t not drink wine themselves, that neither Jew nor
Christian then living in Constantinople, might drink any wine at all." In
like sort amongst papists, fasting at first was generally proposed as a
good thing; after, from such meats at set times, and then last of all so
rigorously proposed, to bind the consciences upon pain of damnation. "First
Friday," saith Erasmus, "then Saturday," _et nunc periclitatur dies
Mercurii_) and Wednesday now is in danger of a fast. [6596]"And for such
like toys, some so miserably afflict themselves, to despair, and death
itself, rather than offend, and think themselves good Christians in it,
when as indeed they are superstitious Jews." So saith Leonardus Fuchsius, a
great physician in his time. [6597]"We are tortured in Germany with these
popish edicts, our bodies so taken down, our goods so diminished, that if
God had not sent Luther, a worthy man, in time, to redress these mischiefs,
we should have eaten hay with our horses before this." [6598]As in fasting,
so in all other superstitious edicts, we crucify one another without a
cause, barring ourselves of many good and lawful things, honest disports,
pleasures and recreations; for wherefore did God create them but for our
use? Feasts, mirth, music, hawking, hunting, singing, dancing, &c. _non tam
necessitatibus nostris Deus inservit, sed in delicias amamur_, as Seneca
notes, God would have it so. And as Plato _2. de legibus_ gives out, _Deos
laboriosam hominum vitam miseratos_, the gods in commiseration of human
estate sent Apollo, Bacchus, and the Muses, _qui cum voluptate tripudia et
soltationes nobis ducant_, to be merry with mortals, to sing and dance with
us. So that he that will not rejoice and enjoy himself, making good use of
such things as are lawfully permitted, _non est temperatus_, as he will,
_sed superstitiosus._ "There is nothing better for a man, than that he
should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his
labour," Eccles. ii. 24. And as [6599]one said of hawking and hunting, _tot
solatia in hac aegri orbis calamitate, mortalibus taediis deus objecit_, I
say of all honest recreations, God hath therefore indulged them to refresh,
ease, solace and comfort us. But we are some of us too stern, too rigid,
too precise, too grossly superstitious, and whilst we make a conscience of
every toy, with touch not, taste not, &c., as those Pythagoreans of old,
and some Indians now, that will eat no flesh, or suffer a