, no good to be
done. That scoffing [6476]Lucian conducts his Menippus to hell by the
directions of that Chaldean Mithrobarzanes, but after long fasting, and
such like idle preparation. Which the Jesuits right well perceiving of what
force this fasting and solitary meditation is, to alter men's minds, when
they would make a man mad, ravish him, improve him beyond himself, to
undertake some great business of moment, to kill a king, or the like,
[6477]they bring him into a melancholy dark chamber, where he shall see no
light for many days together, no company, little meat, ghastly pictures of
devils all about him, and leave him to lie as he will himself, on the bare
floor in this chamber of meditation, as they call it, on his back, side,
belly, till by this strange usage they make him quite mad and beside
himself. And then after some ten days, as they find him animated and
resolved, they make use of him. The devil hath many such factors, many such
engines, which what effect they produce, you shall hear in the following
symptoms.

SUBSECT. III.--_Symptoms general, love to their own sect, hate of all other
religions, obstinacy, peevishness, ready to undergo any danger or cross for
it; Martyrs, blind zeal, blind obedience, fastings, vows, belief of
incredibilities, impossibilities: Particular of Gentiles, Mahometans, Jews,
Christians; and in them, heretics old, and new, schismatics, schoolmen,
prophets, enthusiasts, &c._

_Fleat Heraclitus, an rideat Democritus_? in attempting to speak of these
symptoms, shall I laugh with Democritus, or weep with Heraclitus? they are
so ridiculous and absurd on the one side, so lamentable and tragical on the
other: a mixed scene offers itself, so full of errors and a promiscuous
variety of objects, that I know not in what strain to represent it. When I
think of the Turkish paradise, those Jewish fables, and pontifical rites,
those pagan superstitions, their sacrifices, and ceremonies, as to make
images of all matter, and adore them when they have done, to see them, kiss
the pyx, creep to the cross, &c. I cannot choose but laugh with Democritus:
but when I see them whip and torture themselves, grind their souls for toys
and trifles, desperate, and now ready to die, I cannot but weep with
Heraclitus. When I see a priest say mass, with all those apish gestures,
murmurings, &c. read the customs of the Jews' synagogue, or Mahometa
Meschites, I must needs [6478]laugh at their folly, _risum tene