a fine gew-gaw would it be for the lad? What fine sport would he make with his companions? He would make them beleeve then that he was a Conjurer indeed. But what other use there would be of it, Anthroposophus! truly I doe not know. For it would not state one controversie in Philosophy more then what may be done without it. For whe∣ther there be any such things as rationes seminales, or whether these forms visible arise from heat, which is motion, and the conspiracy of fitted particles, is as well and safely determined from your experiments of one spring, as from this strange whim∣wham in a glasse. But weak stomachs and weak wits long most after rarities.

Pag. 10.

Lin. 4. Two-fold idea, divine, naturall, &c. Anthroposophus! Your naturall idea, is but an idea of your own brain. For it is no more an idea then a sheath is a knife, or the spittle that wets the seal the seal, or the grease the

Saw, or the water the Grindle-stone. But you must strike betwixt this and the divine idea, or else you will misse of your naturall one. And so will be forced to do that of pe∣nury, which he did of choice, and for brevity sake, divide your Text into one part. But your quotation of Moses here near the bot∣tom of the page, is either nothing to your naturall idea, or if you mean it of the divine is no new notion, but nimmed out of Philo the Jew. And yet in the beginning of the following page you magnifie your self, as one that concerning this primitive super∣naturall part of the Creation as you call it, though you have not said so much as you can say by far, (as being a Nip-crust and Niggard of your precious speculations) yet you have produced not a little new.

Pag. 11.

Lin. 5. Some Authors, &c. And the reason why the world is beholden to this Gentle∣man more then to any for new discoveries of mighty truths, is, that whereas some Authors have not searched so deeply into the Center of Nature, and others not wil∣ling to publish such spirituall mysteries, this new Writer is the only man, that is both deeply seen into the Center of Nature,

and as willing also to publish these spiritu∣all mysteries. So that he goes beyond them all. O brave Anthroposophus! What a fine man would you fain appear to the World?

In the residue of this page, Anthroposophus his phansie is pudled so and jumbled in the limbus or Huddle of the matter, that hee cannot distinguish betwixt God and the Creature. For he knows not whether the Chaos be created or uncreated. How much wiser are you now then Aristotle, Mr. Euge∣nius! that made the World eternall. If you can admit this; by the rule of proportion, you might swallow the greatest Gudgeon in Aristotle without kecking or straining.

Pag. 12.

Lin. 11. Fuliginous spawn of Nature. A rare expression! This Magician has turned Na∣ture into a Fish by his Art. Surely such dreams sloat in his swimmering brains, as in the Prophets, who tels us so Authentick stories of his delicious Albebut.

Lin. 12. The created Matter. Before the Matter was in an hazard of not being crea∣ted but of being of it self eternall. Certainly Eugenius! you abound with leasure that can thus create and uncreate, doe and undoe, be∣cause the day is long enough.

Lin. 21. A horrible confused qualm, &c. Here Nature like a child-bearing woman, has a qualm comes over her stomach, and Eugenius like a man-midwife stands by ve∣ry officiously to see what will become of it. Let her alone, Eugenius! it is but a qualm, Some cold raw rheune. Margret will e∣scape well enough. Especially if her two Handmaids Heat and Siccity doe but help, with their Aquavitae botles. What a rare mode or way of Creation has Eugenius set out? Certainly it cannot but satisfie any unreasonable man, if there be any men without reason. And I begin to suspect there is, for Eugenius his sake, such as feed as savourly on the pure milk of phansie, as the Philosophers Asse on Sow-thistles.

Pag. 13.

This page is spent in extracting from the Chaos, a thin spirituall celestiall substance to make the Coelum Empyreum of and the bo∣dy of Angels, and by the by, to be in stead of a Sun for the first day. But then in the se∣cond Extraction was extracted the agill air fitting all betwixt the Masse and the Coelum Empyreum. But here I have so hedg••ed you in Mr. Anthroposophus that you will

hardly extricate your self in this questi∣on. The Empyreall substance encompas∣sing all, how could there be Morning and Evening till the fourth day? For the Masse was alike illumined round about at once. And for your interstellar water you do but phansie it implyed in Moses text, and can never prove that he drives at any thing higher in the letter thereof, than those hanging bottles of water, the clouds.

