Sacred and Truly Christian Philosophy, or Cosmic Meteorology

Sect. I. Port. IV. Part I. Book II.

...we are taught by Holy Testimony: And this is the reason why we said the air is by itself neither hot nor cold, nor moist nor dry, but sometimes hot, sometimes cold, and sometimes moist and dry. But indeed, we said that at the very instant of its creation, it tasted especially of moisture, in a way, and by a sort of adventitious original: "adventitio"; meaning something added from the outside rather than inherent to its basic essence. custom, because of the reasons we alleged above. Indeed, even Aristotle himself, and Robert of Lincoln Robert Grosseteste (c. 1175–1253), a famous English statesman, scientist, and philosopher who wrote extensively on light and the liberal arts., his commentator, seem to hint at this same thing when they maintain that a certain vapor is hot and moist, another hot and cold, and another hot and dry (which others call an "exhalation"). However, they assertively claim that no vapor is cold and dry, even though we see the Thunderstone original: "lapidem Ceraunium"; these were stones or fossils traditionally believed to fall from the sky during a lightning strike. (or lightning stone) has a terrestrial constitution. Consequently, its nearest cause must have been the air, or water, or a thick vapor that was cold and dry; for that which creates such a thing must itself be more like that thing. But those Philosophers say that hot and dry vapor comes partly from water and partly from earth; they want the hot and dry part to come from the earth, while they say the cold and moist part is exhaled from water.

As if indeed water itself, and consequently the earth, were not made of air, rather than air being made of water or earth! For in Genesis, mention is made of the Heavens (by which name "Air" is understood) before mention is made of either the visible waters or the earth; for the Heavens were the work of the second day, while the visible water and earth were of the third. Nor indeed is it just in the course of Nature that the thing which is begun principiatum should be the cause of its own beginning; rather, it is the other way around. The Heavens and the earth were made from these kinds of invisible waters, as St. Peter witnesses in 2 Peter 3:5, and St. Paul says in the place cited before, that visible things were preceded by those which are not seen. Heb. 11.

But in Occult Philosophy and Theosophy, those who are more skilled acknowledge (as seen in Reuchlin's Cabala Johannes Reuchlin (1455–1522) was a German humanist and scholar of Hebrew who introduced Jewish Mysticism/Cabala into Renaissance philosophy.) that all lower things are representative of higher things. From this, they say that as it is below, so it is also enacted above. All the Doctors of the Hebrews and those more skilled in the Cabala approve of this. From this it follows that the figure and image of the earth and waters existed first in the air, just as the impressions of the air descended first from the Aether; in the same way, no true Christian will deny that the image of the heavens and the pattern of the world descended from the Archetypal Throne.

Therefore, we conclude that Air is the first material origin of every kind of meteor. According to the disposition of the angels who rule over it and breathe into it, the air is altered from one constitution to another by the divine will. We say that when the fiery winds blow (for angels are winds and the flaming ministers of God), the substance of the highest region of the air—which is nothing other than invisibly expanded fire—is contracted into the visible form of a Comet or another meteor of that same kind, according to the nature of the acting angel. Similarly, according to the nature of the wind, when fiery angels breathe against watery ones, and the watery ones also equally predominate, they produce thunder and lightning, or "mixed meteors," by the compression of the air.

But if cold winds especially prevail, or moist ones with a very small portion of heat, we say that snow, hail, or rain are produced there, without lightning or flashing, in the middle region of the air. Finally, if the dominion of hot winds is in the middle region of the air, then fiery meteors are usually generated in the lowest region of the air—measuring from the place of the clouds down to the earth—by the compression of the parts of the fiery air expanded everywhere in this region. From this come falling stars, Castor and Pollux A name for "St. Elmo's Fire," a glowing plasma seen on ships during storms., the Will-o'-the-Wisp original: "Ignis fatuus.", etc. If the predominating wind is moderately hot and moist, breathed out by the West Wind Zephyrus, it creates a benevolent and healthy dew. If it abounds in cold and dryness, it brings on frost and ice into the middle region of the air. In this generation, the material cause is the Air; the near efficient cause is the wind (or air moved centrally by angels performing the Word of God); and the remote or primary cause is God the Father, who ordains all things that are done in the world.

And yet, in truth, the Angels are only the organs in which and through which He alone acts immediately in the created spirit. Therefore, the opinions of those who posited that vapors rising from the earth or water are the material causes of meteors in the air are empty. Aristotle was blind, and blind (I say) are the Peripatetics Followers of Aristotle's philosophy. and all the Philosophers who have dared to write about the natures of meteors while being ignorant of their causes, both material and efficient. These secular "wise men" or Philosophers did not understand that at the point of creation, God simultaneously created by His Word the air and the angels and spirits. These spirits perform and execute their duty and office in the air concerning the direction of storms, rain, snow, hail, frost, clouds, lightning, thunder, flashes, chasms original: "chasmatum"; likely referring to auroras or gaps in the clouds., thunderbolts, waters, heat, cold, moisture, dryness, and many other things of that kind. And this very thing still happens today by His Word.

Notice (Christian Reader) how futilely the Philosophers write about these things just mentioned—Philosophers whom the Christian Schools (alas!) follow in everything. Look at where they think clouds, rain, hail, snow, frost, heat, cold, lightning, thunder, the thunderbolt, the thunderstone, floods of water, and good and bad storms arise; you will perceive their errors with your own eyes wide open. You will see how far they truly stand from the doctrine of Holy Scripture. This immense difference between the doctrine of true Christian Philosophers and those Pagans Ethnics arises because they did not rightly know either God or His most holy Word. This is also why the Christian Philosophers who follow them despise, or at least neglect, the true philosophy hidden in the Holy Scriptures, so that they might brood only over Pagan ravings and pile lie upon lie. If they had read the Holy Scripture with the same zeal with which they turned the pages of Aristotle's volumes and the lies of other Pagans, they would have undoubtedly found the true causes of storms in the air, and they would have perceived that...