Nonfiction Books

"English writers from the later Middle Ages to the mid seventeenth century both venerated and denigrated a body, probably a historical certainly a mythologized, body, multiple "images" of which were burnt, in the summer or the autumn of 1538, publicly or privately, certainly at the order and possibly at the house of Thomas Cromwell, in London. That seemingly definitive act, however, remains ambiguous, and did not by any means end the presence of the Virgin in the life and feelings of England. Catholic historians and theologians have argued that Cromwell, Latimer, and their generation of reformers created a huge and perhaps unhealable wound in the collective psyche of early modern England, creating a "disembodied and defeminized Culture.""

"A century before, 1520s, the German Protestant Andres von Karlstadt had likewise become more vehement a destroyer of idols when he noted his own fear before the images: "a harmful fear," he records, "has been bred into me" from which he would be delivered, "but cannot." Those sentiments haunt the century of iconoclasm and epitomize the "traces" and "fades" of the virgin in England."

"Beattie comments that is odd that Christianity and psychoanalysis have not come together more frequently to pose the questions of being since they both claim humanity is "marked by originating experience of catastrophic loss that gives rise to an insatiable yearning for restoration and wholeness.""

""Iconoclasm was the central sacrament of the reform," states Eamon Duffy. It is an assertion that is more provocative than strictly accurate, especially in its dismissive use of the term "sacrament" in association with the Anglican Church, but many historians have persuasively presented iconoclastic extremism as a defining factor in the English Reformation. The long struggle over "images" had broad and deep connections with the transformation of English society and the ideologies of selfhood, identity, gender, and sexuality that governed, or as Louis Althusser puts it, "interpleted", men and women into the grand narrative of their culture. Today, some may say the picture of the world advanced by the reformers was maybe no less false, the idolatry of the Word no less pernicious than the idolatry of the Image."

"As Lyndal Roper states, the body of the Virgin was a "litmus test of the separation of the divine and the human" for Catholics and Protestants and what became their "radically different theologies of the body." All sides of the Reformation struggles agreed that deep and mysterious powers had been attributed to the Virgin and to relics and places especially associated with her. For Catholics such attributions were, with the exception of some marginal and pardonable exaggerations and a little corruption, truthful and reflected God's purposes; for Protestants such claims were false and demonic, slippages into paganism and evidence of the irredeemable corruption of the Roman Church. Reformers generally acknowledged Mary as God's chosen instrument, but rejected what Latimer saw as the foolish opinion and the doctrine of the papists, which would have us to worship a creature before the Creator.""

"What lay behind the reformers' uneasiness about the place of the Virgin was not an upsurge of entirely new views. As Beattie comments, they believed indignantly that "the ancient goddesses and their female devotees still whisper[ed] and beckon[ed] in the cult of Mary," and saw their attacks as a return to the principles of the early Church."

"The reformers perceived the necessity of wholesale cultural revolution and (if possible) the rooting out not just the "structures," but the "feelings" attached to them, to use Raymond Williams's distinction. Their goal was to destroy the images and idols within people's minds. Getting it out of their heads, not just destroying buildings and sending tens of thousands of monks and nuns out into the community, was therefore crucial to the revolution. But the "fantassie of idolatrie" might be so deeply rooted, the reformers feared, that "idolatrie will neaver be left till the said images be taken awaie." Cromwell instructed his agents to remove popular "idols" as discreetly as possible but to highlight what could be presented as obvious fakes, the "certain engines and old wire with rotten sticks," which could be used for propagandist purposes. Reformers jeered that the destruction of some of the more dubious relics and images - the Blood of Hailes and the images of Our Lady of Walingham and her sisters among them - did not provoke the once revered objects to respond, retaliate, or miraculously escape: "Throw them down thrice, they cannot rise, not once to help themselves." With some successes in exposing "idols" and "false reliques," it became easier to make the case that all relics and images were fakes and needed, in the words of a 1535 Proclamation, "utterly to be abolished, eradicated and erased out.""

"Porter, [w]hich is commonly called Beer in London, must be pronounced the most perfect of all kinds of malt liquors."

"The processes employed for brewing this species of malt liquor, all unite to convert the substance from which it is produced into the most perfect vinous fluid that can be obtained from grain."

"The origin of porter is thus related by the Editor of the Picture of London:—"...[I]t ...became the practice to call for a pint or tankard of three threads, meaning a third of ale, beer, and twopenny, and thus the publican had the trouble to go to three casks, and turn three cocks for a pint of liquor. To avoid this trouble and waste, a brewer of the name of Harwood, conceived the idea of making a liquor which should partake of the united flavours of ale, beer, and twopenny. He did so... calling it entire, or entire butt beer, meaning that it was drawn entirely from one cask or butt, and, being a hearty nourishing liquor, it was very suitable for porters and other working people. Hence it obtained its name of porter.""

"The principal distinction of malt liquors is into Beer, properly so called, Ale and Table Beer, or Small Beer."

"Mungo Park found the art of brewing beer... in the interior parts of Africa. They prepare the seed of the Holcus Spicatus nearly in the same manner as we do barley and he says that their beer was, to his taste, equal to the best strong malt liquor he had ever tasted..."

