In another part of the preface he says:—
“Not that I will attribute to myself the name of a prophet, but as a mortal man, being no farther from heaven by my sense than I am from earth by my feet, possum errare, falli, decipi, I am the greatest sinner of the world, subject to all humane afflictions, but being surprised sometimes in the week by a prophetical humour, and by a long calculation, pleasing myself in my study, I have made books of prophecies, &c.”
He speaks also of the mode of enlightenment, “by a long melancholy inspiration revealed,” and says it takes “its original from above, and such light and small flame is of all efficacy and sublimity, no less than the natural light makes the philosophers so secure.” All this justifies fully the distich, so far as motive goes:—
“Vera loquor, non falsa loquor sed munere cœli,
Qui loquitur Deus est, non ego Nostradamus.”
He opens the first “Century” with an announcement (by some called an incantation) of the methods by which he prepared himself for the reception of the knowledge of future things:
“Estant assis, de nuit secrette estude,
Seul, reposé sur la selle d’airain,
Flambe exigue, sortant de solitude,
Fait proferer qui n’est a croire vain.”
“Sitting by night, in secret study alone, resting on a brazen seat, a slight flame arising out of the solitude makes me utter things not vain to be believed.”
“La verge en main, mise au milieu des Branches,
De l’onde je mouille et le Limb et le Pied,
En peur j’escris fremissant par les manches;
Splendeur Divine: le Divine prez s’assied.”
“With wand in hand placed amidst the branches, I wet with water the limb and foot, and write in fear, trembling in my sleeves; “Splendour divine! the Divinity sits at hand.’ ”
A tranquillised mind is requisite to prophecy. We find Elisha (2 Kings iii. 15) requiring a minstrel to play, that the hand of the Lord may come upon him. External objects disturb the senses, so that night is best for contemplation, as Malebranche is said to have shut himself up in a dark room to study and think out his “Recherche de la Vérité.” Solitude is essential to prophecy. A man cannot commune with heaven in the busy haunts of men. Nature is the presence-chamber of the Deity. Every man of sensibility knows this; and the prophet most of all men feels the pith and central depth of Pope’s fine line, and that he must reach prophecy “Looking through Nature up to Nature’s God.” Society demands that you sacrifice your convictions constantly to good manners. Social convention contaminates noble originality and high principle. Truth never dwells in the court of kings, and the drawing-rooms of the well-to-do are no fitter for its shrine, for the men and women there are royalties divested of respect and state-trappings; they are over-pampered humanities for the most part: to be much in their company you must compromise the divinest part of you—your convictions—and it is by pursuing conviction that the soul flies heavenward. One might write an essay on the Brazen Stool with its proverb ex tripode loqui, but anyhow these opening verses convey to the mind with wonderful brevity a vivid picture of a mediæval magician at his work.