touches which greatly hinders the light and splendor of Nature which always desires purity and freedom from darkness as appears by that intense splendor in perfect Bodies a token of their purity seeing others more immerged in impurity are more obscure as Metals perfect and imperfect precious Stones demonstrate But if we would avoid long peregrinations and according to the oracles advice terminate our curious journeys in our selves by seeking out the causes of our Diseases we should easily finde them derived from those infected fumes that obscure the light of our sanity and thence desume a manifest sign of what is wrought within us for a sound Man because of the internal clarity of his natural disposition hath a cleer and lively coloured aspect but a sick Man from the first onset of his disease is pale and plumbeous his native vigour perishing and decaying and all these mutations proceed from the fumes of sulphureous and excrementitious Adustion and Inflammation which extend themselves thorow all the members and by mediation of the pores infect the whole Body This paleness may also proceed from Nature feeling her self aggravated with a disease and thereupon revoking all the pure and good Blood inwards that mustring up their forces she may better oppose her enemy or sustain his assaults and upon this occasion the external parts are destitute of their clarity and in this conflict the external parts remain as it were dead like Earth tend to obscurity because Earth wherein this battle is begun is naturally black as on the contrary Fire is by Nature clear and white The Earth then on its part being spisse and obscure begets blackness and sulphureous fuliginous and smoaky Adustion begets obscurity wherefore both cause corruption destruction and ruine and besides these two nothing in the world procures universal ruine neither is any inferiour Body exempted from these evils save Gold and precious Stones which Nature hath brought to what perfection she can And so Death is to other Bodies a perpetual enemy seeking how to destroy them but Nature as a careful Mother how to preserve her works who hath armed two potent and nimble Champions to help them and withstand the Adversaries fury one whereof is Fire the expugner of sulphureous Adustion the other Water the expeller and driver of Terrestrial dregs And as Nature is ingenious and subtile in all her operations so is Art indued with equal subtilty and industry And there 's no other way to Separation instituted by Nature from the beginning but these two which Nature her self hath trodden from the non-age of the Universe whose first seeds void of form and confusedly mixed in a Chaos were dissolved in Water and by the Spirit of God the first Mover moving upon them divided and distinguished whence the Separation of light from darkness proceeded as also of distinct forms from confusion of generations from barreness and of death from life and if things in the first commixtion were thus confused as impure with pure Excrements with Substance Earth with Heaven and life with death all were without action power essence and life and the whole confusion useless An Artist therefore considering this and observing That nothing can exert its vertue till the confusion of its purity and impurity be separated he takes Water and Fire for his Helpers and follows Natures copy whose operations he should observe with all curiosity especially in generating Metals which are by so much the perfecter by how much they are more digested in the bowels of the Earth This sentence is then irrefragable That Water and Fire are the sole general and principal means of Separation but the composition of things being various and one thing yielding with more ease then another we must also act variously upon them yet so as not to vary from the plain path that nature has delineated For adustion and unctuous Sulphur making a body inflammable and infective may be extracted one way out of one body and terrestrial feculency another way in others Calcination and Sublimation were invented to purge adustion but Distillation and Dissolution to remove terrestrial feculency and Descension for the conservation of weak and easily inflammable bodies and all these are either effected by fire as Calcination Sublimation and Descension or by water as Distillation and Dissolution But because both the Books of ancient and modern writers speak at large of these things I shall not further labour in their explication because I can adde nothing new nor yet any ornament or facility to them it may suffice if I adde any thing definitively and known to my self in general and that is that Calcination is invented for your overcoming of hard and rebellious things and for continuity and valid and firm composition which hinders division and admits not of easie separation and hence four conveniencies arise the combustion of impure and stinking Sulphur the easie separation of superfluous and extraneous earthiness the fixation of the internal Sulphur and more prompt dissolution For it is natural to fire to consume those adustible parts which are not of the essence of a substance to facilitate the division and rejection of terrestrial excrements to fix radical Sulphur and to multiply salt in bodies which alone doth afterwards admit dissolution by water I say therefore that Calcination agrees onely to bodies that because of their continuity scarcely yield for spirits and volatile things which flye away by fire cannot be calcined unless some fixing thing be added which is repugnant to their nature Seeing there is no other end in Calcination then to extract salts wherein the better part and secret vertue of bodies consist to which that corruptive adustion adheres which in sublimation we suffer ro evaporate and flie away as useless that the remaining substance may be better freed from terrestrial dregs and easier educed by fire to purification and stability It is true also that sublimation requires some intension of fire but that happens then chiefly when the things to be sublimated are more profoundly mixed with the dregs of some other fixed body that they may more pertinaciously hold their terrestrial impurities and this kind of sublimation is most secure save when we work upon subjects that have their dregs naturally more fixed Descension hath a two fold use one is to extract Oyl out of vegetables without combustion the other to cleanse fusibles bodies before they be made volatile and these are the three kindes of separation made by fire now we shall speak a little of the other two Distillation and Dissolution made by water and the former of these is made by inclination and straining that the limpidity of bodies may with water come forth into the water of dissolved vegetables for that same that 's made by an Alembick appertains to the order of sublimations which is effected by elevation and not by ablution And though some account this for an indifferent and but a mean way yet I say it should not be rejected but much
