turning it on the Earth again till the Earth putrefie and be cleare again is the Summe of our magistery And when the Philosophers saw their Water diminished and their Earth increased they called it Ceration Then when all became Earth they called their Work Congelation and when White Calcination Monachus ex manuscripto vetustiss Dissolution begets blacknesse Reduction Whitenesse Fixion Citrinity Inceration Rednesse Blacknesse is the Earth Whitenesse the Water Citrinity the Ayre Rednesse the fire Anonymus Solution turnes the Stone into its Materia prima that is into Water Ablution into Ayre Conjunction into fire Fixion into Earth Spiritual and Tingent Scala Philosoph Putrefaction is made by a most Gentle fire hot and moyst and no other so that nothing Ascend Desponsation and Conception is made by a kind putridnesse in the Bottom of the vessell Rosarium pag. 198. Burn with Water wash with Fire Idem ibidem Labour not to make thy Mercury Diaphan that is into a cleare Transparent Water for so it is too highly Inflamed and Irrestrinctible and will never be fixt never congealed Aureola When we Dissolve without any Intervall we Calcine Sublime Seperate Compound and between Solution and Composition of the body and Spirit there intervenes no space of Time Alphid Arabs The Watering of Pegasus at his own Fountain and of his Other food out of the Ayre and Earth ECHO VI. WIth the Water of Paradise bedew the Earth now clarified and that Water will again Ascend to heaven and Descend againe to the Earth to make it fertil and bring forth White Citrine and Flamye Red flowers Isaac Flander Cibation is the Nutrition of our Materia Sicca with milk and meate both moderately given till it be brought to the third order Ripleus Aglus Our Great businesse is to make the Body a spirit and the Spirit a body But it is True That if the Summe of the volatil exceed and Subdue the Summe of the fixt it will finally be turned into a Spiritual body White or Red Rosarius Minor The Earth does not Germinate without frequent Irrigation nor receive Irrigation without Desiccation Therefore at every Turn after desiccation powre Water on it temperatly neither too much nor too litle If too much it will be a Sea of Conturbation If too little all is burnt to a light Cindar Daustricus pag. 25. Our divine Water the Spume of Silver mingled with Magnesia rids away the Darke Umbra of the body Democritus Apud Flamellum The Dragon born in Darknesse is fed with his owne Mercury submerged in it and then a little dealbated by it Keep a soft fire till there be patience betwen Water and Fire and till the Spirit and Body become one Monachus pag. 14. See that thou water it temperatly for if it abound it will be a Sea and if there want a Combustion will be made Desiderabile As in this work in its first Composition nothing that is extraneous to its Nature enters So neither does any thing Multiply it that is not of its first Disposition Trevisanus The Magistery of the Philosophers does not need a Commistion of any extraneous thing but out of the proper seed metallic cast into Philosophicall earth prepared it produces a Stone infinitely multiplicable if it be nourisht with its owne menstrnum or humor Connatural and be excited by the heat of the Philosophers Sun from its Potentia into Act. Theobaldus Hoghelandus Take the quantity know the weight of it and add to it as much of the humidity as it can drink of which humidity we have not the pondus determinate Calrd Aegyptius The Time of every Imbibition to its Exsiccation is Twenty or Thirty Natural dayes Clangor Buccinae IGNIS MAGORVM The Philosophers Fire ECHO VII OUr fire is Mineral Equall Continuall it vapors not unlesse excited too much it partakes of Sulphur it is taken from some other Thing than the Materia it breaks down all before it Dissolves Congeales and Calcines That Fire with a Fire Remisse perfects the whole work and makes all the right Sublimations Pontanus pag. 75. uti et in Epistola The Fire against Nature must torment the bodyes That is the Dragon burning violently like fire of hell Ripleus All along the fire must be gentle till the Water be congealed in Whitenesse A stronger heat given the Mercury flyes the fire by reason of its Frigiditie Therefore keep thy fire soft till thou hast a white Congelation Benedictus By a Temperate fire a little quantity of the Drie Desiccates ethe moyst and this by little and little and not suddainly And by how