Though the writer of the following essays [64] seems to have had the
fortune, common among men of letters, of raising little curiosity
after his private life, and has, therefore, few memorials preserved of
his felicities and misfortunes; yet, because an edition of a
posthumous work appears imperfect and neglected, without some account
of the author, it was thought necessary to attempt the gratification
of that curiosity which naturally inquires by what peculiarities of
nature or fortune eminent men have been distinguished, how uncommon
attainments have been gained, and what influence learning had on its
possessours, or virtue on its teachers.
Sir Thomas Browne was born at London, in the parish of St. Michael in
Cheapside, on the 19th of October, 1605 [65]. His father was a
merchant, of an ancient family at Upton, in Cheshire. Of the name or
family of his mother I find no account.
Of his childhood or youth there is little known, except that he lost
his father very early; that he was, according to the common fate of
orphans [66], defrauded by one of his guardians; and that he was
placed, for his education, at the school of Winchester.
His mother, having taken three thousand pounds [67], as the third part
of her husband's property, left her son, by consequence, six thousand,
a large fortune for a man destined to learning, at that time, when
commerce had not yet filled the nation with nominal riches. But it
happened to him, as to many others, to be made poorer by opulence; for
his mother soon married sir Thomas Dutton, probably by the inducement
of her fortune; and he was left to the rapacity of his guardian,
deprived now of both his parents, and, therefore, helpless, and
unprotected.
He was removed in the beginning of the year 1623, from Winchester to
Oxford [68], and entered a gentleman-commoner of Broadgate hall, which
was soon afterwards endowed, and took the name of Pembroke college,
from the earl of Pembroke, then chancellor of the university. He was
admitted to the degree of bachelor of arts, January 31, 1626-7; being,
as Wood remarks, the first man of eminence graduated from the new
college, to which the zeal or gratitude of those that love it most,
can wish little better than that it may long proceed as it began.
Having afterwards taken his degree of master of arts, he turned his
studies to physick [69], and practised it for some time in
Oxfordshire; but soon afterwards, either induced by curiosity, or
invited by promises, he quitted his settlement, and accompanied his
father-in-law [70], who had some employment in Ireland, in a
visitation of the forts and castles, which the state of Ireland then
made necessary.
He that has once prevailed on himself to break his connexions of
acquaintance, and begin a wandering life, very easily continues it.
Ireland had, at that time, very little to offer to the observation of
a man of letters; he, therefore, passed into France and Italy [71];
made some stay at Montpellier and Padua, which were then the
celebrated schools of physick; and, returning home through Holland,
procured himself to be created doctor of physick at Leyden.
When he began his travels, or when be concluded them, there is no
certain account; nor do there remain any observations made by him in
his passage through those countries which he visited. To consider,
therefore, what pleasure or instruction might have been received from
the remarks of a man so curious and diligent, would be voluntarily to
indulge a painful reflection, and load the imagination with a wish,
which, while it is formed, is known to be vain. It is, however, to be
lamented, that those who are most capable of improving mankind, very
frequently neglect to communicate their knowledge; either because it
is more pleasing to gather ideas than to impart them, or because, to
minds naturally great, few things appear of so much importance as to
deserve the notice of the publick.
About the year 1634 [72], he is supposed to have returned to London;
and the next year to have written his celebrated treatise, called
Religio Medici, "the religion of a physician [73]," which he declares
himself never to have intended for the press, having composed it only
for his own exercise and entertainment. It, indeed, contains many
passages, which, relating merely to his own person, can be of no great
importance to the publick; but when it was written, it happened to him
as to others, he was too much pleased with his performance, not to
think that it might please others as much; he, therefore, communicated
it to his friends, and receiving, I suppose, that exuberant applause
with which every man repays the grant of perusing a manuscript, he was
not very diligent to obstruct his own praise by recalling his papers,
but suffered them to wander from hand to hand, till, at last, without
his own consent, they were, in 1642, given to a printer.
This has, perhaps, sometimes befallen others; and this, I am willing
to believe, did really happen to Dr. Browne: but there is, surely,
some reason to doubt the truth of the complaint so frequently made of
surreptitious editions. A song, or an epigram, may be easily printed
without the author's knowledge; because it may be learned when it is
repeated, or may be written out with very little trouble; but a long
treatise, however elegant, is not often copied by mere zeal or
curiosity, but may be worn out in passing from hand to hand, before it
is multiplied by a transcript. It is easy to convey an imperfect book,
by a distant hand, to the press, and plead the circulation of a false
copy, as an excuse for publishing the true, or to correct what is
found faulty or offensive, and charge the errours on the transcriber's
depravations.
This is a stratagem, by which an author, panting for fame, and yet
afraid of seeming to challenge it, may at once gratify his vanity, and
preserve the appearance of modesty; may enter the lists, and secure a
retreat; and this candour might suffer to pass undetected, as an
innocent fraud, but that, indeed, no fraud is innocent; for the
confidence which makes the happiness of society is, in some degree,
diminished by every man whose practice is at variance with his words.
The Religio Medici was no sooner published than it excited the
attention of the publick, by the novelty of paradoxes, the dignity of
sentiment, the quick succession of images, the multitude of abstruse
allusions, the subtilty of disquisition, and the strength of language.
What is much read will be much criticised. The earl of Dorset
recommended this book to the perusal of sir Kenelm Digby, who returned
his judgment upon it, not in a letter, but a book; in which, though
mingled with some positions fabulous and uncertain, there are acute
remarks, just censures, and profound speculations; yet its principal
claim to admiration is, that it was written in twenty-four hours [74],
of which part was spent in procuring Browne's book, and part in
reading it.
