An exposition with practical observations continued upon the thirty-eighth, thirty-ninth, fortieth, forty-first, and forty-second,…

Her eyes behold afar off.

To behold or see, is the work of the eye, and to behold afar off, is the excellency of the eye in that work. The Eagle seeks after her prey, and her eyes behold afar off. Some render which her eyes behold afar off, that's a good reading; the conjunctive particle and is not in the Original Text, and therefore we may supply it by the relative (which) as well as by the conjunction (and) Naturalists tell us, that the Eagle hath so sharp a sight, that when she is mounted quite out of our sight, out of the sight of any man, and is as it were in the clouds, that even then she doth perfectly behold her prey, and that is afar off indeed; even at that distance she beholds the Hare in the bush, and the fish in the water. There are almost incredible things related, as to the acuteness of the Eagles sight; and the reason given by some of ⟨p. 486⟩her quicksightedness, is this in nature, because her eye lieth very deep in her head, and so hath a great advantage in seeing, the light being the more compassed by, and the rays the more strongly gathered into her eye. I shall not discuss the validity of this reason, all agreeing in the thing, that the Eagle sees very exactly and afar off: And as she hath a very clear, so a very strong sight, so strong that she can steadily behold the Sun shining in its strength (as it was touched before) those beams which blind us, and oppress our eyes, are pleasing to hers. It hath been a torture which some Tyrants have used, to hold open a mans eye directly to the Sun-beams, and so blind him, and quite extinguish the sight of his eye. Now that which blinds us, and puts out our eyes is pleasant, delightful, and as some express it, healing and refreshing to the eyes of the Eagle: and hence 'tis said of her, that she tries her young ones, whether they be of a right breed or no, in this manner; she holds them up to the Sun, and if they can bear the beams of the Sun with open eyes,¹ they are right, otherwise spurious. The Eagle is so sharp-sighted, that, An Eagles eye is the proverb for a sharp sight. Her eyes behold afar off. Not in the sense we find the phrase used (