home, nor abroad, errat, & præter vitam vivitur, he wanders and lives besides himself. In a word, What the mischievous effects of laziness and idleness are, I do not finde any where more accurately expressed, then in these verses of Philolaches in the Comical Poet, which for their elegancy I will in part insert. "Novarum ædium esse arbitror similem ego hominem, Quisque laudat fabrum, atque exemplum expetit, &c. Dicam ut homines similes esse ædium arbitremini, A young Cozen German to Idleness, and a concomitant cause, which goes hand in hand with it, is nimia solitudo, too much solitariness, by the testimony of all Physitians, Cause and Symptom both; but as it is here put for a cause, it is either coact, enforced, or else voluntary. Enforced solitariness is commonly seen in Students, Monks, Friers, Anchorites, that by their order and course of life must abandon all company, society of other men, and betake themselves to a private cell: Otio superstitioso seclusi, as Bale and Hospinian well term it, such as are the Carthusians of our time, that eat no flesh (by their order) keep perpetual silence, never go abroad. Such as live in prison, or some desert place, and cannot have company, as many of our Countrey Gentlemen do in solitary houses, they must either be alone without companions, or live beyond their means, and entertain all comers as so many hostes, or else converse with their servants and hindes, such as are unequal, inferior to them, and of a contrary disposition or else as some do, to avoid solitariness, spend their time with leud fellows in Taverns, and in Alehouses, and thence addict themselves to some unlawful disports, or dissolute courses. Divers again are cast upon this rock of solitariness for want of means, or out of a strong apprehension of some infirmity, disgrace, or through bashfulness, rudeness, simplicity, they cannot apply themselves to others company. Nullum solum infelici gratius solitudine, ubi nullus sit qui miseriam exprobret; this enforced solitariness takes place, and produceth his effect soonest in such as have spent their time jovially, peradventure in all honest recreations, in good company, in some great family or populous City, and are upon a sudden confined to a desert Country Cottage far off, restrained of their liberty, and barred from their ordinary associates: Solitariness is very irksom to such, most tedious, and a sudden cause of great inconvenience. Voluntary solitariness is that which is familiar with Melancholy, and gently brings on like a Siren, a shooing-horn, or some Sphinx to this irrevocable gulf, a primary cause Piso calls it; most pleasant it is at first, to such as are melancholy given, to lie in bed whole days, and keep their chambers, to walk alone in some solitary Grove, betwixt Wood and Water, by a Brook side, to meditate upon some delightsom and pleasant Subject, which shall affect them most; amabilis insania, & mentis gratissimus error: A most incomparable delight it is so to melancholize, and build castles in the air, to go smiling to themselves, acting an infinite variety of parts, which they suppose and strongly imagine they represent, or that they see acted or done: Blande quidem ab initio, saith Lemnius, to conceive aud meditate of such pleasant things, sometimes, "Present, past, or to come," as Rhasis speaks. So delightsom these toyes are at first, they could spend whole days and nights without sleep, even whole yeers alone in such contemplations, and phantastical meditations, which are like unto dreams, and they will hardly be drawn from them, or willingly interrupt, so pleasant their vain conceits are, that they hinder their ordinary tasks and necessary business, they cannot address themselves to them, or almost to any study or imployment, these phantastical and bewitching thoughts so covertly, so feelingly, so urgently, so continually set upon, creep in, insinuate, possess, overcome, distract, and detain them, they cannot I Aquibus malum, velut à primaria causa, occasionem nactum est. 'Jucunda rerum præsentium, præteritarum, & futurarum meditatio. say say go about their more necessary business, stave off or extricate themselves, but are ever musing, melancholizing, and carried along, as he (they say) that is lead round about an Heath with a Puck in the night, they run earnestly on in this labarinth of anxious and solicitous melancholy meditations, and cannot well or willingly refrain, or easily leave off, winding and unwinding themselves, as so many clocks, and stil pleasing their humors, until at last the Scene is turned upon a sudden, by some bad object, and they being now habituated to such vain meditations and solitary places, can endure no company, can ruminate of nothing but harsh and distastfull subjects. Fear, sorrow, suspition, subrusticus pudor, discontent, cares, and weariness of life surprise them in a moment, and they can think of nothing else, continually suspecting, no sooner are their eyes open, but this infernal plague of Melancholy seizeth on them, and terrifies their souls, representing some dismal object to their minds, which now by no means, no labour, no perswasions they can avoid, hæret lateri lethalis arundo, they may not be rid of it," they cannot resist. I may not deny but that there is some profitable Meditation, Contemplation, and kinde of solitariness to be embraced, which the Fathers so highly commended, Hierom, Chrysostom, Cyprian, Austin, in whole Tracts, which Petrarch, Erasmus, Stella, and others, so much magnifie in their books; a Paradise, an Heaven on Earth, if it be used aright, good for the body, and better for the soul: As many of those old Monks used it, to divine contemplations, as Siimulus a Courtier in Adrian's time, Dioclesian the Emperour retired themselves, &c. in that sense, Vatia solus scit vivere, Vatia lives alone, which the Romans were wont to say, when they commended a Country life. Or to the bettering of their knowledg, as Democritus, Cleanthes, and those excellent Philosophers have ever done, to sequester themselves from the tumultuous world, or