to wait upon I know not what strangers Honour and Pleasure which as they be strangers yea and dangerous strangers lying open as all high things to the blast of Envy so most commonly they will not be ruled no more than they which get them and then rebelling against them which are their Lords and Rulers do overthrow an happy Estate Wherefore what marvel is it though our Men did thus when they did no more than Wisdome requires nor any more than all wise Men have ever taught and followed thinking and calling it an heavenly Life because it sunders the heavenly Minde from the earthly Body not as Pliny writes of Hermolinus by sending the same out of the Body to gather and bring home News but by an high contempt of earthly Matters and flying up to divine Thoughts not with the golden feathers of Euripides but with the heavenly wings of Plato And therefore this same divine Man makes the Minde alone the whole Man the Body as a thing that is his and belonging unto him but Riches Honour and such like outward Goods none of his own Matters nor belonging unto him but unto his that is the Body and as I may term them his Mans-men And this thing also Bias before him did as well perform when at the spoil of the City having leave he took not his Carriage with him and answered to the check of his Friends that he carried all his own things with him which was nothing but a naked Body Aristotle is of the same minde just with Plato as appears notably in his last Book of Manners where he hath laid down many sound Reasons why this Life is best and so by wise men is and ought to be taken Because it is saith he the most quiet Life and fullest of true Delight and with all things needful best stored for indeed it wanteth nothing for that as a Minde is divine in respect of a Body so is the Life of it which is that we speak of in regard of a civil and worldly Life And again if our Mindes are Our selves it were meet to lead our own Life before a strangers But last of all which is worth all because GOD our onely Pattern leadeth none other Life but this I might be very large if I list to seek about and traverse this Matter but here is enough to shew the Purpose and Reason our Men of Aegypt had if it was in their choice to chuse this kinde of Life which the World so despiseth But how if I could bring them in bereaved of all choice and free-will and driven by force of Necessity to do the same would not that stop the widest Mouthes trow you in all this lavish Company Let us know first that the Minde of Man being come from that high City of Heaven desireth of her self to live still that heavenly Life that is the blessed Life above described And if there be any lett as there is lightly it is in the weight and grossness of our Bodies over-weighing our Minde down to the Ground and to all our own muddy Matters Then that our Men after they have gotten this Golden Stone so famous in the World do not as they think and would do straightwayes run to their Coffers but first and chiefly Gild their Bodies with it wherefore after that by that mighty fine and temperate Medicine they have scoured out all Grossness and Distemperature of the Body the onely lets to Understanding and good Manners as we shall hear hereafter and thereby left the Minde at large and almost at her first freedom she and so they together laying aside and as it were casting down all earthly Matters must needs return to their own former Life again so far I mean as the Condition and State of Man will suffer And so put case you finde your own dark and dusky Eye-sight so soon taken with every foul and vain worldly Beauty yet you must not judge these heavenly Men thereby but think the most sharp and clear eye-sight of their Understanding easily able to see the blemish and to avoid the bait of common love Wherefore to close up this point at last sith this happy Craft and WAY TO BLISSE of HERMES for ought that they know may be true and honourable let the Common and Unlearned sort stay their Judgement and leave the trial and sifting of any further Matter unto the Wise and Learned And therein all Dioclesians if they have none of themselves might learn better Advice before for the fault of some they run to any raging Counsel and bend the edge of Authority against all I grant that as in all good Arts so in this because it is sweetest there be some Drones crept in among the Swarm what then As they are of another kinde and never begotten by HERMES or any of his Sons So no reason they should slander the Name and House of HERMES but bear the burthen of their own fault They may be sorted out and known from the holy stinged and profitable Bee first by their bigness in Words and Brags and then as followeth lightly by the Course of kinde by their stingless and unarmed weakness