Sivut kuvina
PDF
ePub
[ocr errors]

in the fame kind. Preternatural fleep, and preternatural watching, are altogether inconfiftent; and therefore an apoplexy, and a frenzy, are in no wife incident to the same person at the fame time: So alfo natural fleep and natural watching are inconfiftent one with another, and not competible to the same age; but are to be found in man at as great a distance as his life will give way for; Senibus naturale est vigilare, pueris dormire; but when they are one of one kind, and another of another, namely, preternatural sleep, and natural watching, they may both of them without any incongruity at all, be reckoned up as the symptoms of old age.

[ocr errors]

I make the more of this distinction, (though very common and ordinary) and so I would have others do too, because of its univerfal ufe upon this occafion; for not only here, but in most of the other descriptions of age, it hath its place for the decifion of controverfies; in the very laft defcription, pigra & tarda alvi depofitio was numbred as a fymptom of age, because the spincter ani is hardly and seldom restracted for the natural evacuation of the excrements of that kind; yet alvi humiditates * are reckoned as an attendant on the same state, because without any opening of the door, there is a preternatural flux that way. So alfo in their urine, there is a continual stopping, and

* Hipp. 1. 3. Apho. ult.

yet

yet withal a continual dropping. The teeth are relaxed by reafon of drinefs, and yet moifture expels them their fockets. Siccity of the eyes is their chiefeft disease, and yet they run with a continual rheum; hardness and drinefs. alfo is the temper of the brain, and yet it is always diftilling coryza's and catarrhs. In a word, this diftinction will be found of moft general use, forafmuch as there is fuch an intricate mixture of naturality and preternaturality in age, fo that that plain and easy defcription which is usually given of it, seems to me ingenious and moft fignificant. Senectus eft morbus naturalis.

All the daughters of mufick fhall be brought low.

The organs that have reference to mufick in the body of man (befide which I would by no means feek an interpretation) are of two forts. They are either fuch as make mufick themfelves, or fuch as take and receive the mufick that is by others made; the first of these I call, the active daughters of musick, forasmuch as they are themselves mufical, and every one of them bear their part in making of it; the other I call, the paffive daughters of mufick, forafmuch as they only receive it, taking delight in that, of which they have not the least share in making.

The Chaldee paraphrase hath reference to the first of these, when it faith, remittentur labia

tua

tua à dicendo cantico. The lips, and whatfoever other parts in man, are any way inftrumental unto finging, may be very well fignified unto us by the cantatrices mulieres, or female choristers in the text; and these are very many in our bodies. For befide those remote helpers, the thorax, the diaphragma, the muscles, the nerves, the glandules, &c. There are three feveral kinds of organs, that do more immediately, and yet diftinctly and gradually conduce to the production of vocal mufick. The first, are those that prepare and adminster the matter for a found; the fecond, are thofe that form that found into a voice; the third, are those that modulate that voice unto musick.

The first of these, are none other than the lungs, which are the proper inftruments of our breathing; which how excellent it is in itself, and how neceffary to our being, the fcriptures of God do demonftrate without compare, Gen. ii. 7. Job xii. 10. The life of man in this world, runs parallel with his breath, Pfal. civ. 29. All the while my breath is in me, and the Spirit of God is in my noftrils, Job xxvii. 3. and the death of man is ftill fignified by the departure of his breath; it is faid of the widow's child, He had no more breath left in him, 1 Kings xvii. 17. Pfal. cxlvi. 4. Plainly throughout the whole word of God, breath and life, and foul and fpirit, are fynonymous, and often made exegetical one of another. Among other excellencies

of

of breathing, that whereby it is made inftrumental to speech and harmony is not the leaft; in all wind mufick, there must be firft a gathering of the air into fome cavity to contain it, and afterward a preffing of it forth into those pipes or holes, that are artificially made for the dividing it unto its appointed end; now of this kind of mufick is the voice, and the lungs being of a light, soft, spongy substance, are those parts, that do both draw in, contain, and prefs forth the air, the matter of the voice, according as there is occafion. And those creatures that have no lungs have consequently no voice; so that fishes, which are herein deficient, are mute even to a proverb. And man himself, if by reason of any preternatural matter stuffing the lungs, or by reason of any violent motion, or long expiration, he becomes out of breath, he is not able to speak, much lefs to fing, till he have recovered it again.

The fecond fort of organs that conduce to mufick, are fuch, as form the breath into a voice; and they by logicians, under whofe fubject they do directly fall, are accounted nine, numbred up in this following distich:

Inftrumenta novem, funt guttur, lingua, palatum, Quatuor & dentes, ac duo labra fimul.*

And moreover, hence it is that the wifeft of grammarians, obferving that the feveral words,

* Smith aditus ad Log. 1. c. 2.

by

by which man uttereth his voice, are formed against these several parts, sometime more against one, sometime more against another; have aptly divided their letters, the first compounding parts of words, into gutturales, linguales, palatinas, dentales, & labiales, according as in their pronunciation they bear themselves the hardest against either of those parts.

That part which these two artists have called guttur, anatomists do more strictly and properly call, trachea five afpera arteria; and fince the word artery is derived ἀπὸ τῶ τὸν αέρα Tnge, this of all the parts of the body may primarily and moft aptly bear that name: for this is the great conduit-pipe of air in respiration; it gives pass unto it in inspiration, and and in expiration (whereby the voice is framed) it gives a certain impreffion, which is the first alteration of it towards articulation; which impreffion doth remain in the voice when perfected; fo that if these parts do first dispose the voice to hoarfness or fhrilnefs, or any other preternatural tone, the whole speech hath a tincture of the fame imperfection. And hence it is, that the Welch pronunciation being performed by too hard a collifion of the air against these parts, makes all their letters and words to become guttural.

The second inftrument of the voice is the tongue, and this, by reafon of its fungous fubftance, and volubility, is fo meet, and fo principal

« EdellinenJatka »