Selected quad for the lemma: nature_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nature_n	cold_a	hot_a	moist_a	5,424	5	10.2024	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52581	Sal, lumen, & spiritus mundi philosophici, or, The dawning of the day discovered by the beams of light shewing the true salt and secret of the philosophers, the first and universal spirit of the world / written originally in French, afterwards turned into Latin by the illustrious doctor, Lodovicus Combachius ... and now transplanted into Albyons Garden by R.T. ...; Traittez de l'harmonie et constitution généralle du vray sel, secret des philosophes, et de l'esprit universelle du monde. English	Nuisement, Clovis Hesteau, sieur de.; Turner, Robert, fl. 1654-1665.	1657 (1657)	Wing N1469; ESTC R4890	78,186	256

calls the Spirits Nurse by the Mediation of the Air in whose Belly he shall be carried because the Celestial Influences cannot be communicated to the Earth unless the Air which is like an Intercessor carry them to it and as the Divine Restorer and Protector of our Souls in the assumption of humane Flesh deposed nothing of his Divinity so saith he the Universal Spirit shall retain and keep all its Vertue entire when it is turned into Earth that is when it assumes a Terrestrial Body God also willed his own Son and our Redeemer in his assumed Humanity be as it were regenerated by and with the Water of Baptism and Fire of the Holy Spirit not that he needed any such purgation but because he was to converse with Men contaminated with corruption that he might in all things yield himself an example of Renovation and Purification giving Men a visible and ample Testimony That according to the Flesh he was of the same Nature with them not contaminated or corrupted but obnoxious to passion and equally mortal as they In like manner our fecund Mother Nature willed her first-born though pure in his Centre That he should be regenerated by Water and Fire that is by Separation of the Terrestrial from the fiery part the spisse from the subtile and the impure from the pure which Hermes also aimed at when he said That the Earth should be separated from Fire for what God hath conjoyned Man should not separate but onely the impure and gross from the subtile and pure by Fire And besides this Sense which first offers it self to our Intellects there is yet another more occult meaning for seeing by the Separation of Earth from Fire he means that that 's gross from that that 's subtile he seems to hint that we should separate the natural qualities of these two Elements by detracting the moist frigidity mixt with heavy Terrestrial things without which that cold cannot subsist and by putting on hot siccity which is of the Nature of Fire and consequently light and spiritual For which cause he adds That it must ascend from Earth to Heaven that is from imperfection to perfection for Paracelsus calls Fire the Firmament and as nothing can attain perfection unless it first depose its imperfect gross and mortal bark wherein this cold quality abounds the cause of all mortification as heat is of life so also prudent Nature observes this Rule That each subject should sustain and pass the obsure blackness of death and expect the cleer and candid renovation of life and immortality that is impassible essence whereon neither Fire nor corruption hath any power And assuredly the acquisition of this life by death is naturally exercised by all Creatures continually for all Sperm or Seed of Animals is mortified in some Matrix and of Vegetables in the Earth before any specification can be made But if this rule takes place in the members by how much may we more exactly observe and directly imitate it in the head and if the life acquired by mortification be of any duration how much more shall that be perpetual which is principal Jesus Christ taught these things by similitude of a Grain which he says cannot fructifie unless it first die signifying the mystery of his Resurrection which his Death should precede for he willed Death that he might rise to a glorious and perpetual Life therein not onely giving example to men but expressing the whole Idea of Nature That divine and learned Ermite Morienus Romanus who is often quoted by modern and natural Philosophers avers the same of the fixed Grain whereto Nature hath given power to perfect Metals for he saith Unless it putrefie and grow black it cannot be perfected and compleated but returns to nought I have taken liberty to say thus much that I may teach the younger sort how the Creator should be acknowledged by simple Creatures and because the vulgarity of Men begs this knowledge from remoter things acting as they do who seek the perfection of Sciences from the Scholars of the lowest Form whereas they should require it from the best Directors and Doctors I would excite them by these natural conceptions that they would convert the principal endowments of their Souls to the search of the general principle and that in more exquisite things such as impart life and preservation to all mortal Creatures Mortification then necessarily precedes all entrance into life and principally in this Spirit the first-born of Nature when it assumed a Body for else no Man could separate it from Body which hinders its Regeneration to Life and Pacification of its Essence not as though by combustion and destruction it lost its Body in Death nor yet by Putrefaction but so that in Germination the Putrefaction of Seeds annihilates not that which is corporified in them for which cause in the Exaltion of Mercury or the Universal Spirit after the first degree which is made by Separation all that 's corporeal and spiritual becomes volatile because the sublimatory vertue therein overcomes the fixing faculty but the fixed part