Of these animadversions, when they were yet not all printed, either
officiousness or malice informed Dr. Browne; who wrote to sir Kenelm,
with much softness and ceremony, declaring the unworthiness of his
work to engage such notice, the intended privacy of the composition,
and the corruptions of the impression; and received an answer equally
genteel and respectful, containing high commendations of the piece,
pompous professions of reverence, meek acknowledgments of inability,
and anxious apologies for the hastiness of his remarks.
The reciprocal civility of authors is one of the most risible scenes
in the farce of life. Who would not have thought, that these two
luminaries of their age had ceased to endeavour to grow bright by the
obscuration of each other? yet the animadversions thus weak, thus
precipitate, upon a book thus injured in the transcription, quickly
passed the press; and Religio Medici was more accurately published,
with an admonition prefixed, "to those who have or shall peruse the
observations upon a former corrupt copy;" in which there is a severe
censure, not upon Digby, who was to be used with ceremony, but upon
the observator who had usurped his name; nor was this invective
written by Dr. Browne, who was supposed to be satisfied with his
opponent's apology; but by some officious friend, zealous for his
honour, without his consent.
Browne has, indeed, in his own preface, endeavoured to secure himself
from rigorous examination, by alleging, that "many things are
delivered rhetorically, many expressions merely tropical, and,
therefore, many things to be taken in a soft and flexible sense, and
not to be called unto the rigid test of reason." The first glance upon
his book will, indeed, discover examples of this liberty of thought
and expression: "I could be content," says he, "to be nothing almost
to eternity, if I might enjoy my Saviour at the last." He has little
acquaintance with the acuteness of Browne, who suspects him of a
serious opinion, that any thing can be "almost eternal," or that any
time beginning and ending is not infinitely less than infinite
duration.
In this book he speaks much, and, in the opinion of Digby, too much of
himself; but with such generality and conciseness, as affords very
little light to his biographer: he declares, that, besides the
dialects of different provinces, he understood six languages; that he
was no stranger to astronomy; and that he had seen several countries;
but what most awakens curiosity is, his solemn assertion, that "his
life has been a miracle of thirty years; which to relate were not
history, but a piece of poetry, and would sound like a fable."
There is, undoubtedly, a sense in which all life is miraculous; as it
is an union of powers of which we can image no connexion, a succession
of motions, of which the first cause must be supernatural; but life,
thus explained, whatever it may have of miracle, will have nothing of
fable; and, therefore, the author undoubtedly had regard to something,
by which he imagined himself distinguished from the rest of mankind.
Of these wonders, however, the view that can be now taken of his life
offers no appearance. The course of his education was like that of
others, such as put him little in the way of extraordinary casualties.
A scholastick and academical life is very uniform; and has, indeed,
more safety than pleasure. A traveller has greater opportunities of
adventure; but Browne traversed no unknown seas, or Arabian deserts;
and, surely, a man may visit France and Italy, reside at Montpellier
and Padua, and, at last, take his degree at Leyden, without any thing
miraculous. What it was that would, if it was related, sound so
poetical and fabulous, we are left to guess; I believe without hope of
guessing rightly. The wonders, probably, were transacted in his own
mind; self-love, cooperating with an imagination vigorous and fertile
as that of Browne, will find or make objects of astonishment in every
man's life; and, perhaps, there is no human being, however bid in the
crowd from the observation of his fellow-mortals, who, if he has
leisure and disposition to recollect his own thoughts and actions,
will not conclude his life in some sort a miracle, and imagine himself
distinguished from all the rest of his species by many discriminations
of nature or of fortune.
The success of this performance was such as might naturally encourage
the author to new undertakings. A gentleman of Cambridge [75], whose
name was Merryweather, turned it not inelegantly into Latin; and from
his version it was again translated into Italian, German, Dutch, and
French; and, at Strasburg, the Latin translation was published with
large notes, by Levinus Nicolaus Moltkenius. Of the English
annotations, which in all the editions, from 1644, accompany the book,
the author is unknown.
Of Merryweather, to whose zeal Browne was so much indebted for the
sudden extension of his renown, I know nothing, but that he published
a small treatise for the instruction of young-persons in the
attainment of a Latin style. He printed his translation in Holland
with some difficulty [76]. The first printer to whom he offered it,
carried it to Salmasius, "who laid it by," says he, "in state for
three months," and then discouraged its publication: it was afterwards
rejected by two other printers, and, at last, was received by Hackius.
The peculiarities of this book raised the author, as is usual, many
admirers and many enemies; but we know not of more than one professed
answer, written under the title of Medicus Medicatus [77], by
Alexander Ross, which was universally neglected by the world.
At the time when this book was published, Dr. Browne resided at
Norwich, where he had settled in 1636, by the persuasion of Dr.
Lushington [78], his tutor, who was then rector of Barnham Westgate,
in the neighbourhood. It is recorded by Wood, that his practice was
very extensive, and that many patients resorted to him. In 1637 he was
incorporated doctor of physick in Oxfordf [79].
He married, in 1641, Mrs. Mileham [80], of a good family in Norfolk;
"a lady," says Whitefoot, "of such symmetrical proportion to her
worthy husband, both in the graces of her body and mind, that they
seemed to come together by a kind of natural magnetism."
This marriage could not but draw the raillery of contemporary wits
[81] upon a man who had just been wishing, in his new book, "that we
might procreate, like trees, without conjunction," and had lately
declared [82], that "the whole world was made for man, but only the
twelfth part of man for woman;" and, that "man is the whole world, but
woman only the rib or crooked part of man."
Whether the lady had been yet informed of these contemptuous
positions, or whether she was pleased with the conquest of so
formidable a rebel, and considered it as a double triumph, to attract
so much merit, and overcome so powerful prejudices; or whether, like
most others, she married upon mingled motives, between convenience and
inclination; she had, however, no reason to repent, for she lived
happily with him one-and-forty years, and bore him ten children, of
whom one son and three daughters outlived their parents: she survived
him two years, and passed her widowhood in plenty, if not in opulence.
