But I have done I will now speak something of Generation, and the wayes of it, that the Process of the Philosophers upon this Matter, may be the better understood. You must know that Nature hath two Extremes, and between them a Middle Substance, which elsewhere wee have call'd the Middle Nature. Example enough wee have in the Creation. The first Extreme was that Cloud or Darkness whereof we have spoken formerly; some call it the Remote Matter, and the Invisible Chaos, but very improperly, for it was not invisible. This is the Jewish Ensoph outwardly, and it is the same with that Orphic Night;

Ὦ Νὺξ μέλαινα χρυσέων ἄστρων τροφέ.

O Night! thou black nurse of the golden stars.

Anima Magica.

Out of this Darkness all things that are in this world came as out of their Fountain or Matrix: hence that Position of all famous Poets and Philosophers, Omnia ex Nocte Prodiisse. The middle Substance is the Water, into which that Night or Darkness was condensed, and the Creatures fram'd out of the Water make up the other Extreme. But the Magicians when they speak strictly. will not allow of this last Extreme, because Nature doth not stay here, wherefore their Philosophie runs thus; Man (say they) in his natural state, is in the meane Creation, from which hee must recede to one of

two Extremes; either to Corruption, as commonly all men doe for they die, and moulder away in their graves: or else to a spirituall, glorified Condition, like Enoch and Elijah, who were translated, and this (say they) is a true Extreme, for after it there is no Alteration. Now the Magicians reasoning with themselves, why the meane Creation should be subject to Corruption, concluded the Cause and Original of this disease to be in the Chaos it self, for even that was corrupted, and cursed upon the Fall of Man. But examining Things further, they found that Nature in her Generations did onely concoct the Chaos with a gentle heat, shee did not separate the parts, and purifie each of them by it self, but the purities and impurities of the Sperme remained together in all her Productions, and this Domestic enemie prevayling at last, occasion'd the Death of the Compound. Hence they wisely gathered, that to minister Vegetables, Animals, or Minerals for Physic, was a meer madness, for even these also had their own Impurities and Diseases, and required some Medicine to cleanse them. Upon this Adviso, they resolved (God without all Question being their Guide) to practise on the Chaos it self, they opened it, purified it, united what they had formerly separated, and fed it with a twofold Fire, Thick, and Thin,

till they brought it to the immortal Extreme, and made it a spirituall heavenly Body. This was their Physic, this was their Magic. In this performance they saw the Image of that face, which Zoroaster calls Triadis Vultus ante Essentiam, &c. They perfectly knew the Secundea, which contains all things in her naturally, as God contains all things in himself spiritually. They saw that the Life of all things here below, was a Thick Fire, or fire imprisoned and incorporated in a certaine incombustible Aereall moysture. They found moreover that this fire was originally derived from Heaven, and in this sense Heaven is styl'd in the Oracles,

Ignis, Ignis Derivatio, & Ignis Penu.