are stopped so as that they are not able to pass the narrow confines of their bodies wanting the sense and life of a Soul because there is so little of the Suns virtue in them as will not carry them above the motion of a Vegetation For in the order of creation the Vegetables were first before the Sun wherefore creatures are not equally indebted to him for their originals and the aged principles of their life but must acknowledge them received from the lightsom Air as a nearer Agent For the disposition of their matter was adjudged by Nature as too weak to receive so sublime a form 172 But for Stones since they are not so much generated out of a true mixture of the Elements as from a concourse of Earth and Water by an external force of Heat and Cold they are decocted as an earthen Work or vessel therefore they are altogether senseless having borrowed a feeble form from the dark and cold nature of the Earth and Water 173 Concerning precious Stones and Gems we must conceive otherwise for they derive their forms from the Chrystal Fouutains of the Heavens and the Sun and their bodies are the purest drops of a refined dew engendered by celestial influences and as it were the congealed tears of of Heaven whence they possess and contain many sublime virtues 174 But the matter of Metals because it is watry and earthy and most compacted by reason of the principal subtile commixtion of weighty Elements is therefore heavy and exceedingly ponderous and of it self capable of no motion but because it is sublimated and mundefied by the wonderfull artifice of Nature in an earthy and stony Matrix as in a Limbick and its mixture is compleated in a most thin vapour by reiterated distillations that by reason of its exceeding subtility and exuberancy the influential helps of the Sun and the Heavens get in and mix with it especially in the generation of perfect mettals for this cause though they fetch their bodies from Water and Earth yet Nature performing the office of workman doth so ingeniously make up the bodies especially of a perfect mettal that it delivers them to the heavenly Deities as those that deserve to be informed with the most eminent form It is a work of long travail but an absolute one heightned to the utmost of Natures actings in which Heaven and Earth seem rather to copulate than to consent But the formal spirits of mettals being bound up in a hard cover do stick immoveable till released of their bands by Philosophical Fire they do produce by their heavenly Seed in their matter that noble son of the Sun and at length that Quint-essence of admirable Virtue in which the Heavens seem to lodge with and come down to us 175 It was provided by the Decree of the supream Creatour that a Nature more noble should not degenerate into one less noble or that one more eminent into a nature that is more base or that it should abjuring its native priviledge of birth-right come under a servile vassalage Superiour Beings are coupled with these below and those of greater power do communicate themselves with those of a less that they may inform and compleat them by their emissary spirits which notwithstanding in this do no way derogate from their stock or kind Nay when they work themselves into the seeds of things or also into mixed Beings they subject not themselves to a bondage but do attain a new honour and priviledged power For every mixt Being of whatsoever kind it is is a kind of an Empire yea the whole world who hath a spiritual form of her own to rule her whose office it is to have dominion over the organs and faculties of Nature yea over the whole frame so that that which being void and without distinction did drift it rowling hither and thither in the vast Ocean of Nature is now called to an Empire 176 The formal act of the first matter as also of the Elements doth inform nothing besides the verie principles of Nature therefore the specifical form doth constitute a perfect mixt Being neither is it to be thought to contain any more forms since the very Elements in their mixtion have the charge of the fashioning not of the informing of the bodie 177 It is most probable that the virtue of multiplication which lyes in the seeds of Beings doth not flow from the Elementary matter as its efficient cause but from a celestial form for to multiply is the most natural and proper action of light for from one ray are almost an infinite number darted forth from whence it proceeds that the Sun who is the Fountain of immortal Light is also in nature the first efficient cause of generation and multiplication that therefore every form receives a natural power of multiplication from the celestial light is prov'd by this weighty Argument because it is lightfull and furnished with its native endowments Ergo multiplying It is lightfull because it doth enlighten with its rays the sensitive and imaginative faculties in creatures that so out of that double faculty springs a double apprehension knowledge of things an external by the senses an internal by imagination but all knowledge is a light as all ignorance is a