94 THE HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY, 



tury; 'comprehending in all about a thoufand 

 years. In the year 1651 the Academy del Ci- 

 mcnto was founded at Florence; in 1660 

 Charles II. cflabliJhed the Royal Society of 

 London. The Academy of Inquirers into the 

 works of nature, in 1664, and the Academy of 

 Sciences, in 1666, botharofc at Paris under the 

 aufpices of Lewis XIV. From the dark obfcu- 

 rity in which the hiilory of chemiflry remained 

 buried during all this interval, we 'arc naturally 

 led to compare it with the civil hiilory of the 

 fame time, and perhaps to allign to it fimilar 

 features : And, indeed, the circumilances to be 

 related in the following pages will fully explain 

 the character of this period, and furnifh fuflici- 

 ent reafon to call it by the name of Hermetic 

 or Alchemiftic. 



At the firll view, we find the political con- 

 ilitutioa of thofe countries where chcmiilry re-" 

 ccived its earlielt growth, in a flate of the great- 

 eft barbarifm. The inhabitants of Arabia Felix 

 whom Ptolemy long ago calls Saracens *, were 

 for many ages fubject mollly to the Roman au- 

 thority, and i'erved occasionally as mercenaries 

 in the armies of that empire. But about the 

 beginning of the fcvcnth century, under the 

 reign of the Emperor Heraclius, they overran 

 Egypt, which they had been threatening with 

 an invafion for three years. A fliort time be- 

 fore 

 * 



* Ccogr. vi. 7. 



