of the north and so by their mutuall action a middle nature of a westerly condition will be produced namely water which is between aire and earth as the western position is betwixt the south and north But the southern blast of its own nature is hot and moist as is the disposition of the catholick element of aire or else the word being sent from that quaâ—ter would not have melted and undone the cold and drie effects of the north as is said Again that the breath of the Lord which commeth out of the South affecteth the catholick element of aire diversly but spiritually this Text of Abakkuk doth testifie God comming from the south his glory covered the heavens and the pestilence went before his face c. whereby he argueth the invisible effects namely the corruption and infection of the aire which this divine Spirit in his displeasure breatheth forth from the southern quarter of the world But when he worketh or operateth in his windy organs of the East then they imprint upon the generall element a fiery character and dilateth his substance into the nature and disposition of the fire and then may it passe under the title of the Element of fire as we have it confirmed out of many places of the holy Text Praecepit Dominus saith Jerom vento calido urenti or as Tremellius hath it Paravit Eurum silentem ut percuteret sol caput Jonae adeò ut aestuaret petiit animae suae ut moreretur The Lord commanded a hot and burning wind or a still easterly wind to go out that the sun might strike upon Jonas his head that he might be enflamed with heat insomuch as he did desire in his heart to die And again Ventus urens seu Eurus desiccabit fructus ejus rami ejus erant marcore contracti A burning or Easterly wind shall dry up his fruits and his boughs shall be consumed and wasted And again Ventus Eurus aduret spicas And JEHOVAH saith in his anger Percussi vos in vento urenti in aurigine multitudinem hortorum vestrorum Misi in vos pestem pro ratione Aegypti I have struck you with a burning winde and have blasted the multitude of your gardens I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of that of Aegypt Again Postquam veniente Euro vento IEHOV Ae à deserto ascendente exaruerit scaturigo ejus siccatus fuerit fons ejus After that by Eurus the wind of IEHOVAH comming and arising out of the desert his spring and fountain was dryed up And Haggaj Percussi vos vento urente grandine omniae opera manuum vestrarum I have struck you with a burning winde with hail even all the works of your hands c. Whereby it appeareth that at the blast of these easterly winds the aire or catholick element becommeth burning and fiery so that it heateth and enflameth the bodies of the creatures On the other side the occidentall winds are found by experience to be opposite in nature and condition unto these for they convert the hot aire or generall element into cold and naturall visible water being that they are the procurers of cold raines So that we may see by this that the formall act in each Angell of the four corners of the earth of which the Apocalyps doth make mention hath an essentiall vertue imparted unto it from God according unto his volunty at the instant of the Angels information and therefore in that very property doth the angelicall creature act in the common element or lower waters in the which the creating Spirit properly was when he made it so that the common element is daily informed anew and altered by the formall or essentiall act of the angelicall winde which bloweth with dominion insomuch as if the easterly angelicall wind informeth it then it becommeth a fiery element for it heateth and drieth by super-excellency If a southerly it is changed into that element's nature which is called aire and if a westerly spirit hath dominion it is converted into the temper and proportion of water Lastly the Northern blast transmuteth it unto the consistence and disposition of earth By this therefore that maine doubt which hath so long troubled the Peripateticks and hammered in their brains and yet hath never been rightly resolved by them unto this day may easily be undone and taken away namely to find out the essentiall form of the Elements For by this true Philosophy we find it to be an Angelicall Spiracle or essentiall blast of wind infused by the Spirit of God diversly into the aiery or spirituall vessell to alter and change according unto his will the humid passive nature out of one condition into an other Moreover the Catholick air being diversly so animated bringeth forth and informeth a new after the condition of his variety of animations a multiplicity and multiformity of Meteors As for example the Easterly element brings forth children like it self As are the fiery and light Meteors namely Coruscations Lightnings Comets and such like according unto the nature of such Seminary influences as shall descend from heaven at that instant The Southerly Vapours Clouds Lightning with Thunders The Westerly Cold raines and as it were Snowy resolutions The Northenly Frost Snow Ice Hail But I know that this wil be objected against me What then will you make of the Earth and Seas Are not these distinct Elements which have been from the beginning I answer that if they listen unto St Peters doctrine he teacheth that the Earth was of waters and therefore the waters were before the Earth and again the heavens were made before the Earth as Moses sheweth and therefore the Earth appeareth to be the Foeces or the grosser part of the lower waters and the visible water the grosser part of the Ayre For doth not the Apostle Paul tell us in the Text before mentioned that things visible were first of things invisibâ—e The change therefore of all things visible or invisible are effected by the Condensing or contracting faculty and property in the all-acting spirit And the reducing of them againe from a visible estate unto an invisible is caused by the Rarifying or dilating act of the self same Spirit in essence but differing in property And therefore as air was changed into water and water into Earth by the degrees of Cold so also is Earth changed insensibly into water and water into Ayre by the severall degrees of heat for if this were not how is it possible that so many waters falling from the Clouds should not more and more augment the Seas and diminish the Ayre or why should so much Earthen Coals and whole mountaines of wood that are burnt not make the earth lesse in Consistence if there were not an hourly supply and transmutation of Ayre into water and from water into Earth which though this divine nature doth effect secretly and insensibly yet by effect it
vegetation multiplication and preservation and hath made his seat in the Center of the heavens that by one most perfect Consonant namely a spirituall Diapason he might illuminate the Angels above and the stars round about him and that by a more material Diapason he might penetrate into the Center of the elementary world to communicate his perfection to each creature thereof that they might be beautified by his bright presence and vivified by the penetrating beams of his essence and consequently that the imps or spirits of darkness may be debilitated by the appearance of his Glory as if one chord were extended betwixt the Fountain of Light and the abysse of darkness which being struck made an unison but being pressed down and divided directly in the middle of it each part will render being struck a double diapason unto that unison importing a double perfection proceeding from the bright catholick Emanation whereof the one respecteth the adorning of the lower waters with life and virtue and the other maketh an accord of friendship among the higher Now as the body of the Sun and substance of the Aether is of a middle or mean spirituall matter or consistence of the waters it is evident that it also is subject to be altered by passion as well Antipatheticall as Sympatheticall For else it would not be the immediate receptacle of those opposit and contrary Emanations which descend from the differing Attributes But by effect we find the contrarâ— For some starrs are friends and Sympathise in nature with some creatures below Some again do hate one another deadly and consequently send down into this lower world contrary influences which move contrary passions or impressions in the vitall spirits or souls of certain Elementary creatures Again we find that the life of the Animal doth consist of opposit actions namely of Systole and Diastole that is of contraction by the property of matter and dilatation by the Act of the formall Light So that the nature of matter is to draw by contraction from the Circumference unto the Center but the condition of the formall essence is quite contrary unto it For it doth dilate or emit his beams from the Center to â—he Circumference Also the Philosophers testify that in sleep and rest the spirits are contracted from the Circumference to the Center after the manner of the dark Chaos or cold North wind which bringeth by that contraction the agill and volatil spirit or aire of the lower world to rest and fixation by condensation But contrariwise in wachfulness or waking they conclude that there is an emission or emanation of spirits from the Center unto the Circumferentce which is an Argument of two contrary effects of the firmaments vivifying operation in the souls or spirits of the creatures below and yet by reason of the equality of each action and passion they have a compound-disposition according and agreeing in the naturall operation of life which descendeth from above Thus therefore you see that even from the starry heaven there descendeth Sympathy and Antipathy As for the Elementary world it aboundeth manifestly with the effects of these two contrarieties and therefore lest there should follow any continuall unnaturall perturbation which may deprave this great formall workman of his expectation which was to put concord and peace in the machine whiâ—h he had ordered and framed he divided each region in this lower world that there might be interposed an indifferent friend between two extream enemies which he effected by weight number and measure So that unto the weightiest portion of the lower waters is imparted the least proportion of form that by its grossnesse and weight it might fall unto the Center and remain fixt in it and it was called earth then unto another portion he bestowed a double measure of Light to make it reside in a higher region and thereby the matter which was next the earth became more thin light and movable And therefore this augmentation of Light melted the frozen waters a little and did make them fluxible and transparent So that he partly by reason of the continuity of his matter with that of the earth and partly because of its cold nature it is a temperate friend of the earth and taketh his place next unto him So that it is not so cold as the earth nor so moist as the aire For it is not enough subtiliated till the bright Agent of the world bestoweth on the dark watery abysse above the water three portions of his Light So that it converted part of the gross lower waters into a thinner and more light shape than was the watery Element and it was the aire which by reason of the triple proportion of formall light was hotter and more dilated then was the water wherefore as the water was cold but not so cold as the earth and moist but not so moist as the aire So the aire is hot but not so hot as the fire and moister then the water By reason therefore of his moisture this portion of the catholick Element is friendly to the water on the one side and on the other side unto the fire because of his heat Lastly that in-created Spirit of life did yet multiply a part of those waters by an other or higher degree of subtility and purity So that it became the most subtil and highest portion of the generall Elements and is consequently hot and dry wherefore by reason of its drouth it agreeth on the one side with the earth which in circulation is next unto him and on the other side with the aire in respect of his heat but it is hotter then the aire and not so dry as the earth Lo here you see the effect of that Sympathy which the Peace and Love of God did put among the discordant enemies of this world For thereby the water as a friend to both the aire and earth becometh a stickler and mediator of peace between them The aire as a friend unto the two enemies fire and water is made an indifferent judge betwixt them both So that the one contrary is kept from strugling and tugging with the other by the super-celestiall and golden tie of peace Thus you see that this Spirituall Christ doth as the Apostle saith bear and sustain all things by the word of his Virtue And as Hermes said the humid nature by the assistance of the world is ordered and disposed harmoniously into Elements So that by this Virtue all Sympatheticall action was effected in the Sublunary world of which the Wiseman speaketh thus In se Elementa dum convertebantur sicut in organo qualita is sonus immutatur omnia suum locum custodiunt But when this harmonicall ranck and Symphoniacall proportion is violated then the enemies come together and rage against one another unto the disturbance of the whole Sublunary fabrick For aire and earth do struggle against one another as also the water doth cruelly invade the limits of the fire and all will be
proportion by reason of a part thereof which was exhaled the day before therefore to hinder all vacuity in the operation there is sucked up out of the pot of water C. into the leaden pipe just as much water as there wanted aire or as did correspond unto the aire exhaled Again when the Sun riseth the next day the aire in the ball and pipe will be rarified and then by dilating it self will repell the water to his former place the which was mounted into the pipe And so this alteration in condensation and rarefaction will ever hold in the same manner more or lesse according as the Sun is nearer or farther off from us or according unto the coldnesse or heat of the Wind that bloweth in the element The self same also will happen to the aire included in the second glasse for the globe or ball in the top of the glasse which is the bowl of the Matras or bolts head is full of air and is exactly in every respect referred unto the ball of lead as the streight Pipe which ascendeth out of the water and is joyned to the head is exactly compared unto the crooked pipe of the first so that if the leaden ball be erected upwards and the crooked pipe be made streight to ascend perpendicularly out of the pot of water unto the leaden sphear then will there be no difference betwixt the shape or figure of the first second Machin or Instrument so that each man may discern that the condition and usage of them both are all one in effect CHAP. III. Here the fabrick of this Organ or Instrument properly termed the Weather-glasse with the preparation of the Matras or Glasse commonly called a Bolts-head and the adaption of the Orifiace or Nose thereof into a small vessell of water is expressed Where also their opinions are confuted which deem and affirm that the water is sucked up into the neck of the Matras by heat FIrst we must observe that this our experimentall Instrument is composed of three parts where of two of them are more essentiall and proper unto the nature of the Engin or Machin namely the Matras or Bolts-head and the small vessell of water into the which the nose or orifice of the Matras after it is prepared ought to enter and the other is more accidentall as being onely ordained to sustain the glasse firmly in his perpendicular position and to adorn and set forth the Machin Touching the Matras or Bolts-head it is a round or ovall glasse with a long and narrow neck whose orifice or mouth and nose ought to bee proportionable unâ—o the rest of the neck and it must be prepared after a two-fold manner for first of all the long neck of it being put perpendicularly into the small vessell being full of water so that it do touch the bottom of the vessell we ought to measure from the superficies or top of the water and begin our division into degrees still ascending upwards till we come unto the very ball be it round or ovall And whereas the common sort of this kind of Weather-glasses hath his first degree beginning downward marked with the figne of 1. and so ascendeth upward to the round ball according unto the naturall Arithmeticall progression thus 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15. I for a better method's cause do alter the order in numeration and dividing of the neck or pipe of the Matras in the middle between the head of it and the superficies of the water I mark the place of the division with the figure 1. and so count my degrees downward and upward unto 7. after this manner 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. which I affect for reasons that I will expresse unto you hereafter So that the matter will be ordered thus As for the small vessell of water you see it here also described with the proportion of the pipe of the Matras that descendeth into the bottome of it which is so farre from division as it entreth into the water Now when you have thus divided the neck of your Matras into parts you must prepare and order it after this manner to make it magneticall and attractive by cold and expulsive or dilatative by heat you must therefore take the orifice of the Bolts head in your hand and hold forth the head thereof or the round which is above it against the fire till it be very hot for the heat of the fire will rarifie and dilate the Ayre in the glasse and cause by that meanes a good portion of it to flye out of the glasse's orifice and so it will remaine in that estate so long as the glasse is in the degree of heat at which time if you suddenly put the nose of the pipe into the water you shall perceive that as the bolts head doth keel or waxe cold so also will the water by little and little mount upwards into the neck of the glasse And we must note the hotter the glasse is made and the colder the externall ayre will be found as that present the higher and by so many more degrees will the water ascend into the neck And the reason hereof is because that as heat doth rarifie the aire so the greater the heat is the more excellent will the degree of rarifaction be Contrariwise as cold doth condense and thicken so the greater the cold is the stronger will the condensation be and therefore after that the included aire is much rarified by an intense externall heat It followeth that as the heat doth by little and little fade so the cold will by little and little prevail and have dominion and consequently the included rarified aire must needs by little little be condensed but because there wanteth sufficient matter or corpulency in the aire for the cold to work on being that a part of it was spent and evaporated by rarifaction It followeth that as the succeeding cold doth condense contract the aire so the aire by contraction of it self must also attract and suck up into it so much water out of the vessell as there wanteth air to satisfie the contractive appetite of the cold for the interposition of the water between the externall aire and the internall or included aire will not permit the internall to suck or draw into it the externall to supply her want for the satisfaction of the externall cold's lust and therefore the water is forced to asscend in lieu of the externall aire And this is the mystery of the Instrument and the manner of his fabricle whereby it plainly appeareth that they have been deceived which have deemed that the heat was the occasion of the attraction of the water upwards being that each man may be an eye-witnesse that it is heat that driveth it downwards and contrariwise that cold is the cause of his mounting And whereas some Sophisticators to make the matter the more strange have given out that it is a
secret peculiar included spirit which worketh the feat and to make men to give credit to their tales they have dyed the common water in the vessell with Vardegrease or such like stuffe I must give you to understand that all their prattle is but deceit and that plain dealing is a jewell As for the accidentall part of this Machin being it is framed and composed in a diverse fashion I will not graphically delineate or draw it out unto your view being that the pictures will be chargeable and the matter being done will serve you but to little purpose CHAP. IV. Wherein are Expressed the sundry properties with the usage of this demonstrative Instrument I Divide as well the property as the use of this Instrument into two kinds whereof I call the one generall and I make the other more peculiar As for the generall property of it by the one it contracteth and condenseth namely when the included aire is animated by the externall cold and by the other it dilateth and rarifieth to wit if the included spirit be excited by any externall heat And therefore through his constrictive nature or action which is made evident by the contraction of the aire we may easily discern the universall reason of the inspissation and condensation of things that wâ—re thin And again by his dilatation we may scan or decipher the cause of rarifaction of such things as were thick For by the speculation we shall find that there is nothing in the whole Empire of Nature which can be rarified and made subtle except it be by the action of light or fire whether it be visible or invisible and the essentiall effect of that action is light And on the contrary part nothing can be condensed or inspissared where darknesse hath not dominion forasmuch as darknesse is the essentiall root of cold which is the immoderate act or in condensation The particular properties with the uses thereof are manifold for first The nature of it is to discover the temper of the externall aire or catholick element in heat and cold for the higher that the water doth climbe in the neck or pipe of the Matras it argueth that the firmer stronger is the dominion of cold in the aire so that by this means we may daily judge of the increase or decrease of cold in the aire and by consequence we may guesse at the proportion of heat in the sublunary spirit of the world by the descent of the water Ceâ—tain Experiments worthy of observaâ—ion and approved by many of this City touching this Experimentall Glasse If the water in the pipe of the glasse which before was highly mounted doth fall on the sodaine by some degrees it will be an undoubted signe that raine will immediately ensue If the water in the space of one night doth descend it is also a signe that raine will come not long after If the South or East wind do blow immediately after a North or Westerlie wind the water will fall by certaine degrees but if the North wind or cold Westerlie wind do blow after a Southerne or Easterlie wind then will the water be forth with exalted If the water doth attaine unto the figure 1. it argueth that the Ayre is in a moderation between heat and cold as when the Sunne is in the vernall Equinoctiall or as the naturall temper of the Spring useth to be But if the water mount higher then it argueth that the disposition of the Ayre is by so many degrees more of Northen or Boreall nature as the water is mounted towards the bolts head for you must conceive that the degrees from 1. unto the uppermost 7. are belonging unto the winter Hemisphere and therefore are the degrees which note the augmentation of cold So that if the water do mount up unto 2. in the Northern or higher part it is an argument that cold hath dominion over heat in the externall Ayre only by one degree If it mount unto the 3. of the same Hemisphere it doth foretell a slight frost but if it ascend unto 4. or 5. it pretendeth a hard and solid frost if it come unto 6. and 7. it argueth great ice but if it mount yet higher it sheweth that a hard Ice is likely to surprize and cover the whole river of Thames On the other side if the water descend from 1. unto 2. of the lower ranck of degrees which importeth the Summer or hot Hemisphere then it argueth heat hath gotten dominion over cold by one degree But if it descend unto 3. or 4. it importeth a greater distemper of the Ayre in heat if it descendeth unto 5. or 6. it demonstrateth the ayre to be exceeding hot but if the water be beaten downe unto the lower figure of 7. it sheweth that extreame and Sultry heat causing Coruscations and lightnings hath dominion in the Aire So that we may discerne how great a reference or relation there is between the externall ayre or universall sublunary Element and the Ayre included in the instrument But I will in better termes expresse the Consanguinity and Sympatheticall relation which is between the one and the other in this subsequent Chapter CHAP. V. Here it is proved evidently notwithstanding any objection which may be made to the contrary that not only this experimentall Organ hath a relation unto the great world but also the spirit included in this little modell doth resemble and imitate the action of that which is included in the great or macrocosmicall Machin BUt before I will proceed in any further comparison between the spirit contained in the small modell with the properties of the agents and patients in it and this of the great world I do think it to be necessary first to answer unto a certain doubt or objection that may be made the which unlesse it be resolved and taken away such a relation or comparison may appear unto the ignorant either improper or altogether impossible I know therefore that not a few will object and say that no convenient comparison can be made between this our small artificiall Machin and that naturall fabrick or organ of the world forasmuch as the spirit in our Glasse is every where inclosed and strictly included in his vessell and therefore may easily be incited by force to move according unto the regular figure or fashion of the glasse But the case is far otherwise in the spirit which is contained in the vast cavity of the world for in it the aire or spirit doth use at every impulsion to move freely this way and that way as we are instructed by daily experience in the blowing of the winds from each quarter of the world Unto this I answer That it is the self same reason of motion and relation from a thicker or denser nature unto a thinner and in like manner from a thinner or rarer unto a thicker or denser in a small subject that is in a greater so that the like respects be had and that by an equall weight
