was present when some have vomited up Needles Thimbles Shreds of Cloth pieces of Pots Glass Hair another would suffer himself for money to be run thorow with a sword when I was not there but it appeared to me a Fable I have seen a Rosie Crucian Physician cure these afflicted People But if you will say There is a touchstone whereby we may discerne the truth of Metals but that there is nothing whereby we may discover the truth of Miracles recorded every where in History But I answer there is and that is this First If what is recorded was avouched by such persons who had no end nor interest in avouching such things Secondly if there were many eye-witnesses of the same matter Thirdly and lastly If these things which are so strange and miraculous leave any sensible effects behind them Though I will not acknowledge that all those Stories are false that want these Conditions yet I dare affirme that it is meer Humour and Sullenness in a man to reject the Truth of those that hear them For it is to believe nothing but what he seeth himself from whence it will follow That he is to read nothing of History for there is neither Pleasure nor any usefulnesse if it deserve no Belief Another Remedy for these Supernatural diseases is Let one watch the party Suspected when they go home to their house and presently after before any body goe into the house after him or her let one pull a handful of the Thatch or a Tyle that is over the Door and if it be a Tyle make a good Fire and heat it red hot therein setting a Trivet over it then take the parties Water if it be a Man Woman or Child and poure it upon the red hot Tyle upon one side first and then on the other and again put the Tyle into the Fire and make it extremely hot turning it ever and anon and let no body come into the house in the mean time If they be Cattle that are bewitched take some of the Hair of every one of them and mix the Hair in fair water or wet it well and then lay it under the Tyle the Trevet standing over the Tyle make a lusty fire turne your Tyle oft upon the Hair and stir up the Hair ever and anon after you have done this by the space of a quarter of an hour let the fire alone and when the Ashes are cold bury them in the ground towards that quarter of Heaven where the suspected Witch lives this Mr. Lilly saith he hath experienced If the Witch live where there is no Tyle but Thatch then take a great handful thereof and wet it in the parties Water or else in common Water mixed with some Salt then lay it in the Fire so that it may molter and smother by degrees and in a long time setting a Trivet over it Or else take two new Horse-shooes heat them red hot and nail one of them on the Threshold of the Door but quench the other in the Urine of the party so bewitched then set the Urine over the fire and put the Horse-shooe in it setting a Tryvet over the Pipkin or Pan wherein the Urine is make the urine boil with a little salt put into it and the Horse nailes until it s almost consumed viz. the Urine what is not boiled fully away pour into the fire Keep your Hors-shoe and Nails in a clean Cloth or Paper and do likewise three several times the operation will be far more effectual if you do these things at the very change or full Moon or at the very hour of the first or second Quarter If they be Cattel you must mix the hair of their Tails with the Thatch and moisten them being well bound together and so let them be a long time in the fire consuming You have heard the Cause of some of these diseases and have heard the Cure by Sympathie also but these are without the compass of Nature and so let them pass with our fickle standing which is daily and hourely so beset with destinies that a man can warrant nothing Truly destinies are so deep and bottomless to return straight Homer-like upon them and therefore it were best indeed to let them goe and the applying of the Medicines with them The rather because the other I mean the former is so slight a matter to a discreet Physician such a one as is pointed out by their old and famous Leader Hippocrates who both in this and all other duties of his Art made such speed and so far passed all his fellowes as none since which is a good time could ever overtake him no nor yet come so neer as to keep the sight of him whom they had in chase and followed Then for those Supernatural causes which I shall not stand here to search for so they are called if they flow from unclean and wicked Spirits as some think they are not the Stuff of the things that hurt us though somtimes they dwell in and possess the body but windy matters much like unto those fierce and sudden changes of the Weather proceeding from the Influences of the Planets and fixed Stars and working the like effects in mens bodies so that sith the nearest cause is Natural let the rest be what they will and the Cure be done by Natural means as we see by experience amongst us And therefore E. A. that pretends this and puts the fault in the Faith of the wicked which is a thing as far above Nature yet holds its Cure with a Natural Medicine which we call a Quintessence Although I am not willing that sometimes this sickness is such as he bids us sometimes withstand it with another as strong a belief set against it but for my part I cannot reach it with my conceit let deeper heads then mine or the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford Doctor Owen think upon it how these beliefs and imaginations and other parts and powers of the soul or mind of man can so flye out of their own kingdome and Reigne over a forraign body when we know the Soul and minde is so fast bound in the body indurance and so like to be untill it be the great pleasure of the Omnipotent and the Omnissent God the chief good who hath committed them to let them loose at once and set them full at Liberty and this may be disputed with Grace and knowledge on my part Let this man therefore buzze against my knowledge which he would have to be more then Grace I appeal to the Naturall faculties of any free judge whether there be not as much Grace in me as there is honesty in him All men censure as they like of Stories so let them pass amongst old wives tales for me we will severely follow our task That if the effect do not cease which the object hath wrought upon the Brain so soon as ever by turning aside of the Organs the object ceaseth to work viz. though the sence be past As the stroke of a
