But if you have a mind to such questions, Euthydemus will presently desire you to give an account of smallage and cummin; one of the which, if trodden down as it springs, will grow the better, and the other men curse and blaspheme whilst they sow it.
This last Florus thought to be an idle foolery; but he said, that we should not forbear to search into the causes of the other things as if they were incomprehensible.

I have found, said I, your design to draw me on to this discourse, that you yourself may afterward give us a solution of the other proposed difficulties.
In my opinion it is cold that causes this hardness in corn and pulse, by contracting and constipating their parts till the substance becomes close and extremely rigid; while heat is a dissolving and softening quality.

And therefore those that cite this verse against Homer, The season, not the field, bears fruit, do not justly reprehend him.

For fields that are warm by nature, the air being likewise temperate, bear more mellow fruit than others.

And therefore those seeds that fall immediately on the earth out of the sower's hand, and are covered presently, and cherished by being covered, partake more of the moisture and heat that is in the earth.