IL favorito amico di Dio Gionata 7°, potentissimo sopra tutti i potentissimi della terra, altissimo sopra tutti gl'altissimi sotto il sole e la luna, che sude nella sede di smeraldo della China sopra cento scalini d'oro, ad interpretare la lingua di Dio a tutti i descendenti fedeli d'Abramo, che de la vita e la morte a cento quindici regni, ed a cento settante isole, scrive con la penna dello struzzo vergine, e manda salute ed accresimento di vecchiezza.

Essendo arrivato il tempo in cui il fiore della reale nostro gioventu deve maturare i frutti della nostra vectuezza, e confortare con quell' i desiderii de i populi nostri divoti, e propagare il seme di quella pianta che deve proteggerli, habbiamo stabillito d'accompagnarci con una vergine eccelsa ed amorosa allattata alla mamella della leonessa forte e dell' agnella mansueta. Percio essendoci stato figu rato sempre il vostro populo Europeo Romano per paese di donne invitte, i forte, e caste; allongiamo la nostra mano potente, a stringere una di loro, e questa sarà una vostra nipote, o nipote di qualche altrograri sacerdote Latino, che sia quardata dall', occhio dritto di Dio, sara seminata in lei l'autorita di Sarra, la fedelta d'Esther, e la sapienza di Abba; la vogliamo con l'occhio che guarda il cielo, e la terra, e con la bocca della conchiglia che si pasce della ruggiada del matino. La sua eta non passi ducento corsi della luna, la sua statura si alta quanto la spicca dritta del grano verde, e la sua grossezza quanto un manipolo di grano secco. Noi la mandaremmo a vestire per li nostri mandatici ambasciadori, e chi la conduranno a noi, e noi incontraremmo alla riva del fiume grande facendola salire sue nostro cocchio. Ella potra adorare appresso di noi il suo Dio, con venti quatro altre a suo ellezzione e potre cantare con loro, come la tottora alla primavera.

• Sodisfando noi padre e amico nostro questa nostra brama, sarete caggione di unire in perpetua amicitia cotesti vostri regni d'Europa al nostro dominante imperio, e si abbracciranno le vostri leggi come l'edera abbraccia la pianta; e noi medesemi spargeremo del nostro seme reale in coteste provincei, riscaldando i letti di vostri principi con il fuoco amoroso delle nostre amazoni, d'alcune delle quali i nostri mandatici ambasciadori vi porteranno le somiglianza dipinte.

Vi confirmiamo di tenere in pace le due buone religiose famiglie delli missionarii gli' figlioli d'Ignazio, e li bianchi e neri figlioli di Dominico, il cui consiglio degl' uni e degl' altri ci serve di scorta nel nostro regimento e di lume ad interpretare le divine legge, come appuncto fa lume l'oglio che si getta in mare. In tanto alzandoci dal nostro trono per abbracciarvi, vidi chiariamo nostro congiunto e confederato, ed ordiniamo che questo foglio sia segnato col nostro segno imperiale della nostra citta, capo del mondo, il quinto giorno della terza lunatione l'anno quarto del nostro imperio.

Sigillo e un sole nelle cui faccia e anche quella della luna ed intorno tra i raggi vi sono traposte alcune spada.

Dico il traduttore che secondo il ceremonial di questo lettere e recedentissimo specialmente fessere scritto con la penna dello struzzo-vergine con la quelle non sogliosi scrivere quei re che le pregiere a Dio e scrivendo a qualche altro principe del mondo, la maggior finezza che usino, e scrivergli con la penna del pavone.'

A letter from the emperor of China to the Pope, interpreted by a father Jesuit, secretary of the Indies.

perficial survey of it, it still mends upon the search, and produces our surprise and amazement in proportion as we pry into it. What I have here said

of an human body may be applied to the body of every animal which has been the subject of anatomical observations.

The body of an animal is an object adequate to our senses. It is a particular system of Providence that lies in a narrow compass. The eye is able to command it, and by successive inquiries can search into all its parts. Could the body of the whole earth, or indeed the whole universe, be thus submitted to the examination of our senses, were it not too big and disproportioned for our inquiries, too unwieldy for the management of the eye and hand, there is no question but it would appear to us as curious and well-contrived a frame as that of the human body. We should see the same concatenation and subserviency, the same necessity and usefulness, the same beauty and harmony, in all and every of its parts, as what we discover in the body of every single animal.

The more extended our reason is, and the more able to grapple with immense objects, the greater still are those discoveries which it makes of wisdom and providence in the works of the creation. A sir Isaac Newton, who stands up as the miracle of the present age, can look through a whole planetary system; consider it in its weight, number, and measure; and draw from it as many demonstrations of infinite power and wisdom, as a more confined un derstanding is able to deduce from the system of an human body.

I

But to return to our speculations on anatomy, shall here consider the fabric and texture of the bo dies of animals in one particular view: which, in my opinion, shows the hand of a thinking and all

wise Being in their formation, with the evidence of a thousand demonstrations. I think we may lay this down as an incontested principle, that chance never acts in a perpetual uniformity and consistence with itself. If one should always fling the same number with ten thousand dice, or see every throw just five times less, or five times more in number, than the throw which immediately preceded it, who would not imagine there is some invisible power which directs the cast? This is the proceeding which we find in the operations of nature. Every kind of animal is diversified by different magnitudes, each of which gives rise to a different species. Let a man trace the dog or lion kind, and he will observe how many of the works of nature are published, if I may use the expression, in a variety of editions. If we look into the reptile world, or into those different kinds of animals that fill the element of water, we meet with the same repetition among several species, that diflittle from one another, but in size and bulk. You find the same creature that is drawn at large copied out in several proportions and ending in miniature. It would be tedious to produce instances of this regular conduct in Providence, as it would be superfluous to those who are versed in the natural history of animals. The magnificent harmony of the universe is such, that we may observe innumerable divisions running upon the same grou d I might also extend this speculation to the dead parts of nature, in which we may find matter disposed into many similar systems, as well in our survey of stars and planets as of stones, vegetables, and other sublunary parts of the creation. In a word, Providence has shown the richness of its goodness and wisdom, not only in the production of many original species, but in the multiplicity of

fer

very

descants which it has made on every original spe, cies in particular.

But to pursue this thought still further. Every living creature considered in itself has many very complicated parts that are exact copies of some other parts which it possesses, and which are complicated in the same manner. One eye would have been sufficient for the subsistence and preservation of an animal; but, in order to better his condition, we see another placed with a mathematical exactness in the same most advantageous situation, and in every particular of the same size and texture. Is it possible for chance to be thus delicate and uniform in her operations? Should a million of dice turn up together twice the same number, the wonder would be nothing in comparison with this. But when we see this similitude and resemblance in the arm, the hand, the fingers; when we see one half of the body entirely correspond with the other in all those minute strokes, without which a man might have very well subsisted; nay, when we often see a single part repeated an hundred times in the same body notwithstanding it consist of the most intricate weaving of numberless fibres, and these parts dif fering still in magnitude, as the convenience of their particular situation requires; sure a man must have a strange cast of understanding, who does not discover the finger of God in so wonderful a work. These duplicates in those parts of the body, without which a man might have very well subsisted, though not so well as with them, are a plain demonstration of an all-wise Contriver, as those more numerous copyings which are found among the vessels of the

* Meant perhaps for descents, i. e. progress downwards. JOHNSON.