Select Observations Collected out of Several Authors, Title page – To the reader
Flores Intellectuales: OR, Select Notions, SENTENCES AND Obſervations, COLLECTED Out of ſeveral Authors, and made publick, eſpecially for the Uſe of young Scholars, entring into the Miniſtry.
By MATTHEW BARKER, Miniſter of the Goſpel in London.
Jeſus ſaith unto them, Have ye underſtood all theſe things? they ſay unto him, Yea, Lord; then ſays he unto them, Therefore every Scribe inſtructed to the Kingdom of Heaven is like an Houſholder who bringeth forth out of his Treaſure things new and old, Mat. 13.51, 52.
LONDON, Printed by J. Aſtwood for Iohn Dunton at the Raven in the Poultrey. 1691.
TO THE READER.
I Little Intended, God knows, to bring theſe ſcraps of Learning to the Market for publick ſale, moſt whereof have lain by me for many Years, as thinking them too juvenile for Publick Notice in this Critical Age: For in my younger dayes, to help my Memory, I kept by me a Paper-Book, wherein I inſerted ſome of thoſe things which did occurr to me in my Reading as moſt remarkable, and which I had a deſire to treaſure in my Memory. And a while ſince acquainting a young Student in Philoſoyhy and Divinity what I had done, he earneſtly ſolicited me that they might be made publick, as that which might be of uſe, eſpecially to the younger ſort of Schollars, whoſe minds have not yet been exerciſed with graver Studies, which firſt put it into my mind to put them to the Preſs.
And I now expoſe them as I find them in my Paper-Book, extracted now out of one Author, then out of another, and now written at one time, then at another; now a paſſage in Humanity, then in Divinity; now of Poetry then of Hiſtory; now out of the Scriptures, then out of Expoſitors; now in Philology, then is Philoſophy. I mingled all together, without obſerving any method, and my Pen like the Bee skipt from Flower to Flower: So that the Reader muſt take them as he finds them, and make the beſt uſe of them he can. It may be he may find ſome things that may add to his Knowledge, and be pleaſing to his Mind, as they were to mine own, and as the Bee, he may gather ſome Honey out of theſe Flowers.
All the Method I have uſed, is only to parcel them into ſeveral Centuries, and diſtinguiſh them by Figures one from another. And what is found in them of Language, that none but Schollars underſtand, I have for the moſt part put into Engliſh. And ſometimes I find in my Paper-Book I have quoted the Author of what I have remarked, and ſometimes not: And I cannot well recollect whence I had ſome Notions and Sayings, which I put into my Paper-book above thirty Years agoe; and being thus put together, are like a Chain of Gold, or String of Pearls.
I call them in the Title Intellectual Flowers, and we know 'tis proper and pleaſant to have many diſtinct Flowers tyed together in a Noſe-gay, though of ſeveral ſorts, and gathered out of ſeveral Gardens: And if any will cenſure them as a Rhapſody, I confeſs they may be ſo ſtyled, yet I am not the firſt who hath expoſed Rhapſodies to publick view, taking the word in a more general ſenſe. And hath not Solomon himſelf lead the way to ſuch a kind of Writing, in his Book of Proverbs, which are ſet down for the moſt part, without any Method, or dependance one upon another? And we know the old ſaying, Varietas delectat, Variety Delights; and if the Reader finds nothing elſe, he will find that in theſe Papers. And this I hope may be ſome Apology for my preſent Adventure, which elſe may be cenſured as pedantick and ſingular.