and Omnipotent Plato in his Timaeo giueth testimonie when hée speaketh thus When the sempiternall GOD had created this Vniuersal hee put into it certaine seedes of reason brought in the beginning Life that he might beget with the world the procreating force Wherein our explication which I brought before concerning the Soule of the worlde is confirmed Which also agreeth with that which the Prophet Moses hath written and which King Dauid hath in his Psalme in these wordes By the worde of the Lorde were the Heauens made and all the vertue of them by the spirit of his mouth By which vertue of the quickning spirit that great Trimegistus more conuersant and exercised in Moses writings then all other Philosophers vttered these diuine wordes in his second booke which is called Asclepias All spirit saith he in the world is acted and gouerned by the spirit The spirit telleth all things the worlde nourisheth bodies the spirit giueth them soule By the spirit all things in the world are ministred are made to growe and increase And after that he saith againe All things haue neede of this spirit For it carryeth all things and it quickneth nourisheth all things according to the dignitie of eache thing in it selfe Life and the spirit is brought forth out of the holy fountaine By which diuine words it appeareth plainely that this eternal and quickening spirit is infused and put into all things so that it is not obserued to deduce and deriue the actions forces and powers also all naturall things from the spirits as from the causes CHAP. III. HAuing spoken sufficiently of the first and second beginning that is to say of God vniuersal Nature God the first cause vsing that generall Nature as his handmaid it resteth that somewhat be spoken of nature natured that is to say of that which is particular To make an apt and conuenient definition whereof let vs knowe that it is no other thing than euery naturall body consisting of forme and matter For of these two causes and not onely of the causes but also of the parts of the whole compound all nature that is to say euery naturall body consisteth For the Peripateticks do thinke that whatsoeuer is the beginning of generation ought to be called nature by a certaine peculiar right And Aristotle saith that the same from whence any thing is made at the first and whereof it hath the first motion mutation is the very beginning I say the beginning from whence the essence of all natural things ariseth The which nature Aristotle in another place defineth to be the beginning substantiall and the cause of motion and of the rest thereof in the which it is at the first and not by Accidents the explication of which definition he hath comprehended in eight bookes And Aristotle doth rightly call Nature the cause and the beginning of internall motion For those things which are made by Nature and are therefore called naturall haue a certaine beginning of motion whereby they are moued of their owne accord not by force Whereby plainly appeareth the difference betweene those things which are naturall and which are endued with an effectuall spirit and with power to worke by it selfe and those things which are made by Arte which haue no force nor power of doing but are dead and deuoided of all sense and motion By these things it appeareth that things natural are called properly naturall existences or beings and such as haue nature And they are saide to haue nature which possesse in themselues the beginning of their motion and of their rest the which beginning of motion of euery thing is either the forme or the matter wherof we haue spoken Forme which is wholly spiritual hath all her motion likewise spiritual So the soule is of this same nature in a liuing creature the motions and sences plainely celestiall spirituall and a light beginning Whereas the Matter is terrestriall ponderous and corporal the other beginning of naturall motion By whose waight and grossenesse the body tendeth downeward so as this kind of motion procéedeth not from the soule or spirituall forme but from the corporall matter which is terrestriall and heauy by his owne nature Hereof it commeth that the name of nature is giuen as well to Matter as to Forme but more aptly and conueniently to Forme because Forme doth manifestly giue to a thing his being actually whereas Matter alone cannot performe that For not euery liuing creature hath sense and motion from that body which is solid terrestriall and ponderous but onely from the spiritual forme that is to say the soule mouing the body and informing it with the vitall vertues As for example A horse is in act and in truth a horse when he neither moueth leapeth nor runneth but these motions which are spiritual are the effects operations of the soule or forme whereas otherwise the body hauing nothing but the lineaments and visible forme whereby it séemeth a horse is meere terrestriall heauie and deade Howbeit neither the soule alone of the horse can bée saide to bée a horse except it be coupled with the body For both being ioyned and coupled together make a horse Knowe therefore that the Forme is far more noble and excellent then the Matter and that Nature as touching her effects and operations is of that power that it generateth and giueth being to all things it putteth matter on the formes it beautifieth and suffereth nothing to bee corrupted but preserueth all things in their estate Thâ—se her vertues faculties and powers she very apparantly sheweth when as she worketh and causeth all sorts of beings out of the 〈◊〉 and out of the seedes and beginning of all things Salt Sulphur and Mercurie and informeth with great variety of impressions of the vitall spirits colours and taste and with the properties of such kinde of powers and faculties that it giueth to euery thing so much as concerneth the office and dignity thereof in all sufficiencie The which building and 〈◊〉 of things so aptâ—â— and conueniently formed in order in number and measure wee may wâ—ll call diuine not terrestriall and corporall 〈…〉 same be naturall according to the power which God hath giuen vnto Nature And yet wée must not thinke that God hath so forsaken the frame of this worâ—d that he sitteth idle as hauing giuen such admirable and potent â—ffects to nature onely according to the opinion of Anâ—xagoras Protagoras and many other Atheâ—â—â—i all Philosophers which acknowledge no other God but Name as also did the Epicures 〈◊〉 it they be to be accused and condemned for so wicked an opinion then do they deserue no small reprehension which denie nature her partes and offices in working For the offices pecuâ—â—ar both of her first and second cause are to be attributed to either according to 〈…〉 Neither are these places of Scripture any thing repugnant 〈◊〉 is God which worketh all in all And againe in him wee liue moue and haue our beeing For
THE PRACTISE OF Chymicall and Hermeticall Physicke for the preseruation of health WRITTEN IN LATIN By Iosephus Quersitanus Doctor of Physicke And Translated into English by Thomas Timme Minister LONDON Printed by Thomas Creede 1605. TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE SIR Charles Blunt Earle of Deuonshire L. Mountiâ—y Lieutenant general of Ireland M. of the Ordinance Gouernour and Captaine General of the Towne and Garison of Portsmouth and the I le of Portsey Knight of the noble Order of the Garter and one of his Maiesties most honourable priuie Councell I I may seeme Right Honorable an admirable and new Paradox that Halchymie should haue concurrence and antiquitie with Theologie the one seeming meere Humane and the other Diuine And yet Moses that auncient Theologue describing expressing the most wonderfull Architecture of this great world tels vs that the Spirit of God moued vpon the water which was an indigested Chaos or masse created before by God with confused Earth in mixture yet by his Halchymicall Extraction Seperation Sublimation and Coniunction so ordered and conioyned againe as they are manifestly seene a part and sundered in Earth Fyer included which is a third Element and Ayre a fourth in Water howbeit inuisibly Of which foure Elements two are fixed as earth and fire and two volatil as water ayre That spiritual Motion of the first mouer God hath inspired al the creatures of this vniuersal world with that spirit of Life which may truely be called the spirit of the world which naturally moueth and secretly acteth in all creatures giuing them existence in three to wit salt sulphure and Mercury in one Huposiasis Mercurie congealing Sulphur sulphur Mercurie neither of them being without their Salt the chiefest meane by whose helpe Nature bringeth forth al vegeâ—â—â—ls Minerals Animals So that of these 3. whatsoeuer is in Nature hath his original is compacted of them and so mingled with the 4. Elements that they make one body Therefore this Diuine Halchymie through the operatioÌ„ of the spirit without the which the elemental material Character letter and forme profiteth not was the beginning of Time of Terrestrial existence by which all things liue moue and haue their being consisting of body soule spirit whether they be vegetals minerals or animals reseruing only this difference that the soules of men angels are reasonable immortal according to the Image of God himself the sensuals as beasts and such like not so Moreouer as the omnipoteÌ„t God hath in the beginning by his diuine wisedom created the things of the heueÌ„s earth in weight muÌ„ber measure depeÌ„ding vpoÌ„ most wonderfull proportion harmony to serue the time which he hath appointed so in the fulnesse last period of time which approacheth fast on the 4. Elements whereof al creatures consist hauing in euery of theÌ„ 2. other Elements the one putrifying and combustible the other eternal incombustible as the heauen shall by Gods Halchymie be metamorphosed and changed For the combustible hauing in them a corrupt stinking feces or drossie matter which maketh theÌ„ subiect to corruption shal in that great generall refining day be purged through fire And then God wil make new Heauens and a new Earth and bring all things to a christalline cleernes wil also make the 4. Elements perfect simple fixed in themselues that al things may be reduced to a Quintessence of Eternitie Thus right Honourable you see a Paradox no Paradox a Hieroglyphick plainly disciphered For Halchymie tradeth not alone with transmutation of metals as ignorant vulgars thinke which error hath made them distaste that noble Science but shee hath also a chyrurgical hand in the anatomizing of euery mesenteriall veine of whole nature Gods created handmaid to conceiue and bring forth his Creatures For it is proper to God alone to create something of nothing but it is natures taske to forme that which he hath created VVherefore if the foole which hath in his hart said There is no God will put away the mist of ignorance and infidelitie and behold the power and wisedome of God in his creatures manifested more particularly and inwardly by the Art of Halchymie imitating nature in seperating from one substance be it Vegetall Mimeral or Animal these three Salt Sulphur and Mercurie shal by that mistery as in glasse discerne the holy and most glorious Trinitie in the Vnitie of one Hupostasis Diuine For the inuisible things of God saith the Apostle that is his eternal power and God-head are seene by the creation of the world being considered in his workes This Phylosophy therefore my good lord is not of that kind which tendeth to vanity and deceit but rather to profit and to edification inducing first the knowledge of God secondly the way to find out true medicine in his creatures Plato saith that Phylosophy is the imitating of God so farforth as man is able that we may knowe God more and more vntill we behold him face to face in the kingdome of heauen So that the scope of Phylosophy is to seeke to glorifie God in his wonderfull workes to teach a man how to liue wel and to be charitably affected in helping our neighbour This Philosophy natural both speculatiue actiue is not only to be found in the volume of nature but also in the sacred Scripture as in Genesis in the booke of Iob in the Psalmes in Syrach and in other places In the knowledge of this Philosophy God made Salomon to excel all the kings Phylosophers that were in the world whereby the Queene of Sheba was allured to take a long Iourney to make an experiment of that wisedome whereof she had heard so great fame and found it by effect farre greater Anaxagoras a noble gentleman but more noble in wisdome and vertue Crates Antisthenes with many others contemned the pleasures of the world and gaue theÌ„selues to the studie of naturall Philosophie Philosophers haue brought more profit to the world then did Ceres who inuented the increase of corne grain then did Bacchus that found out the vse of wines then did Hercules which ridde the world of monsters For these things belong to the maintenance of bodily life and pleasure but Philosophy instructeth and nourish the soule it selfe This phylosophy together with the most rare excellent healthful Physicke linked to true grounds and vpholden by daily experience the very marow of true medicine the quintessence of marow it selfe I most humbly present vnto your honours hands as a Iewel of prise to procure and preserue health which Ptolomeus the sonne of Antiochus valued at so high a rate that he gaue to Erasistratus a noble Physitian on hundred talents for the curing of Antiochus My labour herein be it but as the apple which Acontius gaue to beautiful Cydippe to make knowne his amorous affection yet being tendred with no lesse good wil in al humilitie
of the Hesperides in speaking so plainly of salt-péeter giuing thereby a free accesse vnto the doltish and ignorant Be not therefore deceiued in taking my words according to the letter Salt-Péeter of the Phylosophers or fusile salt whereof at the first came the name of Halchymie is not Salt-Péeter or that common Niter yet neuerthelesse the composition and wonderful nature thereof is as it were a certaine example and Lesbian rule our worke Howbeit I haue spoken more plainly manifestly vnto you of this matter then any other which hath gone before me hath done Let therefore Momus from henceforth hold his peace and let slaunderous tongues bée hereafter silenced Also let the ignorant open their eares and eyes and giue good héede to that which followeth wherein shal bée plainly shewed many admirable things and secrets of excéeding great profite Wherewith bée you wel satisfied and take my good will in good part till hereafter I shal deliuer that which shal better content you CHAP. III. Wherein by Examples the forces and properties of Salt are manifested YEe haue séene out of that first remaining Chaos that is to say out of that base earth or out of a matter confused and deformed an extraction and seperation of a fairer bright cléere and transparent forme that is to say of that Salt which is opt to receiue many other formes and which is endued with diuers and wonderfull properties Ye haue also séene how out of one and the same essence thrée distinct and seueral things yea thrée beginnings of Nature are extracted of the which all bodyes are compounded and with skilfull Chymist can extract and seperate out of euery naturâ—ll bodie that is to say out of Mineral Vegetal and Animal to wit Salt Sulphur and Mercurie principles verily most pure most simple and truely Elementarie of Nature all comprehended vnder one essence of Salt Sulphur and Mercurie which Phylosophers are woont to compare with the body Spirit and Soule for the body is attributed to salt the spirit to Mercurie and the soule to sulphur euery one to their apt and conuenient attribute And the spirit is as it were the mediator and conseruer of the soule with the body because through the benefite thereof it is ioyned and coupled with the soule And the soule quickeneth the spirit and the body Yée haue also seene in the aforesaide salt a Hermaphroditicall Nature Male and female fixed and volatil Agent and Pacient and which is more hot and cold fier and Ice by mutual friendship and simpathie ioyned in one and vnited into one substance wherein is to be séene the wonderful nature thereof The properties thereof are no lesse wonderful nay rather much more wonderful For Salt-peter is the especial key and cheife Porter which openeth most hard bodies and the most solid things as wel stones as Metal and bringeth gold and siluer into liquor which the proper water extracted out of the whole maffe without separation of the male or fixed And as it maketh al bodyes metallick spiritual and volatile so on the contrary part it hath vertue to fixe and to incorporate spirits how flying soeuer they bée Who now wil not wonder or rather bée amazed which knoweth that Salt-peter is so apt ready to take fire by which it passeth into ayre and smoake and yet in the meane time seeth that it remaineth liquid and fusible in a red hote crucible placed in the center of burning coales notwithstanding the which most burning heate it conceiueth no flame except the flame or fyre happen to touch it And which is more being of nature so volatil it is at the length fixed neither is it ouercome by the fire neither doth it yéelde bée it neuer so violent and burning no more then doth the Salamander if it be true which is reported of that beast which before notwithstanding it could not abide nor by any manner of meanes indure Thus therefore yée sée that by fire onely his nature is transformed Furthermore the same Saltâ—peter which was of late rightly prepared and clensed so white and Christalline at the least outwardly so appearing being now put into a fixatorie fire you shal sée that it conteineth within it al maner of colours as gréene red yellow and white with many others moe The which if any man wil hardly beléeue because he wil bée rather incredulous than docile I wish him to make tryal thereof and then hée shal learne so notable a mysterie of Nature within the space of tenne houres with very little cost And least yée should take mée for some Lycophrone or Gramarian writer of Tragedies I wil teach you how to worke truely and plainly Take of Salt-peter the finest and clearest one pound or two put it into a glasse Alembic with a couer and set it in sand no otherwise than if you should distil Aqua Fortis Put fyre vnder and moderate the same by degrées according to Art she which fyre thou shalt increase the third or fourth houre after in such wise til the sand appeare very hote This fyre in the highest degrée thou shalt continue by the space of fiue or sixe houres and then thou shalt finde and plainly sée that the spirits of Salt-peter haue penetrated the very glasse of the Alembic and that it hath dissoloued the same as wel within as without Furthermore the spirits of the Salt-peter which are come through the body of glasse cleauing to the out-side therof like vnto flower yée make take off with a soft feather and easilie gather together in great quantitie This flower is nothing else but the spirit of Salt-peter wherein ye shal sée al sorts of colours very liuely expressed That which remaineth in the bottom of the Culcurbit so white as snow and wholy fixed is a special remedie to extinguish al Feauers It is giuen from halfe a drachme to a drachme dissolued in some conuenient liquor And to speake in a word this remedy hath not his like to cut to clense and to purge and euacuate the corruptions of humors and to conserue the body from al pollution of corruption For séeing it is of the nature of Balsamic Salt it must néedes bée indued with such vertues and properties And in very déede to deale plainly and truely I cannot if I would sufficiently extol with prayses the true Salt-peter and Fusile salt of the Phylosophers This Salt Homer cals diuine And Plato writeth that this Salt is a friend and familiar to diuine things And many Phylosophers haue said that it is the soule of the vniuersal the quickening spirit and that which generateth al things It may peraduenture séeme that we haue bene too tedious in the inquisition and speculation as wel of the general as of the particular concerning the nature of Salt but it is so profitable and necessarie that it is the Basis and foundation of al medicinable faculties as more at large shal be shewed in his place that Physitians may haue wherewith to busie themselues and to vnderstand
at this day are little regarded insomuch that many Physitians either neglect them or else disdainfully contemne them for that they know not what profit such preparations doe bring with them And verily I doe not know what should be the cause of such obstinate disdaine wilful contempt but méere ignorance séeing it is well known that nothing is contemned but of the ignorant And what wil not these mad Ignorants contemne which doe also despise the preparations of Medicines which administer nothing to their sicke patients but those things which are crude and full of impurities They rather choose obstinatly to goe forware in their error both to their owne reproach and dammage of the sicke then rightly to followe holesome admonitions least they might be thought not to haue bene wise enough before and to haue learned more knowledge of others Let them consider the necessitie of our life that they may learne that the same hath constrained vs to séeke the preparations of our meates which are necessarie for the sustaining of our bodies in the preparing whereof notwithstanding there is not so great necessitie as there ought to be in the preparing of medicines for our health Let them beholde the corne which commeth out of the earth which is not by and by giuen crude as it is for food but the chaffe and the branne being seperated it is brought to flower which as yet is not so giuen to eate but being first termented or leuened ◠wel kneaded or wrought it is baked that it may be bread fit for nourishment Consider well the fermentation by which bread is made light and fit for nourishment the lighter it is the wholsomer it is and the more it is fermented the lighter it wil be The lesse it is fermented the heauier it is and the more vnholsome If this preparation goe not before but that we onely make a mixture of water and flower together and so presently thrust it into the Ouen in stéede of bread thou shalt prepare a glutinous matter very hurtfull to nature Doe you not sée how paste a glutinous matter and starch also are made onely with flower and water What then thinkest thou will come to passe in thy stomach and bowels especially in those which are more weake if such be offered and taken Surely such as will procreate matter to bréede the stone and wil be the seminary of many diseases So necessarie and profitable is this Fermentation that it is very behouefull for an Apothecarie to knowe it for that it doth attenuate euery substance it looseneth it from his body and terrestrial impurity that it may afterwards be made fit to bring forth the true radical Balsam and the quickening spirit By the benefite of this onely Fermentation are extracted waters of life out of all vegetables whatsoeuer After the same manner by this Fermentation and Leauen of nature all 〈◊〉 humours of or◠body are made thinne and subtiled You know how in holy writ it is said that a little sowre Leauen doth ferment the whole masse By the way of Fermentation which consisteth in a certaine Acetoius liquor of nature our humours are made thinne and disposed to excretion And therefore there are certaine tart things which moue sweates albeit the same by the opinion of Physitians are cold Doe wée not sée that women and ordinary Cookes haue attained this knowledge of Fermentation and thereby prouide for sicke persons Iellyes made of flesh of foules and such like to restore and strengthen them in the time of their weakenesse And what are these but extracts For the terrestrial partes are seperated from the more laudable substance which is more conuenient for the sicke And why doe not Apothecaries the like in compounding their medicines The nature of the sicke man being now weakened cannot abide crude and fulsome meate but doth rather loathe them and is more and more weakened by them How much more will he be offended and hurt by medicines not rightly prepared nor seperated from their impure substance Such impuritie must néeds be a great hurt and hindrance that the natural force of the Medicine cannot encounter with his enemie the sicknesse and ouercome him What shall we say then of those Medicines which haue not onely cruditie in them but also some euil qualitie and the same not seperated or rightly prepared or being corrected may wée be bold to giue it They are woont with griefe I speake it too much and too often I saythey are woont I meane such decocted pouldred and mixed Medicines by no manner of other art prepared to bring more griefe and paine to the sicke that I may say no worse than sollace and helpe Therefore these kinde of preparations concoctions I say Digestions and Fermentations are not to bée despised or neglected For if these things be done they are done according to natures fashion which vseth the same operations to the perfect ripening of fruites and all things the which it bringeth foorth But let vs hasten to conclude this Treatize Aristotle in his fourth of Meteors hath appointed thrée Pipsias or kindes of concoction The first he calleth Pepamsis which is the concoction of humour in moyst séede made by naturall heate And this is the meane of concocting ripening and of making of the seedes of Plants and of other things to grow and to bring foorth plentie of fruite and it is a worke onely belonging to nature which vseth that quickening heate for an Instrument which heate answereth the element of Starres in proportion as the sayd Aristotle saith Albeit Arte cannot immitate this heate yet it may tread in the steppes thereof The second kinde of concoction he calleth Epsesis or Elixation which is a concoction made by a moyst heate of a thing indifinitely existing in a humour The third and last is Optesis or Assation which is the concoction of the same interminate made by a dry and straunge heate These two last concoctions are made especially by Arte concerning the moderation of which heates wée will hereafter teach the diligent and industrious Apethecaries I say industrious and such as follow the prescrips of true Phisitians and Arte not Petlars and Sellers of Trifels which rather desire to make retale of Candels Lanternes and all Mercerie-wares and to fill their shoppes with trash than to follow the workes of Art Therefore in stéede of liberal persons they are miserable hierlings Sowters they are and not Artificers and louers of Art Marchants and handy-crafts men setting their rest vpon pompe pleasure and gaine I had rather sée an enemie in the Cittie then one of these base minded fellowes For Citizens know how to beware of an open enemie but how can a man beware of the falshood and treacherie of these companions which they bring to passe either by ignorance or by mallice or else by negligence I say who shall take héede of these but he which banisheth them quite and cleane out of the Cittie I speake of deceiuers and such as falsly vsurpe the name and