of those waters which are under the Firmament of which division Moses maketh mention and therefore every particular thereof doth correspond unto the whole and consequently the aire included in the glass of the Instrument is of the same nature as is that of the whole Catholick Aire and therefore by reason of their continuity as the excluded whole fareth so also doth the included part Again as the Spirit which walked upon the waters did animate vivify inform and dilate them giving them motion So also by his absence or by hiding its act or contracting its emanating beames into it self the waters are also contracted condensed and darkned as it appeareth by the Northern wind 's property which proceedeth from the privative or contractive action of this Spirit But as the waters do by their existence fill the vaulted cavity of the world So also doth the all-informing Spirit fill every corner of them insomuch as being it operateth all in all but in a diversity of property and therefore it is termed multiformis Sapientia so sometimes it operateth in its privative property in these lower waters as is already told you namely when it bloweth from the North and West and sometimes in his positive nature as when it breatheth from the South or East In the first by his cold action he contracteth from the circumference unto the center as is said by the last namely by his hot property he dilateth from the center to the circumference Seing then that it is water that is the Catholick passive out of the which as being the common Subject of all things the shape of the whole world and every thing therein was and is carved out and fashioned as St. Peter telleth us and that the eternall creating and all-inacting Spirit of the Lord is the universall actoâ— which moveth all in all in the waters as Moses doth intimate unto us and that in and by an infinity of Organs as Angels Sun Moon Starrs Winds fire c. as in many places of Scripture we find it it must needs follow that he is the agent as well in the contraction and dilatation generally without the Glasse as particularly within the Glasse Wherefore as the Sun the hot winds the fire or naturall heat of mans body have their dilative property from his emanating and inacting vertue and do alter by it the cold aire the winds and water from his privative disposition So it followeth that as well the dilatation of the aire in the Glasse as contraction is the immediate act of this Spirit 's positive or privative property for when this Spirit bloweth from the North or West the aire is contracted more or lesse into a narrower room within the Glasse and that is proved thus namely because the water is drawn up higher into the neck of the Glasse lest a corporall vacuity should be admitted in nature And again it is most apparent that the aire in the Glasse is by so much the more contracted by how much the Northern cold hath dominion in the outward aire because it is gathered into a more strait place oâ— passage then it was before the water was elevated up On the other side if the hot winds or Summer Sun do inflame the externall aire then the included aire will also dilate it self and in its dilation require a larger space That the aire is so dilated by heat it is plainly demonstrated in that the water is struck down by so many degrees lower than it was Again if one put his hand on the top of the ball of the Glasse the water will sinke for the aire will forthwith be dilated Now that the spirit of life which giveth this heat unto Man or Beast is from this eternall Spirit which as the Apostle saith doth vivifie all things Scriptures do in many places above and hereafter mentioned confirm Again the Prophet calleth this one Spirit from the four winds to breathe into the dead carcases that they might live again Thus you see it evidently confirmed by an ocular demonstration that cold doth contract inspissate and make gross the included aire which is argued by the drawing up of the water and straitning the aire And again that heat doth dilate and dissipate by the enlargement of the aire in hot weather or by laying of the hand on the bolts head which is made evident by the beating down of the waters Note I beseech you ye that will not be over-partiall on the Peripateticks behalfes the two notable errours of the Aristotelians whereof the first is manifested in that they hold for a Maxim that calidum doth congregare homogenea heat doth congregate and gather together things of one nature Now you see it here ocularly demonstrated that heat doth operate the contrary for it dissipateth and disperseth the aire which is of homogeneall parts and therefore it doth not congregate it But it is cold that doth congregate compact and gather homogeneall things together as well as heterogeneall For you see in our Instrument that it contracts and gathers together the aire yea and water in a straiter and narrower place And therefore their assertion also is not â—ound when they say that frigidum doth onely congregare heterogenea The other of their palpable errours is also described by this ocular experiment for whereas they say that the Sun starrs and Fire yea and all heat whatsoever doth attract and draw unto it the vapours and humidity of the earth waters c. we find the contrary by this our experimentall Glass for in onely laying the warm hand upon the Glass the aire dilates it self immediately and is so far from being attracted by the heat that contrariwise it flyeth away from the hand And that this is so it appeareth by the striking down or precipitation of the water as is said Thus have we sufficiently mentioned in this present Book the estate of the first and second Principles of all things and that but in brief tearms because my purpose is to touch them with a more large and copious style in the first Book of my Sympatheticall and Antipatheticall History I will now proceed unto the next Book wherein I purpose to handle the mystery of Rarefaction and Condensation with the manner of the variety in the heavenly Fabrick and the rotation of one catholick sublunary Element into a four-fold nature or existence And in the last place I will conclude with the radicall efficient cause of Creation Generation Corruption and Resurrection The fourth BOOK The Argument of this Book Herein is expressed the universall mystery of Rarefaction and Condensation where also it is proved that by them the World was made the Heavens established in due order and the catholick Element altered and changed after a quadruple manner and condition CHAP. I. Herein first the common or catholick subject of Condensation and Rarefaction is once again recited or repeated as also the two essentiall opposite properties or vertues which are derived from the eternall Principle in his privative
and positive nature are proved to be the immediate causes of both those alterations in the generall Element of Waters I Have made it as I imagine most plain and evident unto your understandings as well by the testimony of the antique Philosophy and infallible wisdom of holy Writ as by ocular demonstration that the common or universall matter and subject of all things was the Waters which were inacted and created by the bright Spirit of the Lord before all things Which being so and for that all Condensation and Rarefaction do regard a subject or materiall substance wherein it should be performed or effected it followeth therefore that the onely matter which doth endure or suffer the act of either of them must be water or a humid and moist nature being it is the onely substantiall stuff which filleth all the vast cavity of the world and consequently the materiall existence of which both Heaven and Earth and all things therein are framed and were originally shaped out This is therefore that main subject of Condensation and Rarefaction by the means whereof all things in this world are made to differ from one another and are disposed and ordered by God according to weight number and measure in their proper rancks and places that is they are placed in a higher or lower region according unto that dignity which the catholick or eternall Actor hath bestowed upon them in their creation The common matter therefore of incrassation and subtiliation being thus made manifest we are to finde out the universall actor or operator in this work And I did signifie unto you before that it was the sacred emanation of that divine splendour which did operate from all beginnings and doth at this present operate and shall hereafter work all that which hereafter shall be effected in the heavens above and the earth beneath which assertion of mine accordeth well with this axiom of the Apostle oftentimes and that not without a just occasion repeated by me Deus operatur omnia in omnibus God worketh all in all And David In sapientia omnia fecisti Thou hast made all things in thy wisdom And Solomon Sapientia operatur omnia Wisdom worketh all things And the Apostle in another place Christus portat omnia verbo virtutis suae Christ beareth all things by the word of his vertue And St. Peter The heavens were of old and the earth of waters and by waters consisting by the word Again St. Paul saith that Christ is in all and filleth all And in another place Christus omnia est in omnibus Christ is all and in all Now this holy spirit of wisdom is said to be omnibus mobilibus mobilior more swift and movable than any movable thing And therefore he must needs act all in all according unto his will and pleasure Again when he is pleased to withdraw his actuall beams within himself he seems to rest and the act of the creature doth cease and then death doth ensue namely cessation from the activity of life Now being he is the most agil and moovable of all things the vertue of heat doth evermore accompany the motions of his light yea and are essentially united unto the actor even as we see in the Sun which Sydrach the wise-man compareth with Divinity saying that the body is likened unto the Father the the beams or emanation unto the Sun and the active heat which issueth from them both unto the Spirit that the beam is continuate unto the body of the Sun as the emanation from the divine fountain is one individuall essence with the fountain of eternall light and the virtue issuing from the Sun and his beams is in like manner unseparable in essence from the other two even as we find that the holy Spirit which is emitted from Father and Son is one in essence with them both For this reason therefore the divine Philosopher Hermes saith Mens ab essentia Dei nequaquam divisa sed illi potius eo modo connexa quo solis corpori lumen The mentall beam is not at all divided from the essence of God but rather joyned and knit unto him after the same manner that the light is continuated unto the Sun Whereupon it is evident that the vertue of heat is essentiall unto light as the act of motion is never absent from the emanating brightnesse I conclude therefore that Rarefaction is nothing else but the dilating of water by heat which was first contracted by cold and Condensation on the other side is a contraction or sucking and drawing together of those watry parts which were dilated or dispersed by heat So that the subject of both these actions is water and the fountain as well of the privative as positive agent is the Nolunty or Volunty that is to say the negative or affirmative will of that one eternall Unity who is that all-informing and operating Spirit which acteth and accomplisheth his pleasure in all and over all by his divers organs as well angelicall as celestiall and elementary which according unto their diversity in disposition are moved by this internall act to operate in this world the will of the Creator both positively and privatively as shall be told you in the Chapter following CHAP. II. How this Divine spirit or Ruach Elohim being but one in Essence worketh both by his Angelicall and Astrall organs in this sublunary world after a four-fold manner THe Eternall spirit of wisdome who is the initiall principle of all things and in whom and by whom as the Apostle teacheth us the Angels Thrones potestates and dominations were Created doth operate by his Angelicall Organs of a contrary fortitude in the Catholick Element of the lower waters both the effect of Condensation and that of Rarefaction And to verifie this out of the holy Bible's testimony we read first that this one spirit is the arch Lord and Prince of the 4. winds or else the Prophet by the commandement of God would not have said Come O spirit from the 4. winds and make these dead Carcasses to live againe Now that this one spirit worketh in and by spirituall and Angelicall Organs in the execution which is effected by the property of the 4. winds it is proved out of the Apocalyps where we find these words I saw 4. Angels stand on the 4. Corners of the Earth holding the 4. winds of the Earth that they should not blow on the Earth neither on the Sea c. By which it is evident that these Angelicall Presidents over the 4. winds were the Ministers and Organs by and in the which the spirits or blasts of the winds were emitted or retained according unto the will of that eternall spirit which guideth them when and where he list But we find by daily observation that the essentiall vertue in the Northern spirit is cold and therefore contractive or attractive from the circumference unto the centre and by consequence a causer of congelation and condensation By
gunpowders force raised in the aire to a certain height moving neither lower nor higher then the form all vigor affordeth it vertue and there remaineth untill the force of the corruptible and wasting fire be spent and then it falleth down againe But the Light of the star carrieth and raiseth up the spirituall body according unto the proportion of the mounting Light which soreth as high as its power and the ponderosity of the body will permit and so it hangeth perpetually at a certain distance from the center because the fire is of an eternall and incorruptible nature and will not fade as that artificiall fire of the squib doth Now as all the illuminating vigors and animating forces or flames that are imparted unto the universall waters was bestowed on them by that bâ—ight catholick Spirit or emanation which was sent forth by God to be carried on the waters which as Scripture doth averre is brighter then the Sun or Starrs So there is none of all those Lights which are separated or divided in essence from that glorious and glittering Spirit whose beams were dispersed over all the waters in the abysse in giving of them life and being For this reason therefore because each Light had a diversity in proportion of formall brightness and measure of corpulency it is that one celestiall body doth vary in his manner of vertue motion and influence from another but because the extracted quintessence or purer materiall essence of all the Chaos with the purity of Light that issued from the creating Spirit were united into an Angelicall alterity both of those natures in the figure of one masse sored up out of the dark abysse into the heaven's center where they challenged the Royall Phoebaean Throne and that Sphaericall masse is to this hour termed the Sun of Heaven which as from the created Fountain of Light enflameth and formally enlightneth all the rest of the Starrs in the heavens above and the Element and elementated creatures below So that after the universall contracted Light was effected the fourth day of the Creation it was ordained to be that capitall Organ of life and vegetation in the starry world which did send and showre down his influences and fiery spiracles of life conservation vegetation and multiplication upon the sublunary earth and waters Thus therefore in few words you have the reason of that Condensation and Rarefaction whereby both the invisible heavenly Substance and visible celestiall bodies were made And it seemeth not to disagree from the opinions of the learned Theologians Basil and Damascene touching the causes of the divine Spirit 's action in Condensation and Rarefaction before the apparition of the Sun in the heavens Forasmuch as they will have the daie's Rarefaction or cleare heaven to be occasioned by an emission of Light ordained by the divine will or act of this Omnipotent Spirit But they think that the night's Condensation and the opake or condensed bodie in the heavens are effected by a contraction of Light which was also caused by the sacred Spirit 's volunty Thus therefore we see out of the confession of certain of the prime Fathers of the Church what was the cause of the cold condensing Night and the hot rarifying Day before the Spirit was congregated into the Tabernacle or quintessentiall substance of the Sun which was extracted by the Spageâ—ick or separative action of the divine Spirit out of the huge deformed waters of the abysse And therefore this also must be the reason of Condensation and Rarefaction unto this day For as the Spirit in the Sun being far from us and as it were contracting his beames in regard of us unto himself or absenting himself from our Hemisphere so that the cold waters do incline unto the nature of their mother Chaos by reason whereof the night and darkness are long and the light and day but short and faint in heat So also in that season the common sublunary Element is subject to Condensation and Incrâ—ssation and therefore is constrained or contracted into the consistence of Frosts Snows Hail Ice and Cold showers c. Again when it is neare unto us it dilateth it self and by his heat and presence the cold waters become hot and the daies are augmented and fortified or made strong in heat and then the common sublunary Element is apt for dilatation and subtiliation being easy to be inflamed and set on fire with Lightnings coruscations and such like But I leave the history of the Condensation and Subtiliation of the aethereall Spirit to descend unto the like acts or conditions in the sublunary Element CHAP. V. How the lower waters or catholick sublunary element were distinguished ordered and shaped out into sundry distinct sphears which are called particular Elements and that by the foresaid all-working Spirit or dâ—vine Word SInce that it is most certainly proved already that the universall substance of the world's machin was made but of one onely thing namely of a matter that was produced out of the potentiall bowells of the dark chaos or abyss by the spagerick vertue of the divine Word the which matter Moses tearmed Waters and Hermes the humid nature of the which in generall as both Moses and St. Peter aver the heavens and the earth were made of old it must needs follow that out of this catholick masse of waters the universall sublunary element was derived which is commonly termed by the name of Aer as all that humid substance in the celestiall orbe is called Aether Now this generall element is by the breath of the divine Spirit Râ—ach Elohim altered and changed from one shape unto another for that which is the visible waters was made first of the aire which is an invisible water as again the visible water by condensation is made earth And this is proved first by the words of St. Paul who saith Per fidem agnovimus quod semper ita actum sit cum mundo per Verbum ut ex iis quae videri non poterant fierent ea quae possunt videri We know by faith that it hath been ever acted with the world by the word that those things which can be seen were effected or made of those things which could not be seen And again Solomon saith that the world was made of a matter that was not seen But besides these proofs we are taught by chymicall experience that earth is nothing else but coagulated water nor visible water any thing else but invisible air reduced by condensation to a visibility nor fire any thing else but ratified aire And in conclusion all the sublunary waters were in the beginning but an invisible humid or watry spirit which we call by a common name Aire and consequently the catholick sublunary element was in its originall nothing else but one aire being that heaven was made before the seas or the earth as Moses teacheth us And therefore by faith we must believe according unto St. Paul's doctrine that all
narrower place namely the aire then the water will immediately mount up with it and to it because it is contiguous unto the aire By this therefore it is apparent that the contracting and attracting vertue of the northern spirit or rather divine puissance which is made manifest in cold doth first attract contract and condense the dilated aire and then the aire so contracted by the northern spirit doth draw or attract the water from beneath upwards and that without altering of that water which was beneath in any thing from that which is above so that in conclusion it is but one and the self-same water Lo here therefore it is by this demonstration proved feazible and possible that water may be sucked and drawn from the caverns of the earth which is fostered and maintained by the sea even unto the top of the high mountains and that by a naturall means or operation without any necessity of altering the form of the water into vapour as Aristotle doth vainly surmize and that contrary unto his axiom Frustra fit per plura quod fieri potest per pauciora That is vainly done by many which may be effected by a fewer Contrariwise we see and observe in the Weather-glasse that if the dilative vertue of the present Sun or hot winds doth heat the head of the Weather-glasse or inflame the outward aire then the aire within the glasse will also dilate it self and by its dilatation will strike down or precipitate the water that the aire contracted by cold had sucked or drawn up and again the visible sinking of the water doth point at and prove the invisible dilatation of the air CHAP. X. That the actions of contraction and dilatation and consequently of attraction and expulsion of aire in the Weather-glasse with the effects of the elevation and depression of the water which are caused thereby are most conveniently applyed unto the aire and water in the world WE must consider as I have said before that the catholick air and water in the world filleth the whole vaulty cavity thereof no otherwise then the air in the Weather-glasse filleth the hollowness thereof so that the fountains of all the world issuing from one sea do seem to penetrate into the bowells of the earth and fill the generall veines thereof being sucked and drawn up unto them by that self-same reason by the which the water is exalted into the uppermost part of the neck of the glasse and by this reason there is an evident relation between the fountaines of the northern hemisphear and those of the southern forasmuch as it is expressed before that the southerly aire which is on that side the Aequinoctiall line is continued in his homogeneall nature with that on this side the line So that the flying dilated aire passeth from the south and is condensed into clowds in the north Wherefore it is apparent that the matter which feedeth the fountains in the north are more or lesse continuated unto those of the south as the waters that are raised up into the highest degree of the glasse are continued with them in the lower all which is fed and maintained with the pot of water which we compare unto the sea In which figure EFG is the northern hemisphear where the Sun is absent and therefore winter inhabiteth there and cold hath his dominion EHG is the southern hemisphear where the Sun is present and therefore summer dwelleth there and heat hath dominion EG is the Aequinoctiall line which is as it were the barr that divideth the northern region from the southern A and B is the hollow vein in the earth which continueth from the northern region to the southern that there might be a relation between or continuation in some measure of the northern and southern waters as well as of the northern and southern aire of heaven for being the wide sea D. which stretcheth from north to south is the head from whence all springs and rivers do originally arise I see no reason that it should seem strange to any man that I say the northern fountains have relation by a continuity of substance unto the southern and therefore the southern unto the northern Wherefore I conclude that when the catholick northern aire of the hemisphear EFG is cold it sucketh or contracteth unto it the aire in the vein of the earth A the which aire being contracted elevateth of the water out of the wide sea D as is evidently demonstrated by the Weather-glasse for when the cold externall aire hath contracted by congelation the aire in the head and neck of the glasse which head and neck I compare unto the veine in the earth for the vein of the earth is close and expireth no way then the water is drawn up by the contraction of the aire out of the vast water in the pot or basin which I compare unto the sea On the other side in the summer or southern hemisphear EHG where the Sun is present the catholick aire is subtiliated or rarified and dilating of the aire about the fountain and in the cavity of the vein beateth down and abaseth the water in the southern mouth of the vein in the earth B towards C so that oftimes in the summer the springs are found either dried altogether or at the least-wise much depressed Now therefore I say that by reason of the depression of the waters in the summerly south by way of subtiliation of the aire and exhausting or drawing them up in the winterly north by the cold the water is the apter to be raised in the cold north Again the elevation of the waters in the north which were the summer before depressed is effected by the empty aire 's contraction which possesseth the place in the summer time in the vein of earth where the water was as we see in the Weather-glasse and by the dilation of the aire in the south the water is easily there hid in the earth So that it appeareth that it is partly driven and pressed down in the south by heat and consequently with the greater ease drawn up at the north and partly elevated in the north by the cold winter as if a chord were put into a hole of a great piece of timber downward at one end and did ascend upward at the other thus The self-same will happen but in contrary order when the Sun and consequently summer is in the northern hemisphear EFG for then the springs will be there depressed and in the southerly parts exalted The seas draining or soaking into the bowells of the earth D being the commune medium or cistern of both extreams as well to receive the water pressed down and distributing upward of that superfluity unto the surging increasing or winter fountaines Thus therefore do you see evidently how Solomon's saying is proved true All rivers run into the sea and the sea is not the greater they return into the place from whence they came that they may run or flow again But
