Q. Why doth the tongue water when we hear sour and sharp things spoken

of? A. Because the imaginative virtue or power is of greater force than

the power and faculty of tasting; and when we imagine a taste, we

conceive the power of tasting as a means; there is nothing felt by the

taste, but by means of the spittle the tongue doth water.

Q. Why do some persons stammer and lisp? A. Sometimes through the

moistness of the tongue and brain, as in children, who cannot speak

plainly nor pronounce many letters. Sometimes it happeneth by reason of

the shrinking of certain sinews which go to the tongue, which are

corrupted with phlegm.

Q. Why are the tongues of serpents and mad dogs venomous? A. Because of

the malignity and tumosity of the venomous humour which predominates in

them.

Q. Why is a dog’s tongue good for medicine, and a horse’s tongue

pestiferous? A. By reason of some secret property, or that the tongue of

a dog is full of pores, and so doth draw and take the viscosity of a

wound. It is observed that a dog hath some humour in his tongue, with

which, by licking, he doth heal; but the contrary effect is in a horse’s

tongue.

Q. Why is spittle white? A. By reason of the continual movement of the

tongue, whereof heat is engendered, which doth make this superfluity

white; that is seen on the froth of water.

Q. Why is spittle unsavoury and without taste? A. If it had a certain

determinate taste, then the tongue would not taste at all, but only give

the taste of spittle, and could not distinguish others.

Q. Why does the spittle of one that is fasting heal an imposthume? A.

Because it is well digested, and made subtle.

Q. Why do some abound in spittle more than others? A. This doth proceed

of a phlegmatic complexion, which doth predominate in them; and such are

liable to a quotidian ague, which ariseth from the predominance of

phlegm: the contrary, in those that spit little, because heat abounds in

them, which consumes the humidity of the spittle; and so the defect of

spittle is the sign of fever.

Q. Why is the spittle of a man who is fasting more subtle than of one

who is full? A. Because the spittle is without the viscosity of meat,

which is wont to make the spittle of one who is full, gross and thick.

Q. From whence proceedeth the spittle of man? A. From the froth of the

lungs, which, according to the physicians, is the seat of the phlegm.

Q. Why have not birds spittle? A. Because they have very dry lungs.

Q. Why doth the tongue sometimes lose the use of speaking? A. It is

occasioned by a palsy or apoplexy, which is a sudden effusion of blood,

and by gross humours; and sometimes also by infection of _spiritus

animalis_ in the middle cell of the brain, which hinders the spirits

from being carried to the tongue.

_Of the Roof of the Mouth._

Q. Why are fruits, before they are ripe, of a bitter or sour relish, and

afterwards sweet? A. A sour relish or taste proceeds from coldness and

want of heat in gross and thick humidity; but a sweet taste is produced

by sufficient heat; therefore, in the ripe fruit humidity is subtle

through the heat of the sun, and such fruit is commonly sweet; but

before it is ripe, as humidity is gross or subtle for want of heat, the

fruit is bitter or sour.

Q. Why are we better delighted with sweet tastes than with bitter or any

other? A. Because a sweet thing is hot and moist, and through its heat

dissolves and consumes superfluous humidities, and by this humidity

immundicity is washed away; but a sharp eager taste, by reason of the

cold which predominates in it, doth bind overmuch, and prick and offend

the parts of the body in purging, and therefore we do not delight in

that taste.

Q. Why doth a sharp taste, as that of vinegar, provoke appetite rather

than any other? A. Because it is cold, and doth cool. For it is the

nature of cold to desire and draw, and therefore it is the cause of

appetite.

Q. Why do we draw in more air than we breathe out? A. Because much air

is drawn in that is converted into nutriment, and with the vital spirits

is contained in the lungs. Therefore a beast is not suffocated so long

as it receives air with its lungs, in which some part of the air

remaineth also.

Q. Why doth the air seem to be expelled and put forth, seeing the air is

invisible, by reason of its variety and thinness? A. Because the air

which is received in us, is mingled with vapours and fumes from the

heart, by reason whereof it is made thick, and so is seen. And this is

proved by experience, because that in winter we see our breath; for the

coldness of the air doth bind the breath mixed with fume, and so it is

thickened and made gross, and by consequence is seen.

Q. Why have some persons stinking breath? A. Because of evil fumes that

arise from the stomach. And sometimes it doth proceed from the

corruption of the airy parts of the body, as the lungs. The breath of

lepers is so infected, that it would poison birds if near them, because

the inward parts are very corrupt.

Q. Why are lepers hoarse? A. Because the vocal instruments are

corrupted, that is, the lights.

Q. Why do persons become hoarse? A. Because of the rheum descending from

the brain filling the conduit of the lights: and sometimes through

imposthumes of the throat, or rheum gathering in the neck.

Q. Why have the females of all living creatures the shrillest voice, the

crow only excepted, and a woman a shriller and smaller voice than a man?

A. By reason of the composition of the veins the vocal arteries of voice

are formed, as appears by this similitude, that a small pipe sounds

shriller than a great. Also in women, because the passage where the

voice is formed is made narrow and strait, by reason of cold, it being

the nature of cold to bind; but in men, the passage is open and wider

through heat, because it is the property of heat to open and dissolve.

It proceedeth in women through the moistness of the lungs, and weakness

of the heat. Young and diseased men have sharp and shrill voices from

the same cause.

Q. Why doth the voice change in men at fourteen, and in women at twelve?

A. Because then the beginning of the voice is slackened and loosened;

and this is proved by the similitude of the string of an instrument let

down or loosened which gives a great sound; and also because eunuchs,

capons, &c. have softer and slenderer voices than others, in consequence

of the absence of generating powers.

Q. Why do small birds sing more and louder than great ones, as appears

in the lark and nightingale? A. Because the spirits of small birds are

subtle and soft, and the organ conduit strait, as appeareth in a pipe;

therefore their notes following easily at desire they sing very soft.

Q. Why do bees, wasps, locusts, and many other such like insects, make a

noise, seeing they have no lungs, nor instruments of voice? A. Because

in them there is a certain small skin, which, when struck by the air,

causeth a sound.

Q. Why do not fish make a sound? A. Because they have no lungs, but only

gills, nor yet a heart; and therefore they need not the drawing in of

the air, and by consequence they make no noise, because a noise is the

percussion of the air which is drawn.

_Of the Neck._

Q. Why hath a living creature a neck? A. Because the neck is the

supporter of the head, and therefore the neck is in the middle between

the head and the body, to the intent that by it and by its sinews,

motion and sense of the body might be conveyed through all the body; and

that by means of the neck, the heart, which is very hot, might be

separated from the brain.

Q. Why do some creatures want necks, as serpents and fishes? A. Because

they want hearts, and therefore want that assistance which we have

spoken of; or else they have a neck in some inward part of them, which

is not distinguished outwardly.

Q. Why is the neck full of bones and joints? A. That it may bear and

sustain the head the better. Also, because the backbone is joined to the

brain in the neck, and from thence it receives marrow, which is of the

substance of the brain.

Q. Why have some creatures long necks, as cranes, storks, and such like?

A. Because such birds seek their food at the bottom of waters. And some

creatures have short necks, as sparrows, hawks, &c. because such are

ravenous, and therefore for strength have short necks; as appeareth in

the ox, which has a short neck and strong.

Q. Why is the neck hollow, and especially before, about the tongue? A.

Because there are two passages, whereof the one doth carry the meat to

the nutritive instrument, or stomach and liver, which is called by the

Greeks _Œsophagus_; and the other is the wind-pipe.

Q. Why is the artery made with rings and circle? A. The better to bow

and give a good sounding.

_Of the Shoulders and Arms._

Q, Why hath a man shoulders and arms? A. To lift and carry burdens.

Q. Why are the arms round? A. For the swifter and speedier work.

Q. Why are the arms thick? A. That they may be strong to lift and bear

burdens, and thrust and give a strong blow; so their bones are thick,

because they contain much marrow, or they would be easily corrupted and

injured.

Q. Why do the arms become small and slender in some diseases, as in mad

men and such as are sick of the dropsy? A. Because all the parts of the

body do suffer the one with the other; and therefore one member being in

grief, all the humours do concur and run thither to give succour and

help to the aforesaid grief.

Q. Why have brute beasts no arms? A. Their fore feet are instead of

arms, and in their place.

_Of the Hands._

Q. For what use hath a man hands, and an ape also like unto a man? A.

The hand is an instrument that a man doth especially make use of,

because many things are done by the hands and not by any other part.

Q. Why are some men ambo-dexter, that is, they use the left hand as the

right? A. By reason of the great heat of the heart, and for the hot

bowing of the same; for it is that which makes a man as nimble of the

left hand as of the right.

Q. Why are the fingers full of joints? A. To be more fit and apt to

receive and keep what are put in them.

Q. Why hath every finger three joints, and the thumb but two? A. The

thumb hath three, but the third is joined to the arm, therefore is

stronger than the other, fingers; and is called pollox, or polico, that

is to excel in strength.

Q. Why are the fingers of the right hand nimbler than the fingers of the

left? A. It proceedeth from the heat that predominates in those parts,

and causeth greater agility.

_Of the Nails._

Q. From whence do nails proceed? A. Of the tumosity and humours, which

are resolved and go into the extremities of the fingers, and they are

dried through the power of the external air, and brought to the hardness

of horn.

Q. Why do the nails of old men grow black and pale? A. Because the heat

of the heart decaying, causeth their beauty to decay also.

Q. Why are men judged to be good or evil complexioned by the colour of

their nails? A. Because they give witness of the goodness or badness of

the heart, and therefore of the complexion; for if they be somewhat red,

they betoken choler well tempered; but if they be yellowish or black,

they signify melancholy.

Q. Why do white spots appear in the nails? A. Through mixture of phlegm

with the nutriment.

_Of the Paps and Dugs._

Q. Why are the paps placed upon the breasts? A. Because the breast is

the seat of the heart, which is most hot; and therefore the paps grow

there, to the end that the menses being conveyed thither, as being near

to the heat of the heart, should the sooner be digested, perfected, and

converted into the matter and substance of the milk.

