Reflections upon some Persons and Things in Ireland. William Petty
151
The last Letter, pag. 158.
| 1. | The reason that Sir Hierome found any credit with those unto whom he railed against Dr Petty. | 159 |
| 2. | An Enumeration of some other obvious common reasons of Dr. Petty's persecution. | 160 |
| 3. | The commendation of a person of Honor, who defended Dr Petty when the generality reviled him. | 162 |
| 4. | Means prescribed to Dr Petty to acquire the good opinion of his Adversaries, considered even as self-seekers. | 164 |
| A Friends letter of Admonition touching offensive Expressions. | 166 | |
| Explications and Answers, upon Objections made by the said Friends and others, upon whole matters and particular Expressions. | 169 | |
| The Conclusion and Petition of the Author. | 182 | |
FINIS.
THe Printer not being acquainted with the Island, wherein the Copy of this Discourse was written, nor with the marks of Reference frequently used in it, was forced to guess at many interlined and imperfectly obliterated words and sentences, as also at the true places of many of them. Wherefore he desires the Reader to excuse the literal Errata and mis-pointings; and as for others, (if any seem to be) to enquire of Dr. Petty himself, for his own sence and direction concerning them.
SIR,
ALthough I have a long while wanted the happiness of your Society and Assistance, (such as I enjoyed at Paris) yet I have several times heard from you by Mr J.C. whose newes of your thriving condition hath been very gratefull to mee, because (as the world reports) such a condition is very gratefull to your self; though otherwise, and as to my own apprehensions of you, I am not much tickled with it: For Disturbances (the inseparable counterpoises of such a State) are (if I have not forgotten you) not very suitable to your nature.
I must needs confesse, I could have heartily wished you had never wandered out of those waies, whereunto God and Nature seemed to have set and directed you, having advanced you in them by as many Signal Successes as any other person within my knowledge. For how many of all those, about sixty ingenious persons (who were in the year 1644. Students with us in the Netherlands) did within nine years study (like your self) worthily take the highest degrees in our Faculty? even at home in Oxford, (an University seldom prodigal of those Honors) purchasing them (and much credit besides) with extraordinary Exercises both in the Theory and Practice of our Art; and such, whereby you approved the sufficiency of your Head, Hand, and Tongue unto the world: and all this, notwithstanding the many Excursions you made within that small space unto Studies of other natures, even so farr as to have given the world some demonstration of your good proficiency in them likewise.
Moreover, which of all those our Fellow-students did withall, within the same space, arrive to be chosen Publick Professor in one of the most troublesom pieces of our whole Faculty? (as you were of Anatomy in Oxford) not by favor or interest, but as best deserving it, and as having been the first Planter of that Practice in that place, and was afterwards with so much ease and concurrence entertained Chief Physician to three Chief Governors of a Nation, in continual succession, as you were, to the Lord Lambert, Lord Fleetwood, and Lord Henry Cromwell; never falling from that dignity, till the whole Government fell with you. I say, I could wish you had not turned aside into those by Pathes, which you have since found so exceeding thorny; and this I wish not only for your own sake, but for my own also: for I must declare to the whole world, That your dexterity in making Experiments, and that other your more happy and particular genius for designing what Experiments to make, in order to maintain or refute any Proposition, as also your way of making good use and benefit even by all miscarriages with your handsom coherent reasonings and inferences upon them all, were to mee more pleasant than if you had found out[1]Mines of Silver, richer then those of Potosi, and had made mee your Partner in them.
Besides, although you have gotten as much justly, as many say you have done injuriously, all of it will not make the Commonwealth of Learning a gainer by that your devious traffick; nor, I fear, your self, when you shall please to compute and cast up every thing by no better than your own Arithmetick. This I say perhaps by randome and by guesse; but why may not I by these Speculations and at a distance, measure your affairs as well as the Sea? which (I remember) you taught mee to do in the deepest place without a Line, and as well as Astronomers do the remotest Orbs and Stars, themselves standing here below upon the earth.
Really (Sir) it is not altogether for want of other Employment, that I busie my self about you, and about calculating the event of your troubles, but out of my dear respects and care for you; for if
Cœlum non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt,[2]
why should I think you (whom I knew in three several Countries of a gentle and pleasant temper, and of an inoffensive carriage) to be now become savage, barbarous, and an enemy of Mankinde? for such some say you are, and that by the Air of a Countrey which indureth no venome: They say that
—Ingenuas didicisse fideliter artes, Emollit mores, nec sinit esse feros.[3]
I am sure you had learned many such civillizing Arts, wherefore your memory has been very leaky, if you have so unlearned them again, as to be turned bruitish. I say, I cannot yet think you unworthy of my care; wherefore I conjure you, to let mee know the nature of your Accusation, and of those troubles which I hear one
Sankey (
I judge the same that I knew a Foot-ball-Player in
Cambridge)
hath engaged you in, that so I may reckon my own happiness in casting up yours.