that mighty piece of work of the World first to make his prayer how much more may we in such a world of doubts and dangers And to desire of GOD that we may prove our question not onely with sufficient evidence but with such discretion also that those Men which can use it and are worthy of it may see the truth and the rest may be blinded Then both to direct my speech which must have some ground to stand on and their steps which crave a little light to guide them I think it best to come to the entrance of this way to BLISS and to point afar off unto the end leaving the middle way unto their own Wit and Labour for I may not be their guide lest the rest should espy us and follow as fast HERMES MEDICINE and the ready way to BLISS lieth among the Metals and upon the top and highest among them even in Gold And the end of this journey where Bliss begins is the Son of him Albeit that I am not ignorant that Father HERMES and the rest of his wise Foster children hold and teach that out of any Plant Wight or Mineral may be fetched a Medicine for all Diseases of Men and Metals as good as this which we have described Neither do we as though we had drunk the water of Lethe forget the reason of it above declared Because all things are all things and the same and one thing as having all one stuff and Soul if their stuff had the like and not divers minglings And for that all things if they were wrought to the top and highest of perfection as they may be flowed alike with all the Virtues of Heaven and Earth Soul Body Life and Qualities But these wayes are long cumbersome and costly as well as the rest and I seek you know the most ready near and easie which is Gold far above all other things in the World The Reason is because Nature hath poured her self wholly upon him and enfeoffed him of far more and greater gifts both of Soul and Body then all the rest having given him not onely great store of the heat of Heaven but also the most fine temperate and lasting Body whereby but especially by Reason of his excceeding tough and lasting Body wherein he wonderfully passeth all things wee have him halfe ready drest to our hands and brought very near the journeys end quickly to be led forward and finished with little labour when as the rest are left in very hard way and finished with little labour It is strange I am perswaded that a thousand ounces of Plant or Wight as for Minerals they be much better cannot with great labour cost skilâ— and time be brought to that goodness nearness to perfection as one ounce of Gold hath already given him by Nature And I durst warrant you that out of one ounce of Gold in less then one years space with a few pounds charge may be gotten a Medicine as good as the PHILOSOPHERS STONE of a Plant or Wight that taketh a thousand ounces of stuff many hundred pounds of charge three years time and the wearing of many Mens Bodies That we may think although the wise Philosophers in Egypt saw and shewed the depth of Nature and these Works yet they were not so mad and fond as to put them in practise And therefore Geber saith It is possible out of Plants to make the Stone and yet almost impossible also because thy Life would first fail thee Wherfore we may be content also to know the Secreâ— but let us use no other way but this and so dispatch not onely Plants and Wights as foul and earthly things but also middle Minerals which are like the standing Lights of Heaven in this Comparison Nay neither hold we his fellow Plants to be his equals no though they be Quicksilver or Silver themselves the best and nearest of all the rest especially Silver the Wife of Gold but even let her pack away with the rest for as her fire above glisters and makes a fair shew until she come in presence of her Huusband as the wont of bad Women is so this our Earthly Moon be she never so bright and excellent in another Company yet in sight and regard of Gold her Husband she appears as nothing If you marvel why It is because she wanteth much in heat of Heaven temperateness and toughness of Body but in fineness an hundred fold These things are high and lofty and soare above the common sight we will fetch them down anon and make them plain and easie Then let us fall to the Matter that the Son of Gold may be found the ready way to BLISSE and the perfect Medicine both of Man and Mettals And first as it is meet let us regard our selves and cure our own Bodies before we help a Stranger There is no Gift Property or Virtue but it springeth either from the Soul or Body The best gift of the Soul is most store thereof as we shewed before And of the Body fit temperateness in the first qualities and then fineness and closeness which causeth lastingness in the second Let us see how Gold excelleth in all these virtues and overgoeth all other things first by the gift of Nature and then by a Divine Science But it were not good in such a heap of Matters to be disposed and dispatched at once to regard those that be clear and received so then let the fineness of Gold go his wayes as clear in all Mens Eyes and his temperateness which all Leaches grant and take the rest as things both more in doubt and of greater worth Those that are longest a ripening and growing to perfection are both the most tough and lasting and fullest of Heavenly Vertues whereas on the other side soon Ripe soon Rotten as they say an ill Weed grows apace and so forth The cause of this in Bodies is because the first Moisture if it be fast and close that is Fat proceedeth and spreadeth slowly and is hardly consumed and eaten up with the Fire of Life when thin and waterish Moisture both spreads apace and spends as fast And for this that Heavenly Virtue when the stuff hath long lain open under the hands of the Spirits of Heaven it must needs receive great store of them and hold them surely with his strength and toughness what Reason can shew this more plainly except you will call me to examples then bend your Ears awhile and mark the Elephant two years in making in his Mothers Womb and a long time in growing to his best estate and lustiness to reach the highest and best pitch in mortality for Man is immortal not onely by his strength and long life which you heard before but through a kind of Wit and good Conditions also drawing near to the Nature of Mankind Consider again of Mice those little Vermine how soon they be bred as sometimes the Earth creates them
of Silver and Gold and Copper adulterando adulteria naturae as he more finely then constantly saith when he had alotted so chast Virtue before unto her But suppose this Virtue in the hard form of Metals not so apparent yet no Man shall deny the daily proof of them opened by rude Skill and set at liberty as the great use of Burnt Brasse Iron-Saffron Metal-smoke and this by Gallen's own witness and marvellous help in Surgery Nay the mighty power both within and without of Antimony which is unripe Lead and of Quick-silver very raw and running Silver so often tried before their Eyes hath so amazed and quite daunted the later Leaches though Galen himself in times past hath termed this rank Poison set straight against our Nature and the least part thereof taken inward to hurt and annoy us to the great laughter of the Countrey Wits which even with Child a dangerous time to take Physick in without any hurt at all nay with speedy and onely help use to drink it against Worms in great quantitie But Galen did but rove by guess at the matter when as in another place forgetting himself as he doth often he saith he never had tried her force neither within nor without the Body But if these Stones Juices and Metals were by greater Skill more finely drest and freely set at liberty as they be by the German what wonders were they like to work in the Art of Healing Neither let us think as Galen and his band thinks of all things that those great and rare Mineral virtues could issue out and come from the gross and foul Body but from an Heavenly gift of a mighty Soul which cannot be kept in awe and held so straâ— with those Earthly bonds as it shall not be able in somâ— sort to stir and break through and shew his force and power Wherefore to return to my purpose If Nature hath bestowed upon these three sorts and suits of Minerals so large Gifts and Virtues what hath she given to Gold the end and perfection of them all which hath passed in that travel through the midst of them all so receiving and holding the Virtues of them all with advantage What say the Leaches to this matter They are loth to say any thing albeit their deeds speak enough when they lay raw Gold to the out-side of the Head to heal his Ache right e against the Heart to comfort his sadness and trembling and when in such sort they apply it to such purposes Again why do they boil it in their d Cullises mix it with their Pills and Electuaries bid the Lepers swallow it c. Do they not seem to smell his great and matchless power against Diseases and marvellous comfort and wholsomness unto our Nature but that like rude and unskilful Cooks they know not how to dress it But if they knew the Skill they should see it rise in Power and Virtue according to his degrees in Freedom and when it came to the top which I call the Sonne of Gold to prove Almighty I mean within our compass for consider Gold is now good and friendly above all unto us for his exceeding store of comfortable Heat of Heaven shining through the mist of a most fine and temperate Body Then what would it be if those properties of Body were by great mingling and breaking of the Stuffe refined and raised in their kind an hundred degrees at least which our Art professeth and those lively and piercing heaps of comfortable Spirits freed and set at liberty and all these seated upon a most mighty Body subduing all things Is there any thing in the World to be compared unto the marvellous Work which he would make in our Body Could any of these very violent and mortal Poisons which I brought in above so easily and roundly destroy as this would help and save us But to come to the Point If that our Old Fine Close and Aethereal Oil which they call a Fifth Nature was able alone for the Reasons set down in their places to breed and beget all those blessed bodily gifts and properties that is Lastingnesse Health Youth and the two springs of Wisdom and Virtue Clearnesse and Temperatenesse How much more shall this Sonne of Gold the Medicine and Stone of HERMES and his Off-spring be