Physiologia Kircheriana Experimentalis

the second position in the vial above the earthy liquid; the third, the airy [liquid], above the watery third; the fourth finally, the fiery [liquid], above the airy, [shall] occupy the fourth and highest place in the vial; and thus all, being distinct and unmixable, will hold that position on the surface of the earth which the vial A B exhibits. Now let someone descend with the said vial by the power of divine might toward the center of the earth. I say that the more the said liquids approach the center of the earth, the more they will contract themselves into sensible arcs; but when the vial has reached the center of the earth, then the individual liquids will arrange themselves spherically according to the position which the four elements have around the earth, so that the earthy liquid will contract itself into an entire sphere, while the three remaining surrounding liquids will each arrange themselves around the earthy one, according to a certain analogy which is commonly conceived regarding the elements, and which figure H here annexed sufficiently demonstrates. The reason is clearly evident from the preceding; for since these liquids are unmixable, and one is always heavier than the other, the heaviest necessarily—that of the earth—will accommodate itself into the manner of a sphere, with parts of the same ratio inclining toward the center; but the watery liquid, resting upon the heavier one, since it knows not how to be mixed with it, will form itself into the shape of a ring around the earthy globe, and the airy around the watery, and the fiery around the airy, by a certain marvelous artifice of nature: which indeed can happen nowhere except in

the center of the earth, and perhaps in an imaginary space outside this sensible world, if the said vial were transferred there by divine power, the same thing would occur. See what we have discussed more fully concerning these matters in Ars Magna Sciendi, Book 3.

Hence is revealed the vain and stupid boasting of some chemists, who glory that they can represent the artifice of all nature—that is, the sensible orbs of the world and thus the creation of the entire universe—within a glass sphere outside the center of the earth, by means of chemical liquids conglobated as spheres; since this exceeds the limits not only of human but even of angelic power, being reserved for the virtue of the omnipotent God alone, I cannot marvel enough at the crude ignorance of men of this kind, while they are not ashamed to pour such enormous nonsense upon the world; while they persuade themselves either that they do not err when they think such things, or, when they see that they err, they more confidently imagine to themselves that their such obvious blunders cannot be detected by true philosophy. Let, therefore, the vain and preconceived opinion among the common people concerning such an insane chemical artifice now cease; and let all firmly persuade themselves that it cannot be accomplished except at the center of the earth.

If it is true, as it is most true, what is handed down by the unanimous consent of almost all the holy fathers, that hell was established by God in the lowest place of the earth, so that those who have removed themselves as far as possible from God by the gravity of their sins might deservedly occupy the final and most remote place in sensible nature, which, since it can be none other than that huge abyss of a fiery crater established around the center of the universe; certainly, it is clearly evident from the premises that, after the universal resurrection of the flesh, all the bodies of the damned [will gather] into one globe