Showing posts with label Jung. Show all posts

Thursday, August 28, 2025

The phantastical Quincunx in Plato

'The shaping influence of Platonism on Sir Thomas Browne (1605-82) has long been recognized by those attracted to the intangible atmosphere of his mind.'[1]

Allusion to the ancient Greek philosopher Plato (circa 427 BCE- 347 BCE) occurs throughout Browne’s writings. Plato’s proposal that the world is a living creature which possesses a soul (anima mundi), his allegories of the Cave of human illusion and the ‘wild horses’ of the passions, his political allegory of the lost civilization of Atlantis, along with ‘the fantastical Quincunx of Plato' can all be found in Browne’s literary works.

Above all else the discourse The Garden of Cyrus (1658) reveals the full depth of the learned doctor’s immersion in Platonic thought. In a kaleidoscopic procession of art-objects, botanical specimens, optical theories and mystical symbols, Browne showcases his very own home-grown Platonic Form of the Quincunx. With virtuoso skill he improvises upon it in geometrical, numerical and mystical variations in order to highlight a foundational hermetic belief: the interconnectedness of life across the Universe. Browne also supplies his reader throughout the discourse with proper-name symbolism of historical philosopher-Kings and ‘wise rulers’ as advocated by Plato. A timely reminder today with the world-wide rise of authoritarian and demagogue politicians.

It was the Oxford academic Thomas Lushington (1590-1661) who introduced Thomas Browne to Plato’s philosophy. He also recommended Norwich to his former pupil as an ideal city to establish a medical career. Browne followed his advice, and after qualifying as a physician in 1637 relocated to Norwich where he practiced medicine until his death in 1682.

Lushington most likely took pride when his former pupil’s Religio Medici (1643) became a best-seller in England and gained recognition across Europe after translation. Plato is encountered several times in Browne’s spiritual testament and psychological self-portrait. For example, the so-called Great Platonic Year, a period of approximately 24,000 years, the length of time which the Greek philosopher believed was required for the celestial bodies to return to their original positions, is defined by Browne as-

'A revolution of certain thousand years when all things should return unto their former estate and he (Plato) be teaching again in his school as when he delivered this opinion'.[2]

Browne expresses his belief in the anima mundi or World-Soul in Religio Medici, a concept originating from Plato and later embraced by hermetic philosophers.

'Now besides these particular and divided Spirits, there may be (for ought I know) an universal and common Spirit to the whole world. It was the opinion of Plato, and it is yet of the Hermetical Philosophers; [3]

Alchemystical philosophers such as Browne related Plato’s concept of the anima mundi or World-Soul from their own spiritual intuition as much as from reading Plato.

A central tenet of Browne’s spirituality is a belief in an angelic hierarchy, one which he held in common with many in the seventeenth century. It was a belief supported not only from Biblical Scripture, but from Plato also, as Browne informs-

‘Therefore for Spirits I am so far from denying their existence and from denying their existence, that I could easily believe, that not only whole Countries, but particular persons have their Tutelary, and Guardian Angels: It is not a new opinion of the Church of Rome, but an old one of Pythagoras and Plato’. [4]

Religio Medici (The Religion of a doctor) concludes in decisive favour of Plato and dismissive of his pupil Aristotle, Browne wittily declaring-

‘Aristotle whilst he labours to refute the Idea's of Plato, falls upon one himself: for his summum bonum, is a Chimæra, and there is no such thing as his Felicity’.[5]

In Plato's theological, moral and mystical philosophy allegory, symbolism and concepts such as Eternal Ideas or Forms are used to illustrate spiritual truths. As the ‘Father of Western mysticism’ he's the source of much esoteric thought. Plato’s philosophy was fundamentally supplemented with the revival and development of Platonic thought in the early centuries of the Common Era. Neoplatonism flourished through philosophers such as Plotinus (204/5 – 271 CE) Porphyry of Tyre (ca. 233-305 CE) and Iamblichus (245-325 CE) all of whom elaborated and expanded Platonic concepts, often with little connection to the ancient Greek’s original thought. Books by Neoplatonic authors are well-represented in Browne’s library. [6]

The authoritative scholar Reid Barbour in his meticulously researched biography advances our understanding of Browne’s interest in Plato, explaining-

‘The appeal of Plato underscores Browne’s syncretic conviction that behind all transcendentally inclined philosophies – Hermetic, Zoroastrian, Pythagorean, Platonic, Neoplatonic, Chaldaic, Cabbalistic, and Christian – one finds the same supra-rational and even counter-rational truths, which neither dry logic nor blind partisanship can appreciate. [7]

Platonic and Neoplatonic thought influenced numerous artists, poets and thinkers throughout the Renaissance until the late seventeenth century, the low-ebb tide of its influence. The enduring appeal of Platonic thought is succinctly explained thus-

'In the Renaissance, no ancient revival had more impact on the history of philosophy than the recovery of Platonism.....No other renewal of an ancient school had a textual base large enough to support the growth of a coherent, wide-reaching and independent philosophical system ..For at least three reasons, the new Platonism of Ficino and his successors must be seen as central to any discussion of European intellectual history during the Renaissance. First, the rich doctrinal content and formal elegance of Neoplatonic Platonism made it at least a plausible competitor of Peripateticism. What the Neoplatonists lacked in systematic logic and natural philosophy, they made up for with a stronger appeal to creativity .. They gave more latitude to all kinds of speculation, from aesthetics and mythology to cosmology and theology. After Ficino, anyone who disliked Aristotle could turn to Plato... The second strength of Platonism was its extra-philosophical influence. Despite his harsh words for poetry, Plato initiated a tradition that poets admired.... The same is true of his treatment of music...Finally, certain attitudes and methods of the new science were more Platonic than Aristotelian. The habit of idealizing physics, which was fundamental to the new science of the seventeenth century, came more easily to the Platonic mentality than to the Peripatetic. Even more important was Platonic praise of mathematics. For Aristotle, physics and mathematics did not really mix, while Plato gave good grounds for a mathematical analysis of nature. Platonism never vanquished Aristotelianism in the Renaissance, but it acquired great cultural strength'. [8]

In our own times it is Aristotelean reasoning and materialism which has triumphed over Platonic idealism, as the Swiss psychologist C.G. Jung succinctly noted, ‘Greek natural philosophy with its interest in matter, together with Aristotelean reasoning, has achieved a belated but overwhelming victory over Plato’. [9]

Thematically, Browne’s literary diptych Urn-Burial and The Garden of Cyrus (1658) concern themselves with themes of great importance to Plato, namely, the destiny of the eternal soul and number as a key to unlock cosmic mysteries. Browne’s diptych discourses closely reflect these two themes, Urn-Burial speculating upon the destiny of the soul and The Garden of Cyrus advocating number as a key to unlock the mysteries of the Cosmos.

Above- Wall fresco of an ancient Greek drinking party symposium.