"All the ancient malt liquors... seem to have been made entirely of barley, or some other farinaceous grain, and therefore were not generally calculated for long keeping, as this quality depends considerably, though not entirely, on the bitter principle of the ... The use of [which] is of modern date."

"The name of Stout, or Brown Stout, is given to porter of more than ordinary strength."

"Beer may be considered as the wine of grain, for it is the product of the fermentation of malt, just as wine is that of the fermentation of the grape, or other subacid fruits. Malt liquors, however, are distinguished from wine, chiefly by the larger quantity of mucilage and saccharine matter which they contain, and by the absence of super-tartrate of potash, a salt which exists in all wines made of the juice of the grape."

"Galen... and Dioscorides... were neither of them strangers to ale."

"Tacitus informs us, that beer was known in very remote ages among the northern nations, and that this liquor was the favourite drink of the Anglo-Saxons, and Danes, as it had been of their ancestors, the Germans. Before their conversion to Christianity, they believed that drinking large and frequent draughts of fermented malt liquors was one of the chief felicities which those heroes enjoyed, which were admitted into the hall of Odin."

"After the introduction of agriculture into this country, malt liquors were substituted for , and became the most general drink of all the ancient Britons; both and beer is mentioned in the laws of Ina king of Wessex."

"The invention of brewing is ascribed to the Egyptians... from whence it seems to have passed to... western nations... The town of ... was particularly celebrated for its manufacture of malt liquors. Herodotus attributes the discovery of the art of brewing to the wife of ."

"Ale is beer of a more syrupy consistence than porter; it contains a considerable quantity of undecomposed farinaceous matter; and saccharine mucilage, which impart... a clammy consistence and sweetish taste. Hence strong new brewed ale becomes muddy by a copious admixture of alcohol, whereas porter suffers no perceptible change..."

"The art of preparing vinous liquors from nutritive farinaceous seeds, previously subjected to the process of germination, or malting, appears to have been known and practised in very remote ages, among those people who lived in countries that are not adapted for the culture of the grapes."

"The ancient Greek writers gave the name of to malt liquors."

"Among the different kinds of drinks provided for a royal banquet in the reign of , ale is particularly specified. In Scotland and Wales they had at that time two kinds of ale, called common ale, and aromatie ale, both of which were considered... articles of great luxury among the Welsh. Wine, it appears, was then unknown even to the king of Wales."

"Small, or Table Beer... is a weaker liquor than ale, containing a larger quantity of water."

"My main object has been to divest the art of Brewing of the mystery in which it has been involved by interested persons; to enable the reader to avoid the mistakes frequently committed in following the empirical directions given in Treatises... and to lay before those who are interested in it that scientific mode of operating, which alone can lead to exact and successful results."

"Two parts of London table beer may be considered equivalent in strength to one of ale."

"All kinds of malt liquor contain a common identical principle... namely alcohol or spirit. They are of course weaker than wines, and in general more liable to become flat and acescent from this circumstance..."

"Different kinds of corn are employed... In Britain barley is the most common grain... In America it is not uncommon to make beer of Indian corn and sometimes of rice. In the interior of Africa... the holcus spicatus."

"The wort of raw and malted grain is, by the addition of yeast, made to ferment easily, and affords a strong vinous liquor."

"The wort thus formed is not so transparent as that from malt, but its taste is nearly as sweet. It would appear... the starch in the raw grain undergoes a certain change during the , and is brought towards the state of saccharine matter."

"[M]alting... is... germination artificially excited, with the view of converting the fecula, or starch of the barley, into saccharine matter... by the abstraction of carbon... on the malt floor. ...[H]owever, ...the whole starch does not suffer this change; a portion... remains in the grain, which may even be extracted from it pure."

"The malt distillers add to the malted grain, which they ferment, a certain quantity of unmalted corn, nearly ground to powder, and the proportion of unmalted corn has... gradually... increased as to exceed considerably that of the malted grain."

"This mixture they grind to meal, infused with water, at a heat considerably lower than that... used by the brewers, and employ much more agitation to mix it... The wort is drawn off and cooled in the usual way, and fresh water poured on to exhaust the grain."

"During the sweating, the roots... begin to appear, and rapidly increase in length till checked by frequently turning the malt. About a day after the sprouting... rudiments of the future stem called acrospire... rises from the same extremity... and advancing within the husk, at last issues from the opposite end; but the process of germination is stopped before... such progress."

"As the acrospire shoots along the grain, the mealy part of the corn undergoes a chemical change. The glutinous and mucilaginous matter is taken up and removed by the embryo plant; the texture... becomes so loose that it crumbles between the fingers. When the acrospire has come nearly to the end of the seed the process is stopped by drying the malt upon the kiln."

"The degree of heat at first does not exceed 90° but it is raised very slowly up to 150° or higher... It is then cleaned, to separate the rootlets, which are considered as injurious... formed chiefly from the mucilaginous and glutinous part..."

"The great object of the maltman is to keep the temperature from becoming excessive [within 55° to 62° F].... by frequently turning the grain."

