Philosophical poems by Henry More ...

The Argument of PSYCHATHANASIA Or The Immortality of the Soul.

BOOK III. CANT. III.

That th' earth doth move, proofs Physicall Unto us do descrie; Adde reasons Theosophicall, Als adde Astronomie.

1

BLest souls first Authours of Astronomie! Who clomb the heavens with your high reaching mind, Scal'd the high battlements of the lofty skie, To whom compar'd this earth a point you find; Your bodies lesse, what measure hath defin'd? What art that mighty vastnesse? Such high facts The ancient Giants swoln with raging wind Could not effect. A subtile Parallax, A dark Eclipse do quite obscure their braving acts.

2

O the great might of mans high Phantasie! Which with a shade or a divided line, That nought, this but a thin exilitie, Can do farre more then strength enrag'd with tine, Hoysted with haughty pride. That brood combine To clamber up to heaven. Hill upon hill, Ossa upon Olympus doth recline: Their brawnie arms redoubled force doth fill, While they their spirits summon t'effect their furious will.

3

But all in vain they want the inward skill. What comes from heaven onely can thereascend. Not rage nor tempest that this bulk doth fill Can profit ought, but gently to attend The souls still working, patiently to bend Our mind to sifting reason, and clear light, That strangely figur'd in our soul doth wend Shifting its forms, still playing in our sight, Till something it present that we shall take for right.

4

The busie soul it is that hither hent By strength of reason, the true distancies Of th' erring Planets, and the vast extent Of their round bodies without outward eyes Hath view'd, told their proportionalities, Confounded sense by reasons strange report (But wiser he that on reason relies Then stupid sense low-sunken into dirt) This weapon I have got none from me may extort.

5

O You stiff-standers for ag'd Ptolemce, I heartily praise your humble reverence If willingly given to Antiquitie; But when of him in whom's your confidence, Or your own reason and experience In those same arts, you find those things are true That utterly oppugne our outward sense, Then are you forc'd to sense to bid adieu, Not what your sense gainsayes to holden straight untrue.

6

Though contraire unto sense, though it be new (But sooth to sayen th' earths motion is of tri'd Antiquitie, as I above did shew: In Philolaus and in Heraclide Those subtile thoughts of old did close reside) Yet reason ought to bear away the bell. But irefull ignorance cannot abide To be outtopd, reprochfully she 'll yell, Call's mad, when her own self doth with foul furie swell.

7

But let them bark like band-dogs at the Moon, That mindlesse passeth on in silencie: I'll take my flight above this outward sunne, Regardlesse of such fond malignitie, Lift my self up in the Theologie Of heavenly Plato. There I'll contemplate The Archtype of this sunne, that bright Idee Of steddie Good, that doth his beams dilate Through all the worlds, all lives and beings propagate.

8

But yet in words to trifle I will deigne A while: They may our mind fitly prepare For higher flight; we larger breath may gain By a low hovering. These words they are All found in that old Oracle of Clare. That heavenly power which Iao hight The highest of all the Gods thou mayst declare, In spring named Zeus, in summer Helios bright, In autumn call'd Jao, Aides in brumall night.

9

These names do plainly denotate the sunne, In Spring call'd Zeus, from life or kindly heat; In winter, 'cause the day's so quickly done, He Aides hight, he is not long in sight; In Summer, cause he strongly doth us smite With his hot darts, then Helios we him name From Eloim or Eloah so hight; In Autumn Jao, Jehovah is the same: So is the word deprav'd by an uncertain fame.

10

So great similitude twixt Phoebus light And God, that God himself the Nations deem The sunne. The learned Seventy 've boldly pight A tent therein for the true Eloim, The sensible Deity you'll reckon him, If Hermes words bear with you any sway, Or if you Christian Clerks do ought esteem, In Davids odes they make Gods Christ a day; His father's then the sunne from whence this light doth ray.

11

Then by all the wide worlds acknowledgement, The sunne's a type of that eternall light Which we call God, a fair delineament Of that which Good in Plato's school is hight His T'agathon with beauteous rayes bedight. Let's now consult with their Theologie, And that Idea with our inward sight Behold, casheering sensibility Then in clear reason view this correspondency.

12

One steddy Good, centre of essencies, Unmoved Monad, that Apollo hight, The Intellectuall sunne whose energies Are all things that appear in vitall light, Whose brightnesse passeth every creatures sight, Yet round about him stird with gentle fire All things do dance; their being, action, might, They thither do direct with strong desire, To embosome him with close embracements they aspire.

