The Remaining Works of Benedictus de Spinoza

hidden state. Thus wine gladdens and is familiar to man: gold takes on quicksilver, and with it extends for gilding, etc. Goldsmiths know these things, not the Aristotelians, who cannot provide the reasons for them from Aristotle’s Acroamatica esoteric lectures. What follows from this? Does it mean, therefore, that Aristotle’s philosophy should be adorned with shorter feathers? We deny that this follows. For if military discipline cannot be learned from Aristotle’s philosophy, it does not follow that the latter should be despised. That is a ridiculous argument: Goldsmiths know in their craft what Aristotle does not. Therefore, they have sharper eyes and minds.

47. As far as Plato, Democritus, Pythagoras, and Hermes are concerned, it is false that they saw with celestial and angelic eyes, unless you mistake devils for angels, since they were wicked magicians and idolaters, whose entire wisdom is folly before God in divine matters. In human matters, however, they are so teeming with vices and absurdities that they have been reproved by more than one, and specifically the Hermetic Dialogues are full of errors. That the foundations of impious Magic and the acatalepsia incomprehensibility of the Pyrrhonists exist in Plato’s dialogues is evident both of itself and is attested by the writings of the Platonists, Iamblichus, Proclus, Mirandulanus, Pistorius, Marsilius, and others. But from where is it proved that they recognized a seminal virtue in all things? Whatever they knew, they either received through discipline, or learned from Parhedri familiar spirits, or in a natural way through sense, reason, and experience. If you look at discipline, Aristotle does not yield to them. If at Magic, they were wicked: if at the ordinary way, the Peripatetic school leaves them behind by long strides, as the matter itself and the controversies prove.

48. The examples that are brought forward do not prove the thing they are intended to prove. For the Paracelsians have a very false opinion regarding the magnet, namely, that iron is attracted by it because of a ferrous spirit, which pulls more strongly in a foreign body than in its own. Even if there is a spirit, which the Peripatetics and Galenists willingly concede, those new philosophers must say why it attracts. Is it because it is sulfurous? But why does sulfur attract? Because it is familiar? Why? Is it not because such is the temperament and an inexplicable property? Therefore, the Paracelsians stick in the same, or rather, a deeper mud. For they are bound to prove that which is said to be from heaven, since it is not true just because it seems so to them. Regarding garlic, it is said falsely. Regarding the scorpion, the Paracelsians cannot provide a better reason than the Galenists. In both cases,
,, Sympathy and similarity have reasons in hidden things. That a man loves gold is particular
,, and accidental. The same man also loves girls, glory, estates, and many other things
,, which he thinks are good and pleasant to him, and this often not of itself, but by accident.
,, Therefore, many have despised gold who have become not a little famous in the name of
,, wisdom. If pebbles were of value in trade, gold, silver, and the like
,, would become very cheap. Wine is familiar to the nature of man, so that it sometimes becomes a poison, whether you provide the whole or its essence. But was this unknown to the ancients? Do the Paracelsians not beg the question when they say the spirit of wine is the cause? For why is this the cause? You will say: heaven. But I ask for the principle of this too. Thus, the Galenists can discourse better about the familiarity of gold and quicksilver than the Paracelsians, even though the nature of hydrargyrum quicksilver was unexplored by Galen.

49. From his own impotence, that man estimated the power of others. If he had correctly understood the Acroamata of Aristotle, he could have discoursed about the nature of gold and quicksilver physicè naturally from them: he could have taken particulars from the books on generation and the fourth book of the Meteorologica and the declarations of other Peripatetics. Tell me, chemists, why do gold and quicksilver love each other mutually? Is it not because they are of the same root, and differ only in imperfection and perfection, solution and coagulation, cooking and crudity, just like water and ice? Why this? Is it not because the temperament and the whole nature is such? Who, indeed, are those Aristotelian philosophers ignorant of friendship or Sympathy? They have known from particular nature, and can provide reasons from Aristotle regarding gunpowder and fulminating gold. Therefore, the Peripatetics see far more sharply than the Paracelsians, who seem to themselves to see what they see not at all. The Paracelsian would like to hear the cause of these things from an Aristotelian philosopher. But you sciolists, who are sharper than Aristotle, speak first. We read Crollius concerning the hostility of Tartarean salt and sal ammoniac, but he does not satisfy.

50. If the chemical art is not added, the causes of all things cannot be declared from Aristotle’s philosophy. Indeed, I say, not even if the chemical art is added, as far as special and proper causes are concerned. Of general ones, we hold only as much as can be proved. However, we have seen various writings of the Paracelsians concerning the causes of things. Truly, we have not found wisdom and truth in all of them. But so much for this.