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 [Page 2] 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, In Pi­mand. 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 [Page 3] 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 [...]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, In Sma­rag. Tab 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 seve­ [...]al Individuals of this large frame of [...]he world, besides that spirit of the [...]ivine Worker, which lay upon those first waters, and brought forth the seeds of all things, confusedly rowld [...]n the first Chaos, from their power [Page 4] into act, and wheeling them by [...] perpetual alteration, doth mannage them Geometrically by compositi­on and resolution.

5. He that knows not the soul o [...] the world to be that Spirit, the Creatour and Governour of the World, by its cont [...]ed infusion, o [...] its breathing upon the works of na­ture, and by its enlarged diffusio [...] through all things, giving to al [...] 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 thi [...] shall grant Nature the honour of be­ing the second universal Cause at­tending on the first, and as it wer [...] an instrument moved by it, and [...] giving, according to a material or­der, an immediate motion to ever [...] thing in the world, will not spe [...] what disagrees with the opinion [...] Philosophers or Divines, who [...] [Page 5] 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 [Page 6] 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 [Page 7] 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 the Sub­pream Rulers beck. This is the Sym­metry, the order of the whole Uni­verse.

12. It is the excepted priviledge alone of the Creatour, as he crea­ted all things according as he plea­sed out of nothing, so to reduce what he hath created into nothing: for whatsoever being or substance hath an impress from him, cannot deny subjection to him, but is prohibited by Natures law, to return to a Non-Entity. Therefore Trismegist did tru­ly assert, That nothing in the world doth die, but pass into a change, for mixt bodies have their composition from the Elements, which by natures rotation are again resolved into the Elements.

13. The Philosphers did believe a first matter to be of an elder birth to the Elements, but this as it was▪ but scarce apprehended by them, so was it as briefly, and as it were in the clouds, and obscurely handled by them, they made it void of qua­lities and accidents, yet the first sub­ject of them without quantity, yet by which all things have their di­mensions, endowed with simplicity, yet capable of contraries, without the reach of sensible knowledge, yet the basis of sensible, drawn out through all places, yet unperceive­able covetous of all forms, tenacious of none, the root of all bodies, yet not sensible but conceiveable, onely by an act of the intellect: lastly, no­thing in act, all things in aptitude. So have they laid a fancy for the foundation of nature.

14. Aristotle more wary, though he believed the eternity of the world, yet hinted a certain first and univer­sal matter. In the discussion of this [Page 9] he used sobriety and ambiguity, al­wayes avoiding its creeks and per­plexities, so that he opined it bet­ter to conceiveCap. 5. l. 3. de ort. & in­teritu. one inseparable matter of all things, which yet hath a respective difference, from which, the first bodies with the rest, which are under sense, have their subsist­ence; that this is the first principle of them, and not to be separated from them,Cap. 1 & 2. de ort. & interitu but always joyned with a re­pugnancie, always subject to contra­ries, from which the Elements are produced.

15. The Philosopher had been righter, if he had asserted that first matter free from the conflict of Con­traries, and disengaged from that pretended repugnancy, since there is no contrariety inherent in the ve­ry Elements, but what is the result of the intention of their qualities, as we are informed by the daily expe­rience of fire and water, in which, whatsoever opposition there is, ari­seth from the heightening of their qualities. But in the proper and true Elements, which couple in the ge­neration of mixt bodies, those qua­lities which are in a remiss degree in [Page 10] them, are not repugnant each to o­ther: for their temperature doth not admit a contrariety.

16. Thales, De Sa­riis Phi­lo's Sopi­nion. Heraclitus, and Hesio­dus accounted water the first matter of all things, to whose opinion the Writer of the holy Genesis seems to consent: This they call an Abyss and Water, by which I guess they under­stood not our ordinary water, but a kind of sume, or moist and dark va­pour, roaving here and there, and driven in an uncertain motion with­out any certain order.

17. I am not at present able to lay down any positive determination concerning that first Principle of things, since it being created in the dark, could never by mans invention be brought to light, therefore what­soever the troup of Philosophers and Divines do opine, whether these things are so or no, the Authour of Nature alone knows, therefore par­don is to be allowed to him that in dark Doctrines hits what is most likely.

18. Some of the Rabbines agree­ing, conceived an ancient, but ob­scure and inexpressible principle, the [Page 11] matter of all improperly called Hyl [...], which is more properly termed not so much a body, as a large shadow, not a thing, but a dusky image of a thing, or the smoaky appearance of an En­tity, a most dark night, a covert of clouds, actually all nothing, poten­tially all things which cannot be found but in fancie, and understood in a dream. Our imagination cannot exhibit to us this doubtfull princi­ple, this depth of darkness, no more than our talk can through the ears imprint the knowledge of the Sun into a man that was born blind.

19. The same men had an opinion that God brought forth and created the nearest approching matter of the Elements and the World, to wit, that dark, formless, and indigested Abyss out of that farthest Principle: the Scripture calls this Mass sometimes Earth void and emptie, sometimes Waters, although actually it were nei­ther, yet potentially and by way of assignment, it was both: we may give a propable guess that it was not un­like to a dark smoak or vapour▪ in which was closed a stupifying spirit of cold and darkness.

[Page 12] 20. The division of the higher wa­ters from the lower, expressed in Ge­nesis, seems to be done by the seve­ring the subtile from the thick, and as it were a thin spirit from that smoaky body; there was needfull therefore of that lightsom spirit pro­ceeding from the Word of God. For light, which is a fiery spirit, by sepa­rating things of a diverse nature, did drive down the thicker darkness from the nearest and highest Region, and uniting the matter of one and the same kind, being of a thin and a more spiritual substance, inflamed it as an unquencheable oyl, to burn before the Throne of the Divine Majesty. This is the Empyraean Heaven, seated between the Intellectual and Mate­rial heaven, as the Horizon and Fi­nitor of each, receiving spiritual en­dowments from that above, and de­riving them down to the inferiour adjoyning middle heaven.

21. Reason required that this dark Abyss, or next matter of the World, should be watry and moist, that it be the better subject to be attenua­ted, and that by this flux of the mat­ter by attenuation, the whole frame [Page 13] of the Heavens and of the rest of the Fabrick, might issue forth, and might be laid out in a continuous body. For it is the property of moisture to flow, and the continuity of every bo­dy is the effect of the moisture of it. For moisture is the glue and joynct­ure of Elements and bodies. But fire acting upon moisture by heat, doth rarifie, for heat is the instru­ment of fire, by which it doth act two opposite works by one and the same labour, separating the moist nature from the earthy, & by rarifying that, condenseth this: So that by the se­paration of the things of a diverse, proceeds a congregation of things of the same nature. By this first prin­ciple of Chymistry, the uncreated spirit, the artifex of the world, did distinguish the confused natures of things.

22. The Architectonique Spirit of the world began the work of Cre­ation from two universal principles; the one formal, the other material, for otherwise what is the meaning of the words of the Prophet, Gen. 1. God created the Heaven and the Earth? &c. unless that in the beginning of the [Page 14] information of the matter, he distin­guished it into two chief principles, a formal and a material Heaven and Earth; by the word Earth, is to be understood that dark, and as yet un­shaped mass of the waters and Abyss, as is apparent by the subsequent words, (The Earth was void and without form, and darkness was upon the face of the depth, &c.) which the Creatour did shut in and comprise within the highest, to wit, the Empy­rean Heaven, which is Natures first formal, though farthest principle.

23. For the Spirit of God, which is the brightness of the Deity, being poured out upon the Waters, that is, upon the moist and large surface of the depths, in the very moment of creation, light presently broke up, which in the twinkling of the eye, surprized the highest and more sub­tile part of the matter, and encom­passed it as it were with a fringe, and border of light, as that lightening is which is darted from the East to the West, or like a flame which fires the smoak. So was the birth of the first day, but the lower portion of dark­ness devoid of light, continued night, [Page 15] and so the darkness had its division into day and night.

24. Concerning that first Heaven, that formal Principle, it is not decla­red to have been void, empty, and wrapt in darkness, which is a suffici­ent evidence, that that Heaven which was first spread out, was forthwith severed by the light from the subja­cent dark Mass, by reason of the nearness of the Glory and Majesty of God, and the presence of that light­som Spirit flowing from it.

25. There was therefore in the beginning two Principles of all things created, one full of light, and bordering upon the spiritual Nature, the other wholly corporeal and dark; the first, that it might be the Princi­ple of motion, light, and heat; the second, of a drowsie, dark, and cold being: the first active and masculine, the other the passive and feminine Principle. On the part of the for­mer comes a motion in the Elemen­tary world to Generation, from whence proceeds life; from the o­ther part comes the motion to corru­ption, the principle of death. So that is the double fringe or border of the lower world.

[Page 16] 26. But because Love is exten­sive, and acts without from it self, the Divine Nature impatient of its soli­tude, and taken with its own beauty in the light already created, as in a Mirrour, and earnestly desirous to enlarge it, and to multiply his image, commanded that light to be extend­ed and propagated. Then the light, the fiery spirit issuing from the Di­vine understanding, and rowling it self in a Circulation, began to work upon the nearest darkness, and ha­ving prevailed upon it, and sunk it down towards the Centre, and there sprung forth the second day, and there was seen the second mansion of light, or the second Heaven, com­prizing all the airy Region, in whose higher Region are so many Torches kindled and scattered: In the lower are seated the seven wandering Stars according to their order, that they might, as so many Presidents and Ru­lers, give orders by their light, mo­tion and influence to the subjacent Nature.

27. And least any thing should be defective in this great work, already drawn out in the mind of God, the [Page 17] same Spirit by his glittering and fie­ry sword beat off the banded dark­ness, and that shade that lay under him, and thrust it down into the Cen­tre of the Abyss, so the lowest part of the Heavens was enlightened, which we rightly term Air, or the lowest Heavens: Then was the third day. But the darkness which at first did overcast the whole face of the Abyss, being thrust down by the su­pervening light into the lowest Re­gion, was so thickened by reason of the straitness of the room, and the binding force of the Cold, that it passed into a huge mass of a watry Nature, the Kernel and Centre of the whole workmanship, as it were a dale and heap of darkness, being poiz'd in the middest of the waters, and bound up of the dregs and thick matter of the Abyss, into a firm and dark body of earth. After this, up­on the driving of the Spirit, the wa­ters fled from the surface of the earth, casting themselves about the borders of it, and there appeared drie land, that it might produce al­most an infinite number of several sorts of Plants, and receive as guests [Page 18] so many kinds of creatures, especial­ly Man the lord of all, and provide to them food, and to man a plentifull sufficiency of all conveniencies. The Earth therefore and the Water made one Globe, by reason of whose thick­ness, the shadow, the image of the dark Abyss, doth continually beset the whole Region of the Air border­ing upon it, and opposite to the Sun, for it shuns and flies the assayling light, and so in the assault is upon a continual retreat.

28. That Light,The creation of the Sun which upon the conquest and destruction of the dark­ness, had seized upon and spread it self upon the parts of the Abyss, it seemed best to the great Creatour to contract into that most resplendent and illustrious for quantity and qua­lity, for bigness and beauty, that Globe of the Sun, that as the Light was more narrowly pent, so it might be more efficaciously powerfull, and might dart its beams with more vi­gour, as also that the created Light, the nearest approching nature to the divine glory, proceeding from an un­created unity, might through its uni­ty be poured out upon the creatures.

[Page 19] 29. From this glorious lamp of the world do all the other bodies bor­row light; for that dark shade which we sensibly perceive in the Globe of the Moon, by reason of the neigh­bouring earth, and the extension of her shadow, we may credibly guess the like to be in the other globous bodies, though not perceivable by reason of their distance. Indeed the prime and most principal nature of sensibles, the fountain of light, ought to be one, from which these things below might receive the breath of life. Whence is that true saying of the Philosopher, The Sun and man be­get man.

30. It was not an improbable as­sertion of some of the Philosophers, That the soul of the World was in the Sun, and the Sun in the Centre of the whole. For the consideration of e­quity and nature seem to require, that the body of the Sun should have an equal distance from the fountain and rise of created Light, to wit, the Empyrean Heaven, and from the dark Centre the Earth, which are the ex­treams of the whole Fabrick, where­by this lamp of the world, as a middle [Page 20] Nature and Joyner of both Ex­treams, might have its scite in the middle, that it may the more commodiously receive the rich trea­suries of all powers from the chief Spring, and upon a like distance con­vey them to things below.

31. Before the Contraction of this light into the body of the Sun, the earth spent an idle time in its soli­tude, looking for a male, that being impregnated by his copulation, it might bring forth all sorts of crea­tures, for as yet it had been deliver­ed onely of abortives and Embryoes, to wit, of Vegetables onely. For the weak and faint heat of that scattered light, could not get the conquest of that moist and cold matter, nor put forth its virtue in any higher actings.

32. From the light therefore the Elements, as well as the first matter, had their information, and so attain­ed a joynt nature of light, and by kindred a fast friendship betwixt themselves, not according to the vulgar opinion, an hatred and quar­rel; they embrace each the other with a common bond of friendship, that they may joyn themselves to [Page 21] the making up of several mixed bo­dies, according to their several kinds. But the light of the Sun being of a far greater power than this former, is the Form of all forms, or the Uni­versal form which doth convey all natural forms in the work of gene­ration, into the disposed matter and seeds of things. For every particular nature hath within it a spark of light, whose beams do in a secret māner at­tend with an active & motive power.

33. It was necessary that the entire portion of the first matter, allotted to this lower Region, as well as the Elements who did flow from it, should be seasoned from the be­ginning with a light tincture of that first Light, whereby they might be the better fitted to receive that greater and more powerfull light in the information of mixt bodies. So fire with fire, water with water, light with light being homogeneous bodies, have a perfect union.

34. From the sight & efficacy of the Sun, we may inferre that he is in the stead of an heart to the Universe, for from him is life derived to all parts, for light is the Chariot of life, yea, [Page 22] the fountain and next cause, and the souls of creatures are the beams of that heavenly light, which do breath life into them, exempting onely the soul of man, which is a ray of the Su­per-celestial and uncreated Light.