as we may observe in all superiour things which are free from Excrements but inferiour Bodies are otherwise for they lie in the midst of the impure Excrements of this World which naturally destroy and mortifie their Guests whereas purity enlivens and conserves corruptions and mortifications surround men because of the multitude of Dregs and Excrements they are infested with which make them live a short and miserable life as loaden with Aerumnies and Diseases so that they are here detained as a guilty Malefactor in an obscure filthy Prison who being dubious betwixt death and hope of Life lies there obduced with moldiness infested with vermine and nourished with immund and corrupt meats for all Aliments are impure and carry with them an Executioner to wit hidden poyson whence we at length take our own death in our own hands and spontaneously kill our selves seeing our Aliments have so little of enlivening and nourishing vertue in them and that so closely enveloped with Excrements that the digestion of the stomack though strong can scarce attract it now we eating such meats do ingest poyson with the good substance which entring our Bodies ceases not to be augmented and accumulated till it obscure and extinguish the vital Light or rather Natures legitimate Action which is Vivification unless some Medicine or Separation retard or suspend it Corruption then is induced by Excrements and it may happen two ways either from the Parents Seed who being not well and by consequence corrupt produce corrupt Seed degenerating more from Generation to Generation but this is so far subject to Medicinal Corruption as that by help thereof the course of its activity towards Mortification may be stayed or retarded This Corruption may not improperly be called that Malevolent Satan who goes about continually seeking whom he may devour for which cause this wanders about the Terrestrial Globe or the Excrements of the World which have their principal seat on the Earth which also eructate their Corruption upon other Elements and thus Men living of them and in them are corrupted in them and by them and so they produce corrupt Seed which time renders more and more corrupt for our age being more vitious and dissolute then that of our Ancestors hath rendered us worse then they and the next its probable will be worse then us and the next more dissolute still The second rise of Corruption is from the continual use of too too excrementitious Aliments by which our Bodies are depraved so that this infection will pass from the Parent to the Son as we see in the Leprosie and other hereditary Diseases Now these Aliments deduce their Corruption from the place where they are generated for after the Almighty Creator had disposed the confus'd Chaos he so ordered that the superiour Bodies should remain pure and subtile but the inferiour gross and impure because it is the Nature of pure substances to ascend to the place of their origine but of Excrements to descend to the Centre And hence it is That that which is pure in Animals and Vegetables is elevated and ascends highest and makes them ascend increase with it till it be freed from the Excrementitious Mass which subjects it to mortal Corruption and that it may attain the place that is remotest from Excrements and live without alteration or spot for the same cause also more spiritual and subtile Creatures inhabit in higher places as being purer and finding their Aliments more convenient and like their natural substance but such as are coporal inhabit lower places where they are immerged in dregs and filth that have their place in lower parts whence they are corrupted by that of which they live which is mixed with mundane Dregs for whatever the Earth and other Elements which are the Receptacles of impurities can produce is corrupt and maculated and therefore induces corruption and defilement upon all Bodies that use it for Aliment And thus Blood acquires an ill disposition which afterwards beget ill humours but in some more in others less according to the inquinated state of the Parents and the abuse of the corruptive things which cause mortality and destruction for if the Earth and the Fruits thereof were as pure as the Heavens all Animals would live as long as the Celestial Incolists But Nature hath ordained this for a Law That that partakes more of corporeity should dwell about that that 's most corporeal and that which is more corruptible and inquinated about that that 's likest to it but the Earth is lowest of Bodies and therefore most gross and corruptible Nothing therefore can proceed from it but what is like it unless its corruption and impurity be stayed by the Art of Separation and all its pure substance extracted from its Body which a true Philosopher may by industry effect It never was nor yet is my intent to offend Physitians to whom I owe much honour yet I with many learned men admire they do not better instruct Apothecaries that they may be more curious in preparing Medicaments whilst themselves may observe how oft they have been frustrated in success when they proceed after the vulgar manner for they will cure and restore sick and weak Bodies by offering them a great deal of Pottage wherein there is yet so much impurities and gross dregs that very little pure substance wherein the curative faculty consists remains which is so immerged in their Poyson that they have no power against the Disease neither can Nature help their operation for she is subdued in this conflict by the impurity of the Remedy on the one side and the cause of the Disease on another which is all one as if a Man should drive away Corruption by corrupted corrupting means which is impossible for Rain never dries up Rivers nor Fire extinguish a Flame nor yet Corruption expel Corruption They also attempt the Restauration of their Patients debilitated strength by Aliments of easie digestion which they think partake of little impurity and so are not subject to Corruption never considering That this way cannot much profit them for though they use very choise Aliments yet are they not of much advantage because they are indued with no action or power that can either exterminate or lessen the morbifical causes but onely refulciate their miserable lives almost ruined by weakness never freeing them from death unless that Nature spontaneously arise and oppose the mortal Machinations of her Enemies or else the Patient seek help from some exquisite Medicament brought by some perite Artificers industry to supernatural purity and perfection which being free from Corruption may restore the pristine vigour and by this means eradicate the cause of the Disease for every true Medicament should effect two operations to wit purge from Corruption and restore lost Strength and in this the whole Basis and Art of Medicine consists though the lesser of the two parts is onely in use to wit Purgation the more excellent to wit Restauration being wholly abolished
Plato's Doctrine expresses elegantly Lib. 6. Aeneid Principio Caelum ac Terras composque liquentes Lucentemque Globum Lunae Titaniaque Astra Spiritus intus alit totamque infusa per Artus Mens agitat molem magno se corpore miscet The nourishment of th' earth mountains and skars Of th' heaven of planets of glistring stars We attribute to th' Spirit but to th' Soul That these do move stir without controul To which Augurellus also attests in his first Book saying Ast Animae quoniam nil non est corporis expers Mundus at mundi partes quoque corpore constant Spiritus haec inter medius fit quem neque corpus Aut Animam dicas sed eum qui solus utroque Participans in idem simul haec extrema reducat Hic igitur Maria ac Terras atque Aera Ignem Vivereque augerique atque in se cuncta referre Semper Aves semper Stirpes Animantia semper Gignere perpetuamque sequi per secula prolem c. But since a Soul is incorporeal And all the parts o' th' world we meet withal Are bodies these two cannot be combin'd Without a mean betwixt Body and Mind Which is a Spirit wherewith the raging seas Fire air earth all plants fruitful trees With animals are acted so that they Do generate their like and live for aye c. CHAP. 3. That all things which have Essence and Life are made by the Spirit of the World and of the first Matter ALL things are nourished by the same by which they were produced Now that all things breathe live augment and grow by this Mundane Spirit resolve and die