pointed that they easily make Needles or Bodkins of them for stitching their Sayles and for other necessary purposes and that Providence may shew her self benigne as well as wise this so notable a Plant is not restrain'd to one coast of the World as the East-Indies but is found in Affrica Arabia and in all the Islands of the West-Indies as Hispaniola Cuba where our men are victorers and several other places of the new-found World But I thought fit to insist upon these things by way of introduction but to contain my self within the compass of such objects as are necessary for our knowledge and familiarly and ordinarily before our eyes that we may the better these things understood take occasion from thence to demonstrate the Rosie Crucian way to health and their ordinary Medicines which to us are not as yet known CHAP. IX The Rosie Crucian way how to get health The causes why we eat food Of the first nature of the World A measure of raw and temperate meat and the cause of the fiery and soummy Gall and needless muddy bowels the melt nature careless of making the reins of Urine drawers drinkless animals have none at all how to clense your self from these idle Bowels and avoid all diseases DO you not consider the weaknesse of man what faculties he hath and in what order he is in respect of the rest of the creatures Rosie Crucians observe though his body be weake and disarmed yet his inward abilities of reason and artificiall contrivance is admirable he is much given to search out the Medicinall virtues of Plants Wights and Mineralls and hath found out those that were of so present and great consequence as to be Antidotes against poyson that would so quickly have dispatched mankind it were good for us to demonstrate the Rosie Crucian Medicines now our land is afflicted with a sickness called the new disease of which all sorts dye without remedy for none as yet have prescribed a Medicine for young men that desire to live and for old men that wish for health without which no life is sweet and savory then let us bend our selves to cure our brethren first and endeavour to shew the means besides the commmon Collegian Doctors drenches or Culpepers way how every man may get and keep his health that is something strange but a vowed truth the consent equall I mean agreeable to kind temper dulling our four first beginnings the staff of our bodies for if this knot be broken they loos towards their former liberty they wax proud and strong and fight for their nature is together by the ears and put us to pain and lets the rule of nature and this they call the disease Then to handle one at once as our manner is and will keep our custom still to keep our health and body in temper seems no such matter to me as the world would make it even plainly impossible when I know all the wayes and entries to let in diseases and distempers of the body may by small heed be stoped and fenced Wee must needs draw breath and eat meat for the cause I shall speake of it in its place and as this is not all clear and agreeable so nature hath her leavings and again labour and rest are needful and perhaps we cannot chuse but be moved in mind with joy greife fear hope and such like passions though the Stoick deny necessity saith Des Carte By so many wayes and gatâ—s diseases may enter if they be not well watced and looked unto which may be done in reason and hath been done often as they assure us that have lived long without all disease and sicknesses as Iohn Harding relates of a Minister called Iohn Macklaine to have continued for these fourscore years last past together in health after his hair teeth eys flesh renued became yong again such like stories are to be found enough if we might stay to seek them some are contented for all but air and meat but these say they have often seeds of diseases lye hid in them unable to be foreseen or prevented as we find those meats that make the finest shew as Wine and Sugar and such enticeing baites to have hid in them most hateful diseases and dregs in the bottom so the air when it seems the best and highest yet is sometimes infected and poysoned with venemous breath sent out and thrust into it either from below or from the scars of Heaven and as the cause is hidden and unknown to us so the hurt impossible to be avoyed and prevented If I list to let my speech run at large especialy in other mens grounds I could finde that that Division is false first to come to meat anon and then if it were true yet the cause of that infection not unable to be foreseen and warded but I am so sorry for the fault above that I can the better take heed hereafter yet methinks it is a grief to hear the harmless and glorious divine things above so defaced with stander and no man makes answer for them Gentle Reader be pleased to stay a little If the Stars have no light and so no power but from the Sun that most wholsome and prosperous creature then they hurt him most wrongfully and reprove themselves very rightly And again if they be but a piece of the finer part and first nature as it were of the World as I