sufficient and furnished for it For first when his Soul and Heat of Heaven is much more great and mighty and his Body a more fine and fast Oil that is a more like and lasting Food of Life it both upholdeth and strengtheneth Life and Natural Heat the better and so proves the better cause of Long Life and Youth Then being more temperate and that quality carried upon a finer and tougher that is a stronger Body it is able with more ease and speed to subdue his and our Enemies the distempered Diseases and to cleanse and clear fashion and bring into good order and temper the whole frame of our Body and so procure Health Wisdom and Virtue in better sort and in more full and heaped measure for you must not think that a Fifth Nature of Wine or such like which I brought in heretofore and which many Men do make for their Bodies is so good by twenty degrees as the PHILOSOPHERS STONE I mean the same measure of both when besides that it is not so temperate and near unto Heaven though the name be never so near for it wanteth twenty parts of the Soul and as much of that fine Stuffe closely and finely tied up together and therefore one part thereof will last longer and spread further with all his Virtues and so do more good in our Bodies then twenty times as much of the former Deliver to minde what I say it is worthy marking I shall not need to stand to shew you the Reasons why and manner how this great Medicine of HERMES shall be able to get and purchase these our Blisses of Mind and Body because it is already done at large elsewhere and it may suffice in this place to win by force of Reason which hath been done as much as needs that this Medicine is much better and more able than an Aether Heaven or Fifth Nature Then these Men may see I mean Paracelse and such as know whereof they speak let the rest go how rash and unadvised they prove themselves when they are content to let in the name of Poison into this happy Medicine and to avow that it worketh all those wonders in our Bodies by that way of curing which I shewed by stronger like â—oisons for then it would be at most but a general Medicine and Cure-all against Diseases and fit for Health alone but no blessed way to Long-life Youth Wisdom and Virtue which grant as well as the other both he and all the rest do give unto him for it might not be taken and used in a sound Body no more then a purging Medicine except
Greek or Latine hath linked and shut them up both in one Word together I will take the Common and true bounds of Wisdom that is to wit The Knowledge of Divine and Humane things those containing all Mindes and Bodies these the Matters and Affairs of private Men Families and Common-wealths It will be very hard indeed to bring a Fool to be able to understand all these matters But let us march we have passed greater dangers And if in this Discourse of the Minde as well as in the former of the Soul and some other I call in again the best Philosophers and make them abide the brunt I hope you will not blame me in a course ever blameless and allowed in matters of such weight both that the Truth might be the better bolted out and the Man warded against the shot of Envy Therefore letting pass these earthly Judges as Aristoxenus Dicaearchus Pliny Galen c. who rating the Minde as an earthly thing do adjudge it to die and to be clean razed out with the Body and all other wrong Opinions of the same Mine old Philosophy where it is best advised holdeth and teacheth that As the soul and life of all things is all one of it self and all the odds springs from the divers tempers of Bodies so the Divine and immortal Minde proper unto Man and Author of Wisdom and Virtue to be Wise and alike Wise and one and the same in all points in all Men as God from whom it came is One and Wise and to differ when it is divided and sent into sundry places according to the Natures of the same places Even as many Rivers passing through many Grounds of sundry qualities do lightly every one take a sundry Taint Smack and Nature from the Ground though at first they all sprung and flowed from one Head and Fountain Or more fitly like as there are innumerable kinds of Lights in the World differing according to the Seats and Houses that receive them when the light of the Sun from whence they all receive light is of it self all one and the same in all places Then as the Sun think not much if I be still driven to Likes because it is the lightsomest way of delivering Divine things wherein you see me plunged for as the Eye can behold all things but her self and the Sun and those it cannot see but in another thing fit to represent the figure even so the Mind cannot understand her self nor yet other Divine Matters so well as in a like and comparison As the Sun I say of himself ever sheweth and seeth all things if his Beames be not stopt with a Cloud or some other thick imbarment even so the Mind alone and before she fall into the Cloud of the Body is ever busie and likewise knoweth all things as unto so Divine a thing belongeth But now she is intangled and so darkned in this manner she is sometimes idle and never seeth all things yea nought of all without the leave and help of the Body This course therefore she now taketh Sith she may not her self step forth and range abroad to see things she craves and takes the help of the Soul and its servants which they call Beames or Spirits first she useth the outward Spirits that sit in the Edge and Border of the Body for Messengers to receive by means of their Instruments and Parts where they lodge and bring in Tidings that is Shewes and Shapes of things And then the inward Beams sitting in the Brain take the same Tidings and represent them as it were in a Glass before her that she may cast her light which they call the suffering or receiving Mind upon them and see them To skip over the known Five Those inward Wits and Spirits which we have not unfitly compared to a Glass are divided into sundry and several Seats and Offices first one sort called Thought inhabiting the fore part of the Brain takes hold and represents the shapes let in at the Windowes of the five outward Senses Then another Crew which we call Remembrance keeping the hinder part of the Head receiveth still these shapes in great plenty and layeth them up as it were in a Store-house until first the third company of the Soules Spirits called Common sense and sitting in the middle of the Brain as becomes a Judge calleth for them to examine them and determine of them though this lower Judge heareth present matters in Thought also And then at last the great and chief Justice called Understanding by laying the things together and gathering one of another judgeth of all But which is the Seat of the Chief Judge That is a Question among the Learned when I take it to be no Question if they all grant that the Soul by the Pattern of her Sire the Sun in the great World dwelleth in the Heart the middle of the Body that by casting her Beames all about and equally to all parts she might give Light and Life equally to all as equidistant from all And in the midst of the Heart as the onely immoveable and thereby to move others the onely fit part of the Body for then sure the Minde being the inward Kernel as Plato saith of the other two the Soul and the Spirit must needs rest and be rooted there also Seeing then the Minde seeth and knoweth nothing but by means of the Soul and his inward Wits and Spirits nor these but by the help of the outward ones called the five Wits or Messengers nor neither of both without the parts where they lodge and rest then even as the parts of the Body stand affected and disposed so doth the Minde understand Let us go down more particularly to the matter and see what Condition or Disposition of the Body helps or hinders this Work of Understanding After that the Five Wits and Messengers have thus received and delivered up the Tidings to the threefold Glasse within the Brain this by stirring and running up and down presents and musters them before the Minde and she by casting her light and view judgeth and determineth That we may easily gather two things needful to Wisdom and good Understanding first such a Glasse or such inward Spirits as are able to receive and hold many shapes imprinted that is very clear clean and smooth Spirits by the example of an Eye that kindly Glass or of an artificial one which will easily take and shew in that case every little spot shape and fashion set upon them whereas when they be dark foul and uneven they can take nothing nor yet represent them if they had them Secondly these Spirits had need be quick and lively that is hot to be able by their swift running to and fro to represent and shew them all apace and easily for the Minde doth all by matching and laying things together That Heat is the cause of
sent into the Body to work Long-life Health and Lustiness did not onely strike and kill and put out of Being all foul and gross distempers his own and our enemies but also cherish nourish and feed our Bodies and bring it towards our own Nature even as far as we would by disposing of the quantity you may easily conceive the plain and certain way of this great exchange when you know his most clean fine clear bright and lightsome Nature Now we have dispatched the first part of BLISSE let us go to the second and because we have not done it before though we talked much thereof we will now begin to bound the Matter and make Virtue as Aristotle and Truth teacheth us A mean in our outward deeds and dealings with other Men or A Reason in Manners and Conditions as Plato termeth it all is one The cause of Virtue is likewise set out in the beginning to wit A temperate Body but I left the Proof unto this place which is all the hardness in this cure of Lewdness for if it be once known that Temperateness is the cause of Virtue we shall easily by that temperate Medicine so notable in the speech going before purchase and procure the same And why that is so it hath been so often worn before that we may quite cast it off and leave it being enough in this place to prove that a temperate state of Body is the cause and way to Virtue But first let us see whether all Manners flow from the Body or not and then from what State and Condition of the Body Among them that have searched the Reason and Nature of things the cause of Manners is laid upon the Disposition either of Stars or of Mens Bodies or of their Wills thus