THE ALCHEMICAL STUDIES OF SCOT 77 



treatises, containing some forty or fifty articles 

 apiece, which were arranged and copied out at 

 the beginning of the fourteenth century. These 

 volumes became, after the invention of printing, 

 the chief quarry whence were composed the Ay^s 

 Aurifera ; the Theatrum Chemicum of Zetzner, and 

 the Bihliotheca of Manget. 



We are now in a position to understand, not 

 only the nature and progress of the work in which 

 Michael Scot took part, but the exact development 

 which alchemy had reached in his day, and there- 

 fore the relation which his chemical publications 

 bore to the general direction of study in this 

 department of science. The time and care which 

 our survey of the field has demanded need not 

 be thought ill spent. It has prepared the way for 

 a more intelligent appreciation of Scot's labours as 

 a chemist, and has furnished us with the means 

 of coming to a true judgment regarding their 

 authenticity and value. 



To put the matter to the proof: we may begin 

 by dismissing altogether from consideration a 

 treatise which has long been attributed to Scot, 

 and still appears in the most recent list of his 

 works : the Quaestio curiosa de natura Solis et 

 Lunae. It has probably received more attention 

 than it deserves since it appeared under Scot's 

 name in the Theatrum Chemicum.^ The subject 



^ In the editions of 1622 and 1659, Argentorati. It has been stated 

 that the Quaestio Curiosa is a chapter taken from the Liber Intro- 

 dudorius of Michael Scot. The alternative title of that work, Judicia 

 Quaestionum would seem to favour this idea, and may in fact have 

 suggested it. But an examination of the Liber Introdudorius (ms. Bodl. 

 266), which I have caused to be made, proves that the statement referred 

 to is without foundation. It was advanced in a paper read before the 

 Scottish Society of Antiquaries by Mr. John Small, and printed in their 

 Proceedings, vol. xi. p. 179. 



