tual essence and the spiritual virtue of the Serpent Communicated to them, and impressed in them, by virtue of the Serpent's cohabitation with them. For in nature we find that many bodies do not only by their qualities affect their adjacents, but also infuse their virtue into them, and endue them with the same faculty. Thus the magnet doth not only attract iron, but also communicates its virtues to it.
Upon this principle is founded what Theophrastus asserts, "that the hairy and white serpents in Germany are indued with such admirable and υπερ φυσιν αριοις,... supernaturally excellent virtues, that they are of special use for the attainment of knowledge, both natural and occult. The way then to get this spiritual mummy of the serpent, and to confer it upon man, is to take the sperm, that is the eggs of the serpent, which are τα σοχεια κὶ σχηματα, the elements and principles both of their corporal and spiritual mummy, and mixing them with fat