a receptacle for the Angelicall Spirits and blessed Souls as it hath its position betwixt both the extream worlds namely that of Eternity and the other of Temporality for it hath an immediate relation or commerce with them both For first it receiveth its immediate light life or formall existence from Eternity and then it poureth it out or communicateth it with the temporall or inferiour mansion to create and vivify it with the creatures thereof insomuch that as the formall act of the temporall world is Angelicall so the vivifying soul or spirit of the aeviall is divine or eternall Wherefore it followeth that the nature and property of Angells is neither to be excluded from the Subject of Theology forasmuch as they participate with the Divine Light or bright presence of Eternity neither can they be exempted from the body of Philosophy being that the Angelicall light is the soul and life of the Temporal nature and consequently the true Philosopher must acknowledg his essentiall science or Philosophicall grounds to proceed radically from the Eternall God by his aeviall or Angelicall Spirits into his temporall creatures I mean the Stars Winds Elements Meteors and perfect mixed bodies and therefore in respect that the Philosophicall Subject is animated by Angelicall influences it must needs pierce with a mentall regard into the eternall Light which doth centrally vivifie both the aeviall and temporall creatures beyond the which there is nothing to be found or imagined This therefore is the perfect tri-partite measure of that Ladder which Jacob dreamed of when he laid his head upon the stone which in its longitude latitude and profundity contained the images or characters of these three worlds and for that reason it was termed by the Patriarch himself Domus Dei The tabernacle of God Whereupon as that stone had his externall and internall so in his divine dream he observed Angells to ascend by it namely from earth which is the Creator's soot-stool unto the Eternall world where his Throne is by the aeviall mansion and also to descend again by the same degrees Thus may the sacred Philosopher with the Prophet not onely perceive by a more externall spirituall vision Rotam in Rota or the aeviall essence in the temporall beeing but also by a most internall or mentall aspect he may contemplate Rotam in medio Rotarum to wit a centrall mover and Eternall Spirit in the aeviall by the which the temporall or corporeall creature is immediatly vivified and agitated whereby we may boldly infer with the Scriptures that God is essentially one and all And therefore I may lawfully conclude with these axioms of the divine Theo-Philosophists which appertain as well unto the formal act in the Creature which is the true life of Philosophy as the essentiall virtue of Divinity that God operateth all in all He vivifieth all things He filleth all things His incorruptible Spirit is in all things By the Word all things were made In the Word was life and that life was the light of men He giveth life and inspiration and all things In him we live move and have our beeing He is the Father of all who is above all and through all and in all of us From him by him and in him are all things He sent his Spirit and created all things He giveth breath unto the people and spirit unto the creatures that tread on the earth O Lord how manifold are thy works in Wisdom thou hast made them all the earth is full of thy riches c. If thou hidest thy face the creatures are troubled if thou takest a way their breath they die if thou sendest forth thy Spirit they are re-created or revived By him were all things created which are in heaven and which are in earth things visible and invisible whether they be Thrones or Dominations or Principalities or Powers all things were created by him and for him and he is before all things and in him all things consist Note here how the Apostle doth livelily set forth in these words the foresaid three worlds Again Christ is all and in all things He sustaineth all things by the word of his Virtue In him are all the treasures of Wisom hid God by his Wisdom giveth or proportioneth a weight unto the aire and hangeth the waters or clouds in measure and maketh a decree for the rain and ordereth a way for the lightnings of the Thunders He speaketh in Thunder and answereth Job out of a Whirl-wind He by his Word giveth Snow like wool and scattereth the hoary Frost like ashes he casteth forth his Ice like morsels who can resist against his cold He sendeth out his Word and melteth them so soon as he sendeth forth his breath the waters do flow again By his breath the Frost is engendered and the breadth of the waters is made narrow I could produce an infinity of other places out of Scriptures to manifest the universall acts and virtuous operations which are effected in the Elementary creatures by that most essentiall and eternall Wisdom which is the main ground and true Corner-stone whereon the purest Mosaicall Philosophy doth rely but I esteem it needless being that they are copiously expressed already by me in this my Philosophicall Discourse and therefore I imagine that these which are already produced will be sufficient to content and satisfy all such as are unpartially judicious unto whose better wisdom and favourable constructions I recommend these mine indeavours and finally both them and my self unto God's blessed protection Your Friend Robert Fludd MOSAICALL PHILOSOPHY The First Book Section 1. The Argument of the First Book THis first Book sheweth that whereas the minds of worldly men are at this very day erected and soared up even unto the highest pitch of infidelity insomuch as they require and demand after signes and ocular demonstrations as the Jewes did For it is said The Greeks hunt after wisdom the Jewes demand for signes c. or else they will in no case be drawn to believe our Author did esteem it the greatest means of conquest in this Herculean-combat which is to be effected betwixt the two deadly enemies and strong champions Truth and Falshood that is to say the wisdom of God and that of the World if he could find out some vulgar and well known Experiment or practicall Insâ—rument which might serve our celestiall Champion Truth instead of an Herculean-Club to tame and exanimate that foul monster Infidelity who standeth so stifly in the maintenance and defence of his Lord and Master I mean the Prince of darknesse and errour his privileges being that such persons as will not be conducted and directed unto the center of Veritie by reall practise and ocular demonstration may rightly be adjudged more irregular and extravagant from the square and polished rules of reason than the brute beast who warned by experience which in that respect may rightly be esteemed for the mistresse of fools doth make his
and proportionate measure in cold and heat Yea verily and I averre boldly that the whole World or worldly Round is as well and compleatly stuffed or filled with spirit or aire as is this our artificiall vessell or experimentall Machin which if it should not be it would consequently follow that vacuity would be admitted into the nature of things the which would be but an absurd thing in a Philosopher to credit Wherefore we may boldly conclude that the spirit is in the like quantity weight and proportion in the concavity of this instrument considering his magnitude as it is in the great or little world But experience teacheth us that the self same nature be it hot or cold which useth to reigne and have dominion every quarter of the year in the cosmicall or worldly spirit doth produce the self same effects in rarifaction and condensation of the aire included in our artificiall vessell as it useth to procreate in the aire of the world all which is fully demonstrated before For by how much the more the state of the aire doth abound in heat or cold by so much will the water contained in the neck of the glasse be depressed by reason of the included aire 's subtilation And again by how much the more the inclemency of cold doth vegetate and abound in the air by so many degrees higher will the water be exalted And this is the reason as it is already told you that by the observation of this Weather-glasse the temper of the aire in the great world is so exactly discovered unto us And therefore by this it is evident that the foresaid doubt or scruple is abolished and taken away I would in this regard have each discreet Reader to understand that when he beholdeth this Instrument's nature he contemplateth the action as it were of a little world and that it hath after the manner of the great world his Northern and his Southern Hemisphear plainly to be discerned in it the which two are divided exactly by an Aequinoctiall line in effect which cutteth the Degree signed with the character 1. Also it hath his two Tropicks with their Poles onely we take the Southern Pole and Hemisphear to be hot in regard of us because the breath which commeth from it is from the Sun which in our respect is Southernly disposed and therefore we term that Pole the Summer-Pole or Hemisphear and the other the winter-Pole or Hemisphear And we have demonstrated that the degree in the neck of the Glasse 1. doth correspond exactly unto the place of the Aequator because that if the Northern or Winter Tropick be imagined to be the Basis of one Triangle whose Cone shall end in the centre of the Northern Tropick then it must follow that where the intersection is made by these two imaginary Triangles the Aequator must of necessity passe As for example Vide Med. Cathol 26. And we tearm the place of the Aequinoctiall the Sphear of equality because when as the Sun is in Aries or Libra which are the vernall and autumnall intersection of the Aequinoctiall the daies and nights are equall so also the temper of each Hemisphear in heat and cold is naturally observed to tend unto a mediocrity or equality Even such also will the temper of the micro-cosmicall aire or catholick spirituall element be unto the earth when the water in the Glasse is drawn up half way I have sufficiently described unto you as well the fabrick as the nature of this Instrument and therefore since I have prepared it to serve me for ocular demonstration instead of an Herculean Club in this combate which I undergoe against our insulting Peripatetick Adversary and that I am provided of sufficient naturall reasons instead of a trusty armour and that this armour is well tempered and made as it were musket-proof at the least by Authority drawn out of the whole Harmony of the sacred Bible Why should I fear the number of mine enemies when it is Tâ—uâ—h's owne cause which I undergo If God be with me I care not who is against me being that verity which conquereth all things will I am well assured fight for me and defend me though but onely one against a multitude Why should I expect any favour from them in telling the truth and condemning their errours since that they do Satyrically censure and deride my honest endeavours when I hold my peace and say nothing unto them It is an easier matter for malitious carpers and back-biters like temerarious and rash Cynicks to find fault with a thing than with moderate and judicious spirits to judge amend and correct it with equity In the first namely to condemn before the case is heard or understood it is an argument of envy cloked with wilfull ignorance In the latter namely to teach a man his errours a token of learned zeal and Christian charity The Second Book of this Treatise touching Philosophy in generall The Argument of this Second Book of the First Section THis second Book importeth That the Philosophy of the Ethnicks is false and erroneous both in regard it is founded upon the wisdom of this world which as St. Paul teacheth us is but meer foolishnesse in the eyes of God and then because it contradicteth the truth and consequently is not issuing from the Father of Light which is in Heaven but from the Prince of darknesse who reigneth beneath Wherefore this kind of wisdom or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is termed by the Apostle James Terrence animal and diabolicall And for this reason St. Paul that most excellent and sacred Philosopher or lover of wisdom doth warn us that we be not deceived by this kind of Philosophy which he tearmeth Vainfallacy built and framed out according unto the traditions of men and after the elements of this world and not having its foundation upon the true corner stone Jesus Christ in whom dwelleth all the plenitude of Divinity corporally BEfore we dive into the bottomlesse abysse of the essentiall Philosophy whose main foundation is the true wisdom the which is a thing so difficil to be put in execution that nothing but the swift and nimble-winged soul or spirit of man is able to bring to effect it will but concur with reason that we should in the first place consider and observe the Etymology of the name or word whose naked essence we hunt after that thereby we may in the second rank descend more securely and with a better understanding unto the definition or description thereof and so proceed with a surer confidence unto the division or differences of the main subject we have in hand to the intent we may directly point at the truth and distinguish it from falshood Seeing therefore that Philosophia or Philosophy is the main scope or businesse of this our Treatise it is meant commonly and understood in a generality for Sapientia or Wisdom but by a more proper and peculiar signification it is interpreted Amor or Amicus sapientiae
and power as they appear now onely puissant in words being hindred from the good fruit which accompanieth true wisdom by the erroneous doctrine of their seducing Master I know that this good perswasion of mine will make the followers of worldly wisdom to storm and to say of me as the Stoicall and Epicureall Philosophers did to Paul in Athens What will this babler have or what doth he tell us of a new way of learning I answer That it is not I but the word which they follow that teacheth them if they will be pleased to mark it well and sequester themselves in the mean time from the rules or documents of their Ethnick Master But I will come unto my nearer proofs whereby I will most evidently shew that the doctrine of Aristotle is a manifest enemy and opposite or contradictory unto the truth which being so it is by the Apostle James condemned for a branch of that wisdom or philosophy which is terrene animal and diabolicall It appeareth and shall be hereafter proved out of the Book of verity that the vertue whereby God doth manifestly operate in this world is expressed either by attraction from the circumference unto the center or expulsion from the center unto the circumference namely Contraction or Dilatation For after this manner is produced Condensation and Ratification whereby the heavens and the earth and elements with compound creatures as well Meteorologicall or unperfectly mixed as such as are compleat in their composition were created and made And again by it he operateth in this world either sympathetically that is by a concupiscible attraction or antipathetically that is by an odible expulsion Since therefore that all things are effected in this world by attraction or expulsion let us see what is Aristotle's opinion touching the cause of attraction and then afterward examine whether it accordeth with the tenour of truth The Petipatericks being perswaded thereunto by their Master Aristotle do accord in this namely That the Winds the Thunder the Comets the Clouds and other such like Meteors are made and caused by the attractive heat of the Sun and other Stars which draw up vapours and exhalation out of the water and earth and elevateth them into the regions of the aire And therefore Prout saith Velcury according unto the mind of Aristotle magis minusve calidi sunt vapores ita altius aut humilius elevantur sursum à solis calore aliorumque astrorum sicut videmus in sole bâ—bente attrahente aquam As vapours are more or lesse hot so are they elevated higher or lower by the heat of the Sun and other Starrs as we see that the Sun doth drink up and attract water unto it Hence therefore hath that palpable errour been introduced into this world namely that fire and heat do suck and draw unto it vapours and fumes when it may be made most palpable and evident unto the simplest so that he have but human sense about him that the heat of the Sun and fire doth rather discusse and expell from it by dilatation than allure unto it by the way of attraction As for example if the fire did draw vapours unto it then would it not permit any smoak to go from it but the contrary is seen viz. that it discusseth by dissolution and expelleth and seperateth by rarefaction the subtill from the grosse not with a desire to draw or attract the vapours made by rarefaction unto it but to expell and disjoynt it from the whole grosse body it worketh upon for which cause we see the fumes and smoaks to fly away and to be inforced to avoid the action of the fire without any inclination of the fire to retaine them also if we apply a wet handkercher unto the fire we shall see that the watry substance in it will be subtiliated by the heat into a reaking vapour but as for the fire it is so farre from attracting of it that the reaking smoak will be seen to rise up in the house at randome without any evident attraction of the fire In like case it happeneth with the Sun 's operative faculty for it subtiliates or ratifieth the water or humid substances by his heat and consequently it draweth nothing at all unto it but discusseth rather that which was thick into thinner portions Now the reason that water or grosse humid substances being rarified do ascend upward is not any attractive faculty in the Sun or Starrs but a naturall inclination in the thing it selfe for it is a common axiome that omne leve et subâ—ile doth by a naturall sympathy or appetite tendere sursum and therefore it is of his own inclination being so subtiliated that it soareth upward toward his naturall and destinated region or place as we see in Fumes Smokes and such like Contrariwise omne grave doth in like manner tendere deorsum all that is ponderous doth descend by a naturall desire towards the Centre But that I may more exactly and assuredly display this errour of the peripateticall attraction of exhalations and vapours by the Sun Starrs and fire I pray you that you will but observe our Weather-glasse or experimentall Machine and we shall there finde by practice that all attraction from the circumference unto the center is caused of cold and not of heat for by cold the water is drawn or attracted up into the neck of the Glasse and that is effected by the inspissation of the aire and reduction of it into a straiter room when contrariwise we note that if the Sun do heat the head or boul of the Mattras or if the warmth of the hand do but touch it the included aire dilateth it self and forthwith flyeth away from the heat and is so far from being attracted by it that it precipitateth and depresseth the water downwards Which being thus as ocular experience the mother of fools hath taught us let our Christian Peripateticks but duely observe the subtle wisdom of their Master whom they have hitherto followed and let them see and consider how grosly he hath erred in the main argument pillar or prop of his Meteorology which being so what can be more expected then that the whole fabrick of the same should fall before the eyes of each wise contemplator To be brief these such like errours of his have forced divers of his discreetest disciples naturalists to dissent and start from his doctrine as well touching his opinion of the Winds and the Thunder as of the originall of Fountains being perswaded and allured unto this their relinquency by a tâ—uer spirit For Johannes Fregiâ—s a very learned Naturalist and a man who hath taken great pains in searching out the truth of naturall mysteries according unto the documents of Aristotle as it well appeareth by that his large volume entituled Quaest ones Physicae hath this Quaâ—quam tota dâ—sputatio de Ventis sicut de aliis me coris plena est admi abâ—â—â—m operum Dei quorum mille firmae sufficientes
ociosaque ad nihil respiciens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Nihil dicitur in quo statu Aleph tenebrosum dictitatur When the divine sapience was retracted in the abysse of darknesse resting still and quiet and respecting nothing it was esteemed as nothing and in that eâ—tate it was called dark Aleph In this contracted or rather sequestred or private estate therefore of the divine unity it operateth according unto this its negative pâ—operty or condition by his essentiall agent Cold which is proved therefore not to be an accident as the vain doctrine of the Peripateticks would perswade us being it is apparent unto each wise-man that no accidentall qualities are in or can be from God being that the divine Nature is meerly a simple essentiall and formall purity existing in himself and of himself and therefore he being but one essence is able to produce out of himself what essentiall property he pleaseth And for this reason the divine wisdom is said to be spiritus unicus multiplex one simple spirit in essence but manifold in respect of his essentiall properties Now that this essentiall property or nature of Cold is the formall instrument or instrumentall vertue whereby God doth operate in his hidden and potentiall estate for the resistance of heat and action or motion and for the deformity and destroying of that which he in his patent nature did effect by his Heat or active property it is made evident by effect for what the spirit of wisdom in its patent nature did operate by its hot spirit or blast from the south or easterly winde namely in subtiliating and raâ—ifying of the waters into thin aire making that which was gross subtle and making that which was opake and dark diaphan and invisible the self-same spirit again enduing his latent and cold property doth deform and undo For in blowing or breathing from the North the same thin and ratified aire is made thick dense and visible which was through raâ—ifaction made invisible and that which by dissipating of parts was made transparent light and diaphan is now by the Northern properties contractive vertue reduced into an opake or dark substance and no way perspicuous That which was active movable and lively by an addition of heat is now become stupid still and deadly by the invasion of cold That which was light and of no sensible weight is framed into an heavy and ponderous body or consistence as we see when the aire by the northern blast is turned into snow hail ice frost c. Now that it is but one and the same spirit in essence which bloweth from the four winds the Prophet Ezekiel doth testifie when he said Veni spiritus à quatuor veniis insuffla interfectos istos Come O Spirit from the four winds and breathe upon these slain persons c. Whereby he argueth that it is but one spirit though it endueth at his pleasure a four-fold property And now to confirm all this which is said to be true do but mark the words of the royall Psalmist Jehovah emittit nives sicut lanam pruinam sicut cineres dispergit deâ—icit gelu tanquam frusta coram frigore ejus quis conâ—istat Emittens verbum liquefacit ista simul ac efflat ventum suum effluunt aquae God sendeth forth the snow as wooll and scattereth the frost like ashes casteth out the ice like as gobbits who is able to withstand his cold He sending forth his word liquefieth all these northern effects So soon as he bloweth or breatheth forth his wind the waters do flow again that is the snow frost and ice do melt and are turned into water Out of which words we may observe many notable things namely first that God in his hidden or latent property doth by his essentiall action of cold contract unto the center those things which were before dilated towards the circumference Secondly that the property of cold is attributed or ascribed unto God in his northern action and therefore it is said Who is able to resist his cold For which reason it is evident that it is an essentiall vertue in the divine puissance Thirdly That it must be the act of unity in his dark hidden and privative property both because it darkeneth things that are diaphan transparent and light and then because it depriveth of life and motion that which did act move and live through essentiall heat And lastly because it is an utter enemy unto the action of heat which at tendeth on the revealed emanating and vivifying divinity Fourthly that the effects of cold are undone by the act of the revealed nature of God which is the word for the Text saith He sendeth out his word and resolveth or melteth all these namely the snow frost and ice Fifthly that all this is effected by one and the same spirit in essence but of divers and opposite conditions to perform the will of the Father which sendeth it forth Again that the cold property of the winde is the essentiall depriving vertue or stupifying and contracting act of God it appeareth by this of Job Deus fortis edit glacâ—em flatu suo flante Deo concrescit gelu The strong God bringeth forth the ice by his breath God blowing the ice is ingendered I conclude therefore that cold is the essentiall act of the divine puissance or eternall sapience shrowding it self in its mantle of darkness and therefore doth manifest the divine volunty in that estate of his by the effects namely in that it draweth from the circumference unto the center and therefore is the occasion of congregating of things as well hetero-as homo-geniall and by consequence the onely essentiall agent or efficient cause of inspissation contraction constriction fixation immobility ponderosity rest obteneration or darkness of mortification privation stupefaction and such like In the contrary divine property namely in this spirit's patent manifest and positive nature or as he is termed light Aleph wherein he moveth or sendeth out his emanation from the center towards the circumference and revealing himself upon the dark face of the Abysse maketh the invisible non Ens or potentiall Nihil to appeare in Act being first animated by his bright presence in the form of waters He is said by the Wiseman to be omnibus mobilibus mobilior ubique penetrans seu attingens propter munditiam ejus The most agile and movable of all movable things piercing through all things by reason of his purity So that as the other privative or Northern property did produce rest and vacancy from operation by attraction or contraction from the circumference unto the center so in this his positive or Southern and Orient property by dilating himself or sending out his active beam brightness or emanation from the center towards the circumference he doth beget and procreate motion being accompanied by the essentiall Act of Heat or calidity which operateth continually upon the effects of cold in resisting dissolving and
