a straite and most sure way to the highest Wisdome of Divine and humane Things For in these Three principall Poynts also consisteth the whole Foundation of the Magicall and Cabalisticall Art as appeareth by Paracelsus in his third book of the Signature of Things We are not to ascribe our bodily health to the Physitian but to God Mark this O ye Physitians who slight and undervalue God like the Heathen whereas he onely healeth all our sicknesses also ye regard not the appoynted time according to the Divine Will but proudly and rashly promise a set and certaine time of recovery which is to be left to God onely Honour and Praise and Glory therefore belongeth to the Creator who worketh all in all for the desired successe of his Medicine or Word which he hath given But to the Physitian who is the obedient Minister of God and Nature there is no other reward due but that of his faithfull paines and Charity in that by his hand as an Instrument he hath duely administred the power which he received from God to miserable and needy mortalls that so he may not usurp to himselfe those things that belong onely to God For there is nothing at all of his own in it besides Art and right preparation whose good will not his help is to be respected God who alone is to be praised and blessed in all and over all will not give his Honour to another and because he giveth all he also will have and take againe all unto himselfe Neverthelesse the true and sincere Physitian who among all arts and faculties is most accepted of God is to be honoured as the Scripture commandeth First because God worketh and doth his own will by him as by his Minister when he sleepeth and knoweth it not by affording Physick enough from the Earth and his Word from above without which nothing can be efficacious to our health For without me John 15. saith our Saviour ye can nothing Secondly because Health being the greatest Good to men he ought to excell all mortalls in the search and knowledge of Nature and the Light thereof Not in vaine therefore did Homer require a Physitian to be furnished with all knowledge in respect of those small cures which he is to doe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thirdly because he alone manifesteth to all the wonderfull works of God both in the great and little world so that through the Physitian the Praise and Glory of God may passing much be heightned and extolled not onely by opening his mysteryes and hidden secrets but also by curing the sick Therefore among all Sciences and Faculties Physick is to be accounted the most excellent wherein the greatest wonders of God are miraculously seen It taketh its rise from Theology or the Light of Grace and endeth in the Light of Nature CHAP. III. How the True Physick which is covered bark and rind is to be got out and rightly prepared by Fire The Physitian perfecteth the Creature of God by Fire ALL things in respect of the first matter were created perfect but the Chymist perfecteth the last matter by Fire because nothing in this lower world which is subject to generation and corruption is so noble but hath Poyson in it selfe and in respect of another very near the Essence or Physick In all the chiefe works of God where there is hurt there is also help where there is venome there is vertue Therefore nothing was created in vaine but all things for some use For so hath Nature ordained that Good and Evill Eccl. 39.26 c. which the sublunary Elements bring forth should alwayes be joyned together in all things to put us dayly in mind of the Fear of God As soon as the Omnipotent gave Power to Man presently he raised up an enemy least the Power growing lazy should loose its Natureâ— saith Firmianus Nil ex omni propte beâ—um So that as the Poet said nothing is in every respect happy that man partaker of the Divine Nature and Lord of all living creatures should be vexed with Ghosts and hurryed with Furies The severe Justice of God is the disease venome in all things on the contrary the Mercy of God is the Physick in Nature and in all things Wisd 18.15 16. Eccl. 39. 33.14 15. Roger Bacon the English Phylosopher saith that God who made Darknesse and Light in the same place or thing where of his MERCY he appoynted plenty of Physick even there also by the power of his incomprehensible Justice he substituted Poyson to guard it Thistles and prickles of Roses the inseperable companions and avengers of transgressions Good cannot be known but by evill and the Enemy being discovered the danger may be avoyded Thus also Holy Hermes the most Ancient Divine together with Ecclesiasticus writeth in his Key that all sublunary things ought to consist of contraposition and contrariety and this after another manner may be of things Impossible in respect of the generation and corruption of things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All things that are awlesse are also lawlesse nor can Man any other way attaine to the highest pitch unlesse he resolve constantly to maintaine the good fight that is finished in faelicity Eccl. 3.14.7.15 Eccl. 42.25 The cause of Simpathy and Antipathy For so God by his Wisdome hath ordained that Sympathy and Antipathy should be alike good by which spectacle of Nature he would stir up mortall men to contemplate and search out his secrets that if one man hate another he that is hated might cover and cure the defect of the malicious For which cause Heraclitus called Nature the daughter of War and Homer called it Contention Man is his own enemy the Cause of dissolution and death in this our Kingdome divided in it selfe the intestine duell for in the little world the body there lurketh perpetuall strife in it lyeth hid the preserver and destroyer of health in which regard the Saints have called the mortall body Hell and Purgatory wherein continuall war is to be made Eccl. 38.15 Therefore seeing the Anotomy of Death findeth entertainment in the whole State of our Life Nature hath commanded the Physitians to be ministers and to seperate not masters to compose For our Remedies require preparations separations and exaltations before they can impart their hidden and restrained vertues As all things are proved by Fire so also the Tryall of the knowledge of Physick is to be made by Fire Physick and Chymistry cannot be separated For Chymistry not that which Mountebanks use to paint Faces with to make them White and Red doth make manifest not onely the true Simples Wonders Secrets Mysteries Vertues Forces respecting health but also in imatation of the Archaeon Ventricle or Naturall In-bred Chymist it teacheth to segregate every mystery into into its own reservacle and to free the medicines from those scurvy raggs wherein they were wrapt up by a due separation from the impurities and corruptible and
THEOPHRASTê° PARACELSUS †The lively Portraiture of the most famous and profound Philosopher and Physition Aureolê° Philippus Theophrastus Paracelsus Bombast of Hohenheim who was Poysned the 47th yeare of his age PHILOSOPHY Reformed Improved IN Four Profound TRACTATES THE I. Discovering the Great and Deep Mysteries of Nature By that Learned Chymist Physitian OSW CROLLIVS THE OTHER III. Discovering the Wonderfull Mysteries of the Creation BY PARACELSVS BEING His Philosophy to the ATHENIANS Both made English by H. PINNELL for the increase of Learning and true Knowledge LONDON Printed by M. S. for Lodowick Lloyd at the Castle in Cornhill 1657. THE Translators APOLOGY Caution and Retraction READER THOV art sick in body or soule or both t is the gracious care of thy mercifull Creator to prepare and apply means for the Cure of them both It is and ought to be thy duty principally to respect the more worthy and give all diligence to attend the most noble part of thy selfe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dead bones and rottennesse are but such and no better in a painted Sepulchre whatever be neglected let not thy soul run to ruine Thou hast plenty of provision set before thee starve not at a feast of fat things if it be not dish'd out in the best fashion forsake not good meat for the Cooks unskilfulnesse Indeed the princely dainties of this royall banquet call for a neater hand to carve them abroad and I for manners sake have a great while excused the service ut detur digniori prefering and proffering it to some of greater abilities more fit to have undertaken it which if they had accepted these incomparable Mysteries and unsearchable Truths had been more Chymically prepared and not offer'd to thee in the grosse body of so dull a language This onely I have for my Apology viz. that I have been more carefull to be faithfull than curious not striving so much to trim the garment as to proportion it to the body if others would have shew'd their skill I had not been censured for a bungler But Reader I am not so intent to make my own excuse as to leave thee altogether without a Caution what therefore that most profound Teutonick Philosopher Jacob Behmen somewhere in his writings saith to his Reader that I counsell thee viz. if thy mind be not spirituall forbear to read these things for they will doe thee more hurt than good if thou art not illuminated in the true Mysterie of Emanuel if thou know not the extent of the Incarnate Word if thou understand not the Angelicall ascent and descent on Jacobs ladder how canst thou cast thy suffrage into that Seraphicall acclamation Holy Holy Holy is the Lord of hosts Isa 6.3 the whole earth is full of his glory Let no carnall mind cling to the posts of Wisdom's house or come near the gates of her Temple The Oratories of old were by Oraculous care guarded from prophanesse with this inscription over the doors Ite profani Fanum est Fanum nihil ingrediatur profanum this place is holy let no filthy thing come into it I may say of this following Preface it is Holy let no carnall mind profane or pervert it The learned and Religious Author would have thee wise unto salvation that thou mayst be saved from thy own wisdome thy greatest enemy I cannot say whether he was a better Physitian or Divine whether he may doe thy body more good or thy soul sure I am his Prescriptions may well be called Basilica Chymica Royall Receipts being the rare Extracts of the most choyce spirituall Truths out of the grosse body of naturall Things Bear with the prolixity of his Introduction the rest will recompence thy patience I once thought to have abridg'd it but durst not meddle with so good a Symmetry I have sent it abroad without any alteration but what a German hath by a garment of the English fashion The best Physicall Method in order to thy Eternall welfare is here observed the maine scope and principall intention being first to rectifie the Archeus of the inner Man that it may attract health from the heavenly Iliaster and distribute the same to all the faculties of thy soul and members of thy body then to prostigate and chastise the peccant humors of thy