13

Unseen, incomprehensible He moves About himself each seeking entity That never yet shall find that which it loves. No finite thing shall reach infinity, No thing dispers'd comprehend that Unity, Yet in their ranks they seemly foot it round, Trip it with joy at the worlds harmony Struck with the pleasure of an amorous stound, So dance they with fair flowers from unknown root ycrownd.

14

Still falling short they never fail to seek, Nor find they nothing by their diligence; They find repast, their lively longings e••k Rekindled still, by timely influence. Thus all things in distinct circumference Move about Him that satisfies them all. Nor be they thus stird up by wary sense Or foresight, or election rationall, But blindly reel about the leart of Lives centrall.

15

So doth the Earth one of the erring Seven Wheel round the fixed sunne, that is the shade Of steddy Good, shining in this Out-heaven With the rest of those starres that God hath made Of baser matter, all which be array'd With his far-shining light. They sing for joy, They frisque about in circulings unstay'd, Dance through the liquid air, and nimbly toy While Sol keeps clear their sprite, consumes what may accloy.

16

Better the indigent be mov'd, then he That wanteth nought: He fills all things with light And kindly heat: through his fecundity Peoples the world; by his exciting sprite Wakens the plants, calls them out of deep night. They thrust themselves into his fostring rayes, Stretch themselves forth stird by his quickning might. And all the while their merry roundelayes (As lightsome phansies deem) each Planet spritely playes.

17

But sooth to say that sound so subtile is Made by percussion of th'ethereall fire Against our air (if it be not transmisse By its exility,) that none ought admire That we no'te hear what well we mought desire Heavens harmony. 'Cording to others lear The sound's so big that it cannot retire Into the windings of a mortall ear; No more than Egypt can Niles Catadupa bear.

18

There ought to be certain proportion Betwixt the object and the outward sense. Rash man that dost inferre negation From thy dead ear, or non-experience. Then let them dance and sing, raise iufluence From lively motion, that preserves their sprite From foul corruption: motion's the best sense To keep off filth in children of cold Night, Whose life is in dull matter; but the sunne's all Light.

19

Therefore full safely he may steddy stond, Unmov'd, at least not remov'd out of place. I'll not deny but that he may turn round On his own centre. So the steps we'll trace Of Essence, Plato's On, which steddy stayes And moves at once, that same Iao hight In that old Clarian Oracle, that sayes It is the sunne. This answer will aright To Jove or Plato's On as done those schools descry't.

20

That same first Being, Beauty, Intellect, Turns to his father (of whom he was born) In a brief instant. But who can detect Such hidden mysteries? back mine eyes I'll turn, Lest in this light like fluttering moth I burn. Enough is shown of correspondency Twixt this worlds sunne and centre of hid Morn, The radiant light of the deep Deity. Thus have I fairly prov'd the sunnes stability.

21

Then must the earth turn round, or we want day, Or never be in night. Now I'll descend Cloth'd with this truth. As wrathfull dogs do bay At spectres solemn Cynthia doth send; So now I backward to the senses wend: They'll bark at th' shape of my disguised mind, As stranger wights, they wrathfully will rend This uncouth habit. They no such thing find 'Mongst their domestick forms, to whom they are more kind.

22

And weaker reason which they wont misguide Will deem all this nothing mysterious, But my strong-winged Muse feeble to slide Into false thoughts and dreams vertiginous, And plainly judge us woxen furious, Thus in our rage to shake the stable earth, Whirling her round with turns prodigious; For she doth stedfast stand as it appear'th From the unshaken buildings she so safely bear'th.

23

If she should move about, then would she sling From of her self those fair extructed loads Of carved stone: The air aloud would sing With brushing trees: Beasts in their dark aboads Would brained be by their own caves; th' earth strowd With strange destruction. All would shatter'd lie In broken shivers. What mad frantick mood Doth thus invade wary Philosophy, That it so dotes on such a furious falsitie?

24

But still more subt'ly this cause to pursue, The clouds would alwayes seem to rise from th' East, Which sense and oft-experience proves untrue; They rise from all the quarters, South, North, West, From every part, as Aeolus thinketh best. Again the Earths sad stupid gravity Unfit for motion shows her quiet rest: Lastly an arrow shot unto the sky Would not return unto his foot that let it fly.

