SECTION I.

Thus these great cierks their little wifdom fhew, While with their doctrines they at hazard play:

Toffing their light opinions to and fro,

To mock the lewd, as learn'd in this as they.

And though this fpirit be to th' Body knit,
As an apt means her pow'rs to exercife,
Which are life, motion, fenfe, and will, and wit,
Yet fhe furvives, although the Body dies.

That the Soul is a thing fubfifting by itself without the Body.

SHE is a fubftance, and a real thing,

Which hath itself an actual working might, Which neither from the fenfes power doth spring, Nor from the Body's humours temper'd right.

She is a vine, which doth no propping need,
To make her spread herself, or spring upright;
She is a star, whose beams do not proceed

From any fun, but from a native light.

For when the forts things prefent with things paft,
And thereby things to come doth oft foresee;
When the doth doubt at first, and choose at last,
Thefe acts her own §, without her body be.

When of the dew, which th' eye and ear do take,
From flow'rs abroad, and bring into the brain,
She doth within both wax and honey make :
This work is hers, this is her proper pain.

44

et in the Body's prifon fo the lies,

As through the Body's windows the must look, Her divers powers of fenfe to exercife, [book.

By gathering notes out of the world's great

Nor can herself difcourfe or judge of ought,

But what the fenfe collects, and home doth
bring;

And yet the pow'rs of her discourfing thought,
From these collections is a diverfe thing.

For though our eyes can nought but colours fee,
Yet colours give them not their pow'r of fight:
So, though these fruits of fenfe her objects be,

Yet the difcerns them by her proper light.

The workman on his stuff his skill doth shew,

And yet the ftuff gives not the man his skill: Kings their affairs do by their fervants know, But order them by their own royal will,

So, though this cunning mistress, and this queen, Doth, as her inftruments, the fenfes ufe,

To know all things that are felt, heard, or seen ; Yet the herself doth only judge and choose.

E'en as a prudent emperor, that reigns
By fovereign title over fundry lands,
Borrows, in mean affairs, his fubje&s pains,
Sees by their eyes, and writeth by their hands:

But things of weight and confequence indeed, Himself doth in his chamber then debate; Where all his counsellors he doth exceed,

As far in judgment, as he doth in state.

Or as the man whom princes do advance,
Upon their gracious mercy-feat to fit,
Doth common things of courfe and circumftance,
To the reports of common men commit:

But when the cause itself must be decreed,
Himself in perfon in his proper court,
To grave and folemn hearing doth proceed,
Of ev'ry proof, and ev'ry bye-report.

Then, like God's angel, he pronounceth right,
And milk and honey from his tongue doth flow:
Happy are they that ftill are in his fight,

To reap the wisdom which his lips doth sow.

Right fo the Soul, which is a lady free,

And doth the justice of her state maintain : Because the fenfes ready fervants be,

Attending nigh about her court, the brain :

By them the forms of outward things the learns,
For they return into the fantasie,
Whatever each of them abroad difcerns,
And there enroll it for the mind to fee.

But when the fits to judge the good and ill,
And to difcern betwixt the falfe and true,

She is not guided by the senses skill,

Bus doth each thing in her own mirror view.

Therefore no fenfe the precious joys conceives,
Which in her private contemplations be;
For then the ravifh'd spirit th' fenfes leaves,
Hath her own pow'rs, and proper actions free.

Her harmonies are fweet, and full of skill,

When on the Body's inftruments the plays; But the proportions of the wit and will, Thofe sweet accords are even th' angels lays.

These tunes of reafon are Amphion's lyre,

Wherewith he did the Theban city found: These are the notes wherewith the heavenly choir, The praife of him which made the heaven doth found.

As if moft fkill in that musician were,

Which had the best, and best tun'd inftrument? As if the pencil neat, and colours clear,

Had pow'r to make the painter excellent.