Pag. 14.

Lin. 12. A rumbling confused Labyrinth. 'Tis only Erratum Typographicum. I suppose you mean, a rumbling Wheel-Barrow, in allusion to your Wheel-work and Epicy∣cles aforementioned. But why small di∣minutive Epicycles? Eugenius! you are so profound a Magician, that you are no A∣stronomer at all. The bignesse of them is as strong a presumption against them, as a∣ny thing. They are too big to be true.

Lin. 26. This is cribrum Naturaes. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 I warrant you. The very sive that Iupiter himself pisses through, as Aristophanes sports it in his Comedies.

Pag. 15.

Lin. 20. Equally possest the whole Creature.

Therefore again I ask thee, O Eugenius! how could there be Evening and Morning, the light being all over equally dispersed?

Lin. 29. Like a baffled Gyant. Poeticall Eugenius! Is this to lay the sober and sound principles of Truth and Philosophy?

Pag. 16.

Lin. 1. A Black Bag. I tell thee Eugenius! Thy phansie is snap't in this Femall Black-bag, as an unwary Retiarius in a Net. Do's Madam Nature wear her Black∣bag in her middle parts? (for the Earth is the Center of the World) or on her head as other Matrons doe? That Phila∣lethes may seem a great and profound Stu∣dent indeed, hee will not take notice whether a black-bag be furniture for La∣dies heads or their haunches: Well! let him enjoy the glory of his affected rusticity and ignorance.

Lin. 5. Good Lord deliver us. How the man is frighted into devotion by the smut and griminesse of his own imagination!

Lin. 15. Earth and water, &c. Concurrunt e∣lementa ut Materia, ergo duo sufficiunt, says Cardan. 'Tis no new-sprung truth, if true, Mr. Eugenius! But seeing that AEtheri∣al vigour & celestial heat with the substance thereof (for, Coelum pervadit omnia) is in all

things, and the air excluded from few or no living Creatures, if we would severely tug with you, Mr. Anthroposophus! you will en∣danger the taking of the foil.

Pag. 18.

Lin. 22. Both in the same bed. Why did you ever sneak in, Eugenius, and take them, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in the very act? 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 as the Lawyers speak? This is but poeticall pomp in prose. And Ovid Philosophizes better in verse, where speaking of heat and moisture, he expresses himself apertly and significantly.

Quippe ubi temperiem sumpsere humor{que} calor{que} Concipiunt, & ab his generantur cuncta duobus.

Lin. 27. Spiritus aquae invisibilis congelatus melior est quam terra Universa. Now as you are Philalethes, tell me truly if you under∣stand any determinate and usefull sense of this saying. If you doe, why doe you not explain it? if you doe not, for ought you know, it may be onely a charm to fox fishes. And I pray you, Philalethes! make triall of the experimrnt.

Pag. 19.

Lin. 29. It is the Magicians Back-doore. Here I cannot but take notice at the great affe∣ctation

of Philalethes to appear to be deeply seen in Magick. But I suppose if he were well searched, he would be found no Witch, nor all his Back-doore of air worth the winde of an ordinary mans back-doore.

Pag. 20.

Lin. 2. The air is our Animal oil, the fuill of the vitall. Now Eugenius! you are so good natured as to give Aristetle one of his two elements again, that you wrested from him. If this be our animall oil, and fuell of the vitall, it is plain our animall and vital spirits are from the air, and that the air is one element amongst the rest. And your moist silent fire that passes through al things must be a principle of all things, and may well be attempered heat to your forenamed oil. So that Aristotle and you that before seemed as disagreeing as fire and water, now in a love fit again embrace as close as your Apulejus his Psyche and Cupid. But why will you be thus humorous Mr. Eugenius! and be thus off and on to the trouble of others and your self?

