100 ADVAJrCEltENT OP LEAttNlSTQ, [BOOJfe tt. 



disconsolate for the rape of Proserpine, hid herself, and all 

 the gods took tlie utmost pains to find her, by going out 

 different ways for that purpose. Pan only had the good 

 fortune to meet her as he was hunting, and discovered her 

 to the rest. He likewise had the assui'ance to rival Apollo 

 in music; and in the judgment of Midas was preferred: but 

 the judge had, though with great privacy and secrecy, a pair 

 of ass's ears fastened on him for his sentence.^ 



" There is very little said of his amours, which may seem 

 strange among such a multitude of gods, so profusely amo- 

 rous. He is only reported to have been very fond of Echo, 

 who was also esteemed his wife ; and one nymph more called 

 Syrinx, with the love of whom Cupid inflamed him for his 

 insolent challenge ; so he is reported, once, to have solicited 

 the moon to accompany him apart into the deep woods. 



" Lastly, Pan had no descendant, which also is a wonder, 

 when the male gods were so extremely prolific ; only he 

 was the reputed father of a servant girl, called lambe, who 

 used to divert strangers v/ith her ridiculous and prattling 

 stories." 



This fable is, perhaps, the noblest of all antiquity, and 

 pregnant with the mysteries and secrets of nature. Pan, as 

 the name imports, represents the universe, about whose 

 oriffin there are two opinions ; viz., that it either sprung 

 trom Mercury, that is, the Divine Word, according to the 

 Scriptures and philosophical divines ; or from the confused 

 seeds of things. For some of the philosophers'^ held that the 

 seeds and elements of nature were infinite in their substance ; 

 whence arose the opinion of homogeneous primary parts, 

 which Anaxagoras either invented or propagated. Others 

 more accurately maintain that the variety of nature can 

 equally spring from seeds, certain and definite in substance, 

 but only diversified in form and figure, and attribute the 

 ^•«^maining varieties to the interior organization of the seeds 

 \»»oiiiHeives. From this source the doctrine of atoms is de- 

 rived, which Democritus maintained, and Leucippus found 

 out. But others teach only one principle of nature — Thales, 

 water; Anaximenes, air; Heraclitus, fire^ — and defined tliis 



« Ovid, Metamorphoses, ii. * Anaxagoras, in Diog. Laert. 



* This difference between the tliree philosophies is nc thing else, as 

 Hippocxfttes baa observed {De Di«;ta, lib. i.), than a mere dispute about 