darkness but there peeps up some enlightening and lightsomness when there is an apprehension of the images of things and when that which lay unknown in the dark is now manifested by a light of knowledge for it is onely by the good office of light that obscure things receive a revelation God did adde to man a third light to wit his Understanding by the help of which he attains by their causes a far more perfect way of knowledge All these things are produced by the operation of light and of a perspicuity flowing out of an enlightened Soul This last action of light is onely proper to man the two former are shared with beasts as well as by him for their souls are also partakers of celestial light Therefore reason doth convince that the virtue of multiplication in the individual Beings of Animals and Vegetables doth proceed from the Souls multiplication of light and that some rays of it are included in the seed with the Aetherial spirit until at length they are set upon the rising of the Sun of Life 178 Light and Darkness are the principles of Life and Death for the rays of Light are the forms of mixt Beings their bodies a dark Abyss By Light all things live yea Light is life but those that loose their life loose their light and are hurried into their former darkness in which they lay close and hidden before they were drawn to light by the fatal wheel of Predestination 179 The specifical forms of Animals as also of Vegetables are rational though not after the manner of men but after a property of their own according to the virtues and impress of their nature For they have their vital endowments their cognizances knowledge and
vegetation do exceed in a sensitive soul which is in them the principle of life and motion Therefore an Animal seated in the highest degree of things below doth compleat the work of Nature in her Elementary kingdom doth live properly generate properly and in it hath Nature truly distinguished each Sex that from two a third to wit their issue might be produced So in the more perfect Beings the most perfect Symbole of the Trinity is most apparent 160 Man the Prince of all creatures and of the lower World is accounted the Summary of Universal Nature For his Soul is an immortal ray of the Divine Light his Body is a beautified Composure of the Elements The inward and unperceiveable faculties of the Sense by which man doth comprehend all things obvious are altogether celestial and as it were Stars giving the influence of knowledge of things the motions and perturbations of the mind are as it were the Winds Tempests Lightenings and Thunders the Meteors which break forth in the Aerial Region of the Spirit do trouble the heart and the bloud Therefore was man deservedly called a Microcosm and the accomplisht Draught of the Universe 161 But not onely man but even every living creature yea every Plant is a Microcosm So is every Grain or Seed a Chaos in which are the seeds of the whole World compendiously bound up out of which in its season a little World will spring 162 Whatsoever Beings of Natnre have a perfect mixture and life they have a body spirit and soul The body is made of clay in which are all things necessary for the matter of generation for it is most agreeable to reason that Bodies should be made of two corporeal Elements especially viz. Earth and Water 163 The Spirit is a small portion of the purest Air or the Heaven a middle nature betwixt the Body and the Soul the knot and bond of both the case of the Soul and the conduit of the more subtile and spiritual parts of the body 164 The soul or form of a mixt body is a spark of the Fire of Nature an undiscernable Ray of Celestial Light brought into act from the power of the seed by the motion of generation bound to an Elementary body by the mediation of the Spirit giving its individual Being to the mixt body the nearest principle and the efficient cause of life It acts according to the disposed matter and the qualities of the Organs 165 The nature or from of the Soul because it is altogether full of light in living creatures especially hath so great a distance from the dark and earthy matter of bodies that this is wholly irrational in respect of that and this unproportionably more noble and therefore is fastened by that strictest tye which Nature makes use of in her works to the body by reason of the disconveniency and distance unless the conjunction and knot had been made by the virtue and efficacy of a peculiar and powerfull mean therefore did the provident Creatour assign a subtile mean which is the Aetherial spirit which receives and retains the begotten from and is the tye of it to the body communicating in its nature with both These things are to be conceived to be spoken of the celestial Soul of Natural things not of the Super-celestial and divine Soul of man which notwithstanding is according to the good pleasure of the Creatour brought into a consortship with the body of man by natural mediums 166 The specifical forms from the first day of the Creation were imprinted in the first individual and particular