From the book
Sal Lumen and Spiritus Mundi Philosophici
Clovis Hesteau de Nuysement · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Meaning
II.3.21 alternates spiritueuse and spirituelle when discussing the subtle nutritive portion hidden within bodily food. The supplied English differentiates the terms rather than collapsing both into one modern technical expression. Neither adjective should be equated with alcoholic strength.
The argument is inferential: the author says the nourishing spirit is known through its effects, not directly watched as it separates. He also qualifies the claim about waste. The bulk of food is not wholly worthless excrement, because it houses and carries the life-bearing portion. This is an important limit on the prison rhetoric and on the asserted equality of intake and waste. The two adjectives name subtle agency within that argument, not an independently measured chemical fraction.
Places to read
- Book Two · Chapter 3 · Unit 21Alternating source adjectives both describe nutritive immaterial/subtle matter; edition differentiates English renderings.
Word family
Spiritueuse and spirituelle: two adjectives retained in the reading. Exact historical spellings are listed separately.
Attested forms
spiritueuse; spirituelle