or thus framed either by the bent of Nature or by use of Custome Let us scan the matter and yet briefly They cannot flow from the Will of the Mind of Man lest all Men should perforce be good against our daily proof and experience because the Minde of it self as coming from goodness is good and alike good in all Men as I said before And sure no Custome can alter and turn so Divine and Right a Will to lewdness but by great force of Necessity which force cannot be sent and laid upon it by the Stars for whether the Stars be Wights or no they are all as I shewed above of one good strain and quality Or if they were not or whatsoever they be either in substance or quality they cannot touch the Mind immediately but must needs be let in by the loops of the Body and so change and dispose the Body first and by means of this affect the Mind for if the Mind it self a finer thing then the Stars cannot pierce out of the Body as we heard before then much less shall they make way to get in by themselves without the helps to our Mind allotted and as these are all bodily I mean the first helps so the neerest cause of Manners must needs flow from the Body And if the inward Spirits and Wits likewise do nought without the Instruments of the Body and follow the Affection and Disposition of the same then the appetite of the unreasonable Soul common between us and Beasts upon which Aristotle and his heirs do lay the cause of Manners is dispatched also and all the whole strain must needs cleerly run from the Body But lest some All-denier come and shake these old Grounds which you saw the Philosophers lay so long ago and so this Building might fall and tumble I will shoar it up with Experience a thing most fit to fill and please the sence of them which have nothing else but sence As all Diseases so all Manners spring either from the natural and inherited or from the purchased temper of the Body To keep the first till anon This we have either from the Air and Soil where we live or from the Meat which we take The Air followeth either the place of the Sun or the Nature of the Ground But this is somewhat too hard and thorny a kind of teaching let us inlarge our selves and unfold and prove how though I shewed the manner at large before the Air and Meat alters and changeth and maketh to differ the Bodies first and so the Manners All Astronomers and Philosophers no otherwise than we see by proof hold Opinion that where the Sun is either too neer the People as right over them or too far off as under the two Pins of the World there the Bodies are big and strong and the Manners rude and fierce whereas within the two Middle and Temperate Girdles of the Earth they keep a mean and hit the midst as they say both in Body and Manners for that acquaintance with him and his fellow-wanderers To come down to the Ground for I must be short we see that a fat and and foggy Land makes the Blood and Spirits thick and gross and thereby dull and slow and so the Men fond in Wit and rude and simple faithful chast and honest and still in that strain of Manners whereas a barren and dry Ground if the Sun be temperate therewithal as at Rome and Athens maketh the same thin clear and lively subtil and deceitful Men valiant unchaste and so forth of all other properties appertaining For meet Manners in Men are like the Virtues and Properties of Plants following both the sundry tempers of the Bodies when the Soul in them and Mind in us is one in all Then as the mixtures qualities and virtues of Plants are altered up and down according to their Food and Sustenance as to omit the outward nourishment of the Ground whereby Pepper brought out of Calicut into Italy will after a few settings turn into Ivy and such like the case is plain a cunning Gardiner either by steeping the Seed or Slip or better by enclosing the Root or Stock can give to any Plant any colour taste smell or power of Healing even so the temper of Mens Bodies and Condition of their Manners change to and fro upon the same occasion To let go that hold in Physick That distempered Meats do breed the like distempers in those famous Humors which make Complexions and their Conditions why are the Tartarians so Beastly and Barbarous in Manners but because besides their Soil they eat and drink the Flesh and Blood of Horses we see the Islanders of Corsica prove as bold cruel and false as Doggs whose Flesh they feed upon A man may range far in this Field but let us draw neer home It is not without cause that Plutarch Plato and other grave and wise Philosophers give so strait charge of care and heed in the choice of Nurses Is it not like nay in their opinion certain that the Child sucks in with their Milk their outward Shape and inward Manners Why not As well as Beasts that suck of strangers out
Burthen but that the great desire I have both to defend the Truth from slander and to do good to them that love it makes it light and easie And again this hope upholds me That if I chance to stumble or faint at any time they will as gently and willingly lend their hand to stay me or at the least bear with the fall and misfortune Then for the common and viler Sort which either for lack of good Nature or want of good Manners use to wrangle about Words or twitch at Things I care not And because I know them not I will pass by them as unknown men for neither was Hercules able as they say to match with many-headed Hydra nor yet with the awk and crooked Crab. Then to turn my Speech which way were it best to set forward Not right and streight to the matter No Because there is such crying out against the Possibility of the good Works which our Medicine promiseth And that awk fore-judgement of the Matter hath been the chief cause which hath hitherto buried this Divine Art from the sight of good and learned Men I take it the best way of delivery before I come to the point it self to fetch about a little and shew the possibility of these effects and the way to work them by other and weaker means as well as by HERMES his Medicine For although it be not so Natural in marching forward to move the left and weak part yet I ween it right Artificial and then it shall agree with that good order of Art first of all to put by a few of the light things laid against this blessed Science Because albeit they be gathered but by guess besides all grounds and rules of certainty yet they have so wholly possessed the common people yea and some of the better and wiser sort likewise that without any further search or hearing of the Matter they have streightway cast it off for false and condemned it for as when sleep hath once taken the Fort of the Body the Senses yield and can do nothing so if wrong belief once get possession of the Soul Reason is laid to rest and cannot move again before that must be loosened and put to flight and scattered First say they sith there be seen in all places and times so many hundreds with great Pains Heed and Cunning to study this Art and to put the Receipts in practise sure if they were true and faultless as others are some should appear to hit the Mark and to gather the fruit of their Travel and not to live as they all do of all men most miserable Or at least because it is so ancient an Art it would have been recorded in some publick or private Writing besides their own which be it bound with never so deep Oaths as it is yet is it unsufficient proof and witness in their own case These be the most saleable Reasons and best approved among the People wherewith they use to batter this exchanging Science But mark how light and weak they be and easie to be wiped away for how could the Acts and Deeds of these Philosophers come into the Writings and Records of Men to begin there with them whose Fame nay whose Company they have ever shunned And when their own Records if they chanced to like of leaving any were not sown abroad and published to the World as is the use of Worldlings but left like precious Heirlooms unto some Friend of secret trust which was counted as a Son adopted upon Condition to keep it still within the House and Stock of HERMES from the Eyes and Hands of the World and Strangers running evermore like the wise Stars a contrary race unto the World that no marvel though they be both in like sort crossed by the World and mis-called Wanderers or Planets when in deed and truth they go better Now when they deem credit to be denied to the Mens own Report and Witness it is a sign that either their own Report and Witness is of light and little weight whereby they judge of others or else that their Thoughts are vain and phantastical puft up I mean with that new kinde of Self-love and overweening Wisdom to set up themselves and pull down Authorities of which sort it falls out most commonly in proof that while they strive to avoid the Lake of Superstition they run headlong unawares down the Rock of Impiety for if such a wilde breach and entry may be suffered to be made into the Credit and Authority of Writers which are the life of Antiquity and light of Memory great darkness and confusion will soon come in and overcast the World yea and so far forth at length as nought shall be believed and judged true that is not seen that even they which dwell in the main Land shall not grant a Sea A thing not onely fond and childish among all Men but also ill be to me if I speak not as I think wicked and godless amongst us Christians whose whole Religion as S. Augustine saith stands upon that ground Wherefore if we must needs believe Recorders of Acts and Stories yea though they be sometimes lewd men foolish and unlearned as if they were as whole and harmless as Xenocrates but especially although they had great cause to lie and to speak more or less than the truth who can in any common Reason refuse the solemn Oathes of so many good wise and learned Men for he that is Good for the love of Virtue it self he that is Wise to avoid the shame of Lying will speak the Truth What should I say of the learned Men whose whole care and practise drift and study is nothing else but to finde and set down the Truth But all is well and clear of all suspicion if it may be thought these Oathes and Protestations to have sprung from themselves of meer good will and desire to perswade the lovers of Wisdome and Virtue and not wrung out by fear of flattery Which may be easily judged in such Men as were all either Kings that needed not or Diogenists that cared not as it is clear in all their Eyes that are conversant in these kinde of Studies Wherefore such men as are so bold without sure ground of Reason to deny and deny still all that comes are in my Opinion greatly to be looked into for although they like Xerxes pull not down Religion with hands openly yet they are of another sort as dangerous that undermine it closely with wrong Opinions If our Men avowed such plain untruths as might be reproved by common sense and daily experience as when Anaxagor as said Snow was black and Xenophanes the Moon inhabited and full of Hills and Cities and Nicetes of old with some of late that the Earth the onely unmoveable thing in the world onely moved and such like ugly and mis-shapen Lies wherewith Greece over-swarmed then you had reason to use them with ill