25

Adde unto these that contrariety Of motion, when as the self same things At the same time do back and forward hie: As when for speed the rider fiercely dings His horse with iron heel, layes the loose strings Upon his neck, westward they swiftly scoure, When as the Earth, finishing her dayly rings, Doth Eastward make with all her might and power, She quite hath run her stage at end of twice twelve houres.

26

These and like phansies do so strongly tye The slower mind to aged Ptolemee, That shamefull madnesse 't were for to deny So plain a truth as they deem this to be. But yet, alas! if they could standen free From prejudice, and heavie swaying sense That dims our reason that it cannot see What's the pure truth, enough in just defense Of Pythagore we find though with small diligence,

27

One single truth concerning unity Of sprights and bodies, and how on Form may Inact a various Corporeity, Keep't up together and her might display Through all the parts, make't constantly obey The powerfull dictates of its centrall spright, Which being one can variously play: This lore if we but once had learnd aright, All what was brought afore would vanish at first sight.

28

For that Magnetick might doth so combine Earth, Water, Air, into one animate, Whose soul or life so sweetly 't doth incline, So surely, easly, as none can relate But he that's exercis'd in every state Of moving life. What? Can the plastick spright So variously his branching stock dilate Downward to hell upward to heaven bright, And strangely figur'd leaves and flowers send into sight?

29

Can one poore single Centre do all this In a base weed that suddenly decayes? And shall not the earths life that is transmisse Through sea and air, and with its potent rayes Informs all this (all this on that life stayes) Shall't not obtain the like variety Of inward ruling motion? Your minds raise, O sluggish men! single centrality You'l find shall do, what ere's admit by phantasie.

30

Now see if this clear apprehension Will not with case repell each argument Which we rehears'd with an intention For to refute. The earths swift movement, Because 'tis naturall not violent, Will never shatter buildings. With straight line It binds down strongly each partic'larment Of every edifice. All stones incline Unto that Centre; this doth stoutly all combine:

31

Nor is lesse naturall that circular motion, Then this which each part to the centre drives: So every stone on earth with one commotion Goes round, and yet withall right stifly strives To reach the centre, though it never dives So deep. Who then so blind but plainly sees How for our safety Nature well contrives, Binding all close with down-propensities? But now we'll answer make to the loud-singing trees.

32

Walls, Towers, Trees, would stir up a strange noise, If th' air stood still, while the earth is hurled round As doth the switch oft shak'd by idle boyes That please themselves in varying of the sound. But this objection we with reason sound Have well prevented, while we plainly taught Earth, Water, Air, in one to be fast bound By one spermatick spright, which easly raught To each part: Earth, Sea, Air so powerfully hath it caught.

33

All these as one round entire body move Upon their common Poles; that difficulty Of stirring sounds, so clearly we remove. That of the clouds with like facility We straight shall chace away. In th' air they ly And whirl about with it, and when some wind With violence afore him makes them fly, Then in them double motion we find, Eastward they move, and whither by these blasts they're inclin'd.

34

What they pretend of the Earths gravity, Is nought but a long taken up conceit: A stone that downward to the earth doth hy Is not more heavie then dry straws that jet Up to a ring made of black shining jeat. Each thing doth tend to the loud-calling might Of sympathy. So 'tis a misconceit That deems the earth the onely heavie weight. They ken not the strange power of the strong centrall spright.

35

Were there a shiver cut from off the Moon And cast quite off from that round entire masse, Would't fall into our mouths? No, it would soon Make back to th' centre from whence forc'd it was: The same in Mars and Sol would come to passe, And all the stars that have their proper centres. So gravity is nought but close to presse Unto one Magick point, there near to enter; Each sympathetick part doth boldly it adventure.

36

Thus in each starry globe all parts may tend Unto one point, and mean time turn around; Nor doth that sway its circling ought offend: These motions do not at all confound One th' others course. The Earth's not heavy found, But from that strong down-pulling centrall sway, Which hinders not but that it may turn round, Sith that it moves not a contrary way. Which answre I will bend against the fifth assay:

37

An arrow shot into the empty air, Which straight returning to the bowmans foot, The Earths stability must proven clear. Thus these bad archers do at random shoot, Whose easie errour I do thus confute. The arrow hath one spirit with this sphere, Forc'd upward turns with it, mov'd by the root Of naturall motion. So when back't doth bear It self, still Eastward turns with motions circular.

