Her quick'ning power in euery lining part,
Doth as a nurse, or as a mother serue;
And doth employ her oeconomicke art,
And busie care, her houshold to preserue
Here she attracts, and there she doth retaine,
There she decocts, and doth the food prepare;
There she distributes it to euery vaine,
There she expels what she may fitly spare.
This power to Martha may comparèd be,[124]
Which busie was, the houshold-things to doe;
Or to a Dryas, liuing in a tree:[125]
For euen to trees this power is proper too.
And though the Soule may not this power extend
Out of the body, but still vse it there;
She hath a power which she abroad doth send,
Which views and searcheth all things euery where.
The Power of Sense.
This power is Sense, which from abroad doth bring[126]
The colour, taste, and touch, and sent,[127] and sound;
The quantitie, and shape of euery thing
Within th' Earth's center, or Heauen's circle found.
This power, in parts made fit, fit obiects takes,
Yet not the things, but forms of things receiues;
As when a seale in waxe impression makes,
The print therein, but not it selfe it leaues.
And though things sensible be numberlesse,
But onely fiue the Senses' organs be;
And in those fiue, all things their formes expresse,
Which we can touch, taste, feele, or heare, or see.
These are the windows throgh the which she views
The light of knowledge, which is life's loadstar:
"And yet while she these spectacles doth vse,
"Oft worldly things seeme greater then they are.
Sight.