The Major Works (English Library)

by Sir Thomas Browne

  He is then naturally led to treat of the number five; and finds, that by this number many things are circumscribed; that there are five kinds of vegetable productions, five sections of a cone, five orders of architecture, and five acts of a play. And observing that five was the antient conjugal or wedding number, he proceeds to a speculation which I shall give in his own words; ‘The antient numerists made out the conjugal number by two and three, the first parity and imparity, the active and passive digits, the material and formal principles in generative societies.’

  These are all the tracts which he published: but many papers were found in his closet, ‘Some of them, (says Whitefoot) designed for the press, were often transcribed and corrected by his own hand, after the fashion of great and curious writers.’

  Of these, two collections have been published; one by Dr. Tennison, the other in 1722 by a nameless editor.20 Whether the one or the other selected those pieces which the author would have preferred, cannot now be known: but they have both the merit of giving to mankind what was too valuable to be suppressed; and what might, without their interposition, have, perhaps, perished among other innumerable labours of learned men, or have been burnt in a scarcity of fuel like the papers of Pereskius.

  The first of these posthumous treatises contains ‘Observations upon several plants mentioned in Scripture.’ These remarks, though they do not immediately either rectify the faith, or refine the morals of the reader, yet are by no means to be censured as superfluous niceties or useless speculations; for they often shew some propriety of description, or elegance of allusion, utterly undiscoverable to readers not skilled in oriental botany; and are often of more important use, as they remove some difficulty from narratives, or some obscurity from precepts.

  The next is ‘Of garlands, or coronary and garland plants;’ a subject merely of learned curiosity, without any other end than the pleasure of reflecting on antient customs, or on the industry with which studious men have endeavoured to recover them.

  The next is a letter, ‘on the fishes eaten by our Saviour with his disciples, after his resurrection from the dead;’ which contains no determinate resolution of the question, what they were, for indeed it cannot be determined. All the information that diligence or learning could supply, consists in an enumeration of the fishes produced in the waters of Judea.

  Then follow ‘Answers to certain queries about fishes, birds, and insects;’ and ‘A letter of hawks and falconry antient and modern:’ in the first of which he gives the proper interpretation of some antient names of animals, commonly mistaken; and in the other has some curious observations on the art of hawking, which he considers as a practice unknown to the antients. I believe all our sports of the field are of Gothick original; the antients neither hunted by the scent, nor seem much to have practised horsemanship as an exercise; and though, in their works, there is mention of ‘aucupium’ and ‘piscatio,’21 they seem no more to have been considered as diversions, than agriculture or any other manual labour.

  In two more letters he speaks of ‘the cymbals of the Hebrews,’ but without any satisfactory determination; and of ‘repalick or gradual verses,’ that is, of verses beginning with a word of one syllable, and proceeding by words of which each has a syllable more than the former; as,

  O Deus, æternæ stationis conciliator.

  Ausonius.

  and, after his manner, pursuing the hint, he mentions many other restrained methods of versifying, to which industrious ignorance has sometimes voluntarily subjected itself.

  His next attempt is ‘On languages, and particularly the Saxon tongue.’ He discourses with great learning, and generally with great justness, of the derivation and changes of languages; but, like other men of multifarious learning, he receives some notions without examination. Thus he observes, according to the popular opinion, that the Spaniards have retained so much Latin, as to be able to compose sentences that shall be at once gramatically Latin and Castilian: this will appear very unlikely to a man that considers the Spanish terminations; and Howel, who was eminently skilful in the three provincial languages, declares, that after many essays he never could effect it.22

  The principal design of this letter, is to shew the affinity between the modern English and the antient Saxon; and he observes, very rightly, that ‘though we have borrowed many substantives, adjectives, and some verbs, from the French; yet the great body of numerals, auxiliary verbs, articles, pronouns, adverbs, conjunctions, and prepositions, which are the distinguishing and lasting parts of a language, remain with us from the Saxon.’