as in Plinie's villa Laurentana, Tullie's Tusculan, Jovius study, that they might bet ter vacare studiis et Deo, serve God, and follow their studies. Me thinks therefore our too zealous innovators were not so well advised in that general subversion of Abbies and religious houses, promiscuously to fling down all; they might have taken away those gross abuses crept in amongst them, rectified such inconveniencies, and not so far to have raved and raged against those fair buildings, and everlasting monuments of our forefa Facilis descensus Averni: Sel revocare gia lum, superasque evidere ad auras, Hic labor, hoc opus est. Vag. * Hieron.mus (p. 72. dasi oppida & urbes videri sibi tetros carceres, solitudinem Paradisum: solum scorpiombus infectum, sacco amictus, hum Cabins, aqua & herbis vedtans, Romanis prætulit deliciis. thers thers devotion, consecrated to pious uses; some Monasteries and Collegiate Cels might have been well spared, and their revenues otherwise imployed, here and there one, in good Towns or Cities at least, for men and women of all sorts and conditions to live in, to sequester themselves from the cares and tumults of the world, that were not desirous, or fit to marry; or otherwise willing to be troubled with common affairs, and know not well where to bestow themselves, to live apart in, for more conveniency, good education, better company sake, to follow their studies (I say) to the perfection of arts and sciences, common good, and as some truly devoted Monks of old had done, freely and truly to serve God. For these men are neither solitary, nor idle, as the Poet made answer to the husbandman in Esop, that objected idleness to him; he was never so idle as in his company; or that Scipio Africanus in Tully, Nunquam minus solus, quam cum solus; nunquam minus otiosus, quam quum esset otiosus; never less solitary, then when he was alone, never more busie, then when he seemed to be most idle. It is reported by Plato in his dialogue de Amore, in that prodigious commendation of Socrates, how a deep meditation coming into Socrates minde by chance, he stood still musing, eodem vestigo cogitabundus, from morning to noon, and when as then he had not yet finished his meditation, perstabat cogitans, he so continued till the evening, the soldiers (for he then followed the Camp) observed him with admiration, and on set purpose watched all night, but he persevered immovable ad exortum solis, till the Sun rose in the morning, and then saluting the Sun, went his wayes. In what humour constant Socrates did thus, I know not, or how he might be affected, but this would be pernicious to another man ; what intricate business might so really possess him, I cannot casily guess; But this is otiosum otium, it is far otherwise with these men, according to Seneca, Omnia nobis mala solitudo persuadet; this solitude undoeth us, pugnat cum vitá sociali; 'tis a destructive solitariness. These men are Devils alone, as the saying is, Iomo solus aut Deus, aut Dæmon: a man alone, is either a Saint or a Devil, mens ejus aut languescit, aut tumescit; and * V soli in this sense, woe be to him that is so alone. These wretches do frequently degenerate from men, and of sociable creatures become beasts, monsters, inhumane, ugly to behold, Misanthropi; they do even loath themselves, and hate the company of men, as so many Timons, Nebuchadnezzars; by too much indulging to these pleasing humors, and through their own default. So that which Mercurialis consil. 11. sometimes expostulated with his melancholy patient, may be justly applyed to every solitary and idle person in particular. Natura de te videtur conqueri posse, &c. "Nature may justly complain of thee, that whereas she gave thee a good wholesome temperature, a sound body, and God hath given thee so divine and excellent a Soul, so many good parts, and profitable gifts, thou hast not only contemned and rejected, but hast corrupted them, polluted them, overthrown their temperature, and perverted those gifts with riot, idleness, solitariness, and many other wayes, thou art a traitour to God and Nature, an enemy to thy self and to the world." Perditio tua ex te; thou hast lost thyself wilfully, cast away thy self, "thou thy self art the efficient cause of thine own misery, by not resisting such vaine cogitations, but giving way unto them." WHAT SUBSEC. VII. Sleeping and waking, causes. HAT I have formerly said of Exercise, I may now repeat of Sleep. Nothing better than moderate sleep, no thing worse than it, if it be in extreames, or unseasonably used. It is a received opinion, that a melancholy man cannot sleep overmuch; Somnus supra modum prodest, as an only Antidote, and nothing offends them more, or causeth this malady sooner, then waking, yet in some cases sleep may do more harm then good in that flegmatick, swinish, cold, and sluggish melancholy, which Melancthon speaks of, that thinkes of waters, sighing most part, &c. a It duls the Spirits, if overmuch, and senses, fils the head ful of gross humors, causeth distillations, rheumes, great store of excrements in the brain, and all the other parts, as Fuchsius speaks of them, that sleep like so many Dormice. Or if it be used in the day time, upon a ful stomack, the body ill composed to rest, or after hard meats, it increaseth fearful dreams, Incubus, night walking, crying out, and much unquietness; such sleep prepares the body, as one observes," to many perilous diseases." But as I have said, waking overmuch, is both a symptome, and an ordinary cause, b * Natura de te videtur conqueri posse, quod cum ab ea temperatissimum corpus adeptus sis, tam præclarum à Deo ac utile donum, non contempsisti modo, verum corrupisti, sedasti, prodidisti, optimam temperaturam otio, crapula, & aliis vitæ erroribus, &c. Path. lib. cap. 17. Fernel. corpus infrigidat, omnes sensus, mentisque vires torpore debilitat. Lib. 2. sect. 2. cap. 4. Magnam excrementorum vim cerebro & aliis partibus conservat. Jo. Ratzius lib. de rebus 6. non naturalibus. Præparat corpus talis somnus ad multas pericuJosas ægritudines. с |