VISIO QUARTA, cap. LXXIX
The Kidneys and the Earth's Fatness
The kidneys symbolize the earth's fatness, where human powers surge and unseemly things arise, just as moderate earth yields fruit but immoderate earth yields emptiness.
In the kidneys, however, where both strength and slippery wantonness pour themselves out, the fatness of the earth is signified, because just as in them a person's powers sometimes surge up and sometimes even unseemly things arise, so too a moderate fatness of the earth produces an abundance of fruits, but an immoderate one produces empty fruits, even though they may appear very plentiful at times.
The Soul's Powers Under Heavenly Influence
Through the soul's fiery and aerial powers, a person acts under the sun and moon, discerns seasons and elements, and works good or evil — just as hidden strength in the kidneys and the earth's fertility produce both useful and useless things.
A person, then, accomplishes all the things that are done under the orbit of the sun and moon in the seasons of the months through the powers of the soul in wisdom, in knowledge, and in discernment; and through it as well, because it is fiery and aerial, a person does good and evil according to the moon, which waxes and wanes. Through the powers of this same soul, which exists through the understanding of the heavenly good, a person thinks and acts on each thing, and distinguishes the seasons of the times and the elements with which one does good and evil with the discernment of rationality, and names all the things one recognizes. And just as in the kidneys the strength of uprightness and weakness, prosperity and uselessness lie hidden, and just as the earth through the sun, the moon, and the air brings forth all the things through which a person lives, both useful and useless, so this strength in the soul exists insofar as a person, through its powers, works good and evil, useful and useless things.
The Soul Fortified Like a Walled City
As the earth is set in the middle of the air and fortified against storms by mountains and hills like a walled city, so the soul is adorned and defended by holy works amid its struggles against fleshly desires.
The earth is suspended in the air, shielded from storms by mountains and hills — some of them hot, some cold, and some caught between heat and frost — like a city walled in by towers and ramparts. In the same way, the soul, in the many battles it fights against the desires of the flesh, is adorned and defended by the protection of holy works.
Read the original Latin
In renibus autem, in quibus et fortitudo et lubrica petulantia diffunditur, pinguedo terrae notatur, quoniam ut in illis aliquando vires hominis, aliquando quoque ea quae incongrua sunt exsurgunt, ita etiam moderata pinguedo terrae ubertatem fructuum, immoderata vero inanes fructus, quamvis plurimi appareant, interdum producit. Homo namque omnia quae sub circulo solis et lunae in temporibus mensium operatur, per vires animae in sapientia, in scientia et in discretione perficit; per eam etiam, quia ignea et aerea est, secundum lunam quae crescit et deficit, bonum et malum facit. Per vires quoque ejusdem animae, quae per intellectum boni coelestis est, homo quaeque cogitat et operatur, temporaque temporum, et elementa cum quibus bonum et malum facit, cum differentia rationalitatis discernit et omnia quae cognoscit nominat. Et sicut in renibus fortitudo probitatis et infirmitas, prosperitas et inutilitas latent, et ut terra per solem, lunam et aerem, omnia per quae homo vivit utilia et inutilia germinat, ita fortitudo ista in anima est quatenus homo per vires ejus bona et mala, utilia et inutilia operetur.
Quod terra in medio aeris constituta sit, adversus tempestates montibus et collibus partim calidis vel frigidis, partim aestu et gelu temperatis, velut urbs turribus et propugnaculis munita; et quod hoc modo anima in multiplici quem contra desideria carnis exercet conflictu sanctorum operum protectione ornetur et defendatur.
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