exactly in the beginning we open our Body for this Fire can do and doth that which no other Fire can do for it destroys and conquers the Body and makes it no Body but a Spirit So that whatever any Sophisters may suggest our Fire is Mineral it is Sulphur and that pure it is united to the Water in one form and yet hinders not its flux nor corrupts its form This is the true Ignis Gehennae for it Eclipseth the light of the Bodies and makes them become black as Pitch which is a symbol of Hell and for its Cimmerian darkness is by many of the Wise men called Hell Fire of Nature is the third Menstrual That Fire is natural in each thing But Fire occasionate we call unnatural As heat of Ashes and Balnes for putrefying Without these Fires thou mayst nought bring To Putrefaction for to be separate Thy Matters together proportionate OUr natural Fire is as I said the true Sulphur of Gold which in the hard and dry Body is imprisoned but by the mediation of our Water it is let loose by rotting the moles of the Body under which it was detained and after separation of Elements it appears visibly in our third Menstrual For though Gold be a compact and dry Earthy Body none may think that it became what it is without the virtue of a Seed which by perfection is not extinct but sealed up only which Seed is a Fiery form of Light which nothing in the World wanteth and therefore it would be a great Anomalum if it should be only defective in Metals the choice of all sublunary Bodies Betwixt these two Fires in the time of their action and passion one upon another and from another there is made a medium which is part of both which because it is not altogether natural nor wholly against nature is called unnatural The duration of this unnatural Fire is from the time that the Body begins to open and colours to change that is in a word all the time of the rule of Saturn and part of the rule of Jupiter the whole Regimen of Putrefaction and so much of Ablution until the Dove begin to prevail over the Crow which Putrefaction as it is the turning of an intire Wheel so part of it is done in sicco when the Body is all a discontinuous Calx or Ashes and part in humido which is called a Bath when the subsident part is liquid and boils and the superiour part vapours aloft and descends Thus you see how many Fires we have and how they are distinguished wherein I have written what I know and as many as understand me will esteem my Writings highly for without boasting let me assure thee thou hast not such another Directory in the whole World I may speak it without offence being unknown to thee and thou to me This I say not to detract from any Philosopher for many were deeply seen in this Mastery but almost all were envious and the most candid would have judged my plainness deserving an Anathema maranatha I have here laid you so plain demonstrations as I go that you cannot miss if God direct you and without the knowledge of the Fires you are far wide whatever whimsies you have in your head for you shall never see the dissolution of the Body nor shall you ever make black and by consequence you cannot divide Elements as you ought to do because you proportioned not your Matters wisely in the beginning of the Work for Dimidium facti qui bene cepit habet he who makes a good beginning hath as good as half done Therefore make Fire thy Glass within Which burneth the Body much more than Fire Elemental if thou wilt win Our secrets according to thy desire Then shall thy Seed both rot and spire By help of Fire occasionate That kindly after they may be separate TAke then my counsel be not so careful of the Fire of the Athanor as of your Internal Fire seek it in the house of Aries and draw it from the depths of Saturn let Mercury be the Internuncio and your signal the Doves of Diana By the River you shall find a Tree in which is the Nest of 10 Eagles take of them 7 9 or all but take them very white which oft plunging in the River will cause with these you may overcome the Lion The heat of their stomachs is far more powerful than any Fire in the World for in it Gold will be destroyed that thou shalt not know what is become of it which yet loseth nothing from it self though exposed to the greatest violence of any flame Thus with patience thou shalt see thy desire fulfilled and thy heart shall rejoyce for a wide door shall be opened by which thou mayst behold the Mysteries of Nature in all her Kingdoms In 40 or 50 days thou shalt behold the highest sign of most perfect corruption of thy perfect Body which of a dead lump is thus become Seed in which though many cannot believe that there is any active virtue yet it is now to the astonishment of Nature made living and by its life it kills that by which it was made alive and both being mingled make one Bath which by continual decoction moving the Earth and Water below and circulating the Air and Fire above make at last one inseparable quintessence the Father of Wonders Now to God only wise the revealâ—â— of these hidden Mysteries be praise from all his Creatures for ever Of Separation the Gate must thus be won THus I have run through this Gate of Separation which might be enough for it is all but because the Wise men have made many Operations for to hide the secret and have scattered their notions here and there in every Gate oâ— Operation sometimes being at the beginning sometimes at the end thereby to puzzle the unwary I must to make this Treatise intire run through the rest with what brevity and plainness I can I Shall now sing a pleasant Elegy What did betwixt two Lovers Fall out seek the reason why This Song discovers A Wife Did lose her life Because she did her Husband revive Whose death did enforce The man to remorse To see her dead who gave him life He was a King yet dead as dead could be His Sister a Queen Who when her Brother she did breathless see The like was never seen She cryes Vntil her eyes With over-weeping were waxed dim So long till her tears Reach'd up to her ears The Queen sunk but the King did swim These Waters with the Fire which prevail'd Did him so perplex That starting up not knowing what him ail'd He sorely did vex He thought That there was wrought Some Treason but full little did know That it was a Queen Him sav'd though unseen And dy'd her self sad white I trow At length her Carcass when her Gall was broke Rose up to the top From which fum'd up so venomous a smoak His breath which did stop He found Which made him sound
