The Contest of Wisdom with Folly

the aforementioned diatessaron, a diapason is born, which ends in the middle sphere of the sun, which for that reason is called the sphere of equality, because two pyramids intersect each other, and that equal nexus of matter and form is effected.

They conceive the spiritual diapason from the very middle of the sun upward, which is first far more noble, the foundation of which is the perfect consonance of the diapente, just as the elemental is the imperfect diatessaron. But where they establish the remaining part of the sun with a semitone, so that the inferior part of the sun constitutes the lesser semitone by which the diapente of the lower octave was to be perfected, the superior part constitutes the lesser semitone by which the diapente of the superior octave begins. These two semitones, since they do not constitute a tone, the two which remain they attribute to the equilibrium of the sphere of equality and of the sun. But the spheres of Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn are completed, by which a new diapente is constituted, upon which they superimpose the spiritual diatessaron, fashioned from the lowest part of the empyrean heaven, which constitutes a tone, as does the middle, but the supreme responds to the semitone. The hand or power of that divine divinity loosens or tightens the strings of that monochord according to the will's discretion, and thereby emits wonderful consonances and composes a most sweet harmony, by which both the celestial inhabitants and the minds of the blessed, as well as mortals, can be easily enraptured.

He also extracted these verbatim from Book 3, Tract 1 of the history of the physics of the Macrocosm, which book has the title On Worldly Music, to which (you just readers) I refer you, so that you may elicit the entire intention of our Music from it. Therefore, let your eyes be fixed not only on those external figures of ours, but also on the internal and formal speculations of our mind, so that you may better understand the true intention, as much of my pyramids as of the harmony fashioned from their own proportions. Which, so that it may be completed more easily according to your wishes, we will hold a broader and clearer discourse below concerning its more lucid knowledge.

And because this good Inquisitor of ours, throughout such a method of ours for building the world and the disposition of harmony, attributes it to others who are unknown—which in truth pertains solely to me—by always speaking in the plural number, it is openly argued from this that there is no fault to be truly and justly found in it. And for this reason, because of his malice toward me, he refused to attribute to me what he observed as good in that work of mine. But in very truth, at the end, out of his good grace, he deigned to name me by my own name thus.

7. Marin's text Column 110.

Col. 110. The figure of which Robert Fludd exhibits in Tract 1, Book 3, On Worldly Music.

In such a way does Marin refer the whole description of my Macrocosmic substance or subject to others who are unknown and unnamed, while only the assignment of one figure remains for me, as if I, Robert, had made others' inventions mine by usurping them in the manner of Marin, or had accepted what are others' as my own. Truly (Marin), it would befit men who are truly Philosophical and Christian to act more seriously in their corrections and refutations, and to conduct themselves with greater modesty and justice—that is, to bring forth things that are truly to be repudiated and refuted openly and in the sight of men with the author's name, and then to proceed to correct those things which are worthy of correction. For thus are men accustomed to act, when directed toward justice and piety. If it happens otherwise, not only to the wise, but even to the ignorant, will the character of scandal or malevolence appear in the one who criticizes. But now let us see with what sagacity and with what subtle genius this Herculean man is able to refute these opinions in Fludd concerning the fabric of the world and its harmony, so that it may appear to the world whether he is truly such as he seems to preach himself to be in his writings.