98 PARACELSUS 



could become wise; if there were no art, there would 

 be no artists. If the principles from which men and 

 animals derive their qualities did not exist, there could 

 be no men or animals in whom such qualities are made 

 manifest. These principles (forms of will) remain, 

 although the forms in which they have been manifested 

 for the time being decay. If a wise man dies, his 

 wisdom still continues to be, and may be communicated 

 to another person " (Be, Fund. Sajp.). 



If a mill suddenly comes to a stop, it may be from two 

 causes; either the miller who manipulated it has gone 

 away, or there has been something wrong with the 

 works, so that they could not operate any longer. In 

 the same way the death of the body will occur, if for 

 some reason the body is no longer capable to accomplish 

 its work for the spirit by which it is inhabited, or it 

 may be that the inhabitant (the soul) for some reason 

 has left the house. The latter circumstance accounts for 

 many cases of sudden death "from unknown causes," 

 and therefore an apparently dead body should never be 

 buried before the only certain sign, which shows that it 

 is no longer inhabitable — namely, putrefaction — appears ; 

 for otherwise we are not sure that the inhabitant may 

 only be temporarily absent, and find his house destroyed 

 when he returns. 



All forms are subject to annihilation ; they are only 

 illusions, and as such they will cease to exist when the 

 cause that produced them ceases to act. The body of a 

 king or a sage is as useless as that of an animal after the 

 life whose product it was has ceased to act. A form can 

 only maintain its existence as long as the action of life 

 upon the substance of the form continues. But life is an 

 eternal and perfect power ; it can be brought into con- 

 tact, but it cannot be united with physical matter. It 

 can only be attracted to physical matter by the power of 

 the spirit, and if the spirit ceases to attract it, life will 

 depart from matter, and the form will be dissolved into 