things were strange so most strange was it that the Tomb and the intombed Carcass were one and that inseparably Also upon the Tomb I found written a Prophecy viz. That they if the Fire were kept equal and continual should rise again and be more glorious and powerful than ever they were before Then said I to the voice which is in the Glass I must be directed both what and how and when to do The voice answered me Take no care only do as I shall direct and all shall be well in the mean time you may view the places that are about only be sure that you neglect not your time of attending here And for to take away the tediousness which the length of time would otherwise work ask of me and I shall inform you in whatever you desire nor shall I think my discourse to me a burden so you will not think your labour a trouble Then said I Not so though I should be bound to serve you during my whole Life yet should I count it a priviledge not a burden Then she gave unto me as it were a Ball of fine Silk wound up as on a bottom and said Make this fast to a Pin of this Tower and then go round and behold the place it may shorten the time to you Carry this bottom with you and unwind it as you go and by it you may return till you know the place But do not after the common guise THen I passed along and was no sooner out of that place but a very thick misty darkness apprehended me so thick that I might fell it and though my head were as it were transparent and very light and I took also a Candle with me which was burning there continually at the entrance of the Tower yet the darkness was such that it would not receive the light for they were not homogenial but were a little dis-joyned by the Rays of the Light and as it were here and there condensed into strange figures as of Birds Beasts and creeping things of monstrous shapes And by reason of this opposition the Rays of the Light extended but a little way and the Light most clear did shoot as it were in Beams and the darkness stood as it were in clusters by it self There were as it were a multitude of men who seeing my Light in my hand which they could not discern well they being in that dark which would not be inlightned but as through a thick cloud they beheld my Candle and judged it ominous and left their stations for their eyes with dark and smoak were so tender that my Candle over-poured them and they could not bear its lustre therefore they crying out ran away I mused much at this how they could be in such Cimmerian Darkness and as I wondered I espied that they had with them Light as it were of Fox-fire or rotten Wood and Glow-worms Tails and with this they sat in consultation reading Geber Rhasis and such whom I heard them name and commenting on them not without much pleasantness Then I considered that the Light which I had brought with me did not enlighten the place but stood separated as it were from the darkness and withal I remembred that once there was Light in the World and the darkness comprehended it not and that darkness had a false fire Light of its own with which it seemed to its inhabitants wonderous well inlightned I set down my Candle and went with my Thread in my hand by which I intended to return When I was gone out of sight of my Candle my head began to seem as it were opacous and a wind had almost blown me down Then I took my bottom of Thread and made it fast to my Girdle lest it might drop out of my hand and well it was that I did so for soon a Vertigo came upon me and I fell and slumbered and when I awaked methoughts it was no more darkness but day-light about me I wondered at the very strange change and still felt for my Thread which by that Light I could not see but only feel it I began to look about me to see where I was and behold I was in a ruinous place of many millions of turnings each leading several ways and every room was so inlightned with Fox-fire and Glowworm-Tails that for want of a better Light it seemed as if it were day I took out of my Pocket a small Book to see if I could read in it it was called Enchiridion Physicae Restitutae with an Arcanum at the end of it and I could not read one word in it There met me a man aged and decrepit his Face rugged his Eyes bleared his Hands and Fingers corraded and saluted me and said merrily What Book have you there It is said I Arcanum Hermeticum It is a good Book saith he He and Sendivow are the two best that ever wrote I but said I I went to peruse my Book and I can read not one word in it That 's strange quoth he let me see it Then I shewed it him and he read out of it such strange things that I never had heard of before and Sandivogius saith he is of the same mind Then he begun to read in him and read such Processes that I had never heard of I do remember well the Authors and what they wrote but never to my remembrance did I find what you read in them said I. Look on them your self said he and you shall find it plain I went to look on the Book but could not distinguish any word in