persons by the character of the Idaeal copie and that diviue and indelible impress was according to the direction of the Creatour by the way of generation traduced to posterity that so by the perpetual succession of particular individual natures the priviledge of immortality might be continued in the kind 167 It cannot nor must be conceived that Forms do generate in the matter their like for to generate is the alone property of bodies but by an harmonious motion of their Organs they do by them dispose the seminal matter for generation and shut up in it a ray of Light or a secret spark of life as a treasure This is the office and priviledge of the Form as also to imprint its own specifical character on that vivifical spirit wrapt up close in the seed which in its set season doth in the work of generation by the engendering heat display it self into a soul whether Vegetative or Animal so that what was a formal and hidden spirit in the seed is now a Form in the mixt body So that occult thing that was closed in the bosom of Nature is now made manifest and brought forth from a power to an act 168 The Form issues not forth onely out of the power and virtue of the seed because there is an influence of celestial virtues in the generations of Beings which do heighten the efficacies of the matter do multiply them and as it were midwife it to groaning Nature yea they do get into and mixe themselves with and bring in auxiliary strength to the formal and seminal spirit that is in the matter which is also by its original celestial 169 There do not onely meet in the generation of every mixt Being the corporeal Elements but also all the Virtues all the Powers of Nature in general and these do contribute something of their own so are the parts of the Universe bound up together that they have an unanimous combination for life and couple by a mutual affection 170 The natural Forms of things though they are potentially in the seeds yet are they neither of nor generated by the substance of the lower Elements for they have their rise from a more noble spring their original is from Heaven for their father is the Sun the heavenly Nature the bond whereby these matters are knit together 171 The specifical Forms of mixt Beings have within themselves closed a dark kind of knowledge of their original and are carried up by their own strength and by a secret motion like unto Waters to the height of their Fountain head So the Soul of man being derived from the divine Spring of the uncreated Light is reflected to the same by the sharp sight of his mind and by the soaring contemplations of his soul but the forms of other living creatures being taken out of the privy Treasury of the Heavens and the Sun do by the instinct of Nature and by a weak kind of reminiscency glance back thither Hence we may observe the frequent Prognosticks of several creatures concerning the courses of the Sun and the changes of the Heavens But the forms of Vegetables being for the most part airy and inspired from the lowest Region of our Air therefore they are not able to extend or reach forth their power or faculties beyond it they do according to their ability lift up their heads into the Air as willing to visit their Countrey but they
as by way of requital not deny me her assistance as a buckler against the delusions of Sophisters and a breast-plate against the environed darts of either Envy or Ignorance These Beasts will bark the first pining at anothers good the second raging in its own clouds both break into the cultivated Gardens of Knowledge and the delightfull paradise of Philosophy and either snip or blast the endeavours of a more fortunate Genius These to no purpose strive to stop my course by their frights I am seated above their highest reach as long as I can see the Deity of Truth under her patronage I walk I work secure Onely be you pleased to accept these sprinklings of my retirement with the same soul it is presented if any thing seem in it to disrellish deal so gently as that you may seem rather not to comply than wholly to refuse I shall in the interim reach my end if my pains shall cause you to fall upon greater attempts with better success Enchyridion Physicae Restitutae OR A Summary of the Physicks Recovered THE FIRST RULE GOd is an Eternal Being an infinite Oneness the radical Principle of all things whose Essence is an incomprehensible Light his Power Omnipotency whose beck is an absolute act He that dives deeper is swallowed up in a trance and silence and is lost in the abyss of unfathomed glory 2. Most of the Ancients conceived the world from eternity to have been figured in its Archetype and Original which is God who is all Light before the Creation of the Universe he was a book rowld up in himself giving light onely to himself but as it were travailing with the birth of the world he unfolded himself and that work which lay hid in the womb of his own mind was manifested by extending it to view and so brought forth the Idaeal-world as it were in the transcript of that divine Original into an actual and material