Turks might not drink wine themselves, that neither Jew nor Christian then living in Constantinople, might drink any wine at all.”  In like sort amongst papists, fasting at first was generally proposed as a good thing; after, from such meats at set times, and then last of all so rigorously proposed, to bind the consciences upon pain of damnation.  “First Friday,” saith Erasmus, “then Saturday,” et nunc periclitatur dies Mercurii) and Wednesday now is in danger of a fast. [6596]"And for such like toys, some so miserably afflict themselves, to despair, and death itself, rather than offend, and think themselves good Christians in it, when as indeed they are superstitious Jews.”  So saith Leonardus Fuchsius, a great physician in his time. [6597]"We are tortured in Germany with these popish edicts, our bodies so taken down, our goods so diminished, that if God had not sent Luther, a worthy man, in time, to redress these mischiefs, we should have eaten hay with our horses before this.” [6598]As in fasting, so in all other superstitious edicts, we crucify one another without a cause, barring ourselves of many good and lawful things, honest disports, pleasures and recreations; for wherefore did God create them but for our use?  Feasts, mirth, music, hawking, hunting, singing, dancing, &c. non tam necessitatibus nostris Deus inservit, sed in delicias amamur, as Seneca notes, God would have it so.  And as Plato 2. de legibus gives out, Deos laboriosam hominum vitam miseratos, the gods in commiseration of human estate sent Apollo, Bacchus, and the Muses, qui cum voluptate tripudia et soltationes nobis ducant, to be merry with mortals, to sing and dance with us.  So that he that will not rejoice and enjoy himself, making good use of such things as are lawfully permitted, non est temperatus, as he will, sed superstitiosus. “There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour,” Eccles. ii. 24.  And as [6599]one said of hawking and hunting, tot solatia in hac aegri orbis calamitate, mortalibus taediis deus objecit, I say of all honest recreations, God hath therefore indulged them to refresh, ease, solace and comfort us.  But we are some of us too stern, too rigid, too precise, too grossly superstitious, and whilst we make a conscience of every toy, with touch not, taste not, &c., as those Pythagoreans of old, and some Indians now, that will eat no flesh, or suffer any living creature to be killed, the Bannians about Guzzerat; we tyrannise over our brother’s soul, lose the right use of many good gifts; honest [6600]sports, games and pleasant recreations, [6601]punish ourselves without a cause, lose our liberties, and sometimes our lives.  Anno 1270, at [6602]Magdeburg in Germany, a Jew fell into a privy upon a Saturday, and without help could not possibly get out; he called to his fellows for succour, but they denied it, because it was their Sabbath, non licebat opus manuum exercere;