Entry once made in their Hearts the great and marvellous Truth of this famous STONE may the more easily come in and take possession But in such variety of hard and slippery Matter whence were it best to set out which Way first to take Were it not meet the means and helps unto BLISSE should be first rid and cleared before we come to BLISSE it self and among them to give Long Life the foremost place if not for his worthiness yet for his behoof and necessity being needful in all Common-wealths and private persons first to seek to live before to live well though that unto this end Then let us see what is Long Life and how all Men may reach unto it But why do we make such great haste we had need be slow and advised in so great a Matter and to look before we venture upon so long a Way and of so many dayes Journey that we be well provided and furnished of all things wherein I hope if I have not of my own or if after the thrifty manner when I am well stored my self yet I borrow to prevent lending although I take upon trust so much as shall serve this turn it shall be no stain to my Credit but rather deemed a safe and wary way to cut off occasion of Robbery both at home and abroad especially if I take it up of such Men as are most famous and best beloved These should be my Friends of Aegypt and Arabia though we have their secret help now and then the best able indeed and the nearest unto me if they were so well known and beloved in the World But because they be not I will fly to the other side of Greece and to the most renowned there and best liked Hippocrates Plato and Aristotle whom I doubt not to finde very free and willing in this Matter Let us then awake our old Studies out of sleep and hye us to them what need many words after Greeting and the Matter broken they make me this Answer joyntly together GOD because he was good did not grieve to have others enjoy his Goodness that is to be and to be well meaning to make a World though Aristotle withdraw his hand herein full of all kinde of everlasting and changeable things first made all and blended them in one whole confused Mass and Lump together born up by his own weight bending round upon it self Then seeing it lay still and that nought could beget and work upon it self he sorted out and sundred away round about a fine and lively piece which they call Heaven for the Male Mover and Workman leaving still the rest as gross and deadly fit for the Female to receive the Working and Fashioning which we term the four Beginnings or Elements Earth Water Air and Fire and thereof springs the Love which we see get between them and the great desire to be joyned again and coupled together Then that there might be no number and confusion of Workmen and doing Causes but all to flow from one Head as he is One he drew all force of Working and virtue of Begetting into one narrow round Compass which we call the Sun from thence he sent out spred and bestowed all about the World both above and below which again meeting together made one general Light Heat Nature Life and Soul of the World Cause of all things And because it becomed the Might Wisdome and Pleasure of such a Builder to make and rule the infinite Variety of Changes here below and not evermore one self-same thing he commanded that One Light in many to run his eternal and stintless Race to and fro this way and that way that by their variable presence absence and meeting they might fitly work the continual change of flitting Creatures This Soul which Plato calls the Ever-moving Mover quite contrary to Aristotles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which he himself construes an Immoveable Mover that we may marvel how Tully could translate it so as to make it all one with Plato unless Lucians gallows mis-led him which is found in some Copies that he might be an Eternal Mover is in Nature and Being a most subtile and small Beam or spark of heavenly Fire in property and quality for his Cleanness Light and Fineness Hot and for his Moistness withall Temperate as appears to him that bendeth his Minde upon it If you doubt of his Moistness think nothing made without Mingling which is by drawing in and breaking small together the whole stuff when a dry heat draws out and scattereth the fine from the great and thereby wasteth and narroweth all things making nothing As for Example Dung hatcheth an Egge and quickneth any thing apt to receive Life when warm Ashes will never do it What need we more Imagine an heavenly Flame by a good burning Water which flaming upon your Hand or a dry Cloth heateth them both gently without hurt or perishment And yet this Sunny Beam is not moist of it self and before it is tempered with the moisture of the Moon his Wife to make it apt for Generation Thence HERMES calls the Sun and Moon the Father and Mother of all things Now the stuff and Female to be fit to suffer Working must be first open that is Soft and Moist and then not one nor yet many like things lest in both these cases they should stand still the same and not when they be stirred by the Workman rise and strive and bruise and break one another fitly by continual change until they come at last unto a consent rest and stay And that upon small occasion the same consent might jarre again and come to change the wished end and purpose of the work And therefore GOD cast in at first the known four fighting enemies yet in the soft and open Stuff there are but two of them Earth and Water in one mixture seen and extant at the beginning before the painful Soul draws and works out the rest Fire out of Earth and out of Water that breath-like and windy thing called Air. So that if there were much Earth little Water and great Heat to mingle them Fire will shew it self and bear the sway If but small Heat upon the same measure of Earth and Water Earth will rule the rest If on that other side upon small store of Earth and much Water but a small Heat of working the thing will fall out to be raw and waterish If upon the same quantity a stronger Heat it ariseth an Ayery which is termed a fat and oily Body Wherefore when the Soul comes down upon the Stuff clothed with a fine windy coat of the cleanest Air next unto Heaven called Aether without the brokage of which Mean the two Extremes and unacquainted Strangers would never bargain and agree together by his moist milde heat it moves it and alters it very diversly making many fuits and kindes of
things differing according to the Strength of the one and the Obedience of the other And so by reason in that separation of the fine and Male part at first the stuff was throughly tost and mingled and the Heat of Heaven thereby like a hot Summer after a wet Spring very fierce and eager the two causes serving very fitly all Wights Man and all were made alike without any seed sown otherwise than by the great Seedsman of Heaven upon the common stuff of Earth and Water As is still seen in the common Tillage yet used in those lame and unperfect Wights which some call Start-ups and sprung out from themselves As we may be easily led to think if we consider how not onely all kinde of Plants without all setting or sowing grow up by themselves in some places and some kinde of Fish in the Sea are onely Female but also what plenty of Fish there abounds in the frozen Countries for the great heat and fatness of the Waters and chiefly that upon the slimy and hot Land of Aegypt there are yet some bloody and perfect Land-wights as Hares and Goates c. so made and fashioned But because afterward the well-mingled and fat fine Stuff and the strong working Heat failed as it must needs in time and yet the great Lord would have the continual flitting change and succession hold The same two fit Causes were duly kept by continual succession within the Bodies of perfect Wights the Stuff in the She and the Heat in Both yea and as far as need required in seeded Plants also Now we must understand as well that this heavenly Soul which when it is so clothed with that windy Body is called Spirit not onely moveth and worketh with his Heat but also for Food wasteth the Stuff for nothing that is made is able to bear up his state and being without his proper and like food and sustenance Then as our gross Fire here below feedeth upon Weather and Wind called Air as upon his likest meat And as it in his due place is too thin and scattered spreading the Fire so far as it followeth his Food until at last it vanisheth to nothing unless it be plentifully heaped and crowded up together and so kept in a narrow shell of Water which is called Oil or Fatness Even so it is between the fine starry Fire and his like Food the fine Fat of Aether for that cause besides the Divine Purpose above set it cometh down in post into these Quarters to finde and dress himself store of meat as appeareth by his tarrying for as soon as his Food is spent he flieth away as fast and leaves his House at six or sevens uncared for I was about to tell you the Cause of the divers sorts and suits of these lower Creatures but that there was a great puff of Matter came between and swept me away which now being passed over I will go forward Then if the suffering Stuff be Gross Foul and Tough and the making Heat very Small and Easie as it is within and under the Ground things are made which they call Mettals or better by the Arabick word Minerals little broken altered or changed but the gross Beginnings Earth and Water Earth especially rule still and the Life and Soul as it were in a dark dungeon fast shut up and chained is not able to stir and shew it self at all When the Stuff is Finer and Softer with greater Heat upon it there will arise a rooted