VISIO QUARTA, cap. VII
The Breath That Nourishes
The thin air rises to awaken the earth's greenness and sends forth snow and dew to sustain the upper and lower realms.
Now when moisture from the thin air rises, boiling up above the earth, it awakens the earth's greenness and makes all its fruits sprout and grow; and it also carries certain clouds on high that sustain all the upper regions and are in turn strengthened by all the upper regions — this happens because that same thin air sends snow forth from itself, which is spread across the earth as if flying down, when cold settles into the earth through the sun's withdrawing, because drops of water are turned into snow by the cold from above. But in the heat of the sun's rising, the same air lets fall dew descending above the earth in the likeness of a honeycomb, which sometimes melts into gentle rain from the sweetness of the east wind.
Shield and Blessing
The air serves as a protective shield for the earth and sends the blessing of dew, while its gentle steam cleanses the earth's fruitfulness from foul stench.
And this air suppresses the dangers from above and serves as a shield for the earth's defense, just as a shield defends a person from many blows, and it sends dew — the blessing that Jacob gave to his son — upon the earth from the sweetest, most tempered warmth of the sun. And sometimes this air steams up from the rising of water and the moisture of dew — which, however, is not harmful, but licks each fruitfulness of the earth clean, cleansing it from the foul stench by which it was struck through some storm.
Clouds and Their Inner Meaning
A transitional statement introducing how clouds are shaped by fire or cold, how they gradually pour out rain, and what these atmospheric signs signify within the human soul.
How clouds, shaped in the same upper air by either fire or cold, now appear bright and now dark, and how they pour out rain as if squeezed from certain breasts — not all at once, but gradually — and what these things signify in us.
Read the original Latin
Quod autem de tenui aere humor supra terram ebulliens viriditatem terrae suscitat, omnesque fructus germinando procedere facit, et qui etiam quasdam nubes superius fert, quae omnia superiora sustentant, et ab omnibus superioribus confortantur, hoc ideo est, quoniam idem tenuis aer nivem ex se emittit, quae quasi volando in terram sternitur, cum per descensum solis in terra frigus est, quia guttae aquae de superiore frigore in nivem convertuntur. In ardore autem ascensus solis idem aer rorem supra terram cadentem in similitudine favi mellis exsudat, qui de suavitate orientalis venti in suavem pluviam interdum liquescit. Et aer iste superiora pericula comprimit, atque velut scutum ad defensionem terrae est, quemadmodum scutum de plurimis ictibus virum defendit, atque de suavissimo et temperato calore solis rorem benedictionis quem Jacob filio suo dedit supra terram emittit. Interdumque aer iste de ascensione aquae, et de humiditate roris fumat, quod tamen nocivum non est, sed unamquamque fructuositatem terrae lambit, ipsam a squalido fetore mundans, a quo per aliquam tempestatem tacta est.
Quomodo nubes in eodem aere superno vel igne, vel frigore modificatae, nunc lucidae, nunc umbrosae appareant, et pluviam quasi a quibusdam mammis expressam non repente, sed sensim diffundant, et quid in nobis designent.
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