Browne having now entered the world as an author, and experienced the
delights of praise and molestations of censure, probably found his
dread of the publick eye diminished; and, therefore, was not long
before he trusted his name to the criticks a second time; for, in 1646
[83], he printed Inquiries into vulgar and common Errours; a work,
which, as it arose not from fancy and invention, but from observation
and books, and contained not a single discourse of one continued
tenour, of which the latter part arose from the former, but an
enumeration of many unconnected particulars, must have been the
collection of years, and the effect of a design early formed and long
pursued, to which his remarks had been continually referred, and which
arose gradually to its present bulk by the daily aggregation of new
particles of knowledge. It is, indeed, to be wished, that he had
longer delayed the publication, and added what the remaining part of
his life might have furnished: the thirty-six years which he spent
afterwards in study and experience, would, doubtless, have made large
additions to an inquiry into vulgar errours. He published, in 1673,
the sixth edition, with some improvements; but I think rather with
explication of what he had already written, than any new heads of
disquisition. But with the work, such as the author, whether hindered
from continuing it by eagerness of praise, or weariness of labour,
thought fit to give, we must be content; and remember, that in all
sublunary things there is something to be wished which we must wish in
vain.
This book, like his former, was received with great applause, was
answered by Alexander Ross, and translated into Dutch and German, and,
not many years ago, into French. It might now be proper, had not the
favour with which it was at first received filled the kingdom with
copies, to reprint it with notes, partly supplemental, and partly
emendatory, to subjoin those discoveries which the industry of the
last age has made, and correct those mistakes which the author has
committed, not by idleness or negligence, but for want of Boyle's and
Newton's philosophy.
He appears, indeed, to have been willing to pay labour for truth.
Having heard a flying rumour of sympathetick needles, by which,
suspended over a circular alphabet, distant friends or lovers might
correspond, he procured two such alphabets to be made, touched his
needles with the same magnet, and placed them upon proper spindles:
the result was, that when he moved one of his needles, the other,
instead of taking, by sympathy, the same direction, "stood like the
pillars of Hercules." That it continued motionless, will be easily
believed; and most men would have been content to believe it, without
the labour of so hopeless an experiment. Browne might himself have
obtained the same conviction by a method less operose, if he had
thrust his needles through corks, and set them afloat in two basins of
water.
Notwithstanding his zeal to detect old errours, he seems not very easy
to admit new positions, for he never mentions the motion of the earth
but with contempt and ridicule, though the opinion which admits it was
then growing popular, and was surely plausible, even before it was
confirmed by later observations.
The reputation of Browne encouraged some low writer to publish, under
his name, a book called [84] Nature's Cabinet unlocked,--translated,
according to Wood, from the physicks of Magirus; of which Browne took
care to clear himself, by modestly advertising, that "if any man had
been benefited by it, he was not so ambitious as to challenge the
honour thereof, as having no hand in that work [85]."
In 1658, the discovery of some ancient urns in Norfolk gave him
occasion to write Hydriotaphia, Urn-Burial, or a Discourse of
sepulchral Urns; in which he treats, with his usual learning, on the
funeral rites of the ancient nations; exhibits their various treatment
of the dead; and examines the substances found in his Norfolcian urns.
There is, perhaps, none of his works which better exemplifies his
reading or memory. It is scarcely to be imagined, how many particulars
he has amassed together, in a treatise which seems to have been
occasionally written; and for which, therefore, no materials could
have been previously collected. It is, indeed, like other treatises of
antiquity, rather for curiosity than use; for it is of small
importance to know which nation buried their dead in the ground, which
threw them into the sea, or which gave them to birds and beasts; when
the practice of cremation began, or when it was disused; whether the
bones of different persons were mingled in the same urn; what
oblations were thrown into the pyre; or how the ashes of the body were
distinguished from those of other substances. Of the uselessness of
these inquiries, Browne seems not to have been ignorant; and,
therefore, concludes them with an observation which can never be too
frequently recollected:
"All, or most apprehensions, rested in opinions of some future being,
which, ignorantly or coldly believed, begat those perverted
conceptions, ceremonies, sayings, which christians pity or laugh at.
Happy are they, which live not in that disadvantage of time, when men
could say little for futurity, but from reason; whereby the noblest
mind fell often upon doubtful deaths, and melancholy dissolutions:
with these hopes Socrates warmed his doubtful spirits against the cold
potion; and Cato, before he durst give the fatal stroke, spent part of
the night in reading the immortality of Plato, thereby confirming his
wavering hand unto the animosity of that attempt.
"It is the heaviest stone that melancholy can throw at a man, to tell
him he is at the end of his nature; or that there is no further state
to come, unto which this seems progressional, and otherwise made in
vain: without this accomplishment, the natural expectation and desire
of such a state were but a fallacy in nature: unsatisfied
considerators would quarrel at the justness of the constitution, and
rest content that Adam had fallen lower, whereby, by knowing no other
original, and deeper ignorance of themselves, they might have enjoyed
the happiness of inferiour creatures, who in tranquillity possess
their constitutions, as having not the apprehension to deplore their
own natures; and being framed below the circumference of these hopes
of cognition of better things, the wisdom of God hath necessitated
their contentment. But the superiour ingredient and obscured part of
ourselves, whereto all present felicities afford no resting
contentment, will be able, at last, to tell us we are more than our
present selves; and evacuate such hopes in the fruition of their own
accomplishments."
To his treatise on urn-burial, was added the Garden of Cyrus, or the
quincunxial Lozenge, or network Plantation of the Ancients,
artificially, naturally, mystically, considered. This discourse he
begins with the Sacred Garden, in which the first man was placed; and
deduces the practice of horticulture, from the earliest accounts of
antiquity to the time of the Persian Cyrus, the first man whom we
actually know to have planted a quincunx; which, however, our author
is inclined to believe of longer date, and not only discovers it in
the description of the hanging gardens of Babylon, but seems willing
to believe, and to persuade his reader, that it was practised by the
feeders on vegetables before the flood.
