T'admire, commend, and come together

To hear and see a worthy scholar speak,

As children do a peacock's feather.

Nos interim quod, attinet (nec enim immunes ab hac noxa sumus) idem realus manet, idem nobis, et si non multo gravius, crimen objici potest: nostra enim culpa sit, nostra incuria, nostra avaritia, quod tam frequentes, foedaeque fiant in Ecclesia nundinationes, (templum est vaenale, deusque) tot sordes invehantur, tanta grassetur impietas, tanta nequitia, tam insanus miseriarum Euripus, et turbarum aestuarium, nostro inquam, omnium (Academicorum imprimis) vitio sit. Quod tot Resp. malis afficiatur, a nobis seminarium; ultro malum hoc accersimus, et quavis contumelia, quavis interim miseria digni, qui pro virili non occurrimus. Quid enim fieri posse speramus, quum tot indies sine delectu pauperes alumni, terrae filii, et cujuscunque ordinis homunciones ad gradus certatim admittantur? qui si definitionem, distinctionemque unam aut alteram memoriter edidicerint, et pro more tot annos in dialectica posuerint, non refert quo profectu, quales demum sint, idiotae, nugatores, otiatores, aleatores, compotores, indigni, libidinis voluptatumque administri, “Sponsi Penelopes, nebulones, Alcinoique,” modo tot annos in academia insumpserint, et se pro togatis venditarint; lucri causa, et amicorum intercessu praesentantur; addo etiam et magnificis nonnunquam elogiis morum et scientiae; et jam valedicturi testimonialibus hisce litteris, amplissime conscriptis in eorum gratiam honorantur, abiis, qui fidei suae et existimationis jacturam proculdubio faciunt. “Doctores enim et professores” (quod ait [2088]ille) “id unum curant, ut ex professionibus frequentibus, et tumultuariis potius quam legitimis, commoda sua promoverant, et ex dispendio publico suum faciant incrementum.” Id solum in votis habent annui plerumque magistratus, ut ab incipientium numero [2089]pecunias emungant, nec multum interest qui sint, literatores an literati, modo pingues, nitidi, ad aspectum speciosi, et quod verbo dicam, pecuniosi sint. [2090]Philosophastri licentiantur in artibus, artem qui non habent, [2091]“Eosque sapientes esse jubent, qui nulla praediti sunt sapientia, et nihil ad gradum praeterquam velle adferunt.” Theologastri (solvant modo) satis superque docti, per omnes honorum gradus evehuntur et ascendunt. Atque hinc fit quod tam viles scurrae, tot passim idiotae, literarum crepusculo positi, larvae pastorum, circumforanei, vagi, barbi, fungi, crassi, asini, merum pecus in sacrosanctos theologiae aditus, illotis pedibus irrumpant, praeter inverecundam frontem adferentes nihil, vulgares quasdam quisquilias, et scholarium quaedam nugamenta, indigna quae vel recipiantur in triviis. Hoc illud indignum genus hominum et famelicum, indigum, vagum, ventris mancipium, ad stivam potius relegandum, ad haras aptius quam ad aras, quod divinas hasce literas turpiter prostituit; hi sunt qui pulpita complent, in aedes nobilium irrepunt, et quum reliquis vitae destituantur subsidiis, ob corporis et animi egestatem, aliarum in repub. partium minime capaces sint; ad sacram hanc anchoram confugiunt, sacerdotium quovis modo captantes, non ex sinceritate, quod [2092]Paulus ait, “sed cauponantes verbum Dei.” Ne quis interim viris bonis detractum quid putet, quos habet ecclesia Anglicana quamplurimos, eggregie doctos, illustres, intactae famae, homines, et plures forsan quam quaevis Europae provincia; ne quis a florentisimis Academiis, quae viros undiquaque doctissimos, omni virtutum genere suspiciendos, abunde producunt. Et multo plures utraque habitura, multo splendidior futura, si non hae sordes splendidum lumen ejus obfuscarent, obstaret corruptio, et cauponantes quaedam harpyae, proletariique bonum hoc nobis non inviderent. Nemo enim tam caeca mente, qui non hoc ipsum videat: nemo tam stolido ingenio, qui non intelligat; tam pertinaci judicio, qui non agnoscat, ab his idiotis circumforaneis, sacram pollui Theologiam, ac caelestes Musas quasi prophanum quiddam prostitui. “Viles animae et effrontes” (sic enim Lutherus [2093] alicubi vocat) “lucelli causa, ut muscae ad mulctra, ad nobilium et heroum mensas advolant, in spem sacerdotii,” cujuslibet honoris, officii, in quamvis aulam, urbem se ingerunt, ad quodvis se ministerium componunt.