it which made me wonder Then I thought with my self that as that Light had a peculiar difference from that Light which I saw about the Tower where I was before so it might have its peculiar Objects This Opinion I had confirmed by this for that having Geber and Rhasis with me I tried how I could read there and all the Processes I could read very well only some places seemed as it were left out and a distance of white left I knew that my Books were perfect and some of the places which were as they seemed to me left out I remembred very well to be those places in which the Truth was couched in few words Then I returned by my Thread to my Candle and straight my head returned to its former diaphanity I took my Candle in my way and of a sudden all my places that seemed light before returned to be Cimmerian darkness only with the time that I had been there I found my Eyes were beginning to grow tender and smarted and itched at the first glimpse of this true Light which then in comparison of the Light I had before seen did not seem barely Light but the Super-Coelestial Light of Paradise Then I demanded of her with whom in the Glass I had former converse concerning what I had seen She told me That they were such who wrot in Alchymy according to the Light of Fancy and not of Nature
though to them their Light seem clear enough yet can they see nothing by it but what is phantastical and mystically or sophistically written by the Envious for the seducing of such fanciful Doters therefore when once the Light of Nature is brought to their station it discovers Cimmerian darkness there where their imaginary Light only shines such as is fox-Fox-fire and Glow-worms Tails that shine only in the dark This Light makes their Eyes so tender that the Lamp of Nature makes them fly Moreover whatever is written according to this Light they cannot see nay they cannot endure the Light of the true Luna of the wise men for any true Light discovers their Darkness and yet their Darkness is uncapable of apprehending the Light Now in that you went in among them without your Candle it was a bold adventure for had you lost your Thread you could never have returned Then I looked into my Tower and did as I was directed and again I went to view those parts of Cimmerian Darkness once more yet with my Candle in mine hand and my Thread at my Girdle when I came the second time at the sight of this Light all fled so that I could not meet with any but I entered into several turnings which I saw and found in them several works curiously erected in which I might guess they aimed at nothing less than the Philosophers Stone With Sulphurs I Found one Furnace most curiously built in which all degrees of heat imaginable by the Art of man might be kept with one fire in which was set a multitude of curious Glasses in which were several Matters some digesting others subliming others distilling others calcining and about the Glasses and the Furnace was written this of Geber Per Deum Sulphur est omne illud illuminans quod est supra terram By this I knew that Sulphur was the subject on which was wrought and indeed with so great cunning that I could not but admire the ingenuity of the men and knowing that what a man prizeth though it be a trifle yet to spoil or destroy that would be an injury I meddled not with any Glass for indeed there were Labourers that fled not because they knew nothing but only wrought as they were directed and when I came they could not perceive that I had any Candle in my hand and wondred their Masters should fly so from a phansie Moreover I found that they could not see any light from the Fox-fire and Glow-worms tails which were there but the place being dark as being under ground they wrought by Candles and Lamps which yet could give their Masters no light but they sought all the world over for those shining subjects Yet I could notwithstanding both discern utter darkness which the Rays of my Candle would not enlighten Then said I to the Workmen What is this that is brought in here Oh said they they are Sol and Luna terrestrial whereby our Masters can see clearly the Natures of all things in the world and to make by their light the great Elixir and though we can see no light in them or very little it is because of our Ignorance in these things therefore we use our Lamps to work by Where are your Masters said I. They ran away said they because when you came they said you were a Devil and brought an ominous light with you and if they did but once see that with a full view their Works would all vanish they did therefore lay a few Charms and ran away Then I looked and the ground under me was full of Crosses and Circles at which I laughed and departed into another Room Or Salts preparate in divers wise Neither with Corrosives nor with Fire alone Neither with Vinegar nor with Waters ardent Nor with the vapour of Lead our Stone Calcined is according to our intent All those to Calcining which are so bent From this hard Science withdraw their hand Till they our Calcining better understand ANd there I found in the like sort rare Furnaces with this Inscription Sal Metallorum est Lapis Philosophorum many processes I beheld which would be tedious to relate On I passed from thence and in another Room I found large Furnaces in which they were labouring about Waters for t others were with strong reverberations calcining Lead Tin Copper Iron and all Metals and Minerals others were drawing Spirit of Vinegar with a great care till it became exquisitely sharp and in this they laboured to calcine several Metalline bodies others were rectifying Spirit of Wine so long till no Body almost or Receiver could hold it it was so subtile and this they said was the true Water