Urn-Burial

Browne’s sharp intellect and fertile imagination was sparked from the initial discovery of several Anglo-Saxon funerary urns ‘in a field near Old Walsingham’. In Urn-Burial he forensically surveys the burial rites, customs and beliefs of various world religions. It’s as a pioneering scholar of comparative religion that Browne alludes to Plato’s myth or tale of Er, informing his reader that-

‘Plato’s historian of the other world, lies twelve days incorrupted, while his soul was viewing the large stations of the dead’.

Plato’s mythic story begins when a man named Er dies in battle. When the bodies of those who died in the battle are collected, some ten days after his death, Er remains undecomposed. Two days later he miraculously revives on his funeral-pyre and tells others of his soul’s journey in the afterlife, including his account of hearing the music of the celestial spheres. With its account of the cosmos and the afterlife Plato’s myth of Er influenced religious, philosophical, and scientific thought for centuries, not least for its teaching that after death moral people are rewarded and immoral people are punished.

Another ‘soul-journey’ cited in Urn-Burial is by the Roman philosopher Macrobius (395-423CE) whose commentary on ‘Scipio’s Dream’ was well-known throughout the Middle Ages. In Scipio’s ‘soul-journey’ the Roman military General Scipio narrates how he voyaged through the zodiac signs of Cancer and Capricorn, believed to be the exit and entrance to heaven and hears the celestial harmony of the spheres. Browne alludes to Macrobius' Commentary, recognises the importance of music in the grieving process as well as ‘the harmonical nature of the soul’ in relationship to ‘the primitive harmony of heaven’, poetically stating-

'They made use of Musick to excite or quiet the affections of their friends, according to different harmonies. But the secret and symbolical hint was the harmonical nature of the soul; which delivered from the body, went again to enjoy the primitive harmony of heaven, from whence it first descended; which according to its progress traced by antiquity, came down by Cancer, and ascended by Capricornus'.

A vivid allusion to the ancient Greek philosopher’s allegory of the Cave of human unknowingness can also be found in Urn-Burial. Plato’s famous allegory describes people who have spent their entire lives chained by their neck and ankles in front of an inner wall in order to view the wall of a cave. They can only observe the shadows projected onto the outer wall of this cave by objects which are carried behind the inner wall by people who are invisible to the chained prisoners. Walking along the outer wall with a fire behind them, they create shadows on the inner wall in front of the prisoners who can only ever see the world indirectly, their reality is only ever one of fire-lit shadows projected onto a wall.

In Plato’s powerful allegory the senses are proven to be highly unreliable narrators, the soul remains dormant and empirical reality has a transcendent background to it. Browne shared with Plato this view of the human condition. Using highly original medical imagery he declares-

'A Dialogue between two Infants in the womb concerning the state of this world, might handsomely illustrate our ignorance of the next, whereof methinks we yet discourse in Platoes denne, and are but Embryon Philosophers'.

Plato’s allegory of the Cave, idiosyncratically translated as ‘denne’ by Browne retains relevance today in our screen dominated lives, as one author states-

'We can easily imagine Plato believing that we have returned to the world of the Cave, the situation in which our sensibility, values, tastes and desires are decisively shaped by what we absorb from the images presented to us…..Do the media that pervade our culture really contribute to human well-being and happiness, both of which, for Plato, depend on freedom from the control and manipulation that the use of the media can inflict on us ?.... The image of the Cave represented an imprisonment or enslavement by ignorance, illusion, ephemeral interests and harmful desires.... surely Plato’s verdict on our screen-dominated culture would have been severely critical'. [10]

The apotheosis of Browne’s speculations upon the body’s dissolution and the soul’s release includes an inventory of spiritual states of consciousness -

'And if any have been so happy as truly to understand Christian annihilation, extasis, exolution, liquefaction, transformation, the kisse of the Spouse, gustation of God, and ingression into the divine shadow, they have already had an handsome anticipation of heaven; the glory of the world is surely over, and the earth in ashes unto them……….. ‘Tis all one to lye in St. Innocent’s Churchyard as the sands of Egypt’.

Above : SCIOLTA (Freed) Symbolic image of the soul released from the cage of the body. Detail of dove flying from a cage. Suckling Monument (circa 1616) St. Andrew's church Norwich.

The eminent American psychologist James Hillman (1926-2011) stated in words resonate with the prominent moralist found in Urn-Burial -

'religion begins, as we have said, as a reflection upon death. Psychology does too, for it is in the face of death that we ponder and go deep and sense soul, and then build our fantasies for housing it, whether these be the ancient pyramids and sepulchres of religion or the rituals and systems of modern psychology'. [11]

Browne's solitary hint of his Discourses relationship occurs in his Dedicatory Epistle in The Garden of Cyrus where he states-

'That we conjoyn these parts of different Subjects, or that this should succeed the other; Your judgement will admit without impute of incongruity; Since the delightful World comes after death, and Paradise succeeds the Grave.'

Browne’s solitary hint is tantalizing. Together, his discourses have a complex, plexiform relationship to each other. The primary imagery they share is optical. Imagery involving Darkness and Light is replete throughout each Discourse. James Hillman notes - 'The linking of light and darkness sets the stage for a fundamental and recurring theme in both alchemy and Jungian psychology, namely, the coniunctio oppositorum, the unity of opposites, a bringing together of light and darkness into an illuminated vision'. [12]

James Hillman also notes that Light and Darkness are inextricably related to each other as symbolic of Consciousness and unconsciousness. The repeated imagery of Light and Darkness throughout the diptych suggests they function as a product of Browne’s proto-psychology, as such they may be viewed as an early portrait of the psyche in its totality of unconsciousness and consciousness.

Ingeniously constructed with a myriad of polarities (Browne is credited with introducing the very word ‘polarity’ into English language) the literary diptych includes several uniting symbols. For example, in Urn-Burial the Pyramid is condemned as a vain-glorious monument, while in Cyrus the Pyramid is contemplated a geometric form. The two-faced Roman god Janus is also encountered in each Discourse, as are hand gestures signalling subtraction and multiplication. Above all however it’s the philosophical thought of Plato which decisively unites the Discourses.

The Garden of Cyrus

Like the letters in the proverbial stick of rock The Garden of Cyrus has the five letters of the word PLATO embedded at its core. Each of its five chapters names the ancient Greek philosopher. Its opening page references Plato no less than three times, firstly alluding to the Demiurge figure of Plato's Timaeus via the mythological figure of Vulcan, secondly acknowledging Plato’s theological import, describing him as ‘the divine philosopher’ and thirdly in his footnote, 'Plato in Timaeo'. Browne was not alone in his interest in Plato's discourse. Ever since 1484 when Marsilio Ficino made a full Latin translation of Plato's discourse available the Timaeus wielded a near Bible-like authority upon poet, scholar, artist and Hermetic philosopher alike throughout the Renaissance.

The Garden of Cyrus opens with an account of the Creation, evoking the demiurge figure of Vulcan as the Master Workman. ‘Philosophers of Fire’ such as Browne took their cue from the radical Swiss alchemist-physician Paracelsus (1493-1541) who named the Roman blacksmith of the gods as representative of their alchemical art. To Paracelsian physicians such as Browne Vulcan was synonymous with the demiurge figure who created the Universe as described by Plato in his Timaeus.