Why doth not beauty then refine the wit,
And good complexion rectify the will?
Why doth not health bring wifdom ftill with it?
Why doth not fickness make men brutish still.

Who can in memory, or wit, or will,

Or air, or fire, or earth, or water find? What alchymift can draw, with all his skill, The quinteffence of these out of the mind? If th' elements which have nor life, nor fenfe, Can breed in us fo great a pow'r as this, Why give they not themselves like excellence, Or other things wherein their mixture is? If the were but the Body's quality,

[blind. Then he would be with it fick, maim'd and But we perceive where these privations be, An healthy, perfect, and sharp-fighted mind. If the the Body's nature did partake,

[decay:

Her ftrength would with the Body's strength But when the Body's ftrongest finews flake,

Then is the Soul most active, quick and gay.

For of all forms, fhe holds the first degree, That are to grofs, material bodies knit; Yet the herself is bodylefs, and free;

And though confin'd, is almost infinite.

Were fhe a Body, ¶ how could she remain

Within this Body, which is less than fhe?

Or how could fhe the world's great shape contain,

And in our narrow breasts contained be?

All Bodies are confin'd within fome place,
But fhe all place within herself confines:
All Bodies have their measure and their space;
But who can draw the Soul's dimensive lines?

No Body can at once two forms admit,

Except the one the other do deface; But in the Soul ten thousand forms do fit,

And none intrudes into her neighbour's place.

All Bodies are with other Bodies fill'd,

But she receives both heav'n and earth together: Nor are their forms by rafh encounter fpill'd, For there they stand, and neither toucheth either.

Nor can her wide embracements filled be;

For they that most and greatest things embrace, Enlarge thereby their mind's capacity,

As ftreams enlarg'd, enlarge the channel's space.

All things receiv'd, do fuch proportion take,
As those things have, wherein they are receiv'd:
So little glaffes little faces make,

And narrow webs on narrow frames are weav'd.

Then what vaft Body must we make the mind, Wherein are men, beats, trees, towns, feas, and lands;

And yet each thing a proper place doth find,

And each thing in the true proportion ftands?

Doubtless, this could not be, but that the turns

Bodies to Spirits, by fublimation strange; As fire converts to fire the things it burns;

As we our meats into our nature change.

From their grofs matter fhe abftracts the forms, And draws a kind of quinteffence from things; Which to her proper nature fhe transforms,

To bear them light on her celeftial wings.

This doth fhe, when, from things particular,
She doth abstract the univerfal kinds,
Which bodylefs and immaterial are,

And can be only lodg'd within our minds.

And thus from divers accidents and acts,
Which do within her obfervation fall,
She goddeffes, and pow'rs divine abstracts;
As nature, fortune, and the virtues all.

VOL. II.

That it cannot be a Body.

Again; how can the fev'ral Bodies know,
If in herself a body's form the bear?
How can a mirror fundry faces fhow,

If from all shapes and forms it be not clear?

Nor could we by our eyes all colours learn,
Except our eyes were of all colours void;
Nor fundry taftes can any tongue difcern,
Which is with grofs and bitter humours cloy'd.

Nor can a man of paffions judge aright,
Except his mind be from all paffions free:
Nor can a judge his office well acquit,
If he poffefs'd of either party be.

If, laftly, this quick pow'r a body were,
Were it as fwift as in the wind or fire,
(Whose atoms do the one down fide-ways bear,
And th' other make in pyramids aspire.)

Her nimble Body yet in time must move,
And not in inftants thro' all places slide :
But she is nigh and far, beneath, above,
In point of time, which thought cannot divide:

She's fent as foon to China, as to Spain;

And thence returns, as soon as she is fent :
She measures with one time, and with one pain,"
An ell of filk, and heav'n's wide spreading tent.

As then the Soul a fubftance hath alone,
Befides the Body in which the's confin'd;
So hath the not a Body of her own,

But is a spirit, and immaterial mind.

