CONCERNING THE NATURE OF THINGS.
BOOK II.
Concerning the Growth of Natural Things.
IT is clear enough, and well known to everybody, that all natural things grow and mature by warmth and moisture, as is plainly demonstrated by the rain followed up with sunshine. None can deny that the earth is rendered fruitful by the rain, and all must confess that every kind of fruit is ripened by the sun. Since, then, by the Divine institution, this is possible to Nature, who will deny or refuse to believe that man possesses this same power by a prudent and skilful pursuit of the Alchemical Art, so that he shall render the fruitless fruitful, the unripe ripe, and make all increase and grow? The Scripture says that God subjected all created things to man, and handed them over to him as if they were his own property, so that he might use them for his necessity, that he might have dominion over the fishes of the sea, the fowls of the air, and everything on the earth without exception. Wherefore man ought to rejoice because God has illuminated him and endowed him, so that all God's creatures are compelled to obey Him and to be subject to Him, especially all the earth, together with all things which are born, live, and move in it and upon it. Since, then, we see with our eyes, and are taught by daily experience, that the oftener and the more plentifully the rain moistens the earth, and the sun dries it again with its heat and glow, the sooner the fruits of the earth come forth and ripen, while all fruits increase and grow, whatever be the time of year, let none wonder that the alchemist, too, by manifold imbibitions and distillations, can produce the same effect. For what is rain but the imbibition of the earth? What are the heat and glow of the sun other than the sun's process of distillation, which again extracts the humidity? Wherefore I say that it is possible by such co-optation in the middle of winter to produce green herbs, flowers, and fruits, by means of earth and water, from seed and root. Now, if this takes place with herbs and flowers, it will take place in many other similar things too, as, for instance, in all minerals, the imperfect metals whereof can be ripened with mineral water by the industry and art of the skilled alchemist. So, too, can all marchasites, granites, zincs, arsenics, talcs, cachimiæ, bismuths, antimonies, etc., all of which carry with them immature Sol and Luna, be so ripened as to