Plato's Timaeus is his most Pythagorean, influential and mystical discourse. In it he describes how the Demiurge is a divine craftsman who shapes the chaotic material world into an ordered cosmos by imitating eternal, unchanging Platonic Forms. Acting as a father and artificer, the Demiurge imposes mathematical order on pre-existing chaos, creating a universe that is a living god with its own soul, and creates lesser gods responsible for humanity. Plato’s discourse is assessed thus -

'The most important account of the Creation in the classical world was that given in Plato’s Timaeus (a substantial part of which survived into the Christian Middle Ages) and here we find that it is the Demiurge himself (and not the lesser gods) who puts the divine ‘guiding principle’ into humankind'. [13]

Just as Plato in his Timaeus engages in mystical mathematics in which number is a key to unlock the mysteries of the Cosmos, so too Browne indulges in mystical mathematics throughout The Garden of Cyrus. In what is his most Pythagorean and Platonic influenced work, Browne explores eternal patterns, symbolism, mystical numerology and geometry, showcasing the Quincunx pattern in art and nature as reflecting the eternal forms and archetypes discussed in Plato's Timaeus.

Plato's eternal Forms are perfect, timeless, and unchanging abstract archetypes of concepts, objects, and qualities that exist in a separate "Realm of Forms" beyond our physical world. The material world, known only through the senses, is merely an imperfect, shadowy imitation of these perfect Forms. True knowledge, for Plato, is the intellectual grasp of these eternal Forms, rather than flawed perceptions of the physical world. Browne’s demonstration of the Platonic form of the Quincunx in Art, Nature and mystically is modelled upon Plato's notion of Eternal Forms which pre-existed the Creation. The master workman or demiurge figure who consults the blueprints for the Creation, introduces the Eternal or Archetypal Forms to the World.

Number

The Garden of Cyrus sees Browne give full expression to his 'mystical mathematicks' and numerological inclinations. He first expressed his interest in numerological symbolism in Religio Medici frankly declaring -

'I have often admired the mystical way of Pythagoras and the secret magicke of number'. [14]

In his encyclopaedic endeavour Pseudodoxia Epidemica (1646) there's a chapter titled Of the great Climatericall year, that is, Sixty three in which he speculates upon whether the number 63 is fatal in human affairs, noting it was reputedly the age which Plato died. He also informs his reader in this chapter that -‘ The Philosophy of Plato, and most of the Platonists abounds in numerall considerations’. [15]

No writings by Pythagoras survive, however Plato, in what is his most Pythagorean influenced work, the Timaeus, integrated and developed the numerological symbolism central to Pythagorean philosophy, and in some ways its equally accurate to describe Browne’s Discourse as Neo-Pythagorean as much as Platonic in concept.

The ancient Greek philosopher Pythagoras (c. 570 – 490 BCE) who taught, ‘All is Number’ based his teachings upon numerological symbolism. Worshipped as a god for almost 1000 years, Pythagoras expressed his mystery religion through symbols such as the celestial 'harmony of the spheres', geometry and a pyramid of dots structured upon the sum of 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 = 10 known as the tetractys. Browne’s Quincunx can be detected at the very heart of the Pythagorean tetractys.

Received wisdom, often from those unacquainted with Browne’s Garden discourse, will declare that The Garden of Cyrus is ‘all about’ the number five, but in fact the number five is only one of several inter-related symbols used by Browne. The acute angle of V as the Roman numeral for 5, along with its doubling as the letter and symbol X, which in turn is a variant upon the Quincunx pattern, all feature in the Discourse.

In what is one of the most perceptive explanations on the function of Browne's home-grown Eternal Form of the Quincunx. John Irwin states-

'The quincunx represents God's infallible intelligence while it also embodies the main 'tools' man uses to decipher the universe: mathematics, geometry and language. The implication is that if the God-given design of man's original plantation was a quincuncial network, then this design must express the basic relationship between man and the world, known and unknown, which is to say that this formal pattern imposed on physical nature schematizes the interface of mind and world in that it contains within itself the various modes of intelligible representation of the world, i.e. mathematics, language, geometry joined together in the homogeneousness of their physical inscription as numbers, letters and geometric shapes'. [16]

Incidentally, in addition to his botanical studies, naming and describing over 100 plants in the discourse, the learned doctor also displays his zoological inclinations throughout the Garden of Cyrus mentioning insects, reptiles, crustaceans, birds, water-fowl, fish and mammals in order to illustrate the interconnection of life.

Plato’s mythic excursion to Egypt in quest of wisdom is also touched on in The Garden of Cyrus-

‘whereas it is not improbable, he (Plato) learned these and other mystical expressions in his Learned Observations of Egypt, where he might obviously behold the Mercurial characters, the handed crosses, and other mysteries not thoroughly understood in the sacred Letter X, which being derivative from the Stork, one of the ten sacred animals, might be originally Egyptian…’

Hermetic philosophers such as Browne saw great significance in the fact that the letter X, which they believed to have been invented by Hermes Trismegistus, prophetically became the first letter of the name of Christ in the Greek alphabet. To hermetic sensibilities Plato, among others, the letter X seemed to anticipate and prophesize that Christ would one day come into the world in order to redeem humanity. The symbolism of the letter X to represent Christ survives to the present day in the short-hand of Xmas for Christmas. The soul itself is declared to be X shaped as Browne, in a near verbatim repetition from Plato’s Timaeus informs-

'Of this Figure Plato made choice to illustrate the motion of the soul, both of the world and man; while he delivereth that God divided the whole conjunction length-wise, according to the figure of a Greek X, and then turning it about reflected it into a circle'.

The Garden of Cyrus was written in great haste, as scrutiny of manuscript evidence by J.S. Finch proved. Browne’s haste is exemplified in shoe-horning into his essay the after-thought -

‘To omit the phantastical Quincunx in Plato of the first Hermaphrodite or double man, united at the Loynes, which Jupiter after divided’.

In Plato’s Symposium, Eros is an erotic lover who is capable of inspiring bravery and courage along with great deeds as well as vanquishing man's fear of death. Sexuality in the form of Androgyny and homosexuality also feature in the discourse in a myth which narrates how humanity was originally three sexes: male-male people that descended from the sun, female-female people who descended from Earth, and male-female people who came from the Moon. The androgynous humans were spherical and had four legs, four hands and two heads. These androgynous humans dared to challenge the gods of Olympus, who, angered at their divided the primordial humans in two and scattered them across the Earth. The divided searched for their other halves. The women who sought another woman and the men who sought another men were homosexuals.

Above - Ancient Greek vase depicting Plato's hermaphrodite double man.

