hanged; so he fastened the cord about his neck, raising himself upon a stool, and then letting himself fall; thinking it should be in his power to recover the stool at his pleasure, which he failed in, but was helped by a friend then present. He was asked afterward, what he felt? He said he felt no pain; but first he thought he saw before his eyes a great fire and burning; then he thought he saw all black and dark; lastly, it turned to a pale blue, or seawater-green-which colour is also often seen by them which fall into swoonings. I have heard also of a physieian yet living, who recovered a man to life which had hanged himself, and had hanged half an hour, by frications and hot baths; and the same physician did profess, that he made no doubt to recover any man that had hanged so Tong, so his neck were not broken with the first swing.

The Differences of Youth and Old Age.

1. THE ladder of man's body is this: to be conceived; to be quickened in the womb; to be born; to suck; to be weaned; to feed upon pap; to put forth teeth, the first time about the second year of age; to begin to go; to begin to peak; to put forth teeth the second time, about seven years of age; to come to puberty about twelve or fourteen years of age, to be able for generation, and the flowing of the menstrua; to have hairs about the legs and armholes; to put forth a beard-and thus long, and sometimes later

to grow in stature; to come to full years of strength and agility; to grow gray and bald; the ceasing of the menstrua and ability to generation; to grow decrepit, and a monster with three legs; to die. Meanwhile, the mind also hath certain periods, but they cannot be described by years; as, to decay in the memory, and the like, of which hereafter.

2. The differences of youth and old age are these: a young man's skin is smooth and plain; an old man's, dry and wrinkled, especially about the forehead and eyes: a young man's flesh is tender and soft; an old man's, hard: a young man hath strength and agility; an old man feels decay in his strength, and is slow of motion: a young man hath good digestion; an old man, bad: a young man's bowels are soft and succulent; an old man's, salt and parched a young man's body is erect and straight; an eld man's bowing and crooked: a young man's limbs are steady; an old man's, weak and trembling: the humours in a young man are choleric, and his blood inclined to heat; in an old man, phlegmatic and melancholic, and his blood in clined to coldness: a young man ready for the act of Ve hus; an old man slow unto it: in a young man, the juices of his body are more roscid; in an old man, more crude and waterish the spiri, in a young man, plentiful and boiling; in an old man, scarce and jejune: a young man's spirit is dense and vigorous; an old man's, eager and rare: a young man hath his senses quick and entire; an old man, dull and decayed: a young man's teeth are strong and en tire; an old man's, weak, worn, and falling out a young man's hair is coloured; an old man's, of what colour so ever it were, gray: a young man hath hair; an old man, baldness: a young man's pulse is stronger and quicker; an old man's, more confused and slower: the diseases of young men are more acute and curable; of old men, longer and hard to cure: a young man's wounds soon close; an old

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man's

tman's, later: a young man's cheeks are of a fresh colour; an old man's, pale, or with a black blood: a young man is less troubled with rheums; an old man, more: Neither do we know in what things old men do improve, as touching their body, save only sometimes in fatness; whereof the reason is soon given; because old men's bodies do neither perspire well, nor assimilate well; now, fatness is nothing else but an exuberance of nourishment above that which is voided by excrement, or which is perfectly assimilated. Also, some old men improve in the appetite of feeding, by reason of the acid humours; though old men digest worse. And all these things which we have said physicians, negligently enough, will refer to the diminution of the natural beat and radical moisture, which are things of no worth for use. This is certain, dryness, in the coming on of years, doth forego coldness; and bodies, when they come to the top and strength of heat, do decline to dryness, and after that follows coldness.

3. Now we are to consider the affections of the mind.— I remember, when I was a young man, at Poictiers, in France, I conversed familiarly with a certain Frenchman, a witty young man, but something talkative, who afterwards grew to be a very eminent man; he was wont to inveigh against the manners of old men, and would say, that if their minds could be seen, as their bodies are, they would appear no less deformed. Besides, being in love with his own wit, he would maintain, that the vices of old men's minds had some correspondence, and were parallel to the imperfections of their bodies; for the dryness of their skin, he would bring in impudence; for the hardness of their bowels, unmercifulness; for the lippitude of their eyes, an evil eye, and envy; for the casting down of their eyes, and bowing their body towards the earth, atheism, (for, saith he, they look no more up to Heaven, as they were wont); for the trembling of their members, irresolution of their de

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crees

crees and light inconstancy; for the bending of their fingers as it were to catch, rapacity and covetousness; for the buckling of their knees, fearfulness; for their wrinkles, craftiness and obliquity; and other things which I have forgotten. But to be serious. A young man is modest and shamefaced; an old man's forehead is hardened: a young man is full of bounty and mercy; an old man's heart is brawny: a young man is affected with a laudable emulation; an old man, with a malignant envy a young man is inclined to religion and devotion by reason of his fervency and inexperience of evil; an old man cooleth in piety through the coldness of his charity and long conversation in evil, and likewise through the difficulty of his belief: a young man's desires are vehement; an old man's, moderate a young man is light and moveable; an old man, more grave and constant: a young man is given to liberality, and beneficence, and humanity; an old man, to covetousness, wisdom for his own self, and seeking his own ends: a young man is confident and full of hope; an old man, diffident and given to suspect most things: a young man is gentle and obsequious; an old man, forward and disdainful a young man is sincere and open-hearted; an old man, cautelous and close: a young man is given to desire great things an old man, to regard things necessary: a young man think well of the present times; an old man preferreth times past before them: a young man reverenceth his superiors; an old man is more forward to tax them and many other things which pertain rather to manners, than to the present inquisition. Notwithstanding, old men, as in some things they improve in their bodies, so also in their minds, unless hey be altogether out of date; namely, that as they are less apt for invention, so they excel in judgment, and prefer safe things, and sound things, before specious; also, they improve in garrulity and os

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tentation;

tentation; for they seek the fruit of speech, while they are less able for action: so as it was not absurd, that the poets feigned old Tithon to be turned into a grasshopper.

Morceable Canons of the Duration of Life, and Form of

Death.

CANON I.

CONSUMPTION is not caused, unless that which be de parted with by one body, passeth into another.

The Explication.

THERE is in nature no annihilation, or reducing to nothing; therefore, that which is consumed, is either resolved into air, or turned into some body adjacent. So we see a spider, or fly, or ant, in amber, entombed in a more stately monument than kings are, to be laid up for eternity, although they be but tender things, and soon dissipated. But the matter is this, that there is no air by, into which they should be resolved; and the substance of the amber is so heterogeneous, that it receives nothing of them. The like we conceive would be, if a stick, or root, or some such thing, were buried in quicksilver. Also, wax, and honey, and gums, have the same operation, but in part only.

CANON