SECTIO OCTAUA.
[Sidenote: Frisius Zieglerus, Olauus Magn.] Iuxta hos montes (tres prædictos Heclam, &c.) sunt tres hiatus immanes, quorum altitudinem apud montem Heclam potissimum, ne Lynceus quidem perspicere queat: Sed apparent ipsum inspicientibus, homines primùm submersi, adhuc spiritum exhalantes, qui amicis suis, vt ad propria redeant, hortantibus, magnis suspirijs se ad montem Heclam proficisci debere respondent: Sicque subitò euanescunt.
Ad confirmandum superius mendacium de Inferno terrestri ac visibili, commentum hoc, non minus calumniosum (etsi facilè largiar, Frisium non tam calumniandi, quàm noua & inaudita prædicandi animo ista scripsisse) quàm falsum ac gerris Siculis longè vanius ac detestabilius, excogitarunt homines ignaui, nec coelum ec infernum scientes. Quos scriptores isti, viri alioqui præclarissimi & optimè de Repub. literaria meriti, nimium præpropero iudicio secuti sunt.
Cæterum optandum esset, nullos tanto nouitatis studio Historias scribere, vt non vereantur aniles quasuis nugas ijs inserere, atque ita aurum purum coeno aspergere. Qui verò demum sunt homines illi submersi, in lacu infernali natitantes, & nihilominus cum notis & amicis confabulantes? Anne nobis veterem Orphea, cum sua Euridice, in Stygias relabente vndas, colloquentem, & in his extremi orbis partibus, tanquam ad Tanaim Hebrúmque niualem, cantus exercentem lyricos, rediuiuum dabitis? Certè, etsi nolint alij futilem huiusmodi ineptiarum leuitatem ac mendacium agnoscere, agnouit tamen rerum omnium haud negligens æstimator Cardanus, lib. 18. subtil. cuius hæc sunt verba.
Est Hecla mons in Islandia, ardétque non aliter ac Ætna in Sicilia per interualla, ideóque persuasione longa (vulgi) concepta, quòd ibi expientur animaæ. Alij, ne vani sint, affingunt inania fabulæ, vt consona videantur. Quæ sunt autem illa inania? Quòd spectra comminiscuntur, se ad montem Heclam ire respondentia, ait idem. Et addit. Nec in Islandia solum, sed vbique, licet rarò, talia contingunt: Subdítque de laruâ homicidâ Historiam, quæ sic habet. Efferebatur, inquit, anno præterito, funus viri plebeij Mediolani, orientali in porta iuxta templum maius foro venali, quòd à caulium frequentia nomen caulis nostra lingua sonat. Occurrit mihi notus: Peto, vt medicorum moris est, quo morbo excesserit? Respondet ille: consuesse hunc virum hora noctis, tertia à labore redire domum: Vidit lemurem nocte quadam insequentem: Quam cum effugere conaretur, ocyus citato pede abibat: Sed à spectro captus atque in terram proiectus videbatur. Exclamare nitebatur: Non poterat. Tandem, cum diu in terra cum larua volutatus esset, inuentus à prætereuntibus quibusdam, semiuiuus domum relatus, cum resipuisset, interrogatus, hæc quæ minus expectabantur, retulit. Ob id animam despondens, cum nec ab amicis, nec medicis, nec sacerdotibus persuaderi potuisset, inania esse hæc, octo inde diebus perijt. Audiui postmodum & ab alijs, qui vicini essent illi, neminem ab inimico vulneratum tam constanter de illo testatum, vt hic, quod à mortuo fuisset in terram prouolutus. Cum quidam quærerent, quid ille postquam in terram volutaretur ageret? Conatum, inquit, mortuum adhibitis gulæ manibus, vt eum strangularet: Nec obstitisse quicquam, nisi quòd se ipsum tueretur manibus. Cum alij dubitarent, ne fortè hæc à viuo passus esset, interrogarentque in quo mortuum à viuo secernere potuisset? Caussam reddidit satis probabilem, dicens se tanquam cottum attrectasse, nec pondus habuisse, nisi vt premebatur. Et paulò post addit. Eadem verò ratione qua in Islandia, in arenæ solitudinibus Ægypti & Æthiopiæ, Indiæque vbi Sol ardet, eædem imagines, eadem spectra viatores ludificare solent. Hactenus Cardanus. Inde tamen nemo concluseret, sicut de Islandia scriptores nostri faciunt, in illis Ægypti and Æthiopiæ, Indiæque locis, carcerem existere damnatorum.
Hæc ex Cardano adscribere libuit, vt etiam extraneorum testimonia pro nobis, contra figmenta tanta afferamus. Conuincit autem præsens Cardani locus hæc duo, scilicet: nec esse Islandiæ proprias spectrorum apparitiones: (quod etiam omnes norunt, nisi eius rei ignorantiam nimis affectent) nec illud mortuorum cum viuis, in hiatu Heclensi, colloquium, nisi ementitis hominum fabulis, quauis ampulla vani oribus, niti, quibus beluæ vulgares, ad confirmandam de animarum cruciatibus opinionem, vsæ fuerant. Et quisquam est, qui illis scriptorum hiatibus, mortuorum miraculis ad summum vsque refertis, adduci potest vt credat? Quisquam, qui vanitatem tantam non cotemnat? Certè. Nam & hinc conuicia in gentem nostram recte sumi aiunt: Nihil scilicet hac proiectius ac deterius esse vsquam, quæ intra limites Orcum habeat. Scilicet hoc commodi nobis peperit Historicorum ad res nouas diuulgandas auiditas. Verum illa è vulgi dementia nata opinio, vt stulta ac inanis, & in opprobrium nostræ gentis conficta, hactenus, vt spero, satis labefactata est. Quare iam perge Lector, vlterius hanc de secretis infernalibus Philosophiam cognoscere.
