Or as the man, whom she doth now advance, Upon her gracious Mercy Seat to sit, Doth common things, of course and circumstance, To the Reports of common men commit: But when the Cause itself must be decreed, Himself in person, in his proper Court, To grave and solemn hearing doth proceed, Of every proof, and every by-report. Then, like God's angel, he pronounceth right, And milk and honey from his tongue do flow: Happy are they, that still are in his sight, To reap the wisdom, which his lips do sow. Right so, the Soul, which is a Lady free, And doth the justice of her State maintain; Because the Senses, ready servants be, Attending nigh about her Court, the Brain; By them, the forms of outward things She learns, For they return unto the Fantasy, Whatever each of them abroad discerns; And there enrol it for the Mind to see. But when She sits to judge the good and ill, And to discern betwixt the false and true; She is not guided by the Senses' skill, But doth each thing in her own mirror view. Then She the Senses checks! which oft do err, And even against their false reports, decrees; And oft She doth condemn, what they prefer, For with a power above the Sense, She sees: Therefore, no Sense, the precious joys conceives, Which in her private contemplations be; For then, the ravished Spirit, the Senses leaves, Hath her own powers, and proper actions free. Her harmonies are sweet and full of skill, When on the Body's instrument She plays: But the proportions of the Wit and Will, Those sweet accords are even the angels' lays. These tunes of Reason are AMPHION's lyre, Wherewith he did the Theban city found; These are the notes, wherewith the heavenly Quire, The praise of Him, which spreads the heaven, doth sound. Then her self-being nature shines in this, That She performs her noblest works alone! "The work, the touchstone of the nature is!" And "by their operations, things are known!" [Sidenote: 2. That the Soul is more than a perfection or reflection of the Sense.] Are they not senseless then! that think the Soul Nought but a fine perfection of the Sense, Or of the forms which Fancy doth enrol, A quick Resulting, and a Consequence? What is it, then, that doth the Sense accuse, Both of false judgements, and fond appetites? Which makes us do, what Sense doth most refuse? Which oft, in torment of the Sense delights? Sense thinks the planets' spheres not much asunder; What tells us, then, their distance is so far? Sense thinks the lightning born before the thunder, What tells us, then, they both together are?