The Consolidator | Page 4

One I took particular notice of, which might bear this Title, Natural Right prov'd Superior to Temporal Power; wherein the old Author proves, the Chinese Emperors were Originally made so, by Nature's directing the People, to place the Power of Government in the most worthy Person they could find; and the Author giving a most exact History of 2000 Emperors, brings them into about 35 or 36 Periods of Lines when the Race ended; and when a Collective Assembly of the Nobles, Cities, and People, Nominated a new Family to the Goverment.
This being an heretical Book as to European Politicks, and our Learned Authors having long since exploded this Doctrine, and prov'd that Kings and Emperors came down from Heaven with Crowns on their Heads, and all their Subjects were born with Saddles on their Backs; I thought fit to leave it where I found it, least our excellent Tracts of Sir Robert Filmer, Dr. Hammond L...y, S....l, and Others, who have so learnedly treated of the more useful Doctrine of Passive Obedience, Divine Right, &c. should be blasphem'd by the Mob, grow into Contempt of the People; and they should take upon them to question their Superiors for the Blood of Algernon Sidney, and Argyle.
For I take the Doctrines of Passive Obedience, &c. among the States-men, to be like the Copernican System of the Earths Motion among Philosophers; which, though it be contrary to all antient Knowledge, and not capable of Demonstration, yet is adher'd to in general, because by this they can better solve, and give a more rational Account of several dark Phanomena in Nature, than they could before.
Thus our Modern States-men approve of this Scheme of Government; not that it admits of any rational Defence, much less of Demonstration, but because by this Method they can the better explain, as well as defend, all Coertion in Cases invasive of Natural Right, than they could before.
Here I found two famous Volumes in Chyrurgery, being an exact Description of the Circulation of the Blood, discovered long before King Solomon's Allegory of the Bucket's going to the Well; with several curious Methods by which the Demonstration was to be made so plain, as would make even the worthy Doctor B------ himself become a Convert to his own Eye-sight, make him damn his own Elaborate Book, and think it worse Nonsence than ever the Town had the Freedom to imagine.
All our Philosophers are Fools, and their Transactions a parcel of empty Stuff, to the Experiments of the Royal Societies in this Country. Here I came to a Learned Tract of Winds, which outdoes even the Sacred Text, and would make us believe it was not wrote to those People; for they tell Folks whence it comes, and whither it goes. There you have an Account how to make Glasses of Hogs Eyes, that can see the Wind; and they give strange Accounts both of its regular and irregular Motions, its Compositions and Quantities; from whence, by a sort of Algebra, they can cast up its Duration, Violence, and Extent: In these Calculations, some say, those Authors have been so exact, that they can, as our Philosophers say of Comets, state their Revolutions, and tell us how many Storms there shall happen to any Period of time, and when; and perhaps this may be with much about the same Truth.
It was a certain Sign Aristotle had never been at China; for, had he seen the 216th Volume of the Chinese Navigation, in the Library I am speaking of, a large Book in Double Folio, wrote by the Famous Mira-cho-cho-lasmo, Vice-Admiral of China, and said to be printed there about 2000 Years before the Deluge, in the Chapter of Tides he would have seen the Reason of all the certain and uncertain Fluxes and Refluxes of that Element, how the exact Pace is kept between the Moon and the Tides, with a most elaborate Discourse there, of the Power of Sympathy, and the manner how the heavenly Bodies Influence the Earthly: Had he seen this, the Stagyrite would never have Drowned himself, because he could not comprehend this Mystery.
'Tis farther related of this Famous Author, that he was no Native of this World, but was Born in the Moon, and coming hither to make Discoveries, by a strange Invention arrived to by the Virtuosoes of that habitable World, the Emperor of China prevailed with him to stay and improve his Subjects, in the most exquisite Accomplishments of those Lunar Regions; and no wonder the Chinese are such exquisite Artists, and Masters of such sublime Knowledge, when this Famous Author has blest them with such unaccountable Methods of Improvement.
There was abundance of vast Classes full of the Works of this wonderful Philosopher: He gave the how, the modus of all the secret Operations