without it is plain Whatsoever therefore subsists is made by it and this Spirit is nothing else but a simple and subtile essence which the Philosophers call a Quintessence because it may be separated from gross corporeity and the superfluities of the four Elements and so made of wonderful activity in its operations and it is now diffused over all the parts of the World and through it the Soul is dilated with all its vertues which vertues are communicated most to such Bodies as participate most of this Spirit for the Soul is infused by and transmitted from the superiour Bodies as from the Sun which acts most powerfully in this case for this Spirit being calefied by the heat of the Sun acquires abundance of Life which multiplies and enlivens the seeds of all things which thereby encrease and grow to a determinate magnitude according to the species and form of each thing upon which account Virgil saith Igneus est illis vigor caelestis origo But fiery vigour and heat celestial Are to these Bodies their original Now this Spirit is by Philosophers called Mercurius because it is of many or all forms producing all kindes of Bodies giving to some things a fairer and more lasting to others a weaker and more corruptible Life according to the pre-disposition of the matter upon which account this fiery vigour proceeding from the Solar beams is not alike in all subjects but diversified as there is more or less of it in the seeds All matters of purer pre-dispositions have a purer and more durable Life and Spirit for every thing delighting in that that 's likest to it it is more then Reason that this pure Celestial vigour should penetrate and sink deeper into purer Bodies and make them more durable and vital For the proof of which we need go no further then Gold which being purer then all other Terrestrial Bodies participates more of that Celestial Fire which penetrating the bowels of the Earth findes in Minerals the pre-disposed matter to wit the Mercury and Sulphur which Esdras calls The Earth of Gold prepared by the action and diligence of Nature and purged and separated from all inquinations of Terrestrial and adust Dregs which matter in the beginning is onely some Sperm or Water mix'd with that Sperm Powder or pure Sulphur which acted by the coagulative faculty thickens by little and little and in time by long and continued action of the heat hardens and so comes to its perfection which is naturally simple tincted with the colour of Fire for heat is the Progenitor and Parent of Tinctures If therefore it be certain that this heat comes from the Sun as it must needs be indubitable who can so much contradict Truth and Reason as to deny the Sun to be the Author and Parent of this perfection Let us then look higher and seek more accurately how this perfection may be caused by this mean CHAP. 4. How the Sun is by Hermes called The Father of the Mundane Spirit and of the Universal Matter BUt some may here say If all things proceed from one and the same matter how can the Sun be called the Parent of this matter when it self is procreated or produced out of this matter For answer whereunto we must consider That if we speak of the primaeve prejacent matter of all things it is altogether invisible and cannot be comprehended but by strong imagination out of whose vital light and natural heat this Celestial Sun was produced with equal light and fiery vigour which afterwards strengthening this internal and essential heat with natural displayed the beams of his Fire over the whole Universe illuminating the Stars above him and vivifying the things below him But because the Earth is as it were the common Mother of all things the Sun acts most vigorously upon her she being the common Receptacle of all Influences in whose bowels the seeds of all things are absconded which being agitated and moved by the Suns heat come to light and for this cause in Winter when the Sun is furthest absent from us the Earth being destituted of that vigorous heat which his perpendicular Rayes brought with them she is we see barren and produces nothing Whereas in the Spring when the Sun again reviews our Climate then she rises from her sleep or death and receives Life and vigour The cause of which mutation must needs be the Universal Spirit full of Life inhabiting the Earth principally which before it can generate any thing must take up its Inn in some Body as in the Earth which is the Body of Bodies and because all things are nourished and sustained by that which produces them there must be great affinity and harmony betwixt this Spirit and the Sun And for this cause ancient Philosophers say That the Sun in the Spring-time calefies and enlivens his Parent loaden with old age and almost killed with Winter-cold Seeing then she is by the Sun fortified enlivened and impregnated Hermes had reason to say That the Sun was the Father of this matter for being otherwise barren and without off-spring she now conceives generates and multiplies her spirituous matter leading it from incorporality to corporality The Philosopher Hortulanus commenting on Hermes his Table leaves and omits the radical principles of Nature and taking his rise by the principles of Chymistry
we see such things encrease and extol themselves the Spirit which gives them Life doth so much delight in Air as the place where it had its origine Hermes also saith That the Air carries it in its belly Whereunto Aristotle subscribes saying That moist things proceed from the Air and Terrene things from the moist ones for Air being next the Earth humectates it on every side and the humour thereof being condensed by innate heat is turned into a certain kinde of Earth which contains Mercury and Sulphur in due proportions CHAP. 7. How the Earth nourishes this Universal Spirit THough this Spirit be infused into and dwells in superiour as well as inferiour Bodies yet it may be best known and discerned in Bodies most evident and neer to our view of which the Earth is neerest and most vegetable in it therefore is this Spirit generated and manifested more copiously for the Earth is a certain mark whereto all the Influences Rayes and Vertues of the superiour Bodies tend It is moreover the Fundament and Basis of the other Elements containing in it self the seeds and seminal vertues of all things for which cause it is rightly called the common Mother of all Animals Vegetables and Minerals It is therefore impregnated by the Heavens and produces all things out of its womb and though this Spirit were expelled washed away or separated from it by what way you please yet the Earth thus void of Spirit if left a while in the Air would again be impregnated by the Celestial vertues and influences so as to produce some Chystalline stones and lucent sparks and by this means the Spirit which was taken for separated would again regerminate in the Earth Impregnation then made by the action of the Heavens and of the first qualities doth continually render her generative for out of her womb come all things sublunary She produces all things endued with life preserves nourishes and at last resolves them into their own Nature When she is agitated by these actions she causes a twofold expiration one without her another within her which expirations egrede from this Terrene Spirit when moved and calefied by the Celestial heat The expiration elevated without or above the Earth if it be humid causes and produces dew and frost if dry winde thunder and other dry Aereal impressions but the expiration included in the Earth if it be humid generates liquable Metals and Minerals if dry stones and the like that are not liquable All things vegetable proceed from and are nourished by this Spirit whereof the Earth