Archetype

C.G. Jung notes – ‘The term “archetype” occurs as early as Philo Judaeus (circa 20 BCE - 50 CE) and in the Corpus Hermeticum, where God is called an archetypal light'. The term also occurs several times in the writings of the early Christian Neoplatonist author Dionysus the Aeropagite, all of whom are represented in Browne’s library. [17]

Although the Elizabethan natural philosopher Francis Bacon (1561-1626) is credited as the first to use the word ‘archetype’ in early modern English, its Browne in his The Garden of Cyrus who endeavours through highly original proper-name symbolism to depict archetypal exemplars of Plato’s ‘philosopher-King’. Historical figures such as Abraham, Solomon and Moses, Alexander the Great, Augustus and Marcus Aurelius as well as the titular King Cyrus effectively underscore the Platonic ideal that just governance requires ‘wise rulers’. Women aren't overlooked in Browne’s comparative religion symbolism. The ‘Great Mother’ figures of Sarah, Isis, Cleopatra and Juno are also encountered in the Discourse.

For Plato, as for Browne, the figure of the philosopher-King represents a universal pattern or blueprint of human potential, in which wisdom and justice are perfectly balanced. Browne's discourses were published during the Interregnum era of Cromwell's Puritan Rule. His repeated citing of the philosopher-King archetype can be seen as subtle criticism of Crowell’s Protectorate. The Garden of Cyrus retains relevance today, not only for its hermetic message of the interconnectivity of life, but also as a timely reminder of wise governance with the world-wide rise of authoritarian and demagogue political leaders today.

Late in his life Browne acquired a copy of the Athanasius Kircher’s (1602-1680) Mundus Subterraneous (1664) in which the Jesuit priest and scholar printed a map of where he speculated the location of Atlantis. [18]. It was Plato who fabricated the existence of the lost civilization Atlantis in his political allegory the Timaeus. Browne notes in his Christian Morals (pub. post. 1716) of Plato’s account of the lost civilization that-

'Others more Ingeniously doubt whether there hath not been a vast tract of Land in the Atalantick Ocean, which Earthquakes and violent causes have long ago devoured'. [19]

In Kircher's 1665 map (below) North and South are reversed with Africa to the East and America to the West of the vast, fictitious continent of Atlantis.

Plato’s political allegory of Atlantis projected a philosophical ideal of ancient Athens. To teach his point, his fictional Atlantean Empire waged war against the known world, resulting in his idealized Athens leading resistance against it, and eventually winning. Atlantis is thus revealed to be an enemy for a Platonic version of Athens to defeat. Plato's usage of political allegory, narrating the decline and fall of the great imaginary civilization of Atlantis, reminds one that - ‘For all his impatience with myth Plato allowed it an important role in the exploration of ideas that lie beyond the scope of philosophical language’. [20]

Above all else, it was Plato’s moral teachings which appealed to Browne in his pious old age. He shared with the early Church Father St. Augustine (354 - 430 CE) the conviction that Plato was the greatest of all pagan thinkers, primarily for his exhortation of living the morally good and just life. In Christian Morals Browne alludes to Plato's ‘wild horses’ of the irrational passions, as described in Plato's discourse Phaedrus.

In Phaedrus each individual is likened to the driver of a two-horse chariot, whose reason tries to control the force of two horses, one white named spirit which is cooperative and one black named desire which tries to rebel and drag the chariot in the wrong direction. Although spirit and desire are depicted as battling forces, they communicate in language as talking horses to each other. Plato’s equestrian allegory is mentioned in Christian Morals in what is one of Browne's profoundest psychological observations on the human condition -

'To well manage our Affections, and wild Horses of Plato, are the highest Circenses; and the noblest Digladiation is in the Theater of our selves'. [21]

In conclusion, Plato’s influence upon Thomas Browne is multi-faceted. Integral to his hermetic philosophy, the learned doctor found inspiration in Plato’s mystical numerology, Eternal Forms and archetypes. As a moralist he valued the ancient Greek philosopher’s exhortations on how to live the good and just life. The abundance of allusion to Plato throughout Browne’s literary oeuvre confirms the observation that – ‘There is probably no English writer of the seventeenth century who more habitually avows and exhibits attachment to the Platonic tradition than Browne'. [22]

Notes

[1] The Strategy for Truth by Leonard Nathanson pub. Chicago University Press 1967
[2] Religio Medici Part 1: 6
[3]  R.M. 1:32
[4] R.M. 1:33
[5]  R.M. 2:15
[6] Iamblicus  de Mysterriis Aegyptirorum , Chaldaorum Catalogue 16A no.25
Porpyrius Commentary on Epicteus Sales Catalogue p. 15 no. 61
[7] Sir Thomas Browne -A Life by Reid Barbour pub. OUP 2013
[8] Renaissance Philosophy - Brian P. Copenhaver & Charles B. Schmitt
[9] Carl Jung Collected Works Vol. 9 i:149
[10] Plato : All that Matters Ieuan Williams pub. Hodder and Stoughton 2013
[11] James Hillman
[12]The Soul's Code - James Hillman pub. Bantam 1997
[13] Meister Eckhart -Mystical theologian Oliver Davies pub. SPCK 1991
[14] Religio Medici Part 1:12
[15] Pseudodoxia Epidemica Book 4 chapter 12
[16] The Mystery to a Solution by John T. Irwin pub. John Hopkins University Press 1993
[17] Philo Judaeus Opera 1711 Sales Catalogue p. 1 no. 12
Dionysus the Areopagite Sales Catalogue p. 1 no. 16
[18] Mundus Subterraneus pub. Amsterdam 1665 1711 Sales Catalogue page 8
[19] Christian Morals Part 1:17 citing Timaeus 24e
[20] A Short History of myth Karen Armstrong pub. Cannongate 2005
[21] Christian Morals Part 1:24
[22]The Strategy for Truth Leonard Nathanson pub. Chicago University Press 1967

Bibliography

*Sir Thomas Browne -A Life by Reid Barbour pub. OUP 2013

* The Strategy for Truth Leonard Nathanson pub. Chicago University Press 1967

* Sir Thomas Browne - The Major Works ed. with an introduction by C.A. Patrides pub. Penguin 1977

* Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans - A brief History by Charles H. Khan pub. Hackett 2001

*Plato - A Very Short Introduction Julia Annas pub. OUP 2003

* Plato -Timaeus translated with an introduction by H.D.P. Lee pub. Penguin 1965

*The Soul's Code - James Hillman pub. Bantam 1997

*Renaissance Philosophy - Brian P. Copenhaver & Charles B. Schmitt

*The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious - C.G. Jung C.W. vol 9 Part 1 pub. RKP 1959

*Plato : Ideas that Matters Ieuan Williams pub. Hodder and Stoughton 2013

*Atlantis- Lost Lands, Ancient Wisdom Geoffrey Ashe pub. 1992

*Meister Eckhart -Mystical theologian Oliver Davies pub. SPCK 1991

*The Mystery to a Solution by John T. Irwin pub. John Hopkins University Press 1993

*A Short History of myth Karen Armstrong pub. Cannongate 2005

See Also

On the symbolism of X

Magic square of Numbers

Dr. Browne's alchemical mandala

Books in Browne's Library cited

* Chalcides Timaeus de Plato Trans. Notes J. Meurius 1617 Sales Catalogue p.11 no. 106

* Kircher - Mundus Subterraneus, cum. fig. 2 vol. Amsterdam 1665 S. C. p. 8 no. 92

* Philo Judaeus -De Opfico Mundi 1711 Sales Catalogue p. 1 no. 12

* Dionysus the Areopagite Opera Sales Catalogue p. 1 no. 16

* Iamblicus - de Mysterriis Aegyptirorum , Chaldaorum Catalogue 16A no.25

* Porphyry - Commentary on Epictetus Sales Catalogue p. 15 no. 61

Browne on Aristotle

Not so long ago Jean de Launoy, a theologian of Paris, published a book on the changing popularity of Aristotle; whence he establishes that that most famous philosopher has been sometimes publicy burned, sometimes restored, now condemned by solemn decrees, then restored again, and in fact undergone eight changes in the same university.

