Humour me a little history as I begin to conclude. This whole extended essay on that English knight, Thomas Browne, has been about history, and remarkably few historical facts have been mentioned. I have written at length about modernity in the abstract, an abstract I would not venture to assert exists, though I am certainContinue reading “Smatterings of the Philosopher’s Stone – Conclusion: On History”
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Smatterings of the Philosopher’s Stone – Chapter 2, part 3: On Protestants and the Peace of the Church
The wonder of it is that, being a man of his time, the humble physician can call it ‘uncharitable to fall upon those popular scurrilities and opprobrious scoffs at the Bishop of Rome,’ or say that, not forgetting the ‘general charity he owes to humanity,’ he rather pities than hates ‘Turks, infidels’ and (most malignedContinue reading “Smatterings of the Philosopher’s Stone – Chapter 2, part 3: On Protestants and the Peace of the Church”
Smatterings of the Philosopher’s Stone – Chapter 1, part 7 (conclusion)
That is the first attractive quality of his science. The second quality, I think, is one we talk about a lot and practice little. He is astonished by the world, as we complacently think we ought to be. He is so generally and generously astonished that he suspects some mystery in it; and he willContinue reading “Smatterings of the Philosopher’s Stone – Chapter 1, part 7 (conclusion)”
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