have shewed in my Book of the The Wise Mans Crown then they be the wholsomest things in the World so far be they from poysoned slander And so let their Lights be never so grosly mingled in their meetings and thereby that state of the Weather changed suddenly and from thence our bodie 's troubled and turned into Diseases because they were not prepared and made ready for it yet the things are good and prosperous and by knowledge of Astrology or influences of the Planets and races of the stars we may prepare our selves and prevent all if we cannot have that happiness to converse with our Guardian Genius Now for lower reflexion it is not worth the answering when there is so much waste ground in the World then let us pass over to that other Breach may we not shun the leaving baits in our Dyet and take such meat as is most temperate and near our Nature and then dress the same after the most kindly and wholsome manner seasoning it well with labour mirth and sleep And to be plain I have shewed in another Treatise of mine entituled The way to blisse so much noted by our Writers what a jewel of health it were to use all raw temperate meat or becaus we be wise vertuous and this Dyet would perhaps change our Nature of fire but like Philosophers a quite contrary way taking the best when as none is lost and leaving the worst which is that we now take a Way I say to strip of all grossness and foulness of bodies the
stone a blast of wind puts standing water into Motion and it doth not presently give over moving as soon as the wind ceaseth or the Stone setleth so the Image or Conception remaineth but more obscure while we are awake because some object or other continually plyeth and solliciteth our eyes and ears keepeth the mind in a stronger Motion whereby the weaker doth not easily appear And this obscure conception is that we call Phantasie or Imagination Imagination being to define it conception remaining and by little and little decaying from and after the act of sense c. If some of these diseases spring as Mr. Moore Doctor Culpeper and some others hold and with good reason from neither of both these two roots named but from a foul and venomous breath sent forth from a poysoned temper of the Witches body through the windiness of hatefull eyes For Thought fashioneth the blood and Spirits almost at his pleasure then all the causes being ordinary and agreeing to the course of Nature they may be cured and put to flight by the same course and means which opinion if you please to bear with my tarrying it is worth the handling taketh hold upon this reason because as Rosie Crucians do witness some beasts of ranker venome do witch and hurt after the same manner as an old Toad by stedfast view not onely prevails but benums a Weasell but kills a young child And by the same means the Bever hunts the little fish and takes his prey But most fiercely and mischieously of all creatures in the world the two monsters in kind the Cockatrice and Apoblepas again for that the eye of a menstruous woman as all report doth spot the glass which it beholdeth and moreover Eugenius Theodidactus in the wisemans Crown telleth of many folk that through a poysoned prerogative which a monstrous Mark of a double-sighted eye gave unto them were able to bewitch to death all those upon whom that eye was angerly and surely set and fastned but chiefly because we see them that use this wicked trade to be by kind of a muddy and Earthlike complexion and nature brought by age as they be most commonly long life and gross diet to the pitch of melancholy that is to a cold and most dry nature in the world For certain proof whereof bring one of them out of that beast-like life brought unto merry company and fed full with dainty Diet and within twenty days as hath by a Rosie Crucian been tried a truth the whole state and nature of her body will be so changed as it shall not suffer her to bewitch and hurt again as you may read in my Familiar Spirit or Guardian Genius CHAP. XIV The Naturall effects of Medicine the force and power of mineralls in diseases with examples also that every disease-breeder hath the cure or remedy in it examples that poyson prepared cures poysoned people Rosie Crucian Arts the virtue and power of the Planets and heavenly Stars poured through the influence of the moon upon the Lower Creatures of Hot Stomachs of the Etherial first moisture of of man examples also of Rosie Crucian Natural and supernaturall cures of the understanding of these experienced truths by the wit of man of Paracelsus and Culpeper LEt us come to the next and chiefest point And there we must not say for shame that these helps and remedies lye hid in nature too far for the wit of man to find unless we will accuse our own sloth and dulness For nature hath brought them forth and laid them open aswel as the Poysons and hurtful things or else she were very cross and ill-willing to him for whose sake it seems she doth all things Nay further as Mr. Hobs saith her good will is such as she hath not only laid them open but given us wayes to come by them and means of speech hands and wit also far above all other living creatures And yet she hath not left us so but lest by chance we might go wide and miss them to shew her motherly love and affection towards us she hath guided as Mr. Moor saith many witless Beasts even by common sense unto their speedy helps and remdies in their diseases That we by the plainness and shame of the example as Mr. Gadbury wisely saith might be taught and moved to seek out the mysterious truths of nature in Celestial bodies as wel as beasts that seek and find us Medicines helpful in the like diseases for our Terrestial Tabernacle As to name a few not unworthy meaning she maketh the beast