much the Stone has more of the Ablution so much the more Intense is the whitenesse Scotus de Bufone The fire of the first Degree that is of Solution and Putrefaction ought to be so weak that Nothing Ascend of the Nature to be Sublimed and so a gentle fire gives Mercury Ingresse into the body when with a strong one all is destroyed Saturninus pag. 71. The heat Dealbant must not be too much else all is gone But understand this of the first White after Nutrition Anonym Make thy Contritions with fire not with thy hands Argent vive is fierie and burns the bodyes more then fire whatever Metallic body is joyned to it it slayes it and brings it down to dust Synodus Pythagorica Although we alwayes speak of Slow-fire yet in earnest we think that in the Government of the work by little and little and at Turnes the fire to the End is to be Augmented Bacho Spec. Alchym cap. 4. There are onely Two fires found in the books of the Philosophers The one dry the other moyst The Dry is the Elemental The moyst is Mercury Alanus Niger As oft as occasion shall require heat and cool moysten and desiccate thy Earth and there is no Error So oft as thy vessels are broke thy matter must cool to be reposed in a like vessell and put again to the fire Greverius Sacerdos The Philosophers vessel The Cone or Oval The Colours of the Chao's Transienr and Critical ECHO VIII THE vessel must be Glasse and Round with a long Neck firmly Sealed on the Top and is to be Enclosed with another Vessel that the heat enter not the matter immediately and so the Digestion is in a Triple vessel Liber Trium Verborum pag. 49. Put thy Amalgam carefully into a Glasse-vessel of such a capacity that thy Earth that is sown and harrowed may take up only the Third part of it the other two left vacant Close up the orifice with the wisest Lute Jodoc Grever Set one halfe of the round of the Vessel into Ashes the other beare above that thou mayst look at pleasure upon the work Alanus The vessels are Glasse wide below terminating in an Acute like the figure called a Cone Vogelius Think not That the Philosophers lye when they say The whole Magistery is perfected in one only vessel when thou hearest them say so think presently of the Species of the vessel not
1. Manuser vetustiss Our Stone is the potentiall vapor of Metal and how to get this thou must be very carefull and wary Aegidius de Vadis Our Water is a lustral or expiaring essence and the cause efficient of the clarity of the whole body and med cine Two things it works in the earth It washes it It tinges it As it washes it is Water as it tinges it is Ayre Ludus puerorum The ancients call'd our Argentvive Aqua Sicca Dry water Tauladan It is apparent what that Argent vive is that Geber points at in his Summa to be taken namely the Cleane substance of fixt Mercury shut up in Sol and Luna Idem pag 193. Argent vive in its first root is compounded of white earth subtile and sulphureous strongly mingled with a bright and clear water united with such an union per minima till the moyst be tempered with the drie and the drie with the moyst equally into one Intimate substance that will not rest on a plain Surface nor adhere to the Tangent because of its Siccity which has altered and cohibited the Aqueity in it But it is homogeneous in its nature for it either remains all in the fire and fixt or else all flyes away in fume because it is Incombustible and Aereal And this is a signe of perfection Richardus Anglicus Philosoph Vetustus Mercurius crudus Mercury crude dissolves bodyes and reduces them to their Materia prima but the Mercurius corporum the Mercurie of Bodyes cannot do it Holcot Anglus The Mercury of the Philosophers is compounded of Mercury Crude and the Mercury of Bodyes by an Union Intimate and Inseperable as there is in Simple water mixt with Simple water Libanius Gallus apud Trithemium By a Lucid Key he opened secret places otherwise inaccessible and within was great store of Siver and Gold 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mercurius Antiquoruum apud Homerum The Names of the Materia to the Magical practice Echo II. WHen our materialls are Amalgamated that Amalgam to conceale it from the unworthy is call'd by Philosophers our Venus our Gold The earth of Magnesia the whole Compound Jodocus Greverius pag. 21. I tell thee that our Semen is the true Salamander conceived by fire nursed by fire and perfected by fire Idem pag. 36. The matter