destroying of them So that this formall Champion of Light namely Heat warreth perpetually against the cold gardian of Darknesse For the one can have no dominion in the Aire untill the other by little and little be exiled And therefore as the Light principle with all his branches is said to be the Father of posiâ—ion act information plenitude motion life health and Heat So also doth Heat operate according unto the nature of his restless and ever operating Father which is Light to destroy the effects of darkness and cold as we see in the nature of the hot winds namely that of the South and East or Orient For as the Northern cold wind doth congregate contract harden thicken or condense make ponderous fix immovable and opake the aire changing it by inspissation into the nature of more ponderous Elements So contrariwise the said hot winds or spirits do dissipate dilate mollify rarify and make thin and light volatil movable and transparent what the cold winds did so change and alter and all this is effected by the Act spagerick or separative Act of God's Spirit or Word And therefore the Prophet said in the Text mentioned before Emittens verbum suum liquefacit ista simul ac efflaâ— ventum suum effluunt aquae God sending forth his Word that is causing his bright vertue to shine forth he did undo or melt the Snow Frost and Ice which God in his hidden or contractive property had caused and that under the form of an Angelicall wind And therefore it is said So soon as he bloweth forth his breath or wind the waters flow that is to say the Snow is melted and of a fix and opake substance becometh movable lively fluent and diaphan or transparent So also the heat of the Easterly wind destroyeth and dissipateth the watery effects of the Westerly wind and therefore the Prophet saith Postquam veniente Euro vento IEHOVAE è deserto exaruerit scaturigo ejus siccatus fuerit fons ejus Afterwards by the Easterly wind of the Lord coming from the desert his spring withered and his Fountain was dried up As if he had said the water was changed by the heat of that wind into Aire by rarefaction or subtiliation Thus have you understood how these two opposit Vertues namely Cold and Heat do spring from one and the same Spirit in radicall essence by which it operateth actually and essentially by a double property Forasmuch as they produce in the Catholick Element of the sublunary world opposite effects to effect the will of the Creator in the Aire and upon the Earth and Seas Now I will speak a word or two of the Procreation or Generation of such passive Natures as are brought forth by the mutuall action and opposition of the two foresaid essentiall Vertues which do spring and have their root or beginning either in the Divine Nature's Nolunty and privative existence or Volunty and positive emanation These passive qualities do essentially depend upon the former and do no otherwise belong unto them then the female or passive do unto the male or active And first I will tell you my mind touching the birth of Humidity and afterward I will come to speak of Siccity We must imagine that when there was no formall Light to inact the deformed Abysse or Chaos and consequently no Heat to act and make a division of Light from Darkness then all the dark Chaos was inclining unto drouth and wet congealed with cold For cold hath an infinite power and dominion where Heat is absent as we see about the Northen Pole all the waters are frozen into a dry and cold clod or heap by reason of the absence of the Sun's heat In like manner where the Sun or burning Easterly winde doth send forth directly their spiracles of Heat there Cold is banished and the Earth is turned into a dry thirsty and spongy masse Even so and after the like pattern are those or rather these after those patterns For the Chaos was a confused a cold and a dry heap untill the Light did appear and began to operate Also the Light of it self as it was considered without any action upon the passive masse was of a fiery condition that is to say heat and drouth did only appear in it it followeth therefore that as cold in effect is nothing else but the act of the divine puissance made potent and evident by the absence of Heat So also is drouth or dryness nothing else but an apparent passive nature evermore accompanying the two foresaid active powers in their absolute intention where moysture is totally absent Now moysture is as it were a mongrell begotten between the two opposite actives which is proved thus The North wind by his dominion turneth the Aire into Snow Hail Ice or Frost that is into a cold and dry Substance But when the Southerly or Easterly wind doth begin to have dominion then their blasts do penetrate by little and little the said dry masses or substances and undoeth them and coverteth them into a moist or humid nature according unto the tenor of those forementioned words of David So soon saith he as he bloweth forth his wind the waters flow So soon as he sendeth forth his Word they are liquefied So that moisture is nothing else but a mixtion of heat and cold in one solid Substance which is fluxible in potentia and then by little and little doth the cold and drouth depart and become faint according as the power of the wind is more or less vigorous in Heat For thus much we must observe that as cold doth make immobil and fix So it is an evident signe that the Southern or Eastern Heat hath taken possession of the Mass when by their action it beginneth to moysten to revive and move again forasmuch as nothing doth effect that function but Heat In the very same manner also the increated and all-creating Spirit of Light moving upon the face of the dark abysse did operate in it and made the congealed Mass to relent and then it was called by Moses waters and by Hermes humida natura or the humid nature And so they continue unto this day being altered from one nature unto another according unto the will of God which he effecteth by his Ministers the Angelicall winds causing the Spirituall waters to change and wheel about from one nature into another And we must observe in these changes that even the visible waters were first made and derived from the invisible waters according unto St. Paul's doctrine before mentioned For Heaven was before the Sea and Earth which were as it were the feces dregs or grosser part of the catholick Sublunary Element An ocular Demonstration confirming the Divine properties or Vertues above-mentioned Before we proceed unto our ocular demonstration which shall be made in and by our Experimentall instrument we must consider in the first place that the Catholick Aire or Sublunary Heaven is the subtiler and more spiritual portion
visible things and therefore the seas and the earth were first made or produced out of things not visible that is to say aeriall or heavenly For it is one universall aire that filleth the vast cavity or vault of the world which by reason of its levity tenuity or invisibility is called Heaven as contrariwise the earth and seas are so termed because of their gravity density and visibility Since therefore it is evident that the catholick sublunary aire is the main materiall ground and substance of that which the world calleth elements and that it is altered and changed from one estate into another by the Word or divine Spirit Ruach Elohim I mean by the eternall wisdom let us consider with our selves how this potent Spirit doth effect in that one and the same homogeneall invisible thin water or aire such Protean trans-mutations whereby there is an evident rotation made in it out of one nature into another which are therefore tearmed distinct elements We must therefore consider in the first place that this was that vivifying Spirit which the Prophet called from the four winds saying Veni Spiritus a quatuor ventis insuffla interfectos istos ut reviviscant And therefore this one Spirit Ruach Elohim was the royall commander of the four winds and by consequence could contract the aire by his windy organs and again dilate it at his pleasure and therefore it was he and no other that doth animate the four winds and agitate the Angels that are his under-governours of them to alter and change the invisible aire into visible shapes when and how be listeth And first touching his generall act in ordering the aire into divers shapes it is said Deus ventos depromite thesauris And again Aer subito cogetur in nubes ventus transiens fugavit eos Sapientia aptat pondus aeri appendit aquas in mensura ligat densas nubes ut non findantur facit pluviae statuta viam fulgeâ—ro tonitruum God draweth the winds out of his treasury The air is thickned into clouds and the wind that passeth-by doth drive them By wisdom he giveth weight unto the aire hangeth or ballaenceth the waters in it by proportion and measure bindeth fast the thick clouds so that they cleave not giveth lawes unto the rain and maketh a way unto the lightnings of the thunders By which words we may conceive that the invisible aire is the main subject on which the all-operating Spirit of God worketh and bringeth forth the fore-named visible effects and that onely by Condensation or Rarefaction which is insinuated by giving weight unto the aire For by Condensation he converteth the invisible aire into visible clouds and then by a profounder degree of thickening those vaporous clouds are condensed into raine and the thicker and more unctuous part of the cloud is concreted into a hard stone or earth So that out of the invisible aire we see evidently by condensation produced three degrees of visible substance namely a vaporous aire a thick visible water which is rain and a dense and ponderous earth which is the stone called Lapis cerauneus or Thunder-bolt ingendred by the Spirit of God in that fight which is made in the conflict between the liquifying nature of the fire and congealing disposition of the cold water Again on the other side by rarefaction the aire is converted into fire namely into lightning and all these receive their severall forms and changes from the catholick nature of the invisible aire into those shapes in which after the alteration they abide So that you may by this perceive that all that which the antique Philosophers have termed Elements are nothing else but a four-fold changing and mutation of one and the same catholick element or humid nature unto the which according as they in their changes do appear various have divers and sundry names namely of fire water and earth imposed upon them Now the principal organs by the which and in the which this Spiâ—it moveth and acteth by a diversity of property in turning and changing this catholick aeriall subject into a four-fold nature that is to say out of one thing into another are the angelicall winds which he hath ordained to blow from the four quatrers or angles of the earth in a diverse property For as before I told you out of Solomon's doctrine that this wise spirit was one simple thing in essence but man fold in property or operation so doth he being but one Spirit for it is said Veni spiritus à quatuor venus act after a four-fold manner by his four-fold angelicall winds in the catholick element of aire for when he bloweth or breatheth from the North he contracteth the common element into an earthly body namely into frost snow hail and ice And therefore David saith Deo emittente sermonem suum in terram quà m celerrâ—mè excurrit verbum ejus qui edit nivem sicut lanam pruinam sicut cineres dispergit dejicit gelu suum tanquam frusta coram frigore eius quis consistat Emittens verbum suum liquefacit ista simulac efflat ventum sâ—um effluunt aquae God sending forth his word upon the earth it runneth swiftly who bringeth forth the snow like wool and disperseth the frost like ashes and casteth down his ice like lumps who is able to resist against his cold Sending forth his word he liquefieth or melteth all these so soon as he bloweth forth his wind the waters do flow forth c. Out of which speech we may gather first that it is but one word or Spirit of God which both by a northern contraction doth change the sublunary element into an earthly condition and hard and visible consistence namely when he bloweth from the North and therefore saith Ab Arcturo egreditur frigus flatu suo edit Deus fortis glaciem latitudinem aquarum coarctat From the North commeth the cold the mighty God doth bring forth ice by his breath and coarcteth or straightneth the latitude of the waters and also by a southern blast doth melt and undo those terrestriall effects which by his northern spirit it did produce and cause Secondly that the subject in which and on the which it did operate was the aire which it did metamorphose and change from a soft tender light volatil transparent thin and invisible substance into a hard rough heavy fix opake thick and visible masse Thirdly that the word there is taken for the essentiall spirit of the wind in generall and therefore it is used as well to contract the aire into snow ice or frost as to dilate it Again the Psalmist saith Angeli Dei faciunt verbum c. Again when he breatheth from the south then this generall element becommeth vaporous airy humid and hot and will easily by the concourse of the northern fortitude though in never so small a measure be changed into clouds for the southern blast is ever apt to undo the effects
is proved true For when the the wood and Coal is consumed we shall find that their terrestriall Corpulency or bodily masse is almost resolved by fire and heat into watry smoke and fumish ayre But the Philosophicall axiom is that every thing is resolved into his first matter or principle therefore it is apparent that both the water and aery smoke which make up the Earthly bulk of a great Oake or mountaine of pit-Coal was first of the invisible Ayre Again if these were not so the brimstone Stones and dust which authority of the Bible and common experience teacheth to descend from heaven being that they fall in one place or another daily would increase the Earth more and more But leaving these speculative proofs I will descend unto such ocular demonstrations as I have learned out of mine Experimentall glasse The Demonstration We find that from the lower region of the Calender or Weather-glasse unto the summity or top of the head there is nothing but a portion of the common invisible element namely the Aire within it But we shall find even in this little modell of aire strange mutations or alterations effected by vertue of the four winds which blow in the open element for when the hot Easterly wind doth blow it dilateth and extendeth it self all along the neck of the Glasse and beateth down the water unto the lowest degree by reason of its extension so that it approacheth unto the nature of fire for fire is said to be nothing else but aire extreamly dilated though indeed it is the abundant presence of the bright form which dilateth it so but if the South-wind bloweth then it will not be so extreamly dilated but it will endue the mean nature of aire and therefore it will draw up the water by certain degrees But if it happen that the westerly wind have the sole domininion in the sublunary element then will the aire in the Glasse grow thicker and for that reason it draweth or attracteth the water higher For cold hath a great power in the said air whose nature is to condense and thicken Lastly if the cold northern winds do govern or dispose of this universall sublunary element then will the included aire be contracted or coarcted into a very strait room which is argued in this namely because the colder the winde is the higher will the water be elevated in the Glasse and therefore it is made manifest that by how much the more the aire is contracted by so much the more it is thickened and consequently it must be made ponderous considering the proportion of place in which it is for all the aire which weighed thus much in half a yard of Place doth weigh at the least even so much in 2 inches of Space after Contraction Thus you see that in verity there is radically but one catholick sublunary Element though by the angelicall spirit that bloweth from the four corners of the heavens it is four-foldly informed and altered which made the Antients to imagine in their phantasies four distinct elements of an equall birth and beeing from all beginnings But you see apparently by this that is said that this position of the Peripateticks and other sects is false though that it hath gotten an universall name and dominion in this world among men as well of learning as of the ignorant who ground their sayings on the doctrine of the learned of this world who are corrupted and seduced from the truth by the Ethnick discipline I will now expresse unto you in the last place of this book how all generation and corruption in this world is made and that the lowest profundity or terminus ad quem the motion of corruption tendeth is but unto the simple element of nature and then beginneth a new generation from that principle being four-foldly altered according unto the nature of the four winds and therefore when the dead carcasses should live again the Prophet said Come from the four winds O Spirit and blow on these dead bones that is inform and vivifie their Spirit with thy breath for bones were made after a hard Northern and fixt manner the humours after their proportion the Westerly and Southerly property namely flegm and blood and lastly the Spirit of life came from that all-vivifying fire which Hermes calleth Splendorem Sanctum The holy Splendor To conclude I will demonstrate the mystery of the worlds Creation by way of an Arithmeticall progression after this manner Here we have the progression in the worlds Creation where 1. signifieth the Unity which was before all things which whilst it was in it self and did not shine forth conteined its inacting property within its potential Nolunty or Darkness and therefore was esteemed as nothing in regard of mans weak capacity although that in it self it is all in all Then the rank 2. sheweth the actuall emanation of the in-created Light out of the potentiall Unity at the presence whereof the humid nature did appeare out of the dark abysse 1. 0. in the shape of waters so that the light and waters as active and passive are ranked next after Unity thus 0. Light 0. Water 2. then by the fiery Spirit of eternall love and union those two opposit natures are joyned together into the nature of heaven by a spirituall union or composition the which is termed by the Platonicks the soul of the world which the Philosophers have styled by the name of Quinta essentia the quintessence For we must understand that as the 4. Elements were made after the Heavens so also are the Heavens said to animate the Elements no otherwise then the soul doth the body So that this degree of Progression in the Creation standeth thus 0. Light 0. Aire 0. Water 3. The last scale in the Progression of the worlds Creation is thus 0. Fire 0. Aire 0. Water 0. Earth which importeth the four-fold alteration of the catholick Element by the four Winds which was and is effected by the Word the third day of the Creation and this was nothing else but the generall sublunary or lower waters This therefore was the estate of the world in the Creation and in this very state doth continue hitherto and will do till it be refined by the fiery Tryall All this the wise Hermes hath according unto the Tenor of Moses described unto us exactly in these words Erat umbra infinita in abysso aqua insuper spiritus tenuis intellectualis per divinam potentiam in chaos inerant floruit autem splendor sanctus qui sub arena humidanatur a elementa deduxit cumque indistincta fuissent levia postmodum in excelsam regionem provolarunt gravia sub arena humida resederunt distinctis libratisque rebus quae igneo Spiritu vehebantur emicuit coelum septem in circulos c. An infinite shadow or darkness was in the abysse moreover water and a subtil intellectuall spirit was by the divine puissance in the Chaos And a holy brightness or splendor did
Ventus Nubes c. The Sun Moon Starrs Lightnings Winds Clouds c. do obey the Will and Command of God that is they are incited by his Word and of necessity provoked to effect his pleasure It followeth not therefore that he that commandeth must be constrained to do or act in that imperious manner being that he doth it as a first mover who hath not any other actor before it or co-eternall with it and consequently doth operate of a free will which is radically grounded in himself And hereupon the Apostle Voluntati Dei quis resistat Who is able to resist the will of God And the Prophet Consilium meum stabit omnis voluntas mea fiet My counsell shaâ—l stand and my will shall be accomplished And Job Deus quodcunque voluit hoc facit What God would have done that he effecteth And therefore he doth not act involuntarily or of necessity but voluntarily and according unto his free Will We conclude therefore that seeing what is Necessarium or necessary is that which cannot happen otherwise but must of necessity be so So that which is contingent may happen or be effected otherwise as is that thing which is either fortuit or voluntary Now that the Acts of God in this world are voluntary and therefore cannot be tied up with the bands of Necessity it is proved in this namely because it may happen otherwise then it is accustomed to be by the laws or rules of nature As when the will of God was that the Sun should stand still or move retrogradingly or that it should be eclipsed when the Moon was in none of the points of the animall intersection that is neither in the head or tayl of the Dragon c. The fifth BOOK of this present Section The Argument of this Book AFter that the Author had expressed the Originall nature of the two essentiall properties namely of Heat and Cold and had proved the main effects thereof to be Rarefaction and Condensation whereby the Heavens and Elements were framed He proceedeth now in this Book unto the mystery of Meteorologicall impressions being the first degree of Composition shewing that their Fabrick is the act of the Divine Spirit effected in the catholick Element of the world's lower region and consequently do not proceed from such accidentall and externall grounds or beginnings as the Peripateticks do fasly surmise For this reason therefore he hath compared the Meteorologicall doctrine of Aristotle with that of the holy Scripture And finally by producing the Pagan Philosophy touching these aiery impressions unto the Lidian tryall or touch-stone of Truth he findeth them to prove false spurious metal yea and meer dross in respect of the golden Truth CHAP. I. Herein you shall find in few words a Repetition of the precedent Discourse Also an Exposition upon the word Meteoron or Meteor And lastly the Method which the Author intendeth to observe in this Book is expressed IN my precedent discourse I have briefly pointed at first the Principles of things namely the Root of every thing that was viz. the Dark or potentiall unity from which sprung forth the Light or actuall unity And I told you that both of them were but one thing in essence forasmuch as Light was unto the eternall unity all one with darkness though unto our weak capacities they are opposite in property Then I signified that out of the first obscure unity by his other manifest property waters did appeare arguing thereby that of or from this unity by this unity and in this unity are all things After that I shewed how waters were the materiall or passive Principle of all things as the illuminating and formall Spirit was the actuall and informing beginning of every being both which issued as I said before out of one Root which for that cause is rightly said to be all in all Then I expressed unto you how that Cold was an essentiall adherent unto privative rest and the stout of-spring and Champion unto darkness As contrariwise Heat was the immediate issue and companion unto essentiall action or motion and the inseparable Champion or Assistant of Light And then I told you how Humidity and Siccity had their Originall from the mutuall presence or absence of the foresaid two active vertues or essentiall properties Cold and Heat Lastly I declared unto you the reason and manner of Condensation and Rarefaction and that the main matter or Subject thereof was the waters but the catholick Actor was and is the Word or Spirit of God who acteth first in his Angelicall Organs by the Starrs and especially the Sun in Heaven above and winds beneath upon the generall sublunary Waters or Elements according unto his volunty altering of it after a four-fold manner through the formall properties of the four Winds and that either by Condensation or Subtiliation into divers shapes and dispositions Now in this Book I will open unto you after a true and infallible manner forasmuch as it shall in all points agree with the contents of the holy History how the blessed Word or sacred Spirit of the Lord doth by Condensation and Rarefaction produce and bring forth in this our catholick sublunary Element all Meteorologicall bodies But before I enter into this my discourse it is fit for me to tell you what the Antients do mean by this word Meteor Those Apparitions which are seen in the aire are by the Greeks called Meteora not in regard of their naturall essences but by reason of their sublimity in position Others tearm them more naturally Impressions forasmuch as they are shaped and imprinted above in the catholick element called Air. But in respect of their essentiall consistence they are properly called Corpora imperfectè mixta aut composita Bodies that are imperfectly mixed or compounded and that either because of their unexpected generation being that they are procreated and appear suddainly and at a short warning or else because their composition appeareth not to be according unto the mutation or change of substance or alteration of quality or else in regard they are not so exactly composed as other animated bodies which are perfectly mixed Or lastly these impressions are so called forasmuch as they have not attained unto any perfect form neither seems there to be in this kind of composition any great alteration of parts seeing that the members of the element so altered are confused with one another Howsoever it appeareth that such names are assigned unto this kind of impression after the fancy or conceit of this or that Philosopher when in verity they are magnalia Dei a mysticall body I say framed and fashioned by the finger of God out of the bowels of the catholick sublunary element to effect his will upon the earth either to judgment or mercy as shall be more at large expressed hereafter So that in this sense they may rightly be tearmed the characters or signes of Gods benignity and misericord or vengeance and severity upon the earth
plants relent liquifie and become animated and fluent the birds rejoyce and are quickened and the dull and senslesse aire is by little and little refreshed and taketh flight into the southern regions for reasons I will shew you in my demonstrative positions immediately following And yet for all the absence of the bright and inacting Spirit in the Sun it followeth but that one and the self-same Spirit which filleth all may alter his privative property when and where he list for we see oftentimes quite contrary unto the common constitution of the year that by it thunders and lightnings are effected in the midst and hardest of the winters and the winds which are most active namely the east and south blow beyond expectation all which is effected by him at his pleasure who operateth all in all how and by what means and where and when he list This therefore being well pondered I enter into the state of this my demonstration The demonstration or proof how the annuall winds are moved by the vivifying spirit which is in the Sun I have told you that the whole effect of the divine action in the humid nature of this inferiour world did consist in Congelation and Rarefaction and that the first was caused by the privative and northern act of Gods Spirit which doth operate by cold and the other by his positive operation which is guided by heat Now as these two have their dominion or depression by the presence or absence of the Sun so also is the universall aire more cold spisse opake and sluggish or stupid when the Sun is farthest off and again more hot subtle bright transparent agil and active when the Sun is nearest Mark therefore the properties of the aire included in the glazen vessell of the Calender-Instrument and remember that it is but one and the same Spirit in essence that worketh as well privativly as positivly for it was one and the same Spirit which was called by the Prophet from the north and south for the Text saith Veni spiritus à quatuor ventis c. wherefore this Spirit is it that governeth the universall sublunary aire as well privatively as positively And although this Spirit be most plentifully in the Sun yet it being neverthelesse every where is able at all times and in every place to expresse himself in both properties I come therefore unto the point or mark In the first Chapter of the first Book of this present Section I have most clearly demonstrated unto you that the aire included in the Weather-glasse hath in every respect a relation unto the aire or catholick element of the great world where also it is proved that the aeriall humid nature doth as exactly fill every place of the vaulted world where the earth or water are not lest any vacuity should be found in the cavity thereof no otherwise than the dilated aire in the head and neck of the Weather-glasse doth fill the cavity thereof and therefore as the aire included in the glasse doth work by dilatation at the presence of the Sun namely in the Summer-season when the externall aire is heaâ—ed so also and after the self-same manner will the aire of this northern hemisphear be dilated when the Sun is present yea and the nearer the Sun is and the more perpendicular his beams are the greater will the generall aire 's rarefaction be and consequently of that particular aire which is in the glasse On the other side when the Sun is absent from the Boreall hemisphear namely when it moveth beyond the Aequinoctiall then will the common aire in that hemisphear wax cold and be contracted and condensed and consequently the particular aire in the glasse will be contracted after the same proportion which may easily be measured or conceived by the degrees of ascent of the water in the glasse as the rarefaction may be collected by the descent thereof This therefore being well conceived or understood and that the cause of this rarefaction is the presence of this divine act in the sunny tabernacle and that the reason of the condensation is the absence or remotenesse of the said act or operating and emanating Spirit and consequently the presence of the divine puissance which is darknesse for as we said the absence of heat is the presence of cold which is the essentiall worker in the divine puissance and again the presence of heat is the absence of cold So also the absence of positive light conceiveth privative darknesse and the absence of privative darknesse imparteth the presence of positive light We may easily hereupon collect the reason of the annuall winds and perceive what their externall is and how that aire is animated by the vivifying Spirit which is sent out from the Sun Consider therefore that when the Sun is present with us the Summer is created by his presence the aire is calefacted by the bright beams of his Spirit and by calefaction is rarified and by reason of rarefaction of parts requireth a larger place for his existency As for example We put two pound of Vitreol into a Retort and fasten the nose thereof unto a huge Recipient or Receiver stopping the joynts fast that the spirits do no way expire We force out the Spirit from the Retort into the Receiver and we find it tried by experience that part of the Vitreol being dilated into spirits those spirits finding the ample Receiver not sufficient to contain them do violently break the Receiver into an infinity of pieces Whereby it is made plain that a thing which is condensed will occupy but a small place but when it is dilated it will require a very large continent for his existence All this is argued plainly by our experimentall Instrument for when the Sun is present the aire included is forthwith dilated more or lesse according unto the vigour of the solar spirits and winds that blow but when it is dilated it requireth by so much the more a larger place to be contained in by how much the more it is dilated or â—arified and that is proved thus namely because the water is thrust down by so many degrees lower by how many the aire excelleth in rarity So that it is evident that the onely reason why the water is precipitated more and more downwards is because being by degrees subtiliated it maketh it self a larger room to abide in Now that I have shewed you thus much mark that when the Sun commeth newly into an hemisphear where winter did reigne or had dominion and therefore the cold did incrass and thicken the aire as for example when it passeth from us into the southern hemisphear to convert the winter estate of that part into summer it doth forthwith begin to attenuate the aire of that part of the world and that aire so rarified being animated and as it were revived by the operating beams of the Suns bright spirit becommeth light-winged or feathered wherefore it flyeth away from the south and seeketh a larger place for
