| Title: | Copy Letter In Scribal Hand A, John Beale To Hartlib? |
|---|---|
| Dating: | 6 August 1659 |
| Ref: | 65/7/1A-2B |
[65/7/1A]
Hereford. Aug.6. 1659.
I perceive from Mr Oldenburg, That the French Hugenots are still straite laced as they avere allwaies vnable to looke beyond Calvine. Yet some noble spirits emerged amongst them. Such were Causabone & Cameron & others: & some of them that did not professe a totall removall from Rome, wrote like Frenchmen, with as much, if not with more noble Freedome then the Huguonots. When I was in Paris I had frequent resort to a Stationer rue Sainct Iacqves, who furnished mee with all kinds of free discourses, as Robinson at the 3. Pigeons in Paules then did, & as Giles Calvert now does. But the Parisian Stationer, being far more learned & more famous, I found it the Center from whence I could proclaime a free disqvisition all over France. There I could set Grotius & the Iesuites at worke, & did ply it for a short time, & I never sawe a people more apt to assume a free spirit. Here or in the like place de Castres, or rather his correspondent might doe better service, than in England, & then best, when Hee keepes (as the present disguise) alooffe from the Hugonots. And if our Wealthy men of England were Protestants or Christians, these could not want a good pension.
I can give you tydings out of Wales not only of the Prophesy of Enoch, which is acknowledged Iudges 14. but also of the more ancient, & more reserved Monuments of Adams Psalme vpon the Creation, or forma-[catchword: tion]
[65/7/1B]
tion of Eve, & of their penitentiall dialogue in the Ms of St Laurence taken out of the Royall Bibliothec of the Escuriall. And of the Prophesy of Seth, taken vp casually by a Iewe in Toledo out of the midst of a firme stone, as hee was digging in a rocke. It was there written in Hebrewe, Greeke, Latine, & had as it were woodden leaves. Tantùm de Litera habebat, quantum unum psalterium, et loqvebatur de triplici Mundo ab Adam usque ad Antichristum, proprietates hominum cujusque mundi exprimendo, Principium v.tertij Mundi posuit in Christo. It gave soe cleare account of Iesus the sonne of Mary, that therevpon the Iewe & all his household were baptised. This vpon the faith of Alphonsus de Spima in Fortalitio fidei. As found Anno 1243. Of these Adamiticall Psalmes & Sethian prophesyes I have but little beleefe. Iosephus Antiq: l.1.c.4. gives accompt of Sethes two pillars, one of bricke, the other of stone remaining in his daies in Syria, both occasioned upon the Prophesy of Adam, foretelling the two destructions of the World, by the floud, & by fire. Against these pillars I say nothing. It seemes that brutall figures, or hieroglyphiqves in stone pillars, obeliskes, or in leaden plates were more ancient, than Letters in bullrush or in barks of birch. Iob is produced to such purpose.
[65/7/2A]
Qvis mihi det ut sermones mei exarentur in libro stilo ferreo, et plumbi lamina! And the interpretor of Pausanias reports the Bookes of Hesiod to bee retained in Boætia in leaden plates. And Pliny l.13.c.11 Plumbeis Voluminibus Monumenta publica fieri cæpta sunt. Of the prophesyes of Henoch it was long agoe controverted: Origen: Chrysostome, Hierom. Clemens Alexandrinus, Didymus, Athanasius & Epiphanius esteeme them no better than Apocryphall fables. Tertullian & some others speak highly of them. Augustine at severall examinations speakes them somewhat faire, but excludes them from the chastity of the Canon Sed ea Castitas Canonum non recepit, non qvod eorum hominum qvi Deo placuerunt, reprobetur authoritas, sed qvod ista esse non credantur ipsorum. Nec mirum debet videri qvod suspecta habeantur, quæ sub tantæ antiqvitatis nomine proferuntur.
