i8o PARACELSUS 



things come from God, the good as well as the evil 

 ones ; but while the former are His direct products, 

 and in harmony with the Law, the latter are, so to 

 say, His grandchildren which have become degenerated ; 

 for evil is good perverted. Those who put their trust in 

 God — that is to say, in the power of Goodness, Wisdom, 

 Justice, and Truth — will surely succeed ; but those who, 

 while they pretend to serve God, serve merely them- 

 selves, are the children of evil, and will perish with it." 



" One of the most necessary requirements for a phy- 

 sician is perfect purity and singleness of purpose. He 

 should be free of ambition, vanity, envy, unchastity, 

 pomposity, and self-conceit, because these vices are the 

 outcome of ignorance and incompatible with the light of 

 divine wisdom which should illumine the mind of the 

 true physician ; but our practitioners of medicine will 

 not believe me when I say that it is necessary that a 

 physician to be successful should be virtuous; because 

 they imagine that success is due only to learning, and 

 they cannot realise that all true wisdom and power is 

 derived from God." 



" There is a knowledge which is derived from man, 

 and another one which is derived from God through 

 the light of Nature. There are artificially made phy- 

 sicians and there are born physicians. The latter possess 

 their talent from birth, and it may be unfolded and grow 

 like a tree if it is properly nursed. He who lias no 

 natural talent to be a physician will never succeed. He 

 who is not a physician in the spring of his life will not 

 be one in the fall." 



" A physician should be faithful and charitable ; he 

 should have full and perfect faith, a faith which is not 

 divided. Faith and Charity are essentially identical ; 

 they both spring from God, and God is one and cannot 

 be divided. The faith of a physician is not manifested 

 by making many visits to his patient, but by his ability 

 to recognise and treat the disease, He should give to 