his abode or entertainment being that the australl hemisphear is not sufficient to receive his dilated body For this reason it is forced to pass a-traverse the Aequinoctiall and to visit by a successive motion the northern hemisphear and at its entrance therein to make a windy noise by reason of the thickness and coldness of the aire which resisteth the hot vaporous and lately dissolved or rarified aire which is animated with the southern light from whence it receiveth his agility And this aire thus animated and forced by the divine act in the Sunny tabernacle to fly from the south unto the north is that which we call the southern winde which for this reason happeneth so frequently among us in the beginning of winter namely immediately after the Sun hath passed the Aequinoctiall that is to say through Libra into Scorpio This is the reason that the southern winds I say are so plentifull among us in October November and December and consequently that we are saluted with such southern showers by reason that the northern coldness doth condense the fugitive southern aire into clouds as shall be told you in the description of the clouds All this is demonstrated out of the Weather-glass for at the heat of onely a mans hand being placed on the head of the Weather-glass the included aire is rarified and so dilateth it self and flyeth to an opposite Pole namely unto the heat of the cold water the which it beareth down before it On the other side the northern winds and the ice and snow which are more frequent in winter are caused by that breath or spirit which is sent forth from God in his potentiall and privative nature the which he doth exercise or put in execution in this world when the treasure house of his actuall power is farthest and therefore he hath ordained the Magazin or store-house of his cold in the poles of the world being farthest off from the Aequinoctiall For this reason it is said in Scriptures that cold commeth from the north and that before the cola of God who can consist and that the breath of God maketh ice and frost And again Hast thou come into the treasure-house of the snowes or hast thou any knowledge in the treasury of the hail Neither is Gods actuall light severed or distinguished from him though he breathe at his pleasure from the north in his potentiall or privative property for darknesse unto him is as light And for this reason also when he is displeased he breatheth from the north as well in lightning and thunder as in snow and hail Whereupon Ezekiel said Behold a whirl-winde came out of the north and a great cloud involved with fire c. And yet both the cold snow hail and frost and the lightnings and melting heats proceed but from one and the same spirit though divers in properties which as I said was by the same Prophet called from the four winds that is to say one and the same word in essence but multi-form in property Of which the Psalmist God sending forth his word upon the earth by it he poureth down snow on the earth like wool and disperseth the frost like ashes who can resist against his cold So soon as he sendeth out his word it doth liquifie them so soon as he bloweth forth his winde the waters begin to flow and the snow frost and ice to melt Whereby it is evident that God is ever one in himselfe wheresoever he be namely be he in the north where he operateth privation or in the Sun in which he doth expresse his actuall glory Yet doth his Volunty as well as his Nolunty that is his positive property as well as his privative accompany the unity of his essence As for example His negative property in his positive was discerned when he made the Sun to stand still at Joshuah's prayer and to go backwards or become retrograde for the confirmation of Hezekia's belief And his absolute privative when at the death of our Saviour he contracted his manifested bright glory into the center So that the Sun became as black as pitch I conclude therfore that when this potentiall property of the Divine Spirit doth move or act in the aire the aire is sucked towards the pole or center and so is made Frost Snow c. In which space our experimentall Instrument sheweth a nature quiâ—e contrary from the precedent For after the imitation of the aire in the great world it is contracted and sucked up into the bolts-head as to the cold pole and this then demonstrateth that the catholick externall aire doth also work after the same fashion It appeareth therefore that the reason of this emitted Spirit is occult and not known unto any of us that are drowned in the abysse of Ignorance but onely is made known unto him who hath been so happy as to be instructed by the true Wisdome of God which Solomon confesseth to be the worker of all things and therefore the most faithfull Schoole-mistress to teach all mysteries But I will proceed further in the search and inquiry of this Ethnick Peripatetick man's skill in the Science and knowledg of Meteorology And first I will see what he can say touching the Generation of the clowds and the rain CHAP. V. How Aristotle's Doctrine touching the Generation of the Clowds and production of the Drops of Rain is found to be altogether contradictory unto the true Wisdome's Institutions WE will now come unto our inquiry and examination of Aristotle's skill in the watry Meteors and because that the causes of mists called Nebulae and thinner clowds termed Nubeculae are comprehended under the title of Nubes or Clowds I will onely insist upon the Mystery of the clowdy impression For I purpose not to make any great Volume of words to weary your eies with reading them over but onely to touch with brevity such kinds of principall Meteors as may in their generality include by their descriptions every speciality that may be comprehended under them I will therefore briefly begin with Aristotle's opinion and then compare it with the Testimony of holy Writ that thereby the essence of it may be examined with the fire of verity to see whether it will indure the Test or withstand the tryalls of Truth 's touch-stone or no. His opinion therefore with that of his Christian followers is that A clowd is produced of a vapour which is elevated from the earth and water into the middle region of the aire by the attractive power of the Sun or Starrs where it is contracted and as it were congealed into the consistence of a visible clowd by vertue of the extreame coldnesse of the place the which clowd is afterwards partly by the heat of the Sun and partly by the force of the winds carried or forced this way and that way through the middle region of the aire Lo this is the Substance of the Peripateticall definition of a clowd Now that we may
the better gather and understand the truth of this business and find out whether Aristotle be a true or a false Prophet in this his description Let us here consider what the Book or Bible of verity shall teach us concerning the Generation of a cloud and how the members or clauses of this our definition do agree with the intention of it which that we may more distinctly and with the exacter method effect we purpose in this place to compare their minds and senses together that each person though but meanly literated may easily judge and determine of the case as truly it standeth In the precedent Definition he maketh the efficient and procreating cause the heat or act of the Sun saying that by the attractive vertue thereof the vapour which is the matter or substance of the clowd is drawn out of the earth and water and sublimed into the middle region of the aire averring also that partly by the motion of the Sun and partly by the winds it is moved this way and that way Again he surmiseth that the cause of the contraction or condensation of the vapour into the consistence of a cloud is the coldness of the middle region of the aire So that unto the consistence of the clowd he faineth that two Agents quite contrary in nature and condition unto one another do concur and meet together namely the heat of the Sun and coldness of the middle region of the aire but he assigneth no internall cause of motion unto the clowd esteeming it as a thing dead and without an active spirit For this cause therefore there do offer themselves unto each wise-man's consideration sundry doubts in this Definition to be throughly resolved and determined of before he will be able rightly to judge the verity thereof namely first whether the heat of the Sun do draw and attract vapours out of the earth and waters into the middle region of the aire for the composing and shaping out of a clowdy Meteor Secondly whether the coldness of the middle region of the aire be the occasion of the condensation or thickning of a thin vaporous substance into the consistence of a well compacted clowd Thirdly whether the clowds be only moved by externall efficient Agents namely by the winds and Sun as being destitute of any internall active principle or centrall Agent or else if it be moved and animated by an internall Spirit Unto either of these three questions or doubts I purpose here to answer in order as they are proposed Unto the first Objection therefore I say That it is a most false and erroneous Tenent of the Peripateticks that the Sun Starrs or fire do draw unto them any vapours or exhalations For it is proved by experience that they rather expell and dissipate from them such things as are rarified by them than draw and allure them unto them neither is it true as most men falsly dream and surmise that the Sun draweth fumes upward or that the fire sucketh the vaporous substance of the attenuated water unto it but their office is to rarify and subtiliate the waters and to reduce the moister part of the earth into vapour And then it is naturally incident unto those light Substances of their own inclinations to ascend and mount upwards without any other externall agent But all this we have plainly demonstrated by our experimentall Instrument For if you set your hand upon the bolts head or round glasse on the top the aire will dilate it self and presently fly away from the rarifying agent that dilateth it and therefore much less will that agent suck or draw it unto it self By which it is evident that whereas it seemed in the eies of worldly wise-men that because a vapour or fume ascendeth upwards therfore that motion from the Earth must needs proceed from the attractive vertue of the Summer heat now in the conclusion it is proved to be stark false and erroneous being that the nature of Heat and Light are clean contrary unto the attraction forasmuch as they expell by dilatation and do dissipate and enlarge which is contrary unto the condition of attraction gathering together and condensation which are the properties of cold as is mainfested by our experimentall Machin But now to prove that Aristotle's grounds are most extravagant unto the Truth who affirmeth that the clowds are made of a vapour drawn or elevated up into the middle region of the aire we must understand that the Opinion of the holy Scriptures is flatly adverse and contrary unto this clause or member of his definition or description being that first it is easily to be gathered by this Text of St. Paul That we ought to believe by Faith that things visible were first made of such things which were not seen and therefore it is neither the visible earth nor water that can be the Originall of the clowds but rather the invisible aire And this is also maintained by divers plain Testimonies of Scriptures Deus sapienti◠su◠aptat pondus aëri appendit aquas in mensura Ligat eas in densis nubibus facit pluviae statuta viam fulgetro tonitruum God by his Spirit of Wisdome doth give a weight and proportion unto the aire and hangeth or ballanceth the waters by measure tieth them in the thick clowds giveth laws unto the rain and assigneth a way unto the Lightning of the Thunder In which speech the wise and patient Job doth seem to confirm First that God is the Father and Head from whence this work and all other doth radically proceed and the eternall efficient instrument by which he acteth is his Spirit of Wisdome which also accordeth with this of the Apostle Nobis est unus Deus Pater à quo omnia unus Dominus Jesus Christus per quem omnia To us there is but one God the Father of whom are all things and one onely Lord Jesus Christ by whom are all things Secondly That the aire is the main Subject as well of the watery as fiery Meteors for by thickning or condensing of it it giveth a consistence unto the clowds and such-like Meteors which are easily afterward resolved into water and rain and then by attenuating it extreamly it becometh lightning Not that I say that the act of Lightning is of the Substance of the aire but is rather an admirable Light clothed with the aire as with a vestiment And in the very same sense the Text saith Indutus lumine quasi vestimento He is endued with light as with a vestiment And again the wise Philosopher In lumine numen in numine lumen So that the thinner the aire is the hotter it is and consequently the richer in coelestiall fire whose centrall act is divinity Now that the aire is the substance or materiall subject of the watry Meteors the precedent Text beareth it in these words God by his Wisdom assigneth or setteth by proportion a weight unto the aire that is he thickeneth it into clowds
perform what is commanded them So that we see these creatures are drawn out of their secret dwellings to do the will of him that created them CHAP. VII How by our experimentall Instrument the reasâ—n of the composition of clowds is ocularly demonstrated A so in this the Snow is defined falsly and truly NOw I think it most fit to demonstrate unto you how the clowds are procreated by the opposite blast of two winds of a contrary nature namely of the Southerly wind in eminency and dominion and a Northerly spirit which also bloweth but insensibly I told you in the Chapter where I did demonstrate by our experimentall Instrument the reason of the Southerly winds which happen in winter that as the aire included in the Weather-glasse did by the onely touch of a warm hand dilate it self and in dilatation fly from the hand of the toucher unto the cold region of the water which was evidently proved and maintained because the water did suddainly thereupon move downward So also the grosse winter aire in the southern hemisphear did at the approach of the Sun unto the parts beyond the Line dilate it self by vertue of that ever-acting and subtiliating spirit which put his tabernacle in the Sun so that the southern dilated aire posted apace or flew hastily away to seek a larger place but comming into the northern hemisphear which by reason of the Sun's absence became brumall or wintry the constant aire of that region being now contracted by the northern cold and the north-wind by reason of the colds dominion blowing more or lesse though insensibly it meeting with the warm southerly spirit condenseth it with the rest into clowds and this is the reason that alwaies almost and that is where no northern blasts are discerned that the southerly winds do bring abundance of clowds and rain with them for that the hot southerly vertue of the divine agent doth more and more subtiliate and rarifie the winter aire which it found there till it had by rarefaction purified it and reduced it unto the nature of a true Summer aire so that the superfluous parts of the aire after rarefaction were chased away as is said into the northern region where it is condensed again partly by the privative act of the divine puissance and partly by the spissitude of the northern aire which denyeth it free passage into the form of clowds For the cold spisse aire of the northern hemisphear agitated and animated by the northern blast or property resisteth the hot vaporous aire and so it condenseth by little and little To conclude I could here set down the Aristotelian definitions of the snow frost hail ice and such like other meteors and then check and contradict them mainly by other true descriptions of them proved by the testimony of holy writ As for example Aristotle seemeth to aver that the snow is a clowd congealed by the great cold which before it be perfectly dissolved into water by a vaporous disposition it is changed into a snowy substance In which definition because he is ignorant as hath been proved already in the fabrick of a clowd we ought in no case believe him Again he digresseth from the tenour of Scriptures according unto the mind whereof we have defined the snow thus The Snow is a meteor which God draweth forth of his hidden treasury in the form of wool to effect his will upon the earth either by way of punishment or clemency Or thus The Snow is a creature produced out of the air or heavenly treasury of God by the cold breath or blast of the divine spirit in the form of wool to perform his will on the earth Where the fountain of his originall substance is made the aire or the matter of the heavens and therefore the Text hath it Congregatio speritus aspergit nivem The gathering together or condensation of the spirit ingendereth and sprinkleth the snow upon the earth And Job Pervenistine in the sauris nivis Camest thou into the treasury of the snow Also the form and efficient cause is expressed thus Deus verbo suo nives emittit sicut lanam coram frigore ejus quis consistat God by his word sendeth out the snow like wool who is able to resist his cold So that God by his Word which doth operate in his privative property by his cold is the essentiall efficient and omnipotent actor in the production of the snow I could I say effect all this at large but because my minde is not to dwell upon on these particulars forasmuch as in the description of the clowd I have sufficiently pointed at the rest I will proceed unto my enquiry touching Aristotle's opinion concerning the beginning of fountains that we may perceive thereby whether he have erred as far in that mystery as he hath done in the rest CHAP. VIII What Aristotle's opinion is touching the generation of Fountains and Rivers and whether he in his opinion doth jump with the verity of the true wisdom SInce therefore it is apparent that Aristotles doctrine is erroneous and deceiptfull touching the generation and essence of the winds and clowds we purpose in the third place to bring his judgment and opinion concerning the beginning and originall of fountaines and rivers unto the touch-stone of truth that thereby we may perceive whether it will endure the tryall and not shrink as the proverb is in the wetting The Peripateticks as well Christians as Gentiles are as much deceived in their meteorologicall grounds concerning the generation of fountains and rivers as in the rest of which we have spoken before and therefore their Master Aristotle all things being well pondered in the ballance of justice ought to be accounted of all true Christians for a seducer and deceiver of the world and consequently his doctrine touching this point ought of right to be repudiated and rejected Aristotle with his peripateticall sect or faction are of opinion that being the belly or bowells of the earth is full of cavities and hollow passages vapours to avoid vacuity must needs ascend from the center or bottom of it the which cleaving in their ascent unto the sides of the hollow vaults and streighter passages or veines of the earth do resolve into water which distilling down by drops do ingender fountaines and rivers In the which opinion of theirs they conclude that the matter of fountains is nothing else but a vapour arising from the bottom of the earth and resolved liquefied or condensed into water through cold and heat together within the earth no otherwise then after their saying the clowd rain snow and hail do arise and are generated in the aire of a vapour first condensed and afterwards liquefied But if we shall duely examine every member of this their description we shall perceive that they require as well a double matter as formall agent in this generation of fountaines for they faign that the remote matter is a vapour and then the near and immediate
matter they imagine to be drops of water which are caused by the concretion or condensation of that vapour Also they make their two efficient causes cold and heat for say they it is the office of cold to condense and congeal the included vapour into water and that it is the heat and cold together which maketh the water fluxible and moovable Let it therefore be lawfull for me judicious Reader to answer these Peripatetick Philosophers with an over-worn axiom of their own and consequently to fight with them at their own weapons Their axiom is Erustra fit per plura quod fieri potest per pauciora That is vainly done or effected by many which may be effected by lesse Now if that this originall work in the producing of fountains may be performed most conveniently by one and the self-same subject of water without the altering of it first into vapour by subtiliation and afterward by condensing again that subtle vapour into water Then I make no doubt but you will conclude with me that this Peripatetick definition is vain imaginary and sophisticall by their own rules But I will make it apparent hereafter by an ocular demonstration that it is possible by a course in nature onely that water without any alteration of his consistence may by the secret veines and close passages or conduits of the earth be drawn or sucked up out of the huge seas unto the top or summity of the mountains after by his soaking through the sands and pory substance of the earth it hath left his salt nature behind it which appearing evidently to every mans sense the vanity of Aristotles invention will soon be discovered unto wise men Besides all this the sterility of his reason or invention which would faign that these vapours cleaving unto the sides of the caverns or hollow places and that there forsooth they must be converted into drops of water which from thence must issue forth into rivers will be palpable and manifest if we consider that these drops so made are apter to circulate and readier to fall down again into the bowells of the earth from whence they came by those self-same vaulty passages or hollow veines through which they ascended than to issue forth of the ground allaterally because that every heavy thing is more prone to descend then to move sidelong And therefore it is likely that either all the waters so made or the greater part must needs return downward by the way it came or ascended in the form of vapour But omitting these reasons for a while we must see if the Text which is conteined in the Book of Verity do consent in this Opinion with Aristotle and his faction yea or no. We find in the first place that it is not an accidentall and imaginary heat or cold that acteth in this Meteor's Generation but God who operateth by his Angelicall Spirits and solar act in the accomplishment of this business And although that in his action as well privative as positive cold and heat do expresse themselves as his Ministers For the Text saith Coram frigore ejus quis consistat Who can stand against his cold Yet it is his catholick positive act which he extendeth out of his sunny Tabernacle and hotter winds and privative vertue which he manifesteth in the longinquity and absence of his bright Tabernacle from the region pointed at and the propinquity of the polar seat of the colder winds to alter annually the created Element And therefore it is God which by his Spirituall Organs as well in Heaven above as Earth and Water beneath that operateth all things and amongst the rest produceth the Fountains of which the rivers are made And consequently we ought to esteem it the Act of God's Spirit which filleth the earth as Solomon saith and operateth all the naturall effects therein Which also David doth testify in these words Qui emittis fontes per valles ut inter montes ambulent potum praebeant omnibus animantibus agri frangant onagri sitim suam Qui irrig at montes è caenaculis suis faciens ut germinet foenum adjumenti herbam ad hominis usum Who sendeth forth the fountains through the valleys that they may run between the mountains and give drink unto every living creature of the field that the Asse may quench his thirst and that they may water the mountains from their cells causing the grass to grow for the use of the Oxe and the herb for the benefit of man c. So that here we have the sole catholick Agent and therefore the Operator of fountains as is proved by this Text. Again here we have the finall cause set down for the which they were created and continued in succession by God namely to water the earth for the giving drink unto all cattell and living creatures and for the multiplying of grasse herbs trees and fruit for the use as well of man as beast But will our Peripateticks say we hear no news out of Scripture for the contradicting of our matter assigned for the composition or consistence of Fountains which we say to be a vapour and not water in its naturall substance Neverthelesse to qualify this their imagination and to make them behold the Truth without Spectacles I counsell them to give eare unto this assertion of Solomon Omnia flumina saith he intrant in mare mare non redundat ad locum unde exeunt revertuntur ut iterum fluant All rivers enter into the Sea and it is never the bigger they return unto the place from whence they came that they might flow again By the which Speech of the wise-man expressing the materiall cause of Fountains the foresaid definition of Aristotle is utterly othrown for this doth evidently prove that it is one and the self-same water and that in the plain form of water without any transmutation of it out of water into vapour and then from vapour into water again as he doth erroneously alledge which moveth from the Sea unto the Mountains and from the Mountains unto the Sea again Insomuch that for this onely errour some of his earnest disciples have become Apostates or renegado's unto his doctrine For Joannes Velcurius a learned man in the worldly Philosophy and one who hath sweat and taken great pains in the Aristotelian doctrine insomuch that he wrote a Comment on his Physicks when he cometh to speak of the Generation of Fountains he seemeth to confess and publish his Master's folly in these words Non conveniunt plane Sacrae Scripturae cum Physicis de ortu fluminum fontium quae ex mari per varios alveos meatusque fluere ac ad suos fontes refluere Eccles. 1. testatur dicens Omnia flumina intrant in mare mare non redundat aâ— locum unde exeunt flumina reveâ—tuntur ut iterum fluant Caeterum Physici dicunt materiam esse vaporem resolutum in aquam liquefactum à frigore et