world This is hinted by Trisgmegist when he says That God changed his form and that all things were in a sudden revealed and brought to light For the world is nothing else but the disclosed image of an occult Deity This beginning of the world the Ancients seem to have denoted by the birth of their Pallas out of the brain of their Jupiter by the Mid-wiffery of Vulcan that is by the help of divine fire or light 3. The eternal Parent of all things not less wise in governing than powerfull in creating did so orderly dispose the whole organical frame of the world that the highest are so intermixt with the lowest and the lowest interchangeably and inconfusedly with the highest and have an Analogical likeness so that the extreams of the whole work by a secret bond have a fast coherence between themselves through insensible mediums and all â—â—â—â—gs do freely combine in an obedience to their Supream Ruler and to the benefit of the inferiour Nature onely being subject to a dissolution at the will of him who gave them their constitution Wherefore it is well said of Hermes That whatsoever is below hath an assimulation to somewhat above He that transfers the sovereign order of the Universe to any Nature diverse from the Nature of God denies a God For it cannot be just to conceive any other uncreated Deity of Nature as the Cause of the production or conservation of the seveâ—al Individuals of this large frame of the world besides that spirit of the â—ivine Worker which lay upon those first waters and brought forth the seeds of all things confusedly rowld â—n the first Chaos from their power into act and wheeling them by 〈◊〉 perpetual alteration doth mannage them Geometrically by composition and resolution 5. He that knows not the soul oâ— the world to be that Spirit the Creatour and Governour of the World by its contâ—â—â—ed infusion oâ— its breathing upon the works of nature and by its enlarged diffusioâ— through all things giving to alâ— things a set but secret motion according to their kind he is wholly an Ignaro of the laws of the Universe for he that created cannot but assume the power of ruling what is created and it must be acknowledged that all things have their creation generation and conservation by the same Spirit 6. Notwithstanding this he thiâ— shall grant Nature the honour of being the second universal Cause attending on the first and as it werâ— an instrument moved by it and 〈◊〉 giving according to a material order an immediate motion to everâ— thing in the world will not speâ—â— what disagrees with the opinion 〈◊〉 Philosophers or Divines who 〈◊〉 that Natura naturans i. Nature giving nature this Natura naturata Nature made nature 7. He that is verst in the secrets of Nature will acknowledge this second Nature the attendant of the first to be the spirit of the Universe or the quickening virtue of that light created in the beginning and contracted into the body of the Sun and endowed with an hidden faecundity Zoroaster and Heraclit called this The Spirit of Fire the invisible Fire the Soul of the world 8. The order of Nature is nothing else than a large Rowl of the eternal Laws which being Enacted by the highest Sovereign and Recorded and written in various leaves to innumerable people of a various nature by the auspicious power of which Laws the frame of the Universe doth accomplish its motions life and death always atttending on the margins of the last Volume and the other spaces being taken up by alternal motions 9. The world is as it were a Smithswork made orbicular the links of the chain enclasping it each the other are the parts of the world Nature as it were deputed to sit in the middle always present and ever working continually repairs the changes and motions of all things 10. The whole world as it hath its constitution from a three-fold Nature so hath it its distinction into a three-fold Region viz. The Super-celestial the Celestial the Sub-celestial The Super-celestial is that which is otherwise termed the Intelligible it is altogether spiritual and immortal having the nearest approch to the Divine Majesty The Celestial is seated in the middle which having allotted to her the portion of the most perfect bodies and being replenished with spirits doth pour out by the conveyance of spiritual channels numberless efficacies and vital breathings not enduring a corruption onely having attained its period subject to change Lastly the Sub-celestial or Elementary Region hath its assignment in the lowest portion of the world This being wholly of a corporeal nature doth enjoy spiritual gifts and benefits the chief of which is in life by loan onely and upon request being as it were to repay Heaven for it In the bosom of this Region there is no generation without corruption no birth without death 11. It is enacted and setled by the Laws of the Creation that the lowest things should immediately be subservient to the middle the middle to those above these to