38

So 'tis no wonder when it hath descended It falleth back to th' place from whence it flew, Sith all this while its circular course hath bended Toward the East, and in proportion due That arcuall Eastern motion did pursue: Nearer the earth the slower it must go; These Arks be lesse, but in the heavens blew Those Arks increase, it must not be so slow Thus must it needs return unto its idle bow.

39

Nor ought we wonder that it doth conform Its motions to the circles of the aire, Sith water in a wooden bucket born Doth sit it self unto each periphere, By hight or depth, as you shall change the sphere. So lowly set more water 't will contain, 'Cause its round tumour higher then doth bear It self up from the brims. So may't be sayen The lowlier man the larger graces doth obtain.

40

But now to answer to the last objection, Tis not impossible one thing to move Contrary wayes, which by a fit retection I strongly will evince and clearly prove. Take but the pains higher for to remove A clock with hanging plummet. It goes down At that same time you heave it high above Its former place. Thus fairly have we won The field 'gainst stupid sense, that reason fain would drown.

41

Now let's go on (we have well cleard the way) More plainly prove this seeming paradox And make this truth shine brighter then midday, Neglect dull sconses mowes and idle mocks. O constant hearts, as stark as Thracian rocks, Well grounded in grave ignorance, that scorn Reasons sly force, its light slight subtile strokes. Sing we to these wast hills, dern, deaf, forlorn, Or to the cheerfull children of the quick-ey'd Morn?

42

To you we sing that live in purer light, Escap'd the thraldome of down-drooping sense, Whose nimble spirit and clear piercing sight Can easly judge of every conference Withouten prejudice, with patience Can weigh the moments of each reason brought; While others in tempestuous vehemence Blow all away with bitter blasts. Untought In subtilties, they shew themselves in jangling stout.

43

I have the barking of bold sense confuted, Its clamorous tongue thus being consopite, With reasons easie shall I be well suited, To show that P••thagore's position's right. Copernicks, or whosever dogma't hight. The first is that that's wisely signifi'd By Moses Maymons son, a learned wight, Who saith each good Astronomer is ty'd To lessen the heavens motions vainly multiply'd,

44

And the foul botches of false feigned Orbs: Whose uselesse number reason must restrain, That oft the loose luxuriant phansie curbs, And in just bounds doth warily contain: To use more means then needs is all in vain. Why then, O busie sonnes of Prolemee! Do you that vast star-bearing sphere constrain To hurl about with such celerity, When th' earth may move without such strange velocity?

45

What needlesse phansy's this that that huge sphere In one short moment must thus whirl around, That it must fly six hundred thousand sheere Of Germane miles. If that will not confound, For pomp adde fourty thousand more, that 'bound; Three thousand more, if it were requisite, You might annex, and more if they have found The measure right; when as the earth's slow flight One sixteenth of a mile her scarcely doth transmit.

46

But if this All be liquid, pervious, One fine Ethereall (which reason right Will soon admit: for 'tis ridiculous Thus for to stud the heaven with nails bright, The stars in fluid sky will standen tight, As men do feigne the earth in the soft aire To be unmov'd) How will proportion fit? So vast a difference there doth appear Of motions in those stars that the same bignesse bear.

47

Besides that difficulty will remain Of unconceivable swift motion In the Equinoctiall stars, where some contain This earthy globes mighty dimension, Ten thousand times twise told. They hurry on With the same swiftnesse I set down before, And with more pains. A globes extension, The bigger that it grows, groweth still more Nigh to a flat fac'd figure, and finds resistance fore.

48

But now that all the heavens be liquid, hence I'll fetch an argument. Those higher stars They may as well in water hang suspense As do the Planets. Venus orb debars Not Mars, nor enters he with knocks and jars; The soft fi••e yielding Aether gives admission: So gentle Venus to Mercurius dares Descend, and finds an easie intromission, Casts ope that azu•• curtain by a swift discission.

49

That famous star nail'd down in Cassiopee, How was it hammer'd in your solid sky? What pinsers pull'd it out again, that we No longer see it, whither did it fly? Astronomers say 'twas at least as high As the eighth sphere. It gave no parallax, No more then those light lamps that there we spy. But prejudice before her self she'll tax Of holy writ & the heavens she'll make a nose of wax.