outward and naturall man and all through the Grace of God revealed in the great mysteries of the Incarnation Life Death Resurrection Ascension Mediatorship c. of our blessed Lord and Redeemer Jesus Christ Let it not offend thee at which many have stumbled and fallen that the Father and the Son should be so nigh unto thee in All Things that God and Christ should condescend and humble themselves to walk before thee Rom. 1.20 and with thee and in thee that things Invisible should be seen in Visible things Vniversus mundus nihil â—liud cumque It was the common faith of the Ancients both Ecclesiasticall and Profane Deus explicatus Athenagoras Prefente monstrat quaelibet herba Deum that the Creation is but the Revelation of the Creator May God be seen in all things and not Christ also by whom they were made The Gentles that knew God might also have known Christ had they been obedient Hos 6.3 John 6.4 if we follow the Father he will draw us to the Son All things call loud unto us to behold the mysterie of the Father and the Son to hear their voyce and cry shame upon us that we hearken not nor obey The wicked heart saith to God Depart Job 21.14 22.17 18. though he filleth his house with good things The corne and wine and oyle the silver and gold which God multiplyeth unto men they prepare for Baal and spend that upon their Lusts Hos 2.8 which should be motives of their love Psal 19.2 Act. 14.17 Times and seasons are the faithfull Tutors and witnesses of God but men regard not their doctrine nor receive their testimony The bruitish man doth not know Psal 92.5 6. nor doth the fool understand the deep thoughts of God in his great Works but the wise in heart that take pleasure in his works they search and find them out these seek till they have found the Pearl in the field the Messias Mat. 13.44 45. the Christ of God in the things that are made and these shall understand the loving kindnesse of the Lord. Psal 107 43. 111.2 Oh the blindness of the men of this world whose minds the god of this world hath so blinded that though the true God be in all his works which men may see and behold afar off yet they magnifie him not Job 36.24 25. The Lord Jesus Christ the true and onely Wisdome of God Prov. 1.20 21. 8.1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 c. cryeth without and uttereth his voyce in the streets in the chiefe place of concourse in the opening of the gates in the city in the top of high places by
are digged out of the Earth For the Astrum of every Element brings forth and bayes its fruits in a strange region or matrix By a singular Providence all things seem to tend to the Earth and to further its fruitfulnesse Thus the fruits of the Firmament are perfected in the Aire and from hence imparted to the lower Globe as Snow which is bred of Fire is found in the Aire and Earth The fruits of the Aire proceed from the Centre to the Circumference and there attaine to coagulation and perfection The Seeds of the Water doe bring forth in the inner part of the Earth and from thence tend to the superfices or outside For the Earth wherein we live and flourish bringeth forth its fruits into this Circumference for the corne that grows in the Earth is reaped upon the Earth in the Aire so the procreations of all the Elements doe voluntarily and earnestly bend toward Man-kind as to their desired limit and by a liberall supply of moysture doe cherish all the parts of Nature So also we see that by an imutable decree of Eternall Law it comes to passe and is so ordered that the Water doth not bring forth more then the Earth can bring up Astrers saith that the Aire was created befoâ—e any Creature All mâ—yst things â—tâ—râ—cted by the Sun from the Eâ—â—â—h are consumed in the Aire whose fruits are the likeness of the Tereâ—iâ—biâ— or far of Manna the Aire cherish and the Fire consume The Aire also is twofold for it hath its Element as an Inhabitant in it selfe It is the Balsam of all created things and the life of the other three Elements nor is there any Element that God created more subtle or thin which liveth of it selfe and giveth life to all without which neither Firmament nor Water nor Earth can bring forth their fruits the Fire cannot so much as burne without the Aire much lesse can the coales of Heaven those Crescences of Fire shine The Element of Fire according to Paracis the Firmament of Heaven The Firmament or Fire is likewise is twofold and hath its own Element as an Inhabitant in it selfe which Element hath in it all Astra's and Seeds The Element of Fire or the Corporeall Firmament sends the bodies of the Stars Sun Moon and Planets out of it selfe For as hearbs flowers trees did grow out of the Earth and yet remaine in the Earth so at the Creation did the bodies of the Stars grow out of Heaven and yet abide in the Firmament or Heaven swiming in their Orbs as birds fly in the Aire The twelve Caelestiall Signes in the Zodiak with the other Stars of Heaven are the fruits of Fire and come from the invisible Astra's of Fire By how much the Firmament is more subtle or thin then the Earth by so much the fruits thereof are more subtle and operative then the fruits of the other three Elements Thus the seven Rulers of the world are nothing else but the fruits of Fire As the flowers in earth shew the Colours of the Stars so the constellations in Heaven shew the field or meadow of the Earth which fruits are separated from the Element of Fire and by separation doe increase as flowers and hearbs in the Earth onely the flowers of the Earth abide immovable in their place but the Stars doe not so in the Firmament for they move up and down in the Firmament and those Sphaericall bodies doe by the Providence of God swim in their Orbs as fish in the water or a feather in the Aire and are nourished by the Heaven These like all other created things are twofold we see their visible body as a shining light the invisible Astrum or Sydereall Spirit in the Stars we cannot see so that not the body of the Sun but the Spirit in the body is the Sun properly the like also may be said of Man Moreover the four Astra's of the said Elements are the Seeds in the four matrices or wombs and always two are together and in one to wit the Body and Astrum the invisible and visible The Bodily growes out of the Spirituall and abideth in it and so the invisible vertues Seeds and Astra's are propagated into many Millions through the corporeall Visible body as fire increaseth in wood or in convenient and fit matter one Fire alwayes proceedeth from another Angels cannot increase themselves because they want a body but Man may because he hath a one All things that grow as hearbs trees fishes birds living creatures may augment themselves by the help of the body after this manner for the Seed or Astrum can doe nothing without the body so soon as ever the Seed or Astrum dies and rots in its matrix or womb the Astrum goes forward into a new body and multiplyeth it selfe as Christ himselfe sets it forth by a similitude and example in a graine of Wheat John 12.24 and afterward bringeth forth much fruit or many grains which in time come to have the same power or virtue that the former had out of which they grew Putrefaction consumeth and separateth the old Nature and bringeth new fruit Therefore Eternall life cannot be in any but where the body is first dead because death is the cause of the glorifying of the body in eternall Life as Corruption is the cause of the new generation of a Divine substance 'T is necessary that the first life of hearbs and medicines should die that the second life by the Chymists help may be attained through Putrefaction and Regeneration wherein the Three First discover themselves with their hidden vertues which are necessary for a Phisitian to know for without Regeneration no hid Secret of Physick can be attained to which is without all complexion of qualities When the externall World is known the Phylosophicall Physitian doth also understand the Physicall body of Man which is nourished from the Earth and Sydereall body which liveth by the Firmament he sees that the Physicall body is nothing else but Sulphur Salt and Mercury for all bodily things are contained in these Three as hath been said a little before and that the things that grow doe not spring from the four visible Bodies nor from the four humors but out of the invisible Seed as an hearb or tree groweth out of its seed The Anotomy of the diseases of the body is to be fercâ—â—c from the internall Astra's or impressions which cause the diseases and is more necessary for a Physitian them that Locall Anot of Carkasses It is not the Locall Anotomy of a man and dead corpses but the Essentiated and Elemented Anotomy of the World and man that discovereth the disease and cure The Members or parts of the great world are the Remedies of the members and parts of man by an agreement between the externall and internall Anotomy not setling one degree against another As there is but one Anotomy of a man and a woman so the Anotomy of the diseases and of the medicines
filthy mixture of superficiall and externall Elements that that pure and Christiline matter may be administred to our bodies But to deliver this from prison and captivity Hoc opus hic labor est is a hard task to performe It is an honorable Calling when the Physitians live long and are not idle in it for without this Chymicall Phylosophy all Physick is but livelesse Without Alchymicall skill there can be no Speculative or Practick Physick He that rejecteth that knowledge being disheartned by the difficulty thereof shall never find where the disease lyeth In this therefore our common sort of Physitians are not to be followed who patronize their sloth under other mens paines and study and use to leave the preparation of their medicines most commonly to some carelesse and covetous Apothecary to the great dammage of their Patients I speake not against the conscientious Apothecaries who by their trusty diligence serve the Common Wealth as the Alchymy of Vulcan By this artificall resolution of bodyes the propertyes which before layd in the compositions of them are now brought to light By it also as by a certaine kinde of artificiall Tynosure or figures of stars the Chymists have not only made curtaines extending to all the borders of Nature but also to the very admiration contemplation and perseption of the whole Creature and of every obstruce vertue thereof and have attained to a noble knowledge in most things and not without cause Therefore a Physitian should be exercised much in this true Analysis and vitall Anatomy of bodies as hath been said because there is no constant quality of any body which is not to be found either in the Salt or Mercury or Sulphur of the same body Vegetables comprehend plants trees Zoophyts Animalls are the beasts in their order creeping swimming flying four footed creatures But first all compound bodies of the