Pag. 21.

Lin. 9. Performed an exposition of the World. An excellent performance! Which if a

man take a narrow view of, he will finde to amount to no more then this, That God made a dark Masse of Matter, out of which hee extracted, (Chymist like) first an Em∣pyreall body, then an Aereall, &c. Which is a very lank satisfaction to the noble rea∣son of man. Nay, Anthroposophus! I beleeve you have spoke such stuff that will amount to little better then a contradiction to free reason. For you make as if the Masse did contain in a far less compass above all mea∣sure, all that was after extracted. Where fore there was, (for these are all bodies) ei∣ther a penetration of dimensions then, or else a vacuum now: and the ascending par∣ticles of the Masse, lye some distance one from another. Besides I observe that in you, that I doe in all others, that Phan∣tastically and superstitiously force Philo∣sophy out of the sacred Writ (which is in∣tended curtainly for better purposes) For like Ovid in his Metamorphoses, (who after a long pursuit of a Fabulous story, at last descends to something in Nature and com∣mon use, as that of Daphne turned into a Lawrell, which tree is in Nature and ac∣cording to the accustomary conceit of the Heathens, was holy to Apollo) so these running a Wild-Goose chase of Melancho∣ly

imaginations and phansies, think it e∣vidence enough for what they have said, to have the thing but named in some Text of Scripture. Nay even those that are so con∣fident they are inspired, and live of nothing but the free breathings of the Divine Spi∣rit, if you observe them, it is with them as with the Lark, that is so high in the air, that we may better hear her then see her, as if shee were an inhabitant of that Regi∣on only and had no allyance to the Earth, yet at last you shall see her come down and pick on the ground as other birds. So these pretended inspired men though they flye high, and seem to feed of nothing but free truth, as they draw it from Gods own breathing, yet they took their ground first from the Text, though they ran a deal of phansyfull division upon it, and if a man watch them, he shall finde them fall flat up∣on the Text again, and be but as other Mortalls are for all their free pretensions, and extraordinary assistences. But lets leave these Theosophists (as they love to be called) to themselves, and trace on the steps of our Anthroposophus!

Pag. 22.

He exhorts us in the foregoing page to

be curious and diligent in this subsequent part of his discourse, as being now about to deliver the Fundamentalls of Science. But Anthroposophus! you are so deeply Ma∣gicall that you have conjured your self down, below the wit of an ordinary man. The Fundamentalls of Science should bee certain, plain, reall and perspicuous to rea∣son; not muddy and imaginary as all your discourse is from this to your 28 page. For in this present page and the former, setting aside your superstitious affectation of Tri∣nities and Triplicities, which teach a man nothing but that you are a very phantasti∣call and bold man, and lift at that which is too heavy for you, you doe nothing but scold very cholerickly at the Colliers and Kitchen-maides, and like a dog return a∣gain to the Vomit, I mean that vomit you cast awhile agoe on Aristotle. Is that so e∣legant an expression that you must use it twice in so little a space? where is your manners Anthroposophus!

Pag. 23.

Lin. 14. & 24. The Magnet, the Mystery of Union. Not one of ten thousand knowes the sub∣stance or the use of this Nature. Yet you tell it us in this page, that it will attract all

things Physicall or Metaphysicall, at what distance soever. But you are a man of ten thousand, Anthroposophus! and have the My∣stery, questionlesse, of this Magnet. Whence I conclude you King or Prince of the Gyp∣sies, as being able at the farthest distance to attract mettall out of mens purses. But take heed that you be not discovered, lest this Jacobs Ladder raise you up with your fellow Pick-pockets to Heaven in a string.

Pag. 24.