is Nurse for which cause the ancient Poets call the Earth the common Mother and Nurse of all Creatures CHAP. 8. That the Spirit of the World is the cause of perfection in all THe Universal Spirit is the general Genus and common to every Genus for if we cast our eyes into the inferiour or elementary World we see it divided into three subalternals to wit animal vegetable and mineral kindes and yet the same in all onely operating diversly according to the diversity of its forms And hence the infinite variety of Creatures arises for else there would be only one species in the Universe but if we perpend the superiour and Celestial World we shall also finde That the Spirit is one equal in all and differing in nothing but purity and subtilty for the Celestial Spirits are procreated of its pure igneous substance and differ from Terrene ones in corporal grosness and the Celestial Globes and Luminaries are made of its middle and Aereal substance it constitutes therefore all things because it hath in it both the faculties of superior and inferior Bodies and because it is of an exquisite temper for this Body is in all the beginning and end of perfection and if it were destituted of its faculties it could never perfect any thing and here we understand simple and natural perfection and although it be perfect onely according to the intent of Nature containing in it self the rule line action and power of perfection yet it acquires vertues and faculties above the sphere of natural things and can deduce things from potency to act This Spirit alters and penetrates all things though never so gross mollifies hard things hardens soft things and augments nourishes and conserves all things This Spirit also being in all Bodies the Author of Generation and Corruption hath necessarily a threefold operation for by its driness it must enliven and by its coldness congeal and by its moisture congregate and unite for which it hath a threefold name imposed on it desumed from the three kindes of Earth for they call it vitrifying salsuginous and Mercurial because of Salt Glass and Mercury all things are made though Paracelsus reckons these principles otherwise to wit Salt Sulphur and Mercury adding Glass as a fourth As if he should say All things are made of these three first principles and reduced at last to the fourth as though neither Nature nor Art could produce any thing beyond Glass But I shall prove my own sentence by Examples and Reason The Bones of Animals are consolidated and hardened by vitrification the Flesh and Nerves concreted by Salt and united and congregated into one mass by the Mercurial humour In Vegetables also the shells of Almonds Pine-Nuts Wall-Nuts and the like as also of Oysters and Snails in Land and Sea may be made by vitrification and the taste demonstrates That these Bodies are saltish for nothing wants Salt but what is insipid yea those things are very saltish whereof Glass is made as Fem Kali and the like Some may here object That it is not Glass but Salt that causes the induration of Bones Shells and the like which I have mentioned Whereunto I answer That Experience and Reason speak the contrary for Salt is resolved and melted by the least moisture of Air or Water but the Bones and Shells before mentioned resist liquefaction as they are more or less hardened by this Glass-making faculty for the ultimate confirmation of which my assertion I may adduce precious Stones Adamant and Chrystal which are nothing but Glass elaborated to perfection in the Furnace of Nature And now that all things are condensed by Mercury is so manifest that it needs no other Testimony but common Experience Minerals have enough of Salt Sulphur and Mercury in them Stones and such effoded things as acquire not extention and fusion by the Hammer and Fire have some Salt in them but this is superated by the adustion of corruptive Sulphur which comes upon their induration and vitrification Metals and all ductile things are concreted and condensed by Salt and Mercury and so much hardened by vitrification that they bid some resistence to the Hammer which is indeed more or less according to their implication with more or less impurity and adust Earth which comes upon the coagulation of their Mercury And thus we may affirm that all things are made of the ternal number of Glass Salt and Mercury or Water
where Glass is the cause of hardness Salt affords matter and Water causes unition and condensation CHAP. 9. Of the specification of the Universal Spirit to Bodies THe Soul of the World and its Action and Vertue is represented in all things in which it is this bindes and conjoyns the superiour things with the inferiour for as many Idea's as the Heaven contains so many seminal causes it obtains whence by the Mediation of the Spirit it forms so many species in the matter When therefore it falls out that any one of these species degenerate it may by the Soul within it and the mediation of the universal Spirit be reformed and reduced to its former state for the Spirit is alwayes at hand and ready for all motions In the mean while we must not imagine that the intellectual Idea is attracted but rather that the Soul is indued with such a vertue and allured by the material forms which cannot seem absurd to any one for it prepares every one his meat and nutriment because it is transmutable into all things by which it is sollicited and willingly remains and resides therein Zoroaster calls the Agreement and Harmony of the Forms with the Soul of the World Allurements Whence it appears That all things and kindes draw their powers and faculties from the Soul of the World not all totally but such as respect the seed or propagation and the like whereby they germinate or encrease An example hereof we have in Man who feeding onely on Man's meat acquires not the Nature of Birds Fishes or the like which he eats Many other Animals also feed upon the same victuals and yet every one attracts that which is proper to his species so that it is worthy our admiration that out of the same Meat Man can attract what is proper to Man and a Bird what is proper to a Bird. And this is not because there are many and diverse Aliments in one and the same dish but because of the species nourished which attracts and changes the nutriment proper to and convenient for it self by mediation whereof it generates its like by vertue of this Soul and seed which is in it according to its quality But we must not think That in the Machine of the Worid the Spirit Soul and Body are things separated for these three are alwayes united and conjoyned as is apparent and by this union the whole Spirit and corporal substance become vital The universal Soul then feigns and imagines divers forms which the Spirit receiving into the bowels of the Elements makes corporeal and produces Hence Animals generate onely Animals Plants Plants and Minerals Minerals though not all alike for Minerals as I said before generate not their like after the same manner as Plants because their Spirit is cohibited by too gross matter which Spirit if it could be conveniently extracted and conjoyned with Mineral matterâ— would generate its like because by its exquisite penetration into imperfect Bodies through the subtiliation of Art and artificious Graduation of Fire it brings with it proper and Mineral seeds onely not animal because repugnant to its Nature yet I will not say That it wants the action of other faculties but that it doth not demonstrate them but according to the species whereto it is accommodated for else every thing would produce its unlike a Tree would generate a Man a Plant a Bull a Metal an Herb which I speak onely in respect of the diverse specifications of things For