Page 117 - Psychoceramics and the Test of Fire

Arbor Vitae Cortex

With that he struck a note of triumph. Indeed, if he had succeeded
where others with fancy degrees and government grants had failed,
he had a right to crow. Fat chance of that, but I smiled
encouragement.
“The needles of that tree are already in use as a tea, an herbal
decoction,” said Betzaroff, shaking his head. “It’s a waste of time.
That will never get where it’s needed. Here is what I found: the
doctrine of signatures has already been at work, thanks to Western
dissection of the brain. Arbor vitae is the name given to the white
matter branching throughout the gray matter in the cerebral cortex.
This may be explained to your customers as the difference between a
computer and the network cables connecting computers. In cross
section that neural network looks like the silhouette of the arbor vitae
tree—its signature, if you will. The gray matter, the neuronal cell
population, peaks in a person’s twenties; what can be stored in the
computer will not increase in capacity or accessibility in later years.
But the connectors, the arbor vitae, keep on developing well into
middle age. In other words, experience or what you have already
learned or be able to learn in life will max out, while your ability to
make sense of it, to organize it and evaluate it—wisdom, it might be
called—does not stop. And it can be enhanced by a component of
the plant it resembles. All we need do is find a method of introducing
it to its human analogue. And that, sir, is Tree of Life Tonic, brewed
by my proprietary process from the cortex of the noble cedar.”
“Great!” I exclaimed. “That’s not too complicated to grasp. Ah,
do you happen to have any handy? I’d like to try it myself.”
Oliver sat back in his rickety chair. It creaked. I didn’t test mine.
“No, I don’t. To tell you the truth, I need to purchase a few
ingredients and repair some of my equipment before I can produce
more. But the process can be replicated for batches of any size; arbor
vitae grow abundantly in this country—the red cedar, for example.
Raw materials are not a problem.”
“Well, then,” said I, with bluff bonhomie, “I see no problems at
all. Take our money and get to work! Whatever we don’t sell in the
first six months you can take elsewhere; you should be able to afford
your own publicity, too. Just give us first crack at the stuff.”

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