afterwards retains the volatile with it being helped by the action of heat which augmenting the power of the two nobler Elements destroyes the power of the two weaker which Hermes hints at in a certain Treatise by a plumous Bird detained with a Bird without Feathers And Nicholaus Flumellus by two Dragons one with and another without Wings But that I may not longer fold my self in these Daedalean Labyrinths see we not all Vegetables encrease and elevate themselves upwards by vertue of this volatile Spirit which as I said before would carry them higher towards the place whence it came whereto it hath an appetite but that it is detained by its proper Earth and corporal Mass wherein some fixed matter resides But lest some not sufficiently accustomed to Philosophical terms should think we contradict our selves I will here explicate my self I say then That I mean not by this volatile Spirit that which I before called volatile and separable Sulphur for that is rather the Author of Corruption then Growth but that most simple part of the primaeve vapour which never loses it s subtily whose Nature is to be elevated and tend to perfection for to sublimate is properly and Philosophically no more then to perfect and exalt matters from imperfection to perfection As therefore this Mercury hath an elevable so hath it a stable substance the first is naturally innate in it the second is in its centre or power yet it cannot compass its effect without the help of Art And that I may shew more plainly in what ways Nature proceeds in her operations I think it convenient to add a little about the causes and manner of Fixation Repeating therefore that indubitable Axiome I alledged in the beginning of this Book as perpetually observed in the Worlds Constitution to wit That all that hath life hath also some duration and that nothing is produced under the cope of Heaven which

where Glass is the cause of hardness Salt affords matter and Water causes unition and condensation CHAP. 9. Of the specification of the Universal Spirit to Bodies THe Soul of the World and its Action and Vertue is represented in all things in which it is this bindes and conjoyns the superiour things with the inferiour for as many Idea's as the Heaven contains so many seminal causes it obtains whence by the Mediation of the Spirit it forms so many species in the matter When therefore it falls out that any one of these species degenerate it may by the Soul within it and the mediation of the universal Spirit be reformed and reduced to its former state for the Spirit is alwayes at hand and ready for all motions In the mean while we must not imagine that the intellectual Idea is attracted but rather that the Soul is indued with such a vertue and allured by the material forms which cannot seem absurd to any one for it prepares every one his meat and nutriment because it is transmutable into all things by which it is sollicited and willingly remains and resides therein Zoroaster calls the Agreement and Harmony of the Forms with the Soul of the World Allurements Whence it appears That all things and kindes draw their powers and faculties from the Soul of the World not all totally but such as respect the seed or propagation and the like whereby they germinate or encrease An example hereof we have in Man who feeding onely on Man's meat acquires not the Nature of Birds Fishes or the like which he eats Many other Animals also feed upon the same victuals and yet every one attracts that which is proper to his species so that it is worthy our admiration that out of the same Meat Man can attract what is proper to Man and a Bird what is proper to a Bird. And this is not because there are many and diverse Aliments in one and the same dish but because of the species nourished which attracts and changes the nutriment proper to and convenient for it self by mediation whereof it generates its like by vertue of this Soul and seed which is in it according to its quality But we must not think That in the Machine of the Worid the Spirit Soul and Body are things separated for these three are alwayes united and conjoyned as is apparent and by this union the whole Spirit and corporal substance become vital The universal Soul then feigns and imagines divers forms which the Spirit receiving into the bowels of the Elements makes corporeal and produces Hence Animals generate onely Animals Plants Plants and Minerals Minerals though not all alike for Minerals as I said before generate not their like after the same manner as Plants because their Spirit is cohibited by too gross matter which Spirit if it could be conveniently extracted and conjoyned with Mineral matter● would generate its like because by its exquisite penetration into imperfect Bodies through the subtiliation of Art and artificious Graduation of Fire it brings with it proper and Mineral seeds onely not animal because repugnant to its Nature yet I will not say That it wants the action of other faculties but that it doth not demonstrate them but according to the species whereto it is accommodated for else every thing would produce its unlike a Tree would generate a Man a Plant a Bull a Metal an Herb which I speak onely in respect of the diverse specifications of things For if we consider the most general Genus it produces in all things its like because being Mercury it assumes the Nature of all things wherewith it is mixed But humane Art cannot effect that that is solely granted to Nature which alone can procreate a species Art may dilate and multiply it if it begin its operation at the root of the species as prudent Philosophers do who extracting the Spirit from Minerals specificated decently purified and reduced to perfection render it apt to perfect imperfect things And an expert and industrious Artist