In monte Dei videbitur[170].
I was in as much affliction as a mortall could bee, and never quiet till all was gone, <and I> wholly[171] cast myselfe on God's providence.
Monastery[172].
I wished monastrys had not been putt downe, that the reformers would have been more moderate as to that point. Nay, the Turkes have monasteries. Why should our reformers be so severe? Convenience of religious houses—Sir Christopher Wren—fitt there should be receptacles and provision for contemplative men; if of 500, but one or two[173]. 'Tis compensated[174]. What a pleasure 'twould have been to have travelled from monastery to monastery. The reformers in the Lutheran countrys were more prudent then to destroy them (e.g. in Holsatia, etc.); <they> only altered the religion.
But notwithstanding all these embarasments I did pian piano (as they occur'd) take[175] notes of antiquity; and having a quick draught, have drawne landskips on horseback symbolically, e.g. <on my> journey to Ireland in July, Anno Domini 166-.
<The> earl of Thanet[176] <gave me> otium at Hethefield.
<I[177] had> never quiett, nor anything of happinesse till[178] divested of all, 1670, 1671[AB]: at what time providence raysed me (unexpectedly) good friends—the right honourable Nicholas, earl of Thanet, with whom I was delitescent at Hethfield in Kent[AC] neer a yeare, and then was invited ...; anno ..., Sarney; Sir Christopher Wren; Mr. Ogilby; then Edmund Wyld, esq., R<egiae> S<ocietatis> S<ocius>, of Glasely-hall, Salop (sed in margine), tooke me into his armes, with whom I most commonly take my diet and sweet otium's.
Anno 1671, having sold all and disappointed as aforesaid of moneys I received, I had so strong[179] an impulse[180] to (in good part) finish my[181] Description of Wilts, two volumes in folio, that I could not be quiet till I had donne it, and that with danger enough, tanquam canis e Nilo, for feare of the crocodiles, i.e. catchpolls.——And indeed all that I have donne and that little that I have studied have been just after that fashion, so that had I not lived long my want of leisure would have afforded but a slender harvest of....
A man's spirit rises and falls with his[182] ⦻: makes me lethargique.