tradition and are deliuered as it were from hand to hand and euery one adorneth his arte with new inuentions according as he excelleth others in dexteritie of wit And albeit it may be said that it is an easie matter to adde to that which is inuented yet both the Inuentors and also the augmentors are to be thankfully imbraced CHAP. II. THere are thrée principall things mixed in euery Naturall bodie to wit Salte Sulphur and Mercurie These are the beginnings of all Naturall things But he from whom all things haue their beginning is GOD vppon whome all things do depende hée himselfe subsisting by himselfe and taking the Originall of his Essence from no other and is therfore the first and efficient cause of all things From his first beginning procéedeth Nature as the second beginning made by GOD himselfe through the power of his worde This Nature next vnder God ought to be religiously estéemed thought of enquired and searched for The knowledge hereof is very necessary and wil be no lesse profitable the searche and raunsacking thereof will be swéete and pleasing The profite which commeth hereby appeareth in this that the knowledge of all things which consist thereof and wherof they borrow thei◠name and are called Naturall things procéedeth herehence whether they bée subiect to our sences or aboue our sences Hereupon great Philosophers both Christians and Ethnicks haue bene mooued to make the signification of the name of Nature to sitte and serue almost all things Insomuch that Aristotle himselfe in that diuision which he maketh of Nature diuiding the same into the first and second Nature and speaking of the first he calleth it Naturam naturantem Naturing nature by which he meaneth God So in like manner Zeno a Prince of Stoikes openlie taught that Nature was no other thing then God Therefore the first Naturing nature is God but the seconde which properly is said to be Nature is subdiuided into vniuersall and particular The Vniuersall is that ordinarie power of God diffused throughout the whole worlde whereof it is sayd that Nature doth suffer this or that or doth this or that as Augustine teacheth in his booke De ciuitate Dei and Lactantius and among heathen wryters Pliny and Seneca This vniuersall Nature is also taken for the diuine vertue which God hath put and implanted in all creatures by the benefite whereof certaine notes of the Diuinitie are to be discerned in them Hereuppon some olde Fathers were woont to say All things are full of Goddes as did Heraclitus among others Some others take this vniuersal nature for a certaine influence and vertue whereby the Starres do worke in these inferior things or else for an acting vertue in an vniuersall cause that is to say in a bodie Celestiall Furthermore that is vniuersall Nature wherof Plato speaketh when he saith Nature is a certaine force and strength infused throughout all things the moderator and nourisher of all things and by it selfe the beginning of motion and of rest in them The which Nature Hermes Trimegistus almost in the same words saith to be a certaine force risen from the first cause diffused throughout all bodies by it selfe the beginning of motion and rest in them This force the Pythagoreans called God And therefore Virgil a great follower of the Pythagorean disciplne wrote thus saying The spirit nourisheth inwardly c. And the Platonicks called the same the Soule of the worlde But yet the Platonicks haue not defined shewed in what maner by what means this Soule of the world doth moderate and order all these interior things and doth stirre vp in the generation of things neither can they yet determine But the more witty and learned sort of Philosophers holde affirme that this world which comprehendeth in the circumference and compasse therof the fowre Elements the first beginnings of nature is a certaine great bodie whose partes are so knitte together among themselues euen as in one bodie of a liuing Creature all the members doe agrée that there is no one part of the parties of that great body which is not inlyned quickened and susteined by the benefite of that vniuersall soule which they haue called the soule of the worlde affirming also that if the bodyes of liuing creatures doe deriue life and beeing from the soule which is in them the same is much more done and effected in the farre more noble and more excellent body of the whole world by the meanes of the more potent and farre more excellent soule with the which this body of the vniuersall world is indued and by which it subsisteth For it all the parts of the world haue life as manifestly appearing it hath then must it needes follow that wholely it liueth for that the parts drawe and deriue their life from the whole from the which they being separated cannot but perish and die And héereupon they inferre that the Heauen compassing all things is that Soule which nourisheth and susteineth all things Also further they affirme that all the formes virtues and faculties of things by which all things are neurished susteined and haue their being doe come from the worlds Soule And as the body and soule are gathered and ioyned together in one through the benefite of the Spirits bond for that it is partaker of both Natures so the soule and body of the world are knit together by the meanes of the Aethereall Spirits going betwéene ioyning each part of the whole into one subsistence And yet hereof we must not conclude as did Aphrodisaeus and Philoponas which were Platonists that the worlde is a most huge liuing creature indued with sense and vnderstanding wise and happie the which is a most absurde and false opinion But the Platonists by the soule of the world gaue vs rather to vnderstand a certaine spirit which cherisheth quickeneth conserueth and susteineth all things as it were a certaine spirit of that Elohym or great God which mooued vpon the waters which Plato might remember as one not ignorant of Moses and thereupon frame his soule of the worlde Whereupon also it must needes come to passe that all these inferior things otherwise transitorie and infirme should soone come to destruction without they were conserued and continued in theyr being by that diuine power perpetually maintaining and suspecting them the which being disseuered a great confusion perturbation of the whole worlde arise therof Which ruine and destruction God of his great goodnes would preuent creating that vniuersall Nature which should defende all this great worke and kéepe it safe and sounde by his vertue and moderation and that by the yearely and continual rotation and reuolution of the right Heauen and by the Influences and vertues of the Starres Planets and Celestiall powers all things might be well gouerned and might constantly remaine and abide in full fastnes of theyr estate vntill the predestinated time of theyr dissolution To this Aethereall spirit or rather Diuine power euery effectuall
subiect which cannot be seen And as the effects are diuers so are there diuers kindes of Saltes which according to their diuersitie haue diuers tastes and sundery properties of euacuations and clensings and diuers other faculties But among Salts that which is more bitter and néerest to the taste of Aloes or Gaule sheweth his proper working in purging the belly by siege Such Salts Chymists call Salt Niter or Niterous salts Saladine an ancient great Physition speaking of Salts saith thus There are foure famous kinds of Salt to wit the salt of bread that is to say Common-salt salt-gem salt-naptie and salt-Indiâ— And afterward he saith that this last is of all other the most bâ—tter sharpe and most violent and therefore of greatest force to purge And he saith that al Salt is as it were a spurre to other medicines with the which it is mingled for that it maketh them to worke more spéedily Lastly hée saith that all Salt bringeth foorth grosse Phlegmaticke humors Among Salts some are earthie some watery and some aierie or such as haue in them predominant eyther the Element of that earth of water or of ayre insomuch some of them are fixed are of the nature of earth other some are betwéene fixed flying and doe retaine a certaine middle watery propertie But Sal Armoniac is of nature spiritual as is also the common Armoniac of all other most flying ayrie And al Salt whether it be flying or fixed is no otherwise dissolued and commixed in waters than with the water of Water and if one be a dry water the other is moyst These thrée kindes of Saltes which lye hydden in the secret parts of things whether they be metalline vegitable or animal and which are principally seated in that element which produceth his generations out of the earth they do participat of the nature of the thrée beginnings For the common salte and that which is of the sea passing through the philter of the earth and boyled and digested with the heates of the bowels of the same earth doth participate of the nature of fixed and firme salt the father and original of all others But Niter being partly fixed and in part volatile doth participate of the sulphurus beginning of things euen as Sal Amoniac doth participate of the Mercuriall beginning spirituall and ayrie whose extreames to wit fixed and volatile of the sulphurus salt or the Niterus partaker of the volatile nature in part and partly fixed are coupled together by intercession By this straight and wonderfull bond of the thrée beginnings thrée diuers substances of Salts of sundry properties doe manifestly appeare like in essence but not in natures of qualities For beyond all expectation a good wittie Salt-maker wil extract out of a fat and fertile earth by washings these three kindes of Saltes namely the marine and fixed which is dissolued in lye made of ashes the Niterus by it selfe which is there coagulated or congealed and the Armoniac volatile ayrie flying in part out of the Lye and partly contained in both the Saltes and therefore hydden from the sences This may bée done by a skilfull Salt-maker albeit he were vtterly ignorant of all the mysterâ—es which here are hidden Which thrée distinct differences of Saltes as they are to be found in euery fat kind of earth so out of both the saltes namely the marine and fixed and the Niterus volatile they may be thenceforth separated For those Saltes being put into a retort together or apart by themselues with a receiuer first by the force of fire stilleth forth a Volatile Salt sower sharpe and Mercurial then with a greater heate commeth forth a Salt Sulphurus and Niterus and swéete the third Salt which is Salt vpon Salt fixed will not moue with any force of fier but remaineth constantly in the bottome of the glasse All tastes are brought forth out of these thrée sundry Saltes common to that triple beginning of things so as we shall not néede to haue recourse to hot and cold moist and dry For they are procreated out of those beginnings alone Fixed Salt consider as it is simple and without commixtion maketh simply a salt tast A Sulphurus Salt also simply vnderstoode yéeldeth out of it a swéete oylely taste But Mercurial Salt in like sort conceiued by it selfe and apart representeth a sower taste All which tastes mixed together in equall proportions yéelde a pleasant and delightful taste without any sense or taste of any of the particulars These thrée beginnings cannot be found simple in a mixt body in such wise but that they haue some composition and do in mixture communicate their qualities together as may bée séene in sea-salt and salt-péeter out of the which may be separated not onely a salt and sharpe taste but also a swéete taste And it is certaine that in things sulphurus and oylely and also in Mercurial liquors there is to be found a coniunction of such tastes For this cause we affirme that all fixed Salt of a mixt body is very brinish and excéeding bitter the sulphurus of a fat and sweete taste and the Mercurial sower sharpe and fiery So that vpon these simple qualities salt swéete and sower which are to be found in all bodies minerall vegitable and animal all others tastes do depend And as touching the elementary qualities passiue which are as organical and instrumentall causes they little appertaine to this matter whether it be the terrestrial and drie passiue quality passiue coldnesse or whether it be the aiery moist vapor the which tastes of this sort or potent qualities procéedeth from these thrée beginnings do either further to this or that nature or else doe impaire and weaken them To make this plaine by manifest reasons and to lay it open before our eyes we will begin to intreat of mixed bodies the which notwithstanding according to the Elements are most simple CHAP. VI. IT is already said that tastes by a certaine priuate right are ascribed to Salts or to their spirits which euidently appeareth hereby that the differences of tastes are not produced but from the differences of Saltes or contrariwise the differences of Saltes are produced from the differences of tastes In the bosome of nature there are found almost so many kinde of Saltes as there are variety of tastes Digged or minerall and marine Salt is endued with a salt qualitie Niter with a bitter quality Allum with a sharpe Vitriol with a sower Armoniac with a sharpe and sower quality But swéete Saltes do manifestly appeare not onely in Manna and in Sugar but also in marine salt and in salt of Vitriol out of which they are to be seperated And as we haue said in euery of these salts these thrée first beginnings Salt Sulphur and Merucry are contained ioyntly together one aiery mercurial or spiritual the which is sharpe and sower the other earthly which is sower and bitter and the third oylely sweet which is a meane betwéene them
both In Vitriol alone is manifestly to be séene egar sharpe sower and astringent for that of all other Salts it is most corporal But those tastes or qualities which are mixed with passiue and Elementarie qualities haue not the full force of euery of these but are made more weake by mixtion for the sharpe which is not extracted and seperated but by the force of the fier with the aiery part is mixed with a mercurial liquor the sower is mixed with a flegmetique or watery humour and the eger with a terrestrial drinesse the which the more they haue of the Elementary qualities and the same passiue so much the more weake they are and impaired But if the actiue qualities be separated from the passiue as by arte it is to be done then the tarte and sower do obtaine their full force and doe manifestly and fully burne the tongue with their fiers for the sharpe hath a more fiery and burning qualitie and the sower a more watery propertie For the sharpe partaking of the nature of fire hath ouermuch vertue to attenuate dissipate and to fret the sower as aiery watery of thinne parts hath vertue to cutte to open to refrigerate and also to put away putrifactions The eger and more tarte which remaineth in the Colchotar after the extraction of the sharpe oylely and sower water with the aiery parts of the elemental qualities do possesse a nature and force to thicken and binde by reason of the earthy and grosse propertie But if from that terrestrial parte the pure which is Salt be extracted it wil haue a salt taste by the vertue whereof it wil bée made both deiectiue and vomitiue And in the swéete Sulphur of Vitriol there is a manifest swéetnesse which is plainely stupefactiue Finally in all Salts almost disseuered by Chymicall seperation these thrée are to be discerned Sower Swéete and Bitter which haue force of actiue qualities and yet not destitute of the moist passiue terrestrial and grosse but with them in sundry wise so seasoned and tempered that they bring to the Salts varety of tastes And let this serue for demonstration by which it may plainely appeare that those sundry differences of tastes are manifestly contained in Salts both ioyntly and seuerally especially in their spirits And according to the opinion of Hermes schollers we deny that those inset and naturall qualities vertues and properties are to be arrogated to hotte moist and drie but rather to the essences of a nature which is salt bitter eger sharpe sower tarte swéete and oylely For there are sixe hundred frigidities or coldes sixe hundred heates humidities â—â—gities or drinesses then the which nothing doth more heate coole moysten and dry But they haue neuer brought any sauour or taste to pure or simple water or to other Iuices or liquors which haue béene destitute of Salt Whatsoeuer is without Salt or destitute of a brinish spirit can neuer be discerned by taste but is vtterly vnsauory Yet notwithstanding it simple water be powred vpon ashes with a little heate that water wil drawe vnto it saltnesse bitternesse or sharpnesse more or lesse according to the nature of the salt more or lesse salt or bitter which is contained in the ashes And if any man obiect that Hony and Sugar by boyling or by the force of fier may be made sharpe or bitter we answer that it commeth so to passe when the aiery sulphurus and watery partes which bring and preserue the swéetnesse do perish and are separated by decoction But terrestrial Salt whose faculties are inward haue this property that of their owne nature they possesse this or that sharpe or bitter taste how extreame soeuer it be So if thou shalt drawe out of onions and garlicke a Volatile and aiery sharpe Mercurial Salt which ariseth in the superficies vppermost of their bodies thou shalt make them more swéet and pleasing and to put off their sharpnesse by which they bite the tongue but yet they will retaine and represent their hot qualitie with the which they abound by reason of their fixed Saltes As out of Saltes so out of odours also we may drawe certaine faculties without the helpe of hotte qualities For séeing they are referred to the diuers properties of Sulphur sundry odours doe arise therfrom and not from the qualities Which if they be swéete and pleasing the braine receiueth them with pleasure and delight whereas vnpleasant sauours or odours are offensiue both to the nose and to the braine and are reiected Such is the marcotical and stefactiue odour of Poppie and Hemlock and such like which do stinke and astonish the braine by reason as Physitions affirme of their colde qualitie Wherein they breake the Lawe of their axiomes for that they holde that their odours are of a hotte qualitie as most true it is For that which is stupefactiue in the Poppeis and in Opium is no other thing but a certaine oylely and sulphurus parte conceiuing flame much like to that kinde of oyle which is extracted out of the séedes of Poppey the which albeit it do readily burne yet as it is commonly thought it sheweth most colde effects The common Physitians to correct such coldnesse attributed to Opium vse helpes as is to bee séene in their opiat and antidotarie medicines wherein Opium is an Ingredient Of these kind of coÌ„positions Myrepsus describeth aboue foure score where Euphorbium which is of a fiery and burning facultie is no more forborne then either of the Peppers or such other like causticke and burning simples of extreame hotte qualitie when as the true and proper corrector of Opium that I may so speake wel knowne to Hermeticall Physitians is Vineger which putteth away stupefactiue vapours and fumes that they ascende not to the braine so suppressing them by the sharpnesse thereof that it retaineth them whereas their hot correctors do more stirre them vp and multiple them Hereof come sinister and deadly passions and paines by reason whereof men are constrained to vse the imperfect Laudanum of Empiricks against the deadly daunger of such medicines CHAP. VII NOw somewhat shall be saide concerning colours The dogmatical Physitians that they might not diminish any whit of the qualities of colours are woont to referre to those qualities a certaine variety of colours and haue obserued and noted certaine friuolous and light obseruations as when they say that in a white onion or in white wine a man may iudge by the colour a great coldnesse than in a read onion or in red wine Whereas white sublimate and Arsnic albeit they are most white like vnto Christall yet neuerthelesse vnder this whitenesse they foster and hide a most burning and deadly fire Yea Sugar it selfe which is so swéet white and pleasant doth hide in the innermost parts thereof a wonderfull blacknesse and sharpnesse from whence may bée extracted most sharpe liquors and waters which will dissolue and breake the most hard metalls Therefore it is absurd to sharpe and forme colours from hotte and
colde which do procéede from the spirits only or else from the most thinne and aiery vapours which lye hid in the Salt especially in that Salt which by nature is sulphurus such as is Niter or Salt-Peter as men call it Niter throughly depured and clensed will be as white as snow from which whitenesse may be drawen infinite sorts of colours most excellent to beholde Which colours come from the onely spirits of Salt-peter which are able to pearce the most hard kind of glasse by the force of fire thrust forth in the likenesse of volatile meale and cleaning in the ouerture of the glasse Alembic By which colours a maÌ„ may behold the body of the Alembic to be tained dyed as well within as without in the superficial part Which colours are of no lesse varietie then are the flowers of the earth in the time of the Spring Hereby it appeareth plainely that this diuersitie of all colours is to be taken from the spirits no lesse nor otherwise then are all other properties and vertues of all other things to be referred vnto them If therefore the foundation of these thrée things be laid vpon thrée beginnings vpon their spirits it will be very firme and stable in such wise that in the ignorance of any cause it shal not be néedful to fly to hidden properties If this doctrine according to the truth thereof be receiued learned and studied being vpholden also with the authorities of that great Hypocrates it shal easily driue from vs the darkenesse of ignorance and shal bring with it the light of knowledge which will remoue all difficulties For out of this schoole are learned most certain and infallible Thearemes and Axiomes against which as against most assured grounds there can be no opposition or resistance but wil be allowed by the general consent of indifferent Iudges Let vs take an example from Vineger whereof many famous Physitians cannot tell what certainely to affirme For because it is sharpe and therefore cooleth they wil haue it to be colde But contrariwise when they behold the facultie thereof to be attenuating cutting and dissoluing also their â—ernor and boyling thereof when it is put vpon earth or claie they are constrained to forsake their opinion vncertaine what to iudge thereof Who if they had bene acquainted with the Hermeticall doctrine they should haue knowne that the cause of such tartnesse or sowernesse in vineger commeth by the seperation of the spirit from the wine as is plainly séene by experience For the longer that wine standeth in the Sun or in a hotte place the more by little and little it waxeth sharpe and whatsoeuer is aiery therein and of the quintessence of the wine by the force of the heat vaporeth away This eternal and celestial essence being gone which was the cause of the wines swéetnes which swéetnes hath alwaies ioyned with it neuerthelesse a certaine pricking very acceptable to the pallate by reason of a singular temper of sharpnesse Vitriolated by swéete and Sulphurus spirits put by the instinct of nature into wine at the length it waxeth sower the cause of whose sharpnesse is not to be referred to the colde qualities but to those hidden and sower spirits of Salt which by the bonde of the sulphurus substance were contained and kept in their office and working in the wine the which bond being dissolued the spirits range at will and doe make manifest their nature which was afore hidden Hereupon it commeth that vnegers are sharper in one sort then in another according as they haue in them more or lesse of the nature of Salt Armoniac and â—o whit of the sulphurus substance For simple water deuoide of all Salt can neuer by reason of the coldnesse therein waxe sower But as from wine so from meat and from ale or béere and from boyling new wine may be separated the proper water of life and ethereal substance the which being so separated they become eager because they containe in themselues a sharpe salt of nature Such is that sharpe salt which Phylosophers call their Mercury or Salt Armoniac Volatile and spiritual because of al metalline salts the common Armoniac is most Volatile such as in the forme of most white and salt meale may be carried vp vnto the cloudes by sublimation and yet hath a dry and spiritual nature which the Phylosophers call their dry water because this Salt is so farre forth Volatile and flying that it is lifted vp together with the aiery or watery vapour of the which is made the mixture of the compound and so great is the sharpnesse of this salt that one scruple or eightéene or twenty graines of this salt perfitly refined and made most simple dissolued in a pot of commom water doth make all the same wonderfully sower And this is the Salt the sulphurus essence taken away which sheweth it selfe euidently to be séene by his sharpnesse in vineger with watery substance But the more strong the wine shal be the more sharpe the ferment of the vineger and the more vehement the tartnesse thereof will shewe it selfe out of the which the pearcing attenuating dissoluing spirits are extracted by a skilful workmaÌ„ the which forces faculties cannot procéed from any other thing then from that spiritual and Volatile salt Armoniac mixed with a watery humour And to make this more plaine and to proue it by effect take the most strong Vinegar white or red distil the same in Balneo Mariae till it be drie with a gentle fire out of a pinte and a halfe you shall extract thrée partes or more like most cleare water but most sharpe and sower the bottome of the matter as the léese and pheses remaining in the bottome of the glasse with the most sharpe and byting Salt the which because it is fixed and cleauing to the terrestrial part of the Vinegar cannot be extracted but by the great violence of the fire By which meane a most sharpe oyle like in nature to Aqua Regia most corroding and fretting is extracted not by reason of the heate of fire but by the force and power of a brinish substance which is expelled in forme of an oyle with the Salt from the rest of the â—eces by fire But leauing that sharpe fire of the Léese let vs take in hand to explicate the sowernes of the Vineagar distilled By a soft and gentle distillation is first of all extracted a certaine watry elementary phleme which is drawne out of the whole body almost without taste leauing in the bottome of the glasse another liquour farre more sower and sharpe and therefore more strong to dissolue which otherwise before was nothing so sharp because the Salt Armoniac was tempered and mixed with a watery Phleame Whereof if thou desire to know the quantitie take so much of the best Salt Tartar which is of the same nature but fixed by which if thou drawe by little and little thrée pintes of this Vinegar distilled and disphâ—eamed to the waight of
The drye is a Sandy earth or ashes 〈◊〉 of all salt by reason of the washing of Waters and is called by the Chymists Terra damnata or Damned earth Because it hath no other force but that which is drying The mâ—yste which is called vnsauorie Phleame is pestered with all Sulphur and Mercurie hauing no odour or taste or other vital vertue which can onely moysten without any other force at all And as these are of no force so doe they onely possesse passiue qualities and vnprofitable But Ayer the thyrd Element cannot be separated by it selfe but doth eyther vanish into ayre or else remayneth mixed Sulphur and Mercury and doth more chiefely cleaue vnto Mercury which is so spiritual that the most experte woorkeman cannot separate the same from it selfe alone but doth alwayes passe away into aire with the aire or vapour of that thing whereof the separation is made to which aier Mercury is straitely combyned that it can neuer be separated from the same without it be done by the great industry of a skilful workeman who knoweth that Mercury or salte Armoniack volatile is so conioyned with aier or with the aiery parts that it doth also breathe away with the aiery parte and with the same is reduced into spiritual Water which is knowen to be the mercurial water by the sharpe sower and vehement which springeth from the Mercury or salt armoniack of nature spirituall The which the workeman séeking to separate conioyneth this spiritual liquor with a Christalline salt naturally fixed from the which he separateth that aiery liquor by Distillation which by that separation is vtterly spoyled of all force and remaineth an vnsauory aiery liquor for because that Mercuriall spirite possessing the nature of volatil Salt remaineth fixed with his proper Salt with the which hée hath the most chiefe analogie and proportion And thus the Philosophers testify that nature is delighted with nature Thus we sée how the Elementary aier is to be separated from that Mercuriall spirite namely by bringing the Eâ—â—ment of aier into water deuoyde of taste and by cutting the Mercuriall spirit into the salt of his proper preheminence Furthermore hereby it appeareth that Mercury is a certaine aiery thing or aier it selfe and yet somewhat more then the elementarie aier which wanting the spirit of Mercurie is a simple aiery liquor of no vertue or power but simplie to moysten and penetrate And so the actiue qualities doe belong to the beginnings Salt sulphur and Mercurie and the passiue to the Elements This thing wée haue made plaine before by the example of Wine and Water of life These things are therefore spoken that all men may sée by the Anatomie and resolution of things that the element of aier cannot be separated by it selfe alone neyther is it so to be séene of any but of the true Philosophers and by such as are most conuersant in this art Thus certaine demonstration is made of the visible bodies of things procreated both out of the séedes and beginnings and also out of the elements albeit in the resolution of the bodies thou doest not discerne the visible bodies of the séedes put a parte by themselues But it is an easie matter to discerne the seuered partes of those thrée beginnings and also of the Elements in the which partes of the thrée beginnings the vertues and powers of actions wherwith the séedes are indued are included and mixed together Whereby it commeth to passe that their bodies are filled together with the vitall forces and faculties of the Astrall and spirituall séedes as the receptacle of thâ—se vertues But the Elementall bodies haue only passiue qualities the which elementall bodies a wâ—rkeman cannot onely separate by themselues but can also bring them to nothing in such sorte that the passiue and materiall Elements being separated there shall onely remaine those thrée Hypostaticall Formall and Actiue beginnings salt sulphur and mercury which being drawen into one body do make a mixed body which the Philosophers call a fifth or a fourth Essence which is frée from all corruption abounding with quickening spirits whereas contrariwise the sole elements separated from those thrée beginnings doe bring nothing but impurities corruptions and mortification In this Chymestry is to be extolled that imitating nature it rateth Elements and their beginnings by which all the partes of a compund body are anatomized and made manifest And yet those naturall substances are not said to be begotten by such separations as if they were not before neyther yet as bring before are they corrupted by the arte of separation but they were in compounde and after separation they ceased not to bee and to subsist And as the thrée beginnings are coupled together by the benefite of an oylelie liquor ioyning them in one so the thrée Elements Ayer Water and Earth are combyned together by the comming in of Water as a meane For water by her analogie and conuenience partaketh both of the naâ—ure of aier and of earth whereby it commeth to passe that one while it is easily turned into aier another while into earth and so it combyneth both the extreames In things that haue likenesse an alteration is easily made For by reason of likenesse and consent aier made thicke with colde passeth into water and water made thinne becommeth aier and water also made grosse and thick becommeth earth euen as earth also made thinne passeth into water and is chaunged Wherefore forsomuch as aier and earth two extreames are fitlie ioyned together by a thyrd which is water a meane betwéene them both Aristotle did more than was néedefull to appoynt a quaternarie number of Elements out of the quaternary number of the fower qualities Hote Colde Drie Moyst Howbeit it cannot be denied but that he had great probability hereof as is to be séene in his second booke of the generation of liuing creatures where he goeth about by many reasons to prooue that it is most necessary for the production of things to appoynt a fourth element namely Fyer hote and drie But forsomuch as Moses in the first Chapt. of his Genesis wherein he sheweth the creation of all things maketh no mention of Fier it is more conuenient that we leaue it rather to the opinion of the diuine Prophet then to the reasons of an Ethnick Philosopher And therfore wée acknowledge no other Fier then Heauen the fiery Region which is so called of burning Therefore it ought to be called the fourth formall Heauen and essential element or rather the fourth essence extracted out of the other elements bicause it is indueâ— with far more noble vertues then the most simple elements For the Hermeticall Philosophers deny that there is a quintessence because there are not fower elements from whence there may be drawen a fifth essence but thrée onely and no more out of which a fourth may be extracted So great is the power of this fourth essence that it mooueth sharpeneth and mightily animateth the bodies of the thrée principles and of the