— “Ut nervis alienis mobile lignum—Ducitur”—Hor. Lib. II. Sat. 7. [2094] “offam sequentes, psittacorum more, in praedae spem quidvis effutiunt:” obsecundantes Parasiti [2095](Erasmus ait) “quidvis docent, dicunt, scribunt, suadent, et contra conscientiam probant, non ut salutarem reddant gregem, sed ut magnificam sibi parent fortunam.” [2096]“Opiniones quasvis et decreta contra verbum Dei astruunt, ne non offendant patronum, sed ut retineant favorem procerum, et populi plausum, sibique ipsis opes accumulent.” Eo etenim plerunque animo ad Theologiam accedunt, non ut rem divinam, sed ut suam facient; non ad Ecclesiae bonum promovendum, sed expilandum; quaerentes, quod Paulus ait, “non quae Jesu Christi, sed quae sua,” non domini thesaurum, sed ut sibi, suisque thesaurizent. Nec tantum iis, qui vilirrie fortunae, et abjectae, sortis sunt, hoc in usu est: sed et medios, summos elatos, ne dicam Episcopos, hoc malum invasit. [2097] “Dicite pontifices, in sacris quid facit aurum?” [2098]“summos saepe viros transversos agit avaritia,” et qui reliquis morum probitate praelucerent; hi facem praeferunt ad Simoniam, et in corruptionis hunc scopulum impingentes, non tondent pecus, sed deglubunt, et quocunque se conferunt, expilant, exhauriunt, abradunt, magnum famae suae, si non animae naufragium facientes; ut non ab infimis ad summos, sed a summis ad infimos malum promanasse videatur, et illud verum sit quod ille olim lusit, “emerat ille prius, vendere jure potest. Simoniacus enim” (quod cum Leone dicam) “gratiam non accepit, si non accipit, non habet, et si non habet, nec gratus potest esse;” tantum enim absunt istorum nonnulli, qui ad clavum sedent a promovendo reliquos, ut penitus impediant, probe sibi conscii, quibus artibus illic pervenerint. [2099]“Nam qui ob literas emersisse illos credat, desipit; qui vero ingenii, eruditionis, experientiae, probitatis, pietatis, et Musarum id esse pretium putat” (quod olim revera fuit, hodie promittitur) “planissime insanit.” Utcunque vel undecunque malum hoc originem ducat, non ultra quaeram, ex his primordiis caepit vitiorum colluvies, omnis calamitas, omne miseriarum agmen in Ecclesiam invehitur. Hinc tam frequens simonia, hinc ortae querelae, fraudes, imposturae, ab hoc fonte se derivarunt omnes nequitiae. Ne quid obiter dicam de ambitione, adulatione plusquam aulica, ne tristi domicaenio laborent, de luxu, de foedo nonnunquam vitae exemplo, quo nonnullos offendunt, de compotatione Sybaritica, &c. hinc ille squalor academicus, “tristes hac tempestate Camenae,” quum quivis homunculus artium ignarus, hic artibus assurgat, hunc in modum promoveatur et ditescat, ambitiosis appellationibus insignis, et multis dignitatibus augustus vulgi oculos perstringat, bene se habeat, et grandia gradiens majestatem quandam ac amplitudinem prae se ferens, miramque sollicitudinem, barba reverendus, toga nitidus, purpura coruscus, supellectilis splendore, et famulorum numero maxime conspicuus. “Quales statuae” (quod ait [2100]ille) “quae sacris in aedibus columnis imponuntur, velut oneri cedentes videntur, ac si insudarent, quum revera sensu sint carentes, et nihil saxeam adjuvent firmitatem:” atlantes videri volunt, quum sint statuae lapideae, umbratiles revera homunciones, fungi, forsan et bardi, nihil a saxo differentes. Quum interim docti viri, et vilae sanctioris ornamentis praediti, qui aestum diei sustinent, his iniqua sorte serviant, minimo forsan salario contenti, puris nominibus nuncupati, humiles, obscuri, multoque digniores licet, egentes, inhonorati vitam privam privatam agant, tenuique sepulti sacerdotio, vel in collegiis suis in aeternum incarcerati, inglorie delitescant. Sed nolo diutius hanc movere sentinam, hinc illae lachrymae, lugubris musarum habitus, [2101]hinc ipsa religio (quod cum Secellio dicam) “in ludibrium et contemptum adducitur,” abjectum sacerdotium (atque haec ubi fiunt, ausim dicere, et pulidum [2102] putidi dicterium de clero usurpare) “putidum vulgus,” inops, rude, sordidum, melancholicum, miserum, despicabile, contemnendum.[2103]

MEMB. IV.

