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2QO
HISTORY OF THE ROSICRUCIANS.
to a lugubrious consideration of the impediments and de-
generacy
of the arts and sciences in modern times de
scientiarum hodierno die in scholis mgentium impedimentis.
enlarges on the urgent necessity for a reformation in
Natural Philosophy, Medicine, and Alchemy.
Concerning the first, the author declares it to be impossible
for any one to attain to the supreme summit of the natural
sciences unless he be profoundly versed in the occult mean-
ing of the ancient philosophers,
It
but the minute and most
accurate observer who does achieve this height will not find
it difficult to adapt the materials which are prepared by
Nature in such a manner as to produce, by the application
of actives to passives, many marvellous effects before the
time ordained by Nature ; and this, he adds, will be mis-
taken by the uninitiated for a miracle.
Like others of his school, he insists on the uncertainty of
(L posteriori and experimental methods, to which he unhesi-
tatingly attributes all the errors of the natural sciences.
"
Particulars are frequently fallible, but universals never.
Occult philosophy lays bare Nature in her complete naked-
ness, and alone contemplates the wisdom of universals by
the eyes of intelligence. Accustomed to partake of the
rivers which flow from the Fountain of Life, it is unac-
quainted with grossness and with clouded waters."
In Medicine he laments the loss of that universal panacea
referred to by Hippocrates :
" But absolutely nothing re-
mains of that one and only medicament of which Hippo-
crates makes mention (darkly and mystically, I admit) in
several places, and still less are its operations understood,
inasmuch as no one now searches with lynx-like eyes into
the profound depths of true natural philosophy, to gain an
accurate knowledge of its composition and its virtues."