Hippotamus in time of his fulness and fatness to go to a reed and by rubbing a vain to let himself blood and to stop it again by laying mud upon it A sick dog to seek an Herb and purge himself and the bear to do the same after his long fast in Winter she leads the Panther when he is poysoned to her foul and nameless leaving and the Tortoyse after he hath eat a Viper to Summer Savery And the Hedg-hog is so good a natural Astronomer that he fortifies his hole against foul weather the Hog will gather Moss and straw to cover himself a little before it rains The dog knows the influence of Mars when he doth sleep by the fire and will not go out a dores when he is in any evil position and many such like examples hath nature laid before us for our instruction by which at last wise Plato Philo Apollonius Pythagoras and painful men of Greece as they themselves report be they Elias or Elisha from whom the order of the Rosie Cross came as some say or else as others will have it from Moses or Ezekiel or whosoever and by laying reason and further proof together first made the Art and rules of Healing to know whence diseases came and how to recover them And then seeking all about for remedies to serve each turne by little and little they matched the most part of the lesser rank with single Medicines and the greater ones they doubled and coupled many together insomuch as at last which was in Hippocrates time they were able to heal all saving four of the greatest and deepest diseases the Gout the Dropsie the Leprosie the Falling sickness which are now healed by the Rosie Crucians onely But this race is below the Seraphically illuminated Fraternity now not a Physician that is lined with Plush in England Spain Germany or France but holds that Long-life Health Youth not attainable they therefore with one consent amongst the other four call them impossible But to come to the point what wrong this was both to skill and nature they do easily see and laugh at which know that in this labour they did not onely oversee and skip the Minerals the stoutest helps in the whole store-house of Nature although they could dig them out well enough to other and worser uses but also which is in all did let the Rosie Crucian skill of preparing Medicines whereby weak things are made
exquisite skill in the Maker that if I should pursue all that sutes to my purpose it would amount to too large yet an entire Volume I shall therefore write all that is needful to be known by all men leaving the rest to be supply'd by Anatomists And I think there is no man that hath any skill in that Art but will confess the more diligently and accurately the frame of our body is examined it is found the more exquisitely conformable to our Reason Judgement and Desire so that supposing the same matter that our bodies are made of if it had been in our own power to have made our selves we should have fram'd our selves no otherwise then we are To instance in some particulars As in our Eyes the Number the Scituation the Fabrick of them is such that we can excogitate nothing to be added thereto or to be altered either for their beauty safety or usefulness but as for their beauty I have treated largely of it in my youthful merry Poems now am not minded to transcribe my tender nice subject and couple it with my severer stile I will onely note how safely they are guarded and fitly framed out for the use they are intended The Brow and the Nose saves them from harder strokes but such a curious part as the Eye being necessarily liable to mischief from smallest matters the sweat of the Forehead is fenced off by those two Wreaths of Hair which we call the Eye-brows and the Eye-lids are fortified with little stiff bristles as with Pallisadoes against the assault of Flyes and Gnats and such-like bold Animalcula besides the upper-lid presently claps down and is as good a Fence as a Port-Cullis against the importunity of the Enemy which is done also every night whether there be any present assault or no as if nature kept Garrison in this Acropolis of mans body the Head and look'd that such Laws should be duly observed as were most for his safety And now for the use of the Eye which is sight it is evident that this Organ is so exquisitely framed for that purpose that not the least curiosity can be added For first the Humor and Tunicles are purely transparent to let in light and colours unfould and unsophisticated by any inward tincture And then again the parts of the Eye are made convex that there might be a direction of many raies coming from one point of the object unto one point answerable in the bottom of the eye to which purpose the Chrystalline humor is of great moment and without which the sight would be very obscure and weak Thirdly The Tunica uvea hath a Musculous Power and can dilate and contract that round hole in it which is called the Pupil of the Eye for the better moderating the transmission of light Fourthly The inside of the uvea is blacked like the Wall of a Tennis-Court the raies falling upon the Retina again for such a repercussion would make the sight more confused Fifthly The Tanica Arachnoides which invellops the Chrystalline Humour by vertue of its Processus Ciliaros can thrust forward or draw back that precious useful part of the Eye as the nearness or distance of the objects shall require Sixthly and lastly The Tunica Retina is white for the better and more true reception of the species of things as they ordinarily call them as white paper is fittest to receive those Images into a dark room and the eye is already so perfect that I believe it is not needful to speak any more thereof we being able to move our head upwards and downwards and on every side might have unawares thought our selves