35. God hath imprinted in the Sun a threefold image of his Divini­ty, the first in his unity, for Nature cannot away with a multiplicity of Suns, no more than the Deity can with a plurality of Gods, that so one may be the spring of all. Secondly, in its Trinity, or his threefold office. For the Sun, as Gods Vicegerent, doth dispense all the benefits of Na­ture by light, motion, and heat: from hence is life, which is the supream and most accomplisht act of Nature in this world, beyond which can­not go, unless backward. But from Light and Motion issues heat, as the third in the Trinity proceeds from the first and the second Person. Last­ly God, who is the Eternal Light, Infinite, Incomprehensible, could express and demonstrate himself to the world onely by light. Let none therefore wonder, why the Eternal Sun did beautifie that most excel­lent [Page 23] draught of himself, which was his own making, that heavenly Sun with so great endowments, for in him hath he pitcht his pavilion.

36. The Sun is a transparent Mir­rour of the Divine Glory, which be­ing seated above the sense & strength of material creatures, did frame this glass, by whose resplendency the beams of his Eternal Light might be communicated by reflection to all his works, and so should by this re­flection be rendered discernable. For it is beyond the capacity of any mortal to have any immediate view of that Divine Light. This is the Royal eye of the Divinity which doth conferre by his presence, life, and liberty to his suppliants.

37. The last work of this Great Worker, and as it were the corol­ary and shutting of all, man enters [...] Summary of the Worlds Fabrick, [...] small draught of the Divine Na­ture. The Creatour deferred his making to a part of the sixth Light, [...]nd the last of all his working, that [...]he rich Furniture of Nature, and [...]ll endowments of things both above [...]nd below, might bring their conflu­ence [Page 24] to the humane nature as to an­other Pandora. Thus the things of the world being ordered, man want­ed onely to be annexed as the per­fection of all; whereby nature, being now strengthened by a va­rious light, might bring into his perfect temperature more refined Elements, and that there might be the best Clay for the forming of so exquisite a Vessel. Yea, the lower Globe and the inhabitants of it did require such a Governour, lest other­wise they might refuse his Rule.

38 Upon the sixth day from the Creation, the third day of the Suns rising, did man rise out of the Earth: by the time of his production, and the number of the days is shadowed forth a great mysterie. For as upon the fourth day of the Creation the whole light of the Heaven was ga­thered into the single bodie of the Sun, and on the third day from the making of the Sun, which was the sixth day from the beginning of the Creation, the Clay of the Earth re­ceived the breath of life, and was formed into a living man the image of God: So on the fourth Millenary [Page 25] day from the beginning of the world the uncreated Sun, viz. the Divine Nature, infinite and never before comprehended within any bounds, was willing to be comprized, and in a manner shut into the cage of an hu­mane bodie. Upon the third day or millenarie (for a thousand years with God are but as one day) after the first rising of that Sun, and about the end of the sixth day, to wit, of the millenarie from the Creation, shall fall out the glorious Resurrecti­on of the Humane Nature in the se­cond coming of that supream Judge, which was also praesignified to us by his blessed Resurrection on the third day. So did the Prophet in his Ge­nesis roul up the secret age and de­stinie of the world.

39 Although the Almightie, ac­cording to his pleasure, created the World, yet could have brought it out of darkness into light (if his will had so been) in a moment, and by a beck: for he said, and it was so. Yet the or­der of Creation of principles, and successively of the natures according to their times, was set in the mind of God, which order, rather than the [Page 26] work it self of Creation, that sacred Philosopher seems to describe in his Genesis.

40 There seems to have been in the beginning a threefold way of the information of the first matter. For in what portion of the matter there was an irrational lightsom form, and without proportion above the rest, as in the Empyrean heaven, where the light first seized upon the matter, then the form having as it were an infinite virtue, did swallow up its mat­ter, and translated it into a nature al­most spiritual and free from any acci­dent.

41 But where the virtues of the form and matter did meet in an equal poyz and a just equallitie, according to which, the aetherial heaven, and the celestial bodies are informed, there the action of the light, whose force in acting is of greatest power, did proceed so far, that it did rescue its matter from all original blemishes, as also from the loathsom infection of corruption after a wonderfull sort, by illumination and attenuation, and this is to be accounted as a truly per­fect information.

[Page 27] 42 The third way of informing the matter is, in which a weaker form remains, as it often happens, though after divers ways in this our Elemen­tarie region, in which the appetite of the matter, which is an evidence of weakness and imperfection, luxuria­ting, and lavishly springing in its basis and root, cannot be sufficiently satis­fied, by the reason of its remotion and distance from its former principle, neither can this weakness be cured. Hence the matter not being fully in­formed according to its desire, lan­guisheth under the desire of a new form, which having attained, it doth bring to it, as to its husband, the dowrie, a large wardrobe of corrupti­on and faults. This sullen, perverse wrangling and inconstant matter, doth always burn for new beds, gree­dily wooing all forms which it longs for if absent, hates, if present.

43 By which it is evident, that the leaven of alteration and corruption, and at length the fatal venom of death do happen, not from the re­pugnancie of qualities, but from an infected Matrix, and from the men­struous poyson of a dark matter, and [Page 28] this causeth it so to fall out both in elements and in the mixt bodies of this lower region: because the form weakned and insufficient by its de­filement and imperfection, and being not of a just poiz and assize, could not purge it out in its first and radical union. This is confirmed by holy Writ, in which we may observe our first Parent was not created accord­ing to his matter immortal, but that he might be guarded from the tin­cture and corruption of the matter, and therefore God set in Paradise a Tree abounding with the fruit of Life which he might make use of as his as­sertour & guardian from the frailty of his matter, and the bondage of death, from the presence and use of this he was sequestrated after his fatal fall, and final sentence.

44 Two there were therefore first principles of Nature, before which were none, after which all, to wit the first matter, and its universal form, by the copulation of which issued the Elements as second principles, which are nothing else but the first matter diversly informed; out of the mixture of this is made the second [Page 29] matter, which is the nearest subject of accidents, and doth receive the various turns of Generation and Corruption. These are the degrees, this the order of the Principles of Nature.

45. Those who annex to the Mat­ter and Form, a third Principle, viz. Privation, do blast Nature with a Calumnie, far from whose pur­pose it is to admit a Principle that shall go counter to her intention, but her end in Generation being to obtain a Form, to which Pri­vation is adverse, certainly this cannot be part of Natures aim: They had spoken more to the pur­pose, if they had made Love a principle of Nature, for the matter being widowed in its form, covets eagerly the embracing of a new. But Privation is the meer absence of a form, upon which ground the honourable title of being a principle of Nature, is no way due to it, but rather to Love, which is a media­tour betwixt that which desires, and that which is desired, betwixt what is beautifull, and what is deformed, be­twixt matter and form.

[Page 30] 46. Corruption is far nearer than Privation to the principle of Gene­ration, since that is a motion dispo­sing the matter to generation by suc­cessive degrees of alteration; but Privation acts nothing, is of no work in generation, but Corruption doth both promove and prepare the mat­ter, that it may be put in a capacity of receiving the form, and as it were a mediatrix, doth act Pander-like, that the matter may the more easily get a satisfaction for its lust, and by his help may the sooner obtain the copulation of a form: Corruption therefore is the instrumental and ne­cessary cause of Generation. But Privation is nothing else but a meer vacancy of an active and formal prin­ciple: and darkness was upon the face of the depths, to wit, of the uninform­ed and dark matter.

47. The harmony of the Universe consists in the diverse and gradual in­formation of the matter. For from the poized mixture of the first mat­ter and its form, flows both the dif­ference of the Elements, and of the Region of the world, which is brief­ly, but truly set out by Hermes, when [Page 31] he said, That whatsoever is below, hath an assimulation with somewhat above. For things above and below, were made of the same matter and form, differencing onely in respect of their mixture, scite and perfecti­on, in which the distinction of the parts of the world, and the latitude of all Natures, are handled.

48. We must believe that the first matter, after it had received inform­ation from the light, and was di­stinguished by it into several things, did go wholly out of it self, and was transmitted into the Elements, and that which was compounded by them, and was wholly exhausted in the consummation of the work of the Universe, so that those things which were closed in her, being brought forth, and exposed to view, she be­gan wholly to lie hid in them, and we must acknowledge it is not to be found in a separation from them.

49. Nature hath left us a shadow of that ancient confused Mass, or first matter in drie water, not wetting, which rising out of those impost­umes of the earth or Lakes, doth spring forth big with a manifold seed, [Page 32] being also volatile by reason of its lightness through its heat, from which being coupled with its male, he that can take out and separate, and joyn again ingeniously the in­trinsecal Elements, he may well boast that he hath gained the most precious secret of Art and Nature; yea, a Compendium or brief of the Heavenly Essence.

50. He that searcheth for the sim­ple elements of bodies, separated from all mixture, takes a labour in vain, for they are unknown to the most piercing judgements of men, for our common elements are not the simple element, yea, they are inse­parably mixed one with another. The Earth, Water, and Air, may be more truly called the Parts that per­fect and compleat the Universe, ra­ther than Elements, yet they may be rightly termed the Matrix's of them.

51. The bodies of Earth, Water, and Air, which are sensibly distin­guished by their sphears, are differ­ent from the elements which Nature maketh use of in the work of Gene­ration, and which make up mixt bo­dies, [Page 33] for these in their mixture in respect of their thinness, are not di­scernable, but are barr'd from the senses, until they conjoyn in a con­densed matter and body.

But those things which fill up the in­feriour Globe of the Universe, as too thick, impure, and indigested, are de­barred from the right of perfect ge­neration, for they are rather the sha­dows and figures of elements, than true Elements.

52. Those Elements which form­ing Nature makes use of in her mix­tions, and in making bodies, although they are not to be found out before mixtion, yet in the finished work, and in the compleatly mixed body, be­cause their parts have a correspond­ence proportionable with the parts of the world, and have a kind of A­nalogie with them, we may call them by the same names, the more solid parts, Earth; the moister, Water; the more spiritual, Air; the inborn heat, Nature's fire; the hidden and essen­tial virtues; a man may safely term Heavenly and Astral Natures, or the [Page 34] Quint-Essence, and so every mixed body may by this Analogie triumph in the title of Micro-cosme.

53. He that did appoint the first Elements for the generation of bo­dies, alone knows how out of them to make all particulars, and to resolve them, being made, into them again.

54. Let not them therefore refuse the Light, who working about the Elements of Nature, either in the production of some body from them, or the resolution of some into them, create their own trouble, since these Elements are onely subject to the dominion of Nature, and delivered to her onely from their beginning, altogether unknown to all our art, and not compassible by our endea­vours.

55. The Element of Nature may be termed the most simple portion of the first matter, distinguished by its peculiar difference and qualities, constituting a part of the essence in the material composition of mixt bodies.

56. By the Elements of Nature, are denoted the material principles, of which some have a greater purity [Page 35] and perfection than others, accord­ing to the greater Power and Virtue of that form that gives the compleat­ment. They are for the most part distinguished according to their ra­rity or density, so that those that are more thin, and approch nearer to a spiritual substance, are therefore the more pure and light, and so are the more fit for motion and action.

57. Upon this ground it was that reverend Antiquity did seign, that the whole Empire of the world was divided between the three Brothers, the Sons of Saturn as coheirs, be­cause it acknowledged onely three Elementary Natures, or rather three parts of the Universe. For by Jupi­ter, the Omnipotent, who shared hea­ven as his portion, armed with his treble-darted Thunder-bolt, supe­riour to the rest of the brothers, what did those professours of mysteries understand, but that the Heavens, be­ing the Region of heavenly bodies, do assume a priviledge of Sovereign­ty over these inferiour beings. But they placed Juno, wife to Jupiter, to praeside over the lowest Region of the Heaven, or our Air, because this [Page 36] Region troubled with vapours, being moist and cold is as it were in a man­ner defiled and impure, and nearest approaching to a female tempera­ment, as also because it is subjected to the orders of the higher Regions, receive their effects, and communi­cates them to us, twisting it self with more condensed natures, and stoop­ing them to the bent of Heaven. But because male and female differ one­ly in sex, not in kind, therefore would they not have the Air, or the lower Heaven to be distinct in its essence and kind, as another Element from the higher Heaven, but onely diver­sified in place and by accidents. To Neptune the god of the Sea, they at­tributed a dominion over the waters. By Pluto, the lord of the lower parts, abounding in wealth, they denoted the Globe of the Earth replenished with riches, with the desire of which the minds of men being inflamed, are bitterly tormented. So that those wise men admitted of three parts of the Universe, or if you please, of three Elements, because under the Nature of Heaven they comprized the name of Fire, and therefore did [Page 37] they draw Jupiter armed with his Thunder.

58. We are Schollars to experi­ence in this, that all the bodies of mixt beings, have their analysis and resolution into drie and moist, and that all the excrements of creatures, are terminated by the same differ­ences; from whence it is clearly evi­dent, that their bodies are made up onely of two sensible Elements, in which notwithstanding the other are virtually and effectually. But Air, or the Element of the lower Heaven, is not the object of our sense, because in respect of us it is a kind of spiritual being. The fire of Nature, because it is the formal principle, cannot be wrought to any separation or com­prehension by any destruction by way of resolution, nor by any art or artifice of man. For the nature of Forms is not subjected to the censure of the Senses, because of its spiritual being.

59. The Earth is the thickest bo­dy of the Universe, therefore is it accounted the heaviest and the cen­tre of it, we must assert its nature contrary to the received opinion, to [Page 38] be accidentally drie, because it doth retain most of the close and dark na­ture of the first matter, but a shade and darkness are the coverts of cold, from whence they flie the light, and are diametrically opposite to it, but the Earth, in respect of its extream density, is the mother of shade and darkness, hardly passable by light and heat, therefore roughly knit by an heightened cold. And for this reason black choller is to be esteem­ed the coldest humour of all, because it is under the power of the Earth, the Earth under Saturns, who is ac­counted the Authour of a cold and melancholick temperature. Further, those things that are ingendered in the bowels of the Earth, of the sub­stance of the Earth, as Marble and Stones are of a cold nature, although we must otherwise conceive of met­tals, because they are rather of an airy nature, and have in them sparkles of the Fire of Nature, and a spirit of Sulphur congealing their moist and cold matter. Yet Mercurie surpas­sing the rest in moisture and cold, is beholding to the Earth for his cold­ness, and to the Water for his moist­ure. [Page 39] It is otherwise with those things that are produced in the Sea, as in Amber and Coral, and many other things that have their beings from the Sea and fresh Waters, which as it is apparent, are of a hot temper, so that we have this instruction both from reason and experience, that the greatest coldness is to be attri­buted to the Earth, not to the Water.