in all defence of Learning And thirdly by their sloth and idleness For although they never lyn stirring yet as Seneca saith Operosè nihil agunt they painfully do Nothing because all they do is to no purpose all is fruitless and unprofitable But Dioclesian lacked this discerning Wisdome and rashly ran upon all and burnt the Books much like that part of Lycurgus who for the Drunkenness of the People cut down the Vines Had it not been better to have brought the Springs of Water nearer and to have bridled as Plāto saith that mad God with the sober Even so the Emperour might with better advice have tempered the heat of Alchimy with the cooling Card of Discretion and made it an Art lawful for a small Number onely and with the like charge to be Practised which had been a Counsel worthy a wise Prince neither to let the hope of so great a Treasure go for a small loss nor yet upon uncertain Hope be it never so great to lose a certain great thing to wit the Life and Goods of his Subjects well and orderly bestowed THE SECOND BOOK CHAP. I. Of LONG LIFE AFter we have met with the common Arguments wherewith the Unlearned use to deface this goodly Science we must go forward and encounter with the Learned who because the great Deeds and Effects which are promised that is to make all men Long-liv'd Healthful Young Rich Wise and Virtuous are above any Skill of theirs or of their Ancestors the Gracians rate both the Work impossible and the Workman vain false and guileful I must I say prove according to my Task appointed That these great Acts and Deeds may be done and performed by other weaker Means than HERMES MEDICINE And this I must do with more pains and diligence because this Way and
Entry once made in their Hearts the great and marvellous Truth of this famous STONE may the more easily come in and take possession But in such variety of hard and slippery Matter whence were it best to set out which Way first to take Were it not meet the means and helps unto BLISSE should be first rid and cleared before we come to BLISSE it self and among them to give Long Life the foremost place if not for his worthiness yet for his behoof and necessity being needful in all Common-wealths and private persons first to seek to live before to live well though that unto this end Then let us see what is Long Life and how all Men may reach unto it But why do we make such great haste we had need be slow and advised in so great a Matter and to look before we venture upon so long a Way and of so many dayes Journey that we be well provided and furnished of all things wherein I hope if I have not of my own or if after the thrifty manner when I am well stored my self yet I borrow to prevent lending although I take upon trust so much as shall serve this turn it shall be no stain to my Credit but rather deemed a safe and wary way to cut off occasion of Robbery both at home and abroad especially if I take it up of such Men as are most famous and best beloved These should be my Friends of Aegypt and Arabia though we have their secret help now and then the best able indeed and the nearest unto me if they were so well known and beloved in the World But because they be not I will fly to the other side of Greece and to the most renowned there and best liked Hippocrates Plato and Aristotle whom I doubt not to finde very free and willing in this Matter Let us then awake our old Studies out of sleep and hye us to them what need many words after Greeting and the Matter broken they make me this Answer joyntly together GOD because he was good did not grieve to have others enjoy his Goodness that is to be and to be well meaning to make a World though Aristotle withdraw his hand herein full of all kinde of everlasting and changeable things first made all and blended them in one whole confused Mass and Lump together born up by his own weight bending round upon it self Then seeing it lay still and that nought could beget and work upon it self he sorted out and sundred away round about a fine and lively piece which they call Heaven for the Male Mover and Workman leaving still the rest as gross and deadly fit for the Female to receive the Working and Fashioning which we term the four Beginnings or Elements Earth Water Air and Fire and thereof springs the Love which we see get between them and the great desire to be joyned again and coupled together Then that there might be no number and confusion of Workmen and doing Causes but all to flow from one Head as he is One he drew all force of Working and virtue of Begetting into one narrow round Compass which we call the Sun from thence he sent out spred and bestowed all about the World both above and below which again meeting together made one general Light Heat Nature Life and Soul of the World