VIII] 



Astrological Botany 



213 



bodies upon the vegetable world, or, in other words, in 

 botanical astrology. He considered that each plant was 

 under the influence of some particular star, and that it was this 

 influence which drew the plant out of the earth when the 

 seed germinated. He held each plant to be a terrestrial 

 star, and each star, a spiritualised plant. Giambattista 



Text-fig. no. Lunar Herbs [Porta, Phytognomonica, 1591]. 



Porta also believed in a relation between certain plants and 

 corresponding stars or planets. A figure in his ' Phyto- 

 gnomonica' here reproduced (Text-fig. 1 10) shows a number 

 of " lunar plants." 



In order to appreciate the attitude in which Paracelsus 