sufficiently well provided for but Nature hath added Muscles also to the Eyes that no perfection might be wanting for we have oft occasion to move our Eyes our Heads being unmoved as in reading and viewing more particularly any object set before us and that this may be done with more ease and accuracy she hath furnished that Organ with no lesse then six several Muscles and indeed this framing of Muscles not onely in the Eye but in the whole body is admirable for is it not a wonder that even all our flesh should be so handsomly formed and contrived into distinct pieces whose rise and insertions should be with such advantage that they do serve to move some part of the body or other and that the parts of our body are not moved onely so conveniently as wil serve us to walk and subsist by but that they are able to move every way imaginable that will advantage us for we can fling out Legs and Arms upwards and downwards backwards forwards and round as they that spin or would spread a Mole-hill with their feet To say nothing of Respiration the constriction of the Diaphragme for the keeping down the Guts and so enlarging the Thorax that the Lungs may have play and the assistance of the inward intercostal Muscles in deep suspirations when we take more large gulps of air to cool our heart over-charged with love or sorrow nor of the curious Fabrick of the Lainix so well fitted with Muscles for the modulation of the Voice tunable speech and delicious singing You may adde to these the notable contrivance of the Heart it s two ventricles and its many valvulae so fram'd and scituated as is most fit for the reception and transmission of the blood and it 's sent thence away warm to comfort and cherish the rest of the body for which purpose also the valvulae in the veins are made But we see by experience that joy and grief proceed not in all men from the same causes and that men differ very much in the constitution of the body whereby that which helpeth and furthereth vital constitution in one and is therefore delightful hindereth crosseth it in another and therefore causeth grief The difference therefore of Wits hath its original from the different passions from the ends to which the appetite leadeth them As for that difference which ariseth from sickness and such accidental distempers I have appointed them for the second Part of this Book and therefore I omit the same as impertinent to this place and consider it onely in such as have their health perfection of body and Organs well disposed CHAP. II. Of the perfection of the Body and then of the Nature of the Senses of Delight Pain Love Hatred sensual Delight and Pains of the Body Joy and Grief OTher things I have to say but I will rather insist upon such things as are easie ahd intelligible even to Idiots or such Physicians that are no wiser who if they can but tell the Joints of their hands or know the use of their teeth they may easily discover it was Counsel not Chance that created them and if they but understand these natural Medecines I have prepared in this Book for their example they will know that they shall be cured of all Diseases without pain or any great cost and Love not
Money was it that made me undertake this Task Now of the well-fram'd parts of our body I would know why we have three joints in our Legs and Arms as also in our fingers but that it was much better then having but two or four And why are our fore-teeth sharp like Chizzels to cut but our inward teeth broad to grind but this is more exquisite then having them all sharp or all broad or the fore-teeth broad and the other sharp but we might have made a hard shift to have lived though in that worser condition Again Why are the Teeth so luckily placed or rather Why are there not Teeth in other bones as well as in the Jaw-bones for they might have been as capable as these But the reason is Nothing is done foollshly nor in vain I will shew you how to prolong life and to return from age to youth and how to change alter and amend the state of the body but that I intend in a Treatise entituled The Wise Mans Crown To keep the body in perfect health is my present design and to cure all Diseases without reward for there is a Divine Providence that orders all things Again to say nothing of the inward curiosity of the Ear Why is that outward frame of it but that it is certainly known that it 's for the bettering of our hearing I might add That Nature hath made the hind-most parts of our body which we sit upon most fleshy as providing for our ease making us a Natural Cushion as well as for Instruments of Motion for our Thighs and Legs she hath made the hinder part of the Head more strong as being otherwise unfenced against falls and other casualties She hath made the Backbon of several Vertebrae as being more fit to bend more tough and less in danger of breaking then if they were all one intire bone without those gristly Junctures She hath strengthened our fingers and toes with Nailes whereas she might have sent out that substance at the end of the first and second Joints which had not been so handsom and useful nay rather somewhat troublesome and hurtful And lastly She hath made all bones devoid of sense because they were to bear the weight of themselves and of the whole body and therefore if they had had sense our life had been painful continually and dolorous And now I have considered the fitness of the parts of mans bodie for the good of the whole let me but consider briefly his sences and his nature and then I intend more solidly to demonstrate the cause of all Diseases and with that the Cure because I intend a Method of Rosie Crucian Physick promised in my way to Blisse By our several Organs we have several Conceptions of several qualities in