Q. Why are the paps below the breasts in beasts, and above the breasts

in woman? A. Because woman goes upright, and has two legs only: and

therefore if her paps were below her breasts, they would hinder her

going; but beasts having four feet prevents that inconveniency.

Q. Why have not men as great paps and breasts as women? A. Because men

have not monthly terms, and therefore have no vessel deputed for them.

Q. Whether are great, small or middle-sized paps best for children to

suck? A. In great ones the heat is dispersed, and there is no good

digestion of the milk; but in small ones the power and force is strong,

because a virtue united is strongest, and by consequence there is a good

digestion of the milk.

Q. Why do the paps of young women begin to grow about 13 or 15 years of

age? A. Because then the flowers have no course to the teats, by which

the young one is nourished, but follow their ordinary course, and

therefore wax soft.

Q. Why hath a woman who is pregnant of a boy, the right pap harder than

the left? A. Because the male child is conceived in the right side of

the mother: and therefore the flowers do run to the right pap and make

it hard.

Q. Why doth it show weakness of the child, when the milk doth drop out

of the paps before the woman is delivered? A. Because the milk is the

proper nutriment of the child in the womb of the mother; therefore if

the milk run out, it is a token that the child is not nourished, and

consequently is weak.

Q. Why doth the hardness of the paps betoken the health of the child in

the womb? A. Because the flowers are converted into milk, and that milk

doth sufficiently nourish the child, and thereby strength is signified.

Q. Why are women’s paps hard when they be pregnant, and soft at other

times? A. Because they swell then, and are puffed up; and the great

moisture which proceeds from the flowers doth run into the paps, which

at other seasons remaineth in the matrix or womb, and is expelled by the

place deputed for that end.

Q. By what means doth the milk of the paps come to the matrix or womb?

A. There is a certain knitting and coupling of the paps with the womb,

and there are certain veins which the midwives do cut in the time of the

birth of the child, and by those veins the milk flows in at the navel of

the child, and so it receives nourishment by the navel.

Q. Why is it a sign of a male child in the womb, when the milk that

runneth out of a woman’s breast is thick, and not much, and of a female

when it is thin? A. Because a woman that goeth with a boy, hath a great

heat in her, which doth perfect the milk and make it thick; but she who

goes with a girl hath not so much heat, and therefore the milk is

undigested, imperfect, watery, and thin, and will swim above the water

if it be put into it.

Q. Why is the milk white, seeing the flowers are red, of which it is

engendered? A. Because blood which is well purged and concocted becomes

white, as appeareth in flesh whose proper colour is red, and being

boiled is white. Also, because every humour which is engendered of the

body, is made like unto that part in colour where it is engendered, as

near as it can be; but because the flesh of the paps is white, therefore

the colour of the milk is white.

Q. Why doth a cow give milk more abundantly than other beasts? A.

Because she is a great eating beast, and where there is much monthly

superfluity engendered, there is much milk; because it is nothing else

but that blood purged and tried.

Q. Why is not milk wholesome? A. 1. Because it curdeth in the stomach,

whereof an evil breath is bred. 2. Because the milk doth grow sour in

the stomach, where evil humours are bred, and infect the breath.

Q. Why is milk bad for such as have the headache? A. Because it is

easily turned into great fumosities, and hath much terrestrial substance

in it, the which ascending doth cause the headache.

Q. Why is milk fit nutriment for infants? A. Because it is a natural and

usual food, and they were nourished by the same in the womb.

Q. Why are the white-meats made of a new-milked cow good? A. Because

milk at that time is very spongy, expels many fumosities, and, as it

were, purges at that time.

Q. Why do physicians forbid the eating of fish and milk at the same

time? A. Because they produce a leprosy, and because they are

phlegmatic.

Q. Why have not birds and fish milk and paps? A. Because paps would

hinder the flight of birds. And although fish have neither paps nor

milk, the females cast much spawn, which the male touches with a small

gut, and causes their kind to continue in succession.

_Of the Back._

Q. Why have beasts backs? A. 1. Because the back is the way and mien of

the body, from which are extended and spread throughout all the sinews

of the backbone. 2. Because it should be a guard and defence for the

soft parts of the body, as for the stomach, liver, lights and such like.

3. Because it is the foundation of all the bones, as the ribs, fastened

to the backbone.

Q. Why hath the backbone so many joints or knots, called _spondelia_? A.

Because the moving and bending it, without such joints, could not be

done; and therefore they are wrong who say that elephants have no such

joints, for without them they could not move.

Q. Why do fish die after their backbones are broken? A. Because in fish

the backbone is instead of the heart; now the heart is the first thing

that lives, and the last that dies; and when that bone is broken, fish

can live no longer.

Q. Why doth a man die soon after the marrow is hurt or perished? A.

Because the marrow proceeds from the brain, which is the principal part

of a man.

Q. Why have some men the piles? A. Those men are cold and melancholy,

which melancholy first passes to the spleen, its proper seat, but there

cannot be retained, for the abundance of blood; for which reason it is

conveyed to the backbone, where there are certain veins which terminate

in the back, and receive the blood. When those veins are full of the

melancholy blood, then the conduits of nature are opened, and the blood

issues out once a month, like women’s terms. Those men who have this

course of blood, are kept from many infirmities, such as the dropsy,

plague, &c.

Q. Why are the Jews much subject to this disease? A. Because they eat

much phlegmatic and cold meats, which breed melancholy blood, which is

purged with the flux. Another reason is, motion causes heat, and heat

digestion; but strict Jews never move, labour, nor converse much, which

breeds a coldness in them, and hinders digestion, causing melancholic

blood, which is by this means purged out.

_Of the Heart._

Q. Why are the lungs light, spongy, and full of holes? A. That the air

may be received into them for cooling the heart, and expelling humours,

because the lungs are the fan of the heart; and as a pair of bellows are

raised up by taking in the air, and shrunk by blowing it out, so

likewise the lungs draw the air to cool the heart, and cast it out, lest

through too much air drawn in, the heart should be suffocated.

Q. Why is the flesh of the lungs white? A. Because they are in continual

motion.

Q. Why have those beasts only lungs that have hearts? A. Because the

lungs are no part for themselves, but for the heart; and therefore it

were superfluous for those creatures to have lungs that have no hearts.

Q. Why do such creatures as have no lungs want a bladder? A. Because

such drink no water to make their meat digest, and need no bladder for

urine; as appears in such birds who do not drink at all, viz. the falcon

and sparrow-hawk.

Q. Why is the heart in the midst of the body? A. That it may impart life

to all parts of the body; and therefore it is compared to the sun, which

is placed in the midst of the planets, to give light to them all.

Q. Why only in men is the heart on the left side? A. To the end that the

heat of the heart may mitigate the coldness of the spleen; for the

spleen is the seat of melancholy, which is on the left side also.

Q. Why is the heart first engendered; for the heart doth live and die

last? A. Because the heart is the beginning and original of life, and

without it no part can live. For of the seed retained in the matrix,

there is engendered a little small skin, which compasses the seed;

whereof the heart is made of the purest blood; then of blood not so

pure, the liver; and of thick and cold blood the marrow and brain.

Q. Why are beasts bold that have little hearts? A. Because in a little

heart the heat is well united and vehement, and the blood touching it

doth quickly heat it, and is speedily carried to the other parts of the

body, which gives courage and boldness.

Q. Why are creatures with a large heart timorous, as the hare? A. The

heart is dispersed in such a one, and not able to heat the blood which

cometh to it; by which means fear is bred.

Q. How is it that the heart is continually moving? A. Because in it

there is a certain spirit which is more subtle than air, and by reason

of its thickness and rarefaction seeks a larger space, filling the

hollow room of the heart, hence the dilating and opening of the heart;

and because the heart is earthly, the thrusting and moving ceasing, its

parts are at rest, tending downwards. As a proof of this, take an acorn,

which, if put into the fire, the heat dissolves its humidity, therefore

it occupies a greater space, so that the rind cannot contain it, but

puffs up and throws it into the fire. The like of the heart. Therefore

the heart of a living creature is triangular, having its least part

towards its left side, and the greater towards the right; and doth also

open and shut in the least part, by which means it is in continual

motion; the first motion is called _diastole_, that is, extending the

breast or heart; the other _systole_, that is, shutting of the heart;

and from these all the motions of the body proceed, and that of the

pulse which physicians feel.

Q. How comes it that the flesh of the heart is so compact and knit

together? A. Because in thick compacted substances heat is strongly

received and united. And because the heart with its heat should moderate

the coldness of the brain, it is made of that fat flesh apt to keep a

strong heat.

Q. How comes the heart to be the hottest part of all living creatures?

A. It is so compacted as to receive heat best, and because it should

mitigate the coldness of the brain.

Q. Why is the heart the beginning of life? A. It is plain that in it the

vital spark is bred, which is the seat of life; and therefore the heart

having two receptacles, viz. the right and the left, the right hath more

blood than spirits; which spirit is engendered to give life and vivify

the body.

Q. Why is the heart long and sharp like a pyramid? A. The round figure

hath an angle, therefore the heart is round, for fear any poison or

hurtful matter should be retained in it; and because that figure is

fittest for motion.

Q. How comes the blood chiefly to be in the heart? A. The blood in the

heart has its proper or efficient place, which some attribute to the

liver; and therefore the heart doth not receive blood from any other

parts, but all other parts from it.

Q. How comes it that some creatures want a heart? A. Although they have

no heart, yet they have somewhat that answers for it, as appears in eels

and fish that have the backbone instead of the heart.

Q. Why does the heart beat in some creatures when the head is off, as in

birds and hens? A. Because the heart lives first and dies last, and

therefore beats longer than other parts.

Q. Why doth the heat of the heart sometimes fail of a sudden, as in

those who have the falling sickness? A. This proceeds from the defect of

the heart itself, and of certain small sinks with which it is covered,

which being infected and corrupted, the heart faileth on a sudden:

sometimes only by reason of the parts adjoining; and therefore, when any

venomous humour goes out of the stomach, that turns the heart and parts

adjoining, that causeth the fainting.

_Of the Stomach._

Q. For what reason is the stomach large and wide? A. Because in it the

food is first concocted or digested as it were in a pot, to the end that

that which is pure should be separated from that which is not; and

therefore, according to the quantity of food, the stomach is enlarged.

