The Archidoxes and Medico-Chemical Works of Paracelsus

that this can be sustained for a year. Since food and drink are not so
Food is not only bread, wine, or water.

ordered that we must necessarily eat bread or meat, or drink wine or water, but we can also sustain our life with air and even with the clods of the earth. Whatever has been ordained for food, we must believe it was made for us to attempt and taste, which we shall declare more broadly in the Monarchy of God original: "Monarchia Dei". Although we concede that because of our labors and similar things, it is impossible for us to lack temporal and bodily food, and this for many reasons. Wherefore food was ordained for this purpose, just as medicine is for diseases. We shall therefore make the distinction of things entering the body in this way, that they are distributed through all its parts, not otherwise than if burning wine i.e., distilled alcohol or brandy were poured into water; the whole conceives its odor because it has been diffused through its entire body. Likewise, when ink is thrown into wine, the whole is made black by it. So also in the human body, the humor of life immediately diffuses the things that have been received, more quickly than in the examples we have proposed. Regarding the form in which the assumed substance is transmuted, its nature consists only in the members which receive it and digest it
From what the form of the thing to be transmuted depends.

into their own likeness, not otherwise than if bread is passed into a human, it becomes the flesh of the human; and in a fish, it becomes the flesh of the fish, etc. It must be understood similarly that the assumed things are transmuted by the powers of the members of nature and are appropriated according to the nature of the parts receiving them. The same must also be judged concerning medicines, that they are transmuted into the members according to their properties. For they receive their powers and virtues from the proper substances of the medicines, according to the good or bad dispersion of them, whether subtle or coarse, just as the medicine may be. For if it is of the Quinta Essentia Fifth Essence, its transmutation will be stronger and more powerful. If, however, it is coarse, it remains as such, not otherwise than as an image has its ornament, beauty, or deformity from colors; if these are noble, it will also be similar. Therefore, that we may collect our experiences in those who have encountered us, and gather them into our delight and memory, so that when we are in need they are ready for us, we shall write these nine books, reserving the tenth, closed in our occiput, for the sake of ungrateful idiots. To our own, however, these things will nonetheless be sufficiently declared. And let no one marvel at our school of doctrine; although it may be contrary to the courses and methods of the ancients, it is most firmly founded on experience, which is the teacher of all things, through which even all arts must be proven.