of Life that must do the work others were subliming of Lead hoping after it was exquisitely sublimed to have out of it that Menstruum which should effect the Stone without any further laying on of hands This when I had seen I returned to my Furnace and recruited my Fire as I was directed and made a particular relation of what I had seen and desired the verdict of Nature upon them all She told me That they could never by this way expect any thing but loss I asked her if they might not with trying many things at length hit the right She told me No they had not any ground of truth nor could they expect either the great secret or any other particular profitable truth in that way Then said I Noble Lady pray let me know the reason of their error that I may know how to avoid the like For by such Calcination their bodies be shent Which minisheth the moisture of our Stone Therefore when bodies to powder are brent Dry as ashes of Tree or Bone Of such Calxes then will we none For moisture we multiply radical In Calcining minishing none at all THen said she Besides that they work not on the true Matter they work not in a right way which are two most desperate errors for our work is to make a substance fluid penetrating and entring that may have ingress into imperfect Metals for which cause we do preserve humidity without which our Stone cannot be penetrative So then instead of purifying the crude and ripening what is raw by these Calcinations the tender Soul is put to flight and the crudities are the more strongly vitrified so that all hope of fruit is wholly by this means taken away for take this for a rule whatever either by violence of Fire or Corrosives is turned into a dry Powder or Calx it is wholly reprobate in our work for though we Calcine yet it is in such a Fire in which our moisture is not burnt and in such a Vessel so closed that the Spirits are retained and in a word so sweet is our Regimen in reference to our Matter that moisture is advanced and is made more unctuous and by consequent more ingressive And for a sure ground of our true Calcination Work wittily only kind with kind For kind unto kind hath appetitive
moisture and the moisture of the Water uniting the Sulphur of the Sun and the Sulphur of the Water and the Mercury of the Sun and the Mercury of the Water and the united Sulphur prevailing over the united Humidity rotting it into powder as small as Atoms black of the blackest black thou shalt then see a total mixture of Seeds and death of thy Compound This rotting will begin about the 42 46 or 50 th day and the signs of it are the Fumes will not ascend but the Matter will boil at the bottom of the Glass like to melted Pitch boiling and bubbling swelling and puffing in a black colour every day blacker and blacker shewing changable rotting colours in its boiling This will continue till it be so thick that it boil not but grow hard and swell yet it will vary often and appear sometimes as though dry and sometimes a little moisture will appear with fresh bubbling but no Fumes And this will last about 46 days no Fumes rising at all so that about the 84 th or 90 th day after thy Matters begin to be boiled in a continual decoction Putrefaction will be compleat and then Sublimation or Circulation will begin again which in 46 or 50 days will end in a white Dove This first token of blackness proclaims thee a Master after which thou canst not well miss unless thou wilt This is the astonishment of Art to make Gold volatile which was so fixed be patient then and boyl continually till your Gold begin to dissolve and come upon the Water like a Cream Then continue your decoction till the colour begin to change into an imperfect Citrine with moisture and send up yellowish vapours This Citrine will soon be mixed with a blewish black and yet continue the decoction till the Clouds begin to rise and a dark mist then continue your boyling till breath fail that is the Clouds and Fumes arise no more then the Compound boyl at the bottom without Fumes and will shew dark obscure reddish yellowish blewish gray and blackish colours then continue your decoction till the Body and whole Compound begin to rot into Atoms which the 50 th day will give you a Harbinger or fore-runner of with Pitchy blackness then know that all is thorowly mingled together and will never cease till the damned Earth come the Earth of Leaves which is a dust impalpable The Head of the Crow that token call we And some do call it the Crows Bill Some call it the Ashes of Hermes Tree And thus they name it after their will Our Toad of the Earth which eateth his fill Some call it by what it is mortificate Our Spirit with Venom intoxicate But it hath names I say to thee infinite For after each thing that blackness is to sight Named it is till time it waxeth white Then hath it names of more delight After all things that been full white And the red likewise after the same After all read things doth take the name At the first Gate c. THis token then is called the Crow the Crow's Head and the Crow's Bill for it is a shining blackness like unto Printers Ink or a solid Coal new broken or the most black and compacted broken Pitch Others name it the Ashes of Hermes Tree for it is Ashes out of which grows a Tree afterwards beautiful and glorious with Sprigs and Branches and changable colours And indeed this liberty the Philosophers have taken to call it what they list they call it their Toad which crawleth on the ground and feedeth upon the slime of the Earth because before it is quite black it may â—â—semble the colours of a Toad and its likeness pusfing and swelling and rugged with bunches and blisters and knobs Others call it a Spirit killed with its own deadly poison