60. But driness doth agree to the Earth accidentally onely, and in a remiss degree; for it was created in the middest of the Waters, and the order of beings required, that in re­spect of its gravity, being sunk in the Waters, it should never separate from them; but the Creatour using his Prerogative, having removed the Waters, gave to it an open surface, that so there might be room made both for the creation of mixed Be­ings, and for their habitation. The Earth therefore was enfranchiz'd from its natural yoke of bondage and subjection to the Waters, not by any order of Nature, but by a pri­viledge of favour, that so having its face wipt, it might lift up a dry visage [Page 40] to the view of the Heavens, and might partake of the welcome light of the world.

61. Every cold and drie is averse from the faculty of Generation, un­less it be helped out by some etern­al helps; therefore it was the will of the Supream Authour of Nature, to heat the cold womb of the Earth with an heavenly fire, and adjoyn­ed to the drie globe of the Earth the moist nature of Water, that so by the mixture of two generative cau­ses, moist, and hot, the sterility of the Earth might be helped, and that by the mediation of the concourse and mixture of all the Elements, the Earth might be made a natural Ves­sel for fruitfull Generation. There­fore all Elements, and all qualities are in the Earth.

62. The body of the Earth was rightly created by the great God of a spongeous nature, that so there might be a receptacle for Air, Show­ers, and heavenly Influences, and al­so that the moist vapours being ex­pelled by the force of inward heat, from the Centre to the Superficies, through the porous passages of the [Page 41] Earth, might by a mean putrefaction corrupt the seeds of things, and so prepare for generation; these being thus disposed, receive that enliven­ing and heavenly heat. For Nature hath sunk in the depths a magnetick love, by the actings of which they draw down, and suck out the effica­cy and virtue of things above, which do increase the strength of the infor­mation, and hasten the sweetness of vital Air.

63. The heat that comes from the inwards of the Earth, is moist and impure, and doth corrupt by rea­son of the tainted mixture of Earth and Water; But the most pure and heavenly doth generate by excitati­on, dilatation, and furthering the in­bred heat to life, even that inbred heat which is hidden in the seeds of things, and as Natures secret closed in their centre. But because both these heats are of the same kind, they have a joynt and amicable operation in the act of generation, and are in­separably united, until they are brought forth to life and large ve­getation.

64. Water is of a middle nature, [Page 42] betwixt what is thick and what is of a thin nature, betwixt the Earth and the Air; Natures menstruum, a volatile body, flying and not endu­ring fire, drawn forth by a moderate heat into a vapour, assuming multi­plyed shapes, more unstable than Pro­teus.

65. The moist Element is Mercu­rie, which sometimes assuming the nature of a bodie, sometimes of a spirit, doth attract to himself by his revolutions, the virtues of superiour and inferiour Beings, and as it were receiving their instructions, doth trade in commerce as their agent or factor, amongst the remotest natures of the Universe, neither will he leave his trafficquing till all the Elements of the corruptible Nature receive their fixation and purgation by fire, and there issue upon it an Universal Sabbath.

66. Water, being the nearest in nature to the first matter, doth easi­ly receive her impress. The Chaos, the ancient Parent of all things, was a kind of subtile and dark vapour, a kind of a moist dark substance, like a thin smoak, from whose most subtile [Page 43] part the Heavens are drawn forth in­to order, which a three-fold differ­ence divides into a three-fold pro­vince; to wit, the Supream, which is the noblest, the middle which as­sumes the second place of dignity and honour, the lowest is inferiour to the other two both in scite and honour. The thicker substance of the matter went to the making of that watry heap, which is a middle nature. The thickest part, which is as it were the dregs of the whole Mass sate down to the bottom, and was setled for the globe of the Earth. The extremities of this artifice, to wit, the Heaven and the Earth, did recede more from the first state of their matter, and from their ancient shape; the Heaven in regard of its great rarity and levity, the Earth in respect of its great density and gravi­ty. But the Water, which was a mean betwixt them, continued a nature more like the first formless Abyss from whence it proceeds, so that with ease it turns it self by rare­faction into smoak or vapour, which is the image of the ancient Hyle, or first Matter.

[Page 44] 67. Moisture is more proper to Water than Coldness, because Wa­ter is of a greater rarity, and more lightsom than Earth, but those things which communicate most of light are farthest off from cold; the mor [...] ­rarity there is in any thing, the near­er vicinity there is to light. Wate [...] retained the symbole of moisture from the first matter the Abyss, as the Earth coldness. For the Archi­tect Spirit of the World divided the more thick parts into those two near­ly-allied Natures.

68. Coldness wooes Driness, and invests it self with it where it is vigo­rously predominant by the constri­ction of moist beings, and by the desiccation of them, as is evident in Snow, Ice, and Hayl. For it is the work of Nature to bind and drie the Water, than which nothing is more humid by the proper instrument of Cold; yea, the principal and com­mon subject of Heat and Cold, is hu­midity, by both which it is so strong­ly assailed, till it be conquered: from whence it falls out, that in Autumn so many drie leaves fall at the first cold, that the stalks of feeble Plants [Page 45] upon the strength of Winter, in the height of Drought, are void of moi­sture, and drie away: The cold pe­netrating doth so scorch, and makes so furious an assult upon the vital humours: hence proceeds flaggy and withered age, at length death comes and cuts down all with his well-set sickle, and sweeps you into his ge­neral Granary. How then can any one conceive Cold to be friendly to Moisture, and to be its inherent pro­perty? Since Nature suffers not the Elements to act against each other, lest they should destroy and oppose each the others powers, but an in­tense Cold quickly would bring un­der a remiss and weak moisture, and would swallow it up all by a violent constriction: so that by this means one of the Elements being lost, there would necessarily follow an imper­fection in the work of the rest, and a deficiency in the generation of all things. It is therefore not suit­able to the Law of Nature, to invest Water with the property of being cold in the highest degree.

69. Out of these solider Natures of Earth and Water, doth Nature [Page 46] extract her Elements, by which she compacts Vessels and corporeal Or­gans: for out of the commixture of both is made a clay, which is the next matter of things in generation: for it is in stead of the Chaos, In which virtually and confusedly are all Elements. Out of this clay was the first Father of mankind created, and after all Generation issued from it. In the Generation of creatures, is a clay made of the seed and the menstruum, from whence proceeds the living Creature. In the produ­ction of Vegetables, the seeds do first fall into a subtile clay by putrefacti­on, and then are wrought up to a ve­getable body. In the generation of Mettals, there comes forth a clay from the perfect mixture of Sulphur and Mercury, and their resolution in a fat Water, by which means the mettallick bodies are indurated by a long decoction. In the Philoso­phical resolving of mettals, and in the creation of that Philosophical Secret, first is brought forth a clay out of the seed of both parents pur­ged and mixed.

70. Water is the base and root of [Page 47] all moistures, yea, it is moisture it self: from which all moist things re­ceive their denomination, therefore Water may be rightly defined the Fountain of the moist Element, or the Spring of moisture, whose pro­perty it is to wet by its liquour. But those things are termed humid, which do in themselves according to a less or greater degree, contain a moist­ure, or a watry liquor. Moisture is receivable of all qualities, so bloud and yellow choler are humours, en­dued with their own heat, although they have their foundation in the E­lement of Water. Aqua-fortis and the like are empowered with a burn­ing and a fiery nature. The burning Water, and many other essences which are extracted from oyls and water, do abound in heat, although the root of them, which is Water, be cold, because Nature doth first im­print in a moist elemēt various resem­blances and signatures of its powers, and doth in it en-root and infuse its principal and choice qualities. Moi­sture is the first subject of Nature, upon which her prime care is be­stowed, her first charge layed out, [Page 48] by whose liquour it doth dilute and mingle various colours, and indeli­ble tinctures: To it first do the spi­ritual qualities communicate them­selves, in it first do they take up their being and actings.

71. The lower Waters being di­vided into two, do occupy a double seat, for one part of them brimming the Earth, doth lean on it as it were as its proper Base, and with the Earth makes but one Globe: the other part flying upward, doth range up and down the Region of the neigh­bour Air, and there making to it self many masqued fancies of bodies, and various figures of several phan­tasms doth reave hither and thither, over-hanging the lower Region.

72. Always there is a great part of the Waters that keep above, and being driven to and fro by the Ca­roach of the Wind, doth post over divers parts of the Air, which was in this manner ordered from the Day of the Creation, by the enacting of the Wisdom of GOD, that so the uncumbered and plain face of the Earth, might be unmasked and fit­ed for the generation of things. For [Page 49] the Channels of the Sea and Rivers were not sufficient to receive the whole Waters, but if all should break the confining Bars of the Hea­vens, and come tumbling down, it would not onely cover the plain face of the Earth, but it may be, over­top the highest Mountains. Such an enloosening of the Cataracts of Hea­ven, we may guess, did occasion the old Cataclysm or Deluge.

73. Water is not onely sublima­ted into a vapour by heat alone, nei­ther is it onely bound up in a cloud by cold, but to both the virtues of the Sun and the Stars do contribute their aids, not onely by multiplying the vigours of the Elements, but al­so by a kind of Magnetick virtue, at­tracting and retaining a moisture much or less, according to their dif­ferent position, and the diverse fi­gure of Heaven: from whence we observe the various ordering of years and times; for indeed that Mass of Waters is not kept in, so poized one­ly by the solidation of Cold or the Air, but by the powerfull order and regiment of superiour bodies.

74. Lest there might seem to Di­vine [Page 50] Justice a want of judgements for the execution of his wrath, he made that Ocean which is poized o­ver our heads, to be volatile or fly­ing, and withal brought into his Ar­moury those fiery darts, his Thunder-bolts, that so the presumptuous sin­ners that cannot be won by love, might be wrought about by fear.

75. They are much out of the way, who do attribute to Air moist­ure in the highest degree, upon this ground, because it is easily kept in within the bounds of another, but hardly within its own; for this is the property of light and liquid bodies, not of moist, and so doth better a­gree with fire and Heaven, which na­tures are more rarified, than with Water and Air: for bodies that are rarified, because they of their own will flow every where, cannot be comprized within their own bounds, and therefore stand in need of an­other. Onely firm and solid bodies are kept in within their own compass and superficies, which cannot be done by those things that are of a subtile nature, because by reason of their thinness they melt and are [Page 51] fluid, and so less consistent. From whence this flows that the Air is a body of greater rarity, but not of greater humidity.

76. The Air from it self hath no quality intense and in the highest de­gree, but sometimes hath them up­on loan else-where. The nature of Air is a middle nature betwixt things below and above, and so doth with ease assume the qualities of those that border upon it, from whence it happens that its inferiour Region, ac­cording to the diversity of times, hath a variety of temper, which incon­stancy is occasioned by the changes of the neighbouring and thicker bo­dies of Water and Earth, whose state is easily altered by heat and cold.

77. The whole Air is the Heaven, the floor of the World, Natures sieve, through which the virtues and influences of other bodies are trans­mitted: a middle nature it is that knits all the scattered natures of the Universe together: a most thin smoak kindled by the fire of Heaven, into a light, as it were an immortal flame: the subject of light, and shade of day and night, impatient of vacuity: the [Page 52] principal transparent: the easiest re­ceiver of almost all qualities and ef­fects, yet the constant retainer of none: a borderer upon the spiritual nature, therefore in the Tracts con­cerning the Mysteries of Philoso­phers, it is called by the name of a Spirit.

78. The lower Region of the Air is like unto the neck or higher part of an Alembick, for through it the Vapours climbing up, and being brought to the top, receive their condensation from Cold, and being resolved into water, fall down by rea­son of their own weight. So Nature through continued distillations by sublimation of the Water, by coho­bation, or by often drawing off the liquour being often poured on, the body doth rectifie and abound it. In these operations of Nature, the Earth is the vessel receiving. Therefore the Region of the Air that is nearer to us, being bounded by the Region of Clouds, as by a vaulted Chamber, is of a greater thickness and impurity than those Regions above.

79. The middle Region of the Air is not that, in which is the gathering [Page 53] of the Clouds, from whence are Lightenings and Thunders, which is onely the higher part of the lower Region, and the border of it: but that which is above the Clouds is to be stiled The Middle Region, whither the watry Being, by reason of its gra­vity, cannot reach, yet whither sul­phureous exhalations, disburthened of the load of their Vapours, do climb up, and there by a motion, either of their own, or anothers, being kindled, burn. Such are the flaming Meteors of divers sorts, which are viewed in the middle Region, whence we may guess, that it abounds with a hot and moist, though not a watry, yet a fat Being, which is the food of fire. In this Region is much peace and a good temperature, because it is not hurryed with the tempests of any wind, and onely the lighter excre­ments of the inferiour Nature are sucked up hither.

80. The higher Region near the Moon is all airy, not fiery, as it hath been taken up, though falsely, in the Schools. There is the peaceable ha­bitation of the purest Air, and as it borders upon the Heavenly Region, [Page 54] so it approcheth it in nature, for it is not defiled with the least [...]mut of the lower Abyss. There is a tem­perature in the highest, a purity but little inferiour to that of the neigh­bouring Heaven. In this place to fancy a sphear of fire, is the shame of a Philosopher, which breaking the Laws of Nature, would have long ere this ruined the Fabrick of the U­niverse.

81. The Fire, as a fourth Element of Nature, was placed in the high­est Region of the Air, as in its pro­per sphear, by the chief Philoso­phers, being led by an argument, from order and by conjecture, rather than truth. For let no man fancy any other fire of Nature than the ce­lestial Light, therefore the blessed Philosopher in his Genesis, makes no mention of fire, because he had be­fore told of the creation of the Light upon the first day, which is the genuine fire of Nature, and tru­ly he would else not have omitted Fire, if it had been a principle of Nature, having specified Earth, Water, and the Fowls of the Hea­vens.

[Page 55] 82. Let not any therefore fancy, unless sleeping, a Region of Fire burning next the Moon, for the whole Air would not be able to bear so great an abundance of intense fire, but it had long ago fed upon, and ruined the whole Fabrick of the World, for whatsoever it falls upon it feeds upon and devours, being the designed ruin of the World and Nature.

