Chap. V.
1. That the Form and Beauty, Seed and Signature of Plants are Arguments of a Providence. 2. That though the mere motion of the Matter might produce certain Meteors, as Haile, Snow, Ice, &c. yet it will not follow that the same is the adequate cause of Animals and Plants. 3. That it were no great botch nor gap in Nature, if some more rude Phænomena were acknowledged the Results of the mere Mechanical Motion of Matter. 4. That the Forme and Beauty of Flowers and Plants are from an higher Principle. 5. That there is such a thing as Beauty, and that it is the Object of our Intellectual Faculties. 6. From whence it follows, that the beautiful Forms and Figures of Plants and Animals are from an Intellectual Principle.
1. Hitherto we have onely considered the more rude and careless strokes and delineaments of Divine Providence in the world, set out in those more large Phænomena of Day and Night, Winter and Summer, Land and Sea, Rivers, Mountains, Metalls, and the like; we now come to a closer view of God and Nature in Vegetables, Animals, and Man.
And first of Vegetables, where I shall touch only these four heads, their Form and Beauty, their Seed, their Signatures, and their great Use as well for Medicine as Sustenance. And that we may the better understand the advantage we have in this closer Contemplation of the works of Nature, we are in the first place to take notice of the condition of that Substance which we call Matter, how fluid and slippery and undeterminate it is of itself; or if it be hard, how unfit it is to be chang'd into any thing else. And therefore all things rot into a moisture before any thing can be generated of them, as we soften the wax before we set on the Seal.
2. Now therefore, unless we will be so foolish, as, because the uniform motion of the Aire, or some more subtile corporeal Element, may so equally compress or bear against the parts of a little vaporous moisture, as to form it into round drops (as some say it doth in the Dew and other Experiments) and therefore because this more rude and general Motion can doe something, conclude that it does all things; we must in all Reason confess that there is an Eternal Mind, in virtue whereof the Matter is thus usefully formed and changed.
But mere rude and undirected Motion, because naturally it will have some kind of Results, that therefore it will reach to such as plainly imply a wise contrivance of Counsel, is so ridiculous a Sophism, as I have already intimated, that it is more fit to impose upon the inconsiderate Souls of Fools and Children, then upon men of mature Reason and well exercis'd in Philosophy. Admit that Rain and Snow and Wind and Hail and Ice, and such like Meteors, may be the products of Heat and Cold, or of the Motion and Rest of certain small particles of the Matter; yet that the useful and beautiful contrivance of the branches, flowers and, fruits of Plants should be so too (to say nothing yet of the bodies of Birds, Fishes, Beasts and Men) is as ridiculous and supine a Collection, as to infer that, because mere Heat and Cold does soften and harden Wax, and puts it into some shape or other, that therefore this mere Heat and Cold, or Motion and Rest, without any Art and direction, made the Silver Seal too, and graved upon it so curiously some Coat of Arms, or the shape of some Birds or Beasts, as an Eagle, a Lion, and the like. Nay, indeed, this inference is more tolerable far then the other, these effects of Art being more easie and less noble then those others of Nature.
3. Nor is it any botch or gap at all in the works of Nature, that some particular Phænomena be but the easie results of that general Motion communicated unto the Matter from God, others the effects of more curious contrivance, or of the divine Art or Reason (for such are the λόγοι σπερματικοὶ, the ** Concerning these Rationes Seminales, whether they be distinct, or one Common Spirit of Nature, see Book. 3. c. 12, and 13. in the Discourse Of the Immortality of the Soul. Rationes Seminales) incorporated in the Matter, especially the Matter it self being in some sort vital; else it would not continue the Motion that it is put upon, when it is occasionally this or the other way moved: and besides, the Nature of God being the most perfect fulness of Life that is possibly conceivable, it is very congruous that this outmost and remotest shadow of himself be some way, though but obscurely, vital. Wherefore things falling off by degrees from the highest Perfection, it will be no uneven or unproportionable step, if descending from the Top of this outward Creation, Man, in whom there is a principle of more fine and reflexive Reason, which hangs on, though not in that manner, in the more perfect kind of Brutes, as Sense also, loth to be curb'd within too narrow compass, lays hold upon some kinds of Plants, as in those sundry sorts of Zoophyta, (but in the rest there are no further foot-steps discovered of an Animadversive form abiding in them, though there be the effects of an Inadvertent form (λόγος ἔνυλος) of materiated or incorporated Art or Seminal Reason:) I say, it is no uneven jot, to pass from the more faint and obscure examples of Spermatical life to the more considerable effects of general Motion in Minerals, Metalls, and sundry Meteors, whose easie and rude shapes may have no need of any Principle of Life, or Spermatical form distinct from the Rest or Motion of the particles of the Matter.