and growing thing called a Plant better mingled and smaller and further broken from the low and foul Beginnings and the Life of Heaven shall have more scope because Wind or Air and Water and yet Water chiefly swayeth the Matter But if the Soul be yet more mighty and the Stuff yet finer he is able Air and Fire but that above this exalted to shew himself a quicker Workman and to make yet a finer piece of Work moving forward and by mighty sense perceiving But by reason these two Causes passing by those degrees do so mount and rise at last there is an excellent and fiery kinde contrived even Our kinde I mean most throughly and fair and finely wrought even so Fat indeed that he may not easily seem made at all of these All-making Seeds the four Beginnings whence it is that when a Corps is consumed with Fire there are found scarce six Ounces of clean Earth remaining which fineness of Body gives occasion to the greatest freedom and quickness of the Soul and ability to perform as his duty of Life Moving and Perceiving yea and shall I put in Understanding also for albeit GOD hath inbreathed us with another more fine and clean Mover called Minde for a special and Divine purpose yet that Minde as well as the Soul above is all one of it self in all places and worketh diversly according to those divers places as we shall see more at large hereafter Then you see all the differences of the four great Heads or Kindes which contain all things yea and of many lesser degrees and steps lying within every one of these which I named not before as also of sundry sorts not worth the naming of Doubtful and Middle things touching and partaking on each side of the four great ones as between the first two Stones budding like Herbs in the Scottish Sea between Plants and Beasts the Spunge Apes or rather hairy Wildmen between Beasts and Us to proceed from the divers mixtures of the Bodies If you cannot quickly perceive the Matter behold at once the outward Shapes and Fashions as they here go down a short pair of Stairs before you Do you not see Man alone through his exceeding fine and light Body carried up and mounted with a mighty heat of Heaven of an upright stature and carriage of himself that this Divine Wit might be free from the clog of Flesh when other Wights from the contrary Cause which the gross and earthly Leavings or Excrements of Hair Horn Hoof and such like declare are quite otherwise disposed as we see towards the Ground their like Companion and so the less hot and fine they be that is the liker the Earth the nearer they bend unto her being less of stature still and after that many-footed to support them but at length Footless and groveling until it come to their Heads downward and there it stayeth not but passeth quite over and degenerates from Wights to Plants And from thence if I might tarry about it I would send them down still through all the steps of them and Minerals until they came to the main Rest and Stay from whence they all sprang clean Earth and Water But I think it be now high time to take my leave of these Philosophers and to set forward as soon as I have packt up my Stuff round together especially the best and most precious Things Then we gather by that enlarged Speech
one chief and notable Rule in Learning that the Shape Nature Being Perfection and all the difference in all things here below springeth from the Mixture and Temper of the Stuff and Beginnings The Doing Making and Working-Cause that Makes Mingles Brocheth and sets all a running to be a piece of the finer part of the whole parted and packt up together in the SUN Of which finer part some remaining still in the Raw and rude Stuff secretly hid and placed othersome more freely in the half-made Stuff called Seed and in finer Seed yet more lively and in Man most at liberty excepting where I said it was free indeed from all kinde of Body And yet all these but one and the self-same thing called Soul Life Heavenly and Natural Heat c. This meant Divine Hippocrates when he saith Nought is made and nothing perisheth but all are altered and changed up and down by Mingling And again That no Wight can die unless all fall wherein he is most agreeable and jumpeth even with these Grounds and Rules and with the whole Web of our Philosophy If any man doubt of the other two Plato and Aristotle let him reade their Books with heed and he shall finde them where they speak naturally and by the light of humane Reason to draw still towards this one head and point of Truth though they seem to stray sometimes to the infinite Variety of divers-natured and conditioned Stars above causing the like endless odds and difference of all things Let us now I say set forward in our first dayes Journey to Long Life unfolding first What it is and the Cause thereof and lastly the Common and high way to it It seems hard for a Man to appoint what bounds of Life are large and long enough for BLISSE unless GOD who knoweth best both the measure of Happiness fit for us and the race of Time meet for it had first set and marked them So that the greatest Age and furthest Time that the lustiest Men and best disposed Bodies both by kinde and diet have at any time reached and lived may well by the grant and good will of our great Landlord be set the Bounds Stint and End of Life large enough to hold all the Bliss meet for Mankinde and the Mark which we may all aim and level our endevours at yea and with sure hope to hit and reach it and no further is about an hundred and fifty years as you shall hear anon Now if there do three Causes meet to the making up of Things and thereon leaneth all their Being the Stuff the Mover and the Meat of the Mover which is the Fatness of the Stuff then sure the cause of their long Being and Continuance in their Estate can be nothing else but the favour and goodness of those three Causes The Soul and Heat of Heaven is good and favourable to Wights to let the rest go far more dark and further off my Purpose when she pours her self plentifully upon them for there can be no other odds in one and the self-same thing in all places But the Fat Food of Life which they call the first Moisture and the finest piece of all the Seed lying hid and unseen in the sound parts of Wights and yet by skill to be fetched out and set before us must not onely be plentiful and great in store to match the feeding Soul but also Fast and Fine that by his Fineness he may be both friendly and like to Life and Aiery or rather Aetherial we must wear these Words with handling to keep himself both in Cold and Heat flowing and that through his Fastness or Closeness which they call in Latine densum or solidum that is through his much Stuff in a narrow room he may be more lasting and fit to continue Now the Stuff and Body is best when it is Fast and Fine also one to hold and hang long together and that other to give free scope without stopping or lett unto the continual and swift race of Life Then to make a sum of all The Cause of long Life is a fast fine Body sprinkled and seasoned with much-like first Moisture and store of heavenly Heat If this Matter needed any further proof I could easily by cutting up the Nature of Things so lay it open before you as your own Eyes should witness and see the same But if it need to some they shall see something and that sufficient to content them For the first Aristotle saith and we finde it true by Experience that they live longest in hot Countries for the Dry Sound Fast and Fine Bodies but chiefly for their Fineness yielding free recourse and passage unto Life for Age and kindly Death come of Rottenness which flows from the stillness of Heat and slackness to salt and refresh the parts Touching the rest to wit that much Heat and much good Fatness are a cause of Long Life mark the short life of those Wights that either want them by kinde as the maimed and imperfect ones or waste them by motion as the Male Greyhound of Lacedaemon was against the course of Kinde shorter lived than the Bitch for his pains in Hunting and the Cock Sparrow lives but half so long as the Hen and yet this but three years for their Venery The World is full of such Examples And behold again the Elephant on that other side for the great help and favour of all the Causes above the rest as may appear by their great fruits and effects in him that is Strength Bigness and Stomach being able to be the ground-work of a Castle of fifteen armed men to eat nine Bushels at a time and to drink fourteen Tun to endure and hold out much longer than the rest and to live Aristotle is mine Author in the story three hundred years in all Now we know what Long Life is and the Cause thereof let us see whether all Men reach it or no and then which way they may reach it At the first all Mankinde by the will and appointment of Kinde was Sound and Lusty and lived long and all the fail and corruption now adayes which falsly seemeth a weak Condition of our Nature crept in through Disorder in our selves by little and little and so by sowing still the like Children it spred it self at last deeply rooted over all and made it as it were a certain State Nature and Kinde of Man wherefore by good order in our Selves it may be reformed and brought back again unto the ancient State But how may we prove this If GOD and Nature have ordained Man unto a Divine End and Bliss above the rest and yet some Beasts as Theophrastus for a wonder complains live longer than our common rate yea and longer than any Bounds above-set certainly we ought to do as much and more by the rule of Nature and of all Right and Reason and so we did at first before we fell by
