CQ0 philosophical transactions. [anno 1671. 



II. Joh. Joachimi Becheri * Spirensis Med. Doct. Experimentum Chymicum 

 Novum, quo Artificialis et Instantanea Metallorum Generatio et Transmutatio 

 ad oculum demonstratur. Francofurti, 1671, in 8vo. 



This tract was written by the author as a supplement to his Physica Subter^ 

 ranea, the first part of which was printed at Frankfort about two years since, 

 and which undertakes to explain both the abstruse generation of subterraneous 

 things, and the admirable fabric of the superterraneous and subterraneous com- 

 plex globe of earth, air and water : promising to deliver hereafter, in the se- 

 cond book, the particular nature of under ground bodies, and to teach the re-^ 

 solution of them into parts, and the proprieties of those parts ; together with 

 an appendix that shall contain a great number of chemical mixtures, never seen 

 before, and grounded upon numerous experiments. We cannot forbear giving 

 t,he reader one very considerable experiment, said to have been actually made 

 by the author himself, viz. 



Having a mind to melt a jasper, he put it into a crucible, and actually melted 

 it by an intense fire, and some other requisites necessary to the operation. 

 But to the end that no coals might fall into the paste, he covered and 

 luted the crucible, which was about half filled with jasper stone ; which 

 being now melted, he opened the crucible when cool, and, to his great 

 wonder, found at the bottom the jasper melted together into one mass, 



* Many of the circumstances in the Hfe of John Joachim Becher were remarkable. He was a 

 self-taught man, endued with a quick understanding and capable of great application ; but he was of 

 a haughty and violent temper, which proved a source of frequent vexation and disappointment. He 

 was born at Spire in l635. His parents having lost most of their property in the religious and po- 

 litical troubles with which Germany was at that time afflicted, he found himself under the necessity, 

 when he was only 13 years of age, of providing a subsistence not only for himself, but for his mo- 

 ther and two brothers also. This, by his talents and industry, he was able to eiFect. In l660he 

 obtained a medical professorship in tlie university of Mentz, and was moreover appointed physician 

 to the elector of that bishoprick. As his studies and writings had been directed to otlier subjects be- 

 sides medicine, he was recommended to the Emperor as councellor to the chamber of commerce at 

 Vienna, whither he removed in 1666, in consequence of his appointment to tliat office j but not 

 long afterwards disagreeing with some of his colleagues, they intrigued against him at the Imperial 

 court, and he found himself under the necessity of resigning this situation. He then removed to 

 other parts of Germany, and from thence to Holland ; from which country he proceeded in 168O to 

 England. Here he terminated a life of restlessness and disappointment in l682, when only 47 

 years of age. The catalogue of Becher's works on medical, chemical, mechanical, commercial and 

 philosophical subjects, is too extended for insertion here. He is said to have invented an universal 

 character, to have suggested an improved and easy method of teaching languages, and to have 

 thrown out many useful hints relative to metallurgy, mechanics and other arts. One of his tracts is 

 characteristic in many respects of the writer's eccentricity ; it is entitled Foolish Wisdom and Wise 

 Folly, and is a curious and entertaining miscellaneous performance, at that time much admired in Ger- 

 many j but the works by which this author acquired most of his celebrity, are his Institutiones Che- 

 micae and his Physica Subterranea. 