more grosse elements to come into a perfect mixture of one thing which neuer after can be diâ—â—des Wherevpon the Indiuidualls or simples which cannot be diuided doe borrow from Heauen from no other all those forces faculties and properties which they haue no shewe foorth Herevpon it commeth that the proper qualitie of that essence is neither drye nor moiste nor colde nor hote For it is a far more simple thing that is to say a most simple and pure essence extracted out of the more simple and more subtil beginnings and elements which maketh a most simple most pure most thinne and most swifte body indued with the greatest force of generating nourishing increasing and perfecting which commeth so néere vnto the nature of fier that in very déede the Heauen is no other thing but a pure and ethereal fiâ—r neither is the pure fire any thing els but Heauen which the more it ouercometh the principles and elements the more it obtaineth the more potent perfect pure and simple forces and vertues 〈…〉 into all things and furnisheth euery thing with his formes and vertues It appeareth therefore by Moses that there is no other fiery Element but Heauen which hath the place of the fourth element or which is rather a fourth essence extracted out of the more subtil matter and forme of the three elements which is no other thing but a pure ethereal and most simple fier most perfect and most for different from the thrée elements as imperfite which fier is the author of all formes powers and actions in all the inferior things of nature as the first cause and carrying it selfe like the pâ—â—ent toward his ofspring which fier by his winde carryeth conueyeth his séedes into the belly of the earth wherby the generation or fruite is nourished fostered groweth and is at the last thrust foorth out of the lappe or bosome of the elements This Heauen albeit in it selfe it is no complexion that is to say neither hote nor cold nor moyst nor drie yet by his knowledge and predestination it yéeldeth to all things heate and colde moystnesse and drynesse forsomuch as there are starres which haue their most colde and moyst spirites as the Saturnails and Lunaries others most hote and drie as the Solarie and Martialls others hote and moyst as the Ioâ—ialls who by their vertues and complexion wherwith euery Starre and Planet is indued do informe fashion a impregnat all these inferior things in suche wise that some indiuidualls are of this condition and complexion which they haue borrowed and taken from their informing or fashioning planet or starre other some of that which they haue obtained from other Planets and Starres For God hath giuen to Heauen most simple and perfect séedes such as are the Starres and Planets which hauing in them Vitall faculties and complexions do powre them foorth into the lappe of the inferior Elements and do animate and forme them Neyther doth the Heauenâ—casse â—casse from his working nor the Astrall seedes therof because their vertues are neuer exhausted neyther do they suffer alteration or diminution of faculties wherby they may 〈◊〉 from procreating or forming albeit that sometime they do make more or lesse frutefull then at other some Herevpon commeth that perpetuall Circulation by the benefite whereof the séedes of the Elements or theyr matter are coupled with the séedes of the Starres setting and putting their contayned into the maternall lappe that it may forme and bring foorth a kindly sprout For as Heauen is sayde to woorke vppon the Earth so also the inferior Elements do yéelde and bestowe their actions and motions but not after one manner for that Heauen in acting suffereth nothing so farre foorth as it is equalled being of a Hemogeniall and most perfect nature and therefore is incorruptible and Immutable vnto the predestinated ende of things created But these inferior things do suffer in their action because they haue theyr formall beginnings mixed with their materialls subiect to chaunge and destruction whereuppon also it commeth to passe that those things which procéede from them do in continuance of time decay and perish These things knowen to a true Phisitian and Philosopher hée séeketh to restore decayed health and to preserue the same by the extraction of celestiall Essences and Formes and the elementarie separation of the beginnings and materialls from those thrée formall and spirituall beginnings the which heâ—â—seth alone separated from the others which are Heterogeniall or of another kinde that he may worke wonderful effects without any impediment And this is the vniuersal Balsamick medecine wherin all the partes are Homogeneal or of one kinde most pure most simple and most spirituall And being in such simplicitie and most thoroughly clensed and purged from all grosse Feces and incorrupt it is called a Quintessence but more truly and properly a Quartessence and the celestial stone of the Philosophers But let no man thinke here that when I name the Philosophers stone that is to say that vniuersal medicine that I meane the transmutation of metalls as if such transmutation were the chéefe medicine of mans body but knowe rather that in Man which is a little world there lye hidde the mynes of Imperfect metals from whence so many diseases do growe which by a good faithful and skilful Phisitian must be brought to Golde and Siluer that is to say vnto perfect purification by the vertue of so excellent a medicine if we wil haue good and prosperous health The Phisitian therefore must diligently consider two things that is to saye that Nature may be disquieted both by an inward and also by an outward enemie But this more especially he must foresée that Nature be not formented with the outward enemie which then commeth to passe when a medecine is ministred and giuen which is crude impure and venimous and therefore contrary to our nature and spirites Then on the other side he must haue care that the â—omesticall enemies which are within mans body be dryuen out with conuenient and fitte weapons For if a remedy be applyed which is vnfitte then Nature is assayled by two enemies that is to say by the externall medicine and by the inwarde impuritie which remaining long in the body turneth into poyson if spéedy remedy be not had CHAP. XII Moses in his Genesis sheweth the three beginnings Philosophicall which are in euery thing created WE holde by Moses doctrine that GOD in the beginning made of nothing a Chaos or Déepe or Waters if wée please so to call it From the which Chaos Déepe or waters animated with the Spirite of God God as the great workemaister and Creator separated first of all Light from Darkenesse and this Aethereall Heauen which wee beholde as a fifth Essence or most pure Spirite or most simple spirituall body Then hee diuided Waters from Waters that is to say the more subtill Aiery and Mercuriall liquor from the more Thicke Clamâ—y and Oylely or Sulphurous liquor After that he extracted and brought
foorth the Sulphur that to say the more grosse Waters from the drye parte which out of the separation standeth like salte and as yet standeth by it selfe apart And yet for all this those vniuersall partes of the whole Chaos are not to be separated but that stil euery one of them do retaine in themselues those thrée beginnings without the which they cannot bée nor yet fulfill their generations This was the worke of God that hée might separate the Pure from the Impure that is to say that he might reduce the more pure and Ethereal Mercury the more pure and inextinguible Sulphur the more pure and more fixed salte into shyning and inextinguible Starres and Lights into a Christalline and Dyamantine substance or most simple Bodie which is called Heauen the highest and fourth formall Element and that from the same the Formes as it were séedes might be powred forth into the most grosse elements to the generation of all things The which are called the moâ—â— grosse elements because frâ—m them in the diuision of the Chaos the most pure part is abstracted and conuerted and brought to a heauen and to the fruites thereof All which elements whether it be that most simple fourth or whether they be those which are said to be more grosse forsomuch as they consist of those thrée Hypostaticall beginning they could neuer be so separated one from the other at the first nor can now bée so seperated by any Chymist but that alwayes still that which remaineth is compounded of them thrée The difference is this that some are most pure simple and most spirituall substances of the secret parts and other some are more grosse and lesse simple also a third sort most grosse and material in the highest degrée Therefore it must be confessed that the Heauen albeit it bee most simple doth consist of those thrée beginnings but of the most pure and most spirituous and altogether formall Whereby it commeth to passe that the vertues and powers of Heauen being wholy spirituall doe easily without impediment pearcing into the other Elements powre forth the inferiour Elements the spiritual formes from whence all mortall bodies doe obtaine the increase both of their vertues and also of their faculties If we will behold the puritie of the Heauen aboue other Elements and the perpetuall constancie thereof looke then vpon those bright and shining fyers continually glittering and light to whom the heauen hath giuen the most pure and extinguible substance of Sulphur whereof they consist For such as the heauen is in essence such and the like fruites hath it brought foorth in substance out of whose vitall impressions and influences they procreat bring forth some likenes of theÌ„selues in the more grosse ElemeÌ„ts but yet according as the matter is more grosse or more thinne more durable or more constant or more transitorie And the influences of such fyers are mercuriall spirits but the light and shyning brightnes is Sulphur their fixed Heauens or Vitriall and Chrystallyne circles is a salt body which circles are â—â—pure shining and fixed that a Diamond which partaketh oâ— the nature of fixed salt is not of more puritie continuance and perpetuitie than they are As touching the Elements of Ayer the beginnings thereof are more grosse lesse pure and lesse spirituall and simple than the beginnings celestiall and yet much more perfect thinne and penetrating then are the waterie and terrestriall Mercuries and Sulphurs and is such that next to heauen it hath the preheminence of actiuitie and power whose forces are to be séene in diuers and sundry windes which are mercuriall fruites and the spirits of the ayerie Element whose sulphurs also are discerned to be pure and bright in burning Comets which are no perpetuall fires or sulphurs which cannot bée put out for degenerating from the nature of Celestiall starres and Sulphurs as from puritie simplicitie into a more grosse and impure forme Now as concernining Earth which is ayerie it is so subtill and thinne that it is very hard to be séene being diffused throughout the whole Region of the Ayer which doth not sent it selfe to the eye but in Mannas in Dewes and in Frostes as in aierie salts The verie same beginnings of ayer may also be séene in Meteors which in it and out of it are ingendered that is to say in lightnings in corruscations and in thunderings in such like For in that flerie flame which breaketh forth is Sulphur In the windy spirit moystnesse is Mercury and in the thunderbolt or stone of the lightning is salt fixed The fruites also of this nature are Manna celestiall and hony which Bées do gather from flowers wherein there is no other thing but Salt Sulphur and Mercurie of the ayer which by a skilfull workeman are not separated from those without great admiration yea the rustick Coridon findeth this by experience to be true when as he can seperate the matter of the Bées worke into waxe which is a matter sulphurus into hony which is a Mercurial essence into drosse representing the terrestriall salfe And thus that superior globe seuered into an ethereall and ayery heauen hath his thrée beginnings yet neuerthelesse very different in simplicitis and puritie CHAP. XIII Whence is shewed that in this inferior Globe of the Worlde namely in the Elements of Water and Earth these three beginnings are plainely to be seene THose thrée Beginnings doe as yet more plainely shewe foorth themselues in this inferior Globe by reason of their more grosse matter which is to our eyes more sensible For out of the Element of Water the iuyces and metallick substances do daily break foorth in sight the vapours of whose moysture or iuyce more spirituous do set foorth Mercury the more drye exhalations Sulphur and their coagulated or congealed matter Salt Of the which saltes Nature doth offer vnto vs dyuers kindes of Allume of Vitriole sundry differences Saltegemme and salt Armoniac and many others There are also manie kindes of Sulphurs of Pitche and of Bitumen and of Mercuries or Iuyces Moreouer the Sea doth witnes that it is not without such Mercuriall Aiery and Sulphurous spirites whose meteors in Castor and Pollux and in other 〈◊〉 kindled by reason of their sundry sulphurs and exhalations do confirme the same and that the sea is not without his saltes the saltnesse thereof doth make manifest The Earth also doth prooue the same which being like vnto a spunge doth continually draw and sucke vnto it the salte body thereof Wherby it cometh to passe that there are so many kindes of metalls and Mineralls therin From this Marine sale as from the Father and first original all other sates are deryued And these beginnings are so separated in all other Elementes by themselues aparte that no one of them is depryued of the company of another For in the Marine salte albeit the nature of salte doth excéede and ouer matche the nature of the other beginnings yet it is not destitute of a sulphurous and
doth abound whereas otherwise by the nature of his Sulphur it is able to doe the contrarie that is to say to coagulate those metallick spirits and to reduce them into bodies euen as quicksiluer being altogether flying by nature etheriall and truly Homogeny and spirituall doth after a sort congeale and fire So that hereby it appeareth that it hath in it by nature the spirit of heat and of cold and therefore of metallick life and death which maketh the sentence of Hermes good when he said that which is aboue is all one with that which is beneath For such as is Saturne in the superior Elements such also is lead in the inferiour and so of the rest And out of that burning licquor more ready to burne then the very Aquauitie may be seperated a Mercurie or a more ethereall spirit by a Matrat with a long necke by a gentle fier The which so seperated the rest of the matter of meane substance which is Sulphurus Oylely and apt to burne resideth in the bottome of the glasse with the Niterous and Sulphurus spirit of Salt Out of the blacke feces which remaine in the bottome of the retort being reduced according to the Phylosophicall maner into a calxâ— is extracted a fixed Salt which often times dissolued and Coagulated with his proper fleame will at the last become Chyrstalline To this if there be afterward powred by little and little according to Art his ethereal spirit that from hence it may contract and drawe the double or triple waight of the volatile and truly Mercurial salt in such wise that being cast vpon a red hote plate it doe dispearce into fume thou shalt at the last by the meane of sublimation attaine to the foliat earth of the Phylosophers which will haue a greater brightnesse and perspicuitie then can be séene in the most rich and orient pearle in the world This earth the Phylosophers call their Mercurie the which alone hath admirable properties and faculties Againe if to this be added the oylely liquor of his proper Sulphur also exalted and kept a part by it selfe in a iust conuenient qualitie and if the same be drawen forth with sundry cohobations and extillations againe and againe repeated and iterated and be reaffunded and distilled vntil out of a Ternarie there arise a vnitie then out of the grosse terrestrial and material lead shal arise and spring vp a certaine celestial and true dissoluer of nature and a quintessence of admirable vertue and efficacie the true liuely and cleare shyning fountaine wherein as Poets affirme hyding vnder a vaile their secrets Vulcan washed Phaebus and which clenseth away all impuritie to make a most pure and perfect body replenished with vital spirits and full of vegetation and doth so rid himselfe from his adamantine fetters with the which he was bound and hindered from the victorie aginst the Serpent Pytho and doth in such wise shake off all impediments that being frée from all duskie cloudes of darkenesse with the which he was couered and ouerwhelmed he sendeth forth now vnto vs his most bright shining light with the which wee are throughly refreshed receyuing youthful strength putting off all imbecillitie and like vnto that Ason king of Creta through the helpe of Media are throughly restored againe to young age So that the same thing which afore was altogether cold without blood and deuoided of life séeming as dead being washed in this fountaine it ariseth and triumpheth in glory in might and furnished with all vertues and accompanied with an excéeding army of spirits doth communicate vnto vs fréely his glory and brightnesse and doth most mightily restore and câ—â—â—oborate the strength of our radicall balsome with his onely looâ—â— and touch throughly wéeding and rooting out all the causes and séedes of sicknesses lurking in vs and so consuming them that without al trouble it preserueth our helth vnto the appointed end of our life He which hath eares to heare let him heare attentiuely otherwise let him neuer take his worke in hand For albeit I haue shewed the way to perfect working more plainely as I thinke then any other hitherto haue done yet thou mayest erre except thou be wholely addicted and intent to thy worke Thus the way is prepared for true Phylosophers to attaine to that great and most excellent minerall worke and to the preparing of that vniuersal medicine out of mineralls And this is the demonstration by which in all metalls and concrete bodies those thrée beginnings are to be searched out and being by art seperated are to be set before our eyes The which to make it more plaine I thought good to vse the example of lead which of all men is reiected as most vile whereas notwithstanding the Phylosophers haue the same in great estéeme because they ful wel know what great secrets it containeth within And therefore they cal it their Sunne or leperous gold From this trée of Saturne springeth Antimony as the first branch of the stock which the Phylosophers cal their Magnesia which aboue all other metallick substances containeth those thrée beginnings ful of open actiuitie and efficacie Paracelsus among all other Chymical Phylosophers hath wonderfully ransacked all the parts thereof and examined the beginnings most diligently whose substance he hath exalted and commended aboue al other metallick substances and especially the Mercury therof out of which as out of the chiefest subiect and more noble matter he wrought his chiefest and best works In the praise wherof these are Paracelsus own words Antimony is the true balme of gold which the Phylosophers cal the examiner And the Poets fainâ— that Vulcan washed Phaebus in the same lauer and purged him from al his spots and imperfections being deriued from most pure and perfect Mercury and Sulphur vnder a kinde of Vitriol into a metallick forme and brightnesse Hee compareth the same also in another place to the matter of gold concerning whose vertues and effects he deliuereth wondere as that it is the highest and most perfect purger of gold and his Mercury of men His red Sulphur also doth plainly appeare which hath his property that it wil take fier and burne like common Sulphur or Brimstone the which is especially to be séene in the night in a darke place without any sume which the common Sulphur is woont to send forth This Sulphur of Antimony is Solary and such as is able to gild the superficial part of siluer As touching the Salt of Antimony it is to be seperated from the same whose property consisteth in procuring vomit For his strength to procure vomit lyeth hid in the salte flowers thereof from the which flowers if the salt betaken away seperated by vertue of a certaine salt as may be done then out of the flowers thereof is made a most excellent purgation without vomiting But the property of the Mercury thereof bringeth no smal wonder which in the liquation or melting of gold with other metalls reiecteth them al and chooseth the
gold to it selfe with the which it is mingled and vnited into one body in such wise that it swalloweth vp gold whereas all other metalls except siluer do floate aloft and wil not sinke into the same Consider therefore saith Arnold that thing onely which cleaueth to Mercury and to the perfect bodies and thou hast the full knowledge And when he hath thus discribed the deuouring Lyon he addeth these words Because our stone is like to the accidentall quicksiluer which carrieth gold before it and ouercommeth it and is the very same which can kill and make aliue And know further that our coagulated quicksiluer is the father of all the minerals of that our magistery is both body spirit c. The same thrée chiefe beginnings doe offer themselues vnto vs in other semi mineralls as in Arsenick orpinent and such other like which albeit in their whole substance they bee contrary to our nature and spirits yet by nature they haue that spiritual promptnes and flying swiftnesse that by their subtiltie they easily conuey and mingle and mingle themselues with our spirits whether they be inwardly taken or outwardly applyed and doe worke venemous and mortal effects and that by reason of the Arsenical Mercury poinson ful or arsenical Sulphur and arsenicall Salt Gems also and precious stones haue in them the vertues and qualities of those thrée beginnings by reason of whose fier and brightnesse the pure Mercury in them doth shine cleauing firmly to his fixed Salt and also to the Sulphur of the same nature whereby the whole substance of a contrary kind being seperated there ariseth and is made a most pure stone of contrinance like vnto gold Of this sort is the most firme and constant Diamond to whom that good old Saturne hath giuen the leaden colour of his more pure Mercury together with the fixed and constant spirits of his more pure Sulphur and hath so confirmed coniealed and compacted it in all stability with his christalline salt that of all other stones it is the most solyd and hardest by reason of the most firme vnion of the thrée principal beginnings and their coherence which by no art of seperation can be disioyned and sundered into the solution of his spiritual beginnings And this is the cause that the ancient Physitians had no vse thereof in medicine because it could not be dissolued into his first matter And it is not to be thought that those auncient Physitians refrained the vse thereof for that they déemed it to be venemous by nature as some falsely imagin which being homogenial and of a 〈◊〉 simple nature it is wholely celestial and therefore most pure and for that cause nothing venemous but the poyson and daunger commeth here hence that being onely broken and beaten and in no sort apt to preperation taken so into the stomack and remaining there by reason of his soliditie and hardnesse inconcocted by coutinuance of time and by little and little it doth fret and teare the laps of the stomack and so the intralls being â—â—oriated death by a lingering consumption ensueth It belongeth to golde with his Sulphur to giue a red tineture to Carbuncles and Rubines neither doth the difference of their colours come of any other cause then this that their Mercuries and Chrystallyne salts are not defeked and clensed alike the which clensing the more perfect or imperfect it is the colour appeareth accordingly either better or worse And albeit Siluer be outwardly white yet within it hath the colour of Azure and blewe by which shée giueth her tincture to Saphyrs Copper hauing outwardly a shew of rednes hath a gréene colour within as the Viridgreese that is made thereof doth testifie by which it giueth greennesse vnto the Emerand Iron red within as his Saffron yeallow colour doth plainly shew and yet nothing like the colour which gold hath within it giueth colour to the Iacint Tinne albeit it is earthie yet being partaker of the celestial nature it giueth vnto Agates diuers and sundry colours From gold and from other mettals as also from precious stones their colours may be taken away by Cementation and Reuerberation by their proper menstrues which things are well knowen to Chymists and fire workmen The which colours and sulphurs so extracted are very fit for the affects of the braine The colour of gold serueth for the affects of the heart The colour of tinne for the lunges The colour of Mercury The colour of lead for the splene The colour of Iron for the rednesse The colour of Copper for the priuie parts The heauenly menstruéese to dispoyle mettalls of their colours and sulphures naturall is this namely the deaw which falleth in the moneth of May and his sugar Manna out of the which two mixed together digested and distilled according to Arte there wil come forth a general dissoluer most fit to dispoyle stones and mettals of their colours Yea of onely Sugar or of hony by it selfe may be made a dissoluer of mettals Now if these thrée beginnings Salt Sulphur and Mercurie are to be found in the Heauen in the Ayer and in the Waters as is al ready shewed who wil make any doubt but that by a farre greater reason they are to be found in the earth and to be made no lesse apparant séeing the earth of al other elements is the most fruitfull and plentiful The Mercurial spirits shâ—we themselues in the leâ—ues and fruites The Sulphurus in the flowers séedes and kirnels The salts in the wood barke and rootes and yet so that eache one of those thrée partes of the trée or plant seuerally by themselues albeit to one is giuen the mercurial spirit to another that of Sulphur and to the third that of Salt yet euery one apart may as yet be resolued into those thrée beginnings without the which they cannot consist how simple so euer they be For whatsoeuer it bée that hath being within the whole compasse and course of nature doe consist and are profited by these thrée beginnings And whereas some are said to be mercurial some Sulphurus and some Salt it is therefore because the Mercurials doe conteine more Mercurie the Sulphurus more Sulphur and the Saltish more Salt in them than the others For some whole trées are to be séene more sulphurus and roseny than other some as the Pine and Firre-trées which are alwayes gréene in the coldest mountaines because they abound with their Sulphurus beginning being the principal vital instrumeÌ„t of their growing For there are some other plants as the Lawrel and the Trées of Oranges Citrons and Lemons which continue long gréene and yet are subiect to colde because their Sulphure is not so easily dispersed as is the Sulphur of the firre trées which are roseny and are therefore thrice of a more fixed and constant life furnished against the iniuries of times Furthermore al Spice-trées and al fragrant and odoriferous hearts are Sulphurus And as there are sundry sortes of trées of this kinde so are
