Carcasses bleed at the sight of the murderer. Anatomy of Melancholy. Part i. Sect. 1, Memb. 2, Subsect. 5 Every man hath a good and a bad angel attending on him in particular, all his life long.1 Sect. 2, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2. [Witches] steal young children out of their cradles, ministerio dæmonum, and put deformed in their rooms, which we call changelings. Can build castles in the air. 2 Subsect. 3. Ibid. Joh. Mayor, in the first book of his "History of Scotland," contends much for the wholesomeness of oaten bread; it was objected to him, then living at Paris, that his countrymen fed on oats and base grain. . . . And yet Wecker out of Galen calls it horse-meat, and fitter juments than men to feed on.3 Memb. 2, Subsect. 1. Cookery is become an art, a noble science; cooks are gentlemen. Subsect. 2. As much valour is to be found in feasting as in fighting, and some of our city captains and carpet knights will make this good, and prove it.* Ibid. No rule is so general, which admits not some exception.5 2 "Castles in the air," -Montaigne, Sir Philip Sidney, Massinger, Sir Thomas Browne, Giles Fletcher, George Herbert, Dean Swift, Broome, Fielding, Cibber, Churchill, Shenstone, and Lloyd. 8 Oats, a grain which is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people. SAMUEL JOHNSON: Dictionary of the English Language. - 4 Carpet knights are men who are by the prince's grace and favour made knights at home. . . . They are called carpet knights because they receive their honours in the court and upon carpets. - MARKHAM : Booke of Hon our (1625). Du Bartas (ed. 1621), p. 311. "Carpet knights," 5 The exception proves the rule. A nightingale dies for shame if another bird sings better. Anatomy of Melancholy. Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 3, Subsect. 6. They do not live but linger. Subsect. 10. [Diseases] crucify the soul of man, attenuate our bodies, dry them, wither them, shrivel them up like old apples, make them so many anatomies.1 Ibid. [Desire] is a perpetual rack, or horsemill, according to Austin, still going round as in a ring. Subsect. 11. [The rich] are indeed rather possessed by their money than possessors. Subsect. 12. Like a hog, or dog in the manger, he doth only keep it because it shall do nobody else good, hurting himself and others. Ibid. Were it not that they are loath to lay out money on a rope, they would be hanged forthwith, and sometimes die to save charges. A mere madness, to live like a wretch and die rich. Ibid. Ibid. I may not here omit those two main plagues and common dotages of human kind, wine and women, which have infatuated and besotted myriads of people; they go commonly together.2 All our geese are swans. Subsect. 13. Subsect. 14. Though they [philosophers] write contemptu gloriæ, yet as Hieron observes, they will put their names to their books. Ibid. They are proud in humility; proud in that they are not proud. 1 See Shakespeare, page 50. 2 Qui vino indulget, quemque alea decoquit, ille In venerem putret Subsect. 14. (He who is given to drink, and whom the dice are despoiling, is the one who rots away in sexual vice). - PERSIUS: Satires, satire v. We can make majors and officers every year, but not scholars; kings can invest knights and barons, as Sigismund the emperor confessed.1 Anatomy of Melancholy. Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 3, Subsect. 15. Hinc quam sic calamus sævior ense, patet. The pen worse than the sword.2 Memb. 4, Subsect. 4. Homer himself must beg if he want means, and as by report sometimes he did "go from door to door and sing ballads, with a company of boys about him." a Subsect. 6. See one promontory (said Socrates of old), one mountain, one sea, one river, and see all.1 Subsect. 7. Felix Plater notes of some young physicians, that study to cure diseases, catch them themselves, will be sick, and appropriate all symptoms they find related of others to their own persons. Sect. 3, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2. Aristotle said melancholy men of all others are most witty. Subsect. 