Jupiter, by some
new-fangled Icaromenippus, to make an end of all those curious
controversies, and scatter them abroad.

But why should the sun and moon be angry, or take exceptions at
mathematicians and philosophers? when as the like measure is offered unto
God himself, by a company of theologasters: they are not contented to see
the sun and moon, measure their site and biggest distance in a glass,
calculate their motions, or visit the moon in a poetical fiction, or a
dream, as he saith, [3129]_Audax facinus et memorabile nunc incipiam, neque
hoc saeculo usurpatum prius, quid in Lunae regno hac nocte gestum sit
exponam, et quo nemo unquam nisi somniando pervenit_, [3130]but he and
Menippus: or as [3131]Peter Cuneus, _Bona fide agam, nihil eorum quae
scripturus sum, verum esse scitote, &c. quae nec facta, nec futura sunt,
dicam, [3132]stili tantum et ingenii causa_, not in jest, but in good
earnest these gigantical Cyclops will transcend spheres, heaven, stars,
into that Empyrean heaven; soar higher yet, and see what God himself doth.
The Jewish Talmudists take upon them to determine how God spends his whole
time, sometimes playing with Leviathan, sometimes overseeing the world,
&c., like Lucian's Jupiter, that spent much of the year in painting
butterflies' wings, and seeing who offered sacrifice; telling the hours
when it should rain, how much snow should fall in such a place, which way
the wind should stand in Greece, which way in Africa. In the Turks'
Alcoran, Mahomet is taken up to heaven, upon a Pegasus sent on purpose for
him, as he lay in bed with his wife, and after some conference with God is
set on ground again. The pagans paint him and mangle him after a thousand
fashions; our heretics, schismatics, and some schoolmen, come not far
behind: some paint him in the habit of an old man, and make maps of heaven,
number the angels, tell their several [3133]names, offices: some deny God
and his providence, some take his office out of his hands, will [3134]bind
and loose in heaven, release, pardon, forgive, and be quarter-master with
him: some call his Godhead in question, his power, and attributes, his
mercy, justice, providence: they will know with [3135]Cecilius, why good
and bad are punished together, war, fires, plagues, infest all alike, why
wicked men flourish, good are poor, in prison, sick, and ill at ease. Why
doth he suffer so much mischief and evil to be done, if he be [3136]able to
help? why doth he not a