Chapter III: Section 1 (2)

Having now before us the causes out of which the rest of our
discourse is to be framed, let us go back to the point at which
we began, and add a fair ending to our tale. As I said at first,
all things were originally a chaos in which there was no order or
proportion. The elements of this chaos were arranged by the
Creator, and out of them he made the world. Of the divine he
himself was the author, but he committed to his offspring the
creation of the mortal. From him they received the immortal soul,
but themselves made the body to be its vehicle, and constructed
within another soul which was mortal, and subject to terrible
affections—pleasure, the inciter of evil; pain, which deters from
good; rashness and fear, foolish counsellors; anger hard to be
appeased; hope easily led astray. These they mingled with
irrational sense and all-daring love according to necessary laws
and so framed man. And, fearing to pollute the divine element,
they gave the mortal soul a separate habitation in the breast,
parted off from the head by a narrow isthmus. And as in a house
the women’s apartments are divided from the men’s, the cavity of
the thorax was divided into two parts, a higher and a lower. The
higher of the two, which is the seat of courage and anger, lies
nearer to the head, between the midriff and the neck, and assists
reason in restraining the desires. The heart is the house of
guard in which all the veins meet, and through them reason sends
her commands to the extremity of her kingdom. When the passions
are in revolt, or danger approaches from without, then the heart
beats and swells; and the creating powers, knowing this,
implanted in the body the soft and bloodless substance of the
lung, having a porous and springy nature like a sponge, and being
kept cool by drink and air which enters through the trachea.

The part of the soul which desires meat and drink was placed
between the midriff and navel, where they made a sort of manger;
and here they bound it down, like a wild animal, away from the
council-chamber, and leaving the better principle undisturbed to
advise quietly for the good of the whole. For the Creator knew
that the belly would not listen to reason, and was under the
power of idols and fancies. Wherefore he framed the liver to
connect with the lower nature, contriving that it should be
compact, and bright, and sweet, and also bitter and smooth, in
order that the power of thought which originates in the mind
might there be reflected, terrifying the belly with the elements
of bitterness and gall, and a suffusion of bilious colours when
the liver is contracted, and causing pain and misery by twisting
out of its place the lobe and closing up the vessels and gates.
And the converse happens when some gentle inspiration coming from
intelligence mirrors the opposite fancies, giving rest and
sweetness and freedom, and at night, moderation and peace
accompanied with prophetic insight, when reason and sense are
asleep. For the authors of our being, in obedience to their
Father’s will and in order to make men as good as they could,
gave to the liver the power of divination, which is never active
when men are awake or in health; but when they are under the
influence of some disorder or enthusiasm then they receive
intimations, which have to be interpreted by others who are
called prophets, but should rather be called interpreters of
prophecy; after death these intimations become unintelligible.
The spleen which is situated in the neighbourhood, on the left
side, keeps the liver bright and clean, as a napkin does a
mirror, and the evacuations of the liver are received into it;
and being a hollow tissue it is for a time swollen with these
impurities, but when the body is purged it returns to its natural
size.

The truth concerning the soul can only be established by the word
of God. Still, we may venture to assert what is probable both
concerning soul and body.

The creative powers were aware of our tendency to excess. And so
when they made the belly to be a receptacle for food, in order
that men might not perish by insatiable gluttony, they formed the
convolutions of the intestines, in this way retarding the passage
of food through the body, lest mankind should be absorbed in
eating and drinking, and the whole race become impervious to
divine philosophy.

