[SECT. III.]
I.
MADAM,
I have discharged my duty thus far, that in obedience to your commands, I have given you my answers to the opinions of three of those famous and learned Authors you sent me, viz. Hobbes, Des Cartes, and More, and explained my own opinions by examining theirs; My onely task shall be now to proceed in the same manner with that famous Philosopher and Chymist, Van Helmont; But him I find more difficult to be understood then any of the forementioned, not onely by reason of the Art of Chymistry, which I confess myself not versed in, but especially, that he has such strange terms and unusual expressions as may puzle any body to apprehend the sense and meaning of them: Wherefore, if you receive not that full satisfaction you expect from me, in examining his opinions and arguments, I beg your pardon before-hand, and desire you to remember, that I sent you word in the beginning, I did undertake this work more out of desire to clear my own opinions, then a quarrelsome humor to contradict others; which if I do but obtain, I have my aim. And so to the business: When as your Author discourses of the causes and beginnings of Natural things, he is pleased to say,[1] That Souls and Lives, as they know no Degrees, so they know no Parts; which opinion is very different from mine: For although I confess, that there is but one kind of Life, and one kind of Soul in Nature, which is the sensitive Life, and the rational Soul, both consisting not onely of Matter, but of one kind of Matter, to wit, Animate; nevertheless they are of different degrees, the matter of the rational Soul being more agil, subtil and active, then the matter of the sensitive Life; which is the reason that the rational can act in its own substance or degree of matter, and make figures in it self, and its own parts; when as the sensitive, being of somewhat a grosser degree then the rational, and not so subtil and active, is confined to work with and upon the Inanimate matter. But mistake me not, Madam, for I make onely a difference of the degrees of Subtilty, Activity, Agility, Purity, betwixt rational and sensitive Matter; but as for the rational Matter it self, it has no degrees of Purity, Subtilty and Activity in its own Nature or Parts, but is always one and the same in its substance in all Creatures, and so is the sensitive. You will ask me, How comes then the difference of so many Parts and Creatures in Nature, if there be no degrees of Purity, Activity, and Subtilty in the substance of the rational, and in the substance of the sensitive Matter? As for example: if there were no such degrees of the Parts of rational Matter amongst themselves, as also of the Parts of the sensitive, there would be no difference betwixt Animals, Vegetables, Minerals, and Elements, but all Creatures would be alike without distinction, and have the same manner of sense and reason, life and knowledg. I answer, That although each sort or degree of animate Matter, rational as well as sensitive, has in it self or its own substance no degrees of purity, rarity, and subtilty, but is one and the same in its nature or essence; nevertheless, each has degrees of quantity, or parts, which degrees of quantity do make the onely difference betwixt the several creatures or parts of Nature, as well in their general, as particular kinds; for both the rational and sensitive matter being corporeal, and so dividable into parts, some creatures do partake more, some less of them, which makes them to have more or less, and so different sense and reason, each according to the nature of its kind: Nay this difference of the degrees of quantity or parts in the substance of the rational and sensitive Matter, makes also the difference betwixt particulars in every sort of Creatures, as for example, between several particular Men: But as I said, the nature or essence of the sensitive and rational Matter is the same in all; for the difference consists not in the Nature of Matter, but onely in the degrees of quantity, and parts of Matter, and in the various and different actions or motions of this same Matter. And thus Matter being dividable, there are numerous lives and souls in Nature, according to the variousness of her several Parts and Creatures. Next your Author, mentioning the Causes and Principles of natural Bodies, assigns two first or chief beginnings and corporeal causes of every Creature, to wit, the Element of Water, and the Ferment or Leaven; which Ferment he calls a formal created being; neither a substance, nor an accident, but a neutral thing. Truly, Madam, my reason is not able to conceive this neutral Being; for it must either be something or nothing in Nature: and if he makes it any thing betwixt both, it is a strange Monster; and will produce monstrous effects: and for Water, if he doth make it a Principle of Natural things, I see no reason why he excludes the rest of the Elements: But, in my opinion, Water, and the rest of the Elements, are but effects of Nature, as other Creatures are, and so cannot be prime causes. The like the Ferment, which, to my sense and reason, is nothing else, but a natural effect of natural matter. Concerning his opinion, That Causes and Beginnings are all one, or that there is but little difference betwixt them, I do readily subscribe unto it; but when he speaks of those things, which are produced without life, my reason cannot find out, what, or where they should be; for certainly, in Nature they are not, Nature being Life and Soul her self, and all her parts being enlivened and soulified, so that there can be no generation or natural production without Life. Neither is my sense and reason capable to understand his meaning, when he says, That the Seeds of things, and the Spirits, as the Dispensers thereof, are divided from the Material Cause: For I do see no difference betwixt the Seed, and the material Cause, but they are all one thing, it being undeniable, that the seed is the matter of that which is produced. But your Author was pleased to say heretofore, that there are but two beginnings or causes of natural things, and now he makes so many more; for, says he, Of Efficient and Seminal Causes, some are efficiently effecting, and others effectively effecting: which nice distinctions, in my opinion, do but make a confusion in natural knowledg, setting a mans brain on the rack; for who is able to conceive all those Chymæras and Fancies of the Archeus, Ferment, various Ideas, Blas, Gas, and many more, which are neither something nor no-thing in Nature, but betwixt both, except a man have the same Fancies, Visions and Dreams, your Author had? Nature is easie to be understood, and without any difficulty, so as we stand in no need to frame so many strange names, able to fright any body. Neither do natural bodies know many prime causes and beginnings, but there is but one onely chief and prime cause from which all effects and varieties proceed, which cause is corporeal Nature, or natural self-moving Matter, which forms and produces all natural things; and all the variety and difference of natural Creatures arises from her various actions, which are the various motions in Nature; some whereof are Regular, some Irregular: I mean Irregular, as to particular Creatures, not as to Nature her self, for Nature cannot be disturbed or discomposed, or else all would run into confusion; Wherefore Irregularities do onely concern particular Creatures, not Infinite Nature; and the Irregularities of some parts may cause the Irregularities of other Parts, as the Regularities of some parts do cause the Regularities of others: And thus according as Regularities and Irregularities have power, they cause either Peace or War, Sickness or Health, Delight and Pleasure, or Grief and Pain, Life or Death, to particular Creatures or parts of Nature; but all these various actions are but various Effects, and not prime Causes; which is well to be observed, lest we confound Causes with Effects. And so leaving this discourse for the present, I rest,
Madam,
Your Faithful Friend
and Servant.
[1] Van Helm, in his Book intituled, Physick Refined, ch. 4. of the Causes and beginning of natural things.