is seated the fountaine of all motions of life and of heat resembleth that celestial middle world which is the beginning of life of heat and of all motions in the which the Sunne hath the preheminence as the heart in the brest But the highest and supreme parte which is the head or the braine containeth the original of vnderstanding of knowledge and is the seate of reason like vnto the suprem intellectual world which is the Angelical world For by this part man is made partaker of the celestial nature of vnderstanding of the féeling and vegetating soule and of all the celestial functions formal and incorruptible when as otherwise his elementary world is altogether crosse material and terrestrial And as man as touching his substancial forme possesseth all the faculties of the soule and their degrées that is to say the natural which is vegelatiue the animal which is sensatiue and vital and the Rational which God inspired into man when hée had made him euery of the which thrée contained vnder them thrée other inferiours whereof to speake in this place is néedlesse so as concerning the material body of man there are in him thrée radical and balsanick essences out of the which both the containing parts of the body as the fleshy and more solid and also the contained parts that is to say the spiritual and fluible parts are made compacted nourished and doe draw their life Salt in them is the radical beginning of all the solyd parts as being also in the animal séede it compacteth and congealeth the solid parts so as it is accounted the foundation of the whole frame But the radical beginning of swéete Sulphur in the animal which is the natural moist original oylelike sheweth it selfe in the fat grease and marrow and such other parts as wel hidden as manifest The radical Mercury wholy spiritual and ethereal which is that inset and natural spirit of euery part and member the next instrument of the soule doth no lesse declare it selfe in maintayning and concerning the animal life as being the very same which from the soule is the life powred into the body which the Sulphurus part nourisheth and sustaineth These thrée radical essences shut vp in the séed of the animal which we haue set forth in the framing of man both according to forme and matter doe procreate in his members thrée kindes of spirits and faculties The first faculty is that which is called natural or vegetal which being chiefely seated in the liuer taketh conseruation and nourishment from Salt that first radical beginning and base of the others The vital faculty seated in the heart is cherished and sustained by a Sulphurus liquor the which liquor is the natural moysture and fountaine of heate and of life The animal faculty wholy Mercurial ethereal and spiritual and the principal instrument of the functions of the soule is placed in the braine which is defended and conserued by Mercury the third radical beginning which is wholy ethereal and spiritual Hereby it is plaine that these radical spirits or substancial and formal beginnings of things doe so mutually embrace one the other and which is more the one wil beget the other But the terrestrial and solid Salt which is discerned to be in the bones and in other hard parts doth compact and knit together with his gluing force the more soft parts with the hard euen as a windy spirit or windy ayer shut vp in euery body doth make a liuing body more light and nimble then a dead carkasse The which qualities and faculties are wholy elementary as procéeding rather from matter then forme And thus briefely is shewed the thrée beginnings of man and their faculties and powers The body thus compacted and made of these thrée beginnings hath néede of his daily foode and nourishment whereby it may be preserued Which nourishment cannot be supplyed from any other then from those things which are of the same nature whereof it consisteth For we are nourished with those things whereof it consist Neuerthelesse for so much as the bodie is weak tender by his first original it is not to be fed with the more hard food but with meat which wil easily be concocted and turne to nourishment containing these thrée beginnings Such milke which is giuen to Infants to suck without art or labour doth plainly enough shew his thrée beginnings For the butter sheweth the sulphurus substāce the whay sheweth mercurial and the chéese his saltish beginning This milke being of one and the same essence contayning these three substances is easily concocted in the stomack of the Infant and is first turned into a white iuice and then into blood The which blood possesseth that which is more formal and radical in these beginnings separating and abiecting the rest into feces and excrement Also the same blood being carried into the heart by the veyne called Vena Cana which is as it were the Pellican of nature or the vessel circulatory is yet more subtilly concocted and obtaineth the forces as it were of quintessence or of a Sulphurus burning Aquavita which is the original which is the original of natural vnnatural heat The same Aquanita being carried from hence by the arteries into the Balneum Maris of the braine is there exalted againe in a wonderful maner by circulations and is there changed into a spirit truly ethereal and heauenly from whence the animal spirit procéedeth the chiefe instrument of the soule for that it commeth more néere to that same spiritual nature then doe the other two beginnings For as from wine those thrée beginnings are extracted by a skilful workeman the which also may be done out of milke with lesse labour so in blood which we rightly compare to wine are those thrée beginnings which by nature her selfe executing the office of a true Alchymist hath prudently and seuerally distributed and dispearced into all the parts of the bodie in such measure as is fitting to euery member giuing to the bones sinewes and ligaments more plenty of the salt substance then of the others to the fat grease and marrow the substance Sulphurus and to the flesh and humours which come out of blood and to the nourishing and natural spirits whether fixed flowing or wandring a greater plenty of the Mercurial spirit That first age of infancie ouerpassed and greater strength being increased to concoct and digest meat then the stomack offereth it selfe to more solyd and firme sustenance as to bread wine and such like comming as wel out of the store of vegetables as of animals fed and sustained by the same vegetables which are passed into an animal nature that is to say sensatiue euen as a mineral substance is brought into a vegetatiue It is afore shewed that the vegetables and animals appointed for mans substance doe change and come into his substance and nature with their beginnings whereof they consisted so as they being deuoured and concocted and turned into that white iuice called Chylus and
the seuerall parts of Vrines They which shal search diligently in the building and frame of mans body for another thing than the elements their qualities that is to say hote and colde moyst and drie namely for a mercurial liquor sulphur and salt indued with al kinde of vertures faculties and properties the thrée beginnings out of the which the colours tastes and odours and such other things of infinite varietie doe spring shal easily vnderstand that euery one of the beginnings by his temperature or the excurreth out of their consort doe procreat sicknesses of diuers sorts in the bodie as if sulphur doe too much excéed then it bringeth on inflamations and feuers of diuers sorts beside other stupefactiue and drousie affects which the stupefactiue sulphur stirreth vp out of the stupefactiue and drunken spirits which it containeth within the same and being excessiue spreadeth it selfe throughout the whole body The which is easily to be seen in such as drinke too much wine and in eating of bread that hath much darnel in it as also in the taking of Camphyre the iuices of Poppey of Henbane and of such like opiates which bring sléepe by their soporiferus Sulphurs and not by their cold quality Also they shal finde by their sower and sharpe vapours of Mercury that falling sicknesses Apoplexies Palsiâ—s al kindes of Catarres come from thence The which effects if they be accompanied with any poyson or maligne contagious spirits they cannot but must néedes bring on pestilential venemous and contagious diseases If they looke diligently into Salts they shal find that from them doe arise inward gnawings Impostums vlcers disenterie fluxes the Pemoxoides and such like so often as they runne out of their seates and are seperated from the other beginnings or doe excéed the measure of nature from whence also doe come great annoyances to the body as by their resolutioÌ„ the burnings of vrine stranguries and such like For according to the variety of Salts diuers kindes of vlcers impostumes and other diseases as diuers kindes of Collickes doe arise by their sharpe and sower spirit Also by the coagulation and congealing of these Salts are ingendered swellings stones and knots of the sinewes and an infinit sort of abstructions whereof many sicknesses doe arise The which coagulated Salts or tartar forsomuch as they neuer want their Mercury and Sulphur rude indigested and impure if they be out of measure and doe reach to the vppermost degrée of their malignitie they wil commixe according to their sundry natures and properties diuers effects the which notwithstanding wil séeke to come to the full sicknesse of the qualities and forces of euery of the beginnings which are also wrapped and infolded the one within the other And herein wee depart not from the opinion of Hypocrates which he hath shewed in his booke concerning the auncient medicine For he reiecting their opinion which tye the beginnings and causes of sicknesses to the elementarie qualities layeth other foundations namely Swéet Sower Bitter and Salt the which we reduce to those thrée beginnings of all things arrogating to euery of them their singular faculties and properties For what power or vertue soeuer is in the nature of Medicines and of sicknesses and doth moue and put it selfe in action the same is to bée reuoked to those thrée beginnings Yet notwithstanding I deny not but that some kindes of sicknesses may arise from the elementary qualities abounding in our body which do rather come of the excrements and feculent humours either retayned or superabounding and doe certainely rather arise out of such Elements than out of the beginnings For out of the abundance of ayerie and spirituous windes simply out of thinne waters and terrestrial feces or dregges we do sée diuers kindes of effects dayly to come yet notwithstanding such sicknesses haue no long continuance being such as may bée easily cured euen by Elementary remedies being either hote or cold moyst or drie As for example ayerie windes shut vp in the bowels and bringing forth the paines of the Collicke are with lysters dispersed and driuen away Surperfluous humidities and thinne water is consumned with drying medicines Inflamations comming of a terrestrial and simply grosse matter introsulphurus are extinguished by a simple cooling helpe And to conclude we wil say with Fernelius that some sicknesses are méerely secret and hidden which the same Fernelius as doth also Paracelsus affirme to be supernatural which sicknesse come from the influences of Stars wherin also is obserued somewhat which is diuine or at least more singular and peculiar than in common sicknesses Such are the astral and aiery effects which happen to some men more then to other by a certain singular influences of the Starres or constitution of the heauen or by the concourse of the euil Planets who are therefore diuersly affected by the sundry rootes natures and properties of their Ascendentes producing by their aspects and radiations conuenient fruites in fit times The secret and hidden causes of these kinde of diseases being such as we cannot easily reach vnto like medicines of the same nature which are indued with a hidden vertue are to be vsed And as there be Celestial spiritual and etherial effects so also they require spiritual and etherial remedies which may elsewhere be taken then from those thrée beginnings brought into a spirituall nature But wée haue stood too long vpon this point CHAP. XVI Wherein is shewed that the whole force of purging in Medicines in the Antimonial Mercurial and Arsenical Spirits according to euery of their seuerall natures AMong Minerals thrée kindes of spirits doe offer themselues to be viewed and considedered from their first original namely spirits Mercurial Arsenical and Antimonial which by their owne nature are truely simple formal fierie and of wonderfull qualitie and efficacie and of ready working Which are to be distinguished as differing among them and also as rising from the thrée beginnings different For the Mercurials as the most subtil vaporus aierie and waterie take their original from Mercurie the Arsenicals as those which are more prosperous or breathing more fierie hote and meanely volatile doe take their original of sulphur the Antimonials of al others the most grosse corporeat and terrestrial doe take their original from Salt The Mercurials doe borrow their Celestiaâ— spirits from the Sunne from the Moone and from Mercurie and are by them impregnated animated The Arsenicals doe receiue the spirits of Mars Venus euen as the Antimonials do contayne the spiritual properties vertues of Iupiter and Saturne By the which vertues of the Celestial euery of the beginnings being impregnated by the things most fitting for them by theÌ„ increased doe obtaine greater forces in euery of their kindes and a more corrected and temperate nature For the Mercurials as indued with more gentle and wholesome spirits doe get a more gentle nature medicinable and nourishing The Antimonials from the intermedials that is to say from things partly good and
partly malignant receiue a worse nature that is to say an intermedial But the Arsenicals as stirred vp with the worst and most pernitious spirits bring a mortall and destroying nature which oftentimes bringeth great detriment These last being so fyerie vehement and violent doe serue to forme and to boyle metallick and hard substances and are as fyer to giue life vnto them being halfe dead but are in no case fitting to the more gentle and soft bodyes such as are vegetables and Animals Also the spirits themselues do put on bodies agréeing to their natures Arsenicals Sulphurus do put on the body of auripigment Arsenic Antimonials the body of Antimony and of Magnesia or Loade-stone because among other metallicks these are most corpulent and of grossest substance of the roote of Saturne and Vitriole and which for the same cause are the beings and beginnings of other mettals By the impediment of which bodies the force and violent actiuitie of the foresaid spirits is checked and restrained Neither doe they shewe such violent strength when they are brought to a simplicitie and spirituous thinnesse But among corporal spirites the Mercurials doe excéede the Antimonials in benignitie and swéetnesse and the Arsenicals which are the last doe ouercome the other two in violence and malice For these are wholy fierie for the most part as is already said and are therefore most pernicious But the Mercurials being of al other most simple and thinne are therefore more ready to worke Also Mercurie it selfe consisteth wholely of homogenial or kindly partes and the same spiritual and therefore it excéedeth others in readinesse of working And hereupon it is made more fit than others for an vniuersall purger and clenser for that out of his whole substance without any seperation of the partes excellent and the best purgations of all sortes without any preparation at all may bée extracted Prouided alwayes that you correct a certaine hurtfull cruditie which it hath in it and that you alay his too much celeritie and promptnesse in working This you may doe his concoction and fixation Also the spirits which by a certaine meane are fixed and volatile haue place and doe shew forth themselues in Auripigment and in Arsenic out of whose whole substance without any exquisite seperation are extracted certaine solutiue spirits so excéeding sulphurus fierie violent and deadly that deseruedly they are reckoned among the most mortal poysons whose assalts and vilolence the animal nature as more delicate and weake cannot indure but that by and by it decayeth whose vehemencie and pernicious qualitie can by no art be corrected or made fit for and vse But the Antimoniall spirites as more corpulent and grosse than others doe fixe their seate in Antimonie because it is the roote and original of all other mettals which are more corpulent than other things And yet for al that they doe not remaine alone but that being associated and linked to the companie of others as to the societie of Mercurials and Arsenicals of the seuen Mettals they bring forth out of themselues those seueral kinds Namely Lead and Tinne when as the antimonial spirits doe excéed in vertue and plentie Iron and Copper when the arsenicals doe superabound and ouercome Gold Siluer and Mercurie when the Mercurials haue the victorie ouer others the which Mercurials are more spiritual and simple than any others and most essential the which being brought to perfect concoction and fixation doe procreate Siliuer and Golde and doe make them pure and cleane from all antimonial and arsenical Sulphur For Gold and siluer are nothing else but fixed Mercurie brought to perfect concoction And these Mettals of gold and siluer when they are wholy fixed and corporeat hauing put off that simplicitie and thinnes of spirites are destitutâ— of al power of acting or working neither can they worke and performe any thing at all except they be brought againe to their first spiritualitie that is to say into their first matter As for the other foure mettals they hauing as yet not attayned that degrée of perfection that is to say of puritie digestion concoction and fixation albeit they séeme to the sent most hard and solid yet haue they not gotten as yet perfect fixation being ful of much impure Sulphur and such other like kinde of heterogenial and vnkindly substances that is to say of arsenicall and antimonials spirits and doe possesse a very smal portion of the Mercurial spirits and the same as yet full of impuritie Whereby it commeth to passe that some of them cannot indure the tryal of fire but by the force thereof doe turne to ashes and glasse and can neuer more be reduced by any Art into a metallicke nature other some as more volatile and flying than others do vanish away into fume or smoake The which is wel knowne to al not onely Philosophers which haue séene the nature of mettals in the searching out and exercise of these workes but also to euery Goldsmith and Myntman which know how to dispearse and send away such mettals into smoake with their Cupels which Philosophers can bring to passe by diuers other meanes and instruments And out of these kindes of Metals full of flying spirites are extracted purges of admirable operations and the same according to the nature of the spirits abounding or predominating in euery of them Of the flowers or spirits of Tinne and Lead extracted by sublimation are made purgations which worke wonderfully by deiâ—ctions by vomit by sweates and by Vrines which may be reckoned among the meane sort and such as are lesse hurtful albeit they be deriued from the metallicke nature Out of Iron and brasse may be extracted very good purgatiue medicines wel knowne to them of old time Now to passe from metals to semi-minerals and so metallick iuices infinite purgations also are extracted out of them according to the force of their spirits As out of Vitriol Niter Salgem Sal Armoniac out of many other such like things may be extracted both meane and violent Solutiues And to make it plaine that al the power and effect of working which is in Mercurie Arsenic and Antimonie these thrée metallick spirits also what vertue partly those foure imperfect metals and al kindes of Salts Iuices and metallicke substances haue doe altogether come especially from these kinde of spirits it is hereby manifest that fixed Mercurie which by no maner of meanes wil moue or flye from our heart and which is sociable and communicable with our spirits hath no force to purge either by deiecting through the belly or by prouoking to vomit but is rather fit to procure sweat and vrine But when it shal bée volatile and flying by reason of his wonderful spiritualtie and subtiltie it is made a great mundificatiue of the bodie pearcing into all the partes and members thereof So in like maner the glasse of Antimonie in that it hath fuming and flying spirites not fixed which doth both shew foorth themselues at the time of the
fusion or melting as also by a certaine whyte exhalation thereof when béeing moulten it is put vpon the Marble Stone hath also a vehement force of working Whose fusion or melting if it be so long and oftentimes reiterated vntil no more whitenesse wil come from the same then it is made vtterly voyd of al working force It wil also loose all power of working or purging if this glasse be made most thinne in Alchool and set in the heate of the Sunne by the heat whereof the more thinne spirits doe vanish away and are consumed And so then in stéed of a losing mediciénce it is made a most excellent Anodine or procurer of sléepe or rest Therefore to shew by inuincible Arguments that al purging facultie consisteth in those flying spirits and is wholely to bée attributed vnto them it is most certaine that glasse may be made of Antimonie and of Leade and other preparation as well out of them as out of metallick matters whether it bée by subliming flowers out of them or whether it bée by extracting of Saffron out of them by the meanes of calcination the which being beaten into fine pouder and in the quantitie of tenne or twelue Graines infused in water or in wine by the space of certaine houres and after that the water easily powred from the residence or pouder which is in the bottome and the same liquor so giuen there wil follow thereof a wonderful purgation albeit nothing of the quantitie of the pouder bée in waight diminished because the spirits onely which giue no waight to the body are left to the infusion whereof commeth that great force of working The which powder may often bée put into water or wine to leaue therein his purging strength and spirit and it may so bée done a hundred times vntill the spirites be cleane euacuated and yet for all this the pouder béeing dryed there remayneth still the full waight without diminishing But that powder looseth his force quite and cleane of working if the spirits be wholely exhausted I my selfe haue séene a Ring made of the glasse of Leade which being infused was to some a perpetuall solutiue Medicine so often as they would purge the body So to others the Regulus of Antimonie made into a pill of the ordinarie and common bignesse swallowed downe into the stomach afterward passing through the belly by siege takeÌ„ and being washed and wel cleansed swallowed into the stomach againe and so the same washed and swallowed in like sort a hundred times so often as the body hath néede to be purged it will performe the partes of a solutiue Medicine and yet lose nothing of his weight Hereby it doth euidently appeare that the force of working lyeth hidden in certaine spirits which haue the same propertie euen as in other things there is a force and power of altering or of nourishing and of passing into our substaunce Hereof a more assured proofe and tryal may bée made by the industrie of a learned and skilfull workeman who quickly and in a moment can take away from them al force of purging by vsing a certaine fyer of nature either taking away or fixing the excéeding sharpe and penetrating spirits of Mercurie and Antimonie and to make remedies of them which can restore found and perfect health by gentle and easie sweates with insensible transpiration to the coÌ„suming of the superfluous humors of our bodie as also to the clensing away of all impurities rather then by any violent and manifest euacuation to the troubling of the body And as the vegetatiue being of a middle nature betwéen the animal and the minerall by this nature of partaking with both is turned into sensitiue euen as we see of bread and wine blood to be made of blood sperme or séede and of séed a man to be borne so the minerall by that generall consent of all things among themselues passeth into vegetatiue the vegetables sucking vnto them by the rootes of the minerals essentiall and metallick spirits with the which the whole earth is filled as is to be séene by so many yron mines and by such plenty of sundry stones with the which it aboundeth and which it bringeth forth which are nothing else but of a metallick substance And albeit simple vegetants with metallick substances doe draw those mercurialls antimonials and arsenicals of a purging nature whereof they are called purging medicines because they abound with a certaine gaâ—like bitternesse by reason of the entering of the spirits of Salâ—iter terrestrial and metallick by rootes into the anatonie of vegetables yet are they not altogether so violent and of so dangerous a spirit as they were in their first mine original as being thin of nature wholy crude and indigested For they put of the poyson in the vegetable by their manifold concoction and digestion and are made more pure in so much that they haue no other inconuenience in them but the force and effect of purging except paraduenture they be giuen out of measure in a greater quantity then is fitting But some are more purgatiue then others namely those in whom there is greater plenty of the Mercurial spirits the which notwithstanding are nothing offensiue to our nature Neuerthelesse if any vegetable haue in it an arsenicall spirit albeit not altogether so pernicious as is that which is in Arsenic it selfe for that it is made more gentle by concoction yet it is not without the violence and annoyaÌ„ce of the arsenical poyson such are the hearbs Bane wort Aconitum and Enphorbium If any vegetable bee endued with an Antimonial spirit or wheresoeuer the antimonial is ioyned with another spirit it bringeth violent vomits and sieges such are the kinds of Helebores and Spurges and such like neither is the vegetable without commotion and perturbation in regard of the violent spirit which it hath in it selfe And hereof it commeth that such simples of vehement euacuation doe more abound in mountaines in rockes and in stony places where the natiue seate of metallick spirits is then in the fat and fertile soyle For the correction whereof and to make them more gentle and to put off that wild nature of theirs they are to be transplanted into home gardens For thereby they borrow another nature and more gentle nourishment with the which they are tempered whereby they waxe swéete and familiar whereas otherwise in the mountaines they are without and destitute of that gentle nourishment and sufficient heate of the Sunne and of the temperature of the heauens to concoct and to temper their erudities For those things which are austere and wild are woont to be made gentle by digestions and concoctions and things venemous become whole so that arte imitating nature digesting and concocting most excellent remedies are made of deadly poysons and simples But this cannot bee done without the knowledge of the internal anatomie of things and without the assured science of their beginnings CHAP. XVII Concerning potable gold GOld being prepared by the spirit of the