the objects for by sight we have a conception or image composed of colour and figure which is all the notice and knowledge the object imparteth to us of its nature by the excellency of the eye By Hearing we have a conception called Sound which is all the knowledge we have of the quality of the object from the Ear And so the rest of the Sences are also conceptions of several qualities or natures of their objects Because the Image in vision consisting of colour and shape is the knowledge we have of the qualities of the object of that Sence it is no hard matter for a man to fall into this opinion That the same colour shape are the very qualities themselves and for the same cause that sound noise are the qualities of a piece of Canon or Culvering charged with sulphurous Powder fired or of the Air And this opinion hath been so long received that the contrary must needs appear a great Paradox The same qualities are easier in a bell and yet the introduction of species visible and intelligible which is necessary for the maintenance of that opinion passing to and fro from the object is worse then any Paradox as being a plain impossibility I shall therefore endeavor to make plain these points That the subject wherein colour and image are inherent is not the object or thing seen That there is nothing really which we call an Image or Colour That the said Image or Colour is but an apparation unto us of the motion agitation or alteration which the object worketh in the brain or spirits or some internal substance of the Head That as in vision so also in conceptions that arise from the other senses the subject of their inherence is not the object but the continent That conceptions and apparitions are nothing really but motion in some internal substance of the Head which motion not stopping there of necessity must there either help or hinder the motion which is called Vital when it helpeth it is called Delight Contentment or Pleasure which is nothing really but motion about the heart as conception is nothing but motion in the head and the objects that cause it are called Pleasant or Delightful and the same Delight with reference to the object is called Love but when such motion weakneth or hindreth the vital motion then it is called Pain and in relation to that which causeth it Hatred There are two sorts of pleasures whereof one seemeth to affect the corporeal Organ of the sence and that I call sensual the greatest part whereof is that by which we are invited to give continuance to our species and the next by which a man is invited to meat for preservation of his individual person The other sort of Delight is not particularly any part of the body and is called The Delight of the mind is that which we call Joy Likewise of pains some affect the body and are therefore called The pains of the body and some not and those are called grief CHAP. III. Of the nature of the Soul of Man whether she be a meer Modification of the body or a Substance really distinct and then whether corporeal or incorporeal and of the temper of the bodie HEre I am forced to speak what I have in my Familiar Spirit and it is not impertinent to my purpose therefore if we say that the soul is a meer modification of the body the soul then is but one universal faculty of the body or a many faculties put together and those operations which are usually attributed unto the soul must of necessity be attributed unto the body I demand therefore To what in the body will you attribute spontaneous motion I understand thereby a power in our selves of wagging or holding still most of the parts of our body as our hand suppose or little finger If you will say that it is nothing but the immission of the spirits into such and such Muscles I would gladly know what does immit these spirits and direct them so curiously is it themselves or the brains or that particular piece of the brain they call the Pine-Kernel What ever it be that which doth thus immit them and direct them must have
and light differing onely in this that the one is pure and the other perturbed light by that which hath been said not onely the truth of the third proposition but also the whole manner of producing light and colour is apparent As colour is not inherent in the object but an effect thereof upon us caused by such motion in the object as hath been described so neither is sound in the thing we hear but in our selves one manifest sign thereof is That as man may see so also he may hear double trebble by multiplication of Ecchoes which Ecchoes are sounds as well as the Original and not being in one and the same place cannot be inherent in the body that maketh them nothing can make any thing which is not in it self the Clapper of a Bell hath no sound in it but motion and maketh motion in the internal parts of the Bell so the Bell hath motion and not sound that imparteth motion to the air and the aire hath motion but not sound the air imparteth motion by the ear and nerve unto the Brain and the Brain hath motion but not sound from the Brain it reboundeth back into the Nerves outward and thence it becommeth an Apparition without which we call sound And to proceed to the rest of the sences it is apparent enough that the smell and taste of the same thing are not the same to every man and therefore are not in the thing smelt or tasted but in the men so likewise the heat we feel from the fire is manifestly in us and is quite different from the heat which is in the fire for our heat is pleasure or pain according as it is great or moderate but in the cool there is no such thing By this the last is proved viz. that as in vision so also in Conceptions that arise from other senses the subject of their inherence is not in the object but in the