Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

THE SEVENTH BOOK:

THE PARTICULAR PART CONCLUDED.

OF POPULAR AND RECEIVED TENETS, CHIEFLY HISTORICAL, AND SOME DEDUCED FROM THE HOLY SCRIPTURES.

CHAPTER I.

That the Forbidden Fruit was an Apple.

THAT the forbidden fruit of Paradise was an apple, is commonly believed, confirmed by tradition, perpetuated by writings, verses, pictures; and some have been so bad prosodians, as from thence to derive the Latin word malum, because that fruit was the first occasion of evil: wherein notwithstanding determinations are presumptuous, and many I perceive are of another belief. For some have conceived it a vine; in the mystery of whose fruit lay the expiation of the transgression. Goropius Becanus, reviving the conceit of Barcephas, peremptorily concludeth it to be the Indian fig-tree, and by a witty allegory labours to confirm the same. Again, some fruits pass under the name of Adam's apples, which in common acception admit not that appellation: the one described by Matthiolus under the name of Pomum Adami, a very fair fruit, and not unlike a citron, but somewhat rougher, chopped and crannied, vulgarly conceived the marks of Adam's teeth: another, the fruit of that plant which Serapion termeth Musa, but the eastern Christians commonly the apples of Paradise; not resembling an apple in figure, and in taste a melon or cucumber.2 Which fruits

1 a vine.] By the fatal influence of whose fruit the nakedness both of Adam and of Noah were exposed. See the Targum of Jonathan. -Jeff.

again, &c.] The fruit-shops of London exhibit a large kind of citron labelled, Forbidden Fruit, respecting which, and the Pomum Adami of Matthiolus, I have the following obliging and satisfactory

although they have received appellations suitable unto the tradition, yet we cannot from thence infer they were this fruit in question. No more than Arbor vitæ, so commonly called, to obtain its name from the tree of life in Paradise, or Arbor Judæ, to be the same which supplied the gibbet unto Judas.

:

Again, there is no determination in the text; wherein is only particularised, that it was the fruit of a tree good for food, and pleasant unto the eye, in which regards many excel the apple and therefore learned men do wisely conceive it inexplicable; and Philo puts determination unto despair, when he affirmeth the same kind of fruit was never produced since. Surely were it not requisite to have been concealed, it had not passed unspecified; nor the tree revealed which concealed their nakedness, and that concealed which revealed it; for in the same chapter mention is made of figleaves. And the like particulars, although they seem uncircumstantial, are oft set down in Holy Scripture; so is it specified that Elias sat under a juniper-tree, Absalom hanged by an oak, and Zaccheus got up into a sycamore.

And although, to condemn such indeterminables, unto him that demanded on what hand Venus was wounded, the philosopher thought it a sufficient resolution, to re-inquire upon what leg King Philip halted; and the Jews not undoubtedly resolved of the sciatica side of Jacob, do cautiously in their diet abstain from the sinews of both;3 yet are there many nice particulars which may be authentically determined. That Peter cut off the right ear of Malchus, is beyond all doubt. That our Saviour eat the Passover in an upper room, we may determine from the text. And some we may concede which the Scripture plainly defines not. That the dial of Ahaz1 was placed upon the west side of the temple,

notice from my friend Professor Lindley * "The forbidden fruit of the London markets is a variety of the Citrus decumana, and is in fact a small sort of shaddock. But as to the Pomum Adami, no one can make out exactly what it was. The common Italian Pomo d'Adamo is a variety of Citrus limetta: that of Paris is a thick-skinned orange; and at least three other things have been so called. I do not think it possible to ascertain what Matthiolus meant beyond the fact that it was a Citrus of some kind."

3 of both.] And this superstition befooles them alike in both.-Wr. dial of Ahaz.] Suggestions have been made respecting this, as

we will not deny, or contradict the description of Adricomius; that Abraham's servant put his hand under his right thigh, we shall not question; and that the thief on the right hand was saved, and the other on the left reprobated, to make good the method of the last judicial dismission, we are ready to admit. But surely in vain we inquire of what wood was Moses' rod, or the tree that sweetened the waters. Or, though tradition or human history might afford some light, whether the crown of thorns was made of paliurus; whether the cross of Christ were made of those four woods in the distich of Durantes,* or only of oak, according unto Lipsius and Goropius, we labour not to determine. For though hereof prudent symbols and pious allegories be made by wiser conceivers; yet common heads will fly unto superstitious applications, and hardly avoid miraculous or magical expectations.

