Linen is dyed with the bright saffron's flower.And we have learned of you, Demetrius, that only the river Cydnus cleaneth the knife consecrated to Apollo, in the city of Tarsus in Cilicia, and that there is no other water which can scour and cleanse it. So in the town of Olympia, they temper ashes with the water of the river Alpheus, with which they make a mortar wherewith they plaster the altar there; but if this be attempted to be done by the water of any other river, it is all to no purpose.
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Furthermore, a man may say that dryness, being
mixed with heat, attenuateth and subtilizeth the spirit, and
makes it pure and of an ethereal nature and consistence;
for the soul itself, according to Heraclitus, is of a dry constitution; whereas moisture does not only dim the sight
and dull the hearing, but when mingled with the air and
touching the superficies of mirrors, dusketh the brightness
of the one and takes away the light of the other. Or perhaps, on the contrary, by some refrigeration and condensation of this spirit, like the tincture and hardening of iron,
this part of the soul which does prognosticate may become
more intense and get a perfect edge. Just as tin being
melted with brass (which of itself is rare and spongeous)
does drive it nearer and make it more massy and solid, and
[p. 52]
withal causeth it to look more bright and resplendent; so
I cannot see any reason, why this prophetical exhalation,
having some congruence and affinity with souls, may not
fill up that which is lax and empty, and drive it more close
together. For there are many things which have a reference and congruity one with another; as the bean is useful in dyeing purple, and soda in dyeing saffron, if they
be mixed therewith; and as Empedocles says,
Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals. Translated from the Greek by several hands. Corrected and revised by. William W. Goodwin, PH. D. Boston. Little, Brown, and Company. Cambridge. Press Of John Wilson and son. 1874. 4.
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