that is Mercury dissolving Gold in which dissolved Body which then seems a Spirit there is a hidden ferment which may recongeal the same this fermental virtue it is that doth coagulate or thicken the Water that to the wonder of the Beholders what before was thinner and thinner doth after 40 days thicken till it come to a dust or powder like to impalpable Atoms But I shall not insist upon these denominations there being so many given to it by the Envious that there is nothing almost in the World that is black or may be made black by the Fire but they have named it by it Also whatever is filthy or faeculent or unsavoury either to taste or smell they have Allusively called their Stone by in reference to its first putridness or corruption So likewise when by continuance of decoction the colour changeth to white they then call it their Swan their Dove their white Stone of Paradise their white Gold their Alablaster their white Smoak and in a word whatever is white they do call it by And so the Red they name their Vermilion their red Lead their Poppy of the Rock their Tyre their Basilisk their red Lion and in sum it borrows the names of all red things Now thou art entred the first five Gates of the Philosophers Castle for do not believe but that Calcination is verily Putrefaction and is done by Dissolution Separation and Conjunction as if thou hast attended this discourse thou mayst easily conceive only here is the Sophism after this total Calcination there is a relenting again for as I said before our Operation is but turning as it were of a Wheel which runs one half of its circulation directly backwards to its first progress Thou sublimest so long till the Body is made as volatile as it may be this is the activity of the Spirit then thou congealest so long till all appear like Atoms and then is thy bodily virtue active and thy Spirit passive then thy Spirit begins to be active again and thy Compound which was apparently fixed relents again and distils as before till it come to its height again of volatility which is again a Separation then is celebrated again a Conjunction Tetraptive and from that time all ascends and descends together and there is such an union that there doth not then as at first exhale a quick Fume and descend upon the bodily Moles but all ascends like to a glorious Tree with branches and is not sublimed to the top but sprouts up like the tender Forst in a fair morning which falls and rises till all become a Powder impalpable So then after Calcination is again a Solution and that divides between Azoth and Laton and a distilling Separation in which Azoth washeth Laton and after that a Conjunction not of the four Elemental qualities only which was in the first Conjunction but of the Elements themselves the Body Soul and Spirit and then is made another Calcination into a white Calx which by continual decoction relents again and is made volatile again for our Wheel goes round and when it is come thither whence it set forth it begins again Thus is made a third Solution Sublimation
King and Queen contumulate And joyn'd as one together That which before was two by Fate Is ty'd which none can sever The King begets the Queen with Child Conjunction doth allay Their fury who before were wild Conception both doth slay The King is Brother to his Wife And she to him is Mother One Father is to both whose life Depends upon each other The one when dead the other dyes And both are laid in Grave The Coffin's one in which both lyes Each doth the other save Yet each the other doth destroy And yet both are amended One without t' other hath no joy Both are of one descended Twice fourty days do come and go To which twice five are added These do produce a perfect Crow Whose blackness chears hearts sadded Twice fifteen more produce a Dove Whose wings are bright and tender Twice ten more make the Soul above To need no Fire defender For Soul and Body so combine The Spirit interceding Tincture to give of Silver fine The Soul the Body in leading Also such fixity to add Against the Flames prevailing Which may the Chymist make full glad The Sophister still failing Who seeks in fancies for to find Our Art so much concealed Not duly weighing in his mind That 't is a Fountain sealed Which one thing only can unlock This one thing learn to know Lest you the same event should mock That thing these Lines do shew AN EXPOSITION UPON THE Second Gate Which is DISSOLUTION The Second Gate Opened Which is DISSOLUTION Of Dissolution now will I speak a word or two Which sheweth out what erst was hid from fight And maketh intenuate things that were thick also By virtue of our first Menstrue clear and bright In which our Bodies eclipsed been of light And of their hard and dry compaction subtilate Into their own first Matter kindly retrogradate HAving run through the Chapter of Calcination I now come to handle Dissolution which as I said before is the first beginning of the Spirits activity and it is the first half of the Wheel which turns up the Spirit and down the Body the second hath a contrary operation for it makes the Body active and Spirit passive so then Calcination hides the profundity of the Body which Solution discovereth It is then nothing else but a boiling of hard and dry Bodies in our Mercury in a convenient Fire so long till they be dissolved and made thin then the same Fire makes them fly and flying they condense and return in drops on the Body and moisten it This is Solution and Sublimation together for the Water circulating upon the Body doth soften it and by often returning doth at length bring it to its own nature of moisture In this Resolution according to Artephius the Sun loseth its colour and is darkned and the Moon doth