inferiour Globe are to be distributed into three orders or companies into Animalls Vegetables and Mineralls the individualls of all these and the parts of the individualls are diligently to be examined and so we shall find out the notable differences of the three First things viz. Salt Sulphur and Mercury in every particular order For in the shop of Nature there is Animall Vegetable Minerall Salt Animall vegetable minerall Sulphur vegetable animall minerall Mercury The first face of Things was pure sound perfect without corruption and death For the great and all working God for his infinite glory sake created all things good by his Will that all things might glorifie him and live holily and incorruptably according to the prescribed order Man at first was created healthy sicknesse entred by the Woman not by the Man but when he came into the world he found out an entrance unto death because there appeared two contraries the externall corruptable and the internall compleat which could not long continue in one without unavoydable corruption Therefore after the transgression and fall from unity to alterity by the curse of God new Tinctures came in even infinite evills by whose mixture with the miserable state of our life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 together with that troublesome companion the world the beauty of the whole Creature was transplanted The transplantation of the Creature is by the calamity and coming in of sicknesse upon it since the Fall me carry in their own bosome their enemy both of creation and propagation which causeth sicknesse and death by inbred contrariety and corruption Impurity was joyned to the pure roots which was the predestination of diseases For the roots of sicknesses in certaine individuall or species doe not consist apart by themselves but are implanted and mixt in the pure and first seeds of things but the nourishments of Naturall things are the fruits of those seeds which spring up in the foure wombs or Elements Nature therefore as it is now gives us nothing that is pure in the world but hath mixed all things with many impurities that as by the spur of necessity it might often put us in mind that we should begin to learn the knowledge of Chymistry from our cradles that so long as we are shut out of Paradice into the subburbs of this world we ought to till and manure the EARTH to wit the whole frame of the world by admiration searching into and knowledge of both the Visible and Invisible Limus Earth and that we should labour to get our bread and other necessary things for this present life as Natures Labourers not lazily but in the sweat of our browes that by this means by laying the Crosse upon us which we should bear with patience it might stir up our industry in this LAND of LABOUR to attain the fruits of Terrene and Caelestiall Wisdome least base and sluggish idlenesse make us wax leane and pine away or because we are more prone to all kind of sin and vice by doing nothing we should learn to doe naughtily He that hath learned to know God himselfe hath ordered the Earth with good husbandry by â—oo much licentiousnesse men grow worse become like bruite beasts but idlenesse the pillow cushion of the Devill is removed by labour and diligence And this is the true end of Mans Creation that in the fear of God and love of his neighbor he should manage the Earth recovering what he hath lost and not be idle but walking iâ— the Light of Nature not after his own but according to the will of his Creator he should continue the Instrument Habitation and Tabernacle of God and that he should walk in the Wayes of the Lord for avoyding evill and idle thoughts that he should through Nature search out the wonderfull works of God by consideration of Temporall and Caelestiall observations thereby to make known the invisible works of God celebrating the infinite Wisdome Power and perpetuall Goodnesse of the Creator in admiration of his marvellous works wonders and mysteries which he hath revealed But to passe from Food let us come to Physick concerning which there is no man so sottish or stubborn unlesse he had rather eate the husk and shells with the kernell as the former and more rugged generations have done who will dislike this Separatory art which teacheth rightly to discerne and seperate the Good from the Bad the Profitable from the Unprofitable the Stupefactive from Fire the minerall Spirit from the Anthos or blossome the Homogeneans from the Heterogeneans Poyson from healing Medicines and Balsoms Light from Darknesse Life from Death Day from Night Visible from Invisible Putrefications onely are the true Correctives of all Physick As Death separateth eternall and perishing things so doth Fire the good from the bad the Quint-Essence from the body that which is pure Celestiall the kernall and Marrow from that which is Terrestrial Impure the Rinds and Membranes the Covers Shells Husks and dreggs the Coate aed Cottage of Physick which are enemyes to mans body from the Soul the Inhabitant thereof the Super-elementall
hand of God but if he be a wretched Miscreant and an Ignoramus what he giveth is to be lookt upon as poyson And though great part of Physitians who cheat us of other mens good things cannot indure that Physick with its preparations should premiscuously be imparted to all sorts of men for fear if it should be made common or as they say Prophaned they should lose their gaines for t is a foolish conceit of the frantick vulgar sort who think that a Secret looseth its vertue when t is made known Neverthelesse those greedy covetous gaine-getters will cease their murmuring and forbear to curse and wish my eyes out for my good will when they consider that neither God nor Nature hath made every man a Physitian Every one hath not the gift not is he fit to be a Physitian and though all experiences are secrets yet Novices know not the Dose and true quantity in which the vertue of Physick consisteth for if we take too much Saffron or Treacle it is poyson if too little it will doe no good Thus it will be the experience of the Physitian onely though he may rightly administer some known Physick to the Patient according to art and the methodicall and set proportion or quantity of the Dose to say nothing of other circumstances requisite to a godly learned Physitian as one saddle will not fit every horse nor can a child handle his weapon like a fencer That which is the proper duty of a sincere true and expert Physitian onely who is more religiously and holily instructed in the exhibition of their medicines they will follow the steps of pious and venerable antiquity and imitate that most commendable and religious custome of the Hermetick Physitians who always use to pray for a blessing upon their endeavours striving to be equall to those who will not take in hand the smallest matter without Divine Invocation Whosoever useth any Creature without craving a blissing God imputeth it to him for no other than theft and rapine Wee who professe CHRIST ought to administer in that Wonderfull Name of JESU for so the Doctor of the Gentiles commandeth the Colossians saying Whatsoever yee do in word or deed Col. 3.17 1 Cor. 10.31 do all in the NAME of the LORD JHSVH Christ giving thanks to him and to God by him Gods blessing is to be obtain'd by prayer Call upon me in the day of thy trouble I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorifie me saith our Creator First then before we give or take any Physick we are to pray to the good and great God that the Physick which he hath ordained as the meanes may work Divine and healthfull effects that his name may be glorified Secondly after we have recovered and made them well let us never cease to give him hearty thanks in respect of gratitude as it is to be considered in it selfe as a duty and for time to come to avoyd the heavy wrath of God against unthankfull men These two poynts are scarce thought of by most Physitians which is the chief cause of thier ill successe and then all the blame must be laid upon the Art It is also to be observed That as for example though a Cathartick medicine doth work equally effectually in a knave as it doth in an honest man which God permitteth for his praise and glory and to make his mercy known yet the end in both may be far different and unlike for it may be healthfull to the one and hurtfull to the other For what medicine soever it be that is administred and taken without imploring the Divine Grace Ecel 39.28 c. doth become a greater inconvenience of a more grievous disease that will certainly befall the impenitent unbeliever Here also it is to be considered that sometimes the sick person is not recovered by the best and fittest medicines that can be applyed and that for these eight causes Viz. Paracels lib. de resuscitatione naturalium sol 295. First Because the Terme of Life approacheth which cannot be prolong'd by any art or help of Man No Medicine can preserve the corruptible body from death the wages and punishment of sin but there is one thing that hindereth corruption reneweth youth and prolongeth the short life as in the Patriarchs But although as we shall shew anon the life may be shortned or lengthned yet by the immutable decree of the Eternall Law we must of necessity die at last in respect of the punishment of sin least with Plato we conclude a recesse after such a time for the conjunction of divers things necessarily implies a dissolution Our domestick enemy which we beat about usis the cause of our death The Curse in the Creature is removed by death Eccl. 10.11 14.18 41.5 And in this case the universall and chiefest medicine is of no effect because no industry or skill of Artist or Nature can perpetuate the wedlock of life and death which by an immutable necessity is destin'd to a divorce for the Laws of Nature are inviolable we are not therefore to desire much lesse may we think to find any help beyond that utmost bound which God hath set us Secondly Because through the ignorance of unskilfull Physitians and their naughty medicines the sick is brought to that passe that the disease is corrupt pernicious and incurable so that he cannot be repaired or recovered by good medicines And to such commonly the Chymists are sent for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whom Plutarch calls Physitians of Trophilus who said that he was a compleat Physitian who could judg what might be done and what not such never make use of their noble and undeserved Remedies with a vaunting ostentation to their disgrace when the sick is past all hope of mans help for it becomes a wise man to prevent an errour rather than repent of it Let them take heed also they mix not their own medicines with others poyson least the miscarriage be ascribed to the good and the recovery to the bad for it is a lamentable thing to see the cursed hatred of some Physitians who rather than they will allow another his due honour who is more able than themselves to maintaine their tottering credit will utterly cast away the Patient who might be recovered by anothers skill such as these men commonly and justly call Honest Hangmen Thirdly Because the Physitian is sent for too late when Nature is overcome and the disease hath got the mastery Otherwise if the Physitian had Seasonably cast fit leed of Physick into the sick mans body resisting the disease at first no doubt but by Gods blessing the expected fruit of health would have sprung up Fourthly Because the sick doth not follow directions For so it is many times that the sick layes the fault on the Physick or Physitian when he himselfe committed it by his disorderly living contrary to the Golden law of the Locrians recorded by Aelianus Fifthly Because some mens Natures or