83. Such a Devourer of Nature is not lodged as an Element of Nature, neither above the Air, nor below the Earth. Onely he doth tyrannize in the kingdom of Nature, either in the height of the Air, or the depths of the Earth, or else being kindled, upon the superficies of the Earth. Therefore Lullius, a man of a raised wit, did justly account it amongst the Gyants and Tyrants of the World. It may also be termed to be an Enemy to Nature, because whatsoever is de­structive to Nature, is an adversary of Nature.

84. Our common Fire is partly na­tural, partly artificial. It may be man borrowed it for the accommodation of life, and for his necessity, from [Page 56] the Celestial, by an unition of the beams of it, and a multiplication of its vigour, or else by attrition or the collision of two bodies, the Spirit of God suggesting the project to man.

85. The Sovereign Creatour of all things, did place the fiery spirit of a kindly heat in the Globe of the Sun to inspire light, and an enliven­ing heat to the rest of the bodies in the Universe, wherefore many have thought him to be the heart of the whole Fabrick, for from him springs the principle of all generation and life. He that searcheth for any other Element of fire in the world, doth shut his own eyes against the Sun.

86. The source therefore of the Fire of Nature, is seated in the Sun, whose heat is always of an equality, and temperate in it self, though it be felt by us either greater or less, according to his appropinquation or distance, or according to his direct or oblique beams, or according to the scituation or nature of places. The Sun hath been elevated by most Philosophers, as the Soul of the World, breathing in motion, and a [Page 57] faculty of generation to Nature.

87. The Sun is not the Eye of the World, as some Ancients term­ed it, but is the Eye of the Creatour of the World, by which he doth sensibly view his sensible creatures, by which he conveys to them the sweetly-affecting beams of his love, by which he renders himself view­able to them: For scarcely could a sensible Nature have comprehended an insensible Creatour, therefore he formed for himself, and us so noble a body roab'd in his own glory, whose rays, that nearest approach Divinity, are Spirit and Life.

88. From that universal Principle of life, all the in-bred heat of Ele­ments or mixed Beings is derived, which hath gotten to be called by the name of Fire, for wheresoever a free heat, a natural motion or life lodges, there Nature hath hidden Fire, as the principle of them, and the first mover of the Elements, by which the sensible Elements, or the Portions of the World are element­ated, and receive their animations, yet doth it cleave close to the womb of the Earth, being bound up by [Page 58] the Earths density and coldness, ex­citing an Antiperistasis.

89. That Fire of Nature which is seated in mixt bodies, hath chosen the radical moisture, as its proper seat, the principal residence of which is in the heart (although it be diffu­sed through all the parts of the bo­dy) as in the prime organ of life, and the centre of this little world, whence that Prince of Nature, as commanding from its Castle, doth move concordantly all the faculties, and the rest of the organs, and doth in-breathe life to the humours of the mixed Being, to the spirits, and fi­nally to the whole Elementary Mass. And being the Sun, and Vicegerent of the Sun doth act all in this lit­tle, that the Sun doth in that large World.

90. As the Sun, being in the mid­dest of the rest of the Planets, doth enlighten them with his light, re­plenish them with his influential vir­tues, beget an harmony of life by his enlivening spirit, so doth the so­lar spirit in the middle of the Ele­mentary Nature, giveth it an influen­tial light, and gathers the Elements [Page 59] together in the work of Generation and doth unite and enliven them.

91. The first Agent in the World is the Fire of Nature, which being seated in the Globe of the Sun, doth diffuse that vivifical heat by means of his rays, through all the domini­ons of Nature, working in the seeds a power of activity, and setling in them the principle of motion and action, at the removal of which all motion ceaseth, and also the faculty of life and action.

92. The heat of Nature, and the light of Nature, are really one and the same, for they have a continual and uniform effluence from the same Fountain, i. the Sun, but are distin­guished by their office, for the heat is to penetrate into the most inward parts of Nature, but light is to ma­nifest, and open the outward parts: the office of heat is to move the oc­cult Natures of things, that of light, to set before the eyes sensible acci­dents: both of these is wrought by the rays of the Sun. The Sun there­fore is the first Organ of Nature, by whose approach or distance, all the operations of Nature are variously [Page 60] governed, intended, or remitted, by means of light and heat.

93. The second universal Agent is that same light; not so immediately issuing from the Fountain, but refle­cted from solid bodies, inlightened by it as the heavenly, yea, the Earth it self: for the light of the Sun beat­ing upon those bodies, gives a mo­tion to their dispositions and facul­ties, and alters them, and diffuseth their several and different virtues by the reflection of his rays, through the whole frame of Heaven and of our Air: for by those rays, as by so many conveyances, are the various effects of several bodies dispersed every where for the benefit and harmony of Nature, which are called by us Influences. These are the true and first Elements of Nature, which be­cause they are spiritual, do commu­nicate themselves to us under some airy, or also some watry Nature, to whose good act, as to the roots of the Elements, we are beholding for the gift of every birth, and of all life.

94. Love, styled by Plato the El­dest of the gods, was breath'd into na­ture, [Page 61] begotten by the Divine Spirit, and hath the place of a Genius in her dispositions. In the first Division of the World, betwixt the first brothers, she gave the judgement for the par­titions of their families, and after had alwayes the Praefecture in Gene­ration.

95. The God of Nature did fix the first bond of Love in the things of Nature, between the first Matter and the universal Form, the Heaven and the Earth, Light and Darkness, Plenty and Poverty, Beauty and De­formity. The second degree of Love from the first couple, which is as it were the loving embraces of the Pa­rents, issued into the Elements, which having a fraternal tye to bind them, have divided betwixt them the whole right of Nature. The third and last degree, is compleated in mixed bo­dies, which excites them by the in-born and in-bred sparkles of love, to a propagation and multiplication of their like. The Divine Love hath appointed this treble Love-knot, as a kind of Magical tye, that it might de­liver it self by traduction into all and every part of his workmanship. Love [Page 62] is the Base of the Universe, the Cube of Nature, and the fastening bond of things above and below.

96. Let those avaunt therefore, who do attribute the concordant mo­tions of Nature to Discord; for Na­ture is peaceable and pleasant in all her workings, yea, she is delightfully tickled in her actings. The very E­lements of things in their coition are wholly lost in love, that they may knit themselves together by their mutual embraces, and of many be made one.

97. Let the Academies stand up, and tell us how the first Matter can be the first subject of contraries, and how Love can lye amongst the brawl­ings and jarres of Enmity! or that eager appetite, which the Prince of Philosophers acknowledgeth residing in the heart of this Matter,Cap. 9. l. 1. De Mat. whereby it doth as earnestly lust for its form, as a man for a woman? Will not those enemies, constituting the seeds of Beings and the mixt bodies, by their eternal food, at length force Love and Concord to yield to their ruine.

98. They that placed a lust be­tween [Page 63] the Matter and the Form, and yet an hatred and repugnancy in the Matter it self, and in the Elements, in making these contraries, have made themselves so: for according to the dictates of their School, the Soul in all things generated (onely man ex­cepted) is brought forth out of the power and privy virtue of the Mat­ter: But how can this be without love? If the Matter radically doth lye under the dissentions of contra­ries, must not the Form, which springs from her very root, feel the same por­tion? Nay, would it not be stifled by them in its first birth and cradle? What man therefore that stood right in his wits, would acknowledge the rule of these bandetties, to be chief in the nuptials of Love and Nature, in the very juncture of the mixture of the Elements, and of the informati­on of the Matter? Yea, who would expect an uniform, and not a mon­strous issue from the heterogeneous seed of opposite parents?

99. Let therefore the Philosopher surcease to place the cause of the al­teration of Elements, of the corru­ption and failing of mixt beings in [Page 62] [...] [Page 63] [...] [Page 64] the repugnancy of the Elements, but rather lay the fault upon the penuri­ous weakness of the first matter. For in the first Chaos.

It is indeed the Vulgar conceit that there was, whereas onely two, no way contrary, of those four qualities, to wit, Cold and Moisture, agreed to the female, & the matter, and were in it: The other two, which are Heat and Drought, which are masculine and formal qualities, came forth out of the part of the informing light. And the Earth was not called Drie Land before the drawing off the Wa­ters, and the coming on of the light Being, which was first moist and covered with Waters.

100. Therefore certainly reason it self doth evidence, that those four qualities, which by the Vulgar are ac­counted repugnant, are not extant in the first matter, unless after infor­mation. And lest she might endure some contrariety in its solitude, she had other diseases, to wit, Darkness, [Page 65] Confusion, Deformity, Coldness, & an indigested Moisture, with an impoten­cy, which are all evidences of a diseas'd and languishing body: Therefore being infected from its creation with that corruption, it derived it down to its posterity, lodged in this lowest and weakest Region of the elements. Therefore it is not set down in Gene­sis of that Abyss of Darkness, that it was very good, but reserv'd that grace­full Elogie for the Light, and for the rest that were created.

101. But who is there that hath the least dram of knowledge, will conceive that this contentious repug­nancy did flow from the form into the matter, after the union of the four qualities in the matter being in­formed? Since it is essential to and the intent of the form, to adde a per­fection to the matter, and compleat­ly to perfect it into an harmony and consent, and a temperament accord­ing to its ability.

102. The first contraries through opposing qualities, were Light and Darkness; Light hath two qualities Heat and Drougth; Darkness as ma­ny, Cold and Moisture, wholly op­posite [Page 66] each to other, because of their intention. But after those two aged principles of Nature came together, and the dark material and female principle was informed by the light­som, formal and masculine principle, and impregnated by the light, the whole matter of the Universe; and all the Regions thereof received this priviledge of light, though distinct in the degrees and differences: for that fiery tincture of the Spirit of light left nothing unpierced, and the four qualities also at first being in their highest degree, were brought down to a remission in the informed matter, and so closing sweetly, con­tracted a fast friendship, and consent­ed to a temperature: and so being made friendly, they were entered in­to the homogeneous family of the Ele­ments, that so there might nothing of repugnancy or enmity lurk in the generation of mixt bodies, where­by the pleasing motion of Nature might be disturbed.

103. Neither in nature are those four qualities contrary one to an­other, but onely divers and unlike one to another, neither do they ruin, [Page 67] but unite into a firm league one with another: So Heat and Cold in a re­miss degree, do amicably agree and commix in one and the same subject, that a middle and temperate quali­ty, to wit, a lukewarness might be produced. But if in the intense de­gree they couple not without a fight and combat, this proceeds from the excess and tyranny of the intension, which cannot endure two qualities e­qually heightened and adverse, to be partners and sharers of one and the same Sovereignty, but there will fall out a tumult. But indeed Nature cast­eth out intense qualities, as bastards and strangers.

104. Let not therefore any fancy that Nature admits fire intense into the family of her Elements, for such a fire would be fit for destruction, not generation, would not be accor­ding to, but against Nature, which avoids violent things, and delights in a temperature, in which is no fight­ing, no contrariety. For the Rule of Nature cannot away with the rage of a scorching heat, or a wasting cold, or the distemper of moist and drie, but doth pleasingly lye down in a [Page 68] composed temperature. Let not any therefore search for the intense qua­lities in the Elements of things; he will find them in them either less or more remitted.

105. He is deceived therefore who says that hot and cold, moist and drie, are simple contraries. For the Earth, which by Aristotle is laid down as drie in the highest, should always quarrel with the Air, which is said by him to be moist in the highest: Also Water that is cold in the highest, according to his opinion, should be opposite to Fire, that is hot in the highest: and this repugnancy would inclose by force every one of the common Ele­ments, or every Region of the World within the verge of its sphear, and by reason of this antipathie, would destroy all hospitality betwixt them. But we are convinced of the contra­ry, both by reason and experience. For ditches and all hollow places un­der the Earth, yea, the very bowels and pores of the Earth are replenish­ed with Air, and the intrinsical moi­sture of the Earth, by which, as with their mothers milk, all Vegetables are nourished, is nothing else but an [Page 69] hot and moist Air, cleaving close to the Earth, and handing it as a nur­sive and nourishing faculty: the pores of the Earth are the dugs, and the airy moisture the milk, by which, she, the Mother and Nurse of things, doth nourish her off-springs, and give them growth.

106. They, who settle four Ele­ments in as many humours, do grant, that Nature being moist, is receive­able, yea, is the subject of four Ele­mentary qualities: how then can they hold a contrariety in them, which they place in one and the same sub­ject? For though those four humours are distinguished by their respective differences, yet have they but one base, one common root to all, to wit, Humour: for yellow choller which resembles fire, is no less an humour than flegm, which resembles water: and the same may be said of adust Choller and Bloud, although they do not absolutely, but comparatively confound the four Elements in a moist Being.

107. If there were any repugnan­cy in the qualities and elements of Nature, the greatest would be be­twixt [Page 70] hot and cold, and so betwixt Water and Fire, but the nature of these are not adversary, many gene­rations which are under the Waters, do evidence: for wheresoever there is any generation or life, there must be fire, as the nearest intrinsical, effici­ent, moving and altering cause of the matter for generation:

108. There fore certainly he will be in the right, who shall acknow­ledge those four first qualities, in­born and essential to the things them­selves, and to their Elements, to be apt to a mixture by the direction of Nature, and not contrary, for they are as it were four Organs or instru­ments which Nature makes use of in the perfecting of her alterations and generations.

109. Nature sets up a Potters trade, for she is wholly taken with making [Page 71] her matter circular, these four quali­ties are as the wheels, by which she doth by degrees and wisely inform her works through a circular and slow motion.

110. Of those four Wheels, two, viz, those of Moist and Drie, are most agreeable to the matter, because Na­ture doth turn and work the matter between these two: those two qua­lities are nearest the matter, because more subject to be passive, and to a change. But the other two, to wit, of Hot and Cold, are more of action, because by their turns they alter and change the former; these are passive, those active, & are as it were the active instruments of Nature, working upon her passive matter.

111. Let us therefore cast off that tenent of Contraries, as contrary to natures concord, and dash out it with a pen of iron, with the good leave of learning, from the depraved table of Philosophy, and let us in the room of it, inscribe the Symbole of Con­cord, which Nature doth acknow­ledge of the same standing with her self, by whose help the delightfull copulation of actives with passives [Page 72] is procured in every Generation.