Heavens for the Air giving way to the vapour that flies up to it receives it to lodge in the Region of the Clouds as in a large Hall but ere it comes thither its body being in a manner spiritualized the moist Being is divested of its ponderous nature that so it might by this addition of agility the sooner compass its desire and enjoy the priviledge of an ambiguous nature 148 In the mean time the Sun the Prince of the celestial Quire and the rest of the superiour Natures taking care of the inferiour do instil by continual breathings enlivening spirits as so many trilling rivulets from their most clear and pure Fountains But the Vapours being thin and so swimming in the Air or else bound up into a Cloud do most eagerly suck in in that spiritual Nectar and attract it to them by a Magnetick virtue and having received it they grow big and being impregnated and quickened with that ingendering seed as being delivered of their burden do freely fall down back into the lap of the Earth in some Dew hoar Frost Rain or some other nature and this Mother of the Elements doth receive into her womb the returning moisture and being quickened by this Heavenly seed sends forth in her due time innumerable issues according to divers degrees more or less generous according to the goodness of the seed or the disposition of the womb and the inferiour Waters also are made partakers of the benevolence of the Superiour and Celestial because she goes with the Earth to the making up of one and the same Globe and so they receive joynt and common benefits But by the nature of Water is the fermentation of the rest of the Elements 149 But this ferment or leaven is a vivifical spirit flowing down from the superiour Natures upon these inferiour without which the Earth would be again void and empty For it is the seed of Life without which neither man nor any creature nor any growing thing could enjoy the benefit of a generation or life for man lives not by bread alone but especially by that Heavenly food by Air to wit by such a spirit so breathed in and fermented 150 The three material Elements being remote in the composition of things do onely obey God and Nature and come not under the laws of Art or of humane Invention but there are three others that issue from the copulation of these which being extracted by resolution do sufficiently shew that they are the nearest in the composition of mixt Beings to wit Salt Sulphur and Mercury And so it is manifested That there is a Trinity of Elements and a Signature of the universal NATURE 151 These three last Elements are the issue of a three-fold copulation of the three former Mercury of the mixture of Earth and Water Sulphur of the copulation of Earth and Air Salt produced out of the condensation of Air and Water and there can be no more combinations of them named The Fire of Nature is in all of them as their formal principle the virtue of the celestial bodies contributing their influence and co-operation 152 Neither are these latter produced out of any copulation of the former bodies for Mercury comes forth of an unctious Earth and clear Water well diluted and mixt Sulphur is generated of the most subtile and driest Earth coupled with the moist Air Finally Salt is congealed of salt and thick Water and crude Air 153 It may be lawfull to affirm that Democritus his opinion That all bodies were composed out of Atoms is not far distant from truth for both reason and experience do vindicate him from biting tongues for the knowing Philosopher would not wholly conceal but would unfold in an obscure and dark term the mixture of the Elements which that it might be agreeable to the intention of Nature must necessarily be done by the smallest and by actually indivisible Beings other wise the Elements could not combine into a continuous natural body Experience teacheth us in the artifical resolution composition of mixt Beings which are tryed by distillations that the perfect mixtion of two or more bodies is not done but in a subtile vapour But Nature doth make her mixtions far more subtile and as it were spiritual which we may safely believe was the opinion of Democritus for the grosseness of bodies is an impediment to Mixtion therefore the more any thing is attenuated the more apt and fitted it is for mixtion 154 The three-fold degree of Existence in mixt Beings doth offer to us three supream kinds of mixt Beings to wit of Minerals Vegetables and of Animal Beings Natures law hath appointed a Being for Minerals in the Earth for Vegetables in the Earth and the Water for Animals in the Earth Water and Air yet to all the Air is the principal food and foster of life 155 Minerals are thought simply not to have an existence or a life although Metals from Minerals may be said to be endowed with a principal life both because in their generation there is a kind of a copulation and a commixiton of a double seed male and female viz. Sulphure and Mercurie which two by a long and multiplied circulation are turned and purged and being seasoned with the salt of Nature and fermented by it and being perfectly mixed in a most subtile vapour are formed into a clay or soft mass the spirit of Sulphure by degrees closing