Q. How comes it that the stomach is round? A. Because if it had angles

and corners, food would remain in them, and breed ill humours, so that a

man would never want agues, which humours are evacuated and consumed,

and not hid in any such corners, by the roundness of the stomach.

Q. How comes the stomach to be full of sinews? A. Because the sinews can

be extended and enlarged; and so is the stomach when it is full; but

when empty it is drawn together; and therefore nature provides those

sinews.

Q. How comes the stomach to digest? A. Because of the heat which is in

it, and comes from the parts adjoining, that is, the liver and the

heart. For as we see in metals, the heat of the fire takes away the rust

and dross from iron, the silver from tin, and gold from copper; so also

by digestion the pure is separated from the impure.

Q. For what reason doth the stomach join the liver? A. Because the liver

is very hot, and with its heat helps digestion, and provokes appetite.

Q. Why are we commonly cold after dinner? A. Because then the heat goes

to the stomach to further digestion, and so the other parts grow cold.

Q. Why is it hurtful to study soon after dinner? A. Because when the

heat labours to help the imagination in study, it ceases from digesting

the food, which remains undigested; therefore people should walk some

time after meals.

Q. How cometh the stomach slowly to digest meat? A. Because it swims in

the stomach. Now, the best digestion is in the bottom of the stomach,

because the fat descends not there: such as eat fat meat are very

sleepy, by reason that digestion is hindered.

Q. Why is all the body wrong, when the stomach is uneasy? A. Because the

stomach is knit with the brain, heart, and liver, which are the

principal parts in man; and when it is not well the others are

indisposed. Again, if the first digestion be hindered, the others are

also hindered; for in the first digestion is the beginning of the

infirmity of the stomach.

Q. Why are young men sooner hungry than old men? A. Young men do digest

for three causes; 1. For growing: 2. For restoring of life: and, 3. For

conservation of life. Also, young men are hot and dry, and therefore the

heat doth digest more, and by consequence they desire more.

Q. Why do physicians prescribe that men should eat when they have an

appetite? A. Because much hunger and emptiness will fill the stomach

with naughty rotten humours, which are drawn in instead of meat; for, if

we fast over night, we have an appetite to meat, but none in the

morning; as then the stomach is filled with naughty humours, and

especially its mouth, which is no true filling, but a deceitful one. And

therefore, after we have eaten a little, our stomach comes to us again;

for the first morsel, having made clean the mouth of the stomach, doth

provoke the appetite.

Q. Why do physicians prescribe that we should not eat too much at a

time, but by little and little? A. Because when the stomach is full, the

meat doth swim in it, which is a dangerous thing. Another reason is,

that very green wood doth put out the fire, so much meat chokes the

natural heat and puts it out; and therefore the best physic is to use

temperance in eating and drinking.

Q. Why do we desire change of meats according to the change of times; as

in winter, beef, pork, mutton; in summer, light meats, as veal, lamb,

&c.? A. Because the complexion of the body is altered and changed

according to the time of the year. Another reason is, that this proceeds

from the quality of the season; because the cold in winter doth cause a

better digestion.

Q. Why should not the meat we eat be as hot as pepper and ginger? A.

Because as hot meat doth inflame the blood, and dispose it to a leprosy;

so, on the contrary, meat too cold doth mortify and chill the blood. Our

meat should not be over sharp, because it wastes the constitution; too

much sauce doth burn the entrails, and inclineth to often drinking; raw

meat doth the same; and over sweet meats to constipate and cling the

veins together.

Q. Why is it a good custom to eat cheese after dinner, and pears after

all meat? A. Because by reason of its earthliness and thickness it

tendeth down towards the bottom of the stomach, and so putteth down the

meat; and the like of pears. Note, that new cheese is better than old;

and that old soft cheese is very bad, and causeth the headache and

stopping of the liver; and the older the worse. Whereof it is said, that

cheese digesteth all things but itself.

Q. Why are nuts good after cheese, as the proverb is, After fish nuts,

and after flesh cheese? A. Because fish is of hard digestion, and doth

easily putrefy and corrupt; and nuts are a remedy against poison.

Q. Why is it unwholesome to wait long for one dish after another, and to

eat of divers kinds of meat? A. Because the first begins to digest when

the last is eaten, and so digestion is not equally made. But yet this

rule is to be noted, dishes light of digestion, as chickens, kids, veal,

soft eggs, and such like, should be first eaten: because, if they should

be first served and eaten, and were digested, they would hinder the

digestion of the others; and the light meats not digested would be

corrupted in the stomach, and kept in the stomach violently, whereof

would follow belching, loathing, headache, bellyache, and great thirst.

It is very hurtful too, at the same meal, to drink wine and milk because

they are productive of leprosy.

Q. Whether is meat or drink best for the stomach? A. Drink is sooner

digested than meat, because meat is of great substance, and more

material than drink, and therefore meat is harder to digest.

Q. Why is it good to drink after dinner? A. Because the drink will make

the meat readier to digest. The stomach is like unto a pot which doth

boil meat, and therefore physicians do counsel to drink at meals.

Q. Why is it good to forbear a late supper? A. Because there is little

moving or stirring after supper, and so the meat is not sent down to the

bottom of the stomach, but remaineth undigested, and so breeds hurts;

therefore a light supper is best.

_Of the Blood._

Q. Why is it necessary that every living thing that hath blood have also

a liver? A. Because the blood is first made in the liver, its seat,

being drawn from the stomach by certain principal veins, and so

engendered.

Q. Why is the blood red? A. 1. It is like the part in which it is made,

viz. the liver, which is red. 2. It is likewise sweet, because it is

well digested and concocted; but if it hath a little earthy matter mixed

with it, that makes it somewhat salt.

Q. How is women’s blood thicker than men’s? A. Their coldness thickens,

binds, congeals, and joins together.

Q. How comes the blood to all parts of the body through the liver, and

by what means? A. Through the principal veins, as the veins of the head,

liver, &c. to nourish all the body.

_Of the Urine._

Q. How doth the urine come into the bladder, seeing the bladder is shut?

A. Some say by sweating; others, by a small skin in the bladder, which

opens and lets in the urine. Urine is a certain and not deceitful

messenger of the health and infirmity of man. Men make white urine in

the morning, and before dinner red, but after dinner pale, and also

after supper.

Q. Why is it hurtful to drink much cold water? A. Because one contrary

doth hinder and expel another; water is very cold, and lying so in the

stomach hinders digestion.

Q. Why is it unwholesome to drink new wine? A. 1. It cannot be digested;

therefore it causes the belly to swell, and a kind of bloody flux. 2. It

hinders making water.

Q. Why do physicians forbid us to labour presently after dinner? A. 1.

Because motion hinders the virtue and power of digestion. 2. Because

stirring immediately after dinner causes the different parts of the body

to draw the meat to them, which often breeds sickness. 3. Because motion

makes the food descend before it is digested. But after supper it is

good to walk a little, that the food may go to the bottom of the

stomach.

Q. Why is it good to walk after dinner? A. Because it makes a man well

disposed, and fortifies and strengthens the natural heat, causing the

superfluities of the stomach to descend.

Q. Why is it wholesome to vomit? A. It purges the stomach of all naughty

humours, expelling them, which would breed agues if they should remain

in it; and purges the eyes and head, clearing the brain.

Q. How comes sleep to strengthen the stomach and digestive faculty? A.

Because in sleep the heat draws inwards, and helps digestion: but when

awake, the heat returns, and is dispersed through the body.

_Of the Gall and Spleen._

Q. How come living creatures to have a gall? A. Because choleric humours

are received into it, which through their acidity helps the guts to

expel superfluities, also it helps digestion.

Q. How comes the jaundice to proceed from the gall? A. The humour of the

guts is blueish and yellow; therefore when its pores are stopped, the

humours cannot go into the sack thereof, but are mingled with the blood,

wandering throughout all the body, and infecting the skin.

Q. Why hath a horse, mule, ass, or cow, no gall? A. Those creatures have

no gall in one place, as in a purse or vessel, yet they have one

dispersed in small veins.

Q. How comes the spleen to be black? A. It is occasioned by terrestrial

and earthy matter of a black colour. According to physicians, the spleen

is the receptacle of melancholy, and that is black.

Q. Why is he lean who hath a large spleen? A. Because the spleen draws

much water to itself, which would turn to fat; therefore, men that have

a small spleen are fat.

Q. Why does the spleen cause men to laugh, as says Isidorus: “We laugh

with the spleen, we are angry with the gall, we are wise with the heart,

we love with the liver, we feel with the brain, and speak with the

lungs.” A. The reason is, the spleen draws much melancholy to it, being

its proper seat, the which melancholy proceeds from sadness, and is

there consumed; and the cause failing, the effect doth so likewise. And

by the same reason the gall causes anger, for choleric men are often

angry, because they have much gall.

_Of Monsters._

Q. Doth nature make any monsters? A. She doth; if she did not, then

would she be deprived of her end. For of things possible, she doth

always propose to bring forth that which is most perfect and best; but

in the end, through the evil disposition of the matter, not being able

to bring forth that which she intended, she brings forth that which she

can. As it happened in Albertus’s time, when, in a certain village, a

cow brought forth a calf, half a man; then the countrymen suspecting a

shepherd, would have burnt him with the cow; but Albertus, being skilful

in astronomy, said, that this did proceed from a special constellation,

and so delivered the shepherd from their hands.

Q. Are there one or two? A. To find out, you must look into the heart;

if there are two hearts, there are two men.

_Of Infants._

Q. Why are some children like their father, some like their mother, some

to both, and some to neither? A. If the seed of the father wholly

overcome that of the mother, the child doth resemble the father; but if

the mother’s predominate, then it is like the mother; but if it be like

neither, that doth happen sometimes through the four qualities,

sometimes through the influence of some heavenly constellation.

Q. Why are children oftener like the father than the mother? A. It

proceeds from the imagination of the mother, as appeared in a queen who

had her imagination on a blackamoor; and in an Ethiopian queen, who

brought forth a white child, because her imagination was upon a white

colour; as is seen in Jacob’s skill in casting rods of divers colours

into the water when his sheep went to ram.

