7. Every ear is filled with the story of Frier _Bacon_ [SN: Rog. Bacon. minor ita. Oxoniensis vir doctissimus.], that made a brazen head to speak these words, _Time is_, Which though there want not the like relations, is surely too literally received, and was but a mystical fable concerning the Philosophers great work, wherein he eminently laboured: implying no more by the copper head, then the vessel wherein it was wrought, and by the words it spake, then the opportunity to be watched, about the _Tempus ortus_, or birth of the mystical child, or Philosophical King of _Lullius_: the rising of the _Terra foliata_ of _Arnoldus_, when the earth sufficiently impregnated with the water, ascendeth white and splendent. Which not observed, the work is irrecoverably lost; according to that of _Petrus Bonus [SN: Margarita pretiosa.]. Ibi est operis perfectio aut annihilatio; quoniam ipsa die, immo horâ, oriuntur elementa simplicia depurata, quæ egent statim compositione, antequam volent ab igne._ Now letting slip this critical opportunity, he missed the intended treasure. Which had he obtained, he might have made out the tradition of making a brazen wall about _England_. That is, the most powerfull defence, and strongest fortification which Gold could have effected. 8. Who can but pitty the vertuous _Epicurus_, who is commonly conceived to have placed his chief felicity in pleasure and sensual delights, and hath therefore left an infamous name behind him? How true, let them determine who read that he lived seventy years, and wrote more books then any Philosopher but _Chrysippus_, and no less then three hundred, without borrowing from any Author. That he was contented with bread and water, and when he would dine with _Jove_, and pretend unto epulation, he desired no other addition then a piece of _Cytheridian_ cheese. That shall consider the words of _Seneca, Non dico, quod pleriq; nostrorum, sectam Epicuri flagitiorum magistrum esse: sed illud dico, malè audit infamis est, et immerito_. Or shall read his life, his Epistles, his Testament in _Laertius_, who plainly names them Calumnies, which are commonly said against them. The ground hereof seems a mis-apprehension of his opinion, who placed his Felicity not in the pleasures of the body, but the mind, and tranquility thereof, obtained by wisdom and vertue, as is clearly determined in his Epistle unto _Menœceus_. Now how this opinion was first traduced by the _Stoicks_, how it afterwards became a common belief, and so taken up by Authors of all ages, by _Cicero_, _Plutarch_, _Clemens_, _Ambrose_ and others, the learned Pen of _Gassendus_ hath discovered. [SN: De vita et moribus Epicuri.] CHAPTER XVIII More briefly of some others.