self's oppos'd;
The Heavens the Earth the universall Frame
Of living Nature God so soon disclos'd
As He could do, or she receive the same.
All times delay since that must turn to blame,
And what cannot He do that can be done?
And what might let but by th' all-powerfull Name
Or Word of God, the Worlds Creation
More suddenly were made then mans swift thought can run?

41

Wherefore that Heavenly Power or is as young
As this Worlds date; or else some needlesse space
Of time was spent, before the Earth did clung
So close unto her-self and seas embrace
Her hollow breast, and if that time surpasse
A finite number then Infinitie
Of years before this Worlds Creation passe.
So that the durance of the Deitie
We must contract or strait his full Benignitie.

42

But for the cradle of the _Cretian Jove_,
And guardians of his vagient Infancie
What sober man but sagely will reprove?
Or drown the noise of the fond _Dactyli_
By laughter loud? Dated Divinitie
Certes is but the dream of a drie brain:
God maim'd in goodnesse, inconsistencie;
Wherefore my troubled mind is now in pain
Of a new birth, which this one Canto'll not contain.

_Now Reader, thou art arrived to the Canto it self, from which I have
kept thee off by too tedious Preface and Apologie, which is seldome made
without consciousnesse of some fault, which I professe I find not in my
self, unlesse this be it, that I am more tender of thy satisfaction then
mine own credit. As for that high sullen Poem, =Cupids Conflict=, I must
leave it to thy candour and favourable censure. The =Philosophers
Devotion= I cast in onely, that the latter pages should not be
unfurnished._

H. M.

_Nihil tamen frequentius inter Autores occurrit, quam ut omnia adeo ex
moduli fere sensuum suorum aestiment, ut ea quae insuper infinitis rerum
spatiis extare possunt, sive superbe sive imprudenter rejiciant; quin &
ea omnia in usum suum fabricata fuisse glorientur, perinde facientes ac
si pediculi humanum caput, aut pulices sinum muliebrem propter se solos
condita existimarent, eaque demum ex gradibus saltibusve suis
metirentur. =The Lord Herbert in his De Causis Errorum.=_

_De generali totius hujus mundi aspectabilis constructione ut recte
Philosophemur duo sunt imprimis observanda: Unum ut attendentes ad
infinitam Dei potentiam & bonitatem ne vereamur nimis ampla & pulchra &
ab