The creation of bones and flesh was on this wise. The foundation
of these is the marrow which binds together body and soul, and
the marrow is made out of such of the primary triangles as are
adapted by their perfection to produce all the four elements.
These God took and mingled them in due proportion, making as many
kinds of marrow as there were hereafter to be kinds of souls. The
receptacle of the divine soul he made round, and called that
portion of the marrow brain, intending that the vessel containing
this substance should be the head. The remaining part he divided
into long and round figures, and to these as to anchors,
fastening the mortal soul, he proceeded to make the rest of the
body, first forming for both parts a covering of bone. The bone
was formed by sifting pure smooth earth and wetting it with
marrow. It was then thrust alternately into fire and water, and
thus rendered insoluble by either. Of bone he made a globe which
he placed around the brain, leaving a narrow opening, and around
the marrow of the neck and spine he formed the vertebrae, like
hinges, which extended from the head through the whole of the
trunk. And as the bone was brittle and liable to mortify and
destroy the marrow by too great rigidity and susceptibility to
heat and cold, he contrived sinews and flesh—the first to give
flexibility, the second to guard against heat and cold, and to be
a protection against falls, containing a warm moisture, which in
summer exudes and cools the body, and in winter is a defence
against cold. Having this in view, the Creator mingled earth with
fire and water and mixed with them a ferment of acid and salt, so
as to form pulpy flesh. But the sinews he made of a mixture of
bone and unfermented flesh, giving them a mean nature between the
two, and a yellow colour. Hence they were more glutinous than
flesh, but softer than bone. The bones which have most of the
living soul within them he covered with the thinnest film of
flesh, those which have least of it, he lodged deeper. At the
joints he diminished the flesh in order not to impede the flexure
of the limbs, and also to avoid clogging the perceptions of the
mind. About the thighs and arms, which have no sense because
there is little soul in the marrow, and about the inner bones, he
laid the flesh thicker. For where the flesh is thicker there is
less feeling, except in certain parts which the Creator has made
solely of flesh, as for example, the tongue. Had the combination
of solid bone and thick flesh been consistent with acute
perceptions, the Creator would have given man a sinewy and fleshy
head, and then he would have lived twice as long. But our
creators were of opinion that a shorter life which was better was
preferable to a longer which was worse, and therefore they
covered the head with thin bone, and placed the sinews at the
extremity of the head round the neck, and fastened the jawbones
to them below the face. And they framed the mouth, having teeth
and tongue and lips, with a view to the necessary and the good;
for food is a necessity, and the river of speech is the best of
rivers. Still, the head could not be left a bare globe of bone on
account of the extremes of heat and cold, nor be allowed to
become dull and senseless by an overgrowth of flesh. Wherefore it
was covered by a peel or skin which met and grew by the help of
the cerebral humour. The diversity of the sutures was caused by
the struggle of the food against the courses of the soul. The
skin of the head was pierced by fire, and out of the punctures
came forth a moisture, part liquid, and part of a skinny nature,
which was hardened by the pressure of the external cold and
became hair. And God gave hair to the head of man to be a light
covering, so that it might not interfere with his perceptions.
Nails were formed by combining sinew, skin, and bone, and were
made by the creators with a view to the future when, as they
knew, women and other animals who would require them would be
framed out of man.

The gods also mingled natures akin to that of man with other
forms and perceptions. Thus trees and plants were created, which
were originally wild and have been adapted by cultivation to our
use. They partake of that third kind of life which is seated
between the midriff and the navel, and is altogether passive and
incapable of reflection.

When the creators had furnished all these natures for our
sustenance, they cut channels through our bodies as in a garden,
watering them with a perennial stream. Two were cut down the
back, along the back bone, where the skin and flesh meet, one on
the right and the other on the left, having the marrow of
generation between them. In the next place, they divided the
veins about the head and interlaced them with each other in order
that they might form an additional link between the head and the
body, and that the sensations from both sides might be diffused
throughout the body. In the third place, they contrived the
passage of liquids, which may be explained in this way:—Finer
bodies retain coarser, but not the coarser the finer, and the
belly is capable of retaining food, but not fire and air. God
therefore formed a network of fire and air to irrigate the veins,
having within it two lesser nets, and stretched cords reaching
from both the lesser nets to the extremity of the outer net. The
inner parts of the net were made by him of fire, the lesser nets
and their cavities of air. The two latter he made to pass into
the mouth; the one ascending by the air-pipes from the lungs, the
other by the side of the air-pipes from the belly. The entrance
to the first he divided into two parts, both of which he made to
meet at the channels of the nose, that when the mouth was closed
the passage connected with it might still be fed with air. The
cavity of the network he spread around the hollows of the body,
making the entire receptacle to flow into and out of the lesser
nets and the lesser nets into and out of it, while the outer net
found a way into and out of the pores of the body, and the
internal heat followed the air to and fro. These, as we affirm,
are the phenomena of respiration. And all this process takes
place in order that the body may be watered and cooled and
nourished, and the meat and drink digested and liquefied and
carried into the veins.

