Tres Orationes

I would judge that the cause of that permission was the lack of food following the subversion of trees and the change in the earth's original fertility. Because the earth had been devastated and had not failed to contract some vice from the annual flood, it could not cleanse itself so quickly to gather its strength and prepare to produce mild fruits, especially since the sublunary sphere itself was still difficult to penetrate due to the long duration of the rains. Therefore, the eating of meat was granted by God to the human race from those animals that had been kept safe and sound and had increased for the hope of posterity in Noah's ark, not long before they were pushed out and propagated into the different regions of the world. From these things, it can now be established that the original law and the ancestral method of living were subsequently changed and loosened because of the sins of men, having formerly been restricted to the fruits of trees and the green herbs of the field.

But so that the discourse may return to the point from which it diverged: even though herbs were founded so that fruits and the seeds taken from them might be destined for the use of feeding, they were nevertheless endowed at that time with other powers as well, the γεωργία agriculture/husbandry of which was inherent in man, which in our present state medicine converts to the healing of diseases. Undefiled nature did not need medicine: now, after the fall, with bodies subject to every kind of ailment and disease, there is a need not only for food but also for remedies. Therefore, since the wisdom of the Creator gave so many and so various plants—