in the Mercurie at length that Mass doth grow hard and is confirmed to a metallick body 156 As also because perfect Mettals especially do contain in them a principle of life to wit in-set fire infused from heaven which being dulled by being bound in with the hard outside of the Mettal lies hid as void of motion and as an enchanted treasure till getting libertie by philosophical solution and the subtile artifice of the work-man it doth powerfully display its refined spirit and celestial soul by a motion of vegetation in the issue heightned to the sudden perfection of art nature 157 Vegetables also are invested with a vegetative soul or spirit they grow by a vegetative motion and multiplyâ— yet want an animal sence and motion Their seeds are of an Hermaphroditical nature for every particular grain doth contain in it a fruitfull seed without copulation or mixture of a double seed although in every kind almost of Vegetables experience sheweth there are both sexes to be found 158 God also hath wrapt up in the seeds of Vegetables a secret spirit the authour of generation ennobled with a special character which is wholly celestial and a ray of the heavenly light void of corruption in which is preserved the specifical form under the bodie of every individual subsistance which being through corruption resolved lost that immortal spirit being called out by the vivifical and homogeneal heat of the Sun doth rise up in a new stalk and doth bring into it the form of the foâ—mer 159 Animals besides their existence and faculty of
their predestinations The vital endowments of Vegetables are an endeavour of generating the like the multiplying virtues nutritive augmenting motive and sensitive and the like But their knowledge is experienced by their wise fore-knowledge of times their strict observation of change as of the orders of Nature in a variety agreeable to the motion of the Sun and Heaven in the fastening the Roots the erecting the Stalk spreading the Branches in the opening the Leaves and the Flowers in the forming the Fruit in their beautifying in their ripening in the transmutations of Elements into aliments in the inspiring of a vivifical virtue into the Seeds lastly in constituting a various difference of Nature and parts according to the benign or malign concurrence of the Sun or Soil 180 That the souls of Bruits are endowed with knowledge is sufficiently by their copulations and generations upon set times their just distributions in the forming and nourishing of the parts of the individual Beings the distinct offices of those parts free from any confusion the various motions of their souls the nimble faculties of their senses the secret spirits harmoniously moving the members as organs their proneness to discipline their obsequious reverence to their Masters the presaging instinct of things to come in most a devout worship an art in getting their provision in choice of their raunges providing their fence their prudence in the avoiding dangers and the rest actions so agreeable to knowledge and reason bestowed upon them by Nature But Nature in every individual is nothing else but the form it self which is the principle of motion and rest of action and life to it in which it is to which is committed the charge direction and conservation of its body as a Ship to a Pilot. 181 But who will deny the certain predestination of Times for the birth of things unless he fancy a confusion and disorder in the Nature of the Universe for she draws forth all those things out of her bosom according to setled and fore-appointed order for she had a prescript from her Maker for the Law of Order and the times of production their quickening birth life and death have their set times and do fulfil their designed seasons those things that either this or that year receive their Being or return to darkness are pre-ordained to it which pre ordination Nature Gods Vicegerent in the rule of the Universe doth fore-know by the suggestion of the Divine Spirit that she might be ministerial to the compassing of it neither do those things casually fall out but they have a necessary though unknown cause yet the Grand Ruler of all is not comprized within the Law of Necessity but appoints all things and changeth them according to his own will He it is that decrees concerning all even the least things whose Decrees want neither certainty nor order Therefore that Order that runs through the series and succession of things times hath the law of its necessity from the divine Decrees 182 As all things which afterwards were actually produced and separated in respect of their matter were potentially in the Chaos so all individuals before they come to light are in the World in their matter and potentiality and will in their time and order come forth and break into act but when they fail and die they return as Rivers into the Sea into that general Mass from whence they came every Nature recovering its proper Region and being to be brought again and again into Natures shop are wrought into new Beings upon her Anvile It may be this