Gregory of Nyssa, On the Making of Man

From which again, the exhalation from it being refined to its purest state, anoints the membrane surrounding the brain, which, extending from above downwards like a pipe, through the successive vertebrae, conducting both itself and the marrow enclosed in it, terminates together at the base of the spine; to all the joints of bones and articulations, and to the origins of muscles, like some charioteer it imparts the impulse and the power 252 for each movement and posture. For this reason, it seems to me to have been deemed worthy of a more secure protection, and in the head it is encircled by double enclosures of bones, while in the vertebrae, by the projections of the spines and the manifold intricacies of their shape, by which it is kept in all impassibility, having its safety through the guard surrounding it. Similarly, one might also conjecture concerning the heart, that like a secure house, it has been fitted together by the strongest, fortified by the surrounding enclosures of bones. For behind is the spine, secured on either side by the shoulder blades. And on each side, the position of the ribs, enveloping the middle, makes it hard to injure. And in front, the breastbone and the pair of collarbones are set as a defense, so that its safety might be guarded on all sides from external disturbances. Just as in agriculture it is possible to see, the rainfall from the clouds, or the inflow of channels making the underlying ground thoroughly wet. Let some garden be the subject of our discourse, nourishing in itself countless varieties of trees, and all sorts of forms of things that grow from the earth, of which the shape, the quality, and the property of color are observed in great variety in each one. Since so many things, then, are nourished by moisture in one place, the power that moistens each one is one in its nature; but the property of the things nourished changes the moisture into different qualities. For the same thing becomes bitter in wormwood; it is transformed into a deadly juice in hemlock; and it becomes something else in something else, in saffron, in balsam, in the poppy. For by one it is warmed, by another it is cooled, and by another it has a moderate quality. And in laurel, and in rush, and such things it is fragrant; but in the fig and the pear it is sweetened. And through the vine it has become a cluster of grapes and wine; and the juice of the apple, and the redness of the rose, and the brightness of the lily, and the dark blue of the violet, and the purple color of the hyacinth, and all things that can be seen upon the earth, springing from one