3. Like him in Æsop, he whipped his horses withal, and put his shoulder to the wheel. Part . Sect. 1, Memb. 2. Fabricius finds certain spots and clouds in the sun. Sect. 2, Memb. 3. 1 When Abraham Lincoln heard of the death of a private, he said he was sorry it was not a general: "I could make more of them." 2 Tant la plume a eu sous le roi d'avantage sur l'épée (So far had the pen under the king the superiority over the sword). SAINT SIMON: Mémoires, vol. ii. p. 517 (1702), ed. 1856. The pen is mightier than the sword. - BULWER LYTTON: Richelieu, act ii. sc. 2. 3 Seven wealthy towns contend for Homer dead, ANONYMOUS. Great Homer's birthplace seven rival cities claim, THOMAS SEWARD: On Shakespeare's Monument at Seven cities warred for Homer being dead; Who living had no roofe to shrowd his head. THOMAS HEYWOOD: Hierarchie of the Blessed Angells. 4 A blade of grass is always a blade of grass, whether in one country of another. JOHNSON: Piazzi, 52. Seneca thinks the gods are well pleased when they see great men contending with adversity. Anatomy of Melancholy. Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 1, Subsect. 1. Machiavel says virtue and riches seldom settle on one man. Memb. 2. Almost in every kingdom the most ancient families have been at first princes' bastards; their worthiest captains, best wits, greatest scholars, bravest spirits in all our annals, have been base [born]. Ibid. As he said in Machiavel, omnes eodem patre nati, Adam's sons, conceived all and born in sin, etc. "We are by nature all as one, all alike, if you see us naked; let us wear theirs and they our clothes, and what is the difference?" Ibid. Set a beggar on horseback and he will ride a gallop.1 Ibid. Christ himself was poor. ... And as he was himself, so he informed his apostles and disciples, they were all poor, prophets poor, apostles poor.2 Memb. 3. Who cannot give good counsel? "T is cheap, it costs them nothing. Many things happen between the cup and the lip. What can't be cured must be endured. 8 Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Everything, saith Epictetus, hath two handles, - the one to be held by, the other not. All places are distant from heaven alike. Ibid. Mcmb. 4. 1 Set a beggar on horseback, and he 'll outride the Devil. BOHN For eign Proverbs (German). 2 See Wotton, page 174. 8 There is many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip. - HAZLITT: English Proverbs. Though men determine, the gods doo dispose; and oft times many things fall out betweene the cup and the lip. — GREENE : Perimedes the Blacksmith (1588). The commonwealth of Venice in their armoury have this inscription: "Happy is that city which in time of peace thinks of war." Anatomy of Melancholy. Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 6. "Let me not live,” saith Aretine's Antonia, "if I had not rather hear thy discourse than see a play." Part iii. Sect. 1, Memb. 1, Subsect. 1. Every schoolboy hath that famous testament of Grunnius Corocotta Porcellus at his fingers' end. Birds of a feather will gather together. Ibid. Subsect. 2. And this is that Homer's golden chain, which reacheth down from heaven to earth, by which every creature is annexed, and depends on his Creator. Memb. 2, Subsect. 1. And hold one another's noses to the grindstone hard.1 Memb. 3. Every man for himself, his own ends, the Devil for all.2 Ibid. No cord nor cable can so forcibly draw, or hold so fast, as love can do with a twined thread.3 Sect. 2, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2. To enlarge or illustrate this power and effect of love is to set a candle in the sun. He is only fantastical that is not in fashion. Ibid. 1 See Heywood, page 11. Memb. 2, Subsect. 3. 2 See Heywood, page 20. 3 Those curious locks so aptly twin'd, One hair of a woman can draw more than a hundred pair of oxen. HOWELL: Letters, book ii. iv. (1621). She knows her man, and when you rant and swear, Can draw you to her with a single hair. DRYDEN: Persius, satire v. line 246. Beauty draws us with a single hair. canto ii. line 27. And from that luckless hour my tyrant fair BLAND: Anthology, p. 20 (edition 1813) |