which we need to our worke is not the Hyle or the Chaos but the Materia prima propinqua The first matter in a propinquity that is the second which in Animals is Sperm in vegetals Seed in minerals Sulphur and Argent vive Ripleus Anglus Sendivogius Polonus Sulphur perfectly clarified and dealbate Philosophers call Their foliated Earth Vogelius manuscriptus The work yet Crude is call'd our Argent vive water permanent Our Lead Our Saturn the spittle of Luna our Jupiter When better decocted then it is Argent then Magnesia and white Sulphur When it is Red it 's call'd Auripigment Corall Gold Ferment a Stone a Lucid Water of celestiall colour Adeptus Anonymus Desiderabile c. Magnesia is That whole mixture from whence is drawn our humidity call'd Argent vive Ludus puerorum p 136. The Dragon is the Sulphur that is Extracted from the Bodyes by the Magistery Nich Flamellus Annot. in Democritum The liquor of Lunary the vegetable Mercury the quintessence and water Ardent are all one thing With our liquor of Lunary known but to few is our Solution made and our potable Gold but without it not at all Rosarium Philosoph p 173. Trouble not yourselves about the diversity of names and the regiment of the work for if we would make Sol we must take Sol if Luna Luna for our Ferment Dastinus pag 30. Our Black Materia dealbated is called the Terra Foliata Ashes of Ashes ferment of ferment and white Sulphur enduring the fire and yet without Ferment neither Sol nor Luna will come forth but somwhat that 's as good as nothing Lib duorum verborum p. 47. Our Stone in the beginning is called water when the body is dissolved Ayre or Wind when it tends to consolidation then it is named Earth and when it is perfect and fixt it is called Fire Dominus Vobiscum p. 54. Argent Vive is called Wind that is Aereal Argent Vive the strongest vinegar poyson Tingent Virgins Milk Burning fire burning worse than the fire of Hell Incertus Author The Sone is called Adrop that is Saturnus because as Saturn is the chiefest of the Planets So our mercuriall Saturnine Stone is the highest and most pretious of Stones Saturninus Our compound is called by Philosophers White Earth when it is white and Red when it is Red. Scotus de Bufone When our limous earth is whitened we call it yharit that is Silver and when it is made red we call it Temeinchum that is Gold And it is whitenesse that tinges Venus and makes it Yharit and that rednesse that tinges Yharit and makes it Temeinchum that is Gold Calid Egyptius Philosophus nobilis Our matter is call'd the elementall Stone because the four elements are extracted from it The mineral Stone because it is made only of mineralls The vegetable Stone because it is nourisht and augmented which are the properties of the vegetative Soul The Animal Stone because it is refresht with sweet odors and corrupted with stinking Scotus de Bufone Our Stone is called Adrop that is Saturn Speculum Arnaldi Our Stone after its putrefaction is called Magnesia and in the putrefaction it is called Saturnus Idem ibidem All the metalls when they are prepared by Art then they are call'd Sol Luna Mercurius c. For before they were onely Gold Silver and Quicksilver Marcilius Ficinus The Incombustible Grain of metalls is their radicall humidity and is as a certain Seed of Sol and Luna which nature has inserted to them that upon opportunity they may be Excocted to Sol and Luna by Nature in a long by Art in a very short Time Vogelius Azot is a fift Essence a body of itself Subsistent differing from all the Elements and all the Elementals both in Matter and Form Nature and Virtue having nothing of the Corruptible and it is called a fift Essence because it is Extracted from four and has in it no Elemental motion as other Elemental bodyes Tinging and purisying metallic bodyes by its Colour and Keeping from Corruption all other Bodyes that are joyn'd with it Incertus Author Terra Alba White Earth White Sulphur White Fume Auripigment Magnesia and Ethel signifie the same in this Art Tertia Synodus Pythagorica Manuscripta No way but one to the Sulphur of Nature Echo III. NEmo habet in Sulphure nisi Unum Iter. No road but one to find the quick Sulphur David Arabs Thou needest but one thing namely Water and one operation to wit Decoction to White and Red in one vessell understand of one kind Alphid Arabs Although the wise men have varied names and perplext their sayings yet they allwayes would have