Certainly the early Christians, Justin, Clement, Tertullian, Augustine and many others held opinions contrary to the great man's writings. And today he is bitterly cut to the quick by the moderns and almost at the point of death; so that it seems to me that the peripatetic philosophy is now brought to a standstill and can hardly be rescued, or not even hardly.

But while much is lacking in Aristotle, much wrong, much self-contradictory, yet not a little is valuable. Do not then bid farewell to his entire work; but while you hardly touch the Physics and read the Metaphysics superficially, make much of all the rest and study them unwearingly.

Petrus of Abano and Alexander of Aphrodisias have annotated the Problems of Aristotle industriously; better still Petrus Septalius, a physician of great fame.But while, in a less liberal spirit and not tainted with the new philosophy, he expounds almost everything to the philosopher's mind, often and often he hardly gets to the point and does not satisfy a spirit eager for truth.

So it will be worth the effort to weigh them again, so that the truth and reason of the questions may be better determined and where the old rules fail we may pass to new propositions....

British Museum Sloane Mss 1827

Thursday, August 15, 2024

A Browne Index

An index to essays (2010-2025) and short posts on the late Renaissance humanist, Christian mystic, Hermetic philosopher, Paracelsian physician and Janus-faced sage of Norwich also known as Sir Thomas Browne (1605-82).

* Bibliography - A Browne bookshelf

* Introduction to Library-

'A Paradise of books' - Dr. Browne's library

* Individual books in Library -

- de Astronomia - de Harmonia Mundi - Ars Magna Lucis et Umbrae -Optica - Fasciculus Chemicus - Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay -Mathematical Beehives - Physica Subterranea -Polygraphiae - Purple Rain - Oedipus Egypticus

* Countries - America - China - Ancient Egypt - Japan

* Esoteric - Astronomy and Astrology - Kabbalah - A cryptogram deciphered ?

* Garden of Cyrus - That Vulcan gave arrows -Bembine Tablet of Isis -Defeating the mischief intended by the Elephants - Harp -Labyrinth of Crete - the Pythagorical Music of the Spheres -Cryptography of Gafferel -Nebuchadnezzar -Vitruvian Man -Why the goddesses commonly sit cross-legged

* In the Laboratory - Putrificatio -Ginseng - Peruvian Bark - Opium -Dr. Browne's Nose -Ethereal Salt -Jupiter's brain in a piece of Cytheridian cheese

* In relationship to - John Dee - Della Porta -Goethe - Jung - Kepler - Paracelsus - Van Helmont

* Nature - Spiders - Ostrich - Pelican - Vulture - Frog - Elephant - Peacock feathers

* Psychology - 'the Theatre of Ourselves' - Coincidence - Janus - On Dreams

* Review -

'Compassion is the physician's teacher'.

* Urn-Burial -

Lost in the uncomfortable Night of nothing - Invisible Sun

* Urn and Garden -

Dr. Browne's alchemical mandala

*Visual Arts. - Ghosts and Quincunxes - Artwork by Peter Rodulfo and Mark Burrell - On Art and Paintings

Thursday, October 19, 2023

'the Theatre of ourselves' : the proto-psychology of Doctor Browne

Often defined as a polymath because of the multiplicity of his interests, scientific, antiquarian and esoteric, an equally useful and perhaps preciser definition of the philosopher-physician Thomas Browne (1605-82) is that of early or proto-psychologist.

As a doctor practising in the 17th century Browne had plenty of occasion to observe mental trauma through endemic sickness, disease and bereavement. Living through one of the most psychologically disturbed times in English history he also witnessed extremes of human behaviour during the Civil war and its consequences.

In essence the four primary elements of Browne's proto-psychology are - first, his capacity for self-analysis, secondly his lifelong interest in people, thirdly his proper-noun symbolism and lastly, his fascination with the inner world of dreams. Furthermore, modern scholarship has recently detected a remarkable relationship between Browne's proto-psychology to that of Carl Jung's analytical psychology.

Officially published in 1643 Browne's Religio Medici remains a classic of World literature; its thought-provoking soliloquies reward the attention of casual reader and academic alike.

The first ever comparative edition of Religio Medici was published by Oxford University Press in April 2023 after protracted delay. Edited by Reid Barbour and Brooke Conti, the scholarly introduction to the Oxford edition of Browne's Collected Works discusses Religio Medici's major themes and reception, citing the Romantic poet Coleridge, who proposed it should be read 'in a dramatic & not in a metaphysical View - as a sweet Exhibition of character & passion & not as an Expression or Investigation of positive Truth'. [1]

The first volume of the ambitious project to publish a critical edition of the Thomas Browne's complete works reproduces three different versions of his Religio Medici (1643) for the first time. The Pembroke manuscript, a subsequent revised version and the official version are all reproduced, making it easier to identify text which Browne subsequently excluded from the authorized version. Only the early Pembroke version includes the following text, declared in a typical fusion of spirituality, scientific enquiry and hermetic imagery-

'Those strange and mystical transmigrations that I have observed in silkworms, turned my Philosophy into Divinity...............I have therefore forsaken those strict definitions of Death, by privation of life, extinction of natural heat, separation &c. of soul and body, and have framed one in hermetical way unto my own fancy - death is the final change, by which that noble portion of the microcosm is perfected (Latin trans.) for to me that considers things in a natural or experimental way, man seems to be but a digestion or a preparative way unto the last and glorious Elixir which lies imprisoned in the chains of flesh'. [2]

The first readers of Religio Medici were at turns shocked, astonished and admiring of Browne's frank display of his enigmatic personality and his advocacy for greater tolerance in religious belief. He also invites his reader to witness the labyrinthine meanderings of his thought and a precocious talent for self-analysis is prominent throughout its pages.

In many ways self-examination and self understanding is the bedrock foundation of Browne's proto-psychology; without such rigours he'd never achieved individuation or developed fully in creativity.

In Religio Medici the newly-qualified physician informs his reader of the psychic crisis he'd experienced during his trial of self-examination. His devout Christian faith was of its time, Hell along with the Devil were very real psychic entities to him.

