the cords and pullies towards the appointed ends; we perceive outward objects, and move ourselves at pleasure, fo as that an artificial man, could there be in it the fame organs, and the fame difpofition of them all, together with an active power to put them in execution would have a like fenfe and motion with ourselves. The Chaldee paraphrafe doth interpret this cord to the ligula linguæ, the string of the tongue; others interpret it to the spinalis medulla, the marrow of the back; others; to the nerves; others, to the outward tunicle of the nerves and marrow, which they have proper to themselves, for their own ftrength; befide the other two which they receive from the brain. All thefe have offered exceeding well, and without doubt have hit the truth, and being put together may seem to make the whole of what is here intended, which is the whole inftrument of fenfe and motion, after it hath proceeded out of the fcull, and as it is diftributed throughout the body; with all its coats and tunicles, with all its divifions and feparations. I mean, not only the fpinal mar row is here to be understood, (as principally it ought to be) but all the nerves arifing thencefrom, (both those feven pair, be they more more or lefs, that proceed from it, before it hath attained any of the spines; and thofe thirty pair, that proceed from the I feveral vertebra of the neck, the back, the loins, and the os facrum) and alfo the filaments, and fibres, and tendons, that proceed from all thofe nerves. The nerves and fibres muft in no wife be here left out, forafmuch as they do more apparently both unite and draw, than any other of the parts whatsoever. Job faith, thou hast fenced me with bones and with finews, Job x. 11. I compare these fences of a man, to those of an hedge; where the bones answer to the stakes in the hedge, making the substantial trunk of the body, unto which all the other parts are to be fastened: and the finews or nerves to the binders of the hedge; which faften and unite all the others parts to that trunk and as for motion or drawing, it is well known that there is none in all the body performed, (whether voluntary or natural) but by the influence of the animal spirits upon the nerves and fibres, and their contraction thereupon, in those several parts, into which they are inferted. Now, altho' all the feveral and innumerable filaments are to be accounted hereunto, yet, they are moft aptly expreffed in the fingular number, by funiculus argenteus, the filver cord, because they are but the continuation of the fame thing: The fibres being nothing else but the nerves divided and disperfed, and the nerves nothing elfe but the marrow in like manner feparated, as fo many arms and branches of the fame tree; they are all all one in their original, the brain; they are all one in their continuation for a long time, in the fpine; they are all one in their colour, white; they are all one in their form, long and round; they are all one in their coats, having each the fame three tunicles; they are all one in their ufe, to convey the animal fpirits, and all this is an apt resemblance to a cord; to which also they are not unlike in their divifion, for then they are but as fo many wreaths, or wattles of the fame cord; and that which is moft obfervable to our prefent purpose, is, that by how much the more diftant they are from their original, by fo much the thinner and finer, the harder and more compact do they grow, like the feveral fmaller and better twisted ends of the fame cord. It is called the filver cord, firft from its colour, for it appears to the eye, of a white, fhining, refplendent beauty, bright as filver ; and thus it is even when it is taken out of the body, after it is dead; but how much more admirable and glorious muft it needs be, while it remains in the body yet living, and actuated with abundance of most refined fpirits, which continually afcend and defcend thereupon. An ancient and an admirable anatomist, upon confideration of the great luftre and perfpicuity of it, compares it to the cryftalline hu Fallopius. mour mour of the eye, and farther affirms, that he never faw any thing in all his life, more beautiful than thofe two things. Secondly, It may be called the filver cord, from its place in which it is seated in the body : it is placed very deep, fecret, and fecure; Job faith, Surely there is a vein for the filver, Job xxviii. 1. that is, there is an intricate, hidden, and myfterious cavity in the earth, in which this lunar mineral doth more fecurely pafs its branches; juft thus the cord of our body, as foon as ever it hath left its original, it is paffed into the most inward and secret cavity of the fpine, which by reafon of that admiration and reverence the ancients had for it, they called, ispau rígiyla, the holy pipe; and when in feveral places it paffeth thencefrom, it is conveyed all along with wonderful artifice, both for fecrefy and security, which is continued to the most minute filaments; for throughout the whole body, it lieth lower, and deeper, and safer, than the veins, or arteries, or any other common conveyers in the body of man. Lastly, and chiefly, It is called the filver cord, because of its excellency: For as filver above all other minerals whatsoever (fave only that most abfolute and perfect one of gold) is, and ought to be most valued and esteemed; fo is, and ought, this part we are now speaking of, next unto that most abfolute and per fect part, the brain, which in the very next following fymptom is affimilated unto gold. The ingenious chymifts take pleasure to liken the several metals they find in the bowels of earth, to the heavenly luminaries, who after they have compared the most perfect, aptly to the fun; they in the next place, liken this of filver as aptly to the moon, and therefore decipher it also by the self-fame character; fhewing us hereby, that as the moon in heaven is far more glorious and excellent, than all other celestial bodies whatsoever, (the fun alone excepted) fo filver in the earth, above all terrestrial bodies whatsoever (gold alone excepted) hath the fame pre-eminence. Micat inter omnes, Luna minores. And this dignity hath the spinal marrow with all its branches above all other parts of the body, except the brain; it hath been in such esteem among philofophers*, that the best of them hath acknowledged it the foundation of life; and the great master of phyficians hath dignified it with the name of arv, thereby clearly intimating, that if vitality be not chiefly therein placed, yet the higheft and most noble operations thereof are performed thereupon. And fuch an exact likeness there Plate in Timæo. Hippoc. is |
