DIALOGUE TITLED THE WOOD OF LIFE, IN WHICH A SUCCINCT EXPOSITION OF GEBER THE PHILOSOPHER IS ALSO CONTAINED,

originally composed in Italian by the experienced and learned Giovanni Braccesco of Brescia, and now for the first time translated from his own manuscript into Latin by G. Gratarolo, Physician.

A decorative ornamental woodcut initial letter S depicts a figure in a landscape surrounded by foliage.
STUDENT: Greetings, Master Raymond. RAYMOND: Welcome. Tell me, who are you and where do you come from? STUDENT: The fame of your wisdom and your works proclaim that you are gifted with the knowledge of all sciences. Since the desire to live longer is innate in all men, and especially in the elderly, I have departed from Lombardy despite the weight of my years. I have come here to you on the island of Majorca original: "Maioricam in Insulam" solely to learn a remedy from you. I wish to protect myself against death so that I may live some years more without disease.
RAYMOND: Do you not know that God has placed a limit on our life that may not be passed? STUDENT: I do not seek help beyond that limit imposed on us by the Creator. I seek it against many infirmities and the weakening of the radical moisture radicalis humidi: the vital fluid thought to sustain life in medieval medicine and the innate heat innati caloris: the natural warmth or "biological fire" of a living body. For even the ancient Patriarchs, who extended their lives for more than five hundred years, possessed some medicine by which they sustained their lives for a long time without any infirmity. RAYMOND: The first Patriarchs lived so because it was the will of God Most High, so that the human race might be multiplied quickly from that long life of men. STUDENT: Why then did not everyone live so long?
RAYMOND: Those who were closer to the first parents lived longer because the first ones were created immediately by God with the best temperament temperaturae: the balanced proportion of the four humors (blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile) and thus a longer life. The goodness of this temperament was communicated more to those nearby than to those who were distant. STUDENT: Therefore all those first people should have lived longer, yet Holy Scripture mentions only a few. Some, though not from those first people, exceeded five hundred years. RAYMOND: Those first years were not as long or consisting of twelve months as they are now. STUDENT: I do not assert they were twelve months, but they were certainly long. When Moses was chosen by the Lord God as a leader to lead the Hebrew people out of Egypt, he then first numbered forty years. Therefore, if those years were not as long as ours, they were certainly not much different. For this reason, our doctors search for the cause of their long life. RAYMOND: The fruits of the earth were better and more suitable for sustaining human life before the flood than after it. STUDENT: Therefore everyone should have lived a long time, yet this is not true. RAYMOND: Not everyone was gifted with an equally strong constitution complexione: the physical makeup or "complexion" of a person's body. Nor did everyone live temperately once nature was corrupted in Adam. Therefore few surpassed the age of one hundred years.
STUDENT: Is it not possible that among so many men, there were more than twenty or twenty-five who possessed a strong constitution? I hardly believe it. Furthermore, many friends of God lived temperately, yet they did not see one hundred years at all. RAYMOND: The first ones had the Wood of Life original: "Lignum vitae", referring to the Tree of Life or an alchemical elixir derived from it, which protected them from death. STUDENT: As soon as they were expelled from the earthly Paradise, they were deprived of that wood. RAYMOND: Adam was created full of science and had knowledge of all natural things. He knew the things that could prolong human life and he taught them to some successors, and those to others. Therefore, the reason all the first people did not live long was that this secret was not revealed to everyone.