not give her light for all things are turned into their confused Chaos or first Matter in which the Elements with their qualities are hurried together One in Gender they be and in Number two Whose Father is the Sun and the Moon the Mother The mover is Mercury These and no more be Our Magnesia our Adrop and none other Things here be but only Sister and Brother That is to mean Agent and Patient Sulphur and Mercury co-essential to our intent THe cause of this is the Homogeneity of the Matter wherein they agree in essence together with the difference which is between them in Sex they being in the Glass as Male and Female and in ripeness of years one being more mature and by consequent more active to wit the Sun who therefore is the Father the other more crude in comparison of the Sun and so more passive viz. the Moon which therefore is the Mother of our Stone This Mother is our Mercury which for its eminent difference from any other Mercury is called the Moon with its internal true Sulphur which is hidden under its Mercurial form doth first move for at first our Body which is Gold is dead and liveth not till it be quickned by our Mercury then it lives it behoveth thee then to put in thy Body and thy Water and let them stand together and add nothing to them This Composition duly made we call our Magnesia and our Adrop and nothing entreth neither Powder nor Liquor save only these two species which species are the perfect Body and Argent vive These two sprung out of one Root for as I told you the Soul of thy animated Mercury is perfect true Gold yet volatile which by Art may be made to appear in a fixed form so then we joyn Consanguinity with Consanguinity Brother with Sister and make them become together Man and Wife These two by continual Fire do act and re-act the Woman first and then the Man several which then are joyned and make one Hermaphrodite acting one half of each Circulation as a Woman or Spirit and the other half as a Man or Body For each of the two principles have a Sulphur and a Mercuriality the Gold or Body hath its Sulphur external and apparent the Mercury the Spirit hath it internally hidden yet both these are co-essential each to other and in that respect they are the only subjects in the World for our Art Between these two in quality contrarious Ingendred is a mean most marvellous Which is our Mercury and Menstrue unctuous Our secret Sulphur working invisibly More fierce then Fire burning the Body Dissolving Metals into Water Mineral Which Night for darkness in the North we do call FOr with their Homogeneity they have withall such a Contrariety in opposite qualities that they do no sooner feel the Fire but they are stirred up to Work and boiling and circulating in a continual Ebullition or Vapour they do mingle their homogeneal qualities together by reason of which there is a strange medium of an unnatural Fire and a putrefying Bath ingendred then the Sulphur or Fire of the Gold which is the Fire of Nature and the Sulphur of the Water do embrace one another and these two make an unnatural Fire in which the Humidity appears and the Sulphur being hidden to the eye appears in its effects only to sight and that is it burns destroys and conquers the Bodies which common Fire never could do making them to be no Bodies but a Fume of Mineral Vapour and in this Operation the Elements are confused and make our Chaos which is void and dark for here the Lights of the World are eclipsed the Sun is darkned and the Moon sheweth not its light which watrishness of the Compositions for its abundance of moisture and privation of light we call Winter and Night and the North Latitude of our Stone But yet I trow thou understandst not utterly The very secret of Philosophers Dissolution Therefore understand me I counsel thee wittily For the truth I will tell thee without delusion Our Solution is caused of our Congelation For Dissolution on the one side corporal Causeth Congelation on the other
come to that pass that they will ascend no more but remain at the bottom of the Vessel together which is Conjunction in which Conjunction they swell bubble and boil till they calcine and putrefie The black Earth impalpable like Atoms of the Sun being the highest degree of Putrefaction and this is a secret not so clearly discovered by any before THe Sun is set no wonder darkest Night Doth veil the Crystal Skie The Moon 's eclips'd no marvel that her light Doth from us hidden lie The Sun 's declined to the Northern Pole And O the change that 's made The pearly drops are turned to a Coal All brightness quite doth fade Is this Apollo bright whose glory did A lustre great display Is this fair Phoebe who ere light was hid Did shine as bright as day Is this the King whose glory and renown Through all the World did ring Is this the Queen who far and near was known Oh 't is a wondrous thing Such glory and such beauty thus should fade That what before did shine More bright then Tagus should so soon be made More foul then ere 't was fine The Earth doth melt the Heavens drop down rain The Rocks which do relent They seem like Water then condense again Till all their moisture's spent To Ashes they return for Dust they were This Dust from Water springs Therefore at length they melt to Water clear Which all to Spirits brings The Nest is Earth therefore they will congeal To sparkling pearly dew Shining like tender Pearl on which doth steal A Body dry and new And then the parts like Atoms of the Sun For fineness do appear Rejoyce for now thou half thy course hast run Nor hast thou cause to fear Proceed until thou see the sparkling red Oh happy sight to see By which unto the Royal Palace led Thou shalt aye happy be Happy are they who shall not miss to