should move the Intelligence or Soule of the Artist to a true Understanding that he may open to him what is hid in the magistery of this Art Blessed will he be to whom the Lord God shall be pleased to inspire the Gifts of his Grace For it is the Lord of Heaven who knoweth the heart of those in whom he would use the form measure Notwithstanding we see men somtimes offend not onely against God by their ingratitude but also against their undeserving neighbour by strange devices not becoming an Aedpt Phylosopher with which some eminent men heretofore and two publick Phylosophers of divers Nations in our time abusing the Gifts of God against those most horrid Anathema's of Phylosophers afterward as doubtlesse every man according to his dexterity which the sydereall spirit causeth and exciteth is the forger of his own fortune they came to dolefull and lamentable end to the perpetuall reproach of their Name answerable to the unworthy publishing of this most True Phylosophicall Art miserably wasted and restrained by the Wrath of GOD the Righteous Revenger as well for their arrogant pride punishment and repentance accompanying their provoking loquacity as also for their cheating Impostures of the first Hapocraticall silence The originall of the Philosophicall Magistery Most doe otherwise now who make thir boast among others that they have the clear knowledge of it when it is only but imaginary and so hinder themselves by their credulity and perswasion so that they cannot profit or proceed to learn any more which they did by turns to cloak the matter for their safety Those more ancient and skilfull Phylosophers who were born in a happy signe the children of Hermes who first found out the science among whom nothing was more ancient than Truth nothing more filthy and abominable than falshood and deceit and who have even judged it a thing more safely worth their labor to have it indeed without the witnesse of a sottish ignorant multitude then seeme or be supposed onely to have it who also have endeavoured to leave behind them an unspotted memory to posterity not as many too credulous imagine that being deceived with their own vaine imaginations they would deceive others in like manner which is not the property of an honest man In the first age of the world God made it known by the Light of Nature I say these private not publick Secretaries of Nature who have in the Naturall Light fresh and flourishing in them followed Reason the best guide according to the ability God gave them all of them with greatest attention both of body and mind pressing chiefly to one and the same end and scope of Virtue accounting nothing more glorious than that they might peaceably rejoyce prudently and in Quiet Silence with a Mind truly Sound in a Sound Body according to the Fear of God and Love of their Neighbour This is Phylosophy Adept which Paracelsus in the Tincture of Physicks explaineth them to be Long Life and free from all infirmity even till the Naturall death and an honest support of that long life in this vale of miseries that we might serve God without poverty and prejudice of our Neighbour Though there may be many hunting after this happinesse with a kind of great and continued greedinesse of mind yet have been perswaded that they should never attaine the same either by other means or any Arts but by a wonderfull and most abstruse comprehending of all the vertues of the whole Creation flowing and running together in one certaine masse in this Rode or Kings Highway and Phylosophical Reason is to be accomplished The defect of Nature must be supplyed by the industry of Art seeing Nature with her off-spring alway tendeth unto laboureth breatheth after their perfection Prov. 3.16 All these spirituall virtues and active qualities being by great help of ingenuity and Art like the lesser world heaped up together and concentred into one masse as united force is stronger dispersed besides a kind of sweetest and admirable illustration of the Mind for the Light of Nature is glittering in the Darknesse of the world as also the knowledge of all Naturall things and Heavenly seerets and a perfect operation yea they have even miraculously use of this choycest and admirable Magisterie together with a flowing plenty and Abundance of all Things Of which the Phylosophers our predecessors that have been train'd up in Hermes school They durst not under paine of Anathema to speak of it but in a picture of Aenigmaticall words because the Master of Nature gave them not leave lest they should indanger themselves and give an occasion to others of a wicked hurtfull study or practice Prov. 10.10 It exciteth motion in our bodies and reviveth the Elements now the Elements are excited unto their acting for the Naturall life is nothing else but the actings of the Elements though they have been altogether dumb in keeping close the secret of the Art by a constant Taciturnity knowing to what dangers the searchers out of difficult Arts and the publick Secretaries of Nature are obnoxious that full of despaire concerning their safety and peace they have been compelled to deny the same yet usually give this Reason because the greatest Medicine being artificially prepared with the help of wise Nature the Mistresse of Science should be or is the Life and inlightning Light and that which quickneth or maketh alive our Balsom that is the spirit or celestiall not visible vapour of life it may be the Essence of our Life the Fift Essence compounded of the four Elements in which are all the Elements actually and all their arts with greatest agreement made equall with true equation according to all possibility of Nature and bound together with a golden chaine without any contrariety But all things are aggregated in so subtile a Matter and a Form so subtile and so near to simplicity in a respective manner in the curing of diseases and the metamorphosis of Mettalls like as in Lightning and the eye of a Basilisk as is manifest by Experience This is so in respect of the four qualities of the body as the Heaven is incorruptible in respect of the four Elements The most High created this Fift Essence as the root of life in Nature for the preservation of the four qualities of the Humane body The life of natural things is the Union of the Ideall Light as also with the Ideall of Heaven and Earth as he did the Heaven for the preservation of the universe The celestiall Fire that burneth not is the soul and life of all Creatures the subject in which besides the force and operations of the Elements even all the celestiall virtues of the Firmament as well of the Fixed Stars as of the Planets are infused and imprinted after an invisible manner for the Influences of all celestiall bodies which are communicated to the sublunary to every one in particular these are concentred in this one The Theater of
the secrets of all Natur 's Light By this Art the knowledge of almost all things and in this Stone the universal Nature of things shineth forth The Tincture is the Fife Essence of the Microcosm and comes vâ—ry near to the first and most perfect Being and that Cabalisticall unary number Paracelsus calleth it the perfect perpetuall Câ—tholâ—ck Balsom of Physitians or Phylosophers the Defensive of old age the Universall medicament which like the invisible Fire consumeth all diseases the Glasse of God's Mysteries and the Miracle of universall Nature the Fift Essence of the whole frame of the world and the whole world Regenerated wherein the Treasure of all Nature lyeth Subject and Instrument of all Naturall and Transnaturall Virtues the Son of the Sun and Moon who by his ascending into Heaven and descending into the Earth hath obtained all power of superior and inferior things the Habitation of all metallick minerall and vegetable Forms which God created under the Globe of the Moon yea that it is truly the spirit of Life which pierceth through all other spirits Those Ancients who had most perfect knowledge of Things have called this Fist Essence the middle nature of Soules and is altogether one and the same with the spirit of our body the bond between the Body and Soul wherewith that super-celestiall thing is delighted and retained that it fly not from its bodily prison for that peace may be made between those enemies the Soul and Body there is need of the Balsom of life as a means to be sought from Externalls by which the internall is restored to retaine or sustaine the Fire of a long life without which fuell it goeth out of the body as a flame from the lamp-wick for want of oyle it is the most simple Matter which the Best and Greatest Lord generated out of the spirit of this world for the restauration and preservation of Humane Nature which hath been altogether unknown to the Physitians of our time For it never came into their Schools who goe not into the Temple of Apollo through the right door but break through the Roofe and sit in his seat as the Scribes and Pharisees heretofore in Moses chair And while they hold the keys of Sciences in unrighteous captivity they bring to passe nothing with their decrees and ordinances but like false Teachers they themselves enter not into the Academy of Nature and others who desire to enter in a right way they hinder in their laudable course by their pernicious dehortations so that they never come to the knowledge of the Truth and are forced to be ignorant where it may be But because the true originall of all corporall diseases in the judgement of the best Physitians is the enormity of the Naturall proportion of the Three First or as common Physitians say the disorder and ill disposition of the four Elements or Humors of which the Humane compounded body is sick or well this foresaid Medicine which is in it selfe the matter of our Creation may be congeneous and uniform to the substance consisting in equality When the purified Elements are reduced to a pure and equall simplicity then is got the Medicine that prolongeth life because thus the Elements are equall for the inequality and dominion of one over another is it that breedeth diseases the most subtile Soul separate