362 



A DISCOURSE 



IJOOK IV. take to detect the thousandth part, or point, of so exile a grain, as that 

 ""^'''^'^^^ insensible rudiment, or rather halituous spirit, which brings forth the 

 lofty Fir-tree, and the spreading Oak ? that trees of so enormous an 

 height and magnitude, as we find some Elms, Planes, and Cypresses ; 

 that others hard as iron, and solid as marble, (for such the Indies fur- 

 nish,) should be swaddled and involved within so small a dimension, 

 (if a point may be said to have any,) and in so weak and feeble a sub- 

 stance, without the least laxation, confusion, or disorder of parts ! That 

 when they are buried in the moist womb of the earth, which so easily 

 dissolves and corrupts substances so much harder, yet this, which is at 

 first but a kind of tender mucilage, or rather rottenness, should be able 

 in time, to displace and rend asunder whole rocks of stone, and some- 

 times to cleave them beyond the force of iron wedges, so as even to re- 

 move mountains ! That our tree, like man, (whose inverted symbol he 

 is,) being sown in corruption, rises in glory, and by little and little as- 

 cending into an hard erect stem of comely dimensions, becometh a solid 

 tower, as it were ! And that this, which but lately a single ant would 

 easily have borne to his little cavern, should now become capable of re- 

 sisting the fury, and braving the rage of the most impetuous storms, 

 Epist. 53. magni meliercule art'ificis est, clausisse totum in tarn exiguo (to use 

 Seneca's expression) et liorror est consideranti. 



For is it not plainly astonishing, how these minute atoms, rather than 

 visible eggs, should contain the foetus exquisitely formed, (even while yet 

 wrapped in their secundines, like infants in the animal womb,) till grow- 

 ing too big for their dark confinements, they break forth, and after 



in silent reverence: but the man who views him through the medium of his lesser works, 

 forms to himself a closer, and more pleasing connexion : 



. . — — The men 



Whom nature's works can charm, with God himself 



Hold converse ■ akenside. 



A mind brought to such a state of harmony, has only to embrace revelation with zeal 

 and fervency, in order to render the Christian character complete. Some there are who 

 look upon this conjunction as unnecessary. My answer to them shall be in the words of 

 5eneca : 



Quocunque te flexeris, ibi Deum videbis occurrentem tibii 