The causes of respiration have now to be considered. The
exhalation of the breath through the mouth and nostrils displaces
the external air, and at the same time leaves a vacuum into which
through the pores the air which is displaced enters. Also the
vacuum which is made when the air is exhaled through the pores is
filled up by the inhalation of breath through the mouth and
nostrils. The explanation of this double phenomenon is as
follows:—Elements move towards their natural places. Now as every
animal has within him a fountain of fire, the air which is
inhaled through the mouth and nostrils, on coming into contact
with this, is heated; and when heated, in accordance with the law
of attraction, it escapes by the way it entered toward the place
of fire. On leaving the body it is cooled and drives round the
air which it displaces through the pores into the empty lungs.
This again is in turn heated by the internal fire and escapes, as
it entered, through the pores.

The phenomena of medical cupping-glasses, of swallowing, and of
the hurling of bodies, are to be explained on a similar
principle; as also sounds, which are sometimes discordant on
account of the inequality of them, and again harmonious by reason
of equality. The slower sounds reaching the swifter, when they
begin to pause, by degrees assimilate with them: whence arises a
pleasure which even the unwise feel, and which to the wise
becomes a higher sense of delight, being an imitation of divine
harmony in mortal motions. Streams flow, lightnings play, amber
and the magnet attract, not by reason of attraction, but because
‘nature abhors a vacuum,’ and because things, when compounded or
dissolved, move different ways, each to its own place.

I will now return to the phenomena of respiration. The fire,
entering the belly, minces the food, and as it escapes, fills the
veins by drawing after it the divided portions, and thus the
streams of nutriment are diffused through the body. The fruits or
herbs which are our daily sustenance take all sorts of colours
when intermixed, but the colour of red or fire predominates, and
hence the liquid which we call blood is red, being the nurturing
principle of the body, whence all parts are watered and empty
places filled.

The process of repletion and depletion is produced by the
attraction of like to like, after the manner of the universal
motion. The external elements by their attraction are always
diminishing the substance of the body: the particles of blood,
too, formed out of the newly digested food, are attracted towards
kindred elements within the body and so fill up the void. When
more is taken away than flows in, then we decay; and when less,
we grow and increase.

The young of every animal has the triangles new and closely
locked together, and yet the entire frame is soft and delicate,
being newly made of marrow and nurtured on milk. These triangles
are sharper than those which enter the body from without in the
shape of food, and therefore they cut them up. But as life
advances, the triangles wear out and are no longer able to
assimilate food; and at length, when the bonds which unite the
triangles of the marrow become undone, they in turn unloose the
bonds of the soul; and if the release be according to nature, she
then flies away with joy. For the death which is natural is
pleasant, but that which is caused by violence is painful.

Every one may understand the origin of diseases. They may be
occasioned by the disarrangement or disproportion of the elements
out of which the body is framed. This is the origin of many of
them, but the worst of all owe their severity to the following
causes: There is a natural order in the human frame according to
which the flesh and sinews are made of blood, the sinews out of
the fibres, and the flesh out of the congealed substance which is
formed by separation from the fibres. The glutinous matter which
comes away from the sinews and the flesh, not only binds the
flesh to the bones, but nourishes the bones and waters the
marrow. When these processes take place in regular order the body
is in health.