from dregs and as it were the simple substance of the Elements the Fift Essence or Fift Virtue resulting from the purer Essence of the four Elements purified incorruptible is compared to Heaven nor doth it admit any malignant spirit but they all fly from it And because it is obnoxious as little as little may be to a Tempred corruption or putrefaction therefore it expelleth as much as is possible by Nature all accidentall corruptibility from which any sicknesse or weaknesse may arise and restoreth the inward vigour throughout all the members and by reconciliation cureth againe the diseases that hapned by the exaltation of the Three Principles Mans health consisteth in the agreement and union of the Three First Substances Health consisteth in a Temperate body but when they are exalted and set on fire by the Stars the intestine wars follow And because the Three First Substances of diseases are valitile Let it not seem strange to any that the sole act of one Thing should be variously diversified not as to it selfe but accordâ—ng to the Nature of that which receiveth it as the celestiall Sun hardneth the Clay and softneth the Wax they give place to the Essence of Fire which consumeth the disease and separateth the pure from the impure Moreover that Fift Essence of the Human Body bindeth the Elements or Humors in Peace and Harmonicall league and reduceth to the true Temperament by making equall the unequall and strengthneth the naturall heat and substantificall moysture it keepeth the oyle and spark of Life in an equality by its celestiall vigor for so long as the Radicall Humor the Vitall Balsom and most precious Nectar of our Life abideth in its quantity we are not sensible of any disease for the strengthning power of the Human body and of Animalls proceedeth from the spirit of Life and restoreth the sick to health and a good temper it holdeth its Nature in her Being and preserveth the Nectar of our Life in a good and laudable Temperament and so will keep the predisposed or fore-qualified Man safe and sound from sicknesse with the comelinesse of youth for the time of his continuance which is the age of Beauty and Human Fortitude even to his Naturall death that is to that Terme of Life which the Omnipotent God hath appointed to Man for disobedience as well that of every one as that of our first Parent I say such a man who shall use it prudently and seasonably with a devout calling upon the Name of the Lord if the constitution of the body and its complexion be not extreamly waâ—â—ed Therefore in this Fift Essence and Spirituall Medicine which hath the Nature and Heat of Heaven not of our mortall and corruptible it is possible to find out the True Fonntaine of Physick the Conservation of Life the Restitution of health the Renovation of lost youth and the desired clear health and to speak Naturally there is no Balsamick Medicine in all the world better than this true Triacle of Phylosophers which like the Elixir of life is the superlative and last consolation of Mans body preserving all activities in the Humane Nature and restoring the diminished power through the defect of Nature For in every kind there is a certaine One that holdeth the first degree in that kind therefore because this Medicine is made of the more incorruptible and efficacious Matter that can be under Heaven that is the Soule or Spirit of the world which hath in it the force of all Celestiall and Terrestriall things The Heat of the Sun and Moon is that Naturall Heat whereby every thing is digested for the
Paracelsus in that he promisedlong life to others but scarce came to full age himselfe Many more such devices they devise revile out of their malicious ignorance which Paracelsus never thought of the Balsamick Mummy the Vitall Body the liquor of Life the Native or Radicall Humor which the Spirit of Life moveth or acteth may be restor'd strengthned and preserved as in corrupt even to the very utmost consumption of it that is to the last gasp of Life without any sicknesse paine and griefe which thing though he performed in curing the most desperate and dangerous diseases of other men yet was he stopt from continuing so doing any longer being Poysoned in his body by his malicious and inhuman adversaries who had often attempted the same before they could effect it for he came to the Naturall Terme of his Life by an untimely and violent death of a draught of Poyson and not as many maliciously scoffe in their strange fictions that he by this his medicine would presumptously prepare himselfe an entrance and way to the immortall health of his body which the dead Phylosophers his Ancestors in this wicked world and true vale of miseries of which they as strangers and Pilgrims of this world never so much as dreamed God is to be seen beyond the horrizon of Eternity 〈◊〉 the other side the wall of Paradise which is the proper place of those that contemplate him He that continueth united with God in Christ doth like God and the Angels never wax old In vaine will those husks scraps of Paracelsus rise up that use to do who exclaime that this interpretation is forced and far setch'd GOD is the Centre of all Creatures by how much the more any draw near to him by so much the more blessed and lesse variable and mutable is he But the farther any thing departeth from that Centre or One to wit the immutable will of God to the circumference variety and plurality of the Creatures the more unhappy imperfect and mutable is it Blessednesse is in unity not in the circumference in Christ not in the world is Peace and the Rest of Soules He therefore that by the immense Goodnesse of God which runs before us without intermission shall forget all Things and leave sensible and Temporall things behind him which are to be used but onely in our passage and shall be united to that one Centre he waxeth young rather than old And this is the true Long Life of the Cabalists and of Paracelsus which he so often and so earnestly begg'd for by Prayer and holy hope in his Hymns and Soliloquies the true Enochean Life As on the contrary he that is not united to this most united Fountain-like and only Unity by adhaesion must of necessity perish for ever and be separated from the Light and Life by the second death and be cast into the utter Darknesse of the Caliginous world which deprivation and want of the sight of God is the most bitter of all punishments To know GOD himselfe the maker of all things and passe into him with a full image of his likenesse as with a kind of essentiall touch without a bond whereby thou mayest be transform'd and made as it were a God this at last will prove the True and sollid Phylosophy The MIND therefore of Adept Phylosophers whose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or conversation is in Heaven Phil. 3.20 The Mystery of Divine Matrimony with Man they having enough of the Terrene Life to whom one is All in all and All are one in One and who alwayes look upon these transitory things with the left eye but on Heaven with the right The MIND I say By the access of this beam ray or celestiall Stone all drosse is purified and the darknesse of ignorance is driven away Eccl. 18.9 10. Psal 90.10 Rom. 8. of these Adept Phylosophers hath ever been far off and estranged from the Cavill above mentioned For when through Divine Grace cooperating they have by a quiet and religious meditation been raised up out of the sepulchre of their body or out of the dead Works of Darknesse the world that lyeth in the malignant one being cast behind their back they could open the Eyes of their Heart and be turned to God in the Sabbath of their Heart by a separation of the Minde from Terrene obsticles in themselves and see all things in one by a most Blessed Spectacle to wit Whatsoever is not God is Nothing and ought to be esteemed as nothing one simple intuitive vision or sight from within a kind of an Essentiall touch of the Divinity and to contemplate the beauty of the Chiefest Good in the Light of GOD as in the glasse of Eternity which beauty is incomprehensible to the Old Creature INFORTUNIUM they have esteemed it the Vnhappines to stay so long in this Vale of miseries and ignorance For our heart is not at Rest till we have cast behind us the most beautifull Nothing that is the shadow and region of Darknesse and Death and returned to the BEING of BEINGS from whom we are wandred as to the prefixed scope of all our desires and will towards whom every Creature panteth and breatheth Therefore being stript and forsaken of every Crreature they leave themselves and totally go out from themselves contemning all things corporeall and incorporeall in sighing and earnest desire they hasten from the imperfect to that which is one and perfect the knowlege and contemplation whereof that which the most wise Hermes and most pious Phylosopher of reverend antiquity the Antesignan of Naturall Phylosophers and first Prophet Lactantias mentioneth Hermes not so much among the Naturall Phylosophers as among the Sybylis and Prophets as the true Orpheus doth also acknowledge in his Monade is a sacred Heavenly and hid silence the quiet or Rest of the sences and all things when at length after the task of miseries labors and peregrinations is ended all minds by an unanimous friendship after an unutterable manner shall be altogether but one thing in one MIND which is above every MIND All things are seen and lookt into with one presentiall glance It is the intimate vision of GOD and the Intuitive knowledge of GOD which also hapneth by the Light of Grace to the separate Soul even in this world if any man set himselfe about it now and be subject to God Thus many holy men by vertue of the Deifick Spirit have tasted the First fruits of the Resurrection in this life and have had a fore-taste of the Celestiall Country I mean that spirituall Death of the Saints which the Jewes call the kisse of Death which is precious in the sight of God Exod. 33. Es 6. 2 Cor. 11. Psal 116.15 if the fulnesse of Life may be called death We must die to the World Flesh Blood and the whole Animall Man who would faine have got into those Inmost secrets and entred into Paradise by the excesse or going
