n] The ''Principles'' and ''Elements'' 19 



in the preface which follows, unless one understands the 

 special terminology, in which the ''four elements " and the 

 "four principles" or ''natures" play a great part. The ideas 

 expressed by these terms had begun to dominate medical 

 and physiological notions five or six hundred years before 

 the birth of Christ, and they held their own for a period of 

 more than two thousand years. As an instance of their 

 constant occurrence in literature we may recall Sir Toby's 

 remark in 'Twelfth Night,' "Do not our lives consist of 

 the four elements ?" In Aristotle's time these conceptions 

 must have been already quite familiar to his pupils. Like 

 his predecessors he distinguished four elements, Fire, 

 Water, Earth and Air, and to these he added a fifth — 

 the Ether. In the four elements, the four principles are 

 combined in pairs — fire being characterised by heat and 

 dryness, air by heat and moisture, water by cold and 

 moisture, and earth by cold and dryness. According to 

 Aristotle, heat and cold are active, while dryness and 

 moisture are passive in their nature. By the "tempera- 

 ment" of a man is understood the balance or proportion 

 maintained between these conflicting tendencies. The 

 particular "virtues" of each plant, in other words the power 

 of restoring lost health or "temperament," are determined 

 by the "principles" which it contains, and the proportions 

 in which these occur. With this introduction we may pass 

 on to the preface of the Herbarius zu Teutsch^ : 



" Many a time and oft have I contemplated inwardly 

 the wondrous works of the Creator of the universe : how in 

 the beginning He formed the heavens and adorned them 

 with goodly, shining stars, to which He gave power and 

 might to influence everything under heaven. Also how He 

 afterwards formed the four elements : fire, hot and dry — 

 air, hot and moist — water, cold and moist — earth, dry and 

 cold — and gave to each a nature of its own ; and how after 

 this the same Great Master of Nature made and formed 

 herbs of many sorts and animals of all kinds, and last of 

 all Man, the noblest of all created things. Thereupon I 

 thought on the wondrous order which the Creator gave 

 these same creatures of His, so that everything which has 

 its being under heaven receives it from the stars, and 



1 Translated from the second (Augsburg) edition of 1485. 



