stand how they made serpents out of rods: frogs, and blood of water, were worth half Porta's magic. Hermolaus Barbarus was scarce in his wits, when, upon conference with a spirit, he would demand no other question than an explication of Aristotle's Entelecheia. Appion, the grammarian, that would raise the ghost of Homer to decide the controversy of his country, made a frivolous and pedantic use of necromancy, and Philostratus did as little, that called up the ghost of Achilles for a particular of the story of Troy. Smarter curiosities would have been at the great elixir, the flux and reflux of the sea, with other noble obscurities in nature; but, probably, all in vain: in matters cognoscible and framed for our disquisition, our industry must be our Oracle, and reason our Apollo. Not to know things without the arch of our intellectuals, or what spirits apprehend, is the imperfection of our nature, not our knowledge, and rather inscience than ignorance in man. Revelation might render a great part of the creation easy, which now seems beyond the stretch of human indagation; and welcome no doubt from good hands might be a true almagest, and great celestial construction; a clear system of the planetical bodies of the invisible and seeming useless stars unto us; of the many suns in the eight sphere; what they are; what they contain; and to what more immediately those stupendous bodies are serviceable. But being not hinted in the authentic revelation of God, nor known how far their discoveries are stinted; if they should come unto us from the mouth of evil spirits, the belief thereof might be as unsafe as the enquiry.7 This is a copious subject; but having exceeded the bounds of a letter, I will not now pursue it further. I am, 7 enquiry.] MS. Sloan. adds this sentence, "and how far to credit the father of darkness and great obscurer of Yours, &c. truth, might yet be obscure unto us." Here the MS. terminates. TRACT XII.1 1 A PROPHECY CONCERNING THE FUTURE STATE OF SEVERAL NATIONS, IN A LETTER WRITTEN UPON OCCASION OF AN OLD PROPHECY SENT TO THE AUTHOR FROM A FRIEND WITH A REQUEST THAT HE WOULD CONSIDER IT. SIR, I TAKE no pleasure in prophecies so hardly intelligible, and pointing at future things from a pretended spirit of divination; of which sort this seems to be which came unto your hand, and you were pleased to send unto me. And therefore, for your easier apprehension, divertisement, and con TRACT XII.] Dr. Johnson remarks, that in this tract the author plainly discovers his expectation to be the same with that entertained lately with more confidence by Dr. Berkley, "that America will be the seat of the fifth empire." If this alludes to Berkley's favourite "Scheme for Converting the Savage Americans to Christianity," no just comparison can be drawn between it and Browne's speculations on the possible advancement of the New World in political consequence. I can, however, find nothing in Berkley about "America becoming the seat of the fifth empire," unless it be in his "Verses on the prospect of planting arts and learning' there; which he closes, after an allusion to the four ages, (viz. of gold, silver, brass, and iron,) by anticipating the arrival of a second age of gold, which he terms the "fifth act in the course of empire." Many of the more important speculations of our author, respecting the New World, remain, after a lapse of nearly two centuries, matter of speculation still; -though, perhaps, to judge from the course of events since Sir Thomas wrote, we may not unreasonably look forward to their more complete fulfilment. A very spirited writer in our own days has indulged himself (in the specimen number of The Argus newspaper,) with a similar anticipation of events yet (if ever) to come.-By the provisions of that abomination-in a land of liberty and literature-the STAMP ACT, it was forbidden to relate real incidents, unless on stamped paper. He therefore filled his paper with imaginary events. Some of his paragraphs relating to "Foreign Affairs" may afford an amusing parallel to the present tract. "Despatches have been this morning received at the Foreign Office, from the allied Greek and Polish army before Moscow, announcing a truce between the allies and the besieged, under the mediaation of the federative republic of France. Negociations for a final pacification are to be immediately entered on, under the joint mediation of Great Britain, France, and Austria; and it is confidently hoped that the united efforts of these powers to put an end to the destructive five years' war, will be finally successful, and will end in the acknowledgement, by the Emperor Nicholas, of the independence of the crown of Warsaw, in the person of Constantine." "As we gather these facts from what may be considered official sources, we give them this prominent place, out of the general order of our foreign news, on which we now enter, however, in detail, having carefully examined all the sideration, I present you with a very different kind of prediction: not positively or peremptorily telling you what shall come to pass, yet pointing at things not without all reason or probability of their events; not built upon fatal decrees or inevitable designations, but upon conjectural foundations, whereby things wished may be promoted, and such as are feared may more probably be prevented. The Prophecy. WHEN New England shall trouble New Spain; And Mexico shall prove a Madrid; When Mahomet's ships on the Baltic shall ride, letters of this morning's mail, from our established and exclusive correspondents; not doubting but that many will be a little surprised at the extent and variety, to say nothing of the novelty and interest, of the facts thus, for the first time, made public." "United Empire of America.