The Works of Sir Thomas Browne, Volume 1Browne, Thomas, Sir
Religion
The Works of Sir Thomas Browne, Volume 1
Browne, Thomas, Sir
Christianity; Ethics; Religion and medicine
absurdity, and chosen ways of less improbable concealment. Though this
be also as ridiculous unto reason, as fruitless unto their desires; for
he that laid the foundations of the Earth, cannot be excluded the
secrecy of the Mountains; nor can there any thing escape the
perspicacity of those eyes which were before light, and in whose opticks
there is no opacity. This is the consolation of all good men, unto whom
his Ubiquity affordeth continual comfort and security: And this is the
affliction of Hell, unto whom it affordeth despair, and remediless
calamity. For those restless Spirits that fly the face of the Almighty,
being deprived the fruition of his eye, would also avoid the extent of
his hand; which being impossible, their sufferings are desperate, and
their afflictions without evasion; until they can get out of
_Trismegistus_ his Circle, that is, to extend their wings above the
Universe, and pitch beyond Ubiquity.
The Second is that Speech of _Adam_ unto God; _The woman whom thou
gavest me to be with me, she gave me of the Tree, and I did eat_. This
indeed was an unsatisfactory reply, and therein was involved a very
impious Error, as implying God the Author of sin, and accusing his Maker
of his transgression. As if he had said, If thou hadst not given me a
woman, I had not been deceived: Thou promisedst to make her a help, but
she hath proved destruction unto me: Had I remained alone, I had not
sinned; but thou gavest me a Consort, and so I became seduced. This was
a bold and open accusation of God, making the fountain of good, the
contriver of evil, and the forbidder of the crime an abettor of the
fact prohibited. Surely, his mercy was great that did not revenge the
impeachment of his justice; And his goodness to be admired, that it
refuted not his argument in the punishment of his excusation, and only
pursued the first transgression without a penalty of this the second.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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