and the same moisture, are distinguished into so many differences in shape, form, and qualities. Something of this sort is also wondrously wrought by nature in our living soil, or rather, by the Master of nature. Bones and cartilages, veins, arteries, nerves, ligaments, flesh, skin, fats, hairs, glands, nails, eyes, nostrils, ears, all such things, and countless other things besides these, separated from one another by different properties, are nourished by one form of food, in a way suited to their own nature, so that as the food approaches each of the underlying parts, to whichever it draws near, by that it is also altered, becoming proper and congenial to the property of the part. For if it should come to the eye, it is blended with the organ of sight, 253 and is appropriately distributed to each of the different coats around the eye.

But if it flows to the parts concerned with hearing, it is mixed with the auditory nature; and having come to be in a lip, it has become lip; and in bone it is solidified, and in marrow it is softened, and it is made tense with the nerve, and it is stretched over with the surface, and it passes into nails, and it is refined by the appropriate vapors for the generation of hairs. If it should be led through crooked pores, it produces curlier and more hooked hairs, but if the passage of the hair-producing vapors should be through straight [pores], it produces them stretched out and straight. But our discourse has wandered far from the subjects before us, delving into the works of nature, and to describe

Ἀφ' οὗ πάλιν ἐπὶ καθαρώ τατον ἐκλεπτυνομένη ἡ ἀπ' ἐκείνου ἀνάδοσις, ὑπα λείφει τὸν περιεκτικὸν τοῦ ἐγκεφάλου ὑμένα, ὃς ἄνωθεν ἐπὶ τὸ βάθος αὐλοειδῶς διήκων, διὰ τῶν κα θεξῆς σπονδύλων, ἑαυτὸν δὲ καὶ τὸν ἐγκείμενον αὐτῷ μυελὸν διεξάγων, τῇ βάσει συναπολήγει τῆς ῥάχεως· πάσαις ὀστέων τε καὶ ἁρμονιῶν συμβολαῖς, καὶ μυῶν ἀρχαῖς οἷόν τις ἡνίοχος αὐτὸς ἐνδιδοὺς τῆς καθέκαστον κινήσεώς τε καὶ στάσεως τὴν ὁρμὴν καὶ τὴν δύνα 252 μιν. ∆ιὰ τοῦτό μοι δοκεῖ καὶ ἀσφαλεστέρας ἠξιῶσθαι φρουρᾶς, καὶ κατὰ μὲν τὴν κεφαλὴν διπλαῖς ὀστέων περιβολαῖς ἐν κύκλῳ διειλημμένος, ἐν δὲ τοῖς σπον δύλοις ταῖς τε τῶν ἀκανθῶν προβολαῖς καὶ ταῖς πο λυτρόποις κατὰ τὸ σχῆμα διαπλοκαῖς, δι' ὧν ἐν ἀπα θείᾳ πάσῃ φυλάττεται, διὰ τῆς περιεχούσης αὐτὸν φρουρᾶς τὸ ἀσφαλὲς ἔχων. Ὁμοίως δ' ἄν τις καὶ περὶ τῆς καρδίας στοχάσαιτο, ὅτι καθάπερ τις οἶκος ἀσφαλὴς αὕτη διὰ τῶν στεῤῥο τάτων περιηρμόσθη ταῖς τῶν ὀστέων ἐν κύκλῳ πε ριοχαῖς ὠχυρωμένη. Κατόπιν μὲν γάρ ἐστιν ἡ ῥάχις ταῖς ὠμοπλάταις ἑκατέρωθεν ἠσφαλισμένη. Καθ' ἑκάτερον δὲ πλάγιον ἡ τῶν πλευρῶν θέσις περιπτύσ σουσα τὸ μέσον δυσπαθὲς ἀπεργάζεται. Ἐν δὲ τοῖς ἔμπροσθεν, τὸ στέρνον καὶ ἡ τῆς κλειδὸς συζυγία προβέβληται, ὡς ἂν πανταχόθεν αὐτῇ τὸ ἀσφαλὲς ἀπὸ τῶν ἔξωθεν διοχλούντων φυλάσσοιτο. Οἷον δὲ κατὰ τὴν γεωργίαν ἔστιν ἰδεῖν, τῆς ἐκ νεφῶν ἐπομβρίας, ἢ τῆς τῶν ὀχετῶν ἐπιῤῥοῆς διάβροχον ποιούσης τὸ ὑποκείμενον. Κῆπος δέ τις ὑποκείσθω τῷ λόγῳ, μυ ρίας μὲν δένδρων διαφορὰς, παντοδαπὰς δὲ τῶν ἐκ γῆς φυομένων ἰδέας ἐν ἑαυτῷ τρέφων, ὧν καὶ τὸ σχῆμα, καὶ ἡ ποιότης, καὶ ἡ τῆς χρόας ἰδιότης ἐν πολλῇ διαφορᾷ τοῖς καθέκαστον ἐνθεωρεῖται. Τοσού των τοίνυν κατὰ τὸν ἕνα χῶρον τῷ ὑγρῷ τρεφομένων, ἡ μὲν ὑπονοτίζουσα τὰ καθ' ἕκαστον δύναμις, μία τις κατὰ τὴν φύσιν ἐστίν· ἡ δὲ τῶν τρεφομένων ἰδιότης, εἰς διαφόρους τὸ ὑγρὸν μεταβάλλει ποιότη τας. Τὸ γὰρ αὐτὸ πικραίνεται μὲν ἐν τῇ ἀψίνθῳ· εἰς φθοροποιὸν δὲ χυμὸν ἐν τῷ κωνείῳ μεθίσταται· καὶ ἄλλο ἐν ἄλλῳ γίνεται, ἐν κρόκῳ, ἐν βαλσάμῳ, ἐν μήκωνι. Τῷ μὲν γὰρ ἐκθερμαίνεται, τῷ δὲ κα ταψύχεται, τῷ δὲ μέσην ἔχει ποιότητα. Καὶ ἐν δάφνῃ, καὶ ἐν σχοίνῳ, καὶ τοῖς τοιούτοις εὔπνουν ἐστὶν ἐν συκῇ δὲ καὶ ὄχνῃ κατεγλυκάνθη. Καὶ διὰ τῆς ἀμπέλου βότρυς καὶ οἶνος ἐγένετο· καὶ ὁ τοῦ μήλου χυλὸς, καὶ τὸ τοῦ ῥόδου ἐρύθρημα, καὶ τὸ τοῦ κρίνου λαμ πρὸν, καὶ τὸ κυανίζον τοῦ ἴου, καὶ τὸ πορφυραῖον τῆς ὑακίνθου βαφῆς, καὶ πάνθ' ὅσα κατὰ τὴν γῆν ἔστιν ἰδεῖν, ἐκ μιᾶς καὶ τῆς αὐτῆς ἰκμάδος ἀναβλα στάνοντα, εἰς τοσαύτας διαφορὰς κατά τε τὸ σχῆμα, καὶ τὸ εἶδος, καὶ τὰς ποιότητας διακρίνεται. Τοιοῦτόν τι καὶ κατὰ τὴν ἔμψυχον ἡμῶν ἄρουραν θαυματοποιεῖται παρὰ τῆς φύσεως, μᾶλλον δὲ παρὰ τοῦ ∆εσπότου φύσεως. Ὀστέα καὶ χόνδροι, φλέβες, ἀρτηρίαι, νεῦρα, σύνδεσμοι, σάρκες, δέρμα, πιμε λαὶ, τρίχες, ἀδένες, ὄνυχες, ὀφθαλμοὶ, μυκτῆρες, ὦτα, πάντα τὰ τοιαῦτα, καὶ μυρία πρὸς τού τοις ἄλλα διαφόροις ἰδιότησιν ἀπ' ἀλλήλων κε χωρισμένα, μιᾷ τῇ τῆς τροφῆς ἰδέᾳ καταλλήλως τῇ ἑαυτῶν τρέφεται φύσει, ὡς ἑκάστῳ τῶν ὑπο κειμένων τὴν τροφὴν προσεγγίσασαν, ᾧπερ ἂν ἐμπελάσῃ, κατ' ἐκεῖνο καὶ ἀλλοιοῦσθαι, οἰκείαν καὶ συμφυῆ τῇ τοῦ μέρους ἰδιότητι γινομένην. Εἰ γὰρ κατὰ τὸν ὀφθαλμὸν γένοιτο, τῷ ὁρατικῷ μορίῳ συγ 253 κατεκράθη, καὶ τῶν περὶ τὸν ὀφθαλμὸν χιτώνων ταῖς διαφοραῖς οἰκείως εἰς ἕκαστον κατεμερίσθη.

Εἰ δὲ τοῖς κατὰ τὴν ἀκοὴν μέρεσιν ἐπιῤῥυῇ, τῇ ἀκουστικῇ καταμίγνυται φύσει· καὶ ἐν χείλει γενόμενον, χεῖ λος ἐγένετο· καὶ ἐν ὀστέῳ πήγνυται, καὶ ἐν μυελῷ ἁπαλύνεται, καὶ τονοῦται μετὰ τοῦ νεύρου, καὶ τῇ ἐπιφανείᾳ συμπεριτείνεται, καὶ εἰς ὄνυχας διαβαίνει, καὶ εἰς τριχῶν γένεσιν λεπτοποιεῖται τοῖς καταλλήλοις ἀτμοῖς. Εἰ μὲν διὰ σκολιῶν προάγοιτο πόρων, οὐλοτέ ρας τε καὶ κατηγκυλωμένας τὰς τρίχας ἐκφύουσα, εἰ δὲ δι' εὐθείας ἡ τῶν τριχοποιῶν ἀτμῶν γένοιτο πρόοδος, τεταμένας τε καὶ εὐθείας προάγουσα. Ἀλλὰ πολὺ τῶν προκειμένων ὁ λόγος ἡμῖν ἀποπεπλάνηται, τοῖς ἔργοις ἐμβαθύνων τῆς φύσεως, καὶ ὑπογράφειν