Mitchell on Adams 02
This is the next section from W Fraser Mitchell
In 1615 Adams preached, on Trinity Sunday, at St Giles Without Cripplegate, and later published his sermon with the title The Spirituall Navigator Bound for the Holy Land. Milton’s father was at this period resident in St. Giles parish, and it is therefore possible that the future poet, then seven years of age, may have been present and heard Adams preach. The sermon was from a text from the Apocalypse - Before the throne was a sea of glass like unto crystal (Rev. 4:6). After treating of the various allegorical significances of “the glassy and crystal-like sea,” as expounded by Ambrose, Augustine, Brightman (a contemporary Puritan d 1607), Emmanuel Sa (celebrated Jesuit commentator), Bullinger, and others - the authorities quoted provide a good specimen of the catholicity of Adams’ reading ‘- the preacher proceeded, as Donne in his sermon at The Hague’ four years later, to enumerate the various ways in which the world resembled a sea. Some of the parallels are extremely well drawn, and the whole sermon is not unworthy of comparison with that of Donne, who must have been familiar with it, and may have avoided borrowing or repetition of ideas by a careful reading of the earlier discourse. After the parallels had been exhausted, Adams concluded with a description of the varied activities and innumerable follies of mankind which God, seated on His throne, beholds reflected in the mirror of the glassy sea, and so introduced his first company of characters.
“There runne honour and pride aeqvis ceruicibus. There walkes fraud cheeke by iowle with a Trades-man. There stalkes pride, with the face of a Souldier, but habit of a Courtier; striuing to adde to her owne stature fetherd on the crowne, cork’d at the heeles, light all ouer: stretching her legges, and spreading her wings like the Ostrich, with ostentation of great flight: but nil penna, sed usus; not an inch higher or better. There slugs Idlenesse: both hands are in the bosome, while one foote should be in the stirrop.
“Here halts Opinion lame not with the shortnesse, but length of his legges: one foote too long, that marres the verse. There runnes Policie, and moues more with an Engine, then many men can doe with their hands:
“There slides by the meagre ghost of malice. ... There flye a crew of Oathes, like a flight of dismall Ravens, croking the Plague to the House, where the Swearer is …”
The Heavenly camera obscura continues, presenting still fresh types of human folly, until the Divine Spectator is obviously forgotten, and the original intention of showing men their deformities and so disgusting them with their sins. Each fresh sinner is introduced out of pure love for witty description. The moral descriptio has become the character.
The publication, in the year previous (1614) to The Spirituall Navigator, of the collection of characters which came from the pen of Overbury and his friends had given fresh impetus to what was obviously a current fashion, and probably Adams’ characters as depicted in his sermon were received with applause, or he may have discovered his gift for this kind of description. Certain it is, that before the close of the year he issued a complete set of characters in the manner of Hall and Overbury, under the title of Mysticall Bedlam: Or The World of Mad-Men, dedicated to no less a person than Sir Thomas Egerton, Baron Ellesmere. After a kind of preliminary discourse based upon a piece of restrained wit drawn from grammar and logic, and reminiscent of Donne, with the remark, “Stultorum plena sunt omnia,” Adams proceeds to introduce his madmen or characters, presenting one and another before us that they may make us sport, just as the keepers of Bedlam in his day were accustomed to lead in their charges to provide amusement for visitors. The Epicure is chosen to “leade the ring, as the foote man of this mad Morisco,” and accordingly, in the printed version is introduced, as is each character in turn, under a separate heading.
“There runne honour and pride aeqvis ceruicibus. There walkes fraud cheeke by iowle with a Trades-man. There stalkes pride, with the face of a Souldier, but habit of a Courtier; striuing to adde to her owne stature fetherd on the crowne, cork’d at the heeles, light all ouer: stretching her legges, and spreading her wings like the Ostrich, with ostentation of great flight: but nil penna, sed usus; not an inch higher or better. There slugs Idlenesse: both hands are in the bosome, while one foote should be in the stirrop.
“Here halts Opinion lame not with the shortnesse, but length of his legges: one foote too long, that marres the verse. There runnes Policie, and moues more with an Engine, then many men can doe with their hands:
“There slides by the meagre ghost of malice. ... There flye a crew of Oathes, like a flight of dismall Ravens, croking the Plague to the House, where the Swearer is …”
The Heavenly camera obscura continues, presenting still fresh types of human folly, until the Divine Spectator is obviously forgotten, and the original intention of showing men their deformities and so disgusting them with their sins. Each fresh sinner is introduced out of pure love for witty description. The moral descriptio has become the character.
The publication, in the year previous (1614) to The Spirituall Navigator, of the collection of characters which came from the pen of Overbury and his friends had given fresh impetus to what was obviously a current fashion, and probably Adams’ characters as depicted in his sermon were received with applause, or he may have discovered his gift for this kind of description. Certain it is, that before the close of the year he issued a complete set of characters in the manner of Hall and Overbury, under the title of Mysticall Bedlam: Or The World of Mad-Men, dedicated to no less a person than Sir Thomas Egerton, Baron Ellesmere. After a kind of preliminary discourse based upon a piece of restrained wit drawn from grammar and logic, and reminiscent of Donne, with the remark, “Stultorum plena sunt omnia,” Adams proceeds to introduce his madmen or characters, presenting one and another before us that they may make us sport, just as the keepers of Bedlam in his day were accustomed to lead in their charges to provide amusement for visitors. The Epicure is chosen to “leade the ring, as the foote man of this mad Morisco,” and accordingly, in the printed version is introduced, as is each character in turn, under a separate heading.
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