This page is filled with like Gypsie gib∣berish, as also the 25th. yet he pretends to lend us a little light from the Sun and Moon. Which he calls the great Luminaries and Conservatours of the great World in generall. How great, Anthroposohus! doe you think would the Moon appear if your Ma∣gick could remove you but as far as Saturn from her? will shee not appear as little as nothing? Besides, if Fugenius ever tooted through a Galileo's Tube, he might discover four Moons about Jupiter, which will all prove competitours with our Moon for the Conservatour-ship of the Universe. But though Eugenins admits of but one great broad-faced Sun and Moon, yet he acknow∣ledgeth many Mimules or Monky-faced

Suns and Moons, which must be the Con∣servatricules of the many Microcosms in the great World. Certainly Anchroposophus! the speculum of your understanding is cracked, and every fragment gives a severall reflecti∣on, and hence is this innumerable multitude of these little diminutive Suns and Moons. But having passed through much canting language, at the bottome of the page we at last stumble on the Philosophers Stone, which he intends I suppose to fling at Ari∣stotle and brain the Stagirite at one throw.

Lin. ult. A true Receipt of the Medicine, R. Limi coelestis partes, &c. Come out Tom∣Fool from behinde the hangings, that peaks out with your Divels head and hornes, and put off your vizard and be apert and intel∣ligible, or else why doe you pretend to lay the Fundamentalls of Science, and crave our diligence and attention to a non-signifi∣cant noise and buzze? Unlesse you will be understood, it may as well, for ought any bodie knowes, be a plaister for a gauld horses back, or a Medicine for a Mad-dog, as a receipt of the Philosophers Stone.

Pag. 27.

In this page Magicus prophesies of a vi∣trification of the Earth, and turning of it

into a pure diaphanous substance. To what end? Magicus! That the Saints and Angels at each pole of the Earth may play at Boe∣peep with one another through this cry∣stallized Globe? Magicus has rare imagina∣tions in his noddle.

Pag. 28.

At the end of this page Magicus begins to take to task the explication of mans na∣ture. But Magicus you must first learn bet∣ter to know your self, before you attempt to explain the knowledge of man to o∣thers.

Pag. 29.

Lin. 10. The Philosophicall Medicine. This is the Philosophers stone. And they that are ignorant in this point are but Quacks and Pispot Doctors. Ho! Dr. H. Dr. P. Dr. R. Dr. T. and as many Doctors more as will stand be∣twixt London and Oxenford, if you have not a slight of Art to Metamorphize your selves into Triorchises, and have one stone more then Nature has bestowed upon you (which is forsooth the Philosophers Stone) have amongst you blind Harpers, Magicus will not stick to teem Urinals on your heads, and crown you all one after another, with

the Pispot, and honour you with the Title of Quack-salvers. What? Magicus! Is it not sufficient that you haue no sense nor wit, but you will have no good manners nei∣ther?

Pag. 30.

This thirtieth page teaches that the soul of man consists of two parts, Ruach and Nephesh, one Masculine and the other Femi∣nine. And Anthroposophus is so tickled with the Application of the conceit unto Mar∣riage, which he very feelingly and sa∣vourly pursues, that he has not the patience to stay to tell us how these two differ, hee being taken up so with that powerfull charm and thence accrewing Faculty, of Crescite & Multiplicamini.

Pag. 31.

This page has the same Legend that the Alcoran has concerning the envy of the An∣gels. But all goes down alike with him, as if every thing printed were Gospel. In so much that I am perswaded, that he doubts not but that every syllable of his own Book it true, now it has passed the Presse.

Pag. 32.

This page ridiculously places Peter Ra∣mus amongst the Schoolmen against all Lo∣gick and Method. And at the last line there∣of bids us arrigere aures, and tels us he will convey some truth never heretofore disco∣vered, viz. That the sensitive gust in a man is the forbidden fruit: with the rest of the circumstances thereof. Which Theory is so far from being new, that it is above a thou∣sand years old. It is in Origen and every where in the Christian Platonists.

Pag. 38.