Q. Why do children born in the eighth month for the most part die

quickly; and why are they called the children of the moon? A. Because

the moon is a cold planet, which has dominion over the child, and

therefore doth bind it with its coldness, which is the cause of its

death.

Q. Why doth a child cry as soon as it is born? Because of the sudden

change from heat to cold; which cold doth affect its tenderness. Another

reason is, because the child’s soft and tender body is wringed and put

together coming out of the narrow and strait passage of the matrix; and

especially, the brain being moist, and the head being pressed and

wrinkled together, is the cause that some humours distil by the eyes,

which are the cause of tears and weeping.

Q. Why doth the child put its fingers into its mouth as soon as it

cometh into the world? A. Because that coming out of the womb it cometh

out of a hot bath, and entering into the cold, puts its fingers into its

mouth for want of heat.

_Of the Child in the Womb._

Q. How is the child engendered in the womb? A. The first six days the

seed hath the colour of milk; but in the six following a red colour,

which is near unto the disposition of flesh; and then it is changed into

a thick substance of blood. But in the twelve days following, this

substance becomes so thick and round, that it is capable of receiving

shape and form.

Q. Doth the child in the womb void excrements or make water? A. No;

because it hath not the first digestion which is in the stomach. It

receives no food by the mouth, but by the navel; therefore, makes no

urine, but sweats, which is but little, and is received in a skin in the

matrix, which at the birth is cast out.

Of Abortion and Untimely Birth.

Q. Why do women that eat unwholesome meats easily miscarry? A. Because

they breed putrefied seed, which, the mind abhorring, doth cast it out

of the womb, as unfit for the most noble shape which is adapted to

receive the soul.

Q. Why doth wrestling and leaping cause the casting of the child, as

some subtle women do on purpose? A. The vapour is burning, and doth

easily hurt the tender substance of the child, entering at the pores of

the matrix.

Q. Why doth much joy cause a woman to miscarry? A. Because in a time of

joy woman is destitute of heat, and so miscarriage doth follow.

Q. Why do women easily miscarry when they are first with child, viz. the

first, second, or third month? A. As apples and pears easily fall at

first, because the knots or ligaments are weak, so it is with a child in

the womb.

Q. Why is it hard to miscarry in the third, fourth, fifth, or sixth

months? A. Because the ligaments are stronger and well fortified.

_Of Divers Matters._

Q. Why has not a man a tail like a beast? A. Because a man is a noble

creature, whose property it is to sit; which a beast, having a tail,

cannot.

Q. Why does hot water freeze sooner than cold? A. Hot water is thinner,

and gives better entrance to the frost.

Q. Why cannot drunken men judge of taste as well as sober men? A.

Because the tongue being full of pores and spongy, receives great

moisture into it, and more in drunken men than in sober; therefore the

tongue, through often drinking, is full of bad humours; and so the

faculty of tasting is rendered out of order: also, through the

thickening of the taste itself, drink taken by drunkards is not

presently felt. And by this may be also understood why drunkards have

not a perfect speech.

Q. Why have melancholy beasts long ears? A. The ears proceed from a cold

and dry substance, called a gristle, which is apt to become bone; and

because melancholy beasts do abound with this kind of substance, they

have long ears.

Q. Why do hares sleep with their eyes open? A. 1. They have their eyes

standing out, and their eye-lids short, therefore never quite shut. 2.

They are timorous, and, as a safeguard to themselves, sleep with their

eyes open.

Q. Why do not crows feed their young till they be nine days old? A.

Because seeing them of another colour, they think they are of another

kind.

Q. Why are sheep and pigeons mild? A. They want gall, the cause of

anger.

Q. How comes it that birds do not make water? A. Because that

superfluity which would be converted in urine, is turned into feathers.

Q. How do we hear better by night than by day? A. Because there is a

greater quietness in the night than in the day, for the sun doth not

exhale the vapours by night, but it doth in the day: therefore the mean

is more fit than in the day; and the mean being fit, the motion is

better received, which is said to be caused by a sound.

Q. For what reason doth a man laugh sooner when touched in the arm-pits

than in the other parts of the body? A. Because there is in that place a

meeting of many sinews, and the mean we touch, which is the flesh, is

more subtle than in other parts, and therefore of finer feeling. When a

man is moderately and gently touched there, the spirits that are

dispersed, run into the face, and cause laughter.

Q. Why do some women love white men and some black men? A. 1. Some have

a weak sight, and such delight in black, because white doth hurt the

sight more than black. 2. Because like delight in like; but some women

are of a hot nature, and such are delighted with black, because

blackness followeth heat; and others are of a cold nature, and those are

delighted with white, because cold produces white.

Q. Why do men incline to sleep after labour? A. Because, through

continual moving, the heat is dispersed to the external parts of the

body, which, after labour, is gathered together to the internal parts,

there to digest; and from digestion vapours arise from the heart to the

brain, which stop the passage by which the natural heat should be

dispersed to the external parts: and then, the external parts being cold

and thick, by reason of the coldness of the brain, sleep is easily

procured. By this it appeareth, that such as eat and drink too much, do

sleep much and long, because there are great store of humours and

vapours bred in such persons, which cannot be digested and consumed by

the natural heat.

Q. Why are such as sleep much evil disposed and ill-coloured? A. Because

in too much sleep moisture is gathered together which cannot be

consumed, and so it doth covet to go out through the superficial parts

of the body, and especially it resorts to the face, and therefore is the

cause of bad colour, as appeareth in such as are phlegmatic, and who

desire more sleep than others.

Q. Why do some imagine in their sleep that they eat and drink sweet

things? A. Because the phlegm drawn up by the jaws doth distil and drop

to the throat; and this phlegm is sweet after a sore sweat, and that

seemeth so to them.

Q. Why do some dream in their sleep that they are in the water and

drowned, and some that they are in the water and not drowned; especially

such as are phlegmatic? A. Because when the phlegmatic substance doth

turn to the high parts of the body, then they think they are in the

water and drowned; but when that substance draweth into the internal

parts, then they think they escape. Another reason may be, overmuch

repletion and drunkenness; and therefore, when men are overmuch filled

with meat, the fumes and vapours ascend and gather together, and they

are drowned and strangled; but if they cannot ascend so high, then they

seem to escape.

Q. May a man procure a dream, by an external cause? A. It may be done.

If a man speak softly at another’s ear and awake him not, then of this

stirring of the spirits there are thunderings and buzzings in the head,

which cause dreaming.

Q. How many humours are there in a man’s body? A. Four; whereof every

one hath its proper place. The first is choler, called by physicians

_stava bilis_, which is placed in the liver. The second is melancholy,

called _atra bilis_, whose seat is in the spleen. The third is phlegm,

whose place is in the head. The fourth is blood, whose place is in the

heart.

Q. What condition and quality hath a man of a sanguine complexion? A. He

is fair and beautiful; hath his hair for the most part smooth; is bold;

retaineth that which he hath conceived; is shame-faced, given to music,

a lover of sciences, liberal, courteous, and not desirous of revenge.

Q. What properties do follow those of a phlegmatic complexion? A. They

are dull of wit, their hair never curls, they are seldom very thirsty,

much given to sleep, dream of things belonging to water, are fearful,

covetous, and given to heap up riches.

Q. What are the properties of a choleric man? A. He is soon angry,

furious, and quarrelsome, given to war, pale coloured, and unquiet,

drinks much, sleeps little, and desires women’s company much.

Q. What are the properties of a melancholy man? A. He is brown in

complexion, unquiet, his veins hidden, eateth little, and digesteth

less, dreameth of dark and confused things, is sad, fearful, exceeding

covetous, and incontinent.

Q. What dreams do follow these complexions? A. Pleasant merry dreams do

follow the sanguine; fearful dreams the melancholic; the choleric dream

of children, fighting, and fire; the phlegmatic dream of water. This is

the reason why a man’s complexion is said to be known by his dreams.

Q. What is the reason that if you cover an egg over with salt, and let

it lie in it a few days, all the meat within is consumed? A. The great

dryness of the salt consumes the substance of the egg.

Q. Why is the melancholic complexion the worst? A. Because it proceeds

from the dregs of blood, is an enemy to mirth, and bringeth on an aged

appearance and death, being cold and dry.

Q. What is the cause that some men die joyful, and some in extreme

grief? A. Over great joy doth overmuch heat the internal parts of the

body; and overmuch grief doth drown and suffocate the heart, which

failing, a man dieth.

Q. Why hath a man so much hair on his head? A. The hair of the head

proceeds from the vapours which arise from the stomach, and ascend to

the head, and also from the superfluities which are in the brain; and

those two passing through the pores of the head are converted into hair,

by reason of the heat and dryness of the head. And because man’s body is

full of humours, and he hath more brains that any other creature, and

also more superfluities in the brains, which the heat expelleth: hence

it followeth that he hath more hair than any other living creature.

Q. How many ways is the brain purged, and other hidden places of the

body? A. Four; the watery and gross humours are purged by the eyes,

melancholy by the ears, choler by the nose, and phlegm by the hair.

Q. What is the reason that such as are very fat in their youth are in

danger of dying on a sudden? A. Such have very small and close veins, by

reason of their fatness, so that the air and the breath can hardly have

free course in them; and thereupon the natural heat, wanting the

refreshment of air, is put out, and as it were, quenched.

Q. Why do garlic and onions grow after they are gathered? A. It

proceedeth from the humidity that is in them.

Q. Why do men feel cool sooner than women? A. Because men, being more

hot than women, have their pores more open, and therefore it doth sooner

enter into them than women.

Q. Why are not old men subject to the plague like young men and

children? A. They are cold, and their pores are not so open as in youth:

and therefore the infecting air doth not penetrate so soon by reason of

their coldness.

Q. Why do we cast water in a man’s face when he swooneth? A. Because

that through the coldness of water the heat may run to the heart, and so

give strength.

Q. Why are those waters best and most delicate which run towards the

rising sun? A. Because they are the soonest stricken with the sun-beams,

and made pure and subtle, the sun having them under it, and by that

means taking off the coldness and gross vapours which they gather from

the ground they run through.