us think but of One Thing one Disposition one Way The wisemen know this one thing and that it is one they have often proved Morienus Eremita Hrerosolymitanus In a multiplicity of things our art is not perfected For it is one stone one med'cin in which consists the whole magistery to which we add nothing extraneous nor take away any thing but only in our preparation that that is superfluous Idem Eremita White and Red proceed from The same Root without any other Kind intervenient For it dissolves and conjoyns It selfe makes it selfe Black and Citrine white and red espouses Itselfe conceives brings forth and does all to the perfect end Rhasis Arabs Et Idem Haly. If you Govern Our Brasse Our Venus with Our Water then you shall find all that is said otherwise you doe nothing Turba Philosoph There is noway for the Rectifying of Bodies intirely and compleately without our Tincture which is a Clean Seed and has upon it the blessing of multiplication from Heaven Aurora Our water Gilded with Solar Sulphur is the Secret of the Aegyptians Chaldeans Arabians Persians and Greeks Hallelujah per Anonymum The Number of the Components of the Magical Stone ECHO IV. OF Sol and Luna thou mayst make the perfect med'cin without Separation of the Elements without labour without fear without danger they need a long time but they are safe Isaacus Flander lib. 2. mineral The Ancients labour'd in the Almagamation of Sol Luna which is indeed the most perfect worke and the Care little Idem ibidem Mercury alone perfects the works in it we find all that we need to it we adde nothing extraneous Sol and Luna are not Extraneous to one another because they in the beginning of the work are reduced into their first Nature that is Mercury therefore from It they took their beginning Divus Thom Aquinas cap 3. Wherefore I counsell you my friends that you work not on any thing but Sol and Luna reducing them into their first matter that is Our Sulphur and Argent vive Lullii Codicillus Of Sol vulgar Luna vulgar both Solute there is a preparation of Mercury vulgar Of those Three without any other Species the Physic-Stone is generated and of no other can it be made by the Wit of Nature Incertus Incipiens Desidrrabile The difference betwixt the Solar and the Lunar Tincture is This The Solar contains Solar Sulphur The Lunar Lunar Sulphur Albertus Magnus The Stone is one Yet This one is not one in Number but in kind Scala Philosoph Rebis is the first part of the work Elixir the Second Tincture the Third and Medicin the fourth Therefore it appears That to Azoth Elixir is required because Elixir in this work precedes Azoth For from Elixir Azoth is extracted But Azoth is that which is extracted by our Mercury from the bodyes dissolved and That is counted the Maturer Desiderabile 169. Elixir is no other then the body resolved into Mercurial Water after which resolution Azoth is extracted out of it that is a Spirituous Animated Essence Idem In one Thing for speices and Two Individuals It consists and is perfected first to White then to Red finally by increasing the the fire Petrus Valentiae In the first Regimen set the Crude and pure Elements upon an Easie fire that they may be mingled and joyn'd together govern them so that they may be desiccate or dried and all be black from which blacknesse an Occult Whitnesse is drawn afterwards a Redness by decoction And when it is in the perfect White it is in Dust Impalpable Zininus p. 68. The Generation of Metalls and the Philosophers stone is to conjoyn proper principles videlicet Man with Woman Active with a Pssive Sulphur with Mercury that so Generation may ensue Corruption Argent Vive is the Recipient of the Form and Gold the very Philosophers Stone Saturninus pag 71. The whole work consists in Sol Luna and Mercury Tersim pagin 103. Gold and Silver are Metalls out of which the Golden and Silver Elixirs are made Tauladan Pag. 184. Tinge with Gold and Silver because Gold gives the Golden and Silver the Silver Nature and Colour Richardus Anglicus It is necessary that the Stone before it be made Elixir be extracted from the Nature of Two bodyes Monachus The fire ought to be very soft till the Spirit be separated from the Body ascending into black clouds above the body By a Spirit Crude a spirit Digested is Extracted from the body dissolved Idem pag. 167. Take the Stone Suspended upon the Sea his name is Victor with him slay the living and enliven the slain