calore simul intra terram The holy Scriptures do not agree with the Naturalists concerning the Originall of Rivers and Fountains which Ecclesiastes 1. saith to flow by divers channels or passages out of the Sea and to flow again unto their Fountains saying All rivers enter into the Sea and the Sea is not the greater they return again unto the place from whence they came c. Whereby it is plain that he must accuse his Master of false doctrine or else he must condemn Solomon in his Judgment For if the one be contradictory unto the other it ought of all wise-men to be chased away or expelled from Christian mens remembrance Now it were a foolish thing for any religious person to say that the divinely-wise Solomon lied to save the reputation of the Ethnick of diabolically wise Aristotle But if they would yet will I teach them in the next Chapter by an evident ocular demonstration that Solomon's assertion is most true and that of Aristotle's most erroneous and fantasticall I conclude therefore that I gather out of the aforesaid places of the Bible that this following Definition doth best agree with the nature of a Fountain A Fountain is a continuated Flux of water issuing from the Sea as from his beginning and flowing into bowells of the earth and after that from the bowells of the earth as from the mean by which it passeth unto the upper or higher Superficies of it by vertue of the divine act in the mundan Spirit as well positive or dilative as privative and contractive for the benefit and sustenance both of man and beast In which definition plain water without any alteration of his shape is expressed for the materiall cause and is said to have its beginning from the Sea from whence it moveth unto the Mountain's tops The efficient cause of this work we find to be the act of the Divine Word in a double property as shall be more at large demonstrated in the next Chapter And hereupon Solomon said Sapientia erat apuâ— IEHOVAM in principio viae suae cuncta componens quaâ—do roborabat fontes abyssi ponebat mari statum Wisdome was with IEHOVAH in the beginning of his waies as a composer of all things when he did establish the Fountains of the abysse and set the Sea within his limits or bounds And lastly The finall cause is to give drink and food unto both man and beast as we may gather out of the forementioned Text of the royall Prophet We come now unto the demonstration CHAP. IX Wherein Solomon's assertion touching the Fountains and Rivers is maintained partly by an ocular demonstration and partly by true Philosophicall reasons which are founded thereon I Did advertise you Learned Reader in my precedent discourse that Gods Spirit doth operate annually in the common Element of the Sublunary world by a double vertue whereof the one is dilative which is effected in his positive and manifest property namely in his light active and warm disposition the principall Treasury and store-house whereof he hath made the Sun Forasmuch as his bright emanating Spirit of Wisdome did elect that pure vessell for his Tabernacle The other is contractive which is effected in his privative and secret condition namely in his dark fixing and cooling disposition whose principall treasury is about the poles Forasmuch as it being contrary in effect with the first is seated in the farthest quarters or points of the world from the Sun So that as the vivifying Spirit which is seated in the Sun doth by his presence operate onely by dilatation in the common sublunary Element in banishing of the Northern cold and undoing the actions thereof by the way of Rarefaction In like manner by the absence of the Sun the spirits of the Polar property doth take possession of that portion of the Element and undoeth by the way of congelation all the subtill actions of the Spirituall and active solar vertue As for example all that in the winter time among the nations of the Southern world that is to say beyond the line the Sun being then in the Northern Hemisphere causing by his vertuous Spirit our Summer season the Antartick pole's cold property doth effect namely in thickning the aire raising the Fountains or Springs and multiplying the waters producing the Snows Frost Ice and Hail mortifying the herbs fruits and plants and such like the Sun at his next visitation of those quarters which will be in our Northern winter by the vetue of that dilating and vivifying Spirit from the Fountain and Father of Light which aboundeth in it will undo converting the thick aire to thin striking down the Fountains more towards the bowels of the Earth which were raised in the winter dissolving the Snow Frost ice and hail and of fix and opake bodies making them movable and transparent waters reviving the spirit of the trees plants and herbs which were almost livelesse through congelation and renewing their mourning bodies with new green garments blossoms and flowers and lastly with wholsome fruit To conâ—lude there is nothing that the polar cold prevaileth over in the one hemisphear but the solar heat operateth contrarily by the same pâ—oportion in the oppoâ—ite region of the world for else the world must endure an augmentation or a diminution in its substance that is sometimes it would be bigger and sometimes lesser But as Sâ—lomon averred that the seas for all the comming in of rivers are never the greater so also though fountains rise in one part of the world and sinke in another and although also the aire by attenuation made by the active spirit of the Lord moveth from the warm or summer hemisphear unto the cold and winter hemisphear yet is the world no bigger or lesser in its existency for all that What therefore the winter properly doth operate in one hemisphear of the world the summer-hemisphear must needs act in the same proportion in the contrary for if beyond the Line are made great raines in their winter we must needs have great drought in the summer on this side the Line When it is hottest with us it will be coldest with them if it prove temperate with us it will be so with them as the Sun being in the Aequinoctiall maketh daies and nights equally long and the season temperate to both hemispheares These things therefore being considered maturely in the first place I proceed unto my practicall conclusion and my naturall observation thereupon is that the aire included in the Weather-glasse is made Hybernall or of the nature of winter by the dominion of cold for as soon as the head of it feeleth the externall cold the contained aire will immediately shrinck up and contract it self into a little space and consequently the aire is made more dense and thick and that this is so it appeareth by the mounting or attracting up of the water for there is such a naturall tye betwixt the one and the other that if the one contracteth it self in a
let us examine Aristotles opinion a little better that we may the more plainly expresse the absurdity thereof If that it were a vapour which was sent up out of the bowells of the earth it must proceed from some mighty heat which must alter that great mass of cold water which is in the bowells of the earth into that vapour but admit that this were so then mark what absurdities would follow First he confesseth that the fountaines are colder in the summer than in the winter because the externall heat doth per Ant peristasin or by a contrary act preserve and keep in and therefore multiply the inward cold of the earth which being so as it appeareth by the coldness of fountaines in the summer then by that self-same reason this fortified cold of the earth in the summer season must needs also keep in preserve and fortifie in the center of the earth that inward heat which causeth those vapours which are the originall of fountains Mark the conclusion for if that be so namely that the centrall heat in the summer should be greater then would the vapours be in greater abundance in summer for the greater the fire is the more will be the smoak And again by reason of the great cold in the caverns of the earth those vapours would be more suddenly condensed into watry drops and consequently by that means we should have higher Fountains greater Floods and more swelling Rivers in the Summer time then in the Winter all which experience teacheth us to be erroneous and to conclude Aristotle's assertion in this must needs be false But it will be I know objected that it is manifested unto the eye that standing ponds and such like humid places are dried by the Summer heat and how can that be but because the Sun doth attract the moisture and consumeth it by converting it into vapours I answer For the first that the Sun doth not draw but onely rarify and then the thing rarified doth tend upward But that the Sun should spend all those moistures of Lakes and Ponds that way namely by converting in into aire If that were possible I will tell you what absurdity would follow namely that the Sun by reducing all the waters into vapours should thicken the aire when contrariwise our Weather-glass teacheth us by that model of aire which is contained in it that it doth attenuate and rarify the aire and not thicken it Again a greater errour would fall foul on the neck of Aristotle's Doctrine concerning the Generation of clowds if this were so For whereas his Opinion is that a clowd is generated from vapours extracted out of the earth and water by the attractive force of the Sun and Starrs it would follow then that in the Summer-time we should have more clowds and more rain then in the winter But this is as false as the rest But I say rather that because the aire is more rare and thin in the Summer by reason of the presence of the divine act in the Sun which rarifieth and attenuateth the aire by his assidual action and therefore we have fewer clowds in the Sommer For as I proved before the clowds are made by the compression of aire and the aire again is by a circular course renewed by the resolution of those Meteors it produced into their first invisible matter which was but aire I must confess that some part of the waters are subtiliated and by dilatation thrust into the winter Hemisphere but the greatest part doth sink down by the insensible pores of the dry and thirsty earth which drinketh it up and keepeth it in her bowells till it be sucked out by the contraction of the aire which filleth the pores and cracks thereof which contraction happeneth by the cold of the winter following For we see that if there be but a Hogshead full of water it will indure a long time before the hot Sun will exhale it by subtiliation Moreover it is certain that what the Sun doth rarify in the day time so that it riseth in a vaporous form upon the earth in the night time it falleth commonly again in foggy mists and dew So that it is removed out of a contracted place and dilated and besprinkled in mist and dew over the wide and spacious fields Now that this is so it is made evident because we shall ever observe that the Summer mists and dew is most frequent about Lakes and Rivers I will for a conclusion of this Book and whole Section onely examine our princely Peripateticks Opinion touching the Lightnings and the Thunders that we may perceive therein also the validity of his Physicall Doctrine CHAP. XI The Lightnings and Thunders are described in this Chapter according unto Aristotle's Sentence which is aâ—terward confuted by Testimony of Holy-Writ HAving thus made a generall inquiry into the Philosophy of Aristotle touching the Originall of the Winds the Clowds and Fountains I cannot now but enter into his thoughts concerning the wonderfull beginning or primary causes and admirable effects of the Lightnings and Thunders being in verity they are Meteors of so great marvell that they require the profoundest speculation to consider them justly and as they ought to be and therefore I doubt not but that if a due examination be made of Aristotle's validity concerning the research and discovery of so great a mystey it will be more faulty then all the rest Let us then observe in the first place what his mind is touching the essence of the Lightnings Aristotle's Opinion is that the materiall cause of the Lightning is a hot and dry exhalation drawn out of the earth and elevated into the middle region of the aire by the vertue of the Starrs where partly by reason of a strong collision or concussion of clowds and partly because of that antiperistasis which is had between the heat of the exhalation and coldness of the region that inflamable matter so coarcted into the belly of the clowd is set on fire and breaking out of his prison doth tend downward by reason of his terrestiall and compacted disposition and he concludeth that the violence of this eruption is that noise which men do commonly call by the name of Thunder This I say is the summary of Aristotle's mind touching the Lightning And verily Aristotle seemeth in some sort to be excused if he erre in this inquiry being that it is a doubt not easily to be resolved and therefore not only he but also all other Philosophers almost have been inâ—onstant in their resolutions touching this point Forasmuch as therein they have so staggered and varied in this research and have groped as it were by dark for the finding out of the true light thereof For Empedocles judged the Lightning to be caused by the interception or stopping of the descent of the Sun-beames But Anaxagoras would have it to be a portion of the aethereall or heavenly fire which descended from above into the concavity of the clowd within the which
words Quis hominum cognoscit consilium Dei nam ratiocinationes mortalium sunt timidae instabiles cogitationes eorum Infestum enim corruptioni corpus aggravat animam deprimit terrena habitatio mentem plenam curis multis vix conjicimus ea quae in terra sunt quae autem in coelis sunt quis investigavit consilium tuum quis noverit nisi tu dederis sapientiam miseris sanctum Spiritum tuum è locis altissimis sie enim correctae sunt eorum quae in terris sunt semitae itaque sapientiâ fuerint salvati What man doth know the counsell of God for the reasonings of mortall men are doubtfull and unstable are their cogitations For the body being subject unto corruption doth aggravate the soul and an earthly habitation doth depresse the mind which is full of cares And we do scarcely guesse at the things which are upon the earth who is then able to find out the things which are in heaven Or who can know thy counsell unlesse thou shalt give wisdom and send thy holy Spirit from above for by that means were the waies of such men as were upon the earth corrected and amended and therefore were they saved or preserved by wisdom c. Out of which golden words I gather first That the heathen men were ignorant in the mysteries and abstruse operations of God because they wanted the true spirit of wisdom which God revealeth unto his Elect by the vertuous infusion and influxion of his holy Spirit Next that for this reason the subject of true Philosophy is not to be found in Aristotle's works but in the Book of truth and wisdom forasmuch as it is a copy of the revealed Word Thirdly that it is a great folly for Christians to seek for the truth where it is not to be found I mean in the works of the pagan Philosophers and that is made manifest forasmuch as it contradicteth altogether the verity of Scriptures and therefore it is pronounced by St. James to be terrene animal and diabolicall Verbum saepienti CHAP. XIII A conclusion of this work including an admonition unto all good Christians to beware of the Ethnick Philosophy and to stick and cleave fast unto that which is taught us by the Scriptures and that for reasons herein set down LEt it now be lawfull for me in the concluding of this Section O ye Europaeans who seem so seriously and zealously to spend your daies in the Christian Religion to turn the sharp edge of my pen and the rougher file of my speech unto you who being too too much seduced by the fals doctrin of Aristotle do think and imagine the meteors but especially lightning and thunder to be a common natural thing of little or no estimation at all as being onely produced of nature by reason of a hot distemper of the air I would request you as a true Christian ought unto his brethren to observe well and attend with diligence this admonition which I will for a Farewell bestow upon you beseeching you not to scorn or reject my precedent assertion whith hath told and sufficiently proved unto you that the lightnings and thunders yea and all other meteors are the immediate works of Gods hand being that by this endeavour of mine you may not onely bring a comfort and consolation unto your soules when you hear the terrible voice of the Lord and make you to call to mind your passed sins and iniquities and to pray him heartily to pardon you and not to call your offences unto an account in his anger but also give the honour and glory unto him who thundering from above worketh marvellously I would have you therefore to know that the worldly wise-men of this our Christian world who are as it were pages or followers of the Ethnick Philosophers have hitherto blindly or after the manner of lunatick persons erred in their imaginations forasmuch as they being instructed in the blind wisdom of this world by their Ethnick tutors and doctors will not be brought to believe that God doth work immediately all things in heaven and in earth onely by his word but mediately namely by other necessary natural or supernatural means as essential efficient causes when as the holy Text doth in plain terms instruct us that it is one the self-same essence which doth act and operate all in all by his word using each creature onely as his organ or instrument wherein and by the which he moveth and worketh his will Is not this their tenet or assertion I beseech you altogether opposite and contradictory unto the divine authority which saith Though there be that are called gods whether in heaven or in earth as there be many gods and many lords yet unto us there is but one God which is that Father of whom are all things and we in him and one Lord Jesus Christ by whom are all things and we by him But every man hath not that knowledge c Out of which words we may gather that though we worldlings attribute this or that work unto angels or stars or winds or a created nature according unto the doctrine of the Ethnick wisdom yet such true Christian Philosophers as St. Paul was dâ—d acknowledge but one God of whom proceed all actions in this world and one Word by which onely and not by any creature in the world each thing is immediately effected in this world All which although unto reall Christians it seemeth verity and truth yet unto the Philosophers and wise men of this world this kind of doctrine issuing from the heavenly wisdom is rejected and derided And why Forsooth because as the Text doth teach us every man hath not this knowledge and the reason is because they respect more the wisdom of this world which is terrene and animal and as St. Paul saith meer foolishness before God then that which is from above namely from the Father of light Et sic evanuerunt in imaginationibus suis And so they did vanish in their imaginations I heartily wish you therefore which are brought up and made familiar in the holy Bible and nourished spiritually and guided by the law of our Lord Jesus Christ to conceive seriously and perpetually to revolve with your selves that God created the first consistence of things namely the humid and fluid waters by his word and they remain in the word and by the word in the self-same humid or moist estate as they did even unto this very day Also he framed out of this catholick water the heaven and the earth by his word as St. Peter saith Again he did produce by his said word the light in heaven the Sun the Moon the Starrs the day the night and all other creatures and did ordain them to serve for divers Organs by the which he might variously act or operate his volunty as well in heaven above as in the earth and waters beneath All which do move and work in and by the Word
with another And whereas the opposition which is made between the contrary Elements is apparent and manifest namely in respect of the fight or discord which is made betwixt dissonant qualities or natures as are cold and heat moisture and drouth So that in this case the Sympathy and Antipathy of Elements are well known to every one namely betwixt the water and fire and betwixt the earth and the aire We must know that there is yet a more latent and internall cause of Sympathy and Antipathy in things which by some is ascribed unto the occult natures of the Starrs but in verity it proceedeth from those Angelicall influences which do invisibly and after a most occult manner stream out of creatures that are born under a discordant Emanation which Reuchlin doth passingly well describe in these words Pholosophis Peripateticis id probatur quod câ—lum quodâ— bet Sphaericum praeter formam suam essentâ—alem habet assistenâ—em inte ligentiam orbis sui mâ—â—ricâ—m quae vocatur Angelus eò qâ—od ad hoc officium missa intelligens volens compleâ— jussa Creatoris tanquam inter Deum Naturam virtus media à qua fiunt operationes in rebus quas natura earum vel â—on faceret vel non sic faceret quas alii provenire dicunt a proprietate occulta aliâ— quia tale It is approved of the Peripatetick Philosophers that every Spherick heaven hath besides his essentiall form an assistent Intelligence which is the mover of his O be the which Intelligence is called an Angell bâ—cause iâ— being sent to peâ—fâ—rm that Office doth understandingly and willingly accomplish the Command of the Creator as a middle Virtue between God and naâ—ure by the which are effected operations in things which their nature either would not effect or would not do â—t after that faâ—hion the which are said by others to proceed from an occult property and others because it is so Whereby it appeareth that the hidden Sympathy and Antipathy in things as well celestiall as terrestiall proceed from the mysticall and arcane actions of Angelicall spirits or Intelligences who first receive that hidden property from a peculiar influence or irradiation which descendeth from some of the Divine influences which do inform and indue that Angelicall spirit with that Virtue But because it is not the Office of an Astrologian to penetrate thus pâ—ofoundly into these hidden Mysteries which belong unto the aeviall world forasmuch as his custom is to make the visible Starres the fountains of all those effects which by way of influence and irradiation do descend to operate as well by sympathy as antipathy in things below I will here after the Astrologicians manner make the well-spring of all sympathy and antipathy to arise from the manifold influence of the stars as shall more at large appear in the next Chapter CHAP. IV. The Astrologicall reason of Sympathy and Antipathy is herein expressed where also it is proved that being all inferiour spirits receive the influence of their nature from above and being that the elementall creatures are bâ—t the images of the celestiall so also it must consequently follow that as there are both Sympatheticall and Antipatheticall aspects or irradiations between two or more of the heavenly bodies and therefore there must of necessity happen that there is an emission of essentiall beams from one earthly body unto another which according unto the nature of the creature is either Sympatheticall or Antipatheticall I Will leave now a while to speak radically with the mysticall Hebrew and Cabalisticall Theologians and will open this mystery of occult radiation or streaming forth of hidden beams betwixt two creatures whether they be celestiall or terrestriall of a like and sympathising nature or un-like and antipathising condition after the manner of an Astrologian namely taking the visible organ for the invisible agent the externall creature for the internall angelicall vertue the starry influence for the hidden supercelestiall emanation which is poured out into the spirits or intelligences which inhabit and illuminate the stars and send it down again from them into the elementary world to animate the winds and by them the catholick element altered after a four-fold manner and by the element so altered to inform the meteorologick bodies diversly and by them the severall compounded creatures both in the sea and land We ought therefore to know speaking like the Astrologian that there is a manifest opposition and agreement not onely in respect of the manifest qualities of the elements which are observed to be as well in the fixt as erratick stars for the watry signes of the Zodiack are contrary unto the fiery the nocturn unto the diurn the orientall unto the occidentall the male unto the female but also in a more hidden regard For the best Astrologians have noted that as Jupiter Sol and Luna are friends unto Saturn so Mercury Mars and Venus are his enemies Againâ— all the Planets but Mars are friends unto Jupiter Moreover there is not any of the Planets that is Mars his friend but Venus onely and especially Sol and Mercury are his greatest foes Also Jupiter and Venus are friends unto the Sun as contrariwise his enemies are Mars Mercury and Luna All the Planets are said to love and favour Venus but Saturn Mercury's friends are Jupiter Venus and Saturn his enemies are Sol Luna and Mars The friends of the Moon are Venus Jupiter and Saturn her enemies are Mars and Mercury The friends unto the head of the Dragon are Jupiter and Venus the enemies are Saturn and Mars Lastly the enemies of the Tail of the Dragon are Jupiter Luna and Venus as contrariwise his friends are Saturn and Mars Besides all this we ought to note that there is another kind of friendship or enmity between the Planets namely when the one of them hath his exaltation or dignity in another's House In this case therefore the things subject unto the influence of the one will lovingly embrace the aspect of the other and contrariwise the depression or detriment of the one in the House of another maketh the spirit of the one creature who is born under that Planet which hath the detriment and is oppressed by a bad aspect of the other that is in his own house where the detriment is to aspect antipathetically a thing that is under the other by this means I say the presence of the thing born or springing forth under the Planet of that House will be ungratefull and odious unto the other person or thing whose detriment is in the said House Contrariwise we must note that two creatures will well sympathise and joyfully agree with one another where their Planets do consent together in nature quality essence and strength as are Mars and Venus for these sympathise by a naturall instinct So also Venus Jupiter Mercury and the Moon agree together and so likewise the unfortunate Planets do agree in the multiplying of misfortunes We ought also in like manner to know
