177 



ALCHEMY. 



ALCHEMY. 



f the "Tractatus Aureiu' attributed to Hermes, with the works of 

 some other alchemists. The translation is accompanied with notes 

 which rival the original in absurdity. The word hermetic, still in 

 common use, is derived from Hermes. Geber, an Arabian physician 

 who lived in the 7th century, is one of the earliest alchemists 

 whose works are extant ; but some doubt of their genuineness is enter- 

 tained. Dr. Thomson (' History,' vol. i. p. 15) remarks, that though 

 the principles which lie at the bottom of alchemy were implicitly 

 adopted by him, he does not attempt to make gold artificially, nor 

 admit the possibility of converting the baser metals into gold. In 

 Dr. Salmon's work, however, the following passage occurs, trans- 

 lated from Geber'g ' Alchemy of Sol' : " Whatever metal is radically 

 citrine, and brings to equality and cleanses, it makes gold of it; 

 from whence we discern, that copper may be transmuted into gold by 

 artifice," 4c. 4c. 



Geber also treats of the Medicine, Tincture, Elijcir, or Stone of the 

 /'/,.'.,,,/, ,-s in, yenrral. Dr. Johnson supposes that the word ijibheridt , 

 anciently written i/rljcrisli, was originally applied to the language of 

 Geber and his tribe ; many of the quotations given by Salmon would 

 certainly justify the etymology. Although it is also apparent that 

 Geber was an alchemist in the most comprehensive sense of the word, 

 and although his works abound with the most absurd and mystical 

 phrases, yet his chemical labours were directed to the improvement of 

 medicine. He has also described and depicted various furnaces, 

 crucibles, alembics, aludels, and other useful chemical apparatus, of 

 which he was probably the inventor ; and he treats of distillation, sub- 

 limation, calcination, and various other chemical operations. 



Omitting any mention of less celebrated alchemists, we proceed to 

 notice Albert Groot, usually called Albertus Magnus, a German, who 

 was bom at Bollstaedt in 1282. He was acquainted with all the 

 sciences usually taught in that age, and his works were published at 

 Leyden in 1651, in twenty -one folio volumes, among which are seven 

 tracts on alchemy. According to Dr. Thomson, Albertus, in hi* 

 treatise ' De Alchemia,' gives an account of all chemical substances 

 known in his time ; was well acquainted with chemical apparatus, and 

 with the methods of purifying the precious metals. He imagined that 

 tli" metals were composed of mercury and sulphur, and accounts for 

 the diversity of them, by the difference in the proportion of their 

 nentsand their purity. His writings are in general plain and 

 intelligible. Thomas Aquinas is asserted to have been the pupil of 

 Albert ; he wrote three works on alchemy which are said to be always 

 obscure, and often unintelligible; the word amalyam, signifying a 

 compound of mercury and another metal, occurs, and probably for the 

 first time, in his writings ; which contain also some other terms still 

 used in chemistry. 



The alchemist next to be mentioned is Raymond Lully, who 

 was born at Majorca in 1235. He was a very singular person; 

 he travelled to various kingdoms to preach Christianity, and died 

 in 1315, on his passage from Africa, where he had been on this 

 service. 



Lully is stated to have been the scholar and the friend of Koger 

 Bacon ; his reputation as an alchemist was very high, and his works, 

 which are generally obscure, amount to nineteen. He obtained nitric 

 acid by distilling a mixture of nitre and sulphate of iron, observed its 

 power of acting upon metals generally, and of dissolving gold when 

 mixed with sal-ammoniac. He appears also to have known various 

 other chemical compounds, and their action upon each other. 



Roger Bacon, frequently called Friar Bacon, a Franciscan monk, was 

 born at Ilchester, in Somersetshire, in 1214. Notwithstanding the great 

 learning and scientific acquirements of Bacon, he was deeply imbued with 

 the mystery of alchemy : this is the more remarkable, because he ex- 

 poses the absurdity of believing in magic, necromancy, or charms. 

 His chemical and alchemical writings amount to eighteen, a list of 

 which may ! ^en in Dr. Thomson's ' History of Chemistry,' vol. i. 

 p. 35. Bacon appears to have been acquainted with the composition 

 "t" gunpowder, and by some he is thought to be the inventor of it. It 

 was, however, probably introduced into Spain by the Moors; and 

 Bacon, from his acquaintance with Arabic, might have acquired in- 

 formation of its composition from some writing in that language. 

 Bacon has hinted at his knowledge of the ingredients of gunpowder, 

 Epistola de Secretis Operibus Artis et Naturso et de Nullitate 

 Magia;,' in the following enigmatical sentence : " Sed tamen salis petne 

 LURU. VOPO. Vir Can Vtriet sulphuris ; et sic facias touitrum et corns- 

 cation^m, si scias artificium.' Saltpetre and sulphur being distinctly 

 I , we have only to suppose charcoal to be concealed under the 

 enigmatical terms quoted, and then all the substances contained in 

 gunpowder are mentioned as capable of producing thunder and lightning 

 when properly used. 



It i not to be wondered at, in a barbarous age, that one who was 

 ildHad in so many sciences should be accused of witchcraft; we 

 accordingly find, that Bacon was imprisoned on this charge, and 

 narrowly escaped starvation, or being burnt as a magician. The real 

 ground of hi.n o'lence appears to have been his exposure of the immo- 

 rality of the priesthood. He died either in 1284 or 1285 ; his ' Opus 

 Majus,' edited by Dr. Jebb in 1733, and the ' Epistola, 1 already quoted, 

 are the works of this author most worthy of perusal. In the list of 

 Bacon's works already referred to, there are several professedly on 

 ny. Dr. Salmon has translated one which is not among them, 



ARTS AND SCI. DIV. VOL. I. 



called ' Radix Mundi ; ' another work on alchemy, called ' Speculum 

 Alchemiip,' mentioned in the list above referred to, is also translated 

 by Dr. Salmon. 



