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THE SECOND BOOKE 547
extreme bounds of our perceiving. There is nothing
beyond them that may stead us to discover them : No
one sense can discover another.
An poterunt oculos aures reprehendere, an aures
Tactus, an kunc poi ro tactum sapoi arguet oris,
An confutabunt nares, ocuhve revincent ?¹
Can eares the eyes, or can touch reprehend
The eares, or shall mouthes taste that touch amend ?'.
Shall our nose it confute,
Or eyes gainst it dispute ?
They all make the extreamest line of our facultie,
seorsum cuique potestas
Divisa est, sua vis cuique est, 2
To teach distinctly might
Is shar'de, each hath its right.
It is impossible to make a man naturally blind, to
conceive that he seeth not; impossible to make him
desire to see, and sorrow his defect. Therefore ought
we not to take assurance that our mind is contented
and satisfied with those we have, seeing it hath not
wherewith to feel her owne malady, and perceive her
imperfection, if it be in any It is impossible to tell
that blind man any thing, either by discourse, argument,
or similitude, that lodgeth any apprehension of
light, colour, or sight in his imagination. There is
nothing more backward that may push the senses to
any evidence. The blind-borne, which we perceive
desire to se, it is not to understand what they require ;
they have learnt of us that something they want, and
something they desire, that is in us, with the effects
and consequences thereof, which they call good: yet
wot not they what it is, nor apprehend they it neere or
far. I have seene a gentleman of a good house, borne
blind, at least blind in such an age that he knowes not
what sight is; he understandeth so little what he
wanteth, that as we doe, he useth words fitting sight,
and applieth them after a manner onely proper and
1 LUCR. 1. iv. 488. ² lb. 491.