after an Astrologicall manner seemeth to aver so much in these words Si alâ—cu datum esset totam conditionem coelestis harmoniae comprehendere mundum elementorum cum suis singulis contentis in quocunque loco quocunque tempore plene cognosceret tanquam causatum per causas si etâ—am aliquam rem hujus mundi in tota sua conditione cognosceret coelestis harmoniae conditio ipsum non lateret sed etiam causam tanquam per effectum suum comprehenderet omnis enâ—mâ—res quanâ—umcunque modica in mundo elementorum agens totius coelestis harmoniae est effectus Whosoever doth comprehend the whole condition of the celestiall harmony he may fully know the whole elementary world with every content of the same in every place and at all times as the effect by the cause Also if he understand any thing of this world in his totall nature and condition the celestiall disposition and condition will not be hidden from him but will be discovered unto him as the cause is by the effect For every thing in this world how little soever it be that acteth is the effect of the whole harmony of the heaven By which words Alkindus being deeply seen in the mystery of nature seemeth to aver that as there is a descent from unity unto multitude so all that multitude is in that unity as also that unity filleth all the multitude so is 1 in 2 and 2 in 3 and 3 in 4 and 4 in 5 c. and yet that unity which is the beginning is the end and all in all So light enforms the angelicall creature the angelicall the starry creature the starry creature the elements and the elements the compound creature Wherefore open the compound creature and look upon the elements divide the Elements and you shall find the starry and quintessentiall nature open these and you shall conceive the subtill alterity of the Angelicall spirit in which is the Divine act or immediate beam from God In this work therefore there concurreth in the separation of the first a sensible aspect in the other we must behold with intellectuall eies So that you may observe how all is in every thing and every thing in all Hereupon it was also that Hermes said speaking mystically and not after the common sense Qui fornacem cum vase nostro construit novum mundum conflat He which maketh our furnace with the glass to it he maketh a new world But what needs more words when we find all this confirmed by demonstration For we know that the Load-stone is but a part of the Earth and yet it hath all his Circles and both his Poles yea and that very nature in all respects between each Pole and Circle that the whole Earth hath and thereupon it is termed Terrella or a little Earth and so may the whole earth be tearmed parvus mundus being it containeth the Poles circles and astrall yea and Elementall natures of the great world no otherwise then the great world doth in all those respects represent the Archetype which is carved out intellectually in the all-working Spirit of Wisdom or sacred Emanation yea and we go yet deeper into our diminutives For if a piece of Iron rod which naturally aspecteth the North and South be brok off that small piece will have also as exactly his North and South Pole and consequently his circles as the whole rod and nevertheless the rod keepeth still his North and South point as before The like in the Load-stone will happen as experience shall hereafter make it appeare more plainly That we may come a little nearer to the explication of this Mystery ye must understand that this eternall catholick Emanation is the essentiall and spirituall rock out of which first the great world in generall and then all particular things therein were carved or framed by generalities first according unto the Ten generall Emanations and their properties which the Ethnicks in some sort referred unto their Ten generall Predicaments and this again had their specialities or subalternate degrees of many ranks and orders of dignities all which were at last made apparent by the infinity of individualls which they did in their kinds produce according unto those divers beams of the multiplicite Will or Volunty of God which this eternall Emanation poured out into them All which particular beams more or lesse being not divided in essence from the universall Emanation or the Spirit of Wisdome which made all things are the spirituall Corner-stone on which every creature as well particular as universall doth formally or essentially consist and this Corner-stone is that internall essence in every thing which as it giveth life so also it is all and over all the things that it inacteth with life and therefore also the soul whose Center this Corner-stone is is said to be in all and every part I will leave to speak of its action in other creatures and will onely insist on our main Subject in hand which is the earth and her off-spring or progenie amongst the which the feminine Load-stone and his ferruginous mass are chiefly reckoned Divine Philosophy teacheth us that the Globe of the Earth is sustained by this Corner-stone and consequently hath her manifold Virtues from it Ubinam eras saith JEHOVAH quando fundebam terram quis disposuit mensuras ejus aut quis extendit super eam lineam Super quo bases ejus defixae sunt Aut quis jecit lapidem ejus Angularem Where wast thou when I laid the foundation of the earth Who disposed of the measures thereof and who did extend over it a line upon what basis or foundation was it sustained or who laid the corner-stone thereof In the Weather-glass which I have described in my precedent Philosophicall discourse you may discerne two points corresponding unto the two Poles namely the mattras head above resembling the Northern Pole and the water below compared to the Southern Pole the aire interposed betwixt them unto the spatious heaven or sublunary spirit which is betwixt these two Poles the middle of which in the figure 1. the Aequinoctiall doth â—ut as being in the mid-way betwixt the two Poles We find evermore that when the aire included in the top of the Mattras or bolts-head is cold namely when the northern blasts are sent forth it will be contracted and consequently will suck or draw up the water and thereupon we are taught the reason of the attractive nature not onely in the northern or septentrionall winds but also in the Load-stone and all other things which by contraction of the aire do draw and suck unto them namely that they have that property from the power of Gods Spirit which by his angelicall organs doth blow from the north By this also it is made evident why one Pole doth suck and attract from the other in the Load stone namely by the continuity of the spirituall axle-tree which is made and animated by one corner-stone or essentiall and centrall spirit
which he draweth or attracteth from the circumference unto the center and so congealeth inspissateth and hardeneth soft spirits by contraction and coarctation of those parts which before were porous and dilated But some will perchance reply and say How is it likely that the emanation or emission of spirits from the port of Binah under the Attribute of ELOHIM or the streaming forth of the breath or blasts from Boreas and his two collateralls can harden by contraction or suck and draw in spirits from the circumference unto the center when their emissions are straight from the north southward and make no reflexion whereby any such motion à circumferentia ad centrum should be made I answer That this is effected after a wonderfull fashion and worthy to be pondered by the choisest wits We must consider therefore in the first place that the property of the Attribute ELOHIM was before all beginning ordained to indue the negative or contractive nature of the eternall Unity's Nolunty namely of darkness for when God will not shew the light of his countenance he reflecteth his light in himself that is he withdraweth it from the circumference to the center and leaveth onely darkness unto the creatures This property of God is antipatheticall unto such parts of the world as also unto all such creatures as have their life from a naturall heat which heat had its beginning from Gods benevolent emanation that is from the act of unity by an emission or dilatation from the center unto the circumference I mean from unity into multitude It followeth therefore that though the emission of winds from the north be streight yet their essentiall property proceeding immediately from Gods angelicall organ is contractive and attracting from the circumference unto the center seeing that it is an emission which by the divine Spirits emanation and action in the nature of ELOHIM is cold dry coagulative or congealing and apt to rest and is therefore antipatheticall and oppugnant unto the disposition of the air forasmuch as it is hot and moist and consequently is animated by the dilative action which the catholick spirit sendeth or breatheth out of the celestiall Sun and other vivifying stars as are Jupiter and Venus And for this cause it followeth that when the Boreall spirits are sent forth into the aire it must needs succeed that at the antipatheticall contract of these cold spirits the naturall heat or life of the aire flyeth or with-draweth it self from its circumference unto its center and so partly by that contractive motion in it self caused per antiperistasin or by reason of the antipatheticall occurrence or meeting of his contrary and partly by mingling of a new terrestriall form it is congealed and falleth to the earth as if it were dead because unmovable in the form of snow hail frost and ice In like manner we see that the aery life in other creatures whose formall beeing consisteth of Gods dilating property is forced to fly from the circumference unto the center leaving the externall parts chil cold and apt to a deadly congelation or lethall repose which we observe not onely in animal creatures but also in vegetables seeing that their blood as I may tearm it or vitall suck is congealed by the winter and northern cold and is as it were liveless untill by the vivifying and dilative sorce of the ensuing Vernall or Springly and Australl vertue it is resolved and melted again and the severe tye or icy knot of the northern nature undone For this reason therefore you may discern that there is but one catholick element which is partly subject and obnoxious unto the privative and dark contracting and consequently attracting property of Gods Spirit and partly capable to endue his positive and light dilating disposition and that this common subject is the spirit or aire of the sublunary world which by lesse inspissation or contraction caused by the west winds is made water and by more compression and constriction caused by the northern and winter blasts becommeth snowy or icy earth And contrariwise by lesse dilatation and subtiliation is made aery or vaporous caused by the spring season and south wind and by a greater rarefaction and exaltation it is made fire by the dominion of such spirits as are sent out from the east and summers heat and both these main two-fold divided properties belong unto one and the same Spirit as is before related Verily this common demonstration can deceive no man being that the very unreasonable creatures are moved by a naturall inclination either to sympathize and rejoyce with the clemency and comfort of the one property or to fly from or eschew the severer assaults of the other which do antipathize with their nature But to our main business It is manifest by that which is already said that the northern breath is contractive attractive inspissative and apt to darkness immobility and rest and that the south-winde or rather the winde from the Aequinoctiall is contrary in nature unto it as being ready to undo all that the north winde did effect namely to dissolve the congealed aire which was made snow frost hail ice into water and water into aire to make transparent that which was dark and render thin that which was before thick And therefore between these properties there is no more sympathy then I have shewed you to be between the Load-stones Aequinoctiall and the Pole And again that both these opposite natures proceed and spring from one and the same divine and catholick spirit which operateth all in all every where and consequently as well in earth as in heaven this testimony of the true Philosophy doth manifestly confirm and import Deo emittente sermonem suum in terram quam celerrimè excurrit qui nives emittit sicut lanam pruâ—nam quasi cineres dispergit dejicit gelu tanquam frusta coram frigore ejus quis consistat Emittit verbum suum liquefacit ista simul ac efflat ventum suum effluunt aquae God sendeth forth his word it runneth forth most swiftly upon the earth who produceth snow like wool and spreadeth abroad the frost like ashes and casteth down the ice as it were pieces Who is able to resist against his cold He sendeth forth his word and melteth or dissolveth all these so soon as he breatheth forth his wind or Spirit the congealed waters begin to flow and move Whereby it appeareth that the Word or Spirit of God congealeth by one property and dissolveth by another and consequently as God is all one in essence so it is one and the same Spirit that effecteth these four-fold alterations in one catholick spirit of the world which are by the Ancients called distinct Elements because they cuold never as yet throughly determine what was the essentiall form of the Elements But if they had well considered the four Elements of the which they spake so much and as it should seem understood essentially but little or had they well conceived that
heaven and earth were made of water and by water by the Word as Sacred Philosophy teacheth us then they would have known also that the common substantiall Subject of them all was but one created watery spirit also that this spirits four-fold information was effected by one increating formall essence or Divine Word acting and informing that universall Element by a four-fold emanation so that the will of one creating Spirit effected by and working in four Angells of an opposit nature maketh disposeth or changeth every day this one spirituall watery Subject into this or that Element according unto the Will of the Creator All which is evidently demonstrated by the wether-glass For the aire therein inclosed doth by contraction or dilatation convert it self into the form of any of the Elements and is altered therein according as the nature of the Macrocosmicall blast or wind that bloweth Now whereas it may be objectively demanded From whence then came the earth and waters that are resident perpetually here beneath I answer That they are the effects which the winds by the Will of God or ELOHIM RUACH did originally produce and these were framed first out of the aire namely by thickning it by one degree into water and ingrossing it by another into solid and fixt earth as it appeared by the third daies Creation where it was said that Aridum apparuerit ex aquis Dry-land did appear out of the waters But the Divine Philosopher St. Paul doth confirm all this where he affirmeth that we ought to believe by Faith that those things which are visible were first of things invisible and unseen And again if that the two lower bodies did not resolve themselves by little and little though insensibly into aire it would not be possible that the earth or the water could hold that abundance of Water Stones Brimstone caused of Lightnings and such like which falleth from the aire and yet we see that neither the aire nor water nor earth are at any time found bigger then their naturall accustomed proportions By this therefore I have sufficiently expressed unto you the attractive and contractive property of the Northern Pole in the aire which inferreth thus much that as the Northern blasts are enemies unto life because they contract from the circumference to the Center which is contrary unto the act of man's life therefore all things that are reduced into a chill cold and Northern property be they airy watery or earthy they draw strongly unto them as it is proved by the weather-glass For the included aire being animated by the effects of a strong and obstinate Northern wind sucketh and draweth the waters on high namely from the Aequinoctiall point of the glass unto the Center of the North Pole which is assigned by the head of the mattras and also by the same reason congealed spirits in any earthly substance do suck or draw from the exteriour to the interior as we observe that Bole Armoniack sucketh moysture unto it and also all other earth when it is throughly dry and that in his own naturall condition namely because it being of the quality of the North it sucketh and draweth strongly a watery moysture but this is by reason of his drought the attraction therefore in the Load-stone is otherwise For it having the essentiall nature of its mother Earth and the virtue of the North in his Pole draweth the masculine Sulphureous spirits out of Iron greedily and that with a feminine appetite by reason of the propinquity and likeness of one nature unto another The like regard also hath the Pole star unto the Load-stone as the Load-stone hath unto the Iron which is his like For Natura Natura suá gaudet laetatur Nature is glad and rejoyceth in her like nature as Empedocles doth truly testifie But both the Iron and the Load-stone are of one myne one vein and one nature seeing that both of them are of an earthly and boreall disposition and therefore the Load-stone and his formall included spirits being more encombred with superfluities then the refined Iron doth as it were either for their assistance namely to be delivered from that incombrance draw unto them their like out of the purified Iron or Steel by a wonderfull appetite and in this action suck unto it the Iron who as unwilling to leave its formall spirit doth follow by a naturall continuity the motion of its formall beams or else for comfort and consolation yea and formal refection's cause no otherwise then the cold materiall female doth the more formall male to be refreshed by the masculine seed or sulphureous Form which they both received from that generall Agent 's ideal Northern nature that sustaineth and animateth the earth I will prove it by a similitude but in a vegetable substance We observe that the grain of wheat not participating with the nature of the earth that is so long as it is above ground and not sown attracteth not his like from heaven but when it is committed unto the earth and the earth by corruption hath unloosed his bands his spirits suck down from above the Sun-beams and celestiall influences of his fixt constellation and erratick Planet in quantity that thereby it may be delivered and rise again by the celestiall beams of his own nature that descend from heaven and principally from the Sun so that like being added to his like becommeth the stronger in ascention For experience teacheth us that the celestiall included form or vitall beam creepeth out of the earth upwards tending by all his appetite unto its ethereal native home from whence it came but because the Element of fire is contiguous unto the aethereal spirit therefore it will not permit these aethereall or sunny-beams to ascend without it and because the aire is a near-cleaving and continued neighbour unto the fire therefore it will not permit the fire to ascend without his presence and again the water challengeth the self-same priviledge namely to ascend with the aire and lastly the earth will not let the water move upwards without her company as being next of her race and therefore will have the self-same prerogative with the other three But because the earth is ponderous and cannot ascend she holdeth it fast below and will not permit the spirit to sore higher and so those beamy spirits which seemed to descend for the freedom of their brethren are by these Elementary ties or rather the four-fold disposition of one Element detained and made to hover and hang in the aire where insteed of flying upwards to heaven they do multiply into many graines And I have noted by mine own experience namely by anatomising of corn with the fiery knife of distillation that the female in corn which sucketh down the celestiall influences of the like nature is a pure volatil Salt of a refined or aereall terrestrial condition but rich in celelestiall fire and therefore made volatil and airy by the union of both extreames so that it is this female
blood which is sucked into the iron or other weapon and retained in it for so pure worthy and subtle is the spirit of man's life that every creature doth by a naturall instinct affect to participate with it yea the very devills are said to affect a dwelling place in mans body by reason of the excellent temper thereof Neither would I have any man to scorn this saying of mine for there is a concupiscible passion even in the very stones and minerals themselves as in the Load-stone and Iron it is made manifest and the spirit of the Iron though it be minerall is of the same condition in his catholick nature that all other spirits are And therefore marvell not though I say that the universall spirit affecteth the animal being that for the same reason there hath been noted to be both a sympatheticall and antipatheticall condition between as well the mineral and vegetable and the mineral and animal as between the animal and vegetable But I will produce unto you a probable demonstration There was an Earl of whom in my Book intituled The squeesing of Parson Foster's Spunge I made mention that had his Gardiner cruelly wounded in his hand with a syth as he was mowing of grass the wound bled shrewdly and could not be stenched They went up unto his Lord and signified so much unto him and implored his assistance and desired to have some of his weapon-salve He commanded that forth-with the syth should be knocked off from his wooden handle and conveyed unto him The wounded fellow hearing so much took a hammer himself and holding it with one hand he struck hard upon the weapon or syth with the other and immediately a wondrous thing to tell and yet far from any suspition of diabolicall art the blood stenched and he bled not one drop after it as if the mineral spirit which retained that of the animal were terrified and as it were in awe of the animal spirit that struck it and thereby lost all the faculty of attraction or that the spirits included in it which did consent in harmony with the spirits of the bleeding man had rejoyced in a kind of revenge which was taken on the weapon For know that there is a sympatheticall and antipatheticall irradiation as well between the animal and the minerall as between the animal and animal or mineral and mineral But mark I pray you a second notable observation touching this point Sir Bevis Thelwell told me that for triall upon a Wheelers ax that had wounded him grievously on his leg after it was anointed and wrapped up the wounded person that could not sleep for pain in five nights before did sleep immediately after the oyntment and was at rest which when Sir Bevis Thelwell espied he would needs make triall of a thing which he had heard confirmed by many He opened the anointed Ax and scraped off the oyntment at one corner of it and forthwith he was advertised that the party complained of a grievous pain which he felt just about that part of the wound where the ax was bare by scraping whereupon also he anointed that protion over again and suddainly the party felt ease The same experiment was made and found true by the said Lord Captain Stiles and Sir Nicholas Gilbourn I can also say upon mine own knowledge that in the Church-yard on Bred-street-hill a widow-Gentlewoman having a box of this oyntment cured many of the Tooth-ake by pricking the pained tooth with a sharp stick till it bled and putting that stick into her box of oyntment Among the rest one of her neighbours a contentious woman having the tooth-ake made means unto her for her cure or to have ease Her teeth were pricked and the stick put into the oyntment and she grew well But within three or four daies after she fell out with the Gentlewomans maid and gave her Mistress but bad language all which the maid did certifie her Mistress of The Gentlewoman being merrily disposed said She would make her repent it and went unto the box and took away the stick belonging to this woman out of the pot and put it into a bason of cold water and immediately the woman had such pain as she was forced to sue to the Gentlewoman and she receiving another stick which had pricked her teeth anew it gave her immediate ease Which accidents when I had well contemplated I thought with my self that the included spirit had his chiefest comfort from the oyntment by keeping them warm and that if the oyntment was removed the cold aire which is an enemy to the activity of the bloody spirits was potent over it and did congeal them and so by consent of the beamy influence of life emitted from the wound unto the included spirits and continuated ever unto them as inseparable for it was one and the same spirit according unto Ezekiel's testimony in two severall properties that blowed from the north-wind and the south what distemper befalleth the included and congealed spirits in the weapon happeneth by effect of remission of evoked beams and as it were by a report unto the wound of the patient Again we must consider that the separated blood hath in it each respect of the Microcosm no otherwise than a portion of a whole Loadstone being divided from the whole hath in it all the proportions of the World namely the Poles Aequinoctial and so forth as well as the whole in it so that the Idea of the wounded member is in the spirits of the emitted blood and maketh his relation to every part thereof no otherwise than the poles of a piece of the Loadstone do unto the whole As also there is the like occult attraction and emission of beams between the little blood emitted and the whole bulk of blood retained in the veines as is between the small amputated Load-stone and the whole I conclude therefore that as the congealed bloody spirits in the weapon or amputated blood do by vertue of the homogeniall heat and unctuosity of the salve or oyntment ripen and exspire out by little and little unto his fountain no otherwise than the spark in the grain of corn being kept and preserved in the earthly matrix from the cold crude aire doth aspire upward to the heavenly Sun so also by little and little doth the wound heal and mend in the wounded creature And thus much for the manner of action between the wound and weapon-salve Now a word or two touching the intervall or longitude of distance between the wound and the oyntment The distance betwixt the Pole star and the Load-stone is unknown and yet the one doth operate in the other by sending out their reciprocall beams upward and downward therefore here can no certain limited sphear of activity be assigned unto their action The Sun and the spirit in the grain of wheat do operate in like manner by a continuation of one and the same nature Lo here is the limited sphear of activity also