Lin. 27. It is part of Anima Mundi. Why! is Anima Mundi (which you say, in men and beasts can see, feel, tast and smell) a thiug divisible into parts and parcells? Take heed of that Anthroposophus! lest you crumble your own soul into Atoms, iudeed make no soul, but all body.

Pag. 39.

Lin. 22. Blind Peripateticall formes. What impudcnce is this O Magicus! to call them so, unlesse you make your Anima Mundi more intelligible. This is but to rail at pleasure, not to teach or confute.

Pag. 40.

Lin. 2. As it is plain in dreams. Blind men see in their sleep it seems, which is more then they can doe when they are awake. Are you in jest Eugenius! or in good earnest? If you be, I shall suspect you having a facul∣ty to see when you are a sleep, that you have another trick too, that is, to dream when you are awake. Which you practised I con∣ceive very much in the compilement of this book, there being more dreams then truth by far in it.

Lin. 11. Represent the eyes. How phansiful and poeticall are you Mr. Magicus! I sup∣pose you allude to the herb Euphrasia or Eye∣bright. Which yet sees or feels as little light or heat of the Sun, as your soul do's of reason or humanity.

Lin. 27. Angelicall or rationall spirit. Do's not this see and hear too in man? If it do not, how can it judge of what is said or done? If it do's; then there is two hearing and seeing souls in a man. Which I will leave to Anthroposophus his own thoughts, to find out how likely that is to be true.

46, 47, 48, 49. Pages.

Truly, Anthroposophus! these pages are of

that nature, that though you are so unkind to Aristotle, as to acknowledge nothing good in him, yet I am not so inveterate a revengefull assertor of him, but I will allow you your lucida intervalla. What you have delivered in these pages, bating a few Hyper∣boles, might become a man of a more setled brain then Anthroposophus. But while you oppose so impetuously what may with rea∣son be admitted, and propound so magiste∣rially what is not sense, I must tell you Anthroposophus! that you betray to scorn and derision even those things that are sober in the way that you affect, and hazard the soiling of the highest and most delicate truths, by your rude and unskilfull hand∣ling of them: And now the good breath that guided you, forthese four pages toge∣ther, is spent, you begin to rave again after the old manner, and call Galen Antichrist in

Pag. 50.

And quarrel again with the Peripateticks, and provoke the School-divines. And then you fancie that you have so swinged them, that in revenge they'l all fall upon you at once, and so twerilug you: when as they good men feel not your strokes, and find

themselves something else to doe, then to refute such crazy discourses as this. It is only, it is I, your brother Philalethes, that am moved with pity towards you, and would if I could by carefully correcting you in your distempers, bring you to a so∣ber mind, and set you in your right sense again. And I beseech you brother Philale∣thes! forbear this swearing, An honest mans word is as good as his Oath. No body will beleeve you more for swearing, then he would doe without it, but think you more melancholick and distracted.

Lin. 21. Whiles they contemn mysteries, &c. In this heat all that Philalethes writes must be termed holy mysteries. His project certainly is, now neither Episcopacy nor Presbyteri can be setled, to get his booke established jure divino. A crafty colt! Ha, ha, he. Phi∣lalethes, Are you there with your bears?

Lin. 29. Next to God I owe all I have to A∣grippa. What? more then to the Prophe〈…〉〈…〉 and Apostles, Anthrosophus? The businesse is for your fame-sake, you have more desire to be thought a Conjurer then a Christi∣an.

Pag. 53, 54.

