"When I am purified by the light of heaven my soul will become the mirrour of the world, in which I shall discern all abstruse secrets."
— Warton, Thomas, the younger (1728-1790)
Work Title
Place of Publication
London and Oxford
Publisher
Printed for, and sold by J. Dodsley; J. Walter; T. Becket; J. Robson; G. Robinson, and J. Bew; and Messrs. Fletcher
Date
1774-1781
Metaphor
"When I am purified by the light of heaven my soul will become the mirrour of the world, in which I shall discern all abstruse secrets."
Metaphor in Context
The oriental writers relate, that Giamschid, one of their kings, the Solomon of the Persians and their Alexander the Great, possessed, among his inestimable treasures, cups, globes, and mirrours, of metal, glass, and crystal, by means of which, he and his people knew all natural as well as supernatural things. A title of an Arabian book, translated from the Persian, is,
"The Mirrour which reflects the World."
There is this passage in an antient Turkish poet,
"When I am purified by the light of heaven my soul will become the mirrour of the world, in which I shall discern all abstruse secrets."
Monsieur l'Herbelot is of opinion, that the orientals took these notions from the patriarch Joseph's cup of divination, and Nestor's cup in Homer, on which all nature was symbolically represented h. Our great countryman Roger Bacon, in his OPUS MAJUS, a work entirely formed on the Aristotelic and Arabian philosophy, describes a variety of Specula, and explains their construction and uses. This is the most curious and extraordinary part of Bacon's book, which was written about the year 1270. Bacon's optic tube, with which he pretended to see future events, was famous in his age, and long afterwards, and chiefly contributed to give him the name of a magician. This art, with others of the experimental kind, the philosophers of those times were fond of adapting to the purposes of thaumaturgy; and there is much occult and chimerical speculation in the discoveries which Bacon affects to have made from optical experiments. He asserts, and I am obliged to cite the passage in his own mysterious expressions,
"Omnia sciri per Perspectivam, quoniam omnes actiones rerum fiunt secundum specierum et virtutum multiplicationem ab agentibus hujus mundi in materias patientes, &c. l."
(I, pp. 407-408)
"The Mirrour which reflects the World."
There is this passage in an antient Turkish poet,
"When I am purified by the light of heaven my soul will become the mirrour of the world, in which I shall discern all abstruse secrets."
Monsieur l'Herbelot is of opinion, that the orientals took these notions from the patriarch Joseph's cup of divination, and Nestor's cup in Homer, on which all nature was symbolically represented h. Our great countryman Roger Bacon, in his OPUS MAJUS, a work entirely formed on the Aristotelic and Arabian philosophy, describes a variety of Specula, and explains their construction and uses. This is the most curious and extraordinary part of Bacon's book, which was written about the year 1270. Bacon's optic tube, with which he pretended to see future events, was famous in his age, and long afterwards, and chiefly contributed to give him the name of a magician. This art, with others of the experimental kind, the philosophers of those times were fond of adapting to the purposes of thaumaturgy; and there is much occult and chimerical speculation in the discoveries which Bacon affects to have made from optical experiments. He asserts, and I am obliged to cite the passage in his own mysterious expressions,
"Omnia sciri per Perspectivam, quoniam omnes actiones rerum fiunt secundum specierum et virtutum multiplicationem ab agentibus hujus mundi in materias patientes, &c. l."
(I, pp. 407-408)
Categories
Provenance
Reading
Citation
Thomas Warton, The History of English Poetry: From the Close of the Eleventh to the Commencement of the Eighteenth Century. To Which Are Prefixed, Two Dissertations. (London: Printed for, and sold by J. Dodsley; J. Walter; T. Becket; J. Robson; G. Robinson, and J. Bew; and Messrs. Fletcher, at Oxford, 1774-81). <Link to ECCO-TCP>
Date of Entry
10/07/2014
