TWO PSEUDO-SCIENCES 



one visited him save the elector himself. For some 

 time the elector tried by argument and persuasion to 

 penetrate his secret or to induce him to make a certain 

 quantity of gold; but as Seton steadily refused, the 

 rack was tried, and for several months he suffered tort- 

 ure, until finally, reduced to a mere skeleton, he was 

 rescued by a rival candidate of the elector, a Pole 

 named Michael Sendivogins, who drugged the guards. 

 However, before Seton could be "persuaded" by his 

 new captor, he died of his injuries. 



But Sendivogins was also ambitious in alchemy, and, 

 since Seton was beyond his reach, he took the next 

 best step and married his widow. From her, as the 

 story goes, he received an ounce of black powder 

 the veritable philosopher's stone. With this he manu- 

 factured great quantities of gold, even inviting Em- 

 peror Rudolf II. to see him work the miracle. That 

 monarch was so impressed that he caused a tablet to 

 be inserted in the wall of the room in which he had 

 seen the gold made. 



Sendivogins had learned discretion from the mis- 

 fortune of Seton, so that he took the precaution of 

 concealing most of the precious powder in a secret 

 chamber of his carriage when he travelled, having 

 only a small quantity carried by his steward in a gold 

 box. In particularly dangerous places, he is said to 

 have exchanged clothes with his coachman, mak- 

 ing the servant take his place in the carriage while he 

 mounted the box. 



About the middle of the seventeenth century alche- 

 my took such firm root in the religious field that it be- 



