A treatise of the passions and faculties of the soul of man With the…A treatise of the passions and faculties of the soule of man With the…

Now because Emptiness is the cause of Appetence, ¹we shall hereupon find, that the fullest and most contented men, are ever freest from vast desires. The more the mind of any man is in weight, the more it is in rest too. As they say that in Rivers, ships go slower in the Winter, but withal they carry the greater burdens: So many times men of less urgent and importunate Appetitions, and motions of mind, are more furnished and better balanced within. In Jotham's ²Parable the Bramble was more ambitious than the Vine, or the Olive. And the Vine we see which is of all other Arbour Desiderii, the Tree of Desire, is weakest and cannot stand without another to support it. Therefore we shall find that mens Desires are strongest when their constitutions are weakest, and their condition lowest; as we see in servants that labour, women that breed, and sick men that long, whose whole life in that time is but a change and miscellany of Desires. Thus we see little children will reach at every³ thing which is before them, being wholly destitute of internal furniture. Vacuity is ever sucking and attractive, and will make even dull and heavy things rise upward. Eager and greedy, various and swarming Appetitions are usually the⁴ signs either of a childish or a sick Temper of mind; as the Naturalists observe that the least creatures are the greatest breeders, a Mouse ⟨p. 171⟩bringeth more young ones than an Elephant.⁵

Now because Emptinesse is the cause of Appetence, ¹we shall hereupon finde, that the fullest and most contented men, are ever freest from vaste desires. The more the minde of any man is in weight, the more it is in rest too. As they say that in Rivers, ships goe slower in the Winter, but withall they carry the greater burdens: So many times men of lesse urgent and importunate Appetitions, and motions of mind, are more furnished and better ballanced within. In Iothams