if we consider the most general Genus it produces in all things its like because being Mercury it assumes the Nature of all things wherewith it is mixed But humane Art cannot effect that that is solely granted to Nature which alone can procreate a species Art may dilate and multiply it if it begin its operation at the root of the species as prudent Philosophers do who extracting the Spirit from Minerals specificated decently purified and reduced to perfection render it apt to perfect imperfect things And an expert and industrious Artist perpending these things aright may easily institute admirable Adaptations Finis Libri primi A TREATISE OF The Philosophers true Salt and Secret And Of the universal Soul or Spirit of the World BOOK II. CHAP. 1. That the Spirit of the World assumes a Body and how it is incorporated WE have I hope sufficiently explicated in the former Book that all things were not only produced but also made corporeal by the universal Spirit We now come to declare what kinde of Body this Spirit assumes and how it self both is and makes all things corporeal for that must needs be corporeal which makes all other things such seeing nothing can give what it self hath not Let us therefore see with what and how it is vested with a Body not that we will here dispute of the incorporation of celestial and supernatural beings but onely of Physical and Sublunary Generations and of the body of the Earth which is the sole vessel and true matrix where the prime and most general Incorporator of things is it self incorporated I say then That no body can be made without a precedent Mover that may diduce potency to act that which exists not in save potency may be produced into light and according to Natures intent reach its final term which is to make that a body which it would produce Now this mover can be no other then fire or heat which moves it self first in the Air for all Generations begin there because fire is the most active Element and consequently most subtile and light whence it is more prompt for motion Fire therefore whose propriety is through its levity to ascend and make unknown things visible doth requisitely receive the beginning of its motion and action from inferiour Bodies that is from the centre of the Earth where as we said before the old Demogorgon and Progenitor of all things inhabits sitting there in his Throne and midst of his Empire that thence he may govern command preserve and divide the essence of Life to all the parts of that great Spherical Body expanded about him and that he may more easily and from equal distance receive from every Member what he wants The root of Fire is implanted in the fruitful bowels of this old Parent which thence emits a vaporous breath which Hermes calls the humid Nature for vapour is the prime and next action of fire with which it is so conjoyned that it cannot be imagined without it But some may say If vapour comes from fire how can it be moist seeing fire is hot and dry whence acquires it this contrary quality And here we finde nothing absurd if we do but consider That fire cannot live and subsist without moisture which is its aliment support and subject without which fire cannot be conceived for being by Nature active and its action indefatigable it must needs have something to act upon and never be destitute of this thing Fire then and co-essential moisture are like
lives of these influences concentricate And seeing the Earth is a Body so solid that it gives solidity to all others it is requisite that that which penetrates it be very subtile The Heavens therefore being of most subtile matter produce alike effects for the operations ordinarily follow the qualities of the Body that operates And this penetration would profit nothing but like a Torrent running over a Field because of its swift motion scarce wet the surface unless it be by somewhat stayed But seeing it tends infallibly to the Centre and there is stopped because there is no lower place whereto it may descend there it is compelled to subsist and collect it self Hence some have said That the Centre of the Earth is most precious because in it all the influences are united which meeting there have an infinite potency not onely because they continually flow thither but because they proceed from Bodies infinite incorruptible and indeficient in vertue The ancient Poets who involved their Conceits in Fables divide the Earth into three parts assigning the Heaven to Jupiter as first-born of Saturn though some attribute the primogeniture's right to Neptune and the election of the superiour Kingdom to Jupiter for certain Sophistical Reasons impertinent to my purpose Neptune they make the Lord of the Sea and that by lot To Pluto as the youngest Son they assign the Earth for Heritage who is yet thought the richest of the three Brethren because in his Dominion all the Treasures of the World are contained yea he seems to make his two Brothers Tributaries in those things they possess as best This Son they call The King of Hell and to him they give the Elysian Fields as a delightful place where the blessed Souls shall follow his Court after death Divines also assert That Hell and the torture of Souls is in this place adduced by this Argument That seeing the Nature of the Stars is fiery and all their influences concur there must needs be incredible burnings there Again That place is infernal because none is more inferiour But that Souls should be here tormented and that the heat of this place should be so vehement as they say is a Solaecism in Reason and a Contradiction to Philosophical Axioms for besides that Souls possesse no place according to their own confessions and that being devested of the earthy part and corporeal prison they would naturally elevate themselves and ascend by vertue of their spiritual levity which participates more of a fiery then any other quality they cannot but with violence be detained in this subterraneous place seeing they are light nor yet being simple suffer under the action of Fire which cannot act on its like Why therefore they should assert That they descend to this place to be tormented I see no reason unless that the burthen of their sins wherewith they are implicated should detrude and depress them compelling and forcing them to the Centre of the Earth or else that sin hath got them under its Dominion and hath incorporated it self therewith by some unknown kinde of composition and so make them passible and subject not to the simple and natural action of Fire but to some other violent created one destined by God to that effect and perhaps the vertue of the Fire we speak of is by divine Power doubled for this action which may be proved by Holy Writ But I will not rashly cherish any particular Opinion or separate my self from the Orthodox Faith in the defence whereof I will not onely spend my Life but Industry by God's assistance yet I say in my Transient that I may further recede from my intended Discourse That they conclude strangely that say Vehement burnings arise in this place because the influences of the Stars concur there whereunto I would yet yield if they can evince That the heat of the Stars burns and consumes like our Culinary Fire and doth not enliven conserve and nourish for if it were such as they imagine not onely the Earth but the whole Universe had been long since burnt to ashes Those influences indeed in old Demogorgon's bowels calefie but not with a mortal and destructive but with a vital heat which there implants an uniform Vertue which by mediation of heat dilates it self through the whole Body of the Earth being the first moving cause of Generations But we must not here conceive That it is onely the external