Philosophers lead is easily dissolued into liquor and deserueth then to bee called Potable gold this must néedes be more conuenient for medicine in the stomack of man then leafe gold For how can leafe gold benefit the stomack or in any sort be profitable for the sicke when the secret kernell is so fast inclosed in the shell which is so indigestible that it will not be dissolued in the body of the Ostrich The body of any thing profiteth little or nothing without the spirit It cannot be denied but that all actions come from the spirit for a body deuoyd of spirits is empty rotten and dead If the spirits be they which are agents the body is desired in vaine And contrariwise when the body is an impediment to the spirit that it cannot vtter his force and strength as appeareth by the working of nature it selfe which without the destroying and obiecting of the body cannot change the spirit that is to say the nourishment of meate into flesh then of necessitie the spirit must be deliuered from all his impediments that it may shewe it selfe powerfull and not bee hindered from his working This appeareth plaine by daily experience For what good doth that thing in the body which is neither profitable for the nourishment nor yet for the health thereof Nay what annoyance doth it not bring to our faculties which lyeth in the stomack vndigested much better then wée shall prouide for our body if in time of sicknesse we take that to nourish and sustaine vs which is well concocted and digested by art and purged from all grosse superfluitie For so nature is no maner of way hindred from distributing the same to all the parts neither hath it any burden in concocting the same albeit as yet it is requisite for nature to haue a more subtill worke that it may turne to the profit of the body For how much more auaileable to helpe the sicke which are weake of nature is the spirituous substance of a medicine if it be giuen tryed and seperated from grosse impurity then to be administered with such impuritie which oftentimes cloyeth and ouerlayeth the strength of the body He is more blinde then any â—â—oule which seeth not this For the spirit whether it be of meat or of medicine is giuen in such small quantitie that it bringeth no detriment but spéedy profit in a moment But yet these spirits cannot be giuen nor prepared without bodies for the which cause we prescribe broathes Iellies to be the chariots of the spirits and we clense the bodies that they being made pure the spirit may more firmely cleane vnto them And that they are not dispoyled of their first naturall humour it hereby appeareth because that naturall humour is the body of his spirit But when by our art the spirits are extracted wée must haue diligent care that none of theÌ„ flye away into the aier and so be lost For this cause we must looke that our vessels be sure and nothing breake out by violence of the fier the which spirits if we can retaine much lesse can their bodies escape Spirits then are in bodies and bodies passe into spirits in such wise that they are corporeat spirits and spiritual bodies so as we can giue both body and spirit together Furthermore that the most dry calpes doe still retaine their humour and moysture in them in so much that they may be turned into liquor daily experience showeth For glasse brought into ashes and gold brought into a caix may be restored to the formes of glasse and gold againe through the force of fire But here it may be obiected as it is by some that gold hath no force in it to prolong life or to corroborate the same because it is prolonged by onely heate remaining in moysture and is also conserued by the reparation of natural moysture But these faculties or essences say some are not in gold but rather in those things which haue liued as in plants and liuing things from whom that force to prolong and preserue life is to be taken rather then from gold And hereupon it is inferred that there is no life in metalls and minerals but that they are plainly dead I presume no man will denie that gold is the fruite of his element or some thing elementated if a thing elementated then doth it consist of elements therefore also of forme For elements doe not want their beginnings which are formall beginnings giuing being or that which it is to a thing For so much as therefore gold is a body elemeÌ„tated it consisteth of matter and forme by the mixture whereof there ariseth a certaine temperature or some thing of likenesse which is the life of things Therefore gold and other metalls haue life Furthermore whatsoeuer the eye can sée and behold that hath matter and Forme For forme is the external arising from the internal which offereth it selfe to the sence of the eye if it haue forme and matter then hath it also life Death is said so be the destruction of things which séemeth to bring the subiect to nothing But for so much as metalls are the obiects of the sences it shal be thought amisse that they are brought to destruction They liue therfore because they subsist And the things which subsist cannot be said to be brought to nothing therfore not dead By these reasons it doth plainly appeare that there is life in metalls because they subsist and because they consist of Matter and Forme whose mixture and coâ—iunction is nothing but by the bond of a certaine kind of life which is drawen from the elements and beginnings in the which consisteth the life of things Furthermore that cannot be said to be without life which is indued with power of acting For actions as we haue said proceede from spirits In the spirits is life or else they themselues are life And wonderful actions doe proceed and come from gold when it is spiritual and seperated from the waight of his body finally who is he that dare denie life to be in metalls which are indued with so many tastes with so many odours with so many colours and with other vertues Therfore gold is vitall For so Marcilius Ficinus a most witty Phylosopher and a famous Physitian writeth of gold saying We know that all liuing things as well plants as animals doe liue and are generated by a certaine spirit like vnto this and is alwaies moued as if it were liuing and doth most speedily generate among the elements because it is most spirituall But thou wilt say vnto me if the elements and liuing things doe generate and beget why doe not stones and mettalls beget which are meane things betwéene the elements liuing things I answere because the spirit which is in them is restrained and hindered by a more grosse matter the which if at any time it be rightly seperated being seperated if it be conserued as the seminary of one thing it is able to beget vnto it selfe the
like if so be there be put to it a certaine matter of the same kind the which spirit diligent Physitians or naturalists seperating from gold at the fier by a certaine sublimation they wil put the same to any kind of metall and make it quick Thus it is plaine by the authority of this learned author that there is a vitall spirit in gold and a vertue to procreate the like to it selfe as also it is confirmed by the testimony of Virgil in the sixt of his Aeneidos where the Poet saith that gold doth mount and arise by his vertue into a trée whose golden boughes doe spread far and wide If the mineral corall trée by his life natural doe growe and increase why is it not as like that gold and other metals do grow by the same life Séeing metals doe draw their beginnings from minerals minerals from waters and waters from the sea Now if fishes shels pearles and corall receiue life from their element which is the sea why may it not giue vital spirits vnto gold There are sundry sorts of life yea things which haue neither motion nor sense haue life Our daily foode doth teach vs this from the vertue wherof we drawe sustenance and preserue life albeit the flesh of beastes and fowles whereof we féede be first depriued of life and motion So that there is nothing vtterly deuoid of life as we said before but that which is vtterly brought to nothing For out of the very rottennesse of wood which doth shewe and threaten the final destruction thereof wormes of diuers sorts are bred and ingendered What néede many wordes when as Phylosophy teacheth vs that out of the corruption of one thing commeth the generation of another And why then may not the generation of a vital metall be brought forth out of the corruption of a metallick body and which is brought into his first matter when as life in the body is the last that dyeth if it may dye It is plaine then that there is life in metals But now let vs see whether this life which is in metals may be made fit to preserue our life in such sort that it may not be extinguished by diseases The which I wil briefly handle and declare Those things which continue longest in their being haue a more constant and permanent life then haue those things which dye in a moment This is in plants the other in metals for plants and hearbes doe wyther and vanish away in a moment but metalls wil continue a thousand yeares and more Now how can hearbs promise long life helpe of continuance which they themselues doe want Contrariwise for so much as metalls doe so long preserue themselues by their long life why shuld they not performe the same being taken into mens bodies The Phylosophers say that gold of all other metalls is most temperat by the temperatures wherof the balsam which is in vs waxing sicke that is to say degenerating from his temperature by the force of sicknesses is restored holpen in such wise that the vertue of his medicine doth recall him to his temper and doth so increase him with strength that he easily ouercoÌ„meth sicknesse Gold is consecrated to the Sunne for his colour and brightnesse and to Iupiter for his temperature therefore it can wonderfully temper the natural heate with moysture preserue the humours from corruption and bring the Solary and Iouial vertue to the spirits and members The best way to make potable gold is without mixture of any other thing The next vnto potable gold is that which is beaten into thin leaues which for want of the other may be vsed in medicine cordial to comfort the heart The tincture of gold being extracted doth clense and restore the blood So that hereby the homogenial and kindly parts are gathered together and the Heterogenial or vnkindly are seperated For ther is nothing vnder heauen to be found more homogenial or simular of more thinne substance of more temperate nature lesse subiect to corruption or putrifaction then the very pure substance of metalls or quick-siluer What therefore can be more fit for our Balsam then that spirituall medicine purged from all impuritie and brought to exquisite subtiltie Doth not a spirituall nature reioyce and imbrace a spirituall nature Why is not gold impayred in the fier but doth rather ioy therein and is made more pure Is it not because it is fier For fier is not thrust out with fier but they imbrace one the other as being of one kind So in like manner for so much as our Balsam of life is most pure and resembleth the nature of fier why should it not receiue his like and be strengthened thereby For Geber saith that gold is a medicine which maketh the heart merry preserutâ—h the body in youth the which medicine is no other thing but a natural heat multiplyed in the fixed substance of Mercury the vertue of which heat is to gather together as it is said afore yâ— kindly to disceuer and put away all things that are vnkindly conseruing the spirits and humours in a man sooner then in the nature of metalls because a man by his proper natural heat doth seperate the vnkindly superfluities which metalls by their vnnatural heat cannot seperate But let the reader vnderstand that our meaning is not to prescribe this Aurum potabile for continual foode but for medicine onely in time of néede For it will suffice if it be taken once or twise in the yeare to prolong our dayes to Nestorian yeares without the yrkesomnesse of sicknesse The Phylosophers haue not onely called this medicine Aurum potabile but also the water of life the Tincture the pretious stone the medicine which worketh wonderfully vpon thrée sorts of things namely vpon the animal vegetable and minerall for the which cause it is called the Animal Vegetable and Mineral Stone and the Arabian Astrologians call it the great Elixir Wonderful is the vertue of this medicine for herewith the body of man being sick is restored to health imperfect metals are turned into gold or siluer and vegetables albeit they are dry and withered being moystened with this liquor doe waxe fresh and greene againe This Medicine being a quintessence is almost incorruptible and immortal temperate purified by the elements themselues and seperated from the dregs and grosse matter of the fower elements which are the most chiefe cause of corruption as the Phylosophers affirme which therefore maketh a temperate and sound body because it is as it were the spirit of life by whose force and helpe nature doth digest all that is indigested or expulse the superfluous and offending humours it suppresseth their qualities it quickeneth the spirit it maketh the soft hard and the hard soft the thick thinne and the thinne thick the leane fat and the fat leane it maketh the cold hote and the hote cold it moysteneth the dry and drieth the moyst to conclude it confirmeth and strengtheneth the natural heate
that Heauen Aier Water and Earth are in vs but yet a certaine thing also farre more excellent namely a certaine supernatual body which conserueth all other things in their temperature whose strength retaineth all other things in their office whereas imbecilitie and defect suffereth them to be out of course What then is to bée done in this conflict but to cherish and vphold in his vigor and strength that supernatural bodie that is to say the Balsam of nature that al other things subiect thereunto and to whom it giueth life may by the meane thereof be continued in their estate firme and sound But with what things shall the imbecilitie and defect thereof be restored but with things of the same likenesse Doth Oyle increase by putting water therein Doth not one enemie put another to flight euen as one friend helpeth another Al sicknesses come hereof in our bodie in what soeuer they be seated because the Balsam of nature and life doe there decay and decrease What else then is to be done but to helpe our weake friend Hypocrates sayth that hunger is a sicknesse For whatsoeuer doth put a man to paine deserueth the name of sicknesse whatsoeuer then asswageth hunger is a remedie for this sicknesse such is al maner of food wherewith that sicknesse is cured Therefore according to the opinion of Hypocrates foode is a remedie But wherefore are meates and drinkes saâ—de to bee medicinal remedies but because they haue natural properties agréeing with the Balsam of nature not contrarie wherby the weakened forces and strength are corroborated and the defect thereof restored After the same manner drinke alayeth thirst Why and how commeth this to passe but onely hereof because as nourishment is all one with that which is nourished so thirst is al one with the humour wanting or with drinke Hereby wée sée how wrong their iudgement is which apply contraries to contraries to strengthen nature that it may frée it selfe from sicknesse Which nature if shée should séeke helpe for an enemie she must néedes fall into a greater perrill than if she were to try the combate onely with sicknesse And yet for all this wée reiect not the saying of Hypocrates that contraryes must haue contrarie remedies that is to say by the taking away of the diseasefull impurities and by the repairing of the strength and natural Balsam not by calefaction or refrigeation by humestation or exsiccation not by abstersion incision attenuation by such other like too common familiar so Galen But we are of Hypocrates minde that hunger is cured by meate thirst with drinke repletion with euacuation emptines with refection labour with rest and rest with labour The which of some are not vnderstood as they are expounded of Galen who applyeth those contrarieties to those bare qualities whereof Hypocrates speaketh séeing a medicine is nothing else then an apposition of those things which are desired an ablation of those things which doe too much abound according to the sound opinion of Galen here But Hypocrates aymeth at a further matter in that he would haue the disease qualified driuen away by giuing strength to nature against the enemy which nature being the onely Physitian and curer of diseases is to be holpen with such things as are like to the diseases that so sicknesses and the passions oâ— sicknesses may be mittigated euen as hunger and thyrst are recreated asswaged by those remedies which they gréedily desire But hostile things that are enemy contrary are not desired but such things as are a friend and familiar For who wil giue to his hungery son when he asketh bread a Scorpion Therefore like and fitting liquors and nourishments are to be giuen which may procure to nature desired rest For remedies which come out of the same fountaine and out of the same familie which are agréeing and fitting in likenesse are to be ministred For the thyrsting spirits of feuers are to be recreated with syrups with sugars with pertisan alone or with wine because they are not of the same family and affinitie with them therefore neither familiar friends nor kinsmen but with those tart liquors which are begotten of the same linage which are spiritual not corporal as are those former of the which it certaine drops be offered to him which is a thirst they wil by and by slake his thirst and presently bring such thirsty spirits to their rest After the same maner watchings paines burning heares and such like are cured For when the spirits are thirsty that is to say when they desire any thing like to themselues which is wanting they wil neuer be appeased nor at rest vntill they haue obtained that which they desire and haue supplyed their want Wherefore they are rightly called by Hypocrates contraries and by Hermeticall Physitians remedies of like sort For they are Similies which are drawen from the â—ame anatomie of nature contayning like properties tinctures and rootes And on the other side they are contraries because they supply the defects and doe satisfie the desires with friendly fulnesse appeasing the spirits and their fitting impurities séeking to consume them or to take them away Therefore these phrases of spéech in natures anatomie albeit they séeme different and repugnant one to the other yet in good consent and agréement they are receiued and admitted That is to say that contraries haue contrary remedies like to their like But to returne to our beginning that is to say to the elements or to those thrée hypostatical formal principles of bodies namely Salt Sulphur and Mercurie which is a liquor for so much as vpon them all grieuous diseases for the most part doe depend inso much that a coÌ„mon pestilence flying in the outward aire cannot inuade a man but it must make a breach and assaile one of these Therefore thou shalt not doe more foolishly if to helpe him which is grieued with a mercurial sicknesse thou vse a remedie taken out of Sulphur then if thou shouldest mingle oyle with water which two wil neuer be mixed or vnited And in like sort thou shalt labour in vaine if thou goe about to helpe Sulphurus sicknesses with a Mercurial medicine or to put away salt sicknesses with the help of others For these wil neuer agrée together and being so vnlike one to the other they wil neuer be ioyned in one to heale and cure the bodie except they be knit in a friendly peace and vnion by that supernatural ethereal body that is to say by the Balsam which is common to al things Hée therefore which is sick of Mercurie must be holpen with mercurial remedies as the Epilepsie and the Apolexi are to be holpen with vitriolated remedies taken from water And hée which wil help sulphurus sicknesse must vse sulphurus remedies and sicknesses proceeding of Salt with medecines taken from Salt So thou shalt be taught by reason and experience that things of like sort wil agrée be cured with their
like We might yet make these things more plaine lay the same more open by many reasons and examples but why should we ease you of that labour which we haue vndergon our selues by diliâ—eÌ„t reading searching and experimenting the things of nature with great expences before we attained our desire Accept my good wil in this which I fréely offer for some ease of thy paines and for thy profit And if it fit not thy humour taste for al men haue not one relish leaue it for those which shall better allow it FINIS THE SECOND part of this Treatise wherein is contained in some measure the practise of the Hermeticall Physicke CHAP. I. SAlt whereof hath bene spoken before at large is a thing of such qualitie and so excellent in it selfe that all creatures by a certaine natural instinct doe desire the same as a Balsam by which they are preserued conserued doe grow and increase They loue it and like it so wel I say that they long after it and doe drawe it vnto them by their breath and doe licke it with their tongue out of walles and old rubbish Byrdes as Doues and such like doe search after it with their beakes and wil if they can attaine it though out of â—eculent places which are made â—at by mens excrements and vertues What huge multitudes of fishes are bread and nourished in the Salt Sea The which being so apparant I wonder that men are of so peruerse iudgement that they knowe not or at least will not acknowledge the admirable effects of this radical balsam of nature And who wil not admire the vertual properties and qualities of Salt yea euen of that which is extracted out of liuing creatures which qualities are to be séene in making liquide in clensing in binding 〈…〉 preseruing from 〈◊〉 corruption and 〈…〉 Are not all these faculties and many others sufficient to proue that Salt is a thing animal And so much the rather because there haue bene some chiefe Phylosophers who haue affirmed the Magâ—es or Loadstone to be animate or indued with life onely because it hath power to draw â—ron to it How many faculties far greater then these yea and the same magnetical also do we find in Salt if we looke diligently and throughly into them What is greater and more admirable then the Salt of mans â—riâ—e which after conuenient preparation is made fit to dissolue gold and siluer which by this their simpathy and concordance â—o sufficiently declare and manifestly giue attraction and magnetical vertue occasioned or caused by their coniunction and copulation Who seeth not those admirable things which are to be discerned and which fal out in the preparation thereof and in the exaltation whether you respect so great variety of colours or the coagulations and dissolutions when the spirit returneth into the body and the body passeth againe into spirit Christophorus Parisiensis that great Phylosopher did not in vaine take the subiect herehence and begin the foundation of his worke Thus I hope I haue sufficiently declared that our Salt may be saide to be animate But that it may appeare also to be as vegetaâ— as it is animal that is to say that it is not depriued of the growing facultie it may hereby be demonstrated because it is the first mouing thing in nature which maketh to grow and to multiply and therefore serueth for the generation of all things so as with the Poets and auncient Phylosophers it may be said that Venus the mother and first beginner of al generation is begotten of the Salt spume or froath of the male the which also Athenaeus confirmeth For this cause Venus was called by the Greekes Aligene as affâ—anced to the Salt sea And also the generation of most precious pearles in the shels of fishes and of coral springing out of the bowels of hard stones and rockes in the sea spreading forth branches like a 〈◊〉 doe yet more and more confirme this sentence Theâ—â— are the â—â—fects which that fier of nature Salt bringeth forth yea euen in the middest of most cold water But let vs see also what it worketh in the earth The effects which it hath in the earth are these namely it heateth and maketh the earth fat it animaâ—â—th fortifieth and giueth power vnto it It increaseth and giueth a vegetating and growing vertue with séede into euery thing in the same For what other thing is it which 〈◊〉 the earth 〈◊〉 and bringeth to passe that one graine multiplyeth into a hundred but a certaine â—â—ercoration and spreading of 〈…〉 which commeth from cattle What other thing openeth the earth and maketh it to sproute â—n the beginning of the spring time after that the Sunne is exalted into the signe of Ariâ—â— which signe is the full of Saturn and the house of Mars signes altogether fâ—ery but the eleuations and sublâ—â—ations of the spirits of the said Salt and of the balsam of nature This is 〈…〉 and quickeneth which maketh to grow and which 〈◊〉 and ioyeth the medowes and the fieldes and which produceth that most ample and vniuersal vigor and vertue Who seeth not this in the very aâ—er also by the sublimations of the spirits of the 〈◊〉 nature of Salt which spirits being sublenated into aier in the said spring time doe fal againe in forme of a deawe vpon corne and all things that spring out of the earth And who seeth not that these deawes arysing from the earth and falling againe from the aier is a cause of vegetation and growing But that the dewe is the spirit of the foresaid Salt and indued with Salt they which thinke themselues great Philosophers against their wils and not without shame do confesse when they sée that the true Phylosophers doe extract out of the deawe a Salt which dissolueth corall and pearles no lesse then doth the Salt which is extracted out of common Salt out of Salt-Péeter out of Niter or out of other Salts which are prepared for the same end Furthermore the same Salt may rightly also be said to bee vegetall because it is manifestly found in all vegetables and because those things in the which it doth most abound haue the longer life and continuance and doe more manifestly shew forth the vegetable effects either in their owne proper nature â—or at such times as they are to serue for vse Salt also is well known to be metallick or minerall And all men knowe it the better so to be for that such sundry and diuers kinds of Salts are found in the bowels of the earth such are Salt Gem Allum Vitriol Salt niter and such others moe all which are of metallick nature or else doe participate much with the same But a Phylosopher knoweth how to 〈◊〉 this thing further and to find out the innermost 〈…〉 by the helpe of diuers strong waters which hee knoweth how to prepare which are nothing else but the spirits of the foresaide Salts which haue power to