Great glorious penman! A piping hot p〈…〉〈…〉

per of verses indeed Anthroposophus! But say truly! What can you doe in or out of this heat more then other men. Can you cure the sick? Rule and counsell States and Kingdomes more prudently for the com∣mon good? Can you find bread for the Poore? Give a rationall account of the Phaenomena of Nature, more now then at another time? or more then other men can do? Can you tel me the Nature of light? the causes of the Rainbow? what makes the flux and reflux of the Sea? the operations of the Loadstone, and such like? Can you tell us in a rationall, dependent, and cohe∣rent way the nature of such things as these, or foretell to us what will be hereafter, as certainly and evidently as the Prophets of old? But if there bee neither the evidence of Reason, nor the testimony of notable effect, you can give us, you must give mee leave Anthroposophus! to conjecture; That all this is but a friske and dance of your agita∣ted spirits, and firinesse of your fancie, of which you will find no fruit, but a palsied, unsteddy apprehension, and unsound judg∣ment.

Pag. 55.

From this page to the 62. your Theo∣magicall

Nag has been pretty sure-footed, Philalethes! And it is a good long lucidum intervallum you have ambled out. Nay and you have done very well and soberly in not plainly pretending any new thing there. For they are both old and well seasoned, if the Church be so pleased to esteem of them. But what you have toward the latter end of the 62 page, that is, a word of your self, and another of the common Philosophy, has in it a spice of the old malady, pride and conceitednesse: as if you had now finished so famous a peece of worke, as that all the world would stand amazed, and be inquisi∣tive after you, asking who is this Philale∣thes, and what is he? Presbyterian or Inde∣pendent? Sir, may it please you, He is neither Papist, though hee bad faire enough for purgatory in his Exposition of St. Peter in the foregoing page; nor Sectary, though he had rather stile himself a Protestant then a Christian: but be he what he wil be, he is so great in his own conceit, that though you have not the opportunity to ask his judg∣ment, yet he thinks it fit unasked to set him∣self on the seat of Judicature, and disgorge his sentence on our ordinary Philosophy He means you may be sure the Aristotelean in use for so many hundred years in all the U∣niversities

of Europe. And he pronounces of it, that it is An inconsistent Hotch-potch of rash conclusions, built on meer imagination with∣out the light of Experience. You must suppose he means Chymicall experiments, for you see no small pretensions to that in all his Treatise. And his very Title page, the first of the book, has the priviledge to bee first adorned with this magnificent term of Art, Protochymistry. But tell me, Mr. Alchymist! in all your skill and observation in your Experiments, if you have hit on any thing that will settle any considerable point con∣troverted amongst Philosophers, which may not be done as effectually at lesse char∣ges. Nay, whether you may not lose Na∣ture sooner then find her by your industri∣ous vexing of her, and make her appeare something else then what she really is: Like men on the rack or overwatched witches, that are forced many times to confesse that which they were never guilty of. But it be∣ing so unsatisfactory to talk in generall, and of so tedious purpose to descend to particulars, I will break off this discourse. Only let me tell you thus much Mr. Phi∣lalethes! that you are a very unnaturall son to our mother Oxenford, and to her sister U∣niversity; for if they were no wiser then

you would make them, you would hazard them and all their children to be begg'd for fools. And there would bee a sad conse∣quent of that. But your zeale and heated melancholy considers no such things, An∣throposophus!

Pag. 65.

Lin. 3. I have now done, Reader! but how much to my own prejudice I cannot tell. Verily nothing at all Philalethes! For you have met with a friend that hath impartially set out to you your own follies and faults. And has dis∣torted himself often into the deformities of your postures, that you may the better see your self in another, and so for shame amend.

Lin. 8. Paint and trim of Rhetorick. How modest are you grown Philalethes! Why? this affectation of humor and Rhetorick is the most conspicuous thing in your book. And shines as oriently, as false gold and sil∣ver lace on a linsy-woolsy coat.

Lin. 22. Of a brothers death. Some young man certainly that killed himselfe by un∣mercifull studying of Aristotle. And Phi∣lalethes writ this booke to revenge his Death.

Lin. 18. I expose it not to the mercy of man, but to God. See, the man affects an absolute Tyranny in Philosophy. He'll be accoun∣table to none but God. You no Papist Philalethes? Why! you would be a very Pope in Philosophy, if you would not have your Dictates subject to the canvase of mans rea∣son.