THEIR MYSTICISM. 321 



sible. But the mystical trains of association were 

 pursued much further than this; gold and silver 

 were held to be the most noble of metals; gold 

 was their King, and silver their Queen. Mytho- 

 logical associations were called in aid of these 

 fancies, as had been done in astrology. Gold was 

 Sol, the sun ; silver was Luna, the moon ; copper, 

 iron, tin, lead, were assigned to Venus, Mars, Ju- 

 piter, Saturn. The processes of mixture and heat 

 were spoken of as personal actions and relations, 

 struggles and victories. Some elements were con- 

 querors, some conquered ; there existed prepara- 

 tions which possessed the power of changing the 

 whole of a body into a substance of another kind : 

 these were called magisteries 22 . When gold and 

 quicksilver are combined, the king and the queen 

 are married, to produce children of their own 

 kind. It will easily be conceived, that when che- 

 mical operations were described in phraseology of 

 this sort, the enthusiasm of the fancy would be 

 added to that of the hopes, and observation would 

 not be permitted to correct the delusion, or to 

 suggest sounder and more rational views. 



The exaggeration of the vague notion of per- 

 fection and power in the object of the alchemist's 

 search, was carried further still. The same prepa- 

 ration which possessed the faculty of turning baser 

 metals into gold, was imagined to be also a uni- 

 versal medicine, to have the gift of curing or pre- 



28 Boyle, Thomson's Hist. Ch. i. 25. Carolus Musitanus. 

 VOL. I. Y 



