men brought to bed when the moon is a fortnight old, have easy
labors; and for this reason I believe that Diana, which was the same
with the moon, was called the goddess of childbirth. And Timotheus
appositely says,

By the blue heaven that wheels the stars,
And by the moon that eases women's pains.

Even in inanimate bodies the power of the moon is very evident. For
trees that are cut in the full of the moon carpenters refuse, as being
soft, and, by reason of their moistness, subject to corruption; and
in its wane farmers usually thresh their wheat, that being dry it may
better endure the flail; for the corn in the full of the moon is moist,
and commonly bruised in threshing. Besides, they say dough will be
leavened sooner in the full, for then, though the leaven is scarce
proportioned to the meal, yet it rarefies and leavens the whole lump.
Now when flesh putrefies, the combining spirit is only changed into a
moist consistence, and the parts of the body separate and dissolve. And
this is evident in the very air itself, for when the moon is full, most
dew falls; and this Alcman the poet intimates, when he somewhere calls
dew the air's and moon's daughter, saying,

See how the daughter of the Moon and Air
Does nourish all things.

Thus a thousand instances do prove that the light of the moon is moist,
and carries with it a softening and corrupting quality. Now the brazen
nail that is driven through the flesh, if, as they say, it keeps the
flesh from putrefying, doth it by an astringent quality proper to the
brass. The rust of brass physicians use in astringent medicines, and
they say those that dig brass ore have been cured of a rheum in their
eyes, and that the hair upon their eyelids hath grown again; for the
particles rising from the ore, being insensibly applied to the eyes,
stops the rheum and dries up the humor, and upon this account, perhaps;
Homer calls brass [Greek omitted] and [Greek omitted], and Aristotle
says, that wounds made by a brazen dart or a brazen sword are less
painful and sooner cured than those that are made of iron weapons,
because brass hath something medicinal in itself, which in the very
instant is applied to the wound. Now it is manifest that astringents
are contrary to putrefying, and healing to corrupting qualities. Some
perhaps may say, that the nail being driven through draws all the
moisture to itself, for the humor still flows to the part that is hurt;
and ther