tree, about which he moves, whilst they stand unmoveable. Some sail so long on the sea of controversies, tossed up and down, to and fro, pro and con, that the very ground to them seems to move, and their judgments grow skeptical and unstable in the most settled points of divinity. When he cometh to preach, especially if to a plain auditory, with the Paracelsians he extracts an oil out of the driest and hardest bodies; and knowing that knotty timber is unfit to build with, he edifies people with easy and profitable matter.

THE TRUE CHURCH ANTIQUARY.

He is a traveller into former times, whence he hath learnt their language and fashions. If he meets with an old manuscript, which hath the mark worn out of its mouth, and hath lost the date, yet he can tell the age thereof, either by the phrase or character.

He baits at middle antiquity, but lodges not till he comes at that which is ancient indeed. Some scour off the rust of old inscriptions into their own souls, cankering themselves with superstition, having read so often "orate pro anima," that at last they fall a praying for the departed;

and they more lament the ruin of monasteries, than the decay and ruin of monks' lives, degenerating from their ancient piety and painfulness. Indeed, a little skill in antiquity inclines a man to Popery; but depth in that study brings him about again to our religion. A nobleman who had heard of the extreme age of one dwelling not far off, made a journey to visit him, and finding an aged person sitting in the chimney corner, addressed himself unto him with admiration of his age, till his mistake was rectified: for, "Oh Sir," said the young-old man, "I am not he whom you seek for, but his son; my father is farther off in the field." The same error is daily committed by the Romish Church, adoring the reverend brow and gray hairs of some ancient ceremonies, perchance but of some seven or eight hundred years' standing in the church, and mistake these for their fathers, of far greater age in the primitive times.

He desires to imitate the ancient Fathers, as well in their piety, as in their postures; not only conforming his hands and knees, but chiefly his heart to their pattern. O the holiness of their living, and painfulness of their preaching! How full were they of mortified thoughts, and heavenly meditations! Let us not make the ceremonial part of their lives only canonical, and the moral part thereof altogether apocrypha, imitating their

devotion not in the fineness of the stuff, but only in the fashion of the making.

He carefully marks the declination of the Church from the primitive purity; observing how sometimes humble devotion was contented to lie down, whilst proud superstition got on her back. Yea, not only Frederick the Emperor, but many a godly Father some hundreds of years before, held the Pope's stirrup, and by their wellmeaning simplicity gave occasion to his future greatness. He takes notice how their rhetorical hyperboles were afterwards accounted the just measure of dogmatical truths; how plain people took them at their word in their funeral apostrophes to the dead; how praying for the departed brought the fuel, under which after ages kindled the fire of purgatory; how one ceremony begat another, there being no bounds in will-worship, wherewith one may sooner be wearied than satisfied, the inventors of new ceremonies endeavoring to supply in number, what their conceits want in solidity; how men's souls being in the full speed and career of the historical use of pictures, could not stop short, but must lash out into superstition; how the Fathers, vailing their bonnets to Rome in civil courtesy, when making honorable mention thereof, are interpreted by modern Papists to have done it in adoration of the idol of the Pope's infallibility. All these

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things he ponders in his heart, observing both the times and places, when and where they hap pened.

He is not zealous for the introducing of old useless ceremonies. The mischief is, some that are most violent to bring such in, are most negligent to preach the cautions in using them; and simple people, like children in eating of fish, swallow bones and all, to their danger of choking. Besides, what is observed of horse-hairs, that lying nine days in water they turn to snakes; so some ceremonies, though dead at first, in continuance of time quicken, get stings, and may do much mischief, especially if in such an age wherein the meddling of some have justly awaked the jealousy of all. When many Popish tricks are abroad in the country, if then men meet with a ceremony which is a stranger, especially if it can give but a bad account of itself, no wonder if the watch take it up for one on suspicion.

He is not peremptory but conjectural in doubtful matters; not forcing others to his own opinion, but leaving them to their own liberty; not filling up all with his own conjectures, to leave no room for other men: nor tramples he on their credits, if in them he finds slips and mistakes. For here our souls have but one eye, (the Apostle saith, we know in part"): be not proud if that chance to come athwart thy seeing side, which meets with the blind side of another.

He thankfully acknowledgeth those by whom he hath profited. Base natured they, who, when they have quenched their own thirst, stop up, at least muddy, the fountain. But our antiquary, if he be not the first founder of a commendable conceit, contents himself to be a benefactor to it in clearing and adorning it.

He affects not fanciful singularity in his behavior; nor cares to have a proper mark in writing of words, to disguise some peculiar letter from the ordinary character. Others, for fear travellers should take no notice that skill in antiquity dwells in such a head, hang out an antique hat for the sign, or use some obsolete garb in their garments, gestures, or discourse.

He doth not so adore the ancients as to des

pise the moderns. Grant them but dwarfs, yet stand they on giants' shoulders, and may see the further. Sure, as stout champions of truth follow in the rear, as ever marched in the front. Besides, as one excellently observes, " antiquitas seculi juventus mundi."* These times are the ancient times, when the world is ancient; and not those which we count ancient "ordine retrogrado," by a computation backwards from ourselves.

* Sir Francis Bacon, Advancement of Learning.