The leading figures of ancient philosophy placed fire, as nature's fourth element, in the highest region of air as in a sphere of its own. This seemed right to them for the sake of order and through conjecture rather than through the light of truth. For no one should imagine a fire of nature other than celestial light. The sacred philosopher therefore makes no mention of fire in his Genesis, because he had said that light, which is nature's true fire, was created on the first day. Nor would he have omitted fire as a principle of nature when he mentioned earth, water and the birds of heaven.

FIRE.

Let no one imagine a region of burning fire adjoining the lunar region, except in a dream. For all the air would not suffice to sustain so great an abundance of the most intense fire without its having long ago plundered the entire mass of the world. Whatever that robber touches, it immediately devours, destined for the destruction of the world and nature.

* Chapter 11 of the earlier Testament.

Neither the upper air nor the lowest earth receives such a ravager of Nature as a guest among Nature’s elements. Yet it frequently exercises tyranny in Nature’s kingdom, whether kindled in the height of the air, in the depths of the earth or even on its surface. Lull, a man of lofty intelligence,* therefore rightly numbers it among the giants and tyrants of the World. It is also called contrary to Nature, because whatever destroys Nature opposes her.

Our common fire is partly natural and partly artificial. Perhaps human beings borrowed it from heavenly fire for the convenience and necessities of life, by uniting its rays and multiplying its powers, or else through friction or the collision of two bodies, the divine Spirit suggesting the ingenuity needed for this.

NATURE’S FIRE IS IN THE SUN.

The supreme creator of things placed a fiery spirit of gentle heat in the globe of the Sun, so that it might breathe light and life-giving heat into the other bodies of the Universe. Many have therefore believed the Sun to be the heart of the whole fabric of the world, since the principle of all generation and life flows from it. Whoever seeks some other Element of fire in the nature of things is blind, because he does not know the Sun.

The wellspring of Nature’s fire therefore resides in the Sun. Its heat is always equal and most temperate in itself, although we feel it as stronger or weaker according to its approach and retreat, the directness or obliquity of its rays, or even the position and nature of places. Many philosophers have admired it as the soul of the World, breathing motion and the power of generation into Nature.

The Sun is not the eye of the universe, as some of the ancients thought, but the eye of the Universe’s creator. Through it he looks perceptibly upon his perceptible creatures, pours the caressing rays of his love into them, and presents himself visibly to them. For perceptible Nature would scarcely have recognised an imperceptible author. He therefore wished to fashion for himself and for us so noble a body, clothed in his glory, whose rays, nearest to divinity, are spirit and life.

From that universal principle of Nature flows all the heat implanted both in the Elements and in compounds, which has earned the name Fire. For wherever spontaneous heat, natural motion or life dwells, Nature has hidden her Fire as their principle and the first mover of the Elements. From it even the perceptible elements, or provinces of our World, are constituted as elements and, as it were, given life. Yet this fire remains more closely confined in the womb of the earth because of its density and its coldness, which arouses antiperistasis.

That fire of Nature implanted in compounds has chosen radical moisture as its own seat. Its chief dwelling, however, is in the heart—although it is diffused through every part of the body—as the first organ of life and the centre of the Microcosm. From there, ruling as though from his citadel, that Prince of Nature moves all the faculties and other organs in harmony, breathing motion, heat and life into the compound’s humours and spirits and finally into the entire elemental mass. Because he is the Sun’s son and deputy, he performs in each lesser World everything that the Sun performs in the greater.