But when the flesh wastes and returns into the veins there is
discoloured blood as well as air in the veins, having acid and
salt qualities, from which is generated every sort of phlegm and
bile. All things go the wrong way and cease to give nourishment
to the body, no longer preserving their natural courses, but at
war with themselves and destructive to the constitution of the
body. The oldest part of the flesh which is hard to decompose
blackens from long burning, and from being corroded grows bitter,
and as the bitter element refines away, becomes acid. When tinged
with blood the bitter substance has a red colour, and this when
mixed with black takes the hue of grass; or again, the bitter
substance has an auburn colour, when new flesh is decomposed by
the internal flame. To all which phenomena some physician or
philosopher who was able to see the one in many has given the
name of bile. The various kinds of bile have names answering to
their colours. Lymph or serum is of two kinds: first, the whey of
blood, which is gentle; secondly, the secretion of dark and
bitter bile, which, when mingled under the influence of heat with
salt, is malignant and is called acid phlegm. There is also white
phlegm, formed by the decomposition of young and tender flesh,
and covered with little bubbles, separately invisible, but
becoming visible when collected. The water of tears and
perspiration and similar substances is also the watery part of
fresh phlegm. All these humours become sources of disease when
the blood is replenished in irregular ways and not by food or
drink. The danger, however, is not so great when the foundation
remains, for then there is a possibility of recovery. But when
the substance which unites the flesh and bones is diseased, and
is no longer renewed from the muscles and sinews, and instead of
being oily and smooth and glutinous becomes rough and salt and
dry, then the fleshy parts fall away and leave the sinews bare
and full of brine, and the flesh gets back again into the
circulation of the blood, and makes the previously mentioned
disorders still greater. There are other and worse diseases which
are prior to these; as when the bone through the density of the
flesh does not receive sufficient air, and becomes stagnant and
gangrened, and crumbling away passes into the food, and the food
into the flesh, and the flesh returns again into the blood. Worst
of all and most fatal is the disease of the marrow, by which the
whole course of the body is reversed. There is a third class of
diseases which are produced, some by wind and some by phlegm and
some by bile. When the lung, which is the steward of the air, is
obstructed, by rheums, and in one part no air, and in another too
much, enters in, then the parts which are unrefreshed by air
corrode, and other parts are distorted by the excess of air; and
in this manner painful diseases are produced. The most painful
are caused by wind generated within the body, which gets about
the great sinews of the shoulders—these are termed tetanus. The
cure of them is difficult, and in most cases they are relieved
only by fever. White phlegm, which is dangerous if kept in, by
reason of the air bubbles, is not equally dangerous if able to
escape through the pores, although it variegates the body,
generating diverse kinds of leprosies. If, when mingled with
black bile, it disturbs the courses of the head in sleep, there
is not so much danger; but if it assails those who are awake,
then the attack is far more dangerous, and is called epilepsy or
the sacred disease. Acid and salt phlegm is the source of
catarrh.

Inflammations originate in bile, which is sometimes relieved by
boils and swellings, but when detained, and above all when
mingled with pure blood, generates many inflammatory disorders,
disturbing the position of the fibres which are scattered about
in the blood in order to maintain the balance of rare and dense
which is necessary to its regular circulation. If the bile, which
is only stale blood, or liquefied flesh, comes in little by
little, it is congealed by the fibres and produces internal cold
and shuddering. But when it enters with more of a flood it
overcomes the fibres by its heat and reaches the spinal marrow,
and burning up the cables of the soul sets her free from the
body. When on the other hand the body, though wasted, still holds
out, then the bile is expelled, like an exile from a factious
state, causing associating diarrhoeas and dysenteries and similar
disorders. The body which is diseased from the effects of fire is
in a continual fever; when air is the agent, the fever is
quotidian; when water, the fever intermits a day; when earth,
which is the most sluggish element, the fever intermits three
days and is with difficulty shaken off.

Of mental disorders there are two sorts, one madness, the other
ignorance, and they may be justly attributed to disease.
Excessive pleasures or pains are among the greatest diseases, and
deprive men of their senses. When the seed about the spinal
marrow is too abundant, the body has too great pleasures and
pains; and during a great part of his life he who is the subject
of them is more or less mad. He is often thought bad, but this is
a mistake; for the truth is that the intemperance of lust is due
to the fluidity of the marrow produced by the loose consistency
of the bones. And this is true of vice in general, which is
commonly regarded as disgraceful, whereas it is really
involuntary and arises from a bad habit of the body and evil
education. In like manner the soul is often made vicious by the
influence of bodily pain; the briny phlegm and other bitter and
bilious humours wander over the body and find no exit, but are
compressed within, and mingle their own vapours with the motions
of the soul, and are carried to the three places of the soul,
creating infinite varieties of trouble and melancholy, of
rashness and cowardice, of forgetfulness and stupidity. When men
are in this evil plight of body, and evil forms of government and
evil discourses are superadded, and there is no education to save
them, they are corrupted through two causes; but of neither of
them are they really the authors. For the planters are to blame
rather than the plants, the educators and not the educated.
Still, we should endeavour to attain virtue and avoid vice; but
this is part of another subject.

