Three Books of Occult Philosophy/Book 1/Chapter 34
opportunely fitted, viz. under a harmony like to the harmony, which did infuse a certain vertue into the matter. For although things have some vertues, such as we speak of, yet those vertues do so ly hid that there is seldom any effect produced by them: but as in a grain of Mustardseed, bruised, the sharpness which lay hid is stirred up: and as the heat of the fire doth make letters apparently seen, which before could not be read, that were writ with the juice of an Onion or milk: and letters wrote upon a stone with the fat of a Goat, and altogether unperceived, when the stone is put into Vinegar, appear and shew themselves. And as a blow with a stick stirs up the madness of a Dog, which before lay asleep, so doth the Celestiall harmony disclose vertues lying in the water, stirs them up, strengtheneth them, and makes them manifest, and as I may so say, produceth that into Act, which before was only in power, when things are rightly exposed to it in a Celestiall season. As for example; If thou dost desire to attract vertue from the Sun, and to seek those things that are Solary, amongst Vegetables, Plants, Metals, Stones, and Animals, these things are to be used, and taken chiefly, which in a Solary order are higher. For these are more available: So thou shalt draw a singular gift from the Sun through the beams thereof, being seasonably received together, and through the spirit of the world.
It is most evident, that in the inferiour nature all the powers of superior bodies are not found comprehended in any one thing, but are dispersed through many kinds of things amongst us: as there are many Solary things, whereof every one doth not contain all the vertues of the Sun: but some have some properties from the Sun, and others othersome. Wherefore it is sometimes necessary that there be mixtions in operations, that if a hundred or a thousand vertues of the Sun were dispersed through so many Plants, Animals, & the like, we may gather all these together, and bring them into one form, in which we shall see all the said vertues, being united, contained. Now there is a twofold vertue in commixtion, one, viz. which was first planted in its parts, and is Celestiall, the other is obtained by a certain, and artificiall mixtion of things mixt amongst themselves, and of the mixtions of them according to certain proportions, such as agree with the heaven under a certain Constellation; And this vertue descends by a certain likeness, and aptness that is in things amongst themselves towards their superiours, and just as much as the following do by degrees correspond with them that go before, where the patient is fitly applyed to its agent. So from a certain composition of Hearbs, vapours, and such like, made according to naturall Philosophy, and Astronomy, there results a certain common form, endowed with many gifts of the Stars: as in the honey of Bees, that which is gathered out of the juice of innumerable Flowers, and brought into one form, contains the vertue of