The same in English.
THE EIGHT SECTION.
[Sidenote: Frisius. Zieglerus. Olaus magnus.] Neare vnto the mountaines (the 3. fornamed Hecla &c.) there be three vaste holes, the depth whereof, especially at mount Hecla, cannot be discerned by any man, be he neuer so sharpe sighted: but there appeare to the beholders thereof certaine men at that instant plunged in, & as yet drawing their breath, who answere their friends (exhorting them with deepe sighs to returne home) that they must depart to mount Hecla: and with that, they suddenly vanish away.
To confirme the former lie, of an earthly & visible hell (albeit I will easily grant that Frisius in writing these things did not entend to reproch any, but only to blaze abroad new & incredible matters) certaine idle companions knowing neither hell nor heauen haue inuented this fable, no lesse reprochfull then false, and more vaine & detestable then Sicilian scoffes. Which fellowes these writers (being otherwise men of excellent parts, and to whom learning is much indebted) haue followed with an ouer hastie iudgement.
But it were to be wished, that none would write Histories with so great a desire of setting foorth nouelties & strange things, that they feare not, in that regard to broch any fabulous & old-wiues toyes, & so to defile pure gold with filthy mire. But I pray you, how might those drowned men be swimming in the infernal lake, & yet for al that, parletng with their acquaintance & friends? What? Will you coniure, & raise vp vnto vs from death to life old, Orpheus conferring with his wife Euridice (drawen backe againe down to the Stigian flood) & in these parts of the world, as it were by the bankes of snowey Tanais, & Hebrus descanting vpon his harpe? But in very deed although others will not acknowledge the falsbood, & vanity of these trifles, yet Cardane being a diligent considerer of al things in his 18. booke de subtilitate, doth acknowledge & find them out. Whose words be these. There is Hecla a mountaine in Island, which burneth like vnto Ætna at certain seasons, & hereupon the comon people haue conceiued an opinion this long time, that soules are there purged: some, least they should seeme liars, heape vp more vanities to this fable, that it may appeare to be probable, & agreeable to reason. But what be those vanities? namely, they feine certaine ghosts answering them, that they are going to mount Hecla; as the same Cardane saith. And further he addeth. Neither in Island only, but euery where (albeit seldome) such things come to passe. And then he tels this storie following of a man-killing spright. There was (saith he) solemnized this last yeare the funerall of a comon citizen, in the gate neare vnto the great Church, by that marketplace, which in regard of the abundace of herbs, in our tong hath the name of the herbmarket. There meets with me one of mine acquaintance: I (according to the custome of Phisitians) presently aske of what disease the man died? he giueth me answere that this man vsed to come home from his labour 3. houres within night: one night among the rest he espied an hobgoblin pursuing him: which to auoid, he ran away with al speed: but being caught by the spright, he was throwne down vpon the ground. He would faine haue made a shout, & was not able. At length (when the spright & he had struggled together vpon the ground a good while) he was found by certain passengers, & carried home halfe dead. And when he was come to himselfe againe, being asked what was the matter, he vp and tolde this strange relation. Hereupon (being vtterly daunted, & discouraged, when neither by his friends, nor by Phisitians, nor by Priests, he could be perswaded, that these things were but his owne conceits, & that there was no such matter) 8. daies after he died. I heard also afterward of others which were his neighbors, that no man could more constantly affirme himselfe to be wounded of his enemy, then this man did, that he was cast vpon the ground by a ghost. And when some demanded what he did, after he was tumbled on the earth? The dead man (quoth he) laying his hands to my throat, went about to strangle me: neither was there any remedy, but by defending my selfe with mine own hands. When others doubted least he might suffer these things of a liuing man, they asked him how he could discerne a dead man from a liuing? To this he rendered a very probable reason, saying that he seemed in handling to be like Cottum, & that he had no weight, but held him down by maine force. And presently after he addeth. In like manner as in Island, so in the desert sands of Ægypt, Æthiopia, and India, where the sunne is hot, the very same apparitions, the same sprights are wont to delude wayfaring men. Thus much Cardane. Yet from hence (I trow) no man will conclude as our writers of Island do, that in the places of Ægypt, Æthiopia, and India, there is a prison of damned soules.
I thought good to write these things out of Cardane, that I may bring euen the testimony of strangers on our sides, against such monstrous fables. This place of Cardane implieth these two things, namely that apparitions of sprights are not proper to Island alone (which thing al men know, if they do not maliciously feigne themselues to be ignorant). And secondly that that conference of the dead with the liuing in the gulfe of Hecla is not grounded vpon any certainty, but only vpon fables coined by some idle persons, being more vaine then any bubble, which the brutish common sort haue vsed, to confirme their opinion of the tormenting of soules. And is there any man so fantasticall, that wilbe induced to beleeue these gulfes, mentioned by writers, to be any where extant, although they be neuer so ful of dead mens miracles? yea doubtlesse. For from hence also they say, that reproches are iustly vsed against our nation: namely that there is nothing in all the world more base, & worthlesse then it, which conteineth hell within the bounds therof. This verely is the good that we haue gotten by those historiographers, who haue bin so greedy to publish nouelties. But this opinion, bred by the sottishnes of the common people hath hitherto (as I hope) bene sufficiently ouerthrowen as a thing foolish & vaine, and as being deuised for the vpbrayding of our nation. Wherefore, proceede (friendly Reader) and be farther instructed in this philosophy of infernall secrets.