SUBSECT. I—Non-necessary, remote, outward, adventitious, or accidental causes: as first from the Nurse.

Of those remote, outward, ambient, necessary causes, I have sufficiently discoursed in the precedent member, the non-necessary follow; of which, saith [2104]Fuchsius, no art can be made, by reason of their uncertainty, casualty, and multitude; so called “not necessary” because according to [2105]Fernelius, “they may be avoided, and used without necessity.” Many of these accidental causes, which I shall entreat of here, might have well been reduced to the former, because they cannot be avoided, but fatally happen to us, though accidentally, and unawares, at some time or other; the rest are contingent and inevitable, and more properly inserted in this rank of causes. To reckon up all is a thing impossible; of some therefore most remarkable of these contingent causes which produce melancholy, I will briefly speak and in their order.

From a child's nativity, the first ill accident that can likely befall him in this kind is a bad nurse, by whose means alone he may be tainted with this [2106]malady from his cradle, Aulus Gellius l. 12. c. 1. brings in Phavorinus, that eloquent philosopher, proving this at large, [2107] “that there is the same virtue and property in the milk as in the seed, and not in men alone, but in all other creatures; he gives instance in a kid and lamb, if either of them suck of the other's milk, the lamb of the goat's, or the kid of the ewe's, the wool of the one will be hard, and the hair of the other soft.” Giraldus Cambrensis Itinerar. Cambriae, l. 1. c. 2. confirms this by a notable example which happened in his time. A sow-pig by chance sucked a brach, and when she was grown [2108]“would miraculously hunt all manner of deer, and that as well, or rather better, than any ordinary hound.” His conclusion is, [2109]“that men and beasts participate of her nature and conditions by whose milk they are fed.” Phavorinus urges it farther, and demonstrates it more evidently, that if a nurse be [2110]“misshapen, unchaste, dishonest, impudent, [2111]cruel, or the like, the child that sucks upon her breast will be so too;” all other affections of the mind and diseases are almost engrafted, as it were, and imprinted into the temperature of the infant, by the nurse's milk; as pox, leprosy, melancholy, &c. Cato for some such reason would make his servants' children suck upon his wife's breast, because by that means they would love him and his the better, and in all likelihood agree with them. A more evident example that the minds are altered by milk cannot be given, than that of [2112]Dion, which he relates of Caligula's cruelty; it could neither be imputed to father nor mother, but to his cruel nurse alone, that anointed her paps with blood still when he sucked, which made him such a murderer, and to express her cruelty to a hair: and that of Tiberius, who was a common drunkard, because his nurse was such a one. Et si delira fuerit ([2113]one observes) infantulum delirum faciet, if she be a fool or dolt, the child she nurseth will take after her, or otherwise be misaffected; which Franciscus Barbarus l. 2. c. ult. de re uxoria proves at full, and Ant. Guivarra, lib. 2. de Marco Aurelio: the child will surely participate. For bodily sickness there is no doubt to be made. Titus, Vespasian's son, was therefore sickly, because the nurse was so, Lampridius. And if we may believe physicians, many times children catch the pox from a bad nurse, Botaldus cap. 61. de lue vener. Besides evil attendance, negligence, and many gross inconveniences, which are incident to nurses, much danger may so come to the child. [2114]For these causes Aristotle Polit. lib. 7. c. 17. Phavorinus and Marcus Aurelius would not have a child put to nurse at all, but every mother to bring up her own, of what condition soever she be; for a sound and able mother to put out her child to nurse, is naturae intemperies, so [2115]Guatso calls it, 'tis fit therefore she should be nurse herself; the mother will be more careful, loving, and attendant, than any servile woman, or such hired creatures; this all the world acknowledgeth, convenientissimum est (as Rod. a Castro de nat. mulierum. lib. 4. c. 12. in many words confesseth) matrem ipsam lactare infantem, “It is most fit that the mother should suckle her own infant”—who denies that it should be so?—and which some women most curiously observe; amongst the rest, [2116]that queen of France, a Spaniard by birth, that was so precise and zealous in this behalf, that when in her absence a strange nurse had suckled her child, she was never quiet till she had made the infant vomit it up again. But she was too jealous. If it be so, as many times it is, they must be put forth, the mother be not fit or well able to be a nurse, I would then advise such mothers, as [2117]Plutarch doth in his book de liberis educandis and [2118]S. Hierom, li. 2. epist. 27. Laetae de institut. fil. Magninus part 2. Reg. sanit. cap. 7. and the said Rodericus, that they make choice of a sound woman, of a good complexion, honest, free from bodily diseases, if it be possible, all passions and perturbations of the mind, as sorrow, fear, grief, [2119]folly, melancholy. For such passions corrupt the milk, and alter the temperature of the child, which now being [2120] Udum et molle lutum, “a moist and soft clay,” is easily seasoned and perverted. And if such a nurse may be found out, that will be diligent and careful withal, let Phavorinus and M. Aurelius plead how they can against it, I had rather accept of her in some cases than the mother herself, and which Bonacialus the physician, Nic. Biesius the politician, lib. 4. de repub. cap. 8. approves, [2121]“Some nurses are much to be preferred to some mothers.” For why may not the mother be naught, a peevish drunken flirt, a waspish choleric slut, a crazed piece, a fool (as many mothers are), unsound as soon as the nurse? There is more choice of nurses than mothers; and therefore except the mother be most virtuous, staid, a woman of excellent good parts, and of a sound complexion, I would have all children in such cases committed to discreet strangers. And 'tis the only way; as by marriage they are engrafted to other families to alter the breed, or if anything be amiss in the mother, as Ludovicus Mercatus contends, Tom. 2. lib. de morb. haered. to prevent diseases and future maladies, to correct and qualify the child's ill-disposed temperature, which he had from his parents. This is an excellent remedy, if good choice be made of such a nurse.

