Read what you list, and understand what you can. Characters are not
every man's construction, though they be writ in our mother tongue; and
what I have written, being of no other nature, if they fit not your
humour they may please a better. I make no comparison, because I know
you not, but if you will vouchsafe to look into them, it may be you may
find something in them; their natures are diverse, as you may see, if
your eyes be open, and if you can make use of them to good purpose, your
wits may prove the better. In brief, fearing the fool will be put upon
me for being too busy with matters too far above my understanding, I
will leave my imperfection to pardon or correction, and my labour to
their liking that will not think ill of a well-meaning, and so
rest,--Your well-willing friend,
N.B.
CHARACTERS UPON ESSAYS,
MORAL AND DIVINE.
BY NICHOLAS BRETON.
WISDOM.
Wisdom is a working grace in the souls of the elect, by whom the spirit
is made capable of those secrets that neither nature nor reason is able
to comprehend; who, by a powerful virtue she hath from the Divine
Essence, worketh in all things according to the will of the Almighty,
and, being before beginning, shall exceed time in an eternal proceeding.
She is a light in the intellectual part, by which reason is led to
direct the senses in their due course, and nature is preserved from
subjecting herself to imperfection. In the Creation she was of counsel
with the Trinity in the pleasing of the Deity; in the Redemption the
inventor of mercy for the preservation of the elect; and in the
Glorification the treasurer of life for the reward of the faithful, who,
having committed to her care the carriage of the whole motion, finding
the disposition of earth in all the children of her womb, by such a
measure as she finds fitting their quality, she gives them either the
grace of nature or the glory of reason.
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