Q. Why have women such weak and small voices? A. Because their

instruments and organs of speaking, by reason of their coldness, are

small and narrow; and therefore, receiving but little air, causes the

voice to be effeminate.

Q. Wherefore doth it proceed that want of sleep doth weaken the brain

and the body? A. Much watching doth engender choler, the which being hot

doth dry up and lessen the humours which serve the brain, the head, and

other parts of the body.

Q. Wherefore doth vinegar so readily staunch the blood? A. From its cold

virtue; for all cold is naturally binding, and vinegar being cold, hath

the like property.

Q. Why is sea-water saltier in summer than in winter? A. From the heat

of the sun, seeing by experience that a salt thing being heated becometh

more salt.

Q. Why do men live longer in hot regions than in cold? A. Because they

may be more dry, and by that means the natural heat is better preserved

in them than in cold countries.

Q. Why is well-water seldom or ever good? A. All water which standeth

still in the spring, and is never heated by the sun-beams, is very

heavy, and hath much earthy matter in it; and therefore, wanting the

heat of the sun, is naught.

Q, Why do men sleep better and more at ease on the right side than on

the left? A. Because when they lie on the left side, the lungs do lie

upon and cover the heart, which is on that side under the pap; now the

heart, the fountain of life, being thus occupied and hindered with the

lungs, cannot exercise its own proper operation, as being overmuch

heated with the lungs lying upon it, and therefore wanting the

refreshment of the air which the lungs do give it, like the blowing of a

pair of bellows, is choked and suffocated; but by lying on the right

side, these inconveniences are avoided.

Q. What is the reason that old men sneeze with great difficulty? A.

Because that through their coldness their arteries are very narrow and

close, and therefore the heat is not of force to expel the cold.

Q. Why doth a drunken man think that all things about him do turn round?

A. Because the spirits which serve the sight are mingled with vapours

and fumes, arising from the liquors he has drunk: the overmuch heat

causeth the eye to be in continual motion; and the eye being round

causeth all things about it to seem to go round.

Q. Wherefore doth it proceed, that bread which is made with salt, is

lighter than that which is made without it, considering salt is very

heavy of itself? A. Although bread is heavy of itself, yet the salt

dries it, and makes it light, by reason of the heat which it hath; and

the more heat there is in it, the better the bread is, and the lighter

and more wholesome for the body.

Q. Why is not new bread good for the stomach? A. Because it is full of

moistness, and thick hot vapours, which do corrupt the blood; and hot

bread is blacker than cold, because heat is the mother of blackness, and

because the vapours are not gone out of it.

Q. Why do lettuces make a man sleep? A. Because they engender gross

vapours.

Q. Why do the dregs of wine and oil go to the bottom, and those of honey

swim uppermost? A. Because the dregs of wine and oil are earthly, and

therefore go to the bottom; but honey is a liquid that cometh from the

stomach and belly of the bee, and is there in some sort purified and

made subtle; on which account the dregs are most light and hot, and

therefore go uppermost.

Q. Why do cats’ and wolves’ eyes shine in the night, and not in the day?

A. The eyes of these beasts are by nature more crystalline than the eyes

of other beasts, and therefore do shine in darkness; but the brightness

of the sun doth hinder them from being seen in the day-time.

Q. What is the reason that some men, when they see others dance, do the

like with their hands and feet, or by other gestures of the body? A.

Because the sight having carried the represented unto the mind that

action, and judging the same to be pleasant and delightful, therefore

the imagination draweth the like of it in conceit, and stirs up the body

by the gestures.

Q. Why does much sleep cause some to grow fat and some lean? A. Those

who are of ill complexion, when they sleep, do consume and digest the

superfluities of what they have eaten, and therefore become fat. But

such as are of good complexion, when they sleep, are more cold and

digest less.

Q. How and from what cause do we suffer hunger better that thirst? A.

When the stomach has nothing else to consume, it consumeth the phlegm

and humours which it findeth most ready and most at hand; and therefore

we suffer hunger better than thirst, because the heat hath nothing to

refresh itself with.

Q. Why doth the hair fall after a great sickness? A. Where the sickness

is long, as in an ague, the humours of the head are dried up through

over much heat, and, therefore, wanting nourishment, the hair falls.

Q. Why doth the hair of the eye-brows grow long in old men? A. Because

through their age the bones of the eye-lids are thin for want of heat,

and therefore the hair doth grow there, by reason of the rheum of the

eyes.

Q. Whereof proceedeth gaping? A. Of gross vapours, which occupy the

vital spirits of the head, and of the coldness of the senses, causing

sleepiness.

Q. What is the reason that some flowers do open with the sun rising, and

shut with the setting? A. Cold doth close and shut, as hath been said,

but the heat of the sun doth open and enlarge. Some compare the sun to

the soul of the body; for as the soul giveth life, so the sun doth give

life, and vivicate all things; but cold bringeth death, withering and

decaying all things.

Q. Why doth grief cause men to grow old and gray? A. Age is nothing else

but dryness and want of humours of the body; grief then causeth

alteration, and heat dryness; age and greyness follow immediately.

Q. Why are gelded beasts weaker than such as are not gelded? A. Because

they have less heat, and by that means less force and strength.

THE PROBLEMS

of

MARCUS ANTONIUS ZIMARAS SANCTIPERTIAS.

Q. Why is it esteemed in the judgement of the most wise, the hardest

thing to know a man’s self? A. Because nothing can be known that is of

so great importance to man, for the regulation of his conduct in life.

Without this knowledge, man is like the ship which has neither compass

nor rudder to conduct her to port, and is tossed by every passion and

prejudice to which his natural constitution is subjected. To know the

form and natural perfection of man’s self, according to the

philosophers, is a task too hard; and a man, says Plato, is nothing, or

if he be any thing, he is nothing but his soul.

Q. Why is a man, though endowed with reason, the most unjust of all

living creatures? A. Because only man is desirous of honour; and so it

happens that every one covets to seem good, and yet naturally shuns

labour, though he attain no virtue by it.

Q. Why is man the proudest of all living creatures? A. By reason of his

great knowledge; or as philosophers say, all intelligent beings have

understanding, nothing remains that escapes man’s knowledge in

particular; or it is because he hath rule over all earthly creatures,

and all things seem to be brought under his dominion.

Q. Why have beasts their hearts in the middle of their breasts, and man

his inclining to the left side? A. To moderate the cold on that side.

Q. What is the cause that the suffocation of the matrix, which happens

to women through strife and contention, is more dangerous than the

detaining of the flowers? A. Because the more perfect an excrement is,

in its natural disposition, the worse it is when it is altered from that

disposition, and drawn to the contrary quality; as is seen in vinegar,

which is sharpest when it is made of the best wine. And so it happens

that the more men love one another, the more they fall into variance and

discord.

Q. How come women’s bodies to be looser, softer, and less than men’s;

and why do they want hair? A. By reason of their menses; for with them

their superfluities go away, which would produce hair; and thereby the

flesh is filled, consequently the veins are more hid in women than in

men.

Q. What is the reason that when we think upon a horrible thing, we are

stricken with fear? A. Because the conceit or imagination of things has

force and virtue. For Plato saith, the fancy of things has some affinity

with the things themselves; for the image and representation of cold and

heat is such as the nature of things are. Or it is, because when we

comprehend any dreadful matter, the blood runneth to the internal parts;

and therefore the external parts are cold, and shake with fear.

Q. Why doth a radish root help digestion, and yet itself remaineth

undigested? A. Because the substance consisteth of divers parts; for

there are some thin parts in it, which are fit to digest meat, the which

being dissolved, there doth remain some thick and close substance in it,

which the heat cannot digest.

Q. Why do such as cleave wood cleave it easier in the length than

athwart? A. Because in the wood there is a grain, whereby if it be cut

in length, in the very cutting, one part naturally separateth from

another.

Q. What is the reason, that if a spear be stricken on the end, the sound

cometh sooner to one which standeth near, than to him who striketh? A.

Because, as hath been said, there is a certain long grain in wood,

directly forward filled with air, but on the other side there is none,

and therefore a beam or spear being stricken on the end, the air which

is hidden receiveth a sound in the aforesaid grain, which serveth for

its passage; and seeing the sound cannot go easily out, it is carried

unto the ear of him who is opposite; as those passages do not go from

side to side, a sound cannot be distinctly heard there.

Q. Why are the thighs and calves of the legs of men fleshy, seeing the

legs of beasts are not so? A. Because men only go upright; and therefore

nature hath given the lower parts corpulency, and taken it away from the

upper; and thus she has made the buttocks, the thighs, and calves of the

legs fleshy.

Q. Why are the sensible powers in the heart; yet, if the hinder part of

the brain be hurt, the memory suffereth by it; if the fore part, the

imagination; if the middle, the cogitative part? A. It is because the

brain is appointed by Nature to cool the heat of the heart; whereof it

is, that in divers parts it serveth the powers and instruments with

their heat, for every action of the soul doth not proceed from one

measure of heat.

THE PROBLEMS

OF

ALEXANDER APHRODISEUS.

Q. Why doth the sun make a man black, and dirt white, wax soft, and dirt

hard? A. By reason of the disposition of the substance that doth suffer.

All humours, phlegm excepted, when heated above measure, do seem black

about the skin; and dirt, being full either of saltpetre, or salt

liquor, when the sun hath consumed its dregs and filth, doth become

white again; when the sun hath drawn and stirred up the humidity of wax,

it is softened; but in dirt the sun doth consume the humidity, which is

very much, and makes it hard.

Q. Why are round ulcers hard to be cured? A. Because they are bred of a

sharp choler, which eats and gnaws; and because it doth run, dropping

and gnawing, it makes a round ulcer; for which reason it requires drying

medicines, as physicians assert.

Q. Why is honey sweet to all men but such as have the jaundice? A.

Because they have much bitter choler all over their bodies, which

abounds in the tongue; whence it happens, when they eat honey the

humours are stirred, and the taste itself, by the bitterness, of choler,

causes an imagination that the honey is bitter.

Q. Why doth water cast on serpents cause them to fly? A. Because they

are dry and cold by nature, having but little blood, and therefore fly

from excessive coldness.