-Since the last census of the United Empire of North and South America, it has been found that the population now amounts to 180,620,000 inhabitants, including the whole country, from Cape Horn to the Frozen Sea; Upper and Lower Canada, as well as Peru and Patagonia, being now incorporated in the Union. The General Senate still holds its Parliament in the magnificent city of Columbus, which reaches quite across the Isthmus of Darien, and has its fortifications washed by the Atlantic on one side, and the Pacific on the other, while the two Provincial Senates are held at Washington for the north, and at Bolivar for the south, thus preserving the memory of the first great discoverer, and the two greatest patriots, of this magnificent quarter of the globe." "Turkey. Since the elevation of Count Capo d'Istria to the throne of the New Greek Kingdom of the East, tranquillity reigns at Constantinople, and that city promises again to be the centre of commerce and the arts." "China.-Letters from the capital of China state, that there are now not less than fifty commission-houses of Liverpool merchants established at Pekin alone, besides several agents from London establishments, and a few depôts for Birmingham and Manchester goods. The English nankeens are much preferred by the Chinese over their own, and Staffordshire porcelain is sold at nearly twice the price of the original china manufacture, in the bazaars." Syria.-Lady Hester Stanhope had left her beautiful residence between Tyre and Sidon, as well as her summer retreat amid the snows and cedars of Lebanon, and taken up her new abode in the valley of Jehoshaphat, between the Mount of Olives and Mount Zion, at Jerusalem. Her ladyship, though growing old, still retained all her benevolence and vivacity; and her house was the chief resort of all the intelligent visitors to the Jewish capital, which was increasing in splendour every day." 58. 2 6 trouble.] Terrify.'-MS. Rawl. 3 And Turks, &c.] 'When we shall have ports on the Pacific side.'-MS. Rawl. 58. When Africa shall no more sell out their blacks, To make slaves and drudges to the American tracts; * Nor count them their lords but their fellows in trade; The Exposition of the Prophecy. When New England shall trouble New Spain; THAT is, when that thriving colony, which hath so much encreased in our days, and in the space of about fifty years, that they can, as they report, raise between twenty and thirty thousand men upon an exigency, shall in process of time be so advanced, as to be able to send forth ships and fleets, and to infestR the American Spanish ports and maritime dominions by depredations or assaults; for which attempts they are not like to be unprovided, as abounding in the materials for shipping, oak and fir. And when length of time shall so far encrease that industrious people, that the neighbouring country will not contain them, they will range still farther and be able, in time, to set forth great armies, seek for new possessions, or make considerable and conjoined migrations, ac cording to the custom of swarming northern nations; wherein it is not likely that they will move northward, but toward the southern and richer countries, which are either in the dominions or frontiers of the Spaniards: and may not improbably erect new dominions in places not yet thought of, and yet, for some centuries, beyond their power or ambition. When Jamaica shall be lady of the isles and the main; That is, when that advantageous island shall be well peopled, it may become so strong and potent as to overpower the neighbouring isles, and also a part of the main land, especially the maritime parts. And already in their infancy they have given testimony of their power and courage in their bold attempts upon Campeche and Santa Martha; and in that notable attempt upon Panama on the western side of America: especially considering this island is sufficiently large to contain a numerous people, of a northern and warlike descent, addicted to martial affairs both by sea and land, and advantageously seated to infest their neighbours both of the isles and the continent, and like to be a receptacle for colonies of the same originals from Barbadoes and the neighbour isles. When Spain shall be in America hid, That is, when Spain, either by unexpected disasters or continued emissions of people into America, which have already thinned the country, shall be farther exhausted at home; or when, in process of time, their colonies shall grow by many accessions more than their originals, then Mexico may become a Madrid, and as considerable in people, wealth, and splendour: wherein that place is already so well advanced, that accounts scarce credible are given of it. And it is so advantageously seated, that, by Acapulco and other ports on the south sea, they may maintain a communication and commerce with the Indian isles and territories, and with China and Japan, and on this side, by Porto Bello and others, hold correspondence with Europe and Africa. |