heat that comes from the Sun which calefies the Earth and causes Generation for in Winter-time when the Sun is furthest distant the Earth hath abundance of heat in it as experience shews in Fountains Cisterns and profound Cells so that in the coldest Winter-Season Metals are cocted and indurated yea it is credible that they are then most of all ingrossed because the heat of the Centre is kept in and retained because of the frigidity of the ambient Air. The Suns approach and more perpendicular Aspect is not the sole cause of vegetation in the Spring for if so then doubtless as its Ascent were more sublime Vegetations would augment more proportionably to the encrease of the heat of the Rayes but the contrary is observed But because every like attracts its like and the recess of the one causes the recess of the other The Sun by the magnetical Vertue of its Rayes attracts and revokes the heat of the Central Sun detruded by the rigid cold of the ambient into the interiour parts of the Earth which returning to the surface thereof affects all things with a vegetative faculty It is not therefore the external heat of the Celestial Sun but rather the innate heat of the Central Sun that calefies the profundity of the Earth for heat is twofold the one acts by reverberation which is external the other by influx and penetration which is internal whereof I now speak whose Nature is to enliven augment and conserve by the sustentation of radical moisture contained in this Fire which I made mention of in the precedent Chapter But that now we may prove this Central Fire not to be so intense as to torment and burn let us consider how the Stars do not by their influences cause heat solely but work other effects for Saturn is cold and dry Jupiter hot and moist the Sun hot and dry Mars hot and dry Venus cold and moist the Moon moist and cold and Mercury all in all participating of all qualities alike Whence we may gather That all the influences are temperate equally consisting of heat cold moisture and siccity which thus meeting in moderation cannot make the place where they meet immoderate The Vapour then or Spirit that comes from the Centre participates of these four and hence all the qualities of simples have their origine whereof some calefie because in them heat is predominant others dry because siccity superabounds others moisten or refrigerate according to the degree of their moisture or cold but on the other side Stars project many other qualities besides these into the
Centre for they give Beings to those sapours colours and odours which we taste see and feel in sublunary things I say therefore That the Stars calefie the Centre of the Earth and that the Universal Spirit dwelling there participates of this heat and because it is natural to heat to separate that separative vertue which divides the pure from the impure the subtile from the gross and the light from the heavy and the sweet from the bitter descends with these influences which purgative separation is the cause why all things naturally reject their Excrements as not being of their substantial parts which is indeed very requisite seeing there is nothing in the World but its Excrements exceed its natural substance nay all that we see and touch is onely the excremental part of things that obumbrates their occult substance as we may observe in our Aliments whose greater Mass turns not into our substance but goes away by the passages destined for such egress Nature onely extracting the invisible and spiritual succe out of them which is apt to be converted into our flesh and substance We may likewise affirm That this Mass of Earth we tread upon is nothing but the Excrement of that first substance which was united in the Chaos Now encompassing the Centre and so including it in a Spherical Equilibrial proportion that it cannot move or fall for seeing it is in the lowest of places it can tend no wayes further unless it should ascend which is repugnant to its Nature But in the mean while I do not say That the Body of the Earth is nothing but an Excrement for though it appear wholly excrementitious yet there lies under its Excrements a pure substance which being wholly spiritual could not become sensible without the administration of some Body as we see in all things produced their Seed and first Matter is invisible but as they are carried in a corporal Mass and excrementitious substance we can see them and no Body can be made without Excrements for which cause this substance is separated from the Body of Earth in Generations by the influence of Celestial heat retaining nothing of the said Earth but as much as may be for a sustentacle for it which from the beginning had no other use but to serve for a Receptacle and Shop or rather a Vessel wherein this spiritual Matter might effect its operations as we shall largely and plainly demonstrate in the sequel Chapter where I shall treat of Separation more largely But Separation were to little purpose if the things separated should remain without action Natures scope in Separation is to enliven and abandon Death which comes from no other cause but superabundance of Excrements suffocating the pure substance but here I mean natural not violent Death but if the Seeds of things should alwayes lie buried in this excrementitious Earth nothing would be produced or receive Life but the Celestial Vertue by its vital influence extracts them and these being full of Vertue dilate and promote themselves into all and each several species as their Nature and Composition require Life then proceeds from Purification which the Stars effect by their influences with which the augmentative and restorative faculties descend for the Stars being in continual motion they are continually occupied with action and consequently with vivification giving Life to Life which cannot be without Conservation and Restauration Conservation they give by sustaining Life indeficiently Restauration by restoring what the Generations of individuals consume and spend And this we may see manifestly in the first Matter incorporated for being impregnated by Celestial Influences it is of it self nourished multiplied and augmented continually And hence it is called a Dragon or Serpent that preys upon it self always regerminating which where-ever it be it takes such root that the place shall never be quite destitute of it though it be washed or burned which is a certain token by which this first Matter may be known These then are the principal Vertues which the Spirit of the World hath and will alwayes receive from the Celestial Influences which produce great and admirable effects in all the Members of the Universe But here some may enquire How that the first matter receiving such pure and potent Influences from Heaven comes to be conspurcated with so many vitious qualities and how it retains them when it hath received them seeing it is alwayes busied in the actions of vivification augmentation conservation and restauration for if it separate not it will die and if it augment conserve and restore not it will diminish perish and debilitate which it never does Whereunto I answer That the Stars have a twofold influence one natural the other accidental the natural was communicated to them in their first Creation and it is that Government of the Universe which Hermes speaks of whereby they keep it in its Being by defending and preserving it by their influences from destruction and annihilation wherewith the Spirit of the Universe is continually enriched which applies them to and manifests them in all things whereto it gives encrease and substance but the accidental Influence of the Stars is that which falls out preternaturally by reason