  To prove this position more evidently, he has drawn up a short discourse of six paragraphs, in Saxon and English; of which every word is the same in both languages, excepting the terminations and orthography. The words are, indeed, Saxon, but the phraseology is English; and, I think, would not have been understood by Bede or Ælfric, notwithstanding the confidence of our author. He has, however, sufficiently proved his position, that the English resembles its parental language, more than any modern European dialect.

  There remain five tracts of this collection yet unmentioned; one ‘Of artificial hills, mounts, or burrows, in England;’ in reply to an interrogatory letter of E. D. whom the writers of Biographia Britannica23 suppose to be, if rightly printed, W. D. or Sir William Dugdale, one of Browne’s correspondents. These are declared by Browne, in concurrence, I think, with all other antiquarians, to be for the most part funeral monuments. He proves, that both the Danes and Saxons buried their men of eminence under piles of earth, ‘which admitting (says he) neitherornament, epitaph, nor inscription, may, if earthquakes spare them, outlast other monuments: obelisks have their term, and pyramids will tumble; but these mountainous monuments may stand, and are like to have the same period with the earth.’

  In the next, he answers two geographical questions; one concerning Troas, mentioned in the Acts and Epistles of St. Paul, which he determines to be the city built near the antient Ilium; and the other concerning the dead sea, of which he gives the same account with other writers.

  Another letter treats ‘Of the answers of the oracle of Apollo at Delphos, to Cræsus king of Lydia.’ In this tract nothing deserves notice, more than that Browne considers the oracles as evidently and indubitably supernatural, and sounds all his disquisition upon that postulate. He wonders why the physiologists of old, having such means of instruction, did not inquire into the secrets of nature: but judiciously concludes, that such questions would probably have been vain; ‘for, in matters cognoscible, and formed for our disquisition, our industry must be our oracle, and reason our Apollo.’

  The pieces that remain are, ‘A prophecy concerning the future state of several nations;’ in which Browne plainly discovers his expectation to be the same with that entertained lately with more confidence by Dr. Berkley, ‘that America will be the seat of the fifth empire:’24 and ‘Museum clausum, sive Bibliotheca abscondita;’ in which the author amuses himself with imagining the existence of books and curiosities, either never in being, or irrecoverably lost.

  These pieces I have recounted as they are ranged in Tennison’s collection, because the editor has given no account of the time at which any of them were written. Some of them are of little value, more than as they gratify the mind with the picture of a great scholar, turning his learning into amusement; or shew, upon how great a variety of enquiries the same mind has been successfully employed.

  The other collection of his posthumous pieces, published in octavo, London 1722, contains ‘Repertorium; or some account of the tombs and monuments in the cathedral of Norwich;’ where, as Tennison observes, there is not matter proportionate to the skill of the Antiquary.

  The other pieces are, ‘Answers to Sir William Dugdale’s enquiries about the fens; A letter concerning Ireland; Another relating to urns newly discovered; Some short strictures on different subjects;’ and ‘A letter to a friend on the death of his intimate friend,’ published singly by the author’s son in 1690.

  There
is inserted, in the Biographia Britannica, ‘A letter containing instructions for the study of physick;’ which, with the Essays25 here offered to the public, completes the works of Dr. Browne.

  To the life of this learned man, there remains little to be added, but that in 1665 he was chosen honorary fellow of the college of physicians, as a man, ‘Virtute et literis ornatissimus, – eminently embellished with literature and virtue:’ and, in 1671, received, at Norwich, the honour of knighthood from Charles II; a prince, who with many frailties and vices, had yet skill to discover excellence, and virtue to reward it, with such honorary distinctions at least as cost him nothing, yet conferred by a king so judicious and so much beloved, had the power of giving merit new lustre and greater popularity.26

  Thus he lived in high reputation; till in his seventy-sixth year he was seized with a colick, which, after having tortured him about a week, put an end to his life at Norwich, on his birthday, October 19, 1682. Some of his last words were expressions of submission to the will of God, and fearlesness of death.