Enough of disease—I have now to speak of the means by which the
mind and body are to be preserved, a higher theme than the other.
The good is the beautiful, and the beautiful is the symmetrical,
and there is no greater or fairer symmetry than that of body and
soul, as the contrary is the greatest of deformities. A leg or an
arm too long or too short is at once ugly and unserviceable, and
the same is true if body and soul are disproportionate. For a
strong and impassioned soul may ‘fret the pigmy body to decay,’
and so produce convulsions and other evils. The violence of
controversy, or the earnestness of enquiry, will often generate
inflammations and rheums which are not understood, or assigned to
their true cause by the professors of medicine. And in like
manner the body may be too much for the soul, darkening the
reason, and quickening the animal desires. The only security is
to preserve the balance of the two, and to this end the
mathematician or philosopher must practise gymnastics, and the
gymnast must cultivate music. The parts of the body too must be
treated in the same way—they should receive their appropriate
exercise. For the body is set in motion when it is heated and
cooled by the elements which enter in, or is dried up and
moistened by external things; and, if given up to these processes
when at rest, it is liable to destruction. But the natural
motion, as in the world, so also in the human frame, produces
harmony and divides hostile powers. The best exercise is the
spontaneous motion of the body, as in gymnastics, because most
akin to the motion of mind; not so good is the motion of which
the source is in another, as in sailing or riding; least good
when the body is at rest and the motion is in parts only, which
is a species of motion imparted by physic. This should only be
resorted to by men of sense in extreme cases; lesser diseases are
not to be irritated by medicine. For every disease is akin to the
living being and has an appointed term, just as life has, which
depends on the form of the triangles, and cannot be protracted
when they are worn out. And he who, instead of accepting his
destiny, endeavours to prolong his life by medicine, is likely to
multiply and magnify his diseases. Regimen and not medicine is
the true cure, when a man has time at his disposal.

Enough of the nature of man and of the body, and of training and
education. The subject is a great one and cannot be adequately
treated as an appendage to another. To sum up all in a word:
there are three kinds of soul located within us, and any one of
them, if remaining inactive, becomes very weak; if exercised,
very strong. Wherefore we should duly train and exercise all
three kinds.

The divine soul God lodged in the head, to raise us, like plants
which are not of earthly origin, to our kindred; for the head is
nearest to heaven. He who is intent upon the gratification of his
desires and cherishes the mortal soul, has all his ideas mortal,
and is himself mortal in the truest sense. But he who seeks after
knowledge and exercises the divine part of himself in godly and
immortal thoughts, attains to truth and immortality, as far as is
possible to man, and also to happiness, while he is training up
within him the divine principle and indwelling power of order.
There is only one way in which one person can benefit another;
and that is by assigning to him his proper nurture and motion. To
the motions of the soul answer the motions of the universe, and
by the study of these the individual is restored to his original
nature.

Thus we have finished the discussion of the universe, which,
according to our original intention, has now been brought down to
the creation of man. Completeness seems to require that something
should be briefly said about other animals: first of women, who
are probably degenerate and cowardly men. And when they
degenerated, the gods implanted in men the desire of union with
them, creating in man one animate substance and in woman another
in the following manner:—The outlet for liquids they connected
with the living principle of the spinal marrow, which the man has
the desire to emit into the fruitful womb of the woman; this is
like a fertile field in which the seed is quickened and matured,
and at last brought to light. When this desire is unsatisfied the
man is over-mastered by the power of the generative organs, and
the woman is subjected to disorders from the obstruction of the
passages of the breath, until the two meet and pluck the fruit of
the tree.

The race of birds was created out of innocent, light-minded men,
who thought to pursue the study of the heavens by sight; these
were transformed into birds, and grew feathers instead of hair.
The race of wild animals were men who had no philosophy, and
never looked up to heaven or used the courses of the head, but
followed only the influences of passion. Naturally they turned to
their kindred earth, and put their forelegs to the ground, and
their heads were crushed into strange oblong forms. Some of them
have four feet, and some of them more than four,—the latter, who
are the more senseless, drawing closer to their native element;
the most senseless of all have no limbs and trail their whole
body on the ground. The fourth kind are the inhabitants of the
waters; these are made out of the most senseless and ignorant and
impure of men, whom God placed in the uttermost parts of the
world in return for their utter ignorance, and caused them to
respire water instead of the pure element of air. Such are the
laws by which animals pass into one another.

And so the world received animals, mortal and immortal, and was
fulfilled with them, and became a visible God, comprehending the
visible, made in the image of the Intellectual, being the one
perfect only-begotten heaven.