50

What man will now that's not vertiginous Hurrie about his head these severall lights So mighty vast, with so voracious And rapid course whirling them day and night About the earth, when the earths motion might Save that so monstrous labour, with lesse pains, Even infinitely lesse? But thoughts empight Once in the mind do so possesse the brains, That hard it is ••o wash out those deep ancient stains.

51

Two things there be whose reason's nothing clear: Those cool continuall breathings of East wind Under the line; the next high Comets are, In which Philosophers three motions find? Concerning which men hither to are blind, That have not mov'd the earth unto their aid; Diurnall and an annuall course they have mind Like to the sunnes, beside, by what they're sway'd To North or South. This myst'ry's easly thus display'd.

52

The Ecliptick course, and that diurnall moving, Is but apparent as the sunnes, not true: But that the earth doth move, that still wants proving, You'll say. Then if you will, these Comets shew One proof for her two motions. Whence issue Those meteors turnings? what shall hale them on, And guide their steps, that in proportion due They dance Sols measures? what occasion Or fruit can be of that strange double motion?

53

Nought but the Earths circumvolution Doth cause this sight, and but in outward show This sight of double Sunlike motion Seen in the Comets. For the winds that blow Under the Aequinoctiall, who doth know Any other cause, that still they breathe from th' East? That constant feat from whence else can it flow, Save from the Earths swift hurring from the West? Mid part is strongliest rouz'd the Poles do sleep in rest.

54

Wherefore men under th' Aequinoctiall, Where the earths course most rapid is and swift, Sensibly 're dash'd 'gainst that Aereall Pure liquid essence. That clear aire is left Not snatch'd away so fast, not quite bereft Of its own Nature, nor like th' other skie Unmoved quite; but slowpac'd is yeleft And driven close together; sensibly So feel we that fine aire that seems from East to flie.

55

Those parts be in farre greater puritie Devoid of earthy vapours. Thence it is They're not so easly turn'd by sympathie, The air there having lesse of earthinesse; So that they move not with one speedinesse, The earth and it. Yet curious men have fun Something like this, even in the mid-land Seas Ships foure times sooner the same stages run, When Westward they do flie, then when they there begun.

56

But that disgracement of Philosophie From flux and reflux of the Ocean main Their monethly and yearly change; this Theorie Might take't away and shew the causes plain. Some parts of th' Earth do much more swiftnesse gain, When as their course goes whirling on one way With th' annuall motion, which must needs constrain The fluid Sea with unexpected sway. Long time it were this mystery fully to display.

57

Wherefore I'll let it passse, my self betake Unto some reasons Astronomicall, To which if't please the nimble mind t' awake And shake off prejudice, that wont forestall The ablest wit, I fear not but he'll fall Into the same opinion, magnifie That subtile spirit that hath made this All, And hath half-hid his work from mortall eye, To sport and play with souls in sweet philosophie,

58

But with crabb'd mind wisdome will nere consort, Make her abode with a sowr ingenie; That harmlesse spright her self will nere disport With bloudy zeal, currish malignitie, With wrathfull ignorance, grave hypocrisie. Mirth, and Free mindednesse, Simplicitie, Patience, Discreetnesse, and Benignitie, Faithfulnesse, heart-struck Teneritie; These be the lovely playemates of pure veritie.

59

The Eternall Son of God, who Logos hight, Made all things in a fit proportion; Wherefore, I wote, no man that judgeth right In Heaven will make such a confusion, That courses of unlike extension, Vastly unlike, in like time shall be run By ••he flight stars. Such huge distension Of place shews that their time is not all one; Saturn his ring no'te finish as quick as the Moon.

60

Yet if the Earth stand stupid and unmov'd, This needs must come to passe. For they go round In every twise twelve houres, as is prov'd By dayly experience. But it would confound The worlds right order, if't were surely found A reall motion. Wherefore let it be In them but seeming, but a reall round In th' Earth it self. The world so's setten free From that untoward disproportionalitie.

61

For so the courses of the erring Seven With their own orbs will fitly well agree; Their Annuall periods in the liquid Heaven They onely finish then: which as they be Or lesse or greater, so the time they flie In their own circlings hath its difference. The Moon a moneth, Saturn years ten times three; Those have the least and bigg'st circumference. So all their times and o••bs have mutuall reference.

62

Next light's, the Planets dark opacitie, Which long time hath been found in the low Moon: Hills, Valleys, and such like asperitie Through optick glasses thence have plainly shone: By the same trick it hath been clearly shown That Venus Moon-like grows corniculate What time her face with flusher light is blown: Some such like things others have contemplate In Mercurie, about the Sunne both circulate.