of his peares did pass which caused him suddenly to fall sick Francis Follers and Marget Warny and Jacobit Equine confessed the 15. of January 1584. that they had Ointments by which they anointed rods and whips So that if they touched therewith but the vestments of any one he died not long after Also they said that if they anointed their hand with this Magicall Ointment if they but touched any one's garments they died within a small space after Thus you see how the devill cannot work but by naturall poysons For nothing proceedeth meerly of himself but prestigious apparitions namely those which seem but indeed are no more in effect then a painted image is in regard of the true substance And therefore let not the devil's ministers make their braggs that this commeth from his invention For the true Alchymists speak upon their own experience that their Matter when it is in rotting and black is more destructive then the venomous Tyrean or Serpent and therefore it killeth suddenly wherefore they warn the operatours to beware of their Fumes but when it appeareth in decoction between white and black it reduceth the Patient into a straight between death and health that is into a sickly constitution and the white which signifieth perfection of maturity causeth health and cureth infirmities and preventeth the malice that the black and ash colour bring with them So that you see the devill can do no more of him self then man is able Again for strewing of the destroying powder the same was effected by man's wicked invention in Millane the yeare 1629. And for the Ointment which killeth by an immediate contact the Jew and the Cardinall knew that wicked craft namely to abuse God's creatures as well as the devill for whosoever it touched it killed and again the Hermit effected the same business by anointing the hammers of the doores and had his Alexipharmacon or counter-poyson for it as well as the devill So that you may see that the wicked-minded man that abuseth God's good creatures as well as the devill altering it from the true sense for which it was created by God for the benefit of Man may rightly be rancked with the devill and be termed justly a devill incarnate in that without the devil's furtherance he can effect many devilish waies to destroy as well as the devill without flesh and bones I conclude therefore that it is a great absurdity yea and a gross foppery or madness in ignorant men so lightly to adjudge and censure the abstruce Magnalia or occult Mysteries of God in Nature as to affirm them to be actions or inventions of the devill though their effects were bad much less when they are good and salutiferous as is that of the Weapon-salve when it is commonly known unto God and all truly understanding men that it is the animal vegetable or minerall creature which effecteth the one by abuse and the other in the true property and virtue that is for the use for which it was created by God For God created all creatures good and consequently for a good use but it is the malice of the devill that diverteth it from his true use which also is evidently confirmed by the Wiseman in these words Creavit Deus ut essent omnia sanabiles fecit nationes orbis terrarum non est in illis medicamentum exterminii nec Inferorum regnum in terra creavitque hominem inexterminabilem ad imaginem similitudinis suae fecit eum invidiâ autem Diaboli mors introivit in orbem terrarum God created all things that they might exist or be and made all the nations of the earth wholsome and there is not any deadly thing to be found within them nor yet the kingdom of hell and destruction upon the earth And he created Man inexâ—erminable that is to last for ever and he made him after his own image but death entred into the world by the envy and malice of the devill c. For know this that before the fall of Adam all things were streightly and rightly taken and consequently not mistaken but after that he had tasted of the Tree of good and evill his corporall eyes were open and the creatures were interpreted and distinguished for good and evill and were converted unto both uses for from that hour the mysteries of iniquity and righteousnesse began to reigne in the world and evill began in the very first practise after the fall to shoulder goodness and vice did first prevail against vertue and by naturall means was employed by the first fruits of wickedness to wit the vegetable creature or a piece of wood by the envy of unrighteous Cain to knock out the braines of his righteous brother Abel when contrariwise this vegetable creature was in another sense a piece of wood namely in the form of a cross signifying the opposition which in this world is made between good and evill an instrument of Christ's death without the which there was no assurance of salvation We see therefore that all occult operations proceed from the hidden vertue in naturall things which were discovered by Gods Spirit as well unto mankind as conceived by the sharp-witted observation of Satan Unto good men I say they were detected by the good Spirit to do good and prevent evill for except the evill be known a counter-poyson will hardly be found out Unto bad men they were administred to execute mischief and iniquity I will reckon up some of these secret vertues in each of the three kingdoms of compound creatures namely Animal Vegetable and Mineral First therefore for the Animal The Owl is said by Albertus Magnus to have many notable vertues For saith he if his heart and right foot be put upon one that sleepeth he will forthwith tell what he hath done or any thing that you shall ask him and he saith that it hath been tryed by some of his brethren to be most true And again if one do but put it under the arm-pit no dog will bark at him Also the Goat's blood is reported by him to turn glass into a soft and malleable temper if the glass be sod in it and vinegar that one may handle it like paste so that if it be cast against the wall it will not break And if one maketh an oyntment of the same composition and do annoint his face with it things will appear horrible and terrible unto him And if the said composition be put in the fire and there be present one that hath the falling-sickness and a Loadstone touch him he will presently fall into a fit as dead and if some cold water be given him to drink he will recover So saith he if a candle be annointed with the Camel's blood all men in the room will seem to have Camel's heads And thus he proceedeth in his History with a description of admirable wonders which are effected by the occult properties of beasts vegetables and stones If Mr. Foster and his adherents shall say
do concur and meet with a sympathetical embracing 4. Problem The naturall union of Magneticall Spirits is when the condition is made by contrary parts as by the pole North or South Application So the Northern blood or the spirits in the transported blood that are congealed and have assumed a Northern property will easily concur with spirits of a Southern or aequinoctial nature namely with the spirits of the lively fountain from whence they come being that like doth naturally covet his like especially when it is compassed about by the cold and crude aire and so constrained to contract it self with its airy vehicle from his cold adversary for spirits that are derived from the aequinoctial do eschew by a naturall instinct even as the airy nature doth the chill disposition of the earth and therefore being fled or contracted into the Center it draws unto it the lively beams of the Southern blood This is the reason in the Macrocosm that when the North-wind bloweth strongly and the South wind not so strongly the aire is often times condensed into a cloud by the contraction of the fiery formal and aequinoctial or astrall beams in the aire so condensed which by reason of the outward cold do fly from the air's Circumference unto the Center Insomuch that for this reason often times it is seen that it breaketh out into Lightnings and Coruscations This contraction also in the included aire when the externall aire is cold is easily discerned in effect by the Wether-glass namely when the water is drawn up and the included aire contracted or coarcted into a narrow room The ninth Member of the Proposition with his Proofs The ninth member of the Proposition is that the strong attractive faculties of every Magnet is of a Northern condition or Boreal property and consequently hath his chief attractive faculty from the pole-star And therefore after the manner of the Load-stone it draweth from the Circumference unto the Center Again all things coveted or beloved forasmuch as they are formal do participare of the aequinoctiall faculty which emitteth beams by dilatation from the Center and therefore their union by application maketh a mixtion of temper which is between the Northern-pole and the aequinoctial that is partly attractive and partly dilative as is mans vitall spirit which acteth in Systole and Diastole or contraction and dilatation even such is the Act of Magneticall coition Certain Problematical Demonstrations to confirm this Member First I will prove unto you demonstratively and that by a relation made unto the Load-stone that the most vigorous Magneticall attraction is from the North-pole and consequently that by the blood's induing of a Northern and congelative faculty it must needs become most attractive and contractive of his like as we see that the movable and thin expansed aire becometh thick Snow when the North wind doth blow or ice or frost or hail 1. Problem The North-pole is alwaies the most vigorous and strong pole to all Magneticall purposes if he have the quantiry the South hath Application Therefore the bloody spirit induing the natute of the North is most efficacious to operate upon the Southern nature Magnetically or attractively 2 Problem The Loadstone draweth the Iron more strongly from the North-pole than any point else of the said Stone Application This confirmeth the fore-said Problem To conclude the Magneticall attraction of the Northern blood is the cause of planting the light of more spirits in the unctuous Magnet whereby it is made stronger in his operation 3. Problem The Loadstone hath his points that is to say his true poles in the which do abide his greatest virtue And for this cause it doth not attract the Iron with equal force from every part and also the Magneticall Subject doth not move or flow unto every part of the Magnet 4 Problem The parts that are nearest the North-pole are the strongest in attraction and the parts that are remote are observed to be the weaker and more infirm in their drawing virtue Demonstration Now that the greatest attractive virtue is from the North I demonstrate it many waies And first If we shall hang up a long piece of Iron by a threed as is said before the Northen part of the world will attract unto it the end of it So that it will stand directly North and South Secondly if a wier of four or five inches in length be thrust through a cork and touched by the Load-stone and the cork be put into the water the Northern-Star will suck the end of the Iron unto it Thirdly if a long Iron be forged North and South and so be laid to cool in the same situation it will be animated and indued with the virtue of the Pole and move in the aire being hung up by a threed or put into a boat on the water and it will be drawn by the North and have as it were a coition with the North-star Fourthly if a long piece of clay newly burnt doth cool North and South it will then receive a Magneticall power from the earth and pole Fiftly set two Load-stones with their poles of one denomination namely the North-pole or South-pole of each at each end of a piece of clay while it cooleth and both ends will be of one nature Sixtly put a piece of clay of a long form into the fire and afterwards let it cool North and South and it will receive a polar virtue After that burn it again in the fire and let that end which cooled first North cool now South and it will be changed into the nature of the South and the other into the nature of the North. Application By the first therefore of these Problems and experiments it is apparent that the fountain of vigorous attraction is from the pole because that the property of Northern cold is to attract and therefore the bloody Spirit induing the nature of the North becommeth Magneticall as well as that of clay or Iron I will come now therefore to demonstrate the effect that this Northern spirit and the Southern do make by their mutuall concourse and union as we see that the Northern and Southern-pole by their intermediate concourse do produce an aequinoctial nature which is vernall and temperate that is to say hot and moist as is the living blood So that a Media natura or mean nature which participates of both extreams is produced between the confluence of their aspect or application which receiveth from the one and communicateth with the other My magneticall proofs are these 5 Problem Two magneticall bodies being joyned together at their poles those two poles that touch together have the nature of the Aequator or equinoctiall and will not excite or hold a needle thus touching Application The northern or contracted bloody spirit joyning by application with the southern equinoctiall or lively or dilated one will endue by this conjunction an equinoctiall nature which will have relation unto each
the north to the equinoctiall is one and the same spirit in essence although in property it varieth in his parts Likewise the south wind having dominion doth send out from the equinoctiall unto the north his blast without any discontinuance of his essence and yet the nearer it approcheth unto the north the weaker is his force in dilatation and dissolution and yet the spirit is one and the same in essence with that of the north for it is but one anima mundi or vivifying spirit of the world which the Platonist esteem to have his dwelling in the Sun And David saith He put his tabernacle in the Sun And therefore the winds are called by some Titanei filiI the sons of Titan or the Sun And the Prophet argueth aswell the Unity as the Omnipotency of this vivifying Spirit where he saith Veni Spiritus a quatuor ventis insuffla interfectos istos ut reviviscant Come Spirit from the four winds and breathe upon these slain persons that they may live Where he argueth that it is but one essentiall Spirit which as Solomon saith filleth the world and is in every thing of the world but after a manifold property The conclusive Application We conclude therefore that the spirit in the wounded man's blood not exhausted and that in the blood exhausted is all one spirit in essence howsoever it vary in property and therefore being continuate and indivisible in essence it is no marvell though it acteth from one extreame unto another diversly namely Magnetically and attractively from the Oyntment for there by reason of its absence from the Southern or lively blood in the body it indueth a Northern nature and sucketh or attracteth his like being emanated in the aire and the Southern-pole or aequinoctial point by dilatation sendeth out his spirit to be attracted and so there is made a communication betwixt the Balsamick nature and the wounded the self-same spirit operating diversly And I will express unto you a notable example in the great world When the Sun is beyond the aequinoctial Southward which happeneth in the winter then is the Northern nature most powerfull in attraction congelation and inspissation on this side the aequinoctial As contrariwise the Southern nature is most vigorous and efficacious in dilatation dissolution and subtiliation and yet you shall plainly discern how one and the same Spirit in the world doth operate from the one extream unto the other For when the Sun in the South doth dilate the aire and the waters there which the precedent winter had thickened and incrassated by attraction of cold and by dilatation doth dissipate it then that aire and water so dissipated requireth a larger place and flieth from the aspect of the Sun Northward And again the Northern propertie of the same spirit being now in the winter time most potent doth by attraction suck and direct Magnetically those spirits which are chased from the South and the nearer it draweth them unto the pole the more suddenly it condenseth them into clouds which by reason of the Sulphureous nature which it bringeth from the Summer or aequinoctial do immediatly dissolve themselves into rains And this is the reason that the Southern winds are so rife among us in the winter and consequently that we have so much rain in that season So that we may see how the double property of one and the same spirit doth operate at one and the same time about the effecting of one and the same thing in one and the same catholick aire of the world as I have told you before in my foregoing Discourse As also in the ascending or descending of fountains in each Hemisphere the like is effected All which is most lively demonstrated and performed in the Weather-glass as I have expressed before Whereby it is confirmed that being the Microcosmicall spirit is all one in condition with the Macrocosmicall It followeth thâ—t though the body of it be divided yet the spirit remains indivisible and can dilate and contract it self at any extention as is proved by the properties of the two contrary winds whose spirit is continued from both extremities and by the small pieces in the Load-stone which have their compleat poles as well as the whole Also by this a man way see that this spirit's operation is not to be limited by any of the Peripateticks imaginary Sphere of activity and consequently that it may work at any distance being directed and guided by a right and homogeniall Magnet that is to say agreeing at the least-wise in speciality if not in individuality or both as the blood of the wounded which is transplanted and that in the body both which are identity in nature and also as is the Uznea and Mummy in the Oyntment which is of the same Specifick though not of the Individuall You see therefore Learned Reader how plainly this business or the fore-said Proposition hath been demonstrated as well by the Load-stone as the naturall practise in the great world and in practise of the Weather-glass which I term my Demonstrative Instrument But because there are some strange accidents which happen in this cure by chance and unlooked for a reason whereof could never hitheto be expressed I will speak a word or two of them in a second Proposition and so I will end this Chapter The second Proposition It hath been observed in the cure of wounds by the Weapon-salve that if there happen in the time of the cure any issue of blood from some other part of the wounded man as bleeding at the nose pissing of blood or by some other wound or else if he have to do with any menstruous woman in the mean time the force of the Ointment will be diverted and the efficacy of it will stand but in little stead and the reason that I can give is because the Southern bloody spirit which raigning in the veins did emit and direct his beams unto the Oyntment was easily attracted and imbibed by the Oyntment but when that spirit is diverted and turned another way and is attracted by a contrary Magneticall Subject then will a divorce as it were be made by the second Magnet betwixt the emanating Spirit and the attractive in the Oyntment And I will maintain and demonstrate this to be true by this Magneticall experiment A Problem to confirm the Proposition out of Gilb. lib. 2. de Mag cap. 31. Two Load-stones or Irons excited rightly cohaering by the comming of another fresher and stronger Load-stone or Iron excited do make an abort and the new commer will easily drive away the other with a contrary face and will command him and so the endeavour or the desire of the other two which were first joyned will end Application Thus you see how fitly these two do concur namely the fore-recited animal act with these of the mineral I end this Chapter with this Assertion Spirits that have their subtiliation and action from natural heat do act livelily so long as they abide within
be applied unto them all and after that it hath sucked a sufficient proportion then ought you to reserve it for to make your Transplantation The Act of Transplantation of the Spirituall Mummy Touching the act or manner of Transplantation Paracelsus saith that the extracted spirituall Mummy doth not ooperate unto health and preservation but by mineral vegetable and animal means And therefore it is necessary that the spirituall Mummy attracted or extracted out of the body by the virtue of the Animal Magnet must be introduced into a vegetative nature whereby the said Mummy not being of it self vegetative may by adoption as it were be introduced into and be indued with a vegetative nature or condition We ought therefore to mingle a proportion of this imbibed Magnet with a certain proportion of his mother-earth and sow in this composition the seeds of such herbs as are proper for thi◠or that disease and this or that ill affected principall part of man's body or this or that infirm member which is contained in his region As for example For the Lungs in the vitall region when the disease is the Ptifick sow Line-seed or Juniper in the naturall region when it is Dropsy Pimpnel or wormwood in the bruising or contusion of parts Hypericon or Plantain in tumour or wounds Persecaria or the great or lesser Cumfry in Salt diseases as are the tooth-ach pain in the eies and flowing Menstrues Persecaria maculata and so forth The herbs must grow in this compounded earth and that in the open aire and as the herb or plant groweth it will sympathetically and Magnetically extract the imbibed Mummiall spirits out of the Magnet and will by that means cause the Mummy extracted out of every particular member according unto his condition to be fit to cure the infirmity of his proper member Of the Use and Virtue of the Transplanted Mummy Lastly as concerning the manner how to use this Transplanted Mummy now that it is changed into a vegetable nature or condition If the disease be dry and of a combust nature as is the yellow Jaunders the Ptisick c. and you would cure it or expell it out of the body then take the herb with his Magnetick earth and cast them into the running water and the disease will fade and die by little and little But if the disease be moist then you must burn the herb with the Magneticall earth Again if the disease be more temperate namely between the extremities of water and fire then hang up the herb in the aire or smoak to dry and the disease will languish by little and little as the herb doth fade If you shall give the herb or fruit unto the beast that is of a stronger nature than the sick then the beast will be infected with that disease and the sick will be free Also if the spirituall Mummy so extracted out of some peculiar member of a sound Man be conserved in his continuall vegetation if you take of his fruit and transplant it into a sound oken tree by that means the member out of which the Mummy was extracted will grow continually and continue in his naturall and robust proportion of vegetation without defect After this manner also are the Willow trees but that they increase so suddenly and by reason thereof they are not so fit for this purpose lest the member should grow too hastily for by that means many inconveniences may follow As for example If after that manner the hair of a person be shut up into a willow-tree they will grow so suddenly and so copiously that unless they be removed thence or the Willow be burned the eyes and brains will indure dammage and detriment as dolours fluxes c. namely by the suddain increase or too much humidity of the Tree And therefore according unto the proportion of the person there must be a proportionate tree found out into the which the Mummy is to be transplanted but the Oke is to be elected before all others because it increaseth and groweth but temperately and strongly and a mans life will not easily exceed the daies of an Oke By this mysticall kind of attraction the true and wise naturall Magician for so I may call the true Philosopher that operateth as Solomon did by the properties of naturall things may bring to pass such things which in wonder will excell as I said by many degrees the power or act of the weapon-salve for by it wise men have procured friendship love between such as have been utter enemies again by the use of it grace and affection may be recovered from another whose favour is desired Paracelsus speaking darkly of this Mummiall faculty doth shew how the Ape and the Snake betwixt the which a naturall antipathy or strife and hatred is ever observed to be may be made friends and familiar unto one another But to our purpose If the members out of the which the second Mummy is extracted are to be corroborated then you must make the extracted Mummy to vegetate as before by transplantation temperately and according unto the naturall proportion in the Oke or other such like sound tree But if the members be too dry then let their extracted Mummy vegetate in the Willow tree and from thence again be transplanted into some other temperate Tree So also in a humid complexion it may for a time be transplanted into a hot and slowly growing tree as is the Juniper onely observing that the fruit in which the Mummy is transplanted be preserved from all externall dammage Demonstration I need not waste the time in further demonstration of the possibility and feazibility of these acts in the spirituall transplanted Mummy when by the very self-same proofs whereby I have confirmed the manner of curing by the weapon-salve and by transplantation which is set down in one of the Chapters of this present Book I have fully demonstrated the reasons of these occult and abstruse actions in this kind of cure unto such as will not with St. Thomas believe any thing but what is confirmed by sense And therefore for the manifestation of this hidden action by a relation of natures I refer you unto that very place also where the salve is compared unto the vegetable and Magnet the bloody spirits unto the spirituall Mummy the manner of application of beams from the Mummy to the sick member unto the application of the transplanted bloody spirits to the wounded member the keeping the spiritually-growing spirit in the oyntment from cold unto the preserving the vegetable fruit in which the Mummy is planted from externall damage So that eadem est ratio utriusque and by consequence eadem est demonstrationis via in ambobus It is too tedious in this place to express the efficacious operations of this secret mysticall Mummy and I am assured that some ignorant Momus or Cynicall ignorant will either laugh or bark at what is said already touching it for Quis major scientiae inimicus quà m