Q, Why doth an egg break if it be roasted and not if boiled? A. When

moisture comes near the fire, it is heated very much, and so breeds

wind, which being put up in little room, forces its way out, and breaks

the shell: the like happens to tubs, and earthen vessels, when new wine

is put into them: too much phlegm breaks the shell of an egg in

roasting; it is the same with earthen pots too much heated; wherefore

some people wet an egg when they intend to roast it. Hot water, by its

softness, doth dissipate its humidity by little and little, and

dissolves it through the thinness and passages of the shell.

Q. Why have children gravel breeding in their bladders, and old men in

their kidneys and reins? A. Because children have strait passages in

their kidneys, and an earthy thick humour is thrust with violence by the

urine to the bladder, which hath wide conduits and passages, that give

room for the urine and humour whereof gravel is engendered, which waxes

thick, and seats itself, in the manner it is. In old men it is the

reverse, for they have wide passages of the veins, back, and kidneys,

that the urine may pass away, and the earthy humour congeal and sink

down; the colour of the gravel shows the humour whereof the stone comes.

Q. Why is it, if the stone do congeal and wax hard through heat, we use

not contrary things to dissolve it by coldness, but light things, as

parsley, fennel, and the like? A. It is thought to fall out by an

excessive scorching heat, by which the stones do crumble into sand, as

in the manner of earthen vessels, which, when they are over-heated or

roasted, turn to sand. And by this means it happens that small stones

are voided, together with sand, in making water. Sometimes cold drink

thrusts out the stone, the kidneys being stretched, and casting it out

by a great effort, thus easing the belly of its burden. Besides, it

often happens that immoderate heat of the kidneys, or reins of the back

(through which the stone doth grow) is quenched with coldness.

Q. Why is the curing of an ulcer or bile in the kidney or bladder very

hard? A. Because the urine, being sharp, doth ulcerate the sore. Ulcers

are worse to cure in the bladder than in the kidneys, because the urine

stays in the former, but runs away from the latter.

Q. Why do chaff and straw keep water hot, but make snow cold? A. Because

the nature of chaff wants a manifest quality; seeing, therefore, that of

its own nature it can be easily mingled, and consumed by that which it

is annexed unto, it easily assumes the same nature, and being put into

hot things, it is easily hot, heats again, and keeps hot; and, on the

contrary, being made cold by the snow, and making the snow cold, it

keeps it in its coldness.

Q. Why have we oftentime a pain in making water? A. Because sharp choler

issuing out, and pricking the bladder of the urine, doth provoke and

stir up the whole body to ease the part offended and to expel the humour

moderately. This doth happen most of all unto children, because they

have moist excrements, by reason of their often filling.

Q. Why have some medicines of one kind contrary effects, as experience

proves; for mastich doth expel, dissolve, and also knit; and vinegar

cools and heats? A. Because there are some invisible bodies in them, not

by confusion, but by interposition; as sand moistened doth clog together

and seem to be but one body, though indeed there are many small bodies

in sand. And since this is so, it is not absurd that contrary qualities

and virtues should be hidden in mastich, and that nature hath given that

virtue to these bodies.

Q. Why do nurses rock and move their children when they would draw them

to sleep? A. To the end that the humours being scattered by moving, may

move the brains; but those of more years cannot endure this.

Q. Why doth oil, being drank, cause one to vomit, and especially yellow

choler? A. Because, being light, and ascending upwards, it provoketh the

nutriment in the stomach, and lifteth it up, and so the stomach being

grieved, summoneth the ejective virtue to vomit, and especially choler,

because that is light, and consisteth of subtle parts, and therefore the

sooner carried upward; for when it is mingled with any moist thing, it

runneth into the highest room.

Q. Why doth not oil mingle with moist things? A. Because, being pliant,

soft, and thick in itself, it cannot be divided into parts, and so

cannot be mingled; neither if it be put on earth can it enter into it.

Q. Why are water and oil frozen in cold weather, and wine and vinegar

are not? A. Because that oil, being without quality, and fit to be

compounded with any thing, is cold quickly, and so extremely, that it is

most cold. Water, being cold of nature, doth easily freeze when it is

made colder than its own nature. Wine being hot, and of subtle parts,

suffereth no freezing.

Q. Why do contrary things in quality bring forth the same effect? A.

That which is moist is hardened and bound alike by heat and cold. Snow

and liquid do freeze with cold; a plaster, and gravel in the bladder,

are made dry with heat. The effect indeed is the same, but by two divers

actions; the heat doth consume and eat the abundance of moisture; but

the cold stopping and shutting with its overmuch thickness, doth wring

out the filthy humidity, like as a sponge wrung with the hand doth cast

out the water which it hath in the pores or small passages.

Q. Why doth a shaking or quivering seize us oftentimes when any fearful

matter doth happen, as a great noise or crack made, the sudden downfall

of water, or the fall of a large tree? A. Because that oftentimes the

humours being digested and consumed by time, and made thin and weak, all

the heat, vehemently, suddenly, and sharply flying into the inward part

of the body, consumeth the humours which cause the disease.

Q. Why do steel glasses shine so clearly? A. Because they are lined in

the inside with white lead, whose nature is shining, and being put to

glass, which is lucid and transparent, doth shine much more; and casts

its beams through its passages, and without the body of the glass; and

by that means the glass is very shining and clear.

Q. Why do we see ourselves in glasses and clear water? A. Because the

quality of the sight, passing into the bright bodies by reflection, doth

return again on the beam of the eyes, as the image of him who looketh on

it.

Q. What is the reason, that if you cast a stone into standing water

which is near the surface of the earth it causes many circles, and not

if the water be deep in the earth? A. Because that the stone with the

vehemence of the cast, doth agitate the water in every part of it, until

it come to the bottom; and if there be a very great vehemence in the

throw, the circle is still greater, the stone going down to the bottom

causing many circles. For, first of all, it doth divide the outermost

and superficial parts of the water in many parts, and so always going

down to the bottom, again dividing the water, it maketh another circle,

and this is done successively until the stone resteth; and because the

vehemence of the stone is slackened still as it goes down, of necessity

the last circle is less than the first, because by that and also by its

force the water is divided.

Q. Why are such as are deaf by nature dumb? A. Because they cannot speak

and express that which they never heard. Some physicians do say, that

there is one knitting and uniting of sinews belonging to the like

disposition. But such as are dumb by accident are not deaf at all, for

then there ariseth a local passion.

Q. Why doth itching arise when an ulcer doth wax whole and phlegm cease?

A. Because the part which is healed and made sound doth pursue the relic

of the humours which remained there against nature, and which was the

cause of the bile, and so going out through the skin, and dissolving

itself, doth originally cause the itch.

Q. How comes a man to sneeze oftener and more vehemently than a beast?

A. Because he uses more meats and drinks, and of more different sorts,

and that more than requisite; the which, when he cannot digest as he

would, he doth gather together much air and spirit, by reason of much

humidity; the spirits then very subtle, ascending into the head, often

force a man to void them, and so provoke sneezing. The noise caused

thereby proceeds from a vehement spirit or breath passing through the

conduits of the nostrils, as belching doth the stomach, or breaking wind

by the fundament, the voice by the throat, and a sound by the ear.

Q. How come the hair and nails of dead people to grow? A. Because the

flesh rotting, withering, and falling away, that which was hidden about

the root of the hair doth now appear as growing. Some say that it grows

indeed, because carcases are dissolved in the beginning to many

excrements and superfluities by putrefaction. These going out at the

uppermost parts of the body by some passages, do increase the growth of

the hair.

Q. Why does not the hair of the feet soon grow grey? A. For this reason,

because that through great motion they disperse and dissolve the

superfluous phlegm that breeds grayness.

Q. Why, if you put hot burnt barley upon a horse’s sore, is the hair

which grows upon the sore not white but like the other hair? A. Because

it hath the force of expelling, and doth drive away and dissolve the

phlegm, as well as all other unprofitable matter that is gathered

together through the weakness of the parts, or crudity of the sore.

Q. Why doth hair never grow on an ulcer or bile? A. Because man hath a

thick skin, as is seen by the thickness of his hair; and if the scar be

thicker than the skin itself, it stops the passages from whence the hair

should grow. Horses have thinner skins, as is plain by their thick hair;

therefore all passages are not stopped in their wounds and sores; and

after the excrements which were gathered together have broken a passage

through those small pores, the hair doth grow.

Q. Why is Fortune painted with a double forehead, the one side bald and

the other hairy? A. The baldness signifies adversity; and hairiness

prosperity, which we enjoy when it pleaseth her.

Q. Why have some commended flattery? A. Because flattery setteth forth

before our eyes what we ought to be, though not what we are.

Q. Wherefore should virtue be painted girded? A. To show that virtuous

men should not be slothful, but diligent, and always in action.

Q. Why did the ancients say it was better to fall into the hands of a

raven than a flatterer? A. Because ravens do not eat us till we are

dead, but flatterers devour us alive.

Q. Why have choleric men beards before others? A. Because they are hot,

and their pores large.

Q. How comes it that such as have the hiccough do ease themselves by

holding their breath? A. The breath retained doth heat the interior

parts of the body and the hiccough proceeds from cold.

Q. How comes it that old men remember well what they have seen and done

in their youth, and forget such things as they see and do in their old

age? A. Things learned in youth take deep root and habitude in a person,

but those learned in age are forgotten, because the senses are weakened.

Q. What kind of covetousness is best? A. That of time, when employed as

it ought to be.

Q. Why is our life compared to a play? A. Because the dishonest do

occupy the place of the honest, and the worst sort the room of the good.

Q. Why do dolphins, when they appear above the water, denote a storm or

tempest approaching? A. Because at the beginning of a tempest there do

arise from the bottom of the sea certain hot exhalations and vapours

which heat the dolphins, causing them to rise up for cold air.

Q. Why did the Romans call Fabius Maximus the target of the people, and

Marcellus the sword? A. Because the one adapted himself to the service

of the commonwealth, and the other was very eager to revenge the

injuries of his country; and yet they were in the senate joined

together, because the gravity of the one would moderate the courage and

boldness of the other.

