Lactantius is a fourth-century Christian apologist whose writings on divine wisdom and the nourishment of the soul provided patristic authority for the identification of alchemical knowledge with spiritual sustenance. De Jong (1969) identifies Lactantius as one of the sources feeding into the dense scriptural apparatus of Emblem XXVI, where the concept of wisdom as the food of the soul bridges the gap between Christian theology and alchemical practice. This patristic strand reinforces Maier's presentation of alchemy as a legitimate form of religious knowledge at the structural midpoint of Atalanta Fugiens.