'The heart of man is the place the devil dwells in. I feel sometimes a hell within myself, Lucifer keeps his court in my breast, Legion is revived in me'. [3]

'Tis that unruly regiment within me that will destroy me, 'tis I that do infect myself, the man without a Navel yet lives in me; I feel that original canker corrode and devour me. Lord deliver me from myself'.[4]

'The Devil that did but buffet Saint Paul, plays me thinks at Sharp with me. Let me be nothing if within the compass of my self, I do not find the battle of Lepanto passion against reason, reason against faith, faith against the Devil, and my conscience against all..There is another man within me that's angry with me, rebukes, commands and eastwards me'. [ 5]

'Thus did the devil did play Chess with me and yielding a pawn thought to gain a Queen from me. And whilst I laboured to raise the structure of my reason he strove to undermine the edifice of my faith'. [6]

Its testimony to his lifelong interest in people that even when he was advanced in years, when asked for his medical advice, Browne dutifully made the journey from his home in Norwich to the sea-port of Yarmouth. He recorded his doctor's call and very early case-history on the eating disorder known as bulimia in his commonplace notebook thus-

'There is a woman now Living in Yarmouth named Elizabeth Michell, an hundred and two years old, a person of 4 foot and an half high, very lean, very poor, and Living in a meane room without ordinary accommodation. Her youngest son is 45 years old; though she answers well enough to ordinary Questions, yet she conceives her eldest daughter to be her mother. Butt what is remarkable in her is a kind of boulime or dog appetite; she greedily eating day and night all that her allowance, friends and charitable people afford her, drinking beer or water, and making little distinction of any food either of broths, flesh, fish, apples, pears, and any coarse food in no small quantity, insomuch that the overseers of late have been fain to augment her weekly allowance. She sleeps indifferently well till hunger awakes her and then she must have no ordinary supply whether in the day or night. She vomits not, nor is very laxative. This is the oldest example of the sal esurinum chymicorum, which I have taken notice of; though I am ready to afford my charity unto her, yet I should be loth to spend a piece of ambergris I have upon her, and to allow six grains to every dose till I found some effect in moderating her appetite: though that be esteemed a great specific in her condition'. [7]

Symbols are integral to Browne's proto-psychology. In Religio Medici Egyptian hieroglyphs along with the 'book of nature' and music are each proposed to contain symbols which provide a wealth of spiritual wisdom to the receptive enquirer. The sources of Browne's literary symbolism are varied. The Bible and Greek mythology were rich hunting grounds for his proper-name symbolism. He also developed 'home-grown' symbols such as the urn and quincunx which enable him, 'by concentrating, almost like a hypnotist, on this pair of unfamiliar symbols, to paradoxically release the reader's mind into an infinite number of associative levels of awareness, without preconception to give shape and substance to quite literally cosmic generalizations'. [8]

Geographic place names and their frequently unconscious associations are also utilized by Browne. One in particular made a big impression upon C.G. Jung. It was the South African traveller and explorer Laurens van der Post (1906-96) who introduced Carl Jung to one of the greatest of all Browne's psychological observations which celebrates the mystery of consciousness and employs a highly original proper-place name symbol fitting of the unconscious psyche. Van der Post quoted Browne’s bold declaration -

'We carry within us the wonders we seek without us. There is all Africa, and her prodigies in us';

and recorded Jung's response. ‘He was deeply moved. He wrote it down and exclaimed 'that was, and is, just it. But it needed the Africa without to drive home the point in my own self'. Clearly, Jung was impressed by Browne's proto-psychology proper-name symbolism. [9]

It remains unknown whether Jung read Religio Medici which was translated into German in 1746. Jung was however fond of quoting its title and once stated – ‘For the educated person who studied alchemy as part of his general education it was a real Religio medici [10]

According to Jung the seventeenth century was the era in which alchemy and hermetic philosophy attained their most significance. In his view Browne’s era was 'one of those periods in human history when symbol formation still went on unimpeded'. He also noted that Hermetic philosophy was, in the main, practised by physicians not only because many known alchemists were physicians, but also because chemistry in those days was essentially a pharmacopeia. [11]

From proto-psychologists such as Browne there emerged the beginnings of the modern science of psychology. As Jung explains - 'the language of the alchemists is at first sight very different from our psychological terminology and way of thinking. But if we treat their symbols in the same way as we treat modern fantasies, they yield a meaning - even in the Middle Ages confessed alchemists interpreted their symbols in a moral and philosophical sense, their "philosophy" was, indeed, nothing but projected psychology. [12]

Jung's psychology is based upon the protean multiplicity of symbols which the human psyche ceaselessly creates. The symbolic meaning of almost every ancient world myth, animal, geometric form, feature of Nature, planetary god and number is elaborated upon in his writings, for he believed that-

'The protean mythologeme and the shimmering symbol express the processes of the psyche far more trenchantly and, in the end, far more clearly than the clearest concept; for the symbol not only conveys a visualization of the process but—and this is perhaps just as important—it also brings a re-experiencing it'. [13]

The Roman god Janus is a superb example of how Browne’s proto-psychology anticipates Jung's interpretation of symbols . The double-faced god Janus who presents his two faces simultaneously to the past and future appears as a proper-name symbol in each of Browne’s literary works. In Urn-Burial the gloomy but realistic thought that, 'one face of Janus holds no proportion to the other' occurs, while in Cyrus the finger language of 'the mystical statua of Janus' is featured. The double-faced god clearly held proto-psychological significance to Browne. Centuries later, Carl Jung declared the Roman god Janus to be none other than, 'a perfect symbol of the human psyche, as it faces both the past and future. Anything psychic is Janus-faced: it looks both backwards and forwards. Because it is evolving it is also preparing for the future'. [14]

Listed as once in Browne's library, the five gargantuan tomes of the Theatrum Chemicum were the most popular and comprehensive collection of alchemical literature available in the seventeenth century. A woodcut depicting the Nigredo stage of alchemy is reproduced in its first volume. (above). Encased within a bubble the researcher lays prone with a black crow on his stomach. The five planets and two luminaries orbit above him. The black star of Saturn, a planet long associated with melancholy and isolation as well as deep insight, radiates its dark influence upon the researcher.

We can be confident Browne perused his edition of the Theatrum Chemicun closely for he 'borrowed' from the Belgian alchemist Gerard Dorn (c. 1530-84) whose highly moral and psychological writings form the bulk of its first volume the image of an 'invisible sun'. Browne's 'borrowing' from Dorn occurs in the fifth and final chapter of Urn-Burial where he inspirationally declares - 'Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible sun within us'.

Although he lacked modern-day terminology Browne nonetheless was adept in his usage of symbols and imagery to describe the workings of the psyche. He was well acquainted through his reading of alchemical literature such as the Theatrum Chemicum with the sophisticated, yet commonplace schemata of the alchemical stages of the opus known as the Nigredo (Blackness) and Albedo (Whiteness). There's strong evidence that this concept is utilized as the framework for his Discourses. A superabundance of similarities can be discerned, far beyond casual coincidence, between the themes, imagery and symbols of Urn-Burial and The Garden of Cyrus to those of the Nigredo and Albedo of alchemy.