Q. Why doth the shining of the moon hurt the head? A. Because it moves

the humours of the brain, and cannot afterwards dissolve them.

Q. If water do not nourish, why do men drink it? A. Because water causes

the nutriment to spread through the body.

Q. Why is sneezing good? A. Because it purgeth the brain, as milk is

purged by the cough.

Q. Why is hot water lighter than cold? A. Because boiling water has less

ventosity, and is more light and subtle, the earthy and heavy substance

being separated from it.

Q. How comes marsh and pond water to be bad? A. By reason they are

phlegmatic, and do corrupt in summer; the fineness of the water is

turned into vapours, and the earthiness doth remain.

Q. Why are studious and learned men soonest bald? A. It proceeds from a

weakness of the spirits, or because warmth of digestion causes phlegm to

abound in them.

Q. Why doth much watching make the brain feeble? A. Because it increases

choler, which dries and extenuates the body.

Q. Why are boys apt to change their voices about fourteen years of age?

A. Because that then nature doth cause a great and sudden change of

voice, experience proves this to be true; for at that time we may say

that women’s paps do grow great, do hold and gather milk, and also those

places that are above the hips, in which the young fruit would remain.

Likewise men’s breasts and shoulders, which then can bear great and

heavy burdens. The body is bigger and dilated, as the alternation and

change of every part doth testify, and the harshness of the voice and

hoarseness; for the rough artery, the wind-pipe, being made wide in the

beginning, and the exterior and outward part within being unequal to the

throat, the air going out the rough uneven pipe doth then become unequal

and sharp, and after hoarse, something like unto the voice of a goat,

wherefore it has its name called Bronchus. The same doth also happen to

them unto whose rough artery distillation doth flow; it happens by

reason of the drooping humidity that a light small skin filled unequally

causes the uneven going forth of the spirit and air. Understand that the

wind-pipe of goats is such by reason of the abundance of humidity. The

like doth happen unto all such as nature hath given a rough artery, as

unto cranes. After the age of fourteen they leave off that voice,

because the artery is made wider and reacheth its natural evenness and

quality.

Q. Why do hard dens, hollow and high places, send back the likeness and

sound of the voice? A. Because that in such places also by reflection do

return back the image of a sound, for the voice doth beat the air, and

the air the place, which the more it is beaten the more it doth bear,

and therefore doth cause the more vehement sound of the voice; moist

places, and as it were soft, yielding to the stroke, and dissolving it,

give no sound; for according to the quantity of the stroke, the quality

and quantity of the voice is given, which is called an echo. Some do

idly fable that she is a goddess; some say that Pan was in love with

her, which without doubt is false. He was some wise man, who did first

desire to search out the cause of that voice; and as they who love, and

cannot enjoy that love, are grieved, so in like manner was he very sorry

until he found out the solution of that cause: as Endymion also, who

first found out the course of the moon, watching all night, and

observing her course, and searching her motion, did sleep in the

day-time, and therefore they do fable that he was beloved of her, and

that she came to him when he was asleep, because she did give the

philosopher the solution of the course of herself. They say also that he

was a shepherd, because that in the desert and high places he did mark

the course of the moon. And they gave him also the pipe, because that

the high places are blown with wind, or else because he sought out the

consonancy of figures. Prometheus, also, being a wise man, sought the

course of the star, which is called the eagle in the firmament, his

nature and place; and when he was as it were wasted with the desire of

learning, then at last he rested, when Hercules did resolve unto him all

doubts with his wisdom.

Q. Why do not swine cry when they are carried with their snouts upwards?

A. Because that above all other beasts they bend more to the earth. They

delight in filth, and that they seek, and therefore in the sudden change

of their face, they be as it were strangers, and being amazed with so

much light do keep that silence; some say the wind-pipe doth close

together by reason of the straitness of it.

Q. Why do swine delight in dirt? A. As the physicians do say, they are

naturally delighted with it, because they have a great liver, in which

desire is, as Aristotle saith; the wideness of the snout is the cause,

for he hath smelling which doth dissolve itself, and as it were strive

with stench.

Q. Why do many beasts wag their tails when they see their friends, and a

lion and a bull beat their sides when they are angry? A. Because they

have the marrow of their backs reaching to the tail, which hath the

force of motion in it, the imagination acknowledging that which is known

to them as it were with the hand, as happens to men, doth force them to

move their tails. This doth manifestly show some secret force to be

within them, which doth acknowledge what they ought. In the anger of

lions and bulls nature doth consent to the mind, and causeth it to be

gently moved, as men do sometimes when they are angry, beating their

hands on other parts; when the mind cannot be revenged on that which

doth hurt, it presently seeks out some other source, and cures the

malady with a stroke or blow.

Q. How come steel glasses to be better for the sight than any other

kind? A. Because steel is hard, and doth present unto us more

substantially the air that receiveth the light.

Q. How doth love show its greater force; by making the fool to become

wise, or the wise to become a fool? A. In attributing wisdom to him that

hath it not; for it is harder to build than to pull down; and ordinarily

love and folly are but an alteration of the mind.

Q. How comes much labour and fatigue to be bad for the sight? A. Because

it dries the blood too much.

Q. Why is goat’s milk reckoned best for the stomach? A. Because it is

thick, not slimy; and they feed on wood and boughs rather than grass.

Q. Why do grief and vexation bring gray hairs? A. Because they dry,

which bringeth on grayness.

Q. How come those to be most merry who have the thickest blood? A.

Because the blood which is fat and thick makes the spirits firm and

constant, wherein consists the force of all creatures.

Q. Whether is it hardest to obtain a person’s love, or to keep it when

obtained? A. It is hardest to keep it, by reason of the inconstancy of

man, who is quickly angry, and soon weary of a thing; hard to be gained,

and slippery to keep.

Q. Why do serpents shun the herb rue? A. Because they are very cold,

dry, and full of sinews, and that herb is of a contrary nature.

Q. Why is a capon better to eat than a cock? A. Because a capon loses

not his moisture by treading the hens.

Q. Why is our smell less in winter than summer? A. Because the air is

thick, and less moveable.

Q. Why does hair burn so quickly? A. Because it is dry and cold.

Q. Why is love compared to a labyrinth? A. Because the entry and coming

in is easy, and the going out impossible, or very hard.

DISPLAYING

THE SECRETS OF NATURE,

RELATING TO

PHYSIOGNOMY.

CHAPTER I.

SECT. _I Of Physiognomy, showing what it is, and from whence it is

derived._

Physiognomy is an ingenious science, or knowledge of nature, by. which

the inclinations and dispositions of every creature are understood, and

because some of the members are uncompounded and entire of themselves,

as the tongue, the heart, &c. and some are of a mixed nature, as the

eyes, the nose, and others; we therefore say that there are signs which

agree and live together, which inform a wise man how to make his

judgment before he be too rash to deliver it to the world.

Nor is it to be esteemed a foolish or idle art, seeing it is derived

from superior bodies; for there is no part of the face of man but what

is under the peculiar influence or government not only of the seven

planets, but also of the twelve signs of the Zodiac, and the

dispositions, vices, virtues, and fatility, either of a man or woman,

are plainly foretold, if the person pretending to the knowledge thereof

be an artist, which, that my reader may hereby attain to, I shall set

these things in a clearer light.

The reader should remember that the forehead is governed by Mars; the

right eye is under the dominion of Sol; the left is ruled by the Moon;

the right ear is under Jupiter; the left Saturn; the rule of the nose is

claimed by Venus; and nimble Mercury, the significator of eloquence,

claims the dominion of the mouth, and that very justly.

[Illustration]

Thus have the seven planets divided the face among them, but not with so

absolute a sway, but that the twelve signs of the Zodiac do also come in

with a part, (See the engraving): And therefore the sign Cancer presides

in the upper part of the forehead, and Leo attends upon the right

eye-brow, as Sagittarius does upon the right eye, and Libra upon the

right ear: upon the left eye-brow you will find Aquarius: and Gemini and

Aries taking care of the left ear: Taurus rules in the middle of the

forehead, and Capricorn the chin: Scorpio takes upon him the protection

of the nose: Virgo claims the precedence of the right cheek, Pisces the

left. And thus the face of man is cantoned out amongst the signs and

planets; which being carefully attended to, will sufficiently inform the

artist how to pass a judgment. For according to the sign or planet

ruling, so also is the judgment to be of the part ruled, which all those

that have understanding know easily how to apply.

In the judgment that is to be made from physiognomy, there is a great

difference betwixt a man and a woman; the reason is, because in respect

of the whole composition, men more fully comprehend it than women do, as

may evidently appear in the manner and method we shall give. Wherefore

the judgments which we shall pass in every chapter, do properly concern

a man, as comprehending the whole species, and but improperly the woman,

as being but a part thereof, and derived from the man; and therefore

whoever is called to give judgment on such and such a face, ought to be

wary about all the lines and marks that belong to it, respect being also

had to the sex: for when we behold a man whose face is like unto a

woman’s, and we pass a judgment upon it, having diligently observed it,

and not on the face only but on the other parts of the body, as his

hands, &c. in like manner we also behold the face of a woman, who in

respect of her flesh and blood is like unto a man, and in the disposure

also of the greatest parts of the body. But does physiognomy give the

same judgment on her, as it does of a man that is like unto her? By no

means, but far otherwise; in regard that the conception of the woman is

much different from that of a man, even in those respects which are said

to be common. Now in those common respects two parts are attributed to a

man, a third part to a woman.

Wherefore it being our intention to give you an exact account, according

to the rule of physiognomy, of all and every part of the members of the

body, we will begin with the head, as it hath relation only to man and

woman, and not to any other creature, that the work may be more obvious

to every reader.

CHAPTER II.