out of the MIND the Man that liveth in nothing but the Mind is as an Angel as I may so say conceiveth and apprehendeth God after a sort in his whole breast The scope and mark unto which all the most dear beloved holy and intimate Friends of God who live after the Image or inspiration of the most High and not after the Limus Terrae the Eearthy Mind doe bend who from Divine Love willingly cast themselves headlong into the fountaine of the Abysse and into the Sea of Nihilitude or Nothingnesse and enter into the Holies of Holies by the Life of Christ that in the Sabbath they may live with God in Rest and Blessednesse and so drink of the everlasting Ambrosian Nectar of Eternity By the Soul abiding and standing stedfast embracing its Image of Divinity or MIND united to GOD by Christ we enjoy actuall Blessednesse T is possible to extend a long life farther Therefore Porta reject the opinion of those that cast mens fortune from the day or houre of their nativity prefixing the bounds of life affirming that he that is wary of his infirmities and avoydeth those things that are hurtfull may live a longer life Parac chap. 7. of the Labyrinth of Physitians Though it may go for the discourse of Vaine men that the life may be lengthned yet it is repugnant neither to Nature nor Reason that a Man may prolong his life beyond the common ordinary age of Men even to a long time and that for two Reasons First Because in NATURALS there is no certaine appointed Terme apparent what day we shall die but it is in our own hand and power to put an end to our life if we will and to prolong it without offence to GOD if so be we may and have wisdome so to do I speak here Phylosophically of the Naturall death which is onely the wasting of the Naturall Moysture and Heat as may be seen in a burning lamp not Theologically of the Fatall death and utmost Terme which God hath prefixt to every one by which we are inforc'd not onely to pay the debt of Nature but are compel'd also to undergoe the punishment for sin Death is the bound which we cannot passe nor is there any day or hour for by the Grace of God we live the Terme without houres As God hath numbred our hairs so also doth he reckon our years leaving them in our power And because it was the good pleasure of God that Man should live for ever thence it is easie to discerne that for the lawfull matrimoniall propagation and augmentation of Mankind a long and lasting life of Man in this world is not displeasing to him especially if it be spent in the Fear and Service of his Creator yet alwayes short of that utmost and fixed Terme or determined poynt of DIVINE PREDESTINATION which is unknown to mortalls See Paracelsus of long life imposed on our first Parents and their heires for their Fall from Originall Righteousnesse beyond which bound no man can goe See Paracelsus in lib. 8. As Man many wayes may not attaine to the appointed Terme of life it being compassed about with diseases Archid. of the Elixirs It is the conservation of the Human body from all accidentall corruption Death Gods minister expecteth our intestine war There is a two fold death from the Iliad or first principle and from the Ens or Being The Soule of perpetuity or the Spirit of Light joyned to Nature with the light is perpetuall and will not suffer such a conjunction and such a life to be short and so his time may be shortned so may he prolong his life by removing these impediments so that at last he may attaine to the appointed Terme of the Nature of life Secondly Because God hath created the aforesaid Medicine for the preservation of life which may preserve our body as well from the corruption of our Parents as from the defect of our own government cure its infirmities and repaire what is wasted yea chase away from us all diseases which cause the naturall death untill ultimate death the most Terrible of all Terrible things which is the destruction of the Mummy which God the most high Creator hath ordained as the wages of sinners Therefore Paracelsus saith that the death which is from the resolution of the Iliad may be hindred by the industry of the Physitian but that which is from the Ens or Being cannot as we may preserve a little fire by laying on more wood so also may our life be prolonged by administring such Remedies and secrets as are derived from the fountaine of Gods gifts with which the Rayes or little beams the weaknesse of the Moysture and innate heat is nourished and cherished as the Fire with wood This at least is desired in us because we being destitute of wisdome know not that wood wherewith our life might be cherished and prolonged Adam who was full of wisdome and the perfect knowledge of all Naturall things and many more of his time who lived a more frugall life than we did attaine to so many ages not by Nature and property of Time for then all had been Long-liv'd but by the help of Secrets and by Wisdome which was revealed but to few and by speciall knowledge which God gave them in this particular whereby they lengthned out their life to so many years beyond the ordinary time that men lived Many holy men used this universall Medicine before the flood which Adam also had in his Family as Lactantius witnesseth which strengthneth the Internall Balsom and like Fire congregateth Homogeneous things and segregateth Heterogeneous which are of a contrary nature Nor are we to relie upon their judgements who being ignorant of the Mysteries of the Element of Water dream that the Deluge washed away the efficacy of fruits of growing things or that the power and strength of mens bodies was spoyled by the Water For all things that grow by the benefit of Water do yet sprout and spring forth in the same vigour and with the same efficacy as they did in Adams time When men multiplyed in the world wise men lived together in the Centre reserving wisdome among themselves but banished those that had it not into the circumference Paracels Wherefore we want nothing but the knowledge of Secrets and their use And thus the Flood did not wast the things that grow but wash'd away our wisdome of knowing them These most secret of secrets have ever been hid from the common sort of them that professe Phylosophy and especially sincemen began to abuse Wisdome using it to an ill end which God bestow'd upon them for their health and advantage But as few reach the Naturall Terme so also few have known the reason of prolonging the life And hereof there are many Causes For the life is broken off or shortned two manner of wayes MENS ENS abrumpunt nobis vitam First Either by the MIND whence arise mentall
is but one As in Man Man is the Anotomy of the disease so also in Physick Man is the Anotomy of the Physick Anotomy is the Basis of true Phisitians Diseases and Things And though the hidden virtue of Hearbs or the Stars of that Physitian Heaven may be known to us yet the chiefest thing that the Physitian is also to consider is to know the Concordance of Nature viz. how he may make the Astrum of the Physick or of the magicall Heaven agree with the internall Astrum and Olimpus of Man because of the like Anotomy it is that Mummy will stop the bleeding in Man The Nightingale that is subject to the deseases of Spiders is cured by eating them The cause subject of diseases the externall leadeth to the internall as in the great so in the little world He therefore that knows the things that grow and the fruits of the Earth as of hearbs trees c. Viz. that all things proceed out of the seed or Astrum he likewise knoweth that there doe such various diseases lye hid and lurk in the Physicall body which diseases doe not proceed from the four fictitious humours or qualities but rather from the Seed by reason of the Analogy or proportion that is between the great and little world he that knoweth the diseases of the great world cannot be ignorant of the distempers of man As many kinds of Mineralls as are in the world Many diseases proceed out of the mineralls of man which Iliad containeth all things in it selfe so many there be in Man So many kinds of diseases are there as there be sorts bodies and seeds of things that grow No man knows the number of diseases but he that can tell the number of all things that grow The Seeds which the Caelestiall Airy Watry Earthy Astra's are succoured in the Element which agree with mans Nature which in fit and certaine seasons bring forth fruits as messengers of health or sicknesse The Originall of all diseases is from the Three First upon which the Astra's câ—n make some impression as upon wood or Straw or Saf fron upon water So that the Three First are the cause of all diseases for in what body soever they are united that may be concluded to be a sound body but where they are not united there we may be sure that sicknesse and the root of the first death hath taken footing Hereditary diseases which proceed from the Seed or Astra's are partly Elementary because they are known by hot moyst or cold qualities There are other diseases whereof the most part are Astrall or Firmamentall Elementary diseases are cured by Elemental means and Astrall have Astrall remedies The Galenists doe know nothing of these Astral cures which the grave experienced Physitians do well understand which spring out of the Firmament of Man which is as integrally contained in Man as the Elements are And as the visible body hath its meat from the Earth so also the Syderiall spirit of Man or the invisible Man which is the In-mate of the body hath its food from the externall Aire and Fire or Firmament viz. from the Fire of the Firmament as all arts workmanships faculties of the tongue For Heaven is the Father and teacher of all Arts except Divinity and holy Righteousnesse which cannot be learned from the Stars but from the holy Spirit immediately for all Believers and Regenerate men are hid from and unknown to Astronomers as you may find in the Sage and deep Phylosophy of Paracelsus Iron sheweth that man is divided into the externall and internall in the externall dust and earth the matrer of the diseaseand that which afflicteth us doth lye hid therefore the cure is to be sought for in a medicine that is like it seperated from the dregs Spagyrically The internall and Astrallman also hath his proper medicines which the skillfull Physitian knows well As the Loadstone by drawing the Iron to it doth suck out the spirit thereof and leave it rusty so man in respect of the body hath a twofold Loadstone For partly he draws the Astra's to himselfe from which he sucks his food as Bees do hony from flowers and hearbs viz. wordly wisdome sence cogitation c. And partly by his attractive power he inticeth and allureth to him the daily nutriment of his flesh and blood from the Elements And as the Elementall body draweth the Elementary bodies to it by hunger and thirst so the syderiall spirit of Man attracteth all Arts sciences and faculties and all humane Wisdome from the Rayes or beams of the superiour Stars or constellations for the Firmament is the Light of Nature which naturally supplyeth man with all things Furthermore the Astra's or Elements which are Spirits are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is without any quality neither hot nor cold nor dry nor moyst but the things that are produc'd out of them are indued with qualities That whereof any thing is bred of the same doth it live is fed nourished preserved cured made sick punished and â—â—stroyed For out of the Earth grow Poppy Opium cold Darnell the hearb Trinity or Heartsease hot biting Arsesmart thus contrary things grow out of the Elements From the Fire proceedeth Snow Raine Dew Winds Rainbow Thunder Haile Lightning all such Meteor-like impressions proceed from the supreame invisible Spirit of the Firmament out of the Three First i. e. Mercury Salt and Sulphur For as Paracelsus saith they are the fruits and egestions or disgorgings of the Stars of the Firmament the fruits of the invisible Astra's which are in the Stars and make that which is invisible to be visible for the Stars succour and supply their fruits as the Trees of the Earth doe theirs Hence it is plaine that diseases are not cured by contraries as if heat were to expell cold as though man were to have the Elements banished and driven out of him but by the secret things or Astra's which the Chymist can reduce out of the last matter into the first These Arcana or hid things are actually neither cold nor hot yet removeth all diseases as the Axe cutteth down the tree which is neither cold nor hot Of this sort are the Fift Essences Magisteryes and the like Now by Gods assistance I shall say something concerning the Generation Dignity Excelency OF THE MICROCOSM Or Little World MAN For a man to know God lightly esteem of his own selfe is the highest and profitable knowledge AS the most excellent Phylosophy is that which enlightens the mind to the right knowledge of it selfe so to be ignorant of that knowledge is the greatest shame and most pestilent disease of the mind Ignorance saith Trismegistus to his Son Tat is the greatest Enemy and principall Tormenter in every Man Woe be to thee ô Man Luke 16. who neglectest the large patrimony and Talent and the thing committed to thy charge 2 Cor. 4. who considerest not the Treasure that is