Cause of all things And because it becomed the Might Wisdome and Pleasure of such a Builder to make and rule the infinite Variety of Changes here below and not evermore one self-same thing he commanded that One Light in many to run his eternal and stintless Race to and fro this way and that way that by their variable presence absence and meeting they might fitly work the continual change of flitting Creatures This Soul which Plato calls the Ever-moving Mover quite contrary to Aristotles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which he himself construes an Immoveable Mover that we may marvel how Tully could translate it so as to make it all one with Plato unless Lucians gallows mis-led him which is found in some Copies that he might be an Eternal Mover is in Nature and Being a most subtile and small Beam or spark of heavenly Fire in property and quality for his Cleanness Light and Fineness Hot and for his Moistness withall Temperate as appears to him that bendeth his Minde upon it If you doubt of his Moistness think nothing made without Mingling which is by drawing in and breaking small together the whole stuff when a dry heat draws out and scattereth the fine from the great and thereby wasteth and narroweth all things making nothing As for Example Dung hatcheth an Egge and quickneth any thing apt to receive Life when warm Ashes will never do it What need we more Imagine an heavenly Flame by a good burning Water which flaming upon your Hand or a dry Cloth heateth them both gently without hurt or perishment And yet this Sunny Beam is not moist of it self and before it is tempered with the moisture of the Moon his Wife to make it apt for Generation Thence HERMES calls the Sun and Moon the Father and Mother of all things Now the stuff and Female to be fit to suffer Working must be first open that is Soft and Moist and then not one nor yet many like things lest in both these cases they should stand still the same and not when they be stirred by the Workman rise and strive and bruise and break one another fitly by continual change until they come at last unto a consent rest and stay And that upon small occasion the same consent might jarre again and come to change the wished end and purpose of the work And therefore GOD cast in at first the known four fighting enemies yet in the soft and open Stuff there are but two of them Earth and Water in one mixture seen and extant at the beginning before the painful Soul draws and works out the rest Fire out of Earth and out of Water that breath-like and windy thing called Air. So that if there were much Earth little Water and great Heat to mingle them Fire will shew it self and bear the sway If but small Heat upon the same measure of Earth and Water Earth will rule the rest If on that other side upon small store of Earth and much Water but a small Heat of working the thing will fall out to be raw and waterish If upon the same quantity a stronger Heat it ariseth an Ayery which is termed a fat and oily Body Wherefore when the Soul comes down upon the Stuff clothed with a fine windy coat of the cleanest Air next unto Heaven called Aether without the brokage of which Mean the two Extremes and unacquainted Strangers would never bargain and agree together by his moist milde heat it moves it and alters it very diversly making many fuits and kindes of
and bringeth forth search wisely and where it is in the midst of Heaven and Earth for it is in the middest of both these places and yet but in one indeed You may think I cross my self and know not what I say but compare and look about and you shall finde nothing prosper but in his own place Let then the Dew of this Starry blood beat about the Womb and your Seed shall joy and prosper yet so much the better and sooner also if that Blood be whole and sound u and standing of all his parts Wherefore no marvel if the World misseth this Happy Stone when they think to make it above the Ground I say they must either climbe up to Heaven or go down deep within the Earth for there and no where else is this kindely Heat Wights are heat with Blood and Plants with Earth but Minerals with an Heavenly Breath To be short because Men are too heavy to mount up to Heaven you must go down to the midst of the Earth and put your Seed into his Myne again that he may take that Influence of Heaven equally round about him Muse and conject well upon my Words you that are fit and skill'd in Nature for this is a very Natural Heat and yet here all the World is blinded Nay indeed if a man could read little and think much upon the wayes of Nature he might easily hit this Art and before that never What doth now remain we have all the way to mar and spoil our Gold and that was all the doubt I trow for if he be once down