112. Those, who according to the flying opinion do stand for four Ele­ments contrary each to other, do ne­cessarily introduce a fifth, as the knot or bond-tye of concord, as the Peace-maker, otherwise they could not receive any perfect mixture, or any temperature in the work of ge­neration, but without a rudder or a ruler would float a drift through the vast Ocean of Nature, never able to reach a port, or bring forth a birth: and so would they cheat the com­mon Genius of Nature of her proper end.

113. For these four being acknow­ledged by reason of their repugnant qualities to keep up an eternal war betwixt themselves, cannot be uni­ted or appeased in the generation of mixt Beings, but rather with their mutual conflict rushing in, will pro­cure an Abort, than a birth in Na­ture, unless their contrary actings be composed to a peaceable love by the part of some fifth heavenly and tempering Nature, which may intro­duce a temperature void of Hot and Cold, Drie and Moist.

[Page 73] 114. That fifth Element, as they call it, or heavenly and incorruptible Spirit, springing from the light, mo­tion, and virtue of the heavenly bo­dies upon these lower Beings, and preparing the Elements for motion and life, and stopping from ruin par­ticular individuals, as far as their set­ledness will permit, hath merited the name of the salt Nature, the tie of the Elements, the Spirit of the world, to be given it by the searchers of oc­cult Philosophie.

115. If there were any contrariety between the principles of things, certainly it was between Light and Darkness, by reason of their opposite qualities, but those qualities were tempered by the coition of both prin­ciples, and from the extreams be­came a middle temper, and such were they when they dislodged from the first, and went into the second prin­ciples or Elements.

116 The extreams are contrary each to other, onely by reason of the inten­sion of their opposite qualities, but those things that spring from the mixture of these extreams are not [...]dverse, because they are of a mid­dle [Page 74] nature, and the [...]fflux of the uni­on of the two extreams, to wit, of Light and Darkness.

117. That out of the mixture of Contraries, to wit, of Light and Dark­ness, do not come contraries forth but in a temperature, is plain by that of the Kingly Prophet, breaking forth into these words of the Eternal Light, Psal. 18. He bowed the Heavens and came down, and Darkness was under his feet, &c. He made Darkness his Covert, his Pa­vilion in the middest of it, &c. The very fountain of Eternal Light, that he might exhibit the brightnes of his infinite glory to mortal eyes, did wrap it up in a cloud and dark mask, and brought the Darkness to the Light, that he might make of the two Extreams a moderate light, and so al­lay the splendour of so great a light, as was not to be gazed on without the ruin of the Spectatour; yea, Philo­sophers do affirm, the Rain-bow that was given by God as a sign and token of a Covenant made with man, to be produced out of a mixture of Light and Darkness, that so that Symbole of the temperature of Gods wrath, existing out of contraries, might be [Page 75] tempered of various coherent and friendly colours.

118. Those that have delivered that the Earth, Water, Air and Fire, in their sphears are distinct Elements of the World, and are turned each into other, by mutual reciprocati­on, did but slightly look into the depths of Nature; for it is more safe to call them the compleating parts of Nature, or the Shops of the Ele­ments: for the Elements of the world do not lye under our view or senses, as separated in their proper Regions, but do lye hid and keep close in their wombs, till they come together in the generation of mixt bodies, and make up a body. But those parts of the World, as so far mutually dif­ferent, can never have a conversion in them, neither can that one com­mon quality, whereby those natures are linked together, beget such a change, that out of things of a diverse, should be formed a like nature, yea, that they should be turned into the same.

119. If those four Elements as­serted by them, do change and barter their rooms, natures and offices, all [Page 76] the compact frame of the World, de­voted to a chance and motion, would be in a perpetual fluctuation, which we know is established by God in a certain and constant order and scite, and distinction of parts: For Earth will quickly be made Water, Water Air, Air Fire, and so backward, and by this the Centre shall run out to Circumference, and the Circumfer­ence run into the Centre, the far­thest and the middle parts of the World, shall of their own accord re­move out of their places, that so af­ter a long time the order of Nature shall be inverted, whilest the top and the bottom, and the bottom and the top change places, and clash toge­ther. He who doth fancy this so fair composure of a World, doth not de­serve to have so fine a piece termed a World, but a Chaos, an Abyss, which Nature, a friend to Order, doth abso­lutely detest.

120. They which do say that those extream bodies of the lower World, Earth and Fire, (supposing, not grant­ing a sphear of Fire) are turned into each other, do wrong themselves and truth too. For their distant and re­pugnant [Page 77] natures do disagree from such a change, for the heightened cold, thickness, and gravity of the Earth are so opposite to the same de­gree or heat, subtility, and levity in Fire, that they can never be brought to change. Besides, the Earth, a fix­ed body, will not yield to fire, but slighteth its virtue, if we may believe the opinions of Chymists and com­mon experience, neither doth any thing flie out from it, but a fat and warry humour, both of them not na­tural to the Earth: but if any thing is to be turned into elementary Fire, it must necessarily be light and vola­tile, that it may be translated into its Orb and Nature. The Earth therefore being most weighty, and so the Centre of all, being most fixt, and so least volatile, how can it be turn­ed into Fire, and be carried up into the Sphear of Fire, or how can Fre, the highest and lightest of all, be beaten down to be essentially united with the Earth, contrary to the laws of Nature? It were a more easie conversion of Water and Fire, be­cause they are nearer by one degree than Earth and Fire.

[Page 78] 121 They that believed, the ex­halations from the region of the earth drawn up into the Air, and because kindled there, to be earthie, and converted into the Element of Fire, are far out of the way of truth, for they are not earthie, but rather airie natures: for our Air being moist, through the contagion of water lying in the drie bosom of the Earth, gather a fatness, and by the consortship of the Earth, doth temper the moist with the drie, but when it exhales through the pores and crevises of the Earth being drawn by heat, or else the abundance of the matter forcing out, it breaks not forth out of its pri­son without a noise & crack, whence proceed earth-quakes and openings not without much ruin; that exha­lation, got loose, doth flie up into the region proper to light bodies, and there is set on fire, being digested by its errant motion and heat, more ful­ly into a sulphureous matter. There­fore that matter is not truly earthie, since it is neither ponderous nor cold, but because it is made fat and combustible by the concourse of hot, drie, and moist; it may more proper­ly [Page 79] be called the accidental food of fire, than the Fire of Nature, or the Elementarie Fire. That is a bastard, a spurious generation, which for that very reason ought not to have been placed amongst the natures, or been called by the names of Elements; therefore these Firings are rightly called by Aristotle, imperfectly-mix­ed things. The same we must con­ceive of the smoke of combustibles: For Smoke being unctious, doth quickly take fire, which is nothing else but smoke kindled.

122 Fire feeds upon fat and uncti­ous matter, but the fat moisture of the Air is contempered with drought, whence we often may see a sulfure­ous matter, extrinsecally drie and terminated with drought, as our or­dinarie sulfur, gun-powder, and the like; which though they seem to be outwardly drie, do close within them a fat moisture, and upon the firing are resolved into it.

123 And truly they slip to pur­pose, that have taken an opinion, see­ing stones and heavie bodies some­times generated in the Air, and shot down thence by lightnings, thunders, [Page 80] and breaking of the clouds, that the Fire turns to a stone, or is converted into earth, or have a conceit, that the Earth is carried up thither. This is done far otherwise; for that hardened matter was never fire or earth, nor proceeded from the Orb of Fire (if there be any) or from the bodie of the earth, but an unctious and viscous humour, in a manner clayish, shut up in a cloud as in a fornace, is so hard­ened and decocted, as an earthen ves­sel by the heat of the burning exha­lations, that it turns a stone: Hence proceed those darted Thunder-bolts. Such meteors as these are the wens, weaknesses, and diseases of Nature, not Elements. In the same, though after a slower manner, is the stone ge­nerated in the bodie out of flegm in the reins or bladder. For the Micro­cosm hath also his meteors.

124 The fire of nature is far dif­ferent from our artificial or acciden­tal fire. The fire of nature is double, either Universal and Particular, or Individual. The Universal is diffused through all the parts of the Universe, doth sweetly excite and move the propensive virtues of the celestial [Page 81] bodies, doth impregnate and supply with engendering seed this Globe of ours, designed for the generation of things; doth infuse virtues into the seeds; doth untwist the intangled power of nature; mingles the Ele­ments; informs the Matter; and fi­nally doth unlock the secret of Na­ture: but the fountain of it is in the Sun, who as the Heart of the World doth stream forth his enlivening heat as his love through all regions. But the particular Fire of Nature, is in-born and in-bred in every mixed bo­die, and individual, which flows as a rivulet from that General, and doth work all things in this Microcosm or little World MAN, according to an Analogie with the Sun in the Ma­crocosm or greater World. But who is there that would not stile our com­mon fire, being an opposite of all ge­neration, living onely upon prey, subsisting upon the ruins of other Beings, the destruction of life, depu­ting all things to ashes, rather a foe than a friend to nature, its enemie, not its inmate; and rather the ruin than the raising of Life? But those fires that are bred in the Airie regi­on, [Page 82] are rather engendred by chance, than by any intention of Nature.

125 Neither are those two bodies of the Earth and Water, situated next one to the other, convertible each into the other, but onely by reason of their neighbourhood are mingled together; so that the Water washeth the Earth, and the Earth thickens the Water; and hence is made Clay, being a bodie of neither, but a middle betwixt both; which if resolved by the force of fire, will se­parate it self into both these natures. The water flying out, the earth set­tles: neither will there be any con­version of each into the other, for that cannot be effected by that single common qualitie of cold, since the driness and moisture are not less powerful to resist, than the mutual consent of cold can bring them to a conversion. Besides the driness and fixation of the Earth, are quite op­posite to the moist and volatile na­ture of the Water, so there is but one qualitie agreeing to an alteration, and many disagreeings, which will pre­vail in the combate. Besides, here is the help of nature always readie [Page 83] to conserve it self, and doth never in­cline, unless upon force and conquest to its ruin or change.

126 We may guess the whole Globe of the Earth, not to be of a less settled nature than the Heaven, the Moon, or the Stars; for it, if it be the centre of the World, as it is ge­nerally received, then certainly the constancie is not less necessary to it than to the rest of the bodies of the World. Besides the earth is the same without any essential immutation of what it was from the beginning, and what it will be to the end of ages. But if it did suffer any notable detri­ment by the universal deluge in the general, or any accidental in particu­lar, as by some chasme, or by the breakings in of rivers, or the Sea; this falls out by the supream order of him that doth change at list, the laws of the whole and every region: or by the discordant harmonie of the World, or by some disease of some distem­pered nature, rather than by any pro­pensiveness or viciousness of the Earth. For all the bodies of the Universe do lie under their burdens and diseases, although they be diver­sified [Page 84] according to the disagreement of Nature, and difference of perfecti­on, yet the accidents do not change the nature and constancie of them in respect of the whole. Absolute con­stancie and impassibilitie do onely suit to God alone: but the Heaven, Water, Earth, and the rest of the bo­dies of the Universe shall stand firm, in regard of their essence to the de­signed period of their age.

127 If any one of those four na­tures have a propensitie to conversi­on, it will be strongest in the mean qualities; for Water and Air are joyn­ed in greater affinitie between them­selves than with the rest, or the o­thers amongst themselves. For they seem not to differ so much in their qualities, as in the intension and re­mission of them, not so much natural­ly as accidentally. For since Water doth by a right of nature challenge to it self moisture and coldness, it doth also communicate them to the lower region of the Air by way of commerce, (for Air obtains no pro­per qualitie almost besides the high­est tenuitie, yet capable of receiving the rest, therefore is it of an heavenly [Page 85] nature, being of it self most tempe­rate, and not addict to any proper qualitie, doth readily receive and-despence the dispositions, influences, and virtues of the heavenly bodies.) Densitie and raritie, which in a remiss degree are of kin, seem to make the principal difference between Water and our Air; for which reason God is said in Genesis, to have separated the Waters from the Waters; as if by reason of the unity of their nature, it seemed more truely to be a divisi­on of their situation, than a mutation in respect of their essence.

128 Yet these bordering natures, do not entertain any true and essen­tial reciprocation, but onely accord­ing to some respect, not altogether changed, but after some manner▪ and this change is acted in the lower regi­on of the Air, which is bound in by the cover of the clouds, and reacheth not the middle, much less the highest region. Water being rarified into a vapour flies up, and is rather raised then turned into Air; and that vapour condensed doth resolve, and fall down again. The ancients, being led by the legerdemain of sence, [Page 86] more than the light of reason, con­ceived this circulation, and returning into it self of one and the same na­ture, to be the turning of nature into another: but it is found to be other­wise by those that have and use a sharp insight into the depths of Na­ture. He is also deceived that shall call the Air simply a thin Vapour, because a Vapour is a middle and im­perfect bodie betwixt the two Wa­ters, those above, and these below, betwixt our Water and Air, yet it is neither of them, because although it rarifie, yet will it never be heighten­ed to the great degree of the nobi­litie of the Air. It may be made a spurious but never a pure Air: neither will the refined nature of the Air be so depressed and fall from its puritie▪ as to thicken into a vapour, cloud, or Water. For the right of Nature ne­ver got that first separation of the Waters, which was really and actual­ly done by that Architect spirit, and that the established bounds of the parts of the World, which God hath sealed with an indelible signature, should either be blurred or removed by any new confusion.

[Page 87] 129 But those that dive deeper into things, will acknowledge the Earth to be the womb of the World, the vessel of Generation, the mother of a multiplied, and almost number­less issue, which being rescued in the beginning of the Creation from the power of the cover­ing Waters, and priviledged to it self, was made and remained drie land; and her bodie being condensed, sunk to the foundation and the cen­tre of the whole, and spread out her lap as a Parent to all vegetables, and all other creatures; yet did she want moisture, whereby she might be made apt for a fruitful generation. Gods providence set out a remedie for this exigence: Therefore from the beginning was the water made volatile, that so it might be carried up in vapours, which being frozen by cold in this cloud, might by heat be thawed again into Waters. By this master-piece of Divine providence, was this exigence of the Earth sup­plied, and that driness, which threat­ened barrenness, was tempered with a large moisture, and the womb of our mother conceived. Therefore [Page 88] onely Water hath the circulation, to the intent that it might moisten the bosom of the Earth, or more tru­ly it is distilled in the lower region of the Air as in its Alembick; that so by often pouring in, and reiterated distillations, it being abounded, and having gotten virtues both from a­bove and below, and endued with that celestial Nectar, it might more effectually soften the bosom of the Earth, and endue it with a prolifical virtue. The chief worker of all, who maketh use of the art of Nature, hath added nothing superfluous to his work, nor left any thing defective in it.

