320 A DISCOURSE 



BOOK IV. foresters as the warmth, which (after a little gazing at the unusual ac- 

 '"'^'^'y'^ cident) they found so comfortable : this (says he) invited them to ap- 

 proach it nearer, and, as it spent and consumed, by signs and barbarous 

 tones (which in process of time were formed into significant words) they 

 encouraged one another to supply it with fresh combustibles : by this 

 accident the wild people, who before were afraid of one another, and 

 dwelt asunder, began to find the benefit and sweetness of society, 

 mutual assistance, and conversation ; which they afterwards improved, 

 by building houses with those trees, and dwelling nearer together. From 

 these mean and imperfect beginnings, they arrived in time to be authors 

 of the most polished arts ; they established laws, peopled nations, planted 

 countries, and laid the foundation of all that order and magnificence 

 which the succeeding ages have enjoyed. No more, then, let us admire the 

 enormous moles and bridges of Caligula across to Baiee ; or that of Trajan 

 over the Danube (stupendous work of stone and marble !) to the adverse 

 shores ; whilst our timber and our trees making us bridges to the furthest 

 Indies and antipodes, land us into new worlds. In a word, (and to 

 speak a bold and noble truth,) trees and woods have twice saved the 

 whole world ; first by the ark, then by the cross ; making full amends 

 for the evil fruit of the tree in Paradise, by that Avhich was borne on the 

 tree in Golgotha. But that we may give an account of the sacred and 

 other uses of these venerable retirements, we wiU now proceed to de- 

 scribe what those places were. 



Though silva was the more general name, denoting a large tract of 

 wood or trees, the inciduce and cceduce, yet there were several other titles 

 attributed to greater or lesser assemblies of them ; domus silvce was 

 a summer-house ; and such was Solomon's "Oixo? Spv^xs, 1 Reg. vii. 2. 

 When they planted them for pleasure and shade only, they had their 

 nemora ; and as we our parks, for the preservation of game, and particu- 

 larly venison, so had they their saltus, and silva invia, secluded, for the 

 most part, from the rest. But among authors we meet with notliing more 

 frequent, and indeed more celebrated, than those arboreous amenities 

 and plantations of woods, which they caU liici ; and which, though some- 

 times restrained to certain peculiar places for devotion, (which Avere 

 never to be felled,) yet were they also promiscuously both used, and taken 

 for all that the wide forest comprehends, or can signify. To dismiss 

 a number of critics, the name lucus is derived by Quintilian and others. 