Since Body and Soul have fuch diversities, [gan; Well might we mufe, how firft their match beBut that we learn, that he that spread the skies, And fix'd the earth, first form'd the soul in man.

Nor did he firft a certain number make,
Infufing part in beasts and part in men;
And, as unwilling further pains to take,
Would make no more than those he framed
then.

So that the widow Soul, her Body dying,
Unto the next born Body married was;
And fo by often changing, and fupplying, [pafs.
Men's Souls to beafts, and beasts to men did

(Thefe thoughts are fond; for fince the Bodies born
Be more in number far, than those that die,
Thousands must be abortive and forlorn,
Ere others deaths to them their Souls supply :)

But as God's handmaid, Nature, doth create
B dies in time diftinct, and order due;
So God gives Souls the like fucceffive date,
Which himself makes, in Bodies formed new :

Which himself makes of no material thing;

For unto angels he no pow'r hath giv'n Either to form the fhape, or ftuff to bring

From air or fire, or fubftance of the heav'n.

Nor herein doth he Nature's fervice ufe;

For tho' from Bodies, fhe can Bodies bring, Yet could fhe never Souls from Souls traduce, As fire from fire, or light from light doth spring.

SECTION VI,

That the Soul is not ex traduce.

ALAS! that fome who were great lights of old, And in their hands the lamp of God did bear! Some rev'rend fathers did this error hold, Having their eyes dimm'd with religious fear.

OBJECTION.

For when (fay they) by rule of faith we find,
That ev'ry foul unto her Body knit,
Brings from the mother's womb the fin of kind,
The root of all the ill fhe doth commit.

How can we say that God the Soul doth make, But we must make him author of her fin? Then from man's Soul the doth beginning take, Since in man's Soul corruption did begin.

For if God make her firft, he makes her ill,

And yet we fee in her fuch pow'rs divine,
As we could gladly think, from God the came
Fain would we make him author of the wine,
If for the dregs we could fome other blame.

ANSWER.

Thus thefe good men with holy zeal were blind,
Whereof we do clear demonftrations find,
When on the other part the truth did fhine;

By light of nature, and by light divine.

None are fo grofs as to contend for this,

That Souls from Bodies may traduced be; Between whofe natures no proportion is,

When root and branch in nature still agree.

But many fubtle wits have juftify'd,

That Souls from Souls fpiritually may spring Which (if the nature of the Soul be try'd) Will e'en in nature prove as grofs a thing.

SECTION VII.

Reafons drawn from Nature.

FOR all things made, are either made of nought, Or made of fluff that ready made doth ftand: Of nought no creature ever formed ought,

For that is proper to th' Almighty's hand.

If then the Soul another Soul do make,

Because her pow'r is kept within a bound, She must fome former ftuff, or matter take; But in the Soul there is no matter found. Then if her heav'nly form do not agree With any matter which the world contains, Then the of nothing must created be;

And to create, to God alone pertains.

Again, if Souls do other Souls beget,

'Tis by themselves, or by the Body's pow'r : If by themselves, what doth their working let, But they might Souls engender ev'ry hour?

If by the Body, how can wit and will

Join with the Body only in this aЯ, Since when they do their other works fulfil, They from the Body do themselves abstract.

Again, if Souls of Souls begotten were,

Into each other they should change and move; And change and motion ftill corruption bear; How fhall we then the Soul immortal prove?

unto ;)

Or makes the Body her fair form to fpill, Which, of itself, it had not power to do.

Not Adam's Body, but his Soul did fin,

And fo herfelf unto corruption brought; But our poor Soul corrupted is within,

Ere the had finn'd, either in act. or thought;

Then fhould they fpread incorruptible feed: What then becomes of that which they do lofe, When th' act of generation do not speed?

And tho' the Soul could caft fpiritual feed,

Yet would the not, because fhe never dies; For mortal things defire their like to breed, That fo they may their kind inmortalize.