4. But there is that Curiosity of Form and Beauty in the more noble kind of Plants, bearing such a sutableness and harmony with the more refined sense and sagacity of the Soul of Man, that he cannot chuse (his Intellectual Touch being so sweetly gratifi'd by what it deprehends in such like Objects) but acknowledge that some hidden Cause, much akin to his own nature, that is Intellectual, is the contriver and perfecter of these so pleasant spectacles in the world.
5. Nor is it at all to the purpose to Object, that this business of Beauty and Comeliness of proportion is but a conceit, because some men acknowledge no such thing, and all things are alike handsome to them, who yet notwithstanding have the use of their Eyes as well as other folks. For, I say, this rather makes for what we aime at, that Pulchritude is conveigh'd indeed by the outward Senses unto the Soul, but a more Intellectual Faculty is that which relishes it; as a Geometrical Scheme is let in by the Eyes, but the Demonstration is discern'd by Reason. And therefore it is more rational to affirm, that some Intellectual Principle was the Author of this Pulchritude of things, then that they should be thus fashion'd without the help of that Principle. And to say that there is no such thing as Pulchritude, because some mens Souls are so dull and stupid that they relish all Objects alike in that respect; is as absurd and groundless, as to conclude there is no such thing as Reason and Demonstration, because a natural Fool cannot reach unto it. But that there is such a thing as Beauty, and that it is acknowledged by the whole generations of men to be in Trees, Flowers and Fruits, the adorning and beautifying of Buildings in all Ages is an ample and undeniable Testimony. For what is more ordinary with them then the taking in Flowers and Fruitage for the garnishing of their work? Besides, I appeal to any man that is not sunk into so forlorn a pitch of Degeneracy, that he is as stupid to these things as the basest of Beasts, whether, for example, a rightly-cut Tetraedrum, Cube or Icosaedrum have no more pulchritude in them, then any rude broken stone lying in the field or high-ways; or to name other solid Figures, which though they be not Regular, properly so called, yet have a settled Idea and Nature, as a Cone, Sphear or Cylinder, whether the sight of these do not gratifie the minds of men more, and pretend to more elegancy of shape, then those rude cuttings or chippings of free-stone that fall from the Mason's hands, and serve for nothing but to fill up the middle of the Wall, and so to be hid from the Eyes of Man for their ugliness. And it is observable, that if Nature shape any thing near this Geometrical accuracy, that we take notice of it with much content and pleasure: as if it be but exactly round (as there are abundance of such stones found betwixt two hills in Cuba, an Island of America) or ordinately Quinquangular, or have the sides but Parallel, though the Angles be unequal, as is seen in some little stones, and in a kind of Alabaster found here in England; these stones, I say, gratifie our sight, as having a nearer cognation with the Soul of Man, that is Rational and Intellectual, and therefore is well pleased when it meets with any outward Object that fits and agrees with those congenite Ideas her own nature is furnished with. For Symmetry, Equality and Correspondency of parts, is the discernment of Reason, not the Object of Sense, as I have heretofore proved.
6. Now therefore it being evident that there is such a thing as Beauty, Symmetry and Comeliness of Proportion (to say nothing of the delightful mixture of Colours) & that this is the proper Object of the Understanding and Reason, (for these things be not taken notice of by the Beasts) I think I may safely infer, That whatever is the first and principal Cause of changing the fluid and undeterminated Matter into shapes so comely and symmetrical, as we see in Flowers and Trees, is an Understanding Principle, and knows both the nature of man, and of those Objects he offers to his sight in this outward and visible world. For these things cannot come by chance, or by a multifarious attempt of the parts of the Matter upon themselves; for then it were likely that the Species of things (though some might hit right, yet most) would be maim'd and ridiculous; but now there is not any ineptitude in any thing, which is a sign that the fluidness of the Matter is guided and determined by the overpowering counsel of an Eternal Mind, that is of a God.
If it were not needless, I might now instance in sundry kinds of Flowers, Herbs and Trees: but these Objects being so obvious, and every mans phansy being branched with the remembrance of Roses, Marigolds, Gilly-flowers, Pionyes, Tulips, Pansies, Primroses, the leaves and clusters of the Vine, and a thousand such like, of all which they cannot but confess, that there is in them beauty and symmetry and grateful proportion; I hold it superfluous to weary you with any longer Induction, but shall pass onto the three Considerations behind, of their Seed, Signatures and Usefulness, and shall pass through them very briefly, the Observables being very ordinary and easily intelligible.