Sentinent And from hence also it followeth that whatsoever accidents or qualities our sences make us think there be in the world they be not there but are seeming and apparitions only the things that really are in the world without us are those motions by which these seemings are caused and this is the great deception of sence which also is to be by sence corrected for as sence telleth me when I see directly that the colour seemeth to be in the object so also sence telleth me when I see by reflection that colour is in the object But now I am out of the way from the outward Creation of Man in whom there is a principle of more fine and reflexive reason which hangs on though not in that manner in the more perfect kinde of Brutes as sence also loth to be curbed with too narrow compass layes hold upon some kinde of plants as in those sundry sorts of Zoophyta but in the rest there are no further footsteps discovered of an animadversive forme abiding in them yet there be the effects of an inadvertent forme {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} of materiated or incorporated Art or seminal Reason I say it is no uneven jot to pass from the more faint and obscure example of Spermatical life to the more Considerable effects of general Motion in Mineralls Metalls nor yet to say any thing of the Medicines extracted mortified fixt dissolv'd and incorporated with their proper Veagles because we have intended it our last business to return to Mineralls Mettals and sundry Meteors whose easie and rude shapes have no need of any particular principle of life or Spermatical form distinct from the rest or motion of the particles of the matter But there is that curiosity of form and beauty in the more noble kinde of Plants bearing such a sutableness and harmony with the more refined sence and sagacity of the soul of Man that he cannot choose his intellectual touch being so sweetly gratified by what it deprehends in such like objects but acknowledge that some hidden cause much a-kin to his own nature that is intellectual is the contriver and perfecter of these so pleasant spectacles in the world Nor is it at all to the purpose to object that this business of Beauty and comeliness of proportion is but a conceit because some men acknowledge no such thing and all things are alike handsome to them who yet notwithstanding have the use of their eyes as well as other folks for I say this rather makes for what we aim at that Pulchritudo is conveyed indeed by the outward sences unto the soul but a more intellectual faculty is that which relishes it as an Astrologicall or better a Geometricall Scheam is let in by the eyes but the Demonstration is discern'd by Reason And therefore it is more rational to affirm that some intellectual principle was the Author of this Pulchritude of things then that they should be thus fashion'd without the help of that principle And to say there is no such thing as Pulchritude and some say there is no way to felicity The first I answer is because some mens souls are so dull and stupid And the second is that they never knew The way to bliss The first cannot relish all objects alike in that respect The second knows not Happiness nor the way to long life nor the means to Health nor how to return from Age to Youth c. which is as absurd and groundless as to conclude there is no such thing as Reason and Demonstration because a natural fool cannot reach unto it But that there is such a thing as The way to Bliss Long life and a certain way to Health not as yet known in England I will demonstrate in a Treatise by it self The way to Health I shall shew you anon in this book the rest in another Part as I promised you Now that there is such a thing as Beauty and that it is acknowledged by the whole generations of men to be in Trees flowers and fruits and the adorning of buildings in all Ages is an example and undenyable testimony for what is more and ordinary with them then taking in flowers and fruitage for the garnishing of their work Besides I appeal to any man that is not sunk into so forlorne a pitch of Degeneracy that he is as stupid to these things as the basest of Beasts whether for example a rightly cut Tetraeâ—rum cube or Icosaâ—drum have no more pulchritude in them then any rude broken sâ—one lying in the field or high-wayes Or to name other solid Figures which though they be not regular properly so called yet have a setled Idea Nature as a Cone Sphere or Cylinder whether the sight of these do not gratifie the mindes of men more and pretend to more elegancy of shape then those rude cuttings or chippings of free-stone that fall from the Masons hands and serve for nothing but to fill up the middle of the wall and so to be hid from the eyes of Man for their ugliness And
it is observable That if Nature shape any thing neer this Geometrical accuracy that we take notice of it with much content and pleasure as if it be but exactly round as there be abundance of such stones upon Mesque a hill in Arabia I have seen them there or ordinarily Quinquangular or have the sides but parallels though the Angles be unequal as is seen in some little stones and in a kinde of Alablaster found here in England and other pretty stones found upon Bulverton-hill neer Sidmouth in Devonshire and neer Stratford upon Avon and in Tyms Grove at Colton in Warwickeshire are found such stones that grow naturally carved with various works some with Roses others with Lyons Eagles and all manner of delightfull works These stones I say gratifie our sight as having a nearer cognation with the soul of man that is rational and intellectual and therefore is well pleased when it meets with any outward object that fits and agrees with those congenite Ideas her own nature is