124 DR. R. ANGUS SMITH ON THE 



obtain gold if there was gold in the sand ; and thus mercury 

 came to be associated with gold. It works wonders ; but 

 this^ also, is done by means of kemi (heat) . 



Take simple honey and add it to some plants, let it 

 stand, and then apply heat. "The tree of the philosophers 

 is extracted or drawn off in three ; but the wine thereof is 

 not perfected till at length thirty be completed.'^ 



" This is not water in its form, but fire, containing in a 

 strong and pure vessel the ascending waters, lest the 

 spirits should fly away from the bodies ; for by this means 

 they are made tinging and permanent or fixed.^^ " Look 

 into the sweetness of sugar, which is one kind of sweet 

 juice, and into the sweetness of honey, which is yet more 

 intense and inward. Except you make the bodies spiritual 

 and impalpable, you know not how to purify ixir or to 

 proceed in the work.'-' These isolated sentences from the 

 so-called Hermes point to fire and distillation; and I might 

 end with a saying quoted from Van Helmont * : — " Let 

 him who would learn buy coals and fire." 



Addendum I. 



It appears, then, that I go on a very dififerent track from 

 that followed by Prof. Gildemeister and Prof. Schorlemmer. 

 I leave the Arabs as too late to have an opinion ; and I can 

 easily imagine how a Pacha's mind could mix all the un- 

 certain ideas together and form some notion of a plant 

 called kimia which changed base metals into gold. I 

 consider the connexion with " moisture" (%v/i09) far-fetched, 

 and had never any confidence in it. If, however, %i'/io? 

 were considered rather in connexion with " pouring,'' it 

 would have more probability ; but then the original is p^ew, 

 " I pour," and the v is found only in compounds. 



* I have not the original beside me. 