Some of the most pleasing performances have been produced by learning
and genius, exercised upon subjects of little importance. It seems to
have been, in all ages, the pride of wit, to show how it could exalt
the low, and amplify the little. To speak not inadequately of things
really and naturally great, is a task not only diflicult but
disagreeable; because the writer is degraded in his own eyes, by
standing in comparison with his subject, to which he can hope to add
nothing from his imagination: but it is a perpetual triumph of fancy
to expand a scanty theme, to raise glittering ideas from obscure
properties, and to produce to the world an object of wonder, to which
nature had contributed little. To this ambition, perhaps, we owe the
frogs of Homer, the gnat and the bees of Virgil, the butterfly of
Spenser, the shadow of Wowerus, and the quincunx of Browne.
In the prosecution of this sport of fancy, he considers every
production of art and nature, in which he could find any decussation
or approaches to the form of a quincunx; and, as a man once resolved
upon ideal discoveries seldom searches long in vain, he finds his
favourite figure in almost every thing, whether natural or invented,
ancient or modern, rude or artificial, sacred or civil; so that a
reader, not watchful against the power of his infusions, would imagine
that decussation was the great business of the world, and that nature
and art had no other purpose than to exemplify and imitate a quincunx.
To show the excellence of this figure, he enumerates all its
properties; and finds it in almost every thing of use or pleasure: and
to show how readily he supplies what he cannot find, one instance may
be sufficient: "though therein," says he, "we meet not with right
angles, yet every rhombus containing four angles equal unto two right,
it virtually contains two right in every one."
The fanciful sports of great minds are never without some advantage to
knowledge. Browne has interspersed many curious observations on the
form of plants, and the laws of vegetation; and appears to have been a
very accurate observer of the modes of germination, and to have
watched, with great nicety, the evolution of the parts of plants from
their seminal principles.
He is then naturally led to treat of the number five; and finds, that
by this number many things are circumscribed; that there are five
kinds of vegetable productions, five sections of a cone, five orders
of architecture, and five acts of a play. And observing that five was
the ancient conjugal, or wedding number, he proceeds to a speculation,
which I shall give in his own words: "the ancient numerists made out
the conjugal number by two and three, the first parity and imparity,
the active and passive digits, the material and formal principles in
generative societies."
These are all the tracts which he published. But many papers were
found in his closet: "some of them," says Whitefoot, "designed for the
press, were often transcribed and corrected by his own hand, after the
fashion of great and curious writers."
Of these, two collections have been published; one by Dr. Tenison, the
other, in 1722, by a nameless editor. Whether the one or the other
selected those pieces, which the author would have preferred, cannot
be known; but they have both the merit of giving to mankind what was
too valuable to be suppressed; and what might, without their
interposition, have, perhaps, perished among other innumerable labours
of learned men, or have been burnt in a scarcity of fuel, like the
papers of Pierescius.
The first of these posthumous treatises contains Observations upon
several Plants mentioned in Scripture: these remarks, though they do
not immediately either rectify the faith, or refine the morals of the
reader, yet are by no means to be censured as superfluous niceties, or
useless speculations; for they often show some propriety of
description, or elegance of allusion, utterly undiscoverable to
readers not skilled in oriental botany; and are often of more
important use, as they remove some difficulty from narratives, or some
obscurity from precepts.
The next is, of Garlands, or coronary and garland Plants; a subject
merely of learned curiosity, without any other end than the pleasure
of reflecting on ancient customs, or on the industry with which
studious men have endeavoured to recover them.
The next is a letter, on the Fishes eaten by our Saviour with his
Disciples, after his Resurrection from the Dead: which contains no
determinate resolution of the question, what they were, for, indeed,
it cannot be determined. All the information that diligence or
learning could supply, consists in an enumeration of the fishes
produced in the waters of Judea.
Then follow, Answers to certain Queries about Fishes, Birds, Insects;
and a Letter of Hawks and Falconry, ancient and modern; in the first
of which he gives the proper interpretation of some ancient names of
animals, commonly mistaken; and in the other, has some curious
observations on the art of hawking, which he considers as a practice
unknown to the ancients. I believe all our sports of the field are of
Gothick original; the ancients neither hunted by the scent, nor seemed
much to have practised horsemanship, as an exercise; and though in
their works there is mention of _aucupium_ and _piscatio_,
they seemed no more to have been considered as diversions, than
agriculture, or any other manual labour.
In two more letters, he speaks of the cymbals of the Hebrews, but
without any satisfactory determination; and of _rhopalick_, or
gradual verses, that is, of verses beginning with a word of one
syllable, and proceeding by words of which each has a syllable more
than the former; as,
"O deus, aeterne stationis conciliator." AUSONIUS.
And after this manner pursuing the hint, he mentions many other
restrained methods of versifying, to which industrious ignorance has
sometimes voluntarily subjected itself.
His next attempt is, on Languages, and particularly the Saxon Tongue.
He discourses with great learning, and generally with great justness,
of the derivation and changes of languages; but, like other men of
multifarious learning, he receives some notions without examination.
Thus he observes, according to the popular opinion, that the Spaniards
have retained so much Latin as to be able to compose sentences that
shall be, at once, grammatically Latin and Castilian: this will appear
very unlikely to a man that considers the Spanish terminations; and
Howell, who was eminently skilful in the three provincial languages,
declares, that, after many essays, he never could effect it [86].
The principal design of this letter, is to show the affinity between
the modern English, and the ancient Saxon; and he observes, very
rightly, that "though we have borrowed many substantives, adjectives,
and some verbs, from the French; yet the great body of numerals,
auxiliary verbs, articles, pronouns, adverbs, conjunctions, and
prepositions, which are the distinguishing and lasting parts of a
language, remain with us from the Saxon."