Ice whereof the maker of Salt-Péeter finisheth his worke purifying the same by sundry dissolutions and coagulations that it may loose his fatnesse quite and cleane This common worke being triuial and no better then mechanical if it be rightly considered and weighed is as I haue said already full of admiration For by the very same preparation the thrée beginnings are extracted out of earth which may be seperated one from the other and yet neuerthelesse the whole thrée doe consist in one and the same essence and are onely distinguished in properties and vertues And herein we may plainly see as in a glasse after a certaine manner that in comprehensible misery of the thrée persons in one and the same Hypostasis or substance which make the diuine Trinitie For thus it hath pleased the omnipotent Creator to manifest and shewe himselfe a vâ—â—trine or Trinne not onely herein that he is found so to be in the nature of earth but vniuersally in all the workes of the creation For this our comparison of the Salt of the earth is general and is euery where found and in all things Also in this comparison of Salt wée may beholde thrée distinct natures which neuerthelesse are and doe subsist in one and the same essence For the first nature is Salt common fixed and constant and the other nature is Volatil Salt the which alone the Sal-péeter-man seeketh after This volatil or flying Salt containeth in it two kindes of Volatil Salt the other full of Sulphur easily catching flame which men call Niter the other Mercurial watery sower partaking of the nature of Salt Armoniac Wherefore in that most common essence of earth these thrée seueral Salts are found vnder one and the same nature of the which thrée all vegetables and animalls whatsoeuer doe participate And we determine to place our thrée hypostatical and substantial beginnings vpon these thrée Salts as vpon the fundamental grounds in that our worke concerning the hidden nature of things and the misteries of Art the which we had thought to haue published before this time whereof we thought it conuenient to say some thing by the way because the ground-worke and beginnings of Medicines depend vpon them Wherefore to the end so large immensurable doctrine may the better and more diligently be considered of all men especially of the wiser sort then heretofore it hath bene I wil set plainly before their eyes those three distinct natures of Salt comprehended as already is sayd in one Hupostasis or substance For the maker of Salt-peter or Niter to make his salt the more effectual volatile and more apt to take fire taketh away the fatnesse as they terme it from the same and seperateth the Salt thereof which is al one with the sea salt or common salt which is dissolued into common water Contrariwise Salt-peted as men cal it is congealed into such péeces as we sée it to be and so there is made a visible seperation of both the Salts For the water wherein the common Salt being defused and dissolued as we said being euaporated or boyled away there remayneth a portion of Salt in the bottome which is somewhat like to our common marine Salt and of the nature thereof for it hath the same brynish qualities it is fixed it melteth not in the fire neither is it set on fire and therefore is wholy different from that which is congealed in the same water which is called Salt-peter The which thing truly deserueth to bée diligently considered not of ordinary Salt-peter-men which are ignorant of the nature of things but of Phylosophers if they desire to be reputed and to be such To whom it shal manifestly appeare that Salt which by nature and qualitie according to the common opinion of Phylosophers is hote and dry a sulphurus Salt fierie and apt to be set on fire such as is Salt peter wil be coagulated or congealed in water wherein al other saltes are dissolued no lesse than that salt which procéeded from the very same essence of Salt-peter may be dissolued in water as we haue said Therefore not without great cause the admirable nature of Salt-peter deserueth to be considered which comprehendeth in it two volatile partes the one of Sulphur the other of Mercurie The Sulphurus part is the soule thereof the Mercurial is his spirit The Sulphurus part commeth to that first moouing of nature which is nothing else but an ethereal fire which is neither hote nor drie not consuming like the Elementarie fyre but is a certaine Celestial fyre and Ayerie humour hote and moyste and such as wée may almost beholde in Aqua Vitae a fyre I say contempered ful of life which in Vegetables wée cal the vegetating soule in Animals the hote and moyst radical the natural and vnnatural heate the true Nectar of life which falling into any subiect whether it bée Animal or Vegetable death by and by ensueth The which commeth so to passe vppon no other cause but vppon the defect of this vital heate which is the repayrer and conseruer of life The same vital heate is also to bée found albeit more obscurely in Minerals which may more easily bée comprehended by the sympathy and concordance which the sayd salt-peter hath with Mettals as is to be séene in the dissolutions whereof wée haue spoken somewhat before Beside that sulphurus part there is also found in salt-peter a certaine Mercurial of ayerie nature and which notwithstanding cannot take fyre but is rather contrary therevnto This spirit is not hote in qualitie but rather colde as appeareth by the tart and sharpe taste thereof the which sharpnesse and coldnesse is wonderful and is farre different from the Elementary coldnesse for that it can dissolue bodies and coagulate spirites no lesse then it doth congeale salt-peter the which sowernesse is the generall cause of Fermentation and coagulation of al natural things This same sower and tart spirit is also found in sulphurs of the same qualitie not burning nor setting on fire and which congealeth sulpur and maketh it firme which otherwise would bée running like Oyle Vitriol among al the kindes of salt doth most of al abound with this spirit because it is of the nature of Venus or Copper which sower spirit inconstant Mercurie which notwithstanding alwayes tendeth to his perfection that is to say to his coagulation and fixation ful wel can make choyse of and attract it to him that hée may bée fixed and coagulated when it is mixed and sublimed with the same vitriol Euen as Bées suck hony from flowers as Ripley saith Furthermore this sharpe sower and cold spirit is the cause why Salt-Péeter hauing his sulphur set on fire giueth a cracke that so salt-péeter may be of the number of them whereof Aristotle writeth as that they are moued with a contrary motion Which words of his are diligently to be considered But what doe I meane to open the gate of passage into the orchard
But as touching a Chymical Philosopher let him know that hée ought to bestowe his labour most chiefely in fusil Salts and to remember that Philosophers haue not without good cause euer and anon cryed Bake it Bake it and bake it againe which is al one as if they had sayd Calcine calcine or bring it to ashes And in very déede if wée wil confesse the trueth of the matter al Chymical workings as Distillations Calcinations Reuerberations Dissolutions Filtrations Coagulations Decoctions Fixations and such other appertaining to this Science tend to no other ende then so to bring their bodies into dust or ashes that they may communicate the spirits of Saltes and sulphur which haue made them placed neuerthelesse vnder one and the same essence after a certaine imperceptible manner with their metallick water and true Mercurie and that to this ende that by the infernal vertue and force of Salt the Mercurie may bée consumed boyled and altered from his vile nature into a more noble when as of common Mercurie it is made by the benefite of the spirit of Salt the Mercurie of the Phylosophers which Salt it hath attracted out of the ashes or calx vine Metallick Euen like as it commeth to passe in the lye-wash which is made of ashes and water the which béeing oftentimes messhed and drawen away the ashes leaue al their life and strength communicating all their Salt to the foresayd water the which water albeit it alwayes remaineth fluxile and liquid yet it abydeth not simple and pure water colde or of smal vertue but béeing now made lye it is become hote and of a drying qualitie clensing and of qualitie wholely actiue which is altogether the vertue and facultie of an altering medicine But it is to bée considered of what matter this quicke and metallick ashes are to bée made Also of what manner of water the lye is to bée prepared that thou mayest exalt the Salt or Sulphur of the Phylosophers that is to say the Balsamick medicine which is ful of actiue qualities like vnto thunder béeing reduced into a true liuing calx And whereas at the first it was a certaine dead body voyde of life it shal then be made a liuing body indued with spirit and medicinal vertue CHAP. IIII. Gold animated is the chiefe subiect of the metallic Medicine of the Philosophers OF so great power and force is the Phylosophical Sulphur of Nature that it multiplyeth and increaseth gold in strength and vertue béeing already indued with great perfection not so much for the equal concurrencie of Sulphur and Quick-siluer as in regard of the perfect combination adequation equabilitie of Elements and of the principles which make gold And the sayd principles or beginnings to wit Salt Sulphur and Mercurie doe so order themselues that the one doth not excéed the other but being as it were equally ballanced and proportionated they make gold to bée incorruptible in such wise that neither the earth béeing buried therein can canker fret and corrupt it nor the Ayre alter it nor yet the fire maister it nor diminish the least part of it And the reason hereof is for that as the Phylosopher saith No equal hath any commaund or maisterie ouer his equal For because also in euery body equalled and duly preportioned no action or passion can be found Also this is onely that equalitie which Pithagoras called the Mother the Nurce and the defender of the concord of al things This is the cause that in gold and in euery perfect body wherein this equalitie is there is a certaine incontrollable and incorruptible composition The which when the ancient Phylosophers obserued they sought for that great and incomparable Medicine in gold And because they vnderstood that gold was of so smal compacted and firme composition that it could not worke and send his effects into our body so long as it remained in that solidity they sought indeuored to dissolue and breake his hard bonds and by the benefit of vegetable Sulphur and by the artificious working of the Balsam of life to bring it to a perfect adequation that the vegetable spirits of gold which now lay hidden as it were idle might make it of common gold which before it was gold phylosophical and medicinable which hauing gotten a more perfect vegetation and seminal vertue may be dissolued into any liquor and may communicate vnto the same that flowing and balsamic perfection or the Balsam of life and of our nature And because we are now speaking of the animation of gold be it known for a surety that the auncient Fathers and Phylosophers sweat and laboured much to find out the mistery hereof that they might compound a certaine Balsamic Medicine to vegetate and corroborate and by the noble adequation and she integritie of nature thereof to conserue the radical Balsam and that Nectar of our life in good and laudable temperament But indéed it is not to be wondered at that gold being deliuered from his mannacles and fetters and being made so spiritual and animate and increased in vertue and strength doth corroborate nature and renue the Balsam of our nature and doth conserue vnto the last period of life being taken in a very smal dose as in the quantity of one or two graines And so much lesse it is to be maruailed at that forsomuch as by that great adequation of temperature it doth conueniently agrée and communicate with our radical Balsam it doth checke the rule of phleame the burning of choller and the adustion of melancholy and by his incorruptible vertue doth preserue our nature but also to ouercome all the diseases which belong to our body And so much the rather in regard that the same Balsam of nature that natural spirit is the principal cause in vs of all actions operations and of motions not depending vpon temperature or mixture but concerning the same as Galen himselfe is compelled to confesse speaking of that our natural heat Ye must vnderstand saith he that Hypocrates calleth that inset heate which we call the natiue spirit in euery liuing thing Neither hath any other thing formed any liuing creature from the beginning or increased it or nourished it vnto the appointed time of death but onely this inset or natural heate which is the cause of all natural workes Therefore they can be excused by no maner of meanes which contumeliously without any reason doe dispise discōmend and caluminat these kind of remedies which doe principally tend to the restoring corroborating of our radical Balsam which alone holpen with the said medicine is able to seperate those things which are vnkindly grieuous to nature méerely heterogenial by expulsions conuenient ordinary euacuations to retaine the homogenial kindly parts with the which it doth most especially agrée to their further conseruation Whereas if for the corroborating of mans strength there could bee any vse made of leafe gold the which is nothing else but a certaine dead matter in no sort
fit to participate with our nature much lesse able to be digested by our natural heat which is most coÌ„monly in vse in all restoring medicins as in Confectione alkermes electuario de gemmis aurea Alexandrina Diamargariton Aricenna and in such other like why I pray you is the vse of gold animate disallowed prescribed in that maner and forme already shewed But in good sooth they doe in vaine too vnaduisedly discoÌ„mend contemptuously speake against metallick remedies as if they were no better then poysons when as the world knoweth that men which are irrecouerably diseased when no other coÌ„mon medicines wil helpe are then sent to Bathes to the Spawe and to such other waters which are medicinable in regard they spring from Niter Allum Vitriol Sulphur Pitch Antimonie Lead such like all which doe participate of a substance spirit metallick which we haue found by experience to purifie to euacuate our bodies by all manner of euacuation not without great profit as we will declare more at large when we come to speake more particularly of the same in our booke concerning the hidden nature of things and of the misteries of Art In the which worke we wil shewe plainly and openly the vertual qualities of those metallick spirits And it shal be there proued by reason and also by experience that those metallick spirits haue the same effects that the foresaid medicinable waters of Bath and the Sâ—awe and other such like haue which are natural and naturally hote and therewithal we wil shew plainly that such waters artificial by industry may be made at any time and in any place and with no lesse commodity and profit There are a sort of men which in some measure are to be excused which being old and thinke that they know all things are ashamed to begin now to learne againe but they which oppose themselues obstinately and through enuy and malice doe carpe and cauil are more out of course against whom we haue nothing to say in our defence but this that they bewray their grosse ignorance and malice But the order and maner of preparing the Medicine whereof we treat here was in old time called mineral in regard that the Phylosophical Sulphur or Salt which serueth for animation or vegetation is extracted out of the first vegetatiue spring of mineral nature Many Phylosophers haue taken Saturn or Lead for the mineral subiect Other some haue taken the Saturnal Magnesia or Loadstone which is the first metallick roote and of the stocke and kind of vitriol Isaac Holland Ripley and many other Phylosophers haue written their workes concerning this matter the which forsomuch as they are extant euery one that list may read them For we haue no other purpose in this place but to teach and demonstrate in plaine maner what that Balsam radical is and that vniuersal medicine so much spoken of by auncient phylosophers for the conseruation of health and for the curing of diseases in mans body Others among whom also is Raymund Lully sought their fire of nature in a vegetable to animate gold For this was that which al men especially laboured for to put life into gold And this is the reason why they all say that there is onely one way and one matter or Balsamick Sulphur and of nature which yéeldeth actiue and internal fire to the same work And among all vegetables the chiefest is wine For of all other it partaketh very much of the vitriolated nature which may be gathered not so much by that gréene collor of the vnripe clusters of grapes and their sharpe fast as by the saphiric and reddy colour of those that are ripe which appeareth both within and also without and by the sharpe tast all which things doe plainly declare both the external and internal qualities of Vitriol It is also wel knowne that there are certaine such waters in Auuergne in France which haue the taste of wine with a certaine pricking facultie or relish Vineger also whereto wines is easily brought when his sulphurus life is gone that is to say when his spirit is seperated doth represent the tart qualitie of Vitriol as doth also other impressions of wine sufficiently known to true Phylosophers The which also may be gathered by the concordance and agréement which wine hath with the metallick nature séeing that as well out of wine as out of Vitriol the Menstrue of Chymical Art may be prepared which is able to dissolue metals into liquor These are I say the reasons why Raymund Lully and other famous Phylosophers placed their workings in wine for the extracting of their Balsamick Sulphur that thereby they might make true potable gold and the infallible Balsamick medicine But now we wil goe forward to open in few wordes Lullies method which he so greatly hid in his booke of Quintessence and in other places which if it be rightly vnderstood it wil easily direct and instruct euery true Phylosopher to extract out of all things and therefore to compound that Balsamick medicine For the scope is euery where all one there is but one ende and there is but one onely way to the composition of that Balsam or Phylosophical Sulphur which existeth in all things mineral vegetable and animal howbeit in some more in other some lesse CHAP. V. By what Art the Sulphur and Mercury of the Phylosophers may be prepared out of a vegetable to make true potable gold THerefore to the end all things may be duly performed which are required to such working choyse must be made of the best red wine that can be gotten being made of that vine whose wood is all so red and of this wine must bee taken one hogs-head at the least out of the which thou shalt extract an Aqua vitae according to the woonted maner the which thou shalt rectifie to the highest perfection This spirit of wine thou shalt set vp in a most cold place in a vessel very close stopt least that it breath out by reason of the excéeding subtilty thereof The remainder of the wine thou shalt distill againe and there wil come out of the same a middle Aqua Vitae if the wine bee of the best sort The which so distilled kéepe apart or by it selfe This thou shalt doe againe with the rest of the wine seperating as afore the Aqua Vitae from his fleame euery one seuerally restrained by it selfe At the last thou shalt gather the forces which remaine in the bottom out of the which thou shalt drawe the last humidutie by a Balneum vaporosum or by moyst Balneum or by ashes vntil it waxe thick and pyththie These pitchy remainders being put into diuers alembicks if they be much put so much thereto of the reserued fleame as may stand aboue it foure or fiue fingers thicke Put altogether vpon a hote Balme or vppon hote ashes so within fewe dayes the fleame which afore was white receiuing tincture againe will become very red hauing attracted vnto
it a combustible Sulphur out of the impure feces or lées of the wine Seperate this tincted fleame by inclination and kéepe it by it selfe if you will for such vses as hereafter shall bee shewed After that againe powre a newe quantitie of fleame vppon the same feces in seueral allembickes if there be great plenty of them as is shewed afore that which is tincted with red seperate againe as afore and powre it to that which is already tincted and seperated Thou shalt continue this so often vntill the fleame will drawe no more rudenesse with it and that the feces are now become somewhat white or Christalline The which that thou maiest the more easily knowe powre vpon it an other fleame and with thy finger or a cleane sticke stirre them together that thereby thou mayest sée whether any more tincture remaineth For all must bée cleane extracted that the least fleame being powred vpon it will tinct or colour no more By which proofe thou shalt certainly know that the residence is very well depured which in another place wée will call the Chrystal of tartar because out of all common lées and by a more easie method the like christalls are extracted This is a most pleasant and swéete remedy and if any in the world bée acceptable it is this It doth very readily clense the stomack the liuer and the spléene from their impurities prouoking vrine and mouing one or two sieges extraordinarily But let vs returne to our worke The â—eces aforesaide being now rightly and conueniently prepared and depured as is saide must bee put into diuers smal cucurbits with long neckes and into euery one of them put of the rectified spirit of wine so much as that it may stand ouer it three fingers thicke presently set vppon euery one of them a smal cappe or couer with his receiuer strongly and well luted Hermetically closed rounde about that nothing breathe through then set them vppon the hote ashes that they may boyle and distill powring in againe the same which shall distill forth and so let them boyle againe After that suffer all to coole Then as warily as thou canst by inclination seperate the spirit that nothing thick or troubled passe forth therewith And then againe powre into euery cucurbittel another spirit of wine and doe as thou diddest afore This thou shalt doe so often and continue it vntill the feces which by their owne proper nature are calcined beginne to waxe blacke and to smoake if they be put vpon a red hote plate For this is a signe that the first Phylosophycall calcination is finished and that the spirit by the same worke is now become animate by reason of the tarte Balsam and Ferment of nature contained in the foresaid feces reduced into Christal as is said These animated spirits ioyned together and very well reserued that they breathe not nor issue forth thou shalt put the foresaide feces into vessels which are called Matrats like vnto round globes hauing straite neckes by which the matter is powred in These vessels being Hermetically closed and stopt that nothing may vapour forth let them bee couered in sand in the Furnace of Athanor which will yéelde flame round about the compasse of the foresaide vessell Then put fire thereunto by the continuance of fiue or sixe dayes vntill the earth doe become as white as snowe and is well calcined and fixed The which that thou maiest make the more volatil or flying and maiest also make the Sulphur and Mercury of the Phylosophers thou mayest if thou wilt diuide this thy callixe into two or thrée cucurbittils of conuenient greatnesse first waighing the waight of euery of the calxes and powring vpon euery of them a forth part of the spirit of wine animated as aforesaide Put a smal head vpon each of the cucurbittels with their seueral receiuers wel fitted as afore Place them in B. M. which is moyst by the space of one day After that the same vessels being set in ashes put thereto a meane fire that the liquor may distill forth which whereas afore it was most ardent and most sharpe now it shal come forth altogether without taste hauing no other relish vppon the tongue and palat then hath common wel-water the reason hereof is for that the foresaid spirit hath left and forsaken his Balsamic Salt which afore being mixed with the spirit stilled forth with the Salt of the foresaid Calx For nature loueth nature and followeth her in her nature as Phylosophers teach Then againe thou shalt powre on another spirit of wine animate as afore in the same proportion and the former order of distillation obserued vntill in taste thou finde the foresaide animate spirit to come forth and to distil as strong in taste and relish as it was then when thou powredst it on For this shall be a signe that the foresaide fixed Salt hath retained out of the volatil so much as shal be sufficient and conuenient to retaine And now if thou waigh and counterpoyse thy matters thou shalt finde that they are increased a third part in waight as if there were one ounce in euery vessell of Calxe thou shalt finde that euery of them doth waigh thrée ounces or more The which is diligently to bée obserued for sublimation and for the last working which as yet resteth to bee done that the volatill may transcende and ouercome the fixed In the which businesse that thou maiest procéede the more safely thou must take sâ—me of the foresaide Phylosophycal Calxe vine and cast it vppon a red hote plate of yron and if thou sée all the saide Calxe to vapour away and to vanish in smoake like Salarmoniack thou hast an absolute and perfect woorke If otherwise thou must begin the foresaide worke againe and continue it vntil the foresaid signe doe appeare This done thou shalt put these matters into smal long Lymbeckes in forme of a Sublimatorie with heads vpon them and receiuers to receiue the spiritual sulphurus humiditie and then thou shalt distil it in ashes with a gentle fire by the space of a whole day afterward thou shalt increase the fire by a further degrée more more so long vntil about the end of eightéene houres or twenty the fire bée made sublimatorie and that thou see the vessels to bèe no more obsucred or darkenes with spirites or with white fumes And then shal yée sée the sublimated matter cleaning to the sides of the glasses fayre and bright and transparent like vnto pearles or such like Vppon this matter beaten into pouder in a Purphorie morter of smal bignesse thou shalt pouder the sulphurus spirit distilled moystening it by little and little and boyling or straining the whole by the space of foure dayes in a strong Athanor And thus thou shalt haue a pearelike matter a Balsam radical extracted from a Vegetable the Mercurie of the Phylosophers the Sulpur Balsamick and to conclude that fire of Nature so much commended and so hidden by al the
Philosophers which with one consent say Ignis azoc tibi sufficient Let Fire and the Matter suffice thée This onely Balsam is the vniuersal medicine to defend and conserue health if it be giuen with some conuenient liquor to the quantitie of one or two graines Great and admirable is the vertue thereof to restore our radical Balsam the which wée affirme to be the Medicine of diseases euen by the common consent of al Physitians But our Lullie and other Phylosophers are not content with this but procéeding further do dissolue the forsaid Phylosophical Sulphur in a conuenient portion of the spirit of wine rectified to perfection as afore and suffer them to be vnited and very well coupled together by way of Circulation in a Pellican Hermetically stopt or closed and within fewe dayes the water is made azure like or Celestial which béeing distilled is of force to dissolue gold and doth reduce it into the true Calxe of the Phylosophers into a precious liquor which itterated circulations and distillations can also passe by the necke of the Allembic or by Retort In the which working if thou procéede as thou shouldst thou shalt be able to separate from gold already phylosophically dissolued and animated thy phylosophical dissoluing which wil continually serue for newe dissolutions For very little is lost in euery dissolution And so thou hast the true potable golde the vniuersal Medicine which neuer can bée valued béeing inestimable nor yet sufficiently commended After the same manner thou shalt make the dissolutions of Pearles and of pretious stones most general remedies and deseruing to be placed among the chiefe if they bée dissolued after the order and manner aforesaid with a natural dissoluing Remedies I say which can much better confirme and strengthen our nature than if according to the common manner they bée onely powdred and searced as is wont to bée done in those our common preparations and cordial powders But some paraduenture wil say that these kinde of preparations are too hard or such as they vnderstand not or at least care not to vnderstand But this is a vaine obiection to preuent for excuse of their ignorance the difficultie of these preparations and the protract al time when as the thing is neither difficile nor long to them which know how to take it in hand These things are not to bée estéemed nor labour is to bée spared to attaine so excellent precious medicine which in so little smal a dose as in the quantitie of one or two graines can worke so great and wonderful effects which bringeth great commendation and honour to the Physitian and to the sicke perfect health and vnspeakable sollace and ioy But to conclude I wil say with Cicero in his Tusculans There is no measure of seeking after the truth and to be wearie of seeking is disgrace wheÌ„ that which is sought for is most excellent CHAP. VI. The way to prepare and make the Balsamick Medicine out of all things BY the foresaid preparation of sulphur Balsamick vegetable which wée haue before taught faithfully plainly and manifestly it is easie to vnderstand after what manner the same Sulphur may bée extracted out of euery mixed body In the wich bodie that I may summarily gather al things together there is first found a liquor without al odour or rellishing taste which is called Phlegme or passiue water Then commeth a liquor which hath taste colour odour and other impressions of vertual qualities which is called the Hercurial liquor And after that commeth foorth an oylie liquor which floteth aloft and conceiuing flame which is called Sulphur After the extraction of these thrée seueral moystures there remaineth nothing but ashes or dry part out oâ— the which ashes béeing wel calcined Salt is extracted with his proper Phlegme messhing oftentimes and powring water warmed vpon the foresaid ashes put into Hypocrates bagge and repeating this so often times til you perceiue a Salt water to come which hath a brinish taste after the same manner as women are woont to make their lye-wash This béeing done let the moyst be distilled and the salt wil remaine in the bottome The which salt notwithstanding in this first preparation is not made cleane enough nor sufficiently purified Wherefore the same distilled water is to be powred vp againe that the Salt may againe bée dissolued in the same the which so dissolued filter it or straine it through a bag oftentimes as afore til it be most cleare then coagulate it at a gentle heate And after this maner thou mayst extract a Salt cleare pure out of al vegetable ashes Vppon this Salt being put into an Allembic powre al his mercurial sharpe water let them be digested by the space of one or two dayes in the gentle heate of the Balme and then let them be distilled by ashes and so the water wil distil forth without taste or rellish Because whatsoeuer it contained of the volatile Salt wil reside in the bottome with his per fixed salt Goe forward therefore in thy working as before I taught thée concerning the wine Or if thou wilt not worke so exactly meshe vp againe al the mercurial liquor and make it passe through the foresaid Salt which wil take into it al that vitriol impression which that water shal haue and the water or liquor shal haue neither rellish nor taste but shal be altogether like to common water But if thou adde so much that the volatile part doe excéed the fixed that is to say that there be more of the volatile than of the fixed the which thou shalt easily know by waight because it wil be increased thréefold or by trial vpon a red hote copper or Iron plate when this matter béeing cast vppon the same vapoureth and passeth away in smoke then thou must sublime it and it wil become the Sal Aâ—moniack of the Philosophers so it pleaseth them to cal this matter which wil bée cleare and transparant like pearles Vppon this powdred matter thou shalt powre by little and litle the oylie liquor purified and thou shalt boyle this matter that of volatil it may be fixed againe Neuerthelesse that which shal be fixed shal be of nature more fusible than waxe and consequences wil more easily communicate with spirits and with our natural Balsam when it is seperated from his passiue water and passiue earth which are vnprofitable Both which matters the Phylosophers cal the passiue Element because they containe no propertie in them neither doe they shew forth any action And thus a body or nature is made wholely homogenical simple albeit there are to bée séene thrée distinct natures the which notwithstanding are of one or the same essence and nature And so a body shal bée compounded exactly pure out of those three hypostatical beginnings namely salt Mercurie and Sulphur The which Sulphur in some part is answerable to truely simple and Elementarie fire Mercurie to Ayre and to Water in like manner most
