Alchemical Mass

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planets, and to pay attention to Saturn, which is the highest of all, and then is succeeded by Jupiter, next by Mars,
the Sun, Venus, Mercury, and, lastly, by the Moon. It must be observed that the influential virtues of the planets do
not ascend but descend, and experience teaches us that Mars can be easily converted into Venus, not Venus into
Mars, which is of a lower sphere. So, also, Jupiter can be easily transmuted into Mercury, because Jupiter is superior
to Mercury, the one being second after the firmament, the other second above the earth, and Saturn is highest of all,
while the Moon is lowest. The Sun enters into all, but it is never ameliorated by its inferiors. It is clear that there is a
large correspondence between Saturn and the Moon, in the middle of which is the Sun; but to all these changes the
Philosopher should strive to administer the Sun.
Q. When the Philosophers speak of gold and silver, from which they extract their matter, are we to suppose that they
refer to the vulgar gold and silver?
A. By no means; vulgar silver and gold are dead, while those of the Philosophers are full of life.
Q. What is the object of research among the Philosophers?
A. Proficiency in the art of perfecting what Nature has left imperfect in the mineral kingdom, and the attainment of
the treasure of the Philosophical Stone.
Q. What is this Stone?
A. The Stone is nothing else than the radical humidity of the elements, perfectly purified and educed into a
sovereign fixation, which causes it to perform such great things for health, life being resident exclusively in the
humid radical.
Q. In what does the secret of accomplishing this admirable work consist?
A. It consists in knowing how to educe from potentiality into activity the innate warmth, or the fire of Nature, which
is enclosed in the centre of the radical humidity.
Q. What are the precautions which must be made use of to guard against failure in the work?
A. Great pains must be taken to eliminate excrements from the matter, and to conserve nothing but the kernel, which
contains all the virtue of the compound.
Q. Why does this medicine heal every species of disease?
A. It is not on account of tile variety of its qualities, but simply because it powerfully fortifies the natural warmth,
which it gently stimulates, while other physics irritate it by too violent an action.
Q How can you demonstrate to me the truth of the art in the matter of the tincture?
A. Firstly, its truth is founded on the fact that the physical powder, being composed of the same substance as the
metals, namely, quicksilver, has the faculty of combining with these in fusion, one nature easily embracing another
which is like itself. Secondly, seeing that the imperfection of the base metals is owing to the crudeness of their
quicksilver, and to that alone, the physical powder, which is a ripe and decocted quicksilver, and, in itself a pure fire,
can easily communicate to them its own maturity, and can transmute them into its nature, after it has attracted their
crude humidity, that is to say, their quicksilver, which is the sole substance that transmutes them, the rest being
nothing but scoriae and excrements, which are rejected in projection.
Q. What road should the Philosopher follow that he may attain to the knowledge and execution of the physical
work?
A. That precisely which was followed by the Great Architect of the Universe in the creation of the world, by
observing how the chaos was evolved.
Q. What was the matter of the chaos?
A. It could be nothing else than a humid vapour, because water alone enters into all created substances, which all
finish in a strange term, this term being a proper subject for the impression of all forms.
Q. Give me an example to illustrate what you have just stated.
A. An example may be found in the special productions of composite substances, the seeds of which invariably
begin by resolving themselves into a certain humour, which is the chaos of the particular matter, whence issues, by a
kind of irradiation, the complete form of the plant. Moreover, it should be observed that Holy Scripture makes no
mention of anything except water as the material subject whereupon the Spirit of God brooded, nor of anything
except light as the universal form of things.
Q. What profit may the Philosopher derive from these considerations, and what should he especially remark in the
method of creation which was pursued by the Supreme Being?
A. In the first place he should observe the matter out of which the world was made; he will see that out of this
confused mass, the Sovereign Artist began by extracting light, that this light in the same moment dissolved the
darkness which covered the face of the earth, and that it served as the universal form of the matter. He will then
easily perceive that in the generation of all composite substances, a species of irradiation takes place, and a
separation of light and darkness, wherein Nature is an undeviating copyist of her Creator. The Philosopher will
equally understand after what manner, by the action of this light, the empyrean, or firmament which divides the
superior and inferior waters, was subsequently produced; how the sky was studded with luminous bodies; and how
the necessity for the moon arose, which was owing to the space intervening between the things above and the things
below; for the moon is an intermediate torch between the superior and the inferior worlds, receiving the celestial
influences and communicating them to the earth. Finally he will understand how the Creator, in the gathering of the
waters, produced dry land.
Q. How many heavens can you enumerate?
A. Properly there is one only, which is the firmament that divides the waters from the waters. Nevertheless, three are
admitted, of which the first is the space that is above the clouds. In this heaven the waters are rarefied, and fall upon
the fixed stars, and it is also in this space that the planets and wandering stars perform their revolutions. The second
heaven is the firmament of the fixed stars, while the third is the abode of the supercelestial waters.
Q. Why is the rarefaction of the waters confined to the first heaven?
A. Because it is in the nature of rarefied substances to ascend, and because God, in His eternal laws, has assigned its
proper sphere to everything.
Q. Why does each celestial body invariably revolve about an axis?
A. It is by reason of the primeval impetus which it received, and by virtue of the same law which will cause any
heavy substance suspended from a thread to turn with the same velocity, if the power which impels its motion be
always equal.
Q. Why do the superior waters never descend?
A. Because of their extreme rarefaction. It is for this reason that a skilled chemist can derive more profit from the
study of rarefaction than from any other science whatsoever.
Q. What is the matter of the firmament?
A. It is properly air, which is more suitable than water as a medium of light.
Q. After the separation of the waters from the dry earth, what was performed by the Creator to originate generation?
A. He created a certain light which was destined for this office; He placed it in the central fire, and moderated this
fire by the humidity of water and by the coldness of earth, so as to keep a check upon its energy and adapt it to His
design.
Q. What is the action of this central fire?
A. It continually operates upon the nearest humid matter, which it exalts into vapour; now this vapour is the mercury
of Nature and the first matter of the three kingdoms. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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