To prove this position more evidently, he has drawn up a short
discourse of six paragraphs, in Saxon and English; of which every word
is the same in both languages, excepting the terminations and
orthography. The words are, indeed, Saxon, but the phraseology is
English; and, I think, would not have been understood by Bede or
Elfric, notwithstanding the confidence of our author. He has, however,
sufficiently proved his position, that the English resembles its
paternal language more than any modern European dialect.
There remain five tracts of this collection yet unmentioned; one, of
artificial Hills, Mounts, or Barrows, in England; in reply to an
interrogatory letter of E. D. whom the writers of the Biographia
Britannica suppose to be, if rightly printed, W. D. or sir William
Dugdale, one of Browne's correspondents. These are declared by Browne,
in concurrence, I think, with all other antiquaries, to be, for the
most part, funeral monuments. He proves, that both the Danes and
Saxons buried their men of eminence under piles of earth, "which
admitting," says he "neither ornament, epitaph, nor inscription, may,
if earthquakes spare them, outlast other monuments: obelisks have
their term, and pyramids will tumble; but these mountainous monuments
may stand, and are like to have the same period with the earth."
In the next, he answers two geographical questions; one concerning
Troas, mentioned in the acts and epistles of St. Paul, which he
determines to be the city built near the ancient Ilium; and the other
concerning the Dead sea, of which he gives the same account with other
writers.
Another letter treats of the Answers of the Oracle of Apollo, at
Delphos, to Croesus, king of Lydia. In this tract nothing deserves
notice, more than that Browne considers the oracles as evidently and
indubitably supernatural, and founds all his disquisition upon that
postulate. He wonders why the physiologists of old, having such means
of instruction, did not inquire into the secrets of nature: but
judiciously concludes, that such questions would probably have been
vain; "for in matters cognoscible, and formed for our disquisition,
our industry must be our oracle, and reason our Apollo."
The pieces that remain are, a Prophecy concerning the future State of
several Nations; in which Browne plainly discovers his expectation to
be the same with that entertained lately, with more confidence, by Dr.
Berkeley, "that America will be the seat of the fifth empire;" and,
Museum clausum, sive Bibliotheca abscondita: in which the author
amuses himself with imagining the existence of books and curiosities,
either never in being or irrecoverably lost.
These pieces I have recounted, as they are ranged in Tenison's
collection, because the editor has given no account of the time at
which any of them were written.
Some of them are of little value, more than as they gratify the mind
with the picture of a great scholar, turning his learning into
amusement; or show upon how great a variety of inquiries, the same
mind has been successfully employed.
The other collection of his posthumous pieces, published in octavo,
London, 1722, contains Repertorium; or some account of the Tombs and
Monuments in the Cathedral of Norwich; where, as Tenison observes,
there is not matter proportionate to the skill of the antiquary.
The other pieces are, Answers to sir William Dugdale's Inquiries about
the Fens; a letter concerning Ireland; another relating to urns newly
discovered; some short strictures on different subjects; and a Letter
to a Friend on the Death of his intimate Friend, published singly by
the author's son, in 1690.
There is inserted in the Biographia Britannica, a Letter containing
Instructions for the Study of Physick: which, with the essays here
offered to the publick, completes the works of Dr. Browne.
To the life of this learned man, there remains little to be added, but
that, in 1665, he was chosen honorary fellow of the college of
physicians, as a man, "virtute et literis ornatissimus," eminently
embellished with literature and virtue; and in 1671, received, at
Norwich, the honour of knighthood from Charles the second, a prince,
who, with many frailties and vices, had yet skill to discover
excellence, and virtue to reward it with such honorary distinctions,
at least, as cost him nothing, yet, conferred by a king so judicious
and so much beloved, had the power of giving merit new lustre and
greater popularity.
Thus he lived in high reputation, till, in his seventy-sixth year, he
was seized with a colick, which, after having tortured him about a
week, put an end to his life at Norwich, on his birthday, October, 19,
1682 [87]. Some of his last words were expressions of submission to
the will of God, and fearlessness of death.
He lies buried in the church of St. Peter Mancroft, in Norwich, with
this inscription on a mural monument, placed on the south pillar of
the altar:
M. S.
Hic situs est THOMAS BROWNE, M.D.
Et miles.
Anno 1605, Londini natus;
Generosa familia apud Upton
In agro Cestriensi oriundus.
Schola pritnum Wintoniensi, postea
In Coll. Pembr.
Apud Oxonienses bonis literis
Haud leviter imbutus;
In urbe hac Nordovicensi medicinam
Arte egregia, et foelici successu professus;
Scriptis quibus tituli, RELIGIO MEDICI
Et PSEUDODOXIA EPIDEMICA, aliisque
Per orbem notissimus.
Vir prudentissimus, integerrimus, doctissimus;
Obijt Octob. 19, 1682.
Pie posuit moestissima conjux
Da. Doroth. Br.
Near the foot of this pillar
Lies Sir Thomas Browne, knt. and doctor in physick,
Author of Religio Medici, and other learned books,
Who practised physick in this city 46 years,
And died Oct. 1682, in the 77th year of his age.
In memory of whom,
Dame Dorothy Browne, who had been his affectionate
Wife 47 years, caused this monument to be
Erected.
Besides this lady, who died in 1685, he left a son and three
daughters. Of the daughters nothing very remarkable is known; but his
son, Edward Browne, requires a particular mention.