not only that dry minerall water which is also called Hydrargire and Quick-siluer is called Mercurie but also euery water or actiue liquor endued with any vertue is also for the excellencie thereof called Mercurie The which Mercurie as we haue said may bée likened to either Element that is to say to Ayre and to Water to Ayre because when it is put to the fire it is found almost nothing but Ayre or a vapour which vanisheth away This if you please you may call a moyst actiue And it may bée compared to water also because it is running and so long as it continueth in his owne nature it is not contained in his owne listes but in the limmits of another which according to Arictotle is the definition of moyst These thrée beginnings I say are found in all bodyes as internal and necessarie substances for the composition of a mixt body For seeing the foresaid Mercurial volatile and spirituall humiditie cannot easily be conioyned with the earthie corporeat and fixed part by reason of that great difference and contrariety of either of them it is necessarily required that there should bée a meane and indifferent partaking of either that is as wel of the spirituall as of the fixed to conioyne both in one And this indifferent meane is Sulphur or oile which holdeth a meane betwéene that which is fixed and that which is flying For oyles are neuer so quickly so easily and so wel distilled as are waters because the substance of Sulphur or of an oylie bodie is tenax and retentiue and therefore most apt to combinde the other two to effect a good perfect and equal mixture To make the matter more plaine by example For as a man can neuer make good closing morter of water and sand onely without the mixture of lime which bindeth the other two together like oile and glue so Sulphur or the oily substance is the mediator of Salt and Mercurie and coupleth them both together neither doth it onely couple them to death but it doth also represse and contemperate the acrimonie of Salt and the sharpnesse of Mercurie which is found to bée very much therein Much like to the coniunction which the Spirite and quickening moyst radical maketh betwéene the soule and incorporeat substance and the body which very much differeth from the same Thus then it appeareth after what manner these thrée natures may consist in one together and so to be made a mixed and perfect bodie For as salt by it selfe a lone cannot bring this thing to passe euen so neither these two fluxible and mouing humors cannot without Salt by their nature compose a firme fixed and solyd body Moreouer Sulphur most néedes bée had as a Glue without the which the Mercurial liquor wil be swallowed vp by the drinesse of the terrestrial Salt and through the violence of the heate of the fire which by the Sulphur is contained But the Mercurial humour is as it were the chariot of the other two seruing to penetrate and to make the mixture easie and spéedy If there bée any man which through obstinacie or blockishnesse of wit doth not well conceiue and vnderstand this let him beholde and consider of the blood which is in mans body how in the same the whaye is as a chariot or mediator and combiner of the other two beginnings together as may appeare by the preparation and separation thereof Very fitly wée may vse this example in this place And hereafter by infallable and euident demonstration we wil shew after what manner the other two beginnings beside the whaye which supplyeth the place of Mercuries are in blood When Salt is predominate and beareth the swaye it produceth so many kinds of diuers Vicers and many other diseases beside that portion of salt which passeth through the reines and bladder by Vrines In like maner we haue already shewed how Sulphur or the oilie part is in the same blood This sulphur being exalted it causeth sulphurus exhalation as inflamatiōs from whence come so many kindes of Feauers So Mercurial sublimations raise Rheumes and Catarres with other diseases Mercurial Chymistes determine that there are sundry kindes of salt which as they are found apart in nature s◠also in all mixt bodyes That is to say common salt which the Sea by his secret 〈◊〉 pypes doth conuey through the earth Salt gemme also Allum whereof there are diuers kindes Vitriol Salt-Armoniac and Salt-Niter which men commonly call Salt peter Among these salts two are flying and are mixed with liquors after an insensible manner that is to say Niter Salt-Armoniac of nature Niter doth participate of sulphur and of the oylie liquor of things Armoniac partaketh of Mercurie or of the Mercurial humour of things And these foresaid salts which are found both in earthie and metallick substances are deriued through the benefite of rootes into hearbs plants and trées which because they are alwayes in the earth they retaine the nature most chiefly of fixed salt And after the same manner the nature of fixed salt is to bée sought for in rootes In flowers also and in leaues there is great store of the other two flying Salts which béeing such they easily vanish away and come to nothing when the flowers and leaues doe wyther and waxe dry But those plants and hearbes which take their nourishment from fixed salt are alwayes kept flowrishing and gréene and therefore they doe the more strongly resist the fainting heate of Sommer and the morifying cold of Winter Moreouer their Rootes standing déepe in the ground they doe the more easily withstand all external iniuries And when the Spring commeth and the Sunne sendeth foorth his heate entring into the signe of Aries piercing the earth with his quickning beames hée stirreth the same and causeth her to open her bosome out of the which at the last shée powreth foorth abundantly those two liquid beginnings whereof wée haue spoken before The liquor or Mercurial vapour which is lifted vp through the Rootes with Salt Armoniac of a volatile nature by a certaine wonderfull manner of nature◠distilling and ascending into the trunke vnder the barke at which time trées may easily bée disbarked raiseth vp quickeneth and adorneth with gréene leaues trees and plants now hanging downe their heads and halfe dead And the other kinde of volatile salt Nitre-sulphurus mixed with the more volatile sulphur and oyle of nature doth cloath and decke the whole earth euery wherewith sundry sorts of most beautiful flowers And yet wée must not thinke héereupon that one vaporous liquor which procéedeth out of the earth is not partaker of the other séeing the Mercurial liquor is not without his sulphurus nor the sulphurus without his Mercurial And this is the cause why in the vegetable nature wée doe sée that some doe put out their leaues and flowers sooner than other some Nature therefore hath most wisely distributed those beginnings into all things And experience doth teach that somethings doe partake of this
or that more than some other things For thou canst not easily draw an oyle out of leaues but a mercurial liquor plentifully out of al and out of very fewe some sulphurus or oylie liquor The reason is because Mercurie doth carry the rule in leaues and is their chiefe nourishment beginning and foundatioÌ„ as we haue already said But the sulphurus liquor is the cause of the increase plentie of flowers but yet the same sulphur is not alone and pure but mixed with some portion of Mercurial liquor but with the least quantitie of salt For this cause thou maiest extract out of flowers both Sulphur or oyle and also Mercurie but that oyle more volatil and of Salt the least quantity But out of séedes is extracted much of the more fixed Sulphur but of Mercury and Salt almost nothing The cause is for that Sulphur hath giuen beginning and the principal constitution not that volatil Nitrous and airey Sulphur but that which is indéede oyle-like and fat and which holdeth a meane betwéene fixed and flying both which lye hid in séedes euen in those séedes which are in great Mercurial hearbes and fleshlike fruites as in Apples Peares Goordes and such like But Salt is in all these as the most fixed and necessarie beginning for the constitution and compacting of all bodies But this Salt doth most chiefely reâ—ide in the wood and in the roote not as in his center or proper seate fixed for his principal rooting is in the earth but because it is first and most plentifully communicated to the wood and roote From hence afterward much is deriued to the branches and leaues and but little to the flowers and fruites Whereupon out of many leaues a sufficient quantity of salt may be extracted but out of flowers and séedes a very smal quantitie in regard of the others Thus you sée after what maner these thrée beginnings doe order and determine all vegetables as hypostatical beginnings and doe bring them forth conserue make them to sprout and florish and doe giue vnto them diuers forces and vertues It is also euident that the saide thrée beginnings are in all things but in some more and in other some lesse Therefore none of those thrée beginnings is found simple and alone which doth not paticipate also with another For Salt through the benefite of the other two Saltes Niter and Armoniac containeth in it selfe an oylely and a Mercuriall substance Sulphur containeth a Salte and a Mercurial substance and Mercurie a Sulphurus and Salt substance But euery one of these retaineth the name of that whereof 〈◊〉 it doth most partake But yet if we consider of the matter exactly we shal finde that al the other doe spring from salt as from the firme and constant beginning The nature whereof wil enforce vs to lift vp our eyes to heauen seeing that from these inferiour and natural things that admirable and venerable Trinitie in Vnitie is so clearly and euidently to be séene And forasmuch as those thrée substancefying beginnings are and commonly be found in al the things of nature wée must not thinke that they are so in them as without effect or vtterly spoiled of al vertue but wée must rather bée sure of the contrarie namely that from these chiefely al the qualities properties and vertuals doe spring For whatsoeuer hath taste the same if it bée bitter commeth from Salt Gemme And such haue vertue to clense to euacuate or purge So others which haue in them bitternesse are found to bée such as haue the same from this kinde of Salt and by the benefit thereof are reckoned among the number of clensing and purging medicines Such are all bitter hearbes and their Iuices In like maner all gaules For without these thrée ther can be no due excretion or sepâ—rating in bodies of superfluities and excrements For nature by the conduit of her instrument called Cholidoâ—â—n casting out into the bowels some quantitie of gaule stirreth vp the expulser and prouoketh it to sende forth the excrements and also clenseth purgeth and emptieth it selfe by it selfe The which being vndone the Expulser lyeth as it were buried and ouerwhelmed neither is there any good from thence to be looked for And that bitter Iuices as also the very gaule it selfe are of the nature of Salt it may easily bee gathered hereby because the guale is oftentimes congealed as a fixed Salt into stones in his owne bladder Also out of bitter hearbes as out of Woorme-wood out of the lesser Centaurie which some call the gaule of the earth much Salt is extracted as they that be workemen know Moreouer out of the â—â—ules of liuing creatures there is a Salt to bee extracted very bitter which purgeth wonderfully So also there is Salt in vrine which purgeth the blood by the vaines which send it into the reines and from thence by the water pipes into the bladder and so through the conduit thereto appointed In bitter Opium which all men affirme to be so notably stuperfectiue and cold there is a bitter and Nitrous Salt which if thou canst seperate from his stinking Sulphur by the meanes whereof it is so stuperfectiue thou shalt make it a notable purger So in like maner the skilfull know how to exiract out of Centaury Gentian Rue Fumitory and all such like very good purgers Salt which is alluminous giueth a sower taste Vitriol a stiptic or a stringent taste Armoniac a sharpe taste And a diuers mixture of the same Salts procureth sundry tastes and relishes and that most chiefely by the benefit of the two volatile Salts which of all other wil be best mingled by reason of their subtilty and spiritous substance Armoniac which is sharp is more plentiful in vitriol and in things vitriolated then in any other Salt substance or metallick For that sharpe Salt or that sharpenesse of nature is the fermentation thereof and the cause of coagulations and of the dissolutions of all things as we haue already touched before and will in another place more manifestly declare Therefore it is certaine that those things which are stiptick or stopping and haue outwardly a gréene colour or vitriolated with an inward sharpnesse and certaine rednes as is to be seene in Pomegranats Barberies and Limons it is certaine that they haue it from vitriol and from the sharp Salt Armoniac for the vitriol of nature is outwardly gréene and red within if thou search it by skilful Anatomie So also thou maiest extract out of the barke of the said fruits as of Granates a substance comming most néere to the vertue of vitriol And the liquor which is extracted out of their red graines or out of the iuice of Limons or fruite of Barberies hath force to dissolue pearles and corall euen as the spirit of vitriol hath And this commeth by the vertue of Salt Armoniac sharpe of nature and by the nature of mixture but so mixed as by the industrie of the artificer it
may be seperated in such wife that the same Salt Armoniac being extracted the same liquor will be made swéete and potable and the Salt remaine by it selfe the which being againe mixed with spring water or with any other liquor deuoid of taste it wil make the same sharpe That same sharpnesse or Salt Armoniac spirituall is not onely found in Vitriol but also in common Salt in Niter yea in Sulphur also it selfe as also in all things For that sharpnesse is that very same which coagulateth Sulphur which is plentifully found therein For without it Sulphur will not cleane vnited but would be running as are other oyle-like liquors The same Salt Armoniac of nature is manifested vnto vs by that extraction of sharpe oyle which is drawen out of Sulphur whose nature is farre different from that of the said Sulphur For it is so farre from taking fleame that contrariwise it is a hinderance to gun-poulder not-suffering it to be inflamed with the touch of fire as is said already The same liquor doth dissolue pearles and coral no lesse then doth the iuice of Limons of Barberies or any other of that nature the which power it hath by the dissoluing vertue of Salt Armoniac of nature which is in it The like and by the same reason doth Vineger performe For Wine as is saide afore partaketh of the nature of Vitriol more then any other vegetable and containeth much of the foresaide sharpe Salt of nature He which doth exactly consider these things shal readily and out of true grounded reasons dissolue the question concerning the true and natural qualitie of Vineger which question hath troubled many of the most learned Piysitians For the dissoluing vertue which appeareth to be in Vineger euen in this that when clay or earth is put into it it wil as it were boyle argueth that the nature thereof is altogether hote Others on the coâ—trary part denying Vineger to be colde appoint it as a chiefe remedy to extinguish and represse external Inflamations Also by the taste which they affirme to bee the effect of coldnesse they conclude that Vineger is colde But they can very easily end this controuersie which haue the perfect knowledge of the nature of Salt Armoniac which Vineger containeth mat For this Salt is the true cause of dissoluing vertue But because the â—ame Salt is of force to coagulate spirits and to dissolue bodies therefore it is effectual and a singular remedy against both inward and outward inflamations For it doth coagulate the Niter Sulphurus exhalations which stirreth vp those inflamations For such heates and feauerous passions doe procéed out of the spirits onely either Niterous or Sulphurus arysing out of the Saltâ—Niter Sulphurus or tartarus of our body and lifted vp into euaporations which cause such vnkindly heates The which coÌ„meth not so to passe when the same spirits be as yet bound together and lye as it they were buried in their proper bodies or tartarous feces But if thou wilt yet knowe more manifestly the corrosiue force and inflaming heate of the saide spirits consider the strong waters which are nothing else but the spirits of Niter and Vitriol which thou shalt sée will dissolue siluer or any hard metall But if thou put but one onely ounce of siluer to one hundred pound waight of Vitriol and Niter as they are in their owne nature and body yet they will neuer be able to dissolue it It is therefore manifest that such violent forces and operations are onely in the spirits seperated euaporated and dissolued from their body the which forces thou shalt by no safer meanes take away and suppresse then if the same spirits bée againe incorporated and coagulated And this is performed by that Salt Armoniac sharpe of nature which is in Vineger as also in other things which haue sharpnesse But peraduenture there are some which now thinking that wee haue killed our selues with our owne swoord will inferre vpon the same example by vs alleaged that such essences prepared by Chymists are all for the most part spiritual and therfore by consequence are more violent remedies then is fitting for nature to beare and therefore cannot be giuen with safetie I would haue those which make this obiection to be in this wise answered That the reason is not all one and therefore the conclâ—sion not good For it we take the spirit of Vitriol or of Salt-Péeter which indéed are spirits partaking of the terrestrial fire yet neuerthelesse they may bee so swéetened and mingled with broathes or other conuenient liquor that they wil be very familiar to nature grateful sauory and gentle and not without great vertue and efficacie The iuice of Limons giuen by it selfe alone into great plenty can hurt the stomack For the which cause our maner is to mingle it with some liquor or with sugar and to bring it into a syrup or Iulep no lesse profitable then pleasing to the stomack But the vertue of the spirit of vitriol is better knowne at this day and commended of the most approued Physitians of diuers countries then that the ignorant can detract any thing from the dignity and praise thereâ—f It is reported very credibly that in France it is much vsed and commended for the effects it hath to extinguish burning feauers And not without iust cause for it is a most singular remedy not onely against feauers but also against many other contumacious sicknesses as hereafter in due place shal be shewed but it is fit that no other presume to administer it then such as are expert Phisitians not Emperikes and such as try conclusions by killing men Furthermore the sharpe spirit drawen out of Niter alone or Sulphur among the metallick Salts is of the same nature and property For these doe auaile no lesse then the other to extinguish feauers of what kind soeuer by their coagulatiâ—e vertue whereby they doe tame subdue and coagulate those Sulphurs and burning spirits of our body Moreouer there are other some which iudge vs worthy of much reprehension because we said afore that one and the selfe-same sharpe Salt Armoniar hath both vertue to dissolue and also to congeale which being effects contrary cannot procéed from one and the same cause according to the common opinion of Phylosophers To this we answere that as we haue spoken it so we will maintaine it And therefore we say againe that this Salt Armoniac sharpe of nature whereof we speake can both dissolue bodies and also which is more to be maruailed at congeale spirits yea and which is yet more wonderfull euen in the middest of fire it can congeale And concerning dissolution it shall not be necessary that we proue this because it is well known to persons of very meane skill And now to say somewhat for the ignorants sake The spirit of Vitriol or of Sulphur or of sower Niter wel prepared and seperated from all terrestreitie doth dissolue corall and pearles By which dissolution an excellent
remedy is made to stop the fluxes hepatic Lienterie and Dyssenterie where the liuer hath néed of spéedy corroboration But they must necessarily be prepared according to Art But now time and reason perswadeth vs that we say somewhat concerning the contrarie faculty of this sharpnesse which is contrary to the other coagulating effect To doe this little wit and lesse labour wil serue For they which are but meanely séene in the Spargerick Art and haue bene Chymists a very short time or if they be but common Apothecaries they know this and haue séene it in the preparation of quicksiluer whose liquor and running nature no exterior coldnesse no Elementall frost how great soeuer the same be congeale or fixe But if it be sublimed with Vitriol onely meanely calcined it will come to passe that Mercury or quick-siluer which desireth his coagulation as his perfection by a certaine magnetical vertue draweth into it selfe that Sulphur or that Salt Armoniac sharpe of nature by the benefit whereof of running it is made solid and firme so as thou maiest easily handle it Being brought into this forme it is commonly called Sublimate But to make it yet more perfect those which are careful and skilfull workmen reiterate their sublimations adding to this new Vitriol that by his Salt Armoniac of nature it may be impregnated And thus at the last it becommeth solid and cleare as any Christal Venis-glasse Spargeric Phylosophers can so dispoyle againe this Mercurie so prepared of his coagulation or of his sharpe Salt Armoniac of nature that he shal returne to his former state and of fixed shal become moueable and running But he is now perfectly clenâ—ed and is now no more commoÌ„ Mercury or Hydrargyre but the Phylosophers Mercury And now if the foresaid water be exhaled or vapored that there may remaine nothing but a sharpe liquor like vnto the spirit of Vitriol thou shalt haue a liquor more excellent then any Vitriolated spirit and truly spiritual And so in stéede of a great poyson which was mixed with Mercurie which was then nothing but a certaine terrestrial corrosiue fire thou shalt now haue the true spirit of Vitriol whose greater and better part vaporeth away is consumed and lost if it bee extracted according to the common manner with that great and violent fire by Retort This spirit prepared after the saide manner excéeding good and a special commaunder of the Epilepste if it be administred by a skilful Physitian not by an Emperick with proper and conuenient liquor And this is one tryal of the vertue of coagulating Mercury The same coagulating force of his doth manifestly appeare in those preparations which are called precipitations which are made with the sharpe spirits of Vitriol and of Sulphur by the meanes whereof it may be brought into a poulder which cannot be easily done by fire But that it may appeare that this coagulating power of Armoniac of nature is not oâ—ely vppon Mercurie ouer whome it can exercise this power but nothing at all vpon the spirits Niter Sulphurus of our bodies with the which quick-siluer hath no simpathy or conuenience we wil shew it by a certaine other manifest demonstration and the same most true as shall appeare to them which will try it And in the same experiment I wil also teach a very excellent remedy against Gangrena and all sorts of cankerous Vlcers if any bee loth to take it inwardly into the body because of the vrine ingredient Take the vrine of a boy betwéene the age of ten and sixtéene which drinketh wine in good quantity let it be depured according to Art Adde hereunto of Romane or Hungarian Vitriol for by these the operation wil be the better I say of the Vitriol twise so much Put it to digestion in Balneo Mar which is moyst by the space of fixe or eight dayes in one or in seueral glasse Allembicks For there is required much matter This digestion being ended thou shalt increase the fire of Balne til the water 〈◊〉 Presently set on a head with a receiuer and distill the water And the same which first commeth forth is an excellent Ophthalmick water for the eyes The second something more sharp then the former is excellent good to asswage the paines of the Gout Thus goe forward brging the heate of the Balne or else by hote ashes vntill the matter in the bottom of the Alembic remaine like vnto hony The which afterward thou shalt put into an yron vessel and putting fire vnder it stirre it continually with an yron spattle that it cleane not too this thou shalt continue so long vntil all the liquor is vapored away and that there remaineth onely the Salt of Vitriol and of the vrine dry in the bottome and in a certaine masse This being pouldred put it into a cornute wel luted hauing a wide receiuer wel closed that the spirits issue not forth Then put to a vehement fire such as is néedful for the making of strong water or the spirit of Vitrioll But the fire must bee moderated by degrées vntill it come to the highest degrée as Art requireth And then at the last you shall sée the receiuer filled euery where with white spirits which in that great heate will be congealed as it were into Isâ—-â—ickels hauing all bout the body of the receiuer much like vnto the hayse or white thréedes which in time of frost are congealed out of foggy mistes and doe hang vpon the trées These are the spirits of the Salt which through the vehement heate of the fire are thus formed This Ise may be kept after the maner of Salt Niter Wherof if thou giue one scruple or halfe a scruple in broath wine or other conuenient liquor it will shewe it selfe an excellent remedy against all obstructions of the Liuer and of the spleene it prouoketh vrines and is also a special remedy against the Stone The same Ise being brought into water for it will easily be dissolued is a principal remedy for Inflamations and Gangrenas which very sodainly it extinguisheth Out of this so faire and noble experient euery true Phylosopher and Physitian will take occasion of séeking and searching further then the common sort are woont and so he may more certainly finde out the causes of stones congealed which are ingendred of the same salts or tartarous matter in diuers parts of our body He will also haue more quick insight into many other diseases which come by the coagulation of the foresaid sharp and Vitciolated spirits or else of the euaporations of other most sharpe spirits from whence Inflamations and gouty paines with swellings doe spring by the inward vertue of the thickened spirits aforesaid These things being thus knowne a remedy wil easily be found to mittigate and to dissolue such calculous and stony matter if we marke and consider diligently where that sharpe vertue lyeth hidden and wherein also the coagulatiue propertie of the said spirits are Also