for in his power are Death and Life Incognitus qui incipit Exemplum Scientiae Our Mercury is drawn from the Calx of Metalls by putrefaction till the Compound put off one nature and put on another And so by such Operations is made the Mercury of the Philosophers Jacobus de Sancto Saturnino The Operations of Art in her Ministery and Attendance to Nature ECHO V. NAture begins all her Actions from Seperation Mortification is the first step to Separation and the only way to that End for as long as Bodies remain in their old Origin Separation without putrefaction or mortification cannot reach them Anonymus Adeptus Amalgama which is the first Work is made with one of Sol and four of Mercury And this beginning of the Work the Philosophers have called by many names Our Venus Our Gold The Earth of Magnesia The whole Compound Jodocus Greverius In the first Decoction when thou art blacking there will rise from the Earth a certain humidity of Argent vive like a Cloud and will stick to the upper part of thy vacant Oval by its sides which thou must let alone untoucht Idem Blacknesse like that of the blackest Coal is the Secret of True Dissolution Raym. Lullius in Claviculâ Turne thy clouds into raine to water thy Earth and make it fruitful This Reduction of clouds into raine is called by some Cauda Draconis The Dragons Taile and others say that new Mercury is to be added Idem Greverius pag. 22. The bodyes are first to be Subtiliated by Dissolution which is the first Degree of the Work And this Dissolution is nothing else but that bodyes be return'd into Mercury and Sulphur from whence they took their Original But no other body can be resolved into Mercury but a Metallic consisting of Mercury and Sulphur The Spirit of Metalls is part of Our Stone and That we must evacuate from the bodys of metalls namely from the two perfect by putrefaction division of Elements and their fixation Raym. Lullius When the matter Ascends by Wind that is by fume the Philosophers call it Sublimation when it is cast into the bottom of the vessel and Converted into Water they call it Solution or Distillation When the Earth is Inspissate they say it is Corruption and when it begins to change from black they call it Ablution Extraction of Water from the Earth and
cannot hold from telling you plainly that Basil speakes of the vulgar Saturn and vulgar Jupiter both of which while they still remain in their own minera are of a higher consideration virtue and force and to That purpose in his Triumphal Chariot of Antimony where he speaks of the fixation of vulgar mercury he has these words page 87. Mercury can be brought to no Coagulation unlesse there be an addition to it of the other metallic Spirits and that Coagulation is most efficaciously and most powerfully of all effused in the mother of Saturn without which it cannot be done unlesse thou hast the Philosophers Stone itselfe And so again of Saturn in his book of Natural and Supernatural Things cap. 9. pag. 121. Every man is to know and think upon it That no Transmutation of metal can be had out of Saturn because of his most excessive Cold except onely the Coagulation of the common mercury because the Cold Sulphur of Lead can stop and tame the current vagrant hot spirit of Mercury and take it away if the processe be rightly instituted And to these a little after he subjoynes Wherefore see thou do not reject Saturn or look scornfully upon it to fling it behind thee for indeed his nature and virtue is yet known but to a few and it is from this Saturn that the True and great Stone takes the Initials of its Celestial flagrant colour it is from this metal and this alone and by the Influence of this Planet is given to It a key of perseverance through putrefaction because of Citrine no redde can be made unlesse from the beginning out of Black a White be raised These Things he Which as they are of a higher search and consideration so they seem to belong to a Secreter Saturn namely the Philosophical which does arise out of the putrefaction of Sol and the Salt of nature although a certain excellent Doctor of Law labours to evince in his Ruricola That in the very minera of Lead of a certain sort whose flowers are double there is a very great force the same also appeares to be proved by the Tincture called the Aromatic of the Philosophers out of the mercury of Lead to say no more of particular Tinctures Hence Paracelsus in his book of Vexations are