perpending these things aright may easily institute admirable Adaptations Finis Libri primi A TREATISE OF The Philosophers true Salt and Secret And Of the universal Soul or Spirit of the World BOOK II. CHAP. 1. That the Spirit of the World assumes a Body and how it is incorporated WE have I hope sufficiently explicated in the former Book that all things were not only produced but also made corporeal by the universal Spirit We now come to declare what kinde of Body this Spirit assumes and how it self both is and makes all things corporeal for that must needs be corporeal which makes all other things such seeing nothing can give what it self hath not Let us therefore see with what and how it is vested with a Body not that we will here dispute of the incorporation of celestial and supernatural beings but onely of Physical and Sublunary Generations and of the body of the Earth which is the sole vessel and true matrix where the prime and most general Incorporator of things is it self incorporated I say then That no body can be made without a precedent Mover that may diduce potency to act that which exists not in save potency may be produced into light and according to Natures intent reach its final term which is to make that a body which it would produce Now this mover can be no other then fire or heat which moves it self first in the Air for all Generations begin there because fire is the most active Element and consequently most subtile and light whence it is more prompt for motion Fire therefore whose propriety is through its levity to ascend and make unknown things visible doth requisitely receive the beginning of its motion and action from inferiour Bodies that is from the centre of the Earth where as we said before the old Demogorgon and Progenitor of all things inhabits sitting there in his Throne and midst of his Empire that thence he may govern command preserve and divide the essence of Life to all the parts of that great Spherical Body expanded about him and that he may more easily and from equal distance receive from every Member what he wants The root of Fire is implanted in the fruitful bowels of this old Parent which thence emits a vaporous breath which Hermes calls the humid Nature for vapour is the prime and next action of fire with which it is so conjoyned that it cannot be imagined without it But some may say If vapour comes from fire how can it be moist seeing fire is hot and dry whence acquires it this contrary quality And here we finde nothing absurd if we do but consider That fire cannot live and subsist without moisture which is its aliment support and subject without which fire cannot be conceived for being by Nature active and its action indefatigable it must needs have something to act upon and never be destitute of this thing Fire then and co-essential moisture are like

Male and Female in all Generations and are the first Parents of corporification of the Spirit of the World as hereafter we shall make appear But Fire is the first Operator because action precedes passion though the Patient be inseparably co-existent with the Agent as the old Stoick Zenon asserts who thought that the substance of Fire was by Air turned into Water and there conserved as the general Sperm and first universal matter whence all things were first generated Thales Milesius whom the Greeks surnamed the wise perceiving the matter patient said That Water was the first matter which Heraclitus attributed to the Sea and Moses more illuminated then both saith That before the heaven and earth were created the Spirit of the Lord moved on the face of the waters calling Fire because of its noble and pure essence The Spirit of God In saying therefore That Fire is the first principle of beings I transgress not the limits of Reason and Verity for it is without doubt the first Operator and the last Destroyer and Changer of forms whose cause it is even till it hath brought them to their period and first matter beyond which there is no progress but onely a transformation as I shall by and by declare by comparison with visible and familiar beings the first active potency which begins to operate in the production of man is the agitation or motion of heat which imitating the action of fire whose Nature is chiefly separative draws Sperm from the whole Body wherein Man's seed is potentially included and cocts and digests it thereby rendring it apt for expulsion and afterwards for Generation and Augmentation which Generation and Augmentation is alwayes helped by Fire which is the sole Actor so that if it should attain the end of its exaltation being inflamed by the Sulphur of Excrements and impurity of Aliments it would absume the radical Moisture which is the Seat and Preserver of Life which done the fire remits not of its power and action till by resolution and corruption it brings the Body to Ashes which nothing can do but fire But that we may make this more palpable and finde out the first matter by the knowledge of the last let us impose a Body on a common Fire and we shall see that what is inflammable in it will be totally consumed and redacted to a few Ashes which Ashes also will participate of a fiery Nature and for their last subject and matter turn into a certain Salt whose sole Parent and Multiplier Fire must needs be And though these should be further turned yet Salt would alwayes be left in whose internals we may finde Fire which is delighted with its like And by this means Alchymists finde that there is something in Salt that is incombustible or secret Elementary Fire which hath the same actions with primitive Fire upon which account they call it the Balsam of the Body because it contains that that gives life as also that conserves and augments it which is nothing else but a moist vapour accompanied