Page:The Works of William Harvey (part 1 of 2).djvu/606

 the blood ; I say that they are not fire, and neither do they derive their origin from fire. They rather share the nature of some other, and that a more divine body or substance. They act by no faculty or property of the elements ; but as there is a something inherent in the semen which makes it prolific, and as, in producing an animal, it surpasses the power of the elements, as it is a spirit, namely, and the inherent nature of that spirit corresponds to the essence of the stars, so is there a spirit, or certain force, inherent in the blood, acting superiorly to the powers of the elements, very conspicuously displayed in the nutrition and preservation of the several parts of the animal body ; and the nature, yea, the soul in this spirit and blood, is identical with the essence of the stars. That the heat of the blood of animals during their lifetime, therefore, is neither fire, nor derived from fire, is manifest, and indeed is clearly demon- strated by our observations.

But that this may be made still more certain let me be per- mitted to digress a little from my subject, and, in a few words, to show what is meant by the word " spirit," and what by the phrases ' ' superior in action to the forces of the elements," ' ' to have the properties of another body, and that more divine than those bodies which are called elements," and "the nature in- herent in this spirit which answers to the essence of the stars."

We have already had occasion to say something both of the nature of " spirit" and " the vital principle," and we shall here enter into the subject at greater length. There are three bodies simple bodies which seem especially entitled to receive the name, at all events, to perform the office of "spirit," viz. fire, air, and water, each of which, by reason of its ceaseless flux and motion, expressed by the words flame, wind, and flood, appears to have the properties of life, or of some other body. Flame is the flow of fire, wind the flow of air, stream or flood the flow of water. Flame, like an animal, is self-motive, self- nutrient, self- augmentative, and is the symbol of our life. It is therefore that it is so universally brought into requisition in re- ligious ceremonies : it was guarded by priestesses and virgins in the temples of Apollo and Vesta as a sacred thing, and from the remotest antiquity has been held worthy of divine worship by the Persians and other ancient nations ; as if God were most conspicuous in flame, and spoke to us from fire as he did to