_Of the Judgment of Physiognomy._

Hair that hangs down without curling, if it be of a fair complexion,

thin and soft withal, signifies a man to be naturally faint-hearted, and

of a weak body, but of a quiet and harmless disposition. Hair that is

big, and thick, and short withal, denotes a man to be of a strong

constitution, secure, bold, deceitful, and for the most part, unquiet

and vain, lusting after beauty, and more foolish than wise, though

fortune may favour him. He whose hair is partly curled and partly

hanging down, is commonly wise, or a very great fool, or else as very a

knave as he is a fool. He whose hair grows thick on his temples and his

brow, one may at the first sight certainly conclude that such a man is

by nature simple, vain, luxurious, lustful, credulous, clownish in his

speech and conversation, and dull in his apprehension. He whose hair not

only curls very much, but bushes out, and stands on end, if the hair be

white, or of a yellowish colour, he is by nature proud and bold, dull of

apprehension, soon angry, given to lying, malicious, and ready to do any

mischief. He whose hair rises in the corner of his temples, and is gross

and rough withal, is a man highly conceited of himself, inclined to

malice, but cunningly conceals it, is very courtly, and a lover of new

fashions. He who hath much hair, that is to say, whose hair is thick all

over his head, is naturally vain and very luxurious, of a good

digestion, easy of belief, and slow of performance, of a weak memory,

and for the most part unfortunate. He whose hair is of a reddish

complexion, is for the most part, if not always, proud, deceitful,

detracting, and full of envy. He whose hair is extraordinary fair, is

for the most part a man fit for all praiseworthy enterprises, a lover of

honours, and much more inclined to do good than evil; laborious and

careful to perform whatsoever is committed to his care, secret in

carrying on any business, and fortunate. Hair of a yellowish colour

shows a man to be good-conditioned, and willing to do any thing,

fearful, shame-faced, and weak of body, but strong in the abilities of

the mind, and more apt to remember than to revenge an injury. He whose

hair is of a brownish colour, and curled not too much nor too little, is

a well disposed man, inclined to that which is good, a lover of peace,

cleanliness, and good manners. He whose hair turns gray or hoary in the

time of his youth, is generally given to women, vain, false, unstable,

and talkative. Note. That whatever signification the hair has in men, it

has the same in women also.

The forehead that riseth in a round, signifies a man liberally merry, of

a good understanding, and generally inclined to virtue. He whose

forehead is fleshy, and the bone of the brow jutting out, and without

wrinkles, is a man much inclined to suits of law, contentious, vain,

deceitful, and addicted to follow ill courses. He whose forehead is very

low and little, is of a good understanding, magnanimous, but extremely

bold and confident, and a great pretender to love and honour. He whose

forehead seems sharp, and pointed up in the corners of his temples, so

that the bone seems to jut forth a little, is a man naturally weak and

fickle, and weak in the intellectuals. He whose brow upon the temples is

full of flesh, is a man of a great spirit, proud, watchful, and of a

gross understanding. He whose brow is full of wrinkles, and has as it

were a seam coming down the middle of the forehead, so that a man may

think he hath two foreheads, is one that is of a great spirit, a great

wit, void of deceit, and yet of a hard fortune. He who has a full large

forehead, and a little round withal, destitute of hair, or at least that

has little on it, is bold, malicious, high-spirited, full of choler, and

apt to transgress beyond all bounds, and yet of a good wit, and very

apprehensive. He whose forehead is long and high, and jutting forth, and

whose face is figured, almost sharp and picked towards the chin, is one

reasonably honest, but weak and simple, and of a hard fortune.

Those eye-brows that are much arched, whether in man or woman, and which

by frequent motion elevate themselves, show the person to be proud,

high-spirited, vain-glorious, bold and threatening, a lover of beauty,

and indifferently inclined to either good or evil. He whose eye-lids

bend downwards when he speaks to another, or when he looks upon him, and

who has a kind of skulking look, is by nature a penurious wretch, close

in all his actions, of a very few words, but full of malice in his

heart. He whose eye-brows are thick, and have but little hair upon them,

is but weak in his intellectuals, and too credulous, very sincere,

sociable, and desirous of good company. He whose eye-brows are folded,

and the hair thick, and bending downwards, is one that is clownish and

unlearned, heavy, suspicious, miserable, envious, and one that will

cheat and cozen you if he can, and is only to be kept honest by good

looking to. He whose eye-brows have but short hair and of a whitish

colour, is fearful, and very easy of belief, and apt to undertake any

thing. Those on the other side whose eye-brows are black, and the hair

of them but thin, will do nothing without great consideration, and are

bold and confident of the performance of what they undertake: neither

are they apt to believe any thing without reason for so doing.

If the space between the eye-brows be of more than ordinary distance, it

shows the person to be hard-hearted, envious, close, cunning,

apprehensive, greedy of novelties, of a vain fortune, addicted to

cruelty more than love. But those men whose eye-brows are at lesser

distance from each other, are for the most part of a dull understanding;

yet subtle enough in their dealings, and of an uncommon boldness, which

is often attended with great felicity; but that which is most

commendable in them is, that they are most sure and constant in their

friendship.

Great and full eyes in either man or woman, show the person to be for

the most part slothful, bold, envious, a bad concealer of secrets,

miserable, vain, given to lying, and yet of a bad memory, slow in

invention, weak in his intellectuals, and yet very much conceited of

that little knack of wisdom he thinks himself master of. He whose eyes

are hollow in his head, and therefore discerns excellently well at a

great distance, is one that is suspicious, malicious, furious, perverse

in his conversation, of an extraordinary memory, bold, cruel and false

both in words and deeds, threatening, vicious, luxurious, proud,

envious, and treacherous; but he whose eyes are as it were starting out

of his head, is a simple foolish person, shameless, very fertile, and

easy to be persuaded either to vice or virtue. He who looks studiously

and acutely with his eyes and eye-lids downwards, denotes thereby to be

of a malicious nature, very treacherous, false, unfaithful, envious,

miserable, impious towards God, and dishonest towards men. He whose eyes

are small and conveniently round, is bashful and weak, very credulous,

liberal to others, and even in his conversation. He whose eyes look

asquint, is thereby denoted to be a deceitful person, unjust, envious,

furious, a great liar, and as the effect of all this, miserable. He who

hath a wandering eye, and which is rolling up and down, is for the most

part a vain, simple, deceitful man, lustful, treacherous, or

high-minded, an admirer of the fair sex, and one easy to be persuaded to

virtue or vice. He or she whose eyes are twinkling, and which move

forward or backward, shows the person to be luxurious, unfaithful, and

treacherous, presumptuous, and hard to believe any thing that is spoken.

If a person has any greenness mingled in the white of his eyes, such is

commonly silly, and often very false, vain and deceitful, unkind to his

friends, a great concealer of his own secrets, and very choleric. Those

whose eyes are every way rolling up and down, or they who seldom move

their eyes, and when they do, do as it were draw their eyes inwardly,

and accurately fasten them upon some object, such are by their

inclinations very malicious, vain-glorious, slothful, unfaithful,

envious, false and contentious. They whose eyes are addicted to

blood-shot, are naturally choleric, proud, disdainful, cruel without

shame, perfidious, and much inclined to superstition. They that have

eyes like oxen, are persons of good nutriment, but of a weak memory, are

dull of understanding, and silly in their conversation. But he whose

eyes are neither too little nor too big, and inclined to black, do

signify a man mild, peaceable, honest, witty, and of a good

understanding: and one that, when need requires, will be serviceable to

his friend.

A long and thin nose denotes a man bold, furious, angry, vain, easy to

be persuaded either to good or evil, weak and credulous. A long nose

extended, the tip of it bending downwards, shows the person to be wise,

discreet, secret and officious, honest, faithful, and one who will not

be over-reached in bargaining.

A bottle-nose is what denotes a man to be impetuous in obtaining his

desires, also vain, false, luxurious, weak, and an uncertain man, apt to

believe, and easy to be persuaded. A nose broad in the middle, and less

towards the end, denotes a vain talkative person, a liar, and one of a

hard fortune. He who hath a long and great nose, is an admirer of the

fair sex, but ignorant of the knowledge of any thing that is good,

extremely addicted to vice; assiduous in obtaining what he desires, and

very secret in the prosecution of it; and though very ignorant, would

fain be thought very knowing.

A nose very sharp on the tip of it, and neither too long nor too short,

too thick nor too thin, denotes the person, if a man, to be of a fretful

disposition, always pining and peevish; and if a woman, a scold, or

contentious, wedded to her own humours; of a morose and dogged carriage,

and if married, a plague to her husband. A nose very round at the end of

it, and having but little nostrils, shows the person to be munificent,

and liberal, true to his trust, but withal very proud, credulous and

vain. A nose very long and thin at the end of it, and something round

withal, signifies one bold in his discourse, honest in his dealings,

patient in receiving, and slow in offering injuries, but yet privately

malicious. He whose nose is naturally more red than any other part of

his face, is thereby denoted to be covetous, impious, luxurious, and an

enemy to goodness. A nose that turns up again, and is long and full on

the tip of it, shows the person that has it to be bold, proud, covetous,

envious, luxurious, a liar and deceiver, vain-glorious, unfortunate and

contentious. He whose nose riseth high in the middle, is prudent and

polite, and of great courage, honourable in his actions, and true to his

word. A nose big at the end shows a person to be of a peaceable

disposition, industrious and faithful, and of a good understanding. A

very wide nose, with wide nostrils, denotes a man dull of apprehension,

and inclined more to simplicity than wisdom, and withal contentious,

vain-glorious, and a liar.

A great and wide mouth shows a man to be bold, warlike, shameless and

stout, a great liar, and as great a talker, also a great eater; but as

to his intellectuals he is very dull, being for the most part very

simple. A little mouth shows the person to be of a quiet and pacific

temper, somewhat fearful, but faithful, secret, modest, bountiful, and

but a little eater.

He whose mouth smells of a bad breath, is one of a corrupted liver or

lungs, is oftentimes vain, wanton, deceitful, of indifferent intellects,

envious, covetous, and a promise-breaker. He that has a sweet breath, is

the contrary.

The lips, when they are very big and blubbering, show a person to be

credulous, foolish, dull, and stupid, and apt to be enticed to any

thing. Lips of a different size denote a person to be discreet, secret

in all things, judicious and of good wit, but somewhat hasty. To have

lips well coloured, and more thin than thick, shows a person to be

good-humoured in all things, and more easily persuaded to good than

evil. To have one lip bigger than the other shows variety of fortunes,

and denotes the party to be of a dull, sluggish temper, and but of a

very indifferent understanding, as being much addicted to folly.