63

When Venus is the furthest off from us. Then is she in her full. When in her full, She seemeth least; which proves she's exterous Beyond the Sunne, and further off doth roll. But when her circling nearer down doth pull, Then gins she swell, and waxen bug with horn, But loose her light, parts clad with darknesse dull She shows to us, She and Mercury ne're born Farre from the Sunne, proves that about him both do turn.

64

They both opake, as also is the Moon That turns about the Earth (so turn those foure 'Bout Jupiter, tend him as he doth run His annuall course) That Tellus so may scoure Th'Ethereall Plain, and have the self same power To run her circuits in the liquid skie About the Sunne, the mind that doth not lour, Drooping in earthy dregs, will not deny, Sith we so well have prov'd the starres opacitie.

65

About the great the lesser lamps do dance, The Medicean foure reel about Jove; Two round old Saturn without Nominance, Luna about the earth doth nimbly move: Then all as it doth seemly well behove, About the bigg'st of all great Phoebus hight With joy and jollitie needs round must rove, Tickled with pleasure of his heat and light. What tumbling tricks they play in his farre-piercing sight!

66

Next argument (could I it well expresse With Poets pen) it hath so mighty force, That an ingenious man 'twould stoutly presse To give assent unto the Annuall course Of this our earth. But prejudice the nurse Of ignorance stoppeth all free confession, Als keeps the way that souls have not recourse To purer reason, chok'd with that oppression. This argument is drawn from the stars retrocession.

67

Planets go back, stand still, and forward flie With unexpected swiftnesse: What's the cause That they thus stagger in the plain-pay'd skie? Or stupid stand, as if some dull repose Did numb their spirits and their sinews lose? Here 'gins the wheel-work of the Epicycle: Thus patch they Heaven more botch'dly then old cloths This pretty sport doth make my heart to tickle With laughter, and mine eyes with merry tears to trickle.

68

O daring phansie! that dost thus compile The Heavens from hasty thoughts, such as fall next; Wary Philosophers cannot but smile At such feat gear, at thy rude rash context. An heap of Orbs disorderly perplext, Thrust in on every hint of motion, Must be the wondrous art of Nature, next Here working under God. Thus, thus vain man Intitles alwayes God to his opinion;

69

Thinks every thing is done as he conceives; Would bind all men to his religion; All the world else of freedome he bereaves, He and his God must have Dominion, The truth must have her propagation: That is his thought, which he hath made a God, That furious hot inust impression Doth so disturb his veins, that all abroad With rage he roves, and all gainsayers down hath trod.

70

But to return from whence my Muse hath flown, All this disordred superfluity Of Epicycles, or what else is shown To salve the strange absurd enormity Of staggering motions in the azure skie; Both Epicycles and those turns enorm Would all prove nought, if you would but let flie The earth in the Ecliptick line yborn, As I could well describe in Mathematick form.

71

So could I (that's another argument) From this same principle most clearly prove In regresse and in progresse different Of the free Planets: Why Saturn should rove With shorter startings, give back lesse then Jove; Jove lesse then Mars; why Venus flincheth out More then Mercurius; why Saturn moves Ofter in those back jets then Jove doth shoot; But Mercury more oft then Venus and Mars stout,

72

And why the Sunne escap'd an Epicycle, When as th' old prodigall Astronomie On th' other six bestowed that needlesse cycle; Why Saturn, Jove, and Mars be very nigh Unto the Earth, show bigger in our eye At Eventide when they rise Acronicall; Why far remov'd with so vast distancy When they go down with setting Cronicall: All these will plain appear from th' earths course Annuall.

73

Many other reasons from those heauenly motions Might well be drawn, but with exility Of subtile Mathematicks obscure notions, A Poets pen so fitly no'te agree; And curious men will judge't a vagrancy To start thus from my scope. My pitched end Was for to prove the immortality Of humane souls: But if you well attend, My ship to the right port by this bow'd course did bend.

74

For I have clearly show'd that stout resistence Of the pure soul against the Mundane spright And body, that's the lower mans consistence; How it doth quell by force of reason right Those grosse impressions which our outward sight Seald in our lower life: From whence we see That we have proper independent might, In our own mind, behold our own Idee, Which needs must prove the souls sure immortality.