  He lies buried in the church of St. Peter, Mancroft, in Norwich, with this inscription on a mural monument, placed on the south pillar of the altar:

  M. S.

  Hic situs est THOMAS BROWNE, M. D.

  Et Miles.

  A° 1605. Londini natus

  Generosa Familia apud Upton

  In agro Cestriensi oriundus.

  Scholâ primum Wintoniensi, postea

  In Coll. Pembr.

  Apud Oxonienses bonis literis

  Haud leviter imbutus

  In urbe hâc Nordovicensi medicinam

  Arte egregia, & fælici sussessu prosessus,

  Scriptis quibus tituli RELIGIO MEDICI

  Et PSEUDODOXIA EPIDEMICA aliisque

  Per Orbem notissimus.

  Vir Prudentissimus, Integerrimus, Doctissimus;

  Obiit Octobr. 19, 1682.

  Pie posuit mæstissima Conjux

  Da. Doroth. Br.

  Near the Foot of this Pillar

  Lies Sir Thomas Browne, Kt. and Doctor in Physick,

  Author of Religio Medici, and other Learned Books

  Who practic’d Physick in this City 46 Years,

  And died Octr. 1682, in the 77 Year of his Age.

  In Memory of whom

  Dame Dorothy Browne, who has bin his Affectionate Wife

  47 Years, caused this Monument to be Erected.

  Besides his lady, who died in 1685, he left a son and three daughters. Of the daughters nothing very remarkable is known; but his son, Edward Browne, requires a particular mention.

  He was born about the year 1642; and after having passed through the classes of the school at Norwich, became bachelor of physick at Cambridge; and afterwards removing to Merton-College in Oxford, was admitted there to the same degree, and afterwards made a doctor. In 1668 he visited part of Germany; and in the year following made a wider excursion into Austria, Hungary, and Thessaly; where the Turkish Sultan then kept his court at Larissa. He afterwards passed through Italy. His skill in natural history made him particularly attentive to mines and metallurgy. Upon his return he published an account of the countries thro’ which he had passed;27 which I have heard commended by a learned traveller, who has visited many places after him, as written with scrupulous and exact veracity, such as is scarcely to be found in any other book of the same kind. But whatever it may contribute to the instruction of a naturalist, I cannot recommend it as likely to give much pleasure to common readers: for whether it be, that the world is very uniform, and therefore he who is resolved to adhere to truth, will have few novelties to relate; or that Dr. Browne was, by the train of his studies, led to enquire most after those things, by which the greatest part of mankind is little affected; a great part of his book seems to contain very unimportant accounts of his passage from one place where he saw little, to another where he saw no more.

  Upon his return, he practised physick in London; was made physician first to Charles II, and afterwards in 1682 to St. Bartholomew’s hospital. About the same time he joined his name to those of many other eminent men, in ‘A translation of Plutarch’s lives.’ He was first censor, then elect, and treasurer of the college of physicians; of which in 1705 he was chosen president, and held his office, till in 1708 he died in a degree of estimation suitable to a man so variously accomplished, that King Charles had honoured him with this panegyrick, that ‘He was as learned as any of the college, and as well-bred as any of the court.’

  Of every great and eminent character, part breaks forth into publick view, and part lies hid in domestick privacy. Those qualities which have been exerted in any known and lasting performances, may, at any distance of time, be traced and estimated; but silent excellencies are soon forgotten; and those minute peculiarities which discriminate every man from all others, if they are not recorded by those whom personal knowledge enabled to observe them, are irrecoverably lost. This mutilation of character must have happened, among many others, to Sir Thomas Browne, had it not been delineated by his friend Mr. Whitefoot, who ‘esteemed it an especial favour of Providence, to have had a particular acquaintance with him for two thirds of his life.’ Part of his observations I shall, therefore, copy.28

  ‘For a character of his person, his complexion and hair was answerable to his name; his stature was moderate, and habit of body neither fat nor lean, but εσαρκο.29

  In his habit of clothing, he had an aversion to all finery, and affected plainness, both in the fashion and ornaments. He ever wore a cloke, or boots, when few others did. He kept himself always very warm, and thought it most safe so to do, though he never loaded himself with such a multitude of garments, as Suetonius reports of Augustus, enough to clothe a good family.