of their different Situations and Aspects and this is alwayes subject to mutation and never remains equal and this hath only power upon the effects of Matter not upon the Matter it self for whatever influence happen though never so malign the Centre of the Earth intermits not its actions but absolves them as before and produces Animals Vegetables and Minerals as well as ever and if mortifications sometimes fall out from the malignity of some Aspect they onely touch the surface or excrementitious mass of Bodies and not the interiour substance and such an accident is often changed so that the influence sometimes operates one thing sometimes the quite contrary which the natural and principal influx never does Whence we may conclude That the first Matter as it is simple of it self receives nothing but those Celestial Vertues which it also retains and keeps in its Terrification But we must now declare how it retains them that we may make good that saying of Hermes That its Vertue remains entire when it is converted into Earth because all the Celestial Vertues descend and meet in the Centre of the Earth which in their course aim at nothing but the information of the Matter which is as it were the Receptacle of the supream Idea's The same Matter being full of Forms is diversified not indeed actually but potentially into innumerable specifications and so it is not properly a Body but as it were a Body or Companion of a Body whereunto it hath an Appetite and by information moves to that end and this motion it hath from the action of Celestial Fire which I before called The first Mover in the Chaos which the old Poets Orpheus and Hesiod describe under the Name of Love And Ronsardus our French Homer or Pindar thus delineates Le suis
may be repaired by newness of life which makes us like our heavenly Father in incorruption And our Restorer Jesus hath taught us two ways to Regeneration one by the Water of Baptism and the other by the Fire of the Holy Ghost Water washes away the spots and Fire consumes and separates all impurity from the pure essence and as his precious Blood which is true Water indeed purges away our sins and saves us from that death which the mortal corruption of our earthly Parent introduced so Water dissolves and purges away those excrementitious impurities which corrupt all substances The Fire of the Holy Spirit consumes and separates the excrementitious impurity of sins and so the vulgar Fire blots out the impurity of Bodies which should therefore be mortified that it may be regenerated and this Mortification is that Putrefaction and Digestion which fits it to receive Separation and this Mortification is then wrought in us when the Sun of the Holy Spirit rises upon our Hearts and warms our Centre consuming by little and little the corrupt affections of old Adam After the same manner the Chymical Fire reverberating its flame about the Body that is to be purged burns and annihilates that that is of an extraneous Nature and that more or less as the impurity is more or less obstinate to Separation which is effected by Distillation This then is the right way which Nature observes in the Regeneration of all things which will have no laudable effect in Medicine unless they be gegenerated by Water and Fire But the same things after this second Nativity are most free in their vertues and actions whereas before their vital functions were buried in an excrementitious Mass and though the benign influences of Heaven had given them much vertue yet could not they exert it even so a Man whilst he is detained in the impure Prison of old Adam he can produce no good and laudable action But before I proceed further in the practical explication of these things I must return to my begun-order to wit that after I have given the definition of Separation and declared of how many kindes it is that now I may shew what these kindes are whence things proceed to be separated and whence this separative vertue arises And I have sufficiently demonstrated That there are in Bodies two parts the one is an Excrement the other substance the one accidental and the other substantial for substance simply considered is wholly pure and without Corruption but an Excrement wholly impure mixing it self with the substance and contaminating and subverting its purity The Generation and Formation of substance is sufficiently detected in the two first Chapters of this Book it now rests that I explain the Nature and Qualities of Excrements where I infer from the aforesaid Narration that nothing but Excrements should be separated supposing this for undeniable That amongst passible things in this sublunary World nothing is void and free from Excrements for when God separated the parts of the World he commanded That some should descend to the lowest Region as partaking of the grosness of the first matter and that they should there congregate amongst themselves and of this feculent Mass the Earth was formed which is nevertheless indued with some part of pure substance though diffused through its thick crassitude after that Phoebus had slain the monstrous Python swelled up with poysonous humours which was generated of the mud of the Earth that is when the innate siccity had imbibed the superfluous humidity by the operation of natural heat the Earth begun to feel the actions of this substance included in its brest which substance is that spirituous matter which is never idle but alwayes imployed about Generations and Vivifications which may here be properly called the Earth because the proper and vertuous substance of the Earth is that alone that by proper corporation generates all Bodies according to individual Idea's as I have described it in this Ode out of which I shall take what is convenient for my purpose L'esprit porte sur la sace De ceste indigeste masse L'en virounant tout autour Feit separer la matiere Pesante de la legiere Et la noire nuict du sour Puis de l'humeur a masse Le corps plus pesant froid Feit la roundeur compasse Que d'un serrement estroit L'eau ou l'air contrebalance D'un poids si ferme egal Que sans souffâ—ir mesme mal Ne peur choir en decadence Puis versant l'ame an dedans Et les semences du monde La feit nurisse feconde Du ciel des feux ardens When yet the world did in a Chaos lie The Spirit full of fiery heat did flie About the surface of this shapeless Mass And so fomented it that what erst was One lump without all form did now begin By Separation which was wrought therein By this same Spirit a multitude to make Of Bodies and likewise of forms to take A number almost numberless and now Light things ascend and heavy things below The centre seek to pass the day breaks out And all the ponderous reliques press about The centre where staying themselves they make A round terraqueous Globe which nought can shake Out of its place for 't is on every side Equally balanced and cannot slide Seeing no over-weight presses one part More then another hereto the Stars impart Their influences which by life and seed Make this great Nurse all things to keep and breed And seeing in this Universal Separation that which is more fiery and subtile chuses the higher Seat and that which is gross and massy the lowest it follows that Celestial Bodies are immortal as being most remote and separate from all immund Dregs and that they are crooked or excavated into rotundity because they flew up at once for which cause also Nature desires a round form for eternal things as being most perfect and indeficient and on the contrary it follows that Terrestrial things must be obnoxious to corruption and death because contraries are conjoyned in their composition to wit Elements of contrary qualities wherewith the impurities or dregs of the first matter were mixed which were not created pure as some imagine for then all that proceeded from them would be immortal nay more there could have been no Generation in the World for without contrariety of qualities and impurities there had been no alteration nor mutation of forms but all would have had one face without distinction all things would have remained equally pure and subtile and consequently without all ornament yea that I may speak freely there had been neither matter nor World created It was therefore necessary That the subtile substance should be mixed with gross dregs for where nothing but purity is there is no action because there can be no action where there is no patient seeing what is pure hath no power over what is as pure nor impure over as impure But Nature being always occupied in separating