furnished with For Symmemetry Equality and Correspondency of parts is the discernment of Reason not the object of Sence as I have in another place proved Now therefore it being evident that there is such a thing as Beauty Symmetry and Comeliness of proportion to say nothing of the delightful mixture of colours and that this is the proper object of the Understanding and Reason for these things be not taken notice of by the Beasts I think I may safely inferre that whatsoever is the first and principal cause of changing the fluid and undeterminated Matter into shapes so comely and symmetrical as we see in flowers and trees is an understanding Principle and knowes both the nature of man and of those objects he offers to his sight in this outward and visible world and would have man search and finde out those secrets by the which he might keep his body in health many hundreds of years and at last find the way to Bliss for these things cannot come by chance or by a Multiranious attempt of the parts of the matter upon themselves for then it were likely that the species of things though some might hit right yet most would be maimed and ridiculous but now there is not any ineptitude in any thing which is a sign that the fluidnesse of the matter is guided and determined by the overpowering counsel of an eternall mind If it were not needlesse I might instance in sundry kinds of flowers herbs and trees but these objects being so obvious and every mans fancy being brauched with the remembrance of Roses Marigolds Gelliflowers Pionies Tulips Pausies Primroses the leaves and clusters of the Vine c. Of all which you must confess that there is in them beauty and symetry and use in Physick and gratefull proportion I hold it superfluity to weary you with any longer induction but shall pass on to those considerations behind of their seed signaure and usefullness and shall pass through them very briefly and then I shall come to minerall Medicines these observables being very necessary first to be known by way of an Introduction and as ordinary and easily Intelligible CHAP. VI Of the Seeds and Signatures of Plants and wherefore GOD made them EVery plant hath its seed Rosie Crucians therefore say there are secret Mysteries lye hidden in them which should be our delight to find out for Divine Providence made all good for the use of man And this being no necessary result of the motion of the matter as the whole contrivance of the plant indeed is not and it being of great consequence that they have Seed for the continuance of propagation of their whole Species and for the gratifying of mans Art also industry and necessitie for much of Husbandry and Gardening lies in this it cannot but be the Act of Counsel to furnish the several kinds of Plants with their Seeds especially the Earth being of such a nature that though at first for a while it might bring forth all manner of Plantts as some will have it also to have brought forth all kinds of Animals yet at last it would grow so sluggish that without the advantage of those small compendious principles of generation the Grain of Seed would yeild no such births no more then a Pump grown dry will yeild any Water unless you pour a little Water into it first and then for so many Basons full you may fetch up as many Tankards full Nor is it material to object that stinking Weeds and poysonous Plants bear Seed too as well as the most pleasant and useful for even those stinking Weeds and poysonous Plants have their use in Rosie Crucian Physick as you shall know hereafter besides our common Physick-Mongers often use them as their Fancy guides them grounded upon no other reason then woful and deadly experience sometimes the industry of man is exercised by them to weed them out where they are hurtful which reasons if they seeme sleight let us but consider that if humane industry had nothing to conflict and struggle with the fire of mans spirit would behalf extinguished in the flesh and then we shall acknowledge that that which I have alledged is not so contemptible nor invalid But secondly Who knows but it is so with poysonous Plants as vulgarly is fancyed concerning Toads and other poysonous Serpents that lick the Venom from off the Earth So poysonous Plants may well draw to them all the Maligne Juice and nourishment that the other may be more pure and defaecate as there are Recepticles in the body of man and Emunctories to drain them of superfluous Choler and Melancholy c. Lastly It is very well known by them that know any thing in Nature and Physick That those Herbs that the rude and ignorant would call Weeds are the materials of very soveraign Medicines that Aconitum Hyemale or Winter Wolfs bain that otherwise is rank poyson is reported to prevail mightily against the biting of Vipers Scorpions and mad dogs which Sir Christopher Heydon assenteth unto and that that plant that bears death in the very Name of it Solanum Lethiferum prevents death by procuring sleep if it be ayplyed in a Fever nor are those things to be deemed uprofitable say the Rosie Crucians whose use our heavy ignorance will not let us understand but they will teach us as followeth We come now to the signatures of plants which indeed respects us more properly and adaequately then the other and is a Key as Rosie Crucians say to enter man into the knowledge and use of the Treasures of nature I demand therefore Whether it be not a very easie and Genuine inference from the observing that several herbs are marked with some mark or sign that intimates their vertue what they are good for and there being such a creature as man in the World that can read understand these signs and characters hence to collect that the Author both of man and them knew the nature of them