Amoldus de Villa Nova was not only an alchemist, but an astrologer 

 and magician. He is said to have been born, in 1240, at Villeneuve, a 

 village of Provence : he was educated at Barcelona, which place he 

 was obliged to leave, in consequence of foretelling the death of Peter of 

 Aragon. When he left Barcelona, he went to Paris, and travelled 

 through Italy ; and afterwards taught in the university of Montpelier. 

 He acquired high reputation as a physician ; and was well skilled hi 

 several languages and in the sciences of his time. 



He wrote about twenty different works, some of which are pro- 

 fessedly on alchemy : the book entitled ' Rosarium ' is probably the, 

 most curious, it being intended as a compendium of the alchemy of 

 the day. The second part of this work, which professes to treat of the 

 art of making the philosophers' stone, is stated to be quite unintel- 

 ligible. Like his predecessors, he considered mercury as a constituent 

 of metals ; and professed that he could increase the pliilosphers' stone 

 at pleasure. He died in the year 1313, on his way to visit Pope 

 Clement V., who lay sick at Avignon. 



Raymond Lully and Arnoldus de Villa Nova are stilted to have 

 inspired men of all ranks with a taste for alchemy. Pope John XXII. 

 was one of them ; he professed and described the art of transmuting 

 metals ; and boasts, in the beginning of his book, that he had made 

 200 ingots of gold, each weighing a hundred pounds. 



The 14th century produced a considerable number of alchemists, 

 as Nicolas Flammel, Pierre le Bon of Lombardy, the monk Ferrari in 

 Italy, Cremer, abbot of Westminster, the disciple and friend of Lully, 

 John Daustein and Richard, in England, practised and wrote upon 

 hermetic philosophy. The work attributed to Flammel is generally 

 reckoned spurious. The 15th century was more productive in adepts, 

 even than the preceding. About 1408 flourished John Isaac Hollandus, 

 and his countryman of the same name, who were either brothers or a 

 father and son. They were bom in the village of Stolk, in Holland. 

 Few circumstances are known respecting them. They wrote several 

 treatises on chemistry, which are remarkable for clearness and pre- 

 cision, considering the time at which they appeared. In the opinion of 

 Boerhaave, they were very distinguished chemists. Paracelsus and, sub- 

 sequently, Boyle repeated many of the experiments contained in their 

 works ; they related", however, principally to the transmutation of metals. 

 In this century was born George Ripley, who' was canon of Bridlington, 

 in Yorkshire : he published a work, called ' Medulla Alchymiie,' which 

 is translated by Dr. Salmon, in his ' Clavis.' This work is replete 

 with the same sort of unintelligible jargon which usually abounds in 

 such productions. He wrote another work, in rugged rhyme, called 

 the ' Compound of Alchemic,' which was dedicated to Edward the 

 Fourth. 



Basil Valentine, a Benedictine monk, of Erfurt, in Germany, was 

 born at the latter end of the 14th century ; and, with the exception 

 of -Paracelsus, he was, perhaps, the most famous professor of the 

 hermetic philosophy : but he possessed, at the same time, very con- 

 siderable merit as a chemical experimenter, and was much occupied 

 in the preparation of chemical medicines. He first introduced anti- 

 mony into medicine : his work on this subject is entitled ' Triuinph- 

 wagen Antimonii,' which was translated from the German into Latin, 

 under the title of ' Currus Triumphalis Autimouii,' by Kerkringius, in 

 1671. In this book he strongly advocates the chemical sect; and 

 treats the practice and theories of his opponents with great severity, 

 because they are unable to prepare their own medicines ; " They 

 know not whether they be hot or dry, black or white ; they only know 

 them as written in their books, and seek after nothing but money. 

 Labour is tedious to them, and they commit all to chance ; they have 

 no consciences, and coal are outlandish wares with them ; they writs 

 long scrolls of prescription*, and the apothecary thumps their medicine 

 in his mortar, and health out of the patient." 



Basil Valentine was of opinion that the metals are compounds of salt, 

 sulphur, and mercury, and that the philosophers' stone was composed 

 of the same ingredients. He was acquainted with many of the pro- 

 perties of several metals, and with the effects they were capable of 

 producing by their chemical agency. He was, however, more parti- 

 cularly informed with respect to antimony, and knew most of the 

 preparations of it which at present exist in the pharmacopoeias of 

 Europe. Twenty-three different publications have been ascribed to 

 Basil Valentine, but it is uncertain how many of them were written by 

 him. His works contain the first accurate mention of the nitric, 

 hydrochloric, and sulphuric acids, with intelligible directions for pre- 

 paring them ; and he was acquainted with a very considerable number 

 of metallic salts and compounds. 



We have now mentioned the principal writers on alchemy. There 

 arose, however, from time to time, various authors, who appear to have 

 been rather believers in the possibility of the transmutation of metals 

 than pretenders to have accomplished it. A list of alchemists, from 

 Hermes, who is represented as having flourished nearly 2000 years 

 before the Christian era, down to Mathieu Dammy, in 1739, may be 

 seen in the ' Encyclopddie Methodique : ' it is copied from Dufrenoy's 

 ' Histoire do la Philosophic Herme'tiquc.' This list contains names 

 which are more familiar as chemists than as adepts ; sucu, for example, 

 as Paracelsus (who applied the philosophers' stone, not to the making 



