LXXIX. 1. And must I also speak of the daily incense-

offerings, as I promised,^ the reader should first of all have in mind the fact, that not only have men [in general] always paid most serious attention to things that conduce to health, but that especially in sacred ceremonies and purifications and prescribed modes of life " healthy " is not less important than " holy " ; for they did not think it right to render service to the Pure and perfectly Harmless and Unpolluted with either bodies or with souls festering and diseased.
2. Since, then, the air — of which we make most use, and with which we have most to do — does not always keep the same disposition and blend, but at night is condensed, and weighs down the body, and brings the soul into a desponding and anxious state, as though it had become mist-like and heavy ; [therefore] as soon as they get up they incense with pine resin, sanifying and purifying the air by its ^ disintegration, and fanning up again the [fire of the] spirit connate with body*
» Cf. lil 6. * Se, the resin's.
> That is, presumably, what was called the " bodily or animal spirits" — the ethers or prdna^t.
364 THRICE-GREATEST HERMES
which had died down, — since its perfume ▼ehement and penetrating [force].
3. And, again, at mid-day, perceiying that the son draws from the earth by force an exceedingly large and heavy exhalation, and commingles it with the air, they incense with myrrh.^ For its heat dissolves and dis- perses the turbid and mud-like combination in the atmosphere.
4. And, indeed, physicians seem to relieve sofiereis from plague by making a great blaze, as though it cleared the air. But it clears it better if they bum fragrant woods, such as [those] of cypress, juniper, and pina
5. At anyrate, they say that at Athens, at the time of the Great Plague, Akr5n the physician became famous through ordering them to keep fires burning by the side of the sick, for he [thus] benefitted not a few.
6. And Aristotle says that the sweet-smelling odours, given off by perfumes and flowers and meadows* conduce no less to health than to enjoyment ; because by their warmth and softness they diffuse themselves gently through the brain, which is naturally cold and as though congested.
7. And if, moreover, they call myrrh bal among Egyptians — and in translation this comes pretty near to meaning the dispersion of silly talk — this also affords some evidence for the reason why [they use it].