Page:Chronicles of pharmacy (Volume 1).djvu/257

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That of the minerals is called Stannar or Trughat; of the vegetable kingdom, Leffas; while the astral bodies of animals are their Evestra. The Evestrum may travel about apart from its body; it may live long after the death of the body. Ghosts are, in fact, the Evestra of the departed. If you commit suicide the Evestrum does not recognise the act; it goes on as if the body were going on also until its appointed time.

Man is a microcosm; the universe is the macrocosm. Not that they are comparable to each other; they are one in reality, divided only by form. If you are not spiritually enlightened you may not be able to perceive this. Each plant on earth has its star. There is a stella absinthii, a stella rorismarini. If we could compile a complete "herbarium spirituale sidereum" we should be fully equipped to treat disease. Star influences also form our soul-essences. This accounts for our varying temperaments and talents.

The material part of man, the living body, is the Mumia. This is managed by the Archæus, which rules over everybody; it is the vital principle. It provides the internal balsam which heals wounds or diseases, and controls the action of the various organs.

His theories of mercury, sulphur, and salt, as the constituents of all things, seem at first likely to lead to something conceivable if not credible. But before we grasp the idea we are switched off into the spiritual world again. It is the sidereal mercury, sulphur, and salt, spirit, soul, and body, to which he is alluding.


His Chemical and Pharmaceutical Innovations.

These fantastic notions permeate all the medical treatises of Paracelsus. But every now and then there