calls the Spirits Nurse by the Mediation of the Air in whose Belly he shall be carried because the Celestial Influences cannot be communicated to the Earth unless the Air which is like an Intercessor carry them to it and as the Divine Restorer and Protector of our Souls in the assumption of humane Flesh deposed nothing of his Divinity so saith he the Universal Spirit shall retain and keep all its Vertue entire when it is turned into Earth that is when it assumes a Terrestrial Body God also willed his own Son and our Redeemer in his assumed Humanity be as it were regenerated by and with the Water of Baptism and Fire of the Holy Spirit not that he needed any such purgation but because he was to converse with Men contaminated with corruption that he might in all things yield himself an example of Renovation and Purification giving Men a visible and ample Testimony That according to the Flesh he was of the same Nature with them not contaminated or corrupted but obnoxious to passion and equally mortal as they In like manner our fecund Mother Nature willed her first-born though pure in his Centre That he should be regenerated by Water and Fire that is by Separation of the Terrestrial from the fiery part the spisse from the subtile and the impure from the pure which Hermes also aimed at when he said That the Earth should be separated from Fire for what God hath conjoyned Man should not separate but onely the impure and gross from the subtile and pure by Fire And besides this Sense which first offers it self to our Intellects there is yet another more occult meaning for seeing by the Separation of Earth from Fire he means that that 's gross from that that 's subtile he seems to hint that we should separate the natural qualities of these two Elements by detracting the moist frigidity mixt with heavy Terrestrial things without which that cold cannot subsist and by putting on hot siccity which is of the Nature of Fire and consequently light and spiritual For which cause he adds That it must ascend from Earth to Heaven that is from imperfection to perfection for Paracelsus calls Fire the Firmament and as nothing can attain perfection unless it first depose its imperfect gross and mortal bark wherein this cold quality abounds the cause of all mortification as heat is of life so also prudent Nature observes this Rule That each subject should sustain and pass the obsure blackness of death and expect the cleer and candid renovation of life and immortality that is impassible essence whereon neither Fire nor corruption hath any power And assuredly the acquisition of this life by death is naturally exercised by all Creatures continually for all Sperm or Seed of Animals is mortified in some Matrix and of Vegetables in the Earth before any specification can be made But if this rule takes place in the members by how much may we more exactly observe and directly imitate it in the head and if the life acquired by mortification be of any duration how much more shall that be perpetual which is principal Jesus Christ taught these things by similitude of a Grain which he says cannot fructifie unless it first die signifying the mystery of his Resurrection which his Death should precede for he willed Death that he might rise to a glorious and perpetual Life therein not onely giving example to men but expressing the whole Idea of Nature That divine and learned Ermite Morienus Romanus who is often quoted by modern and natural Philosophers avers the same of the fixed Grain whereto Nature hath given power to perfect Metals for he saith Unless it putrefie and grow black it cannot be perfected and compleated but returns to nought I have taken liberty to say thus much that I may teach the younger sort how the Creator should be acknowledged by simple Creatures and because the vulgarity of Men begs this knowledge from remoter things acting as they do who seek the perfection of Sciences from the Scholars of the lowest Form whereas they should require it from the best Directors and Doctors I would excite them by these natural conceptions that they would convert the principal endowments of their Souls to the search of the general principle and that in more exquisite things such as impart life and preservation to all mortal Creatures Mortification then necessarily precedes all entrance into life and principally in this Spirit the first-born of Nature when it assumed a Body for else no Man could separate it from Body which hinders its Regeneration to Life and Pacification of its Essence not as though by combustion and destruction it lost its Body in Death nor yet by Putrefaction but so that in Germination the Putrefaction of Seeds annihilates not that which is corporified in them for which cause in the Exaltion of Mercury or the Universal Spirit after the first degree which is made by Separation all that 's corporeal and spiritual becomes volatile because the sublimatory vertue therein overcomes the fixing faculty but the fixed part afterwards retains the volatile with it being helped by the action of heat which augmenting the power of the two nobler Elements destroyes the power of the two weaker which Hermes hints at in a certain Treatise by a plumous Bird detained with a Bird without Feathers And Nicholaus Flumellus by two Dragons one with and another without Wings But that I may not longer fold my self in these Daedalean Labyrinths see we not all Vegetables encrease and elevate themselves upwards by vertue of this volatile Spirit which as I said before would carry them higher towards the place whence it came whereto it hath an appetite but that it is detained by its proper Earth and corporal Mass wherein some fixed matter resides But lest some not sufficiently accustomed to Philosophical terms should think we contradict our selves I will here explicate my self I say then That I mean not by this volatile Spirit that which I before called volatile and separable Sulphur for that is rather the Author of Corruption then Growth but that most simple part of the primaeve vapour which never loses it s subtily whose Nature is to be elevated and tend to perfection for to sublimate is properly and Philosophically no more then to perfect and exalt matters from imperfection to perfection As therefore this Mercury hath an elevable so hath it a stable substance the first is naturally innate in it the second is in its centre or power yet it cannot compass its effect without the help of Art And that I may shew more plainly in what ways Nature proceeds in her operations I think it convenient to add a little about the causes and manner of Fixation Repeating therefore that indubitable Axiome I alledged in the beginning of this Book as perpetually observed in the Worlds Constitution to wit That all that hath life hath also some duration and that nothing is produced under the cope of Heaven which