Spring which brake out this yeare in the coasts of Misnia and Bohemia unto which almost an incredible number of sick and weake people dayly resort For which there can be no other reason given but the constant excessive affection of them that use it which power is in the very soul of him that takes the medicine when without any feare or sinister imaginations it is carryed to some great excesse of its desire For the rational soul rouzed up and inflamed with a vehement imagination overcometh even Nature it selfe and by her strong affections renueth many things in her own body and causeth sicknesse or health not only in her own body but in others also He that falls mad by the biting of a mad dogg will have the shape of doggs appearing in his urine Thus the lust and longing of a pregnant woman worketh upon another body when through oblivion of her selfe she imprints the marke of the thing longed for upon the child in her womb as saffron coloureth water For by her Imagination she formeth the infant as a Potter doth the clay Fear trembling and appetite are the chiefe cause of the fancy estimation and imagination of women with child Therefore when she begins to imagine There are impressions of the inferior 〈◊〉 Astrâ—â—â— then the Astra's of the microcosmicall Firmament or the Astra's of the humane Mind are moved with the phantâ—cy estimation and imagination just as the externall Astra's of the microcosmicall Firmament where the Astra's ascend and descend every moment till the impression be made in which impression the Astra's of the Imagination of the great bellied women doe print an Influence and impression upon the child as Engravers mark their work with an iron stamp Therefore it is better the body be sick than the soul good words are the Physitians of a sick Soul In lib. de Anima The body is corrupted by the passions of the Soulâ— the mind is nor impassible of the â—â—â—tions of the body This Naturaâ—â— Faith 〈◊〉 the Wiâ—â—◠〈◊〉 the Creator bestowed upon thâ— Creature thaâ— was made after his likenesse although it can do all things yet ought it to keep and observe the property of the Image All things are possible to him that believeth and is willing All things are impossible to the unbeliever and rebellious as he thinketh and imagineâ—h the thing to be so it must be Unbeliefe is the greatest and most powerfull enemy of Faith For the Imagination joyned with Faith can do all things The Fares also make diseases incurable when we perceive by the deny all of such help which we expected from the ministring of fiâ— medicines Thus it is manifest that the affections of Mind when tâ—ey are most vehement are able to deprive of Life as in histories we read And this is well known to every man that many through overmuch joy or too much sorrow by too much love or hatred have dyed and many times by the like passions have been cured of long diseases because as Avicen saith Nature obeyeth the cogitations and vehement desires of the Soul and when the spirit is affected the body in which the spirit lies hid is affected also Againe the aforesaid Naturall Faith its efficacy manifested it selfe in the woman that had the bloody issue and in the Centurion Man who was created after the likenesse and image of God and savouring as it were of a Celestiall Majesty hath great things in his hands and power Gen. 32.25 26. It is well known to all what great matters a constant Credulity in an elevated or raised Mind can doe by a strong imagination even so great that in false intense opinions and operations it worketh miracles But haesitation of Credulity and diffidence doe not onely shatter and break the vertue or force of the operating mind which is the mean between both extreams but do also weaken every work as well in Superstition as in true Religion and enervate the desired effect even of the most powerfull Experiments And that which is here diligently to be observed Mar. 13.58 Marke 6.5 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our Saviour as Holy Writ saith was not able to work miracles in Capernaum because they believed not but with their incredulity and false faith resisted him For as man can done nothing without God Mat. 9.1 2. so likewise God will doe nothing without Man as his Organ or Instument God and the Creature both together neither without the other Therefore no Man ought to will without God because no Man can Be without God in whom we are and live and are moved Eightly Least the sick party recovering should commit greater sins against God his neighbor and himselfe to the losse of his Soul for every sicknesse is as it were an expiation or propitiatory of sacrifice either the just Judge by this Divine innate revenge pennance and scourge doth call him to amendment of life for the time to come or that by this Fatherly visitation and imposition of the crosse which he ought patiently to indure he may be a pattern to himsefe and his neighbour for the more fervent Fear and Worship of God for God many times permitteth some men to fall into many and great sicknesses whose minds have been greivously infected distempered by the gladsome and pleasant health of the flesh together with the continuation of their sins to the losse of their Eternall health For health is nothing worth seeing it is but condemnation to us if our sins be not forgiven Moreover sins weaken the powers of the Soul and make it impotent to the Naturall Government of the body Therefore the powers of the body are enfeebled and hasten to death Job 33.19 20 Or else the sick is held under this yoke and bridle of infirmity as by a wholsome Purgatory though few are reformed by their sicknesse to the duty of Piety at least whilst that loose licentiousness of sinning is lopt and cut off which he would abuse if he should live and be well any longer In these diseases that arise from the resisting Astrall impression and wrath of God A Physitian beginneth in appeasing Gods wrath Job 33.26 no Corporall medicine because God hath shut the doors of Nature can do any good but onely Celestiall and spirituall viz. by serious repentance heartily to bewaile the sins that we have committed to allay the provoked wrath of God by Amendment of life and Reconciliation to our neighbor to be reconciled to God through our Saviour the Celestiall Physitian of our Soules and to submit our Will to the most righteous pleasure of the Divine Will devoutly patiently and humbly in all things with a most assured perticipation of Divine Mercy Paracelsus calleth them Deal diseases which are from the Ens of God who inflicteth all such diseases and who alone worketh by good and bad men the Cure saith he is by Faith or when the purging is perfected the Physitian may then try his skill The Causes of those diseases that
Tob. 12.7 nor doe I thinke their miserable life is to be desired whose felicity is their ruine and who loose by that that should advantage them and who in the height of fortune do yet desire fortune for the chains and fetters sake even when the indulgents of Fools could scarce add any greater happinesse and on whom God bestoweth somethings as a punishment when he is angry which he denies as a blessing when he is pleased Yet since the works of God are to be published and celebrated and that by this monument here left it may hereafter appear that that Divine Benificence hath not been denyed to men of our age also who did not begrudge posterity their felicity I cannot but in attestation and confirmation of the Truth here remember that singular Divine Clemency to me which not without the clear favour of God was shewed to me as an eye-witnesse in my travells which was denyed to many others who earnestly desired it that I should see and taste it at some Great mans house Cui in aeternum bene sIt Cumprimis egregium Helioch Antharum bor EaLem nunc in Christo quiescentem cujuSmodi lENtis DenIque consueVerunt latitare tempOrum currIcVlis Which I forbear to English The Physophycall Basilisk like Lightning suddenly and unawares burneth up any imperfect mettall whatsoever and on a sudden Produceth another new forme Therefore the searching it out is most to be commended to all that are studious of the Truth Whence being a long time astonished and amazed at the greatest miracle of Nature wrought by Art among the various and manifold metamorphosis of the Inferior Astronomy made in the cold the Moyst way of the Ancients not as yet intensly exalted to the eye of the Basilisk this one prodigie passing the admiration of all wonders seemed strange and most worthy to be seen that by giving one onely drop of that Latex or liquor in which as in a storehouse the dispersed vertues of all Celestiall and Terrestriall bodies were by a wonderfull artifice invisibly gathered together in an heap nay in which the whole world was centred a man desperately sick and at the point of death was recovered by its Fiery Astrall and Celestiall Invisible Nature conveying to the Heart a beam of the Naturall Life and renewing the organs of Life and repairing Nature which by an accidentall sicknesse causing a remotion was spent and wasted restoring him to firme and perfect health in one night For this Kingly medicine and the Empresse of all other causeth Humane Bodies immediately and as it were miraculously to rise againe from what desperate diseases soever There is no Physitian