The Anatomy of Melancholy eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 2,057 pages of information about The Anatomy of Melancholy.

The Anatomy of Melancholy eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 2,057 pages of information about The Anatomy of Melancholy.
Cadamustus, &c.?  Those accurate diaries of Portuguese, Hollanders, of Bartison, Oliver a Nort, &c.  Hakluyt’s voyages, Pet.  Martyr’s Decades, Benzo, Lerius, Linschoten’s relations, those Hodoeporicons of Jod. a Meggen, Brocard the monk, Bredenbachius, Jo.  Dublinius, Sands, &c., to Jerusalem, Egypt, and other remote places of the world? those pleasant itineraries of Paulus Hentzerus, Jodocus Sincerus, Dux Polonus, &c., to read Bellonius’ observations, P. Gillius his surveys; those parts of America, set out, and curiously cut in pictures, by Fratres a Bry.  To see a well-cut herbal, herbs, trees, flowers, plants, all vegetables expressed in their proper colours to the life, as that of Matthiolus upon Dioscorides, Delacampius, Lobel, Bauhinus, and that last voluminous and mighty herbal of Beslar of Nuremberg, wherein almost every plant is to his own bigness.  To see birds, beasts, and fishes of the sea, spiders, gnats, serpents, flies, &c., all creatures set out by the same art, and truly expressed in lively colours, with an exact description of their natures, virtues, qualities, &c., as hath been accurately performed by Aelian, Gesner, Ulysses Aldrovandus, Bellonius, Rondoletius, Hippolitus Salvianus, &c. [3326]_Arcana coeli, naturae secreta, ordinem universi scire majoris felicitatis et dulcedinis est, quam cogitatione quis assequi possit, aut mortalis sperare_.  What more pleasing studies can there be than the mathematics, theoretical or practical parts? as to survey land, make maps, models, dials, &c., with which I was ever much delighted myself. Tails est Mathematum pulchritudo (saith [3327] Plutarch) ut his indignum sit divitiarum phaleras istas et bullas, et puellaria spectacula comparari; such is the excellency of these studies, that all those ornaments and childish bubbles of wealth, are not worthy to be compared to them:  credi mihi ( [3328]saith one) extingui dulce erit Mathematicarum artium studio, I could even live and die with such meditation, [3329]and take more delight, true content of mind in them, than thou hast in all thy wealth and sport, how rich soever thou art.  And as [3330]Cardan well seconds me, Honorificum magis est et gloriosum haec intelligere, quam provinciis praeesse, formosum aut ditem juvenem esse. [3331]The like pleasure there is in all other studies, to such as are truly addicted to them, [3332]_ea suavitas_ (one holds) ut cum quis ea degustaverit, quasi poculis Circeis captus, non possit unquam ab illis divelli; the like sweetness, which as Circe’s cup bewitcheth a student, he cannot leave off, as well may witness those many laborious hours, days and nights, spent in the voluminous treatises written by them; the same content. [3333]Julius Scaliger was so much affected with poetry, that he brake out into a pathetical protestation, he had rather be the author of twelve verses in Lucan, or such an ode in [3334]Horace, than emperor of Germany. [3335]Nicholas Gerbelius, that good old man, was so
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The Anatomy of Melancholy from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.