The condition of the spirit of herbs.

Someone might object that no herb, while attached to its root, becomes older than four or at most five months, reckoning from May to autumn, when every herb dies and falls away from its root. To this I reply that a single power from God exists in the root, the first being and spirit of the herb, from which the herb springs and is sustained until its predestined time, being raised as far as the production of seed. This is a sign or indication that the power returns into the root, so that the herb dries up. As long as this spirit, which is the herb’s highest force, remains in the root, the herb is renewed every year, unless the spirit is removed and dies away together with the herb itself. Then the herb is not renewed, because the root is dead and no longer has life in itself. How this spirit is removed with the herb from the root, or with the root from the earth, so that its power returns into the root or from the root into the earth, need not be considered here. It is a sublime mystery of nature, not to be made public for sophistical physicians, who regard such arcana not merely as a joke but with the utmost contempt. What we omit here we shall teach in the Herbarius.

The younger and less aged herbs are, the more they excel in powers and faculties. As a human being is weakened by old age and declines in natural strength, so are herbs. To know the chiromancy and age of herbs and similar things requires long experience. The number of their years is not written on them, but must be divined from chiromancy alone, as was said. Chiromancy supplies no numbers, letters or characters, only lines, veins and wrinkles according to each thing’s age. The older a thing is, the larger and more conspicuous its lines become, and the weaker its power and operation. Just as a disease of one month or year is cured more easily than one of two, three, four or five months or years, so a herb one year old cures its disease sooner than one two or three years old. For this reason young and less aged herbs are due to old ailments, while old herbs and medicines are due to recent ailments. If old is joined to old, the blind leads the blind and both fall into the ditch. This is why many medicines do nothing but remain within the body and occupy its parts as mud clings to shoes, so that diseases afterwards are doubled.

Fresh herbs are to be applied to old diseases, and conversely.

Inexperienced sophists have not hitherto considered this, and through ignorance have destroyed far more people than they have cured. You physicians especially ought to know that a medicine must always be younger than the disease, so that it may conquer more successfully and be stronger in overcoming the ailment. If the medicine is more powerful and vigorous than the disease, the disease will be overcome and extinguished like fire by water. If the disease is more powerful than the medicine, it changes the medicine into poison, so that diseases are afterwards doubled and grow worse. If the disease is iron, therefore, the medicine must be steel, for steel cannot be overcome by iron. The stronger always conquers and the weaker is subdued. Although it was not originally our purpose to write about medicine here, I could not pass over these things in silence for the sake of true and genuine physicians.

On Mineral Signs.

By what means minerals are observed.

Ores and metals too, outside fire and the excavated matter, disclose their true indications and signs, which they have received both from the Archaeus and from the upper stars. Each displays its kind through distinct colours and differences of earth. Gold ore differs from silver ore; silver ore from copper ore; copper ore from iron ore; and iron ore from tin and lead ore, and so on. Nobody can deny that through the chiromancy of mines all mineral and metallic bodies hidden within the earth are recognised by outward signs. This is the chiromancy of mines, veins and courses, which disclose not only what lies concealed inside but also the precise depth, richness of the mine and quantity of metal. In this chiromancy three things must be known: the age, depth and breadth of the veins, as was said of herbs a little earlier. The older the veins, the richer and more abundant the mines in metals. One must philosophise about this in the following way: all metals still hidden in their own matrix grow constantly and continually. Hence it is clear that any growing thing, even placed outside its matrix, cannot become smaller but continues to increase, that is, multiply and grow in substance, measure and weight until its predestined time.

There are three chief kinds of all things.

The limit of the elements; things dwelling below ground are incorruptible.

This predestined time is one third of the appointed lifespan of all minerals, plants and animals, the three chief kinds of earthly things. Whatever remains in its own matrix grows until the matrix itself dies. For the matrix too has its predestined time of living and dying, provided it is subject to the external elements. What is not subject to them has no time or limit other than the elements themselves; it will perish with them on the last day, their own limit. It follows that everything below the earth is not subject to the external elements, for it experiences neither heat, cold, moisture, dryness, wind nor air by which it might be destroyed. Such bodies therefore cannot rot, acquire mould and stench, or die while they remain below the earth in their own chaos. What has been said of metals and stones must also be understood in this way: many human beings have sustained themselves in mountain caverns for several hundred years, such as giants and pygmies, about whom we have written a separate little book.

Continuing our purpose and turning to teach briefly the practice of the chiromancy of mines, know that the deeper and broader veins are, the older they are. Where the courses of veins extend a great distance and finally fail without disappearing below ground, that is a bad sign. As their courses fail, so do the mines which they indicate at depth. Although good mines are sometimes found, the deeper one descends the more they dwindle, so that work can continue only at a loss. Where, however, the veins are repeatedly enlarged by other tributaries or frequently cut across by others, that is a favourable sign. It indicates good mines not only nearby but increasing and multiplying at depth, until the mines generally become richer and yield pure metal, and thus a very great treasure.