enlivening; for our food being received from the ftomach and guts into the common paffage of chyle, is thence-from carried directly into the fubclavial branch of the vena tava, where being mixed with blood, it yet remains lifeless and heartlefs, till being carried along that vein it is at last brought into the right ventricle of the heart; wherein the heat, motion, and ferment, fet the active principles thereof at perfect freedom, and fo inftantly endow it with plenty both of life and fpirit. Thus richly fraught, doth the blood pafs out of its fountain, and by the ways before described it is brought to all the parts of the body, where parting with much of its lading for their fuftentation, and being refrigerated by the coldness of the extremities, and the ambient air, it would foon be coagulated, and altogether barren, did it not return again to the right ventricle of the heart, as unto its fountain, to recover its former perfection. This part, therefore, that doth at the first give life to that which enliveneth the whole man, and doth, as often as it returns thither, impregnate it anew with the fame, muft needs be the fountain here intended. And to this the original word gives an extraordinary clearness; implying, not only the fignum, but the fignatum; not the hieroglyphick only, but the part thereby deciphered: fignifying in the first place, fons, a fountain; and fecondarily,

featurigo venarum, the spring or original from whence the veins arife: and this is fo clear, that it made ancient commentators interpret the fountain here unto the liver: Now, had they been right in their natural knowledge; that is, had they known that the veins do not arise from the liver, as from their firft original, but from the right ventricle of the heart, (as all knowing men now confefs they do); they had without all doubt, by the gui dance of this moft fignificant word, pitched upon the true meaning of the place.

Thefe veffels being throughly understood, we must farther know, that so long as man remains in perfect health and strength, they are unceffantly and carefully performing all thofe offices unto which they are appointed; but this natural course doth not continue for ever, for this pitcher is but an earthen veffel, and doth not so often go to the fountain, but at laft it comes broken home. This breaking. of the pitcher here (which is the fymptom of old age just upon the point of death) is the failing of the veins, their ceafing from their natural action and ufe, when they can no longer carry back, nor conveniently pass into the heart that liquor, which they properly contain. That little blood that remains in the cold body of man near his end is foon coagulated; and, ftagnating in the veins, the motion and circulation thereof is hindered;

dered; and fo it becomes thick, like unto the pith of elder: and because it cannot return to the fountain, for a redintegration of its life and fpirit, it dieth in the veins; and fo all the extreme parts of the bady become spiritless and cold; which is the symyptom here intended. Frigiditas extremorum is acknowledged by all that have confidered that subject, as one of the most certain figns of approaching death. And our great mafter of prognofticks, in that compleat and yet compendious book of his aphorifms, doth once and again, not out of forgetfulness, but out of earnestness, that it may more especially be taken notice of, give us that famous maxim, ψύξις, ακρωτηρίων, θανάσιμον.

The wheel broken at the cifern.

The symptom last spoken of had reference to the inftruments of the vital faculty, which ferve for importation, and reception of the blood and fpirits; this that we are now fpeaking to hath reference to thofe, which serve for exportation and rejection of the fame.

The blood (as was before obferved) naturally, of its own accord, tends in the veins, unto the heart; but it returns not from the heart, into the parts of the body, but by force Thus all the rivers in the land naturally ebb into the fea; but they flow not thence

from

!

from, any farther than the violence and impulfe of the fea extends. The blood, being once forced from the heart, is prefently received into the trunk of the great artery, calfed the acrta; and by the branches thereof is carried to all the parts of the body. This therefore being the chief and principal inftrument of rotation, or circulation of the blood, is moft aptly intimated unto us by a wheel: For what is a wheel, but an instrument of circulation? And what can a wheel be an hieroglyphick of, but of something that goes, or makes the round? And this is so obvious to every one, that all who have ever commented upon this place, have been ftill ham mering at fome fuch thing. Some therefore have interpreted this place to the life of man, which paffeth as in a ring, according to that faying, κοινὰ πάθη πάντων, ὁ βίω τροχός. Others have interpreted it to the death of man, when his compounding parts fhall revert into the first beings.

Cedit enim retro, de terra quod fuit ante,
In terram, &c.

And so they make this expreffion explained at large in the following verfe; The duft fhall return to the earth as it was,

return to God that gave it.

and the Spirit fhall Others interpret it

to the reciprocal communications between the heart and the head; the heart continually

fend

fending to the head, blood and vital spirits; and the head again returning them to the heart, fublimed inftruments of animality.

Laftly, There are that ingeniously interpret it to respiration, which is performed by a circular motion; infpiration, and exfpiration continually fucceeding one another in their courses. All these archers have shot exceeding well, and have hit the but, (while many others have shot at rovers); yet thefe, not being able to difcern the white, have not touched that principal mark. I mean, the grand circulation in man's body, not being known to these ancient commentators, they have done the best that could be in the second place. What this grand circulation is, and how performed, hath been already described; and those veffels that are inward bound, which bring home the noble traveller, the encompaffer of the little world, were defcribed in the explanation of the foregoing fymbol; but those which are outward bound, which carry him forth with all his wealth and fubftance to accomplish his intended end, are here intimated unto us by the wheel. That the great artery, with all its branches throughout the whole body, is here principally pointed at, hath been already faid; and may be farther confirmed, first, in that it answers fo directly to the vein fignified in the last symptom, by the pitcher. Secondly, In that it is to us the most apparent pulfor;

we