Now the ground or reason that occasioned this expression by an apple, might be the community of this fruit, and which is often taken for any other. So the goddess of gardens is termed Pomona; so the proverb expresseth it, to give apples unto Alcinous; so the fruit which Paris decided was called an apple; so in the garden of Hesperides (which many conceive a fiction drawn from Paradise) we read of golden apples guarded by the dragon. And to speak strictly in this appellation, they placed it more safely than any other; for, beside the great variety of apples, the word in Greek comprehendeth oranges, lemons, citrons, quinces; and as Ruellius defineth,† such fruits as have no stone within, and a soft covering without; excepting the pomegranate; and * Pes Cedrus est, truncus Cupressus, Oliva supremum, Palmaque transversum Christi sunt in cruce lignum.

Ruel. De Stirpium Natura.

well as some other miracles, which seem to me to proceed too much on the principle of endeavouring to lessen them, so as to bring them within the compass of belief. Thus the dial only, not the sun, is supposed to have gone backwards; and that not really, but only apparently,-by a "miraculous refraction." Is it not better to take the literal meaning, content to believe that to omnipotence one miracle is no greater than another?

5 word in Greek.] Not only in Greeke but in Latin also, all these are cald by the very name of apple trees, as Malus aurantia, citria, cydonia, granata.- Wr.

will extend much further in the acception of Spigelius,* who comprehendeth all round fruits under the name of apples, not excluding nuts and plums.

6

It hath been promoted in some constructions from a passage in the Canticles, as it runs in the Vulgar translation, Sub arbore malo suscitavi te, ibi corrupta est mater tua, ibi violata est genitrix tua.† Which words, notwithstanding parabolically intended, admit no literal inference, and are of little force in our translation: "I raised thee under an apple-tree, there thy mother brought thee forth, there she brought thee forth that bare thee." So when, from a basket of summer fruits or apples, as the Vulgar rendereth them, God by Amos foretold the destruction of his people, we cannot say they had any reference unto the fruit of Paradise, which was the destruction of man; but thereby was declared the propinquity of their desolation, and that their tranquillity was of no longer duration than those horary or soon-decaying fruits of summer. Nor, when it is said in the same translation, Poma desiderii animæ tuæ discesserunt à te,—" the apples that thy soul lusted after are departed from thee," is there any allusion therein unto the fruit of Paradise; but thereby is threatened unto Babylon, that the pleasures and delights of their palate should forsake them. And we read in Pierius, that an apple was the hieroglyphick of love, and that the statue of Venus was made with one in her hand. So the little cupids in the figures of Philostratus § do play with apples in a garden; and there want not some who have symbolized the apple of Paradise unto such constructions.7

Since therefore after this fruit, curiosity fruitlessly inquireth, and confidence blindly determineth, we shall surcease our inquisition; rather troubled that it was tasted, than troubling ourselves in its decision; this only we observe, when things are left uncertain, men will assure them by determination. Which is not only verified concerning the fruit, but the serpent that persuaded; many defining the kind or species thereof. So Bonaventure and Comestor

* Isagoge in rem Herbariam.
+ Fructus borai.

and will extend, &c.]
7 So the little cupids, &c.]

+ Cant. viii.

§ Philostrat. figure vi. De amoribus. First added in 2nd edition. First added in 2nd edition.

affirm it was a dragon, Engubinus a basilisk, Delrio a viper, and others a common snake.8 Wherein men still continue the delusion of the serpent, who having deceived Eve in the main, sets her posterity on work to mistake in the circumstance, and endeavours to propagate errors at any hand. And those he surely most desireth which concern either God or himself; for they dishonour God, who is absolute truth and goodness; but for himself, who is extremely evil, and the worst we can conceive, by aberration of conceit they may extenuate his depravity, and ascribe some goodness unto him.

CHAPTER II.

That a Man hath one Rib less than a Woman.

THAT a man hath one rib less than a woman, is a common conceit, derived from the history of Genesis, wherein it stands delivered, that Eve was framed out of a rib of Adam; whence it is concluded the sex of men still wants that rib our father lost in Eve. And this is not only passant with the many, but was urged against Columbus in an anatomy of his at Pisa, where having prepared the skeleton of a woman that chanced to have thirteen ribs on one side, there arose a party that cried him down, and even unto oaths affirmed, this was the rib wherein a woman exceeded. Were this true, it would ocularly silence that dispute out of which side Eve was framed; it would determine the opinion of Oleaster, that she was made out of the ribs of both sides, or such as from the expression of the text* maintain there was a plurality of ribs required; and might indeed decry the parabolical exposition of Origen, Cajetan, and such as fearing to concede a monstrosity, or mutilate the integrity of Adam, preventively conceive the creation of thirteen ribs.

But this will not consist with reason or inspection. For if we survey the skeleton of both sexes, and therein the compage of bones, we shall readily discover that men and women have

* Os ex ossibus meis.

8 snake.] Itt seemes to bee none of these but rather that species which Scaliger, the great secretary of nature, with noe reference to this storye, wittily cals (Exercitat. 226, §) ¿yxeλav0pwπovç.—Wr.

« AnteriorContinuar »