"The starch is not employed in their formation; but undergoes a change... for the future nourishment of the plumula, or embryo plant. It acquires... the property of forming a transparent sweet solution with hot water, approaching to the nature of sugar."

"At this time the barley... becomes again so damp that it wets the hand; this is called sweating."

"The... only essentially necessary substances employed in brewing beer are water, malted corn, and hops."

"In domestic brewing, the addition of molasses, or coarse brown sugar, to the malt employed, greatly economises the fabrication of the beer."

"[B]arley, and other cereal and leguminous seeds, when penetrated first with a portion of water, and afterwards exposed to a moderate temperature, swell, and announce the intestine movement that is excited in them by the development of the germ which sprouts out of these seeds. ...it has acquired a saccharine taste and the water in which it is boiled extracts from it a real saccharine substance..."

"In Scotland the species of barley called beer, or big, (hordeum hexastichon) is employed, which is a much more hardy... and ripens better in northern latitudes."

"When the grain has been thus changed the brewer... heats and dries the germinated seed by the action of fire and when... well dried he grinds the seed in order afterwards to prepare an infusion of it which when boiled with hops and suffered to ferment affords beer."

"In some northern countries of Europe a mixture of rye and barley is used. In the East Indies beer is frequently made of wheat; but the grain which answers best is common barley, because its germination is most easily conducted, and its farinaceous matter is more readily converted into saccharine matter than any other seed, and affords it in greater quantity."

"The term malt is... applied to grain which has been made to germinate..."

"The process of preparing malt is as follows: The barley is steeped in water for... not less than forty hours, beyond that time the steeping may be continued as long as the maltman chooses. The barley increases in weight... and... in bulk..; during this change much carbonic acid is disengaged; the grains become somewhat tender, and tinges the water of a bright reddish brown colour. The water being drained away, the barley is spread about two feet thick upon a floor, where it is formed into a rectangular heap, called the couch, about sixteen inches deep. ...[I]t is allowed to remain about twenty-six hours. It is then turned by... wooden shovels and diminished a little in depth. This... is repeated twice a day or oftener and the grain is spread thinner... till at last its depth [is less than] a few inches. ...[I]t ...gradually ...absorb[s] oxygen from the air ...to convert it into carbonic acid. In consequence ...temperature slowly increases and in about ninety-six hours the grain ...average[s] about 10° hotter than the surrounding air."

"The doctrine of Metempsychosis has been abundantly ridiculed by men of science and rejected by theologians, yet if it had been properly understood in its application to the indestructibility of matter and the immortality of spirit, it would have been perceived that it is a sublime conception. Should we not first regard the subject from the stand-point of the ancients before venturing to disparage its teachers? The solution of the great problem of eternity belongs neither to religious superstition nor to gross materialism. The harmony and mathematical equiformity of the double evolution — spiritual and physical — are elucidated only in the universal numerals of Pythagoras, who built his system entirely upon the so-called "metrical speech" of the Hindu Vedas. Vol. I, Ch. I, p.8"

"If the Pythagorean metempsychosis should be thoroughly explained and compared with the modern theory of evolution, it would be found to supply every "missing link" in the chain of the latter. But who of our scientists would consent to lose his precious time over the vagaries of the ancients. Notwithstanding proofs to the contrary, they not only deny that the nations of the archaic periods, but even the ancient philosophers had any positive knowledge of the Heliocentric system. The "Venerable Bedes," the Augustines and Lactantii appear to have smothered, with their dogmatic ignorance, all faith in the more ancient theologists of the pre-Christian centuries. But now philology and a closer acquaintance with Sanskrit literature have partially enabled us to vindicate them from these unmerited imputations. In the Vedas, for instance, we find positive proof that so long ago as 2000 B.C., the Hindu sages and scholars must have been acquainted with the rotundity of our globe and the Heliocentric system. Hence, Pythagoras and Plato knew well this astronomical truth; for Pythagoras obtained his knowledge in India, or from men who had been there, and Plato faithfully echoed his teachings. Vol. 1, Ch. I, p.8,"

"There was not a philosopher of any notoriety who did not hold to this doctrine of metempsychosis, as taught by the Brahmans, Buddhists, and later by the Pythagoreans, in its esoteric sense, whether he expressed it more or less intelligibly. Origen and Clemens Alexandrinus, Synesius and Chalcidius, all believed in it; and the Gnostics, who are unhesitatingly proclaimed by history as a body of the most refined, learned, and enlightened men, were all believers in metempsychosis. Socrates entertained opinions identical with those of Pythagoras; and both, as the penalty of their divine philosophy, were put to a violent death.... Aristotle, notwithstanding that for political reasons of his own he maintained a prudent silence as to certain esoteric matters, expressed very clearly his opinion on the subject. It was his belief that human souls are emanations of God, that are finally re-absorbed into Divinity. Zeno, the founder of the Stoics, taught that there are “ two eternal qualities throughout nature: the one active ; or male, the other passive, or female: that the former is pure, subtile ether, or Divine Spirit; the other entirely inert in itself till united with the active principle. Vol. 1, Ch. I, p. 14"