have affigned unto it three operations, viz. reception, retention, and rendition; that this faculty doth not only keep, what is committed to it, (which indeed it doth most faithfully,) but that it doth also take into cuftody, that which it keeps; and deliver it up again, when called for; hereby making the memory, both condus, and promus, of the things therein contained, and giving unto it fuch a power, as many noblemen to their butlers, whereby they become more mafters of what is contained in their cellars than they that made them. Now if we will divide aright, and give unto the memory that which is its; and unto the underftanding and imagination that which is theirs ; we shall foon understand how fpecies of a diverfe nature, whether fenfitive or intelligible; more or lefs fpiritualized; and diverfly circumftantiated, in respect of time, or place, or whatsoever elfe may alter them; may eafily be contained within the the fame faculty without multiplication. Say we, that the understanding and imagination, as they make their feveral fpecies, so also they take them, and they lay them up in the memory as they are by them altered or circumftantiated; and as they have occafion to make use of them, they look for them, and find them treasured up in the same nature, order, and manner, that they put them in; and from thence they themselves take them out again: The memory in the mean time doing no nothing at all, towards either the receiving them, or delivering them up, but only exercifing its paffive power in the keeping of them; which keeping alfo is nothing elfe, but the duration of that impreffion (without any act, or endeavour, or knowledge, on the part of the memory) which the more fuperior faculties make; the memory being most truly that which the philofophers have usually said of the will, cæca potentia; keeping those things committed to its charge, with no more knowledge, or action, than the wax doth the impreffion, or the paper the writing thereon made, or the coffer the treasure therein repofited: Which being fo, it may easily contain things of a divers nature, and as much diverfified in respect of circumftances, as the fupeFior faculties can poffibly make them. The fame coffer may eafily preserve the gold of one man, and the filver of another, till they each of them come, and take their own goods again. And thus we understand, that the power of this faculty in man is only paffive, and its only work is to retain those things that are committed to its charge; which work it performs with great trust, so long as man abides in ftrength, but as he declines in age, fo alfo doth this faculty in its use; not only unfaithfully and confusedly retaining the images that are made upon it, but oftentimes letting them flip. -Nec Nee Nomina fervorum, nec vultum agnofcit amici And as it is faid, concerning the greater world, when it shall draw towards its end, The fun fhall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the ftars fall fall from heaven, and all the powers of the heavens fhall be fhaken, Mat. xxiv. 29. fo alfo may it as well be faid in that world's epitomy, Man: As he shall draw towards his end, his understanding fhall be darkened, his imagination fhall be weakened, and withhold its light, and those things that were fixed in the memory shall fall from thence, and all the powers of the mind fhall be broken; and this is that which to me seems the true meaning of this fecond verfe. And hence we may gather how fad man's condition must needs be in this last Age of his, in respect of his mind. The diseases and symp toms which do neceffarily arise from the dar kening of these luminaries are these which foltow. Mentis imbecillitas, hebetudo, ftupiditas, fatuitas; púgwors, (i. e.) ftultitia, tarditas ingenii, judicii defectus; dvora, (i. e.) amentia, mebancholia, defipientia, memoria imminuta, abolita: And these proceed from the darkning of the feveral and particular lights; there are others: alfo alfo incident to age that shake all the powers of the heavens at once, and they are Vertigo, Carus, and Apoplexia. And these are the miferable attendants of this feeble frate, which is fo much the more to be lamented, by how much the lefs it is to be helped. Sad are the infirmifies before mentioned in any age, and most difficultly do they receive their cure; but in this they admit of none at all. Some means may be by phyficians ufed for the proroguing of of them, and keeping them off for a time; and for the mitigation of their violent affaults, but for the total preventing, or the abfolute curing, let no man living hope for. ἐδ' ἀσκληπιάδας τέτο ἔδωκε Θεός. And this the enfuing proverb doth fufficiently confirm. Nor the clouds return after the rain. Having before fhewed, that the precedent words do not fignify the infirmities of the eyes, I need fay no more, to fhew that thefe do not intimate the rheums or diftillations from the eyes or head, falling upon any of the subject ed parts. It will be enough plainly to declare, that these words fignify, that the miferies and infirmities of old age, do unceffantly and unavoidably fucceed one upon another, as the fhowers in April. And they are placed here in the midft between the defcriptions of the infir mities of the mind which preceded, and thofe of the body which immediately follow; as having reference to them both. Whereby we must understand, that all the infirmities that appertain to this ftate, whether they be those of the mind, or thofe of the body, do immediately follow one upon another, and one paroxyfm upon another, and that without remedy. Nubes poft imbrem, is a known Adage, fignifying, the speedy fucceffion of miferies upon miferies; as on the contrary is fignified joy and happinefs, after affliction, by that proverb, Poft nubila Phoebus. The infirmities in this allegory mentioned, if they shall at any time fall upon a man in any other age, may poffibly be eafed : And if fo, there is good hopes that they may be kept from redintegration, or ever returning more; but in this age no fuch hopes; if their violence may poffibly be for a time remitted, yet they will as certainly return again, as the clouds after a rain in a rainy feason. Now when the weather is (as we usually say) fet in to rain, it is wonderful to fee, how quick the clouds will rife and ride one after another, and every one, the smalleft of them, pour down rain upon the earth beyond all expectation. And if there fhall be any small interval between shower and fhower, and the fun at any time begin to peep out between the clouds, it is foon darkened again; and the clouds return thicker and blacker, and the fhowers greater |