differences are to be made in Antimonials Arsenicals and Mineral humours or vapours and that out of their effect either seplic putrifying or caustic burning the which effects are in the said fumes by the meanes of salt Such pearcing fumes are too wel knowne and felt of our eyes oftentimes to which they bring by their sharpenesse paines inflamations and flowing of teares Héereupon out of this diuersitie of fumes there arise diuers passions in continuance in maladie and in vemencie more or lesse inuading and troubling according to the nature mineral and condition of the qualitie or quantitie of the exhalations and of their substances which are lifted vp with them as it were in a certaine chariot Moreouer we sée in the bowels of the earth of the little world man no lesse then in the great worlds belly in the bellies I say of both almost the same effects are to bée seene of Meteors as wel waterie as fierie For example the Tympanie the swelling of the Coddes windinesse of the stomach and bellie al which doe represent the windes raynes and Earth-quakes of the earth and the waters within the body and betwéene the skin and the flesh doe represent the Sea the Riuers and Springs of the earth Also there are in man diuers fierie Meteors by reason of the exhalations of the Niterous and Sulphurus spirits which being set on fire stirre vp such diuersities of Feauers and inflamations There are bred also in man diuers metallic substances as landes and stones which are commonly ingendered in diuers parts of his bodie as in his bowels stomach gaule spléene lyuer yea in the lunges and braine but more often in the reynes and bladder which are the most fertile mines of al the rest There are also procreated in mans bodie certaine concreate congealed Iuices as many kindes of Sulphurs but of Saltes more differences vitriolated alluminous niterous and Gemmeus Salt-gemme or common salt is plentifull in Salt spittle sower Salt-Armoniac in sower flegme or spittle and also in a certaine kinde of sower melancholy salt vitriolated and of the colour of rustie metal in choller that is of the same complexion Salt aluminous pricking and stiptickâ— in glassy fleame of the same qualitie Salt niterous and bitter in bitter choller Moreouer Vrines which are wholy niterous doe represent a matter most like to Niter There are also in this little worlde as also in the greater world found many differences of Salts as a sugered salt in swéete flegme as also an Arsenical and corroding Salt in malignant and pestilent humours From the resolutions of the which Saltes but most especially of the stiplick or corroding salts come certaine kindes of Chollickes which afterwards degenerate into contractions of the bowels From the corrosiue Salts spring diuers kindes of disenterie fluxes from the brinish salts come the burnings of Vlrines from the tart Salts commeth the appetite of the Stomach from the Arsenicall Salts comes Carbuncles cankerous Vlcers running pockes such like And of the congelations of these salts comes Goutes Stones Scirrhus hardnesse and diuers kindes of obstructions according to the diuersitie of tartars and of Salts which are ingendred and procreate to nature in our body From these things are the causes of diseases in mans body to be truely and exactly learned and discerned without the which wée shal in vaine séeke for remedies But to make al which hath béene hitherto spoken more plaine wée wil adde certayne manifest demonstrations and playne to sense but yet in as briefe manner as I can séeing wée haue reserued a more ample and special Treatise of these things to our worke concerning the hidden nature of things It is known and confessed of al by the Edict of Hyppocrates the chiefest Authour of Phisitians that our body consisteth of things containing of things contained and of things enforcing The things containing are the solide and more firme partes as the bones gristles ligaments flesh which doe containe and as it were restraine the more soft and delicate parts The contents are in a two-fold difference some are violent breathing out and enforcing as Physitians speake othersome moystening and flowing out The first sort are the spirits of our radical Balsam which they call naturall spirits whether they bée firmely fixed in any one part or whether they haue scope and recourse throughout the whole body generated of the most pure substance spiritual of the Sulphurus liquor and of the 〈◊〉 of the nourishments of our life Furthermore they diuide the spirits into natural vital and animal All these are either natural and pure or else impure and seculent The one are of a most pure nature ethereal and conseruers of life the other grosse and impure in comparison of them subiect to alterations for that they participate much of the seculent impuritie of Mercurie and of the liquors of Salt and also of the aliments of Sulphur of the which beginnings wée doe consist as wée said before The moystening parts are mercucurial liquors or that which they commonly call humours as well the natural profiting and nourishing which retaine somewhat of the spirit of life as the vnprofitable and excremental The out-flowing and breathing foorth are the breathes vnder which name also wée comprehend the vapours of the which we made mention before which vapours are a distillation and that moyst euaporation taken from the more watery part of humoral or mercurial things or else a dry exhalation of Sulphurus and tartarous things and of Salts of our body And such exhalations also are no other thing but fumes and spiritual smoakes but yet excremental and therefore superfluous For beside those first seperations which nature maketh out of the more grosse part of nourishments by the excretion and separation of the ordinarie impure feces there are yet also in the Chylus or good Iuice and in the very blood which of all other humours are most noble certaine superfluous impurities which for the same cause Nature seperateth Therefore the more mâ—yst superfluities are separated by euaporations and those onely which are seperated in the third concoction which could not be made semblable or like to the nourishing parts For the which cause nature expelleth them by insensible passages eueÌ„ through the pores of the skin that our natural heate may the more fréely be winded by the ayre and the burning of the heart comforted The breathing superfluities also doe paticipate as much of the drie as of the moyst that is to say of those which are exhaled and euaporated out of the sulphurus salt matters and mercurial liquors Whereof the more thinne and breathie part passe by insensible transpirations the more waterie by sweates but the more foule and that which is feculent cleaueth to the outside of the skinne But now if such vapouring exhalations be retained stil in our body the which sometime commeth to passe through the coldnesse of the ayre coÌ„passing vs about by the shrinking of the skin by occasion of place or of age
worthy the marking and admiration namely that two or thrée fiery coales and no moe put vnder a large vessel or chaldrone which may containe sixe gallons will heate the same wine and will procure the spirit of wine to distill when as by that small heate a much lesse portion of water cannot bée made blood warme But which is more to bée maruailed at and obserued when the same spirit of wine doth passe through the Colunrina as they terme it namely by very long cunduites and pipes of brasse reforsed fit for this distillation it doth so heate them as also a whole pipeful of cold water-besidâ— and farâ— enough from fire in the which the saide pipes are moystened that a man may scarce handle them The which is to bee attributed to the great heate which the spirit of wine giueth to the colde water passing through the foresaide pipes For when all the spirit of wine is distilled forth although thou put vnder the saide vessell a much more vehement fire yet thou shalt féele the heate of that water in the vessel contained to bée extinguished and cooled The which should put vs in minde what is the next cause and original of natural or connatural heate in vs for this heate is stirres vp in vs by the continual circulation of the quickening spirit of our blood When all this water of life is at last distilled forth by a certaine internal external and violent heate or else vtterly wasted by progresse of time then doth appeare the extinction of that quickening heate and cold death insueth But to returne to the matter After the extraction of the true Aqua-Vitae or spirit of wine which is the whole purity of those thrée substantial beginnings whole liquor representeth Mercury whose flame which it readily conceiueth sheweth the Sulphurus nature and the excéeding strong taste declareth the spirit of Salt Armoniac there remaineth great plenty of â—â—eame or of Mercurial water which as yet containeth some quantity of spirit of wine But the last remainder is no better then vnprofitable water which soone corrupteth in like manner after the extraction of the water of life which is truly spiritual from out of our blood there remaineth in our body that moyst and moystening liquor which is partly nourishing and partly excrementall as is saide afore Lastly there remaine ouer and aboue the former the Feces Tartarous residences and Niterus Sulphurus matter which containe many stinking Impurities as also greate plentie of Salt The impurities doe sufficiently shewe the impurities in the eyes and filthy stinkes out of the nosthrils where as diuers oyles are distilled out of the said feces by vehement fire And out of the very feces there is extracted Salt if they be calcined and the same is also fixed with his proper fleame as we haue shewed afore in the working of the same vegetable This Salt is made Volatil with Salt Armoniac flying contained in his own spirit or water of life procéeding as we haue already shewed In like sort in blood beside that spirit of life and Mercurial liquor which two may in very déede be seperated from blood it selfe and shewed to the eye after conuenient digestions in the heate of Balne Mary which resembleth the heate of nature that it may the better and more easily appeare how the same heate and the same nature in vs maketh the same seperations and operations I say beside those two a certaine soft consistence like liquor wil reside in the bottome wherein thou shalt finde many impurities to be séene and smelt if the same matter be dryed vpon a fire of ashes proportionable to the heate of a feauer and no greater This Niter-Sulphurus stinke is that which manifestly causeth in vs fiery meteors as wel in the vpper as in the inferiour part of the body and which bringeth forth innumerable passions and paines beside as is already shewed afore So also by the force of the fire Sulphurs and oyles thick and gluing like pitch may be seperated out of the feces and tartar of blood no lesse then out of wine so offensiue with stinke as thou art not able to abide the odour thereof whereof how many diseases may arise in our bodies euery man may easily coniecture This done there wil remaine ashes out of which a Salt is extracted the which by the vertue of the Salt Armoniac of nature may be made Volatil and the very same which Lullie calleth the greater Lunarie for the imitation of the vegetable work This worke is very admirable by which the true Numie the vniuersal Medicine and the true Balsam conseruing and restoring nature is made And this is the true and vital anatomie of blood which by manifest demonstration we haue shewed that it hath a great analogie proportion and resemblance with wine when as a true Phylosopher as wel out of the one as out of the other sauing that the one requireth greater artifice knoweth how to seperate waters of life méerely spirituall which are saide to be very forcible and strong and beside these Mercuriall liquors which are as wel profitable as hurtful which are also moystening and finally which knoweth how to extract vapors and exhalations fuming which are called out-flowings Now therefore if so be in wine which we easily vse to nourish our bodies and the same pure and cleare after the seperation of the spirit thereof we sée and behold so many vnkindly things and so impure how many more grosse impurities I pray you shall we finde in the Lées of wines cleaning to the caskes and in the grosse residence of the same They which knowe and vnderstand that great and excéeding blacknesse of wine lées which is manifestly to be séene in the calcination thereof and the sepreation of his spirit and of his oyle red blacke and stinking which is done by destillation they I say can giue cleare testimony and credibly informe what a great stinke there is in the Sulphur thereof and how great the acrimony and byting sharpnesse is in the same tartar or lées by reason of the Salt which is extracted out of the same and the oyle which is made by the resolution of the same Salt of tartar And trust mée in the feces of the same wine there are found beside the things already spoken those matters which are more grosse impure and stinking as they wel knowe who to calcine them into ashes which they call clanelated are compelled to goe out of the Cities into the fieldes and places further off by reason of their excéeding infection and stinke with the which they are wont to infect the places néere adioyning What maruaile is it then as is shewed afore if in our blood after the seperation of the true spirit there are found so many vnkindly tartarous stinking and Sulphurus impurities But what maruaile I say if more and greater impurities and stinkes are to bee found in diuers of the Heterogeneal parts of the Chylus or best matter digested in the stomach for nourishment from whence
tittle of Apothecaries professing that and yet follow the Trade of Marchandise and not of honest and good men which are dilligent in their Arte to whom this our labour pertaineth and to whom these our studies and admonions are dedicated for the health of many and for their praise and profite The auncient Physitians and men of the best sort delt more warily and prouided better for themselues had this arte in great honor and therefore in their owne houses they prepared medicines with their owne hands And wée also for our owne partes would bee loath that some of our secrets should bee cast before these Hogges and therefore wée commonly prouide that they bée prepared in our Laboratorie at home by a kilfull workeman whome wée direct and appoint for that purpose Not that wee might make thereby the greater gaine to our selues but for the honour and praise of the Arte and to our friends good the which all those know that know vs and haue receyued the benefite from vs. But for this time these shall suffice For the Patterne of Furnaces and glasses apt and méete for Distillation buy Maister George Bakers Booke our Countryman And if thou be desirous to procure glasses of all sortes for this Arte thou mayst haue them at the Marchants hand which sell such in their houses néere the Poultery in London THe winde Furnace must haue a hole beneath one foote déepe inwarde and one foote and a halfe vpward and at that height a grate shall be layed wherein the coales of fire must lie Also at that height make another mouth where at thou shalt put in the saide coales of fire and aboute the same raise vp the walles round about ten Inches in height and there also lay two barres of Iron to set the Panne vppon either for Balneum Mariae or for a dry fire To make thy nourishing Balnâ— TAke chopt Hay and water and put it into an earthen Pan then set ouer it a Trencher with a hole in the middest to answere the bottome of the glasse which must come within two Inches of the water Concerning Hermes Seale and the making of diuers closiers of glasses FIrst thou shalt know that of all fastnings or closing vp of Glasses that no vâ—pours nor spirits goe foorth the Seale of Hermes is most noble which is done in the manner following First make a little Furnace with the Instruments belonging It must haue a grate in the bottome to make fire vppon In the middst of the Furnace shall be a hole to put in the ende of a narrowe necked Glasse so that the third part of the glasse be emptie And if the hole of the Furnace be greater then the glasses necke close vp the hole with claye on euery side round about so as the mouth of the glasse haue some libertie Let thy fire be as farre from thy glasse as thou canst and when thy coale fire is readie put the Glasse néerer and néerer by little and litle till the mouth of thy glasse waxe red as it were ready to melt Then take the red hote tonges and therewith wring or nippe the toppe close together whereby it shall be so closed as if it had no vent 〈◊〉 or came so closed out of the Glasse-makers shoppe But take héed when you haue so done that you pull it not too suddenly out of the fire least the sâ—dden colde cracke the glasse and marre all Therefore abate it by little and little and not at once And when thou wilt open the glasse take a thridde dipt in brimstone or waxe and wind it 6. or 7. times about the necke of the glasse where thou wouldest haue it to breake and set it on fire with a small waxe candle and when it is burnt powre a drop or two of cold water vpon it and it will crack in the saâ—â— place that thou maist take it off Concerning the maner of making Lutes wherewith to close glasses THe ordinary Lutes wherewith to stop vessels of glasse against faint vapours are these Take quick lyme beaten to â—oulder as fine as may be and searsed temper it with the white of egs Or else mix wheat flower with the white of egges spred them vpon linnen cloath and wrap it diuers times about the mouth or ioynts of the glasse Other Lutes called Lutum Sapientiae made for the defence of stronger vapours either to parget and lute the body of the glasses or to stop their mouthes or loose their ioynts which are to be wrought cleare smooth and without knots or bladders in maner following Take potters earth with a forth part of shorne floxe added to the same an eigth part of white ashes with a forth part of dry horse-dung All these wel beaten together with an yron rod. This is the right composition of Lutum Sapientiae There be that doe adde to this composition the poulder of brick and of the scales beaten from yron finely searsed And for the more conuenient drying of vessels so luted and fenced you shal bore certaine holes in a wodden forme into the which put the neckes of thy glasses that their bottomes and bodies may be dryed the better Another most excellent Lute for the like incloser is made of glasse and Vermilion of each like quantitie pouldred and searsed then incorporated with vernish and a little oyle of Linséede and making the whole like a soft poultesse which is to be spread on a fine linnen cloath wrap it about the mouth ioynts of the glasses and so suffer them to dry in the Sunne Which albeit it is a long worke yet it is most sure For this will serue against the strongest vapours that are Also to compound a Lute wherewith to make your Fornace that it may not riue or chap take chalke and potters clay and a quantity of sand wrought together with wollen 〈◊〉 and horse-dung incorporated as afore Thus courteous Reader I haue shewed thée such secrets in this Art as neither Quersitanus Isacus Hollandus nor any other Phylosopher haue before published in print to my knowledge but haue come to my hands in paper and parchment copies If thou be industruous doest tread the right Hermetical path thou shalt by the meanes of these helps so plainly set before thine eyes without Hieroglyphicks and Riddels to do thy selfe and thy countrey good Thus wishing to thée as to my selfe good successe in all thy godly indeuours I commend them and thée to the Lord. FINIS Genesis 1. 2. Eccle. 3. 19. Acts 17. 28. 1. Thess 5 23 Heb. 4. 12. Gen. 1. 16. Wisd 11. 17 2. Pet. 3. 10. 13. Apoc. 21. 5. Psal 14. 1. Rom. 1. 20. Col. 2. 8. Gen 30. 37. Iob. 9. 26. 28 37. 38. 39. 2. Cron. 9. 2 Mat 12 4. Eccle. 38. Luke 14. verse 5. Num. 11. 29. Lact. lib. de Ira Dei cap. 10. Plin. lib. 2. cap. 7. Sen. lib. 4 de benet cap. 7. Thomas lib 9 super 2. lib. de coelo Plato in Timaeo Gen. 1. Metaph. 5. Cap. 1. 1. Thes 5. 23. Heb. 4. 12. Lib. de remed 7. cap. 3 Lib. colleâ— 15. Lib. 2. de virtute simp medi. ad Eutrapi Tetr 1. serm 2. cap. 43. 4. 6. Ter. â— serm 1. cap 24. In lib. de metho meâ—â— cap. 9. Li. de medidica cap. 30. Ter. 1. Ser. 2. Cap. 156. Cap. 157. Cap. 161. Lib. 7. de re medica Coll lib. 15. The Heauen of Philosophers Venus and Mars are Copper and Iron The greene Lyon Sol and Lana Gold Siluer Lib de Aurora Lib. de sâ—â—â—â—bus Hip. lib. de Antiq maedicina All things naturally loue Salt Salt the Balsam of nature Salt hath life in it is animal Salt is also vegetal Salt the original matter of pearles and corall Salt the fier of nature The effects of Salt in the earth The effects of Salt in the aier Salts minerall Salts of diuers kinds Stirring waters Nature accordâ—â—h with nature Salt is fusible Salts may be extracted out of metalls A Figure of the Trinitie Phree distinct natures in Salt Two salts appeare in the 〈◊〉 of salt-peter Two flying parts of salt-peter Sulphur of Nature The Mercurial part of salt-peter The cause of ferment is sowernesse Vitriolis of the nature of Copper The spirit of Vitriol fixeth Mercurie Body soule and spirit A practise A good purgation of bad humours Gold tryumpheth in earth in aier and in fire The incorruptibilitie of gold maketh it the best Medicine to helpe a corruptible body The wonderful effects of potable gold Bathes and waters artificial The Chymical ministries Balsam is in euery thing The spirit of wine The Christal of Tartar The good effects of the spirit of wine B. M. signifieth Balneum â—arie A Balsam Radicaâ— Potable gold 1. Phlegme 2. Mercury 3. Sulphur 4. Salt Elements passiue Actiue Elâ—ments A Medicine particular and general 〈…〉 Crude wines breede the stone Helleborâ— poisonfull Transplanting of herbs helpeth their nature Obiection Answerâ— Galen Lib. 13. Method Syrach 38. 4 A Dissoluing water Copper is red without and greens within Narcotical is Stupefactiue Taste odour and colours Salt of 2. sorts Salt defined Salt and earth Sulphur and Fire Mercurie Ayre and Water Mercurie a moyst actiue Sulphur the meane to ioyne salt and Mercurie Three natures in one Salt causeth Vicers in the body Saltes of diuers sortes Mercurie is properly extracted from leaues Sulphur out of Seedes Salt out of wood and rootes A mixture of the 3. beginnings Salt the root of the other beginnings Bitter things doe purge Salt extracted out of bitter things Salt in vrinâ— Purgers Dissoluing liquors Dissoluing liquor Dissoluing spirits Obiection Answere The spirit of vitriol and his vertue A remedy against feauers Obiection A remedy to stoppe fluxes The fixing of quick-siluer Mercurie of the Phylosophers The right spirit of Vitriol good against the falling euil A remedy for Gangrena eating vlâ—ers Water for the Ophthalmie Water to ease the gout A remedy against obseruations and to breake the Stone Gangrena â—ured Causes of the Stonâ— Sal-Armoniac a coagulator and a dissotuer The cause of dogge-like appetite Choller rustie yeallow and greene The Philosophical cause of Meteors c. The cause of madnesse Phrensie and such like Salts of diuers kinds in mands body The stopping of the pores procureth sicknesse Spirit of wine The water of 2. degree Mercurie An Oyle Sulphur Fyer The Feces Salt Earth A most precious Elixir Hippocrates bagge is like the bagge where through Hypocras runneth
dissolue and to bring metallick bodies into waters as is knowne to euery one I say that by this dissolution we may beâ—â—ld the 〈◊〉 simpathy of these Salts with the metallick nature For because they are like they wil be wel mingled together conioyned and vnited dissoluing his like and associating himselfe to his like For strong waters doe neuer worke vpon wood or vpon any oâ—her matter which is not of metallick nature As it was most truly said of a certaine great Phylosopher Nature loueth her like and delighteth in her owne nature And by another wittily thus spoken Easie is the passage of things one into the other which are one in likenesse Sulphur and other things which are of an oyle like nature are sooner and better dissolued with oyles as with the oyles of Terebinth and of Flaxe or Linsede which is most swâ—â—te then with that great force and most violent sharpnesse of strong waters which are nothing else but the spirits of Salts and by consequent doe disagrée with Sulphur which is a beginning contrary to the said spirits Here iâ— offered large occasion of 〈…〉 iâ— time and place would serue but I omit it Let vs returne to our Salt the which if I shal shew that it may be moulten and dissolued no lesse then gold and siluer with the force of fire and being cold againe may be congealed into a masse as metalls be then no doubt it wil euidently appeare that Salt is of a meâ—allick nature And this I say is to be doâ—e not onely in Salt which is sound in mines and in caues of the earth but also in the very Salt of the Sea But for so much as the same is better knowne to them that haue but meane skil in metalls then that I shal néede at this time to spend much labour about it I cease to speake any word more thereof Hereby it doth appeare very euidently that this opioâ—e of Aristotle is false where he saith that cold dissolueth the things which are congealed with heate and that those things which are coagulated by cold are dissolued by heate The which notwithstanding we grant to be true on the one part for that wée knowe well that Salt which is coagulated or congealed by the heate of the Sunne is dissolued in cold water But it must bée confessed also to be true that Salt by the vehemencie of the heat of fier is to be dissolued moulten and made fluxible and to be cast into a moulten lumpe as easily as metalls be Moreouer Salts may be extracted out of all calcined metals which are to be dissolued filtred and coagulated after the same manner as are other salts whether they be common and not moulten or whether they be moulten by the force of heate For it is known to a Chymist of smal practise that out of one pound of calcined lead tenne or twelue ounces of Salt may be extracted All which things doe sufficiently demonstrate and proue that the nature of Salt is metallick and that therefore metall is nothing else but a certaine â—uâ—il Salt By that which hath bene spoken it may easily appeare how Salt is animal vegetal and mineral and that it agreeth with that which all the Phylosophers haue decréed with one consent concerning the matter and subiect of the vniuersal Medicine And hereunto tend all other signes whereby they describe their foresaid matter albeit most abscurely All which things to agrée with the nature of Saltâ— as that 〈◊〉 is of smal estimation that it is to be found in euery thing 〈…〉 our selues the which is most plaine for so much as there is nothing compounded in vniuersal world out of the which and at all times Salt cannot be extracted CHAP. II. The three principles of all things are contained in Salt extracted out of the earth BVt to shewe now more particularly those things whereof we haue spoken generally namely that Salt doe participate with the animal vegetal and mineral nature wée wil vse a common example the which notwithstanding being exactly and diligently waighed and considered by a true Phylosopher is a notable mistery The which albeit it bee taken from out of the earth yet it may lift vp our eyes to heauen I meane to speake of Niter which men commonly cal Salt-Peeter I let passe the detestable and pernicious vse thereof inuented for the destruction of men And yet I must confesse that it deserueth great admiration in that it sheweth forth so great and incredible effects when as we being in these lower parts it representeth thundrings and lightenings as if they were in the aire aloft But it we should consider what it is and of what quality in his owne nature and composition what diuers faculties and qualities and effects there are in a thing so vile and so common it would no doubt make vs to wonder out of measure Niter is made and compounded of earth his mother which bringeth forth the same or it is taken out of old rubbish grâ—unds or out of places where stables for beasts haue bene or out of such kind of groundes which haue bene replenished with salt liquor or with the vrine of beastes rather then out of a leane hungry land washed with raine or by some such like occasion depriued of that radical humour It is most plentifully extracted from the ground where doue-houses are seated and out of Pigeons dung and this is the best Niter of all others the which is worthy the noting Whereby it appeareth that Niter doth participate with the excrements and vrines of liuing creatures For vrines are nothing else but a superfluous seperation of the Salt of vegetables by which liuing creatures are nourished and doe liue Whereby it euidently appeare how the foresaid Salt doth in kind participate with the nature animal and vegetable For as touching that which pertaineth to the mineral it is not much pertinent to our purpose to speake thereof sauing that wée thinke good to adde thus much that it is extracted out of the earth which is the reason why it is called Salt-Péeter when as more properly it should be called the salt of the earth But let vs goe forward Nature ministereth matter to Art whereof Salt-Péeter is compounded Art cannot make by it selfe no more then nature can make Salt-Péeter-pure and seperated from all terrestrilie and heterogeneal or vnkindly substance For that it may produce the same effects which the other produceth it must be prepared by the industry of workemen For these make choyse of conuenient earth and out of fit places to them well knowne and being filtered or strained with hote common water againe and againe through the same earth as lyes are vsually made with ashes it commeth to passe that a saltnesse or brinish taste is mingled therewith which is proper to all salts Of the which like or water so distreined if two thirds or theraboutes be vapored away by séething at the fire and then let coole the salt will be thickened into an