with moderate heat Johannes Fontanus in his Philosophical Narrations En son Romant Philosophique shews That he was not ignorant of this Secret where he brings in Nature speaking thus Aucuns disent que feu n' engendre De son naturel fo rs que cendre Mais leur reverence sauvee Nature est dans le feu autee Et si prover je le vou loye Le sel a Tesmoing je prendoye Some dare t' affirm that fire can generate Nothing but ashes but those seem to relate The truth thereof who say that in fires brest All Natures operations are imprest And if hereof a proof you do require Salt gives you proof enough what is in fire And that it participates of moisture is plain enough from its easie resolution as also its fulness of heat is demonstrable from its ready congelation from which we may observe That Fire acts and is united with Fire as in liquefaction Air acts and is joyned with Air for how in one subject could the dry imbibe the moist if there were no innate heat seeing driness as it proceeds from heat doth naturally imbibe moisture And hence we may easily understand That the Demogorgon or central Fire cannot be destitute of moisture on which it may act and thence elevate a vapour mixed of two qualities which I call The Spirit of the World but many Philosophers Mercury of Merries because all other proceed from this naturally but this elevated vapour is not yet a Body but a mean betwixt a Body and a Spirit participating of both Natures which whilst it remains in that state can generate nothing It is therefore necessary That it either assume or form a Body which it thus doth This subtile vapour proceeding from dry and moist principles when it is elevated penetrates the spungyness of the Earth wherein it is gradually turned into Mercurial Water by the occurse of the ambient Air and of the Earth it self whose surface is far distant from its Centre where the Fire resides whence this heat arises After the like manner as we see in an Alembick where the vapour or Spirit to be distilled runs out But this vapour and its water partaking of two principles heat and moisture it is ingrossed and by moderate and continued coction condensed The principal cause and mean of which action is innate Fire which contains this very vapour and by its continual action stimulates and compels it to imbibe this moisture and to coagulate this Water not in all parts with a like solidity and hardness nor yet altogether but first with a mucilaginous and different solidity Now that which Nature assayes to do in the information of Idea's is to begin their induration and solidity which must necessarily hold on in Natures way which is a progress from one extream to another by intermediate disposition And Nature thus continuing its digestion this Mucilage stays of whose grosser matter Metals are generated in the veins of the Earth or cavities of Rocks which differ not in substance being produced by one and the same seed but onely in accidents which they take from the diversities of the places and matrixes where they are generated But the more subtile part of this vapour ascends to the surface of the Earth where it stays by compulsion and being in continual agitation though it can neither regrede nor ascend higher and finding no solid matter to carry it with it it is compelled to continue Natures intention and therefore serves for the Generation and Corporification of individuals But that what I have said may be better understood let us take some one individual and let us see how it is produced for this will ascertain us that the Spirit of the World assumes a Body and shew us how it is incorporated An Acorn may be long enough set or sown in the Earth and consume without germination unless some Agent be neer it that may deduce its occult potency naturally within it

it possible for them to get any thing This indeed is a work the other a labour Such Searchers surely believe not that the first matter is so subtile and loose a Spirit or Vapour as that it cannot be reached save onely by intellect and imagination However seeing it is contained in the Body of this great Parent and dwells there Reason evinces That it hath something of corporeity in it and although I have sufficiently declared to subtile intellects of what Nature it is I shall further add That the Pores of the Earth are full of this Vapour which acquires a dry quality by its innate heat accompanied with some secret moisture by which it is condensed and coagulated into a specifical Body and as this moist Nature now dried up was first Water so it must be reduced into Waters again by Water which is the sole mean whereby to humectate dry things as fire is to siccate moist things which is a work duely observed by Nature in generating Metals for Water flowing through the Pores of the Earth findes there a dissoluble substance wherewith it unites its most simple parts to which union all the Elements concur in due proportion This substance then by its own dissolution is so conjoyned that it of it self condenses through hardness which is natural to it because of its innate siccity and by successive and long decoction acquires a metallical induration But now this substance being dissoluble of what other Nature can it participate but of Salt for nothing is so dissoluble as Salt which by how much it is more burned is by so much easier dissolved unless it be turned into Glass The first matter then is Salt or Salt is the first Body whereby this matter becomes visible or palpable of which Salt Raymundus speaks when in his Testament he saith We have before declared That in the Centre of the Earth there is a certain Virgin-Earth and true Element and that that is Natures work Nature therefore is placed in the Centre of every thing so Salt is this Virgin-Earth which hath yet produced nothing into which