A Look Inside

The cover pages give the reader a nice etching of Sir Thomas Brown, with possibly the artist’s signature underneath, reading: R. White Sculpsit.  On the right page we find a table of contents, Religio Medici and Hydriotaphia being two treatise.

The section of “Enquiries into Vulgar and Common Errors” includes many random topics, serving as a platform for Brown to really share opinions on anything.  This chapter on the Loadstone further shows the significance of this discovery and how it helped to advance the study of metals and magnets.

Here is the start of the book on animals.  Similarly to other books, the discussion of land beasts starts with the elephant.  This creature was exotic and thus the subject of many a discourse.

Another chapter on an interesting creature: the basilisk, called the “King of Serpents.”  Here, Brown pulls in a lot of references to scripture and literature surrounding the existence of such a beast.

In his comments of the Griffin, Brown states that many affirm and cannot deny its existence.  Yet, he sets them against other beasts from Greek mythology.  For many of these topics, the author doesn’t make one conclusion or another; rather, these seem to be unfiltered thoughts and theories, summaries of popular ideas about relevant topics.

A chapter on the Phoenix.  Brown can be very deceiving in his sure-sounding diction and rhetoric of these debated creatures.  He states their existence so matter-of-factly then continues in the logic behind not assuming anything.

Many books of this era discuss the existence of unicorns.  It is interesting that this chapter focuses on one element of the unicorn, and that is its horn.  In other works, the medicinal properties of the horn are often touched upon.  Brown also references the other animal horns that are also mentioned alongside the unicorn horn.

The start of the Fourth Book of “Enquiries into Vulgar and Common Errors,” which is on man, starts with linking the stature of man to their purpose on the earth.  Sections such as this remind the reader where Brown is coming from with his understanding and interest in discussing the mysteries of God and nature.  Similar to Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy, this book is very much a mix of philosophical and scientific discourse.

Readers can expect the chapter on the heart to start off technical but soon transition into a discussion where many literary and Biblical references are pulled in to expand the definition of the heart.

Brown really explores all the parts of man, including that strange behavior of sneezing and the even stranger custom of blessing people who sneeze.  This chapter is a discussion about a human custom, its origins, and its implications, rather than an explanation of the science behind the bodily function.

This Fifth Book seems almost comical, especially as a common observation by modern readers is often related to how well-known animals can be represented unusually in artistic renditions from this period.  Brown addresses this issue.  However, modern readers will be confused, as the pictures he points out may have been common knowledge then but are obscure today.

The first page of Brown’s more famous dissertation, Religio Medici. The name itself is the combination of two of passions when it came to writing.  This work was the most popular of his writings.