, Chap.
xvi.

25. _Reign of James I, 1625 to 1603.--From an Advertisement, dated 1608_.

"I svppose it altogether needlesse (Christian Reader) by commending M.
_VVilliam Perkins_, the Author of this booke, to wooe your holy affection,
which either himselfe in his life time by his Christian conversation hath
woon in you, or sithence his death, the neuer-dying memorie of his
excellent knowledge, his great humilitie, his sound religion, his feruent
zeale, his painefull labours, in the Church of God, doe most iustly
challenge at your hands: onely in one word, I dare be bold to say of him as
in times past _Nazianzen_ spake of _Athanasius_. His life was a good
definition of a true minister and preacher of the Gospell."--_The Printer
to the Reader_.

26. _Examples written about the end of Elizabeth's reign--1603_.

"Some say, That euer 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's Birth is celebrated,
The Bird of Dawning singeth all night long;
And then, say they, no Spirit dares walk abroad:
The nights are wholsom, then no Planets strike,
No Fairy takes, nor Witch hath pow'r to charm;
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time."
SHAKSPEARE: _Hamlet_.

"The sea, with such a storme as his bare head
In hell-blacke night indur'd, would haue buoy'd up
And quench'd the stelled fires.
Yet, poore old heart, he holpe the heuens to raine.
If wolues had at thy gate howl'd that sterne time,
Thou shouldst haue said, Good porter, turne the key."
SHAKSPEARE: _Lear_.

IV. ENGLISH OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

27. _Reign of Elizabeth, 1603 back to 1558.--Example written in 1592_.

"As for the soule, it is no accidentarie qualitie, but a spirituall and
inuisible essence or nature, subsisting by it selfe. Which plainely
appeares in that the soules of men haue beeing and continuance as well
forth of the bodies of men as in the same; and are as wel subiect to
torments as the bodie is. And whereas we can and doe put in practise
sundrie actions of life, sense, motion, vnderstanding, we doe it onely by
the power and vertue of the soule. Hence ariseth the difference betweene
the soules of men, and beasts. The soules of men are substances: but the
soules of other creatures seeme not to be substances; because they haue no
beeing out of the bodies in which they are."--WILLIAM PERKINS: _Theol.
Works, folio_, p. 155.