by cleaning and quickning the Spirits and searching the Body be no little help and comfort in this Journey As we shall easily see if we mark how amongst all Creatures those that lead their lives in the cleaner Element do live the longer Fish than Worms and Land-Wights than These and Winged ones yet longer because the higher the better Air still Insomuch that Cardan dares think that if any dwell in Aether as Plato's heirs affirm they live for ever yet if ill Diet went withall it would marre as much as the other made and greatly cloy and hinder yea and cut short the race of their Long Life I am of the same minde for all other odde and private Persons of great Age and Long Life recorded as for some Italians in Pliny's time registred of one hundred and forty years and such other aged Men in Authors a Man might let in here a Sea of Examples but I must be short Neither would I name King Arganthon that lived a hundred and twenty years and reigned eighty thereof nor yet that old Knight of our Country Sir Allington yet twenty years older but that it is so strange in Nobility that they came as near unto that kindly course of Life as unto the goal and end of Long Life Then we see at length that it is not impossible as they say but an ordinary and easie matter to strengthen the weak Nature of Mankinde to enlarge the straits of his Life and to lead him on still to the ancient Age and Long Life appointed But I see them start and say that like as Cato in Affairs of State used to give Counsel unwisely though never so well as if he had been in Plato's Common-wealth and not in the Dregs of Romulus so I in matter of Diet and order of Body speak as if we lived in the former Golden Age which as Poets feign was under Saturn and not in the corruption of Jupiters Kingdom and that sith the World as it now goeth cannot be brought without a kind of Divine Power to rase out the old and make a new World and that in long time unto the first and kindly custom of Life I must if I mean to do wisely take the Men as I finde them and prove that all such weakness as is now among them may by Mans endevour and skill of Healing be upholden and led forth unto those bounds and that end of Long Life afore-set Albeit I have done as much as reasonably may be required at my hands in this place which was allotted out to shew the possibility of the Matter yet because I count it better by plainness of speech to do good which is the end of my Writing than by subtileness of Argument to obtain my purpose I will come unto you and venture upon that Point also be it never so hard and desperate hoping not that Fortune will favour bold Men but GOD good Men. Then as there are three Causes of Life and Being the Life and Soul it self and his Food the first Moisture and the frame and temper of the Body that holds them both so let us take them all in order and see how they may be preserved and kept together beginning first with the last because it is least and lightest It is enacted by the Law of Nature That no Body mixt or single shall or may live and preserve his estate and being without two helps or stayes that is Meat and Exercise each like his Kinde and of his Nature As in lone and simple or subtile Bodies for it is plain in the first row especially if they be Living as they term them though all things indeed have Life and Soul as we heard above the Hot ones crave fiery Meat and moving Exercise Moist ones as Wind and Water flowing Food and Exercise Cold and Dry things like and Earthly Sustenance and Rest for Exercise which is also like and preserves their State and Being But if all lone and simple things are within the Compass of this Law then Heaven may not be free nor exempted and they speak not altogether fondly that say the Stars feed upon the Sea and for that cause by good advice of Nature the Ocean so rightly placed under the course and walk of the Sun for although the Water be yet so far off and unlike them yet their power and strength is such as they are able by their labour easily to refine it and turn it first into Air and then into Aether a weaker like thing and their proper food That this is so the hungry Souls which are but Imps slipt off the Heavenly Body make it plain here below unto us when we see them still unwilling to tarry and unable to live amongst us without Meat as they bewray themselves by the plain expence and waste of the first moisture Nay take this one away if you will mark well and all lieth on the Ground Then there is an old coyl and fighting here below for Meat and Exercise that is for life and being which makes the cause of all action and doing rest and change and of all things and every one runneth easily and gladly to his like and if his strength be never so little greater he subdues digests and turns him into his own Nature and is strengthned by him But if he miss of his like food at hand and be much stronger he dares encounter and is able to quell unlike things also as I said of the Stars the mightiest things giving Might to all things in the World But in case the unlikes and contraries be of equal power and matches then neither devoureth and consumeth other but both are marred dulled and weakned which they call Consent and Temper and Mixture For Example Fire extreme hot and somewhat dry withall and Water very cold and somewhat wet meeting together in even powers and proportions of strength are both impaired but neither lost and destroyed But if this Water chance by the heat of Heaven to be taken in hand and turned into Aiery and fat substance though there be now two Moistures set against the drought of Fire yet because of the heat of Weather and Heaven abounding it is now become partly like to Fire and friendly or at least his weaker Foe and Enemy yielding himself for Food unto it and increasing his strength and Nature But if on the other side Air unto his exceeding Moisture matching the drought of Fire get some strength and watery coldness as appeareth in a thick and foggy weather it is able easily to overcome the Fire and eat him up Now for a mixt Body which is a consent and dulling the four first famous Enemies made and kept in tune and awe by the force and skill of an heavenly and natural Heat upon them it hath the same reason for when either for lack of Meat or driven by Violence this Heat departeth the friends begin to stir and fight for Food and Freedom until some
one stands out above the rest and recovers some part of his former Power which puts those that can feel to pain and breeds Diseases and at last gets the whole Lordship and rule over all and turns them all into his own Nature Then the old consent knot and body is broken lost and spoiled and a new made and gotten still going downward untill they return to Earth from whence they all came for Example and that near home for the fiery frame of Mans Body when the Soul for want of food fails and flits away they straight retire and run back in order first Fire waxeth moist and lukewarm supt up with Air and this soon after thick and cold that is Waterish and Water muddy still more and more thick and dry till at last it be moist dry and heavy and all be devoured and brought to Earth from whence they all set forth before And this is natural Dissolution and Death of our Bodies forcible Death and Destruction is by Diseases to bar out other force which no man can warrant when either Breath or Meat distemper'd in some quality do feed and nourish some one their like beginning above the rest and make him strong and able to vanquish them and bring in the Jarre of that Musical Consent aforesaid As when by waterish Meat and Air all the beginnings are changed into Water the Hot and Dry into a fiery temper and so forth or else when the Body wants the Exercise which is owing and due unto him which is quick Motion to preserve the Air and Fire in the fine frame and temper of Man from the sloth and idleness of the slow and rusty Beginnings By which grounds laid we see the way to uphold the temper of our Body made plain and easie No more but to feed and cherish it with clean and temperate Air and Meat continually that all the Beginnings served and fed alike one may not be more proud strong and able than another to subdue the rest and overthrow the state And thereof it is that Poyson killeth is because it is extreme Cold and Dry for we may shut out all Rotten as also Fiery and Watery Tempers from the name of Poyson feeding and strengthning the Dregs but devouring the fine Liquor of the Body wherein the Life standeth when as the same Poyson nourisheth and maintaineth the like framed and so tempered Body as venomous Juyces the like Plants and these noisome Beasts as one of these another Nay which is very strange I have read of such natured Men of India that used to eat Toads and Vipers And Albertus saith he saw a Girl of three years old that fed greedily upon Spiders and was never hurt but liked greatly with it Do not think it any Discord when I said above Fast-fineness and now Temperateness upholds the Body all is one It cannot be Fast unless the Earth and Water be well and evenly mixt nor Fine except Fire and Air bear as good a stroke of rule among them But you will say that Nature hath given her Creatures a walk of course not to stand still in one stay and place for ever but to move and walk up and down to and fro from one side to another that is as it was said before GOD hath made a changeable World and therefore this frame and building of Mans Body cannot ever hold and hang together but must needs one day be loosened and fall asunder I grant it must be so by the course of Nature because to fulfil the Will of her Lord she hath appointed a stronger means and cause to work it either the want and absence of the inward Friendship and keeping of the Soul in those which the common sort call Living things or in the rest the presence of some ravenous and spoiling Enemy But if cunning Art and Skill which by the help of Nature is above the course of Nature by knowledge of the due Food for Life and defence against the Enemy may be able to defend the one and keep off the other then no doubt the frame and temper of both Dead and Quick may last for ever The way is found already and known by certain and often proof for the one I mean that Art hath often by keeping off the spoiling Enemy with a strong Contrary preserved and upheld a dead thing of slippery state and soon decay for ever as a Corps by Balm or Water of Salt Timber by the Oyl of Brimstone and such like why then should the next prove impossible to wit by giving store of fit Food still to Life and natural Heat for the other two helps of Meat and Exercise are easie to under-shore and keep upright our weak and falling frame for ever The Greeks hold that our natural Heat and Life because it feeds upon and washeth the most fine and unseen Oyl called first Moisture daily which no Food of Air or Meat is fit and fine enough to repair must needs faint and fail withall and cannot be restored Let us see what may be said to this yea and bend all our force unto it for this is all The Soul and Life and Natural Heat of things is often and fitly compared and likened unto the other gross and fierce hot and dry Body called Fire to feed and maintain this his weak Like that is Air cannot be wanting and because it in his due place is too thin and scattered dividing the Fire to nought in pursuit of his Food Sustenance it must needs by heaps be crowded up in a shell of Water called Oyl or Fat as we heard before In that Fight Battel if much Heat and Oyl meet together the work is great and busie thereout ariseth a smoke as a leaving of the Meat and the Fire follows as far as the Smoke hath any Fatness which makes a flame Albeit the Nature of Fire be as long as he hath Food enough to crave no great Exercise and will last well in a close place as under Ashes c. yet a Flame being more than Fire a hot Smoke or Breath besides desires open and clean Air both to receive the thiâ—k refuse which else would choke him as also for his like weaker Food that he be not starved which two are enough besides a little Motion for his Exercise That we may marvel as those Men which bring in Cooling for another needful thing in this business whereas the kinde of Fire and Air abhor Cooling as his contrary as it is engraven in the Nature of all things still to fly from that which hurts it Now in like manner to come to the purpose if the Fire of Life and Natural Heat be not great a little fine Oyl and first Moisture will serve to feed it and out of that slack working small store of refuse Breath and Smoke ariseth to make any need of fresh and open Air to clense and feed it as appears by those Wights which are able to live in
