Page:Hermetic and Alchemical Writings of Paracelsus Vol I (IA cu31924092287121).djvu/202

 finger to Saturn, the ring finger or medicus to the Sun, and the little finger to Mercury. Meanwhile, Mars and the Moon were, so to say, banished. Would one be surprised, then, if in righteous indignation Mars bade his sons kill that allotter, or keep up continual strife with him: or who would wonder if the Moon weakened his brain, or took his wits away altogether? And this is the first error which we say has been committed in chiromancy.

The second mistake is this. It often happens that the original natural lines of the hands are changed by injuries or chance accidents, or become larger or smaller, or appear in other places. It is just as if a road were blocked with some obstacle, or covered by a mountain falling on it, or destroyed by an inundation. Men would make another road near it. So with the old lines of the hand. Sometimes when wounds or ulcers have healed, along with the new flesh new lines come into existence, and the old ones are altogether blotted out. In the same way, by hard work lines are obliterated, or those which were there originally enlarged. Then the same thing happens as with trees. If the growing tree puts forth many leaves, a number of them are cut off and the tree is enlarged in size.

And now let us pass on to the practical part of this science of chiromancy, and in a few words disclose our opinion. I would have you know that, so far as relates to hands, I make no change therein, but I acquiesce with the observations and descriptions of the ancients. But in this practical chiromancy I have undertaken to write only of those matters which the ancients have not mentioned, as concerning the chiromancy of herbs, woods, stones, and the like. And first it should be remarked that all herbs, of whatever kind they are, belong to one and the same chiromancy. If their lines are unlike, and appear greater or less in some than in others, this is through their age. We expressly avow that the chiromancy of herbs confers no other advantage beyond enabling us to know the age of any herb or root.

Someone in arguing may urge and assert that no herb as long as it adheres to its root can be more than four or at the most five months old, that is, reckoning from May to autumn, after which time every herb perishes and drops away from its root. To this I answer that a unique virtue exists in the root, which is the first essence and spirit of the herb, from which the herb is born and sustained to its predestined time, and so is exalted right up to the production of the seed. And this is the sign or indication that the virtue goes back again into the root, and thus the herb withers. But as long as that spirit, which is the supreme force of the herb, remains in the root, every year that herb is renewed, unless it happens that the spirit is taken away, and withers along with the herb. Then for that herb there is no renovation. The root is dead, and no longer has life in it. But how that spirit is taken away with the herb from the root, or with the root from the earth, so that its virtue goes back either into the root, or from the root into the earth, must not be discussed in this place. It is Nature's sublime mystery, not to be put forth for the benefit of sophistical physicians, for whom such secrets are not only a