as that which falls through
painted windows, and which somehow harmonises the whole quaint
assemblage of images. The sacred is made more interesting instead of
being degraded by its association with the quaint; and on the whole,
after a stay in this microcosm, we feel better, calmer, more tolerant,
and a good deal more amused than when we entered it.

Passing from the portrait to the original, we may recognise, or fancy
that we recognise, the same general features. Sir Thomas assures us that
his life, up to the period of the 'Religio Medici,' was a 'miracle of
thirty years, which to relate were not a history, but a piece of poetry,
and would sound to common ears like a fable.' Johnson, with his usual
sense, observes that it is rather difficult to detect the miraculous
element in any part of the story open to our observation. 'Surely,' he
says, 'a man may visit France and Italy, reside at Montpelier and Padua,
and at last take his degree at Leyden, without anything miraculous.' And
although Southey endeavours to maintain that the miracle consisted in
Browne's preservation from infidelity, it must be admitted that to the
ordinary mind that result seems explicable by natural causes. We must be
content with Johnson's explanation, that, in some sense, 'all life is
miraculous;' and, in short, that the strangeness consists rather in
Browne's view of his own history, than in any unusual phenomena.
Certainly, no man seems on the whole to have slipped down the stream of
life more smoothly. After his travels he settled quietly at Norwich, and
there passed forty-five years of scarcely interrupted prosperity. In the
'Religio Medici' he indulges in some disparaging remarks upon marriage.
'The whole world,' he says, 'was made for man; but the twelfth part of
man for woman. Man is the whole world and the breath of God; woman the
rib and crooked part of man.' He wishes, after the fashion of Montaigne,
that we might grow like the trees, and avoid this foolish and trivial
ceremony; and therefore--for such inferences are perfectly legitimate in
the history of a humorist--he married a lady, of whom it is said that
she was so perfect that 'they seemed to come together by a kind of
natural magnetism,' had ten children, and lived very happily ever
afterwards. It is not difficult, from the fragmentary notices that have
been left to us, to put together some picture of his personal
appearance. He was a man of dignified appearance, with a striking