find The new uprising Sun More happy they who with renewed mind In God find rest alone AN EXPOSITION UPON THE Third Gate Which is SEPARATION The Third Gate Opened Which is SEPARATION Separation doth each part from other divide The subtle from the gross the thick from the thin But manual Separation see thou set aside For that pertains to Fools which little fruit doth win But in our Separation Nature doth not blin Making division of qualities Elemental Into a fifth degree till they be turned all HAving now run through two of the twelve Gates I am come to the third which is Separation which begins so soon as the Matters have been so long circulated as to begin to hold one of another This Operation the Ancient Sages have denominated Division of Elements which afterwards they say must be joyned with a perpetual union This Separation is by others called Extraction of Natures and the parts separated are compared to two Dragons the one winged and the other without wings Artephius who for Age and Candor was next to Hermes the most eminent calls this Separation the Key of the Work which according to him is a Sublimation in a continual Vapour that what is Heavenly and subtile may ascend aloft that is to the upper part of the Vessel and there take the nature of a Body Heavenly or Spirit and what is gross may remain below in the nature of a Body Earthly which is the end of our Mastery to bring the Bodies which are compact and dry to become a Spiritual fume which is only to be done by Sublimation and Division or Separation So then our Separation is not to be understood as many foolish Alchymists do interpret it who have their Elements of which they boast much which are indeed manual done by handy-work the Glass being removed altered or renewed every time Nor are our Separations made by filter or per tritorium as many imagine who know not the nature of our Work and therefore run into such foolish fancies Nature then in our Work doth all in all who as a curious Artificer maketh no confused mixtures but first of all causeth the moisture to ascend which because it cannot get out it doth therefore condense in drops and descends so long till at length it begin to be acuated from the Body which is below for naturally all homogeneal moisture cohobated on a bodily substance with which it hath affinity is acuated by it Gold then is a Body in which the active qualities of heat and driness are more than in the Mercury and the Mercury being cohobated on it begins to be a little more Fiery or hot and then the Exhalations are more Aërial which before were more Watry and by continued Cohobation the Water partakes yet more and more of the Solary nature until at length this heat or Sulphur impregnating the Mercury cause it to congeal into a new Body or quintessence which is after the corruption of the old Body which is called the Earth or Ashes of Hermes's Tree Earth is turned into Water under black and bloe And Water after into Air under very white Then Air into Fire Elements there be no moe Of these is made our Stone of great delight But of this Separation much more I must write And Separation is called by Philosophers definition Of several qualities a Tetraptive dispersion SO then this is the method of our Operation Earth that is Sol is boiled in our Mercury in such a heat in which the Mercury may ascend constantly in a smoak and descend in drops and the Body below stand liquid and boil then shall the Water dry up under which is blackness hidden which when the Water is dryed up shall appear like the Crows Bill Then shall this Powder again relent and after 40 days rotting without fumes shall send up a smoak again which shall ascend and descend so long till the whole be made volatile and Aërial then shall the black colour vanish and the white appear This white Argent vive or Mercury animated which appears after blackness shall then totally congeal and shall be then Fire whose Nurse is the Earth then hast thou the four Elements that is cohobated thy Natures to the highest degree of perfection of the white Stone then canst thou go no further but go back and turn the same Wheel till thou hast attained the red Stone Thus hast thou the true Principles and Operation of our great Elixirs both red and white which if thou once hast thou hast Riches enough and needest no more in this life This if no more were said of this point might be enough to shew thee the truth of our true Separation yet because Philosophers have spoken much of it and indeed it is all the work to cause ascension and descension of our true Water on our true Body so long till by the Water the Body be volatized and after that by the Body the Water fixed and till that be brought to pass there will come and go the four Qualities in their season and will cause change of colours suitable
former Kingdom he Vnto his Brethren gives The worst of them doth now those Fortunes see That each in plenty lives And what their Brother was before his death That they are now become For he their sickness cures with his breath And makes them live at home No more in bondage bond 's no place can find All liberty enjoy There 's nothing here can hurt for all one mind Have all that would destroy Is banish'd from the Kingly Palace where The Streets with Gold are pav'd The Walls are Silver fine the Gates most clear Intire Gems engrav'd With wondrous Art the Windows glass most pure Which falls nor knocks can break The Drink from fear of venom still is sure Whoso virtue none can speak Whose comes there is at a place arriv'd Where neither want nor death Nor any grief is known a place contriv'd For Saints therein to breath Whom God shall choose and to his Palace bring What need he more desire Then God himself that