1 879.] 
and Perpetual Lamps . 
7i 7 
write works on theology, history, philosophy, and alchemy — 
gives two receipts for making the inexhaustible oil : one of 
these reads as follows : — 
“ Mix four ounces of sulphur and four ounces of alum, 
sublime them, and convert them into flowers. Take two 
and one-half ounces of these flowers, with half an ounce of 
borax and Venetian crystal, and pulverise the whole in a 
glass mortar. Put the powder into a phial, and, having 
poured into it spirit of wine four times rectified, cause it to 
digest. Pour off the spirit of wine, and, having added some 
new, repeat the operation three or four times, until the sul- 
phur runs on hot plates of brass without smoke, like wax. 
You must then prepare a proper wick, which maybe done in 
the following manner : take filaments of mineral flax of the 
length of the finger, form them into a packet half as thick 
as the finger, and tie them with a white silk thread. The 
wick being thus arranged, cover it with the sulphur prepared 
as before described, and immerse it in the sulphur in a vessel 
of Venetian glass. Place the whole upon a sand-bath for 
twenty-four hours, so that you may always see the sulphur 
boil, and the wick being by these means well penetrated and 
impregnated with that aliment, put it into a small glass with 
a wide mouth. Then fill this vessel with the prepared sul- 
phur and place it in warm sand, that the sulphur may melt 
and surround the wick. If it be then kindled it will burn 
with a perpetual flame.”* 
It is hardly necessary to add that the process, described 
with so much care, would prove very unsatisfactory to any 
curious investigator. 
The alchemists also claimed that an inconsumable oil 
could be obtained by treating gold with oil of vitriol, and 
they called the produdt oleum vitrioli aurificatum. Other 
receipts are given by the Jesuit Athanasius Kircher, and 
will be found by the curious in his “ Mundus Subter- 
raneus.” t 
The belief in perpetual lamps was sustained and diffused 
by the publication of many legends, which appear to have 
been freely accepted by a credulous people, notwithstanding 
their highly improbable character and the slender basis of 
truth on which they were founded. One of the most famous 
and oft-quoted legends establishing this superstitious belief 
was that of the tomb of Tulliola. In the pontificate of 
Paul III. (1534 — 1549), the same who convoked the Council 
of Trent, a tomb was opened, at Rome, which contained the 
* Trithemius, Tradatus de Lapide Philosophorum. 1611, 8vo. 
f Vol. ii., Lib. 8, Sed. 3, De Asbesto, &c. 
2Z 2 