rather of fixations cannot sufficiently extol that Interior Spirit of Saturn which is able to kill and slay the other Spirits or mercuries of the metals as I my self have sometimes seen bars of perfect proved Gold out of the mercury of common Lead as they were shown to me five yeares agoe by a very learned wise man In the sixth and last place Basil makes mention of the Tincture of mercury It self But That Tincture is prepared either by the mediation of the Calx of Egge-shels as Paracelsus has it in the fifth book of Ulcers patent or is elevated by the vitriol of Mars and Venus resolved distilled and coagulated as you may see in the same Author concerning the Death and Metamorphosis of Things and more to That in Rupecissa to whom I restore that little book of the Tincture of mercury in the Second part of Gratarolus or else Its Sublimate by help of the malagma of Jupiter is resolved and distill'd in which the mercury is calcin'd and coagulated with metals the very way that Basil himselfe seems to have taken in his book of the Twofold Mercury of Sol pag. 108. in that part of the Repetition of the Great Stone For the way of proceeding with mercury is very various and multiform and yet it is easily reduced into a liquor by fire with the help of the powder of beaten coale which liquor afterwards by a certain Artifice is able to Extract the Soul of Sol. It is also precipitated by it self and fixt with the Tinctures of Venus Mars and Sol but chiefly it is nourisht with its own milk to which perchance thou mayst Interpret that of Sybilla Enimeria when She sayes Sitting upon a plain and well-disposed Seat thou givest It of its own broth that is milk sent down from heaven which yet again may be applyed to the Universal great stone c. in the Sybillin fragments of Philip de Lignamine the Sicilian Knight Of This too take that speech of Geber the Arab. when he sayes If of mercury alone mineral he means though taken from another place thou canst tell how to make the Stone thou hast lookt for and found a most excellent nature and pretious skill Hence Basil in his Triumphal Chariot pag. 88. For mercury sayes he is a pure meer fire and nothing else And thence it is that It is burnt by no fire and that no kind of fire can captivate it to its final Destruction It either flyes away suddainly resolving it selfe spiritually into an Oyle Incombustible or remains after its fixation so constant that it is not possible for any man to take any thing from it insomuch that whatsoever can be made out of Gold the same may be made out of It by Art For after the right Coagulation of It it is in all things like to Gold because it comes from the same root the same Stock and that same Unity that Gold does With these agree those other pretious Sayings of his that he has scatter'd up and down when he speaks of the Star of Sol and the starre of Mercury which Two being joyn'd together in their radious power opens to us at a certain time the Clossets of the most secret Wisdome See his Triumphal Chariot pag. 71 and 72. 91 and 92. I should not need to take much pains in explaining the words of Basil if That Tractate which he writ upon the Astrum of Sol and Mercury were not so enviously supprest by some Nor are we ignorant that those by some are applyed to the minera of Sol the processe whereof by the wet way and the mediation of Nitre and Sal-gemme is instituted so that first Three Principles are sequestred and then depurated by Spirit of Wine and first of all ascends the Astrum of Mercury White his Sulphur and Salt remaining downwards whereof the Salt is extracted from the Sulphur by distill'd rain-water and when it is purged of all its Terrestrial faeculence it congeales into a vitriol under a triangular and quadrangular forme Out of these Three Depurates is againe extracted a new intire minera of Sol and the Extract for some Times cohobated by affusion of a New Aqua Regis untill the mouth of the Lyon as it is call'd be well opend which in Digestion is circulated and afterwards the water being drawn away ascends the bright Mercurial Spirit In This the Vitriol prepared afore is first Dissolved and Digested till it deposes all its feculence And this oleaginous clear water dissolves the Sulphur above named and in a double proportion of it To these Three parts are added four of the Mercurial Astrum and so Digested into a Balny for forty dayes till all pass into a Green viscous Liquor and