204 







are the greater veines and the lefTe, fb as they have a 

 knitting in themfelves : and it fcemes properly that 

 thefc mineralcs grow like vn to plants 5 not that they 

 have any inward vegitative life, being onely proper to 

 plants : but they are engendered in the bowels of the 

 earth , by the vertue and force of the Sunne and other 

 planets,and in long continuance of time,they increafe 

 and multiply after the rnaner of plants . And even as 

 mettallsbe plants hidden in the earth , fo we may fay, 

 that plants be living creatures fixed in one place, whofe 

 life is maintained by the nourishment which Nature 

 furnifheth from their firft begnning. But living crea- 

 turesjurgafle plants L in thatthey have a more perfect 

 being- and therefore have neede of a more perfect 

 foode and nourifhment- for thefenrch whereof, Na- 

 ture hath given them a moving and feeling to difcover 



a 



is fertile and better fcafoned a nourifhment for plants. 

 TheTame plants ferve as a nourifhment for living crea 

 tures, and the plants and living creatures together as 

 a nourifhment for men , the inferiour nature alwaies 

 ferving for the maintenance and fuftentation of the fu- 

 periour, andthclefleperfedyeelding vnto the more 

 perfe<ft: whereby, we may feg how much it wan ts ? that 

 gold and filvcrajfid other thTngs which men fomuch 

 cfteemebylheir covetoufneffe , ihould be the happi- 

 nes of man, wherevnto he fliould tend,feeing they be 

 fo many degrees in qualitie inferior to man 5 who hath 

 j>een created and made onely to be a fubic<5l to fervc 

 thevniverfall Creator of all things, as his proper end 

 and perfeft reft, and to which man, all other things in 

 this world , were not propounded or left, but to gaine 



this 