C.G. Jung helpfully defines the initial nigredo stage of alchemy thus-

'the nigredo not only brought decay, suffering, death, and the torments of hell visibly before the eyes of the alchemist, it also cast the shadow of melancholy over his solitary soul. In the blackness of his despair he experienced.. grotesque images which reflect the conflict of opposites into which the researcher's curiosity had led him. His work began with a katabasis, a journey to the underworld as Dante also experienced it'. [15]

Urn-Burial alludes to several 'soul journeys' of classical literature, including Dante's Inferno as well as Homer's Odyssey in which Ulysses descends into the Underworld. the Discourse also alludes to the soul journeys of Scipio's Dream and Plato's myth of Er. The religious mystic in Browne knew that each one of us from our birth, conscious or not of the fact, embarks upon a soul-journey with Death as a final port of call.

Alchemical literature frequently warns the researcher of the dangers of being engulfed and overwhelmed by the dark contents of the initial stage of the nigredo. Browne resisted this peril through professional acumen, but was also aware of how other's succumbed to the despair of the Nigredo -

'It is the heaviest stone that melancholy can throw at a man, to tell him he is at the end of his nature; or that there is no further state to come, unto which this seems progressional, and otherwise made in vain. [16]

Browne’s proto-psychology in Urn-Burial stoically notes of the relationship between pain and memory.

‘We slightly remember our felicities, and the smartest strokes of affliction leave but short smart upon us. Sense endureth no extremities, and sorrows destroy us or themselves. … To be ignorant of evils to come, and forgetful of evils past, is a merciful provision in nature.' [17]

The Nigredo is encapsulated perfectly in Urn-Burial's pithy expression, 'lost in the uncomfortable night of nothing'. Though little recognised, Browne's forensic survey of the burial rites and customs of various world religions, contemplation of ancient world beliefs associated with death and the afterlife along with its mention of putrefaction and mortification makes it the most sustained and exemplary work of the Nigredo stage of alchemy extant in English literature.

The succeeding stage of the alchemical opus was known as the albedo or whitening in which a widening of consciousness and revelation occurs. The albedo is frequently likened in alchemical literature to the Creation, Paradise and the Garden of Eden, each of which are alluded to in the opening paragraphs of The Garden of Cyrus.

Misapprehension and prejudice continues to bedevil understanding of the vital influence which alchemy, Neoplatonic thought and Hermetic philosophy exerted upon artist, scientist and philosopher alike throughout the Renaissance. Such misapprehensions continue to hamper comprehension of Browne who read and studied alchemical literature closely, as the contents of his library reveals. Along with other spiritual alchemists Browne intuited the bizarre symbolism and imagery of alchemy as a proto-psychology which discoursed upon the unconscious processes of the psyche to attain self-knowledge and individuation, the very Philosopher's Stone no less. In essence, Browne recognised in alchemical literature a kinship to the moralism and insights of Christian theology. Spiritually orientated alchemy is his greatest interest, as he makes clear in Religio Medici -

'The smattering I have of the Philosopher's Stone (which is something more than the perfect exaltation of gold) hath taught me a great deal of theology'. [18]

Even late in his life, when orthodox in his Christian faith, Browne justified the study of esoteric literature, naming two mystical scientists he held in high regard in Christian Morals - 'many would be content that some would write like Helmont and Paracelsus; and be willing to endure the monstrosity of some opinions, for divers singular notions requiting such aberrations'. [19]

The frontispiece to Mario Bettini's Beehives of Univeral Mathematical Philosophy (published in 1656 and listed as once in Browne's library) is a fitting visualization of the overall mood-music of The Garden of Cyrus. In its foreground is a villa courtyard in which mathematical, optical and geometric instruments stand in vases as if cultivated plants. In the centre of the courtyard a peacock stands upon a sphere and displays its feathers, water flows from its feathered eyes creating a streaming fountain. Mercurius, the god of communication and revelation stands aloft a pyramid of skep beehives holding an armillary sphere. Ten bees in quincunx formation hover beside him.

The Garden of Cyrus is crowded with concepts and symbols from various Western esoteric disciplines. The quincunx is one of many symbols featured in the discourse. Although the quincunx is mentioned in classical antiquity the idea of it being a pattern which transcends the realm of the artificial originates from the Renaissance. The idea can be found in book 4 of the Italian polymath and scholar Giambattista Della Porta's vast agricultural encyclopedia known as Villa (1583-1592). Della Porta (1535-1615) asserts in Villa that the quincunx pattern in addition to featuring in gardens and plantations, 'is to be found in each and every single thing in nature'. An illustration of the quincunx pattern from Della Porta's Villa was borrowed by Browne for the frontispiece of The Garden of Cyrus. Astoundingly, centuries later, C.G. Jung declared the quincunx to be none other than 'a symbol of the quinta essentia which is identical to the Philosopher's Stone'. [20]

In contrast to Urn-Burial's slow, stately rhythms, The Garden of Cyrus includes many paragraphs of rapid, near breathless prose. In a rare first person outburst Browne couples the game of chess to Persia to Egyptian deities, Hermes Trismegistus to cosmology to the potent alchemical 'coniunctio' symbol of Sol et Luna in a train of stream-of-consciousness association.

'In Chess-boards and Tables we yet find Pyramids and Squares, I wish we had their true and ancient description, far different from ours, or the Chet mat of the Persians, which might continue some elegant remarkables, as being an invention as High as Hermes the Secretary of Osyris, figuring the whole world, the motion of the Planets, with Eclipses of Sun and Moon'. [21]

While Urn-Burial with its oratorical flourishes and 'full Organ-stop' prose exhibits distinctly baroque traits thematically and stylistically, in complete contrast The Garden of Cyrus has strong Mannerist characteristics in style and theme. The Hungarian art-historian Arnold Hauser noted that Mannerist art delighted in symbols and hidden meanings and that it had an intellectual and even surrealistic outlook. He also noted that Mannerist art was inclined towards esoteric concepts and defined its qualities and excesses in words easily applicable to Browne's creativity and the hermetic content of The Garden of Cyrus.

'At one time it is the deepening and spiritualizing of religious experience and a vision of a new spiritual content in life; at another, an exaggerated intellectualism, consciously and deliberately deforming reality, with a tinge of the bizarre and the abstruse.' [22]

C.G. Jung studied and borrowed from hermetic philosopher and alchemist alike in the development of his psychology. His great achievement was identifying the unconscious imagery of the alchemists to be a proto-psychology which discusses the stages and processes of the psyche in its striving towards Self-realization and individuation. Foremost of all symbols in Jung's psychology are the archetypes, the primordial models of the psyche which he believed are embedded at the deepest strata of the collective psyche; some of the most important are the hero, the lover, the Great Mother, the wise ruler and the trickster.