  The horizon of his understanding was much larger than the hemisphere of the world: All that was visible in the heavens he comprehended so well, that few that are under them knew so much: He could tell the number of the visible stars in his horizon, and call them all by their names that had any; and of the earth he had such a minute and exact geographical knowledge, as if he had been by Divine Providence ordained surveyor-general of the whole terrestrial orb, and its products, minerals, plants, and animals. He was so curious a botanist, that besides the specifical distinctions, he made nice and elaborate observations, equally useful as entertaining.

  His memory, though not so eminent as that of Seneca or Scaliger, was capacious and tenacious, insomuch as he remembred all that was remarkable in any book that he had read; and not only knew all persons again that he had ever seen at any distance of time, but remembred the circumstances of their bodies, and their particular discourses and speeches.

  In the latin poets he remembred every thing that was acute and pungent; he had read most of the historians, antient and modern, wherein his observations were singular, not taken notice of by common readers; he was excellent company when he was at leisure, and expressed more light than heat in the temper of his brain.

  He had no despotical power over his affections and passions, (that was a privilege of original perfection, forfeited by the neglect of the use of it;) but as large a political power over them, as any Stoick, or man of his time, whereof he gave so great experiment, that he hath very rarely been known to have been overcome with any of them. The strongest that were found in him, both of the irascible and concupiscible, were under the controul of his reason. Of admiration, which is one of them, being the only product, either of ignorance, or uncommon knowledge, he had more, and less, than other men, upon the same account of his knowing more than others; so that tho’ he met with many rarities, he admired them not so much as others do.

  He was never seen to be transported with mirth, or dejected with sadness; always chearful, but rarely merry, at any sensible rate; seldom heard to break a jest; and when he did, he would be apt to blush at the levity of it: his gravity was natural without affectation.

  His modesty was visible in a natural habitual blush, which was increased upon the least occasion,
and oft discovered without any observable cause.

  They that knew no more of him than by the briskness of his writings, found themselves deceived in their expectation, when they came in his company, noting the gravity and sobriety of his aspect and conversation; so free from loquacity, or much talkativeness, that he was something difficult to be engaged in any discourse; though when he was so, it was always singular, and never trite or vulgar. Parsimonious in nothing but his time, whereof he made as much improvement, with as little loss as any man in it: when he had any to spare from his drudging practice, he was scarce patient of any diversion from his study; so impatient of sloth and idleness, that he would say, he could not do nothing.

  Sir Thomas understood most of the European languages; viz. all that are in Hutter’s bible,30 which he made use of. The Latin and Greek he understood critically; the Oriental languages, which never were vernacular in this part of the world, he thought the use of them would not answer the time and pains of learning them; yet had so great a veneration for the matrix of them, viz. the Hebrew, consecrated to the Oracles of God, that he was not content to be totally ignorant of it; tho’ very little of his science is to be found in any books of that primitive language. And tho’ much is said to be written in the derivative idioms of that tongue, especially the Arabick, yet he was satisfied with the translations, wherein he found nothing admirable.31

  In his religion he continued in the same mind which he had declared in his first book, written when he was but thirty years old, his Religio Medici, wherein he fully assented to that of the church of England, preferring it before any in the world, as did the learned Grotius. He attended the publick service very constantly, when he was not withheld by his practice. Never missed the sacrament in his parish, if he were in town. Read the best English sermons he could hear of, with liberal applause; and delighted not in controversies. In his last sickness, wherein he continued about a week’s time, enduring great pain of the cholick, besides a continual fever, with as much patience as hath been seen in any man, without any pretence of Stoical apathy, animosity, or vanity of not being concerned thereat, or suffering no impeachment of happiness. Nihil agis dolor.32