dertaking may be entered upon, if their majesties please, with all convenient speed; because I have a strong inclination, before I leave the world, to taste a blessing, which we mysterious writers can seldom reach, till we have gotten into our graves: whether it is, that fame, being a fruit grafted on the body, can hardly grow, and much less ripen, till the stock is in the earth: or, whether she be a bird of prey, and is lured, among the rest, to pursue after the scent of a carcase: or whether she conceives her trumpet sounds best and farthest, when she stands on a tomb, by the advantage of a rising ground, and the echo of a hollow vault.
It is true, indeed, the republick of dark authors, after they once found out this excellent expedient of dying, have been peculiarly happy in the variety, as well as extent of their reputation. For, night being the universal mother of things, wise philosophers hold all writings to be fruitful, in the proportion[1] they are dark; and therefore, the true illuminated[2] (that is to say, the darkest of all) have met with such numberless commentators, whose scholastick midwifery has delivered them of meanings, that the authors themselves perhaps never conceived, and yet may very justly be allowed the lawful parents of them; the words of such writers be-
- ↑ It should be, 'in the proportion that they are dark:' or, 'in proportion as they are dark:' or, still better, 'in proportion to their darkness.'
- ↑ A name of the Rosicrucians. These were Fanatick alchemists, who in search after the great secret had invented a means altogether proportioned to their end: it was a kind of theological philosophy, made up of almost equal mixtures of pagan platonism, Christian quietism, and the Jewish cabbala. Warburton on the Rape of the Lock.