He was born about the year 1642; and, after having passed through the
classes of the school at Norwich, became bachelor of physick at
Cambridge; and afterwards removing to Merton college in Oxford, was
admitted there to the same degree, and afterwards made a doctor. In
1668 he visited part of Germany; and in the year following made a
wider excursion into Austria, Hungary, and Thessaly; where the Turkish
sultan then kept his court at Larissa. He afterwards passed through
Italy. His skill in natural history made him particularly attentive to
mines and metallurgy. Upon his return, he published an account of the
countries through which he had passed; which I have heard commended by
a learned traveller, who has visited many places after him, as written
with scrupulous and exact veracity, such as is scarcely to be found in
any other book of the same kind. But whatever it may contribute to the
instruction of a naturalist, I cannot recommend it, as likely to give
much pleasure to common readers; for, whether it be that the world is
very uniform, and, therefore, he who is resolved to adhere to truth
will have few novelties to relate; or, that Dr. Browne was, by the
train of his studies, led to inquire most after those things by which
the greatest part of mankind is little affected; a great part of his
book seems to contain very unimportant accounts of his passage from
one place where he saw little, to another where he saw no more.
Upon his return, he practised physick in London; was made physician
first to Charles the second, and afterwards, in 1682, to St.
Bartholomew's hospital. About the same time, he joined his name to
those of many other eminent men, in a translation of Plutarch's lives.
He was first censor, then elect, and treasurer of the college of
physicians; of which, in 1705, he was chosen president, and held his
office till, in 1708, he died, in a degree of estimation suitable to a
man so variously accomplished, that king Charles had honoured him with
this panegyrick, that "he was as learned as any of the college, and as
well bred as any of the court."
Of every great and eminent character, part breaks forth into publick
view, and part lies hid in domestick privacy. Those qualities, which
have been exerted in any known and lasting performances, may, at any
distance of time, be traced and estimated; but silent excellencies are
soon forgotten; and those minute peculiarities which discriminate
every man from all others, if they are not recorded by those whom
personal knowledge enables to observe them, are irrecoverably lost.
This mutilation of character must have happened, among many others, to
sir Thomas Browne, had it not been delineated by his friend Mr.
Whitefoot, "who esteemed it an especial favour of providence, to have
had a particular acquaintance with him for two-thirds of his life."
Part of his observations I shall therefore copy.
"For a character of his person, his complexion and hair was answerable
to his name; his stature was moderate, and a habit of body neither fat
nor lean, but [Greek: eusarkos].
"In his habit of clothing, he had an aversion to all finery, and
affected plainness, both in the fashion and ornaments. He ever wore a
cloak, or boots, when few others did. He kept himself always very
warm, and thought it most safe so to do, though he never loaded
himself with such a multitude of garments, as Suetonius reports of
Augustus, enough to clothe a good family.
"The horizon of his understanding was much larger than the hemisphere
of the world: all that was visible in the heavens he comprehended so
well, that few that are under them knew so much: he could tell the
number of the visible stars in his horizon, and call them all by their
names that had any; and of the earth he had such a minute and exact
geographical knowledge, as if he had been by divine providence
ordained surveyor-general of the whole terrestrial orb, and its
products, minerals, plants, and animals. He was so curious a botanist,
that, besides the specifical distinctions, he made nice and elaborate
observations, equally useful as entertaining.
"His memory, though not so eminent as that of Seneca or Scaliger, was
capacious and tenacious, insomuch as he remembered all that was
remarkable in any book that he had read; and not only knew all
person's again that he had ever seen, at any distance of time, but
remembered the circumstances of their bodies, and their particular
discourses and speeches.
"In the Latin poets he remembered every thing that was acute and
pungent; he had read most of the historians, ancient and modern,
wherein his observations were singular, not taken notice of by common
readers; he was excellent company when he was at leisure, and
expressed more light than heat in the temper of his brain.
"He had no despotical power over his affections and passions, (that
was a privilege of original perfection, forfeited by the neglect of
the use of it,) but as large a political power over them, as any
stoick, or man of his time; whereof he gave so great experiment, that
he hath very rarely been known to have been overcome with any of them.
The strongest that were found in him, both of the irascible and
concupiscible, were under the control of his reason. Of admiration,
which is one of them, being the only product either of ignorance or
uncommon knowledge, he had more and less than other men, upon the same
account of his knowing more than others; so that though he met with
many rarities, he admired them not so much as others do.
"He was never seen to be transported with mirth, or dejected with
sadness; always cheerful, but rarely merry, at any sensible rate;
seldom heard to break a jest; and when he did, he would be apt to
blush at the levity of it: his gravity was natural, without
affectation.
"His modesty was visible in a natural habitual blush, which was
increased upon the least occasion, and oft discovered without any
observable cause.
"They that knew no more of him than by the briskness of his writings,
found themselves deceived in their expectation, when they came in his
company, noting the gravity and sobriety of his aspect and
conversation; so free from loquacity or much talkativeness, that he
was sometimes difficult to be engaged in any discourse; though when he
was so, it was always singular, and never trite or vulgar.
Parsimonious in nothing but his time, whereof he made as much
improvement, with as little loss as any man in it: when he had any to
spare from his drudging practice, he was scarce patient of any
diversion from his study; so impatient of sloth and idleness, that he
would say, he could not do nothing.
"Sir Thomas understood most of the European languages; viz. all that
are in Hutter's Bible, which he made use of. The Latin and Greek he
understood critically; the oriental languages, which never were
vernacular in this part of the world, he thought the use of them would
not answer the time and pains of learning them; yet had so great a
veneration for the matrix of them, viz. the Hebrew, consecrated to the
oracles of God, that he was not content to be totally ignorant of it;
though very little of his science is to be found in any books of that
primitive language. And though much is said to be written in the
derivative idioms of that tongue, especially the Arabick, yet he was
satisfied with the translations, wherein he found nothing admirable.
"In his religion he continued in the same mind which he had declared
in his first book, written when he was but thirty years old, his
Religio Medici, wherein he fully assented to that of the church of
England, preferring it before any in the world, as did the learned
Grotius. He attended the publick service very constantly, when he was
not withheld by his practice; never missed the sacrament in his
parish, if he were in town; read the best English sermons he could
hear of, with liberal applause; and delighted not in controversies. In
his last sickness, wherein he continued about a week's time, enduring
great pain of the colick, besides a continual fever, with as much
patience as hath been seen in any man, without any pretence of stoical
apathy, animosity, or vanity of not being concerned thereat, or
suffering no impeachment of happiness: 'Nihil agis, dolor.'