was that opinion of the Pythagoreans therefore exploded because not comprehended concerning their Tenet of Transanimation 183 When the mixt body is dissolved and the corruption of the frail Elements come to a loss the Aetherial nature returns to its native home and there is nothing left in the carkass but a perturbation and confusion of the Elements having lost their Governour then there reigns nothing but corruption death and darkness in the widowed matter untill she through corruption be made fit for generation and the virtue of Heaven do again flow down into the matter thus disposed and gathering and mingling the wandering Elements do re-kindle the weak light of a new form which at length breaks forth the forces of the Elements being corroborated and so compleats the new mixture 184 In that corruption which tends to generation which is a corruption in the mean and is done with the conservation of the specifical form potentially inherent in the seed or matter that sublime spirit departs not but being weak and impotent is excited by external heat and begins to move and withal give motion to the matter till at length it works more vigorously and gives information to the perfectly mixed body 185 The Elements as well as the Aliments of Nature do begin their generation and nutrition which are in most respects the same from Corruption For both must necessarily be putrified and by putrefaction be resolved into a moist and as it were a first matter then is there made a Chaos in which are all things necessary for generation and nutrition So doth the birth and repair of every Microcosm bear with an Analogical resemblance with the creation and conservation of the Macrocosm 186 The insensible seeds of things and those mixed bodies which are begot from them do consist of a threefold Nature of a Celestial Elementary and Mixt Nature The Celestial is a ray of the Light of the Sun endued with all heavenly vigour the principle of action motion generation and life by whose help the seeds by their renewed vigour do resemble the constant permanency of the Stars and being in a manner as so many immortal grafts of celestial plants ingrafted upon corruptible nature as upon a strange stock do by a kind of an eternal succession vindicate it from death The Elementary corporeal and sensible portion which in creatures is called the Sperm is the Case and keeper of the seed which putrifies and is corrupted and generates an invisible seed The Radical Moisture or the Ferment of Nature in which lyes the spirit is a middle substance coupling the Celestial and Elementary in the material part answering the Elements in the spiritual the Form Like the Day-break whose cheek being covered with a duskie light doth knit together the two extreams of Light and Darkness and being neither doth hold forth a mixture of both 187 Life is an harmonical act proceeding from the copulation of the Matter and the Form constituting the perfect Being of an individual nature Death is the term or end of this act the separation of the matter and form and a resolution of the mixt body 188 These mixt bodies have the roots of their generation and life in Heaven from whence springs their Causes and Principles whence also as inverted Trees they do suck their juice and aliment Neither is it suitable for the Understanding to be envassaled to the Rule of the Senses which
filthy excrements Therefore that radical Moisture is the nearest and never-ceasing subject of generation and life in which is first kindled the fire of Nature and the formal act in a well disposed and prepared matter But in a confused and ill ordered matter where that humour doth act the part of the male it begets spurious and bastard births of Nature for that generation which is made without specifical seed seems to be made rather by chance and default than by the intention of Nature although in it seems to be a dark and confused kind of copulation of actives with passives which is required also to the production of every though imperfect Being 223 That radical Ferment constantly abiding in the depth of mixt Bodies seem to be the Band Seat and Tye of that matrimony contracted between Light and Darkness between the first Matter and the universal Form finally of all the Contraries otherwise the Matter and Form by reason of their repugnant natures would not be knit together But that dark unbridledness of the first matter and its averseness from light was tamed and its hatred turned into love by the good office of that lightsom tincture which doth reconcile things repugnant 224 The inbred Heat and the radical Moisture are of a divers kind for that is wholly spiritual and of the Sun this of a middle nature betwixt a spiritual and a corporeal both participating of an aethereal and elementary Nature that is of the degree of things above this of things below in which was celebrated the first marriage of Heaven Earth by which also Heaven hath its abode in the very Centre of the Earth They are therefore deceived that do confound the inbred heat and the radical Moisture for they differ no less than smoke and flame the light of the Sun and the Air Sulphur and Mercury In mixt Beings the radical Moisture is the seat and food of the inbred and celestial Fire its bond with the Elementary body but that power of Fire is the Form and Soul of mixt Beings In seeds that moisture is the immediate Keeper and Case of that Spirit of Fire inclosed in the seed till it be set on to generation in a disposed Matrix by an adventitious heat Finally that radical Substance is Vulcan's Shop in every mixt Being the Chimney in which is kept that immortal Fire which is the first mover of all the faculties in an individual nature 225 That radical Moisture is the Catholical Balsam the most precious Elixar of Nature the Mercury of Life having a perfect sublimation by Nature a dose of which is administered to every individual of her family weighed to a just quantity by plenteous Nature They that have attained the happiness to fetch out this hidden Treasure of Nature wrapt up close in the heart and in the closets of Natures birth and can get it out of those close coverts of the Elements let him boast that he hath attained the chiefest staff and help of life and a most precious Treasure 226 The order of Reason and of Creation doth require that the first Copies of things being first of all concealed in the celestial Natures were transmitted into inferiour Beings but in the first they are of a far greater perfection both because of their greater tenuity and dignity as also because of their neighbouring seats to the Eternal Being but with us they are much meaner because carved in a grosser and less valuable matter and more distant from their eternal Principle There is nothing therefore printed in this lower Margin of the World which was not at first copied in the heavenly Being neither is there any particular kind of Being of the inferiour natures which doth not acknowledge the dominion of one Superiour agreeable to it and which it hath not the secret seal and signature of it So do things below depend on things above 227 The World is a creature of an ambiguous nature for it is of both Sexes the higher part to wit the celestial is active and masculine the lower Elementary nature is the passive and feminine nature The Globe of the Earth is the womb in which the engendering seed of Heaven is received and kept From the masculine part proceed life and strength from the female part corruption and death do issue 228 Since superiour and inferiour bodies have their original from the same Principles as from their parts yet are they not such as have their equal lot it is equal that those things that have the honour of being nobler substances and advanced to higher offices should distribute to their brethren of a lower degree being poor and in want some of their wealth and so provide for their life and conversation For it was provided by the foresight of the Deity that since there was a necessity that the World should be made up of unequal natures the more powerfull Natures should aid the weaker hand help to the fainting Natures So Love is the indissoluble knot of the parts of the Universe 229 In this sublunary Region diseased Nature sickens out of a defect of the proportion and temperament of the Elements either by reason of the quantity or of the qualities either out of a too great intension or remission and so is there a dissonancy in Natures musick and a distemper in her bodies Therefore the consonancy of the Elements which riseth from a proportion and constitutes their temperament being gone the matter and form of the whole mixt Being hath a bad coherence Nature is troubled and staggers with a perplexed confusion and hence do first diseases and then death assault disordering and falling Nature 230 That discord of those Principles have either an intrinsecal and radical cause as from a vicious seed an evil generation or age or an intrinsecal and accidental as from a too great repletion or emptiness from whence either an excess or defect in humours and spirits or from putrefaction mortal poison infection grief hurt or some other impediment brought upon the Organs of life with the like which do hurt Nature 231 The four radical Qualities of the Elements are as so many harmonious Tones of Nature not contrary but divers and distant each from other by certain pauses from whose rational difference intension and remission is made a perfect consent of Nature perceivable by the understanding bearing an Analogy to that vocal Musick which is heard by the Senses Sharp and Flat in Musick though they are extreams yet are not Contraries in Musick they are the terms of those means which lye betwixt them and are composed and tempered after a divers manner by these two extreams So Heat and Cold Driness and Moisture are the extream Qualities in Nature yet not therefore contrary but onely the bounds of the middle and interjacent Qualities from whose mixture and temperament do the middle proceed 232 The motion of Nature is continual and not tyred no less in every part than in the whole For she always acts never idle so that