the Spirit of the World is converted by vitrification that is by extenuation of its moisture This is that which gives the form to all things and without which nothing could incur into the senses nothing is coagulated without Salt nothing congealed This is that that gives hardness to Gold as also to the Adamant and all Stones both precious and vulgar with a Secret vitrifying Vertue Yea what is more we manifestly see that all Bodies compounded of the four Elements return into Salt for if a Body putrefie what remains but powder and ashes covering most precious Salt and if a Body be destroyed by combustion calcination or incineration what rests in the last extraction but Salt Glass-makers do give manifest testimony hereto whence Arnoldus de villa nova in his new Chymical Light speaking of the permanent Water of Philosophers which Water is dry and wets the Tangents hand no more then common Quicksilver saith Who then can prepare this Water Well he may do it who can make Glass The same Author speaking of the excellency of this dry Water manifests it sufficiently when he saith in his Chymical Treatise which he calls his Philosophical Breviary That an Operator can no more do any thing without Salt then an Archer emit an Arrow without a cord or string And Fons Amantium saith the same Sans sel ne peux metre en effect Utile chose pour lon faict I can effect nothing in your rare Art Unless with Salt I 'gin to operate All Bodies then are composed of Salt and as we said before the Principles of Composition and Resolution are equal which concurs with the Philosophers infallible Rule That the first matter of all things is one with the last where they alledge Ice and Snow for example which are by heat resolved into Water out of which they were by cold congealed And if I should here suggest the Testimony of all approved Authors to this Verity my Treatise would end in a Volume but that I may demonstrate That this Salt is pure and true Earth not such as we tread upon which I shall hereafter prove to be nothing but the Dregs and Excrements of the other I must recur to the first Creation which I shall decypher by a familiar example of an Operation made in imitation of Nature and by the same Rule and Model by which this great Universe was framed I said before That Water or the humid Nature as Hermes calls it upon which Moses saith That the Spirit of the Lord moved was the principle of all things And here the Question will be How that great and confused heap of Waters was so divided that this ample and gross Terrestrial Mass proceeded thence and by what medium so different things were procreated of the Earth I shall answer to these Questions onely what experience hath taught me It is therefore naturally probable that in the middle of these Waters by way of separation there was a certain collection of sediments or setlings wherein I follow the Text of Moses who saith That God separated the water from the water for there are two kindes of Waters to wit elevative and congelative Waters the former then elevating it self in a vapour left the other fixed in the botom as those that coct Sea or Fountain-Salt daily experience though perhaps it be be true that the one is made by the attraction of the Suns Rayes the other by the expulsion of Fire And here note That Fire and Heat onely are indued with a separative faculty which they exert either by violent or natural motion This separation then was made by one of these wayes and to what thing could Moses better compare this Fire which cannot be otherwise defined then the origine of Universal Light of Animal heat and vital motion which gives existence to all things and preserves them in their being then to the Spirit of the Lord Let us again consider Natures Salt in its Chaos diffused dissolved and suffocated in its Water under what form will it then appear or with what quality will it affect our gust but that of bitter Water and this form and quality it would retain for ever if it were not separated but as soon as this elevative Water feels the action of Fire it begins to flie from it by vaporation and so the collection is gradually diminished till onely a little heap of Salt be left in the bottom which comes together as the Earth did in the first Chaos of the Universe And thus we see the first operation of Fire which is the production of Driness that is of Earth But as this first Earth remained still coagulated with its Excrements and Dregs by Fire so this Salt which is true Earth retains its Excrements though it seem pure white and full of light for nothing is generated nourished and augmented but it abjects its Recrements of the formation and separation whereof we

or through sloath or avarice neglected And that these things are thus carried is apparent from certain Potions introsumed which have no other effect but onely to make the Belly laxative or purge out not that matter that causes the Disease but some other Excrement that hath nothing to do with the Disease or else through the ill preparation dispensation or impertinent adaptation of simples cause superfluous evacuations to the ruine of Nature too weak before but now more enervated both by reason of vacuity which it abhors above all things and also by reason of violent motion caused by such Purges And thus they rather procure Death then Sanity for Nature can no more endure violent motion then vacuity and she is very impatient of these two her sworn Enemies which attempt so evidently her destruction And for this cause common Medicine seldom cures obstinate Diseases by their Compositions as they commonly prepare them and if amongst many any one be cured this happens not because of Pills Boles and Potions but of the strength of Nature which is able to overcome the impure quantity mixed with these remedies and