Middle nature and bonds

Use in the book

At p. 85 · Passage 1 first matter is a middle nature between thick and thin, neither wholly earthy nor wholly fiery. The adjectives describe a subject that crosses ordinary categories. It is not simply an average of two familiar materials. Its intermediary condition helps explain why it can be the source of different kinds while belonging to none of them as an already formed specimen.

The account of influences assigns a different intermediate role to fire, air and water (p. 89 · Passage 1). They convey the spirit’s seed toward material earth rather than retaining it. Here the middle is a route, while the receiving extreme is the terminus. This passage cautions against making “middle nature” a rigid proper name used identically throughout the work. The same relational vocabulary can distribute different roles according to what is being explained.

In the creation sequence, darkness is the first extreme, water the middle substance, and creatures the other extreme (p. 114 · Passage 1; p. 114 · Passage 2). Vaughan immediately complicates the scheme: strict magical philosophy will not accept the present creature as the final endpoint because further alteration remains possible. Ordinary human existence itself becomes a middle condition between corruption and a glorified state (p. 115). The middle thus depends on the scale and completion criterion of the argument. What is an endpoint in one sequence is intermediate in another.

The moon at p. 118 is also called a middle nature. The surrounding directions place it in relation to two elements, but the discourse does not supply a determinate ordinary identification. The lexicon can explain the relational demand without converting it into practical instructions. What remains consistent is the attempt to maintain a subject in balanced relations rather than to expose it to an unqualified dominant extreme.

The account of living reduction supplies the clearest warning against bypassing a middle. A body derives from seed, which derives from elements; returning it to separated elements destroys the intermediate capacity Nature had composed (p. 128; p. 129). The intermediate stage is not expendable simply because it is not the first source. On the contrary, it is where the parts possess the relations necessary for the later body. A return that ignores this middle is explanatory and practical failure in Vaughan’s terms.

The final elemental discussion then turns the general pattern into a carefully worked example. Water joins air and earth; air joins water and fire (p. 132 · Passage 2; p. 133). Yet each mediator has its own contrary. A local reconciliation does not secure the whole arrangement against every opposition. Vaughan therefore calls the resulting love weak and partial. The need for a stronger mediator arises from the limits of the shared-quality account, not from an unexplained interruption of it.

At p. 134 the Spirit of the living God is named as cement and balsam. Cement binds; balsam suggests preserving or healing. Vaughan says this Spirit strengthens an existing natural disposition toward union, for God works with Nature rather than against her. Divine mediation is not presented as replacing the elemental order with an unrelated structure. It perfects a relation already prepared but not fully secured by that order.

The soul is then distinguished from the principal agent. It waits as an instrumental agent for its body’s perfection; God unites soul and body (p. 134; p. 135). A jewel does not make the cabinet merely because it is contained in it. This final comparison prevents the bond from being assigned to whichever subtle or valuable thing happens to occupy the body. Presence, instrumentality and principal causation are different relations.

Places to read

1. p. 85 · Passage 1OriginalFirst matter is described between thick and thin, earthy and fiery.
2. p. 89 · Passage 1OriginalIntermediate elements convey the spirit’s seed toward the receiving extreme.
3. p. 114 · Passage 1Original; p. 114 · Original marginal noteOriginal; p. 114 · Passage 2Original; p. 115OriginalWater and ordinary created existence occupy different middle positions in successive schemes.
4. p. 118OriginalThe moon is called a middle nature within an intentionally reserved account of relations.
5. p. 128Original; p. 128 · Original marginal noteOriginal; p. 129OriginalThe generative middle cannot be bypassed by destructive return to constituents.
6. p. 132 · Passage 2Original; p. 133Original; p. 134Original; p. 134 · Original marginal noteOriginal; p. 135OriginalPartial elemental mediation requires divine strengthening, and principal agency is distinguished from the soul’s instrumentality.

In this edition

At p. 132 · Passage 2 Limus coelestis becomes “heavenly slime,” preserving the material image rather than upgrading it to an exclusively spiritual abstraction. “Mean complexion” becomes a temperament intermediate between extremes. The modern wording makes a relational sense intelligible without changing water into a modern chemical formula.

“Cement and balsam” at p. 134 remains a double metaphor for the Spirit’s work. Vaughan first rebukes those who call this Spirit a quintessence, yet at p. 137 himself calls the Spirit of peace the true eternal quintessence. The variation must remain. It suggests a distinction between an inadequate or presumptuous label and a qualified true use, but the source does not give a systematic lexical rule that would eliminate the tension. The Spirit’s divine identity and reconciliatory function are more explicit than any single technical noun.

Historical forms and local uses: middle nature — the subject intermediate between thick and thin, earthy and fiery (p. 85 · Passage 1); Middle Substance — a condition between Nature’s two extremes (p. 114 · Passage 1); middle Nature — water as a mediator sharing qualities with air and earth (p. 132 · Passage 2); Limus coelestis — heavenly slime: a name Vaughan says he has used for the subject (p. 132 · Passage 2); Mediator — a stronger agency needed to confirm the elements’ incomplete union (p. 133); Caement, and Balsam — the divine Spirit as the stabilising bond of the elements (p. 134).

Temper and proportion — tempers their Extremities; proportionate to them both

Water tempers air and earth because it shares moisture with one and coldness with the other. Proportion therefore concerns relational fitness, not a numerical half-distance. The following difficulty—water itself opposes fire—shows why this local moderation cannot be mistaken for a complete and unbreakable agreement of all four elements.

Historical forms: tempers their Extremities — moderates opposed qualities through a middle nature (p. 133); proportionate to them both — suited to both extremes by shared qualities (p. 133).

Read: p. 132 · Passage 2 · Original; p. 133 · Original.

Anthroposophia margin — Anthroposoph.

The abbreviated marginal title accompanies Vaughan’s statement that the Spirit is seated in fire, a point he says he has sufficiently discussed elsewhere. It is a reference to another work, not a newly named principle in this one. Anthroposophia returns in the prose conclusion when he recalls having promised a larger work there.

Historical forms: Anthroposoph. — Vaughan’s marginal reference to Anthroposophia (p. 134 · Original marginal note).

Read: p. 134 · Original; p. 134 · Original marginal note · Original; p. 138 · Passage 1 · Original.