so kindly he will rise again sure or else all Nature will fail and lose her custome And if he rise he shall rise ever in Vertue ten-fold encreased I mean if he be not imbased as the seeds of Plants and Wights are and as the feed of Gold was by that base way abovesaid with the Ground that corrupteth it So if a poisoned Plant or Wight be rotted in a Glass she will rise again a most Venemous Beast and perhaps a Cockatrice for that is her Off-spring Corrupt in like sort a good Plant and it will prove a Worm or such like with much encreased Vertue What is the Reason Because the same temper and measure of the qualities still riseth in power as the Body is refined and the gross stuff that hindereth the working stript of the Lets of Body and all the qualities shall be raised equally and shall work mightily devour and draw things to their own Nature more then any thing else because they be not onely free and in their clean and naked Naturè but also seated upon a most subtile and tough Body able to pierce divide and subdue all things Again both Mettals and stones the more heat they have as in hotter Countreys the finer and better and therefore the oftner they be brought back to their first matter and baked with temperate heat the more they increase in goodness And if he be brought to such a temperate fineness that is to such an Heavenly Nature then he keeps no longer the nature of a mettal in respect of any quality save the lastingness of the Body nor of any other gross meat nor Medicine and therefore he cannot be an Enemy to our Nature nor yet need any Ordinary digestion in our Body but straitwayes flies out as I said before and scours most swiftly through all the parts of the Body and by extraordinary means and passages as well as Nature her self and so coyneth with our first moysture and doth all other good deeds belonging to this BLISS of Body in such sort and better then I have shewed you of a fifth-nature And so Erastus and all other slanderous mouths may now begin again for there is not a word spoken to any purpose because all runneth upon a false and unknown ground A wise man would first have known the Nature of the thing he speaketh of if he meant not to move Laughter to them that hear him and know the matter But indeed these Railers are safe enough because these things are so hid and unknown to the World that no man but one of their Houshold can espy them or controul them Therefore I took in hand this hard and dangerous labour which all other of our Ancestors have refused both that they might be ashamed of their wrongful slanders and the wise and Well-disposed see and take profit by the Truth of so great a Blessing If they ever finde it let them thank GOD and use it as no doubt they will to do good to good men If I have slipt in Words or Truth of matter let them think how common it is among men and weigh the good and bad together Or else Homer himself when he slips now and then could never escape it and yet he was in an easie matter A Man may fain for ever and had Orpheus and Musaeus I think before him But you see the hardness of this stuff although my Pattern you do not see because it is not to my knowledge in the World to be scen But what care I These Men whom I regard will take all things well and then the rest I passed by long since unregarded FINIS All glory be ever and onely to him that is that was and that is to come Amen Amen Amen a Cic. Offic. lib. 1. b Terent. Prolog in Andr. Plat. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c Pind. Olym. Od. 5. Isthm Od. 5. d Cicer. de Nat. Deor. lib. 1. e Plat. in Philaeb f Plat. in Timaet g Aristot Ethic. lib. 10. cap. 7. 8. h Cicer. de Nat. Deor. lib. 2. i Plato in Timaeo k Arist Polit. lib. 7. cap. 1. l Plato N. I. m Arist Pol. lib. 7. cap. 3. n Arist Polit. l. b. 2. cap. 7. o Plato in Aâ—cibiad primo sub finâ—m p Arist Eth. lib. 10 c. 8. q Polit. lib. 7. cap. 1. r Hom. Ill. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 142. Arist Eâ—hic lib. 2. cap. ult s Plato in Euthydem t Arist lib. De incessu animal Histor animal lib. 1. c. 15. u Cicer. de Nat. Deor. lib. 2. Plat. de leg lib. 7. prope finem w Cic. de Nat. Deor. lib. 1. x Diog. Laer. vita Xenocrat y Plat. de Repub. Dial. 6. z Cic. de Nat. Deor. lib. 1. a Cic. Acad. quaest lib. 4. b Copernicus Gâ—lbertus Campanella Gallilaeus Wrightus c Cicer. de Divin lib. 2. d Pâ—t Martyr Decad. 3. lib. 8. in p. 135. Et Tho Campan de sensu rerum lib. 4. cap. 3. in p. 274. e G. Agricol de Nat. fossil lib. 5. cap. 3. f G. Agricol ubi supra Et Serapio Olaus Magnus ap Guil. Gilbert de Magnet lib. 1. cap. 1. g Aug. de Civit. D i lib. 21. cap. 4. Plin. Nat. Hist lib. 37. cap. 4. Jul. Solin Polyb. cap. 65. Mar. Paling in Scorp Aurel. Aug. Chrys lib. 2. Albert. Mag. de reb Met. lib.