Medicines secretly hid and couched in the midst and Oyl of Bodies to be fetcht out and gotten by skilfull means of Alchimy even of that Art I say which is so much condemned of his Fellows and Companions To this Harbour also the best of his Fellows before and since him have fled and do daily fly apace from the toil and trouble of their fruitless and barren dead Sea Then let us shift our Sails and fly as far and further too I hope if Tide and Wind and all which we have at will fail not But first let us describe that Haven of Medicine and see what Marks it hath and how it differs from other Creeks adjoyning lest at our Journeys end we miss with more shame and grief and suffer shipwreck A Medicine is that which kills the force of that which hurts us and this it doth many wayes and yet all to one end which is the End of all doing and working as I said before for his Food and Sustenance then let us come again and sort our Speeches A Medicine heals us and kills our Enemy either by dulling or consuming it for when it meets with the contrary of even strength as when Oyl and Poison c. joyn then in Fight they neither eat up nor destroy each other but both are dulled and weakned and make one blockish thing which Nature casteth out for an unlike and unkindly dead thing which they call a Leaving or Excrement But in case it be of more strength and power than our Enemy then it quite destroys devours and turns him into his own Nature And this Consumer is either like the thing that hurts us In which sore even as every Herb of sundry qualities draws and feeds upon his own Juyce in a Garden so one Poison doth cure another and all purging and drawing things do heal us and all Fernel's hid and divine Properties work by plain reason Or else it is unlike and contrary after which manner As dry Sticks and Towe and Vinegar quench wilde Fires or other fat Fires before Water whose fatness feeds it for the stronger contrary quality quelling and eating up the weaker so doth any cold and dry thing as Bole Armin Terra Lemnia c. cure a rotten Poison and so are a great number of Cures done which onely course in word the Graecian Physick taketh though not in deed for we heard even now of two oother wayes of Healing which they themselves and other Folk did take unawares though Paracelse found out the name belike of late but he strayeth as much as they on that other side when he thinks all Cures thereby performed Now when the consuming Medicines have done their duties Nature expels them for Poison and unlike strange things according to the Graecian Rules because all their Medicines were by their own confessions such But if they had either Thought of the dulling Nourisher which as I told you takes the nature of Leaving or had known our Mens wholsome Medicines they would have made another reckoning But let them go and let us set out in time towards the Haven of Health If the Art of Healing be nothing else but the matching of hurtful things and their stronger Enemies but equality will sometimes serve the turn or Likes together and the world be full of both these kindes of Creatures following the nature of their Parents the four Beginnings which are as we see some like and some contrary one to another Then sure our All-healing Art is not impossible and wanteth nought but a Man well skilled in the Nature of things a Philosopher by name for I need not put in a Physician also to know that other part the causes of Diseases which must be matched because as Paracelse well saith in that he that knoweth the causes of Changes and Chances in the great World may soon espy them in the little But our nought-healing Leaches will step in and say Diseases are some so great and in all so many Mans wit so weak and shallow and the Medicine so hid and drown'd in the deep of Nature that it is not possible to finde them all or if they were found to apply them with such discretion as Nature might abide those poisoned frayes and battels within her And again that admit all this untrue yet there be some Diseases sent from Witch-craft and Sorcery and other means which have their Cause and so their Cure without the compass of Nature to let pass our tickle standing daily and hourly so beset with Destinies that a man can warrant nothing I marry Destinies are too deep and bottomless to return straight Homer-like upon them and therefore it were best indeed to let them go and the applying of the Medicines with them the rather because the other the former I mean is so slight a matter to a discreet and well-ordered Leach such a one as is pointed out by their old and famous Leader Hippocrates who both in this and all other duties of his Art hath made such speed and so far passed all his Fellows as none since which is a good time could ever overtake him no nor yet come so near as to keep the sight of him whom they had in chase and followed Then for those unsearchable and supernatural Causes as they call them if they flow from unclean and wicked Spirits as some think they are not the Stuff of the thing that hurts us though they sometimes dwell in and possess the Body but windy movers workers and disturbers of the peace and good order of our Bodies much like unto those fierce and sudden changes of Weather proceeding from the Stars and working the like effect in Mens Bodies so that sith the nearest Cause is Natural let the rest be what it will and the Cure be done by Natural Means as we see it sometimes amongst us And therefore Paracelse who puts the fault in the Faith of the wicked Witch a thing as far above Nature yet holds it curable with a natural Medicine which they call a Quintessence Although I am not unwitting that sometimes his Sickness is such he bids us withstand it with another as strong a Belief set against it But for my part I cannot reach it with my Conceit let deeper Heads think upon it How those Beliefs and Imaginations and other parts and powers of the Soul or Minde of Man can so fly out of their own Kingdom and reign over a forreign Body when we know the whole Soul and Minde so fast bound in durance and so like to be until it be the pleasure of the great Magistrate who hath committed them to let them loose at once and set them out at full liberty let old Wives buz of Hermotimus and such like Tales what they will But if those Diseases spring as some of Learning hold and with Reason from neither of both those two Roots named but from a foul and venomous Breath sent forth from a Poisoned temper of the Witches
this work As also there is oddes of Quick-silver But indeed the cause of all the difference is in the working Heat that maketh and disposeth the beginning midst and end of all thus or thus according to her strength and continuance and which is the main ground to this purpose Quick-silver is the Mother of all the Metalls Now when the work is done it lyeth yet as it did all the while in a thick flowing form like the form of a molten Metall and when the owner comes to enjoy it bringing in the cold breath of the Aire upon it like unto Corall and other soft and growing Sea-plants it freezeth and hardeneth of a sudden fit for the turn and use of Man wherefore it was made and ordained These be the grounds of the most and best Men that is of Men best seen and furthest travelled in such matters whereunto Cardane a man indifferent and none of us and yet very learned agreeth jump as may be But lest these dimme and little lights may seem to be darkned with the brightnesse and fame of Aristotle and his Scholar Theophrast and the late renowned Agricola holding hard the contrary and the same sometime stifly maintaining I will as much as in me lyeth and my narrow bounds will suffer endeavour to lay the Reasons all down in order which moved them to think thus and staied them in the same opinion That Wisemen at least may weigh one Reason with another and judge which is the weightiest and worthy to bear the best price without the vain regard of outward shewes and Authorities First that the Minerall stuffe sprung out from those rock-shavings aforesaid all cunning Miners can tell you who still by the nature and grit of the stone though there be twenty sundry sorts as there be sometimes in the Rock are able certainly to say this or that Veine followeth But to passe over lightly the lighter matters and such they grant as well as we The Quick-silver is the nearest stuffe and Menstrue or Mother of Metals that is the thing in great strife and question when it needed not in mine opinion if we mark the consent of all those Men in all Nations that put the name upon things which were not of the unwisest soâ—t flatly to allow his saying when they by calling it in Greek Latine and other Tongues Quick or liquid silver in secret meaning plainly say that if by the force of those two hot Workmen aforesaid it were staied and better purged it were nothing else but silver for indeed Avicen and some other of the learned side leaving out the middle degrees hold the very same opinion which I also thinke