SUBSECT. II.—Education a Cause of Melancholy.

Education, of these accidental causes of melancholy, may justly challenge the next place, for if a man escape a bad nurse, he may be undone by evil bringing up. [2122]Jason Pratensis puts this of education for a principal cause; bad parents, stepmothers, tutors, masters, teachers, too rigorous, too severe, too remiss or indulgent on the other side, are often fountains and furtherers of this disease. Parents and such as have the tuition and oversight of children, offend many times in that they are too stern, always threatening, chiding, brawling, whipping, or striking; by means of which their poor children are so disheartened and cowed, that they never after have any courage, a merry hour in their lives, or take pleasure in anything. There is a great moderation to be had in such things, as matters of so great moment to the making or marring of a child. Some fright their children with beggars, bugbears, and hobgoblins, if they cry, or be otherwise unruly: but they are much to blame in it, many times, saith Lavater, de spectris, part. 1, cap. 5. ex metu in morbos graves incidunt et noctu dormientes clamant, for fear they fall into many diseases, and cry out in their sleep, and are much the worse for it all their lives: these things ought not at all, or to be sparingly done, and upon just occasion. Tyrannical, impatient, hair-brain schoolmasters, aridi magistri, so [2123]Fabius terms them, Ajaces flagelliferi, are in this kind as bad as hangmen and executioners, they make many children endure a martyrdom all the while they are at school, with bad diet, if they board in their houses, too much severity and ill-usage, they quite pervert their temperature of body and mind: still chiding, railing, frowning, lashing, tasking, keeping, that they are fracti animis, moped many times, weary of their lives, [2124]nimia severitate deficiunt et desperant, and think no slavery in the world (as once I did myself) like to that of a grammar scholar. Praeceptorum ineptiis discruciantur ingenia puerorum, [2125] saith Erasmus, they tremble at his voice, looks, coming in. St. Austin, in the first book of his confess. et 4 ca. calls this schooling meliculosam necessitatem, and elsewhere a martyrdom, and confesseth of himself, how cruelly he was tortured in mind for learning Greek, nulla verba noveram, et saevis terroribus et poenis, ut nossem, instabatur mihi vehementer, I know nothing, and with cruel terrors and punishment I was daily compelled. [2126]Beza complains in like case of a rigorous schoolmaster in Paris, that made him by his continual thunder and threats once in a mind to drown himself, had he not met by the way with an uncle of his that vindicated him from that misery for the time, by taking him to his house. Trincavellius, lib. 1. consil. 16. had a patient nineteen years of age, extremely melancholy, ob nimium studium, Tarvitii et praeceptoris minas, by reason of overmuch study, and his [2127]tutor's threats. Many masters are hard-hearted, and bitter to their servants, and by that means do so deject, with terrible speeches and hard usage so crucify them, that they become desperate, and can never be recalled.