"His patience was founded upon the Christian philosophy, and a sound
faith of God's providence, and a meek and holy submission thereunto,
which he expressed in few words. I visited him near his end, when he
had not strength to hear or speak much; the last words which I heard
from him were, besides some expressions of dearness, that he did
freely submit to the will of God, being without fear; he had often
triumphed over the king of terrours in others, and given many repulses
in the defence of patients; but, when his own turn came, he submitted
with a meek, rational, and religious courage.
"He might have made good the old saying of 'dat Galenus opes,' had he
lived in a place that could have afforded it. But his indulgence and
liberality to his children, especially in their travels, two of his
sons in divers countries, and two of his daughters in France, spent
him more than a little. He was liberal in his house entertainments and
in his charity: he left a comfortable, but no great estate, both to
his lady and children, gained by his own industry.
"Such was his sagacity and knowledge of all history, ancient and
modern, and his observations thereupon so singular, that, it hath been
said, by them that knew him best, that, if his profession, and place
of abode, would have suited, his ability, he would have made an
extraordinary man for the privy council, not much inferiour to the
famous Padre Paulo, the late oracle of the Venetian state.
"Though he were no prophet, nor son of a prophet, yet in that faculty
which comes nearest it, he excelled, i.e. the stochastick, wherein he
was seldom mistaken, as to future events, as well publick as private;
but not apt to discover any presages or superstition."
It is observable, that he, who, in his earlier years, had read all the
books against religion, was, in the latter part of his life, averse
from controversies. To play with important truths, to disturb the
repose of established tenets, to subtilize objections, and elude
proof, is too often the sport of youthful vanity, of which maturer
experience commonly repents. There is a time when every man is weary
of raising difficulties only to task himself with the solution, and
desires to enjoy truth without the labour or hazard of contest. There
is, perhaps, no better method of encountering these troublesome
irruptions of skepticism, with which inquisitive minds are frequently
harassed, than that which Browne declares himself to have taken: "If
there arise any doubts in my way, I do forget them; or, at least,
defer them, till my better settled judgment, and more manly reason, be
able to resolve them: for I perceive every man's reason is his best
Oedipus, and will, upon a reasonable truce, find a way to loose those
bonds, wherewith the subtilties of errour have enchained our more
flexible and tender judgments."
The foregoing character may be confirmed and enlarged by many passages
in the Religio Medici; in which it appears, from Whitefoot's
testimony, that the author, though no very sparing panegyrist of
himself, had not exceeded the truth, with respect to his attainments
or visible qualities.
There are, indeed, some interiour and secret virtues, which a man may,
sometimes, have without the knowledge of others; and may, sometimes,
assume to himself, without sufficient reasons for his opinion. It is
charged upon Browne, by Dr. Watts, as an instance of arrogant
temerity, that, after a long detail of his attainments, he declares
himself to have escaped "the first and father-sin of pride." A perusal
of the Religio Medici will not much contribute to produce a belief of
the author's exemption from this father-sin; pride is a vice, which
pride itself inclines every man to find in others, and to overlook in
himself.
As easily may we be mistaken in estimating our own courage, as our own
humility; and, therefore, when Browne shows himself persuaded, that
"he could lose an arm without a tear, or, with a few groans, be
quartered to pieces," I am not sure that he felt in himself any
uncommon powers of endurance; or, indeed, any thing more than a sudden
effervescence of imagination, which, uncertain and involuntary as it
is, he mistook for settled resolution.
"That there were not many extant, that, in a noble way, feared the
face of death less than himself," he might, likewise, believe at a
very easy expense, while death was yet at a distance; but the time
will come, to every human being, when it must be known how well he can
bear to die; and it has appeared that our author's fortitude did not
desert him in the great hour of trial.
It was observed, by some of the remarkers on the Religio Medici, that
"the author was yet alive, and might grow worse as well as better:" it
is, therefore, happy, that this suspicion can be obviated by a
testimony given to the continuance of his virtue, at a time when death
had set him free from danger of change, and his panegyrist from
temptation to flattery.
But it is not on the praises of others, but on his own writings, that
he is to depend for the esteem of posterity; of which he will not
easily be deprived, while learning shall have any reverence among men;
for there is no science in which he does not discover some skill; and
scarce any kind of knowledge, profane or sacred, abstruse or elegant,
which he does not appear to have cultivated with success.
His exuberance of knowledge, and plenitude of ideas, sometimes
obstruct the tendency of his reasoning and the clearness of his
decisions: on whatever subject he employed his mind, there started up
immediately so many images before him, that he lost one by grasping
another. His memory supplied him with so many illustrations, parallel
or dependent notions, that he was always starting into collateral
considerations; but the spirit and vigour of his pursuit always gives
delight; and the reader follows him, without reluctance, through his
mazes, in themselves flowery and pleasing, and ending at the point
originally in view.
"To have great excellencies and great faults, 'magnae; virtutes nee
minora vitia,' is the poesy," says our author, "of the best natures."
This poesy may be properly applied to the style of Browne; it is
vigorous, but rugged; it is learned, but pedantick; it is deep, but
obscure; it strikes, but does not please; it commands, but does not
allure; his tropes are harsh, and his combinations uncouth.