true if the stuffe and heates as they are in hot Countries be good and faultlesse But the disputers will account this kind of Argument unskilfull and soone cast it off Then remove the cold that at last came upon the Metall and hardened it and it appeares to the eye nothing else but such an altered Quick-silver Or if the witnesse of sence be sometimes false and deceitfull enter into our School and behold them by a more kindly and gentle way lead them back to a true Quick-silver both in cold and heat abiding being a true rule in Philosophy Every thing to be made of that whereunto it is loosned and dissolved But if this will not serve passe a little further into the border and edge of secrets and you shall see them by following the steps of Kinde underneath which I marked out before that is by sowing the dissolved seedes and breaths of Metalls upon Quick-silver to curdle and bring her into that form of Metall which they will and wish for Now for that earthly Brimstone As Nature to make a perfect Wight is fain to break her first order and to take the help of an hot Womb and of another Workman even so to frame a perfect dead Creature beside the help of a certain dead Wombe she must needs use the hand of a lusty fellow Workman both to fashion and to boyle it to perfection then as Aristotle saith The Sun and Man make a Man and the rest have two working and moving causes the Heat of Heaven and the breath of the Male-seed so in this work of Metall there is not onely the great and generall begetting breath of Heaven but also the private and particular seed of the Earth their father That there lacks a little Earth to stay Quick-silver Aristotle himself sheweth by a pretty like example He saith the Hares blood flameth still when it is cold whereas others stand because it wants those earthly Streams which others have to make it grow together as we may see by tryall finding no bloud which hath them with a Strainer taken away to stand and cluster but run continually Even so take away the Earth and Brimstone of a Metall which our Art can doe and the Water will not stand again but flow for ever And this is generall if we mark well that nothing stands and leaves his running before Earth ruling binds and stayes him Whosoever allowes not this way of making Metalls besides other fayls and errors he shall never unfold the Nature of Quick-silver as we may see by Aristotle and Agricola strugling and striving against the stream about it giving the cause of his flowing and flying from the Fire unto abundance of Ayre in him for then his lightnesse and feeding of the Fire two things far from his nature would as well as in all ayrie Bodies appear and shine forth unto us But he that stands upon our Grounds and Rules laid down before may easily perceive his raw cold and watry condition to make him fly the Fire his Enemy and this even proportion in power and equall rule of Earth and Water in him to be the cause of his running The first is plain But there is as much Earth in power as Water in Quick-silver albeit it seems all Water for a little Earth is as strong as much Water and no more of this then of that surely mingled and put together appears because it is the onely dry Water in the World her Earth haling one way makes her dry and her Water another causeth her to flow but this is a certain sign thereof that when we find by reason all other things if either Earth or Water ruleth over them either to stand with Cold and harden or else to melt with Fire and Water yet we see plainly this one dry Water called Quick-silver to stoop and yeeld to neither But to our purpose The Reasons why the heat of Heaven is the Workman in the Mine are many but hear a few and briefly delivered If he worketh and mingleth as I proved above all perfect mingled Bodies then what shall lett and bar him from this labour also the depth and hardnesse of the Rock No for if those subtile Bodies which we call Spirits are able in the opinion of all Men
to pierce through stone-walls without breach or sign of passage how much more subtile and strong and able to doe it is this heavenly Soul But all Men grant the Workmanship w of living things to flow from the onely cause and fountain Then tell us how it comes to passe that Fish by the witnesse of good Authors are sometimes found in the deep and sound Earth where no Water runneth Nay which way doe very Toads get into certain Rocks in Germany and Milstone-Rocks in France even so close that they cannot be spyed before they be set in grinding and break themselves as George Agricola reporteth But if Mineralls as well as Plants take Food and Nourishment wax and grow in bignesse all is clear I hope and void of doubt This will I prove hereafter In the mean time let us win it again by proof and tryal the strongest Battery that may be Cold binds and gathers in the stuffe of both like and unlike grosse and fine together without any clensing or sundering But Metalls especially Gold are very finely and cleanly purged Bodies Again if Cold had frozen and packt up Gold together the force of Heat as we see the proof in all things should cut the bands and unmask the work again which is not To this what Colour springs from Cold but his own waterish and earthy colour That if a thing be dyed with other Colours we know straightway where it had them Besides Cold leaves no smell behind it but Heat is the cause of all smells Then to omit the fiery smell of some stones and sweet savour of others and the variety of sent in Juices how hapned it that Silver found at Mary-berg smelt like Violets as Agricola reporteth That all Men feel the unpleasant scent of Copper and other base metals But mark the practice of the plain Men when they devise to judge of a Mine below they take their aime at no better mark then if by grating two stones of the hill together they feel a smell of Brimstone because they take this the Leaving of the Metals in their concoction To be short doe but cast with your selves why there be no Metals but in Rocks and Mountains unlesse these unload them and shoot them down into the Plain and then wherefore chiefly foul Metals in Cold and fine Silver and Gold besides Precious Stones in Hot Countries and you shall finde the cause of this to be the difference of that purging and refining Heat and the closenesse of the Place to keep in that heavenly heat and barrennesse withall and emptinesse of Plants to draw it forth and spend it Some cannot conceive how Heat should cause this Matter when they feel not Heat in the Mine I will not say to such that this Heat is most mild and gentle every where and there especially but bid them bring up a piece of Minerall earth and lay it in the open Ayre and they shall feel if they lay their hand upon it no small but a burning Heat by the cold blast stirred up and raised even as the lurking heat of Lime is stirred up with Water Wherefore we may safely set down and build upon it that all Mineralls are made with Heat and get thereby their Being and Perfection Albeit the outward shape and last cover as it were of the work is put on by Cold. Now for the steps and degrees of Metals that they all except Iron and Copper though some doe not except them arise from the steps and degrees of baking the self same thing and stuffe of Quick-silver it appears in Lead-mines where is alwayes for the most part some Gold and Silver found by report of good Authors And therefore Albert saith that cunning Miners use in such case to shut up the Mine again for thirty or forty years to bake the Lead better and lead it on to perfection and that thing to have been found true in his time in Sclavonia But what doe white and yellow Coppers sometime found in the Ground signifie unto us but that Nature was travelling by way of Concoction unto the end of Silver and Gold Again how comes it to passe that plain Artificers can fetch out of every Metall some Gold and Silver and out of these some base Metall unlesse Gold and Silver were the Heart and best part of the whole Body and of one self same thing with the Metals Nay Paracelse avoweth that not onely these but Mines of Middle-Minerals things further off as you know are never without some Silver or Gold and therefore he giveth counsel to water them as it were Plants with their own Mine and kindly water assuring us that they will grow up to ripeness and in few years prove as rich as any Silver or Gold Mine Then we see at last the truth of this Metalline Ground unshaken and standing sure for all the Battery of the stoutest Graecians that All Metals have but one Quicksilver Stuff Kind and Nature being all one self same thing differing by degrees of Cleanness Fineness Closeness and Colour that is by those Hang-byes called Accidents sprung out from the degrees of Boyling and Concoction It is now time to go to build upon this Matter and to shew how these lower and unclean Metals may be mended and changed into Silver and Gold to make the way to attain Riches If all Metals are so neer and like one another especially some of them which I set down before wanting nothing but continuance of Cleansing and Purging by Concoction then sure this exchange may seem no such hard and impossible matter nor to need perhaps the help of the Divine Art of Hermes but a Lesser and Baser Skill may serve the turn And as Nature is not Poor and Needy but full of Store and Change so may Skill if She will mark and follow the steps of Nature find more wayes then one to one Matter Then which is the lower way and lesser Skill following Nature We will fetch it from that way which we saw Nature take even now beneath the Ground What is that I will tell you shortly As Nature in her work below used two hot Workmen so will I and because we cannot tarry her leisure and long time she taketh to that purpose we will match and countervail her little Heats with proportions answerable and meet for our time that we may do that in fourty dayes which she doth in as many years And this proportion is not hard to be found when we consider the odds and space that lieth between the Founders Fire and the gentle Heat of Heaven And again the difference betwixt such a scowring Purger and that Eater above consuming Stones and Iron so quickly and the milde Heat and easie Breath that thickned Quick-silver And therefore as the Miners do well in trying and purging the rude Metals from the outward filth leavings besides a great outward fire to put to the lump many hot and