Although mention of archetypes can be traced back to Plato and Gnostic philosophers, one of the earliest modern usages of the word 'archetype' occurs in The Garden of Cyrus. Browne even attempts to delineate a specific archetype, that of the 'wise ruler' through proper-name symbolism allusion to the Persian King Cyrus, the biblical leaders Solomon and Moses, the Roman Emperor Augustus and the Macedonian Alexander the Great. The archetype of the 'Great Mother' is also tentatively sketched in Cyrus through allusion to the matriarchal figures of Sarah of the Hebrew Old Testament, the Greek goddess Juno, and Isis of ancient Egypt.

Another great example of how Browne's proto-psychology anticipates Jung's occurs at the apotheosis of The Garden of Cyrus with his advising his reader 'to search out the quaternio's and figured draughts of this order'. Its advice was taken seriously by Carl Jung with the Swiss psychoanalyst firmly believing that the quaternity or patterns which are four-fold to invariably symbolize wholeness or totality; and in fact the earliest known divisions of Space and Time - the four seasons of the Year and the four points of the compass are based upon a quaternity, as are the four humours of ancient Greek medicine along with the four temperaments of medieval medicine as well as the four gospels of the New Testament. Jung even structured his understanding of the psyche upon a quaternity, defining the psyche as comprising of four entities in totality, these being - Rational thinking, feeling, sensation and intuition.

C.G. Jung once declared - 'the late alchemical texts are fantastic and baroque; only when we have learnt to interpret them can we recognise what treasures they hide'. [23] Today Urn-Burial and The Garden of Cyrus (1658) can be identified as Browne's supreme work of proto-psychology. Jam-packed with symbolism and imagery allusive to esoteric concepts, together they form a portrait of the psyche, unconscious and conscious, irrational and rational, stoical and transcendent, fearful of Death yet always planning for the future.

Urn-Burial and The Garden of Cyrus are highly polarised to each other in respective truth, imagery and symbolism. The invisible world of decay and death in Urn-Burial is 'answered' by the visible world of growth and life in The Garden of Cyrus. Imagery of darkness in Urn-Burial is mirrored by imagery of Light in The Garden of Cyrus. Likewise, the gloomy, Saturnine speculations of Urn-Burial are 'answered' by the cheerful, Mercurial revelations of Cyrus. Together the diptych traces a commonplace route of 'Soul-journey' literature from the Grave to the Garden. Browne’s soul-journey begins in the ‘subterranean world’ of Urn-Burial's opening paragraph and arrives at ‘the City of Heaven’ in the penultimate paragraph of Cyrus. The gordian knot of why these two philosophical discourses of 1658 share a multiplicity of oppositions or polarities thematically and in imagery such as - Darkness and Light, Decay and Growth, Mortality and Eternity, Body and Soul, Accident and Design, Speculation and Revelation, World and Universe, Microcosm and Macrocosm is swiftly spliced by C. G. Jung's sharp remark - 'the alchemystical philosophers made the opposites and their union their chiefest concern'. [24]

If we choose to reflect in depth on the themes, rich imagery and symbolism within Dr. Browne's major work of proto-psychology and Hermetic philosophy, it can lead us deep into the mysteries of our inner world. Far from the received wisdom of Urn Burial being simply a gloomy essay on Death with an essay on gardening appended to it to bulk out for the printer, as one Victorian literary critic believed, the literary spiritual mandala of Urn-Burial and The Garden of Cyrus with its Nigredo speculations and Albedo revelations is capable of unlocking the mysteries of the psyche/soul's architecture.

The altered state of consciousness known as dreaming fascinated Browne. It remains unknown why exactly we dream. For most dreams are involuntary, a sequence of strange events and unfamiliar places which are out of one’s control and which simply happen to one when asleep. Browne however was one of those fortunate people able to manipulate the sequence of events of a dream at will, so-called lucid dreaming. Supplementing his many observations on dreams in Religio Medici Browne describes his ability to lucid dream thus-

'Yet in one dream I can compose a whole comedy, behold the action, apprehend the jests and laugh myself awake at the conceits thereof. Were my memory as faithful as my reason is fruitful I would chose never to study but in my dreams'. [25]

For those living in the grim realities of the seventeenth century, the ability to lucid dream must have been a welcome diversion. In tandem with his wide-ranging reading lucid dreaming was rich fuel for Browne’s artistic imagination.

Concrete evidence of the relationship between Browne’s proto-psychology to modern-day psychoanalysis can be found in his short tract on dreams. Taking his cue from Paracelsus on the psychotherapeutic value of interpreting dreams, especially at a critical stage of a patient’s illness, Browne expounds his theory for interpreting dreams thus-

'Many dreams are made out by sagacious exposition and from the signature of their subjects; carrying their interpretation in their fundamental sense and mystery of similitude whereby he that understands upon what natural fundamental every notional dependeth, may by symbolical adaption hold a ready way to read the characters of Morpheus'. [26]

Browne's proposal that dreams can be interpreted by 'symbolical adaptation' links him closely to Jung's psychology for the Swiss analyst also believed that his patients dreams could be interpreted through 'symbolical adaptation'.

Browne states in his tract that dreams have changed lives, naming J.B. van Helmont and Jerome Cardan as recipients of transformative dreams. Centuries later, after dreaming of being trapped in the 17th century, Jung embarked upon what was to be over thirty years study of alchemy and its literature.

Conclusion

Writing in 1961 the American psychiatrist Jerome Schneck asserted- 'When Browne is assessed with the context of modern medico-psychological principles, the strength and richness of his thoughts and the appreciation of him as a psychologically minded physician comes to more fruitful expression. It may be reasonable to predict that more elements of interest in Sir Thomas Browne will be discovered in the future. He will find a more significant place in psychiatry. His importance in the history of medicine will be more fully perceived'. [27]

Browne is far more interested in the Renaissance discovery of the psyche than the discoveries of the two scientific instruments which advanced and developed scientific understanding in his lifetime, the telescope and microscope. This is because, above all, it is spirituality and processes of the mind, in particular self-realization and individuation which are of primary interest to him. Browne's only science of value today is his contribution to the science of the mind. He would doubtless have agreed with Carl Jung’s assessment of our modern-day world.

‘Science and technology have indeed conquered the world, but whether the psyche has gained anything is another matter’. [28]

Today, Sir Thomas Browne can confidently be termed an early or proto-psychologist. His capacity for self-analysis, deep interest in people, usage of symbolism and fascination with dreams are each vital components of his proto psychology. Though lacking in terminology, he nonetheless attempted through his proper-name symbolism and imagery such as 'the theatre of ourselves' to discourse upon the psyche. But perhaps his greatest achievement as a proto psychologist is simply his introduction into English language words useful to his profession such as - ‘medical’ ‘pathology’ 'suicide' ‘hallucination’ and best of all ‘therapeutic’. Furthermore, as I hope I've adequately proved, Thomas Browne’s proto-psychology has a unique, and yet to be fully explored relationship to the analytical psychology of Carl Jung.

Aquarium of Vulcan