He fell into an age in which our language began to lose the stability
which it had obtained in the time of Elizabeth; and was considered by
every writer as a subject on which he might try his plastick skill, by
moulding it according to his own fancy. Milton, in consequence of this
encroaching license, began to introduce the Latin idiom: and Browne,
though he gave less disturbance to our structures in phraseology, yet
poured in a multitude of exotick words; many, indeed, useful and
significant, which, if rejected, must be supplied by circumlocution,
such as _commensality_, for the state of many living at the same
table; but many superfluous, as a _paralogical_, for an unreasonable
doubt; and some so obscure, that they conceal his meaning rather than
explain it, as _arthritical analogies_, for parts that serve some
animals in the place of joints.
His style is, indeed, a tissue of many languages; a mixture of
heterogeneous words, brought together from distant regions, with terms
originally appropriated to one art, and drawn by violence into the
service of another. He must, however, be confessed to have augmented
our philosophical diction; and, in defence of his uncommon words and
expressions, we must consider, that he had uncommon sentiments, and
was not content to express, in many words, that idea for which any
language could supply a single term.
But his innovations are sometimes pleasing, and his temerities happy:
he has many "verba ardentia" forcible expressions, which he would
never have found, but by venturing to the utmost verge of propriety;
and flights which would never have been reached, but by one who had
very little fear of the shame of falling.
There remains yet an objection against the writings of Browne, more
formidable than the animadversions of criticism. There are passages
from which some have taken occasion to rank him among deists, and
others among atheists. It would be difficult to guess how any such
conclusion should be formed, had not experience shown that there are
two sorts of men willing to enlarge the catalogue of infidels.
It has been long observed, that an atheist has no just reason for
endeavouring conversions; and yet none harass those minds which they
can influence, with more importunity of solicitation to adopt their
opinions. In proportion as they doubt the truth of their own
doctrines, they are desirous to gain the attestation of another
understanding: and industriously labour to win a proselyte, and
eagerly catch at the slightest pretence to dignify their sect with a
celebrated name [88].
The others become friends to infidelity only by unskilful hostility;
men of rigid orthodoxy, cautious conversation, and religious asperity.
Among these, it is, too frequently, the practice to make in their heat
concessions to atheism or deism, which their most confident advocates
had never dared to claim, or to hope. A sally of levity, an idle
paradox, an indecent jest, an unreasonable objection, are sufficient,
in the opinion of these men, to efface a name from the lists of
christianity, to exclude a soul from everlasting life. Such men are so
watchful to censure, that they have seldom much care to look for
favourable interpretations of ambiguities, to set the general tenour
of life against single failures, or to know how soon any slip of
inadvertency has been expiated by sorrow and retraction; but let fly
their fulminations, without mercy or prudence, against slight offences
or casual temerities, against crimes never committed, or immediately
repented.
The infidel knows well what he is doing. He is endeavouring to supply,
by authority, the deficiency of his arguments, and to make his cause
less invidious, by showing numbers on his side; he will, therefore,
not change his conduct, till he reforms his principles. But the zealot
should recollect, that he is labouring by this frequency of
excommunication, against his own cause, and voluntarily adding
strength to the enemies of truth. It must always be the condition of a
great part of mankind, to reject and embrace tenets upon the authority
of those whom they think wiser than themselves; and, therefore, the
addition of every name to infidelity, in some degree, invalidates that
argument upon which the religion of multitudes is necessarily founded.
Men may differ from each other in many religious opinions, and yet all
may retain the essentials of christianity; men may sometimes eagerly
dispute, and yet not differ much from one another: the rigorous
persecutors of errour should, therefore, enlighten their zeal with
knowledge, and temper their orthodoxy with charity; that charity,
without which orthodoxy is vain; charity that "thinketh no evil," but
"hopeth all things," and "endureth all things."
Whether Browne has been numbered among the contemners of religion, by
the fury of its friends, or the artifice of its enemies, it is no
difficult task to replace him among the most zealous professors of
christianity. He may, perhaps, in the ardour of his imagination, have
hazarded an expression, which a mind intent upon faults may interpret
into heresy, if considered apart from the rest of his discourse; but a
phrase is not to be opposed to volumes; there is scarcely a writer to
be found, whose profession was not divinity, that has so frequently
testified his belief of the sacred writings, has appealed to them with
such unlimited submission, or mentioned them with such unvaried
reverence.
It is, indeed, somewhat wonderful, that he should be placed without
the pale of christianity, who declares, "that he assumes the
honourable style of a christian," not because it is "the religion of
his country," but because "having in his riper years and confirmed
judgment seen" and examined all, he finds himself obliged, by the
principles of grace, and the law of his own reason, to embrace "no
other name but this;" who, to specify his persuasion yet more, tells
us, that "he is of the reformed religion; of the same belief our
Saviour taught, the apostles disseminated, the fathers authorized, and
the martyrs confirmed;" who, though "paradoxical in philosophy, loves
in divinity to keep the beaten road; and pleases himself that he has
no taint of heresy, schism, or errour:" to whom, "where the scripture
is silent, the church is a text; where that speaks, 'tis but a
comment;" and who uses not "the dictates of his own reason, but where
there is a joint silence of both: who blesses himself, that he lived
not in the days of miracles, when faith had been thrust upon him; but
enjoys that greater blessing, pronounced to all that believe and saw
not." He cannot surely be charged with a defect of faith, who
"believes that our Saviour was dead, and buried, and rose again, and
desires to see him in his glory:" and who affirms that "this is not
much to believe;" that "we have reason to owe this faith unto
history;" and that "they only had the advantage of a bold and noble
faith, who lived before his coming; and, upon obscure prophecies, and
mystical types, could raise a belief." Nor can contempt of the
positive and ritual parts of religion be imputed to him, who doubts,
whether a good man would refuse a poisoned eucharist; and "who would
violate his own arm, rather than a church."
The opinions of every man must be learned from himself: concerning his
practice, it is safest to trust the evidence of others. Where these
testimonies concur, no higher degree of historical certainty can be
obtained; and they apparently concur to prove, that Browne was a
zealous adherent to the faith of Christ; that he lived in obedience to
his laws, and died in confidence of his mercy.