extract something out of their pure substance commodious for its subsidy or else because the poysonous quality of these excrementitious and corruptive things is rejected and expelled by Nature which is of that power that it carries with it some portion of the peccant humour which is like to it by attraction and sympathy And thus an extraneous Medicament impugning the Body moves Nature which provoked and prepared to resist this her Enemy rejects and violently impugnes what is contrary to her And now if a Medicament should always be convenient and not contrary to Nature it should be purged from its poyson that is from its excrementitious Mass Wherefore a Medick should first chuse such things as are convenient for and hold sympathy with Man's Body and free them from their impurities or at least chuse such as contain in them the general vertue or innate purity which Purification cannot be effected till the impure and noxious be separated and destroyed and the pure restored which lay buried and suffocated under the Excrements But it being none of my Profession to make Medicaments I will not further treat of this business but will return into the way whence I have a little swerved I say therefore Seeing there is no inferiour thing but that 's infected with Poyson immerged in Excrements and buried in Dregs that cause its mortification and hinder the liberty and action of its legitimate substance Nature is constrained by a certain necessity to make use of Separation which is effected by division of the pure from the impure the subtile from the gross and the salutary from the destructive part But because this admirable Agent works her operations in darkness labouring in bodies by a secret digestion she never exceeds simple perfection for hereto onely is her power extended whence corporal Elements being not able to conduce to the highest degree of their proprieties the Bodies wherein they are included Philosophers prudently endeavour to separate their substance from their corruptive Mass and after this Separation in Natures way to wit by Digestion and Sublimation to carry them to the highest degree of purity getting them by Regeneration a new form taking away their former Nature Qualities and Proprieties and changing their impure Bodies into Spirits full of purity their moisture and cold into dryness and heat practising and effecting this not onely in some species or simples but in the great Body of the World also which is our Universal Spirit for unless the Universal Nature of all things be renewed it is impossible to bring it to a state of incorruption Regeneration then is the first Fruits of Separation but as a Grain can of it self generate nothing unless it die and putrefie in the Earth so it is impossible any thing should be renewed or regenerated save by precedent mortification Mortification then is the first step to Separation and the onely tract to that end for as long as Bodies remain in their old Corruption and origine Separation cannot reach them unless putrefaction and mortification lead the way which also our Lord Jesus divinely taught saying Unless that a Man like a Grain of Corn die he cannot acquire life incorruptible not as if he meant that life incorruptible should be acquired by death corporal for then impious and wicked Men by dying would attain Beatitude with the Good and Just but he meant that the old Man should die that is mortifie and separate his old Corruption from him which he attracted from the Seed of his first Parents And this Corruption is properly intemperance and excess introduced by the eating of the forbidden Fruit by which Death entred the World and since which Man ceased not to die because afterwards the Earth and all it produced were infected by the Poyson of the fraudulent Serpent hidden in their Aliments whose enticements led Man to transgression and to the eating of Fruit wherein death was included And this corrupting Serpent is he that I call Satan who creeping and without ceasing going about the Earth mixes his Poyson therewith and with all things it produces to wit Animals Vegetables and Minerals with intent to infect the World with his Poyson and tyrannize over Man Upon this intemperance and excess in diet a privation of Vertue followed for Vice is nothing but a neglect of what is just and justice is a temperate desire and continual progress to good This intemperance then and excess must die in us because it generates all kinde of sin in us and stimulates us to malice and impiety and therefore we are injoyned to live soberly and shun gluttony and drunkenness the true Authors of all carnal lusts and that we fast often to extinguish those internal flames which move our Sences and burn our Blood to Corruption The Anatomists of Man know that Man is twofold the one Celestial and immortal the other Terrestrial and corruptible and the first is as a Sojourner the second as a Prisoner But here arises a great Question How it comes to pass that the heavenly Man can whilst buried in this putrid and corrupt Carkase conserve his essential purity for it is manifest That a Liquor though never so precious and excellent will lose its sapour and odour if it be long contained in a stinking Vessel and Man also though never so sound is subject to infection if he dwell in a pestilent House a heavenly Man is of himself good and sincere but as he is joyned to the Terrestrial to whom impurity and vices naturally adhere he can scarcely remain free from spots The depravation of this essential purity depends without doubt on the eating the forbidden Fruit or to speak more expresly on the intemperance of Aliments condited with pernicious and contagious Corruption for which cause this intemperance corruption must be mortified that the old Destroyer of Man may be restrained that that