130 But the Water being the menstruum of the World, doth che­rish and contain in it the seeds of things and their elements; but she having this circulation, the true and genuine Elements of things which are in the Earth, as in the matrix and vessel of Generation; and in the Wa­ter, as in the menstruum, are also whirled about. In the vapour there­fore, are the Elements of the Earth, the Water, and the Air, & have their sublimation, and exuberation with it. [Page 89] They are not the bodies of Earth, Water, and Air, which have their pro­per sphears, and constitute the sever­al Regions of the World, but they are the very spiritual Elements of Nature, which lye hid and inhabit in them, out of which many bodies, as stones may be generated and excoct­ed in the Air. For where all the E­lements well mixt, do meet, as they do in a vapour, there bodies may be generated; but when they find not a convenient matrix, as in the Air, there are ingendered imperfect mixtures, not by reason of any fault in the mix­ture, but in the Matrix.

131. The Water being seated as middle, betwixt the Earth and the Air, doth trouble both it by its flow­ing, and always moving inconstancy, infesting the Air with a black soote, and noisom vapours, and often drow­ning the Earth by flouds; causing tempests in the Air, ruines to the Earth, and corruption to both; and it doth assault the Region of the one with its levity, and of the other with its gravity; and doth cross the order of Nature, and the nature of Times by its defect or excess, yea, doth [Page 90] shake all her borderers with her ter­rible claps and tumultuous ragings. Her nature being altogether female▪ the supream Creatour seems to have bestowed her on the World in the nature of a Woman, or a necessary Evil, even so doth she arrogate all things as subject to her, and turns those things that were given her for a general good, to a publick ruin. Fi­nally, it is the scourge of divine Ju­stice, revenging Nemeses, which be­ing designed to the vengeance of sin, doth break out to punish, and sets the hopes and wealth of many the very roots of pride, under several shapes of judgements, the scoff and blast of the world.

132. The universal Natures, the more thick they are, the more im­pure, the more endued with tenuity; the more purity. The Earth, because more thick than Water, therefore is less noble, and so Water than Air; and Air than Heaven: and so the highest Region of the Heavens is the most noble, because it is most subtile. For it is an undoubted truth, that spiritual Natures are more excellent than corporeal, and the more bor­dering [Page 91] upon the spiritual Natures, the more they draw nigh to perfe­ction.

133. The foundation of Genera­tion and Corruption is in Moisture, for in both the travails of Nature, Moisture, of all the Elements, is the first patient, receiving the first seal of the form. The natural Spirits are easily united with it, because flowing from it, do lightly return to it, be­cause the root of them, in that, and by that, are the rest of the Elements mixed. The moist Element hath its circulation no less in mixed and indi­vidual bodies, than in the World, both in the work of Generation and of Nutrition, for it was Natures plea­sure, that both these works should be performed by the same instruments of condensation and rarefaction, and by the same means, to wit, Spirits.

134. The Earth is the Vessel of Generation, Water the menstruum of Nature, containing in it the formal and seminal virtues, which it borrows from the Sun, the male and the form­al universal Principle; from him is de­rived into all things the influence of the fire of Nature, and of formal Spi­rits, [Page 92] in which are all things necessa­ry for generation, the in-bred heat being wrapt up in the moist: There­fore Hippocrates did rightly affirm, That these two Elements,Lib. 1. de Diae­ia. Fire and Water, could do all, contained all things in them: For from them do issue two masculine qualities of Hot and Drie, from the other two more of Cold and Moist, being the female qualities, which so concurring and mixing, perfect the generation of mixed bodies. Over those two prin­cipal Elements, the two greater Lights were set, the Sun the authour of Fire, and the Moon the Lady of Moisture.

135. Nature perfects the circula­tion of the volatile Element, by a three-fold action or instrument, by Sublimation, Demission or Refusion, and by Decoction, which stand in need of a divers temperament. So doth the rightly ordered intention of Nature, wandering through vari­ous motions, directeth her interrupt­ed actions to their designed end, and attaineth the same mark, though it trades through divers wayes.

136 Sublimation is the conversion [Page 93] of a moist and a ponderous nature, into a light, or the exhalation of it into a vapour. The end and benefit of it is three-fold: First, that a gross and impure body might be munde­fied by attenuation, and might by degrees be drawn off the dregs; then that by sublimation it might gain the higher virtues, which continually flow down. Lastly, that by such an evacuation the Earth might be dis­burthened of its superfluous and loa­ding humours, which seizing upon its passages, do hinder the action of the heat, and the free pass of the na­tural spirits, yea, do violently choak them. This drawing away of the su­perfluous moisture, takes away the cause of obstructions, and gives ease to the squeazy stomach of the Earth, and makes it more fit for digestion.

137. But the Moisture is sublimat­ed by the impulsive operation of heat. For Nature useth her fire as its proper instrument for rarefaction of moist bodies. Therefore the Va­pours that generates Clouds & Rain, are most frequently drawn up in the Fall and Spring, because then the womb of the Earth doth more a­bound [Page 94] with hot and moist; now Moi­sture is the material, and Heat the ef­ficient cause of exhalations. Nature doth shew a kind of intense heat in sublimation, whilest it is bound in within the terms and latitude of tem­perature.

138. Demission is the second wheel of Nature; in the work of Circulation is the returning of the spirituous Va­pour into a gross and watry body: or the Refusion of a rarefied and subli­mated humour, being again conden­sed, and its descent into Earth, that it may dilute it of its exuberant li­quour, and suck it up by a sweet and celestial draught.

139. Nature doth intend three things by irrigation. First, that it might not pour out, but by degrees distil its abundant humour, lest there fall out a gulf, and by the abund­ance of water, the passage for the vi­vifical spirit in the bowels of the earth be dammed up, and the intrinsecal heat of the Earth be extinguished, for that wise and righteous Governess doth dispense all her benefits in num­ber, weight and measure. Secondly, that it might distribute the humour [Page 95] by divers drops, and by a various manner, to wit, a Rain sometimes larger, sometimes less, sometimes a dew, sometimes a hoar frost, some­times pouring out a greater, some­times a less plenty, that so it might water the Earth according to its ap­petite or necessity, thirsting for more or less. Thirdly, that these irrigati­ons or waterings may be not continu­al, but by turns and betwixt other works; for the Sun doth in its course succeed the Showers, and the Show­ers in theirs the Sun, the day the night, and the night the day.

140. The lightest Cold or the de­parting Heat, doth unloose and make fit to fall those vapours that are brought up into the middle Region, and there frozen. For an immode­rate heat doth dissipate and hinders their condensation, and an intense heat doth so knit and freeze them, that they cannot produce a humour that may be fit to fall down.

141. The last wheel or action of the Circulation of Nature, is Deco­ction, which is nothing else but the digestion, ripening, and conversion into aliment of a crude humour in­stilled [Page 96] on the bosom of the Earth. This seemeth to be the end and the scope of the others, because it is the release of their labour, and a recei­ving of the food, attained by the former labours. For that crude hu­mour, by force of that internal heat, is chewed, concocted, and digested by it, being as it were without motion and in a trance, silently and without noise, moving that secret fire as the proper instrument of Nature, that it may turn that crude liquour temper­ed with driness into a food. This is the compleat circle of Nature, which she rowls round by various degrees of labour and heat.

142 These three operations of Nature are so knit together, and have such a relation each to the other, that the beginning of the one is the end of the other, and according to Na­tures intention, they do in a neces­sary order succeed one another by turns. And the orders of these vicisti­tudes, are so interwoven and linkt to­gether, as that combining to the good of the whole, they do in their opera­tions prove serviceable each to other.

143 Yet Nature is forcedly some­times [Page 97] drawn out of her bounds and verges, and ranges in an uncertain path, especially in the guidance of the moist Element, whose orders be­ing interrupted do deceive, and they do easily as well as suffer wrong, by reason of the inconstancy of its vola­tile and flitting nature, as also by rea­son of the various disposition of the superiour bodies, which do bend these things below, especially Moist­ure, and draw them from their setled track, according to the beck of the Sovereign Moderatour, who doth use them as Organs and Instruments to the motion of the frame of the Uni­verse. Hence is raised the deceitfull and inconstant temperature of this our Mansion, and the changed seasons of the year. So doth the womb of the Earth, being diversly affected, bring forth either more plentifully or more sparingly, generous or castling births. So doth the bordering Air being either pure or impure, produce either health or sickness, the moist Nature rowling and tossing all things amongst us.

144 The Rule of our Heavens is uncertain and deceitful to us, because [Page 98] things below receive their orders from things above, whose natures and affections are for the most part un­known to us, yet let the Philosopher set always before his eyes the inten­tion rather than the action of Nature, the order rather than the disturbance of the order.

145 We may observe the volubi­lity or flittingness of the moist Na­ture, not onely in the general harmo­ny of the World, but also in the par­ticular of mixed Beings. For they are generated by the revolution of Moisture, they are nourished and grow by drying, moistening, and dige­sting; wherefore those three opera­tions of nature are resembled to food, drink, and sleep, because meat answers to driness, drink to moisture, and sleep to concoction.

146 Lest man should dream fan­cies to himself, glory in divers privi­ledges, assume to himself as proper onely to him the name of Microcosm, or the Worlds lesser draught, be­cause there are discernable in his ma­terial workmanship, an Analogie of all the natural motions of the Micro­cosm, or the larger Volume of the [Page 99] World, let him consider that every creature, even a worm, that every plant, even the weed of the Sea, is a lesser world, having in it an epitome of the greater. Therefore let man seek for a world out of himself, and he shall find it every where, for there is one and the same first Copy of all creatures, out of which were made infinite worlds of the same matter, yet in form differenced. Let therefore man share humility and lowliness of spirit, and attribute to God glory and honour.

147 The inferiour natures are lea­vened by the superiour: But the Wa­ter not enduring delay, doth hast to meet the operations of the 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 [Page 100] 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 [Page 101] 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 [Page 102] 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 [Page 103] 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 [Page 104] 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 [Page 105] 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 multiply [...], 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, [Page 106] doth rise up in a new stalk, and doth bring into it the form of the fo [...]mer.

159 Animals, besides their exist­ence and faculty of 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 [Page 107] 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 [Page 108] 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 [Page 109] 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 [Page 110] 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.

[Page 111] 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 [Page 112] 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 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 [Page 113] 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 [Page 114] 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 [Page 115] 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, [Page 116] 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 [Page 117] 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 [Page 118] 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 [Page 119] of their nature. For they have their vital endowments, their cogni­zances, knowledge, and 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 [Page 120] 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 [Page 121] 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 [Page 122] 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 [Page 123] thus disposed, and gathering and min­gling the wandering Elements, do re­kindle 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 [Page 124] 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 [Page 125] 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 comprehend nothing but what is sensible. But the mind rangeth far abroad beyond the Cloysters of the Senses, and searcheth to a greater height, for the hunting out of the bounds of Nature. The bodies are as it were the barks, the grosser parts of the Elements the accidents of things, [Page 126] under which lye hid the pure and sprightly Essences, which acknow­ledge not the subjection and censure of the Senses, and which it was a ne­cessity to cloth under a dark Cloud, that they might pass from their hea­venly, to their earthly province of the corporeal Beings. The supream Cre­atour of Nature enacted this copula­tion of spirituals with corporeals, whereby his uncreated spirit commu­nicating it self, first to the more spi­ritual and simple Natures, might be conveyed through them, as by so ma­ny conduits, to corporeal Beings, and in this manner diffusing it self gradu­ally and orderly, through all the Re­gions of the World, through all and every Being, doth sustain all things by the Divine presence, as also that by a sensible creature, the insensible CREATOUR might be appre­hended through corporeal and sensi­ble resemblances.

189 Whatsoever lives either an A­nimal or Vegetable life, stands in need of food, that the natural spirits might be recruited, which do continually slide forth through the pores, and that so the loss of Nature might have a [Page 127] successive repair. For the nourishing juice is made by the more succulent substance of the meat, whereby the parts and humours of the body are re-inforced. The radical Moisture is renewed out of the purer portion of the humours, especially of the bloud, the celestial influence intermingling it self by respiration with it.

190 Living things have a two-fold nourishment, to wit, a Corporeal and a Spiritual, the former being of small avail to life without the latter. For Vegetables do evidently referre the benefit of their increase and nourish­ment no less to the Air and Heaven, than to the Earth: yea the Earth it self, unless suckled with the milk of Heaven, would quickly find her own breast to flag drie, this that holy Di­ver into Natures secrets, when he bles­sed Joseph, Deut. cap. 33. doth thus express: Blest be the Lord for his Earth, for the apples of Heaven, for the Dew, and for the Deep that coucheth beneath, for the pleasant apples of the Sun and of the Moon, for the top of the everlasting Mountains, for the fruits of the eternal Hills, &c. By which mystical speech, the Prophet fore-ensureth the Earths [Page 128] plenty, by the abundant influence of the Sun, Moon, and of the rest of the celestial bodies.

191 That spiritual Diet, as far as it conduceth to the life of creatures, is acknowledged by every vulgar ca­pacity, that sees the renewed respira­tion, and the frequent sucking in of the external Air. For not onely ac­cording to the opinion of ordinary Physicians, hath Nature so workman­like framed those bellows, bordering upon the heart to cool it, but also that by their continued fanning, they might breath in an aethereal Air, and hand to it celestial spirits, that so by their recruits the vital spirits may be kept in repair, and be alwayes mul­tiplied.

192 Philosophers do not onely call those spiritual Natures, which being created without matter, are onely comprehended by the Understand­ing, as the intelligencies, Angels▪ and Devils are accounted to be: but also those that, which although they have their original from matter, yet in re­spect of their great tenuity & nobility, do not subject themselvs to the search of the Senses, and nearer approching [Page 129] to spiritual Beings, are rather under stood by reason, than found by sense Such is the pure part of the Air, such are the influencies of heavenly bo­dies, such the in-set fire and seminal virtues, such the vegetable spirits, such the animal, and the vital, and the like, in which consists the very nature of Beings, than in grosser bodies. Such like natures spring from Heaven, and in relation to sensibles, do assume to themselves the name and right of spirits.

