Read The Major Works (English Library) Online
Authors: Sir Thomas Browne
The Major Works (English Library) (77 page)
11
. i.e. water germander.
12
. i.e. the river Acheron (
Odyssey
, X, 509–10).
13
. i.e. in a room.
14
. ‘bending downeward’ (Bullokar).
15
. i.e. at the summer solstice (see next note).
16
. i.e. on Midsummer Day.
17
. In
On Plants
, I, x, 1.
18
. ‘that is toward the Eastern or Western points’ (
Pseudodoxia Epidemica
, II, 2).
19
. i.e. in the direction of the sun’s (apparent) annual motion.
20
. Song of Solomon 4.16; cf. Theophrastus on the impact of winds, in
On Plants
, IV, i, 4.
21
. Suitable arrangement; in Varro,
On Agriculture
, I, vii, 2. On ‘
quaternio’s
’ see above,
p. 333, note 60
.
22
. Literally ‘deviations from the circular form’. Cf. ‘eccentricall’ in the next paragraph.
23
. Spherical layers (
R
).
24
. ‘In a lop-sided onion of seven or more rings, those closer to the centre on one side are larger than those farthest from the centre on the other’ (
H
).
25
. i.e. upstream.
26
. Turn.
27
. Theophrastus,
On Plants
, IV, iv, 1, and Plutarch,
Alexander
, XXXV; respectively.
28
.
Of the Temperaments and Powers of Simples
, VII (Browne marg.), where Galen gives a prescription for splenetic patients.
29
. ‘fairer than the white ivy’ (Browne marg., quoting the Latin of Virgil,
Eclogues
, VII, 38).
30
. i.e. insition: engrafting (
OED
).
31
. ‘
Satio
, the acte of sowinge of come’ (Elyot).
32
. Linschoten,
Discourse of Voyages
, I, 61 (Browne marg.). The Royal Society was to express an interest in the reputed ‘horns taking root and growing about Goa’, only to discover that ‘it was a jeer put upon the Portugues, because the women of Goa are counted much given to lechery’ (
§ 187
).
33
. i.e. joined by their apexes.
34
. i.e. degrees.
35
. On conic sections (as before,
p. 361, note 100
). An ‘Equicrurall’ cone is an isosceles (as above,
p. 337, note 25
).
36
. Genesis 6.14; Arrian, VII, 19; and Song of Solomon (‘Canticles’) 1.14 – respectively.
37
. Pruning in circular fashion.
38
. Stalks.
39
. Inner halls of Roman houses.
40
. Open-air temples (
subdialia
is synonymous with
hypætbros
).
41
. Arcades with recesses.
42
. In
On Architecture
, V, i, 3.
43
. With thinly spaced columns.
44
. ‘the space betweene pilars’ (Elyot).
45
. Spacing.
46
. Exodus 27.9–11.
47
. Shading.
48
. i.e. the eye’s pupil.
49
. Unshaded (
R
).
50
. ‘that parte of the eie, whych is called the syghte… Also the front of an hoste, at the joynynge of battayle’ (Elyot).
51
. Brilliant whiteness.
52
. i.e. burying under ground.
53
. i.e. seminal principles (of growth).
54
. Slimy covers.
55
. Helmont had planted a willow’s stem in sterilised earth; watered only with rain or distilled water, its weight multiplied over thirty times within five years.
56
. Used as an emetic.
58
. ‘Orcus’s light is Jupiter’s darkness, Orcus’s darkness is Jupiter’s light’: Hippocrates (Browne marg., quoted in Latin).
59
. i.e. dispenses with natural occultations or eclipses. So Hevelius in his study of the moon (Browne marg.).
60
. As above,
p. 325, note 2
.
61
. The Incarnation was prefigured ‘by types / And shadowes’, as Milton was to write in
Paradise Lost
(XII, 232–3; cf. above,
p. 70
). Hence,
inter alia
, ‘the cherubims of glory shadowing the mercy-seat’ of the Tabernacle (Hebrews 9.5) prefigured the advent of Christ (Luke 1.35: ‘the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee’).
62
. Image.
64
. i.e. the
camera obscura
. The paragraph describes accepted theories of vision, both modern and ancient, involving patterns diagrammatically represented as > (‘the decussation’) and >— (‘semi-decussation’).
65
. i.e. by a force strong enough to make them rebound (
M
).
66
. Well-tuned (
R
).
67
. i.e. animate, and therefore spiritual.
68
. In his treatise
Of Perception
(Browne marg.). Bovillus makes his point with a diagram of several crossing lines (see
M
).
69
. i.e. fantastical: pertaining to vision.
70
.
Timaeus
, 36b-d; merged in the next paragraph with Justin Martyr’s
First Apology
, LXX. The argument must be visualised, for it involves not only Christ’s initial in Greek (X) and the Cross (+
or
T) but patterns which, made by the intersecting circles if rotated on a vertical axis, pass through the Greek letter
theta
(θ) representing thanatos or death (cf. above,
p. 309, note 21
; and
§198
).
71
. Union. Also ‘communication between a man and a god’.
72
. ‘make knowne’ (Bullokar).
73
. ‘He placed him crosswise in the universe’. So Justin Martyr (above,
note 70
), who attributes the statement to Plato.
74
. Numbers 21.8–9.
75
. Cf. ‘the mysterious crosses of
Ægypt
’,
above, p. 330
. ‘Mercurial’ refers to both Hermes (Mercurius) Trismegistus [cf. the handed crosses ♀,
above, p. 357, note 76
] and the sign of the planet Mercury
(
G2
).
1
. i.e. the mystical import of numbers according to Pythagoras and his disciples.
2
.
δ
κη
(Browne marg.):
dike
or justice.
3
. A marginal note provides the diagram
which ‘by square numeration’ becomes
with the number five ‘hanging in the centre of Nine’.
4
. i.e. nine-pins (
M
).
5
. In
The Cessation of the Oracles
.
6
. i.e. the four constituents of matter – ‘fire, water, earth, and aire’ (as above,
p. 124
) – and the quintessence (ether).
7
.
‘Arbor, frute
, suffrute
, herba
, and that fifth which comprehendeth the
fungi
and
tubera
’ (Browne marg.). Cf. above,
p. 350, note 46
.
8
. ‘As Herns, Bitterns, and long claw’d Fowls’ (Browne suppl.).
9
. i.e. claws.
10
. Ellipse, parabola, hyperbola, circle, triangle (Browne marg., named in Latin).