he may praises sing Kindled with holy fire But he whose hands unclean and heart defil'd These Mysteries forbear For you th' are not cease timely for y' are wild T' have neither wit nor fear AN EXPOSITION UPON THE Fifth Gate Which is PUTREFACTION The Fifth Gate Opened Which is PUTREFACTION Now we begin the Chapter of Putrefaction Without which Pole no Seed can multiply Which must be done only by continual action Of heat in the Body moist not manually For Bodies else may not be altered naturally WE have already run through four Gates the first being opened the rest stand open at will so that thou hast need only to enter The course and method of Philosophers now doth lead us to the Gate of Putrefaction a horrible Gate whose entrance is dark with Cimmerian night dreadful with many windings and turnings And yet it is a Gate so necessary that unless you pass through it you may never expect to reap fruit from your labour for without it can be no Life nor Generation much less desired Multiplication therefore saith the Poet Felices atrum quotquot habere queant The cause of this death or corruption or rottenness proceeds from the action of continual heat not so much of the external Fire of the Athanor as of the Compound within it self in which the Fire of the Water which is against Nature doth open the perfect Body by continual contrition and decoction and so le ts loose its Sulphur that was incarcerate which is Fire of Nature that so between these two in continual action and passion together with the external heat continually acting the whole Compound is brought to corruption being sometimes roasted with external heat which doth sublime the moisture which again of its own accord returns continually and doth moisten the Earth so long until by reason of the heat it have drunk up the moisture wholly and then it dyes And unless thou see this sign of rotting of thy Compound which is done in a black colour a stinking odour and with a discontinuity of parts thy labour will still be in vain for thou mayst never expect what thou desirest to have a new form brought in till the old form be corrupted and put off Sith Christ doth witness without the Grain of Wheat Dye in the Ground increase thou mayst none get And in likewise without the Matter putrefie It may in no wise truly be alterate Neither thy Elements may be divided kindly Nor the Conjunction of them perfectly celebrate That therefore thy labour be not frustrate The privity of our putrefying well understand Or ever thou take this Work in hand THis is so constant to Natures constant proceedings that the painful Husbandman that he may have an increased Harvest commits his precious Seed to the Ground in it to rot and to be corrupted that so a new Life may spring from the old dead Body nor doth he ever expect increase so long as it remains in his Garner Right so we so long as our Material principles continue in their own nature and form they are but of a single value for Gold and Mercury are two such principles that they will for ever delude as many as proceed to work on them in a Sophistical way for whatever the Artist may think they will remain the same unto the end of the World unless pure Sol being mixed with its own pure and appropriated Mercury and set in a due heat of digestion there arise a mutual action and passion between them which without the laying on of the Artists hands will tend to a new Generation For in a convenient Fire in which the Compound may perpetually and uncessantly boyl and the subtle parts may ascend and circulate upon the gross without intermission the most digested Virtue or Soul of the fixed Body which is his basis of Tincture will be extracted by the Water and this will mix it self with the pure Spirit of the Water and with this it will ascend and return until a total separation be made of the pure from the impure and the subtle from the gross Then shall the Body draw down its Soul again and by the power of the most High it shall be united and with it the Spirit of life shall be joyned also so that all three shall become one with an union indissolvable but all this pre-supposeth a Putrefaction or Corruption of one form else cannot there be an Introduction of another Therefore since this mystery of Putrefaction is not more secret then necessary so necessary that without it there is nothing can be done to purpose that is to say with profit I shall be a little plain and full in the prosecution of this mystery For in the knowledge of this consists all that is required to make a Philosopher All the intentions of the Artist must be only so to prepare and order things that he may be sure of this terminus and when he is there come he is as sure a Master as if he had the Stone in his Cabinet By the failing of this sign the Operator is always to turn either backward to seek out some other principles or forward or to the right hand or to the left but when he is Master of this he then can fail in nothing but in the Regimen of the outward heat And Putrefaction may thus defined be After Philosophers definition to be of Bodies the slaying And in our Compound a division of things three The killed Bodies into Corruption forth leading And after unto Regeneration them ableing For things being in the Earth without doubt Be engendred of Rotation of the Heavens about THe definition that the Philosophers give of this Operation is perpetually Allegorical for this Gate they have named by all Metaphors almost in the World especially from death and dead men therefore they allegorize the Vessel in this station to Grave or Tomb and emblematically discover this Operation by the types of Skuls dead Bones and rotten Carcasses according to which Metaphors they call Putrefaction the