193 It is suitable that we should give the Fire of Nature a place a­mongst the spiritual Beings, for in it self it is not perceivable by any sense, but discovers it self onely in bodies, by heat and other effects and acci­dents. This is apparent in living crea­tures, into which by this unperceive­able fire, is infused a sensible heat, and that Fire with the life stealing away, the Elementary body or the carkass, yet the mixed being dissol­ved, remains sound and unhurt. In Vegetables, because this Fire is weak­er, it doth elude the sense, and is not to be perceived by any heat.

194 Reason also convinceth, that [Page 130] our common Fire is to be sorted a­mongst the spiritual, rather than cor­poreal Beings. For if it were corpo­real, it should have from it self a pe­culiar and inseparable body, no less than Earth, Water, or Air, and the rest of the sensible Natures, which do consist and are bounded within their proper bodies, which do exist in them and by them, which do act according to their virtues, and produce them to the Senses. But Fire hath not a pe­culiar and sensible body, lodgeth one­ly in anothers, for a Coal is not Fire, but Wood fired, neither is the flame Fire, but smoke inflamed; finally, that Robber onely feeds upon what is not his own, lives upon the prey, and is extinguished when this fails, having nothing in it self to feed it. Besides, a body super-added to an­other body, doth augment the quan­tity of it, but this not found in fire put into wood or smoke, for the smoke or wood is no way increased by the accession of fire in their quantities, from which it is evident, that a fiery spirit rather than a body, doth invade the wood or smoke. A sword melted, the scabbard being untouch't, the [Page 131] bones shattered by the fiery bolt of Thunder, and yet the flesh unhurt, do sufficiently argue the spiritual nature, even of that thundering fire. Yet we must know that Fire is not wholly im­material, for it hath a matter, though a very subtile and light one, where­by it cleaves to the encompassing air, whereby it may be kept in by a more gross body. Yet doth it rather deserve the name of a spirit, than of a body, because it hath not a sensible quantity, neither can it be compre­hended, but when it is arrayed in an­other body.

195 For Light the original of it doth evince, that it ought to be seat­ed amongst those things that are tru­ly spiritual. There was no light but in God before the informing of the first matter, & the birth of the world. But when Nature received her Be­ing, then began there a spiritual light to issue forth from the fiery spirit of God upon the matter, and there to settle as in its lamp, and this was the creation and original of Light: that was the first act of the Deity upon the matter; the first copulation of the Creatour with the creature, of a spirit [Page 132] with a body. Therefore the first in­forming Light, was a meer Spirit, which did kindle with its fiery virtue, as with heat, the nearest matter, be­ing exceedingly rarefied by its spiri­tual Light, and so were the darkness converted to light. The Heaven, be­ing distinguished by the first light, al­though it be not material and fiery, yet is nevertheless invisible, because in respect of the matter, it is brought to the highest degree of tenuity, and in respect of its form, is endowed with spirituality. But the Light that was scattered in the middle Heaven, being bounded into a narrower compass, was cast into the Globe of the Sun, which was necessarily to be formed into a kind of a thick body, as it were into a smoke fit to be kindled, yet not combustible, that so it might be set­led, being kindled by that immortal Light, and be in the room of the ge­neral Lamp of Nature, or as a fiery Mass. The light of the Sun there­fore is nothing else but a lightsome spirit, deriving its rise from the Spirit of eternal Light, gathered in, and in­separably cleaving to the body of the Sun, and made sensible by reason of [Page 133] the thickness of the body, communi­cating to all the natures of the Uni­verse, light, and a manifold virtue: constituting the spirit of the World by its non-intermitted influence: and bound up in a body for the good and welfare of the corporeal Nature.

196 Yet the Sun-beams that are perceivable by our eyes, are not pure spirits, for issuing continually from the Sun, have their progress, being clothed with the encompassing Air. They are therefore nothing else but a continued flowing forth of the spi­rit of Light, which springing forth as so many rivulets from their Eternal Fountain, and working themselves in­to the aetherial Nature, as a flame into a most thin smoke, do over-spread the whole face of the Universal World with their light.

197 It is natural to Light to flow continually from its Fountain. We call those Rays issuing forth, and mix­ing themselves with the airy nature, and they are the first actings of light in the Sun, and the conveyance of it from the Sun. For it is the property of a lightfull body, to act by it rays, and to send forth heat and light, and [Page 134] that might spread its light abroad by a darting forth, and multiplying of its beams. We do by light signifie both the first act of the lightsom bo­dy, as also a secondary lightsomness which floweth out from the former.

198 The Lamp being out, either for want of matter, or blown out by the wind, the fiery and lightsom spi­rit that kindled the Lamp doth not perish, neither is it extinguished, as it commonly seems, but onely loosing what it feeds on, and being stript from it, is scattered in and vanisheth to Air, which is the Abyss and universal Re­ceptacle of all lights and spiritual na­tures of the material World: from whence we may learn, that the nature of this Lightsomness is spiritual, and is derived from the spiritual Fount­ain, not otherwise than natural forms from their Matrix, which is the spirit of the Universe, perpetually flowing from the Sun, as from an eternal and immortal Spring. For as the bodies of mixt Beings in their making, do rise from the first matter, and the E­lements, and do gradually at their de­parture, slide into the same again, so the natural forms of individuals in [Page 135] their approch, do flow from the uni­versal form (which in the manner of a Form of forms, doth inspire a formal virtue into the seeds) and in their re­cess do again return into it. But that form is the Spirit of the light of the Universe, to which, as to their prin­ciple, and as to a nature of the same kind, do all single forms and sparks of light got loose from their tyes, re­turn. So are all mixt Beings resolved into their first principles, but these principles do return to that Eternal Spring of Nature, as to their proper centre and peculiar countrey.

199 But that Spirit of the Universe is from the Sun, yet not the very light of the Sun, conspicuous to us by rea­son of the presence of its body; but that invisible spirit, which is continu­ally dispersed by the beams of the Sun, through the universal Region of the Air, and doth extend it self per­petually by communication through our Heaven, yea, even to the centre of the Earth, and that in the absence of the Sun, and in the darkest night, pouring out all gifts for generation and life, through all the bodies of the Universe.

[Page 136] 200 The divine Love was not able to contain it self within it self, but did wholly go out of it self in the cre­ation, by multiplication of it self, and pouring out himself wholly also in the conservation of creatures in them­selves. Light also, which is the ex­actest Copie of the Deity, doth also imitate the divine Love: for it is not able to be comprized within its own lightsom body, but is diffused far and near for the good of other Beings, by a strong multiplication of its beams, being not so much born for it self as for others, being as it were the token of Divine Love, communicating it self to its power, and reaching forth into the most remote places, unless it meet with a stop from a thick bo­die.

201 Light also doth hold forth to us the infinite Nature of God; for the small light of a lamp or candle can­not, as long as it is fed, by all its con­tinued effluence of rays, and by its infinite communication of its flames, be exhausted or diminished. As many beams so many streams flow from it. Yet though it gives, though it diffu­seth it self, although much be taken [Page 137] from it, yet is it not brought to no­thing, neither receives loss, which is the alone property of a spiritual na­ture, and is altogether unappliable to a corporeal. So the intellectual en­dowments, as the understanding and knowledge of things, which are justly esteemed spiritual lights, are of the same kind, that though alwayes be­stowed abroad, yet are preserved en­tire at home. Therefore must we con­fess that there is something divine in Light.

202 The beams of a lightsom bo­dy, although they be of a spiritual nature, yet are they stopt by a thick body, because their conveyance is by means of the Air, without which they are not perceivable by us, by which copulation also they are in a manner made corporeal, and therefore cannot pierce or enter into the bodies that are not porous. So spiritual things do act with us by some sensible mean, that so we may perceive them to act. But the lightsom body being absent, the beams also depart, neither do they part from his presence, because they immediately flow from him.

203 But the Air is without en­lightened, [Page 138] not onely by the presence of a body of light, and of the beams from it, but also the body being gone, and the beams withdrawn, by a light­som spirit flowing from them: as is clear in the darkest Eclipse, or the Heavens over-cast with the blackest clouds, or wrapt up in the mask of night, yea, the Sun being sunk under the Horizon: for that act of present light cannot proceed from the body of light, and its beams being absent, but from the access and presence of a spi­ritual light.

204 A transparent body as glass, being pointed with the Sun beams, doth gather them, and receives in it the image of the Sun, and is made lightsom, & as it were a brief draught of the Sun, which sends forth its beams on the farthest side opposite to the Sun, from which the beams of the Sun being refracted, by the con­course of the glass, seem to pass through the glass, which yet indeed they do not, for the rays by reason of the Air that cleaves to them, are setled about the glass, the spirit of light onely passing forward, but by the beams which are darted out on [Page 139] the other side, are the beams of the Sun, or of the glass being kindled by the Sun-beams into a lightsom bo­die.

205 Every transparent body, espe­cially glass, is a medium of light, be­cause it receives light into it, and ha­ving received it, doth communicate it to the Air that is beyond it, not by the sending forth of lightsom Air a­bout it, which is repugnant to Nature, but by another double way. First, be­cause a transparent body yields to, and lets pass the spirit of light, and doth send it forth abroad being received by it, which sent forth, gets into the adjoyning Air, hence springs that plentifull light; and besides, because that transparent Medium is made by the benefit of the light, it receives not onely light in it self, but lightsom to others, and by the spirit of Light, which is in love with transparent bo­dies, becomes as it were a lighted lamp. But now every lightsom body hath the priviledge and power to scat­ter its light, which is not granted to thick and dark bodies, unless by re­flection.

206 Those which are the pure na­tures [Page 140] of mixt Beings, are mearly spi­ritual, the bodies are as it were the Barks and Vessels, in which they are contained and kept. And not other­wise could those sublime Natures, un­less tied to the corporeal Elements, and so bound in by their weight, pass this lower Sea, and lodge in the Cen­tre of this Abyss. They come subject to sense by their bodies, the bodies are moved and acted by them, so do they do interchangeable offices. This that secret of Homers Juno, whom Ju­piter let down with a weight at her heels.

207 Since the whole frame of the Universe is but one onely body, one onely universal Nature, consisting of many natures and bodies, bound to­gether by their proper Mediums and bonds, it should not be wondered at, that such parts & members are knit to­gether by a strong, but secret tye, and do give a mutual assistance each to other, for they have not onely a mu­tual relation to, but also a communi­cation with one the other, and these various natures do exercise a kind of a commerce, the extreams by the middle, the middle by the nearest. [Page 141] But this communication is perform­ed by spirits sent forth: for all the parts of the world, all the individual natures of the world do abound in spirits; many of which flowing forth, leave room and give way for those that flow in, and so is there by the continual ebbing out and flowing in of spirits, a continual reparation of the world, and of the natures there­of. This is the scale of general Na­ture presented in a vision to the Pa­triarch Jacob, these are Mercuries wings, by whose help being mistically termed by the Ancients, the Messen­ger of the Gods, he was thought fre­quently to visit the coasts of the Earth, and the courts of Heaven.

208 The active principles of eve­ry kind of Vegetables or Animals are spiritual, their bodies are the passive organs of the spirits, by which they exercise the faculties of the senses, and do by various actings put forth their powers, as the authours of acti­ons, so that in the general life may be termed a concent of actions, or a continued act diversified by the mul­tiplicitie of actions, flowing from a spiritual fountain, and brought forth by corporeal organs.

[Page 142] 209 It is the propertie of the spi­ritual nature to act, of the corporeal to be passive, where therefore there is a concourse of both, as in mixed bodies, that as the more noble doth act and rule this as passive doth obey. For the power of act is the priviledge of ruling, but the burden of being passive is the mark of being servile; so the in-set fire in the seed, is the prin­ciple of generation and life, the high­est operating spirit, the Archaeus of Nature, the orderer in the preparing and forming the matter in the mixti­on and distribution of the Elements. So doth the Form in the mixt Being exercise its rule at his will, as the fountain of all actions. So do the vir­tues of the heavenly Beings dispose and seal all inferiour Elements and corporeal matter.

210 Natural bodies which have an active vigour, and an occult cause of acting, do not, as is commonly thought, act alone by their qualities, but by secret spirits. For the fire doth not heat and burn by the single qualitie of heat, but by the continu­al flux of spirits and rayes. Neither do the Earth and Water refrigerate [Page 143] or moisten by the alone qualities of cold and moist, but by their vapours and in-nate spirits sent forth, do affect the sense from without. Neither do poysons onely by cold or hot quali­ties, but by malignant spirits bring death or infection sooner or later. Concerning Plants or Herbs, we must judge alike, because their active vir­tues do not lie hid in their qualities, but in their essence, which Nature hath made abundant in spirits, whose basis and principle powers are con­cerning spirituals, for the bodies are as the shadows or the investments of things, under which the invisible Na­ture is hidden, but since qualities are the accidents of things, are not therefore able to constitute their es­sence, nor shew forth in their actings those wonderful virtues, but are one­ly as the in set instruments of actions & passions, which the working spirits, that are the workers of all actions make use of in their actings, but yet Nature indures them not as princi­ples and efficient causes of actions.

211 The natural tinctures, odours and tasts of things are special and spi­ritual gifts of Nature, with which it [Page 144] hath suitably inriched her Beings, & which do not onely contribute to their ornament, or onely are inherent in them, as extrinsecal accidents, but also have an in-set and radical cause, and are not so much to be termed ac­cidents, as demonstrative tokens of inward virtues, by which the occult and formal signatures of things disco­ver themselves.

212 Rarefaction and condensation are the two instruments of Nature, by which spirits are converted into bo­dies, and bodies into spirits, or also by which corporeal Elements are changed into spiritual Beings, and spiritual into corporeal; for Elements do suffer these changes in mixt bo­dies. So the Earth doth minister spiritual food to the roots of vegeta­bles, which being fed upon, doth go into the stalk, the bark, the boughs, the branches, the flowrs, and into the corporeal substance. The same is done by Nature in Animals. For the meat and drink, which they diet on, or at least the better part, is termina­ted into humours, and at length into spirits, which getting through the pores, and knit to the flesh, nerves, [Page 145] bones, and the rest of the parts of the bodie, do nourish and augment them, and do by the never-tired work of supply, repair decaying nature. So the spiritual and the portion of the purer substance, is curdled to the frothie bodie of seed. Art the Ape of Nature, doth experience the like in her resolutions and compositions.