can cure death but Christ if God hath not otherwise decreed for many diseases are a Divine innate punishment for which there is no cure in Nature For surely this whole new regenerate world is able by vertue of its Regeneration to renew the little old corruptible world Man to restore whatsoever is amisse in Mans body to consume what is superfluous to mend what is defective and reduce the whole Microcosm into a true Temperament and preserve it therein till the appointed Terme of death imposed on mortalls for their sin Imperfect and impure mettalls are cleansed from their infirmities and accidents by the same spirit of the world by the same Heat of Sun and Moon as mens bodies are they are restored to their True Health which is aureity or goldness without a new motion of generation and corruption by way of alteration onely and remotion of accidents which are the cause of the sicknesse and distemper for mettals doe not differ in specie but onely in accidents This incredulous doubtfulnesse will fall out to the gaine rather than to the losse as heretofore to our ancestors so hereafter to all posterity because there are few that believe that this Art is true and with 〈◊〉 stedfast confidence are perswaded of it for upon that account God provideth for the security of those that give themselves truly to the study of Phylosophy Exod. 32.20 Job 14.19 No marvell if this secret by reason of the proclaimed uncertainty of so great mysteries shall seem incredible and justly not to be made known though it be truer then true to our Vulgar sort though Athenians of a clean nose as being ignorant because they never heard any thing in all their life of the Heat of the Sun and Moon who know not these Vulcanean metamorphoses and this Power of GOD joyned to Nature but admire the Heathenish Physick who to excuse their own ignorance doe foolishly enough account the sayings of Prudent men but as fables and fictions no marvell I say when the understanding of the intelligent clouded with no precepts or traditions of foolish men can hardly apprehend it much lesse that the Element of EARTH should by the help of Mechanick Magick swim upon the water To know this Phylosophicall Secret truly is principally necessary to an Astrall Physitian none of which Physitians can come to any operation or knowledge of wonderfull effects nor be certaine in his Art except he cleave to this Science especially in the cure of desperate diseases in our body to wit the four Monarchs of all diseases the Epilepsie Gout Dropsie Leprosie These four chiefest kinds of Diseases Paracelsus It is not Christian-like to ascribe to the Devill a greater possibility and power than to the Infinite divine Wisdome omnipotence The chiefe Foundation Scope of true Physitians because it is not the first but second birth that produceth it through the help of Christ not of the Devill cured by a wonderfull Art proving in some of his works that God taught him the medicine for he did it not by our common ordinary medicines but by Restoring or regenerating ones which are known to very few by which Nature being renewed afterward of her own accord she expelleth all things that offend her as his Epitaph at Salisburg doth truly and sufficiently witnesse to posterity All diseases proceeding from the corruption of humors how great and desperate soever their cures be are healed by this universall medicine as a Carpenter that squareth all kind of timber except the party be at the utmost Terme appointed him by the supream Being or the disease be inflicted by God besides Nature as a punishment and speciall affliction But no man as hath been said can make use of this peculiar and celestiall Gift but he on whom God himselfe hath bestowed it who onely both inlightneth the obscurity and darkneth the clearnesse of these mysteries so that none can understand the plainest things except he enlighten them nor be ignorant of the darkest if he illustrate them for so great a faculty is there given by the rich and peculiar Grace of the most high Creator Therefore Lullius that Divine and most perfect Phylosopher rightly concluded that between the Artist and God the first cause there ought to be an agreement without contrariety that the first mover as the principall Forme
sustentation and multiplication of Individualâ—s The Spirit is the life and Balsom of all Naturall things therefore it ought to hold the first degree in the order of Physick and the Man that useth it with the moderation of other meat may live as long as the ancient Fathers From those two fountaines the SUN and MOON as Suchtenius learnedly discourseth springeth the Naturall and Vitall Spirit of the world which runneth thorow all Beings giving life and consistance to all things by which as a mediator every occult quality all vertue all life is propagated into the inferior bodies into hearbs mettalls stones animalls so that there can be nothing in all the world that may or can be without a spark of this Spirit The Life of Man is the Astral Balsom the Balsamick Impression the Celestiall and Invisible Fire the Aire shut up and the Tincturing Spirit of Salt This Celestiall Spirit which is one and the same with our Naturall spirit when its breathing in our body is not lesned or hindred by outward things is that Naturall Heat of ours whereby every thing is digested for the sustentation and multiplication of every particular It digesteth the nourishment that Man taketh and breeds good blood in all the members so long as the blood is pure it continueth and is the strong vitall pure and sound spirit of the Heart so that the whole body liveth orderly and well But if it be hindered by sicknesse that it cannot so well doe its office the nourishment is not well concocted and that breeds bad blood by which the vitall spirit of the Heart is weakned Whence comes Old age that house of oblivion at last followeth a full extinction consumption and dissipation of that spirit which is the Naturall Death that the consumption and dissiapation of the said spirit may be prevented as much as by Nature may be that spirit and Naturall Heat in Humane bodies so weakned and hindred must be increased and strengthned that it may be the better able to do its duty But seeing every agent when it begins to act doth not move toward any thing below it selfe but to that which is equall like and sutable to it Therefore this strengthning also must be by its like that is by that Celestiall Heat of the Sun and Moon and the other Planets or with those things in which the Virtue of the SUN and MOON is most potent and doth most abound or is lesse restrain'd by matter The Celestiall or that Spirit of the world and the Naturall Spirit of our body is one and the same Spirit and therefore the Heat of the Sun and Moon generated of the very stroke of the spirit is a â—bing more concoct and by consequence more perfect For these things work more quick and perfectly and doe more readily beget their like and what is more easie the spirit or that supernall Fire is got out of them by art to which the Heat that burneth not like the Elementall but that which maketh all things fruitfull and Light giving life to all things are proper But burning Heat consuming all things and darknesse making all things barren are proper to the Elementall and Inferior Fire That same Heat therefore is excluded as also with it all divers and contrary things such as are all the inferior Elements For this and all things else that include a Naturall composition in them so far as they are yet drowned in a thick grosse matter and as yet not separate from it are subject to corruption and transmutation But Medicines ought to be preserving and very durable and remote from corruption For whereas they should preserve the Human body from corruption they ought first to be of a long and lasting nature otherwise they would corrupt rather then preserve Besides t is but in vaine to think to preserve a corruptible body by a putrid and corruptible thing to cure the weak by a feeble thing to form a Thing by a thing subject to deformity Every corruptible weak and feeble thing added to its like augmenteth it One Like added to its like maketh it more Like and so that corruptibility is increased not diminished as we see some and truly too many Physitians of our time who labor in vaine to cure Men of their maladies by their grosse and corporall compositions of Medicines but a higher speculation is here required The vitall spirit in Man the Elemental is one spirit For whereas diseases are not corporall but spirituall and lurking in the spirits they also call for spirituall medicines They therefore that would preserve that vitall spirit which is the Radicall Moysture and Heat The Innate Heat and Radical Moysture of the Microcosm are sustained by the MacrocoMacrocosmicall Heat and Moysture of the Sun and Moon as being thatoâ—e the same Celestial and Naturall spirit of ours the innate Mummy and hath its seat in the midst of Mans heart as the sustentacle of all our life in young men and repaire it languishing in old men and as much as may be make them young againe and so bring Mans life into the greatest health they must seek after not the Elementall but that Celestiall Heat of the Sun and Moon that dwelleth in the more incorruptible substance that is to be found under the Globe of the Moon to make this like our heart or spirit which is done when it is prepared and made up into a medicine and most pleasant meat so that being taken by the mouth it may presently pierce and passe throughout the human body keep every thing incorrupt especially the flesh that is united to it nourish the power and spirit of life increase and restore digest every raw thing lop and prune all excesse of every quality make the Naturall moysture abound and strengthen inflame and augment the weak Naturall Heat or Fire This is the duty of a true Physitian and of the more sound Phylosopher The Tincture doth so cleanse the Balsom that our children in the tenth generation may see the effect of it living so long Paracels For thus he might preserve our body from corruption retard old age keep youth flourishing in its vigour to the very poynt of death and were it not for the wages of sin withstand death preserve our body in perpetuall health and defend it from destruction Paracelsus calleth it the Element of FIRE which like the Sun of the Terrene or inferiour Firmament may be the greatest Secret for the removing all diseases and refreshing the cold benummed members for that Essentiall Fire worketh in the body as the Flame and Nettle doth without the body Whose meaning was that of right he may here be vindicated from the unjust calumny wherewith he was branded where he treateth of the vertues of this perfect Fire of Life that the Balsom of Nature The Humors of life do nourish the spirit of life See Paracel in the sift Tome among his Physicall fragments sol 162. Cease therefore henceforth to blame