the midst of their sufferings made their bread of sorrow taste more pleasantly than the banquets of dull and lowspirited people-Life of Dr. Donne. 5. Birds. THOSE little nimble musicians of the air, that warble forth their curious ditties, with which nature hath furnished them to the shame of art. As first the lark, when she means to rejoice, to cheer herself and those that hear her; she then quits the earth, and sings as she ascends higher into the air, and having ended her heavenly employment grows then mute and sad, to think she must descend to the dull earth, which she would not touch, but for necessity. How do the blackbird and thrassel, with their melodious voices, bid welcome to the cheerful spring, and in their fixed months warble forth such ditties as no art or instrument can reach to! Nay, the smaller birds also do the like in their particular seasons, as, namely, the laverock, the titlark, the little linnet, and the honest robin, that loves mankind both alive and dead. But the nightingale, another of my airy creatures, breathes such sweet loud music out of her little instrumental throat, that it might make mankind to think miracles are not ceased. He that at midnight, when the very labourer sleeps securely, should hear, as I have very often, the clear airs, the sweet descants, the natural rising and falling, the doubling and redoubling of her voice, might well be lifted above earth, and say, 'Lord, what music hast Thou provided for the Saints in Heaven, when Thou affordest bad men such music on earth?'-Complete Angler. XI. SIR THOMAS BROWNE. 1605-1682. THOMAS BROWNE was born in St. Michael's, Cheapside, in the year 1605. He was sent to Winchester School, and studied and graduated in Arts at Oxford. Afterwards he practised medicine in the counties surrounding the University. He travelled in Ireland, France and Italy, and returning through Holland, took the degree of Doctor of Medicine at Leyden. In 1636 he settled in Norwich, where he lived for forty-six years practising his profession extensively. In 1637 he was incor porated M.D. at Oxford. He was married in 1641; his wife survived him. In 1664 he was chosen an Honorary Fellow of the College of Physicians, and received the honour of knighthood from Charles II on the occasion of his paying a visit to the city of Norwich in 1671. He died at Norwich in 1682 at the mature age of seventy-seven. His writings are numerous, and generally desultory. The most remarkable and the best known are The Religion of a Physician, Religio Medici, and a treatise on Vulgar or Common Errors, Pseudodoxia Epidemica. The Religio Medici was written shortly after his return from travel, and during a residence of two or three years at Halifax, and was published soon after he went to reside at Norwich. The work excited immediate attention by the liberality of sentiment and the freedom from prejudice which marked it, as well as by its novel paradoxes, subtle disquisitions, strength of language, and dignity of style. Sir Kenelm Digby produced a volume of acute comment and mixed censure and speculation, which gave the work further importance. Pseudodoxia appeared ten years later, and passed through six editions in the lifetime of its author; it is noteworthy as much for the strangeness of the errors as for the quaintness of the refutations. In 1658 the discovery of some ancient urns in Norfolk gave rise to his treatise on Urn Burial, Hydriotaphia—a work full of antiquarian learning. Sir Thomas Browne's style is flowing, rich with illustrations, and here and there poetical. It is marred by a want of uniformity. The reader is surprised by eccentric changes from polished thoughts to the most uncouth ideas. Coleridge has characterised Browne as 'rich in various knowledge, exuberant in conceptions and conceits, contemplative, imaginative, often truly great in his style and diction, though doubtless too often big, stiff, and hyperlatinistic. In him the humourist constantly mingles with the philosopher.' If he combated errors he resisted innovations, not accepting the motion of the earth around the sun. Being a devout Christian he spoke with candour of the hard things of his faith, and so was deemed by some an atheist; and since he was a firm believer, with others he passed as superstitious. He was in truth a thoughtful and cultivated man, fearless in maintaining what he believed, desirous of attaining to truth, indifferent to blame; and in gentle charity with all men. 1. God and Nature. THUS there are two books from whence I collect my divinity; besides that written one of God, another of his servant nature, that universal and public manuscript, that lies expans'd unto the eyes of all; those that never saw him in the one, have discovered him in the other. This was the Scripture and theology of the heathens; the natural motion of the sun made them more admire him, than its supernatural station did the children of Israel; the ordinary effect of nature wrought more admiration in them, than in the other all his miracles; surely the heathens knew better how to join and read these mystical letters, than we Christians, who cast a more careless eye on these common hieroglyphics, and disdain to suck divinity from the flowers of nature. Nor do I so forget God, as to adore the name of nature; which I define not with the schools, the principle of motion and rest, but that straight and regular line, that settled and constant course the wisdom of God hath ordained the actions of his creatures, according to their several kinds. To make a revolution every day, is the nature of the sun, because that necessary course which God hath ordained it, from which it cannot swerve, by a faculty from that voice which first did give it motion. Now this course of nature God seldom alters or perverts, but like an excellent artist hath so contrived his work, that with the self same instrument without a new creation he may effect his obscurest designs. Thus he sweeteneth the water with a wood, preserveth the creatures in the Ark, which the blast of his mouth might have as easily created: for God is like a skilful geometrician, who when more easily and with one stroke of his compass he might describe, or divide a right line, had yet rather do this in a circle or longer way; according to the constituted and forelaid principles of his art: yet this rule of his he doth sometimes pervert, to acquaint the world with his prerogative, lest the arrogancy of our reason should question his power, and conclude he could not; and thus I call the effects of nature the works of God, whose hand and instrument she only is; and therefore to ascribe his actions unto her, is to devolve the honour of the principal agent, upon the instrument; which if with : reason we may do, then let our hammers rise up and boast they have built our houses, and our pens receive the honour of our writing. I hold there is a general beauty in the works of God, and therefore no deformity in any kind or species of creature whatsoever I cannot tell by what logic we call a toad, a bear, or an elephant, ugly, they being created in those outward shapes and figures which best express those actions of their inward forms. And having past that general visitation of God, who saw that all that he had made was good, that is, conformable to his will, which abhors deformity, and is the rule of order and beauty; there is no deformity but in monstrosity, wherein notwithstanding there is a kind of beauty, nature so ingenuously contriving the irregular parts, as they become sometimes more remarkable than the principal fabric. To speak yet more narrowly, there was never any thing ugly, or misshapen, but the chaos; wherein, notwithstanding, to speak strictly, there was no deformity, because no form, nor was it yet impregnant by the voice of God: now nature is not at variance with art, nor art with nature; they being both the servants of his providence: art is the perfection of nature were the world now as it was the sixth day, there were yet a chaos: nature hath made one world, and art another. In brief, all things are artificial, for nature is the art of God.-Religio Medici 2. True Affection. THERE are wonders in true affection, it is a body of enigmas, mysteries and riddles; wherein two so become one, as they both become two; I love my friend before myself, and yet methinks I do not love him enough; some few months hence my multiplied affection will make me |