213 The life of individuals is in a rational and strict union of the mat­ter and form: but the knot of both natures, their tie and base lieth hid in the fortified embraces of the in­nate heat and fire, and the radical moisture. For that formal fire is an heavenly ray, which is united with the radical moisture, which is the purest and best digested portion of the matter, and as it were an oyl de­faecated, exuberated, and turned as it were into a spiritual nature, by the organs of Nature, as by so many A­lembicks.

214 There is much of the radical moisture in the seed of things, in which, as in its food, is kept a celestial Spark, which doth act all things ne­cessarie to generation in a conveni­ent matrix. But wheresoever there is [Page 146] a constant principle of heat, there is conceived to be a fire, because the natural principle of heat is his in which it is,

215 A man may observe some­thing immortal in the radical moi­sture, which doth neither vanish by death, nor consume by the force of the most violent fire, but remains unvanquished in the carkases and ashes of bodies burnt.

216 There is a double moisture lies in every mixed Being, to wit, an Elementarie and a Radical. The Elementarie, being partly of an aeri­all, parly of a watrie nature, yields not to fire, but flies away into a va­pour or smoke, which being drawn forth, the bodie is resolved into ashes; for by it, as by a glue, the Elements in their mixture are knit together. But the radical moisture scorns the tyrannical assaults of common fire, but it neither dies in the martyrdom, nor flies away in the combat, but sur­viving the mixt bodie, doth stubborn­ly stick to its ashes, which is an evi­dence of its exact puritie.

217 The experience of this radi­cal moisture, hidden in the ashes, did [Page 147] teach a secret to the glas-makers, be­ing ignorant of the nature of things, for by bringing Glass out of Ashes by the sharp point of their casting flames, they have made a hidden thing evident, beyond which, neither the strength of fire or art are able to stretch it. But the ashes must neces­sarily run, that there might be a con­tinued quantitie, and a solid bodie made as glass is, which could not be otherwise, for there can be no flow­ing of any thing without moisture. Therefore that moisture being inse­parable from its matter, is at length brought to terminate into that noble and as it were aetherial transparent bodie.

218 The extraction of Salts out of Ashes, in which is the chief virtue of mixt Beings, the fertilitie of ground increased by the burning of stubble, and by ashes, doth evidence, that that moisture preserved free from fire, is the radical principal of generation, & the root of nature. Al­though this virtue lies hid, solitarie and idle, till being received by the Earth, the common matrix of Na­tures principles, yet shew forth a hid­den [Page 148] facultie convenient for generati­on and multiplication, as it is also ac­customable in the seed of things.

219 That Radical Balsame, is Na­tures ferment or leaven, infecting the whole mass of the bodie. It is an in­delible and multiplying tincture, for it pierceth and tingeth even the more loathsom excrements, which is evident by the frequent, although imperfect generation, that is made from out of them, as also by the fre­quent dunging of ground, which is known by the most unskilfull hus­bandmen, that so the languishing land may be set forward to pay its due, and that with an advantage to the expecting labourer.

220 We may guess, that that root of Nature, which survives the ruin of the mixt bodie, is a foot-step, and the purest and immortal portion of the first matter informed, and signed with the divine character of Light. For that ancient matrimonie betwixt the first Matter and its Form, is not to be untied, from which copulation the other bodies drew their original. Moreover, it was necessarie that this incorruptible base of corruptible [Page 149] things, and as it were the cube-root of them should lie hid, always remain­ing and immortal in the depth of bo­dies, that it might be constantly and perpetually a material Principle, ha­ving a potentiality and aptitude to life, about which, as about an immove­able Axle-tree, there might be a con­tinual turning of the Elements and things. And if we may have the liber­ty in dark things, to guess at what is most likely truth, that immortal Sub­stance is the foundation of the mate­rial World, and the Ferment of its im­mortality, which the Eternal Measu­rer of all things hath fore-established to survive the day of the conflagration of all things, when the Elements shall be purified by that refining fire, that so he might renew and repair out of this pure and ever-remaining Matter, his work vindicated from original sin, and the taint of corruption.

221 That this radical Basis is not of the kind of special forms, is evi­dent, because every individual hath its individual and singular form, which doth depart the body upon the disso­lution of the mixt Being, yet that ra­dical principle remaining unextin­guished, although it abide much wea­kened, [Page 150] and of little efficacy, by reason of the absence of the form, yet do those vital sparkles remain apt for the production of more debased and im­perfect births, which production be­longs not so much to Nature, as to the matter in its birth; this attempteth, but is not able to generate without a companion, by reason of the absence of the formal and specifical virtue. So the carkass of a man or an horse, by reason of the defect of seed is not capable for the generation of a man or an horse, but of loathed worms and other insects, from whence we may guess, that that feeble principle of life proceeds from the scarcity of the first matter, and rather to be of the family of the lower Elements, than of the higher and celestial, yet that there is in it some of that tincture of light.

222 For certainly that slight spark of that former light, which did in the beginning inform the dark matter of the lower Abyss, may be sufficient for the generation of insects: for it doth work the matter by a confused and disordered motion, that it might bring forth the power into a feeble act, but the matter warmed by this spark, and [Page 151] as it were languishing, being corrupt­ed rather by the fancy than the co­pulation of a male, doth rush into the lustfull act, and being unable to bring forth a just issue of Nature, doth form loathsom phantasms, as Worms, Hor­nets, Beetles, and the like, in the 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 [Page 152] 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 [Page 153] 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 [Page 154] 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; [Page 155] 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 [Page 156] 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, [Page 157] 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 if she were but out of action for a moment, it would ruine the whole frame of the Universe, which is addicted to a de­cree of a perpetual motion. For nei­ther doth the setled Earth, the calm Sea, the quiet Air, therefore altoge­ther rest, because they are not seen to be moved, they rest no more than a sleeping man: that rest is a remission of action, not an omission or cessati­on. Nature acts within, neither doth it ever desist its action or motion of the Organs. Even a very carkass hath a motion, to wit, of corruption: but [Page 158] living Beings, though they are not acted by a local, yet are they by an organical motion.

233 Nature doth move the frame of the Universe in a uniform and or­derly motiō, yet so that wheels things unequal and unlike, by an unequal unlike motion. This unequality of the motion is required by a Geome­trical equity, and so all the motions of all the heavenly bodies, may be Geo­metrically termed equal, considering the difference of the magnitude, di­stance, and nature of them.

234 Nature being no less power­full than wise, in the informing and governing of her Works, doth attain her certain end by many wanderings and windings, which is most evident in the births of the Earth, for she handling the Elements in an unequal temper, doth, especially in the Win­ter, replenish the womb of the Earth with a fruitfull seed, in the Spring brings forth an easie birth, in the Summer ripens the fruit, and in the Autumn all fall.

235 This diversity doth especially proceed from the approch and recess of the Sun, appointed to this end by [Page 159] the Creatour: For he hath destina­ted the Sun to the Rule of the Ele­ments, that by his various distance, in­flection and reflection, they may have a divers and various temperament, and so there might be some help for Nature, working divers things by di­vers means, and that she might per­fect her changes, by the various chan­ges of Times. This variety of Na­ture is worth the exactest thoughts of the most acute Philosophers.

236 The heavenly bodies, though not subject to that stain of alteration, do notwithstanding introduce mani­fold changes in the Elementary Re­gion, and do inspire various affections by their divers propension, and the various motions of the planetick bo­dies, which do alter their site and di­stance between themselves, and also the figure of the Heavens, which a­ctions do diversly form and incline the pliable natures of the Elements, and they never cease to ferment them by their continual influence.

237 The whole substance of the Heaven, hath parts continuous, though not contiguous; let not any therefore fancie the World to be the [Page 160] works of Art, which is the work of Nature, which cannot endure any section into Sphears and Circles; for they that first divided the aetherial region into many orbs and circles, did propose to themselves rather the easie teaching by it, than to shew the truth of the thing. For the divine nature being an unitie, is desirous of and endeavours unitie, and so avoid­eth multiplicitie: wherefore we must conceive she created not many Hea­vens, separated by their matter and superficies, when one bodie, in respect of the continuitie of the matter, though distinct in the dignitie and virtue of the parts, might suffice. Nei­ther is this taken off by the motions of the Stars in their courses and cu­stoms, which because we know not, we therefore make a fancied Astrolo­gie, and do too boldly bring the power of God under the weakness of man, though the continuitie of the Heaven hinder not the motion of the Stars, and there might be some help for mans reason to find out their or­ders,

238 That there should be a first moveable above the Heavens, by [Page 161] whose hurrying motion the lower Heavens are turned about, is not an invention of the wisdom of God, but onely a fancied help for mans igno­rance: for if we assign the principle of motion to that first mover, why do we denie it to the globe of heaven? why should we fancie an external cause of motion, which may be all this time intrinsecal?

239 As this lowest province of the World is subject to the rule of the middle, so is the middle, viz. the aetherial to the highest and superce­lestial for its priviledges and deputie­ship. For the Empyrean heaven, and the quire of the intelligible Beings, do inspire into the celestial orb those virtues, which they receive from the Archetype, in order of succession, and do move those natures that lie nearest them, not without a concent, as the first organs of the material world: by which motion the inferiour bodies, being also moved, do exercise their turns, as so many dances to a set pace, and do borrow whatsoever is excel­lent from the superiour bodies.

240 But Intelligences are illumi­nated at hand, according to their or­ders [Page 162] from the mind of God, as from the spring of eternal light, by which illumination they are fed, as with an immortal food, and in it, as in a glass, do they read, receive the commands and will of the Divine Majestie, and by it are enkindled to an honourable obedience. This is the manner and union of the threefold nature of the Universe, the knot and Herculean bond of this union is the love of God. So in a ternarie is compleated the whole state of the World, whose Creatour is by no means part of it, no otherwise than Unitie is neither a Number, nor the part of a Number, although it constitutes all number, but is the principle and measure of Number, neither is the Musician or Lutonist a part, but the authour of the Concent.

241 They which believe that an almost innumerable multitude of heavenly bodies, were created for the commoditie of the globe of the Earth, and for her inhabitants, as to their proper end, are deceived, for reason will denie, that natures, so far more noble and transcendent, were enslaved to the service of more vile [Page 163] and low-born Beings. Is it not rather more likely, that every Globe doth rather of it self make a peculiar world, and that so many worlds as feodaries to the eternal Empire of a God, are diffused through the vast range of the heaven, and there do hang as bound each to the other by that common bond of the heaven, and that the whole large Universe doth consist of those manifold na­tures? These, though so far severed in nature and place, yet do joyn in a mutual love, so as to make up a per­fect harmonie in the Universe, The heaven is the common place of all, yet is it more pure about those more perfect Beings, therefore it is of great tenuitie and almost spiritual, and so fils up the places between, that so it may the better receive the various affections of so many natures, and the secret virtues continually is­suing from them, and having recei­ved them, it might swiftly communi­cate them to others, though far di­stant. For the heaven is Natures conveyance, by the mediation of which, all the Cities of Nature do traffique one with another, and are [Page 164] made partakers of each the others wealth and store. So are they linked together by a most powerfull bond of friendship and nearness, as it were by some magnetick virtue.

242 What hinders, but that we may reckon the Globe of the Earth, as well as the Moon amongst the Stars? For both are naturally dark bodies, both do borrow light from the Sun, both are solid bodies, and reflect the beams of the Sun, both send forth spirits and virtues, both hang in their heaven or their air. But the doubt is, whether it moves or no. But to what end is her motion need­full? why may not she also stand fixt amongst so many fixt bodies? And it may be the Moon hath her inhabi­tants, for it is not credible, that Orbs of so immense and vast a compass, should be idle and useless, not inha­bited by any creatures; that their motions, actions, and travels should onely tend to the good of this lowest and most despicable Globe: since God himself, not liking Solitude, did go out of himself in the Creation, and poured out himself upon the creatures, and gave them a Law for [Page 165] Multiplication. Is it not more for Gods glorie, to assert the intire Fa­brick of the whole Universe to be like a great Empire, graced with the various natures of many worlds, as with so many Provinces or Cities? and that the Worlds themselves are as so many habitations & tenements for innumerable Citizens of divers kinds, and all created to set forth the superlative glorie of the great Crea­tour.

243 And who will not admire the Sun as an immortal Lamp, hanging up in the middle of the hall of the Great Lord, and enlightening all the corners & recesses of it, or else as the Vicege­rent of the Divine Majestie, infusing light, spirit and life into all the crea­tures of the World? For it was fit that God, being altogether immate­rial, should rule and order his materi­al works by an organ, which should be of a middle and most excellent material Being, which also ought to be full of vivifical spirits, and so to set over sensible things, a sensible Monarch.

244 This Doctrine of many Worlds is not repugnant to Scri­pture, [Page 106] which doth onely relate to us the Creation of our World, descri­bing all things concerning the others in a mystical, rather than an open & clear way, onely touching at them, that so mens feeble souls, that had al­readie fallen, as too curious of know­ledge, might rather sit and admire, than rise and understand. The cloud­ing of this truth, this darkness of mans soul, was part of the punish­ment of sin, by which he fell from the pleasures of Paradise, the delights of knowledge, the knowledge of Na­ture and heavenly things, that so he that would stretch himself to a sinfull desire of a forbidden knowledge, might be nipt by a just deprivement of what was given: and so he having brought in a multiplication and con­fusion of knowledge, might be pu­nished with the loss of that true Knowledge, which was one of all things. That is the Cherub, the guardian of the Garden, he that hath his flaming faulcheon, striking blind the guiltie souls of men with the brightness of his light, and forcing us off from the secrets of Nature, and the truth of the Universe.

[Page 167] 245 The Divine nature, although it be a most perfect unitie, yet seems to consist of, and to be perfected by two things, viz. Understanding and Will. By his Understanding, he knows all things from eternitie; by his Will, he acts all; and both he doth most absolutely. His Knowledge and Wisdom belong to his Under­standing: but his Goodness, Mercy, Justice and the rest of those virtues, which are accounted Moral with us, belong to his Will; yea so doth also Gods Omnipotencie, which is no­thing else but his Omnipotent Will. The Intelligible natures, viz. the Angelical nature, and the Soul of Man, which are small draughts of the Divine nature, have also these two faculties, according to their weight and measure. For in them the un­derstanding is the organ of Know­ledge, the will of Working, and be­yond these can they not act.